PDF VERSION

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.

CANADA PASTOR CLEARED OF “HATE CRIME” AFTER SEVEN YEARS OF HARASSMENT (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - After seven years of harassment by the Human Rights Commission of Alberta, youth pastor Stephen Boissoin has been cleared of hate crimes against homosexuals by a civil judge (“Canadian Pastor Cleared,” Christian.org.uk, Dec. 8, 2009). As we first reported in Friday Church News Notes in September 2005, Boissoin was called before the Human Rights Commission for writing about the immorality and dangers of homosexuality. This appeared in a letter to the editor that was published in the Red Deer Advocate on June 17, 2002. Boissoin rightly lamented that “children as young as five and six years of age are being subjected to psychologically and physiologically damaging pro-homosexual literature and guidance in the public school system; all under the fraudulent guise of equal rights.” A civil rights complaint was filed by homosexual activist Darren Lund, an assistant professor at the University of Calgary. Though threatened with a large fine, Boissoin said that he would not pay it nor would he apologize for what he wrote, even if he had to go to prison. He has stood by his convictions through the ordeal. In 2008, the Alberta Human Rights Tribunal found Boissoin guilty of hate crimes. It banned him from expressing his views on homosexuality “in newspapers, by e-mail, on the radio, in public speeches, or on the Internet,” ordered him to pay $7,000 for “damages for pain and suffering,” and demanded that he apologize to Lund. We are pleased that Justice Earl Wilson has overturned this totalitarian-style ruling, having determined that Boissoin’s letter does not constitute a hate crime. He also said that Lori Andreachuk, the civil rights lawyer that issued the ruling under the auspices of the Human Rights Tribunal, made many errors in her decision and had no power to impose a speech ban on Mr. Boissoin.

JOHN PAUL II CLOSER TO SAINTHOOD (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Pope Benedict XVI has moved his predecessor, John Paul II, closer to sainthood or beatification by signing a decree on his “virtue” (AP, Dec. 19, 2009). The only remaining step is for the Vatican to certify a miracle attributed to his intercession. John Paul II has been on the fast-track for sainthood since soon after his death, when Benedict waived the five-year waiting period for the investigation to begin. Even during his funeral in 2005, there were cries of “Santo Subito (Sainthood Immediately)! A French nun has claimed that she was cured of Parkinson’s disease after praying to the dead pope, and it has been reported that John Paul II could be beatified as early as October 2010 if doctors, bishops, and cardinals sign off on this alleged miracle. Rome’s doctrine of sainthood is one of the countless evidences that it is a false “church.” The term “saint” is used 62 times in the New Testament, and nowhere does it refer to a dead person that has been exalted by the Vatican. A New Testament saint is a believer in Jesus Christ. It describes one who has been set apart into God’s family by the blood of Christ. The Christians at Jerusalem, Rome, Corinth, Achaia, Ephesus, Philippi, and Colosse were called saints (Rom. 15:25-26; 16:15; 1 Cor. 1:2; 2 Cor. 1:1; Eph. 1:1; Phil. 1:1; Col. 1:2). When Jesus returns from heaven, he will come with ten thousands of saints, and that is far more saints than even Rome has created (Jude 14)!

UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY REMOVES REFERENCE TO HOMOSEXUALS IN CIVIL RIGHTS TREATY (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - On December 18, the United Nations General Assembly voted to delete language from a proposed addition to an international treaty on civil rights that would have made specific reference to homosexuals. The addition was Comment 20 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). The existing covenant requires that the signatory nations “undertake to guarantee that the rights enunciated in the present Covenant will be exercised without discrimination of any kind as to race, color, sex, language, religion ... or other status.” The proposed addition would have specifically mentioned “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” and would have required the passing of legislation to ensure that these groups are not discriminated against (LifeSiteNews, Dec. 21, 2009). The language was rejected due to efforts by organizations such as the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. The United Nations is a very dangerous institution that is committed to a “new world order” that has no place for the free exercise of the New Testament Christian faith.

