While a student at UCLA 60 years ago, I carefully read everything I could find written by atheists and skeptics against the Bible and Christ. Why? I wanted to know their best arguments, the better to refute them. I still keep track of the latest atheist thinking.

I have never had the slightest doubt that the Bible is in every word inspired of the Holy Spirit, nor have I ever doubted my salvation since the day I personally received Christ at a summer camp just before entering the tenth grade. Nevertheless, wasn't it dangerous for a young student only four years old in the Lord to read the arguments of those determined to destroy every Christian's faith? No. How could any argument be dangerous to one who is clothed in the whole armor of God? And of what value is armor except in combat?

My attitude was and still is like that of David, who was ashamed that the armies of Israel would tremble before Goliath. Without hesitation he stepped forward with complete confidence in the God who had proven Himself to be faithful (1 Sam 17 [1]). For David, the size of the giant was irrelevant.

David demanded of Israel's trembling soldiers, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?!" To David such fear and lack of faith were incomprehensible. He did not consider confronting Goliath a heroic deed for which he should be praised. Not to defeat Goliath was unthinkable.

David warned Goliath that the Philistines were defying the God of Israel: "I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied [who] will deliver thee into mine hand...." Nor did David approach Goliath cautiously. He "ran toward the army to meet the Philistine....[He] put his hand in his bag" into which he had just placed "five smooth stones out of the brook" (because Goliath had four giant brothers), "and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead...and he fell upon his face...."

Back to my student days at UCLA: what was the effect upon me of reading the leading atheists' best arguments against God? As a young man, naïve in so many ways, the more I read of atheists' pitiful attempts to defend their faith (yes, atheism is a faith), the stronger my faith became in the Bible as God's infallible Word, and the greater my love grew for the Lord Jesus Christ, who purchased my redemption.

Sadly, many of today's Christians follow the example of Israel's armies rather than David's. Fearful of a challenge by adversaries of God and His Word, they excuse themselves from engaging in "the good fight of faith" (1 Tim 6:12 [2]) because they are "not knowledgeable enough," or this is "not their calling," etc. This is not pleasing to our Lord. The person who avoids open discussion with skeptics out of timidity or fear of being proven wrong has forgotten Peter's exhortation: "But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear" (1 Pt 3:15 [3]-Italics added for emphasis).

"Meekness"? Yes, in recognition of the fact that our confidence is not in our own inadequate intellect and abilities but is in the Holy Spirit to guide and empower us to help the questioner to understand and to win him or her to Christ. "Fear"? Yes, because God knows our every thought and motive, hears our every word, and is the unseen witness of our every deed--and we will one day give an account to Christ as our judge. We testify for our Lord, not as "holier-than-thou-know-it-all" condemners of the unsaved but as ones who, in His love and meekness, seek to deliver from the "snare of the devil" those who have been "taken captive by him at his will" (2 Tim 2:23-26 [4]).

No Christian is excused from this solemn duty. Moreover, on-the-job training is the only way to learn. I remember in my early days of witnessing on university campuses, returning home, falling on my knees, and crying out, "Father, I didn't know how to respond to some of the questions thrown at me. Lord, please show me the answers so I'll be ready next time." Winning souls to Christ is the most worthwhile and satisfying thing a Christian can do, and we learn by doing. Abraham's servant said, "I being in the way, the LORD led me..." (Gen 24:27 [5]).

Science (now almost completely controlled by atheists, whom the media recognizes as the sole scientific spokespersons), has given atheists far more ammunition against faith in God and His Word (as have the ongoing moral failures of Christian leaders) than they had when I was at university 60 years ago. Moreover, atheists, skeptics, and critics today are far more numerous, outspoken, belligerent, and organized in their hatred of God.

A few years ago, Madalyn Murray O'Hair was almost the only recognizable voice and face of atheism in America. Within a short time, atheism's female Lone Ranger was wielding amazing influence through the courts. In 1963, the Supreme Court ruled 8-1 in her favor, banning Bible reading in public schools. In 1964, Life magazine called her "the most hated woman in America." In 1965, she became the founder and president of American Atheists and founding editor of American Atheist Magazine. On Christmas Eve of 1968, Apollo 8's crew (the first men to orbit the moon) read back to earth the first ten verses of Genesis (In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...etc.), O'Hair threatened to sue and effectively removed Bible reading from space. In 1984, she was "chief speechwriter" for pornographer and blasphemy defender Larry Flint's failed presidential campaign.

