I heard it again. In a discussion about morality a lady said this: “Religion is evil. Religion poisons everything.”  Another person said “religion is responsible for more wars and suffering than anything else in history”.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of people in the world who naively accept that premise without checking the facts. Has religion ever led to bloodshed? Of course it has. But usually after such statements about evil religion and its’ reign of terror we are pointed to the Crusades and even the Salem witch hunts as examples of religious hostility. Why? Because theses falsehoods are generally pointed to a bias against Christianity, not just “religion”.

              While the witch-hunting hysteria is most certainly a black eye for Christ-followers we must put the number of deaths in perspective to “Religion is responsible” for worldwide deaths. 20 people were executed for the crime of witchcraft in a period of about 15 months. Contrast that with just one weekend in Chicago where 12 people were murdered and 66 shot.  Religion had nothing to do with that.

              The Crusades are a different matter.  It is estimated that over 1.5 million people died in the 200+ years of the crusades. That is an awful number.  But let’s look at the reason for the crusades: they were fought to regain land taken by over 1000 years of Islamic aggression. Yes, definitely a religious war that caused a lot of death and suffering but who knows how many harsh Islamic caliphates there would be in Europe and the Mediterranean had not Christians fought back.  So, yes, religion has played a part in wars throughout history.

              But is religion responsible for more wars that any other cause? Has religion resulted in the death of more people than any other reason? Absolutely not.  To make that statement even remotely true you would have to belief that World War I and World War II, as well as the Korean War and Vietnam, were fueled by religious hatred and fought to advance religious beliefs. Do you really think that Adolf Hitler wanted to rule the world because he was a religious man?  And, in fact many of the European “religious” wars were more about land grabs and power struggles than religion.

              Christianity is, and always will be, the supreme religion of peace.  Never did Jesus command us to force people to accept our faith by force. Becoming a Christian must be a personal choice; a conscious decision to accept Christ as Savior. No amount of outside force can achieve that. Christianity is the reason we can have true peace in our lives.  It is the reason we can truly change from self-centered to selfless, from from hateful to loving.  In fact Jesus said “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives”.  Falsely blame war and suffering on Christianity if you like but in reality Jesus give a peace that supersedes anything the world can offer.

Say good things about your Savior and about His Church.

Bro. Tony

All or none. That choice is pretty stark: Everything or nothing.  We don’t like being put in a position where we have to make such a drastic determination, do we?  We usually like a “middle ground”; a place of compromise.  Honestly, in so many cases, compromise can be a good thing.  But there are some cases where compromise is useless.  The Bible is the most glaring example .

                You see, we must believe all of the Bible or there is no use in believing any of it. It is either all the very word of God or we can’t decipher which is the word of God, if any of it. If we think we can pick and choose what is truth and what isn’t we then become the master of the Bible, that is, it’s editor. If effect, we become as God, deciding what is right or wrong, what is good and evil.  The Bible becomes ineffective, useful only as a personal handbook for what we want to believe.

Yet, I see that happening in more and more people and, unfortunately, more and more churches/denominations. If what the Bible says doesn’t line up with what we want and think we simply ignore it and say the dumbest of all rationales: “Well, they didn’t know back then what we know today”. Hear this…God knew more back then than we will ever know.  We must make up our minds that we will live by by pure faith in the Bible and believe every word of it.

I understand that there will be some different interpretations of what God meant in a few passages such as whether a deacon can be divorced or what the dragon in John’s Revelation vision represents, but we will still believe that God, Himself, told those men what to write and it is all His word.

So, yes, I believe a snake and a donkey talked, I believe the Red Sea parted, I believe angels came to earth and talked to people, I believe people were miraculously healed, Jesus was born of a virgin and He was murdered and raised from the dead.

So, too, I believe it when He says that homosexuality is wrong, there are only two genders, and marriage is to be between a man and a woman.  I believe God created in the womb and it is not our choice as to whether a baby lives or dies after it is conceived. I believe those things, not because they are rational to an imperfect mind or because the ideology of the day favors them.  I believe them because I believe the Bible is the never-changing, ever-truthful Word of God.

I believe it all.

Say good things about your Savior and about His Church.

Bro. Tony

Hate is a pretty strong word.  The Miriam-Webster defines hate as “1. a: intense hostility and aversion usually deriving from fear, anger, or sense of injury. b: extreme dislike or disgust: antipathy, loathing”.  I bring that up because people are getting away with misappropriating the word and lessening it’s true impact and in the current atmosphere of opposition to Christianity we Christians are receiving the brunt of the false implications of the word; we are being mis-labeled as “haters”.

For instance, do I  hate women because I am opposed to abortion?  Do I have a hostility and aversion to them because I view life as beginning at conception? Do I feel disgust at them or loathe them because I believe in the sanctity of life in the womb? If you listen to the news and the rhetoric of so many liberal organizations (as well as politicians) you’d believe I did hate women.

