[mon’-ur-jiz-um]
(Greek mono-, “one” + Greek ergon, “work”)
The doctrine that God the Holy Spirit solely and independently acts to regenerate the heart of man so as to receive Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. In other words, God performs a unilateral inward action upon man’s heart to respond to the call of salvation.
Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.Stuart McMillen, on his cartoon blog, recently illustrated their contrasting visions (HT: Challies).
What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.
This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.
A lack of real humor characterizes Pete Seeger’s legacy | Arsenio Orteza
Neilson Barnard /Getty Images
The folksinger Pete Seeger turned 90 in May, an occasion marked by a Madison Square Garden birthday party at which dozens of his legatees feted him—Bruce Springsteen, Arlo Guthrie, Joan Baez, and Bruce Cockburn among them—and that made Seeger front-page news for the first time in decades.
Most of the stories disinterestedly recounted such highlights of Seeger's career as his having written or popularized, solo or as a member of the Weavers, "Where Have All the Flowers Gone," "If I Had a Hammer," "Wimoweh," and "Kumbaya," leaving it to the conservative gadfly Mark Steyn to point out that the essential childishness of "Flowers" and "Hammer" deserve the opprobrium of all thoughtful people for infecting several generations of left-wing social protesters with an apparently permanent case of arrested development.
Steyn also pointed out that it took Seeger half a century to denounce Stalin (whom Seeger, as a former card-carrying Communist, had enthusiastically supported for a time) and only then under duress. What no one pointed out was that, in retrospect, the most obvious element of Seeger's legacy—and perhaps that of the Left in general—is his humorlessness. (Not for nothing did Orwell include the "silly" among the "obvious" and the "true" as those things that must always be defended.)
Not that Seeger couldn't be a little funny. Indeed, "Little Boxes," a Malvina Reynolds-composed send-up of mass middle-class conformity that Seeger made popular, is nothing if not a little funny. But what keeps it from being funnier (and therefore more satirically effective) is that it refuses to laugh at itself.
It never dawns on the singer of "Little Boxes," in other words, that the Left might also be susceptible to mindless conformity, or that it might be a "little box," itself.
. . . [P]resent church leaders (pastors, lay ministers, youth leaders, etc.) must educate themselves in the arts and aesthetics. Of course, the usual demands of ministry are severe, and most pastors are over-worked as it is. I am not suggesting that they supplant their normal duties of ministry and counseling for the sake of this task. What I do suggest is that church leaders at least make the arts a regular part of their lives, whether that takes the form of attending plays and symphony orchestras, reading great literature and poetry, or perusing local art galleries. I believe that as few as two hours per week devoted to artistic edification can significantly enhance a person’s aesthetic sensibility. For those who complain that they do not even have that much time to spare, I would ask them to estimate the number of hours per week they spend watching television. If they are sincerely convinced that it is better stewardship of time to watch a sitcom or football game than to attend a play or read a classic work of literature, then nothing I have to say will convince them anyway.In a 2004 lecture on Engaging the Renewed Imagination, Tim Keller said:
Christians cannot abdicate the arts to secular society. We must consume, study, and participate in the arts if we are to have a seat at the table. Whether it has a religious theme or strikes us as irreligious, we must be patrons if we are to have an impact on how the world interprets and responds to the arts. We cannot be wary, we cannot be afraid, we cannot be self-righteous. Christians must look, listen, read, and experience the arts if we are to lead our culture to renewal.Keller also provides several questions you can ask yourself to determine the extent to which you are a "patron" of the arts.
Verse 1
Here’s a controversial subject that tends to divide
For years it’s had Christians lining up on both sides
By God’s grace, I’ll address this without pride
The question concerns those for whom Christ died
Was He trying to save everybody worldwide?
Was He trying to make the entire world His Bride?
Does man’s unbelief keep the Savior’s hands tied?
Biblically, each of these must be denied
It’s true, Jesus gave up His life for His Bride
But His Bride is the elect, to whom His death is applied
If on judgment day, you see that you can’t hide
And because of your sin, God’s wrath on you abides
And hell is the place you eternally reside
That means your wrath from God hasn’t been satisfied
But we believe His mission was accomplished when He died
But how the cross relates to those in hell?
