HandMeDowns

We Are In A Bad Place

2008-08-11T16:28:00.004-04:00

You know evangelical Christianity in America is in deep trouble when the folks at ABC News knows something goofy is going on. In an online article, two writers ask "WWJB: What Would Jesus Buy?"

Worship has a new look now that the Bible, God and church have become commodities. From the Bible Bar to Holy bottled water, to quench your spiritual hunger and thrust, some marketers are selling religious merchandise in the hopes of spreading their faith.

But this 21st century way of approaching the relationship between God and man is not what some are used to. The thought that consumers can buy a bobblehead Jesus to act as a co-pilot, or attend Florida's Holy Land theme park when they're looking to blend faith and vacation, troubles critics.

"Turning everything religious into a little plastic toy can cheapen religion, trivialize it," said Beliefnet.com editor in chief, Steve Waldman. "The other danger is that people will think that by wearing a "Jesus is my homeboy" t-shirt, that that by itself makes them a good Christian."

Do you know of anyone who was ever converted because of somebody's tee-shirt or bumper sticker or some other article? Tell us about it.

WABC Intern Proficiency Examination

2008-08-07T10:52:00.000-04:00

We offer internships during the summer months at Western Avenue. Mark Collins was an intern for several years and is now our youth pastor. This year, Michael Dearman and Macey Bowman have served and served well. Mark typically asks the interns to read a particular book during the summer months and discuss it with him. I thought I'd get in on the game and devise a theological proficiency test. Here they are - first the test for the middle school interns and then the high school:

MIDDLE SCHOOL INTERN EXAMINATION

1) The B-I-B-L-E, is that the book for thee?
2) What is thy story? What is thy song?
3) Do you have joy, joy, joy, joy? If so, where? Where?
4) I ask you how you know He lives?
5) Who is on the Lord’s side?
6) If “A” is Admit, “B” is believe, and “C” is commit in the Baptist plan of salvation, then what does “D” stand for?
7) When the roll, roll, roll, is called up yonder, where will you be?
8) Who is your boss?
9) Who is your co-pilot?
10) Are you a “C” or a “CH” or a “CHRISTIAN”?
11) When will Jesus come soon – Morning? Night? or Noon?
12) Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelu, Hallelujah?
13) Describe Christ’s use of the “sinner’s prayer” in his evangelistic encounters in John’s Gospel.
14) Can I get a Witness? Can I hear an Ay-men?

HIGH SCHOOL INTERN EXAMINATION

1) Proof definitively that God exists.

2) What are the arguments for and against the following:

a. Sola Ecclesia
b. Sola Scriptura
c. Solo Scriptura

3) What are the arguments for and against the inclusion/exclusion of the Deuterocanonical/Apocryphal books of the Roman Catholic Bible?

4) Describe the main tenets of the following worldviews:

a. Deistic
b. Pantheistic
c. Panentheistic
d. Polytheistic
e. Naturalistic
f. Pluralistic

5) Is there a contradiction between God’s absolute divine foreknowledge and the free will of man? If so, explain the contradiction away? If not, why? What about God’s absolute divine foreknowledge and man’s libertarian free will?

6) Discuss if and how each of the seven ecumenical councils (particularly Nicea, Chalcedon and Constantinople) dealt with the following Christological and Trinitarian heresies:

a. Arianism
b. Monophysitism
c. Nestorianism
d. Apollinarianism
e. Eutychianism

7) Argue against the kenosis theory.

8) Is man a dichotomous or trichotomous creature? Explain your position.

9) Defend the Augustinian position of the will against the Pelagian argument.

10) Are you a complementarian or egalitarian? Defend your position.

11) Do you hold to unconditional, conditional, or a corporate view of election? Why?

12) Which of the following is the BEST/WORST of the following theories of the atonement? Why?

a. Ransom
b. Recapitulation
c. Governmental
d. Satisfaction
e. Moral Example
f. Penal Substitution

13) For whom did Christ die?

14) Which of the following lapsarian views is most accurate?

a. Infralapsarian
b. Supralapsarian

15) What is the relationship between the Church and Israel? Do you see a difference in the Old and New Testament presentation of this relationship?

16) Is the Lord’s Supper transubstantial or consubstantial?

17) Describe the most biblical form of church governance. Prove your position biblically and historically using various Baptist confessions of faith.

18) To which millennial view do you subscribe?

19) In regards to the rapture, are you pretribulational, midtribulational, posttribulational, or pre-wrath? Defend your position and disprove the others.

20) Which position on baptism is the correct one: credo-baptism or paedo-baptism? Prove your position.

Heretic Enters Southern Gospel Hall of Fame

2008-07-18T18:07:00.010-04:00

I grew up with a father who loved Southern Gospel music. As a small child, I knew it was Sunday when I heard "JUBILEE, JUBILEE, something something something Gospel Jubilee." Then a bunch of families in very bad polyester clothing would parade onto a fake gazebo and pause while smiling at the camera. I remember such groups as the Chuck Wagon Gang, the Statesman, the Blackwood Brothers, and the Dixie Melody Boys. We listened to Southern Gospel on albums at home and on eight-track cassettes in the car.

In 2007, the Southern Gospel Music Association inducted Joel Hemphill of the Hemphills into the SGMA Hall of Fame. They have this to say about him:

Born August 1, 1939, in Fresno, CA, Joel Hemphill is a noted singer-songwriter, evangelist, musician, and author. He and his wife, LeBreeska, formed the Singing Hemphills in the mid 1960s, traveling the quartet circuit to much acclaim. The Hemphill patriarch has penned over 350 songs, many of which became Gospel Music classics. His songs included such hits as "Pity the Man," "Not in a Million Years," and "Wait Till You See My Brand-New Home.”

Hemphill wrote and recorded six #1 songs. Over a twenty-year period, from 1970-1990, Hemphill had an average #8 song on the "Singing News" Chart. Along with his singing family, Hemphill is the recipient of eight (8) Dove Awards. Joel has received three (3) BMI Awards of Excellence.

The only problem with all this: Hemphill isn't a Christian. He completely and openly denies that Jesus Christ is God which means he doesn't believe in the Trinity. In his book To God Be The Glory: Exalting the Bible View of God, he lays out some of his views. However, to remove all doubt, Hemphill answers his critics and writes the following about the book on his own website:

The focus of my book isn't what Jesus is not, but rather who God the Father is. God is immortal - Jesus was not... Hebrews teaches, and I believe that Jesus did not come in the God family (there is only one God), or the angel family, but in the human family (Heb. 2:7, 9). He is perfect, sinless man, but man nevertheless!...

A God-man could not redeem us. It took a sinless man, the Lamb of God, with righteous blood untainted by the sin of Adam, to redeem mankind. He is the second Adam, not the first God-man... If the disciples who had just seen Jesus ascend to heaven in Acts chapter one, did not pray to him in Acts chapter four, then he is not God!... The incarnation as taught by modern Christianity is a fable.

Jesus was not just a body full of God, he was a man full of God. He had a human mind, soul, spirit and will. Being full of God does not make a person God.

Here is a good question. If we continue to give God’s glory to another, even His highly exalted, sinless, virgin-born son, after we have come to the knowledge of the truth, will it be accounted to us for idolatry? God still speaks! Please pray and ask Him.

He writes more here:

Jesus is not a human incarnation of Almighty God as the Oneness teach, nor an incarnation of God the Son, second person of a triune God, a pre-existent being, as millions of Trinitarians believe.

The doctrine of the Trinity with its lack of Biblical covering reminds me of a tale by Hans Christian Andersen called "The Emperor's New Clothes." . . . You may ask, "what are you saying?" I am saying that the doctrine of the Trinity is Biblically naked , and I am calling on all of those who see and love the truth to join me in speaking up (emphasis in original).

Just like the popular group Philips, Craig & Dean, Joel Hemphill and his family continue to sing in Trinitarian churches. I wonder if any Muslim mosques, Mormon stakes, or Jehovah's Witness' congregations would want him to come sing - he would fit in better theologically there!

Do you know your candy?

2008-06-27T19:38:00.005-04:00

Click here to see if you can guess the identity of candy bars by their cross-section? I got 14 of 20 but some were pretty tricky (the Skor/Heath and 5thAvenue/Butterfinger bars are almost identical). However, my misspent youth of television watching came in handy with my memorization of the "Almond Joy has _______, Mounds don't" lyric.

Premil Problems? Part 2

2008-06-27T18:55:00.004-04:00

I am a premillennialist. I guess I should say that I am a premillennialist by default - it's all I have ever been taught. I was reared in the thought in my home church(es) and taught the system in seminary. I was trained to study the Bible with a historical-grammatical interpretive method and to interpret the Bible with a literal hermeneutic. With that said, I'll have to admit that I've never really thought that deeply about the millennium - it seems to just come with the territory of being a Baptist. Oh, to be sure, I've taught on the subject but I mostly went to sympathetic theologians and presented the material I've always known.

However, I never want to be wed to a system (I know those out there who know me as a Calvinist are having a big laugh right now but I truly mean those words). I want to be submissive to the word of God, which is why I rather reluctantly became more Calvinistic in my theology back in late 2000-early 2001. I didn't intend to become a Calvinist. I didn't want to be a Calvinist. My life would be a lot easier and simpler if I was not a Calvinist. However, I just see these particular doctrines present everywhere in Scripture so my submission to the Scriptures demands that I be a Calvinist.

What does this have to do with the millennium? Well, when I read some words in Scripture the other day during my time with God, it forced me to think about the millennium for the first time in a long time. I was in Matthew 13 and reading about the Kingdom of God. I'll tell you all about that in the next post. For now, let me lay down some initial thoughts.

In discussing the millennium, one’s first thought is to go to the Revelation because the 20th chapter of Revelation is the only place in the entire Bible that explicitly mentions the millennium. Differing theological positions approach this disputed passage in widely disparate ways and quickly call the other approaches bad names.

The premillennial view states that it is the only view that takes the Bible literally and claims that the amillennialists are "spiritualizers" or even "liberal." The amillennialists claim that they do take the Bible literally, meaning they literally interpret the Bible as it was meant to be interpreted and that the premillers are escapists. Both claim the postmillennialists are overly optimistic wishful thinkers with their heads in the clouds.

Here is the passage from Revelation 20:

Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the first resurrection.

Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.

And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

So, as I said, a few questions came to mind after reading that passage in Matthew (and others) and the passage in Revelation. Before we get to those passages and the questions they raised in my mind, I have two thoughts that I think one must keep in mind when studying eschatology in general and the Revelation in particular:

1) The Revelation is an apocalyptic book. It also has prophecies and sections that qualify as epistle. However, it is apocalyptic for the most part. We no longer write in this fashion but the readers of the first century were intimately acquainted with the style. Apocalyptic is highly symbolic and almost everything is a symbol of something else (though not in an allegorical sense). The thing we must remember is that this book was written to a specific audience for a specific purpose. Therefore, it had relevant application to them at that moment. They knew immediately what every symbol meant but we do not - separated as we are by two thousand years. An example will be helpful.

Imagine someone from another country picking up today's newspaper about 2000 years from now and seeing a drawing of an angry donkey arguing with an even angrier elephant. We know exactly what those images mean but someone from the far future will most likely not. Someone separated by time and culture will have an even more difficult time in decipering the cartoon. What if they decide that the donkey and elephant stands for something entirely different from a democrat and republican in the American political system? Even if that future interpretation makes sense and entire systems of thought are built around it and scads of book are written about it, they would be wrong.

The same holds true in the study of Revelation. When we read Revelation, we must keep this in mind: If our interpretation would be considered nonsensical to the first century audience, then our interpretation is wrong. This most likely means that horses probably do not equal tanks, locusts probably do not equal Apache attack helicopters and, hold on to your seats, the mark of the beast is probably not a computer chip hooked to a giant mainframe computer in Belgium!

2) In determining the meaning of disputed passages in the Bible, it is best to refer to the clear teaching passages of Scripture. Scripture will interpret Scripture. Therefore, it is advisable to let the clear inform the less clear. If we want to know for certain about the Lord's return, it makes sense to read what Paul wrote in his letters which were meant to instruct directly and clearly. It is also helpful to read the words of Christ in the Gospels. We take out understanding of the epistles and Gospels with us into Revelation. It just does not make sense to use the highly symbolic apocalyptic to inform our interpretation of the epistles and gospels.

So, concerning the alleged problematic gap of 1000 years between Christ's return and the judgment of the wicked, what about those other passages of Scripture that seem to provide a problem for the premillennial view? They are found in the epistles and the Gospels. We will look at some of those in the next post.

Thinking about the Millennium

2008-06-26T16:21:00.021-04:00

People know that Christians are gullible so we will continue to see things like You've Been Left Behind and the Post-Rapture Post. According to their own words:

Do you know someone who is in danger of being "left behind" because of a sinful life? Imagine if you could write a letter to a friend or loved one after the Great Day of Reckoning. Maybe a message to your family telling them to trust in God, and that everything will be okay. . . . It could be that your message is the light that opens a sinner's eyes to the Glory of God and allows them entrance to Heaven during the trials before the Second Coming. This is where the Post-Rapture Post comes in.

My response to a Christian's use of that "service" is that if you want to share the gospel with a loved one . . .

DO IT NOW!

Of course, these websites are only applicable with a pretribulational or mid-trib rapture. At this time (and I have to use temporal markers when discussing my understanding of eschatology), I lean more towards a post-tribulational rapture/return of Christ. I do not want to talk about the Rapture right now (I do that elsewhere). I want to discuss the other major topic of the end times - the millennium.

Over the last couple weeks, a few members of the church staff have been discussing this very issue. In our discussions, I noticed that each were reared in a premillennial frame of thought - as was I. That means that we all have been taught that Jesus will physically and gloriously return to earth after a period of great tribulation and prior to a 1000-year period of time in which He will establish His kingdom on earth. After the thousand years are completed, Jesus will then resurrect the wicked and judge them (along with the living wicked) and usher in the New Heavens and the New Earth. This judgment is different from the resurrection of the righteous, which occurs immediately before the tribulation or immediately after. Therefore, in the premill schema, the resurrections and judgments of the believer and non-believer are separated by this one thousand year gap.

As you can imagine in a theological discussion amongs seminary-trained pastors, issues were raised. Since that staff discussion, I've done some reading to try and resolve some issues. I first read Riddlebarger's A Case for Amillennialism because I've never really considered that position and his book comes highly recommended by proponents of the position.

However, I was not persuaded thought I do appreciate the fact that he bases his position on thoughtful exegesis of extended passages. I just could not accept the conclusions he reached. I also have pulled The Meaning of the Millennium: Four Views off my shelf and will begin that soon. I just noticed there is a new book out there called Three Views on the Millennium. Why three views instead of four? The first book has separate chapters on the two major strands of premillennialism: classic dispensationalism (pre-trib) and historic premillennialism (post-trib).

While I was not persauded by the amillennial view, one potential problem for premillennialism was raised that got me thinking - Is there any place in the Bible that clearly states that there is a gap of some time between the return of Christ and His judgment of the wicked?

Happy? Really?

2008-06-25T20:04:00.004-04:00

I walked into the den and saw that my youngest (turns 7 in Sept) was watching an old "Tom and Jerry" cartoon. In particular, he was watching "Part-Time Pal" which was produced in 1947. I saw him smiling and asked if he liked to watch those old cartoons and he said he did. That answer made me smile.

However, as I continued to watch, I noticed the cartoon contained the comedic cartoon staple of accidental drunkenness. It appears Tom was trying to keep Jerry out of the fridge at the command of "Mammy Two-Shoes" (a topic for another post). Anyway, Tom was chasing Jerry and Tom fell through the floor into the basement and into a barrel of "CIDER-XXX" in the basement. After sobering up thanks to some water thrown in his face, Tom later slipped in the bathroom and a bottle of bay rum fell into his mouth. After quickly drinking the entire bottle, Tom began to smile and hiccup a lot. All the while, the old "How Dry I Am" music was playing.

I asked Joey what was going on. He said, "Tom drank something and now he's happy." Just like that, an opportunity to teach my son something came from out of the blue. I believe he has a new definition of "happy" now.

PS - I read from the source of the picture that it is OK to post under Fair-Use Laws. I don't know what that means but I'll take their word for it.

"Building Bridges" to be published soon

2008-06-24T19:13:00.003-04:00

Last November, I attended a conference with Brian Burgess, Brian Pestotnik, Andy Lackey, Jamie Steele, and Greg Barefoot. The conference, Building Bridges: Southern Baptists and Calvinism, was jointly put on by Lifeway, Southeastern Seminary, and Founders Ministries. It was to be a discussion from both sides of the aisle and it was a wonderful 2 1/2 day event.

Now, all of the lectures have been edited and collected into a single volume called Calvinism: A Southern Baptist Dialogue, edited by Brad Waggoner and Ray Clendenen. You can pre-order the book for under $14 and it should be available in the late summer/early fall.

The table of contents will include the following (with my remembrances of the lectures):

THE CURRENT CLIMATE

Ed Stetzer, “Calvinism, Evangelism, and SBC Leadership” - Stetzer provided a look at recent statistics from Lifeway Research's surveys of pastors and recent seminary graduates. The numbers have been rehashed multiple times but the main point made was that while Calvinists are nowhere close to challenging the majority view, Calvinism is increasing in the SBC, especially among the newly graduated. Only ten percent of current pastors agreed with the statement "I am a five-point Calvinist." That is good news because all the doom and gloom of recent days cannot be laid at the feet of the Southern Baptist Calvinist. There's just no way that 10% of the pastors of 42,000 churches can be blamed for the lack of baptisms and decrease in growth. However, if I remember correctly, around 30% of recent graduates from all six seminaries between 1998-2004 did agree with the same statement.

THE HISTORICAL RECORD

David S. Dockery, “Southern Baptists and Calvinism: A Historical Look” - Dockery was extremely amiable and I thoroughly enjoyed his lecture, even though he admitted he was "the leadoff hitter on the 'Akin Amyraldian team.'" He went with the "Two Streams" theory of Baptist History, which has been revealed to be slightly revisionistic (go about 2/3 of the way down this post).
Tom J. Nettles, “A Historical View of the Doctrinal Importance of Calvinism among Baptists” - I love Tom Nettles but I had a very difficult time making it through this talk. My notes are very sparse. He spoke of the issues of inerrancy, Trinitarianism, substitutionary atonement, religious liberty, missions and evangelism, Christ-centered preaching, holiness of life, and regenerate church membership. He told us that these are inherently Calvinistic doctrines but I imagine truly conservative Christians of all stripes would adhere to these.

GENERAL EVALUATION

Malcolm B. Yarnell III, “Calvinism: Cause for Rejoicing, Cause for Concern” - Yarnell, along with Noblit below, provided the two most provocative lectures (sermons) of the conference. Yarnell upset the Calvinists in the crowd by redefining the label. He said that within the SBC there are classic Calvinists like Bucer and Calvin and Beza. He referred to this as a philosophy and a dangerous one at that. He mentioned that the traditional Baptist finds this position to be "reprehensible." The second category is Baptistic Calvinism. The third is Hyper-Calvinism. The main point of all this was his statement that "Hyper-Calvinists and Classical Calvinists are unwelcome." (I want go back and listen to the MP3 but that is what I wrote and circled in my notes.) Near the end, Yarnell told a ridiculous anecdote of a man leaving his wife and kids after turning to Calvinism - I had forgotten that but can still feel my hackles rising over that sensationalistic and manipulative point. He ended with the statements that "Classic Calvinism is unwelcome!" and "Baptist Calvinists must refute Classical and Hyper-Calvinism."
Jeff Noblit, “The Rise of Calvinism in the Southern Baptist Convention: Reason for Rejoicing” - If Yarnell upset the Calvinists, Noblit probably upset the non-Calvinists just as much. He did not lecture; he preached. In fact, he did not preach; he went to meddlin'. He said that we should rejoice in the Calvinistic resurgence because (1) it helps us overcome our inerrancy idolatry and helps us move to biblical sufficiency; (2) it produces better church splits; (3) it exposes and removes covert liberalism, (4) it restores true biblical evangelism; (5) it seems to grasp the new wine of biblical church ministry; and (6) it is supremely God-focused.

THE ATONEMENT

David P. Nelson, “The Design, Nature, and Extent of the Atonement” - A very well done and even-keeled presentation by both Nelson and Waldron, especially after the heightened emotions of the previous two. Nelson argued that the atonement is unlimited because of the design, nature, and extent of the atonement. He referred to John 3:16, 2 Timothy 2:1-6, Hebrews 2:9, and 2 Peter 3:9.
Sam Waldron, “The Biblical Confirmation of Particular Redemption” - Sam Waldron is a great writer. As a speaker, he is a great writer. He offered four proofs: (1) the substitutionary nature of the atonement, (2) the restricted recipients of the atonement, (3) the guaranteed effects of the atonement, and (4) the covenantal aspect of the atonement. He also dealt with the "problems" of the Calvinistic view (universal terms such as "all" and "everyone" and "world," the free offer of the Gospel to all men, and the apostasy passages in Rom 14:15, 1 Cor 8:11, 2 Peter 2:1, and Heb 10:29).

THEOLOGICAL STEREOTYPES

Chuck Lawless, “Southern Baptist Non-Calvinists—Who Are We Really?” - Issues covered by Lawless include the common stereotypes such as non-Calvinists are more interested in numbers than good theology, they promote pragmatic church growth, they use faulty approaches to evangelism and are unconcerned about regenerate church growth, and finally, the incorrect assertion that they do not like Calvinists.
Nathan A. Finn, “Southern Baptist Calvinism: Setting the Record Straight” - Finn covered five myths about Calvinists (perhaps calling on Olson's book). He dealt with the stereotype that Calvinists are a threat to evangelism, are opposed to altar calls and invitations, are really Hyper-Calvinists (or "extreme Calvinists"), deny free will, and that an authentic Baptist could never be a true Calvinist (contra Yarnell).

ELECTION AND CALLING

Ken Keathley, “A Molinist View of Election, or How to Be a Consistent Infralapsarian” - I was looking forward to these two lectures more than any other. Welty did not disappoint but I was sorely disappointed in the choice to bring Keathley to the stage. He did not present the common non-Calvinistic views of election(elect according to foreknowledge, elect in Christ, conditional election) but instead championed the seldom-heard position of Molinism. I suppose the chief redeeming feature of this (from my perspective) was that Keathley admitted that both non-Calvinism and Molinism posit that libertarian free will is the prima facia view.
Greg Welty, “Election and Calling: A Biblical Theological Study” - Welty did a phenomenal job (a little biased but I believe all would agree). He did not come close to covering all he wrote but the book will take care of that. He was one of the few that actually dealt exegetically with the biblical passages instead of merely reading them or, even worse, merely listing the references. He covered Ephesians 1:3-11 and Romans 9. He also dealt with expected objections, a la Paul in Romans 9. If you only listen to one lecture from this conference, listen to this one.

WORKING TOGETHER TO MAKE CHRIST KNOWN

Daniel L. Akin, “Answering the Call to a Great Commission Resurgence” - We ended the conference with these two heavyweights. Akin, the president of my alma mater (SEBTS) told us that we needed the following: sound theology, to let biblical theology drive our systematic theology, a revival of authentic expository preaching, a balance in our Great Commission theology, and to love and respect those with whom we are not in complete agreement. Well said.
Tom Ascol, “Working Together to Make Christ Know: Considerations for the Future” - Tom Ascol spoke on the five points (imagine that?) of bridge-building. We must agree on what is the gospel, what is a Christian, what is a church, what does it mean to obey truth, and what does it mean to live in love.

