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Good Morning!First and foremost let me apologize for not publishing the last edition! It has a terribly busy couple of weeks and I just got so behind that it was impossible to accomplish - sorry! I make this edition extra good! We got a note from the McIntyres as well as from the Dugans since last we were together and so I'll pass them on first of all. First, a note from Jim and Lynda Dugan with Word of Life in Australia. They are home of furlough at the moment and getting ready to head back at the end of the summer. Dear Praying Friends, We received a phone call from Jeremiah late Sunday night. He was at the hospital waiting for results from some x-rays. He has torn ligaments and chipped bones in his ankle. He must return to the doctor in 10 days to see if his bones are healing properly. If not, he will have to have surgery. We're thankful that Jim is able to be with him this week in New York. Please be praying for the Australian staff men as they meet this week to make a strategic plan for ministry in Australia. Thank you for your faithful prayer support!
Love, And then a longer one from the McIntyres in Guam with TWR: Hi everyone, today is Friday 5/21. I'm recovering nicely from my hysterectomy surgery last week. It was delayed a couple of weeks and so was in May instead of April. The past 3 days I don't even feel like I have to rest very much, though of course I know I need to, and sit down to read often. I've taken over feeding the birdies, and unloading and loading the dishwasher. I've been outside to check on the mangoes and even picked some with the picker. Jim was off work until yesterday and could frequently be heard in the kitchen singing, "Cinderella, Cinderella, ..." Occasionally I would chime in from the livingroom, "CINNDERRELLAA!" The staples are out of my stomach, so now I have a vertical railroad track scar about 7 inches long, that goes up past my belly button. Ladies from church are bringing us dinner through next week, so we're eating very well and we're thankful for that provision. Our next door neighbor also brought us dinner, and their boys like to help out by walking Samson. I went to church Wednesday for supper (which we do every Wed) and Bible Study. Someone brought a reclining lawn chair, as it's more comfortable for me to sit in a reclining position than up straight. The pathology report was positive for cancer consistent with metastatic breast cancer in both ovaries, 1 fallopian tube, something called a cul-de-sac box, and the omentum which is a fatty lining in the abdomen, though female organs are not usually the place breast cancer spreads to. It is not growing as a tumor, but as granules interconnected, so whatever is left in there is small grainy stuff. There was a change in my recent chest x-ray, so I have to get a CT scan of my chest. The pathology report was faxed to HI to Dr. Bala, the oncologist who left here when The Cancer Institute closed on April 8, to get his opinion on what to do next, probably chemo. Good news though--the group my plastic surgeon is part of is adding an oncologist, so they will have an oncologist, oncologic surgeon and plastic surgeon, and will do chemotherapy. The group where I have my x-rays and scans is adding a radiology oncologist and equipment to do radiation therapy. Right now I'm seeing a doctor for my monthly bone treatment and hormone injection who has done chemo on Guam for years, and has himself recently had chemo, so I can start chemo with him if need be. So far we have confidence in the competency of these 2 medical groups.
We're still in His grip and in His care, If you do any amount of reading in Christian circles, then you have heard reports of revival world-wide and of great miracles accompanying, and some would say, causing those revivals. Do Nigerian Miracle Ministries Discredit the Faith?The spiritual dynamism of West African Christianity is now well known even in the West. Do credulity-stretching, highly publicized miracles discredit what God is doing in that region?Recently Nigeria's National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) issued a ban on the television broadcasting of miracles—specifically, those not "provable and believable" (though the NBC failed to provide guidelines for establishing proof). The ban is aimed at the many Pentecostal ministries in that country who air video of healing miracles to draw people to their meetings and to Christ. My response to this sort of "news of the miraculous" in Africa is mixed. First, I get a small thrill—a little, inner voice saying "Yay!"—when I am reminded of how powerfully God has touched that continent, so that miracles of healing would become standard television fare. Second, I share in the skepticism that suspects some charismatic ministers broadcast such events—without adequately checking the genuineness of the "miracles"—to aggrandize their ministries and gain followers. Third, I am angry (with, I hope, a holy sort of anger) that the Devil continues, as he always has, to discredit by any means possible the work of the Holy Spirit—in this case, through exploiting the base motives of some leaders. No longer among my reactions, however, is a desire to dismiss all of African Christianity as shallow and unbiblical. Though I once did lean toward this opinion, I have moved away from it as I have learned more about the progress of the faith on that continent during the past century. The twin lions of African ChristianityWest Africa's two most distinctive, fast-growing indigenous religious movements are, first, the "prophetic independent churches" that began to appear after World War I, and second, the charismatic and Pentecostal churches that sprang up in the 1970s. Both are growing with stunning rapidity. And both are rooted in the belief that a personal Devil and demons are at work in Africa—especially through African traditional religion; that prayer is the key to all problems in this world; and that God continues to heal and deliver people today as in the day of the apostles. These movements draw deeply from the African assumption—also strong in traditional religion—that the spiritual world is real and that it constantly impinges on the material world. In our Issue 79: The African Apostles, Dr. Ogbu Kalu of McCormick Theological Seminary compares this assumption to the modern, Word-centered beliefs of the early Western missionaries: "The missionaries read the Bible through the lenses of the Protestant emphasis on Word over Spirit and the Enlightenment desacralization of the universe. The Africans, on the other hand, read the Bible through their own traditionally 'charismatic' worldview: they knew there were spirits in the sky, the water, the land, and the ancestral worlds. Only, now, they proclaimed the power of Jesus over these