As I say in my last post I have come around from the popular view of America's Founders as Christians to recognizing that they were often outright anti-Christian. Nevertheless I continue to see America as having been highly blessed by God over its two plus centuries of existence, and predominantly Christian in its population, and Christian also from its original settling by true Christians. How all this works together is open to discussion but I haven't yet come to the conclusion that America should simply be abandoned because the Founders weren't Christians.
I get the impression that something along those lines may be the opinion of Brannon Howse if not also Chris Pinto -- but maybe him too. As if there is no point in hoping to "reclaim" the lost Christian worldview of America because it never was Christian. Well, but it was and it wasn't. We are under God's judgment now because we've fallen from the Christian worldview the nation really did mostly live by until the last few decades. Nations must live by the Law of God to be protected. When they abandon that Law God brings judgment against them. And as Jonathan Cahn's study reveals, America really was dedicated to God in a very real sense despite all these new revelations about the anti-Christian beliefs of the Founders.
Toward the end of yesterday's Worldview Weekend broadcast, Part 3 of the discussion about Kirk Cameron's soon to be released film, Monumental, there is an exchange I find puzzling and still need to think more about. Howse and Pinto see Cameron as pursuing what is essentially an ecumenical approach to reclaiming the "Christian foundations" of America, which they don't agree existed anyway, by joining hands with nonChristians on political and moral issues that Christians share with them. Cameron's side of the argument is presented as desiring to save the nation for his children and future generations. They accuse Howse of sitting around waiting for the Antichrist in a self-fulfilling prophecy. Howse responds that this is is to be a God-fulfilled prophecy if so, not self-fulfilling. A caller chimes in that it seems that Cameron is rejecting God's own revelation. See, I do have trouble keeping this issue clear in my mind. I'm going to have to listen to that part of the discussion again to see if I can sort it out better.
But something like this appears to be the way the two sides fall out. I certainly can't agree with the ecumenical approach to "reclaiming" anything, even if the nation WERE clearly Christian from its founding. I do believe, however, that there is a sense in which the nation WAS essentially Christian despite the views of the Founders. I may have to modify this. Perhaps we were more "Judeo-Christian" in that there was a basic respect to God's Laws even in the Founding generation, as they warned that the nation needed to adhere to God's laws to prosper. That's not quite Christianity but it is compatible with Christianity, which must be part of the confusion here.
I've been vacillating a great deal myself about "reclaiming the nation" in the sense of yearning for a great revival to turn us back to Christ. Versus thinking we've gone beyond any point where we could hope for such a revival, or that it would be too risky considering the state of apostasy of the churches. I go back and forth on this a great deal. True revival can make inroads in apostasy, can bring liberal Christians to recognize the truth of the Bible. God CAN turn things completely around in revival. I know that is so. The Great Awakening just before the American Revolution did revitalize the Christian mentality of the nation. However, that was also followed by the generation of the Deists and Enlightenment-influenced anti-Christians which is the subject here.
It COULD happen but the churches would need to be praying in huge numbers with huge intensity and without ecumenical interference. That's not happening.
Although I believe we're right at the threshold of the coming of the Antichrist myself I don't see that in itself as a reason to give up hope that God might yet give us a temporary reprieve. We don't KNOW the Antichrist is right around the corner after all, although it certainly does seem imminent. But while we are to believe that prophecy is certainly going to be fulfilled I don't see that we are to cease all efforts to revive the churches and the nation, especially since we don't know for sure when it's going to happen anyway.
I certainly agree that we can't reclaim America in any way at all by ecumenical means, that's a lost cause. Politics is useless, even worldview training is probably useless. The problem is supernatural. There may also be many reasons we can't reclaim America even through a God-sent revival, however, including the imminence of the reign of the Antichrist, but all that is God's own sovereign timing. But I don't see anything in he growing apostasy or the imminence of the final evil empire as a reason to abandon the hope for revival. It COULD even be an argument FOR it. But again, we'd have to be praying our hearts out for it.
So there's my current state of rather muddled thought on this subject that I've needed to get put down in some form. It will probably be modified as I learn more and think more about it. But the main point is that I can't agree wholly with Howse and Pinto on this insofar as I understand their position -- which, again, I may not understand all that well.
