Christian Fathers Need To Stand Up for America

Building a Hedge of God's Protection, for our Nation

       America today is like a rudderless ship drifting in a turbulent sea.  Our nation thrived as it followed God and allowed him to guide our path. God provided a hedge of protection for America. As America shifts more onto a path of self-righteousness the hedge of God’s Protection has withered. If we are going to save America and the World, the Father’s in our nation need to stand up and take the helm and turn our nation back to God.  In Isaiah it speaks of a great nation crashing on the rocks in rough seas. In 30:25 it mentions the fall of the towers, and in 33:18 it describes a period of terror. It also speaks of a period of seventy years which is how long it has been since Israel became a nation again. The irony in those verses is that Israel had to exist as a nation. It didn’t for over 2000 years. When you read Isaiah 24:1 it makes clear that even worse times are to come, all of which is purely coincidence unless you believe God says what he means, and means what he says.

      Surviving in the world today is a hard thing to do.  Especially when you have no job, mouths to feed and the need to provide shelter. As the old saying goes been there and done that. It is purely by the Grace of God that I am here today.  God provides a hedge of protection that protects us from the evil in this world. Left to my own devices I would have starved to death.  At one point in my life I had my own business and was making what I thought was good money.  The problem was I lost sight of the source of my blessing. I had to get as low as I could go before I realized that I had turned away from the source of my blessing.  I had lost my business, my house, my car and my family.  In retrospect there was no need to have lost any of it.  The reason I did lose it all was by feeling that “I” was doing it all.  I was the master of my destiny and that “I” could do it on my own.  Looking back it is easy to see dozens of ways it could have been avoided, but God was letting me “do my own thing.”

       In reality I knew where my blessings were coming from. It was a willful choice to turn away from God.  It was not that I intentionally turned my back on God.  It got to the point I started taking for granted the blessings I was receiving. Slowly I stopped tithing, I stopped looking for God in the things happening in my life and worst of all I quit giving even verbal thanks to him. God simply removed his hedge of protection and let me see how well I could do on my own.  Having reached a point where I had virtually nothing and the only way I could look was up. I did.  I told God I understood the error of my ways.  I had nothing.  I promised to tithe 10% of my time to the Lord as it was all I had to give.  The next several years I spent at least two and one half hours a day in the Bible.  It was easy when I was unemployed, but it became a challenge when I had a job. It was a period that changed my life.  In less than three years I had my family back and had recovered all my losses and then some.  God is good to His Word.  My desire now is to return to spending that time with the Lord.  Notice there are a whole lot of I's in these first paragraphs.

        In the course of studying God’s Word many things became clear to me..  One is that God does work the same yesterday, today and forever just as His Word says.  He does provide a hedge of protection for us.  Just as Jesus said, “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”  While that verse is in Matthew, Jesus was quoting it from Deuteronomy 8:3.  If you study the Bible you will find it says, “Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.” Proverbs 30:5 At that point a shield would have been handy. The Bible gives us many stories as examples of how and how not to live our lives.               

        Hedges are mentioned several times in the Bible. The first is in Job 1:10.  God is having a conversation with Satan.  Satan wants to harm Job but he can’t because God protects Job.  In the course of the Book of Job we get to see what happens to a person when God removes his protection.  At the end of this post there is a list of verses that show what and how a hedge works. How it works is determined by our walk with the Lord.  In Hosea 4:6 it says, “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge; because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will reject thee.”  Notice it says my people.  It does not say sinners or heathens.

       God does not wish that any should perish. II Chronicles 16:9 makes that clear.  It says, “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him.  He makes it clear in Ezekiel 33:11 that he does not desire that the wicked die, but that they turn from their evil.  He also makes it clear in the next couple verses that trusting in your own righteousness will not save you if you sin.  It is cut and dried and as they would say in this day and age.  It is either God’s way or the highway.  He does not play let’s make a deal.

       Three verses in the Bible changed my life. The first was Luke 6:46 “Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things I say.  That means I have to do what he said to do.  He told his Father to forgive those crucifying him.  In Matthew 6:14 he makes it clear the same is required of us.  The last commandment he gave as far as I can tell was in 1st Corinthians 11:23-30 that we partake of the body and the blood of Christ every time we come together in remembrance of him and what he did.  Will taking communion get me into heaven?  No I do not think so, but I do think it shows I am seeking to follow His Word as he proclaimed it.  Very few churches besides the Catholic Church; the Church of Christ which has two kinds, instrumental and non- instrumental and the Christian Churches actually do so.

        In Haggai 1:6 we are told, “You have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe yourselves, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it in a bag with holes. 7. Thus saith the Lord of host: Consider your ways.”  This was God’s judgment for failing to follow him and His Word.  God offered them a solution in Malachi 3:10-12,  10“ Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and test me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven, and pour out for you a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. 11. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruit of your ground; neither shall your vine cast its fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts 12. And all nations shall call you blessed. That is a pretty awesome challenge.

        America may have had a Malachi blessing, but we are definitely turning towards a Haggai curse. The 28th Chapter of Deuteronomy gives a list of the blessings and curses that befall a nation that follows God and one that turns its back on God.  The first fourteen verses describe the blessings.  The remaining fifty-four verses describe the curses that befall a nation that turns its back on God.  Read it and make up your own mind where America is headed as a nation.

