Sermon Notes: The Nature of Man (Anthropology)

From Tony S. Reinke @ http://spurgeon.wordpress.com

Purpose: We were created in the image of God – as humble dust and eternal spirit – to see God face-to-face. I traced out the nature of the dust (our bodies) and our need for resurrection. Then I traced out the image of God in the soul and how God restores this image through conversion, sanctification and glorification. The punch-line is that God is restores our image perfectly (in glorification) so we can once again see God’s glory face-to-face as Adam once did when God walked in the garden in the cool of the day.

Download …

1. The full lesson notes (PDF)
2. The lesson handout (PDF)

Expositional Listening

From Jason E. Robertson @ http://fide-o.blogspot.com

There is no greater joy than preaching to people who love the Word. I usually have certain people in every audience who I can tell are just being absolutely blessed by the sermon. Those faces are so encouraging... I just want to preach to them everything God blessed me with in my studies.

But not everybody appreciates expositional preaching. In the years that I traveled as an evangelist I actually had times when a pastor or church members rejected me because my preaching was too substantive and not theatrical enough. Now, I think boring preaching is a sin, but I also think that expository preaching doesn't have to be boring -- if you know how to listen to a sermon rather than just watch a preacher. I remember one Sunday after preaching for a pastor he called me into his office to rebuke me saying, "If I had known you were going to preach like that I would not have called you to preach this meeting." He wanted me to preach before his Sunday congregation like had preached before his youth one night at a fire-side service at a youth camp. There was nothing wrong with either sermon, but one was more topical and the other more expositional. One was a highly evangelistic sermon on Hell (biblically sound but quite emotionally dramatic); the other was the first sermon in a series through Ephesians 4. I simply told the pastor that I was obeying God and asked him to let me continue preaching; after six days many in the church were saved. In fact, I was asked to stay an extra six days and continue the series.

Now I have the privilege to preach weekly to a congregation who expects nothing less than expositional preaching. In fact, they are what I call "expositional listeners." At Murrieta Valley Church we not only believe in training expositors, but we also think it is important to teach church members how to listen to a sermon. So how can church members cultivate the habit of expositional listening? Here are seven practical ideas [HT 9Marks] that can foster more attentive listening to God’s word.

1. Meditate on the sermon passage during your quiet time. Usually expositors are preaching through a book of the Bible, thus it is relatively easy for church members to know which text their preacher will be expounding. Throughout the week you should read the text and the context in which it is found and pray over it. Encourage the preacher by letting him know that you’ll be praying for his preparation and preparing to listen to the sermon. Throughout the week, outline the text in your own quiet time and use it to inform your prayer life. You can then use your outline as a listening aid; compare it to the preacher’s outline for new insights you missed in your own study.

2. If you ask your pastor, he can suggest individual books that would parallel great with his sermons. At least buy commentaries on the book of the Bible your pastor is preaching through. Here are a few suggested authors and commentary sets: John MacArthur, John Calvin, James Montgomery Boice, The Bible Speaks Today, Old & New Testament Surveys, and Matthew Henry. There is nothing like listening to a sermon on a passage you are familiar with -- you will hear truths in the sermon that many other in the audience will miss.

3. After church, talk and pray with friends about the sermon. Once the worship service is dismissed start spiritual conversations with others by asking, “How did the Scripture challenge or speak to you today?” Or, “What about God’s character most surprised or encouraged you?” And pray with others that God would keep the congregation from becoming “dull of hearing,” that He would bless the congregation with an increasingly strong desire for the “solid food” of His word (Isaiah 6:9-10; Hebrews 5:11-14).

4. Choose one or two particular applications from the Scripture and prayerfully put it into practice over the coming week. Don’t let the Sunday sermon become a one-time event that fades from memory as soon as it is over (James 1:22-25). Re-listen to the sermons via a tape/CD ministry or web audio ministry. With your pastors' support, you may even organize fellowship groups that meet each week to spend 1 hour together discussing the previous Sunday's sermon, swapping sermon notes, and sharing testimonies of how the sermon impacted your spiritual life. This atmosphere great for bringing friends whom you wish to introduce to the church. We provide such fellowship groups in our church follow-up questions that reinforce the sermon. Other families that have a regular sermon review time as their Sunday evening family devotional. There are a hundred ways to keep the sermon alive in your spiritual life by reviewing God’s word throughout the week. Be creative. It is well worth the planning.

5. Don't be afraid to ask questions and search for answers. Pastors usually don't like to be asked too many theological questions after they have preached -- so be respectful of the fact that they have just spent about an hour in the most intense place of spiritual warfare -- proclaiming God's Word. But all expositors love to talk about the Bible. So discover how or when is best way to dialogue with your pastor about questions you may have about his sermon. He may prefer to be emailed. Moreover, don’t be passive in your private study; seek answers by searching the Scripture yourself and by talking with accountability partners or small groups. But don’t forget that the pastor has likely spent more time thinking about that passage than most and is there to feed you God’s word.

6. Beware: Cultivate humility or you shall become overly critical. As you dig into God’s word you will no doubt begin to grow and discover many wonderful treasures. But as you grow, do not become a “professional sermon listener” who is always hearing but never learning. Beware of false knowledge that “puffs up” (I Corinthians 1:8; Colossians 2:18) and tends to cause strife and dissension. Occasionally I have certain people who approach me right after I preach to correct me on some "misspeak" or to give me what they think is a better outline. Sometimes "young" expositors make the mistake of asking congregations for feedback on how they preached; thus they have unintentionally encouraged the congregation to listen to the sermons for the wrong reason. When listening to sound expositors we should never hear the Word of God as the words of men but as the Word of God (1 Thessalonians 2:13). In reality, I have never listened to an expositor and not come away blessed by God's Word. Don't listen to sermons to critique but to confess and repent. Mortify any tendencies toward pride, condemning others, and critical nit-picking. Don't be the church member who thinks that he has heard everything that there is to say about a passage, or listens more to how the sermon was preached homiletically than to what God had to say to him through the sermon.

7. Become a mature church member. Click here.

The Third Day: translating statistics into time

Posted by Adele Konyndyk @ http://persecutedchurch.blogspot.com

A number of aid organizations often explain the severity of their cause, such as poverty or disease, by translating statistics into time. Make Poverty History, for example, reports that every fifteen seconds a child dies from water-related diseases. Similarily, UNICEF recently reported that every five minutes a woman in India dies in childbirth. Both statements highlight the direness of the situation at hand by demonstrating the alarming rate at which poverty is robbing people of their lives.

So why are statistics phrased in this way? What is the effect of putting the sufferings of others on a sort of universal clock? Well, I believe that it reminds those of us who are free from these specific problems that they are not occurring in some distant, faraway place. These people are suffering in our world, in our time. Their seconds are our seconds, their minutes are our minutes and their days are our days

This week, All India Christian Council reported that every third day of 2006 there was an act of violence against Christians in India. There were 128 cases of reported violence against India's Christian minority---2.3 percent of the 1.20 billion total population. Furthermore, AICC noted that, since incidents of violence against Christians are still widely underreported by the mainstream media, the actual figure is likely much higher.