There were four other speakers at the conference but it doesn't appear their messages will be included (they were also not included in the posted MP3s):

James Merrit - a sermon on Ephesians 1 that spoke of the emerald of election, the pearl of predestination, the ruby of redemption, and the gold of grace. As I listened, I wrote a prayer in my notes: "God, please deliver me from cliche'-driven preaching!"
Al Mohler - a sermon on Romans 10:8-17 with a lengthy overview of the first nine chapters of Romans.
J.D. Greear - a sermon on Romans 9:11-23.
Don Whitney - Dr. Whitney filled in at the very last moment for a sick and absent Voddie Baucham. While extremely disappointed in Baucham's absense, Whitney delivered one of the best sermons I have ever heard. It was on the "Clarity of the Gospel" and dealt with the doctrine of hell from Matthew 25:31-46.

Get the book.

Wordle - Now This Is Pretty Cool

2008-06-24T14:34:00.009-04:00

Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. You can enter or cut-n-paste any text you want and the resultant clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. For example, if you type "apple banana banana grape grape grape," you'll see that the font size for "banana" is twice the size of "apple" and "grape" will be 1/3 that of "banana."

According to the FAQ on the site, you can tweak your complted clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out (to save them you must print as a PDF or press "PRTSCN" on your keyboard and open the copied image in an image editor.

Here are some I made from some documents on my computer:

A twenty-two page chapter on "Textual Variants" from a recent course on Textual Criticism:
I was not surprised by the many uses of the words "manuscripts" or "variants" or "words."

Here's one from a 249-page paper on the subject of Calvinism. What do you think will be the top three words?
How about that? "God," "Jesus," and "Christ" are the top three, followed closely by "Paul" and "people."

A good game would be to guess which words would occur most often in books of the Bible or to look at a wordle and guess from which book of the Bible it was made. Let's try the former first - what are the top words from Revelation?
Did you guess "God" or "earth" or "seven" or "heaven"or "saying" or "great"?

Now, from what book was the following wordle made?

If you guessed the Psalms, you are correct. Technically, it is only the first forty-four psalms. I trued to copy all 150 of them but only the first 44 were actually pasted into this incredibly interesting piece of technology.

To quote Charles Shacklerford: "He's Amphibious!"

2008-06-23T10:05:00.007-04:00

Charles Shackleford was a goofy but effective player for the Wolfpack basketball team back in the day. He also looks like a very tall Urkel. He once lost a few games to "injury" because he slept on his arm during a long flight and it "went to sleep" for an extended period of time. Anyway, Shackleford also made the news by telling an ABC reporter "I can shoot with my left hand, I can shoot with my right hand, I'm amphibious." Of course, he meant ambidextrous.

Well, the New York Yankees just drafted an ambidextrous pitcher - Pat Venditte Jr. Venditte was drafted in the 20th round of the 2008 draft and according to Wikipedia (he has a page all to himself):

When using his right arm, Venditte delivers over the top and can throw a curveball as well as a fastball reaching up to 91 mph. His left-handed delivery is side-armed in which he throws a slider and a relat ively slower fastball. Venditte uses a custom made six-fingered glove with a thumb-hole on each side allowing him to easily switch back and forth. He generally pitches with his right arm against right-handed batters and left-handed against left-handed batters which minimizes his opponent's advantage when strategically ordering batters in the line-up based on which side of the plate they hit from. Furthermore, by splitting his pitches between his arms, he is able to pitch longer than traditional pitchers before becoming fatigue.

Here is the photographic proof from Chris Machian for The New York Times:

Here's his specially modified baseball glove:

His unique ability has caused a few problems. According to the NY Times article referenced above:

Umpires working Creighton’s games have to dust off seldom-used rules regarding switch-pitchers. Like everyone else, Venditte gets only eight warm-up pitches upon entering a game and five before any inning, whether he chooses to throw left-handed or right-handed, and may not warm up again if he changes arms midinning.
A switch-pitcher facing a switch-hitter could make a fine Abbott and Costello routine. Against Nebraska last year, a switch-hitter came to the plate right-handed, prompting Venditte to switch to his right arm, which caused the batter to move to the left-hand batter’s box, with Venditte switching his arm again. Umpires ultimately restored order, applying the rule (the same as that in the majors) that a pitcher must declare which arm he will use before throwing his first pitch and cannot change before the at-bat ends.

If God is sovereign, why _________ ?

2008-06-19T13:27:00.008-04:00

Last night, Brian Burgess, our Minister of Outreach, taught part two of his two-part series on "Things God Never Said About Evangelism." He did an outstanding job and I encourage you to listen to his remarks from both messages. In last night's Equipping University, one of the things God never said is "Since I am sovereign, I don't need your help in evangelism."

When Brian and I discussed this over lunch prior to the class, I told him that no true believer is really going to think God ever said such a thing. A hyper-Calvinist will believe that ridiculous statement but Hyper-calvinism is not Christian. A hyper-Calvinist is not a Calvinist who really believes the doctrines of Calvinism and don't let anyone tell you different (no matter how many degrees he has or what position he holds in a seminary). Now, back to the subject at hand...

However, believers will fall into different categories as to WHY they think God would never utter that sentence. Some would say that God is sovereign but has freely "given up" (not the best choice of words) part of that sovereignty to ensure that man engages with Him of man's own libertarian free will. I, on the other hand, would reject that sentence because God is sovereign and gives up none of it and yet that same sovereignty in no way interferes with man's responsibility for his sins. This is called compatibilism. God is sovereign in all of salvation, man is responsible, and Christians are to witness and pray.

Non-Calvinists will immediately ask me, "But why? If God is sovereign and He alone chooses who gets saved, then why witness? Does it really change anything if the end result is already decided in God's mind?"

Compatibilism teaches that God's sovereignty is compatible with man's will and responsibility (not at odds or contradictory to either). The primary texts used to buttress this theological position is Genesis 50:20; Isaiah 10; and Acts 4:27-28. But I thought of another Old Testament example that I think makes a good point. In fact, the same type of event occurs over and over in the Old Testament (see Joshua 1:3, Joshua 6:2, Joshua 10:8 and more). Here's just one example.

In the opening verses of Judges, Joshua has died and the people were worried about the plan to conquer Canaan without their faithful and courageous general. Read the following:

After the death of Joshua, the people of Israel inquired of the LORD, "Who shall go up first for us against the Canaanites, to fight against them?" The LORD said, "Judah shall go up; behold, I have given the land into his hand" (Judges 1:1-2)

The Lord chose Judah to fight and then told the Israelites that the battle was already won. God had already decided to give the land to Judah and it was going to happen just as God said (unless you want to open a can of worms and say God could be incorrect or ignorant of future events).

However, what if the tribe of Judah responded to these words for YHWH and said, "Whew, what a relief. The battle is already won. The land is ours. We can just stay here. We don't even have to fight. Thanks God, for winning the battle for us"? What would have been the outcome of that type of response. Well, we will never know because God ordained the ends (victory) as well as the means to achieve victory (Judah's ability to fight). We read later in the same chapter that

Then Judah went up and the LORD gave the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand, and they defeated 10,000 of them at Bezek. They found Adoni-bezek at Bezek and fought against him and defeated the Canaanites and the Perizzites (Judges 1:4-5).

One thing is for sure: the people of Israel were not sloppy theologians. They did not think that just because God has ordained/predestined a very real future that they had no part in that future. The same thing holds true for evangelism. God has promised us that His word will not return void. God has promised us that when His sheep hear His voice, they will come to Him. God has told us that He has chosen men and women from every nation on earth. That does not negate the need to witness, that gives power and confidence in the very task of witnessing! We cannot fail when we are obedient to witness. Our positive proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ will either serve as a just cause of the unbeliever's righteous condemnation or as the tool used by God to draw people to Himself.

That is why I - a Calvinist - evangelize.

Please - before you buy that new car - watch this:

2008-06-17T09:17:00.002-04:00

Before you buy a new car

The ESV Study Bible

2008-06-16T11:30:00.000-04:00

Crossway will release the new English Standard Version Study Bible in October 2008 and it looks to be an amazing tool for Bible study.

The publishers have a lot of information already available at their website - www.ESVStudyBible.org.

Of particular interest is their recent release of the introductory material to the Book of the Revelation. Crossway says:

The Introduction to the book of Revelation explains the book’s author, date, historical setting, and purpose. The introduction also unpacks the key themes of the book, its literary features, and its place in the history of salvation. In addition to a full-color map showing the location of the seven churches mentioned in Revelation 2 and 3, you’ll also find a number of charts that give an overview of the various approaches to interpreting Revelation and the different millennial positions.

Every book in the ESV Study Bible has an introduction like this one, providing essential information to enrich your study of God’s Word. We have also included the first few pages from chapters 1 and 2 of the book of Revelation so that you can see the font size and layout of the ESV Study Bible.

I imagine that this Bible will be my default answer to those asking "What Bible should I get?"

Father's Day: What to Give When Ties Disappear?

2008-06-11T12:34:00.003-04:00

It appears that the men's tie is about to become extinct. In this article from the Wall Street Journal, we read that:

Many American men stopped wearing neckties years ago. Now, even tie guys are giving up on them. After 60 years, the Men's Dress Furnishings Association, the trade group that represents American tie makers, is expected to shut down Thursday.

Association members now number just 25, down from 120 during the 1980s power-tie era. U.S. tie companies have been consolidating. Others have closed because of overseas competition as the U.S. market share for American-made ties has fallen to about 40%, from 75% in 1995. Members have lost interest. But the biggest reason for the group's demise: Men aren't wearing ties.

Click here for an interesting look at the evolution of the modern tie.

Sex and the CT

2008-06-11T11:25:00.005-04:00

Christianity Today has just waded into some very hot water after giving a favorable review to the new movie, Sex and the City:The Movie. For the uninitiated (which includes me), Sex and the City was an HBO television series (1998-2004) that won 7 Emmy Awards. The movie based on the television show (rated R) was released on May 30 with what the Chicago Tribune labels “outré fashion, casual sex and dubious cocktails” and “plenty of eye candy for the ladies (think naked men and haute couture).” Not your typical Christian movie.

Yet, Christianity Today’s Camerin Courtney wrote a fairly explicit and positive review, giving the movie 3 stars. Near the end of the review, we read that

All of this said, there is a lot of sex and nudity in the movie. Be warned: There's a threesome, a naked man in a shower, some steamy makeup sex. The sex scenes between married folk are somewhat less offensive, but there were too many times when it seemed that the producers were simply trying to shock.

At the very bottom of the page, CT manages to put forth this disclaimer in its Family Corner:

Sex and the City is rated R for strong sexual content, graphic nudity, and language. Take the rating very seriously. There are several scenes with nudity, including a brief glimpse at frontal male nudity, a brief guy-to-guy kiss, and several graphic sex scenes, including a threesome. The language is colorful at times, but not as problematic as the sex and nudity. This isn't a movie for children or teens, and due to the content, not even for some adults.

A sometimes contributor to CT responded incredulously here. A response by Focus on the Family is here.

Amazingly, CT responded to the criticism by standing resolutely behind the review (and the movie). The editors instead criticized the critics and essentially poo-poo'd the criticism by claiming that they were merely reviewing the movie. The editors responded by writing:

We totally understand why many people would have no desire to see Sex and the City, choosing to avoid it because of its portrayals of pre- and extra-marital sex and rampant materialism. I myself have no desire to see it, mostly for those reasons.

But to slam us for reviewing the film makes no sense. Our mission statement is to help readers make discerning choices about movies—not to make the choices for people. Our review clearly warned readers of the sinful behavior in the movie, while also noting some of its redeeming factors—like the universal longing for love and companionship, what it means to be a true friend, and more. . . .
It's good to sometimes enter into the minds and worldviews of others, even of those we completely disagree with. It's good to see what the world looks like through the eyes of even the depraved (all emphases in the original).

Then, in a very condescending way, they close by writing:

That, (emphasis in original) dear readers, is why we review "objectionable" movies. Because our eyes "are not enough for me." We will "see through the eyes of others" and yet "remain" ourselves. It is our own "experiment in criticism." If that kind of thinking is good enough for C. S. Lewis, it's certainly good enough for us.

No one disagrees with "that." However, "merely reviewing" the film is not a problem with anyone. People I know would appreciate a warning every now and then about the way culture is heading. However, the editors completely misread the criticism: the problem the editors do not seem to realize is that they did not merely review the film, they reviewed the movie positively (or, at least not negatively enough) and even seem to be promoting it! Did Carl F.H. Henry and Billy Graham (see below) ever envision the day when their magazine would promote a "randy" show filled with "soft-porn" (both CT's words). At least blush!

After all, the magazine gave the movie THREE STARS! Ironically, in channeling the words of C.S. Lewis, the same magazine gave Prince Caspian only two and a half stars. Perhaps a little more skin and extra-martial sex between Susan and Caspian could have saved Lewis' work in the eyes of Christianity Today!

It is not enough to merely point out the bad scenes and say "Cover your eyes at the 45:16 mark- it gets kinda steamy then." Denounce sin when you see it. Don't merely point sin out - encourage and exhort the reader to avoid it. Instead, the reviewer closes by saying, "In the end, I didn't quite heart SATC—but I certainly enjoyed this meaningful reunion with its beloved characters and their winning friendships."

HT: Shepherd's Scrapbook

NOTE: Christianity Today was founded in 1956 to be a journal of “international, interdenominational scholarship” with “the largest circulation in the world to the Protestant ministry and lay leadership" (Carl F.H. Henry, “The Mission of a Magazine,” Christianity Today, 12 October 1959, page 20).

Calvinists and their Eschatology

2008-06-11T10:12:00.011-04:00

At the 2007 Shepherds' Conference, Pastor John MacArthur delivered a controversial message entitled, "Why Every Self-Respecting Calvinist is a Premillennialist." MacArthur said that premillennialism as being the only consistent position for any person who holds to the doctrine of sovereign electing grace. He even went so far as to say that the amillennial position is more consistent with Arminianism than it is with Calvinism.

You can read about that message here and here. I have not found a free MP3 download anywhere but you can get an MP3 for $2.00 if you register (for free) at the Shepherd's Fellowship.

The gist of MacArthur's message is below:

1. Were the writers of the Old Testament amillennialists? No

2. Were the Jews of Jesus time amillennialists? No

3. Was Jesus an amillennialist? No (cf. Acts 1:3, 6-7)

4. Were the apostles amillennialists? No (cf. Acts 3:19-21, 25; 15:15-17; Rom. 3:3-4; 9:6-8, 13; 11:26-29)

To this could be added…

5. Were the earliest church fathers amillennialists? No

MacArthur lays out his eschatological positions in the following books:

Because the Time is Near: John MacArthur Explains the Book of Revelation
The Second Coming: Signs of Christ's Return and the End of the Age
Commentaries on Revelation 1-11 and 12-22.
Commentary on 1 & 2 Thessalonians.
Page after page of sermon transcripts of Revelation and 1 Thessalonians and 2 Thessalonians and Daniel.

MacArthur knew exactly what he was doing in opening the popular and well-attended conference. He knew the audience was filled with amillennialists. He knew the backlash that would occur but he threw down the gauntlet anyway - which is another reason to love the guy.

The responses came quickly. You can read those here and here and here. That last link is part one of a series by Sam Waldon. His blog posts have just been published as a book, MacArthur's Millennial Manifesto (which you can read about here).

Endorsers say:

Thank you, Dr. Waldron, for showing us how a theological refutation may be done with grace and kindness...James M. Renihan, Ph.D.

Samuel Waldron's "friendly response" to John MacArthur's "millennial manifesto" will go a long way toward setting the record straight about what Reformed amillennialists actually believe about the church and Israel...I highly recommend this book to all who are interested in this controversy...Kim Riddlebarger, Ph.D.

Samuel Waldron's response to John MacArthur's controversial sermon, "Why Every Self-Respecting Calvinist Is a Premillennialist," is a gem. In a gentle spirit, and with an awareness of what is at stake, Waldron makes a persuasive case against MacArthur's unlikely claim that true Calvinists must subscribe to the tenets of dispensational premillennialism...Cornelis Venema, Ph.D.

Most of the individuals who would read this blog are familiar with the premillennial scheme of the end times (rapture, tribulation, millennial kingdom, final battle, eternity). To learn more about the other views that are out there, the following books are worth reading:

Vern Poythress' The Returning King
Kim Riddlebarger's The Case for Amillennialism
Kim Riddlebarger's The Man of Sin: Uncovering the Truth about the Antichrist
The Meaning of the Millennium: Four Views
Three Views on the Rapture
R.C. Sproul's The Last Days According to Jesus
Tim LeHaye and Jerry Jenkins' Left Behind (Just kidding! Never read fiction for theological purposes (see "The Shack" for the damage that mindset can bring about).

Songs that are TRULY Different

2008-06-11T08:55:00.004-04:00

As I mentioned in the last post, the Minister of Music at my church received two boxes filled with old hymnbooks and songbooks from ages past. Most were published in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. One book in particular caught the attention of some of our staff as we met in Rodney's recently cleaned-out office: "Songs that are Different" by F.M. Lehman. I'll just present some of the songs that we are hoping Rodney never has us sing on Sunday:

Remember in the last post I spoke of "Jesus or my boyfriend" type songs. Those are not unique to the current age. Read the lyrics to this hymn: "My Honeymoon."

Jesus is the only lover of my soul (of my soul),
He has won my heart and now has full control (full control);
Other loves come and go, Jesus never leaves me so -
There's a honeymoon in my heart all the time (since He is mine).
F.M. Lehman (1917, renewed 1945)

Here's a song of warning of all the false teachers of the day, presented in "The Auction":

Come ye, come ye, bargain seekers!
Come and see our special wares;
We are stocked with worldwide notions,
Have our counters full of snares.
We have Mother Eddy's science, Pastor Russell's no-hell seeds,
What we lack in real gospel we supply in crooked creeds.

We have Theosophic lectures,
You may purchase by the yard;
We will sell you cheap religion
if you'll only sign a card.
You may buy an easy method
How to clime [sic] the golden stairs
We have just received a shipment of the the famous brimstone wares.

We have games of chance for ladies
for their Thursday afternoons;
Statuary nude and paintings,
spicy songs with racy tunes.
Ho, ye! Come and take off our bargains!
Hell today is out of date.
Easy creeds will surely give you entrance through the golden gate.
F.M. Lehman (copyright 1919, renewed 1947)

Did anyone ever sing this song - "The Brown Blade"- in North Carolina?

There's a very noxious weed, fed by appetite and greed,
That is chewed by worms and goats and foolish man;
It discolors tooth and tongue in the age and the young,
It is time we placed this poison under ban.
We have seen church members, too, often slyly smoke and chew,
Heard them sing of heav'n and golden crowns to wear;
But they never will get through be they Gentile, Greek, or Jew,
God has said the filthy folks will not be there.

Some use the filthy stuff in the form of powdered snuff
On their gums or else they snuff it up their nose;
And a snuffiend who can smell with his breath the taint of - - well?
He is soaked in nicotine from heard to toes.
Though you think this song is odd
It will take the grace of God to regenerate the users of the weed.
It is time we were afraid of the brown tobacco blade
For the manhood of the nation we will plead.

Hell will reap a harvest yet through the deadly cigarette,
For our boys and even girls are gone astray;
Can our youth be truly just when the great Tobacco Trust
Flaunts its deadly wares before them night and day?
It is not enough to frown; we must break this evil down
By publicity and pray'r, both far and wide;
With no tombstone at his head,
Ol' John Barleycorn lies dead - King Tobacco shall be buried at his side.

Heaven is a clean place, no tobacco there.
All the folks are holy over there.
If you refuse to do God's will,
The Book syas you shall be filthy still.
F.M. Lehman (copyright 1920, renewed 1948).

People REALLY hated cigarettes back then. Check out this song: "King Nicotine Must Die!"

I have walked the woodland meadows
where the sunbeams flashed and broke,
But I never saw the cattle nor the sheep and horses smoke.
I have watched the birds in wonder
When the world with dew was wet,
But I never saw a robin smoke a filthy cigarette.

We broke the beer and whiskey jug, we smashed the license plan,
We'll take away the pipe and plus - We will; we know we can.
We voted out the vile saloon and made the nation dry;
Tobacco, too, must go; and soon, King Nicotine must die!

I have fished in many a river
When the sucker crop was ripe,
But I never saw a catfish puffing at a brierwood pipe.
I have watched the playful monkey
eating peanuts from my hand
But I never saw it dipping snuff at some tobacco stand.

I have listened to the cricket
And the droning katydid
But they never sang their love song through the droolings of a quid.
I have seen the hooting wood owl
sitting on its lonely crag,
But I never saw if puffing at a two-inch Turkish fag.

Finally, hot on the heels of the Scopes Monkey Trial, churches (somewhere) sang this song:

The "wise and prudent" tell me just what once I used to be -
A "germ" and then a "tadpole" then a "monkey" up a tree;
But just because a coconut fell on their poor old head
should be no reason I believe what disbelief has said:
They're guessing! Just guessing - only guessing!
(slowly here)
God made you and me. We're no relation to the money up a coconut tree.

Some ignoramus of the schools in mortarboard and gown
Declares this "monkey business" has been ably shifted down;
He guessed because a coconut fell on his hollow head
that evolution must be true; that Christ the Lord is dead.
F.M. Lehman (copyright 1924, renewed 1951).

This puts "God of Earth and Outer Space" on the level of "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross."

The Perfect Hymn: "My Mother is in My Mansion in Glory"

2008-06-11T08:45:00.002-04:00

In the near-constant battle of today’s “worship wars,” two different ages tout the glories of their songs and denounce the woes of the “other kind of songs.” The battle line is usually one of style, which basically is synonymous with differing eras. People of all ages come to the same church and all of them want songs like they sang when they were growing up. Everyone likes familiarity. What we fail to admit is that our memories of our “golden days” are selective – we remember the good and forget the bad. We also fail to remember or realize that all eras have some of each.

To be sure, many of today’s popular worship songs are simply horrible. They suffer from unsingable tunes or from theologically weak lyrics. It is often hard to discern if you are singing a song to your Savior or to your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse. Also, what will future generations think of the depth of this song?

Yes Lord, Yes Lord, Yes Yes Lord,
Yes Lord, Yes Lord, Yes Yes Lord,
Yes Lord, Yes Lord, Yes Yes Lord. Amen.

The older generation might hear such words and scoff at the theological airiness of such lyrics. I join them. However, their memories are selective. It wasn’t all “Power in the Blood” and “Amazing Grace” back in the day, either. Rodney Harrison, our Minister of Music, was just presented with a two boxes full of old hymnals and songbooks. A quick glance through these books from the 1920s-1950s brought many a raised eyebrow.

