Survey on Men & Women
Wednesday, June 18, 2008, 10:26 AM
A recent survey suggests that
women may become more depressed if they stop attending church,
but men may become less depressed if they do so.
Why do you think that may be?
Men experience more guilt at church than women do. 4%
Women experience more community at church than men do. 44%
It's less socially acceptable for men to be religiously observant. 6%
Men feel out of place at church because it's too feminized. 15%
Men don't think as much about religion when they're not at church. 8%
I doubt the study's results. 16%
Other8%
Total Votes: 1382
What do you think???
Vox Verax - Pastor Mike
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The Roman Road
Monday, June 9, 2008, 11:35 AM
The Roman Road
A Study of History by Arnold J. Toynbee (1889-1975) is acknowledged as one of the "greatest achievements of modern scholarship."
Toynbee centered on the moral and religious challenges within a given society, and the response to such challenges, as the reason decline of a civilization. He described life cycles of nations in terms of growth, then dissolution, then "time of troubles," and finally a collapse.
For the United States this all began in the 18th century as a result of the “Enlightenment” teachings. The Enlightenment was less a set of ideas than it was a set of attitudes. At its core was a critical questioning of traditional institutions, customs, Christianity and morals. This movement produced a tolerance, (not based on the Christian moral values or the virtues of faith, hope, and love) but rather based on the whims and desires of people who wanted to escape what they felt were the restrictive & oppressive guidelines of Biblical Morality.
We see the extreme results of this today with a new kind of tolerance to things that were once thought to be morally repugnant such as abortion, pornography, and sexual perversions. They are now widely accepted.
We are witnessing the legitimization of homosexuality at the expense of marriage. If you think this is bad, hang on. It is going to get much worse.
Today, we are taught that to be tolerant means that we must accept this twisted version of morality, and to speak out against it is a crime of hate, which will soon be punishable. No wonder so many Christians are fearful of speaking out against immorality. It just might cost them their jobs.
But speak out we must! America hangs in the balance.
S. Michael Craven (Center for Christ & Culture) believes that
“We, as a nation, have sunk to the level in which a despotic minority is in the process of reorienting our entire society, that minority being those who advocate a natural and now constitutional right to homosexual behavior.”
Thrown in the face of the citizens of California, who had voted overwhelmingly to keep marriage between and women, the California Supreme Court justices rebuked the will of the people in order to allow for gay marriage. Their 4-3 ruling in mid-May essentially said that
“One job of courts is to adjust the vision of people
who simply aren’t smart enough to make moral decisions.”
Four “activist judges” are substituting their will over the will of the people. They are flexing their power over the Legislature, the Governor & the people. So much for 3 separate but equal branches of government!
This is nothing but a corruption of their power and a great breach in the freedoms of our democracy. It is no longer “a government of the people, by the people, for the people” as Lincoln had described. It is now becoming a government by Judicial Legislation.
"Why does all of this really matter?"
The social libertarians are quite clear in their view.
“This affects no one else in society.”
What a joke! All of society is affected by its morals and values!
Why have any moral guidelines at all?
“You can’t legislate morality”, they whine!
What a crock! Every law we have is a defining of morality.
The real question is whose morality are we going to use and follow, God’s or the Devils? It is a line that comes straight from Satan himself, right out of the Garden, “Has God really said that you should not…”
Once that doubt is put in place, sin and death is sure to follow.
History offers an incredible warning to the people of America.
In Gibbon's famous History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
we learn that their breakdown in sexual morality began in 146 B.C.
In the ensuing years, sexual immorality became so widespread that it threatened the institution of marriage. "There was nothing in which they [the Romans] did not indulge or which they thought a disgrace."
This is quickly becoming the state of American morality.
We are on a parallel course of destruction from within.
In Rome as a result of sexual extravagance,
"Roman marriages had greatly deteriorated; they had become a loose and voluntary compact and religious and civil rites were no longer essential."
In essence, marriage became meaningless and its accompanying societal benefits disappeared. Family termination increased, fracturing the cornerstone of society, crime exploded, productivity and creativity diminished, cynicism and apathy ensued; the Empire began to crumble.
As if blind to the past, the American Empire is being shaped by an extreme minority of its citizens with great support from activist judges and entertainment superstars across the country. We are now following the Roman road to self destruction, proving again what Toynbee said, "Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder."
Veritas vos Liberabit! – Pastor Mike
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A Miracle or Happen-chance?
Thursday, April 3, 2008, 04:48 PM
Was it a miracle, or was it just a coincidence, the natural order of things in this world? Miracles are happening every day. But too many Christians are quick to call it good luck, or good fortune. They can see how it can be explained naturally, so they do not see the hand of God working through the natural order of things.
Recently I received 2 e-mails from Ron Miller at the Baan Emmanuel Orphanage in Chiang Rai, Thailand. One of the sons of a man who works at the orphanage was brutally attacked, and could be well be dead had not God intervened. With his permission to share, here is Ron’s explanation of the event.
