Text: "How long will ye turn My glory into shame?" --Ps. 4:2

Each generation seems to change from beliefs and practices of the generation before. Sometimes a change in culture brings out that which is good. Then there are times when the new that replaces the old is bad. ...Most of the new music of this age is guilty of cheapening the things of God, and a number of people are guilty before Him.

Shame on religious songwriters and publishers who style their compositions to sound like the depraved music of Rock and Disco with fleshly beat and "copy cat" instrumental arrangements. They hide a few shallow Gospel words among the beat and roar of flesh-pleasing sounds in the hope of bringing sinners to Christ. God’s Holy truths do not need the vehicle of worldly sounds to please the ears of electronic-dazed youths. All music either lifts the soul or feeds the flesh.... Most can no longer be trusted for decent background tapes, choir arrangements, cantatas, and other church music. As long as choir directors, musicians, and "Christian" stations push it, writers and publishers will keep putting the pocketbook ahead of the Bible.... God’s command is to "love not the world, neither the things that are in the world." (I John 2:15) When Christian music carries the beat, instrumentation, and exact sounds of the lost crowd, it results in confusion and shame.

Shame on Christian musicians and entertainers who with worldly hair, dress, and mannerisms fail to glorify God. They croon words with shallow religious thought, singing anywhere and everywhere, gathering praise to themselves. They become youth’s substitute for acid Rock with their so-called "Christian" Rock, Disco, and even Country music. Their compromising squirm up the ladder of popular religious music cannot glorify God. Modern religious concerts attract the same hand-clapping, foot-stomping, hero-worshipping fans as the world’s Rock Scene. Reveling in the praise of men, they blend worldly musical techniques and lead youth away from proven musical values. Seeking men’s praise is certainly not "doing all to the glory of God." (I Corinthians 10:31) Shame on new-sound singers whose style and accompaniment are the same as today’s depraved secular music. Spotlights flash and drum beats roll, but it’s all for the flesh and little for the soul.

Shame on Christian music stations many of whom owe their beginning to people who gave their life savings to enjoy good Christian programming. Now stations chase ratings and play contemporary contemptible music not fit for Christian families. ...A few good national programs are sandwiched between hours of trash music sung by flesh-pleasing groups in musical desecration. Such stations ...have turned from doing eternal good to babysitting worldly musical tastes.

Shame on managers and "disc jocks" who cater to shallow listener desires and "Rock" through the day with shameful music. Perhaps the "Charismatic" stations are most guilty playing that which old-time Pentecostals should rise up and condemn. One has only to spin the dial to wonder which is a Christian. These new-sound stations put popularity above spirituality, worldly before holy, and sensual above spiritual. Paul would surely say, "I speak to your shame."

(I Corinthians 6:5)

Shame on ministers and music directors who have allowed church music to deteriorate into cheap worldly entertainment. The new sound has invaded the choir; the yearly cantata, and special numbers feature the sounds and shallow faith of modern writers) publishers, and singers. It is shameful to use musicians who in shallow songs daze instead of praise, who entertain instead of train, background tapes featuring drum and guitar techniques used in regular Rock are shameful and counter-productive. Preachers who allow questionable groups in dress, actions, and affiliation on their platform cheapen and degrade God’s house. The pulpit is a holy place for holy servants truly converted, surrendered, and dedicated to inspire people to glorify God.

For sure to shepherd the flock in this area will lead to the suicide of Christ-honoring music in the church. Youth pastors and choir leaders need to beware the shameful worldly music craze. God’s true men cannot stand against the world’s Rock and adopt the same beat and sounds of religious Rock. Constant diligent monitoring must be maintained or the shame of musical compromise will grip the church.

Shame on Christian parents who are so naive they cannot seem to sense what such music does to their children. Most true believers know the worldly Rock must be banned or it will lead our children into drugs, sex, and rebellion. Teens can become just as addicted to "Christian" Rock and other cheap religious music as the acid stuff. Drugs, screaming guitars, and worldly musicians all work to hinder genuine spiritual growth of youth. The Bible commands, "train up a child in the way he should go." (Proverbs 22:6) Exercising control over youths’ music habits and building a taste for quality Christ- honoring music is a valuable part of that training. Parents must stand together for good music in church, home, and school. Hero-worshipping teens must learn to love good music and be taught to avoid the bad. Good records, tapes, and control of radio and television are essential. Quality parents cannot develop quality children on a music diet of cheap religious words and heathen tempos.

