Thursday, December 17, 2009

Watch out for THE CHARISMATIC MOVEMENT!


Watch out for
THE CHARISMATIC
MOVEMENT!


Today many people attend charismatic meetings. Many are surprised by what they see and hear. At such meetings you may experience wonders, healings, miracles, shouting, screams, speeches you do not un-derstand, faintings on command by symbolic touches, hypnotic repetitions and suggestive words, hysteric and uncontrolled laughter, speechlessness, raised arms and ecstatic behaviour. The strong emotional feeling is, by the adherents, interpreted as a proof of the presence and workings of the spirit of God.

Do you dare to question any of the above-mentioned manifestations? It is not for us to judge anyone. We have no right to do that, but it is not wrong to evaluate these things to see what forces are behind these manifestations.

EXAMINE

The Bible urges us to examine and be on guard. In 1 John, chapter 4 and verse 1, we read: "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God."

The problem today is that when someone starts to examine and ask questions, one is often labelled as being a "critic," belonging to a "fragmented movement," or as lacking a "spirit of love." But those who label you as such would probably never buy a house or a property without seeing the place or checking out the house. Let us therefore simply investigate the charismatic movement and compare it with the word of God.

Since there are wonders and miracles in these meetings, and since the Bible repeatedly tells us that both Satan and God can do miracles through their human agents, it should be in our interest to find out whether this is from God or from Satan.

FAITHFUL SERVANTS or DECEITFUL WORKERS?

From the New Testament we have several examples of how Jesus and the disciples healed people.1 The disciples healed in the name of Jesus. The Holy Spirit worked through them and healed paralyzed arms and feet.

But the Bible also reveals that Satan too is able to perform miracles through his human agents. In Paul's second letter to the Corinthians, chapter 11 and verses 13-15 we read: "For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works."

MIRACLES, SIGNS AND WONDERS!

Many people now understand that the great changes and upheavals in this world, and other signs of the times, indicate that Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world, soon will return. But before Jesus returns, the Bible calls our attention to the fact that Satan will deceive the people with all kinds of signs and wonders. We read: "Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders."2

The Bible also describes how the rulers of this world, just prior to Jesus' second coming, will be seduced by unclean spirits that perform signs.3

The Bible also describes how the rulers of this world, just prior to Jesus' second coming, will be seduced by unclean spirits that perform signs.3




Is the number of attendants determining if it is
the truths of the Bible that are being preached?


Jesus himself says: "Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter unto the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity."4

Today many are claiming that their message and wonders are from God. But please do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see if they are from God. Jesus tells us that we are to know them by their fruits.5 Do their lives reveal the Biblical pattern of life?

As we have read, the Bible declares that many will heal in the name of Jesus, prophesy in the name of Jesus, cast out demons in the name of Jesus, perform miracles, signs and wonders in the name of Jesus, but Jesus will say to them on that great day: "I never knew you."

WHO RECEIVES THE SPIRIT OF GOD?

Miracles in themselves do not reveal their source. In order to distinguish the false from the genuine, what is from Satan and what is from God, Jesus urges us to seek the kingdom of God first.6 First we have to learn to know the will of God through the study of His Word, and then see if these men are doing the will of God. Are they, in the daily life, walking in the footsteps of Jesus? Are their lives and preaching reflecting the life and preaching of Jesus? This is the test!

But what kind of message do these teachers preach? Does it lead you to fear and love God? Are you filled with a longing to reveal your love for Jesus Christ by faithfully living according to His commandments? The apostle John writes: "He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him."30 People who do not realize the great importance of the moral law, that look down on and deliberately break and violate the commandments of God, even if it is only one of them, and teach other people to do the same, are looked upon as unrighteous in the eyes of God.31 Then we know that their teaching is not from God. They carry on the same work as the prince of darkness started, he who is the enemy of God.

There are those who believe they are right when they are in the wrong. While they proclaim that Jesus is their Lord and declare that they are doing great things in His name, they are really doing what is evil. "And they come unto thee as the people cometh, and they sit before thee as my people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness." 32

It is no use pretending to be a Christian. You rarely hear it being preached about the faith in Jesus that saves and changes a man. Just believe, they say, then you do not need to keep the law. But a faith that does not lead to obedience, is a dead faith.33

Therefore the spirit of God is not given to everybody. It is God who decides who will receive His Spirit. It is He who decides who He will work through. It is He who decides who will be His ambassador. Therefore the Bible says quite simply and clearly that those who are doing His will and are obedient to Him, will receive the Holy Spirit.7

Besides, a godly man or woman will not accept money or gifts for miraculous healings that come from God. They will declare that God alone is the One to receive honor and glory.8 This will, also today, characterize those who truly heal in the name of Jesus. But today we see many healers and their coworkers readily accept a "quiet collection."

We are aware that several charismatics use NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), a hypnotic technique that sales representatives, politicians, charismatics and others use in order to sell their products or win adherents or followers.29

The charismatic movement emphasizes experiences of the spirit. But it is not screaming, faintings, repeated shouts of "hallelujah" and so on, that prove whether they have the Spirit of God or not. God wants conscious human beings, not unconscious, half-fainted and knocked out individuals that lie on the floor kicking their legs and writhing in ecstatic laughter. The devil is an expert on debauched experiences, while the Bible says: "Let all things be done decently and in order."9 It is Jesus Christ and Biblical truth that are going to set us free, and give a true revival - not emotional and sentimental mass meetings.10

TRANSFORMATION - TRUE REVIVAL

There are many kinds of revivals. A true revival appears when we say Yes to Jesus. Then we will receive the Holy Spirit as a source of power in our life, and this will bring about a change in us. There will take place a reform, a change or a transformation in our minds and lives. It will involve not letting Self control or rule us. Then we will say no to the lust of the flesh and worldly pleasures and temptations, and yes to the Spirit. The sinful nature of the flesh will be a part of us as long as we live here on this earth, but we are not to let it control our minds and lives. We must let the Holy Spirit enter our minds, so that we will be partakers of the divine nature. And we will be partakers of the divine nature as long as we stay close to Jesus, and do His will.11

When we let the Spirit control our minds, we will turn away from impurity, cheating, adultery, lust, envy and everything that has to do with sin. We will not love the world and the things that are in it anymore, but rather love Jesus and everything He represented in His life and teachings. We will receive a new mind, new purposes and new motives. People will notice that a change has taken place. The fruit of the Spirit will be shown in our lives, such as love, joy, peace, goodness, patience and so on.12 In other words, a character change takes place in our lives. It is a pleasure to let Jesus be represented in our daily lives, by not taking part in the pleasures and the lust of this world. This we can not do alone, by ourselves, but in our efforts to resist the temptations of the devil and live for Christ, we can unite our weakness with the strength of Jesus.13 It is this kind of revival and transformation that Jesus and the Bible are speaking about, totally different from faintings on command, hypnotic repetitions of words, ecstatic and uncontrolled laughter and so on.

