Random Bits

"I walk through this sinful world as a 

pilgrim in a foreign country" - CH Spurgeon

I normally do not post links to articles in the WND because it has gotten weird lately, but in this case I will make an exception - (Start the Rod Serling "Twilight Zone" voice):
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Submitted for your inspection a world where up is down, right is wrong, and where gender is assigned not by physiology but by whim of popular culture. A world where feelings have priority over rational thought and where children raise their parents. This is a Halloween haunted house for you, a trip through the truth-free “LGBT” parallel universe, hold on to your lunch as we enter The Liberal Zone.

If you've been following my blog this week you know that I've been making biblical arguments against the participation in pagan Halloween revelry. If you are a Christian and avoid Halloween, you're sadly in the minority

But if biblical argument didn't convince you, maybe the Obama Administration's suggestions on how to participate in Halloween will sour your stomach on the whole idea.

If you didn't realize that we are seeing the Great Falling Away you haven't been paying attention. Leading the plunge into the depths, of course, is the UCC who this month celebrated their 5th Annual Drag Queen Gospel Festival.  No this isn't a satire, and if you don't know what a Drag Queen is, I apologize for ruining your day.

Do Atheists Complain About Halloween?

I love the autumn and the things that go with it; the leaves changing colors, the smell of the dry leaves (or the damp leaves on a rainy day), the bite of frost, the sound of a college football game on a distant radio as leaves are being raked... I so miss the smell of burning leaves. I think a few handfuls are going to 'accidentally' drop into my firepit this weekend. Ages ago I lived near a cider mill and the smell of those crisp tart apples being juiced as I walked past the mill can only be described as heavenly.

Autumn traditionally is a time of plenty - down on the farm the harvest is in and the critters were frisky so there's too many animals to support during the winter. So we can the fruit and vegetables and feast on what we didn't have jars to hold, along with feasting on the surplus critters. Autumn is the perfect time for the Thanksgiving holiday because God's plenty abounds. It's also when Atheism shows its true colors

We know about Atheist's allergy to Christmas, the day we choose to celebrate the birth of our Savior and Lord, Christ Jesus. If you pay attention they also have a big issue with Thanksgiving, the day we annually set aside solely to give thanks to our Lord for His abundance. I've heard several atheist screeds verging on the hysterical about giving thanks to God on a day we set aside to give thanks to God. But what about Halloween? 

Repost: A Christian Response to Halloween

A Christian Response to Halloween

Joe Schimmel

When we became followers of Jesus Christ there were many practices we put behind us; lying, immorality, drunkenness, brawling, etc. We accepted the clear teaching of Holy Scripture that a believer should not make such habits a practice in his life. Many, however, feel that the bible is not so clear in condemning the believer’s participation in the celebration of Halloween. They would say that it is a "gray area" where each man must be convinced in his own mind. Is this true? Let us examine, from a biblical and historical perspective, what the bible has to say about the revelry of October 31st.

Reference materials are in general agreement about the origins of the practices of Halloween:

American Pastors - Living In A Land Of Misbelief?

Denial isn't just a river in Egypt, it flows through American pulpits too. Lifeway Research has just published a report of their survey of American pastors and their views on Islam. The results are not unexpected but they are still saddening. 

I've reviewed the survey and over all it's pretty good, however one question should have been laughed off the survey: "Is Islam Relevant today?" - the correct answer is "Relevant to what?" If they are asking if Islam is relevant to Bacon the answer is "No, not so much" but if they're asking if Islam is relevant to Christianity the answer is "Yes, they're slaughtering us daily throughout the world" 

A very slim majority of American pastors have paid attention to the plight of Christians world wide and know that Islam is dangerous (52%), almost half recognize that Islam promotes violence (49%), and 46% know that Islam is spiritually evil. After that it sadly falls apart. 

Mr. Pope's Take on Judgement and The Great Commission

"I want you to Shut Up!"

