The following is my personal manifesto which I bring back from time to time:
The free men of the thirteen colonies choose who, or in this case "what" was to be their king. They made this decision for those who were not free or could not vote, slaves, indentured servants, the native population and women. Indeed, not all that were free made that decision for many wanted no part of independence from England, but the die was cast...they had crossed their Rubicon, and a nation would arise.
Their first choice was independence, their second was a representative government and their third was a constitutional republic. That constitution would rule in the affairs of the whole through the administration of those chosen by the majority. Our representatives are bound by that piece of paper and that paper allows for amendments to it which eventually gave freedom and suffrage to all. Our Supreme Court is bound by that same paper and judges are bound by the laws that that constitution permits us to make for ourselves.
Man (please allow that generic term) is fallible...more than fallible, even prone for error. Indeed, the Founding Fathers knew this and made every attempt to secure the preeminence of the Constitution against the whims and machinations of man himself, for he may see what he wants to see in the words therein and not what is in fact there, and may sit in the judgment seat fully convinced of his own interpretation. He may even come to despise the words of his fathers and their intent but keep this to himself as he twists the self-evident truths before him. Others may call him to account on this. If they are successful the nation will go on as designed. A proverb of Solomon says Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, but such as keep the law contend with them. If those who contend... fail, the nation will proceed as an entirely new entity. The Constitution will no longer be the ultimate rule for it will be little more than a handmaiden to the autonomy of man himself, changing as different men ascend to power, changing as the winds of self-indulgence change course, changing as the powers of one group becomes stronger than the powers of another.
Another Proverb of Solomon says He who pampers his servant from childhood, will have him as a son in the end. At first glance one might think that this recommends pampering for it will buy a son but in actuality it says that to pamper a servant will cause that servant to demand his rights as a son. A charitable society will receive honor but an entitlement society, built on bribes, will fall from within. Lex Rex...the law is our temporal king. It is to the law that we owe our allegiance. It is to the Constitution that we gave powers over us, not to those who represent us in upholding that Constitution.
Our prayer to the King of Kings is not for the Constitution but for those who administer it. They do not have our allegiance but our prayers which are more valuable. Insofar as they do not legislate against the specific laws of God we are subject to those laws. If they do, we are subject to our responsibility to elect those who will not depart from the intentions of those who designed the freedoms and the liberties with reverence for Almighty God and dependence upon their Creator that this nation was built upon.
Thursday, December 26, 2013
Sunday, December 22, 2013
Duck Dyansty
I was standing in front of the ground floor elevator at work yesterday and it came to me that I started working there thirty-four years ago to the day. I had walked through the door next to me for the job interview, showing up in a three piece suit, and the personnel manager asked me politely "You do know that this is an entry level job?" I was young and strong and shoveled a lot of coal for a lot of years. I thank God every day for the employment he provided for me.
Until about a week ago I didn't know very much about Duck Dynasty. I hear the guys at work talk about the show but since I don't get extended cable, and therefore not A&E, I never saw it. Well, I was given an early Christmas present, the CD Duck The Halls, A Robertson Family Christmas. I have probably played it twenty times since receiving it, it's that good! I did then get to see a sample of their show and I like these folks and see what all the fuss was about. And then came the GQ article. Other than the mention of specific body parts I thought Phil Robertson's answers were eloquent, tolerant and even loving but you would never know that from the mainstream news coverage.
Camille Paglia is a professor and prominent social critic whose views even conservatives pay attention to. She is a feminist, an atheist and is gay, and she is also fair-minded. She was on the conservative Laura Ingraham radio program and spoke her mind just as Phil Robertson did. She responded to a question with this, "I think that this intolerance by gay activists toward the full spectrum of human beliefs is a sign of immaturity, juvenility.......this is not the mark of a true intellectual life. This is why there is no cultural life now in the U. S., why nothing is of interest coming from the major media in terms of cultural criticism." Professor Paglia then commented on something that Christians have known for quite some time that the elite northeastern universities put out graduates that are "cultural illiterates.....because they are not being educated in any way to give respect to opposing view points."
The other day I picked up a DVD at Rite-Aid. It was a three hour HBO mini-series from the 90s starring Robert Duvall and titled Stalin. In spite of the magnificent portrayal that Duvall gave it was a difficult film to watch and he himself has said that it was a difficult character to, in effect, become. Duvall gets my vote as America's finest actor. I'm thinking of his portrayal of Robert E. Lee in God's And Generals, Stalin and just about everything else he did. It was reported this week that the U. S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., which I enjoy visiting on occasion, is considering taking down portraits of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson because they were Confederates. Back to Camille Paglia, she likened the uproar over comments by the Robertson patriarch as "utterly Stalinist." That's what this is. Whether it is over Duck Dynasty or these portraits it is attempts to purify society of the vestiges of its past. We are in the middle of a coup in our government and an attempted forced cultural shift that has elements from Brave New World, 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 not to mention the Stalinist purges!
