Time Season Mind Reason

Think about it....

2010-08-25T14:35:00.001-07:00

The imagination, given to man by God who created him, is a mysterious thing. Residing somewhere within the mind...somewhere in the intangible and intelligent vaporous part of every human being, it holds and reflects the essence of who and what a person is, and yet it is not all they are, nor all they think. Within it's walls is a reflection of the world at large, a reflection of who the individual is, or who they imagine themselves to be, or not to be.... The imagination is seemingly a world all of its own, a region far beyond our cognitive grasp.

The imagination.... It’s a special place to dream, to delight, do and discover so many things where, unhindered by the physical limitations of the real world, one is, or rather, can be truly free, this even despite outward circumstances. It is a vast realm of interesting wonders. For some it is magical, for others it is divine, and for some it can be a frightening place, somewhere they fear to read, not knowing where it might lead them in the end. The imagination can be a lonely fearful place... almost like hell, or it can be heavenly.

We carry it with us, and like a trunk, or maybe suitcase it goes with us everywhere we go... uing it to contain and or store for a rainy day all the baggage of our life's play and work, the things we see, the things we know and learn, the things we think about, remember... the things we would like to remember, or wish that we would forget, but can't It is a sacred space, a personal place, that manifests itself in the world as a reflection of who were are, what we know and believe and how we see ourselves and the world around us. We fill it like we fill our heart, with love as well as pain, with thoughts... desires....aspirations; and it is here too that we human beings find ourselves searching for something greater than who we are, something greater that the world outside of us; we grope about like blindmen, in hopes of finding our source of being, God.

Imagination is powerful. It is the fuel which gives humans the power to create, to visualize what will or will not be.. With it we soar to heights beyond the physical, building mental facsimiles in a far off place and bringing them back into the world...our grand ideas... electricity, machines, technologies, things that have the potential to change us and our world. With our imagination we cross boundaries of human limitation every day... we conquered time and space, and make a plan to recreate the world, to our own liking and comfort.

Then, like everything else in the world, the human being dies. Once vibrant, energetic, thoughtful, creative, ingenious, takes it's place among the fallen leaves of autumn beneath the earth. With all we know and dream about it life, it seems death, like life, is real and cannot be imagined away.

Philippians 4:8 says, “Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” The writer of such words mut have known that to do so as a human being, would bring us closer to the reality of what we seek and need to know, bring us closer unto God, for God is all these things.

In the vastness of human imagination, do you believe? Do you believe in God?Do you leave room for the possibility that he is real and that he exists, much the way you do?

We get glimpses of God everywhere in the world. The sea, the stars, all life on earth tells os of his glory (Psalm 19) The bible says that there is no speech or language where their voice is not heard, We humans, discover, contemplate, examine, and analyze... life, the universe and everything as we grope about the world, looking at life in our own ways, hoping to be wiser, to unravel the great mystery of life, find our meaning and purpose... the reasons for it all and where life on this swirling whirling planet came from, once upon a time, long ago and far far far away. We proudly imagine ourselves to be somehow co-creators of it all and think we know all the answers, if we are smart, if not smart enough to know, we become superstitious, and this as we grope about not knowing who or what or why we are alive at all. In God's grace, what we need the most is truth.... for truth sets us free from all delusion..

Truth? What is truth?.

In the beginning, God created man in his image, then through sin, man was changed. He lost something, innocence perhaps, the consequence of disobeying God. No longer in Edenic paradise, we long for, we imagine what heaven must be like, either that or we make this fallen world our only home. Paradise was lost, but not without the promise of redemption. Man's condition is abase, his heart and mind obscured and marred, his spirit wanting and God has sanctioned it to be so because of sin. Made in His image, fallen now, released from heaven's doorstep into darkness,throughout time and history, the imagination of man has been filled with many things.

The imagination has been the playground for psychiatrists and psychologists, the drawing board of inventors and artists, the fanciful dream of explorers and conquerors, and the inspirational powerhouse behind both madmen and kings. With it, we humans can do almost anything we think of, and without it, there is no way we could ever do anything at all. Indispensable to our being human, or humane, the mind is the very place that we can even begin and end to fathom the reality of God, and there is only one way to let God come back into our personal realities, Jesus Christ, the one sent to redeem mankind from heaven, Jesus, because he lived and died and rose again, as only God can do, Jesus, because he is God.

It is only in our imagination that we see things in life with perfect vision, know what things are and will be, or thing that all is well on planet earth, and as such we humans tell ourselves the lie, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But this is foolishness. We are lost, dead in sin and spiritual darkness... and yet physically alive, simply because God gave us life and because he promised to redeem us, if only we believe in Him. We have no hope of ever reaching heaven until the walls of pride, arrogance and self-sufficiency that we cling to in our vain imaginations are broken by the truth. If we retain the knowledge of God, somewhere in our heart and minds, if we believe in God with our imaginations, if we have eyes to see and ears to hear, and understand that we are imperfect people, spiritually wretched, miserable, poor, blind and naked, we only need to call on him. (Revelation 3:17)

The earth itself, the fish of the sea and the sky, even the animals, know who is God, but mankind lost and in sin, thinks to kill wisdom, thinking himself wise, not realizing he is but a fool. Making up his own mind, making up his own world his own laws and his own idea of right and wrong in his vain imagination, he will only die... and be forever, this side of Eden.

But God is at work, forming a nation. Wisdom is calling from the high places of the city... you can hear her in the streets, and people are confessing their sin and turning to God... and God saves!

There is a nation rising...a nation of people, his own purchased possession...
people washed of sin,
cleansed by the blood of the Lamb,
people born of water and of spirit,
reborn,
lead by the Holy Spirit of Almighty God,

Can you imagine? Do you believe? Do you know that God is love and he loves and died for you?

One day, we shall all be changed, and the world around us will be transformed, but not the way people plan it in their vanity. One day, one glorious day the earth will be renewed and a new heaven and a new earth will stand forever, the way God intended life, the way that he created life to be from the very beginning, and it will stand forever, it will stand for eternity.

It will happen, not because humanity evolved, (evolution) or obtained any secret power of the mind to make it so, nor because we used positive thinking, and made it happen because we imagined it to be that way. It will happen simply because God said so, and because to make it so he gave his word, the seed of promise and a broken earthen vessel of clay, like earth itself, received it.

Yes, those who are dead in Christ will be raised from death to life, just as Jesus was; this is our hope and God's promise. Living in his light, we will rise to a world filled with true and everlasting righteousness and peace. It will be more incredible, more beautiful, more peaceful, more lovely and perfect, than we humans will, (even collectively) in our wonderfully creative, seemingly limitless imaginative minds ever imagine on our own. It will be a New Day, He will be our Light and in that Day, we shall be like him and see Him as He is.

Truth is, it is God who in his infinite wisdom made everything. God created the world, the animals and oceans, designed systems to support life, hang the planets, moons, and stars in orbit out in space on nothing. He created it all, with but a Word and he fulfilled his Promise. He who began a good work, is faithful and true and He will be faithful to complete it,

and he can...

He is God.

We are not.

And truth, is sometimes stranger than fiction.

“No eye has seen, no mind has comprehended what God has planned... (1 Corinthians 2:9) We could never imagine, but we can believe and then God will fill us with Him..

"
And so Paul wrote: (Ephesians 3: 14-21) For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God."

Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

Yes, God can do so much more, much more, than we...especially without him, could ever imagine..

harmonically converge

2010-08-25T14:23:00.000-07:00

To “harmonically converge” in astrological/New Age terms, means to create a synchronized intention of human spirit combined with the spiritual force of the universe. The concept of harmonic convergence became well-known to the world after August 1987, when newspapers and magazines ran huge articles on the 'New Age" activities that took place at Mt. Shasta in California. One event was called the Harmonic Convergence, and attendees at the time believed that the gathering was to have ushered in a NEW AGE of love and unity of humanity on Earth, through transformation of a spiritual kind.

That was in 1987. Harmonic convergence came and went... and here we are.

It was a book, The Mayan Factor, by Jose Arguelles that got the word out to people about the transformation taking place and urged them to participate. Arguelles, who said he got "inside information" from Quetzalcoatl the Mayan, from the spirit world, laid everything out in his book. People read it and were talking about it and the rest, well, the rest is now history....

People then came to the vortex spot in California from all over the world. They gathered, (or rather, converged in time and space,) for prayer, meditation, songs, and danced, all in the New Age, Mayan, “spirit” of Quetzalcoatl, (of course,) and found themselves doing all sorts of new age things, intending to create a better world of course.

And, here we are.

The Harmonic Convergence of 1987 was a special event, but New Age "convergences" have taken place since then on other occasions and in various “mystical places.” They have been held in Sedona Arizona, at Mt. Kilamanjaro, Africa; and Haleakala in Maui, Hawaii, to name a few. Events like these happen frequently and when they do they frequently attract those interested in occult ideas and new age philosophies, things like reincarnation, channeling, astrology, and various forms of mysticism and mystery religions.

Time magazine ran a religious sounding article the same month as this Shasta convergence highlighting Arguelles, calling him “the prophet of the New Age.” The word going around then was that, “the "materialistic" world would end on Aug. 16 -- when three planets lined up with the new moon --that is, unless "144,000 true believers' gathered in various "sacred sites" around the world and "resonated" sufficiently to bring on a new age of peace and harmony.”

Apparently it didn't work. Years later, I am writing this anyhow and you... you are reading this as well as the evening news.

Arguelles is still around and apparently is still serious about his work. He is not simply an unknown individual with no people to influence with his religious ideas. His biographies say he holds a Ph.D. in art history from the University of Chicago and has taught at many well-known universities. He is also a prolific writer. His written works include: The Mayan Factor, (1987); Earth Ascending,(1988) and Time and the Technosphere: The Law of Time in Human Affairs. (2002) As the “prophet of the New Age”Arguelles claims it is time for the world to return to UR.

Do you remember UR?

You remember, do you not, that God called Abram out of UR... called him to a promised land, flowing with milk and honey. The NEw Age call is to return to UR, which very well may be an acronym for the place of "Universal Religion."

The times have changed since way back in 1987. Even Arguelles has now renounced the man he used to be (Jose Arguelles) and he has adopted a new identity for today. His name is now Valum Votan and he now works intimately with the Galactic Research Institute of the Foundation for the Law of Time an organization that currently works to promote a universal shift in human consciousness in the year 2012, based on the Mayan calendar of Quetzalcoatl, of course.

Since the time of the first Harmonic Convergence, Arguelles has been interested in the Mayan Culture and their calendar. He believes that mankind needs to change the way they perceive time, and he calls for calendar reform. He says that we need to return to a natural sense of time, which he says, equates to the Mayan-inspired Thirteen-Moon calendar.

According to Votan (aka Arguelles) the Mayan believed that a “Great Cycle began in 3113 BCE and ends in 2012 CE” — a period of human history referred to as "civilization," (meaning "living in cities.")

Arguelles argues that the first city, Uruk (a cognate of Iraq), came into existence about 3113 BC and he says we humans need to stop trying to align ourselves to the Gregorian calendar, which is he believes, merely a mental concept of arranging things Instead, he believes, humanity should go back to aligning ourselves with the true cycles of the sun and moon.

Arguelles, (now Votan,) teaches his followers that “Re-harmonizing ourselves with the cosmos will result in the formation of the noosphere, the earth's mental envelope, with implicit telepathic awareness for humanity." As New Agers, people believe it is something new, but really it is a very old idea, like the Mayan Calendar, and as you probably know, the Voltan idea of "calendar reform" is nothing new either. It's a concept that has been discussed and done before.

There have been several times in human history that the calendars have been modified. Julius Caesar did it in 45 BC, (causing the "Year of Confusion" and resulting in the "Ides of March.") Pope Gregory did it too in 1582, (although it took a long time to be adopted by everyone, with Russia officially going “Gregorian” in 1917 and Greece in 1923.) There have been suggestion made for calendar reform by George Eastman, president of the Kodak Company, Elisabeth Achelis, founder of the World Calendar Society and Dr. Irv Bromberg, who’s calendar puts Easter on a fixed day every year. Even the United Nations has considered implementing calendar reform. Argueles just doesn't have an original idea here, even if one calls it "NEW".

The world is still hoping to harmonically converge somewhere. They just refuse to converge at the cross of Jesus Christ. The place where east meets west, up meets down and God turns everything upside down upright. He even, really makes everything NEW... in his time, according to his plan and his very own way and purpose. Than answer to humanity is to know the one that made us. Jesus Christ, for in him dwells the fullness of God, the deity. He became man and dwelt among us.

New Agers still say that something wil l happen on earth when the Mayan Calendar ends... this would be 2012... and if Argueles, I mean Voltan is right, like he was in 1987, then the cosmic energy flow will be just right, again and something particularly spiritually powerful will happen here on planet earth, just like it did back then.

Imagination

2010-01-23T16:34:00.000-08:00

Helena Blavatsky

2010-01-21T18:43:00.000-08:00

Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891) or Madame Blavatsky (or HPB as she is sometimes referred to) was the first Russian Woman ever to gain United States citizenship, but that is not what she is best known for. Her name is notable because much of occultism in the world today can be traced back to her.

It was 1875 in New York when a group called “the Miracle Club” began to meet regularly and one of those people was Helena Blavatsky. It was a group that met to perform seances and talk to the dead, mostly because it was a curious thing to do in that day and age and the people in the group were anti-materialist, perhaps even looking for a way to create the perfect world. There were about 20 people, originally member of this group who later forms another group, the Theosophical Society, a group headed by Blavatsky and dedicated to the study of the spiritual... aka, occult. They named the group theosophy, or .“theos” “sophia,” meaning, wisdom of God. Eventually this group disbanded, because of the lack of intereting things taking place in the meetings, except for Blavatsky and a man named Henry S Olcott.

In 1879 the two traveled to India to delve more into the spirituality they thought they had discovered, and three years later, in 1882 they established the International headquarters of the Theosophical society in India. They began publishing information about the occult and it wasn't long before the Theosophical Society became popular, because people were easily fascinated by the mysterious concepts, attracted to it were some of the wealthier types who thought it all to be quite fashionable.

Blavatsky, according to Marion Meade, her biographer, rejected orthodox Christianity all her life, beginning at an early age. Blavatsky had what Marion (who was not a theosophist,) called "a venomous hatred of Christianity." She was also a prolific writer and published many works including, Isis Unveiled, (1877); The Key to Theosophy, (1889); The Voice of the Silence, (1899); Nightmare Tales, (1892); and The Theosophical Glossary, (1892)

Blavatsky most recognized work is called the Secret Doctrine. (1888.) It is a two-volume collection of fragments of information about cosmic, planetary, and human evolution, as well as science, religion, and mythology. The information it contains is supposedly from another source, a book called the Stanzas of Dzyan that was 'shown' to her in the air before her eyes as the Akashic Records. (Dzyan means mystic meditation.) In other words, Blavasky, like so many others got her “wisdom” and information from occult sources.

The Theosophy Society today boasts that famed people such as Mohandas Gandhi, George Bernard Shaw, Annie Besant, Jawaharlal Nehru, Thomas Edison, Albert Einstein, Alice Bailey, William Butler Yeats, L. Frank Baum, Aleister Crowley, Guy Ballard, Rudolf Steiner took an interest in the group at one time or another. It has made it’s way into many minds around the world. Even Sirhan Sirhan, the convicted assassin of Robert Kennedy, reportedly requested to read Blavasky’s books in prison.

A man named C W Leadbeater reworked Blavatsky’s concepts into what became known as called the .“Adyar-Theosophy” Another man, Rudolph Steiner, also influenced by her began his Anthroposophical Society and Waldorf Schools. One couple, Guy and Edna Ballard left Theosophy and started their “I Am” Mt. Shasta Religious Activity group. Theosophical Society was not an obscure group, it was quite well known and had far reaching tentacles that left Blavasky's mark upon the religious world, and one of those marks is the belief in a mystical place called Thule and Vril that she made known to the world.

Thule, or Ultima Thule is supposedly a place beyond the known world where it is rumored that a race of giant supermen live. Lore says that these beings, (through magical powers and their special occult knowledge) could create a new super race. Blavatsky called them Atlanteans, which sounds like they may have been associated with Atlantis, the legendary city that disappeared into the bottom of the sea long ago. But most importantly we know that it is this Society, this brotherhood and the legend of Thule that birthed Nazism and the belief of an Aryan peoples into the world.

Hitler, though not on the Theosophical Societies official Roster, was very much interested in it. He, and his associates, Deitrich Eckart, Rudolph Hess, Wilhelm Frick and other well-known Nazi leaders like Alfred Rosenberg were rumored to be “members” in Thule, Blavasky's secret society, and it's no surprise since the concept of such a place held promise of a master race, which to the Nazi’s, aka Hitler and friends, were the equivalent of what they commonly called “Aryans.”

Thulists may have met secretly, but it was also no secret that Hitler condemned the orthodox beliefs of Protestant and Catholic churches, just like Blavatsky did. Anyone who has lived through or studied German history and the life of Adolph Hitler knows that the primary struggle of this supposed super Aryan race was against Judaism, the God they embraced (and what Hitler,) even though he had been raised to believe in God as he was "Catholic," called “negative Christianity.”

Blavatsky is not alone in her thinking, experimentations and spiritual hunger or beliefs.Today we see people all over the world not only infatuated with Hinduism and Buddhism, mysticism and magic but every sort of occult practice. The not only think nothing of it, but they sell it to others. We also see a lot of what is commonly thought of as "positive Christianity" (not the NEGATIVE kind) We see, "positive thinking" movements, people looking at things like life in a “positive” light and know it or not they are following blissfully in the footsteps of Blavatsky, Crowley Levey, Stiener, and Besant, even Hitler. Many people today even think that Anton Levey and his brand of Satanism is “cool.”

We see New Spirituality emerging on the planet along with every form of occult practices, and they are even being done is what is called, the Church. There seems to be a lack in of faith, a rebellion of the old, a discarding of the truth and a hatred for someone, or something known down through the ages as God.

Parents embrace the strange notion that their difficult children might Indigo, as they come home from work and practice transcendental meditation in the living room channel spirits that tell them to soul travel into “other dimensions” or perform macabre rituals in the dark hoping to connect with, or to become rulers of their own universes. Some even think that they are “God”. It’s a New Age, NEw World, an “all-inclusive” spiritual brotherhood of occultic proportion that claims it will give us earthlings “peace.” Unfortunately it all has little or nothing in common with the true and living God.

There is a simple equation that goes like this: Know Jesus, Know Peace; No Jesus, No Peace.
PEACE on Earth?
The only answer to peace on earth, good will to men, is Jesus.

Indigo

2010-01-21T18:07:00.000-08:00

Have you heard of “Indigo children?” They are being touted as the newest editions to the human family, at least on the evolutionary front. This information is being distributed mostly among advocates of the New Age, who endorse occult practices. They say that the evolutionary feature of this more highly evolved human way of being is that these children, the New Children, (also labeled Indigo and Christalline) are “prone to psychic abilities." But the mainstream media has picked up on it too, even ABC News did a special report with Diane Sawyer on the subject, of psychic children, Sept 25, 2006.

Not only do these "Indigos" have psychic experiences, they are also said to be troubled with having to deal with uptight adults concerned over their “misunderstood” emotional outbursts. They are said to act like royalty, have difficulty with absolute authority, (unless given "choices" or explanations" for the why's of doing things not their own way, and they tend to get really frustrated at things like waiting in line. They are non-conformist, seemingly anti-social and this is probably because they prefer to be with their own kind... Indigos. Surprisingly, "They are here to create a whole new world."

Literature from "the experts" on such things tells reader that many of these indigos can have social difficulties in school. They also tell parents not to worry, and inform the rest of the world that parenting and teaching such children is an “incredible privilege” in this time of “change.” However, they caustion that parents and teachers should be extremely careful not to hinder the psychic needs of these special children and to remember that it ids the parents’ duty to ensure that the needs of these children be fully met, after all, they are raising the next generation of highly evolved humans who will lead humanity into the future. Indigos and Christalline children and their enthusiastic trainers want you to know how to help the Indigos fulfill their mission in the world. There is a lot to know about Indigos and their history, so, be aware!

Indigos are alittle different than those who are labeled “Crystalline.” Reports say that Chrystallines are psychic like Indigos, but not as “dark and angry.” They also have a stronger connection to nature. They also say, don’t worry if you have an Indigo and not a Crystalline, because both Indigos and Chrystalline are considered (by these promoters of such things) as "divine." Think yourself "lucky"

The concept of these special children, arriving in the world was first popularized into society by servel New Age sources, one major one being the books The Indigo Children, (1999) and subsequently The Indigo Celebration, (2001) written by Lee Carroll and Jan Tober. Carroll, who wrote the book with his wife Jan, says he is as a channeler for 'Kryon,' a spiritual entity who predicted the coming of the Indigo Children to the human race. Since that time the Indigo children have been being "Recognized as a phenomena, with parents consulting Lee and Jan in how to raise their kids.

Lee says that since 1995 the Society for Enlightenment and Transformation (SEAT) at the United Nations building in New York City has been inviting him to channel Kyon for them. SEAT is part of the United Nations Staff Recreational Council (UNSRC). This is a group of clubs that is sanctioned by the UN for members, guests, employees and delegates of the United Nations. Apparently Lee and friends have some high governmental influence and connections "Indigo children" like Severn Suzuki, are speaking out, (Earth Summit, 1992) and speaking out on You Tube. There you will meet children, shown off to the world as Indigo, like Akiane and Boris (from Mars.) Jessica Schab (who is 22 years old,) and Tom Milsom.

You know, a parent can spend a lot of money learning from them how to parent an Indigo miracle child, after all to have birthed divinity int ot he world does tend to stimulates a sort of pride in their offspring. Indigos and Crystals are special we are told, and as such they have speacial needs.Not only is indigoe such a pretty color and a fine sounding concept, much better than to deal with the typical diagnoses of any disorder or syndrom or being labeld something negative like, "a spoiled brat," "undisciplined" or "unruly. They seem to forget that every child is special... and babies are incredibly intelligent being

The spiritual aspect to it all is astounding as the individuals talk about God, and spiritual enthusiasts like James Twyman, Neale Donald Walsch, and Stephen Simon promote it as the New Age now coming up the earth... and believe something positive is happening to the breeding on planet earth causing these Indigos some sort of new kind of human to emerge. Like others supporters of

New Age ideas, they believe that Indigo and Crystalline children should be exposed to and allowed to explore and learn all the paranormal things they can.

The philosophy of raising an indigo is that these kids know more than their parents, or teachers. They are not on Earth to learn, but to teach, and they are labeled “christal” which means, according to New Agers, they are “Christed” with energy, like "Jesus" was. Children like Akiane, who in the past were thought of as prodigy's can easily get labeled "Indigo" instead.

New Ager Celia Fenn, in a web article titled, A Message of the New Children, A Message of the Heart at starchildglobal.com describes the Indigo child as “right-brained, artistic, creative, and spiritual by nature.” She says that indigos love meditation and yoga and working with crystals. She says that they are “group beings, and they enjoying being part of a group.”However, “part of a group,” does not necessarily mean family (in the traditional sense.)

She talks about what Indigos are like to be around, and tells us why "they" are here: "Their message and their mission {is}to show their society that they had become locked into systems that were no longer supportive of human growth…. They refused to accept the control and power structures of the typical nuclear family where dad was boss and everyone did what they were told. In fact they refused to accept domination and control in any form. Many families were shattered as Indigos held up the mirror which showed the ugly and destructive side of traditional nuclear family life.”

Fenn, who holds two college degrees, an MA and a Ph.D. is known for working with the Archangel Michael. She says the Indigo or Crystalline children, “have come at this time on "special assignment" to assist Earth and her inhabitants with their transition and rebirth as a higher dimensional ‘New Earth."

In the days ahead you may hear about these Crystalline children, the Indigo Child , about The New Children, The Masters, Ascending Children, Star Children, or the Super Psychic Children, but what will you believe?

Believe JEsus Christ.

Jesus said, " Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven." (Matt 18:3) and "I am the way the truth and the life... no one comes to the father but by me." John 14:6)

Tolstoy said, "I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives."

The scriptures exhort us:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Matthew 24:21-24

For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables.

But you be watchful in all things..." 2 Timothy 4:2-5

Anton Levey (LaVey)

2010-01-21T01:54:00.000-08:00

Born Howard Stanton Levey, Anton LaVey (1930- 1997) became a legend in 1966 when he and his first wife Diane founded the Church of Satan. It was a mimicry of the traditional church in America, except it was “Satanic.” It was even called the world's first Satanic "Church.”

It was like the church in that they held, “Satanic weddings, ” performed a baptism (for their daughter Zeena) and even had a Satanic funeral, and LaVey got a lot of notoriety from the media. Magazines like Time, Look, Newsweek and McCalls did stories on the man. Talk show hosts like Phil Donahue and Johnny Carson, made him a public figure. He had close associations with various celebrities including, Jayne Mansfield, Sammy Davis Jr., Elke Sommers, John Travolta, and Robert Fuest.
He is also the author of what was published (by a group known as Avon Publishers) as the Satanic Bible.

The publicity from appearances on TV shows, articles in magazines and reports of celebrity parties and multiple media blitzes generated a growth in church membership and made LaVey famous for his balsphemic renunciation of everything having to do with “God.” He studied the works of Aleister Crowley, a well known religious non conformist who lived before his time, and when asked about his religion would tell people that he had no special revelation for his religion and that he thought of his practices as more as a way of “unreligion."

People who have chosen to join Levey’s religious thinking, do often call themselves “Satanists” and they claim that they do not subscribe to the idea of an all-encompassing deity who is worthy of worship. Instead of believing in God the Satanist actively renounces God’s existence or God’s power over himself.

What does LeVay have to say about Satan?

"Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it, instead of love wasted on ingrates."
“Satan represents vengeance instead of turning the other cheek!”
"Satan represents all of the so-called sins, as they all lead to physical, mental, or emotional gratification."

LaVey died in 1997 at the age of 67.

Silvania Machado

2010-01-21T00:20:00.000-08:00

Silvania Machado is a Brazilian woman who some suggest has been used mightily by God to start a “revival” among God’s people. It is a most unusual "revival" in that it is centered on gold dust.

According to her own testimony, a miraculous oil oozes from her skin and gold dust appears on her arms and her hands, and even falls from her hair... a couple of handfuls... (she says) during the day. She believes these appearances of gold dust on her body are a miracle from God.

Silvania, speaking Spanish to the crowds that gather to hear her tell her story, gives a very passionate testimony of healing that took place in her body that she says was wrecked with disease and pain. Speaking though her interpreter, pastor and personal friend, Ruth Heflin, Silvania claims that it was Jesus who healed her and set her free.Her husband too gives testimony saying that Silvania asked the Lord for a sign and even he was surprised that the sign he gave to her was that she excreted a mysterious oil from her body.

At first they did not believe that it was God made this “miracle,” so they asked God for another sign and the sign he gave was that gold dust covered her body. They tell the story of how Silvania was then covered in gold for forty days. Then they took to traveling around to tell people about the wonderful revival that God is doing and how Jesus healed her from the terrible things she was going through. She claims that God healed her and gave her these miraculous signs and in order to bring revival to the dead church.

Such wondrous miracles and testimonies do get people very excited that God is being seen and felt and doing things in their midst. Many believe that they are seeing proof of God working when they see such things as this. Sylvania has visited churches in Canada and all across the USA and people were amazed as gold oozed from her pores and gold dust sprinkled from her hair onto their Bibles, ending up all over the floor. People even reported that sometimes gold in the form of filings miraculously appeared in their dental work.

On circuit in the late 1990’s, visiting many churches, including the Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship in Ontario Canada, (home of the Toronto Blessing and John Arnott.) reports abounded that many people were renewed in their faith because of it. God was doing a new thing. People draw it with their own eyes, and it was exciting. However, something about it all was all quite strange. First of all, if she had been blessed with all this gold, why did they need to pass the collection plate? Some people were just a little bit suspicious.

Then on March 30, 1999, Christian Week, (a Canadian Newspaper,) reported that more than three hundred people at one of these functions had made a “claim that they had received gold or silver fillings or gold caps on their teeth.” It was quite a stir. Immediately experts were brought in to see if the claims were for real. When experts analyzed the gold, it was found to be plastic. It was fake.

The apostle Peter didn’t have gold dust to sprinkle around and get attention. It was even he who said to the lame man, begging at the beautiful gate, “Silver and gold have I none, but what I have I give thee, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk!" (Acts 3:6) The healing was not about gold, it was about God, even though gold was perhaps the thing the man would have wanted to see. Peter didn’t pretend to have something he did not and neither did God; the healing from God through Peter was real.

Christians are told that in the end times, incredible sign’s, miracles, and wonders (Matthew 24:24) will be done with the intent of deceiving us all, everyone on earth, and it will be easy for anyone to be deceived. IT's not always easy to know the difference between gold and plastic when they both look the same.

How does a person discern what is real from what is fake? Well, first you have to know the real thing, in the case of God, you have to know the truth about God. It was Jesus who said something about truth being the things that will set you free, it is the only thing that will free one from lies and deception.

Seeing is not always reliable when it comes to believing, and all that glistens, is not really gold.

Matthew 24:24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Mel Gibson

2010-01-20T23:28:00.000-08:00

Mel Gibson is famous for the movie Passion of the Christ (2004) and other films too, like: Mad Max, (1979); Road Warrior, (1981); Lethal Weapon (1987) ; Hamlet, (1990) Braveheart,(1995) Conspiracy Theory, (1997) Payback.(1999)and The Patriot. (2000) All these films are violent and rated “R.” Even his movie, Passion of the Christ, hit the big screen with an “R” rating for violence, but this film stands out from the rest, not only because it was shown in churches., but because Gibson made the movie happen, all on his own.   He personally financed the film.

