Category: Christianity and politics
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No confusion in the kingdom of God
(Due to technical problems there will not be a video of John reading the Catch today.) Soon, citizens of the United States of America will exercise a privilege many citizens do not have in this world. We will participate in our own government’s mid-term elections. We will choose representative leaders and we will vote on…
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Where is the truth?
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) I’ve never known the Bible to carry more of the weight of truth than it does today. That’s because nothing else does. Now that’s always been true, but even more so today. With the internet completely unchecked by facts and the major news sources aligned…
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What Christians should be known for
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) I’M FOR THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND HATE — a popular bumper sticker that speaks a volume of truth. Every once in a while, it becomes necessary to refocus our sight. Who are we as Christians; what do we stand for; and what are we…
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We the (fallen) people
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch In his book, We the Fallen People: The Founders and the Future of American Democracy, Robert Tracy McKenzie, PhD, and professor of history at Wheaton College, brings out the most important “Christian” thing about the Founding Fathers of America. Not that they were Christians (there…
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Is Christianity a brand or a relationship?
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) Yesterday we looked at Jesus plus. We realized that being a Christian today comes with a long list of assumptions — assumptions that, for the most part, are not true but that have nevertheless become tightly associated with Christianity, especially in the minds of non-Christians.
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Christianity and
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) In his book Screwtape Letters where an underling demon learns how to trip up Christians so as to render them useless for the kingdom of God, Lewis introduces the sinister idea of “Christianity and” where one’s faith is bound up in something in addition to…
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True Christianity
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) In a 2017 article in the New York Times Rod Dreher raises an effective argument that American Christianity is actually not true Christianity. Now this is certainly not a new idea, nor is it something we haven’t discussed quite often here at the Catch. In…
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The Word
(Click here for a video of John reading this Catch.) Who can you trust anymore? It’s a rather helpless feeling, isn’t it? News sources are all biased — even the “unbiased” ones. Used to be you could trust anyone in a lab coat, or anyone wearing a badge, or anyone in a pulpit, or anything…
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Reaching for the eternal ‘oughtness’
“I accept this award today with an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in the future of mankind. I refuse to accept despair as the final response to the ambiguities of history. I refuse to accept the idea that the ‘isness’ of man’s present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for…
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Breaking camp
We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat. Hebrews 13:10 An altar is a place of slaughter. The lamb or bull that was brought in as a sacrifice for sin would be slain on the altar and the blood was spread around in various places as the…
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Whose kingdom?
We are now at a critical juncture in our cultural history as Christians in America. We are discovering that the kingdom of God has nothing to do with the kingdoms of this world, be they governmental, social or religious. We’ve had 2,000 years of making these same mistakes over and over again, but then again,…
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For heaven’s sake
God has now revealed to us his mysterious will regarding Christ—which is to fulfill his own good plan. And this is the plan: At the right time he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ—everything in heaven and on earth. Furthermore, because we are united with Christ, we have received an inheritance from God, for he…
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Come together
It’s a silly, nonsensical Beatles song (even George Harrison admitted that), but its most memorable line is the word for the church in 2021: “Come together, right now, over me,” if by that we mean: Come together over Jesus.
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Our kingdom is not of this world
There is a movement of fear sweeping across this country that is sucking in a lot of Christians and sidetracking them into much useless endeavor. Christians who have staked their claim on saving a “Christian” America through politics are worried and afraid over what is happening to this country. Fear mongers are stoking the fires…
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Inauguration Day 2021
Mankind was made of clay Each of us in the very same way from “The Very Last Day” by Peter, Paul & Mary Fingers crossed. The nation holding its breath. Today’s inauguration brought new meaning to the term, “the peaceful transition of power”…
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Our wishful Washington concert
What a concert! Yesterday I wrote a Catch about how music might have affected the large political gathering at the Capitol building last week the way music addressed another political crowd gathered near the nation’s capitol back in 1963 during the civil rights march on Washington where Dr. Martin Luther King gave his famous…
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Grace and peace
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, 1st and 2nd Timothy, and Philemon, all start out this way. “Grace and peace to you …” I used to think that was just a nice sentiment. Not sure…
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‘Thy will be done’
Yesterday was one of the darker days in U.S. history, no matter what your take on it or your political persuasion. And what happens from here is equally disrupting. It was unsettling to see as revered an icon and symbol of liberty as the Capital building overrun by a mob bent on destruction and the…
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Are these the last days?
I was wondering if we might start hearing lots of end times predictions around a renewed look at biblical prophecy, and sure enough this last weekend I ran into a few sources of information on the topic. End times prophecy is all about a few major events falling into place, and the current scenario is…