Well, they be saying:
God knows He tried (8x)
Verse 2
Father, Son and Spirit: three and yet one
Working as a unit to get things done
Our salvation began in eternity past
God certainly has to bring all His purpose to pass
A triune, eternal bond no one could ever sever
When it comes to the church, peep how they work together
The Father foreknew first, the Son came to earth
To die- the Holy Spirit gives the new birth
The Father elects them, the Son pays their debt and protects them
The Spirit is the One who resurrects them
The Father chooses them, the Son gets bruised for them
The Spirit renews them and produces fruit in them
Everybody’s not elect, the Father decides
And it’s only the elect in whom the Spirit resides
The Father and the Spirit- completely unified
But when it comes to Christ and those in hell?
Well, they be saying:
God knows He tried (8x)
Verse 3
My third and final verse- here’s the situation
Just a couple more things for your consideration
If saving everybody was why Christ came in history
With so many in hell, we’d have to say He failed miserably
So many think He only came to make it possible
Let’s follow this solution to a conclusion that’s logical
What about those who were already in the grave?
The Old Testament wicked- condemned as depraved
Did He die for them? C’mon, behave
But worst of all, you’re saying the cross by itself doesn’t save
That we must do something to give the cross its power
That means, at the end of the day, the glory’s ours
That man-centered thinking is not recommended
The cross will save all for whom it was intended
Because for the elect, God’s wrath was satisfied
But still, when it comes to those in hell
Well, they be saying:
God knows He tried (8x)
The astonishing vision emerged on Good Friday after a website called for oddball religious discoveries. "I was amazed. I just took a bite and then I saw the face of Christ in it," the finder told the NU.nl Dutch website. Other witnesses are less impressed. "It looks more like Darth Vader," said one.
On page 35, you write "Spiritually you're better off a little mixed up about economics than indifferent to human suffering. Economically, though, only what you do is important, whatever your reason." This seems to be a very important point for the book. What are you trying to say in these two sentences?Read the whole thing.
When I wrote: "Spiritually you're better off a little mixed up about economics than indifferent to human suffering. Economically, though, only what you do is important, whatever your reason," I was trying to balance but capture Gilson's "Piety is no substitute for technique." To me, this is one of most important points I've tried to make. Motivation IS important when we're considering our spiritual state before God. It's just that our motivation for a policy has nothing to do with the real world effects of the policy. I think that Christians often weight our (and others') motivations far too heavily on economic matters. It's as if we think feeling bad about poverty is more obligatory than actually doing something that helps the poor. For instance, several times in churches I've pointed out why minimum wage laws don't really help the poor in the long run. I've never had anyone try to debunk the argument, but several times I've received the complaint that my argument shows that I'm not really concerned about the poor. It doesn't of course. But even if it were evidence that I weren't concerned about the poor, the argument's validity (or lack thereof) would remain the same.
. . . [H]aving the right intentions, being oriented in the right way, doesn't take the place of doing things right. A pilot's caring deeply for his passengers and wanting to land a plane safely are no substitute for his learning how to actually land plans safely. . . . I hope you already have a heart for the poor. Lots of Christians do. But do you have a mind for the poor? Unfortunately that's in rather short supply. (p. 35)
It is one of the signs of our times that so many in the media are focusing on the life story of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States.
You might think that this was some kind of popularity contest, instead of a weighty decision about someone whose impact on the fundamental law of the nation will extend for decades after Barack Obama has come and gone.
Much is being made of the fact that Sonia Sotomayor had to struggle to rise in the world. But stop and think.
If you were going to have open heart surgery, would you want to be operated on by a surgeon who was chosen because he had to struggle to get where he is or by the best surgeon you could find-- even if he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and had every advantage that money and social position could offer?
If it were you who was going to be lying on that operating table with his heart cut open, you wouldn't give a tinker's damn about somebody's struggle or somebody else's privileges.
The Supreme Court of the United States is in effect operating on the heart of our nation-- the Constitution and the statutes and government policies that all of us must live under.
