January 29, 2010, Volume 11, Issue 5
29/01/10 09:15
PDF VERSION
AVERAGE AGE OF CHURCH OF ENGLAND ATTENDEES IS 61 (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - According to a new study, the average age of attendees in the Church of England is 61. That’s the average! Lyda Barley, head of research and statistics for the Anglican Church, blamed the situation on general societal trends (“Average age of churchgoer now 61,” The Telegraph, Jan. 22, 2010). The real problem is wretched apostasy. Why should people attend “church” when even the leaders don’t believe their own Scriptures and are confused about the most basic tenets of the Christian faith? When I was in London in 1982, I read an interview by John Mortiner of the Sunday Times with Archbishop of Canterbury Robert Runcie. It was Easter, and the interviewer asked Runcie if he understood why Christ had to suffer. The Archbishop replied, “As to that I am an agnostic.” He did not know why Christ died on the cross! The interviewer asked, “Is God a judge?” Runcie was more dogmatic on that one. He replied, “No.” The interviewer then said, “So you don’t see God as celestial Lord Chief Justice?” Runcie answered, “Not at all. I had an old landlady when we were at Oxford. And when we got into any sort of trouble, she’d say: ‘There’s one above who seeth all’. I can’t think of God like that.” Runcie’s wretched unbelief is typical of the Church of England today. (For evidence see “Fifty Years of Anglican Liberalism” at the Way of Life web site. There is a search engine.)
UNITED NATIONS REPORT REPRODUCES MYTH ABOUT HIMALAYAN GLACIAL MELTING (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “World misled over Himalayan glacier meltdown,” The Times, London, Jan. 17, 2010: “A warning that climate change will melt most of the Himalayan glaciers by 2035 is likely to be retracted after a series of scientific blunders by the United Nations body that issued it. Two years ago the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a benchmark report that was claimed to incorporate the latest and most detailed research into the impact of global warming. A central claim was the world’s glaciers were melting so fast that those in the Himalayas could vanish by 2035. In the past few days the scientists behind the warning have admitted that it was based on a news story in the New Scientist, a popular science journal, published eight years before the IPCC’s 2007 report. It has also emerged that the New Scientist report was itself based on a short telephone interview with Syed Hasnain, a little-known Indian scientist then based at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi. Hasnain has since admitted that the claim was ‘speculation’ and was not supported by any formal research. ... glaciologists find such figures inherently ludicrous, pointing out that most Himalayan glaciers are hundreds of feet thick and could not melt fast enough to vanish by 2035 unless there was a huge global temperature rise. The maximum rate of decline in thickness seen in glaciers at the moment is 2-3 feet a year and most are far lower. Professor Julian Dowdeswell, director of the Scott Polar Research Institute at Cambridge University, said: ‘Even a small glacier such as the Dokriani glacier is up to 120 metres [394ft] thick. A big one would be several hundred metres thick and tens of kilometres long. The average is 300 metres thick so to melt one even at 5 metres a year would take 60 years. That is a lot faster than anything we are seeing now so the idea of losing it all by 2035 is unrealistically high.’” [CONCLUDING NOTE: On January 20, the UN apologized for the misleading data by labeling it “poorly substantiated.” Actually, the data was entirely unsubstantiated, but the global warming Nazis aren’t about to back away from their money-making, power-grabbing myth.]
VISITING EVANGELICALS SILENT ON CHINA’S PERSECUTED HOUSE CHURCHES (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Christian Newswire, January 14, 2010: “The Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD) is dismayed at the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA)'s having ignored religious persecution in China during its recent visit. Instead, it spoke only of cooperation with the government-registered church while disregarding restrictions by the communist regime on unofficial churches. The vast majority of Chinese Christians, conservatively estimated at 80 million in number, worship in unregistered congregations that meet in homes and other settings. In the past week alone, leaders of the Chinese House Church Alliance were detained by the authorities in Hebei province according to China Aid. House churches in both Beijing and Shanghai have also been closed recently by the police. In Shanxi province, authorities demolished the Fushan House Church's building, giving church leaders long prison sentences. In December, a Ugyhur Christian convert from Islam was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for his faith.”
