Brutally Honest

Just an Observation....

Posted by guest blogger NickS

I thought you said preaching was outdated?

Posted by guest blogger NickS.

From Irish Calvinist

We are now in the home stretch of the presidential conventions. With the exception of the Olympics, these last several months have seemed like a constant barrage of speeches. The candidates and their respective teams believe that speeches are one of the best mediums for communicating their ideas to the American people.

I thought we were cutting edge?

Does this not sound a bit old fashioned to the sophisticated evangelical pastor? After all, we are told by many ‘experts’ today that talking to people in large chunks of time is not effective. Furthermore, it is often said to be arrogant and archaic to stand up behind a podium and have people sit down while you talk.

But what do you see at the National Conventions? A speaker, a podium, a crowd seated, an appeal to action, and even propositional statements! What’s more, we have panels of talking heads dissecting everything about the speeches with the tenacity of a hyper-calvinist in a Methodist church.

It seems to me that the people who are spending millions of dollars to get their candidates message out actually believe that this venue is appropriate. They have apparently not gotten the evangelical memo outlining the social dynamic of our culture and their inability to listen.  Political experts must have dismissed all of the questioning and imagination that goes on in the contemporary church about the role of the preacher and the delivery of the message, specifically with regard to the audience’s ability to hear and listen. 

In many churches the sermon has been replaced with the talk
The pulpit has been replaced by props, (a stool and the bottle of Snapple).

Yet when the kingdom of man is on the line, and the contestants will spare no expense to win votes how do they rally the congregation?

With speeches.  With one guy standing and delivering the message.

There is obviously no “one size fits all” worship format.  I love Snapple, and hardly ever stand behind the pulpit when I preach.  So what can we learn from political conventions? (We’ve already got the glitz and showmanship) 

That in our day and time, preaching can produce,

- enthusiastic, committed participants who will talk about it for weeks and are committed to the dissemination of the message

- an audience who then go out and acts on with a common goal and common purpose, regardless of the differences between them.

Imagine what would happen if we allowed the eternal word of God to permeate that preaching.  When the message is grace through faith, and peace with God.

NickS

The Subject of Subjectivity

Posted by guest blogger NickS.

The Bible is God’s book, it is a revelation of God, and our thinking must always start with God. Much of the trouble in the Church today is due to the fact that we are so subjective, so interested in ourselves, so egocentric. That is the peculiar error of this present century. Having forgotten God, and having become so interested in ourselves, we become miserable and wretched, and spend our time in ’shallows and in miseries.’

The message of the Bible from beginning to end is designed to bring us back to God, to humble us before God, and to enable us to see our true relationship to Him. And that is the great theme of this Epistle [Ephesians]…We must not start by examining ourselves and our needs microscopically; we must start with God, and forget ourselves. In this Epistle we are taken as it were by the hand by the Apostle and are told that we are going to be given a view of the glory and the majesty of God.

From God’s Ultimate Purpose by Martyn-Lloyd Jones

I ask myself…..

What occupied my thoughts yesterday?

Me or Him?

Did I meditate on the Word, or mediate the call of the world with the call of the Word?

Will today’s deepest thoughts start with “I”?

Drift

PEOPLE DO NOT drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord.
We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance;
we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom;
we drift toward superstition and call it faith.

We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation;
we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism;
we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated.   

D. A. Carson

Obama Wins !!!

Posted by guest blogger NickS.

And it wasn’t as close as we thought it might be…..

Senator Feinstein supported the interests of the National Journal - Composite Liberal Score 71% in 2007.

Senator Kennedy supported the interests of the National Journal - Composite Liberal Score 76.2% in 2007.

Senator Clinton supported the interests of the National Journal - Composite Liberal Score 82.8% in 2007.

Representative Pelosi supported the interests of the National Journal - Composite Liberal Score 92.3% in 2006.

Senator Obama supported the interests of the National Journal - Composite Liberal Score  95.5% in 2007.

