Way of Life's blog

The following is excerpted from “U.N. Makes Its Move into Your School,” WorldNetDaily, August 10, 2010:

“The agenda of the United-Nations-funded and -run International Baccalaureate Curriculum is making massive inroads into America's public schools, with operations already established in more than 1,000 locations. Worldview Weekend President and Founder Brannon Howse says the program is trying to train American students to embrace an anti-Christian worldview. ‘This U.N. curriculum is extremely hostile to Christians. It's hostile to American values and ideas and very big on humanism, redistribution of wealth, and very big on pluralism and that all religions are equal,’ Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend told WND. Howse points to the program's objectives that say the entire curriculum is shaped by the U.N According to a report at EdNews.org, the program should overrule any ‘parochial’ values or beliefs, with a heavy focus on a social agenda throughout classes. ‘Math Studies curriculum explores problems concerning the weather, environmental protection, conservation and energy. … The statistics unit will examine a variety of problems from a global perspective, such as the disparity of wealth distribution between first- and third-world countries.’ The organization ‘not only teaches its own worldview, it simultaneously undermines the beliefs and values of the United States (also called the “American creed”),’ the report said. ... Recent evidence of federal involvement is seen in a 2008 position paper issued by the Obama-Biden campaign that openly promoted the International Baccalaureate program. ... Support for the program also comes from U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan. In a May 2010 Council on Foreign Relations forum, Duncan advocated more international integration for U.S. schools.”

(Friday Church News Notes, August 20, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Jack Schaap, pastor of First Baptist Church, Hammond, Indiana, recently praised a raunchy emerging rapper church and claimed to be its mentor. The church, the Richmond Outreach Center, is pastored by Geronimo Aguilar. Schaap said Aguilar has been attending Pastor’s School for 10 years and was preceded there by his street biker father, Phil Aguilar, who, according to Schaap, “followed Brother Hyles to a T.” Phil’s MySpace site features demonic-looking pictures of he and his friends decked out in their biker regalia, including Nazi helmet symbols. If there is such a thing as being “conformed to the world” (Romans 12:2), Phil has mastered it. Phil produces a line of clothing called SoldierMade, which is advertised with profanities and immodest models. Schaap says that Geronimo sought his counsel when founding the ROC in 2001 and meets with him every year for a day or two of private counsel. “He and I are very dear friends.” Schaap praises the ROC as the “sixth fastest growing church in America, running 4,000 every week.” Schaap told his congregation that Aguilar “knows where to find how to build a church.” That’s the bottom line for Schaap. His is an unscriptural, idolatrous pragmatism that worships “results.” The results can be obtained by side-show promotionalism or by CCM and the contemporary no-standards, judge-not philosophy. Apparently it’s all the same to Schaap. The worship leader at ROC is a rapper dude who goes by the moniker “Chill” Aguilar, and the “worship service” features raunchy performances by the congregation’s rap dancers. Chill’s web site praises filthy rockers such as Korn, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Prince, Morrissey, and Kid Rock. We are thankful for every soul at ROC that has truly been born again and set free of drugs and alcohol, but they have not given up their raunchy music and sensual dancing, their immodest, unisex clothing styles, or their “be cool, live and let live” philosophy, and the result is a worldly confusion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjVZGUWRJgA

(Friday Church News Notes, August 20, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

The following is excerpted from Graham West’s <tbbc_mem@aapt.net.au> excellent presentation “The Rhythm of Rock,” which is available as an e-video download from Way of Life Literature.