When the born-again Christian learns to know Jesus and the unlimited love He has shown us, in order to save us, then this person will love Jesus dearly. He or she wants to be a disciple of Jesus, and will by the guidance of the Holy Spirit try to help others on the path to heaven.

Dear reader! Remember that even if you feel unworthy to come to God in humility and prayer, even if you have fallen very deeply into sin, Jesus stands there like the father of the prodigal son with arms opened wide, ready to accept us, as long as we are willing to repent and forsake our sins. The Holy Spirit calls on you to make this decision now. If you still doubt whether Jesus accepts you or not, then remember His own words: "him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out."14 This is Jesus. Such is His love for human beings.

THEY WILL PREACH A CORRECT BIBLICAL MESSAGE

Those who have humbled themselves before God, repented from their sins and accepted the salvation of Jesus by faith, will receive forgiveness for their sins. They will be partakers of baptism, and by the grace of God receive the Holy Spirit as the source of power in their lives. They also will go out and preach a correct Biblical message.

They will preach that Jesus is the only one who can save us, and that it is up to you and me if we will accept this gift of salvation by grace through faith.15
They will preach that if we forget to stay close to Jesus and then sin, God will only look upon us as righteous if we wholeheartedly repent of our sins and accept the gift of salvation.16
They will preach that - just like Jesus, who came to this earth as a degenerated man, had to receive power and strength from God in order to obtain victory in every temptation,17 so we, too, can - by God's help - have victory in every temptation that we meet.18
They will not only preach that God is love, but "this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments ( not the commandments you find in the Catechism, but God's Ten Commandments in Exodus 20: 3-17) are not grievous."19

They will preach that Jesus was one with the Father. He was God. He was the Creator. When Jesus came to save the human race from sin, He clothed His divinity with humanity. For 4000 years the race had been decreasing in physical strength, in mental power and in moral worth; and Christ took upon Himself the infirmities of degenerate humanity. He was tempted in all points as we are, but He did not sin.21 Only in this way could He save us.
They will preach that if we are wholeheartedly surrendered to Jesus Christ, we will "be partakers of the divine nature" - by His Spirit.22
They will preach that we will receive all the power and strength we need (by the Holy Spirit) in order not to sin, and that "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God."23
They will preach that the change in our lives has to happen now, before the coming of Jesus, so that we may be clean and prepared when Jesus returns in the clouds of heaven. For "there shall in no wise enter into it (in heaven) any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life."24
Do you doubt that Jesus can give you victory in every temptation? As long as we stay close to Him and have a constant relationship with Jesus, like the branch to the vine, we will receive the help we need in order to gain victory over sin.25 When do you hear this being preached?

A MESSAGE OF SALVATION AND A MESSAGE OF WARNING

Dear reader! It is important that we place ourselves on the side of Jesus now, so that we may receive the Spirit of God and be a part of the last movement that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are behind, before the return of Jesus. The Bible, in Revelation chapter 14, verses 6-12, mentions three special messages God's faithful servants will preach just before the coming of Jesus. We are also strongly urged to LEAVE all false religious systems and revivals, so that we will not have a part in their apostasy and sins.26 Will you accept this challenge? Remember that those who place themselves on the side of Jesus, have the strongest one on their side. Jesus says: "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations"...27

Let us come to a conclusion: We must be aware of the fact that the charismatic movement is a global movement, a movement that is seeking to unite the world under false manifestations, a movement that unfortunately is one of the means that Satan is using in order to gather "Christianity" and different religions into one. Protestants that have thrown off the shield of faith, will - together with Catholics and worldly people indiscriminately - unite in the last times. Satan will strengthen his cause by seducing them all into the camp of spiritualism. Many will regard this alliance as a great movement that will unite and convert the world and finally proclaim the much longed for Millenium. This will be a fulfillment of the prophecy of the Bible that tells us how the world will unite through spiritualism. And we see the prelude to this fulfillment now. 28

I pray that we all will take our stand completely and totally on the side of Jesus, so that we may receive the Holy Spirit. Only then can we be able to discern the false from the genuine. Only then can we be ready when Jesus soon returns to gather His people and take them home to heaven. May you and I be among them!

In the blessed hope,

Bente and Abel Struksnes


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References:

1. Matt. 8. 5-13; Acts 3. 3-19
2. 2. Thes. 2. 9
3. Rev. 16. 13,14
4. Matt. 7. 21-23
5. Matt. 7. 15-20
6. Matt. 6. 33
7. Acts 5. 32
8. 2. Kings 5
9. 1. Cor. 14. 20
10. John 8. 32-34
11. 2. Pet. 1. 3,4; 1. John 3. 9; 1. John 2. 1,2
12. Gal. 5. 22
13. Phil. 2. 12,13
14. Luke 15. 11-32; John 6. 37
15. John 14. 6; John 3. 16
16. 1. John 2. 1,2; Heb. 8. 1+2
17. John 5. 30
18. 1. Cor. 10.13; Matt. 28.18
19. 1. John 5.3
20. Rom. 8.3; John. 1. 1-3+14; Jes. 9.6; 2.Pet. 1.4
21. Heb. 2.16-18; Heb. 4.15-17
22. 2. Pet. 1. 3,4
23. 1 John 3.9; 2. Pet. 1.10
24. Rom. 12. 1,2; James 1.4; Rev. 21.27; 1. Thess. 4. 13-18
25. 1. Cor. 10.13; John 15. 4+5
26. Rev. 18. 1-4
27. Matt. 28.18; Rev. 17. 13,14; Rev. 5. 12-14
28. Rev. 16. 12-14; Rev. 17. 12-14; "The Great Controversy" by E. G. White p. 588
29. "Freedom's Ring" by Bob Trefz, March 1991, p. 9-18.
30. 1. John 2.4
31. Matt. 5.17-19
32. Eze. 33.31
33. James 2. 14-26; 1. John 5.3; John 14. 23,24
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"Hillary is down wit' O.P.P."

Hillary ('stand by your pocket-book') Clinton at COP15


Hillary Clinton Pledges $100B for Developing Countries
New York Times - Lisa Friedman, Darren Samuelsohn - ‎7 hours ago‎
COPENHAGEN -- Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton has promised the United States will help raise ...

World Citizen: Human Rights in the Age of Obama and Clinton
World Politics Review - ‎7 hours ago‎
With the volume of criticism rising, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton offered a detailed presentation of her -- and presumably the administration's ...
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*(Google search page)
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O.P.P. means Other People's Property.
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Fire and Brimstone

26And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days of the Son of man.

27They did eat, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all.

28Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded;

29But the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all.

30Even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed.

Luke 17: 27-30.


I've often heard certain Gospel preachers referred to as Preachers of Fire and Brimstone.
Our Lord Jesus the Christ, stated that "the (same) day that Lot left Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all".

