Truths that anchor our soul:
1. God is still sovereign.
2. Christ is still reigning.
3. The Spirit is still interceding.
4. The church is still growing.
5. Scripture is still teaching.
6. The gospel is still saving.
7. Glory is still coming!
"Without the light of Christianity it is as little possible for man to have the correct view about himself and the world as it is to have the true view about God."
- Cornelius Van Til
Why Christianity is so controversial:
1) Jesus is the only way to Heaven.
2) Christianity teaches a strict moral standard that includes sins of the heart.
3) The Christian sexual ethic: all sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman is sinful.
4) Christianity calls everyone to repentance.
5) Jesus commands His followers to take up their cross daily, forgive their enemies, and live humbly as servants to God and men.
6) Christianity teaches the reality of a literal, eternal Hell, where those who refuse to repent of their sins and trust in Jesus Christ will spend eternity.
"In that old rugged cross, stained with blood so divine,
a wondrous beauty I see,
for 'twas on that old cross Jesus suffered and died,
to pardon and sanctify me."
- George Bennard (That Old Rugged Cross, 1912)
Read the Bible daily.
Don’t worry about having a measurably wonderful experience each time you do read the Bible.
Consider it a worthwhile thing to do regardless of how your emotions feel at the time (you know, the same way we ought to treat any worthwhile activity).
To be Reformed is to apply God's sovereignty to all of life. It is to work daily on creating and applying a Christian worldview in light of God's eternal purposes revealed in Scripture. It is to see through the lens of the gospel, to look at all things in light of God's redemptive purpose.
Which is why I truly wonder at seeing so many "Reformed" men posting graphics of Crusaders and pumping up narratives that plainly and clearly are not gospel-centered in their analysis of this period of history. What is motivating this? There are a number factors involved, but the one factor that is NOT involved is a scriptural understanding of gospel priority. The West was dominated by Rome at this point in time. After the degradation of the Pornocracy, forgeries such as the Donation of Constantine and especially the Pseudo-Isidorian Decretals gave Rome a foundation to claim ultimate authority not just in theological matters, but political matters as well. Hence, entire armies could be raised with promises of indulgences and salvation, all of which should not only cause a person committed to the Reformed Gospel to shudder in revulsion, but should remind us that it is oh so very easy to confuse gospel categories with worldly power categories.
Of course, I come at this from a pretty unique perspective. I well see the danger of political Islam in our day. But unlike 99.995% of those playing games with crusading with AI bots on line, I have stood in mosques around the world to proclaim the gospel of peace. I know that the power of God is found in the gospel, not in the political ambitions of kings and nations. True, biblically-originated Christianity has a power Islam cannot fathom: the power to change hearts through the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Rome could not equip the Crusaders with the one thing that can, in fact, change the world, because Rome, by this point in time, was thoroughly corrupted, top to bottom. Were there still Christians to be found? Of course. But there came a time where the depth of the degradation that came from man-made tradition resulted in a form of nominalism that allowed men to think they were serving Christ and His kingdom by sacking Constantinople, or opening pilgrimage routes so people could earn more indulgences by visiting "sacred sites" in the "holy land" all the while "slaying the infidel" with the cross displayed on their armor.
Let me ask a simple question: how many of those who want to be modern day, buffed up, "king crusaders" are first, and foremost, longing to bring the gospel of grace to the Muslim people in the way Paul was willing to give his life to bring that same gospel to the Jews?
Think about it, and then read less biased, narrative driven works on the Crusades. Turn down the temperature a bit and read, say, Schaff on the topic.