"We see, in many a land, the proudest dynasties and tyrannies still crushing, with their mountain weight, every free motion of the Consciences and hearts of men. We see, on the other hand, the truest heroism for the right and the greatest devotion to the Truth in hearts that God has touched. We have a work to do, as great as our forefathers and, perhaps, far greater. The enemies of Truth are more numerous and subtle than ever and the needs of the Church are greater than at any preceding time. If we are not debtors to the present, then men were never debtors to their age and their time. Brethren, we are debtors to the hour in which we live. Oh, that we might stamp it with Truth and that God might help us to impress upon its wings some proof that it has not flown by neglected and unheeded." -- C.H. Spurgeon . . . "If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." John 8:31, 32 . . . . .

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Thursday, December 24, 2009

The Humble King & The Little Drummer Boy

 ~~By James Fire

Some of you may recall after reading an article from FROM The MIND of FIRE that one of my favorite Christmas Carols is JOY to the WORLD. Well, another favorite of mine is The LITTLE DRUMMER Boy.

“Why?” you ask.
Well let’s set the stage first: Can we know that this carol is in any way factual? Perhaps not, although caravans, like the one that those Wise Man had, often used ‘drummer boys’ to lead them, beating on their drums in order to keep time in the march. Journeys were often arduous and most difficult, and it was easy in fatigue to lose one’s step. So these little guys were employed, sometimes for a mere pittance or a free meal, to lead caravans.

Whether or not there actually was a little drummer boy at the scene, it really doesn’t matter as the story itself illustrates some significant truths (although I harbor a belief that there really was; so call me a romantic already!).
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Monday, December 21, 2009

The MOTHER of HARLOTS EMERGES – Part 4b


~~ by James Fire

We now pick up where we left off in the previous article in this series, and will wrap it up. To recap what was covered in The MOTHER of HARLOTS EMERGES - Part 4a, let's address an issue discussed by Emergent Church leader, Brian McLaren on the subject of the kingdom of heaven, and what Jesus meant by this term.

Mr. McLaren claims that Jesus’ mission was NOT to show us the way to heaven after we die, but to show us how we can live the kingdom of heaven right now on this Earth: 

View this assertion he made here:
Brian McLaren's Take on the Kingdom of God

Jesus emphatically stated that the way to heaven and our Father who dwells there, is through Him and Him alone (JOHN 14:6); everywhere in the New Testament, which Mr. McLaren claims he’s based his assertions on, we see that the Kingdom of heaven is inaugurated, NOT by His church, or through the actions and plans of Christians, or by a global religious movement, but by the LORD Christ Jesus Himself:  MATT 24:30-31; MARK 8:38; LUKE 18:8; 2 THESS 1:7-10.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009

The MOTHER of HARLOTS EMERGES – Part 4-a


~~ by James Fire

In the previous articles (parts 1-3) we delved into various aspects of the “Mother of Harlots” that is, the one world religious body as prophesied in REVELATION 17, and how different ecclesial forces are melding together. Two of the primary forces that are acting as catalysts for the emergence of the Mother are the Roman Catholic Church and the Emergent Church Movement.

There is a third force as well, one that has been a part of our society for about thirty years, the New Age Movement (more often today referred to as the New Spirituality).You will find that as you read the writings of New Age leaders and their Emergent Church counterparts, what they have to say on particular matters is virtually identical.

Some therefore conclude that the ECM is simply the New Age Movement dressed in evangelical clothes, while still denying the fundamentals of the faith (The New Age Movement is likewise old ‘Babylon-ish’ occult technique dressed up as well as 'cutting edge' spirituality).

The difference is that New Age dogma used to be a fringe element in our society; today Emergent church beliefs and practices are quickly becoming a majority voice: a kind of spiritual tsunami sweeping over the landscape, and it will wreak ruin and destruction for fundamental, biblical Christianity as far as its overt presence and viability where this nation is concerned.
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Monday, December 14, 2009

What does Israel really think of Obama Policies?

by A.M. Kisly

I received some very interesting news today regarding an enormous protest rally that took place in the streets of Jerusalem.

I don’t know about you, but I didn’t here about this through our national news media. I think it’s important enough to post.
According to Israel News Network, there was a large scale rally against the United States Polices with regards to Israel.

The protest was held in downtown Jerusalem organized by various residents and committees of Binyamin and Samaria and others.
Watch: Thousands Attend Anti-Freeze Rally

According to this report, “Not since the days of [U.S. Secretary of State Henry] Kissinger has there been such a protest against American policies,” said MK Yaakov Katz (Ketzaleh), chairman of the National Union party.

“The pressure that Barack Hussein Obama is exerting against us to simply stop growing, and stop living will not work.”
 

