Jackie Hill Perry on how the church can reach those who are LGBT—
Was the Constitution written in a way that was designed to protect freedom and limit the government’s size? Here is how Robert George answers that—
Voddie Baucham talks about how to fight pornography—
Re. Trent Franks makes a passionate appeal for Planned Parenthood to be defunded—
Bobby Conway talks with J. Warner Wallace, a cold case detective, about how he uses his investigative skills to examine the existence of God—
“Stress is believing you can do more than your human frame can take.” —Dr. Archibald Hart
“In short, the blessing of Christ means having a life that is pleasing to the Lord. It’s an inner knowing from the Holy Ghost that as God looks on your life, He says, ‘I’m pleased with you, My son, My daughter. There is nothing between us to hinder our communion and relationship.’” —David Wilkerson
Cold-case detective J. Warner Wallace talks about inculpatory and exculpatory evidence in terms of God’s existence. It is quite fascinating.
Even if it is a scientific journal, don’t trust everything you read. This study shows that over half of psychological studies cannot be reproduced.
If you want to know about Islam from an insider’s perspective, Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus by Nabeel Qureshi is simply a phenomenal book! Check out my book review by clicking here. Below are just a few of the quotes I found quite educational.
“There is much division in Islam. The best determination of whether a man is Muslim is if he exclusively declares that Allah is God and Mohammad is Allah’s messenger. Beyond this point, there is great diversity in Islam.”
“There is no book of sharia. We must derive the law from a hierarchy of sources using a process of jurisprudence called fiqh. The first and greatest source is the Quran. Nothing can supersede the Quran because it is the word of Allah. But the Koran is not comprehensive. As Muslims, there is much we must do and believe that is not found in the Quran. For this, we go to the second source, hadith. The hadith elaborate and clarify what is found in the Quran, but they never contradict. There is no contradiction in Islam. If a hadith is found in any way to contradict the Quran, then it is inauthentic and must be disregarded. If no hadith can be found to clarify an issue, then we must turn to the third source of sharia: the ulema, Muslim scholars who are wise and experienced in Islam.”
“Muftis from different schools of thought have different precedents and therefore provide different fatwas. Each denomination differs on what hadith they consider accurate. Since the hadith are the second rung of sharia, these differences of opinion have real consequences. Many of the differences between the ways Sunnis and Shias practice Islam are over this very matter. Their books of hadith are disparate. This difference, combined with the Shia position regarding the authority of imams, results in a significantly different view of sharia. … Most Muslims do not know these things. They know Islam to the extent that they practice it, and these are matters for the learned.”
“Christians believe Jesus is God incarnate, and this is a necessary belief for orthodox Christianity. Muslims believe that Jesus is no more than a prophet, and to consider Him God incarnate would be blasphemy and would cause one to be condemned to hell eternally, according to the Quran.”
“Regarding Jesus, there are two issues on which Muslims particularly disagree with Christians: that Jesus died on the Cross and that Jesus claimed to be God. The Quran specifically denies both of these beliefs.”
“Sahih Bukhari…is the most trustworthy book of hadith, compiled by Imam Bukhari. The hadith were not collected into the books until a long time after Mohammad’s death. Many false hadith had been fabricated, and it was difficult to determine which ones were accurate. Imam Bukhari sifted through five hundred thousand hadith and pick out the five thousand most accurate.”
“The earliest historical records show that Mohammad launched offensive military campaigns and used violence at times to accomplish his purposes. He used the term jihad in both spiritual and physical contexts, but the physical jihad is the one Mohammad strongly emphasizes. The peaceful practice of Islam hinges on later, often Western, interpretations of Mohammad’s teachings, whereas the more violent variations of Islam are deeply rooted in orthodoxy and history.”
