Standing in support of Israel, Jews, and believers in all the nations, in the name of Jesus (Yeshua). Sharing biblical truth, encouragement, news and prophecy.
A massive reserve of water near Earth's core might lend support to the "fountains of the deep" which helped cause the Genesis Flood. (Flickr/Paloika [edited])
Geologists are hailing the fact that an underground ocean could be the source of our seas on the planet's surface, according to Time.
Researchers from Northwestern University have determined that underneath the continental U.S., near the core of the earth, lies an underground body of water three times larger than any ocean on the surface.
The subterranean ocean's existence was presumed when the researchers' seismic waves slowed near a layer of blue rock, called ringwoodite, indicating the presence of water.
"It's good evidence earth's water came from within," lead researcher Steven Jacobsen told NewScientist.
Creation scientists have long held that much of the water in the Noah's Flood came from the "fountains of the deep" referenced in Genesis 7:11 and 8:2.
Today, it is thought that much of that water remained on our planet's surface, eventually covering ancient land bridges that allowed humans and animal to migrate across continents. Today, Earth's surface is 71 percent underwater.
Mid-ocean ridges, which span the Earth's seas like the seam of a baseball, may be the remnants of this explosive water release from below, some creationists hold.
That same catastrophe in the book of Genesis is believed to best account for Earth's plate tectonics.
The researchers are still unsure whether similar subterranean water exists elsewhere within the planet.
- See more at: http://www.christianlifenews.com/us/43760-huge-underground-ocean-discovered-beneath-us-could-help-prove-genesis-flood#sthash.AlW68aYQ.dpuf
Winners were announced Sunday evening at the 2nd Annual K-LOVE Fan Awards at Nashville's Grand Ole Opry. The event was hosted by Dancing With the Stars finalist Candace Cameron Bure and award-winning artist Matthew West.
Broadcast live on the K-LOVE radio network, the fan-voted show "celebrated and promoted artists, athletes, authors and entertainers who, with excellence, engage and impact popular culture for Jesus Christ."
With Casting Crowns receiving the evening's biggest honor of Artist of the Year, other winners were announced in the following categories: Male Artist of the Year: Chris Tomlin; Female Artist of the Year: Mandisa; Group/Duo of the Year: Newsboys; Song of the Year: Mandisa, "Overcomer"; Worship Song of the Year: Hillsong United, "Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)"; Best Live Show: TobyMac; First Christian Artist to Appear on 7UP Can: Jamie Grace; Sports Impact: Carolina Panthers Linebacker Thomas Davis; Movie Impact: God's Not Dead; and Book Impact: Max Lucado, You'll Get Through This.
This year's K-LOVE Fan Awards partnered with World Hope to aid in the revival of the people of Detroit. With every half-million votes cast, World Hope committed to unlock a newly remodeled home for a family in need in the city. With over 2 million votes tallied, four homes will be provided to Detroit-area families.
Additionally, last week World Hope released the new single, "Hope Can Change Everything" featuring Jeremy Camp, Bart Millard of MercyMe, Matt Maher, Francesca Battistelli, Jamie Grace and Dave Frey of Sidewalk Prophets on iTunes. The song shot up the iTunes Christian and Gospel Songs Chart, peaking at No. 2. Proceeds will go toward the Revival of Detroit efforts (revivalofdetroit.com). Click here to download "Hope Can Change Everything."
The evening showcased performances and appearances from the worlds of music, sports, film and books, including MercyMe, Switchfoot, Chris Tomlin, Louie Giglio, New York Times best-selling author Ann Voskamp, K-LOVE NASCAR driver Michael McDowell, Michael W. Smith and Scott Stapp.
This year, fans could interact with Christian music artists at the K-LOVE Fan Awards Weekend. Starting May 30, the weekend began with the official Weekend Kickoff Concert, and all weekend, fans participated in the first ever K-LOVE Fan Zone, which featured a variety of fan-focused events, including tours of Jeremy Camp's bus, celebrity basketball games and autograph sessions.
"Once again, the K-LOVE Fan Awards turned out to be far more than 'awards,' " says Mike Novak, K-LOVE president and CEO. "We heard stories of God using music, movies, the printed word and the world of sports to touch His people and change lives forever. It's an honor and very humbling to be one of the ways He reaches His people."
The 3rd Annual K-LOVE Fan Awards is slated for June 1, 2015. For more information, visit KLOVEFanAwards.com
We like to keep God in our own theological box, but the hardest pill to swallow in the book of Romans is that God is perfectly justified in condemning or saving whomever He pleases. (CreationSwap/Travis Silva)
What if God Really Did Do This One Thing?
Whenever I’ve had the privilege of sharing the Gospel with someone, perhaps the biggest regret I have in every conversation ismaking too little of God’s justice.
We pray for help, healing, guidance, and the salvation of others. We thank God for good things, like food in our stomachs and a roof over our heads. When we’re feeling inspired, we give God some holy attention in worship. And, in moments of great clarity, we may even have the wisdom and soberness to thank Him for the cross.