Now a days, this warning from Jesus is ignored in favor of smooth preaching (like smooth Jazz), feel-good sermons that don't offend anyone, instead they encourage people to continue their sinful ways, but only modify their behavior; change their attitudes to a more positive one so they can look forward to a prosperous, more fulfilling life. This is one reason why Tele-Evangelists are so popular with those that claim to be christians.

In a time when people are looking forward to 'celebrating' the winter solstice; When many are advocating in the courts and in the media for the rights of Marriage of people of the same gender; When children and youth are being indoctrinated in humanistic socialistic ideology, advancing a "Global" (Godless) consciousness; When Safe Sex is presented as a means to prevent communicable sexual diseases; When abortion is considered healthcare; At a time when anything goes, and the only thing not accepted is truth; It is time for remembering Jesus words of warning about these days resembling those of Lot's day. Fire and Brimstone is the type of message required for this time to shaken awake the masses that are snoring while they walk among us. Fire and Brimstone is what will finally awaken most of humanity; Yet, then it will be too late to heed!
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Arsenio.
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What ever Lola wants, Lola gets?



I wonder how many people can remember Lola Falana?
She appeared on The Tonight Show, Laugh In, The Flip Wilson Show, and her own TV specials....

Her motto used to be: "Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets".

Well, she made quite an impression on me way back then, with that statement. Was she conceited or what? That was show-business, I understand.

Now as the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen winds down I wonder....

President Obama will make a trip to COP15, and I contemplate the parallels with Lola Falana;
So far, Mr. Obama has advocated forcefully for all the social changes on his agenda with little regard to opposition, or the popularity of his moves.

Will he give away the store as if it were his to give away?
Will he continue on his "whatever Obama wants, Obama gets", campaign?

I hope he wakes up and sees the irrationality of his changes to the status quo. After all, he was only voted president, not the King?
He has single-handedly restructured the American Economy within just 11 months, for the worse; He's fired CEO's of major U.S. corporations at whim. Now he speaks of placing caps on salaries of directors of 'private firms'.

Why not limit governmnet civil servants salaries, too?
Not too many people earn $400, 000 a year, or $200, 000, in the private sector?

Now as he embarks on this voyage to Scandinavia for the second time in a week.
What will he do now? Promise the world a subsistence allowance at our cost?
Will he fall for that carbon foot print nonsense?

"Whatever Obama wants, Obama gets"?

It's time to step out of character and realize this is not Chicagoland or Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana; There is still a Constitution in effect that guarantees checks and balances on the powers of government.

And yes, Mr. president, executive power, too!

Climate change is a fraud; A means of further subverting the soverignty of this Constitutional Republic. The story of Robin Hood is being written all over again, this time in Norway.


Arsenio
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Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Happy Birthday, Tea Party


By fitsnews • on December 16, 2009

We’d be remiss if we didn’t point out that this December 16th marks the 236th anniversary of the original Boston Tea Party, one of the defining moments of the American Revolution.

It’s especially appropriate to mark the anniversary this year, as 2009 has indeed been the “Year of the Tea Party,” a series of genuine, populist uprisings against the policies of an American government that’s sadly become every bit as tyrannical and repressive as the old British Empire from which it declared its independence.

Anyway, our hats off to everyone who is standing up for this nation’s founding principles … and those who continue to seek the expansion of freedom in all its forms.
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An Alien Space Ship hovering over New York City?




This evening on BBC News (radio) at approximately 5:00 GMT, a person named Philip Hudson commented (while being interviewed) that Copenhagen 15 Conference wishes would be approved by the United States of America if an Alien Space Ship were hovering over New York City as a threat.

Sounds like a perfect scenario right out of a science fiction film; Or, is it?

If such a phenomenon were to occur would it extort the U.S. into conforming with the Global Enviromental Agenda shifting wealth from those that have earned it (U.S.) to those demanding a multi-trillion dollar hand out? Money that doesn't even exist?


Arsenio.
See if you can find it:
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Hope in Copenhagen

Tuesday, December 15, 2009
By Megan Sweas


Having spent part of my Thanksgiving vacation in Hopenhagen, as the locals are calling it, I have been optimistic that this round of climate change talks would achieve something.

But now that I'm on the other side of the ocean from the talks, it's hard to keep that optimism up. I admit that I am not following the talks too closely, though the "news" from the Daily Show was distressing--both that limos are being brought in to cart around dignitaries and that some loud people (on FOX News, of course) are denying climate change.
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I’m glad for Catholic News Service’s update on the talks, in which we get the view from the developing world.
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I feel that I am represented well by the Catholic Church at least, and I’m thankful that the pope released his World Peace Day message about climate change now (the official day is January 1).
While angry protesters have caused some problems, there are a number of peaceful protesters as well. I thought this idea of ringing church bells 350 times to signify 350 ppm of carbon dioxide, the safe upper limit according to the latest science, was unique. And more than 11 million have signed this petition. I am inspired by the women religious/ecotheologians that Meghan writes about in her blog post.

But I can't help worrying that nothing or little will happen.
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This photo is of a new statue placed in the water near Copenhagen's famous Little Mermaid. A fat woman, representing rich, Western countries, rides on the back of a skinny African man, representing the poor. I was distressed by a comment on FOX (see the Daily Show) that said the rest of the world just wants to bring the U.S. standard of living in the down.

This statement discounts the fact that not everyone in the United States can afford to live in McMansions in the suburbs and drive around SUVs. And most Catholics know that de-emphasizing the material in favor of the spiritual will actually give you a higher quality of life.
“Live simply so that others may simply live” is a good prescription for happiness. God’s love is unlimited, but Earth's bounty is limited. Especially at this time of year when waste is so high (read my post on having a green Christmas from last year), we should try to live by our values and remember that the poor suffer because of the way we treat the Earth.
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ClimateGate, the Green Dragon, and the End of Christianity - Special Report


AIM Column By Cliff Kincaid December 9, 2009


What is the real agenda behind the fraudulent “science?


With the ClimateGate revelations of flimsy "science" behind the man-made global warming theory, the role of the religious left in promoting this fraudulent scheme now deserves serious media scrutiny. Walter Grazer, who served as the Director of the Environmental Justice Program for the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops from 1993 to 2007 and is now interim executive director of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE), was asked for a comment on ClimateGate and replied, "I am really not up on that issue at all."

Ignoring the growing scandal, the National Religious Coalition on Creation Care issued a press release on the occasion of the opening of the Copenhagen climate change conference declaring that "climate change is a moral and ethical issue because it deals with lifestyle issues and choices that all people must face." Cardinal Theodore McCarrick was quoted as saying that Catholic bishops will be promoting a new "Climate Covenant" and "take the message on the seriousness of climate change to every Catholic parish in America."

But what is the real agenda behind the fraudulent "science?" Is it something more than political and economic control over people's lives?

