Stay Close to the Source by T. L. Wiens

How many of you have read something and thought this is a very interesting theology? Sometimes I’ve read things and thought, wow, someone else sees the same thing in scripture that I see. Then I continue to read and find there it is, the false teaching that so many times contradicts the very thing the author has set out to point out to other believers.

Why does this happen so often? It discredits everything—the truth is lost. And I live in fear of being that author. How do we avoid something that seems like a very basic human weakness? The Bible.

We all need to study our Bibles, not with a devotional manual but with the Holy Spirit guiding us. Sometimes this means putting down a lot of preconceived notions put there by our own thoughts on issues, church background and denominational lines. This is not easy but must be done to make sure we’re not sabotaging our own faith. We all want to honour Jesus Christ in the words we write. The only way to do that is by making sure we know His Word first.

2 Timothy 2:15 “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”

Does God Love the Blind? - Bruce Atchison

Attending church has always been a problem for millions of blind and visually-impaired folks. For us, the hymn books and Bibles are unreadable, the overhead projector is hard to see or invisable, and the bulletins may as well be blank sheets of paper.

In most congregations, this is an unintentional oversight. The Lutheran Blind Mission does produce braille and large print worship materials but the majority of churches are unprepared for blind congregants. Worse yet, some denominations either don't explain why God doesn't perform miracles today or they blame the poor disabled soul for not receiving healing after being prayed for by the elders. I've experienced both forms of cruelty.

In Deliverance From Jericho (Six Years in a Blind School), I wrote of the first sort when I was forced to attend an Anglican church. Though I now know the truth, here's how the lack of teaching on verses such as John 9:3 left my blind friends and me to conclude in May of 1968 that God didn't care about us.

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Church began to seem futile and irrelevant to me around that time. I dreaded going and wished we could stay at the dorm on Sunday. All those stories concerning Christ and the Old Testament characters appeared to be as germane as fairy tails. After one service, we were sitting on our beds in the dorm when Peter said, "I wonder why God doesn't heal people anymore." "Yeah, I wonder about that too," Michael added. "I wish God would heal us. We could get out of this horrible place and be free," I added. "God sure doesn't care about us," Peter noted. "If he did, he'd heal us." Our theological discussion left us in deep thought. "I hate God," I concluded after a long pause. "He doesn't want to help us." In the stunned silence which followed my remark, I began to doubt that the Lord was even listening.

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In my next memoir, entitled How I Was Razed, I describe how nobody from the Vacation Bible School taught me the basics of Christianity when I gave my life to Jesus in 1969. As a result, I was lead into a cult congregation and believed their hurtful lies for more than 15 years. After rejecting God for nearly a decade, I realized it wasn't his fault that phony Christians mislead me to think I could be healed by willing my sight to get better.

If all goes well, this book should be in print by the end of the year. Meanwhile, information about my previous titles is at the InScribe Writers Group page.