What would the political spinmasters say if some white man said that a white male would more often reach a better conclusion than a Hispanic female?
For those who believe in the rule of law, Barack Obama used the words "rule of law" in introducing his nominee. For those who take his words as gospel, even when his own actions are directly the opposite of his words, that may be enough to let him put this dangerous woman on the Supreme Court.
This year’s winner of the first ever, Worst Easter Sermon Award went to Joel Osteen’s sermon “You Have Come Back Power”.
Commenting on Osteen’s sermon Rosebrough stated, “Jesus didn’t die and rise again on the cross so that you can have ‘come back power over life’s set backs’. Osteen completely missed the point of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection and as a result he missed the entire point of Christianity.”
Said Rosebrough, “I wasn’t surprised that Osteen was the first winner of this award. Osteen is like the Tiger Woods of heresy, he takes false teaching to a whole new level.”
"You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist."
Friedrich Nietzsche
"If God did not exist, all would be permitted."
Feodor Dostoevsky
Romans 1:18-19NASB
. . . [I]t has become abundantly clear in the second half of the twentieth century that Western Man has decided to abolish himself. Having wearied of the struggle to be himself, he has createdMalcome Muggeride, from his essay "Jesus: The Man Who Lives," in Seeing Through the Eye: Malcolm Muggeridge on Faith, ed. Cecil Kuhne (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2005), 16.his own boredom out of his own affluence,himself blowing the trumpet that brings the walls of his own city tumbling down, and, in a process of auto-genocide, convincing himself that he is too numerous, and labouring accordingly with pill and scalpel and syringe to make himself fewer in order to be an easier prey for his enemies; until at last, having educated himself into imbecility, and polluted and drugged himself into stupefaction, he keels over a weary, battered old brontosaurus and becomes extinct.
his own impotence out of his own erotomania,
his own vulnerability out of his own strength;
The most experienced psychologist or observer of human nature knows infinitely less of the human heart than the simplest Christian who lives beneath the Cross of Jesus.HT: David Powlison
The greatest psychological insight, ability, and experience cannot grasp this one thing: what sin is.
Worldly wisdom knows what distress and weakness and failure are, but it does not know the godlessness of man. And so it does not know that man is destroyed only by his sin and can be healed only by forgiveness. Only the Christian knows this.
In the presence of a psychiatrist I can only be a sick man; in the presence of a Christian brother I can dare to be a sinner.
The psychiatrist must first search my heart and yet he never plumbs its ultimate depth. The Christian brother knows when I come to him: here is a sinner like myself, a godless man who wants to confess and yearns for God’s forgiveness.
The psychiatrist views me as if there were no God. The brother views me as I am before the judging and merciful God in the Cross of Jesus Christ.
A few months ago Bob Dylan surprised everyone—including his record company—with the announcement that he had recorded a new album, and last month Together Through Life was released, to the jubilance of Dylan cronies like me everywhere. At nearly 68 years of age, the great rock bard is nearing the end of his extraordinary career. So each new album is a yet more precious gift. What is most remarkable is that late-period Dylan is arguably his very best. The most recent trio of albums—including Love and Theft, Modern Times, and Together Through Life—form what I have begun calling Dylan’s Americana Trilogy, all having been produced by Jack Frost (Dylan’s pseudonym as record producer) and showcasing a rootsy, relaxed kind of energy to match consistently strong compositions. However many more albums he records, the first decade of the 21st century will surely go down as a peak Dylan period.
Here’s a quick survey of the tracks, most of which Dylan co-wrote with Grateful Dead wordsmith, Robert Hunter:
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, was instituted to honor Union soldiers who died in the Civil War. After World War I, the purpose of the day was expanded to include all men and women who died in U.S. military service. Today, Memorial Day is mainly thought of as the unofficial start of summer–a long weekend with a car race, playoff basketball, and brats and burgers on the grill.Below is an outline of Kevin's main points--but of course to see the explanation and justification for each you'll have to read the whole thing:
It is always tricky to know how the church should or shouldn’t celebrate patriotic holidays. Certainly, some churches blend church and state in such a way that the kingdom of God morphs into a doctrinally-thin, spiritually nebulous civil religion. But even with this dangers, there are a number of good reasons why Christians should give thanks for Memorial Day.