In 1995, O'Hair, her son Jon Garth Murray, and her granddaughter Robin Murray-O'Hair (daughter of William Murray, who had become an evangelical Christian) disappeared from American Atheists offices. The office manager, David R. Waters, had stolen the organization's money, murdered the three, and buried their bodies on a remote Texas ranch. In 2003, at the age of 56, Waters died in a Federal prison medical facility of lung cancer.

There's a new breed of atheists today. Its leaders are intelligent scientists and university professors. These "New Atheists," as they are called (or "Brights," as they call themselves, relegating theists to dimwittedness), have organized worldwide and have their own popular radio and TV programs. Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens (known as the new atheists' "Four Horsemen") are selling millions of copies of their books in numerous languages. Atheism is the new tsunami, with growing numbers eager to deny Christ and joining this latest wave of unbelief.

Atheism has become a major threat to the church. New Atheists tend to be articulate and belligerent. They are aggressively engaging in "atheist evangelism," determined to stamp out every vestige of belief in God, which they insist is not only "stupid" but "wicked."

Most churches have little to offer their members (especially the youth) to counter this sweeping tide of unbelief. Much of the apologetics against evolution from only a few years ago is no longer suited to deal with current developments in the field. Cosmos, Creator, and Human Destiny [5], which we hope will come off the press by November, will be a great help and ought to be read by every Christian.

The clever DVD, The God Who Wasn't There, is just one example of what the New Atheists are successfully doing in their attempt to destroy faith in God. The voice-over (v.o.), an unseen narrator, takes viewers into a huge Christian school (1,800 students K-12) in the Los Angeles area. The camera zooms in on a particular seat in the chapel, and v.o. (a former student now atheist co-producer) says, "That's where I sat the first time I was born again." The camera moves to another seat and v.o. says, "That's where I sat the second time I was born again."

With further mockery, the film proceeds to cleverly but dishonestly discredit the Bible and misrepresent true faith in Christ--and then issues "the blasphemy challenge." Christ's declaration is quoted: "...him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost...shall not be forgiven" (Lk 12:10 [6]), then viewers are challenged to face a video camera, blasphemously declare their contempt for God and Christ and that they have no fear of hell because it doesn't exist. Those who send in a personal copy of their video receive a free copy of the DVD they have been watching.

What has been the result? Thousands, mostly young people, have responded, and The God Who Wasn't There is spreading like wildfire.

What can Christians do? Take this attack upon the Truth seriously, and ask the Lord to help you rescue many. Study God's Word daily to be certain that your own faith has a sound biblical basis. Then learn how to deal with the atheists' arguments.

In obeying 1 Peter 3:15 [7], you will be confronted by numerous "scientific" objections. Evolution and natural selection have been Satan's major means to lead multitudes astray. In response to the claim that "evolution is a proven fact," simply ask questions: 1) Every living thing is made of energy. What is energy and where did it come from? Science can't tell us. Before we can discuss whether evolution is true, we must know what energy is and its origin. Isn't it unfair to make definitive pronouncements about evolution without knowing what is evolving? 2) Natural selection can only work on living things, but it cannot create life. Only a living cell can create a living cell, and it does so by replicating itself. How did the first cell get life? When science explains what life is and its origin (which it has failed to do), only then can we discuss evolution. Until then, evolutionists are attempting to construct an edifice in the air without any foundation.

The science of mathematics, upon which all other science rests, irrefutably disproves both atheism and evolution. We need a brief review of math in order to proceed. For example, ten to the second power is expressed as 10². It means 10 squared, which is 100. Ten to the 4th power (10⁴) is not twice as much as 10², it is actually 100 times larger. So 10⁴ means one with 4 zeroes after it. The "2" and "4" are called exponents. Thus 10⁸ means one with 8 zeros after it. It is not twice 10⁴ but 10,000 times greater (i.e., add four more zeroes). This is what is known as increasing "exponentially." The numbers quickly become too large to comprehend.

