December 4, 2009, Volume 10, Issue 49
The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this does not imply an endorsement. For instructions on how to unsubscribe to this list or to change mailing addresses, please consult the information paragraph at the end.
THE CLIMATE CHANGE MAFIA EXPOSED (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Climate Change: The Worst Scientific Scandal of Our Generation,” by Christopher Booker, The Telegraph, Nov. 28, 2009: “A week after my colleague James Delingpole, on his Telegraph blog, coined the term ‘Climategate’ to describe the scandal revealed by the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, Google was showing that the word now appears across the internet more than nine million times. ... The reason why even the Guardian’s George Monbiot has expressed total shock and dismay at the picture revealed by the documents is that their authors are not just any old bunch of academics. What we are looking at here is the small group of scientists who have for years been more influential in driving the worldwide alarm over global warming than any others, not least through the role they play at the heart of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Professor Philip Jones, the CRU's director, is in charge of the two key sets of data used by the IPCC to draw up its reports. ... his global temperature record is the most important of the four sets of temperature data on which the IPCC and governments rely--not least for their predictions that the world will warm to catastrophic levels unless trillions of dollars are spent to avert it. Dr Jones is also a key part of the closely knit group of American and British scientists responsible for promoting that picture of world temperatures conveyed by Michael Mann's ‘hockey stick’ graph which 10 years ago turned climate history on its head by showing that, after 1,000 years of decline, global temperatures have recently shot up to their highest level in recorded history. ... The senders and recipients of the leaked CRU emails constitute a cast list of the IPCC’s scientific elite ... There are three threads in particular in the leaked documents which have sent a shock wave through informed observers across the world. Perhaps the most obvious ... is the highly disturbing series of emails which show how Dr Jones and his colleagues have for years been discussing the devious tactics whereby they could avoid releasing their data to outsiders under freedom of information laws. ... The second and most shocking revelation of the leaked documents is how they show the scientists trying to manipulate data through their tortuous computer programmes, always to point in only the one desired direction--to lower past temperatures and to ‘adjust’ recent temperatures upwards, in order to convey the impression of an accelerated warming. ... The third shocking revelation of these documents is the ruthless way in which these academics have been determined to silence any expert questioning of the findings they have arrived at by such dubious methods--not just by refusing to disclose their basic data but by discrediting and freezing out any scientific journal which dares to publish their critics’ work.”
THE SCIENTIFIC-TECHNOLOGICAL ELITE (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Eisenhower on ClimateGate” by Michael Egnor, Evolution News & Views, Nov. 30, 2009: “President Eisenhower, in his farewell speech, issued the following warning. ‘Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers. The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present--and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.’ This is a remarkably succinct and accurate prediction of the situation we face today. ClimateGate is the tip of the iceberg of the corrupt influence of our scientific elite on public policy, ranging from censorship of honest discussion of evolution in our schools to the ‘Cap and Trade’ boondoggle based on fabricated global warming science to the fraud and political power-play shaping up in Copenhagen to self-enriching pressure by scientists and industry to exempt human embryonic stem cell research from traditional ethical constraints on destroying human life. We ignore Eisenhower’s warning, and the overwhelming evidence before us now, at our own peril.”
JEWS SPITTING ON CHRISTIANS (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Mouths Filled with Hatred,” The Jerusalem Post, Nov. 26, 2009: “Samuel Aghoyan, a senior Armenian Orthodox cleric in Jerusalem's Old City, says he’s been spat at by young haredi and national Orthodox Jews ‘about 15 to 20 times’ in the past decade. The last time it happened, he said, was earlier this month. ‘Every Christian cleric who’s been here for a while, and who dresses in robes in public, has a story to tell about being spat at,’ says Athanasius, a Franciscan monk. He’s been spat at by haredi and national Orthodox Jews ‘about 15 times in the last six months.’ ... Anti-Christian Orthodox Jews, overwhelmingly boys and young men, have been spitting with regularity on priests and nuns in the Old City for about 20 years, and the problem is only getting worse. ... Christians in Israel are a small, weak community known for ‘turning the other cheek,’ so these Jewish xenophobes feel free to spit on them; they don’t spit on Muslims in the Old City because they’re afraid to, the clerics noted.”
CHINA HOUSE CHURCH LEADERS SENTENCED TO PRISON (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “China House Church Leaders Sentenced,” AP, Nov. 25, 2009: “A court in northern China has sentenced five leaders of an unauthorized Protestant church to prison terms of up to seven years on charges including illegal assembly, rights groups reported Thursday. The sentences are among the harshest in recent years for members of so-called ‘house churches’--congregations that refuse to register and accept the authority of the government’s Religious Affairs Bureau. Arrests stemmed from a Sept. 13 raid by police and hired security guards on sunrise services held in a dormitory building by the 50,000-member Linfen Fushan Church in Linfen, northern Shanxi province, rights groups and the advocacy Web site Boxun.com reported. Those sentenced late Wednesday by the Linfen Intermediate Court included the church's pastor Wang Xiaoguang and his wife Yang Rongli, who both received the maximum sentence. Yang was apparently targeted for her efforts to petition local authorities on Wang’s behalf, Boxun said. Others were given sentences of between three and four-and-a-half-years, it said. ... Officially, China’s communist government requires all Protestants to worship in the non-denominational Three-Self Patriotic Movement.”
