Is there a war brewing at the North Pole over a controversial decision by a not-so-jolly St. Nick? The following comes from reputable news sources:
No more cognac, Rolex watches, cigarettes, artwork, expensive cars, Harley Davidson motorcycles or even personal watercraft, such as Jet Skis. Afraid that people have forgotten the true meaning of Christmas, Santa decides to skip a year of delivering presents.
"I just couldn't believe it," said Walker, 59, who lives in a wood-frame home near Riverdale. "I couldn't believe it. It's something I guess wouldn't happen in 100 years," she said
As dusk fell, usually bustling streets quickly emptied as rumors flew that rebels might arrive within hours. Government troops set up roadblocks, about six miles from the capital, and were searching cars and fighting-age men. "Hundreds of armed men, many in military uniforms and some in civilian clothes, on horses, camels and in several trucks and Toyota Land Cruisers, attacked the civilian population," said Praveen Randhawa, a spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.
President Trump lashed out Tuesday morning at FBI Director Christopher A. Wray. Trump said it showed an attempted overthrow of the government.
The good news is that this isn’t really the news. Oh, every sentence came from a reputable major newspaper’s web site and is presumed true. But the sentences are yanked from a variety of articles and pieced together in a way that none of the writers ever intended and used to suggest something that is not true.
The bad news is that this is often done with words from the Bible. We take sentences from Scripture and string them together to “prove” our point without regard for the words’ original intent or context.
The result is confusion, conflict, and disillusionment. Some abandon hope that the Bible can ever really be understood. God, however, believes that it can be understood; that’s why he gave the Bible to us. As the apostle Paul said, “For we do not write you anything you cannot read or understand” (2 Corinthians 1:13).
The key is to read the Bible like we read the newspaper (or anything else): to pay attention to the context and the original intent of the author. If we will do that, we can understand the Bible and even agree on what it says.
Now, that would be big news!