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The image on the right was a recent meme posted on Facebook shortly after the horrible tragedy killing 50 people in Orlando, carried out by a lone Muslim gunman who had declared his allegiance to ISIS.  The ACLU and many progressive secularists were eager find a way to blame Christians for the massacre.

The rhetoric dished out by progressive secularists defining anyone who disagrees with them as a "bigot" has now been stepped up a notch. Not only are you a bigot if you disagree with them but now it somehow follows that if you disagree with their ideas you must want them to suffer a horrible death. Huh? Excuse me. That is an inexcusable leap of prejudicial logic. If anything this reveals the hearts of the persons making the declarations. The whole argument is based on the idea (false in my estimation) that if you disagree with LGBT politically then you must want them dead. So I am simply taking the same logic and turning it back on them. If that argument has any validity then it follows that you must want people dead if you oppose them politically. Since I disagree with making POLYGAMY legal (for example), your leap of logic is that somehow I want them dead. So if you likewise opposed polygamy then it would follow you wanted them dead, according to your own logic. This is a self defeating argument that cancels itself out.

Not only his this irrational thinking  but it is demonizing a whole group of persons of horrible intentions and is creating perhaps one of the widest wedges between people this land has ever seen  Isn't THAT the very definition of prejudice? Let's live in peace together with our diverse ideas, allowing liberty of conscience(1) and stick to changing people's minds through persuasion, not bullying or fear tactics.

"And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will." -Tim 2:24-26

"And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, “Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent,  for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people.” Act 18:9

"...brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you,  and that we may be delivered from wicked and evil men. For not all have faith." 2 Thess 3:1

Let these Texts soak in deeply and remind us who is sovereign over the whole of creation and over the hearts of men ...  For certain, it isn't me and it isn't you and it isn't those who hear the gospel. It is God and God alone. 

What are the moral values of a consistent atheist? Well, it would be consistent if he or she were a person of integrity but it would also be consistent if they were a person of dishonor, racism, greed, oppression, torture, human trafficking, slavery and rape ... all of which are not, in any way, inconsistent with being an atheist. But neither is being a person of honor, sincerity and decency. That is the reality of a system of understanding the world which has no belief in objective truth. Atheists cannot, therefore critique the morals of other atheists or people with differing belief systems, and remain consistent in their claim to moral relativism. As soon as they claim their own morals are "better" they are appealing to some absolute standard of morality. To consistently live by "atheistic principles", therefore, is a recipe for moral anarchy. It is true that a person professing to be a Christian may also be a dishonorable person, but he is being inconsistent with what he knows to be true.

by John Hendryx

It is pretty common knowledge that it rains quite a bit here in our city of Portland, Oregon. Most often it is a very light rain such that the city-dwellers do not even use umbrellas when they go about their business. But recently we had quite an unusual phenomenon.  My wife and I were in our home early in the evening just before sunset and over the airwaves came the news that a major electrical storm would be passing over our area.  It is not very often that thunder and lightning accompanies the rain here, but especially at this magnitude. As we went out on our front porch the sky became dark and gloomy while lightning flashed from one end of the sky to the other.  But since the sun was near to setting in the west, its light came through underneath the dark clouds creating a surreal glow among the half-darkness.  Then as we looked out at the beauty of the moment, what appeared to be a transcendent rainbow, one like I had never seen in my life, sprang to life in full color in the midst of the mournful sky.  While most rainbows seem to be partial, disappearing into the clouds, this one created a full arc or a half-circle from one end of the heavens to the other. Then another rainbow was revealed creating a double rainbow.   We just stood in awe at its dreamlike quality and immediately both my wife and I, who were now sitting on the front porch transfixed at the vision, recalling its biblical significance spoke of it as a sign of a great blessing from God.  I also saw several neighbors come out of their houses to view the unusual prism of colors. I approached to see if our next door neighbors had seen it and one of them said they thought was that it was “the end of the world”, but my wife and I recalled that rainbows are not signs of the end but of a new beginning in which God looks at His creation with favor.  God uses covenant signs to create and affirm His covenant favor toward us.