The same goes for the folks caught up in the LGBT hysteria. Because I disagree with them and believe that their lifestyles and beliefs are caused by mental/emotional disorders I’m said to hate them. Nothing could be further from the truth, of course, but you wouldn’t know that to hear people speak of my attitude.  According to those who stand on the opposite side of my beliefs, I hate people. We have got to fight, as Christians, the combat that stereotype as “haters”.  Why is it so important that we not let our society view us as haters (besides the fact that it is just so blatantly false)? The answer is simple:  hate speech.

In a nation that was founded on the wonderful principle of free speech we are hurtling toward the abyss of certain speech being free no longer. If our society can successfully brand opinions and beliefs as “hate speech” they can quieten any and all voices they so choose. You better believe that the voice of the church will be the first causality. This is a battle for the soul of a nation.

Say good things about your Savior and about His Church.

Bro. Tony

We are just a couple of weeks removed from a contentious Republican primary in Alabama in which every candidate professed to love Jesus, the Constitution, guns, and President Trump (not necessarily in that order) and about three months away from the general election. I’m not excited about that.  Why?  Because in the recent elections it seems that the church has forgotten our true calling; our first love, so to speak.

              We must remember that the church is not a political organization. In fact, the church should transcend politics. Jesus and the early church leaders were not concerned with how the church affected the governments of the time…and they were harsh, tyrannical governments. At the same time the church in America has an unique opportunity that wasn’t present in New Testament times: the opportunity to vote. I, for one, believe we should take advantage of that opportunity to try and shape a nation whose morals and identity reflect the nature of God.

              What we have to be careful with is our rhetoric. We are to promote truth, honesty, purity, and virtue. (Philippians 4:8) yet speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15). The nature of today’s politics makes that difficult. We need to learn to pick and choose the battles in which we brandish our indignity as Christians. In the great scheme of eternity some things are important and some aren’t. I think the command expressed in 2 Timothy 2:23-26 is important to keep in mind these days: “Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.”

Never shy away from Biblical truth but always measure your words.  Will the subject and the way you present it shine light on God’s nature, desires, and purpose? Will it help draw someone to Christ?

Say good things about your Savior and about His Church.

Bro. Tony

              Can you remember when the nation overwhelmingly viewed Christianity as a good thing? In the business world, educational system, and even politics a “person of faith” was admired and respected. Now a Christian can get fired for expressing a Biblical truth in public, displays of Christian faith are forbidden in schools, and people will publicly question your sanity if you express belief in God.  What happened? How did that happen over just a few years?

           Here is a quote attributed to Alexander Fraser Tytler:  “A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been 200 years. These nations have progressed through this sequence: From bondage to spiritual faith; From spiritual faith to great courage; From courage to liberty; From liberty to abundance; From abundance to selfishness; From selfishness to apathy; From apathy to dependence; From dependence back into bondage.”

              While this quote specifically references money and abundance, I believe it also speaks to the issues of “how did this happen” in regards to the place of Christianity.  I believe that our nation entered into that fourth stage of democracy: “from abundance to selfishness” and the people with money and its accompanying power have discovered that they can use the democratic process to bestow upon themselves the “freedom” to engage in any and all perverse behaviors their carnal souls desire. To do this, though, they must erase any remembrance of that first step: “from bondage to spiritual faith”.  And how can that be accomplished except they belittle and disown any sense of the absolute truths  contained in the Bible and espoused by persons of faith?

              What does this realization mean to Christians? It calls us back to the basics. Our call is to share the Gospel and to do it without fear. Peter and John were called before the governing body and commanded not to speak or teach in the name of Jesus and their response should be ours, “which is right in God’s eyes: to listen to you or to Him? As for us we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” Acts 4:19-20

Say good things about your church and about your Savior!

Bro. Tony

              Two recent decisions by the United States Supreme Court have a direct impact on the lives of Christian businesses. One involved a baker who refused to design a cake for a same-sex wedding and the other concerned a florist who did not want to arrange flowers for a similar wedding. Both cases were decided for the Christian business owners and the media, The LGBT activists, as well as  anti-Christians, went ballistic. They began presenting scenarios where businesses would put up “no gays allowed” signs and people would began a wholesale purge of all things not heterosexual.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

              Both business gladly served their LGBT patrons in the normal course of business, selling them baked good or flowers; there was absolutely no discrimination.  The owners felt, though, that they could not “actively participate” in an activity they (correctly) perceived as violating their Christian beliefs.  Both owners would have sold them anything in their store to do with whatever they wanted, but they would not design special cakes/floral arrangements for the events. 

              Make no mistake about it, it was only because they were Christians.  The services demanded could have easily been attained elsewhere without any problem or trouble. Here was a chance to attack Christians and it seemed to have worked as both business owners lost their businesses.  But the Supreme Court finally recognized the cases for what they were: animosity toward Christians simply because of their religious beliefs.  Our constitution says you can’t do that.