I've said in the past that while I'm inspired by good teachers, I am also inspired by bad teachers. I made myself an expert on First World War bombing tactics by a history professor who claimed that there were no heavy bombers used in the First World War. I studied the US Constitution night and day for weeks thanks to an English Professor who told me it was illegal to mention God in her classroom. Yet another history professor told me that Neville Chamberlain was right and that the Byzantine Empire had no bearing on the development of the west. Needless to say my term paper was on the failures of Neville Chamberlain and my future college plans included a major in Byzantine studies at the University at Buffalo. 

Now we have Mr. Pope re-writing the Great Commission.

First of all, he did this in a homily, which is different than a sermon. A homily is a "preaching event" that is informal, scriptures are used in a laid back kind of way. It's an attempt to inject a bit of scripture and dogma into the congregant's daily lives. A sermon on the other hand is a lesson in theology, a deep dive into the Word of God, and a plea to live our lives as Christ demands. Or, to be quicker and clearer, Joel Osteen gives Homilies, John MacArthur gives sermons. In my experience being raised in the Roman Catholic church and saved from that man centered institution by my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ; a homily feeds the goats and starves the sheep. A sermon feeds the sheep and chases off the goats.

Let's look at what Mr. Pope laid down in his homily.

Random Bits

"I walk through this sinful world as a 

pilgrim in a foreign country" - CH Spurgeon

A while ago I wrote an article on Gretta Vosper, atheist infiltrator to pulpit the United Church of Canada. Glenn Chatfield responded sagely "The Untied Church of Canada, from all that I've read over the years, is just as apostate as the United Church of Christ in the USA. So having an atheist wouldn't surprise me." Guess what Glenn!  Two utterly apostate organizations signing a mutual recognition pact. Go figure. I hope they did it on the US side of the border - it would serve them right.

Breaking News! Mr. Pope just doesn't get it. Not a clue in the world about what Christianity is all about. I am so blogging about this next week.

Is it possible to make the Word of God too convenient? I've never heard that complaint before.

In Germany, the home of the reformation, the word of God is now considered to be "un-Christian". (I'm not making this up!)

Christians in Mexico are now coming under persecution from the Mexican government and are being starved to death. Their crime; they're Protestant. They're being faced with a "Convert to catholicism or die" situation. Sound familiar? Now you know why the Roman Catholic Church thinks Islam is cool.

Guarding the Faith

A while ago a pastor decided to look into the state of Evangelical preaching, He and a friend researched the state of Protestantism and found that the Bride of Christ had been overcome by liberalism, academic arrogance, skepticism, and the shift away from God's sovereignty in salvation to the Arminian thought that the human will is the deciding factor in salvation. 

The study found that these were the discrete entry points for heresy to enter the church and drive a wedge between the Bride and her Bridegroom. And by "a while ago" I actually mean 128 years ago. The year was 1887 and the pastors who started the study were Charles Spurgeon and Robert Schindler. As John MacArthur explains in his book Ashamed of the Gospel

Many of those who remained true to the faith were nevertheless reluctant to fight for what they believed in. Evangelical preaching was often cold and lifeless, and even those who held to sound doctrine were careless about where they drew the line in their associations with others: “Those who were really orthodox in their sentiments were too often lax and unfaithful as to the introduction of heretical ministers into their pulpits, either as assistants or occasional preachers. In this way the Arian and Socinian heresies were introduced into the Presbyterian congregations in the city of Exeter.”

Thus within only a few decades, the Puritan fervor that had so captured the soul of England gave way to dry, listless, apostate teaching. Churches became lax in granting membership privileges to the unregenerate. People who were, in Shindler’s words, “strangers to the work of renewing grace” nevertheless claimed to be Christians and were admitted to membership—even leadership—in the churches (John MacArthur, Ashamed of the Gospel, 3rd ed. (Wheaton: Crossway, 2010), 235.)

That's one of Satan's favorite ploys - to corrupt the teaching of God's word. He starts with just a little at first (Did God really say "you shall not eat from any tree of the garden"?), then slowly creeping in through the chink in the wall with more and more heresies. That chink was opened up by the introduction of skepticism and man's pride. 

