Christian News - 30 October 2006

Christian News

30 October 2006
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* CELEBRATING THE REFORMATION - At the end of October, churches all over the world will be celebrating the birth of the Reformation when German Reformer Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of the Schlosskirche, Wittenberg, 31 October 1517. If you are in Cape Town, please join the Reformation Society in our Reformation Celebrations. Otherwise, please visit www.ReformationSA.org for great resources to inspire and involve your family, students, congregation or co-workers in working for a new Biblical Reformation and praying for a fresh spiritual Revival in our time. Here is an example of the great character studies and articles available on the www.ReformationSA.org website:
Zwingli – The Reformer of Zurich - Ulrich Zwingli was the father of the Reformation in Switzerland. Born and raised in the Alps, Zwingli was one of the most colourful and audacious characters in Swiss history. A devout student of the Scripture, Zwingli was transformed and shaped by the Word of God. He has been described as "an amazing combination of intellect, passion and wit."
Born at an altitude of 3,600 feet (1,100 metres), the son of the Mayor of Wildhaus, Zwingli studied in Bern, Basel, and Vienna. In 1506, he received his MA degree.
When Erasmus’s New Testament in Greek appeared, in 1516, Zwingli immediately purchased a copy. Zwingli taught himself Hebrew and Greek and wrote out and memorized Paul’s Epistles in the Greek New Testament. He carried around his little pocket edition with him, memorizing much of the New Testament. Zwingli was shocked to find that there was a world of difference between the teachings of the Bible and the teachings and practices of the Roman Catholic Church.
When Zwingli was appointed pastor at Grossmunster, (the Great Cathedral) in Zurich, he began his duties, on 1 January 1519, by preaching through the Gospel of Matthew. This bold action of replacing the mass with the preaching of the Word as the central focus of church services marked the beginning of expository preaching.
Shortly after he became pastor in Zurich, the city was hit by the plague. Zwingli showed his courage by giving no thought to his own safety, but staying in Zurich and ministering selflessly to the highly contagious victims. He himself was soon struck down with the plague, and nearly died.
Zwingli recovered from this ordeal, his faith deepened and matured, his mind resolute. He called the people to return to the Bible as the sole standard of faith and practice, to recognise Christ as the only true Head of the Church. Zwingli attacked one Roman doctrine after another. He attacked unbelief, superstition and hypocrisy. Eagerly he strove after repentance, applying Christ’s Lordship to all areas of life, in Christian love and faith. He emphasized the need to care for and protect widows and orphans, to maintain law and uphold justice. Zwingli was concerned that our personal Christian faith and love also result in justice established by the laws of the community.
At the heart of the Swiss Reformation was a dynamic sense of Christian community. The Church is a genuine community, one in body and spirit, having the grace of Christ in common and bearing the fruits of the Spirit, the fruits of Christ and the Spirit of God. This unity must extend beyond matters of the spirit to social concern for the entire community, taught Zwingli.
As Zwingli systematically preached through the New Testament, he laid the foundations for the Reformation in Switzerland. In 1523, the City Council of Zurich voted to become Protestant.
Zwingli preached in the market place on Fridays so that the crowds from surrounding villages might hear the Word of God. He proclaimed the sufficiency of faith in Christ, the deficiency of superstition and indulgences, the necessity of true repentance and holy living. He also emphasized the importance of caring for the poor and needy, the widow and orphan.
Grace could not be bought or sold. Zwingli confessed his own sins publically, including an affair with a nun while a priest in Einsiedeln, and declared Christ’s saving grace to be sufficient for the salvation of all who truly repent. Zurich’s freedom loving city, known for their efficient army and love of political independence, found themselves drawn to this dynamic preacher and Reformer.
From the time that Zwingli began his expository preaching on the Gospel of Matthew, 1 January 1519, he only had 12 years to establish the Reformation in Switzerland. He died in battle, fighting to defend Zurich from attack, in 1531. In 1529, a Protestant missionary from Zurich was burned at the stake for preaching the Gospel in the Catholic Canton of Schwyz. Zurich stopped trading with Schwyz in protest. The Catholic Cantons declared war. In October 1531, 8,000 Catholic soldiers met 1,500 Protestant soldiers in battle at Kappel. Historian Myconius described Zwingli’s death at the Battle of Kappel: "Three times Zwingli was thrown to the ground by the advancing forces, but in each case he stood up again. On the fourth occasion, a spear reached his chin and he fell to his knees saying: ‘They can kill the body, but not the soul’." Although Zwingli’s career had been cut down at the Battle of Kappel, he laid firm foundations, which were later built upon by Heinrich Bullinger and John Calvin.

