For to Live is Christ...

The Way the World Turns....

2011-11-01T15:41:00.004-04:00

One of my dear friends, Breanna, just started a blog and she inspired me to start posting favorite songs again! I used to do it all the time but little to no response, so stopped. But just because I'm not getting any comments is no reason to stop doing something good! :) So here goes...

Life has not been easy lately. I mean, it's not usually easy, but it's been ESPECIALLY hard the past couple of months. But you know? Christ never promises that this life will be easy. And it's songs like these that help me see the bigger picture... Sanctus Real is an amazing band.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85PxGLqIxoA

♫Empty moments when I feel hopeless
Have left me restless inside
Doubt and sadness have kept me in fragments
Longing for a better life
Oh, it's the way the world turns
The way, the way

And I feel the current pulling me down
Can't keep the world from turning around
So I keep turning to You
I keep turning
'Cause You're the hope of a new sunrise
Breaking over a desperate life
And I keep turning to You
I keep turning to You

I'm so distracted by senseless passions
Tempting my wandering eyes
But ever pursuit brings me closer to the truth
That only You can satisfy

When I feel the current pulling me down
Can't keep the world from turning around
So I keep turning to You
I keep turning
'Cause You're the hope of a new sunrise
Breaking over a desperate life
And I keep on turning to You
I keep turning

The way we're hurting keeps us turning to You
To You♫

We Can Cry with Hope....

2011-10-17T11:57:00.001-04:00

Steven Curtis Chapman's song on his Speechless CD keeps running through my mind--particularly the chorus:

♫We can cry with hope
we can say goodbye with hope
'cause we know our goodbye is not the end
And we can breathe with hope
'cause we believe with hope
there's a place where we'll see your face again...♫

My grandmother, Dorothy Christine Robertson Cochran, passed away last Thursday, October 13th. She was a bright, energetic, spunky, fun, individual who could never be beat and never stayed sad. She had a difficult life, yet didn't allow that to quench her spirit and make her hard, bitter, and joyless. She chose instead to make nearly everything into a joke of some kind, love comedy, and make others laugh as much as she could.

During the last ten years we have lived far from her residence in FL--first in GA and now in CO. But the distance never lessened our love for her, or her love for us. I am so grateful that God lengthened her life to 81 years so we could know and love her longer.

The most difficult thing about her passing is that none of us are 100% certain she was a Christian. I don't say this out of arrogance but out of a painful desire to be truthful to myself. But like the song says, we can cry with HOPE. We can HOPE that she is in heaven right now, waiting for us to get there. Knowing a peaceful and pain-free existence she really never had here on earth.

I honor, love, respect, and cherish my grandmother's memory, and I always will. I miss her so much and still can't believe she's gone at times, but it's just another reminder that this earth is not our home. She is the first of my close family members to pass away, and I know that if I live my full life expectancy, this is only the beginning of seeing death in those closest to me. I honestly don't know how I will deal with other family members' deaths who are even closer to me than my grandmother was. But I do know that God will never send anything my way that I can't handle with his strength.

I love you, Grandmother.

Is there STILL "no chance in the world" for him?

2011-09-30T08:43:00.000-04:00

Harris Poll: Ron Paul Would Beat Obama 51-49

Congressman tells packed out NYC audience: “America is ripe for a true revolution”

Paul Joseph Watson

Infowars.com

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

http://www.infowars.com/harris-poll-ron-paul-would-beat-obama-51-49/

A new Harris Interactive poll released today reveals that Congressman Ron Paul would defeat Barack Obama 51-49 in a hypothetical run off, one of only two Republican candidates who would stand a good chance of preventing Obama from securing a second term in the White House.

Paul-Obama

Only Ron Paul and Mitt Romney would beat Obama, according to the poll, which found that Obama would defeat every other Republican candidate, including Rick Perry.

The survey is another indication that Paul is quickly moving into second place to become Romney’s main challenger as Rick Perry’s campaign crashes and burns.

The poll was conducted in mid-September and surveyed 2,462 US adults. Its findings reveal that Paul has now overturned Obama’s slim majority in a hypothetical run off between the two and would likely beat him, especially if he was afforded the kind of national platform that the corporate press have been loathe to provide.

As we have previously discussed, despite an admitted establishment media dirty tricks campaign to deliberately ignore Ron Paul’s candidacy, he has emerged as a top tier candidate with a genuine chance of challenging Romney. A Paul victory in the Republican primary would represent a major problem for Obama’s hopes of a return to the Oval Office because it would remove the incentive for many Democrats to back Obama.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

MY COMMENTS: The last sentence in this article is poignant.... The reason Paul receiving the Republican nomination would bereave Obama of many of his supporters is because Paul wants to withdraw our troops from the 150 countries they are in. Not all in a day of course, but gradually taking the number down, rather than gradually increasing it (which is happening now). A sovereign, powerful nation does not mean a busy-body, sprawled out nation. Look at your history--that is how EVERY other nation in the past met its doom--by being too thinly spread.

Legislate YOURSELF

2011-08-24T22:55:00.002-04:00

The case for blackmail and child labor

John Stossel also defends ticket scalping, price gouging, kidney selling

Posted: August 23, 2011

2:04 pm Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=337077

By John Stossel

We grow up learning that some things are just bad: child labor, ticket scalping, price gouging, kidney selling, blackmail, etc. But maybe they're not.

What I love about economics is that it can show that what seems harmful is actually good for society. It illuminates what common sense overlooks.

This was the subject of my Fox Business show last week. It was inspired by the eye-opening book "Defending the Undefendable" by economist Walter Block.

Most people call child labor an unmitigated evil. But my guests, David Boaz of the Cato Institute and Nick Gillespie of Reason.tv, said that's wrong.

"If we say that the United States should abolish child labor in very poor countries," Boaz said, "then what will happen to these children? ... They're not suddenly going to go to the country day school. ... They may be out selling their bodies on the street. That is not an improvement over working in a T-shirt factory."

In fact, studies show that in at least one country where child labor was suddenly banned, prostitution increased. Good economics teaches that as poor countries get richer and freer, capital investment raises the productivity of labor and child labor diminishes. There's no shortcut through government prohibition – unless you like starvation and child prostitution.

What about price-gouging? State laws attempt to prevent people from charging "unconscionable" prices during emergencies.

"If I'm in the neighborhood of Hurricane Katrina," Boaz said, "what I want is water and ice and generators. ... If you are in Kentucky (and) you've got 10 generators in your store, are you getting up at 4 a.m. to drive all day to get to Louisiana to sell these generators if you can only sell them for the same price you can sell them for in Kentucky? No, you're going to go down because ... you can sell them for more."

Also, if prices rise during an emergency, that's a signal for people to buy only what they most need. That leaves more for everyone else. If the price remains low, an incentive to conserve is lost.

Ticket scalpers are seen as sleazy guys who cheat you by marking up the price of tickets. Profits go to middlemen instead of the performers. What good could they possibly do?

"I like to think of ticket scalpers as the guy who stands in line so that I don't have to," Gillespie said.

Time spent in line is part of the ticket cost. Scalpers let you pay entirely in money, rather than partly in valuable time.

Most people say that selling body parts is wrong.

"It also seems wrong to have people dying because they can't get a kidney," Boaz said.

Some 400,000 Americans are on a waiting list now for a new kidney, and they are not allowed to pay for one.

(Column continues below)

"We sell hair. We sell sperm. We sell eggs these days," Boaz added.

Gillespie added, "The best way to grow the supply and allow more people to live is to allow the market to price those organs."

Maybe the most counterintuitive position argued on my show was that blackmail should not be a crime. Blackmail (unlike extortion) is the demand for money in return for withholding information. Robin Hanson, a George Mason University economist, defends blackmail.

"The thing you're threatening when you're threatening blackmail (is) gossip," Hanson said. "If it should be all right to tell people, it should be all right to threaten to tell people."

What we don't like, however, is the blackmailer saying, "Pay me to keep quiet."

"But the effect of that is to make people behave," Hanson said. "If we (allow) blackmail, people behave even more because they are even more afraid of what might happen if they don't."

Maybe Ponzi-schemer Bernie Madoff would have been caught earlier?

"That's right. ... Blackmail is actually a form of private law enforcement."

Also, since gossip is free speech, blackmail is simply selling the service of not engaging in free speech. Why should that be outlawed?

I subtitled my last book, "Everything You Know Is Wrong." I was exaggerating, of course, but many things we're taught are fallacies. That's why I like economics. It explodes fallacies.

How about some REAL change....

2011-08-24T22:50:00.000-04:00

Our Guide to the Best Coverage of Ron Paul and His Record

by Lois Beckett

ProPublica, Aug. 23, 2011, 2:19 p.m.

http://www.propublica.org/article/our-guide-to-the-best-coverage-of-ron-paul-and-his-record

This is the second installment in a series of reading guides on 2012 presidential candidates. Our first one was one Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

Three-time presidential candidate Ron Paul is consistently disregarded by the media, a point made recently by comedian Jon Stewart and confirmed by a Pew Research Center analysis of news coverage.

But the 76-year-old Texas Republican congressman's tiny-government ideals have become increasingly relevant to the national debate. And despite some eye-rolling by television anchors, there's been plenty of substantive coverage of Paul's ideals and track record. Here's our guide to some of the best reading on Ron Paul.

The basics:

The best place to start is a 2001 Texas Monthly profile by Sam Gwynne, who explains why Paul remained such a viable Republican congressional candidate despite his refusal to toe the party line.

Paul, an obstetrician who has delivered an estimated 4,000 babies, is a pro-life Libertarian who believes that much of the federal government is unconstitutional. (His son, Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, is a U.S. senator and Tea Party favorite.)

Ron Paul's 2012 campaign website summarizes his policy views, which include abolishing the Federal Reserve and the IRS, eliminating income and capital-gains taxes and refusing to raise the debt ceiling.

On principle, Paul supports ending federal bans on marijuana, heroin, cocaine and prostitution, although he says he’s never used marijuana himself, and is so conservative in his personal life that he does not travel alone with women. He says on his website that he avoids discussing his Christian faith publicly because he wants “to avoid any appearance of exploiting it for political gain.”

As a doctor, he would not accept Medicaid or Medicare funds, reportedly treating patients for free instead. (He has argued that Medicare and Medicaid are unconstitutional.) He does not believe members of Congress should receive pensions, so he has opted out of receiving his own.

As an Atlantic profile explains, Paul’s views are defined by his affinity to Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises, who opposed central banking and argued that most problems with the economy result from government interference. Paul believes that the United States should return to the gold standard, and describes Aug. 15, 1971, when President Nixon ordered that U.S. dollars no longer be backed by gold, as a watershed moment that inspired him to begin his career in politics.

Overview of his record as a congressman:

The Texas Monthly profile explores the tension between Paul’s principled approach to politics and his ability to get things done in Washington. He earned the nickname “Dr. No” for his tendency to vote against bills with wide Republican or bipartisan support. He voted against the USA Patriot Act and the federal ban on same-sex marriage—and also against congressional gold medals for Ronald Reagan, Rosa Parks and Mother Teresa. (“It’s easier to be generous with other people’s money,” he noted at the time, and suggested that if his fellow legislators wanted to award medals, they should contribute $100 each.)

You can see the highlights of his congressional voting record on his Washington Post profile page, or look through the full list of his votes at GovTrack.us.

