When President Obama recently completed his “evolution” on homosexual marriage, he ambushed not only some of his friends, but the majority of Americans who still hold to the truth of heterosexual marriage.

For years, pundits have debated the “culture war.” The term war, however, implies that two equal sides are duking it out. But is that really true? How can the sides be equal when one side is simply trying to maintain territories of ancient and biblical truth—a truth that has served civilization for more than 6,000 years?

No, what is happening now—championed by no less a figure than the President of the United States—is an ambush.

The ambush, started by the sexual revolution in the sixties, has progressed faster than any other moral revolution in human history. Those old enough to be saved from the sixties remember the intensity of that ambush on truth, morality, and civilization. From that point on, the volume from the attack grew so loud that many people today have pierced eardrums and have turned a deaf ear to the cacophony.

Those that defend ancient biblical truth have tried to lovingly explain that God’s plan for humanity is the best plan. That God’s design for creation is the secret to blessing, joy, peace, and prosperity. FULL POST

Recently I read a masterful article in The Christian Post by Dr. Albert Mohler, who is nothing short of a modern-day prophet. In the article, Dr. Mohler warns, “The urgency to reach people with the Gospel can, if the church is not faithful and watchful, tempt us to subvert the Gospel by redefining its terms.”

Specifically, Dr. Mohler drew attention to how some evangelical megachurches appear to be softening their positions on homosexuality. He calls on evangelical leaders to steer clear of the sinking sand of celebrating homosexuality—a quicksand that the mainline churches, I believe, have fallen into. Many evangelicals today need to take a hard look at what happened to their mainline forebears.

Having once served as a priest in the Episcopal Church, having warned my denomination’s leadership against sinking sand, having walked out before the denomination enveloped me, I offer my plea to my friends in some of these churches.

I am hearing the same language I heard 25 years ago: “We must love without passing judgment,” they say. “We need to accept people regardless of their moral practices.” FULL POST

"You can't reason a person out of a position they didn't reason themselves into."

99% of those reading that statement know it to be a true statement, and this from experience. The first thought will be to view this as a borderline insult about someone. In other words, we don't think very highly of the person the statement describes.

I do not wish to make anyone uncomfortable, so I will pass over the other likely first reaction: the assumption it does not apply to oneself. No one of us believes we have come to our opinions apart from fact and reason, and yet all of us can point to people who have opinions that do not seem to rest on fact or derive from reason.

What I would like to call attention to is the fact that the statement is not necessarily a derogatory remark. In order for it to be seen negatively, several assumptions must be made. FULL POST

Have you ever pondered the significance of the fact that Jesus did much of his speaking through parables? Granted, even then people didn't get it many of the times, but at the very least, they paid attention!

Pastors have been incorporating stories and anecdotes into their sermons for a long time, but apologists- defenders of the Christian faith- and storytellers haven't usually given due weight to the power that story has in the human heart.

There is a conference coming up, April 19-21st, that is dedicated to calling apologists and writers and artists and others interested in furthering the Kingdom of God. It calls attention to several points:

1. Since we are so receptive to absorbing things through the culture via stories, novels, movies, etc, Christians in particular should exercise discernment in all things.

2. Christians can use both the good and the bad in our culture to explain, defend, and transmit the Christian faith; both existing stories and new stories can be applied to different aspects of the veracity of Christianity- including the fact that we respond to Story! FULL POST

Nigeria is a very different place. I'm not sure how different it is from the surrounding countries in West Africa, but it sure is a lot different than any of the other places in East Africa that I've been to.Your first impression when you get off the plane feels slightly out of focus. On the surface, everything seems the same as other African countries, and yet there something that lies just beneath it that you can't quite put your finger on. It's just different somehow. A somber blanket lies in the air that lends a subdued feeling to everything. There isn't that feeling of color and laughter in the air. It's as if Nigeria has stepped out of Technicolor into a world that is colored in shades of grey. Life is a serious undertaking here.

Is it the culture? Is it just the way it is? Or is it something deeper than that makes everything seem so drab – something deeply spiritual in nature?

I have spent the last two weeks bringing a message of revival to several churches whose hearts are turned to God for something other than the same old stuff that they have been hearing. Something different has to happen. Their desperation for a true move of God is rising and pushing past the ineffective platitudes of blessings and good things that have been promised to them free of charge. It's not working and they know it. I am embarrassed to say that these messages of false prosperity and unmerited blessings have poured forth from America, and so many innocent people have believed that, because America has been so blessed, this message must be true. FULL POST

In my previous column, "How the Apostates Take Over, Part 1," I explained how apostates used the cause of equality to gain a destructive foothold within the church. Some of my readers have missed the point of this 2-part column all together, thinking it is about women's ordination. People will see what they want to see. The deeper point is that those who deny the core of the Gospel used an innocent issue, such the role of women in the church, to flood the church with non bible-believing men, women, and homosexuals.