“Dan Lucarini, a former contemporary worship leader, warns that the rock rhythm affects us like a musical drug. ‘Though it may be subtly introduced, the listener soon develops a craving for it. The flesh demands more and more, just like an addict, and there is no turning back’ (Why I Left the Contemporary Christian Music Movement). This sets up an inevitable trend away from traditional church music. In chapter 17 of his book, Dan writes, ‘In reality, what happens over time is a steady slide down the slippery slope away from all traditional music into the latest, edgiest contemporary styles.’ I like Dan’s illustration of a slippery slope. I can remember when we were children. We had this particular park where we would go, and it had a very steep grassy slope. And we all had our pieces of cardboard, and with these we would slide down at our own risk. I was probably the littlest of all the kids, and for me it was a pretty scary thing. I remember when you first started off, if you really wanted to stop yourself you could. But if you didn’t stop yourself immediately, then pretty soon you would reach the point of no return, and like it or not you would wind up at the bottom of that hill. That’s exactly what it’s like when a conservative church once begins to dabble in CCM. Like it or not, they will wind up at the bottom of that hill, and they will get there at an alarming rate. Whether you understand it or not, once you begin listening to soft rock, immediately you begin sliding down that slippery slope to the more aggressive forms of rock. This is because the rock ballad begins to orientate the whole way of perceiving music: around rhythm and away from melody. Your musical interests will change. The hymns and songs of the past that seemed such excellent vehicles for worship will suddenly sound dull in comparison to your newly acquired tastes. It’s a progression I’ve seen over and over again in the lives of Christians. It’s like a downward spiral. It happens to individuals; it happens to families; it happens to churches. The trend is really all that we would expect, because people are only following their CCM idols as they in turn faithfully follow the world and its trend of ever-increasing musical degradation. In the past 50 years in the West, as our culture has become progressively more fleshly the musical focus of society has been increasingly dominated by complex, sensual rhythm. So here we are in the 21st century with rap, the world’s number two selling music format, almost completely devoid of any melody whatsoever. Over time the musical ear has become disorientated. Once it was attuned to melody, but the addictive, sensual rhythms of rock & roll have carried us swiftly down that slippery slope to the place where our ear is now tuned to rhythm. The church, sadly, has followed this same corrupt trend.”

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

The wretched worldliness that permeates the Southern Baptist Convention is not a new phenomenon. Sixty years ago, Hovie Lister, frontman of the Statesmen gospel quartet, represented the spiritual backsliding that was not uncommon within the Convention. Lister, an ordained SBC preacher, not only was one of the early forerunners of Christian rock, but he was also a 32nd degree Mason. When Ivan Tribe asked him in 2001 if he had gotten much criticism for his Masonic membership from within the Southern Baptist ranks, Lister replied “that he had received very little, in part because so many Southern Baptist ministers were numbered among his Masonic Brethren” (“Hovie Franklin Lister: A Legend in Southern Gospel,” Scottish Rite Journal of Freemasonry, 2001). For a Christian to join a secret organization that is permeated with pagan beliefs and holds to a false gospel of salvation through good works and religion is strictly and solemnly forbidden by God’s Word (e.g., 2 Corinthians 6:14-17; 11:1-4; Ephesians 5:11; 2 Timothy 3:5). As for Lister’s music, he was one of the men who broke down the wall of separation from the world in Southern Gospel in the 1940s. Lister’s style, “which differed from his predecessors in his adoption of jazz, soul and ragtime idioms over the staid solemn accompaniment of prior generations, influenced the sound of gospel and CCM in the later 20th century” (Wikipedia). Spiritually discerning saints of that day deridingly called it “Broadway Gospel.” Lister justified his approach by claiming he was keeping kids out of the world. “If it takes shaking my hair down, beating a piano like Liberace or Piano Red to keep these young people out of beer joints and the rear seats of cars, I’ll do it.” He said, “I get results; that’s what counts.” I don’t know what kind of results he got, but his jazzy music didn’t keep the kids of the world. I was born one year after Lister founded the Statesmen in 1948 and grew up in an SBC congregation that loved ragtime Southern Gospel, and I can assure you that it had no spiritual impact on our lives. I don’t recall one kid in that church that had a real testimony of salvation. It was as worldly an outfit as you can imagine, and in my experience that was true of all of the SBC churches in our area. Preachers who throw away separation always have a good excuse, but it doesn’t work. 1 Corinthians 15:33 ALWAYS comes into play. “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.” I’m not warning about this because I want to mock the SBC and degrade Lister’s memory. I’m sure there are many things that could be praised in the man’s life, but that is not the point. I am trying to warn my fellow Independent Baptists, many of whom are headed down the same road that the SBC traveled long ago.

