Monday, March 18, 2024

Worrying!

Drain the swamp? Some churches need to drain the pulpit!


Though we may not realize it, our worldview shapes every decision we make.

A worldview is the intellectual, emotional, and spiritual filter every individual uses to experience, interpret, and respond to reality. Possessing a biblical worldview (sometimes called biblical theism, or a Christian worldview) implies that people’s ideas about all aspects of life and eternity derive from scriptural principles and commands.

Spiritual leadership eventually influences and affects the next generation, either for God and biblical values or against them. Because so much is at stake, Christians must take care to not sit under woke, or spiritually wishy-washy clergy and teaching. Parents must not trust their families to those who do not hold a biblical worldview.

Arizona Christian University conducts an annual worldview survey among incoming freshmen and other respondents. The 2023 study documents significant declines among born-again Christians, indicating that a biblical worldview does not inform their actions or decisions.

A few of the survey results were alarming:

  • Of American adult “born-again Christians,” only 13% hold a consistently biblical worldview.
  • While 22% of preteens’ parents are born-again Christians, only 8% of the teens themselves hold a biblical worldview.
  • About 1% of preteens have a biblical worldview.
  • Of young teens, only 36% believe God exists and is the all-knowing, all-powerful Creator of the universe.
  • 61% either accept Jesus Christ sinned while He was on Earth or believe it’s possible.
  • The majority think there are no absolute, objective truths or can’t apply a biblical worldview to their decisions or actions.
  • 21% percent of born-again teens believe they will live with God in eternity because of a personal decision to trust Christ, but nearly double that believe in reincarnation.
  • Roughly 25% of parents of preteens relegate to their churches the responsibility of instilling a Christian worldview in their children.

Can the church, its pastors, or Christian leaders instill a biblical worldview in the youth entrusted to them?

So, can parents be confident about the churches to which they have delegated the spiritual mentoring of their kids? You tell me; In America today in 2024:

  • Only 51% of senior pastors have a consistently biblical worldview.
  • Less than 30% of associate pastors hold a consistently biblical viewpoint.
  • Only 13% of teaching pastors hold a biblical worldview.
  • Of youth pastors, only 12% have a consistently biblical viewpoint.

The research shows churches, pastors, and youth leaders are increasingly unreliable for truly Biblical discipleship. The survey offers several insights parents can use to instill a biblical Christian worldview in the next generation.

One: Begin early. “Train up a child in the way they should go…” (Prov. 22:6) A person's worldview starts developing in the second year of life and is largely in place by age 13, giving parents a small window of opportunity for discipleship.

Two: Instill and continuously reinforce your children’s spiritual foundation. Scripture holds parents responsible for developing a child’s biblical worldview (Deut. 6:1-9; Prov. 2:1-13; 22:6; 23:13; 2 Cor. 12:14; and Eph. 6:4).

Three: “Outsourcing" is a troubling trend, as parents increasingly delegate spiritual child-rearing to others.  I’ve said this before to hundreds of audiences, and I’ll say it here: Lose at anything else but win with your children! 

Four: Given the statistics, it’s a gross understatement to say that current approaches to biblical worldview development are not working!

George Barna, a trusted survey developer commented, “The impact of arts and entertainment, government, and public schools is clearly apparent in the shift from biblical perspectives to a more experiential and emotional form of decision-making.”

If you are in a church that teaches a biblical worldview, praise God!

If not, leave. Do not be misled by clergy who are either unable or unwilling to courageously proclaim God’s truth and call Christians to bold obedience. Take your family and your money and leave. Your children’s spiritual future is at stake.

Our nation’s worldview — and our very survival — hinges on a return to truth in this generation.

Dr. Alex McFarland is a youth, religion and culture expert, author of more than 20 books and is heard live daily on the 200+ stations of the American Family Radio Network. He is Director of worldview for Charis Bible College, Woodland Park, CO, and co-hosts the “Truth and Liberty” TV broadcast.   His website is, alexmcfarland.com.  

Birdies.

The Lord Will Keep You From All Harm.


 

Devastation Awaits?

The Western economy is about to be dealt a devastating blow.

Our societies depend on complex systems working as intended. Our adversaries are developing technologies that could totally disrupt this

The Dilution refrigerator is seen inside Amazon's quantum networking lab

The modern Western world is dependent on undependable technology. From healthcare to banking, communications to infrastructure – electricity grids, water supplies, sewage systems and trains – we rely on complex systems that do what they do, when they’re meant to. For this to work, these systems must be secure against attack.

However, as shown by recent ransomware attacks on everything from hospitals to libraries, we often aren’t ready for sophisticated attacks on our technology. Our systems were built to be operationally reliable, but were not designed to be resilient to the efforts of determined adversaries who want our information or money. And this situation could get significantly worse. New technology has put a timer on our current security methods.

