DO POLITICAL PRIMARIES MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

It has begun, the  political campaign season, that is. The two parties are holding their primaries to certify their respective nominees for the president of the United States. The political season has begun. Really? Not really, no it hasn't. We're subjected to politics immediately after the election of a new president or the retention of the old. Immediately after the winner is declared, we hear of the possible candidates four years down the  road and those seeking the position start gearing up their fundraising machines, the taking of polls, and the "experts" start talking about who the front runners are. There is no surcease the politics of primaries, ballots, speeches, and promises. It wearies the soul. Will all of this make a difference and save the republic?

Unfortunately in the midst of this around-the-clock and year political banter, speeches, and posturing, we've forgotten something somebody told us decades ago but we didn't listen then and aren't listening now. He did warn us, you know, but we had ears of stone.

The one who came to warn us was Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn a Nobel Prize winner in Literature in 1970. When he came to America, his warnings began. He said, "The strength or weakness of a society depends more on it's spiritual life than its level of industrialization. If a nation's spiritual energies have been exhausted, it will not be saved from collapse by the most perfect governmental structure. A tree with a rotten core cannot stand." (Pause and think about that.)

One of the Founding Fathers said the same: "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." (John Adams) In other words, character counts. 

It was most interesting a few decades ago to listen to what the liberal establishment had as their talking point in defense of President Clinton when his adulterous character made headlines; "We elected a commander-in-chief, not a pastor-in-chief." Like most sloganeering, this one rings hollow.

Michael Brown was correct when he wrote: "I’m not keen on the line, “But we’re electing a president, a commander-in-chief, not a pastor-in-chief.” But when it’s used to justify voting for someone who has a long track record of being ruthless, cruel, unchristian, immoral, profane, full of pride, greedy, and double-minded, then I have a real problem with it. . . .Does the fact that we’re electing a president, not a pastor mean that the president doesn’t need to have a solid moral base? That he doesn’t need integrity? That he can mistreat and abuse others? That he can be petulant, self-centered, and nasty? That ethics don’t matter since he’s our political leader not our spiritual leader? . . .I will confront the empty, 'We’re not electing a pastor-in-chief” slogan wherever I find it.'"

Let's switch gears and move to the local church. When God instructed Paul to lay out the qualifications for being an elder, 86.6% of them have to do with the man's character. It bears repeating, character counts. 

As we tread on the tiresome path of politics, politics, politics,  we see Solzhenitsyn standing by the side of the road, pointing to a large sign with large letters: A TREE WITH A ROTTEN CORE CANNOT STAND."

SHE LET THE CAT OUT OF THE BAG

We employ an odd idiomatic expression without asking, "Where did that come from?" Such an expression is the odd saying, "Letting the cat out of the bag." Those who research such things tell us why we say, “Let the cat out of the bag” dates back to the Middle Ages. As the story goes, shady livestock vendors in medieval marketplaces tried to swindle their customers. 

When someone would purchase a pig, the vendor would sneak a cat into the bag instead, cheating the buyer out of the higher price for a pig. It wasn’t until the buyer arrived home and, literally, let the cat out of the bag that he'd realize he had been scammed, hence the phrase’s association with revealing a secret." (From "The Reader's Digest," Feb. 9, 2022)

A university professor held the bag and then let the kitty out of it and deliberately so.  (She either was or is a professor, I don't know the status of her employment.) Anyway, she delivered the following report which shows the state of American "education."

Here's what she said, and I'm paraphrasing: "Let's say you're doing research with due diligence. You are examining the data as you should; you're piling up the evidence that leads you to the correct, inescapable and absolute conclusion. The data and research have taken you there. 

But the problem is that you can't publish, teach, or publicize the truth you've proven. You must keep it quiet. Why? Because, if the conclusion hurts a specific group of people, that cat must stay in the bag. 

Let's say your research proves that a civilization based on the Judaeo-Christian ethic (i. e. the Bible) produces more freedom for women, is a more productive, and healthier country than a society based on the Koran, then you MUST sequester that kitty in the halls and journals of academia (i. e. the truth must be hidden). 

