Cindy Temple...Child of God!

My Neighbor Cindy decided to Put on Christ in Baptism today. She saw the Power of God working in our lives and was convinced that Jesus Christ is the only one who can take away the pain and guilt and sorrow and the destructive nature of sin. Please pray for her in her new walk with God! Praise Him! Praise Him!

Making Rounds: Apostolic Truth Church (ATC)

Good day to you folks!

Last Sunday I had the opportunity to witness 3 people being baptized into Christ. At least I hope they were. They are friends of mine and had made their decision to be baptized about a week prior. Now, this post isn't going to be about the reasons and  purposes of baptism but rather my experience at this particular organizations services.

There are some students from Turkey here visiting for 3 months and they wanted to do something and I asked them if they wanted to witness a Christian baptism. They agreed and I picked them up and we went. (Turkey is between 98-99% Muslim population) I got pretty excited to find out that they were from Izmir (Modern day Ephesus)!

Anyway back to my trip.

Apostolic Truth Church (ATC) is a building and group of people located on the Northeast side of Appleton near the corner of Meade and OO/Northland Ave. They have a hefty member count. I didn't get an exact number but there was more in attendance that day than Pathways was when I visited there a year ago. The services provided can be seen HERE.

We arrived just before services were starting and were greeted in the parking lot by at least two ushers. They had their little name tags on and I could tell they felt they had a VERY important job to do. Not sure where "ushers" were mentioned in the New Testament but hey, at least they've got something to do, right? Of course as expected we were mostly ignored by the rest of the congregation aside from those whom we were specifically introduced to. (That's the Usher's job after all.)

I greeted my friends who were being baptized that day and was able to speak to them for about two seconds before we were pulled away to do something REALLY important. We were asked pressured into filling out the guest cards.We were allowed to keep their expensive looking pens that had the church name on them. No doubt an advertising tactic used by MANY business's in America to get their name out there. (I guess preaching the Truth isn't enough anymore.) I wondered to myself how much the pens cost and how many poor people could have been fed with that money. I'm sure they got a good deal for buying in bulk.

We then made our way into the auditorium where there were 4 rows of LONG pews and a concert stage up front that was no doubt furnished by some very expensive instruments and audio/video equipment. There were three digital projectors on the ceiling and were used mainly for scripture and spiritual song lyrics. (Good way to save money on Bibles and Hymnals. While at the same time limiting people from reading the context of any verses that are displayed while trying to get your point across during the sermon.) I had my NKJV with me. However, they seemed pretty stuck to the 400 year-old KJV. Which, in my opinion, just makes it that much harder for people to follow along in understanding, while at the same time creating a complacent "laity" that trusts the "clergy's" interpretation. If you wanted to search the scriptures on your own you were better off bringing a notebook rather than your Bible.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The service started off with the baptisms of my friends. The baptism seemed to have been performed properly (i.e. full bodily immersion in water, and in the name of Jesus Christ) But there was a lot of double-talk going on by the pastor performing the baptisms. He rightly stated that baptism was for the remission of sins and that it was the moment you come in contact with the blood of Christ. But he went on to say that they were saved the Wednesday before when they were "baptized by the Holy Spirit". I did ask pastor Soto about this afterwards and of course I got hit with your typical Pentecostal stories attempting to confirm that what they do is legit in regards to speaking in tongues. To be honest, I heard a LOT of gibberish speaking every time the service leader lead a prayer. And furthermore, being honest, it was all quite distracting and I'm not sure anyone heard what was being prayed by the service leader. Yet without hesitation, EVERYONE gave a resounding AMEN when the prayer was finished. That pastor could have prayed for pancakes for all anyone cared.

Again this post is not going to be about specific doctrine, (I will answer those questions in another post), but I want to just cover my experience.

So, anyhoo, what I did enjoy about the service was the singing. I really enjoyed the praise and worship. I even teared up a few times singing those songs. Singing is probably (in my mind) the most pure way to worship God. Unfortunately, there were a number of people jumping and dancing around erratically during many of the songs. I understand lifting up Holy hands to God in praise, but I don't remember jumping around and causing a raucous being in scripture. What I do remember is a chastisement by Paul telling the Corinthians to keep things decent and in order lest non-believers come in and think your crazy. See 1 Cor. 14

Now I know what you are thinking, "Chad, Let's be reasonable here. Jumping and dancing to praise God does not mean it's not decent or in order. And certainly anyone who attends there will know to expect that." I would be inclined to concede that for lack of evidence, however, the first thing the Turkish students mentioned to me when we got in the car to leave was that they thought some of the people there were crazy because they were jumping around and speaking gibberish with no explanation. Hmmm, point made?