This is why huge numbers must be expressed by exponents. It is much easier to write 10¹⁰ than to write 10,000,000,000; easier to write 10⁵⁰ than to write a one with 50 zeroes after it. Imagine trying to multiply such numbers! But expressed exponentially, it is easy to multiply. One simply adds the exponents. Thus 10³ (1,000) multiplied by 10⁶ (1,000,000) equals 10⁹ (1,000,000,000).

To show how things increase exponentially, suppose you tear in half a piece of paper, put one piece on top of the other and tear the two in half, then keep doing this 50 times. Think this could be done by hand? No! The number of resulting pieces is expressed mathematically as 2⁵⁰. If the paper was 1/500th of an inch thick, multiplying that thickness times 2⁵⁰ tells how tall the stack of paper would be. Any guesses? It would be nearly 35,539,770 miles high!

When it comes to life, the mathematics become even more impossible to imagine.

Science doesn't know what life is and can't explain how life arose from the chaos of an explosion that sterilized the entire cosmos a trillion times over. "Natural selection" is no help. It can neither create life nor assist the first living thing to start functioning.

The first living cell would have had to come about by pure chance. But this is mathematically impossible--and there is no arguing with mathematics.

There are approximately 10⁸⁰ atoms in the cosmos. Assuming 10¹² interatomic interactions per second per atom, and 10¹⁸ seconds (30 billion years) as twice the evolutionists' age of the universe, we get 10¹¹⁰ (80 +12+18) as the total number of possible interatomic interactions in 30 billion years.

If each interatomic interaction produced a unique molecule, then no more than 10¹¹⁰ unique molecules could have ever existed in the universe. About 1,000 protein molecules composed of amino acids are needed for the most primitive form of life. To find a proper sequence of 200 amino acids for a relatively short protein molecule has been calculated to require "about 10¹³⁰ trials. This is a hundred billion billion times the total number of molecules ever to exist in the history of the cosmos! No random process could ever result in even one such protein structure, much less the full set of roughly 1000 needed in the simplest form of life.

"It is therefore sheer irrationality...to believe that random chemical interactions could ever [form] a viable set of functional proteins out of the truly staggering number of candidate possibilities. In the face of such stunningly unfavourable odds, how could any scientist with any sense of honesty appeal to chance interactions as the explanation for the complexity we see in living systems? To do so with conscious awareness of these numbers, in my opinion, represents a serious breach of scientific integrity" (John R. Baumgardener, Theoretical Division of Los Alamos National Laboratory. See In Six Days [7], pp. 224-25).

Remember, the simplest physical structure upon which natural selection might operate must happen by chance--and it can't.

When anyone says that an eye, for example, couldn't happen by chance, Dawkins responds in an offended tone, "Well, of course an eye couldn't happen by chance! Natural selection is the very opposite of chance!" But Dawkins doesn't mention that natural selection is impossible without some living thing that can replicate itself.

For atheism, nothing exists except matter, of which all living things are composed. The physical brain cannot originate ideas because ideas such as "justice" or "truth" have no material substance nor do they occupy space. Many leading scientists reject materialism. It cannot explain the most important concepts that make life meaningful-but atheism and evolution are wholly materialistic. Sir Arthur Eddington pointed out the difference between physical laws that must be obeyed and moral laws that ought to be obeyed. He said, "Ought takes us outside the laws of physics and chemistry." The mind that originates nonphysical ideas must be nonphysical and could therefore not evolve.

One can refute evolution without becoming an expert. David refused physical armor in confronting Goliath. His only weapons were the sling and the stones, with which he was so familiar, along with his faith in the only true God. Being challenged in our own faith, whether by atheists, those of false religions, or any other "giants," can be a very useful tool in strengthening our understanding of why we believe what we believe.

As you step into the battle for truth, God will supply all you need, and your faith will grow ever stronger in Him. The church needs more "Davids"--men and women ready to be used in defense of the truth against the "giants" of unbelief. TBC

Quotable

The Christian life is not a "self-improvement" program in which I "add Jesus" to my life in order to become a better...more successful person. When Christ saves someone, He does not grant that person a fresh start...He gives that person a new life--His life!

