Friday, August 11th, in the year of our Lord 2017
By Kevin Swanson
North Korea Announces Plan to Launch Missiles Toward Guam
North Korea has announced its plan to launch four missiles towards Guam sometime this week. According to the North Korea TV News, the missiles will touch down 30 to 40 kilometers from the island.
China Complains About US Navy Ship in South China Sea
China has expressed some disagreement over a United States Navy ship that sailed within twelve miles of a man-made island in the South China Sea, according to a Reuters report.
Survey Indicates Only 8 Percent of Millennials Appreciate the Bill of Rights
Only 8% of American millennials appreciate the Bill of Rights, down from 22% for the Baby Boomer Generation. That’s according to a new survey from Barna Research.
Only 2% of Christian evangelicals registered appreciation for the Bill of Rights, but 53% said they appreciate freedom of religion.
Los Angeles Pastor Plays Obscene Songs in Worship Service
A Missionary Baptist Church pastor in Los Angeles is standing by his decision to play Jay-Z songs during the worship service, complete with obscene words denoting rape and excrement.
The dance performances to the Jay-Z songs have received millions of downloads on YouTube.
Pastor Who Resigned After Alleged Affair Is Approved to Return
The Christian Post reports that the senior pastor of Potter’s Church in Denver has been approved for returning to his post by his mentor T.D. Jakes. This comes three months after Pastor Chris Hill resigned from the Potter’s Church for an alleged affair with a married woman in the church.
1 Peter 4:17 says “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begins with us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?”
One of the Seventy Mormon Bishops Excommunicated
The Mormons have excommunicated a leading bishop, a member of the seventy elders that rule their organization.
No reason has been given except that the excommunicant, James Hamula, is not accused of apostasy. More likely it was a moral failure.
Washington State Pushes Gender Ideology in K-12 Health Education
All Washington state K-12 schools will be subject to new health learning standards as the schools open for the 2017-2018 school year.
According to the new standards, kindergarten children must be able to understand the many ways to express gender and second graders must understand the range of gender roles and expression. Fourth graders must be able to define sexual orientation.
Disney Promotes Homosexuality to Children
And now, Disney is targeting younger children, pre-school children, with pro-homosexual content.
The August 5th episode of Doc McStuffins featured two lesbians or two women living together while in a state of unnatural relations.
In addition, four months ago, Disney introduced the first homosexual act on a Disney cartoon program targeting young teens.
Ezekiel 16:20-23 says, “You took your sons and your daughters, whom you had borne to me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. . . Was your prostitution or whorings so small a matter that you slaughtered my children and delivered them up as an offering by fire to them?. . . (Woe, woe to you! declares the Lord God).”
Special Report on Original Christian Entertainment After the Newscast
Thankfully, in the midst of all of this depressing cultural news, I have a Special Report immediately following today’s newscast which will warm your heart and encourage you.
Christians are seizing the day for Christ in the world of television and film, not only in the genre of drama, but in stand-up comedy, sitcoms, and, imagine this, a soap opera. Stay tuned.
Tim Tebow Hits Home Run After Shaking Hands with Boy with Autism
Finally, one young fan gave Christian baseball player Tim Tebow the magic touch to help him hit another minor league home run, reports the New York Post.
While playing in the St. Lucie Mets’ game against the Charlotte Stone Crabs on July 29, Tebow was standing in the on-deck circle getting ready for his at-bat when he decided to go over to the stands and greet an eager young fan.
The young fan, Seth Bosch, who has high-functioning autism, made his way down to the front row of the stands, reached through the protective netting and received a handshake from the former Florida quarterback. After shaking hands with Tebow, Bosch turned around to face his mom, who was filming the encounter, and raised his arm triumphantly.
His mother, Ileanna Bosch, said, “When Seth came back to his seat, he was crying,” according to the Tampa Bay Times. Clearly, they were tears of joy.
The mother, who filmed the entire encounter, predicted on camera that Tebow would now hit a homerun.
And that’s exactly what happened. After meeting Seth, Tebow stepped up to the plate and blasted a three-run homer. Check out the touching video link in our transcript at www.TheWorldView.com.
Ileanna said, “I started crying too. How does that happen? I think God brought Seth and Tim together.”
Special Report: PureFlix.com, Christian alternative to NetFlix
Time now for a Special Report. I’m Adam McManus.
By Adam McManus
“The average U.S. adult spends more than 11 hours a day in media; it’s a crazy amount of time!”
Those are the words of Greg Gudorf, the CEO of www.PureFlix.com, a Christian streaming video-on-demand service, in an exclusive interview with The World View.