His religious convictions earned Gibson $678 million dollars which was more than he needed to pay for making the film and pay for his newly established business, Icon Productions. He did so well at the box office with this movie that Forbes magazine titled him the “most powerful celebrity in the world."

The story is that no one would help Gibson finance the project, and he decided it was too important not to do, so even though the decision to do it was a huge financial risk to him he had enough faith to make it happen. In the end, it was a risk that paid off pretty well, because it was well-marketed and well-received, by the Christian community.

Christians everywhere and of all denominations applauded him for his efforts especially those who loved previous Gibson movies. Many movie goers had no qualms about the “R “rating, and most believed that with Mel Gibson’s experience and expertise in movie making, anything he made would have to be good; and since it came from the Bible, in the minds of many, Gibson could do no wrong.

Mel Gibson co-wrote, directed and produced the Passion of the Christ. He even appeared in the film as the hands that nailed Jesus to the wooden beam of the cross in the film, saying that this part was particularly significant to him, because he is a Christian and knows that it was his own sins that put Jesus on the tree. He believe the film was a testimony to his faith.

Gibson calls himself a “devout Roman Catholic” and took seriously producing the film from a Catholic perspective. It opened on the Catholic holy day of Ash Wednesday, it contained a visual of The Stations of The Cross, and Gibson creatively added to what was in the scriptures with the work of Catholic mystic, Anne Catherine Emmerich. Gibson's Cathodic faith was very much a part of the production; just the same, Protestant churches supported the film, endorsed it and called it Biblical.
This was a little surprising.

As anyone who studies religions of the world knows, there are some similarities Catholics and Protestants share, but there are also many distinctions between the two aspects of Christianity, some variations in what they do and what they profess, even what they read and look to for definition of the truth. Gibson, himself being Roman Catholic, personally espouses the idea that anyone who does not accept the authority of the pope on all matters of faith and practice will go to hell, regardless if they believe in Jesus Christ or not; something that generally refers directly to Protestants and to protestants more than people of other religions.

In a 2003 interview that appeared in both the New Yorker and the Arizona Republic newspapers, as well as a portion on MSNBC, Gibson was asked if he believed that Protestants are denied eternal salvation. Gibson, using his wife as an example replied, “My wife is a saint. She’s a much better person than I am. She’s Episcopalian, Church of England. She prays, she believes in God, she knows Jesus, she believes in that stuff. And it’s just not fair if she doesn’t make it, she’s better than I am. But that is a pronouncement from the Chair. I go with it."

According to Gibson, his own wife will be going to hell, not because she doesn’t believe in Jesus, not because she is a particularly BAD person, but because she is "Episcopalian" and as such, she does not claim to submit to the absolute monarchy of the Roman Pontiff. Gibson's comments didn't keep Epicopalians or any other denominations from going to see the film. In fact, theaters were packed.

Pastors everywhere bused or simply urged their congregations to see the “Biblically accurate” self financed by Mel, Mel Gibsomn, Christian film. They were also impressed that Gibson would use his own money to get "the message of the gospel" out to the world.

And what is that Gospel message? For bother Catholics and Protestants it is centered on the person of Jesus and his death and resurrection, and the subsequent grace and mercy of God as it is applied to the repentant sinner. The application of that grace however can be a point of contention between the two denominations.   Both will agree, that the Christian faith is about Jesus and the forgiveness God offers unto mankind through the sinless life of Jesus Christ and Who he is, as well as his death and resurrection from the dead, according to the scriptures.

The truth is that what Jesus has done for sinful man is not something we could ever do for ourselves, no matter how hard we tried; the reason being we are sinners. Christians believe that it is because of him that we who are sinners can stand before God at all, and to stand before God in judgement for sin, people must have their sins atoned for... Jesus is for Christians, the one who did just that, and so Christians attempt to follow Jesus and do what he said and did. They believe that in order to be saved, one must repent of sin, confess that they believe on the one whom God sent... Jesus Christ, for their salvation and mature in the same spirit, the spirit of God.

God has a demonstrated his love for us; in that while we were yet sinners, Christ, died for us (Romans 5:8) and that is something upon which all Christians, Catholic or Protestant should and can agree... and while they might not always agree about everything, they can and do also agree, Mel Gibsons Passion movie was about the death of Jesus Christ.

“Apples Trees, Honeybees and Snow-White Turtledoves”

2010-01-20T21:59:00.000-08:00

“Apples trees, honeybees and snow-white turtledoves” are lyrics from an old Coca-Cola commercial whose lyrics are written by four people: Bill Backer, Billy Davis, Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway. The song is about teaching “the world to sing in perfect harmony,” and it went like this: “I'd like to build the world a home, and furnish it with love…grow apple trees and honey bees, and snow white turtle doves… I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, I’d like to hold it in my arms and keep it company… I'd like to see the world for once, all standing hand in hand, and hear them echo through the hills, for peace throughout the land.”

Digital Angel

2010-01-20T21:49:00.000-08:00

In the year 2000, Worldnet Daily news reported that Digital Angel, a minuscule, subdermal microchip implant designed for widespread, worldwide use in tracking human beings, had been unveiled. Since that time other such devices, such as the Verichip, have been approved by the FDA and marketed mainly for medical applications.

The implanted microchip works like a UPC code we see on products but it has special features. It can relay important personal medical information in an emergency, or even perhaps while a person is at a routine visit to a doctor. In an instant you could give someone access to your name, emergency contact, medications being taken, blood type, any recent medical proceedures or needs. Such an item could be used at the bank to transfer funds, purchase grocery store or check out library items as well. It’s a simple procedure to insert the chip and for many people, it seems to have practical applications. Some people see it as the passport of the future.

The microchip is gaining popularity for use in livestock, and microchip implants have become almost routine in vet clinics and puppy pounds. It is not science fiction from an Orwellian tale to think about using these devices on human beings as they could be effectively used as a means of identification or financial transaction; and they are already being used in various capacities.

The scripture writer, John, banished to the island of Pathmos had written a long, long, long time ago, these words: “And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads; and that no man might buy or sell, save he had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast; for it is the number of a man and his number is Six hundred, threescore and six. "(Revelation 13:16-18) Such forthtelling of future events, of a mark used for buying and selling, could refer to something as simple as a tattoo, to as sophisticated as a micro chip implant. We do not know exactly what it is or will be, but we know that it has been forthtold by God that this is how it will someday be.

As for the microchip being used as a mark in the hand or on the forehead and being unable to buy or sell without it, many Christians speculate that this description sounds remarkably akin to these new microchip implants.

Jesuits

2010-01-20T18:03:00.000-08:00

An article by Malcome Gladwell appeared in New Yorker magazine, Sept 12, 2005 and appeared posted at the pastors.com website too. Peter Drucker, a close friend of Warren, is quoted in the article as saying of Rick Warren, “He's building an army, like the Jesuits.'"

“Like the Jesuits?” Who or what are the Jesuits?

The Jesuits are a religious order of monks said to be started by Ignatius Loyola, in 1540. The Jesuits, also called the Society of Jesus, became eventually known as an army created with the purpose of overthrowing the reformation started by Martin Luther, (which the pope declared to be heresy.) Jesuits, then and now must make take oaths and vows when considering being part of the order, they make vows of poverty, chastity, and strict obedience to the hierarchy of the Church. Ignatius is known to have written: "I will believe that the white that I see is black if the hierarchical Church so defines it."

Still headquartered in Rome, still sworn by oaths and vows, the Jesuits are still fulfilling their mission in the world, and they are commonly considered to be the “foot soldiers of the Pope” his army.

In addition to strict allegience and the carying out of missions, the Jesuit Order is trained to carry out the daily practices of the “spiritual exercises” of Ignatius, (a program of meditations, prayers, considerations, and contemplative practices that exercise mind memory and imagination.) This is because Ignatius desired to make this style of contemplative mysticism a part of everyday church life and to use it as a way of rebuilding the Church after the reformation.

Jesuits pursue high level education. They are consecrated to the Blessed Virgin under the name, Madonna Della Strada and are considered the largest religious order in the Catholic Church. They are historically said to be the ones who carried out the pope’s orders during the Inquisition to "dispel heretics."

In their pursuit of education, they often subsequently serve as educators and many famous colleges and universities in the United States are founded and run by Jesuits. In the US these include, Loyola Marymount University, University of San Francisco, Loyola University Chicago, (and other Loyola named Universities,) the Boston College, Wheeling University, Rockherst University, Seattle University, Gonzaga University, Georgetown University and Marquette University, to name a few.

Rick Warren says he is building healthy churches the result of which will be "an army of people serving God," fulfilling his purposes... going on a mission to rid the earth of all it's evil... mainly poverty and disease. Jesuits do that too...so maybe they have something in common.

It is not just the Rick Warren devotees or the Jesuits who have cornered the market on doing good in the world, either. People do good works every day, people of every religion, Christians of every denomination give their life in service.. not serving the world, but Jesus. Jesus said, "the poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me."

Some insist on believing that the Kingdom of God is of this earth, and they will do anything to justify it, and take dominion of it. Believing that the "the end justifies the means," they attempt to accomplish good here on Earth by force and by violence, or so the scriptures say.

This should not be.

God doesn't need an army, he has one, and it stands while God does all the work. IT stands throughout time and eternity built on love, His love for us. The gates of hell cannot prevail over it either. Jesus didn't need an army... He even once told Peter to put away his sword, and this he did as he healed the ear that Peter cut off from a man during Jesus' arrest. He reattached the ear, completely.

God takes nothing by force. He lays his life down. He is kind and gentle, lowly and meek.

God is God; and as God who can do anything, he has nothing to prove. He has no reputation to defend. He simply is and was, and is to come, and God is Love.

The Journey of a Lifetime

2010-01-20T13:45:00.000-08:00

Rick Warren's " 40 Days of Purpose" is not exactly what is advertised; it is much more than a 40-day deal. Promotional materials would have you understand that the forty day program is a "movement of God" a means to fulfilling God's "agenda" in the world. Even more than that, they tell you and me that the 40 days of purpose is the “journey of a lifetime.”

Warren's 40 Days of Purpose materials declares, "This campaign is all about the Kingdom of God, fulfilling his agenda in His world. Nothing brings more glory to God than having his churches, small groups, and his people fulfilling His Purposes. Because 40 Days of Purpose is about God's Kingdom, it is much bigger than any individual, church or denomination. We must work together "to serve God's purpose in our generation. (Acts. 13:36). I hope and pray that your church won't miss out on this movement of God. I invite you to join us. We're waiting to partner with you on the journey of a lifetime!"

Wow...is that interesting? Nothing brings more glory to God than... what is being offered by this program ... the program where God's churches, small groups and people, all learn to fulfill their purposes. This is "the journey of a lifetime?"

Rick says that it's a "Movement of God," Wow, those are some strong words: "Movement of God"...Rick would have the person on the other end of the words here believing that this program was sent to them through him, direct from God.

It is true? If it is a movement of God and I am not on board, won;t I kinda miss the boat? Kinda like Noah's Ark... he told the people to get aboard his program too. With statment like this being presented, one cannot afford not to get with the program, such a thing could mean the difference between being healthy or unhealthy, or rather, life and death. But are these statements true?

How does one know if the inspiration for the Purpose Driven EVERYTHING is direct from God to the the church and is now being delivered to everyone in every denomination all over the world though Rick, or not? Is it possible that such terminology is simply promotional copy, Rick's way, or rather Zondervan's way of slickly marketing these books to the church hoping to make some money, intended to do what slick advertising does... sell books? Determining the truth of these, and any other such unequivocal claims, seems only prudent.   It's hard to know sometimes. What is a Christian to do?

Well, there is a couple things.. first of all, remember the words of the good shepherd...Jesus. Obey the shepherd and do exactly what he says to do. And remember, you cannot judge a book by it's cover, sometimes you have to take a look inside...kinda the way you cannot always be so sure that you are looking at a sheep, just because you see a little wool. Jesus did warn his followers saying, "Beware of the false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves." (Matthew 7:15)

Is this movement of God congruent with what the Lord Jesus Christ, the Good Shepherd teaches? And what does Rick say, what does Rick believe?

You should be able to believe someone who says he is a Christian pastor, one that has been teaching the Bible for 25 years. Paul the Apostle made note of the Bereans of his day, who "received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so." This too is what we as Christians should do, especially in regard to someone who wants to pastor them, to let them eat from their hands, who like Rick Warren, says that their product and their teaching is "a movement of God." This is simply what one with readiness of mind to hear from the Lord, would want to do.

Rick Warren is not only labeled, "America's Pastor," he is the Pastor of Saddleback Church,and he has a lot of accomplishments that give him a lot of fame. He seems like a person who know what he talks about and he also makes it a point to point to the bible, left and right....and he says that his 40 days of Purpose is the "journey of a lifetime," and that it is "a movement of God." He is either right or wrong on the issue, so, as he is preaching and teaching we who are listening with readiness of mind, should consider what he says in light of scripture. It is what Paul commended the Beareans for and it is what we who "follow Paul as he follows Jesus Christ," should want to do.

Rick says a lot of things to lot of people. He has spoken at a lot of places like the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, the African Union and the Council on Human Relations and he gives a lot of people things to think about. He even has a plan, one he calls the PEACE Plan that he has unveiled to the world and he believes his PEACE plan will change the world.

But what is this PEACE Plan? It is Warren's idea that will to bring all the segments of society – like a stool with three legs... government, business and church together to solve the problems of the world, (like HIV/AIDS) he says, “Both a one-legged and a two-legged stool will fall over, but a three-legged stool will stand,” and when he combines the efforts of the church with buisness and govenment to change the world in his plan, he is not just talking about Christian churches, but the entire "faith sector" aka, every religious entity and creed, what he identifies as "churches and houses of worship." This not only includes Christians denominations of every kind, but every religion on the planet, working together, hand in hand, like a three legged foot stool working together to uphold the same values, to tackle the five evil giants in the land. This is all a part of Warren's PEACE Plan.

He has been quoted saying, "A three legged stool will have stability. So I am going from country to country teaching buisness its role, teaching the church it's role and teaching government leaders their role-- you've got to work together! You cannot solve the problem in your country, or in the world if we won't work together." (http://showbizandstyle.inquirer.net)

The day Rick Warren unveiled his P.E.A.C.E. Plan to his congregation in 2003, he preached a special message to his congregation, saying this, “You’ve heard me say many times that the greatest thing you can do with your life is tell somebody about Jesus … if you help somebody secure their eternal destiny, that they spend the rest of their life in Heaven not Hell …your life counts, your life matters because nothing matters more than helping get a person and their eternal destiny settled. They will be forever eternally grateful….And I’ve always said that that was the greatest thing you can do with your life. I was wrong. There is one thing you can do greater than share Jesus Christ with somebody, and it is help start a church.”

(Seriously Rick... You "were wrong?"For twenty five years, you were wrong about leading other people to believe in Jesus Christ so that they could be saved from hell? Seriously? )

Is that in the bible?

And Rick, could you elaborate also on what you believe is to be the foundation of the church? In other words, "What exactly is the cornerstone you are building upon when you are "starting," or building, or growing... a church, if it is not this concept of securing one's "eternal destiny" the "foundational belief," that it takes faith, faith in the saving work and personal knowledge of Jesus Christ one's Savior to be a part of the church of God?

Rick says, "Healthy churches are built on purpose!"

Is that in the Bible?

My bible tells me how and upon what the true church is built and it says nothing of it being built upon five purposes... but it does have pillars. The bible tells me Jesus told to Peter upon what this church is built... "And I say to thee. thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." (Matthew 16:18)

My Bible says nothing about the church being "built on Purpose," and it tells who exactly will be doing the building when it is built... Jesus, aka God.

I read in my Bible, that Jesus has been exalted to the right hand of God, and that he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. I am reminded also of his servant, David, who did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said, " 'The Lord said to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet."

It appears that this is exactly what the Lord is doing.

God is the potter and we are the clay... " God has a purpose for your life," it is true. But Mr. Rick fails to tell you, is that the potter has power over his clay, of the same lump he has the power to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour. Every vessel has a purpose.

What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known , endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, but then they refuse his gift, or his children simply do not listen or obey? (Romans 9:21-23 or so...) What if without thinking, those vessels, because they are disobedient, hear someone telling them something and think it sounds pretty good? What if, instead of listening to the voice of dear old dad, they listen to one who is but "a hireling," and, what is this hirelings intent in walking off with someone elses vessels anyhow?

But wait, there is more...

What if this stranger then invites those vessels to climb aboard his peace train, promising them that they will, (if they listen to him,) be filled with purpose, and have the "journey of a lifetime," (this instead of being filled with the Holy Spirit, who will lead them and guide them, because they put their hope and faith in Jesus Christ our Lord.) The next thing you know those vessels start looking and acting a little unusual, and they do not even read their bibles like they used to anymore.

It's a little like the fairy tale story of Pinocchio don't you agree?

Someone once said, "You cannot believe everything you hear." No you can't, which by the way, is why you must be like those Bereans; If you are to be a nobleman, then you have to know which half of what you hear you can believe. Pinocchio, if you remember, learned the importance of obedience and the power of his father Gepetto's love.

Ultimately we who are Christian, set apart for his choice of use, have to trust in the Lord with all of our hearts and lean not on our own understanding. We rest in his promises and believe Him, take him at his word. In all our ways we are to acknowledge him, knowing that he will lead us, guide us....like a good shepherd... (not drive us,) but gentle and truthfully direct, our paths.

Preachers Preaching

2010-01-19T23:25:00.000-08:00

Rick Warren believes, or wants you to believe, that he knows more than most pastors. He proudly boasted, “I probably have the largest library of books on preaching in America. I've read over 500 books on preaching. Maybe some seminary might come close to that, but I am sure that no pastor comes close to 500 books on preaching. And as I've read them, the vast majority doesn't really understand that preaching is about transformation, not information.” (Purpose-Driven Preaching: An Interview with Rick Warren by Michael Duduit.)

Sadly, Rick probably believes he understands more about preaching than the “vast majority” of pastors, he says that he is certain that “no pastor” has or has read as many books as he has or does on "preaching." He believes it so much he offers to teach all the pastors in the world from his own expertise and boasts that he has trained over 300,000 pastors worldwide.

Let's Talk about "Unschooled Ordinary Men"

2010-01-19T23:11:00.000-08:00

This is a post about Rick Warren.

Proper seminary training, according to Rick Warren, is an one essential ingredient he believes is missing from the church. In 2003, he began saying, “In the developing world there are 2.1 million pastors and church leaders. Of those, 1.9 million have never had any training at all. Not only have these leaders not gone to seminary or Bible school, they haven’t even gone to high school or primary school. They have no training whatsoever -- and yet they lead the church. This must be remedied.” (Facing the World's Five Evil Giants! Rick and Kay Warren ) Saying such a thing is simply umbilical.

Rick is not the only one astonished that so many “pastors” have the authority that they do. The high priests of Peter’s day were astonished with Peter and John too. Like Rick they probably would have loved to rid the world of these unschooled and ordinary men who had nothing but big mouths and wouldn’t shut up about the scriptures or that Jesus guy they used to hang with, you know, the one who healed the sick, gave sight to the blind and even was himself raised from the dead.

Acts 4:13 says, “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marveled.”Rick, doesn;t just marvel, he says they are one of the five great evil giants in the world.

Amputation

2010-01-19T23:01:00.000-08:00

This post is about Rick Waren and his constant use of this term "amputation" in relation to the Christian Church.

To undergo an amputation means that some extremity of the body has been removed. When a part is amputated, the once usable limb is forever unavailable for use. Amputation can occur accidentally through a traumatic event, but sometimes it is done strategically to save the life of a person suffering from disease or serious injury.

Warren likes to talk about amputation in relation to the Christian church. In a USA Today article, A Model of Faith, June 2006, Rick Warren said, “The New Testament says the church is the body of Christ, but for the last 100 years, the hands and feet have been amputated, and the church has just been a mouth. And mostly, it's been known for what it's against. ... I'm so tired of Christians being known for what they're against."

He repeatedly comments this way, suggesting that Jesus' body, the Church, is without arms and legs, and like to make the accusation that the Church, particularly the "self serving" American Church is a failure, having done nothing constructive for the world, “for the last 100 years.” He has also said, “We have become one big mouth that only stands against things. I am tired of being associated with people who only stand against things.”(Rick Warren, Willow Creek Association’s Leadership Summit, Day One, August 11, 2005)

On CNN’s LARRY KING LIVE, Interview With Rick Warren, that aired March 22, 2005, Warren repeated his mantra. He remarked, “I believe the church is ready for what I call, a second reaffirmation… The Bible calls the church, the body of Christ. And for too long the church has had two hands and arms amputated, and it's just been a big mouth. And too often the church has been known for what it's against, rather than what it's for. And I hope to make a change in that along with a lot of another people. That we need to reattach the hands and arms, that's why I was in Africa.”

The overuse of this phrase is notable. Warren is ready to fix the body of Jesus, reattach the body parts that are not there and get the church to stop being a mouth to the world. He says he is tired of it, a long with a lot of other people, but he doesn't seem to mind, if he is the one doing all the talking.

Is the Church nothing but a “big mouth?”

Better yet, is a "big mouth" a bad thing for the church to be?

Think about the prophets. These men were big mouths. They were , if you will, “mouths” for God. They were spokesmen, who as prophets, declared the Word of the Lord to the people. They warned people of the consequences of sin. They revealed the truth of God. Today we call such men of faith who have big mouths and preach about Jesus, “preachers.”

And what does a preacher do? Their job is to actually use their mouth and preach, as Paul wrote to Timothy, , “in season and out.” (2 Tim 4:2) The church cannot be silent.... Jesus himself said that if all the human tongues were still, the rocks and stones would cry out. In other words, if people do not open their mouths and speak, the rocks will.

Rick also says, "And too often the church has been known for what it's against, rather than what it's for?"

What exactly does the church stand for and against in the world?

It is no secret. The church stands undoubtedly for faith in God and Jesus... you can ask most anyone on the street, they will have heard. And yes, someone in the world has to speak out against atrocity and sin. The mandate of the church is to SPEAK the truth, love.... love for JEsus and for people, and for Christians that means in love for one another. The darkness hates the light and the darkness hates to hear the word of God being preached.Why would a Christian pastor be tired of peple talking about God? What exactly is the "big mouth" church saying that Pastor Rick is offended by?

He is working, as he said on Larry King's show, "to make a change in that along with a lot of another people," he has a plan to " reattach the {amputated} hands and arms. Metaphrocally speaking, it sounds more like he is creating a monster.

Surprisingly, Rick Warren does not think that the biggest problems in the world today, is murder, greed and other sins, he is worried about really evil things, like illiteracy and poverty.Worse of all, he forgets that it is often the Christians in America that dare to speak up for the poor and the fatherless and the orphans, he forgets that the Christian church, for the last hundred years in fact, has taken stands against the things God says are truely evil.

Meanwhile, Rick Warren continues to preach his message all over the media and airwaves,. He talks about the Bible, about the gospel, the good news, and his own church, Saddleback Church in California, and yet he spends a lot of time finding fault with "self-serving" American Christians and the "big mouth" Christian Church, making sure he get's his "purpose driven" message out. Out of his mouth come both blessing and cursing, and somehow, this should just not be!

From the book of James, Chapter 3
With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be. Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water. (NIV)

Not U or Knot You

2010-01-19T17:52:00.000-08:00

“It’s not about you…It’s all about God,” is one thing Rick Warren likes to say. He has made it his ministry to get people, mostly those who profess to be Christians, thinking about serving, getting their focus redirected. He says repeatedly, I want to tell you, it is "NOT about YOU."

The Dallas Morning News, October 2, 2006, did an article in which reporter Michael Young asked Warren a lot of questions. At one point, Warren said, “I'm trying to move the American church from self-centered consumerism, where it's all about me, to unselfish contribution, where it's all about God and serving God by serving other people.”

Oh, It is not all about you, it's all about God. That makes sense now...since God is obviously the one I am to worship as a Christian... not myself. But, but why doesn't he just say it is all about Jesus? Why does he always answers obscurely using the term “God.” As a pastor, a Christian pastor, Rick Warren should have the clear understanding that any person of most any religious affiliation can assert that their religion is “all about God.” But I wonder too, why he continually berates the American Church, calling Christians self-serving, and says, "It.'s not about you."?

Has he not read his Bible?

It’s interesting to note that in the gospel of Matthew, Jesus spoke the words, “I say unto YOU,” fifty-nine times. Christian's often tell someone who is not Christian, how the Lord Jesus died for them.... or that God loves them.... If "IT," whatever it is, is not about the person listening, then who is it about? If not about the person who can receive Christ as Lord and Savior by laying down their will to the will of God the Father, and believing on Jesus for their own salvation… then who is it for?

Someone else besides you? And if it is all about God; does God really desire that everything be about Him?

Are you certain that IT is not about you?

When Jesus broke the break and gave it to his disciples, he said, “This is my body, which is given for YOU.” By the mere act of communion we remember, Him and how his body was broken and his blood poured out for someone.

Was it you?

It is not entirely true to say, "it’s not about you, its about God." Truth is, it is about you and about God, your relationship with Him. It's about YOU being yoked to Jesus, YOU knowing he is God and trusting Him, entering his rest and remaining in Him, so he can remain in YOU.

Then YOU can know the truth and the truth can set YOU free.

Fidel Castro

2010-01-19T16:26:00.000-08:00

Rick Warren, in his 2003 letter announcing his Peace Plan, happily boasted that Fidel Castro had requested an autographed copy the “Purpose Driven Life” book. HE obviously believes this book changes peoples life for the better and he wants to be sure we all know who is reading it, you know all the great names and people who's lives are changed, so we will all want to be just like them...

Rick Warren wrote, “The influence of the book [Purpose Driven Life] keeps amazing me everyday as I get requests for autographed copies. In today's stack: I signed books for 1) All the Supreme Court Justices 2) One for Fidel Castro 3) One for the President of Peru, these last 2 were Spanish editions,(note, he wants to tell us the book is EVEN translated into Spanish), and I recently got a note saying that everyone on Air Force One was reading the book recently. But all this is not about us. God's intention is much bigger than the book.” (Quoted from what is known as the "Peace Plan Letter" by Rick Warren, a letter sent to his congregation, Saddleback Church in 2003.)

But who is Fidel Castro? I do not hear too much about him these days, not aas much as I did growing up, but for a long time he was quite a political figure. Just so you know, he has had a reputation as a "bad guy," a notorious, communist, dictator of Cuba.

Coming to power in 1959, Castro and his Communist regime transformed the tiny island nation of Cuba into the first communist state in the west. He ruled as a dictator and tens of thousands of political opponents and dissidents have been reported killed by him and while it probably is not very much talked about these days... the reality is that for years the whole world knew this was the case and many people were outraged. They denounced his state sponsored threats to life, the violence, and the political oppression that has taken place in Cuba under Castro’s leadership.

There are few who dare to question Castro's absolute rule and wisdom, few who dare to think outside the box in which they are allowed to think or live. Few even know the outside world is any different... they are told the way things are and aren't told what to believe. There are not many willing to overcome the fear of the death threats or harsh imprisonment in Cuban prisons that they will face if they dare to disagree. Few stand up against such oppression, few ever have a voice of their own, and there are fewer still who try to flee from it that ever escape alive.

From those who do escape, we hear their stories, stories of the fear, oppression and economic slavery that come from living under a totalitarian , communist regime. Research such things for yourself and see. Life in a communist country is seldom sweet and rosy, there is no such things as freedom...nor individualism.... you simply must conform, or die. Life there is often hard and oppressive. People do not leave Cuba, they escape. They try to escape, something commonly known as communism.

Communism, (according to Frontline’s website China in the Red, a glossary for teachers 2006,) is defined as: “A system of government in which the state plans and controls the economy and a single, often authoritarian party, holds power, claiming to make progress toward a higher social order in which all goods are equally shared by the people." And make no mistake, Castro is that "authoritarian," Communist leader, or has been until lately as his ailing health as failed. One thing you can be sure of, Communism hates Capitalism... free enterprise, and individual freedom.

The central idea of communism is that private property is to be eliminated, followed by an equitable distribution of wealth to all the people. It seems like it would be ideal because theoretically you'd have no "middle class," as well as eliminate the extremely wealthy, best of all, no people who are poor. But in practice this is not what communism is.

A commonly held principal of Communism is "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" (This is a quote from famous Communist, Karl Marx.) It perhaps sounds a bit fair, that of giving to each benevolently what he deserves, and what he needs. It's Utopian, and Communism’s imperialistic “conformity without question” is always required to make such a perfect system of community, with fairness and justice for all, work.

In Communism, non-conformity, even to the seemingly little things, is often punishable by death, as we have seen in communist societies of the past and present. Rules and regulations of the state are typically enforced by force, to the point that even thought must be controlled... Every aspect of public and private behavior is suspect, every aspect of life is to be under complete and total state control, and for this to happen, the person... or group entity, or mob...who can evoke the most force, or fear, ultimately gains control.

Living in a totalitarian state means not having freedom to choose occupation, place of residence, or even express ideas that are contrary to the political climate, (or the leader) of the state. One must always be politically correct in everything they do. There is no such thing as a peaceful protest in a totalitarian communist government, because protesting is not an option, protestors are met with brutality and force, as was witnessed by the world at Tiananmen Square in 1989. Few dare to stand up to the opposition, but some do.

Totalitarian leaders demand total control of the people, they have no mercy, no respect for himan life and dignity... there is no freedom of religion, no freedom of speech, no freedom of the press, no freedom of words, and they who ascribe to controlling the "state" he creates for him and his subjects are not afraid to make anyone an example of what happens if one disobeys his personal rule of law. The Italian dictator Mussolini described it like this: “All within the state, nothing outside the state, and nothing against the state.” That is totalitarian.