This current age is perilous not because of...threats of terrorism, ungodly lawmakers, pro-active judges, insecure economy, conflicts among nations, or even the activity of Satan. No, the real problem is that Christ is being subtly moved from His proper place of preeminence to that of prominence. We...include Christ in our lives and even give Him a part in the ministry, programs, and messages of the Church--but is He preeminent?

It is the folly of our day that we think we can have none of His kingship in this life, yet have some claim to part of His Kingdom in the next. But for those who reject the rule of the Lord Jesus now, there is only the fearful expectation of the fury of the wrath of God, the Judge of heaven and earth.

Q&A

QUESTION: I recently read your article titled "Cosmos and Creator" (6/06). In that article, you say the Voyager space probe would take thousands of years to reach the closest star system, Alpha Centauri. This information is true...but you must consider the near-term possibilities of reaching nearby star systems in much shorter amounts of time. Proposals for nuclear-powered spacecraft and laser-driven ships [could result] in travel times to Alpha Centauri on the order of a few decades....I am a firm believer in God, but I am disconcerted when I see the bashing of science and exploration in articles such as "Cosmos and Creator." I am a young student [17 years old], and I one day hope to explore space and witness the amazing universe God has created. But the publication of articles [like yours] ridiculing the God-instilled desire to explore and expand only aid in the darkening of an otherwise bright future.

RESPONSE: Voyager I and II are about to run out of power, soon to become very expensive junk drifting in space. If Voyager I retained its power, it would take 77,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri. You say that with new propulsion systems on the horizon it could be done in decades.

How many "decades"? Two or three? When do you think this might be accomplished, given the design engineering and financing involved? One hundred years? It's taken the world 50 years since Sputnik to get to where we are today. Because Alpha Centauri is only four light years away, and the Milky Way is 100,000 light years across, if it took only one week to get to Alpha Centauri, it would take 25,000 weeks, or about 500 years, to cross our galaxy with your new propulsion system. How will the crew stay alive?

I don't want to dampen your youthful enthusiasm and optimism, but some things are impossible. Even at the speed of light, it would take 100,000 years to cross our galaxy and trillions of years to reach the farthest star systems. You say you "hope to explore space." Even at ten times the speed of light, it would take you 10,000 years to cross our galaxy--to say nothing of the question of how the crew could live that long. Even at 50 times the speed of light, it would still take 2,000 years to cross the Milky Way, and you would scarcely have touched the fringe of space!

I did not "bash" either science or exploration; I simply gave the facts as I am giving them to you now. Sit down, take a deep breath, and finally admit that although "with God all things are possible" (Mt 19:26) the same cannot be said for man. The old joke may be apropos right now:

Far from "ridiculing the God-instilled desire to explore," I commended what has been accomplished in exploration of our solar system--and the future possibilities available. But I pointed out the simple fact that there are an estimated 200 billion star systems like ours in this galaxy and a trillion galaxies in the cosmos, many of them larger. So if we eventually understood perfectly every detail about our solar system, we would only have in our computers one-two-hundred-billionth-of-a-trillionth of a sample of the cosmos, rather too small to be of any value.

Let's say you broke the world record in the 100-meter race. With that feat accomplished, you decide that you are going to high-jump 100 meters. You chide those who attempt to tell you that to jump that high is impossible, as you have just chided me: "The publication of articles like yours ridiculing the God-instilled desire to jump ever higher only aid in the darkening of an otherwise bright future."

People would tell you to get real! But the ambition to explore even the tiniest part of the universe is more like believing that one day high jumpers could clear the bar at 1,000 meters. Some things are simply impossible.

QUESTION: Why do you say that no life exists anywhere in the universe but on Earth? I am a born-again Christian, but I don't understand why God couldn't have made other "earths" or other life forms elsewhere in this vast universe. The Hubble Space Telescope recently found methane gas (an organic compound) in the atmosphere of a planet light years away from Earth. Methane is often one of the signs of life on our planet. Why not on another?

RESPONSE: If you are truly a "born-again Christian" as you claim, then you believe that Christ made our salvation possible by paying the full penalty for our sins. You also must believe that in order to do so He had to become a genuine man--body, soul, and spirit. He is the only God-man, fully God yet fully man in one person at the same time.

