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The Church of England has found that an increasing number of people turn to its prayer website for support in the current global financial crisis, the church said Friday. A Church of England website focusing on advice to those concerned about rising personal debt had seen a 70-per-cent increase in traffic in recent weeks, the church’s own website said.The number of web users looking up the page for the daily prayer had grown by 25 per cent, with one addressing the financial turmoil proving especially popular, the church website said.The prayer had been viewed nearly 8,000 times since it was published online in September.
It reads: “Lord God, we live in disturbing days, across the world, prices rise, debts increase, banks collapse, jobs are taken away, and fragile security is under threat. Loving God, meet us in our fear and hear our prayer: be a tower of strength amidst the shifting sands, and a light in the darkness; help us receive your gift of peace, and fix our hearts where true joys are to be found, in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.Source Earth Times
Scientists using American space technology have started a huge project to digitally photograph the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest known version of the Hebrew Bible, and post it on the Internet for all to see, Israeli authorities said Wednesday.
High-tech cameras using infrared photography are being used to uncover sections of the 2,000-year-old scrolls that have faded over the centuries and become indecipherable, the Israeli Antiquities Authority said.
The project is expected to take about five years and the goal is to make the scrolls accessible to scientists and the general public, Antiquities Authority official Pnina Shor said.
“Now for the first time the scrolls will be a computer click away,” said Shor, who heads the authority’s department responsible for the conservation of artifacts. “This will ensure that the scrolls are preserved for another 2,000 years.”
Experts have complained for years that only a small number of scholars have been allowed access to the scrolls and the thousands of fragments that were found in caves near the Dead Sea in the late 1940s. In recent years, steps have been taken to widen access, but many of the findings are still not properly identified and categorized. To protect the scrolls, Shor said, the new imaging will be done in a setting that minimizes exposure to light.
A pilot project started Wednesday and when it is finished, it will be possible to determine how long it will take to digitize the thousands of fragments from about 900 separate documents, Shor said, estimating five years.
Infrared technology was used to photograph all the findings in 1950, the Antiquities Authority said, but technology has advanced considerably since then.
The first scrolls were discovered by accident in 1947 by a young Bedouin shepherd who was chasing a runaway sheep. They were buried in a cave in Qumran, just above the Dead Sea — one of the most barren areas in the world. Archaeologists began buying scrolls and fragments that appeared in marketplaces around the region, but many were damaged by their removal from the extreme dryness of the cave where they were buried for 20 centuries.
Occasionally, the Antiquities Authority, which is in charge of preserving the scrolls, allows the public to see some of them. A 24-foot section with the Book of Isaiah went on display in May to coincide with Israel’s 60th anniversary celebrations.
A special hall called the Shrine of the Book at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem is dedicated to the scrolls, but the fragments on display there are copies.
Source – Fox news
The world’s leading audio Bible ministry announced Wednesday that it now offers recordings in 311 languages.
Faith Comes By Hearing ministry released 15 more languages for the Audio New Testament recordings, which now makes the Word of God available to an additional 13 million people in their own language.
“God’s Word is going forth to the nations, reaching those with the least access – namely those too poor to afford a Bible and those who cannot, will not or choose not to read,” said Jerry Jackson, the ministry’s president and founder, in a statement.
According to estimates, more than 3 billion people cannot read and therefore do not have access to Scripture.
In Peru, Quechua Huaylas is spoken by about 300,000 people but less than five percent of the people can read their own language.
“There’s such a need and a hunger for God’s Word in audio,” Jackson said, reflecting on the 300 language milestone.
“This milestone is a testimony to the eternal life of God’s Word and shows that the Bible continues to be the most sought after book in the world,” he said. “It is sobering to be allowed to make His Word in audio available to every person in the world free of charge.”
The new languages are Aceh from Indonesia, Alladian from Cote de Ivoire, Bali from Indonesia, Dagara from Burkina Faso, Gude from Nigeria, Gourmanchema from Burkina Faso, Mbundu from Angola, Mofu-Gudur from Cameroon, Ixil de Nebaj from Guatemala, Nias from Indonesia, Pijin from Solomon Islands, Quechua Huaylas Ancash from Peru, Quechua Southern Conchucos from Peru, Ronga (Xhirhonga) from Mozambique, and Woun Meu from Panama.
Faith Comes By Hearing’s goal is to record Audio Bibles in 2,000 languages by 2016, reaching 97 percent of the world’s population.
