Michael Bresciani
Internet or the heart - - which is the land of shadows?
By Michael Bresciani
O'Reilly Factor contributors McGuirk and Gutfeld discussed everything from Obama's gun proposals to Notre Dame's Manti Te'o on Friday January 18, 2013. No one is happy with Lance Armstrong, Obama or the football superstar, but it was the viewer emails that stole the spotlight.
A Pastor from Duncan, Washington said, "Bill, great Talking Points Memo; do not let the machines take over your lives. I have preached on this very thing. Evil flourishes in the shadows. The Internet is full of shadows."
Speaking with less foreboding, George Alexander from Sydney Australia exclaimed, "The Internet is not a machine. It's a means of communication. A rather bizarre Talking Points. What's tomorrow? Fear of the telephone?"
No one could deny that the internet is a land of shadows filled with scams, conspiracies, nonsense, porn, and drivel. But then we are reminded that most of the nation's major newspapers now have online editions and when all else fails sometimes the only way to get an unbiased story is to search the web. Comparisons can be made quickly, and liberal media cannot hold out their biases for very long because of the instant cross references provided by the internet.
Today there is an ample supply of shadowed lands including the White House. Canada Free Press contributor Erik Rush said in an article entitled "The Darkest Design of Barack Obama," "Obama's definitely high on power...As the press continues to maintain the illusion that Obama is simply another American trying to do the right thing, he has been involved in the darkest machinations, some as yet incomprehensible to the average American."
Shadowed areas are not limited to the secular regions of the public alone. In the realms of Christianity and the church there is a growing apostasy that is besmirching the call of the simple gospel with a new theology that makes a caricature of Christ and clowns of his followers.
The Salon website recently featured an article on evangelist Creflo Dollar's powerful influence on the black churches to adopt the so called "prosperity gospel," even as some more traditional black ministers are calling him "Cash-flow Dollar." It isn't that Salon is wrongfully mocking the prosperity gospel without foundation, it is rather the idea that God wants us all to "drive a Bentley," that Salon and anyone with half a brain is cringing from. This is, to many believers and unbelievers alike, darkness standing right out in the middle of a blinding public spotlight.
It is far more honest to say that the ever increasing state of reprobation that is overtaking the minds of modern man are causing them all to be living, and acting out the course of their entire lives in a land of deepening shadows. It isn't the internet or the apostate church that has drawn them in, but the condition, the pre-disposition and the desires of their own hearts that have lured them into the shadows.
Bill O'Reilly's assertion that the internet is responsible for things like football heroes with imaginary girlfriends, and most of the bizarre behaviors of the day, falls seriously short of the truth. Even after a generation long push by the atheists', academics, the media and the liberals to remove the consciousness of God from virtually everyone, the honest answer still lies much closer to home.
From the realm of the eternal comes a single line of scriptures from one declared to be the wisest man to have ever lived, with the exception of Christ himself.
Solomon said, "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life." (Pr 4: 23)
That some hearts are filled with the illuminating presence of God's Holy Spirit is alone the reason that nothing offered in the media, the internet, or the world at large can draw them into the land of shadows.
For those without God – all bets are off.
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings." (Jer 17: 9-10)
The deceitfulness of a man's heart is always much closer than the internet.
This article was first published in American Thinker
© Michael Bresciani
January 23, 2013
O'Reilly Factor contributors McGuirk and Gutfeld discussed everything from Obama's gun proposals to Notre Dame's Manti Te'o on Friday January 18, 2013. No one is happy with Lance Armstrong, Obama or the football superstar, but it was the viewer emails that stole the spotlight.
A Pastor from Duncan, Washington said, "Bill, great Talking Points Memo; do not let the machines take over your lives. I have preached on this very thing. Evil flourishes in the shadows. The Internet is full of shadows."
Speaking with less foreboding, George Alexander from Sydney Australia exclaimed, "The Internet is not a machine. It's a means of communication. A rather bizarre Talking Points. What's tomorrow? Fear of the telephone?"
No one could deny that the internet is a land of shadows filled with scams, conspiracies, nonsense, porn, and drivel. But then we are reminded that most of the nation's major newspapers now have online editions and when all else fails sometimes the only way to get an unbiased story is to search the web. Comparisons can be made quickly, and liberal media cannot hold out their biases for very long because of the instant cross references provided by the internet.
Today there is an ample supply of shadowed lands including the White House. Canada Free Press contributor Erik Rush said in an article entitled "The Darkest Design of Barack Obama," "Obama's definitely high on power...As the press continues to maintain the illusion that Obama is simply another American trying to do the right thing, he has been involved in the darkest machinations, some as yet incomprehensible to the average American."
Shadowed areas are not limited to the secular regions of the public alone. In the realms of Christianity and the church there is a growing apostasy that is besmirching the call of the simple gospel with a new theology that makes a caricature of Christ and clowns of his followers.
The Salon website recently featured an article on evangelist Creflo Dollar's powerful influence on the black churches to adopt the so called "prosperity gospel," even as some more traditional black ministers are calling him "Cash-flow Dollar." It isn't that Salon is wrongfully mocking the prosperity gospel without foundation, it is rather the idea that God wants us all to "drive a Bentley," that Salon and anyone with half a brain is cringing from. This is, to many believers and unbelievers alike, darkness standing right out in the middle of a blinding public spotlight.
It is far more honest to say that the ever increasing state of reprobation that is overtaking the minds of modern man are causing them all to be living, and acting out the course of their entire lives in a land of deepening shadows. It isn't the internet or the apostate church that has drawn them in, but the condition, the pre-disposition and the desires of their own hearts that have lured them into the shadows.
Bill O'Reilly's assertion that the internet is responsible for things like football heroes with imaginary girlfriends, and most of the bizarre behaviors of the day, falls seriously short of the truth. Even after a generation long push by the atheists', academics, the media and the liberals to remove the consciousness of God from virtually everyone, the honest answer still lies much closer to home.
From the realm of the eternal comes a single line of scriptures from one declared to be the wisest man to have ever lived, with the exception of Christ himself.
Solomon said, "Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life." (Pr 4: 23)
That some hearts are filled with the illuminating presence of God's Holy Spirit is alone the reason that nothing offered in the media, the internet, or the world at large can draw them into the land of shadows.
For those without God – all bets are off.
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings." (Jer 17: 9-10)
The deceitfulness of a man's heart is always much closer than the internet.
This article was first published in American Thinker
© Michael Bresciani
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