Mankind Legally Blind

2011-07-12T15:32:00.000-04:00

"Thus, too, it happens in estimating our spiritual qualities. So long as we do not look beyond the earth, we are quite pleased with our own righteousness, wisdom, and virtue; we address ourselves in the most flattering terms, and seem only less than demigods. But should we once begin to raise our thoughts to God, and reflect what kind of being He is, and how absolute the perfection of that righteousness, and wisdom, and virtue, to which as a standard, we are bound to be conformed, what formerly delighted us by its false show of righteousness, will become polluted with the greatest iniquity; what strangely imposed upon us under the name of wisdom, will disgust by its extreme folly; and what presented the appearance of virtuous energy, will be condemned as the most miserable impotence. So far are those qualities in us, which seems most perfect, from corresponding to the divine purity."
-John Calvin in his book The Institutes of the Christian Religion

How often do we, as Christians, think we have it all figured out? Oh to be sure, we don't come out and SAY this in words, but we live like we do. We don't consult with our Lord on every action we take, every decision we make, every movie we watch, every book we read, every word we say, every thought we think! The mindset is that we have "freedom" in Christ to do whatever we jolly well want, without actually seeking "what would please the Lord." (1 Thess. 4:1) As this quote so brilliantly states, we are HUMAN and our minds are naturally set on the things of this world. It will take work, perseverance, faith, and an ACTIVE seeking of the Lord and his Word to overcome this natural tendency we have as fallen man.

Just some food for thought :) Be encouraged! There is hope because God has seen fit to renew our minds. This means always scrutinizing what we allow into our minds, and what we allow into our hearts....

An Interesting Perspective

2011-05-31T17:17:00.000-04:00

Marital roulette

Exclusive: Vox Day advises men to avoid wedding working women

Posted: May 30, 2011

1:00 am Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=304781

Sunday, May 29, 2011

By Vox Day

There has been an amount of discussion of a marriage strike in recent years as various male and female commentators alike attempt to explain the continuing decline in marriage rates throughout the advanced nations of the West. As more and more men have become aware that women file for most divorces and that family courts are now little more than thieves' dens designed to funnel financial resources from men to women by any means or legal-sounding excuse necessary, they have understandably become considerably more marriage-averse.

In the last 40 years, the percentage of 25-34 American adults who were married has dropped from 80 percent to 45 percent. In 2009, it was reported that at only 52 percent, the percentage of married adults of all ages was the lowest percentage recorded since the U.S. Census Bureau began collecting marital information 100 years ago.

When one considers the widespread availability of wildly entertaining, time-intensive video games as well as high-quality, high-definition pornography produced to suit even the most esoteric sexual tastes, it is not terribly surprising that American men are becoming ever more disinclined to risk pledging their lives and fortunes to the increasingly adipose, decreasingly reliable creature known as the American woman?

Dr. Helen Smith writes: "Nowadays, for many men, the negatives of marriage for men often outweigh the positives. Therefore, they engage in it less often. Not because they are bad, not because they are perpetual adolescents, but because they have weighed the pros and cons of marriage in a rational manner and found the institution to be lacking for them."

The problem is that marriage is more than an institution; it is a structural foundation of society. Moreover, marriage is historically proven to be the best means of producing and raising healthy children, which means that it is integral to the continuation of both American society as well as the human race. Without a strong base of healthy marriages between men and women, no society is likely to survive, let alone prosper.

(Column continues below)

So, what is a young man who wishes to be a happy and productive member of society but does not wish to find himself locked into a life of post-divorce serfdom to an ill-tempered, overweight woman with a legal obligation to children who may not even belong to him? Fortunately, the answer is both clear and easily applied. To increase your chances of marital and familial success in life, it is vital to stay away from what are known as "career" or "working" women.

While this will not eliminate all the risks of what has become known as Marriage 2.0, it will return a man's probability of successful marriage to that of the earlier, more marriage-friendly era. Marriage to a stay-at-home wife rather than one with a full-time job reduces the risk of divorce by nearly one-third. Just the simple act of avoiding romantic involvement with working women is nearly enough on its own to again make marriage a viable option for young men.

Moreover, stay-at-home mothers make for much better mothers as they spend 91 percent more time with their children than working mothers do. The most remarkable observation is that stay-at-home mothers spend 12 more minutes per day on the physical care of their children than working mothers spend with their children in total; the net result of this insufficient attention is that the children of working mothers are 23 percent less likely to pass college entrance exams, 29 percent more likely to be unemployed and are more likely to be overweight by age 11.

Although it may appear to be disturbingly like one, this column is not intended as an indictment of career women or working mothers. The facts are what they are, and my only objective is to point out to men that it is a mistake to conclude the societal changes of the last 40 years have rendered all American women equally unsuited for marriage. No one would dispute that the odds of successfully raising a family with a meth head or crack addict tend to be on the low side, and no one should be upset by the statistically observable fact that men who wish to marry and have children will have a significantly greater probability of success if they choose to marry women who are dedicated to making a career of being a wife and mother.

Humility

2011-05-24T16:38:00.000-04:00

If you have never read CJ Mahaney's book HUMILITY, then it's time to make room on your reading list--like around #1 position. No kidding--this book is short, sweet, sharp, and very much to the point. No really--it IS short (only about 150 pages and very small pages at that), sweet (in the sense that it gives us so many ideas for how to be more sweet *smile*), sharp (meaning intelligent) and to the point--well that's sort of self-explanatory.

Humility. As soon as you think you have it down--you're prideful to even be thinking that. And when you don't have it down, you don't have it down, and are therefore being prideful! It seems this elusive character quality is impossible to achieve.

Guess what?

It IS indeed impossible.

And this is where I realized that humility and the Gospel are so inseparable, that trying to have humility without the Gospel is like trying to swim when there's no water, or trying to breathe when there's no air. It's impossible! Our works of piety on our own accord are completely abhorrent to God because they reek of pride, and our own sinful propensity to think we are just amazing if we do something right.

And so without the Gospel, there is hopelessness for humility. Don't discount the Gospel! It's not just the first building block in your walk as a Christian, it's the entire framework! We never outgrow it as Christians, and we never stop needing it--every second of every day. What struck me most about Mahaney's book was how he never failed to being the saving grace of the Gospel into every point he made on humility.

Basically, we have a need so great that only Christ and his Word can fill it in our soul. But even once He has filled that desire, every day the temptations to do evil will overwhelm our defenses. And here's the greatest mystery of all of this... Our INADEQUACY and INABILITY to be humble on our own leads us to the only way we CAN be humble: in acknowledging that we are not! God loves working like this (check out 1 Corinthians 1).

I could go round and round on this--in circles. But the bottom line is, that if we keep our eyes fixed on Christ and what HE and not WE have accomplished, we will indeed be humble! He promises it.

Be encouraged in that today, and keep your eyes fixed on Jesus Christ. It's that simple.

Determinism or Chaos?

2011-05-09T14:13:00.001-04:00

This morning I was reading through Chalcedon magazine, and came across a fantastic article by RJ Rushdoony. First off, let me state my high admiration and respect for Rushdoony. I wish he were still alive so I could meet him somehow... Ah well, in heaven! :)

Anyway, this article addressed the caving in of churches and Christians to the idea that it took God longer--perhaps as long as billions of years--to create the world. Basically, the surrender of many godly people to the theory of evolution. First of all, I don't presume to judge any of my brothers and sisters in Christ who may believe in theistic evolution, or just plain evolution (I might argue that it's basically the same thing, but that's another blog post). I simply seek the TRUTH and this argument made sense to me...

Just like creationism, evolution relies on DETERMINISM and craves it. Determinism = the fact that there is order in any given circumstance, and that we as human beings discern situations from the perspective of already having a determined way it ought to be. The problem with evolution is that it rejects an idea of a supernatural being, so it cannot find a way to use determinism in its theory. Yet determinism is REQUIRED. The opposite of determinism is CHAOS. Let me quote directly from the article as the wording is perfect...

"Science thus WANTS a universe of law and of causality without God, but it would rather ascribe all the magnificent order of the universe to chaos rather than to God, because the scientists involved are fallen men, in rebellion against God and bent on suppressing their knowledge of Him. Men will either presuppose God, or they will presuppose themselves as the basic reality of being."

So if evolution rejects determinism, and the alternative is chaos, therefore evolution began out of chaos.. WAIT A SECOND. Is this really science? Science is socially thought to be a marketplace of ideas that are rationally and reasonably tested, hypothesis applied, theory applied, and finally fact applied it if holds up under the testing and scrutinizing of scientists. How can the very idea that our entire UNIVERSE sprang from chaos even have a seat--much less a high one!--amongst academic science!

OK so you believe that God DID create the world, he just did it a whole lot slower than six 24 hour days... This would lead us back to the Bible--does the word day mean day or DAY!? The word day in Hebrew literally means 24 hours. This is a whole lot simpler than many have made it....

There is a whole lot more from this article, but I will just encourage you to read this book. Find a review HERE.

We can either give glory to chaos and chance, or to a mighty God who DOES exist and who each one of us will see face to face once we die. I pray for a reformation among Christians and non-Christians alike, and a return to moral creationism as opposed to amoral and chancy evolution.

one of those "times"

2011-04-23T22:20:00.000-04:00

i broke my wrist 5 weeks ago and therefore this post will be short, messy, and sweet. but i just wanted to first say im not dead and i DO plan on blogging here more regularly... i was reading something in politics today that i just sat down to post but suddenly remembered how long it takes me to type (and im so very wordy about politics--politics and theology *smile*). SO i will hold off on that post until i get my cast off in about four weeks.... im sure ull be waiting for it oh so eagerly haha :)

so breaking (or rather, shattering) a bone is no fun, and having surgery in the bargain definitely didnt help matters--but u know, as God fully intended, this trial has definitely brought me closer to my Elder Brother... it was so fitting because God timed my break right around the time (actually nearly right on the day) i started memorizing Romans 5, and the third verse in that incredible chapter goes as follows...

"More than that we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces HOPE, and hope will not put us to shame because God's LOVE has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

needless to say, i feel loved. our GOD, Lord, Saviour, Friend, Healer, Redeemer, and Lover will never leave us nor forsake us. and not only that but he works all things together for our GOOD.

remember that today. live it.

Perspective

2011-03-07T19:48:00.000-05:00

I began memorizing Romans 4 today, and as is my custom, wrote out the entire chapter on separate 3x5 cards. As I was doing so, I found it incredible that Paul talks at length about how Abraham NEVER wavered concerning the promise of God, that he and his offspring would be heirs of the world!

No mention of Hagar, and Abraham's illicit relationship with her at Sarah's bidding. I was struck at God's mercy and the way he blots out our sin, his chosen children's sin, from his gaze and remembers it NO MORE. What an awesome God we serve!

This goes to show that God looks at things so differently than we do--he defies "logic," that is, man's reasoning. History, and all other subjects, must be viewed through HIS lenses. The way God views everything is the ONLY way to view it. And I am so glad he's chosen to view his children as spotless and without blemish.

Be downcast no more, oh my soul, but rejoice and be glad! For our Lord Jesus Christ has looked on us with favor in our distress.

This is what I'm talking about....

2011-02-18T21:45:00.002-05:00

Up From Paulism

By W. James Antle, III on 2.14.11 @ 6:09AM

http://spectator.org/archives/2011/02/14/up-from-paulism

On the same day Ron Paul won the presidential straw poll of the nation's largest gathering of conservative activists, one of the nation's oldest conservative-libertarian activist groups kicked him off their national advisory board. Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) announced it had severed ties with the twelve-term Texas congressman, who had been on the advisory board for over two decades, over what it described as his "delusional and disturbing alliance with the fringe Anti-War movement."

Later, Paul triumphed at the at Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) straw poll for the second year in a row. He beat Mitt Romney, the only other candidate with an experienced campaign organization, 30 percent to 23 percent. Paul left the other possible Republican presidential contenders who are favored by either the mainstream media or the conservative movement -- most of whom got fewer votes than libertarian fellow-traveler and former Paul endorser Gary Johnson -- in the dust.

While some individual participants may have been out of the mainstream, CPAC as a whole was hardly fringe. It attracted over 11,000 people, mostly mainline conservative activists. Romney, Tim Pawlenty, Haley Barbour, Newt Gingrich, Mitch Daniels, and Rick Santorum were among the other possible Republican candidates on hand. This wasn't, as some of the conference's conservative detractors imply, a joint meeting of the Log Cabin Club and the Libertarian National Committee.