1. Being a soldier is not a sub-Christian activity. . . .
2. The life of a soldier can demonstrate the highest Christian virtues. . . .
3. Military service is one of the most common metaphors in the New Testament to describe the Christian life. . . .
4. Love of country can be a good thing. . . .
5. This may be controversial to some, but I believe the facts of history will demonstrate that on the whole, the United States military has been a force for good in the world. . . .
This doesn’t immediately resonate with many of us. We are by nature so intractably selfish that we regard our own souls “as the center of all providences” and “naturally seek to explain everything by its bearing on ourselves alone” (James Denney). We struggle to envision how our pain and hardship could possibly have any relevance for or bearing upon anyone else. If nothing else, Paul’s confession “calls into question the individualism of modern Christianity and the sense of remoteness within and among many contemporary churches" (Paul Barnett, 73).
But there’s a vital lesson for us to learn in this truth. When afflicted, whatever its nature or source or perceived cause, stop and do two things: first, avail yourself of the corresponding comforts of Christ and, second, lift up your head, look around, and ask: “Who else, Lord?”
The "Glenn Beck Program" had a segment today on Fox News about the connection between ACORN and the Tides Foundation. (I can't find a video clip of the segment online yet.)
He said that Drummond Pike, head of the Tides Foundation, wrote a personal check for about $700,000 to ACORN to cover the bulk of the $948,000 that Dale Rathke, brother of ACORN founder Wade Rathke, embezzled from the ACORN network.
The Tides Foundation is a pass-through entity. Wealthy liberals give the charity money, take the tax deduction, and then tell Tides which causes to give their money to. The money is then given in the name of Tides and the real donor's name is withheld. Pike has said that keeping the identity of Tides donors secret is very important.
Wade Rathke, who was expelled by ACORN's national board last summer for his role in covering up the embezzlement, is a member of the Tides board. Suspicious? You betcha.
Meanwhile, ACORN stands accused of election fraud, extortion, and racketeering, yet congressional leaders have no interest in investigating the group. House Financial Services Committee Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts) and House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-Michigan) refuse to probe ACORN.
[uh-say’-ih-tee]
(Latin a-, “from” + se, “itself”)
Attribute or property of God describing his self-existence and non-contingency. In other words, God is the only absolutely independent being. His existence and well-being are not dependent upon any being or circumstance. He is the final and primary cause of all things, therefore, there is no cause that precedes him. He is in need of nothing.
Scripture Reference: Ps. 50:10–12; Acts 17:23–26, Ex. 3:14
Late Show Top Ten
10. Biden confirmed vice president has no actual responsibilities
9. Obama also bought his kids a kangaroo
8. Nixon faked his death to escape gambling debts
7. In case of trouble, President's car can turn into a fighting robot
6. To enter Oval Office, you must know the president's secret fist-bump
5. Biden often skips staff meetings to watch "Jon And Kate Plus Eight"
4. America will declare that it's going out of business next Tuesday
3. Obama smokes in his sleep
2. When Bush ran out of pate at a state dinner, he fed Queen Elizabeth week-old taco meat
1. Dick Cheney once caught waterboarding himself
This article is about the new standards that Obama wants — standards that will significantly increase the price of cars. From the Wall Street Journal:
"All that's left to arrive at the President's new destination for the American way of driving are huge, unanswered questions about technology, financing and the marketability of cars that will be small and expensive.
…We wish these folks luck "working together" with the Obama auto-design team. One thing seems certain by 2016: Taxpayers will be paying Detroit to make the cars Americans don't want, and then they will pay again either through (trust us) a gas tax or with a purchase subsidy. Even the French must think we're nuts."
This is not a plan to help anyone but the Federal Government to have more power. These morons in Washington are not competent to to run any private business, if you want something done wrong let the Federal government run it, just look at the United States Postal Service or Amtrak for examples. These are the Bluesman's thoughts not the Wall Street Journal.
