News from a different perspective

FRIDAY CHURCH NEWS NOTES

August 13, 2010, Volume 11, Issue 33

The Friday Church News Notes is designed for use in churches and is published by Way of Life Literature’s Fundamental Baptist Information Service. Unless otherwise stated, the Notes are written by David Cloud. Of necessity we quote from a wide variety of sources, but this does not imply an endorsement. For instructions on how to unsubscribe to this list or to change mailing addresses, please consult the information paragraph at the end.

ANN COULTER TO SPEAK AT “GAY” CONVENTION (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – Ann Coulter, a political commentator who is often held forth as one of the bright stars of the conservative movement in America, will be the featured speaker at Homocon 2010 in New York City. The meeting is staged by GOProud, the only national organization of “gay conservatives.” (GOP usually stands for the Republican Party, though we do not know if it has that meaning in this context.) This highlights the extreme weakness of the “conservative” movement for the Bible believer. What good does it do to fight for constitutional conservatism when the root problem of America’s ills is moral and spiritual? It’s like putting a bandaid on a cancer. The U.S. Constitution could not have been created in this wicked, apostate generation, and it will not be preserved in this generation. The only hope is for true spiritual revival in the churches, and that would require separation from the things that God hates. Many Independent Baptists and fundamentalists are yoked together with unbelievers and immoral people for the sake of “saving America.” That is disobedience to the Bible, which says, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness” (2 Corinthians 6:14). We are never going to get God’s power and blessing by disobeying Him. Furthermore, Bible believers are already being persecuted and harassed by homosexuals across the land, and this persecution is increasing each year. Will these “gay conservatives” speak out against the so-called hate crimes laws and the persecution of Christians who believe that homosexuality is a sin?

MEGACHURCH PASTOR SLAMS “NORMAL” CHURCHES (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – In a recent sermon, Perry Noble, pastor of the four-campus NewSpring Church in South Carolina, slammed traditional churches mercilessly. Responding to criticisms that his church is too loud and resembles a concert, Noble said, “I don’t want to be normal when it comes to church in America because normal is dehydrated, normal is dead, normal is predictable, normal is boring, normal is lifeless, and when the tomb is empty and Jesus is alive and I’ve crossed over from death to life, praise God, I don’t want to be normal!” (“S.C. Pastor,” Christian Post, Aug. 4, 2010). By Noble’s strange thinking, before rock & roll was brought into the house of God a few years ago every church was dehydrated, dead, predictable, boring, and lifeless. Until a bare 40 years ago, there were NO churches like NewSpring, and there had not been any for 2,000 years. No Sunday morning rock & roll parties. None. Nowhere. All of the churches then were “normal” and “traditional” in that respect. Noble is confusing a worldly rock & roll party with godly spiritual excitement, but they are not the same. Rock & roll is definitely spiritual, but it is the spirit of the world, the flesh, and the devil. Any man that confuses rock & roll with godly spiritual excitement is far too blind to lead God’s people.

MEN WHO WERE CONVERTED TRYING TO DISPROVE THE BIBLE (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – To believe the Bible is not blind religious faith. It is testable, and that is scientific. Richard Dawkins and his fellow raging atheists haven’t seriously tested it. Many wiser men–such as Gilbert West, George Lyttelton, Frank Morison (Albert Henry Ross), Simon Greenleaf, William Mitchell Ramsay, Josh McDowell, Richard Lumsden, Gary Parker, Lee Strobel, and Jobe Martin–have made the effort to pursue the evidence rather than rejecting it out-of-hand based on a non-scientific principle that miracles can’t happen and a Supreme God doesn’t exist. The aforementioned men, and countless others over the past 2,000 years, set out to disprove the Bible but ended up publishing books defending it, instead. One of the first to do this was the brilliant scholar Paul in the first century. Dawkins personally knows some men who have followed in Paul’s footsteps in moving from skepticism to faith in Christ. Of course, Dawkins seems to consider himself a cut above the common yokels, but these men are not common yokels (not that being an “ordinary person” is a disadvantage when it comes to possessing wisdom), and they all approached the Bible skeptically at first, being convinced only by the evidence. “To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by MANY INFALLIBLE PROOFS” (Acts 1:3).