BRITISH METEORIGICAL OFFICE PREDICTED MILD WINTER (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The British Met (formerly called Meteorological) Office’s prediction for a mild winter was grossly wrong. In fact, it has been bitterly cold, with temperatures plunging to as low as -22C in places. A BBC weatherman, Paul Hudson, suggested that the Met Office’s computer simulations might have “developed a warm bias” that caused the wrong forecast. (“Met Office computer accused of ‘warm bias,’” Daily Mail, Jan. 17, 2010). Be that as it may, one thing is certain, and that is that modern scientists cannot predict the weather three months from now, not to speak of three years or three decades. (The Met Office’s prediction of a “barbeque summer” last year was just as wrong as its winter forecast.) The “computer models” that are used to predict long-term global warming are a joke. Man, even with his vaunted modern scientific expertise, simply does not have enough knowledge to make such predictions accurately. Pompous ignorance seasoned with a good measure of outright deception and a heaping dose of greed are the ingredients of the man-made global warming stew.
MUSIC AT TRINITY BAPTIST, JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is by Jeff Royal -- “I visited Trinity Baptist Church in Jacksonville several weeks ago where Pastor Tom Messer is pastor. What concerned me was the music. They opened with a jazzed up version of ‘To God Be the Glory’ and I could not follow the worship leader Jason Cross although I tried. It was sung very fast and choppy and had a whole new chorus inserted in the song that supposedly made it more meaningful. They next led with the celebration choir and worship team in ‘Let the Worshippers Arise’ by the Pentecostal group Philips, Craig, and Dean. They followed that with ‘Lord, I Offer My Life to You’ by Don Moen of Integrity music. In my opinion, Trinity has succumbed to and completely bought into CCM as part of their worship services. Of course, this change has been going on for several years now. They just didn’t decide a few weeks ago to embrace CCM. The people in general are very friendly at Trinity. Something I’m sad to say is lacking at many fundamental IB churches today. Please pray for Pastor Messer and the leadership at Trinity Baptist. In my opinion, they are headed down a dangerous road. While introducing a choir performance, Jason Cross mentioned Lou Giglio in no less than glowing terms. Giglio in my opinion is from the ‘emerging’ church camp and Pastor Messer should know better even if his worship leader doesn’t. I’m reminded of the wise words of the late evangelist Gordon Sears who said, ‘When the standard of music is lowered, then the standard of dress is also lowered. When the standard of dress is lowered, then the standard of conduct is also lowered. When the standard of conduct is lowered, then the sense of value in God’s truth is lowered’ (Songfest newsletter, April 2001).”
THE QUIBBLING OF EVOLUTIONARY SCIENCE (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - To quibble means “to evade the truth or importance of an issue by raising trivial distinctions and objections, to find fault or criticize for petty reasons.” That is exactly how evolutionists typically treat the arguments for creation and intelligent design. For example, when I referred to Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan as “evolutionary scientists” in a report about atheistic evolution’s influence on the field of science fiction, many berated me mercilessly because of my “gross mistake” in applying “evolutionary scientist” to anyone other than a biologist. This is a quibble. Evolution has permeated every field of “science” and the term “evolutionary science” is used today to reflect this fact. A quick search of the Internet will demonstrate this. By using the term “evolutionary scientist” I was simply describing them as scientists committed to Darwinian evolution. That was the only point, and it was accurate. Evolutionists quibble because they cannot prove their theories with scientific facts; they cannot answer the substantive arguments leveled against them. They quibble because they have no truth. The quibble might be some mistake in documentation, some minor error in logic, some outdated figure, some perceived less than ideal use of a term, the failure to cite the very latest research. Typically, evolutionists do not engage the creationist’s major arguments. Every man makes mistakes, of course, but a mistake does not necessarily disprove his arguments. In a topic as complicated, far-reaching, and quickly changing as the evolution-creation-intelligent design debate, mistakes will be made on all sides. When someone purports to give a reply to a man’s substantive arguments but actually ignores the arguments and quibbles about minor things, he is dodging the truth.