Mussolini, Hitler, Castro... these men are totalitarian

Castro was taught in Roman Catholic (specifically Jesuit) schools, but according to Wikipedia, he is an atheist, not Catholic. In fact he was excommunicated in 1962 by the Pope, (leader of the Roman Catholic Church) for being a Communist. In return of that favor, Castro has never allowed anyone with catholic ties to be members of his Communist Party.

Recently however, Castro has had a change of heart... and if what Rick Warren says is true, Castro is not only reading Warren's Purpose Driven life, but now surprisingly allows church-going Catholics to join the Cuban Communist Party. Word on the street is that he even tolerates Christmas parties, something the excommunicated, communist, atheist man has never done before.

Change is taking place... and Castro has been through some changes.

For example, in 1988 he “allowed” the Pope to visit him on Cuban soil. That was a "first."

Then when Pope John Paul II died, Castro was seen attending Catholic mass at Havana’s cathedral, this he did simply to honor him. Now, as reported by Rick Warren, Castro has even asked for an autographed copy of the Purpose Driven Life book! Imagine that! THe totalitaiand man is finally going to learn how to be, "Purpose Driven!"

Maybe Castro isn’t the hard-line Communist, ruthless person he used to be.
(That would be a praise!)

These ties with religion, this softness of heart... is for many, much the way the early Christians felt about Paul... and his conversion to Christianity. It s little suspicious. Unlike Paul however, there has not really been any official words or actions that would demonstrate to the world that Castro converted to Christianity, that the man believes in God, believes in Jesus Christ as his Lord and savior, or has admitted any guilt regarding any murders or crimes against humanity.... but many people in the press are all ears.

On August 13, 2005, (two years after asking Rick Warren for an autographed copy of his book) the Christian Post reported that the World Council of Churches made a public announcement about Cuba. Apparently, after a four-day visit and meeting with Castro in Cuba by their secretary general, they were happy to announce that “Cuban President Fidel Castro will provide facilities to help Evangelical Churches build new churches and develop their pastoral mission.”

Maybe he is a Christian?This would be a change for sure, because men like Amondo Valladares who spent 22 years in Cuban prison because he refused to put a slogan supporting Castro and communism on his desk at work, tells the world, "During those years, (in prison) with the purpose of forcing us to abandon our religious beliefs and to demoralize us."

Valladares also reports that during those years, "...the Cuban Communist indoctrinators repeatedly used the statements made by some representatives of the American Christian churches. Every time a pamphlet was published in U.S., every time a clergyman would write an article in support of Cuba’s dictatorship, a translation would be given to us, and that was far worse for the Christian political prisoners than the beatings or the hunger. Incomprehensible to us, while we waited for the embrace of solidarity from our brothers in Christ, those who were embraced were our tormentors.” Today's Cuba, with Fidel's ailing health, is being lead by Fidel's brother, Raul, who, since "Fidel had grown in respect for religion and appreciation for the Church, " now shakes hands and rubs elbows with religious dignitaries.

Who knows, maybe things in Cuba are improving? This, despite the Crackdown in Cuba (PBS, 2003) on people who disagree with the Communist regime.

It kinda makes one wonder how it feels to be a Christian in Cuban Prison, as the Vatican delegates embrace the Castro brothers and Rick Warren boasts that Fidel Castro, is requesting signed copies of his Best Selling Christian book. The world looks on and smiles, meanwhile men and women are doing time in prison, for believing in God, for refusing to support with a placard on a desk, the only possible candidate for office, and who, according to Valladares will stand before firing squads saying, "Long live Christ the King, Down with Communism!"

But hey, the Lord can change hardened hearts, he has been known to change a few people, and Fidel Castro is vulnerable to change, like everyone else. Besides , the Bible has many examples of converts including Saul who became Paul the apostle. He too, a much of a law-keeper as he was, repented of his sin against Almighty God, and God forgave him, then He used him to spread the gospel of God's love and mercy to the world. If you remember from the bible, he used to murder Christians.

But are the Castro brothers, Raul and Fidel now, after all these years, changing their ways of doing things in their communist country? Have they had a change of heart, confessed their sin, and turned to God? Are they Christian?

This is something that as of yet, remains to be seen,

Even Paul had a reputation to combat, and he did so for many years after he finally came face to face with the reality of his sin and his faith in God.

World Class Christians

2010-01-18T17:31:00.000-08:00

This is another post referencing Rick Warren and his many teachings.

Becoming a World Class Christian by Rick Warren, (May 2003,) is one of many articles written by Rick that says there are two kinds of Christians in the world. That is, besides "healthy" or "unhealthy"- his usual two options for a Christian or church or a pastor. He says, a Christian can either be “world class,” or “worldly.” He also did a radio segment called “One Minute with Rick Warren” that aired on many a Christian Radio, proudly announcing too that it was sponsored by the Moody Bible Institute. Here too, he asks the question of listening Christians, "World-Class or Worldly? Which one are you?"

It probably goes without saying that most Christians know being "worldly" is NOT the thing a Christian is supposed to be and knowing this, the most desirable option between the two choices to pick is "world class." Few would not think to themselves, "I want to be a world-class Christian... I want to be the best Christian I can be!" Few.

"World class" denotes something of the highest caliber, such as a world-class figure skaters, or a world-class heavyweight champion. It usually refers to someone brilliant, even someone "your greatest opponent" would respect. Should be a pretty easy answer for most of us, because we know being worldly would not be right, and we would rightly gravitate one direction over the other between the two. "World class Christian,"-- if I do not already bear that title or label, is...kinda like that old commercial for Oscar Meyer, ....It " is really what I want to be..e.. e....."

Like a magician, Rick has simply waved the magic wand.... and the rabbit popped right out... a white rabbit too... (The good one, the one that you would expect...) Very few even notice that with masterful slight of hand, or is it mouth, Christianity has just been divided as they pick what they want to be. Christians in his audience who are not on board being his newly defined "world-class," the white rabbit he just pulled out of his hat, must be the "other" kind... worldly, which are those who are self centered, not "others-centered" or "serving"anyone but themselves. (Aka, unhealthy.) After all, there are only two kinds of Christians in the world; and they are either, this or that.... and if they are not this lovely white rabbit here, they must be that; (and THAT... is bad.)

Christians have read their Bible... they have learned, (hopefully, their doctrine and practices) from the bible, from the teachings of Jesus Christ in the Word of God.... and they know that being labeled as "worldly" is something a Christian does not want to be. Rick is quite certain that upon hearing him, they will all happily choose the one he wants them to, and wear the new and improved Christian label,(World Class) with great pride. Many do. They now are not longer merely Christians, not like all those others who think only of themselves... no they are suddenly something more, moe significant than that. They are "world-class."

It's quite amazing, really.... One Minute you are a Christian, do your best, reading your Bible, intent on loving the Lord with all you heart, mind and strength, loving your neighbor as yourself, and seeking God's approval, not the worlds and the next, you a putty in Warren's hands, reading his books, doing his programs, hoping to find out what on Earth you have been born for besides sitting in a church pew and learning doctrine. The next thing you know, you're buying Warren's book, disciovering things the Bible never told you. Wondering what your "shape" for ministry is, and instead of regular Bible study through something like the book of Daniel, you are working through six weeks of Purpose, six weeks of Community and then six weeks more learning how to implement Rick Warren's global plan to slay the five evil giants in the world by implementing P.E.A.C.E. from your own home town.

Five purposes, 40 days, seven secrets, 12 steps...he uses ever number in the book, except for 1...(one way for everyone to go if they want to be saved from sin and death) as he convinces Christians on this planet that they are lost, that the hands and feet of the body of Christ is amputated and all that’s left is a big mouth... preaching all the time.... known more for what we are against, than what we are for. Unhealthy, and so are pastors who preach in season and out of season.... that is if they do not listen to the expert, who knows everything... which, of course, is him.

It is quite sad.

He is teaching "World Class Christians new things... new ways to be a Christian, including learning new things to do as believers in Christ, like how to practice praying breath prayers. He is busy reviving old practices like lectio divina too. (See: Day 5, Week Thirty Eight, 40 Days of Purpose, "The Great Commission is My Commission.) He will even suggest your church members be required to tithe to the church, that they should be signing oaths and covenants in their congregations. Oaths and covenants, if they are anything like we have seen in biblical history, would be hard for anyone to actually "keep."

Is this because we can no longer trust one another as Christians to simply do what the word says, not because we have to, but because we simply do... can we no longer simply let our yes be yes and our no be no? What changed? And these revived, old practices like "breath prayers" and "lectio divina" are these suddenly some kind of essential ingredients to living the Christian life? You know, that "unhealthy," Christian church that Rick Warren speaks of with contempt, is... in his opinion, unhealthy because they do not do these things he teaches them to do, and because they believe myths about prayer and preaching, like "that all you need is prayer and dedication to grow a healthy church." Warren teaches healthier world class Christians to practice breath prayer and lectio divina, but fails to mention that there are not instructions to do them anywhere in the bible, excpet for maybe that part about vain surreptitious prayer.(Matthew 6:7)

Doing all these things, makes the church no longer operate as a place of friendship with the Lord and one another, but a business, or a huge stage production. Church relationships become hierarchical in nature, denominations blend into something unidentifiable as "Christian" and everyone runs around martha-like. Converts are made, not recieved and then they are locked into relationships via contract. Church is become a market place... where men market their products, ideas, and talents hoping they will be Christian celebrities for all the things they do...people gather, not for prayer but to fulfill a religious duty or to fill a coffee cup... study the lastest, greatest, "New York Times best selling 'Christian' book... and unearth new creative ways to convince the world that the "local church" anyone you like... the one you are most comfortable in, is a great place to belong, discover who you really are, even find your purpose and your shape... and make new friends.

Rick Warren wants to be the catalyst for change. He want to help Christians unify and work together, teach them that they were made to serve the world and realize they are part of a "global culture."

He tells Christians,most of the world already thinks globally, (inferring that it's just the rest who do not that, who lag behind,) and he infers that becoming a "World Class Christian" involves developing this "global thinking", and this because "God is a global God,"

"You will be either a world-class Christian or a worldly Christian...." (says Rick in the Purpose Driven Life, Pg 297, and it's repeated elsewhere in a lot of his materials too.) Here is how to know one from the other: (source: Purpose Driven Life Daily Devotion ; Your Commission by Rick Warren, 7/1/2007)

"Worldly Christians look to God primarily for personal fulfillment. They are saved, but self-centered. They attend concerts and enrichment seminars, but you’ll rarely find them at a missions conference because they aren’t interested. Their prayers focus on their own needs, blessings, and happiness. It’s a “me-first” faith: How can God make my life more comfortable? They want to use God for their purposes -- instead of being used for his purposes.

World-class Christians, in contrast, know they’re saved to serve and made for a mission. They’re eager to receive a personal assignment and excited about the privilege of being used by God. World-class Christians are the only fully alive people on the planet. Their joy, confidence, and enthusiasm are contagious because they know they’re making a difference. They wake up each morning expecting God to work through them in fresh ways. "

Which one do you want to be? Which one are you? And does it even matter?... after all, according to Rick, they both "are saved?" (just .... never mind for just one minute that he neglects the very words of Jesus that suggest "not everyone who says Lord, Lord, to him, will be "saved." Quick! You have one minute here to decide. Which are you?)

"World Class or Worldly?"

How about just "Christian?" How about simply putting your faith in JEsus Christ, in what he said and what he did, and following, not Rick Warren or anyone else, just Jesus Christ ands those who give testimony to Him?

The accolades and the approval of the world, (having everyone be in love with YOU) is not the goal of the Bible believing, Spirit filled Christian. Rather it is loving God, because he love us. It is in being devoted to serving God, not the world, with all our heart and mind and strength, and loving others as we love ourselves... being a light in the darkness, being a testimony to Jesus Christ... believing His promises and trusting in his Word, hearing and obeying his word, and pleasing God, not men by our actions in the world.

If you want the world's approval... to be like everybody else, to listen to the wisdom of this man named Rick, think again...

Jesus said, "I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. (John 15:9)
See also: John 17: 9; John 17:14,16; John 1:10 ; John 15:14,15)

If you are a pastor or a true believer, they might even label you, "unhealthy," or maybe "evil"... and "uneducated".... thinking only of yourself because you are busy managing your own affairs at home or work, not quite as busy as they are, or because you shun a relationship with a forming group.

A War'in Peace Plan

2010-01-18T00:50:00.000-08:00

Have you heard about Rick Warren's Peace Plan? A lot of people have. What have they heard?

“The Elements of the Peace Plan is not new or different than traditional missions. The difference is not so much in what is done, but rather both how it is done and who does it.” This is another quote of Rick Warren’s originally from an article at his website, Purposedriven.com titled, "What makes the Peace plan so different?" (lowercase letters intentional, as that is how it is published.) It is quite amazing that he says that the “elements” of the plan can be both different and not different at the same time. Which is it? Is it “not new or different” or is there a “difference?”

To infer that it can both different and not different at the same time is, for lack of a better word, simply Zen. It could possibly be a mistake in linguistics, but it has been said many times, much like a motto, and such convolution of words and their meanings is common with Warren, that it warrants investigation. "The elements of the Peace Plan are not new or different than traditional missions. The difference is not so much in what is done, but rather both how it is done and who does it.”

Really?

One cannot help but investigate this when they stop to consider that Warren is thought to be a Christian Pastor and that "Christian" pastors are not to be in the business of using tricky words to fool or confuse people. The scripture in 2 Corinthians 4:2 tells readers that those who tend the sheep of God, “ do not use deception, nor do we distort the word of God. On the contrary, by setting forth the truth plainly we commend ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.” Christians read this in their bibles and they often wonder how their brother in the Lord, (Rick Warren) is able to in good conscious, repeat the same confusing messages over and over and over to different audiences. They are left scratching their heads in amazement that one would so boldly proclaim:

“It is not new or different, but the difference is…revolutionary!”

Globaldayofprayer.com has an article written by Rick and Kay Warren together, it is titled, Facing the world’s five evil giants. Later in the same article the Warren describes the same plan he says is “not new or different” as “revolutionary.” Meanwhile, back at the dictionary, Wordnet at Princeton defines the word “revolutionary” as “markedly new or introducing radical change.” This is pretty tricky. One minute he is talking about how his Peace Plan is just like traditional missions and the next it the Peace Plan becomes something “revolutionary.” It's mesmerizing.

Like a magician with a magic wand, Warren wields words before his audience and “presto change-o” like magic... " not new" becomes “revolutionary,” and so few people seem to notice. They applaud him as words like "transformation" magically replaces "repentance," or "meditation" becomes synonymous with "prayer." The permutations of scriptures is nearly infinite! The mesmerized audience, seized with awe by such success and showmanship, applauds.

They love it. Seems that they can hardly wait for more.

What does Rick have to say six years after the unveiling of his P.E.A.C.E. Plan? He says, "The church was global 200 years before anybody started talking about globalization. Nothing has as many people groups, as many languages, as many contacts as the church..." and "...We, (Saddleback Church) will be the first church in 2000 years of Christianity to literally go to every nation."

So, was the church global already, long before Rick was born, or Rick really going to be "the first "to facilitate the church going "global?"

....How amazing that everything already done he can do better... and "first" too!

It's like magic!

See him address the world on important issues on Larry King Live 2009.

"Can we all get along?"

2010-01-17T21:40:00.000-08:00

"Can we all just get along here? Can we all get along?" These famous words fall from the lips of Americans from time to time, especially as they reminiscence the plea for peace made by Rodney King after the Los Angeles Riots in 1992.

It was March 1991, and King, who was speeding down the road in his car, refused to pull over when police of Lake View Terrace, CA decided to pull him over with flashing lights and sirens. Instead of doing what was required of him by law when a person sees the flashing lights of a patrol car behind them, he put the pedal to the metal, and at 110 mph he sped away, giving them a bit of a chase. In his escapade he ran through several red lights and stop signs before the police finally pulled him over.

Police officers, who were already dealing with a person who tried to evade them and put peoples lives in danger on the road, suspected King of being under the influence of a mind altering drug. HE was still uncooperative, and was lunging for one of their weapons, and the officers proceeded to use intense physical force, to stop him. For some reason it took over 50 baton hits for the police to subdue and arrest the man.

During King's arrest, another man, George Holliday, was alerted by noises he heard outside of his nearby apartment window. He ran, got his camera, and began to videotape what was happening outside on the road and in that moment was caught on video for the world the world to see, a suspect resisting arrest and the LAPD officers using extreme force. It was not long until the scene was being called “police brutality," and people suspecting that it was brutality "motivated by racial differences.” Other people, defending the police actions, said that it was simply indicative of the environment there is in working with criminals who just as soon take your life when you are working to uphold the law.

It spurred a huge debates as King was taken in to custody and the film went public in the media. Eventually the case went to trial... and on trial was the arresting officers.... who were charged with assault.

As it went public that the jury found the officers "not guilty" riots and looting broke out in the streets of LA, and that’s when Rodney King, the man in the car chase, the man who was beaten by police, made a famous appearance before television news cameras to plead for peace in the city... saying, "Can we get along here? Can we all get along?" It was a national crisis.

President Bush appeared on the television condemning the “terror and lawlessness” that broke out and vowed assistance to the governor and the mayor to restore order to the region making it clear that they would use whatever force was necessary to make peace happen in LA.

Two officers were eventually sentenced to thirty months in federal correctional camps, but the government appealed, arguing that the sentences were too light and violated federal sentencing guidelines. In 1995, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the government's position and sent the case back to Judge Davies for the imposition of a tougher sentence. After appeal to the Supreme Court the Ninth Circuit and upheld the sentence of Judge Davies and the original thirty-month sentence stood.

Rodney King, meanwhile, won a $3.8 million verdict from the City of Los Angeles and became the proud owner of Straight Alta-Pazz Recording Company.

Purpose

2010-01-16T03:38:00.000-08:00

"God made you for a purpose” is the well-known saying and focus of Rick Warren, Pastor of Saddleback Church in California. This cliché (or slogan) is used so often by Warren in his presentations to the public that it almost singularly identifies him, his sermons, and his books.

Rick Warren describes himself as a doctor, pastor, author, global strategist, theologian and philanthropist, and he has flooded the market with his many books. Some of his titles are: The Purpose Driven Church: Growing Without Compromise, (1995) The Purpose Driven Life; What on Earth am I Here For? (2002) God’s Power to Change Your Life (2006) and The Purpose of Christmas. (2008) He is also the driving force behind the Christian Recovery classes called Celebrate Recovery, and has written much of their material. Additionally he has co-authored or fully endorsed books like, Living the Life You Were Meant to Live ( 2003, with Tom Paterson) The Emerging Church;Vintage Christiantiy for New Genrations ( 2003, with Dan Kimball, Brian McLauren and Howard Hendricks) Life 2.0: How People Across America are Transforming their Lives by Finding the Where of Their Happiness ( 2005, with Rich Karlgaard) to name a few. In 2005, Warren even began writing a monthly article for the nationally syndicated, Ladies Home Journal magazine, perhaps to help women find purpose and meaning in their lives.

Warren posted an Internet website in 2001 called, Ministry Toolbox, which he has used to disseminate his teachings and his quotations, which he calls Saddle back sayings, to pastors all over the world. With the click of your computer mouse, you can read what he thinks and learn from him. To further help get his message out, he sells the audio recordings of his sermons from Saddleback, books, along with journals and workbooks to go with his books, placards and calendars, magazine subscriptions and he will even twitter your cell phone if you'd like to inspire you every day. Rick Warren has deliberately placed himself in a position to teach not only the world but pastors of every and any denomination who will listen to him..

Warren is not shy about telling readers that he is "America’s pastor". His website boasts about the what the media has to say about him and he makes sure it's the biggest wealthiest names in media behind his own. We read that Forbes Magazine says, “Were it a business, Saddleback Church would be compared with Dell, Google or Starbucks;” We read that TIME Magazine says, “Movie stars and political leaders aren't the only ones turning to Rick Warren for spiritual guidance. Millions of people – from NFL and LPGA players to corporate executives to high school students to prison inmates – meet regularly to discuss The Purpose Driven Life.” He also quotes USA Today, Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, Boston Globe, Washington Post and the New York Times calling him, “America's most influential spiritual leader" and “ America’s Pastor.” Warren is pretty convinced that everyone, who is anyone, endorses his teaching.

Maybe they do.

The media glamorized man wears a Hawaiian shirt which has almost become Warren's signature, so much so, that he once joked about the addition of a Hawaiian shirt into every box for pastors receiving what Warren called “church in a box.” Church in a box was a serious idea he had to send essentials to pastors working in the field. It would be a box of all the things they would need to help them start his brand of “purpose driven” churches. He was joking about the shirt, perhaps, but Warren is definitely known for his love of Hawaiian shirts and he wasn’t kidding about the "church in a box" idea.

But as one listens to Warren’s ideas of church, it seems the focus of his preaching is to criticize and find fault with Christians and with the Christian church. He repetitively rants, in his writings as well as from the pulpit, about how badly “Christians” behave, and about how unhealthy “Christian” pastors and churches are.

You will hear him saying things like, “It's unfortunate, but “many churches” assume that spiritual maturity happens automatically, so they have no real plan for helping their members grow in Christ. That’s why I encourage churches to be purpose driven;” (Pastors.com Article: Helping Members Grow To Maturity by Rick Warren.) He likes to say, “’Most Christians’ do not behave the way they claim to believe,” and “The ‘typical believer’ never shares his faith, never helps the poor, never visits those in prison, and never does many of the other things Jesus commanded us to do.” (A Purpose Driven Phenomena Interview with Rick Warren in Modern Reformation magazine.). By using such language he degrades Christians while he himself is above average and never part of the "many" or the "typical" he finds fault with. He even likes to point out how he is not like all the rest.

Warren accuses Christians of being incompetent. He insists that they are ill prepared, too caught up in doctrine and figuring out prophecy. Unlike the usual pastor who preaches against sin, Warren preaches against the church, calling those who are called by His name, hypocritical liars and typifies the average Christians as unhelpful and uncaring. Using the language he does, he hopes that those who think they are better than the ones he finds fault with will flock to him for wisdom, and they do. It’s uncommon to find a Christian pastor who so frequently berates the Christian church.

Pastors are to preach the word, in season and out of season, to feed the flock, and strive to unite the sheep in spirit as they grow into what Jude calls the “most holy faith.” (Jude 1:20) Like a good shepherd, a pastor is to nourish and cherish (that is, tenderly look after) the church for it is the Bride of Christ and Jesus left his sheep in their care. Instead Warren ‘s words fall like bombshells, continually bombarding Christian congregations with the notion that their pastor is not to be trusted, and niether is the church at large. Warren suggests they are unhealthy. The cure, the way, the path to Warren’s definition of “health” is not Jesus and Bible studies. Health comes from listening to Warren and becoming "purpose driven."

Warren says things to make your ears twitch if you know the scriptures. He says, “If you want Jesus to come back sooner focus on fulfilling your mission, not figuring out prophecy” (Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren pg. 286) This stands starkly contrasted to Rev 22:7 Rev. 1:3; 2 Peter 1:21; 1 Tim 4:14; and 1 Thess. 5:20, scriptures that counsel Christians to understand prophecy.

Warren's 40 Days of Purpose Day 13 teaches, “There is no "one-size-fits-all" approach to worship and friendship with God." (See also: Purpose Driven Life: Worship That Pleases God by Rick Warren., MT #71) In contrast, John 14:6 declares emphatically that there is only One Way for everyone and that His name is Jesus. And maybe you will agree with Rick when he quotes the Bible, saying, "True worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers that the Father seeks.”then he adds, " Worship in truth means to worship as God is revealed in the Bible." Believers cannot help but note, Warren fails to mention that God is Jesus.

Then he tells his listeners, "Most pastors do not understand the power of preaching. But even more important than that is they don't understand the purpose of preaching. I probably have the largest library of books on preaching in America. I've read over 500 books on preaching. Maybe some seminary might come close to that, but I am sure that no pastor comes close to 500 books on preaching. And as I've read them, the vast majority do not really understand that preaching is about transformation, not information."(Rick Warren, "Purpose-Driven Preaching: an interview with Rick Warren," Pastors.com, MT #62)

But truth is, it is not "what" you know, but "who" and more importantly, "who knows you." Read in Matthew 7: 21... "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven." There is only one person, who ever did perfectly, God's will: Jesus.

On Sunday Nov. 2, 2003, something interesting happened. Rick Warren revealed what he calls his Peace Plan to the world. It is his plan, he says, to eradicate from the world what he called the five evil giants... 1.) spiritual lostness, 2.) uneducated pastors, 3.) poverty, 4.) disease, and 5.) illiteracy. According to Warren, THESE are the most devastating problems in the world, responsible for the suffering of billions and a staggering amount of oppression.

(Spiritual lostness?..What is THAT?....Pastors, who are "uneducated?".(suddenly called one of the world's great evils?) How about poverty?.....(These are the greatest evils in the world today?... One would think, "murder" was evil... or maybe "greed," not things out of human control, like being born without money in your pocket, or having some "disease.") What IS this man, Rick Warren, thinking?

During the same service, Rick made confession to his congregation that he had been wrong about something for twenty five years. He told the watching world and the people in front of him that day that he “used to believe the greatest thing a person could do in their life was to lead another person to Jesus Christ,” but that he “didn’t believe that any more.” Then apologetically making reference to how, even as a pastor, he had taught and believed that very thing for 25 years, he added, I “now believe that the greatest thing a person can do, is build a church.”

The observant listener can only guess what "kind of " church "that" would be. The believer in Jesus, marvels and wonders, "if not built upon Jesus, then what would that church's foundation be?"

Rick never tires of sharing his message either, In February, 2006, he even had the opportunity to talk about God before a group called TED. (Technology, Entertainment, Design... a "small nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading.") He told his audience, “Did you know that God smiles when you be you. Some people have the misguided idea that God only gets excited when you're doing “spiritual things” like going to church or helping the poor or confessing or doing something like that. The bottom line is that God gets pleasure watching you be you. Why? He made you..."

One thing for certain, as you listen to him speak, is that his message to the listening world, the "good news", according to Rick... is two fold; First, "God loves you;" and second, he "created you for a purpose.

Rick has a lot of Bible sounding words to say, but he never ties the knot of that they mean when you put them all together...Jesus Christ as the savior of the world. He never takes the time to make a red-ribboned bow and present the real gift of God to man in it's plain and simple meaning... Jesus Christ given for the forgiveness of the sin of sinners. God loves.. he love loves the world... (John 3:16) and gave his only begotten Son on so that all who believe on him would be saved.

Yes, one must believe on Jesus Christ... ( not that their life has purpose,) to be saved.
He is the way the truth and the life... and no one comes to the Father but by Him (John 14:6)

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Higher Power

2010-01-15T16:26:00.000-08:00

Higher Power, as the term is thrown about in certain cultural circles, that refers, not necessarily to a belief in God, but the prevailing notion that it doesn’t matter who or what you believe in. Such a belief does of course, include God if that is what a person would desire their personal "higher power" to be, but a higher power can be any thing at all whether it is a crystal rock or a rabbit’s foot or a person. In other words, all that matters is a person is willing to say they have faith in something, anything, greater than themselves.

While it is a start, the underlying understanding of course of such a philosophy as this is that everyone can do what they believe is right for themselves, and that God is undefined, not a one size fits all sort of thing. It comes from the belief that whatever works for you must be good, if it works.

It's a start, for to come to God and be saved by Him, one must first believe, that God is.

And God.. is.. the I AM.

Vegan

2010-01-15T16:15:00.000-08:00

Thoughts on Veganism and Religion:

A person who is vegan is a strict vegetarian, using no animal products at all. They eat no milk, cheese, or eggs; nor do they use leather or silk or even honey; to do so, (in their religious thinking, their worldview) would exploit the animals these items come from. Sometimes they believe that naturally carnivorous animals, like dogs and cats should be vegan too. In the mind of vegans, it would be unethical for humans to harm living creatures of any kind, sometimes even insects, and ethically wrong for man to dominate the beasts.

Donald Watson in 1944 first defined veganism as follows: “Veganism is a way of living which excludes all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, the animal kingdom, and includes a reverence for life. It applies to the practice of living on the products of the plant kingdom to the exclusion of flesh, fish, fowl, eggs, honey, animal milk and its derivatives, and encourages the use of alternatives for all commodities derived wholly or in part from animals.”

Even Vegan knitters, also do not use animals products for their knitting. Vegans are always on the lookout for using organic, plant based, "cruelty-free" products. Cotton, hemp, linen, bamboo, ingeo , as well as synthetics like acrylic, nylon, and microfiber—are fibers that do not come from animals.

But how are such synthetic fibers, such as ingeo, produced and collected? Are they produced in factories? Who makes them? Who are the little people working so hard to turns vegetable materials into such fine gold?

It is a little confusing to think that man made, synthetic items produced in factories.. like Nylon , would be better than the things natural and more desirable than the things produces naturally, things of the natural world. And one must wonder if synthetic meats are really desirable to be eaten or just some weird political maneuver.

You get the idea, after reading about vegans and veganism, (Thank you Dr. Sapon and others that some people think that veganism is the answer to man's proplems. Some think it is what we eat that will solve the the problem of death and suffering we see all around us in the world,. They believe that death and suffering, can avoided in this world... if we would only change our ways. Truth is, it is not what goes into a man that defiles him (Thank you Jesus) but what comes out, and in this world, such things as both suffering and death, cannot be avoided.

May the good Lord bless, the plants and animals, as well as other men and women, who give their lives that we can live, in this world! All things, are not beneficial, but permissible... and all things with thanksgiving to the the One who in the very beginning of life on Earth, made them all.

Even if we overlook the realities of suffering and death... avoid them like the plague...or try to fix them by changing the choices we make, the products we buy, we are still buying and selling and we are still going to see death of both man and beast sometime in our lives, unless of course, we sterilize everything we do and never get in touch with nature, (sad day.) or appreciate it. The righteous man does not exploit his animals, in fact he tends to his animals needs.