Straw polls aren't scientific surveys and thus can't be used to refute Donald Trump's CPAC prediction that Paul has "zero chance" of winning the presidency. But it is a good barometer that at this very early stage the other 2012 aspirants lack either grassroots support or organizational strength -- and in some cases, probably both -- at least in sufficient amounts to overcome Paul's zealous backers.

The straw poll win coupled with the YAF flap shows the dilemma for the movement Paul is trying to lead. On the one hand, it was once unusual to hear Republican leaders not named Ron Paul talking regularly about the Constitution. Now it is commonplace, and not a single Republican contemplating the presidency defends the constitutionality of Obamacare. There is much more mainstream conservative interest in auditing the Federal Reserve, the doctrine of enumerated powers, nullification, and Austrian economics. But deep divisions still remain.

Even at CPAC, there was little obvious comity between Paul's supporters and those who preferred other candidates. About half the crowd booed when the straw poll results were announced. All hell broke loose when Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld appeared with the audience still full of Paulites who had been there to hear the congressman's son Rand, now a freshman Republican senator from Kentucky, speak. They heckled the former vice president and defense secretary. The more traditional Republicans and movement conservatives on hand responded by shouting, "USA, USA!"

One side believed Cheney should present and Rumsfeld should receive an award for defending the Constitution, while the other thought they had a record of undermining it. The Paul supporters at CPAC branded these men "war criminals" while YAF declared that opposing their preferred foreign policy "border[s] on treason." What common ground can there be between these two extremes?

"Paul's supporters have all the lungs and confidence of fourth-century Christians overwhelming the pagans," writes professional Paul-watcher Dave Weigel. But this can sometimes backfire. When they attempted to shout down Orrin Hatch as he explained his support for the bailout, they won him sympathy from the rest of the crowd -- even though most rank-and-file conservatives agree with Paul and disagree with Hatch on the issue.

Yet Rand Paul struck a much different tone. He unapologetically made common cause with the Tea Party: "Is there anybody here from the Tea Party? Are we going to let Washington co-opt the Tea Party? Will you help me fight for and defend the Constitution?"

The younger Paul also invoked Barry Goldwater in reminding the audience that strict constitutionalism was part of the conservative movement's heritage. He cited the following from Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative: "I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is 'needed' before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissible."

Of course, Rand Paul's father also favorably quotes conservative and Republican leaders of days gone by in his speeches, from Robert Taft to Ronald Reagan. But the son made common cause with his GOP contemporaries as well. Just as he has cosponsored legislation with Sens. Mike Lee of Utah, David Vitter of Louisiana, and Jim DeMint of South Carolina, the younger Paul enlisted Oklahoma conservative Tom Coburn in his speech. He even gave a shout out to Maine's moderate Susan Collins. Nancy Pelosi and other leading Democrats were cast as villains.

While Ron Paul challenged the CPAC crowd by saying that he bet half of them wouldn't support cuts in the defense budget, Rand Paul led with entitlement reform, asking to applause, "Is there anybody here who would like to opt out of Social Security?" Then he emphasized the significance of national defense, calling it "the one primary and most important constitutional thing our government does." But he also referred to Pentagon cuts as the "one compromise we will have to make as conservatives."

Rand also put himself convincingly to the right of the Republican leadership. "They're talking about cutting $35 billion," he said. "We spend $35 billion in five days. We add $35 billion to the debt in nine days. It's not enough, and we will not stop the ruin in our country unless we think more boldly." Just as Reagan once called for a platform painted in "bold colors, not pale pastels."

When it comes to the substance of his positions on the Patriot Act, the Iraq war, and foreign aid to Israel, Rand Paul is still his father's son. But just as in his CPAC speech, he is trying to speak in tones less jarring to Republican ears, bringing his father's supporters and more traditional conservatives together.

Sad but Unsurprising...

2011-02-16T20:50:00.000-05:00

Study: Many college students not learning to think critically

Sara Rimer, The Hechinger Report | The Hechinger Report

last updated: January 17, 2011 04:52:23 PM

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/01/18/106949/study-many-college-students-not.html#storylink=omni_popular

Posted on Tue, Jan. 18, 2011

NEW YORK — An unprecedented study that followed several thousand undergraduates through four years of college found that large numbers didn't learn the critical thinking, complex reasoning and written communication skills that are widely assumed to be at the core of a college education.

Many of the students graduated without knowing how to sift fact from opinion, make a clear written argument or objectively review conflicting reports of a situation or event, according to New York University sociologist Richard Arum, lead author of the study. The students, for example, couldn't determine the cause of an increase in neighborhood crime or how best to respond without being swayed by emotional testimony and political spin.

Arum, whose book "Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses" (University of Chicago Press) comes out this month, followed 2,322 traditional-age students from the fall of 2005 to the spring of 2009 and examined testing data and student surveys at a broad range of 24 U.S. colleges and universities, from the highly selective to the less selective.

Forty-five percent of students made no significant improvement in their critical thinking, reasoning or writing skills during the first two years of college, according to the study. After four years, 36 percent showed no significant gains in these so-called "higher order" thinking skills.

Combining the hours spent studying and in class, students devoted less than a fifth of their time each week to academic pursuits. By contrast, students spent 51 percent of their time — or 85 hours a week — socializing or in extracurricular activities.

The study also showed that students who studied alone made more significant gains in learning than those who studied in groups.

"I'm not surprised at the results," said Stephen G. Emerson, the president of Haverford College in Pennsylvania. "Our very best students don't study in groups. They might work in groups in lab projects. But when they study, they study by themselves."

The study marks one of the first times a cohort of undergraduates has been followed over four years to examine whether they're learning specific skills. It provides a portrait of the complex set of factors, from the quality of secondary school preparation to the academic demands on campus, which determine learning. It comes amid President Barack Obama's call for more college graduates by 2020 and is likely to shine a spotlight on the quality of the education they receive.

"These findings are extremely valuable for those of us deeply concerned about the state of undergraduate learning and student intellectual engagement," said Brian D. Casey, the president of DePauw University in Greencastle, Ind. "They will surely shape discussions about curriculum and campus life for years to come."

Some educators note that a weakened economy and a need to work while in school may be partly responsible for the reduced focus on academics, while others caution against using the study to blame students for not applying themselves.

Howard Gardner, a professor at Harvard's Graduate School of Education known for his theory of multiple intelligences, said the study underscores the need for higher education to push students harder.

"No one concerned with education can be pleased with the findings of this study," Gardner said. "I think that higher education in general is not demanding enough of students — academics are simply of less importance than they were a generation ago."

But the solution, in Gardner's view, shouldn't be to introduce high-stakes tests to measure learning in college because, "The cure is likely to be worse than the disease."

Arum concluded that while students at highly selective schools made more gains than those at less selective schools, there are even greater disparities within institutions.

"In all these 24 colleges and universities, you have pockets of kids that are working hard and learning at very high rates," Arum said. "There is this variation across colleges, but even greater variation within colleges in how much kids are applying themselves and learning."

For that reason, Arum added, he hopes his data will encourage colleges and universities to look within for ways to improve teaching and learning.

Arum co-authored the book with Josipa Roksa, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Virginia. The study, conducted with Esther Cho, a researcher with the Social Science Research Council, showed that students learned more when asked to do more.

Students who majored in the traditional liberal arts — including the social sciences, humanities, natural sciences and mathematics — showed significantly greater gains over time than other students in critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing skills.

Students majoring in business, education, social work and communications showed the least gains in learning. However, the authors note that their findings don't preclude the possibility that such students "are developing subject-specific or occupationally relevant skills."

Greater gains in liberal arts subjects are at least partly the result of faculty requiring higher levels of reading and writing, as well as students spending more time studying, the study's authors found. Students who took courses heavy on both reading (more than 40 pages a week) and writing (more than 20 pages in a semester) showed higher rates of learning.

That's welcome news to liberal arts advocates.

"We do teach analytical reading and writing," said Ellen Fitzpatrick, a history professor at the University of New Hampshire.

The study used data from the Collegiate Learning Assessment, a 90-minute essay-type test that attempts to measure what liberal arts colleges teach and that more than 400 colleges and universities have used since 2002. The test is voluntary and includes real world problem-solving tasks, such as determining the cause of an airplane crash, that require reading and analyzing documents from newspaper articles to government reports.

The study's authors also found that large numbers of students didn't enroll in courses requiring substantial work. In a typical semester, a third of students took no courses with more than 40 pages of reading per week. Half didn't take a single course in which they wrote more than 20 pages over the semester.

The findings show that colleges need to be acutely aware of how instruction relates to the learning of critical-thinking and related skills, said Daniel J. Bradley, the president of Indiana State University and one of 71 college presidents who recently signed a pledge to improve student learning.

"We haven't spent enough time making sure we are indeed teaching — and students are learning — these skills," Bradley said.

Hello New Year...

2011-02-05T00:19:00.000-05:00

I was just getting on my friend for not blogging the entire month of January, and OH MY WORD my blog doesn't have a January post either!!! *gasp* Well, since it's too late to remedy that, I figure I'd best blog before February is too far gone...

Frankly I am surprised at myself for even thinking of blogging--especially around this time! For those of you who don't know, I work at H&R Block during tax season (which is right now, for those of you who are completely out of it haha). AND, this is their BUSIEST two weeks out of the entire year!! However, when I need to blog, I blog. So here I am :)

I have nothing amazing to say--nothing spectacular or off record incredible. But life is like that. I am trying to be realistic here. Perhaps you were expecting some of my new year's resolutions. I could put some down, sure. But I was just thinking (uh oh) what are these things called "new year's resolutions" or "new year's goals"? For some it's a way to prick themselves into action--get them moving. For others it's just "what you do" and they write out their list, only to lose it within their next pile of junk. But really, why goals--and for many, only at the beginning of each year?

I have a couple questions on this subject. Number one, if goals are so awesome and amazing, how come we wait an entire year to make a list of them!? I am speaking generally here of course (I know you list freaks are out there---don't try to deny it!). And my second questions is, why even MAKE goals. I see where this is going, and it's the nature of man. Again. But that's ok--it's a subject I would do well to dwell on!

We make goals because we want something more than what we have. Most of our natures desire something BETTER than what we have: a better lifestyle, body, health--you name it! And yet that same nature fights against this desire, making us creatures of the moment, ease, and convenience, rather than FIGHTING our flesh. We make goals for several reason, I grant you, but I contend that the main reason most people make goals is to make themselves feel better about themselves.

The thing is, we want everything INSTANTLY! Patience is definitely out of style. So making goals is easy--sitting there and making a lovely list on lovely paper in stylish hand writing. But for most of us, when it really comes down to business, we turn to the "easy" little things that give us satisfaction in the moment, but at the end of the day only make us feel sick with how much time we wasted.

I am definitely not trying to bash new year's resolutions or say that no one should ever do them etc etc. But it seems to me that new year's goals have become not only fashionable, but fanciful. Goals are amazing and everyone should have them, but how about you make some NOW. If you didn't make some on New Year's Eve, and think inspiring thoughts while you watched the ball drop, who cares? What matters is to honor God in this life with EVERYTHING we do--and goals can definitely be one of them :)

I know this was sort of random--I just wrote it on the spot. Thanks for riding through it with me, and as always, I hope I caused some thoughts to go through your head. I love thinking, and I love getting others to think as well.

Sooo HAPPY THINKING! :)

2010-12-28T23:20:00.001-05:00

What do women want?

Dennis Prager finishes 2-part column on greatest desires of each gender

Posted: December 28, 2010

1:00 am Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=244705

Monday, December 27, 2010

By Dennis Prager

In my previous column, I offered an answer to the question: What do men want?