CHINA CRUSHES LARGE HOUSE CHURCHES (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Fast-Growing Christian Churches Crushed,” Fox News, Dec. 10, 2009: “Towering eight stories over wheat fields, the Golden Lamp Church [of Linfen] was built to serve nearly 50,000 worshippers in the gritty heart of China's coal country. But that was before September when hundreds of police and hired thugs descended on the mega-church, smashing doors and windows, seizing Bibles and sending dozens of worshippers to hospitals with serious injuries, members and activists say. Today, the church’s co-pastors are in jail. The gates to the church complex in the northern province of Shanxi are locked and a police armored personnel vehicle sits outside. The closure of what may be China’s first mega-church is the most visible sign that the communist government is determined to rein in the rapid spread of Christianity, with a crackdown in recent months that church leaders call the harshest in years. ... House churches have been around for decades, but their growth has accelerated in recent decades, producing larger and larger congregations that are far more conspicuous than the small groups of friends and neighbors that used to worship in private homes, giving the movement its name. Their expansion and growing influence has deeply unsettled China’s rulers, always suspicious of any independent social group that could challenge communist authority. ... At least two other large churches have recently faced similar crackdowns. In Beijing in October, authorities locked parishioners of Shouwang house church out of the space they had rented to worship in. In Shanghai, the Wangbang congregation faced a similar lockout. Both congregations had grown to more than 1,000 members.”

LUTHERAN LEADER SAYS BIBLE NOT SOLE AUTHORITY (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Mark Hanson, president bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, said on December 6 that the Bible is not the final word on homosexuality. In a meeting in Chicago he said, “The understanding we have of homosexuality today does not seem to be reflected at all in the context of the biblical writers,” but he thinks that is O.K. because “God is still speaking to us” (Lighthouse Trails Research, Dec. 7, 2009). Thus, according to this Lutheran leader, the Bible is clearly not the sole authority for faith and practice. So much for Martin Luther’s sola scriptura.

FICTIONALIZED BUNYAN (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is by Brian Snider: “The Internet is a good way to share news and information that is not filtered by the mainstream media; however, we often find that Christians can be very gullible in circulating chain emails that are filled with errors. Of all people, Christians ought to make sure that they are dealing in things that are honest and true. There are several websites around that exist for the sole purpose of debunking things that are known to be false. Before we circulate something, we ought to make a reasonable effort to see that it is true. We recently received a supposed transcript of the trial of John Bunyan. No doubt, the author thought he was ‘helping the cause’ by embellishing the transcript to make Bunyan even more of a hero than he already is for many people, but the author makes up whole passages of conversation that, to the best of our research, never took place. This falsified document has found its way onto many websites throughout the Internet. That brief piece of writing could actually replace the truth about Bunyan’s trial and imprisonment, as most people will simply accept what is written there without delving deeper to see if it is true or not. ‘Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things’ (Phil. 4:8).”

ERIC LIDDELL’S GODLY EXAMPLE (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - In an age when sports has become a religion, we would do well to consider the godly example of Eric Liddell. The son of Scottish missionaries to China, Liddell became Scotland’s fastest runner. In 1923 he won the 100 meter race at the AAA Championship with 9.7 seconds, a record that stood for 35 years. A committed Christian, Liddell spoke at gospel meetings for the Glasgow Students Evangelical Union during his college years. He qualified for the British track and field team at the 1924 Olympics in Paris, but because the 100 meter race was held on Sunday he refused to participate, even though this was his best distance. It has been said that “most athletes come to the games desiring to be great and do great, Eric Liddle came to the Paris Olympics desiring to be good, and to do good.” In spite of personal pleas from the royal family and criticism in the British press for letting down his country, he stood by his decision and spent that Sunday preaching in a Protestant church in Paris. He entered the 400 meter race, and as he headed to the starting block, a man handed him a piece of paper with a quotation from 1 Samuel 2:30, “... them that honour me I will honour.” He ran with that piece of paper in his hand and won, breaking the world record with a time of 47.6 seconds. In 1925, Liddell returned to China to preach the gospel. In 1943, he was incarcerated in a Japanese prison camp where he died two years later. Liddell said, “We are all missionaries. Wherever we go, we either bring people nearer to Christ, or we repel them from Christ.”

