Finding True Courage: Truth & Liberty in Today's Church w/ Conrad Vine

Courage for the Conflict

And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. Matthew 24:12, 13.

“And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” The very atmosphere is polluted with sin. Soon God's people will be tested by fiery trials, and the great proportion of those who now appear to be genuine and true will prove to be base metal. Instead of being strengthened and confirmed by opposition, threats, and abuse, they will cowardly take the side of the opposers. The promise is: “Them that honour me I will honour.” ...

Already the judgments of God are abroad in the land, as seen in storms, in floods, in tempests, in earthquakes, in peril by land and by sea. The great I AM is speaking to those who make void His law. When God's wrath is poured out upon the earth, who will then be able to stand? Now is the time for God's people to show themselves true to principle. When the religion of Christ is most held in contempt, when His law is most despised, then should our zeal be the warmest and our courage and firmness the most unflinching. To stand in the defense of truth and righteousness when the majority forsake us, to fight the battles of the Lord when champions are few—this will be our test. At this time we must gather warmth from the coldness of others, courage from their cowardice, and loyalty from their treason....

The Captain of our salvation will strengthen His people for the conflict in which they must engage....

Now is the time when we should closely connect with God, that we may be hid when the fierceness of His wrath is poured upon the sons of men.27Testimonies for the Church 5:136, 137.

All who will gather warmth from the coldness of others, courage from their defections, and loyalty from their treason, will triumph with the third angel's message.28The Review and Herald, June 8, 1897.

Sons and Daughters of God, p.201.

Pope calls for courage in halting use of fossil fuels to protect planet

Pontiff tells young people he is pinning his hopes on their efforts to safeguard environment and help the poor



Associated Press in Assisi

Sat 24 Sep 2022 12.41 EDT


Pope Francis has called for courage in abandoning fossil fuels and lamented that older generations did not know how to protect the planet and secure peace.

The pope, who was visiting Assisi, the birthplace of his namesake saint who was close to nature, told young people on Saturday that he was pinning his hopes on their efforts in working to save the planet and to make the world’s economy more

attentive to the poor.

During his brief visit to the hill town in central Italy, Francis spoke to a gathering of 1,000 young people, some of them young economists. Others are involved in efforts, including start-ups, focused on helping the environment.

The participants came from all over the world. Among them was a woman who recounted to the pope how she and her husband were helped to flee Afghanistan after the takeover of the Taliban last year by an organisation called The Economy of Francis, which is inspired by the life of St Francis, with his attention to the poor and others in need.

The pope said a world economy is needed that expresses “a new vision of the environment and the Earth”.

“There are many people, businesses and institutions that are making an ecological conversion. We need to go forward on this road and do more,” Francis said.

The pontiff cited an urgent need to discuss models of development. “Now is the time for new courage in abandoning fossil fuels to accelerate the development of zero- or positive-impact sources of energy,” Francis said.

He told the young people: “Our generation has left you with a rich heritage, but we have not known how to protect the planet and are not securing peace.”

He lamented a lack of “creativity, optimism, enthusiasm”, and told young people that “we are grateful to God that you are here. Not only will you be there tomorrow, but you are here today.”

Source

Hollywood taking notice of Desmond Doss story

Lynchburg native was World War II Congressional Medal of Honor winner




News & Advance file photo
Pfc. Desmond Doss receives his Medal of Honor from President Harry S. Truman. On his Medal of Honor citation, he is credited with saving 75 lives.


Posted: Saturday, December 6, 2014 5:02 pm

Emma Schkloven


The story of Pfc. Desmond T. Doss, a Lynchburg native and the first conscientious objector to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor, is on its way to the big screen — and Mel Gibson is apparently in talks to direct.

The film, “Hacksaw Ridge,” has been linked by several Hollywood media outlets to Cross Creek Pictures, which also produced the Oscar-winning “Black Swan” in 2010.

Doss, who grew up on Easley Avenue in Fairview Heights, was drafted into the U.S. Army in 1942, though he refused to carry a weapon in combat because of his religious beliefs as a Seventh-day Adventist. He was assigned as a combat medic, and is credited with saving as many as 75 men during the battle of Okinawa. Doss singlehandedly lowered the soldiers with ropes off a 400-foot cliff to safety, all while facing enemy fire.

“His commander said it had to be more than 100, and he was a small man,” said Harlow Reynolds, one of the Lynchburg locals who worked with City Council to rename the northwest extension of the Lynchburg Expressway after Doss in 2007. “How he did it, I will never know with his size.”

Steve Doss, the principal of Desmond T. Doss Christian Academy in Lynchburg, learned of the movie’s possibility about two years ago, when he met Dr. Charles Knapp, a retired U.S. Army colonel. Knapp is chairman of the Georgia-Cumberland Conference’s Desmond Doss Council, which owns the rights to Doss’s story.

“They had turned down a number of screenplays because they wanted it to stay true to who Desmond was,” Doss said.

Pfc. Doss died in 2006, but his retelling of the story is immortalized in the award-winning documentary, “The Conscientious Objector,” produced in 2004.

“Variety” and “Deadline” both have reported that Andrew Garfield (“The Amazing Spiderman,” “The Social Network”) is on the short list of stars who may portray the hero in the new film. Several entertainment outlets have reported that Gibson is in talks to direct. “[The film] will cross over to so many different people who will enjoy it, especially now with the revitalization of appreciation for what veterans have done for us,” Doss said.

Pfc. Doss visited the school, which changed its name from Lynchburg Seventh-day Adventist School in 1984, several times over the years.

“He came in his uniform and did the knots for the kids that he used to lower the men down that escarpment,” Doss said.

The principal described the veteran as “kind-hearted … very down to earth.”

“He was in awe that people were in awe of him,” Doss said.

