The American Bible Challenge

Jeff Foxworthy (b. 1958, Georgia, USA) is a standup comedian, television game show host, and writer.  He is not a “Christian comedian” but a comedian who is a Christian. Before he became a standup comic he worked as computer repairman.  Foxworthy is especially known for his humor about life in the southern United States.  He is known for the catchphrase, “You might be a redneck.”

The term “redneck” is usually used as a disparaging term by outsiders but many Southerners find it funny because some of the stereotypes are at least partly true and many have relatives who may be rednecks.

Foxworthy is also known as the host of the television game show, Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?, in which adults are challenged to answer Fifth Grade elementary school questions.  The adults are allowed to recruit help from their classmates, actual Fifth Grade elementary school geniuses.  Almost invariably the adults are forced to admit that “I am not smarter than a fifth grader.”

Jeff Foxworthy’s new game show is The American Bible Challenge on the Game Show Network, a cable and satellite television network.  The show features teams of three playing not for themselves, but for charities.  The questions, even the “easy” ones, can make the viewer question whether they know anything at all about the Bible.

Are You Smater Than a Fifth Grader?

Some of Jeff Foxworthy’s Standup Humor

Redneck Fashion Tips

You Might Be a Redneck

I Am His Favorite

I saw a woman wearing a Tee-shirt emblazoned with the logo, “Jesus Loves You … But I’m His Favorite!”  I had to think about that one and then I realized that it was true.  She is His favorite.  You are His favorite.  I am His favorite.

Would Jesus have endured the Cross to save only the woman? Yes.

Would Jesus have endured the Cross to save only you? Yes.

Would Jesus have endured the Cross to save only me? Yes.

Saint Augustine of Hippo said, "God loves each one of us as if there were only one of us to love."

“Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.” Luke 15:10

Another Light Bulb Joke

How many evolutionists does it take to change a light bulb?

Only one, but it takes seventeen million years.

Playing on the Porch

“A pastor was walking down the street one day when he noticed a small boy across the street struggling to ring a doorbell.

After watching the boy’s efforts for some time, the pastor walked across the street and placed his hand kindly on the child’s shoulder before leaning over to give the doorbell a solid ring.

Crouching down to the child’s level, the pastor smiled benevolently and asked, “And now what, my little man?”  To which the boy replied, “Now we run!”

“From The Big Book of Church Jokes, published by Barbour Publishing, Inc. Used by permission.”

A Christian Yodeler

Here is a link for Margo Smith, a Christian yodeler.

A definition from Wikipedia:
Yodeling (or yodelling, jodeling) is a form of singing that involves singing an extended note which rapidly and repeatedly changes in pitch from the vocal or chest register (or "chest voice") to the falsetto/head register; making a high-low-high-low sound. The English word yodel is derived from a German word jodeln(originally Austro-Bavarian language) meaning "to utter the syllable jo" (pronounced "yo" in English). This vocal technique is used in many cultures throughout the world.

Hello, Azerbaijan!

Salam, Azərbaycan! Bu blog ziyarət edən yüz on üç digər ölkələrin oxucu qrup xoş gəlmisiniz. Mən sizə faydalı və ya mənalı ismarışları bəzi tapa ümid edirik.

Bu birbaşa "Total Sehife Görünümleri" yuxarıda gadget "Bu səhifəni tərcümə" Counter birbaşa Azərbaycan da daxil olmaqla, çoxsaylı digər dillər, bu blog İngilis dili mətn tərcümə malikdir.


