Avoiding Evil

It is not a surprise that atheism has been around for a long time. Even back in ancient Greece, people said there was no God. Of course back then there was a pantheistic belief system (meaning there are many God’s), and atheism was simply a rejection of that belief.

Unfortunately about 40 years ago a woman by the name of Madalyn Murray O’Hair founded a group called the American Atheists. She had a part in fighting prayer in school, which of course was a battle that was finally won. This group that she founded has been known to provide literature and speakers to college campuses, have pride marches at the state capital, and many other things to promote their cause. Not only did she fight and finally won taking prayer out of schools, she also fought to take “in God we trust” off of the money, but she lost that battle. Madalyn Murray O’Hair has been called the most hated woman in America. In 1995 she, her son, and her grand-daughter all disappeared and were found 6 years later, murdered.

So what do Atheists believe?
They don’t believe in anything supernatural - god, heaven, devil, hell. They only believe in this world, the things that you can see and touch. Which means that after you die you just stop existing.

(The Following information comes from “Why so many God’s” by K. Etue.

Atheists think that:

Morals come from humanity, not from any religious code. They rely on communities to come up with their own moral code.

Evidence about the world and the universe is to be gained through science. Science cannot prove the existence of God, so there is no God.

Freedom from Religion: They believe that religion imposes too many restrictions on humanity. They reject the concept of God, and they want to get rid of all organized religion.

They also believe that more mistakes are made from ignorance than anything else. So they are all for people having access to all kinds of information. For example, they’re into minors having complete access to information about sex so they can learn about it before they make mistakes.

The cosmos is all there is. It is eternal and self-sustaining.

Evil is a reality, a necessary part of human evolution, but atheists don’t know how to deal with it.

Man does not have a immortal soul.

So what is the main attraction to this Atheism? Most people are attracted to the fact that you don’t have to be responsible to any higher power.

What is their main goal? Proving that God does not exist.

There are around 220 million worldwide professing Atheists, 1.6 million of those living in the U.S.A.

Did you know that these Celebrities are Atheists:
Woody Allen
Bill Gates
Seth Green
Angelina Jolie
Jack Nicholson

Fact: Gene Roddenberry, creator of Star Trek who died in 1991, said that he purposefully created Star Trek to have a god-free, humanistic view of the universe.

The Problem:

Atheists would claim that because you can’t see God, hear God, or touch God he cannot exist. I cannot see wind, but I see it’s effects. I cannot see natural gas, but I know what it does, and I cannot see God, but I see what he does in my life and others lives who believe in Jesus Christ. Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean that it does not exist.

An Agnostic is a person that knows there is a higher power, but has not really put faith in a God. An Atheist is a person who claims to know that there is no God. But in order for them to know that there is no God, wouldn’t they have to contain all knowledge? So if a true atheist is a person who knows for sure that God doesn’t exist, can a true atheist actually exist? Hmmmm things to ponder.

Pressed

I just finished two of my seminary finals today, one in Hebrew and one in Baptist History. After doing that and driving an hour and a half back home, I am so tired. I need to post, but honestly, I don’t feel like doing that either. It is draining to study all night long, all morning long, and then set for 5 hours in two tests and then drive home. Only one final left and then I am home free for the Christmas season!

For now, I am outta here. Maybe I will post later. Or tomorrow. Or next week.

So until then, you can check out one of my favorite review blogs, The Impulsive Buy

Ripping Music
Since I bought my new iMac G5 I decided to start several projects. The first project that I embarked on was ripping my entire CD collection onto my hard drive. I like the idea of having a digital copy of all my music and being able to put my whole song library on my iPod.

One thing that I learned right away was that I needed to make sure each song was specifically named with an album title, artist title, and the whole works. If I didn’t do this, then it is next to impossible to find songs in my iTunes list or on my iPod. I have spent hours upon hours finding information for many of my unlisted songs, just to get them in the right list. I am a little over half way complete with ripping my songs onto my hard drive and so far I have 2084 songs with about 43 more full albums to add. It’s going to be great to have my entire library on my iPod. I don’t have to mess with having CD’s thrown all over my truck getting all scratched up. It’s great.

Re-Format The PC
Now that I have a back up computer I am re-formatting the hard drive on my PC. It was getting sluggish and almost unberable the last few weeks. It always takes forever to get my PC back into an operational state once I start the formatting process. As always I have ran into several different problems that I have been dealing with just trying to get the software installed. I bought a new graphics card for the computer, but I can’t install the drivers until the operating system is installed. The problem is, the operating system won’t display properly without the drivers to the new video card and thus I am stuck trying to see what to click in a jumbled nasty mess. It took me a while to get through the operating system set up menu, just to get to the point where I could install the display drivers. All is good for now. I am installing program, after program, after program.

A Pile Of Unmarked CDs
The third adventure I have emarked on is trying to organize this nasty pile of CD mess I have. I am really good about making CD’s and not labeling them. I have well over 60 CD’s that have something on them, but no label to tell me what it is. So I am also in the process of looking at each CD, deciding whether to toss it or keep it, and then labeling those I keep.

Needless to say I am keeping myself busy.

