Top 50 Stories on The Aquila Report for 2021: 21-30
In keeping with the journalistic tradition of looking back at the recent past, we present the top 50 stories of the year that were read on The Aquila Report site based on the number of hits. We will present the 50 stories in groups of 10 to run on five lists on consecutive days. Here are numbers 21-30.
In 2021 The Aquila Report (TAR) posted over 3,000 stories. At the end of each year we feature the top 50 stories that were read.
TAR posts 8 new stories each day, on a variety of subjects – all of which we trust are of interest to our readers. As a web magazine TAR is an aggregator of news and information that we believe will provide articles that will inform the church of current trends and movements within the church and culture.
In keeping with the journalistic tradition of looking back at the recent past, we present the top 50 stories of the year that were read on The Aquila Report site based on the number of hits. We will present the 50 stories in groups of 10 to run on five lists on consecutive days. Here are numbers 21-30:
The old distinction of 1985 in the PCC between an acceptable homosexual orientation and the forbidden homosexual practice did not last. On June 7, 2021 wide ranging changes were adopted. The old policy was labelled as exclusion, the sort of attitude unknown to a loving God. This has been replaced, or so they say, by God’s covenantal embrace. This means that in love the Lord now includes the “sexually immoral” who, according to Revelation 21:8, will be eternally excluded from the New Jerusalem.
That the foremost sufferers of our present deeds are those that are tempted with homosexual lust. For they need to be encouraged diligently with the assurance that their sin belongs to the old man that was crucified with Christ (Rom. 6:6), and that they are new creations (2 Cor. 5:17) who have been cleansed of their sin and who can and will finally overcome it (Rom. 6:12-14). And yet we set before them as leaders and models men who proudly claim their sin as an essential part of their identity, and who name themselves by it.
Cru Elevated Ethnic Identity over Christian Identity. Of particular concern is Cru’s Cultural Training called the Lenses Institute. Lenses was an in-depth “cultural competency training for Cru staff. However, it functioned as an ideological re-education camp where Christian unity was replaced by the primacy of ethnic identity.
If something like the positions espoused by Revoice were being articulated in 2005, I almost certainly would have gravitated to them. Though I was no longer interested in dating, I think that if I had been told it was okay to identify as same-sex attracted and even to pursue celibate friendships with other women who identified that way, I would have been very receptive to the arguments.
Instead of expressing sympathy towards the legitimate concerns of thousands around the PCA, the Open Letter highlights a slanderous claim that “the PCA is ordaining practicing homosexuals,” a claim that I’ve never heard. Not even once. Rather than give attention to the real pressing issues facing the PCA, the Open Letter regrettably diverts the reader’s attention to a Red Herring.
Thus far, 51 of the 88 PCA presbyteries have voted on Overtures 23 and 37. The remaining presbyteries will begin voting at their respective meetings beginning in January 2022, with 20 presbyteries voting during January; by then, a clearer trend will become obvious as to whether these amendments will receive the required 2/3 votes of the presbyteries.
Lastly, to those thinking this response lacks compassion toward the sexually broken and frustrates our ability to counsel those struggling with SSA, I would suggest that clarity is more compassionate than confusion. Equivocating on homosexual sin hinders our witness. SSA is a heinous sin (Colossians 3:5). It is unacceptable to adopt a gay Christian identity (Galatians 2:20).
There is a world of difference between identifying our sin so as to mortify it and identifying by our sin as a component part of our Christian identity. Every Christian is called to identify his sin, take it to the cross in faith and repentance, and ask God for an increase of grace to war against the desires of the flesh. Far from singling out our brothers and sisters who struggle with SSA we are simply calling on them to join the rest of us who are no less committed to being renewed in the whole man after the image of Christ.
The evidence is clear. Ravi Zacharias was a liar, a sexual pervert, and an abusive, deceitful manipulative, greedy hypocrite. This goes way beyond one incident, one fall. It reveals a lifestyle and pattern over many years. He fooled many people, shamed his family and brought disgrace upon the Church. He was someone of whom the Scripture warns us – a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
As a denomination, you men of God will face a major issue this year that has already caused many congregations to leave the PCA, and may very well cause a major split in the PCA. Will teaching elders (and ruling elders) who identify as gays (or homosexuals) be allowed to hold office in this branch of the Lord’s Church? The answer should be clear. Absolutely not! Action must be taken now. It must be taken this year.
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Held by Tender Hands
Bring your bruises to Jesus. He will not break you off and caste you aside. That little bit of flame that remains, the small glow that just burns in desperate defiance of the approaching night, he will not snuff it out. The breath he breaths on you is to fan that smouldering wick into flame again. The hands that hold you now are not to caste you aside, but to draw you near.
I am a reed, but not like others.
I suppose I should be. I grow by the quiet waters of a sheltered pond. In the late Summer evenings I watch the same dance of the Dragonfly as she gently kisses the smooth surface and momentarily shatters the mirrored sky. I grow beneath the sprawling branches of an ancient tree that drinks the same water I do. I grow among my brethren, other reeds who bow their heads each evening, only to lift them again to greet the rising sun, nodding with the warm breeze that carries the smell of earth and harvest. I don’t grow alone.
I am a reed, but not like the others.
Oh, it may appear I am the clone of those who gather round me; tall and straight I stretch toward the sky. The creatures of the wetland make their home around my feet, the birds of the air come to harvest from my crown, and like my brethren, one day the workers from the village will come and harvest us to weave into their art. We reeds have a noble calling. But I am not like the others.