I made the case that what men most want from the woman they love is to be admired.

If my answer is correct, and if we presume that the natures of men and women are complementary (a presumption many men and women understandably doubt given how often men and women do not get along), what women most want must be related to that which men most want.

I believe it is.

What a woman most wants is to be loved by a man she admires.

I am well aware that to say this today is akin to announcing that the sun revolves around the Earth. For half a century, we have been told that what women most want is professional success and equality. And to the extent that a modern "liberated" woman does admit to wanting a man to love, she will say that she wants a "partner" who is her "equal." And girls and women have been told – or, more accurately, have had drummed into them – that equality means that both sexes are essentially the same (except for the physical differences) and therefore want the same things. Equality and sameness have been rendered synonymous. That is why she cannot say – and ideally wouldn't even admit to herself – that she wants a man to admire; that would be "sexist," as it would imply an unequal relationship.

The notion that a woman most wants a man, admirable or not, has been scoffed at. This was encapsulated by the famous feminist slogan "A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle." Even feminism that did not agree with the fish-bicycle metaphor communicated to young women that an "authentic" woman would not have as her greatest desire to bond with a man.

Today, feminism holds less appeal for young women than it did for the previous generation, but "equality" remains the liberal god of the day. That renders my theory – that a woman wants to be cherished by a man she admires – politically incorrect in the extreme.

It is problematic enough to say that a woman most wants a man. But that pales compared to the claim that she most wants a man whom she admires. That seems to affirm gender inequality. The image it conjures up is of a woman looking up to her man as if he were some sort of lord and she his serf.

Yet, any woman who believes that she is married to an admirable man would laugh at such a dismissal. Admiring one's husband doesn't render a woman a serf. It renders her fortunate.

The truth is that almost nothing – including job success – elevates a woman in her own eyes as much as being loved by a husband whom she admires. That is why when married women get together, they don't talk about their jobs nearly as much as men do. They talk, among other things, about their man if they are proud of him, and complain about him if they are not. Even most feminists are happiest when married to a man they admire.

And what is it that women most admire in a man? From decades of talking to women on the radio and, of course, from simply living life, I have concluded that an admirable man is one who has three qualities: strength, integrity and ambition.

All three are needed. Strength without integrity is machismo. Integrity without strength or without ambition is a milquetoast. And ambition without integrity is a successful crook.

(Column continues below)

Women are drawn to strong men. Though many men, when asked the secret to their long marriage, answer, "I learned to always say, 'Yes, Dear,'" the truth is that most women are not attracted to "Yes, Dear" men who always give in to a woman's whim. They are attracted to a man who exhibits strength in the outer world and at home as husband and father.

But that strength must come with integrity. If it doesn't, he is a strong bad man. And while more than a few women fall for bad men (precisely because of the power of masculine strength to attract women), most women do not want such a man over the long run.

And ambition does not mean that he is necessarily rich, but that he is a hard worker who wants to improve himself; plenty of men who earn relatively little are admired and loved by their wives. That is why a major "turn-off" to most women is a husband who sits and watches television all night (let alone all day).

The beauty of all this is that it all comes together for men, for women and for society.

Women get what they want most: to be married to and loved by a man they admire. Men then attain what they want most: to be admired by the woman they love. And society gets the thing it most needs: admirable men.

Unfortunately, none of this is taught at college.

I Want to Believe This!!! :)

2010-12-27T21:44:00.000-05:00

Chocolate better cure for common cold than echinacea

* From: NewsCore

* December 22, 2010 12:35AM

http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/chocolate-better-cure-for-common-cold-than-echinacea/story-e6frfku0-1225974729266

PEOPLE who buy echinacea to stave off a common cold are wasting their money and should buy chocolate instead, two separate scientific studies have claimed.

Echinacea, which is believed to minimise the impact of a common cold, was studied by scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health.

They found the over-the-counter herbal treatment only slightly delayed cold symptoms

In tests of 719 people, aged between 12 and 80, volunteers were randomly given either no pill, a pill they knew contained echinacea, or a pill that could have been echinacea or a placebo.

Those who received echinacea saw the duration of their cold reduced by seven to 10 hours.

"Trends were in the direction of benefit, amounting to an average half-day reduction in the duration of a weeklong cold or an approximate 10 percent reduction in overall severity," said Bruce Barrett, the lead researcher, writing in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

"However, this dose regimen did not make a large impact on the course of the common cold, compared either to blinded placebo or to no pills," he concluded.

In the UK, scientists at a British-based drugs company called SEEK, working with experts at Hull Cough Clinic, said that a naturally-occurring substance in cocoa - theobromine - has been shown to prevent the key features of a persistent cough.

Seek was developing a medication based on theobromine, which is found in significant quantities in cocoa-based products and which it says "has been shown to inhibit the inappropriate firing of the vagus nerve, which is a key feature of persistent cough.”

Professor Alyn Morice from the clinic, said, "Due to the drawbacks of current opioid drugs such as codeine, we are in desperate need of a non-opioid treatment with a drastically improved side effect profile for patients."

2010-12-20T22:52:00.001-05:00

Austria: Judge Rules That Yodeling Offends Muslims

Tevet 8, 5771, 15 December 10 05:12

by Elad Benari

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/141152

(Israelnationalnews.com) It seems as though in Austria, the popular yodel is an insult to Muslims.

An Austrian court has recently fined a citizen for yodeling while mowing his lawn, according to a report in The Kronen Zeitung newspaper.

The citizen, 63-year-old Helmut G., was told by the court that his yodeling offended his next-door Muslim neighbors, who accused him of trying to mock and imitate the call of the Muezzin.

In Muslim tradition, the Muezzin is the chosen person at a mosque who leads the call to prayer at Friday services and the five daily times for prayer from one of the mosque's minarets.

The yodel is a song which is sung with an extended note which rapidly and repeatedly changes in pitch and makes a high-low-high-low sound. Developed in the Central Alps as a method of communication between alpine mountaineers or between alpine villages, the yodel later became part of the region's traditional lore and musical expression. The technique is used in many cultures throughout the world and Austria is one of the countries where it is most popular.

Unfortunately for Helmut G., his neighbors were in the middle of a prayer when he started to yodel. The Kronen Zeitung reported that he was fined 800 Euros after judges ruled that he could have tried to offend his neighbors and ridicule their belief.

Helmut G. clarified that “It was not my intention to imitate or insult them. I simply started to yodel a few tunes because I was in such a good mood.”

The Most Astounding Event in History...

2010-12-16T22:17:00.000-05:00

As the time to celebrate Jesus' birth draws near yet again this holiday season, I sat down to tea and Tabletalk magazine (an old Tabletalk mind you, but still Tabletalk none the less) and stumbled across a moving and significant article on the true meaning of what we call CHRISTMAS. Yes, this subject has been hashed and re-hashed over and over again, but what is the TRUE meaning of Christmas? Why do we even celebrate it as Christians? I loved this article by RC Sproul Jr on how the past has made the future glorious! But I will say no more--read for yourself :) I couldn't find it anywhere online at all, so now it's on here for the online world to see! May it be the better for it... Praise God for sending his Son in the form of a baby to a virgin in Bethlehem.

THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS FUTURE
by RC SPROUL JR

   I must have been 10 years old when the anxiety hit me. I sat amidst the crumpled paper when it dawned on me, "It doesn't get any better than this." As I surveyed my gifts, however, I knew--the descent had already begun. Like a subtle heresy, clothes had slowly begun to creep into the mix. There were plenty of toys, new diversions that I was eager to get to. The joy of anticipation, however, was tempered by the clothes and the dreadful realization that next year there would be more clothes. The year after that still more clothes. Perhaps even--God help me--underwear. The spirit of Christmas future was haunting me.
   I had adopted the creed of Sally Brown, Charlie's younger sister. Surveying her lengthy and demanding wish list to Santa Claus, Charlie Brown, the round-headed sage, chastised his sister for her greed. Her response? "All I want is what's coming to me, all I want is my fair share." Lucy van Pelt complained that she never got what she wanted: real estate. I wanted children's things, and I wanted to stay a child.
   While I suffered from greed, my understanding of Christmas wasn't exclusively materialistic. I understood that we were celebrating an event. I understood that center-stage of the Christmas pageant was not the North Pole but the little town of Bethlehem.
   It was an awe-inspiring thing to see how the world changed each Christmas season. In my small world of home, school, and television, the change was ubiquitous. All this because of what happened in a stable halfway across the world nearly two millenia ago.
   Of course when the original event occurred, the world did not change. Those in the know were very few. All the world was busy tending to the business of keeping Caesar happy through the census. Jesus chose tax time to arrive, and only a few people noticed. The shepherds were tending to their flocks with care when they heard the Good News. The magi sought the child, following a star. It's the ultimate in dramatic irony. All Israel awaited a mighty king to restore their glory and throw off the shackles of Rome. What they got was a baby, long promised but unnoticed. That Christmas they received not a toy soldier but clothes, swaddling clothes enshrouding a tiny little newborn.
   We, the audience of the future, know what happened. We know what became of that baby. This season, Advent, we look backward to that time before Christ so that we can experience looking forward to His birth. In the Advent season we seek to recreate the joy of anticipation.
   The Spirit of Christmas future haunted Ebenezer Scrooge with the ultimate burden. He gave Scrooge a glimpse of what was to come. Down toward the grave the bony hand pointed mutely. That spirit was a false prophet. Because of Christmas past, Christmas future points no bony hand toward a grave but a living hand skyward. The Advent is coming again.
   Christmas future is not about clothes or toys. It is not about secrets and subtle portents in the stars. It is not about a darling sweet baby. The Christmas which is to come will not be hearkened with angels singing in an our-of-the-way pasture. Like the shepherds we will all look heavenward, and we will be sore afraid. When He comes again all the world will know. He is coming again, this time in judgment. The mightiest of warriors, He will bear the sword, and not in vain.
   But we, who are His sheep, who know His voice, look to that great day with great anticipation. We will be as children again, His children. He will remove all our burdens. He will wipe away every tear.
   And we will receive no new clothes. For when He comes, we no longer need to stand clothed in His righteousness. When He comes in glory we too will be glorified, our sanctification complete. Like Adam before us, we will stand before Him, naked and unashamed. We will see Him as He is, and we will be like Him.
   Never again will we look backward with anticipation. We will look forward, moving onward and upward. And each day we will be astounded to realize that it does get better than this, every day perfect, yet every day better than the last, on into eternity.
   On that glorious day, wisdom is given to all. Not just three wise men but all men everywhere, sheep and goats, will bow the knee, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. I was a foolish 10-year old, for there is every reason to look forward to Christmas. When we look to Christmas future, our joy outshines the reborn Scrooge. God bless us, one and all.

2010-12-08T22:21:00.002-05:00

When healing meets marketing: The perfect storm

By Jon Rappoport

http://jonrappoport.wordpress.com/2010/12/06/when-healing-meets-marketing/

www.nomorefakenews.com

DECEMBER 5, 2010. About ten years ago, I decided that the medical cartel could become the most dangerous of all power groups on the planet. I have not changed my mind.

My decision is based on looking up the road 40 or 50 years and inferring what the picture will look like then.

It’s clear to me that drug companies, as they carve up markets and create new markets, are eagerly anticipating the day when every human, from cradle to grave—actually from inside the womb—has the status of Patient.

A person is born a patient and dies a patient. And in between, he receives 40 or 50 key diagnoses of physical and mental diseases/disorders and takes prescribed drug and surgery treatments.

More than that, though, he is stamped with the label, Patient, and he learns that everyone is in the same boat. “We’re all patients, this is a medical world, and it’s normal to be disabled in some way.”

People become proud, yes, proud to be victims. They wear their diagnoses as badges of honor. If you can’t see this trend, you’re not looking.

