About Killing the Innocents

I want to tell you a Bible story that will illustrate how God feels about abortion. Consider this: America has really not retracted from the disastrous Roe v Wade decision.  We still allow nearly one million babies to be killed in the womb in the U.S. every year. We tinker with abortion by not allowing it later, etc, restricting it a bit, but we’re still not anywhere close to shutting it down. I read about how Asians around the world are still memorializing the 2004 earthquake and tsunami that killed 228,000 people. An astounding number, don't you think? If you do 260 more just like it, you finally get close to the number of babies murdered through abortion in the U.S. since Roe (1973) was enacted, through today. That’s 60 million little lives lost.

Here is the Biblical story that relates to our subject.  Start with a “religious” practice of the Canaanites—namely, they killed their children as a sacrifice offering to their god, Baal, whose title was Prince, Lord of the Earth.

Can you believe that Ahab, a Jewish king, also got hooked on this practice?  It wasn't his notorious wife Jezebel's idea, but he had his own tale of evil when he hooked up with the Canaanites in doing this. The Canaanites were so evil that God told Israel to attack them and not leave a single soul breathing.  Here is II Chronicles 28:3:

He (Ahab) burned incense in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and burned his children in the fire, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before the children of Israel.

This horrific act seems beyond understanding. Why did Ahab do it? Well, Baal was a god of fertility, which meant the religion included ritual orgies, sodomy and prostitution, and adultery with swapping wives and fornication with other men’s virgin daughters.  So maybe the sexual “benefits”  were worth killing a son for. (It helped if you had many wives and many sons, which kings typically had; the pain of losing one was lessened).

A reform king tore down all the "high places" where this ritual went on.  But these were restored by a later Jewish king--Manasseh.  He did the same shocking thing as Ahab, killing his child. But he did even worse: he promoted it among the people! Many Israelites followed his lead. From II Kings 21:11:

“Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations (he has acted more wickedly than all the Amorites who were before him, and has also made Judah sin with his idols)...

More on Manasseh’s sin, II Chronicles 33:2-3, 6-7:

But he did evil in the sight of the LORD, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before the children of Israel. 3 For he rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had broken down; he raised up altars for the Baals, and made wooden images; and he worshiped all the host of heaven and served them...6 Also he caused his sons to pass through the fire in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom; he practiced soothsaying, used witchcraft and sorcery, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke Him to anger. 7 He even set a carved image, the idol which he had made, in the house of God…

Unbelievable that he would do a carved image in God’s house. God is also against killing innocents and out-of-marriage sex--and totally against mediums and spiritists, as you see in Deuteronomy 18:9-14:

“When you come into the land which the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not learn to follow the abominations of those nations. 10 There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, or one who practices witchcraft, or a soothsayer, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer, 11 or one who conjures spells, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead. 12 For all who do these things are an abomination to the LORD, and because of these abominations the LORD your God drives them out from before you. 13 You shall be blameless before the LORD your God. 14 For these nations which you will dispossess listened to soothsayers and diviners; but as for you, the LORD your God has not appointed such for you.

As you can see, making your children “pass through the fire,” a sacrifice murder of your own child (similar to abortion, my main point), was mentioned as early as Deuteronomy. This practice, and God’s hatred of it, had been known a long time by the Jews. So these two kings, Ahab and Manasseh, were in direct violation of an earlier command of God.

But let’s get back to our story. Manasseh’s sin (promoting it to the people, and doing it in God's house) was so great in the eyes of God that He promised His anger could not be quenched. The sad words are in II Kings 21:12-15, right next to verses above:

… therefore thus says the LORD God of Israel: ‘Behold, I am bringing such calamity upon Jerusalem and Judah, that whoever hears of it, both his ears will tingle. 13 … I will wipe Jerusalem as one wipes a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down. 14 So I will forsake the remnant of My inheritance and deliver them into the hand of their enemies; and they shall become victims of plunder to all their enemies, 15 because they have done evil in My sight, and have provoked Me to anger since the day their fathers came out of Egypt, even to this day.’”

The key is in the next verse:

Moreover Manasseh shed very much innocent blood, till he had filled Jerusalem from one end to another, besides his sin by which he made Judah sin, in doing evil in the sight of the LORD.

It was the innocent blood. Blood of little children. "From one end" of Jerusalem "to another" meant lots of people followed his lead. Now Jesus loves little children. How was Manasseh’s sin greater than Ahab, so that Ahab wasn’t threatened with this judgment? I suspect because, as the verse above says, “by which he (Manasseh) made Judah sin.” He publicized it, and lots of people followed. So the murder of the innocents was that much greater. (But I suspect it doesn’t total America’s sin thus far, 60 million souls!)

Now you expect judgment, and--perchance, if there is repentance, God is OK again, right? Well, now you’re going to see a part of God you don’t want to see.

We’ve all heard about how Jonah, after being burped out of a big fish, preached to the vicious Assyrians, you heard about their repentance—and how God changed His mind of His promise of judgment on them and rolled it back. Great story about God’s mercy. Yes, we’ve all heard of the Jonah story, and there are many kids’ books about it. But did you know that Manasseh repented, and had a great reformation? Have you ever heard what happened after that? I suspect not. Well, did you ever hear about how his grandson Josiah had the greatest revival in human history? What, you’ve never heard that one either? Not surprising, considering God’s reaction to these wonderful repentances is “unexpected.” Let me warn you:  We all just need to know more about God. We have imagined His mercy is unending— but for a nation, that might not be a true image. Kind of important since He has the keys to every nation's judgment.