Dr. James Wanliss, Associate Professor of Physics at Presbyterian College, has written The Green Dragon, a book about how environmentalism is actually committed to "the reconstruction of a pagan world order" and "rejection of Christian spirituality." Wanliss argues that the environmental movement "is a religion with a vision of sin and repentance, heaven and hell. It even has a special vocabulary, with words like 'sustainability' and 'carbon neutral.' Its communion is organic food. Its sacraments are sex, abortion, and when all else fails, sterilization. Its saints are Al Gore and the InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change."

"Both professing Protestants and Roman Catholics bear a burden of guilt for the current political mess we are in with the global warming and other hysterias," he argues. "If the church had not turned from the gospel of Jesus Christ it is unlikely the Green Dragon would have been able to so deeply sink its fangs into our lives."

Green Religion

Major U.S. religious groups involved in the "climate change" campaign include the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, the Catholic Campaign on Climate Change, the Evangelical Environmental Network and the Evangelical Climate Initiative.

Dr. E. Calvin Beisner, national spokesman for the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation, identifies evangelical leftist Ron Sider as a key figure behind the Evangelical Environmental Network and the Evangelical Climate Initiative. "He's been pressing for wealth redistribution for over thirty years, and the global treaty being touted to fight global warming is nothing if it isn't an exercise in wealth redistribution," says Beisner.

Sider, who is also founder and president of Evangelicals for Social Action, is the author of Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger.

Richard Cizik, who served for ten years as vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals, was instrumental in creating the Evangelical Climate Initiative. He now serves as a fellow of the George Soros-funded Open Society Institute, where his current job is to "organize and host gatherings of evangelical faith leaders, policy-makers and academics" on climate change.

Beisner says it's a shame that evangelicals are being asked to jump on the global warming bandwagon right when the wheels are falling off because of the ClimateGate scandal.

Big Liberal Money

Wanliss identifies the National Council of Churches (NCC) as playing a major role. He says massive infusions of "green"--money, that is--for the NCC come from left-leaning philanthropies including Pew Charitable Trusts, Tides Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Turner Foundation, W. Alton Jones Foundation, V. Kann Rasmussen Foundation, and New World Foundation.

As a result, "There has been, in past decades, a cosmic shift towards a social climate that begins to favor the environment--polar bears, trees, and bugs--over human beings."

Another major player, the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE), "has an awesome army of organizational links and is itself something of a matryoshka, the Russian nested doll, which is never what it appears at first sight. For it is also not grassroots but launched with funding from left-leaning foundations, primarily the Pew Charitable Trust," he says.

NRPE describes itself as "an association of independent faith groups" that includes the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the National Council of Churches, the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life, and the Evangelical Environmental Network.

"When it began in 1993," Wanliss says, "NRPE had over $5 million in grants to accomplish the goal, according to executive director Paul Gorman, of utilizing churches to produce a 'distinctly religious response to the crisis of environmental sustainability and social justice.' The Partnership has been able to spread environmentalist propaganda and teaching aids to almost every Jewish, and to several hundred thousand Protestant congregations in America."

Through another entity, the Au Sable Institute, Wanliss says that these forces "have infiltrated Christian higher education by careful placement of teachers and teaching materials on environmental activism in schools associated with the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU). Many of these schools are conservative in politics or theology. What they teach there under the Au Sable banner, will surprise their supporters. Not surprisingly, the Au Sable Institute and the NRPE share a subset of the same donor pool. Little by little wolves try to douse Christian resistance and lead sheep by troubled waters to accept the inevitability of a divine environmental movement."

The Catholic Coalition on Climate Change was launched in 2006 as a vehicle of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. This group says that "Because we are not experts on climate change and its consequences, we rely on a scientific consensus (best represented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) to guide our activities." Of course, it is the IPCC that is embroiled in the ClimateGate scandal.

In addition to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Catholic Coalition on Climate Change enjoys the active support of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, Carmelite NGO, Catholic Charities USA; the Catholic Health Association of the United States, Catholic Relief Services, the Conference of Major Superiors of Men, the Franciscan Action Network, the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the National Catholic Rural Life Conference, and the National Council of Catholic Women.

A related organization is the Catholic Climate Covenant, which claims that the poor are suffering because of the "carbon footprints" of people in the United States and other "rich" nations.
Wanliss says such notions are essential to the "alternative religion" of environmentalism.
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Penance for New "Sin"

He explains that, "people with money to burn can buy indulgences just like in the medieval Roman Catholic Church. In that religion priests sold indulgences to souls burdened with guilt over their sins. Even today, when Roman indulgences are not generally for sale--at least not for money--forgiveness is only assured to those who complete the required tasks that earn the indulgence. The green movement has absorbed these faux religious elements, and for each one has its own ersatz affectation. Whatever it may mean, raping the earth is not ecologically sound or morally attractive. But if you must rape Mother Earth, then be sure to visit the Green Dragon and pay a sum of money to cleanse your guilt, until next time. Forgiveness for sins is only a carbon offset away."

"It is possible to calculate the extent of one's sins online," Wanliss points out. "According to TerraPass, over the past three years my weekly driving has resulted in about 5,224 pounds of CO2 a year, and for a mere $29.95 I can buy an indulgence that will offset the environmental impact of my reckless, indeed sacrilegious, lifestyle. These 'carbon offsets' will do as little for the salvation of the world as papal indulgences would for my soul. But for people with a desperate spiritual hunger it is a panacea and penance they are eager to embrace, and an incredible gift to give-it promises guilt free living and a purpose driven life. If only it were true. Go ahead, say the Gore-like business barons, pay the toll at our gate, and this year 'Give the gift of green.'"

Meanwhile, America Magazine, the national Catholic weekly published by the Jesuits, is complaining that Congress did not pass legislation on greenhouse gas emissions before the current United Nations Copenhagen meeting. "The United States will thus remain the only developed nation with no established target for carbon reduction," it says.

The magazine praises the National Religious Partnership for the Environment and the Catholic Campaign on Climate Change for being "vigorous advocates for integrating the world's poor in a climate covenant with funding for both adapting infrastructure to meet the hardships of changing climate and for transferring green technology."

It goes on, "If the planet is to survive, as Pope Benedict XVI concluded in Caritas in Veritate, all nations must accept binding reductions in carbon emissions and construct an equitable structure for energy consumption and for sharing the development of green technology among rich and poor nations--for the sake of this generation and generations to come."
.
Pope Endorses Green Religion
.
As AIM has reported, in the encyclical, the Pope says that there is a need for a "a worldwide redistribution of energy resources" and that, "The technologically advanced societies can and must lower their domestic energy consumption, either through an evolution in manufacturing methods or through greater ecological sensitivity among their citizens."

At the same time, he warned that "it is contrary to authentic development to view nature as something more important than the human person" and that this position "leads to attitudes of neo-paganism or a new pantheism."