It was soon apparent that many of these songs centered on certain themes. In particular, I was amazed at the number of “going home” songs. Generations past seemed to focus a great deal on leaving this earth behind and were in a hurry to get to glory. I assume the recent Great Depression had a lot to do with that, not to mention World War I and the looming World War II. I'd want out of here, as well. But take a look at some titles from a few songs:

I Want to Go There, Don’t You?
When I Enter the Gate
I’ll Be Singing in my New Home
I Am Going to My Home
I’m on the Highway of Love
There’s a Mansion
There’s a Mansion in the Sky
And, my favorite, There’s No Housing Shortage in Heaven. Here are the lyrics:

There’s no housing shortage in heaven,
No searching for somewhere to live,
No signs “We are sorry, no children”
No bribes to an agent to give;
We’ll never be bothered by landlords,
Demanding their rent when it’s due,
Up there we may live in a mansion,
Rent-free, and utilities, too.

There’s no housing shortage in heaven,
I’m bound for that home all my own.
“Twas purchased for me by my Savior,
No mortgage, no trust deed, or loan;
I’m going to live there forever,
No taxes, no rentals to pay,
What a joy will be mine in that country divine,
When I come to my last moving day.
Grover C. (Grandad) Hite and J.R. (Pap) Baxter, Jr., 1946

Another common theme was “mothers.” I was stunned by the number of songs extolling the virtures of motherhood or mourning the passing of long-lost mothers. Here are some titles:

O Dear Mother (Once I had a precious mother . . . )
O Mother How We Miss You
Heaven is Nearer Since Mother is There
Once again, one in particular stood out. Here are the lyrics to Shake My Mother’s Hand For Me:

When you reach that golden city,
Friends and loved ones you will see;
When the saints come out to meet you,
O shake my mother’s hand for me.

There are times I often wonder
How can all these trials be?
Time can’t keep me here much longer
O shake my mother’s hand for me.

Over there you’ll meet my Savior
Many others you will see.
When you’ve had a talk with Jesus,
O shake my mother’s hand for me.
Eugene Wright, 1937

Some songs reveal religious attitudes of the day (that often remain). Here’s another good example:

Ain’t it a shame to work on Sunday,
Ain’t it a shame, a working shame
Ain’t it a shame to work on Sunday,
Ain’t it a shame, a working shame.
When you got Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday
And you got Thursday, Friday and Saturday,
Ain’t it a shame.

Ain’t it a shame to joyride on Sunday . . .
Ain’t it a shame to gossip on Sunday . . .
Ain’t it a shame to lie on Sunday . . .
Cook and Whitworth, 1939.

Finally, I noted this song: R.E. Winset wrote “The Skeptic’s Daughter,” a true story in song. It contains 17 (!) verses.

However, either in today’s or yesterday’s music, none compare to the songs in “Songs that Are Different” by F.M. Lehman. This collection of songs published by Lillenas Publishing in Kansas City sometime in the late 1940s is amazingly bad. How bad? You’ll find out in the next post.

I Suddenly Lost My Appetite

2008-06-05T09:21:00.002-04:00

It's great working where I do. The pastoral staff at Western Avenue is comprised of good friends who enjoy being around each other. Our staff meetings contain almost as much laughter as anything else. We also go out to eat as a group a lot and I really look forward to these times. However, I recognize some things in this list that I need to repent of:

Eat this, Not that!

See especially the #1 Worst Food in America - doesn't it look delicious!?! What an illustration for the illusory attraction of sin.

Habitat for Humanity and Planned Parenthood

2008-06-02T08:27:00.004-04:00

If you could stop Planned Parenthood from continuing their evil agenda, would you do it? That was the question facing Habitat for Humanity last week:

In an agreement with Planned Parenthood, Habitat for Humanity is allowing the group to bypass zoning regulations in Sarasota, Fla., that restrict the opening of abortion facilities “without the presence of a multifamily liner building.”

According to a statement released earlier this month by the Sarasota City Commission, Habitat for Humanity will reportedly facilitate the opening of Planned Parenthood in the area through a $10 real estate purchase from the group.

More information is found here and here. The way I understand it is that Planned Parenthood could not have gone forward with their plans without the help of Habitat for Humanity. If you stood in the way and Planned Parenthood came to you with hat in hand, what would you have done?

Preforeordestination and Other Theologicalish Words

2008-05-30T19:23:00.005-04:00

Huck Finn once complained about going to church, saying,

Next Sunday, we all went to church, about three mile, everybody a-horseback. The men took their guns along, so did Buck, and kept them between their knees or stood them handy against the wall. The Shepherdsons done the same. It was pretty ornery preaching — all about brotherly love, and such-like tiresomeness; but everybody said it was a good sermon, and they tall talked it over going home, and had such a powerful lot to say about faith, and good works, and free grace, and preforeordestination, and I don't know what else, that it did seem to me to be one of the roughest Sundays I had run across yet (Ch. 18).

Just in case you're wondering about the deep theological meaning behind "preforeordestination" and other such terms in the debate, here are two equal-opportunity-offender dictionaries for both sides of the Calvinist - Anything But Calvinist positions (which includes the Pelagian - Arminian - Semi-Pelagian - Moderate Calvinist - Anabaptist - Yarnell Baptist Calvinist - Caner Baptist Biblicist positions (I know I'm leaving out some of the other "non-Calvinist positions - I apologize).

Calvinist Dictionary

Anything but Calvinist Dictionar y

Let the complaints that neither side understands the other begin . . . NOW!

The Gospel of Judas and the Humiliation of National Geographic

2008-05-28T09:25:00.004-04:00

In the spring of 2006, a news conference was held to announce the discovery of an ancient document that presents a "new and improved" Judas. The National Geographic Society and National Geographic channel spent millions to research, translate, print, and televise a lot of information on the Gospel of Judas. The most recent edition of The Journal of Higher Education presents the following:

In 2004, National Geographic bought the rights to translate and publish the gospel for a reported $1-million. Under the terms of the deal, the society wouldn't own the manuscript, which — once it was restored — would be displayed in Cairo's Coptic Museum.

What National Geographic had bought access to was more like a puzzle than a book. As one scholar explains it, imagine that you have 10 pieces of paper with writing on both sides. Now take those 10 pages and tear them up into tiny pieces. Then get rid of, say, a third of those pieces. Take what's left, place it in a shoebox, and shake it. Now try to reconstruct the original 10 pages, keeping in mind that the fragile pieces must match on both sides.

However, recent information has come forth that puts all of the work done by the Society into serious academic question. The same article says:

"Ancient Document, Judas, Minus the Betrayal," read the headline in The New York Times. The British paper The Guardian called it "a radical makeover for one of the worst reputations in history." A documentary that aired a few days later on National Geographic's cable channel also pushed the Judas-as-hero theme. The premiere attracted four million viewers, making it the second-highest-rated program in the channel's history, behind only a documentary on September 11.

But almost immediately, other scholars began to take issue with the interpretation of Meyer and the rest of the National Geographic team. They didn't see a good Judas at all. In fact, this Judas seemed more evil than ever. Those early voices of dissent have since grown into a chorus, some of whom argue that National Geographic's handling of the project amounts to scholarly malpractice. It's a perfect example, critics argue, of what can happen when commercial considerations are allowed to ride roughshod over careful research. What's more, the controversy has strained friendships in this small community of religion scholars — causing some on both sides of the argument to feel, in a word, betrayed.

Al Mohler writes:

There were disturbing elements to the story, however. The National Geographic Society clearly aimed at making a financial gain through the much-publicized book and television documentary. More importantly, the Society did not make the actual manuscript available for other scholars to check and consult.

A devastating analysis of the actual translation put forth by the Society and its chosen scholars came from Professor April D. DeConick of Rice University. In her book, The Thirteenth Apostle: What the Gospel of Judas Really Says, DeConick proved that the most famous "finding" offered by the National Geographic Society translation (claiming that Judas was good and not evil) was a complete misrepresentation of the text and a profound mistranslation. . . .

It is clear that the media were misled -- and that the media then mislead their audiences. Now, when the integrity of the entire project is called into doubt, the media are far less interested.

The Chronicle of Higher Education is to be commended, the National Geographic Society should be humiliated, and Christians should be reminded once again not to be shaken by media sensationalism. The discovery of the "Gospel of Judas" changes nothing except to add yet another manuscript to the pile of false gospels and Gnostic documents.

When those scholars misrepresented the "Gospel of Judas," they betrayed not only the public trust, but the truth.

Godless Communists and Clueless Christians

2008-05-28T07:00:00.003-04:00

It seems that China, in its continual effort to put its best foot forward in their Olympic year, only serves to remind the world how backward and ungodly the leadership really is. After the earthquake in the Sichuan province several days ago, the "Compassionate Communist" government has offered the following, according to the Associated Press:

“Parents whose only child was killed or maimed in China’s earthquake would be allowed to have another, officials who administer the country’s one-child policy in part of the disaster zone said Monday, offering some solace to grieving couples.
“Couples whose only child was killed, severely injured or disabled in the quake can get a certificate allowing them to have another child, said the Chengdu Population and Family Planning Committee, which oversees the policy in the capital of Sichuan province.”

Nothing proclaims the value of a human life like a new law saying, "Just go have yourself another one." The government's actions reveals their thoughts that children are replaceable commodities. As I write this, I am reminded of a class I taught last summer on "A Biblical Look at the Death of Infants." In that class, we looked at what to say and what not to say in the event of such a tragedy. Christians are typically at a loss for words and end up saying some very hurtful, though unintentional things. We must be careful that we don't betray our feelings toward children by saying something like, "At least you're young; you can always have another child." No, that mother and father lost a dear precious child, a soul that counts and a life they'll always remember no matter how short it was. You can never "replace" a child.

Christians understand this. I don't think China does.

HT: Denny Burk

Good Questions about the Future of the SBC

2008-05-23T19:33:00.006-04:00

Nathan Finn has begun writing a series of posts based on questions he fields on an annual basis as professor at Southeastern. So far, he has dealt with four of them:

1. What is all the fuss about at the International Mission Board? (Variation: What do you [NAF] think about the new IMB rules?) (Variation 2: Is there really a problem with missionaries who are speaking in tongues?) If you are unfamiliar with why this question is #1, there has been a lot of controversy over two decisions made by the IMB regarding those whom it will allow to serve on the mission field. First, they must have undergone a "valid" baptism. Second, they must not engage in a private prayer language. Finn gives his two cents on both issues.

2. Will the SBC split over Calvinism? (Variation: Do you think they will “kick out” all the Calvinists one day?) Finn points to four groups of people on this issue: Non-cooperative Non-Calvinists, Cooperative Non-Calvinists, Cooperative Calvinists, and Non-cooperative Calvinists. Finn expresses hope for the Convention as along as the two extreme positions above cease and desist. However, that seems unlikely because both groups feed off one another and both feel entitled to exercise dominion over their "authentic Baptist" fiefdom. Finn's final position on a split over Calvinism:

I do not think the SBC will divide over Calvinism, though it is possible if the extremes do not tone it down or move on. . . .If the above-mentioned cooperation does not happen, then yes, we will divide over Calvinism. The SBC will lose a healthy chunk of its “younger leaders” and the annual meetings will be attended by 1500 senior citizens and “harvest evangelists” while Sovereign Grace and Reformed Baptist churches will get a surge of new pastors and missionaries who drink sweet tea, eat grits, and root for SEC football. When that happens, there will be no Great Commission Resurgence and the Conservative Resurgence will prove to be little more than the last gasp of an ultimately irrelevant group of Baptists in the American South and Southwest. And that will be a shame.

3 & 4: Skipped for now

5. When will the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina become really conservative? (Variation: Is there any hope for the Biblical Recorder?) It is becoming more conservative but there are still much more to do.

6. I’m not a cessasionist–is there a place for me in the SBC? (Variation: I don’t have a problem with speaking in tongues, but I don’t personally do it–can I be a missionary?) [SIDENOTE: Speaking of cessationism, Dr. Jim Hamilton of Southern says we all are (at least those of us who believe in a closed canon.]

Dr. Finn is one of the best young thinkers in the SBC and one worth reading. I look forward to reading more of his thoughts on these good questions that we all should be asking.

Christianity or Jesusanity

2008-05-23T19:23:00.005-04:00

Justin Taylor interviews Dr. Darrell Bock of Dallas Theological Seminary. He recently co-wrote Dethroning Jesus with Dan Wallace, a book about our culture's bent on "loving Jesus" as long as it is not the Jesus of Scriptures. In fact, they put forth an entirely new American religion:

Central to your book is the claim that there are two competing Jesus stories: Christianity and Jesusanity. Can you explain what you mean by these terms and how these visions differ?

Christianity is the old, well-known, biblical story that Jesus was the Messiah and came to restore a broken relationship with humanity through his work as Son of God. In other words, Jesus’ person is key to Christianity.

Jesusanity is the alternative “cultural Christianity,” where Jesus is a prophet, even a religious great, but his person is not involved in God’s program, only his teaching on how we can know God through ourselves. Thus the person of Jesus and the centrality of him in what God is doing is ignored. This is now a quite widespread claim in many TV documentaries about Jesus, especially on niche historical channels.

A New Hymnbook, A New Old Hymn

2008-05-23T10:05:00.006-04:00

Lifeway has announced that a new Baptist Hymnal will be produced in 2008. It appears that the organizers of this new book are getting serious about the theology of our hymnody, saying "the theology of the hymns and songs is so critical, the group was deliberately made up of theologians and musician/theologians." I am especially pleased to see the inclusion of Ron Owen, co-author of Return to Worship. I count Ron a good friend, as well as his co-author, Jan MacMurry, a member and parent of three of my former youth in my previous church in Kingsport, Tennessee. The committee will discern the relative worth of each hymn - both old and new - with the following questions:

Does the hymn speak biblically of God?
Is it God-honoring?
Does the hymn present a biblical view of man?
Does the song help us to cover the depth and breadth of our theology?
Does the hymn call us to true discipleship, service, repentance, witness, missions and devotion?
Does the hymn speak biblically of salvation?
Does it engage the whole person - allowing a person to express his deepest feelings?
Does the hymn emphasize that Christ is the Christian's Lord, Master and King? (the idea of total submission)
Does the hymn present an Americanized/Westernized gospel? (civil religion)
Is there a balance with corporate and individual response in worship? (immanence and transcendence)
Does the hymn speak biblically about the church, the body of Christ?

The list above makes me wonder if twelve Baptists in a room can come to an agreement on what is the biblical view of God and man but I am hopeful. At the very least, I doubt that Hymn #20 from the 1975 edition will make the cut: "God of Earth and Outer Space." I always wanted to shout out #20 during one of the "old-fashioned hymn singin's" we used to do in other churches. Sing along with me:

God of earth and outer space,
God of love and God of grace,
bless the astronauts who fly
as they soar beyond the sky.
God who flung the stars in space,
God who set the sun ablaze,
fling the spacecraft thro' the air.
Let man know your presence there.

Excuse me whilst I compose myself!

Nathan Finn, professor at Southeastern, also notes a hymn familiar to our older generation from the 1953 Broadman Hymnal. He writes that "a student introduced me to a hymn that I am convinced needs to be added to the new hymnal. It has history. It has panache. And it is Southern Baptist to the marrow. So without further adieu, I give you 'A Million More in ‘54,' the companion hymn for the well-known SBC Sunday School enrollment campaign of the mid-1950s:

A million more in fifty-four! Enrolled in Sunday School,
To hear the gospel, read the Word And learn the Golden Rule.
A million more in fifty-four, To leave the paths of sin;
To meet the Saviour, know His grace, And find new peace within.

A million more in fifty-four! The gospel will be sown
In hearts of women, boy and girls, And men who have not known
The saving pow’r of matchless grace Provided by God’s Son
Who came and died on Calv’ry’s tree To save them, ev’ry one.

A million more in fifty-four! Depends on workers true;
Our hearts, our strength, our wills, our time, We dedicate anew.
We each must visit, work, and pray In answer to God’s call.
A work to honor Christ our King Demands our best, our all.

Chorus:
A million more in fifty-four, Enrolled in Sunday School;
A million more in fifty-four, Enrolled in Sunday School.

[By W. Hines Sims. Copyright, 1953, Broadman Press]

YOWZA! I'm so thankful we didn't have to hear tortured lyrics from the "Everyone Can, You're It" campaign.

Alvin Reid, SEBTS professor of evangelism, makes a valid point in the comments to Finn's post: "I have often said 'if the 50s come back, most of our churches are ready.' By that I do not mean their evangelistic passion, because I wish we had more of that as then. But I do mean our obsession with conformity of style and method, and with the obsession toward programmatic ministry that was born in the middle of the 50s. I may blog on this at some point, but if one reads CE Matthews’ Southern Baptist Program of Evangelism (appropriate name for the times) one can see a double edged sword–I love the passion I read to see people come to Christ, but the meticulous programming sowed seeds whose harvest we are still reaping, and represents much of what we must change."

This song did mark a turning point in the SBC - a quickening descent towards the idolatry of numbers and the beginnings of our bloated membership rolls, both of which continue to be the cancer that we must fight within the convention and each individual church.

I've Been Monergized!

2008-05-22T21:13:00.004-04:00

Is that a word? It should be. I'm referring to the incredible work of John Hendryx and his incredible Monergism website. If you are not familiar with the word "monergism," Hendryx explains it this way: The word "monergism" consists of two main parts. The Greek prefix "mono" signifies "one", "single", or "alone" while the suffix "ergon" means "to work". Taken together it means "the work of one".

Monergism.com is the online epicenter of the Reformed world, containing thousands upon thousands of links to articles, lectures, and MP3s of reformed teachers and scholars both past and present. A few of my classes from our Wednesday night "Equipping University" have managed to be included alongside some of my heroes in the faith. Here are some links:

Lessons on Calvinism

Lessons on Textual Criticism (at the top under "Has the Bible Been Corrupted?")

Lessons on Heresy!

Lessons on Open Theism

We Might Have New Bills Soon

2008-05-22T14:02:00.002-04:00

The New York Times reports that a federal appeals court panel ruled on Tuesday that the United States discriminates against the blind because the country’s paper currency is the same size regardless of a bill’s value. “Of the more than 180 countries that issue paper currency,” Judge Robertson wrote on Nov. 28, 2006, “only the United States prints bills that are identical in size and color in all their denominations.”

The dissenter in Tuesday’s circuit ruling was Judge A. Raymond Randolph, who said the majority had too quickly accepted the plaintiffs’ assertions and rejected the government’s evidence that retooling or replacing the approximately seven million food-and-beverage vending machines in the country could cost $3.5 billion if bills of different size were introduced.

Other parties who would be affected would be manufacturers of money-dispensing automatic teller machines and, for that matter, manufacturers of wallets and purses, Judge Randolph said.

The White/Caner Debate Debacle

2006-10-10T18:56:00.001-04:00

Way back in March, I wrote that a debate was on the calendar for October 16. That debate is now cancelled. What a mess. I've been following this debate from its inception to its recent cancellation. I was planning to attend the debate with several good friends and have mixed feelings for the cancellation of the debate (glad that the threat of a "sound-bite circus" will be avoided but sad that the truths of Reformed soteriology would not be presented).

After the announcement of the debate, much has occurred:

Ergun Caner preached a sermon titled "Why I Am Not Predestined to be a Hyper-Calvinist." This sermon got the attention of James White, who parsed the message here (with a Liberty student online) but mostly here. Tom Ascol commented about the sermon on his blog. You can also get to a VERY thorough (and lengthy) critique by Gene Bridges here.
Caner later wrote an article with the same title for "The Liberty Journal." White answered that article here and here and here.
James White and Ergun Caner began exchanging emails to set up the debate. This simple act turned out to be very difficult and the emails quickly took a slight turn toward the ungodly. White wisely kept every document, which reveals some errors on both sides in behaving like gentlemen (although Caner surely exceeds anything White did in that department - his behavior is shocking for a minister and seminary dean!).
On June 13, White's blog says: The following e-mail was sent to Ergun Caner, Emir Caner, Brent O'Donnell, Tom Ascol, and Rich Pierce at 3:28pm MST, June 13, 2006.
Greetings: Allow me to state right up front that in light of the public nature of the debate and the issues that separate us, I will be posting all attempts at communication concurrently on my website.
James finally heard back from Lynchburg on June 22.
You can read all the emails here, then here and finally here!

More.

Some crass words from Ergun Caner to White. White apologizes to Caner for misstatement.

On August 3, I wrote of a breakthrough in the long and tedious discussions between White, Ascol and the Caner brothers. All seemed well and in this entry, it appears the debate IS ON!

On September 19, White wrote that the debate had less than one month to go.

Then, suddenly, trouble was on the horizon in the October 6 post.

In Brazil on Oct 6, White's debate partner Tom Ascol writes of the rumor of some unilateral changes in the accepted debate format.

Ascol announced there would be no debate (LOTS of comments after this post).

White announced there would be no debate.

The cancellation was deemed official.

On his website, Caner writes "Calvinist Debate Cancelled by Hyper-Calvinist. White responds to Caner's blurb.

Ergun Caner writes his take on the whole affiar on the Liberty University website. Without fear, without fail, without flinching!

White sheds a little light on Caner's behavior, parsing Ergun Caner's own official post about the cancellation on the Liberty University website. White goes through the article line-by-line, explaining some details that Caner left out.

White's fuller resonse to Caner's spin on the cancellation.

James White's internet radio show (The Dividing Line) has special guest Tom Ascol.

Tom Ascol writes PART ONE of "What Really Happened!"

Tom Ascol writes PART TWO of "What Really Happened!"

Tom Ascol writes PART THREE of "What Really Happened!"

Emir Caner wrote his take of the events. Though Emir still leaves out some pertinent details, his communication is refreshingly free of bombast.

James White responds to Emir Caner's article.

Check out the interesting cartoon.

Over at Calvinist Gadfly, "Willliam D" said this in a comment:

Mr. Caner's father died some years ago rejecting Christ. Caner witnessed to him on his deathbed but his father would not let go of his Islam. For Mr. Caner to accept that his father was not one of the elect must be a pretty difficult thing to come to terms with. I think that his zeal and anger against Calvinism is fueled by his refusal to accept that his father could have accepted Christ, but could not because God had not chosen to give him the faith to do so.

If true, that is good insight into Caner's behavior. A good friend of mine named Brian P also noted this: Caner is a former Muslim and well acquainted with the fatalism of that false religion. Perhaps the reason why he exhibits such vitriol towards the Doctrines of Grace stems from his aversion towards anything that smacks of any sort of determinism (whether hard or soft). He wants as far away from Islam as he can get - not understanding the difference between Islam's fatalism and biblical determinism.

While not entirely sure, these two thoughts potentially shed some light on Caner's personal hatred for reformed soteriology.

Some of my thoughts on Caner's constant use of the phrase: "I'm not an Arminian. I'm not a Calvinist. I'm a Baptist." To put it briefly, it's a nonsensical statement.

Some other thoughts of mine on two similar issues: Does All always mean all? and the role of Christ as our Mediator in the Book of Hebrews.

A very early post on "Let the Bible Speak: Being Blind."

A very early post on "Let the Bible Speak: Being Deaf."

A very early post on "Let the Bible Speak: Being Dead."

A very early post on "Let the Bible Speak: The Final Coroner's Report."

Who Said It?

