CHRISTIANITY - A MAN-MADE RELIGION?

As I travel around in cyber space, I come across an atheist or two and this seems to be their mantra. “Christianity is just a man-made religion” or “The Bible is just written by man, it’s all just fiction.”

Is it?

 It suits the pride and wilfulness of Man to believe that there is no God because that raises the matter of accountability, so Man does not “like to retain God in their knowledge.” The Bible indicates that the end result of Mankind denying their Creator is that they will tend towards homosexuality.  Isn’t that what we are increasingly observing?

Was the Bible written by men? Actually, yes it was; but men who were anointed and inspired by the Spirit of God and that makes God the real Author.  God is a Spirit and He works in the world through the willing co-operation of human vessels. Scripture is God-breathed. Those who have been anointed by the Spirit at any time can understand how this works.

Anyone who has objectively and intelligently researched the subject would have to be convinced of the authenticity and inspiration of the Bible.

Fulfilled prophecy  

Many events concerning individuals, cities and nations, minutely foretold in the Bible, have been, and are being, fulfilled. Recent and current events can be understood in the light of Bible prophecy, e.g. the regathering of the Jews to their homeland and subsequent events in Israel; most particularly concerning Jerusalem and the Temple Mount. The current push to divide the Land of Israel is foretold. Most remarkable is the many Old Testament prophecies concerning the central figure of the Bible – Jesus Christ – His birth, life, ministry, message, His death and resurrection. Apart from the hundreds of surface prophecies there are multiple prophecies locked into the types and shadows in the Old Testament which find their fulfilment in Jesus show the on-going plan of God for the Church and the world. Still to be fulfilled are the prophecies concerning His Second Coming and reign on Earth. The Holy Spirit continues to bring revelation out of the pages of the Bible in a way that no other book can.  The Bible explains why the world is the way it is and gives the answer  for the many and complex problems humanity faces.

The Unity of Scripture

Though written by [about] 40 people [the authorship of some books is uncertain] over a period of about 1,500 years, the Bible is one Book. The Old Testament points to and prepares the way for the coming of the Messiah [the Christ]; the Gospels record His Birth, ministry death and resurrection. The rest of the New Testament interprets the meaning of His coming into the world and looks toward His 2^nd Coming and the New [renewed] Heavens and Earth – the Kingdom of God “On Earth as it is in Heaven.” The Old and New Testaments complement one another.-

The New is in the Old concealed, the Old is in the New revealed.

Though written by human writers, it is evident that God Himself superintended, directed and dictated the Bible books. Therefore the Bible is God’s Word.  That is what the Bible claims for itself and there can be no other explanation.

“knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.” 2 Peter 1:20,21.

“All Scripture is given by inspiration of God..” 2 Timothy 3:16

The Witness of Archaeology

Archaeologists have uncovered the sites of many towns named only in the Bible; also inscriptions confirming many Bible events. Not all of the characters in Bible stories have been mentioned in other ancient writings, but what has been found supports and adds detail to the Bible record. New evidence continues to be unearthed that confirms the truth of the biblical narratives.

Age and Number of Ancient manuscripts

The number of ancient copies of the Scriptures far outweighs the number of copies of other ancient writings which are taken to be authentic. E.g. two factors are taken into consideration when ascertaining the reliability of manuscripts – the number of manuscript copies in existence and the time span between when the original copy was first written and the oldest existing copy

                                                Manuscript Copies                          Time Span

Caesar’s Wars                                    10                                           1,000 years

Plato                                                      7                                              1,200 years

Aristotle                                               5                                              1,400 years

Homer                                                  643                                           500 years

New Testament                                24,000                                       25 years

Given these numbers, one wonders why some people readily accept that the other writings are authentic, yet balk at the New Testament. ” The Gospels and other books of the New Testament were written by men who walked with Jesus and were witnesses to the events they wrote about. As the Apostle Peter states “For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty.”

