LIBERAL THEOLOGY – Christmas Eve I was listening to assorted Christmas Eve services, mainly to enjoy the Christmas music, since I was not able to attend our own services. Most of the services I heard were put on by liberal church bodies associated with the National Council of Churches, such as the Riverside Church in New York. During a break from the music a man stepped up to the mike and made the statement, “Christ came to take upon Himself our broken human nature.” That caught my attention because of the falseness of the theology, something I should have expected from such a source. I don’t imagine another soul in the entire place even noticed how wrong that statement was. Hopefully all my readers have. Had he said something to the effect, “Christ took upon Himself human flesh that He might die for our broken human natures” I would not be making this criticism. Christ took on Himself human flesh when He was born a Babe in the manger, not our “broken” fallen natures! Christ was born of a “virgin,” He did not receive our fallen sinful natures that have been passed on to all of us through the fallen Adam. If you are not aware, so many among the liberal church leadership and seminaries, do not believe in the virgin birth and therefore have become false teachers, promoting unsound theology. Christ lived a sinless life, not having the sinful Adamic nature, so that he might present Himself a perfect, sinless sacrifice at Calvary for our forgiveness. There, He paid the price, made the sacrifice, for man’s “broken (fallen) nature.” We need to be so very careful as we listen to the radio and TV preachers (teachers) today, for many do not hold to sound doctrine and many are being misled down a path to destruction. We are to know our Bibles and thus rightly divide the Word of truth.
PAPER ACCUMULATES – Do you have this same problem? I just finished going through a lot of papers that I had saved on my computer stand. As I looked through it all I was not sure why I’d put them there. At the time I know it was something I wanted to deal with or comment on in my “Musings” but they are no longer registering or relevant. I had good intentions but the intent has flown away and I no longer remember the reason. Someday I’ll learn to deal with such matters immediately, not put them before me, hoping to remember and use them later. This world is full of paper with good ideas and information. Information registers with my mind but with time that registry seems to pass me by and I fail to recall so I’ll just blame it on old age.
GLOBAL WARMING – I grow weary of all the Global Warming rhetoric and people that can’t seem to comprehend the reality of earths cyclical past. The earth has gone through many cycles, some warm and some cold. Yet, we are now plagued with all kinds of news dealing with the topic. Isn’t it interesting that snow made it all the way down to the southern areas of Texas and elsewhere this year? We are suppose to believe the theory of Global Warming and yet cold and snow is reaching further south. Their theory couldn’t possibly be wrong and they will find some way to explain away these types of weather events. Just hang around for a while and smile whenever their theory comes to these bumps in the road and you personally observe the flaws in their theories that provide an income for their proponents. In my nearly eighty years I have experienced severe winters and mild winters as well as hot summers and not so hot summers. I am not about to jump through the hoops of Global Warming theorists, How about you? Some people enjoy worrying about the weather. Me, I just take what God chooses to pass out year by year. In due course I will be in glory enjoying the perfect weather of Heaven.
MORE ON MEDICAL COSTS – One dear brother responded regarding eye injections he receives that cost $4,000 each. OUCH! I just found an article from an Oct. 20th U. S. News & World Report Titled “Is Healthcare Armageddon Next?” by Bernadine Healy, M.D. with the following: “ Clueless Doctors are largely clueless about the cost of care they prescribe or its implications for a patients personal finances and, until serious illness strikes, patients often are, too. But any good doc can tell you lower cost does not necessarily mean lower quality. A study led by John Wennberg at the Dartmouth Institute for health Policy and clinical Practice found that the cost of care for comparable patients during the last two years of life at the 18 hospitals in the 2007 U.S. News “Best Hospitals” honor roll ranged from $34,372 to $71,637 with the lowest-cost centers ranking at the top. The report concludes, “More is not better.” This expresses the same conclusions I have personally come too. The article would be worth looking up at the library. The point of the article tells of the new medicines and procedures and their cost are heading us toward a medical Armageddon in the title of the article. I won’t quote more but these increasing costs are leading the insurance companies, etc. to a tremendous crisis.