2006-10-05T20:38:00.000-04:00

If you get this right - you're cheating:

While I am not a five-point Calvinist, I salute the great impact that Calvin made on the world. With Calvin’s high view of the sovereignty of God, his great commitment to word-for-word inerrancy of Scripture, his understanding of the total depravity of man, and his unashamed support for the blood atonement of Jesus Christ; Calvin’s anointed scholarship produced men who went around the world teaching the Reformed view of theology that has become the foundation of Presbyterianism and traditional evangelical Christianity.

Thinking Like Paul

2006-09-09T21:01:00.000-04:00

When you talk with someone about the doctrine of salvation (soteriology), do they accuse you of making God seem unjust? Or unrighteous? Or not fair? If they don't, then there may be a problem.

In Romans 9, Paul is laying out his understanding of how God works salvation in people's lives and knows it is a hard teaching. He even does us the great favor of anticipating his readers' objections. After verse thirteen's proclamation that ""JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED," Paul knew people would be puzzled and supposed the following imaginary objection: "What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be!"

He follows this up with an explanation of how he could possibly say something so shocking about God's stance towards Isaac's two sons: "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion."

Then, in verse sixteen, Paul writes "So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy." Again, the person that makes this biblical statement today will be castigated and will be charged with denying the absolute free will of man in salvation. It will be argued that if salvation is all of God, then how can God possibly punish those who never accept Christ?

Again, Paul anticipates this and provides yet another imaginary argument, writing, "You will say to me then, 'Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?'"

Now, here is the question I ask of you: when you explain your understanding of God's role in the salvation of humans, do you ever have anyone complain that your view makes God seem UNJUST or UNFAIR? If not, perhaps it is because your understanding of salvation is at odds with Paul's!

Bush, our Theologian-In-Chief

2006-09-07T22:20:00.000-04:00

In an interview with ABC News, President George W. Bush reveals why religion and politics make very strange bed-fellows. Bush does pretty well up until the 1:30 mark and then he turns sharply towards heresy.

Wall Street Journal Tackles Rick Warren

2006-09-06T09:20:00.000-04:00

Suzanne Sataline, a journalist for the Wall Street Journal, wrote an article on September 5 that takes on the biggest of targets: Rick Warren and the Purpose Driven Life/Church phenomenon. Her thesis is as follows:

Mr. Warren preaches in sandals and a Hawaiian shirt, and he encourages ministers to banish church traditions such as hymns, choirs and pews. He and his followers use "praise team" singers, backed by rock bands playing contemporary Christian songs. His sermons rarely linger on self-denial and fighting sin, instead focusing on healing modern American angst, such as troubled marriages and stress. . . .

Christians have long divided over efforts to adapt and modernize their faith. Some believers worry that purpose-driven techniques are so widespread among Protestant churches that they are permanently altering the way Christians worship.

You can read more here.

The Baptist Press rebuts the article here.

Heading to London Saturday

2006-08-11T00:47:00.000-04:00

I've been preparing to go to London for quite a time now. I leave with 23 others on Saturday night (Aug 12) for a long overnight flight to Gatwick to spend ten days distributing Arabic New Testaments to vacationing Muslims. I heard a figure the other day that said the groups before us had passed out over 30,000 copies of the Scripture.

God is truly doing a great thing within that people group and it will be a great privilege to be a part of it. American evangelism puts so much emphasis on the "soul winning" aspect of witnessing that little attention and no honor is bestowed upon the "seed sowing" part. Yet it is vital. All the glory goes to those who keep count in order to brag that "I've led xxx people to the Lord at my last revival meeting." To be sure, people are being regenerated in the power of the Holy Spirit during these past few weeks but the final tally will not be known until this age has come to a conclusion. I am satisfied with putting the only true way of salvation into people's hands and leaving the Lord to do His great work in their hearts as they read through His powerful Word. I am also hopeful that the Lord will allow me to engage in several conversations where perhaps I can be present when the blind are made to see and the deaf are made to hear.

Of course, to get to London means I have to fly - right on the heels of the recent terrorist activity in London earlier today. All seems to be well and all terrorist plots were averted before they could be set into motion. Praise the Lord for the diligence and hard work of the anti-terrorist protectors in London and America.

But now, my long arduous flight to London will begin with a long arduous ordeal in the Charlotte airport. I am not looking forward to that. In fact, I have no fear whatsoever of flying in this age. My trust and confidence is in the Lord and His perfect ability to complete the work He has begun in me. I don't know what my "expiriation date" is but He does and I can rest comfortably in that.

But I cannot shake the sick feeling in my stomach every time I think of standing in that long, snaking, slow moving line at the airport, shuffling my feet and luggage a fraction of an inch every couple minutes.

Then word came out that no carry-on luggage is allowed on the planes. No laptops. No MP3 players. No phones. I look forward to lack of electronic entanglements but no carry-on means no briefcases or backpacks with books. I can't imagine a flight of that length with no books. I'll take one or two in my hands that I don't mind losing if I have to toss it but I gotta try.

So, whoever reads this thing, say a prayer for our group that God would work mightily through our feeble attempts to spread His word and that many lives are made new through the reading of that powerful word.

White/Caner et. al. Speak to Calvinism Debate

2006-08-03T22:14:00.001-04:00

Copied from James White's website:

Since February 27th of this year, plans have been underway to schedule a debate on Baptists and Calvinism. Drs. James White, Ergun Caner, Emir Caner and Tom Ascol initially agreed to participate in this event which was scheduled to be held at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia on October 16, 2006.

Over the last five months, efforts to negotiate the terms of the debate at times degenerated into heated, antagonistic exchanges between the four participants. In both speech and tone too much of the communication has been perceived and/or characterized by sinful attitudes that have not honored the Lord Jesus Christ. We acknowledge our responsibility in this and deeply regret that we allowed it to happen. Each of us longs to represent Christ honorably and our intent is to conduct further negotiations in ways that will do so.

Through ongoing communication out of the public eye we have come to terms regarding the debate. It remains scheduled on October 16th and will involve all four of us. The topic will be, "Baptists and Calvinism: An Open Debate." The length will be three hours. The format will be modified Parliamentary. The place will be Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia.

We are committed to engaging in a debate that will highlight the significant differences that exist between our respective views of how the Gospel of God works in bringing salvation to sinners. We believe that such debate can be conducted in a lively, vigorous exchange that need not violate the standard for Christian conduct that God has given us in His Word. Our goal is to do exactly this. The issues on which we disagree are important. It is because of our love for Christ and His truth that we believe these issues are worth debating. However, we regard this as a fraternal debate and intend to approach it not as antagonists, but as brothers with strong disagreements.

To that end we are asking those who have followed the issues surrounding this debate to join us in prayer that the Lord will guide us as final preparations are being made and that He will help us to conduct ourselves in a manner "worthy of the calling with which [we] have been called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Ephesians 4:1-3).

Sincerely in Christ,
Ergun Caner
Emir Caner
James White
Tom Ascol

I am thrilled to read this. The debate had taken a decidedly unChristian turn and was bringing dishonor to the kingdom from all sides. It is good that these men (otherwise godly) stepped out of the public spotlight and came to a compromise regarding the sticking points of the debate. From what I know, the concessions are:

1) James White gets his three hours. The Caner brothers only reluctantly extended the debate from two hours to two and a half hours. At first, the Caners said no one would be interested in a three hour debate on this topic. Obviously, they underestimated people's desire to learn more.

2) The debate topic seems to have changed. Originally, the Caners insisted on a topic centering on the omnibenevolence of God. This all started from Caner's comments on Tom Ascol's blog about Calvinism being a "virus" that needed to be stamped out. It is good to see they will be debating Calvinism in the SBC.

3) The style of the debate will be a modified parliamentary debate and I can only assume that the moderator will be the coach of Liberty's national championship debate team.

Does This Mean You Get a Day Off?

2006-08-01T22:25:00.000-04:00

Scientology has established a list of their "holidays:"

To commemorate memorable dates in its history, the Church of Scientology observes holidays in all parts of the world through the course of the year. The most significant are celebrated with internationally telecast events to link all Scientology churches.

Here are some highlights:

February 8 - National Founding Day United States, to celebrate the founding of the first church in the US, the Church of Scientology Los Angeles in 1954
March 13 - The birthday of the Founder of Dianetics and Scientology, March 13, 1911, is commemorated each year with a major celebration honoring L. Ron Hubbard’s achievements and his continuing contributions to mankind. Outstanding churches and missions are recognized for service to their parishioners and communities during the previous year. (IS THIS LIKE CHRISTMAS??!!!??)
May 9 - Anniversary of Dianetics: The annual international celebration on this day salutes the publication of Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health on May 9, 1950. It is the occasion when Scientologists and community leaders from around the world acknowledge the contributions Dianetics has made to the betterment of individuals and society at large and the daily miracles that occur through its widespread application.
June 6 - On this date in 1988, the Sea Org Motor Vessel Freewinds began her maiden voyage, during which New OT VIII was released publicly. In memory of that day, OT VIII completions convene aboard the Freewinds for a week of special briefings and acknowledgments to new OT VIII completions for their work in disseminating and expanding Scientology. (WHAT?????)
Second Sunday in September - Auditors' Day - On this day auditors are acknowledged for their dedication in bringing man up the Bridge to Total Freedom. Top auditors from around the world are recognized for their efforts in helping their fellow man.

Steeler Stripes - The Reason for No Blogging

2006-07-25T23:25:00.000-04:00

Posting on this blog has been inconsistent at best and non-existent at worst for stretches of time. However, I have a good excuse. Let me 'splain.

Our home has a full basement, running the length of our home. When we moved here in 2001, there was only a single wall running the length of the basement - effectively cutting the basement in half. About two years ago, my father-in-law helped take one-third of the back half and make a very large bedroom. However, the boys were too young then to move down there so it became a "tv-room." Now, the boys are old enough and the girls are also getting to old to share a room and MOM AND DAD WANT THEIR BATHROOM BACK! So, back on May 13, I set out to finish the front half of the basement for a new TV/Rec room so that the boys could move downstairs and one of the girls could move into the soon-to-be vacant boys' room. Below you will see our slow but steady progress on the new room.

Andy Rosenbalm, a good friend from church and fantasy football cohort, agreed to help me with the project. To prhase that more accurately, he agreed to let me help him with the project. Andy is living up to his nickname - Handy Andy. This engineer from Kewaunee knows what he's doing.

Andy and I started way back on May 13 by building some walls for the bathroom and closet to hide the HVAC unit. The bathroom walls went up in one Saturday morning with no problems except the need to purchase additional drill bits to drill through the hard concrete. You can also see the shower unit which was not easy to get into the basement and left both of us picking fiberglass shards out of our hands.

Now the drywall is up and ready for mud. Andy and I hung the drywall ourselves but left the mudding to the experts. That was $500 well spent! I don't know if you've ever lugged 16 sheets of twelve-foot drywall but it is extremely heavy and awkward and "bendy." In the upper right of the photo, you can see the main trouble-maker of the project - a pipe that goes to the septic tank. The ceiling in the basement is about nine feet high to allow for a drop ceiling. This pipe runs along the front wall, getting lower and lower all the time. At the point where it hits the bathroom wall, it is about 93 inches off the ground. So our eight-foot ceiling ended up being 92-inches high. Fortunately, I don't know any 7'8" people.

Besides the approximately twelve "good ideas" I have come up with (Yes, I kept count!), here is my main contribution to the project (except perhaps the shower step - more on that later). We had a hard time figuring out how run the stairwell ceiling into the suspended ceiling. Here's the solution. The suspended ceiling was to run along the bottom of those 2-by-4s. However, we did this about four weeks prior to installing the suspended ceiling and we ran into some problems there. You'll see our solution later. Try not to laugh and professional carpenters - walk away NOW!

You are looking at the ceiling of the shower. This also caused a little problem. Because I didn't want to bust up the concrete, we decided to go with a pump-up system to take care of our waste from the shower, sink and toilet. We are using this ingenious little system - kinda like a blender on steroids attached to a powerful yet quiet pump. The picture tells the whole story except we were able to hide all our pipes in the walls so you'll never know you are using some weird type of toilet. Anyway, because we didn't bust up the concrete, we had to elevate the shower to allow for the placement of the p-trap. This raised the top of the shower to about just an inch above the top of the shower pipe sticking out of the wall. That just would not do so we built a little wood-n-drywall box above the shower stall to address the problem. This also allowed room to install a light/exhaust fan to take care of the moisture. All in all, a nicer solution than the original plan.

Here is the bathroom with the tile laid down and the shower step covered. The shower will mainly be used by my two boys (12 and 5 at their next birthday) and they basically had to crawl into the shower jacked up on 2x10s. This little step solved that problem and actually looks pretty good, even if I did build it unsupervised by Andy. Needs a little protection on the edges - any suggestions?

The family and I drove to Tampa/St. Pete on July 6 and spent a week down on the white sands of the gulf coast and also took in a Yankees/Devil Rays game. While we were gone. some very capable men took care of the difficult and dirty job of putting the mud on the dryall. They came about three days to spread the mud and then sand it down. There's NO WAY we could have done it in that time they did it and even less possibility it would have looked as good. Plus, we'd still be sweeping up the dust about five years from now!

The primer is on the walls. Ambra and I put this coat on the day after we returned from Tampa. My wife has been a great help and incredibly patient. You will appreciate that even more once you see what I decided to do with this room. My wife loves me a lot. She must because I am decorating this room in a Steelers theme. I've been a fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers since the mid-70s when I was an impressionable 10-year-old. However, I am also a faithful fan and stuck with them through the horrible Bubby Brister-years of the 80s. As you can see on the wall, I had a plan to paint the Steelers logo on the wall, which would be just above my television. After tracing the logo using an overhead projector, I soon realized that I could not paint that thing and be happy with it. I am still exploring possibilities for getting it on the wall (professional painter, vinyl stickers, stencils to paint it with, etc). Any other good ideas are welcome - send them my way!

Here you can see that I decided to paint that "tv wall" solid black. Most of the home theaters I found online have done that. Supposedly, the darker background really makes the colors pop out and the darks even darker. I'll still put the logo up there. You can also see my idea for decorating the front wall. Part of the Steelers' uniform are the recognizable stipes on their sleeves. If I had thought about it more, I might not have done it. I had to tape the walls in a three step process. First, while painting the white upper half and gold lower half, I taped where the black stripes would be and simply painted the gold and white in the correct places. Then, I taped above and below the upper and lower stripes on each half and painted the four outer black stripes. Finally, I taped the middle stripes and painted the two remaining black stripes. My back and eyes will recover about the time I turn 45.

While Rick was over installing the shower and pump unit, he suggested putting in a kitchen. He said it would be easy. He didn't say it would be as expensive as it was but we're all glad we did it. This will be very nice on those Monday Night Football gatherings. We also decided to put in ceramic tile in the kitchen area and bath. Ambra and I went to Lowe's and picked out the tile on a Friday night. We even brought four individual tiles home to just see how it would look. Then I went back Saturday morning to buy the eleven boxes for the kitchen. As Andy and I began putting the tiles down, we quickly laid down one column and two rows in a 13x10 pattern. Andy then noticed that the light looked different on one of the tiles. I quickly realized what had happened. We had installed on of the tiles purchased on Friday night - which were the correct ones. The other 21 we had laid were the wrong color - barely but still wrong. So we pulled them up, washed them off, returned them and started all over again. Andy is VERY patient with me.

Here you see our initial progress with the suspended ceiling. This is simply an adult-size erector set. However, you have to get it EXACTLY right from the start or you will never get it right. We started with a four-foot level and realized we would not be exact enough. After much head-scratching and phone calls, Todd Ellis agreed to let us use his rotating DeWalt laser. That incredible device made things go much quicker and even fun. It gets a little complicated working around the heating ducts but so far, so good.

I earlier mentioned the problem with the suspended ceiling and our stairwell ceiling. It was too high for the rest of the suspended ceiling - thanks to the waste pipe. We had to lower the stairwell ceiling and it runed out to need exactly three inches, which is also exactly the width of two 2x4s. It might not look good here (we know it doesn't look good so be quiet), but once some decorative wood trim is nailed up, no one will ever know (except the three or four guys who read this long blog).

Well, it is now late on a Tuesday night, July 25. I've spent the night painting and you can see the handiwork. Well, you can't see the third coat in the bathroom and stairwell but it is boring plain white. Here, you can see the final version of the stripes. The black stripes are a little wider than I wanted them to be but I could only find painters tape in 3/4" width. If I didn't use that, I could have accomplished the correct perspective of stripe widths but it would have also taken multiple more steps of tape-n-paint and I just couldn't bring myself to do it on this long 42-foot wall. You can also see the glossy black baseboards that will be nailed up soon. The carpet comes Monday and the black leather furniture comes Tuesday. After that, all that remains is to put up the closet doors on the HVAC closet, cut the countertop to size for the kitchen and cut the hole for the sink and then get the plumber and electrician over to complete their expert work. I'll post pictures of the completed project once it's done sometime in late August.

Who Said it? - Part 11 (A Real Shocker)

2006-07-17T20:53:00.000-04:00

OK, read through this theological heresy and try to determine who wrote these words. All of them came from the same person!

God is first and foremost an all loving Father, and any theology which fails to recognize this, in an attempt to maintain the sovereignty of God, is betraying everything that is best in the Christian tradition. Luther dimly recognized this, and attempted, although often unsatisfactorily, to stress the love of God. But not so with Calvin. It is justice and power that are prominent in Calvin's God. The God of the Genevan reformer was a monster of iniquity. He was so bent on justice that he possessed no conscience. He was so concerned about being respected and glorified that He found in Himself neither glory nor respect for men. When men become servants of such a God, they may be expected to set flame to the faggots piled high about the body of a Servetus or preach the sermon of Jonathan Edwards, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God."

Hence, we must affirm that Christ is a unitary personality, and this unity we find in his own ego. There is nothing in rational speculation nor New Testament thought to warrant the view that Jesus had two personal centers. We must then think of Christ as a unitary being whose divinity consists not in any second nature or in a substantial unity with God, but in a unique and potent God consciousness. His unity of {with} God was a unity of purpose rather than a unity of substance.

Concerning the work of Christ the two reformers stressed a substitutionary theory of atonement. They maintained that Christ actually took the place of sinners in the sight of God, and as a substitutee suffered the punishment that was due to men. But all of this is based on a false view of personality. Merit and guilt are not transferable from one person to another. They are inalienable from personality. Moreover, on moral grounds, a person cannot be punished in the place of another.

Another weakness in this theory of atonement is that it is based on the assumption that the chief obstacle to man's redemption is in the nature of God. But there was never any obstacle to man's redemption in God himself. The real obstacle to man's redemption has always lain in man himself. It is from this standpoint, therefore, that the death of Christ is to be interpreted. Christ's death was not a ransom, or a penal substitute, or a penal example, rather it was a revelation of the sacrificial love of God intended to awaken an answering love in the hearts of men.

We are compelled, therefore, to reject the idea of a catastrophic fall and regard man's moral condition from another point of view. Man's fall is not due to some falling away from an original righteousness, but to a failure to rise to a higher level of his present existence.

In the same vein we must reject Luther's and Calvin's view that man is incapable of performing any saving good, and that man can do nothing to save himself. Certainly we must agree that the image of God is terribly scared in man, but not to the degree that man cannot move toward God.

A final doctrine of Luther and Calvin which needs to be critized is the doctrine of predestination. Any form of mechanical determinism is far from adequate for lasting Christian doctrine. The Kantian "I ought therefore I can" should stand out as a prelude in any Christian conception of man. Any attempt to maintain a doctrine of man devoid of freedom leads us into needless paradoxes.

So, in the second paragraph, the deity of Christ is denied. In the third, the penal substitutionary atonement is denied in favor of a Grotius' governmental view. In the fourth through sixth paragraphs, original sin and total depravity are denied. Finally, the writer trains his sights on God's sovereingnty in salvation.

That's a lot of work for one person in one setting. Any guesses? You'll probably be shocked at who it is! The answer comes on Wednesday!

HT: James White

Big Thoughts for Little Thinkers

2006-07-03T15:03:00.000-04:00

I want my children to think. In fact, I told my oldest child (almost 12 years old) that if she ever got to the point where Christianity made absolutely no sense and was proven to her to be a bunch of nonsense that she should just abandon it all right then and there. I sure do not want her using the faith of her parents and thinking all is right in her world. That faith must be her own and I am trying to help her increase in those beliefs. I am also that confident of the rationality and authenticity of the Christian faith. It has withstood the best attacks the world could muster and all are to be considered glancing blows - "merely flesh wounds," if you will!

To work on this growth in the ability to think, I have invited my children to do some summer reading. For the two oldest (12 and 10), they have been reading two different versions of Lee Strobel's "The Case for Christ." The 12 year old is reading the student's version and the ten year old is reading the kids' version. Tonight, before we leave for vacation, they will take a test I made and will earn spending money for their vacation based on how well they do on the test. You may object to this form of reward but you do with your kids what you want to do. Here is the test I am giving them:

Suppose someone approached you and said, “Jesus is not God.” What would you say to defend the Christian belief that Jesus is God?
Is it possible that Jesus was merely a “good moral teacher?” Why or why not?
Do you have to trust in Christ alone for salvation? Is there any other way to eternal life?
What are some of the prophecies that Jesus fulfilled that shows that He is the Messiah of the Old Testament?
When were the gospels written? What are some evidences that show that we can trust their authority and reliability?
What would you say to someone who questioned the reliability of the resurrection of Jesus Christ?

How well would you have done on that little quiz? I will post their answers later and let you know how they did.

For the two youngest children (almost 8 years, almost 5 years), I just ordered three of these little books. They are fantastic books written at that age level discussing deep subjects like the Trinity, the Bible, the Gospel and the Christian's mission. If you have small children, I encourage you to purchase these for about $6-7 each. Each of these books were endorsed by some very strong men in the evangelical community (who also wrote the foreword in the volumes), such as Al Mohler and Earl Radmacher.

Personal Note: The "Gospel" book had a little bit of synergism mixed in but still a good quality book for my "little thinkers."

Read this! Read it now!

2006-07-03T14:50:00.000-04:00

Go here!

ABC News Reports Noah's Ark FOUND

2006-07-01T00:29:00.000-04:00

AOL.COM and ABC News arereporting that an expedition has found what just might be Noah's Ark. From ABC:

A team of Texas archaeologists believe they may have located the remains of Noah's Ark in Iran's Elburz mountain range.
"I can't imagine what it could be if it is not the Ark," said Arch Bonnema of the Bible Archaeology Search and Exploration (B.A.S.E) Institute, a Christian archeology organization dedicated to looking for biblical artifacts.

Bonnema and the other B.A.S.E. Institute members hiked for seven hours in the mountains northwest of Tehran, climbing 13,000 feet before making the apparent discovery.

"We got up to this object, nestled in the side of a hill," said Robert Cornuke, a member of the B.A.S.E. Institute. "We found something that has my heart skipping a beat."

Scroll down a little bit on this page for some photos.

However, even with ABC News giving this news a tad of credibility, this the same guy who earlier claimed to have found the "Real Mount Sinai. " and whose claims were found to be bogus.

Jesus: Our Perfect Mediator

2006-06-24T00:02:00.000-04:00

Preface: I wrote this a long time ago and truly regret the fact that I failed to footnote my sources. I now have no idea where each idea and statement came. Just know up front that I do not claim credit for all of this.

