In an email to Ken Ham, the leader of this homeschool group wrote to us (just after midnight last night) to announce its decision. Sadly, the leader of this group did not personally call Ken or anyone at AiG first, nor did anyone on his board, to make sure they got the full background. Just as a common courtesy, not to speak of biblical guidelines (such as Proverbs 18:13; Matthew 18:15–17; etc.), one would expect that one of its leaders would at least have spoken to us before rescinding our agreement.

We are quoting the entire email so we don’t misrepresent in any way the group’s claimed motivations:

After much prayer and deliberation over the weekend, Great Homeschool Convention's Advisory Board has unanimously decided to disinvite Ken and AIG from all future conventions, including the Cincinnati convention next week. The Board believes this to be the Lord's will for our convention and searched the Scriptures for the mind of the Lord and the leadership of the Holy Spirit before arriving at this decision. The Board believes that Ken's public criticism of the convention itself and other speakers at our convention require him to surrender the spiritual privilege of addressing our homeschool audience.Please know that our Board is 100% young earth and we largely share AIG's perspective from a scientific standpoint. That is why Ken was originally invited and treated so graciously and extremely generously in Memphis and Greenville (far beyond what we do for other speakers or their ministries). Our expression of sacrifice and extraordinary kindness towards Ken and AIG has been returned to us and our attendees with Ken publicly attacking our conventions and other speakers. Our Board believes Ken's comments to be unnecessary, ungodly, and mean-spirited statements that are divisive at best and defamatory at worst.

One of the core values of our convention is that we believe that good people can disagree and still be good people. We believe that Christians do not need to personally question the integrity, the intelligence, or the salvation of other Christians when debating Biblical issues. Ken has obviously felt led to publicly attack our conventions and a number of our speakers. We believe that what Ken has said and done is unChristian and sinful. A number of attendees are demanding explanations from our board and we must respond to them.

We believe that Dr. Ham is very intelligent and deliberate and that he decided that publicly slandering our conventions and defaming a number of our speakers is what he wanted to do. Whereas Ken chooses to conduct himself in a way that we believe to be unscriptural, we cannot countenance that spirit as we believe it would not honor the Savior whom we serve.

A public statement will be prepared for distribution at the convention explaining our Board's decision. Anyone who inquires regarding Dr. Ham or AIG will be referred to that statement. We have no intention to defame or publicly slander Dr. Ham, the Creation Museum, or the work of AIG. Our Board would respectfully request that Dr. Ham and AIG prayerfully consider doing the same. Our Board takes seriously the admonition of Jesus in John 13:35, "By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another.”

Sincerely,

Brennan Dean
Great Homeschool Conventions, Inc.

These are serious accusations. Are we really guilty of “public criticism of the convention itself and other speakers at our convention” that require Ken Ham “to surrender the spiritual privilege of addressing [their] homeschool audience”?

While Ken was highly critical of the compromises and teachings of one of the presenters at a previous convention that was organized by Mr. Dean, he certainly did not question anyone’s intelligence or salvation.

We won’t dwell much into the fact that another speaker, Dr. Jay Wile, made personal attacks on Ken on his blog before the convention, and his attack was supported by two other speakers, John Stonestreet and Susan Wise Bauer. Maybe Mr. Dean has talked with them already.

Ken did write Facebook and blog items sharing his concerns about the teaching of one of the speakers at the homeschool convention—Dr. Peter Enns. For a long time now, Ken has been alerting audiences to what Dr. Enns believes and teaches. Since he was there at the convention to promote a Bible curriculum to homeschoolers, Ken could not in good conscience speak without warning people about him. Also, the conference organizers were aware back in November that we would be talking about the beliefs of BioLogos at upcoming conventions. Because Dr. Enns of BioLogos was speaking at Mr. Dean’s conventions to promote a Bible curriculum to homeschoolers, which we consider very dangerous to the spiritual upbringing of kids, we wanted to make sure that people knew what he believed.

