Murder is Murder - 
Breivik's Actions Should Be Condemned


If you haven't read about Anders Behring Breivik in the last week, you've probably been hiding under a rock. Maybe that rock is a good place to be. Breivik is the Norwegian who is responsible for nearly a hundred (so far) deaths in the Norwegian capitol of Oslo last week. According to Breivik, and his lawyers, this bombing and shooting spree was intended to spark anti-Muslim feeling in Europe. He hates Muslims and what they are, in his estimation, doing to Europe.


I'm not exactly on the Muslim bandwagon, myself. I have seen some of the effects of hardline Islam in European nations. Fanatical Islam is to opposed. That is not, however, a good reason to go around killing people. Right wing murder is no better than left wing murder, or hardcore Muslim murder.


When Muslims blow up innocent civilians, they should be condemned. When anti-abortion activists (I intentionally do not refer to these particular folks as pro-life) blow up abortion clinics or kill abortion-providing doctors, they are wrong. They should be condemned. Likewise, right-wing, anti-Muslim activists should be condemned.


Anders Behring Breivik did not do a good thing in Oslo. He committed an atrocity. He should not be applauded, lauded, or defended. He must be condemned by all people of good conscience - especially by the Christian community.

Lord's Day

I guess as I get older, the Lord's Day becomes even more precious to me. I hate to see people who profess to be believers in Jesus Christ profane His Worship. This morning, in the course of our sermon series on the Book of Genesis, I addressed the creation of the Sabbath and the subsequent change to the Lord's Day. It may be heard here.


Below, is a quote from Rev. John Brown of Haddington an 18th century preacher. Nothing that has happened since the time of Brown has diminished our need for a Christian Sabbath.

Nothing more effectually tends to banish virtue, and introduce all manner of vice into a nation, than the indulged public profanation of the Sabbath. The Christian Sabbath, and all the ordinances to be observed in it, are calculated to promote the knowledge, belief, and impression of the existence, infinity, supreme authority, unbounded wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth of God, and of his future judgment of the world, and the infinitely important and everlasting consequences of it. Such views, belief, and impressions are the most powerful determents from vice, and excitements to virtue of every kind. By a cordial and spiritual sanctification of the Sabbath, we enjoy familiar fellowship with Christ, and his Father, and Spirit; and receive out of his fulness grace, which effectually teacheth, and enableth us to deny ungodliness and worldly lust, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present sinful world, Tit. 22:11-13.

Grab hold, friends of this great gift which God has bestowed upon us, a day of rest and gladness.