TEN THOUSAND ROCK & ROLL SCOFFLAWS (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - An estimated 10,000 people gathered on April 20 for the annual Pot Smoke-Out at Colorado University in Boulder. The massive crowd lit up the marijuana joints and pipes at 4:20 pm sharp. The police simply stood and observed. No one was arrested. Freshman Emily Benson said, “People are getting out their best pot and hippie clothes today” (“CU’s 4/20 Pot Smoke-Out,” Daily Camera, Boulder, April 20). She said that the “weed atmosphere” was why she applied to Colorado University, and she hopes to see it decriminalized. Marijuana smoking is illegal in Colorado, but these people don’t care about laws. They have been raised on the rock & roll philosophy, which says I have a right to do as I please. As one popular rock song says, “I’m free to do what I want any old time.” I was a “rock & roll pot head” before I was saved in 1973, and there is nothing good or wise about it. I thank the Lord for His merciful deliverance from that lifestyle and way of thinking. Boulder is one of the nation’s New Age strongholds.

CALIFORNIA MOVING AHEAD ON SPANKING BAN (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “Spanking Ban Advances Despite Testimony from Mom,” OneNewsNow, April 19, 2008: “California lawmakers have moved forward on a bill that imposes severe limitations on the methods used to spank one's child. AB 2943 has passed out of the state Assembly’s Public Safety Committee and it now heads to the Appropriations Committee. The legislation is a resurrected version of Democrat Sally Lieber’s bill from last year, minus the outright spanking ban. The bill prohibits using ‘implements’ such as wooden spoons, paddles, rolled-up newspapers, switches, belts, or brushes--essentially, allowing only the hand. Randy Thomasson of Campaign for Children and Families warns that if the bill is approved, the penalty for their use is severe. ‘You're going to be arrested, handcuffed, taken to the police station, [and be] charged,’ he details. Thomasson says that once a parent is charged, then a jury will determine if it was reasonable for that parent to administer a spanking.” NOTE FROM BROTHER CLOUD: This is a very dangerous bill which flies in the face of the right to the free exercise of religion. We are not surprised, though. This is the same state that has banned any criticism of homosexuality in its public school system and that recently forbade a Christian mother to home school her children. Biblical spanking is not child abuse, but sparing the rod is. “He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes” (Proverbs 13:24).

CHRISTIAN COUPLE FINED UNDER NEW MEXICO ANTI-DISCRIMINATION LAW (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - On April 9 Jon and Elaine Huguenin of Albuquerque, New Mexico, were found guilty of discrimination against homosexuals and ordered to pay more than $6,000. After they refused to photograph a lesbian “commitment ceremony,” one of the lesbians filed a complaint against the Huguenin’s photographic studio with the New Mexico Human Rights Commission. Jordan Lorence of the Alliance Defense Fund, who represented the couple, said: “This decision is a stunning disregard for religious liberty and First Amendment freedoms of people of faith, of Christians, and those who believe in traditional marriage defined as one man and one woman. This shows the very disconcerting, authoritarian face of the homosexual activists, who are using these non-discrimination laws as weapons against Christians in the business world and Christians in their churches. There is a great threat to our religious liberties and our ability to speak out in favor of traditional marriage when these non-discrimination laws are interpreted in such a harsh way to censor Christians and others” (“New Mexico Commission Orders $6,000 Fine,” OneNewsNow, April 11, 2008).

A VERY COLD WINTER (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - In spite of the global warming frenzy, this past winter witnessed record levels of cold and snow. “Pacific storms dumped record snowfalls in the American West, in the Northeast and in Canada. China experienced its harshest winter in a century. Snow cover in Siberia and Mongolia is greater than at any time since the mid-1960s, and even Iraq saw snow this year for the first time in recent memory. ... A report from the Canadian Ice Service, which has kept records on sea ice since 1972, noted above-average coverage of the Arctic. Gilles Langis, a forecaster with the Ice Service, said the ice also is 10 to 20 cm thicker in most places. The report from the Ice Service was corroborated by the Denmark Meteorological Institute, which said the sea ice between Greenland and Canada was at its most expansive in 15 years” (“International Group Disavows U.N.’s Climate Claims,” Baptist Press, March 19, 2008).

THE COMPLEX COSMOS (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from “The Complex Cosmos” by the late Henry Morris, Institute for Creation Research, http://www.icr.org/article/3586: “He hath made the earth by His power, He hath established the world by His wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by His discretion (Jeremiah 10:12). God’s ‘power’ refers to the tremendous energy or force required to organize the complex systems and physio-chemical processes which govern the earth. The ‘wisdom’ of God speaks of the skillful planning by which He set up the plant biosphere and the hydrologic systems to maintain it. His ‘discretion’ is the infinite intelligence necessary to spread out the infinite cosmos filled with innumerable stars and clusters of stars, all individually distinct from all others. The infinite, complex, highly energized universe could never in all eternity have evolved itself out of primeval chaotic nothingness, as evolutionists delude themselves into believing. The universal law of entropy now operates in such a way in the universe as to dissipate its energy and disintegrate its complexity, as it heads downward towards chaos and death. It is absurd to think that the cosmos could have ‘organized’ itself by the same processes which are now ‘disorganizing’ it. [These] verses say it well. ‘But the LORD is the true God, He is the living God, and an everlasting king: . . . The gods that have not made the heavens and the earth, even they shall perish from the earth, and from under these heavens’ (Jeremiah 10:10-11). We do well, therefore, to trust Him in all things. ‘I am the LORD,’ says He, ‘the God of all flesh: is there anything too hard for me?’ (Jeremiah 32:27).”