In that light, what about life on other planets? If you were an atheist evolutionist (Dawkins admits that evolution made an atheist out of him), life on other planets seems logical. Without God, life must have happened here by chance, so why couldn't life arise spontaneously from similar lifeless chemicals on other planets? But as a Christian, you believe that God created Adam and Eve and that for there to be other similar creatures with body, soul, and spirit, and the free will to love and obey God but also to rebel, He must also have created them.

Why would God create such beings? Would it be because He hoped that the next "Adam and Eve" would not use their free will to take their own way? You must know that any created beings less than God (who was not created) would make less-than-perfect choices and inevitably rebel, seeking to be like God. They would be susceptible to the same temptation from Satan that destroyed the human race. Surely God would love them and want to forgive their sins, but in order to do so He would have to become one of them and die for their sins.

God knew that Adam and Eve would rebel and He made provision for that. He wouldn't "try again and again" to create a perfect creature who would not sin. That would be impossible because everywhere that there were humanoid creatures, it would be true of them as of us, "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God."

Why couldn't Christ's death on this earth be sufficient for the salvation of others on other planets? You know the answer. Christ became a man in order to redeem men. Believers are "the body of Christ." How could other humanoids on other planets also be "the body of Christ" who is "the same, yesterday, today, and for ever"? I think you know.

QUESTION: How can you be sure that your interpretation of the Scriptures is correct, especially when it comes to things that no one can really explain? In an article you wrote in June of 2006 titled "Cosmos and Creator" you made the following statement: "Carter claims to be a Christian. Yet the hope he holds out for earthlings is to 'join a community of Galactic Civilizations'? That's hardly what Jesus meant by His Father's house of 'many mansions' (Jn 14:2,3 [8])! Carter's 'hope [and] determination' caused me to title a book, Whatever Happened To Heaven?"

You question Jimmy Carter's Christianity, yet you make decisive judgments about the interpretation of biblical quotes?! What gives you the right? Do you honestly believe that you are capable of deciding the intended meaning of the Holy Bible?

RESPONSE: This question troubles me. If by reading I cannot discern "the intended meaning of the Holy Bible," then who can? Was it written only for some elite? Must we trust a pastor, priest, denomination? The Roman Catholic pope and magisterium? How could I or you or anyone else today know to whom to look for the correct interpretation of the Bible? If you are suggesting that no one can know, then God has given us a worthless book.

The Council of Carthage, held in A.D. 397, was the first one to specify the New Testament scriptures that by consensus had already been recognized by the church. Had Christians been waiting for four centuries to know which books to read? Did they have no guidance individually from God's Word? Almost the entire New Testament can be reconstructed from individuals' private letters that have survived from the first and second centuries and from scriptures inscribed on broken pottery placed on hearths, or inscribed on tombstones, etc. It is clear that there was a consensus of which writings were Scripture and which were not. No official pronouncement was needed.

The same Holy Spirit who inspired the Scriptures indwells true believers, and that is how we know that the Bible is inspired of God and that the Qur'an or Book of Mormon, etc., are not. Paul writes, "If any man think himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord" (1 Cor 14:37 [9]). It was upon this basis that the early church recognized genuine Scripture and rejected the rest. And so it must be for us today.

QUESTION: If you had time to give only one argument against atheism and evolution, what would it be?

RESPONSE: There are numerous scientific proofs refuting these pretentions. DNA contains written instructions for life, encoded in a language, which could come only from an infinite intelligence, and which had to be in place before the first cell came into being. Yet in spite of such facts, Francis Collins, who headed the Human Genome Project for ten years and should therefore be the ultimate expert on DNA, remains an evolutionist even after becoming a Christian. Scientific proofs, no matter how conclusive, seem insufficient.

Instead, I would use what God himself offers as the proof of His existence and the infallibility of His Word. What is that? His prophetic declarations concerning future events: "I am the LORD:...new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them....I am God...and there is none like me, declaring...from ancient times the things that are not yet done..." (Isaiah 42:8,9 [10]; Isaiah 46:9,10 [11], etc.).

