All posts filed under: z110

Storm near Garden City, Kansas, US Credit: Dave Sills/Flickr/Creative Commons

Apocalypse 1: The Boring Part

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Is it possible for people call themselves Christians to fail? Can we be wrong? That’s not a serious question, and the answer is yes. The famous Pentecostal television preacher Jim Bakker went to prison. RELATED: Jim Bakker And the Roman Catholic Church is trying to recover from the scandal of sex abuse by priests. RELATED: Child sexual abuse and the Catholic Church: What you need to know Sometimes we fail, and our failure has two sides; if we do something wrong, we are prevented from doing good things. Damage control to recover from our failures doesn’t leave room for all the good that we should be doing in this world. I think that is a good starting point to understand the Apocalypse. Everyone should read the book of Revelation. In the Christian Bible, it’s the last book, and one that we often talk about. What we seldom do is read the whole book. For me, that is the best starting point to understand the last book in the Bible. “Revelation” gives us images like the …

Rio De Janeiro, Brazil at night Credit: Rafael Defavari/Wikipedia/Creative Commons

Spiritual warfare: Attempted assassination of Christian presidential candidate in Brazil

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[UPDATED] According to the Brazilian newspaper, O Globo, there was an assassination attempt on a Conservative politician in Brazil. Senator Jair Bolsonaro is campaigning to become the next president of Brazil in an election scheduled for October. With 22% of the support, Bolsonaro is the front-runner. Bolsonaro has taken a very pro family and pro Christian position during the campaign and has openly solicited Christian support. He is also taken a strong stand against the corruption that has rocked the previous Brazilian administration and as well vehemently opposed the violent elements in the communist and left-wing movement in Brazil. Some have referred to Bolsonaro as the Trump of South America because of his strait talk on issues facing Braizil While being carried along by a large crowd during a campaign stop in Mina Gerais earlier this week, a person in the crowd attacked Bolsonaro with a knife. He was quickly carried off by his security detail and police arrested the attacker. Fortunately, Bolsonaro was wearing a bullet proof vest and the knife cut was superficial …

Church in Montbovon, Switzerland Credit: keepps/Flickr/Creative Commons

Stopping the ‘social justice’ creep into the church

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A number of evangelicals have recently organized to oppose the growing intrusion of “social justice” into evangelical churches. The group has issued a Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel where they are expressing their concerns about this philosophy that is becoming increasing popular in the secular world and is now making its way into the Christian one. In their statement, they say: “We are deeply concerned that values borrowed from secular culture are currently undermining Scripture in the areas of race and ethnicity, manhood and womanhood, and human sexuality,” declares the statement.” At this point, over 4,500 Christian leaders have signed the petition. I remember a couple of years back during testimony time at the church we were attending, a woman came to the front and expressed how the church needs to become concerned about “social justice” and the unfairness in the world. It seemed so spiritual, but is it? The problem is that this social justice push is trying to reinterpret the Bible. The Bible speaks often of justice, but now where does …

Abu Dhabi Credit: Stephane PERES/Flickr/Creative Commons

That Expensive Jesus in Abu Dhabi

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Hey, would you like to see Jesus, the savior of the world? It’s gonna cost you. When viewing becomes possible, you will have to travel to the heart of the Middle East, and buy a ticket, if you can get one, and line up. Here’s the story. Leonardo Da Vinci is credited with painting the most expensive work of art in the world, although possibly some of his students contributed. The painting is a picture of Jesus and it’s named “Salvator Mundi” or “Savior of the World.” This painting recently went up for auction in New York and there was a fierce bidding war for it. The final price was $450 million US. The first reports were that a wealthy prince in Saudi Arabia named Mohammed won the bid; Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. That was corrected by records that showed the bidder was actually Saudi Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Farhan, a relative of the first prince. So, some wealthy Saudi princes just paid too much for a picture of Jesus, Savior of …

Peter's denial of Christ by Nikolaas Verkolje (1673-1746) Credit: Wikipedia/Creative Commons

Be vigilant and guard your mind against attacks of condemnation

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I remember my dad sharing a story from World War II. He worked as a scout for an artillery unit, and they had bedded down for the night. They had pulled back from the front line, so were expecting a peaceful night. When they woke the next morning every one of the several men who had been posted to guard the camp during the night was gone. There were no bodies, they had just disappeared. They suspected that a Nazi commando unit had snuck up on the camp during the night, silently killed the guards and then dragged their bodies away. The sentries were never seen again. He said the fact they disappeared unnerved his unit more than if the Nazis had killed them and left their bodies behind. It is the nature of warfare. A person must never let their guard down and it is no different in spiritual warfare. Peter understood spiritual warfare and he gained that knowledge first hand through his own personal failure. And he used that experience to warn us: …

Vineyard in Soragna, Italy Credit: Andreas Metz/Flickr/Creative Commons

Have archaeologists discovered the place where Jesus turned water into wine?