CHURCH MUSIC FROM THE PAST – I was thinking back to our first church plant in Federal Way, Washington. Our little church group was like family and we had some rather informal services (I think we have become too formal in many of our churche. Roland Barnes was a Boeing Engineer and he also enjoyed playing his violin. Occasionally he would bring his violin to the evening service and played it while we sang some old favorite hymn and choruses. Did you ever try to out sing a violin? You can’t do it! That stringed instrument always comes out on top, above all the voices singing along with it. Our song services were longer then and the people sang enthusiastically. What has happened to those joyous times? We also had a lady that still corresponds with me via e-mails. She played the piano and marimba. I remember her keeping after all of us that had played instruments into bringing them to the evening service and we tried playing together during the song service. I even got out my old clarinet and played with them. That was the time I learned some of our instruments didn’t fit with the hymnal and we had to get separate music to be able to play the music in the hymnals, including my clarinet. Anyway, we had great times in those days and it seemed to me it got the people in a good spirit to receive and follow the messages I preached after all that music shared together. (Thanks Jeanne.) To realize that little church no longer exists because of assorted problems that followed and someone that came along and took it out of our GARBC Fellowship is heart rending.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Monday, December 29, 2008
December 2008 #3
Dear Family, Friends & Prayer Warriors:
“MUSINGS” December 2008 #3 By Leslie G. Newell
(Sharing Thoughts Past & Present By A Home Missionary Past His Prime.)
Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year To All My Musings Readers..
FROM A CHRISTMAS PAST – As my son Gary was leaving today to have Christmas with their daughter and family in the Cleveland area, he reminded me of the following. When we started our first church in Federal Way, Washington we had obtained five acres of property with an older home on the west end of it and we built our first church on the east end of it. There was a dead-end gravel road that stopped just past the parsonage among a lot of fir trees. It was a great place to find our Christmas trees. My wife Kathy was always very particular about the size and shape of the tree chosen. The first one we cut down ended up being too big for our living room. I don’t remember what was wrong with the second tree but we ended up with three Christmas tree to bring back the one that met the need. It really wasn’t a waste because the elementary school where John and Gary attended school that was on the east side of our church property. Both of the boys provided Christmas trees for their classes. The day is long past now when most people can go out into the woods or forest and cut their own tree but those were joyous days for our family.
MISSED MUSINGS – This is the first day I have been on the computer for a week or two as I have been too weak and short of breath to even think about checking e-mails or writing a Musings. Monday I went to the hospital as an outpatient to have fluid removed from my left lung again. It was two and a half litres this time. That is one way to lose weight quickly. I think I weight eight pounds lighter today than I did before the procedure. I am feeling better now and praying the fluids don’t come back again.
PHARMACUTICAL SHOCK – UPS delivered Betty’s refill today for one of her chemo pills. Get this, two bottles of pills with 28 in each to achieve the required amount by taking one of each twice a day for fourteen days. The price: $1,303.33! How thankful we are for real good insurance. There is a second pill that she takes five of each day an hour before a meal. I know the price of that one would shock you as well. I guess the lesson here is, if you want to be in a moneymaking business, be a pill maker. When I see lists of the actual cost of ingredients found in pills, it is outrageous.
A CHRISTMAS RITUAL AGAIN – The discussion and argument all over again as it is each year anymore. Cities are being attacked for displaying manger scenes, etc. The politically correct avoiding the term “Merry Christmas” by using “Happy Holidays.” If I were to get into a discussion over the word “Christmas” I’d much rather discuss a preference over “Christ’s Day” or Christ’s Birth,” rather than “Christ’s Mass.” But, then, I’d be getting into a discussion that goes way over the heads or understanding of most today. Christmas did not have its origin with early Christian believer but rather a religion that had its beginnings much later. A thought, of course, that would be denied by its founders. But, we have come to a time in history that has forgotten those things long ago. Anyway, have a blessed Christ’s Day.