PRECISE BLOOD (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from Creation Moments, http://www.creationmoments.com/radio/transcript.php?t=2446: “While most would agree that our circulatory system is vital to life, many of us don’t fully appreciate the almost miraculous workings of that system. Your heart pumps about one-hundred thousand times every day. That means that your heart pumps the equivalent of 10 tons of blood every day or 80 million gallons in a lifetime. Your circulatory system brings that blood to every cell in your body through a capillary network that is so large that the combined capillaries of only four people, stretched end to end, would reach from the Earth to the moon! But your circulatory system involves quality as well as quantity. The chemistry of your blood is monitored and adjusted to within incredibly fine limits to keep it in precise balance second by second, day by day, year in, year out. For example, the acidity of your blood is adjusted constantly to within one part in a hundred million. Our circulation system cannot be simply ‘good enough’; it has to work perfectly. So if mindless evolution created us, it had to make the whole system perfect the first time. There is no room for millions of years or for a poorer circulation system to be improved by mutations. Here, the facts clearly support Scripture, strongly indicating that we were created in finished form--not developed slowly by trial and error.”

DISCIPLINE OR DISORDERS? (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Training Your Children to Turn out Right, an excellent book by David Sorenson (Northstar Ministries, 1820 W. Morgan St., Duluth, MN 55811, 218-726-0209, www.northstarministries.com, dhs.northstar@charter.net) -- “I make no pretense of being a psychologist. However, I am convinced that much of what is diagnosed by modern child psychologists is just a figment of their professional imagination. It seems that decade by decade and almost year by year new ‘psychological’ disorders are ‘discovered’ in children. ... I am convinced that some of these ‘disorders’ are things that psychologists have invented to describe children who are just lacking in self-discipline. ... My wife, particularly, has worked with children for over 27 years and in my estimation is a master in working with them. ... In later years as the nature of our ministry changed, Pam has continued to work with children. Though the group size she has worked with in more recent years is smaller, parents still come to her and tell her that ‘Johnny’ is hyperactive, or ‘Susie’ has an attention deficit disorder, or little ‘Billy’ is learning disabled. Our experience usually has been that these children have had very little encouragement in self-discipline. ... I have watched Pam work with children who are ‘hyperactive.’ The psychologist’s solution to the problem was to prescribe behavior modification drugs to essentially sedate the children. Their parents would come to Pam and warn her that little Susie had this disorder and that they could not do anything with her. ... Pam would work with these children in junior church or in some other children’s program and would let little Susie know in no uncertain terms that her word was law, and that she was going to obey, period. There was kindness, a positive incentive to cooperate, and a fun atmosphere about the program, but above all she demanded and taught behavioral discipline. And she got it. I have watched many of these children over the years. Even though they were a terror at home and diagnosed as hyperactive at school, they would sit up straight, pay attention, behave, and learn the lesson or story in junior church. ... Pam teaches discipline and she demands it. Yet the children love her. And the Sunday School bus kids, who for the most part come of their own volition, come back week after week” (Training Your Children to Turn Out Right, 1995, pp. 38, 39).

THE COMING RAPTURE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT SAINTS (Friday Church News Notes, December 25, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - “For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:15-18).

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.

PDF VERSION

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.

ORAL ROBERTS DIES, PROVING THAT HIS TEACHING WAS FALSE (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Famous Pentecostal “healing evangelist” Oral Roberts died of pneumonia on December 15 at age 91. This act proved that his teaching was false, as he often said that it is God’s will to heal every sickness. For example, the September 1976 issue of Abundant Life magazine contained an article entitled, “Why I Know that God Wants to Heal You.” Roberts wrote, “Sickness is part of the curse and Jesus came to destroy the curse. He suffered in our stead because he did not want us to suffer disease. He took our specific diseases and infirmities upon his own sinless, perfect body in complete payment for the penalty of sin,” and, “Sickness is not part of God’s plan and not devised by God’s will.” Roberts even suggested that preachers who pray for God to heal, “If it be thy will,” should be sued for “theological malpractice.” When he breathed his last, Roberts demonstrated with great finality that he was a false teacher. No one dies of healthiness!

