For Book Lovers- an excerpt from Perretti's "Veritas Project": Is truth really a matter of opinion?

With his finely toned muscles straining and sweat on his brow, young Elias swung the iron door shut and dropped the bolt into place as the rest of his family scrambled about the lab in search of anything they could use to barricade the door.

The beast was coming down the hallway. They could feel the pounding of his footsteps shaking the floor.

Elias's sister Lisa brought a chair. As she brushed her long blond hair from her face, Elias could see that fear filled her eyes. Even so, she was still beautiful. Elias took the chair and braced it against the door. "Thanks."

She answered, "I'm not doing this for you."

"So you're still angry?"

"This is all your fault! You should have selected a better brain!"

Elias was offended. "I selected the best brain money can buy. It's highly intelligent, highly rational! That beast can solve the most complicated equations in mere seconds!"

"But it doesn't care about people!"

"Who cares? Besides, I'm not interested in your notions of should. I did what I thought was right."

"But you were wrong."

"In your opinion!"

Just then, their parents came with a large table, and all four of them leaned the table on end against the door.

BOOM! BOOM! The sudden pounding told them where the monster was at: just outside the door, trying to smash it open.

Norton, the father, marveled. "What intelligence! What power! We've created a magnificent new creature!"

Susan, the mother, looked at him in horror and anger. "A magnificent new creature? Norton, we've created something evil and now there's no controlling it!"

He sneered at her even as they braced their backs against the door to keep it shut. "Evil? Come now, my darling! Since when have you adopted such old, antiquated notions? Good and Evil are only an invention of our society, a

matter of opinion."

"But that thing wants to kill us!"

"Well..."

"And that's evil!"

He thought it over even as the door thudded against his back with each impact of the beast's angry fists. "Well, I can't say it's evil, but I'm not comfortable about it."

"Neither am I," said Lisa, helping to hold the door shut.

"Perhaps we should have given the beast a, a conscience."

They all looked at her as if she were mad.

"Based on what? Feelings?" Elias shouted.

"Self-interest?" Norton fumed.

"Oh, he has that!" Susan sneered.

"Well, morals then."

"Morals?" Elias scoffed.

"Whose morals?" Susan snorted. "We went through all that, remember? We couldn't decide."

"We had no right to decide!" Norton objected. "We can't impose morality on

something we created. We can't impose right and wrong on anything! There is no truth! What a monste believes is true, is true for him."

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The door and the barricade were weakening.

"So here we are," said Susan.

"No," said Lisa, backing away from the door. "Here you are. You made the creature, you can live with it or die with it. I'm getting out of here!" She ran for the stairway on the other side of the lab, the stairway that would lead to the outside, and freedom.

"Hey," Elias yelled angrily, "you were involved in this project just as much as we were!"

"In your opinion!" she called back.

"But you aligned all the joints and synchronized the cardio-vascular system! You, you even sewed his outfit!"

"That was then. This is now!" 

With that, she ran up the stairs, through the outside door, and away, leaving them behind.

CRACK! GROAN! The door was coming apart.

"I, I just can't stand it any longer!" Susan cried, moving away from the door.

"Susan!" Norton shouted desperately. "Susan, don't go! Stand with me! Help me!"

She kept backing away, shaking her head. "No, Norton, no. There are too many things more important to me. Our house. Our money. The Gladiola Society. I was going to have my eyes lasered. I can't miss all that!"

"But I need you!"

"Oh, Norton, you're resilient, you'll recover, you'll see! I just

need to find my own path - such as, out of here."

"But, but you can't do that!"

She looked at him quizzically. "I can't? Who are you to tell me

I can't?"

"If this monster gets loose, he'll terrorize all mankind!"

"I suppose you see something wrong with that?"

Norton had to think about it. "Well... I can't say there's anything wrong with it but I'd feel uncomfortable about it."

"Well, those are your feelings." She headed for the stairs.

CRUNCH! The table barricade was bending like weak cardboard. The door

was breaking open.

"Susan!" Norton screamed.

As Susan ran up the stairs, leaving them behind, Elias admitted, "She has to

do what's right for her." He stepped away from the door. "And so do I."

"Not you, too!" Norton exclaimed.

Elias was backing away quickly as pieces of plaster and fragments of door frame began to fall around him. "It's been fun, Dad, working on a family project together, creating a whole new breed of man. But I think Lisa may have had a point. We gave our guy incredible strength and terrific brainpower, but you know, a sense of right and wrong would've been a good idea even if there is no such thing."

"Son! Don't leave me here alone to face this monster!"

"Well Dad, I would stay, really, but it's starting to get uncomfortable. I'm

not happy here anymore."

"Son!"

"Besides, who's to say there's really a monster crashing in here? Maybe that's

just a matter of opinion, too."

A rivet bounced off Norton's head as he marveled at such a thought. "Opinion? You call this a matter of opinion?"

"Can't call it a matter of truth, now can I?" Elias headed for the stairs. "Looks like a nice day outside. Of course, that's only a matter of opinion."

"Son, have you no honor?"

Elias stopped to think about that. "Well, I really don't like running out on you like this, but I can't say it's wrong." And with that, he was up the stairs and gone.

Norton knew it was useless to resist. He dashed away from the door and turn

ed to see the iron door flex, warp, and give way with a crash.

The monster, towering and mighty, entered the room, looking about for helpless human flesh to devour. The huge red eyes immediately focused on Nor ton, who was shaking with fear, but resolute. The thing took one step forward.

"Stop!" Norton yelled. "I command you to stop!"

The monster raised an eyebrow. "Are you talking to me?"

