Well, here I go…headed to Australia tomorrow night. My debate with Abdullah Kunde is Monday evening, and my debate with Roger Perkins is Friday night in Brisbane. Please be praying for both of these encounters, that the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, would be glorified, His people edified, the gospel proclaimed, His elect drawn. Of course, please pray for my health on this trip (being in a sealed metal container with a couple hundred other folks is a really, really good way to catch some kind of illness), the 19 television programs I will be recording, the conferences, lectures, sermons, etc. And please continue to support the ministry even while the DL is not broadcasting live. Nothing is more encouraging than to hear from Rich that folks are continuing to support the work while I am away.
Apostate Presbyterians Revel in Their Apostasy
I am sure I could recount for you how Scott Anderson, 56, would respond to almost every text on the sinfulness of homosexuality, the proper, God-ordained form of marriage, etc. and etc. While the pro-homosexual movement that, for some reason, wishes to be religious at the same time, is very inventive in its ways around clear biblical standards, the patterns remain the same, and the sound, exegetical refutations stand the test of time. His “ordination” in a PCUSA church (Covenant Presbyterian Church in Madison, Wisconsin) recently is the first since the PCUSA threw in the towel in even pretending to honor the Bible and its moral and sexual norms. Like its liberal cousins in other denominations (ELCA, United Methodists, United Church of Christ, American Episcopalians, etc.), the PCUSA has entered into full blown apostasy in its capitulation to the spirit of the age and in direct violation of Christ’s commands. Yes, I know there are still individual faithful believers in most of these groups (I honestly do not know how anyone could survive in the UCC), and even small, faithful congregations struggling on, but I am speaking of the denominations as a whole. There comes a time when a line is crossed, and when the sacred office of elder in the church is purposefully filled with those who cannot possibly qualify on the basis of divinely ordained standards, and in fact, are filled with those who are specifically disqualified by their own dogged insistence to openly flout God’s standards and engage in perverse activities, formal and official apostasy has come to such a denomination. It is often a long process, stretching over many decades, but its inevitable end is discernible to all.
Anderson is quoted as having said, “To the thousands of Presbyterians who have worked and prayed for almost 40 years for this day, I give thanks. And I give thanks for those who disagree with what we’re doing today yet who know that we are one in Jesus Christ.” May I respond by pointing out that Mr. Anderson, and its compatriots, are the ones who have introduced not only heresy and sinfulness into the church, but have made schism as well? We do not get to define what is pleasing to God. We do not get to change divine standards for ministry and worship. That is what Mr. Anderson and others like him have worked “forty years” to accomplish, but that is only done at the cost to fidelity to God’s truth. And I assure you, the Spirit of God does not bless the efforts of those who seek to muzzle His own revelation in Scripture. I am not “one” with Mr. Anderson in Jesus Christ, for Jesus said that if we love Him, we will do…what? Change His commandments? Alter them? Update them according to the spirit of our age? No, we will keep them, observe them, live in them. Anderson and the others who will falsely follow him into a faux-“Christian” ministry are not doing that, and hence, they are not one with those who obediently follow Jesus Christ.
Richard Mouw Continues to Shill for Salt Lake City
The headline says it all, “My Take: This evangelical says Mormonism isn’t a cult.” Richard Mouw, President of Fuller Theological Seminary, continues his campaign to help Mormonism “mainstream” and, in the process, to throw every one of those who have worked so diligently to bring the gospel to the Mormon people under the bus. Mouw’s confusion on Mormonism, rooted not only in his personal theological liberalism, but in his friendships with leading LDS personalities (on the more liberal or left side of the spectrum of Mormonism, to be sure), was put on display years ago when he “apologized” to the Mormons for all those nasty Christians out there who had been seeking to evangelize them all these years. Let’s not worry about the fact that Mormonism teaches that there exists a plurality of gods; that the god of this planet was once a man himself who attained the status of godhood through the eternal law of progression; that Jesus is the first born spirit offspring of this exalted man (who lives on a planet that circles a star named Kolob) and one of his many wives (who, like him, have bodies of flesh and bone and with whom God, named Elohim, sires billions of spirit offspring); that men can become gods just as Elohim did. No, let’s leave all that aside as stuff we can “discuss” around the wonderful table of ecumenical dialogue! I am not sure what the basis of that discussion would be, since Mormonism has patently a-historical and simply false books of “revelation” that are held in higher esteem than the Bible (which is only the word of God so far as it is “translated correctly”), but given how far Mouw leans to the left anyway, that kind of “Bible thing” is not going to be a major hindrance anyway. In any case, Mouw continues to sow confusion and error regarding the status of Mormonism which, on any semi-fair examination, is fundamentally farther removed from Christianity in the spectrum of religious teaching than Islam is! Though I know there are still some good folks teaching at Fuller, it is another example (like the one above) of what happens when the anchor dislodges and the ultimate and normative authority of the Word is lost.
