Announcements

[gibby]

Please be familiar with the forum rules:


Rule #1. This is a Chrisitan site created so that people can relax and fellowship in a welcoming atmosphere. Therefore any posts that are deemed to be insulting or offensive towards others and/or the Christian faith will be removed and the user warned or banned.

Rule #2. No swearing is permitted for any reason.

Rule #3. Please do not become agressive or offensive when debating with people. Personal attacks will not be tolerated. If you have a problem with a particular person then send them a PM. If this cannot resolve the issue please contact admin or a moderator.

Rule #4. No !!! There is a links section for you to advertise a website in the Christain Webmasters forum section. Any links deemed to be inapropiate will be removed. If you are unsure please ask admin or a moderator. Please do not advertise in any other sections of the board. This will constitute as spam and will result in a warning and a possible subsequent ban if it continues. If you have a link that is related to your topic/post then go ahead and post it (e.g. references, source of conversation, etc.) If your sole intent on registering here and posting is to "get a link", then it may be deemed as spam by Lampstand staff. Plus, links here are "no follow" so it wouldn't do you any good anyway.

Rule #5. Please see the statement of faith. This forum will not serve as a springboard for obvious false teaching. Discussing differing views of interpretations of scripture is fine, but teachings that have no scriptural basis whatsoever will not be allowed. Any posting of obvious false teachings will result in a warning and/or being banned. Also, teachings that spring up from a foundation that God's word has errors and is inaccurate are not allowed.

Rule #6. No trolling/baiting. This is deliberate attempts to make other members angry by outrageous statements or posts that have the sole intent on offending.

Rule #7. Again, on the topic of debating. I know this may come as a shock, but not everyone is going to agree with you on all points of scripture. I applause you if you have strong convictions on where you stand. But keep in mind, not everyone will come to your point of view, no matter how hard you try. This is not so much as a rule, but a guideline to guard you from beating your head against a wall and lashing out in the flesh at others. By not taking this into consideration can quickly cause you to start sliding down the slippery slope to board rule violations and consequently, being banned from the community.

Rule #8. Copyright laws. If you would like to share a news story or article from another site or publication, please don't cut and paste the entire article here into your posts. The best way to share an article is to post maybe the first few sentences of the article with a link to the rest, sum up the article in your own words and then post the link, or just post the link. (added 10-16-08)

Rule #9. Topics - Off-topic chat here at Lampstand occurs quite frequently and we generally don't police discussions if they stray a bit off the original topic. However, respect the topic starter and obey any requests by them to return to the topic if they ask. Hijacking topics completely can be viewed as disrespectful in some cases.

Starting topics that are complete nonsense are not allowed. These topics will be identified by Lampstand staff and the topic author will be notified of the violation.

Additional:

The administrators of this board reserve the right to update or modify the rules at any time. Additionally, the staff at Lampstand reserve the right to make individual exceptions to rule # 5 to accomodate sincere seekers of Truth. This will be done in a few rare cases.

Also, Lampstand staff may delete, move, or lock any post or thread as well as give infractions leading up to temporary or permanent bans at their discretion. If you would like to appeal any decision made by Lampstand staff, feel free to contact the board administrators using the "contact" form at the bottom of the page.

Any decisions by Lampstand staff are made with the thought for the benefit of the community as a whole.

If you don't agree with the rules and the statement of faith of the community and find them offensive, perhaps this forum is not for you and we hope you find a forum that will suit your beliefs.

If you don't know much about biblical Christianity and would like to know more, by all means join our community and start asking questions. If you already have a non-biblical belief system in place and your sole purpose here is to post your beliefs in efforts to persuade others to your point of view, this is not the place. Non-Christians may qualify for the "Guest Membership". This entitles posting access to the Welcome Section, Pictures Section, Games Room, Debating Christianity and Questions about Christianity sections. This will be determined on a case by case basis.

On another note, Lampstand staff work very hard to keep the forums tidy and in order. If you find that a thread that you started has been moved, please don't think you did something wrong; (if you did, we will let you know ) we are just performing some topic housekeeping.

Infraction System:

Members can accumulate up to 3 infractions which flags them for discussion about potential banning. Recieving 3 flags is not a prerequisite for ban, however.

Concerning Roman Catholicism:

We here at Lampstand believe in the Holy Bible as the only authority for our belief in Christ and the source of the truths about God. If you had to give us a label, we would be considered a "reformed protestant" forum. Topics discussed here concerning Roman Catholicism are not necessarily the beliefs here at Lampstand. I created this forum in order for us to learn about what the Roman Catholic Church teaches. Please respect our Catholic members who post in here to share with us about the beliefs of RCC. Feel free to debate; just keep the forum rules in mind.

Catholics: The purpose for this forum is, that in my experiences, allowing RC members to post Catholic Church doctrine in open forums on a protestant site tend to always get out of hand. Feel free to post in open forums topics related to the Holy Bible, Christian life and fellowship. But topics concerning Roman Catholic Church doctrine specifically, please keep in the RCC forum . RCC doctrine that surfaces in open forums will be either deleted, split and/or moved to the RCC forum. The decisions on how each case will be handled is at the discretion of Lampstand staff.

[gibby]

This is the Lampstand Statement of Faith:

We believe the only true basis of Christian fellowship is Christ's Agape love, which is greater than any differences we possess and without which we have no right to claim ourselves Christians.

We believe in the singularity of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and that the only way to the Father is through the Son. John 14:6

We believe in the inerrancy of Scripture, that the Bible, Old and New Testaments are the inspired, authoritative Word of God.

We believe that God is eternally existent in three distinct persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

We believe that all people are, by nature, separated from God and responsible for their own sin, but that salvation, redemption, and forgiveness are freely offered to all by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. When a person repents of sin and accepts Jesus Christ as personal Savior and Lord, trusting Him to save, that person is immediately born again and sealed by the Holy Spirit, all his/her sins are forgiven, and that person becomes a child of God, destined to spend eternity with the Lord.

*Taken in part from the Calvary Chapel statement of faith.