Since I heard this report, I have not been able to stop trying to apply this three-day perspective to my own life, in hopes that doing so might help me to better understand the reality of persecution in India. I have been asking myself such questions as "where I was three days ago?" and "where will I be in three days?" Such questions are my way of asking the big question---"what is it like to live in a country where Christians suffer so frequently and so severely for their faith?" Lord, help me to understand, I have been praying. Help me to know the price that these believers are paying. Help me to remember that their time is my time, their faith is my faith and their Lord is my Lord.

While I was thinking and praying, the Lord helped me to see this statistic in a new light. He reminded me that they are proof of His grace at work in India. Every third day in 2006, the sacrifice of Christ Jesus was made manifest by His children; every third day, believers gave their mortal bodies over to the Lord's will; every third day, persecutors were made to witness God's truth undenied. Those who suffer for Him share in His sacrifice and so also share in His glory. The third day He arose again from the dead...

What Pastors Do

By Jason E. Robertson @ http://fide-o.blogspot.com

Biblically the church office of pastor and elder were the same. Pastors are elders and elders are pastors. And the Biblical instuction is that each local church should have a plurality of pastors. The decision of churches as to who shall be their pastors is one of, if not the most important decision they can make. Churches should understand Biblical eldership and practice it with joy.

Alexander Strauch notes: Biblical eldership is dependent on men who seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness (Matthew 6:33), men who have presented themselves as living and holy sacrifices to God and view themselves as slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 12:1-2), men who love Jesus Christ above all else, men who willingly sacrifice self for the sake of others, men who seek to love as Christ loved, men who are self-disciplined and self-sacrificing, and men who have taken up the cross and are willing to suffer for Christ.

The Scriptures use the imagery of shepherding to describe the work of pastors. As keepers of sheep, pastors are to protect, feed, lead and provide for the flock. Let’s consider these four jobs of pastors:

Protecting the Flock: A major part of the New Testament elders' work is to protect the local church from false teachers. As Paul was leaving Asia Minor, he summons the elders of the church in Ephesus for a farewell exhortation. Paul told the pastors to shepherd the church by protecting her from savage wolves that will attack the church from without and within, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them. See Acts 20:17-31.

According to Paul's required qualifications for eldership, a prospective elder must have enough knowledge of the Bible to be able to refute false teachers. He left Titus in Crete to appoint a plurality of pastors in each church. He instructed Titus that these men must be able to hold fast the faithful word and must be able to refute those who contradict sound doctrine. See Titus 1:5-9.

Feeding the Flock: All New Testament elders were required to be "able to teach" (1 Timothy 3:2). Listing elder qualifications in his letter to Titus, Paul states, "[The elder must hold] fast the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching, that he may be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict" (Titus 1:9).

In an extremely significant passage on elders, Paul recognizes the amount of time that such teaching requires of pastors, time in study, preparation. Paul instructed congregations to financially support the elders within their church who work hard at preaching and teaching. See 1 Timothy 5:17-18.

Leading the Flock: In Titus 1:7, Paul insists that a prospective elder be morally and spiritually above reproach because he will be "God's steward." A steward is a "household manager," someone with official responsibility over the master's servants, property, and even finances. Elders are stewards of God's household, the local church.

Elders are also called "overseers," which signifies that they supervise and manage the church. Peter uses the verb form of overseer when he exhorts the elders: "Therefore, I exhort the elders among you . . . shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight" (1 Peter 5:1-2). To the church in Ephesus, Paul writes, "Let the elders who rule [lead, direct, manage] well be considered worthy of double honor" (1 Timothy 5:17). Elders, then, are to lead, direct, govern, manage, and otherwise care for the flock of God.

Providing for the Flock: Pastors bear the responsibility for meeting the practical, diverse needs of the flock. For example, James instructs members of the flock to call for the elders of the church to pray for them and counsel them through spiritual crises and sickness (James 5:14). Paul exhorts the Ephesian elders to care for the weak and needy of the flock: "In everything I showed you that by working hard in this manner you must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He Himself said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive' " (Acts 20:35).

Well, that's one way to do outreach: Church Event Promises Porn, Pancakes

By The Associated Press

ONTARIO, N.Y. (AP) - It's not your typical church breakfast.

An event billed as "Porn and Pancakes" is being hosted by a church in rural upstate New York.

The breakfast discussion on the pornography industry in America is planned next month at the Living Word Assembly of God Church in the town of Ontario, in rural Wayne County about ten miles east of Rochester.

A billboard advertisement near the church shows the words "Porn and Pancakes" written in syrup on a stack of flapjacks.

Organizers tell Rochester's WHEC-TV that the February tenth event will be an honest discussion about pornography and its impact on society. The discussion will be led by Triple-X Church, a group of youth ministers who travel the country talking about porn and the porn industry.

The pastor of the Wayne County church that churches from Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse have asked about hosting "Porn and Pancakes" events.

How To Be a Mature Church Member

By Jason E. Robertson @ http://fide-o.blogspot.com

If nowhere else, it is obvious from Revelation 2 - 3 that God's concern for his Church is specifically revealed in his concern for local churches. In those chapters God was concerned with particular people, circumstances, and practices within each church. Jesus' letters to the seven churches in Revelation are all about one thing ultimately -- healthy local churches. In effect, God's normal way of fulfilling his will in the church universally is by fulfilling his will in the church locally. Thus we can conclude that healthy churches are pleasing to God and healthy churches are made up of spiritually mature church members. Here are few suggestions on how to mature in your roll as a church member:

1. Read theology books by trusted authors. Unless a church member takes it upon themselves to read theology books they will never be able to fully appreciate and comprehend expositional sermons. There are many good theology books to choose from authors such as: Wayne Grudem, Robert Reymond, Louis Berkhof, R.C. Sproul, James White, John MacArthur, Mark Dever, and James Boice.

2. Balance your private devotions by studying the Bible verse-by-verse and thematically. The use of theology books will help in this effort of thematic study, but also try just using a concordance or Bible dictionary. Trace these themes throughout Scripture and make note of the continuities and discontinuities across various periods of redemptive history. By doing this, you will not only learn biblical passages, but you will also develop a comprehensive understanding of God's work of Redemption.

3. Adopt the New Testament’s attitude toward the Old Testament. The Bible is one story about God redeeming for Himself a special people. When studying the New Testament, train yourself to link what you learn there to the Old Testament. Ask, how is this passage a fulfillment of something promised in the Old Testament? How is this New Testament idea different from or similar to an Old Testament teaching? In what way does this New Testament passage clarify, unveil, or amplify something from the Old Testament? Asking these questions will help to underscore the unity and diversity of the Bible and its message. An excellent book to study with these questions in mind is the book of Hebrews. Study Hebrews and be amazed at the supremacy of Jesus Christ demonstrated in the Old Testament.