Indeed, the U.N. Environmental Program, which is now promoting a "Global Green New Deal," has celebrated the idea of an "Environmental Sabbath," in which children hold hands around a tree and meditate.

Wanliss notes that George Orwell's book Animal Farm tells of the visionary pig Old Major who had a dream that soon proved disastrous: "And now, comrades, I will tell you about my dream of last night. I cannot describe that dream to you. It was a dream of the earth as it will be when Man is forgotten."

Wanliss cautions that attempts by Church leaders and Christian organizations to synthesize a Christian environmentalism can succeed "only by exorcising truth, and ultimately, by expelling Christianity..."

But he adds, "Will it not be ironic if the Green Dragon they so adore ends up destroying them?"
.
Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org


Ron Paul EXPOSED! Himself

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9KTgv7O05Uhttp://


SteveTrinityMay 31, 2009

Sorry to inform you that Ron Paul is an illuminati puppet.Just to clarify this up.I did not make this video. I uploaded from one of my subscriptions...But it doesn't change the fact. Seeing is believing.

.

Jan MARCUSSEN's Newsletter December 2009,

Pastor Jan Marcussen - P O Box 68, Thompsonville, IL 62890 -

Phone 618-627-2357 - Fax - 618-627-2712

This is your 494th letter - My web-sites are Reg6.com, HenryPotter.org, & WBNS.US

December Y2K+9 The AT Radio Network is on the air at Atradio.net


“And such as do wickedly against the covenant shall he corrupt by flatteries: but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits... and some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white...But in his estate shall he honour the God of forces: and a god whom his fathers knew not shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things... And he shall cause them to rule over many, and shall divide the land for gain... But tidings out of the east and out of the north shall trouble him: therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many... And he shall plant the tabernacles of his palace between the seas in the glorious holy mountain; yet he shall come to his end, and none shall help him.”

Dear SDA friends around the world. Read all the boxes in this letter, then come back here and we’ll talk about what’s happening. Faith: Before we get shocked with the “Czar Wars,” I want to ask this - The temple of God is “on the sides of the north.” Ps. 48:2. And the cloud in which Jesus appears is “in the east.” So are the “tidings out of the east and out of the north” which “shall trouble him,” God’s three angels’ messages? In your last letter, you mentioned your conversation with the General Conference President concerning his plane ride with Ronald Reagan, and their words about religious laws; but you didn’t tell us what they said. Before you reveal the amazing Czar Wars, will you tell us about that now? Pastor Jan: Are you ready? Here we go -



Do you remember what this sign means?











*Visit Jan Marcussen's site to view this pdf Newsletter @

.

Time magazine names Bernanke 'Person of the Year'





Wed Dec 16, 2009 10:17am EST



By Mark Felsenthal

WASHINGTON, Dec 16 (Reuters) - Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke was named Person of the Year by Time magazine on Wednesday, a highly visible show of support at a time he seeks to beat back proposals that would erode the central bank's authority and independence.

Time credited Bernanke with creative leadership that ensured 2009 would be a year of recovery, however weak, rather than a catastrophic second Great Depression.

"The recession was the story of the year. Without Ben Bernanke ... it would have been a lot worse," Time managing editor Richard Stengel said in a statement.

"We've rarely had such a perfect revision of the cliche that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Bernanke didn't just learn from history; he wrote it himself and was damned if he was going to repeat it."

Time's selection of Bernanke, an expert on the Depression, is sure to be noticed on Capitol Hill, where Fed-bashing has been the norm in recent weeks.

It comes a day ahead of a vote in the Senate Banking Committee on his nomination to a second term. His first four-year term as Fed chief expires on January 31.

Congress is considering proposals that would strip the Fed, which was due to close out a two-day policy meeting on Wednesday, of its regulatory authority over major banks and expose its interest rate decisions to audits.

One criticism that has been leveled at the Fed and the Obama administration is that despite efforts to prop up the financial system with billions of taxpayers' dollars, banks still show a reluctance to lend.

In an interview with Time, Bernanke said banks have been stabilized, but he conceded that lending remains too weak to support a healthy recovery.

"We have told the banks very clearly that we want them to make loans to creditworthy borrowers, where there are borrowers who can repay the loans," Bernanke said.

After a "near-death experience," banks are wary of taking on the kind of risk that led to the crisis, although they have rebuilt capital, he said.

Bernanke and his colleagues lowered overnight interest rates to near zero a year ago and have pumped more than a trillion dollars into the financial system to overcome the crisis.

Now, Bernanke said it was time to put in place reforms to ward off future crises. "We need to have extensive reform in the private sector, in the public sector, to eliminate these risks in the future," he said.

The Fed, along with the administration and Congress, still has a lot to do to get the economy back to stability and start creating jobs again, he said.

"Even though the recession may be technically over, in a sense that the economy is growing, it's going to feel like a recession for some time, because unemployment remains very high, about 10 percent," he said.

He also said that Congress and the administration need to develop "a credible medium term ... strategy for fiscal policy."

The Obama administration had proposed making the Fed the lead regulatory policing the financial sector for 'systemic" risks. Bernanke said the Fed had never proposed that it be responsible for regulating the entire financial system, although he argued no other agency has its expertise.

"We have a wide range of expertise that makes us the natural supervisor for these large, complex firms," he said.

Banks have yet to broadly understand the need for more restraint on pay after they were bailed out with taxpayer money, he said.

The Fed instituted policies "which we'll be enforcing on banks" that require them to structure pay in ways that align it with performance and discourage excessive risk taking, he said.

"We are going to be looking at that as part of our supervision of banks," he said. (Additional reporting by Ciara Linnane; Editing by Padraic Cassidy)



.

We are counted as sheep for the slaughter


Psalm 44


1We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old.

2How thou didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst afflict the people, and cast them out.

3For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them.

4Thou art my King, O God: command deliverances for Jacob.

5Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.

6For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me.

7But thou hast saved us from our enemies, and hast put them to shame that hated us.

8In God we boast all the day long, and praise thy name for ever. Selah.

9But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and goest not forth with our armies.

10Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy: and they which hate us spoil for themselves.

11Thou hast given us like sheep appointed for meat; and hast scattered us among the heathen.

12Thou sellest thy people for nought, and dost not increase thy wealth by their price.

13Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derision to them that are round about us.

14Thou makest us a byword among the heathen, a shaking of the head among the people.

15My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me,

16For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth; by reason of the enemy and avenger.

17All this is come upon us; yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant.

18Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way;

19Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death.

20If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god;

21Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.

22Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.

23Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, cast us not off for ever.

24Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and forgettest our affliction and our oppression?

25For our soul is bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.

26Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy mercies' sake.
.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

THE MODERN HUMANISTIC ERA


CHAPTER 44 : THE MODERN HUMANISTIC ERA

The general progress in Reformation that marked the era of Protestant Reformation went
in reverse during the modern era of world history. As we shall see, the new era became
characterized by increasing humanism and decreasing faith in the word of God. This in
turn gave way to decreasing will to uphold the Ten Commandments. Heresies again
began to multiply and increase. Many of the Protestant churches became lukewarm and
doctrinally corrupted. And the Protestant nations became de-Protestantized and even de-
Christianized. As false religion and false worship increased during the era, God gave up
societies to judgment, just as He revealed in Romans 1. Sins like sodomy, adultery, and
abortion abounded. Deadly revolutions, civil wars, and even world wars multiplied
.

The causes of this deformation are largely owing to the intrigues and persecutions by the
Romanist powers, the educational influence of the Jesuits, and the spiritual dullness and
even apostasy of the Protestants. Too many protestants lacked the heart to uphold
Biblical truth and enforce the Ten Commandments. They forgot that the very prosperity
they enjoyed came by way of God's blessing for their earlier faithfulness to God's word.
They began to conceive it was the result of their own native reason and skill, instead of
God's grace. The Protestants therefore became easy prey for the Jesuits and other
heretics, who offered philosophies contrary to scripture. The Protestant Reformation
quickly gave way to the Enlightenment movement as the dominant intellectual force
ordering societal conduct and civil policy.

The Enlightenment was a philosophical movement arising out of the 17th century which
advocated a rational and scientific approach to religious, social, political, and economic
issues, as opposed to an approach based upon divine revelation. As such, it promoted a
secular view of the world and a general sense of progress and perfectibility. And it
attacked religious authority, dogmatism, intolerance, censorship, and economic and social
restraints. It sought to usher in an Age of Reason that it was believed would rid mankind
of the ills it faced. It was thoroughly humanistic in its foundations, skeptical of the
revealed religion of scripture. As the schoolmasters of Europe, the Jesuits were able to
promote a form of humanism which eventually gave way to the secular humanism of the
Enlightenment.

We have already seen how the Jesuit Order arose in the era of Protestant Reformation,
from its founding by Ignatius Loyola. We also treated its methods and its ends. We
noted how one of its aims, if not its preeminent aim, was the thwarting of established
Protestantism. The Holy Roman Empire was declining and proving inadequate to stop
the Protestant Reformation. So a new institution – one more equipped for the task – was
needed by Rome. In stepped the Jesuit Order, led by its Superior General (sometimes
referred to as
“the Black Pope”), to fill these shoes. In the era of Protestant Reformation
she began to enjoy remarkable success, and she continued her success into the modern
era. Indeed, one important factor for the very rise of the age of secular humanism was
the promotion of humanism by the Jesuits. Their influence was profound because of their
leading role in education through their network of schools.

The establishment of schools as a means of outreach evolved and was not conceived at
the inception of the Order. In 1547, scarcely a half-dozen years after the founding of the
Society, Ignatius received an unexpected and unsolicited invitation from leading citizens
of the city of Messina in Sicily to found and staff a secondary school for their sons. He
accepted, and the school opened the next year.

That same year, thirty members of the senate in Palermo, impressed by what was
happening in Messina, petitioned Ignatius for a similar school. Again he acquiesced.
Other schools soon followed -- in 1551 schools opened in both Vienna and Rome. By the
time Ignatius died in 1556, the Jesuits were operating some thirty schools, practically all
of them secondary, and just a few years later Polanco would write in the name of the new
general to inform Jesuits that education had become the primary ministry of the Society.

Meanwhile the school in Rome, the “Roman College,” had developed into a university,
and, while secondary schools would always be far more numerous, other institutions of
higher learning would henceforth be an important part of the Jesuit enterprise. Within a
century 300 Jesuit colleges dotted Catholic Europe in "one of the great extensions and
consolidations of Renaissance humanism".
By 1773, the Jesuits were operating more than
eight hundred universities, seminaries, primary, and secondary schools around the globe.
The world had never seen before, nor has it seen since, such an immense network of
educational institutions operating on an international basis under a single aegis. Jesuits
were called the schoolmasters of Europe during these centuries, not only because of their
schools but also for their pre-eminence as scholars and for the thousands of textbooks
they composed. Christopher Clavius, S.J., for example, whom Enlightenment
philosophers Descartes and Leibniz acknowledged as a source of their inspiration, wrote
a standard geometry text used throughout Europe.

Gerónimo Nadal, one of Ignatius’s closest collaborators, was also the founder and first
rector of the school in Messina. He drew up the curriculum along lines in accord with
those promoted by Renaissance humanists, and this became, along with some of Nadal’s
other writings, the first, somewhat indistinct, blueprint for the schools that were springing
up everywhere. A number of attempts were made in succeeding decades to come up with
a comprehensive Jesuit plan of studies that could be used as a guide in all
the Jesuit
schools. It was Claudio Acquaviva who was able to bring this long-standing project to
completion and officially publish in 1599 the Ratio studiorum that became the Magna
Charta of Jesuit education. It included the humanities - literature, history, drama, etc. - as
well as philosophy and theology. This meant that the Jesuit Ratio assumed that literary or
humanistic subjects could be integrated into the study of professional or scientific
subjects; that is, it assumed that the humanistic program of the Renaissance was
compatible with the Scholastic program of the Middle Ages. Its basic premises were
humanistic, and quite contrary to scriptural Protestant principles. Man's reason – and not
God's word – was treated by the Jesuit Ratio as the ultimate fountain of knowledge.
The Ratio had impact far beyond Jesuit institutions, truly setting the educational
standards for schools in Protestant and Catholic nations alike. It was seen as a proper
statement of ideals, methods, and objectives shared broadly by educators in early modern
Europe. For the Society of Jesus, the Ratio studiorum symbolized a certain maturing in its
commitment to education, which had great repercussions for the future of Roman
Catholicism. The schools were often at the center of the culture of the towns and cities
where they were located: typically, they would produce several plays or even ballets per
year, and some maintained important astronomical observatories.

Perhaps most profoundly, it meant a special relationship to culture in that the Society as
an institution had a systematic relationship to “secular” learning, for its members had to
be prepared to teach both the classics of Latin and Greek literature of the humanistic
tradition (Homer, Virgil, Cicero, and Terence, for example) and the scientific texts of
Aristotle in the Scholastic tradition (we must remember that “philosophy” meant to a
large extent “natural philosophy,” subjects we call biology, physics, and astronomy). If
Jesuits were to teach these subjects, they would also almost perforce begin to write about
them, at least to the point of producing textbooks for their students.