“The Bible and the Quran were nothing alike. Not in the slightest. … Mohammad dictated the contents of the Quran to his scribes over a period of twenty-three years. Only after his death was the Quran collected into a book. Verses that had been dictated years or decades apart are frequently found side-by-side in the Quran, often with no obvious connection. The result is that Muslims placed relatively little weight on surrounding passages when trying to interpret sections of the Quran.”
“Almost everything Muslims know about Mohammad comes to them orally, rarely from primary sources. Unlike Christians learning about Jesus from the Bible, the Quran has very little to say about Mohammad.”
“Mohammad’s first biography, Sirat Rasul Allah by Ibn Ishaq, comes down to our date only through the transmission of a later biographer, Ibn Hisham. In his introduction, Ibn Hisham explains that he altered the story of Mohammad’s life. ‘Things which it is disgraceful to discuss, matters which would distressed certain people, and such reports as [my teacher] (sic) told me he could not accept as trustworthy—all these things I have omitted.’”
“According to the hadith, Mohammad named four men as the best teachers of the Quran. The first one was Abdullah ibn Mas’ud, whome Mohammad distinguished as the foremost expert of the Quran. The last one was Ubay ibn Ka’b, whom Sahih Bukhari identifies as the best reciter of the Quran. These were the men that Mohammad hand selected as the best teachers of the Quran, but as I studied the early sources, I found that they did not agree with the final Quran, which has been passed down as today’s version. They did not even agree with each other. … Ubay is known to have had 116 chapters in his Quran, two more than Zaid’s edition. Ibn Mas’ud had only 111 chapters in his Quran, insisting that the additional chapters in Zaid’s Quran and Ubay’s Quran were just prayers, not Quranic recitation.”
“In Islam, there is only one unforgivable sin, shirk, the belief that someone other than Allah is God. Shirk is specifically discussed in the context of Jesus in 5:72. He who believes Jesus is God, ‘Allah has forbidden Heaven for him, and his abode will be the Hellfire.’”
“All suffering is worth it to follow Jesus. He is amazing.”
“Are our ears ever open? Are we eager listeners? As ready to hear as God is to speak? Oh, how much we lose of happy wisdom, simply from not listening!” —Horatius Bonar
“It would be a great folly and a great tragedy if a man loved his wedding band more than he loved his bride. But that is what this passage [Romans 1:22-23] says has happened. Human beings have fallen in love with the echo of God’s excellency in creation and lost the ability to hear the incomparable, original shout of love [Psalm 19:1-2].” —John Piper
Charles Spurgeon was a Calvinist, which means he held to the doctrine of predestination, but read how he pulled together both predestination and freewill. “It is a wonderful thing how God effects His purpose while still the creature is free. They who think that predestination and the fulfillment of the divine purpose is contrary to the free-agency of man, know not what they say, nor whereof they affirm. It would be no miracle for God to effect His own purpose, if He were dealing with stocks and stones, with granite and with trees; but this is the miracle of miracles, that the creatures are free, absolutely free, and yet the divine purpose stands. Herein is wisdom. This is a deep unsearchable. Man walks without a fetter, yet treads in the very steps which God ordained him to tread in, as certainly as though manacles had bound him to the spot. Man chooses his own seat, selects his own position, guided by his will he chooses sin, or guided by divine grace he chooses the right, and yet in his choice, God sits as Sovereign on the throne; not disturbing, but still over-ruling, and proving Himself to be able to deal as well with free creatures as with creatures without freedom, as well able to effect His purpose when He has endowed men with thought, and reason, and judgment, as when He had only to deal with the solid rocks and the imbedded sea.” —Charles Spurgeon
J. Warner Wallace asks, “Are moral truths a product of culture? Can they be explained by purely naturalistic forces?”
[VIDEO] Are you on the wrong side of history? Check out Jonah Goldberg’s insightful commentary on this question—
I have a family member who works in predominately Muslim areas of the world. I recently asked him how I could learn more about Muslims and the Islamic belief system, and he highly recommended Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus by Nabeel Quereshi. I am so glad he did!
