Josiah Concept Ministries

I was hoping that after the Da Vinci Code movie that we’d see less offshoots. But that doesn’t seem to be the case. Both Jimmy Akin and James White had entries about Kathleen McGowan, who claims to be of the so-called “royal bloodline” descended from Jesus and Mary Magdalene.

In case anyone doesn’t know by now, the book and movie titled The Da Vinci Code claims that Jesus survived his execution on the cross and moved with his wife, Mary Magdalene, to the south of France and had children. These children are the Merovigian kings, a line that supposedly had magical powers. McGowan, 43, claims to be descended from this line, and by extension, Jesus Himself.

There are so many books written about the claims made in the Da Vinci Code, that I’m not even going to waste my time trying to disprove the claim here. (I’ve provided a link to one such book above; special to me since Jody bought it for me for Christmas shortly after I became a Christian.) I’m going to assume that everyone knows that McGowan’s claim is both bogus and heretical.

My issue is that I can’t believe what lengths people are going through to make money these days. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not happy doing what I do for living. I left Wendy’s hoping for something bigger and better, and instead I wind up at Burger King? Not fair! It does, however, pay the bills and I have been blessed by God in other ways.

Overall, I’m happier now than I was five years ago. Heck, even two years ago.

I endeavor to serve God, not insult Him and His Son. This woman has insulted the God I serve, and she gets a seven-figure advance and a contract to write two more books! Two verses come to mind:

Dear friends, since you are foreigners and temporary residents in the world, I’m encouraging you to keep away from the desires of your corrupt nature. These desires constantly attack you. (1 Peter 2:11 GW)

She has given in, and sold out. In her desire for more money, she has sold out the God who loves her, and who created her. This world is not all there is, but more and more people are treating it that way. In so doing, she has openly rebelled against both the truth of the Bible and against God Himself. We should pray that God opens her eyes to the truth of His Word, and that she uses all of this money for God’s glory.

So on the outside you look as though you have God’s approval, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness. (Matthew 23:2

This verse was in regard to the Pharisees, who actively led others to a life of God’s disapproval. This verse is relevant today for any person who leads others into such a life. She has publicly confirmed a lie, but a lie that the apostate world is embracing as truth. She is paving the way to sin and lawlessness. Worse, it appears as though she has God’s blessing to do this, with her seven figure advance and three-book deal.

All too often in this world we judge the outside without looking in. Only God knows what is in her heart. But I doubt that what is inside her is any different than that verse in Matthew. Unless she repents and accepts Christ, I think that, like the Pharisees, her only reward is now.

Kathleen McGowan Links:

• McGowan’s Home Page
• Article in The Independant
• James White’s Blog Entry
• Jimmy Akin’s Blog Entry - With More Links
• Articles on McGowan from ReligionNewsBlog.com

Also, I find this absolutely hilarious:
Pope Appoints Five New Bishops.

Scientologists protest psychiatry at national conference

NIAGARA FALLS - A weekend conference of psychiatrists was picketed here Friday by Scientologists who marched outside the convention center banging drums and carrying signs that read, “Psychiatry kills.”

More than 200 psychiatrists and mental health professionals from across the country are attending the second annual Comprehensive Review of Psychiatry in the Conference Center Niagara Falls.

The pickets belong to the Citizens Commission on Human Rights, which was co-founded in 1969 by the Church of Scientology and has more than 135 chapters in 34 countries. One of the organization’s more famous members is actor Tom Cruise.

“Their beliefs have nothing to do with psychiatry,” said Dr. Steven Dubovsky, chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the University at Buffalo, which is co-sponsoring the conference with the Western New York Psychiatric Society. “They have the same credibility as people who say they’ve been kidnapped by aliens in flying saucers.”

One of the speakers on Friday’s program was Dr. Daniel Fisher of Washington, D.C., a former schizophrenic who said he was cured by psychiatry and psychiatric drugs.

The Scientologists weren’t allowed inside the convention center, but they wouldn’t have been swayed in their beliefs.

One of their signs, “Psychiatric drugs create kid killers,” referred to school shootings such as the one that occurred at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., in 1999. Eric Harris, one of the two teens who killed 13 and wounded 21, was on the Prozac-like drug Luvox at the time.

“At least eight of the 13 school shooters in recent years were on mind-altering drugs,” said Bruce Wiseman, the commission’s national president, who came from Los Angeles for the protest.

Wiseman said there are 10 million children in the United States on psychiatric drugs that are known to cause suicidal thoughts and behavior. Children with attention deficit disorders are given Ritalin, which is as addictive as cocaine, he claims.

Dubovsky brushed aside that argument as “nonsensical.”

“That’s like saying you shouldn’t give penicillin to a child with pneumonia,” Dubovsky said.

The Buffalo chapter set up an exhibit of anti-psychiatry panels and videos in the Niagara Center, the former Occidental office building near the Rainbow Bridge, that will coincide with the convention.