The very first post that I had written back in November of 2009 was on a topic that comes into play with the Duck Dynasty uproar. The bundling of cable stations that we are forced to accept if we want a specific channel has been a huge tool in this attempted cultural shift. One cannot boycott A&E, nor can it evict MSNBC from their home as it stands now. My position has been that a la carte cable for consumers, for Americans, would be a "game changer!" In a short period of time after we were allowed to pick and choose the cable channels for our television the hold that the liberal and progressive television industry has on us would be broken! No, we do not have to watch their indoctrination programming today but the temptation and the visual enticements are an effective tool in breaking down our resolve. Cancelling specific channels would be much easier and would shake the industry to the core as to their agenda which is true intolerance. But enacting laws for a la carte cable is a long-term plan and we have to deal with the situation as it presently exists.
Prayer is and has always been our primary weapon and the Robertson's apparently do that well also.
Until about a week ago I didn't know very much about Duck Dynasty. I hear the guys at work talk about the show but since I don't get extended cable, and therefore not A&E, I never saw it. Well, I was given an early Christmas present, the CD Duck The Halls, A Robertson Family Christmas. I have probably played it twenty times since receiving it, it's that good! I did then get to see a sample of their show and I like these folks and see what all the fuss was about. And then came the GQ article. Other than the mention of specific body parts I thought Phil Robertson's answers were eloquent, tolerant and even loving but you would never know that from the mainstream news coverage.
Camille Paglia is a professor and prominent social critic whose views even conservatives pay attention to. She is a feminist, an atheist and is gay, and she is also fair-minded. She was on the conservative Laura Ingraham radio program and spoke her mind just as Phil Robertson did. She responded to a question with this, "I think that this intolerance by gay activists toward the full spectrum of human beliefs is a sign of immaturity, juvenility.......this is not the mark of a true intellectual life. This is why there is no cultural life now in the U. S., why nothing is of interest coming from the major media in terms of cultural criticism." Professor Paglia then commented on something that Christians have known for quite some time that the elite northeastern universities put out graduates that are "cultural illiterates.....because they are not being educated in any way to give respect to opposing view points."
The other day I picked up a DVD at Rite-Aid. It was a three hour HBO mini-series from the 90s starring Robert Duvall and titled Stalin. In spite of the magnificent portrayal that Duvall gave it was a difficult film to watch and he himself has said that it was a difficult character to, in effect, become. Duvall gets my vote as America's finest actor. I'm thinking of his portrayal of Robert E. Lee in God's And Generals, Stalin and just about everything else he did. It was reported this week that the U. S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., which I enjoy visiting on occasion, is considering taking down portraits of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson because they were Confederates. Back to Camille Paglia, she likened the uproar over comments by the Robertson patriarch as "utterly Stalinist." That's what this is. Whether it is over Duck Dynasty or these portraits it is attempts to purify society of the vestiges of its past. We are in the middle of a coup in our government and an attempted forced cultural shift that has elements from Brave New World, 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 not to mention the Stalinist purges!
The very first post that I had written back in November of 2009 was on a topic that comes into play with the Duck Dynasty uproar. The bundling of cable stations that we are forced to accept if we want a specific channel has been a huge tool in this attempted cultural shift. One cannot boycott A&E, nor can it evict MSNBC from their home as it stands now. My position has been that a la carte cable for consumers, for Americans, would be a "game changer!" In a short period of time after we were allowed to pick and choose the cable channels for our television the hold that the liberal and progressive television industry has on us would be broken! No, we do not have to watch their indoctrination programming today but the temptation and the visual enticements are an effective tool in breaking down our resolve. Cancelling specific channels would be much easier and would shake the industry to the core as to their agenda which is true intolerance. But enacting laws for a la carte cable is a long-term plan and we have to deal with the situation as it presently exists.
Prayer is and has always been our primary weapon and the Robertson's apparently do that well also.
".....but the real cross of Christ is not there."
The following is my Lord's Day post which I will leave up for a day and then transfer to another blog:
In roughly twelve hours from now pastors will take to pulpits across this land. What will be preached from those pulpits will entertain, inform, motivate and comfort. Folks, I don't mean this as a compliment. From other pulpits doctrine will be preached in amongst extravagant worship... doctrine that is man-made and worthless, and yet in others there will be a condemnation with no love and no realization that that condemnation was first ours before God reached in and plucked us out of the fires. In other pulpits, and I don't know what percentage this is, the Gospel of Jesus Christ is indeed preached. The cross is preached. The love of God, demonstrated to us from Calvary, is evident along with judgment mixed with mercy for those who believe.