The Obama administration has made it clear that Israel must stop building of all types throughout Judea and Samaria, as well as in parts of Israel’s capital city that were liberated during the Six Day War of 1967.

In foreign policy, President Barack Obama has demonstrated a disturbing propensity to curry favor with Israel’s adversaries at the expense of her friends.
The Czechs and Poles are rightly concerned that they will be sacrificed on the altar of better U.S. relations with Russia.

And the Israelis fear that the Obama administration’s desired opening to the Muslim world will be achieved at their expense. Mr. Obama’s attempted bullying of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is a case in point.
Mr. Netanyahu was sworn in as Israel’s prime minister on March 31. Shortly thereafter, the Obama administration confronted Israel’s new leader in a very public way regarding Israeli settlements in the West Bank, an area partially controlled by the Palestinian National Authority. 

This was an extremely unusual way for an American president to greet the new leader of a liberal democracy that’s a close ally of the U.S.
The Obama administration was not satisfied with a series of understandings crafted by the Bush administration that, while not freezing settlements, had nonetheless achieved a significant reduction in settlement construction.

During a May press conference with the Egyptian foreign minister, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that Mr. Obama “wants to see a stop to settlements-not some settlements, not outposts, not natural-growth exceptions.”


Subsequently, Mr. Obama demanded that Israel freeze construction in east Jerusalem. Of course, Mr. Netanyahu rejected Mr. Obama’s demand. He declared that Jerusalem is an open, undivided city “that has no separation according to religion or national affiliation.”

Mr. Netanyahu added that “we cannot accept the idea that Jews will not have the right to live and purchase in all parts of Jerusalem.”
If Jews were prohibited from buying property in New York, London, Paris or Rome, there would be an international outcry. Why, Mr. Netanyahu wondered, should the standard be different for Jerusalem?

Mr. Obama is woefully wrong if he believes that his confrontational style will provide an incentive for the Palestinians and the members of the Arab League to resolve the Arab-Israeli dispute. It will simply reinforce the long-standing Arab belief that the U.S. can “deliver” Israel if it only has the will to do so, thereby reducing Arab incentives to make concessions in direct negotiations with Israel.
As if on cue, Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the Palestinian National Authority, announced that he would not negotiate on any issue with the new Israeli government until Mr. Obama’s settlement conditions are met.

In addition to the building freeze in Jerusalem and the West Bank, Mr. Abbas insisted on four other unilateral, non-negotiable concessions:
First, an independent Palestinian state; second, that Israel pulls back to its pre-June 1967 borders, minus a Palestinian land bridge between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip; third, a Palestinian “right of return” to Israel; and fourth, resolution of all permanent status issues on the basis of the 2002 Abdullah plan calling on Arabs to normalize relations with Israel in return for Israel’s withdrawal to its pre-1967 borders.

The “right of return,” in particular, is a non-starter.
If Mr. Obama seeks a Palestinian Arab state, he is going about it the wrong way. The fact is that Mr. Netanyahu has endorsed a two-state solution and an end to the expansion of settlements in the West Bank—as long as the Palestinians accept Israel as a legitimate Jewish state and cannot militarily threaten it.

Israel has been willing to accept a two-state solution since the United Nations partition resolution for Palestine in 1947, but the Arabs have refused. They are not interested in creating a separate Palestinian Arab state but in destroying Israel as a Jewish state.
The Obama approach in the Middle East is predicated on what might be called the Arab “grievance narrative,” which holds that Israel was created as a result of Western guilt about the Holocaust.

It is also based on the idea that, as the president suggested in his Cairo speech, there is moral equivalence between the Holocaust and Palestinian “dislocation.”
Such language illustrates an inability to make distinctions. Arabs launched a war against Jewish self-determination and the state of Israel long before any Israeli “occupation” of their lands.

When Israel seized land in a defensive war, it was the Arabs, not the Israelis, who kept Palestinian “refugees” in limbo for three generations to await Israel’s destruction.
As Mr. Netanyahu reminded Mr. Obama after the latter’s Cairo speech, the Arab claim that Israel was a land grab by the great powers to salve the collective conscience of the West after the Holocaust is a slander.

On the contrary, he observed, Israel’s right to its homeland rests on the longstanding historical connection of the Jewish people to the land of Israel. This right was ratified by the unanimous and legitimizing votes of the League of Nations and the U.N. Security Council’s permanent members, and validated by over 60 years of Israel’s successful, democratic statehood.


Israel’s “right to exist” was expressed best by Israeli diplomat Abba Eban in 1981. He wrote, “Israel’s right to exist, like that of the United States, Saudi Arabia, and 152 other states, is axiomatic and unreserved. Israel’s legitimacy is not suspended in midair, awaiting acknowledgment. . . .