Dramatic placards and video images decrying psychiatrists as “Masterminds of destruction” and the science as “An industry of death” had a profound effect on some of the people viewing them.

Patricia Felske, a mother of four from Toronto, had one word for her reaction to the exhibit: “Horror.”

The Scientologists said they will picket outside the convention center again today and Sunday.

Consumer Alert: Scientologists “unqualified”

“Scientology is evil; its techniques are evil; its practice is a serious threat to the community, medically, morally, and socially; and its adherents are sadly deluded and often mentally ill… (Scientology is) the world’s largest organization of unqualified persons engaged in the practice of dangerous techniques which masquerade as mental therapy.”
- Justice Anderson, Supreme Court of Victoria, Australia, quoted at What judges have to say about Scientology

• Scientology Kills
• Research resources on Scientology

Hate Group within a Hate Group

The Citizens Commission on Human Rights is a front organization for the Church of Scientology. Both organizations are hate groups actively involved in unethical behavior.

• More articles on the Citizens Commission on Human Rights
• Research resources on CCHR

Reported by Religion News Blog

I slammed Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin the other day for not taking a stronger stance and calling for more action with Planned Parenthood. I accused him of only keeping theology in the intellectual realm and taking no action with it. I thought that was wrong. As apologists, we come in more contact with skeptics and unbelievers than the average Joe Pastor, and it is my position that we should use that responsibility wisely and for the glory of God. If the only Christian that a skeptic comes in contact with is an apologist who turns him off of the faith forever, how is that going to look for said apologist at Final Judgement time? This is why I believe that we, as apologists, have been entrusted with a greater responsibility.

While I still stand behind my original statements on July 20, I now realize that Jimmy Akin’s ministry is purely intellectual, so it only makes sense that the answer stay in the theoretical realms. His purpose is to give us the facts, but let us decide what to do with them. This is what God has set his ministry up to do. Akin seems very sincere in his faith from everything I’ve read in his blog.

I was hasty in my comment, and the blog entry I read today proved to me as much. Akin handled this situation very well. While he still didn’t use Scripture to point the seeker in the right direction, he nonetheless arrived at a similar conclusion to what those of us who believe in sola scriptura would have.

I have a lot of respect for Akin’s minsitry, or else I wouldn’t bother to read his blog everyday.

Almost everyday, I read the apologetics news and blogs. Sometimes there is a lot of useful information, sometimes there isn’t. Today I happened on something in James White’s blog that really struck a chord with me, and I wanted to share it with everyone:

Sometimes I take a little trip through a residential area to avoid a bad corner on my way to the office. This morning as I went through this area I glanced at the thermometer and saw it was reading 111 degrees at only 10am. The thought crossed my mind, “I wonder if Jehovah’s Witnesses are out in this furnace?” I turned a corner and what did I see? An entire group of JW’s. And there, rolling up to someone’s door, three JW’s led by…a man in a wheelchair. Remember, it’s 111. I know, the “official” temperature was probably only 107 or so, but, that’s in the shade, and that man in the chair was not in the shade. I looked down the road and saw the inevitable van heading their way. They were at the end of their “service ministry.” I wondered when they had started.

In case you are thinking I am going to try to do the “look at what those trapped in false religion will do for a lie while so many blessed with so much truth in Christ waste their lives satisfying their own personal desires” thing–while that is all quite true, that’s not where I’m going. Instead, my thoughts turned to a phrase I have used a number of times on this blog, “Theology matters.” I look at those folks going door to door spreading a message of…what? They do not believe they are “in” Christ. They have no heavenly hope, they are not in the New Covenant, they do not stand justified in the righteousness of Christ, they have no sure promise of final salvation. They truly have nothing more than a second-class salvation system.

What about you? Most of my readers have been blessed to be part of a sound, biblical fellowship of believers. You may be going today, or just now returning from, a church where the gospel–in purity, in truth–was proclaimed this day. So let me ask you, because I know all too well how it is: how much did you rejoice in that gospel this day? Did you consider the glory of being redeemed, forgiven, freely, so that you are the blessed man or woman of Romans 4:7-8? Or were you distracted by…so many of those things that get in our way of rejoicing in what is truly important? Got cut off on the way to church? Got a late start because [fill in the blank] just can’t get out the door on time no matter how early he/she gets up? Upset because Mr. X or Mrs. Y said something snippy to you on the way into Bible Study? Thinking so much about duties next week you could not even hear the sermon after the first 90 seconds? No, I wasn’t following you around. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt.

The ease with which we are distracted from worship says a lot about how much we really love the gospel. If we treasure it so that it defines us and has captured our hearts, will we not rejoice in its proclamation, revel in contemplating its truths? How often we lose so much blessing because we are so earthly minded!