My hope, my prayer for America, has been what I wrote first in a post from July of 2011: My prayer has consistently been for God to allow 40 more years...one more period where we would be a source of stability in the world, one more generation added to a storied past of spreading freedom and liberty, one more testimony to the rest of the world that God upholds nations who trust in Him. I hope only for 40 years because of human nature. A couple decades of trusting solely in Jesus Christ and we surely would begin to fall away again. Pessimism, you say? I look at it as the opposite for it is only God's mercy and grace that permitted the world to reach this stage and God is as real today as when He, time and again, humbled and blessed repentant Israel.... as when He sent His church throughout the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ.... as when the Reformation of the 16th century exploded in the hearts and minds of peoples and nations.... as when he guided the Mayflower to Plymouth Rock and as when He crushed the occult Nazi Third Reich. We will turn to Him as a nation...should He will it. And if we do not then that is also His will, also glorious as it would be His plan and maybe...maybe...a precursor to His Second Coming in power and glory, the fulfillment of all of history and the final triumph of good over evil. As bleak as the future of our nation is it is within one word of restoration and that word would be spoken within the Godhead. If you are not overly concerned right now, any words that I write would surely seem ridiculous. If you are, then we are two of hopefully many who are petitioning God for one more manifestation of His power in mercy and blessings upon our nation...and therefore the world.
Personally, I'm convinced that should God have mercy upon us as a nation it will begin in our pulpits. If you should happen to agree with me then please pray for your pastor. Pray that he would be overcome with dread at what we as a nation have become and then filled with the power that only God's Holy Spirit can give, the power to preach the redemptive graces won on that cross of Calvary. Graces that can protect us from the deception that engulfs us as a raging forest fire destroying everything in it's path.
The Chapel Library is a ministry that "Send (s) Christ centered materials from prior centuries worldwide." I would like to quote the 19th century Anglican preacher from London, J. C. Ryle, from some materials I just received: "You may know a good deal about Jesus Christ, by a kind of head knowledge. You may know who He was, where he was born, and what He did. You may know His miracles, His sayings, His prophesies, and His ordinances. you may know how He lived, how He suffered, and how He died. But unless you know the power of Christ's cross by experience, unless you know and feel within that the blood shed on that cross has washed away your own particular sins, unless you are willing to confess that your salvation depends entirely on that work that Christ did upon the cross-unless this be the case, Christ will profit you nothing.... you must know His cross and His blood, or else you will die in your sins."
The Reverend Ryle, who preached at the same time and in the same city as Charles Spurgeon, continued, "As long as you live, beware of a religion in which there is not much of the cross (emphasis his).....there is carved oak and sculptured stone; there is stained glass and brilliant painting; there are solemn services and a constant round of ordinances; but the real cross of Christ is not there. Jesus Christ is not proclaimed in the pulpit. The Lamb of God is not lifted up, and salvation by faith in Him is not freely proclaimed. And hence, all is wrong......Do not be ashamed of the 'old paths' in which men walked who were inspired by the Holy Ghost. Let not the vague talk of modern teachers, who speak great swelling words about 'catholicity' and 'the church' disturb your peace and make you loose your hands from the cross."
Our pulpits, many of them, are filled with men who love Christ but for one reason or another failed in their calling to preach Him. Pray for them for in doing so you will be praying for us all in a nation that, evidenced by news items every day, is hastening to oblivion.
The Gideon's
The Apollo 8 mission in 1968 saw, for the first time, man leave the gravitational pull of the earth and come under the same force of another heavenly body. Frank Borman commanded the mission that included James Lovell and William Anders. On Christmas Eve, on the ninth orbit of the Moon, with the world watching on television, the three astronauts read in turn the first ten verses from the Book of Genesis:
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
And God said, "Let there be light", and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
And God said, "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so.
And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
And God said, "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear"; and it was so.
And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: And God saw that it was good. (KJV)
There was a Japanese correspondent watching this on television from his hotel and called NASA for a copy of the script that the astronaut was reading. He was asked where he was calling from and told to look in the desk drawer and he would see it in the first ten verses of the first book, Genesis, of the Gideon Bible that would be there. The correspondent was impressed that NASA Public Relations would leave him an advance copy of the script! (This from an old Parade Magazine I believe.)
In 1982, as a new Christian, my wife and I were on our first cruise. As we rounded the western end of Cuba there was a storm that rocked the boat so much that the passengers could do nothing but sit in their cabins. Too new of a believer to even bring a Bible with me, I opened the desk drawer and there was a Gideon Bible. I opened it and read the first verses that I came to. It was the 93rd Psalm. As the boat rocked, I read:
The Lord reigns, He is clothed with majesty;
The Lord has clothed and girded Himself with strength;
Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved.
