The majority of American Christians do not believe that Satan is a real being or that the Holy Spirit is a living entity, the latest Barna survey found.

Wow.

via Most U.S. Christians Don’t Believe Satan, Holy Spirit Exist| Christianpost.com.

This ‘I think” or I “believe,” terminology with which doctrine is prefaced rather than strengthening the point the preacher is making (which, presumably is why he makes it in the first place), actually weakens it.

Institute for Nouthetic Studies Blog » Blog Archive » Believe me . . ..

No one comes to the Bible without presuppositions and a basic intellectual disposition.  That is true for Bart Ehrman, and it is no less true for the evangelical believer.  In both cases, the presuppositions assign the way each will read the Bible.  Krattenmaker simplistically cites Ehrman as his authority for suggesting that Jesus spoke of himself as God in John’s gospel but not in Matthew.  But this facile assertion, offered without any supporting argument, does not take in to account that throughout the Gospel of Matthew Jesus speaks and acts as God.  When Jesus delivers the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, He cites Scripture with the formula, “you have heard it said.”  When Jesus then continues by saying, “but I say unto you,” He speaks as God in a way that any first-century Jewish person would have readily understood.  Nature obeys his command, and he performs miracles (even bringing the dead back to life) that show his providential control over the created order.

Fighting Words about the Bible?.