MANILA – Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has ordered the termination of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA), a major security pact allowing US military activities in the Philippines. 

Will this drastic move lead to the ending of 69 years of the alliance between the two countries?

A military drill is just one of 300 joint activities every year between the Philippines and the US 
military under the VFA. The VFA provides the legal framework for US military activities including the entry and facilitation of US troops and assets in the Philippines.

Besides military training, the US forces have also provided significant humanitarian assistance in times of disasters and provided surveillance in combating ISIS-inspired terrorists. 

But these and many more benefits will cease in six months because  Duterte has ended the agreement.

Security analyst Dr. Rommel Banlaoi says President Duterte believes that it is about time the Philippines strengthen their own defenses and assert national sovereignty. 

“The Philippine government feels that the United States because of our familiarity with the US is already interfering in our domestic affairs, including jurisdiction, custody, detention, compensation and even court proceedings,” Banlaoi noted. 

Since he came to power in 2016, Duterte was very vocal about his lack of faith in the United States and has argued that the presence of US forces makes the Philippines a potential target for aggression. On the contrary, many observers believe the move will benefit China which has claimed most of the West Philippine Sea and may threaten regional security.

Neighboring countries are concerned that the scrapping of the Visiting Forces Agreement will reduce US military presence which serves as a counterweight to the aggression of China in the Asia-Pacific region. 

Meanwhile, members of the Philippine Senate are seeking the help of the Supreme Court to determine if the chamber’s concurrence is needed for repealing the treaty. 

They are concerned that the VFA termination might lead to the end of almost 7 decades of the alliance between the Philippines and the US. 

The senators are hoping for a renegotiation of the agreement with provisions that are fairer and more protective of the country’s national interests that will also address the criminal liability of US forces under Philippine law.

But for Duterte, totally abandoning the alliance is a strategy that he needs in dealing with China. 

“We cannot match the military power of China,” Banlaoi explained. ” That is why the Philippine government is telling China and the whole world that military option is not an option.  We pray that if we have some problems, I hope we can settle these problems peacefully, diplomatically, politically without resorting to the use of force.”

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The country of Sweden has revealed a monumental rise in teenage gender dysphoria diagnoses over a ten-year period. 

The Guardian reports Sweden’s Board of Health and Welfare has confirmed a 1,500 percent rise in gender dysphoria diagnoses among 13-to 17-year-olds born as girls between 2008 and 2018.  The findings were revealed in a recently released report. 

In the fall of 2018, the government proposed a law pushed by the Swedish LGBT group RFSL that would reduce the minimum age for sex reassignment medical care from 18 to 15, remove all need for parental consent, and allow children as young as 12 to change their legal gender.

Public backlash against the proposed law began in March of last year when Christopher Gillberg, a psychiatrist at Gothenburg’s Sahlgrenska Academy wrote an op-ed in the Svenska Dagbladet newspaper cautioned that surgery and hormone treatments conducted on children was a “big experiment” which could become one of the Scandinavian country’s worst medical scandals, according to The Guardian.

Then last October, an investigative news program looked into the methods used at Stockholm’s Karolinska University hospital, which specializes in treating minors with gender dysphoria. The hospital has been criticized for performing double mastectomies on self-identifying transgenders as young as 14. 

Several media outlets also profiled cases of former transgenders who regretted their surgeries, including one report by Filter magazine on the case of a 32-year-old transgender woman who committed suicide four years after her surgery.  A psychosis expert later determined after reading through her medical journal that the person clearly showed signs of mental problems at the time she first tried to get gender dysphoria treatment.  One clinic refused to treat her. However, when she approached the Karolinska Hospital, they went ahead with the procedure, according to the newspaper.

The government is responding to the public outcry. The proposed bill to lower the minimum legal age for sex reassignment surgery was shelved. The Board of Health and Welfare was ordered to study the evidence issue its findings. The report is scheduled to be released on March 31.