And universal health care insurance guarantees continuous treatment all the way along the line.

Every medical diagnosis becomes an excuse not to perform, not to excel, not to pursue big goals with large ambition.

Nowhere in the search to gain recognition as a victim do circumstances conspire so well as in the medical arena. It’s perfect. There’s no argument. The doctor told you you have X disease. That’s that. It’s not political. It’s not agenda-driven. It’s science. The proof is laid out on a silver platter. You ARE a victim.

In the coming future, every move a person makes, every step he takes will come under the umbrella of the doctor.

And, again, the main supporter of this system will be the patient himself. That’s how beautiful the marketing is.

In case you’ve been living in a cave for the last 30 years, drug companies and their researchers can invent any vague disease label they want to—and then they can invent five or six sub-categories of the label—and they can set out rules on how to diagnose each sliver of the label—and of course the doctors will make these diagnoses and prescribe drugs. It’s marketing and “healing” at the same time.

Parents who don’t have a clue will submit their children to this system—especially if the government pays for it—and the children will grow up trained to think of themselves as patients/victims…and the only contest will be: who has the most drastic diagnoses and treatments? Who can most proudly wear the badge of honor as Patient?

“Last month, they had to remove my head for five minutes while they fixed my brain.”

“Wow. Well, they put me in a body cast for three months and I couldn’t move, except for my left thumb.”

Cradle to grave.

If you go back and read Huxley’s Brave New World again, you’ll notice the factor of “patient pride.” It isn’t just that the society is controlled, the citizens are idealistic about it.

That’s where the victim industry is heading.

Against it, we have, what?

A little thing called individual freedom. Which includes the right to refuse medical treatment, no matter who prescribes it under what regulations.

People imagine that this right is some arcane matter best debated in medical-ethics journals. It’s an obscure curio.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

As I’ve been writing, the ObamaCare plan contains the seeds of a future in which, by law, the citizen will have less freedom to determine his own medical fate. The walls will gradually close in.

The Founders knew what they were talking about when they warned of the incursion of government and the loss of freedom. At every crossroad, since then, the issue of freedom has resurfaced as the unavoidable key factor.

Well, we’re at one of those crossroads again.

JON RAPPOPORT

Jon is the author of LOGIC AND ANALYSIS, a unique course for home schools and adults. To inquire: qjrconsulting@gmail.com

2010-11-30T11:29:00.000-05:00

Yes, laugh and sing while your children are being stolen

Exclusive: Drew Zahn says 'Tangled' is hilarious, beautiful and dangerous

Posted: November 28, 2010

7:51 pm Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=233949

Monday, November 29, 2010

By Drew Zahn's column

My wife and I argued as we left the theater: she hoping my review of "Tangled" could somehow gloss over the startlingly anti-parent messages in the movie to praise this otherwise funny and beautiful film; while I stuck to critiquing the movie's worldview, regardless of its theatrical qualities.

To my wife's credit, there is much to praise in "Tangled," Disney's 50th animated feature film.

For starters, the movie is very entertaining. Vivid characters, snappy dialogue, witty one-liners, a dashing dose of swashbuckling and one scene in particular that is fall-out-of-your-chair funny make "Tangled" a delightful romp.

And in trademark Disney fashion, animal characters – in this case, the marvelous horse Maximus and Paschal the chameleon – are memorable, endearing and make me wish I was a kid again so I could have an excuse for buying the action figure in my Happy Meal.

The film's songs are reminiscent of a Broadway musical. The animation is crafted with care and beauty. The scenery is magical, and the romance is heart-felt. Disney's 50th is worth that place in the studio's history.

The film's final scene is even a beautiful example of the true nature of love – giving of yourself, even your life, for another.

Man! What's not to like about "Tangled"?

Alas, a lot … if you but stop and analyze the resounding message this movie plants in children's minds.

(Column continues below)

"Tangled" is a retelling of the story of Rapunzel, the girl with unbelievably long hair, locked in a tower until her "prince" can come and rescue her by climbing that hair to reach her.

In this retelling, however, Princess Rapunzel's hair has the power to heal and even reverse aging. As an infant, the king's daughter was kidnapped by a wicked woman in search of eternal youth, a woman who poses as the girl's "mother" and keeps her locked away until her teenage years.

But when Rapunzel reaches those ever-so-challenging teenage years, she yearns to be free of the tower and see the distant lights of the kingdom (from which she was unknowingly kidnapped). Then, while "Mom" is away for a few days, a rogue thief named Ryder chances upon her hidden tower, and the two embark on a forbidden "road trip" to the kingdom.

"Tangled" then revels in a widely assumed, very worldly and yet completely wicked and untrue philosophy on adolescence.

In regards to the teenage Rapunzel sneaking out of the house and going on an parent-unauthorized road trip with a strange but dashing man several years her senior:

"This is part of growing up," Ryder claims. "A little rebellion, a little adventure, that's good. Healthy even."

But what would Mom think?

Ryder has the answer for that too:

"Crush your mother's soul," he says. "Like a grape."

Yeah. That's "good." Um, "healthy" even.

Eventually, Rapunzel learns to see things Ryder's way.

"You were wrong about the world. You were wrong about me," she growls at her mother. "I will never stop fighting you."

Yeah. That's a "good" message for the movie, right? "Healthy" even?

And, of course, Ryder and Rapunzel are proved justified in the girl's rebellion, the mother is shown wicked and the youngsters' little "road trip" proves to be just what the doctor ordered. And it's all OK for the young minds in the audience to be seeped in this spirit of defiance and parent-degradation, because the mother is really the bad guy.

Happily ever after. Walk out of the theater smiling. And then, somehow, be surprised when your children think you're an overprotective know-nothing, assume they're justified in rebellion and do a little bar-hopping, frat-party "road trip" of their own.

Wait. What happened to the happy ending?

Is "Tangled" just describing adolescent life as it is? Or is it part of a wider culture that is prescribing life as it wants to be to loose teens from their parents in order to teach its own values?

I'm the father of four teenagers, and like many parents, I've found that adolescents do begin at about that age to think critically about authority. They question the old rules, they long for and test their independence. Stretching the wings is a necessary part of growing up.

But nowhere does God prescribe rebellion and defiance as a proper path to adulthood. It is not "good" and it is not "healthy." No, contrary to popular belief and Disney brainwashing, children do not have to suddenly become the spawn of Satan (the first rebel, after all) when they turn 13.

One of the greatest rewards I've found in watching the homeschooling community is that its children are often raised by parents who question the entire worldly paradigm of what kids are like and supposed to be, including what they can be like as teenagers. And while every community has its share of rebellious and difficult teens, I have marveled at watching how some young men and women from families that reject the message of "Tangled" grow up in partnership with their parents to be models of respect and independence tempered by Godly submission. They are the best example I have seen to prove rebellion is simply not a mandate.

In the end, even though my wife tried to argue that Ryder's speech came from the lips of a rogue and that the "mother" was ultimately wicked, she eventually conceded the movie left the impression that Ryder was right, leaving me to write but one conclusion to this review: "Tangled" is a great movie with a mangled message.

Content advisory:

* "Tangled" contains no profanity or spoken blasphemies.

* The film has a few kisses and a few veiled comments from Ryder about being handsome or attractive "with the ladies," but otherwise no overt sexual content. The animators, however, seemed enamored with drawing women's busts, as Rapunzel and her mother boast Barbie figures in tight tops.

* The film contains numerous scenes of chasing, shooting crossbows, falling, crashing, swordfighting and getting knocked unconscious with an iron frying pan (which in real life could kill a person, but in "Tangled" doesn't even leave a bruise). There is also a scene where a character is stabbed, though the actual cut is not seen.

* In regards to religious or occult content, one character is frequently depicted as the Roman god Cupid. The healing power of Rapunzel's hair is attributed to "a drop of sunlight" falling on the ground and creating a "magical" flower that heals when it's sung to. The flower heals Rapunzel's pregnant mother, transferring the power to the girl in the womb. Rapunzel then uses the "magic" to heal others. The movie is filled with images of the sun in reference to the life-giving flower, but it is not specifically idolized

KATIE'S NOTES:

The reason I posted this article was not because I am necessarily against the movie Tangled in particular, but because the TITLE of this article caught my eye, and I feel this is a warning that many parents need to heed in the area of all media. There is a strange ignoring of subtle substances in movies among Christians. Many parents seem to throw their rules out the window in regards to everyone else but their own children. I have noticed this not only in movie intake, but in political and other media situations as well. We as Christians MUST be consistent! If I, as a mother, tell my daughter she is not to sass me, then go laugh with her over a movie where the female character is nothing but a sass, what message am I sending?

Blunt but GOOD

2010-11-05T20:00:00.001-04:00

The following are quotes by the pastor Paul Washer. They are amazing! I was so encouraged when I read them. I hope you are also encouraged. And maybe even challenged :) He certainly doesn't tread on egg shells so as not to offend...

—————
The person who loves you most will tell you the most truth. One of the greatest distinguishing marks of a false prophet is that he will always tell you what you want to hear, he will never rain on your parade, he will get you clapping, he will get you jumping, he will make you dizzy, he will keep you entertained, and he will present a Christianity to you that will make your church look like a Six Flags over Jesus. And keep you so entertained you are never addressed with great issues such as these:

Is God working in my life?
Am I growing in holiness?
Have I truly been born again?

In modern day evangelism, this precious doctrine [of regeneration] has been reduced to nothing more than a human decision to raise one’s hand, walk an aisle, or pray a “sinner’s prayer.” As a result, the majority of Americans believe that they’ve been “born again” (i.e., regenerated) even though their thoughts, words, and deeds are a continual contradiction to the nature and will of God.
——————
Here stands God on the day of creation. He looks at stars and He says all you stars move yourself to this place and start in this order and move in a circle and move exactly as I tell you, until I give you another word. Planets-pick yourself up and whirl, make this formation at my command, until I give you another word. He looks at mountains and says be lifted up and they obey him. He tells valleys be cast down and they obey him. He looks at the sea and says you will come this far, and the sea obeys. Then, he looks at you and says come and you go no! Does that bother anyone?
————
People tell me judge not lest ye be judged. I always tell them, twist not scripture lest ye be like Satan.
————-
The work is hindered. The glory of God is tarnished and it is because the people of God no longer know how to discern the things of God.
—————
Ever wonder how the people of God could walk into the temple of God, could offer sacrifices to God could praise God, and then turn right around and find the biggest tree on the highest hill and worship any number of idols, and not be able to tell the difference, and not be able to recognize the wrong, in a multiplicity of gods? Well, I want you to know that is the church in America today. And because the greatest sin among the men of God today is the fear of men which is a snare, and the fear losing economic security and reputation in the denomination. As the church runs headlong into judgment today the men of God instead of repenting and crying out and studying God’s word with all their passion are looking for models on how to keep lost people in their congregations and it’s wrong.
—————
(As American Christians) We have forgotten how to blush.
————–
Most of you live your life on flimsy little songs, not upon the word of God.
——————
We honor the old prophets, we honor the Tozer’s and Spurgen’s but we don’t want to pay the price they payed, and they payed the price by being men who walked alone who lived with God and who loved His word.
————–
What’s the will of God for my life? You don’t need to know the will of God in your life, you need to know the God of your life!
————
How could we have such a low view of the gospel of Jesus Christ that we have to manipulate men psychologically to get them to come down and pray a prayer? …How many times have I heard evangelists say, “It’ll only take five minutes.“? No my dear friend, it will take your life — all of it! “We’re just trying to attract people and then we’ll gradually bring them in further and further.” That is what the cults do, that’s not what Jesus did. Notice that in the gospels every time a great crowd is following Jesus, he turns around and says something so radical to them that most of them walk away. Of course Jesus probably would not get invited to teach evangelism [in most churches today].”
———–
I don’t know why you’re clapping; I’m talking about you.
————
Well, I was out here on the highway, and I was driving and I had a flat tire and I got out to change the tire, and when I was changing the tire, the lug nut fell off, and I wasn’t paying attention that I was on the middle of the highway, I stood up and there was a 30-ton logging truck going 120 miles an hour about ten yards in front of me, and it ran me over and that’s why I’m late.

