Baptist Temple

So, there's this building right next to the Liberty Pole which used to be the Baptist Temple. This was built in like 1925 I believe. It was home of the Second Baptist Church. I wonder what kind of Baptist history the city of Rochester and Monroe County have. This building had/has an auditorium with 1400 seats. (You see, I'm at the Library right now while my kids are looking at books, and I was just doing strange searches and I came across it.) I also wonder what that building is used for now. It was sold off in the 60's when that church decided it wasn't working trying to run a 14 story office building.

Anyway, I wonder if First Bible should have just looked at purchasing that building. I wonder if it would have been cheaper than their new building!

Poor little girls...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070518/ap_on_fe_st/girl_bandits

So, there's a story on Yahoo News today about 2 girls that robbed a bank. The two girls that did it were 18 and 19 years old, and a third one they claim was an "inside man" that helped them do it. After they were caught, They interviewed the girls' mothers, and here's what they said:

First:

her daughter "was sorry for what happened and just fell in with the wrong crowd."

How sad it must have been for her little girl to have gotten mixed up with the wrong crowd. I mean she was probably the perfect little angel all the time she was growing up, and for her to commit this felony, was clearly just a result of her being "in the wrong crowd." It's their fault, and she is guilty by association.

Second mother:

She wept as she told ABC how she had hoped to instill positive values in her children. She did this by, "doing something special with them every day." She said, "I hoped that would instill and pretty much guarantee me wonderful adults..."

Ok, she purposed to do something special for her kids every day. So, I guess the principle is that if I give my kids everything they want, that when they get older, they won't want more. Their lust will be satisified, and they'll be content with what they have. Makes sense... huh?

Now, I know at times I'm too soft on my kids and am inconsistent with discipline. I also know that at times I am too hard on my kids. But my kids have learned to understand the definition of the word "No." Call me wacky, but I think that human nature's lust or covetousness is not satisfied when it is met, but rather that it just grows bigger and stronger when it gets what it wants. That's why when sin is let go, it will grow into the next "bigger" sin to try to satisfy the lust. The way to stop lust/covetousness, (can I use the word lasciviousness here?) is to stop it when it is small. It takes work, but it will be more successful than giving them what they want. Temperance is a fruit of the Spirit.

Could I also say that my kids know (at least mentally) that they are sinners. They don't do bad things just because they are around bad people, though it is true that they do lose more control at times when with the wrong people. My point is that kids need to learn to take responsibility for their actions and not have them blamed on someone else.

Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old, he will not depart from it. Bring up a child in the nurture (that's the caring for, tending to) and admonition (that is the WARNING) of the Lord. We need to be sure to warn our kids about the Lord and His hatred of sin.

Then of course, there's baby Esther, who may come out of mother's belly some day!

Ok, that's all for today. I'm impressed I made it all the way through a post without mentioning Gospel To Italy or even Aaron Putney's blog.

Smoke Break???

Ok, since I took time today to go to lunch with a missionary (he should be on the field in about 5 years), I didn't have time to write during my lunch break. But I did talk to him about what I'm going to write. And as always he was just full of wisdom. I would like to thank Michael Barone for his time, and for letting me buy him lunch again, and I would just like to share with everyone his website: http://www.gospeltoitaly.com.

Anyway, this post is actually an email that I am sending to respond to a question that was asked on the http://www.HeDiedForMe.comwebsite. It is a site that was originally designed to be a follow up to tracts that we handed outside of movie theaters during the movie, the Passion of the Christ. The site has a form that poeple can fill out to ask questions, and then we do our best to answer them. Anyway, for my "Smoke-Break Thought" of the day (No, I don't really smoke, but I should get the same amount of time, right!?) I post the response:

You have asked a couple of so very important questions. Hopefully I can do the answers justice for you. Your questions had somewhat of a progression to them, and I'd like to answer them using the same progression. You asked two questions, but I divided the first one into two: 1) How do we know that God is real? 2) How do we know that the Bible is the inspired word of God and 3) Which day is the true Sabbath day?

The first question to ask, How do we know that God is real? There are a few different ways to answer this question, but the one that has the strongest evidence to me is that of Creation. The world we live in, the life that we have must have come from somewhere. People have come up with this Theory (I emphasize the word Theory) of evolution that ultimately teaches that Something (this universe) came from Nothing. I cannot believe that. Darwin himself wrote that if evolution were true, that in time we would find innumerable transitional fossils. However, there has not been found even One single one of these transitional fossils that Darwin said there must be for evolution to be true. There are a ton of other scientific proofs for Creation and of the fallacy of evolution found at www.AnswersInGenesis.org if you want to learn more. But, my point is that if evolution is false, and we can see so much evidence of a Design in this universe, it must be there is a Designer. That Designer is God, and since God created us, we should consider whether or not He wants anything of us.

