Recently, the Living Education–Charlotte students took a field trip to the Waldensian Trail of Faith to learn a little more about part of our spiritual heritage. The video below and others can be found on the Living Ed YouTube channel. Check it out the video, then check out the channel!
The first time I heard Philippians 4:8 focused on in a sermon—many, many years ago now—I felt a twinge of discomfort, to be honest about it. Here is the passage (though it would be good to look it up in your own Bible, too):
Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things.
It’s a positive and uplifting verse, to be sure, and portions of it resonated with me. However, I recognized that I had certain interests—things I enjoyed “meditating on,” if you will—that probably didn’t fit such descriptions. Not that they were obviously terrible or filled with evil. But still, there was a draw to some things that, if I were going to truly begin using Philippians 4:8 as a sort of “mental filter” for what I was willing to choose (for instance) for entertainment, then I would have to start spending less time with some of the things I then enjoyed spending more time with.
There is, in an odd way in this messed-up world, an allure to ugly things, things lacking proper virtue, and things that are not really of good report. For example, I could think of heroes in stories who were really antiheroes—not only lacking admirable qualities but also possessing some frankly evil ones, yet for whom it was the negative qualities that made the characters attractive. It would be one thing if the attraction were the opportunity to see the character overcome those qualities and become a better person, but it wasn’t. The evil qualities were part and parcel of the hero’s real appeal.
Again, there is, simply, an appealing quality to darkness, to the “bad guy”—and, yes, to wickedness and evil. Even if we don’t want the objects of our mental devotion—songs, stories, art, what have you—to be consumed by such things, we too often enjoy the flavor they add or the dark sentiment they mix in. Were we all that God wants us to be, it would not be so. But this world trains us, even when we aren’t aware—perhaps most effectively when we aren’t—to want for the things we should not.
But as I matured over the years, I began to see the wisdom of Philippians 4:8. The more time I spent seeking to apply the Apostle Paul’s advice, the more I began to appreciate when something lacked such darker characteristics and when they more fully embodied the elements of virtue, purity, and praiseworthiness. To be sure, I had a lot of work to do. It’s not an easy task to train your mind to begin moving in different directions—recognizing that one path is more appealing and enjoyable than another is not the same thing as training the feet and legs to walk that newer path. But it is a start. And Paul’s admonition that we work to meditate on those things in our mind—the things that are noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous, and praiseworthy—is how we begin to devote ourselves more fully to them in all areas of our life.
That brings me to this morning. I woke up earlier than usual, while it was still dark, and seeing how I was not going back to sleep, I decided to go ahead and get up. The idea of making a little coffee and eating just a bite of my wife’s amazing homemade sourdough bread fresh out of the toaster was appealing enough to get my feet on the floor. Then, a little later, sitting here in the living room where I am typing this now, I noticed that dawn was creeping over the horizon, so I decided to take my coffee outside to the steps and driveway to go look at it for a while. I’d heard enough about how some neurologists say it is beneficial for the human brain to get dawn light into your eyeballs, so I thought it would be nice to take advantage of the opportunity to do so.
And as I stood there, looking over my neighbor’s misty field across the street, soaking in the orange sky mingling with the blue above as the sun continued to make its presence known ahead of its arrival to begin the day, I thought to myself that I was thankful to God for the beautiful things. Because the scene truly was beautiful: the mixture of hues, silhouettes, and a touch of haze on the ground with a clear and brightening sky above. It was simply beautiful, and it reminded me that there were beautiful things in my life and that God wants me to spend time meditating on them, not on the ugly things. In fact, the longer I looked at the horizon there (and the temporary nature of sunrises always presses me to linger in looking at them), the more I thought that wasting time on the ugly things leaves less time for things like this—the truly beautiful things. And as I continued to enjoy the scene in front of me, I thought, What a bad trade it is to spend precious time meditating on the ugly and the unworthy, since it takes time away that could be spent instead on the beautiful and the good.
So, work to take Paul’s advice seriously. Your Father in Heaven longs to give you an eternal existence completely and utterly filled with the noble, the just, the pure, the lovely, the good, the virtuous, and the praiseworthy—the beautiful. And every moment spent meditating on those things is an opportunity to taste, in however small a way, that future. And it is a moment spent learning to be drawn in the right direction.
Some time ago, we did a Tomorrow’s World telecast on the problems with whale evolution. Why focus on whales? Because the supposed evolutionary sequence of whales is touted as one of the clearest and most supported by evidence. (Horses and, of course, humans are similarly touted. Pretty predictable touting. Or toutage, perhaps. Not really sure.) Yet, when you look at it closely, it falls short, which should cause one to wonder: If one of the best examples of evolution is actually a terrible example, then what sort of faith does such a theory deserve?
We bring it up because we just stumbled on a great “Long Story Short” video from the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture that makes most of the same points as we did in the telecast, just quicker and (to be honest) cuter. We’ve featured their videos before (like this one), and they are very well-made (and well-documented). Check out—it’s short! You’ll find it below, and then, below that, our own telecast on the same subject.
…and here’s our program, “Evolution: A Whale of a Tale,” making many of the same points.
