10 August 2012

Protect and Defend Your Right to the Establishment of a Religion, and the Free Exercise Thereof – Part III

I was listening to an Andy Stanley sermon on iTunes this afternoon when the doorbell rang. It was Chris Hagenow, my state representative, doing the door-to-door thing for this fall’s election. Now, I don’t know if Chris is Republicrat or Democan, and I don’t care. He emails his constitutents, I email him, he always writes back, takes what I talk about and explains how he is carrying the views of his constituents into the snakepit Iowa House of Representatives. At least it isn’t the Iowa State Senate where he has to put up with dingbat Gronstal on a regular basis.

But, I digress. Yes, I am going to vote for him again and would recommend you do so too if you have the opportunity. But, as we were talking, he mentioned that he hadn’t seen a new blog from me for a while. Just knowing that anyone else reads these things inspired me to go ahead and get back on the keyboard. And, knowing it was Chris kind of puffed me up and pepped me up.

This is the third in a series. It is longer than a typical blog, because this is a really detailed topic that I feel very strongly about. Very simply, it is time for all citizens, let alone all Christians, all Disciples of our Lord, to fight for the right to establish their religion and to exercise thereof freely.

Let’s get clear on this. Please, understand completely from the outset how strongly I feel here. This is what Doug Giles had to say that kicked my mind in to “prolific writing” status:

The Church needs the biblical rebel spirit of our founders injected back into the evangelical mix instead of this squishy, pusillanimous, ignoble and compliant crapola that’s currently cranking through our indolent pulpits and pews. God help the Church to lose its cowardly, effeminate bent in these critical days. Amen. – Doug Giles

I always said that, when the revolution comes and they are lining up people who they try and find to be guilty of Christianity, they would grab me, stab me and slab me without a trial, that there would no need to find evidence, that my true colors are clear. You shall know we are Christians by our love, and there are a lot more reasons that you should know I am a Christian.

As a Disciple of our Lord, you might ask, what is it that I fundamentally believe. Lots of things are variable and optional among those I know to be Disciples and those who profess to be Christians, but the salient points of import to me are:

1. The Great Commission – found in Matthew 28:16-20

It is our job, directly commanded to Disciples by the Lord, to go into the world and preach the gospel to everybody. Not just the ones who want to hear it, not just where we want to go, not just where they want us to go. It’s like Stansfield in The Professional screaming”I MEAN EVERYBODY!!!”

2. One Way – found in John 3

Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.

3. One End – found in Revelation 21:

Conquerors inherit all this. I’ll be God to them, they’ll be sons and daughters to me. But for the rest—the feckless and faithless —for them it’s Lake Fire and Brimstone. Second death!"

Conveniently, Doug Giles then brought up 4 points that he proposed as talking points. Then he did not do a lot of talking. Silly boy. That leaves room for me to talk, right?

Point, the First

Some dainty saints of today think rebellion against tyrants is disobedience to God, when the converse is actually true.

One of the greatest learnings of a Disciple is discernment; that pretty much either follows or leads to willingness to buck the flow, another key ingredient in life according to the Voice of Truth.

The “unknown epistle writer” tells us in the letter to the Hebrews in the 5^th and 6^th chapters:

By this time you ought to be teachers yourselves, yet here I find you need someone to sit down with you and go over the basics on God again, starting from square one—baby’s milk, when you should have been on solid food long ago! Milk is for beginners, inexperienced in God’s ways; solid food is for the mature, who have some practice in telling right from wrong. So come on, let’s leave the preschool fingerpainting exercises on Christ and get on with the grand work of art. Grow up in Christ.

Practice in telling right from wrong. Easily said, difficult initially to discern. God makes it pretty clear to me in His Word that right is right and wrong is wrong; but, the world of today, post modern as it is, has phased to a state of relative truth. Relative analysis is dangerous, because what we end up with what I think is right may be wrong for you, what I think is wrong may be right for you, and we both are right and wrong at the same time.