Zwingli succeeded in establishing a thoroughly Reformed Church in Zurich, which served as a model for the Swiss National Protestant Church. Zwingli’s model of Reform was adopted in Berne, Basel, Shaffhausen, Zurich and later Geneva. (Frontline Fellowship and www.reformationsa.org, Oct 2006) (to index)

* DEBATE: SAME-SEX MARRIAGES - In December 2005 the Constitutional Court ruled that section 30 (1) of the Marriage Act was unconstitutional because the wording only allowed for marriages between men and women and gave parliament 12 months to include the words "or spouse" after the words wife or husband.
If not done in time, the relevant section of the act would automatically be read to include those words, which take away the legal requirement that a marriage be between a man and a woman.
The home affairs portfolio committee has proposed a Civil Unions Bill that would complement the existing Marriage Act. According to the proposed Bill the union cannot be called a "marriage", is open only to same-sex couples and marriage officers can refuse to perform the ceremony.
Pastor Errol Naidoo, spokesperson for the "For Marriage Alliance" had the following to say, "The Church's defence of the institution of marriage has nothing to do with prejudice or discrimination.
Monogamous heterosexual marriage and the family have always been recognised, across cultures, as fundamental to a healthy society. In the modern era, the world community has acknowledged the importance of the family in its foundational human rights document, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Article 16 declares; "Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family". Section 3 of article 16 goes on to state: "The family is the natural and the fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State".

God, the Creator of the universe, revealed His divine blueprint for marriage and the family at the very beginning of time.

Significantly, the Creator’s masterplan for the family predates the State, the Church, or religion. In the beginning God created them male and female. And to His creation He stated; "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh" Gen: 2:24.

Consequently, God defined and ordained the most enduring of society's institutions - marriage and the family. Five thousand years of recorded history have come and gone, yet every civilization in the history of the world has been built upon it.
Marriage, therefore, is a fundamental social institution. It is central to the nurture and raising of children. It is the "social glue" that reliably attaches fathers to children. It contributes to the physical, emotional, and economic health of men, women and children, and thus to the nation as a whole. With same-sex 'marriage' none of this is possible.
Contrary to popular opinion, Christians fully support all the constitutional rights, protections, and benefits afforded to homosexual persons - except those which expressly legitimise their sexual behaviour. Wherever the Christian message has penetrated the deepest is where you will find the freest nations on earth today. For example, homosexual lobby groups would not be able to demand special rights and privileges in countries like China, Iran, Libya, Syria and Sudan amongst others.
Homosexuality is a sexual behaviour and not an inherent characteristic like skin colour or ethnicity. Many homosexuals have made the transition to heterosexuality but no black person has ever become a white person. The claim therefore by homosexuals that their demand for equal status with heterosexual marriage is a human rights issue is erroneous. The Bible confirms in both the Old and New Testaments that God created two genders - male and female.
1 Timothy 1:9 – 10 states, "Knowing this: that the law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless....For fornicators, for sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine". 1 Corinthians 6:9 - 11 "Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites...And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God".

My prayer is that instead of justifying sinful behaviour, homosexuals will receive God's love, mercy and grace, repent of their sin and turn to Him." (News24.com, 16 Oct 2006) (to index)

International

Jailed … for homeschooling in Germany
Eritrea: police arrest 150 more Christians
Human rights watchdog group criticizes united states on abortion
BBC acknowledges bias against christianity
Planned parenthood feels the heat
South Dakota Christians ask for prayer

* JAILED ... FOR HOMESCHOOLING IN GERMANY - The European Union has just uncovered another dangerous threat to European social stability: home-schooling. Yes, German police recently arrested the mother of children who were being homeschooled. The father had to flee with the children to Austria. The European Court of Human Rights upheld the German ban on homeschooling, which dated back to 1938 in the Nazi era.
I happen to teach in a college in Virginia, Patrick Henry College, where most of the students have been homeschooled through high-school. Their SAT scores compare with Ivy League colleges. If the college were in Germany, however, all of their parents would be subject to arrest.
Think about that at a time when Americans, even Supreme Court justices, are advocating the use of foreign legal precedents for American court rulings. Do we really want to start jailing home-schooling parents? (Crosswalk, 19 Oct 2006) (to index)

