As some of you readers know, I have made a cross-country move to a new university. This is the reason for my long hiatus from the Crux. This week we take a brief pause from Don’s excellent investigation and critique of the “social justice” movement to look at a spiritual conundrum. How to pray for the world’s most cantankerous atheist. First the news. Christopher Hitchens has cancer. And not just cancer but cancer of the one part of his body that means the most to him–his throat. Hitchens announced recently that he has throat cancer. He will be cutting short his book tour for his memoir Hitch-22 to undergo chemotherapy. As usual anything Hitch does or says is a lightning rod for controversy. The lastest is whether or not believers should pray for him and for what should they pray: his recovery, his damnation, his speedy demise, his conversion. You get the idea. It seems to me there are a few questions that are paramount:

Should we pray for Hitch?  If yes, what should we pray for? Should Christians announce that they are praying for Hitch? Finally, what should we expect in return?

The answer to the first question seems simple. (more…)

My wife, Joy, is ½ Danish. While working on our family genealogy, which she has online, a cousin who lives in Denmark contacted her. She and her family came to the states about a month ago and we had a wonderful time getting to know them. We had some interesting discussions because Denmark is a socialist liberal nation and has been since 1929. She has never known anything other than Socialism and is trying to understand the split in America as we grapple with the rising Socialism and claims for social justice as its outworking as opposed to capitalism and personal responsibility. This system worked in Denmark for about 50 years. As we talked she mentioned that it worked because it is largely a homogenous system in a relatively small population with a shared history and pride in their nation. They are having problems these days. An excellent article done in August of 2007 looks at the history of the experiment in Socialism and the result when new population doesn’t play by the same rules. Salute the Danish Flag! – It’s a Symbol of Western Freedom The article is long but well worth reading. A few paragraphs grabbed my attention immediately: (more…)

The Barna organizations latest poll, The Crisis of Confidence in the Church. The following paragraph states the issue:

“I’d encourage you to pause and think about the significance of losing people’s confidence. A leader can only sustain forward movement if he/she has the confidence of the people being led into battle. Now, if a church is simply providing a safe comfort station for hurting people, that’s one thing. But if a church is intent upon facilitating a moral and spiritual revolution, recognizing that doing so is a declaration of war on current cultural preferences and values, the loss of confidence is a devastating setback. And – strategically – such confidence cannot be restored by simply waiting for the tide to turn; church leaders must intentionally win back people’s confidence through visionary leadership, holy character, and guiding people in transformational ministry efforts.”

This past weekend before even seeing Barna’s report, this is also one of the main emphasis I was making. You might say it has even been a theme of mine for some time. The church is in a state of confusion and the result is many are not certain what it’s mission and responsibilities are in an increasingly pagan culture. Even reading the comments on Barna’s short article show the lack of biblical literacy on our calling. “B Crump” has a lengthy comment in which they decry the non-acceptance of them by the organized church. There is a lot of truth to that. There seems to be an almost natural attempt to cause everyone to conform to the group. Independence is not encouraged in many cases. If you happened to really be called as a missionary to your culture, you will likely be a round peg in a square hole in many churches. Working with people is messy and churches don’t like messy because it is, well, messy. The ministry of the church in the first century was mostly about training, equipping and comforting hurting people who had come to the faith from paganism. It was a time to be loved in spite of your differences and readied to get back out into the mission field. The Apostle Paul in Romans 14 reminds the Romans to accept one another in spite of their differences.