Thursday, March 1, 2012
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Revelations about the ANTI-Christian beliefs of the Founders and deceptions about Christian America that many are falling for these days
Revelations about the anti-Christian beliefs of the American founding fathers, that I first discovered through a film by Chris Pinto at You Tube, are very disturbing to a conservative patriotic American Christian. But I'm now convinced that these revelations are really as important as Jonathan Cahn's about God's message to America in events surrounding 9/11. The deceptions that contemporary Christians fall into come at us from every direction these days, and unfortunately they are so utterly unexpected and Christians so woefully unprepared to stand against them, that most of us fall into at least some of them.
I certainly fell for the patriotic Christian view of the founding fathers that has been promoted particularly by David Barton over the last couple of decades. You must be convinced, if you watch Chris Pinto's revelations, that Barton was not playing with a full deck in his claims that America's founders were true Christians. Whether he fooled himself as well isn't clear, but now he's supporting Glenn Beck the Mormon as a "Christian" and has become thoroughly untrustworthy whether his misguided views are intentional or he is deceived himself.
Barton's claims are trusted and propagated still by most Christians, and Glenn Beck himself is also a strong propagator of the "Christian" basis of America, which I too accepted as true, although knowing Beck is a Mormon ought to be a warning in itself that something may not be quite right about what he's promoting. Beck is a very talented and convincing spokesman for American conservatism and patriotism. It really kind of takes the wind out of you to begin to see through such apparently righteous opinions to hidden deceptions. The whole Christian-Founders position needs to be exposed as deception. Truly Satan presents himself as "an angel of light."
Need to add here that this doesn't mean that America is not Christian in a very basic sense nevertheless, as the original settlers were genuine Christians, the Pilgrims and Puritans. But their Christian beliefs were betrayed by the generation of the Revolution and the Founding of the nation. These revelations have got me wondering why it is that God has so clearly blessed America, as He truly has, up until fairly recently, and it must be because of the Christian beliefs and lives of the original settlers as well as the majority of the population.
There is also the fact that the founders DID insist on prayer for the nation, recognizing the sovereign power of God and the need to trust Him for the nation's success. Even Benjamin Franklin called for prayer in Congress to assure God's favor on the proceedings, and he was among the least Christian of the founders. That prayer was so prominent on their agenda is puzzling after you realize just how anti-Christian the main leaders were -- which is revealed in Pinto's films on the subject. But the Deists of those days apparently believed in a God who hears prayer, they just didn't believe in Christ as God Himself and salvation through His death and resurrection, which is made only too clear in Pinto's films. It does seem to be the case that God heard George Washington's inaugural prayers for the nation that were made from that little chapel at the corner of Ground Zero that is a big part of Jonathan Cahn's revelations about 9/11, and that the blessings that God had bestowed on this nation dedicated to God in so many ways were rescinded by God at the very same place on 9/11.
Puzzling. Uncanny. Disturbing. Breath-taking really.
As far as I know, the revelations originated with Chris Pinto, but they have recently been taken up by Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend as well. He is doing a three-part radio series -- the second aired today and the third will air tomorrow -- on a film made by Kirk Cameron that is to come out at the end of March titled Monumental, which is about a little-known monument to the founding fathers of America that claims to reflect the beliefs of the Pilgrim settlers of America. As Howse, Pinto and Decker make clear, that monument is utterly pagan in all its imagery, and was established by Masons, reflecting Masonic beliefs about "God" and has nothing Christian about it at all. An open Bible is part of it but "God" is presented as the generic "higher power" rather than the God of the Bible, and the Masons could just as easily have put a Koran in its place. If the Pilgrims had been around when this monument was created they would have denounced it as a work of Satan.
They would also most likely have denounced the generation of the Revolution and the Founders as followers of Satan.
Sobering stuff. Important stuff.
Chris Pinto also discusses this on his radio show for 2/29/11, titled Council of Trent And More, which is an interesting subject in itself, but most of the broadcast he spends discussing Kirk Cameron's film he'd also been discussing on the Worldview Weekend broadcast I've linked above.
This is a perfect, a classic, example of how Christians can be deceived. It's important to know about this.
Brannon Howse's broadcasts are only available free to the public for 14 days after airing, and then they become part of his archives that you have to subscribe to. Pinto's broadcasts I believe are free at any time.
