There's a lot that could be said

Image courtesy of Yahoo! Image Search.

Well, there's a lot that could be said. Really. But as I've pondered these last few days, it all comes back to one thread that just won't go away.
America Needs to Repent
Oh, now I'm not saying that we need to follow Israel's civil law as laid out in the Bible (any more than they should follow ours). I'm just saying that a good place to start is the ten commandments. Gee, is it such a bad and contemptible thing to forgo stealing and murder? (Sorry, but the video of the man who lives in the White House having so much sneer toward the Bible has me a little annoyed.) But, him aside- we ought to have some respect for God. Gee, I thought "tolerance" was the big thing in the USA these days. Argh, it's so hard not to get snarky. And as angry as the religion of peace gets when God is insulted, I'm really surprised they didn't at least make a statement like they usually do.

Ok, back to repentance. I know, it's nearly reached cuss-word status in our society, but if we really want change for the better of all Americans, we've got to do some soul searching. Yes, all the calls and letters to the congress are nice- that's what we're supposed to do; but the main thing does not need to be neglected. Until we as a nation get over our foolish pride and take some responsibility before the Allmighty, we cannot expect things to get better for the everyday people. I've blogged about the need for salvation before and what it means, you can refer to previous posts for a more in-depth look. It boils down to we've broken God's laws (see the 10 Commandments) and stand guilty before Him. The only thing we deserve or can earn is death and hell. God loved us anyway and made a way that we would not have to collect the wages of our sins- Jesus the Messiah. Without Jesus we are all doomed- lost- but with his holy, sinless blood he paid the price for all the times we've sinned against God. When He rose from the dead He proved to us that He had conquored death for us. But, while this gift is available for EACH ONE OF US, we must individually accept it. Then we become accepted by God. That simple. But, if we come before Him anything less than humble, it does not work: "God resisteth the proud but giveth grace to the humble". We have to turn ourselves over to His hands. Till we do that, we're still just slaves and have no true freedom. In turning ourselves over to Him in accepting the free gift of grace, we are free, never to be enslaved again.

If we seek to "change" things without a true relationship with God, we'll end up as Rome did. The founders of this nation succeeded because of faith in God (aka Providence)- don't believe it? Look at the founding documents and take a moment to compare the American "Revolution" to the French Revolution.

For all the snideness of the guy who lives in the White House, there is some pretty important prophecy in Deuteronomy. In fact, every single thing that is happening in our nation today can be found there. (I suggest you use a King James Bible, since it used not two manuscripts that did not even agree with eachother, but it used hundreds of manuscripts that all agreed. Age is irrelevant, it's the content. But, whatever Bible you use, it's between you and God and none of my beeswax.) Anyway, we Christians are getting a very bad name these last years (like steadily since 1993). We do not help that false perception when we bicker amongst ourselves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FCNKwHRCQM
And, yea, I'm waaaaay behind the curve here apparently. I had no idea he had made these comments this far back. And I'm just wondering why on all these things like country of origin and educational records mean so little. Is it because things are happening so fast? Is congress terrified? Is the Supreme Court? This is after all, only one person. Y'all all swore to uphold the constitution.

Yes, I'm like every other person right now, no matter which side of the political view- I am really distracted by the things happening in DC. I was only out of the news for short stretches at a time, but I completely missed these mysteriously unaccountable to anyone czars. You know, Caesar Augustus pulled the same kind of whirlwind change in Rome. And the Senators were terrified to stand against him, too. But, to be fair, he had the support of the military. He just kept things moving so fast that nobody could keep up, and it was danged hard to see past all the red herrings.

And as for my picture up top. Yea, I'm a Star Wars person (I think we're called dorks nowadays). I wonder if Senator Palpatine was even from Naboo. He did the create-a-crisis thing and could care less whether every single person (or Gungan) on the planet was killed, so long as it won him sympathy and the vote he needed to become chancellor. From there, it was just a matter of manipulating crises and making the only guys who could actually help out to be villains. And then, total dominion. Easy peasy, just like playing Risk or chess. It was change, to be sure. But, then, I'm seeing phantoms of our political situation in Wolverine and the X-Men, too. Heehee. Oh, and the first season of BSG (DVD- I miss that show. Adama was one of the greatest TV characters ev-er.)