First, Manasseh’s judgment and repentance. From II Chronicles 33:11-16:

And the LORD spoke to Manasseh and his people, but they would not listen.11 Therefore the LORD brought upon them the captains of the army of the king of Assyria, who took Manasseh with hooks, bound him with bronze fetters, and carried him off to Babylon. 12 Now when he was in affliction, he implored the LORD his God, and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers, 13 and prayed to Him; and He received his entreaty, heard his supplication, and brought him back to Jerusalem into his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the LORD was God. 14 After this he (Manasseh)…took away the foreign gods and the idol from the house of the LORD, and all the altars that he had built in the mount of the house of the LORD and in Jerusalem; and he cast them out of the city. 16 He also repaired the altar of the LORD, sacrificed peace offerings and thank offerings on it, and commanded Judah to serve the LORD God of Israel.

So, you say, the land was forgiven, right? Jerusalem was saved, right? Uh, no…He died right after that. Then there was a short reign of his son, who was killed. Then his grandson Josiah comes to power. During his reign, the priests find the buried Book of the Law, blew the dust off, and read it to him. He tore his clothes in distress, and urged his aides to seek a prophetess (not the same as a medium, this person was touched by God and had a 100% rate of prophecies that came true). II Kings 22:13 records Josiah's great words:

“Go, inquire of the LORD for me, for the people and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that has been found; for great is the wrath of the LORD that is aroused against us, because our fathers have not obeyed the words of this book, to do according to all that is written concerning us.”

Later, he does a “clean-up” operation like his grandfather, only better; and this is what joyous Scriptures record, from II Kings 23:1-10:

Now the king (Josiah)...read in their hearing all the words of the Book of the Covenant which had been found in the house of the LORD. 3 Then the king stood by a pillar and made a covenant before the LORD, to follow the LORD and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. And all the people took a stand for the covenant.4 And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, the priests of the second order, and the doorkeepers, to bring out of the temple of the LORD all the articles that were made for Baal, for Asherah, and for all the host of heaven; and he burned them outside Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried their ashes to Bethel. 5 Then he removed the idolatrous priests whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense on the high places in the cities of Judah and in the places all around Jerusalem, and those who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, to the moon, to the constellations, and to all the host of heaven.6 And he brought out the wooden image from the house of the LORD, to the Brook Kidron outside Jerusalem, burned it at the Brook Kidron and ground it to ashes, and threw its ashes on the graves of the common people. 7 Then he tore down the ritual booths of the perverted persons that were in the house of the LORD, where the women wove hangings for the wooden image. 8 And he brought all the priests from the cities of Judah, and defiled the high places where the priests had burned incense, from Geba to Beersheba; also he broke down the high places at the gates which were at the entrance of the Gate of Joshua the governor of the city, which were to the left of the city gate… 10 And he defiled Topheth, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter pass through the fire to Molech.

Josiah goes farther in reform than his repentant grandfather, because and he goes out of his way to defile the worship places of false gods—and because he gets the populace involved with making a covenant to God. The main thing is that he stopped the sacrifice killing of children.

He goes even further yet. In honor of religious holidays that he’d just heard about, he institutes a Passover festival (memorializing God’s miracles which saved them from Egypt). We read this joyous event in II Chronicles 35:18:

There had been no Passover kept in Israel like that since the days of Samuel the prophet; and none of the kings of Israel had kept such a Passover as Josiah kept, with the priests and the Levites, all Judah and Israel who were present, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.

All in all, he was praised as a wonderful king—he gets higher praise than King David. Think about that! From II Kings 23:25:

Now before him there was no king like him, who turned to the LORD with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the Law of Moses; nor after him did any arise like him.

So, you say, God forgave the land, right? Jerusalem was saved, right? If God could give the vicious Assyrians a break with Jonah, He could give His favorites, the “apple of His eye,” a break, right? Uh….no. Only five verses after the great Passover festival, only four verses after the verses recording the reformation above, Josiah was simply…dead. Explanation? From II Kings 23:26:

Nevertheless the LORD did not turn from the fierceness of His great wrath, with which His anger was aroused against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked Him.

So, great reformation and the greatest revival in history could not bring forgiveness. I remind you, what were the “provocations” that were unable to save Jerusalem, despite two stupendous reforms? Killing the innocents.  Immediately after Josiah, it turns out that the Israeli kings, and soon the land, too, are in the hand of their enemies. They are captives, slaves, for life.

You can see why this story is not in kids’ books, and not well-known. We don’t like stories with a bad ending. But God is a Judge, as well as Grace. Kill the innocent—by government fiat--and a country gets a bad ending. So shouldn't we expect the same for the U.S.--since we have not even repented? A country who seems to lack the spiritual power to slow down or stop the status quo of killing a million innocents a year?

Now if any of my readers out there had an abortion, or encouraged one, that's a different subject than judging a country. We’re talking about your individual soul. You will have different consequences than Israel if you repent. Murder will, indeed, get you to hell—unless you repent and begin living your life for Christ, who came to die to pay for your sin. Become a “living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God,” as Romans 12:1 puts it. It’s never too late to confess and begin to have guilt-free living.

Acknowledgement: Ancient Paganism, Ken Johnson

Fire and Brimstone Preaching: Good Idea or Bad Idea?