Has science made God obsolete? Dan Brown's Maximilian Kohler argues that by giving rational explanations for the rising and setting of the sun, science has made the Greek god Helios dispensable. In every field, the growth of science pushes back the need to postulate the activities of gods. Kohler expresses what is on many people's minds in our day.
Ironically, the rise of science took place in the opposite direction from what Kohler depicts. Kohler suggests that science destroyed the gods. Actually, the destruction of the gods created an opening for science. How?
The polytheistic religion of Greeks said that there were many gods. There were as many divine plans and as many purposes as there were gods. Since the gods interacted in a chaotic fashion, people had no guarantee that the world would show any stable order. Greek religion discouraged any hope for a scientific exploration of a rational order.
Modern science arose in the context of Christian monotheism, which displaced the Greek gods and gave confidence to prospective scientists by means of three fundamental principles:
In fact, God's word is the foundation for scientific law. According to Genesis 1, God by speaking specified the regular order for the sun and moon and stars, and the regular pattern for the growth and reproduction of plants (Genesis 1:11, 14-15). What scientists call scientific law is in fact their guess about God's law, God's specification, "let it be so." Scientists in their investigation are in fact investigating the mind of God and thinking his thoughts after him--albeit on their limited, human level.
Early scientists like Copernicus and Isaac Newton understood that they stood before God's workmanship. The universe wasbuilt for us by the Best and Most Orderly Workman of all.How exceedingly fine is the godlike work of the Best and Greatest Artist. (Copernicus, The Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres)
By Mark Driscoll
Pastor, Mars Hill Church
Has Christian America come to an end? That question has been hotly debated since Newsweek published their recent feature story reporting that the number of Americans claiming no religious affiliation has nearly doubled since 1990. Additionally, the percentage of self-identified Christians has dropped ten points in the past two decades.
As an evangelical pastor with one of America’s fastest-growing churches in one of its least churched cities, I do not find the report surprising or discouraging. Newsweek missed the subtle — but vital — difference between Christian America and Christendom America.
Christian America is comprised of those people who have had a truly transforming experience with Jesus Christ and are living new lives as practicing Christians. Experts such as sociologist Bradford Wilcox at the University of Virginia have well documented the fact that those who practice Christian faith by reading their Bibles regularly, attending church, praying, and so forth are far less likely to engage in acts such as adultery, divorce, substance abuse, and the like.
Christendom America is comprised of those people who have not had a truly transforming experience with Jesus Christ and are living lives virtually indistinguishable from those who are non-Christians. The confusion is that it was common in Christendom for people who did not practice Christianity to profess Christianity. This was often done for social reasons, such as living in a culture that expected church affiliation, being born into a religious tradition and assuming it was simply part of one’s identity (like a cultural or racial connection), or personally, socially, and vocationally benefitting from being connected, even loosely, to a church or denomination.
In a recent op-ed, Tom Daschle repeatedly invokes a baseball metaphor when discussing government-run health care. His apparent aim is to make it seem as American as baseball or apple pie. But government-run health care is really about as American as government-owned Chevrolet--and would prove even less beneficial to America's future.
Ronald Reagan said that "outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector." He believed the American people knew this as well. But that knowledge is exactly what Daschle, President Obama, Speaker Pelosi, and Senator Reid hope we no longer have--or will soon unlearn.
Sticking with Daschle's baseball metaphor, here are the three strikes against President Obama's health-care plan: One, it would force millions of Americans off of employer-provided insurance. Two, it would run private insurers out of business. Three, it would eventually lead to a government monopoly and rationed care.
Calvin said, "Now someone asks, How has Christ abolished sin, banished the separation between us and God, and acquired righteousness to render God favorable and kindly toward us? To this we can in general reply that he has achieved this for us by the whole course of his obedience. This is proved by Paul’s testimony: “As by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by one man’s obedience we are made righteous” [Romans 5:19]. In another passage, to be sure, Paul extends the basis of the pardon that frees us from the curse of the law to the whole life of Christ: “But when the fullness of time came, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, subject to the law, to redeem those who were under the law” [Galatians 4:4-5]. Thus in his very baptism, also, he asserted that he fulfilled a part of righteousness in obediently carrying out his Father’s commandment [Matthew 3:15]. In short, from the time when he took on the form of a servant, he began to pay the price of liberation in order to redeem us.