other powers. For example, when confronted with illness, the Africans read their Bibles and came up with a straightforward belief in healing. They were used to seeing illness and health as spiritual matters. They had always accepted witchcraft as the source of illness." This supernaturalist belief results in a "wild side" of these groups that is very hard for Westerners (and especially non-charismatic Westerners) either to understand or to credit as legitimate. See, for example, the profiles from our Africa issue of several founders and leaders from West Africa's "Aladura"—Christian groups in the prophetic independent church stream. An equally spirit- and prayer-focused, but slightly less indigenous movement followed, beginning a scant three decades ago. These are the Pentecostal and charismatic churches—West African churches with roots and ties in Western Pentecostalism, but almost entirely indigenous in leadership and style. The West African charismatic movement has been growing like a flash fire since it emerged in the 1970s from such sources as house churches birthed by college ministries (e.g. the Student Christian Movement, Scripture Union, and Campus Christian Fellowship). Like the West African prophetic churches, the Pentecostal/charismatics believe in healing and miracles. They also share the prophetic churches' astounding growth rates, contributing to the almost total Christianization of some countries during the 20th century. Unlike the semi-literate founders and leaders of the prophetic churches, the leaders of the charismatics tend to be educated and fully literate. They also focus more on tracts and other literature than (as the prophetic churches do) on "prayer tangibles"— items like staffs, crosses, gourds, and so forth. Finally, the newer groups are also fond of crusades, revivals, and other open-air meetings, choosing them over the smaller-group, more communal style of most prophetic groups. A shadow on the landNot all Africans accept the highly supernaturalist style of these groups. Especially those African churches with stronger links to Western mainstream churches are at odds with the newcomers. So one African journalist—a Christian—refers to that continent's "war between the Orthodoxes and the Pentecostalists." Sadly, another source of this division is that in their quest for personal holiness, many of the charismatic churches have practiced a kind of exclusivism and elitism that too easily writes mainstream Christians out of the Kingdom. This is of course also a familiar story line in the history of Western evangelicalism—and Western missions. More troubling still are the prosperity preaching, get-rich-quick schemes, and outright scams that have been associated with Nigerian charismatic Christians. All of this is real matter for concern. The continuing scandal of African and Western ministers abusing their power over the faithful masses for personal gain—and preaching messages that tickle the ear—is not just a p.r. problem. It is a matter having grave eternal consequences—and evidence enough, for that matter, that the Africans' belief in demonic influence is an accurate one! But we must step carefully before we use the abuses of a few—or even many—Christian leaders to discredit all miracles or belittle the power of prayer. Criticisms of evangelistic "miracle ministries" remind me of a story that is told (perhaps apocryphally) about St. Francis of Assisi. Francis went to the pope of his day to present his simple monastic rule, hoping to get his "friars minor" approved as an official monastic order of the church. The pope, reading the short, Biblical rule, found it idealistic and impracticable. "It'll never work," he said, in effect. At which juncture, the story goes, one of his cardinals leaned over to whisper a reminder that Francis's rule was made up almost entirely of the words of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. "This," said the cardinal, "is only what Jesus told us to do!" Well, Jesus told us what to expect from prayer, just as he told us, in his Sermon on the Mount, how to live. Of course, the Biblical promises about the power of prayer can seem as impossible to our limited human perspective as the injunctions of that sermon. But there they are in our Bibles. Remember what Jesus said to his disciples when they questioned him about the nature of his ministry—and theirs: "I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father" (John 14:12-13). Jesus also warned that the "wheat would grow up with the tares" in the Christian body. And it would only get worse as the end neared: "False Christs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and miracles to deceive the elect" (Mark 13:22). The early Christians took this warning to heart. Their church manual, the Didache, gave a clear guideline for discerning whether a would-be apostle of Christ who entered your town was a true or a false apostle: "If he asks for money, he is a false prophet." It is writtenThe real question is this: Does God intend to bless and rescue people in the physical realm and in historical time (that is, not just in a far-off afterlife)? Is it inadmissible selfishness and hubris to think so? Granted, it is easy for us to fall off into the seductive doctrine that says God will always enable the obedient Christian to "live large" both in ministry and in daily life. The "prosperity gospellers" need to remember Paul's testimony (in Philippians 4:11-12) that he had learned the fine art of being contented in trials and sufferings as well as in fat times. And it is clear that many thousands of Africans are struggling with some version of the doctrine of God the Cash Machine. But how are we to interpret John 15:7—"If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you"? In our Africa issue, Dr. Kalu makes clear how African Christians have interpreted such words: "Africans appropriated Christian teaching on prosperity and poverty not because they were gulled by televangelists, but because the televangelists were addressing a deep vein in the indigenous worldview. Africans have always known poverty as a dire threat, and they have attempted to explain and deal with it from a religious rather than a secular economic perspective. When they read in their Bibles promises of spiritual power that can deal with issues of wealth and prosperity and protect people from the devastating effects of poverty, then these elements became dominant in their theology." Do African believers sometimes go too far in their assumptions about what the Bible teaches on wealth and poverty, or on healing? This may be. But do we, in reaction to fraudulent miracles and shady motives, give up on the Hebrew earthiness of Jewish religion—which was Jesus' religion—that sees God as intimately engaged in his beloved people's lives, saving them in