We’re defining “fire and brimstone” as, preaching against a sin, or a burden of sins that's on every life, or reminding people of Satan or hell.  Let’s look at Peter.  In his very first sermon, in Acts 2:19-21, he began with a quote from Joel 2:

I will show wonders in heaven above And signs in the earth beneath: Blood and fire and vapor of smoke. ²⁰ The sun shall be turned into darkness, And the moon into blood, Before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord. ²¹ And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord Shall be saved.’

So he begins his preaching by giving graphic images of the devastation of the Day of the Lord. Such a terribly negative start, don't you think?  This was, at least, book-ended with hopeful statements. God would give prophecies, dreams, and images; and He would respond if they call on His name.  Right after the scary statement above, Peter wasted no time in reproaching everyone (Acts 2:22-24a) for a recent incident that was still raw on their nerves—he accused them (notice, he did not place the responsibility on Pilate or on the Pharisees) of crucifying their Messiah.  He didn’t shy away from blunt language:

Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles… ²³ Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death;²⁴ whom God raised up…

Note how confrontational Peter is, YOU have crucified, you have put Him to death.  Note particularly his calling them “lawless.”  The Jews thought they knew the law, and had abundant scribes and lawyers to tell them exactly how to be lawful to the finest degree possible; so being accused of lawlessness was a gigantic slap in the face, was it not?

He points more emphatically at their mistake in verse 36 in the same sermon:

“Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”

This directness about their sin makes this “fire and brimstone” preaching.  What was the reaction? Surprisingly, a good one, from Acts 2:37-41:

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” ³⁸ Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized…" and, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” ⁴¹ Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.

Three thousand people saved!  An astonishing result from one “fire and brimstone” sermon.  These people turned completely around; as later verses show, they were on fire for Christ. 

If something works in a sermon, you do it again, right?  Peter, after healing a lame man, is equally forceful in his reproach of the Jews, in Acts 3:13-15:

…God…glorified His Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let Him go. ¹⁴ But you denied the Holy One and the Just, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, ¹⁵ and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses

Peter won’t let them escape blame by saying “Pilate did it.”  Nor could they escape blame by saying, "He never really said He was God."  The Jews knew that certain things He did, certain names He called himself, clearly claimed Godhood. They knew that Pilate tried hard to prevent this crucifixion, but the Jews wouldn’t let Jesus off the hook.  Peter is again forceful with his language; “you killed the Prince of life,” you delivered Him up, you traded Him for a murderer.  He also accused them of denying Christ.  To do that was a serious charge; if unrepentant, it is a ticket to hell, as Jesus points out in Matthew 10:33:

But whoever denies Me before men, him I will also deny before My Father who is in heaven

Then Peter seems to open the door for them to escape blame, in Acts 3:17:

“Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers.

But how acceptable is it, to say, “Yes, we killed Him, but we did it out of ignorance.” They knew that their ignorance was their own making, as far as they knew. But that backhanded "compliment" was only a temporary respite.  His censorious language reaches its peak in verse 23:

And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet (Jesus) shall be utterly destroyed from among the people. 

A bold statement.  I can only surmise that rumors of a resurrection must have spread, or else he would have been called a lunatic, telling them that if they don't hear Jesus' words, they'll be destroyed.  You just never hear this confrontational preaching anymore, do you?  In any event, except for the priests, the response was amazing, as Acts 4:4 says:

However, many of those who heard the word believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand. 

Considering that households generally took on a faith together, this suggests at least 10,000 people, including wives and older children, either were saved in this sermon, or have been saved soon after, following the father.  When compared to 3000 souls added in his previous sermon, shortly before, this sermon, also classed as "fire and brimstone," might’ve saved another 10,000 people!  Two fire and brimstone sermons, 13,000 saved!  This is shocking, is it not?  .  

Now of course, you might beg off from the obvious conclusion, saying that "it was an unusual time; the Jews were ultra-sensitive as to what they did."  Well, how do sensitive people react when you push their buttons, telling them they were wrong and how God will avenge justice on them?  No, that explanation didn't fly.  Or maybe you'd say "the Holy Spirit did something special here just to “kick off” Christianity’s start."  Well, “doing something special” is my point.  I believe God honors the boldness of the Word preached, and the Holy Spirit acted to convict as a result.  

Couldn't the Holy Spirit do the same again, acting on a preacher's boldness?  Preachers need to understand that the results are not theirs—the results belong to God.  The Holy Spirit can knock a person down with conviction far better than the preacher can. Your first motive should be to honor God, not to rationally persuade people of the benefits of Christianity.  You want to tell the truth about both sides of God, despite continual harping from the baby Christians about our intolerance, or how we scare people away, and "fear is not a good reason to be saved," and such malarky.  Suppose that a pastor is never blunt about sin, and fears a negative response to such preaching so much that he never delivers a fire and brimstone message.  Given that this is the OPPOSITE from the above, shouldn't he expect results that are the opposite?  I.e, few people saved?  Are you in a church where everyone loves the pastor because he delivers comfortable messages, even has good timing with jokes? Well, how many parishioners are on fire for God there? How many congregants are willing to do the evangelistic work, encourage you to step up and do your gift God gave you, talks a lot about what Christ is doing to you and people you know? You say, we don't get that--only the newly saved folks act like that."  Agrees with my point.  Does your pastor want to save souls more than worry about how some of the people feel about him?  If that's the case, he should be willing to give the hard line, give f&b a try, right? His model is in God's revealed guidebook, the Book of Acts.  That model is from the best teacher, right?  God.  But if pastor rejects it, maybe he's got that devil's disease, called "fear of the world."  So how can the Holy Spirit bless his messages? Is this why in many churches, the Holy Spirit is MIA. You see the liturgy, the fine use of words in a fine pastor, at a fine church building, with fine people. You are linked in.  But how many souls does that get you?  It could even be that with bland preaching, he attracts more “worldly Christians” to his membership (that’s an oxymoron—being worldly and a Christian shouldn’t exist).  These lukewarm people are often trouble.  They actually get angry and fearful if the Holy Spirit goes to work, and gets some people truly saved and starts to shake up the place.  If pastors then listen to their complaints, and gets worried himself, he might suppress anything considered "radical" today--but thereby kill a revival.

