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Defunding Planned Parenthood, Defending Women, and Casting Lots
Talk of defunding Planned Parenthood, the ban on men entering women’s bathrooms at the US Capitol, John Calvin’s magnum opus, the biblical origin of the Jewish holiday Purim, and much more.
It's Saturday, November 23, 2024.
Today’s edition covers talk of defunding Planned Parenthood, the ban on men entering women’s bathrooms at the US Capitol, John Calvin’s magnum opus, the biblical origin of the Jewish holiday Purim, and much more.
“[B]y knowledge the rooms are filled with all precious and pleasant riches.” (Proverbs 24:4)
Of Christian Concern
MUSK AND RAMASWAMY SUGGEST THEY WILL DEFUND PLANNED PARENTHOOD
Screenshot: Headline of Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy’s Wednesday op-ed. (Wall Street Journal)
Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the leaders of Donald Trump’s newly formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), co-wrote an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, laying out their plan to reform government spending. One of their many suggestions is to cut the “nearly $300 million to progressive groups like Planned Parenthood.”
Pro-lifers like LifeNews celebrated this development, while some abortion abolitionists like Abolitionists Rising expressed skepticism and suggested that defunding the leading abortion provider is a distraction from establishing justice. Rather than “defund” Planned Parenthood, the anti-abortion group says, we should “prosecute” Planned Parenthood.
We should defund Planned Parenthood.
But that is not even close to the bare minimum of what the state should do with abortion.
We should establish equal protection of the laws for preborn babies and prosecute anyone who willfully murders a child in the womb.”
MIKE JOHNSON BANS MEN FROM WOMEN’S BATHROOMS IN THE US CAPITOL
Screenshot of Rep. Mike Johnson at the press conference on Tuesday. (C-SPAN)
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, when asked on Tuesday whether Congress’s first trans-identifying representative-elect Sarah McBride is a man or a woman, refused to answer but acknowledged “a concern about uses of restroom facilities…” Later that day, he called an extra press conference to clarify the statement, saying more directly, “A man is a man, and a woman is a woman, and a man cannot become a woman.”
Reportedly, Johnson had already told the GOP conference that transgender women would not be allowed to use the women’s bathrooms in the Capitol. McBride said he would adhere to the rule, stating, “I’m not here to fight about bathrooms.”
These developments come as Rep. Nancy Mace promises to file a bill “that would ban biological men from women’s spaces on all federal property all across the country.”
Cultural commentator Matt Walsh suggests the bathroom ban, McBride’s concession, and the recent “unvarnished language” of the Republicans on this issue show an irreversible shift toward “sanity.”
RELATED: Have you ever heard this banger of a song from Mr. Rogers? “If you were born a boy, you stay a boy…”
Also Noteworthy
Screenshot of Tim Pool on Michael Knowles’s show YES or NO. (Michael Knowles / YouTube)
→ Popular podcaster Tim Pool (not a Christian), in a recent appearance on conservative commentator Michael Knowles’s show YES or NO, explained how the 14th Amendment requires life to be protected from conception. His thesis: abortion will inevitably be banned nationwide, eventually.
→ Patreon de-platformed Christian content creator Joshua Haymes’ podcast Reformation Red Pill. Haymes reported on X, “Today I Was CANCELLED For Being Too Christian!”
→ Controversial pastor and sociologist Tony Campolo died at 89 on Tuesday. Some sermon clips resurfaced in the wake of his passing, including one where he tells the story of throwing a birthday party for a prostitute in Honolulu and another where he tells the story of a boy with cerebral palsy who was bullied at junior high camp. Despite his giftedness as a speaker, Campolo held liberal theological positions for which he was labeled “a dangerous false teacher,” as detailed in the 2013 article “Beware of Tony Campolo.”
→ An ancient mosaic with the earliest “Jesus is God” inscription ever found is now on display at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC. The 1,800-year-old artifact was discovered in 2005 beneath the Meggido Prison in Israel. The CEO of the museum, Carlos Campo, called it “the greatest discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls,” saying it confirms that Christians believed in the divinity of Jesus from the beginning. The mosaic will conclude its exhibition at the museum in July 2025 before returning to its permanent display in Israel. Learn more here.
