Thinking Over Things is Justification Enough, Right?

As a conservative evangelical, one issue dominated my mind during this election: abortion.  With the election of a liberal senator as president with a liberal house and senate would be a tragic downfall for those of us who are fighting hard for the lives of innocent unborn children who are being murdered (yes, murdered) legally day in and day out.  The nightmare has become reality.

Our president-elect made this statement at the Saddleback forum:

“I am pro-choice, I believe in Roe vs. Wade and I come to that conclusion not because I’m pro-abortion, but because ultimately I don’t believe women make these decisions casually.  I think they wrestle with these things in profound ways in consultation with their pastors or their spouses or their doctors and their family members.”

On February 12, 2008, click2houston.com ran a story about a lady who came to the hospital, gave birth in the restroom and threw her newborn in the trash can.  The story is at http://www.click2houston.com/news/15278887/detail.html

This country is full of idiots, crazies, thiefs, murderers, embezzlers, rapists, molesters, etc.  The government exists to protect its citizens from that.  I would be willing to bet that many people that have committed crimes did not do so lightly.  I bet they thought about very seriously before they did.  Does that make it ok?  I’m sure Martha Stewart counted the costs before she committed her crime, but did that get her off the hook? Nope.

Senator Obama, and all you other liberals for that matter, you are wrong for thinking that just because a woman may think about it first, it’s ok to kill a baby.  There have been many instances of babies being born and thrown in the trash, which shows there are some stupid pregnant women out there.  Why are you putting lives in their hands and at their discretion?

Our government has failed miserably in the protection of its people.  Millions have needlessly been murdered.  The blood stains the hands of the one we have chosen as our leader.  I am afraid that the river of blood will only get deeper in his administration.  May God be with those innocent babies.

We Don’t Need No Education

I love Christmas movies. One of my favorites is The Santa Clause 2, where Santa (Tim Allen) has multiple things to take care of, so, at the advice of the assistant head elf, decides to “clone” himself through a magical machine that is only at the North Pole that creates another “toy-like” Santa that would take care of the North Pole duties while the real Santa goes to tend to Charlie (his son). Of course this is fiction. I mean, it’s crazy to think of a machine that can zap someone and create a clone that contains similar knowledge to its original copy. Or is it?

The phrase that I hear so much in the ministry is, “Well, God can use anybody.” While I whole-heartedly agree with this statement, I disagree with the lazy Christians that it has produced. Too many times do I hear from others about my longing to complete seminary that, “You don’t have to have an education for God to use you.” Did I miss something? Are the baptismal waters also a machine that zaps knowledge into our minds that makes us like our Father? God has given us His Word for a purpose: for us to understand and know more about Him. While there are aspects of God that are mysterious, there are things of God that He has given us to understand about Him. Rob Bell wrote on page 32-33 of Velvet Elvis,

The Christian faith is mysterious to the core. It is about things and beings that ultimately can’t be put into words. Language fails. And if we do definitively put God into words, we have at that very moment made God something God is not…The mystery is the truth.

(emphasis is in the original).

Language fails? I have 1,189 chapters that disagree. There are over 40 authors from all walks of life that would disagree. Those that wrote the Bible over a 1500 year span would say that language would definitely fall short of describing ALL of who God is, but He has definitely chosen to reveal a portion of His infinite goodness and holiness to us through His written Word. And it should be our goal, our hunger, to know everything that we can about His written Word. We should cling to it. We should stand firm on it. We should read it over and over and over. It is what God saw fit to reveal to us and that in itself should usher in the grandest form of urgency and importance in our lives.

But no, education is not a priority anymore in our churches. We seek emotionally moving worship services that use a variety of visual and audible stimuli; we seek preachers that tickle our ears; we seek discussion groups where we freely express our own beliefs and not be afraid that someone will correct us if we are not in line with Scripture. We seek pastors and ministers in our churches who have not been properly trained in the Word. And then here comes that statement again, “God can use anybody.” Yes, but it’s not to be used as an excuse for one not to get properly trained before taking on a leadership position in the teaching of God’s church. If one truly wants to teach the Word of God, then one needs to saturate himself in the Word and sit under the teaching of the Word. Continuing education is imperative for those who are going into vocational ministry. Consider James 3:1, “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.”

My plea is that ALL will seek to continually gain more knowledge of God through His Word, but that especially those who are leaders in the church would treasure knowledge and that the words of Proverbs 2:10 would echo in their hearts; “for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.” After all, you would not want a surgeon operating on your body who never attended medical school and attained the proper knowledge, so why are there churches filled with leaders who are great at loving people, but they have never pursued the knowledge needed to operate on souls?

I pray that you and I would always seek to know more about our great God and His Word. After all, machines that zap knowledge into our minds only exist in fictional movies….and maybe at a few good seminaries.