There are plenty of "watchmen" or "discernment" type ministries out there that have also aimed to "expose" such Masonic and pagan roots of the American founding, but in my experience some of them are themselves so untrustworthy I have trouble taking them seriously even though some of what they say may be true. Their "evidence" is often incomplete, sometimes little more than circumstantial, often accusing people of guilt by association. They jump to conclusions without really proving the conclusions justified by the facts, although they themselves are thoroughly convinced by what seem to them to be sufficient facts, even saying things like "it's a no-brainer to me." Seems to me there is plenty of reason to think they are just being carried away, and worse, accusing true Christians of intentional deception that is not warranted. They show little concern that by trusting in their own personal grasp of the facts they may be accusing a true brother in Christ of intentional deception who is himself merely led away by a deception -- which any of us can be these days. I've heard too many true Christians denounced by such incautious "ministries" even as "devils" to the point I can barely take any of it seriously any more and just have to pray for the teacher who is behaving like a bull in a china shop, and possibly dangerously worse than that, letting himself be overcome by emotion through lack of complete knowledge and in fact setting himself up against God without knowing it.
But Chris Pinto's revelations about the founding fathers just blew me away with his careful mustering of evidence and objective attitude. Brannon Howse also has the same attitude and is very careful to acknowledge that Kirk Cameron is a true brother in Christ although he is trying to show that he is deceived about the meaning of this monument he has been championing in the film about it.
Here's a page on the program at Worldview Weekend:
I certainly fell for the patriotic Christian view of the founding fathers that has been promoted particularly by David Barton over the last couple of decades. You must be convinced, if you watch Chris Pinto's revelations, that Barton was not playing with a full deck in his claims that America's founders were true Christians. Whether he fooled himself as well isn't clear, but now he's supporting Glenn Beck the Mormon as a "Christian" and has become thoroughly untrustworthy whether his misguided views are intentional or he is deceived himself.
Barton's claims are trusted and propagated still by most Christians, and Glenn Beck himself is also a strong propagator of the "Christian" basis of America, which I too accepted as true, although knowing Beck is a Mormon ought to be a warning in itself that something may not be quite right about what he's promoting. Beck is a very talented and convincing spokesman for American conservatism and patriotism. It really kind of takes the wind out of you to begin to see through such apparently righteous opinions to hidden deceptions. The whole Christian-Founders position needs to be exposed as deception. Truly Satan presents himself as "an angel of light."
Need to add here that this doesn't mean that America is not Christian in a very basic sense nevertheless, as the original settlers were genuine Christians, the Pilgrims and Puritans. But their Christian beliefs were betrayed by the generation of the Revolution and the Founding of the nation. These revelations have got me wondering why it is that God has so clearly blessed America, as He truly has, up until fairly recently, and it must be because of the Christian beliefs and lives of the original settlers as well as the majority of the population.
There is also the fact that the founders DID insist on prayer for the nation, recognizing the sovereign power of God and the need to trust Him for the nation's success. Even Benjamin Franklin called for prayer in Congress to assure God's favor on the proceedings, and he was among the least Christian of the founders. That prayer was so prominent on their agenda is puzzling after you realize just how anti-Christian the main leaders were -- which is revealed in Pinto's films on the subject. But the Deists of those days apparently believed in a God who hears prayer, they just didn't believe in Christ as God Himself and salvation through His death and resurrection, which is made only too clear in Pinto's films. It does seem to be the case that God heard George Washington's inaugural prayers for the nation that were made from that little chapel at the corner of Ground Zero that is a big part of Jonathan Cahn's revelations about 9/11, and that the blessings that God had bestowed on this nation dedicated to God in so many ways were rescinded by God at the very same place on 9/11.
Puzzling. Uncanny. Disturbing. Breath-taking really.
As far as I know, the revelations originated with Chris Pinto, but they have recently been taken up by Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend as well. He is doing a three-part radio series -- the second aired today and the third will air tomorrow -- on a film made by Kirk Cameron that is to come out at the end of March titled Monumental, which is about a little-known monument to the founding fathers of America that claims to reflect the beliefs of the Pilgrim settlers of America. As Howse, Pinto and Decker make clear, that monument is utterly pagan in all its imagery, and was established by Masons, reflecting Masonic beliefs about "God" and has nothing Christian about it at all. An open Bible is part of it but "God" is presented as the generic "higher power" rather than the God of the Bible, and the Masons could just as easily have put a Koran in its place. If the Pilgrims had been around when this monument was created they would have denounced it as a work of Satan.
They would also most likely have denounced the generation of the Revolution and the Founders as followers of Satan.
Sobering stuff. Important stuff.