There are hundreds of prophecies about Israel--even more than for the Messiah. God offers these as the major proof of His existence. For example, Joel 3:2 [12] declares that in the last days God will "gather all nations" to Jerusalem to punish them for

1) their hatred and persecution of His people Israel; and 2) for dividing His land. Israel was conquered many times by various nations but never divided until the United Nations did it. UN Resolution 181 is called "the partition of the land." It divided Israel, giving 87 percent to the Arabs (for oil) and 13 percent to the Jews, although the League of Nations' 1922 Declaration of Principles had said that all of "Palestine" belonged to the Jews.

Resolution 181 also designated Jerusalem as an international territory never to be under the sovereignty of the Jews, fulfilling Christ's declaration that it would "be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled" (Lk 21:24 [13]). In Judgment Day [13], we thoroughly document the fact that the UN, EU, American presidents, and the Vatican are all joined in the attempt to force Israel to submit to international rule over Jerusalem.

Jeremiah 23:7-8 [14] declares that the big news in the last days will no longer be Israel's deliverance from Egypt under Moses but the Lord's gathering back into their land His people Israel from "the north country, and from all countries whither I had driven them...."

Zechariah 14:2 [15] declares that in the last days all the nations surrounding Israel will be allied against her. In fact, throughout history the surrounding nations have never been united together in anything but have fought one another. In our day, however, the impossible has happened: just as God foretold, all are united against Israel by Islam.

These prophecies are too clear to be denied--and there are hundreds more. The evolution-creation argument will never be settled scientifically. Although it is helpful to give the numerous scientific reasons for rejecting evolution, we need to use the irrefutable proof God has given us. Many Bible prophecies are so simple, so clear, and their fulfillment so undeniable, that we need to rely primarily upon this superweapon our Lord has provided--not only in combating false science but in winning the lost through the gospel. Remember that Paul continually declared that the gospel was "according to the scriptures" (Rom 1:1-5 [16]; 1 Cor 15:3 [17], etc.).

News Alert

Christianity Today, 3/28/08 [Excerpts]: Sybil MacBeth, a mathematics instructor by profession, doodler and dancer by avocation, has written, and doodled, a daring devotional: Praying in Color: Drawing a New Path to God.

About three years ago, a litany of cancers...struck among family, friends, and colleagues....MacBeth...possessed what she calls a "critical prayer list." Going to the back porch, she doodled a random shape and wrote [the name of someone on her prayer list] in its center. "I [added] detail and color to the drawing. Each dot, each line, and each stroke of color became another moment of time spent with the person in the center."

[Then] she...drew another shape and put another name in its middle. She embellished it with lines, dots, colors. She continued drawing...until her friends and family formed a colorful community of designs. "To my surprise," she writes, "I had not just doodled--I had prayed."

MacBeth has been leading workshops about praying in color for two years. She recommends 15 to 30 minutes--half spent in drawing and the other half in carrying the visual memories throughout the day....She trusts herself enough to experiment, mess up, and try again in prayer. She trusts God enough to guide her as she falters, succeeds, and grows stronger.

[TBC: Whether or not MacBeth realizes it, she has developed a prayer technique akin to what Buddhist monks and shamans perform. Nevertheless, she has no biblical basis for her approach to prayer.]

Letters

Dear TBC,
Thank you for being there....I tried to imagine what my scriptural awareness would be like if I had not your teachings over the years, and I can tell you that my understanding would not be nearly as substantial. Not only are you marvelously skilled at filling in the gaps of the meat of the Word--even the "by-word" one-liners that punctuate your texts are gems. Like when you once said we all come from the blood of Noah (every time I remind people of this, their perspective of race and man's history is changed), and that children believe in God until they are taught not to. My favorite is..."The Bible is God's love letter to man." I've been contemplating His love and its depth ever since. Jesus knows how to lead one to His anointed teachers. I thank the Lord for your gifts. DC (prisoner, GA)

Dear Dave and Tom,
The Lord recently used your ministry to reveal to me the ever-increasing mystic teachings in the church that I realized I was being misled by. I pray that the Lord will use your ministry to open the eyes of others the way it has opened mine. AE (CA)

Dear TBC,
It is valuable, if sad, that much of what occurs within ["Christianity"] today is deceptive, ecumenical, ritualized, and full of error. Exposing the...contrary beliefs of Robert Schuller, Harold Camping, Rick Warren, et al., may sound to the blinded sheep as divisive and critical, but it is necessary. The media paints us all largely with the same brush....People do not go to church to worship--they go to be entertained and feel good after a 15-minute sermonette.... JW (PA)

