Friday Church News Notes
Oct. 18, 2024 - Volume 25, Issue 42
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.
Sarah Buteux
JONATHAN EDWARDS’ CHURCH THEN AND NOW (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) was a key figure in the First Great Awakening in America. The revival in the northeastern part of the United States started in his church in Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1734. He preached the new birth and held to the infallible inspiration of Scripture. He believed in a God who is both holy and compassionate, a Judge and a Saviour. He preached salvation through faith in the vicarious atonement of Jesus Christ. Edwards’ famous sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God warned people to flee God’s wrath. Following is an excerpt: “The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present; they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is given; and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its course, when once it is let loose. It is true, that judgment against your evil works has not been executed hitherto; the floods of God's vengeance have been withheld; but your guilt in the mean time is constantly increasing, and you are every day treasuring up more wrath; the waters are constantly rising, and waxing more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere pleasure of God, that holds the waters back, that are unwilling to be stopped, and press hard to go forward. If God should only withdraw his hand from the flood-gate, it would immediately fly open, and the fiery floods of the fierceness and wrath of God, would rush forth with inconceivable fury, and would come upon you with omnipotent power; and if your strength were ten thousand times greater than it is, yea, ten thousand times greater than the strength of the stoutest, sturdiest devil in hell, it would be nothing to withstand or endure it.” Edwards’ church, First Church of Northampton, was founded by English Puritans in 1654. Its third meetinghouse was built in 1737 during Edwards ministry and the Great Awakening. The current building was constructed in 1878 after the previous one was destroyed by fire. It is considered “one of the finest examples of High Victorian Neo-Gothic architecture in America.” It features stained glass windows, an organ built by Ernest Skinner, and a clock weighing 1,600 pounds. In 1988, First Church of Christ of Northampton and First Baptist Church of Northampton combined to form one church known as “The First Churches.” It is a member of World Council of Churches. Though the building is beautiful and historic, the church itself is apostate. It has a form of godliness but denies the power thereof, with no supernatural new birth gospel and no belief in the divinely inspired, inerrant Scripture. First Church “has been a forerunner in welcoming LGBTQ+ people into the life of the church.” In 1996, the church officially became an “Open and Affirming congregation,” meaning it “invites all to worship with us, without regard to differences such as race, gender identity, ability, sexual orientation ... or any other difference that may be misunderstood as a barrier to Christian fellowship.” A rainbow homosexual rights flag is featured on the church sign and the church’s web site, with photos of same-sex couples. The church’s pastor, Sarah Buteux, is shown holding a sign that has God proclaiming, “Be You!” The church promotes contemplative mysticism, including centering prayer, which is a mindless practice that attempts to obtain revelation directly from God.
HAMAS ADMITS 80% OF CASUALTIES ARE TERRORISTS AND THEIR FAMILY MEMBERS (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Hamas Admits,” Israel365News, Oct. 13, 2024: “Recent reports from Israel’s Channel 12 indicate that Hamas privately acknowledged that approximately 80% of the casualties from the war against Israel were affiliated with the organization or are their family members. This revelation casts doubt on claims made by the Biden administration and the United Nations concerning civilian deaths.”
CBS NEWS TELLS REPORTERS NOT TO REFER TO JERUSALEM AS BEING IN ISRAEL (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “CBS News Tells Reporters,” Israel365News, Oct. 11, 2024: “According to a recent report, Mark Memmott, CBS News’s senior director of standards and practices, emailed all of its employees in August, instructing them to ‘be careful with some terms when we talk or write about the news’ from Israel and Gaza. According to the report in The Free Press, the employees were instructed that when referring to Jerusalem, ‘Do not refer to it as being in Israel.’ It should be emphasized that this instruction was issued to thousands of journalists and reporters. ‘Yes, the U.S. embassy is there and the Trump administration recognized it as being Israel’s capital. But its status is disputed. The status of Jerusalem goes to the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel regards Jerusalem as its eternal and undivided capital, while the Palestinians claim East Jerusalem—occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war—as the capital of a future state.’ ... Jerusalem was unified in the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed in its entirety by the Israeli government under the Basic Law: Jerusalem, Capital of Israel passed by the Knesset on 30 July 1980. The US government has recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital under the Jerusalem Embassy Act passed by Congress in 1995.” [CONCLUSION: Jerusalem has been Israel’s capital since David conquered it 3,000 years ago. Two Jewish temples have stood there. This is where Jesus Christ was crucified and rose from the dead. The Bible says a glorified Jerusalem will be the capital of the Messianic kingdom.]