Ignatius Loyola had mentioned in the Jesuit Constitutions the possibility of “writing
books useful for
the common good.” Few such books were produced, however, until the
number of schools began to grow and the need for appropriate and inexpensive textbooks
felt. With textbooks in view, Ignatius in the last year of his life went to immense trouble
to secure a good press for the Roman College, which was installed and in good working
order within a few months of his death. Among the first books published by this first
press operated by the Jesuits was André des Freux’s edition of Martial’s Epigrams (1558)
- a book tellingly by a pagan. Within two generations, Jesuits were producing books on a
great scale, a phenomenon that would come to characterize the order. Many of these were
textbooks or at least related directly to instruction in the Jesuit classrooms, but others
ranged far more broadly and began to touch on almost every imaginable subject. The
experience of the Jesuit missionaries in exotic places like Japan, China, and Viet Nam
gave, when viewed largely, an extraordinarily cosmopolitan cast to this production.
It is highly probable that even without the schools, the Jesuits would have produced a
significant number of books, for their counterparts in other religious orders did so.
However that may be, the incontrovertible fact is that the schools provided the impetus
for an extraordinarily copious production. They also required that the scope of that
production be consistently and predictably wide-ranging, for the schools took the Jesuits
into just about every conceivable aspect of human culture and made them reflect upon it
and come up with something to say. That they did, and their humanistic influence
penetrated the world over.

Jesuits in the Protestant nations tended to promote religious toleration and secularism,
while those in the Roman Catholic nations tended to urge the maintenance of Roman
Catholic Church privileges and suppression of religious dissent
. The reasons for this
variance are not hard to discern. In both cases the Jesuit Order pursued a policy which
was in the best political interest of the Roman Catholic Church and
the Jesuit Order, even
though the Order’s philosophical position was not consistent across national lines. In the
Roman Catholic nations
the Jesuits promoted Renaissance humanism, whereas the Jesuits
in the Protestant nations tended to promote secular humanism as a means to wean the
nation away from established Protestantism.

In the Protestant nations an informal coalition evolved of Roman Catholics, Anabaptists,
Enlightenment intellectuals, Jews, and other heretical factions in favor of religious
toleration and secularism.
They did not want to be disadvantaged by the established
Protestant religion. Even within the established Protestant churches in the Protestant
nations, Enlightenment ideas eventually became popular. As a consequence,
“Protestantism” – at least in political terms – became synonymous with religious
toleration, in contrast to the suppression of religious dissent which persisted in Roman
Catholic nations.

“Protestantism” thereby gradually lost its original meaning among the self-professed
Protestants.
In the Reformation era, Protestantism had meant structuring and ordering
everything in accordance with God’s word. The Bible was treated as the foundation of
all knowledge, which it is. This had meant the Ten Commandments were to be upheld by
the state, and religious falsehood was to be suppressed.
The confessions of the
Reformation era uniformly upheld the Establishment Principle. They also upheld such
Protestant distinctives as the doctrines of grace. But as “Protestants” abandoned true
Protestantism, the very term “Protestant” began to take on new meanings in the minds of
men.
Even Arminians – whose doctrine of salvation was actually closer to that of the
Roman Catholic Church than that of historic Protestantism – became identified with
Protestantism. “Protestantism” so called (albeit not the true Protestantism of the
Reformation era) swelled with all manner of heretics- from Arminian Methodists to
Unitarian Congregationalists to Baptist separatists. As the number of heresies and
heretics abounded in the Protestant nations, the movement towards pluralism,
tolerationism, and secularism became all the greater.

Freemasonry developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as a means to
forward the aspirations of the Enlightenment.
People of all religious faiths were invited
into Masonic lodges as lodge “brothers”. Their vision was of a secular state where
people of all religious creeds could be treated equally. They idealized a brotherhood of
man, unbroken by religious distinctions.

The Roman Catholic Church and the Jesuit Order only objected to the Enlightenment
movement when its effects reverberated to the Roman Catholic nations and Roman
Catholic Church privileges became threatened. Roman (or Renaissance) humanism was
quite acceptable in the Roman Catholic Church, but secular humanism’s inroads into
Roman Catholic nations threatened Roman Catholic interests and privileges. Indeed,
within the Roman Catholic Church, the Jesuit Order had perhaps the most to lose by an
adoption of secular humanism in the Roman Catholic nations. The war against secular
humanism by the Roman Catholic Church included a ban in the eighteenth century on
Roman Catholic participation in freemasonry.

It is no exaggeration to assert that the Jesuit Order hatched the Enlightenment movement
which effectively overturned established Protestantism.

Paving the way for the Enlightenment was a French-born philosopher named Descartes
(1596-1650). Descartes sought to prove how, starting from a position of universal doubt,
he could through reason arrive at a system of truth. This methodology has earned him the
title of the ‘father of modern philosophy.’ This methodology directly contradicted the
historic reformed, Biblical view of theologians like Augustine and Calvin whose
methodology was instead: ‘I believe in order that I may know’ (or as worded in scripture,
‘the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom’). Reformed Christianity stresses man’s
inability to attain true knowledge about the fundamental nature of God and man apart
from divine revelation, due to man’s sinful corruption. Not surprisingly, Descartes
rejected this reformed principle, for he was a devout Roman Catholic, educated in the
Jesuit
College at La Flèche and the University of Poitiers. He was a product of the Jesuit
Ratio studiorum. Descartes had significant influence even in Protestant countries,
residing much of his life in Holland and the end of his life in Sweden. Descartes’
credibility was certainly enhanced by his significant achievements in mathematics and
science.
The German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz profoundly stimulated the
Enlightenment movement in Germany. Leibniz was born in Leipzig in 1646. Of
Lutheran background, he ended his life as a thorough-going humanistic rationalist.
Leibniz was the greatest polymath of modern philosophers, making contributions to
mathematics, jurisprudence, and history, as well as philosophy. He discovered
differential calculus and pioneered symbolic logic. He worked on among other things
hydraulic presses, windmills, lamps, submarines, clocks, carriages and waterpumps. He
traveled extensively, and corresponded with the leading humanists of his day. He was the
founder of the academy of Berlin. He wrote books on his rationalistic philosophy. These
works influenced Christian von Wolff, whose popularization of the Leibnizian system
became the standard academic philosophy in 18th century Germany.

The philosopher who arguably most popularized the Enlightenment among the Englishspeaking
peoples was John Locke (1632-1704). Locke was greatly influenced by the
humanistic philosophy of Descartes.
Locke argued that people had the gift of reason, or
the ability to think. In the Essay Concerning Human Understanding Locke proposed that
the mind is born blank, a tabula rasa upon which the world describes itself through the
experience of the five senses. Knowledge arising from sensation is perfected by
reflection, thus enabling humans to arrive at such ideas as space, time, and infinity.

Based upon man’s presumed native ability to reason, Locke thought men had the natural
ability to govern themselves and to look after the well being of society. He wrote, “The
state of nature has a law of nature to govern it, which [treats] everyone [equally]. Reason,
which is that law, teaches all mankind... that being all equal and independent, no one
ought to harm another in his life, health or possessions.”
Locke did not believe that God
had chosen a group or family of people to rule countries. He rejected the Divine Right of
Kings, which many kings and queens used to justify their right to rule. Instead, he argued
that governments should only operate with the consent of the people they are governing.
In this way, Locke supported democracy as a form of government. Locke wrote, “[We
have learned from] history we have reason to conclude that all peaceful beginnings of
government have been laid in the consent of the people.” Governments were formed,
according to Locke, to protect the right to life, the right to freedom, and the right to
property. Their rights were absolute, belonging to all the people. Locke also believed
that government power should be divided equally into three branches of government so
that politicians will not face the “temptation... to grasp at [absolute] power.” If any
government abused these rights instead of protecting them, then the people had the right
to rebel and form a new government.