Things in nature live and die, some suffer too, which can only be avoided if we give ourselves liscences to kill them, ignoring the command of God, who also by the way, demanded blood of goats and rams to be sacrifices as a means of making retribution for man's sin... but that is another story.... His; and it's a story about how he himself became flesh and blood and dwelt among mankind, and showed man true kindness.... and showed huanity how unkind and unjust man really was when he allowed evil to be poured out onto himself, giving his life, his flesh and blood, like a lamb to the slaughter, so that we who were imperfect could see the reality of sin.

Denying reality and the natural world, we prefer to go synthetic and think ourselves to be no difffernet than the animals, even tot he point of excusing ourselves with rationalities we make up, when we act like them.

We create our own products, make our own human laws and want to think we are but animals, animals of a more superior mind and heart than even God. We reject the generosity of God, and his righteous judgment... and neglect our responsibility to properly manage, feed, care for and learn from and about the animals. This is much like the responsibility God gave to Noah, on the Ark...

and to David, who was a shepherd boy.

David knew that the job of the shepherd was not to dominate the animals, but to live with them, and among them, knowing they were there to help him and that God had given mankind dominion over them, and as such he cared diligently for them. He would even lay down his own life for them,

and they for he.

Vegans often have good intentions in pursing their world view... after all, when God created Adam and Even in the garden of Eden, they were probably Vegan. But we are not in Eden now, and to force veganism... or vegetarian for that matter is not a natural view of the world and how it now works because, Adam and Eve sinned, and we are not in the garden of GOd anymore, but we do have his promise of his love and redemption from sin.

Sin has brought death into this world and since the flood God has given man the animals for food.... and for sacrifices to show us that a perfect sinless life can be given in exchange for an imperfect life..
to reveal our need for God, and our redeemer, Jesus Christ. One day though, God will make all things new....In many ways vegan people are simply trying to create their own Eden state of being...unfortunately, this cannot be done because we live in a fallen world. Only God can fix the problem we are in and he has.... through Jesus Christ.

Do you hate sin and what it has done to this creation? I do.

Good news... Jesus saves.

I know, you have probably heard it a thousands times before... but it is true and Jesus is something you can, naturally, believe in. He was flesh and blood just like you and I... like a good shepherd he loves us and gave his own life for ours.

If you are wondering what to eat or not eat... consider, Mathew 15:11 or Romans 14:2. If anyone knew what he was talking about, especially regarding veganism, it would be God, who created Adam and Eve to be Fruitarian.... (Genesis 1:29)

After they left Eden they tilled the soil and were vegetarians.... until after the flood.

Supermen and other Heroes of a Superior Nature

2010-01-15T12:37:00.000-08:00

Superman is a comic book character developed in the 1930’s by two guys who liked detective type comics. Jerry Siegle and Joe Shuster. Jerry wrote the stories, and Joe drew the art that gave the image of a man with unbelievable superhuman powers life in the minds of their readers. It was the year 1932 when Superman and all his super strength was first revealed upon the written page to fight crime and evil in the world.

Superman’s "real" (given) name is Kal El. He is from a far away unknown planet called Krypton and the stroy is that he fell to earth as a child, having been released in a capsule by his parents who were hoping to save his life, if not their own, as their planet was about to be destroyed. He traveled through space a little bit like the baby Moses of the Bible, safe in a basket. Moses traveled down the Nile river's waters, baby superman traveled through time and space, his spacecraft like a baby's basket hurling on a trajectory towards planet Earth.

Luckily for Superman, somewhere downstream in the galaxy, in fact, somewhere in the Bible Belt of America’s Midwest, he is found by a poor, childless, older Christian earth couple, who take him in to their home and raise him as their own son, take him to church and raise him with good morals and values. They name him Clark, Clark Kent.

He and his parents cannot help but know he arrived via spacecraft, and even though they know he is a special child, they do not reveal the secret of his super-powers to the world. Clark grow up fairly normal, but comes across as a misfit or a nerd, a clean cut, well-mannered, humble and noble guy, who aspires to help little old ladies cross the street, but secretly is the all-time crime fighter... faster than a speeding bullet, able to leap tall building with a single bound. Initially, the cartoon Superman did not have the ability to fly through the air, but this ability and many more, (like his allergy to Kryptonite,) have been added over the years to give him more appeal to the masses and keep the story interesting.

But it's no fun being Superman. It's a lot of work to save the world, after all, the world needs him and he beckons at their call, 24/7, because he really cares. The only thing more difficult for Kent than caring about all the people on the planet, is living the lie about his identity to the woman he loves, a woman named Lois; and he can never tell her the truth because, she wouldn't understand.

Superman, is the ultimate fighter of crime. He stop gangsters and people of the baser sort whose morals are out of line from living a life of crime and he puts them behind bars where they belong. Wife-beaters, thugs, thieves, and hoodlums all simply flee at his name, and if he catches them doing something illegal or immoral they are turned in at the local police headquarters so that they could be “locked up for good." He is just the kind of charater any parent would want their child to emulate.

Over the years, people have interpreted the psychological effect of the character known as Superman on the human mind. For some he is nearly a religious icon. Besides being good looking and strong, he is trustworthy and responsible, genuinely concerned for humanity and willing to take action and do something about the plight of evil. Not only that, he has helped sell war bonds, informed humanity about the latest technological threats, even taught us all to consider how such super powers, if some human were to obtain them, would really help to save the world. He even has international appeal, and people do not simly buy the comic books, they flock to theaters to see the Superman come to life on the big screen.

Superman is perhaps the nearest thing to a Jesus that a secular world can really comprehend.

He’s like God in many ways. For example, he has special vision, by which walls become transparent, he can see all things; nothing can escape his X-ray glare. He has super hearing powers too, and can hear people crying out for help, even miles and miles away, and he is compelled to answer their call much the way God listens to and answers prayer.

In his book, The Gospel According to the World's Greatest Superhero, Stephen Skelton goes to great lengths to reveal how writers for Superman intentionally modeled Superman, as a picture of Jesus Christ. He has even written guidance for pastors who want to use the Christ Imagery in the movie Superman Returns in their sermons as the movie hit the theaters in recent years.
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In the 2006 release, Superman Returns, Lois Lane is being awarded the Pulitzer Peace Prize for her latest editorial, "Why the World Doesn't Need Superman." Lex Luthor, the master of Kryptonite, (the only thing that can defeat Superman) is out of prison and this due to the fact that Superman is no where to be found. The audience watches in suspense as Superman, hovering over the Earth in the silence of space, listens to the voice of his father who has been deceased since the planet he was born on blew up in the first movie (when Kal-El was just a baby.) His father says, (reminding him of his mission, "They can be a great people, Kal-El; if they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the Way. For this reason, above all their capacity for good, I have sent them you—my only son."

Sound biblical?

The script writers have Jor-El suggest that humans can be a “great people” if someone will be an example for them and that Kal El, came to be that example of all the things humans are capable of being if they simply want to.

Its almost natural to prefer a savior that is everything you think is great, one you can fully understand, one you would even create yourself, if you could, one that would display every inner strength or all the supernatural power that could be imagined or displayed on the Big Screen. But such heroes like Superman, even as closely portrayed to the story of Jesus, are not real. They are imaginary.

But we do need a savior, someone to make the world right.

Our only real hope for the world is in God and in His Son Jesus Christ.

Even the God hater, Neitze would welcome Superman, since he is no doubt, “faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive,” and "able to leap tall buildings in a single bound.” Jesus, the real savior of the world, and our example, didn’t do all those things. Yes, he did perform miracles, but Christ the suffering servant, is scandalous foolery for a hero... for what real superhero gets himself hung on a cross?

It's the stumbling block that opposes the wisdom of the world.

Nietzsche, who captured “worldly wisdom” so well for the more progressive humans who dismiss the possibiility in their minds that God exists, judges and will hold man accountable for his behaviors, is often quoted saying, almost rejoicing, “God is dead.”

(Oh that darned Kryptonite!) Yes, the sin of the world was upon Him that day. He was lead, like a lamb to the slaughter.

Jesus Christ, the Passover Lamb... suffered and he died... but he rose again, and this according to the scriptures he fulfilled in our hearing...both then, and now.

Raising from such a death, to life again, is something that no human on earth could do, even if they tried. And Jesus did. Jesus wasn't simply someone's imaginary character in a comic book. He's real and part of our human story, our history. He is God.

You can't keep a good man down.

Wayshowers

2010-01-15T02:02:00.000-08:00

"Who can I believe in
I'm kneeling on the floor
There has to be a force who do I phone
The stars are out and shinning, but all I really want to know...
Oh won't you show me the way
I want you ...show me the way"

Peter Frampton sang the song, "Show me the Way." You might say he was looking for someone (or something,) to show him the way to go. Maybe he was looking for the way to God? Where wa he hoping to go? It's hard to tell for sure.

Wayshowers, as the name implies, are those personalities here on the planet who have the magnanimous ability to “show” the rest of us “the way.” And you’ll be impressed to know that they are here to announce to us all that they are indeed “wayshowers,” (not way-pushers or way-draggers.)

There are many people who impress others with the idea that they have some secret wisdom or knowledge and that they should be followed and listened to by the crowds. As leaders, they do not intend to do anything except show you the way that you should go.. usually to "find God." One amazing thing about these fantastic teachers (a-hem) is that everything else, including whether you get there or not, is your hand, your ability to get to the answer to everything in the universes, according to them, is completely up to...none other than you.

They put forth an image of themselves as masters and leaders, people of special ability and talent who deserve to rule and reign by virtue of being elite spiritual trainers, guides, directors, lightworkers, etc. Some even make claim both outwardly and implied that they are in fact, “God.” And then, they simply tell their follower they can only show the way, but that is al they can do, the rest is up to them. They say, everyone needs to be responsible for their own choices, figure the way to go for himself or herself. There are so many leaders and wayshowers, guides, coaches, and spiritual directors, that there are rarely any “followers” to be found.

Jesus said he was the Way… and never thought himself simply a “wayshower.” one that was not willing to do himself exactly what he suggested others do. Not only that, he never said, "lbe sure to lead others, have them follow you..." He simply did what he did, did what he had to do, and said, "follow me."

Gong Show

2010-01-15T01:05:00.000-08:00

The Gong Show was a televised game show where people would get on stage and do totally unpredictable, sometimes outrageously inane things. Celebrities on a panel, would watch the people perform songs, stunts or tricks and judge their acts. If they were amused, they would tolerate the act, if they were bored, sickened or if they hated what the contestant was doing, then they would pick up a huge baton and hit an enormous brass gong and oust the contestant from the stage before the act was finished.

If the contestant didn’t get “gonged” they would be awarded a number score from each celebrity judge. Then at the end of the show, after several contestants performed, the act with the highest score would be declared the winner.

Silence

2010-01-15T01:04:00.000-08:00

Silence

Do we simply turn a deaf ear to that which we cannot bear to hear, fearing that we will be undone when the existence of a holy, righteous God infiltrates our minds?

“Faith comes by hearing,” the scriptures say as men strain their ears to hear… not God's voice, not his words, not his instruction, but the resounding sound of silence.

Deep Space

2010-01-15T00:54:00.000-08:00

Technically speaking, deep space refers to the vast empty fields of space in the universe outside of Earth's atmosphere. It is the nothingness that lies between the atmospheres of all the celestial bodies that hang in suspended motion both inside and outside our known solar system. From an earthen perspective, space can also refer to anything outside the earth’s atmosphere that that can be viewed nicely with the Hubbell Telescope or monitored with the Very Large Array (VLA)

The VLA, located in New Mexico, USA is a part of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and it is best described perhaps as an enormous ear. Turned towards space it is searching for sounds, signals, anything that might let mankind know that there is life somewhere besides earth, somewhere out beyond in the vast crevices of deep space. The VLA project, (costing 78 million dollars,) began in 1972 with it’s purpose being to search the universe for any signal or sign that might be consider an intelligent life form.

You might be interested to know that since that time, and contrary to what is shown in movies, read about in book... after book... after book... after book written by UFO enthusiasts, and conjectured by the media, there has been no real contact with any other beings,no sign of life out there. There has not been any discovery of any life form outside of earth.

Earth is a special place; and even though we have swept the skies, visited planets in out solar system and beyond vicariously, we have yet, to discover other life forms or signs of extraterrestrial intelligence anywhere out there, proving that Earth is unique.

We humans are on a planet suspended, perfectly balanced in space and it’s not a dead planet either. It contains life, intelligent life at that! Here on earth we have beautiful things like animals, flowers, sunsets, and children. We are a planet that exists in calculable measurements, predictable outcomes and repeatable processes, things we call "science." And we exist here in our wonderfully marvelous balanced world of heat and cold, light and darkness, life and…death. Still and yet, in our infinitely creative, contemplative, coherent human minds we find ourselves looking ad listening into the deep darkness of space, hoping to find intelligent life, to prove to ourselves, we were right all along.

"There is no such thing as God."

The Big Bang

2010-01-15T00:38:00.000-08:00

The Big Bang theory, is a theory about the origin of the universe, which asserts that the universe was created sometime between 10 billion and 20 billion years ago. The theory puts forth the idea that a mysterious explosion (from nothingness) occurred at some point in time and the explosion hurled matter and in all directions, expanding outward into the cosmos and creating our planet’s solar system and consequently the universe, in a process called vacuum fluctuation. Humanity, (and all living things on Earth,) is believed is a by-product of this chaotic explosion that rocked the primordial world, as is everything in it.

Evolutionists, who may subscribe to a process such as this, do not believe in God. Creationists on the other hand, and believe it was God who spoke the worlds into existence with a word. Some suggest that God simply said “BANG!’ and caused it all to happen.

MLM...Tupperware

2010-01-15T00:25:00.000-08:00

Tupperware is another MLM business opportunity much like Amway; however, it is more like Mary Kay cosmetics and Avon than Amway in how it is set up. Unlike Amway, Tupperware, Mary Kay and Avon, are more likely to be sold by women,to women through in-home parties. Tupperware is unique though because the main product is plstic products for the home.

Like other home party MLM businesses, special discounts are given to people who sign up to host parties with their friends, then friends are invited to come and purchase products or host parties with their friends. Also like all other MLM’s they hold within their gatherings, the salepitch that if you buy into the product, you can own your own business, setting your own hours, being your own boss. Additionally, you might even catching someone along your way who is an outgoing entrepreneur, someone who will sell lots of product, sign up down-line entrepreneurial types, from which you too will reap the benefits of sales.

While some MLM businesses, like Tupperware, Mary Kay and Avon, are not “pyramid schemes,” and do have good business reputations, there are many MLM business opportunities that are and don't. Just the same, the companies mentioned here, all have one thing in common, and that is that they make it a normal cultural practice for people to make merchandise opportunities of their friends.

People invite their friends and allow a sales pitch to be delivered, and sometimes these friends buy stuff. Sometimes they buy stuff they do not really need or want because they do not want to insult their friend... and then they start thinking of people they can sell stuff to and invite their friends. If people are not careful they can get caught up in these schemes and begin to see friends and people they meet, only as potential customers and dollar signs. If they are not careful, they may end up building friendships on money and business opportunity, aka exploiting people, rather than basing relationships on true friendship and love. The neighborhood which should have been a safe haven gets turned into a marketplace and when that happens, there is a whole new dynamic in it's place.

Besides getting a different set of eyes with which to view the people that you meet and know, MLM is often based upon discontentment. The MLM programs are often sold with the sublime hook of, "Why work for someone else?... Be your own boss!" or "Add some extra income to your life."
This is a different spirit than the biblical one which admonishes us Christians to "keep ourselves free from the love of money," and "be content in every circumstance."

Hebrews 13:5 (NIV) Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have, because God has said, "Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you."

Philippians 4:11-13 (NIV) I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

1Timothy 6:6-11 (NIV) Godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. People who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge men into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.

”I’ll do whatever I want to”

2010-01-14T17:50:00.000-08:00

”I’ll do whatever I want to” is a rebellious attitude and reminiscent of the idea put forth by Allister Crowley, (1875-1947,) who's ’famous words, “Do as thou wilt, is the whole of the law.”

Crowley’s quote, taken from his Book of the Law, (1904) became the “moral rule” for those who practiced and continue to practice what is commonly called witchcraft, or in Crowleian terms, "Magick" Aleister Crowley, they say, is the man who “put the “k” in magick,” and he was mostly known as and occultist, mystic, and drug addict. He did however have some more normal pursuits, like writing, chess, traveling the world and mountain climbing. The normal interests he did have however did not stop him from his exploits of evil and rebellion.

Crowley, though he liked to say and hear other people say, that he put the “K” in majick, really didn’t. Truth was it was Eliphas Levi, a “French Philosopher ” of the 19th century who did that. Crowley just liked to follow in Eliphas’ footsteps.

Alphonse Louis Constant, was Eliphas Levi’s given name, but he renamed himself "Eliphas Lévi Zahed, " which he is said to have derived from the Hebrew translation of his name. He was a man who once studied for the catholic priesthood, and it is said that he did all but the taking of vows. He stopped there because somewhere along the way he became very interested in the philosophies of “magic” arts. Constant, a.k.a. Levi, wrote several books, including: Doctrine of Transcendental Magic (1855), Ritual of Transcendental Magic (1856) and History of Magic, (1860) and he is even thought of, in the occultist’s world of “black magic”, to be perhaps what Michelangelo is to Christianity... as he painted the Sistine chapel to honor God. Constant, (Levi,) in contrast, was said to have painted the western Christian ideologies with occultism.

Constant (Eliphas Levi) wnet down in history as one of the greatest occult “revivalists” of all time. He was not a contemporary of Aleister Crowley, in fact, he had died before Crowley’s birth, but Crowley, a believer in all things occult, including reincarnation, liked to believe he was Constant, reincarnated.

Cowley was raised in a Christian environment, but he rebelled against it all and against its very roots. Edwards steeped himself in everything occult, then he changed his name to Aleister, so as to be different from his earthy Christian father, who was also named Edward. Alister from then enjoyed the power and the fame of being totally rebellious, violent, getting his own way, and being feared by others.

As an avid writer, Aleister wrote books of poetry, though note that it was sexual poetry… and novels as well as manual type information on magic arts, which he recieved as he indulged in the ocult practice of channeling spirits. He wrote The Book of the Law, in 1904 and Magick in Theory and Practice, in 1929. His books, Thelema, (The “bible” of his religion,) and "The Book of Thoth" are broadly used in occult circuits today... as are many of his other works written under his pseudonyms, Frater Perdurabo, HD Carr, and Khaled Khan.

It’s notable too, that Aleister Crowley has gone down in history as the man who put a face to “Satanism” in the minds of western culture. While this is ture, it is also highly propagated that Crowley was not a worshipper of Satan. In fact occultists, like prefer to think that Crowley merely worshipped himself which may be true, but as such it does not nullify the truth about his religious bent. BEsides, such propaganda serves oonly to make the character and personality of the biblical Satan, merely a figment of what they would call “evil” Christianity and makes the devil, "appear" as a sort of imaginary mythical being with no “real” power. They, like Crowley, prefer that the spiritually ignorant person, remain ignorant of the devils schemes and devices... and laugh-off Satan they way they would Alietser… and maybe even laugh about God and sin. To such as these, tis all merely a joke.

Christians, of course, take Satan a little more serious because, Christians who actually believe what these claim is only "mythical nonsense," things about God and Jesus, and Satan. But make no mistake, Satan was unashamedly, much like Aleister, a slover of self and a self-proclaimed hater of God and Christianity. Spirituality is real and God is real and as such it is not all a joke.

And Crowley knew what he was doing when he composed the Gnostic Mass (Leiber XV) to mock Christianity, and he liberally used biblical references in everything he did, even calling himself “the Beast” and using the number “666” of Bible fame. He gleefully announced to the world that he hoped to produce an antichrist child though his “sexual magick.”(with a “K”) But, with all the references and insinuations, he always insisted that he would never stoop “so low” as to worship Satan, God or anything else for that matter. Crowley himself, deceived and thinking himself to be incontrol, and having fun, insisted he worshipped self.

Of course, he liked people to believe that he “summoned” the devil, Bezelbub, Molech, and other “demon beings” (beings of evil named in the scriptures.) He role played his mental ideas that he took time to write down in the many “ ritual” scripts he wrote. He even may have thought of Satan as his guardian of sorts, but he insisted that he didn’t worship “Satan.” He didn’t believe such a person or entity existed, after all, he believed that all of his desires, love, pleasure; interest and beliefs were directed at nothing other than himself.

And it was his self-love, and self-exhalation, his hatred of anything Christian, his indulgence of both heroine and cocaine as well as sex acts of all kinds and animal sacrifices that earned him a reputation. He had no choice but to leave Britain where he lived, the press there dubbing him the “wickedest man in the world” He was living in 1920 to Sicily where he bought the property he named Abbey of Thelema at Cefalu, from which Mussolini, (you know, THE Mussolini, ) felt compelled to deport him from Italy.

When all was said and done, Crowley and his family and friends died ravaged by incredible insanity, ruined by the satanic evil that he willed into his life. Crowley advocated the strength of will, and will against God in particular. He may have even had notoriety for a moment in time, but he died in 1947, penniless, childless, loveless and a confused degenerate drug addict.

Yet Crowley remains a hero in the minds of many people who claim to be dedicated to Crowley’s spiritually occult teachings. Crowley’s “wisdom” from his writings is often quoted. Sometimes we just get snippets as we hear it in song lyrics by rock and roll bands who want to project a satanic image, but other times it is quoted chapter and verse, similar to the Bible or the Koran.

His book, Liber AL vel Legis, contains his famous statements like: “"Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law," (AL I:40) Other commonly repeated sayings are, “Compassion is the vice of Kings: " and “Delight, and stir the hearts of men with drunkenness. To worship me, take wine and strange drugs...They shall not harm ye at all.”

His most famous occult writings are titled, The Book of Lies (1913), Magick in Theory and Practice (1929), and The Book of the Law (1938)

Allister could have repented and received Jesus Christ to save him from such wicked ways.... all he would have to do is turn from sin and rebellion... to repent and turn to God, and God would be there for him....and yet, he persisted in going his own way, being rebellious all of his life... and so this is what we read of him today.

And then, there is Jesus. We read about him too.

"Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked?" declares the Sovereign Lord. "Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?... Because he considers all the offenses he has committed and turns away from them, he will surely live; he will not die... Repent! Turn away from all your offenses; then sin will not be your downfall. Rid yourselves of all the offenses you have committed, and get a new heart and a new spirit. Why will you die, O house of Israel?" Ezekiel 18:23-31
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Hell Hath No Fury?

2010-01-14T15:58:00.000-08:00

James 3:5 tells us that the tongue is like a fire. Like a little flame it starts and then the sparks grow and spread and it turns into what ends up to be big fires. Like a raging fire from hell itself, it is a powerful fire, capable of great destruction. James also says that the tongue is remarkably capable of both blessing and cursing. And he says too, that “this should not be.” He points out how interesting it is that man cannot tame the tongue, because from the tongue comes what is in the heart, both blessing and cursing.

So it is.

Unleashed, unbridled, and without the power and wisdom of God above, the tongue produces destructions, houses ablaze! People cursed and damned to hell.... a trail of smoke, ash and rubble. Satans deadly poison spewed abroad, covering the earth. But then, God also appeared to Moses as a fire, ... in a burning bush.... He is himself is a consuming fire, but who exactly, is in charge of hell?

Jesus referred many times to “hell” and the “unquenchable fire” (Matt 3:12) and the terrible torment of souls that exists there. (Luke 17:29-30; Mark 9:43; Luke 16) He is said to have ddied a horrific death, descended into hell... and rose again from death to life in order to set sins and satan's captives free Satan on the other hand, is doomed hell... considered Hell's great ruler and as such he seeks to destroy and kill, and murder, anyone he can. The Bible informs us that he knows his time is short, whants to take God's precious souls, the ones He loves, down with him, and he will do it anyway he can.

The one who will someday be cast into the “lake of fire,”this place called Hell, where “the worm never dies and the fire is never quenched," is working hard to change his image, and the image of “biblical” hell in the minds of men. According to a US News and World Report cover article by Jeffery L. Sheler, titled, Hell Hath No Fury, polls show that many Americans believe in hell, (more than in previous polls,) but not as a literal place and not as a place where there will be literal and eternal fire. Instead they think of hell as simply "an anguished state of existence."

Sheler’s report quoted a 1992 Roman Catholic Catechism proclaimed that “To die in "mortal sin" without repenting, means remaining separated from God forever by our own free choice.This state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed is called 'hell.'”

Truly, the catechism is not as strong as Jesus' description. This, compared to a literal fiery hell, is putting it mildly. Fear of the One, (GOD) who has the power to send us to the fiery hell with Satan, who is cursed beyond redemption, should help us understand our despairing need for salvation, but instead this teaching makes hell, the mere "natural consequence" of human choice to live life apart from God. J

esus teaches in Luke 16, for example, that Hell is a place of unquenchable fire and torment.... we see this through they eyes of the rich man, who did not care for the poor, in verses, 27-31. "(KJV) The rich man, in hell said to Abraham, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him (Lazarus) to my father's house:. For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent.And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead." Not only did Jesus raise one named Lazarus, but he himself was raised on the third day according to the scriptures. And yet, people refuse to believe in god's judgment, or in Hell.

Sheler also reported that teachers of the faith, like Prof. Stephen J. Patterson of the Eden Theological Seminary in St. Louis, and Martin Marty of the University of Chicago Divinity School in Illinois, say that people who have heard about hell, don’t think of hell as literal, and that it has even become “politically incorrect” to talk about it as such. So, ask yourself if you think there is such a thing.

Ask the average person on the street too. Studies show that he will not think of hell as a place of fire, or of the eternal resting spot for the judgment of God for humanity's sin, but something a person merely chooses or creates for his or her self. Sometimes people talk about such a "hell" being our lifetime here on Earth., and because our leaders tell us certain things, we tend to believe what they say, that "hell" is but a state of self-isolation and loneliness. Biblical speaking, hell is full of fire, a place where there is no water.

But one thing should be made perfectly clear, and that is that God takes no pleasure in the destruction of the wicked. Ezekiel 18 (21-23) says, “but if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all my statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die. All his transgressions that he hath committed, they shall not be mentioned unto him: in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live. Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die? saith the Lord GOD: and not that he should return from his ways, and live?”

In the New Testament, we read that "God, is love." and we see how in the beginning of it all, (in Genesis,) God did not create man with anything but goodness, he never made mankind or life on earth to be toilsome or painful, he did not create it all, simply to punish him or to destroy. Sin entered and judgement procured for the evil one who perpetrated it and would not repent. Hell is not created for the sake of mankind, yet it is the ultimate judgment for sin, created and reseved reserved for Satan, the devil, that old serpent himself.

Hell is not just a matter of being separated from God, it’s not a matter of simple isolation from a happy community of smiling people here upon the earth, Hell is God's judgment, and it is as Jesus said, "a lake of fire."

Revelation chapter 20 tells us that he (the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, is cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet [are], and there they shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever. It gives you the idea that hell is eternal and that Satan will go there, that is, if you believe in God and what he says and what he has done and will do. Hell, associated with fire and judgment, is something we can understand as a construct of the one that the Bible is about, Almighty God.

All have sinned. All have sinned and deserve the end result of being in sin, they deserve the same end that Satan, the father of all lies will meet one day. But the good news is that God, our real father in heaven, loved us enough to rescue us, to save us from the grips of Satan and from hell. Right there, that very day that Adam and Eve sinned, God made a promise out of his love and righteousness, and he keeps is promise because God is faithful and God is true. God had judged them for their sin, by putting them out of the garden, but he gave them grace because God is merciful and gracious, loving kind and longsuffering toward his children, and all that he has made.

He is God, and as God, he gave them a promise to believe in... and they did, and their children too. Noah, Abraham...and onward…each faithfully believing, trusting hoping, in God as they lived out their earthly life, until they, in God's mercy and in faith, looking to the fulfillment of his promise, died.

The scripture says that whosoever believes in God’s promised son Jesus Christ shall not perish, but have every lasting life. They are redeemed (Luke 1:68; Rev. 5:9) from sin and death forever.

Revelation 20:15

And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is life, eternal life, (Romans 6:23) and the lake of fire, which is hell, is reserved for death and Satan, who will go there because of judgment for sin.

Unrepentant, unregenerate man, though he may think he can balance his life perfectly, or control his ultimate destiny, even earn his way to heaven, but as such he is deceived. He is stuck in the world, separated from God, but Jesus, crossed that chasm.... and he redeemed us. Taking our place and with our sin upon himself, he wrote down our name, and gave us his as he paid the price for us, leaving no balance would ever come due.

Revelation 20:15

And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

We think we do good and that doing good things, or doing bad, will earn us heaven or hell, but truth is, only Jesus Christ, our faith in Him will save us. We have no goodness of our own with which to save us. Truth is, we are sinners by nature... and as such, we are imperfect people, unable to to keep the Law of God, people who scarcely even control such a small and seemingly insignificant thing belonging to no one but oneself, the tongue. And it's true, "out of the mouth come both blessing and cursing."

James says, (James 3:10) “My brethren, these things ought not so to be.”

American Way

2010-01-14T13:25:00.000-08:00

Jay Van Andel and Richard DeVos began Amway, (short for American Way,) in 1959. It began as a soap company organized for the purpose of helping every American have their own business. The mission of the company is, and has been since it began, to help people “lead better lives.”

Over the years Amway has grown to be an international, multi-billion-dollar, multilevel marketing (MLM) business. Today it is parented by a company called Alticor, which also oversees the company Quixtar, the America On Line (Internet) version of the preexisting "Amway" company.