The Tolerance Jesus Will Not Tolerate

by Kevin DeYoung

Reblogged from The Gospel Coalition,  

Christians cannot be tolerant of all things because God is not tolerant of all things. We can respect differing opinions and try to understand them, but we cannot give our unqualified, unconditional affirmation to every belief and behavior. Because God doesn’t. We must love what God loves. That’s where Ephesus failed. But we must also hate what God hates. That’s where Thyatira failed.

Of the seven cities in Revelation, Thyatira is the least well known, the least impressive, and the least important. And yet, the letter is the longest of the seven. There was a lot going on at this church–some bad, some good.

Let’s start with the good. Verse 19, “I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance.” Ephesus was praised for its good deeds and strong work ethic. Thyatira is even better.  Is has the deeds that Ephesus had and the love that Ephesus lacked. The church at Thyatira was not without genuine virtue. It was a tight-knit bunch who loved, served, believed, and endured.

Maybe Thyatira was the kind of church you walked into and immediately felt like you belonged: “Great to meet you. Come, let me introduce you to my friends.  Here, I’ll show you how you can get plugged in, use your gifts, do ministry. We’re so glad you’re here.” It was a caring church, a sacrificial church, a loving church.

That was the good part. And the bad part? Its love could be undiscerning and blindly affirming. The big problem at Thyatira was tolerance. The folks at Thyatira tolerated false teaching and immoral behavior, two things God is fiercely intolerant of. Jesus says, “You’re loving in many ways, but your tolerance is not love. It’s unfaithfulness.”

Random Bits

"I walk through this sinful world as a 

pilgrim in a foreign country" - CH Spurgeon

Jim Bakker is back - and he's up to his old tricks, this time with a zombie apocalypse.

Ever have an atheist engage you and when his argument begins to crumble resorts to "Well... Hitler was a Christian" (I have)
No Mr. Atheist, Hitler was NOT a Christian

It's not just the Middle East and Islam, we are being attacked from all directions is all locations. Chamu Hasda Purty, 54, of the pastor of the Independent Pentecostal Church, was shot dead in his home in India. This is part of "an agenda to terrorise people [so that they] disassociate with Christianity."

The Chinese government is stepping up its efforts to place restrictions on Christian churches operating within China. (Google Chrome will translate this article for you)

Embarrassing. There's a lot of other words that can be used, but Embarrassing sums it up for me.

Communion - The Meal that Jesus Gave Us

A Tale of Two Trees

8 The Lord God planted a garden toward the east, in Eden; and there He placed the man whom He had formed. 9 Out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Genesis 2:8-9)

At our BSF bible study meeting last night part of the discussion was taken up by the Two Trees. I had been aware of the two trees, but I never have seen the whole story put together, nor have I heard the whole story ever mentioned. Needless to say I was fascinated when I did see it when it was included with the BSF study material and my inner Berean took over.

After creating everything, including Adam, God planted a garden, and that's the term used - planted - from the Hebrew nata` which means "planted" in English. It means that God physically planted the garden. He caused every tree that is pleasing to look at and every tree that produces good fruit to grow up out of the ground, and in the garden grew the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. 

Spurgeon on Death

Emergent Monday: Be The Berean!

11 Now these were more noble-minded than those in Thessalonica, for they received the word with great eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see whether these things were so. 12 Therefore many of them believed, along with a number of prominent Greek women and men. (Acts 17:11-12)

Think about it - the Emergent Church (New Age, Liberal Left, Red Letter, post-evangelical, post-modern) movement could have been stopped dead in its tracks, not a soul lost to their strange doctrine. Well, maybe not but had the members of the churches falling under the spell of this New Age teaching been the Bereans that God calls us to be the emergent church could have been a foot note filed under failed movements and Satan would have had to find another way to drive a wedge between the Bride of Christ and Christ.