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

The following is by Brian Snider <bksnider@gmail.com> --

“Whether Facebook is to blame, or is simply part of the problem, the fact remains that a UK law firm recently went through all their divorce petitions and found that one in five mentioned Facebook in some manner. One of the reasons for the explosion in the popularity of Facebook is the fact that you can easily look up old school mates or acquaintances from the past. What is your high school sweetheart doing today? You are just a few clicks away from finding out. No doubt, many marriages have been ruined because one of the parties connected or reconnected with someone they had no business talking to. Mark Keenan, Managing Director of Divorce-Online said: ‘I had heard from my staff that there were a lot of people saying they had found out things about their partners on Facebook and I decided to see how prevalent it was. I was really surprised to see 20 per cent of all the petitions containing references to Facebook. The most common reason seemed to be people having inappropriate sexual chats with people they were not supposed to.’ Flirty emails and messages found on Facebook pages are increasingly being cited as evidence against a spouse. One 35-year-old woman even discovered her husband was divorcing her via Facebook. Emma Brady was distraught to read that her marriage was over when her husband updated his status on the site to read, ‘Neil Brady has ended his marriage to Emma Brady.’ Last year a 28-year-old woman ended her marriage after discovering her husband had been having a virtual affair with someone in cyberspace he had never met. WHAS News in Louisville, KY, recently reported on a man who said that Facebook led to his divorce. He said that his ex-wife went to her high school reunion and saw an old flame, but the meeting didn't stop there. His wife and the old flame started to message each other through Facebook. The divorcee says he went into her account, saw inappropriate messages and the marriage went downhill from there. ‘Facebook creates a lot of temptation,’ he said. One divorce attorney said that in the past, ‘If there was an affair in a divorce case it was usually a co-worker that was involved. Nowadays, it’s just as likely to be somebody from an entirely different city and a lot of that has to do with Facebook and how easy it is to reconnect with old flames.’”

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

At least three lakes lined with vacation homes have disappeared in the last few years in the States. Last month Lake Delhi in Iowa drained when a dam broke. Millions of dollars in property values disappeared when hundreds of vacation homes and permanent residences lost their lakefront views overnight. In June 2008, Lake Delton in Wisconsin overflowed and then nearly emptied in one day. It is a vacation haven for many Chicago residents. In June 2004, Lake Chesterfield near St. Louis, Missouri, disappeared over a matter of days when a sink hole opened up. Residents who had spent large amounts of money for beautiful lakeside property were left facing a large, smelly mud flat. One 74-year-old retired resident who had purchased an expensive condominium for its view said, “It’s disheartening, getting out on your deck and seeing this. One day it’s a beautiful lake, and now, bingo, it’s gone” (AP, June 11, 2004). This reminds us of the brevity of life and the necessity of setting our priorities right. The first priority, of course, is to be saved and have our sins forgiven through Christ’s blood so that death does not take us into eternal judgment. The second priority is to put Christ and His business first. Those who have hopes and dreams only for this fleeting world will always be the losers. Jesus told the parable of the rich man who stored up his wealth for himself and determined to live the rest of his life in ease. “I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?” (Luke 12:19-20). Jesus summarized the wise philosophy of life in these words: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:38).

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

To believe the Bible is not blind religious faith. It is testable, and that is scientific. Richard Dawkins and his fellow raging atheists haven’t seriously tested it. Many wiser men--such as Gilbert West, George Lyttelton, Frank Morison (Albert Henry Ross), Simon Greenleaf, William Mitchell Ramsay, Josh McDowell, Richard Lumsden, Gary Parker, Lee Strobel, and Jobe Martin--have made the effort to pursue the evidence rather than rejecting it out-of-hand based on a non-scientific principle that miracles can’t happen and a Supreme God doesn’t exist. The aforementioned men, and countless others over the past 2,000 years, set out to disprove the Bible but ended up publishing books defending it, instead. One of the first to do this was the brilliant scholar Paul in the first century. Dawkins personally knows some men who have followed in Paul’s footsteps in moving from skepticism to faith in Christ. Of course, Dawkins seems to consider himself a cut above the common yokels, but these men are not common yokels (not that being an “ordinary person” is a disadvantage when it comes to possessing wisdom), and they all approached the Bible skeptically at first, being convinced only by the evidence. “To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by MANY INFALLIBLE PROOFS” (Acts 1:3).