After the service was over I was visiting with my friends and shortly after we were called to the "Hospitality Room" which felt more like being called to the principal's office. There, we were treated to coffee and cookies. Of course we were surrounded by clergy there. They seemed WAY more interested in the Turkish students than myself. This didn't bother me much. What did bother me is that I'm not sure what the whole point of dragging us all off to the side to talk to us was. And when I did ask some questions they didn't really want to answer them.

One saving grace was that they were willing to help the Turkish students find a place to live with one of their members as they have a little bit of a housing issue right now. I wasn't about to let them be subjected to that though without fair fore-warning that they would be in store for 3 months of straight up militant evangelism. :\

After they had their fill of us, and when most of the other people had left we were quickly ushered out. I guess they all had other things scheduled. I got to speak with my friends for a whole of about 5 minutes of the 2 hours we were there. I didn't get a chance to discuss anything with the "leaders" of the congregation and I certainly didn't get a chance to properly introduce myself to anyone there.

So in essence it was just a smaller version of Pathways Church to be sure. A lot of fake sales tactics being used to rile up the laity and get them to put more money into the coffers of their organizations treasury.

I think the Father's day gift of extra dark chocolate they gave me as I walked out of the auditorium summed it up quite nicely. Extremely bitter taste. My son Max had grabbed a piece of it when I came home and it brought him to tears. Literally. :\ Maybe they should have saved the money they spent on pens and got some decent tasting chocolate. :P

Needless-to-say I enjoyed the singing. But I had absolutely no impression that the "leaders" of the organization had any intention to preach the Gospel but rather to put on an entertaining show. I need to stop attending these churches on holidays. It did seem, however, oddly appropriate having attended this "mini-Pathways" exactly 1 year after attending Pathways itself.

In Christ,

Chad Kennow

P.S. My wife said this post sounded like it had a lot of sarcasm in it. I think she's right. But I will leave it be as I felt that the service I attended was mostly a joke anyway.

P.P.S. You'll have to excuse my bitterness. I haven't slept much recently and I am going through a bit of a current disappointment with humanity in general. Feel free to suggest any overly offensive parts be changed and I'll be sure to season it up a bit.

Happy 1st Birthday to my darling Son Elijah Jesse Kennow!

 

I’m so proud of him. His first steps were at 9 1/2 months and he’s been trying to put a lot of words together lately. Mostly trying to copy what Woody says when you pull his string. “Reach for the SKYYYYYY!” So Eli goes, “KYYYYYYYY”. So cute.

Here’s to another wonderful year with my little boy. And with the whole family! I am so blessed! Thank you God!

In Christ,

Chad Kennow

Update….

Okay. So I haven’t posted anything in a while but it seems I’ve gotten some hits. Here’s a summary of what I’ve posted so far.

1. I did some reviews of a few churches and seem to have inadvertently exposed a ‘pastor’ for some wrong doings in his past.

2. I celebrated Atari’s 33rd anniversary.

3. I solicited donations for purchasing books written by Frank Viola to be given out freely.

4. I wrote this update.

What would you like to  see me write about? Leave a comment below and I will try to write about it. It can be anything at all. I will research it and write what I know. Let’s see some great ideas folks! And please Subscribe so that I know people are reading.

In Christ,

Chad Kennow
Appleton, WI

Happy 33rd Anniversary Atari 2600

On October 14th 1977 Atari Inc. released the Atari 2600 Video Game Console. Effectively igniting one of the more lucrative industries in human history. The Video Game revolution was now in full swing.

For a full history check out this Wikipedia article.

Did you know you can actually enjoy these great games STILL to this day. That's right! on your own PC you can play these old games. You don't even need an old controller however if you still have those rickety old hand cramping devices you can purchase a USB adapter for use with these games. But you can use your keyboard or if you have an Xbox360 controller you can use that as well. Windows update will automatically install the correct drivers for your computer when you plug this controller in.

To start you will need to download the free Stella Atari 2600 emulator from HERE. Or HERE if you have a 64-bit OS running on your computer.

Once downloaded just run the file and follow the simple instructions. After installation you will need some games!

Get the Games!


Remember those old cartridges? Yeah? Well you don't need those anymore. Today the games come in files called ROM's. These ROM's contain the programs that would run on your Atari 2600. Since the games were pretty simple programming they don't take up a lot of space. This was 8-bit computing back then and if you remember the graphics weren't too impressive by today's standards.

You can pretty much Google the name of any game you would like and add the term 'ROM' after it and you'll find the one(s) you want. However many times getting a package of all the games that came out for the 2600 is much more sensible and time-saving. Here is a page where you can download entire packages of the games or you can search for the specific game you would like and download them individually.