My conclusion is, the Holy Spirit liked Peter’s sermons, and blessed them by convicting people and bringing more souls to heaven.  May God be praised.  When you see these results, why not copy it, pastors? Are you bold enough? 

In Acts 4, Peter preaches like that again, this time before the religious rulers, after a miraculous healing.  If Peter had used worldly logic, it would suggest that he “back off” from a fire and brimstone style with them, knowing that they had the power to imprison him, and then no one would hear the gospel from him again. Better to "go softer" than to be forced to go silent, right?   But the Holy Spirit gave him the fire and brimstone words, as we’re told in Acts 4:8, and you can see his forthrightness in the sermon in verses 10-12:

Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders of Israel… ¹⁰ let it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead… ¹¹ This is the 

‘stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’

¹² Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

Note that Peter really accuses them of conspiracy to murder.  I would also just like to note, for present day culturally astute readers, the “bigoted intolerance” of Peter’s—or really God’s —statement in verse 12, that there is no salvation in any other faith, including the Jews trying to obey the law--which they had strained at for thousands of years. 

This time, the results are radically different. Namely, the Spirit doesn't convict them--probably because they hadn't repented from killing Jesus. And they might have even committed the unpardonable sin--attributing to Satan the power of the Holy Spirit.

Now you may argue that, sure, some people are beyond hope, but: if we could have more miraculous healings, as Peter had in Acts 4, we could get more people saved today.   My answer is three-fold:  First, despite the healings, Jesus was crucified.  Secondly, the Jewish rulers cared less about the miracle in Acts 4; their concern was that Peter was preaching that Jesus was raised from the dead. Note verses 1b-2:

…the priests, the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees came upon them, ² being greatly disturbed that they taught the people and preached in Jesus the resurrection from the dead.

  My third reason is, Jesus knew that salvation by miracles was temporary; its design was mostly to pull more people around to hear His great words.  The words were the key, not the healings; they were calculated to convict of sin, which is essential in being saved.  As you can see in John 2:23-25:

Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs which He did.²⁴ But Jesus did not commit Himself to them, because He knew all men,²⁵ and had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man

Now let’s turn to the deacon, Stephen, a fire and brimstone preacher in the “worst” way.  Just like Peter, when Stephen used fire and brimstone style on the religious rulers, the results were again disastrous. He was stoned to death. But God was acceptable to this style, as Acts 6:15 clearly implies:

And all who sat in the council, looking steadfastly at him, saw his face as the face of an angel.

Why did God want Stephen to preach that way, when it resulted in him being killed?  The biggest reason was, God had told the apostles to preach to the Jerusalem first, then to spread out--to Judea, to Samaria, to the world (Acts 1:8).  But the saved folks weren't doing that. So God was willing to let them suffer persecution.  As a result, they did spread out--when they fled elsewhere--and brought the Gospel to the whole world. 

Now Stephen uses language guaranteed to touch their “hot buttons” more than Peter, in Acts 7:51 and 52:

“You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you. ⁵² Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers

Stiff-necked!  Uncircumcised! (That must’ve hurt—circumcision was a badge of honor to them).  You always resist the Holy Spirit. He told them that they were persecutors, betrayers, and murderers.  This over-the-top language, calling people names, is guaranteed NOT to save anyone, except a masochist.  So why did God want him to do it? Why would maybe He might want you to do it (we're not talking about a sermon now, we're talking about you and an individual.  Here was the stranger side of evangelism, a possible approach when the sinner has seen the power of God and still refuses). Maybe He would want it on rate occasion, because when they stand in judgment, God will remind them of the words you said to help convict them.  

There is another reason too:  Sometimes over-the-top preaching will expose the worst in people, and we get to see who they really are. Here are people who know how to keep up surfaces; they were nice; they were civilized.  But after these sermons?  Now they're whining to pastor, now they're downgrading him to others.  

Here's yet another reason:  We all should be “watchmen,” when culture starts to turn rotten. Ezekiel 33:2-6 explains the idea: 

…let the people of the land take a man from their territory and make him their watchman, ³ when he sees the sword coming upon the land, if he blows the trumpet and warns the people, ⁴ then whoever hears the sound of the trumpet and does not take warning, if the sword comes and takes him away, his blood shall be on his own head. ⁵ He heard the sound of the trumpet, but did not take warning; his blood shall be upon himself. But he who takes warning will save his life. ⁶ But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, and the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any person from among them, he is taken away in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand.’   

The definition of “warn” is to “inform someone of an impending danger…give someone forceful advice about their actions.”  If you are the watchman, it is your obligation to use forceful (i.e, fire and brimstone) language on frequent occasions to steer them clear of danger.  If you don’t, judgment is on you.  A sober reason to change preaching styles now and then!