Yüz on dörd ölkələr: Albaniya, Cezayir, Argentina, Ermənistan, Aruba, Avstraliya, Avstriya, Azərbaycan, Bahreyn, Banqladeş, Belarus, Belçika, Beliz, Braziliya, Bolqarıstan, Kanada, Kayman adaları, Çili, Çin, Çex Respublikası, Kolumbiya, Konqo, Kosta Rika, Xorvatiya, Kipr, Çex Respublikası, Danimarka, Dominikan Respublikası, Ekvador, Misir, El Salvador, Estoniya, Efiopiya, Finlandiya, Fransa, Gürcüstan, Almaniya, Qabon, Qana, Yunanıstan, Hong Kong, Macarıstan, İslandiya, Hindistan , İndoneziya, İran, İraq, İrlandiya, İsrail, İtaliya, Fil dişi Sahili, Yamayka, Yaponiya, İordaniya, Kampuchea, Keniya, Küveyt, Laos, Latviya, Livan, Lesoto, Litva, Lüksemburq, Makedoniya, Malayziya, Mali, Malta, Meksika, Seneqal Moldova, Morocco, Myanma, Namibiya, Hollandiya, Yeni Kaledoniya, Yeni Zelandiya, Nigeriya, Norveç, Pakistan, Panama, Paraqvay, Peru, Filippin, Polşa, Portuqaliya, Qatar, Rumıniya, Rusiya, Saint Kitts və Nevis, Səudiyyə Ərəbistanı, Serbiya, Sinqapur, Slovakiya, Sloveniya, Cənubi Afrika, Cənubi Koreya, İspaniya, Şri Lanka, Sudan, Surinam, İsveç, İsveçrə, Tayvan, Tanzaniya, Tayland, Trinidad və Tobaqo, Tunis, Türkiyə, Uqanda, Ukrayna, Birləşmiş Ərəb Əmirlikləri, Böyük Kingdom, United States, Venesuela, Vyetnam, Yəmən, Zimbabve.

Amish Bishop Convicted of Hate Crime

In Bergholz, Ohio, sixty-six year old Amish Bishop Samuel Mullet Sr., four of his children, and eleven of his followers have been convicted of hate crimes against an Amish man and his wife whom Mullet accused of rebelliousness and straying from his religious teachings.  The man and his wife were awakened to several persons holding them down and cutting off their hair and the man’s beard.

Old Order Amish men all grow beards and the women do not cut their hair.  The hair-cutting attacks were taken to shame the couple.  Those convicted of the hate crimes face up to ten years or more in prison.  The hair cuttings were considered to be hate crimes because they were motivated strictly on the basis of differences in religious beliefs.

Mullet, the founder of the twenty-five family group about twenty years ago,  has been described as an authoritarian leader who has abused his authority to coerce sexual favors from female members and who has enforced many practices at variance with traditional Amish culture.  The attacked couple were among those resistant to Mullet’s leadership.

Some of the other members of the group shielded their faces as they left after the reading of the verdict.  Because of their tradition which favors separation from the outside culture and because of biblical instructions to settle church issues within the church, many were quite ashamed of the church leader being dragged into court.

The Amish are a subsect of the Mennonite faith.  Most are of German or Swiss-German ancestry.  They are Anabaptists (they practice adult believer’s baptism rather than infant baptism) and, while they aware of modern technology, they do not use it.  Most Amish live as farmers and they are known for their sturdy and beautiful furniture.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish

http://pittsburgh.about.com/cs/pennsylvania/a/amish.htm

http://www.religioustolerance.org/amish.htm

A Swahili Gospel Song: Mimi Yesu

"Mimi Yesu" is a Swahili song which translates in English as "I Am Jesus."

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References to Jesus in the Talmud

The Latin language work, Jesus in Talmude (1699), by Rudolph Martin Meelfuhrer in Altdorf, Germany, was the first book devoted entirely to the subject of references to Jesus in the Talmud.
Most modern Jewish scholars view the references as reactions to Christian proselytism of Jews.

During the Middle Ages, Jews and Christians argued over the references, which the Christians interpreted as insulting to Jesus.  Some of the Jewish scholars said the references were to someone else other than Jesus.  Some of the references were removed from later editions of the Talmud.  Since the early 20th Century most Talmuds include the references.