4. Study the Old Testament with Jesus and the New Testament in view. As you read and study the Old Testament, ask yourself how it fits together with the revelation of the New Testament. For example, where does this passage fit in the timeline of redemptive history? How does this passage point me to Jesus? How does this relate to the New Testament idea of the church? How is this passage foundational for an understanding of New Testament Christianity? How is this idea or teaching in the Old Testament continuous or discontinuous with the New Testament? Which New Testament passages help me to answer these questions?

5. Study the major and minor Prophets in the Old Testament. Perhaps the most neglected books of the Old Testament are the books of prophecy, especially the unfortunately named "minor prophets." These books contain some of the richest material in Scripture about the life, ministry, and supremacy of Jesus Christ. The more one realizes how the Prophets preached Christ, the more one finds the Prophets to be vital to one's spiritual maturity.

6. Know and agree to support your church’s statement of faith. When we join a church we should know what the church believes and whether we agree with that teaching. Commit yourself to studying the church’s statement of faith. Is it doctrinally sound? Do you understand the statement? Some churches have a healthy practice of requiring new members to sign the church’s statement of faith as an indication of their agreement with and willingness to defend the truths expressed therein. Could you in good conscience sign your church’s statement of faith? If so, commit yourselves to upholding the doctrinal integrity of your church.

7. Seek doctrinal unity and avoid needless disputes. From time to time, doctrinal differences will arise in a local church. The key question for members is "how will you participate in the resolution of such differences?" The maxim is useful here: “in all things essential, unity; in all things non-essential, liberty; and in all things, love.” A healthy church member, committed to becoming a biblical theologian, will work to know the difference between beliefs essential to biblical Christianity and beliefs that are non-essential to the integrity and continuance of the faith. They will commit themselves to defending the essential things of the gospel (Philippians 1:27; Jude 3), while avoiding strife and contention over things that are not essential to the gospel. The Apostle Paul’s instructions to Timothy are appropriate in 2 Timothy 2:14-17 . On the one hand, we are to be workmen who are skilled in correctly handling the word of truth; on the other hand, we must be innocent of engendering disagreements over things of no value. Quarreling about petty and inconsequential things "only ruins those who listen" and like a gangrenous death leads to more and more ungodliness. Let us work for unity in belief and peace in our churches, remembering: "It is a man’s honor to avoid strife, but every fool is quick to quarrel" (Proverbs 20:3).

Thus, as you can tell, I believe that it is vital for a church member to have a sound biblical theology in order to be mature. If you don't believe me, then just consider what Jesus meant in Matthew 4:4. When I consider the maturity of a church member, I always first consider their relationship to God's Word. No matter how loving or committed a church member may seem, if they are unwilling to mature in their biblical theology then they remain the most dangerous threat to the church. "Why?" you may ask. Because of the sinfulness of our hearts, our understanding of God and His work has been skewed. Without an increasing devotion to knowing and obeying the Scripture, we will naturally depart from truth and open ourselves and our church to dangerous errors. Those who increase in their studies of God's Word will increase the spiritual health of the church, will increase the spiritual safety found in a mature church, and will increase the capabilities of a church to accomplish God's will.

Free Music

From Tim Challies @ http://www.challies.com

Sovereign Grace Music is offering a free song written by Steve and Vikki Cook and sung by Vikki. It is from the Everlasting recording that was released in 1999. "I Bow Down" is a slow, meditative song that reflects on the holiness of God. Here is a sample of the lyrics:

You saved me the sinner
With crimson red You washed me
White as snow
How I love You Lord
You loved me the mocker
With kindness You won my
Heart forever
How I love You Lord
And as I behold this mercy
I'm undone

To download "I Bow Down," click here and add the song to your shopping cart. During the checkout procedure, simply enter the promotional code FREEDOWNLOAD to bypass the credit card payment. Make sure that the total is now $0.00. Simply finalize the sale and you will be presented with a download link. This offer is only good until February 9.

There is also a new single available and another song written by the Cooks. "Beautiful Grace" moves at a slightly higher tempo and speaks of God's grace.

Who could imagine
The life-giving beauty
That shines from Calvary
My eyes were opened
And my heart was won
When Your mercy conquered me
Lord, how could I flee from this love
Lord, why would I flee from this love

What beautiful grace, incredible hope
Lord, thank you for saving me
This beautiful grace will carry me home
Lord, thank you for saving me
For saving me

It is available here for 99 cents. Several other Sovereign Grace products have seen price reductions and are now priced at $10 per album.

If you enjoy the Sovereign Grace music, you may want to Sovereign Grace e-News. Almost every newsletter comes with news of a free song.

Is The Fetus Merely A Potential Life?

From http://apologiachristi.blogspot.com

During this Pro-life week, I taught a class that emphasized the pro-life position. I present the position in favor of the embryo being seen as a living human being in this way. First, I note that the factual question "What is it?" is the first that must be answered. Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason and Scott Klusendorf of Prolife Training give the same illustration as a way of presenting the importance of this question:

Suppose that you are standing at your sink washing dishes when your five year old son, daughter, grandson or granddaughter comes behind you and asks "Can I kill this?" What is the first question you should ask? Of course, the first and most important question is "what is it?" If it's a cockroach, kill it! In fact, if you find anymore cockroaches, kill them, too. If it's a puppy he found in the street, then I doubt anyone would be in favor of allowing the child to kill it. What if "it" is the little boy who lives down the street? No one (except the criminally insane) would say that it's okay to kill the little boy. You see, if you don't first know what "it" is, then you cannot make a rational decision as to whether killing it is okay. As Greg Koukl, paraphrasing Francis Beckwith, says: "If the zygote or embryo or fetus is not a human being, then no justification for either abortion [or Embryonic Stem Cell Research] is necessary. However, if the unborn is a human being, no justification for taking her life is adequate."

So, how do we know that the fetus (beginning with the embryo) is a human being. Well, we know that life begins at conception. The unborn are distinct, living, and whole human beings. The parents are human beings and the law of biogenesis says that everything recreates after its own kind. The law of identify says that whatever a thing is it remains such as long as it exists. Moreover, it's alive! If allowed to proceed to normal development, it will grow into a full human being. It's features may change but it is fully a human being. Since it is a human being, then certain rights follow from that.

During the talk, I was confronted by a scientist who took the position with me that the fetus/embryo is merely a potential life only. Sure, everything I said was true, but the fetus had to undergrow a great deal of growth which depended upon many factors (such as being left in the womb) before it could qualify as a human being. I decided to respond in two ways.