(We will be providing a detailed critique of the Bible curriculum in the near future. For the moment, you should be aware that Dr. Enns makes it clear that sin should not be discussed with young children because it will cause problems with their view of God. He also doesn’t believe in a literal Adam and literal Fall. Yet he sometimes describes Adam and the Fall in a way that he appears to believe in them, but only later do you understand he merely uses these words metaphorically.)

Ken Ham did mention Peter Enns by name in one of his five talks at an earlier South Carolina convention in Greenville organized by Mr. Dean. Ken showed two video clips of Dr. Enns, done in the context of showing how some modern Christian speakers are compromising God’s Word in Genesis. Ken did say that Dr. Enns was also speaking at the conference and had connections to another convention speaker, Susan Wise Bauer. In another talk about a common Christian viewpoint that compromises Genesis, Ken briefly mentioned that one of the speakers at this convention took that view.

You can read for yourself what Ken wrote in his blog and Facebook (by the way, we are not at all ashamed of what we have done to warn Christian families, and we would do it all over again):

• http://blogs.answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2011/03/15/another-compromiser-speaking-at-homeschool-conventions/



• http://blogs.answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2011/03/19/teaching-the-truth-amidst-a-sea-of-lies/

Also, we have written prior blogs posts showing photos of convention resources to warn parents about compromising materials distributed at homeschool conventions:
http://blogs.answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2011/03/20/beware/

Ken’s main Facebook entry is the following: http://www.facebook.com/aigkenham#!/notes/ken-ham/warning-all-homeschoolers/186020768110064

Our Creator and Savior, the Word, the Lord Jesus, certainly confronted compromisers publicly. He taught, “whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were thrown into the sea” (Mark 9:42).

In Jude we read, “Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3).

We at AiG are burdened before the Lord that parents may choose to use the Bible curriculum from Dr. Enns, without being aware of the destructive teachings in it. The church is already losing two-thirds of our young people. Someone needs to stand against the compromise that is pouring into the church from many directions.

Interestingly, the Great Homeschool Convention’s website states the following:

While are Christians – gratefully and unapologetically so – and whereas this helps to guide how we structure the convention, we do not require that an attendee, speaker or exhibitor “affirm” their agreement to our own Statement of Faith. Neither do we require that you PAY to join our organization (we don’t have one) or any other organization in order to receive a discounted admission to the convention. Further, if you elect to PAY to join a homeschooling-related group of some sort that you saw at our convention – – – we do NOT receive commissions on your membership fees.

Similarly – – – whereas we may not schedule a speaker or approve an exhibitor that is specifically “anti-Christian” – – – we do have Speakers and Exhibitors that are not specifically “Christian” but that DO provide knowledge, information and/or curriculum that is applicable and valuable for homeschoolers, both Christian and non-Christian alike. Accordingly, you should note that we do not necessarily endorse everything you may find in the Exhibit Hall or that you may hear in a Seminar or Workshop session.

Because this is an education forum, we do not propose to “filter” everything–allowing you to see or hear only what “we” have approved. We believe that you, as parent educators, are very capable of judging and making intelligent decisions for yourself and for your family. Our conventions are designed to help a broad spectrum of homeschoolers and people considering homeschooling. They are not, however, denominational meetings to formulate unity of belief and practice.

Isn’t a “forum” a place where various competing views have a place to speak their position? Well, despite their rhetoric, it seems that Answers in Genesis has been filtered! Because we publicly exposed one of their speakers and his curriculum because his beliefs clearly undermine the authority of Scripture, we apparently come under the heading of “anti-Christian” in our actions.

In the homeschool board’s email to Ken they stated the following:

We believe that Christians do not need to personally question the integrity, the intelligence, or the salvation of other Christians when debating Biblical issues.

I certainly questioned a person’s stand on Scripture, but I did not question his integrity, intelligence, or salvation. My focus was upon the error of his teaching, not his personal relationship with Jesus Christ or his character. Furthermore, we are unaware of anything said or done at previous a convention that could be viewed as an attack on the conference itself. That certainly was not our intention, and if we attacked the conference or our hosts, we would want to fix that problem. After appearing at two recent conferences now, we note that not one person we have met at the conferences or who has written to us later has suggested we attacked the conference. Instead, what AiG did was to attack ideas—ideas being represented at the conference that are clearly outside the pale of orthodox Christianity. If the conference organizers were sincere in their concern for Christian charity, why did they make no effort to talk to us before unilaterally disinviting AiG? And to confront us first and have some dialogue? Is this really about Christian charity, or something else altogether?