Who Cares About the World? What About Britney?!?!?!?!

Americans for the most part are not too interested in what progress is being made in Iraq, or what the total number of deaths is, or those few times that we have come close to catching Bin Laden. We are oblivious to the millions of children that are dying everyday due to hunger, famine, child warfare, AIDS and other diseases, abuse, and neglect. We do not pay much attention to our brothers and sisters on this earth who have absolutely nothing and must walk 5 miles one way to simply get drinking water for their family. But that’s okay, because as long as we can keep up with Britney Spears and every other celebrity and every single mistake they make along the way, then we’re fine.

Anna Nicole Smith died a few months ago. At the same time, so did much of my faith in Fox News Channel. I had always liked Fox News because it was different. Then, when every news channel in America could do nothing but talk about Anna Nicole Smith, I thought to myself, “Well, at least Fox News will have enough sense to know that its viewers want real news and could actually care less about celebrities’ personal business.” I was wrong. Fox joined the rest in doing nothing but talking about Smith. I wanted real news but could not find it anywhere. After weeks of talking about nothing but Smith, the shocking results finally came that she had in fact died of drug overdose. duh. Now we can sleep in peace at night knowing that the mystery had been solved.

When the time comes, my wife and I would like to adopt a child from one of the African countries where children are being recruited for warfare. Right now, some 250,000 children are involved in warfare, and in the past decade, over 2 million have been killed in combat, and an estimated 6 million have been injured or permanently disabled. Not only are these children used on the front lines, used as suicide bombers, used to be mine sweepers, they are also sexually abused. Young girls, as young as 6, are used as sex slaves for soldiers fighting in countries from Latin America to Asia to Africa.

But as long as we can keep up with Britney’s kids and know exactly where they are and who’s custody they are in, we can sleep better at night. Wake up America and smell the coffee. Chances are your coffee is coming from a country that has illegal military groups using child warfare, and that coffee company could be supporting them financially in return for protection. In one year alone, Chiquita Bananas gave $7 million to terrorist groups in return for protection of their land. I no longer buy Chiquita bananas.

Our world is dying. Celebrities are fine without our attention. In fact, most of them are sick and tired of paparazzi anyway. Let’s focus on real issues and real problems facing our world and let Britney’s kids play in the sandbox.

*For more info or to see how you can help with issues such as child warfare, please visit www.worldvision.org

Poisonous Coffee

There is something about a coffee shop conversation that automatically raises the intelligence level up a few notches. It just seems to make one more philosophical to sit in a Starbucks and talk about the deep things of existence, the meaning of life, the laws of thermodynamics, how water north of the equator goes down the drain clockwise and south of the equator goes counter-clockwise, and other random topics. My dad always jokingly said that watching “Walker, Texas Ranger” would make my IQ drop. After seeing the show a few times, I think I agree, and in the same way, once one steps into a coffee shop and orders a grande blended creme, the brain starts working twice as hard.

I had a conversation with such a person in a coffee shop one time. He was the son of Christian missionaries and in his late 20s. He had glasses, a full thick beard, and long hair, so he had “smart” written all over him. A pipe would have completed the outfit. However, he was completely anti-God. He said,

“If there is a God who creates people and sends them to Hell, then I choose not to worship that God.”

That seems to be a popular opinion in 21st century America today. It is a product of a self-satisfying, self-seeking, self-glorifying, selfish culture. We are so self-centered that we think that the universe revolves around humans, specifically Americans. We think that we have come so far that we have surpassed the Creator as the utmost being in the universe and that we have the final say in existence and how everything is going to play out. The creation has passed the Creator and God better do what we want or we will continue to completely throw Him out of America and will bolt the door to make sure He cannot come back in. We stand upright, proudly, looking to the heavens with our finger pointed shouting, “This is ours: our planet, our country, our culture, our LIFE. You no longer have authority here.”

This post modernism literally brings me to my knees, crying an endless river of tears. I cry for two reasons. First, and foremost, my God, the Creator of all things who is worthy of all glory, honor, and praise, who when He did not have to or was not obligated to, sent Jesus Christ as the payment for my sins, to take God’s wrath off of me and put it upon Himself, this God is being treated in such a manner by humanity. Secondly, people make me cry. Do you not see? Have you not heard? GOD HAS MADE A WAY FOR US!!!!! We are lost, we are blind, we are separated, and we are evil. God does not send us to Hell for the fun of it, we deserve it! Yet He created a way for us to be with Him, and all we can do is point our finger to the heavens and say, “You better do it OUR way!” As Paul says, “Who are you, o man, to answer back to GOD?”

I don’t go to coffee shops much anymore. People there usually already have their minds made up about where they stand on the authority of God, and add to that the rush of caffeine from the coffee and people are nearly impossible to reason with. Plus, $5 is just too much for one drink.