First, I told him that the term "potential" was difficult to understand. After all, a one year old is a potential five year old. A seven year old is a potential eight year old. I am a potential ninety year old (many years in the future). I am not now a ninety year old, and I will only reach the stage of being a ninety year old depending upon many factors such as being left in an environment in which I can survive in order to become a realized ninety year old. You see, the fetus is fitted to its environment. If you take it out of its intended environment for its stage of development, it will certainly die. But is that a reason to think of it as being non-human? Consider, we all live in an environment that we are suited for in our level of development. Because we can’t live outside that environment (space, deep in the ocean, in the Antarctic) does that make it okay to kill us?

But then I took a second tact. I asked him if he was certain he knew when a "fetus" went from being a non-human being (or a potential human being) to a fully realized human being. If not, then how can he know when it has crossed the line making it okay to kill or not to kill. Isn't the better approach if we don't know when the "fetus" passes from the "potential human being" category into the "realized human being" category to refrain from killing?

In other words, I presented to him the abortion quadrilemma discussed by Boston College philosopher Dr. Peter Kreeft. Here's how it works. You begin with the question such as the following: "So, if we don't know when life begins that makes it okay to kill something? Doesn't that argue for not killing something until we're sure?" Then you throw out an illustration to make the point cleearer. Picture a hunter who hears a rustling in the bush. The rustling could be an animal that he is licensed to hunt, and killing that animal would be perfectly legal and (setting aside the difficult moral issues that involve hunting of animals not for food) ethical. But what if the rustling in the bush is another hunter? It could be, but the hunter doesn't know. Should he shoot before he's sure it isn't a human being? Obviously not. The law puts an obligation on us to not kill negligently.

The quadrilemma makes capital of the fact that there are only four options available concerning the humanity of the fetus. It is either a human being or not, and we either know what it is for certain or not. Combining these options, we come up with four categories:

Category 1. X is a human being and we know it for certain.
Category 2. X is a human being and we don't know it for certain.
Category 3. X is not a human being and we know it for certain.
Category 4. X is not a human being and we don't know it for certain.

If the fetus is a human being and we know it, it seems apparent that we shouldn't kill it since that would be a form of murder. If the fetus is a human being and we don't know it for certain, or if the fetus is not a human being but we don't know that for certain, then it is very much like the rustling in the bush. Wisdom tells us that it's wrong to kill the thing in the bush when we aren't certain what it is because it may be a human being. By the same token, we shouldn't kill the fetus in the womb if we aren't certain whether its a human being or not because it may be a human being and to kill a human being by accident due to mistake about his or her nature is also wrong (at minimum, negligent homicide in most states). It is only if the fetus is not a human being and we are certain that it's not a human being that it would be okay to kill it.

Of course, unless they are pro-choice zealots, they are going to have to admit that they don't know for certain that the fetus is not a human being. In fact, the argument that the fetus is necessarily a human being is much stronger than the argument that it isn't a human being. So, if they can't say with certainty when the fetus crosses the line between humanity and non-humanity, then the only wise and appropriate course is to not kill the fetus through abortion.

Problems with Personal Guidance from God

by Brian Thornton @ http://voiceofthesheep.wordpress.com

If you have been coming to this blog recently, you have no doubt seen a particular theme running through my posts over the last several days. The main subject of my recent entries has been the issue of people hearing from and receiving direct, personal guidance from God. Even though my position has made me rather unpopular with some who have read my comments, I still have some thoughts I would like to share on this topic. Some of these are my own thoughts and some of these have been gleaned from material produced by Greg Koukl of Stand to Reason. Just in case anyone is not familiar with what I am talking about when I say ‘personal guidance from God’, I am referring to what many claim to receive in various mediums that they attribute to the voice or direct leading of God. These range from being called by God to do something (in ministry or otherwise) to being told directly what to do to being led to receiving a feeling or impression of what to do. Koukl gives some examples of the Christian lingo used to verbalize this: “I feel led…”, “I think God is telling me…”, “God wants me to…”, “I feel God is calling me…”, “I beleive it’s God’s will that I…”. Another more direct one I hear a lot these days is, “God told me to…”, “God spoke to me and said…”.

Here are some things that trouble me about this:

• These personal directives from God are totally subjective and unverifiable.
• Aside from direct, supernatural, unmistakable directives from God…this type of personal guidance cannot be found anywhere in Scripture.
• What was a very rare occurrence in the NT has been made into the norm for our day.
• IF these personal directives to individuals are, in fact, happening…what does that say to those believers who do not receive this kind of personal guidance from God? Are we less spiritual or less important to God? Have we not discovered how to tap into the ‘hotline’ to God’s will as these others have? Are we just not letting go and letting God…?
• Is it not more reasonable to attribute this ‘personal guidance’ to our own thoughts and conscience coupled with the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit upon God’s revealed will found in His word that we either had put to memory or were familiar with already, rather than to say that God is telling me something, or has revealed something to me, or is leading me to make some specific decision?
• Doesn’t this kind of direct instruction from God reduce the need for knowing His revealed will, since He is going to tell me directly what to do anyway?
• Doesn’t this personal guidance from God put Him on the hook and make Him responsible for all sorts of bad decisions we may make?
• Doesn’t this sort of personal guidance from God go contrary to being transformed by the renewing of our minds, and taking every thought captive for Christ?

Those are some of my additional thoughts on this. Here are some from Greg Koukl contained within his Ambasador Basic Curriculum on Decision Making and the Will of God:

• Hearing that God is providing direct personal guidance to others can create confusion, frustration, anxiety and even fear that we are not “tuned in” like others are.
• Some Christian leaders warn you not to do anything unless you have heard from God about the decision (Blackaby).
• All spiritual disciplines that are important and essential for productive Christian living are taught clearly in Scripture. They are not hidden between the lines.
• The teaching that we get guidance from God from a feeling is simply not biblical. There’s not a single instance in Scripture that asserts this (that Greg is aware of).
• God DOES use special personalized guidance in the Bible…but it is RARE. The cases are exceptional. There is no hint that day-to-day decisions - big or small - were made by getting special directions from God. They are sometimes given, but the biblical pattern is that they are rare, intrusive, clear, supernatural, and often go against wisdom.
• Regarding God’s individual will for me - God’s sovereign will is secret and His moral will is totally revealed. No other ‘will’ exists in the Bible. Greg found NO special category of ‘God’s will’ in the Scriptures tailor-made for us that we have to discover before we can make decisions.

Finally, this is a statement by J.I. Packer contained in the materials I am quoting from Stand to Reason on the subject of receiving personal guidance from God:

“What shall we say of [the personal guidance model]? The first thing to say is that this idea of guidance is actually a novelty among orthodox evangelicals. It does not go back further than the last century. Second, it has led people to so much foolish action on the one hand, and so much foolish inaction on the other, as well as puzzlement and heartbreak when the ‘hotline’ to God seems to go silent, that it has to be seen as discredited. Third, it must be said that Scripture gives us no more warrant to expect a personal ‘hotline’, ‘voice from the control-tower’ guidance than to expect new authoritative revelations for the guidance of the whole church.” - Hot Tub Religion, p.116

Koukl goes on in this curriculum (there are also audio tapes that accompany it) to talk about what biblical decision making really is apart from feeling led, called, directed, open/closed doors, circumstantial signs & fleeces, confirmations, etc.