The very first chapter in Hebrews demonstrates Jesus’ superiority over the old shadows of the Jewish system. Every chapter that follows expands on this theme. Chapter seven introduces Jesus as a superior priest. The NT closely connects the work of Christ as our High Priest with His death on the cross. In this passage, we are told that Jesus, since He lives forever, has an unchangeable or permanent priesthood. Because of this (and in opposition to the earthly priests who pass away), He is able to save completely. He is not the Great Assistor who makes it possible for men to save themselves.

Hebrews 7:24-26
But because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them. Such a high priest meets our need—one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens. Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself.

Because Christ holds His priesthood permanently, He, as opposed to the Jewish priests, is able to save COMPLETELY, FOREVER, TO THE UTTERMOST. WHY is Jesus able to save forever? Because He intercedes for them. So if Jesus intercedes for those who are lost, the passage makes no sense. The biblical truth is that if Jesus intercedes for you, you will be saved.

Also, we see that He is able to save completely a PARTICULAR PEOPLE, i.e., “those who come to God through Him.” Of this group, Jesus, “lives to intercede for them.” At first glance, this seems to refute the position. However, as we [know], man can not naturally draw near to God. Only those whom God draws approach the cross (John 6:44, 65). Furthermore, would Christ (Does Christ?) intercede for those who are NOT approaching God? Christ’s intercession is only on behalf of the people of God. Christ’s intercession is for all of those for whom He dies.

Upon what ground does Christ intercede with the Father? Does He appear before God and ask the Father to forget His holiness and justice and simply pass over the sins of men? Of course not! The Son intercedes before the Father on the BASIS of HIS DEATH. Christ’s intercession is based on the fact that He has died as a substitute and has borne believers’ sins on His body and has placated the Father’s wrath through His act of propitiation. Just as the High Priest of old could not intercede for anyone without a sacrifice, so too does our Great High Priest not make intercession without atonement.

Someone might say that just because Christ intercedes for someone does not mean they will be saved. However, in the context of the passage, the writer is arguing the superiority of Christ as priest. The old priests could indeed intercede for an individual to no effect. If Christ does likewise, how is He superior?

Hebrews 9:11-12
11 When Christ came as high priest of the good things that are already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not man-made, that is to say, not a part of this creation. 12 He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption.

Did Christ enter the Holy Place having made salvation a “possibility”? When Jesus entered the Holy of Holies, He did so “once for all.” This refers to time (once for all time) not scope (once for all individuals). He did so by “His own blood.” When He did this, we are told that He had ALREADY “obtained eternal redemption.” This is not theoretical or hypothetical but a statement of fact. Christ did not enter the sanctuary to attempt to gain redemption; He entered HAVING ALREADY OBTAINED IT. So then, what is He doing here? Christ is presenting before the Father His perfect and complete sacrifice. He is our High Priest and the sacrifice He offers is Himself. We see the following truths:

The Son will intercede for everyone for whom He died. If Christ died as their Substitute, how could He not present His sacrifice in their stead before the Father? Can we believe that Christ would die or mediate for someone He did not intend to save? Can we further believe that God would accept that sacrifice - as a substitute - and then reject it later based on man's rejection?
Anyone for whom Christ dies will receive Christ’s intercession. If Christ did NOT die in behalf of a certain individual, then Christ will not intercede for that individual because He will not have the grounds on which to seek the Father’s mercy.
No one for whom Christ dies will be lost. Can we imagine Christ interceding for someone and pleading His perfect atonement and then the Father rejecting the intercession? The Bible tells us the Father ALWAYS hears the Son (John 11:42). Would the Father not hear the Son’s pleas in behalf of a man the Son wants to save? If so, then there is incredible disagreement and disunity in the Trinity.

Hebrews 9:24-26
24 For Christ did not enter a man-made sanctuary that was only a copy of the true one; he entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God’s presence. 25 Nor did he enter heaven to offer himself again and again, the way the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood that is not his own. 26 Then Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But now he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself.

Again, we see the finality of Christ’s work. It further says He appeared in order to “DO AWAY” with sin (other versions say “PUT AWAY”). If His self-sacrifice does indeed “put away” sin, how can man FOR WHOM CHRIST DIED be held accountable for those same sins?

Hebrews 10:8-14
8 First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them” (although the law required them to be made). 9 Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second. 10 And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. 11 Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12 But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God. 13 Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, 14 because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

What does the ONE offering of the body of Christ ACCOMPLISH? Answer: the setting apart, or sanctification of believers. Read carefully and consider the following:

What is the effect of the one time sacrifice of the body of Christ? Verse 10 above tells us that we have been made holy or sanctified! The Greek language is perfect tense, indicating a past and completed action. The death of Christ ACTUALLY makes us holy. Do we believe this? Did the death of Christ actually set apart those for whom the death was made? Or did it simply make possible the future sanctification?

Does ALL always mean ALL?

2006-06-23T00:23:00.000-04:00

Warning: VERY long post ahead!

You’ve probably heard the preacher say it. It goes something like this when finding a particular three-letter word in the Bible:

There’s this little word that I want you to notice. A – L – L. We know what it means in English. It means “all.” Well, I did a little study in the Greek language and discovered what it means in Greek. It means “all.” Not “some.” Not “many.” Not “most.” All means “all” and that’s all all means.

Determining whether or not this summation is accurate is very important, especially because it is often voiced after reading the following two statements:

I Timothy 2:3-4 - This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
2 Peter 3:9 - The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.

Before we look at those two verses to see how the biblical authors used the term “all” (which is “pas” in the Greek), we need to examine a few other passages to show some potential problems with this simplistic understanding and lay a little foundation for how we interpret (if we want to be consistent) the two main passages above.

First, look at the first chapter of Philippians. In the first verse, Paul states that he is writing “to all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons.” We have just established the audience. Then, as he continues to write, Paul addresses this specific audience repeatedly using very specific pronouns.

In 1:3-4, Paul writes that he thanks God for “you” and that he prays with joy in his prayers for “you.”
In 1:6, Paul is confident that God will complete the good work that He began in “you.”
In 1:7, he says “you” are all partakers of grace with him.
In 1:29, Paul says it is for “you” that is has been granted for Christ’s sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer.
In 2:15, he then tells the readers to do all things without grumbling so that “you” may prove “yourselves” to be blameless and innocent, children of God in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom “you” appears as lights in the world.

In 2:20, the subject matter of Paul's thoughts change. Paul starts talking about “them.” He says “'they' all seek after 'their' own interests, not those of Christ Jesus.” It seems quite evident that Paul is talking about two separate groups of people here: “you” and “them.” There is no way you will confuse the two groups in this chapter. I've not proved anything here - just laying some foundation that I hope you will remember.

Now, look at Romans 11:7-13. Paul speaks of some Israelites, saying that God gave “them” a spirit of stupor. He quotes David in saying “Let ‘their’ table become a snare . . . and a retribution to ‘them.’” He continues, saying, “Let ‘their’ eyes be darkened . . . bend ‘their’ backs.” Paul says that “they” did not stumble so as to fall. Instead, Paul asserts that it is by “their” transgression that salvation has come to the Gentiles.

Then, Paul says in 11:13 “But I am speaking to ‘you’ who are Gentiles.” Do you see how the conversation has turned? Different pronouns to speak of different groups. It is again very evident and undeniable. Do you agree? Nothing more to say here - only laying more foundational layers.

Let’s look at just one more important example - 1 Peter. It is important because it comes from the pen of the man who wrote one of the main verses mentioned much earlier. Peter, in his first letter, wrote to “those who reside as aliens, scatter throughout . . . who are chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father” (That is a discussion for a later time but it will come). What does Peter say about these chosen scattered aliens?

In 1:3, Peter writes that God is to be blessed because He has caused “us” to be born again through the resurrection of Jesus Christ . . . to obtain an inheritance that is imperishable. Peter is lumping himself with this group.
In 1:6, Peter tells this same group that because of what God has done, “you” can rejoice greatly even though “you” have been distressed by various trials.
In 1:8, Peter says that even though “you” have not seen Him, “you” love Him.
In 1:14, Peter calls his readers “obedient children” who should not be conformed to the former lusts which were “yours” in “your” ignorance. Instead, “you” shall be holy because “you” were not redeemed with perishable things but with precious blood. Peter keeps this up throughout the rest of chapter one and into chapter two.

Then, in 2:12, Peter writes this: “Keep ‘your’ behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the things in which ‘they’ slander ‘you’ as evildoers, ‘they’ may on account of ‘your’ good deeds, as ‘they’ observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.”

Again, it is an elementary observation that Peter is writing now of two completely distinct groups: “you” and “them.” It is undeniable and hardly needs mentioning except for the foundational application that comes next.

The above needed mentioning because of the two verses mentioned at the beginning of this long post, namely 1 Timothy 2:3-4 and 2 Peter 3:9.

First, since we just finished reading from Peter’s pen, let’s continue on to his second letter. In the first verse, Peter says he is writing to “those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ.” The audience is set – Peter is writing to fellow Christians. Again, he includes himself in this group. He will do so often.

In 1:3, Peter says that God has granted to “us” His previous and magnificent promises so that “you” may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption of the world.
In 1:5-7, Peter writes of “your” faith and “your” moral excellence and “your” knowledge and “your” self-control and “your” perseverance and “your” godliness and brotherly kindness. This sounds like decidedly Christian characteristics.
In 1:10, Peter calls his readers “brethren” and encourages them to be certain about God’s calling and choosing “you.”

From all this, we can discern that Peter is addressing a particular group. Then, in 2:1, Peter starts talking about another group – false prophets. He says the following of this new group:

In 2:2, he writes that many will follow “their” sensuality and because of “them” the way of the truth will be maligned.
In 2:3, “they” will exploit “you” with false words because of greed and “their” judgment and destruction are certain.
In 2:10, he says that because these in this different group are “daring [and] self-willed, ‘they’ do not tremble when ‘they’ revile angelic majesties.”
In 2:13, “they” count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime. “They” are stains and blemishes, reveling in “their” deceptions, as “they” carouse with “you.”
In 2:15, Peter writes more about this group: "forsaking the right way, 'they' have gone astray, having followed the way of Balaam."
In 2:17, Peter writes “these” are springs without water. “They” entice by fleshly desires.

No one would think Peter is still speaking of "those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours."

Finally, in chapter three, Peter returns his attention to the original audience but does not forget about “them.”

In 3:2, Peter says “you” should remember the words spoken by the prophets.
In 3:3, Peter says that in the last days, mockers will come following after “their” own lusts. As this group mocks the return of Christ, Peter says that it escapes “their” notice that creation speaks of God.
In 3:8, Peter cautions the readers to not let a fact escape “your” notice – that a day is like a thousand years to the Lord.

With all this in mind, we are now ready to read and understand Peter’s words in 2 Peter 3:9. He writes “The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”

Now, you see why I went to the trouble of working through those other passages. They have nothing to do with this particular text except to force you to be consistent in how you interpret the Scriptures. We see here that the Lord is patient towards whom? God is patient toward “you.” With all the passages given earlier in mind, who is “you?”

You must be careful here. How you answer this question will determine how you interpret the often misunderstood second half of this verse.

Obviously, “you” refers to the readers of this document – the saints of God. Can anyone deny this contextually? To deny this is to ignore all the evidence to the contrary and arbitrarily assign random meanings to various antecedents. You didn’t do it in the examples given earlier from Romans and Philippians and 1 Peter. Don’t do it now.

With that settled, the meat of the discussion occurs. After this phrase, Peter says that God is not wishing for “any” to perish but for “all” to come to repentance. It is at this point that "all" is said to speak of "every single person who has ever lived or will ever live," including "them."

However, it appears to be that the “any” and “all” are limited by the inclusion of “you.” God does not wish that “any of you” perish but that “all of you” come to repentance. Does that make sense? I think you would, at the very least, agree that this interpretation is plausible. You can not simply dismiss it as Calvinistic proof-texting or philosophical bias - especially since Peter returns immediately back to “you” in 3:11, asking “What sort of people ought ‘you’ to be?”

So, it has taken us a long time to get here but it appears that ALL does not ALWAYS mean "every single person." Sometimes it means "all kinds" or "all types" or "all of this group." It's just like someone sticking his head into a room and saying, "I want everyone to come with me. I'm buying lunch." Just how big a tab will this person have if by "everyone" he means "every single person" in the building, town, county, state, etc., etc., etc. No, we know what he means - "everyone OF YOU."

Now, let’s look at the other passage: 1 Timothy 2. Paul begins the chapter by asked for prayers to be made on behalf of “all men.” Did Paul mean to pray for every single individual alive at that moment? Was he suggesting that Timothy open the phone book and pray through it from alpha to omega?

Of course not. Paul gives us his meaning of “all” in the next verse, saying “for all men, for kings and all who are in authority.” It seems that in Paul's mind, he is equating the two groups. It is important because we need to pray for our leaders. We often forget that. It is easy to pray for President Bush. How many of us truly prayed in an intercessory fashion for the well-being of President Clinton?

Paul is using “all” to refer to “all KINDS of men.” We think this because Paul gives his reason for asking for prayer for “all men” – so that “we may lead a tranquil and quiet life.” What exactly will lead to this kind of life: praying generally for “every single person” or praying specifically for our leaders? The answer is obvious.

This is an important realization because Paul repeats the phrase in verse 4. He says that praying for all kinds of men, including leaders, is good and acceptable in the sight of God, who “desires all men to be saved.” Is God forever disappointed because His desires are forever frustrated since not all men are saved? Not necessarily, if you take “all men” to once again mean “all kinds of men.”

Is this an accurate interpretation? It is - if you take seriously the verses that follow.

In verse five, Paul starts the verse with the word “for” which indicates he is going to explain his previous statement. He writes that there is one God and one mediator between this God and man – Christ. In verse 6, Paul writes that Jesus gave Himself as a “ransom for all.” Did Jesus give His life as a ransom for every single individual who has ever lived or will ever live? Or did He give His life as a ransom for many (Matt 20:28)?

Before you anwer that, there are a few more things I want you to ponder:

How does Jesus “mediate” between God and man? Hebrews 9:15 argues that the blood of Christ allows Him to be the “mediator of a new covenant.” In 9:24, the author says that Christ did not enter a man-made holy place but heaven itself to appear in the presence of God for us. He does not offer Himself “often” but only once and then He sat down at the right hand of the Father (Heb 7:26 - "Unlike the other high priests, he does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for his own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when he offered himself." See also 10:12). The job was complete. In 10:14, we learn that “by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.” Has Christ done this for every single person who has ever lived?

To answer "yes" is to say that that Christ appeared in heaven before the Father, offered His precious blood as a very real substitute for the sins of every single person who ever lived and then sat down because God accepted that substitutionary sacrifice even though God would later punish those same people for whom Christ allegedly died and made atonement and propitiation?

What does it mean for Jesus to give Himself as a “ransom for all?” Jesus offered His blood as a substitute and God accepted that substitution. His wrath was propitiated – which means His holy anger burned no more on those for whom Christ substituted. Yet, that anger must flame once more at the final judgment. Can this be?

So, all does not necessarily always mean all. Agree? Disagree?

15 Thoughts While Watching The NHL Finals

2006-06-19T23:09:00.000-04:00

Tonight, the Carolina Hurricanes won the National Hockey League's Stanley Cup. For the uninitated, that is like winning the World Series for a professional baseball team or the Super Bowl for a professional football team.

And the sound that went up from most of North Carolina - a deafening collective yawn. Oh, the crowd was loud in Raleigh. The TV crew kept referencing their refusal to sit for any part of the game. However, for the most part, North Carolinians are in that strange season between basketball and football. Hockey? Never heard of it!

But, it IS nice to be a champion! And because I live here, I am a champion. I hereby claim the Carolina Hurricanes as my favorite professional hockey team.

Thoughts I had while watching the final period:

Hockey is a very fast-paced game with moments of amazing anxiety. Any action around the goal will definitely draw you in, especially action around your own goal while nursing a one goal lead.
I think I can name seven or eight hockey teams off the top of my head, besides the two in play tonight. I'll give it a go: Detroit Redwings, Chicago Blackhawks, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, Boston Bruins, Dallas Stars, Anaheim Mighty Ducks, Colorado Avalanche, San Jose Sharks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, Tampa Lightning, Atlanta Thrashers (? - a guess), Winnipeg Jets or something (?) and . . . that's about all. Hmm, better than I thought - twelve names and two guesses. Can you think of any more? How many are there - 30, 32, 100?
I do not know why television went away from the "glowing puck" from a few years ago. That seems like such a common-sense idea. You only capture brief glimpses of the puck as it skits around the ice like a laser. It would be nice to be able to see the thing.
I believe I heard the announcer say something to the tune of "back in April in the first round of the playoffs." Now, that is utterly ridiculous. Three months of playoffs???
Why would anyone want to grow up to be a hockey goalie? That is an insane thing to do. And it is a remarkable thing that anyone can do it well. The puck comes flying in at you, which would be difficult enough to absorb the blows, or it comes flying in near you, forcing you to track it with your eyes and get your body to block it by any means necessary. Sometimes that means using the handy-dandy oversized catcher's mitt or your stick (I can't believe any goalie is able to deflect a puck with that thing) or your body. Often while stretched out in a way that would make Mary Lou Retton wince. My hat is off to you, Cam Ward!
"Pulling the goalie" is a pretty exciting portion of the game. This is the strategy of the team that is losing whereby they remove their goalie from the game in order to get an additional offensive player on the ice in an attempt to get a quick goal. Of course, this leaves absolutely no defense on the other side of the . . . what is it, RED line or BLUE line. That happened tonight at around the 1:30 mark of the final period (I keep wanting to say "quarter") and sure enough, a Hurricane (that sounds silly, doesn't it) broke free and scored an easy goal to make it 3-1.
What is "icing?" It happened repeatedly tonight and I'm still not sure what it is. It seems to be when a player shoots the puck towards his own end of the ice to stop the action.
I am not surprised there is fighting in the NHL. With all the banging around, I can't believe there isn't MORE fighting in the NHL.
There doesn't seem to be much for a coach to do during a game. How can you coach the chaos that seems to be happening out on the ice. It all appears so random. All the Carolina coach did was chew on his fingernails and look silly in a suit. As for the coach's attire, I guess it could be worse - at least he didn't wear a hockey uniform like his players (as they do in baseball).
When will the politically correct pressure come against the Hurricanes and force them to change their name? We don't like mascots named after Native Americans. The Washington Bullets changed their names to Wizards. After Katrina and Andrew and Hugo and all the other disasters, someone is sure to complain about the emotional distress from hearing that name over and over and looking at the ominous Hurricane symbol all game long.
How do hockey players move so quickly and stop so suddenly and spin so gracefully with all that equipment on?
I was astounded by the announcers' ability to name all the players and accurately detail the action. Some entirely indecipherable action would occur, the announcers would let us know what happened. Sure enough, the soon-coming slow-motion replay would prove them right almost every time. Tonight, over on ESPN, I heard a baseball announcer start giving the end-of-inning rundown (0 runs, 2 hits, 2 left on base) when there were only two outs. Baseball is absolutely bucolic and the announcers can't stay on top of the game. Hockey is like describing the landscape looking straight out a car window travelling 100 miles per hour and the announcers can keep up with it - and keep up with all the foreign names (and not easy names like Gomez and Rodriquez but hard names like Farxzydinksiywak . . . or something like that).
The NHL is not exactly the bastion for racial diversity, is it?
The "beard-to-nonbeard" ratio is pretty high. Is that a playoff solidarity bonding thing or is the de rigeur among hockey players?
How come more people don't like this game? Now, soccer - I can understand the apathy towards that game. Put soccer on a field the size of a hockey rink and you got some action. Play soccer out on the North-40 like they do and . . . zzzzzzzz. Huh, where was I? (Sorry, Chuck - I await your rebuttal and will take it like a man.)

Calvinist? Arminian? Baptist?

2006-06-18T22:44:00.000-04:00

Logic is a good thing. It helps to have a working knowledge of logic and the use/misuse/abuse of it. One of the most beneficial studies you can make is to understand "logical errors." There are certain things that people say within the argument that makes the argument invalid. Their position is defeated because of the fallac y being made. A fallacy is a "mistake," therefore a logical fallacy is a mistake made in your logic.

One such fallacy is to engage in a "category mistake." What is a category mistake? Let me give a very real and relevant example.

A certain phrase has been appearing a lot lately almost to the point of becoming a slogan. That statement is "I'm not a Calvinist. I'm not an Arminian. I'm a Baptist." I heard and read that statement from Ergun Caner. The statement was uttered quite a few times at the recent Southern Baptist Convention. Perhaps it even resonates with you. It shouldn't. It is a nonsensical statement.

It is a nonsense statement because the one who speaks it or writes it makes a "category mistake." It is the same thing as saying, "I am not a Republican. I am not a Democrat. I am a Steelers fan."

Do you see the connection? In the hypothetical statement above, Republicans and Democrats belong in one category (political parties) and Steelers fan belongs in another (sports team devotion). In fact, one can combine the two - a Republican who likes the Steelers or a Democrat who likes the Steelers. Therefore, the statement is unnecessary and does not move the debate along.

In the same way, the "Calvinist/Arminian/Baptist" triumvirate does the same thing. The terms "Calvinist" and "Arminian" belong to a single category (a certain belief about the doctrine of salvation). "Baptist" belongs to a different category, defining how one views issues like church polity/governance, baptism, deacons/elders, mission work and funding, etc.

Also, in the same way with the political football fan, one can be an Arminian Baptist or a Calvinistic Baptist. "Baptist" is not mutually exclusive of the other two terms.

Next time you hear that statement, think it through. You can be sure the one who utters it has not done so.

Logic is a wonderful thing.

Christian Liberty

2006-06-17T18:52:00.000-04:00

There has been much discussion regarding the recent SBC resolution of "total opposition" to the consumption, distribution, purchasing or selling of alcohol. The speakers to this resolution did so with no biblical warrant. Instead, they were left with appeals to moralism.

In affirming this resolution, the convention has made the use of alcohol a sin on the same level as murder, adultery and covetousness. In effect, the Convention has now bound the conscience of its members with extrabiblical legislation - the very definition of LEGALISM.

Now, if you want to talk about a subject that the Bible classifies as sin and that Jesus denounced with a holy hatred, we will have to talk about legalism.

In a good series discussing the Christian and the liberty we enjoy in Christ, Mark Lauterbach over at "GospelDrivenLife" writes four articles that are worth reading. You can find them here:

Lauterbach is my pastor's good friend and former seminary classmate. He is always thought-provoking and gracious in his posts and shows a keen exegetical and theological mind. In short, he is well worth reading on a regular basis.

PS: I feel that after a few posts like this that I must make something clear - I do not drink alcohol and will teach my children that the best decision is to abstain from alcohol use. To discuss this issue on a biblical basis is to come across to some as "liberal" or "pro-alchohol." I am neither. I simply want my convictions to be based on the biblical text as I fully believe it is the SUFFICIENT guide to life. There is no need for me to add to what it says I must or must not do.

More Burleson on Wine-Drinking

2006-06-15T00:03:00.000-04:00

Over at Wade Burleson's blog (Grace and Truth to You), he writes of the alleged motives of Resolution No. 5. Towards the end, he gives this story about drinking wine and being a Christian. What do you think of it?

