NBC portrays Christians as violent

NBC, being out of touch with reality (it is only a TV station you know), thinks that Christians are violent and unenlightened.

Read here.

2008 Puritan Reading Challenge

Timmy Brister has come up with a reading challenge for all of us. His challenge is to read one Puritan book per month during 2008. These are not just any Puritan books, but a specific list. This list can be viewed at Reformation Heritage Books.

I know what you are thinking, that's if you are thinking like I used to think about 10+ years ago. "These are all old books written by a bunch of dead guys!"

C.S. Lewis, wrote a very insightful introduction to the book of one of those old dead guys. He wrote this forward to Athanasius' On the Incarnation.

This is what he wrote:
"There is a strange idea abroad that in every subject the ancient books should be read only by the professionals, and that the amateur should content himself with the modern books. Thus I have found as a tutor in English Literature that if the average student wants to find out something about Platonism, the very last thing he thinks of doing is to take a translation of Plato off the library shelf and read the Symposium. He would rather read some dreary modern book ten times as long, all about "isms" and influences and only once in twelve pages telling him what Plato actually said. The error is rather an amiable one, for it springs from humility. The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism. It has always therefore been one of my main endeavours as a teacher to persuade the young that firsthand knowledge is not only more worth acquiring than secondhand knowledge, but is usually much easier and more delightful to acquire."

He also wrote:
"Naturally, since I myself am a writer, I do not wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old. And I would give him this advice precisely because he is an amateur and therefore much less protected than the expert against the dangers of an exclusive contemporary diet. A new book is still on its trial and the amateur is not in a position to judge it. It has to be tested against the great body of Christian thought down the ages, and all its hidden implications (often unsuspected by the author himself) have to be brought to light. Often it cannot be fully understood without the knowledge of a good many other modern books. If you join at eleven o'clock a conversation which began at eight you will often not see the real bearing of what is said. Remarks which seem to you very ordinary will produce laughter or irritation and you will not see why—the reason, of course, being that the earlier stages of the conversation have given them a special point. In the same way sentences in a modern book which look quite ordinary may be directed at some other book; in this way you may be led to accept what you would have indignantly rejected if you knew its real significance. The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity ("mere Christianity" as Baxter called it) which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. Such a standard can be acquired only from the old books. It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones."

So, I would like to challenge my readers to take up Timmy Brister's challenge to read the Puritans.

If you are from South Africa like I am, you might try Augustine Bookroom for all those books. I have checked their catalogue, and they indeed have it in their catalogue.

Theology affects your prayer life

I have believed, for long now, that what we believe will affect our prayer lives. If that belief is not solidly grounded in the Bible, then our theology will be full of errors, or perhaps even heresies.

If we approach God, without the solid backing of what His Word says about Him, then our prayer lives could be ruined.

Joe Thom wrote an article on exactly this called The Secret to a Better Prayer Life.

Media nuisance

I wonder how you respond to the media when they "reveal" the "latest" in scholarly research on Jesus, especially when it contradicts everything Christianity has believed for the last 2000 years?

Darrell Bock has written a short article addressing this issue. Even though it is not an in-depth look at the issues, it certainly gets one thinking.

"Not long ago, topics like textual criticism and the extra-biblical Gospels elicited yawns from my seminary students. I went through the obligatory motions of covering these staples of New Testament study, knowing that no matter how hard I tried, questions would be rare and engagement minimal.

"All that has changed. Topics like the James ossuary and the Gospel of Judas have hit Times Square, not only pricking the attention of seminary students, but also garnering coverage from journalists and culture-watchers, from CBS News's traditional news team to 360 Degrees's Anderson Cooper."

Continue reading here...

HT: Justin Taylor

Golden Compass on Santa's banned list!

For more, visit ChristmasGram.

Charles Finney is no hero!

Evangelicals of all stripes revere Charles Finney. However, they probably do not have a clue about his beliefs, and he is just a name out there, a poster boy if you like.

Yet, Finney was one of those über-heretics, but still made it into the evangelical "Hall of Fame."

What a shame that evangelicals have lost its capability to discern evil, dangerous and heretical doctrines.

Read more about Finney and his heresy at GraceRemarx, Phil Johnson's website, Modern Reformation, from Charles Hodge, and at Monergism.

Help for Africa's doctrinal wanderings

Some time ago I pointed to an article which highlighted the African church's doctrinal wanderings towards the WOF heresy.

Well, it seems that some help may have arrived in the form of the Africa Center for Apologetics Research (ACFAR). ACFAR has realised the need for solid doctrinal teaching and the battle against the many cults and false teachers in Africa, and as a result they have set up their ministry in Kampala, Uganda.

ACFAR also has a blog to keep up to date with what is going on there.

Pay them a visit. Perhaps you can help in one way or another.

Christian Worldview: Does it exist?

"He took the blade. It was bright silver. He loved the way it glistened. It felt good in his hand. He cut deep into her chest again and again. He showed no emotion, no recognition of her humanity. She lay motionless, her life gone. He made no attempt to cover the body. Later that night over a beer he openly talked to a stranger in the bar about what he had done. The stranger felt ill.

What are we to make of this? Should someone have called 911? Should he have been ar-rested? Is this a Hannibal Lector story? It all depends. To make sense of it, this narrative fragment needs placing in a larger picture or frame of reference. We need to know more.

Now suppose I were to inform you that the setting earlier that night was a back alley late at night and that the woman had been alive but drunk when she entered it, then you would be entitled to think that this is a case for CSI. The man listening to the story in the bar ought to have called the police. However, if I were to say that instead of the alley, the setting earlier that night had been a CSI autopsy room, then the complexion of the event changes your reading of it. The man with the knife is no serial killer but instead a forensic scientist. Maybe he shouldn’t have talked about the details to a stranger over a beer. But if that was misconduct it was unprofessional, not criminal."
Continue reading Graham A. Cole's article called "DO CHRISTIANS HAVE A WORLDVIEW?"