IS THE UNITED PENTECOSTAL CHURCH A CHRISTIAN CHURCH?

From CRI at www.equip.org

The United Pentecostal Church International teaches that there's only one God, and that Jesus is fully God. Can we therefore regard it as a Christian church?

Although there may possibly be individuals in the United Pentecostal Church who are indeed Christians, we believe that the church as a whole is heretical. Like other pseudo-Christian groups, the United Pentecostal flatly denies the doctrine of the Trinity. It would be inappropriate to argue that Jehovah's Witnesses or various other groups are non-Christian because they deny the doctrine of the Trinity, but that the United Pentecostal Church can reject the Trinity and still be considered Christian.

And while they claim that only they believe that Jesus Christ is God, the United Pentecostal Church actually teaches that Jesus is not a pre-existent divine Person, but was simply the fleshly body in whom God dwelled. They don't believe that the Son of God, as a person distinct from the Father, existed before His birth in Bethlehem (Prov. 30:4; John 1:1-2, 14). In fact, they hold that the Son was not a distinct person even while He was a man on earth. This implies that in John 17, Jesus the man was talking with someone dwelling inside Himself -- namely, Jesus the God -- which means that either there are two "Christs" or that Jesus was talking to Himself!

Besides rejecting the New Testament's central message -- that God the Father sent His divine Son into the world to die for us so that we might have eternal life (John 3:16; Gal. 4:4) -- the United Pentecostal Church is also plagued with various legalistic doctrines to which members must adhere in order to remain in good standing and be considered a Christian. For example, they teach that unless you're baptized using the correct formula (which they prescribe) you're really not saved. For these and other reasons, the United Pentecostal Church International cannot be regarded as an orthodox Christian church. We can afford to differ on peripheral issues, but not when it comes to the essentials of the Christian faith.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION

CRI has available an article by Gregory Boyd entitled, "Sharing Your Faith with a Oneness Pentecostal" (DO077/$0.25) as well as his book, Oneness Pentecostals and the Trinity (B151/$17). These resources are available through CRI. For shipping and handling information, please call CRI or refer to our Resource Listing. To place a credit card order, call toll-free (888) 7000-CRI. To receive a free copy of our Resource Listing, fax us at (949) 858-6111 or write us with your request at PO Box 7000, Rancho Santa Margarita, CA 92688-7000.

What are we to do about Islam?

By Mike Licona.
Baptist Press News

ALPHARETTA, Ga. (BP)--In the spring of 2006 1,000 British Muslims were polled. The results were alarming:

-- 28 percent wanted to see Great Britain become an Islamic state

-- 68 percent held that Brits who insult Islam should be arrested & prosecuted

-- 25 percent had either never heard of the Holocaust or contended it never happened

-- 45 percent held that 9/11 was a conspiracy between the U.S. & Israel (another 35 percent said “don’t know”)

The objective of many Muslims is to Islamicize the world. When a person or a country stands in the way of Islam’s efforts, these regard it as a “war on Islam.” This does not mean all Muslims hate Christians. For over a thousand years there have been many friendships between Muslims and Christians. However, Muslims who have befriended Christians have disregarded the Koran in the process, since it prohibits such friendships (Q 5:51). So what are Christians to do? I would like to suggest three initial responses by evangelicals to Islam.

-- Understand that we stand in the way of Islam intentionally. We believe that Islam is a religion that promotes false teachings about God. The Apostle Paul wrote, “But even if we (or an angel from heaven) should preach a Gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be condemned to hell!” (Galatians 1:8). Since Islam’s message differs fundamentally from the Gospel, it is clear what Paul taught regarding the fate of Muhammad and those who propagate Islam. A few years later Paul wrote, “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5). It is the responsibility of evangelical Christians to promote the Gospel of Christ to the exclusion of the core messages of other religions -- including Islam. In the eyes of Muslim Islamicists, this places evangelical Christians at war with Islam.

-- Love Muslims! Jesus predicted the current dilemma. He warned that false prophets would come (Matthew 16:11-12) and that the day was likewise coming when religious zealots will kill Christians and think they are offering a service to God (John 16:2-4). It is natural to feel anger and hatred toward Muslims who want to kill us. On a national level, we can support politicians who are committed to hunting down and destroying terrorists, upholding free speech, and standing in the way of Muslim thugs who declare war on everything which does not allow Islam to dominate. On a personal level, Jesus tells us plainly what our response should be:

"But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.... If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. ... But love your enemies, and do good ... and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men" (Luke 6:27-35).

Jesus calls us to a "holy war" -- the difference is that our holy war actually involves, well, holiness, and does not involve weapons and violence. These words of Jesus were not easy to hear for the early Christians who were persecuted and killed by Jewish and Roman authorities. It will not be easy for us either. However, this is a day when cooler heads must prevail and holiness is our goal.

-- Know that God is bringing Muslims to Christ. A few years ago, Al-Jazeera reported that roughly six million Muslims are leaving Islam and becoming followers of Jesus every year in Africa. In 2005, roughly 250,000 Muslims converted to Christianity in Iran. Between 2003-2005, roughly 1 million Muslims converted to Christianity in Arab countries. Muslims are coming to Christ in North America, too, although not to the same extent as in Muslim countries. Ergun Caner came to North America in order to build Mosques and Islamicize the U.S. A persistent evangelical Christian led him to Christ. Ergun then led his entire family to Christ, with the exception of his father who disowned him. He is now the president of Liberty Theological Seminary and his brother Emir is the dean of The College of Southwestern.

Abdu Murray is an attorney in the Detroit area who became a Christian after wrestling with the preponderance of evidence in its favor. He is now active in sharing the Gospel with Muslims. Nabeel Qureshi was a committed Muslim whose father is a Muslim leader in Virginia. In 2005 Nabeel became a Christian. After being shaken by the evidence for the truth of Christianity, Nabeel traveled to Europe and Canada and met with Muslim leaders in search of answers to his questions. In both cases, he returned unsatisfied with the answers he was given. Wanting Islam to be true, Nabeel prayed that God would give him three dreams that would provide guidance. His prayer was answered. Against what Nabeel had hoped for, God confirmed the truth of Christianity to him. Nabeel is now in medical school and is simultaneously completing a master’s degree in Christian apologetics, and has already engaged in a public debate with a Muslim Imam.

In “Me and Becky,” Christian artist Chris Rice challenges believers to get out of their comfort zone. He sings about a girl who has a home on Abundant Life Blvd., butterflies in her yard and a fish on her car. She tears up in church and sings her harmonies loud. She reads her Bible, keeps a prayer journal, and is careful to give thanks before meals in restaurants. But is that enough?

