Friday Church News Notes
Volume 23, Issue 34 - August 26, 2022
The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, though this does not imply an endorsement.
Jack Schaap
JACK SCHAAP RELEASED FROM PRISON (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Jack Schaap (pronounced skop), former pastor of First Baptist Church, Hammond, Indiana, was released from prison on May 4 after serving nine years (of a 12-year sentence) for a sexual relationship with a teenage church member (“Former pastor released,” The Times of Northwest Indiana, Munster, May 14, 2022). Schaap, the son-in-law of Jack Hyles, took the pastorate after Hyles’ death in 2001. (Schaap’s wife, Cindy, divorced him in 2014.) Schaap’s sad and frightful case is only a drop in the bucket. Many other women, teenage girls, and even children have been the target of sexual predators at First Baptist, including those polluted by Hyles’ son, Dave, when he was a youth leader at First Baptist, beginning in 1969 when he was 16 years old. That year, Dave organized the Teenage Soul Winning program. In six years, the teens reported 100,000 salvation decisions, though the youth Sunday School averaged only 2,500. Dave’s sister, Cindy, said, “I won thousands of souls before I finished my teen years” (The Fundamental Man, p. 271). In 1976, Dave’s book Successful Church Youth Work was published by the Sword of the Lord. The book was described as “the successful formula of Dave Hyles” and was advertised by the Sword as “double success!” (on the back cover of Let’s Baptize More Converts). It turns out that the charismatic youth leader had more than evangelism on his mind. Dave’s first wife, Paula, testified of his serial philandering, as did many others. In 2020, two lawsuits were filed against Dave Hyles by women who claim that he sexually abused them in the 1970s. One is Joy Ryder and the other is Nanette Miles. Miles’ class action lawsuit alleges that she was sexually assaulted beginning at age 13, that at least 10 others “have credibly accused D. Hyles of using his position of power to sexually prey on them,” and that “First Baptist and the College staff members were aware of his reprehensible conduct for years and remained silent” (“Class Action Sex Abuse Case,” Ministry Watch, Dec. 7, 2020). In January 2013, Chicago Magazine ran a front-page report entitled “Let Us Prey: Big Trouble at First Baptist Church,” documenting ten cases of sexual crimes and fornications committed by pastors associated with First Baptist. That is just a drop in the bucket, as has been documented in many reports. This is not a “local church” matter. First Baptist has influenced thousands of churches. First Baptist was ground zero for the promotion of the damnable practices of Quick Prayerism and Big-Manism and Big-Numberism and Diotrephesism (blind, unquestioning loyalty to a pastor).
ABRAHAM PIPER PREACHING THE GOSPEL OF LIVE AS YOU PLEASE (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Abraham Piper, son of prominent author John Piper, uses TikTok as a platform to spout vain words to deceive his 920,000 followers. He calls fundamentalism “a destructive narrow-minded worldview” and preaches the gospel of “live as you please.” He says, “Nothing really matters and this is what gives us the freedom to feel our own meaning, and feel it with ease instead of a sense of fear or guilt.” John Piper’s most influential book is Desiring God, which promotes the strange concept of “Christian Hedonism,” according to which man’s highest calling is to pursue his own happiness by pursuing God. “The desire to be happy is a proper motive for every good deed, and if you abandon the pursuit of your own joy you cannot love man or please God” (Desiring God). Piper cites C.S. Lewis, “It is a Christian duty, as you know, for everyone to be as happy as he can” (Desiring God, Kindle location 1615). In Desiring God and Don’t Waste Your Life, Piper describes the roots of Christian Hedonism. He is candid in his admission that he got it from the writings of the following very dangerous men: Blaise Pascal (Roman Catholic), C.S. Lewis, Daniel Fuller, and Harold John Ockenga. Piper says that Christian Hedonism “does not mean God becomes a means to help us get worldly pleasures,” but in spite of this disclaimer, Christian Hedonism has played right into the hands of the contemporary philosophy of “don’t let anyone tell you how to live.” Now we see how that Piper’s own son understands Christian Hedonism. (For more on this, see John Piper and Christian Hedonism, available in print and as a free eBook from www.wayoflife.org.)