Now, you pastors and others, may argue that you are following a Scriptural path, as I John 4:7-8 points out:

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. ⁸ He who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

So you say, "How can we do fire and brimstone, in light of those verses?  My sermons are often on love.  You think that warning, that fire and brimstone, is love?"  But let's talk about the real meaning of love.  If a man loves his wife, he protects her, right?  That's a given.  Suppose he comes home from work, and sees his house completely engulfed in a raging fire.  Toxic smoke is pouring out, he can hear the stairway collapsing.  Then he sees his wife, outside, with a strange look on her face, running toward the house. Maybe she wants to save the baby.  But the firemen are on the scene, ready to do that.  But she still wants to  hurry and save the baby,  So what does husband do?  He steps out in front of her--she goes around him, moving on toward disaster.  He runs up to her, tells her in strong language to stop.  She ignores him, persistently moving ahead.  She's getting close to the front door.  Then he has to do things that are "unreasonable," in most situations.  He wrestles her, tackles her, puts a knee in her back to prevent her from walking into the fire.  

Well, what is hell?  It's far worse than this fire. It's forever.  None of us can imagine God doing that to most people, but we trust His Word to tell the truth. We need to act like it's the truth.  There are times when we should act desperately.  Truth is, the majority will go to hell.  Proof?  Matthew 7:13-14.  Yes, you've read it many times.  But do you meditate on His words, really think what He's saying here?

 And we know how certain people live, that some of them can't be Christian.  We don't know when they may die, or I might die, and the kind of relationship-designed message I can give them about the Gospel would be lost.  So we get pointed with them.  Hey, we might get unreasonable with them, with dangers of hell, with fire and brimstone.  I guarantee you of one thing.  Even if they cut off relationship with you for being "weird," the desperation on your lips will haunt them for a long time. Thus, we need to be a continual watchman.  We have the answers.  They don't.  Give them the knowledge. 

Now let's take another angle on this subject.  When Peter preached to Gentiles, beginning with Cornelius in Acts 10, his approach was completely different.  No more fire and brimstone.  Why?  Well, he saw the Gentiles as a foreign mission.  Jews previously had minimal relations with Gentiles, particularly about religion.  Most of the Gentiles knew little about this Jesus of Nazareth.  They were certainly wary of the Jews.  So the words to the Gentiles were those of instruction and education about Jesus.

So, we see that fire and brimstone preaching was highly successful--or highly non-successful--with the Jews, who had Scripture that they allegedly knew and believed in.  Well, speaking of people who likewise should have plenty of Scripture and knowledge, isn't that the U.S. mostly through our history? But today, things are different.  We have lots of Bibles, lots of Christian "tradition," as each denomination defines it.  But hardly anybody reads Scripture.  And parents aren't teaching their children.  As many studies prove, people's knowledge of Jesus has been lost.  So it's like preaching to the Gentiles again. I'm NOT saying that means preaching that God is love, Christianity has benefits, etc.  Preaching to the unknowledgeable is simple:  Go for expository preaching, cover all sides of God, about sin, about money and the world, about hell.  When you discuss hell, simply use fire and brimstone.  You'll see a huge wall of resistance there.  You can tell the sinner from the saved, in how they respond.  Many people would rather believe Scripture is lying on this subject, rather than what it says about the devil and hell. Straighten them out on that.  Tell them you can't cherry-pick Scripture.   

Pastors, resist the urge to assume that everyone in your church is saved, so you conclude not to aggressively warn them.  You say to yourself, the devil has not captured anybody in my church.  (Of course, it doesn't help that you haven't   been preaching on the wiles of the devil.) Yes, it's true that pastors are diplomats--they push back on this idea.  If the prophetic voices are active, let them speak the hard word to everyone. (That would involve changing the service--like the church did in Acts.  Is that bad?)  The problem I see, is pastors tend to suppress prophetic voices among their leaders.  It seem so negative, and so scary with unpredictability in services. (How pastors hate things beyond their control!  Are they willing to let the Holy Spirit have control?)  Pastors consider the prophets, the sources for those utterances, as speculative, emotionally driven, only believable with a large grain of salt, and pastors don’t like to deal with problems that seem to always result when someone gets their feelings hurt when these guys talk.  And that's even among churches that believe all the gifts are for today.  If pastors don't believe that, they'll shut down the naysayers even quicker.  

Also, church discipline, commanded in Scripture, is totally ignored (I have a blog on that subject).  But take a look at Paul’s statement in I Corinthians 10:11-12.  This was after his listing past sins of lusting after evil things, sexual immorality, etc, all of which are pointed out explicitly in Scripture.  Gee, you might ask, do you really want to mention these terrible things that people are capable of doing?  Here is his answer:

Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. ¹² Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.:

Some Scriptures are for our admonition, to shake a finger at us, to warn us, “lest (we) fall.”  Fall might mean going to hell, or taking steps in that direction (a good verse for those who mistakenly believe "once saved, always saved.")  Such admonishment is needed to remind ourselves that we are sinful people and need God every day.  So when was the last time you heard a pastor preach on one of the fallen people in Scriptures, preaching deeply about the sin, and concluding the sermon with “so as far as we know, he is in hell even today. We could go there ourselves, taking the path he took.”  Not going to happen, right?  Pastors are trained in seminary to begin a sermon lighthearted, and end on a positive note, to send everyone home happy. Keeps everyone coming back, tithing, paying the bills. But God’s goal is sometimes not to make us happy—but to call us up short, to make us sober and vigilant, sometimes to make us introspective.  To make us take a good hard look at ourselves, trying to strip away the self-deception that we fall prey to if we are not bathed in Scripture, which gives us a realistic look at ourselves.