That leads to the second questions of, How do we know that the Bible is the inspired word of God? Well, our website has an article written about how we can know that the Bible is True and Trustworthy (at http://www.hediedforme.com/questions.asp?QuestionID=9 ). Like the first question, there are a few different ways to answer this question, but the easiest way for me to explain it would be to see scientific facts found in the Bible that nobody on the earth could have known about when the Bible was written. For example, in the book of Isaiah, written some 700 years B.C., he speaks of the earth by calling it the "circle of the earth." The notion of a round earth was not popularized or confirmed by scientists for many, many centuries later. However, Isaiah claimed to be rehearsing the words of God Himself when he wrote that. Nobody at that time could have wrote so definitively on the subject, unless it had supernatural or divine origins. On top of science, there are so many prophecies that were written hundreds of years earlier than they were fulfilled. Archaeological finds have all confirmed the Bible to be true and accurate. If you would like to do some longer reading on the subject, there is a book available in electronic edition at: http://www.pbministries.org/books/pink/Inspiration/inspiration.htm that really dives deep into the subject.

After we know there's a God and believe that He has communicated to us through His word, the Bible, then we can move on to answer the third question, Which day is the true Sabbath day? There are a couple of different uses for that word Sabbath in the Bible. Sometimes referring to special feast days of the children of Israel, but most often in the Bible it refers to the 7th day of the week. This in remembrance of the day that God rested from His work of creation which can be found in Genesis 2:1-3. The Sabbath was established as a day of rest. Some 2500 years later, when Moses was given the Ten Commandments, the Sabbath was instituted as part of the covenant God made with the children of Israel, again in remembrance of His creation. This 7th day of the week is what we call Saturday. When we come to the New Testament, however, we find a new covenant, a new testament established for believers in Jesus Christ. They were not given the same command to rest on the 7th day, but rather they were told to find their rest, their Sabbath (Hebrews 4:1-11) in the work that Jesus Christ had done for them on the Cross, when He bore their sins in His own body. What I mean is that a Christian's rest is found in the word that Jesus Christ did. There is nothing that we can do to earn our own salvation, but we must put our faith, our trust, in His work on the Cross and repent of our sin that put Him there. Now, there is a principle in the 7th day of rest that we can learn from. Jesus tells us that the Sabbath was made for man, and it is not that the man was made for the Sabbath (Mark 2:27). So it is profitable for human beings to take one day a week to rest, and what a great opportunity to take that day to really focus on the God that gave us life while we are taking that time to rest and meditate. I believe that is why the principle of going to church on Sundays really came from. Some in Christianity will teach that Sunday is the Sabbath day, however, since the Bible is our final authority and I don't see where the Bible says that, I do not hold it to be true. Sunday is the day that we can celebrate Jesus having resurrected from the dead which is what changed everything! Christians are told not to forsake the assembling together (Hebrews 10:25), so going to church is important. But Paul says in Romans 14:5 that we do not have to value one day higher than another. That is not Sunday or Saturday should we worship God more than the other. We are to be worshipping God all of the time, ascribing to Him worth that He is due.

I hope this answers your questions a little bit. If I have failed to address the specific point you have, please feel free to respond to this email for more clarification.

To the praise of the glory of His grace,
Andy@HeDiedForMe.com

Lunch-Time Thoughts – Pastor David Reagan

Well, I'm going to try something out, and see if it lasts for me. I'm calling it Lunch-Time Thoughts.

Too often I will get busy at work and forget about what my (as a Christian) true calling in life is – Whether therefore ye eat or drink or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. (1 Corinthians 10:31) So, my plan is to take some of my lunch break and share some sort of thought on the Scriptures or maybe just anything that I think may be helpful to others that are trying to do things to glorify God, to learn the Scriptures, to simply walk in the Way.

For this first post, I don't have much to say, but I did want to share a link with everyone. Yesterday, Jerry Fallwell died, and it is big news. What isn't so big of news but has had more impact in my life (Fallwell had no impact on my life that I know of, and this man had at least a little) is the death of a Pastor David Reagan of Antioch Baptist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee on May 8^th. The church there has a website that is just loaded with Bible Study material that is very scripturally based. They go right ahead and tackle some of the more controversial issues in the church today. Many (Most?) of the articles are written by Pastor Reagan himself, and I think they can be very helpful. Though he was, in my opinion, a very conservative man, he was honest to how he handled the Scriptural commands vs. his personal thoughts. An example I can give you of this is his dealings with "Women Wearing Pants." One thing is certain about him: he's got the right doctrine now!!!

Anyway, I wanted to share that with you during this lunch break, and we'll see how this thing goes!