The following is another installment of the Friday Church News Notes designed especially for use in churches. It is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. For instructions on how to unsubscribe to this list or to change mailing addresses, please consult the information paragraph at the end.

EARTHQUAKES IN DIVERS PLACES POINTING TO THE GREAT TRIBULATION. Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - According to early estimates, over 40,000 people died in an earthquake in South Asia on October 8. The year 2004 ended with the death of 220,000 in Indonesia, while the year 2003 rung out with an earthquake that killed 31,000 in Iran. Both events remind us that God’s Word is true. The Lord Jesus Christ warned that the Great Tribulation at the end of the church age would be preceded by “earthquakes in divers places” (Mt. 24:7; Mk. 13:8; Lk. 21:11). Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs compared it to “a scene from the Bible.” In fact, this is only a gentle warning of what lies ahead. At the very opening of the seven-year Tribulation one-fourth of the earth’s population will die from war and famine (Rev. 6:7-8). A third of all the ships in the seas will be destroyed (Rev. 8:9). A third of the waters on the earth will be poisoned (Rev. 8:10-11). A swarm of demonic locusts will torment men with stings so fearful that they will seek death but “shall not find it” (Rev. 9:1-6). A third of the world’s inhabitants will die when an army of 200 million marches from the east (Rev. 9:15-18). The antichrist will rule and require that all men bow to his image and take his mark or die (Rev. 13:11-18). The sun will become so hot that men will be “scorched with great heat” (Rev. 16:8-9). A terrible shaking of the earth will cause every island to sink and the mountains to fall (Rev. 16:20). Hailstones weighing 75-95 pounds will fall from heaven (Rev. 16:21). Men’s hearts will fail “for looking after those things which are coming on the earth” (Lk. 21:26). No person living today has to go through these horrible judgments. We are still living in the era of “good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people” (Lk. 2:10), which is the gospel of Jesus Christ, that He died for our sins, was buried, and rose the third day to offer eternal salvation to whosoever will believe in Him as Lord and Saviour. The Bible says God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 33:11); it is His will, rather, that all men be saved (1 Tim. 2:3-4; 1 Pet. 3:9).

COUNTRY MUSIC AND BEER GOGGLES. Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - I have often warned about the spiritual and moral danger of America’s country music. It is as vile and wicked as rock & roll or rap, but it is often considered safer, because of its thin veneer of God and country, and it is therefore not uncommon for professing Christians, even those who claim to take the Bible seriously, to listen to it. But it has the same addictive sensual back beat as rock & roll (a back beat that the rock & rollers themselves call “sexy”) and the lyrics are just as godless. The themes of country music are drinking, complaining, drinking, quitting your job, drinking, quitting your marriage, drinking, dancing, drinking, being lonely, drinking..... I think you get the idea. Only the Lord knows the true extent of the evil fruit of country music, how many men and women have become alcoholics, how many marriages broken, how many babies born out of wedlock, how many fights, how many terrible accidents caused by drinking and driving, how many suicides, not to speak of the eternal consequences. Just consider three of the country songs playing on mainstream radio. There is, for example, “ALL JACKED UP,” sung by Gretchen Wilson. Our friend Jeff Royal said, “NBC’s Today Show last week featured Wilson performing ‘All Jacked Up’ to the delight of ten year old girls and grandmothers.” Consider the wholesome lyrics: “Well, five of the PM rolls around/ There’s a little ol’ joint outside of town/ I only got time for a couple of beers/ An’ a jukebox song ringin’ in my ear/ The next thing you know, the bartenders pourin’/ Shots are flowing; got me stoned, man. All I really know is that I should be goin’/ But I’m soakin’ up the moment; I’m all jacked up, all jacked up.” Then there is “COMIN’ TO YOUR CITY” sung by Big & Rich. The lyrics go like this: “Well, we’re comin’ to your city/ Gonna play our guitars an’ sing you a country song./ We’ll all be flyin’ higher than a jet airliner/ ... An’ in the middle of a Boston night, we ran into Jessica White/ An’ a little moonshine got us right/ ... Well, we broke down in Greenville in the middle of a hay field/ But a Bud Light truck pulled up an’ helped us out/ So we dead-headed up to Philly, partied down like real hillbillies.” The foolish song continues to recount drunken episodes in cities across America. Then there is “BILLY’S GOT HIS BEER GOGGLES ON” sung by Neil McCoy. “Billy’s at the bar, He’s been there all night/ First ten beers he’s had, Since her goodbye/ ... Grabs him a girl and he holds on tight/ He’s chasin’ everything in sight/ He’ll fall apart when he gets home/ But right now his worries are gone/ Life looks good, good, good/ Billy’s got his beer goggles on.” Music is a powerful thing, and it behooves God’s people to be exceedingly careful about the music in their homes, cars, and churches.

