BBC News - Salman Taseer: Thousands mourn Pakistan governor

When are people going to face up to what is before their eyes? Islam is a religion of violence and death, that eschews mercy, celebrates vengeance and advances by oppression and subjugation. History shows it, current affairs demonstrate it.

The governor - a senior member of the governing Pakistan People's Party (PPP) - had recently angered Islamists by appealing for a Christian woman, sentenced to death for blasphemy, to be pardoned.

Mr Gilani has declared three days of national mourning and appealed for calm.

The bodyguard, Malik Mumtaz Hussein Qadri, 26, was showered with rose petals by supporters as he appeared in court in Islamabad on Wednesday.

News reports carefully avoid naming Islam when reporting these things by speaking of “religious extremists” but this is inaccurate and misleading; indeed, these are weasel words. Whenever we see these reports they are Muslim Extremists. Muslims blowing up Christian churches, Muslims blowing up mosques and killing each other, Muslims bombing our cities and killing our fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters.

When a Muslim leader stands up for what are called “liberal values” but what are actually “civilised values” Muslims far and wide go into their usual screaming fit of hysteria and he gets killed by his own bodyguard who, in turn, gets lauded and showered with rose petals as he appears in court.

There is no maturity, no reason, no civilised outlook and no mercy in Islam and it is time we demanded that Muslim Pakistan step up to the mark and prove itself capable of civilised involvement with the wider world. Time we stopped making excuses for a nuclear power with the mind and emotional maturity of a petulant child.

BBC News - Salman Taseer: Thousands mourn Pakistan governor

Melanie Phillips’s Articles » I think, therefore I’m guilty

I am not her biggest fan but here is a superb commentary on the parlous state of UK society today, where freedom of speech is the preserve only of those approved by the thought police.

“It is difficult to say when, exactly, the priorities of the British police shifted from the prevention of criminal offences towards criminalising people for causing offence. The police have become the thin blue line against the Wrong Opinion. Instead of protecting society against oppression, British police officers have become the agents of oppression…

…if you are a white Christian man upholding traditional family values and expressing a desire to stop immigration and leave the EU, while being sceptical of man-made global warming and believing that Darwinian evolution does not explain the origin of life on earth, Britain is no longer your country.

But don’t worry. Utopia is taking its place. The police are on their way to tell you.”

Melanie Phillips’s Articles » I think, therefore I’m guilty

Charity in a Moral Vacuum?

By last night (20/03/’10) the popular charity initiative Sport Relief had raised almost £30 million for charitable causes both abroad and in the UK. Via telethons and sponsored events such as running the Sport Relief Mile huge sums have flooded into the charity and much more is expected to be raised in events up and down the country this weekend.

You would have to be churlish to the point of perverse to not celebrate the good-hearted generosity of people and the great and practical good that is done as a result of such events. From the now historic Band Aid concert, through the well established British institution Comic Relief to Sport Relief and even the money raised for causes by the National Lottery  much good is done.

However, I can’t help but think that when we look back at 19th century missionary societies and, indeed, their 21st century counterparts, and consider how they are represented in our social and cultural histories they don’t come out well. Yet they did, and continue to do much the same in raising resources to help developing societies, feed the hungry, teach the ill-educated, protect the vulnerable – and share the gospel. This last is what our secular society finds little to celebrate about, being suspicious about the fact that what they do is done in the name of Christianity. But what is the difference between going into a country in the name of liberal democracy and insisting that something must be done and things have to change and doing the same in the name of Christian charity?

Christian teaching, building, nursing and, yes, evangelistic missions are carried out by people who have chosen to serve a moral cause because they have committed their lives to a moral course. Unlike the celebrities who front events like Sport Relief and who fly in for a few days filming and then fly out to talk endlessly into a camera about how harrowing and moving was their experience, Christian missionaries devote years, sometimes their whole lives in the cause to which they are committed. Sometimes they sacrifice their lives to serve their God by serving “the least of these” (Mt.25:45)

The difference, it seems to me, and the great advantage to a secular society of such charitable events as Sport Relief is that, where Christian missionaries serve a moral cause because committed to a moral course, here people can serve a moral cause without making a commitment to a moral course. In this way they can salve their conscience, feel they are doing some good, but make no fundamental change to the way they live their daily lives.

It looks as though they are living their lives in a morally neutral world. One in which they can give and serve if it suits but pass on the other side if not. But this is not a morally neutral world and the requirements, indeed commandments of the God who made us apply equally to everyone in it. That is why mission exists in its most fundamental, evangelistic form. It is ironic that, while many perhaps feel that charity without religion is the best of all possible worlds, the greatest good that can be done them in this world is to remind them of their obligations to God and of what he requires of them “in these last days” (Acts 17:29-30)

Every effort at helping and serving the needy and vulnerable is to be applauded but as Christians the greatest help we could ever offer is to pray for and be involved in the mission of the church to “go into all the world and tell the good news” (Mt.28:16-20) It is not always popular but we may as well nail our colours to the mast – the world has.