GLOBAL WARMING GESTAPO: KILL A BABY AND SAVE THE EARTH (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - At the U.N. climate conference in Copenhagen this week, the vice minister of China’s Family Planning Commission said her communist state’s “one-child” policy is helping save the world from “global warming” and should be a model for other nations to follow. Proclaiming the policy “a great success,” Zhao Baige said it has prevented 400 million births and thus saves “1.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide “pollution” per year (“Chinese Minister Links ‘One-Child Policy’ to Emissions Reduction,” CNSNews, Dec. 11, 2009). She knows, of course, that the “one-child” policy has resulted in forced abortions and infanticide, but that does not faze a devoted Darwinist earth worshipper. In 2007, the Sierra Club called for stronger support for “family planning” in order to save the earth. This summer, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton agreed that population control should be linked with environmental concerns. This week, Canada’s Financial Post called for a global law patterned after “China’s one-child policy” as “the only way to reverse the disastrous global birthrate,” calling China “the world’s leader in terms of fashioning policy to combat environmental degradation.” Sure, China has such a glorious environmental policy that you need a gas mask in Beijing to breathe the filthy air.

NEW STUDY CONCLUDES THAT NATURAL SELECTION “MAY NOT BE NOT THE CAUSE OF SPECIATION” (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - A new computerized study of thousands of plants and animals “suggest new species may arise from rare events instead of through an accumulation of small changes made in response to changes in the environment” (“Evolution may take giant leaps,” Physorg.com, Dec. 11, 2009). The study was conducted by Mark Pagel and other scientists at the University of Reading. Though it was based on Darwinist assumptions, it didn’t support Darwin’s processes. Charles Darwin claimed that species come into being through a gradual process of natural selection or “survival of the fittest,” but neither he nor any of his followers have ever given evidence of this. Darwin’s 1859 book was titled “On the Origin of the Species,” but he gave no evidence for such a thing. The only evidence he gave was for adaptation and minor changes within “kinds.” Since then, Darwinists have been probing, digging, dissecting, gazing, computerizing, and guessing, in the attempt to provide proof for Darwin’s “theory,” but it has been in vain. To this day there is not one speck of indisputable proof. Pagel said that “the model that provided the best fit for the data is surprisingly incompatible with the idea that speciation is a result of many small small events.” That is only surprising to a Darwinist.

THE UNITED NATIONS’ EARTH WORSHIPING SERVICE (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The United Nations has an earth-worshiping program entitled “The United Nations Environmental Sabbath Service.” First published in 1990, it is a call to prayer to an unknown entity for the salvation of the earth. It describes this entity only as “the energy that moves all things.” It is a call for all people “to join with the earth and with each other” for “the healing of the earth and the renewal of all life.” It urges the earth’s inhabitants to chant, “We live in all things; all things live in us. We live by the sun; we move with the stars.” This is the pagan pantheism that lies at the heart of the United Nations New Age objectives.

PARLIAMENT OF WORLD RELIGIONS MEETS IN MELBOURNE (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - More than 6,000 attended the fifth Parliament of World’s Religions in Melbourne, Australia, December 3-9, to proclaim interfaith unity, world peace, and the sacredness and fragility of the earth. More than 220 “faith traditions” were present to celebrate the theme of “Making a World of Difference: Hearing Each Other, Healing Each Other.” There were Hindus, Buddhists, Shintos, Muslims, Zoroastrians, Wiccans, Scientologists, Sikhs, Australian Aborigines, North American nature worshipers, Jains, Atheists, Baha’is, Roman Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, even a Baptist named Jimmy Carter. The keynote address was delivered by Hindu “holy man” Ravi Shankar, who said that God “is in the heart of each and every one of us” and that the interfaith movement is “a necessity for the very survival of our planet.” A British child rights activist called for a ban on child spanking, claiming that it infringes children’s rights and dignity. A former British high court judge explained to the Parliament how to read the Bible in a way that justifies homosexuality. The first Parliament of World Religions in 1893 in Chicago was the first formal gathering of Christianity and Eastern religions. Hindu swami Vivekananda was given a three-minute standing ovation when he got up to speak and addressed his audience as “brothers and sisters.” He said that “the different paths which men take ... crooked or straight, all lead” to God. On the other hand, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).