All that people have to do make a lot of money in Amway or Quixtar is sell products to other people, and they tell you that it's easy because they are products people need and use everyday. Amway sells, for example; soap, and everyone needs and uses soap. They also sell vitamins, cosmetics, appliances and electronics. When you deliver your product to your customer, as the seller, you get a percentage of the sales. You can get other people to sell Amway too and when they get their product through you and you get a portion from that as well. The more people you recruit, and the more money they make, helps you make money too. They too can follow in your footsteps... and make sales and new recruits. This benefits you, them and the company at large.

When people join the company, (after attending a great sales pitch where they either purchase products or sign up to make money selling Amway,) people buy into the company and are told they are “business owners,” rather than salesmen. They are touted as "entrepreneurs," not connected particularly to the company; they are their own financial risk. This has created a scenario for allegations over the years whereby people contend that the Amway business is not a true business, but a money making scheme, perpetrated in order to make only a few people at the top rich while everyone under them in the “line” does the work. There have been numerous investigations into this.

However, when investigated it became apparent that most of the products Amway sold were sold for personal consumption. People were not forced, (only offered) to become independent business owners, which they chose to do on their own volition. In Amway, no one is really working for anyone else's benefit, but their own, and as such they are merely a long line of happy consumers each buying the Amway products. The end result of course, was making the people who started the idea rich .

If you or I were clever enough, "entrepreneurial" enough, like everyone in line ahead of us, we could get other people to buy their own company too, from us, consume the same products we do, and then we too would be wealthy as they are.

The American Way?
What is it?

Singer Toby Keith, sings a song "about it."
Miller Beer, brews booze "that" way,
People use the term loosely all the time.

The People for the American Way, think they know exactly what the "American Way" is and they have a mission to make that "way" quite clear to everyone else.

Sometime you would think that "the American Way," is anybody's guess. The United States of America's way, no matter how you look at it, has always stood for freedom and had respect for individual human rights, derived via nature's natural laws.

An America is known for being a Christian Nation, the US of A all around the world as she has sent out missionaries to aid the sick and poor, or welcomed them at her doorsteps, has stood for Faith in God, and Jesus Christ the Savior too. The United States of America, has stood for the FREEDOM TO BELIEVE in such things, a land when men and women had the freedom to live without fear of being harmed by their fellow man, because God, not man, was looked to (Even metaphorically speaking,) as landlord, judge and as King. But now, people have and promote such different perspectives or what freedom is and isn't. Instead of the freedom TO BELEIVE, people come to the USA and fight for the freedom to reject God's declaration that through Him is the only way, and in Him is really where true freedom is ever to be found.

Yes, in America, where people are "free" they are free to choose what they will and will not believe. While some believe God and uphold his standards there are those who demand that they have a choice.... and who choose openly to rebell against God, his will, and all his ways. They make their own choices about who they are and aren't. They are happy flaunt form of bad behavior possible, even make it look elegant and pretty, deliberatly doing what God says is evil, with pleasure as they reject Jesus Christ, who is OUR HOPE, and fight to keep God far away from themselves. They do not believe in God and make the demand for the "separation of church and state" and practice things that are unnautral to human dignigty and decency, this with great pride. They make their preference clear and determine for themselves in their own minds and hearts, what they believe about who they are.... and simply reject God, and his promised Savior, and dispise His Holy Word.

The "American Way" hasn't changed. It is still about freedom and free will. And we have had the increidible opportunity, the freedom to choose between God and man, heaven and hell, good and evil, believing truth, or believing lies. There is something still to be said about exercising that freedom. IT wasn't America who gave us freewill, to serve the master of our choice.

It was God.

Turtle Theory

2010-01-14T00:09:00.000-08:00

Steven Hawking, in his book, A Brief History of Time, used the illustration of what he called the Turtle Theory as an analogy to show how differently people view the universe. Hawking does not endorse this theory, but in using this example, he made the bold assertion that no matter how far fetched a “theory” of origins may seem, none can be proven right or wrong, they are but theories. He believes that not being able to proven them, one way or another, makes all of the equally valid in their own context. He says this would be true even if someone believed the Turtle Theory, that is, that the earth exists on the back of a turtle, and it is turtles all the way from the top, down.

Interestingly, turtles are a common religious theme. For example, at an Interfaith Council gathering in Spokane, WA, 2007, a Native American woman addressed the crowd by welcoming us to “Turtle Island.” Turtle Island is considered to be an Indian name for thee land they live on and this was her way of expressing her Indian heritage, her faith in Indian Lore and beliefs, as well in welcoming everyone in this particular group of very diverse people.

The name Turtle Island was originally given to this land, (particularly the lands of North America and Canada upon which these native peoples live) because they tell a tale of how at one time the entire earth was flooded and when the water receded, land re-emerged like a turtle rising up and out of the water. This land being that back of that mighty turtle. Its a little reminiscent of the Judeo Christian account of Noah's flood.

Similarly, in the Hindu religion there is a tale that Kurma the turtle god, carries the world on his back.

In Jewdeo Christian lore, Noah was told by god to build a big boat, called an ark, and in doing so, he and his family survived the worldwide flood, According to the Bible, they are the ancestors of all the peoples who currently live on earth. Global flood stories besides these are documented as history or legend in almost every region of earth.

There seems to be some common elements... flood, water, turtles, boats, gods, people being saved... So, does it matter if a person believes one story or another?

The question of origins is a reasonable discussion, for reasonable and reasoning human beings. It is also reasonable to consider culture stories and to see the correlation between them as well, even to apply the proper metaphors. One can certainly consider every belief out there as valid, no matter how ridiculous and far-fetched it is, ... even to the point of dismissing what you actually see before your eyes, but to do so, and to do so without testing the truth and validity of these ideas, is just not very... "scientific."

Mr. God

2010-01-13T16:09:00.000-08:00

The believe in God, they know about him, but they are not on a first name basis. Some people do not even know what they believe. The do know what they see, and what they see is incredible evidence of design... as if life on earth had a plan and a purpose. Did god do it all? In the beginning, did God create... or is life here just some evolving chaos that ends in chaos in the end? Some people look around and they say "no," and hope this perishing universe around us... the war, the greed, the power struggle, and finally our birth and death is not "all there is."

Intelligent Design, ID for short, is an “intellectual movement that includes a scientific research program for investigating intelligent causes and that challenges naturalistic explanations of origins which currently drive science education and research,” as stated at their website: www.intelligentdesignmetwork.org.   The ID movement has also been called, “the bridge between science and theology: ("Science" : meaning knowledge; and theology, meaning, "ordered knowledge, in the region of the intellect what religion represents in the heart and life of man. --Gladstone. [1913 Webster]. ) but is it? Is this notion of Intelligent Design, then, " a bridge between science and religion," a bridge between scientific theory and what we humans think of in our hearts as, "God?"

It makes sense, to look at it this way since most ID advocates are religious, and they are scientists, but not all ID-ists are religious. Some are labeled as agnostics and some are atheists, who claim they are ID-ist who support ID because they reject the "Evolutionists" idea of "natural selection."   In fact, most ID people emphatically refuse to claim to be "Creationists," (even though they might be Baptist, or Catholic, or Lutheran, or Episcopalian, or Anglican, or Methodist, or Presbyterian..and maybe even .Jewish, or Moslem.) In fact, they are willing to drop their Christian label and simply embrace ID because they want to stand for what they do know, and to them Evolution has some flaws that they can't embrace. ID-ists come in many different flavors and the movement is quite broad.

They say they are not Creationists though and profess to all who look on them that their beliefs are not based on the Bible, nor in defending the Bible's book of Genesis, nor even in defending "God,. Instead, their work is scientific, and they are scientists; as a movement, their focus is on detecting and documenting, as well as distributing, information to others about the evidence of this thing they refer to as Intelligent Design. As religious people, if they are religious, they profess to believe that life is evidently not without a greater purpose, and for this they look to something they call "intelligent cause."

According to the National Center for Science Education, these ID-ist are not honest. As proof they cite something they call the Wedge Document that states the Itelligent Design movement's governing goals, and say indeed they are not only religious, but that this has something to do with their beliefs in a creator God. Accordingly they state the document reads, the goal of ID proponents is:, "to defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies and to replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God."

The ID movement is a movement that has notoriety around the world. Anyone of nearly any religious pursuation can get on board.    It makes “God” (by any name,) quite all-inclusive.

There is a lot of excitement over the project, particularly in the Christian World and people have been quite eager to prove evolution wrong. They are often quick to jump on board the ID cause. You might even see them passing out ID literature and giving the organization, financial aid, be;ieving such an endeavor is a great and noble cause. Yet not every one in Christianity is on the Intelligent Design bandwagon, some are not. Then also, some Christians believe quite firmly in Evolutionary theory.

Take for example, Father George V. Coyne, serving as the director of the Vatican Observatory. He is of the opinion, evolution is true. He os not on board with the IDists and their movement. He says, “Intelligent Design diminishes God into “an engineer who designs systems rather than a lover.” (Catholic Online article by Mark Lombard; 1/30/2006 @ catholic.com)

Coyne also said, “God in his infinite freedom continuously creates a world which reflects that freedom at all levels of the evolutionary process to greater and greater complexity, God lets the world be what it will be in its continuous evolution. He does not intervene, but rather allows, participates, loves.”

Nice sentiments... But...if Coynes statements are true, (that God uses "evolution" to create life here on the earth, and does not intervene, then what does the book of Genesis or the Bible as a Whole, have to do with us today or yesterday?   If evolution were true, shouldn't and woudn't we have seen examples of evolutionary transition? And more importantly, what is a Christian to believe; can one follow Jesus Christ in Spirit and in truth and still believe that all that is created in the heavens and here on Earth to have come about by chance and that it is getting better and better by a process called "change" or they one believe as Coyne says, that God does not intervene in the affairs of men?"

What child is this?    (Thank you dear "Elizabeth" who gave me this drawing...):

This is intervention.

Not only that...God, has a name.... and he did intervene on our behalf.

Seeing evidence he is around, should we not acknowledge that he is.. and call him who he is? "God."

He is God.

"Mr. God," to some, and he doesn't get angry if you think of him that way. It is respectful, and we should have the utmost respect for one as powerful as God. And one can treat God like a far and distant stranger, to do so as we are sinners, would be right.

There is no denial. God is and as God He is the creator and sustainer of all things.... both seen and unseen, as some men profess. But there is more to this story.

You can know of God, or you can know him and be known by him... be his friend. And what a friend he is.

He has a name,"Immanuel," "God with us...the God who saves. We celebrate him in our lives and in our world. Christmas, Easter... and other Holidays, because some people here on earth "believe."
Some of us talk to him alot, and we listen to him too. We are even on a first name basis.
We simply call him "Jesus."

Intelligent Design?
Of course... it's the handiwork of that guy in "the universe next door"

you know....

"Mr. God".

In fact, you might even say he "stands and knocks, at your door," longsuffering toward you, not willing that any should perish, hoping you will one day people will hear him, hear his voice and open the door of their hearts and invite him in.

John Chapter One....

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2 The same was in the beginning with God.

3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

"In a galaxy far, far away".......................... or: What Is Wisdom? Really.

2010-01-08T15:28:00.000-08:00

Referring to a galaxy far, far away is literary allusion to the famous movie, Star Wars, produced by George Lucas. The average person reading this remark, or hearing it in conversation would understand that that is where it came from and most likely make an immediate connection without any of this particular explanation. But average is only average. It is quite possible that some people might not make the connection and think it simply meant “in a galaxy far, far away.” It would all depend on the shared point of reference between the communicators. It may depend to what extent the fame of the film really went, or on whom had the technology to view it, or the ability to read it in a book,, for in novel form is where the story began... with the exception of maybe in the mind of Mr. Lucas who knew in his mind what he intended to be understood.

Sometimes people will talk about a familiar word or concept, one they know and are familiar with, but to their listeners the words have completely different meaning. Some are in the know, (because they read the book) while others simply are not (because they haven;t) and take the words to mean something of a completely different intent.   Generally people relate to that which they are more used to or familiar, and this regardless of how the word was intended by the one who used it. It is generally helpful when people build concepts together from a foundational point they share in both their minds which is why we write things down in history books and dictionaries.... to have a common understanding of what took place, and how words are defined.

Without writing as a reference point, history and historical facts would be forgotten, without dictionaries defining what a substance is and isn't words would be often misconstrued and without regard for understanding the true meaning or the context, our own interpretation is all we will see or understand.   without agreement to definitions, and the proper intended use, it is possible that a conversation can take place between two parties referring to completely different things and each assumes the other is standing on the same reference point, when in fact they are not.

It happens every day that words deviate from the meaning and appear to be something they are not. Words are hijacked.

Some examples of hijacked words are:
Christ, (could mean Jesus, could mean your won personal god-like consciousness,)
scriptures, (could mean Koran, or Quran, could mean Bible or the writings of any religion,)
gay, (could mean happy, could mean homosexual.)
reproductive rights (the right to bear children, pre- and post-natal care,   hijacked to mean a presumed right to end the life of an unborn child )
gender (literally and traditionally means and refers to the masculine or feminine, if taken to new heights could mean radical feminism or LGBT or ???"

It all depends on your reference point. After all, as progressives like George Lakoff like to say, "How can a person fairly argue against such nomenclature as "pro-life," "tax relief," and "family values," since to argue against such inherently positive terminology necessarily casts the arguer in a negative light? "

Yes, a little inspiration, a little bit of spirit, and the next thing you know, words are running off and into a life all their own, sometimes completely different than what they were intended. They way to know the source, of course, is to seek understanding and wisdom and to test the spirits,

And some people never test anything. They never even stop to think, or really listen, they think they know what is being talked about, think it is the same reference point they have, and really they have no idea that they are not engaged in understanding, sometimes because they do not really care, or maybe because they are uneducated as to what the words say from the other perspective, where the words came from or reference ourside of their own experience, or minds. They never read the book or saw the Star Wars movie, for example, sand as such, perhaps they missed the actual point of what was being said.

People seldom ask questions. They take things for granted, or they think some things everyone should automatically know, just like them. Unless of course they are inquisitive, or if they want to become smarer than they were before they asked. People should ask questions. Questions and answers are the stuff that scientific study is made of. Questions are hard, but sometimes finding the answers is the problem,that takes some work and time and effort.

People seldom look up words they do not know, unless someone tells them to, or if perhaps they have a need or maybe some sort of inkling they could be wrong. They don't check sources, because sometime they really do not care... that email simply "sounds good" to thier itching ears... and so they pass the information on as if it were the gospel truth, and then find out it's not. lThey don't like to be told what to do, or read the manual, let alone the bible and hear what God says is wrong or what is right. Simply happy with themselves and what they know and what they like, when it comes to words and understanding thing about their own life, they are often quite happy to simply go along and make things up for themselves, decide things like right and wrong, all on their own.

For what it is worth, the point here is that there is value in good instruction and that even in such simple things, there are colloquialisms and such that can make some problems with communicating effectively, especially when it comes to words and what they mean. True wisdom, communicates effectively because of their inspiration. True wisdom as well as good communication happen best when a person takes the time to listen, makes and effort know the meaning behind the words, and are able to identify the same source of understanding as the person you are commuicating with.

The love of wisdom?

It was Socrates who said, "I know that I know nothing."

Ah... Socrates, who according to Wikipedia, "often said that his wisdom was limited to an awareness of his own ignorance." and that " Socrates believed wrongdoing was a consequence of ignorance and those who did wrong knew no better." and "The one thing Socrates consistently claimed to have knowledge of was "the art of love" which he connected with the concept of "the love of wisdom", i.e., philosophy." and " He never actually claimed to be wise, only to understand the path a lover of wisdom must take in pursuing it."

But what is wisdom, really?

U.F.O.

2010-01-08T12:31:00.000-08:00

UFO is an acronym for Unidentified Flying Object, which could refer to anything that is FLYING that is not immediately identified as to what it is or is not. And while it may also be true that UFO could stand for things like UnFinished Objects, or Undergraduate Funding Office or even the United Filmmakers Organization, in this section that you are reading UFO refers to an airborne object no one who sees it can identify as something they have seen before. This would include things that people sometimes refer to as flying saucers.

In science fiction stories, tabloid papers and even in hoaxes, people make up stories about flying objects that are of "extraterrestrial" origin or from another dimension or time. People who are not connected to the making up of such stories, sometimes also report “sightings” of such things from time to time, but most investigations of such objects turn out to actually, eventually, identify the object they had seen. Usually it is decided, after investigation of some kind, to declare such objects to have been related to an airplane or weather balloon, or something of that nature. Some reports turn out to be optical illusions. Only a small percentage of the reports made to the military and the police about UFOs are said to remain unexplained and it is to these unexplained sightings and reports that people’s imaginations like to add fanciful twists that then get published in tabloids.

People like to add fanciful twists to the scriptures too. Some UFO enthusiasts (like Barry Downing) believe the Bible is full of references to UFOs. Not only that, he tries to mix the "scientific" theory of evolution that he believes with his faith in God. It seems to him that "life is not an accident" and he still believes the Bible true.. but only to a point. HE believes that if people entertained the notion of extraterrestrial beings and their UFOs, they would engaged the wonder of hope once more in their minds as they believed in something like God again. If people thought that we were planted here by extraterrestrials, (and if this is actually what earlier people less smart than us today thought to be "God"....if they mixed their religious beliefs with evolutionary "science," they would once again be able to find purpose and meaning in life, and they would have hope, (something which has gone by the way side in our culture... the results of which we see in peoples acts of desperation and crime.) Downing,
and people like him, are under a strong delusion.

Such people believe things like Jesus' ascension into heaven occurred when he was beamed up from Earth by a flying saucer; or that the bright cloud that led the people of Israel through the desert or through the Red Sea was an extraterrestrial "UFO." There are some people who say that when Elijah was taken up into heaven, the chariot of fire (and the horses with it) was a flying saucer from another planet. This is their interpretation, and the problem with their interpretation is that such things are purely a twist, or spin on what is written, to fit the enthusiasts own notions or to stir up doubt or wonderment or imagination in the minds of the hearers of what the scriptures really do say, not because they believe in God, but because they believe in extraterrestrial beings. Some people believe the Bible, others believe hat they want to believe and end up believing what the Bible calls "delusion."

Well actually, "strong delusion."

'And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness."
2 Thessolonians 2:11-12.

In Exodus, God gave his servant Aaron the power to turn his staff into a snake. Then miraculously, Pharaoh’s magicians had the power to do the same thing that Aaron did. In the end, Aaron's snake swallowed up the two snakes of the magicians.Deception is like that. It looks like the real thing but the power being it is completely different.

But take that verse in Thessalonians back a couple of stanzas, read it in more context...

“And then shall that Wicked be revealed, Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, And with all deceiveableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved....... And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

Simply put, these people make up their own stories based upon what they want to believe, rather than simply believe and trust and rest in God and his promises.

While many claim to believe in UFOs even suggest they come into our world from far away planets and dimensions, it is purely speculative. It is in the movies, in our vivid imaginations that flow out into the pages of our humanly produces novels, tabloids, even in our underground magazines and comic books, but it is not commonly understood as "really" true or provable. No verified, contact has been made. Life on other planets remains unknown and we have been searching, listening waiting.. hoping... there might be, that is of course assuming that we simply do not want to believe in the bible or in God. Extraterrestrial proofs do not exist... they are not a part of human history like the Bible or like the man named Jesus Christ. It is more like superstition, supposition or curious speculation, most of the times such things have been proven to be frauds.

All of this is quite opposite to Jesus. He was real. He was really crucified. And according to many valid witnesses... Jesus Christ, by the power of God which was in Him, was risen from the dead. Some people just choose not to believe such historical verifiable and spiritual things are true. They rather dote upon aliens.

People have the freewill to believe what they would like to, (more likely, of course, if they happen to live in a country where they can truly be free to think and speak their minds.... in liberty.) In a world void of freedom, void of God and of freewill, bent on sin and filled with darkness, God, who is love and truth and light and mercy, would be despised and hatred of such a foreign, holy being of revealing light from heaven would be met with such animosity that people of the earth might even murder God, and this, for fear their places of authority be taken away and replace by him, or that their deeds of darkness be exposed. In fact, people might even prefer a murderer and liar in their midst, one that would be released while a man, claiming to be King of the Jews, claiming to be equal to God, who knew no sin and had done no wrong, who gave sight to the blind, healed the deaf and made the lame to walk, even raised the dead, was sentenced by the highest court of man to die an extraordinary brutal, public death, and this, even in the place of that famous Barnabas, guilty of every crime!

Man is made in God's image, but God is not like we are.

God creates and can create living things, like plants and animals, and does not need elaborate machines. God, who makes something out of nothing, who merely speaks and forms the land and sea and sky, also made our first human parents, Adam and Eve, a man and a woman, who are a lot like you or me. And all of humanity since the begining is fallen in nature, suffering mortality. Instead of looking and who we are and unto God, instead of believing God made both the heavens and the earth, some put thier hope in finding aliens and UFOs in the cold, dark, lifeless, void of outer space.

This because they are void of understanding and reject the wisdom that is from God.

Salvation comes from God and from Jesus Christ his only son, who also is the exact representation of God, His Father. Jesus was sent , not merely sent, via spacecraft, but BORN, like you and I, born as a babe into this world of spiritual darkness, so that in the light of God, we would see, repent of sin and embrace not only the salvation, but the righteousness of our good and gracious God.

God parted the Red Sea, (not a UFO) and God took Elijah in a whirlwind, (not a UFO... it was clearly identified. It was a chariot with horses. There was no “Unidentified” anything.) And Jesus, was said by those who stood by and witnessed it, taken up to the heavens in a cloud, (not a “unidentifiable object,” either.)

We will either look at the truth or we will believe the lies and the delusions.

As Paul told the Corinthians, Chapter 1:17, and all the way to the end...

For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.

For the Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom:But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.

Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are; That no flesh should glory in his presence."

"...and so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen."

1 Peter 4:11 (NASB 1995)

Publish Post

Astral Plane

2010-01-07T16:34:00.000-08:00

The astral plane, another New Age concept, is also called the “astral world” or “astral universe.” It exists presumably somewhere in the mind, though not quite on the mental plane. It is described as a place, outside the physical realm, a place you cannot see but only experience in thought or maybe in dreams.

The concept of the New Age Astral Plane, (or is it plain?) It may be much like the “noosphere” suggested by Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard Chardin, who spent most of his life, (1881-1955) attempting to integrate his Christian theology with theories of evolution.

This noosphere, according to Chardin, is like a “biosphere” of mental and emotional interactions between living organisms on earth. Chardin believed that the fusion of human consciousness would lead he world to a new state of peace and planetary unity, which he called, “Omega Point.” He believed this Omega Point to be the final pinnacle, the culminating point, a point when and where all human history integrated.

But the concept Chardin espoused was not his own, nor is he the only one to think of it, he actually adapted his own concept from a Russian scientist named Vladimir Verdansky. Chardin’s view was that the Earth had its own autonomous personality, and he believed that the “consciousness” of it, or what he called the noosphere, would be a guiding force for the unification of humanity sometime in the future. This concept of a noosphere is like James’ Lovelock’s Gaia theory, and is nearly synonymous with Peter Russell’s idea of a Global Brain. It's not even their original concept, we have heard the likes before from Anne Bessant, CW Leadbeater and Helena Blavatsky, who also wote about the noosphere or "astral planes" in the early 1900's.

CW Leadbeater, who died in 1934, was once an ordained Anglican priest, however he took to an interest in "the occult" when he met the well-known occultist, Helena Blavatsky in England in 1884. Soon after he even followed her to India. Leadbeater also had ties to political activist Annie Besant who, like Leadbeater became interested in Theosophy and went to India to study the occult philosophies with Blavatsky.

Together, Blavatsky, Leadbeater and Bessant made “occult investigations together into the cosmos,” “requently "visiting the Masters " in their "astral bodies." Leadbeater, who published many books on the occult gave descriptions of astral planes he said he visited. From his works much information of this type has been disseminated.

The astral planes can be thought of as a spiritual world that exists in layers, like the atmosphere of the earth is said to be. Sometimes it is described as layers of various vibrations sometime the layers are inter-perceived to be not so much on top of one another but transcendent of one another. The planes are often labeled, mental causal, ethereal, ect. We are informed by such clairvoyants that the astral world parallels the physical world we live in though it is supposedly richer in color, and contains “life in abundance” unlike what we have on earth.

Some people would call it heaven; others would call it the occult, and suggest that as heavenly as it may be, such a realm is a place that belongs only to God. Occult it is, for it is hidden from plain sight, and it is by entering into this plane, via “spirit,” that “ psychics” and mediums make contact with spirits from what humanity has always known as the underworld.

Spiritists like Rudolf Stiener, Alice Bailey talked about astral planes; Edgar Cayce frequently referred to certain books or information in the astral plains, or "underworld." that he would read from gathering information for people who consulted him about their medical conditions.

Knowledge of the astral plane is promoted by those who make witchcraft their hobby as well, and (according to Mystic Web) Witches and occultists say that such places can be accessed by those who “want to acquire knowledge through experience about ourselves, about the Earth, the Universe, or anything we want to.” Practicing “witches” say that they believe that “The higher astral planes are where we begin to reach toward self-godhood, becoming fully aware and acknowledging that all life is symbiotic and connected for the "good" of all.” (The Astral Plane and Its Divisions, by Abhishek Agarwal 2006 www.ecauldron.com.)

Perhaps the Christian has read in the Bible somewhere that there are books in heavenly places. In the book of Revelation, (through a revelation from God through his Holy Spirit to the apostle John,) we are told, “Nothing impure will ever enter [the New Jerusalem], nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful; but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.”

We read in Daniel about names being written in a book. (Daniel 12:1) we read about how there is an accounting of works that are also written in some kind of book. (Revelation 20:11 ) We also read in Revelation that there is only one who is worthy to open the book of life, and that is the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ.

Meanwhile occult practitioners believe and teach others that the astral plane is a link between the divine and the physical, free for the taking and is a place that has access to these "books." Such experiences are supposed to make you wiser than you already are, or bring you closer to God and being spiritual, maybe even master your own world or attain godhood for yourself.. the ability in doing so some say is to bring you closer to knowing everything in the universe there is to know.

What they do not tell you is that those who enter these realms of unearthly nature by occultic means, without it being initiated by God, are not only in utter darkness, but they are robbers and thieves. (See John 10:1) God has made a way for us to know him and and be his friend and he has made a door for us to return to heaven where we belong.

His name is Jesus.

If you remember, God drove sinful man out of a place called Eden for his disobedience when he and his wife Eve hearkened unto a snake-like serpent and were deceived. God then placed at the East of the Garden of Eden, Cherubim, and a flaming sword, which turned every way. There was to be no return, except through the promise of God and eating of the tree of life, in the midst of the paradise of God, which was guarded by Cherubim and a flaming sword and was protected. Such a thing as this, would only be accessible to those whose names were written in the Lamb’s book of life. (Rev 13:8; 17:8)

God specifically warned the Israelites, his chosen people, "There shall not be found among you anyone" who practices divination, witchcraft, sorcery, or spiritism. Imagine that!

And yet, these are the very things people do in order to “enter” the astral planes of the occult astral world.

Walk-Ins

2010-01-07T14:10:00.000-08:00

The term, Walk-In, is a New Age term that describes people who have “walked in” to our human realm, supposedly these are entities from another more “spiritual” place of existence, another planet or another dimension. As the name implies, these entities are not human earthling, and while some think they have been born on earth, they realize they have a purpose and directive from another place far away to help the earthlings born on this "planted" planet created as some part of some extraterrestrial plan..

Some starseeds have simply walked into their human lives assuming the shape and form of a human so as to be "incognito." They are believed to be and believe themselves to be, benign spirits, and as such they tell inquirers that they only take over the body of human beings with their permission to do so.

Some believe we are all Starseeds, ones that simply have not awakened to such a reality as yet. And those who are, or think they are Walk-Ins or Starseeds, because they have awakened believe that they are on a mission, though tthe mission and the interpretation of such spiritual things is varied. Generally, the mission is one of saving or assisting Planet Earth and her peoples as we "evolve" as a species, even perhaps in being a little "green." The ultimate goal is to help in bringing about, what is referred to in some circles as, “the Golden Age.”

Do you think this is strange? It is, but do we realize that people are increasingly exposed to ideas like this and the concepts are going more and more mainstream every day. Panspermia, is the more "scientific" (see: Fred Hoyle) concept given to this religious belief of life origins. Rejecting Genesis, rejecting God, these people believe that nothing alive on earth is actually native to the planet.

Within both New Age and Science Fiction fan circles, there are people who talk about and believe in thing existing like little green men from Mars, UFOs and the alien life forms that travel in them, and scientific theories like panspermia. There are people who will tell you that they are not human, but rather Starseeds, Wanderers, Star People, or even identify themselves as Lightworkers.

It's a religion and a religious belief because it goes beyond the physical we can see and know with confidence from our human point of view. The core belief of those who embrace this somewhat unusual, phenomena of galaxy derrived entities of various forms coming to earth in disguise to help people evolve is their way of avoiding God as their creator, designer, judge and savior. They rather believe and deliberately invent their own story of beginning and endings Atheists believe only in the physical and that there is no God, but spiritual atheists look beyond the physical and dismiss the true and living God. Such is the stuff UFOs, alien abductions, and stories of little green beings from the planet Mars are made of.

Starseeds and Walk-ins have a mission as Lightworkers. They are often politically active, maybe even royalty and heriachial in their organization, they take places of prominence or "stardom," as celebrities or sometimes just remain humble tenders or keepers of the planet earth by being "green." They are everywhere and anyone can be one. One who is a Walk-in or Starseed his or herself, may never even know it until such a fascinating reality is revealed to them via things like paranormal experiences, suffering food allergies, periods of insomnia and or feelings of alienation and loneliness.. which would perhaps lead one to seek answers from a holistic physician, spiritual director, or psychologist who would help you open yourself to the spiritual world and inner dimensions of spirituality, so that your true self, as a Starseed, Walk-in or Lightworker can emerge.

