Surfin' the Christian Blog World

From time to time I have recommended certain posts on certain blogs. But I haven't really told you the Christian blogs I read daily. So, here goes--at least here a some of the best of the ones I surf regularly. Of course there are scadillions more that are good. I just haven't found them yet::)

I start my daily blogging with Bob's TotemtoTemple. I met Bob on some Christian forums and noticed that we think a lot alike on many Christian issues. So, I guess that is why I like his blog so much and I hope you will too. Check out his post from Oct. 30 entitled, New World Man or Church Growth Pastor.
At the end of his week, Bob posts his Anti-Christ of the week. He got this idea from all the silliness people engage in trying to guess who the anti-Christ will be.

Next on my blogging journey I hit Jollyblogger. David who writes this much read blog is a PCA pastor. For those of you who do not know about the intricacies of Presbyterianisms, here they are.

PCUSA=The mostly liberal Presbyterian church, although there are quite a few evangelical churches like mine that bug the heck out of the liberals at Presbyerian headquarters in Lousville, KY.

PCA=The original reformed Presbyterian church. In the early 1970's, when we were altogether, the PCA folks said enough liberalism is enough! So they basically said Hasta la vista! Baby! We are outta here! And, they formed their own denomination.

OPC, EPC, etc.=Other types of smaller Presbyterian churches.

Hey! Now that is a coincidence. I just went over to Jollyblogger and guess what? He wrote a description of the difference between PCA and PCUSA (Oct. 29 blog). So, if you want more on this, go there. And if you don't care, go there anyway becaue he has one of the best Christian blogs around IMO.

Next on the list are two of Michael Spencer's. He and I don't always agree on everything but we do agree on alot of things. These two are also must reads. They are the Internet Monk and michael spencer.

I didn't plan this but it seems I like blogs written by Presbyterians. Bob at TotemtoTemple is one and as I just wrote, David at Jollyblogger is one--a pastor in fact. And now another one who I read is Presbyterian pastor Mark Roberts at markdroberts. He pastors about an hour from me--another true Southern Californian.

Now for two changes of pace. I found nykola:bothering people since 1981at Jollyblogger one day. This is a very interesting blog written by Ambra Nykola, a young African-American woman who is a conservative Republican (at times) and isn't afraid to be African-American culturally, not white. I learn a lot about black life from her. Since I at one time taught in an inner city black school in the Watts section of Los Angeles, her blog is especially interesting to me. Lately she blogged about how she and so many of her other young middle class friends (who look sharp--not like gangstas) are continually stopped by the police. I think white churches really need to speak out about this. After all, maybe there will be some members who are policemen who will learn something. Hopefully so. You can read this particular post here.

Another change of pace is mainly for any of you who have an interest in classical music, especially violinists. I read about this one in the Los Angeles Times. The blogger is Laurie Niles, who plays in some of the "one-notch-below-the-L.A. Philharmonic" orchestras. Her blogs about auditioning for the Los Angeles Philharmonic are priceless. Although I majored in music and know quite a bit about the classical world, I really didn't know what an audition for a major orchestra was like. You can find her blog at the violinist.

OK..just three more to go and I will do them quickly.

21st Century Reformation has some good posts. He came out of the third wave so it's fascinating to me to see what he writes.

In the Outer is a farmer who writes at times about his rebellious daughters. But he also writes some very good theological/Christian life stuff.

And last but not least is one I found just yesterday, but I really like it and want to include it here. I will be blogging in the future about the prosperity message. And, in those messages I have the feeling that somewhere I will probably be referring to this blog. It is very different to put it mildly. I won't tell you much about it..check it out for yourself, "The Poor You Will Always Have With You.....

That's all. I hope I haven't worn you out.....so until tomorrow.....happy blog reading....:)

Diane

Halloween--A National Holiday?

Halloween is becoming almost popular as Christmas. According to the Los Angeles Times, in the Oct.11 business section, retail sales for Halloween are expected to be over 3 billion dollars. Predictions are that Christmas spending this year will be up 4.5%. While that is good, Halloween sales will be up 5.4%.

Nearly 60% of Americans will participate in Halloween this year in some way. 56% of them will don costumes and 21% of them will costume their pets.
Some Anericans spend hundreds of dollars on Halloween.

Some experts are saying that more people are participating in Halloween than ever to alleviate their fears of 9/11 and terorism.

Let's see...I thought that is what God was supposed to do...alleviate fears....you know...Psalm 91 and all of that.

To me these percentages and the amount of money spent is alarming. I think the churches are failing in this regard. IMO Christians should be as concerned about the onslaught of the occult in our country through eastern religions, paganism, satanism, witchcraft, drugs (yes I said drugs) and so forth as they are about homosexuality and abortion.
This isn't about Christian kids going trick or treating in costumes. To me that is minor. This is about many Christians and even some churches that are into occultic-tinged books, movies, music, new age humanistic theories, etc. as well as "Christian witchcraft" themselves. I think I remember Scriptures that speak to this point. In fact, one is James 4:4-
Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.
Pretty strong language there.

Mission Tidbits

Although I don't attend a Foursquare church anymore, I still receive their monthly magazine, Advance. I really like the magazine....it reflects the Pentecostal balance of the Foursquare denomination. If you can get past their founder, Aimee Semple MacFerson, I think you'll like the denomination too. It's the one Jack Hayford belongs to; in fact, he was just elected its president recently.

In this month's issue of Advance they have some very interesting statistics and other tidbits about missions and missionaries.

*29% of teens have gone on a missions trip or service project overseas.
*18% have gone on two or more of these trips.
*10% have gone on three or more.

*700 billion dollars are needed to provide those in poverty (worldwide) with adequate food, water, education and health care.

*Quick quiz:
Match the missionaries with the countries they served.
Missionaries
David Livingstone
St. Patrick
Mother Teresa
Hudson Taylor
Martin and Gracia Burnam
Dayna Curry and Heather Mercer
Apostle Paul
Nate Saint

Countries
Ecuador
Afghanistan
Rome and Greece
Ireland
Philippines
India
China
Africa

Answers are at the end of the post.

The best quote yet...by Philip Enzor (from Brother's Keeper)
"God showed me how selfish and spoiled I truly am. He also taught me that I need to be much more concerned with the needs of others--both here and overseas. Lastly, He taught me that this life is brief. We must tell as many people as we can about Jesus and the hope He alone offers."

quotes from CCM groups:
"We got over there and realized that the body of Christ is so much bigger than we ever thought. It was like being introduced to your foot for the first time. It was like finally seeing another part of your body that you never knew existed."
-Jars of Clay

"We spend a lot of time gratifying ourselves. On a mission trip, all those things are stripped away and you are forced to look inside yourself and ask yourself if you are doing the things that Jesus asked us to do: to love the sick, the orphans, the widows and those who cannot help themselves."
-Jeff Frankenstein of the Newsboys

*$15.2 is the personal income of Christians worldwide.
There are 500 million people in the world on the verge of starvation.

Answers to quiz:
David Livingston-Africa
St. Patrick-Ireland
Mother Teresa-India
Hudson Taylor-China
Martin and Gracia Burnham-Philippines
Dayna Curry and Heather Mercer-Afghanistan
Apostle Paul-Rome and Greece
Nate Saint-Ecuador

Big Brother-Part IV

This will be the last in this series for a while. What I am trying to get across is the governments' encroachment of our freedoms. It doesn't matter what administration is behind this and Chrisitans need to stop playing partisan politics with this. In other words, if Christians like a president then this type of thing is OK to them. But if they don't like the president, then they yell and scream all day long about anti-Christ encroachment. That is simply pure hypocrisy. So today let's examine the Patriot Act. That is the act that really began to send alarm bells off in me and led to this series.

Again, a summary of material gleaned from the ACLU site.

The Patriot Act does the following:

1.Expands the terrorism laws to include domestic terrorism. This can include political organizations and even religious ones to wiretapping, surveillance and harassment for anything deemed "political action." New Attorney General guidelines allow for spying on religious and political organizations without any evidence of wrongdoing whatsoever.