Sol Davidson, who was pretty much regarded as the smartest man around then and could have given Hawking , Freud, Kant, Plato, Aristotle, Socrates and Einstein a run for their money, in the 29^th chapter of his book of witticisms says:

1 For people who hate discipline and only get more stubborn, There’ll come a day when life tumbles in and they break, but by then it’ll be too late to help them. 2 When good people run things, everyone is glad, but when the ruler is bad, everyone groans. 3 If you love wisdom, you’ll delight your parents, but you’ll destroy their trust if you run with whores. 4 A leader of good judgment gives stability; an exploiting leader leaves a trail of waste. 5 A flattering neighbor is up to no good; he’s probably planning to take advantage of you. 6 Evil people fall into their own traps; good people run the other way, glad to escape. 7 The good-hearted understand what it’s like to be poor; the hardhearted haven’t the faintest idea. 8 A gang of cynics can upset a whole city; a group of sages can calm everyone down. 9 A sage trying to work things out with a fool gets only scorn and sarcasm for his trouble. 10 Murderers hate honest people; moral folks encourage them. 11 A fool lets it all hang out; a sage quietly mulls it over. 12 When a leader listens to malicious gossip, all the workers get infected with evil. 13 The poor and their abusers have at least something in common: they can both see—their sight, GOD’s gift! 14 Leadership gains authority and respect when the voiceless poor are treated fairly. 15 Wise discipline imparts wisdom; spoiled adolescents embarrass their parents. 16 When degenerates take charge, crime runs wild, but the righteous will eventually observe their collapse. 17 Discipline your children; you’ll be glad you did—they’ll turn out delightful to live with.

My first thought to discuss that popped immediately out of this is: “When good people run things, everyone is glad, but when the ruler is bad, everyone groans.” True then, true now, shall be true forever. And, another line worth noting especially is “A sage trying to work things out with a fool gets only scorn and sarcasm for his trouble.” And, finally, “Discipline your children; you’ll be glad you did—they’ll turn out delightful to live with.”

The same principles are equally or moreso true with respect to tyrants and kings.

Next time:

Point, the Second

A lot of evangelicals would rather live as government slaves than live and die as free men.

12 July 2012

Protect and Defend Your Right to the Establishment of a Religion, and the Free Exercise Thereof – Part II

This is the second in a series. It is still longer than a typical blog, because this is a really detailed topic that I feel very strongly about. Very simply, it is time for all citizens, let alone all Christians, to fight for the right to establish their religion and to exercise thereof freely. I mean, obviously this was in the founding fathers’s mind in the forefront – after the Constitution this was the first amendment in the Bill of Rights, right? Today, though, we wimpy wussy foot around talking about our religion. Happy holidays? Baloney – and what holidays are those? Christmas, for me, so Merry Christmas. Easter? Actually, I celebrate the Feast of the Resurrection; Easter is a pagan holiday honoring Oestre the goddess of fertility and birth, which is why all the eggs and chickens and rabbits hopping around. Discrimination?

Wait a minute? Where did discrimination come from, you ask? It’s right SDM, smack dab in the middle, of the whole brouhaha. If I am, in accordance with your definition, non-accepting or intolerantof your particular beliefs, then, by nature of public misbeliefs of today, I must be discriminating against you. This is obviously and particularly the case if I have proclaimed myself a “Christian” and somehow you infer that I think you are not Christian.