"Yes!" Norton replied. "I am your master! You have to do as I say."

The monster was obviously amused. "This is a joke, right? Me, do as you sa y? Take a look, buddy. I'm stronger than you. I'm bigger than you. End of discussion."

The monster, drooling hungrily, moved forward....

The Misconception of Worship

There is a misconception concerning the worship of God, and I send this message to my christian brethren, especially to those in the catholic church, because their practises worry me the most. It can also be noticed in various pentecostal churches, and It is somethignthat seems to be a craze.

Back in the days, God instructed the Israelites, that when they get to the land he had promised them, they should take care when it comes to the worship practices of the heathens, or non worshippers of God. That no matter how interesting the worship practices may look, they should never be employed in his own worship. He drew out his own way that he should be worshipped. But some of them thought that God didn’t know any better, that surely he would be enamored by the lavish and beautiful way that the practices were being done. One such case is the case of the death of Uzzah. When the ark was coming back to Israel, they decided to carry it on a cart instead of on the shoulders of the priest. God was angry and struck Uzziah dead when He caused the ark to stumble, and uzziah tried to steady it. (1 Chron 13, 2 Sam 6) Some preachers say it was because Uzzah was not qualified to touch the ark, but if you remember, Uzzah was a priest, a son of Amminadab, of the priesthood of Israel. (2 Sam 6:3). Also, look at the words of David (Read the entire chapter.)

1 Chron 15:13- For because ye did it not at the first, the LORD our God made a breach upon us, for that we sought him not after the due order.

There is a due of serving God. We are always saying that God is the same and he never changes. Well, he has still not changed on this topic. We cannot assume to try and please God with the very things that displease him.

Bowing down to statues of Mary or saints or even Jesus-

Exo 20:4  Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:

Exo 20:5  Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

Lev_26:1  Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall ye set up any image of stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am the LORD your God.

Deu 4:15  Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no manner of similitude on the day that the LORD spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire:

Deu 4:16  Lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female,

Deu_4:23  Take heed unto yourselves, lest ye forget the covenant of the LORD your God, which he made with you, and make you a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, which the LORD thy God hath forbidden thee.

Rom_1:23  And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.  (and much more…)

Basically copying any form of worship that has no origins in the Word of God. Lighting of candles, washing in streams, worshipping humans(at some points, they don’t know where to draw the line between worship and honor) in order to get God's favor, , and other "new" forms of worship that is entering the church lately. For those of you who think I'm being too harsh or judgemental, please understand my life is at stake here. God is a God of absolutes. Anything that is not absolutely right is absolutely wrong. And we don’t want to wing it here. Either we obey God's precepts, or we do not. Paul said as let by the Spirit

Act 15:28  For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things;

Act 15:29  That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication: from which if ye keep yourselves, ye shall do well. Fare ye well.

And I intend on doing so. As Christians, we should be careful the practices we adopt. It either pleases God or it does not. If he hates it, there is no amount of dressing that we can do to make it please him, even if we say we are doing it to honor him. Live a life that pleases God, and by His grace, he will keep you in him until the day of his coming. Amen.

ANOREXIA

People suffer from spiritual anorexia. They take a look at themselves in the spiritual mirror, and feel they have 'arrived', or are even too good. They no longer compare themselves to who God wants them to be, but to their own perception of how they feel they should look like. And so they begin to starve. Not noticably in the first few days, but after a while, it could become almost fatal. The sad thing however about a person with anorexia is that whenever they look at themselves in the mirror, they feel okay, or sometimes even too fat. The only way they can see what is wrong is comparing themselves with somebody else. With a standard.
The Bible says, take heed where you stand, lest you fall. If you do not compare yourself with the standards of God's word, very often(I mean VERY often), you will begin to lose spiritual weight badly. And on that day, when the scale is brought forth and you are weighed, God forbid that you be found wanting.

Just a Handfull....

I was studying the bible recently with my family members, and we stumbled across something quite frightening. During the time of Noah, when God was angry with the world and wanted to destroy it, out of everyone on the planet, the only person that pleased him was Noah. (Gen 6)
Also, when he rescued the Israelites out of Egypt, out of the more than half a million people that came out in a generation, only two made it to the promised land- Joshua and Caleb.  (1 Corinthians 10)
Also, when Elijah wanted God to kill him, and he told God that in the entire country of Israel, he felt he was the only one who still served God, and God replied that he had kept for himself a remnant of about 7000 people in an entire generation. (1 Kings 19, especially vs 18)
In the book of Ezekiel, when God wanted to destroy the people of Israel for sinning against him, he told Ezekiel to divide the hairs in his hand (which represented toe population of Israel) into three places, and from one of these places remove just a few strands. Then he made Ezekiel destroy the three divisions minus the strands he had separated, then destroy a few more from the strands he had separated out. (Ezekiel 5)
Now, the Bible says that these things are written for our examples. The end of all things approaches, and as we have seen, God never goes for the majority. Watch yourself as a Christian. If your 'Christianity" is one which is majorly accepted, then you have most likely got it wrong. If people have not started seeing you as a mad man yet, you have not started. The bible says that one should take heed where  he stands, else you will fall (1 Cor 10:12) . Never base how good your Christian life is on the opinion of the general populace, even if it is the general church. In the end, the general church will not judge you, but God will.
If you have noticed, even the sermons being preached in the general church nowadays is mostly heresy or lies, and we are either too ignorant or too afraid to speak out against it.
God has given us the means and the courage to do what is right, but base your right living on his word and his word alone, and not on what the majority says, because according to the words of Jesus Christ himself, "Many will be called, but only a handful will be chosen...