This book is told in the narrative style of an autobiography, as Nabeel walks us through his devout Muslim upbringing, and the conversations and confrontations that got him thinking about his religion in contrast to Christianity. The book has a “documentary” feel to it, as Nabeel takes us inside his home, school and mosque to let us see his life portrayed almost in real-time. Many of the conversations include Arabic phrases, which Nabeel footnotes at the beginning of the book, and then continues to use without the footnoted translation later, allowing the reader to become more immersed in his world.
Nabeel states his three main purposes for his book:
In my mind, he accomplished all three of these purposes beautifully. In addition, I discovered a whole new way to pray for my Muslim friends, as well as feeling like I may now carry on a more intelligent conversation with them about their cherished beliefs.
I too highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn more about what Muslims believe.
“What we long to see and know is a Person Whose power is unlimited, Whose kindness is tender, and Whose purpose is single and unflinching. Novelists and poets and movie-makers and TV writers now and then create a shadow of this Person. But they can no more fill our longing to worship than this month’s National Geographic can satisfy my longing for the Grand Canyon. We must have the real thing. We must see the Original of all power and kindness and purposefulness. We must see and worship the risen Christ.” —John Piper
“Brethren, we have no right to thrust a brother into the ministry until he has first given evidence of his own conversion, and has also given proof not only of being a good average worker but something more. If he cannot labor in the church before he pretends to be a minister, he is good for nothing. If he cannot perform all the duties of membership with zeal and energy, and if he is not evidently a consecrated man whilst he is a private Christian, certainly you do not feel the guidance of God’s Holy Spirit to bid him enter the ministry. No man has a right to aspire to come into that office until he has shown that he is really devoted to Christ by having served Him as others have done.” —Charles Spurgeon
“People of our time are losing the power of celebration. Instead of celebrating we seek to be amused or entertained. To be entertained is a passive state, it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle. Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence and appreciation.” —Abraham Joshua Heschel
Exactly right: The “prosperity” gospel creates poor Christians.
The messed-up thinking of Margaret Sanger that is still seen in Planned Parenthood’s practices today.
A good apologetic piece: Reasons to believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Once again Murray Vassar gets it right…
Speak out about abortion: check out the #callhimemmett campaign.
“The Kingdom of God, as Jesus envisioned it, was not simply for then and there. Jesus announced a Kingdom that had come. His preaching and teaching lead us to understand that the Kingdom is very much a ‘here and now’ reality [Matthew 4:17], that which is to be sought above, within, and through everything else in our lives.” —T.M. Moore
“Sexual sin is a symptom, not the disease. People give way to sexual sin because they don’t have the fullness of joy and gladness in Christ. Their spirits are not steadfast and firm and established. They waver. They are enticed, and they give way because God does not have the place in our feelings and thoughts that He should. David knew this about himself. It’s true about us too. David is showing us, by the way he prays [Psalm 51:8, 12], what the real need is for those who sin sexually—joy in God.” —John Piper
“For the day may come when false prophets shall arise, and delude the people, and by this shall we be able to discover them; if they claim anything beyond what Christ has revealed, put them aside, for they are false prophets, wolves in sheep’s clothing. The Spirit only teaches us that which Christ has taught beforehand either by Himself or by the inspired apostles.” —Charles Spurgeon
“From many modern sermons would you know that there was a Holy Spirit? If it were not for the benediction or the doxology you might go in and out of many churches and meeting-houses by the year together, and scarcely know that there was such a Person as that blessed, blessed Giver of all good, the Holy Spirit. Sometimes we hear a little about His influences, as if the Holy Spirit were not as truly a Person as even Jesus Christ Himself, Who in flesh and blood trod this earth. Oh, dear friends, I fear the first danger, that of running wild with whimsies and fancies about inner lights and new revelations; but I equally dread this last, this going forth to work with the sword, forgetting that it is the sword of the Spirit, and only mighty as the Holy Spirit makes it mighty ‘to the pulling down of strongholds.’” —Charles Spurgeon
No surprises here: Planned Parenthood spends a lot of money to buys votes from your U.S. Senator.