Chris Pinto also discusses this on his radio show for 2/29/11, titled Council of Trent And More, which is an interesting subject in itself, but most of the broadcast he spends discussing Kirk Cameron's film he'd also been discussing on the Worldview Weekend broadcast I've linked above.
This is a perfect, a classic, example of how Christians can be deceived. It's important to know about this.
Brannon Howse's broadcasts are only available free to the public for 14 days after airing, and then they become part of his archives that you have to subscribe to. Pinto's broadcasts I believe are free at any time.
There are plenty of "watchmen" or "discernment" type ministries out there that have also aimed to "expose" such Masonic and pagan roots of the American founding, but in my experience some of them are themselves so untrustworthy I have trouble taking them seriously even though some of what they say may be true. Their "evidence" is often incomplete, sometimes little more than circumstantial, often accusing people of guilt by association. They jump to conclusions without really proving the conclusions justified by the facts, although they themselves are thoroughly convinced by what seem to them to be sufficient facts, even saying things like "it's a no-brainer to me." Seems to me there is plenty of reason to think they are just being carried away, and worse, accusing true Christians of intentional deception that is not warranted. They show little concern that by trusting in their own personal grasp of the facts they may be accusing a true brother in Christ of intentional deception who is himself merely led away by a deception -- which any of us can be these days. I've heard too many true Christians denounced by such incautious "ministries" even as "devils" to the point I can barely take any of it seriously any more and just have to pray for the teacher who is behaving like a bull in a china shop, and possibly dangerously worse than that, letting himself be overcome by emotion through lack of complete knowledge and in fact setting himself up against God without knowing it.
But Chris Pinto's revelations about the founding fathers just blew me away with his careful mustering of evidence and objective attitude. Brannon Howse also has the same attitude and is very careful to acknowledge that Kirk Cameron is a true brother in Christ although he is trying to show that he is deceived about the meaning of this monument he has been championing in the film about it.
Here's a page on the program at Worldview Weekend:
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
The growing apostasy makes revival risky
More Christians are recognizing the validity of Jonathan Cahn's revelation of God's messages to America about 9/11, which ought to herald a great awakening beginning with the repentance of the churches. That and only that could prevent God's judgments against America that the "harbingers" are all about, and lead to the recovery of God's blessings on the nation. And I'm still doing what I can to promote it simply because this is truly God's own word to us.
At the same time it is so clear that the churches are going off in so many false directions these days my old forbodings about a false revival are coming back in force, and it's becoming hard to welcome any revival at all, even one that would come in response to these uncanny revelations of God's judgments against the nation.
I think it was A. W. Tozer I first heard say something along these lines. There are times when the condition of the churches makes revival a bad idea.
I've been willing to accept that the Brownsville "revival" of a decade or so ago was most likely truly from God despite my initial misgivings, because of a few people who seemed to be having genuine experiences, although I still have to question others, and if the questionable ones were all I'd seen I wouldn't have been so convinced it was from God.
In any case it seems like a "weak" revival, heavy on the physical phenomena that former true revivals always played down. We don't need more of those. We need revival that majors in repentance for the sins of the churches and the sins of the nation and a return to pure doctrine, and a revived national moral conscience that comes as a consequence of the purification of the churches.
But even as I contemplate that as the desired direction I'm aware of all the false movements growing up these days that would be waiting in the wings to co-opt any such move of the Spirit and turn it into a false revival that would be extremely hard to distinguish from the true.
Right now we've got politicians and pundits who preach policies a true conservative Christian wants to hear and yet they are Catholics and Mormons. Two of the Republican candidates are Catholics, one is a Mormon. Then there is Glenn Beck who is a popular and very articulate spokesman for conservative politics, but his Mormonism, and now his Mormonism aligning itself with Catholicism as well, is becoming blatantly obviously his main agenda. He'd turn revival to purposes a true Christian couldn't welcome. And he keeps calling for a revival too, again no revival a Christian could welcome. David Barton, former champion of evangelical hopes for the revival of a supposedly once-Christian nation, has sadly joined with Glenn Beck and dashed all such hopes for anyone who has a solid Biblical basis. Any revival that got co-opted by these false religionists would become a false revival in the service of false religion, mislead people away from Christ and the nation closer to judgment.
There are many supposed evangelicals who have already proved their lack of discernment by embracing both Mormons and Catholics as genuine Christians, evangelicals who denounce the true evangelicals who do have good Biblical discernment and refuse to link with Mormonism and Catholicism, as "haters" who fail at the most basic requirement of Christian love. And there are some who reject Mormonism but accept Catholicism, to make it even more complicated, such as Franklin Graham, following after his father Billy Graham.