The government agency’s most recent report also disclosed 32.4 percent of 13 to 17-year-olds with gender dysphoria registered at birth as women also had diagnoses for anxiety disorder, 28.9 percent had depression, 19.4 percent had ADHD, and 15.2 percent had autism, according to The Guardian. 

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This is Daniel Whyte III, president of Gospel Light Society International with the Whyte House Family Devotional Reading of Charles Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening podcast. This is Episode #40.

Charles Spurgeon was a prominent English Particular Baptist preacher. He was very influential among the Christians of various denominations during his age and even today, and is commonly called the “Prince of Preachers”. After some time of alternately searching for God and running from God, he had a powerful encounter which led him to give his life to Christ. Spurgeon was only 16 when he preached his first sermon and he began publishing books shortly afterward. At the time of his death, he had preached nearly 3,600 sermons and published 49 volumes of commentaries, sayings, anecdotes, illustrations and devotions. Spurgeon said, “encouraging thoughts are like honey to the heart”, and wrote this devotional in hopes that its uplifting messages for each day of the year would bring comfort and refreshment to our walk with God. He was inspired by Isaiah 50:4 which reads, “He wakeneth morning by morning. He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned” and Psalm 63:5-6 which says, “My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness; and my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips; when I remember Thee upon my bed, and meditate on Thee in the night watches.”

Psalm 119:37 reads: “Turn away mine eyes from beholding vanity; and quicken thou me in thy way.”

There are divers kinds of vanity. The cap and bells of the fool, the mirth of the world, the dance, the lyre, and the cup of the dissolute, all these men know to be vanities; they wear upon their forefront their proper name and title. Far more treacherous are those equally vain things, the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches. A man may follow vanity as truly in the counting-house as in the theatre. If he be spending his life in amassing wealth, he passes his days in a vain show. Unless we follow Christ, and make our God the great object of life, we only differ in appearance from the most frivolous. It is clear that there is much need of the first prayer of our text.

“Quicken thou me in thy way.” The Psalmist confesses that he is dull, heavy, lumpy, all but dead. Perhaps, dear reader, you feel the same. We are so sluggish that the best motives cannot quicken us, apart from the Lord himself. What! will not hell quicken me? Shall I think of sinners perishing, and yet not be awakened? Will not heaven quicken me? Can I think of the reward that awaiteth the righteous, and yet be cold? Will not death quicken me? Can I think of dying, and standing before my God, and yet be slothful in my Master’s service? Will not Christ’s love constrain me? Can I think of his dear wounds, can I sit at the foot of his cross, and not be stirred with fervency and zeal? It seems so! No mere consideration can quicken us to zeal, but God Himself must do it, hence the cry, “Quicken thou me.” The Psalmist breathes out his whole soul in vehement pleadings: his body and his soul unite in prayer. “Turn away mine eyes,” says the body: “Quicken thou me,” cries the soul. This is a fit prayer for every day. O Lord, hear it in my case this night.

PRAY.

Thank you for listening to the Morning and Evening podcast. If you do not know the Lord as your Savior, here is how you can be saved from Hell and walk with the Lord morning and evening until you go to that wonderful place called Heaven when you die:

First, accept the fact that you are a sinner, and that you have broken God’s law. The Bible says in Romans 3:23: “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”

Second, accept the fact that there is a penalty for sin. The Bible states in Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death…”

Third, accept the fact that you are on the road to hell. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 18:8: “Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them off, and cast them from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire.” Also, the Bible states in Revelation 21:8: “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.”

Now that is bad news, but here’s the good news. Jesus Christ said in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Just believe in your heart that Jesus Christ died for your sins, was buried, and rose from the dead by the power of God for you so that you can live eternally with Him. Pray and ask Him to come into your heart today, and He will.