FIRST EUTHANASIA BY SUICIDE POD (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - An American woman became the first person to die in the Sarco pod in Switzerland. “The Sarco pod is a recently developed mobile assisted suicide machine. Once a person gets in and closes the lid, a computerized screen asks several questions, the last being, ‘Do you want to die?’ If the person presses a button indicating ‘yes,’ the machine starts filling with nitrogen, which then kills him or her via hypoxia” (“Sarco suicide pod,” Standing for Freedom, Sept. 25, 2024). The Sarco pod was developed in 2017 by Philip Nitschke, who has participated in hundreds of assisted suicides. The Sarco’s resemblance to a spaceship is “intended to convince its user that he or she is journeying to the great beyond,” Nitschke said (“Meet the Elon Musk of Assisted Suicide,” Newsweek, Dec. 1, 2017). Nitschke says it is the “right of a rational adult to have a peaceful death.” If man were merely an evolved animal, there would be no moral problem with this, because there would be no absolute morality, but that’s not the case. Man is not his own. He has a Creator to whom he is accountable. God’s law says, “Thou shalt not kill.” Death is not a spaceship ride to “the great unknown.” According to the Bible, there are but two destinations, heaven or hell, depending on whether the individual dies with or without the Saviour Jesus Christ. “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation” (Hebrews 9:27-28). (For more on this subject see “Do We Have the Right to Die?” at www.wayoflife.org.)
THE OBITUARY OF MRS. PRAYER MEETING (Friday Church News Notes, October 25, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following anonymous piece has appeared in various publications and frightfully describes the prayer ministry of too many supposedly Bible-believing churches: “Mrs. Prayer Meeting died recently at the First Neglected Church on Worldly Avenue. Born many years ago in the midst of great revivals, she was a strong, healthy child, fed largely on testimony and Bible study, soon grew into worldwide prominence, and was one of the most influential members of the famous church family. For the past several years, Mrs. Prayer Meeting has been failing in health, gradually wasting away until rendered helpless by stiffness of knees, coldness of heart, inactivity and weakness of purpose and will power. At the last she was but a shadow of her former happy self. Her last whispered words were inquiries concerning the strange absence of her loved ones now busy in the markets of trade and places of worldly amusements. Experts, including Dr. Works, Dr. Reform, and Dr. Joiner, disagreed as to the cause of her fatal illness. They had administered large doses of organizations, socials, contests and drives, but to no avail. A postmortem showed that a deficiency of spiritual food, coupled with a lack of faith, heartfelt religion, and general support, were contributing causes. Only a few were present at her death, sobbing over memories of her past beauty and power. In honor of her going, the church doors will be closed on Wednesday nights, except the third Wednesday night of each month when the Ladies Pink Lemonade Society serves refreshments to the Men’s Handball Team.” It has rightly been said that “a prayerful life is always a powerful life; and a prayerless life is always a powerless life.”
GROCERIES, ANT STYLE (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) The following is from CreationMoments.com, September 26, 2024: “Even a small household must have some organization to keep enough food and supplies on hand for the family. Yet, the thousands of members in an ant colony never run short of supplies even though there is no central organization and not one shopping list. Modern science is discovering how the ant’s astonishing system works. An ant colony depends on worker ants to bring in water and supplies. In the morning, workers search mainly for drops of dew that can be carried into the nest. Some of the water is shared with nest mates. Some of the water is delivered to the brood chambers where immature ants are still developing. This water is used to soak the ground to keep the humidity inside the chamber high. Food is likewise collected by the workers and returned to the colony to be shared with every member of the colony. Food is most often shared by regurgitation. To learn how widespread this sharing in the colony is, researchers gave one worker ant sugar water that was radioactively tagged. Within a day, some of the tagged material had been shared with every member of the colony. Within a week, every member of the colony had an equal amount of the tag. This means that through continuous food sharing every member of the colony always has an equal amount of food. When one worker is hungry, she knows that the entire colony is hungry. This simple, yet ingenious grocery system designed by the Creator keeps ant colonies supplied through the sparsest of times. Notes: E. O. Wilson, Professor of Entomology, Harvard University.”
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; Mt. 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” (Ro. 13:11-14).
HAMAS ADMITS 80% OF CASUALTIES ARE TERRORISTS AND THEIR FAMILY MEMBERS (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Hamas Admits,” Israel365News, Oct. 13, 2024: “Recent reports from Israel’s Channel 12 indicate that Hamas privately acknowledged that approximately 80% of the casualties from the war against Israel were affiliated with the organization or are their family members. This revelation casts doubt on claims made by the Biden administration and the United Nations concerning civilian deaths.”