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The Apostle John records that Jesus’ first miracle took place at a wedding in Cana. When the bridegroom of wedding that Christ and the disciples were attending ran out of wine, Jesus changed six pots of water into wine. According to an article in the Daily Mail, archaeologists are convinced that they have found the location where this miracle took place and it’s five miles north of the spot traditionally considered the most likely site of the Cana miracle. The new location is called Khirbet Qana and includes a series of tunnels inside a hill and with its addition, there are now four possible Cana sites. So what makes Khirbet Qana special? According to archaeologists, evidence found in the tunnels at Khirbet Qana suggest early pilgrims believed this was the original site of the Cana miracle. Inside the tunnels there are Christian markings that include crosses and the name Lord Jesus carved into the wall indicating early Christians venerated this site. They also found an old stone vessel typically used to store wine and it …

San Antonio, Texas Credit: Brandon Watts/Flickr/Creative Commons

Religious Wars in Texas

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Recently, a man took his stepdaughter to a Christian school in San Antonio Texas, to register her as a student. The interview went well until someone asked if the girl was a Christian. The answer was “no” because the whole family was Muslim. I think they are from Lebanon. The school administrator rejected the girl’s application because the private school was only for Christians, or at least one parent had to be a professing Christian. The stepfather was outraged and made a video about the experience, which went viral. This has produced much debate, and someone has pointed out that the local Jewish school only accepts Jewish students. As long as the school is funded with private money, they can reject anyone who does not believe what they believe. RELATED: Muslim family upset after daughter rejected from Texas Christian School I understand the debate and I’m not surprised. I hope the community can find a solution because they will still live together in the same space, after this argument is forgotten. There is one thing …

Coming storm Credit: Roy Keeris/Flickr/Creative Commons

Did the Apostle Paul warn about a coming narcissist plague?

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I walked out of the doctor’s office a few days ago and noticed a young woman in front of me crying. I passed her on the way to my car and then thought I should check if she was okay and turned around and went back to talk to her. She looked at me as she wiped a tear from her eye and said that she was just diagnosed with PTSD. She shared that it had been a year since she left a relationship with her narcissistic boyfriend. She fled England a year ago after her boyfriend burned her house down. The only way she could get away from him was to leave the country. Just days before leaving England she considered going back to him “because he would only be angry for a while and then things would get better.” This is the same guy that set fire to her house! What was interesting about this is that until a few weeks ago, I had no idea what narcissism was until I started reading …

The main mound of the ancient city of Nineveh on the Plains of Nineveh Credit: fredarch/Wikipedia/Creative Commons

The power of forgiveness

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When the Islamic extremist group ISIS invaded the Nineveh Plains in North Eastern Iraq over four years ago, the 140,000 Assyrian Christians living there were given three choices convert to Islam, die or flee. The Nineveh Plains are home to the ancient ruins of Nineveh, the city that the prophet Jonah called to repentance. Christians have inhabited this area for 2,000 years and many speak modern Aramaic, a version of the language that many believe Jesus spoke. Tens of thousands of Assyrian Christians fled into neighboring countries where they lived for years as ISIS ravaged their homeland. The Islamic extremists were determined to wipe out any evidence of the Christian faith on the Nineveh plain. ISIS leveled an estimated 13,000 homes of Christians, destroyed 263 Christian churches and obliterated Christian monuments including the tomb of Jonah. Christian cemeteries were also destroyed and purposefully desecrated. ISIS was determined to wipe out the memory of the Christians who had lived on this plain for the past 2,000 years.  But with ISIS routed, four years later Christians are …

Red Kangaroos Credit: David Cook/Flickr/Creative Commons

Australia has its first Pentecostal Prime Minister

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Over the weekend, the Australian Liberal party elected Scott Morrison. 50, as Prime Minister of Australia after the party’s leader Malcolm Turnbull resigned on Friday after realizing he no longer had the majority support of his party. Morrison won the nomination in an election run off with two other contenders. Prior to becoming Prime Minister, Morrison served as the country’s treasurer, social services minister and minister in charge of immigration and border protection. In Australia, the Liberal party is considered a center-right party with its main opposition the Labour party considered center left. There has been a lot of political upheaval in Australia recently as Morrison will be Australia’s sixth Prime Minister in the past 10 years. What makes Morrison’s nomination interesting is that he is Australia’s first openly Pentecostal Prime Minister. He and his family regularly attend Horizon Church, a 2,200 member Assemblies of God church in Sydney, Australia. He grew up in a Christian family and according to Reverend Ray Green, the pastor of the church his family attended, as a teenager, Morrison …