Romans 10:9 & 13 says, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved… For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

If you believe that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for your sins, was buried, and rose from the dead, and you want to trust Him for your Salvation today, please pray with me this simple prayer: Holy Father God, I realize that I am a sinner and that I have done some bad things in my life. I am sorry for my sins, and today I choose to turn from my sins. For Jesus Christ sake, please forgive me of my sins. I believe with all of my heart that Jesus Christ died for me, was buried, and rose again. I trust Jesus Christ as my Savior and I choose to follow Him as Lord from this day forward. Lord Jesus, please come into my heart and save my soul and change my life today. Amen.

If you believed in your heart that Jesus Christ died on the Cross, was buried, and rose again, allow me to say, congratulations on doing the most important thing in life and that is accepting Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour! For more information to help you grow in your newfound faith in Christ, go to Gospel Light Society.com and read “What To Do After You Enter Through the Door”. Jesus Christ said in John 10:9, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.”

If you accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior today, please email me at [email protected] and let us know. There is some free material that we want to send you. If you have a prayer request, please e-mail that to us as well, and we will pray for you until you tell us to stop.

God loves you. We love you. And may God bless you.

All Content & Images are provided by the acknowledged source

This is Daniel Whyte III, president of Gospel Light Society International with the Whyte House Daily Devotional Bible Reading Episode #91. Where I read three chapters of the Holy Bible in the King James Version a day with my family as a part of our family devotions, to encourage you to read the Holy Bible in a year’s time. We are using a modified version of the Five Day Bible Reading Plan. It is modified because we read the Bible everyday and not just five days a week. The benefit of using the Five Day Bible Reading Plan is: you can read the entire Bible in a chronological reading plan that helps the Bible make sense. Today we are reading Numbers 5, Psalm 132 and Acts 17.

Charles Spurgeon said, “If you wish to know God, you must know His Word. If you wish to perceive His power, you must see how He works by His Word. If you wish to know His purpose before it comes to pass, you can only discover it by His Word.”

Lee Roberson said, “If you are a child of God, know that every promise in the Bible is yours. The Bible is a gold mine, waiting for someone to take out its riches.”

Numbers 5
1 And the Lord spake unto Mo’-ses, saying,

2 Command the children of Is’-ra-el, that they put out of the camp every leper, and every one that hath an issue, and whosoever is defiled by the dead:

3 Both male and female shall ye put out, without the camp shall ye put them; that they defile not their camps, in the midst whereof I dwell.

4 And the children of Is’-ra-el did so, and put them out without the camp: as the Lord spake unto Mo’-ses, so did the children of Is’-ra-el.

5 And the Lord spake unto Mo’-ses, saying,

6 Speak unto the children of Is’-ra-el, When a man or woman shall commit any sin that men commit, to do a trespass against the Lord, and that person be guilty;

7 Then they shall confess their sin which they have done: and he shall recompense his trespass with the principal thereof, and add unto it the fifth part thereof, and give it unto him against whom he hath trespassed.

8 But if the man have no kinsman to recompense the trespass unto, let the trespass be recompensed unto the Lord, even to the priest; beside the ram of the atonement, whereby an atonement shall be made for him.

9 And every offering of all the holy things of the children of Is’-ra-el, which they bring unto the priest, shall be his.

10 And every man’s hallowed things shall be his: whatsoever any man giveth the priest, it shall be his.

11 And the Lord spake unto Mo’-ses, saying,

12 Speak unto the children of Is’-ra-el, and say unto them, If any man’s wife go aside, and commit a trespass against him,

13 And a man lie with her carnally, and it be hid from the eyes of her husband, and be kept close, and she be defiled, and there be no witness against her, neither she be taken with the manner;

14 And the spirit of jealousy come upon him, and he be jealous of his wife, and she be defiled: or if the spirit of jealousy come upon him, and he be jealous of his wife, and she be not defiled:

15 Then shall the man bring his wife unto the priest, and he shall bring her offering for her, the tenth part of an e’-phah of barley meal; he shall pour no oil upon it, nor put frankincense thereon; for it is an offering of jealousy, an offering of memorial, bringing iniquity to remembrance.