With that kind of twistedness out there, my hope for a genuine revival is foundering and I'm beginning to see the "harbinger" revelations, that should be the catalyst to true revival, instead as God's witnesses against America that are going to stand against the nation to the last day. What could have inspired the purification the churches need probably shouldn't happen even if it could at this point, so the nation can only continue to deteriorate under God's judgments while the global-minded church keeps building the platform for the rise of the Antichrist.
Now I'm more inclined in the direction of wanting to see what's left of the true churches and true Christians be strengthened in Biblical foundations, so we can "stand in that evil day" maybe manage to shout truth into the storm as it swirls around us -- if we're still here when it breaks.
At the same time it is so clear that the churches are going off in so many false directions these days my old forbodings about a false revival are coming back in force, and it's becoming hard to welcome any revival at all, even one that would come in response to these uncanny revelations of God's judgments against the nation.
I think it was A. W. Tozer I first heard say something along these lines. There are times when the condition of the churches makes revival a bad idea.
I've been willing to accept that the Brownsville "revival" of a decade or so ago was most likely truly from God despite my initial misgivings, because of a few people who seemed to be having genuine experiences, although I still have to question others, and if the questionable ones were all I'd seen I wouldn't have been so convinced it was from God.
In any case it seems like a "weak" revival, heavy on the physical phenomena that former true revivals always played down. We don't need more of those. We need revival that majors in repentance for the sins of the churches and the sins of the nation and a return to pure doctrine, and a revived national moral conscience that comes as a consequence of the purification of the churches.
But even as I contemplate that as the desired direction I'm aware of all the false movements growing up these days that would be waiting in the wings to co-opt any such move of the Spirit and turn it into a false revival that would be extremely hard to distinguish from the true.
Right now we've got politicians and pundits who preach policies a true conservative Christian wants to hear and yet they are Catholics and Mormons. Two of the Republican candidates are Catholics, one is a Mormon. Then there is Glenn Beck who is a popular and very articulate spokesman for conservative politics, but his Mormonism, and now his Mormonism aligning itself with Catholicism as well, is becoming blatantly obviously his main agenda. He'd turn revival to purposes a true Christian couldn't welcome. And he keeps calling for a revival too, again no revival a Christian could welcome. David Barton, former champion of evangelical hopes for the revival of a supposedly once-Christian nation, has sadly joined with Glenn Beck and dashed all such hopes for anyone who has a solid Biblical basis. Any revival that got co-opted by these false religionists would become a false revival in the service of false religion, mislead people away from Christ and the nation closer to judgment.
There are many supposed evangelicals who have already proved their lack of discernment by embracing both Mormons and Catholics as genuine Christians, evangelicals who denounce the true evangelicals who do have good Biblical discernment and refuse to link with Mormonism and Catholicism, as "haters" who fail at the most basic requirement of Christian love. And there are some who reject Mormonism but accept Catholicism, to make it even more complicated, such as Franklin Graham, following after his father Billy Graham.
With that kind of twistedness out there, my hope for a genuine revival is foundering and I'm beginning to see the "harbinger" revelations, that should be the catalyst to true revival, instead as God's witnesses against America that are going to stand against the nation to the last day. What could have inspired the purification the churches need probably shouldn't happen even if it could at this point, so the nation can only continue to deteriorate under God's judgments while the global-minded church keeps building the platform for the rise of the Antichrist.
Now I'm more inclined in the direction of wanting to see what's left of the true churches and true Christians be strengthened in Biblical foundations, so we can "stand in that evil day" maybe manage to shout truth into the storm as it swirls around us -- if we're still here when it breaks.
Monday, February 20, 2012
The floating tribute to the fallen World Trade Center, USS New York, unfortunately another icon of America's defiance of God
Someone recently sent me an email honoring our American military in which the last part was about the USS New York, the battleship built from steel from the collapsed World Trade Center. I'd seen information about this before, it circulates especially among patriotic conservatives, but this time I had Jonathan Cahn's revelations about 9/11 in mind as I read it, as did the person who sent it to me.