Since pastors are often not very good at encouraging us to do these things, may we desire to be closer to God, and warn ourselves to put an end to our own sins and self-deception.  And pray for pastors to become leaders, with more spine.  Willing to warn us away from falling; may God have mercy on us.

The Vatican Speaks of an Alien Savior

This is probably the strangest blog that I have ever written (Note: information taken from early 2017).  I read a book by Cris Putnam and Thomas Horn, two writers that have covered controversy in the past.  This subject is even stranger; but they provided lots of proof, including jaw-dropping quotes. Their conclusions are well-founded, though radical.  So let’s at least consider it.  We’ll start by looking at the Jesuit priest Guy J. Consolmagno, a leading astronomer who often is a spokesman for the Vatican.  He is brilliant; he has worked for NASA and taught at Harvard and MIT.  Some of his time in 2013 was spent at the Vatican observatory at the summer residence of Pope Francis in Castel Gandolfo, Italy; the rest of his time, since, is at Mt. Graham in Arizona as Director (more on that later) and he is also President of the Vatican Observatory Foundation.  He is close enough to the Pope that he can be called his friend.

His time in public forums is lecturing on the subject of science and religion; specifically, would you believe, extraterrestrial life and its potential impact on the future of faith.  He authored a booklet entitled Intelligent Life in the Universe: Catholic Belief and the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligent Life. It was first authorized by Rome, but they changed their mind; it was pulled by the Vatican publisher in 2005, and is no longer available.  But our authors persuaded him to send them a copy of this work.  Here is a partial quote, in which he stretches Jesus’ words in John 10:16 to a strange conclusion:

“…other sheep I have, which are not of this fold:  them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice…” 

Consolmagno’s interpretation:  “Perhaps it’s not so far-fetched to see the Second Person of the Trinity…coming not only as a Son of Man but also as a Child of other races.”

His reference of contrast between Man and “other races” says that he believes Jesus was referring to alien life when He said “other sheep…not of this fold.”  (The traditional interpretation of the passage is that Jesus is speaking about Gentiles, “not of this (Jewish) fold,” being evangelized for salvation through Him.  There are many references in Paul’s epistles about the effort to evangelize the Gentiles into faith.) 

Jesuit Consolmagno was not alone in his belief about alien life.  Numerous Vatican astronomers, many of them Jesuits, are believers.  And the Vatican believes this enough to lay out a lot of cash looking for alien life--witness the purchase of Mt. Graham observatory, and the attachment of expensive advanced scopes.  It is 80 miles from Tucson, and skirts Indian territories.  Indians, in fact, consider Mt. Graham to be one of the four holiest mountains in the Americas, and tried to stop construction of the observatories.  A large binocular telescope, one of the world’s most advanced optical telescopes, has a new device between its twin mirrors.  Officially, it’s a “Large Binocular Telescope Near-Infrared Utility with Camera and Integral Field Unit for Extragalactic Research.”  And, yes, that name suggests it was very expensive.  Strangely, someone in the Vatican shortened it to L.U.C.I.F.E.R.--a name for the devil.  (The word actually means ‘morning star.’)  Our authors traveled to Mt. Graham for interviews.  They noticed how Jesuit astronomers are actually--and earnestly searching for intelligent alien life.  Surprising to Messrs Putnam and Horn also was the Jesuit astronomers’ frequent reference to UFOs as well. 

Oh, yes…UFOs.  I, like a majority of Americans, was not a believer.  But what shocked me, on research, is that sensible and scientific people—even many of the earlier astronauts--believe in them.  Here is a list of believers and comments:

Edgar Mitchell (Died in 2016).  The former NASA astronaut claimed in 2009 that alien life exists but that the US government was covering up the evidence.  Mr Mitchell, who was part of the 1971 Apollo 14 moon mission, made the claims in a talk to the fifth annual X-Conference – a meeting of those who believe in UFOs and other life forms.  He also said he had attempted to investigate the 1947 'Roswell Incident', which some believe was the crash-landing of a UFO, but he had been thwarted by military authorities.

He said: "We're not alone. Our destiny, in my opinion, and we might as well get started with it, is [to] become a part of the planetary community. ... We should be ready to reach out beyond our planet and beyond our solar system to find out what is really going on out there.  I urge those who are doubtful: Read the books… start to understand what has really been going on. Because there really is no doubt we are being visited.  The universe that we live in is much more wondrous, exciting, complex and far-reaching than we were ever able to know up to this point in time."

Gordon Cooper (Died in 2004) wrote a letter addressed to the United Nations in 1978 asking the organization to set up a research program to study UFOs. In 1951 when the astronaut was piloting an F-86 over Germany, he spotted saucers.

Bill Clinton has openly spoken out about extraterrestrial life and UFOs and has been very forthcoming about his belief that E.T.s exist and that we’re not alone. Presidents may not be immediately privy to all the nation’s secrets, but Clinton claims to have had aides research Area 51 and Roswell during his presidency.  “If we were visited someday I wouldn’t be surprised,” Clinton said in an interview on Jimmy Kimmel Live that aired in April 2014. “I just hope it’s not like ‘Independence Day.’ … It may be the only way to unite this increasingly divided world of ours. Think about [it,] all the differences among people of Earth would seem small if we feel threatened by a space invader,” he said.