ASSOCIATED PRESS GIVES JOURNALISTS PERMISSION TO SAY WOMEN GET PREGNANT (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Associated Press,” PJMedia, Aug. 20, 2022: “The Associated Press Stylebook has updated its guidelines to let journalists know that they have permission to use phrases like ‘pregnant women’ and ‘women seeking abortions’ in their reports. ‘We now have guidance saying that pregnant women or women seeking abortions is acceptable phrasing,’ the AP Stylebook announced on Twitter. ‘Phrases like pregnant people or people seeking abortions are acceptable when you want to be inclusive of people who have those experiences but do not identify as women.’ ... The AP added ‘pregnant people’ to its guidelines in May, and the newly revised guidelines clarified that the historically and biologically correct term ‘woman’ or ‘women’ was still okay to use. Of course, the AP earned mockery from both sides on this update--with radical leftists angry that the AP has resumed acknowledging biological sex still exists.”
WHAT CONSPIRACY ARE YOU FIGHTING? (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Ephesians 6:11-13 - “Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” In Ephesians 6, the apostle Paul describes the hidden powers that rule this fallen world. This is the supernatural conspiracy behind all human conspiracies. Many professing believers are caught up with such things as the Illuminati, the Bilderbergs, Zionism, Majestic-12, HAARP weather manipulation, FEMA camps, the Knights of Malta, Operation Paperclip, Operation Northwoods, Area 51, shadow governments, 9/11 Truth, and QAnon. But Scripture instructs God’s people to look beyond puny, mortal man to the supernatural fundamentals of earthly life. God’s people are taught to wrestle with spiritual wickedness in high places. We are taught to use mighty spiritual weapons rather than the carnal weapons of politics, demonstrations, fighting, anger, cursing, mocking, bitterness, vengeance, and violence. “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds” (2 Co. 10:4).
CALTECH FINDS AMAZING ROLE FOR “JUNK DNA” (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Caltech Finds,” Evolution News, Dec. 3, 2021: “Scientists at Caltech may have sounded the final death knell for the ‘junk DNA’ myth. ... ENCODE, readers recall, found that 80 percent of the genome is transcribed, even if only a small part codes for proteins. The functions of those non-coding regions were only hinted at. Now, the windows are opening on organization so all-encompassing for all those non-coding RNA transcripts, it is truly mind-boggling what goes on in the nucleus of a cell. Using a new survey tool they call RD-SPRITE, Caltech researchers, in cooperation with others at USC and UCLA, mapped the spatial organization of all the DNA and RNA in the nucleus. ... ‘These maps reveal higher-order RNA-chromatin structures associated with three major classes of nuclear function: RNA processing, heterochromatin assembly, and gene regulation. These data demonstrate that hundreds of ncRNAs form high-concentration territories throughout the nucleus, that specific RNAs are required to recruit various regulators into these territories, and that these RNAs can shape long-range DNA contacts, heterochromatin assembly, and gene expression...’ A new picture begins to emerge of hierarchical organization in the nucleus. No longer does it look like spaghetti in a basketball. On the contrary, there are territories and compartments throughout the interior. ... In the newly identified territories are found ncRNAs (noncoding RNAs, not destined for protein)--thousands of them--that are doing important jobs: guiding regulators into the right territories where ‘essential nuclear functions’ need to take place. ... The roles of these transcripts, formerly thought to be useless, have risen to the status of essential players. What an amazing turnaround! The conclusion of this Caltech paper, which never mentions evolution, appears to nail the case shut for junk DNA, while also adding new levels of awe to the workings inside the nucleus. ... This is a paper to remember. It shows in hindsight the fruitfulness of the ID [Intelligent Design] perspective over the evolutionary one. Evolutionary thinking dismissed these non-coding RNAs as junk. ID thinking would have approached the unknown with the premise, ‘If something works, it’s not happening by accident.’”