16 And the priest shall bring her near, and set her before the Lord:

17 And the priest shall take holy water in an earthen vessel; and of the dust that is in the floor of the tabernacle the priest shall take, and put it into the water:

18 And the priest shall set the woman before the Lord, and uncover the woman’s head, and put the offering of memorial in her hands, which is the jealousy offering: and the priest shall have in his hand the bitter water that causeth the curse:

19 And the priest shall charge her by an oath, and say unto the woman, If no man have lain with thee, and if thou hast not gone aside to uncleanness with another instead of thy husband, be thou free from this bitter water that causeth the curse:

20 But if thou hast gone aside to another instead of thy husband, and if thou be defiled, and some man have lain with thee beside thine husband:

21 Then the priest shall charge the woman with an oath of cursing, and the priest shall say unto the woman, The Lord make thee a curse and an oath among thy people, when the Lord doth make thy thigh to rot, and thy belly to swell;

22 And this water that causeth the curse shall go into thy bowels, to make thy belly to swell, and thy thigh to rot: And the woman shall say, A’-men, a’-men.

23 And the priest shall write these curses in a book, and he shall blot them out with the bitter water:

24 And he shall cause the woman to drink the bitter water that causeth the curse: and the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, and become bitter.

25 Then the priest shall take the jealousy offering out of the woman’s hand, and shall wave the offering before the Lord, and offer it upon the altar:

26 And the priest shall take an handful of the offering, even the memorial thereof, and burn it upon the altar, and afterward shall cause the woman to drink the water.

27 And when he hath made her to drink the water, then it shall come to pass, that, if she be defiled, and have done trespass against her husband, that the water that causeth the curse shall enter into her, and become bitter, and her belly shall swell, and her thigh shall rot: and the woman shall be a curse among her people.

28 And if the woman be not defiled, but be clean; then she shall be free, and shall conceive seed.

29 This is the law of jealousies, when a wife goeth aside to another instead of her husband, and is defiled;

30 Or when the spirit of jealousy cometh upon him, and he be jealous over his wife, and shall set the woman before the Lord, and the priest shall execute upon her all this law.

31 Then shall the man be guiltless from iniquity, and this woman shall bear her iniquity.

Psalm 132
A Song of degrees.
1 Lord, remember Da’-vid, and all his afflictions:

2 How he sware unto the Lord, and vowed unto the mighty God of Ja’-cob;

3 Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house, nor go up into my bed;

4 I will not give sleep to mine eyes, or slumber to mine eyelids,

5 Until I find out a place for the Lord, an habitation for the mighty God of Ja’-cob.

6 Lo, we heard of it at Eph’-ra-tah: we found it in the fields of the wood.

7 We will go into his tabernacles: we will worship at his footstool.

8 Arise, O Lord, into thy rest; thou, and the ark of thy strength.

9 Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness; and let thy saints shout for joy.

10 For thy servant Da’-vid’s sake turn not away the face of thine anointed.

11 The Lord hath sworn in truth unto Da’-vid; he will not turn from it; Of the fruit of thy body will I set upon thy throne.

12 If thy children will keep my covenant and my testimony that I shall teach them, their children shall also sit upon thy throne for evermore.

13 For the Lord hath chosen Zi’-on; he hath desired it for his habitation.

14 This is my rest for ever: here will I dwell; for I have desired it.

15 I will abundantly bless her provision: I will satisfy her poor with bread.

16 I will also clothe her priests with salvation: and her saints shall shout aloud for joy.

17 There will I make the horn of Da’-vid to bud: I have ordained a lamp for mine anointed.

18 His enemies will I clothe with shame: but upon himself shall his crown flourish.

Acts 17
1 Now when they had passed through Am-phip’-o-lis and Ap-ol-lo’-ni-a, they came to Thess-a-lo-ni’-ca, where was a synagogue of the Jews:

2 And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,

3 Opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is Christ.

4 And some of them believed, and consorted with Paul and Si’-las; and of the devout Greeks a great multitude, and of the chief women not a few.

