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By jeff, January 30, 2010 6:24 pm

There is one great common denominator between all religions outside of Christianity—they all believe that a right standing with God is based upon obedience, personal merit, or some ability to please God. Christianity stands alone in declaring that man is hopelessly and helplessly lost. He cannot improve his standing before God, he cannot obey God, he cannot please God. If he is to be saved, God alone must save him. It is this truth that fallen man hates most of all, for it requires him to humble himself before God, acknowledge his sin, and ask for mercy! God is righteous and man is a lawbreaker, therefore he is no more inclined to seek God than a criminal at large is inclined to seek an officer of the law.

Paul Washer

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By jeff, January 26, 2010 7:29 pm

U.S. passes 50 million abortion mark

At some point during the past two years the United States experienced its 50 millionth legal abortion, the overwhelming majority of which were conducted for reasons of convenience.

The tragic statistic — which spans the 37 years since the U.S. Supreme Court legalized abortion nationwide in 1973 — is based on data compiled by the pro-choice Guttmacher Institute and tallied by the National Right to Life Committee. Guttmacher’s data is respected by both sides of the issue and comes directly from abortion clinics.

The mark of 50 million was passed in 2008 and likely approached or reached 52 million in 2009, although data is not yet available for that year. The 50 million figure actually is an estimate based on Guttmacher data from 2005 — the last year of data — when 1.2 million abortions were performed. The abortion rate ranged between 1.2 and 1.3 million from 2000 to 2005. If the same number of abortions performed in 2005 were performed in each succeeding year, then the number stood at 52 million at the end of last year.

To put the total in perspective, the combined number of military deaths in all of America’s wars –- from the Revolutionary War to the second Iraq war –- is 1.2 million.

“We’ve been brutalized, desensitized and paganized by an ever-rising flood of the unborns’ blood as our nation continues to abort roughly one out of every four babies conceived,” Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, said.

“I can still remember the Bible lesson I heard as a youngster in Sunday School about how the people of God turned their back on the One True God and went down into the Valley of Hinnom [2 Chronicles 28] to offer up in pagan sacrifice their little children to the pagan god Molech. I could never have imagined then that I would live to see the day that America would offer up its unborn children as pagan sacrifices because they were viewed as too expensive, too embarrassing, too ill or too inconvenient.”
Read the rest here.

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By jeff, January 14, 2010 9:48 pm

Chinese Official Says Gao Zhisheng “Went Missing”

Act Now to Help Gao’s Family Learn the Truth!

Since mid-December, 2009, ominous rumors have circulated about Gao Zhisheng, hinting that he has died after brutal torture in prison. However, no reports have been confirmed, and the Chinese government continues to refuse comment on his condition and whereabouts.

Gege, Gao’s daughter, had been reportedly “pale and tired-looking” with worry for months. After hearing a rumor of Gao’s death just before Christmas, Gege became so emotionally distraught, she was forced to be hospitalized. She remains fragile and under medical watch in a New York hospital.

This week, after searching out the policeman who originally detained Gao Zhisheng back in February, 2009, Gao’s brother Zhiyi was told that Attorney Gao allegedly “went missing while out on a walk” on September 25, 2009. Gao’s wife refused to comment, but was reported to be extremely upset after hearing the news.

This is the first time a Chinese government official has hinted that they no longer have Gao Zhisheng in their custody, leading ChinaAid to believe Gao’s condition has taken a turn for the worse.

“It is totally unacceptable for the Chinese government to lose track of their own prisoner,” said President of ChinaAid Bob Fu. “It is absolutely clear that he was forcibly taken from his home in February 2009. Nearly a year later, the Chinese government now says they do not have him.”

Though the rumors of death cannot be confirmed, Bob Fu remains extremely concerned for this new development.

“We have every reason to suspect that the Chinese government has something very serious to hide. Gao’s family has every right to know what happened to him. It is unbelievable that a high security prisoner would go missing while “out on a walk,” without suspecting that there is a major cover up of his condition.”

The Chinese government can no longer hide their actions from the world and must be held accountable for their treatment of Gao Zhisheng. Now is the time to act!

Sign the Petition to Free Gao Zhisheng, and encourage your friends and family to join the effort.

Contact your U.S. Representative and call for them to pressure the Chinese government to disclose the true condition and whereabouts of prominent human rights Attorney Gao Zhisheng. Even if you have sent a letter in the past, this new development calls for renewed action.

Gao’s family deserves to know the truth, and so does the world! For more ways to help Free Gao, visit www.FreeGao.com.

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By jeff, January 4, 2010 10:45 pm

-J.R. Miller

“Whoever claims to live in Him–must walk as Jesus did.” 1 John 2:6

We have only successfully acquired the art of living a Christian life–when we have learned to apply the principles of true religion, and enjoy its help and comfort in our daily life.

It is easy to join in devotional exercises, to quote Bible promises, to extol the beauty of the Scriptures. But there are many who do these things–whose religion utterly fails them in the very places and at the very times–when it ought to prove their staff and stay!

All of us must go out from the sweet services of the Sunday–into a week of very real and very commonplace life. We must mingle with people who are not angels! We must pass through experiences, that will naturally worry and vex us. Those about us, either wittingly or unwittingly, annoy and try us! We will meet many troubles and worries in ordinary week-day life. There are continual irritations and annoyances!

The problem is to live a beautiful Christian life–in the face of all these hindrances! How can we get through the tangled briers which grow along our path–without having our hands and feet torn by them? How can we live sweetly–amid the vexing and irritating things, and the multitude of little worries and frets which infest our way, and which we cannot evade?

It is not enough merely to ‘get along in any sort of way’, to drag to the close of each long, wearisome day–happy when night comes to end the strife. Life should be a joy–and not a burden. We should live victoriously, ever master of our experiences, and not tossed by them like a leaf on the dashing waves. Every earnest Christian wants to live a truly beautiful life, whatever the circumstances may be.

A little child, when asked ‘what it was to be a Christian,’ replied, “For me, to be a Christian is to live as Jesus would live–and behave as Jesus would behave–if He were a little girl and lived at our house.”

No better definition of the Christian life could be given. Each one of us is to live just as Jesus would–if He were living out our little life in the midst of its actual environment, mingling with the same people with whom we must mingle, and exposed to the very annoyances, trials and provocations to which we are exposed. We want to live a life that will please God, and that will bear witness to the genuineness of our piety.

“Leaving you an example–so that you should follow in His steps.” 1 Peter 2:21