Fred Thompson sounding like Ron Paul

(HT: Mark Horne) Hits the nail on the head!

From Ron Paul's Campaign for Liberty....


3rd Grade Civics Lesson

Posted by Don Rasmussen on 10/30/08 09:08 AM Last updated 10/30/08 09:11 AM

Special thanks to my mom for sending this along.

The most eye-opening civics lesson I ever had was while teaching third grade. The presidential election was heating up and some of the children showed an interest. I decided we would have an election for a class president. We would choose our nominees. They would make a campaign speech and the class would vote.
To simplify the process, candidates were nominated by other class members. We discussed what kinds of characteristics these students should have. We got many nominations and from those, Jamie and Olivia were picked to run for the top spot.
The class had done a great job in their selections. Both candidates were good kids. I thought Jamie might have an advantage because he got lots of parental support. I had never seen Olivia’s mother. The day arrived when they were to make their speeches. Jamie went first. He had specific ideas about how to make our class a better place. He ended by promising to do his very best. Every one applauded. He sat down and Olivia came to the podium. Her speech was concise. She said, “If you will vote for me, I will give you ice cream.” She sat down. The class went wild. “Yes! Yes! We want ice cream.”
She surely would say more. She did not have to. A discussion followed. How did she plan to pay for the ice cream? She wasn’t sure. Would her parents buy it or would the class pay for it. She didn’t know. The class really didn’t care. All they were thinking about was ice cream. Jamie was forgotten. Olivia won by a land slide.
Every time Barack Obama opens his mouth he offers ice cream, and fifty percent of America reacts like nine year olds. They want ice cream. The other fifty percent know they’re going to have to feed the cow.

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Now here are some economic proposals that break the socialist connection! Christian Schools need to teach this stuff. Somebody write the curriculum, please!

You Heard It Here First

By Dr. Richard A. Jones

Pretend I’ve been chosen as a special select committee of one with authority to fix the financial crisis. The following is my plan to bring you the most effective U-turn possible. I’ve taken the best of the remedies as suggested in recent weeks by various experts and merged them for your information into a single, all-inclusive package. You’ll also see why these proposals help explain why so many in Congress were in a lose-lose dilemma last week per the bailout no matter which way they voted. Neither a Yes nor a No vote will be of any lasting value, with Yes being by far the worst of the two. As you read, keep in mind what the Bible says about honest money, honest markets and honest men. Also be aware that only by adopting the no-nonsense blueprint below will a lasting cure take place, outright socialism prevented, the potential for an explosion of solid, long-term growth made possible, and individual freedom made more secure. Continue reading...

The Day and the Hour......

Please take this seriously....not the DVD series, but what the production and sale of such stuff reveals. When will Christians stop buying this nonsense that purports to tell us what God has NOT revealed in His Word? I guess when the Holy Spirit graciously opens the eyes of the blind.

See here WorldNet Daily


That is why Christ Covenant Church's men's study is doing this:....An antidote to end-times craziness that detracts from the work of following Christ's command to "disciple the nations". Join us this Friday, 7:30pm at the Smith Public House. Call for directions: (631)594-1377

Insufficient evidence?

HT(Pawel Bartosik)

Let's kick-start our thinking, men, as we look forward to our next Calvin on Tap....

Why this World Matters

By Gary DeMar

Today’s preoccupation with eschatology has led some to advocate a wholesale abandonment of this age, stating that there is no relationship between the temporal kingdom and the eternal kingdom. There is no prescription for the transformation of this world based on the certainty of the next, so some want us to believe. The transformation of the present social structure is built “upon the concept of commitment to the heavenly society as being primary and determinative for this worldly order.”1 There is continuity between the present age and the age to come. The preaching of Jesus regarding affairs in everyday society was based on an

intimate continuity between the world to be and the world that was, even now, being summoned into likeness with it. What the Lord wills for this life cannot be severed from his ultimate plans to be realized fully in the eternal kingdom. Jesus’ own parables makes clear that this kingdom which is future in its complete fulfillment is already present in its operation and influences. Far from proposing a rigid separation of the future and the present, Jesus is proposing, not another world in which to find refuge, but one whose character and being is even now modifying and reshaping the present organization of life.2