Shame on Christian teens who are still hooked on the world’s sensual Rock music and still profess to love God. Many teens have grudgingly given it up, replacing it with the same beat and tempos of "Christian" Rock. They like it because it still speaks pleasingly to their flesh, and its shallow message does not cramp their world-loving style. They "dig" modern religious singers and learn their compromise and disobedience. Christian entertainers, accompanied by "drum frenzies" and "guitar squeals" become teen idols... Teens who limit their musical experience to popular religious singers attain little depth in Christian worth. The album jackets in the compromising bookstores look like those of the world’s idols, while the sound and content do little to develop Godly Christians. They transfer the worship owed to Christ to "concert hopping," money-hungry entertainers who have never left the world far enough behind to stop sounding like it. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God will all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind." (Matthew 22:37) This cannot be done listening to worldly, often Charismatic, careless religious music of today. Wise teens will choose the music that advances the cause of Christ, builds genuine devotion, and glorifies God not men.

Shame on me and all believers who do not cry a warning of the rape of Christ-honoring music by today’s compromising musicians. Wise believers have enjoyed too many years of beautiful inspiring Christian music to allow a new brand of popular, counterfeit Christian entertainment. I challenge all believers to work for the return of good quality Christian music to our churches, homes, schools, radio stations) and television. There must be a concentrated effort to let the words of our mouth be once again musically acceptable to our God.

(Dr. Hal Webb --Hal Webb Evangelistic Team, Box 195, Hemlock Hill, Conklin, New York 13748. 100 copies 5.00; 500 copies 20.00; and 1000 copies 32.50)

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The Agrarian

Revolt

Between 1875 and 1877, hundreds of mortgage companies were established in the Eastern states. Their purpose was to find western borrowers of Eastern capital, and their energies were spent in convincing farmers to make a loan. "Agents roamed the prairie states in horse and buggy, pleading with westerners to accept a loan." (Ray Allen Billington, Westward Expansion, p.732)

The frontiersman has been described as "materialistic, mobile, versatile, inventive, wasteful, optimistic, and nationalistic,"

(p. 752) and as such he fell a-lusting as agents declared improved implements would increase profits. Every town saw itself as a future blazing metropolis and borrowed huge sums to build waterworks, schools, courthouses, etc. Fifteen towns in Kansas installed streetcars as agents counseled, "Don’t be afraid to go into debt. Spend money for the city’s betterment as free as water (and) let the increase of population and wealth take care of taxes." (p. 733)

Then the day of reckoning came. The winter of 1886-1887 was so severe cattlemen were ruined. The summer of 1887 was so hot crops dried up. Those that did survive were devoured by chinch bugs. For 10 years, the plains states failed to reach the 20 inches rainfall needed to sustain crops. (p. 733)

In Kansas and North Dakota there existed a mortgage for every 2 persons. In Nebraska, South Dakota and Minnesota, there was one for every 3 persons. One mortgage company head confessed, "My desk was piled high each morning with hundreds of letters each enclosing a draft and asking me to send a farm mortgage from Kansas or Nebraska." (p. 732)

Between 1888 and 1892, half the population of Kansas moved out, while 30,000 left South Dakota. In 1891 alone, 18,000 prairie schooners entered Iowa from Nebraska. (p. 733-34)

In Kansas, 11,000 farms were foreclosed between 1889-1893. By 1890, 25 percent of Kansas’s farmers were tenants or sharecroppers.

In Nebraska 17 percent were such tenants, while in South Dakota, they numbered 11 percent. (p. 734)

Westerners began to form their own political parties. The People’s party, the Independent Party, the Industrial Party, and the Alliance Party were all formed in what was termed "The Agrarian Revolt." It has been described as "a religious revival, a Crusade a Pentecost of politics in which a tongue of flame sat upon every man, and each spake as the Spirit gave them utterance."(p. 738) It was the birth of the "Gospel of Populism," (p. 739) and of the Populist Party.

Oh! the sufferings men could spare themselves if they would heed the Words of Scripture: "The rich ruleth over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender." (Proverbs 22:7) Even Shakespeare counseled, "Neither borrower nor lender be!"