Sir Frederick Kenyon former director and principal librarian of the British Museum, stated concerning the New Testament:-“…the last foundation for any doubt that the Scriptures have come down to us substantially as they were written, has now been removed”

Jewish scribes copied the Old Testament Scriptures with extreme care.  Every word, syllable, letter and paragraph was checked and counted.  If a mistake was made they started again.  The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls has confirmed the accuracy of the Old Testament as we have them in our Bible today. Christianity did not come from a vacuum but is the continuation and fulfilment of all that was promised in the Old Testament Scriptures.

The Witness of History

The writings of historians confirm some of the Biblical events. e.g. Josephus a Jewish historian wrote about Jesus in AD 90, "Now there arose one Jesus, a wise man who performed surprising works, a teacher of men. He was the so-called Christ. When Pilate, acting on information supplied by the chief men condemned him to the cross, those who first believed did not cease to do so, and the tribe of Christians which had taken their name from him is not extinct today."

Roman historian Tacitus wrote in about AD 115 "They got their name from Christ, who was executed by sentence of the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius."

 

The Bible Code

It has been discovered that there is a Code in the Bible, which describes historical and recent events and names of notable people. Thousands of instances of the Code have already been discovered using high-speed computers. The Code is in Equi-distant Letter Sequence [ELS] i.e. words spelt in equal distant letters, en-coded in the Hebrew test. Existence of the Code has been confirmed and acknowledged by scientific institutes. Sir Isaac Newton and others believed in the existence of the Code, but it was only with the arrival of computers that their theories were able to be confirmed. This is a truly amazing discovery and should quell any lingering doubts as to the inspiration of Scripture. However Michael Drosnyn author of “The Bible Code” and a determined atheist somehow manages to attribute it to a space man from another world, which only goes to show how wilfully blind people can be.

The Power of the Bible to Transform Lives and Influence Society for Good

A compelling case for the inspiration of the Bible is the countless lives that have been transformed by reading the Scriptures and encountering the Christ of the Bible, and the strength of societies who uphold its principles.

Notable sayings:

Abraham Lincoln: “I believe the Bible is the best gift God has given to man.”

W.E. Gladstone: “I have known ninety five of the world’s great men in my time, and of these eighty seven were followers of the Bible.”

George Washington: “It is impossible to rightly govern the world without God and the Bible.”

Sir Isaac Newton: “There are more sure marks of authenticity in the Bible than in any profane history.”

Thomas Huxley: “The Bible has been the Magna Charta of the poor and oppressed. The human race is not in a position to dispense with it.”

 

On a personal note:  After over 40 years of studying the Bible, I am totally convinced of its inspiration. It has truly been ” a light to my feet and a lamp for my path.” In times of difficulty the Spirit brings up just the right Scripture to guide or comfort me. Its promises shine through the dark places and give faith and hope for the future and the Presence of the Christ of the Bible is ever with me. The Bible is a book like no other. As the Holy Spirit breaths on it, Truth continues to pour from its pages. In the area of Typology, one can see that the patterns which God has laid down in the nation of Israel were fulfilled in Jesus and are being fulfilled in the history of the Church. God is working in history towards a goal – the Kingdom of God on Earth as it is in Heaven. Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would lead and guide us into all truth and show us things to come, and He does - through the pages of the Bible. The Word and the Spirit are the witnesses to Truth that God has given us. The Bible has stood the test of time and is still the world’s best seller. Jesus said “Heaven and Earth may pass away, but My Word will never pass away.” 

THE ANVIL OF GOD’S WORD

Last eve I paused beside a blacksmith’s door

And heard the anvil ring the vesper chime.

Then looking in, I saw upon the floor

Old hammers worn, beating years of time.

“How many anvils have you had,” said I,

“To wear and batter all these hammers so?”

“Just one,” said he, and then with twinkling eye,

“The anvil wears the hammers out you know.”

And so,” I thought, “The Anvil of God’s Word,

For ages sceptic blows have beat upon,

Yet though the noise of falling blows was heard,

                                                 The Anvil is unchanged, the hammers gone.”