battle, providing them with food, healing their illnesses? Do we turn instead to the airy realm of Greek abstractions about soteriology and eschatology? Is the former an illegitimate thing called "folk religion," while only the latter is the legitimate, properly theological "high religion" of Scripture? It seems to me that at the very least, while we're thinking about their "speck" of "hyper-belief," we should consider the Enlightenment "log" still in our own eye. I have to watch carefully my reaction to reports of African Christianity—my tendency to lean back onto my old assumption that here is a faith "a mile wide and an inch deep." I'm afraid there is in this assumption more than a little of the modern intellectual snobbery that squeezes God until he is too small to do anything, or bounces him up into a high heaven where he is too remote to reach down and change our circumstances, as well as our hearts, when we pray. When I think of the amazing work of the Spirit—and the counteracting work of the Devil—in modern-day Africa, I am reminded of church historian Richard Lovelace's comment when asked a decade ago about the Toronto Airport Vineyard revival, which featured such fringe phenomena as worshippers barking like dogs and roaring like lions. First, Dr. Lovelace recognized that in the Great Awakening and in many other incidences of wide-spread revival, physical phenomena have accompanied the work of the Holy Spirit. Then, tellingly, he added: "But it is in the Devil's interest to make Christians look weird." Where any element of a revival can be exploited to discredit the faith, the Devil will exploit it. But any real or imagined imbalance in the African church's approaches to God's action in the physical world should not lead us to conclude that God has ceased to work miracles today—or even that he does not frequently answer his children's prayers for all kinds of aid, both spiritual and material. This negative conclusion looks dangerously like the sin of unbelief. Today is History Day! Glory! Doncha just love history and the way it shows God's hand and control of all things? I have a number of articles for you this morning so let's get started! Not a Synod but a SalonThe "evangelical underground" plotted England's and the world's salvation at a London pub.Aldersgate Street, London. This was where John Wesley, who had launched Britain's Evangelical Revival decades before, had found his heart "strangely warmed" in May 1738. But it was not only Wesley's Methodists who spread that revival. On a frozen Thursday evening in January 1783, in an upper room of the Castle-and-Falcon Pub on Aldersgate Street, John Newton met with fellow evangelical leaders Richard Cecil and Henry Foster, Anglican clergymen, and Eli Bates, an Anglican layman. Though there is no record of what transpired at that meeting, it is a safe bet that the 57-year-old Newton had his pipe in hand and that he was exuding characteristic warmth and enthusiasm. The four of them agreed to meet on a regular basis—"fortnightly"—the beginnings of the Eclectic Society. As it expanded to include other attendees, Newton's meeting would gain a reputation as one in which Christian leaders from different strains of evangelicalism could discuss important issues in a relaxed setting. It was an environment defined by Newton's signature conversation style, which William Jay remembers as "most easy, and free, and varied, and delightful, and edifying." Newton himself called his meeting an "association," representing a much-needed alternative to the churches' beloved "assemblies, consistories, synods, councils, benches, [and] boards," which he cordially disliked. He was, after all, in the habit of receiving scores of parishioners and friends at least twice a week in his home, in the intimacy of his back room—sometimes 40 in a single day. The Castle-and-Falcon meetings marked more than a change in style, however. Over the next three decades, the Eclectic Society would become a center of English evangelicalism, a place for London clergy and country parsons alike to hang their hats, discuss whatever was on their minds, and dream about reaching the unsaved masses in Africa. It would eventually birth the influential Church Missionary Society and the widely read Christian Observer magazine. Making it officialEven after the first nine months, the meeting was still a nebulous gathering, which its founder referred to as "the society that bears no name, and espouses no party." Nevertheless it doubled in size, adding clergy and laity of various stripes, including (despite the fact that Newton had at first distrusted the Moravians) the noted Moravian composer Christian Ignatius LaTrobe, then only 26 years old. By 1784 the group had adopted its name and grown to about 12 regular attendees. Rev. Cecil offered to host the meetings in a more accommodating venue—the vestry of his own church, St John's Chapel in Bedford Row. The initial rules of the society are recorded on the inside cover of Newton's journal for 1791. The meeting time was every other Monday afternoon at 4:30 P.M. Tea was served from a silver teapot, followed by three or so hours of discussion—"Bible on the table." Each participant contributed a shilling for food. Potential new members were proposed by one member and admitted only by unanimous consent, though the number of members could not exceed 13. The meeting's agenda was driven by a single question, submitted by one of the members at the end of the previous meeting. The members would take turns answering, and Newton kept minutes in a small journal. Questions deep and wideThe questions were appropriately eclectic. Sometimes they dealt with a theological issue, such as "How should we reconcile Paul and James on justification?" Sometimes a cultural question arose: "What are the particular dangers of youth in the present day?" The inevitable presence of Newton—hymnist, pastor, and former slave trader—gave the evenings a unique character in which anything might be discussed. In the early period of Eclectic Society meetings, most of the topics were practical rather than theological. Several were family-oriented. In response to the question for December 10, 1787, "What is the nature and obligation of conjugal duties?" the members recommended a "softening" of male headship. "Authority as the remedy" may prove to be the "disease" itself; instead, it is best to "leave some things to the Woman." "If we stretch our authority," Newton concluded, "we lose it." In discussing "Parents and Children," the topic for December 24, 1787, the group began with a long list of duties of parents to their children, then turned to a shorter list of children's duties to their parents: "reverence, obedience, gratitude." The key to effective child-rearing, the gentlemen agreed, was "the tone and spirit of the