The most commonly identified references to Jesus in the Torah:
He was a sorceror. Bablyonian Sanhedrin 43a-b
Healing was performed in his name. Hullin 2:22f; Abodah Zarah 2:22/12; Jerusalem Shabbath 124:4/13; Qohelet Rabbah 1:8; Bablyonian Abodah Zarah 27b
He was  Torah teacher.  Bablyonian Abodah Zarah 17a; Hullin 1:8; Qohelet Rabbah1:8
He was a son who turned out badly.  Sanhedrin 193a/b; Berakoth 17b
He was a magician and an idolator.  Sanhedrin 107b; Sotah 47a
He was punished in hell.  Bablyonian Gittin 56b, 57a
He was executed.  Bablyonian Sanhedrin 43a-b
He was the son of Mary.  Shabbath 104b; Sanhedrin 67a

More on Edgar Cayce

Yesterday, I posted about Edgar Cayce, the Sleeping Prophet.  Search your Bible and test some of the other teachings of Edgar Cayce.

1. The Christ entity came to Earth in many different time periods in order "to manifest the first idea."  At various times it manifested in the following men: Adam, Enoch, Melchizedek, Joseph, JKoshua, Jeshua, and Jesus.

2. Christians serve "the Master Jesus who became the Christ." The Christ entity is a created being and is not a man; Jesus was the man.

3. Enlightenment comes when we realize our own divine nature and become at one with God.  This is classical pantheism.

4. Each of us is the same as Jesus, a spirit child of God. We each may have the Christ consciousness, the Holy Spirit.  The Creator Consciousness desired to have companions and so it created entities like itself from within itself, the first being Christ.  This means that every soul is a portion of God and therefore is divine and existed before this life.

5. Jesus was an Essene.  His mother Mary was one of twelve young girls chosen by the Essenes to be trained to become the mother of the Messiah.  Jesus and Mary were twin souls. Both were trained in the teachings of India, Egypt, and Persia and studied astrology, numerology, phrenology and reincarnation under the tutelage of the leader of the Essenes, Judy, "the first of women."  Judy's parents were Essenes at Carmel.

(Poster's comment; This teaching is totally absurd. The Essenes were a Jewish ascetic sect which strove for absolute ritual cleanliness and purity. They took ritual baths each day and avoided women to the point of not even allowing female animals in their communities.)

6. Cayce life readings dealt with telepathy, past lives, auras, telepathy, out-of-body experiences, and communicating with the dead.

7.  The power in gemstones can be harnessed.  The ancient city of Atlantis was powered by a giant crystal ball.

8.  Cayce predicted that in 1958 the United States would discover a death ray which was used on the ancient city of Atlantis.

9. Soul entities on Earth had sex with animals to produce giants.

10. The five human races were created separately but simultaneously on the Earth.

11. Many modern people were associates of Jesus in prior lives.

12. We are usually associated with people we knew in past lives.

13. Reincarnation gives a soul entity time to correct and perfect itself in its way back to oneness with God.

Book Comment: Edgar Cayce on Jesus and His Church

Edgar Cayce, a photographer by trade, and born in 1877 in Kentucky (USA), is known as the Sleeping Prophet.  He is represented today by the Association for Research and Enlightenment. 

In a trance state, Cayce gave thousands of “life readings” (over 14,000 documents) for individuals over a forty-three year career.  He claimed to be a Christian, read the entire Bible annually, and served as a Campbellite (Christian Church, Disciples of Christ) Sunday School teacher.  Those who knew him personally said that he was a gentle, kind, and humble man. Then, why is he considered to have been a heretic by the vast majority of Christendom?  Reading Edgar Cayce on Jesus and His Church (1970) will give you a good idea.

 

The book, by devotee Anne Read, is supposed to give us a “much truer and more complete understanding of the life of Jesus than the Bible alone.”  To the spiritually and intellectually awake Christian, this statement is a giant flashing red flag.