We are rapidly connecting the critical components of the most important systems that keep our economy running to the internet. The cornerstone of the current security practices that make this safe is cryptography; encoding information so that only the intended recipient can decipher it. Our current cryptographic techniques are highly secure against current technologies. They are totally unready for the quantum age and the new types of attacks our adversaries are aggressively developing.

Last year, the cybersecurity community was stirred by a sensational claim that RSA, the most widely deployed asymmetric encryption algorithm, had been cracked by a new method harnessing properties of quantum mechanics augmented by AI. This story passed without disaster. But at some point, quantum computers capable of breaking our current system will be here. Researchers and institutes around the world are pouring tens of billions of dollars into quantum computing, and the timelines for working devices are shrinking.

While there are many promising applications in science and medicine for a large quantum computer, one of the first specific and proven applications will be breaking cryptography. This means that RSA’s immunity, and the security of all the cryptographic systems powering our Internet connected society, may soon be in doubt. Last year’s announcement was a shot across the bows for the Western world. The next breakthrough could be real.

In 1994, the American mathematician Peter Shor proved that a large enough quantum computer would totally undermine the security of RSA based cryptography by efficiently solving the mathematically intractable problem of factoring large numbers. Over 20 years ago a research team at IBM deployed Shor’s algorithm in a lab environment, proving the theory is not just impractical maths. “Classical” computers – of the sort you’re reading this on – find this task almost impossible in any practical timeframes. While our current quantum computers are relatively small, they are developing rapidly, and once they are large enough everything we thought was secure is open access.

There are ways of addressing this. Quantum-resistant algorithms already exist. But the West is sleepwalking into disaster. Given that almost every Internet connected device will require software or hardware upgrades, businesses, governments and even individuals should be taking pre-emptive measures to upgrade our digital fortifications. If we do this now, we can stave off the worst of the damage.
But the clock is ticking. Even now, there are warnings of massive data harvesting operations being undertaken by adversarial state bodies. Encrypted data is hoovered up and stored, waiting against the day when successful decryption is available. And there is no clear or exact timeline to Q-day – the date when a quantum computer capable of this task is operational. It could be this year or next; it could take a decade or more. That uncertainty, in this case, puts the balance of risks firmly in favour of acting early. Some companies aren’t waiting; Apple announced this week that they are rolling out post-quantum encryption for its iMessage service and Google has been deploying quantum resilient systems over the last year.

The best time to deploy resilient countermeasures to ensure our secrets remain secret and our systems secure was yesterday. The next best time is today. Q-day is inching closer minute by minute. If we wait until it’s here to deploy quantum resilient systems, we will be acting too late – and the very fabric of our economies will be vulnerable to attack.




Karl Holmqvist is the CEO of Lastwall

Precipice Alert!

Church of England is 'standing on the brink of a precipice'.

Susie Leafe  24 February 2024.

(Photo: Church of England)

As the General Synod of the Church of England gathered once again in London on Friday, Rev Ian Paul, a member of the Archbishops' Council challenged the agenda in forceful terms.

Suggesting that Synod had made "avoiding reality a bit of an art form," he claimed that the Church of England is "standing on the brink of a precipice". A precipice which could leave the next generation with nothing but a "heap of ruins" to fight over.

Rev Paul suggested that the last 10 years of discussions about sexuality have left the Church "more anxious, more divided and more uncertain than ever before," and he held out little hope that another eight hours of debate - as scheduled next week - would provide any answers.

"Fiddling while Canterbury burns doesn't even capture it," he said, pointing to the real problem of a Church on the brink of disintegration.

"Over the same 10 years adult attendance has declined by 30 per cent, child attendance by 40 per cent," he said. 

He said that "there is a very real prospect that ministry is going to completely collapse in large parts of the Church of England within the next five years."

However, he was clear that decline was not inevitable.

"The Church in England is not in decline, other churches are growing," he pointed out. "But we are reluctant to learn from them. We now represent less than 18 per cent of all Christians in a church on a Sunday."

This view is backed up by the Bible Society – who found that the proportion of people attending church changed very little between 2018 and 2023. Their research showed 7% of the population attend church weekly and one in ten attend once a month.

In an article for Baptists Together, Mark Woods, a Baptist minister said, "In terms of overall numbers, the Church in England and Wales is not declining. But it is changing shape, and increasingly less white.

"However, when historic denominations extrapolate a narrative of inevitable decline from their own difficulties, this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy – who wants to take a cruise on a sinking ship?"

This is not the first time Rev Paul has tried to draw Synod's attention to these challenging statistics, nor is it likely to be the last. The question is whether anyone will listen.

"Brothers and sisters," he finished, "if we continue to avoid this reality, if we continue with this fruitless conversation, that will be the legacy we leave - the Church of England - a heap of ruins for the next generation. It's up to us."

Susie Leafe is director of Anglican Futures, which supports orthodox Anglicans in the UK. CT.

Good grief!

Nurse says not all people who give birth are women, on NHS-sponsored podcast.