What’s wrong with this picture…

Junior High Prostitution Ring
Authorities in Brockton, Mass., are investigating an alleged junior high prostitution ring. They are also debating whether to charge a 13-year-old girl who is accused of pressuring a mentally impaired friend into turning tricks for as little as $5. Brockton School Superintendent Joseph Bage said that neither girl has suffered disciplinary action, since the alleged incidents took place behind a shopping plaza a half-mile from the school. Bage said, Once they’re away from the school building, they’re kind of on their own. A source indicated that the 13-year-old girl admitted to authorities that she took part in the racket. According to the source, the sex-for-cash had been going on for weeks and involved up to 20 boys, at least one 18-years-old, from West Junior High and Brockton High School. The alarming case first came to light when two girls reported to school officials that they were solicited by the accused junior high madam to join the prostitution ring. (Boston Herald, June 2, 2004)

Idiot Parent Should Go To Jail!
Two teenage girls, ages 14 and 13, admitted to ganging up on a 12-year-old girl at a birthday party and beating her so severely that she spent three weeks in a coma all because a boy kissed her on the cheek. Police and prosecutors said the beating began when a boy at the party, acting on a dare, kissed her on the cheek. Apparently the mother of the girl celebrating her birthday was offended because the boy was her daughter’s boyfriend. The mother then urged her daughter to “handle your business” in other words, defend the family’s honor. Police said that the victim was attacked by as many as six women and girls. The birthday girl and her 36-year-old mother were among those charged, along with another 13-year-old girl, a 15-year-old girl, and two women. (AP News Service, April 29,2004)

The Teenage Mind
Police arrested two middle school students, described as clean-cut 14-year-olds, for allegedly plotting to kill a teacher who had flunked one of them. The plot was foiled after a student at Palm Middle School in a suburb of San Diego Grove heard the teens boasting about their plans and told his parents. Lt. Dennis Ferons said, “It was within a half-hour of happening.” The boys were arrested at school, and a .25-caliber semiautomatic pistol belonging to the father of one of the boys was found hidden in bushes on campus. The teacher is known for staying after school to help her students, and the 14-year-olds allegedly were going to kill her then. Ferons said that one of them was to put on a ski mask, walk into her class, and shoot her. (AP News Service, March 6, 2004)

Spurgeon made three important points when it came to Arminianism. First of all Arminianism confuses scripture. Secondly, Arminiansim leads to legality. Thirdly, Arminianism contains errors.

For the final post on a case against Arminianism I am simply going to leave you with a quote from Spurgeon. I hope that if these posts did anything, they made you think and caused you to seek the truth in God’s Word. My prayer is that the church would not hide from dealing with these issues. We are called to proclaim the whole truth of God’s word, not simply parts of it.

“Sinner, unconverted sinner, I warn thee thou canst never cause thyself to be born again, and though the new birth is absolutely necessary, it is absolutely impossible to thee, unless God the Spirit shall do it… Do what you will, and still at your very best there is a division wide as eternity between you and the regenerate man… The Spirit of God must new make you, ye must be born again. The same power which raised Christ Jesus from the dead must be exerted in raising us from the dead; the very same omnipotence, without which angels or worms could not have had a being, must again step forth out of his privy chamber, and do as great a work as it did at the first creation in making us anew in Christ Jesus our Lord. Constantly the Christian Church itself tries to forget it, but as often as ever this old doctrine of regeneration is brought forward pointedly, God is pleased to favor His Church with a revival…

Unless God the Holy Spirit, who “worketh in us to will and to do”, should operate upon the will and the conscience, regeneration is an absolute impossibility, and therefore so is salvation. “What!”, says one, “Do you mean to say that God absolutely interposes in the salvation of every man to make him regenerate?” I do indeed; in the salvation of every person there is an actual putting forth of divine power, whereby the dead sinner is quickened, the unwilling sinner is made willing, the desperately hard sinner has his conscience made tender; and he who rejected God and despised Christ, is brought to cast himself down at the feet of Jesus. There must be a divine interposition, a divine working, a divine influence, or else do what you may, without that you perish and are undone - “For except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God”… Be it never forgotten by us that the salvation of a soul is a creation. Now, no man has ever been able to create a fly… Jehovah alone creates… No human or angelic power can intrude upon this glorious province of divine power. Creation is God’s own domain. Now, in every Christian there is an absolute creation - “Created anew in Christ Jesus.” “The new man, after God, is created in righteousness.” Regeneration is not the reforming of principles which were there before, but the implantation of a something which had no existence; it is the putting into man of a new thing called the Spirit, the new man - the creation not of a soul, but of a principle higher still - as much higher than the soul, as the soul is higher than the body… In the bringing of any man to believe in Christ, there is as true and proper a manifestation of creating power, as when God made the heavens and the earth… He only who fashioned the heavens and the earth could create a new nature. It is a work that is not to be paralleled, it is unique and unrivalled, seeing the Father, Son and Spirit must all co-operate in it; for to implant the new nature in the Christian, there must be the decree of the Eternal Father, the death of the ever-blessed Son, and the fullness of the operation of the adorable Spirit. It is a work indeed. The labors of Hercules were but trifles compared with this; to slay lions and hydras, and cleanse Augean stables - all this is child’s play compared with renewing a right spirit in the fallen nature of man. Observe that the apostle affirms (Phil. 1:6) that this good work was begun by God. He was evidently no believer in those remarkable powers which some theologians ascribe to free will; he has no worshiper of that modern Diana of the Ephesians.”

Remember. This message comes from the heart of a man whose desire was to see souls brought to Christ. He lived as one of the greatest evangelists of all time and, through the sovereign Word of God, many came to Christ during his preaching. This is the theology that Spurgeon preached in his day, a theology that stood against Hyper Calvinism and Arminianism and made him one of the least popular among the religious community, but one of the most popular among the people both converted and unconverted. Thousands came to hear him preach, and through him God brought many to Himself. This is a message that should not be lost in our generation. This is the point of the book Iain Murray wrote, “The Forgotten Spurgeon.” If you want to know more about this and the other controversies that Spurgeon dealt with I would recommend this book. It is good, but his theology will make you think!