Friday Church News Notes
Volume 25, Issue 04 - January 26, 2024
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.
Hans Schmidt with wife and children
STREET PREACHER WHO WAS SHOT - UPDATE (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - On Nov. 15, 2023, Hans Schmidt was shot in the head while street preaching near his church in Glendale, Arizona. In spite of a $10,000 reward, no suspects have yet been apprehended, but Schmidt, a former Marine medic, is making good progress medically. He was moved out of intensive care in December. On January 6, his father, Eric, tweeted, “Visiting my soon, Hans. He’s awake and alert and has been receiving physical therapy and rehabilitation. He can’t speak just yet because of the tracheotomy but hopefully that will get removed soon.” We are including a January 2 photo of Hans with his wife and two small children.
THE CHURCH AS A WALLED SHEEPFOLD AND A WATERED GARDEN (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - It was common in the 17th and 18th centuries for Baptist churches to refer to the New Testament assembly as a walled sheepfold and a watered garden. The First London Confession of 1644 said the members are “under His heavenly conduct and government, to lead their lives in His walled sheepfold, and watered garden, to have communion here with the saints...” In 1815, Benjamin Keach (who pastored the church later made famous by Charles Spurgeon) wrote, “Some part of a wilderness [of this world] hath been turned into a garden or fruitful vineyard: so God hath out of the people of this world, taken his churches and walled them about, that none of the wild beasts can hurt them” (Gospel Mysteries Unveiled). This is the language of a regenerate church membership and a pilgrim Christianity, which is the church we see beginning in Acts 2:41-42. The term a “walled sheepfold” speaks of a fold in which Christ’s sheep are kept, fed, and protected. Christ’s true sheep are defined in John 10:27-28, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” The term “watered garden” is from Song 4:12, “A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.” The redeemed are Christ’s delight, Christ’s jewels. He has purchased them at great price. They are the joy that was set before Him as He set His face like flint to Gethsemane and Calvary (Heb. 12:2).
WHEATON COLLEGE PROHIBITS PREFERRED PRONOUNS (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Wheaton College,” Religion News, Jan. 10, 2024: “Wheaton College, a flagship evangelical school in Wheaton, Illinois, recently updated its student and employee handbooks to restrict employees’ ability to designate personal pronouns and to elaborate on the school’s position on trans/nonbinary students and faculty. “The College does not permit the statement of preferred personal pronouns by employees when conducting College business, when on a platform where they are publicly identified as College employees, and/or when using the College brand in print or digital media, except when employees are required to submit such pronouns when registering for a conference or for membership in a professional organization,” new language in the student handbook says. Updates to the handbook, which were approved in October and shared with employees in December and with students in January, clarify that the college does not endorse the statement of preferred pronouns by employees or students of Wheaton. Both the previous and current versions of the student handbook make clear that the college believes God created sex to occur in the context of a marriage between a man and a woman and prohibit ‘same-sex sexual behavior,’ including marriages, civil unions or dating relationships. The handbook also has and continues to clarify that Wheaton hopes to be a loving community that respects and cares for all members, including those who ‘experience incongruity between birth sex and gender identity.’” [Conclusion by Way of Life: The most loving thing that can possibly be done for mankind is to speak the truth of God’s Word without compromise.]
WHAT KEEPS THE LIGHTS ON? (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from PowerLineBlog.com, Jan. 17, 2024: “Most of the country is in the grip of a cold snap, and demand for electricity is high. So where is our power coming from? Fossil fuels and nuclear energy. [Consider the] chart from the invaluable Grid Brief on energy usage from Jan. 10-16. America runs on natural gas, coal and nuclear power. Everything else is an afterthought. Note that over the last few days, when demand for electricity has spiked, wind turbines have contributed almost nothing. That is typical. When it gets very cold, the wind tends to die down. In fact, if it gets cold enough wind turbines draw electricity from the grid, and thus become a net negative factor. And solar power is consistently pathetic. The idea that America can be run on wind and solar power is absurd, but the grifters promoting that fantasy are sucking many billions of dollars out of our economy, with a goal of eventually shifting trillions of dollars into their pockets.”
A WORD OF CAUTION ABOUT “THE NEWS” (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - We want to be informed about what is happening, but we want to see everything through God’s eyes. We have no intention to fret or worry, to be addicted to politics or to get wrapped up in a political solution, to fill our minds with the latest conspiracy theory, or to get involved with any type of uprising. We intend to obey God’s exhortations, such as these: “Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb. Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed” (Psalm 37:1-3). “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33). “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth” (Colossians 3:1-2). Let the unredeemed do the fretting, as their only hope is this present world. What we are doing in the face of end-time apostasy and rampant wickedness is simple. We are doing what God has told us to do, which is to immerse ourselves in Scripture, meditating in God’s Word day and night (Ps. 1:1-3), focusing like a laser on Christ’s Great Commission (Mt. 28:18-20), preaching the life-changing gospel as far and wide as possible, building good churches and good Christian homes by the grace of God, raising children and youth for the glory of Jesus Christ, training preachers, starting new churches, earnestly contending for the faith, and lots and lots and lots of praying, including prayer for “all that are in authority; that we might lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.” God has not instructed me to fight those in authority; He has instructed me to pray for them.