The following story is a beautiful narrative of reconciliation, conversion, and ultimate redemption --- all initiated because of a glass of wine.

Years ago a man came into our services and sat through the preaching time weeping. He was a wealthy, high profile business man who had just gone through a heartwrenching divorce because of his own indiscretions.

After the service he introduced himself to me and set up an appointment to see me for some counseling. This began a six month pastoral relationship with this man that eventually led him to an understanding of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the ultimate experience of Divine forgiveness.

All that was now needed was reconciliation with his wife. He asked if I would counsel them. I said I would, but when he requested his wife to come with him to see me, she said, "No. He's a Baptist preacher. All he will do is condemn me."

The businessman was crushed. I asked him why his wife was so hostile about Baptist preachers. He told me she grew up Roman Catholic and the only time she ever attended a Baptist Church the preacher yelled and screamed about the sins of the people in the pews including drinking, going to movies, wearing short skirts and long hair, etc . . . and it turned her off from "the Baptist religion."

I suggested that rather than have her come to my office that the man might want to see if his ex-wife (a divorce had since occurred) would have my wife and I over for dinner, just to get acquainted. To his surprise, she agreed.

To our surprise she was a gourmet chef. We entered the lovely home with the smell of French bread wafting in the air, and sat at the table meticulously crafted for a true dining experience.

Unfortunately, though the introductions were cordial, I could tell the evening might be a long one because of the chill toward this "Baptist preacher."

As we sat down, I noticed the brilliant table settings, the scrumptiously prepared French gourmet meal, and the solemn expression on the woman's face.

I also noticed there was tea and water on the table.

So this Baptist pastor said, "You can't have a meal like this without wine. Where is the wine?"

I wish you could have seen her expression. She smiled and warmly said, "But I thought you were a Baptist preacher."

"I am," was my response, "And this Baptist preacher knows a great chef when he sees one, and no chef worth her salt would prepare a meal like this without wine."

She asked my wife and I to follow her as she took us down to the cellar. She was a wine collector and she proudly showed us her collection, passed down to her by her grandfather. She meticulously chose a bottle of wine for the occasion and we made our way back to the table.

I led us in prayer and we thanked God for the food and the drink and His provision for us. We ate a wonderful meal and I enjoyed a glass of wine. Nobody around the table had more than two glasses.

To make a long story short, the walls that had hindered the relationship came down. We enjoyed the evening with the couple and as a result five things happened:

I was able to lead this woman to faith in Jesus Christ, showing her that Christ alone provided the righteousness she needed, and that she must forsake any trust in her own "self-righteousness." She trusted Him and was baptized shortly thereafter.
It was my privilege to perform the private ceremony where wedding vows were exchanged again and this man and woman were reunited in marriage.
The couple became very active in our church and have led out in our outreach of the lost in our community through Sunday School.
They have personally given tens of thousands of dollars to the Lord's work through our church and Christian school, and have personally been able to lead several of their own family members to faith in Christ.
They still have their wine collection, but have never been drunk since giving their lives to Christ as Lord.
Now, I ask this simple question to my Southern Baptist friends. What, if anything, is wrong with the events just described to you?

I am convinced that we Southern Baptists have for too long avoided teaching our children the principles of God's Word, and instead, substituted a system of religious morality that is often contradictory to the Bible, and therefore, when kids leave Southern Baptists homes they go off the deep end into addictions, rather than live their lives in the enjoyment of the things of God within the parameters established by God.

I have heard the argument before that "Even if one person becomes a drunk then I will abstain from alcohol because of it." The power of the gospel is absolutely lost in that kind of thinking. The drunk is a drunk because of the sin in his soul. His soul is transformed by the gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit, not by observing cultural prohibitions of a Southern Baptist. Christians around the world drink beer and wine without getting drunk. It doesn't hurt their witness. It seems the only weaker brothers I keep running into are Southern Baptist pastors who "stumble" when they see a Christian drinking wine. We Southern Baptist pastors claim to believe the Bible, but I sometimes wonder what Bible it is we are reading.

Well?

Ben Franklin's Religion

2006-06-14T22:39:00.000-04:00

Depending on whom you read, our Founding Fathers were either Bible-toting, Scripture-quoting, God-fearing Christian men bent on establishing a government a little short of a theocracy or they were nigh-athiestic deists. Of course, you can't make such broad generalizations about "the founding fathers" since they were individual men from vastly different colonies and families. Of some of these men we know much of the religious opinions. Of others, we know little.

Now, after reading Walter Isaacson's wonderful biography of Benjamin Franklin, I know more of his ideas.

On page eight, we see that Franklin's father, Josiah, was "not zealous about his faith. He was close to his father and older brother John, both of whom remained Anglican." Isaacason quotes another source that says Josiah's spirit of independence and intellectual liveliness led him to become Puritans.

For reason of faith and finances, Josiah moved his family to America in 1683 after the fall of Cromwell's Puritan rule in England and the restoration of the monarchy in 1660. The trip took nine weeks and cost the equivalent of six month's salary. Franklin was born in American on January 17, 1706 in Boston.

Franklin was an excellent student and was set to go to Harvard, a training ground for ministers of the gospel at that time. His father decided against it, saying that Franklin was "not suited for the clergy" as he was skeptical, puckish, curious, irreverent (19).

Franklin had an interesting relationship with the famous evangelist George Whitefield and admitted to being stirred by his oratory skills. Franklin also helped print Whitefield's sermons, which made the preacher famous and the printer rich (111). Later, Franklin recalled that Whitefield "used, indeed, sometimes to pray for my conversion, but never had the satisfaction of believing that his prayers were heard" (113).

Frankin completely abandoned the Calvinistic tenets of his father's religion and leaned closer to the deism that was the "creed of choice during the Enlightenment" (26). While living in London in 1724, Franklin printed Wollaston's The Religion of Nature Delineated. This tract argued that religious truths were to be gleaned through the study of science and nature rather than through divine revelation (45). Frankling decided that Wollaston was right in general but wrong in parts (45). He set out his own ideas in A Dissertation on Liberty and Necessity, Pleasure and Pain. It was so bad that he later was embarrassed by its existence, burning as many as he could purchase.

As he wrote in his Autobiography, "The arguments of the deists which were quoted to be refuted appeared to me much stronger than the refutation" (46). However, Franklin's overriding concern over spiritual isses was its practicality and he thought that deism, "though it may be true, was not very useful" (46). The most useful was Christianity, though he admitted that the Bible "had no weight with me" (46). Because Christianity was so useful, Franklin "paid his annual subscription to support the town's Presbyterian minister, the Reverend Jedediah Andrews" (84).

Eventually, Isaacson writes that Franklin began to "embrace a morally fortified brand of deism that held God was best served by doing good works and helping other people" (46). To Franklin, the idea that people are saved by grace alone is "unintelligble" and "not beneficial" (46). Isaacson writes that Franklin believed that a faith in God was beneficial but his faith was devoid of "sectarian dogma, burning spirituality, deep soul-searching or a personal relationship to Christ" (85).

Franklin had "little interest in organized religion and even less in attending Sunday services" (84). However, he was a spiritual being. He opened his November 1728 essay Articles of Belief and Acts of Religion with the confession that "I believe there is one Supreme most perfect being" (85). As a deist of some sorts, he also stated that "I imagine it great vanity in me to suppose that the Supremely Perfect does in the least regard such an inconsiderable nothing as man" (85).

This "Supreme Being" was far above wanting our praise and worship. However, since humans want to worship something, Franklin wrote that his Supreme Being caused "there to be lesser and more personal gods for mortal men to worship" (85).

As he grew older and prepared to die, his "amorphous faith in a benevolent God seemd to become more firm" (467). He wrote after the war that "If it had not been for the justice of our cause and the consequent interposition of Providence, in which we had faith, we must have been ruined" (467). He convinced Thomas Paine to not publish an essay that ridiculed public worship (Paine withheld publishing the essay for another seven years.

Franklin's tolerance led him to contribute to the building funds of every single sect in Philadelphia, including the Jewish synagogue. At the July 4 celebration in 1788, at Franklin's direction, "the clergy of different Christian denominations, with the rabbi of the Jews, walked arm in arm" (468).

One month before he died, Franklin wrote a response to Ezra Stiles, the President of Yale University (still a religious school at the time). Franklin restated his creed: "I believe in one God, Creator of the Universe. That he governs it by his Providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable service we render him is doing good to his other children" (468).

Stiles had earlier asked Franklin if he believed in Jesus. Franklin said that was the first time he had ever been asked that question directly. WHAT AN INCREDIBLY TRAGIC STATEMENT!

Franklin responded by saying that "the system of morals that Jesus provided was "the best the world ever saw or is likely to see" (468-9). However, regarding the issue of Jesus' divinity, Frankling answered candidly, saying, "I have some doubts as to his divinity; though it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the truth with less trouble" (469).

He was right in this statement. Frankling died at 11:00 PM on April 17, 1790 at the age of 84. Twenty thousand mourners gathered in Philadelphia as his funeral procession travelled the route to Christ Church. In front of the casket marched the clergymen of the city - ALL OF THEM of EVERY FAITH.

Sadly, Franklin now knows the truth.

The Controversy of the Cooperative Program

2006-06-14T21:33:00.000-04:00

Let me say from the outset that I support giving through the Cooperative Program. It is a brilliant strategic administration that has produced far-reaching success for the Kingdom of God. It's not perfect but it is very good.

From the Baptist Press, we learn that messengers to the Convention approved a request from the Executive Committee. The Press writes:

One of the recommendations now encourages churches “to give an increasing percentage of undesignated receipts through the Cooperative Program” but no longer specifies a 10-percent goal for supporting the missions and ministries of state Baptist conventions and the Southern Baptist Convention.

Another now encourages the election of leaders whose churches “systematically and enthusiastically lead by example in giving sacrificially and proportionally through the Cooperative Program,” again without mention of a 10 percent target.

Later in the article, we read:

Anthony Jordan, executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma and chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee, told messengers he believes this is one of the finest hours in the history of the convention and church members have a responsibility to step forward and reach the world with the Gospel. But, he added, he also believes the convention is “on the brink of defaulting in our responsibility.”

“In 1980 the Southern Baptist Convention gave 10.7 percent per church of undesignated receipts to the Cooperative Program,” Jordan said. “Today that number is 6.6 percent. In the greatest hour of opportunity, we’re walking away from our responsibility to fund the greatest missionary force in the evangelical history of Christendom.”

This is especially pertinent in the context of this year's convention. One of the major points of the presidential election was the fact that Ronnie Floyd's church gave 0.27% (that's zero point two seven percent) to the Cooperative Program. Our new president, Frank Page, pastors a church that gave over 12% to the CP.

So, what does giving to the CP actually accomplish? I did some "cipherin'" and after carrying over all of my "aughts," I discovered it does not accomplish as much as most people think. Many believe that if a church gives $100 to the CP, then $100 goes to the mission field. That is not true (of course, it is true with the annual "Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for Foreign Missions" and similar offerings).

Regarding the CP, let me explain. First of all, churches have four options for the allocation of their funds:

PLAN A - 67.5% of the money given by an individual church stays in the state of North Carolina and the rest (32.5%) goes to the national convention. There are no designations - the monies are dispensed by the agencies.
PLAN B - The same amount stays in NC but the balance is divided thusly: 10.5% goes to the national offices, 10.9% goes to Baptist colleges in NC, 10.6% goes to special missions and 0.5% goes to the "Adopt-An-Annuitant" program (caring for uninsured retired pastors).
PLAN C - The distribution is the same as Plan B except instead of 10.5% going to the SBC, that amount goes to the CBF (Cooperative Baptist Fellowship).
PLAN D - Only 49.5% of your church's dollars stay in NC. The rest is divided thusly: 5% goes to Fruitland Bible, 12.5% to special missions, 32.5% to the national convention and 0.5% to the "Adopt-An-Annuitant" program.

Now, let's consider PLAN A, probably the most popular plan, by looking at the numbers from a hypothetical church (Note: The percentages are actual numbers from the 2006-2007 budget):

A church gives $100,000 to the CP. Of that amount, a full 67.5% stays in North Carolina for state purposes such as our Baptist colleges ($11,319.75) and Baptist Hospital ($1,302.75) and Baptist Children's Homes ($3,186.00) and the Biblical Recorder ($769.50) and Administrative overhead ($5,967.00) and NC Home Missions ($4,509.00) and Fruitland Bible Institute ($722.250 and adminstrative overhead ($16,773.75) and more.

The remaining 32.5% of the $100,000 goes on to Nashville - $32,500. Of this amount, HALF goes to International Missions ($16,250) and 22.79% goes to Home Missions ($7,406.75).

Our six seminaries get a little over 21% ($6,955.24) and the rest of the $1,888.25 goes to the SBC operating budget, the "Ethnic and Religious Liberties Commission," the Annuity Board, and the Historical Library/Archives.

So, if you are keeping score, out of the original $100,000 given by the church "to missions," only $23,656.75 actually goes to the missionaries. That's less than 25%!

Again, I want to express my appreciation for the CP and all it has done to spread the gospel over much of the past 100 years. There is no doubt that the CP is a great innovation that has helped Baptists through the years do great things for the cause of Christ.

However, the dramatic language used to promote this program could stand to be toned down just a notch or two. The kingdom of God does not stand or fall because of the CP.

Majoring on the Minors!

2006-06-14T20:56:00.000-04:00

Morris Chapman encouraged everyone to major on the majors at the Convention and in their churches when they go home. Sadly, that admonition did not truly apply at the Convention.

A very important resolution was offered for consideration from the floor of the Southern Baptist Convention this year. Tom Ascol was the writer of this resolution that called for proper church discipline. Here is an excerpt from the resolution:

Whereas in 2004 the Southern Baptist Convention Annual Church Profiles indicated that there are 16,267,494 members in Southern Baptist churches; and

Whereas well over one half of those members never attend or participate meaningfully in the life of any local Southern Baptist church and are thus no different than non-members; and

Whereas the ideal of a regenerate church membership has long been and remains a cherished Baptist principle; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED that . . . Southern Baptists . . . repent of our failure to maintain responsible church membership, and be it further

RESOLVED that we . . . repent of the widespread failure among us to obey Jesus Christ in the practice of church discipline and be it further

RESOLVED that we plead with pastors and church leaders to lead their churches to study and implement our Lord's teachings on this essential church practice, and be it further

RESOLVED that we commit to pray for our churches as they seek to honor the Lord Jesus Christ through reestablishing integrity to church membership and to the reporting of statistics in the Annual Church Profile.

This resolution is needed and should have been accepted for consideration and debate. However, the reason given for denying this resolution to come to the floor for a vote was:

The committee questioned the validity of membership statistics and the assertion that "well over half" never attend or participate and
The committee stated that churches should not remove these non-attending members from their church rolls because they were "excellent prospects for outreach" and we shouldn't throw away our "prospect list."

WOW! If it is true that these peoplel are our best prospects for evangelism, then WHY are they on our church rolls. With this answer, it appears that the committee agrees that lost individuals can be church members!

As Gene Bridges wrote, it is the height of irony that many call Calvinists "closet Presbyterians" for their soteriological beliefs and these same may be called the same for opening the door for unregenerate church membership (because Presbyterians practice paedobaptism, it is very possible for a member of the church to be unregenerate).

As for majoring on the minors, another resolution did pass: the forbidding of anyone who partakes of alcohol to serve as a trustee for an SBC institution (admittedly just one part of the resolution). Many think this was brought up and ratified as a veiled attempt to remove Wade Burleson from the Board of Trustees of the International Mission Board. Burleson answers that assumption in a very gracious way and even throws in some good exegesis on the whole topic of drinking alcohol.

So, in the mind of this year's convention, it is more of a sin to drink wine during Communion or have a glass of wine at a dinner than it is to have a church with half of its membership heading to hell . . . on the church bus?

Darrell Bock now blogging

2006-06-13T20:54:00.000-04:00

Darrell Bock, the professor of New Testament at Dallas Theological Seminary, is now blogging over at bible.org (a most edifying site that I frequent often).

He has written many commentaries and books that grace my shelves in my office. He also wrote the best book on "The Da Vinci Code," in my opinion. His massive two-volume commentary on Luke from the Baker Exegetical Commentary line is superb.

Visit him often. You'll be better for it.

Live-Blogging at SBC

2006-06-13T20:45:00.000-04:00

The guys over at Thoughts and Adventures are blogging and updating every little bit as something noteworthy happens. Here are their thoughts on the Mohler/Patterson discussion.

Not everyone could go to the convention so this guy over at Provocations and Pantings is keeping up with all the blogging going all. You can go to his site as a sort of "clearing-house" for all the good blogging going on.

Report on Patterson/Mohler Discussion

2006-06-13T20:22:00.000-04:00

As stated long ago, the discussion on Calvinism within the SBC finally took place at this year's Pastor's Conference between Southwestern Seminary president Paige Patterson (my president while I was at Southeastern) and Southern Seminary president Al Mohler. Transcripts of this will be available soon but in the meantime, here is a fair and objective assessment of what went on by Tom Ascol (a truly gracious man).

The comments left at the end of the post were not always so fair but everyone's got an opinion. I did find it troublesome if Dr. Morris Chapman said what he said when he took the podium to deliver the report from the Executive Committee. Instead, it APPEARS that he took the opportunity to scold all the Calvinist meanies in the crowd. If true - that's bad form!

(NOTE: Tom Ascol just commented on the comments by Chapman. He wrote:

Morris Chapman addressed it (Calvinism), not in a mean-spirited way, but in an attempt to be humorous. I was not offended but appreciated what I think he was trying to do. BTW--he also made a negative comment about elders, but again, it wasn't mean. When I saw him later I shook his hand, told him I appreciated much of what he said and looked forward to getting home to discuss it with my elders! We both enjoyed a good laugh. His spirit was great.

Another blogger at the convention took extensive notes during the Mohler-Patterson discussion and writes an abridged transcript here. Sounds like the breakout session was handled very professionally and cordially, as should have been expected by these two men.

If you want the real thing, you can order an audio recording of the discussion here.

Frank Page: New SBC President

2006-06-13T20:16:00.000-04:00

Here are the voting statistics from the 2006 Presidential election:

11,346 messenger
9,005 casting ballots
44 disallowed ballots .49%

Frank Page 4,546 50.48%
Ronnie Floyd 2,247 24.9%
Jerry Sutton 2,168 24.08%

If Page had not got the extra 0.4% and finished at the halfway point, there would have been a run-off.

More Caner Critique

2006-06-07T23:09:00.000-04:00

Gene Bridges, ever loquacious, enjoins the post-NLJ frenzy and adds a resounding rejoinder (Warning: rather lengthy at 4,500 words) to Caner's article. He goes quote-by-quote through Caner's article and gives answer to each assertion.

I would love for those who read this blog to read both links above and sound off with their reactions and answer to these questions (just curious - that's all) :

Is Caner's use of "hyper-Calvinism" correct?
Is it acceptable to say "I'm not a Hyper-Calvinist (which means "Calvinist" to Caner). I'm not an Arminian. I'm a Baptist"? If yes, why? If no, why not?
What do you think happens to babies when they die? Why do you believe that?
Do you think God loves every single person who has ever lived and will live in the same way and to the same degree?
What is your opinion on "altar calls" (not "invitations" but "altar calls")?

By the way, Bridges, one of the best (and lengthiest) writers in the blogosphere, lives in Winston-Salem - not too far from Statesville.

William Lane Craig vs. Bart Ehrman

2006-06-06T20:59:00.000-04:00

These two heavyweights engaged in a debate on the resurrection of Jesus at Holy Cross College in Worcester, Massachusetts. Here is a transcript of the debate (38-page PDF file).

Ergun Caner and "Neo-Calvinism"

2006-06-06T20:31:00.000-04:00

In the recent edition of The National Liberty Journal, Ergun Caner writes the cover story: "Predestined Not To Be a Hyper-Calvinist."

As in his sermon by the same title, Caner continues to make the mistake of equating hyper-Calvinism with Calvinism. The title speaks of HYPER-Calvinism. Several paragraphs speak of HYPER-Calvinism. However, the brunt of Caner's article is a response to plain-jane Calvinism. They are not the same thing. The Dean of a theological seminary should know better.

I'll allow Tom Ascol to handle the evaluation of the article for the time being. Ascol is one of the two men (the other being James White) who will join in debate with Ergun Caner and his brother Emir in October at Liberty.

For a good primer on the actual definition of hyper-Calvinism, go here first or maybe here or here.

I wonder what she said?

2006-06-05T22:27:00.000-04:00

WSB-TV News in Atlanta (Channel 2) has this story, which raises some questions: Clara Jean Brown was struck by lightning while standing in her kitchen praying for safety in that very same storm.

Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia

2006-06-05T22:15:00.000-04:00

Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia is a fear found in the Western Christian world, which originates in the belief that the Biblical verse, Revelation 13:18, indicates that the number 666 is linked to Satan or the Anti-Christ. Outside the Christian faith, the phobia has been further popularized as a motif in various horror films.

Now, in June 2006, several are taking the opportunity of Tuesday's date (06-06-06) as a marketing ploy:

The Omen will open in theaters on this date. This is one movie you can count me OUT of seeing. No way, no how! Not superstitious or anything - just too easily freaked out with stuff like this.
Tim LaHaye's new book on the Rapture to be released on this date.
Ann Coulter's new book "Godless" will be released on this date.

I guess everyone thinks that God is stuck with using the Gregorian calendar which is based on an incorrect understanding of the birth of Christ (or, if you really must - the beginning of the Common Era. Ha!).

$55,000.00

2006-06-04T23:19:00.000-04:00

That's how much a church in Indianapolis is spending on an advertising campaign. Here is some of the ad copy:

"Do you know someone who is homosexual? Would you give your life for that person? Jesus did!"

Would Jesus discriminate?

A future ad will say this:

A Sunday edition of The Star will show a group of Klansmen around a burning cross with a headline, "Remember a time when a symbol of love was used as a symbol of hate?" The subtext: "The Bible shouldn't be misused to justify discrimination against any group, including gay people."

Oh, Lifeway! Why?

2006-05-31T11:44:00.000-04:00

I just got a copy of "The Source," the sales paper for Lifeway Christian Stores. On page three are some ideas to "honor the dads in your church with key reminders of their faith." There is a leather bookmark and a keyring shaped like a cross and then this item:

Here's the ad copy: "Based on Jeremiah 17:7, this tire gauge is a unique way to remind the fathers in your church of God's love. Each gauge features a cross and 'Jesus' is engraved on the handle."

You know, it's one thing to sell air pressure gauges. That is fine and good. However, it is another thing altogether to sell cheap air pressure gauges and slap the name of the Creator of the Universe on it and sell it as a religious item. That act borders on tawdry. No, it doesn't border - it crosses completely over that line.

However, the tackiness of the product aside, what really bothers me is the misuse and abuse of Scripture. The copy says "Based on Jeremiah 17:7." I have to wonder what exactly is based on that Old Testament passage. Jeremiah wrote, "But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him."

How can a tire gauge, a flashlight or a keychain be based on this passage? I just don't think the Weeping Prophet had in mind to build in a man the confidence that his tires were properly inflated!