MUSLIMS CONTINUE ON THE WARPATH AGAINST CHRISTIANS (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following reports are excerpted from recent editions of Worthy News. In Somalia, Pastor Ali Hussein Weheliye was shot to death by Islamic militants on October 10 (“Islamic Militants Kill Somali Church Leader,” Nov. 16, 2009). Weheliye converted to Christ in 1999. His wife and daughter are in hiding in fear for their lives. The attack came after the al-Qaida-linked group al-Shabab declared Somalia “an Islamic state” and vowed to eradicate Christians and impose Sharia law. In Egypt, a large mob of angry Muslims burned shops owned by Coptic Christians (“Egypt Muslims Burn Christian Shops,” Nov. 21, 2009). Leaflets entitled “These Have to Die” have urged Muslims to “burn, vandalize and clean the country of these evil immoral infidels.” In Pakistan, a shop was bombed for selling video CDs of the Jesus film (“Pakistan Militants Bomb CD Shop,” Nov. 23, 2009). The shop owner was critically wounded. A letter delivered to the shopkeeper by a child said, “Allah is the greatest” and “Death to the U.S., Christians and all the Jews in the world.”
MAN MISDIAGNOSED AS BRAIN DEAD FOR 23 YEARS (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Rom Houben can communicate via a computer today, but for 23 years he was misdiagnosed as brain dead (a “persistent vegetative state”) following a car crash. The paralyzed man recently told the media of the horror of being considered brain dead when he was conscious the whole time. He says, “I screamed, but there was nothing to hear” (Daily Mail, Nov. 23, 2009). He says, “I felt alone, lonely, frustrated,” and, “I dreamed myself away.” After using a range of coma tests following the 1983 crash, the doctors concluded that Houben’s consciousness was “extinct.” It was not until three years ago that new hi-tech scans showed that his brain was still functioning normally. Since then he has learned to communicate via a computer. Dr. Steven Laurey, the neurological expert who re-evaluated Houben, claims that patients classed as in a vegetative state are often misdiagnosed. A recent study found that 40 percent of patients so diagnosed are in fact minimally conscious (“Comatose for 23 Years, Belgian Feels Reborn,” AP, Nov. 25, 2009). Dr. Joseph Fins of the Weill Cornell Medical College, who says that many people recover over time, warns, “It’s very easy for the label that is affixed at one point to sort of become eternalized, and so no one questions the diagnosis.” Yet courts often allow life support to be removed on the basis of the same type of “evidence” that turned out to be wrong in Houben’s case.
LIBERAL COURTS ON THE RAMPAGE AGAINST THE FIRST AMENDMENT (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Judges and court officials brainwashed on secular humanism continue their rampage against the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. In August an official of a New Hampshire court ordered a 10-year-old girl to be placed in public school rather than continue her homeschool education (“Hearing for Homeschooler Forced into Gov’t System,” WorldNetDaily, Nov. 24, 2009). The court determined that the girl, identified in court documents as Amanda, needed to be subjected to other points of view because she was too dogmatic about her Christian faith and too vigorous in its defense. The decision by “Marital Master” Michael Garner was approved by Judge Lucinda Sadler. The case is being appealed by attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund and the New Hampshire Supreme Court has recently agreed to hear it. Amanda’s parents divorced in 1999 when she was an infant, and her mother has homeschooled her since first grade. She also attends supplemental public school classes. Even though the girl was found to be “sociable, academically promising, and intellectually at or superior to grade level,” the biased state officials fear that she is being corrupted by her mother’s Christian faith. One family court official pompously told Amanda’s mother, “If I want her in public school, she’ll be in public school.”
LUTHERANS SPLITTING FROM LIBERAL DENOMINATION (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The liberal Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is splitting over the issue of the ordination of homosexuals. On November 18 a group of Lutherans called CORE (Coalition for Renewal) voted to form a new Lutheran denomination in response to the decision this summer by the ELCA to allow “openly practicing homosexuals” to serve as pastors (“Lutherans Splitting,” Baptist Press, Nov. 25, 2009). It is not yet certain how many churches will join the new group, as it takes a two-thirds vote for a congregation to leave the ELCA. Some 1,200 supporters of CORE met in late September to show their support for the split.
THE DESIGNER LUST CHURCH (Friday Church News Notes, December 4, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is an excerpt from an article by Pastor Terry Coomer, For the Love of the Family Ministries, P.O. Box 535, Elwood, IN 46036, 765-552-1973, tlcoomer@juno.com, http://www.churchpages.org/fortheloveofthefamily -- “One of the great enemies of the Christian family today is the ‘Designer Lust Church.’ It is a by-product of this apostate hour in which we live. Galatians 5:16, ‘This I say then, Walk in the Spirit and ye shall not fulfill the LUSTS of the flesh.’ We now have people desiring to find out what people want in a church and that is what they give them. Why? So they can do exactly the opposite of what the Scripture tells us and they can have ‘The Designer Lust Church.’ They will design the music, the activities, and the church service to appeal to the flesh rather than teaching and instructing what the Bible commands. It is a lot easier to entertain people and make them feel good than to teach them the truth. ‘The Designer Lust Church’ will let you hear what you want to hear and how you want to hear it. It is the mark of an apostate age that is destroying our families, lives, churches, and homes. It has taken the country by storm. This ‘Designer Lust Church’ will culminate in the one-world apostate church. What we see now is the forerunner of this church. I need to be in a church that truly desires to help me build the intimate, personal, passionate relationship with the Savior that enables me to have real spiritual power in my life. That is the power that will really affect my wife and my children for Christ.”
CONCLUSION: The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this obviously does not imply an endorsement. We trust that our readers will not be discouraged. 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. The News Notes remind us that the hour is very late, and we need to be ready for the Lord’s coming. Are you sure that you are born again? Are you living for Christ? “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). This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list. To SUBSCRIBE, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/wayoflife/subscribe.html. TO UNSUBSCRIBE OR CHANGE ADDRESSES, go to the very bottom of any email received from us and click "Manage My Subscription." Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org.