Reynolds, who communicated with the Doss family in the last years of the veteran’s life, has some advice for the film’s producers.

“Just tell the truth of how he did it, you don’t have to beef it up or anything,” he said. “If [it] tells the truth, it will be a great movie.”

Medal of Honor Citation

He was a company aid man when the 1st Battalion assaulted a jagged escarpment 400 feet (120 m) high. As our troops gained the summit, a heavy concentration of artillery, mortar and machinegun fire crashed into them, inflicting approximately 75 casualties and driving the others back. Pfc. Doss refused to seek cover and remained in the fire-swept area with the many stricken, carrying all 75 casualties one-by-one to the edge of the escarpment and there lowering them on a rope-supported litter down the face of a cliff to friendly hands.

On May 2, he exposed himself to heavy rifle and mortar fire in rescuing a wounded man 200 yards (180 m) forward of the lines on the same escarpment; and 2 days later he treated 4 men who had been cut down while assaulting a strongly defended cave, advancing through a shower of grenades to within 8 yards (7.3 m) of enemy forces in a cave's mouth, where he dressed his comrades' wounds before making 4 separate trips under fire to evacuate them to safety.

On May 5, he unhesitatingly braved enemy shelling and small arms fire to assist an artillery officer. He applied bandages, moved his patient to a spot that offered protection from small arms fire and, while artillery and mortar shells fell close by, painstakingly administered plasma. Later that day, when an American was severely wounded by fire from a cave, Pfc. Doss crawled to him where he had fallen 25 feet (7.6 m) from the enemy position, rendered aid, and carried him 100 yards (91 m) to safety while continually exposed to enemy fire. On May 21, in a night attack on high ground near Shuri, he remained in exposed territory while the rest of his company took cover, fearlessly risking the chance that he would be mistaken for an infiltrating Japanese and giving aid to the injured until he was himself seriously wounded in the legs by the explosion of a grenade.

Rather than call another aid man from cover, he cared for his own injuries and waited 5 hours before litter bearers reached him and started carrying him to cover. The trio was caught in an enemy tank attack and Pfc. Doss, seeing a more critically wounded man nearby, crawled off the litter; and directed the bearers to give their first attention to the other man. Awaiting the litter bearers' return, he was again struck, by a sniper bullet while being carried off the field by a comrade, this time suffering a compound fracture of 1 arm. With magnificent fortitude he bound a rifle stock to his shattered arm as a splint and then crawled 300 yards (270 m) over rough terrain to the aid station. Through his outstanding bravery and unflinching determination in the face of desperately dangerous conditions Pfc. Doss saved the lives of many soldiers. His name became a symbol throughout the 77th Infantry Division for outstanding gallantry far above and beyond the call of duty.

Source

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The Promise of Final Triumph

The work that lies before us is one that will put to the stretch every power of the human being. It will call for the exercise of strong faith and constant vigilance. At times the difficulties that we shall meet will be most disheartening. The very greatness of the task will appall us. And yet, with God's help, His servants will finally triumph. "Wherefore," my brethren, "I desire that ye faint not" (Eph. 3:13) because of the trying experiences that are before you. Jesus will be with you; He will go before you by His Holy Spirit, preparing the way; and He will be your helper in every emergency.

"For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God."

"Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen" (Eph. 3:14-21).--General Conference Bulletin, May 27, 1913, pp. 164, 165.

Selected Messages Book 2, pp.407,408.

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A Prayer of Praise

Psalm 27

¹The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?

²When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell.

³Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear: though war should rise against me, in this will I be confident.

⁴One thing have I desired of the LORD, that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD, and to enquire in his temple.

⁵For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion: in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me; he shall set me up upon a rock.

⁶And now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me: therefore will I offer in his tabernacle sacrifices of joy; I will sing, yea, I will sing praises unto the LORD.

⁷Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice: have mercy also upon me, and answer me.

⁸When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek.

⁹Hide not thy face far from me; put not thy servant away in anger: thou hast been my help; leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation.

¹⁰When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take me up.

¹¹Teach me thy way, O LORD, and lead me in a plain path, because of mine enemies.

¹²Deliver me not over unto the will of mine enemies: for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe out cruelty.

¹³I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.

¹⁴Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.

The word from Obama: 'Courage'

Photo (Courtesy) http://whitehouse.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/03/15/president-obama-we-need-courage/

Updated 7:30 p.m.

By Peter Slevin

STRONGSVILLE, Ohio - President Obama knows a good line when he hears it.

During the presidential primary, he grabbed a South Carolina supporter's call of "Fired up! Ready to go!" and made it a mantra. On Monday, talking health-care reform, it happened again.

Obama was pivoting from a promise to strengthen Medicare to a call for Congress to vote when a woman shouted from the audience at his rally, "We need courage!"

The crowd cheered, and Obama paused in his prepared remarks to repeat the phrase.

"We need courage," he said. "Did you hear what somebody just said? That's what we need.

That's why I came here today. We need courage."

More applause.

"We need courage," Obama said again, then returned to the words scrolling through his twin teleprompters.

But the word, and the sentiment, stuck with him. As he charged into the crescendo of his 30-minute speech, he returned to it.

"The American people want to know if it's still possible for Washington to look out for these interests, for their future," Obama said. "So what they're looking for is some courage. They're waiting for us to act."

By the end, in a scene reminiscent of the height of his campaign-year popularity in 2008, Obama's words were swamped by crowd's cheers. Sleeves rolled up, his voice rising to a shout, he declared, "I'm calling on Congress to pass these reforms, and I'm going to sign them into law.
"I want some courage. I want us to do the right thing, Ohio. And with your help, we're going to make it happen."

By Peter Slevin March 15, 2010; 3:07 PM ET

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Source: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2010/03/the-word-from-obama-courage.html

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