family." Parents' private habits, tones of voice, and even body language must be the touchstones for effective child-rearing. The Eclectics applied a similar ethic of gracious self-denial to ministry, response to theological error, dealing with enemies, and preaching style. The common theme in all of these discussions was that kindness always trumps sternness. Persuasion is preferable to browbeating. In response to the January 22, 1798, question, "What may be done towards the interests of the children of a congregation?" Newton said, a bit impatiently, "What is agreeable to children is agreeable to children of six feet high. … Talk to children abstractedly, and it is all in vain. Go through the life of Christ, and all the historical parts of Scripture." On another occasion, Newton said, "For an old Christian to say to a young one, 'Stand in my evidence,' is like a man who has with difficulty climbed by a ladder of scaffolding to the top of a house, and cries to one at the bottom, 'This is the place for a prospect—come up at a step.'" Newton's approach, which would become the approach of the whole Eclectic assembly, was to discern each person's needs and respond accordingly. Sacrifice should be on the part of the pastor, of the husband, the parent. An eventful eraThe founding years of the Eclectic Society were years of major political change, not only in England, but throughout Europe. In Paris, on January 20, 1783—four days after that first meeting at Castle-and-Falcon—England signed away one of its best colonial assets to the likes of John Adams and Ben Franklin. It was also a time of religious change. A grassroots evangelical movement had been growing steadily in the Church of England since at least the 1760s (p. 30). Just two months before the Eclectics' first meeting, evangelical leader Charles Simeon was installed at Holy Trinity Church, Cambridge (p. 50). In London, evangelical lecturers and chaplains were becoming so popular that people brimmed out into the sidewalks and streets. The Eclectic Society's chief importance was that it focused an ethos. In place of the old-fashioned ecclesiastical bureaucracy, here was a "back-room" meeting, an almost revolutionary event in which the Bible lay open on the table and each man had his say. Instead of a synod, Newton hosted a salon—the kind of intellectual club that had been so effective in focusing philosophical ideas in France during the previous hundred years. Such meetings had formed the molecular substructure of the Enlightenment; and, with the subsequent rise of other informal gatherings, such as William Wilberforce's "Clapham Sect," they would serve the evangelical cause in a similar way. Missionaries, magazines, and moreThe practical effect of the Eclectic Society was first felt in—of all places—Australia. In addition to Newton himself, young zealots like Christian LaTrobe and John Venn had given the assembly a distinct air of missions-mindedness. Newton had been instrumental in the appointment of Richard Johnson to establish a church in New South Wales, and in 1786 the Society considered the question: "What is the best method for planting and propagating the Gospel in Botany Bay?" The Society discussed missions again in 1789, when the question was, "What is the best way of propagating the Gospel in the East Indies?" One evening in 1792, discussion turned to the slave trade—a practice that Newton by then opposed as steadfastly as did his close friend William Wilberforce. This stirred the group to an ongoing discussion of Africa, which led to the founding of Venn's Church Missionary Society for Africa and the East (CMS) in 1799. The CMS held its inaugural meeting at the Castle-and-Falcon, as had the London Missionary Society, founded in 1795. Wilberforce himself was asked to be the president of the CMS, though he refused, accepting instead vice-presidency. Also in 1799, a young clergyman who had been recently recruited to the Eclectic Society, Josiah Pratt, proposed the following question: "How far may a periodical Publication be made subservient to the interest of Religion?" In 1801 Pratt founded the Christian Observer, which throughout the nineteenth century served as a valuable organ for evangelical ideas. The boom years for the Eclectic Society were really 1799 and 1800. According to Pratt's register, 24 different members were active at some point during that span. As he entered his late 70s, however, Newton's health fell into decline, and after he died in 1807, his society also fell on hard times. Although there were still 16 members in 1814, Pratt resigned in that year because the "discussions were not made latterly with the same fulness [sic] as before." And the society disbanded. Of course, the legacy of Newton, Wilberforce, Cecil, Pratt, Johnson, and others lives on, but not due solely to their accomplishments. These were friends, sitting at table, a pipe handy, significant questions to pursue, and a familiar manner of expression. Their lives were knit together not in public but in Newton's back room and in the pub on Aldersgate Street. When and why did the custom of conducting altar calls begin?Your question is tied to the history of revival and revivalism. George Whitefield, who historians identify as the key preacher of the Great Awakening, refused to speculate on how many of his listeners had been converted. "There are so many stony-ground hearers which receive the word with joy," Whitefield said, "that I have determined to suspend my judgment till I know the tree by its fruits." Revivals were the sole work of the Holy Spirit, and the test of time either confirmed or disproved these conversions. But as the nineteenth century dawned, popular American Methodist preachers wanted a method to help them determine who of their listeners had been converted. Anglican churches featured an altar in front of the communion table, and ministers often encouraged parishioners to come to the altar if they needed prayer or encouragement. Methodist preachers inherited this tradition but changed its purpose, calling rather those "under conviction" to come forward to the altar. In 1801, for example, itinerant Methodist preacher Peter Cartwright told women at a camp meeting that if they promised "to pray to God for religion," they might take a seat at the altar. Cartwright further accused parents who discouraged their children from "going to the altar" of hindering their salvation. The altar call gained popularity in the 1830s with the preaching of Charles G. Finney. Finney rejected Calvinistic teaching that human nature was irreparably depraved; he believed only men's wills, not their natures, needed to be converted. His "new measures," then, set out to make regeneration as easy as possible. "A revival is not a miracle," Finney wrote. "It is a purely philosophical result of the right use of the constituted means." In other words, preachers might create revival if they used proven methods, chief of these being the "anxious bench" or "seat of decision." "The object of our measures is to gain attention," Finney said, and for that "you must have something new." Prominent evangelists since Finney's time, most notably D.L. Moody and Billy Graham, have continued to make use of the altar call. But if Moody used Finney's method with enthusiasm, he was careful to avoid implying that a minister can "cause" salvation—whatever the methods used. "It is not our strength we want," he told his volunteer counselors. "It is not our work to make them believe. That is the work of the Spirit … I cannot convert men; I can only proclaim the Gospel." This Week In Christian HistoryWe haven't done a "this Week In Christian History for a while so here goes:
I do have some news items for you this morning:Baptist Journalist Urges Parents to Abandon Public SchoolsAgape Press - Southern Baptists are being challenged to pull their children out of public schools for "the good of Christ's church and the strength of their own commitment to Jesus." Two years ago, Dr. James Dobson of Focus on the Family drew both praise and criticism when he urged California parents not to send their children to state-run schools for fear they could be corrupted by a pro-homosexual agenda. While acknowledging there were many Christians teachers in the California system who were "struggling mightily to do what's right," he noted that kindergartners through high school seniors in the Golden State were being taught "homosexual propaganda" and "other politically correct, post-modern views." Now two Southern Baptists are apparently following Dobson's lead. A resolution submitted to the 2004 annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), convening next month in Indianapolis, Indiana, urges all leaders and members of the denomination to remove their children from government-run schools and "see to it that they receive a thoroughly Christian education." T.C. Pinckney, editor of The Baptist Banner newsletter, co-authored the "Christian Education Resolution" to challenge members of the SBC about ending the influence of public schools on their children. He says the resolution came about after he and his friend, Bruce Shortt, realized the depths to which America's public schools had fallen. "Currently the schools have gone down, down, down," Pinckney says, "both academically and in the principles of life or the worldview that they teach. I don't see how any thinking Christian today, if they really will think about the issue, can possibly leave their children in government schools." Turning children over to government schools for seven hours a day may be an easy and inexpensive thing to do, Pinckney says, but he insists that it is not a choice that will bring glory to God. He says it is "absolutely ridiculous" for Christian parents to assert that their children can be "salt and light" in government schools. Pinckney, a retired Air Force brigadier general, says when young people are placed in anti-Christian schools without being equipped to deal with that environment, the church ends up losing them to worldly pleasures and philosophies. The SBC leader uses a military analogy to underscore his argument. "We do not take soldiers out of civilian life and immediately throw them into military combat without proper training, guidance, instruction, and practice in the skills that they're going to have to have in combat," he says. SBC president Dr. Jack Graham has been quoted as saying that while he supports Christian education, he doubts that Southern Baptists will adopt a resolution urging parents to pull their children out of public schools. According to a report by the North Carolina Baptist News, Graham said in a recent e-mail that parents should make a "make a fully informed decision" about their children's education "after much prayer." Another report says Shortt, co-sponsor of the Christian Education Resolution, feels that passage of the measure is less important to him than drawing attention to an already-growing movement of home schooling and starting Christian schools. "We're trying to raise the issue in a general way, because this issue needs to come full front-and-center -- not just among leadership, but among the laity as well," Shortt told EthicsDaily.com. Paper vs. PracticeSome Mainlines Bend Beliefs to Accommodate Same-Sex Marriage; Others Hold Fast to Biblical Truth(AgapePress) - Senator Mark Dayton (D-MN) is a Presbyterian. However, on February 28, he told a gathering of homosexual parents that those who oppose same-sex marriage are "forces of bigotry and hatred." Two days later he invoked numerous Bible passages to argue against a Federal Marriage Amendment, which would protect a scriptural view of marriage. Dayton is one of many American churchgoers and leaders whose personal opinion about same-sex marriage is out of accord with his own church's creeds. Historic Presbyterian doctrine holds that marriage is to be only between one man and one woman. While such differences in doctrine and practice threaten schism in mainline churches, many biblically conservative groups have reaffirmed orthodox teachings about the nature of marriage. The following is a survey of selected church positions that define stated beliefs about marriage. The Roman Catholic ChurchRoman Catholics offer what is arguably the most comprehensive and lengthy declaration in Christendom in support of a biblical view of marriage. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, an authoritative reference to Roman Catholic belief, states, "Everyone, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity. Physical, moral, and spiritual difference and complementarity are oriented toward the goods of marriage and the flourishing of family life. The harmony of the couple and of society depends in part on the way in which the complementarity, needs, and mutual support between the sexes are lived out." In the section "The Love of Husband and Wife" the catechism teaches: "Sexuality is ordered to the conjugal love of man and woman. In marriage the physical intimacy of the spouses becomes a sign and pledge of spiritual communion." The catechism also declares homosexual acts to be "intrinsically disordered," "contrary to the natural law," and "under no circumstances [to] be approved." The Roman Catholic Church is the largest Christian group in the U.S. with 64.6 million members. Baptist TraditionThe largest U.S. Protestant denomination is the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) with 16.4 million members. Although the SBC is careful to state that Scripture is the final authority on all matters of faith and practice, they offer this statement in their Baptist Faith and Message: "Marriage