National Journal - Composite Liberal Score

National Journal Group Inc. is a leading publisher of magazines, newsletters, books and directories for people who have a professional interest in politics, policy and government. Based in Washington, D.C., National Journal Group Inc. is committed to providing publications and services that are nonpartisan, reliable and of the highest quality."

The ratings are based on calculations by the organization of economic, defense and foreign policy voting records. These percentages are calculated through a complex mathematical formula to determine how liberally a member of Congress voted in relation to the rest of the House or Senate.

Oh, I didn't mean at the convention, I meant in real life.  It's the issues baby.....

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day (UPDATED)

Posted by guest blogger NickS

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
Had rolled along the unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Till ringing, singing on its way
The world revolved from night to day,
A voice, a chime, a chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Most are familiar with the carol, "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day" as sung by Bing Crosby.  This morning, as I dressed for work and contemplated the words of our Pastor this Sunday, the 4 & 5th stanzas hit me as they had not before.  It was not the perfect phrasing and pitch of “The Bing”, nor the memories of Christmases past that moved me.  Not the tree, the lights, the glitz.  It was the reality that in our experience, for the most part, there is no peace on earth.  There is the strong mocking of hate. 

Not unlike the time in which Henry Wadsworth Longfellow penned the poem "Christmas Bells," upon which the carol is based.  Longfellow wrote it on Christmas day 1864 in the midst of the American Civil War.  The news that his son Charles had been wounded in battle compounded the great sadness of the loss of his wife two years prior in an accident at home.

Not unlike the announcement of the Lords birth.  The words “peace on earth” and “glad tidings” are as out of place now as they were 2000 years ago in that Bethlehem field.  The iron grip of Rome, the despotic rule of Herod, the uncertainty of tomorrow, all worked together to fill the heart with fear.   Yet the truth remains,

And in despair I bowed my head
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men.”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

The psalmist knew it and proclaimed:

The cords of death encompassed me
And the terrors of Sheol came upon me;
I found distress and sorrow.

Then I called upon the name of the LORD:
“O LORD, I beseech You, save my life!”
Gracious is the LORD, and righteous;
Yes, our God is compassionate.

The LORD preserves the simple;
I was brought low, and He saved me.

Return to your rest, O my soul,
For the LORD has dealt bountifully with you.
Psalm 116:3-7 (NASB)

I pray that this season would be one of rest and peace.  Not the worldly kind of “break in the action” that many will experience, but the supernatural peace of God as He dwells among us.

UPDATED: From commenter BlueSky, some historical perspective on the author of the referenced poem:

Just a sidenote...
In 1861 Longfellow had an ideal home; a lovely wife and 5 children. When the Civil War started another tragedy befell Longfellow personally. His wife had been cutting his youngest daughter's hair and wanted to save a lock of her curls. She was heating some sealing wax and a breeze blew some hot wax onto her dress, igniting it in flames. She ran to her husband's study where he tried to put out the flames with a rug, but it was too small, so he embraced her with his own arms and put the fire out. His hands, arms and face became severely burned. His wife had been so badly burned that she died the next morning and he was in the hospital for the burns he had suffered and missed attending her funeral. It was because of the burns to his face that whenever you see a picture of Longfellow he has a long white beard. His skin was so sensitive he couldn't shave. For three years he wrote in his journal that he had no peace nor happiness in his life any longer. During this time his son Charles was wounded in battle with the bullet hitting his spine. Longfellow became even more sullen. Then in 1864, Lincoln was re-elected president and the war seemed to be coming to an end. His son became healed of his wound and Longfellow's faith became restored, so on Christmas Day, 1864 he penned the words to this song which was a retelling of his personal suffering and lack of peace he had experiencing tragedy and the confidence and faith he had now.

Ted Kennedy tied to Testosterone Tumbling in American Males?

FRIDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- The testosterone-fueled American male may be losing his punch. Over the past two decades, levels of the sex hormone in U.S. men have been falling steadily, a new study finds.

Ok, so I’m not totally surprised. Most of what I see has indicated this feminization for quite some time. This piece of info however was kind of telling…

He and his colleagues analyzed blood samples -- along with health and other information -- from about 1,500 men in the greater Boston area who took part in the Massachusetts Male Aging Study. That study collected data in 1987-89, 1995-97, and 2002-04.