Those sneaky Democrats

The heat is on and many Americans have been sucked in to the empty promises of the democrats. One of their main platforms is the raising of taxes for the wealthy. While raising taxes usually carries with it a negative connotation, the dems think they have found a way to make it positive. “We will raise taxes on the wealthy Americans!” Great. Now America is fixed. More money from the economy into the neverending pocket of Uncle Sam. Here are just a few points as to why this will hurt more than just the wealthy in America.

1.) It obviously hurts the wealthy. More money is taken from them. I don’t necessarily fall into that bracket, but I do believe that their money is their money, and wealth is not a crime to be punished for. The Republicans’ tax break gave more money back to the wealthy and many dems were upset because they stated it wasn’t fair. Yeah, that’s right, let’s give more money back to the people who did not pay hardly any taxes at all. If Bob pays $100 in federal income tax in a year and Joe pays $10,000 in federal income tax, who is going to get more back in a tax refund? Naturally Joe, because he paid more. There are too many “Bobs” in the world that pay very little taxes and complain because those that pay more, monetarily AND percentage based, get more back.

2.) What happens when more money is taken from the wealthy? It is taken out of our economy, which means that it will not trickle down the system. What do wealthy people do with money? They build houses, take vacations, buy cars, and do all these things that help provide jobs and income for everyone else. Take that money out and there simply will not be as much available to the economy for the 300,000,000 people in America.

3.) Don’t buy into the dems sleezy ways for one second. We automatically think that because they say that they will raise taxes on the wealthy means that the rest of us are safe. Nope. They will raise taxes on EVERYBODY!!! They try to disguise and make it sound fair by saying that they will raise taxes on the wealthy, but they don’t ever say anything about the taxes of the other classes. They know that we assume that that means our taxes will be lower. Nope. EVERYBODY’S TAXES WILL RAISE WITH DEMOCRATS IN CONTROL. The US Government does not need more money. They are poor spenders already, why give them more from the U.S. economy, which is not invincible to another depression?

4.) Don’t believe that people like John Edwards want to help the lower class. It’s because of John Edwards and guys like John Edwards that our Health system is the way it is. We still have the best health system in the world, but the reason our prices are ridiculous is not because doctors are greedy, but because malpractice insurance is so high from frivolous law suits from Edwards and others. Many insurance companies have gotten out of the business altogether, leaving doctors stranded and left to pay much higher prices for malpractice insurance. Thanks, John. My health insurance bill is higher because of you. You wanna help me pay the bill? If you like poor people so much, why haven’t you invited me to come and stay in your oversized house while I’m living paycheck to paycheck?

Politicians make most of the Americans sick, but democrats especially are nothing but liars and thieves who lookout for only themselves. It is for this reason and many others that I support Fred Thompson in 2008.

Having Your Cake and Eating it Too

There are two great mysteries in this world that I don’t believe will ever be discovered while on this earth.  One is the sovereignty of God and the free will of man, and the other is a Baptist committee.  While the latter was just used as a writer’s tool of sucking you in, making you smile, and tempting you to read on, while lightening you up for the words ahead from a staunch Calvinist.

        How is it possible to say that God is sovereign and yet we have free will to choose Him?  Saying that man has the free will to choose God is by itself opposite of the definition of the sovereignty of God.  The Arminian belief obviously takes God out of the center of salvation and puts man in the center of the salvation process, which completely contradicts the Bible, but at the same time, they want to say that God is still sovereign because He knows who will choose Him.  There is a span that is larger than the Milky Way galaxy between saying that 1.) God chooses, or 2.) God knows who will choose Him.  The latter portrays a weaker God who could not possibly be sovereign.  Allow me to explain.

       God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross so that we as sinners could spend eternity with Him, having been made holy by the perfect blood of the perfect sacrifice.  If God did not choose us, then there is the possibility that no one would have ever come to faith in Christ and the death of Christ would have been in vain.  If God was not in control of salvation, and man was, then it is completely possible and fair to say that at the death of Christ no one may have ever come to salvation in Christ.  Did God just get lucky that some people have chosen Him?  Is He wiping the sweat off His forehead and saying, “Whew!  I’m glad that worked out!”? 

     Imagine this.  You are falling off of a skyscraper.  On your way down you see a flagpole sticking out of the side of the building.  It’s not reaching out to you.  It’s just there.  You decide to grab it and you are saved.  That flagpole was not in control of your salvation; you were.  That’s what Arminianism says.  What makes Calvinistic theology so beautiful is that it places God at the complete center.  Instead of reaching out and grabbing a flagpole, we are caught by the hand of God.  Praise God, He saved me!

Arminians, you cannot have your cake and eat it too.  God is not sovereign in your beliefs.  It is contradictory to believe so.

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