2.Expands local law enforcement's powers of secret searches. This includes invasion of private records. Once again, the Fourth Amendment is being compromised.

3. Allows the FBI to investigate American citizens for criminal matters without any probable cause of the crime being committed IF the FBI says it is for "intelligence purposes."

4. Permits non-citizens to be jailed on mere suspicion.

And this is the scary part:
American citizens suspected of terrorism can be held indefinitely by the military without charges brought against them or access to lawyers.

This also happened with the FBI as evidenced by the wrongful detaining with NO charges brought and NO access to a phone or attorneys of the citizen and lawyer who the FBI "thought" was involved in the Madrid train bombing. It turns out that the fingerprints found at the Madrid site wasn't his after all. Go figure. The FBI just shrugged it off.

Perhaps the FBI and the Bush administration need to review some parts of the Constitution, notably:

The First Amendment which guarantees freedom of speech, religion and assembly.

The Fourth Amendment-Freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures.

The Fifth Amendment-No person shall be deprived of liberty or life without due process of the law. I guess the FBI "forgot" this one with the Madrid bombing "suspect."

The Sixth Amendment-The right of a speedy trial by a jury of peers.

The Fourteenth Amendment-All persons (both citizens and non-citizens within the US) are entitled to due process and equal access to the laws. N0n-citizens are being arrested and held in secret.

The shocking thing to me is that Christians are so behind this Patriot Act.
I'm telling you that we had better listen to Martin Niemoller, one of the leaders of the Barmen Synod (the churches that wouldn't go along with a lot of Hitler's "program.") He was a thorn in Hitler's side so he ended up in a concentration camp. He is also the one I quoted in a previous post who said that they came for the Communists and then Jews and then the Catholics and he did nothing. Then they came for him.

Christians are blind if they think this will just apply to Muslims for eternity. Once this precedent has been set, if there is a president and/or Congress who believe that Christians are a threat, then whammo! Out comes the Patriot Act and we may very well be saying what Niemoller said.

But more shocking than this, is the sense of injustice and unfairness and cruelty that Christians are displaying toward their fellow citizens (and non-citizens). We already have laws to protect us. And, we have God. But God isn't going to lift a finger to help Christians who support this stuff IMO.

By the way, you can bet on the fact that it will come back to bite us in the future.

You may read the other three parts of this series here:
Part I--At times Christians get behind certain laws that come back to bite them.

Part II--First section of new government and corporate surveillance laws and tactics.

Part III--Second section on surveillance.

Big Brother-Part III

Here is the rest of the ACLU report on surveillance. You many find the first part here.

VII. Government Surveillance
Government Databases
The government's access to personal information begins with the thousands of databases it maintains on the lives of Americans and others. For instance, the FBI maintains a giant database that contains millions of records covering everything from criminal records to stolen boats and databases with millions of computerized fingerprints and DNA records.
The Treasury Department runs a database that collects financial information reported to the government by thousands of banks and other financial institutions.
A "new hires" database maintained by the Department of Health and Human Services, contains the name, address, social security number, and quarterly wages of every working person in the U.S.
The federal Department of Education maintains an enormous information bank holding years worth of educational records on individuals stretching from their primary school years through higher education.
--->After September 11, Congress gave the FBI permission to access the database without probable cause.

State departments of motor vehicles of course possess millions of up-to-date files containing a variety of personal data, including photographs of most adults living in the United States.

VIII. The Patriot Act
Easy access to records.
Under the PATRIOT Act, the FBI can force anyone to turn over
records on their customers or clients, giving the government unchecked power to rifle through individuals' financial records, medical histories, Internet usage, travel patterns, or any other records. Some of the most invasive and disturbing uses permitted by the Act involve government access to citizens' reading habits from libraries and bookstores. The FBI does not have to show suspicion of a crime, can gag the recipient of a search order from disclosing
the search to anyone, and is subject to no meaningful judicial oversight.

Expansion of the "pen register" exception in wiretap law.
The PATRIOT Act expands exceptions to the normal requirement for probable cause in wiretap law. As with its new power to search records, the FBI need not show probable cause or even reasonable suspicion of criminal activity, and judicial oversight is essentially nil.

Expansion of the intelligence exception in wiretap law. The PATRIOT Act also loosens the evidence needed by the government to justify an intelligence wiretap or physical search. Previously the law allowed exceptions to the Fourth Amendment for these kinds of searches only if "the purpose" of the search was to gather foreign intelligence. But the Act changes "the purpose" to "a significant purpose," which lets the government circumvent the Constitution's probable cause requirement even when its main goal is ordinary law enforcement.

More secret searches.
Except in rare cases, the law has always required that the subject of a search be notified that a search is taking place. Such notice is a crucial check on the government's power because it forces the authorities to operate in the open and allows the subject of searches to challenge their validity in court. But the PATRIOT Act allows the government to conduct searches without notifying the subjects until long after the search has been executed.

The TIPS program
In the name of fighting terrorism, the Bush Administration has also proposed a program that would encourage citizens to spy on each other. The Administration initially planned to recruit people such as letter carriers and utility technicians, who, the White House said, are "well-positioned to recognize unusual events." In the face of fierce public criticism, the Administration scaled back the program, but continued to enlist workers involved in certain key industries. In November 2002 Congress included a provision in the Homeland Security Act prohibiting the Bush Administration from moving forward with TIPS. Although Congress killed TIPS, the fact that the Administration would pursue such a program reveals a disturbing disconnect with American values and a disturbing lack of awareness of the history of governmental abuses of power. Dividing citizen from citizen by encouraging mutual suspicion and reporting to the government would dramatically increase the government's power by extending surveillance into every nook and cranny of American society. Such a strategy was central to the Soviet Union and other totalitarian regimes. Attorney General John Ashcroft issued new guidelines that significantly increase the freedom of federal agents to conduct surveillance on Americans.

Loosened Domestic Spying Regulations
In May 2002, Attorney General John Ashcroft issued new guidelines on domestic spying that significantly increase the freedom of federal agents to conduct surveillance on American individuals and organizations. Under the new guidelines, FBI agents can infiltrate any event that is open to the public, from public meetings and demonstrations to political conventions to church services to 12-step
programs. This was the same basis upon which abuses were carried out by the FBI in the 1950s and 1960s, including surveillance of political groups that disagreed with the government, anonymous letters sent to the spouses of targets to try to ruin their marriages, and the infamous campaign against Martin Luther King, who was investigated and harassed for decades. The new guidelines are purely for spying on Americans; there is a separate set of Foreign Guidelines that cover investigations inside the U.S. of foreign powers and terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda.

The Washington Post has reported that work is being done on CAPS II with the goal of creating a vast air security screening system designed to instantly pull together every passenger's travel history and living arrangements, plus a wealth of other personal and demographic information in the hopes that the authorities will be able to profile passenger activity and intuit obscure clues about potential threats. The government program would reportedly draw on enormous stores of personal information from data aggregators and other sources, including travel records, real estate histories, personal associations, credit card records, and telephone records. Plans call for using complex computer algorithms, including highly experimental technologies such as neural networks, to sort through the reams of new personal information and identify "suspicious" people.


Reviving the Fourth Amendment
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.-Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

AMEN.

Big Brother-Part II

In every dictatorship surveillance is one of the most important tools. Therefore, when a country that I live in, in this case the United States, begins to use more and more surveillance on it's citizens, I worry.
Alot.

Here are some interesting tidbits on current [mostly government] surveillance trends. I suppose I shouldn't tell you that my main source is a report by the ACLU entitled, Bigger Monster, Weaker Chains: The Growth of an American Surveillance Society since most Christians probably won't believe anything they say. However, I have learned when one listens to leftist intellectuals such as NPR and the ACLU, IF one is mature and intelligent enough to separate bias from fact, one can learn a whole lot that isn't being covered in the mainstream media AND certainly NOT being covered in the Christian media.

So here is a summary of the ACLU report on surveillance...you may of course take it or leave 'it.
Part 1 of the report is today and Part 2 is tomororw.

