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.

GLENN BECK’S BIBLE TWISTING (Friday Church News Notes, November 26, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Political commentator and talk show host Glen Beck uses a strange, allegorical interpretation of the Bible to support his conspiracy theories. Raised Roman Catholic, Beck converted to Mormonism in 1999 after “church shopping” with his second wife. Two weeks ago Beck discussed the Tower of Babel of Genesis 10-11 on his radio program, and he stated that the chief problem was the use of bricks instead of stones. He further said that there are two names for God in the Genesis passage, one for a “happy-go-lucky God” and one for an angry God. Beck says it was the “happy-go-lucky God” who divided the languages, and he claims that God was not punishing men but setting them free. This is contrary to the Bible’s plain statements that the sin of the Tower of Babel was man’s rebellion to God’s express will and that God’s actions were for the purpose of judging man and hindering him from accomplishing his fallen will. Beck is heavily influenced by Mormon conspiratorialist W. Cleon Skousen, who believed that the U.S. Constitution was inspired of God. Beck touts Skousen’s books as required reading for those wanting to understand the world today and he wrote the foreword for the 2008 edition of Skousen’s 5,000 Year Leap. There are doubtless many human conspiracies at work in the world today, but the conspiracies that really matter are supernatural and operate beyond the realm of human discovery and can only be known through the Biblical revelation. There is a divine “conspiracy,” which is God working out His sovereign plan to put His eternal Son, Jesus, on the throne of this world. There is also a satanic conspiracy, which is the devil’s plan to put the Antichrist on the throne of the world. This will be accomplished when God allows it, but it will only last for a few years and will be crushed at Christ’s Second Coming. The Satanic conspiracy is called the “mystery of iniquity” in 2 Thessalonians 2. These are the conspiracies that one must understand if he is to understand current events, but, sadly, Glenn Beck doesn’t have a clue on this count because he worships a false christ and holds to a false gospel and does not understand the Bible.

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.

NEW ATHEIST AD CAMPAIGN CRITICIZING THE BIBLE (Friday Church News Notes, November 12, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - A new atheist ad campaign criticizes the Bible’s morality. Sponsored by the American Humanist Association, the ads pretend that atheist morality is superior to the Bible’s. One ad criticizes the Bible’s teaching on women, contrasting it with that of 19th-century God-hater Robert Ingersoll. Not surprisingly, Richard Dawkins appears in the ad campaign. He claims to be an atheist, but strangely he talks about God more than most Christians do. He seems absolutely obsessed with God. Then, again, he has made a name for himself and a fortune criticizing God. According to the Bible, the atheist is a fool (Psalm 14:1), because the evidence for God is overwhelming. “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). In fact, the atheist campaign is an absolute joke, because if life were a blind accident as the Humanists claim, if man is an evolved bacteria, there would be no basis for morality. The atheist ads have appeared as a television spot on NBC Dateline as well as in print in USA Today, the Seattle Times, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, and the San Francisco Chronicle.

Since the nineteenth century, multitudes of people have assumed that the Bible has been discredited by modern science and by the “higher criticism” of theological modernism.

In his biography of Charles Darwin, Jacques Barzun repeats this myth,

“The cosmogony of Genesis was swamped under an avalanche of contrary geological facts” (Darwin, Marx, Wagner, p. 66).

In fact, it was not an avalanche of scientific facts that swamped the Bible; it was an avalanche of myths based upon evolutionary assumptions.

Yet countless people have given up their faith in the Bible because they ASSUMED that it was discredited.

Charles Templeton is an example. He was once the preaching partner of Billy Graham, but he became an atheist after being convinced that science had discredited the Bible. He wrote the following to Graham,

“Billy, it's simply not possible any longer to believe, for instance, the biblical account of creation.  The world wasn't created over a period of days a few thousand years ago; it has evolved over millions of years. It's not a matter of speculation; it's demonstrable fact” (Templeton, Farewell to God).

Yesterday, the New York Times website carried a stunning look at how computer generated animation is depicting the inner workings of the cell. These animations describe cellular operations that are truly ‘jaw-dropping’ as the newspaper said. However, they also show processes that are impossible to explain by chance and time. If nothing else, these animations show intelligence, design, order, complexity, and, most of all, purpose. We felt that this NY Times video was a fitting companion piece to today’s FBIS article, “Staking Eternity on a Wispy Hypothesis.” “Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high:” Hebrews 1:3

In 1922, William Jennings Bryan warned,

“It is no light matter to impeach the veracity of the Scriptures in order to accept, not a truth--not even a theory--but a mere hypothesis” (In His Image, 1922, p. 94).

