The slogan “black lives matter” excludes the unborn says Washington Times columnist Kenneth Blackwell. He wonders if the civil rights leaders really care when a black life is lost, or whether they simply exploit situations for political gain. Blackwell writes:

Today, on the somber anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, it’s time for black leaders to face up to the real danger threatening black lives in America. It isn’t the police. According to an anti-police brutality organization, the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, 313 blacks were killed by “police, security guards and vigilantes” in 2013. It isn’t even black criminals, who, as Rudy Giuliani famously pointed out on “Meet the Press,” are responsible for 93 percent of violent deaths among blacks. Sources estimate that between 6,000 and 8,000 blacks are murdered each year.

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In 2011 Rick Warren, who is the pastor of a megachurch in California and the author of the popular “Purpose-Driven” books chose to enter into a partnership with a man who is steeped in New Age/New Thought spirituality. Warren elicited the aid of Dr. Mehmet Oz to come up with a health and fitness plan for his church. Marsha West has learned that a recent study by the British Medical Journal showed that “Half of Dr. Oz’s health advice is bad.” View article →

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With their cover of Britney Spears’ Circus, Church by the Glades illustrates the point of the earlier article, The Church Growth Movement: innovating like it’s 1894. View article →

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discern.org notes Beth Moore’s post and links to some resources on her teaching. View article →

Many Christians today are partaking in astrology, unbiblical meditation, so-called Christian yoga, and calling on angels, in spite of the fact that Scripture clearly teaches that believers must not do as the pagans do. Marsha West lays out for us some of the many of the practices God deems evil. View article →

Alcoholics Anonymous (A.A.) allegedly helps drunks achieve and maintain sobriety. John Lanagan of My Word Like Fire asserts that the two most aggressive promoters of A.A.’s “Christian roots” seem to have committed some very shoddy scholarship.

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discern.org:

Perry Noble of NewSpring has apologised for saying that there is no Hebrew word for ‘commandment’, and also for a Tweet he made.

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discern.org explains why seeker-driven megachurch preaching is necessarily powerless. View article →

The monarchial government of many seeker-driven churches is certainly efficient. When a leader is supported by a board of subordinates whom he has appointed, and can just as easily remove, he is well placed to Get Things Done. Nevertheless, is efficiency a virtue in the church? View article →

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discern.org has a convenient round-up of helpful rebuttals to Newsweek and Kurt Eichenwald’s ignorant Christmas polemic against the Bible and historic Christianity. View article →

What follows is a brief timeline of Mars Hill history. This timeline is by no means comprehensive, but merely gives a brief overview of some of what has taken place in Mars Hill under Mark Driscoll. In my opinion, three of the events below were pivotal moments that, taken together, caused Christians outside of Mars Hill to sit up and start asking questions about Driscoll. View article →

According to Christian News Network:

Actor and filmmaker Kirk Cameron recently invited a former evangelical pastor who converted to Roman Catholicism to TBN to make the case for Santa Claus as Cameron promotes his new film “Saving Christmas,” which seeks to convince Christians who choose not to celebrate the holiday.

Cameron shared a segment of the interview on his Facebook page on Tuesday, in which he spoke with historian William Federer, a former evangelical minister who now identifies as Roman Catholic. Sporting the Liberty University logo embroidered on his shirt, Cameron invited Federer to outline the history of Saint Nicholas and other items found in his book “There Really Is a Santa Claus: The History of Saint Nicholas & Christmas Holiday Traditions.”

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I have noticed in recent weeks what seems to now be an annual occurrence of Christians-shouldn’t-celebrate-Christmas-because-it’s-a-pagan-holiday commentary online. So to address that topic head on, I should like first to say that I would never urge a brother or sister to go against their conscience if they felt that celebrating Christmas was wrong or sinful. I do not disdain my brothers or sisters who are uncomfortable with such celebrations, nor do I feel somehow superior in my freedom. But what I should like to point out is that a lot of this fear over celebrating Christmas (and oftentimes, Easter, too) comes from misinformation attributed to an historian named Alexander Hislop. We’ve posted before about the myths associated with Hislop – myths that were formed from his own biases, and which were not actually rooted in historical data. And I would therefore urge, with all gentleness and kindness, for my fellow Christians to think this issue through biblically, historically and truthfully. After all, God is the author of all truth, isn’t He? So truth matters.

