29. April 2009 by Michael Carl.

By Canadian Press 

NATO has imposed tough new restrictions on foreign journalists covering the war in southern Afghanistan, changes that could affect how much Canadians see and hear from war-torn Kandahar.

The new measures, imposed in early March, mirror the way the U.S. military manages reporters in Iraq.

The restrictions make it virtually impossible for Canadian journalists to leave Kandahar Airfield on their own to interview local Afghans and return unimpeded to the safety of NATO’s principal base.

Last month, Canadian soldiers were required to escort newly arrived journalists everywhere on the airfield, including to the dining hall and showers. A photographer from the Reuters news agency and a handful of Canadian journalists were escorted between buildings and confined to their sleeping quarters when not working.  For the rest of the story, click here… http://www.cbc.ca/arts/media/story/2009/04/29/afghanistan-media-restrictions.html 

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29. April 2009 by Michael Carl.

By AINA Baghdad, IRAQ — What many Chaldeans have feared in the U.S. Presidential debate has come true.  “We know if America leaves they will come and kill us. They think we have something to do with them and they think we have money. The Iraqi government is happy if all Christians leave. They say they want us to stay, but they don’t mean it. If they mean it, then they would protect us more,” says Masoud Gallozi.  In the past few days Iraq Christians have been targeted for slaughter. The murder of four Christians across Iraq in just two days is raising concern among churches there that another round of religious cleansing has begun. Chaldean Monsignor Sako warns that US troop pullout is likely to plunge the country in a “civil war.” Between 31 March and 4 April five Christians are murdered in Kirkuk, Baghdad and Mosul. The prelate calls on the faithful to pray during Holy Week so “that the blood of our martyrs may restore peace.“Chaldeans in America are frustrated over President Obama’s handling of the Middle East issues.   “There were many Chaldeans fooled into believing the new administration would pressure the Iraqi government to get serious about properly protecting Chaldeans. These Chaldeans sent an e-mail of a letter by Obama and his people showing he was concerned. It was just another lie from this man. A lie that is leaving our people vulnerable. Those who supported him are partly to blame,” a frustrated James Selmu declares.  For more on this story, click here… http://www.aina.org/news/20090427183433.htm 

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2. March 2009 by Michael Carl.

Scripture and Commentary

43. The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, “Follow me.”

            Everyone here knows that in the past couple of years, we’ve spoken in Adult Bible Study and in the sermons on what it means to follow Jesus.  What does it mean to accept the call into a life in Christ, whether it’s in full-time vocational ministry or as a full-time, servant of the Lord in a ‘secular’ occupation.

            The word Jesus uses here is instructive.            The Greek word used for the imperative, ‘Follow,’ in the command “’Follow Me,’” is ἀ.κο.λού.θει. 

            The only other place the word for follow occurs in this form in the New Testament is in Revelation 19.14, in the context of the soldiers of the Lord following Him into the final battle.

            So this is what it means:  It means to be one who follows with a sense of deep dedication.  It means to be one who follows with the thought that the following is unto the ultimate level, as a soldier who goes into battle.

            That’s the word Jesus uses to call Philip to serve Him. 

            The point here is that the call and command to follow Christ as a disciple and full-time preacher or as a simple soldier in the Lord’s army are indisting-uishable one from another.

            The intensity of the command to follow Christ is the same whatever the vocation in which one finds oneself. 

            The difference is the context, location and vocation in which we are directed to do the serving.

            Why?

            In a recent article, Fitzsimmons Allison quotes Anglican Archbishop William Temple as saying, “When we open our eyes as babies we see the world stretching out around us; we are in the middle of it; all we see is determined by the relation of all objects to ourselves. This will be true as long as we live. I am the center of the world I see; where the horizon is depends on where I stand. The same is true of our mental and spiritual vision. Some things hurt us; we hope they will not happen again; we call them bad. Some things please us; we hope they will happen again; we call them good. Our standard of value is the way things affect ourselves. So each of us takes his place in the center of his own world.”

            This is the problem the Lord Jesus is trying to address in His call to us.  His call asks us to be people of greater substance than self-absorbed pleasure seekers.

         In this month’s issue of R. C. Sproul’s Ligonier Ministries devotion book, Tabletalk, there’s an article about Jonathan Edwards’ Resolutions, the list of things he wanted to master.  The remarkable thing about this list is that they weren’t like the self-help resolutions most of us make at New Year’s.  His were Christ-centred and filled with a heart-felt desire to glorify the Lord in his life.

            The article about Edwards observes that the fulfillment we all seek in this life isn’t obtained by the empty efforts at self-centred living.  The fulfillment we all say we want only comes through a life lived for the higher purpose of serving Christ. 

            This then is why Jesus makes such a call.  It’s His loving desire to mould our hearts into something with greater meaning and depth. 

            Let us then not hear these things and merely lament the possibility that the Lord wants us to work.  The Lord lovingly desires us to find greater meaning and purpose through a life of depth lived beyond the limits of our own selves.

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26. February 2009 by Michael Carl.

In the mid-1990s, film maker Rich Christiano did a movie called The Time Changer.  The movie centred on a professor named Russell Carlisle who wrote a book promoting the idea that sound morals could be taught without the solid, moral framework and Biblical foundation for those values.