is the uniting of one man and one woman in covenant commitment for a lifetime. It is God's unique gift to reveal the union between Christ and His church and to provide for the man and the woman in marriage the framework for intimate companionship, the channel of sexual expression according to biblical standards, and the means for procreation of the human race." A Policy Statement on Family Life from American Baptist Churches in the USA, membership approximately 1.5 million, says: "We affirm that God intends marriage to be a monogamous, life-long, one flesh union of a woman and a man ...." The National Baptist Convention USA, a large African-American denomination (five million members) did not respond to phone calls concerning this article. However, on March 23, two dozen African-American pastors rallied at a Missionary Baptist church in Atlanta, Georgia, to distance themselves from the claim by homosexual activists that same-sex marriage is a civil right. The pastors signed a declaration supporting a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and promoting marriage as only between one man and one woman. Wesleyan TraditionThe United Methodist Church (UMC), with 8.25 million members, is the second largest Protestant denomination in the country. For 30 years the UMC has been a battleground for homosexual activists, who have gained major concessions in church life. Still, the UMC Book of Discipline, Social Principles section, says: "We affirm the sanctity of the marriage covenant that is expressed in love, mutual support, personal commitment, and shared fidelity between a man and a woman." Ironically, Rev. Karen Dammann, the lesbian UMC pastor in Washington recently found not guilty of trespassing church law, was recently "married" to her homosexual partner. The Church of the Nazarene, a smaller and theologically more conservative denomination from the Wesleyan tradition, is unequivocal in their support for traditional marriage. Their 2001-2005 Manual states the denomination's official position: "The institution of marriage was ordained by God in the time of man's innocence, and is, according to apostolic authority, ‘honourable in all'; it is the mutual union of one man and one woman for fellowship, helpfulness, and the propagation of the race." Pentecostal TraditionThe Church of God in Christ (COGIC) is the nation's third largest Protestant church (5.49 million members) and largest African-American denomination. In a statement addressing same-sex marriage, issued on March 30 from their international headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee, Presiding Bishop G. E. Patterson said COGIC "stands firmly against same-sex marriages because we believe it to be contrary to the teaching of the Holy Scriptures." The statement from COGIC also took issue with those who argue that same-sex marriage is a civil right: "Homosexuality is a lifestyle; it is not to be compared with a minority ethnic group such as Blacks or Jews. It is a lifestyle that has destroyed every civilization of the past that embraced it." Assemblies of God (AOG) is the eighth largest Protestant denomination in the U.S. with 2.68 million members. Their Position Paper on Homosexuality includes this belief statement: "The biblical order for human sexual expression is that of an intimate physical relationship to be shared exclusively within a lifelong marriage covenant -- a heterosexual and monogamous relationship." Position Papers are official documents of the AOG and have been approved by its highest legislative bodies. A smaller denomination in the Pentecostal tradition, The Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee), instructs their membership that: "Marriage is ordained of God and is a spiritual union in which a man and a woman are joined by God to live together as one" (Genesis 2:24; Mark 10:7). Anglican TraditionThose working for society's full acceptance of homosexuality have made no greater institutional inroads than in the liberal Episcopal Church USA. Case in point, the denomination consecrated a practicing homosexual man as bishop during its annual convention last August. Despite the Episcopal Church's leading role in promoting same-sex marriage, the official standard of the church, the Book of Common Prayer, in several passages refers solely to "woman and man" as those to be married. From the section titled The Celebration and Blessing of a Marriage: "Dearly beloved: We have come together in the presence of God to witness and bless the joining together of this man and this woman in Holy Matrimony .... The union of husband and wife in heart, body, and mind is intended by God for their mutual joy; for the help and comfort given one another in prosperity and adversity; and, when it is God's will, for the procreation of children and their nurture in the knowledge and love of the Lord." In the Episcopal Church, the Book of Common Prayer is the definitive descriptive expression of Episcopal beliefs. Reformed/Presbyterian TraditionThe largest Presbyterian body in the nation, The Presbyterian Church in the United States (PCUSA), maintains doctrinal standards which state that a Christian marriage is one in which "a lifelong commitment is made by a woman and a man to each other ...." However, the PCUSA supports extending "gay and lesbian couples access to the civil status of civil marriage and to share fully and equally in the rights and responsibilities of that status," according to Rev. Elenora Gidding, director of the Washington, DC, office of the PCUSA. Gidding made the comment at a March 3 press conference prior to the U.S. Senate hearings on the Federal Marriage Amendment. She clearly stated that the PCUSA opposes such a constitutional amendment to protect the traditional definition of marriage. As further evidence of support for the homosexual political agenda among PCUSA leadership, last summer the PCUSA named a radical feminist pastor to its highest elected post. Susan Andrews, pastor of Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church in Bethesda, Maryland, is on record as saying it is her "fondest dream" that the PCUSA remove its ban on ordaining practicing homosexuals. PCUSA pastor Parker T. Williamson, editor-in-chief of the Presbyterian Layman, calls Andrew's selection an "unfortunate" vote by the General Assembly. "Susan Andrews stands for everything that has caused the decline of this once great denomination," Williamson said. "She is part of an organization called the Covenant Network of Presbyterians that has been lobbying for the full inclusions of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgendered persons into the leadership of the church." The Presbyterian Church In America (PCA) is a smaller, theologically conservative group that split from the liberal mainline church 30 years ago. Their primary