The post Andrew Wommack Devotional 31 July 2019 – Build Faith, Destroy Doubt appeared first on Flatimes.
Billy Graham Devotional 31 July 201 – Molding You
The post Billy Graham Devotional 31 July 201 – Molding You appeared first on Flatimes.
Representative Ayanna Pressley Introduces Bill Abolishing the Death Penalty
A Democratic congresswoman has introduced a bill to abolish the death penalty after the Department of Justice announced it would be resuming executions after a 16-year hiatus from the punishment.
In response to Attorney General William Barr’s decision to resume executions, Democratic Rep. Ayanna Pressley presented her legislative challenge, arguing that capital punishment has “no place in a just society.”
According to CBS News, the bill aims to “prohibit the imposition of the death penalty for any violation of Federal law, and for other purposes,” though the specifics surrounding the legislation are yet to be known. In a photo of the bill tweeted by the congresswoman, it reads that “no person may be sentenced to death or put to death on or after the date of enactment of this act.”
Pressley, who is known to be part of the so-called quartet of democratic congresswomen known as the “squad,” also launched into a Twitter tirade against President Trump upon news of the death penalty re-introduction.
“The same racist rhetoric coming from the occupant of the White House, who called for the execution of the #Exonerated5, is what led to this racist, vile policy,” Pressley tweeted, referencing the “Central Park Five” case. “It was wrong then and it’s wrong now,” she added. “The cruelty is the point – this is by design.”
In the Department of…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.
Churches urged to support poorer pupils as new report reveals disadvantaged students ‘stuck 18 months behind’
That is according to a report by the Education Policy Institute which shows progress in closing the divide has come to a standstill.
Christian charity, Transforming Lives for Good (TLG) which helps churches support struggling children says while this is nothing new, it’s good for the issue to be back in the spotlight.
Explaining the reasons for the gap on Premier’s News Hour, one of the directors of TLG, Paul Chenery said: “They measured it by children receiving school meals, so that is linked to kids in poverty, you have children with special educational needs, you have children that are being looked after by child services, in foster families etc and children in different demographic areas will all cause this divide and make it harder for children academically.”
The Government has defended its record helping disadvantaged school children in England.
School standards Minister Nick Gibb said the Department for Education spends £2.4bn per year dedicated to supporting poorer pupils, students that receive free school meals.
He says that the gap for both primary and secondary schools was narrower than in 2011.
But, Labour’s shadow education secretary Angela Rayner says this report “is the latest evidence that inequality continues to rise under the Tories, with the most disadvantaged students losing out.”
Paul Chenrey says the answer is not just about throwing money at…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Premier Christianity News.
California Lawmakers Pass Resolution Blaming Religious People for High Suicide Rates in the LGBT Community
Lawmakers in California have passed a resolution that singles out the state’s religious communities and forces them to fully support LGBT individuals.
In an astonishing bid to have people of faith conform to the pervading progressive culture, the legislators even blamed religious individuals for many of the issues faced by those in the LGBT community today – including suicide, the Federalist reports.
The resolution, which recently passed through the state assembly, reads: “the Legislature calls upon all Californians to embrace the individual and social benefits of family and community acceptance” of LGBT people. The document unapologetically pins blame on people of faith for being contributors to the sky-rocketing suicide rates among the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.
“The stigma associated with being LGBT often created by groups in society, including therapists and religious groups, has caused disproportionately high rates of suicide, attempted suicide, depression, rejection, and isolation amongst LGBT and questioning individuals…” the bill reads.
So, with this assertion put forward as fact, the California legislature is effectively seeking to force religious people to agree with and support the LGBT community even if they hold strong personal convictions that would draw them away from doing…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.
Murder investigation underway after church gardener found dead
71 year old Christine Ford, who was a regular member of St Leonard’s Church, was found dead at her home in the village of Flamstead on Saturday.
A man from Flamstead has been arrested on suspicion of murder in connection with the investigation and is currently in police custody.
Police found her with multiple fatal injuries just before 9pm when they arrived at the house.
Her family had reported her missing earlier in the day.
The Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire Major Crime Unit has launched an investigation and is conducting extensive enquiries into the circumstances around her death.
Detective Superintendent Joanne Walker, from the BCH MCU, said: “This is a tragic incident and our thoughts are very much with Christine’s family at this difficult time.
“They are being supported by specially-trained family liaison officers and we are doing everything we can to determine the events that led up to her death.”