* ERITREA: POLICE ARREST 150 MORE CHRISTIANS - In a large-scale roundup the past week, Eritrean authorities have detained 150 Christians from at least five of the country’s outlawed churches.
Starting at 6 a.m. last Wednesday (October 25), security officers in the town of Mendefera began going from house to house, arresting local Christians from a list they compiled of known members of Pentecostal churches and the Orthodox renewal movement.
During the first day’s raids, a total of 38 men and 17 women were incarcerated at the military fort in Mendefera, 30 miles south of Asmara. Local sources confirmed to Compass that police authorities were subjecting the detained Christians to beatings and other physical mistreatment.
According to eyewitnesses, at least 10 nursing mothers were among the new prisoners, all of them forced to leave their infants behind.
The roundup continued the following morning, October 26, when an even larger total of 95 evangelical Christians were reportedly put under arrest.
According to sources in Mendefera, a local pastor jailed there eight months ago was recently hospitalized with severe injuries. Pastor Iyob Berhe from the Kale Hiwot Church had been subjected to harsh military punishments requiring emergency medical treatment in the Mendefera Public Hospital.
Berhe has since been transferred back to the Mendefera police station, where he remains under arrest for refusing to sign papers recanting his evangelical beliefs and activities.
Of the 162 Christians arrested this month, two young men were beaten to death at a military camp near Adi-Quala on October 17, two days after their arrest.
In May 2002, Eritrea closed down all independent religious groups not operating under the umbrella of the government-sanctioned Orthodox, Catholic, Lutheran or Muslim faiths. Independent Protestant churches have been refused legal registration, and even the Orthodox Church’s patriarch and its flourishing renewal movement have fallen out of favor.
Anyone caught worshipping outside the four recognized religious institutions, even in private homes, has been subjected to arrest, torture and severe pressure to deny their faith. (Worthy News, 30 Oct 2006) (to index)

* HUMAN RIGHTS WATCHDOG GROUP CRITICIZES UNITED STATES ON ABORTION - An organization that is supposed to monitor international human rights abuses is instead furthering its pro-abortion agenda and has issued comments responding to a new report condemning various states in the U.S. for their pro-life laws that place sensible limits on abortion.
Human Rights Watch condemned the laws in some states that it says is infringing on the so-called right to an abortion.
The group condemned laws that require abortion practitioners to tell women about abortion's link to breast cancer.
"There is a direct assault on women's right to safe abortion through deliberate misinformation," Mollmann said.
However, Dr. Joel Brind, a professor at New York's Baruch College, when he conducted an analysis of all research on abortion and breast cancer done to date, concluded that women who had an abortion before their first term child had a 50% increased risk of developing breast cancer while women who had an abortion after their first child sustained a 30% increased risk. (LifeNews, 30 Oct 2006) (to index)

* BBC ACKNOWLEDGES BIAS AGAINST CHRISTIANITY - BBC executives have been forced to admit what critics have known for years - that the corporation is institutionally biased.
The revelation came after details of an 'impartiality' summit called by its chairman, Michael Grade, were leaked.Senior figures admitted that the BBC is guilty of promoting Left-wing views and an anti-Christian sentiment.
They also said that as an organisation it was disproportionately over-represented by gays and ethnic minorities.
It was also suggested that the BBC is guilty of political correctness, the overt promotion of multiculturalism and of being anti-American. (MailOnSunday, 22 Oct 2006) (to index)

* PLANNED PARENTHOOD FEELS THE HEAT - The Planned Parenthood Federation, the nation's largest abortion business, has released a new memo revealing its upcoming national strategy. The memo focuses mostly on the efforts of pro-life advocates to counter the abortion business and it laments the amount of time Planned Parenthood devotes to responding.
Cecile Richards, who became the new president of the pro-abortion outfit earlier this year, writes the memo and bases it on her observations during her nine months as president.
Richards says that the strategy was developed to answer the question, "What do we have to do differently to achieve our goals more quickly and more effectively?"
Jim Sedlack of STOPP International, a group that monitors Planned Parenthood, has analyzed the memo's contents.
"The thing that hits you about A Strategy for Moving Forward is that Richards believes that pro-life forces have been very effective in our battle against Planned Parenthood," he explained. "She says that Planned Parenthood is on the 'defensive.'"
"The entire tone of this document reveals a Planned Parenthood leader who feels the organization is under siege," Sedlack adds. (LifeNews, 25 Oct 2006) (to index)

* SOUTH DAKOTA CHRISTIANS ASK FOR PRAYER - Leslie Unruh, a post-abortive woman and codirector of the group that was able to garner bipartisan legislative support to outlaw abortion in South Dakota was on the James Dobson Focus on the Family radio show.
They brought the facts of the significant problems with post-abortive mothers as well as significant testimony from post-abortive mothers in their successful effort to outlaw the practice of abortion in South Dakota.
However, Planned Parenthood among others has put this on the ballot in November for a vote by the people and they are funneling millions of dollars and Hollywood stars to do a big media campaign to try to turn back this legislation.
They need our prayers because this battle is not just South Dakota's battle. This could eventually turn back Roe versus Wade if it would go to the Supreme Court. Also, the volunteers who are working to try to persuade the people to support the legislation are being given death threats and they are just working on a very minimal budget, borrowing computers to try to help get out the word. (LatinoChristians.com, voteyesforlife.com, 29 Sep 2006) (to index)