“MUSINGS” December 2008 #3 By Leslie G. Newell
(Sharing Thoughts Past & Present By A Home Missionary Past His Prime.)
Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year To All My Musings Readers..
FROM A CHRISTMAS PAST – As my son Gary was leaving today to have Christmas with their daughter and family in the Cleveland area, he reminded me of the following. When we started our first church in Federal Way, Washington we had obtained five acres of property with an older home on the west end of it and we built our first church on the east end of it. There was a dead-end gravel road that stopped just past the parsonage among a lot of fir trees. It was a great place to find our Christmas trees. My wife Kathy was always very particular about the size and shape of the tree chosen. The first one we cut down ended up being too big for our living room. I don’t remember what was wrong with the second tree but we ended up with three Christmas tree to bring back the one that met the need. It really wasn’t a waste because the elementary school where John and Gary attended school that was on the east side of our church property. Both of the boys provided Christmas trees for their classes. The day is long past now when most people can go out into the woods or forest and cut their own tree but those were joyous days for our family.
MISSED MUSINGS – This is the first day I have been on the computer for a week or two as I have been too weak and short of breath to even think about checking e-mails or writing a Musings. Monday I went to the hospital as an outpatient to have fluid removed from my left lung again. It was two and a half litres this time. That is one way to lose weight quickly. I think I weight eight pounds lighter today than I did before the procedure. I am feeling better now and praying the fluids don’t come back again.
PHARMACUTICAL SHOCK – UPS delivered Betty’s refill today for one of her chemo pills. Get this, two bottles of pills with 28 in each to achieve the required amount by taking one of each twice a day for fourteen days. The price: $1,303.33! How thankful we are for real good insurance. There is a second pill that she takes five of each day an hour before a meal. I know the price of that one would shock you as well. I guess the lesson here is, if you want to be in a moneymaking business, be a pill maker. When I see lists of the actual cost of ingredients found in pills, it is outrageous.
A CHRISTMAS RITUAL AGAIN – The discussion and argument all over again as it is each year anymore. Cities are being attacked for displaying manger scenes, etc. The politically correct avoiding the term “Merry Christmas” by using “Happy Holidays.” If I were to get into a discussion over the word “Christmas” I’d much rather discuss a preference over “Christ’s Day” or Christ’s Birth,” rather than “Christ’s Mass.” But, then, I’d be getting into a discussion that goes way over the heads or understanding of most today. Christmas did not have its origin with early Christian believer but rather a religion that had its beginnings much later. A thought, of course, that would be denied by its founders. But, we have come to a time in history that has forgotten those things long ago. Anyway, have a blessed Christ’s Day.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
December 2008 #1
WONDERING & TRYING TO UNDERSTAND – Remembering back to my early adult Christian experience I wanted to learn and know all I could about my faith and what Baptists believed. Hiscox gave detailed doctrinal beliefs and practices of Baptists and how their churches were conducted and I read it through, checking time and again to verify belief and practice. When I learned about the Baptist Bulletin I read it through, keeping track of our fellowship and continuing to learn and understand our fellowship of churches, the function, belief and practices. Further, most Baptists I knew had Scofield Bibles that had footnotes that clearly taught dispensationalism which afforded a clear church means for interpreting Biblical truth in a clear understandable manner. I was thus enabled to read, study and interpret the Bible for myself and found myself in the company of other Christians who could do the same and find themselves in accord with one another. I wonder about today’s church members. How many know anything about these biblical tools? How many concern themselves about personal Biblical study and interpretation? How many really know what their church believes or even care, satisfying themselves with fellowship, music or whatever else may grab their attention to bind themselves to a particular church? Perhaps their occasional attendance is enough, never questioning these things.
