Truth Magazine

By Adria Edwards

It was about nine or ten months ago that I had decided it was time for me to start looking for a job. I was fifteen and was ready to start making my own money and to save some for college and have a little spending money.

I was interested in some type of restaurant work, and that is where I headed first. I filled out an application at a nearby family style restaurant, that was close and very easy to find. Two weeks had gone by and I didn’t hear from them. I called them and they told me that I was a little bit young for the job, but they had not fully decided yet. This process went on and on for about a month. I made up my mind that I would call one more time, and it was a success! The manager told me to come in so she could talk to me about the job position. The interview went well and I began my job as bus girl/dish room helper shortly after that day.

My first evening went extremely well. All of the other employees showed me around and took time to explain everything that I needed to know. One of the things that I noticed immediately was that everyone helped each other out. I was pleased that I had found such a nice job where everyone worked together like a family.

The schedule that I was given was just enough work for me to do and not be so worn out by the end of the week. On my application I wrote that I could not work any Sundays or any Wednesday nights because I attended church services. They told me that they wouldn’t have a problem with that.

As the months went by, I became attached to my job and all of the other people that I worked with. I was getting quicker and beginning to feel comfortable. The owner and the manager told me often that I was doing well and that they liked me a lot. Shortly after that I got a raise in pay. The owner took all the employees out for dinner a few times and gave us presents and gift certificates. I greatly enjoyed those times being with them and getting to know them better outside the work place.

About a month before New Year’s Eve we were all told that it was mandatory that everyone work that night. At the time I didn’t think much of it until I found out that it was on a Sunday evening. I wrote the manager a note asking her if I could have off an hour and a half for church. She told me that I would have to write the owner of the restaurant and ask him. I wrote him a similar note, but I used stronger words that I thought would be appropriate. Shortly after he read the note, he told me that there was no way that he could let me off. He said that it would not be fair to just let me off and no one else. He told me that if I didn’t show up I would be fired! At that moment my emotions went crazy. My heart was pounding so hard and fast, that my tears wanted to come out, but I tried my best to hold them in.

I went home with mixed feelings about my job. I knew that I had already made up my mind that I wasn’t going to work, but I hated to lose my job. I had a very hard time understanding why everything was going so well and it had to come to a sudden stop. I realized that I had an extremely tough decision to make. I knew what my mom and my dad wanted me to do and they told me it had to be my decision.

I went in shortly after this and told them that I would not be able to work on New Year’s Eve. They were extremely upset and they tried to talk me out of it. It was the hardest thing I have ever done, but I’m glad it’s over.

Several passages helped me make my difficult decision: Hebrews 10:25, which reads, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.” (I knew that if I worked I would break this command and might be forever lost.) In Matthew 6:33 Jesus said, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” From this I learned that I needed to put God first in my life and let no one cause me not to keep him first. I also read in Matthew 5:11-12 that we are blessed when they revile and persecute you and say all kinds of evil against you and falsely accuse you for Jesus’ sake. I realized that throughout this life there will be many obstacles in our way and things will get tough at times. If we didn’t have obstacles such as this one most of us probably wouldn’t be as strong as we are.

I hope that you never have to go through an experience like this. But I hope that if something like this comes up that you will make the right decision and be stronger because of it. Always remember that if you stand up for Jesus that God will bless you more than you’ll ever begin to imagine.

Isaiah 41:10, “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am thy God. I will strengthen you, yea I will help thee, yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.”

Guardian of Truth XL: 8 p. 5
April 18, 1996

By A. A. Granke, Jr.

As Christians ought (1 Tim 2:1-4), we have been praying for our government and all men, that they might come to know the truth, and that God would help our leaders make right decisions which accord with his will. “For righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people” (Prov. 14:34). In regard to the abortion issue, here are eight reasons why we should realize that God has been hearing and answering our prayers (James 5:16), that there is more reason than ever to keep praying (1 Thess. 5:17), and that we ought to be abundant in our thanksgiving to God for honoring our requests (Phil. 4:6).

1. Last August, Norma McCorvey was baptized in a Dallas, Texas, swimming pool. She renounced her lesbian lifestyle, now even opposes all abortion, and works for Operation Rescue headquarters, in Dallas. Not by any means the only woman to abandon the pro-abortion cause on religious grounds – indeed, many others have done the same; but as the “Jane Roe” of the infamous 1979 U.S. Supreme Court Roe v. Wade decision which established murder of the unborn as a “fundamental Constitutional right,” she is, by far, the highest profile defection from their ranks.