By John Clifford

 

 

 

Don't let the Accuser Silence You

 

One of the ways that the Devil tries to silence the Church, in fact the main way, is accusation. After all he is “the Accuser of the brethren” [Revelation 12: ] If you are a Christian who knows how to stand in the imputed righteousness of Christ, and he can’t get anything on you; then he’ll hurl someone else’s sins at you to shut you up.

 

The classic one of course is THE CRUSADES. “What about THE CRUSADES?” Well WHAT about the Crusades? They were well over a thousand years ago. Just a bit before my time!  I’m a bit fuzzy about the Crusades but I do know that the Crusades were to take back the Holy Land which the Turks had captured. There were a lot of nasty things that happened on both sides. However the Accuser wants me to feel guilty about the Crusades so I will feel I don’t have a right to speak up for the sake of the Kingdom. I was once even accused of being responsible for the Holocaust ‘That you Christians did.’ Huh! Hitler may have been taken to Church and sprinkled as a baby, I really don’t know; but he was no Christian. Jesus said that His people would be known for their love.

 

The- right- up –to- date accusation is the current investigation going on into the abuse of children in Church institutions. “What about THAT? THAT ought to shut you up!”

 

Jesus told the story about the wheat and the tares.

 

“The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field; but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared.

So the servants of the owner came and said to him, ‘Sir did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’

He said to them, ‘an enemy has done this,’ The servants said to him, ‘do you want us then to go and gather them up?’

But he said, ‘No, lest while you gather up the tares you also uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, ‘First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.’”

Matthew 13.

 

Don’t confuse the organized Church with the true Church – the Body of Christ. The tares are there, we know that; but the wheat is still working on producing a harvest. Because some person who calls himself a Christian does something disgusting, does that then negate my right to speak up? The Devil would like me to think so. But I don’t! And by the way because I don’t endorse homosexuality doesn’t mean that I’m ‘phobic’ or that I ‘hate’ people.  As a Christian I believe that when God says something is wrong, then that is that, and the Word is very clear on the matter. God loves all people but He doesn’t endorse everything people do.

 

The organized Church is going through a cleansing and that’s good. God is going to give us all a good shake up. He is going to ‘once more shake the Earth ‘  to bring down those things which can be shaken and reveal the kingdom which cannot be shaken [Hebrews 12:26-28]; and He is going to cleanse His Church. He is going to come  ‘suddenly come to His temple,…He will purify the sons of Levi and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer to the Lord an offering in righteousness.” Malachi 3.

 

Meanwhile, keep on keeping on.  Don’t be intimidated by the Accuser. His day is coming.  [Check this out in Revelation 12 and 20:10.] Jesus is working on the Church “till we all come to the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.”  [Ephesians 4:13] Look out then Devil!

MASSACHUSETTS AND SAME-SEX MARRIAGE

- 1 -

What same-sex "marriage" has done to

Massachusetts

It's far worse than most people realize

by Brian Camenker

October 20, 2008

Anyone who thinks that same-sex “marriage” is a benign eccentricity which won’t affect the

average person should consider what it has done in Massachusetts. It’s become a hammer toforce the acceptance and normalization of homosexuality on everyone. And this train is movingfast. What has happened so far is only the beginning.

On November 18, 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court announced its Goodridge opinion, ruling that it was unconstitutional not to allow same-sex “marriage.” Six months later,homosexual marriages began to be performed.

The public schools

The homosexual “marriage” onslaught in public schools across the state started soon after theNovember 2003, court decision.

• At my own children's high school there was a school-wide assembly to celebrate

same-sex “marriage” in early December, 2003. It featured an array of speakers,

including teachers at the school who announced that they would be “marrying” their

same-sex partners and starting families either through adoption or artificial insemination.

Literature on same-sex marriage – how it is now a normal part of society – was handed

out to the students.

