PORN

Is porn bad for a Christian?

For the Christian that thinks the porn industry isn't so bad, I would refer them to Shelley Lubben's website. Shelley's an ex-porn star, ex-prostitude who came to Christ and now has a ministry to help educate people about what it is like to live/work in the world of pornography. She reveals that drugs/alcohol/sexual diseases run rampant and although they make good money they tend to blow whatever they make. The damage to these people's lives is devastating and some take their own lives after only a short career. After listening to her story, it's hard to claim no one's getting hurt by watching pornography. And whether we want to admit it or not, if we watch these movies we are watching someone's daughter/son in a legalized form of prostitution.

Having said all of that let me say that I’ve struggled with pornography most of my life. The Internet has made it a whole lot easier to get it as opposed to not just 10 years ago you had to drive some place or mail order.

As a believer in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17 – “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”), we are called to not be of the world (see Galatians 5:16-26) and if we slip or fall into lust we must repent and turn from it. And not make the excuse that everyone does it...

Shelley recommends digging into the Bible for help. Her favorite Bible verse is 2 Corinthians 10:5 “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

Another ministry that helps with porn addiction is
Pure Life Ministries.

I am currently using a porn filter (X3Pro) from XXXChurch which emails the websites that you visit to up to three accountability partners every week.

Evil Chuck of Death, a Christian or just spiritual?

Was Evil Chuck of the death metal band Death, a Christian or just spiritual at the time of his death in 2001? He had battled cancer for over two years and possibly this challenged what he believed. As I tried to find an answer to this question, I was amazed at the death metal fans who considered him a traitor or worse because he might had been a Christian. Statements from his mother simply stated that he had always been very spiritual never stating him as a follower of Christ. I searched the Internet high and low and couldn't find anything on him making a declaration of faith in Christ.

I have a friend who was on tour with Chuck in the 80s and many of the stories weren't very flattering. He would take the shirts bands would give him and put them on the steps of their tour bus to step on them. He wasn't very positive towards fans that came up to meet him either. He sounded like a pretty complicated guy. He might have been different in the 90s and I admit I never met him. I did see him play at Joe's Garage in the late 80s and I was amazed to see a blue-eyed baby-faced Chuck spout out such deep, guttural death groans.

Recently, as I was listening to the second song on Spiritual Healing, "Altering the Future," the question of the late great Chuck's beliefs came up. "Altering the Future" appears to describe abortion as murder that calls for the death of women who have had an abortion. I didn't hold antiabortion views at this time in the 80s. I believed in the horrible lie of abortion until 2002 when I became a believer. And, obviously, I don't believe that women who have abortions should be killed, they have a chance to repent of this sin and some truly have repented after having one. So all of this got me to thinking as to whether he had come to Christ or not. Chuck probably knew that there was a good chance he was going to die during his struggle with cancer.

In the Christian world we see a lot of people who claim to be spiritual but there's a big difference between being spiritual and knowing and trusting in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. The Bible states that there is one way to Heaven and that is through the blood of Jesus Christ. The world will tell you different and if you listen to some of Chuck's former fans Christianity is bad and has harmed society. But that's a subject for another blog.... I just hope Chuck decided to trust in Jesus before he died from brain cancer in 2001.

Altering The Future (lyrics)

Creating a life only to destroy
Saved from a life of the unemployed
Where crime is the only way to survive
Which is the best to be dead or alive?
Maybe a chance but maybe not
Born to be thrown in the trash to rot
To exist in this world may be a mistake
The one who is with child, it's their choice to make

Death and life taken so easily
Right or wrong, whose choice will it be?

Abortion, when it is needed
Execution, for those who deserve it
The giving and taking of life will always be
Altering the future

Look into the future to prepare us for our fate
Controlling our existence with every life we take

Life for a life should remain the rule
The innocent victim that is what's cruel
Look to the past is what we should do
When justice was done and justice was true
Using our laws to help their escape
An easy way out is what they create
Claiming insane is the way to freedom
People are stupid enough to believe them

Death and life taken so easily
Right or wrong, whose choice will it be?

Abortion, when it is needed
Execution, for those who deserve it
The giving and taking of life will always be

BONO

I have to admit I'm really sick of hearing U2 music in churches.

Why do Christians glorify Bono? Before I came to Christ in 2002, I was a fan of U2 and have seen them twice in concert during the 90s. And from knowing their lyrics and even how they portrayed themselves in concert, there wasn't much Christian about them that I ever witnessed.