              Many people have wondered how I, as a Christian, could vote for our current president.  Well, this is it: Conservative judges that realize the laws of our land protect people of conscience. He appointed one and now, pray for him as he appoints another. Perhaps, just perhaps, Christians can regain some of our freedoms and our nation will quit drifting toward pure evil of unrestrained humanism.

Say good things about your church and about your Savior!

Bro. Tony

Tolerance. Diversity. Discrimination. These words are in the forefront of cultural ideology today.  Each one has become a measuring stick for people’s belief and actions; a public badge of either honor or disgrace. There is just one problem and it’s a large problem: who gets to decide the acceptable limits of each? For Christians, especially, that question is important.  There are, indeed, some times when we should not be intolerant.  There are situations in which too much diversity can be detrimental to Christian rights.  And Christians should be very discriminate people, when it comes to certain things.

Nowhere is this as obvious and important as in our school systems. I believe in public education; I’m a product of public education. I believe that it is in the best interest of children, as well as the public good, to receive a good education. I also believe it is one function of a good government to assist parents in the education of their children.  There are immutable sciences and disciplines that every child should at least be exposed to in order to give them a chance to compete in an adult world.  Math is important, of course, as is the science disciplines, english, geography, and history. I enjoyed social studies in school and civics gave me a good understanding of how government and politics work.

But what about morals?  Do lifestyle choices need to be taught by schools? At what point does education become indoctrination? Teaching a child that 2+2=4 is good.  That will not change and there will be countless times in our lives when addition will come in very handy.  But should we allow schools to teach children that a male can become a female simply by thinking it to be so?  There is certainly not any measurable science discipline that makes that a fact. To indoctrinate impressionable children with such “pseudoscience” is uncalled for and detrimental to a child’s mental health and well-being. Those things are then responsibility of the family.

There is so much more that should be left to parents.  And Christian parents should be intolerant of schools usurping their family responsibilities.  We should be very wary of including changing morals and mental states as science and fact.  We should discriminate against such teachings.  The government is not our nanny and when it comes to morals, ethics, and lifestyle the government is not our master.  God is. Christians should be allowed to send their children to a school to be taught solid fundamentals without fear of godless indoctrination.

Say good things about your church and about your Savior!

Bro. Tony

                We had a fantastic Vacation Bible School this year.  There were so many “unknowns” approaching the week. Family vacations, sports, others church’s VBS, etc.  So it’s difficult to predict attendance and to prepare.  But God knows who is coming and He knows their individual and family needs and it amazes me how He prepares us for them. Even when things didn’t work out exactly as we planned, God had planned for us.

We had over 25 children enrolled and met several new families.  That, in itself, borders on miraculous.  We often judge the success of VBS by whether or not we “got” any new families from our effort. That is certainly one thing I look at and I hope and pray every year that we do. It’s a joy to be able to minister to new people. But we must also realized that the main focus of VBS is to teach children the Bible.  We did that and we did it well.  Our teachers, helpers, rotation leaders and workers did a fantastic job. On the final night, when we saw the tail lights of cars pulling away with those children inside there was a lot of those “unknowns” about our future ministry with them and their families, but there is one very certain “known”:  those kids were taught about God, about His love for them through Jesus Christ, and about how to live a life reflective of Him. We were obedient to God, we accomplished our task, and those children are better off for it.

But don’t quit praying that we will, indeed, reach some of those new families and bring them into this sweet fellowship of believers! And if you want to pat yourselves on the back for a job well done….go ahead.  You deserve it.

Pray constantly, work hard, and trust God!

Bro. Tony

            I grew up reading superhero comic books. I’m still somewhat of a comic “geek”.  There is just something about someone with amazing powers defeating the evil forces of the world; promoting “truth, justice, and the American way”. 

            One of the storylines in a Superman comic concerned Superman’s realization that he could not save everyone. With all of his abilities and powers he couldn’t attend to every crisis around the world; time and distance were against even him. In fact, it got to the point where he was about to just give up.  If he couldn’t save everyone, what good was he?  Thankfully for all the people in comic book land, Superman came to the conclusion that if he couldn’t save everyone, he could still save those he could reach.

            I think that a great many of us Christians feel that way about their effectiveness in the kingdom of God. We look around us and see so much lostness, so much hurting, and so much sorrow. We see immorality, wayward living, and un-godly influences and we think it’s hopeless.  Be honest, haven’t you wanted to give up?  Haven’t you gotten tired and said “what’s the use”?

            We can take a lesson from a fictional comic book character and realize that while we can’t minister to the whole world individually, we can minister to one person at a time.  We may not save the world per se, but to one person we can be a genuine “superhero”.

Pray constantly, work hard, and trust God!

Bro. Tony