Author Brad Steiger (born in 1936) is a big promoter of this New Age and he wrote a book titled Star People, popular in the eighties. He has over 150 different books in print, many are on the subject of UFO’s and the existence of and contact with Walk-ins, Starseeds, and Wanderers, though he has since digressed to more horrific things like vampire. Following in Stiegers trail is another writer and New Age promoter is Scott Mandelker, (born in 1962.) Scott believes himself to be an "extra-terrestrial," and has also written book and lectures frequently on the subject of extraterrestrials and a what he believes about the "one god" and "creator."

It easy to for anyone feel like a stranger and an alien in world like ours, especially if with our eyes we actually do see the world around us perishing and tainted, marred by sin, greed and selfishness. With those same eyes we also look around and see incredible beauty, the handiwork of God and to ignore this beauty would be wrong. (See: Psalm 19) In the mixed message we often just want to simply believe in what is easiest for us. Not willing to accept the fact that we ourselves have sinned against God, we are often willing to settle into less than God's very best, and as such we are apt to fall into such astronomical delusions.

Abraham, was one who longed for a better place, a country not of this world, not of Egypt either. In fact he was nomadic. He also believed in God and listened to God, more importantly Abraham obey God acting on what he believed. If we, like Abraham believe in God, we also should act accordingly. If we feel a little out of place on Earth, and find ourselves longing for heaven, then like "father" Abraham we should turn our eyes to God, our heavenly Father, much the way that JEsus, our true example of faith did.

Atheists believe the lie that God is dead of non existant and are decieved into believing that this material Physical life is all there is. Religious people of many kinds believe in spiritual things, but believe that they can earn merit before God by deeds, or learn for themselves the way that they should go. Christianity is different that either because of Jesus, his birth, his life, his death, and his ressurection from the dead... and his faith in the FAther and the Father's love, even though for the moment he was separate from God. Jesus, true God from true God is God in the flesh, and yet born of a woman, is man and our brother. In Jesus God is our friend and Jesus is also our example. .

Jesus came to establish the truth and to show us the way we could never. They was we could never go because sin blinds us and we cannot see thing the way they really are without the light of God and his instruction. Separated from God because of so much sin, even our own, we are alienated from him, and from the home we were created to live in, Eden. Such a thing is something a person sometimes simply knows in the epitome of soul, and yet in his mind because of pride of life, lust of the flesh and lust of eyes we can be deceived. We long for Eden, or someplace like it, because in our inds and in our hearts we know the world as it is, is simply not our home.

Jesus said, "Follow me." and said we should love the God he taught us about, with all our heart and all our mind and all our soul and love others as we love ourselves. Simple teachings from the one who died and rose again. Powerful words, in fact so powerful that people still know and love his words of truth and life and love today. They repeat them all the time.

People fall into false delusions like theism and false religion because they do not love God . Instead they love themselves or maybe worldly possessions. Failing to acknowledge God, failing to believe that he exists, failing to see their own shortcoming they are willing to settle for less than the very best.

To know what the very best is, one must repent of sin, and and ask for God to be God and show you, teach you right from wrong, and forgive your sins. It's simple to do, because God loves you, (and he proved it, showed himself as to what love really is.) but it's hard to do because of pride and being blind, deaf and dumb about ourselves.... but we grope about just the same, and we think we see and know it all without God's assistance, and in our pride think we even know so much more than He.

But do we? If we don;t all we have to do is ask. "Ask, seek and knock, for God gives generaously to all who ask. (That is in the Bible.) So is this concept... been there for centuries too..."God is love."

Love....This is why he redeemed humanity through fulfilling his promise to us. "For God so loved the world," the Bible says.

This is why he sent Jesus Christ his son to die and why he raised him up to life again. He could do it. He would do it. He did it too. Do you believe?

But even God himself did not just Walk-in and make himself at King, this even though in reality he ws God. He was born here, by virgin birth, in a little town called Nazareth; and he lived here and he died here in a body that had been prepared for him since the beginning of human time.... and God's plan is grander than any plan of man.

Magazine

2010-01-06T22:53:00.000-08:00

Militarily speaking, a magazine is a place for the storage of gunpowder, guns, bombs or other ordnance, but in the literary world it refers to printed material, a periodical, complete with pictures, stories and advertisements.

A book-like magazine is aimed at getting the attention of as many readers as possible in order to give them information. The more information publishers can put into a magazine, and the more people who like the information they see and read, the more money the magazine can make. The more money they can make, the more information can be dispersed, because then even more magazines can be published. Some magazines have a very large following of readers. Nowadays we have the internet to keep us unformed, making information more readily available at everyone's fingertips.

Over the years there have been a couple of popular science magazines that keep people informed about new technologies emerging in the scientific world and in the minds of humanity. Some of the more famous ones have been Popular Science, and Omni.

Popular Science, founded in 1872, began as a scientific journal and was originally read mostly by people who wanted to know the latest and greatest scientific discoveries, most of whom thought of themselves as educated scientist. In the agrarian communities of the 1900, many people learned to read and write at home if at all. Even with the Education Act of 1872, it is estimated that 5 % of youth in America graduated from high school and only 1% then went on to learn and research in colleges. Over the years, Popular Science has remained popular and even today it has broad spectrum of readers and articles.

The company boasts that it currently, (as of this writing) has 1.45 million subscribers whom read it to learn the “latest news in science.” This does not reflect the people who do not subscribe who read their resources on the Internet, or the magazine bought and newstands in the airport by passersby. They say that the hard copy magazine currently earns about 42 billion dollars a year for Time / Warner, it’s publisher, and the majority of it’s readers are people who have attended college. However, because people from all walks of life are interested in scientific things like computer technology and information, evolution, medical research, aerospace, etc.…the science magazine industry has been a lucrative one.

Over the years, Popular Science magazine has documented many noteworthy inventions. Famous names such as Herbert Spencer, (the first Evolutionist, a predecessor to Darwin) Charles Darwin, Alexander Graham Bell, (of telegraph and telephone fame) Thomas Edison, (inventor of the lightbulb) Henry Ford (of automobile fame,) T.H. Huxley, (an avid Darwin Supporter) and Louis Pasteur, (researcher noted for study of rabies) all contributed articles to be published. Todys magazine are filled with articles about personal space travel, houses that clean themselves, the newest airplanes for warfare. Then as now, a lot of money can be made selling magazines that perk a person’s curiosity and often what is published for the masses to absorb has huge financial backing or a particular political agenda.

For example, Popular Science in 2005 ran an article containing a list of the “Top 10 Worst Jobs in Science.” According to their research, it is worse to be a biology teacher in Kansas than to be a manure inspector at the University in Georgia. Why? Because, if you are a biology teacher in Kansas “Parents will say their child can't be in class during any discussion of evolution, making your life miserable, and students will argue with you and say things like 'My grandfather wasn't a monkey!'”

Because of the evolution/creation debate long held in Kansas, the topic of science teachers teaching Intelligent Design (ID) came up in the article as well. A man named Brad Wilson commented on how , “The problem for teachers is that ID can't be tested using the scientific method, the system of making, testing and re-testing hypotheses that is the bedrock of science.” Wilson neglects however to acknowledge that the theory of evolution, has not been tested using the scientific method either.Readers of Popular Science, all 1.45 million of them are digesting this information.

Another science magazine that has had popular appeal was called Omni. Omni means “all” or “all-powerful.” (One who believes in God, might think of God as omni-present, or omni-potent or omni-scient.) Omni, the all powerful science magazine, went out of business in 1998.

Omni magazine was all about offering readers news, interviews and information of the “scientific” speculation going ons in the world, particularly scientific thoughts on science fiction. The magazine was owned by Kathy Keeton Guccione, wife of magazine publisher Bob Guccione who published the pornographic magazine, Penthouse. Penthouse magazine and Omni magazine had a shared interest, like their owners, Bob and Kathy... an interest in UFO’s.

In the 90’s both magazines often ran articles about “aliens,” and in particular they promoted a lot of what has become known and publicized as the Roswell incident, where a supposed UFO crash landed and was retrieved by the US military who called the object a “top secret’ research balloon. The so-named incident cause a lot of controversy and suspicion, people wrote a lot of books on the subject too. Omni even published something called the Roswell Declaration, an international “petition to end government secrecy on UFO’s.”

It was in September 1996, that Penthouse magazine, known for it’s fascination with the flesh, decided to get “scientific” like Omni. They published, along with the usual fare of naked bodies, what they called “actual photos of an alien autopsy.” (This was supposedly some kind of “evidence” of alien life forms and the photos had been taken here on earth!)

“I am convinced that these are 100 percent genuine photos of an alien,” said Guccione, authoritatively to his readers, “but the government (aka, American government, ) will never admit it because to do so would acknowledge a cover-up of the existence of life beyond our solar system." Somehow, though ironic, it seems appropriate that a pornographic magazine proprietor would be upset about a government “cover-up. ” But Bob Guccione “is convinced.” “These are 100% genuine photos of an alien,” he said.

Magazines, books and movies feed our minds and we let them. We pay good hard-earned cash in exchange for what they offer us, seldom considering the impact of their scientific or theological ideas, rarely thinking that bullet statement by bullet statement, like a round of ammunition, they take ground in our unguarded thinking.

OBE

2010-01-06T17:50:00.000-08:00

An out-of-body experience (OBE) is characterized by a feeling of departing from one’s physical body. Some people say it is like being almost dead. When having an OBE, a person is said to be able to observe their own physical body from a distance and travel about without it. It is, they report, as if there is something that remains you, but no longer sees from the eyes of the physical body left behind.

This experience has various terms. It may be called soul travel, astral projection, lucid dreaming or simply out-of-body experience, abbreviated OBE.

Some people even call the OBE occurrence a near death experience, (NDE) which is much like an OBE, with the difference that an NDE would be accompanied by either a “light at the end of the tunnel” or a “life review” type of experience. However, even with this being the case, others claim they are more than similar, even say that they are the same. OBEs sometimes are reported to occur occur while someone is under the influence of drugs, or in trauma as well as simply upon awaking in the morning and the ind is still in a dream-like state.

But there are people who try to make themselves have this type of experience. They want to be able to do such things simply as a matter of their own will.T Often times tose who practice having OBE's do it as a form of spiritual "exercise," a means of reaching a higher level of consciousness or enlightenment, a religious type of experience.Some even believe that the OBE experience is part of humanity’s “spiritual development” or evolution, particularly as it is associated to New Age and New Spirituality teachings.

OBEs may very well be spiritual. There are scriptures in the Bible that would seem to make references to such things. Passages like 2 Corinthians 12: 2-4, Acts 10:9-16, John 4: 23-24 and Revelation 1:9-11, are often cited by promoters of such practices to confirm, (or to justify) for seekers, doubters and potential naysayers, that OBEs are even part of the teachings of “true” Christianity, evidence perhaps that God want’s his people to be “in the spirit” (meaning outside of their bodies) in order to worship him in "spirit and in truth." There may be a spirit in this kinds of strange spirituality, there may even be a convincing argument at hand, and a lot of voices with many people saying this is the way you should walk in if you really want to know about God, but this is why a Christian must “test the spirits” to see if they are from God, remembering that mediums and spiritists, diviners and sorcerers are considered “abominations” before the 'Lord and to remember that it is easy, very easy to be deceived. (Deuteronomy 18:9-11, Galatians 5:19-26, and 2 Chronicles 33:6). It happened to Adam and Eve, who had freewill and lived amidst the Garden of Almighty God!

There are many New Age influences around us and many enticing ideas. We have “new” technology and “new” paradigms, “new” science and “new” spirituality all around. Scripture does however say, “there is nothing new under the sun,” (Ecclesiastes 1:9) and that everything that was made was made not only the very first time, but already made NEW in and through Jesus. (John 1:3, 10) We must decide when a voice we hear is truth or error and the only way to know the difference is to know the voice of and believe the promises of God.

Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it. - Ecclesiastes 12:6-7

Apparently when people leave their bodies for higher planes and soul travel, (as they say,) they remain attached by a link to the physical body, “a cord,” often referred to as the “silver cord.” Some people think of it as an "umbilical cord" like that of a baby, and they believe such a cord sends pulses of energy or life into the spirit body from the physical one, without it, one would presumably die. Those who do believe it exists report that this cord goes “very, very far,” enabling them to explore the "astral realms" realms of universe the encompass our earthly existence, realm we do not ordinarily "see". Some also claim that they use the cord like a trail, to return to their body, while others complain that this silver cord sometimes pulls them back into their bodies before they want to return.

So the question is.. are these experiences real and are they are spiritual, or are they maybe even imaginary. Some people, do not beleive such things exist at all reasoning that such things have never happened to them before, others say they do them every day.

People who have OBEs warn future explorers of the deep, that if the connecting cord is damaged or broken one would suffer great physical harm. If this were to happen, such a one might be found in a “real world” coma or the body could die and the soul would be “stranded” in the astral plane. Others suggest the intentional severing of such a cord is a positive thing and the person doing so would gain immortal life in the spiritual worlds, never having to return to life in the physical realm again.

There is a lot of diverse ideas and a lot of voices telling others how things may or may not be and what they are and are not. The question for Christians is, "Who are you listening to?"

Christians understand and believe that Jesus Christ is God, incarnate, Immanuel, GOd with us, in the flesh. They believe that Jesus came from heaven into a body prepared for him. (Hebrews 10:5) that he died, ws buried and rose again from death to life on the third day, according tot he scriptures. Sure, Jesus “ascended” into the heavens, but he did so in the flesh again, not with some astral projection, out of the body experience thing that New Age people like to promote in the world of spirituality and sometimes even in Christianity today. Jesus was made manifest in the flesh. He he rose bodily from grave and ascended into heaven where he is seated at the right hand of God.

That is the truth.

If you are Christian and conclude that the scriptures and the person of Jesus Christ are real and historically accurate then you need to be discerning. Just because the Bible talks about praying in the spirit and even something called the third heaven, doesn’t mean that a particular teaching about the “spirit worlds” or OBE or NDE is from God. The Bible also teaches about an entity named Satan who is a destroyer, a liar, in fact “the father of lies,” who can deceive and even appear as an angel of light. (1 Corinthians 11:14; Galatians 1:8-9)

And Satan, will be happy to deceive anyone.

Snake Oil

2010-01-06T16:35:00.000-08:00

“Snake oil” is often a derogatory term used to describe fraudulent and ineffective medicines. It comes from people in the past who have sold medicines and cures, often as concoction or potions with “secret ingredients” (maybe even real snake oil) claiming that their miracle product is a panacea for virtually every ailment. Too many times people have bought the advertising claims, only to discover the snake oil didn;t work. It's the kind of thing that gave snake oil salesmen, going door to door and town to town, bad reputations.

Some people believe that real “snake oil,” is a real cure. It's use as medicine is sometimes found in the lore of Native American and Chinese folk medicine and perhaps this is why it is used to make susch auspicious claims. However, numerous potions, mostly fraudulent money making schemes have been bought into by unsuspecting people, and as such snake oil gained it's reputation and now is associated with exaggerated claims that proved to be nothing more than fraud.

But it is no surprise. There is a certain connotation that comes from the serpent, Satan, in the Garden of Eden,. Adam and Eve were the very first humans given the deceptively sugar coated promises of the poisonous words, they were decieving by the wicked salesman. Duly anointed with the serpentine wisdom he offered them, they believed his fraudulent claims and were deceived, since which time all of humanity has had to suffer the effects of the fall.

In today’s world a lot of people make exaggerated claims for the sole purpose of making money form the unsuspecting and the gullible. More than actual exaggeration however, people will even sometimes outright lie, and this simply to take advantage of another. We even like to say such folks, "speaketh with forked tongue” (like a snake) as they lie and cheat and double face others to deceive for mere financial gain. Such “snake-like” individuals have an incredible knack for truthfully speaking out of one side of the tongue while deceptively lying at the same time with the other. When they get really good at it, they are sometimes considered clever businessmen, shrewd individuals and perhaps even “wise,” all because he knows how to make money by doing so.

Sometimes such savvy entrepreneurship can actually swindle people. If you know the right techniques you can get someone else to purchase just about anything, even perhaps a product that doesn’t work, (known affectionately as a "lemon.") The slick, slithery, snake–like marketing scheme is apt to catch someone sometime somewhere, and usually it catches a person (a.k.a. victim) unaware. Once they are bitten, the poison goes down smooth like oil, until it makes them sick. If not dead, the victim looks like a fool, because they have believed something false or fraudulent. In business and is other matters of life such a one is left with nothing in their hands of value and no money in their wallet.

How about a machine that you can use to make your own Free Energy? There is a computer firewall system that possesses extraordinary powers, of being faster than a speeding bullet, and it’s able to keep out every virus, (even the ones that haven’t been invented yet,) from your hard drive. Then there’s the email that tells you that you are being contacted because you have been specially selected to “win a million dollars” but in order to claim the prize you have to send in your name, address, email address, and phone number right away. This is the kind of fancy salesmanship and entrepreneurial expertise that is analogous to charlatan.

Buyer, beware of the "snake oil."

Psychobabble

2010-01-06T15:33:00.000-08:00

Psychobabble is a word, an expression ,whose use can be attributed to journalist Richard Dean Rosen who publicly used it in 1977. It refers to the media's use of words and expressions like, “dysfunctional family,” “type ‘A’ personality, “up-tight” or “co-dependent;” words deriving their origin in the field of psychology and subsequently have made their way into our common everyday usage.

The word “psychobabble” is often used by someone who believes the world of psychology to be somewhat of a non-scientific head-trip with bizarre terminology that makes no sense to the average person unless he has wrapped his brain about the high minded lofty notion of nonsensical realities.   Rosen however, specifically implicated that the “babbling,” was more like that of a baby who just learning a new language learns a new word and then applies it to everything. He intended to infer that psychology and psychological jargon is over-used and perhaps a bit overrated, often even totally irrelevant to how it happened to be used in a particular instance and misapplied.

Psychology, is based on observation, with interpretation of course; and for those who practice it’s guiding principles in their daily lives, (depending of course on which aspect or interpretation they adhere to, (be it Jung or Freud or someone else, and how much to each they personally ascribe “wisdom,”) it is considered (by them) to be good sound logical understanding of life and the human experience. It is the source of their understanding and guide for their human reasoning, a way of perceiving and living life. Full of principles and insights into the inner workings of the human mind, a person's "worldview" and how they view the world and themselves, it is almost like a religion.

Psychology deals with mental processes. It’s the way a person thinks about themselves in relation to the world and other people. It’s a philosophy of how to build “healthy” relationships, particularly in family, but not excluding managing business, organizing educational curriculum and standards, parenting children, basically viewing the world. The word itself is derived from the Greek word 'psyche' meaning breath, spirit, or soul, more evidence that true "psychology" is "spiritual" and about understanding who you are. A person into psychology will most likely "need" psychotherapy, which is the application of psychology in it’s various forms. This therapy in all it's forms is what nurtures your understanding of that soul or spirit, the person that you are or can become, give you a "healthy" identity...(if is it Id?) This of course because psychology helps you understand YOU better, instructs YOU in what YOU say and do and don't do unto others and what YOU should and should not believe.

It is all about YOU.

Unfortunately as enamored with thoughts of ourselves as we all are, the whole field of psychology is built on the false premise of self and self discovery being the most important think in life the universe and everything.   This can be a problem for Christians, who, not unlike people in psychotherapy know very much they are spiritual beings souls and psyches, feeling hopeless, helpless, like their life is a wreck and feeling like they need salvation from the things too difficult to bear. Christians have a great savior than themselves, God.

Even if a particular branch of psychology is dubbed “spiritual” in nature it is often entwined like a weed in the occult, in fact, much of psychology has deep roots l in realms of the occult and the problem is that one may realize it’s origin until it’s too late.

In the realm of psychology, one begins with the understanding they have a problem and need help, and they get help from a psychologist, one who has studied and now knows how the mind works. From there, the problem is identified and dealt with, and then one psychological understanding is built on top of another until a person can finally look back over their lives and understand everything about themselves and all the hows and whys of who they are and the person they have become. They identify who is and who is not to blame for them being the way they are and learn new truths on which to base their lives if their consellors do not happen to be Christian, but are atheists.

And is such a person were to be Christian, to ascribe to a belief in God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, they would most likely be expected to refrain from talking about "sin" or pointing the ailing one to Christ as the redeemer or the Savior, or the wisdom of the Bible as holding the answer to everything that ails both genders of the human species, man and woman. Such a thing as this is, for the humanly educated mind, often far too simplistic. Most counselors of psychology have been duly trained by atheists, and as graduates of the educational ladder, they know earily man's ideas of God are but "a myth" and with a more realistic view of life, the universe and everything, know that their work helps humanity evolve into the next level of awareness... that they are the masters of their own realities, maybe even God, certainly not sinners being convicted of any guilt or shame.

The wisdom and knowledge that feeds the soul of man in “psychology” is very different from the wisdom and knowledge of God. It is even a bit like the situation that took place at the Tower of Babel long ago. (Genesis 11:1-11)

The Tower of Babel is, just a story right? Who on earth reads such tales, tales like the story of the Tower of Babel? Who on earth even thinks that they are true?

Is it true?

The Tower of Babel in the Bible, was said to be built by Nimrod and Nimrod, we learn in various sources of history that Nimrod was a real person, and a king, a king in a place now considered to be modern day Iraq. The Tower of Babel was an ancient “tower” being built within the city wall no doubt a common practice in that time period, and the bible tells us that the building of this mighty "tower to the heavens" was a combined effort of all the peoples of the earth . It took place under the direction of Nimrod, King of Babylon in the city of Babel when he ruled, which would have been around 3400 BC.

Babel was a real tower, built with bricks that the people made with their own hands. These bricks were then stuck together using slime for mortar as they built for themselves first a city then a tower that reached up to the sky. Their goal was heaven, and they were doing it without God, for they had their own gods they created for themselves to worship; and they did, even unto the total disrespect of the God who gave man life in the beginning.    Leaving God's basic instructions behind them they made their own and yet, they still wanted heaven, or at least access to heaven from the earth. They believed that if they worked together, (and they could work together well because they all spoke one language and understood one another perfectly,) they could build a tower to the sky.

But God, being God, (who knows and sees all things,) saw what they were doing and confounded them by changing their languages and thus putting an end to all their work. Unable to make sense of one anothers babbling talk, not understanding one anther's words, they could no longer cooperate and the peoples were dispersed, each going out to find some habitable place somewhere else.

Their dream was shattered. The work was ended and the Tower was left incomplete and abandoned, at least until more recent days.

The goal of building such a tower then, as it is today, is reaching heaven... so that man, any man, every man, perhaps even one single man can sit over all the earth, over all that is called God and proclaim himself to be God, even if he is not. Ruler over land sea and sky, knowing all there is to know and more, the creature will then marvel at the works of his own hands, and make his own laws regarding what is good and what is right. He will deliver justice as his own justice will see fit, and do good deeds to suit his own perceptions and desires, to get him what he wants and think he needs. The tower of Babel, if it were to be built today, would be built on man's own foundation, and have nothing whatsoever to do with the true and living God, creator and sustainer of all the heavens and the Earth.

Some think that such things are but a myth of man's imagination, but there was in Babylon an ancient ziggurat that fits such a strange and curious description. It is mentioned in the writings of Nebucanezzar, and named also by the Greek historian Herodotus. It is known as "Etemenanki,” a Sumarian name which means, “house of the foundation of heaven on earth.” (Some references to Etemenanki say, “the house foundation of sky and earth” or “"The temple of the creation of heaven and earth.") Some believe remnants of it have been discovered.

The annuls of the Assyrian King Sennacherib mention such a temple as well. He claims he and his armies destroyed such a temple in Babylon in 689 BCE. Alexander the great is said to have ordered it’s rebuilding in 331 BC, but this never happened. A man named Antiochus however, is said to have finally rebuilt it, but he also is said to have ordered that it be destroyed by elephants, and until recent years, there in the rubble, babble lay; at least until the German explorer and archeologist Robert Johann Koldewey claimed to have found the ruins of Etemenanki when he discovered the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon in Iraq in 1913.

In the Bible story of the Tower of Babel, God saw this temple that the people had built, this tower to heaven and He knew that once this was complete, nothing would be restrained from man he would do whatever it was that he imagines himself to do. God confounded their language, the people dispersed and then God called Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees.

Today we have psychology experts to do more than connect us in language, but to connect the inner workings of our minds. We have psychology giants like Joseph Alder, Sigmund Freud, Ray Rosenman, Abraham Maslow, Carl Jung, Erich Fromm and others who are responsible for coining certain terms and phrases we see in common use, like: “defense mechanism,” “inner child,” “ego,” “introvert,” “type “A” personality” or something called the “collective consciousness of humanity. ”

Such words seem like babble to some, "psychobabble" in fact, but to others it is the very things that will help us better understand ourselves and relate to one another. Current teachings from many a university teaches that these psychologists are wise men that know what they were talking about and are even quite devoted to the fountains of human wisdom that babble forth from their lips as they speak, and write and teach the rest of us their wisdom. While they babel, some still Bible.

Psychology as a discipline, considered to be a type of science, and "it is believed to embrace all aspects of the human experience — from the functions of the brain to the actions of nations, from child development to care for the aged.” (American Psychological Association definition of psychology.) There is nothing in the human experience to which it cannot be applied and by psychology’s own definition, this would include spiritual experiences as well.

But there are two very distinct and divergent fonts of "wisdom." There is human wisdom that is earthly and formulated by men who believe they are so very smart, in control of everything, even on their way to becomming a god, and then there is the wisdom from above, the wisdom of Almighty God. A thirsty soul should be thoughtful about which brook they drink from and what water is their source. One babbling brook give life only in this world, and one gives living water that actually revives the soul.

Like fresh flowing living water, Jesus’ words are true, and they come from a source that can be trusted. Jesus’ words are heavenly derived and they flow from the eternal rock, the solid foundation put in place on earth by God. Christians know God's word is the true source of life, words that like rain from heaven fall to earth on parched dry lifeless ground.And they do not return void.

But then again, to some, who are merely saturated with their own ideas, giving heed to the wisdom which originates from the earth, the falling rain from heaven is undesirable. It even ruins all their work.
To them such wisdom of God, even stories of the tower of Babel, is merely myth, or just for imaginative children who have yet to be adulterated, indoctrinated by the wisdom of world..

Pilates

2010-01-06T01:05:00.000-08:00

Pilates, (pronounced, puh-LAH-teez) is a currently popular method of exercise that has many striking similarities to Yoga. It is named after it’s German born developer, now American, Joseph Hubertus Pilates (1880 - 1967) who originally called his method the art of “contrology” because he said it uses the mind to control the muscles.

Pilates is a sort of combination of calisthenics, controlled breathing and yoga. (Calisthenics are exercises performed without weights or other equipment like jumping jacks and push-ups.)

There are three types of Pilates, authentic Pilates, Contemporary Pilates and Modern Pilates. There is even a form called Yogalates too.

It Feels Good To Be Out Of The Rain

2010-01-06T00:59:00.000-08:00

“Out of the Rain” is part of the lyrics to a song by a band called America. The song is called A Horse With No Name. The song, sung by Dan Peek, was a huge radio hit in the 70’s and at the time there was a lot of speculation about the meaning of the song. The big question was what was the meaning of the "horse" Some people thought it was code for some sort of drug, mainly heroine. Others thought the meaning was some reference to religion. It really didn;t matter what the horse was or wasn't; the song was a hit.

The song goes, "Well, I've been through the desert on a horse with know name, It felt good to be out of the rain. In the desert you can remember your name, cause there ain’t no one for to give you no pain…La, la ... etc.”

In January 2006, Peek, in an interview with Mike Rimmer, talked about how the band became one of the most successful of the period and how, despite all the success and fame, life for the band, and for Peek in particular, was not well.

Dan Peek told Rimmer, “I had bought into the whole materialistic consumer-oriented advertising age theory that if you just have the right car and the right clothes and the right hairstyle and the right shoes, then you would be happy and fulfilled. We were able to attain all of that stuff at a very early age because we were just miraculously and incredibly fortunate. Things just clicked. We had all the success; the hit records and the fame and the material things that came along with it. I think probably the rudest shock of all was to just wake up and think, 'My goodness. I'm empty!' I was still searching for some type of peace and some type of meaning to my life after we ended up with walls covered in gold and platinum albums and the accolades and the praise of our peers and the fans. You just still felt this nagging emptiness. It was very, very frightening."

Peek however has since become a Christian. In the same interview, talking about his conversion, Peek said, "I finally found out that all of this stuff - the fame, the success, the glory, the records, the accolades - had left me totally empty. So I turned to Christ. I turned to Jesus as Lord and Savior. THAT was the transformation that I had been looking for my whole life.”

Transpersonal Psychology

2010-01-06T00:26:00.000-08:00

Charles Tart, born in 1937, is known as one of the founders of a branch of psychology called Transpersonal Psychology and has been involved in “Consciousness Studies” at several state universities as well as the faculty Institute of Noetic Sciences” in California. (Noetic Science is a science exploring the frontiers of consciousness) Tart is considered by some, to be one of the foremost researchers on “states of consciousness.” He studies psychic abilities, (E.S.P.) mystical states of awareness, mind-matter interaction phenomena, martial arts, and out of the body experiences.(O.B.E.)

His home page notes that he has been “involved with research and theory in the fields of Hypnosis, Psychology, Transpersonal Psychology, Parapsychology, Consciousness and Mindfulness since 1963.” In addition to his research, he has authored several books and articles, some which have been published in “prestigious scientific journals such as Science and Nature.” Tart also says his primary goal is to” build bridges between the scientific and spiritual communities and to help bring about a refinement and integration of Western and Eastern approaches for knowing the world and for personal and social growth.”