So as you go to church today, rejoice that you are not enslaved to a system that would have you proving your worthiness to Jehovah in a wheel chair in the Arizona sun. And pray God’s Spirit will aid you in worshipping God in spirit and in truth this day.

http://www.aomin.org/index.php?itemid=1448

This means a lot to me because today for two reasons: first, I had a petty dispute with my dad. It’s over now, and our relationship better. Through the hardship, I saw the sanctifying grace of the Lord through Jody’s parents–Denny and Carol, Mom and Dad–and I realized (again) how wonderful it is to serve the Lord. I wanted to share that same sanctifying grace to my own father, who doesn’t know it but I hope will see it through me the same I way I have seen it through others.

The second reason it meant something to me was that Jody and I got into a huge traffic snarl outside the Radisson. They were hosting a Jehovah’s Witness convention, and we were driving by when the convention was letting out. Cars and those omnipresent buses were holding up traffic on Summit St.

I came from Catholicism, yet I doubt that I’ll ever truly understand the belief system. I can even agree to a certain extent to most of the theology, but the fact that the majority of their apologetic arguments reason from Tradition rather than Scripture bothers me.

A perfect example comes from an article in Catholic apologist Jimmy Akin’s blog titled “Render Unto Ceasar.” Akin reasons that, even though our taxes support government programs that are morally reprehensible to Christians, we should still pay taxes to the government. Scripture supports his position, however Akin mentions Scritpture only once and as an afterthought. He reasons purely on the basis of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

If I were to answer the letter from his reader, I would take a two-pronged approach. First, understand that the society in which we live has departed from the Biblical standard of living, and has denied its Creator by both lifestyles and philosophies. Planned Parenthood is a product of the times. But, contrary to popular belief, Planned Parenthood does not advocate abortions. They advocate the right to manage one’s own reproductive health regardless of income. They are an informational resource center and attempt to educate the public, not make choices for them.

If more people understood that abortion is equivalent to murder, then people may be more apt to consider adoption. Planned Parenthood does offer that as a choice, and will work through the process with an expectant mother. They also offer low-cost and free healthcare to those who cannot afford it. For those reasons, as well as the education that they provide, I believe that this organization does more good than harm. Not once in Akin’s article was any attempt to explain that Planned Parenthood does more than abortions.

The second tack I would take is that the United States government is an authority, and as I mentioned in an earlier blog, God and God alone ordains and establishes authority (Rom 13:1, 2). The freedoms we enjoy in the United States are unsurpassed in history. The Roman Empire was oppressive, yet Jesus told the Pharisees to pay their taxes (Mat 22:21). Why? Because authority is ordained and established by God.

It is unreasonable to assume that the US government will share all of the morals of Christianity. But, we can let our voice be heard in the voting booth. We can circulate petitions, as taxpayers, to voice our concerns about how our tax money is used by the folks at Planned Parenthood. Maybe if we loudly proclaimed to Planned Parenthood our objections to the practice of abortions, they would hear us and try to use more of our money to encourage a platform of abstinence and adoption. Bottom line, there are much better ways to handle this situation than to stop paying taxes.

None of those ideas were discussed in Akin’s article. I refuse to believe that apologists should stay in the intellectual circles only. Shouldn’t we take stances and action? We are in a unique position–we are heard by both believers and skeptics. We can influence a wider variety of people than the average pastor, who usually can only get his message out to believers during church services.

Instead, the article remains in the intellectual circle only. Why not call for action? Is contending for the faith only a matter of stuffy and dry intellectualism? If so, then I don’t think I am cut out for apologetics. I would prefer to see some action taken to correct these perceived wrongs rather than simply debating weather or not their mere presence offers me a theological excuse to skip out on my taxes.

Religious news… sometimes heartwarming, sometimes weird.

I have one from each category. Jody sent me an article from the Toledo Blade that detailed an organization called the Greater Toledo House of Prayer. It is a relatively new organization in Toledo that serves as a 24 hour open prayer meeting house. They have a few noteworthy ministries, including Kid’s HOP that teaches young kids the importance of prayer. This is definately a ministry that I plan to watch and support.

On the weird side, the rather vulgar and one-joke show South Park aired an episode so controversial, it led to the resignation of Isaac Hayes, a long time cast member. The show was a send up of the so-called religion of Scientology, of which Hayes is a member. Tom Cruise reportedly threatened Comedy Central and its parent company Viacom with boycotting his own scheduled promotional appearances for Mission: Impossible 3 if they aired the episode, entitled “Trapped in the Closet.”

View a clip.

In the story, Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard is thought to be reincarnated as Stan. The show features a non-sequitor appearance by R. Kelley and extremely unflattering portrayals of John Travolta and Tom Cruise.

The episode is very tame for South Park, however, as I only count one unbleeped expletive–a female dog–and one bleeped expletive. Both were uttered by R. Kelley as he sings a tune.