Free Republic

What people don’t know is that the Christmas special almost didn’t happen, because some not-so-smart television executives almost didn’t let it air. You see, Charles Schulz had some ideas that challenged the way of thinking of those executives 46 years ago, and one of them had to do with the inclusion in his Christmas cartoon of a reading from the King James Bible’s version of the Gospel of Luke. The more things change, the more things stay the same. There was a standoff of sorts, but Schulz did not back down, and because of the tight production schedule and CBS’s...

It's hard to believe that the greatest message the world will ever hear is contained in one simple scale. (Voice over by Willie Minor.)

"For as man, disobeying, drew death upon himself; so, obeying the will of God, he who desires is able to procure for himself life everlasting. For God has given us a law and holy commandments; and every one who keeps these can be saved, and, obtaining the resurrection, can inherit incorruption." - St. Theophilus of Antioch, to Autolycus (Book 2, Chapter 27) [link] Are we still under a Law? Yes. However, we are not under the Mosaic one. The Mosaic Law worked for a while, but ceased to be the best option after the "time of reformation" (Hebrews 9:10). At...

There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of the band called the Italian band,A devout man, and one that feared God with all his house, which gave much alms to the people, and prayed to God alway.He saw in a vision evidently about the ninth hour of the day an angel of God coming in to him, and saying unto him, Cornelius.And when he looked on him, he was afraid, and said, What is it, Lord? And he said unto him, Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God.And now send...

Two suspected terrorists are being held in Kosovo after a Nov. 3 attack on two American women serving as missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A total of six men were arrested Nov. 5 in connection with an alleged terrorist plot "inspired by extreme Islamist ideology." Two of the six are suspects in the investigation of the attack on the LDS missionaries, a senior police official involved with the investigation told the Associated Press. The attack took place in Pristina, Kosovo's capital. "We can confirm two sister missionaries were beaten in Kosovo and have been moved...

Patrick Blute is no Andrew Lloyd Webber. Webber was 23-years old when he famously staged the rock musical “Jesus Christ Superstar,” which debuted on Broadway in 1971. Blute, a 23-year-old Columbia University grad, is the creator of “Spears The Musical – The Gospel According to Britney,” for which there is a funders preview this week. “Jesus Christ Superstar” was fairly faithful to the Gospel account of the last week in the earthly life of Christ before He went to be with the Father. It featured such notable songs as “I Don’t Know How to Love Him,” “Gethsemane,” and, of course,...

Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and preached Christ unto them.And the people with one accord gave heed unto those things which Philip spake, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did.For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of many that were possessed with them: and many taken with palsies, and that were lame, were healed.And there was great joy in that city.(Acts 8:5-9)Who was Phillip? Not one of the Apostles, nor yet was he an evangelist, Phillip was one of the first Deacons of the church, he served God and the church in practical...

Expounding on the importance of our actions for salvation is, I suppose, my primary “thing.” I have been in so many informal debates over the issue that I have started to lose count of them. I have written about the topic many times. And often, I become angry (like God in 1 Kings 11:9-10) at the mere thought of sola fide (“faith alone”), because I know that it is completely contrary to “what the Lord [has] commanded.” But why? “Faith alone” was, without a doubt, the primary reason that I left Protestantism. Even though I was ill-educated in theology at...

Nine Words that Changed the World             There are nine words that irrevocably changed the course of life on planet Earth, the implications on philosophy, theology, and life are that significant. They are three sentences, each containing three words and each illustrating three aspects of a single man that touched the world in a manner so astounding it still echoes to this day: 1.         “Peace, be still.”             Imagine, for a moment, that you are a seaman, that you have experienced the dangers of the winds and the waves and a man says to these literal forces of nature “peace, be still”… and...

The Bible identifies several kinds of sexual sin, including fornication, adultery, incest and homosexuality. Homosexual behavior is unequivocally and consistently portrayed in the Bible as sin (Genesis 19:5 with Jude 1:7; Leviticus 18:22; Leviticus 20:13; Romans 1:26-27; I Corinthians 6:9-10; and I Timothy 1:10). The biblical witness on this point could not be any clearer.