expression of orthodoxy is the Westminster Confession of Faith (WCF), written in the 1640s. The WCF chapter titled "Of Marriage and Divorce" begins with the statement: "Marriage is to be between one man and one woman ...." At their General Assembly in June 2003, the PCA used that WCF language in a resolution to reaffirm the denomination's strong stand for a Biblical view of marriage. Lutheran TraditionThe Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is the fourth largest Protestant group in the U.S. with 5.3 million members. According to ReligiousTolerance.org, a website that "promotes religious diversity as a positive cultural value," ELCA is one of the most liberal denominations in the country. In 2001 the Churchwide Assembly called for the development of a study on homosexuality, which is due in 2005. The purpose of the study is "to deal with the blessing of same-gender unions and the rostering of persons in committed gay or lesbian relationships." A companion denominational study guide titled "Journey Together Faithfully" asks ELCA members "to consider how this church should respond to the requests to bless same-sex unions and to ordain, consecrate, or commission people in committed same-sex unions." Meanwhile, the document A Message on Sexuality: Some Common Convictions, adopted by the Church Council in 1996, states: "Marriage is a lifelong covenant of faithfulness between a man and a woman." The smaller Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, remains faithful in belief and practice to biblical teachings on marriage. A pastoral letter in March 2004 from Dr. Gerald B. Kieschnick, president of The Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, states, "We are against [same-sex marriage] in no uncertain terms. The definition of marriage must always be what it always has been: the loving, permanent relationship between one man and one woman .... If it takes an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to preserve the timeless and holy definition of marriage in our country, then I am in favor of it." America Has Lost Its Moorings, Needs a Moral Champion(AgapePress) - A Christian author and speaker is sounding a rather fatalistic tone when it comes to homosexual "marriage" in America. Os Guinness says the nation apparently doesn't have the moral strength to reverse the legalization of same-sex unions, precipitated by this week's events in Massachusetts. Dr. Guinness has authored such books as Dining With the Devil: The Megachurch Movement Flirts with Modernity and Fit Bodies, Fat Minds: Why Evangelicals Don't Think and What To Do About It. Guinness, who sits on the board of trustees for Trinity Forum, recently told Associated Press that it does not look like homosexual marriage in the U.S. is something that can be reversed. "There are moments in peoples' decline when [they] finally draw the line, but the signs are with same-sex marriage in the nation that won't happen," he says. "And what we're seeing politically and in the polls is that the American center is very soft and is not going to make a stand." Americans, he says, seem resigned to just living with the concept of same-sex marriages. "Any pretense of a moral majority has long since gone," he says, adding that he is disappointed at the lack of moral leadership coming from Capitol Hill. "[W]hat's alarming on this issue is you see the inability of political leaders -- supremely, the president -- to raise people across the board to stand against this," he says. "In other words, what's called the 'soft center' of America really is caving in -- that includes Christians, it includes conservatives, and there's no end to where this may go." According to Guinness, the American culture is waiting for a leader "who understands the issues, who can rise above the culture wars to state them, and can do so persuasively to those he opposes as well as those who he supports." "I had hoped that George W. Bush might be the person, but clearly he's become so preoccupied and now bogged down with his war on terrorism and in Iraq that he's incapable of this -- and he may not even have a second term," the author says. Guinness describes the legalization of homosexual marriage as a milestone on the road to cultural collapse, and he predicts that "within a generation or two, the harvest of chaos in this country will be enormous." In addition, he sees Bible-believing Christians becoming an increasingly besieged counterculture. "It will take people who really take their faith seriously to say, 'Look, the culture may be eroding, collapsing all around me -- but not through me. I can responsible for my world.'" He contends that the nation's main challenge is not terrorism or rogue states who might possess weapons of mass destruction. "Our main dangers are actually within this country," he says. Growing Acceptance?Guinness' predictions may be on the mark. A growing number of states appear to be leaning towards accepting same-sex marriages performed in Massachusetts. Joining the attorney general of New York, the attorneys general of Rhode Island and Connecticut have issued non-binding opinions indicating they would recognize homosexuals married in Massachusetts. Peter Sprigg with the Family Research Council tells Family News In Focus that it essentially means a bypassing of the will of the people. "We are seeing the real agenda of the homosexual activists, which does not involve respect for federalism or respect for each state's right to make up its own mind about marriage," he laments. Sprigg says those activists are going to use Massachusetts as a wedge to achieve the goal of imposing same-sex marriage on every state. The Heat of SummerNow that Massachusetts officials have begun issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, the supporters of traditional marriage are bracing for an explosive summer. Homosexual couples from other states have flocked to the Bay State to get married, but many say they will return to their own states with an agenda. U.S. Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave, sponsor of the Federal Marriage Amendment legislation current working its way through the House of Representatives, says this summer of upheaval is courtesy of the pro-homosexual judiciary in Massachusetts. "Armed with such an unprecedented ruling by the four Supreme Court justices in Massachusetts, and the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in the Lawrence v. Texas case, homosexual couples will fiercely attack well-founded state laws," the Colorado Republican says. Thirty-eight states have Defense of Marriage Acts (DOMAs) which define marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Musgrave says those DOMAs will be attacked in the courts this summer by homosexual activists. U.S. Senators at Center of Vietnamese Human Rights DebateCNS News - The Vietnamese communist government's alleged murder of hundreds of tribal Christians requires a response by the U.S. government, but any effort to sanction Vietnam is being blocked by Sens. John Kerry and John McCain, according to a Washington, D.C. human rights group. International Christian Concern President Jeff King also alleges that he's heard complaints about Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat currently running for president, and McCain, an Arizona Republican who ran for president in 2000, from some of their congressional colleagues on the issue of Vietnam abuses. "Senators have complained to us that these guys are the fast friends of the Vietnamese and they've blocked any real attempt at reform or punishment for these types of abuses, and so Vietnam continues to get away with murder," King told CNSNews.com. When asked to name the senators who had complained, King quickly replied, "No way." But he added that, "It's not a political thing." "[Kerry and McCain are] known as being big defenders of Vietnam," and the senators unhappy with Kerry and McCain are "people with a human rights angle," King said. International Christian Concern (ICC) alleges that an Easter crackdown by the Vietnamese government against Montagnard Christians in Vietnam's Central Highlands resulted in the deaths of at least 280 people. At least another 26 people are missing, according to the ICC, which claims to be getting information from the Vietnamese villages affected. "We have the reports coming in from different villages - people calling in and saying, 'here's how many we lost, here's the names and what village,'" King said, adding that the information is difficult to obtain because Vietnamese soldiers have attempted to seal off the affected villages to outsiders. The persecution of the Montagnards allegedly can be traced as far back as the end of the Vietnam War. "They were friends with the U.S. back in the war, so they've just been marked ever since and hated," King said. Three years ago, according to King, the Vietnamese government launched a similar crackdown when the Montagnards protested their living conditions and Vietnamese soldiers ended up killing about 400 pastors, he said. Kok Ksor, president of Montagnard Foundation, Inc., left Vietnam in 1975 and for the last 14 years has fought to "preserve the lives and culture" of the Montagnard Christians from his home in Spartanburg, S.C. "We don't have any right to our ancestral land. They confiscate all of our land ... they relocate our people from our ancestral land -- good farm land -- to the land where we could not grow anything to survive," Ksor told CNSNews.com . "The people can't take any more. They said, 'sooner or later, we're going to die. But before we die, we have to let the world know,'" Ksor added. U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, a Republican from Kansas, has met in the past with Vietnamese officials and been promised that his staff would be given access to the villages in the Central Highlands, according to Aaron Groote, Brownback's press secretary. "When the staff arrived, however, they were not allowed to enter the region," Groote stated in a response to CNSNews.com questions. "We don't want to speculate on the exact number of killings, but there have certainly been substantiated reports of many deaths and the violent suppression of demonstrators by the Vietnamese government," Groote added. As for congressional attempts to stop the persecution, Brownback "feels strongly that we have not seen the improvements in Vietnam's human rights record that some people claim have been made in the past three years," Groote stated. He added that his boss "remains very concerned about the situation there." An aide to McCain echoed those comments. "Senator McCain is ... monitoring all human rights violations in Vietnam, including the deaths of tribal Christians, and ... we hope to work with the government to approach a bilateral solution to this problem," the aide, who did not want to be identified, told CNSNews.com . The McCain aide also refused to address the complaint alleging that the senator, along with Kerry, were "fast friends" of the Vietnamese communists. A telephone call to Kerry's Senate office, seeking comment for this report, was not returned. The U.S. State Department releases an annual report on religious persecution around the world and in its 2003 report, categorized several nations as "countries of particular concern." Vietnam was not on the list. However, a State Department spokesman told CNSNews.com Wednesday that "there is a process underway right now ... about which countries might be named" in the 2004 report. If a nation makes it to the list of "countries of particular concern," it sets into motion a process by which the State Department may impose economic sanctions. The sanctions are authorized under the International Religious Freedom Act. However, King believes there are other steps available for Congress to seek punishment of Vietnam for human rights abuses. "Whether that's censure, whether that's tariffs, whether that's trading sanctions - there are any number of things to do, but the point is that [Kerry and McCain] block almost all of these things," King said. Even the Bush administration is not doing as much as the ICC would like, though King conceded that, "[President] Bush has been pretty good as a friend of the persecuted Christians around the world." Turkey: Pastor Acquitted Of Criminal ChargesCompass Direct - In what the Hurriyet newspaper called a "jet acquittal," a criminal court in southeastern Turkey dropped all charges yesterday against a Protestant pastor accused of opening an "illegal" church. Pastor Ahmet Guvener was fully acquitted in the opening hearing of his case before Diyarbakir's Third Criminal Court. The quick resolution of the case surprised both Guvener and his lawyer, Abdul Kadir Pekdemir, who said a criminal case typically extends for a year or more before a verdict is issued. But when Judge Necla Ipek asked State Prosecutor Vahdettin Taskiran to present the government's case against Guvener, Taskiran declared that no sufficient grounds existed to bring charges. Instead, Taskiran stressed that under recent reforms passed in Parliament, international agreements now take precedence over national laws, granting Turkish citizens the right both individually and in community to conduct worship, as well as to teach and propagate their faith. Moments later, Ipek declared Guvener acquitted and the case closed. "It's a great step forward for Turkey," Guvener told Compass afterward, "for Christians here, for religious freedom, for democracy."
And here are our devotionals for the next few mornings:Have a good and a godly day!Pastor Bill Farrow
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