I. Video Surveillance
There are three factors fueling the revolution of surveillance cameras in everyday American life.
1. Improved technology
2. Centralized surveillance
Washington DC has a new system of surveillance cameras where the hub is in a new centralized surveillance center. Officers can view people wherever the cameras are located.
3. The public acceptance and assumption is that increased surveillance will increase security especially against terrorists. In Britain, where this system is already in operation, there are no indications that crime, for example, has increased because of the camera's presence even though the general public does know about them.
At many airports and the Statue of Liberty, face identification scans are now routine without the people scanned knowing this is happening.
Se. John Warner wants to explore the possibility of having unmanned aircraft with onboard cameras flying around for the purpose of surveillance of the general populace.

II. Data Surveillance
Corporations, banks and local, state and federal agencies are collecting data which is being shared with the federal government.

III. Genetic Surveillance
Did you think what you share with your doctor is private and confidential? Think again. It is shared with your insurance company, researchers, employers and marketers. An insurance trade organization called the Medical Information Bureau even keeps a centralized medical database with records on millions of patients.
In the future we may have our DNA tested without our knowing it as it is relatively easy to collect DNA from hair, saliva, etc.

A testing company called Genelex reports that it has amassed 50,000 DNA samples, many gathered surreptitiously for paternity testing. "You'd be amazed", the company's CEO told U.S. News & World Report, "siblings have sent in mom's discarded Kleenex and wax from her hearing aid to resolve the family rumors."

IV. Financial Surveillance
financial companies today routinely put the details of their customers' financial lives up for sale.
A big part of the problem is the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act passed by Congress in 1999.
Gramm-Leach effectively gives financial institutions permission to sell their customers' financial data to anyone they choose. That includes the date, amount, and recipient of credit card charges or checks a customer has written; account balances; and information about the flow of deposits and withdrawals through an account.

V. New Data-Gathering Technologies
1. Cell phone location data
2. Biometrics
Proposals have already been made for a national ID card which would include fingerprints, iris patterns, DNA, etc.
3. "Black Boxes" like those found in aircraft are being built into some cars. They Provide information about the location of the driver and how fast the vehicle is traveling.
4. RFID chips
RFID chips, which are already used in such applications as toll-booth speed passes, emit a short-range radio signal containing a unique code that identifies each chip. Once the cost of these chips falls to a few pennies each, plans are underway to affix them to products in stores, down to every can of soup and tube of toothpaste. They will allow everyday objects to "talk" to each other--or to anyone else who is listening. For example, they could let market researchers scan the contents of your purse or car from five feet away, or let police officers scan your identification when they pass you on the street.

5. Implantable GPS chips.
These are computer chips that can record and broadcast their location. In addition to practical uses such as building them into shipping containers, they can also serve as location "bugs" when, for example, hidden by a suspicious husband in a wife's purse. They also can be implanted under the skin (as can RFID chips).

VI. Corporate Surveillance
Companies called data aggregators (such as Acxiom and ChoicePoint) are in the business of compiling detailed databases on individuals and then selling that information to others. Although these companies are invisible to the average person, data aggregation is an enormous, multi-billion-dollar industry. Some databases are even "co-ops" where participants agree to contribute data about their customers in return for the ability to pull out cross-merchant profiles of customers' activities.

Politics and Saving the Nation--Again

Michael Spencer has once again written an A-One post over at his Internet Monk blog. I am finding that more and more Christian bloggers are presenting the gospel as the way out of our national American malaise. I know I am. And, so is Michael Spencer, Bob at TotemtoTemple, David at Jollyblogger, and a host of others.

Sadly, I am finding the younger Christian [male] bloggers are still thinking that putting in Republican politicians will save us. I hope the younger guys will read us older folks more. We've seen that the Christian Right politics thing hasn't worked for the past 30 years..

I do hope you will read Michael Spencer's post entitled, Politics East of Eden. The link is at the end of this post.

I would like to add these thoughts to what he wrote. In fact I've shared some of them here before, but we have a slew of new readers, so here goes again.

Prayer in the Schools
Out here in So. California I am not aware of anybody who ever had prayer in the schools or had the Bible read in class.
My mother was born in the first decade of the 20th century and graduated from high school in the 1920's. She went to school in our city which is next to Los Angeles. She never had prayer or Bible in school.
Two of our neighbors were born a decade later and graduated in the 1930's. They too never had prayer or Bible in school. They both attended schools in the city of Los Angeles (Los Angeles City School District).
Two of my friends were born in the 1930's and graduated in the 1940's.
Both attended Los Angeles city schools and still no Bible and no prayer.
I was born near the end of WWII and graduated from high school in the early 60's. I went to school in two cities which are both next to where I live now (which is next to L.A.). No prayer; no Bible reading in my schools.
BUT, the California schools during those eras were the best in the nation.
Hmmmmm......

I think the Bible reading-prayer thing is a Southern thing. Let's see....and I hope this doesn't offend anyone....but while the Bible was being read and the prayers were being prayed in the schools there, weren't black people being lynched and disenfranchised? Yes indeedy, I do believe that was so. Meanwhile, in the late 1950's, way before busing and civil rights got going, I went to a high school in the black inner city section of the city next to my town. I was from an upper-middle class all-white community and this was our nearest high school. It was a great school and we all got along well. But then, that was paganistic California where the Bible wasn't read and prayers weren't prayed. Go figure.

About the Ten Commandments
I see a lot of hypocrisy here. Most Christians can not even name the Ten Commandments in any order, much less the right order. This was clearly seen in a poll taken two years in a row a few years ago. Only 5% of Christians could name the Ten Commandments in any order. But they are insistent that these commandments that they don't know themselves are posted in public places so our country will "turn around"

Do read Michael's article, Politics East of Eden. You will find it here.

Five Solas for the Folks

The League of Reformed Bloggers of which I am a member, has issued a challenge to do a blog using the five solas. I am sure the other bloggers will all be quite erudite....that is except mine::)

But, I decided to write for the "folks." Here is why.

I've had a fantasy for some time now. I envision myself being invited to teach at all types of churches-- Charismatic Third Wave revival churches (i.e. Toronto, Brownsville, etc.); seeker-sensitive churches (i.e. Willowcreek, Saddleback, etc.); denominational Pentecostal churches (AG, Foursquare, COGIC, etc.); mainline churches (read that liberal PCUSA types) and non-C/P evangelical churches (read that Baptist, Nazarene, Evangelical Free, etc).
The main part of my fantasy of course is what I would teach. That is a no-brainer--the five solas of course.

For those of you who don't know what they are, and I find most Christians do not, here is a little background. It's not that Christians are stupid. They simply are not acquainted with the solas because most of the evangelical church for some strange reason havn't taught them for the last half century or so.

The solas were formulated by the leading 16th century Reformers to unify their theology. Sola means only or alone in Latin. Latin was the "business" language of the day, just as French was in the 19th and early 20th century, and English is now. Therefore, so everyone would understand the solas back then, they were put into Latin.

I've put everyday lay people's definitions to them as well as the journalistic "W's" and "H" which I found at another site.

So here are the five solas:

1. Sola gratia-by God's grace alone we have our salvation-the Why.
2. Sola fide-by faith alone we have our salvation-the How.
3. Sola Christus-by Christ alone and His atoning substitutionary work on the cross we have our salvation-the Who.

The above three solas throw out Finney's holiness program that has been a mainstay in so many evangelical churches throughout the latter 19th and 20th century. Of course there is that pesky sin question to deal with and many evangelical churches and especially seeker-sensitive ones don't do it. Therefore, the above three solas are meaningless unless the sin question is brought up. In other words, saved from what? Why do we need Christ except to "help us fulfill our life's purpose?" That is the thinking in many churches today.
I found an excellent quote from Gerharde Forde:
"The totality of our depravity consists in the blindness: We do not even see that our virtues are as sinful as our vices."

That really needs to be taught today...big time! Does anyone except for me think that perhaps today's evangelical churches are descending into the same liberalism that the mainline churches (which by the way used to be evangelicals) slid into a little before 1900?