So, apparently, Ulster County in New York holds an annual contest in which children can submit possible drawings for the”I Voted” stickers they will hand out that year. And in a moment that calls to mind the Boaty McBoatface affair (a.k.a., “What happens when you let the Internet decide things”), the 2022 contest produced a very… er… special winner from a 14-year-old. I’ll include a tweet with a larger image below at the “Read More” link, so be warned: It’s not pretty. And as… uh… delightful as the image may be, it offers a lot more to think about than you might guess at first.
Read moreMr. Gerald Weston loves to mention the complexity of even the simplest cells as evidence of a Creator. And at a Charlotte Family Weekend years ago, I showed a video by animator Mr. Drew Berry (with Mr. Berry’s permission) depicting, with scientific accuracy, the process of DNA replication inside our cells. When you see videos like these, you understand why Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of DNA’s structure, once said, “Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved,” and why famed evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins once wrote, “Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.” Because one’s natural reaction to seeing such videos is that these molecular machines were obviously designed for a purpose.
If you’ve never seen such videos for yourselves, two of them are below. One shows—again, with scientific accuracy—how the mitochondria of our cells create ATP molecules, the “energy” molecules we rely on for the processes of life. The other is a collection of videos depicting various mechanisms related to DNA. If you are honest with yourself, you will see designed machines at work in these images. They are a tribute to the skill and talent of Mr. Drew Berry and the folks at WEHI—who, it should be noted, did not create these videos to make any religious points (indeed, I have no idea concerning any religious ties at all), but out of a desire to accurately depict the processes within our cells.
Here are the two videos from the WEHI YouTube channel.
You may or may not be into football, but the 28-year-old kicker for the Kansas City Chiefs, Harrison Butker, gave quite a commencement address this month to the graduates of Benedictine College, a Catholic university in Kansas. Whether you have or haven’t, it’s worth knowing what took place.
First, Butker is clear and plain about the current, perverted state of the world. He doesn’t go into details (mercifully), but he also doesn’t artificially hold back or self-censor. He notes that “Pride Month” is a celebration of deadly sin. He tells the young women that they have been relentlessly lied to by our culture, just as young men have been pressured to abandon healthy masculinity. (Not the evil, twisted version of masculinity, but the right kind.)
The second thing to note is that he doesn’t dwell on the negative. He, instead, seeks to focus on the positive—encouraging the young men and women listening to embrace their primary and most important vocations, beyond a title, jobs, or career. Butker speaks, for example, of how his success and his family’s success would not be possible if his wife had not fully embraced what he calls the most important title—that of “homemaker.” He received an 18-second round of applause after that statement—applause that even those who hated the speech noted was given by both men and women there. Honestly, seeing such values reflected in a young man in a position where many are corrupted by worldly priorities was encouraging. Hopefully, such values really do inform the rest of his life away from the cameras.
The third item worth noting by those who know the truth is that his speech was not simply a defense of “traditional” or even biblical values. It was a full-throated promotion of Catholic values and the Catholic faith. Of course, this should not be a surprise. He’s a serious Catholic. (Personally, I’d say he’s more Catholic than their pope these days.) And he is speaking at a Catholic college commencement to (presumably) young Catholic graduates. So, again, it should not be a surprise.
But it should mean something to those of us in the Church of God, who—by God’s grace—have been given insight into such things. His depiction of the Roman Catholic Church as the church founded by Jesus Christ when it was not should get our attention. His praise of how life should be centered around a “sacrificial mass” that is in contradiction to the laws of God should catch our mind’s eye. Does it mean he is evil? Not at all! Just deceived (Revelation 12:9).
This suggests a few different but related takeaways: (1) Those who represent the false faith often do not come across as “villains”—if anything, they often share some (even many) of our values. 2 Corinthians 11:14 points out that Satan seeks to come across as an angel of light, and he will ensure his counterfeit Christianity seems that way. (2) That said, he speaks of his own faith with a passionate devotion that should challenge us. Do we feel as passionately devoted to our own—a faith that literally does go all the way back to Jesus Christ and His disciples? If not, we should examine how we can grow into such a devotion. And (3) his speech could have prophetic weight (believe it or not). Is Harrison Butker the Beast of Revelation?!?! Er… no. However, there is a growing backlash among Catholics against certain progressive attitudes in the Roman Catholic church and, frankly, associated with their current pope. And should a wave of “Catholics taking Catholicism seriously” gain real traction among the younger generations, what prophecy says concerning the future actions of the apostate, counterfeit Christianity should begin to come to mind.
Tomorrow’s World should have a commentary coming out soon on the topic, and when it does, we’ll try to remember to come back here and add a link to it.
This is a very short video, but the author has aggregated several great clips of molecular motor design in living cells. All I ask is that you look at it with your “commonsense hat” on: Do these look designed or not? Listen to the descriptions in the video: clutches, switches, etc. In a normal world, our basic, instinctive response to this information would be to assume that these motors have been intelligently crafted. Evolutionists seek to train you to ignore that instinct, and their words can sound convincing—after all, our untutored, “commonsense” conclusions about some phenomena are truly incorrect. Yet even some atheists recognize that the evidence behind the theory of evolution has not yet earned the credibility to ask you to ignore your intuitive conclusion that this is designed. Take a look for yourself:
Tomorrow’s World