A WIFE TOO MANY (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Michael Haykin, Kiffen, Knollys, and Keach: Rediscovering Our English Baptist Heritage: “During [William] Kiffen’s final years he continued to be active in his pastorate at Devonshire Square and in the life of the English Calvinistic Baptists as a whole. ... However, these were also years of domestic tragedy. Three of Kiffen’s children, as well as his first wife Hanna, had already died by this time. William, his eldest, at the age of twenty in 1669; a second son in Venice, whom Kiffen asserted was poisoned by a Roman Catholic priest; a daughter, Priscilla, in 1679; Hanna in 1682. Respecting Hanna’s life and death, Kiffen wrote later: ‘It pleased the Lord to take to himself, my dear and faithful wife, with whom I had lived nearly forty-four years; whose tenderness to me, and faithfulness to God, were such as cannot, by me, be expressed, as she constantly sympathized with me in all my afflictions. I can truly say, I never heard her utter the least discontent under all the various providences that attended either me or her; she eyed the hand of God in all our sorrows, so as constantly to encourage me in the ways of God: her death was the greatest sorrow to me that ever I met with in the world.’ Kiffen’s second wife, Sarah, however, was cut of a different cloth. On 2 March 1698 she was charged with a number of misdeeds by Devonshire Square Church. Upon examination, she was found guilty of, among other things, defrauding her husband of two hundred pounds and making false accusations about him. When she refused to appear before the congregation, Sarah was suspended from communion on 24 April 1698.”
BATS THAT FEED TREES (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from CreationMoments.com, Jan. 16, 2024: “The surface of the Earth 50 to 150 feet below the great living canopy of the rainforest is a dark, humid, still world dominated by great columns of tree trunks. Within those trunks and some of the giant hollow branches extending from them lies the secret of the life of the canopy itself. A rainforest typically receives 12 or more feet of rain per year. That much rain washes out of the soil most of the nitrates needed by the trees for growth. What the trees need is a rich source of nitrates that is constantly being replenished. And that’s where the bats come in. Typically, these huge trees are hollow inside. Many different kinds of creatures, including fruit bats, enter the hollow trees through various openings. Fruit bats find ideal daytime sleeping rooms inside the great hollow branches that extend like caverns from the hollow tree trunk. The accumulating layer of bat guano inside the tree itself is one of the richest sources of nitrates known. So the bats provide the tree with the nitrates it needs in exchange for a protected home during the day! In a very real sense, the fruit bats are the collection and transport system for the raw materials that make possible the tropical rain forest canopy with its millions of residents. The Creator has devised an ingenious way to provide for the needs of many creatures. Truly, the Lord does provide all living things with their food in precisely the way they need it! Ref.: Science Digest, October, 1978, page 30.”
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).
THE CHURCH AS A WALLED SHEEPFOLD AND A WATERED GARDEN (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - It was common in the 17th and 18th centuries for Baptist churches to refer to the New Testament assembly as a walled sheepfold and a watered garden. The First London Confession of 1644 said the members are “under His heavenly conduct and government, to lead their lives in His walled sheepfold, and watered garden, to have communion here with the saints...” In 1815, Benjamin Keach (who pastored the church later made famous by Charles Spurgeon) wrote, “Some part of a wilderness [of this world] hath been turned into a garden or fruitful vineyard: so God hath out of the people of this world, taken his churches and walled them about, that none of the wild beasts can hurt them” (Gospel Mysteries Unveiled). This is the language of a regenerate church membership and a pilgrim Christianity, which is the church we see beginning in Acts 2:41-42. The term a “walled sheepfold” speaks of a fold in which Christ’s sheep are kept, fed, and protected. Christ’s true sheep are defined in John 10:27-28, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” The term “watered garden” is from Song 4:12, “A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.” The redeemed are Christ’s delight, Christ’s jewels. He has purchased them at great price. They are the joy that was set before Him as He set His face like flint to Gethsemane and Calvary (Heb. 12:2).
WHEATON COLLEGE PROHIBITS PREFERRED PRONOUNS (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Wheaton College,” Religion News, Jan. 10, 2024: “Wheaton College, a flagship evangelical school in Wheaton, Illinois, recently updated its student and employee handbooks to restrict employees’ ability to designate personal pronouns and to elaborate on the school’s position on trans/nonbinary students and faculty. “The College does not permit the statement of preferred personal pronouns by employees when conducting College business, when on a platform where they are publicly identified as College employees, and/or when using the College brand in print or digital media, except when employees are required to submit such pronouns when registering for a conference or for membership in a professional organization,” new language in the student handbook says. Updates to the handbook, which were approved in October and shared with employees in December and with students in January, clarify that the college does not endorse the statement of preferred pronouns by employees or students of Wheaton. Both the previous and current versions of the student handbook make clear that the college believes God created sex to occur in the context of a marriage between a man and a woman and prohibit ‘same-sex sexual behavior,’ including marriages, civil unions or dating relationships. The handbook also has and continues to clarify that Wheaton hopes to be a loving community that respects and cares for all members, including those who ‘experience incongruity between birth sex and gender identity.’” [Conclusion by Way of Life: The most loving thing that can possibly be done for mankind is to speak the truth of God’s Word without compromise.]