But almost never do we dare let our minds wander to God’s justice—much lest praise Him for it.
What if God _________?
Theologians argue in circles over God’s sovereignty and our own free will, and countless volumes have been written throughout church history with little consensus. And in the name of unity, many young Christians tune the whole thing out.
But as a result, one of Paul’s most frightening verses has been profoundly ignored.
“What if God,desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy…?” (Romans 9:22-23a)
Many believers, upon reading this verse, will barge into Scripture to douse the fire of this verse. “Surely God doesn’t create people just to send them to Hell,” we are quick to specify—and rightly so, of course.
But that said, the problem is that Paul’s point isn’t mainly to teach a theological principle about how we get saved. His main point is to ask one question:
What if?
What if God did have full control over who chooses Him and who didn’t?
What if He did have the ability to force everyone into Heaven by trusting the Gospel, but to glorify Himself, He didn’t?
Am I suggesting that God made certain people just for the hell fire? Certainly not. But regardless of where you fall on the spectrum, consider this.
Before You Answer…
How you answer the questions of God’s sovereignty in this passage is not the point. The point is that God has the right to do whatever He wants.
He is not arbitrary, unjust, or egotistical.
He is, simply put, God.
He does nothing that’s inconsistent with His perfect justice and righteousness—even forgiving us required that His wrath be unleashed against a substitute. But His sense of justice is just a wee bit superior to ours.
Are we okay with the possibilities that opens up?
Respectable thinkers can make compelling arguments for both sides of the Calvinism/Arminianism debate. But whoever you are, as soon as you find yourself clinging at all costs to, “God can’t do _______,” you might be thinking in the flesh.
We all must realize already that God would have been perfectly justified not to saveanyone at all; why are we so quick to limit the character and behavior of a God whom we can only access at a blood-bought, great and terrible price?
“Perfect love casts out fear,” we cite over and over again, reminding ourselves that we don’t have to be scared of God. But even this oft-used verse implies that there was some fear to begin with in need of being cast out.
In other words, God is fearsome—yet the sacrificial punishment of Christ grants us the tremendous gift of full access to His love and mercy only, Christ having absorbed all His justice and wrath.
The mercy bought to us at the cross gives us access to the same God who proclaimed against His own chosen people: “Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury!” (Isaiah 10:5, ESV)
Regardless of where you stand theologically, do not forget that you—the clay has no right to question the potter (Romans 9:21).
The Right Reaction
Biblical theology has its place. But, to butcher Paul’s words from Romans 11 and 12…
Who can fully understand the depths of the riches of God’s knowledge, planning, and power over the human heart? Who can give God advice? To whom does God owe anything? Answer: no one.
By contrast, everything—from the greatest galaxies to the insects crawling the earth, including you and the person you’re sharing the Gospel with—is all for God, from God, to God, and through God. His glory is chief.
So give Him glory sacrifice yourself to Him, and let Him transform your limited human mind.
Disney has relaxed its appropriateness standards a lot in recent years - but one standard that doesn't seem to have any sign of budging is its unspoken rule: don't mention God. (
Now, the writers of several of the movie’s hit songs, including “Let it Go,” are revealing one unsurprising fact about Disney.
God is banned.
“Well, you can say it in Disney but you can't put it in the movie,” songwriter Kristen Anderson-Lopez told NPR.
Disney prides itself for having an open attitude. It hasn’t filtered out creative talent that has worked on inappropriate and questionable content, hiring the makers of the grotesque musical “Little Shop of Horrors,” which even Anderson-Lopez described as “off color and racy.” Disney’s Touchstone division was responsible for the entertainment empire’s first R-rated film, and regularly hosts gay pride events at its theme parks.
“Disney is not this sanitized place that you might imagine it to be,” fellow songwriter Robert Lopez said in the interview.
But the only place where it draws a line is anything hinting of God—much less Christianity in general.
“It's funny. One of the only places you have to draw the line at Disney is with religious things, the word God,” Anderson-Lopez observed.
For those who have follow Disney in recent years, such news is likely to cause little surprise. Late in 2013, Glenn Beck, a notable Mormon and proponent of biblical values, described the company as “rotted fruit” on-air.
Still, however, American evangelicals have yet to take a broad stance on whether the company has overstayed its welcome in the conservative Christian home.
But one thing is certain—if God was ever welcome in Disney before, he’s long since gone.
WATCH: Remember the Time Steven Colbert Stood Up for Jesus' Divinity? Neither Did We
Stephen Colbert (right) argues that the Bible is real and presents the divinity of Christ to well-known Bible critic Bart Ehrman.
Since Stephen Colbert was named as David Letterman's successor on The Late Show, a video of an interview he conducted with well-known Bible critic Bart Ehrman has been getting a lot of attention.
