Survey Results...Very Telling...

(Click on the above picture to read it...Blogger doesn't let me post it full-size)

These selected questions (published through the Pew Center www.pewforum.org) are from a recent survey about religion. They speak for themselves.

Apologies for the lack of exigetical/substantial posts! I'll be back soon!

Definitely a necessary message...

Readers,

I apologize for the lack of posts recently; I have been helping my wife set up the foundation of her new business, and the only time we are able to work on the necessary preparations (website, legal forms, business plan writing, etc.) is during the evening.

While working from home today, I came across this message via changeyourcampus.com. The pastor/teacher's name is Paul Washer, and he is giving this message to a group of college-age students (I believe they are at a Baptist Bible college).

It calls its listeners yet again to the the external (and more importantly, internal) self-examination of Christ's Lordship as the evidence of a regenerate heart and a truly "saved soul". Emergents/ecumenicals/faint-of-heart/"people who don't like hell-and-damnation sermons" beware...it will open your eyes and I pray that it will work in your heart. It definitely gives me a gut check, and will find a permanent place in my sermon library.

MP3 and WMV Video links are on the page, it requires signing up for a weekly newsletter:
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?sermonID=52906154239

Many of you may have heard or come across this sermon before. This being the first I've heard of it, I had to share it.

I'll make some posts of some substance soon! :-)

Selfish Fulfillment

This is an excerpt from the following story: "McCain: Overall faith what's important"

In a June interview with McClatchy Newspapers, the senator said his wife and two of their children have been baptized in the Arizona Baptist church, but he had not. "I didn't find it necessary to do so for my spiritual needs," he said.

He told McClatchy he found the Baptist church more fulfilling than the Episcopal church, but still referred to himself as an Episcopalian.

I realize that this is yet another political article in my blog, but I promise that I will not be dealing with any sort of social or political agendas (those are best left to other blogs). Instead, this quote worries me because I believe it is evident of an ever-present but growing trend in our society and among those who profess to be Christian: that Baptism and other evidences of submission to Christ as Lord are unnecessary and only exist for our edification and self-satisfaction.

The Presidential candidates have "evangelical strategists" that help them to court the vote the "Christian" community through the use of faith-based words, actions and associations. Instead of worrying about whether or not a candidate condones murder of innocent children, some of our Christian brothers and sisters care more about a candidate's shallow words or affiliation. The next post will be some selective excerpts from a recent Pew survey that will further demonstrate the responsibility of His children that have been provided with the Truth and have had it revealed to them through His Word that we have much work to be done in our "own house".

(Sorry, I thought I posted this the other day!)

Saudi Arabia = Apparently a Safe Mission Field?

The U.S. has given Saudi Arabia a pass during its recent study of worldwide "religious freedom", despite the Saudi state being the premier fundamentalist Muslim regime in the world.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070914/pl_afp/usreligionrightssaudi;_ylt=AsOCElYsUJj6gtPrf3oBl_k7Xs8F

Oil will make the U.S. do some crazy things. While 19 of the 20 Sept. 11th hijackers, Osama Bin Laden and billions in laundered terrorist funds all came from Saudi Arabia, they are seemingly innocent of all wrongdoing in both the GWOT and the oppression and brainwashing of its citizenry.

I realize this isn't a political blog, but for the U.S. to blantantly overlook a regime that persecutes Christians to the extent of punishing them under law is reprehensible and...well, flabbergasting.

Please pray for our brothers and sisters in the Muslim world; what a testament to the truth of Christ at calling of the Holy Spirit that these people face religous, legal and social persecution at a level we can barely fathom every day, yet proclaim His Holy Name with strength and confidence. I pray that we be motivated to do the same!

Hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend!

Open-Ended Question…How do you deal with frustration?

In this era of the Internet, YouTube, consumerism and 24-hour “Christian” TV networks, the Truth is under attack from every angle and at every moment of the day. While I strive to do my earthly duties and spend time in my walk with God, I find myself constantly upset by the mangling of Jesus’ truth and even His name throughout our culture. Deceivers like Joel Osteen (who I just found out has never attended seminary, and has one semester of undergraduate education to his famous name) and others lead people astray, and while I pray for those people and for God’s work to be done, I constantly feel as if it is my personal duty to spend time against these deceptive leaders.

What I’m looking for from my readers is: How do you deal with this frustration? What is your reaction when you hear Word Faith speakers and Universal Salvation peddlers broadcast to an audience of millions? What would He have us do in these situations?

I might have a little more time than many of you out there (young, no kids, no house), so I have time to ponder these things instead of tending to a family or mowing the lawn! That being the case, there aren’t enough hours in the day to go around correcting erroneous blogs and commenting of heretical YouTube videos…

Looking forward to your comments!

AdSense = Nonsense

I put Google AdSense ads on this site to see how much traffic would pass through the site, and to donate any proceeds to my church's general ministry fund (anyone coming here is definitely His work!).

After watching them for a couple of weeks, I realized that Google's crawling of my site must have picked the wrong words, because somehow the most blasphemous, unbiblical nonsense makes its way into those AdSense boxes.

I've decided to take them off, and if God ever wants me to "advertise" again, I'm sure He'll provide me with someone who is actually selling something of value!

Thanks for reading!

Response to the classic question...

I was going through some blogs and came across a posting with the title "Once Saved, Always Saved? Is the Jury Still Out on this One?"

