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"Only the facts, Ma'am!"

By Carl Shank • March 22, 2025
"Only the facts. Ma'am!" I recall that phrase said over and over again on TV as a kid watching the old TV series, "Dragnet." Dragnet was an American crime drama television series starring Jack Webb and Harry Morgan which ran for four seasons, from January 12, 1967, to April 16, 1970. This very famous and dour saying was Jack Webb's cryptic remark to interviewed witnesses of a crime. He did not want superfluous or extraneous or personal opinions to cloud the real "facts" of the crime or situation at hand. A current public radio program claims that they are following "only the facts," that they report only factual events as they really took place. They claim to be free of bias and not "progressively oriented" in their reporting. Consequently, a recent show on abortion offered the scientific "fact" of an unborn baby, or fetus, achieving "life status" at so many weeks of gestation. This was said in response to a conservative caller who phoned in citing other "evidence," including the Bible's take on conception, as the beginning of life. The public radio station claimed that the caller was wrong and cited "scientific facts" about the "real" beginning of life. This is an instance and example of what modern society, especially anti-Christian society, considers as "factual" and therefore worth reporting and worth our time. There are actually three problems with what are called "facts" today even when claiming to be fair and unbiased. The definition of what is "factual" has shifted, first of all, over time and history. Hillsdale College publishes speeches in a format called "Imprimis" ( https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/ ) This very conservative institution offers excellent and gifted speakers who go against the tide of "progressivism" in the country. While they and their invited speakers are often dismissed and ignored by most public and social media today, they offer another look at American culture that is Constitutionally based. One of those speakers noted that in the court system today, progressive constitutional thinking has replaced and overtaken original constitutional mandates. This can actually be traced in the history of the court system. "Facts" seen as such years ago are now replaced by "real" facts, modern facts, today's facts. This is part of the problem of a public radio station purporting to only report the "facts" of a situation today. In the second place, reporters and journalists today have been schooled and educated by liberal elite to discard "old" ways of thinking, especially conservatively based thinking, and report things as they "see" them. And this is the problem. How we process what we see is often, whether consciously or unconsciously, biased in favor of a liberal, anti-Christian way of thinking and seeing. Rather than admit such presuppositional flavoring to "factual" reporting, the modern way is seen as the "only" way to see and process everything. Scientific reasoning, crafted by liberal theologians and philosophers of the Enlightenment, has replaced and driven out any hint of truthful reporting that takes into account biblical truth. And, of course, "religious" truth has been replaced by "scientific" truth, as if humanity's way of reasoning trumps God's revelation. Third, American individualism, copying the French Revolution, has defined American "freedom" today. This requires some explanation. Os Guinness in his Last Call for Liberty: How America's Genius for Freedom has Become Its Greatest Threat (InterVarsity Press, 2018), has carefully cited historical "facts" that link the 1789 French Revolution and the American Left — "The former struggled for "liberté" and "egalité" the latter for "liberation" and "social justice." The former won through violent revolution, whereas the latter seeks to win through a cultural revolution, after which the elite imposes its will through administrative and bureaucratic procedures (regulative bodies and the law courts). And both are characterized by their reliance on the state, their open hostility toward religion, their radical separation of religion and public life, their attempt to control language in order to control reality (French and Soviet "Newspeak," "doublespeak," and American "political correctness"), their unashamed espousal of power, their egalitarian appeal to envy rather than liberty, and their naive utopianism that the removal of repression will mean fulfillment of freedom." (51) He says that American has rejected its covenantal/constitutional heritage of freedom as a republic surrendering to those supoposedly "democratic" forces that redefine our "facts" and our heritage. "Only the facts, Ma'am!" has taken on a new meaning, a new way of thinking and processing, and an anti-Christian, anti-biblical, anti-religious cast that we cannot even see or take into account in our reporting of the "facts."
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Oct 28, 2025

Week #43 — Day 3

A Means of Grace


Q. 97. What is required to the worthy receiving of the Lord’s Supper?

A. It is required of them that would worthily partake of the Lord’s Supper, that they examine themselves, of their knowledge to discern the Lord’s body, of their faith to feed upon him, of their repentance, love, and new obedience; lest, coming unworthily, they eat and drink judgment to themselves.