The vast majority of the Cayce “life readings” concern health, massage therapy,  and the treatment of disease states.  Cayce, though possessing only a seventh-grade education, is considered by many to have been one of the fathers of modern holistic medicine.

In other readings, starting around 1922, Cayce began to stray significantly from orthodox Christian doctrine.  His trance declarations began to include references to past lives, reincarnation, astrology, Atlantis, Akashic records, the Universal Mind, spiritual beings, prophecies of the future, and unorthodox declarations about the nature of God and Jesus.       

At first, Cayce himself was concerned about the turn his readings had taken, but soon, he became convinced he was imparting the truth to his followers.  Edgar Cayce said that he never actually heard his own readings because he was asleep when he gave them.  He read transcripts of the readings when he woke up.  His initial misgivings about the contents of the readings is obvious from what he said to Arthur Lammers when he awoke from one trance state and read what he had said.  

“But what you’ve been telling me today, and what the readings have been saying, is foreign to all I’ve believed and been taught, and all I’ve taught others, all of my life.  It ever the Devil was going to play a trick on me, this would be it.” Quoted in Thomas Sugrue, Stranger in the Earth, 1971, p. 210.

The worst deviation from Christianity in the Cayce teachings concerns who Jesus was.  This is the main point of Cayce’s heresy.  He taught that Jesus was a man, a created soul, a spirit child of God, who became the Christ.  He further taught that we are also the spirit children of God, the same as Jesus, and that salvation and enlightenment comes when we realize our true nature and return to God.  This is the New Age doctrine of the divinity of man mixed in with the ancient heresies of Adoptionism and Arianism.  Both heresies deny the full deity of Jesus.

One Christian response to Cayce is stated by William J. Petersen in his book, Those Curious New Cults, p. 46.

“For a good portion of his life, Cayce was a commercial photographer.  He understood very well the mechanics of his trade.  A blank film is inserted, the shutter is snapped,  and then the film is developed in the dark.  The nature of a photograph, whether it is a formal family picture or pornography, depends not on the film but on the photographer who uses the cameras.  During his trances, Cayce’s mind was like a blank film that would be developed in the dark.  I believe that Cayce allowed his camera to get into the wrong hands.”

Petersen is hinting at what many people believe: the person who was speaking during Cayce’s trance states was not Edgar Cayce, but someone else, something else.  Speaking in traces is a standard event for mediumship and spiritism/spiritualism.  The New Age teachings of Ascended Masters and spirit guides speaking through human channellers comes immediately to mind.  The messages given by these spirit guides invariably are at odds with orthodox Christianity.

 What I am about to say will sound very controversial to some Christians, especially those who have accepted the anti-supernaturalism of the modernist world view (there it is again).  Unless one accepts that the spirit guides are who they say they are, they must be someone else.  The obvious answer is that they are Satan himself, or more likely his demons.

The Bible is quite emphatic that Satan and his demons exist.  In fact, Jesus said so.  Either Jesus was ignorant, mistaken, or correct.  I would go with Jesus.

A detailed Christian Response

http://www.watchman.org/profiles/edgar-cayce/

More on Edgar Cayce tomorrow.

Вижу Бога каждый день (I See God Every Day)

This is a Russian Christian song, Вижу Бога каждый день (I See God Every Day), performed at the Slavic Grace Baptist Church in Vancouver, Washington (USA).

Embryo Adoption

As a follow-up to my series of posts on Why Life Begins At Conception, here is something to think about from the edges of reproductive science: embryo adoption.

In-vitro fertilization is the procedure of fertilization of human eggs outside of the mother’s body and their subsequent implantation in the uterus..  This procedure is used when, for various reasons, it is highly unlikely, dangerous, or impossible for fertilization to occur in the natural way.   The procedure can be used for non-spousal donor fertilization, for fertilization after the death of the husband, or for implantation into surrogate mothers.  Some lesbians use this method to become pregnant.