“Continue to pray for us and those working around the world. Continue to support this ministry as we take on new languages, new challenges and new technologies,” Jackson said.
Source – The Christain Post
Christians who believe they might one day be physically swept up to heaven in the Rapture will be able to send e-mails to loved ones left behind on Earth nearly one week after the apocalyptic event takes place, thanks to a new website.
YouveBeenLeftBehind.com lets subscribers send an e-mail message to up to 62 people exactly six days after they’ve disappeared from the face of the Earth, Wired Magazine’s Threat Level reports.
The website, run by Mark Heard along with four other Christians, dispatches the e-mails when at least three staff members fail to log in for six consecutive days. Its main purpose is to give Christians one final shot at evangelism.
“You’ve Been Left Behind gives you one last opportunity to reach your lost family and friends for Christ,” states the website. Read the rest of this entry »
It is apparent to me after reading countless books published by mainline publishers on the subject of the emerging church movement that there are two underlying common denominators.
First, it is apparent that the “new kind of Christian” that is being groomed by emergent teachings is being conditioned to accept, embrace and promote a “new mysticism” under the banner of spiritual formation. However, the so-called spiritual disciplines that are promoted as part of this spiritual formation are not new. They are the same methods and techniques that have seduced the masses since the fall of man in the Garden of Eden.
Second, the teachings and beliefs of Roman Catholic mystics who embraced eastern mysticism in the past are being reintroduced, and for many, are taking precedence over the Word of God. The onslaught of ideas promoted by these Roman Catholic mystics is staggering. Why is this so? Is it possible many are being seduced and don’t realize what is happening? Why can people not see the Roman Catholic connection? Have they been blinded?
For example, in a section of The Lost Virtue of Happiness: Discovering The Disciplines of The Good Life, Moreland and Issler provide tips for “developing ongoing prayer.” Here are some of the points they made:
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We recommend that you begin by saying the Jesus Prayer about three hundred times a day. [6]
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When you first awaken, say the Jesus Prayer twenty to thirty times. As you do, something will begin to happen to you. God will begin to slowly occupy the center of your attention. [7]
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Repetitive use of the Jesus Prayer while doing more focused things allows God to be on the boundaries of your mind and forms the habit of being gently in contact with him all day long. [8]
You don’t have to be Bible scholar to understand that repetitive prayers designed to get one into a state of consciousness in order to bring one closer to God, is not in the Word of God.
Further, Moreland and Issler attempt to justify their case for the practice of repetitive prayer in their book, claiming that such a “spiritual discipline” is biblically and historically valid. Encouraging the unsuspecting reader to be at ease, they say:
Now, before you role your eyes in disbelief, hang in there with me. Derived from Luke 18:38, the Jesus Prayer has had a powerful impact on people at various times in church history. [9] And while it comes in different forms, the wording we prefer is “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me!” If you take up the challenge, I think you’ll see some remarkable results. [10]
Then, attempting to add more convincing biblical grounds to place a seal of approval on such antibiblical practice to get closer to God, Moreland and Issler stated:
You may be thinking that repeating a prayer over and over again violates Jesus’ warning, “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition [do not keep on babbling, NIV] as the gentiles do, for they suppose they will be heard for their many words” (Matthew 6:7, NASB). On the contrary, the use of repetitive prayer as a spiritual training exercise does not fall under this prohibition. As New Testament scholar Don Carson said, Jesus is not forbidding all long prayers or all repetition. He himself prayed at length (Luke :12), repeated himself in prayer (Matt 26:14), and told a parable to show His disciples that “they should always pray and not give up” (Luke :12). His point is that His disciples should avoid meaningless, repetitive prayers offered under the misconception that mere length will make prayers efficacious. [11]
This apologetic, if it was written by J.P. Moreland who is a well known apologist, justifying mindless repetitive short word prayers verses long prayers is difficult for me to accept. This would mean that for centuries Christians who have spoken out against the very thing the authors are promoting were mindless fools. This is just too much to accept.
I have been to the country of Myanmar (formerly called Burma) twice. On both occasions I observed (and have video footage) of both Roman Catholics and Buddhists practicing the spiritual principle of repetitive prayer. By the way, in both cases they were chanting these prayers over and over again while they were counting beads. Yes, Roman Catholics and Buddhists both have a “rosary” technique to keep track of how many times they have chanted a prayer.