Yet to define the way of salvation more exactly, Scripture ascribes this as peculiar and proper to Christ’s death. He declares that “he gave his life to redeem many” [Matthew 20:28]. Paul teaches that “Christ died for our sins” [Romans 4:25]. John the Baptist proclaimed that he came “to take away the sins of the world,” for he was “the Lamb of God” [John 1:29]. In another passage Paul teaches that “we are freely justified through the redemption which is in Christ, because he was put forward as a reconciler in his blood” [Romans 3:24-25]. Likewise: “We are …justified by his blood …and reconciled …through his death.” [Romans 5:9-10.] Again: “For our sake he who knew no sin was made sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” [2 Corinthians 5:21] I shall not pursue all the testimonies, for the list would be endless, and many of them will be referred to in their order. For this reason the so-called “Apostles’ Creed” passes at once in the best order from the birth of Christ to his death and resurrection, wherein the whole of perfect salvation consists. Yet the remainder of the obedience that he manifested in his life is not excluded. Paul embraces it all from beginning to end: “He emptied himself, taking the form of a servant …and was obedient to the Father unto death, even death on a cross” - Calvin's Institutes 2.16.5
Economists Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore have an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that analyzes how people and capital leave higher tax states for lower tax states.
Updating some research from Richard Vedder of Ohio University, we found that from 1998 to 2007, more than 1,100 people every day including Sundays and holidays moved from the nine highest income-tax states such as California, New Jersey, New York and Ohio and relocated mostly to the nine tax-haven states with no income tax, including Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire and Texas. We also found that over these same years the no-income tax states created 89% more jobs and had 32% faster personal income growth than their high-tax counterparts.
…Or consider the fiasco of New Jersey. In the early 1960s, the state had no state income tax and no state sales tax. It was a rapidly growing state attracting people from everywhere and running budget surpluses. Today its income and sales taxes are among the highest in the nation yet it suffers from perpetual deficits and its schools rank among the worst in the nation -- much worse than those in New Hampshire. Most of the massive infusion of tax dollars over the past 40 years has simply enriched the public-employee unions in the Garden State. People are fleeing the state in droves.
This is a no-brainer: you get less of that which you tax; you get more of that which you subsidize.If New Jersey wants to run its millionaires out of state, all they have to do is raise the marginal tax rates.
Now who will pay the taxes in that state?
“Give me your 4 years olds, and in a generation I will build a socialist state.”
—Vladimir Lenin
Your government schools at work…
As the Obama saga gets weirder and weirder, Christians shouldn't forget to interpret all the news in the fundamental terms of who we want to be our god, and who wants to be the embodiment of that god. Worship is always the key to everything. And it is not the "key to everything" because we keep repeating that mindlessly like a mantra. It is the key to everything because it explains why so many people, otherwise intelligent, are doing such foolish things.
One of the central reasons why it is so important to insist on the absolute sovereignty of the triune God of Scripture (and for those just joining us, that would be the true God) is because if we dial that sovereignty back (not in reality, but in our fevered dreams) something bad always happens to us. We (also in our fevered dreams) think to step into the void that our imaginations created, the vacant spot recently relinquished by the Maker of heaven and earth. Denial of the true God is the first step of two. It is not that we want no God; it is that we want to replace Him. So the first step is to deny Him. The second step is a necessary one (meaning that it cannot be avoided once the first is taken), and it involves volunteering to pick up the slack created by the divine absence.
To paraphrase the great Francis Schaeffer, if there is no God above the state, the state becomes god.The regulatory state wants to be Lord, and with no veto power hanging over them from above. But the bad news for them is what we Christians call the good news. Christ is Lord. There is no other. And we serve a Lord who was crucified for us, not a lord who wants to crucify others for himself.Our would-be soft despots are offering Americans money and the promise of security against economic distress. The vastly increased cost of government will nonetheless nearly leave half of households free from the burden of paying federal income tax and eligible for occasional rebates. As CNN reporter Susan Roesgen said to a tea party protester, "Don't you realize that you're eligible for a $400 tax cut?"
