All posts filed under: z43

The University of Toronto is changing its position on providing only gender-neutral facilities. Photo: Roman Boldyrev/Flickr/Creative Commons

The surprising reason why this ACLU director resigned

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The director of the Georgia branch of the American Civil Liberties Union, Maya Dillard Smith, announced she will be stepping down as its interim leader because of a conflict with the ACLU’s stand on transgender bathroom rights. The ACLU has taken on the cause to allow transgender men and women to use the bathroom and change facilities of their choice. This would allow biological males to use female facilities. However, there are concerns that such laws would also give sexual predators easy access to women and girls. In her resignation, she cited a personal experience with her own elementary-aged daughters that caused her to question the ACLU’s position on this controversial issue. Her daughters were using a public facility, when according to Smith: “Three Transgender young adults over six feet with deep voices entered. My children were visibly frightened, concerned about their safety and left asking lots of questions for which I, like many parents, was ill-prepared to answer.” She adds: “I understood it to be ACLU’s goal to delicately balance competing rights to ensure …

Photo: Rafal Zych/Flickr/Creative Commons

Generational Curses: Part 5 — Exposing the secret sins

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In this series we are studying the Biblical concept of Generational Curses that tells how the “iniquity” of the parents can be passed down to the children (Exodus 20:4-5). Children can actually inherit their parent’s sin. In the last article, we started our discussed on how to break with Generational curses. The first step involves understanding that Jesus broke the curse. This means that we are fighting from the higher ground. The curse is broken, we must enforce it. We also looked at the need to deal with the victim mentality that can cause people to quit the fight. In this post, I want to look at the next important step. Coming clean on your iniquity Because of the nature of iniquity, it tends to be our most closely guarded secret. We don’t want anyone to find out about it. Some say that we are only as sick as our deepest secrets. One of the keys to breaking the power of generational curses is confession. Job’s cover-up In Job 31:33, the ancient patriarch confesses that …

Inheriting sin?

Generational Curses: Part 1 — Inheriting sin?

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Español: Las maldiciones generacionales: Parte 1 – La herencia de pecado? In her article in the Globe and Mail entitled “The Bad Seed,” Carolyn Abraham tells the story of Dan S. (a pseudonym). In 2003, when she wrote this article, the man was sitting on death row in a state prison in the southern US. The court sentenced him to death for the cold-blooded murder of a pizza store manager in a 1991 robbery. When he entered the pizza store, the 24-year-old manager quickly complied with Dan’s demands and handed over all the money in the till. Then Dan forced the manager to his knees and in a gangland style murder, callously shot the employee point-blank in the back of the head. “You should have seen the fat slob begging for his life,” Dan later gloated. He was on a rampage. Prior to this incident, he had committed a number of armed robberies, plus a string of car and credit-card thefts. After the pizza-store hold-up, he robbed six more restaurants and dry cleaning businesses before …

The aftermath of a 6.5 magnitude earthquake that hit California on December 22, 2003. Photo: Brian Lopez/Flickr/Creative Commons

Geologists warn mega earthquake looming

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Over the past week the earth has been hit with several large earthquakes resulting in hundreds of people being killed. Two major earthquakes hit Japan. The first one occurred on Thursday, April 14. With a magnitude of 6.5, it resulted in nine deaths and 800 injuries. A similar-sized earthquake hit the Pacific island of Vanuatu that same day with no reported deaths. Then a second 7.3 magnitude earthquake hit Japan two days later on Saturday, April 16 killing 34 and injuring 1,500. There is even concern that repeated earthquakes could eventually split Japan’s southern island in half. That same day an earthquake with a 7.6 magnitude rocked Ecuador, South America killing over 272 people (update: 570 dead as of April 21, 2016) and injuring 2,500. This group of earthquakes fell in the Ring of Fire, that circulates around the edges of the Pacific Ocean. About 90% of the world’s earthquakes occur in this region and as well 81% of the major earthquakes, those exceeding 7.0 magnitude. Anyone with an interest in end-times events are probably …

Will the Bible soon be banned in America? Photo: Joseph Li/Flickr/Creative Commons

Bible persecution?

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I was saved during the Jesus people movement that swept North America during the late 60s and early 70s. I ended up going to what can only be described as a Hippy church full of flower girls and long-haired boys. The pastor was the oldest person in our church — I think he was 25 at the time. A good friend of mine during those days was a fellow named Duncan. He stood over six-feet and had hair nearly as long. It was right down to his waist, actually even a bit further. Despite all that hair, Duncan went on to have a very distinguished, professional career. I remember a conversation he and I had back then. We discussed buying dozens of Bibles, building a waterproof box for them and then going deep into the woods and burying them. We suspected at some point it would be illegal to own a Bible in North America, but we would still have our secret stash. We had even decided on which version we would hide — the …

Student accused of violating university’s ‘safe place’ rules by raising her hand

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An article in The Telegraph exposes the bizarre culture permeating universities not only in England but in North America as well. Imogen Wilson is a student at Scotland’s University of Edinburgh. She also serves the student council as vice president of academic affairs. She recently spoke of how students on the extreme political left tried to have her kicked out of a council meeting because she dared to raise her hand. The student association has instituted a bizarro rule called the “safe place environment.” This policy sets out to create a ‘safe space’ where people are protected from anyone disagreeing with them, specifically: “refraining from hand gestures which denote disagreement,” or “in any other way indicating disagreement with a point or points being made.” People are only allowed to use gestures showing agreement. The problems started shortly after Imogen made a presentation disagreeing with those wanting to institute a policy to boycott Israel. Imogen opposes this because it leads to antisemitism which creates an unsafe place for Jews — note the contradiction. In a column …

Ship sailing into the sunset. Photo: Ozgur Mulazimoglu/Flickr/Creative Commons

Does the Bible predict a solar ‘superflare’?