OK, let’s get clear on this. Please, understand completely from the outset. How strongly do I feel here? This is what Doug Giles had to say that kicked my mind in to “prolific writing” status:

As an aside, it’s actually neither an appropriate nor exact demarcation to call me a Christian. Oh, yeah, as far as the general public, the media, the family, my folks, my friends and my church community associates are concerned Christian is a convenient tag. But: did you realize the word Christian only occurs 4 times in the New Testament (my version) and all 4 times it is a derogatory and disrespectful appelation used by non-Christians. We, that is to say the group with whom I would have associated and with which I now identify, preferred to be and are more appropriately called followers of The Way, or Disciples (not really a proper noun, but I decided to use it as such to show specificity rather than just generality). Since there was a reasonable prolific cult in the late 70’s early 80’s period, around the time of the Blessed Father and Mother Divine and The Church of Jesus Christ of What’s Happenin’ Now, whose name was “The Way International,” I have chosen to eschew saying that I am a follower of The Way, simply because I don’t want to be associated with that quote. So, if you ask me for my definitive answer as to what I am and how I believe, I am a Disciple; and, I suppose more fully and most correctly, I am a Disciple of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We were discriminated against in the First Century. Nero fiddled, threw us to lions, burned us – you know, all those things you see in the movies that must have, of course, actually happened. OK, most of that stuff did happen and pretty much that way. Watch the Discovery Channel, National Geographic and The History Channel, if you can miss Ice Road Truckin’ Swamp Pawn Auctioneers, and see some of the real documentaries about early life of the Disciples (Christians).

Just today (today, for now, being July 12, 2012) I made a comment, my second cousin made a comment and my oldest daughter made a comment on Facebook. Had to do with sin, defining sin, going to Hell, who will go to Hell, if there is a Hell, how do you raise kids, how do you go all in at Texas Hold’em – you know, the general kind of humdrum discussion. We are talking here a very fundamental Baptistally bent person, a devout lifetime Catholic, and a sockdologizing old bald fat coot with a heart of gold and an ankle of mush who has tripped through Southern Baptist, American Baptist, Roman Catholic, Episcopalian, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod. I guess I could also mention dalliances into Eric Berne and Claude Steiner with the somebody’s ok somebody’s not ok analyze my transaction school, Henri Nouwen, Paul Tillich, Dietrich Bonhoffer, Charles Stanley, Andy Stanley, Jamie Bakker, Jack (aka C.S. Lewis), Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov and Robert Heinlein. My apologies to the others I have forgotten. In my bottom line, you might ask, what is it that I fundamentally believe as the Disciple of the Lord I profess to be. Lots of things are variable and optional among those I know to be Disciples and those who profess to be Christians, but the salient points of import to me are:

1. The Great Commission – found in Matthew 28:16-20

Meanwhile, the eleven disciples were on their way to Galilee, headed for the mountain Jesus had set for their reunion. The moment they saw him they worshiped him. Some, though, held back, not sure about worship, about risking themselves totally. Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: "God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in the practice of all I have commanded you. I’ll be with you as you do this, day after day after day, right up to the end of the age."

2. One Way – found in John 3, along with the 3:16 on the sign of the rainbow afro bespectaled guy at every football and basketball game: folks, if was all just that “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life,” things would be so simple. I have to read verses before and after to get the context:

5 Unless a person submits to this original creation—the ‘wind hovering over the water’ creation, the invisible moving the visible, a baptism into a new life—it’s not possible to enter God’s kingdom.

6 When you look at a baby, it’s just that: a body you can look at and touch. But the person who takes shape within is formed by something you can’t see and touch—the Spirit—and becomes a living spirit.

7 "So don’t be so surprised when I tell you that you have to be ‘born from above’—out of this world, so to speak.

8 You know well enough how the wind blows this way and that. You hear it rustling through the trees, but you have no idea where it comes from or where it’s headed next. That’s the way it is with everyone ‘born from above’ by the wind of God, the Spirit of God."

9 Nicodemus asked, "What do you mean by this? How does this happen?"

10 Jesus said, "You’re a respected teacher of Israel and you don’t know these basics?

11 Listen carefully. I’m speaking sober truth to you. I speak only of what I know by experience; I give witness only to what I have seen with my own eyes. There is nothing secondhand here, no hearsay. Yet instead of facing the evidence and accepting it, you procrastinate with questions.

