Defend Religious Freedom!

Increasingly in America we are finding that Christians are losing jobs, losing businesses, being sued, being fined, etc. simply because they are living out their Christian convictions regarding marriage or abortion. Unfortunately, all too many Christians (those who have not yet been affected) respond with a big yawn, saying that Christians should expect persecution. They are absolutely right—we should expect persecution. But that doesn’t mean we should always just sit idly by an accept it.

For example, Paul charged the magistrates of Philippi with violating his rights as a Roman Citizen and demanded that they personally escort him out of jail (Acts 17:16-40). Paul used his rights as a Roman citizen to avoid flogging in Jerusalem (Acts 22:25). It was Paul’s status as Roman citizen that got him transferred from Jerusalem to Caesarea in Roman protective custody (Acts 22:12-22, cf. 23:27). And Paul used his right as a Roman citizen to appeal his case to Caesar (Acts 25:10-11).

Isaiah commands readers to “defend the oppressed” (Isa 1:17) and to “lose the chains of injustice” (Isaiah 58:6; cf. Jeremiah 22:3). As hard as it is to believe—more and more people in America are now being oppressed because of their Christian faith!

So what can you do?

1) Pray

2) Support and vote for people who will stand for religious liberty

3) Support organizations that are defending your freedom, e.g. Alliance Defending Freedom or the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), et al.

4) Let your Senators and Representatives know that you are not happy with what is going on.

5) Ask your Representative and Senators to support the First Amendment Defense Act (S. 1598, H.R. 2802) which would, “prevent discriminatory treatment of any person on the basis of views held with respect to marriage.”

6) Re-post Twitter and Facebook articles on this issue in order to raise awareness of the problem

7) Encourage your family and friends to get involved too. Pastors, start informing your congregations on what is happening and pray!

You don’t have to do it all—but please don’t just sit back and watch your children’s freedom get flushed down the drain on your watch!

Shut up and Dance!

There is a very popular song--number 4 on Billboard's top 100 this week--called “Shut up and Dance” by a group called “Walk the Moon.”  As I was listening to this song recently, I started thinking of the story of how Jesus called to Peter to come out of the boat and walk on the water with him--and the words below came to mind (go figure)! To the tune of “Shut up and Dance:”

Oh don’t you dare look down

Just keep your eyes on me

I said “But I might drown”

He said, look up and walk with me

This Savior is my destiny

He said, “I’ll rescue you…

Look up and walk with me”

On the sea in fading light

The wind was blowing

Lightening flashing bright

Tossed around and helpless in the night

But, He’s stronger than weather

Much stronger than weather

He took my hand,

I don’t know how it happened

He pulled me up and He said,

Oh don’t you dare look down

Just keep your eyes on me

I said “But I might drown”

He said, look up and walk with me

This Savior is my destiny

He said, “I’ll save you-ou…

Look up and follow me”

(If you don't know "Shut up and Dance" you can find the video on YouTube).

I think I would be on shaky, even dangerous ground (or in over my head?) to say that God gave the these words to me. The entire thing didn't just pop into my head--I did spend some time editing and tweaking it. More importantly, in the OT God strongly condemns those who say God spoke when God did not speak.

But on the other hand, I have no musical talent or song-writing ability whatsoever (some readers will say, "Amen!"), and "Shut Up and Dance" has absolutely nothing to do with Peter or Jesus, so where did the words come from? 

Some Christians might say that God never directly speaks to us today. Other Christians seem to assume that almost any random thought, feeling or inclination they have is God speaking to them.

The point of my post is this: How can we know when or if God is speaking as opposed to when our thoughts are just our own thoughts? 

The origin of human beings: One Adam or many "adams"

Last Sunday someone asked a great question about whether Adam could have been just one of many early people on earth--in other words, the idea that humankind did not all originate from Adam but from many "adams.'  Below is a slightly edited version of my e-mailed response:

You asked whether Adam could have been just one of many early people on earth.
The idea that "Adam" was just one of many does not come from the Bible but from science. 

Most scientists operate from the philosophical presupposition that if God exists at all, he would never involve himself in human events. They, therefore, believe that any idea of God must be completely ruled out of any scientific inquiry (In other words, IF God had anything to do with the origin of life, most scientists would never know about it because they have ruled God out their research as a matter of methodology).


These scientists conclude that if life just happened to originate from non-living material in one instance, there is no reason it couldn't have done so independently in multiple instances.


To say that this hypothesis is scientifically flawed is a huge understatement. That is because even the very simplest organism (one-cell organisms) are so incredibly complex it is scientifically impossible for them to have evolved in only 15 billion years (the supposed age of the universe). I once read that even the simplest one-cell organism is more complicated in some ways than a modern computer!


Even the DNA in those single-celled organisms is too complex to have originated and evolved in 15 billion years just by chance and random selection alone-the DNA is quite literally similar to a chemical computer code. This was the conclusion of a world-renowned atheist philosopher named Antony Flew. He eventually came to the conclusion that atheism was scientifically impossible (he hasn't become a Christian yet-he's still looking for an explanation).


There is another philosopher who is also a scientist who studied the origin of life at Cambridge University-one of the most prestigious universities in the world. He studied every single theory of the origin of life ever proposed and concluded that not a single one of them is scientifically valid-ALL of them are flawed. None of them can adequately explain the origin of life from a purely naturalistic (i.e. ruling out God) perspective.


All this doesn't prove God did it, of course, but it does give scientific reason to believe that the origin of a single living creature on earth is extremely improbable if not outright scientifically impossible. And if that is true, the independent origin of multiple living creatures is exponentially impossible!


Some of us, therefore, choose to believe the Bible's explanation over science's deeply flawed explanations. And the Bible is very clear-in Genesis and elsewhere (e.g. Romans 5)-that all human life came from Adam who was created directly by God


Anyway, I guess the bottom line with regard to Adam and Eve and the origin of life is that I could 1) believe some scientific theory that many scientists and philosophers argue is scientifically impossible, 2) believe the Bible's explanation that God created a human being in his image and all others came from that one or 3) throw up my hands and say we just don't know.


In my humble opinion, the first option takes more faith than I have. The third option is an honest option but is, I think, a head-in-the sand approach. The second option makes the most sense to me.


If you'd like to read more, I've written some short articles on my blog about science and the origin of life:

http://goo.gl/St23wA
http://goo.gl/vDf0Iv
http://goo.gl/DXZLNc
http://goo.gl/T7YeX1
http://goo.gl/RLzCKD
http://goo.gl/PaMFXv