The prayers of the saints have been answered. Hallelujah! Political Correctness is done. Hallelujah! The evangelical vote is back! Hallelujah! Israel has a new friend. Hallelujah! The Swamp will be drained. Hallelujah! The justice that our government refused to deliver came from the people. Hallelujah! Abortion has a new enemy. Hallelujah! A leader will work for us and not our enemies. Hallelujah! The Supreme Court will be saved. Hallelujah!
The people have repudiated the Obama legacy. Hallelujah! Obamacare will be replaced. Hallelujah! America has been spared. Hallelujah! Instead of filth, there will be faith in the White House. Hallelujah! The House, the Senate, and the President will work together for hard working Americans. Hallelujah! Outreach ministries are safe from the IRS. Hallelujah! A corrupt mainstream media has been discredited and neutralized. Hallelujah!
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Today, you are indeed, witnessing a singular miracle in American history. Donald Trump faced insanely impossible resistance. He was pronounced dead again and again. Today, he stands with humility, on the cusp of making America Great Again. Hallelujah!
Mario Murillo, Mario Murillo Ministries, Hallelujah!, November 9, 2016
Question: “Pastor John, did God cause, or would God cause, my wife to miscarry our child because I have a struggle with lust and pornography? I have a lot of guilt right now, and I don’t know how to think about God’s discipline and punishment for my sin. I’m very confused, please help.”
May that discipline come in the form of harm, even death, to others that we love, as well as ourselves? And the answer is yes, it may. This was certainly the case with David’s sin of adultery and murder with Bathsheba and her husband. Nathan the prophet said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin” (2 Samuel 12:13). And then the next thing, “Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the Lord” — and surely that is what pornography is — “the child who is born to you shall die” (2 Samuel 12:14).
So, I would certainly say in my own life — now hear this carefully — I would certainly say in my own life the most painful and humbling disciplining from the Lord has regularly been though the pain and suffering and sometimes death of those I love, rather than through any blows against my own body. Oh, that we only suffered in our own body. This has been the way the deepest Christians have always thought about the losses through the death of those they love. Jonathan Edwards preached numerous sermons about the way the Lord disciplines a church by taking away a godly pastor in death. Edwards’s godly wife Sarah spoke about kissing the rod of God in the death of her 54-year-old husband — a rod of discipline that she felt more than anyone. She called it a rod of God on her back. And she kissed it.
Every loss that we endure as sinful children of God have two designs: one from Satan, one from God. Satan designs our unbelief and rebellion and renunciation and guilt and paralysis and loss of faith. God designs our purification and that we would hope less in this world and more in God who raises the dead.
I don’t know whether our friend who wrote this question lost his child in miscarriage as a direct discipline from God because of his pornography. I do not know. He does not know. I do know that in the loss of the child, God wills a new humility and a new submission and a new faith and new purity through the pain of this loss.
When it comes to God’s sexual ethic, there’s a clear rationale for what’s commanded. His Word doesn’t so much show us a theology of sexuality or sexual ethics as it does a theology of marriage. Human marriage, we see repeatedly, is to point us to the ultimate marriage between Jesus and his bride, the church. It’s a signpost to the big thing God is doing in the universe—drawing together a people to belong to his Son. That vision explains the contours and boundaries we see in Scripture’s teaching about marriage. Once we unpack it we see why God insists that sex is for marriage (since only in a covenantal relationship with him do we have the ability to be vulnerable and intimate); that marriage is between one man and one woman (since God brings together two unlike yet complementary beings in a union); and why Christians are to marry only those in the faith (since our union with Christ means we cannot painlessly unite with someone who doesn’t also belong to him).
After I had my daughter Camila everything changed. I was overjoyed, overwhelmed and very scared. I was almost certain I would screw something up so I welcomed the Mommy Fear with open arms. My careless, free spirit soon became a very irritable, worrisome one. What changed?
Yes, I had a kid but there was something more. I started to remember all the negative things people would say. “Get ready for NO sleep”, “This will be the hardest thing you’ll do, but it’ll be worth it”, “You’re traveling with a baby?! Good Luck!”
I began to dwell on the terrible “hardships” I was about to endure and the thought of having to be responsible for a child 24/7 almost paralyzed me with fear. I put up with the fear and things began to materialize. One night, Camila had an allergic reaction to some bananas and was hardly breathing. Jonathan quickly whisked her up from the bed and began to pray. It wasn’t more than five minutes after he had prayed that Camila began to breathe normally. It was as though nothing had happened.