4. Sola Scripture-by Scripture alone we understand where to find out about our salvation-the Where.
This then curtails the modern penchant toward outside revelation, psychobabble theology, and so forth that tends to supercede Scripture.
My former Presbyterian pastor gave our congregation a great clue to really understanding and receiving the Bible. He said to allow the Bible to speak for itself. Of course that might mean to read whole passages in their entirety instead of hopping around in it like a rabbit, pulling out this and that to fit the "theme of the day.".
For example, I would certainly challenge the average evangelical church to go through Romans chapter by chapter. The five solas will jump out at them in chapters 1-8. Except for Calvary Chapel, does anyone do this anymore? By the way, in talking to people on the Internet who have come out of Third Wave, Word of Faith and seeker sensitive churches, the majority have told me they sped to their nearest Calvary Chapel Church. Gee, I bet I know why.

5. Soli dei gloria-to God alone be the glory for our salvation-the For What Purpose.
In other words, the pope can't get the glory. That goes for the modern day "apostles" and "prophets" too.

Why would I teach the five solas to these people?

I have seen my ministry for some time as a balancing one. Where a church is weak...I come in and balance it by presenting what they never or rarely hear.

Third Wave and seeker sensitive churches almost never hear about the five solas. In fact they seldom hear about Christ at all, much less what was done at the cross.

It is vital today that Christians once again understand that [Christian] humanistic psychology, Christian [occultic-like] mysticism and [Christian] business-directed leadership models will not support them in the time of disaster and need.

Christ is our foundation and an understanding of His work at the cross for us is vital.

The Third Wavers are following the old Finney holiness model of saved by grace, or actually saved by experience, and kept by works. A Good dose of the solas hopefully would enlighten these folks...or at least their followers...to give a good and needed foundation.

For both the seeker sensitives and Third Wavers sola Scriptura is necessary as both camps love to pick and choose their Scriptures based on thematic teaching and/or revelation/prophecies.

Soli Dei gloria isn't a problem in Saddleback land, but it sure is in Third Wave land as the apostles seem to be trying to be God themselves at times.

So let's hear three cheers for the five solas. I say we need to bring them back into every church. What say you?

Big Brother-Part I

I really do not participate in conspiracy theories, especially the newest chip device to be implanted under the skin with 666 on it. But when the Patriot Act was passed, I became aware that this country just turned a corner. Having studied the Third Reich (Hitler) for many years, I guess I am keenly sensitive of freedoms being taken away and too much control being installed in their place.

So, I would like to blog a bit about this subject in the next few weeks. I would like to begin by saying that I believe Christians are rather dense and undiscerning when it comes to depending on the arm of flesh. In the past months I've blogged about this in relation to health, both physical and mental. But perhaps we are resting too much on the arm of flesh (read that government) in the matter of security also.

Let me begin with an example of how Christians at times will get enthusiastically behind a law and then that law comes back to bite them. IMO that is precisely how satan gets Christians under his control....that is...when we depend too much on the arm of flesh. Martin Niemoller, one of the Confessing Church leaders during Hitler's reign was pretty anti-Semitic. So, when the SS and SA guys came for the Jews..well..too bad..but..oh..well. Then they came for him. That is a perfect example of laws coming back to bite Christians.

In the early 80's, there were a flurry of laws passed in several states designed to stop any molestation of children in both public and private schools, including pre-schools. This all started with the McMartin pre-school case in Southern California. 20 years later no one understands what really happened, but the lives of the school workers are ruined. Adding to that, the so-called child psychologists that police departments used to interview children that said they were molested has been called into question throughout the entire country. If that weren't enough, a flurry of laws were passed in several states to try to prevent this type of thing. Here in California the laws really didn't need to be passed as we already had good laws on the books to take care of this. But the public, in their hysteria, wanted more laws. The Christians were in the forefront of this by the way. So now here are the laws we have--I hope you like them....I'm not sure most people do at this point. If you are a teacher in California you will be told the following:
If you touch a child (this includes hugging, a pat on the back, etc.) and the child goes home and tells his or her parents that he or she didn't feel right about it, the school is mandated to call the police FIRST. Then the police call the social service agencies. At that point the teacher may be arrested. If he or she has children of their own, those children may very well be taken into custodial care by the Department of Social Services.
I've been in innumerable faculty meetings in several schools when primary teachers have asked what they should do if their children run up to them and hug them. The answer is basically the same: don't hug back. Well, that is really rejecting! I am aware that teachers need to be careful about touching kids but when you give this type of authority to a governmental agency, this is what you get. Overkill.

Here is my point: Christians need to calm down when these events happen, pray thoughtfully, stop listening to the Christian Right leaders at that point, and THINK.

Ask what a law will do down the road if the president/governor/mayor isn't friendly to Christians.

Next week we will look at the Patriot Act as well as NEW surveillance laws and acts. Are you sure you really want these?

Marriage Amendment--Another View

I am still picking my way through the October 2004 issue of Christianity Today magazine. Some fascinating stuff in this issue.

I just read an article by Daniel A. Crane, assistant professor of law at Yeshiva University in New York City. He invokes C.S. Lewis' view of a dichotomy between two types of marriage "licenses," the civil (read that governmental) and the ecclesiastical (read that church).

He asks the important question, do we really want the government to be in the marriage decision business. That could backfire in the future IMO. He suggests as C.S. Lewis did, two types of ceremonies. The church should certainly retain the right to define marriage among its own ranks. The government could have civil ceremonies for non-Christians. The state would recognize both.

Crane writes,
"...same-sex marriage [amendment] is a dangerous shibboleth: It reinforces the status of government as the custodian of the institution of marriage. If the church not only abets but actively furthers the notion that marriage owes its legitimacy to the state's approval, then the battle for the family is all but lost."

And further,
"...it is alarming to see how many Christians insist that defeating legal recognition of same-sex marriage is necessary to preserve the institution of marriage. If that is true, it must because marriage owes its definition and legitimacy to the state.."

Crane's solution is to abolish the word marriage altogether and replace it with civil unions for both heterosexual and homosexuals outside of the church; and, inside the church call it holy matrimony. That doesn't mean that the government will necessarily recognize same sex unions. What the government does, it does, but the church shouldn't be bound to what the government thinks or doesn't think.

He ends the article by stating,
"But neither should we escalate the culture war by making this debate into a battle for the heart and soul of marriage. If we do that, we concede that the state owns marriage [i.e. instead of the church] and that the church's function in blessing unions is subservient to the government's. Far better to lose the battle over the legal definition of marriage than to win it and find that the government now owns one of our most sacred institutions."

I am amazed and appalled at how dense Christians seem to be today at government encroachment of our freedoms. In fact, they are applauding it! I will be blogging more about this in future days.

CT Letters

The Letters to the Editor section in Christianity Today magazine are often as informative and entertaining as the articles in the magazine itself.

Here is the gist of some of the letters in the October 2004 issue:

On the recent article about John Eldredge--the Christian REAL men guru

-->One reader says that Christian, middle-class men might be better off alleviating their spiritual boredom on the mission field rather than in their local sporting goods store (Eldredge likes men to do sports).

--> Another reader thinks the church should lovingly but firmly rebuke Eldredge for his bashing of women (I guess Eldredge calls them seducers and emasculators of men and boys), families (wounders of us all), and the church (intent on turning men into puny Mother Teresas). He writes that "surely we can affirm the renewal of the human heart without denying the pervasiveness of sin and the need for sanctification."

--> Another reader disputes Eldredge's hypothesis about men pursuing their God-given heart for adventure (like doing stuff together in the wilderness). He cites sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox whose study shows that evangelical men who regularly attend church are more affectionate with their spouses and children and less likely to divorce. Wilcox points out that this behavior indicates servanthood and maturity instead of Elderedge's idea that it produces a tamed, toothless, and tepid guy.

My comment: Perhaps there can be a synthesis of some of Eldredge's ideas and some of these readers' ideas.

On Christians and Pagan America
-->A reader says that the only time God called a nation his people was Israel. Since then, there has been no "nation of God." "
The idea of a Christian nation, he writes, is a myth."