There’s a world out there that we left behind

Full of souls as important as yours and mine.

Looks like a reckless road and a sacrifice

And I’m crazy scared it may cost our lives

But then I remember Jesus died

So come on Becky. Let’s go for a ride.

We may also remember Paul’s words: “For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). Now is the time for Christians to begin serious dialogue concerning how we may be used by God to get His glorious Gospel to Muslims in North America, a people whom God loves passionately.

Licona is director of apologetics and interfaith evangelism at the North American Mission Board.

Qur'an 101: the Uthmanic Revision

By James White @ http://www.aomin.org

Sometimes just having a small number of specific vocabularly terms mastered will help you feel more at home in a conversation or discussion. This is especially the case when it comes to Islam. For regular readers of this blog, you have undoubtedly heard me make reference to the "Uthmanic Revision." It is best to give you the direct statement from "official" Muslim sources. Here is the relevant material from the Hadith literature as recorded in Sahih Al-Bukhari, 6.507, 509-510:

(The Caliph 'Uthman ordered Zaid bin Thabit, Said bin Al-As, 'Abdullah bin Az-Zubair and 'Abdur-Rahman bin Al-Harith bin Hisham to write the Qur'an in the form of a book (Mushafs) and said to them, "In case you disagree with Zaid bin Thabit (Al-Ansari) regarding any dialectic Arabic utterance of the Quran, then write it in the dialect of Quraish, for the Qur'an was revealed in this dialect." So they did it.
Abu Bakr As-Siddiq sent for me when the people of Yamama had been killed (i.e., a number of the Prophet's Companions who fought against Musailama). (I went to him) and found 'Umar bin Al-Khattab sitting with him. Abu Bakr then said (to me), "Umar has come to me and said: 'Casualties were heavy among the Qurra' of the Qur'an (i.e. those who knew the Quran by heart) on the day of the Battle of Yalmama, and I am afraid that more heavy casualties may take place among the Qurra' on other battlefields, whereby a large part of the Qur'an may be lost. Therefore I suggest, you (Abu Bakr) order that the Qur'an be collected." I said to 'Umar, "How can you do something which Allah's Apostle did not do?" 'Umar said, "By Allah, that is a good project." 'Umar kept on urging me to accept his proposal till Allah opened my chest for it and I began to realize the good in the idea which 'Umar had realized." Then Abu Bakr said (to me). 'You are a wise young man and we do not have any suspicion about you, and you used to write the Divine Inspiration for Allah's Apostle. So you should search for (the fragmentary scripts of) the Qur'an and collect it in one book)." By Allah If they had ordered me to shift one of the mountains, it would not have been heavier for me than this ordering me to collect the Qur'an. Then I said to Abu Bakr, "How will you do something which Allah's Apostle did not do?" Abu Bakr replied, "By Allah, it is a good project." Abu Bakr kept on urging me to accept his idea until Allah opened my chest for what He had opened the chests of Abu Bakr and 'Umar. So I started looking for the Qur'an and collecting it from (what was written on) palmed stalks, thin white stones and also from the men who knew it by heart, till I found the last Verse of Surat At-Tauba (Repentance) with Abi Khuzaima Al-Ansari, and I did not find it with anybody other than him. The Verse is:
"Verily there has come unto you an Apostle (Muhammad) from amongst yourselves. It grieves him that you should receive any injury or difficulty...(till the end of Surat-Baraa' (At-Tauba). (9.128-129) Then the complete manuscripts (copy) of the Qur'an remained with Abu Bakr till he died, then with 'Umar till the end of his life, and then with Hafsa, the daughter of 'Umar.
Hudhaifa bin Al-Yaman came to Uthman at the time when the people of Sham and the people of Iraq were waging war to conquer Arminya and Adharbijan. Hudhaifa was afraid of their (the people of Sham and Iraq) differences in the recitation of the Qur'an, so he said to 'Uthman, "O chief of the Believers! Save this nation before they differ about the Book (Qur'an) as Jews and the Christians did before." So 'Uthman sent a message to Hafsa saying, "Send us the manuscripts of the Qur'an so that we may compile the Qur'anic materials in perfect copies and return the manuscripts to you." Hafsa sent it to 'Uthman. 'Uthman then ordered Zaid bin Thabit, 'Abdullah bin AzZubair, Said bin Al-As and 'Abdur-Rahman bin Harith bin Hisham to rewrite the manuscripts in perfect copies. 'Uthman said to the three Quraishi men, "In case you disagree with Zaid bin Thabit on any point in the Qur'an, then write it in the dialect of Quraish, the Qur'an was revealed in their tongue." They did so, and when they had
written many copies, 'Uthman returned the original manuscripts to Hafsa. 'Uthman sent to every Muslim province one copy of what they had copied, and ordered that all the other Qur'anic materials, whether written in fragmentary manuscripts or whole copies, be burnt. Said bin Thabit added, "A Verse from Surat Ahzab was missed by me when we copied the Qur'an and I used to hear Allah's Apostle reciting it. So we searched for it and found it with Khuzaima bin Thabit Al-Ansari. (That Verse was): 'Among the Believers are men who have been true in their covenant with Allah.' " (33.23)

Here we have the traditional Islamic statement of the Uthmanic Revision, that point in time where Uthman, prompted, according to this form of the tradition, by others, and by the death of a number of the Qurra (those who knew the Quran by heart), gathered up the Qur'an from various sources and compiled an "authoritative" version. Note that part of the concern was so that the Muslims would not argue over the text of the Qur'an "as Jews and the Christians did before." This is vitally important (I have often made reference to the same concept in KJV Onlyism: exchanging truth for certainty, an issue I will address in the upcoming series on textual criticism). But note especially the destruction by fire of "all other Qur'anic materials, whether written in fragmentary manuscripts or whole copies." Given the reference to differing recitations based, clearly, upon different readings in the collections that had already come into existence, we have here evidence of textual variation in the pre-Uthmanic Qur'anic manuscripts. Uthman's action, then, destroys the very means that could have been used to arrive at a far clearer picture of the original compilation and reading of the Qur'an.

However, in 1972, fragments of what may well be a pre-Uthmanic compilation of the Qur'an were found in Sana'a, Yemen. The picture above comes from the same manuscript find, specifically, from what is today Surah 5, with part of ayah 60, 61, and part of 62.

So when you hear someone speaking of the "Uthmanic Revision," this is what they are referring to. Of course, there is much discussion concerning just how accurate this tradition itself is, and what truly prompted Uthman's actions, etc. But even from the most conservative Islamic perspective, there is clear evidence of pre-Uthmanic textual variation in the text of the Qur'an.

The Gospel and Islam

From http://christianresearchnetwork.com/

Here is an interesting 9 Marks Interview audio message by “Pastor and author Thabiti Anyabwile [who] describes the beliefs and history of Islam, his own experience as a Muslim, the contradictions in the Koran, as well as the way for churches to approach evangelism with Muslims, which he calls an amazing, God-given opportunity the church has today.”