Did I stay by Jonathan [Evangelist Jonathan Shuttlesworth] believing in faith for our daughter? HECK NO. I was outside calling 911. It was then that I realized my faith in God needed a major tune up. Instead of resting in the peace of God knowing His promises belong to me and my children, I totally freaked out. I allowed that Mommy Fear to fester because I thought it was normal. I read articles about the so-called “healthy fears” in parenting. The truth is, the devil will creep in wherever he’s allowed. I opened the door to fear for my child and soon, it began to trickle into everything I did. My mind began to think about worst case scenarios. I could hardly sleep. I thought to be responsible meant being in fear. I was seriously wrong.
You can blame it on hormonal imbalances but deep down, the root is fear. The Bible has commanded us several times not to fear. We are not exempted as mothers. In fact, we should have stronger faith! Fear is a trait that can be easily picked up by your kids. The way you walk, talk, and act, are all affected by fear. Stop that cycle today!
Matthew 6 is one my favorite scriptures because God instructs us to not worry about a single thing. It also says in verse 33 “ Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.” Seek God for guidance. Ask the Holy Spirit to lead you in the way you should go. Don’t allow for that fear to take control of you a minute longer. You can be a parent and not fear. Don’t open the door to the devil. If you open that door a tiny little bit the devil will kick that thing open on your face. You’ll have a broken nose and a ton of problems. Keep it shut by staying in God’s Word. Anoint your children daily, not out of fear but in faith knowing God’s Word will prevail.
— Adalis Shuttlesworth, Revival Today, The Mommy Fear, November 3, 2016
It’s hard to believe what is happening [liberals, communists, socialists, atheists, secularists, and humanists taking over America] in our nation, isn’t it? It’s difficult to comprehend the corruption in someone [Hillary Clinton, not Donald Trump] who wants to lead our [Christian] country! There was a time [when exactly?] when America was the least corrupt nation in the world. Now it is rife at the top [especially since Obama took office]! But we thank [the Evangelical] God for answering prayer. We have been praying earnestly and consistently [look at us, so faithful in serving Jesus] for [the Evangelical] God to expose all deception, corruption, and the hidden agendas in our government. God is answering prayer and exposing it [exposing meaning Benghazi and Hillary’s emails].
We must keep praying. Praying begins with families, not the church. Are you praying earnestly [for Donald Trump to be elected] as a family each day for these coming elections which are just about upon us? This country is at tipping point [tipping point being Christianity losing its preferential seat at the cultural and political table]. These elections will determine the course of this nation and ultimately the world.
We must pray and we most vote against evil—against corruption [Hillary Clinton], against the murdering of babies in the womb right up until the day they are born (which is Hilary’s [sic] agenda) [which is a bold-faced lie Nancy Campbell keeps repeating over, and over, and over again] , against euthanasia, against the appointment of liberal Supreme Court judges (which Hilary [sic] plans to do) and it goes on and on [as does Nancy Campbell’s whining].
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If you are not currently praying, can you begin today? [not today, my favorite TV show is on] Gather your family together at your evening meal tonight and PRAY TOGETHER, Everyone around the table. Don’t just pray. CALL out to God to save our nation [from Hillary Clinton]. You may have to rearrange your whole schedule. We can’t even consider that sacrifice when we consider that our nation hangs in the balances.
Can you imagine what could happen if every God-fearing, Bible believing family began to gather their family together morning and evening and cry out to God for this nation. [ yes, absolutely nothing]
— Nancy Campbell, Above Rubies, Are You Praying?, November 2, 2016
Male Commenter on Lori Alexander’s post (protect yourself from what, rape?)
Many women are rebellious today and want to do what is right in their own eyes. They are rebellious to all types of authority and they don’t want to be told what to do: what to wear, what to do with their bodies, and what to do with their lives. They want to do what they want to do regardless of who it hurts in the process. One example is from a man who wrote about his disgust with so many women wearing yoga pants.
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Yes, this is very foreign in today’s culture since most women are taught to be independent and do their own thing since the women’s liberation movement freed them from the shackles of modesty, motherhood, marriage, and all the other things that they believed held women in bondage.