12 If I tell you things that are plain as the hand before your face and you don’t believe me, what use is there in telling you of things you can’t see, the things of God?

13 "No one has ever gone up into the presence of God except the One who came down from that Presence, the Son of Man.

14 In the same way that Moses lifted the serpent in the desert so people could have something to see and then believe, it is necessary for the Son of Man to be lifted up—

15 and everyone who looks up to him, trusting and expectant, will gain a real life, eternal life.

16 "This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life.

17 God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again.

18 Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.

3. One End – Revelation 21:

6Then he said, "It’s happened. I’m A to Z. I’m the Beginning, I’m the Conclusion. From Water-of-Life Well I give freely to the thirsty.

7 Conquerors inherit all this. I’ll be God to them, they’ll be sons and daughters to me.

8 But for the rest—the feckless and faithless, degenerates and murderers, sex peddlers and sorcerers, idolaters and all liars—for them it’s Lake Fire and Brimstone. Second death!"

Terse recap and leaving everyone hanging now until I pick up part 3, and strictly because this is already longer than a 1-day read should be:

That gospel we preach is what we live: there is only one Way to get out. Unless a person submits to this original creation it’s not possible to enter God’s kingdom. Anyone who trusts in Him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. Totally binary, yes no, 0-1, zero sum game, no push, no edge to the house or the player, straight up.

The end result is binary, too. Yes no. In out. Zero sum. Paradise as the sons and daughters of God orthe Lake Fire and Brimstone, second death. Not maybe. Not for a while. No purgatory thing. The word is forever, kinda like kids saying what-ev’-er today. Always. Eternity. Really long; even longer than that.

Think about that overnight. I may be up again as soon as tomorrow.

11 July 2012

Protect and Defend Your Right to the Establishment of a Religion, and the Free Exercise Thereof – Part I

A few days ago as I started out reading my email, I got my normal tickler from TownHall. TownHall is my kind of place – a gathering place for right wing extreme writers for most of whom Tea Party is, correctly, recognized not as a party but as a movement, and a rather wimpy movement at that. Writers for whom real political parties are the American Nazi Party (no, I do not advocate Nazism, but it is a real and active party and you gotta admit not liberal at all), the Libertarian Party (liberal in its espousement of liberty) and my party, The Constitution Party.

My current TownHall homeboy is Doug Giles. Well, one of my homeboys. So is Chuck Norris, of course, and I like Ann Coulter, Cal Thomas and several others who show up on TownHall. They all have their own column websites in their home papers or publishing, but TownHall aggregates them handily for me. Anyway, back to Doug Giles. Anyone who writes a book about and for his daughters is quite OK by me, especially if that book is Raising Righteous & Rowdy Girls. You need to learn how to drop it, dress it, skin it and butcher it before you learn how to cook it, as Doug and Ted Nugent would point out. Me? Not quite that extreme. But, as I think of extreme I recall one of my most favorite quotes of all time:

I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue! – Barry Morris Goldwater

One suburb away, in Evanston, I was president of Evanston Teenage Republicans when Hillary Rodham was president of Skokie Teenage Republicans. To my recollection, we never met. We did, I am sure, both work hard for Barry that year. I still have a boxfull of “AuH₂O in ‘64” buttons somewhere in the basement. Why did the extremism thought come to mind? Because Doug had written on

The Current Cowardly Church Needs a Mega Dose of the Rebel Spirit

read it here

In turn, then, I thought of the Armor of God and that we frequently try to go on front-line offensive with minimalist defense in the religion arena of politico-socio-ethnoracial-correctness of the post modern milieu; so, well to remind us of what we really should put on when we get up in the morning and why to do it:

The Message:

Paul Höganmöcher in his letter to the church at Ephesus, Chapter 6:

5 respectfully obey your earthly masters but always with an eye to obeying the real master, Christ.

6 Don’t just do what you have to do to get by, but work heartily, as Christ’s servants doing what God wants you to do.

7 And work with a smile on your face, always keeping in mind that no matter who happens to be giving the orders, you’re really serving God.