Jimmy Carter (now 96), US President from 1976 to 1980, promised while on the campaign trail that he would make public all documents on UFOs if elected. He said: "I don't laugh at people any more when they say they've seen UFOs. I've seen one myself."

General Douglas MacArthur (died 1964), the Korean and Second World War soldier, said in 1955 that "the next war will be an interplanetary war. The nations of the earth must someday make a common front against attack by people from other planets. The politics of the future will be cosmic, or interplanetary".

J Edgar Hoover (died 1972), head of the FBI from its inception in 1935 to 1972, said of a famous incident when flying saucers were allegedly fired at over Los Angeles in 1942: "We must insist upon full access to disks recovered. For instance, in the LA case the Army grabbed it and would not let us have it for cursory examination."

Monsignor Corrado Balducci (died 2008), a Vatican theologian, said: "Extraterrestrial contact is a real phenomenon. The Vatican is receiving much information about extraterrestrials and their contacts with humans from its embassies in various countries, such as Mexico, Chile and Venezuela."

Ronald Reagan (died 2004) saw a UFO during a 1974 Cessna Citation flight.  He was with three other passengers. He alerted pilot Bill Paynter to the UFO, which was described as being elongated and moving at an incredible speed. Reagan told the story to the Wall Street Journal’s Washington bureau chief Norman C. Miller, according to the Discovery Channel.  He said, "I looked out the window and saw this white light. It was zigzagging around. I went up to the pilot and I said to him: 'Let's follow it!' We followed it for several minutes. It was a bright white light.  We followed it to Bakersfield, and all of a sudden to our utter amazement it went straight up into the heavens.  He expressed thoughts on the matter similar to Clinton’s:  He said in a speech to the United Nations in 1987, according to MSNBC: “I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world.”

Mikhail Gorbachev (now 89), the USSR's last head of state: "The phenomenon of UFOs does exist, and it must be treated seriously."

And let’s not forget one of our smartest Christians, Dr. Walter Martin (died 1989), who founded Christian Research Institute in 1960 and who authored the famous textbook, The Kingdom of the Occult. In a portion of his 1970 UFO presentation, he not only took the UFO phenomenon seriously, but he was also an eyewitness to a flying saucer. 

OK, let’s just say, on wild speculation, that there have been UFOs—aliens who have visited earth.  What would that mean?  Well, our authors Putnam and Horn believe (and I agree) that IF this has happened, these were visits by demons to prepare us for the devil’s greatest deception of all time, in the last days. What might happen is, they eventually would land, show themselves to be much smarter than man; why not, demons are smart—when they are under a master strategist, Satan.  And, being from another dimension, they can perform unbelievable tricks as well.  The story that they could spread is, they created, or to use a popular term, “seeded” us.  And they stand ready to give us fantastic scientific and medical knowledge.  We could live a much longer time.  We could feel immortal, as gods.  And we could change our belief system to worshipping them, or their god.  With their presence as proof, it's possible that most people will believe their gospel (in a desire for longer life), and a world religion will be born.  Christians, who believe in the “old, Neanderthal” theology of sin, judgment, blood and sacrifice, would be directly persecuted for trying to stop man’s evolution into this glorious future of worship.

As you can see, this directly feeds into the Bible’s vision of the last days.  (I have other blogs on the future).  I have always wondered, frankly, how a world religion, specifically mentioned in Revelation, would be possible in this conflicted world. As is intimated by two of our believers above, these invaders could suggest that all of mankind would have to decide on this religion from another world, and man’s purpose and origin. That’s the only way I see to a single world religion that the Bible predicts. But like I said—this is all a gigantic deception by the devil to pull us away from the real God.

But here’s another brain-blowing revelation—certain important Jesuits, with a lot of influence, believe this and were willing to be quoted on it.  Let’s take a look at Jesuit George V. Coyne, former director of the Vatican Observatory and its Advanced Technology Telescope—the one in Mt. Graham which is expressly looking for extraterrestrial life.  In addition to his duties as a Jesuit, he was a professor in the University of Arizona’s astronomy department, as well as associate director of the Steward Observatory.  He appeared with Richard Dawkins advocating a deistic form of Darwinism (hint: This blasphemes the Genesis record of Creation).  Jesuit Coyne stunned the high priest of atheism by promoting a radical form of pluralism, the idea that all religions lead to the same God.  (P.S. God does not hold to this theology, as many Scriptures attest).  Coyne stretches the bounds of Catholic orthodoxy, even given Rome’s embrace of postmodernism.  On another occasion, he claimed that the Scriptures are scientifically inaccurate obscurantisms--music to the ears of secularists and pagans universal.  It seems that one prophet, Malachi Martin, was right:  In his book The Jesuits: The Society of Jesus and the Betrayal of the Roman Catholic Church (1987), Martin (died 1999) asserts there is a “satanic cabal” among Jesuits, and he lamented that this sort of postmodernism has become the stock and trade of third-millennium Jesuitism.  A prophet among Catholics.

Or let’s have a listen to Rome’s heralded demonologist, Monsignor Corrado Balducci.  He was a theologian of the Vatican Curia, (governing body at Rome), a long-time exorcist for the archdiocese of Rome, also a friend of  pope Benedict, and a Prelate of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. No Catholic demonologist has more clout.   He asserted that extraterrestrial encounters “are not demonic, they are not due to psychological impairment, and they are not a case of entity attachment.”  Of course, this begs the question—How does he know? He further fulminates that “We don’t even have to waste a thought on the devil and his demons…they are purely spiritual beings, limited in their activity by God, and not able to bring all their hatred to us.”  (His suggestion that they are limited to the spirit realm is defying Scripture, which in many places show how angels—what demons are, only they became bad angels—have taken on material form). 