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I wrote an entire chapter in my book on modesty since women are not taught modesty anymore. I warned about yoga pants since I know they are not modest and cause men to stumble. It’s a little tough on guys to continually avert their eyes when almost every single women they see is wearing them no matter what they look like in them.
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Most everything that is good, decent, and the Lord’s ways are offensive to women today. Try to teach Titus 2:3, 4 to younger women and see all the offended women come out of hiding. The things that should offend them, like evil, don’t offend them anymore…. No, never tell women what is good and right and what the Lord requires of them since they are their own god now and decide what is right.
ATHEISM is unbelief in God and denial of God as the Supreme Being and the source of all creation. Atheism is closely connected to liberalism. Liberalism simplifies religion in order to equate idol worship to the worship of God the creator of the universe and all that is there in. In other words, liberalism is a tool created by Satan which seeks to justify Atheism to the vulnerable world of today. Atheism takes Faith away from the heart of a man and the result is fear, suspicion, cruelty, violence, chaos and confusion.
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Atheism, like a virus, is spreading in the hearts of mankind and in high places and governments of the world. Most of the advanced world has become non-believers in God as they make materialism, modernism and liberalism a gospel to preach to the world and in recent years’ force has been use in the form of laws and sanctions to enforce these gospels of the devil. There is systematic denial of the existence and sovereignty of God the Creator. They deny the atoning power of the blood of Jesus Christ shed on Calvary’s cross; they deny his resurrection from the dead and the necessity of Salvation.
Multitudes are following this satanic teaching but unfortunately they have not found piece [sic] in their pursuits. They cry in despair but no one hears them. Suicides, divorces, depressions, sleepless nights, alcoholism, immorality, greediness and many other countless human calamities and vices are a direct result of this misleading, satanic ideology called Atheism. The world over is catching up to this folly called Atheism and liberalism and indeed suffering and lack of direction especially among the young generation is the order of the day.
— Happiers Simbo, New Zimbabwe, A Relationship with God: The Folly of Atheism, October 23, 2016
For most of our married life, Jenell and I [Darren Wilson] haven’t had a ton of money, so anytime we were able to bring a dog into our lives, we typically had to go the cheapest route. Humane societies. We liked the idea of saving an animal, and neither of us were interested in training a puppy, so the local pound was it. The only problem, at least in our case, was that every dog we ever got from the pound was in some way “broken.”
Behavior issues up the wazoo, peeing issues, mental issues, you name it, we had it. My wife is fond of saying that I am very good at loving a dog; I’m just very lousy at taking care of a dog. So after years of having to give up dogs we had become attached to, or having to put down dogs who were sick before their time, Jenell finally came to me and said she had had enough. It was too painful. We stunk at taking care of dogs, and she just couldn’t do it anymore.
The only problem with this was the fact that I was still a dog person. I’ve never known life without them. And I really wanted a dog, but a good dog. Unfortunately, my wife was resolute. No way. Never again. And then the ultimate stonewall: “God Himself would have to tell me to get a dog before I’d get another one.”
Years went by, and occasionally I’d bring it up, but it was always a lost cause. No way was she going to budge. So I did the only thing I knew to do: I prayed.
After a few months, my wife and some friends went on a mission trip, and along the way they stayed with a friend of mine who was very prophetic. All week long the others received words from the Lord, but my wife, who has become very healthy and doesn’t chase such things, was content to just abide in Christ. Of course she’d like a prophetic word, but she didn’t need one.
As they were all arriving at the airport to come home, my friend pulled Jenell aside and told her he had a word from the Lord for her. A smile came across her face, a silent thank-you to God for blessing her. Then, He hit her with a sledgehammer.
“Jenell, the Lord said it’s time to get a dog. Darren needs a dog. Your kids need a dog. And He has already picked the perfect one out for you. In fact, this dog will heal your heart.”
Her response was far from elation. “Did Darren put you up to this?”
He assured her he never talked to me, and Jenell contacted me to reluctantly tell me to start researching dogs.
I couldn’t believe it. God, You are amazing. But this time I was determined to do this right. So I researched actual breeders and dog breeds until I found what seemed the perfect dog breed for me: a king cavalier spaniel. The only problem I had was that we only had about $500 we could put toward this mutt, and the little research I was doing showed that purebreds were decidedly more than that, and then you had another $350 in shipping costs. But I believed in the God of the impossible now, so I jumped in with faith.