THE NOVEMBER-DECEMBER BAPTISTS BULLETIN – This issue has several interesting issues, “Rightly Dividing” – A report from the Council on Dispensational Hermeneutics. Another article on “Church Discipline A Delicate Operation” is worth reading. In the Q & A section Norman A. Olson answers the question, “When People Say Christmas Is Pagan” is a worthwhile read. Though I have mentioned it before, I will repeat myself, for years as a missionary pastor, I always found a way to see that all our people received a copy of this magazine. I believed it helped them understand the faith and our fellowship, being a helpful tool to get information to them I might not have time to do on the brief occasions of Sunday and Wednesday services. I have now personal interest in promoting the Baptist Bulletin, but I do believe you will find it helpful to you and yours.
TEACHING WITH OR WITHOUT HELPS – I have had repeated discussions with my son Gary about teaching God’s Word to children & adults. He started teaching when he was seventeen as the result of a junior boys class that others (male or female) had not been able to teach. He successfully taught them and he has been doing so now for about forty years. I suggested he write an article on his philosophy of teaching God’s Word that can be shared with others. I don’t know if he will find time to do so or not but I will give you the gist of it to think about. He sees God in everything whether it is a little baby, a tree or any other aspect of nature or creation. The observation of God’s creative work gives us ample illustrations for our teaching opportunities. Whether you have materials provided to teach or have an occasion when you are caught needing to teach with out them. Recognition of, and an expansion of everything that surrounds us can provide a lesson. If you recall the teachings of Christ or that of the Apostle James, you will find that they used this means of teaching. They drew their illustrations from the surrounding nature (creation). Think about it if you are a teacher or are called upon to teach sometime.
MEGAR BEGINNINGS – The little church that gave me a start in ministry you would hardly believe. I don’t know exactly what the initial beginning was like. Pastor Baker worked for the State of Oregon and had a family of two girls still at home when we came on the scene. His wife and the girls would work harvesting cherries etc. during the summer. The building we met in was horrible. It had been some type of store and they had started to tear the building down. Before the task was accomplished they rented it to people who used the space to hull nuts such as walnuts and hazelnuts. Some way the little church started renting it and we came on the scene in time to help clear out the shells left behind. I remember the strips of supposed tarpaper like material with a floral print of some sort supposedly make the place look a little better. Whether it was there previously or added when the little church took the place over. The cracks in the outside walls would allow wind to blow in and move that strange wallpaper around during services behind the pastor as he preached. There was the larger room in which we held services and several smaller rooms used for classrooms, a real classy meeting place, sic. I preached my first sermon in that building when the pastor took a vacation. It lasted a whole ten minutes and I had tried to prepare it two whole weeks before delivering it. It is obvious I didn’t know what I was doing. Aside from my crude effort we did have a good preacher under whom I learned much. The fellowship was sweet and the people were very gracious, trying to make me believe my effort was good. They all wrapped their arms around us, encouraged us, taught us and gave us an opportunity to begin serving our Lord. Most people would never enter such humble surroundings to worship, and few did but those were precious days. Eventually we were able to purchase an old four-room schoolhouse to fix up for our place of worship. Two large rooms downstairs and two large rooms upstairs were kept warm by an old coal furnace in the basement. We had to come early to fire it up and keep stoking as the day went by. Though many would not go to such a church, that church spawned this home missionary, and I am sure that little handful of people will reap a huge reward at the day of award giving. Not because of any great accomplishments on my part but rather due to their faithfulness to the Lord in dire circumstances and by their support of missions and their encouragement of so many others. This is the church that saw something in me that I didn’t see and gave me my first license to preach and put up with my many blunders. Great loving people, most of whom are now with the Lord.
A LITTLE SIDE NOTE – Today’s churches that are looking for perfection and failing to give opportunities to the weak and inexperienced are missing the purpose of the local church to build people up in their faith and to prepare them to future ministry. So a young pianist hits a wrong key or note, so a substitute teacher misses the point of a lesson, so a young man is lacking in biblical knowledge, the local church is to train and bring those people along, giving them opportunity to grow in the Lord. Even deacons are grown by experience gained by observing and ministering with others. Think about it.