Why Mormons Have problems with Jude

How often have you set out to argue your case for your Christian faith with a Mormon only to be met by a determination on their part to maintain what they regard a civilised detachment, insisting they don’t want to be contentious? You expect at least a lively discussion, for your Mormon friend to give a good account of his/her faith, but they imperiously declare that they don’t engage in such dubious and uncharitable bickering.

They quote the late Krister Stendahl, (1921-April 2008) one time Bishop of Stockholm and renowned religious pluralist, who said that when you are trying to understand another religion, don’t compare your best with their worst. Of course, in quoting him like this, they are doing that very thing, comparing their admirable determination to stay out of it with your unfortunate propensity to argue.

Mormons have a real problem with Jude. Jude instructs Christians to "contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints" (Jude 3) But Mormons confuse contending for the faith with being contentious, arguing your case with being argumentative. You are left staring incredulously as the Mormon runs every time to the protection of "contention is of the devil. I would never drag down your church!"

This way the actual issues that stand between Mormons and Christians (and they are legion) never actually get addressed. Not least the fact that the Mormon Church is built on a claim that specifically “tears down” other churches (Joseph Smith History, 1:19)

Jude wrote, "Contend for the faith" and if today's Mormons can't bring themselves to defend their beliefs and contend for their faith they are actually being unbiblical. Mormons will protest that any such argument as you present is based on the idea that Mormons are not Christians and since Mormons are Christians your argument is hollow. But this response postulates the very thing that is in contention and is yet to be demonstrated. Their view is based on the hubristic assumption that what Mormons believe is true beyond doubt or revision, is not there to be questioned but received gratefully, and therefore anyone questioning Mormonism is misled, mischievous or plain wicked

Ultimately it excuses the Mormon from the biblical injunctions to "contend for the faith" and "go into all the world telling the good news". The refusal to engage is hard-hearted because it says in effect, "I ‘know it’s true’ and if you don't believe it, tough luck." You may be a soul to win but because you come up with good questions and won't just roll over and express your undying admiration for all things Mormon no one will contend for your soul. So it’s the Terrestrial Kingdom for you.

A Mormon will cite the words of Jesus, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” (Mt.7:1). However, the idea that we should not judge is unbiblical in respect to the words of Jude. Even Paul urged his readers to "judge for yourself what I say" (1 Co.10:14) and the saints of Berea are commended as noble for "examining the scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true" (Acts 17:11) Proverbs counsels us to “speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy” (Pro.31:8-9) (What about the spiritual poor and needy)

The injunction from the Lord that we should not judge is a warning to not put ourselves in the place of God as ultimate judge. It does not condone the strange idea that we are not to use wise judgement. Scripture counsels us to judge wisely in doctrine and practice, in faith and action. We judge what company we keep, what we believe and what we reject as untrue, how we respond to the needs of others and who we trust. And James, so beloved of Mormons, wrote a whole letter about wisdom and sound judgement in how we conduct ourselves and live out our faith (Js.1:5 has nothing to do with finding truth but with the wise application of the truth we have. See how he develops his argument in Js.3:17)

Many Mormons are raised in almost entirely Mormon communities and many others come under no other influence. Until they serve a mission, or venture onto the Internet for the first time, or engage in this discussion they are so keen to avoid they never hear any other argument. They are drilled with these ideas by their families and church leaders who will shake their heads in regret more than anger that muddle-headed Christians, influenced by anti-Mormon elements, still misunderstand Mormonism and would rather contend than act in the grace so clearly taught in the Bible. But Jude wrote that we should “Contend for the faith.”

Jesus said that if we love our friends we only do what the heathens do. It seems to me that Mormons only want to love their friends and only want to keep company with those who love them back. But Jude said that we should contend for the faith; perhaps because he felt he had a faith worth contending for and because there are souls out there worth the battle.

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Note: You may ask how a man like Krister Stendahl, Lutheran Bishop of Stockholm, religious pluralist, ecumenical and gay rights activist and champion of women’s ordination, came to be a champion for the anti-clerical, anti-gay, anti-women’s ordination and staunchly conservative Mormon Church.

It seems that in 1985 the Mormon Church met strong opposition to their building a temple in Stockholm. In a press conference Stendahl took the part of the Mormons and presented his three rules of understanding, developed in response to this crisis for Mormons. It was, then, not so much a meeting of minds but more a case of “my enemy’s enemy is my friend.” Strange bedfellows indeed.

Stendahl’s rules are:

(1) When you are trying to understand another religion, you should ask the adherents of that religion and not its enemies.

(2) Don't compare your best to their worst.

(3) Leave room for "holy envy." (By this Stendahl meant that you should be willing to recognize elements in the other religious tradition or faith that you admire and wish could, in some way, be reflected in your own religious tradition or faith.)

These are very helpful as a rule of thumb and we mustn’t dismiss them as guides to conduct but:

(1) what if the adherents of the religion are deceived or, heaven forbid, deceiving? Would we have been considered wise to ask Kenneth Lay about Enron?

(2) What if direct comparisons don’t help except in the most general of terms, since generalisation is a lie. Mormons are nice people but what does that tell us?

