Read the full story here, via Utterance.  Thank you Peter Hallett for the coverage.

The real shame would be if Court is denied the recognition she deserves from the professional world of tennis because of her convictions in her role as church pastor.  Her views on marriage are based on scriptural precepts and have not changed.  Only recently, however, have they become a thing of public scrutiny.  The same protesters waving rainbow flags and claiming people should be accepted the way they are seem to be refusing to accept Margaret Court for the way she is.  If her name is removed from the arena because of her views on marriage, which differs from some people, that almost smacks of prejudice.

If you can’t read the cartoon, click on it to view full size.

Radio Free Babylon

Today you might get an email or see a Facebook message claiming Dr. James Dobson (or some other Christian leader) is pleading with American Christians to sign a petition or write the FCC.  Dobson denies any involvement with such requests.  Other preachers or ministries are sometimes listed as being in danger, and some versions are geared toward Christmas.  2493 would supposedly ban all Christmas programs and carols from public schools.  Please don’t sign the petition, don’t forward it to anyone, and certainly DO NOT write a letter to the FCC.  They have been inundated with thousands of pieces of mail for over 35 years for no good reason whatsoever.

The real RM-2493 was presented to the FCC in 1974 and denied in 1975.  The real document was not sponsored nor endorsed by O’Hair in any way.  It requested the FCC not give religious organizations licences to broadcast on channels reserved for education.  Again, the resolution was denied by the FCC in 1975, but even at that time they responded to the thousands of letter received from misinformed citizens.  The FCC clearly understood their role as an agency of the federal government was to neither promote nor inhibit religion.

RM-2493 did not call for a ban on religious programming on the airwaves.  The resolution was denied in 1975.  The FCC does not have the authority to ban religious programming even if it wanted to.  Further, Madalyn O’Hair has been dead since 1995.  Yet the rumor lives on.  The FCC has received over 10 million letters, email and phone calls.

More at snopes.com

I use artificial sweetener in my tea.  It’s not the same as sugar, but I have tried and failed to drink unsweetened tea.  Diet pop, Mrs. Dash and Smart Balance butter-flavored whatever that is are all examples of products made to imitate the real thing.  While we endeavor to become like Christ, we will never do so perfectly.  But it’s a progression; we’re on  a journey.  The real goal is to keep getting closer.  Paul said has not achieved it yet but he continued to press on toward the mark and the prize.

Christian believers are justified at the moment of salvation.  When a new believer confesses Christ as their savior they become a new creation.  The slate is wiped clean and the sin debt is paid.  It’s “just if I’d” never sinned.  The process of sanctification, however, just begins at the moment.  Sanctification is a lifelong journey that we will never get perfectly right.  It involves repenting, or turning away from our former sinful ways.  Some days an individual may do better at it than others.  Our spirit is renewed in Christ, but the desires of the flesh must be crucified daily.  Paul the Super Apostle felt like a failure too when it came to this.  He said the things he wanted to do he did not and the things he did not want to do he did.  He considered himself chief among sinners.  The spirit is willing, the flesh is weak.  The further we get in the journey, the more likely we are to make a big deal out the tiniest little things.  That’s actually a good sign; it means you’re on the right track.

Christ gave us many examples to follow.  If we love him we will obey his commands.  Paul told his followers to imitate him as he imitated Christ.  We will never do so perfectly, but the longer we spend on the journey the farther down the road we should be getting.  Christians are meant to grow.  Maturing as Christians should mean eating spiritual meat, so to speak (Paul again) and not stay stuck on spiritual milk.  After decades of scripture reading, prayer, fellowship with other believers, teaching, sharing the gospel, tithing and serving in the local church we should be so Christlike the resemblance is uncanny.  Such a person will probably, however, be too humble to notice.

On our own we cannot become like Christ.  By the grace of God we can become increasing more Christlike.  That’s the challenge and the blessing.

Snopes.com is an incredible resource for fact checking urban legends and internet scams.  Remember the whole Veggie Monster debacle?  There are still plenty of people that think Cookie Monster has been removed from Sesame Street and replaced with a health conscious, veggie munching counterpart designed to combat childhood obesity.  There was an email writing campaign to get him back on the show.  Thing is, he never went anywhere.  He admits that “Cookies are a sometimes food” but there is not now nor has there ever been a Veggie Monster.  Sesame Street has denied rumors and even issued press releases, but the rumor is larger than life.  People repeat it without any confirmation whatsoever, making it the perfect example of what happens when we copy and paste total fabrications.  If people would spend 60 seconds on Snopes, such stories would die a quick death.

About 10 years ago a story began circulating online that John Wayne made a dramatic conversion during the final weeks of his life.  You can read the full story here, so I’ll summarize.  That story goes that the Duke sent get well wishes to Robert Schuller’s daughter who was in the hospital following a motorcycle accident.  The myth revolves around her sending a reply, stating that she would be fine because Jesus would help her, and asking John Wayne if he knew Jesus.  Long story short, Wayne broke down and cried, and claimed that at that very moment he gave his heart to Jesus.  He died only 3 weeks later, implying that one little girl sharing the Gospel at a key moment kept John Wayne from going straight to hell.