Bryan was right, and nearly a century later, evolution remains “a mere hypothesis.”

The outcome of a murder trial requires evidence “beyond a reasonable doubt,” because so much is at stake, and we should require no less on the issue of creation vs. evolution, which potentially has eternal consequences.

The Bible claims to be the revelation of God to man. It claims to reveal God, man’s beginning and fall, the way of salvation, and the future. If the Bible is true, there is a heaven and a hell, man will live forever in one place or another, and salvation is only through personal faith in Jesus Christ.

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.

ANOTHER BOGUS PENTECOSTAL HEALING REVIVAL (Friday Church News Notes, November 12, 2010, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Another in an endless series of supposed Pentecostal healing revivals is occurring in Mobile, Alabama. Since August, meetings led by John Kilpatrick and British evangelist Nathan Morris have been held four nights a week. Kilpatrick is the Pentecostal pastor who led the so-called Brownsville Revival at an Assemblies of God church in Pensacola, Florida, in the 1990s. Since the birth of Pentecostalism at the Azusa Street Mission in 1906, Pentecostals have lurched from one alleged miracle outbreak to the next, exhibiting the very lust for signs and wonders that Jesus reproved (Matthew 12:39). At the outbreak of the Brownsville Revival in 1995, Kilpatrick lay in a drunken stupor on the church platform for four hours and was so “drunk in the spirit” at other times as the “revival” progressed that he had to be carried out of the church in a wheelbarrow and when he tried to operate his car he crashed into things. Many healings were claimed at Brownsville, but weirdness ruled. For example, one woman in the choir was allegedly healed of a serious neck injury, but for at last a year and a half afterwards she experienced wild and uncontrollable jerking of her head from side to side whenever she was near the church. Bogus healings and unscriptural weirdness also characterize the Mobile “revival.” Their shining example is the supposed healing of Pentecostal preacher and gospel singer Delia Knox, who has been wheelchair bound for 20 years. Kilpatrick claimed that “she didn’t rise up out of the wheelchair, she jumped up out of the wheelchair” (“Thousands Flock to Alabama Revival Meetings,” Charisma, Sept. 3, 2010). In fact, the video of the event shows that Kilpatrick and another Pentecostal preacher helped Knox out of the wheelchair, and she could “walk” only in a pathetic, halting manner. When Nightline requested to discuss the “healing” with Knox to examine its authenticity, she declined (“Turning to Revivals for Healing,” Nightline, Oct. 11, 2010).

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A misunderstanding of the kingdom of God is a foundational error of all aspects of the emerging church. They believe that “the long-promised kingdom, spoken of by the Hebrew prophets, was established in provisional form with the coming of Jesus and the outpouring of His Spirit (Emerging Churches, p. 47).

Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids (senior pastor Rob Bell) has the following statement of purpose: “We take great joy in partnering with God to change the world, embracing the truth that all of life is sacred.”

Tony Campolo says, “Our call is to be God’s agents, to rescue not only the human race but the whole of creation” (“Why Care for Creation,” Tear Times, Summer 1992).

The emerging church is earth-minded and mocks a heavenly-minded orientation. Typically, it gets more excited about solving the “AIDS crisis” and saving polar bears than winning lost souls.

By surveying the Old and New Testaments, we can see the error of this doctrine.

Enlarged November 9, 2010 (first published February 16, 2010) (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -

The following is excerpted from KEEPING THE KIDS: HOW TO KEEP THE CHILDREN FROM FALLING PREY TO THE WORLD, which is available from Way of Life Literature.

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Scripture Warnings that Apply to Television Viewing

The following Scripture passages have a direct application to this issue and are a loud warning to those who have ears to hear. Parents need to teach their children these biblical principles and guide them in learning how to apply them to their daily lives. It is not enough to have a list of do’s and don’ts.

“I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes: I hate the work of them that turn aside; it shall not cleave to me (Psalm 101:3).

This verse single-handedly forbids the child of God to watch the vast majority of the movies and television programs that are made today. Consider just a few of the wicked things that you or your children will see:

* The breaking of God’s commandments
* Flaunted immorality
* Casual drinking and drug usage
* Drunkenness portrayed as humorous
* Sexually alluring fashions
* Sexually enticing dancing
* Violence and mayhem
* Casual dating and petting (Parents, do you want your children to date after the fashion portrayed in most movies and television programs?)
* Mockery of the things of God
* Mockery of God’s people
* Pagan religions depicted as truth
* Situational ethics
* Occultism, paganism, humanism, evolution, and New Age error (even in cartoons and in a large number of Disney movies)

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.

