Light Brings Salt
Volume 2, Issue 43 November 14, 2004
Iron Range Bible
Church
Dedicated to the
Systematic Exposition of the Word of God
Hien Pham: A Man Set Apart
Throughout history, the Old
and New Testaments have shown themselves to be reliable and true; they rise up
to outlive their pallbearers, if you will. The following story probably stirs
my own confidence in the power of God's Word and His sovereignty more than any
other. Let me share part of it with you today.
I was ministering in
Shortly after
The next morning, he was assigned the dreaded chore of
cleaning the prison latrines. As he cleaned out a tin can overflowing with
toilet paper, his eye caught what seemed to be English printed on one piece of
paper. He hurriedly grabbed it, washed it, and after his roommates had retired
that night, he retrieved the paper and read the words, "Romans, Chapter
8." Trembling, he began to read, "And we know that in all things God
works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his
purpose. … For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor
demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor
depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the
love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans
Hien wept. He knew his Bible, and he
knew that there was not a more relevant passage for one on the verge of
surrender. He cried out to God, asking forgiveness. This was to have been the first
day that he would not pray; evidently God had other plans.
As it were, there was an official in the camp who was
using a Bible as toilet paper. So Hien asked the
commander if he could clean the latrines regularly. Each day he picked up a
portion of Scripture, cleaned it off, and added it to his collection of nightly
reading.
Then the day came when, through an equally providential
set of circumstances, Hien was released from prison.
He promptly began to make plans to leave the country and to construct a boat
for the escape of him and 53 others. All was going according to plan until days
before their departure. Four Vietcong knocked on Hien's
door and said they had heard of his escape. He denied it and they left. Hien felt relieved, but at the same time disappointed with
himself. He made a promise to God—fervently hoping that God would not take him
up on it—that if the Vietcong returned, he would tell them the truth. He was
thoroughly shaken when only a few hours before they were to set sail, the four
men returned. When questioned again, he confessed the truth. To Hien's astonishment, the men leaned forward and, in hushed
tones, asked if they could go with him!
In an utterly incredible escape plan, all 58 of them found
themselves on the high seas, suddenly engulfed by a violent storm. Hien cried out to God, "Did you bring us here to
die?" But then he said to me, "Brother Ravi,
if it were not for the sailing ability of those four Vietcong, we would not
have made it." They arrived safely in
How fittingly do the words of the eighteenth-century poet
William Cowper capture what God did in Hien's life, a
man set apart in Christ:
God moves in a mysterious way His
wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the sea, And rides upon the
storm.
His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every
hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste, But
sweet will be the flower.
Blind unbelief is sure to err, And scan His works
in vain;
God is His own interpreter And He will make it plain.
The
Media Elite and the Evangelicals:
Time to Look Dangerous
by
Dr. Al Mohler
Once again,
The two groups inhabit
very different worlds. The media elite is often educated in the major centers
of American higher education, where a naturalistic and secular worldview is
just taken for granted. Historic Christianity is seen as a relic of the past --
a repressive system of belief that produced beautiful cathedrals, but called
upon its adherents to accept revealed truths and to live by a repressive
morality. Been there, done that, moved on to the modern age.
Evangelical Christians
[and traditionalist Roman Catholics] are seen as throwbacks. Our convictions
are routinely dismissed as anti-intellectual and our moral concerns are
assailed as hostile to human liberation. Many of the most influential
journalists want us to disappear, or at least go back into the backwoods from
which we must have emerged.
Their friends in the
educational elite,
Conservative Christians
are seen as the great threat to social progress, abortion rights, homosexual
marriage, and full human liberation. We should get out of the political arena,
the elite warn, because we have no right imposing our morality on the rest of
the country. Leaving, of course, the media elite free to impose their morality
[or amorality, as may be the case].
Reporter Michael Weisskopf of The Washington Post once dismissed
conservative Christians as "largely poor, uneducated, and easy to
command." When called on the carpet, Weisskopf
said that he should have written that "most" evangelicals are poor,
uneducated, and easy to command. Ah, now that's better.
Veteran CBS journalist
Bernard Goldberg claims that the media elite see conservative Christians as
"especially juicy targets." He explains: "In a lot of newsrooms,
they're seen as odd and viewed with suspicion because their lives are shaped by
faith and devotion to God and an adherence to rigid principles -- opposition to
abortion, for one -- that seem archaic and closed-minded to a lot of
journalists who, survey after survey suggests, are not especially
religious themselves."
CNN founder Ted Turner
once called Christianity a
religion "for losers." Turner's remark was criticized,
but more because it was impolite than untrue. It's no accident that moguls like
Ted Turner hire those who share their worldview. Why would CNN hire
"losers?"
Journalism professor
Marvin Olasky explains: "Lack of understanding,
along with outright anti-Christian prejudice, leads to journalistic amazement
or horror at the supposed self-deception of those who do see a spiritual
realm."
The media elite and
their colleagues in liberal culture are absolutely certain that secularism is
the shape of the future. They pity those poor and backward Christians who are
destined to be mowed down by secularism and washed out of history.
"Normal"
people are not deeply committed Christians, explains Eric Alterman.
Alterman is a liberal journalist whose book, What
Liberal Media? is a rejoinder to Goldberg's Bias.
Journalists are far more comfortable with the secular-minded, he explains.
Their worldview is taken as normal: "Indeed it is so normal, it does not
occur to anyone to point it out." At least we know where we stand. And what about the
journalists? Alterman reveals that most
reporters are "clueless" about what conservative Christians really
believe. They just know enough to know that we are not "normal."
David Brooks, who
describes himself as a "recovering secularist," accuses his fellow
journalists of being "secular fundamentalists" who "remain
smugly ignorant of the enormous shifts occurring all around
them."
September 11 should have been a wake-up call, he argues: "Secularism is
not the future; it is yesterday's incorrect vision of the future. This sends us
recovering secularists to the bookstore or the library in a desperate attempt
to find out what is going on in the world."
They should go to
church instead. Of course, for this to be helpful, the church must actually
preach the Gospel and teach the Bible. Secular journalists could go into all
too many churches and see very little that would offend or challenge.
Authentic Christianity
must be presented without fear or compromise, and without "dumbing
down" the faith so that its intellectual content and theological core
disappear.
The secular
establishment considers Christians odd, outdated, and embarrassingly vocal.
Secularists just want us to go away. Authentic Christianity represents a threat
-- the only threat that matters -- to the secular momentum of the postmodern
age. We should be tired of the secular condescension that sees us as odd and
eccentric. It's about time we look
dangerous.