Well, that’s the FWD:FWD:fwd e-mail internet version.  Schuller did have a daughter who was hospitalized in 1978 following a motorcycle accident.  John Wayne did send her a letter, though there is no evidence she sent a reply.  Wayne was raised Presbyterian, and converted to Catholicism later in life.  The story at Snopes is much more detailed, but bear with me as I come to a point.

I like the way Snopes handles this dramatic story of sharing the Gospel.  In an attempt to stress the importance of sharing the good news, some clever person warped the truth and fabricated what amounts to a lie.  In his zeal to encourage us all to spread the Word, someone overlook the command to not bear false witness.  Snopes just about sermonizes by declaring “better Christians” will see how ludicrous it is to use the favorite tactic of Satan (father of lies) to shepherd people toward salvation.

Kudos to Snopes on this one, not just for clearing up the misinformation but for knowing what good Christians spreading the Gospel is supposed to look like.

Sexperiment: 7 Days to Lasting Intimacy with your Spouse is due out on Tuesday.  To promote the book Ed and Lisa will spend 24 hours in bed on the roof of their Texas church.  That’s what I said: Ed and Lisa Young will spend 24 hours doing web interviews and Skype from a bed on the roof of the church.  Driscoll may be provocative and even attention-grabbing at times, but to get the real circus effect you need to work without a net.  Ed Young received national attention in 2008 when he recommended married couples have sex for 7 straight days, promising the results would last well beyond one week.  The book coming out this week is based on the same idea.  The Young couple’s bed-in begins Friday morning, Jan 13th, at 6 a.m. and will be streamed live on the book’s website.

On the one hand I can’t believe this is happening.  On the other hand – of course it’s happening.  Any distraction will work that gets Christians talking about anything rather than the Gospel.  That’s what Christians have that the world needs to hear about, but you won’t get on the front page of any national newspapers that way.  Mark and Grace better work on their tight-rope act if they expect to stay ahead of the game.  Ladies and gentlemen step right up…

UPDATE: Be sure to read me in the comments below.  I thought about posting again, but this should suffice.

At odb.org you can read the text of each devotion, or click the player to hear the mp3.  Our Daily Bread is still available in print format, or you can subscribe to email or RSS feeds.  They are also on iTunes and I just liked their Facebook page.  As a fan of social media and a blogger, I don’t know why it never occurred to me that Our Daily Bread would have made the update to the Information Age.

This daily devotion can be read in under five minutes, but I found it a great way to put myself in the right frame of mind to face the day.  I’ve also packed it in my lunch and took just a few minutes in the middle of the day to recenter.  These are not the hard sayings of Jesus and there will not be any emotionally charged reviews of Mark Driscoll’s new book on sex.  It’s a few minutes in God’s word and a little bit of encouragement each day.  And I’m looking forward to it.

Here’s an excerpt:

The Louvre Museum has 8.5 million visitors per year. This blog was viewed about 110,000 times in 2011. If it were an exhibit at the Louvre Museum, it would take about 5 days for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

That’s why I love Michael Spencer.  I still read Christian blogs, including Internet Monk.  I author a Christian blog, but haven’t found anything that gets my gears turning the way Spencer did.  Read this classic iMonk post to see what I’m talking about.

Michael Spencer was blogging before I knew what a blog was. He started internetmonk.com 12 years ago, really getting in on the ground floor of the Christian blogosphere. Chaplain Mike and others keep the dream alive at iMonk after Michael passed away in April of 2010.  I was a disciple of  Michael in real life for seven years, and he had a profound impact on the way I think about ministry.  The post linked above cuts right to the heart Christianity.

Okay, we have one calendar year before the Mayan calendar ends in December 2012.  My first question is always this: if the Mayans couldn’t see the Spanish coming, why take their word for the end of the world?  It turns out their calendar had about 400 years they didn’t even need.  Their civilization had already collapsed and they were living in small farming villages when the first Spanish Conquistadors arrived.  If they could not hold their civilization together, nor predict the collapse of every South American civilization to European conquerors, why do we suppose they could predict the apocalypse?  They did some wicked math, but it’s leap in logic to assume they’re experts on the cosmos.

Secondly, the Mayans did not predict the end of anything.  2012 is the last year on the Mayan calendar.  It was designed to be basically perpetual.  It lasted centuries longer than they did after all.  My desk calendar runs out on Saturday, but no one assumes the world will end before next week.

Thirdly, every person or group that has ever predicted a day and date for the end times has been wrong.  Pick up a copy of 88 reasons Christ Will Come in 88 and see what I mean.  We saw a church and pastor get egg all over the proverbial face just last fall over this.  They bought ad space on buses and billboards, and designed a huge website.  Oops.  Remember Heaven’s Gate?  Turned out there was no spaceship behind the Hail Bop comet and they left their “containers” for nothing.  It’s now been over a decade since some of us built fall out shelters and headed underground to avoid Y2K, the rapture, et.al. I could go on (and on) but won’t.

Finally, it comes to this.  The Bible says no man knows the hour.  Not even Jesus Christ himself knows when he will return, he is waiting for God the Father to tell him its time.  We are warned not to believe such people when they come up with a date, or a secret biblical formula, or code, or whatever.  You would think as many times as different people have been wrong everyone would come to the same conclusion.