I won't cite it here because I believe the author is still growing in her understanding of Scripture on this issue, but I did want to post my reply to that post to see if I was concise enough to get the point across, but lengthy enough to assure that the full Truth was discussed:

To the Author,

Your posting is extremely lengthy, but in you have some different issues that I would like to address. First, the title:

1. “Once Saved, Always Saved?” - Loaded Question
2. “Is the Jury Still Out on this One?” - No.

1. This question is a bit loaded, because each of its parts need to be defined and analyzed:

Once Saved = True, Christ died once and for all to sin, and as His people we are also dead in sin but alive in Him (Romans 6:9-11).

Always Saved = True, true believers who confess and repent of their sin nature and replace it with Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of their life will not perish (Hebrews 7:24-26).

In the context you are using “once saved, always saved” here, however, worries me because it seems like you are asking “does someone who is a professing Christian have the license to sin, or the ability to lose their salvation?” The answer to that is no. Evidence of a Christian is seen through works done in the name of Christ before men (James 2:14-26). Christians are not saved through their works (as false religions teach), but do works in thanksgiving and praise to God. Someone who says they are a Christian and does not have a regenerate heart that grieves over sin and strives to please God in both words and deeds is not to be regarded as a brother or sister.

2. The jury is not still out. The Bible is the Word of God, and is sufficient for all that we need to know about Him (2 Tim 3:16-17). The Bible is extremely clear on this issue.

Comments welcome!

Taking the "o" out of Good...

In speaking with a mentor/brother of mine last night over coffee, we got on the subject of the altruistic human-centered movements that seem to be springing up all over our country, if not the globe. Movements for "green" living, animal rights, humanism and others have become extremely popular over the last few years, and they have begun to make their way into advertisements and even the arts (e.g. Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth").

These are all "good things": keeping our earth clean, reducing waste and consumption, treating animals with respect and dignity, treating people of different backgrounds and races equally...I don't think that anyone debates the worth of these principles.

The problem is the ardent followers of these movements have erased an "o" from these "good things"...the "good" has become their "god".

It is a knee-jerk reaction to be critical of those that seem to deify the earth, animals or even human beings. "They are breaking the first commandment! AND the second one! Blasphemy! Heresy!" Now, that is probably a little over the top, but my general point is that we look at those people as following false Gods in spite of our God. Now, these people are against God per the Bible, and they have put their trust in something else other than Him, but do they make an effort to hate our God? Are they lost forever?

What we should look at instead is the reason why these people have taken these "good things" and turned them in to "God things". They obviously have the capacity to venerate something "good" above themselves, and are willing to dedicate themselves to that purpose. Why the earth/animals/humans instead of our Lord?

For example, put yourself in a humanist's shoes: long ago, you showed up at a church at the request of a friend, but secretly wondering what's going on with this God thing? You aren't able to locate the friend, so you sit down in the back corner near the exit. During the greeting, you exchange hollow handshakes with your neighbors, who speak to each other like family but seemingly ignore you completely. During the worship service, you see some people singing, but others standing there with a countenance that looks like indifference and annoyance, not awe and wonder at the God about whom they are singing. This bothers you so much that you don't even listen to the sermon, and as you leave the church, you are ignored again while people chat away as they leave the chapel.

Did the church "love their neighbor" as itself? Did they do their part in letting this guest know that Jesus is "seeking and saving the lost?" Maybe this person knew a little about Jesus at the time...but he certainly didn't see Him in the people he just met.

Instead, the disenchanted visitor leaves in search of something to fill the void, and given the pervasive nature of these "good" movements in our culture, they are easily drawn in to these groups. They are taking on new disciples each week, they openly welcome new "converts", there is a wealth of information available for any questions or doubts, they hold events and meetings where people are inviting and understanding, with an undercurrent of whatever the cause may be uniting them, and they offer a greater cause than themselves in order to help seekers fill that void in their soul.

I'm as guilty as any of the people I just villified; we all are. We believe that the people who need to tell the guests about Jesus are the pastor, the elders, those who serve at the welcome reception, the Evangelism Explosion group, missionaries, deacons, Sunday school teachers...anyone but us.

We are not in competition with these movements. God created all of the things that are being worshiped: the earth, the animal kingdom, our beautiful natural resources, and the human race. Instead of treating these things as God has commanded us to (responsible dominion of nature in Genesis 1:28, conducting ourselves in love with others in 1 Corinthians 13), we have declared these movements as worship of idols or man, and in our condescension we seem to condone the abusive or apathetic behaviors that they seek to eradicate.

What would happen if a church started to plant trees on Saturdays? If it hosted a mobile pet vaccination center? If it hosted a forum on racism? (Please do not equate this with any sort of ecumenical meetings; that's not what I'm getting at)

Would it be guilty of giving in to environmentalist "nutjobs"? Would it be complacent with these "anti-God" humanisitc movements? Would it give undue veneration to animals?

No.

Each of these movements could very easily be Christ-centered. Call it "Caring for Creation" or "All God's Creatures" or something else catchy, and exemplify the Biblical teaching regarding these elements of our world. They would be awesome outreach opportunities, showing people that Christians aren't an exclusive club that gets together and talks about each other and maybe talks about God between the gossip.

As Christians, we could stand to do some "good" for the world around us. We are not supposed to only do good on Wednesday night and Sunday morning. We aren't supposed to be a bright light under the "basket" of the church; we are supposed to shine the bright light of Christ on the lampstand of the world! Jesus said in Matthew 5:16,

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.

I pray that God will change my heart and yours, that we would not treat these people as willful enemies of God, but sheep that have lost their way and followed the wrong shepherd. Many will never come to know Him, but He rejoices for each one that is found. God bless!