THE METROPOLITAN COMMUNITY CHURCH’S DELUSION (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches consists of 300 congregations in 22 countries and boasts a membership of 43,000. It was founded by a homosexual man named Troy Perry and about 80% of the membership is composed of “GLBT,” meaning gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender. They call their religion “Queer Spirituality” and claim that God made homosexuals as they are. They say, “It is time we listen to the experiences of God’s gay and lesbian children who know with all their hearts that God has created them just as they are” (Mona West, “The Bible and Homosexuality”). The history of the Metropolitan Community Church is a frightful study in spiritual delusion. In his autobiography, “The Lord Is My Shepherd and He Knows I Am Gay,” Troy Perry says that he tried to commit suicide in 1968 when his male “lover” left him. After that he was befriended by a black female preacher named Vera who told him that God had His hand on Him. She said, “You’re a minister; you always have been, and it won’t be long before you will be pastoring a church.” He was convinced that this message was from God because Vera told him things about his life that no one knew. He says, “She started to tell me many things about myself--she told me more than anyone could possibly have known about me. It really rocked me, and I knew that his was no ordinary woman. She had powers of insight that must have come from God.” Instead of repenting of his sin and putting his faith in Christ’s atonement, Perry said that he began to “feel God’s presence.” He decided that “God was the force of good, of energy, of creative positive happenings.” When Perry asked this God if he wanted him to start a church, he “heard a still small voice within say, ‘Now!’” In October 1968, he held the first “gay service” in his living room with 12 people in attendance. Perry’s first sermon was entitled “Be True to You,” from a line in Shakespeare’s play Hamlet, “This above all: To thine own self be true.” Had Perry believed the Bible, he would have known that the devil knows secrets of people’s lives and the fact that Vera knew such things was no proof that she was of God. Further, any “still small voice” must be tested with Scripture, and again, it could not have been of God since it advised Perry to do something forbidden by God. The Bible says that all men are sinners, that God loves them and Jesus died them, but God also calls all men to repent and to turn to His holy paths. Any sinner should be welcome to attend church to hear God’s Word, but only those who repent are allowed to join. Some of the members of the church at Corinth were former homosexuals, but they had been converted and changed (1 Corinthians 1:9-11).

ECUMENISTS AND EMERGING CHURCHERS WARNING ABOUT “DANGEROUS” PRE-TRIBULATIONISTS (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Evangelicals and Catholics Together and the Rejection of End-Time Christians” by Roger Oakland, Light House Trails, Dec. 7, 2009: “If you haven’t already noticed, anti-Christian sentiment is growing toward those who believe in a biblical last days/Book of Revelation scenario prior to Christ’s return. A 2005 article titled ‘Lutheran leader calls for an ecumenical council to address growing biblical fundamentalism’ should help convince you. The article shows not only this growing resentment towards Bible-believing Christians but also the interspiritual path this change in attitude is taking: ‘The leader of the nation’s largest Lutheran has called for a global Christian council to address an “identity crisis” on how churches interpret and understand the Bible. Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America … called for Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran churches to come together to combat a fundamentalist-millenialist-apocalypticist reading of Scripture’ [Religious News Service, Aug. 11, 2005]. Hanson’s request for a group to monitor and expose anti-ecumenists who take the Bible literally carries some weight! His message contains other statements showing his concern about Bible literalists--particularly those who take Bible prophecy seriously and see Israel and the Middle East crisis as an end-times sign post. ... Bishop Hanson believes that a global ecumenical group made up of Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans, and Lutherans is the answer to the crisis he sees. Hanson calls this effort a ‘ministry of reconciliation,’ that will ‘result of Christ breaking down the dividing walls,’ and ‘reconcil[ing] the whole creation to God’s self’ [‘The Church: Called to a Ministry of Reconciliation,’ Lutheran World, Sept. 2005]. Hanson says that those who believe in a biblical end times and a literal Bible interpretation are counterproductive to and holding back the cause of Christ, which he suggests is to unite all of creation and produce a planetary utopia. ... Reverend Munib Younan, bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jerusalem, believes that those who adhere to an apocalyptic end-time scenario (with a focus on Israel) are spreading ‘heresy.’ ... He has requested that Lutherans ‘alert all Christians everywhere to its dangers and false teachings’ [‘Christian Zionism Is Heresy,’ The Lutheran, March 2003]. ... Tony Campolo says Christians that focus on end-time scenarios have been the cause of ‘extremely detrimental’ consequences. ... Brian McLaren also says that such Christians are really going to hurt our world. He writes, ‘An eschatology of abandonment, which is how I would characterize certain streams of the left-behind approach, has disastrous social consequences. … Any project geared toward improving the world long term is seen as unfaithful, since we’re supposed to assume that the world is getting worse and worse’ [Interview by Planet Preterist with Brian McLaren, Jan. 30, 2006] ... In essence, McLaren is saying if you believe the Book of Revelation and Matthew 24 are yet to take place, you are a dangerous psychological misfit and are assumed to have no compassion for the suffering, no concerns for the environment or the world in which we live, and have the potential to blow up the world with ‘weapons of mass destruction.’”