So, the land of Ted Kennedy is losing its testosterone. Science is without an explanation for this male hormone reduction in Boston.

The reasons for this trend are unclear, said researchers at the New England Research Institutes in Waterdown, Mass. They noted that neither aging nor certain other health factors, such as smoking or obesity, can fully explain the decline.

Perhaps the Teddy K link can explain it. Guess by extension we could say that the land of Jesse Helms must have the most testosterone in the country.  Until they figure it out, I’m going with this theory.

Perhaps its de-evolution at work.

The findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism. You can read some of it here

..Nicks

What will the Non-Italian Pope say about this?

Kidnap Christians, urges purported al Qaeda in Iraq tape

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/09/28/iraq.main/index.html

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- In an audiotape posted on Muslim Web sites Thursday, a man purported to be the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq called for an escalation of violence and the kidnapping of "Christian dogs" -- mainly Westerners -- in exchange for a cleric jailed in the United States.

"I here announce the beginning of a military campaign to uproot the infidels," said the speaker, who is believed to be new al Qaeda in Iraq chief Abu Hamza al-Muhajer.

CNN has not been able to confirm that the voice on the tape belongs to al-Muhajer. 

"Ramadan is a month of jihad and martyrdom," the speaker said, referring to the Muslim holy month that continues until late October.

"I call every free mujahedeen to get his strength together and work hard during this holy month. May God send our way a few Christian dogs to imprison and exchange for our sheik."

..Nicks

Who’s got the ball?

There is trouble brewin' across the ocean.  Here are three excerpts to clue you in....

Takeover of Europe creeps forward

by Mona Charen,  Syndicated Columnist

As Danish embassies and European Union offices smolder in Beirut, Damascus, Gaza and Tehran - the result of a junior varsity jihad - the time could not be more apt for Bruce Bawer's "While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within," due out at the end of this month. Bawer is a gay American with a flair for languages who moved to Europe in 1999 to escape what he perceived to be the narrow-mindedness of the Christian right in America.

The move changed him. It also afforded a front row seat at the clash of civilizations now flaring into flames. If American Christian conservatives seemed intolerant to Bawer, they were cream puffs in comparison with the Islamofascists who are multiplying in Europe.

(ed)

The Muslim world clearly is not composed solely of murderous fanatics - but only the most self-deluded would deny that the umma is under the sway of its most radical, medieval and intolerant members. It is they who have the wind at their backs at this moment of history. Forty percent of Britain's Muslims hold a favorable view of Osama bin Laden. Hopeful Westerners continue to call for moderate Muslims to speak up. But, as Bawer asks, "[W]here were the moderate Muslims? British Muslims seemed sincerely to deplore the London attacks. But though hundreds of thousands of them had marched in protest against the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, 7/7 occasioned no sizable Muslim protest demonstration against Islamic terror ... if that silent majority existed at all, it had to be one of the most silent majorities ever. It had remained silent after 9/11, Madrid, Beslan, and van Gogh's murder."

(ed)

Into this boiling cauldron (recall the October 2005 riots in France) insert demography. Muslim families have multiple children, and European families are failing to have babies at even replacement levels. Historian Bernard Lewis has predicted that Europe will be majority Muslim by the end of this century "at the very latest."

In Stockholm, Muslim teenagers can be seen wearing a T-shirt that says "2030 - then we take over."

The coming takeover of Europe

The Coming Muslim Takeover of Europe June 3rd, 2006
http://www.americanthinker.com/

[Book review of While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West From Within by Bruce Bawer; published February of 2006; 237 pages; $23.95]

This stunner of a book about Continental Islam has two main themes. The first is that Europe has a horrific Muslim immigration and reproduction problem. European Muslims are expanding their numbers almost exponentially, and they are not being assimilated or integrated into European culture. This radically new and explosive demographic, according to the author, is not being converted to Western liberalism or adopting Western life-styles.