Some comments imply that Jesus cared not a fig for doctrine. He wasn’t a theologian according to one but we can hardly read the gospels (more…)

Since 1971, homosexual activists have worked hard in the courts trying to have marriage redefined. In our 2006 article Whose on First … First? we looked at the history of marriage and the law in the United States. Prior to 1971 thechallenge to traditional marriage was bigamy and polygamy. Could a man be married to 2 or more women at the same time? The court cases typically ended with the general affirmation of one man, one women constituting marriage but as far as the Constitution was concerned the courts held that:

“… every civil government had the right to determine whether monogamy or polygamy should be the law of social life under its jurisdiction.” 1

The Federal Courts left the final determination on monogamy vs polygamy to the states. It wasn’t a Federal issue. The question of sex and sexual partners and governmental restrictions is not limited to the United States. It surfaced overseas in 2006 when the Dutch Court OKs Pedophile Party Why did they do this? Their thinking is consistent with what we are finding in the U.S. Courts:

“It is not illegal to try democratically to change the system – which is what these people are trying to do,” said a Hague spokesperson, summarizing the ruling of Judge H. Hofius.

“They are exercising their freedoms of speech and association, and as such cannot be banned by the state.”

These stories are related. (more…)

“What you are doing speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you are saying.”

Beside privacy issues in arguing for abortion, one of the reasons cited was child abuse. An unwanted child, it was argued, increased the instance of child abuse. So, by giving women “choice” that supposedly translated to “every child a wanted child.” That this policy hasn’t dimished child abuse but perhaps has permitted its increase is a discussion for another day. In Do Humans Have Rights That Can Be Violated? I demonstrated that in American law and legislation, humanness and personhood have traditionally been two different things. Human is a statement of biology not personhood. Someone could be biologically human but not legally a person. Since they are not legally a person they have no rights or protections under the law. The one who owns them as property have rights and can pretty much do what they want with their property. According to the Prolife Action League there has been 1.3 million abortions annually since 1973 and as of May 17, 2005 that brought the number to 46 million. This becomes important for two reasons. Economic and end of life questions. A majority of the aborted would have been wage earners and tax payers. By killing off these humans there are less persons available to support the aging cry-baby boomers. As the current administration embarked on “health care reform” one of the questions was how that would impact healthcare for the elderly. Assurances were given that the healthcare would be as good as or better at a lower cost than is currently being charged. Conservatives were firm this was untrue. Now that it has passed, unread by most in the House and Senate who voted for it, we see that conservatives were right, Medicare Reform Means Some Seniors Face Benefit Cuts. (more…)

“The government of Vietnam’s desire to reap the benefits of the global economy must be matched by efforts to respect comprehensive human rights,” a bipartisan group of 19 members of Congress wrote to Clinton on July 15.

This was an interesting paragraph in the article Clinton pushes Vietnam on human rights progress. It also helped to begin crystallizing something I have been thinking about. Do humans have rights solely based on being human? Rather than simply making an assertion I decided to put the question to an organization that specializes in addressing human rights violations the Amnesty International. I emailed them and asked:

There seems to be some confusion when using the term phrase “human rights.”Do you mean by this that humans have rights based solely on being human? If a nation decides that a human is not legally a person and therefore has no rights, for only persons have rights, is that something you affirm?

The question is fairly simple and straightforward. Do humans have rights because they are human or are there some other criteria for protecting rights. Perhaps a human has no rights because they law makers used come arbitrary criteria to define personhood and then only protect the rights of those who are legally a person. In this scenario non-persons, human or not, do not have any legal rights nor are deserving of protection. I received a response back in less than 24 hours: (more…)

I received a phone call last week which began, “I am not one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, but …” This is nearly always a tip off that the caller is a Jehovah’s Witness who is currently disfellowshipped, or for some other reason not meeting with the Jehovah’s Witnesses at the local Kingdom Hall, but still believes the teachings of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society. He called after seeing the YouTube video Young Jehovah’s Witness Dies Over the Weekend. When these calls come in, I have to make assessments. Is the caller asking real questions or just taking up time? I wrote on this last year in Only Real Questions Deserve Real Answers – Pt.1,Part 2 and Part 3.

Being a missionary, like being an evangelist, pastor or teacher, requires that we are good stewards with our time as well as our finances and talents. One of the more frequently asked questions I receive is, “How much time or energy should I put in to someone who seems to be unreachable?” The answer is not simple or clean. Different settings dictate different responses on a case by case basis. (more…)