There is certainly no other state, big or small, young or old, that would consider mere recognition of its ‘right to exist’ a favor, or a negotiable concession.”
Mr. Netanyahu might also have added that Israel’s control of the West Bank (territory that should properly be called “disputed” rather than “occupied”), was the result of defeating the Arab powers who initiated the Six Day War of 1967.

The status of aggressors and defenders is not interchangeable. Neither is the status of victorious powers and defeated ones.
Nonetheless, Israel has taken unilateral steps toward peace, steps not reciprocated by the Palestinians. When Israel unilaterally disengaged from the Gaza Strip, dismantling 21 settlements and displacing over 9,000 residents, it conducted the most comprehensive test of the “land for peace” concept in the history of Israeli-Palestinian relations.

Yet Israel was rewarded with the creation of a terrorist enclave governed by Hamas, rather than the peaceful, responsible neighbor Israel would need in order to accept a Palestinian Arab state.
Unlike Hamas, the corrupt Palestinian National Authority that holds sway in the West Bank has nominally accepted Israel’s right to exist but has never given up the “right of return” for Palestinian “refugees.”

That right, if implemented, would mean the end of Israel’s existence.
Peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians requires compromises on both sides. U.S. pressure on Israel, without any on the Palestinians, will not achieve the desired outcome. Earlier this summer, the president justified his decision to downplay even rhetorical support for the Iranian protesters who rose up against their government and its fraudulent election. He did not wish the U.S. to appear to be “meddling” in Iranian affairs.
He apparently feels no similar constraint when it comes to Israel.
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Wednesday, December 9, 2009

DO ALL RELIGIONS OF THE WORLD REACH THE SAME GOD?

by Anne Kisly

All roads do not reach the same God, nor lead to heaven!

Since religious truth claims are objective, then the belief all roads lead to heaven is contradictory. Here is why. If all roads lead to heaven then all belief systems are true.

This has three major problems:

1. If all views are true then Christianity is true. The Christian belief Jesus is the only way to heaven and all other religions are false is therefore true. This contradicts the belief all roads lead to heaven. On the other hand if the statement Jesus is the only way is false, then Christianity doesn’t lead to heaven, contradicting all roads lead to heaven.

2. All roads cannot lead to heaven because the core beliefs or the central doctrines of all worldviews contradict each other. Let’s look at a few examples.
  • Christianity teaches you cannot get to heaven by doing good. Islam teaches you must do good to get to heaven. These views are contradictory and both cannot be true at the same time. 
  • God is personal or God is impersonal. Christianity and Hinduism cannot both be true. 
  • Christianity says Jesus bodily rose from the dead. All other religions deny this event. Both cannot be true. 
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Monday, December 7, 2009

CHRISTIANITY SPREADING IN MUSLIM COUNTRIES

by A.M. Kisly

There are two ministries that I would like to introduce to our readers this week: The Lehore Bible Institute; and Compassion Ministries.


The reasons I have for sharing these ministries with you are many, but I will narrow them to just a few.


First and foremost, I am sharing this with you because the Lord has laid this upon my heart and it is my honor and privilege to do so.
Secondly, I hope to encourage you in the work of the LORD. As we peruse the website links and watch the video that I have posted, we will be able to see the fruit of these ministries through the lives of those who have so sacrificially laid them down for others.

 It is miraculous, amazing, inspiring and well worth sharing. Also just seeing the joy of the Lord on the faces of those who are receiving salvation and the love of Jesus Christ not only encourages us, but is a wonderful look at the power of God to change lives.


Third, I would ask that you pray for all of your brothers and sisters serving and living in Pakistan. As you know, Pakistan is a Muslim country and home to Islamic Terrorist groups, such as the Taliban.

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Saturday, December 5, 2009

The MOTHER of HARLOTS EMERGES – Part Three


~~ By James Fire

We now pick up where we left off from Part Two of the article, The MOTHER of HARLOTS EMERGES . . .

Where we left off previously Roger Oakland was dealing with the subject of the mystical fathers of the Catholic church and the credence given to such authorities, versus the authority of scripture alone.

Roger Oakland documents many cases in which those who were formerly Protestant, had since become Roman Catholic after reading and studying from the church fathers and mystics – Catholics all.

As he himself stated in regards to the so-called wisdom of these men:

“We know that God’s Word is light. When we replace the Word of God with the words of man, which are considered to bring enlightenment, we have a perfect formula for returning to darkness (emphasis mine). The early mystics added ideas to Christianity that cannot be found in the Bible—a recipe for spiritual detriment. Pg. 79

See JUDE 1:4

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