My comment: I tend to agree. We need to really consider this position.

--> Another reader says that the recent spate of popular Christian books and movies merely represents a subculture of Christians more than a popular movement of change. He further goes on to say, "Christians will reshape U.S. culture by once again witnessing to the truth of the gospel in every era, not relying on the cultural underpinnings of an America gone by.

My comment: Wow! I say amen to that!

On Judge Roy Moore and the Ten Commandments
--> A reader writes that where Moore erred was when he favored a specific religion with his 2.5 ton Ten Commandments monument.
The reader goes on to point out that a second error was also made when Moore ignored a federal court ruling to have the monument removed.
Next, the reader does a double whammy on us..."For those living under the New Covenant, what point is there in promoting the Old Covenant."

My comment: Uh huh.....that is precisely the direction in which we need to think.

Worse than Watergate-A Different Christian Response

I realize that what I am about to write will be considered rank heresy in some Christian corners.

It has taken me a few years to get to this point....both politically and theologically that is. I am seeing more and more that the Christian Right has influenced us to the point where we are no longer thinkers...-simply robots. I have already highly recommended the book, Blinded By Might: Can the Religious Right Save America" by Cal Thomas and Ed Dobson. These two men helped Jerry Falwell start the Moral Majority. Now, 25 years later, they realize their BIG mistake.

If we don't start to use some discernment and question things, it will be to our great detriment in the future as satan will take that lack of discernment and slap it against us. Let me explain by taking you on my personal odyssey over the past 15 years (well, actually 30, but I will only go back 15 for our purposes here).

In the 1992 Senate race here in California, a Jewish gentleman ran on the Republican ticket. The Christians here were all ga-ga over him because he was the "family values" (fv) candidate. Just before the election it was found out that our fv candidate did the following on a regular level:
*bought pornographic magazines
*was living with a woman he wasn't married to
*went to strip clubs
The interesting fact was that he admitted to all of these things. And STILL, he is invited to this day onto a few Christian Right talk programs. In fact, Hal Lindsey had him on not long ago. Absolutely amazing!

In the next Senatorial race out here another fv guy ran for the office on the Republican ticket. About a year or so after the election, he divorced his wife (the infamous Adriana Huffington) and announced that he was gay. Then a few years after that, he said he wasn't sure, but he thought he might be bisexual.

In the 2002 CA governors race Gray Davis was elected over a not-well-known Republican fv guy. The fv guy was found just before the election taking contributions from the Log Cabin Republicans (the gay Republican group). This was sort of hypocritical since he spent a lot of his campaign time on Christian talk radio here telling us all how he was against the gay agenda. When asked to come on the most listened to Christian talk program in CA to explain, he couldn't be found.

Of course all of these losers lost their elections and so they should have. And as a result we keep getting Dianne Feinstein and ultra-liberal Barbara Boxer. Boxer is running this time again against some "no-one-ever-heard-of-him guy named......uh......his name is ...uh....hmmmm...Jones I think. That's how much he is going to win.
So we will be stuck with Boxer again while the ultra -conservative Republican party here stumbles over all themselves to find another no-name fv bozo candidate. Why did Arnold get elected? He is a Democrat in disguise. This is a liberal state. One-moral issue candidates won't win here. That is just the sobering fact. But the answer is not to run hypocritical unethical candidates. I don't know anything much about this Jones character...so he might be ethical...don't know. The sad fact is I am very informed on politics in this state and I still don't know this guy well. So if I don't, who does?
I think he is a farmer and a former state legislator.

Why are Christians so uninformed and undiscerning?
They don't read. They don't think. They don't ask questions. They want someone else to think for them. That is called codependents getting under a dictatorship.
(see my website on control and codependency at
The Faustian Covenant.

Which brings me to my second point. I just got finished reading John Dean's new book, Worse Than Watergate.
John Dean was Richard Nixon's chief counsel and in on the unethical Watergate mess.
In this book he contrasts the Nixon administration's penchant for secrecy with the Bush II's administration for the same thing. But he says that Bush II is way more secretive, unethical and outright dangerous than Nixon ever could be.

Here are some of Dean's points:
*The Cheney-Wolfowitz-Rumsfeld coalition of neo-cons have prepared for the type of intrusive warfare (when a country doesn't invade us or is even a threat to us) since the end of the cold war--NOT after 9/11.
*The Bush II administration constantly and blatantly withholds information that is required for them to give by law. They ignore Congressional requests as well as other public information requests. They have the stall technique down to an art.
*Dean points out that under Texas law every governor after they leave office is required to send their papers to the Texas state library. Bush refused to do that, and instead, sent his to his father's Presidential library where they have stayed to this day, despite the Texas state librarian's repeated requests to have them sent back to Texas.
*He cites Rep. Ron Paul's assessment of neo-conservatives from a speech Rep. Paul made in the House. Representative Paul, by the way, is a Republican.
Paul said,
1. Neocons agree with Trotsky's idea (one of the Russian revolutionaries in 1917) of a permanent revolution.
2. They identify strongly with the writings of Leo Strauss (he was considered a father of the modern neo-conservative movement).
3. They express no opposition whatsoever to the welfare state and will expand it to win votes and power.
4. They believe in a powerful federal government.
5. They believe the ends justify the means in politics--that hardball in politics is a moral necessity. Cheney is quoted as saying,
"Principle is okay up to a certain point, but principle doesn't do any good if you lose."
6. They believe lying is necessary for the state to survive.
7. They believe certain facts should be known only by the political elite, and withheld from the general public.
8. They believe in preemptive war and the naked use of military force to achieve any desired ends.
9. They openly endorse the idea of American Empire, and hence unapologetically call for imperialism.
10. They are very willing to use force to impose American ideals.
11. They scoff at the Founding Father's belief in neutrality in foreign affairs.
12. They believe 9/11 resulted from a lack of foreign entanglements, not from too many.
13. They are willing to redraw the map of the Middle East by force (emphasis mine), while unconditionally supporting Israel and the Likud Party.
14. They view civil rights with suspicion, as unnecessary restrictions on the federal government.
15. They despise libertarians and dismiss any arguments based on constitutional grounds.
Dean correctly assesses many of the neo-cons as simply former liberal intellectuals that became disenchanted with the way the hippie,free-speech,anti-war left was going. I have also always felt this. I am a true conservative...backing Barry Goldwater. And these neo-cons are simply strangers to my way of thinking.

But the most egregious problem in the Bush II administration IMO is the Patriot Act. In his book John Dean also points out the seriousness of this act.
For example, A man from the northwest United States was arrested and held incognito without habeas corpus, a lawyer, specific charges made against him and so forth. This was the man that the FBI were convinced had taken part in the Madrid train station bombing. The FBI then admitted they had "made a mistake." They were able to do all of this under the Patriot Act.
What Christians just do not get is the legal precedent this establishes. If an unfriendly-to-Christians president was in power, what would preclude him or her from using this same act against Christians that "disagreed" with the administration and so proved to be a "threat to national security?" Believe me, this is where this is heading. Christians will rue the day they got behind this act. In a few days I will be writing about the similarities between the Third Reich and what we are seeing today here. Many of the Christians in Germany didn't get it either--until it was too late.

So now if we don't vote for Bush and we don't want to vote for ultra-liberal Kerry, then what do we do?

It's amazing that the American people, including Christians, have been herded in(mainly by the two parties) to think there are just two parties.
So then, let's examine the other parties.
There is the Green party. Umm..well..probably not. They don't pass the Christian moral-issues litmus test.
Then there is the Libertarian party. Many Christians could vote for them if they passed the moral-issues litmus test, but they don't.
There is the Constitutional party which is better, but this year they are throwing their weight behind the Libertarian candidate.
The Independent party--I don't even know who is running if anyone.
And....there is Ralph Nader--well..no.

But wait! There is a write-in option. How about if all of the Evangelical Christians + many Catholics + many independents, both Republicans and Democrats write in the same candidate. I bet he or she would have a good chance. At the very least it would send a HUGE message to the two parties and especially the Republicans. The message would be this:
*no more business as usual in making us into an aggressive empire.
*no more selling out to big business.
*no more unethical, secretive, lying behavior.