REPUBLICAN LANDSLIDE IN AMERICA (Friday Church News Notes, November 5, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The U.S. mid-term election this week was historic. For Democrats, it was a devastating Perfect Storm. As the Detroit Free Press emblazoned on its front page, it was a “Landslide.” The Republicans took over the House of Representatives with a large majority. Prior to the election it was Democrat 256 to Republican 179, whereas afterward it was Republican 239 to Democrat 185 (with some seats still to be decided). At least 10 powerful senior House Democrats lost their jobs, including three committee chairs. The new House leader, John Boehner, in dramatic contrast to the former House leader Nancy Pelosi, vows to roll back Obama’s big spending and repeal the national health care boondoggle. Republicans also strengthened their presence in the U.S. Senate significantly, and in the 2012 election Republicans will only have to defend 10 Senate seats whereas the Democrats must defend at least 21. At the state level, Republicans gained at least 10 governorships formerly held by Democrats, and they unseated about 650 Democrats to control more legislative seats than at any time since 1928. They took over both chambers of state legislatures in Alabama, Maine, Minnesota, New Hampshire, North Carolina, and Wisconsin. They won control of houses of representatives in Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Montana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, with the vote still out in New York, Oregon, and Washington. The Republicans are in control of both chambers in North Carolina and Alabama for the first time since just after the Civil War. The Democrats only gain in the entire 50 states was to pick up one seat in Delaware. The new Republicans are also very conservative, even more so that the class of 1994 that swept Newt Gingrich into power as Speaker of the House. As John Gizzi of Human Events observed, “Overlooked by much of the liberal media so far is that this large class of Republican Members-elect will be one of the most conservative in modern times. ... with almost all calling for repeal of ‘Obamacare’ and quite a few of them campaigning on ‘red meat’ conservative issues such as abolishing the Department of Education or taking a fresh look at entitlements such as Medicare.”

Many New Testament prophecies describe a turning away from the New Testament faith and the creation of false churches that follow man-made tradition and heresies instead of the pure doctrine of God’s Word. This is called apostasy, and the Bible says it will increase as the time of Christ’s return draws nearer. See, for example, Matthew 7:15-22; 1 Timothy 4:1-6; 2 Timothy 3:1, 5, 12-13; 4:3-4; 2 Peter 2:1-2; 2 John 7-11; Jude 3-4.

On a trip to Israel in April of this year, we saw the fulfillment of these prophecies throughout Israel.

Practically every important geographical site is owned by some apostate church that enriches itself by this means. There is the Church of the Nativity with its Chapel of the Milk Grotto; the Church of St. Peter at Capernaum; the Basilica of the Annunciation at Nazareth; the Church of the Beatitudes on the Sea of Galilee; the Church of the Loaves and Fishes at Tabgha; the Church of the Miracle at Cana; Elisha’s Church at Jericho; St. Peter’s Church at Jaffa; and the Church of John the Baptist in Samaria, to mention a few.

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Introduction

Abortion is legal in 54 countries today. It has been legal in America since the infamous Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision in 1973. Worldwide, roughly 46 million babies are destroyed in the womb each year. About one in five pregnancies end in abortion. The overwhelming majority of abortions are done as a means of birth control and convenience.

God’s people are obligated to honor God’s Law more than man’s. Though abortion is legal, that does not mean that it is right in God’s eyes (Acts 5:29).

By 21 days the baby’s heart begins to beat and the blood flows through its body. At 45 days the tiny baby’s brain waves can be detected. By 8 to 9 weeks the eyelids have begun forming and hair appears. By 9 or 10 weeks it sucks its thumb, jumps, frowns, swallows, and moves its tongue. By 12 or 13 weeks the baby has fingernails and its own unique fingerprints; all arteries are present, vocal chords are complete; the baby can cry and recoils from pain. At 14 weeks the mother begins to feel the baby moving inside of her. At 15 weeks the baby has fully-formed taste buds. At 16 weeks, it has eyebrows and eyelashes, and it can grasp with its hands, kick, and even somersault. At 20 weeks the baby can hear and recognize its’s mother’s voice.