Dear Mr. Hunt,
The Berean Call is always eagerly read and passed from person to person in our family. We have several of your books, and they are read and referenced often. Your book An Urgent Call to a Serious Faith [17] is one that has made quite an impact on my life, and one that I read again and again. It is also one that we have read aloud as a family. Our family often feels quite alone in regard to our faith. There are so few that hold "fast the faithful word" and strive to be obedient to it. Though such distance divides us, we feel such a fellowship with you as brothers and sisters in the Lord. Perhaps someday we can meet on this earth, and if not, we will rejoice to see you in our heavenly home. SP (MO)

The Berean Call,
[Regarding TBC, 3/08, article, "Ancient-Future Heresies [17]"] You know, you're absolutely right! Nobody knew anything until Luther and nobody knew how to interpret it until you! The Holy Spirit just up and abandoned the church right after John wrote his last book and never came back until Luther. Jesus just up and lied when he said hell would not prevail against the church to throw us off and let all the millions of Christians from A.D. 100-1500 go straight to hell!....Take me off your mailing list. I have only gotten angrier with each of your newsletters, and I'm tired of the disinformation you dish out. By the way, I'm not Roman Catholic, nor am I for the ecumenical movement. KL (FL)

Dear Tom,
Recently reread your articles in the February and March newsletters, "Evangelical Mysticism" and "Ancient-Future Heresies"-- a very frightening and informative bit of information! It grieves me deeply to think how many people are being led astray by what the world calls wisdom but what God calls foolishness (Rom 1:18-32 [18]). And from this passage of Scripture we learn that when men disregard God and His Word, things only get worse (1 Cor 3:19-20 [19])....I've believed for a long time that when people band together to promote and support one another or some cause other than Christ, they usually end up compromising the Word of God in order to maintain unity for the sake of the cause. The supposed good they are trying to accomplish becomes more important to them than Scriptural purity....This is the worldly way; this is the popular way; this is the way of Purpose Driven and Emerging....It's very easy and quite natural to get involved in some project that so captivates our minds that we begin to neglect and then forget the proper application of God's Word, not even realizing that we have substituted human wisdom for the truth of God's Word. RA (CA)

Dear Brother Dave,
I live in Denmark, where the Lutheran State Church teaches that one is born again through water baptism, and I was so glad to read your article on the subject [3/95,"Baptismal Regeneration?"] that I translated it to Danish and made it available on my website....I hope it will be a blessing to many that they may realize that they need to repent and believe the Gospel to be born again from above by the Spirit of Christ. MW (Denmark)

 

TBC Notes

Proverbs for Dinner

In Matthew 4:4 [20] and Mark 4:4 [21] we have the words of Jesus declaring: "It is written, Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God."

One of the things I've noticed lately is that evangelical young people with whom I've interacted rarely exhibit a biblical mindset. By that I mean they don't usually think in biblical terms or respond with what the Bible teaches in situations outside a formal Sunday school class or a Bible study.

Of course, I could be wrong in thinking that this is the way it is in general today for evangelical youth. Whether right or wrong, however, here is a suggestion that will be beneficial either way: Bring the Book of Proverbs to the dinner table.

Solomon, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, collected and wrote proverbs for the instruction of his son, covering everything from how to raise a child to how to rule a kingdom. Proverbs has been characterized as "laws from heaven for life on earth."

Read a proverb at every meal where your (or at least most of your) family gathers and let the discussion of it comprise at least some of your dinner conversation. Think of it as "the wisdom diet" for building a morally strong family.

 

TBC Extra

OCCULT INVASION - Spiritual Deception of the World & Church

LESS THAN ONE GENERATION AGO, a majority of Americans (churched and unchurched) would have agreed philosophically on matters regarding the absolute nature of truth and error, right and wrong. But after several decades of softening up the culture--simultaneously ridiculing biblical Christianity while using government schools and the media to propagandize the world with relativism and political correctness--the majority of today's generation has bought into the postmodern, subjective smorgasboard of "self-help" spirituality. Unfortunately, it is not only the world that is receptive to the New Spirituality and its counterfeit self-help gospel, which includes the so-called "Law of Attraction." Just as foretold in Scripture (2 Timothy 4:3-4 [22]), increasing numbers of evangelical leaders and movements are rapidly aligning with false doctrines identical to those "revealed" in The Secret as well as Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth, William P. Young'sand A Course in Miracles (demonically channeled "wisdom") -- all of which present a counterfeit Christ and "another gospel" that is not from God.