It is common for 10 to 30 eggs to be chosen for fertilization.  The healthiest eggs are incubated for about 18 hours in a concentrated solution of sperm.  Any eggs which become fertilized are graded on several factors to choose those which will optimize the expected pregnancy rate.  With women under 30 the pregnancy rate approaches 50%.  The rate drops off sharply as the mother’s age approaches or exceeds 40.

Two to three of the optimal eggs will be implanted into the mother’s uterus.   The fate of the other fertilized embryos then becomes a controversial question.  Many agree with former US president George W. Bush that “These boys and girls are not spare parts.”

What currently happens:

1.     Many of the fertilized embryos are discarded or are donated to research laboratories.

2.     Some embryos are donated to other couples who are otherwise unable to conceive.

3.     Some of the embryos are intentionally implanted when conception is unlikely, letting “nature take its course.”

4.     Some couples pay to maintain their unused embryos in a frozen state. There are currently about 400,000 to 600,000 frozen embryos in the United States.

A growing movement among evangelicals is embryo adoption.  In 2003, there were about 11,500 embryo adoptions in the United States.  By 2010, the number had risen to about 15,000.

“The earliest Christians were distinguished by their care for those society discarded.  Embryo adoption seems to me a seminal way to do such a thinhg here in the third millennium.”  Gabriel Fluhrer. 

Religious Place Names

Andaman Islands:  This name is believed to have been derived from the name of the monkey god, Handuman.

Amritsar, India: From the Sanskrit words “amrita saras,” meaning “lake of immortality.”

Munster, Germany:  From the Old High German word “munistri.”  This word was ultimately derived from the Latin word, “monasterium” (“monastery.”)

Montruex, Switzerland:  This name is also from from the Latin word, “monasterium” (“monastery.”)

Kilmanjaro, Tanzania:  The name of this volcano derives from the Swahili words “kilima” = “mountain” plus “njaro” = “god of cold.”

Amazing Grace by Rock Guitarists Jeff beck and Steve Vai

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Amazing Grace by Jeff Beck

amazing grace by Steve Vai

Iranian Pastor Freed

Youcef Nagarkhani (b. 1977, Iran), a pastor of the Protestant evangelical Church of Iran, was released three days ago after spending the last three years in an Iranian prison under the threat of a death sentence.  What was his crime?  Pastor Nadarkhani was originally charged with the capital crime of apostasy; leaving Islam to follow another religion.  The punishment in Iran for apostasy is death.  Though apostasy is not officially a crime in Iran, judges may still level the charge against a person based on religious fatwas.  Nadarkani insisted that he was never a Muslim; even though he was raised in a Muslim family, he never accepted Islam and, instead, became a Christian as a teenager.  He steadfastly refused to convert to Islam.

Youcef Ndarkhani's wife, Fatemah Pasandideh, was also arrested and charged with apostasy.  She received a sentence of life imprisonment but was released after four months.

International criticism of the charges against Pastor Nadarkani was raised loudly from around the world.
United States president barack Obama said, "The United States condemns the conviction of Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani.  Pastor Nadarkhani has done nothing more than maintain his devout faith, which is a universal right for all people."  The British Foreign Secretary, William Hague, also condemned the sentence.

During the three years of his imprisonment, the charges continued to change and eventually included charges of rape, extortion, and baptizing converts.  The charges, in the end, became that Nadarkhani had attempted to evangelize Muslims.  The penalty for this crime was set at three years and the pastor was released for the time he had already served in prison.

Christians around the world are rejoicing that their prayers for Youcef Nadarkhani's safe release have been answered.  Pastor Nadarkhani is to be admired for his absolute refusal to betray his faith.