         Hopefully you will read the verses that I put at the end of this post.  You will see why you want to have a relation with God.  Especially one in which he puts a hedge of protection around you and your family.  If you feel you are walking with God may you be encouraged to look at the hedge you presently have.  Is it growing or dying.  I challenge you to spend some time in the study of God’s Word.  Especially if you feel you are coming up short in life and see if it does not fill the void.  All the blessings may not be financial, some may be doors opening and protection for loved ones.  You will see the difference if you just open your eyes and look for it. 

Verses dealing with Hedges

Job 1:10        

Prov 15:19

Ec 10:8

Isa 5:5

Eze 13:5 Warning against following false prophets

Eze 22:30 Warns that there was no one to stand in the gap.

Ho 2:6

Mic 7:4

Mk 12:1

June 7th? End of Days? Or a New Beginning?

The Final Lap?

Fifty years ago today I was a twenty year old soldier stationed in Mainz, Germany. In January I had volunteered for Vietnam and was supposed to leave that week for the United States on my way to Vietnam. When I got up Monday morning my whole life had changed and my schedule had been put on hold.  The Israeli Six Day War had started and America was committed to backing up Israel if it became necessary.

     My job was rigging supplies to drop by parachute. It was not my first rig out, but it moved at a level I had never seen before. While we rigged, the Infantry units tried to cram door to door fighting techniques into a minimum amount of time. They were also gearing up for a dessert war. The base was humming. Busses arrived and hauled troops to the flight line at Rhein Main Air Force Base. We started rigging live ammo for dropping.  Units started distributing basic loads of ammo to the troops. That upped the ante for us so that we knew this was the real deal. Shortly later it got totally confirmed.  In all the rig outs we had done we strived for realism, but when the blood plasma arrived it cinched the deal.

    Some units were in the air within hours.  It was a long ways to go. Due to the cold war we could not fly over communist territory, Switzerland and France denied us the use of their air space also.  We had to fly to the English Channel, down the coast and then across the Mediterranean to Turkey. Israel was holding its own so the decision was made to stage aircraft in Turkey, in case we got the go ahead. Some units spent several days sitting under the wings of the aircraft waiting for a decision to be made.  Other troops were sitting at Rhein Main AFB and waiting, Rigging and training went on twenty four hours a day for the whole five days. We were dead on our feet.

     One piece of good news for us was when we heard that Israel had captured the Temple Mount on the 7^th of June, and that they were getting the upper hand. It was still tense right up till the end of the War. Gearing down from a war footing was a very tedious process. The following week things started getting back to a more normal pace and I departed for the States

    So what does all that have to do with things happening today?  If you read the Bible and know what a Jubilee is and what Pentecost is about you can see the significance clearly.  Wednesday will be the 50^th Anniversary of the capture of the Temple Mount and the Jubilee which started by the blowing of a shofar. It is an action that started the clock ticking for a fifty year period of time.  A jubilee is supposed to end with all debts being repaid and all slaves being set free and allowed to return to their land. It is also a time of judgment. The significance is that this is the first time that has happened in over two thousand years with Israel in the Promised Land for the whole period of time.  It is something that was prophesied and promised over two thousand years ago.

     Anybody who has read my blog posts knows that I am fixated on recurring events in the Bible, but also in my own life and events. In 1917 my Grandfather was stationed in France during World War I. He was a Teamster and drove horse drawn wagons to the front. He was sprayed with mustard gas and it affected his lungs for the rest of his life.

    Fifty years later I found myself in Vietnam in 1967, where I learned to drive a truck, which is how I made my living after leaving the Army, and my health was damaged by being sprayed with Agent Orange. So what is the significance of that to today? My grandfather served in France.  I served in a war that had been started by the French in one of their colonies. That brings us up to today and the Paris Climate Treaty.  So what do I have invested in today’s events.  My youngest daughters, youngest son is in basic training in the U.S. Army. The chemical warfare in Syria bothers me.

    What are the chances of America going to war during his time in the Army?  Pretty high considering the President we now have for a leader of this country. In barely four months he has alienated almost every nation that America could count as a friend.

   So am I saying it is the end of time?  Not hardly.  There are way too many prophecies yet to be fulfilled.  Yet the stage may be being set.  If you read Revelations 11:18, it makes reference to God destroying those who destroy the earth. It might be something to think about.  It may show that even after all these years, things are not just happening.  God’s hand is still in the middle of it all guiding it to the inevitable end that His Word clearly lays out as coming to pass.

      My cousin just gave me a direction for tomorrow. A movie is being released called In Our Hands, The Battle for Jerusalem.  It is fifty miles to the nearest theater, but it may be worth the drive, especially as Wednesday the World as we know it today may be changed, or starting to anyhow. It is going to happen sooner or later. I think we are at later.

      OH! This may be a weird way to end, but I thank anyone who prayed for my plants. After planting several hundred gourd seeds and none coming up I had one plant come up in my greenhouse. It made my day. One is better than none. I pray your hand is in the right hand if something significant does happen in the next few days. Thanks to all those who read my posts. Especially those in Korea as they often outnumber my American readers.  I served with the ROK’s in Vietnam and they are super in my book. At one point in life I had a Korean girlfriend and she convinced me that Korean’s are awesome people. I pray all the issues settle down and both sides come to their senses.

   My final advice is to read Matthew 6:15 and take it to heart. You know the Lord’s Prayer, but do you know what the first verse after it says, you should….