The only exception to this cat's staying in the bag is that any "research" that hurts a group of Christians or Jews must get out of the bag. Let's say that your statistics show that Christians were using bullhorns to chant slogans and then to block members of the Young Democrats from going to class in 96.7% of American universities, that cat would be out of the bag and mewing all over the U. S.  (The bullhorns, the chants, the use of force to harass Jewish students is what's happening in our universities, not by Christians but by those of the demonized antisemitic persuasion. In one case, anti-Jewish chanting and harassment lasted for 10 hours on one college campus.)

What this means is the collapse of a civilization because truth is dead.Roger Author Kimball writes, "Our educational institutions. . . have sacrificed their legitimacy on the altar of a corrupt and mendacious ideology... . Civilization, if it is to survive, must acknowledge the radical nature of that challenge and respond in kind."

You and I know the gospel is true; you and I know there is only one way to God and that is through faith alone in Christ alone. The "response in kind" for the follower of Jesus Christ is to let the cat out of the bag no matter what group is "hurt." You and I have the bag, let's open it up.

WHEN WILL CHRIST RETURN?

 We have a Scripture which tells us when Christ will return at His Second Advent, not the rapture of the church as described in I Thessalonians 4:13 -18 but His Second Coming. He told us in Matthew 23:39: "For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, ‘Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord!’”

A fundamental rule of hermeneutics is to ask this question about any portion of Scripture: To whom  is this person speaking or writing?" Matthew 23:1 answers that question: "Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples." So, the answer is that He spoke to Israel, not the Gentiles. 

The next important hermeneutical question is this: What's the context in which the verse occurs? The end of the chapter brings the answer:  Jesus said, "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who have been sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. ³⁸ Behold, your house is being left to you desolate! ³⁹ For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, ‘Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord!’” 

So there it is. Christ will return when the nation Israel recognizes Him as their Messiah. When will the nation of Israel say that about Jesus? They certainly aren't saying that today.

We must put that national realization into its context. Israel will realize that Jesus of Nazareth whom they had rejected is their Messiah after the Great Tribulation whose judgments will prepare them to come to that belief. 

In the Tribulation, Israel will come to believe that the antichrist is their Messiah. Midway through that judgmental time, he will turn on them and betray them, breaking his treaty with them.

Then all the nations of the world will come against Israel ant that, with the other factor, will cause them to realize that Jesus is their Messiah and will turn to Him saying, "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord" and will make the great confession of Isaiah 53:1-12.  

No one today can set a date for that confession when, as Romans 11:26 says, "and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written: “The Deliverer will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.”

CHRISTMAS AND THE MEMORY HOLE

CHRISTMAS IN RUSSIA

 Less than a century ago, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin outlawed Christmas. Russians could be sent to Gulag in Siberia for erecting an illegal Christmas tree. The celebration has never been the same in Russia since.

CHRISTMAS IN GERMANY

During the Nazi regime, they sought to eliminate Christmas. Among the most important part of the elimination was the celebration of the winter solstice. The Nazis attempted to move the date of Christmas to the solstice instead and mounted large performances and community bonfires that supposedly drew on pre-Christian celebrations. They also tried to redefine St. Nicholas as Wotan, the ancient Germanic deity.

As the years went on, Nazi attempts to take over Christmas intensified. The Nazis rewrote the lyrics of “Silent Night” to remove all attempts to religion or Christ. They distributed Advent Calendars for kids filled with propaganda and militaristic imagery. They even tried to rewrite Handel's Messiah. Mothers were encouraged to bake swastika-shaped cookies. Even the familiar star that topped millions of Christmas trees was replaced by a sunburst that looked less like the Star of David.

 CHRISTMAS IN CHINA

Christmas in Mainland China is not a public holiday and is not related to religion at all. It’s more of a novelty day like Valentine’s Day, rather than a religious celebration.  

Christmas is celebrated in North Korea, but not with the same fanfare as in other countries. North Korean celebrations don’t look anything like the Christmas we know in the West. Christmas is seen as an exotic foreign holiday in this country. There are no Christmas trees, no decorations, and no traditional activities like carol singing. Instead, North Koreans celebrate the day by going to outdoor performances or gathering for family dinners.

