Ntuhresting...
From The Tennessean:
"A newly released LifeWay poll of 2,500 churchgoers contradicts a major finding of the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.
Pew researchers found that most evangelicals held an inclusive view of heaven, with 59 percent saying that many religions lead to eternal life.
But LifeWay found that less than a third of evangelicals believed salvation could be found outside Christianity.
Ed Stetzer, director of LifeWay research, says that, at least when it comes to evangelicals, Pew was asking the wrong question.
Pew pollsters asked respondents to choose between two options: "My religion is the one, true faith leading to eternal life" or "Many religions can lead to eternal life."
Pew researchers, who polled more than 35,000 Americans, did not attempt to find out what respondents meant by "many religions."
"We made no attempt to define the term religion," says Greg Smith, a research fellow at the Pew Forum.
Two different questions
LifeWay, on the other hand, asked specifically about Christianity: "If a person is sincerely seeking God, he or she can obtain eternal life through religions other than Christianity."
Those are two completely different questions, says Stetzer. While evangelicals believe that other Christians, such as mainline Protestants or Catholics, may go to heaven, they draw the line at other faiths.
That's a point longtime religion journalist Terry Mattingly made recently. Mattingly, who directs the Washington Journalism Center at the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, wrote about the Pew Survey at www.getreligion.org.
Mattingly says that evangelicals are less likely to condemn other brands of Christianity. But there's a world of difference, he said, between evangelicals saying that Catholics or Pentecostals can go to heaven, and saying that Muslims or Buddhists will make it to heaven.
John Green, senior fellow in religion and American politics at the Pew Forum, said its survey raised more questions than it answered.
"When people tell us, for instance, that they believe many faiths can lead to eternal life, that could mean many things," he said at the press conference announcing survey results.
"It could mean people have a universalistic view of religion. It could be they're merely tolerant. There's also the question of who constitutes the 'many' in that question.
"Is this a case of evangelicals who have decided mainline Protestants are within the fold but nobody else? Or are these evangelicals, for instance, who might include Jews and Muslims because after all, they're people of Scripture as well?"
Stetzer thinks that many evangelicals from the Pew survey weren't active churchgoers or didn't hold to core evangelical beliefs.
Eighty percent of those who held to a core set of nine evangelical beliefs said Christianity offered the only road to heaven."
"Forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians and yet did nothing."
I found this over at The Thinklings blog. It is a quote by a German Christian man who did nothing about the extermination of Jews, even though he knew it was happening. I echo Philip at Thinklings in saying that we are doing the same thing about the extermination of the unborn - we are turning a deaf ear. The abortion massacre is "occurring in slaughter houses disguised as clinics, instead of gas chambers disguised as showers."
Here is the quote from Hitler's Cross by Erwin Lutzer, Moody Press, 1995, pp. 99-100, that I found at The Thinklings blog. Don't click away without reading:
"In a small church on the East Coast a pastor delivered a sermon on abortion and after the service a German man who had lived in Nazi Germany told of his experience:
I lived in Germany during the Nazi Holocaust. I considered myself a Christian. We heard stories of what was happening to the Jews, but we tried to distance ourselves from it, because, what could anyone do to stop it?
A railroad track ran behind our small church, and each Sunday morning we could hear the whistle in the distance and then the wheels coming over the tracks. We became disturbed when we heard the cries coming from the train as it passed by. We realized that it was carrying Jews like cattle in the cars!
Week after week the whistle would blow. We dreaded to hear the sound of those wheels because we knew that we would hear the cries of the Jews en route to the death camp. Their screams torment us.
We knew the time the train was coming and when we heard the whistle blow we began singing hymns. By the time the train came past our church we were singing at the top of our voices. If we heard the screams, we sang more loudly and soon we heard them no more.
Years have passed and no one talks about it anymore. But I still hear that train whistle in my sleep. God forgive me; forgive all of us who called ourselves Christians and yet did nothing..."
Righteous anger
"In another of my books, I have used the account of Jesus before the tomb of Lazarus. To me, what Jesus did at the tomb of Lazarus sets the world on fire - it becomes a great shout into the morass of the twentieth century. Jesus came to the tomb of Lazarus. The One who claims to be God stood before the tomb, and the Greek language makes it very plain that he had two emotions. The first was tears for Lazarus, but the second emotion was anger. He was furious; and he could be furious at the abnormality of death without being furious with Himself as God. This is tremendous in the context of the twentieth century. When I look at evil - the cruelty which is abnormal to that which God made - my reaction should be the same. I am able not only to cry over the evil, but I can be angry at the evil - as long as I am careful that egoism does not enter into my reaction. I have a basis to fight the thing which is abnormal to what God originally made.
The Christian should be in the front line, fighting the results of man's cruelty, for we know that it is not what God has made. We are able to be angry at the results of man's cruelty without being angry at God or being angry at what is normal."
- Francis A. Schaeffer, He Is There and He Is Not Silent
The Acid Test for Pain
It seems like lately I've had several conversations with people on the topic of pain. Pain, I believe, is pretty cyclical for most people - it comes and goes. But several of my friends lately are going through the bottom of the valley, or the wave, or whatever imagery you want to use. So I thought I would do a little blog post on pain since surely some of you out there are in that place as well.
I think it is very important to learn to handle pain well - whether mental, physical or whatever. The ability to handle the fire has made a big difference for me since I began learning to do it. Before that I was whiny and immature about painful experiences, and I was always afraid of what was coming around the bend. Now, I certainly don't welcome pain, but I recognize it as the major way that I become closer to God.
