WHEATON COLLEGE PROFESSOR CALLS ON SCHOOL TO ALLOW ROMAN CATHOLIC TEACHERS (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Wheaton College professor Alan Jacobs has called on the school to open its doors to Roman Catholic professors. The call was motivated by the 2004 dismissal of Joshua Hochschild, who was fired after he joined the Roman Catholic Church. Hochschild left Wheaton in 2005 and joined the faculty of Mount Saint Mary University in Maryland. In an April 2006 article in First Things, Jacobs said: “I think it is important to avoid the claim that the differences between Protestants and Catholics are insignificant; they are not, and it is frivolous to think that they are. But it may well be that sufficient common ground in the gospel exists, and is recognized to exist, so that it makes sense for a college like Wheaton to take a significant step toward effective Christian unity. ... Wheaton could strike a great blow, not for insipid and vacuous ‘moral and religious influences,’ but for true Christian unity, if it welcomed into its midst Josh Hochschild and other Catholic teacher-scholars who share his passion for Christian truth.” This statement either exhibits Jacobs’ personal commitment to a false gospel or his ignorance of Romanism or both. Rome’s official proclamations, including Vatican Council II and the New Catholic Catechism, state that salvation is not by grace alone through faith in Christ alone but requires sacraments and works. How can there be sufficient common ground for unity between someone who believes in a grace-works gospel and someone who believes in a grace-alone gospel? The apostle Paul said that anyone who teaches a different gospel than grace is cursed of God (Galatians 1:8-10). Further, how can there be sufficient ground for unity between someone who prays to “saints” and someone who believes Christ is the sole mediator, between someone who honors the pope and someone who thinks the pope is a usurper, between someone who accepts the mass and someone who believes the mass is a man-made tradition, between someone who believes baptism is the new birth and someone who believes baptism is a picture of the gospel? These are not tertiary issues! The problem with the average evangelical today is that he doesn’t care about it enough to fight for it and doesn’t hate error enough to separate from it. Jacobs is the author of The Narnian, a biography of C. S. Lewis, and he has imbibed Lewis’s unscriptural ecumenical philosophy. On page 213 Jacobs wrote of Lewis: “He believed that there was a core of orthodox Christianity that Puritans, Anglicans, and Catholics all affirmed and that should have been a source of peace among them.” C. S. Lewis was dead wrong, and so are his evangelical followers today.

NEW ZEALAND BANS SPANKING (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - This year three more countries banned spanking of children. In May New Zealand became the first English-speaking country to ban the practice. Over the past two months Uruguay and Venezuela have followed suit. New Zealand’s Crimes Amendment Act of 2007 abrogates section 59 of the Crimes Act of 1961 which allowed the “use of force” for correction of children. Activists such as Save the Children have fought to ban corporal punishment for decades. There are now 22 nations that ban spanking by law. Sweden was the first in 1979. Other nations are Austria, Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Norway, Portugal, Romania, the Netherlands, and Ukraine. Humanists are fighting throughout the world to ban this practice, and the United Nations is pushing this agenda. It is a direct attack on God’s Word which exhorts parents, “Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him” (Proverbs 22:15).

BIN LADEN THREATENS TO DRIVE JEWS FROM “PALESTINE” (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - In a new taped message, mass murderer Osama Bin Laden, speaking from his burrow probably somewhere in the desolate no man’s land on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, threatens to carry Al-Qaeda’s terror war to Israel. He says: “We intend to liberate Palestine, the whole of Palestine from the river [Jordan] to the sea. We will not recognize even one inch for Jews in the land of Palestine as other Muslim leaders have” (“Bin Laden Tape Threatens Sunnis, Israelis,” USA Today, Dec. 29, 2007). Bin Laden threatens “blood for blood, destruction for destruction.” According to Bible prophecy, Israel will be driven out of her land one more time during the reign of the Antichrist in the Great Tribulation, but God gave her that land by eternal decree, and she will enjoy it forever when Jesus Christ returns. “And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn” (Zechariah 12:9-10). “Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land. In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely: and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The LORD our righteousness. ... Thus saith the LORD; If my covenant be not with day and night, and if I have not appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth; then will I cast away the seed of Jacob, and David my servant, so that I will not take any of his seed to be rulers over the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: for I will cause their captivity to return, and have mercy on them” (Jeremiah 33:14-16, 25-26).

THE AMAZING NANO BIBLE (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Jewish scientists have inscribed the entire Hebrew Old Testament onto a gold-coated silicon surface the size of a crystal of sugar. Since the letters can only be read with a scanning electron microscope, the practicality of the project is slight, but the objective is to arouse public interest in nanotechnology. In the future the scientists want to inscribe data on DNA or other bio-molecules (“Technion Released First Ever Non-Bible,” Jerusalem Post, Dec. 17, 2007). The project was carried out at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa. “But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased” (Daniel 12:4).