HOW CAN CHURCH MEMBERS KEEP A RIGHT RELATIONSHIP WITH THEIR PASTORS? (Friday Church News Notes, December 18, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Know them (1 Th. 5:12). The church member should go to the effort to know and understand his leaders. Honor them (1 Th. 5:13). Love them (1 Th. 5:13). Obey them (Heb. 13:17). Support them (1 Tim. 5:17-18). Bring an accusation against them only with witnesses (1 Tim. 5:19). Pray for them (Eph. 6:18-19).

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.

PDF VERSION

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.

BEWARE OF SCIENCE FICTION (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Science fiction takes the reader into a strange world without God. Oh, there might be “a god,” a “force,” but it is definitely not the God of the Bible, and the prominent names in this field are atheists. Take CARL SAGAN, for example. His best-selling sci-fi novel Contact was made into a movie. Sagan was one of the high priests of atheistic evolution. In his novel he has the main character debating two preachers and saying, “There is no compelling evidence that God exists.” In 1997 Sagan said, “I share the view of a hero of mine, Albert Einstein: ‘I cannot conceive of a god who rewards and punishes his creatures or has a will of the kind that we experience in ourselves. Neither can I--nor would I want to--conceive of an individual that survives his physical death. Let feeble souls, from fear or absurd egotism, cherish such thoughts’” (Parade, March 10, 1997). Consider another prominent name in Sci-Fi, ISAAC ASIMOV. In a 1982 interview he said, “Emotionally, I am an atheist. I don’t have the evidence to prove that God doesn’t exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn’t that I don’t want to waste my time” (Paul Kurtz, “An Interview with Isaac Asimov on Science and the Bible,” Free Inquiry, Spring 1982, p. 9). Consider ROBERT HEINLEIN, called “the dean of science fiction writers.” He rejected the Bible and promoted “free sex.” His book “Stranger in a Strange Land” is considered “the unofficial bible of the hippie movement.” Heinlein was a nudist and practiced “polyandry.” He promoted agnosticism in his sci-fi books. Consider ARTHUR CLARKE, author of many sci-fi works, including 2001: A Space Odyssey. Clarke, who was probably a homosexual, promoted evolutionary pantheism. He told a Sri Lankan newspaper, “I don’t believe in God or an afterlife” (“Life Beyond 2001: Exclusive Interview with Arthur C. Clarke,” The Island, Dec. 20, 2000). In the instructions he left for his funeral in March 2008 he said, “Absolutely no religious rites of any kind, relating to any religious faith, should be associated with my funeral.” Consider KURT VONNEGUT. He was an atheist, and as an honorary president of the American Humanist Association he subscribed to its code which “does not accept supernatural views of reality.” Consider GENE RODDENBERRY, creator of Star Trek. He was an agnostic and humanist who envisioned a world in which “everyone is an atheist and better for it” (Brannon Braga, “Every Religion Has a Mythology,” International Atheist Conference, June 24, 2006). Science fiction is intimately associated with Darwinian evolution. Sagan and Asimov, for example, were prominent evolutionary scientists. Sci-fi arose in the late 19th and early 20th century as a product of an evolutionary worldview that denies the Almighty Creator. In fact, evolution IS the pre-eminent science fiction. Beware!

EPISCOPALIANS ELECT LESBIAN “BISHOP” (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - On December 5, the Los Angeles diocese of the Episcopal Church in America voted to elect a lesbian as bishop. The appointment of Mary Glasspool, who lives with her female “partner” of 19 years, must be confirmed by a majority of the denomination’s 108 dioceses. The archbishop of Canterbury pathetically stated that the election “raises very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion, but for the Communion as a whole” (“Los Angeles Episcopalians Elect Lesbian,” CNN, Dec. 6, 2009). The homosexual issue is tearing the Episcopal Church apart, with many congregations leaving.

