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	<title>Pilgrim Platform</title>
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	<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org</link>
	<description>ordinary Christianity for the world</description>
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		<title>Secret Service Kerfuffle</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/secret-service-kerfuffle/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/secret-service-kerfuffle/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 30 Apr 2012 17:09:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[universalism]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1103</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[What does the recent Secret Service kerfuffle mean? Members of the Secret Service are drawn from the cream of the crop of American society, the best of the best that America can produce. The best what? The best people measured by intelligence, ability, focus, loyalty, honesty and integrity. The American SS is most assuredly not composed of ordinary Americans. So the recent scandal regarding the drunken abuse of foreign prostitutes by members of the American SS demonstrates the extent of the disease of sin in American culture. Like any other contagious disease, sin is not simply an individual infection, but is a cultural infection and spreads just like any other disease—through exposure. The fact of the SS scandal points to the extent of the infection in American culture. You may not like the language of equating sin with disease, but the point is that sin is a kind of rot. And the SS scandal indicates that there is rot at the top of the cultural pile in America. This should come as no surprise because it is everywhere obvious. The only “shocking” thing that I am saying may be that the rot is a function of sin. And such a [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Richard Dawkins vs Cardinal George Pell</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/richard-dawkins-vs-cardinal-george-pell/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/richard-dawkins-vs-cardinal-george-pell/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 12 Apr 2012 14:34:14 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1098</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There are so many problems with this debate that it’s hard to know where to begin. I can’t agree with either disputant. Dawkins proves that it is possible to be deluded about God, and he is correct. He adequately proves that Gnosticism is false, and this is a useful contribution to Christian theology. The problem with this debate, as with most debates, is that the disputants are arguing from different definitions and presuppositions. The god that Dawkins describes is not the God of Christianity, even though he is able to use the words of Christian definitions. The difference is that words and descriptions apart from belief (or experience or participation or even submission) are inadequate to define God because doing so turns the idea of God into an abstraction. Dawkins destroys Gnosticism—praise God! The early Christians were accused of being atheists because the God of Christianity is not at all like the gods of human imagination. Pagans recognized that Christians did not believe in divinity in the way that they did. The point here is that Christians have something in common with atheists, who argue against the gods of human imagination. In the video Dawkins referred to antecedent factors of [...]]]></description>
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		<title>This is My Body</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/this-is-my-body/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/this-is-my-body/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:26:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sermons]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1094</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you.” (Luke 22:19). What are we doing here? What did Jesus do in that Upper Room that night? What is this Holy Communion that we celebrate? I want to talk to you about what I think it is, and what I think it isn’t. And the way I want to get at it is to examine Jesus’ words, “This is my body.” It might sound like a simple sentence, but there is more to it than meets the eye. There are two questions I want to explore. The first one is: what is His body? And the second is: What did Jesus mean by this? This what? The common answer to the second question is that He meant the bread. The bread is His body. And the Roman Catholic understanding of transubstantiantion comes from this understanding, which leads to a huge problem: how can bread be or become a body? The Catholics explain it by the miracle of transubstantiantion, and the Protestants deny any such miracle. When I was 12 or 13 it [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Peter&#8217;s Vision of The End</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/peters-vision-of-the-end/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/peters-vision-of-the-end/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 09 Jan 2012 19:44:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Sermons]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[church]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[emerging/emergent]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[homosexuality]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[philosophy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Trinity]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1019</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Add To Cart Price $12.95 ISBN: 978-0-9820385-9-8 Publisher: Pilgrim Platform Copyright: ©2012 by Phillip A. Ross 195 pages 195 pages by Phillip A. Ross Introduction A couple of years ago a friend asked me about my interpretation of 2 Peter 3:12: “waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn!” Are we to take it literally? And if not, why not? Isn’t the plain reading the right reading most of the time? I’ve thought a lot about the questions, issues and concerns regarding this and address them here, sometimes somewhat indirectly. I knew that I couldn’t just jump into Second Peter without dealing with First Peter first. So, I worked my way through First Peter and published that book as Peter’s Vision of Christ’s Purpose in First Peter (Pilgrim Platform, Marietta, Ohio, 2011). There Peter wrote to the fledgling saints who fled Jerusalem prior to its destruction in a.d. 70 in order to help them understand that God had not and would not abandon them. On the contrary, God inhabited them as they fled in order to [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Marriage Fidelity</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/marriage-fidelity/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2012/marriage-fidelity/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 03 Jan 2012 06:55:56 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Constitution]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[equality]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[family]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[health care]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[homosexuality]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Political Action]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Wedding/Marriage]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1012</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[What’s wrong with current marriage laws? In a recent article (Marriage Equality, 12/21/2011) the following scenario was suggested: the person you love is injured in an auto accident and is barely clinging to life in the hospital, but you cannot visit him or her because you are not married. It is then suggested that the cure for this problem is to change the marriage laws. “In this moment of tragedy you cannot be with the person you love because of one simple reason: you are gay.” But wait a minute! The problem is not the gayness of some couples, nor the institution of marriage. The problem is HIPAA. The real problem is a health care issue rather than a gay or marriage issue. Why is the easiest solution to the problem not amending HIPAA? Isn’t it HIPAA that stops the visit? It is. Isn’t HIPAA a much more recent law? And shouldn’t the remedy use the least extensive means to remedy the problem? Why does HIPAA trump marriage? And since the entire structure of U.S. health care is in the midst of the most serious and extensive overhaul in history, why not amend HIPAA to include visiting rights for civil [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