A concern for this world is evidence of concern for the next. Others are beginning to see it (read more here). Love for our neighbor is evidence of our love for God who presently occupies the throne of heaven. The exhibit of our Christian life in this world is a reflection of our regard for the world to come. The world to come is the Christian’s focal point. The Christian takes his stand with Christ in the heavenly places (Eph. 2:5–7) and brings from heaven, through the “God-breathed” Scriptures, instructions for this present world (2 Tim. 3:16–17). “This constitutes setting one’s affections on things above. It does not spell the turning of one’s back on things beneath. . . . The kingdom of God is not brought in by man. It will come in God’s own way and with his unconquerable consummation. It is coming even now, in its present impact upon the belligerent, but already defeated, world that knows it not.”3

The medieval church saw a vital connection between heaven and earth, with heaven being the pattern for earthly activity. The eternal serves as a standard for the temporal. The Creator outlines parameters for living for the creature.

Central was the assumption of a coherence between heaven and earth, two parts of one homogeneous world, built to a single plan and hence reciprocally related, yet based on a principle of inequality inherent in hierarchy, in which the superior serves as a model for the inferior.4

Without the heaven/earth connection, the world is assigned to the realm of indifference and the inevitabilities of evil. The Lutheran and Calvinistic arms of the Reformation viewed the possibility of social change differently:

Luther had regarded this world and its institutions as incorrigible, and was prepared to leave them to the devil. But for Calvin this world, created by God, still belonged to Him; it remained potentially His kingdom; and every Christian was obliged to devote his life to make it so in reality by reforming and bringing it under God’s law.5

The relationship between gospel and society can best be seen in how our nation’s founders appreciated education, and how education was conceived as a way to preserve the Christian past and the establishment of a Christian future. Harvard College (founded in 1636, six years after the arrival of the British Puritans and named after John Harvard), set the agenda for the nation’s future: “Let every Student be plainly instructed, and earnestly pressed to consider well, the main end of his life and studies is, to know God and Jesus Christ which is eternal life (John 17:3) and therefore lay Christ in the bottom, as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and Learning.”

There were similar expressions of evangelical reform in England. We should expect this, since America’s penchant for reform was inherited from its theological English forbears. For example, England’s abolition movement was almost entirely led by the evangelical wing of the church. At the pleading of Lady Middleton and Bishop Porteus, James Ramsay wrote a long Essay on the Treatment and Conversion of Slaves in the British Sugar Colonies (1784). Ramsay was “convinced that men will not respond to lessons of eternal redemption from those who enslave them on earth, or about heaven when kept in hell. . . . He proposed steps to total Emancipation, and suggested that free labour would yield more profit to plantation owners.”6 William Wilberforce, upon being struck with the oppression of the slave trade, wrote in his diary, “Almighty God has set before me two great objectives: The abolition of the slave trade and the reformation of manners.”7 Had the British government “not been in the hands of Christians there seems little reason to have expected it to mount its massive, expensive, and voluntary campaign against slavery.”8 If modern anti-reformists had their way, the institution of slavery would still be with us. They would be preaching to the Church to remain silent on the issue and not to mix Church and State.

I don’t know how true it is, but I’ve heard that John MacArthur is stating that he is unconcerned about the November election (go here). If Brannon Howse is faithfully representing MacArthur views, then his views are outside the great reforming efforts of the church that had political implications. It wouldn’t surprise me that MacArthur holds these views. He has an eschatology that discounts the future. Read some of the comments to Howse’s post, and you’ll understand why the church and our nation are in such a mess. I’ve made my views on this topic clear in “Is the World a Sinking Titanic?” in the May 2007 issue of Biblical Worldview which is a response to an article by Jan Markell who posts frequent articles on Howse’s site. Most of the people who speak at the Worldview Weekend conferences are dispensationalists. Howse is offering “Looking for the Blessed Hope” by David Jeremiah. Schizophrenia reigns.

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1 Ray C. Petry, Christian Eschatology and Social Thought: A Historical essay on the Social Implications of Some Selected Aspects in Christian Eschatology to A. D. 150 (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1956), 18.

2 Petry, Christian Eschatology and Social Thought, 18–19.

3 Petry, Christian Eschatology and Social Thought, 21.

4 Georges Duby, The Three Orders: Feudal Society Imagined, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1980), 57. Quoted in Stephen Tonsor, “Order and Degree: The Medieval Quest for Individuality within the Bounds of Community,” The Intercollegiate Review (Fall 1988), 29.