5 But the Jews which believed not, moved with envy, took unto them certain lewd fellows of the baser sort, and gathered a company, and set all the city on an uproar, and assaulted the house of Ja’-son, and sought to bring them out to the people.

6 And when they found them not, they drew Ja’-son and certain brethren unto the rulers of the city, crying, These that have turned the world upside down are come hither also;

7 Whom Ja’-son hath received: and these all do contrary to the decrees of Cae’-sar, saying that there is another king, one Jesus.

8 And they troubled the people and the rulers of the city, when they heard these things.

9 And when they had taken security of Ja’-son, and of the other, they let them go.

10 And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Si’-las by night unto Be-re’-a: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews.

11 These were more noble than those in Thess-a-lo-ni’-ca, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.

12 Therefore many of them believed; also of honourable women which were Greeks, and of men, not a few.

13 But when the Jews of Thess-a-lo-ni’-ca had knowledge that the word of God was preached of Paul at Be-re’-a, they came thither also, and stirred up the people.

14 And then immediately the brethren sent away Paul to go as it were to the sea: but Si’-las and Ti-moth’-e-us abode there still.

15 And they that conducted Paul brought him unto Ath’-ens: and receiving a commandment unto Si’-las and Ti-moth’-e-us for to come to him with all speed, they departed.

16 Now while Paul waited for them at Ath’-ens, his spirit was stirred in him, when he saw the city wholly given to idolatry.

17 Therefore disputed he in the synagogue with the Jews, and with the devout persons, and in the market daily with them that met with him.

18 Then certain philosophers of the Ep-i-cu-re’-ans, and of the Sto’-icks, encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.

19 And they took him, and brought him unto Ar-e-op’-agus, saying, May we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is?

20 For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears: we would know therefore what these things mean.

21 (For all the A-the’-ni-ans and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing.)

22 Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars’ hill, and said, Ye men of Ath’-ens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious.

23 For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To The Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you.

24 God that made the world and all things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;

25 Neither is worshipped with men’s hands, as though he needed any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things;

26 And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;

27 That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us:

28 For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.

29 Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device.

30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:

31 Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.

32 And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked: and others said, We will hear thee again of this matter.

33 So Paul departed from among them.

34 Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed: among the which was Di-o-nys’-i-us the Ar-e-op’-a-gite, and a woman named Dam’-a-ris, and others with them.

________

PRAY
________

When I was a teenager I wanted to get wisdom and knowledge, so I set out the read the big family Bible that many families had in those days. But I couldn’t get past Genesis 2 before I got bored with reading the Bible. I found out later in life that you have to believe on Christ and get saved before you can understand the Bible. So here is how I became a Christian and how you can too:

First, accept the fact that you are a sinner, and that you have broken God’s law. The Bible says in Romans 3:23: “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”

Second, accept the fact that there is a penalty for sin. The Bible states in Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death…”

Third, accept the fact that you are on the road to hell. Jesus Christ said in Matthew 18:8: “Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them off, and cast them from thee: it is better for thee to enter into life halt or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into everlasting fire.” Also, the Bible states in Revelation 21:8: “But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.”

Now that is bad news, but here’s the good news. Jesus Christ said in John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Just believe in your heart that Jesus Christ died for your sins, was buried, and rose from the dead by the power of God for you so that you can live eternally with Him. Pray and ask Him to come into your heart today, and He will.

Romans 10:9 & 13 says, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved… For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

If you believe that Jesus Christ died on the Cross for your sins, was buried, and rose from the dead, and you want to trust Him for your Salvation today, please pray with me this simple prayer: Holy Father God, I realize that I am a sinner and that I have done some bad things in my life. I am sorry for my sins, and today I choose to turn from my sins. For Jesus Christ sake, please forgive me of my sins. I believe with all of my heart that Jesus Christ died for me, was buried, and rose again. I trust Jesus Christ as my Savior and I choose to follow Him as Lord from this day forward. Lord Jesus, please come into my heart and save my soul and change my life today. Amen.