Now, there would only be two…I know no one studies logic anymore, but there would only be two logical conclusions. One, I’m a liar or two, I’m a madman. You would say, “Brother Paul, it’s absolutely absurd. It is impossible, Brother Paul, to have an encounter with something as large as a logging truck and not be changed.”

And then my question would be to you — What is larger? A logging truck or God? How is it that so many people today profess to have had an encounter with Jesus Christ, and yet, they are not permanently changed?
————–
You say, “The most important thing on the face of the earth is to know Jesus Christ.” That is not true. The most important thing on the face of the earth is that Jesus Christ knows you! Do you know Jesus? Does Jesus know you?
———-
Jesus is all we need! (man)
Young man, Jesus is all we have. Outside of Christ, you have nothing to do with God. And God has nothing to do with you, except judgment. (Paul)
————-
If you’re a Christian, you’re not a Christian because when Jesus Christ was on that cross – the Romans and Jews beat Him up. If you’re a Christian – your sins are paid for, because when He was on that tree, He bore the sins of His people. And God, His own Father, crushed Him under the full force of His wrath – all the wrath that should have been poured out on you; God crushed His only begotten Son in your place.
—————
…and you say you’re bold, Christian, cause you wear a Christian T-shirt!
————–
Many of the things that you love to do, God hates. Did you know that?
—————
The greatest heresy in the American evangelical and protestant church is that if you pray and “ask Jesus Christ to come into your heart,” He will definitely come in.
—————
A little boy… Andrew Meimann… the Muslim shot him five times through the stomach and left him on a sidewalk simply because he cried out, ‘I am so afraid but I cannot deny Jesus Christ. Please don’t kill me but I will not deny Him!’ And he died in a pool of blood. And you talk about being a radical Christian because you wear a t-shirt… because you go to a conference! I’m talking about holiness! I’m talking about godliness!
————–
The question is not whether you would like to pray this prayer and ask Jesus to come into your heart — after all, you know, the handle to your heart is on the inside and if you do not open it Jesus cannot come in. My friend, Jesus is Lord of your heart and if He wants to come in, He will kick the door down.
—————-
Oh, this movie only has a bit of cussing and it only has a bit of nudity…how much sin does it take to grieve the Holy Spirit?
————
He can’t fill up your cup with himself, if your cup is already full of the world!

Marvelous Grace

2010-11-02T07:02:00.001-04:00

"We stutter and we stammer 'till you say us
a symphony of chaos, 'till you play us
Phrases on the pages of unknown, 'till you read unto poetry and prose

And we are kept, and we are captive 'till you free us
Vainly unimagined 'till you dream us
Aimlessly unguided 'till you lead us home.

And by your voice we speak
It is by your strength we're no longer weak
We are no longer weak, and

By your wounds, we are healed
Tell me what kind of love is this?
By your wounds we are healed....

Passed over and passed by until you claim us
Orphaned and abandoned, 'till you name us
Hidden and disclosed 'till you expose our hearts

And by your death we live
It is by your gift that we might give
That we might give, and

By your wounds we are healed
Tell me what kind of love is this?
By your wounds we are healed

And what kind of love
Would take your shame and spill his blood for you?
Saved us by his wounds...
By your wounds, we are healed
Tell me what kind of love is this?
By your wounds we are healed

Healed..."

Healed by Sung by Nicole Nordeman (I am not sure who wrote the song)

Hallowed or Harmful?

2010-10-29T16:54:00.002-04:00

A Christian Perspective on Halloween

By Katie Cochran Winter 2007

Hundreds of years before the birth of Christ, the Celts, inhabitants of Britain and Ireland, observed a festival on October 31. Unlike modern-day Halloween, theirs was no children's holiday. The Celts and their priests, the Druids, celebrated Samhain, a festival that marked the eve of the Celtic New Year, which began on November 1.

The fall harvest was complete and winter loomed ahead. The Celts believed the power of the sun was fading. For the next several months, darkness would prevail. The Celts also believed that during Samhain the veil separating the living from the dead was at its thinnest. They thought that on the evening of October 31, evil spirits and the souls of the dead passed through the barrier and entered the world of the living. Departed family members could revisit their earthly homes. The thought was frightening – and exciting!

These druids thought that dead souls could torment the living. Crops might be destroyed, babies stolen, farm animals killed. But this was also an opportunity to commune with the spirits -- and divine the future. The Devil, the lord of darkness, was ordinarily feared, but during Samhain, his power could be called on to foretell the future.

The Druids were charged with appeasing the goblins and preventing harm to the people. Huge Samhain bonfires were lit to guide the way of the spirits. Various sacrifices -- including human -- were performed to assure a good year. Several ancient authors comment on the gory religious rites of the Druids.

It is believed that, like many pagan cultures around the world, the Celts left out food for the spirits, hoping that a "treat" would prevent an evil "trick."

Centuries later, the descendants of the Celts continued to observe the Samhain festival by dressing as evil spirits. They roamed from house to house demanding food in exchange for the "spirits" leaving the home unharmed. They carved demon faces in hollowed-out turnips and lit them with candles. That night they also practiced many customs designed to foretell the future. Young people roasted nuts in Samhain fires to see which would crack first -- and tell them who they would marry. The person who retrieved an apple with his mouth from a tub of water assured himself of a lucky year. Obviously some of these customs (like "apple-bobbing") have remained with us, strictly as amusement.

When Christianity began to spread through Europe in the third and fourth centuries, the pagan temples were torn down. But pagan worship never completely disappeared. The festival of Samhain remained a primary pagan celebration.

Belief in spirits may have waned, but many of the old Samhain traditions continued to be practiced -- especially by the children. Primarily in Ireland, children dressed as spirits went from house to house demanding a treat. If they received none, they performed an unwelcomed trick. They were acting the part of evil spirits that had to be appeased, rather than trying to appease real spirits, as their fathers had done.

In the 700s AD the Church decided to combat this festival by replacing it with a celebration of the Lord of life. Instead of honoring evil spirits and the souls of the dead, the church chose to recognize the saints -- or hallowed ones -- who had lived godly lives. The Church seemed to be saying, "All right, if you must have a day to celebrate the dead, then celebrate those who died and are now with the Lord."

So November 1 came to be called All Saints' Day, also called All Hallows' Day. The evening before was called All Hallows' Evening. From this we get the modern name of Halloween. But pagan customs persisted. And with the growth of witchcraft in the Middle Ages, additional symbols became associated with Halloween -- black cats, witches, bats, and skulls.

Irish immigrants in the mid-1800s brought to

America

the Halloween customs we're familiar with -- costumes, trick-or-treat, and carved Jack-o-lanterns. Interestingly, the Jack-o-lantern is simply an American version of the hollowed-out turnip, mentioned earlier. The pumpkin did not grow in Ireland and Britain. Unfortunately, the madcap Irish also brought "tricks" with them -- which often involved breaking windows and over-turning sheds and outhouses.

Even though the practice of actually performing a trick if no treat is given has faded, the custom of children going "trick-or-treating" has become an established American tradition. Only in recent years have parents hesitated to send their children into the streets because of the increasing danger of accidents, poisoned food, and menacing strangers. Nonetheless, despite the dangers associated with trick-or-treating, Halloween is celebrated more than ever. In fact, the night is the second most popular party night of the year (after December 31) for "baby-boomer" adults. Many adults view Halloween as the one night of the year they can dress up and act foolish.

But while children and adults innocently imitate ancient Celtic customs, darker practices persist. Witches and Satanists still consider Halloween to be one of the strongest times during the year to cast a spell. On Halloween most witchcraft practitioners participate in a ritual called "drawing down the moon." In this the chief witch of the coven (group of witches) becomes, they believe, a channel for the moon goddess. During this ritual the participants, both male and female, are 'sky-clad" -- that is, naked. Stonehenge, the mysterious ancient stone formation in

England

, is often the site for bizarre gatherings of occultists, some of who believe they are modern-day Druids. Many scholars believe that Stonehenge was a Druid religious site. In horrible addition, some Satanist and voodoo groups offer sacrifices -- usually animals, but, possibly, human babies—in honor of death.

Witches and Satanists are, of course, a small minority. Few people who currently celebrate Halloween ever think about the darkness that underlies most October 31st practices. A beaming child dressed in a black pointed hat and matching gown -- with a wart carefully drawn on her nose and a trick-or-treat bag held tightly in her hand -- is hardly thinking of death or the spirits of departed relatives. Nor should she be. She's thinking of candy and fun. She's glowing because of her delight in her special costume. And she's anticipating the adventure of her house-to-house pilgrimage. Merchants also look forward to October 31. The sale of candy, costumes, decorations, and party goods make Halloween one of the major retail seasons of the year.

Surely, no one can deny children or adults all the Halloween fun simply because of its unsavory history. Can there really be anything wrong with this lighthearted revelry?

Does the Bible have anything to say about celebrating Halloween? In Corinth, meat that had been sacrificed to idols was sold on the market. People would buy and eat the offered meat to honor whatever pagan god they favored. Speaking of his freedom to eat food that a pagan had dedicated to an idol, the apostle Paul said, "Everything is permissible" (I Corinthians 10:23). After all, he didn't believe the pagan gods really existed. If we apply Paul's statement to the celebration of Halloween, then one could argue that Christians can dress in ghostly costumes and practice the traditions passed down from the ancient Celts. After all, the supernatural powers they tried to appease don't have power over those who belong to Christ.

The Bible says that Jesus destroyed the power of death when He went to the cross. By Jesus' death and resurrection, anyone who gives his or her life to Jesus doesn't need to fear evil. But Paul didn't stop with a statement of his freedom. He said, "'Everything is permissible -- but not everything is beneficial." It is in this light that Christians need to examine how to observe Halloween.

What may not hurt you may hurt others. Paul said that it wouldn't harm a Christian to eat meat sacrificed to an idol. After all, the pagan gods that the meat had been sacrificed to weren't real gods. In the same light, he probably would say that Christians are not prohibited from dressing in costumes and going trick-or-treating or attending Halloween parties. After all, "We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one" (I Corinthians 8:4).

But Paul went on to say that by doing what the believer was free in the Lord to do, said believer may be distressing another who doesn't realize he has this freedom. "Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak" (I Corinthians 8:9). The weak ones would be those who still had problems with the idea of eating the food sacrificed to idols. Little children in particular are the “weak” ones. On TV, in movies, in school, and with their playmates, many children today are exposed to occult influences. We may be opening our children to these influences if we approve of these things in Halloween fun. We adults may be fully aware that we are only spoofing witches and ghosts, but the young many not be so sure.

If we have given our lives to Jesus Christ, then our eternal destiny is safe in the hands of Almighty God. But that's not true of some or most of the people around us. There is a valid reason for individuals to fear a "lord of death" -- even if they don't take him seriously on Halloween. We who have found life in Jesus should be careful that our freedom doesn't hinder others from finding that same eternal life.

Some “permissible” things may hinder Christian growth. The Bible encourages us to "throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus" (Hebrews 12:1-2). This one night of the year, most eyes are fixed not on Jesus, but on a darker image. The Christian's "race of faith" leads him to eternal life, to a joy that has no shadow. Should we really be focusing on the devil, witches and other dark beings, even for one night?

God says, "When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, do not learn to imitate the detestable ways of the nations there. Let no one be found among you who...practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium, or spiritist or who consults the dead. (Deuteronomy 18:9-11).