Thy throne is established from old;
Thou art from everlasting.
The floods have lifted up, O Lord,
The floods have lifted up their voice;
The floods lift up their pounding waves.
More than the sounds of many waters,
Than the mighty breakers of the sea,
The Lord on high is mighty.
Thy testimonies are fully confirmed;
Holiness befits Thy house,
O Lord, forevermore. (NAS)
I'm writing this blog from a motel room and the ever present Gideon Bible is in the drawer. They have distributed over 1.5 billion Bibles since 1908 and I am reminded of Romans 10:15b:
How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news. (NIV)
In roughly twelve hours from now pastors will take to pulpits across this land. What will be preached from those pulpits will entertain, inform, motivate and comfort. Folks, I don't mean this as a compliment. From other pulpits doctrine will be preached in amongst extravagant worship... doctrine that is man-made and worthless, and yet in others there will be a condemnation with no love and no realization that that condemnation was first ours before God reached in and plucked us out of the fires. In other pulpits, and I don't know what percentage this is, the Gospel of Jesus Christ is indeed preached. The cross is preached. The love of God, demonstrated to us from Calvary, is evident along with judgment mixed with mercy for those who believe.
My hope, my prayer for America, has been what I wrote first in a post from July of 2011: My prayer has consistently been for God to allow 40 more years...one more period where we would be a source of stability in the world, one more generation added to a storied past of spreading freedom and liberty, one more testimony to the rest of the world that God upholds nations who trust in Him. I hope only for 40 years because of human nature. A couple decades of trusting solely in Jesus Christ and we surely would begin to fall away again. Pessimism, you say? I look at it as the opposite for it is only God's mercy and grace that permitted the world to reach this stage and God is as real today as when He, time and again, humbled and blessed repentant Israel.... as when He sent His church throughout the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ.... as when the Reformation of the 16th century exploded in the hearts and minds of peoples and nations.... as when he guided the Mayflower to Plymouth Rock and as when He crushed the occult Nazi Third Reich. We will turn to Him as a nation...should He will it. And if we do not then that is also His will, also glorious as it would be His plan and maybe...maybe...a precursor to His Second Coming in power and glory, the fulfillment of all of history and the final triumph of good over evil. As bleak as the future of our nation is it is within one word of restoration and that word would be spoken within the Godhead. If you are not overly concerned right now, any words that I write would surely seem ridiculous. If you are, then we are two of hopefully many who are petitioning God for one more manifestation of His power in mercy and blessings upon our nation...and therefore the world.
Personally, I'm convinced that should God have mercy upon us as a nation it will begin in our pulpits. If you should happen to agree with me then please pray for your pastor. Pray that he would be overcome with dread at what we as a nation have become and then filled with the power that only God's Holy Spirit can give, the power to preach the redemptive graces won on that cross of Calvary. Graces that can protect us from the deception that engulfs us as a raging forest fire destroying everything in it's path.
The Chapel Library is a ministry that "Send (s) Christ centered materials from prior centuries worldwide." I would like to quote the 19th century Anglican preacher from London, J. C. Ryle, from some materials I just received: "You may know a good deal about Jesus Christ, by a kind of head knowledge. You may know who He was, where he was born, and what He did. You may know His miracles, His sayings, His prophesies, and His ordinances. you may know how He lived, how He suffered, and how He died. But unless you know the power of Christ's cross by experience, unless you know and feel within that the blood shed on that cross has washed away your own particular sins, unless you are willing to confess that your salvation depends entirely on that work that Christ did upon the cross-unless this be the case, Christ will profit you nothing.... you must know His cross and His blood, or else you will die in your sins."
The Reverend Ryle, who preached at the same time and in the same city as Charles Spurgeon, continued, "As long as you live, beware of a religion in which there is not much of the cross (emphasis his).....there is carved oak and sculptured stone; there is stained glass and brilliant painting; there are solemn services and a constant round of ordinances; but the real cross of Christ is not there. Jesus Christ is not proclaimed in the pulpit. The Lamb of God is not lifted up, and salvation by faith in Him is not freely proclaimed. And hence, all is wrong......Do not be ashamed of the 'old paths' in which men walked who were inspired by the Holy Ghost. Let not the vague talk of modern teachers, who speak great swelling words about 'catholicity' and 'the church' disturb your peace and make you loose your hands from the cross."
Our pulpits, many of them, are filled with men who love Christ but for one reason or another failed in their calling to preach Him. Pray for them for in doing so you will be praying for us all in a nation that, evidenced by news items every day, is hastening to oblivion.