2. Feminists and social liberals are beginning to recognize flaws in their pro-abortion position, and are emphatically saying so. For ex-ample, in the October edition of The New Republic, America’s fore-most liberal magazine, feminist Naomi Wolf criticized the abortion movement. She wrote:

To its own ethical and political detriment, the pro-choice movement has relinquished the moral frame around the issue of abortion. It has ceded the language of right and wrong to abortion foes. The movement’s abandonment of what Americans have always, and rightly, demanded of their movements – an ethical core – and its reliance in-stead on a political rhetoric in which the fetus means nothing are proving fatal.

We are also in danger of losing something more important than votes. We stand in jeopardy of losing what can only be called our souls. Clinging to a rhetoric about abortion in which there is no life and no death, we entangle our beliefs in a series of self delusions, fibs, and evasions. And we risk becoming precisely what our critics charge us with being: callous, selfish, and casually destructive men and women who share a cheapened view of human life.

Any doubt that our current pro-choice rhetoric leads to disaster should be dispelled by the famous recent defection of the woman who had been Jane Roe. What happened to Norma McCorvey? To judge by her characterization in the elite media and by some prominent pro choice feminists, nothing very important. Her change of heart about abortion was relentlessly “explained away” as having everything to do with the girlish motivations of insecurity, fickleness and the need for attention, and little to do with any actual moral agency.

Norma McCorvey should be seen as an object lesson for the pro choice movement – a call to us to search our souls and take an-other, humbler look at how we go about what we are doing. For Norma McCorvey is in fact an American Every woman: She is the lost middle of the abortion debate.

3. Abortion advocates are even beginning to notice the disingenuousness of their rhetoric, and to concede what Christians have argued all along, the obvious fact that abortion is killing, and human beings are the victims. George McKenna answered the following questions in an article appearing in the September issue of the ultra-liberal magazine, Atlantic Monthly:

“The Clinton Administration, the first administration clearly committed to abortion, seems to be trying hard to promote it without mentioning it.

Why, in a decade when public discourse about sex has become determinedly forthright, is “abortion” so hard to say? No one hesitates to say “abortion” in other contexts – in referring, for example, to aborting a plane’s takeoff. Why not say “abortion of a fetus”? Why substitute a spongy expression like “termination of pregnancy”? And why do abortion clinics get called “reproductive health clinics” when their manifest purpose is to stop reproduction? Why all this strange language? What is going on here?. . . What is it about abortion that is so troubling? The obvious answer is that abortion is troubling because it is a killing process … [Abortion clinics’) primary purpose is to kill human fetuses.

4. In November and December, powerful medical testimony by nursing, OB/GYN, and anesthesiology experts and drawings depicting partial birth abortion (PBA), also known as “dilation and extraction” (D&X), displayed in committee hearings and on the floors of the U.S. Senate and House, fueled several months’ debate which concluded with both chambers passing legislation outlawing PBAs. Although the President intends to veto it, it was the first legislation either house had passed banning any method of abortion, since the Roe v. Wade decision, in January 1973, and it is one of several key pro-life issues awaiting disposition in the present balanced budget impasse, where much more is at stake than a mere seven dollars, in seven years!

5. Other legislation regulating abortion has also been passed by Congress and signed by the President, including:

An appropriations bill for the Treasury Department, Postal Service, and other agencies, prohibiting coverage for abortions under federal health insurance, except in cases of rape or incest, or to save the mother’s life.

An appropriations bill banning abortions at all U.S. military facilities worldwide.

6. In the public debate, the tide is turning against abortion, as evidenced in November 1994, when pro-life candidates won election in all Congressional and Senatorial contests against pro-abortion candidates and incumbents nationwide.

7. Pro-abortion politicians are surrendering the field of battle. The freshman Congressmen’s determination to uncompromisingly represent their constituents’ pro-life, anti-abortion views, to date, has contributed to decisions by twelve pro-abortion U.S. senators not to seek reelection in 1996, including Democrats Shroeder (Colorado), Bill Bradley (New Jersey), Paul Simon (Illinois), and Re-publican Alan Simpson (Wyoming).

8. Victories won nationally reflect even more victories won at the state level, as legislative and executive measures favoring righteousness succeeded in at least 21 states, during the past year. Here are a few of them:

 Beating Congress to the punch, the Ohio House voted last spring to outlaw partial birth abortions.