By the way, don’t buy into the lie that if Planned Parenthood is defunded women won’t have access to healthcare. First of all, PP makes way too much money from abortions already. Second, there are 20 comprehensive healthcare centers for every one PP office, so the options are plentiful.
[VIDEO] Jesus in the New Testament is the same as Jehovah in the Old Testament—
If you would like a written form of the charts he shares in this video, click here.
Dr. John Sanford’s ebook In Light Of Genetics is fascinating reading. It’s a bit technical in certain places, but I think Dr. Sanford does a good job making the genetic concepts accessible to almost anyone. Check out my book review by clicking here. Below are some quotes from this work.
“Forensic evidence is never conclusive, and so scientific claims about the distant past must always contain an element of belief. The direction of genetic change is down, not up. Humanity is devolving due to mutation.”
“We feel biological similarities between different kinds of life are better explained by a Common Designer than by common descent.”
“We are unique and alone now in the world. There is no other animal species that truly resembles our own. A physical and mental chasm separates us from all other living creatures. There is no other bipedal mammal. No other mammal controls and uses fire, writes books, travels in space, paints portraits, or prays. This not a question of degrees. It is all or nothing; there is no semi-bipedal animal, none that makes only small fires, writes only short sentences, builds only rudimentary spaceships, draws just a little bit, or prays just occasionally.” —Juan Arsuaga, writing in The Neanderthal’s Necklace
“Man is a singular creature. He has a set of gifts which make him unique among the animals: so that, unlike them, he is not a figure in the landscape—he is a shaper of the landscape.” —Jacob Bronowski
“From a genetic point of view, the genes that enable our unique capabilities, gifts, and talents (i.e., science, art, love, relation to God) could not arise by any series of random mutations filtered by natural selection—not in any amount of time. There is no credible mechanism that could lead to spontaneous origin of mind, consciousness, intelligence, soul, or spirit. Indeed, while these human traits are found within a biological context (i.e., within an animal-like body/brain), they clearly transcend mere biology. We are exquisitely programmed to be more than animals, and our bodies are well-designed vessels that house our immaterial being: mind, soul, and spirit.”
“Leading human geneticists agree that in mankind deleterious (bad) mutations are accumulating faster than they are being selected away, and so the human genome is degenerating. … The data are highly consistent. The coefficient of determination (matching the curve to the data) is very high: 0.96. Due to the consistency of the decay rate, we can also rule out the idea that there were hundreds (or thousands) of missing generations that were not recorded. We conclude that the genealogical record must either be complete or very nearly complete. This validation of the genealogical record very powerfully points to the historicity and reliability of the book of Genesis.”
“Mounting evidence shows that natural selection is not a creative force, but is a stabilizing force that helps preserve the various kinds of life (i.e., it culls out the most dysfunctional individuals). It is very clear that natural selection cannot create our genome, let alone our mind and soul. At best, natural selection can only slow down the rate of genetic degeneration. … Because of the great abundance of deleterious mutations and the extreme rarity of beneficial mutations, it is not possible for mankind to achieve a net gain of genetic information.”
“Our latest numerical simulations show that in the type of pre-human population that supposedly gave rise to modern man, billions of years would be required just to create and establish a new genetic text string as small as six or seven letters, such as ‘GTCGCT’ or ‘GAGTTCA.’ Yet such a string would be just a drop in the ocean of new information needed to transform an ape into a man.”
“In the biblical model, humanity begins with Adam and Eve, who descendants rapidly multiply, and then, went through a one-generation bottleneck at the time of the Flood, then the population once again rapidly increased, followed by rapid divergence at the Tower of Babel event, creating today’s people groups.”