It's one thing to know that 9/11 was God's warning judgment on America, but another to know that God Himself spoke to America through events connected with that day. This He did in such an immediate and personal way that you can almost see its significance reaching into the future, heralding new judgments to come because the nation failed to recognize God's hand in the attack, failed to humble ourselves and repent in response to it. Instead we did the equivalent of shaking our fist at God, though of course we THOUGHT it was only shaking our fist at the terrorists.
It is touching to read about the reverence the steelworkers who molded part of the ship felt about it. The foundry operations manager said that when the trade center steel first arrived he touched it with his hand and the "hair on my neck stood up." "It had a big meaning to it for all of us" he said, "They knocked us down, they can't keep us down. We're going to be back up."
Moving though such patriotic expressions may be, if you know about the harbingers or omens of 9/11 that were discovered by Jonathan Cahn, it must give you a shudder to see this same sentiment expressed again and again like this. "We're going to be back up," not, "God is judging America, we must repent," but "They can't keep us down, we're going to be back up," exactly the same sentiment God Himself pointed to in Isaiah 9:10 through many irrefutable signs to show the identity between ancient Israel's defiance of God and America's after 9/11.
So I worry for the ship and its crew. If the mere steel from the trade center made a man's hair stand on end, surely we know God's hand is on that steel and now it's in that ship and it signifies God's judgment, and how can that ship be safe under such circumstances?
It was the seventh ship to be named after the city of New York, and the number seven strongly figures in certain events since 9/11 that Cahn discovered. The ship was commissioned on November 9 of 2009. What time factor may apply from that date forward I don't know but God's judgments keep ticking away and I can only fear for the future of that icon to 9/11.
"We're going to be back up?" Not according to God, not in any permanent way for sure. The only way back up is down: on our knees in repentance and prayer.
It's one thing to know that 9/11 was God's warning judgment on America, but another to know that God Himself spoke to America through events connected with that day. This He did in such an immediate and personal way that you can almost see its significance reaching into the future, heralding new judgments to come because the nation failed to recognize God's hand in the attack, failed to humble ourselves and repent in response to it. Instead we did the equivalent of shaking our fist at God, though of course we THOUGHT it was only shaking our fist at the terrorists.
It is touching to read about the reverence the steelworkers who molded part of the ship felt about it. The foundry operations manager said that when the trade center steel first arrived he touched it with his hand and the "hair on my neck stood up." "It had a big meaning to it for all of us" he said, "They knocked us down, they can't keep us down. We're going to be back up."
Moving though such patriotic expressions may be, if you know about the harbingers or omens of 9/11 that were discovered by Jonathan Cahn, it must give you a shudder to see this same sentiment expressed again and again like this. "We're going to be back up," not, "God is judging America, we must repent," but "They can't keep us down, we're going to be back up," exactly the same sentiment God Himself pointed to in Isaiah 9:10 through many irrefutable signs to show the identity between ancient Israel's defiance of God and America's after 9/11.
So I worry for the ship and its crew. If the mere steel from the trade center made a man's hair stand on end, surely we know God's hand is on that steel and now it's in that ship and it signifies God's judgment, and how can that ship be safe under such circumstances?
It was the seventh ship to be named after the city of New York, and the number seven strongly figures in certain events since 9/11 that Cahn discovered. The ship was commissioned on November 9 of 2009. What time factor may apply from that date forward I don't know but God's judgments keep ticking away and I can only fear for the future of that icon to 9/11.
"We're going to be back up?" Not according to God, not in any permanent way for sure. The only way back up is down: on our knees in repentance and prayer.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
One man's testimony of Salvation and Life in the Jesus Freaks movement
I hope this brother doesn't mind that I commandeered his post for my blog. If he comes by and sees it and wants me to give his identity and where I got it I'll do that, but for now I just loved this testimony and wanted to put it "out there." It's in the context of a thread about how the church should deal with single mothers who come to faith.
It fits what little I've known about the Jesus movement, much from Keith Green's story, who got saved during that same time and became well known as the author and singer of many Christian songs. Green followed the command to love brothers and sisters in Christ by buying houses in which many homeless hippies who came to the Lord could be sheltered.
This man's story has a similar spirit. His name is "Brother Tom:"
It fits what little I've known about the Jesus movement, much from Keith Green's story, who got saved during that same time and became well known as the author and singer of many Christian songs. Green followed the command to love brothers and sisters in Christ by buying houses in which many homeless hippies who came to the Lord could be sheltered.