 Legislation requiring informed consent for abortion was enacted in Indiana, Louisiana, and Montana. An informed consent bill passed both houses of the Missouri legislature, but was vetoed by the governor. The Rhode Island Senate also passed such a bill, and similar legislation cleared committees of the Alabama Senate and the North Carolina House.

 Illinois, Montana, and Tennessee enacted new laws, and Louisiana amended its statue, to mandate parental notice or consent before an abortion can be performed on a minor. Similar bills have passed both houses of the Iowa legislature, as well as the Delaware, North Carolina, and Washington Houses of Representatives, and the Oregon Senate. Parental notice or consent legislation has also cleared senate committee hurdles in Alaska and Texas.

 Montana enacted legislation outlawing abortion by anyone other than licensed medical doctors. All but a handful of states now have such laws, notwithstanding abortion industry exertions to promote authorization for abortion procedures by others besides physicians.

 A bill passed by the Washington House requires doctors to inform women seeking abortion of numerous studies suggesting that women who undergo elective abortion prior to their first live birth face an increased risk of breast cancer. It further orders the state health department to compile and summarize research on this possible connection. Pennsylvania has allocated funds to analyze current studies of the link, as well.

 Although, Roe v. Wade prevents states from criminalizing abortion, most states consider it a felony homicide to kill an unborn child by any other means, including death resulting from motor vehicle accidents. South Dakota came on line with new legislation last year, and Georgia and Kansas increased their penalties. Such laws clearly imply that if Roe ever falls, the days of legalized abortion in America are numbered.

Conclusion

Obviously, the cause of righteousness has not gained all we could hope for, but these are steps in the right direction for which we ought to give thanks. Let us diligently continue to watch, pray, and work while it is still day.

Guardian of Truth XL: 8 p. 8-9
April 18, 1996

By Mike Willis

“Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psa. 29:2).

Holiness has a beauty all of its own. There is something marvelous about a character that is pure in heart, without guile, devoted to the Lord’s service, lovely, and loveable. The beauty of holiness is “the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit” (1 Pet. 3:4). The beauty of Christ’s holiness has attracted men to him for nearly twenty centuries.

In What Does Holiness Consist?

1. Holiness consists in consecration to God. A person must be to-tally devoted to the Lord’s service. Those things designated “holy unto the Lord” were those things consecrated to his service. It might be one’s house that was vowed to the Lord (Lev. 27:14), an animal, or the produce of his field that was set apart as his tithe (Lev. 27:28,30). Anything specifically separated to the Lord’s use was “holy unto the Lord.”

That which is “sanctified” is “set apart” to the Lord. Christians are “sanctified” when they obey the gospel. Paul wrote, “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:9-11).

Jesus spoke of this kind of dedication to the Lord in these terms: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment” (Matt. 22:37-38). This is a spirit totally committed to the Lord.

Paul manifested this kind of holiness when he explained that his life was a “living sacrifice” to the Lord. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service” (Rom. 12:1). He also wrote, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). This is a beauty in seeing a person so totally devoted to the Lord.

2. Holiness consists in becoming like God. Peter wrote, “But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation” (1 Pet. 1:15). Peter explained that we imitate God’s divine attributes when we add faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, etc. to our character. `By these ye might be partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:3-10).

We learn to love what God loves and hate what he hates. “Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way” (Psa. 119:104). The wise man wrote, “These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren” (Prov. 6:16-19). Sometimes, we look upon sin as something to be played with that has no ability to inflict harm on a person. Rather, sin is so dangerous, that it can only be hated. We therefore hate fornication and adultery, because we have seen what it does to families. We hate drug addiction and drunkenness, be-cause we have witnessed how it destroys lives. We hate lying and stealing, because we have seen how it eats the heart out of one’s character. We hate all forms of lasciviousness because of how it leads to other immoralities. We see the damnation of hell to which all of these lead and we hate sin. Anyone who does not hate sin is not God-like.

Look at what God loves. He not only loves righteousness but also those who practice righteousness. Sometimes the world describes those who are righteous as “geeks,” “nerds,” “right wing fundamentalists,” and similar epithets. But God loves the righteous and so should we. Paul wrote, “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God” (2 Tim. 1:8). Perhaps there were some who were ashamed of Paul, like there are some who are ashamed to be associated with those who are righteous. If we are going to be God-like we will love both righteousness and those who practice righteousness.