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Our sun experiences massive explosions on its surface on a regular basis. Up to know it was thought our sun could only produce minor eruptions compared to the superflares other suns are capable of producing. Superflares occur when a large magnetic field on a sun’s surface collapses resulting in a massive release of energetic energy and plasma. Astronomers were able to study superflares after NASA launched a space observatory, called the Kepler Mission, in 2009. It had on board a massive telescope intended to look for other planets in our Milky Way that could hold life. Though it failed miserably on that front, astronomers saw other suns giving off massive solar flares, 10 to 100 times larger than what our sun typically throws off. After analyzing this data, researchers with Denmark’s Aarhus University concluded that though our sun does not routinely give off superflares, it is capable of doing so. Compared to most suns studied, ours has a weaker magnetic field. But they noticed that suns with the same-sized and even weaker magnetic fields as …

Twenty-one Christian men marching to martyrdom on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea.

Redeeming the land?

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Dr Joseph Yousef has a ministry, Leading the Way, that broadcasts via radio and TV to over 190 countries around the world. On a recent program, Yousef interviewed Shahid (not his real name) a former Muslim from Libya. After attending a Muslim school for 14 years, Shahid was an expert in Islamic Law and interpretation. However, he began to question his Islamic faith and when he asked sincere questions to those mentoring him, he was abruptly told the Qur’an forbids people from asking questions. Shahid said he struggled with this doubt for four years and finally renounced Islam and decided to become an atheist. It was during this period he heard about Christianity through Leading the Way’s 24-hour satellite channel. He ended up contacting the ministry who eventually introduced the young Muslim man to several Christians living in Jordan and Lebanon. Shahid met secretly with a group for a few months, studying the Bible. He eventually became a Christian and was baptized. Today, he is sharing his faith with fellow Muslims primarily in Libya and …

The Bible predicted a time when the Jews would return to Israel. Jews at the Western Wall wearing their tradition Kippah or skullcap. Photo: delayed gratification/Flickr/Creative Commons

Israel’s regathering hitting record levels

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One of the sign posts on the second coming of Christ was the restoration of Israel as a nation. People who study end-times prophecy, such as Isaac Newton (1642-17260), believed it was necessary.  Though Israel did not exist in Newton’s day, from his study of the Bible he said it needed to happen before Christ’s second coming. There are several verses that spoke of the nation of Israel being restored (see Amos 9:14-15; Ezekiel 37:10-14; 37:21-22; 34:13; Deuteronomy 30:3-5). The prophet Isaiah writes: “Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Can a land be born in one day? Can a nation be brought forth all at once? As soon as Zion travailed, she also brought forth her sons. (Isaiah 66:8 NASV) That event predicted in the Old Testament miraculously happened on May 14, 1948. But along with this, the prophets also predicted that the Jews would pour back into the promised land from nations around the world. They would literally flood in: And He will lift up a standard for the …

Pentecostal camp meeting in Colorado. Photo: Masonerecycleicious/Flickr/Creative Commons

Why Paul wishes we all spoke in tongues

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Back in the early 70s, I was saved in a church belonging to a denomination with a strong evangelistic, missionary emphasis. Though the church was not charismatic, it was not opposed to  the gift of tongues. Its semi official position was “seek not, forbid not” with more of an emphasis on “seek not.” However, the particular church that I had been saved in had formed out of the Jesus’ people movement and over time fully embraced the charismatic. Speaking in tongues was as controversial back then as it is today. As a result of the denominational influence, I had started to develop a negative attitude towards the gift and was looking down upon those who practiced it in the church I attended. But at a Bible study group, I felt the Lord speak to me of my need to be filled with the Holy Spirit. I asked some of the people in attendance to pray with me for the in filling. It was a dramatic moment as I was instantly filled with God’s Spirit. I can …

Israeli officers saluting their flag Photo: Israel Defense Forces/Flickr/Creative Commons

Who does ISIS really fear?

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As ISIS works to set up a Muslim Caliphate in the Middle East with hopes of extending its influence into even Europe, there is only one country it fears — Israel. This is according to a German reporter who spent 10 days with ISIS in 2014. Because of a unique relationship he had developed with ISIS leaders, Jurgen Todenhofer received permission to embed with the Islamic extremists. During this time he was able to interview several Jihadi fighting in Iraq and Syria. Though several countries such as America and Britain have military in Iraq, Todenhoffer said in an interview with Jerusalem News that ISIS is not scared of them because they lack the commitment and experience needed for city guerrilla warfare. As one fighter pointed out, Mosul, Iraq has 1.5 million people and ISIS has 10,000 fighters scattered throughout the city and Western armies lack the experience for that type of urban fighting. ISIS’s headquarters is based in Mosul. In addition, ISIS fighters are prepared to die for their cause, and they do not believe …