Author: Texas Gospel

The Sound Releases Debut Recording with New Day Records Friday

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The Sound

NASHVILLE, TN (NOV 27, 2019) — One of the most highly-anticipated recordings of 2019 is set to be released Friday. The Sound, comprised of singer-songwriters Rob Mills, Levi Mills, and Jacob Mills, is generating the level of excitement for a new family group last seen in Southern Gospel with the arrival of the Booth Brothers.

Make It Count, The Sound’s debut album produced by Scott Godsey for New Day Records (Daywind Music Group), is a musical joyride balanced with soul-searching lyrics that takes the listener on a fantastic journey of encouragement and hope. The group’s first national radio single, “Can I Get a Witness,” has received significant national airplay and charted as a Singing News magazine top new release.

The band is receiving lots of interest from top promoters across the country. Clarke Beasley, executive director of the National Quartet Convention, Southern Gospel’s largest event with nearly 50,000 attendees, is an early adopter, stating, “At NQC 2020, we will be presenting The Sound in a featured set for the first time, and we are excited to be able to showcase the immense talent and versatility of this amazing new trio. We feel certain they have a bright future ahead of them.”

New Day Records’ president, Ed Leonard, shared, “Every once in a great while, a new ‘sound’ emerges in our genre that changes everything. The youthful energy and talent contained in The Sound, ignited by the Mills’ personal passions for their music, strongly indicates a genre-impacting possibility. I am so excited to see what they do and can’t wait for people to experience what we have while working with them.”

Producer Scott Godsey added, “I’ve been fortunate to work with many talented bands, but it’s rare to find such gifted musicians and singers with such passion for their craft. The songs and arrangements on this recording will encourage the listener and bring joy to all who hear this music! I’m excited to see what the future holds for these guys!”

New Day Records is home to The Sound, along with 62nd GrammyÂŽ Award nominee Tim Menzies, Lefevre Quartet, HighRoad, and the Griffith Family. The label is distributed to retail through New Day Christian Distributors and the Orchard, covering all physical, digital, and streaming outlets.

Is it possible my faith isn’t as strong as I thought?

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A self-proclaimed “exvangelical” made a candid social media post questioning why people are surprised that atheism is such a big part of his self-identity.  He said he was never asked why faith in God was an important part of his identity when he identified as Christian. He also wanted to know why Christians found it odd that he would talk about his disbelief so often.  The answers to his questions depend on several things. Is atheism non-belief and nothing else? Is there a premise hidden in the “exvangelical’s” questions of which even he is unaware? Can one discuss his or her faith often without anyone asking questions?

 There are atheists who simply have no belief; that is, to them, atheism is nothing beyond not being convinced that God exists.  This group has no motivation to “prove” God’s non-existence; therefore, they have no position to defend or one they wish to prove wrong.  The “exvangelical’s” question implies he is not among this group of atheists because opposition to belief in God would not an important part of their identity.  There are other non-believers who proselytize for atheism. They make it a point to bring up the topic of disbelief often and even try to get others to abandon their faith. This group goes beyond saying, “I don’t know.”  They take the position there is no God. Would it make sense to say I don’t know if God exists but I oppose belief in Him? The “exvangelical’s” question is based on the idea that non-belief is part of his identity and that he is part of this group.

 God is part of a Christian’s identity by definition.  Christians believe the scripture that says if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: the old one has gone.  Christians accept The Great Commission; the command to tell others about Christ. It should not come as a surprise that someone who believes they are commanded to spread the Gospel would do so. Wouldn’t these things make being a Christian a bigger part of one’s identity than something about which the individual has no belief?

 Consider, I don’t know if life exists anywhere but Earth. While it may exist, I have not seen evidence sufficient for me to form a belief on the matter.  But my non-belief in extraterrestrials is not part of my identity. I don’t go out of my way to find people who believe in ET so I can debate the issue, and I don’t mock those who believe life is out there. I’ll wait for explorers to answer that question before I form a belief.  The point I’m making is this: If a person has a strong belief, it is only natural for it to be a part of his or her identity. If a person has no position to defend, why would it be part of their identity any more than non-belief in exterritorial life? 