738 PROFESSIONS OF FAITH AND 25 BAPTISMS (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted and slightly adapted from The Technique Catastrophe: An Explanation of the Multitudes of False Professions in the Independent Baptist Movement by Bob Creel (865-712-4537): “When numbers become so important to us that they outweigh the truth, it’s time that we admit to a crisis! When we receive missionary reports similar to the one recently sent to the church where I am now attending, it’s time we take stock of our methodology. This missionary brother was rejoicing over the results that he had experienced in his first full year on the mission field. He boasted of 738 professions of faith with 25 following in believer’s baptism. How could you even pen those words without asking yourself if there isn’t something wrong with that picture? I seem to remember 3,000 saved at Pentecost, and 3,000 baptized! The most refreshing missionary that I have heard in a long time gave his update to our church recently. He has been in Poland for 14 years and to date knows of only five people who have been saved under his ministry. Just like at Pentecost, he only counts the ones who have been saved, baptized, and are in the church. Most of our ‘one, two, three, pray after me’ fellows would have dropped his support a long time ago! Myself, I would drop the guy with 738 saved and 25 baptized and shift the support to the fellow from Poland!”
PARENTS SHOULD FILL THE HOME WITH SPIRITUAL MUSIC (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The late Pastor J.B. Buffington said, “Worldly music produces a worldly environment and creates worldly attitudes. On the other hand, you can program temperament and stability and peace and quietness in your home if you get good sacred Christian music. You can play Bible stories in a room where a little baby is sleeping, and you are programming Bible stories into his little mind. Kids don’t have to learn things formally; you just put it there and they are like a blotter. They absorb it. Put soothing, Christ-honoring, soul-stirring Christian music on and just let it play in your home, and you are programming something of security and tranquility and peace into the children’s hearts” (“How to Lose a Child Before He Is Five Years Old”). An extensive list of “Suggested Sacred Music Recordings” can be found at the Way of Life Literature 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.
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.
UNITED NATIONS REPORT REPRODUCES MYTH ABOUT HIMALAYAN GLACIAL MELTING (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “World misled over Himalayan glacier meltdown,” The Times, London, Jan. 17, 2010: “A warning that climate change will melt most of the Himalayan glaciers by 2035 is likely to be retracted after a series of scientific blunders by the United Nations body that issued it. Two years ago the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a benchmark report that was claimed to incorporate the latest and most detailed research into the impact of global warming. A central claim was the world’s glaciers were melting so fast that those in the Himalayas could vanish by 2035. In the past few days the scientists behind the warning have admitted that it was based on a news story in the New Scientist, a popular science journal, published eight years before the IPCC’s 2007 report. It has also emerged that the New Scientist report was itself based on a short telephone interview with Syed Hasnain, a little-known Indian scientist then based at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi. Hasnain has since admitted that the claim was ‘speculation’ and was not supported by any formal research. ... glaciologists find such figures inherently ludicrous, pointing out that most Himalayan glaciers are hundreds of feet thick and could not melt fast enough to vanish by 2035 unless there was a huge global temperature rise. The maximum rate of decline in thickness seen in glaciers at the moment is 2-3 feet a year and most are far lower. Professor Julian Dowdeswell, director of the Scott Polar Research Institute at Cambridge University, said: ‘Even a small glacier such as the Dokriani glacier is up to 120 metres [394ft] thick. A big one would be several hundred metres thick and tens of kilometres long. The average is 300 metres thick so to melt one even at 5 metres a year would take 60 years. That is a lot faster than anything we are seeing now so the idea of losing it all by 2035 is unrealistically high.’” [CONCLUDING NOTE: On January 20, the UN apologized for the misleading data by labeling it “poorly substantiated.” Actually, the data was entirely unsubstantiated, but the global warming Nazis aren’t about to back away from their money-making, power-grabbing myth.]