Jeremiah might be weeping all the more now.

Now, if Lifeway could come up with a "TYRE" gauge!!!

Interview with SBC Presidential Candidate - the "other one"

2006-05-27T09:54:00.000-04:00

For many people in the Southern Baptist Convention, the election of the president is a foregone conclusion. Several denomination and seminary leaders have already come out in support of Ronnie Floyd. However, recently another pastor has thrown his name into the ring - Frank Page of Taylors First Baptist Church in South Carolina.

Tad Thompson, an SBC blogger in Arkansas, made a name for himself a few weeks back by sending several questions to Floyd that Floyd did not answer. Thompson sent the same questions to Page and got answers to all the questions within several hours. We might just have an honest-to-goodness election this summer in Greensboro instead of the typical coronation!

DAED SI KCAJ

2006-05-25T08:27:00.000-04:00

Say it ain't so!

If you watched the season finale of "24" on Monday night, you saw some satisfying scenes: Jack commandeering a Russian sub, Jack teaching an engineer the proper technique to slit a bad guy's throat, Christopher Henderson getting his come-uppance, a really cool stare-down from Jack to the kidnapped President and finally President Logan getting JUSTICE RIGHT NOW!

There was also a tender scene at the end of the show where CTU Director Bill Buchanon gave Chloe a picture of her with Edgar Styles, her friend who died when the Centox nerve gas was unleashed in CTU HQ ASAP PDQ.

However, what you might have missed was the scribbling on the back of the photo. The camera stayed there a little long and I was able to pause the TiVO (thank you, Lord, for my TiVO) and I took some digital photos. Can you decipher the "top-secret CTU code"? Maybe this is why CTU is so easy to infiltrate and escape - they utilize third-grade note-passing codes!!!

Photo 1 - Chloe opening photo - just to show you the context:

Photo 2 - Closeup of "coded" message:

Photo 3 - Closeup of some "secret numbers" (perhaps a Chinese fortune cookie):

Photo 4 - Closeup of Jack. He's got the Chinese right where he wants them!

I called the "fan phone," being the 24-nerd that I am. It connects you to a Nextel phone but it was "full." So, we have seven months to see what happens next to Jack. Hopefully we'll learn more about the Graham and the Bluetooth Gang, the location of Wayne Palmer and Aaron Pierce, the ability of Hal Gardner and vice-president !MIKE NOVICK! to govern the country.

Jack vs the Chinese army - sounds like a fair fight!

She'd Better Be Glad . . .

2006-05-24T14:14:00.000-04:00

Madonna had better be glad that Christians don't react like Muslims when their faith is affronted.

Go here to read and see an image of how "Halfway through her accustomed set of costume changes and simulated sex acts, [Madonna] performed her '80s hit "Live to Tell" while affixed to a mirrored cross and wearing a crown of thorns."

I Guess That's That!

2006-05-24T08:54:00.000-04:00

In Miami, the Associated Press picked up this story about a "political endorsement." Here are the pertinent quotes:

A reverend who introduced Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist during a breakfast with other pastors Monday said the Lord came to him in a dream two years ago and told him Crist would be the state's next governor.

The Lord Jesus spoke to me and he said 'There's something I want you to know,'" said Dozier, pastor of the Worldwide Christian Center in Pompano Beach. "'Charlie Crist will be the next governor of the state of Florida.'"

At a meeting with other pastors, Dozier introduced Crist this way:

"I introduce to you, as the Lord Jesus has said, the next governor of the state of Florida, Charlie Crist," Dozier said.

WOW! Why should we even bother holding an election down there? How did Crist respond?

Crist's first words were, "Well, as they say, the praise doesn't get any higher."

"It's the most amazing thing anyone's every told me," Crist said. "It's beyond overwhelming, but the reverend has a very strong faith in his heart and he's a good man. I'm very grateful for his help and his support and his belief."

And what of his opponent:

Chief Financial Officer Tom Gallagher, who is opposing Crist in the primary, wouldn't comment on the remarks after the event.

And why should he? What could he possibly say to a statement like that? Of course, Gallagher and two other candidates were there. They were all running for the same office and it appears that at least Gallagher shares Crist's moral values and Christian beliefs.

This brings up a more important issue. More and more, people are talking like this, invoking God as a source for all sorts of things. Recently, Pat Robertson said that God "told him" that tsunamis will hit the northwest coast of the United States sometime this year.

God told him that in January but Robertson didn't tell anyone until a few weeks ago. When did God get so "fuzzy in the details"? God told Jonah "Forty days and Nineveh is destroyed."

Sometimes, it is not so blatant. When Johnny Hunt nominated Ronnie Floyd for the presidency of the Southern Baptist Convention, he opened with this statement: “With strong conviction in my heart under God’s Holy Spirit-led leadership, I will nominate Dr. Ronnie W. Floyd…”

Now, this is obviously Hunt's personal conviction but, as another has said, the wording here is subtly implying that to disagree with this nomination is to disagree with the Holy Spirit. What if another pastor, also a believer indwelt by the same Spirit, is "led by the Spirit" to nominate another? Does the Holy Spirit give contradictory "suggestions"?

Later, Hunt said Floyd "called me last Wednesday and informed me that he will humbly accept this nomination due to God speaking to him dramatically through Acts 16:6-10. He never sought it one moment, but was drafted supernaturally to let me nominate him to be our next president."

In the same way, what if another pastor, also a believer indwelt by the same Spirit, is "spoke to dramatically" by this passage to run himself or to nominate another?

The author of this passage had one thing in mind - to tell the readers of the events of Paul's life. That is all that can be inferred from this passage. Interpretation is easy. This passage deals with Paul's unsuccessful attempts to enter Bithynia. Instead, we read that Paul had a vision of man from Macedonia saying "Come over to Macedonia and help us." In verse ten, we see that "After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them."

I'm sure that's how Floyd would interpret this passage. However, application is more difficult. Some passages are easy to apply - "steal no longer." This passage is different. It is "descriptive," not "prescriptive." I'm do not think that this passage speaks to the nomination to SBC presidency.

We all get "feelings" but there is just NO WAY to know if that "peace" comes from the Lord or from your own personal desires or maybe from eating a Hershey bar with all those released endorphins running rampant through your system.

Here are three good books that will help you escape the pagan ideas of "iscovering" God's will:

Floyd clarifies some of those quotes here and it is very obvious that he is a man of great character and love for the Lord. The issue I am addressing is not Floyd's ability to be a great leader for the SBC - I'm sure he will be, if elected.

However, the issue that needs to be addressed is the assumption that we can speak for God about anything based on a subjective feeling of "peace" that we can't adequately define. If it is the "peace that passes all understanding," who are we to say we understand it?

We do it all the time, myself included.

I, for one, will attempt to better edit my "theological language."

John MacArthur's Pulpit

2006-05-19T16:54:00.000-04:00

While many churches have gone to lucite pulpits in some attempt at relevance, the pulpit used by John MacArthur at Grace Community Church is ginormous. It is also famous as one of the first pulpits built on a hydraulic lift, capable of being raised and lowered into the platform.

Phil Johnson, blogger extraordinaire and right-hand man to Johnny Mac, wrote about the pulpit here. The pictures he speaks of in that past can be found here, along with the dimensions (just in case you wanted to build one yourself).

Finally, here is one confessional post from a former church member and custodial staffer at Grace. He tells of "riding the pulpit."

Da Vinci Code: Help from Unexpected Source

2006-05-17T09:21:00.000-04:00

This week, the most recent edition of U.S. News & World Report, no true friend to Christianity, has come out exposing the mistakes in Dan Brown's book, The Da Vinci Code, and the upcoming movie of the same name (which opens Friday, May 19).

The magazine spends a lot of time debunking the "historical facts" of the book and movie. This is amazing. I hope this magazine remembers this article this Christmas and next Easter when the next round of articles from the "Jesus Seminar" start making their annual appearances to question the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection. For some reason, I don't think USN&WR will be so kind to my faith at that time. But this edition is a nice start.

The article quotes Ron Howard, the director of the movie, who refused, along with Sony, to put up a disclaimer at the beginning of the movie claiming it is fiction:

Why all the fuss over a movie and a novel? "This is a work of fiction," Ron Howard, the movie's Academy Award-winning director, told the Los Angeles Times. "It's not theology. It's not history ... Spy thrillers don't start off with disclaimers." Brown, the book's reclusive author, has sent mixed messages regarding the proportions of history and make-believe in his book. Although he declines interviews now, he told National Public Radio during a 2003 publicity tour that the book's characters and action are fictional but that "the ancient history, the secret documents, the rituals, all of this is factual. "He also told CNN at that time that "the background is all true."

The article goes on to dispel historical "facts" and statements about the origin of the New Testament and other statements denying Jesus' alleged marriage and Jesus' deity. Regarding the latter, the article says this:

In Brown's version of history, the early Christians thought of Jesus as "a great and powerful man but a man nonetheless"--a mere mortal. It was the Roman Emperor Constantine, according to Brown's fictional scholars, who imposed the doctrine of Christ's divinity on the church at the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. And the emperor did so largely for political purposes: He wanted to unify the empire around the Christian faith, which he recently had come to embrace.
But as Catholic writers Carl Olson and Sandra Miesel point out in their book The Da Vinci Hoax, "any historian, whether Christian or not, knows that the early Christians most definitely believed that Jesus of Nazareth was somehow divine." The central issue at the Council of Nicaea, they note, "was not whether Jesus was merely human or something more but how exactly his divinity ... was to be understood."

Finally, regarding basic facts of history, the article has this to say:

The debunkers have gone after other "howlers" in the book's historical representations. On the opening page, for example, Brown declares as "fact" that the Priory of Sion, depicted in the book as a European secret society founded in 1099 and the prime keeper of the Da Vinci Code secrets, "is a real organization" and that "parchments known as Les Dossiers Secrets" and listing its members were discovered in Paris's Bibliotheque Nationale in 1975. Among the Priory of Sion's members: Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci. In fact, the Priory of Sion's documents were conclusively proven in the 1990s to have been part of an elaborate hoax. The society itself, as Brown described it, never existed.

The website then posts a page that offers the following:

Just how much of this is true? Just in time for the movie, U.S. News separates fact from fantasy on a range of Code-related questions, from the inner workings of Opus Dei to the truth about Mary Magdalene. Answers are based on a U.S. News Special Edition, Secrets of the Da Vinci Code, and on the book on which the special edition is based, Secrets of the Code: The Unauthorized Guide to the Mysteries of the Da Vinci Code, edited by Dan Burstein. Think you know the answers already? Click on the links to the right and test your knowledge of the world of the Code.

However, in the link to the "Truth" about the Church (of course, they're talking about the Roman Catholic Church), the writers made this statement:

The historical Jesus was essentially a Jewish rabbi, teacher, or spiritual leader. This statement is unlikely to sit well with Jews or Christians. But for a long time after Jesus's death, his followers were not necessarily perceived as believers in a religion that was fundamentally different from Judaism.

Hence my despair for the annual Christmas and Easter articles!

Who Said It? Part 10

2006-05-16T21:52:00.000-04:00

OK, let's try again - this one is WAY out there:

There is nothing in religion beyond the ordinary powers of nature. A revival is not a miracle, nor dependent on a miracle, in any sense. It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means—as much so as any other effect produced by the application of means. . . . A revival is as naturally a result of the use of means as a crop is of the use of its appropriate means.

Christians and the Lottery - Part 2

2006-05-16T08:46:00.000-04:00

When talking about the lottery, I've heard some ask, "What's the difference between the lottery and using the stock market." Let's examine that question:

Gambling refers to a wager or a bet in which each player agrees to risk losing some money or material possession to other players for the chance to win the money or material possessions of those same players. There is no compensation to the loser.

In this definition, there are four components that must exist for gambling to take place:

A game of chance or skill - You need some sort of contest where the outcome is uncertain. This could be a professional sport, a game of poker or guessing if the next person to come out of the grocery store is a woman or man.
Stakes - You need to place something at risk, either money or something else of material value.
An agreement - This is usually called "the bet" or "the wager." Each player agrees to risk losing his possession in exchange for the opportunity to take the possessions of the others.
A lack of fair compensation - The loser gives up everything and gains nothing. It really is "winner takes all."

Let's put this definition to work in certain examples:

Simply living life: I've heard one make the incredible logical leap of saying that the lottery is OK because "life itself is a gamble." This confuses RISK with gambling. Not all risks involve gambling. You don't place wagers on whether or not you can cross the street. You don't bet with another that you will make it through the day. There is no agreement to take someone else's possessions in these things. This leads to a closely related argument...
Insurance: However, there is not wager and there IS compensation. The whole purpose of insurance is to provide compensation when you "lose the bet." Even if no loss occurs, you have gained a peace of mind knowing you would have been compensated. Without getting into whether or not certain types of insurance are wise investments, the point here is that owning insurance policies is not gambling.
Farming or owning a business: Again, you run the risk of losing money but there is no wager and there is compensation. There is no agreement to take other people's money or property without just compensation. The intent is to produce goods or services of benefit to others in exchange for monetary compensation. Both sides win. In gambling, only one side wins.
The stock market: Stock is a means for people to become a part owner of a company. Buying stock is no more gambling thatn ownership of any other company or business. The intent is to make a profit by helping a company with capital to produce their product or service as a benefit to customers. Investers receive compensation in the form of dividends. When stock is sold, both buyer and seller agree on the price. There is no wager and no agreement to risk loss at another's expense. If the price is deemed unfair, the deal is broken. It must be admitted that it is possible to gamble or sin in the stock market but the simple act of buying/selling stock is not inherently sinful gambling.

See "www.biblestudylessons.com" for more information.

Christians and the Lottery

2006-05-16T08:36:00.000-04:00

The lottery has come to North Carolina. We were the 42nd state to start playing the game and the last state on the east coast to do so. The lottery commission says that the goal for the state is $1.2 BILLION in sales this year. About $420 million of that amazing amount will supposedly find its way to our public schools.

To meet this goal, they need to sell $3.3 million in tickets PER DAY. The Charlotte Oberver noted that after the first 22 days, $80million had been sold. This amounts to $3.6million/day. North Carolinians have caught the fever.

I do not want to argue the political, economic or educational benefits/detriments of the lottery. That was all hashed out in the fight to bring the lottery to the state. We lost that fight. Now the question for Christians is "Should I participate?" I do not think Christians should play the lottery.

Borrowing from John Piper and several other resources, here are reasons why a Christian should not participate in the lottery:

1) The Bible teaches us not to want to be rich.

Paul wrote in I Timothy 6:9-12 that “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. But flee from these things, you man of God, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness. Fight the good fight of faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called, and you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.”

This passage teaches us to use our money in a way that will bring us the greatest and longest gain and help us pursue our full and lasting pleasure. John Piper wrote that “The evils in the world come not because our desires for happiness are too strong but because they are so weak that we settle for fleeting pleasures that do not satisfy our deepest souls but in the end destroy them.” The root of all kinds of evil is that we are the kind of people who settle for the love of money instead of the love of God (v.10).

Christians are not to be motivated by greed or a desire for money. Christians live for a GREATER gain – CONTENTMENT is the WAY. If your godliness has freed you from the desire to be rich and has helped you be content with what you have, then your godliness is tremendously profitable (1 Tim. 4:8). Godliness that overcomes the craving for material wealth produces great spiritual wealth. So what verse 6 is saying is that it is very profitable not to pursue wealth.”

The desire to be rich is SUICIDE for your spiritual life. The heart that is focused on money is not focused on God. The Bible says if ever so clearly: THE LOVE OF MONEY IS THE ROOT OF ALL KINDS OF EVILS.

Proverbs 23:4-5 says “Do not weary yourself to gain wealth, Cease from your consideration of it. When you set your eyes on it, it is gone. For wealth certainly makes itself wings like an eagle that flies toward the heavens.”

2) It is wrong to wager with a trust fund.

Suppose I had to go away for six months on a mission trip. During that time, I gave you access to my funds to pay my mortgage, pay my bills, kids’ tuition, etc. Suppose you then you decided to take MY MONEY and play gambling games with it. Would you say that is RIGHT OR WRONG?

Good stewards do not handle their master’s money in that way. They have NO RIGHT. Christians believe that EVERYTHING we have is a trust from God. Paul asked in I Cor 4:7 “What do you have that you did not receive?” He stated again in I Cor 6:19 that “you are not your own. You have been bought with a price.”

3) It is wrong to support something that preys on weaknesses and cultivates sinfulness.

Many of you begin daydreaming when you hear about the lottery. You start thinking of what you could do with $200,000 or a million dollars. If you had not read this, that thought would still lie dormant. That greed and covetousness would lie latent in your heart.

The lottery is a system that preys on your human sinfulness and cultivates within you sinful thoughts and desires that otherwise would not be active. The sins the lottery brings to the surface of your life include the following:

i. The lottery encourages the breaking of first commandment, which says we are to have no other God in this world. It is possible that the lottery will take over your mind and be all that some think about. Matthew 6:24 says that “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”

ii. The lottery encourages the breaking of the tenth commandment, which tells us we are not to covet. However, coveting is exactly what we do when we hear about the lottery. We think “She won $100K, I wish I could win $100K” Luke wrote that we are to “Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.”

iii. The lottery encourages foolish financial decisions and life soon spirals out of control. On the radio and television you hear only of success stories. You only see the guy with the giant cardboard check. What of hundreds of thousands who don’t win? What of those who lose control? It’s like the beer commercials on television. The beer companies only show young and fit 20somethings enjoying a life of activity and leisure. They do not show the alcoholic hitting on his wife and wasting his money. The desire to be wealthy and to spend the newfound wealth is a recipe for disaster. Proverbs 13:11 tells us that “Wealth gained hastily will dwindle,but whoever gathers little by little will increase it.”

iv. The lottery encourages people to dream of laziness and slothfulness. What do most people say when dreaming of winning lottery? They say (and you’ve probably said), “I’ll never have to work again.” Nothing fosters sin as much as IDLENESS. Paul wrote in Colossians 3:23 that “Whatever you do, work for the Lord – serve God.” Paul wrote in 2 Thessalonaisn 3:10 that “If a man won’t work, he won’t eat.”

v. The lottery encourages people to look for unrealistic solution to very real problems. You might have very real problem of DEBT. You might have very real problem of SPENDING. It took a while to get into debt – it will take a while to get out of debt.

vi. The lottery encourages people to think unbiblically that they can “give a little” and “get a lot.” In the lottery, it is possible to spend a dollar and win a million. However, the Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians 9:6 that “whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”

vii. The lottery encourages people to count on LUCK instead of GOD’S PROVIDENCE. People spend average of $150/year on lottery tickets. The odds of winning the Mega Millions are 1 in 135,145,920. Buying two tickets bumps your odds only to 2 in 135,145,920. If you bought 10 tickets per week, it would take you 259,000 years to purchase enough tickets to WIN ONCE. To save that $500,000 nest egg, you'd have to tuck away a little less than $100 a month starting at age 21. What's more likely: that you can find an extra $100 a month -- or that the 1-in-several-million odds of even the smallest seven-figure jackpot suddenly tilt in your favor?

viii. The lottery encourages thinking “It is better to receive than to give.” The backers of the lottery want to make you think you are “helping education.” That’s not true. YOU want to win a million dollars. If you really want to help education – GIVE TO EDUCATION. Give to the PTA. Buy supplies for your school. Perhaps you think that if you win, you can give it to your church. If you go to our church, WE WILL NOT TAKE IT KNOWINGLY. As Piper said, we will not salve your conscience by taking your plunder or assist you in your spiritual suicide. We will gladly accept and use the widow’s penny! God doesn’t need it and it doesn’t HONOR him anymore than giving money from a drug sale or bank robbery.

ix. The lottery encourages discontentment. Iinstead of thanking God for what they do have, lottery players often complain about what they do not have. Hebrews 13:5 tells us to “Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, ‘I will never leave you nor forsake you.’”

Who Said It? Part 9

2006-05-15T21:35:00.000-04:00

Speaking on the subject of original sin and the depravity of man, someone once wrote the following:

"Moral depravity cannot consist in any attribute of nature or constitution, nor in any lapsed or fallen state of nature. . . . Moral depravity, as I use the term, does not consist in, nor imply a sinful nature, in the sense that the human soul is sinful in itself. It is not a constitutional sinfulness"

"[Sinners] are under the necessity of first changing their hearts, or their choice of an end, before they can put forth any volitions to secure any other than a selfish end. And this is plainly the everywhere assumed philosophy of the Bible. That uniformly represents the unregenerate as totally depraved, and calls upon them to repent, to make themselves a new heart"

Any guesses as to the originator of this quote?

Fire Truck Baptistry Rebuttal

2006-05-15T07:08:00.000-04:00

Jeremy Roberts is an M.Div. student at Southwestern and serves as an intern to Jack Graham at Prestonwood Baptist in Dallas. He also used to serve as an assistant to Ronnie Floyd. With all the attention given to Floyd's church over the past several days, Roberts rises to the occasion to give a response (a personal one, not an official one). You can read it here.

Back in the day . . .

2006-05-12T19:52:00.000-04:00

Everybody remembers paying a small pittance for gas "back in the day." I distinctly remember paying about eighty cents for a gallon as a high school senior, filling up my 1977 Toyota Corolla for less then ten dollars. However, as you can see in this graph, I was really paying about $1.60/gallon in 2004 dollars.

In fact, that 25 cents a gallon your parents paid in 1950 is equal to about $2.00/gallon in 2004 dollars. I'd like to see an updated graph.

Greensboro Convention Is Gonna Be Messy

2006-05-12T00:28:00.000-04:00

Southern Baptists from across the country will descend on North Carolina this summer for the annual gathering at the convention. This is the fifth time the SBC has held their annual meeting in North Carolina but the first time since 1916 in Asheville.

There are many topics that will bring much heated discussion this June and one is the election of our new president. Johnny Hunt was supposed to be nominated (and the way it works these days - to be "nominated" is to later be "coronated" - there is no "election). For some reason, Dr. Hunt withdrew his name from consideration. At the same time, Dr. Hunt nominated Ronnie Floyd of the First Baptist Church of Springdale, Arkansas (yes, the "fire-engine-baptistry" church).

Since then, Dr. Floyd has had no end of trouble. First, he agreed to an interview on a Baptist blog (see questions here) then suddenly declined.

Meanwhile, much is being made of a recent recommendation by the Executive Committee that a person should not be nominated to denominational office unless the church in which he serves gives at least ten percent to the Cooperative Program. The Florida Baptist Witness just published an article saying that this new rule means Floyd can NOT be president because his church gave a total of 0.27% to the CP last year.