Or, how about a listen to Notre Dame theologian Thomas O’Mera, who is on the forefront of Catholic exotheology with his book Vast Universe, and his interviews with the Huffington Post.  Here is his blasphemous statement on Jesus’ claims about limitations of salvation:  “Is Jesus so central a figure that only he and his Middle Eastern religious world can reveal God?”  Of course, the fact that Jesus IS God should certify Jesus' ability to reveal God. This corrupt modernist has a brother when Vatican II was designed, as one of its more influential figures in molding it, Karl Rahner, has proposed that a sincere Hindu or Buddhist can be saved without knowledge of the Gospel.  This view was explicitly endorsed during Vatican II. 

I should mention that Rome has never admonished any of the men mentioned above, despite their un-Biblical statements, nor removed them from any of their influential positions.       

   

Now I hope you’re ready, because I have the last bit of mind-blowing material for you.  Fr. Coyne (see above) was, shall we say, partially traditional when he said, “Should intelligent (alien) life be found, the Church would be obliged to address the question of whether extraterrestrials might be brought within the fold and baptized.”  In 2009, the Vatican had a 150^th celebration of publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species. (Yes they did. Real Christian churches were long hostile to Darwin because his theory conflicted with the literal biblical account of creation; but the Catholic Church never condemned Darwin. Pope John Paul II said that evolution was "more than a hypothesis;" and he has never been contradicted by popes since).  A leading American scholar of biology, Prof. Francisco Ayala, told that conference that the so-called theory of intelligent design, proposed by Creationists, is flawed.  "The design of organisms is not what would be expected from an intelligent engineer, but imperfect and worse," he said.  (Imagine what God feels about being called "not an intelligent engineer.")  Further, he blathered: "Defects, dysfunctions, oddities, waste and cruelty pervade the living  world".  So the Catholic rulers agreed (any speaker has to submit an outline of his speech ahead of time) to having a speaker tell them that the choice they have, is either an imperfect designer-God, or Darwinism.  I have to disagree, folks—any imperfections we have is due to our sin, and our responsibility for it.  Scriptures are clear that God created the world perfect.  Any real study of its balance and design will fill you with awe.

The latest word on the evolution of man starts with Jesuit priest Guy J. Consolmagno (see earlier).  He called his job reconciling ”the wildest reaches of science fiction (which he doesn’t think is fiction) with the flint-eyed dogma of the Holy See.”  He believes in “the Jesus Seed,” which says that every planet that harbors intelligent life may also have had a Christ walk across its methane seas.  Further on this is from the May 2008 L’Osservatore Romano (a Vatican approved newspaper), recording an interview with a Vatican spokesperson, Father Funes, who wrote “The Extraterrestrial Is My Brother.”  He was asked whether extraterrestrials need to be redeemed.  His answer:  “God was made man in Jesus to save us…if other intelligent beings exist, it is not said that they would have need of redemption.”  Thus, he asserts that some extraterrestrials are morally superior to men--as if he knew.  He asserts in his book Brother Astronomer:  Adventures of a Vatican Scientist that they may come here to evangelize us. Yes, we need to learn a new gospel from the aliens.

But let me give you one more infamous quote:  In a paper for the Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Religion and Science website, Father Giuseppe Tanzella-Nitti—an Opus Dei theologian of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome—says these “spiritual aliens” should be respected.  He states that this would not immediately oblige the Christian “to renounce his own faith”….but that such a renunciation could come soon after as the new “religious content” originating outside Earth is confirmed as reasonable and credible.  Once it is verified, we are obliged to “conduct a re-reading of the Gospel inclusive of the new data.”  This is explained more thoroughly by former Vatican observatory vice director Christopher Corbally in his article “What if There Were Other Inhabited Worlds?”  He concluded that Jesus simply might not remain the only Word of salvation.  He quotes:  “Christ..is not necessarily the only word spoken to the universe…to aliens, it does not have to be a repeated death-and-resurrection…” (But Christ is the only Revelation of God, the Logos, the Word--says Scripture.) 

So, with such radical assertions, do Jesuits and Catholic hierarchy want us to throw away Scripture? 

My question to all this is, what is the alien gospel that they speak of aliens redeeming us?  What is its source?  I believe to have a world religion, if they exist, these "aliens" are really demons--and their source is Satan. Their gospel would be the same one Satan gave to Eve--"ye shall be as gods."  Because long, pleasant lives are waiting for us.

One final quote from Monsignor Balducci:  Extraterrestrials “were already interacting with Earth.”  This idea is repeated by Fr Malachi Martin:  “the highest levels of Vatican administration know what’s going on in space, and what’s approaching us…”  

So there you have it.  These Catholic “prophets” are preparing the world to listen to a new Gospel, and it's getting ready to happen soon.  Their longing for extraterrestrials to teach us may lead many people away from the real Gospel, to eternal death.  They say, let’s throw out the old, get on board with the new, right?  No, wrong.  Let’s pray that none of this nightmare will ever happen. 

Acknowledgement:  Book by Putnam and Horn, Exo-Vaticana:  The Vatican’s Astonishing Plan for the Arrival of an Alien Savior