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

In a recent sermon, Perry Noble, pastor of the four-campus NewSpring Church in South Carolina, slammed traditional churches mercilessly. Responding to criticisms that his church is too loud and resembles a concert, Noble said, “I don’t want to be normal when it comes to church in America because normal is dehydrated, normal is dead, normal is predictable, normal is boring, normal is lifeless, and when the tomb is empty and Jesus is alive and I’ve crossed over from death to life, praise God, I don't want to be normal!” (“S.C. Pastor,” Christian Post, Aug. 4, 2010). By Noble’s strange thinking, before rock & roll was brought into the house of God a few years ago every church was dehydrated, dead, predictable, boring, and lifeless. Until a bare 40 years ago, there were NO churches like NewSpring, and there had not been any for 2,000 years. No Sunday morning rock & roll parties. None! Nowhere! All of the churches then were “normal” and “traditional” in that respect. Noble is confusing a worldly rock & roll party with godly spiritual excitement, but they are not the same. Rock & roll is definitely spiritual, but it is the spirit of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Any man that confuses rock & roll with godly spiritual excitement is far too blind to lead God’s people.

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Ann Coulter, a political commentator who is often held forth as one of the bright stars of the conservative movement in America, will be the featured speaker at Homocon 2010 in New York City. The meeting is staged by GOProud, the only national organization of “gay conservatives.” (GOP usually stands for the Republican Party, though we do not know if it has that meaning in this context.) This highlights the extreme weakness of the “conservative” movement for the Bible believer. What good does it do to fight for constitutional conservatism when the root problem of America’s ills is moral and spiritual? It’s like putting a band aid on a cancer. The U.S. Constitution could not have been created in this wicked, apostate generation, and it will not be preserved in this generation. The only hope is for true spiritual revival in the churches, and that would require separation from the things that God hates. Many Independent Baptists and fundamentalists are yoked together with unbelievers and immoral people for the sake of “saving America.” That is disobedience to the Bible, which says, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness” (2 Corinthians 6:14). We are never going to get God’s power and blessing by disobeying Him. Furthermore, Bible believers are already being persecuted and harassed by homosexuals across the land, and this persecution is increasing each year. Will these “gay conservatives” speak out against the so-called hate crimes laws and the persecution of Christians who believe that homosexuality is a sin?

(Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)

Two thousand years ago, the apostle Paul wrote by divine inspiration, “This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, highminded, LOVERS OF PLEASURES MORE THAN LOVERS OF GOD” (2 Timothy 3:1-4). One of the multitudes of proofs that the Bible is indeed the divinely-inspired Revelation from God is the fact that its statements are true. Even statements written 4,000 years ago, are true. For people to treat a dead piece of technology, that has a shelf life not much more than that of a butterfly, with all of the zeal of religious zealots must be evidence that they are lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God. Consider the cult-like status of Steve Jobs, the wild enthusiasm that greets each new Apple gadget, the buyers parked in snaking lines in front of Apple stores to buy those gadgets. Leander Kahney, editor of the tech blog Cult of Mac, says: “If you’re joining a church, you’re joining a community. ... Just as new church members learn the myths, rites and values, new Apple users start to learn the myths and rituals supported by other ‘believers’” (“Looking for a New Religion: Apple Gives Dose of the Divine” ABCNews, Aug. 2, 2010). I like Apple products. They usually work well and they are interesting, but what a poor substitute for God is Apple or the Beatles or the Dallas Cowboys or money or a beautiful woman or a cool guy or anything whatsoever.

(Friday Church News Notes, August 6, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143)