While Europe Slept argues that while Europe is currently only about ten percent Islamic-vs. two percent for America-if present trends continue it will only take a generation or two for Muslims to become the majority. The once-noble Continent will become what intellectual fellow-traveler Bat Ye'or in 2005 called "Eurabia." The shocking claim by Bruce Bawer is that well before 2050, most of Europe is likely to become an outpost of Islamdom governed by Sharia. Europe will be alien to Western culture and an enemy of Western Civilization.

The second theme of this almost shattering book is that Europe today is a hellhole of leftist multiculturalism, far worse than anything in America, and even far worse than almost anyone in America suspects. American expatriate Bawer-who has lived the past ten years in various European countries, mostly Holland and Norway-is almost uniformly horrified by every country he resides in or visits. According to him, political correctness and multiculturalism are "a habit of thought that in America is an annoyance but in Europe is a veritable religion."

Bawer excoriates his European friends for their propensity to display phony "respect" and "understanding" of the various foreigners in their midst, especially Muslims. He blasts their cult-like belief in the mantra of multiculturalism and their unlimited "belief in peace and reconciliation through dialog," even with Muslims who emphatically reject peace, reconciliation, and dialog as methodologies or ideals.

While Europe Slept also makes the interesting observation that there is virtually no American-style "religious right" to oppose growing Muslim power. Virtually the whole Continent is atheist or de facto atheist. Thus in Europe the religious right is the Muslims.

(ed)

Perhaps the most terrifying part of the book is the way Muslims everywhere are already confidently planning to rule Europe and make it part of the caliphate. A popular Swedish t-shirt reads simply "2030-then we take over." With France still only 12% Muslim, the leading Parisian newspaper Le Monde seems to have already surrendered. In 2004 it praised France for "the fact of its having and accepting the role of the first Muslim country of Europe."

(ed)

By right, any Muslim or Muslim gang can rape any uncovered girl. Afterwards, the girl is properly killed by relatives to end the "shame" of her family.  The rapists, naturally, go unpunished. And because native Europeans differ on this practice, Muslims scornfully think of all white men as weak and effeminate, for not being able to control their women. They think of all normally-dressed Western women as honorless low-lifes and unloved harlots, valuable only for group violation and subsequent termination.

Among the nightmare statistics cited by the book are these:

1. 80% of the women in Oslo's shelter system are Muslims fleeing abusive families, husbands, and boyfriends;
2. Danish Muslims make up 5% of the population but 40% of the welfare rolls;
3. refugee-friendly Switzerland is already 20% Muslim;
4. the world's most wonderful city (in my view) Amsterdam is now majority Muslim;
5. 70% of all French prisoners are Muslim;
6. the four London bombers that killed 56 in July of 2005 received almost a million dollars in welfare benefits.

The Butterfly Effect

Islam, cartoons and the ongoing battle
By BRENDAN BERNHARD

There's a popular scientific theory known as "the butterfly effect," in which a small insect beating its wings in one corner of the world can start a chain reaction that leads to a hurricane in another. Like bird flu, the butterfly effect appears to have transmuted and taken up residence among humans. Radical Islamists seem particularly susceptible to the virus, as demonstrated by the global controversy over the Danish cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad. The butterfly effect, Islamist-style, goes like this: An imam flaps the sleeves of his gown in Copenhagen, and five months later angry mobs torch Scandinavian embassies in Damascus and Beirut.   

(ed)

"Muslims have a dream of living in an Islamic society," declared a Danish Muslim leader in 2000. "This dream will surely be fulfilled in Denmark . . . We will eventually be a majority."

A T-shirt popular among young Muslims in Stockholm reads:   "2030 - then we take over."

In many places in Europe, agitation for the transfer of sovereignty has already begun. In France, a public official met with an imam at the edge of Roubaix's Muslim district, out of respect for his declaration of the neighborhood as Islamic territory to which she had no right of access. In Britain, imams have pressed the government to officially designate certain areas of Bradford as being under Muslim, not British, law. In Denmark, Muslim leaders have sought the same kind of control over parts of Copenhagen. And in Belgium, Muslims living in the Brussels neighborhood of Sint-Jans-Molenbeek already view it not as part of Belgium but as an area under Islamic jurisdiction in which Belgians are not welcome.