“If Adam’s genome was intelligently designed, it would obviously have had a great number of designed genetic variants. Otherwise all people would essentially be clones of Adam and Eve, which would be bad design, for many obvious reasons. … Even though many mutations have accumulated in the genome during human history, it is reasonable to conclude that most observable human genetic variation was created by God. The biblical perspective has unique explanatory power in terms of giving a credible explanation for the amazing range of human traits and abilities. There is no single ‘superior genotype.’ We all have unique sets of gifts and talents, which very reasonably reflect good design, and for which we can give thanks to God.”
“We have statistically analyzed over 800 human mitochondrial sequences and have been able to reconstruct and publish a very close approximation of Eve’s mitochondrial sequence. We found that the average human being is only about 22 mutations removed from the Eve sequence, although some individuals are as much as 100 mutations removed from Eve. Can we account for this amount of mutation in a biblical timeframe? Easily. The most recent estimate of the mutation rate in human mitochondria is about 0.5 per generation. Thus, even for the most mutated sequences, it would only require 200 generations (less than 6,000 years) to accumulate 100 mutations.”
“Now, by God’s grace, we do not have to choose between faith in God’s Word vs. faith in science, we can embrace both. There is now very strong genetic evidence that strongly supports Scripture and refutes evolution.”
“May the Lord increase your hunger and your thirst to see the face of God. And may He grant your desire through the gospel of the glory of Christ, Who is the image of God.” —John Piper
Chuck Colson said, “It seems that everywhere—from Tennessee to Tokyo—religion is being permeated by a consumerist mentality.” Read more (or take a listen to Chuck’s broadcast) on Gimmie That Hot-Tub Religion.
My friend and mentor, Tom Kaastra, has an amazing new website called The Basics of Life—Help for your spiritual journey. Do yourself a favor, check out the site, and then subscribe so you can receive his wisdom each time he publishes something new.
Ken Davis has some good insights on handling the ups and downs of life.
Dr. Ben Carson sets the record straight on Planned Parenthood’s racist foundation. And Jayme Metztgar explains why abortion is the new slavery, giving three reasons why what Planned Parenthood is doing is morally wrong.
From Planned Parenthood’s own annual report, prenatal services—which have decreased—amount to 18,684 services. Out of the total 10,590,433 services then, pre-natal care accounts for less than 1 percent. For pregnant women who come to Planned Parenthood, 94 percent of them have an abortion. (h/t Live Action)
J. Warner Wallace asks: Can naturalists [evolutionists] explain where life originated? Great apologetics for those who believe in a Creator or Intelligent Design.
David Wilkerson says there is a command from Jesus that far too many Christians ignore: “The King has told us to bind up the devil and cast him out of the banqueting hall. In short, we’re to rise up and take serious action against satan’s attacks on Christ’s Body.” Read more here.
When I went to college, I went as a biomedical chemistry major. I began my collegiate education at a Christian liberal arts university, and then transferred to a very secular state university. Ever since that time, I have always been deeply interested in the scientific fields, especially biology. So I was excited to read Dr. John Sanford’s paper In Light Of Genetics: Adam, Eve and the Creation/Fall.
In my Christian education experience, the scale was slightly weighted in favor of a biblical view of Creation. In my state university experience, the scale was overwhelming tipped toward an evolutionary paradigm. At both universities, I had rather intense conversations with my professors and classmates about hard science viewed through a biblical paradigm. Dr. Sanford’s paper was an encouraging study to read because of its balance between science and the Bible.
You can read Dr. Sanford’s full paper by clicking here, but here are a few highlights for me:
For all my geeky science friends, I will post some quotes from this paper soon.
Whether you are a geek or not, this is fascinating reading! I encourage my friends who hold Darwinist views to read this, and then let’s talk. I also encourage my Creationist friends to read this too, and use these studies to strengthen your apologetics.
Craig T. Owens 