“The press has called us a NetFlix for Christians. So that tells you that we have a little bit of a different worldview right away.”
In an article this spring, The New York Times headline declared, “Forget NetFlix and chill, Think PureFlix and Pray.” Apparently, according to the Times, 250,000 PureFlix.com subscribers are taking that advice.
“What we are aiming to do is to make sure that at least some of that — the time they spend with PureFlix — is feeding positive and uplifting, as opposed to the raw sex and violence and language that the typical shows serve up nowadays.”
For two years now, PureFlix.com has produced seven original series to meet the seemingly insatiable appetite with wholesome programming.
“What drove us to do it was a desire to bring the absolute best we could in content from sources that we license – movies, TV shows, shorts – everything from dramas to action to kids’ animation. And, in the process, we saw what we thought were a couple of gaps that PureFlix could uniquely fill.”
Unlike NetFlix, which has been featuring original programming for four years, PureFlix guarantees that there will never be any bad language, sex, or violence.
“Our tag line is ‘No language, sex, or violence surprises’. NetFlix today, with the original, it’s almost always a sex, language, or violence surprise. We go the opposite way with that regard. Our focus is on bringing the good, the uplifting, the powerful to the screen.
“The first series that we brought out late last year was a series called ‘The Encounter’ with Bruce Marchiano as Jesus. It’s 10 episodes of everyday encounters. One of the people in the encounter is Jesus. People in the encounter are struggling with something which we all struggle with and here’s a word of wisdom which resolves the show. It’s proven to be very popular with our viewers.
“You go to your favorite diner/dive for breakfast, you’re sitting there with a friend talking about an issue. The waiter turn out to be Jesus and just hears these little snippets of conversation and, as he hands you a cup of coffee that you’re getting refilled, and He says something profound and – boom – you get resolution.”
Gudorf explained that “the popularity and success of ‘The Encounter’ series was the driving force for us to expand our original content lineup. It gave us the confidence to keep on developing new original series and programs.”
Another big success was “Pure Flix Comedy All-Stars”.
“In December we produced and then brought to the platform in June this year, an all-star comedy series. We had Sinbad host a night, Jeff Allen hosted a night, Louie Anderson hosted a night – all clean comedy. Each of those three guys had a host of up-and-coming comics who they brought to the stage. That proved to be very popular as we introduced it through most Fridays in June.”
Pure Flix even released a talk show covering Christian issues and trends called “Pure Talk”.
“Most recently, just 10 days ago, we brought a sitcom called ‘Hitting the Breaks’, a family sitcom, kind of a little bit like Bob Newhart and the inn-type show from way back, if you’ll recall.”
It’s a sitcom about a former racecar driver, portrayed by David A.R. White, the PureFlix founder, who relocates his family to Colorado to run a country inn in a town full of colorful characters. It also stars Andrea Logan White, Gianna Simone, and Kevin Downes. Plus, Tim Tebow, Rob Schneider, and Carrot Top all make guest appearances. Each of the 10 episodes concludes with a prayer provided by award-winning actor Burt Reynolds.
“Based on the way consumers have reacted so far, we think we’re on to something here.”
And get this, the first Christian soap opera from PureFlix.com debuts this fall.
“We’ve got a soap opera, or as a friend of mine says, a ‘hope’ opera.”
“Hilton Head Island” is currently in production and features such stars as Antonio Sabato Jr., Donna Mills, and Wink Martindale in a 22-episode family-focused dramatic series.
Plus, another sitcom named “Malibu Dan” will hit this fall. Also starring David White, this 12-episode comedic series tells the story of a co-host of a morning talk show in Malibu, California who struggles to find a balance between his work and his home life.
Greg Gudorf, the CEO of PureFlix.com, concluded by saying, “There’s clearly an appetite for original content in the streaming video world and we decided it was a hunger we needed to feed. Our efforts paid off; our growing subscriber base gravitates toward original series that are new, fresh and can only be seen on our platform.”
2 Corinthians 10:5 challenges the believer to “take captive every thought, to make it obedient to Christ.”
PureFlix.com is helping the body of Christ do just that through film.
This has been a Special Report. I’m Adam McManus.
And that’s the World View in Five Minutes.
What kind of worldview do your children get? The vast majority of teens from Christian families are abandoning a biblical worldview, according to the Barna Group. Sadly, many parents do not realize that the curriculum they have chosen for their children actually conveys the wrong worldview of history, science, life’s purpose, and truth. Pass on the faith to your children with a distinctively Christian education.
Check out our Christian discipleship curriculum at https://store.generations.org/collections/curriculum.