A source of news:
http://www.drudgereport.com/

And what???? How in the heck did Momar Khadaffi end up living in NJ? And why is it really, really hard to find stuff on the internet these days? Some really strange earthquake locations lately, too. I can't find a straight story on the Momar thing, some say he's just visiting, some say he's moving here... Nonetheless, he's not exactly the guy I figured would be um, welcome in the US. And why would he want to come here? Strange.

But, for all of it, I think the only thing I can do is study up on my Constitutional law and the Declaration ;-) and especially my Bible. In my whole life I have never heard of the kinds of attacks on churches that are happening around the US today. And all the meanness to the priests- the media/entertainment industry has used the church as the acceptable "bad guy" for so long, that I reckon folks think they're doing a good thing by busting into communion services and being nasty. But, you know what? I think that deep in their hearts, they know good and well they're mocking God and they just don't care. Guess what, "guys", I'm praying for your salvation anyway. Y'all wanted tolerance, but are unwilling to be tolerant toward others. Who're the hypocrites now? And for all y'all who are assaulting and now murdering people who have different faiths than your S/G brand- God knows. And He is not mocked, for whatsoever a man soweth, that also shall he reap. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind- it's true, too. I've seen it in my own life.

Dang, I don't seem to have done a very good job with this. All I really wanted to do was express the need for repentance in our land. Mr. Man said folks aren't reading their Bibles; well, we ought to start. Freedom for every person is in there. And the God of freedom is in there, too. It's His letter to you. Instead of taking man's word for it, how 'bout we take God's Word for it for a change.

Keep in mind as you read the Bible: the Holy Spirit will help you along, compare scripture with scripture, the Church and Israel are different- the church did not replace Israel, there are special things in there for Israel only, the Bible records what men said and did- the men did not always say and do the right things- keep reading and you will see what God thought about it, consider the context and the audience, a good commentary is nice- but do not let man's words usurp God's words. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God.
As I said earlier, the KJV is the one I use- mainly for the reasons above listed. But, also because I read the other versions for years and they did not help me really find the truth.
To answer the "it's outdated" arguement: is Shakespeare outdated? Is Poe? Is Milton? C'mon, the "I just can't understand it" thing is a cop-out. The KJV is on a 4th grade reading level- do you see how the folks who hold the copyrights to the "new" versions are insulting your intelligence? Think about it.

If we return to God with our whole hearts it WILL make a difference. One family and community at a time, no joke- and that's a real grassroots movement. :-) to use a popular phrase from a few months ago, "Yes We Can!" heehee. Really. Be strong and of a good courage...the LORD your God will fight for you this day...fear not, neither be afraid.

God Save America

Please Don't Boycot Britain

I just wanted to say real quick-

Please do not boycot Britain.

Just because they have some nutter(s) in politics, that does not mean that all the people should suffer.

After all, we've got some real doosies in office over here, too.

Unity, folks.

Pray for them.

God bless y'all!

We're off to watch Doctor Who on Netflix ;-)

God save the Queen (she's sooooo classy!)

And help us remember that we're all brothers and sisters in this boat together.

ttfn

Summertime

Bougureau's la vierge aux agnes courtesy of The Art Renewal Center Online. I really like most of this artist's material. :-)

Well, sorry it's been so long. After I was done with classes for the summer I just turned my computer off. Glitches with the phone lines? No problem! But, I've been remiss in my posting.
I'm going to put livingwaters.org's address in my links bar. They're a great resource and they are a ministry that is not in it for the money. All their CDs are reproducable with their blessing.