Thomas Freidman, in the New York Times Op/Ed page today muses over who he would vote for if he didn't vote for either Kerry or Bush.
His answer was Bill Cosby. The reason for his choice was that Cosby tells parents like it is. No lies.
Friedman says that up ahead the Social Security will collapse if future presidents don't stop lying about it (we took that subject up here at this blog previously). He also points out that the Southeast Asian kids are taking math and science at an accelerating rate while our kids are sitting at home watching video games (and MTV).
And he brings up the huge baby boom now happening in the Arab countries among mostly the poor. The Islamic fundamentalist madras's (schools) are licking their chops just waiting for these kids.

Will the Christians decide not to listen to their Christian Right masters?

No.

After the Bush "reign," here is what will happen:
Many of the lies and junk will be made public, some of it by Republicans themselves. The Christian Right will ignore it and tell their follower sheep to ignore it.
And, like the California Senate races, it will start all over again with another (probably) Republican "Christian" candidate for whom the dutiful evangelistic community will vote.

The Holiness Question and Church Organization

I've written before here about the false holiness theology that is basically founded on the 19th century evangelist Charles Finney.

In a nutshell this system teaches that you are saved by grace and kept by works. That is ---your works...not God's works. There are several variations of this works program. One was seen in the latter half of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries. The other is being seen today mostly in Third Wave revivalism, which by the way loves Charles Finney. It figures. The old version of the holiness-legalism thought in the last two centuries was a "don't doism." Don't smoke, drink, dance, gamble, go to movies, wear makeup (if you are a woman..and certainly not if you are a man....:), and so on. Of course, it was understood that the really bad stuff like adultery, fornication, homosexuality, theft and murder were waaaay off limits. And that part of it was Biblical; the first part was not.

Today, the new holiness movement is a "works doism." To really be close to God and to be one of the really anointed ones, you must--fast and pray constantly (it's a miracle these people ae not all anorexic), chase God, observe certain Old Testament feasts, and a myraid of other assorted and at times oddball stuff depending on the particular church, prophet, apostle, etc.

I do need to say one word of discipline to the Third Wavers. Please stop using Jonathan Edwards as one of your models--UNLESS you are also prepared to get back to his reformed theology (at least making an effort to go in that direction).

Why does the church get into this throughout history? I believe that organizational structure has a lot to do with it. Jollyblogger today has written an excellent post on this subject. He correctly points out that organizational structure has a lot to do with what happens theologically. Yes it does. In the 90's I felt led to do research using all of the church history books at Fuller seminary (I live near there). Luckily, they allowed non-students to use the library, although a non-student could not check out books. So I spent many hours perusing the books which were written between the late 19th century and the 1990's. As I recall there were about 30 or so of them. I was chiefly interested in three eras of church history--the first century of the Apostles and how the church was organized under them; the church right after the Apostles died; and, the church organization at the beginning of the Reformation. I felt these were the key points in the history of the church both theologically and organizationally.

I tried to keep an open mind, although after studying church abuse and control at that time for 10 years, I felt I already knew what the answer would be. I found out that my hypothesis was fairly correct--the same conclusion that Jollyblooger also made. The organizational structure that God set up through the Apostles was for the most part a presytry one--that is an oligarchical rule--that is, rule by the elders. The pastor(s) is one of the elders. The pastor is NOT over the elders. And that is where churches fall apart. In other words, God didn't set up a dictatorship. Jollyblogger also points out that in the Presbyterian churches, there are people over churches to assist when and if the eldership rule breaks down (the presbytery, synod). In other words, he demonstrates that there are several levels of accountability.
I have been in several abusive churchs and they have always been pastor run and pastor centered.
I also have been in a Presbyterian church where there was some pastoral abuse but after a few years it was "Hasta la vista baby!" The elders fired him. But in churches where pastors tell us that "God told them to start a church," who is going to dismiss these guys?

No..God didn't tell them to start a church.

Going back after the second century, the church organizational structure came to be in the hands of the pastors and alot of power in the hands of the few large churches. Isn't it interesting that it was at that point the theology also got offtrack. Hmmmm....do you perhaps think maybe there is a correlation here?

When the Reformation came, what did the reformers do? Did they see the problem? Well, yes they did, except, in my opinion, too many of them simply transferred the title of priest into pastor/minister. John Knox (Scottish guy and founder of the Presbyterian church) and some others did get the church back to the original eldership rule.

I do hope you will read Jollybloggers excellent post on this subject. It sparked my post here.

You can find Jollybloggers post here.

A Must Read

I've been yelling about "it"; Bob over at TotemtoTemple has been discussing "it"; and now, the guy over at 21st Century Reformation is talking about "it."

This is another MUST READ post. So to find out what "it" is, go to:

Why I Personally Do Not Blog Politics.

More Like Jesus

At another blog, I was reading where the blogger challenged Christians to be more like Jesus as to how they were and what they did. However, the blogger seemed to come up to an invisible line and then stopped cold.

Jesus healed the sick, cast out demons and resurrected the dead. He also prophesied. For some reason, this particulat blogger couldn't seem to get over that line. In fact, in some recent blogs, the blogger denounced these things.
My Bible says that Jesus is the same--yesterday, today and forever (Heb. 13:8).

That brings me once again to the topic of healing the sick, especially getting people out of wheelchairs. I have already reported that we should be getting people out of wheelchairs. I also reported that I actually saw one person prayed out of complete paralysis over a period of around 6 months; and another person getting 1/2 there after a lot of prayer over a few months (I left the that particualr church and so don't know if complete healing came).

Unfortunately, I haven't seen many Christians, churches or so-called healing ministries do this.

Well, I have some very bad news for the faith healers. They had better get on the ball...fast! It looks like science may beat us Christians to it. Science may be getting people out of wheelchairs....soon. If that happens, then Christians will have no place in the healing world. After all, who will want to get healed (or actually not healed) by the weird looking televangelists on TBN? No one. They will all go to their doctor,

Of course, as I have already pointed out in many previous posts here( Church--Meet the Future), if we depend on the "professionals," we may suffer side effects or long term effects.

With the healing power of God, there are no side or long term effects. So, healing evangelists, pastors and elders, and others--get off your arrogant high horse and get busy....quickly.

Bang! Bang!

A Rap by Me (Diane R)

Da homies are killin' all da best,
then they down chillin' for doin' in da rest
Da young in da hood--the ones who're good
The shot ring out and da brothers give a shout
....the good ones they fall
and da homies--they ha' a ball

When da folks going ta rise on up?
When da folks going ta take care of business?
not be afraid no more, no more, no more?
Hey, hood! face up and take off da mask
and take dose homies down to task!

Meanwhile the good ones fall
but nothin' changes, not at all
da calls to 411 go on all night
and we here to say....it's just not right!

But it goes on...and on and on
while the man, he pulls a con

and the good ones, they fall,
the good ones fall.

--Our condolences to the family of Byron Lee, Jr., age 14, who was gunned down by gangbangers in Los Angeles.

Kudos go to the Los Angeles police who are making finding his killers a major priority.

More from the Two "Diversions"

As I have intimated before, there seems to be two main streams of Christian diversion...I'll be nice and call it that instead of using the word heresy...the Seeker-Sensitives (read that Willowcreek and Saddleback); and the Third Wave revivalists (read that Toronto, Brownsville, etc.). You may also throw in the WOF'ers (read that Hagin, Copeland et. al.) if you wish although I've already showed that there are many redeemable theological traits in that camp (see Answered Prayer).

There are some smaller streams of "diversion" such as universalism which now has reared its ugly head since Carleton Pearson's switcheroo. And the open view or open theism as it is also called which seems to be confined to a few seminaries and Bethel College. But most Christians have never heard of these views so they aren't that threatening.

Anyway, here is more craziness from the other two big ones..the seeker-sensitives and the Third Wavers.

First from Jill Austin, a Third Wave...well...I guess prophetess....I'm not sure what she calls herself. She is the one who used to come to churches doing the Potter's Clay presentation. She would make a pot in the church and tell us how God forms us in our character. It was interesting. But it seems that Jill has embraced the "revival."