CHRISTMAS IN NORTH KOREA

In recent years, there has been some change in the way Christmas is celebrated in North Korea. Some people have started to put up decorations, such as pine trees and lights, in their homes and on the streets. It’s not uncommon to see Christmas trees in the capital city of Pyongyang, although the decoration is still very limited.

Christmas is not an officially recognized holiday in North Korea, so there are no national celebrations. However, some religious communities, such as Catholics and Protestants, are allowed to celebrate Christmas in a limited way. There are churches in Pyongyang, and priests and imams can visit them on Christmas Day.

But these celebrations are more muted than in other countries. Church services are limited to under two hours and worshipers are forbidden from singing Christmas carols or speaking out against the North Korean government. They are also forbidden from taking photos or making videos inside of churches. 

CHRISTMAS IN AMERICA

At the lighting of the national Christmas tree by the President and his wife, it was the continuation of a 100-year old tradition. During the President's remarks, he stated the theme at the White House of this year's "Holiday," was,  “Magic, Wonder, and Joy.” 

You can read the rest of his remarks by going to White House.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2023/11/30/remarks-by-president-biden-at-the-national-christmas-tree-lighting-2/. When you get there I challenge you to find the words, "Jesus," "Christ," "manger," Bethlehem," "angels," "shepherds," "Joseph," or "Wise Men." Those words and the story in which they appear have been put down George Orwell's Memory Hole at the White House.

In a school district in Pennsylvania,  "A memo initially sent to drivers at Wallingford-Swarthmore School District demanded they remove any decorations associated with the holiday, citing a need for 'inclusivity.'

“If you have decorated your bus with anything specific to the Christmas Holiday or any other decorations relating to a specific religion, please remove them immediately,” a copy of the memo obtained by Crisis in the Classroom (CITC) reads. “'In addition, employees are instructed not to wear clothing related to Christmas or any other religious holiday.”

We see the result of all of the above in the following poll: 

"A Lifeway Research study finds 9 in 10 U.S. adults say they celebrate Christmas, including many non-Christians. Overall, 91% of Americans celebrate the Christmas holiday, unchanged from2  010.”

"Yet only 22% indicate they could “accurately tell the Christmas story found in the Bible from memory. A plurality of U.S. adults (31%) say they could tell the story but may miss some details or get others wrong. Another quarter (25%) could only give a quick overview and 17% say they couldn’t tell any of it.

“Almost half of Americans do not think they could share the Christmas story somewhat accurately from memory,” asserts Scott McConnell, executive director of LifeWay Research. “Of all the Christmas programs churches offer in December, possibly the most important is simply reading the biblical account of the Christmas story itself.” 

The summation of the saga is this: a dictatorship will not and cannot tolerate an authority higher than itself. The Incarnation must be Memory Holed.

 

 

 

 

HATERED OF THE JEWS IN THE CHURCH TODAY

 There is and should be a deep concern on the part of American Christians for our nation in view of the virulent 4,000 year-old hatred of Jews exploding in our country today. This spiritual aberration is a cancer in the college campuses such as the Ivy League schools along with MIT et al. We see frenetic demonstrations, endless mindless chants ("From the river to the sea, Palestine shall be free."). We saw students in a high school in San Francisco rampaging through the halls yelling and chanting antisemitic slogans, the same students who probably can't even spell Palestine. 

True to form, the United Nations has once again placarded its long-lasting hatred of Israel: "The United States was looking increasingly isolated on the world stage on Tuesday after a resounding vote at the UN general assembly calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.

"Cheers and clapping echoed around the general assembly chamber in New York as the emergency vote was announced. A thumping 153 member states out of the 193 total membership backed the resolution, with only 10 including the US, Israel, and Austria voting against, and 23 – including the UK and Germany – abstaining." (from a news report)

"Cease fire" means, "Israel, stop fighting and let them kill you." The 153 countries were opposing a nation the size of New Jersey. They gang up and condemn Israel day after day, year after year.

BUT WAIT!

Antisemitism is in American churches too. These churches promote antisemitism by teaching something called "Replacement Theology." This theology infects seminaries, scholars, books and journals. If you are in a church and you've heard from your Sunday school teacher or your pastor that God is finished with the Jewish people and that the church is now the “new Israel," if you have heard , "The covenants God made with Israel (the Abrahamic, the Palestinian,, the Davidic, and the New Covenants) are no longer valid," then you're sitting in and supporting an antisemitic church that has robbed Israel of her God-given promises.