[You will need a PDF reader to read this article. You can find one here and here.]

HT: Justin Taylor

Sometimes the good guys win, even if it is a Gator!

What an acceptance speech for the Heisman Trophy!

Congratulations Tim Tebow, not just for winning the Heisman Trophy, but for having your priorities straight in your acceptance speech! You are a real winner!


Of course, if he was aborted like the doctor suggested to his mother, he would never have had this honour bestowed on him!

Teaching apologetics to Iranian Christians

Dr. James R White has been busy. He has been doing a series of videos for television satellite broadcasting into Iran. Here is a short clip from the first day of recording.

Tomorrow's People School

My wife, Charlaine, bless her heart, is a teacher for grade 3s, and also head of department for the junior phase (grade 0-3) at her school, Tomorrow's People Primary School, here in Pretoria, South Africa.

It is a Christian school for disabled children of all types. They accept normal children, children with learning disabilities, ADD, autistic, Down Syndrome, and up to children with cerebral palsy.

The idea behind the school is to normalise their education as much as possible, and even to get some to progress to the standard of normal schools. Obviously it depends very much on the individual child.

Obviously, schools like these are not cheap to run and they are always in need of one thing or another.

DISCLAIMER: I was not asked or approached by anyone from the school, not even my wife, to garner support for the school. I simply have noticed a need in the school.

A school like this needs finances to buy specialised computers with special software, for those that do not have the ability to write with their hands and therefore needs to be able to do class work on these special computers with special keyboards.

As a Christian school, Biblical principles are followed in their treatment of children. No child is seen as just another student.

My wife had only 6 children in her class this year (2007), as they were the difficult children in terms of abilities and disabilities. So many times my wife came home thinking that she was not making an impact on these children, just to be amazed a few days later at what they actually achieved.

Because one class could have children of such vastly different capabilities, teachers need to be acutely aware of how to handle each child's education. This calls for teachers with special abilities. That, in turn, leads to higher salaries, which the school can't afford, as their budget does not allow for it, since the school tries to keep school fees as low as possible to keep it affordable for the parents.

It would be nice to find sponsors for this school to be able to buy the specialised computer equipment for these special children, and also to be able to attract specialised teachers into the school.

If you have contact with anyone that may perhaps help in sponsorship, it would be greatly appreciated. Simply point them my way, and I will put them in contact with the owners of the school. It really doesn't matter if the sponsorship comes from within or from outside of South Africa.

Thanks for your time!

Patrick Henry Hughes - a little inspiration

DVD Giveaway!

Mohammedans are crypto-Christians

Steve Hays wrote an interesting blog post called "The blasphemous teddy bear."

It is certainly worth the read...

Acceptance of sin in the church

This is probably going to cause some controversy, but I guess not that much, since I do not have thousands of readers here.

At a local church nearby, there was a member who was known to the leadership as a serial murderer. What was amazing about this church was that there was an organization that was passively condoned by this church, that promoted serial murder as a way of life. One would have to stretch the imagination to its limits to imagine something like this happening, yet here it was. What was even worse than this, is the fact that this church knew about this organization, and that several of its members were part of it, and that there was an actual serial murderer in their midst. Yet, the church passively condoned it all. I say passively, because the church did or said nothing against this organization or those that supported it.

On a smaller scale, churches are forever condoning sin by not doing or saying anything against it. We all know of the adulterers and fornicators in our churches, but the leadership in our churches are usually without any backbone and choose not to "offend" these offending church members.

The Bible is very clear about situations like these. Unrepentant people in the church should be treated as unbelievers. However, in the church today, these people are welcomed with open arms, and as such are encouraged (albeit passively) to continue in their sinful ways.

Now, coming back to the story about the church that condoned serial killers and their supporters, I hope you realize that it was completely fictional as the facts stand. However, it is not that far from the truth!

We have people in our churches that do commit murder everyday. We also have people in our churches that even encourage those that commit these murders.

What am I talking about? I am taking about abortion of course! It is nothing short of murder! And, it should be classified as such!

It is time that we confront these people, abortionists and their supporters in our churches. And, if they refuse to repent, we need to treat them as unbelievers.

That means, that when a person actively supports abortion, homosexuality, same-sex marriage, pornography, or those that continue to legalize these abominations, then they should no longer be treated as believers and should effectively be excommunicated from the church.

Here in South Africa, where political parties can literally stand on absolute opposing sides of the coin, it should be much clearer for Christians to know who to vote for, but I guess that Christians here still vote very strongly according to the colour line and do not even think about moral issues.

Here, many who claim to be Christians actively vote for the ANC, who have been the greatest purveyors of immorality and injustice. They are the ones who have forced through liberal laws such as free abortion, pornography, same-sex marriage, etc.

While a Christian party exists, the ACDP, many of these Christians still vote for and assist the ANC with all its immorality. In fact, I know a person who used to be a member of the ACDP, but walked over to the ANC and is expending all his energies in working for the ANC. Yet, while he is actively supporting the ANC (with all its injustices and immoral legislation) during the week, he comes to church on Sundays to raise his hands in worship unto the Lord.

I personally think that the church should start setting the boundaries of its membership and not just see membership as a notch on its belt and tithes in the church coffers.

There are real moral issues at stake here, and many who claim to be Christians in our churches are simply turning a blind eye at the terrible atrocities committed in the name of ANC forced law!

Church, stand up against immorality in the church! Do something about it!

Dare have a backbone!