 The words on this page should not be taken as a slam of the “exvangelical.” He wrote a very frank description of his experience as an atheist.  If anything, this is a warning to Christians to constantly turn to God for self-understanding. The “exvangelical” has no doubt that he was a committed Christian who has now abandoned his faith.  But do you know any person who regularly talks about his or her faith who hasn’t been questioned about it? How often on social media have you seen someone reference their faith on a public post without an anti-theist chiming up?  Yet the “exvangelical,” who believes he had strong self-identifying faith when he was a Christian says he was seldom questioned. Doesn’t this at least imply he was wrong about his own commitment to Christ?

 The Bible tells us there are those who believe strongly in their own faith.  They will tell God that they prophesied, drove out demons and even worked miracles in God’s name; yet they never had a relationship with God even though they had a very strong false self-image of someone firmly grounded in faith.  The “exvangelical” obviously felt his own Christian faith was so strong others should have taken note, yet the questions he posted are grounded on his observation that no one gave his faith a second thought.  

Isn’t this a good reason for Christians to ask God to help us understand our own motivations and open our eyes to any self-delusion we may have?

Historic California church heavily damaged by fire, cause unknown

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Fire heavily damaged a 140-year-old California church building in Forestville, California.

A spokesperson for Forestville No. 3 Fire District said the fire was prevented from spreading from the building owned by the Forestville Church of Christ.

The Press Democrat reports the church was built in 1879 with old-growth redwood and was a, “piece of local history as well as a religious gathering place.”

The cause of the fire remains unknown.  The Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives are assisting in the investigation.

Does Christianity really cause criminal behavior?

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Only 0.1 percent of U.S. federal inmates are atheists; a much smaller percentage than the country. Doesn’t this mean that religion causes people to be criminal; or at least that criminals tend to be religious?  This question, or some form of it, is often presented by atheist debaters seeking to win a debate rather than arrive at truth. It cites a correlation and asks the non-atheist to draw a conclusion based on very limited information. It plays on the problem of rival causal factors. These are the things a researcher has not considered that could affect the outcome of an experiment or study.  My eyes were opened to this when I took criminal justice research in college.  Data alone may be an indicator, but why it is not proof?

Is it possible that marginally religious people turn to their religion when they get in a pinch?  Is it possible that some atheist inmates will claim religion to gain sympathy? I could go further with this line of questioning, but the point is, outside of assumption or special pleading, one cannot draw the conclusion that the causal factor of criminal behavior is religion without ruling out other probable causes not shown by raw data.  Too, if the atheist debater has drawn this conclusion, it is up to him or her to provide evidence.  It is not true simply because someone else doesn’t have information ready to demonstrate the conclusion to be false.

By the way, if you are rolling your eyes because you are convinced that data alone is enough to draw this kind of conclusion, you might want to check out military intelligence analyst Tyler Vigen’s book Spurious Correlations.  He uses correlating data in a hilarious way to show just how silly it is to draw such conclusions.  For example, he has data to show the number of people who drowned in a pool actually DOES correlate with films featuring Nicolas Cage released in the same year.  He also found that the per capita consumption of margarine correlates with the divorce rate in Maine. Do you really thing the causal agent in these two correlations can be decided without further study to find the real causal agent?

Why do you think some people who are otherwise logically-thinking individuals concerned with numbers and statistics, etc., seem to want to find malice in Christianity, even when it means abandoning very basic concepts of research?

What are your thoughts?

Man upset with Virginia church shelter staff sets building on fire

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A Virginia fire marshal says an arsonist who set a church building on fire this week claims he did it because he was prevented from staying in the church’s shelter with others seeking to escape the freezing conditions. Deputy Fire Marshal Matthew Gearhart said the suspect’s name will not be released until pending charges are filed.

The fire was reported Thursday at the Market Street United Methodist Church.

The church posted on social media that everyone was safe following the fire.

Authorities in Virignia say the man was denied entry because of a history of disrupting shelters.