Genesis 2:7 & 18-22 & 25 (New International Version)

7Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.

18Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him."
19Out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the sky, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name.
20The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him.
21So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place.
22The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man.

25And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.

Genesis 3:16 (New International Version)

I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.

This Tuesday is Flag Day and Independence Day is right around the corner.

In honor of these great American holidays (or in order to mock a great Christian tradition) I have re-written the words to our national anthem. I will admit that it isn’t very original, but you will admit that it is funny.

Sometimes (read: always) we go for the cheap laugh in place of the intellectual comment. This post is no different and so I give you…

“The Star Spangled Tithe”

Oh, say, can you see, by our dome’s early light,
What so proudly we gave at “Super Sunday’s” last meeting?
Whose broad gift’s and bright tithes, shouts of “Let’s go all night”,
O'er the new carpet we watched, were so plasma screening?
And the dollars green glare, “Faith Harvest” bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that Malachi 3:8 was still there.
O say, does that “Forward Together” banner yet wave
O'er the Butte of Rocky and the money we gave?

*a special thanks goes out to Finally Home for his inspirational work on this piece.

Recently the blog was posed with this question:

Question: What fruit does this bare in your lives? Does it feed the Spirit or the flesh? Please read 1 Cor. 6:1-8 and tell me how this public blog of entertainment at the expense of other christians faults (true or false, not the issue)is in harmony with God’s known will? And how, pray tell, is God glorified in all of this?

Instantly I was excited. For one of the first times we were being called out and were not referred to as bitter. Now, I know what you’re thinking, if anything this is one of few scriptures that support the blog.

“And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases? 3Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more the things of this life!”

Yes, it supports the blog, but that’s not the point. The point is that someone from CBC actually opened their Bible and found a scripture; they used their mind and came up with an argument. It really was ground breaking.

Later that night I was at a children’s ministry meeting (surprisingly yes, they do let me around children) at my home church, when someone came up to me and said “That was me. I’m 1 Cor. 6.” Shaking my head I responded “What?”

Yes, that’s right people. 1 Cor 6 is not a “think for yourself Christian” from CBC, but rather a confused and sometimes wishy-washy member of the Well. This is the same person who “leaked” the info about L.T. and Ken Ross.

As much as I appreciate your comments, if you can’t print your name then you shouldn’t be posting.

In the words of Elaine Bennis: “I have seen the nipple on your soul”

I expect better from you next time.

I think the above headline is my favorite line from the movie Jerry MacGuire, or at least its tied with "who’s going with me?"

Anyway, this Friday I’m leaving the country for 10 days to attend a good friend’s wedding. I’m excited and it should be fun. Anytime you send Catalyst to a Third World Country, he usually comes away with some pretty funny stories.

However, I don’t anticipate posting much in the next couple of weeks. And since, I don’t want to leave my readers completely bored. Me and the Pope had an idea.

So many of you wrote and made comments on the blog regarding your disapproval of Larry and Ken’s firing. We though it might be fun if we emailed Ken Malmin and expressed our discontent.

Although your letters may not bring Ken and Larry back, it will be a great sign of support. Thus, please use the link below to send an email to Ken Malmin expressing your dissatisfaction with City Bible’s decision to fire 2 excellent teachers.

ken@portlandbiblecollege.org

Update June 8: All is not lost. Apparently, my intern will be taking over the blog while I’m gone. Should be fun.

Today is the day that City Bible spoke about women being elders. Here is how I imagine the sermon went.

Good Morning, everyone. As many of you know, today we are going to discuss the ordination of women at City Bible Church. I am well aware that the Bible says some specific things about women, and that’s why the leadership and I have prepared a special presentation to help you grasp this complex Biblical issue.

First, we are now selling new Bibles in the bookstore for $49.95. These new Bibles are interepreted by Kevin Connor and edited by Lanny Hubbard. We call them the KCV version of the Bible. And yes, the teachings of Christ are in red. As is Malichi 3:8. My step-father informed me that Christ meant to speak Malachi 3:8, he just forgot.

For those of you who can’t afford this new KCV version, I am going to ask you to take out a ball point pen. Something permanent and indelible. Okay, everyone cross out 1 Corinthians 14:34-35…. well, better yet, just cross out that entire chapter. We’re not gonna be needing it anymore. Thanks… Okay.. well that settles that. Great. Now we’re all on board.

Oh and before I forget, we have bussed in some gays for us to pray for. What’s that? Oh, no, no, no, they’re not practicing homosexuality, they’re gays who don’t want to be gay. The only sin we tolerate at this church is pride.