WHAT KEEPS THE LIGHTS ON? (Friday Church News Notes, January 19, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from PowerLineBlog.com, Jan. 17, 2024: “Most of the country is in the grip of a cold snap, and demand for electricity is high. So where is our power coming from? Fossil fuels and nuclear energy. [Consider the] chart from the invaluable Grid Brief on energy usage from Jan. 10-16. America runs on natural gas, coal and nuclear power. Everything else is an afterthought. Note that over the last few days, when demand for electricity has spiked, wind turbines have contributed almost nothing. That is typical. When it gets very cold, the wind tends to die down. In fact, if it gets cold enough wind turbines draw electricity from the grid, and thus become a net negative factor. And solar power is consistently pathetic. The idea that America can be run on wind and solar power is absurd, but the grifters promoting that fantasy are sucking many billions of dollars out of our economy, with a goal of eventually shifting trillions of dollars into their pockets.”
A WORD OF CAUTION ABOUT “THE NEWS” (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - We want to be informed about what is happening, but we want to see everything through God’s eyes. We have no intention to fret or worry, to be addicted to politics or to get wrapped up in a political solution, to fill our minds with the latest conspiracy theory, or to get involved with any type of uprising. We intend to obey God’s exhortations, such as these: “Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb. Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed” (Psalm 37:1-3). “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:33). “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth” (Colossians 3:1-2). Let the unredeemed do the fretting, as their only hope is this present world. What we are doing in the face of end-time apostasy and rampant wickedness is simple. We are doing what God has told us to do, which is to immerse ourselves in Scripture, meditating in God’s Word day and night (Ps. 1:1-3), focusing like a laser on Christ’s Great Commission (Mt. 28:18-20), preaching the life-changing gospel as far and wide as possible, building good churches and good Christian homes by the grace of God, raising children and youth for the glory of Jesus Christ, training preachers, starting new churches, earnestly contending for the faith, and lots and lots and lots of praying, including prayer for “all that are in authority; that we might lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty.” God has not instructed me to fight those in authority; He has instructed me to pray for them.
A WIFE TOO MANY (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Michael Haykin, Kiffen, Knollys, and Keach: Rediscovering Our English Baptist Heritage: “During [William] Kiffen’s final years he continued to be active in his pastorate at Devonshire Square and in the life of the English Calvinistic Baptists as a whole. ... However, these were also years of domestic tragedy. Three of Kiffen’s children, as well as his first wife Hanna, had already died by this time. William, his eldest, at the age of twenty in 1669; a second son in Venice, whom Kiffen asserted was poisoned by a Roman Catholic priest; a daughter, Priscilla, in 1679; Hanna in 1682. Respecting Hanna’s life and death, Kiffen wrote later: ‘It pleased the Lord to take to himself, my dear and faithful wife, with whom I had lived nearly forty-four years; whose tenderness to me, and faithfulness to God, were such as cannot, by me, be expressed, as she constantly sympathized with me in all my afflictions. I can truly say, I never heard her utter the least discontent under all the various providences that attended either me or her; she eyed the hand of God in all our sorrows, so as constantly to encourage me in the ways of God: her death was the greatest sorrow to me that ever I met with in the world.’ Kiffen’s second wife, Sarah, however, was cut of a different cloth. On 2 March 1698 she was charged with a number of misdeeds by Devonshire Square Church. Upon examination, she was found guilty of, among other things, defrauding her husband of two hundred pounds and making false accusations about him. When she refused to appear before the congregation, Sarah was suspended from communion on 24 April 1698.”
BATS THAT FEED TREES (Friday Church News Notes, January 26, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is from CreationMoments.com, Jan. 16, 2024: “The surface of the Earth 50 to 150 feet below the great living canopy of the rainforest is a dark, humid, still world dominated by great columns of tree trunks. Within those trunks and some of the giant hollow branches extending from them lies the secret of the life of the canopy itself. A rainforest typically receives 12 or more feet of rain per year. That much rain washes out of the soil most of the nitrates needed by the trees for growth. What the trees need is a rich source of nitrates that is constantly being replenished. And that’s where the bats come in. Typically, these huge trees are hollow inside. Many different kinds of creatures, including fruit bats, enter the hollow trees through various openings. Fruit bats find ideal daytime sleeping rooms inside the great hollow branches that extend like caverns from the hollow tree trunk. The accumulating layer of bat guano inside the tree itself is one of the richest sources of nitrates known. So the bats provide the tree with the nitrates it needs in exchange for a protected home during the day! In a very real sense, the fruit bats are the collection and transport system for the raw materials that make possible the tropical rain forest canopy with its millions of residents. The Creator has devised an ingenious way to provide for the needs of many creatures. Truly, the Lord does provide all living things with their food in precisely the way they need it! Ref.: Science Digest, October, 1978, page 30.”
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).
_____
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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