This man's story has a similar spirit. His name is "Brother Tom:"
I was saved out of the hippie movement,and all of the entrapment's of it, into the Jesus People movement. There was a day when Salvation happened all around us, every single day. It was a rare day, when someone was not saved. We baptized once a month in the nearby river..[ Russian River ]..and often had 20-30 confessors of faith.
We carried, and read our bibles everywhere, and wore them out. When people got saved, there was nothing in between them and God. The Holy Spirit entered them visibly, and they became radiant with a holy glow, and they smiled with joy and love toward one another. They had really been born again from above the second time.
The depravity in us before our salvation was no less, for sure, than those today, nor the wounds of sin among us no less severe than today. We were a sick mess, and after being born again, we were healed and delivered of our sicknesses.
Issues like this were trivial, and very common...with most all of us coming out of free love ideas that was founded on immorality as a life-style. There were lots and lots of single mothers in our church.
Almost every one, over the years, got married off, and went on as happy Christian moms. I guess what I'm saying, is that we never worried about figuring it out; We just did it in a very normal and common fashion; loved our brothers and sisters...and in a worshipping church...we all got healed up. God provided, it seemed, for everyone.
Back then, there were "Sisters houses", where perhaps 3 or 4 sisters lived , and some with children. Everybody got a job...and paid rent, and chipped in with the kids. I adapted a family of five boys, and one girl, living with their single mother.
I was single, and had a good job, working with my hands. I cared for those boys, took them fishing at the Ocean, took them out about every weekend, and provided extra's for them, in everyday needs. This went on for several years. I never thought twice about it, or that I was doing some special deed..I wanted to.
Today, these men now, still have respect for me..and made it through into manhood without too much craziness. It was always a joy for me to be there.
This was born out of Community. The Church [ local community [ always precedes the Meeting. Otherwise, you have a dysfunctional Body; usually wrapped up into the divisions of a Priest/pulpit ---Pew/congregation type mindset, and never, ever develop a family, a functioning many membered body, that edifies itself in love.
Life flows through this body that meets house to house, and breaks bread together, devoid of the ecclesiastical control , or respect that the religious live by. I have written in my Bible, that RELIGION KILLS!...and the solution to matters like these will never come to us in the current Clergy/Laity model, as neither will Revival...no matter how much you preach about it.
A healed Church, which is what we are talking about here, is one where Faith works by love, and my experiences in this church that brought life all came from a natural flow of loving one another with Christ Jesus in our midst as Lord....not a program or a defining system of ministry.
One day God will pour Himself upon us again, those who really want Him, and we will become a body again, of equal brothers and sisters, unto the very least of the brethren, and again issues like the single mom ministry will just fall in place, naturally, because they are loved, and worth it.....and no man or woman will ever be judged after their old nature or sins...but as New Creatures! Hallelujah!
Friday, February 17, 2012
A Christian Worldview the result of the Christian work of being salt and light
If only the Lord might give us revival across the nation it wouldn't be long before a Christian worldview was reconstructed. There's always a question how much can be accomplished by purely intellectual means -- even through the sanctified intellect of born-again Christians. But we ARE to be salt and light to the culture so it's hard to go along with some who advocate just leaving it all alone while these worldly and pagan views that are dominating the world today are not only bringing about God's judgments on this earth but dragging millions to a hellish eternity. At the very least there are Christians who are saved but who nevertheless accept ideas that contradict a Christian worldview, and it has to be important to shine some light on that problem.
I've been reading in an older book about Christian Worldview, 7 Men Who Rule the World from the Grave by Dave Breese, which discusses the effect of seven thinkers on today's cultural climate: Darwin of course, Marx of course, Julius Wellhausen, Freud, John Dewey, John Maynard Keynes, and Soren Kierkegaard. Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend has also written a book, Grave Influence, that uses much of Breese's thinking and expands the list of influential anti-Christians to 21, and I suppose more could be added.
Christians just ARE influenced by the thinking of such men as it's been diffused throughout the culture over the last century or so. I don't think we can ignore it and hope to say anything very effective against it. I guess we could take the position that our job is simply to make spiritually strong Christians, hope for revival, and leave the culture to itself. Breese on the other hand wants to see Christians become educated to answer the culture, although in the following example revival played a big part:
I've been reading in an older book about Christian Worldview, 7 Men Who Rule the World from the Grave by Dave Breese, which discusses the effect of seven thinkers on today's cultural climate: Darwin of course, Marx of course, Julius Wellhausen, Freud, John Dewey, John Maynard Keynes, and Soren Kierkegaard. Brannon Howse of Worldview Weekend has also written a book, Grave Influence, that uses much of Breese's thinking and expands the list of influential anti-Christians to 21, and I suppose more could be added.