This morning I ran across a post at the SharperIron blog that is incredible and directly on the subject of pain. So rather than saying the same thing but very likely not as well, I'm just going to link to the post over there. It's called "The Acid Test: Handling Life's Pain." If you're in a rut right now or going through a painful situation, or if you're questioning why God has brought you where you are, I hope you'll check it out.
Gone to the dogs
So who's heard of Leona Helmsley? You may have known who she was before she died, but if you read or listen to the news then you couldn't have missed her. She was the woman who became a billionaire managing her late husband's real estate in New York, and she went to prison for tax evasion. Interesting life I guess - but the most interesting thing about Leona Helmsley is how much she hated people and loved dogs.
I love dogs, really love them, I have four and I couldn't imagine life without dogs. But my love is definitely not on the level of Leona Helmsley's love. Get this - when Leona Helmsley died, she left her huge reserves of money to dogs and dogs alone. A New York Times article describes it:
Her instructions, specified in a two-page “mission statement,” are that the entire trust, valued at $5 billion to $8 billion and amounting to virtually all her estate, be used for the care and welfare of dogs, according to two people who have seen the document and who described it on condition of anonymity.
The two people who described the statement said Mrs. Helmsley signed it in 2003 to establish goals for the multibillion-dollar trust that would disburse assets after her death.
The first goal was to help indigent people, the second to provide for the care and welfare of dogs. A year later, they said, she deleted the first goal.
Now, I contend, this woman didn't so much love dogs as she absolutely detested people. By the accounts of people who knew her, Helmsley was indeed "known for her sharp tongue and impatience with humanity."
Albert Mohler has a great perspective on this spectacle:
"We really do know that feeding fellow human beings is more important than feeding dogs, and that care for humans should take precedence over care for animals...Confusion about this abounds. Radical animal rights activists claim no moral distinction between human beings and other creatures. Spain proposes to give apes and other "hominids" legal rights. Professor Peter Singer of Princeton University argues that some domestic animals such as cows and pigs should be granted moral preference over human infants in some situations. Scientists grounded in a naturalistic worldview are more and more hard pressed to define just what makes humans unique as a species. Leona Helmsley is not alone in her confusion...But anyone who thinks that a dog is as morally significant as a human being is lacking in moral judgment...The case of Leona Helmsley -- whatever the eventual outcome of legal battles ahead -- makes this point with absolute clarity. Her worldview had, quite literally, gone to the dogs."
The company you keep
“It is far better to be alone, than to be in bad company.” - President George Washington
Just thought I'd inject that thought into your day. I want to clarify though - "bad" company in my mind means people who are detrimental to you mentally, physically or spiritually. Those people could be Christian or non-Christian, older or younger, male or female - it doesn't matter what their particulars are, but rather what kind of impact they have on you.
For instance...say you have a friend who disrespects and disobeys her parents and tries to get you to do the same thing. Or a friend who tries to get you to compromise on the beliefs/standards you know you shouldn't compromise on.
Or...say you're married, but you're attracted to a coworker or you know a coworker is attracted to you. Probably not a great idea to hang out with that person because it could lead to something that you don't want it to lead to.
Or...say you have a friend who likes to gossip or complain about her husband. Hanging out with her would probably lead to you gossiping and complaining too.
OK so there are many "Or..."s and many different situations. I think most of us have that inner voice that lets us know when we're keeping bad company. Unfortunately it doesn't work if you don't listen to it! Let's all give some thought to the company we keep today - and praise God for the amazing company we keep that we surely don't deserve all the time.
Fighting to end the slaughter of innocents
"I am not in the least embarrassed to say that I believe we will one day each be called upon to tender an account for what we have done, and what we have failed to do, in our lifetime. And while I believe in a merciful God, I would be terrified at the thought of having to explain, at the final judgment, why I stood unmoved while Herod's slaughter of the innocents was being reenacted here in my own country."
- Henry Hyde on fighting for a partial-birth abortion ban in America
Are you hurting yourself?
I was recently chatting with my friend about our childhoods, and he told me that when he was a toddler, he would take his finger and twist his hair around it. The finger would get stuck in the hair and of course hurt him, but he didn't realize he was the one hurting himself. His mom said he cried and tried to run away from whatever it was, and she had to catch him and get his finger out.
Of course I made lots of jokes about how this proves my theory of him being not too bright and all. But then it hit me - we do that very same thing all the time as not-so-little people. How often do you hear that voice in your head telling you something is a bad idea, but you do it anyway, only to be mad later because of the consequences? I do it all the time. I'll procrastinate on something, then get mad when at the last minute as I'm trying to catch up, something needs my attention. I'll give that thing attention and then blame it on that distraction that I was late with whatever I'd procrastinated on.
Another one - sometimes I get mad at God and biology itself if I gain a few pounds. Like it's God's fault when I put off the gym for three weeks and develop an obsession with breakfast burritos. I'm twisting and pulling my own hair. I'm hurting myself and blaming someone or something else - but the difference between me and my friend as a toddler is that I know what's really going on. I'm deliberately sabotaging myself to get out of doing something hard or restraining myself from something bad. And you know what that is - to do something knowing that it's going to hurt you? That is stupid. Plain, straight up stoopid.
Sometimes you have to do the things you don't want to do, or avoid the things you do want to do. Sometimes we all just have to suck it up and be our own leader.
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