PAUL MCCARTNEY CLAIMS TO BE IN TOUCH WITH DEAD BEATLES (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Paul McCartney, one of the two surviving Beatles, told the media recently that when he plays Beatles songs he is in contact with his departed band mates again. “If I’m doing the song ‘Something,’ I’m thinking of George. It’s great. I really like it. In a way I’m revisiting them. In a way, you’re kind of in contact with them again. ... I still think I’m in the Beatles” (“Paul McCartney Says He’s in Touch with Dead Beatles,” IrishCentral.com, Dec. 4, 2009). It appears that McCartney is not claiming to be in touch with the dead Beatles in a spiritualistic way but in a mystical way. Rock music is a major part of the end-time mysticism that has permeated modern society. It’s about shutting down the critical apparatus of the mind and allowing one’s emotions to lead and rule. It is being “hooked on a feeling.” Atheists like Richard Dawkins and John Lennon criticize Bible believers for exercising “blind faith,” but in reality it is their “faith” that is utterly blind. Biblical faith is based upon many infallible proofs (Acts 1:3), such as the Bible’s prophecies and Christ’s resurrection. It is not called “faith” because it is blind, but because it believes in things that are presently unseen. It “is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1).

FORMER DUTCH HEALTH MINISTER ADMITS ERROR OF LEGALIZING EUTHANASIA (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from LifeSiteNews.com, Dec. 2, 2009: “The former Dutch minister who successfully promoted the legalization of euthanasia has now admitted that the government's move was a mistake, and says that they should have first focused on palliative care. Els Borst, who served as Health Minister for the Netherlands from 1994 to 2002, proposed the country’s infamous euthanasia bill. When it passed in 2001, the Netherlands became the first country in the world to legalize euthanasia. In 2008 alone, Dutch doctors reported 2,331 cases of euthanasia and assisted suicide. ... Borst’s regret over the situation in the Netherlands is particularly important given that that country has served as a model for euthanasia advocates in other countries. ... [Alex] Schadenberg [of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition] went on to point out the ‘slippery slope’ occurring in the Netherlands, which the country’s politicians deny, he says, through ‘a systematic cover-up.’ He asked, ‘How can you say there is no slippery slope in the Netherlands--knowing that you now allow euthanasia for newborns, and you went from originally just the terminally ill, [and] now it’s also for those who are mentally ill?’”

AL-QAIDA KILLS MANY TIMES MORE MUSLIMS THAN NON-MUSLIMS (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Surprising Study on Terrorism,” Spiegel Online, Dec. 3, 2009: “[A] new study by the Combating Terrorism Center in the US has shown that an overwhelming majority of al-Qaida victims are, in fact, co-religionists. In the battle against unbelievers, can one also kill Muslims? Even the terror network al-Qaida is troubled by this question. ... Between 2004 and 2008, for example, al-Qaida claimed responsibility for 313 attacks, resulting in the deaths of 3,010 people. And even though these attacks include terrorist incidents in the West--in Madrid in 2004 and in London in 2005--only 12 percent of those killed (371 deaths) were Westerners. ... Perhaps more significantly, if one only examines attacks in 2007 and disregards those having been perpetrated in Iraq and Afghanistan, the share of non-Westerners killed by al-Qaida rises to 99 percent. In 2008, it was 96 percent.”