Adherents of replacement theology believe the Jews are no longer God’s chosen people, and God does not have specific future plans for the nation of Israel. So, the prophecies in Scripture concerning the blessing and restoration of Israel to the Promised Land are “spiritualized” or “allegorized” into promises of God’s blessing for the church.

HOW IN THE WORLD?

How could the early leaders of the church read the promises that God had made to Israel and justify this replacement? They found that they could do so only by spiritualizing the promises, that is, deliteralizing them. This method of interpretation allowed them to replace Israel as the beneficiary of God’s unfulfilled promises. The words of these early Christian leaders reveal their theology of replacement.

Here is a sample of writings from the first 300 years of the church. The Epistle of Barnabas, written around A.D. 100, states that the Jews have no further claim to God’s promises:

Take heed now to yourselves, and not to be like some, adding largely to your sins, and saying, “The covenant is both theirs and ours.” But they thus finally lost it.

Irenaeus, writing around A.D. 180, said, “They who boast themselves as being the house of Jacob and the people of Israel, are disinherited from the grace of God.”

Origen, the most prolific writer of the early church (c. A.D. 250), grounded his Replacement Theology in allegorical interpretation. For instance, when explaining that Jesus was sent to the “lost sheep of the house of Israel.” he argued that the lost sheep are not Jews, who are “carnal” Israel, but Christians, who are “heavenly” Israel.

John Chrysostom preached the same message in the capital city of the Roman Empire in A.D. 387:

It is because you killed Christ….It is because you shed the precious blood, that there is now no restoration, no mercy any more and no defense…. You have committed the ultimate transgression. This is why you are being punished worse now than in the past….If this were not the case God would not have turned his back on you so completely.

 

John Calvin,  a follower of Augustine and a leading figure of the Reformation, viewed the Old and New Testaments as continuous, with the Church inheriting the promises made to Israel. Luther was so done with the Jews that his 80+ page rant against them was quoted favorably by Hitler and his propaganda master, Goebbels. Luther infected Germany with Jew-hatred.and later came the Holocaust in his native land.

When you hear your pastor or Sunday school teacher tell you that God is through with the Jews, it's time to go and take your wallet with you. Period. Why? Because to stay involves complicity with those who are gouging God's eye: Zechariah 2:8: "For the Lord of armies says this: “After glory He has sent me against the nations that plunder you, for the one who touches you, touches the apple (lit. "pupil") of His eye.

The covenant God made with Abraham began in Genesis 12:1-3, it's concluding words are still in effect, "Those who curse you, I must curse." Be careful America, you are treading on the thinnest of ice. 

 

 

THE FUNERAL OF MRS. JIMMY CARTER

 Funeral services for former first lady Rosalynn Carter, who died at the age of 96 on Nov. 19, continued Tuesday, Nov. 28 in Atlanta, Ga. A tribute service at Glenn Memorial Church at Emory University took place from 1:30-3 p.m.

An interesting historical footnote arose when it was revealed that all of the living First Ladies were invited and in attendance. As would unfortunately naturally follow was a report and in one case, a critique of what the ladies were wearing. The critique, as would be expected, was written about former First Lady Mrs. Donald Trump who was called out for wearing a light gray coat. (It seems out of place to obsess over one's sartorial choice rather than the life of the deceased but that's the name of the game in the jungle that is politics.)

Various family members eulogized their mother, their grandmother as did various friends and a former employee who became a fast and loyal friend of Mrs. Carter. They praised her tireless work for various causes and the energy she brought to her husband's political campaigns as well as the crushing heartache she and the family felt when her husband went down to defeat in his quest for a second term. 

Music was in abundance at the service but there was one piece of music that should never have been at the service nor at any meeting of the church. How it got into the proceedings should be an insult to Christians everywhere but it seemed to be accepted as normal and A-OK with the congregation and the hosting church. 