VISITING EVANGELICALS SILENT ON CHINA’S PERSECUTED HOUSE CHURCHES (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Christian Newswire, January 14, 2010: “The Institute on Religion & Democracy (IRD) is dismayed at the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA)'s having ignored religious persecution in China during its recent visit. Instead, it spoke only of cooperation with the government-registered church while disregarding restrictions by the communist regime on unofficial churches. The vast majority of Chinese Christians, conservatively estimated at 80 million in number, worship in unregistered congregations that meet in homes and other settings. In the past week alone, leaders of the Chinese House Church Alliance were detained by the authorities in Hebei province according to China Aid. House churches in both Beijing and Shanghai have also been closed recently by the police. In Shanxi province, authorities demolished the Fushan House Church's building, giving church leaders long prison sentences. In December, a Ugyhur Christian convert from Islam was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for his faith.”
BRITISH METEORIGICAL OFFICE PREDICTED MILD WINTER (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The British Met (formerly called Meteorological) Office’s prediction for a mild winter was grossly wrong. In fact, it has been bitterly cold, with temperatures plunging to as low as -22C in places. A BBC weatherman, Paul Hudson, suggested that the Met Office’s computer simulations might have “developed a warm bias” that caused the wrong forecast. (“Met Office computer accused of ‘warm bias,’” Daily Mail, Jan. 17, 2010). Be that as it may, one thing is certain, and that is that modern scientists cannot predict the weather three months from now, not to speak of three years or three decades. (The Met Office’s prediction of a “barbeque summer” last year was just as wrong as its winter forecast.) The “computer models” that are used to predict long-term global warming are a joke. Man, even with his vaunted modern scientific expertise, simply does not have enough knowledge to make such predictions accurately. Pompous ignorance seasoned with a good measure of outright deception and a heaping dose of greed are the ingredients of the man-made global warming stew.
MUSIC AT TRINITY BAPTIST, JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is by Jeff Royal
738 PROFESSIONS OF FAITH AND 25 BAPTISMS (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted and slightly adapted from The Technique Catastrophe: An Explanation of the Multitudes of False Professions in the Independent Baptist Movement by Bob Creel (865-712-4537): “When numbers become so important to us that they outweigh the truth, it’s time that we admit to a crisis! When we receive missionary reports similar to the one recently sent to the church where I am now attending, it’s time we take stock of our methodology. This missionary brother was rejoicing over the results that he had experienced in his first full year on the mission field. He boasted of 738 professions of faith with 25 following in believer’s baptism. How could you even pen those words without asking yourself if there isn’t something wrong with that picture? I seem to remember 3,000 saved at Pentecost, and 3,000 baptized! The most refreshing missionary that I have heard in a long time gave his update to our church recently. He has been in Poland for 14 years and to date knows of only five people who have been saved under his ministry. Just like at Pentecost, he only counts the ones who have been saved, baptized, and are in the church. Most of our ‘one, two, three, pray after me’ fellows would have dropped his support a long time ago! Myself, I would drop the guy with 738 saved and 25 baptized and shift the support to the fellow from Poland!”
PARENTS SHOULD FILL THE HOME WITH SPIRITUAL MUSIC (Friday Church News Notes, January 29, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The late Pastor J.B. Buffington said, “Worldly music produces a worldly environment and creates worldly attitudes. On the other hand, you can program temperament and stability and peace and quietness in your home if you get good sacred Christian music. You can play Bible stories in a room where a little baby is sleeping, and you are programming Bible stories into his little mind. Kids don’t have to learn things formally; you just put it there and they are like a blotter. They absorb it. Put soothing, Christ-honoring, soul-stirring Christian music on and just let it play in your home, and you are programming something of security and tranquility and peace into the children’s hearts” (“How to Lose a Child Before He Is Five Years Old”). An extensive list of “Suggested Sacred Music Recordings” can be found at the Way of Life Literature 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.