Some Churches Don’t Care About Increasing Outreach to Their Community

by Kent Shaffer @ http://churchrelevance.com

Ellison Research recently discovered that four out of ten pastors lack strong interest in increasing community outreach. At the same time, Ellison Research also learned what the 811 ministers who were surveyed are using to reach their communities.

In the last year,

• 70% use Vacation Bible School
• 59% use tracts or magazines
• 56% use events such as block parties or a Fall Festival
• 51% use musical events or concerts
• 50% use mailings or fliers
• 49% use nursing home or retirement center visits
• 42% use “invite a friend to church” days
• 40% use revivals or crusades
• 38% use evangelism training classes or groups
• 37% use door-to-door visitation within the community
• 31% use community service such as cleanup days
• 27% use online efforts such as blogs or web sites
• 26% use audio or visual products such as tapes or DVDs
• 20% use booths at community events such as the county fair

While some ministers may not be interested in increasing community outreach because they lack the resources to do so, it is still surprising that 40% of the ministers surveyed lack a strong interest.

Not the best witnessing approach: "God hates Fags" song.

The Evening Service: "God Hates Fags"

Help! My Church Has Gone Postmodern

From http://www.oldtruth.com/

Here's a 10 minute audio clip from STR's radio show, in which a caller expresses his concern about his church's doctrinal statement which says: "Acceptance or rejection of any doctrine should be strictly up to the individual. Since genuine and ultimate conviction of bible truths is the work of the Holy Spirit, no individual should be criticized or looked upon with suspicion because he does not see some doctrine or prophecy as others do. Oneness in Christ should be the aim of all". Could it be that this self-refuting belief statement is a train wreck waiting to happen? Listen-in and find out. ... [Play/Download MP3]

Listen

The Garden of Sanctification

by JoyWagner athttp://www.sharperiron.org/2007/01/26/the-garden-of-sanctification/#more-1175

Imagine you are walking through a garden. Some areas are lush and filled with beautiful fruit. Then you take a few more steps and notice huge patches of dry ground where plants are bent over, withered, and brown. That dry patch will eventually produce dryness in the rest of the garden.

Our fundamental churches are like that garden. Wonderful aspects of our ministries are flourishing, and the perfectly green trees there give shade and encouragement. In the midst of the lush areas, however, are areas of discipleship and counseling where the soil of many of our fundamental churches is cracking and dangerously dry.

The First Layer of Dryness: The Lack of Discipleship

The first layer of dryness is the realm of discipleship. We are commanded in several passages of Scripture to build each other up in the faith. In his list of gifts in Ephesians 4, Paul clarifies the purpose of the gifts as . . .

the building up of the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves, and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming. But speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects unto Him, Who is the head, even Christ (Eph. 4:12-15, NASB).

We would never dream of telling our physical children, “I give you a house to live in and food to eat. The rest of growing up is your job.” If we are to help the spiritual children grow up, we must invest personal time, energy, and thought into their development.

Some pastors say that their discipleship happens in the pulpit. I would agree that the preaching of God’s Word always builds the faith of the listener. However, Christ didn’t stop with just formal preaching. He taught His disciples many things He did not share with the masses. He spent time with the small band of followers, constantly teaching truth—sometimes to just one or two or three of the 12. He invested personal attention because He knew they would change the world with the truth He had given them.

The classic passage on discipleship is 2 Timothy 2:2—“And the things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, these entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.” Paul gave Timothy individual tutoring about doctrine, pastoral theology, and personal growth. Unfortunately, in our fundamental churches, there’s often a great lack in the individual discipleship process. Seventy-one percent (708 people) of those who took the Young Fundamentalist Survey said they have never been personally discipled by anyone. We all make excuses for our lack of discipleship—“I don’t have time,” “I don’t know what to teach,” “Nobody wants to put the work into learning,” “That’s the job of the Sunday school teacher,” etc. The truth is, we don’t want to take the time and effort to build one another. Thousands of messages have been preached on Matthew 28:19-20. We hear about “the Great Commission,” “the great authority,” “the great power” of that passage. When is the last time you taught your people the other half of the Great Commission—“teaching them to learn of all things whatsoever I have commanded you”? Then why are we surprised when believers become spiritually dry? We are not pouring the water of life into their thirsting souls.

One practical suggestion for seeing real discipleship take place is to teach a group of mature believers how to disciple and then to assign them to one other person in the church on whom to practice the process. You as the leader would need to provide some discipleship tools to help them in their new endeavor. Another idea is to break up into small groups through the Bible Study Hour. Each group would have a leader who guides the group through a discipleship curriculum. This method would accomplish a two-fold purpose: (1) you would be training your mature believers how to disciple, and (2) you would be passing along biblical truth to your congregation. Ultimately, discipleship in your church will “make it or break it” through the example, the enthusiasm, and the emphasis of the leadership.

The Second Layer of Dryness: The Lack of Real Biblical Counseling

The soil of hearts gets dry not only because of the discipleship area but also because of the lack of real biblical counseling in most of our churches. I have often thought and taught that “biblical counseling” and “discipleship” are synonymous. I have recently come to change my opinion slightly. I see the purpose of both biblical counseling and discipleship to be taking each person from the level where he or she is to a new level of conformity to the image of Christ. That purpose statement comes from my philosophical foundation of the hope that is available in Christ—the sufficiency of Scripture for all matters and the efficacy of the truth for every problem of life. In those two areas, philosophy and purpose, a biblical counselor is a discipler and vice versa. The difference to me lies in the practical areas of functionality and form. Discipleship typically concentrates more on a didactic technique of laying one truth on top of another to help both parties learn more from the Scripture in a particular area. Biblical counselors, on the other hand, mainly tend to address a wrong behavior or thinking and to teach the counselee how to correct that thinking or behavior.

There’s no question that we all struggle through steps of sanctification. We see the great spiritual needs in our own lives and in the lives of those surrounding us, but we do so little to get help for those needs. We have become masters at wearing a mask. A friend of mine, for example, covered up his pornography and immorality for six years while he was an elder at his church. I wonder how many times this hypocrisy is repeated in our churches. I also wonder how things would be different if people were encouraged to get the biblical help they need and if they knew where to get that help.

One reason for not getting the help they need is that people feel they will be condemned if they reveal the true nature of their sin. Our self-righteousness often gets in the way of real ministry to sinful hearts. I work in an addictions program in my church called Changed Life Ministry, and first-timers come in skeptical and searching for answers. Over and over again, we have heard statements like, “I felt welcome and not judged when I came to Changed Life” (commercial intended). We don’t sugarcoat their problem with psychological labels, and we don’t mince words about their sin and the devastating effects it has; but we won’t see lives changed without meeting people where they are and without showing them God’s love, grace, and forgiveness. Someone’s heart will never blossom into conformity to Christlikeness if he is watered with the concrete of self-righteousness.