“Bless the Lord oh my soul and all that is with in me!
We need some prayer. On March 17th, Anoi, Khun Yiak's son, was attacked while returning to his village. You remember that Khun Yiak was a fighter in Khun Sa's opium army. He came to faith around 8 years ago and he has been working with us ever since. Anoi is his oldest son definitely has a calling on his life as a pastor/teacher.
Anyway, the road to Doi Masalong is a steep winding road. As he was turning a corner and ascending the road someone jumped out from the tress and hit him in the face with a quart bottle. He was knocked from his motorcycle and lay unconscious in the road. The perpetrator then proceeded to cut up his face with the broken bottle. He wounds required some hundred stitches. We are not sure if any reconstructive surgery will be required. Even if it is, the next question would be where to have this done.
March 29th: Wow, things here are crazy. I was going to say unbelievable, but that is not true. It is all very believable when you're on satan's turf. My trust is in the Lord and my consolation is knowing that our God reigns!
Anoi is out of the hospital. We have come to find out that his throat was cut. It was totally the supernatural intervention of the Lord that has kept him. None of us can speculate why this happened, but we trust the will of our Lord. It could be Satan trying to take Anoi out - he must somehow see and know the calling on his life. We all choose to give the glory to God for His mercy and grace on Anoi, and on all of us as well. Had he died we would all have been deeply grieved.
You know, I find this interesting. Some have explained this away in natural terms. They say, "Well, here's what happened. You see, the guy didn't make the cut deep enough to cause death..... yada, yada, yada". That is absolutely true - and we choose to give our Lord Jesus the glory for staying the man's hand. The reason I mention this is because we have seen and experienced the miraculous supernatural outpourings of our Lord Jesus upon Baan Immanuel. Baan Immanuel's existence is a truly a miracle.
We have seen demon's cast out, physical healing, food and funds arrive in absolutely miraculous ways, and yet, to many people look for a natural reason to explain God's grace. Here in lay the essence of the matter: God may used someone to deliver the food to our door
(a physical act), but it was His will, it was God's prompting, that caused this man to do what he did (a supernatural spiritual act).
We all too often we fall short of witnessing the grace of our Lord Jesus when we fail to give Him the glory for all things. We Christian should be on our knees giving glory to our Lord Jesus Christ in all things. The world is on the knees searching the ground digging in the dirt and filth looking for evidence to disprove our Lord's hand involved in all things.
It is an absolute miracle that Anoi is still alive. For this we give our Lord Jesus all glory and honor. Through all of this our resolve to serve our Lord Jesus is greater now then before. You know, this entire Christian walk is choices isn't it? Or maybe more accurately, a choice to submit our will to our Father's will. Not in or of foolishness but in faith. To the world the faith of a Christian is foolishness.
Bless God that we are fools for Christ.”
Veritas vos Liberabit! – Pastor Mike
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Taxes
Monday, March 31, 2008, 09:03 AM
The Government has just put out a new and improved tax form to make things much easier for everyone.
NEW AND IMPROVED IRS FORM 1040-2EZ (Tax Year 2007)
Name:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip:
Social Security Number:___-__-____
1. How much money did you make in 2004?
$_____________
2. Send it to us:
A fine is a tax for doing wrong.
A tax is a fine for doing well.
Veritas vos Liberabit! – Pastor Mike
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Why do we call it Easter?
Monday, March 17, 2008, 09:24 AM
Why do we call it Easter?
That is a great question. Many Christians don’t know the “why’s and how’s” of our Easter traditions. We just grew up celebrating it this way. When we became Christians we came to know that it was all about the Resurrection of Jesus. But how does that relate to all the “stuff” we do at Easter?
Why is it called Easter? The fact of the matter is no one knows for sure, but our best bet comes from Bede ("The Venerable"), a late-seventh-century historian and scholar from Anglo-Saxon England.
He says Easter's name comes from the Anglo-Saxon goddess Eostre, associated with spring and fertility, and celebrated around the vernal equinox. So there you go. As Christmas was moved to coincide with
(and supplant) the pagan celebration of winter, Easter was likely moved to coincide and replace the pagan celebration of spring.
Why does the date of Easter always change?
The question of the proper date for Easter—the most important festival on the Christian calendar—is another of those fascinating and complicated odysseys in the history of Christianity. It begins at the Council of Nicea in 325, where, after settling the Arian controversy, bishops debated the correct formula for determining the date of Easter.
The Eastern bishops (those from Eastern Europe and western Asia) preferred scheduling Easter in conjunction with the Jewish Passover celebration, because the Gospels place the death and resurrection of Jesus during that time. Also, since most Eastern Christians had come from Jewish roots, this practice gave them continuity with past traditions.
