Watch out for the thought police!

John 14:6 "Jesus answered, 'I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."

The Washington Nationals professional baseball club has suspended a volunteer chaplain and rebuked a baseball player because they hold religious beliefs that are "Religiously Incorrect." Volunteer chaplain Joe Moeller and outfielder Ryan Church were having a conversation concerning Christianity.

Church asked Moeller a question about Jesus and salvation. "I said, like, Jewish people, they don't believe in Jesus. Does that mean they're doomed?" Church asked. Volunteer chaplain Moeller simply nodded his head in agreement. For his "religiously incorrect" thinking even if it was simply a nod of the head Moeller was suspended.

Rabbi Shmuel Herzfeld, leader of an Orthodox Jewish congregation in Washington, said, "The Nationals did a good job about bringing hate into the locker room." A chaplain and a baseball player are accused of hate speech because they were discussing a basic tenet of their faith! Wow! Now it is not "religiously correct" for Christians to just "think" that salvation comes through Christ alone.

The Nationals immediately suspended Chaplain Moeller and Church issued an apology for asking the question. Dr. Richard Land, head of the Religious Liberty Commission, had this to say: "The worst this chaplain could be convicted of is ascribing to orthodox Christian faith, which is what you want from a Christian chaplain."

MLB is considering dropping their work with Baseball Chapel, the group who the chaplin works for. Will they fire an anthiest play for beliving that no one is going to heaven? No? Then why fire the Christian for his beliefs?

Go here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/30/AR2005093001974.html?nav=rss_sports

Is It The Governments Role To Feed The Poor?

Who's Job Is It To Care For This Man In Need?

We all noticed that during the Katrina aftermath, that churches and private organizations did what the government and all it's money could not, they helped people in need. In the town where we delivered 12 tons of supplies, only churches were feeding the 50,000 people there a week and a half after the Strom hit. The government is always slow and inefficient. The private sector always gets the best bang for the buck.

Any government response and program will be red tape upon red tape. It will have the efficiency of the DMV, work ethic of the state highway department, and the fairness of the IRS. Government never does as well what private industry does in competition. Fore example, the U.S. Post Office was sold to private industry so it could complete with UPS and FedEX.

That is why God does not put caring for the needy in the hands of people who don't care. Biblically, feeding the poor is not a government job. As we read the New Testament and understand that much is said about caring for those who cannot care for themselves, we also realize that the responsibility is placed on those who are local, responsible and care.

Study it for yourselves Christians. First of all we should all work hard to pay our own way in life. (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12) The needy are first to be cared for by their immediate families. (Read Mark 7:7-13) Next we see, that when their immediate family cannot care for them, only then should the local church should care for them. ( 1 Timothy 5:3-16)

The burden of benevolence is never placed on the back of government because it was not designed to do that. God has given three divine institutions. The family, the government and the church. They each have distinctive roles. They should give each the freedom to play their part without metling in each others business.

Governments true role is in protecting the rights of life, liberty and property of the citizens by punishing the evil doer. (See Romans 13:1-8 & proverbs 31:8-9 for Governments role) Unfortunately today, our government is neglecting the role of protecting the lives of innocent babies in the womb. It is not protecting the property of it's citizens. It is not defending their rights to public prayer and religious expression. It has abandoned it's true Biblical calling of giving justice by punishing the wicked. Now we have "correctional facilities" not ahangman's noose. We have no justice in our justice system. Liberties are slowly being eroded because a lack of security produced by a lack of justice through punishment of the wicked. (Proverbs 16:12, 25:5, 29:4, & 29:14)

Meanwhile, as the government abandons it's true role, it has invaded the home, taking over the role of educating our youth, rather than parents. It has taken over benevolence from the charity of the church through socialism and wealth redistribution programs such as welfare and social security. Rather than punish murderers with guns by executing them, their solution is to steal the rights of the honest citizen to have a gun for hunting, sporting, self and national defense. Rather than use the full force of power on anyone who would dare threaten us, we steal the rights and civil liberties of our citizens away in a futile struggle to create a "secure homeland." Governments solutions to needs that are really family and church responsibilities are always ineffective and often disastrous.

Government must punish the evil doer. But do we have the will to let government do it's God given job? Security comes with the utter defeat of those who would harm us. That was true for Germany and for Japan. And only when we totally defeat our enemies and rebuild them in our image will we have peace with them that will last until they are our allies selling us cheap cars and buying out our own auto manufacturers like Toyota and Daimler Chrysler.

Today the individual doesn't want to take care of himself. He wants the government to do it. The Families don't want to take care of their own. They want the government to do it. The churches don't want to feed the poor and help the needy. They want the government to do it. And the government was not meant to meet these needs. It can't even when it tries. Meanwhile, the government is not allowed to do what it should be doing, that is rewarding those who do good and punishing those who do evil. (1 Peter 2:13-14)

God help us!