The first breeder I came across had some awesome dogs, but, man, were they expensive. So I decided to just contact them anyway and ask if they had any old dogs they just wanted to get rid of. It was the best I could hope for. All I told them was that I was a filmmaker looking for a dog. I didn’t mention that what I really wanted was a black and tan male, around 2 years old. And I didn’t mention that I only had $500.
The next morning I awoke to an email from the breeder. The first line shocked me.
“Dear Darren, first of all, we want you to know that we are huge fans of Finger of God.”
She then went on to say that they pray about every dog they place, and when she was praying the night before, the Lord highlighted one of her dogs in particular. His parents were both champion show dogs, and he was a male, 2 years old, with black and tan coloring. She then said that while she was praying God told her something strange. Usually they tithe on every dog they sell, and this particular dog was $1500. But God told her to keep the tithe and give Him the rest, so she asked if I’d be willing to take the dog for $150, plus $350 for shipping, for a total of $500?
I was speechless.
And that’s how Moses came into my life. He was a supernatural gift from God, and he truly did heal my wife’s heart…
Wilson’s God-given dog later ran away. Wilson “tried” to find the dog, eventually giving up. I suppose he thought, the Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away, right?
The atheist has been unleashed on the world as part of a planned attack on all religions of faith. The specific targets of the atheists are: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. When the man of sin shows up, he will destroy the atheists along with everyone else that does not accept his “pure luciferian” religion.
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To illustrate how ridiculous the atheist argument is, consider this: Take any complex organism, or machine, or anything else in the world that has hundreds (if not thousands of parts) and shake them around in a box for thousands of years, and see what you get when you open the box. Somehow humans “evolved?” Well, great theory, but how? Who set the rules for that evolution? Who designed it all? The entire universe screams at the top of its lungs “RANDOM DOES’NT [sic] WORK HERE.”
Can you imagine how long an engineer would last at any company if they suggested the best way to create something new was to throw all kinds of pieces and parts in a box and shake them around for a long time? That is utterly, completely ridiculous, and its also the argument the atheist uses for the existence of everything we see.”
Atheist “it all “just happened, we don’t know how”
Christian: “oh, so your faith is in “I don’t know.”
Atheist “correct, “I don’t know” explains more than an intelligent designer.”
Christian “ummm, sorry, but I don’t know, explains nothing.”
The atheist worships math and science. Great! So who set the laws that govern math and science? Math and science are based on order, so who set the order? Oh yea, I remember, the order came from “i don’t know.”
The universe that we live in is the evidence that our God exists. All creation is evidence that he exists. The incredible complexity, order, and grandeur of creation is the evidence, but the atheist says that “I don’t know” makes more sense than a creator.
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All creation is evidence for the existence of our God. Atheism explains nothing, so how exactly is that worldview helpful to mankind? The atheist is a spiritually bankrupt person, running around telling other people that somehow they have a superior spiritual view from those of us who believe in a Creator? We have answers for the creation, they have “I don’t know,” which is superior?
The atheist has no “deathblow” arguments for Christianity, which is why they have to setup never ending debates and monologues, write hundreds of books, etc etc etc. If they had some kind of “magic bullet” argument why don’t they just use it and be done with it? Since they have no “magic bullet” they go on, and on, and on, debating, writing, and rehashing the same arguments over and over again.
Here’s another vexing question for the atheist: What happens after you die? Now, can you guess what their answer is to that question? Try hard to guess now…. I DON’T KNOW!….there it is…again…the atheist answer for everything. For people who debate ad nauseum [sic], claiming the wisdom and brilliance of mankind over God, surely they have a better answer to the most important questions in life than “I don’t know?”
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The atheist has much, much, MUCH more faith than any member of Islam, Judaism or Christianity, and their faith is in “I don’t know.” We will see here very soon how far “I don’t know” carries these men, as their world turns upside down on them, chews them up and spits them out. They will cry out to “I don’t know” for help when their hearts are failing them for fear, and “I don’t know” will watch their destruction passively with a grin on its face.
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If the atheists were honestly inquiring in their hearts to determine if our God was real, they would find him. But they ask only to answer their own questions with their predetermined agendas, and their self satisfaction in giving canned answers that other men provided for them. The bible says if we seek him with all of our heart, we will find him. For men who call science and math their gods, I am amazed at how far they ride “I don’t know” when it comes to God.