PRAGMATISM AMONG CHARISMATICS AND INDEPENDENT BAPTISTS (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - An anonymous writer in Australia has been critiquing Hillsong Church, the largest church in the country, in a series of blogs. In the latest one he says, “Nothing frustrates a church-building pastor more than conflict of purpose or multiple agenda amongst their church members. Where there is divergence of opinion, or lengthy debate over a proposed course of action, pro-active pastors get understandably impatient. ... Pursuit of the vision is top priority, and so all other concerns are subordinated to the common drive to ‘build the church.’ ... This seems reasonable; after all, why get caught up with minor issues and neglect the bigger picture? But this reasoning sets up a false choice. Why is it assumed that we must decide between either the big picture, or minor issues? ... if we agree that there are at least ‘lesser concerns,’ why must these be ignored in favour of the bigger picture? ... Let us consider a hypothetical situation. Imagine an active church member who faithfully serves each weekend; someone who might be described as ‘committed to the house.’ After several weekends of questionable doctrine being preached, he decides to approach a pastor, to whom he outlines his concern: why does Brian [Houston, Hillsong’s senior pastor] teach one thing, when the Bible teaches quite the opposite? ... the pastor makes it clear that Brian’s preaching is building the church, and that the man’s ‘theologizing’ only serves to distract from the bigger picture. Perhaps, the pastor suggests, the man should decide whether he is ‘committed to the house,’ or should consider a different church. ... This is how the ‘unquestioning’ element of Hillsong’s culture is perpetuated. From a church-growth perspective, it’s very effective. People who disagree don’t last long enough to have their concerns properly heard and acted upon” (http://tttdiscussionforum.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default). COMMENT BY BROTHER CLOUD: This same philosophy is rampant among independent Baptists. I saw it at Highland Park Baptist Church and Tennessee Temple in the 1970s, and it characterized Jack Hyles’ ministry. This is why the students at Hyles-Anderson and other places cannot criticize “the man of God” or the institution. (While I don’t believe in a critical spirit, I do believe in proving all things by God’s Word and I do not believe that any man or church is beyond this.) Nothing must get in the way of the “program” of building the church and winning souls. This is why so many IB pastors consider my ministry “divisive.” In their minds it gets in the way of the things are “truly important.” If they loved the whole Word of God, they would delight in the preaching of the whole Word of God, let the chips fall where they will (Psalm 119:128), but they are pragmatists. Paul taught Timothy to respect even the spots of doctrine and practice commanded in the Bible (1 Timothy 6:13-14).

TIMES CHOOSES INTELLIGENT DESIGN BOOK OVER PRO-DARWIN WORKS (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Pro-Intelligent Design Books Makes Times Literary Supplement’s Books of the Year,” Evolution News, Nov. 30, 2009: “Although this year has been widely touted as the ‘Year of Darwin’ because of its big Darwin-related anniversaries, the book reviewers at the Times Literary Supplement (TLS) in London seem less than enthralled with the year’s crop of pro-Darwin retreads from the publishing industry. Indeed, the TLS’s ‘Books of the Year’ issue just released last Friday fails to include any of the year’s big pro-Darwin tomes such as Jerry Coyne’s Why Evolution Is True or even Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on Earth among its ‘Books of the Year.’ Instead, the only book so honored that focuses on the Darwin-ID debate is Stephen Meyer’s Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design, which was selected by noted atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel. If I were a Darwinist, I’d be more than a bit concerned. Even many of those sympathetic to Darwinian materialism aren’t expressing much enthusiasm anymore for the tired arguments of the Neo-Darwinists.”

A WARNING ABOUT “HOLISTIC MEDICINE” (Friday Church News Notes, December 11, 2009, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - In response to our reports on homeopathy and other New Age health care practices I received the following testimony: “In your article on homeopathy it is noteworthy that the women were spreading the occult ‘medicine’ while a man warned against it. I have also, unfortunately, seen a significant amount of influence in favor of occultic and quackish ‘holistic’ remedies in some independent Baptist churches, and I have noticed that they are usually promoted by the women while the men who are supposed to protect them (1 Timothy 2:14), though they are not pushing the occultic ‘medicine,’ either do not even know what their women are into or are simply passive about it. I know one fundamental Baptist evangelist who, while he holds meetings, has his wife promote unscientific remedies in special meetings for ladies. They were influential in getting another lady who had a very easily curable form of cancer not to get surgery and chemo but to try ‘alternatives,’ some of which were occultic and none of which had any factual basis, and now cancer has spread through her whole body. Another woman I know promotes worthless supplement products and attacks legitimate medicine by an organization that is fraudulent (the Body Wise Corporation) and whose sole ‘scientist’ and ‘researcher’ is a homeopath who makes money from what the organization sells. This woman has tried to bypass me and influence my wife, something I did not appreciate (and so I contacted the husband of the woman, since he is responsible for her). I can think of numbers of other fundamental Baptist women in families that I know that are leading and passing along occult and quack remedies while men are failing in their responsibility to discern and protect their families. This ought not to be so.” (For more on this see the article “The New Age in Health Care” at the Way of Life web site.)

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.

PDF VERSION HERE

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.