Why I’ve turned to God at nearly 70, by reformed Ringo Starr... that’s 44 years after John Lennon said the Beatles were bigger than Jesus

Assist News | Britain’s Daily Mail is reporting that former Beatles drummer, Ringo Starr has found God at nearly 70 years of age. This was revealed in a story written by Ben Todd who said, “John Lennon caused a worldwide storm by claiming that the Beatles were more popular than Jesus.

“Now, more than four decades on, it seems his former bandmate Ringo Starr has acknowledged a humbler place in the grand scheme of things. “The drummer says he has found God - after taking a long and winding road to enlightenment.”

Todd said that Liverpool-born Starr admitted he lost his way when he was younger, both as a Beatle experimenting with marijuana and LSD and afterwards when he suffered alcohol and cocaine problems in the late 1970s. “But the musician, who has since become teetotal and quit his 60-a-day cigarette habit, says that religion now plays an important role in his life,” said Todd.

Heterosexuality: A New Hate Crime

Bill Muehlenberg | It is not just in the futurist, dystopian novels such as Brave New World and 1984 that the totalist state seeks to punish thoughts as well as actions. In real world dictatorships and totalitarian states the same attempt has been made. Certain thoughts and ideas are declared to be verboten with corresponding punishments for those daring to think them.

The tyrannical state determines what is acceptable thought, and woe to those who wish to remain a free thinker. Any recalcitrants are swiftly dealt with, and the full weight of the state apparatus is brought to bear on any offenders. Correct Speak and Correct Think are maintained by various measures

ACMA out of touch on TV standards

Lyle Shelton , Australian Christian Lobby | The Australian Communication and Media Authority’s (ACMA) assertions in Senate Estimates this afternoon that television standards had not been weakened under the new code of practice defy belief, according to the Australian Christian Lobby.

Free TV Australia’s Commercial Television Industry Code of Practice, approved just days before Christmas, removed the requirement for sex and nudity to be “discreetly” implied in MA programs and allows MA rated material to be advertised during children’s viewing times.

British Supply Teacher Fired for Offering Prayer Able to Return to Work

Assist News | Olive Jones, a British Christian supply teacher from Weston-super-Mare, has been offered the opportunity to return to her old job after North Somerset Council recognized that it can be appropriate for a tutor to share their faith with a pupil or a family, depending on the situation.

According to the UK-based Christian Legal Centre, Mrs. Jones, 54, was dismissed in November 2009 after attending a meeting with her employers who had received a complaint from a parent that Olive had shared her faith with a sick pupil and asked the pupil's mother whether she could pray for the pupil.

The God of the Mountains and Valleys

Francis Frangipane | The battles we face are often intense times of weakness, distress, and confusion. If the events of our lives were charted, these would be the lowest points. Yet God is no less with us during difficulties than at other times. In fact, these valleys are often as much the plan of God as our mountaintop experiences.

Does TV Provide Your Family Values?

Dr. Gordon Moyes | Where does your family derive its values? There are surveys constantly being taken about what Australians think and about what guides our actions.

The Australian Values survey was a very extensive coverage of Australian motivation, which was compared with that of thirty other countries where the same survey was undertaken. It will be repeated every decade to see how our belief systems change.

The Commonwealth Government has commissioned its own survey, and the Morgan Gallup Poll and the Saulwick poll produce commercial versions. The social welfare units attached to our universities likewise chart what we believe and what moves us. Hugh Mackay interprets our changing values to us in his book, “Reinventing Australia.” .

Dad AND mum matter: please act today for Qld kids

Australian Christian Lobby | Some children will be deliberately denied a mother AND a father if a bill before the Queensland Parliament to make surrogacy available to homosexuals and singles is passed.

While the desires of adults are important, they should never trump the rights of a child which all governments are bound to uphold.

The Liberal National Party (LNP) has already signalled its opposition to homosexual surrogacy and many Labor MPs are known to be uncomfortable with this radical social engineering, which has profound impacts for the lives of children.

ACL is urging all Queensland supporters to urgently contact their local Member of Parliament and express opposition to the idea of depriving a child of its mother or father.

More information is available at our Wanted: Mum AND Dad campaign on the www.makeastand.org.au website.

The Surrogacy Bill 2009 is due to be debated when Parliament resumes on February 9, having been delayed before Christmas.
The move comes as the NSW Labor Government recently said no to allowing children to be adopted by same-sex couples because it deprived them of a mother and father figure, something the Bligh Government also did last year when it reformed adoption laws.
It makes no sense for the Queensland Government to be violating a parenting principle it upheld in its adoption law.