If you believed in your heart that Jesus Christ died on the Cross, was buried, and rose again, allow me to say, congratulations on doing the most important thing in life and that is accepting Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour! For more information to help you grow in your newfound faith in Christ, go to Gospel Light Society.com and read “What To Do After You Enter Through the Door”. Jesus Christ said in John 10:9, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.”

If you accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior today, please email me at [email protected] and let us know. There is some free material that we want to send you. If you have a prayer request, please e-mail that to us as well, and we will pray for you until you tell us to stop.

God loves you. We love you. And may God bless you.

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Ryan P. Burge is an instructor of political science at Eastern Illinois University. His research appears on the site Religion in Public, and he tweets at @ryanburge.

The Interfaith Diversity Experiences and Attitudes Longitudinal Survey (IDEALS) is a national study that is led by Alyssa Rockenbach (North Carolina State University) and Matthew Mayhew (The Ohio State University) in partnership with Interfaith Youth Core, with funding by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Fetzer Institute, and the Julian Grace Foundation. Burge partnered with IDEALS to share his independent analysis of the data its researchers provided.

One of the negative stereotypes of evangelical colleges is that they keep students in a religious “bubble.” But new survey data shows that these schools are particularly effective at teaching students about other faiths, and that this exposure to outside traditions is actually correlated with a deeper commitment to their own beliefs.

The Interfaith Diversity Experiences and Attitudes Longitudinal Survey (IDEALS)—a panel study that surveys the same students before, during, and at the end of their college career—measures basic knowledge about world religions.

The sample included over 1,300 students from 15 evangelical universities, the majority of which were members of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities.

Compared to students who planned to attend Catholic or private secular universities, evangelical students had a lower baseline level of knowledge. The average student attending an evangelical university could answer just 4.9 questions correctly. However, this score was higher than those attending public universities (4.8) and those who attended Protestant schools that were not classified as evangelical (4.6 questions correct).

All institutions of higher education impart some knowledge of world religions, but there are clear differences between the types of schools. For instance, the average student attending a Catholic college answered 0.64 more questions correctly after four years at college, which is close to the average for the entire sample (0.67).

Those attending evangelical schools—many of which require some sort of religious formation or classees in their curricula—saw a larger improvement, answering 0.83 more questions correctly on average by the end of their college career. That gain in religious knowledge is tied for the largest increase among any type of college or university and resulted in the highest average score at the end of the survey period.

Evangelical schools are emphasizing world religions, and students are seeing measurable gains in knowledge.

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Marlena Graves is the author of The Way Up Is Down: Finding Yourself by Forgetting Yourself (IVP, July 2020) and A Beautiful Disaster: Finding Hope in the Midst of Brokenness (Brazos Press, 2014). She lives with her husband and three daughters in the Toledo, Ohio area. The views expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of BCNN1.

L’Arche International recently published an internal report revealing the news that Jean Vanier, its founder, sexually abused women for decades. In the report, the leaders of L’Arche unequivocally condemned Vanier’s abusive behavior. They sought forgiveness from the victims while also lauding the victims’ courage to come forward and testify.

Along with many others, I was devastated by the news. After Vanier won the Templeton Prize, I contacted him about a possible interview. When his secretary was on vacation, he sent me a personal response that said, “From Jean, yes we can meet, tell me when you can come, peace.” Although I was never able to go, I cherished the invitation. I had been quoting Vanier in my writing for years. And in the seminary classes I taught, I repeatedly used Vanier as a role model of incarnational community and an exemplar of what it means to manifest Christ’s presence in the world.