Christians just ARE influenced by the thinking of such men as it's been diffused throughout the culture over the last century or so. I don't think we can ignore it and hope to say anything very effective against it. I guess we could take the position that our job is simply to make spiritually strong Christians, hope for revival, and leave the culture to itself. Breese on the other hand wants to see Christians become educated to answer the culture, although in the following example revival played a big part:
History teaches us that a single strong voice for God in a leaderless generation can be effective. Historians agree that the revivals of John and Charles Wesley in England did save England from the terrors of the French Revolution. Surely the single voice of Martin Luther at the Diet of Worms liberated northern Germany, then England, then major portions of the world from incarceration behind the purple curtain of Rome. Liberalism in America was impeded in some places and stopped outright in others by simple fundamentalist preachers who spoke strongly for the truth of God.[p.230]He believes that all of us need to be educated for this purpose:
Lenin himself, speaking of the Communist revolution in Russia, said that it could have been defeated by a hundred purposeful people in St. Petersburg who knew what they were doing. One effective debater, or even an intelligent Christian conversationalist, might have stopped Rousseau and his nonsensical arguments in one evening in the salons of Paris. By so doing, he might have prevented the French Revolution.And:
Keynesian economics, with its assertion that government is God, might have died aborning had there been a Christian position on government and global economics ready to meet it.[231]And:
Let is also note that the anti-Christian tides of thought prevailed in no small measure because the church had lost even its own message. Across the world Christians are often remiss, not only in not presenting position papers on global problems but also in not presenting the gospel.[231]
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Crash Courses available on Christian Worldview
In the previous post I mention that we've lost our Christian worldview, which means western culture is now laboring under something else, a sort of pagan secular conglomerate with false tones of quasi-Christianity, which is exemplified in the examples I gave. We did once have a coherent consistent Christian worldview, and so did Europe. Not perfect, not unchallenged, but dominant, coherent and consistent. Its loss is part of the judgment western nations are under.
In recent years some ministries have sprung up with the intent of identifying the Christian worldview for the sake of Christians who are also losing it under the onslaught of the world, the flesh and the devil. I just want to point to them in this post and maybe later discuss them.
The Truth Project which is taught by Del Tackett and put out on DVDs by Focus on the Family is a twelve-part seminar style teaching that systematically addresses all the elements of society explaining the Christian view of that element and the pagan worldview that has been supplanting it. My brother who is a fairly new Christian fell in love with this training, found it incredibly eye-opening and hopes to find time to teach it himself when he retires next year. Here's the website
The other major ministry devoted to teaching a Christian worldview that I'm aware of is Brannon Howse's Worldview Weekend. He offers courses that cover the material systematically but on his website you find discussions of separate elements in no particular order, which may fail to get across that there is such a thing as a consistent systematic Christian worldview. Here's the link to the main site.
He does have a Christian Worldview test you can take, however, which may be the most concentrated way to get a sense of what is meant by a Christian worldview, at this link. (I passed with "flying colors" as they say, I don't remember if it was with a perfect score, it's been a while, but near-perfect anyway).
In recent years some ministries have sprung up with the intent of identifying the Christian worldview for the sake of Christians who are also losing it under the onslaught of the world, the flesh and the devil. I just want to point to them in this post and maybe later discuss them.
The Truth Project which is taught by Del Tackett and put out on DVDs by Focus on the Family is a twelve-part seminar style teaching that systematically addresses all the elements of society explaining the Christian view of that element and the pagan worldview that has been supplanting it. My brother who is a fairly new Christian fell in love with this training, found it incredibly eye-opening and hopes to find time to teach it himself when he retires next year. Here's the website
The other major ministry devoted to teaching a Christian worldview that I'm aware of is Brannon Howse's Worldview Weekend. He offers courses that cover the material systematically but on his website you find discussions of separate elements in no particular order, which may fail to get across that there is such a thing as a consistent systematic Christian worldview. Here's the link to the main site.
He does have a Christian Worldview test you can take, however, which may be the most concentrated way to get a sense of what is meant by a Christian worldview, at this link. (I passed with "flying colors" as they say, I don't remember if it was with a perfect score, it's been a while, but near-perfect anyway).
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