John 3:14-18 doesn’t necessarily support the “faith alone” position. For Protestants, John 3:14-18 might seem like the ultimate “Gotcha!” passage to use against Catholics. But if you look a little deeper, you’ll recognize that the passage does not defend the “faith alone” position and is totally in line with Catholic teaching. The passage reads as, “‘As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes...

A look at last Sunday's readings in the context of the position that faith and works are both directly important for salvation. ... "Good works are extremely important for our salvation. We will be judged 'according to [our] deeds' (Revelation 20:13)." ...

"What do we do about our kids?" The group of parents sat together in my office, wiping their eyes. I'm a high school pastor, but for once, they weren't talking about 16-year-olds drinking and partying. Each had a story to tell about a "good Christian" child, raised in their home and in our church, who had walked away from the faith during the college years. These children had come through our church's youth program, gone on short-term mission trips, and served in several different ministries during their teenage years. Now they didn't want anything to do with it anymore. And,...

Full Title: Let the Little Ones Come to Me — Social Justice Gone Awry This is an anti-gospel—learning morality from nature and being successful from within ourselves, without depending on the Creator and Redeemer of nature. _______________ A further danger lurks—that Christian good works can be recuperated by movements of pagan utopianism. A case in point. In January 2013 World Vision (WV) sent an Easter funding appeal to those sponsoring needy children. WV began as an evangelistic ministry of Bob Pierce, a powerful preacher whom I heard preach when I was just a lad in my hometown in Liverpool in...

According to Essence magazine, the GRAMMY Award winning gospel dou Mary Mary will Join Stevie Wonder in his Florida concert boycott following the acquittal of former neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman. "We will stand with Stevie Wonder & boycott Florida until the Stand Your Ground Law is changed," the pair reportedly told their Twitter followers. The pair explained "We love our fans but we MUST do something. We understand that a No from us isn't as big as a 'No' from Stevie Wonder, but if all our voices join together we can REALLY change things." Before the announcement, Mary Mary singer...

The Bible pretty much lays it on the line. When the Bible speaks, it's God talking. Hard to argue with God. Proverbs 11:10 - When it goes well with the righteous, the city rejoices, And when the wicked perish, there is glad shouting. So, when Hitler, Stalin, Khadafi, Kim Il Sung, Hugo Chavez, Osama Bin Laden, Che Guevara, Arafat, Saddam Hussein, Peter Jennings and Helen Thomas died, a lot of folks rejoiced. And, many of us are waiting for others to pass on like ANY of the leftists who have turned this nation upside down morally and in every way....

Here’s an exerpt from Reaching Muslims with the Gospel of God, an interview with Abdul Saleeb from the June issue of Tabletalk. Tabletalk: Tell us how the Lord led you out of Islam to Christianity. Abdul Saleeb: My first encounter with the gospel and the Christian faith was through the ministry of a group of American missionaries in Europe. When I discovered that Christians did not believe that Jesus was simply a prophet but God incarnate who had died on the cross for our sins, my first reactions were: 1. Christians are insane. 2. How can anyone believe such blasphemies?...

I was flying from Los Angeles to Miami when I found myself sitting next to two women. Sarah was sitting closest to me. She was 29, inappropriately dressed, with a ring through her nose, and she wasn’t the friendliest person I have sat next to on a plane. After we took off I couldn’t help but notice that her friend kept kissing her on the cheek, holding her hand, and rubbing her shoulder. They were gay, and that little revelation lifted my planned witnessing encounter up a big notch on the awkward-meter. I really didn’t want an angry gay couple...

According to an article published at Breitbart.com., entitled "Pentagon May Court Martial Soldiers Who Share Christian Faith, Christians in the military, including chaplains, could be court martialed and charged with treason for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don't pretend to be an expert on constitutional law, but I would think that this would be unconstitutional for many reasons. Of course, I felt that way about Obama Care until Chief Justice John Roberts weighed in, much to my utter surprise and disappointment. (I may never get over that) But if I can be allowed to reason in my common...

Thought this would be more relevant now. This is a compilation of interviews of sincere Boston Street evangelists, reduced to 9 minutes from 3 hours. Asa shown below, Boston and MA in general is one of most resistant (and antagonistic to) the gospel, being liberal and mostly institutionalized religion (except for many recent immigrants). Video: http://youtu.be/AO6SIDZ4RNM