THE PAGAN PRACTICE OF TATTOOING. Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - Tattooing is all the craze. It is the new rock & roll fashion statement. What is the history of tattooing? It is a pagan practice and has long been associated with idolatry and debauchery. Even today it is closely associated with paganism. An article by Clay Thompson in the Pacific News Service for July 27, 1996, was titled “Pagan Fashion’s New Frontier - Facial Tattoos.” Note that the author, who in this article makes no claim to be a Christian, associates tattoos with paganism. He connects it with a “new reverence for pagan beliefs.” A prominent book on tattooing is titled “Pagan Fleshworks.” It is by Maureen Mercury and contains photos by Steve Haworth, identified as “the foremost body modification artist in the United States.” “Body modification” describes the practice of burning, inking, cutting, piercing, and otherwise desecrating one’s God-given body. A 2003 survey of more than 2,000 people in the United States, reported in the AFP for Oct. 11, 2003, found that among women who get tattoos, 34% “feel sexier,” and 29% overall “feel more rebellious.” It is not surprising that the Christian rock crowd, being only the slightest step behind the world in all points, is adopting tattooing from their pagan secular brethren. “Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD” (Lev. 19:28). “Abstain from all appearance of evil” (1 Thess. 5:22). “Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble” (1 Peter 4:5).

MUSIC HAS THE POWER TO DRAW YOUNG PEOPLE INTO THE WORLD (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is excerpted from Training Your Children to Turn out Right, an excellent book by David Sorenson (Northstar Ministries, 1820 W. Morgan St., Duluth, MN 55811, 218-726-0209, www.northstarministries.com, dhs.northstar@charter.net) -- “Multitudes of Christian young people have been enticed into the world simply through listening to the world’s music. It is attractive to the ear. It can be fun to listen to. It is habit forming, and it absolutely will influence spirituality. You show me the music you allow in your home and I will tell you how your children will turn out spirituality. It is that critical. Perhaps you have noticed that thus far I have basically avoided using specific terms such as rock ‘n roll, or country western, or the blues, etc. ... Here is why. People will be critical of, for example, rock ‘n roll, but they will listen to country western. Sometimes they will be critical of both, but listen to the big bands of the 40’s and 50’s. Perhaps they will listen to the pop music of the 50’s and early 60’s. ... So many Christian parents get into the silly game of categorizing some of the world’s music as not as bad as such and such. They use euphemisms such as ‘light’ rock or ‘golden oldies.’ It is still the music of the world. It is going to be virtually impossible to forbid your children to listen to the world’s music of their day when you as parents continue to listen to the world’s music of your day. The world’s music will hook your children into the world just as surely as drugs or booze. ...You show me Christian young people who, despite determined efforts by their parents to the contrary, wind up in the world. If I were a betting man, I would lay money on the fact that those teenagers had been into the world’s music for a long time. ... I love my parents dearly, and I believe that they instilled into me a godly heritage. (Though at the time, I did not appreciate it.) However, if they made one mistake in my upbringing, it was that they allowed me to have a radio in my room. A radio is a piece of electronic equipment which is not intrinsically evil, but it was through that radio at my bedside that I became acquainted with the world’s music. I developed a desire for it, and it profoundly influenced me for the worse in my teenage years. That radio introduced me to the world. I would sit in my room or lie on my bed and listen to the top forty day after day and hour after hour. That, perhaps more than anything else, drew me into the world before I was saved” (Training Your Children to Turn Out Right, 1995, pp. 101-104).

LAZY CHRISTIANS LOVE SIMPLE EQUATIONS (Friday Church News Notes, May 2, 2008, www.wayoflife.org fbns@wayoflife.org, 866-295-4143) - The following is by Pastor Buddy Smith of Malenda, Queensland, Australia <smiletex@bigpond.net.au>: “1+1=2. That’s what we like. Anything more complex than that requires too much thought. When we read the story of Elkanah, Hannah, and Samuel, we would like it to be ever so simple. Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Boy marries girl. Boy and girl have six children. They all live close to grandma so she can babysit the kids, and boy, girl, kids, and grandma all live happily ever after. All very simple. God’s equations are not that simple. We read in the Bible God’s equations for blessing his people, and we find them to be incredibly complex and painful to the heart. Hannah is barren; Peninah torments her; Hannah grieves and prays a tearful prayer to God, vowing to give to God her firstborn son. Eli falsely accuses her of drunkenness and then blesses her when he finds he is mistaken. Hannah  bears a son, and she gives him to God, and the nation is blest because God’s equation for blessing was complex and painful…….and perfect. If it had been simple (1+1=2) there would have never been any tears, never a vow, and never a Samuel.”