Becoming like God also leads to developing the virtues of righteousness. We learn to be patient like God. The quick-tempered person has not become God-like. Think how God would act toward those who sin (that includes me), if he had the quick-tempered nature some of us have. We learn to love like God. God’s love is self-sacrificing and is full of grace – that is, it is given toward those who do not deserve it. We can be God-like when we show love to those who have done nothing to deserve our love.

Conclusion

When a person who meets the descriptions listed above brings his worship to God, he is doing what the verse in Psalm 29:2 is saying – worship God in the beauty of holiness. We would be wise to give more attention to bringing the “beauty of holiness” when we come to worship than fretting so much on whether or not one’s shoes match one’s skirt or purse, whether or not the tie and suit matched, and other things pertaining to one’s outward appearance.

Guardian of Truth XL: 8 p. 2
April 18, 1996

By Mike Willis

“Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name; worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psa. 29:2).

Holiness has a beauty all of its own. There is something marvelous about a character that is pure in heart, without guile, devoted to the Lord’s service, lovely, and loveable. The beauty of holiness is “the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit” (1 Pet. 3:4). The beauty of Christ’s holiness has attracted men to him for nearly twenty centuries.

In What Does Holiness Consist?

1. Holiness consists in consecration to God. A person must be to-tally devoted to the Lord’s service. Those things designated “holy unto the Lord” were those things consecrated to his service. It might be one’s house that was vowed to the Lord (Lev. 27:14), an animal, or the produce of his field that was set apart as his tithe (Lev. 27:28,30). Anything specifically separated to the Lord’s use was “holy unto the Lord.”

That which is “sanctified” is “set apart” to the Lord. Christians are “sanctified” when they obey the gospel. Paul wrote, “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:9-11).

Jesus spoke of this kind of dedication to the Lord in these terms: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment” (Matt. 22:37-38). This is a spirit totally committed to the Lord.

Paul manifested this kind of holiness when he explained that his life was a “living sacrifice” to the Lord. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service” (Rom. 12:1). He also wrote, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). This is a beauty in seeing a person so totally devoted to the Lord.

2. Holiness consists in becoming like God. Peter wrote, “But as he which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy in all manner of conversation” (1 Pet. 1:15). Peter explained that we imitate God’s divine attributes when we add faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness, etc. to our character. `By these ye might be partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pet. 1:3-10).

We learn to love what God loves and hate what he hates. “Through thy precepts I get understanding: therefore I hate every false way” (Psa. 119:104). The wise man wrote, “These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren” (Prov. 6:16-19). Sometimes, we look upon sin as something to be played with that has no ability to inflict harm on a person. Rather, sin is so dangerous, that it can only be hated. We therefore hate fornication and adultery, because we have seen what it does to families. We hate drug addiction and drunkenness, be-cause we have witnessed how it destroys lives. We hate lying and stealing, because we have seen how it eats the heart out of one’s character. We hate all forms of lasciviousness because of how it leads to other immoralities. We see the damnation of hell to which all of these lead and we hate sin. Anyone who does not hate sin is not God-like.

Look at what God loves. He not only loves righteousness but also those who practice righteousness. Sometimes the world describes those who are righteous as “geeks,” “nerds,” “right wing fundamentalists,” and similar epithets. But God loves the righteous and so should we. Paul wrote, “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God” (2 Tim. 1:8). Perhaps there were some who were ashamed of Paul, like there are some who are ashamed to be associated with those who are righteous. If we are going to be God-like we will love both righteousness and those who practice righteousness.

Becoming like God also leads to developing the virtues of righteousness. We learn to be patient like God. The quick-tempered person has not become God-like. Think how God would act toward those who sin (that includes me), if he had the quick-tempered nature some of us have. We learn to love like God. God’s love is self-sacrificing and is full of grace – that is, it is given toward those who do not deserve it. We can be God-like when we show love to those who have done nothing to deserve our love.

Conclusion

When a person who meets the descriptions listed above brings his worship to God, he is doing what the verse in Psalm 29:2 is saying – worship God in the beauty of holiness. We would be wise to give more attention to bringing the “beauty of holiness” when we come to worship than fretting so much on whether or not one’s shoes match one’s skirt or purse, whether or not the tie and suit matched, and other things pertaining to one’s outward appearance.

Guardian of Truth XL: 8 p. 2
April 18, 1996