As news about his abuse ricocheted across the globe, many of us took to social media to express our reactions and to collectively grieve. Many echoed Mark Galli’s question about sinful leaders: “What are we to make,” he writes, “of everything they taught, if their lives exhibited anything but what they taught?”

Others have opined that if we were more realistic about human nature, we wouldn’t be disappointed. “The lesson, surely,” Michael Coren tweeted, “is that nobody should be placed on such a pedestal.” Still others have wondered if we should have heroes at all.

They’re right, of course, but only in part. Scripture does tell us that “There is no one righteous, not even one” (Rom. 3:10). Hebrews 11 and other parts of the New and Old Testaments highlight people of faith with grievous sins and fatal flaws. So yes, God uses even the most broken among us. And yes, we have to be cautious about whom we venerate.

And yet, this language of “not putting people on pedestals” is often used to let people off the hook and soften their mistakes in the public eye. More importantly, this rhetoric often erodes our understanding of righteousness and the high calling to holiness. Scripture, experience, tradition, and reason demonstrate that some believers are indeed more righteous than others. Their private lives correspond to their public lives. What you see is what you get. They are honest, without guile, and unduplicitous. Their holiness is simple and uncomplicated.

Source: Christianity Today

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Fred Sanders is a theologian who teaches in the Torrey Honors Institute at Biola University. He has written, edited, or contributed to several books, including The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything. He blogs at ScriptoriumDaily.com. The views expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of BCNN1.

The cross of Christ is the center of salvation. It is the crucial point, the place of convergence where everything about the gospel comes together. If you interrogate Christian faith and ask, “In one word, how does God save sinners?” the response of a healthy faith will be instantly and confidently to pick out the Cross.

Of course a healthy faith will also ask, “Please, may I have more words than one?” The Cross is meaningfully central only when it is recognized as the center of something vaster. Salvation in seven terms might include, along with the Cross, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, and the Ascension, not to mention the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Salvation in 20 words could be explicit about even more ideas that are presupposed in a shorter answer. O for a thousand words to sing my great Redeemer’s praise, to paraphrase Charles Wesley! Christian faith is fluent and eloquent when it comes to salvation; speaking as a theologian, I would love to tell you about salvation in as many words as you will permit me. But just as strong as the impulse to elaborate on the greatness of God in the work of salvation is the impulse to condense the whole message to the key point.

Yet the condensed statement is always meant to call to mind the larger reality. Whenever we say anything about the Cross, we are almost always using a figure of speech called metonymy. A word functions as a metonym when we use it to refer to something else, usually something larger to which it is closely related. When Paul says he boasts only “in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world” (Gal. 6:14), he is using one thing (a large, wooden object used for executions) to refer to something else: the death of Jesus and its effect in reconciling us to God. Similarly, when Christians sing songs about the wooden object itself, we are well aware that what we cherish is not just “the old rugged cross” as such, but the Son of God who used that cross in his work of seeking and saving. The Cross means Christ crucified. All of this flashes across the Christian mind in an instant when the Cross is mentioned.

Now think vaster: When we speak of Christ crucified, something else also flashes across the Christian mind: the presence of Christ risen and ascended, in whose almighty presence I am writing these words and you are reading them. The One who says, “I was dead, and now look, I am alive for ever and ever!” (Rev. 1:18). And behind that risen One is the infinite depth of his eternal personhood as the Son of the Father in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the perfect life of the blessed Trinity. All of this is implicit in what Christians say about the death of Jesus. We never mean just the death of Christ in an isolated way, as if it were cut off from his entire life, his preexistence and exaltation, or the Father and Holy Spirit with whom he indivisibly accomplished our salvation.

The apostle Paul knew this. When he said he “resolved to know nothing … except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2), he meant he was focusing on the central point, not that he was ignoring the Resurrection or the Holy Spirit (both of which he goes on to say much about in 1 Corinthians). But Paul leads with the Cross: “For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3). Paul started his world-changing message with the Cross and centered his life-transforming message on the Cross. He knew how to indicate the total reality of God’s salvation, but he also knew how to focus.