So, what all have we been doing? Well, I've been feeling a little lost without classes hanging over my head, if you can believe that! After a year and a half of online school with no real breaks to speak of, I feel like I'm missing something. I have really enjoyed playing with the kids more. Most of the stuff on TV these days is either full of blasphemy (what's up with all the cussing on the regular channels?!) or smut- which I think really ruins good shows rather than making them more appealing. So, we're watching less TV, too. Two big time suckers gone for awhile. I was thinking about canceling cable after the next season of LOST. I may just before hand and just watch it online. You know, even the kids' stuff has overload of crudeness and that just isn't comedy. Who do they have writing this stuff? Maybe the guys at the top need to get out of the city/office every once in a while and see what people really want to watch. But, enough of the rant. ;-)

Does anyone else feel like there's this pervading sense of urgency? Sometimes it feels like there's this silent war going on all around us and it's getting ready to be settled for good or ill- once and for all.

I reckon I'll try to live each day as if they were numbered. Not to gratify my flesh, but to draw near to my Saviour and to those He's given me to love. To try to reach out as best I can to those in need, even if I'm not very good at it. What would I do if I knew there were only three days left? What would you do? I always thought those movies where people went crazy and started looting were stupid. If the earth is getting ready to be blown up by a meteor, what need has anyone of a stolen big-screen TV? People aren't that ridiculous. Yea, some would go violent, but I think that a great deal of people would want to know more about God since they were getting ready to face Him. Would the Christians try to help them? I think so. I think that even the most backslidden among us would step up and try to help as many people be ready to face God as possible.

So, why aren't we doing that anyway? Why does some big disaster have to be looming for us to step up and do one of the few things our Saviour asked us to do? We live in a free country; it isn't like our neighbors are going to behead us for sharing the gospel like in some other countries. Our neighbors might die tomorrow on the way to work. Have we helped them be ready? Are they even aware that they can be ready?

And, on the other hand, we ourselves might not live to see another day. Have we done all we can for our Lord? Have we shared the Good News with anyone lately? Will we stand before Him ashamed? Sometimes we just need to look at the coming storm and think of the mighty holiness of God. We will be facing Him someday soon. Really, life goes by so quickly that it really will seem soon to us, even if we live another 50 years. Just ask any elderly person.

So, how will we stand? Are we "christians" in name only? Have we ever really humbled ourselves before a Holy God and repented in sorrow for our sinfulness? Have we accepted the free gift of Salvation that cost Jesus everything in His sacrifice for us? Or will He say to us in that day, "Depart from me- I know you not!"? Will we stand there saved but ashamed for the way we squandered the time and resources He has given us? Will we stand before Him in tears because we were too afraid to upset a family member who is now in Hell for eternity- suffering- when we could have made a difference? Or will we rejoice with our whole hearts because from this day we did all we could for Him?

God help me! I know I've been slack. Even though I have been redeemed, I know that I have not, not, not! done all I could for Him. I have not made myself available for His service as I should. When I think about standing in His presence, it terrifies the flesh part of me. The spiritual side looks forward to giving Jesus the biggest hug ever, but in my humanity, when I am outside at night and look at the vastness of the universe He has made, I feel so small. I understand for a moment how anyone in this flesh would be burned to a cinder in the presence of God. I understand why the Hebrews asked Moses to be the one who talked with Him from now on. Imagine how they must've felt seeing His glory! Imagine for a moment how you, dear reader, will feel.

Please pray for all Christians everywhere. It's hard times for God's people. And please always remember to pray for the Jewish people. They are still God's chosen people and they are having a really hard time of it right now. And please, dear reader- if you do not know the Saviour- if you have not faced the moment when you realize that you will stand before a Holy God someday and give an account of every single one of God's laws you have broken; if you have not fallen upon His mercy and grace- I beg of you, accept the blood of Jesus as the covering for your sins before it is eternally too late. He was the once and for all sacrifice- perfect, sinless- and He paid the price for our sins.

Praise the Lord!
ttfn
Rose