I have also taken the time to interview Roman Catholics and Buddhists in the country of Myanmar. I have asked them what they are doing and why they are doing this. Each time that I have asked this question I have been told the same thing. It is a way to concentrate and focus their thoughts and get in tune with the spirit world.
One of the main indicators that something has changed can be seen in the way the future is perceived. Rather than urgently proclaiming the gospel according to the Scriptures and believing the time to do so is short, the emphasis has now shifted. No longer are “signs of the times” significant. The battle cry is very different. A major emphasis among evangelicals is the idea that the world can be radically improved through social programs.
This concept, while on the surface may sound very good, has some serious biblical implications. According to the Scriptures, there will be no kingdom of God until the King arrives. All the human effort man can muster up will fall short of bringing utopia. In fact, according to the Scriptures, fallen man will lead us further down the road to a society of despair and lawlessness just like it was in the days of Noah.
Thus, this purpose-driven view of establishing global utopia may be a plan, but it is “driven” by humanistic reasoning and not led by the Holy Spirit. While it is of course good to do good unto others, all the goodness that we can do will not be good enough. Pastors and church leaders who get involved in such man-driven programs can usually be identified by certain characteristics:
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Sound biblical doctrine is dangerous and divisive, and the experiential (i.e.,mystical) is given a greater role than doctrine.
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Bible prophecy is no longer taught and is considered a waste of time
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Israel becomes less and less important and has no biblical significance
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Eventually the promises for Israel are applied to the church and not Israel (Replacement Theology).
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Bible study is replaced by studying someone’s book and his methods
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Church health is evaluated on the quantity of people who attend.
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The truth of God’s Word becomes less and less important
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God’s Word, especially concepts like hell, sin and repentance, is eventually downplayed so the unbeliever is not offended.
Source – Understandthetimes.org
Israel is the major topic of the Bible. The word “Israel” occurs 2,565 times in 2,293 verses. More than enough prophecies have already been fulfilled in Israel’s unique history to prove that “the God of Israel” (203 times) is the true God. In Zechariah 12:2-3, He declares:
Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem. And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.
This is an amazing prophecy not only that Jerusalem, which was then in ruins, would become a burden to the whole world, but that all of Israel’s neighbors would be united against her. They have fought one another in the past. Yet today, for the first time in history, “all the people round about” are united by Islam to destroy Israel.
For more than 50 years, Israel’s neighbors have launched surprise attacks against her and she has proved too strong militarily, even though they outnumber her forty to one. God said, “I [will] make…Judah like an hearth of fire among the wood…and they shall devour all the people round about…” (Zech 12:6). Soundly defeated every time, her Muslim neighbors feign a desire for peace, hoping to deceive and ultimately destroy her—a strategy established by Muhammad.
The real battle is not between Arabs and Jews, but between Allah and Yahweh. There is no question of the outcome, but it will be costly for both sides: Israel will be severely punished for rebellion, and her enemies will be destroyed.
Exactly as foretold, Jerusalem is a burden to all people of the world. More than 60,000 individual votes have been cast in the UN against Israel. This tiny nation with one 1,000th of the world’s population has occupied one-third of the United Nations’ time—a burden indeed!
Skeptics accuse Christians of trying to fit current events to the Bible, claiming that no one recognized such prophecies until Israel was formed in 1948. On the contrary, for centuries most evangelical Christians have preached from the Bible the return of the Jews to their own land. Even John Owen, a leading Calvinist, wrote in the 17th century: “The Jews shall be gathered…into their homeland.” 1 This was also the opinion of the poet John Milton, of John Bunyan, Roger Williams, Oliver Cromwell, and many others.
Martin Luther wrote: “If the Jews are Abraham’s descendants…[they should be] back in their own land [with] a state of their own. But…[they are] scattered and despised.” 2 He therefore wrote off the Jews as God’s chosen people and persecuted them. But today the Jews are back in their own land after 2,500 years of being scattered worldwide, speaking Hebrew just as King David did 3,000 years ago. No other people have returned to reestablish their own nation and language after being cast out of their land for such a period of time.