Having watched him on you tube and visited his blog, I would say he is a nice man, enthusiastic and inquisitive too, a man looking for answers to the ultimate questions of life in things that are of interest to him, like how the mind works, and altered states of consciousness , E.S.P. and O.B.E. He is so enthusiastic about experimenting with the occult and psycodelic drugs that he even publically endorses more experimentation and even advocates their "disciplined use." Curiously enough, what Tart really seems to want to know is more than how the mind works,(though he obviously has formulated a lot of ideas about this in his own mind.) What Tart really wants to do is "survive" and he thinks occult spirituality mixed with "science" will assist him in finding answers.

According to the Ensalen Center where Tart teaches in conferences on the subject of "Surviving Bodily Death," "From Tart’s perspective, science is hallmarked by the unwavering commitment to the truth regardless of preference, while Buddhism is interested in what is useful for ending suffering and attaining enlightenment. Therein lies the nobility of the objective scientific quest to empirically investigate the survival of bodily death."

Tart is currently working in collaboration with other scientists from universities all over the world discussing and researching trans personal psychology, a new branch of science that he hopes will give humanity the answer to the question of whether we (humans) survive bodily death in some form. He hosts a journal, The Archives of Scientists Transcendent Experiences (TASTE) where other scientists interested in the spiritual can contribute information regarding spiritual experiences they themselves have had, but you have to be a "scientist" to contribute to their scintific study of transpersonal psychology. .

In the study of what happens after death, scientific knowledge, if it is truely scientific should include both descriptions of what happens when one dies and and explanations of why it happens. Science is scince because the scientific method is reliable and repeatable, but the problem with testing death is that it is appoint once for man to die, death, it's not something that can be repeated and retested. In fact, it is very rare that one will die and be raised again to life.

This has been done only one time in human history... Jesus Christ rose from the dead. He is the answer.

Miraculously this event of JEsus's death and resurrection was forth-told in writing before it ever happened and in fact is still something may people believe and celebrate even yet today. My advice to people like Tart who dabble in darkness, who are toying with death, is repent of your occult practices, call on the name of Jesus and "TASTE and see, that the Lord is good."... (Psalm 34:8 ) Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ ans you will be saved! REmember, God and the things of God are very good, in fact, sweet, "sweeter than honey and the honey comb." ( Psalm 19:10)

Our human journey here on earth in this precious life we have been given is simply justice being served and grace being given. We will die. But by believing God and receiving Christ as savior, we will live, forever... yes, like Jesus we will be raised from death to life and be invited to return to God and live again in the heavenly realms. not because we know all there is to know, not because we are so smart and hold degrees and not because of anything we could do or give to God who gave us lie, but simply because we heard the truth and we believed.

Blessed is the man who has faith in Him. (Psalm 34:8 )

Carl Rogers

2010-01-05T16:51:00.000-08:00

Carl Rogers, (1902-1987) who once served as a Professor at Columbia University, is well known for his role in the development of Humanistic Psychology. It was Carl Rogers who coined the concept of Client Centered Therapy. His developments, together with Abraham Maslow’s concept of "self-actualization" and "hierarchy of needs" helped mankind to see their need for self-love and self-esteem.

Following in the psychology footsteps of probing men like Freud and Jung, Rogers' work in understanding the human psyche earned him great notoriety. In 1964, he took the celebrated honor of “Humanist of the Year,” and eighteen years later, in 1982, the psychologists journal, American Psychologist, named Rogers as the "Most Influential Psychotherapist of the Year."

He was a true optimist of the highest degree, for Rogers believed that all living things, even seaweed and mushrooms, not only knew within themselves what was good for them, but that if left to themselves all living things would strive to make the very best of their existence. Rogers' practice in the mental health community was different from Jung and Freud, who practiced the theory that the doctor knew how to treat the patient, whereas Rogers, who believed that all living things intrinsically knew what they needed believed that the "client" themselves would be able to identify their own needs and problems. He called the method of work he did in helping them discover it, Client Centered Counseling.

As a devout humanist Rogers had what might be described as an unshakable belief in the inherent goodness of people. He believed that the ills of humanity, even the worse criminal behavior, could be overcome if people simply had a better psychological understanding of “self. Rogers taught his students, that negative inputs from parents and teachers when they were growing up, put limits on self and self discovery. He believed that all living things, even babies instinctively knew what was best for themselves if let to their own discoveries, encouraged to find their own heart's desires.

Interestingly, though he was a humanist, Rogers grew up in a Christian home, and at one point in his life he was even studying to be a Christian minister. He was on a mission trip when he made the important life changing discovery that changed the course of his life and his career: mankind was not intrinsically evil, as he had been taught, but that all men were actually "good., He saw first hand that good people were capable of very good things, even if they did believe different things religiously. He began to believe that man was not in need of any particular religious doctrine, or even of any formal teaching, but what was needed was unconditional positive regard from other human beings... this ather than the love of a parent or the Love of One universally understood and known to the world as, "God."

His main theories were formulated after working as a psychologist in the Child Study Department of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, in Rochester, New York. He learned a lot from working with children and their parents, which inspired him into the formulation of his "person-centered approach" for psychological therapy sessions. He began to believe that what mentally disordered people needed in a therapist was what was obviously lacking in their "conditionally" loving parents. His brand of therapy still offered at many mental health treatment centers nation wide.

It was in Rogerian treatment that patients who were previously considered to be “mentally ill” first got the positive self-image of being “clients,” instead of “patients.” This is because Rogers believed that if they were called "patients," they might consider themselves to be, "ill." Rogers is also known for the group therapy sometimes referred to as the "encounter group."

The humanistic philosophy says, "at the core, you are good, only waiting to be recognized as such." And as such it stand in place of opposition to the philosophy in Christianity which declares that only God is good and all the rest of humanity has sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God. In fact, when Jesus was approached by someone in a crowd who called him "good," his response was. "Why callest thou me good? There is none good but one, that is, God." (Mark 10:18)

It would be easy to dismiss God in our human thinking, since we do have something called freewill. Rogers who grew up in a Christian home, who know a lot about Christian thought and practice did just that. In effect he exchanged our God-likeness as human beings created in his image, for the false understanding that there is no God. Seeing such "goodness" in mankind, believing that somehow is was only struggling to emerge, via the superior thinking that believed in evolution and not in God's creative all knowing force and power, he dropped his thinking about God and became a "humanist."

And while it would be nice for a while to believe Rogers' humanist psychology about the nature of man and to believe that changing our beliefs like he did would create a utopia here on earth, history and the reality of human life speaks differently. We see that our desire to get what self wants is not always comparable with having consideration for others. As much good that can be derived from a godless philosophy like Carl Rogers', as much as unconditional regard is discussed and practiced by those who see clints once hour a week and do not have to live with them, the foundation for such a philosophy of life remains faulty because it is one that denies the existence of the very source of love, God. (1 John 4:8)

There is truth to be found in the idea that unconditional love is an important to the psyche of a human being; but Rogers was not the first to discover that it was... it has been read about for centuries in the Bible, for example, look at the Proverbs of King Solomon, Chapter 19, verse 22.) The problem with humanistic love, even if you want to call it " psychology " is that with humanism, God is not allowed to be in the equation.

The only answer to man's problems is in knowing he is loved, first by parent and ultimately by God, both of these make for a healthy individual. True love for God is when a person strives to do what is right and knows that he can start again if he should fail because he is loved and his sin will be erased, forgiven. Response of the human heart, mind and soul...to the needs of others and to God and his love, is where and why we see a change in heart and mind, true psychological reform and freedom in humans. The rest is "psychobabble snake oil," that is, high minded, lofty human arrogance, intended by powers and principalities to keep man in darkness and sin, in the hopes that he can live and subsequently die without ever being set free by the power of the love of God and Jesus Christ our Savior.

Faith, Hope and Love.. the greatest of these is love, says 1 Corinthians 13:13. Love is much deeper and even mutually relational than mere (conditional or unconditional,) "positive regard."

Kinsey

2010-01-04T16:34:00.000-08:00

The following is rated " M "by me... because I intend it to be for Mature audiences only. It is written by an adult for an adult audience, and discusses the work of sexologist, Alfred Kinsey from a historical perspective. If you are an adolescent, please consult your mom or dad before reading this page and know that Mr. Alfred Kinsey was a very troubled, although famous, man.

Alfred Kinsey, (1894-1956) was at first a zoologist with a keen interest in insects, particularly wasps, but at the end of his life he was most notably a very famous "sex expert." It cannot go unoticed that there is much debate as to if he was an expert or a pervert, and to help one look at the debate about this more clearly, here is provided a somewhat short rendering of Kinsey's historic tale.

Alfred Kinsey's name and reputation first got widespread media coverage in 1948, when his book, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male was put into print. (It sold more than 200,000 copies the first month after tpublication.) A few years later in 1953, Kinsey published a sequel that was titled, Sexual Behavior in the Human Female. This too became a "National Bestseller," and the name Kinsey was almost a household word. He became world reknown for his research and his published fndings were intended to give the world a whole new perspective on human sexuality.

The Kinsey Report, as his works became called, served to change the way people viewed sex and sexuality, even family life. His scientifically collected data was published in order to shed some light on thing before thought to have been perverse or taboo. Research showed that at least 10% percent of the male population was exclusively homosexual, concluding for Kinsey that such behavor was not at all "abnormal" for men,as society previously thought. Not only that, but Kiinsey's research showed that, 46% of men in his studies responded sexually to both women and men, thus demonstrating that many hedrosexual men, "normall" had "homosexual tendencies."

Regarding marriage and family life, Kinsey stressed in his reports that multiple partners during marriage was normal. Research showed that 50% of men had extramarital affairs, as did 26 % of women. For all his research into the psyche and behavior of human sexuality and the influence it had on American families, Kinsey himself had become known as, "the Father of the sexual revolution."

Kinsey was an atheist who believed the research of Darwin and his theory and therefore took the view that man was simply a higher order animal. Being nothing more than an animal, he believed that human sexuality was really, simply a matter of doing what comes naturally, like it does with the animals. Kinsey believed that there were social taboos on certain sexual activities, not because they were "immoral," or harmful to other human beings, but because people were religiously superstitious. He believed peple were afraid of their own sexuality, and he even used the term, "sexually repressed"… (a Sigmund Freud invented term, ) to describe people who were “not properly in touch” with their sexuality.

So according to Kinsey, Americans were just simply too uptight, so he advocated that people be more open about sex and feel free to engage in all kinds of sexual activity. He even had the support of Mrs. Kinsey, his wife and mother of their four children in this endeavor to free society from the bondage of repression. Mrs. Kinsey appeared in the July 1948 McCalls magazine, a magazine directed at women, but read by men and found in most American homes in that day, telling readers in an interview titled Meet Mrs. Kinsey, that her husband's work represented "a plea for tolerance.”

Yes, "Tolerance," the same word we hear today.According to Kinsey, people should be more tolerant of what previously had been thought of as promiscuity and perversion. Besides advocating homosexuality, Kinsey believed premarital sex was healthyand normal. He believed that waiting until marriage for intercourse was psychologically harmful. The worse offenders, the most intolerant were of course, American Christians.

Christians considered homosexuality, promiscuity, adultery and fornication to be sinful, thus causing repression and psychosis for everyone. Kinsey believed that they and anyone else who would oppose his work were those who stood in the way of science and progress because they believed such practices should be restrained, or worse… that they were somehow shameful, obscene, or harmful to others and that they should be considered illegal, punishable by law. It was time, in Kinsey’s mind for "tolerance" and time to "change" these views. With the Kinsey Reports he, and others who believed in his work felt they had the scientific research hat would set mankind free.

Working to validate his work in the minds of the American people were numerous factors. Besides being on the “best seller” status, popular and respected writers and magazines like Newsweek, McCalls, Life and Look, featured articles about Kinsey and his work. They knew the topic would peak the curiosity of the American public and sell magazines and papers. Some were happy in and of themselves to join the cause of “sexually liberating" the world. Interest in Kinsey's "research" also came from professionals in the medical community, many who were quite impressed that a scientifically minded colleague finally found out for them the very things they always wanted to ask their patients, but were afraid to ask.

In certain circles, Kinsey was respectable, knowledgeable and professional and the public was repeatedly informed that Kinsey’s Report was conducted scientifically and with full regard for the latest refinements in, "public survery methods."They were told to believe it was science, never realizing the real methods and who the subjects were.

I you are convinced it was not science at all, then you may not want to read on. This will only be repetitious for you. If you believe it was scientific think again. "science" was only an excuse for something that should have been considered criminal. Truth is, Kinsey used real, live, (even by today's standards,) "sex offenders." His scientific research was conducted with men both in, and recently released from prison for their crimes, men who were more than happy to perform or instigate sexual encounters with and between children. Kinsey's subjects were, no doubt, those who were biasly interested in the cause of liberated sex, and create less criminal penalties for such crimes.

His subjects were bias, in that they were prostitutes, people who frequented prostitutes, people who wanted affirmation and fulfillment of their otherwise rejected sexual provocations, people happy to find a “professional” who shared their enthusiasm for the topic, who even enjoyed attending the "doctors" s sex lectures. Kinsey was a source of an encouragement to themin their exploits and they to his own.

Kinsey valued the information the people on the fringe of society provided him and most provided information about their own sexuality to Kinsey on a regular basis. They were enthusiastic in participating and Kinsey shared in their enthusiasm. His biographer, James Jones, author of Alfred C. Kinsey: A Public Private Life, explained Kinsey’s pursuit for scientific information better than anyone. He wrote, “In his eagerness to learn everything he could about human sexuality, Kinsey was a vacuum cleaner, and he had absolutely no standards about censorship or passing moral judgment."

Like many of the people Kinsey researched, Kinsey himself had “no standards and no moral judgment.” With no thoughts on the matter, he was nothing but a vacuum who knew no restraint sucking up information no matter where it came from, be it wasps or rats or tiny babies in a crib, to him they were all the same, animals and research subjects. Sex was nothing sacred nor profound in his decrepit mind. To Kinsey and friends, sex of any kind, even sex between men and infants was to be considered perfectly normal. The sad and disturbing thing is that it is from the research of the man named Kinsey, that even today, most of the American public is educated about their own human sexuality, particularly the segment of society that loves to do as they will and even reject "God."

Kinsey thought himself to be a broadminded, progressive man, simply a scientist searching for believed his motives were altruistic. If the man had any question in his mind that he might have been doing something wrong, he regarded his work important enough to believe that the end result somehow that justified his means.As a trained entomologist, might have sincerely believed he was, simply studying a different kind of creature than a wasp when he delved into his study of human beings, he may have even believed that in his study he was working to benefit all of mankind in the future. Whatever it was he obviously rationalized his use of infants and prepubescent adolescents subjects to collect his data, for to Kinsey, pedophilia, (the rape and molesting of even the youngest of children, babies.. infants and toddlers,) was somehow justified. With his consciousness seared, as if with a hot iron, he didn't think such a thing was evil.

It’s a strong word; evil. But evil is exactly what kind of work it was because this man, father and husband should have been the kind of man to protect these children, even very young children, from the hands of ruthless men who used their tiny bodies not only to fulfill their own perverted passions, but for gathering information for Kinsey.

The Kinsey Institute has taken a lot of criticism over the years for these instances of what they still call “perceived child abuse" claims. They maintain to this day that Kinsey himself never personally had sexual interaction with children. They are also emphatic in stating that Kinsey had high moral standards in doing his research, after all, as they claim, “he always interviewed children in the presence of their parents.”

What they fail to acknowledge, if this is the case, is that these "parents" were the perpetrators and either allowed the allowed the abuse, or were the abusers. Inmany instances, who the perpetrator was or who the subject was, could be anybody’s guess; take for example, Mr. X.

Mr. X was a man whom Kinsey regularly obtained research information from and he was a known child molester,presumably an adult. Kinsey considered Mr. X to be a true “pioneer” in sexology because he actually took the time to journalize his exploits with a few hundred subjects.. er eh... victims. Working "scientifically, " and for the benefit of all mankind with Mr. X, did not seem something evil or perverse to Kinsey. And Mr, X’s behavior, was not viewed as detrimental to the children either. No, Kinsey who believed that children were sexual beings, having sexual encounters with Mr. X , did not believe that these encounters would be something harmful to the life and happiness of a child.

The Kinsey Institute even believes hat children today still reap the benefit of his research. In fact, University of Indiana where the Kinsey Research Institute is located and has been established since 1947, has expanded and become the Sex Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS) a group that works to insure the sexual education of America, a group that is very involved in American public schools. SIECUS sponsors school programs like “Right from the Start” and hosts internet webpages like “familiesaretalking.org.”

SEICUS is not just a secular organization, they also seek to educate religious communities by forming religious groups like the Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing. (RISMJH) Publishing pamphlets like The Really Good News: What the Bible Says About Sex, they obviously do not fail to address the sexual issues as they would like to think they relate to the Bible, but they fail to see the problem with the research of their all-time American Hero, Alfred C. Kinsey. And make no mistake, "The Religious Institute's mission is to change the way America understands the relationship of sexuality and religion." SEICUS and the RISMJH are educting America according to Kinsey,

But if you, like all those who uses these products and organizational materials, still doubt there was anything morally "wrong" with Kinsey's research, consider the testimony of Clarence Tripp, photographer and well-known writer on homosexual issues, (now deceased,) who was a friend and supporter of Kinsey when he was alive. In 1990, as a guest on the Phil Donahue Show, he defended Kinsey’s controversial research saying, “(Kinsey) would listen only to pedophiles who were very careful, used stopwatches, knew how to record their thing.”

This was not a revelation. Kinsey’s report testified to the accuracy of TRipps statement. The real revelation here is that people who listened to such testimonies rationalized the behavior of the adults as documented incidences of nepiophilia, rape, abuse, or incest took place while the pediophiles did their "thing." For whatever reason people, like Kinsey somehow believe that the "bad" behavior of the adults was legitimate. Kinsey, after all said he found it, “difficult to understand why a child should be disturbed by sexual contact, observation or molestation.” (Kinsey pg. 121)

SEICUS and RISMJH people simply nod their heads in approval of the studies Kinsey and they think his information is legitimate and accurate. Kinsey is their hero in the so-called, " sexual revolution." As a result of his heroic work into the inner workings of human sexuality, individuals and groups still work politically to gain public acceptance of prostitution as a legitimate form of work, pedophilia and child pornography as a legitimate business, sodomy no longer a crime and homosexual marriage as a legal right. Groups such as SEICUS and RISMJH aren;t the only Kinsey supporters today. The North American Man/Boy Love Association, (NAMBLA) would not be in business if it were not for the work of Alfred Kinsey and friends.

NAMBLA and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU work very hard, hand in hand to change laws, in particular the laws against such things as pedophilia, sodomy and the “age of consent." They believe these laws are unjust and say, these laws do nothing but terrorize those who find simple pleasure in various forms of sex. Like Kinsey before them, they cry that the rest of us should have “tolerance” as they simply fulfill their human desires.

But male sexuality and the hitherto before “secret” sexual life of little children was not all Kinsey would be remembered for. His report on women taught that women enjoy sex as much as men. It taught America that when women said no to sex, they really didn’t mean it. They might have said no, they might have even ought the man off tooth and nail, but Kinsey told America, that such behavior was a game and that the truth was that the women who said "no,"n only did so because of their sexual repression and from that day forward, Kinsey’s “revolutionary” sex theories were used to counter charges of rape in courts of law.

Anyone who was educated and scientific, who revered the work of Kinsey, had read the research on women. They were familiar with the report. It wasn't long before laws requiring severe punishments for offenses of rape, incest, and even sodomy seemed far too inhuman, after all this was sexuality, human sexuality....we were dealing with. Then of course came the heated issue of abortion.

With unrestrained sexuality being the order of the day, there were, needless to say, unwanted pregnancies ....and children, as Kinsey clearly demonstrated in his research were undeserving of human rights and protection under law. Considered fetuses, not babies, unborn children had already been proven by Darwin (and Kinsey) to be animals, merely products of a sex act, much less than human beings. Pregnancy was now a problem, not a blessing; and being pregnant, not to mention raising children was burdensome, repressive, certainly a hardship for individuals who wanted to be free to do whatever they so desired. Pregnancy however was a problem that could be remedied by abortion and better so if abortions would be made legal.

In 2004, Kinsey’s work gained notoriety once more for a whole new generation, and for a whole new generation of voters as the movie titled Kinsey hit the big important screen. The film was to be a portrait of the sex hero of a man, Alfred Kinsey; once more pictured for the public eye as a courageous scientist who discovered the deep truths about human sexuality through his bold and daring research. As this rated “R” film swept across the nation and across the world it served to re-educate a new generation. Moviegoers left the theater thinking that Kinsey was a hero, the ultimate free thinker.

SEICUS, the organization sponsored by the Kinsey Institute boasted that the movie grossed almost 4 million dollars. In addition, they boast that the movie has gained critical acclaim, having been nominated for several Golden Globe Awards, including Best Picture Drama and Best Actor Drama.

In response to the movie’s release, outspoken Christian and Dr. Judith Reisman has chosen to speak out for the voices of the children who have been shamelessly silenced by Kinsey’s “research.” She has written, several books on the matter; Kinsey: Crimes and Consequences; (1998) Kinsey, Sex and Fraud, The Indoctrination of a People; (1990) and Kinsey’s Attic: The Shocking Story of How One Mans Sexual Pathology Changed the World. (2006) She documents in her writings the research Kinsey did, the methods he used in doing his research and the financiay support he incurred to make it all happen. Her loud voice in the crowd as earned her a great backlash both from the gay and lesbian community and from the Kinsey Institute as well.

The Institute holds the position that Dr. Kinsey was honorable, meanwhile they paint the picture that Reisman is perpetrating evil by being intolerant and biased due to her religious beliefs. They continue to uphold the position that Mr. Kinsey was a man of impeccable scientific ethics, only motivated by an interest in the welfare of children and that he was and is a hero because he was protecting the children of the world from “negative, inhibitory, guilt-provoking influences.”

They say her concern about Tables 31 through 34 in the Male volume, is “an understandable concern.” Then they negate the concern by giving the official statement is that it would never have occurred to Kinsey that responses of “sobbing or crying or hypersensitivity” of a child having a sexual encounter with other children or an adult would be interpreted as “physical torture.” They then insist that Kinsey, the altruistic man that he was, if he thought that children were being harmed in any way, “would have been opposed to it.”

It’s pretty obvious that Kinsey wasn’t opposed, and since the publication of his Kinsey Report millions of teetering minds wavered in silence, confused, willing to entertain the thoughts the media projection was feeding to them. Amused at the mere notion of discovering more about themselves and satiating their own desires they were willing to entertain such wisdom from a man who didn;t care what was right and what was wrong. Millions still do to this day and it's almost as if America had been seduced into silence, not thinking anyore, simply listening to the wisdom of such self proclaimed, "experts".

Today a whole generation of people were educated and are still being educated in such Kinsian wisdom. They still herald Kinsey as some great liberator, a genius. Few dared to speak out in defense of the weak and helpless because they live in darkness and their personal misery loves the company of anyone who will keep them company. Like a big black hole, such misery, is like a vacuum, self-absorbed taking down into the depths of depravity anything not anchored down.

Into darkness it goes, seeking not God but how self and how self's desire can be fulfilled via sexual freedom. It's a deep dark place that replaces holy and sacred love with ...pornography, prostitution, pedophilia, bestiality, voyeurism, and other "harmless"( ? ) forms of sexual entertainment... and worse.

But we know from the scriptures that the words of wisdom, often guilt producing, will be perceived as either foolish or wise. To the wise they are wise. To the fool, wisdom is foolish.

It's sad to say, but those who reject God and believe man is but a product of evolution, no different than an animal, those who do not value human life and dignity,who seek only their own pleasure no matter who or what gets in their way, God will always be the villian, and men and women, like Mr. Kinsey will be thought of by them as some kind of hero.

Thanks be to God, he is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish. He also loves us, forgives our sins gives us light to walk in instead of darkness, his love is forever an anchor to our soul and he gives us the amazing gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ. Not only did God created mankind upright, but even today his Holy Spirit is still working to restrain upon this earth, something known to humanity as evil.

Freud

2010-01-04T11:34:00.000-08:00

Sigmund Freud was born in 1856. Today he is known as the father of psychoanalysis and his work, much like that of Carl Jung, has contributed greatly to the practice of psychology and psychiatry we have today. Freud was a "doctor" and a "scientist" in his day. His first love was neurology, the study of the physical brain.

Some people do not know that early in his medical career Freud did research on cerebral palsy. It was later that he became interested in working with the mentally ill. Freud became interested in the mind and how it works, specifically how it related to human behavior and in particularly, how it worked in relation to human sexuality.

Freud liked to investigate people’s most inner thoughts and dreams and this fascination lead him to believe that dreams were the “royal road to the unconscious." He also developed theories about how a person’s childhood affected their adult life and how people repressed desires, especially of the sexual kind. He worked with hypnosis and tried to learn how memory works and he studied the effect of traumatic experiences on the mind. He used methods of talking and analyzing the problems his patients had that he called psychoanalysis. He is probably most known and recognized for his probing into people’s thoughts on sex and publishing his research on human sexual behaviors.

It was Freud who was bewhinds the developement of many psychology theories about the human sex drive. He popularized for interested parties the idea that everyone had this "libido." within the "Id." As an atheist, humanist and a strong believer that Darwin was right, he reasoned and taught that food and sex and repression of sexuality was the motivating force behind all human life and activity. He notably developed theories about the growth and development of sexuality in humans and did lots of research into the sexuality of children and infants as well as adults. His bold and aggressive research on this "taboo" subject and the dissemination of his theories got a lot of attention from the world both positive and negative.

Freud was a contemporary of Carl Jung, and the two of them spent some time traveling together lecturing and sharing their discoveries, but they had some differences of opinions. Jung was critical of Freud’s headstrong insistence that he knew so much and Freud, being an atheist, was critical of Jung’s occult spirituality. They ultimately went their separate ways and developed different theories, and both made a mark upon the work. Both are still studied in universities and their ideas practiced in various fields of psychology today.

As for his personal life, Freud was born into a family full of complexity and confusion. He had two older siblings that were from the same father, but their mother died and his father, Jacob Freud married Sigmonds mother. Sigmond was third child in the family as well as the first of eight. His mother married Freud’s father when she was 20 and he was 41. It should be no wonder that Sigmund Freud was the first to document the notion that birth order as well as gender would have great influences in a persons later life.

Throughout his career in studying the mind, Freud experimented with and was addicted to cocaine. He smoked cigars and endured cancer of the jaw in a time when medical options for treatment of cancer were not as they are today. Eventually he died of throat cancer. Well, he actually died from euthanasia, but it was because of his cancer that he asked his physician to give him a lethal dose of morphine in 1939.

As for religion, he is often quoted as believing that religion was a mere illusion, and he often called it something the whole world would be better without. Still, the man born to Jewish parents, who grew up in the Roman Catholic town of Freiburg, Moravia and was himself saved from Hitler's Invasion of his country by a Nazi officer who liked his books and being set over the Freud family affairs, allowed him to escape to Britan. Ironically, Frued ended his life writing his last book on the topic of religion titled, Moses and Monotheism, (1938.)

Freud wasn't a convert to any particular religion, nor was that the purpose of this writing, but the now eighty year old man had obviously had given great thought to the Bible and the biblical record...his own family's heritage... and had something to say about it all. He obviously had to come to some sort of terms with the impact of religion, and his heritage as a human being. It seems one can simply not ignore the effect of religion and morality both in the human psyche and in the role it has in the history of the world.

Carl Jung

2010-01-04T10:20:00.000-08:00

Carl Jung, born in 1875, was a psychotherapist; that is, he was a person in the study of the mind and in treating behavioral or emotional disorders. He believed that people's mental problems could be solved by interaction with someone who was trained in how the mind and psyche worked. He believed in using non-physical methods, rather than medications or things that have a more physical effect. As a "scientist int his field of study, Jung wrote many books about his studies of the human mind and how it works; it's behavioral patterns as well as his ideas of patient doctor methods of dealing with mind disorders. His book titles include, Symbols of Transformation, (1912) and Modern Man in Search of a Soul. (1955)

Jung, was the contemporary of another famous psychologist, Sigmund Freud; and though they were both in the same field of study at the same time in history, both interested in human behaviors, Jung had more of a spiritual take on psychology than Freud. Freud, a Jewish man, claimed to be an atheist and he despised religion. Freud and Jung, though they both studied the mind and human behavior, even met one another and discussed their beliefs and discoveries, had their strong differences of opinion.

Freud, until the time of his death, believed that religion was "an escape" from reality, he even called it, a "collective Neurosis," and believed religion should not be propagated. Jung on the other hand, was intrigued by the notion of religion's role in societies as well as in the life of the individual. On a personal level, he took interest in the occult.

Jung was interested specifically in channeling, and even consulted regularly with a spirit guide who he said was named Philemon. Jung also believed in the power of dreams and dreaming and interested in deciphering their hidden meanings. He was a pioneer, they say, in "dream analysis." He believed that "modern man" relied too much on science and logic and that he would benefit from understanding his unconscious realms of being, a place he tried to explore within himself and others. He thought religions of all kinds had commonalities and saw spirituality and religion as a way for people to connect with people and make discoveries of who they are as individuals... discovering both "self and "the divine" or "God."

It is no surprise that Jung had good thoughts about religious ideas, even though he rejects the central issues of God and Jesus Christ being the only way "to the Father"for he was the son of a Christian pastor, grew up in a Christian home, they were familiar ideals. He never adopted his father's "faith" in Christ, but even so, in his psychological theory, he inevitably made reference to Jesus, but this without regard for Him as God. Taking it all a step further, Jung also believed that men and women were not "whole" until they had some kind of spiritual experience, but in his mind this experience did not have to be Christian... it could be any religion and any kind of spirit.. He believed this quest of finding and discovering what he called "self" was the true connecting point between all religions and subsequently all peoples..