We should also add that many months before Ken spoke, AiG made it quite clear to the leader of this convention that we speak against those who compromise Scripture, including those who might be speaking at his convention. AiG’s CCO, Mark Looy, had a very frank but cordial discussion with Mr. Dean about this BioLogos/Dr. Enns matter in November. Mark took notes during the phone conversation; here are excerpts from his summary:

Since I know Brennan a little, I called him a few weeks ago and told him our deep concerns about BioLogos [being at the convention]—but informed him we will not be pulling out.

He told me that many h.s. conventions are becoming “less Christian”—that they will have vendors there to cater to the secular and even Jewish families that are becoming good-size segments within the h.s. movement . . . . Brennan made it sound as if he might avoid BioLogos in 2012 and beyond, but he did not promise that. I told him that Ken would still mention compromise in the church, and might bring up BioLogos by name in his keynotes, and Brennan replied: “I would expect nothing else from AiG.”

Ken and I decided that we will just live with BioLogos there. At least we can counter their compromise messages with solid teaching from Ken.

We often find today that if we speak against someone’s theological compromise, we are accused of being “un-Christian” or “unloving.” This is a bigger topic for another time, but for the moment let us state that we need to understand what the Bible means by “love.” It does not mean one doesn’t publicly stand against error.

Being kicked out of these conventions is sad, but AiG notes this is not the major issue here. What is troubling is more and more churches have been infiltrated by academics who compromise God’s Word, and many Christians are simply unaware of the danger. This is the saddest part of all: a convention that will attract thousands of parents wanting direction in their choice of materials and information to give their children may be led astray and end up unwittingly undermining the faith of their children—children whom they want to train to serve the Lord.

We at Answers in Genesis are on a crusade—a mission. We continue to move ahead to call the church and culture back to the authority of God’s Word.

It is sad that a speaker and ministry, which stand boldly and uncompromisingly on the authority of God’s Word, are eliminated from a homeschool convention. Yet speakers and exhibitors who obviously undermine the authority of God’s Word are welcomed.

Incidentally, have you ever noticed individuals at BioLogos and elsewhere cry the loudest for what they call tolerance and free speech, but tend to be the most intolerant and censorious of others? The position of Answers in Genesis is that when it comes to biblical truth, there is only one truth, and we are called to be intolerant of all other opposing claims of truth. AiG is, therefore, at least willing to admit our “intolerance” in this area. Those who have joined together in a harmony of accusations against AiG over this homeschool convention incident have one thing in common: a double standard. At the end of the day, they are censors. They claim to want open debate and discussion, but when we engage them in the battle of ideas, they launch invectives and ad hominem arguments, and then seek to exclude AiG from the debate. In our view, there is nothing “Christian” about that.

In the convention’s email to us, it was stated, “Please know that our Board is 100% young earth and we largely share AIG's perspective from a scientific standpoint.” We have made this point over and over again: we recognize that Christians who believe millions of years, evolution, Adam is a metaphor, etc. are undermining the authority of God’s Word. The issue comes down to one of authority.

This sad situation clearly illustrates a massive problem in our churches today about the authority of God’s Word.



Reposted with permission from Aig. You can find the original article HERE.

Read this, in it's entirety, and I challenge you to give me a Biblical argument against it. Leave it in the comments, and I would love to give it a look.

Justin Martyr

Tophet was a small valley south to southwest of Jerusalem which belonged to the sons of Hinnom. Tophet and Gehenna came to be designations of hell because of the terrible things which occurred there.