8 Good work will get you good pay from the Master, regardless of whether you are slave or free.

9 Masters, it’s the same with you. No abuse, please, and no threats. You and your servants are both under the same Master in heaven. He makes no distinction between you and them.

10 ¶ And that about wraps it up. God is strong, and he wants you strong.

11 So take everything the Master has set out for you, well-made weapons of the best materials. And put them to use so you will be able to stand up to everything the Devil throws your way.

12 This is no afternoon athletic contest that we’ll walk away from and forget about in a couple of hours. This is for keeps, a life-or-death fight to the finish against the Devil and all his angels.

13 Be prepared. You’re up against far more than you can handle on your own. Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it’s all over but the shouting you’ll still be on your feet.

14 Truth, righteousness,

15 peace,

16 faith,

17 and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You’ll need them throughout your life. God’s Word is an indispensable weapon.

18 In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. Pray hard and long. Pray for your brothers and sisters. Keep your eyes open. Keep each other’s spirits up so that no one falls behind or drops out.

Now finally to the meat of what I will be later writing in my blog: Doug is right and we have a LOT of work and probably changing to do!!! And, here is the prayer he expressed to do it:

OK Here is Doug Giles column:

The Current Cowardly Church Needs a Mega Dose of the Rebel Spirit

By Doug Giles

7/8/2012

Whenever the ends of Government are perverted, and public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the People may, and of right ought to reform the old, or establish a new Government; the doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression is absurd, slavish and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind. –Declaration of Rights, Maryland
Unlike America’s original rebel Christians who dumped the Brits’ taxed tea into Boston Harbor and told King George that he could kiss their King George, today’s evangelicals, I believe—especially the dandy ministers who love to be loved—would have folded like one-ply toilet paper before British oppression. We’re a timid tufted titmouse compared to our rowdy founding forefathers.
Here are four reasons why I believe today’s evangelicals would have melted like little bon-bons during the American Revolution:
1. Some dainty saints of today think rebellion against tyrants is disobedience to God, when the converse is actually true. Yep, these stooges of the machine believe that Yahweh wants Christians to be the corralled cattle of corrupt politicians and policies. Indeed, a lot of pop evangelicals have become nicer than God. Our current craven “faithful” think it’s sinful to say bad stuff about bad elected leadership. Many somehow think it’s righteous to go in an unrighteous national direction. And we’ve got stacks of do-gooders who are turning the other cheek to political abuse and generational theft so fast that they make Shakira look arthritic.
2. A lot of evangelicals would rather live as government slaves than live and die as free men. Some do it out of sinful slothfulness, completely passive and thus complicit in the face of evil. Others do so because they actually think Christ was a Communist and that government theft and wealth redistribution somehow fulfill the Sermon on the Mount. D’oh.
3. Others, especially in the ministry, won’t say squat about our political squalor because it’ll offend the emotional members of their congregation and thereby jack with their weekly offerings, which, in turn, will cause them to lose their vacation home in Naples where they’re currently banging their mistress. Here we are during one of the most crucial elections of our lifetime, and ministers don’t (or won’t) address these issues or show up at protests. Wow. Good luck at the judgment seat. I’ve been to many, many Tea Parties up and down the east coast of Florida and have only run into a handful of ministers. Where are you, ladies? Your absence and silence during America’s demise is more obvious than Pam Anderson’s recent enhancement. Hello, Judas.
4. Another thing that irks me is this end-of-the-world Rapture mentality that, supposedly, all of this bad stuff we’re currently fielding as a nation is God’s plan for the ages and that there’s nothing we can do about it. I’m sure glad our predecessors didn’t look at the gargantuan junk they were facing during times of oppression and upheaval and say, “Oh, well. The Rapture must be right around the corner.” No, what they did was think, work, pray and fight. And guess what, end-of-the-world Christian? They yielded up this grand experiment in self-governance, that’s what.
The Church needs the biblical rebel spirit of our founders injected back into the evangelical mix instead of this squishy, pusillanimous, ignoble and compliant crapola that’s currently cranking through our indolent pulpits and pews. God help the Church to lose its cowardly, effeminate bent in these critical days. Amen.
Doug Giles is the author of Raising Righteous & Rowdy Girls. Follow him on Twitter @Doug_Giles and on Facebook. You can see and hear Doug’s video blog and talk show at ClashRadio.com.