Leaders in the emergent church view the Bible and its stories through a lens which they believe finds meaning for their community's social and personal stories rather than finding absolutes regarding salvation and conduct. In other words, they're looking for illustrations which fit their narrative rather than looking for The Truth. 

Had we done the Berean thing, had we studied the scripture, had we questioned these preachers who spread their tainted gospel, had we held up their perversions of the Word of God to the light could we have slowed down or stopped the progress of the falling away that the Emergent Church is part of? Do not be afraid to discuss with your pastor questions you may have with his message. I'm sure Pastor Paratus will agree with me when I say that you may learn something, he may learn something, and he will know that you were listening. As always, do it with love... this is the word of God we are talking about

For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe. (1 Thessalonians 2:13)

Random Bits

"I walk through this sinful world as a 

pilgrim in a foreign country" - CH Spurgeon

Expository Preaching: Not only is it good, it's good for you!

 “I sacrificed an animal to the god of the wilderness — yes, I drank the goat’s blood.” Florida politics at its finest.

I have no words for this. Except maybe "You were warned."

Breaking News! - the world did not come to an end this week. The ghost of Harold Camping's false prophesy still haunts Christianity.

Scientists now claim that they can tell if a baby is going to grow up to be homosexual by studying the DNA of the child. This sets my mind to thinking - if they really can do this, then they'll be able to determine if an unborn child is going to be homosexual. Since we know that Planned Parenthood is perfectly ok with slaughtering unborn children based solely on their sex in what they call "sex selective abortions" what is going to happen if people start showing up saying that they don't want to have a homosexual child? Will that "nonviable tissue mass" suddenly have human rights? Will we see homosexuals protesting abortion clinics who dare threaten 'their' children? And what is going to happen when a homosexual couple find out that their fetus is not going to grow up to be a sodomite? It's a Romans 1 world...

Pastor Joe Schimmel at GoodFight Ministries finally updated his blog Cup O' Joe with a great article on Justin Beiber. This is a great read even if you care nothing about Justin Beiber or the whole popular culture, because like everthing Pastor Joe writes about, it always comes back to Jesus (Come on Pastor Joe - 7 posts in 10 months is not nearly enough!)

Men pretending to be women are upset that Obamacare doesn't support their sin as much as they want.

Christian champion golfer Jordan Spieth. No news here, just an awesome kid.

The Price of Costly Grace

Costly grace is the sanctuary of God; it has to be protected from the world, and not thrown to the dogs. It is therefore the living word, the Word of God, which He speaks as it pleases Him. Costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. Grace is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow Him; it is grace because Jesus says: "My yoke is easy and My burden light." - "The Cost of Discipleship" by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was an outspoken critic of the unbiblical legalism, formalism, and the Nazi subjugation of the church named after Martin Luther in 1930's -1940's Germany. This put him directly in the cross-hairs of both the Nazi/Lutheran church and the German government. With war clouds looming on the horizon Bonhoeffer's friends convinced him to leave Germany, and he did make it to America. However he almost immediately returned to Germany saying “I shall have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share the trials of this time with my people."

Bonhoeffer's life is an example of Costly Grace. He railed against the church of Cheap Grace, the church that turned it's back on Christ's teachings to make peace with Adolph Hitler. Bonhoffer along with his twin sister and her husband was arrested by the Gestapo on April 5th, 1943 for helping Jews escape to Switzerland. In 1944 his friends made an attempt to liberate him from Flossenbürg concentration camp and smuggle him out of the country but Dietrich decided to remain in prison so not to endanger others and to continue his ministry there. He was executed by hanging at Flossenbürg concentration camp on April 9, 1945 shortly before its liberation. 

The True Cost of Cheap Grace

I was reading an article by Pastor Joe Schimmel about a young recording artist who professes to be a Christian but continues to act like he did before coming to Christ. I'm really hoping the young man responds to criticism of his lack of Christian fruit by prayer and actual repentance. However it appears that his response is reciting the mantra of his generation "Don't judge me man!" Mister, you claimed to be a Christian, you just allowed everyone in Christ to judge you.