5 William J. Bouwsma, “Explaining John Calvin,” Wilson Quarterly (New Year’s 1989), 73.

6 John Pollock, Wilberforce (Belleville, MI: Lion Publishing, [1977] 1986), 51. William Wilberforce led the effort in Parliament. In the United States, abolition was spawned by revolutionary rhetoric and acts. See Otto J. Scott, The Secret Six: John Brown and the Abolitionist Movement (Seattle, WA: Uncommon Publications, [1979] 1993).

7 Cited in Charles Colson, Kingdoms in Conflict, 100.

8 Scott, The Secret Six, 85.

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Gary DeMar is the President of American Vision.

Calvin on Tap

Tonight we finish up our History of Christianity study at the Smith Public House. Next month we'll be back to see how suds and prophecy go together....hmm. I'm sure we'll arrive at a more sober interpretation of things eschatological than our dispensational friends! It's a 12-part series called: Basic Training for Understanding Bible Prophecy by Gary DeMar of American Vision.

With all the nonsense in the Middle East and Russia flexing some muscle, you can be sure the books will be flying off the shelves....the ones that predict the end is near...again! But why should Christians let the newspapers decide what Scripture means? So join us as we study the Word of God together. Call for directions you first-timers: (631) 594-1377

A Return to Posting

Yes, it has been a while, hasn't it? But if you go here
you'll see lots of posts...that's where we've been lately. So we're looking to revive this place with new articles, and other items of interest to brothers, sisters, and covenant children. We are also starting a weekly church email newsletter. Why not sign up over there in that little box to the right? You'll find shorter articles in the newsletter and more details here....so watch this space.

Calvin on Tap #3...and beyond

Men,
We begin a six-part video series on the History of Christianity, February 22nd at the Smith Public House. Come and learn...invite a friend. This is a survey course designed to provide glimpses of the pivotal events in the spread of Christianity and sketches of great Christian figures who have significantly affected Christian history. This series also demonstrates how Christianity affected world history. Kit includes six half-hour programs, leader's guide, program scripts, and reproducible student workbook. Topics covered in the six programs are:

PART I: The Early Church From the executions of Peter and Paul in Rome to the death of Augustine in North Africa, we follow the Early Church as she emerges from the womb of Judaism to survive horrendous persecution and become established in the Roman world. Explore what took place at the early Ecumenical Councils and how the great doctrines of the Church were formulated.

PART II: The Church in the Middle Ages During this period in history, universities, monasteries, and museums were established. The Church, with her majestic Cathedrals, joined these institutions in influencing society. But this interaction with culture was not without difficulties: barbarian invasion, crusades, the Muslim challenge. Also, during this period, Christendom was divided into the Eastern Church and the Western Church.

PART III: The Reformation It was an age of exploration and discovery, of art and literature. The Medieval Church, however, had placed too much emphasis on the church as an institution. As a result, the papacy enjoyed unusual power often coupled with unusual corruption. Cries of reform were heard all over Europe. The Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century was a tremendous movement of spiritual and ecclesial renewal.

PART IV: The Age of Reason and Piety During the two centuries between the death of Martin Luther in 1546 and the conversion of John Wesley in 1738, the Christian world experienced a major paradigm shift from an age of faith to an age of reason. On the heels of Copernicus discovery that the earth is not the center of the universe, rose the Enlightenment a movement that shifted the focus away from God and to human creativity.

PART V: Christianity in the New World America was the land of new beginnings. Europe represented for Americans a corrupt past, whose contamination they wished to escape. This period includes the study of great traditions such as the Puritans and Quakers, and great movements such as the First Great Awakening.

PART VI: Christian Movement in an Age of Uncertainty From the fall of Bastille in 1789 (marking the beginning of the French Revolution) to the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989 (marking the end of communism), study the Christian movement in an age of uncertainty. William Carey, the father of modern missions carries the Gospel to India; others followed to remote regions people like David Livingstone, Lottie Moon, Henry Martyn, and Hudson Taylor. Explore the Christian Church as it moves into all the world.

Presenter-host Dr. Timothy George is an Historian and Dean of Samford Universitys Beeson Divinity School. Trained in theology and church history at Harvard University, he has written numerous articles and books including Theology of the Reformers, John Calvin and the Church, and Faithful Witness: The Life and Mission of William Carey. George also serves as senior editor of Christianity Today.