Go ahead and plug in any controller(s) you have right now before starting up Stella. (If you don't have one don't worry you can use your Keyboard and/or Mouse.)

Once you have them downloaded (you'll need to unzip any ROM packages you downloaded into a file on your hard drive. However the individual ROM's can stay zipped up) go ahead and start up Stella. It should be in your Start Menu Programs list. Browse to the folder where your ROM's are and double click the game you want to play.

ENJOY!!!! Have fun reminiscing and welcoming back the classic days of gaming! Nostalgia Rulez!

Combat originally shipped with the Atari 2600 so here is a screen-shot of the game loaded on my laptop.

Thanks to the Stella Developers and AtariAge.com for hosting these programs! So fun.

Donations for Bibles and books

Hey there everyone. I was able to strike a deal with Author Frank Viola's Publisher at a deeply discounted price for his books. I'm hoping to raise $1000.00 to purchase multiple Bible's and books in order to hand them out to people I come across. Every penny donated will go to the purchase of Bible's (ESV), Frank's books and other study materials. If you are not familiar with Frank Viola's books please visit his website http://www.ptmin.org/.

I will also be working on striking a deal with Wayne Jacobson as well for copies of his books. More about  him can be found at http://lifestream.org/

I would consider Frank Viola a leader in the push for an organic expression of the church. If you can afford to, please purchase his books directly from his page as he receives a better cut from Amazon.com. My goal is to give these books out to people who appear to be ready to hear Frank's message but are not able or unwilling to go out of their way to purchase these books. I want to remove any excuse people may use to refuse to hear a message that could possibly change their lives forever.

I've put a Paypal donation button up on the top-right of my blog. If you feel inclined, please donate to what I feel is a worthy cause.

Response to Norman Horn...

I recently came across an article shared by a friend of mine on facebook. The article is by a gentleman by the name of Norman Horn. I don't claim any knowledge about this author more than what is written in this article by him. But after reading it this was my gut reaction to his discourse.

Here is the link to his Article.


Norman invites you to comment on this article at LibertarianChristians.com.

I find it amusing that he claims his motives are purely apolitical whilst propagating his agenda through a politicized website. Unfortunately he discredits himself and shows himself to be a wolf in sheep's clothing by posting this where all of his libertarian friends will see it encouraging them to change the hearts and minds to a political viewpoint closer to his own. He claims in the article that it is not a political issue but recognizes that at face value his position is completely political. His article unfortunately comes off as nothing more than a DIY Libertarian propaganda "tract" if you will. He seems to be attempting to sell Libertarianism as a more morally Judeo-Christian ethical political viewpoint. Unfortunately Mr. Horn misses the point. I agree that we should pray for our enemies and for our leaders and especially for our brothers and sisters in Christ. However, he uses terms like "US invasion" a buzzword used to initiate a particular emotion in those who are supporters of the efforts in the Middle East, and "indiscriminate warfare" and "indiscriminate killing". All in effort to show some kind of immoral injustice being propagated by the American Government and the incompetence of the American military.

Also his statement, "..this war – which is now the longest prolonged conflict in American history – ..." is tossed out there without any basis in fact at all. The Vietnam War lasted for 10 years from 65 to 75. But either way it doesn't matter. WWI and WWII and The Revolutionary war are all contenders for the longest conflicts in US History. Again none of this even matters. The length of time is of no added consequence to the calamities that come to those, whom, when the nations of this world make war with each other, suffer. But either way, his claims to keep the issue completely apolitical, when put in context with his overly political nature, unfortunately, proves to be too much for this reader to accept.

As I stated above. I believe with the proper Kingdom mindset the issue can be more easily addressed without having to unnecessarily criminalize a government or unduelly ruffle the feathers of our more politically minded brothers and sisters.

Jesus taught us to pray for our enemies and bless those who persecute us. Turn the other cheek, and pray for our leaders and for those who are suffering in this world especially for persecuted Christians. All these points can be made without even entering into a discussion about the political nature of the current world events. It should be no surprise to us that this world has once again shot itself in the foot. It happens in every generation. Sometimes multiple times. Jesus and His disciples/apostles also taught us to not speak evil of anyone. Nor to judge another man's servant. These principles alone should drive our concern for those trapped in these worldly affairs.

I admire this authors concern for our brothers and sisters conditions, however misguided they may be. I also share in his concerns, perhaps even for similar reasons. And in this I rejoice that the love of Christ is being spread. But I urge every Christian to examine themselves continually, (myself also) that we not find ourselves caught up in this Worlds affairs in a way that will distract us from that Kingdom mindset that will allow us that peace that surpasses all understanding with the love of Christ at the center of our hearts, minds, and souls.

The peace of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all, Forever and Ever. Amen.