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Stand Up For The Truth writes:

OWN television has just announced the premiere of its new series titled, The Rob Bell Show. The same Rob Bell who challenges the truth of the Bible and continues to influence millions of fans around the world (having just returned from a national tour with New Agers Deepak Chopra and Oprah), despite his fall from biblical Christianity. The same former pastor of Mars Hill church who denies the doctrine of a real Hell (making him a heretic in the true sense of the word). He is the author of many books pushing unscriptural doctrine including Velvet Elvis, Love Wins and his new The Zimzum of Love, giving people a “startling new way of looking at marriage.” (Bell has come out in support of homosexual marriage.)

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The Hebrew Roots folks are out in force again this Christmas season, attempting to convince Christians that they are sinning against God by celebrating Christmas.^* Sorry, but I’m going to have to whip out my can of Luke on them for that. After all, if the gospel accounts record Jesus’ birth being proclaimed, angels singing his praises, shepherds rushing to see him, and wise men bringing him gifts some time later, why should we not, as Christians, also have the freedom to:

• proclaim his birth (using Christmas as a springboard to talk about how God has sent a Savior who died for sinners);
• sing his praises;
• dwell on the fact that one day I will bodily be in his presence, just as those who rushed to his side that day were in his presence; and
• exchange gifts with my loved ones as a way of remembering the greatest Gift of all time, our Savior, who was given to us by God out of his great loving-kindness?

* Please note that I respect the right of my Christian brothers and sisters who choose not to celebrate Christmas. And just as I do not look upon them with disdain, neither should they look upon me with disdain (Col. 2:16).

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Jesse Johnson of The Cripplegate was interviewed by The Daily Signal to get a pastor’s perspective on the Ferguson rioting. Johnson put forth three sound biblical principles concerning the riots in Ferguson. View article →

For those unfamiliar with Christian Reconstructionism/Theonomy, here’s a thumbnail sketch: Christian Reconstructionists are the buttoned-up version of Dominionism. On one side of the Dominionism coin, you have the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), who believe they have a mandate from God to take spiritual dominion of the earth. Out of this mistaken belief, which is based on misinterpreting various Bible verses including Genesis 1:28 and Psalm 8 (which are about taking physical dominion of the earth, not spiritual dominion), the NARs have developed errant teachings known as “Joel’s Army” and the “7 Mountain Mandate.”

But flip the Dominionism coin, and you will find Christian Reconstructionism, a much more theologically buttoned-up form of Dominionism, and one that has taken strong root inside the homeschooling community. Christian Reconstructionists work very, very hard to distinguish themselves from the New Apostolic Reformation, with its wackadoodle services where adherents sometimes shake, quiver, bark like dogs, and deceive themselves into believing angel feathers, gold dust and glory clouds are manifesting. Christian Reconstructionists eschew all this nonsense, and rightly so. Christian Reconstructionists are also, as previously noted, much more theologically buttoned-up and biblically grounded. But like their NAR counterparts, Christian Reconstructionists also believe they have a mandate from God to reclaim the culture, and the world.

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Pastoring 101 – here’s what should happen when seminary students show up for their first day of class: they are handed two live sheep. And the professor then tells them this: your assignment is to look after these sheep for the next semester. You are to feed them, care for them, tend them, comb their wool, and protect them from wolves. If, at the end of the semester, you return both of these sheep to me, alive and in good condition (i.e. they not frightened, malnourished or missing any limbs), then you will have earned the right to graduate to the next step: learning how to minister to actual people. View article →