CBS NEWS TELLS REPORTERS NOT TO REFER TO JERUSALEM AS BEING IN ISRAEL (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “CBS News Tells Reporters,” Israel365News, Oct. 11, 2024: “According to a recent report, Mark Memmott, CBS News’s senior director of standards and practices, emailed all of its employees in August, instructing them to ‘be careful with some terms when we talk or write about the news’ from Israel and Gaza. According to the report in The Free Press, the employees were instructed that when referring to Jerusalem, ‘Do not refer to it as being in Israel.’ It should be emphasized that this instruction was issued to thousands of journalists and reporters. ‘Yes, the U.S. embassy is there and the Trump administration recognized it as being Israel’s capital. But its status is disputed. The status of Jerusalem goes to the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel regards Jerusalem as its eternal and undivided capital, while the Palestinians claim East Jerusalem—occupied by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war—as the capital of a future state.’ ... Jerusalem was unified in the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed in its entirety by the Israeli government under the Basic Law: Jerusalem, Capital of Israel passed by the Knesset on 30 July 1980. The US government has recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital under the Jerusalem Embassy Act passed by Congress in 1995.” [CONCLUSION: Jerusalem has been Israel’s capital since David conquered it 3,000 years ago. Two Jewish temples have stood there. This is where Jesus Christ was crucified and rose from the dead. The Bible says a glorified Jerusalem will be the capital of the Messianic kingdom.]
FIRST EUTHANASIA BY SUICIDE POD (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - An American woman became the first person to die in the Sarco pod in Switzerland. “The Sarco pod is a recently developed mobile assisted suicide machine. Once a person gets in and closes the lid, a computerized screen asks several questions, the last being, ‘Do you want to die?’ If the person presses a button indicating ‘yes,’ the machine starts filling with nitrogen, which then kills him or her via hypoxia” (“Sarco suicide pod,” Standing for Freedom, Sept. 25, 2024). The Sarco pod was developed in 2017 by Philip Nitschke, who has participated in hundreds of assisted suicides. The Sarco’s resemblance to a spaceship is “intended to convince its user that he or she is journeying to the great beyond,” Nitschke said (“Meet the Elon Musk of Assisted Suicide,” Newsweek, Dec. 1, 2017). Nitschke says it is the “right of a rational adult to have a peaceful death.” If man were merely an evolved animal, there would be no moral problem with this, because there would be no absolute morality, but that’s not the case. Man is not his own. He has a Creator to whom he is accountable. God’s law says, “Thou shalt not kill.” Death is not a spaceship ride to “the great unknown.” According to the Bible, there are but two destinations, heaven or hell, depending on whether the individual dies with or without the Saviour Jesus Christ. “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation” (Hebrews 9:27-28). (For more on this subject see “Do We Have the Right to Die?” at www.wayoflife.org.)
THE OBITUARY OF MRS. PRAYER MEETING (Friday Church News Notes, October 25, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following anonymous piece has appeared in various publications and frightfully describes the prayer ministry of too many supposedly Bible-believing churches: “Mrs. Prayer Meeting died recently at the First Neglected Church on Worldly Avenue. Born many years ago in the midst of great revivals, she was a strong, healthy child, fed largely on testimony and Bible study, soon grew into worldwide prominence, and was one of the most influential members of the famous church family. For the past several years, Mrs. Prayer Meeting has been failing in health, gradually wasting away until rendered helpless by stiffness of knees, coldness of heart, inactivity and weakness of purpose and will power. At the last she was but a shadow of her former happy self. Her last whispered words were inquiries concerning the strange absence of her loved ones now busy in the markets of trade and places of worldly amusements. Experts, including Dr. Works, Dr. Reform, and Dr. Joiner, disagreed as to the cause of her fatal illness. They had administered large doses of organizations, socials, contests and drives, but to no avail. A postmortem showed that a deficiency of spiritual food, coupled with a lack of faith, heartfelt religion, and general support, were contributing causes. Only a few were present at her death, sobbing over memories of her past beauty and power. In honor of her going, the church doors will be closed on Wednesday nights, except the third Wednesday night of each month when the Ladies Pink Lemonade Society serves refreshments to the Men’s Handball Team.” It has rightly been said that “a prayerful life is always a powerful life; and a prayerless life is always a powerless life.”
GROCERIES, ANT STYLE (Friday Church News Notes, October 18, 2024, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) The following is from CreationMoments.com, September 26, 2024: “Even a small household must have some organization to keep enough food and supplies on hand for the family. Yet, the thousands of members in an ant colony never run short of supplies even though there is no central organization and not one shopping list. Modern science is discovering how the ant’s astonishing system works. An ant colony depends on worker ants to bring in water and supplies. In the morning, workers search mainly for drops of dew that can be carried into the nest. Some of the water is shared with nest mates. Some of the water is delivered to the brood chambers where immature ants are still developing. This water is used to soak the ground to keep the humidity inside the chamber high. Food is likewise collected by the workers and returned to the colony to be shared with every member of the colony. Food is most often shared by regurgitation. To learn how widespread this sharing in the colony is, researchers gave one worker ant sugar water that was radioactively tagged. Within a day, some of the tagged material had been shared with every member of the colony. Within a week, every member of the colony had an equal amount of the tag. This means that through continuous food sharing every member of the colony always has an equal amount of food. When one worker is hungry, she knows that the entire colony is hungry. This simple, yet ingenious grocery system designed by the Creator keeps ant colonies supplied through the sparsest of times. Notes: E. O. Wilson, Professor of Entomology, Harvard University.”
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; Mt. 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” (Ro. 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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