She says in the recent email from the Elijah list,
"the ultimate goal in prayer is not to have our prayers answered but to encounter God Himself."
Really? Where is that in the NT? Oh it isn't there? It seems to me when people in the NT prayed, they prayed so they could have their prayers answered. You don't encounter God through prayers.....you encounter God through Christ, although prayer might be the vehicle. But then, there is that pesky word the Third Wavers just do not like to mention--Christ.
Why does Ms. Austin's statement sound so Roman Catholic? Why does the whole Third Wave seem so Roman Catholic?
I sure wish these people would read their Bibles.

OK..now for the seeker sensitive craziness. An Internet friend is hot on their trail as she researches what they are up to. To protect her identity, I won't tell you how she found this out, but let's say she heard it from many of the follower's mouths, especially those from one of the KEY seeker sensitive churches (see above). Here are some of the things they were saying:

"church is for the unchurched.."

Wow! In my Bible it seems to clearly indicate that church is for Christians. I'm not sure if this person meant the unsaved, or the saved who don't attend church..or what. But earlier there was another conversation where they indicated that scads of unsaved were attending.
I sure wish people would read their Bibles.

Here are some more:
"People don't need to bring their Bibles. The Scripture passages used are on the overhead projector screen."

Hmmm....maybe someone would like to read the whole chapter to see what the Bible is really saying.

I sure wish these people would bring their Bibles to church so they could READ them.

Law & Order...Kudos

Kudos to last night's TV program Law & Order!

Here is the background to last night's program:
Editors from 11 of the world's leading medical journals announced a few weeks ago that they will not publish the results of any drug trial that has not been registered publicly from the outset--that is ALL results are reported, not only the favorable ones.

Law & Order had an excellent program on this issue of drug companies that do not either test adequately and/or don't show the full results of their tests.

Believe me, this is going to come out more and more in the media. I have already written about the awful testing of antidepressants. But there are many more drugs out there with either dire side effects and/or long term use efects that will be catastophic.

Again, I emphasize that the church needs to begin to craft together a Biblical theology of physical/emotional healing instead of constantly palming people off to the "professionals."

I suggested in another post that the church look more seriously at what Jesus did at the cross, besides just getting us to heaven.

Here is the link for that post:
Answered Prayer

For the antidepressant series Go here.

Movies

I am becoming more and more concerned about how Christians today view movies. Basically almost anything goes. Sex and violence is no problem. Their mantra is, "Since we live in the world, we need to see it as it really is."

Somehow churches are failing to teach the Bible. There is a little verse that blows this movie-reality theory out of the water. Phil. 4:8 says (NIV),
Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy-think about such things. There are also myraids of other Scriptures, as I pointed out in my post yesterday, that exhort us to stop being like the Gentiles and that we must stop certain activiites and practices. In that previous post I pointed out that the word must was used frequently in the epistles.

Christians going to R rated movies and many of the PG ones (probably most of them) don't seem to fit in with these Scriptural truths. I wonder if some people are depressed and having problems in their thought life which is translated into their outer life because of what they expose their minds to. This of course can include TV, especially cable programs.

In the old days, Christians didn't go to movies....and that is when the movies were really sanitized. No sex; no violence; no occultism. Should we go back into that type of legalism? No. Should we teach the Bible? Yes. It is amazing what happens when pastors teach the Bible. It gives the Holy Spirit a chance to convict and teach the congregants. Going to movies as with other "vices" has to be an individual decision. Churches and governments can try to legislate morality, but it usually doesn't work.

Should we be ignorant about what is going on in the world? No. I read movie reviews so I can intelligently talk about them with my neighbors and non-Christian acquaintances. But I usually do not go to most of the movies currently being shown.

I realize that today this type of post seems antiquated. But, I wonder how in touch with themselves many Christians are. Do they really understand how much these type of movies affect them? Where do we draw the line with the content? Today Christians are not drawing much of a line. Isn't it a bit hypocritical to say, "Well, there isn't that much sex in that particular movie, just some." What is some?
Or, "There isn't too much violence in that movie." How much is too much? Is there any line left?

Now the Christians have decided to get into the movie realism act. T.D. Jakes, pastor extraordinaire, has decided to make a real nitty gritty flick. It comes complete with drugs and violence. Oh goody. I can't wait to see it so I can come home and be depressed and fearful. Yes, I know it has a gospel message in there somewhere. And I do understand the need to get away from the sappy Billy Graham type of movies. But in the 1950's in the WWII and cowboy movies, there was no blood and gore. That might have been a sort of make believe world but at least it got the point across without freaking everyone out.

I am hearing Christians complain about how many children are going to these movies. But these same Christians think it is alright for them to attend. After all, they can handle it. Can't they? Hmm...............

Extreme Holiness vs. Extreme Human-ness

Over at the Internet Monk there is an interesting post. Internet Monk is owned by Michael Spencer who also posted a companion piece at his michaelspencer blog.

In these articles he contrasts the extreme holiness view of people, especailly pastors, needing to be almost super human. But, IMO he goes to the other extreme in arguing that the pastor after all is human and so if he has probs...no problemo.

But there is a problemo. In Eph. chapter 4 and 5 alone there are alot of "musts."

Paul writes, "So I tell you this and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do."

And again in vs. 25-"Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak the truthfully to his neighbor..."

In chapter 5:3-"But among you there must not be even a hint of...."and then he lsits several items including sexual immorality, course joking, etc.

Eph. 5:8-"For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light."

Notice that it doesn't say light is in you. It says that you are light.
If we live depressed lives aren't we living as darkness?

And there are scads of passage like this in the NT. If they are there, then we must be able to be empowered by God to live them...right?

In other passages such as I Timothy 3, Paul gives qualifications for bishops (our elders, pastors). It seems here that Paul had the funny idea that pastors and elders could live up to a high standard.

But Spencer and others today have decided to "allow" the pastor to be "human."

Now I have no problem with human. But if a pastor is depressed alot, shouldn't he submit to other church/denominational leaders for help? If his wife is divorcing him as in Spencer's blog, shouldn't he submit himself to the elder council? Unfortunately for the modern day American Christian, the passage in Timothy talks about a pastor (and elders to by the way) having an intact family. If the children are unruly and the wife wants out, there is a hint that maybe the pastor should step down a while until hopefully things get straightened out. But to suggest that today ranks with high heresy. It is assumed that you must have something against the pastor. Not at all....but church leaders must understand that this is a serious office in the church and they cannot accept this without thinking through what it will mean to their personal lives and families.

I used to date a lot of seminary guys (in my youth a long time ago..LOL) and looking back on it they didn't have a clue to what the ministry entailed.
For years, I've called for our Bible colleges and seminaries to stop being diploma mills and really get to know their students. I also am firm in the belief that every student should have to go through a class or even personal counseling course for them...not to learn to counsel others. That would be another class. I saw some very angry/depressed men completing their seminary work about to be up for ordination. I hate to tell you this....but these types can ruin peoples' lives. Read my blog yesterday about the emotionally ill pastor I was under....as well as some of the WOF ones. I know what I am talking about.

Depression is often repressed anger. There is no qualification to get knowledge in any seminary or Bible college about getting rid of anger before getting a ministerial degree. There should be.

I know about depression. I wa sucidely depressed for years after I became a Christian. The first three years was the joyful honeymoon, and then the depression settled in for the next 14 years. But I refused to take antidepressants because my body said "no." I listen to my body. I think it is one of God's ways to tell us things. When body says, "sleep," then we need to sleep. When body says "I am full," then we need to stop eating and so forth. I was determined to push through with the good fight of faith and bug God until He answerd me as to why I was depressed and what I could do about it. He did and I did. I cannot even remember what dperession felt like becuase I have become completely free of it for the last 20 years. I am not holding individuals responsible to find these things out. I am holding a church responsible that still refuses to take depression seriously and find out what they can do about it in prayer. I should have never had to seek God on this for so long--14 years. My churches should have helped me . Instead they wanted to palm me off onto the Christian psychologists. Unfortunately, they didn't have a clue either. Sadly, my first therapist was into sex therapy and now is one of the leading Christian sex therapists. Everyothing wrong was due to sex or the lack of it, according to him.