• Within months it was brought into the middle schools. In September, 2004, an 8thgradeteacher in Brookline, MA, told National Public Radio that the marriage ruling had

opened up the floodgates for teaching homosexuality. “In my mind, I know that, `OK, this

is legal now.' If somebody wants to challenge me, I'll say, `Give me a break. It's legal

now,'” she told NPR. She added that she now discusses gay sex with her students as

explicitly as she desires. For example, she said she tells the kids that lesbians can have

vaginal intercourse using sex toys.

• By the following year it was in elementary school curricula. Kindergartners were

given picture books telling them that same-sex couples are just another kind of family,

like their own parents. In 2005, when David Parker of Lexington, MA – a parent of a

kindergartner – strongly insisted on being notified when teachers were discussing

homosexuality or transgenderism with his son, the school had him arrested and put in

jail overnight.

• Second graders at the same school were read a book, “King and King”, about two

men who have a romance and marry each other, with a picture of them kissing. When

parents Rob and Robin Wirthlin complained, they were told that the school had no

obligation to notify them or allow them to opt-out their child.

• In 2006 the Parkers and Wirthlins filed a federal Civil Rights lawsuit to force the

schools to notify parents and allow them to opt-out their elementary-school children

when homosexual-related subjects were taught. The federal judges dismissed the case.

The judges ruled that because same-sex marriage is legal in Massachusetts, the school

actually had a duty to normalize homosexual relationships to children, and that schools

no obligation to notify parents or let them opt-out their children! Acceptance of

homosexuality had become a matter of good citizenship!

Think about that: Because same-sex marriage is “legal”, a federal judge has

ruled that the schools now have a duty to portray homosexual relationships as

normal to children, despite what parents think or believe!

• In 2006, in the elementary school where my daughter went to Kindergarten, the parents

of a third-grader were forced to take their child out of school because a man

undergoing a sex-change operation and cross-dressing was being brought into

class to teach the children that there are now “different kinds of families.” School

officials told the mother that her complaints to the principal were considered

“inappropriate behavior.”

• Libraries have also radically changed. School libraries across the state, from

elementary school to high school, now have shelves of books to normalize homosexual

behavior and the lifestyle in the minds of kids, some of them quite explicit and even

pornographic. Parents complaints are ignored or met with hostility.

Over the past year, homosexual groups have been using taxpayer money to
distribute a large, slick hardcover book celebrating homosexual marriage titled

“Courting Equality” into every school library in the state.

• It’s become commonplace in Massachusetts schools for teachers to prominently

display photos of their same-sex “spouses” and occasionally bring them to

school functions. Both high schools in my own town now have principals who are

“married” to their same-sex partners, whom they bring to school and introduce to the

students.

• “Gay days” in schools are considered necessary to fight “intolerance” which may

exist against same-sex relationships. Hundreds of high schools and even middle

schools across the state now hold “gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender appreciation

days”. They “celebrate” homosexual marriage and move forward to other behaviors such

as cross-dressing and transsexuality. In my own town, a school committee member

recently announced that combating “homophobia” is now a top priority.

• Once homosexuality is normalized, all boundaries begin to down. The schools are

already moving on to normalizing transgenderism (including cross-dressing and sex

changes). The state-funded Commission on Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender

Youth includes leaders who are transsexuals.

Public health

• The Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health is “married”

to another man. In 2007 he told a crowd of kids at a state-sponsored youth event that it’s

“wonderful being gay” and he wants to make sure there’s enough HIV testing available

for all of them.

 Since homosexual marriage became “legal” the rates of HIV / AIDS have gone up

considerably in Massachusetts. This year public funding to deal with HIV/AIDS has

risen by $500,000. As the homosexual lobby group MassEquality wrote to their

supporters after successfully persuading the Legislature to spend that money: "With the

rate of HIV infections rising dramatically in Massachusetts, it's clear the fight against

AIDS is far from over."

• Citing “the right to marry” as one of the “important challenges” in a place where “it’s a

great time to be gay”, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health helped

produce The Little Black Book, Queer in the 21st Century, a hideous work of

obscene pornography which was given to kids at Brookline High School on April 30,