Christine Ford, a retired hairdresser with two sons, regularly tended to the gardens at her parish church, a stone’s throw away from her house.
Rev Tom Sander, the local vicar, 32, told the BBC: “She was a very keen gardener and a very nice person.
“She was a committed member of the church family and regularly looked after the roses in the churchyard.”
He told The Times: “She was a very neat and tidy person. She was very quiet and unassuming. She was…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Premier Christianity News.
Six Ways a Church Failed the Guest Friendliness Test
Podcast Episode #558
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Every church thinks they’re a guest friendly church. But as we discuss today, guest friendliness is not something at which every church excels.
Some highlights from today’s episode include:
- Church signs need info on them, but there are really just three essentials: church name, worship times, website address.
- If your church has a digital sign, you have to consider the length of the rotation of information.
- Don’t think that “everyone knows ______” at your church because almost always, everyone doesn’t know.
- Some churches aren’t just not guest friendly, they are also not guest desirous.
The six failures we discuss are:
- It had no website.
- No service times on sign.
- “Our church is always open.”
- “Everyone knows the times of our service.”
- Didn’t consider the impact of special events on guests.
- It failed to see the opportunities.
Resources mentioned in today’s podcast
Rainer on Leadership is a member of the LifeWay Leadership Podcast Network
Episode Sponsors
Vanderbloemen has been serving churches for nine years, but did you know that Vanderbloemen also serves Christian schools, nonprofits, and Christian businesses? So if you’re listening, and you know a Christian school, nonprofit, or values-based business that is hiring, contact our friends at Vanderbloemen for your staffing needs.
For more information, visit Vanderbloemen.com.
The mission at…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Thom Rainer.
The Gilroy Garlic Festival shooting: Moving forward by not moving on
Note from Dr. Denison: While my wife and I are on vacation, our oldest son, Ryan, is writing The Daily Article. Ryan is an MDiv graduate of Truett Seminary currently completing his PhD in Church History. He has written The Daily Article in my absence in the past and was the co-author of our latest publication, How Does God See America? I am honored to share this ministry with him.
What more is there to say?
The news is once again headlined by reports of a mass shooting, complete with essentially the same statements of remorse, promises of prayer, and debates about gun laws we’ve heard countless times before.
As of this writing, details continue to emerge regarding the latest attack, this time at the Garlic Festival in Gilroy, California. Three were killed, including a six-year-old boy and a thirteen-year-old girl, while another twelve were injured. Police also shot and killed the suspected shooter.
The gunman, who has since been identified but will remain unnamed in this article, bypassed security by entering the festival grounds via a nearby creek and then cutting a hole in the surrounding fence.
He started shooting around 5:41 on Sunday evening, and, by the grace of God and the accuracy of festival security, stopped shooting less than a minute later.
Yet that was all the time it took to forever alter the lives of countless individuals.
So, where do we go from here?
Keep the focus on the people rather than the issues
We could spend this time debating our nation’s gun laws and what guidance we can find in Scripture. The former has been at the crux of most comments coming from those in the political sphere. And, while the latter is always helpful, we’ve been there before.
We could look at the mental health aspects of the discussion. We could examine the degree to which the most sustainable…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Denison Forum.
Jury finds Katy Perry’s ‘Dark Horse’ copied Christian rap song
The decision returned by a nine-member federal jury in a Los Angeles courtroom came five years after Marcus Gray and two co-authors first sued alleging Dark Horse stole from Joyful Noise, a song Gray released under the stage name Flame.
The case now goes to a penalty phase, where the jury will decide how much the plaintiffs are owed for copyright infringement.
Gray’s lawyers argued that the beat and instrumental line featured through nearly half of Dark Horse are substantially similar to those of Joyful Noise.
Dark Horse, a hybrid of pop, trap and hip-hop sounds that was the third single of Perry’s 2013 album Prism, spent four weeks on top of the Billboard Hot 100 in early 2014, and earned Perry a Grammy nomination.
Perry’s lawyers argued the song sections in question represent the kind of simple musical elements that if found to be subject to copyright would hurt music and all songwriters.
“They’re trying to own basic building blocks of music, the alphabet of music that should be available to everyone,” Perry’s lawyer Christine Lepera said during closing arguments.
Perry and the song’s co-authors, including her producer Dr Luke, testified during the seven-day trial that none of them had heard the song or heard of Gray before the lawsuit, nor did they listen to Christian music.
Gray’s lawyers had only to demonstrate, however, that Joyful Noise had wide…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Premier Christianity News.