DREAM HOME VACATION LAKES DISAPPEAR (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – At least three lakes lined with vacation homes have disappeared in the last few years in the States. Last month Lake Delhi in Iowa drained when a dam broke. Millions of dollars in property values disappeared when hundreds of vacation homes and permanent residences lost their lakefront views overnight. In June 2008, Lake Delton in Wisconsin overflowed and then nearly emptied in one day. It is a vacation haven for many Chicago residents. In June 2004, Lake Chesterfield near St. Louis, Missouri, disappeared over a matter of days when a sink hole opened up. Residents who had spent large amounts of money for beautiful lakeside property were left facing a large, smelly mud flat. One 74-year-old retired resident who had purchased an expensive condominium for its view said, “It’s disheartening, getting out on your deck and seeing this. One day it’s a beautiful lake, and now, bingo, it’s gone” (AP, June 11, 2004). This reminds us of the brevity of life and the necessity of setting our priorities right. The first priority, of course, is to be saved and have our sins forgiven through Christ’s blood so that death does not take us into eternal judgment. The second priority is to put Christ and His business first. Those who have hopes and dreams only for this fleeting world will always be the losers. Jesus told the parable of the rich man who stored up his wealth for himself and determined to live the rest of his life in ease. “I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?” (Luke 12:19-20). Jesus summarized the wise philosophy of life in these words: “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (Matthew 6:38).

FACEBOOK ADDS FUEL TO HIGH DIVORCE RATE (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – The following is by Brian Snider <bksnider@gmail.com> — “Whether Facebook is to blame, or is simply part of the problem, the fact remains that a UK law firm recently went through all their divorce petitions and found that one in five mentioned Facebook in some manner. One of the reasons for the explosion in the popularity of Facebook is the fact that you can easily look up old school mates or acquaintances from the past. What is your high school sweetheart doing today? You are just a few clicks away from finding out. No doubt, many marriages have been ruined because one of the parties connected or reconnected with someone they had no business talking to. Mark Keenan, Managing Director of Divorce-Online said: ‘I had heard from my staff that there were a lot of people saying they had found out things about their partners on Facebook and I decided to see how prevalent it was I was really surprised to see 20 per cent of all the petitions containing references to Facebook. The most common reason seemed to be people having inappropriate sexual chats with people they were not supposed to.’ Flirty emails and messages found on Facebook pages are increasingly being cited as evidence against a spouse. One 35-year-old woman even discovered her husband was divorcing her via Facebook. Emma Brady was distraught to read that her marriage was over when her husband updated his status on the site to read, ‘Neil Brady has ended his marriage to Emma Brady.’ Last year a 28-year-old woman ended her marriage after discovering her husband had been having a virtual affair with someone in cyberspace he had never met. WHAS News in Louisville, KY, recently reported on a man who said that Facebook led to his divorce. He said that his ex-wife went to her high school reunion and saw an old flame, but the meeting didn’t stop there.  His wife and the old flame started to message each other through Facebook. The divorcee says he went into her account, saw inappropriate messages and the marriage went downhill from there. ‘Facebook creates a lot of temptation,’ he said. One divorce attorney said that in the past, ‘If there was an affair in a divorce case it was usually a co-worker that was involved. Nowadays, it’s just as likely to be somebody from an entirely different city and a lot of that has to do with Facebook and how easy it is to reconnect with old flames.’”