(3) What if you find nothing to envy and much to regret about their religion? How far would investigators have got in probing the truth about Enron if they had grubbed around determined to find something to like?

BBC NEWS | Technology | Multitaskers bad at multitasking

I knew it! I just KNEW IT! All those smug beggars out there who thought so well of themselves (especially among the female population), who looked down on the rest of us getting one thing done at a time and made such a fuss about “juggling home and work” yadayadaya and all that guff are just shallow and ineffectual. Say it loud and say it clear:

MULTITASKERS ARE NO GOOD AT MULTITASKING!

If multitasking equals  shallow and inattentive then unitasking equals depth and attentiveness. Remember that you who blame memory loss on the pressures of multitasking; huh! PAY ATTENTION! (especially when driving). As I have always maintained – wherever you are be there because if your not where you are you are nowhere!

BBC NEWS | Technology | Multitaskers bad at multitasking

Wading in Skubala

I so wish I had written this. The subject matter is controversial and the author addresses that very point in a powerful, no-holds-barred commentary on Paul’s words in Philippians. Go to Jeff’s blog and learn something really worth knowing.

You need to be warned that this post contains a bad word. But it does so only because the Bible itself contains a bad word. I never knew that. You don't know it either, because you've been protected from knowing it.
It appears in Philippians 3:8 (which I've recently been working on for my 3rd semester Greek class at seminary). Here it is in the original Greek:

ἀλλὰ μενοῦνγε καὶ ἡγοῦμαι πάντα ζημίαν εἶναι διὰ τὸ ὑπερέχον τῆς γνώσεως Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου μου, διὃν τὰ πάντα ἐζημιώθην, καὶ ἡγοῦμαι σκύβαλα, ἵνα Χριστὸν κερδήσω...

The word you want to keep your eye on is "σκύβαλα"--pronounced "skubala." Here's a literal translation of the verse.

Jeff Wofford: Wading in Skubala

Dear Saints - Its the Real Thing

The Real Thing (Revelation 3:14-22)

“It’s the real thing!” So went a famous advertising slogan some years ago. In this, the last of the seven letters to the churches, there could not be a clearer illustration of the importance of having the real thing. The letter is addressed “To the angel of the church in Laodicea” and later in the letter we find one of most iconic images of Christ in the Bible, made famous for us in the painting of the nineteenth century artist William Holman Hunt: “I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me” (v20)

As we are often reminded, Christ is seeking admittance to the heart of the saint and not the sinner. Here is a letter to the church and its members, not the world and it’s lost. There is an urgency about the Saviour’s mission, “I am about to spit you out of my mouth!” And there is the exposure of a powerful delusion that is at work in the church that considers itself rich and wanting for nothing. But they didn’t have the real thing.

Laodicea was a fabulously wealthy city, famous for three things: banking, schools of medicine and a textile industry. It was so wealthy that, when it was destroyed by an earthquake in 60 AD Tacitus was able to say that the city, “without any relief from us, recovered itself by its own resources”. Time and again we have seen the danger of adopting the spirit of the society around us and here, in Laodicea, that same self-sufficiency and pride in personal wealth and resources in their secular lives had made the saints lukewarm in their religion. They were a church, they met and worshipped, they were busy churchmen and women who sang the latest choruses, kept the flowers fresh in the side chapel, the church silver polished and the collection plates filled and yet Christ wishes for them that they were either hot or cold. It is a damning indictment to be told that it would be better to be utterly cold towards Christ than wallow in a false piety.

Those who are falsely pious inevitably put their trust in false things and Christ stands at the door of their hearts offering what is true. He tells the saints in Laodicea that they are “wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked” and he invites them to purchase from him three things that contrast starkly with Laodicea’s wealth:

1. “Gold refined in the fire, so that you can become rich”

Peter refers to faith as “of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire”, that it “may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed” (1 Pe.1:7)

2. “White clothes to wear, so that you can cover your shameful nakedness”

White robes contrast with black woollen clothing for which the city was famous and nakedness was seen as the ultimate humiliation in the ancient world, while to be clothed in fine clothing was a great honour.

3. “Salve to put on your eyes, so that you can see”

Laodicea’s medical schools would have used a famous salve, brought in from nearby Phrygia, to treat eye complaints. However, Christ alone gives true sight (Jn.9:39)

He stands at the door of hearts gone lukewarm and complacent in things of faith and offers the priceless wealth of faith that is of greater worth than gold, righteousness that is not our own and true insight into the things of God. To all who will open their hearts he offers to come and eat; a picture of leisurely intimacy and association – the real thing.

When it comes to counterfeits the Bible gives us ample warning; Paul wrote to the Colossians:

“See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world” (Col.2:8)

Whether it is worldly wealth and self-sufficiency or the hollow and deceptive philosophies offered by the world we are to guard against the counterfeit, contend for the faith and refuse to settle for anything less than that which Christ offers and has won for us through his atoning work on the Cross; the real thing.

Previous Posts in this Series:
A Message of Hope
Remember Your First Love
Be Faithful
Be True
Hold On!
Wake Up!

A New name