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		<title>Christmas Greetings!</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/christmas-greetings/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/christmas-greetings/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 10 Dec 2011 17:52:49 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=1008</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[New Christmas Song]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<title>Peter&#8217;s Vision of Christ&#8217;s Purpose</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/peters-vision-of-christs-purpose/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/peters-vision-of-christs-purpose/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 30 Aug 2011 14:52:58 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Education]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Political Action]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=970</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Add To Cart Price $14.95 ISBN: 978-0-9820385-9-8 Publisher: Pilgrim Platform Copyright: ©2011 by Phillip A. Ross 317 pages Introduction Reading Peter’s letters is quite different than reading Paul’s. Paul was a scholar trained in biblical academics, which involves focusing in on meaning. It usually means looking at something with a microscope in order to clarify what sometimes appears to be minutia. Peter, who came to Christ as an uneducated fisherman (though he most certainly did not remain so), turns the microscope around, which turns it into a telescope. So, while Paul is often focused on the inner, personal realities of faithfulness, Peter is focused on the grand scheme of Christ’s mission in the world. Where Paul was focused on particulars, Peter was focused on the whole. While understanding Paul involves the personal experience of the Holy Spirit through regeneration, understanding Peter builds on regeneration and takes in the whole sweep of human history in the light of Christ. Peter understood history as the Old Testament. He had nor needed any other history book. As such, reading Peter without more than a passing familiarity with the Old Testament will surely lead you astray. Peter brought his ordinary understanding and experience of [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<title>The True Mystery of The Mystical Presence</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/the-true-mystery-of-the-mystical-presence/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/the-true-mystery-of-the-mystical-presence/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 09 Aug 2011 18:36:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Common Grace]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[communion]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Nevin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[philosophy]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=937</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Add To Cart Price: $14.95 ISBN: 978-0-9839046-0-1 Publisher: Pilgrim Platform Copyright: ©2011 &#8220;Nevin&#8217;s Mystical Presence fell into my hands quite providentially at the most impressionable stage of my theological formation, and it made a lasting impression on me. Nevin&#8217;s burden is a theological genealogy: to evince that the paltry sacramental teachings in the Reformed churches of his day (mid-19th century) had degenerated from the robust views of the original Reformed testimony. He exhibits that even by the mid-17th century the rich sacramentalism of Calvin and other Continental Reformers as well as the Scotch had begun to wane, and the sacramental views of Nevin&#8217;s own contemporaries were, to him, positively bankrupt. We can only imagine what Nevin would have made of the utterly de-sacramentalized Reformed churches of our own time. I therefore commend Phillip Ross&#8217;s noteworthy revised re-release of this work and, without endorsing Nevin at every point, commend this rich—and equally convicting—study to your most careful reading.&#8221; &#8211; P. Andrew Sandlin President, Center for Cultural Leadership Preaching Pastor, Church of the King-Santa Cruz &#8220;One of the most encouraging developments of recent years has been the resurgence of interest in the 19th-century Reformed movement known as the Mercersberg theology. The publication [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
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		<title>Marketing Jesus</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/marketing-jesus/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/marketing-jesus/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 01 Aug 2011 13:32:54 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=932</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I was contacted by Russia Today TV in January, 2011, to participate in an interview about marketing Jesus on their &#8220;CrossTalk&#8221; program, with Peter Lavelle.]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>1</slash:comments>
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		<title>The Orthodoxy of Rob Bell</title>
		<link>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/the-orthodoxy-of-rob-bell/</link>
		<comments>http://pilgrim-platform.org/2011/the-orthodoxy-of-rob-bell/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 26 Mar 2011 18:29:50 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Phillip Ross</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Christianity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Culture]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Theology]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Church Growth]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[emerging/emergent]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[evangelism]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[heresy]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Rob Bell]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[universalism]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://pilgrim-platform.org/?p=919</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[First let me respond to the recent Richard Mouw article: The Orthodoxy of Rob Bell, Christian Post, March 20, 1011. He begins by saying that he agrees with Bell, and he does. But the fact that he agrees with Bell does NOT relieve the problems. He said, &#8220;Suppose &#8230; we go up to someone and tell them that God loves them and sent Jesus to die for their sins. Accept Jesus right now, we say, because if ten minutes from now you die without accepting this offer God will punish you forever in the fires of hell. What kind of God are we presenting to the person?&#8221; This is indicative of the problem because this kind of presentation of the gospel is NOT biblical. I know that the Evangelical Church has been using it for a long time, but that does not make it biblical. The problem is in the way that God is depicted in this presentation. Nowhere in the Bible is God depicted as giving people the choice of Christ or hell. This will be difficult for Bell or Mouw to understand because it does not fit with their understanding of God/Scripture. Nonetheless, be a sport and try [...]]]></description>
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