→ An ongoing controversy, principally between pastors Joel Webbon (Georgetown, Texas) and Tobias Riemenschneider (Oberursel, Germany), continued this week with the publication of the Antioch Declaration, “A Statement On Racial Ideologies Threatening The Church.” Some viewed the release of this statement, supported by several prominent pastors, as an attempt to stoke further division rather than seek reconciliation. Critics say, among other things, that the declaration’s language is convoluted and simplistic. Podcaster Jon Harris explains the background and reacts to the statement here.
Content Catch-Up
Recent, notable content of Christian interest.*
ATTENTION: Last week’s edition of Project 18:15 was missing the link to the trailer for Christian author Jack Richardson IV’s new podcast, Jack’s Corner. Here is that link.
→ Jack’s Corner: Now, the first episode is out. Richardson talks about Trump's victory, his appointment picks, an example of DEI in Kentucky, and more. (YouTube / Apple Podcasts)
→ The Moral Dilemma: A new documentary film featuring Mark Spence of Living Waters and Jon Speed of By The Word Baptist Church tackles the issue of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) from a Christian perspective—largely through man-on-the-street interviews. (Film)
*Not necessarily an endorsement
Church History Tidbit
Calvin’s Institutes
Portrait of John Calvin by an unknown artist (c. 1550) and title page of a 1559 edition of John Calvin's Institute of the Christian Religion. (Public Domain)
“Probably no book in the history of the Protestant churches has been more influential than Calvin’s Institutes,” according to the Christian History Institute.
John Calvin (1509-1564) was France’s greatest reformer during the Protestant Reformation, and Institutes of the Christian Religion (1536) was his masterpiece. The book systematizes God’s revelation about Himself and us. It is divided into four parts:
Book One—what we know of God through creation and the Bible
Book Two—what we know of Christ, our sin, and salvation
Book Three—our reception of salvation through justification by faith and predestination
Book Four—the church and the two sacraments
Calvin’s teaching, clear and convincing to many Protestants in the sixteenth century, centered on the sovereignty of God. This sovereignty, as the Christian History Institute describes, “means that nothing is left to chance or human free will. This is what led [Calvin] to put such emphasis on the doctrine of predestination — the idea that God, not we, decides whether we will be saved.”
Read the Institutes in full here.
The Bible, Briefly
The Pur of “Purim”
Haman Begging the Mercy of Esther, 1618, by Pieter Lastman, depicts the moments before Haman was executed for his attempt to commit genocide of the Jewish people. (Public Domain)
”In the first month, which is the month of Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur (that is, they cast lots) before Haman day after day; and they cast it month after month till the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar.” (Esther 3:7)
“For Haman the Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews to destroy them, and had cast Pur (that is, cast lots), to crush and to destroy them. . . . Therefore they called these days Purim, after the term Pur.” (Esther 9:24, 26a)
Many Christians are none too aware of most Jewish holidays, despite the majority of them having their origin in the Bible. One such holiday is Purim, whose observance the law of Moses does not command but whose origin the book of Esther describes.
The word “Purim” is the plural form of the Assyrian word “pur,” meaning “lot,” as in casting lots. “Casting lots,” 2BeLikeChrist explains,
was a form of random selection. A modern equivalent might be flipping a coin, drawing straws, or rolling dice. Our modern word LOTtery has its foundation in this ancient practice. Curiously, the Bible never describes the method or instruments used to make the selection. The Bible's use of "casting lots" is probably a general term used to refer to any form of unbiased random selection.
The Ancient Greek writers Sophocles and Homer described a method of the practice with greater detail, portraying “lots” as pieces of clay marked for each option and placed into a container. The container was shaken until the first piece popped out, making the selection. Biblical instances may have been similar.
In the case of the events commemorated by Purim, it was the Assyrian official Haman who cast lots. Why? The Ryrie ESV Study Bible explains: “Haman, being very superstitious, cast the lot in order to determine the most propitious time for carrying out his plot against the Jews” (p. 683). Haman may have thought he was seeking divine guidance from Assyrian gods.
However, the study Bible adds, “The lot fell on the twelfth month (Feb.-Mar.), which not only gave Haman time to prepare but also, in the overruling providence of God, gave the Jews time to thwart his plan.”
This fact calls to mind another verse: “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord” (Proverbs 16:33). While Haman may have been seeking an answer from false gods, the answer he received was from the one true God, the God of Israel, who chose the lot most suitable to deliver His people.
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