The Gideon's
The Apollo 8 mission in 1968 saw, for the first time, man leave the gravitational pull of the earth and come under the same force of another heavenly body. Frank Borman commanded the mission that included James Lovell and William Anders. On Christmas Eve, on the ninth orbit of the Moon, with the world watching on television, the three astronauts read in turn the first ten verses from the Book of Genesis:
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters
And God said, "Let there be light", and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness.
And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
And God said, "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so.
And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
And God said, "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear"; and it was so.
And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: And God saw that it was good. (KJV)
There was a Japanese correspondent watching this on television from his hotel and called NASA for a copy of the script that the astronaut was reading. He was asked where he was calling from and told to look in the desk drawer and he would see it in the first ten verses of the first book, Genesis, of the Gideon Bible that would be there. The correspondent was impressed that NASA Public Relations would leave him an advance copy of the script! (This from an old Parade Magazine I believe.)
In 1982, as a new Christian, my wife and I were on our first cruise. As we rounded the western end of Cuba there was a storm that rocked the boat so much that the passengers could do nothing but sit in their cabins. Too new of a believer to even bring a Bible with me, I opened the desk drawer and there was a Gideon Bible. I opened it and read the first verses that I came to. It was the 93rd Psalm. As the boat rocked, I read:
The Lord reigns, He is clothed with majesty;
The Lord has clothed and girded Himself with strength;
Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved.
Thy throne is established from old;
Thou art from everlasting.
The floods have lifted up, O Lord,
The floods have lifted up their voice;
The floods lift up their pounding waves.
More than the sounds of many waters,
Than the mighty breakers of the sea,
The Lord on high is mighty.
Thy testimonies are fully confirmed;
Holiness befits Thy house,
O Lord, forevermore. (NAS)
I'm writing this blog from a motel room and the ever present Gideon Bible is in the drawer. They have distributed over 1.5 billion Bibles since 1908 and I am reminded of Romans 10:15b:
How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news. (NIV)
Friday, December 13, 2013
Reject The Fool's Errand
The line that the Establishment wing of the Republican Party will give is that unless the party sticks together the Democrats will continue to win. It's an odd statement because that Establishment wing essentially gave us the Clinton and Obama administrations! Every trick in the book will be used against Conservatives before the primaries. The following is the last half of a post from this past November 6th.
What Are Republicans To Do?
As for the turmoil in the Republican Party, my advice has been and continues to be a stalwart defense of our Constitution by supporting candidates who are outraged as we are by the incompetent leadership, broken promises and now full-fledged attacks by Establishment Republicans upon those who actually see the carnage to our Constitution and immanent disasters that face us brought on by not only Progressives of the Clinton administration and Marxists in the current administration but what has proven to be hopelessly flawed strategies of a political class of Republicans who even if they would regain control of our Senate and Executive Branch would have compromised, as they are now very clearly proving, the principles that originally put most of them into office.
Work for men and women of integrity in the Congress, work to put the political class out to pasture, nominate a true conservative who will be running in the primaries against an Establishment candidate who will lie through his teeth as to conservative principles, support and win with a third Party candidate should we fail in the nomination process, and all the while hold in abeyance the current occupant of the White House....... All of this is under the condition that God even permits us to continue as a Republic for we have gone beyond presumption that he will bless us and now find excuses to openly, egregiously and even pridefully thwart and even mock His law, all in the name of political pragmatism which is a fool's errand for it thinks that it can survive these imminent disasters that threaten us without God's enabling, sustenance in times of trouble and mercy for current and past abuses.
What Are Republicans To Do?
As for the turmoil in the Republican Party, my advice has been and continues to be a stalwart defense of our Constitution by supporting candidates who are outraged as we are by the incompetent leadership, broken promises and now full-fledged attacks by Establishment Republicans upon those who actually see the carnage to our Constitution and immanent disasters that face us brought on by not only Progressives of the Clinton administration and Marxists in the current administration but what has proven to be hopelessly flawed strategies of a political class of Republicans who even if they would regain control of our Senate and Executive Branch would have compromised, as they are now very clearly proving, the principles that originally put most of them into office.
Work for men and women of integrity in the Congress, work to put the political class out to pasture, nominate a true conservative who will be running in the primaries against an Establishment candidate who will lie through his teeth as to conservative principles, support and win with a third Party candidate should we fail in the nomination process, and all the while hold in abeyance the current occupant of the White House....... All of this is under the condition that God even permits us to continue as a Republic for we have gone beyond presumption that he will bless us and now find excuses to openly, egregiously and even pridefully thwart and even mock His law, all in the name of political pragmatism which is a fool's errand for it thinks that it can survive these imminent disasters that threaten us without God's enabling, sustenance in times of trouble and mercy for current and past abuses.