Some prophecies applicable only to our day are frightening, foretelling God’s judgment. The language is often graphic:
If I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine enemies…my sword shall devour flesh… (Dt 32:41,42). For, behold, the LORD will come…to render his anger with fury…by his sword…
(Is 66:15,16). And the slain of the LORD shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other…they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried…. (Jer 25:33)
The question is often asked as to whether the United States (or Canada, Australia, et al.) is in Bible prophecy. Of course! Scripture declares that every nation in the world will join together to invade Israel in the last days and be destroyed in the battle of Armageddon: “I will gather all nations [surely all includes America] against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken….Then shall the LORD go forth, and fight against those nations…” (Zech 12:9; 14:2-4).
But wouldn’t the United States be spared for being Israel’s friend? In fact, the U.S. State Department has often been against Israel. This was true in the Yom Kippur War. In a sneak attack (October 1973), 80,000 Egyptians overwhelmed 500 Israeli defenders along the Suez and 1,400 Syrian tanks swept down the Golan with only one Israeli tank in service to oppose them. Israel was taken by surprise. Most of her armed forces were on holiday. The initial success of the attackers so electrified the Arab world that nine other Arab states rushed to get in on the slaughter.
Historian David A. Rausch writes: “Jordan’s King Hussein sent two of his best armored brigades to Syria. Saudi Arabia and Kuwait financially underwrote the huge cost while sending thousands of troops to fight the Israelis. Kuwait lent her British-made Lightning jets to Egypt. Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi turned over forty French-made Mirage III fighters and 100 tanks. Iraqi MiG fighter jets as well as tank and infantry divisions fought on the Golan Heights, while a squadron of Iraqi Hunter jets were utilized by Egypt. Arabs predicted the extermination of the Jewish state and the ‘liberation’ of Palestine….” 3
The Soviet Union blocked any UN attempt at a cease-fire and refortified the Arab forces with armaments and supplies by sea and air. It was the closest Israel ever came to being defeated. But when the war ended, the Israeli tank columns were on the outskirts of Damascus and Cairo and could have taken those cities had they not turned back. Tragically, Israel suffered about 3,000 dead—which would be comparable to the U.S. losing 150,000. Except for a series of miracles from God, Israel would not have survived.
Where was her friend, the United States? Dozens of notices were sent to the Nixon White House by America’s National Security Administration (NSA) that an Arab Pearl Harbor was about to be launched against Israel. Nixon sat on them. Kissinger hid at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York the day of the attack and waited another three days before convening the UN Security Council. Declining to rush desperately needed military supplies to Israel, the White House said it had to be careful not to upset the Arabs and cause an oil crisis.
Six years earlier, on June 8, 1967, the fourth morning of the “Six-day War,” the USS Liberty, an electronics eavesdropping vessel, arrived off the Sinai coast and began to suck in every Israeli military communication, relaying it all to the British Secret Service’s giant computer installation on Cyprus. From there, complete maps of every Israeli military move were transmitted in advance to the Arab armed forces. With that help, the Arabs might have been able to use their overwhelming numerical superiority to turn the tide of the war. Israel had no choice except to sink the Liberty. Of course the media screamed about this “cold-blooded attack.” No one believed Israel’s public excuse that the Liberty had been mistaken for a hostile Egyptian ship—and neither the U.S. nor Israel has publicly told the truth.
Yes, the United States, too, will attack Israel and will be punished at Armageddon. God declares plainly that He will bring all nations against Israel to destroy them:
In the latter days…I will bring thee against my land…my fury shall come up in my face…there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel…the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things [on] the earth, and all the men [on] the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence…[all nations] shall know that I am the Lord. (Ezk 38:16-23)
This is terrifying language! What causes this “great shaking” of the entire planet and every living creature upon it? God is personally coming to earth as He did at Mount Sinai when He gave the Law—and He is going to take vengeance upon the enemies of Israel!
There are two specific reasons for God’s judgment: “I will also gather all nations …into the valley of Jehoshaphat [between Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives, where God miraculously destroyed invading nations without Israel lifting a finger
(2 Chr 21:10-25)], and will plead with [punish] them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have [1] scattered among the nations, and [2] parted my land” (Joel 3:2).
Of course, all nations have participated in persecuting and scattering the Jews from country to country for 2,500 years. The second reason for God’s judgment falling on all nations, however, is something that has only occurred within our generation: “they have…parted [divided] my land.”
Israel has been overrun by invaders many times—but never did any conqueror divide the land. The victor does not share its spoils with others. Since World War I, however, all nations have joined to divide the land of Israel.