SBC’S WORLDLINESS AND SPIRITUAL COMPROMISE 60 YEARS AGO (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – The wretched worldliness that permeates the Southern Baptist Convention is not a new phenomenon. Sixty years ago, Hovie Lister, frontman of the Statesmen gospel quartet, represented the spiritual backsliding that was not uncommon within the Convention. Lister, an ordained SBC preacher, not only was one of the early forerunners of Christian rock, but he was also a 32nd degree Mason. When Ivan Tribe asked him in 2001 if he had gotten much criticism for his Masonic membership from within the Southern Baptist ranks, Lister replied “that he had received very little, in part because so many Southern Baptist ministers were numbered among his Masonic Brethren” (“Hovie Franklin Lister: A Legend in Southern Gospel,” Scottish Rite Journal of Freemasonry, 2001). For a Christian to join a secret organization that is permeated with pagan beliefs and holds to a false gospel of salvation through good works and religion is strictly and solemnly forbidden by God’s Word (e.g., 2 Corinthians 6:14-17; 11:1-4; Ephesians 5:11; 2 Timothy 3:5). As for Lister’s music, he was one of the men who broke down the wall of separation from the world in Southern Gospel in the 1940s. Lister’s style, “which differed from his predecessors in his adoption of jazz, soul and ragtime idioms over the staid solemn accompaniment of prior generations, influenced the sound of gospel and CCM in the later 20th century” (Wikipedia). Spiritually discerning saints of that day deridingly called it “Broadway Gospel.” Lister justified his approach by claiming he was keeping kids out of the world. “If it takes shaking my hair down, beating a piano like Liberace or Piano Red to keep these young people out of beer joints and the rear seats of cars, I’ll do it.” He said, “I get results; that’s what counts.” I don’t know what kind of results he got, but his jazzy music didn’t keep the kids of the world. I was born one year after Lister founded the Statesmen in 1948 and grew up in an SBC congregation that loved ragtime Southern Gospel, and I can assure you that it had no spiritual impact on our lives. I don’t recall one kid in that church that had a real testimony of salvation. It was as worldly an outfit as you can imagine, and in my experience that was true of all of the SBC churches in our area. Preachers who throw away separation always have a good excuse, but it doesn’t work. 1 Corinthians 15:33 ALWAYS comes into play. “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.” I’m not warning about this because I want to mock the SBC and degrade Lister’s memory.  I’m sure there are many things that could be praised in the man’s life, but that is not the point. I am trying to warn my fellow Independent Baptists, many of whom are headed down the same road that the SBC traveled long ago.

CCM’S SLIPPERY SLOPE (Friday Church News Notes, August 13, 2010, www.wayoflife.org, fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) – The following is excerpted from Graham West’s <tbbc_mem@aapt.net.au> excellent presentation “The Rhythm of Rock,” which is available as an e-video download from Way of Life Literature. “Dan Lucarini, a former contemporary worship leader, warns that the rock rhythm affects us like a musical drug. ‘Though it may be subtly introduced, the listener soon develops a craving for it. The flesh demands more and more, just like an addict, and there is no turning back’ (Why I Left the Contemporary Christian Music Movement). This sets up an inevitable trend away from traditional church music. In chapter 17 of his book, Dan writes, ‘In reality, what happens over time is a steady slide down the slippery slope away from all traditional music into the latest, edgiest contemporary styles.’ I like Dan’s illustration of a slippery slope. I can remember when we were children. We had this particular park where we would go, and it had a very steep grassy slope. And we all had our pieces of cardboard, and with these we would slide down at our own risk. I was probably the littlest of all the kids, and for me it was a pretty scary thing. I remember when you first started off, if you really wanted to stop yourself you could. But if you didn’t stop yourself immediately, then pretty soon you would reach the point of no return, and like it or not you would wind up at the bottom of that hill. That’s exactly what it’s like when a conservative church once begins to dabble in CCM. Like it or not, they will wind up at the bottom of that hill, and they will get there at an alarming rate. Whether you understand it or not, once you begin listening to soft rock, immediately you begin sliding down that slippery slope to the more aggressive forms of rock. This is because the rock ballad begins to orientate the whole way of perceiving music: around rhythm and away from melody. Your musical interests will change. The hymns and songs of the past that seemed such excellent vehicles for worship will suddenly sound dull in comparison to your newly acquired tastes. It’s a progression I’ve seen it over and over again in the lives of Christians. It’s like a downward spiral. It happens in the lives of individuals; it happens in the lives of families; it happens in the lives of churches. The trend is really all that we would expect, because people are only following their CCM idols as they in turn faithfully follow the world and its trend of ever-increasing musical degradation. In the past 50 years in the West, as our culture has become progressively more fleshly the musical focus of society has been increasingly dominated by complex, sensual rhythm. So here we are in the 21st century with rap, the world’s number two selling music format, almost completely devoid of any melody whatsoever. Over time the musical ear has become disorientated. Once it was attuned to melody, but the addictive, sensual rhythms of rock & roll have carried us swiftly down that slippery slope to the place where our ear is now tuned to rhythm. The church, sadly, has followed this same corrupt trend.”

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). This material is sent only to those who personally subscribe to the Fundamental Baptist Information Service mailing list. To SUBSCRIBE, go to http://www.wayoflife.org/wayoflife/subscribe.html.  TO UNSUBSCRIBE OR CHANGE ADDRESSES, go to the very bottom of any email received from us and click “Manage My Subscription.” Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org.