Thursday, December 12, 2013
A Pilgrim's Progress
I wrote what follows in January of 1999. Back then I had to rely on a word processor, copier, envelopes and stamps to get my message out. Reading this old A Pilgrim's Progress showed me that the message hasn't changed. The great books that came out during this time period lit a fire under the church that has expanded in many areas. I'd like to recommend one area here. It is 24/7 sound biblical radio/internet teaching from many teachers that you probably already have heard of and can easily be accessed at www.refnet.fm.
We are indeed a "destitute nation" as I concluded the following writing with but I could not have imagined back in 1999 that we would elect a communist as our president and that the elites of the Republican Party, the Guardians of our intellect and decisions if you will, would turn their wrath, not on the enemy within but on those trying to salvage a national defense, an economy and our very heritage. But I was aware then and know very well today that politics could never save us. Yes we have to be involved but if that involvement impinges upon the realization that there never was, is not and never will be any glory for America or its heritage unless that glory is gratefully thrown at the feet of Jesus Christ to whom it belongs, then all of our efforts will be in vain!
A Pilgrim's Progress.....January, 1999
A few years ago David Wells wrote a book called No Place For Truth, Whatever Happened To Evangelical Theology. Although this was not the first book on the topic, it proved to be a catalyst to a movement attempting to call the church back to its theological moorings that had been weakened after decades of sectarianism that quite naturally evolved when creeds, confessions and catechisms of the historic church were devalued and even ignored. Os Guinness wrote a small book, Fit Bodies, Fat Minds, that accused evangelicals of not thinking and even mapped out the peculiarly American characteristics such as "pluralism, pragmatism" and five other "isms" that quite naturally influenced our evangelical church. Mark Noll's Scandal Of The Evangelical Mind was given the Book Of The Year award. Gene Edward Veith did the best work on postmodernism in Postmodern Times. Michael Horton has repeatedly addressed these issues, his latest effort being a call to return to the Apostles Creed in We Believe. John Armstrong, Iain Murray, R. C. Sproul, John MacArthur, John Piper, Alistair Begg, James M. Boice, D. A. Carson, Hank Hannegraaff, Don Matzat and many others have taken turns trumpeting the dire need of a Reformation today.
What was it that they wrote of that all of a sudden made me realize that I was treading on holy ground? Maybe it was the Puritan William Gurnall's great work Christian In Complete Armour that made me realize that my understanding of spiritual warfare was dangerously in error? Maybe it was Sproul's Knowing Scripture that caused me to use proper hermeneutical tools in studying Scripture? Maybe it was Horton's Putting The Amazing Back Into Grace that made me understand that I did not choose Christ, that if He did not choose to have mercy on this poor miserable soul that I would never have seen the glory of Christ? Maybe it was the incomparable John Bunyan, the tinker whose Pilgrim's Progress, written from prison, that states so poignantly and profoundly that we truly are pilgrims on a journey, people of The Book on our way to the Celestial Kingdom? Maybe it was Arthur Bennett's compilation of Puritan prayers, Valley Of Vision, that sits worn on my dining room table that every dinner time lays me low in my wretchedness only to enable me to more clearly see and feel God's grace? Please forgive my rambling like this, for I look lovingly at these men but fully realize that it is Christ who redeemed me, it is the Father who chose the weakest, unsightliest jar of clay and it is the Holy Spirit who dragged me to belief, opened my eyes and gave me faith. And it is Christ again who keeps me, who keeps all of us, though we let Him down time after time.
The modern church bears scant witness to the glories that underlie the gospel. Its doctrines permit man to credit His own choosing of Christ as evidence of his salvation. Christ is less than sufficient, the Bible is less than adequate and the Holy Spirit hastens to our beckon call. Large churches legitimize us, oblivious of the warnings to the Laodiceans. Reformed churches sit on the laurels of sound doctrine forgetting the command to the Ephesian church to return to their first love. Evangelicals pass out 'four spiritual laws' booklets with a place for a signature for salvation as if they were handling out coupons for a free Big Mac. Pray for a Reformation, that we return to the cross of Christ, that pastors would preach His glories, that fathers would teach His truths and that we would be salt and light to a destitute nation.
We are indeed a "destitute nation" as I concluded the following writing with but I could not have imagined back in 1999 that we would elect a communist as our president and that the elites of the Republican Party, the Guardians of our intellect and decisions if you will, would turn their wrath, not on the enemy within but on those trying to salvage a national defense, an economy and our very heritage. But I was aware then and know very well today that politics could never save us. Yes we have to be involved but if that involvement impinges upon the realization that there never was, is not and never will be any glory for America or its heritage unless that glory is gratefully thrown at the feet of Jesus Christ to whom it belongs, then all of our efforts will be in vain!