FRANKLIN GRAHAM SPEAKS AT LIBERTY UNIVERSITY. Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Jerry Falwell, Thomas Road Baptist Church, and Liberty University again demonstrated their total commitment to New Evangelicalism and their rebellion to the Scriptures by inviting Franklin Graham to speak at the 2005 Super Conference. Franklin Graham has taken his father place as the head of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, and, sadly, he is walking in the same deeply compromising shoes. The two-fold objective of Graham’s enterprise for the past 50 years has been evangelism and ecumenism. Billy Graham has preached the Gospel to massive numbers of people, but he has also done more than any other man to break down the biblical walls of separation between sound churches and false ones. He has urged churches to yoke together for evangelism, regardless of grave doctrinal differences. He has turned thousands upon thousands of seekers over to Roman Catholic and theologically liberal Protestant churches. Franklin is continuing this practice. He told the Indianapolis Star that his father’s ecumenical alliance with the Catholic Church and all other denominations “was one of the smartest things his father ever did” (“Keeping It Simple, Safe Keeps Graham on High,” The Indianapolis Star, Thurs., June 3, 1999, p. H2). He said: “In the early years, up in Boston, the Catholic church got behind my father’s crusade. That was a first. It took back many Protestants. They didn’t know how to handle it. But it set the example. ‘If Billy Graham is willing to work with everybody, then maybe we should too’” (The Indianapolis Star, June 3, 1999). For Jerry Falwell and his institutions to promote Franklin Graham, with his unscriptural ecumenism, is simply inexcusable. And the fact that the Baptist Bible Fellowship International and Tennessee Temple and Southwide Baptist Fellowship associates with Falwell and says nothing about his deep compromise is clear evidence that they are committed to the downward path of New Evangelicalism.

STOP THAT COOING; HAVEN’T YOU HEARD OF INFANT’S RIGHTS? Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Calderdale Royal Hospital in Halifax, West Yorks, England, has taken new age thinking and “rights” to a new level. They have banned visitors from “cooing” over newborn babies “to protect their dignity and parents’ rights to confidentiality” (“Hospital Bans Cooing over Baby,” Telegraph News, Sept. 27). The hospital exhorts visitors to resist the temptation to touch or coo over the infants. Visitors are given cards which say: “I am small and precious so treat me with privacy and respect. My parents ask you to treat my personal space with consideration. I deserve to be left undisturbed and protected against unwanted public view.” An infant’s right to privacy? What silliness. Any self respecting infant delights in a little cooing! The card should read, “Cooing over these babies is most appreciated!”

ALABAMA STATE SENATOR SAYS GOD IS JUDGING AMERICA WITH DISASTROUS HURRICANES. Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Alabama Republican senator Hank Erwin says the reason why the U.S. Gulf Coast suffered from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita is because God is judging Americans in that region for sinful behavior (“Bold Enough to Speak the Truth,” WorldNetDaily, Sept. 29). In a column published in the Birmingham News, Erwin said, “New Orleans and the Mississippi Gulf Coast have always been known for gambling, sin and wickedness. It is the kind of behavior that ultimately brings the judgment of God. ... Warnings year after year by godly evangelists and preachers went unheeded. So why were we surprised when finally the hand of judgment fell? ... Sadly, innocents suffered along with the guilty. Sin always brings suffering to good people as well as the bad. ... America has been moving away from God. ... As harsh as it may sound, those hurricanes do say that God is real, and we have to realize sin has consequences.”

ANGLICAN BISHOP ORDAINS TRANSSEXUAL PRIEST. Friday Church News Notes, October 14, 2005 (Fundamental Baptist Information Service, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from the Australian Independent Baptist Newsletter, Sept. 2005, #2 -- “According to BBC News for Sept. 24: ‘The Bishop of Hereford has defended the decision to ordain a transsexual woman as a priest. Assistant curate Sarah Jones, 43, from Ross-on-Wye in Herefordshire, spent the first 33 years of her life living as a man. ... the Right Reverend Anthony Priddis said Ms Jones--being ordained on Saturday--was “made and loved by God.”’ Genesis 1:27 says, ‘So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.’ Romans 9:20, ‘Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?’”

CONCLUSION: Friends in Christ, do not be discouraged by any of this. It is God’s will that we know the times (1 Ch. 12:32; Mat. 16:3) and that we be as wise as serpents and harmless as doves. These things remind us that the hour is very late, and we need to be ready for the coming of the Lord. Are you sure that you are born again? Are you living for Christ day by day? “And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof” (Rom. 13:11-14).