The wicked, unbelieving Jews of old would come to Tophet to sacrifice their children to the god Molech (Jer. 7:31). At Tophet the idolatrous Jews placed a large, bronze statue of Molech, shaped like a man with outstretched arms and hands. A fire would be built within the statue. When the statue was red hot, the idol-worshipers would place their baby sons and daughters onto the outstretched, red-hot arms and hands. Their little infants would die the most painful, excruciating death imaginable: their skin would be seared off their bodies, their flesh would be roasted; they were burned alive.

The screams, cries and screeches of their own children’s agony was unbearable, even to these wicked, debauched parents. Therefore, drums were played to drown out the hideous screams of the tortured infants. Hence Tophet, in the Hebrew, signifies the beating of drums. Therefore Tophet is a perfect symbol of hell where “God takes His rebellious children, casts them into the fire, [and] puts them into the arms of destruction” forever away from Christ and His saving blood. Will there be drums to drown out your screams when you sink into the flames of hell—you who reject Christ and His gospel? (Brian Schwertly, The Biblical Doctrine of Hell Examined)

Jesus taught that "...as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Mt. 13:40-42)

And again, "They are to be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever” (Rev. 14:10)

Most people would agree that one of most horrible pains a human can experience is being burned alive. But if a person would be burned alive, and never feel the relief of death, it would be a fate worse than we can imagine.

Spiritual Torment

People who will have an eternal existence in hell will realize a few things very quickly. One of the first is that they have been deemed worthless. They are garbage, refuse and without an positive attribute for all eternity. Even the way they will be put into hell tells us of their worth. The greek word we discussed before, βάλλω, gives the connotation that the things being cast or flung, are done so without care as to where they land. It is a flippant, "away with you", and the first spiritual torment will be the realization that there is no hope and there will never again be any hope. "Cast out the worthless slave into the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Matthew 13:40-42

It will also be a place of intense loneliness. No communication. The only sound will be the raging of the fire and the competing screams of agony. There will be no shoulders to lean on. No support groups. Imagine a darkness so dark and so thick that “it may be felt” (Ex. 10:21). Hell is utter darkness. The Bible says it is “black darkness” (Jude 13). The wicked suffer torment in the flames of hell, yet they do so in total, black, terrifying darkness. “Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into the outer darkness, in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Mt. 22:13). In the outer darkness you will be alone with your thoughts. You will have eternity to dwell upon a life wasted serving your own foolish lusts and vanities rather than Jesus Christ.

3. Hell is Eternal

Some heretical teachers are sneaking old false teachings, long known as anti biblical into the Church body that teach that hell is not eternal. They teach it is a place of punishment, and then God will remove the people in it from existence. Rob Bell is in the limelight right now, but there are a few guys who have been teaching these things. Here is an an article that brings this argument: http://www.lamblion.com/articles/articles_eternity3.php

I respond to this article with the following:

Initially we must get out of the way that I do not hold the platonic view that man’s soul is immortal and cannot be annihilated. I believe it cannot be destroyed by secondary causes such as man or disease, but could in theory be annihilated by God. Now it is up to us to determine if it is the intention of God to annihilate the soul of wicked mankind.
First, we look at the true nature of Hell:
We observe from Matthew 25:41, 46 that wicked men will befall the same fate as the Devil and the wicked angels. Hell was created for them, and they will eventually be thrown into it. Wicked mankind, who has not repented of their sins, will meet the same fate because they are children of the Devil.

Since this article does not argue the reality of the torture of Hell, I will not comment on the reality of God’s wrath being poured out on the wicked in Hell. It is clear that he does believe that Hell will be both physically and spiritually painful.

To deal with the erroneous view of conditional immortality, I will issue a response from a few angles.

1. Eternal Punishment (αἰώνιος κόλασις) vs. 46. William Shedd made a good point about this. I will tweak it slightly to shed light on this particular point.
a. Punishment must always include suffering.
b. If suffering is lacking, so is punishment.
c. Ergo, punishment requires consciousness.
d. If consciousness is extinguished, so does the punishment.
e. It is a very curious description that God chooses to inspire- would He be describing annihilation.

“If God by a positive act extinguishes, at death, the remorse of a hardened villain, by extinguishing his self-consciousness, it is a strange use of language to denominate this a punishment.”