1 John Chapter One

In his first epistle the Apostle John is writing to Christians. People who "walk in the light" and "have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus" are Christians not lost people.

1 John 1:7 "But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin."

The Epsitle of 1 John is written to the purified. To these purified, the inspired Apostle writes in verse 8, "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us." It is possible to "decieve ourselves" into thinking we can be sinless. But a person who does not admit his sin cannot do two things. He cannot repent and thus he cannot be forgiven.

To think you will never stumble contradicts all experience, common sence, and more importantly the Word of God. James 3:2 says, "We all stumble in many ways." It makes you a liar and the truth is not in you. Anyone purified by the Blood and in fellowship with Jesus will be aware of their stumbling problem.

But one in fellowship with the Truth will also realize the way of escape and be a repentant person (1 John 3:6). 1 John 1:9 proclaims, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness." Notice that the path to purity is forgiveness not living perfectly. If we would live perfectly, we wouldn't all sin and wouldn't need a savior. If we would chose not to ever sin, the Law would have been sufficant to save us but it wasn't. The Law of Moses was powerless to make us rigteous because we all obeyed our fleshly desires rather than God.(Romans 3:20 & Romans 8:3).

The law was something no one but Jesus would bear (Acts 15:10). Some say when we get the Holy Spirit, that allows us to do what we couldn't do before, live sinnlessly. But that would mean before we became Christians we HAD to sin because we were born incapable of doing right (That's Calvanism) not that we all CHOSE to sin because we are free will agents who decide to rebel because of temptation. Sin is something we choose to do (1 Peter 4:3). But the Bible teaches we didn't have to sin and there was a way not to sin (1: Corinthians 10:13). But no one chose to do that (Isaiah 53:6, Romans 3:11-12 & James 1:14-15). No one was without sin (Romans 3:23). The Bible teaches that we are without excuse (Romans 1:20) and accountable for our choices (Romans 3:19).

If that is true, then we all had the ability, even before we were Christians, to not sin but still chose by our own free will to violate our consciences and become sinners. We need some way to atone for sin when we are weak willed and stumble. There is a battle between the desires of our spirit and desires of our flesh (Galatians 5:17 & Romans 7:14-20). We need atonement for when our flesh wins out so that we can live by the Spirit (1 Peter 4:6). So we learn that if we confess our sins (as purified believers who are in fellowship with Christ) he will forgive us our sins and cleans us from ALL unrigteousness.

So don't fall for the lie that you can become sinless via your own will power. Only by forgiveness of grace and atonement of the blood by the sanctification of the Spirit with in you can you be purged of sinful guilt. We must view ourselves as sinners forgiven by grace (1 Timothy 1:15). It is knowledge of Grace that will teach us to say no to ungodliness not pridful delusions about our own unrealistic perfection. (Titus 2:11-13).

1 John 1:10 says, "If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives."

Hospital or Hospice -What is the Church here for?

Running a hospital must be a hard job. Imagine all the complaints hospital administrators receive from patients and employees. Take just one example, the temperature. Many people often complain about the temperature being too cold in Hospitals. Those tables in the X-ray room can sure be cold. Some places in the hospital the temperature is kept cool because some of the diagnostic equipment is sensitive temperature and must be kept cool.

Imagine you are a hospital administrator who learns this in a medical journal. You realize you have been keeping your temperature 5 degrees too high in your radiology department. It’s a proven fact in studies that hospitals with temperatures 5 degrees lower than your hospitals have fewer problems with the delicate equipment and can help more patients. So you send a memo out to the radiology department and explain the need to lower the temperature to maintain optimal performance of the equipment in order to heal more people and save more lives.

Now imagine that some, not all and not even most, but some of your nurses are now cold at work. They feel it’s chilly and want you to raise the temperature back. They start to really complain. You explain that some think it’s too hot and others think it’s too cold but you have to find the best balance you can to protect the equipment and help patient. You remind them that the mission of the hospital is to heal those who come in sick not keep the staff cozy. They then say you don’t care about the staff.

You explain to the nurses that the hospital’s priority is to help the sick and then if you can also make the employee as comfortable as possible you will. You explain that the needs of the patient out way the desires of the staff. You offer to buy them sweaters but the nurses won’t compromise. They say the fact that they have been there for dozens of years serving faithfully should mean the hospital would care about them enough to keep the building at the temperature they like. They insist you either raise the temperature back to their liking or they are going to leave the hospital and leave you short handed without enough nursing staff in the radiology department.

Imagine you are the hospital administrator…. what do you do? It’s hard because you have known these nurses for years and really care about them. Do you keep these four or five nurses by giving in to their demands or do you let them go in order to best utilize your equipment and help heal more patients? Do you please the healthy or save the sick? What would you do?

This is the same dilemma church leaders sadly face. Do you design church services to please the saved and lose the lost or do you meet the needs of the lost and lose a few members who are more interested in their personal comfort than the mission of the church? In Mark 2:17 Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."