One can see the beginnings of such movements in the U.S. Last November in New York, a mosque got city permission to celebrate the end of Ramadan in Tompkins Square Park, the secular heart of the ultra-secular East Village, at 7:30 on a weekday morning. Huge loudspeakers were set up, blaring the Islamic call to prayer in piercingly nasal Arabic for about half an hour, sufficient to wake up people a block away. (The East Village is not noted for its early risers.) Handsomely printed signs were posted on the park fence wishing all a Happy Eid courtesy of the Islamic Council of America, Inc. An African-American convert gave a talk about peace and brotherly love, but, predictably, the tone in which he delivered it was hostile and aggressive. Then a prayer service was held by some 200 to 300 men, with a handful of shrouded women marooned pathetically 20 yards behind them. Was this just an innocent little end-of-Ramadan celebration, or the calculated placement of a cultural marker, an initial bid for spiritual and geographic territory of the kind Bauer describes in his book? Most of the early birds out walking their dogs took a studiously "see no evil, hear no evil" approach, but one black teenager, seeing me take notes, winked and said: "They're plottin', man!"   Which is hardly an unusual line of thought.

A few days earlier I'd paid a visit to a well-educated Indian friend, who works across from a Middle-Eastern restaurant. He complained that Arabs were going in and out of it all day. "Well, what are they doing?" I asked, presuming they were going in and out for the usual reasons: to eat. "What the hell do you think they are doing?" he rebuked me sternly, eyes practically popping out of his head. "They are conspiring to kill Americans!"  So that's the word on the street in New York, at least on the basis of an unsolicited, highly unscientific poll of two. On the street in London last week, however, there were words that seemed to confirm those New York words, and then some. Placards held up by radical Muslims protesting the Danish cartoons included these charmers:

"Europe Is the Cancer, Islam Is the Answer";
"Exterminate Those Who Slander Islam";
"Europe, Take Some Lessons From 9/11";
and
"Prepare for the REAL Holocaust."

(ed)

None of the protesters was arrested, despite all the hate-crime laws on the books. (In January, a student at Oxford University was taken to court for "homophobic comments" after saying, "Excuse me, do you realize your horse is gay?" to a mounted police officer.) 

...Nicks

Radical Christian Alert!!

The American Family Association has issued the following statement:

NBC, Madonna Set To Mock The Crucifixion of Christ

Following the lead of Rosie O'Donnell and ABC, NBC has decided to join in the bashing of Christians by airing a Madonna special in November. A specific date has not been released.

In the show, Madonna, wearing a fake crown of thorns, descends on a suspended mirrored, disco ball-type cross. When some Christian leaders complained about the mockery, NBC ignored their concerns.

Making mockery of the crucifixion of Christ has been a trademark of Madonna for many years. In 1989 she had a video for the hit song "Like A Prayer." The video featured burning crosses, statues crying blood and Madonna--representing Jesus--freeing a saint from his sexual repression by seducing him. This is the same Madonna who once said, "Crucifixes are sexy because there's a naked man on them."

Kevin Reilly, an executive at NBC, said Madonna considered the scene mocking the crucifixion of Christ the highlight of her show. "We (NBC) viewed it and didn't see it as being inappropriate." Madonna considers mocking the crucifixion of Jesus the highlight of her show and NBC agrees

And the call to arms for all radical Christians.....

Take Action

1. Help us secure one million emails to NBC asking the network not to air the Madonna special.

2. Call your local NBC affiliate and ask them not to run the Madonna special.

3. Help get the word out about Madonna's mocking the crucifixion by forwarding this email to your entire mailing list and urge them to take action.

4. Print out the AFA Pass Along sheet and distribute at your Sunday School class and church. Ask your pastor to encourage members to send an email.

Conspicuously absent are the words

Burn, Kill, or Destroy,

Or as the Mujahideen Shura Council put it,

"(May) God enable us to slit their throats, and make their money and descendants the bounty of the mujahideen,"

I thought you should know.  Rosie won't tell ya.....

..Nicks