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Thursday, March 13, 2014

God's Message to America, He Said It He Meant It.

                        God’s Sign to America

       Has America lost its bearing and claim to being a Christian nation.  Events unfolding in the media daily certainly imply that Biblical values are under assault.
Marriage, an institution created by God himself, is no longer necessarily sanctified in society. Nationally, morals are defined by the individual, not by the church or its measuring stick, the Bible.  Many groups define the Bible as a book of hate speech.  We have entered a time when each individual defines his own moral path and what is, or is not, acceptable speech. It is based on one’s own personal choices and experiences.  The Word of God is more often mocked than held up as a guideline by which one lives their life. 

      Often times I hear people whining and complaining that America is not the Christian nation it used to be.  Many of them are too young to have any idea of what America was like as little as sixty years ago.  When I was growing up you only had two options on Sunday.  You could go to church or you could go fishing and on a good Sunday you did both.  There were no Wal-Marts or K-marts. Convenience stores, filling stations, restaurants and all other businesses were closed on Sundays.  The only ones working were the police, fire department and the hospitals.  Sunday was a day of rest.  It was a day that family’s spent time together.  State’s had blue laws that required all businesses to close on Sunday.  The laws slowly died when challenged in the court system.

    Has or does God speak in this day and age.  His Word says that He is the same, yesterday, today and forever.  So His Word is just as valid today as it was the day he spoke it.  If that is the case the upholding of the Sabbath is still required by God and when we fail to uphold it we are not following God’s Word. He said it way back then and he still means it today, regardless if the most of the world thinks otherwise.

      Blessings and Curses are promised by God for following or failing to follow His Word.  The 28th chapter of Deuteronomy lays out clearly what the blessings and curses are.  It also makes clear that they are a sign for nations that fall away from following His Word. Verses 45 to 47 make clear the curses will fall on those who abandon following God. Verse 46 makes clear it is a sign.  If you take the time to read the chapter you will see America clearly in the part addressing blessed nations.  When you start reading the curses you will quickly see that America is coming under judgment of God for her actions.

      The truly scary part of God’s Word is when God says he will eventually reach a point where he turns his back on a nation and pour out his judgment on them.  Romans 1: 16-32 gives a pretty clear description of the condition of much of America today.  It makes clear God will give them over to do as they please, but they will suffer the consequences of their actions.

      It is made clear in 2nd Thessalonians 2:3-12 that there will be a falling away of the church and those that believe at the time of the end.  Most people agree that we are at that point in time.  In Luke 17:20-37 Jesus makes it clear that the end shall be as it was in the days of Noah and at the time when Lot came out of Sodom.  /to really get a grip on what that was like simply read it yourself.  I could put all the scriptures in this post, but if you do not care enough to take the time to read the verses I am giving you, you evidently don’t care, or are ready to go now.

       So what was it like in the days of Noah?  Here is what the Bible says on the matter.

        5And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.  
6And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart. 7And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. 
8But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD. 9These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.  10And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.
11The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. 12And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

 Sound a lot like the world we live in today?

                                                              

Saturday, March 8, 2014

Unfinished Business

                  

                        Unfinished Business

     Three years ago today it was my privilege to start out on an adventure and it truly has been one.  Encouraged by my daughter who is a teacher I posted my very first blog.  My goal was to help people who were impacted by the economic downturn.  Being self-employed and having weathered a few economic storms in my life I felt I might be able to help others.

       While it took me some time to get my footing and figure out where I was going with my writing.  If you type in the word MONEY on my blog search bar it will bring up quite a few articles on how to overcome many personal financial crises.  Most of my advice is from the, been there, done that, point of view.  While I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer, I have found I tend to learn from most of my mistakes.