HOUR GLASS OF THE ROCKS (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from CreationMoments.com, August 2, 2022: “Evolutionary geologists find ages for rocks, using a method known as radiometric dating. For example, uranium-lead dating relies on the change of uranium into lead. The rate at which uranium changes into lead is not linear, but can nevertheless be measured. This value is called the half-life. If we know the half-life of uranium, and the amount of lead that there was in the rock, when it was formed, then we can calculate the age of the rock, assuming that no lead has been added to or taken out of the rock. Imagine an hourglass. Sand is flowing from the top to the bottom. You could measure how much sand was in the top of the hourglass, and also how much in the lower part. Finally, you would measure the rate at which sand flows from top to bottom. You might think you could use these values to calculate how long the hourglass had been going, but you would be wrong. This is because you do not know if all the sand started in the top, or if the glass was shaken at some time, making the sand go through faster. In the same way, geologists assume that an igneous rock was formed without any lead in it, but it is impossible to know this. They also assume that the half-life of uranium has never changed. But we now have considerable evidence to suggest that the half-life changed rapidly in the past. Author: Paul F. Taylor. Ref: Humphreys, R. (et al), ‘Radioactivity and the Age of the Earth,’ (ICR).”
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).
ABRAHAM PIPER PREACHING THE GOSPEL OF LIVE AS YOU PLEASE (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Abraham Piper, son of prominent author John Piper, uses TikTok as a platform to spout vain words to deceive his 920,000 followers. He calls fundamentalism “a destructive narrow-minded worldview” and preaches the gospel of “live as you please.” He says, “Nothing really matters and this is what gives us the freedom to feel our own meaning, and feel it with ease instead of a sense of fear or guilt.” John Piper’s most influential book is Desiring God, which promotes the strange concept of “Christian Hedonism,” according to which man’s highest calling is to pursue his own happiness by pursuing God. “The desire to be happy is a proper motive for every good deed, and if you abandon the pursuit of your own joy you cannot love man or please God” (Desiring God). Piper cites C.S. Lewis, “It is a Christian duty, as you know, for everyone to be as happy as he can” (Desiring God, Kindle location 1615). In Desiring God and Don’t Waste Your Life, Piper describes the roots of Christian Hedonism. He is candid in his admission that he got it from the writings of the following very dangerous men: Blaise Pascal (Roman Catholic), C.S. Lewis, Daniel Fuller, and Harold John Ockenga. Piper says that Christian Hedonism “does not mean God becomes a means to help us get worldly pleasures,” but in spite of this disclaimer, Christian Hedonism has played right into the hands of the contemporary philosophy of “don’t let anyone tell you how to live.” Now we see how that Piper’s own son understands Christian Hedonism. (For more on this, see John Piper and Christian Hedonism, available in print and as a free eBook from www.wayoflife.org.)
ASSOCIATED PRESS GIVES JOURNALISTS PERMISSION TO SAY WOMEN GET PREGNANT (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Associated Press,” PJMedia, Aug. 20, 2022: “The Associated Press Stylebook has updated its guidelines to let journalists know that they have permission to use phrases like ‘pregnant women’ and ‘women seeking abortions’ in their reports. ‘We now have guidance saying that pregnant women or women seeking abortions is acceptable phrasing,’ the AP Stylebook announced on Twitter. ‘Phrases like pregnant people or people seeking abortions are acceptable when you want to be inclusive of people who have those experiences but do not identify as women.’ ... The AP added ‘pregnant people’ to its guidelines in May, and the newly revised guidelines clarified that the historically and biologically correct term ‘woman’ or ‘women’ was still okay to use. Of course, the AP earned mockery from both sides on this update--with radical leftists angry that the AP has resumed acknowledging biological sex still exists.”
WHAT CONSPIRACY ARE YOU FIGHTING? (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Ephesians 6:11-13 - “Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.” In Ephesians 6, the apostle Paul describes the hidden powers that rule this fallen world. This is the supernatural conspiracy behind all human conspiracies. Many professing believers are caught up with such things as the Illuminati, the Bilderbergs, Zionism, Majestic-12, HAARP weather manipulation, FEMA camps, the Knights of Malta, Operation Paperclip, Operation Northwoods, Area 51, shadow governments, 9/11 Truth, and QAnon. But Scripture instructs God’s people to look beyond puny, mortal man to the supernatural fundamentals of earthly life. God’s people are taught to wrestle with spiritual wickedness in high places. We are taught to use mighty spiritual weapons rather than the carnal weapons of politics, demonstrations, fighting, anger, cursing, mocking, bitterness, vengeance, and violence. “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds” (2 Co. 10:4).
