I like this quote (H/T Bert): If you wake up tomorrow morning thinking that saying a few Latin words over your pancakes is going to turn them into the body of Elvis Presley, you have lost your mind. But if you think more or less the same thing about a cracker and the body of [Read More...]
from
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/tippling/2016/09/29/transubstantiation-and-elvis/
Wednesday, 28 September 2016
John 3:20-21
“Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.”
from
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=NIV&search=John%203:20-21
from
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?version=NIV&search=John%203:20-21
Finally: Killers of Malatya Martyrs Sentenced to Life in Turkish Prison
But Turkish Christians are still 'infuriated.' Here's why.
After a nine-year legal saga, a Turkish criminal court today sentenced five men to life in prison for the torture and murder of three Christians in southeast Turkey in 2007.
The Malatya First Heavy Penal Court found Salih Gurler, Cuma Ozdemir, Abuzer Yildirim, Hamit Ceker, and Emre Gunaydin guilty on three counts each of premeditated murder, and sentenced them all to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Despite the conviction and sentencing, however, all five walked out of court free men while their case awaits higher legal review, infuriating Turkish Christians.
Gokhan Talas, close friend of the three slain Christians and witness at the murder scene, said he was “okay” with the decision, but was angry that the convicted men walked away free while the sentence is reviewed by higher courts.
“They need to be in jail right now,” Talas said. “This process is unjust. There’s no justice for Christians in this country. This is the proof of that. They are just hiding behind the laws. These people are killers.”
In a press release issued by the Association of Protestant Churches in Turkey, chairman and pastor Ihsan Ozbek echoed Talas’s dismay that the perpetrators were free despite being handed life sentences.
“Of course the legal process will continue as the case passes to the Regional Administrative Court, and then will go to the Supreme Court. This process can take years, and the killers of our brothers brutally murdered can move around freely for years to come,” Ozbek said. “The continuous postponement of the punishment they deserve severely wounds confidence in justice.”
On April 18, 2007, in the office of the Zirve Publishing House in Malatya in southeastern ...
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/NsSrkirlCx4/finally-killers-malatya-martyrs-sentenced-turkey-ergenekon.html
Ten Christian Athletes Who Were Tebowing Before Tebow
Christian sports stars have a long history of using their public platform to display their private faith.
Clergymen hovering along the sidelines; athletes proselytizing like revival preachers; and “Jocks for Jesus” steadily colonizing locker rooms nationwide.
This was the brave new sports world that journalist Frank Deford described in a 1976 three-part series for Sports Illustrated on religion and sports. “It is almost as if a new denomination had been created,” Deford posited. “Sportianity.”
Deford was writing at a unique historical moment. Newsweek had proclaimed 1976 “The Year of the Evangelical,” as presidential candidate Jimmy Carter identified as a “born again” Christian. Evangelicals, it seemed, were everywhere—even in the games that people played and loved.
More than simply documenting this trend, though, Deford channeled his inner-most H. L. Mencken and produced a whimsical and astute lament of the burgeoning Sportian movement. “They endorse Jesus, much as they would a new sneaker or a graphite-shafted driver,” he quipped.
In the 40 years since Deford’s profile, Sportians have become increasingly ubiquitous. Indeed, the mere fact of their presence is no longer noteworthy. It takes a more conspicuous act or angle to get attention: think of A. C. Green’s celibacy, Orel Hershiser’s singing of the doxology, or Tim Tebow’s sideline gesticulations.
But while the “Christian athlete” phenomenon may have intensified in recent decades, a look back at our past reveals a lengthy history of evangelical Protestant involvement in sports. Long before Deford deployed his now-infamous neologism, Christian athletes made playing and praying part of their athletic identity.
Here, then, is a list of ten noteworthy “proto-Sportians" ...
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/uSZh1NBuBPs/ten-christian-athletes-who-were-tebowing-before-tebow.html
Crossway Reverses Decision to Make ESV Bible Text Permanent
After much public debate, publisher says strategy for a 'stable' Bible was a 'mistake.'
The publisher of the English Standard Version (ESV) of the Bible has reversed its controversial decision to finalize the current text after tweaking 29 verses.