It's a song by John Lennon, he of the Beatles fame of decades long ago. The lyrics speak for themselves: 

Imagine there's no Heaven

It's easy if you try

No Hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people
Living for today
Ah, ah, ah-ah

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion, too

Imagine all the people
Living life in peace
Yoo-hoo, ooh-ooh

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions

I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world
Yoo-hoo, ooh-ooh

 

You may say I'm a dreamer

But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.

It's a song that denies heaven and hell; a song of globalism; a song of communism (no private property) and a song of irrational idealism in a fallen world that will never be able to get back to Eden apart from the 2nd Advent of Christ.

Who chose that song? I don't know. Who approved of that song's being sung in that church? I don't know. But you and I do know that it's a song that conveys humanism in ever note. "Imagine" is a foolish song devoid of wisdom and cannot help but be such because "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." The author had no fear of the Lord which, by definition is a positive response to God and His Word.

 

 

THE NIGHTMARE OF JOHN BOOKMAN

John Bookman is the beloved pastor of the First United Church of Cannon Ball Run and on this Sunday night he was feeling mighty proud of himself for the sermons he'd preached, one in the morning service and the second one that evening. He was feeling his sermonic oats that day as he witnessed 15 people walk the aisle as the choir sang "Just As I Am," seven times during the invitation period. 

He'd concluded the two stem-winder preaching sessions with his standard invitation calling on those who wanted to be baptized and join Cannon Ball run to come forward; those who wanted to rededicate their lives to Christ to come forward; and those who wanted to make a profession of faith to change their geographic location and come forward. For those wanting to make a profession of faith and be saved that day, he'd given them a special set of instructions.

He told them that salvation was free but it would cost them everything. John didn't seem to notice the lack of logic in that statement but he'd heard his idol of a preacher say it, so it must be true. Rev. Bookman then went on to say to those wanting to be saved that they had to work up a feeling of sorrow for their sins, then turn from their sins and then give their lives to Christ and then the "free gift" of heaven would the theirs. 

John enjoyed the evening and couldn't wait for Monday morning when he would file his report of the attendance, the number of new members, the number of rededicates, and the number of those who were saved that day at Cannon Ball. As he filled out the forms to turn into the denominational headquarters, he enjoyed his usual surfeit of four slices of pizza and later, a slice or two of chocolate cake. 

It was getting near his bedtime, so he got ready to hie himself off into the arms of Morpheus and within fifteen minutes or so, he was sound asleep. And that's when the Reverend John Bookman dreamed a dream. 

He dreamed that he was watching a woman carrying a water pot and heading toward a well, and lo, and behold, Jesus was there. The dream was so real that he heard their conversation between Jesus and the woman, a conversation all about regular water and what Jesus called, "Living water." He heard Jesus telling the woman that one sip of that living water He was offering would render it no longer necessary to drink again.

It was then that what Bookman overheard really interested him; it was that this woman was immoral to the core. She had been divorced by not one, not two, but five husbands. He was astounded to hear that the man she was now living with wasn't her husband but that he and she were in a seriously immoral situation. 

And this is where his dreamed turned into a nightmare. Jesus didn't command her to feel sorry for her sins. Jesus didn't tell her to break off the relationship with her current boyfriend. he didn't tell her to turn from her sins which were no doubt plentiful. He didn't tell her to give her life to Him from that day forward. There was none of that in Jesus offer of salvation by faith as symbolized by the one drink.

The Right Reverend jerked awake in a cold sweat, grabbed his Bible and went into the den to read John 4 and all about that immoral woman and what Jesus said to her. He read it over and over but he couldn't find, "repent" in there anywhere; he couldn't find "turn from your sins in there either. Nor did he find, "give you life to Me," in the text. 

The Reverend John Bookman didn't sleep much that night. The shock was great. Could his idol have theological feet of clay? He went to I Corinthians 15 to read it with fresh eyes and found that the gospel contained none of works requirements he's been insisting on; instead, he found the gospel to be simple:faith alone in Christ the Son of God who died for John's sins, rose from the dead and offers eternal to anyone, anywhere who trusts His finished work for that eternal life.

 Bookman's entire system of theology had just fallen apart and great was the fall thereof. But after that dream, he began to learn that salvation is offered absolutely free.