This is how it happened:

Initially, whole denominations acquiesced and allowed women to be ordained, but most churches still did not call women to be pastors. But with an influx of women into the system, something had to be done. So while the men worked by pastoring to parishes and parishioners, many women aimed at taking over denominational committees. Time and persistence had a way of succeeding.

By the early 90s, women made up only 20 percent of the clergy in some denominations, but they controlled every single committee.

With control of the ministerial candidate selection committees, for example, they focused on expanding the number of women clergy, not expanding the Kingdom of God. Time after time, I saw good young men turned down for ordination while spiritually unqualified women were given the green light. FULL POST

The evangelical church is under constant threat to compromise its reliance on biblical truth. The human desire to be accepted, to not be seen as "outside the mainstream," can be overwhelming. But that desire is our weakness, our downfall. It does not always immediately destroy the dam we build to protect the waters of truth, but instead it leads to tiny fissures that grow until destruction is inevitable.Twenty years ago, I experienced the painful demise of the Episcopal Church, who once was a bastion of biblical truth. It was not a pretty picture. It was a picture painted in the primary colors of relentlessness and deception.

The combination of those elements inevitably led some sincere folks to weariness, and willingness to compromise, and yes, ultimately to surrender. For those who sought peace at any price, conformity over conviction, and popularity over principle, capitulation seemed the easier way out.

The initial compromise, which caused the first cracks in the dike, seemed innocent enough at the time: the ordination of women.

But to truly understand how that initial compromise caused a wave of liberalism to overcome biblical boundaries within the Episcopal Church (and soon by the rest of the mainline denominations), we have to understand the different groups involved. FULL POST

The weather here is gorgeous and the temperature is perfect!

It was evening when I got off the plane in Kilgali and walked across the tarmac to the terminal.  As soon as I stepped outside, I could feel the scent of that gentle Africa breeze in the air.  I’m not sure what it is or why, but each of the sub-Saharan countries that I have visited have their own distinct exotic scent – similar but slightly unique to each land. As I emerge from the plane, it’s as if the land is welcoming me back.  I almost feel at home.

Tomorrow morning, I will catch up on my jet lag and will slowly emerge from the hotel room later on to meet the General Manager of Restore FM, a major radio station in Rwanda.  We are starting a 30-minute broadcast in Rwanda, twice a week every Monday and Friday for the next year, and I need to give him the DVD that has the broadcasts on it.  As it turns out, he is a good friend of one of my hosts, Pastor Isaiah.  Small world. FULL POST

Did you ever watch a duck going after the pieces of bread that you keep tossing at him? They say that a duck will eat himself to death if you keep feeding him.  I get the feeling that my host here in Tanzania is afraid that the same will happen to me if they keep giving me too many places to preach at.  Instead of the usual two or three services a day, they have geared me back to one service a night. I suppose there are some good reasons for that – for one, most people have to work during the day and would miss any services that took place during the day.  Besides, they have not had a lot of time to plan for any extensive seminars because we only decided to come here a few weeks ago, so people would not have been able to make plans to take the time off to take time off to attend during the daytime. 

Still, I get the feeling that my host, Pastor Noah, is afraid that I will get worn out if I push too hard.  I appreciate the concern, nevertheless there is a sense of frustration that hangs over me to get this message of revival to as many people as I can while there is time.  If I had a hundred years to do this, it would be different. But I don’t.  I believe Jesus is coming sooner than we really expect.  FULL POST

"Why y'all dressed up?" the African-American man asked me, waiting for his drink at the bar.

"We're missionaries," I said, unbuttoning the coat of my tuxedo and leaning on the bar.

"Y'all are missionaries?" he asked, his eyes wide as he sipped his martini.

"Yep." I couldn't help but grin. I looked around to see if anyone else was nearby. Nope. It was just the two of us.

A few long minutes ticked by without a word. The sound of laughter and clinking glasses in the background made the silence even more uncomfortable. I cleared my throat.

Then, after glancing around the reception hall full of black ties and long dresses, he turned back to me. "Why?" he asked, earnestly.

It was a simple question, and I knew what he was asking. Why all this — this hoopla — for a bunch of missionaries? Why the largesse? Why the fanfare?

The irony of the situation didn't escape anyone present. No one felt comfortable in those penguin suits, picking hors d'ouevres off a silver plate. This is the same question others have asked, the same one that, admittedly, haunted me. FULL POST