      One of my favorite quotes is, “When you are up to your ass in alligators, it is sometimes hard to stay focused on the fact that you came to drain the swamp.” When you are in the middle of a financial meltdown it sometimes becomes hard to deal with the day to day problems of life.  That is when we need to focus on not only how bad is it and how bad can it get, but what can I do to cut my losses and survive the storm in a worst case scenario.  Sometimes holding onto “things” is what pulls us under.  Letting go and starting over sometimes is not only the better answer.  Sometimes it is the only answer.  One of my most popular posts deals with that issue.  It is “MONEY, Victory  Over Stuffitis.” 6/13/12

    Over the past three years I did tend to get on my soapbox and do quite a few opinion pieces.  Some of them are fairly good, in my personal opinion.  Several also were quite bad.  The best in “my opinion,” you can take that for what it is worth is one called, “A Trucker’s Perspective of Why America Is In a Rut,” 9/9/13 which draws on insights from twenty years of trucking and thirteen years in military logistics. While I had written for a paper in the past, attended a few years of college, and been to a few writer conferences, my writing is basically a work in progress.  It took me some time to discover that the Google site did not have a grammar correction feature.  Some of my early stuff was and is real bad. It is my goal to redo most of them in Word documents and correct most of the mistakes.  While I do have a couple years of college, that did not correct what I missed by dropping out of high school and joining the Army.

     Time and reader response has allowed me to see the good and the bad.  Never in my life did I think people in over seventy countries would read my writing.  What is really neat is when a piece takes on a life of its own and people all over the world start reading it.  One piece had readers in places as diverse as China, Mongolia and Morocco.  My post “You Need No Man Teach You,” of 5/4/12 was one of my first to acquire a life of its own and have many people read it.  It helped me see that while I am not a pastor, sometimes a lay person can say something that may help others grow in their faith.  

      Over the course of the last couple years I have found the adage, “Write what you know.” Has a lot of truth in it.  That has led me to write mostly on my personal experiences in trucking and faith.  My one other area of expertise I had been hesitant to write about.  Not because I did not know what I was talking about, but because I left the sport in 1979 due to and injury.  The sport has truly progressed way beyond the level it was at when I was involved in it.  To cure that problem I used my recent financial blessing to take a three week vacation and update and upgrade myself so I don’t put out any information that goes against the latest trends in the sport.  Basically I went to Florida and watched skydivers in action for a several days and met many really neat people.

        The Canadian Contingent, escaping Mother Nature's Wrath

     The trip was a true adventure and it showed me that travel is almost mandatory if you want to grow as a writer.  In the course of the trip I visited several places I had been to in the past.  The trip allowed me to see the growth and changes that are taking place all over.








Tybee Lighthouse and Beach near Savannah, GA
















    Today has been an awesome day as most of my children, grandchildren and even my twin great granddaughters have spent the day with me.  It has been a truly blessed day. Even is I have been getting flack for not participating in what is going on. My wife and I have our Twin Great Grand Daughters a couple days a week and they are a joy to behold.  So full of life and curiosity.  My pen may never write the great world shaking masterpiece, but if it helps a few souls find a few minutes of piece in their quest to survive it will make me happy.  The main thing that keeps me going though is seeing what is next.

     It is a mystery to me where my life is taking me and where I will end up.  My goal is to enjoy the here and now of life.  Always looking for the Blessings God has bestowed on me. 

   In the course of my life I have seen four plane crashes live and a couple far closer than I cared to be. Three of them were military aircraft and if you consider the fourth had been hijacked and turned into a missile, they could technically all be considered military crashes.  I also lost one of my best friends in a plane crash when we were in our mid-twenties.  He had a young daughter in Germany he had never seen when he died.  It made me see the fragile hold we have on this thing called life.  At any moment we can be called home and we may not have a chance to say good bye or finish all the things we have planned in our life. That is the just the nature of life.

     The good thing is that at any time in our life we can ask God to come into our lives and know that at least there is one important piece of business we took care of.  Tomorrow is promised to no one.  With my Biblical end time mindset it is my hope that everyone will make their peace with God and know that on Judgment Day there is one piece of business they do not have to worry about.

    Jesus said we would not know the day, nor the hour of the time of the end.  He did say, however, we would be able to discern the time we are in.  Every year at Easter I have to wonder if this is the one when he comes back.  If you read enough of my writing you will see I am a bit out there when it comes to the Bible.  I just believe the Bible simply says what God has said he is going to do, and I am silly enough to believe, he is actually going to do what he says he is going to do.

    Lord Willing my next post will be about my trip to Savannah, GA and to Florida. Till then, keep looking up.


 
                    Yes he likes Black and Gold, must be his viking heritage

                       
 Where I spent most of my time, This is Mecca for Skydivers, 3 twin Otters and a professional staff that keep the lifts moving. They have a topflight tandem and Advanced Free Fall instruction program.  It is also nice and warm in Jan/Feb


This is why I love Savannah, GA and the Gulf Coast area.