Sadly much of the Christian psychological world is so whacked it makes you cry and scream to think or talk about it.

But back to the topic. Spencer points out, correctly IMO, that the holiness movement is very unhelpful too. In fact I believe that is the other extreme. Can we not get into the happy balanced middle where God and His power is? Please??

Charles Finney of the early 19th century is the culprit behind the holiness movement. By the way, please do read TotemtoTemple's blog today (Oct.3-"I Guess We Christians Are Not Saved")....it is one of the best refutation of Finney and his goofy holiness doctrine I think I have ever read. Kudos to Bob for writing this masterpiece.

So, summing up then, our leaders need to be a step up from the lowest human common denominator, But they do not need to be perfect or little gods.

There is a middle and I hope the church can find it.

As a sad footnote, the pastor in Spencer's blog committed suicide many years later. That didn't need to be. It was the church and it's faulty theology and organizational structure that failed him.

Yes....The Organizational Structure Does matter

Does the organizational structure of a church really matter?

In the early 1990's, I felt impressed to do a study of church structure--that is the way it was in the early church.

After my study, I discovered something very interesting. I saw most of the time that bad theology came out of bad organizational structure--not vice-versa, although at times they happened simultaneously.

I traveled three times to the Fuller Seminary library, which fortunately is within 15 minutes of me, to peruse every book they had on church history. I was looking specifically for church organizational structure in three eras:
*the first century church of the Apostles
*the church right after the Apostles died
*the Reformation's idea of proper church organization

I found that almost all of the books agreed. The oldest one was published in the late 1890's and the most recent one two years before my research.

Essentially they all said that the early church was elder-ruled with one elder being selected by the other elders as pastor. The pastor was to do some teaching, some administrative duties, and to keep in touch with other churches for the purposes of what God was saying to them. He also was to ask other churches if false prophets and teachers had been identified so if those might wander into the pastor's town, his church would be ready.

In other words, God didn't set up a dictatorship, but what we would call an oligarchy--that is rule by a few. After the last Apostle died, there were no more apostles OVER already existing churches, although there seemed to be apostles sent out by churches to UNCHURCHED areas. This certainly has serious implications for the "false" apostle program of today doesn't it.

After the Apostles died, the churches basically followed the same organizational structure of eldership rule that ahd been set up before. As the years went by though, the rule of the elders began to go more and more into the hands of the pastor. It's interesting that the theology began to change as this happened...for the worse. It's also interesting to note that the Roman Empire had gone in the same direction. In the first years of the country, the senate ruled (oligarchy). But as the country became empire, the rule concentrated in the hands of the emporer with the senate being nothing more than a "yes-boy" group.

As America goes more and more toward empire, should we perhaps be concerned about the same thing? I think we do.

Meanwhile, back to the church. The Reformation made some reorganizational changes but not really as much as they should have in the office of pastor. There was too much of the pastor as priest left in. Most churches did reinstate the elders.

Today we have in the mainline denominations (especially Presbyterian and Congregational churches) a more correct organizational structure. That doesn't mean their theology is always good, just their structure. The one glaring problem is the pastor teaching 48 weeks of the year with two weeks off for vacation and two weeks of someone else teaching, usually a missionary.

In the early church, the pastor-teacher (Eph. 4:11 teaches a four-fold ministry...not a five-fold in the Greek grammatical construction) shared the pulpit with other teachers, prophets, evangelists and apostles. In other words, the other parts of Eph. 4:11 were actually allowed frequently to speak and teach the congregation. Added to that were teachers (I Cor. 12:28) and teaching and prophetic elders. In addition to that were visiting teachers and prophets from outside the church.

Today, we basically hear the same thing from the same person week after week; year after year. If we would go back to the original concept, it wouldn't denigrate the postion of pastor. It simply would allow the poor man to rest. It would also allow him NOT to be a god---that is administrator, evangelist, prophet, teacher, counselor and so forth. Pastors are not apostles. We must understand this.

When the church members hear from various people both inside and outside the church, I believe because of the increased information, theological balance and spiritual giftings and (yes that awful word) anointings, there will be increased answers to prayer as well as a more victorious church.

I've been under both systems. In some of the Pentecostal chruches and almost all of the Charismatic churches the pastors would say that "God told them to start a church." No, God didn't tell them to start a church. They then selected the elders. Since the type of person who seeks to be in the pastor-rules-only type of church is often a controller, you can imagine what the elders he would select were like. In other words, a very dysfunctional church. And of course, he cannot be fired because he alone makes policy.

Contrast this with a Presbyterian church I was a member of years ago. They had a very gifted pastor but he was very emotionally immature and I think slightly emotionally ill. After about 4 or 5 years of this, the elders fired him. It was a very difficult decision as he was well regareded in his denomination as a great Bible teacher.

You might have heard of the Fullerton (CA)Evangelical Free Church. That was where Chuck Swindoll pastored. Here is how that church began. Ten mature Christian men wanted to start a church there and so they did. Later they asked the Evangelical Free denomination to be their head. These mature men understood how necessary it was to submit to a larger body and they also understood that one man starting a church was not a good idea. After I left the Presbyterian church with the immature pator, I began to attend an Evangelical Free church (not the Fullerton one). It started the same way. A group of mature men started it.

When I was in the one-pastor-rule churches, it was like being with Jim Jones. In fact in one church, I wondered when we would all go to Guyana and drink the kool aid. I could tell you stories that would make your hair stand on end. Why did I stay? Not being codependent, I wanted out almost as soon as I arrived since I am good at seeing red flags. However, I was deeply impressed by God to stay. In fact, I eventually got on staff there so I saw more than the average member of the church saw. This was the beginnings of my 23 year odyssey of studying controllers and codependents (see my website)

Yep....this is the type of stuff that happens when we don't follow God's original outlines both theologically and organizationally.

Oh by the way. If you hear the word primitve church, be careful. That is a red flag that says the person who is peddling this first century church history is a Third Wave revivalist and is telling fairy tales. In other words--most of the time it is very historically inaccurate.

On a Lighter Side

I'm going to bump the organizational structure post to tomorrow.

--->Well, ok..since I'm sure every Christian political pundit blogger will discuss ad naseum "who won the debates, I will weigh in with a brief word.

Kerry.

Today's IWON survey agrees:
32%-Kerry won
22%-Bush won
14%-they were even
29%-didn't watch the debate
2%-aren't sure
1%-don't care

Will I vote for Kerry? No. Will I vote for Bush. Perhaps. Well, you might ask, who else is there beside Nader? There actually are quite a few people..Greens, Constitutional, Libertarian...and then...and I don't think many realize this or at least remember it...you can write in a candidate.

Like many this year, I don't want either of the major candidates. There are so many of us, it seems a shame for us not to get altogether and write in one name. That person just might win...:)

--->On another note...I am expanding my prophetic word of the other day to include all drugs, legal or illegal, not just antidepressants. If a human takes a chemical for a prolonged period of time, it is probable that they will have health problems down the line. Oh by the way, they just pulled another drug from the shelf...if you have arthritis..sorry..no Vioxx for you any more (yes I know there're other drugs for this purpose). As the drugs disappear, I am wondering what the church will say to their sick parishoners. Read my post from Sept. 29.


--->A funny but true story. In Virginia, the Board of Directors of an elementary school were having a dinner meeting in the school cafeteria. It was a Mexican themed dinner so they had margaritas with their food. After the dinner, there were some margaritas left over so for some strange reason they were put into the school cafeteria refrigerator.

I bet you know where this true story is going don't you?....:)

Yes, the next week, the cafeteria ran out of milk and so searched the refrigerator for another beverage. They saw some "limeade" and gave that to the children.

Fortunately, the children didn't have any bad effects. In fact, many of them said, "it didn't taste so good." Hopefully, that attitude will continue into adulthood. Well, one can hope can't they?.