After a publisher agreed to print Dr. Carlisle’s book, the theology faculty gathered together to decide if they would endorse the book.  Most of the faculty said, ‘Russell it’s a marvelous work and I’ll be glad to lend my name to its publication.’

All of the faculty agreed except for one.  This chap played by actor Gavin McLeod of The Mary Tyler Moore Show and The Love Boat, was late to the meeting.  He had just returned from a journey.

The man said that while the book was wonderful, well-written and well-argued, he couldn’t endorse it.

The faculty wanted to know why but he couldn’t say.  Russell would have to see for himself.

The film is a semi-sci-fi movie and it turns out that the tardy professor had invented a time machine.  McLeod’s character gets Russell Carlisle to travel ahead in time to see the results of attempting to teach sound morals apart from their religious and/or Biblical foundation.

Russell enters the United States in the 1990s and is horrified!  God’s name was no longer honoured as holy.  Filth permeated the airwaves; children were rebellious.  He saw a sex-saturated country that had a casual, if not lethargic attitude about sin. 

So what happens when we try to advance morality apart from its Biblical foundation?

We get relativism. 

With no objective standard upon which to base moral values, who is able to say whose morals are right or wrong?  We say, ‘Stealing is wrong!’  The reply can honestly be, ‘Who says?’

We can answer, ‘Well, everyone,’ or, ‘Society,’ or ‘the country,’ all we want.  Yet, without the Biblical foundation and a proper reverence for the things of God, it’s a matter of competing opinions.

This describes the United States right now.  If you have any doubt, try arguing moral virtue with just about anyone.  We’re awash in relativism because as a culture we’ve thrown away the sound Biblical values upon which our culture was rightly based.

America is in desperate need of a Spirit-fired, Christ-centred, revival.  America needs another Great Awakening, but we won’t have one until the Church gets on its knees collectively and repents of its complicity in the moral decay.  

This process begins with worship.  Spirit-filled, Christ-centred, Three Streams worship cleans us, grounds us in our faith and glorifies the Lord.  It’s then that we experience God’s glory!

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29. December 2008 by Michael Carl.

HI Folks,Tomorrow is Tuesday.This Tuesday is perhaps a bit more crucial than the others, for it’s the final Tuesday of 2008.  New Year’s Day is this Thursday.Normally I don’t put much stock in New Year’s Day, for it’s largely a commemoration of our own scientific prowess.  We’re the ones who decided the location for the Prime Meridian and the location of 0 degrees longitude.  These are the measures by which we determine time zones, and thus days, weeks, etc.However, we’re this much closer to the Lord’s judgment if this nation doesn’t turn back to the Lord.A well-known pastor calls his church to 21-Days of Prayer and Fasting every New Year’s Day.  Due to the lateness of the hour and the ever-nearing approach of the Lord’s wrath upon our land, maybe we should begin 2009 with 21 days of fasting and prayer.  Why fast?  Fasting makes us more able to hear the Lord’s voice and brings a greater reliance upon Him for strength.  Fasting purges our systems of the toxins we’ve introduced by our abysmal diets and poor nutritional habits.  This purging of our systems brings better physical health and thus, a greater ability to think clearly.  When this happens, we’re better able to read and understand God’s Word.  Fasting trains our minds to be able to focus on the Lord more clearly.  The discipline of submitting our flesh to a righteous hunger for more of the Lord brings us closer to Him and facilitates greater obedience to Him.So, we have everything to gain by fasting.So how?  I suggest something like the Bible’s Daniel Fast:  This is a diet of fresh (hopefully organic) fruits and vegetables and whole grain cereals.  We drink only water, tea and pure fruit juices.  No chocolate, cake, pie or other sweets, no fruit punch or Kool-Aid, no sodas (pop), or milk shakes and ice cream.  Or you can take one day a week to do a 24-hour, no-food fast.  During the 21 days, do two, two-day fasts or start out the 21 days with a 3-day, liquid only fast.I usually prefer one 24-hour, no-food fast or the fresh fruits, veggies and whole grain fast.  Not only is my mind more in tune with the Lord, I simply feel better physically.    With fasting, there are also other things that take place.  Let’s look at Isaiah 58.6…

• 6.

 

• Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?

Fasting tears down ’strongholds’, removes barriers, opens hearts and minds.  Those who have resisted hearing the Gospel are more open.  The hardest hearted of our nemeses are suddenly willing to listen.  No, fasting isn’t a ‘hunger strike’ where God changes others because we’re denying ourselves food.  What happens is that because our minds are clearer and we’re more in tune with the Lord, we’re better able to pray in line with what needs to happen.  We hear God more clearly and are better able to listen to how He leads.  So the walls come down inside of us.  We hear the Lord more clearly and we’re able to pray more powerfully!So tomorrow evening, let’s join together in our weekly Tuesday at 8:45 Eastern prayer time.  Yet, on New Year’s Eve, let’s resolve that we will enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise by allowing our bodies to pray by fasting.Rev. Michael CarlPastorGreenwood Union ChurchWakefield, MA   01880Pastor@GreenwoodUnionChurch,org

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