Category: Purity

Israel disobeyed God after the destruction of Jericho, as Achan took of the accursed things. Israel’s defeat at the hands of the small city of Ai teaches us that God’s acceptance is contingent upon our righteousness and obedience. There are lessons to be learned from this text (Joshua 7).

Sermon PowerPoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

Sermon Title: Lot – How to Make a Terrible Decision

This sermon by Heath Rogers establishes that bad influences (in this case the men of Sodom) can corrupt our thinking and judgment to the point that we make bad decisions. Great lesson for young people.

Sermon PowerPoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

AUSTIN – Forget education reform and taxes. On Tuesday, the Texas House turned its attention to a measure dubbed “the booty bill,” voting to crack down on cheerleaders who perform sexually suggestive routines at school-sponsored events.

The legislation, which passed 65-56, would give the state and school districts more power to shut down or punish drill teams, dance squads, cheerleaders or “any other performance group” that perform ribald acts.

Many members chortled, joked and jovially waved blue and white pompoms during the debate, but the bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Al Edwards of Houston, said the legislation is no laughing matter.

“Girls can get out and do these overtly sexual performances and we applaud them. And that’s not right,” said Edwards, an ordained minister. “This is the beginning of an era to change some of what we’ve been seeing.”

Though Edwards is a Democrat, most in his party opposed the bill while most Republicans voted in favor.

Opponents said the bill has already made Texas a national laughingstock, can’t be enforced and gives the state a power that should be reserved exclusively for local school districts&ldots;

…State Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, said the bill was embarrassing and insulting, particularly as more pressing issues — like a major overhaul of the state’s school finance system — await consideration.

“We can’t legislate morality,” Thompson said. “I don’t know how this bill got to the floor. It’s stupid!”

The measure, which would still have to pass the Senate and be signed by the governor to become law, would allow the Texas Education Agency to require that school districts review possibly lewd performances.

If the school district determined that the act was conducted in an “overtly sexually suggestive manner,” they would have to take unspecified “appropriate action” against the performers and the performers’ sponsor.

Will Harrell, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, said the legislation was too vague, petty and “patently unconstitutional.”

“This broad, morally restrictive legislation reminds me of the Taliban,” Harrell said, referring to the former hard-line regime in Afghanistan. “Why not go all the way? Why not require them all to wear a burka?”

Ft. Worth Star Telegram
Jay Root

Analysis:

I purposefully printed most of the article, as it speaks for itself. While I will not comment on the wisdom of the legislation itself, the present attitudes toward what is obviously lasciviousness is interesting:

• The view that we can’t legislate morality is obviously not so. Laws against murder, for example, do just that.

• We live in a society in which many think that any limitation of prurient activity is tantamount to fascism.

• The world recognizes that the routines and dress of cheerleaders are sexually suggestive. Why is it that so many Christian parents still allow their daughters to participate?

A teacher was trying to teach his twelve male students the importance of respecting women. To illustrate his point, he brought 13 roses to class, took one out of the bunch and gave it to the boys to handle each in turn. He asked them to touch it and feel the softness, and admire the beauty of the rose. After all had handled the flower, he returned it to the bunch, and told the boys they each could have one flower. Each in turn came forward, and took a single rose. They each took a rose which had not been handled. No one wanted the rose all had touched, handled, and admired. It had been soiled, and was no longer the pristine, beautiful blossom it had been. The lesson was obvious, and forceful. Continue reading “Young Ladies, Keep Yourself Pure” →

The apostle Paul apparently felt that sexual sin was a constant threat to the welfare of Christians in the first century. He continually warned about it, writing such things as, “Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body” (1 Corinthians 6:18); and “Nor let us commit sexual immorality…” (1 Corinthians 10:8).

Continue reading “A Plea for Purity” →