This video takes a hard look at U2's lyrics and the songs they choose to cover. This is a must see for anyone who thinks "I still haven't found what I'm looking for" is a Christian song or is glorying Christ:








Matthew 7:15-16
15 "Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16 By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 Likewise every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.

What is the Emergent Church?

I have mentioned the term "Emergent Church" to several Christian friends and they are not familiar with term so I thought it's important to define it. Quite a few churches now are experimenting with some of the practices of the emergent church movement which at first come across as good ideas but can be very deceptive. You often hear people like Rick Warren say they want to change the way we "do" church. This is a good warning sign that you're about to hear some Emergent teaching mixed in with good teaching. The more liberal teachings of the emergent church I find are more deceptive, dangerous than a Marilyn Manson or Slayer because you know where they're coming from.

Definition: (from Encyclopedia) : "a label that has been used to refer to a particular subset of Christians who are rethinking Christianity against the backdrop of Postmodernism....

VOTM radio Todd Friel interviews John MacArthur about Brian McLaren's social gospel, one of the leaders of the emergent movement. MacArthur points out how the more liberal emergents believe that Jesus came to fix the world (Liberation Theology), and how they want to move away from teaching of sin. As Todd Friel has paraphrased them, "We can spend all our time making the world a better place so they can go to hell from." And another disturbing aspect to some emergents is that they do not accept the Bible as absolutely true. This is a must listen!

Recently I read an article on the web by Brian McLaren where he basically doesn't answer question posed to him on his church's stance on homosexuality and then tries to make the reader feel guilty for even wanting to know his answer. This guy is slick. When he later reveals that the couple who asked the question has a parent who is now gay and they want to know if the father and his partner can come to a wedding if they hold it there, it's almost like he's triumphant at this point attempting to make us feel guilty. You can't even tell if he answered their question from this article. He seems to imply people might come to Christ if we're wishy-washy tolerant.

Taken from that article:
"Perhaps we need a five-year moratorium on making pronouncements. In the meantime, we'll practice prayerful Christian dialogue, listening respectfully, disagreeing agreeably."

The last thing we ought to do according to this emergent guru is go to the Bible and actually see what God says. Now if McLaren went to the Bible he'd most probably pull out something like "The Message" so he can manipulate the meaning into the nothingness he's shooting for.

This is very similar to Joel Osteen - they doesn't wan to offend people. Jesus never offended anyone, did he? They put him on the cross because he tickled their ears? But they think things are different now in this crazy modern world? Their view is that we need to modify how we teach Christianity to be effective.

This is the kind of mindset many leaders of the mega-churches want to embrace as they throw old seeker sensitive methods on the dung hill and look for the next big thing. Six Flags over Jesus hasn't worked well for them. Now they turn to affirming, non threatening, kind and never state anything definite on the big questions just like a big teddy bear.

I was in a grocery store the other day and I witnessed an older white gentleman get mad at the cashier and manager because something wasn't working the way he wanted it. He stormed out and those minimum wage workers just shook their heads. And I thought you know that's bad when a Christian acts like that in public (I'm not saying this guy was or wasn't). But what I believe the emergents have allowed themselves to be formed by our postmodern society into thinking is that they don't want to be like the rude Christian in public when asked hard questions the Bible is straightforward in answering. I have no clue how it helps people to hear a sugar coated the message of the gospel, it certainly doesn't challenge them to repent, turn from their sins. And the tough questions can be answered in love without malice but there will be times that people hearing those answers will not be happy with the answer. Now McLaren in this article goes one step further by not even answering the question and then wants you to believe he's brilliant with his zen-like tolerance. Oprah would be clapping, "You, go girl!"

Here's an interesting quote from Mark Driscoll, founder of Mars Hill Church in Seattle.
"In the mid-1990s I was part of what is now known as the Emerging Church and spent some time traveling the country to speak on the emerging church in the emerging culture on a team put together by Leadership Network called the Young Leader Network. But, I eventually had to distance myself from the Emergent stream of the network because friends like Brian McLaren and Doug Pagitt began pushing a theological agenda that greatly troubled me. Examples include referring to God as a chick, questioning God's sovereignty over and knowledge of the future, denial of the substitutionary atonement at the cross, a low view of Scripture, and denial of hell which is one hell of a mistake." – Mark Driscoll

Mark Driscoll discusses the emerging church.