A Tamil Christian Short Film

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Book Comment: The Challenge of Postmodernism

The Challenge of Postmodernism.  An Evangelical Engagement, edited by David S. Dockery, 2001

The modernist philosophy, the prevailing worldview of the 19^th, 20^th , and early 21^st  centuries, holds that there is a truth to be known and that it is knowable by the scientific method.  In its most developed form, it holds that everything which can be known is knowable only from measurable and observable phenomena.  There is an absolute denial of the supernatural and a denigration of knowledge derived in other ways than the scientific.

A new worldview is replacing the scientific/modernist philosophy.  Postmodernism has been building since the early 20^th century.  It rejects the idea of a knowable single absolute truth and stresses the idea of pluralism.  There are many truths.  Community is favored over individualism.  Truth is mediated through social relations, true because it is accepted with a particular community.  In effect, anything can be true because it is accepted by a particular community.  The truth of one community is just as true as the truth of another community, even if the truths are incompatible.  Since there is no absolute truth,  truth becomes subjective and relative to the situation and community in which It is believed.

Meaning is defined by how one feels.  Your truth may not be my truth,  but all truths are equally valid.  Reality becomes a social construct.

To a postmodernist, truth, if it exists at all, is a social relation.  It is what a particular group declares that it is.  To assert truth is to assert domination over other groups that define truth differently.  Absolute truth claims are seen as oppressive and imperialist.  Those who uphold traditional orthodox Christianity are derided.  Pope Benedict XVI has called it “the dictatorship of relativism.”

Postmodernist H. Tristam Engelhardt has said, “Insofar as individual do not share in the consensusof a common religious belief, including the divine roots of state authority, appeals to religious consideration will appear to those without faith or with a different faith as an appeal simply to force in order to support private interests.”

Obviously, then, postmodernism is a direct and hostile challenge to Christianity because Christianity declares that  “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.”  Acts 4:12

The point of The Challenge of Postmodernism is that Christians must not be caught unaware.  Postmodernist philosophy is all around us; perhaps you have heard it expressed by someone you know.  Postmodern thought can even be found in many Christian churches, especially those which pride themselves on their inclusiveness and those which accept Christianity as merely one religion among many.  

The Challenge of Postmodernism discusses the background information Which Christians need to know in order to understand postmoderism so that they may counter it intellectually and successfully evangelize the new culture.

I would strongly recommend this book to pastors, theologians, and those others who are not intimidated by a bit of “heavy” reading.  It is good to be aware of the bear before he attempts to eat you.

………………………………………………………………………

I bought a trade paperback copy of The Challenge of Postmodernism at 2^nd and Charles, a used bookstore.  When I got it home, I realized that it was a signed copy.  The inscription reads, “Soli Deo Gloria, David S. Dockery.”

“Soli Deo Gloria” is Latin and translates as “glory only to God” or “glory to God alone.”  Some have translated it as “glory to the only God.”

Gladly the Bear

“A child came home from Sunday school and told his mother that they sang a new song about a cross-eyed bear named Gladly.  It took his mother a while before she realized that the hymn was really ‘Gladly the Cross I’d Bear.’”

From the Big Book of Church Jokes, published by Barbour Publishing, Inc. Used by permission.

Why Life Begins at Conception, Part 5

The scientific facts are not at issue.  Human life demonstrably begins at conception.  Froma Harrop, a columnist and editorial board member with the Providence (Rhode Island) Journal, has said, “the issue isn’t when life begins, but when personhood begins.”

“Personhood” has become an international issue, heavily debated by religion, philosophy, and law.  Does the fetus become a person at conception, at “quickening,” at birth, or sometime else during its intrauterine development?  When is it acceptable to “terminate” (abort) the fetus and when does it become impermissible?  Is there a set date during the fetal development or is it different for each fetus?  If it is different for each fetus, who has the legal right to determine when that date occurs?  What if the incorrect date is set?  Is termination (abortion) permissible for rape or incest or if the children carries a genetic disease?  If the date is missed, can other factors make termination (abortion) acceptable?  Is the possibility of a mistake in developmental dating a strong deterrent to termination (abortion)?