The 1917 Balfour Declaration, the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, and the 1922 Declaration of Principles by the League of Nations all recognized that the land that had become known as “Palestine” (since the Romans renamed Israel in A.D. 135) belonged to the Jews. It was set aside to become the national homeland of the Jewish people “internationally guaranteed, and…formally recognized to rest upon ancient historic connection.” Of course, history ties Israel to all of “Palestine.”
Britain was given the mandate to see that the Jews were safely settled there. The discovery of huge reservoirs of oil under Arab lands caused Britain to keep Jewish immigrants out and let in tens of thousands of Arabs. Just when millions of Jews desperately needed a haven to which they could flee from Nazi Germany, Britain’s 1939 White Paper limited Jewish immigrants to 10,000 per year for a maximum of five years, plus an additional 25,000 “refugees” during that period—then the door to Palestine would be shut entirely to the Jews. Since the Nazis had marked for extinction 11 million Jews in Europe, the quota of 25,000 defied God and conscience.
A year earlier, President Roosevelt had gathered delegates from 32 countries in Evian, France, to discuss the worsening plight of the Jews. Roosevelt made it clear that the United States would do nothing. Britain said there was no room in Palestine and it was not to be discussed. Professing their great sympathy for Europe’s Jews that everyone knew were to be exterminated, the nations offered various excuses why they could do nothing to intervene.
Hitler shrewdly declared, “We…are ready to put all these criminals at the disposal of these countries…even on luxury ships.” When the conference ended with the Jews completely abandoned, Hitler mocked the participants: “It was recently regarded as wholly incomprehensible why Germany did not wish to preserve in its population…the Jews…[yet these] countries seem in no way anxious to [receive them] now that the opportunity offers.” The entire world was Hitler’s partner in destroying the Jews!
In 1944, Hitler offered to sell to the allies 500,000 Hungarian Jews for $2 each—and no one would take them! England said there was “no room” in Palestine for them! In 1943, Britain and America had agreed to say and do nothing about the Holocaust, fearful that if pressed, Hitler would dump the Jews on his critics. The Allies steadfastly refused the repeated urgent appeals from Jewish organizations to bomb the rail lines going in and out of the extermination camps. God will judge all nations!
After the war, a trickle of emaciated survivors of Hitler’s death machines sought to reach “Palestine” in half-sinking ships. Some who got within sight of the land God had given to them as an everlasting inheritance (1 Chr 16:15-18) were driven back by the British navy and put into internment camps on Cyprus. Many who did manage to find shelter within what would become the new Jewish State of Israel were rounded up by the British and removed to those camps. Britain created Jordan out of most of the Promised Land. The demise of the British Empire, upon which “the sun never sank,” can be counted from the time Britain betrayed the Jews—one more fulfillment of the prophecy, “I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee…” (Gn 12:3).
When the UN finally voted to partition Palestine on November 29, 1947 (UN Res. 181), God’s “chosen people” received about 13 percent of the land that had once belonged to them! Thus Joel’s prophecy was fulfilled that all nations would join to divide Israel. The only part of that prophecy remaining to be fulfilled is the judgment on the nations for having “parted” God’s land: “The land shall not be sold [partitioned] for ever; for the land is mine” (Lev 25:23).
God’s anger is growing hotter against the nations of this world for robbing Israel of what He gave to her. Yet in continued defiance of God, every peace proposal that the West has imposed upon Israel has involved further dividing of God’s land. President Bush, a professing Christian, originated the so-called “road map to peace,” which calls for a further dividing of the land of Israel. He ought to tremble and repent, as should President Putin, the EU, and the UN, who have joined Bush to make up the “quartet” sponsoring this plan.
On her part, Israel has been willing to give away more and more land in exchange for promises of “peace” from the PLO in spite of the fact that its charter calls for the destruction of Israel and that its maps and those of the entire Arab world do not even acknowledge Israel’s existence. The fact that Israel has been forced to do so by the West is no excuse. For this she will be punished severely in what is called “the time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer 30:7). Yes, God will deliver her, but only after two-thirds of all Jews on earth have been killed (Zec 13:8,9).
There is no more appropriate place and way to destroy the nations that have abused Israel than when they, in the spirit of Satan, come to effect once and for all what Hitler called the “final solution to the Jewish problem.” Believers are to meet together to encourage and exhort one another from Scripture, “so much the more, as ye see the day [of judgment] approaching” (Heb 10:25). Fulfilled prophecies are heralding that day as never before.
Source – the bereancall.org
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