The Shack (New Age fiction),

WHEN HIS DISCIPLES ASKED JESUS what the signs would be of the nearness of His return and the end of the world, the first sign He gave them was religious deception: "Take heed that no man deceive you" (Matthew 24:4 [23]). His reply came as a warning. He went on to explain the nature of the deception, repeating this first and most important sign three times:

Obviously, Christ's warning is not about atheists or rank unbelievers or leaders of some opposing non-Christian religion. There is no deceit in such frontal assaults. It is not likely that a true Christian would be deceived into embracing atheism or following a Hindu guru or joining the Mormon church, or any other obvious cult. On the other hand, false doctrine (such as positive confession, positive/possibility thinking, psychology, etc.) taught within the church by admired church leaders could be very destructive. Christ's warning is about a deception which is all the more subtle because it comes from within the church--and in His name?!

Jude also warns about "certain men [who have] crept in unawares" (Jude 4 [24]). Crept in where? Obviously, into the church. That these are not Satanists or deliberate occultists who are insidiously at work in the church, but "Christian leaders," is clear from Christ's description:

These enemies who, incredibly, oppose Christ in His name are clearly occultists. Some power is at work through them that is not of God. Christ is not describing mere trickery, though these men are not above that. Their signs and wonders are so impressive that even the elect are in danger of being deceived. Moreover, the "power" convinces these false prophets themselves, for they ask, seemingly surprised, "Lord, have we not?...?" It is the display of such power that attracts revival seekers today.

The lust for health and wealth and especially godlike power opens the door to occult bondage. This is a major problem in the charismatic movement: A desire for power and at the same time a denigration of biblical doctrine, with the resultant loss of the very guidelines which would protect one from occult involvement. Will some of today's charismatic leaders be among those who will say, "Lord, Lord, did we not...?" and to whom the Lord will reply, "I never knew you; -depart from Me" (Matthew 7:23 [26])? Very clearly, Christ is warning (as do other Scriptures) of a false "signs-and-wonders" movement in the last days, led by false teachers, false prophets and false apostles. Paul was even more specific:

Jannes and Jambres were occultists--magicians in Pharaoh's court. By the power of Satan, they duplicated some of the miracles that God performed through Moses and Aaron. Paul declares that resistance to the truth in the last days will come from those who produce by the power of Satan what seem to be miracles of God and thereby pervert the faith.

Many false prophets will arise and will deceive many. Christ is not describing something small. The false revival will be worldwide. In fact, such a movement is here, and it is growing with the support of those who ought to know better. Unfortunately, the "great spiritual awakening" [also called "emergence," "convergence," "deep shift" or "paradigm shift"] being praised today is characterized by a neglect of sound doctrine, and tolerance for false prophets. Such gullibility and the rejection of biblical guidance open the door to the occult. Satan and his minions are ever eager to provide "signs and wonders" for those who neglect sound doctrine.

When we name those who have led or are leading the church into occultism [as we periodically have done and will continue to do] we are not suggesting that this is necessarily deliberate on their part. Few people, even atheists, intentionally go into the occult. [Recall that]for three years, Paul warned the Ephesian elders "night and day with tears" that even some of them would speak "perverse things to draw away disciples after them" (Acts 20:28-31 [28]). --DAVE HUNT

Above excerpt condensed from Dave Hunt's newly revised and expanded hardback edition of Occult Invasion, scheduled for August release. Today, the evangelical church is full of men and women--from "new" Latter-Rain apostles and prophets to "new" contemplative mystics of the postmodern, ecumenical (and increasingly universalist) Emerging Church--who clearly fit Paul's description. These individuals may sincerely believe they are serving Christ, but like the teachers of counterfeit New Spirituality, they too have been "beguiled" to believe and preach "another Jesus...another spirit...another gospel" (2 Cor 11:3-4 [29]).