1 Cor. 11:28-29; 2 Cor. 13:5; 1 Cor. 11:31; 1 Cor. 10:16-17; 1 Cor. 5:7-8.

“Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For

anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself.”

“Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”

“But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged.”


“However, we must add that the Supper is not just a visible sign—as a sacrament, it is more than a memorial. It is a means of grace. Not only is the death of Christ shown forth “by giving and receiving bread and wine, according to Christ’s appointment,” but there is a real spiritual benefit given by the Holy Spirit to believers. The Shorter Catechism states, “The worthy receivers are, not after a corporal and carnal manner, but by faith, made partakers of his body and blood, with all his benefits, to their spiritual nourishment, and growth in grace.”


Excerpt From Glorifying and Enjoying God: 52 Devotions through the Westminster Shorter Catechism (Boekestein & Cruse & Miller)


A means of grace. “Roman Catholics believe in transubstantiation. Relying on Aristotelian categories, Catholic theology teaches that the substance of the elements is transformed into the physical body and blood of Christ, while the accidents (i.e., the external qualities) retain the characteristics of bread and wine. The Lutheran position is usually referred to as consubstantiation (though not all Lutherans like this term). In Lutheran theology, the bread is real bread and the wine is real wine, but the physical presence of Christ is also there, “in, with, and under” the elements.


The memorial view is often attributed to Ulrich Zwingli, though some scholars insist that his beliefs were not all that different from Calvin. Zwingli wanted to rid the Lord’s Supper of unintelligible mysticism. He strongly denied the bodily presence of Christ in the Supper and emphasized that the sacrament is commemoration of the Lord’s death. The Reformed view argues that Christ is spiritually present in the Supper. The Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed views do not dispute the real presence of Christ. They disagree as to whether that presence is corporal, local, or spiritual.” (Kevin DeYoung, Daily Doctrine) In all these views, except the Zwinglian memorial view, something really spiritual happens when we partake the Lord’s Supper. The Bible tells us that in such an act of faith we engage in “communion” with Christ(1 Corinthians 10:16) “We are joined to him and experience a deep, spiritual koinonia with him. When we feast in faith, Christ is our nourishment and strength.” 


A Puritan Prayer —

“THOU INCOMPREHENSIBLE BUT PRAYER-HEARING GOD,

Known, but beyond knowledge,

revealed, but unrevealed,

my wants and welfare draw me to thee,

for thou hast never said, ‘Seek ye me in vain’.

To thee I come in my difficulties, necessities, distresses;

possess me with thyself,

with a spirit of grace and supplication,

with a prayerful attitude of mind,

with access into warmth of fellowship,

so that in the ordinary concerns of life

my thoughts and desires may rise to thee,

and in habitual devotion I may find a resource that will

soothe my sorrows, sanctify my successes,

and qualify me in all ways for dealings with my fellow men.

I bless thee that thou hast made me capable

of knowing thee, the author of all being,

of resembling thee, the perfection of all excellency,

of enjoying thee, the source of all happiness.

O God, attend me in every part of my arduous and trying pilgrimage;

I need the same counsel, defence, comfort I found at my beginning.

Let my religion be more obvious to my conscience,

more perceptible to those around.

While Jesus is representing me in heaven, may I reflect him on earth,

While he pleads my cause, may I show forth his praise.

Continue the gentleness of thy goodness towards me,

And whether I wake or sleep, let thy presence go with me,

thy blessing attend me.

Thou hast led me on and I have found thy promises true,

I have been sorrowful, but thou hast been my help,

fearful, but thou hast delivered me,

despairing, but thou hast lifted me up.

Thy vows are ever upon me,

And I praise thee, O God.”


Excerpt From

The Valley of Vision

Edited by Arthur Bennett



"We must unquestionably receive its [the Bible's] statements of fact,  bow before its enunciation of duty, tremble before its threatenings, 
and rest upon its promises." – B.B. Warfield

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