In other words, take the money and shut up. Which brings to mind Tocqueville's warning: "Every measure which establishes legal charity on a permanent basis and gives to it an administrative form creates thereby a class unproductive and idle, living at the expense of the class which is industrious and given to work."
The folks at Innocent Bystanders added the red triangles which represent a little thing I like to call reality. Those are the actual unemployment numbers for the last two months. As you can see, it appears we’re now charting a course even worse (steeper) than the President’s worst predictions. But of course we did spend the stimulus money. So it’s really the worst of both worlds.
What exactly has the administration accomplished, beside digging a huge financial hole for the US?
First, the Holy Spirit freely gives life. There is no how-to here at all; he must sovereignly do this.
Second, this happens through the living and abiding Word of God. We see here the human agency of the divine sovereign awakening of dead souls.
Third, the gospel brings about faith. Believing is the result, not the cause of the new birth.
Fourth, Christ is received and believed upon.
These four steps cannot be carved apart—they must happen simultaneouslyI have always considered Jon Stewart (The Daily Show) to be a thoroughly repugnant ass and his TV show a bunch of garbage for only the very stupidest of left-wing nobrains. As a result of my avoidance of the man and his works, I have seldom had occasion to write about him.
Thus I greatly enjoyed Andrew Breitbart's column about Stewart in today's Washington Times, in which he shows up Stewart as a partisan hack.
My only prior substantive reference to Stewart in this august publication, in fact, characterized him as "another open Democrat partisan talker" as opposed to him being any sort of comedian, and I dismissed him as an uninteresting Democrat water-carrier.
Predictably, Stewart has continued his old ways, attacking obscure and powerless Republicans while giving a free pass to President Obama as the Chief Executive and his complicit Congress attempt a grotesque and horrifying transformation of the United States into a combination of 1970s Great Britain and current-day Mexico.Jonathan and his amazing technicolor dream-teleprompter (yes, he has one too) has for 10 years used sophisticated character assassination to slyly annihilate the political enemies of the Democratic Party.
The show's multitude of liberal, Ivy-League-educated writers—another Obama echo—feed the mildly successful former stand-up comedian irony-laden words that he offers up with his signature goofy facial expressions. And Jon Stewart has a studio audience of pliant seals commanded and trained to flap their fins at every smirk or sarcastic joke.
As a smug and pretentious elitist who portrays himself as more intelligent than the opposition when in fact he simply reads Democrat talking points in a snarky tone of voice while expressing mock astonishment, Stewart caters to an audience of people who likewise think themselves superior to the population as a whole and hence think that pseudo intellectuals such as themselves should be given the keys to the car and the rest of us should remain in the back seat and shut the hell up.
A lot of folks are upset over comedienne Wanda Sykes's attack on Rush Limbaugh at Saturday's White House Correspondents' Dinner. She called Rush a "traitor," and said "I hope his kidneys fail." Limbaugh aside, though, there were deeper problems with Sykes's routine: it was the work of a courtier comic: embarrassingly sycophantic and unfunny.
Sykes began her routine by gushing to the president "you're so likable," and spent most of her time savaging Obama's critics. For her grand finale, she took on people who complained that the president didn't get a rescue dog: "Look, the man has to rescue a country that's been abused by its previous owner. Let him have a fresh start with a dog." Edgy stuff! Lenny Bruce would be proud.
A solitary flop at stand-up is no big deal, but Sykes isn't the only comic who has trouble making fun of Barack Obama. Jon Stewart's been a lot less amusing since his guy got elected.
Tearing into Jim Cramer makes for good TV, but Stewart's painful earnestness hardly provides the yuks. Comedian Jackie Mason--who summed up Bill Clinton with one razor-sharp line: "at least Nixon had the decency to twitch when he lied"--says that his fellow comics have fallen prey to "hero worship."
From AmSpecBlog