I am wounded. The fibres of my being have faltered. Where others stand strong and secure, I feel the soft place within, the weakness that threatens to topple me. While others sway with the gentle evening breeze, I fear that their breeze will be my storm. Rather than sway, I bend, and I know that one day the bend will become a break.
I am bruised.
When the other reeds of the river are woven into tapestries of beauty, I will not be wound around my brothers, I will still be standing here, alone. Or worse, I will be hewn in half and thrown down; a bruised reed broken and left behind. I’m sure it is only a matter of time. Like the fire that burns the chaff away, when it has done its intended work the labourers of the field stamp out the smouldering remains. Or like the nightwatchman who blows out the candle before the smouldering wick stings his eyes with unwanted smoke, so my tall crown will be cast down to the mud in which I stand.
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Tucker Carlson Calls Out the ‘Professional Christians’
Tragically, Moore, French, Moore, and Keller are far from alone. As I’ve noted multiple times in the past several years, whether “professional Christians,” “Christian celebrities,” pastors and priests, Tucker Carlson, or everyday Christians, for far too long, far too many Christians have sat on the sidelines when it comes to the grave moral issues that demand our attention. Thus, in a matter of just a few short years, we went from a near nationwide rejection of same-sex “marriage” to a widespread — and now often legally enforced — embrace of it.
In one of his monologues last week, Tucker Carlson called Merrick Garland “the weakest attorney general” in American history. Tucker added, “Merrick Garland has presided over the most aggressive attack on civil liberties, in particular, an attack on the practice of traditional Christianity, than any living American has seen.”
Tucker’s comments came on the heels of Garland’s recent testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. During the testimony, GOP senators Mike Lee and Josh Hawley confronted the attorney general on the Biden Justice Department’s heavy-handed and disproportionate attacks on American Christians, especially noting the attacks against Christians who protest abortion centers.
The senators highlighted the FBI’s shocking raid of Mark Houck’s home, where 20 to 30 agents with “full SWAT gear, heavily armored vests, ballistic shields, helmets, [and] battering ram” terrorized Mr. Houck, his wife, and their seven children simply because Mr. Houck shoved a pro-abortion extremist who was harassing his 12-year-old son.
Tucker also noted the incident involving Paul Vaughn, a pro-life father of eleven children:
In March of 2021, Paul Vaughn and 10 others were peacefully praying at an abortion clinic in Tennessee. They didn’t damage any property. They hurt no one. More than a year after they dared to do that, to pray, Merrick Garland sent the FBI to terrorize Vaughn and his 11 children at their home…
Paul Vaughn and his co-conspirators now face more than a decade in prison.
After highlighting these gross injustices against American Christians, Tucker makes what I believe is his most important point:
You have to wonder when you see a tape like that, where are so-called Christian leaders? Where’s Russell Moore and all the other breast-beating Christians as that happens, as the U.S. government cracks down on Christianity, on prayer? Silent.
The “People’s Republic of Canada” has been even more hostile to Christians. Things have gotten so bad for Christians in Canada, that in February of last year Senator Hawley reiterated his call for Canada to be placed on a special watch list of religious liberty violators. Hawley’s statements were mostly due to Canada’s then ongoing treatment of Pastor Artur Pawlowski.
A day after Fox News reported on Senator Hawley’s call, in a piece entitled “Free speech and the Bible on global trial,” the Washington Times reported,
Canada’s recently unanimously passed law, C-4, prevents its citizens from spreading Biblical views on marriage and sexuality. Canadian parents, faith leaders, and citizens who hold traditional views of marriage and sexuality will now face up to 5 years of jail time for providing spiritual guidance to those seeking counseling.
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Majoring in the Minors: Jonah
Paul views Jesus in Jonah-like terms, one who is both a true Israelite and true Israel himself, and in whom even the godless and uncircumcised Gentiles can find reconciliation. What was there in God’s call to Jonah was only a dimly-lit picture, a veiled foreshadowing of something greater – it was, in the Biblical sense, a true mystery[3]. But this account of Jonah certainly pointed forward to what Paul says was the unfurled “mystery that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (Ephesians 3:6; see also Col. 1:26-27).
Of all the Minor Prophets, perhaps Jonah is the most read and beloved, and certainly not for its brevity but for its extraordinary story – a story of a prophet running from God, of being thrown overboard in the midst of a storm, of being swallowed alive by a whale of a fish, and upon being spit out three days later, the account of the revival of the heathen and godless Ninevites. And when it comes to the Christo-telic thrust of Jonah, we have a clear reference that Jesus himself makes in Matthew 12:40 – “For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” It’s divinely established typology.
But even beyond this clear typological connection, Jonah provides a wealth of Gospel connections that both foreshadow the person and ministry of Jesus Christ but also the inbreaking of Christ’s world-wide Kingdom. And it is this latter focus which is of special interest. In one sense, Jonah himself serves as a representative of Israel. He, like Israel in his day, had forgotten and forsaken the role they were to have to the wider world.[1] Genesis 12:2-3 is a clear statement of what God wanted his people, the Jews, to be: “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing… in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Likewise, Isaiah 49:6: “I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.” Their role to the world is clear, but it’s also clear that both Israel, and Jonah himself, have forgotten that role.
Hugh Martin makes this point beautifully, that Israel drifted into the wrong conclusion, “that the heathen nations, as to their moral and spiritual interests, were, among Israel, objects of simple contempt and neglect, and were dealt with as if Jehovah, the God of Israel, utterly neglected them also.”
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