A Pilgrim's Progress.....January, 1999
A few years ago David Wells wrote a book called No Place For Truth, Whatever Happened To Evangelical Theology. Although this was not the first book on the topic, it proved to be a catalyst to a movement attempting to call the church back to its theological moorings that had been weakened after decades of sectarianism that quite naturally evolved when creeds, confessions and catechisms of the historic church were devalued and even ignored. Os Guinness wrote a small book, Fit Bodies, Fat Minds, that accused evangelicals of not thinking and even mapped out the peculiarly American characteristics such as "pluralism, pragmatism" and five other "isms" that quite naturally influenced our evangelical church. Mark Noll's Scandal Of The Evangelical Mind was given the Book Of The Year award. Gene Edward Veith did the best work on postmodernism in Postmodern Times. Michael Horton has repeatedly addressed these issues, his latest effort being a call to return to the Apostles Creed in We Believe. John Armstrong, Iain Murray, R. C. Sproul, John MacArthur, John Piper, Alistair Begg, James M. Boice, D. A. Carson, Hank Hannegraaff, Don Matzat and many others have taken turns trumpeting the dire need of a Reformation today.
What was it that they wrote of that all of a sudden made me realize that I was treading on holy ground? Maybe it was the Puritan William Gurnall's great work Christian In Complete Armour that made me realize that my understanding of spiritual warfare was dangerously in error? Maybe it was Sproul's Knowing Scripture that caused me to use proper hermeneutical tools in studying Scripture? Maybe it was Horton's Putting The Amazing Back Into Grace that made me understand that I did not choose Christ, that if He did not choose to have mercy on this poor miserable soul that I would never have seen the glory of Christ? Maybe it was the incomparable John Bunyan, the tinker whose Pilgrim's Progress, written from prison, that states so poignantly and profoundly that we truly are pilgrims on a journey, people of The Book on our way to the Celestial Kingdom? Maybe it was Arthur Bennett's compilation of Puritan prayers, Valley Of Vision, that sits worn on my dining room table that every dinner time lays me low in my wretchedness only to enable me to more clearly see and feel God's grace? Please forgive my rambling like this, for I look lovingly at these men but fully realize that it is Christ who redeemed me, it is the Father who chose the weakest, unsightliest jar of clay and it is the Holy Spirit who dragged me to belief, opened my eyes and gave me faith. And it is Christ again who keeps me, who keeps all of us, though we let Him down time after time.
The modern church bears scant witness to the glories that underlie the gospel. Its doctrines permit man to credit His own choosing of Christ as evidence of his salvation. Christ is less than sufficient, the Bible is less than adequate and the Holy Spirit hastens to our beckon call. Large churches legitimize us, oblivious of the warnings to the Laodiceans. Reformed churches sit on the laurels of sound doctrine forgetting the command to the Ephesian church to return to their first love. Evangelicals pass out 'four spiritual laws' booklets with a place for a signature for salvation as if they were handling out coupons for a free Big Mac. Pray for a Reformation, that we return to the cross of Christ, that pastors would preach His glories, that fathers would teach His truths and that we would be salt and light to a destitute nation.
Monday, December 9, 2013
My Top Three Talk Radio Show Hosts
I've been a radio talk show person for almost fifty years now going back to KDKA's Party Line with Ed and Wendy King and later midnight's Jack Wheeler then Mike Levine and then Roy Fox who was avant-garde with his Fox's Den that was a lot like today's talk radio with the exception that conservative talk radio of today is our news in a culture where the mainstream news has become state-run, profligate in its responsibilities to inform and almost as if hypnotized in its cultic devotion to Barack Obama. I slowed down a little in the 80s and it took me a while to get my nose out of a book long enough to find conservative talk radio but that's where I often go today, out of necessity, for news on this war on America from both without and within.
So there's my resume' and here are my top three conservative talk show hosts. Rush Limbaugh is indeed the best even though he's not nearly as accurate as the 99.7% of the time that he jokingly reminds us of every day. It's one of his traits that will be the focus of this post. Mark Levin gets my vote for #2. Quite simply, he holds Republican's feet to the fire far better than anyone, he's uncompromising on truth as it pertains to the defense of our heritage, plus he's an author of significance with his legal and constitutional expertise. You may or may not have heard of my #3. He's a former disk jockey Jim Quinn that I used to listen to here in Pittsburgh in the 60s and 70s.
Quinn is part of the Quinn and Rose (Rose Tennent) team (www.warroom.com). Up until recently you could hear them on XM and other venues emanating from their home base at a Pittsburgh radio station. XM Satellite Radio inexplicably had Jim Quinn on an alternate conservative channel 244 until in what was even more baffling they did away with that channel and Quinn and Rose! More recently, within the last month, his Pittsburgh home base dropped his show. I don't claim to know the ins and outs of this decision but it certainly wasn't based on popularity or profits. This man is ultra popular in this area and for good reason. I don't mean to slight Rose but Jim Quinn is up there with Limbaugh and Levin. He has insight into the ploys of the liberal politician and he cuts to the quick. He knows what issues are important and he has a gift for explaining them. I won't speculate on executive decisions but I will on high level liberal political operative's anxieties. They were very uncomfortable with Jim Quinn and with good reason. Hopefully their celebrating will be short lived.
