DISCIPLE

This excellent article appeared in the January 1, 1999  issue of The Smithsonian magazine. It can be found now at Smithsonian.com "Let's Get Dale to Play!" by Bruce Watson When my daughter entere d first grade last fall, I was not afraid to raise the really tough questions. Striding up to her teacher, I asked, "Who's your class accordion player?" My own first grade had an accordion player, and I assumed the accordion was still the official instrument of first grade. I was shocked to find that not a single child in my daughter's class played it. Lawrence Welk died in vain. Dale Slaney was our accordionist. He was as big-eared and dorky as the rest of us in 1959. This was the age of Brylcreem, and a little dab did Dale into a freckle-faced rube with an accordion strapped across his chest. The occasion for a performance mattered little. A birthday? Miss Barnes would light up and say: "Let's get Dale to play 'Happy Birthd...

The Demise of Biblical Discernment by T.A. McMahon The Demise of Biblical Discernment   McMahon, T.A. In last month’s issue of this newsletter we exhorted our readers to discipline themselves to read the Word of God daily. The emphasis was on developing a habit, the best and most necessary habit—one that every believer should have. Of course, we encouraged reading the Bible as a basis for living one’s life by what it teaches, which is the only way that one who is born again spiritually can mature in the faith. Yet, here is the simple truth that too many Christians have missed: if we don’t read God’s Word for ourselves, we can’t truly know its  instructions . If we don’t know God’s instructions, we can’t follow Him, and we therefore can’t do what pleases Him. Tragically, many if not most Christians haven’t considered that simple truth. Their spiritual beliefs tend to be a collection of things they’ve heard (sermons, radio, TV, books, movies, etc.) mixed with what they may ...

"But refuse profane and old wives' fables, and exercise thyself rather unto godliness. For bodily exercise profiteth little: but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come" (1Timothy 4:7-8). from the cover of the January 2013 issue of The Berean Call.  www.thebereancall.org

LOST IN THE CROWD In this day of mass movements it is easy to overlook the individual. Sometimes it seems as though people are just cogs in a machine without any sense of personal recognition – useful while doing a job of work, but easily replaced and forgotten. In one realm however, every man is “himself,” in the spiritual realm. Each has to have personal dealings with God. There is no such things as being lost in the crowd with Him. The Bible individualizes us. It says, “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23) and adds, “There is none righteous, no not one” (Romans 3:10). The point is this; there are many who will acknowledge that ALL have sinned, who are not so willing to say, “I have sinned.”  But the Bible is quite clear. Sin is individual, and carries an individual accountability. As an individual you were born into this world; as an individual you have lived your life; as an individual you have sinned and as an individual you wi...