It's notable that one mainstream organization still in existence in our day and age, was influenced by the work of Carl Jung. This group is known as Alcoholics Anonymous. In fact, Carl Jung and Bill W., one of the founders of AA were correspondents.

(See the above links as well as the excerpts of these letters, published in AA’s Pass It On: The Story of Bill Wilson and How the AA Message Reached the World. 1984, pp. 381-386)

Dewey Know?

2010-01-04T00:22:00.000-08:00

Do we really know John Dewey? If someone asked you, "Who was John Dewey," what would you say?

He is not the man who invented the familiar “Dewey Decimal System” used in libraries to categorize books that we call it the "Dewey Decimal System." That was Melvil, Melvil Dewey...the librarian. John Dewey, (1859-1952) you might know or remember, was an educator, psychologist, and philosopher. You might know him as the Father of Modern Education People sometimes get him mixed up with Melvil, but this should set the record straight a little.

John Dewey was a humanist and one who believed in reforming the American system of Education. As a humanist, he was historically very much a part of creating the document called the Humanist Manifesto, an American version of the Communist one. As an humanist, Dewey professed atheism. He didn’t believe in God, but you might say that he was quite religious in how he viewed both his atheism and public education.

Though Dewey was an atheist, he did believe religion was important part of human life. In his book titled, A Common Faith, he even advocated a militant “faith,” but he meant a militant faith in Humanism, (which he believed to have “always been the common faith of mankind.”) Dewey said humanism was "a religious faith that shall not be confined to sect, class, or race."

Indeed humanism is a "faith," it is something you believe in but it was antiChristianity and anti-family. It was the kind of faith that required children to be liberated from the prejudices and values of their parents. Like religious communities of faith, being a humanist required learning about that faith, and the place where this faith would be taught would not be churches and synogogues, but public schools.

Dewey's vision for life in 1930 America, included children being educated using a radically secular vision of life that did not include God. It was based upon the premise that humanity, (recently enlightened by the wisdom of Charles Darwin,)was to progress or rather, "evolve" higher and tthat this could only be done through change. Furthermore, he believed that the American schools of his day violated the child's nature and hindered the best "ethical results," this by, “by introducing the child too abruptly" to reading, writing, geography, etc., and this "out of relation to this social life.” He did not believe the true center of school to be "science, nor literature, nor history, nor geography, but the child's own social activities.” (My Pedagogic Creed by John Dewey, 1897)

For the young child in a typical home, their social activities would be oriented around family, siblings, brothers sisters mother father... dog.... but Dewey wanted to remove children from this environment and create a new one. It was not necessarily a placd where they would actually learn subjects, (like science and history,) but more importantly to be “socialized” and directed in what their thoughts and beliefs ought to be. Dewey believed that children needed to learn how to be a part of a group, but that " group" would not apply to family, or to neighbors or neighborhoods, nor recreational hobbies like sports, and certainly not the church community. It applied to the classroom experience, one that would be taught by a trained professional who had adopted his way of thinking, socialism.

Can you imagine education without facts and truths? Dewey did. He said they make one selfish.

“The mere absorption of facts and truths is so exclusively an individual affair that it tends very naturally to pass into selfishness. There is no obvious social motive for the acquirement of mere learning, there is no clear social gain in success thereat.”
(John Dewey, The School and Society, 1899)

Do we know John Dewey? Yes, we do! He's the Father of Modern Education!

This Could Be Your Hour of Power

2010-01-03T23:22:00.000-08:00

The Hour of Power is a weekly religious television broadcast that featured the preaching of a man named Robert Schuller whose weekly messages were given from a place in Garden Grove, California he calls the Crystal Cathedral. Schuller, is likely one of the best known television evangelists in America. He is famouse for his teachings on “self-esteem” and “positive thinking,” and he uses these philosophies in his preaching.

Dr. Schuller has written at least 35 books over the years, including titles like: Success is Never Ending, Failure is Never Final, (1990) Self Esteem: The New Reformation, (1982) If It’s Going to Be, It’s Up to Me , (1998) Move Ahead With Possibility Thinking (1986) and many more. He is also the founder of the Institute for Successful Church Leadership which he says is established (since 1970) in order to build "successful church leaders." He stopped holding the conferences in 2005, (this, after doing them for 35 years,) saying that now he was going to prepare for something new.

But "doing new things" is nothing new for Schueller. He has over the years taken a lot of disapproval from many fellow Christians who emphatically believe that Schuller, instead of preaching Christianity, preaches something new; New Age Theology.

As evidence of Schuller's "New Age Christianity", they cite his statements in books and magazine articles. They cite, for example, his lack of talk about sin. Schuller said in Time magazine, March 1985; “I don't think anything has been done in the name of Christ and under the banner of Christianity that has proven more destructive to human personality and, hence, counterproductive to the evangelism enterprise than the often crude, uncouth, and unchristian strategy of attempting to make people aware of their lost and sinful condition.” They say he endorses eastern religious practices, like Transcendental Meditation. In his book, Peace of Mind Through Possibility Thinking, pg 131 and 132, Schuller tells his readers, “The most effective mantras employ the "M" sound... Transcendental Meditation or TM... is not a religion nor is it necessarily anti-Christian.” And, while there may be some naysayers, many people give testimony to the help they receive from his preaching. The congregation at Christial Cathedral, estimated at about 10,000 is still growing and his books are selling, so obviously, there are a lot of people who approve of Schuller's message.

January 24th, 2007, Schuller announced a new idea for conferences for Church Leaders to attend, this time on satellite and with a new name. He called it the Faith Forward Forum (FFF) and told the pastors and leaders who would come to the conference that he was about to do something new. He said, “You will not be inspired to preach sermons. We’ve done that for over 30 years. No, this is a Faith where you will be inspired to think, think, yes, THINK! – theologically, like you never have before!”

Schuller also warned interested parties saying, “But do not come unless you are prepared to hear ideas that you have never heard or read anywhere before.” One can only wonder if that would include the Bible.

Anonymously Speaking

2010-01-03T00:20:00.000-08:00

Anonymous means “not named or identified.” and being anonymous is a way to do something you want to do without disclosing who you are. It's secretive; illusive, and it means that no one will be able to identify who you are, When anonymity is used, the name of someone is deliberately withheld so as NOT to identify who or what is the person, motive or force behind a deed, action or even a gift,. The true identity of the anonymous person can remain shrouded in secrecy, revealed only, if revealed at all, to those closest to the anonymous one, to those who will keep the identity secret and unnamed.

This anonymity is commonly done in regards to giving gifts, authoring written material, even things as benign as signing customer comment forms. Often, the point of being anonymous is to effect something with a good and positive action, such as in the giving of a gift, (so the recipient of such a gift does not feel indebted to the gift giver.) In such cases, it is seen often as an at of humility, so as not to draw any attention or glory to the gift giver, but remaining anonymous is not always used for good and humble reasons. Anonymity, used for good or bad, shrouds the anonymous in the dark recesses of secrecy.

One group that likes to remain anonymous is the well-known Alcoholics Anonymous, an alcoholism rehabilitation program, also known as "AA." In this group the individuals looking for help in overcoming their addiction to alcohol feel more able to talk about their problems if they feel like they do not have to disclose everything about who they are. Members step into this group on an anonymous or first name basis so that they do not have to their name or reputation publicly tainted by other peoples knowledge of their personal alcohol addictions. Things mentioned in the A.A. group will be kept confidential between the members of A.A.

Remaining anonymous, not having to disclose who you are publicly, is a large part of how the A.A. organization thrives and gets new members.   Members are actually those who have gone through the twelve step program they offer and then help others do the same. When the program is complete, the member will go public, stating that hard truth that they are and always will be an "alcoholic," and as such they are dependent and always will be dependent on the group to help them deal with their alcoholism.. in fact they believe their life depends upon it.

AA places great emphasis on the idea that alcoholism is a disease and that people who suffer from alcoholism can only recover by practicing complete abstinence from the consumption of alcohol. Instead of conquering the problem, AA members who successfully quit drinking will always be a member of this group, and they will always be a “recovering alcoholic.”   Never cured of "the disease," always anonymous, they have to rely on the group for strength as they come to believe that AA will always be there for them in their time of need.

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) was started by two guys in the 1930's.   Their names were "Bill" and "Bob," and AAers, even up to this day, refer to them this way. Their (un-anonymous) names were William Griffith Wilson and Robert Holbrook Smith. The two of them got together in 1935, to help each other quit their own self-destructive drinking habit. In 1939, when they believed they found success, they published the book, Alcoholics Anonymous, a book still used by AA members today.

Originally it was believed that AA was a Christian organization, but dispite the religious overtones and despite the forward in the Big Book, 2nd edition, (What is often perceived to be the "AA Bible") the A.A> groups often state that A.A. is not a religious organization. However, to many people, and for many years, it certainly looked like one. Bill W and Bob S. knew Bible teachings and they even took much of the teachings they implemented in their program from a Christian organization of the time called the Oxford Group. But what is the Oxford Group?

Oxford Group, founded by man named Buchanan, was a group that upheld Christian morals and values. The group had a definitive fourpoint doctrine of absolute honesty, absolute purity, absolute unselfishness and absolute love, all attributes of the Christian God.. In fact, the Oxford Group later became known as the "Moral ReArmament" religious movement, a group dedicated to "arming" people, as it were, with morality to combat the ills of humanity at large. The group remained named the Oxford Group until 2001 when the name was changed to "Initiatives of Change." But again, A.A. does not hold to Christian doctrine, nor do they consider themselves a religious organization, despite the connections.

While Christian doctrine is a non issue for AA members, they do believe that people can have a higher power of a religious sort. There is no reference to any particular god by name but they do encourage people involved with the group to call on their "higher power" (meaning any God or power they would like to,) if they feel they need the help of more than simply the other members of the group to help them remain sober.

AA also does not use or reference the bible. Instead, in a mimicking fashion, they use something called the Big Book, a sort of instruction manual for those interested in learning, applying, and practicing Bill and Bob's principles of AA’s 12-Step Program of recovery from consumption issues. It is this book that gives the recovering alcoholic insight, strength and guidance regarding the condition of their being and the answers to overcoming their addiction. And while they make the claim openly that they are not a Christian group and do not name any particular god, the do mention God.... whith a capital "G." The Big Book (3rd edition) quotes the words of Bill Wilson, saying, "At the moment we are trying to put our lives in order. But this is not an end in itself. Our real purpose is to fit ourselves to be of maximum service to God..."(pg. 77.) Leaving a person to really wonder what AA really is and isn't.

So we who are ou the outside find it interesting that AA asserts it is not religious, but at the same time, and in a contradictory fashion, it talks about religious things like God and "spiritual growth" and even calls itself a “spiritual fellowship”Is it or not, and who is behind all the anonynimity? It is interesting to consider, and it is the very thing that got atheist, Robert Warner's attention when in 1994 he was caught driving drunk and “forced” to attend AA meetings by the judge who presided his case.

Warner went to AA, he checked it out, but then he subsequently sued the state for forcing him to attend these religious classes, saying that a government office in America could not impose religion upon him, (pointing out the separation of Church and state as reasoning for the lawsuit.) Warner’s claim after his experience in the group, was that the AA organization was definitely religious, and this dispite it’s declaration in the forward of the Big Book saying “Alcoholics Anonymous is not a religious organization.” He wanted nothing to do with religion. Warner won the case in court, but was awarded only $1.00 in the suit.

Still peeved about it all, in 2001 Warner wrote a paper titled, How AA Steals Your Soul. In it he said, “It is still being claimed by AA and my government that AA is not religious” and he contends that they in fact really are. HE attempted in this paper to point out that the group was filled with talk about “spiritual awakening,” “spiritual experiences,” “God,” having a “higher power” and “prayer," He writes about how AA even calls itself a “spiritual fellowship.” He believed the group's "non religious" claim was totally dishonest, and deceptive, and he was still mad he was forced by the dictate of the judge, to go.

Don't be too hard on the atheistic Mr. Warner, $1.00 is less than he paid for parking that day in court. Besides he is not alone in seeing an aspect of "deceptive" religion in AA. Take note too that this "religious" issue is not the only problem people have had with the program. Many people find the teachings and actions of AA disturbing.

Citing AA writings that read, “It's Alcoholics Anonymous -- or else!” (The AA Big Book, 3rd Edition, pg. 378) and “Unless each AA member follows to the best of his ability our suggested Twelve Steps to recovery, he almost certainly signs his own death warrant.” (Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, William G. Wilson, pg. 174,) many people see that the group practices mind-controlling, cult-like, scare tactics to keep people from leaving. Who would leave, believing that to leave "is like signing your own death warrant?"

Recognizing one's need for the group is important in AA. "It's AA or booze," they say. Some people are deeply concerned that their friends and loved ones in AA cannot function normally without the group. Many feel alienated from these friends as well as they read how the Big Book tells readers how it is... how it has to be... if you are ever going defeat this problem in your life, to become a ecovering Alcoholic. It says, "I decided I must place this program above everything else, even my family, because if I did not maintain my sobriety I would lose my family anyway." (The Big Book, 3rd Edition, pg. 293,) and “Since I gave my will over to A.A., whatever A.A. has wanted of me I've tried to do to the best of my ability.” (The Big Book, 3rd Edition, pg. 340.)

Who is behind AA is anybody's guess, after all, they're anonymous!

So apparently, those Big book readers are supposed to learn this stuff and then do it. And not ony that... consider this: A person never graduates from the AA program, and is never “cured” of the disease.

AA teaches, “We are not cured of alcoholism. What we have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition. Every day is a day when we must carry the vision of God's will into all of our daily activities.” (The Big Book, 3rd & 4th Editions, pg. 85,) and “A.A. is not a plan for recovery that can be finished and done with. It is a way of life, and the challenge contained in its principles is great enough to keep any human being striving for as long as he lives. We do not, cannot, out-grow this plan.” (A.A. Big Book, 3rd Edition, pg. 311.)

And as for anonyminty....

AA members are told that sometimes, for various reasons someone may "break anonymity," and they are told that doing so is a matter of individual choice and conscience; however, as the AA document titled,”The Importance of Anonymity" states, “It is clear, that such individuals do not have the approval of the overwhelming majority of members.”

(This is no doubt "peer pressure" to conform to the secrecy aspect of AA.)

And note: In AA "keeping anonymity" means that only AA members have a right to know that what takes place at meetings... and a whole lot of people in your group would disapprove of you talking about your experiences at AA meeting with outsiders, (people like even your immediate family who are not in your group.) People in AA do not talk with others about what happens in their meeting. Meeting are for members only.

Besides the devaluing of outsiders, besides the peer pressure to conform to secrecy and besides never being fully cured, and always having to be apart of the group in order to survive, there is something else people note about the effects of AA on a person. It is what AA calls “Wisdom in Shorthand.”

Wisdom in shorthand is the little quips and slogans used in the AA "training" process, like: "Are you in AA or around AA?” ‘AA is not something you join, it’s a way of life.” “Don't drink, don't think and go to meetings." “You have a thinking problem, not a drinking problem.” “Work the steps or die!" Or even, “Take the cotton out of your ears and stick it in your mouth,” meaning stop talking and not listening to what you are being told.

But who is telling you these things? Why?

We are dealing with a serious problem here... alcoholism. For many it may be a life or death situation too, therefore it would almost be easy to argue that this is exactly the kind of boot-camp-like regimented treatment an addict needs so that they come to grips with the importance of coming clean, overcoming the problem, yet it does not and must not go unnoticed that the language is coercive and controlling. A person may get sober for fear of death but when they no longer depend upon their addiction it's likely that they will be fully convinced in their mind that they could never survive without the AA program, their AA sponsor or the AA meetings with the group.   As such the "shorthand" is really nothing more than mind control.

This mind control factor of AA makes it very difficult to talk to an AA member about the problems with the Big Book or to tell them that the group they are so attached to is misleading them. Furthermore, all the interaction that takes place within the group is designed to prevent or squelch any and all skepticism or self-reliance. As you may now begin to see, even thinking for one's self is not a good idea in AA... it's group think and help is not wanted if it comes from outsiders, because according to the work and words of Bill and Bob, outsiders just do not understand.
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While AA appears as a group of people who have overcome a problem, it really is much more involved than that. Its members are dubbed addiction experts, offering their (not religious, not Christian) "spiritual" help.. These people also are those involved in law-making and implementing social programs at the state and federal level, they also influence other vulnerable people to participate in the group, as we saw with Mr. Warner.

Shrouded in secrecy, saying contradictory things, and using questionable tactics the organization has infiltrated every aspect of human society around the world. They might be "spiritual," as they claim, but as such, one can only wonder what spirit it is of.

One thing for certain, if it is spiritual it is not the spirit of Jesus.

Jesus is not anonymous. He has a name tha is to be named, and he does not keep people in bondage like this AA spirit does... he sets them Free! JEsus makes himself known, He reveals who he is and who we are. Jesus also does not just keep people who are alcoholics in recovery... Jesus heals and restores...he puts them back on their own two feet AND he sheds light into the darkness, makes them new creations to walk not in the darkness, but in the light. JEsus is the light... he shines light, healing light on the matter of sin in our lives, no matter how great that sin is and he gives us hope as he heals us and enables us to walk again.

Jesus saves.

The apostles who healed people and taught them about Jesus preached in the Name of Jesus. They were not anonymous. HE did npt remain un-named. the apostles openly confessed his name before men, and he will in turn confess theirs before the father in heaven. He will do that for those who confesss with our mouth and believe in our hearts, that God raised him from the dead. Names areimportant, and there is only one name given among men by which they might be saved; and it is the name that is above every name, the name that is to be named... and that name is Jesus.

Unleash WHAT Power?

2009-12-31T23:15:00.000-08:00

Anthony (aka "Tony") Robbins is a motivational success expert, author and infomercial star with many noted accomplishments. He is, (according to his own website,) a “peace negotiator, humanitarian, philanthropist, strategic adviser to world leaders, successful entrepreneur and honored business strategist, award winning speaker, internationally known and best selling author, authority on Peak Performance, mass media veteran, world authority on the psychology of leadership, innovator on psychology and intervention, and dedicated family man.” There is apparently little that he does not do and do well. He says when world leader have a problem, they come to him. He even claims in his biography that the International Chamber of Commerce has named him one of the top ten Outstanding People of the World."

As to how he does all this, Robbins attributes it all to his "faith," that is, faith in the “science of achievement” and “the art of fulfillment.” Like a philosopher Robbins wants you and I and anyone else to listen to him and learn from him, even adopt his core beliefs. Like a salesman he wants you to buy his beliefs, for his beliefs are his product and Robbins believes he has the ability to motivate anyone to the same level of personal excellence he has achieved; He will even help you “turn dreams into reality,” (a-hem, ) for a fee.

Yes, for a fee. Robbins does not just give free advice, he sells his "expertise," and it is not cheap. His Anthony Robbins Rapid Planning Method , (RPM) "a revolutionary breakthrough in time and life management that will show you how to manage your life instead of your time," is a calendar product that you can purchase from him for a mere $199.00. A 12 hour seminar will cost you about $180.00; or if you prefer. the 9-Day Mastery Program, it runs for about $5,000.00. Yes, for a fee, Robbins will help anyone "Unleash the Power Within."

And what do you get for your money? He advertises his Anthony Robbins' Business Mastery program, that with his program, "The world is yours."

Over the years, Robbin's has taught that Unleashing the Power within is a "powerful metaphor" for what will happen when you learn his secrets to success. While he quotes the Father of Evolutionary theory, Charles Darwin, strangely, Robbins also talks about God, and forgiveness but the most incredible thing Robbins can teach a person is how to become rich, or maybe just richer. Not only that, Robbins even teaches his students to do incredible physical feats that they never thought possible, like breaking boards with their "bare hands.”

But breaking boards is somewhat passe' these days. Robbins has a new gimmick. Now, "the ultimate physical metaphor for your newly emerging mastery," is storming "barefoot across a bed of glowing coals--and that is only day one!” Robbins is now into Firewalking.

Robbins, who himself has been firewalking since 1983, says, believes and teaches others to do it. It's the highlight of his seminars all over the world, places like Rome, Singapore...and Atlanta Georgia. Robbins teaches that things like breaking boards with your bare hands, walking on beds of hot coals without being burned by them, is only the beginning. He advertises that after attending his seminar, one will return home....with "a fire in your soul", (one that "can never be extinguished.") This is because of the ultimate metaphor... firewalking.

Fire-walking takes courage for most people to do. It is after all, something far-removed from what people normally do with their time and energy. It's not really "normal" to simply walk upon hot coals. It's not "normal" to do such a thing without being burned. Yet those who have been under Tony's influence do it and live to talk about it. They love to talk about it. It's all over You Tube.

This video examining firewalking, was quite interesting.It tells about how traditionally fiji firewalkers believe walking through the fires will purge them of their sin, and as such ...firewalking, when it is successful, proves the favor of the gods... Other people think there is some scientific reason it can be done. But people all over the world and on fiji, ( thanks to the famous Anthony Robbins and his fire-walking friends,) are firewalking and they do not even need to be superstitious about fire goddesses and gods All that they have to do is attend a corporate management motivational seminar with Tony and learn that they have the power to do anything they simply put their mind to, even the seemingly impossible.

Firewalking done in the corporate world has many effects. It tends to boosts company morale as co-workers see what each other is made of. It it has the effect of building confidence in individuals who can then work as teams knowing they can all do something a bit outside of the proverbial "box." Not only that, people get excited about their own success as they do something they thought was physically impossible, if not downright dangerous. The promise to businessmen is that after a seminar with Tony, after employee have had the experience of walking on fire, they will be rejuvenated and subsequently be able to produce results far beyond anything ever experienced before.

Firewalking does look dangerous, but proponents say it is a "relatively safe" experience. You can see the excitement in the You Tube videos; a lot of people have successfully done it. If someone fails, it can only be because they did not have enough faith or will power to make it happen. At that point, it becomes their own fault, not the instructors. The greatest danger in learning to firewalk appears to be a person's ego, or maybe their wallet, as some instructors charge as much as $500.00 per event. But if you look a little deeper, you may see that it is not really just the wallet or the ego that is as risk, it is.. and Robbins will even tell you this, you wil need to change your belief system.

Advertisers and motivational speakers like Anthony Robbins who promote firewalking like to say that firewalking is a way of “challenging the traditional,” and “going beyond the boundaries.” They say it's about "change," and changing those "limiting belief systems." One might wonder, "Which ones?"

When it comes to firewalking, could this be refering to your parents who warned you as a child, not to play with fire, who told you that if you played with fire, you might get burned? Could it be your religious upbringing, maybe it refers toChristians (and Christianity,) you know, Christians are always warning others to repent of sin or they will face the terrible fire of hell and they put faith in the Bible, and those "thou shall nots" in that Old Testament too.

But then, maybe such firewalking is completely compatable with biblical teaching. After all, some firewalkers, quoting verses like Isiah 43:2 and Proverbs 6:28, say that such practices are not forbidden at all by God. Besides, there are many prominent Christian people that endorse Robbins, ;like Christian businessman and leadership expert, Kenneth Blanchard. Blanchard even “co-authored" Robbin’s book, Unlimited Power in 1997.

Blanchard, who authored his own book titled, the One-Minute Manager, professes publicly to be a born-again, bible believing Christian. Besides partnering with Anthony Robbins, he “partners” with other well-known Christian "celebrities" like Zig Ziglar, Henry Blackaby, Lori Beth Jones, Phil Hodges, Norman Vincent Peale, John Maxwell, Bill Hybels, and even "America's Pastor" Rick Warren who did President Obama's Inaugural address. Blanchard heartily endorses Robbins. , and has been quoted many times saying, "You can't afford not to know what Anthony Robbins in teaching." In the forward to the co-authored book, Unlimited Power, Blanchard encourages readers saying, "use Tony's thinking to unleash the "magic" within you.”

"Magic"? Hmmm...What is this "magic"? Is it something supernatural?

Some people say firewalking is supernatural, spiritual... a way to connect to God.

Tolly Burkan is one of those people.

Anthony Robbins originally "learned" to Firewalk from Tolly Burkan, the man who claims to have “created the firewalking movement” in America. Burkan himself has authored his own book titled, "Extreme Spirituality" in which he teaches people how to do things like walk on broken glass or fire, in order to "make a personal connection to God."

Burkan does not teach traditional Christian beliefs, such as how Jesus is the only mediator between man and God, but he does talk about Jesus. He says, "Two thousand years ago, a revered teacher (Jesus) said all people possess the ability to do the same miracles he himself did… and more.” He also says that by doing these "extreme" spiritual acts, (the ones he teaches in his book,) “You will discover that your spirit is not of human origin, that some part of you is eternal, and as you explore more deeply, you'll be developing an intimate relationship with God… and to be able to access this spiritual power 24/7 so you can use it as a resource. Instead of dogma or teachings, Extreme Spirituality gives you a direct experience!”

It's a new gospel, a new spiritual paradigm....

Burkan insists it's mind and spirit that takes a person over such extremes unscathed. He says, “When people burn, it may indicate that their states of mind have made them more “dense.” A “fluid” mind-state translates into fluidity of the body itself…. After people tell themselves "I can do this and not get burned," and they feel "comfortable" with that certainty, they proceed to walk with "confidence." (Quote from: firewalking.com) The end result of doing a firewalk, (whatever the reason for success, beit the temperature of the burned materials, the amount of time the feet are in contact with the coals, or simply the will to make it happen,) the end result is confidence, self-confidence. Self confidence is the spirit released from within. Anthony Robbins, calls if self-mastery.

It is not the kind of spirit that comes from repenting of sin and believing in the supernatural power of God, but the power that comes from grasping the position of God in your own life, driving your own life, creating your own destiny, finding and fulfilling your purpose as you love those who either help you become wealthy or make you feel good about yourself. It is about creating for yourself, (as Joel Olsteen would say,) "your best life now."

Yes, no doubt there is a power being released, (or rather, unleashed, unrestrained,) but truth is, some people simply do not stop to test the spirits and see what "spirit" they are of. They will learn from men and leave their old limiting belief systems behind to embrace the new spiritual paradigm being offered, a gospel that teaches everyman is God (as if equality with God is something to be grasped.)

Man, created by God and given freewill, may have truly have within himself the power in him to do whatever he wills, even firewalking, but with man, somethings really are impossible. But as Jesus Christ revealed, with God, all things are possible. (Matthew 19:26)

Man, is mortal and as such he will one day come face to face with something he cannot overcome in his own strength. He will one day run out of his inner power, (or money,) and face the ultimate enemy, death. Without repentance, without rebirth into the Holy Spirit of God, man will surely die in his sin and he will be ft eternally walking in the unquenchable fire of eternal separation from God.

We can live our lives on earth believing the words of men who do not believe the words of Jesus, who tell people they can attain their best life now if only they believe in themselves, or we can believe in Jesus Christ and in the almighty power and sovereignty of a God who loves us and cares for us, and seek to serve Him and others instead of ourselves. Truth is, we cannot serve two masters (Matthew 6:34) and it's important to wonder, what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? (Matthew 16:26)

Mark Satin

2009-12-28T16:56:00.000-08:00

Mark Satin is known as a lawyer, political activist and writer and he enjoys his reputation as a US draft dodger. He is also a New Ager, and has authored the books, New Age Politics: Healing Self and Society (1979) and Radical Middle, the Politics We Need Now, (2004.)

Satin is notable because he is tends to be neither left nor right. In fact, he believes that he takes the “concerns of the left and right – and builds on them toward something new.” He is neither thesis nor antitheseis, but rather, a man of synthesis, and he calls his form of politics “the emerging new politics.”

Satin claims to be the founder of an organization he calls the New World Alliance. which makes the claim that they are, “An Alliance of individuals to encourage ALL of us to look deeply and questioningly at our attitudes and values, our institutions, and the way we live . . . and, together, to create a New -- and better -- World.” At his webpage he states that the members of this organization "are not a political party, nor another special interest lobby, but rather something far more fundamental.”

But what exactly could be "more fundamental than politics? If it is not political, what is it? Religion? If religion, which one?

Does it even matter, and would any in particular be excluded from the mix?

One thing is certain, that is, the concept behind such thinking in one that believes in man's goodwill toward man, something "obviously" evident as we look back at human history... NOT. It's also a belief than man, no matter his belief in God has the superior intellect to justly manage all the affairs of the world, including food production and equitable dispersion of goods and services for all. Thes are lovely aspirations, but where is god in it all. Where is the Bible?

Without God, these ideas are what some people would call that call that socialism, others, who deliberately forget, or do not want to believe that "in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth," simply call it "change" and they try to be pluralistic in a world of opposites. It's a lovely dream until one awakens to the reality that mankind is not as benevolent a creature as he would like to think he is and totallu lost without God. For some, it never dawns upon then that they are double minded in their thinking as they strive onward to what they call sustainability or perhaps a more "Natural Genesis."

Satin is not an atheist, and he is definately looking for answers as he tries to solve the problems of the world. He says he recently discovered the Bible and now believes the Bible, even believes it to be "the very best tool we have for accessing the complexity, the many-sidedness, and the terrible bitter truths of our world ." He endorses it saying "that the Bible is the one essential social change manual for grown-ups, be they 18 or 81 years of age." He concluded that it is the Master Book for Our Time.

Indeed it is...and it does not come back void. Certainly it has a perspective to lend to our minds about a lot of things... particularly the person of Jesus and those who believe the things he said and did. Sometimes that just takes a while, and time is on God's side.

In 2008 Satin said, (at his radical middle website,) "I read the Bible for the first time at the end of last year, and I’ve been reading Bible commentaries and better translations ever since. On another level, though, I’ve always been searching for a book like the Bible. For my entire adult life, I’ve been searching for a book – a One Book, a Master Text -- that could show us how to change the world for the better."

He might be on to something with that thought.... the answer of course is Jesus.