The early church knew it. The Apostles’ Creed tells a very short version of the life of Jesus, jumping straight from “born of the Virgin Mary” over 33 years of life to the final days: “He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead.” For a short creed, that is a lot of emphasis to put in one place. Yet this focus on Jesus’ death falls right in the middle of a creed that teaches the full counsel of the Trinity and of God’s work from Creation to “the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.” The creed has the Cross at its center but all things at its circumference.

Source: Christianity Today

All Content & Images are provided by the acknowledged source

Sadiri “Joy” Tira (DMiss, Western Seminary; DMin, Reformed Theological Seminary) is Coordinator for the Lausanne Diasporas North American Strategy Group. He also serves as Missiology Specialist at the Jaffray Centre for Global Initiatives at Ambrose University and Seminary (AUS), Calgary, AB, Canada; on the Advisory Council of Gospel-Life.net at the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College in Illinois, USA, and on the Board of Directors for SIM (Canada) and MoveIn International. The views expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of BCNN1.

The World Health Organization has named the Coronavirus, “Covid-19” (https://time.com/5782284/who-name-coronavirus-covid-19/). This virus started in Central China and has spread to over 51,800 lab-confirmed cases globally (https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-reports/20200216-sitrep-27-covid-19.pdf).

This outbreak has impacted economic growth, tourism industries, geopolitical landscapes, and “people on the move.” Specifically, thousands of travelers—businesspeople, international students, migrant workers, family members seeking reunion, and even recreational migrants, have been locked down and isolated.

Airports, markets, malls, schools, recreational facilities, and even church buildings are closely monitored. Foreigners in China are now being evacuated and repatriated to their homelands — a reverse diaspora!

Last week, the Asia Theological Association announced that Rev. Dr. Wilson Teo, a respected Singaporean church leader, senior pastor of Grace Assembly in Singapore, has been infected with Covid-19. To date, 16 cases linked to the congregation have been identified (https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/coronavirus-grace-assembly-of-god-services-suspended-but-members-using-tech-to-pray-and).

How do we respond to the Covid-19? I am not a medical expert, economist, or political scientist, but just like Wilson Teo, I was a local church pastor, and a reflective practitioner of international migration.

Let me suggest a brief response to this global crises through the lenses of biblical-theology, missiology, and pastoral ministry.

First, we need our theology to be moored in solid biblical truths and principles, because this will help our ethical practices.

God is sovereign and all-knowing. His eyes are not closed to global current events and personal crisis. God is our refuge in times of troubles, and he is our defender, as well as our deliverer.

With this guarantee, we must not fear (Ps. 91). Even God’s children are exposed to pestilence, as recorded in the Bible. For example, leprosy was deadly and rampant during the Roman period. The lepers were isolated and considered unclean social outcasts, but Jesus, the compassionate healer, ministered to them, transcending gender, cultural, and racial considerations of the time.

Today, we are exposed to all kinds of infectious diseases, including Covid-19. The words of the Apostle Paul are comforting: “Can anything separate us from the love of Christ? Can trouble, suffering, and hard times or hunger and nakedness, or danger or death… I am sure nothing can separate us from God’s love…” (Rom. 8:31-39).

Second, during seasons of epidemic outbreaks, the church must respond pastorally.

I am writing this post in Toronto, Ontario, arguably, “the most multicultural city in the world.” Recently, I invited a friend for dinner. He responded, “Great, but I don’t like eating ‘oriental’ food — these restaurants have corona viruses!”

I was appalled to hear these condescending and discriminating comments. Pastors have a prophetic voice and we must remind God’s people to practice peace, hope, and courage, and encourage God’s people to be empathetic and sympathetic to those who are hurting.

Source: Christianity Today

All Content & Images are provided by the acknowledged source