If our children dress as witches and sorcerers, if we hang cardboard ghosts in our windows, if we entertain with tales of ghouls and haunted houses -- what are we doing but imitating that which is evil? We need to make it clear as Christians that witches and evil spirits are not funny and are not harmless, even if the people in witch costumes are only play-acting.

Are There Alternatives? As Christians, we have plenty of reason to celebrate. While the world around us focuses on activities honoring fear and death, we can celebrate the One who brings life. The following ideas might help you celebrate October 31 in ways that are joyful for you and your family:

1. Celebrate All Saints' Day

Some Protestants shy away from honoring saints. Their reluctance generally is based on a fear that the honor will cross the line into worship or prayer to saints. We are to worship and pray to no one but God. However, there is a good biblical basis for looking to those who have faithfully followed God in the past: Hebrews 11 has a roll call of believers who have set examples for us. But in his Letters to the Corinthians, Paul makes it abundantly clear that he and other saints are only servants -- men and women like us who are following God. And it is God and God alone to whom we look in our worship and prayers. But with nearly 2000 years of church history, we can well remember many faithful believers whose lives can encourage us in our walk with the Lord. These can include not only famous figures from the church's history, but also the saints we have known personally -- people in our own family and church who are now with the lord. While the Celts trembled at the thought of their departed kin returning on Samhain, we can celebrate Halloween and All Saints Day by joyfully recalling our own departed saints. In addition, Christians from many Protestant traditions may want to recall that October 31 is also Reformation Day, celebrating Martin Luther's beginning the Reformation by posting his "Ninety-five Theses" on the church door.

2. Have a different kind of party.

You can have a fall harvest party, an All Saint's Day party, or simply a costume party. Have children (and maybe adults too) dress up as biblical characters and/or figures from Christian history. Or find some other positive theme. Some Christians plan a "Fools for Christ" party (see I Corinthians 4:10). This involves costumes and fun, but none of the traditional symbols of death and witchcraft. Whatever you choose, avoid the usual Halloween symbols in decorations and activities. The way to "celebrate the dead" is by honoring God's saints, already in heaven, part of the body of Christ of which the living saints are a part.

3. Hold a Bible study on what God says about the occult and witchcraft, and pray for those under the dominion of Satan. This might be especially good for teenagers, since they are probably coming into frequent contact with influences of this type. In recent years there has been an amazing growth of witchcraft and Satanism in the U.S. Human kind want desperately to worship something; and we can pray that on Halloween, instead of the focus being on death and destruction, people everywhere will celebrate new life in Christ, and the honoring of victorious saints.

Let's REFORM!

2010-10-28T11:11:00.000-04:00



	The Five Scariest Things You Can Do This Halloween The fear of the Lord is to hate evil. (Proverbs 8:13) By Doug Phillips Our country is in the grip of a fear crisis. The tension because of this fear is almost palpable. There is fear over elections, fear over the economy, and fear over hundreds of other issues ranging from the environment to terrorism. The one fear that America is missing is a fear of the Lord. As a people, we no longer fear God. Because we do not fear God, we no longer hate evil (Proverbs 8:13). Instead of hating evil, Americans toy with it. We toy with holidays like Halloween that were conceived in evil and that promote the “cute-ification” of evil, whether that evil takes the form of witchcraft, sorcery, ghoulishness, or some other form of malevolent imagery paraded before our children. We laugh at the very things that the Lord describes as “abominations,” and we find ourselves obsessively fascinated by, and attracted to, all things dark. Yet we do not fear the Lord. Those who “hate evil” are very scary to a secular society that fears man more than God. They are scary because they dare to declare that there are absolute standards by which society must be governed. They are scary because, if they are successful, industries like Hollywood that make billions of dollars by promoting ungodly fear will lose their influence. They are scary because such people will not be swayed by political candidates who use fear as a tool for manipulation. With this in mind, I offer you the five “scariest” things you can do this Halloween: The scariest thing you can do this Halloween is to not make light of evil. Halloween was conceived in evil and has remained a celebration that uses children to promote a fascination with darkness and superstitious fear. Simultaneously, it makes light of things that the Bible describes as evil. Stand against such things, and the world will find you very scary indeed. The fear of the Lord makes men turn from evil (Proverbs 16:6). The scariest thing you can do this Halloween is to not be fearful. The media wants you to be afraid of everything from overpopulation to global warming. The politicians want you to be afraid of the economy and political instability. God wants you to do what is morally right, trust Him completely, and never be gripped by an ungodly spirit of fear. You can place your trust and hope for this nation in the King of Kings. Jesus said: “And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him” (Luke 12:4-5). Believe this, and you will be light to the world. The scariest thing you can do this Halloween is to completely skip Halloween and remember Reformation Day. It was 493 years ago that Martin Luther nailed his world-changing 95 Theses to the door of the Wittenberg church. These theses included rebukes to ungodly fear and superstition. 501 years ago, sometime near October 31, a baby named John Calvin was conceived who would dedicate his life to eradicating an ungodly fear of superstitious beliefs and proclaiming the gospel of grace. His emphasis on reformation, revival, and the sufficiency of Scripture had such far-reaching implications for nations like the United States that he has been described by Christian and secular scholars alike as the true founding father of America. The Reformers did something that was very scary to the world of their day. They stood against all forms of dark superstitions which grip the minds and souls of men. It was their emphasis on the fear of the Lord and the wisdom of Holy Scripture that was used by God to liberate untold numbers of men and women. But to remember the Reformers instead of Halloween is very scary to the world. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 9:10). The scariest thing you can do this Halloween is to refuse to watch or allow your children to watch any of the toxic Halloween and horror films emerging from Hollywood. America’s fascination with ungodly fear has made horror the most popular and fastest-growing film genre amoung youth. When parents allow their children to toy with this genre, they promote ungodly fear, and they contribute to the fear-factories in Hollywood that prey upon the youth of our culture. Say “no” to Hollywood horror and you will be dangerously scary to the media elite. “Fear ye not me? saith the Lord: will ye not tremble at my presence....?” (Jeremiah 5:22). The scariest thing you can do this Halloween is to get on your knees as a mother and father and pray that the Lord will send you many, children who will fear God, not man — children who will especially shun the glorification of witchcraft, the bondage of ungodly fear, and the “cute-ification” of evil that is promoted through holidays like Halloween. Cultures that toy with evil end up being cultures of death. The Christian response is to be a people of life. That means babies. It means fearing God by honoring His command to “be fruitful and multiply.” It means remembering that the Scripture describes children as a “blessing” and a “reward.” Raise children that fear God more than man, and that will be answer enough to our Halloween- and darkness-obsessed culture; for if you trust God over your womb and commit your children to a holy education, you will be very scary to the modern world. “Come, my children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord” (Psalm 34:11). Taken from Doug Philips Web address

REALLY Smart Janitors and Waiters

2010-10-25T21:43:00.002-04:00

Why Did 17 Million Students Go to College?

October 20, 2010, 9:53 am

http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/why-did-17-million-students-go-to-college/27634

By Richard Vedder

Two sets of information were presented to me in the last 24 hours that have dramatically reinforced my feeling that diminishing returns have set in to investments in higher education, with increasing evidence suggesting that we are in one respect “overinvesting” in the field. First, following up on information provided by former student Douglas Himes at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), my sidekick Chris Matgouranis showed me the table reproduced below (And for more see this).

Over 317,000 waiters and waitresses have college degrees (over 8,000 of them have doctoral or professional degrees), along with over 80,000 bartenders, and over 18,000 parking lot attendants. All told, some 17,000,000 Americans with college degrees are doing jobs that the BLS says require less than the skill levels associated with a bachelor’s degree.

I have long been a proponent of Charles Murray’s thesis that an increasing number of people attending college do not have the cognitive abilities or other attributes usually necessary for success at higher levels of learning. As more and more try to attend colleges, either college degrees will be watered down (something already happening I suspect) or drop-out rates will rise.

The relentless claims of the Obama administration and others that having more college graduates is necessary for continued economic leadership is incompatible with this view. Putting issues of student abilities aside, the growing disconnect between labor market realities and the propaganda of higher-education apologists is causing more and more people to graduate and take menial jobs or no job at all. This is even true at the doctoral and professional level—there are 5,057 janitors in the U.S. with Ph.D.’s, other doctorates, or professional degrees.

This week an extraordinarily interesting new study was posted on the Web site of America’s most prestigious economic-research organization, the National Bureau of Economic Research. Three highly regarded economists (one of whom has won the Nobel Prize in Economic Science) have produced “Estimating Marginal Returns to Education,” Working Paper 16474 of the NBER. After very sophisticated and elaborate analysis, the authors conclude “In general, marginal and average returns to college are not the same.” (p. 28)

In other words, even if on average, an investment in higher education yields a good, say 10 percent, rate of return, it does not follow that adding to existing investments will yield that return, partly for reasons outlined above. The authors (Pedro Carneiro, James Heckman, and Edward Vytlacil) make that point explicitly, stating “Some marginal expansions of schooling produce gains that are well below average returns, in general agreement with the analysis of Charles Murray.” (p.29)

Now it is true that college has a consumption as well as investment function. People often enjoy going to classes, just as they enjoy watching movies or taking trips. They love the socialization dimensions of schooling—particularly in this age of the country-clubization of American universities. They may improve their self-esteem by earning a college degree. Yet, at a time when resources are scarce, when American governments are running $1.3-trillion deficits, when we face huge unfunded liabilities associated with commitments made to our growing elderly population, should we be subsidizing increasingly problematic educational programs for students whose prior academic record would suggest little likelihood of academic, much less vocational, success?

I think the American people understand, albeit dimly, the logic above. Increasingly, state governments are cutting back higher-education funding, thinking it is an activity that largely confers private benefits. The pleas of university leaders and governmental officials for more and more college attendance appear to be increasingly costly and unproductive forms of special pleading by a sector that abhors transparency and performance measures.

Higher education is on the brink of big change, like it or not.

Christopher Matgouranis helped enormously in preparing this posting.

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Called to Sight

2010-10-21T09:39:00.000-04:00

I was reading Mark 10 this morning in my quiet time, and tears came to my eyes as I read this section...

"...Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, the son of Timaeus, was sitting by the roadside. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent. But he cried out all the more, "Son of David, have mercy on me!" And Jesus stopped and said, "Call him." And they called the blind man, saying to him, "Take heart. Get up; he is calling you."

No matter what you're going through, what you've done, what rules you've broken; no matter how blind you may be, or how feeble--Jesus is calling you. He HAS indeed called his children! So take heart, get up, and live this life he has given us with a joyful heart for what Christ has done forever for our very souls--releasing us from our spiritual blindness and giving new life eternal.

Praise God!

To Know

2010-10-20T23:02:00.000-04:00

"All I once held dear, built my life upon
all this world revers, and wars to own
all I once thought gain, I have counted loss
spent and worthless now, compared to this...

Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you
there is no greater thing
You're my all, you're the best
You're my joy, my righteousness
and I love you Lord

Oh to know the power of your risen life
And to know you in your sufferings
To become like you, in your death my Lord
So with you to live, and never die!

Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you
there is no greater thing
You're my all, you're the best,
You're my joy, my righteousness
and I love you Lord

Now my heart's desire is to know you more
to be found in you, and known as yours
to possess by faith what I could not earn
all surpassing gift of righteousness!

Knowing you, Jesus, knowing you
there is no greater thing
You're my all, you're the best
You're my joy, my righteousness
And I love you Lord...."

Music and Words by Sovereign Grace Ministries

Thank you Jesus....

WISDOM

2010-10-19T09:58:00.000-04:00

"For the Lord gives wisdom;

from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;

he stores up sound wisdom for the upright;

he is a shield to those who walk in integrity,

guarding the paths of justice

and watching over the way of his saints.