2. Either one is annihilated, or one is not. There are no degrees of annihilation. The Bible clearly teaches that there will be degrees of punishment (Matt. 10:15; 11:21-24; 16:27; Luke 12:47-48; John 15:22; Heb. 10:29; Rev. 20:11-15; 22:12)
Rev. 9:6 describes the wicked experiencing the conscious wrath of God and begging the mountains to fall on them, but in vain. As Shedd goes on to say, “The guilty and remorseful have, in all ages, deemed the extinction of consciousness after death to be a blessing; but the advocate of conditional immortality explains it to be a curse...."
The basic idea is that annihilation is not a punishment, it is a blessing. It is a welcome end to the punishment of God haters in Hell. It is possible for one to exist and not be punished, it is not possible to be punished, but not exist. The stance of conditional immortality cannot be reconciled with the scriptures describing punishment.

3. Is αἰώνιος eternal, or just a period of time? What convinces me is that it describes both the end of the righteous and the wicked in Matt. 25. It is impossible to cut short the punishment of the wicked without cutting short the eternal life of the righteous. John Broadus’ commentary on Matthew states it this way: “It will at once be granted, by any unprejudiced and docile mind, that the punishment of the wicked will last as long as the life of the righteous; it is to the last degree improbable that the Great Teacher would have used an expression so inevitably suggesting a great doctrine he did not mean to teach....”

4. This article also confirms that the Bible unquestionably teaches that the Devil and His angels will receive an eternal conscious punishment. If one would read Matt. 25:41-46, you will inevitably come away with the conclusion that the wicked and the Devil will share the same fate--An eternal conscious punishment.

5. A temporary hell is not justice when compared to sinning against an infinitely Holy God. God sees our sin as an infinite transgression against an infinitely perfect and holy law, and the only justice is an eternal punishment suffering under His eternal wrath. So either hell is eternal, or God is not just.

Now a little about what hell is not.

Hell is not eternal separation from God.

The Bible is clear on this issue. Jesus "...is before all things, and in him all things hold together." (Col. 1:17) There is nothing outside of God. Existence, time and space do not exist outside of Him. Even hell is within him. But where heaven will be a place where He pours out His eternal grace and mercy, hell will be a place where he continually pours out His wrath and justice.

"A breath of relief is usually heard when someone declares, “Hell is a symbol for separation from God.” To be separated from God for eternity is no great threat to the impenitent person. The ungodly want nothing more than to be separated from God. Their problem in hell will not be separation from God, it will be the presence of God that will torment them. In hell, God will be present in the fullness of His divine wrath. He will be there to exercise His just punishment of the damned. They will know Him as an all-consuming fire." (R.C. Sproul, On Hell) Johnathan Edwards, preaching on Heaven and Hell said, "Wicked men will hereafter earnestly wish to be turned to nothing and forever cease to be that they may escape the wrath of God."

Hell will not be cruel.

I will let R.C. Sproul speak to this:

No matter how we analyze the concept of hell it often sounds to us as a place of cruel and unusual punishment. If, however, we can take any comfort in the concept of hell, we can take it in the full assurance that there will be no cruelty there. It is impossible for God to be cruel. Cruelty involves inflicting a punishment that is more severe or harsh than the crime. Cruelty in this sense is unjust. God is incapable of inflicting an unjust punishment. The Judge of all the earth will surely do what is right. No innocent person will ever suffer at His hand. (R.C. Sproul, Essential Truths of the Christian Faith)

Now if you are disturbed by my description of Hell, good! I'm on a mission to disturb the comfortable, preach the gospel, and by God's sovereign grace and mercy, save some. Turn to Christ, and you have never to fear the terrors of Hell. But ignore the plain truth of scripture at your peril. I love my fellow man to say that. It is not out of a sense of anger that I talk about Hell. It is a great pain and burden I feel for the lost. If you do not know Christ, open your Bible and read the book of Romans. Read 1John. Then read them again. Find a Bible believing church and ask them to pray with you and beg God to save you. Continue that process until you are saved, or die and spend eternity in Hell.