Episode aimed at school nurses also labelled irresponsible for the way it discusses suicide

A school health nurse has claimed “not all people who have babies might call themselves a she or a woman or a mum”, speaking on a podcast sponsored by the NHS... ST.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Balaam.

Welcome to the latest edition of our UK e-newsletter, UKview. In this edition, we look at Simon Turpin's latest article and a couple of relevant articles you may have missed. We trust the content of these emails continues to be of interest to you and you are blessed as you read it and click on the links. Thank you for your time and ongoing support...

Latest Article by Simon Turpin...

wikimedia-balaam-donkey image

How God Used a Pagan Diviner to Deliver a Messianic Prophecy


The Balaam narratives have long fascinated readers of the Bible. This is primarily because of the character of Balaam (Numbers 22–24). On the one hand, he is presented as a Spirit-filled prophet who refuses to curse Israel and seems to confess faith. On the other hand, he is depicted as a pagan diviner with less spiritual insight than his donkey. In his latest article Simon Turpin asks whether we can trust the words of such a man who speaks from "both sides of his mouth"...

Birdie.


 

Psalm 23.


 

"He is not here!"

 

Join us in praising God for his goodness |  View in browser

Compassion
HeaderImage

Happy Easter

 

We’re so grateful for your faithful support, which enables our local church partners to share the hope of the Easter message with children and families in their communities. We have a delightful blog that gives you insight into how Easter is celebrated in Matias's country.

Not only that: today is International Women’s Day, and so we’d love to share about some inspiring women who are dedicating themselves to raising up the next generation.  

Block 1

Celebrating Inspiring Women

 8th March is International Women’s Day. This year, we’re sharing 5 different stories on social media, which each celebrate the different women who surround a sponsored girl and empower her to fulfil her potential.

 

Women like Maritza from Mexico, who says, ‘After I graduated from the Compassion project, the staff invited me to be part of the team of volunteers... Every day, my request to God is that He allows me to continue serving the children with love and dedication.’

 

Help us raise awareness by sharing one of these stories with your friends online.

See and share!
Block 2

Easter Traditions from around the world

Have you ever wondered how Easter is celebrated in Matias’s country? From tooth-brushing competitions in Indonesia to kite flying in Haiti, discover how Compassion-supported children might be celebrating this year.

 

“Easter assures me of the love God has for me to sacrifice His only son for me.” 14-year-old Leticia from Ghana.

Discover more
Block 3

Gifts to bless you this Easter

As we journey through this Lent season, we’ve collected five gifts to bless and inspire you. 

 

From delicious Easter recipes to reflective devotionals, we hope these small tokens of our appreciation bring you joy and enable you to bless others.

Find our Easter gifts here

He is not here; he has risen!

Stand with these courageous defenders of freedom.

 Everyone should be free to practise their faith without fear.

CSW Logo

Hi.

Earlier this week I wrote to you about Bishop Rolando Álvarez Lagos from Nicaragua. He is a vocal critic of human rights abuses in Nicaragua and was sentenced to over 26 years in prison on false charges of conspiracy and spreading false information. Thankfully, he was released into exile in January.

We meet courageous people like Bishop Álvarez all the time. We think of:

  • Rev Dr Hkalam Samson, who is in prison in Myanmar/Burma, jailed for speaking the truth about the barbaric atrocities perpetrated by the Myanmar military against the people of Myanmar, particularly amongst religious minorities. 
  • Feng Yunqing, who made videos of the Chinese government’s persecution of Falun Gong, Christian house churches and human rights activists, and was jailed for seven years and six months. She remains in Wuhan Women’s Prison today.
  • Luka Binniyat, who is currently on bail awaiting trial in connection with an article he had written criticising the Kaduna State government’s inadequate response to attacks on communities in southern Kaduna in September 2021. 

Your gift of £4 will enable us to work on cases like Rev Samson’s, Feng Yunqing’s, Luka Binniyat’s and many others suffering for their beliefs around the world.

Your gift will enable us to continue documenting abuses of religious freedom and training people in places such as Nicaragua and Nigeria to record these abuses themselves. It will also help us to take these first-hand accounts and our analysis of a country’s track record of violations to decision-makers in the United Nations, European Union and UK Parliament to demand that those perpetrating these violations are held to account.

Give £4 and help us to keep gathering evidence and speaking up for people who have been targeted for their beliefs - until they are free to practise their faith without fear. 

We can all play a part in bringing justice to our world. Will you join us?

Grace and peace,

Scot Bower
CEO

P.S. Give £4, or whatever you can, and help us work on cases like Rev Samson’s, Feng Yunqing’s, Luka Binniyat’s and so many others who are being targeted for their beliefs.

Worrying!

Drain the swamp? Some churches need to drain the pulpit! By  Alex McFarland , CP Op-Ed Contributor Friday, February 16, 2024 Though we may n...