HINDU MOBS RAMPAGING AGAINST CHRISTIANS IN INDIA (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Hindu mobs went on a rampage against Christians in the Indian state of Orissa on Christmas Eve. A report in the Christian Post for Dec. 27 said the riots continued for three days, and the Global Council of Indian Christians reported that at least 2,000 Christians had been injured, two killed, and 20 churches damaged, including some burned to the ground. The mobs were led by activists affiliated with the World Hindu Council and they made no distinction between Catholics, Protestants, or Baptists. At least one Indian preacher was forced to kneel before Hindu idols after being beaten up. In 1999 Orissa was the scene of a horrible attack upon an Australian missionary and his two sons. While sleeping in their station wagon one night they were surrounded by a noisy Hindu mob and forced to remain in the car while it was set on fire. Baptist missionary Graham Staines and his sons Philip and Timothy were burned to death. Staines had been exhibiting the love of Christ by working with leprosy patients for 34 years.

BHUTTO WANTED TO STRENGTHEN TIES BETWEEN ISRAEL AND PAKISTAN, ALLOW U.S. TROOPS TO SEARCH FOR BIN LADIN (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated last week, wanted to strengthen ties between Israel and Pakistan and allow America to hunt for Bin Ladin on Pakistani territory. CNSNews.com reported: “Assassinated former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto wanted her country to normalize relations with Israel and could have acted as a bridge between Israel and the Muslim world, Israeli officials said. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that Bhutto had relayed a message through a mutual acquaintance that she would like to ‘strengthen the ties between Israel and Pakistan’ in the future. Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Dan Gillerman said that he and his wife had met for dinner with Bhutto and her husband. She was interested in normalizing relations with Israel and wanted Gillerman to relay that information to Washington, he said (“Bhutto Wanted Ties between Muslim Pakistan, Israel,” CNSNews.com, Dec. 28, 2007). Bhutto had also stated that she would allow U.S. troops to hunt for Osama bin Laden in Pakistani territory (“Bhutto’s Political Prominence Offended Islamic Radicals,” CNSNews, Dec. 28, 2007). The Islamic terrorists also hated her because she believed in democracy, was a female in leadership position, and refused to cover her face or to refrain from shaking hands with males. An Al Qaida-tied bombing attempt was made on Bhutto’s life in 1993 and again when she returned to Pakistan from exile in October. In February another female Pakistani politician, Zilla Huma Usman, was murdered by a Muslim man who was angry because she didn’t cover her face and she was involved in politics. The killer said he was obeying Allah’s command because, “Women can’t become rulers in Islam.” 

THE DEATH OF THE PRAYER MEETING (Friday Church News Notes, January 4, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is by Pastor Buddy Smith, Malanda, Queensland <smiletex@bigpond.net.au> -- “We need not pretend any longer that fundamental churches, in general, have prayer meetings. There are exceptions, but they are increasingly rare. If there is an endangered species we ought to be worried about, it would have to be the few churches that still have real prayer meetings. Prayer meetings differ from Sunday School classes, and from Sunday preaching services. Prayer meetings are for praying. A song or two, and a short word from the Lord, and then to prayer! Why can’t we go back to holding meetings whose sole purpose is to get down to the serious business of praying? The death of the old fashioned prayer meeting is a great loss to the church, because the heavy artillery of Heaven is never brought to bear upon the strongholds of Satan. Every one of us is a forward spotter on the battlefield, as well as a gunner. It is our business to identify the fortresses of sin which men erect in their hearts and homes. Once we know the coordinates for the Enemy’s positions we can call on our brethren to fire away with all their might. My dad told me after the war how that the heavy artillery was dug in far behind the front lines. He said that when they knew where the targets were, they would begin firing and never stop until they had destroyed the enemy. John Ridley, who was possibly Australia’s greatest preacher, once described the campaign to win the Holy Land back from the Turks. He said the Allies lined their cannons up wheel to wheel for several miles, with every cannon aimed at the same target. When the command came every cannon fired and fired and fired until the target was completely and finally destroyed. So it must be with the prayer ministry of the local church. Of course, there will be people who will not attend a real prayer meeting. But some will. So we start with those who will and then conscript some more to help us fire away. Wheel to wheel, petition after petition, firing away hour after hour, until the gunbarrels melt down, if need be, or all will be lost. The Devil’s citadels have never been able to stand against the artillery of Heaven. Doubtless, the Enemy will build them again, but if we have trained our children in the arts of prayerful gunnery, they will pray all his strongholds to smithereens.”