This blog shows all the hard-n-fast numbers:

Year	Undesignated Receipts	Cooperative Program	Percentage
1986	$1,398,075	$128,586	9.19%
1987	$1,651,755	$146,929	8.89%
1988	$1,882,105	$179,840	9.56%
1989	$2,165,265	$200,000	9.24%
1990	$2,434,105	$200,000	8.22%
1991	$2,584,245	$200,000	7.74%
1992	$2,955,735	$200,000	6.77%
1993	$3,783,625	$220,000	5.81%
1994	$4,323,764	$242,000	5.60%
1995	$4,510,307	$250,000	5.54%
1996	$4,915,860	$275,000	5.59%
1997	$5,174,379	$219,000	4.23%
1998	$5,386,436	$225,000	4.18%
1999*	$5,926,454	$486,800	8.21%
2000*	$7,392,331	$474,927	6.42%
2001	$8,028,127	$174,992	2.18%
2002	$8,278,618	$248,917	3.01%
2003	$10,470,164	$204,992	1.96%
2004	$10,881,867	$312,226	2.87%
2005	$11,952,137	$32,000	0.27%

*Data for these two years does not differentiate the church's
CP participation from its total missions expenditure for the year

Of course, this does not take into account other types of giving, such as Annie Armstrong, Lottie Moon and giving that bypasses the state convention.

Stuff like this reminds me of why I will NEVER work in denominational politics.

Dark or Light?

2006-05-12T00:23:00.000-04:00

Just in case you don't know what the people of the Bible looked like, a company called TRAIN UP A CHILD, INC. has created two distinct sets of biblical action figures. One set of Jesus, Joseph, Mary, David, Goliath and the rest are very pale white-skinned figures. Another set of the same people have very dark skin.

Which ever one gets purchased, this much is true - it's guaranteed to be tacky!!!

Are you ready for Mother's Day?

2006-05-09T08:54:00.000-04:00

If you haven't finished your shopping for your mother or wife, here's a fresh idea from the great minds of the modern church:

THE JESUS PAN!

Only $30 for two of them.

Operators are standing by!

Confusion over the Fire Truck Baptistery

2006-05-08T23:31:00.000-04:00

There was some confusion over the existence of the fire-truck baptistery at First Baptist Springdale, Arkansas over on the Founder's Blog. One gentleman wrote in the comments that he attends the church and has never seen the alleged fire truck. Then others pointed out the the fire truck was merely an IDEA that they had but never actually realized. Some pointed out that kids are "baptized" only in a metaphorical way, not as an official ordinance of the church.

Tony Kummer, a children's minister in Hanover, Indiana, then did a little research and came up with this information:

Two witness confirmation?

Baptist Standard reports this is a fire truck baptismal.
http://www.baptiststandard.com/2000/11_20/pages/baptisms.html

A quote from the Houston Chronicle
http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=2000_3251603

Second Baptist is not the only church that is adapting amusement attractions, said Bruce Barry, president and CEO of Wacky World. His first church work came two years ago with an Arkansas congregation.

He acknowledges, though, that he was stunned when First Baptist Church of Springdale, Ark., asked him to design a "Toon Town" children's sanctuary.

But he took the challenge and created characters that yell and scream as clocks spin crazily and water towers explode with water spouts. He designed a fire truck that holds a baptistry for kids. Once a child is baptized, a bell rings and he or she is sprayed with confetti.

"It is a pretty big deal to get baptized in Springdale, Ark.," Barry said.

The Rev. Ronnie Floyd, pastor of the 12,000-member congregation, said Toon Town, geared for first- through third-graders, and a space-theme Planet 45 for fourth- and fifth-graders have led to an increase in children's attendance from more than 400 children to 500.

More than 150 children have been baptized since the opening of the new children's worship center. Floyd said the majority of children are baptized in the main sanctuary's baptistry while some prefer the firetruck christening.

What would you say if I told you . ..

2006-05-07T22:50:00.000-04:00

that there is a Southern Baptist church that got a former Disney designer to revamp their children's ministry area. Here's is how it is described:

Christianity Today (June 8, 2000) and other news sources have reported on what appears to be a new trend in some large evangelical churches. First Baptist Church in ____________, _____ hired a well-known former Disney World designer of children's amusement rides to design two "high tech sets" for elementary age worship areas: Toon Town for first-through third-graders, and Planet 45 for fourth- and fifth-graders. The fully animated cartoon town has 26-foot-tall buildings. The rationale behind the $270,000 project is summed up by the church's children's minister: "Putting a talking head in front of kids for an hour doesn't work ….This is a visual generation. We need to use technology to the max." That includes a special baptistry which is built around a fire engine. When a child is baptized, the sirens sound and confetti is fired out of cannons.

When kids enter the rooms, a music video is playing on a giant screen in front, and they can amuse themselves at a row of nonviolent video game screens along walls. Once the service starts, "it's 90 minutes of mostly frenetic activity, akin to a live television variety show from the 1950s. In Toon Town, buzzers and bells sound, lights flash from the ceiling and from car headlights on the set, bubbles come out the top of a giant bucket and fill the room, confetti streamers squirt out onto the first few rows, and mist is sprayed onto the crowd." According to the designer, Bruce Barry, "It's just like going on a ride at Disney World."

I am sure the intentions of this church are good and noble but what of the end result? What do you think of this approach to the evangelization of children?

. . . . . . .

On a related note, the Fall 2000 edition of the Founders Journal, Mark Dever (pastor of Capital Hill Baptist in DC) interviewed Paige Patterson (now the President of Southwestern Seminary). They discussed this very method of children's ministry. Here is an excerpt:

Dever: I heard about one church recently, and I don't know if you know about churches like this or not, in order to encourage baptisms among children the baptistry is shaped like a fire truck and they've got confetti cannons that go off whenever a kid is baptized. Do you know about any of this?

Patterson: This is my first time to hear this. This is blasphemous!

Dever: Anyway, it's a church in America. It's an evangelical church and they mean to preach the gospel so I want to be real quick to say their intentions are good. That's going to get kids of course, because they want to come forward, get in the fire truck and make the confetti cannons go off.

Patterson: I do not view [positively] the huge number of child baptisms that Baptists are now guilty of--Baptists are some of the worst paedo-baptizers there are.

I don't know if I'd call it blasphemy but it's obvious Dr. Patterson does not like the practice. This is interesting because of some of the news coming out regarding the upcoming Southern Baptist Convention in Greensboro this summer!

Who Said It? Part VIII

2006-05-05T09:40:00.000-04:00

Somebody STOP ME!!! PLEASE!!!

OK, last one from this bunch:

"Holy Spirit said something to me and I had to go like a mad man and looking in the Word. He says, ‘God’s original plan is that the woman was to bring forth children out of her side.’ What? You know that there is nowhere in the Bible but where God gives birth out of His side. Jesus gives birth to the church out of His side. Adam gives birth to his wife out of his side. It was sin that turned the thing around. And it was sin that transformed her flesh and her body."

Who Said It? - Part VII

2006-05-05T09:34:00.000-04:00

Same crowd, different participants!

PERSON 1: "Adam was a superbeing when God created Him. I don’t know whether people even know this, but he was the first superman that ever lived. (PERSON 2 is heard laughing on the set.) First of all, the Scriptures declare clearly that he had dominion over the fowls of the air, the fish of the sea, which means he used to fly."

PERSON 2: "Wow!"

PERSON 1: "Of course, how can you have dominion over the birds and not be able to do what they do?"

PERSON 2: "Whoa, I mean, wait a minute. PERSON 1, wait a minute."

PERSON 1: "I’ll prove it to you. The word dominion in the Hebrew clearly declares that, if you have dominion over a subject, you can do everything that subject does. In other words, that subject, if it does something that you cannot do, you don’t have dominion over it. I’ll prove it further. Adam not only flew, he flew to space. He used to be . . . He, He, He, He, He, He . . . with one thought He’d be on the moon."

Well, I guess that "proves" it!

Wait, no it doesn't! Read that last statement again:

"I'll prove it further. Adam not only flew, he flew to space..."

THAT'S PROOF in this fairy-tale world of their's???

Who Said It? - Part VI

2006-05-05T09:30:00.000-04:00

Boy, once you get started with these, they're like Pringles - you can't stop!!!

PERSON 1: "He doesn’t ever draw a distinction between himself." (PERSON 3 agrees in the background.)

PERSON 2: "Never, never. You never can do that in a covenant relationship."

PERSON 1: "You know what else that settles then tonight. This hue and cry and controversy that has been spawned by the devil to try and bring dissent within the body of Christ that we are gods. I am a little god."

PERSON 2: "Yes, yes!"

PERSON 1: "I have His name. I’m one with Him. I’m in a covenant relationship. I am a little god."

PERSON 2: "Critic, you are anything that He is."

PERSON 1 (heard under the words of PERSON 2): "Critic, be gone."

PERSON 1: "Yes!"

When do people meet in "little worship services" to worship these "little gods"?

Here's another statemnt (free bonus) from PERSON 1:

"God’s reason for creating Adam was His desire to reproduce Himself and in the Garden of Eden, He did that. He was not a little like God, He was not almost like God, he was subordinate to God, even. And Adam was as much like God as you can get . . . And I want you to know something. Adam in the Garden of Eden was God manifested in the flesh."

Who Said It? Part V

2006-05-05T09:24:00.000-04:00

OK, these are probably pretty easy but they are at least revealing:

PERSON 1: "I was shocked when I found out who the biggest failure in the Bible actually is."

PERSON 2: "Okay."

PERSON 1: "You know everybody you ask, you say, ‘Who’s the biggest failure?’ They say, ‘Judas.’ Somebody else will say, ‘No, I believe it was Adam.’ Well, how about the devil?"

PERSON 2: (unintelligible sound of amazement.)

PERSON 1: "He’s the most consistent failure . . . but he’s not the biggest in terms of material failure and so forth. The biggest in the whole Bible is God. . . . Wait, wait. Don’t you turn that set off. You listen to us. I told you. . . . Now, you sit still a minute. You know me well enough to know I wouldn’t tell something I can’t prove by the Bible. "

He lost His top ranking of most anointed angel, the first man He ever created, the first woman He ever created, the whole earth and all the fullness therein, a third of the angels at least. That’s a big loss, man! I mean you figure up all of that, that’s a lot of real estate, gone down the drain. "Now, the reason you don’t think of God as a failure, He never said He’s a failure. And you are not a failure until you say you are one."

Sadly, the best thing to come out of that conversation was "unintelligible sound of amazement."

However, in thinking of this quote, it appears to make a lot of sense for the free will theist and their more consistent cousin, the open theist. If God is going to grant libertarian free will to His creatures, then He is obviously taking some kind of "risk" that they will or will not love Him.

Do angels have "free will" in that libertarian sense that many want to assume for themselves? Here's a good article from the Pyromaniacs that attempts to address that issue: HERE

Who Said It? - Part IV

2006-05-05T09:17:00.000-04:00

Here's a triple-header: a conversation between three people.

Any guesses? Try for ALL THREE!

PERSON 1: "The force of faith is in the spiritual realm a great deal like certain forces in the natural realm. It is a spiritual force, like gravity is a natural force, and electricity is a natural force of power."

PERSON 2: "A measurable natural force."

PERSON 1: "It’s a measurable force, it’s conductible, it’s perceptible to the touch . . . Faith is a spiritual force, it’s perceptible, . . . it is a tangible force, it’s an invisible force, so is gravity, but it is there."

PERSON 2: "So is electricity . . . Does God use faith?"

PERSON 1: "Surely."

PERSON 2: ". . . See, here is the sore spot. There are those who say . . ."

PERSON 3: "Not with him." (speaking of PERSON 1)

PERSON 2: "Not with you." (lots of laughter follows)

PERSON 3: "Not with God."

PERSON 1: ". . . the fact. No, I’m not sore at God at all and I don’t think He’s sore at me . . . I haven’t done anything to Him."

PERSON 2: ". . . The critics say God is God, He doesn’t have to have faith; He doesn’t exercise faith. He doesn’t use faith. He’s God. He’s the object of faith."

PERSON 1: " . . . Wait a minute, what does that mean? Object of faith. I don’t know what that means."

PERSON 3: "I don’t either."

Just thinking here - I'm pretty sure they don't know what "object of faith" means! And a whole lot more!

Who Said It? Part III

2006-05-04T09:32:00.000-04:00

This quote seems appropraite considering the political wrangling going on these days. Who said it?

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American...There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Who Said It? Part Deux

2006-05-04T08:26:00.000-04:00

Try to guess the originator of this quote from a very accessible and available book. You might even have heard it on the radio (WMIT for the NC people who read)!

Where is this place represented by "outer darkness" in Jesus' parables? To be in outer darkness is to be in the kingdom of God but outside the circle of men and women whose faithfulness on this earth has earned them a special rank or position of authority (italics in original).
The "outer darkness" represents not so much an actual place as it does a sphere of influence and privilege. It is not a geographical area in a kingdom where certain men and women are consigned to stay. It is simply a figure of speech describing their low rank or status in God's kingdom. . . . Now, imagine standing before God and seeing all you have lived for reduced to ashes. How do you think you would feel? How do you think you would respond? Picture yourself watching saint after saint rewarded for faithfulness and service to the King--and all the time knowing that you had just as many opportunities but did nothing about them. . .
We do not know how long this time of rejoicing and sorrow will last. Those whose works are burned will not weep and gnash their teeth for all eternity. At some point, we know God will comfort those who have suffered loss.

Sounds almost like purgatory, doesn't it?

Any guesses?

Hank Hill and the Mega-Church

2006-05-03T23:00:00.000-04:00

On "King of the Hill," it appears the "pew situation" might lead Hank Hill to change churches. His wife wants to visit the local mega-church. A few quotes:

Hank: That place is too big. What does it have - 5,000 some odd members.
Peggy: And it pampers ALL of them . . . dry cleaning.
Hank: If I wanted to go that route, I could just walk around the mall and think about Jesus.

Some hippie: I don't go to church, church goes with me. I worship when I'm drinking a beer, digging a hole or fishing for trout.
Hank's airhead daughter: Wow, that's beautiful.
Hank: Louann, I happen to know that's asinine.

Who Said This? Part I

2006-05-03T22:51:00.000-04:00

Can you guess who said this quote?

I believe the doctrine of election, because I am quite sure that if God had not chosen me I should never have chosen Him; and I am sure He chose me before I was born, or else He never would have chosen me afterwards; and He must have elected me for reasons unknown to me, for I never could find any reason in myself why He should have looked upon me with special love. So I am forced to accept that doctrine.

The answer comes later, unless someone gets it right. (No "googling.")

How to Tell if you are a "Sound Christian"

2006-05-03T22:44:00.000-04:00

Over at the Calvinist Gadfly, Steve Camp posted this article from Puritan Thomas Hooker:

1. If you can mourn daily for your own corruptions and failings committed, yet so as to be thankful for the grace received.
Romans 7:24–25: “O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord . . . So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin.”

2. If you are grieved for the sins of the times and places wherein you live.
Ezekiel 9:4: “And the Lord said unto him, ‘Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh, and that cry for all the abominations that be done in the midst thereof.’”

Psalm 119:136: “Rivers of water run down mine eyes because men keep not Thy law.”

2 Peter 2:8: “For that righteous man dwelling among them, in seeing and hearing, vexed his righteous soul from day to day, with their unlawful deeds.

3. If when you mourn for the sins of the times, you take heed that you are not infected with them.
Philippians 2:15: “That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.”

Acts 20:40: “And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, ‘Save yourselves from this untoward generation.’ ”

James 1:27: “Pure religion, and undefiled before God and the Father, is this: to visit the fatherless and widow in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”

1 Peter 4:4: “Wherein they think it strange that you run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you.”

4. If you endeavor to get victory over your corruptions, and are daily more circumspect over your ways, and more fearful to fall in time to come.
1 Corinthians 9:27: “But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection, lest that by any means when I have preached to others I myself should be a castaway.”

Psalm 39:1: “I said I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue. I will keep my mouth with a bridle while the wicked are before me.”

Job 40:5: “Once I have spoken, but I will not answer thee; yea twice, but I will proceed no further.”

Philippians 2:12: “Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in mine absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”

Proverbs 28:14: “Happy is the man that feareth always.”

5. If you can chide your own heart for the coldness and dullness of it to good duties, and use all holy means for quickening it up afterwards.
Psalm 42:5: “Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquietted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, who is the health of my countenance and my God.”

Psalm 57:8: “Awake, my glory, awake psaltery and harp. I myself will awake early.”

Isaiah 64:7: “And there is none that calleth on thy name that stirreth up themselves to take hold of thee.”
Judges 5:12: “Awake, awake, Deborah, awake, awake, utter a song. Arise, Barak, and lead thy captivity captive, thou son of Abinoam.”

6. If you can be patient under afflictions and better for afflictions.
Hebrews 12:5: “And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaks unto you as unto children, my son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of Him.”

Hebrews 12:11: “Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless, afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them that are exercised thereby.”

Psalm 119:67: “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I have kept Thy words.”

Jeremiah 5:3: “O Lord, are not Thine eyes upon the truth! Thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved. Thou hast consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. They have made their faces harder than a rock; they have refused to return.

7. If your conversation is in heaven, that is, if your thoughts and the course of your life are heavenwards.
Philippians 3:20: “For our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Colossians 3:2: “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.”

Hebrews 11:15: “And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.”

8. If you delight to speak to God in your praises, and that God should speak to you in His Word.
Romans 8:26: “Likewise also the Spirit helpeth with our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.”

John 8:47: “He that is of God heareth God’s words; ye therefore hear them not because ye are not of God.”

9. If you are as content to submit your heart and life to God’s Word in all things, even when it crosses you in your profits and pleasures, as you are content to come and hear it.
Isaiah 2:3: “And many people shall go and say, ‘Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths.”

Ezekiel 33:32: “And lo, Thou art to them as a very lovely song of one that hath a pleasant voice, and can play well on an instrument, for they hear Thy words, but they do them not.”

10. If you can rely constantly by faith on the promises of God in Christ when you are in any strait or temptation, as well for your present provision and preservation in this life, as for your salvation in the life to come, abstaining from the use of any unlawful or unwarrantable practices.
Genesis 22:8: “And Abraham said, ‘My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering’; so they went both of them together.”

Exodus 14:13: “And Moses said unto the people, ‘Fear ye not; stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, what He will show to you today; for the Egyptians whom ye have seen today, ye shall see them again no more forever.’ ”

11. If you can find in your heart that you love God sincerely, although you could never love Him except that He loved you first.
1 John 4:19: “We love Him because He first loved us.”

Romans 5:5: “And hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.”

12. If you can heartily love good Christians, and others who have helped you on to heaven; and, on the contrary, if you hate and avoid wicked and dissolute men, but most of all such as withdraw others from the faith or, by scandalous lives, have caused the faith to be blasphemed and evil spoken of.
1 John 3:14: “We know we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren.”

13. If there is a fight between the flesh and the Spirit.
Romans 7:23: “But I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members.”

Galatians 5:17: “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other, so that you cannot do the things you would.”

14. If we long for the appearing of Christ.
Revelation 22:20: “He which testifies these things saith, ‘Surely I come quickly.’ Amen, even so come, Lord Jesus.”

2 Timothy 4:8: “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto them also that love His appearing.”

15. If you make conscience of secret sins which no eye sees, such as a hard heart, a secure and proud spirit; if you do not look to much to the matter of good duties as to the manner; if they are done in truth and sincerity; also if you apply both the promises and the threatenings to yourself in the Word of God, and love and admire grace more in others than in yourself, and hate sin in all, but mostly in yourself. You may take comfort from these if you can do them in a holy manner, namely:
1. With uprightness of heart
2. With continuance
3. With daily growth in the practice of them

And to this end two things must be practice:
1. Often examine, try, and search your heart and all your actions.
2. Often take account of your life concerning your progress in the course of godliness. For lack of this examination, many life and die as hypocrites, and do not know it, but suppose their case is good.
1 John 3:18: “My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and truth.”

1 Chronicles 29:17: “I know also my God that Thou triest the heart and hast pleasure in uprightness; as for me, in the uprightness of my heart, I have offered all these things.”

16. If you desire to keep no corruptions, or if your endeavors are constant in the use of all means against every corruption.
Colossians 3:5-10 “Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. For it is on account of these things that the wrath of God will come, and in them you also once walked, when you were living in them. But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him.”

17. If you desire Christ for His holiness’ sake, which, if you do, then you will take all that comes with holiness, whether it is shame, disgrace, or persecution.
2 Corinthians 6:3-10 “giving no cause for offense in anything, in order that the ministry be not discredited, but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses, in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in hunger, in purity, in knowledge, in patience, in kindness, in the Holy Spirit, in genuine love, in the word of truth, in the power of God; by the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and the left, by glory and dishonor, by evil report and good report; regarded as deceivers and yet true; as unknown yet well-known, as dying yet behold, we live; as punished yet not put to death, as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things.”

Could John Owen pastor a church today?

2006-05-03T22:37:00.000-04:00

John Owen, the greatest of the Puritans, once wrote this:

"To suppose that whatever God requireth of us that we have power of ourselves to do, is to make the cross and grace of Jesus Christ of none effect."

Another Puritan, John Flavel (it seems they were ALL named John back then), wrote these words:
"Whatever religion or doctrine condones or makes allowances for sin is not of Christ. The Doctrine of Christ everywhere teaches self-denial and mortification of worldliness and sin. The whole stream of the gospel runs against those things. Scripture emphasizes the 'holy' and the 'heavenly' (not the sinful and the worldly). The true gospel has not even the slightest tendency to extol corrupt nature, or feed it's pride by magnifying it's freedom and power. And it rejects everything that undermines or obscures the merit of Christ, or tries to give any credit to man, in any way. And it certainly never makes the death of Christ a cloak to cover sin, but rather it always speaks of it as an instrument that destroys it!"
How much of what goes on in the modern church can stand in the light of these statements?

The Emerging Church speaks (curses) out

2006-05-01T15:27:00.000-04:00

The Emerging Church continues to make waves as it comes out of its shell. One of the major portals to engage with Emerging Church culture is THE OOZE. In one of the featured articles, they have "updated" a familiar Bible story but incorporated some pretty shocking language. This story is about Judas but even the gnostic rag "The Gospel of Judas" doesn't contain such vulgarity as seen below:

No one hated rich people more than Judas. Seriously, he hated them. Judas said the problems our people were having could be traced back to all sorts of abuses by the establishment and the powerful people who were in charge of things. He hated the professional priests and their rich supporters. He hated their nice houses, fancy clothes, and high-dollar religious festivals.

Before he met Jesus, Judas lived out in the desert with the Essene zealots. He told us he left them because b******* politics were ruining the movement. I don’t exactly remember the details, but it was something like that.

. . .

But you’re not going to believe what happened next. You couldn’t guess in a million years. The woman walked over to Jesus and broke the neck of the bottle on the edge of the table. Everyone jumped because it was pretty loud. Then she poured it all on the top of Jesus’ head and started rubbing it into his hair and whispering stuff in his ear.

I know. Unbelievable.

It kinda seemed like a long time that everyone just stared at them without saying anything, but I think it was just a second or two. Then Judas said, “Oh s***!” He and a couple of the guys jumped up and ran over to where Jesus and the woman were. Judas said, “What the h*** have you done, you stupid b***!”

Jesus got everyone calmed down and back to their places around the table, but for a minute there, it was quite a scene. Judas put his face in his hands and shook his head back and forth, saying, “That woman just poured twenty-thousand dollars onto his head. Do you know how many people we could have fed with that money?”

Then he jumped to his feet and yelled at her again.

“You know you just killed a bunch of kids, right? You DO know that. Little children. Children who might have lived will now die. Because of you. That’s right, dead children. I hope you sleep well tonight. You probably will because people like you don’t give a d*** about anyone or anything but themselves.”