In the following clip from an April 2009 Colbert Report episode that aired on Maundy Thursday, Colbert, an outspoken Catholic, argues that the Bible is real and presents the divinity of Christ in a way that leaves Ehrman speechless.
Watch the video below.
EDITOR'S NOTE: Be sure to read Bible scholar Andreas Köstenberger's recent article (click to see website or read below), where he provided Christian Life News with a few more reasons Ehrman's latest book, How Jesus Became God, is wrong.
Don't Cancel Your Easter Service: Why Bart Ehrman's 'How Jesus Became God' Is Wrong
“Jesus was a lower-class Jewish preacher from the backwaters of rural Galilee who was condemned for illegal activities and crucified for crimes against the state. Yet not long after his death, his followers were claiming that he was a divine being. Eventually, they went even further, declaring that he was none other than God, Lord of heaven and earth. And so the question: How did a crucified peasant come to be thought of as the Lord who created all things? How did Jesus become God?” (1).
This is how Bart Ehrman, professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina, frames the question in his latest attempt at deconstructing the Christian faith in his popularly written, often lopsided,1 and at places eccentric book How Jesus Became God: The Exaltation of a Jewish Preacher from Galilee. While Jesus was a Jewish preacher from Galilee who was crucified for political reasons (though surely also for religious ones) and whose followers claimed was divine shortly after his death, Ehrman’s portrait neglects Jesus’ miracles, his messianic claims,2 and his followers’ confessions of him as Messiah and even God during his public ministry and immediately following his resurrection (e.g., Matt. 28:17; Luke 24:52; John 20:28). Right from the start, one gets the impression Ehrman’s Jesus is a truncated version construed by a historical-critical scholar—and an unduly skeptical one at that. This isn’t only Ehrman the historian; it’s also Ehrman the ex-believer and notorious skeptic.3
From beginning to end Ehrman dichotomizes between faith and reason, history and theology, the historical Jesus and the Christ of faith.4 With such premises in place, the outcome of his historical research is predictable: Jesus never claimed to be God; he viewed himself as an apocalyptic prophet (echoes of Albert Schweitzer); and his followers never considered him to be God either. In customary fashion, Ehrman assigns the emergence of the notion of Jesus’ divinity to the latest possible date. He asserts ancient people frequently thought of a particular human as a god or of a god having become human, so there’s nothing unique about Christians’ claim that Jesus was divine.5
As is also customary for Ehrman, he paints a rather monolithic portrait of scholarship on the issue. There are sober-minded, realistic historians—that is, “the majority of critical scholars”—who for “more than a century” have maintained Jesus was an apocalyptic prophet and didn’t even claim to be divine (6). Then there are others who are naïve and uncritical, if not unreasonable, refusing to follow the lead of the self-proclaimed critical scholarly elite and thus condemning themselves to unenlightened historical-critical darkness and ignorance. Tertium quid non datur. (Editor's note: that means a statement must either be true or false.)
Bombshell Explodes
A bombshell explodes when Ehrman admits he no longer believes Jesus was actually buried or that the tomb was empty. He claims, notwithstanding the unanimous testimony of all four Gospels and Paul, [6] that “Christian storytellers” had a compelling reason to fabricate Jesus’ burial: “If Jesus had not been buried, his tomb could not be declared empty” (160). Pilate, he says, was not a “beneficent prefect who kindly listened to the protests of the people he governed” (163) and was therefore unlikely to grant the request to release Jesus’ body. Ehrman also claims the resurrection narratives are replete with contradictions.7
What we do know, Ehrman says, is that many of Jesus’ followers (Peter, Paul, and Mary, among others) had visions of him still alive, perhaps out of bereavement. Belief in those visions (not the historically resurrected Jesus) then led them to posit Jesus’ exaltation—the first exaltation Christologies. However, there was no precedent for belief in a resurrected Messiah, as first-century Jews did not anticipate a suffering Messiah (and a God who doesn’t die needs no resurrection). Later on, Ehrman alleges, an alternative view was posited that Jesus pre-existed as divine and became human (incarnation Christologies). In so doing, Ehrman posits a radical discontinuity between the Synoptics and John (270). He also claims Jesus didn’t exist prior to the incarnation; only the Logos did (274).
Later still, Christians espoused views eventually declared heretical (e.g., Jesus was fully human but not divine; he was fully divine but not human; he was two beings, divine and human, united temporarily during his earthly ministry). Finally, the fourth-century AD Arian heresy claimed Jesus was God but not on the same level as the Father (subordinationist Christology).
Essentially, Ehrman sketches a trajectory during the course of which the prevailing Christology evolved from “no God” (Jesus, his first followers) to “exaltation” (based on belief in visions; Mark) to “incarnation” (John) to the more sophisticated Christological formulations of the early councils and creeds. In other words, as Ehrman puts it, from “not . . . God in any sense at all” to “divine . . . in some sense” to “equal with God Almighty in an absolute sense” (44). The model is simple, but is it the most plausible way to characterize what happened?