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"THEY WILL RISE UP IN JUDGMENT AGAINST THIS GENERATION"

"While on a walking tour through Scotland during a College vacation Alexander Moody Stuart spent a weekend at a country inn on the road between Glasgow and Edinburgh. His interest was aroused in two lads who arrived at the inn late on Saturday evening. After spending the night there they left early next morning and returned to the inn again that evening. He discovered they were working lads from Glasgow who, on coming under spiritual concern, had sought for a minister that preached the Gospel fully. That preacher was Dr. John Colquhoun of the New Church in South Leith. Such value did they set upon Colquhoun’s preaching that they were willing to walk about a hundred miles each weekend to hear him and be back at work at 6 o’clock Monday morning."

(from the Biographical Introduction to John Colquhoun’s Repentance, by John Murray)

"AS THE HART PANTETH"

Text: "As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God." --Psalm 42:1

The Godly man does not have to be whipped to worship his Lord.

He needs no threatening, no scolding. There is a love for His Word and for His people. Such a man finds his delight in the Law of the Lord, and in His Law doth he meditate day and night!

Like the deer that craves the brooks "that run among hills," so the soul of the righteous craves the presence of the Lord, and there he finds a place where like the swallow, he may lay his young "even Thine altars, 0 Lord of Hosts." He cries out, "How lovely are Thy dwellings, 0 Lord of Hosts!"

It is not possessions that the Godly man covets. It is not honor that he seeks. His soul that once flamed with other passions now burns with holy oil!

The water of life is not his greatest craving: it is the "Living water" "clear as crystal that flows from the throne of God." He needs neither chastening nor rebuking to come into the presence of Him whom his soul loves.

The soul of such a man convulses, his heart pounds as he pursues his Master and his Master’s will. He does not seek the Lord in devotions only: his life is "hid with Christ in God." He sets his affections "on things above not on things on the earth," but "where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God."

When he prays, his confession is "A day in Thy courts is better than a thousand." His conversation is of Him. "Evening, morning and at noon" he cries out for the living God. "Early" does he seek him. He remembers Him upon his bed and meditates upon Him in the night watches. When he awakes, he is still with Him.

He thirsts and faints for the courts of the living God. Like Enoch of old, he "walks with God." He dwells "in the Heavenlies," and anxiously asks, "When shall I come and appear before God?" for "as the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after Thee, Of God."

HELP US COMPILE A BOOK! In our travels, my family and I have often chuckled at the amusing or anomalous names of Baptist churches. For instance, "The Runs Baptist Church" is located in Beech Island, So. Carolina, and "St. Mary’s Baptist Church" is located in Atlanta, Georgia (I believe).

If you know of any unusual church names, will you send them to us complete with their location? Should we elect to use it we will give you the credit.

"It may be natural enough to prefer the married to the unmarried state, when an opportunity offers for entering into it. But let not your minds be unduly restless and anxious in realizing the object of your wishes.

"Avoid all romantic and poetic imaginativeness on this momentous affair. Do not allow yourselves ever to treat it with levity, or to dictate a line of conduct which would look as if you were more anxious to be a wife, than to be qualified for such a state.

"Never come to the conclusion that you can not be happy if you are not married, and can not but be happy if you are. Let the multitude of happy maidens, and the equal number of unhappy wives, correct such mistakes, and dispel all the illusions with which the idea of connubialism (marriage) disturbs the propriety of some young women’s conduct.

"Treat the whole subject not as a matter of poetry and romance but as one of the gravest realities of life. It is an affair of love, but it is also an affair of prudence. It is a matter of taste and even of poetic delightfulness; but it is also a matter of judgment and of conscientiousness.

"It is not a thing to be laughed and joked about, but to be pondered in the deepest recesses of the soul, and prayed over in the most solemn seasons of devotion."

HEALING BALM for TROUBLED HOMES--

WHOLESOME COUNSEL for all

Contemplating marriage –

"THE MARRIAGE RING"

-by John Angell James

$2.50

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"PORNOGRAPHY"

"The word ‘pornography’ derives from the Greek ‘porne’ meaning ‘prostitute’ and ‘graphein’ –‘to write.’ It includes writing about prostitutes or prostitution, and involves literature and pictures intended to stimulate lust without love-- the trade of prostitutes. Its purpose, Dr. Meford Evans explains, ‘is to entrap men into frequenting prostitutes (actually or in fevered imagination) and women into becoming prostitutes.’ It is, you will note, inherently adultery--and fornication--oriented, exclusively spawning as it does fantasies of a premarital or extra-marital nature. As such, it is also inherently an enemy of the Biblical moral code, and the institutions of marriage and the family." --Robert W. Lee in "American Opinion"