THE NOVEMBER-DECEMBER BAPTISTS BULLETIN – This issue has several interesting issues, “Rightly Dividing” – A report from the Council on Dispensational Hermeneutics. Another article on “Church Discipline A Delicate Operation” is worth reading. In the Q & A section Norman A. Olson answers the question, “When People Say Christmas Is Pagan” is a worthwhile read. Though I have mentioned it before, I will repeat myself, for years as a missionary pastor, I always found a way to see that all our people received a copy of this magazine. I believed it helped them understand the faith and our fellowship, being a helpful tool to get information to them I might not have time to do on the brief occasions of Sunday and Wednesday services. I have now personal interest in promoting the Baptist Bulletin, but I do believe you will find it helpful to you and yours.
TEACHING WITH OR WITHOUT HELPS – I have had repeated discussions with my son Gary about teaching God’s Word to children & adults. He started teaching when he was seventeen as the result of a junior boys class that others (male or female) had not been able to teach. He successfully taught them and he has been doing so now for about forty years. I suggested he write an article on his philosophy of teaching God’s Word that can be shared with others. I don’t know if he will find time to do so or not but I will give you the gist of it to think about. He sees God in everything whether it is a little baby, a tree or any other aspect of nature or creation. The observation of God’s creative work gives us ample illustrations for our teaching opportunities. Whether you have materials provided to teach or have an occasion when you are caught needing to teach with out them. Recognition of, and an expansion of everything that surrounds us can provide a lesson. If you recall the teachings of Christ or that of the Apostle James, you will find that they used this means of teaching. They drew their illustrations from the surrounding nature (creation). Think about it if you are a teacher or are called upon to teach sometime.
MEGAR BEGINNINGS – The little church that gave me a start in ministry you would hardly believe. I don’t know exactly what the initial beginning was like. Pastor Baker worked for the State of Oregon and had a family of two girls still at home when we came on the scene. His wife and the girls would work harvesting cherries etc. during the summer. The building we met in was horrible. It had been some type of store and they had started to tear the building down. Before the task was accomplished they rented it to people who used the space to hull nuts such as walnuts and hazelnuts. Some way the little church started renting it and we came on the scene in time to help clear out the shells left behind. I remember the strips of supposed tarpaper like material with a floral print of some sort supposedly make the place look a little better. Whether it was there previously or added when the little church took the place over. The cracks in the outside walls would allow wind to blow in and move that strange wallpaper around during services behind the pastor as he preached. There was the larger room in which we held services and several smaller rooms used for classrooms, a real classy meeting place, sic. I preached my first sermon in that building when the pastor took a vacation. It lasted a whole ten minutes and I had tried to prepare it two whole weeks before delivering it. It is obvious I didn’t know what I was doing. Aside from my crude effort we did have a good preacher under whom I learned much. The fellowship was sweet and the people were very gracious, trying to make me believe my effort was good. They all wrapped their arms around us, encouraged us, taught us and gave us an opportunity to begin serving our Lord. Most people would never enter such humble surroundings to worship, and few did but those were precious days. Eventually we were able to purchase an old four-room schoolhouse to fix up for our place of worship. Two large rooms downstairs and two large rooms upstairs were kept warm by an old coal furnace in the basement. We had to come early to fire it up and keep stoking as the day went by. Though many would not go to such a church, that church spawned this home missionary, and I am sure that little handful of people will reap a huge reward at the day of award giving. Not because of any great accomplishments on my part but rather due to their faithfulness to the Lord in dire circumstances and by their support of missions and their encouragement of so many others. This is the church that saw something in me that I didn’t see and gave me my first license to preach and put up with my many blunders. Great loving people, most of whom are now with the Lord.
A LITTLE SIDE NOTE – Today’s churches that are looking for perfection and failing to give opportunities to the weak and inexperienced are missing the purpose of the local church to build people up in their faith and to prepare them to future ministry. So a young pianist hits a wrong key or note, so a substitute teacher misses the point of a lesson, so a young man is lacking in biblical knowledge, the local church is to train and bring those people along, giving them opportunity to grow in the Lord. Even deacons are grown by experience gained by observing and ministering with others. Think about it.
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