OK, now for my disagreement with Rush. He consistently reminds us that he is an optimist on America. It's part of who he is, on the radio at least. There was a Grammy nominated #1 song by Starship in the mid-80s called We Built This City. Well, we built America as it has become today. I bear plenty of responsibility for I added to the defective brick and mortar into my 30s and I was well into my 40s until I finally realized that America had turned from its Benefactor and had not only rejected God but in its influential professions and entertainments brazenly began to ridicule Him. As it stands today, God's judgment on America must be near. I am an optimist in that I do believe that America will repent, I just don't know if it will be from the ashes of a ruined nation or from an awakening beforehand as to what we have become.
I finally picked up Diana West's 2007 book The Death of the Grown-up, How America's Arrested Development Is Bringing Down Western Civilization. George Will and Michele Malkin both used the word "wit"..."witty" in their blurbs but I personally can no longer smile at witticisms concerning the mockery of reason that describes our government and our nation. No, there were even tears formed as I read and recognized her description of our journey to the center of perpetual adolescence that has rendered us Godless, defenseless and clueless as to who and what our enemies are. Read it and weep might be my blurb. So that's my difference with Rush. We have to address politics and government and foreign affairs and taxes and on and on but our sickness is stage four and the doctor....the only doctor.... is God. These are very sad times and they are going to get worse. The question, as I previously inferred, is will we realize beforehand, when there may be time, that God's hand has already been withdrawn.
So there's my resume' and here are my top three conservative talk show hosts. Rush Limbaugh is indeed the best even though he's not nearly as accurate as the 99.7% of the time that he jokingly reminds us of every day. It's one of his traits that will be the focus of this post. Mark Levin gets my vote for #2. Quite simply, he holds Republican's feet to the fire far better than anyone, he's uncompromising on truth as it pertains to the defense of our heritage, plus he's an author of significance with his legal and constitutional expertise. You may or may not have heard of my #3. He's a former disk jockey Jim Quinn that I used to listen to here in Pittsburgh in the 60s and 70s.
Quinn is part of the Quinn and Rose (Rose Tennent) team (www.warroom.com). Up until recently you could hear them on XM and other venues emanating from their home base at a Pittsburgh radio station. XM Satellite Radio inexplicably had Jim Quinn on an alternate conservative channel 244 until in what was even more baffling they did away with that channel and Quinn and Rose! More recently, within the last month, his Pittsburgh home base dropped his show. I don't claim to know the ins and outs of this decision but it certainly wasn't based on popularity or profits. This man is ultra popular in this area and for good reason. I don't mean to slight Rose but Jim Quinn is up there with Limbaugh and Levin. He has insight into the ploys of the liberal politician and he cuts to the quick. He knows what issues are important and he has a gift for explaining them. I won't speculate on executive decisions but I will on high level liberal political operative's anxieties. They were very uncomfortable with Jim Quinn and with good reason. Hopefully their celebrating will be short lived.
OK, now for my disagreement with Rush. He consistently reminds us that he is an optimist on America. It's part of who he is, on the radio at least. There was a Grammy nominated #1 song by Starship in the mid-80s called We Built This City. Well, we built America as it has become today. I bear plenty of responsibility for I added to the defective brick and mortar into my 30s and I was well into my 40s until I finally realized that America had turned from its Benefactor and had not only rejected God but in its influential professions and entertainments brazenly began to ridicule Him. As it stands today, God's judgment on America must be near. I am an optimist in that I do believe that America will repent, I just don't know if it will be from the ashes of a ruined nation or from an awakening beforehand as to what we have become.
I finally picked up Diana West's 2007 book The Death of the Grown-up, How America's Arrested Development Is Bringing Down Western Civilization. George Will and Michele Malkin both used the word "wit"..."witty" in their blurbs but I personally can no longer smile at witticisms concerning the mockery of reason that describes our government and our nation. No, there were even tears formed as I read and recognized her description of our journey to the center of perpetual adolescence that has rendered us Godless, defenseless and clueless as to who and what our enemies are. Read it and weep might be my blurb. So that's my difference with Rush. We have to address politics and government and foreign affairs and taxes and on and on but our sickness is stage four and the doctor....the only doctor.... is God. These are very sad times and they are going to get worse. The question, as I previously inferred, is will we realize beforehand, when there may be time, that God's hand has already been withdrawn.
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