What’s that? Another question? Ummm, well yes the Bible does say some things about women. But we’ve crossed those verses out. What’s that? “God doesn’t change.” No, you’re absolutely right, God doesn’t change, just the Bible.

Okay. Great… well everyone open your Bibles to Malichi 3:8…..

I think I’ve found Larry and Ken’s replacement. This is from the City Bible Bulletin.

WOMEN AND MINISTRY

In Joel 2:28, God said that He would pour out His Spirit on all mankind. The purpose of this would be to empower His people so they might accomplish His work in the earth. This power was to be given to both male and female and would manifest itself in gifts and abilities from the Holy Spirit.

Sadly, the reality is that many churches don’t utilize the God-given gifts and skills that reside in the women of their congregations. As a result, many churches are not only deprived of a vast reserve of God’s grace resident in their female members, but the complexion of the churches lack the important contributions that will only come from their women. In the end, these churches attempt to accomplish the commission given to them with only part of the resources necessary to do it.

It is our responsibility to help the people of this church to understand the treasure that resides in the women of this congregation and to motivate us all to release more of those gifts to the Body of Christ. The Bible provides us with God’s original pattern for women harmoniously working alongside men.

It also gives guidelines to ensure this is done in a proper manner. Both the Old and New Testament work together to give us a clear understanding of what that is to look like. When Paul stated that the church is like a human body, in which every member contributes to the successful function of the whole, he definitely had in mind the female members of that body along with the male. As we move into the future, it is encouraging to see our women function in their God given gifts and calling.

Lanny Hubbard
Portland Bible College
Faculty Member

(Warning: This post is rated PG-13)

So it sounds like CBC is trying to make the school less Bible College and more Internship (i.e. Timothy program). This may be a little bit obvious, but how long before we can start calling it Portland Business College?

I guess they want to raise up an army of ass-kissers. Don’t you want to be a part of “Generation Kiss Ass”?

And if PBC is going to become the Timothy Program. At least, I hope they include a class about safe sex, or at least hand out condoms at orientation. Last I checked, the Timothy program was less about serving the Lord and more about servicing your co-intern… but whatever…

Anyway, here is the new theme song for the School of Internship at City Bible. Led by General Hank and his army of ass-kissers.

I am an A.

I am an A…

I am an A-S

I am an A-S-S-K-I-S-S-E-R

And I will T-I-T-H-E to my home church C-B-C

Or God will C-U-R-S-E me for all Eternity

I have been thinking about the recent layoffs at PBC. The official version seems to be that City Bible is restructuring PBC and they no longer need the services of Larry and Ken. Which is fair enough.

Here is my concern. I thought City Bible was a family. I was unaware that it is acceptable to restructure family members. Not that I oppose, mind you. Immediately upon hearing a family restructure is posible, I fired off a call to my mother asking whether perhaps we could restructure a certain Joel Morton out of the family. She, of course, was less than amused. But my younger siblings gave it great thought and, much like Pastor Hank, decided that, "Yes a family restructure was definately possible. And Joel has to go." They’re excited to see the basement room finally become available as a TV room.

Seriously though, to me this is just another sign of City Bible running the church like a business instead of a ministry. I understand that churches have to support themselves and tough decisions have to be made. But instead of using corporate lingo for firing someone, why not just be honest and say, "PBC isn’t making enough money to support both of your salaries. But, you are family, so we’ll do our best to support you until you find another job."

A business probably wouldn’t do this. But a church might.

Anyway, I don’t know either Ken Ross or Larry Taylor but they seemed like genuine sincere leaders, not hype-masters like most of the elders at City Bible.

Today is the six month anniversary of citybiblewatch. It has been a rather enjoyable six months, and I appreciate all the people who have commented and offered their opinion. I have learned a lot.

We had many rules when we first started this blog, most of which we have already broken. However, one of the rules we tried to stand by was “no gossip”. We did not want to print rumors, and we did not want to get sued.

Of course… rules are made to be broken.

So, here is the lastest rumor. Allegedly, City Bible has just fired two faculty members at Portland Bible College. Thus, significantly reducing the number of faculty at PBC. Apparently, they don’t offer tenure at PBC.

One of the recently fired faculty members was heard to say, “I imagine it’s only a matter of time before this gets on the blog.”

Not wanting to dissapoint…

Anyway, I could offer my thoughts on why these members got fired. But I really do not know the circumstances surrounding this situation. So, I’ll leave the speculation to others.