The Western bishops, however, were stubborn & disagreed with the Eastern practice, because few Jews lived in their regions. They favored a date in conjunction with the solar beginning of spring, which was the time of many pagan celebrations. I think the Eastern Bishops had it right. But by tradition, coming down from Western Catholicism, we celebrate it in association with the date of spring.
Emperor Constantine sent a letter to all Christian leaders not present at council encouraging a uniform celebration of Easter that ignored the Jewish calendar, since Jews had largely rejected Christ.
No formula for determing the date of Easter was universally accepted in the West until, under the influence of the Venerable Bede (c.673-735), the method of Dionysius Exiguus (c.500-550) was widely adopted. Since then, Easter for us has always been the 1st Sunday after the 1st full moon after the Spring (Vernal) Equinox (which is March 20 or 21, depending on the year). This dating of Easter is based on the lunar calendar that Hebrew people used to identify passover, which is why it moves around on our Roman calendar.
Linking the schedule of Easter to the beginning of spring didn't completely solve the problem, however, because the Julian calendar, in use from the Roman era until the late sixteenth century, had a small flaw: its solar year of 365 and one-fourth days was 11 minutes, 17 and one-half seconds too long. This seemingly tiny error adds up to slightly more than three days in the span of 400 years.
That is why, despite learned astronomers' best calculations,
the church found its Easter calendar in need of adjustment on a regular basis. That is also why, when the calendar was reformed under the approval of Pope Gregory XIII in October 1582, it was necessary to eliminate ten entire days to correct the error (the day after October 4 was declared to be October 15). I can’t help but wonder if the folks got paid for their missing week?
Even with the Gregorian Reform, the date for Easter can vary widely, since it is still partly dependent on lunar cycles. The advantage of the Gregorian Reform, especially after it was adopted in England in 1752, was that it facilitated an accurate and uniform celebration of Easter across the entire West.
Occasionally, the Western celebration of Easter even coincides with the Eastern Orthodox date. (Their Easter is still calculated by the Julian calendar, and their calculation of the paschal full moon is five days later than the astronomical full moon—thus the Eastern and Western dates can vary by as much as five weeks.)
Since the date of Easter also affects a great number of secular affairs in many nations around the world, some people have suggested that Easter be given a fixed date, or at least that the range of possible dates be narrowed. Perhaps because we have finally come to terms with a relatively accurate calendar and a reliable method for determining the date for this all-important festival, no large ecclesiastical body has taken the lead on this reform, though the Vatican and the Church of England have looked into it.
This year will be the earliest Easter any of us will ever see again in our lifetime. The next time Easter will be this early, March 23, will be in the year 2228, which is 220 years from now. And as a few old timers might recall, the last time it was this early was 1913, 95 years ago.
And while we're at it, the Easter Bunny comes from these pagan rites of spring as well, but more from pagan Germany than pagan Britain. Eighteenth-century German settlers brought "Oschter Haws"
(never knew the bunny had a name, did you?) to America, where Pennsylvania Dutch settlers prepared nests for him in the garden or barn. On Easter Eve, the rabbit laid his colored eggs in the nests in payment. In Germany, old Oschter lays red eggs on Maundy Thursday.
If anyone knows why children in an agrarian society would believe a rabbit lays eggs, please tell me because I am dying to know.
Hot cross buns are a Christianized pagan custom, too—from the Eostre celebrations.
On one Good Friday, a nineteenth-century missionary to Bermuda had difficulty explaining the ascension of Jesus, so he launched a kite with an image of Jesus on it and cut the string. Kite-flying is now a Bermuda Good Friday tradition.
So much for the pagan side of Easter.
Here is the Christian history of our celebration.
Another Bermuda fact: it's where Easter lilies came from.
They were brought to America from the island in the 1880s
(and, for once, not a Christianized pagan symbol). They're now associated with Easter because it grows from a bulb that is "buried" and "reborn." So this Easter, consider the lilies. And what they represent.
Thursday commemorates the Last Supper of Jesus,
getting its name from the Latin translation of Jesus' saying that evening, "A new commandment I give to you" Mandatum novum do vobis. It is marked by foot washing and the blessing of the oils.
But in various parts of the world, it has other traditions as well.
The German word "to mourn" (grun) is very similar to the word for green (grÜn). So in Austria, Hungary, and much of Germany, today is GrÜndonnerstag: a day to eat spinach and green salad.
This is not the only reason for eating greens:
Passover is celebrated with karpas (a green vegetable, usually parsley) and bitter herbs. In old England, men used to shave their beards on Maundy Thursday, as this was a time to cleanse the body as well as the soul to prepare for Easter.
Friday, of course, is Good Friday. (The Orthodox call it Great Friday,
but they're not celebrating Holy week at the same time we do.)
“Good Friday” is a strange name for it. Christians commemorate Jesus' death and call it "Good." It used to be that Good Friday was observed even more than Easter, but for a while Protestants ignored it.
This may be a lot more than you wanted to know.
But at least you can say you read about it once.
Veritas pro Christo et ecclesia, Pastor Mike
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