Australia Day January 26th: 'Understanding Our Australian Christian Heritage' presentation available online

Graham McLennan | With Australia celebrating its National Day next Tuesday (January 26, 2010), a 98 downloadable slide presentation, "Understanding Our Christian Heritage" is now available online from the Christian History website (www.chr.org.au).

It details many of Australia's European founders as well as institutions, documents and events in early Australian History

Australia Day - Beaches, BBQ'S, Booze - OR The Lord!

Australia Day is approaching, sadly most Aussies see this just as a day for sun, sand, BBQ's and booze!  Few know anything of this nation's rich Christian heritage and the fact that it was dedicated to the Lord, or that many of our early explorers, pioneers and politicians were men and women of God. It ' s largely unknown and, sadly, seldom taught, that Captain James Cook, Captain Charles Sturt, Edward John Eyre, Flynn of the Inland and many other famous names were men with a heart for the Lord.

Certainly the "Providential" hand of God was upon their lives. Fewer still are aware that one of the men who co-authored our nation's constitution was Prime Minister Alfred Deakin, a man who prayed and was used of God in the founding of this nation. Not many people are aware that Australia has seen the Holy Spirit poured out in some 70 documented revivals!

The Blind Side sets US box office record for Sandra Bullock

Angela Walker | Even before the film opened nationally, Bullock made a prediction about its impact. "I don't think they [the Tuohys] realize the profound effect they're going to have on our country. I finally met people who walk the walk and it's made me happy. Very happy."

The Change We Need by Cherie Blair

When I was a child, we had to live in our grandmother’s house. My mother, a lone parent, couldn’t get a mortgage simply because she was a woman, even though she had a well-paid job. When I qualified as a lawyer in the U.K. three decades ago, women in the legal profession still had to overcome open prejudice and discrimination. So when we examine the position of women across the Middle East, it’s important not to despair — or forget our own past.

Up Up and Away

Fatherhood Foundation | The latest animation from Pixar, 'Up', certainly captured the hearts of many people around the world when it was released in May 2009. It became the Number 4 film in domestic box office sales in the USA and Number 37 in gross domestic box office sales on a worldwide basis for all time. To put it in perspective, 'Up' beat Casino Royale, The Incredibles and even Star Wars Episode II.

Why would a simple story about a 78 year old balloon salesman, Carl Fredricksen, and an over eager 8 year old Wilderness Explorer Scout, named Russell, be so successful?

A Historian Looks At Jesus

Paul Johnson | Christianity, like the Judaism from which it sprang, is a historical religion, or it is nothing. It does not deal in myths and metaphors and symbols, or in states of being and cycles. It deals in facts. It presupposes a linear flight in time, through a real universe of concrete events. It sees humanity as marching inexorably from an irrecoverable past into an unprecedented future. The march is not haphazard. It proceeds according to a divine plan, in part revealed to us. Christians believe that certain specific, historical events occurred, and that, in time, certain other specific historical events will occur, bringing humanity’s sojourn in this world to a climax. Then, to use Shakespeare’s phrase, “time must have a stop. “There the Christian’s perception of the timeless world of eternity—the nonhistorical afterlife—is much less clear.

About F. W. Boreham

Frank William Boreham was born in Tonbridge Wells, Kent in March 1871. From an early age he served the Lord, preaching his first sermon at the age of seventeen and printing his first book at the age of twenty.

Boreham was, apparently, the last student to be personally interviewed by Charles Spurgeon as a prospective student for his Pastor's school. He studied there for a number of years but did not graduate. When James Spurgeon returned from New Zealand to continue his famous brother's work he offered Boreham the opportunity of taking over a small Baptist congregation in Mosgiel, New Zealand. He set sail in January 1895. It was, as leader of this congregation, that Boreham mastered the art of storytelling and became known around the world.

A Vision for the Lost

by William Booth (1829 - 1912) | I saw a dark and stormy ocean. Over it the black clouds hung heavily; through them every now and then vivid lightening flashed and loud thunder rolled, while the winds moaned, and the waves rose and foamed, towered and broke, only to rise and foam, tower and break again. In that ocean I thought I saw myriads of poor human beings plunging and floating, shouting and shrieking, cursing and struggling and drowning; and as they cursed and screamed they rose and shrieked again, and then some sank to rise no more.

And I saw out of this dark angry ocean, a mighty rock that rose up with it’s summit towering high above the black clouds that overhung the stormy sea. And all around the base of this great rock I saw a vast platform. Onto this platform, I saw with delight a number of the poor struggling, drowning wretches continually climbing out of the angry ocean. And I saw that a few of those who were already safe on the platform were helping the poor creatures still in the angry waters to reach the place of safety. .