The reason Pastor Joe gave for the young man's attitude of "I can do what ever I want even though I'm a Christian" is "Cheap Grace". I've never come across the expression "Cheap Grace" before, but looking back I've seen that I have been railing against it on this blog. Cheap Grace is also known as Hyper Grace, In The Cost of Discipleship, published in 1937 Dietrich Bonhoeffer defined Cheap Grace as: 

“Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like cheapjacks' wares. The sacraments, the forgiveness of sin, and the consolations of religion are thrown away at cut prices... Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ.

Bravery

Book Review - The Babylon Code

The BabylonCode – Solving the Bible’s Greatest End-Times Mystery by Paul McGuire and Troy Anderson.

Are we now living in the last days of planet Earth? If so, how will the apocalyptic events foreseen by the ancient prophets unfold? Are the powerful forces now at work to create a global government, economic system, and religion as predicted in the Bible? Unlocking a great biblical mystery that has puzzled scholars for nearly two thousand years, The Babylon Code unearths answers to these momentous questions.

With this breathless introduction, The Babylon Code begins to sprint down a rabbit hole of opinion polls, conspiracy theories, and fantastic quotations all predicting the imminent end of the world as we know it, and this is just the first few pages of the introduction of the book.

The Babylon Code has extended end notes sourcing the quotes used, unfortunately many quotes are from emails and telephone calls between the authors and the sources making any of these quotes impossible to verify at the local library. This book also lists the Bible versions that they use: the King James Version (KJV), the New King James Version (NKJV), the English Standard Version (ESV), the New Revised Standard Version (NSRV), the New Living Translation (NLT), the New English Translation (NET), the Common English Bible (CEB), and The Living Bible (TLB). That’s eight different versions all to say the same thing. Why would an author use so many different bibles? Because with enough different bible versions you can get the bible to say what you want it to say, something quite difficult to do with a single version. 

Random Bits

"I walk through this sinful world as a 

pilgrim in a foreign country" - CH Spurgeon

Pray for the families of the Oregon martyrs. I didn't realize it (because of our worthless lame stream media news) but the shooting rampage at the Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, OR was directed exclusively at Christians. Chris Harper-Mercer started his rampage by asking people one by one what their religion was. When they said "Christian" he replied "Good, because you’re a Christian, you are going to see God in just about one second." Then he murdered them.

We don't know the names of the Oregon martyrs but we do know who they are. They're our brothers and sisters and they were killed for their faith in Christ Jesus. We know they are under the altar in God's throne room, and soon they will be given a white robe:

⁹ When the Lamb broke the fifth seal, I saw underneath the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God, and because of the testimony which they had maintained; ¹⁰ and they cried out with a loud voice, saying, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth?” ¹¹ And there was given to each of them a white robe; and they were told that they should rest for a little while longer, until the number of their fellow servants and their brethren who were to be killed even as they had been, would be completed also. (Revelation 6:9-11)

Obama to Christians: perversions are more important than your constitutional rights.

God Saved My Life - By Killing My Car?

My son, Ben, and I are train nuts. he works at a railroad transloading facility in North Dakota and comes down to visit me here in the railroad Meca of Colorado where we go see trains. This year he came down to see the autumn colors, and the trains. 

We spent Saturday just west of Denver photographing the leaves and dining in one of the finest BBQ joints on earth. After a meal that couldn't be beat we headed up to Silverplume CO to ride the Georgetown Loop Railroad behind the fabled steam locomotive West Side Lumber #9. When we got to the Silverplume Depot we saw a chilling sight - West Side Lumber #9 being dragged into the depot dead in tow. As it passed us we could see that several broken pieces of pistons were piled up in the cab. West Side Lumber #9 had suffered a catastrophic failure and we ended up riding behind a small diesel locomotive engine. It was still a fun way to spend a warm autumn afternoon, but not the same as taming a fire breathing steam locomotive. Little did I know this was to be a harbinger of things to come.