Another reason for the lack of biblical counseling in our churches is the tremendous amount of time necessary to guide someone on the path of sanctification. Certain issues demand an extensive amount of counseling. Many pastors are good about giving of their time to counsel people in their congregation. Some have designated specific hours for the purpose of counseling. The pastor must “give himself to prayer and the ministry of the Word” (Acts 6:4), so sometimes his time is seriously limited. One option is to train people in the church to help with the load of the counseling. Several Bible colleges now offer biblical counseling degrees. A degree is not essential for someone to be an effective counselor, but some classes would be a huge benefit. First Baptist Church of Lake Orion, Michigan, actually pays a biblical counselor a part-time salary in order to make counseling available to the congregation and community. This process takes time and resources, but what are we willing to pay in exchange for a soul? Without compassion and guidance, people wander aimlessly through their sin struggles, and then the soil of the heart gets progressively harder.

The ground of people’s lives is often a cold, rocky place; but the tools of personal discipleship and dedicated biblical counseling can soften that ground into a fertile area that will multiply itself in bushels of spiritual fruit.

———–

^{Joy Wagner taught classes and was the ladies’ dorm supervisor at Northland Baptist Bible College (Dunbar, WI) for 10 years. For the last year, Joy has been working as a counselor at Red Rocks Baptist Church (Lakewood, CO).}

The Scary Logic of Peter Singer

By Al Mohler @ http://albertmohler.com

Peter Singer, Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at the Center for Human Values at Princeton University, is one of the most controversial academics in the world -- and deservedly so. His views on human dignity, infanticide, and animal rights are some of the most radical to be found.

In an opinion column published in today's edition of The New York Times, singer addresses the case of a severely disabled girl known only as Ashley. Ashley has been described by her devoted parents as a "pillow baby." She is unable to communicate, to walk, or even to change her position in bed. Even her parents are not sure that she recognizes them. Her mental age has been estimated at three months, even though she is now nine years old.

In an effort to keep her size manageable and to prevent puberty, doctors recently removed her reproductive organs and are treating her with hormones to prevent further growth. These treatments have raised a host of complex ethical issues. Nevertheless, in raising the case of Ashley, Peter Singer is not primarily concerned with those questions of bioethics -- he wants to deny her human dignity.

For many years, Singer has argued that membership in the human species should not imply any particular set of rights. He denies that all members of the human species should be recognized as possessing human dignity. He has pushed this argument to the point that he suggests that some animals should possess more rights and be recognized with greater dignity than some humans.

He is an advocate of primate rights and animal rights. He suggests that a pig with its limited pig consciousness may possess greater claim on rights -- including a right to live -- than an unconscious human being. He has argued that human infants, lacking the ability to communicate or to envision their own future, do not possess any non-negotiable right to life. Therefore, he has argued that infanticide in some cases may be fully appropriate.

In his column published today, "A Convenient Truth," Singer argues that the moral considerations of what is right for Ashley should not be based on the assumption that she possesses human dignity:

Here's where things get philosophically interesting. We are always ready to find dignity in human beings, including those whose mental age will never exceed that of an infant, but we don't attribute dignity to dogs or cats, though they clearly operate at a more advanced mental level than human infants. Just making that comparison provokes outrage in some quarters. But why should dignity always go together with species membership, no matter what the characteristics of the individual may be?

Here is how I summarized Singer's position in an earlier article:

Consider this chilling statement: "If we compare a severely defective human infant with a nonhuman animal, a dog or a pig, for example, we will often find the nonhuman to have superior capacities, both actual and potential, for rationality, self-consciousness, communication, and anything else that can plausibly be considered morally significant."

Singer's point is clear--a dog that is able to communicate in a rudimentary way is superior to a human infant who lacks an equal ability to communicate.

In his book Practical Ethics, Singer argues, "The fact that a being is a human being, in the sense of a member of the species Homo sapiens, is not relevant to the wrongness of killing it; it is, rather, characteristics like rationality, autonomy, and self-consciousness that make a difference. Infants lack these characteristics. Killing them, therefore, cannot be equated with killing normal human beings, or any other self-conscious beings."

Ponder that statement carefully, for it is a manifesto for killing human infants. Furthermore, Singer presses his case to make clear that he is not limiting his argument to the killing of infants who lack the potential to develop such qualities. "This conclusion is not limited to infants who, because of irreversible intellectual disabilities, will never be rational, self-conscious beings," Singer clarifies. As in his argument for abortion, Singer asserts "that the potential of a fetus to become a rational, self-conscious being cannot count against killing it at a stage when it lacks these characteristics."

This is precisely where the Christian worldview runs into direct and inescapable collision with the postmodern worldview of Peter Singer. In Singer's world, "defective" infants would have no inherent right to live, but a primate might. As his words make clear, this argument is not actually limited even to "defective" infants by to all infants at early stages of life and development.

Christians believe that every single human being possesses full human dignity because every human being is made in the image of God. A worldview that denies the existence of God and thus denies the reality of the image of God has to come up with some other explanation for human dignity -- one that lacks essential dignity. Thus, in this worldview, the humans that are thought to deserve dignity are recognized as having it, while others are denied the same.

It is not as though we have not seen this logic at work before. Just think of any effort to divide human beings between those who deserve to live and those who do not. Remember the Third Reich?

This is the stuff of nightmares. What does it say that Peter Singer teaches bioethics at Princeton University and that his column was published in today's edition of The New York Times. Someone out there thinks that Peter Singer's ideas should be the shape of our future. Nightmare anyone?

OTHER RESOURCES: My articles "Is the Sanctity of Human Life an Outmoded Concept", (October 13, 2005) and "The Age of Infanticide: The Culture of Death Marches On," (February 11,2004).

Joshua Harris on Sexual Purity

Date	Speaker	Sermon Title and Scripture	Streaming Audio	Download mp3
01.21.2007	Joshua Harris	Purity - Part 3	Listen Online	Download (11 MB)
01.14.2007	Joshua Harris	Purity - Part 2	Listen Online	Download (11 MB)
01.07.2007	Joshua Harris	Purity - Part 1	Listen Online	Download (10.7 MB)

At Home Youth Ministry

From Anthony J. Carter @ http://cyreneministries1.blogspot.com

Here is a message (powerful and controversial) by Voddie Baucham that was recently brought to my attention. Voddie has a passion and pleasure for the family. In Voddie I hear a man with whose heart I can identify. I have been saying much of what Voddie is saying in this message, but I just never have said it so clearly and convincingly. And so I thank God for Voddie's insights. This message was given to a group of Southern Baptist pastors and he challenged them to rethink youth ministry and the need to develop and support what I like to think of as Home Youth Ministry. The message is called The Home is the Key. Check it out. But be warned, Voddie does not play nice with our churches' popular understanding of ministry to our children.