Ultimately, these issues will be decided by the secular courts in each country.  The trend in some countries is to allow abortions with increasing flexibility.  There is one faction which would allow partial birth abortion.  Some would deny medical care to infants who survive unsuccessful abortions.

Those of us who believe that personhood is established at conception may have to remain as loyal dissenters.  We may have to accept the legal reality but we do not have to remain silent.

Some may be faced with hard choices.  They may have to withdraw from the system if they are a nurse or physician who would be forced to participate in an abortion procedure.  Difficult choices may become necessary.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

“It was snack time at Sunday School and the teacher was getting ready to hand out giant chocolate chip cookies.  Two young brothers began to argue over who would get the first cookie.  The teacher saw an opportunity for a moral lesson: “If Jesus were here, He would say ‘Let my brother have the first cookie.  I can wait.’”

The older boy turned to his brother and said, ‘You be Jesus.’”

From the Big Book of Church Jokes, published by Barbour Publishing, Inc. Used by permission.

Why Life Begins at Conception, Part 4

The sperm (from the father) and the egg (from the mother) each carry one half of the parent’s genetic information.  At fertilization, a full set of genetic information is present; the exact same full set of information which is present in every cell of the adult individual.  Between thirty and one hundred fifty million sperm compete to reach an egg after each sexual act.  Each one of these sperm carries one half of the full set of the father’s genetic information.

The fertilized egg begins almost immediately to reproduce itself. Each copy carries a  full set of genetic information; the exact same full set of information which is present in every cell of the adult individual.

The cells form a flattened disk called the blastodisc and a groove, the neural groove, develops in the middle of the disk.  The walls of the groove rise up and close together to form the neural tube.  The neural tube becomes the spinal cord.  Each cell in the structure carries a  full set of genetic information; the exact same full set of information which is present in every cell of the adult individual.

This short video is of a chicken embryo, but the process is exactly the same in the human embryo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuL2wUOZKf8&feature=related

At each step of the baby’s development every cell in the body carries a full set of genetic information; the exact same full set of information which is present in every cell of the adult individual.   If a blind DNA analysis were to be performed on two separately submitted specimens, on the embryo and on tissue taken from the mother, the result would be this: the analysis would show two individuals who were related genetically.  

A Financial Company Dedicated to Biblically Responsible Investing

The Timothy Plan was created in 1992 by Arthur Ally as a retirement plan for evangelical pastors.  The plan is now a family of funds which screens investment opportunities for activities inconsistent with a conservative Evangelical Judeo-Christian understanding.  The items for which the plan screens include alcohol, tobacco, abortion, pornography, casino gambling, anti-family entertainment, alternative lifestyles, and anti-Israel bias.  As do all legitimate investment firms, the plan warns that "Investing in a mutual fund may result in loss of principal."

Book Comment: The Money Answer Book

The Money Answer Book (2010) by Dave Ramsey, is a collection of questions and answers about money and personal finance from a Christian perspective.  There is nothing of the heretical Prosperity Gospel here.  Ramsey does not teach that you can have a person “key to God’s bank.”

Several of the principles taught by Ramsey include:

1.     Be responsible to God and your family in your use of money.

2.     Discuss all money decisions with your spouse.

3.     Do not borrow money.

4.     Get rid of debt.

5.     Do not let your emotions be manipulated into buying  things.  You do not need more things. 

6.     Tithe.

An example Ramsey gives:

“The average monthly car payment is $378.  If you only have one car payment you’re shelling out almost $5000 in one year.  Investing $378 per month in a good growth stock market fund from age 25 to age 65 will be worth more than $4.4 million !”

In the book, Ramsey discusses:

1.     401K and IRA retirement saving accounts

2.     Saving and Investment

3.     Retirement

4.     Insurance

5.     Real Estate

6.     Student Loans

The book is interspersed with biblical quotations with illuminate the points being made.