John Locke spoke out against the control of any man against his will. This control was
acceptable neither in the form of an unfair government, nor in slavery. Locke wrote, “The
natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under
the will or legislative authority of man, but only have the law of nature for his rule.”

Consonant with this opinion, Locke asserted in “A Letter Concerning Toleration” that
“the toleration of those that differ from others in matters of religion is so agreeable to the
Gospel of Jesus Christ, and to the genuine reason of mankind, that it seems monstrous for
men to be so blind as not to perceive the necessity and advantage of it in so clear a light.”

Enlightenment thought struck at the heart of historic reformed doctrine. Historic
reformed doctrine urged the suppression of false religion and false worship by the
magistrate, and it rejected popular political revolution. As John Calvin wrote:

"This feeling of reverence, and even of piety, we owe to the utmost to all our rulers, be
their characters what they may. This I repeat the oftener, that we may learn not to
consider the individuals themselves, but hold it to be enough that by the will of the Lord
they sustain a character on which he has impressed and engraven inviolable majesty. But
rulers, you will say, owe mutual duties to those under them. This I have already
confessed. But if from this you conclude that obedience is to be returned to none but just
governors, you reason absurdly. Husbands are bound by mutual duties to their wives, and
parents to their children. Should husbands and parents neglect their duty; should the latter
be harsh and severe to the children whom they are enjoined not to provoke to anger, and
by their severity harass them beyond measure; should the former treat with the greatest
contumely the wives whom they are enjoined to love and to spare as the weaker vessels;
would children be less bound in duty to their parents, and wives to their husbands? They
are made subject to the froward and undutiful. Nay, since the duty of all is not to look
behind them, that is, not to inquire into the duties of one another, but to submit each to
his own duty, this ought especially to be exemplified in the case of those who are placed
under the power of others. Wherefore, if we are cruelly tormented by a savage, if we are
rapaciously pillaged by an avaricious or luxurious, if we are neglected by a sluggish, if, in
short, we are persecuted for righteousness’ sake by an impious and sacrilegious prince,
let us first call up the remembrance of our faults, which doubtless the Lord is chastising
by such scourges. In this way humility will curb our impatience. And let us reflect that it
belongs not to us to cure these evils, that all that remains for us is to implore the help of
the Lord, in whose hands are the hearts of kings, and inclinations of kingdoms.65 “God
standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the gods.” Before his face
shall fall and be crushed all kings and judges of the earth, who have not kissed his
anointed, who have enacted unjust laws to oppress the poor in judgment, and do violence
to the cause of the humble, to make widows a prey, and plunder the fatherless…But in
that obedience which we hold to be due to the commands of rulers, we must always make
the exception, nay, must be particularly careful that it is not incompatible with obedience
to Him to whose will the wishes of all kings should be subject, to whose decrees their
commands must yield, to whose majesty their sceptres must bow."

John Locke was actually well read in the works of the Jesuit Bellarmine, but since
Catholicism was such a social taboo at the time in England, he never openly admitted to
it.
A careful reading of Locke’s Second Treaties on Government reveals the striking
similarities between Bellarmine and Locke.
Bellarmine, like Locke after him, argued for
popular sovereignty as follows: “Political power resides immediately in the whole
multitude as in an organic unit. The Divine law has not given it to any particular man;
therefore, it has given it to the multitude.” Both could then urge the natural right of
popular revolution against a ruler, since both held legitimate government depends upon
the consent of the governed. In contrast, Calvin advocated the responsibility of
subordinate magistrates to protect the rights of God and men, but rejected popular
revolution.

The Enlightenment philosophies of Descartes, Leibniz, Locke and others, which really
had their foundational origins in
Jesuit philosophy, undermined and eventually
overwhelmed the Biblical faith in the West.
It would take time for the Enlightenment
ideals to take root in the constitutions of nations, but once it did, the formerly Protestant
states became dominated by secular humanism.

Yet, not all the blessings of the Protestant Reformation were lost in this new era, any
more than all the curses of Romanism were lost during the era of Protestant Reformation.
The Protestant Reformation helped usher in great industrial and technological
revolutions, beginning in the Protestant nations. The products of these technological
innovations have consisted not only of weapons of destruction, but also tools for
disseminating knowledge, including knowledge of the Bible. The wider distribution of
the Bible has thus marked the modern era. The Bible and reformed literature about the
Bible has become available in almost every corner of the earth, as communication and
transportation have improved. This access to the truth has paved the way for a future
Reformation even grander in scope than the Protestant Reformation. But it has also
meant mankind is more culpable for refusing to implement scriptural truth in our modern
era, with ignorance less an excuse than it was in previous ages.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

CHAPTER 44 : THE MODERN HUMANISTIC ERA

This second volume in a two-part series on church history is primarily an edited version
of the following works on church history and Biblical interpretation:

James A. Wylie, The History of Protestantism (Cassell & Company, Limited:
London, Paris & New York. 1878). (see electronic version at
http://www.whatsaiththescripture.com/Fellowship/James.A.Wylie.html )
Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church (Logos Research Systems, Inc.: Oak
Harbor, WA, 1997). (see electronic version at
http://www.ccel.org/s/schaff/history/About.htm)
J. Parnell McCarter, Sabbath Bible Survey Tests and Assignments (PHSC: Grand Rapids,
MI, 2003). (see electronic version at http://www.puritans.net/curriculum/)
J. Parnell McCarter, Let My People Go (PHSC: Grand Rapids, MI, 2003). (see electronic
version at http://www.puritans.net/curriculum/ )
The on-line resources of Historicism Research Foundation at http://www.historicism.net/
also proved invaluable for my understanding of Biblical prophecy. Biblical prophecy
concerning Christian church history, especially as revealed in the book of Revelation,
serves as the foundation upon which all church histories should be based.
Other references especially consulted for this chapter include:

The Internet Encylopedia of Philosophy http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/d/descarte.htm



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From the book:

THY KINGDOM COME
A SKETCH OF CHRIST’S CHURCH
IN HISTORY
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Book II : Christ’s Church in the New Testament Era
Compiled and edited by J. Parnell McCarter
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“…I will build my church…” – Matthew 16:18
“…Unto him [be] glory in the church…” – Ephesians 3:21
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Dedicated to the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland.
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Compiled and edited by J. Parnell McCarter
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©2004 J. Parnell McCarter. All Rights Reserved.
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The Puritans’ Home School Curriculum
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