CALTECH FINDS AMAZING ROLE FOR “JUNK DNA” (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Caltech Finds,” Evolution News, Dec. 3, 2021: “Scientists at Caltech may have sounded the final death knell for the ‘junk DNA’ myth. ... ENCODE, readers recall, found that 80 percent of the genome is transcribed, even if only a small part codes for proteins. The functions of those non-coding regions were only hinted at. Now, the windows are opening on organization so all-encompassing for all those non-coding RNA transcripts, it is truly mind-boggling what goes on in the nucleus of a cell. Using a new survey tool they call RD-SPRITE, Caltech researchers, in cooperation with others at USC and UCLA, mapped the spatial organization of all the DNA and RNA in the nucleus. ... ‘These maps reveal higher-order RNA-chromatin structures associated with three major classes of nuclear function: RNA processing, heterochromatin assembly, and gene regulation. These data demonstrate that hundreds of ncRNAs form high-concentration territories throughout the nucleus, that specific RNAs are required to recruit various regulators into these territories, and that these RNAs can shape long-range DNA contacts, heterochromatin assembly, and gene expression...’ A new picture begins to emerge of hierarchical organization in the nucleus. No longer does it look like spaghetti in a basketball. On the contrary, there are territories and compartments throughout the interior. ... In the newly identified territories are found ncRNAs (noncoding RNAs, not destined for protein)--thousands of them--that are doing important jobs: guiding regulators into the right territories where ‘essential nuclear functions’ need to take place. ... The roles of these transcripts, formerly thought to be useless, have risen to the status of essential players. What an amazing turnaround! The conclusion of this Caltech paper, which never mentions evolution, appears to nail the case shut for junk DNA, while also adding new levels of awe to the workings inside the nucleus. ... This is a paper to remember. It shows in hindsight the fruitfulness of the ID [Intelligent Design] perspective over the evolutionary one. Evolutionary thinking dismissed these non-coding RNAs as junk. ID thinking would have approached the unknown with the premise, ‘If something works, it’s not happening by accident.’”
HOUR GLASS OF THE ROCKS (Friday Church News Notes, August 26, 2022, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from CreationMoments.com, August 2, 2022: “Evolutionary geologists find ages for rocks, using a method known as radiometric dating. For example, uranium-lead dating relies on the change of uranium into lead. The rate at which uranium changes into lead is not linear, but can nevertheless be measured. This value is called the half-life. If we know the half-life of uranium, and the amount of lead that there was in the rock, when it was formed, then we can calculate the age of the rock, assuming that no lead has been added to or taken out of the rock. Imagine an hourglass. Sand is flowing from the top to the bottom. You could measure how much sand was in the top of the hourglass, and also how much in the lower part. Finally, you would measure the rate at which sand flows from top to bottom. You might think you could use these values to calculate how long the hourglass had been going, but you would be wrong. This is because you do not know if all the sand started in the top, or if the glass was shaken at some time, making the sand go through faster. In the same way, geologists assume that an igneous rock was formed without any lead in it, but it is impossible to know this. They also assume that the half-life of uranium has never changed. But we now have considerable evidence to suggest that the half-life changed rapidly in the past. Author: Paul F. Taylor. Ref: Humphreys, R. (et al), ‘Radioactivity and the Age of the Earth,’ (ICR).”
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).
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Distributed by Way of Life Literature., publisher of Bible Study Materials and reports for Fundamental Baptists and other fundamentalist, Bible-believing Christians. Established in 1974, Way of Life Literature is a fundamental Baptist preaching and publishing ministry based in Bethel Baptist Church, London, Ontario, of which Wilbert Unger is the founding Pastor. Brother Cloud lives in South Asia where he has been a church planting missionary since 1979. OUR GOAL IN THIS PARTICULAR ASPECT OF OUR MINISTRY (REPORTS AND FRIDAY NEWS) IS NOT DEVOTIONAL. IS TO PROVIDE INFORMATION TO ASSIST PREACHERS IN THE PROTECTION OF THE CHURCHES IN THIS APOSTATE HOUR.
David Cloud, Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org
The Way of Life Literature preaching and publishing ministry is based at Bethel Baptist Church, London, Ontario, of which Wilbert Unger is the founding Pastor. A mail stop is maintained in Port Huron, Michigan.
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