15 June 2012

Decisions and Contentment - or 8:28'ed to Tears

Hop in, buckle up, hold on tight, be ready for a long ride today.

I am a big fan of Dr. Charles Stanley. I regularly read the In Touch Ministries daily devotional and it usually seems like a great thing to me. Today, their devotional is about "Decisions That Lead to Contentment." And, atypically, I take exception on this devotional.

Oh, there's nothing really wrong with it. It is a short treatise about Romans 8:28-39, quoted, in part, here from the NASB:

²⁸And we know that ^[a]God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. ²⁹For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; ³⁰and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.

and quoted here from The Message:

26-30That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good. God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him. After God made that decision of what his children should be like, he followed it up by calling people by name. After he called them by name, he set them on a solid basis with himself. And then, after getting them established, he stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun.

If you have been to church more than a few times, you have probably heard at least one sermon echoing 8:28. It's easy and all to common to pump out a homily about how bad things are really good using this text.

But one thing I have learned over the years is never underestimate the power of Romans when you tackle it. 8:28 is no hole in the line to go rushing through blindly, it is not a magic salve that soothes any pain, and it has certainly, over the years, been the focus of much weak, incomplete, or just plain inappropriate theology. In fact, sometimes the "standard, Sunday School" treatment is just plain wrong.

I have a close spiritual friend who had two babies predecease her. Absolutely 8:28 tells us that God causes their worldly deaths to work "together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose."

Someone tell me now how this helps my friend feel better, please!

We are talking about a year of sustained, deep pain and grief, and it is NOT over yet!!
The Sunday School approach, presented in the In Touch devotional, tells you to "choose to accept this as though it's coming from You. No matter what I see, I'm choosing to look to You, Lord."
Poppycock!!
I say that because "Oh, bull....! [bullroar, of course:-)]" is not overtly Christian in nature.

Consider, very simply, the implications of:

called according to His purpose...conformed to the image of His Son...called...justified; and...glorified.

We are called to be glorified and justified. We are called to live a life of glory and justification. We are sanctified. We are saved. We are resurrected. We are immortalized. We are the sons and daughters of God.

If I have a hangnail, then 8:28 me about putting up with it because God wants me not to use that finger for something bad. When I put up with my devastating cluster headaches, God is pimping me through the thorn in my side, probably because of my impatience, definitely because I need to center myself on His purpose, positively because I need to continue seeking justification, sanctification and redemption. When my friend's babies die, when my wife has a coworker whose 2 year old grandson falls out of a 3rd story window to his death, when random teenagers fall victim to bullying in the extreme, when a nutcase goes wacko at an army base and plays spin the Beretta - don't EVEN try to tell me to rejoice because these are all good things. That is theological poppycock, like I said. And, don't EVEN try to reinforce me that all of these things are working together for His purpose, because I already know that. If, for a minute, you make the ridiculous mistake of telling me it's because I have sinned and need to be punished, don't even bother continuing to talk to me and be glad I was not packing a Beretta - not that I would hurt you, but I would scare the bejabbers out of you to catch your attention and then yell and lecture you into blithering submission about your weak theological interpretations.

We are called to be glorified. It ain't easy on the way, boys and girls. God never said it would be easy, He just said we would never be alone. Grieve, cry, mourn my dear friends when you must - I am there with you, and always, too, is God.