The atheist’s faith in “I don’t know” is something to be marveled at. Time will soon tell who the wise and the foolish among us are. grace and peace
Our secularized culture teaches a strange history. We are told that we were once dumb brutes in an evolutionary past—no different from animals—but over the millennia we got a little smarter and came out of Africa and learned how to be farmers instead of hunters and gatherers.
Then we began building basic settlements and then civilizations and finally empires. So here we are sitting on top of the food chain because, unlike “other animals,” we have become smarter and smarter to become masters of our domain.
Okay, so this is a bunch of hogwash—man is made unique from animals and created in the image of God! But people believe these lies because this is what has been imposed upon them in secular schools, secular media, secular museums, and so on. Do you realize this alleged evolutionary history is not recorded by ancient historians in any culture? It is a modern fairly tale. It is a story that comes out of religions like secularism (including atheism and so on).
But as a result, kids of the next generation look at technology today and misunderstand it. They presume that, since we have more technology, we are “getting smarter” just like the evolutionary story says.
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After the Flood, a godly worldview dominated. As cultures deviated at Babel and down through the ages, man abandoned a godly and biblical worldview (of what had been revealed from Adam down through Noah) in favor of man’s flawed ideas (i.e., forms of humanism). As they began worshipping ancestors and false gods, their general worldview deteriorated into many various paths of paganism.
This affected science and innovation in a general pattern. It caused technology to remain nearly stagnant—with a few exceptions of course. A mind and culture with little hope has little desire to grow in the knowledge of God’s world (albeit sin-cursed and broken). Many worldviews even deter science and technology because of their very nature (e.g., animism). Animism, for example, has spirit beings that help or harm human interests in the physical world. Thus causality, which is the basis for observable and repeatable science, is meaningless because aspects of nature are controlled by the spirits rather than by a God who has promised to uphold things in a consistent fashion. (For more on world religions read World Religions and Cults Volumes 1–2.)
As Christianity began to explode in Europe prior to AD 1400, people began returning to a godly, biblical worldview leading up to the early modern period. This gave them the proper understanding of the world around them. Acknowledging that our all-knowing (Psalm 147:5) and all-powerful (e.g., Jeremiah 32:27) God upholds the world (Hebrews 1:3) and that He has promised to do so in the future until the end (e.g., Genesis 8:22) gives us the basis for doing observable and repeatable science. This presupposition is vital to make science possible.
As a result Christians began systematically studying the world and how it works (operational science). Most fields of science were developed by Bible believers—even the scientific method was developed by a young-earth creationist, Sir Francis Bacon!6
As Biblically based science erupted, technology, knowledge, inventions, and innovation built one on top of the other. This brings us to the world in which we live, built on centuries of technology.
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I humbly suggest that as the culture moves away from a biblical understanding of the world, so will they also miss out on certain scientific advancements—or at least delay them. Consider the unbiblical worldview of millions of years: researchers never thought oil could be produced quickly because they had been indoctrinated with the idea that oil production took vast ages. Yet oil can be made in 30 minutes from algae.12
Imagine if researchers in the 1960s had been thinking correctly (i.e., a younger age of the earth and thus rapid oil production at the time of the Flood) and had developed technology based on that truth. It could have revolutionized the oil industry in our current age! Instead, researchers only recently figured it out.
I want to encourage you to think biblically. The Bible makes sense of the world and makes sense of science and technology. Even so, we are in a world where the Bible comes under increasing attack, and secular scientists want to divorce science from the Bible (see “Is Science Secular?”). Science exists because the Bible is true. There is no reason to suppress this knowledge (Romans 1:18–21).
According to the Bible, man has always been brilliant—both in the past and in the present. The difference today is that we have more accumulated knowledge and technologies.
Words in [words] belong to Dr. Snarkapus
For most of our married life, Jenell and I [Darren Wilson] haven’t had a ton of money, so anytime we were able to bring a dog into our lives, we typically had to go the cheapest route. Humane societies. We liked the idea of saving an animal, and neither of us were interested in training a puppy, so the local pound was it. The only problem, at least in our case, was that every dog we ever got from the pound was in some way “broken.”
The atheist has been unleashed on the world as part of a planned attack on all religions of faith. The specific targets of the atheists are: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. When the man of sin shows up, he will destroy the atheists along with everyone else that does not accept his “pure luciferian” religion.