“We have become convinced that this decision was a mistake,” stated Crossway president and CEO Lane Dennis in an announcement released today. “We apologize for this and for any concern this has caused for readers of the ESV, and we want to explain what we now believe to be the way forward. Our desire, above all, is to do what is right before the Lord.”
Crossway recently announced that after changing 52 words found in 29 verses, the ESV “will remain unchanged in all future editions.”
The publisher’s intended goal was “to stabilize the [ESV], serving its readership by establishing the ESV as a translation that could be used “for generations to come,” stated Dennis. “We desired for there to be a stable and standard text that would serve the reading, memorizing, preaching, and liturgical needs of Christians worldwide from one generation to another.”
However, after much public discussion over the decision, Crossway has changed its strategy.
“The means to that goal, we now see, is not to establish a permanent text but rather to allow for ongoing periodic updating of the text to reflect the realities of biblical scholarship such as textual discoveries or changes in English over time,” stated Dennis. “These kinds of updates will be minimal and infrequent, but fidelity to Scripture requires that we remain open in principle to such changes.”
CT will update this blog with reactions.
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/3OgJ0zvS6C8/crossway-reverses-decision-esv-bible-text-permanent-mistake.html
Melinda Gates: Why Women Are the Best Investment
Melinda Gates is known for her work as the co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and she is passionate about making the world a better place through intentional philanthropic investment. So far, it’s paying off. In the last 25 years, thanks in part to the work of the foundation, extreme poverty and childhood deaths have been cut in half. Maternal deaths have been nearly cut in half. Although there’s work yet to be done, Gates is convinced that if we deliver to developing countries the simple tools we take for granted in the West, we can see those numbers halve again at a much faster rate.
“There is a passage in Luke, that you do not put a light under a bushel basket,” said Gates in her CTinterview last year. “You put it up for everybody to see. We at the foundation are trying to shine light on the world, on the world’s problems and inequities, so that other people will feel this calling too.”
Driven by her Christian faith, Gates is using her influence to speak out for people who often don’t have a voice, especially women. During the recent Willow Creek Leadership Summit, I sat down with Gates to talk about her work with the foundation, both globally and domestically, and why she thinks women are such a good investment.
Why does the foundation primarily focus on women? What makes women a good investment?
We know that for every marginal dollar a woman gets in her hands, she’s twice as likely [as a man] to pile it back into her family. So if she gets more income that actually stays in her hands, she spends it on the family. Men tend to spend it on other things. When a woman is empowered, she transforms everything around her because she is often the center of the ...
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/xBujormI8Vs/melinda-gates-why-women-are-best-investment.html
News: Evangelicals' Favorite Heresies Revisited by Researchers
Second study examines what Americans believe about 47 theological statements.
How well does the average American understand basic Christian doctrine? For that matter, how about the average evangelical?
Perhaps not all that differently. And perhaps it matters how the questions are asked.
Reprising their ground-breaking study from two years ago, LifeWay Research and Ligonier Ministries released an update today on the state of American theology in 2016. Researchers surveyed 3,000 adults to measure their agreement with a set of 47 statements about Christian theology—everything from the divinity of Christ to the nature of salvation to the importance of regular church attendance.
About two-thirds of Americans said that God accepts the worship of Christians, Jews, and Muslims (64%); around the same number agreed strongly or somewhat that there is one true God (69%), that he is perfect (65%), and that he still answers prayers (66%).
Of the 3,000 respondents, LifeWay identified 586 as evangelicals by belief: those who strongly agreed that the Bible is the highest authority for Christian belief; that personal evangelism is very important; that Jesus’ death on the cross was the only way to cancel the penalty of sin; and that trusting in Jesus is the only way to eternal salvation.
In the previous study, evangelicals identified themselves. The results revealed that they had a surprising level of confusion surrounding core Christian doctrine, including whether Jesus was fully divine, whether the Holy Spirit was a force or a personal being, and whether salvation depends on God or humans making the first move.
But this year’s study showed similar results, indicating that not only are those who self-identify as evangelical confused about the basic tenets of their faith, but so are those who fit the National ...
from
http://feeds.christianitytoday.com/~r/christianitytoday/ctmag/~3/62AJJfFYKhw/evangelicals-favorite-heresies-state-of-theology-ligonier.html
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