01 June 2012

Breaking Routine

Ouch!
That is exactly what I said when it happened. I closed the dog door, turned around, and was attacked by a kitchen chair. I never go barefoot. Until Wednesday night when I was carrying my slippers instead of wearing them.

Don't break routine. You don't know what else you might be breaking!

The Xrays were negative. Madi and I think it was dislocated and she relocated it and straightened it when she taped it for me. I had vicodin at home already. It is hurting less all of the time.

Have a great weekend, folks.

23 May 2012

Trimming Twitter

Yes, I tweet. No, it is not an addiction for me as it is for some. However, I realized this morning that much of the junk I was reading I had originally "follow"ed because it sounded neat at the time and now it was pretty much a sea of drivel with a few, a very few, nuggets of wisdom included.

So, I "unfollow"ed some of my tweets. I didn't "block" anyone, but I unfollowed several people. I probably get unfollowed too, and for much the same reasons I used today. Too many tweets, too many times the same thing, obviously very reactionary and stuck on one point, and bitter comments about some of the people and movements they most radically oppose.

Those feelings are okay to have; but, expressing them all of the time to everybody else would not win any favor with Dale Carnegie; for sure you are not winning friends and influencing people with a lot of the tweets that I see.

Then there were a couple of the generically generated fact tweets. If they repeat the same facts over and over, and they tweet 18 times a day spouting only marginally interesting, if that, information, then it's out of my window for sure.

So, I am trimming down my input, and I hope to be appropriately pruning my output over the next several days.

21 May 2012

Sharing Burdens

Practical Ways to Bear Burdens

Directly copied from today's In Touch devotional
Comments to follow

Read | 1 Thessalonians 5:14
There are hurting people everywhere, but at times we just don't know what to say or do to ease their pain. Here are six practical ways to bear someone else's burden.

Be there. At times the best "method" of helping is simply to be present. During our darkest hours, we don't need someone who tries in vain to fix everything; we just need a friend.
Listen. Don't attempt to give answers or tell people what to do next. Injured souls frequently want simply a listening ear so they can express what's on their mind.
Share. Never parade yourself as someone who has all the answers. Instead, allow your own pain and failures to help others.
Pray. There is power in speaking people's names before the Lord. When they hear someone talk to Jesus on their behalf, healing often starts taking place.
Give. Sometimes helping others involves more than a handshake or warm hug. Maybe they need something financial or material. One of the best measures of sincerity is how much we're willing to give to others.
Substitute.You may know an individual who bears the burden of caring for someone else. If you step in and take his or her place for a while, you are emulating your Savior--He, too, was a substitute.

Because we were unable to do it ourselves, Jesus bore all of our sin and sorrow, even unto death. As a result, we can live happily and eternally in communion with our Father. If Christ did that for us, how can we ever say, "I'm too busy to bear someone else's burden"?

Burdens of others

I sense, lately, a sentiment and a movement that there are a lot of us who would like to reach out and help someone but that we do not really know how. The need and the reticence may both have roots in the materialism of society today. To quote from "The Jerk", "I can live without the money. I just like all the stuff." There is a great tendency to think that stuff is what it's all about where realistically it's thoughts and emotions that are most burdensome. That is why the 6 steps

Be there

Listen

Share

Pray

Give

Substitute

make so much sense. Jesus's guidance is pretty straightforward about these things: if your neighbor needs it and you have it, give it to your neighbor.

That is true brotherly love.

Unfortunately, a lot of people over the years fall into the trap of "letting Joe do it." If the attitude is "I'm too busy, take care of it for me" prevails, then it is a quick transition to having the government take over, and we end up with robbing from Peter to pay Paul. Smacking loudly of socialism, because it is, we eventually reach the point that there is not enough of somebody else's money to steal and spread around. Big difference when that "somebody else" is allowed and driven to share his gifts with others.

Be that somebody else. Take stock in what you, yourself have. Determine what you are going to do to help your neighbors bear their burdens. Then do it.