Then you will understand

righteousness and justice

and equity, every good path;

for wisdom will come into your heart,

and knowledge will be pleasant to

your soul;

discretion will watch over you,

understanding will guard you,

delivering you from the way of evil,

from men of perverted speech,

who forsake the paths of uprightness

to walk in the ways of darkness,

who rejoice in doing evil

and delight in the perverseness of evil,

men whose paths are crooked,

and who are devious in their ways."

Proverbs 2:6-16

Studying Eschotology Part 2

2010-10-13T14:41:00.000-04:00

Wow, this book just gets more and more interesting! I am thoroughly enjoying it. To clarify, the book is The Bible and the Future by Anthony Hoekema. OK let's dive right in... I will mention page numbers in the future to be more helpful in the event you own the book.

PAGE 30
When Paul talks about the "old man" being renewed and becoming a "new man" (Romans 12:2) the author makes an interesting connection to "old age" and " new age." Before Jesus we were in the old age--dead and unable to live in Christ. Here in the "new age" and "last days" we are new people! I always took those verses to mean old = sinful life (before Jesus saved me) and new = new life (after being saved by Jesus' blood). But I suppose they are fundamentally the same thing--in fact, I am now convinced that they are precisely the same thing! Just as Jesus separates the old and new ages by his death and resurrection, so the old and new man is separated by what Christ did on the cross! This especially makes perfect sense for reformed/Calvinist thinkers who believe that the VERY SECOND Jesus died, all of his chosen people were made new and their sins were gone FOREVER. Cool!

PAGE 37
"The world is often better than we expect it to be, where as the church is often worse than we expect it to be."
-Abraham Kuyper
God works ALL events in history together for the ultimate good because his plans are always and only GOOD.

PAGE 42
The author makes rather a bold claim regarding John the Baptist and Jesus. In Matt. 3:12 John is preaching before Jesus comes, and says that the one to come will, "burn the chaff with fire and save sinners." Later in Matt. 11 John questions Jesus when he's in prison, saying "are you the one who was to come, or should we look for another?" The author chooses to interpret these passages as directly related. To paraphrase the author's own words, John was wondering why Jesus wasn't burning up the sinners (so fulfilling John's prophecy in Matt 3) and bringing a better life to the righteous. He wanted to see some blood, so to speak. And he was anxious for this to happen on this earth, and so sent Jesus a message wondering if he truly was the one whom John had spoken about in Matt. 3. While this interpretation is by no means out of the question, the author almost acts like there is no other interpretation to be considered, and uses his interpretation to deal with a seemingly positive assurance of judgment coming soon, so neutralizing it.
My personal opinion is that John was simply a little low in prison (who can blame him) and wondered why Jesus, his blood cousin, didn't help him out--start a little revolution or something against Herod. John always struck me as a marvelous DOER. Someone who knew the job and got it done with no dilly dallying or shenanigans. He just got in there and got the job done. I can relate because my personality is similar. But Jesus defied the "wisdom" of a revolution and came instead with love and worked on people's HEARTS rather than directly addressing their political condition. And this probably threw pragmatic John for a loop!
I also disagree with the author that Jesus did not fulfill John's prophecy by "saving sinners and burning the chaff." I believe the moment Jesus died, he saved every sinner who was his own, and condemned every person who was not his own to "unquenchable fire," just as John said he would in Matt 3. Another instance where one's denomination will heavily influence how one interprets a passage...
Again, I am not saying the author is WRONG, just pointing out a concern that he seems to leave no room for debate and make a bold claim. Perhaps I misunderstood the author's paragraph on this topic. :)

PAGE 52
The author does an excellent job here of explaining succinctly how the kingdom of God is HERE among us now, yet not fully "out in the open" so to speak. I agree!

PAGE 54
I end with a wonderful quote by the author and Kuyper:
"As Abraham Kuyper once said, 'There is not a thumb-breadth of the universe about which Christ does not say, "It's mine."' This implies a Christian philosophy of history: all of history must be seen as the working out of God's eternal purpose. This kingdom vision includes a Christian philosophy of culture: art and science reflect the glory of God and are therefore to be pursued for his praise. It also includes a Christian view of vocation: all callings are from God and all that we do in everyday life is to be done to God's praise, whether this be study, teaching, preaching, business, industry, or housework."

Root

2010-10-08T12:25:00.002-04:00

“Throughout history you see families either bringing Christ, or bringing wickedness, wherever they go. Families, mind, NOT government, or even the church, but families… It starts with families.” –Marshall Foster

Studying Eschotology Part 1

2010-10-06T18:49:00.002-04:00

A good friend and I got into a discussion on eschatology and fulfillment of prophecies, etc. The end of it was, that he lent me this book called The Bible and the Future by Anthony Hoekema. Well, actually it was very far from the end of it; in fact, it was the beginning :) Anyway, I have been working my way through it, and decided that I'd blog my thoughts. Be warned, this is a deep subject. If I lose anyone, let me know, and I will try to simplify what I'm saying. As a farther disclaimer, I am not the most clever at writing about these deep subjects, so if I am not clear or seem to be presenting faulty ideas, just shoot me an email or leave me a comment (either one is fine) and ask me what I mean!! OK, let's dive in...

This book is meant to expound on what the Bible has to say about the future, and passages relating to the final coming of Christ. Which prophecies are already fulfilled and which ones have yet to be fulfilled. I will directly quote the author a lot of times (in italics), and then expound on what the author said in my own words.

Even as the Jews looked FORWARD to the coming of Jesus, his name was called "Immanuel" which means "God WITH us"! Despite the fact that Jesus had not yet been born, he is referred to as "God with us." To me that was profound. That as the Jews waited for the Messiah, God was already with them, even though Jesus had not yet come to earth... I thought that was cool!

The old covenant is "fading away" (Hebrews 8) BECAUSE the Israelites broke it! A covenant stands only so long as both parties keep it. If one party breaks covenant, the other party is no longer obligated to keep said covenant! So the old covenant was broken and is no more--but the new covenant, with God as one party, and us IN Christ Jesus as the other party, will never be broken because Christ makes intercession for us to the Father. Wow!! Praise God! Jeremiah 31:31-32 also speaks on this subject...

The author made a claim on page 9 about "prophetic perspective" that I found most interesting, and honestly am not sure I agree with... He says that "Prophetic perspective is a phenomenon where a prophet sees in a single vision events actually separated by thousands of years." The author didn't really give any proof for this opinion, so I am still waiting for some :)

"And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there shall be those who escape, as the Lord has said, and among the survivors shall be those whom the Lord calls." -Joel 2:30-32
The author takes this passage and applies it to the final day of God--where all men on earth are judged and a new earth takes place of the old one. But I think this could be referring to another event. According to the writings of Josephus and the Roman general Tacitus, these very things (bloody sky, smoke, sun darkened) happened in the fall of Jerusalem in 70 AD. The reason I think this passage is referring to 70 AD and NOT the end of time, is because verse 32 refers directly to Mount Zion and Jerusalem. I believe they are referred to in a literal sense. If this is the "final day of the Lord"--the end of time, then it wouldn't say Mount Zion or Jerusalem, but simply the whole world, right? I do not agree with the author in his interpretation of this verse, but that's OK as I agree with him on many other matters :) And I also could be wrong, it is just my opinion! Interestingly enough, the same exact words are used in Matthew 24 where Jesus says that "this generation will not pass away before these things take place."

I was and still sort of am overall disturbed with the author's lack of mentioning Revelation, the Fall of Jerusalem, and 70 AD. He did not mention Revelation at all until page 65! To me this is an interesting tactic. Revelation is the most eschotological book in the entire Bible (according to most people). If the author did not agree with this, he did not say so, but simply ignored it until page 65... Anyway, the author quotes many of the New Testament passages talking about the last days (Peter and Hebrews) and even says John must have been one of the later writers as he goes so far as to speak of a last hour. But the last days before what exactly, is my question for the author..? Surely they could not have been referring to the VERY END of the world as we know it, since that still hasn't happened, and the apostles were writing about it as if it was about to happen. And since Jesus had already come, my conclusion yet again is that they are speaking of 70 AD and the Fall of Jerusalem. For your information, there was a longish gap right after the fall of Jerusalem, and there are NO writings recorded from any godly person, which makes me believe the righteous were taken up to heaven, as Jesus said they would be after the tribulation (Matt 24).

I think that is enough for now. I hope I've given you some food for thought, and I also pray that I have glorified God through my typing. This is all for him and his glory--I TRULY want to know the RIGHT way and what God really meant when he inspired those men to write all those prophecies. I have tried to simply attribute all of the "day of the Lord" prophecies to the FINAL coming of Christ, but I cannot reconcile some of the wording--especially how Jesus says that certain things will take place SOON and within the generation he is speaking to.

God bless, and stay tuned, as I only reached page 20 through the above thoughts, and I am on like page 105, so I have some catching up to do!

What is PLEASING to the Lord?

2010-10-05T20:19:00.000-04:00

I have decided to go back and edit some of my old, short highschool papers, and then share them on this blog! I am starting with a subject I feel very strongly about: Courtship versus Dating. I won't say more, since my "persuasive" paper is supposed to outline my position. :) I welcome your feedback!

Courtship VS Dating

By Katie Cochran ~ September 13^th 2007

Dating or courtship, which course is more Biblical? The culture we live in promotes and even encourages dating, while courtship is a dying flame. In the 1800s, the accepted course for a man interested in a woman was to ask the woman’s father, get the okay from the woman herself as well, and then come and visit the house where she lived, getting to know her, seeing if she was “the one.” But the fore mentioned method has faded almost to non-existence, and if you say the word courtship many people, including Christians, will look at you like you are from another planet. The modern “thing” is definitely not courtship! It is considered “old-fashioned” and “primitive.” Despite courtship’s unpopularity, it is Biblical, and promotes a healthier marriage.

Dating, according to the Webster online Dictionary, is “An appointment for a particular time. A social appointment, engagement, or occasion arranged with a [my emphasis] person of the opposite sex. To go out on usually romantic dates.” Dating occurs between two people only, and they are of the opposite sex. So what you essentially have in dating are two people going out, mostly at night, alone.

Courtship, from the same dictionary, is defined as this: “To seek the affections of. To seek to win a pledge of marriage from. To seek an alliance with. To engage in social activities leading to engagement and marriage.” Notice that the definition of dating never mentions marriage, while the definition for courtship most certainly does! When a Christian courtship is begun, the man and woman involved should have a mutual understanding that they are friends who like and have an interest in each other. The focus is that they get to know each other; becoming good friends and caring for one another as brother and sister in the Lord with purity, godliness, and kindness. These two should pray for and encourage one other to walk in the ways of God and pursue intimacy with Him to become the man and woman of God he created them to be. They are giving it a try; they are listening; they are yielding to Jesus Christ for the direction of their relationship. God may want them to marry; He may want them to each marry somebody else. And there is always the possibility that God would have them serve him as singles. Whatever life path has been appointed for them, the man and woman should be waiting patiently on God, aligning themselves with purity, holiness, and the Word of God. The man and woman should have a mature understanding that if the courtship does not work out, they should part as friends, without resentment and with all due respect for each other’s feelings. It’s all about God, not the individuals! The man and woman must put their hope in God and let go of their desires.

Although it may not be “hip” and “cool”, courtship is Biblical. Would you say that God “dated” his people? Of course not! He didn’t try out the Assyrians, and then move on to the Egyptians (or any other group of people). From the first he chose a lowly tent-dweller named Abraham… And he’s pursued a people for himself ever since. Never has he dropped his people, or tired of them.

And we see that repeated in the Bible over and over again. Despite his people’s ungratefulness, God continued to pursue the relationship all throughout the Old Testament. Look at Boaz and Ruth in the book of Ruth. Boaz was attracted to Ruth, but he didn’t ask her on a date! He went to Ruth’s nearest kinsman and proposed a marriage because he saw a woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with, and accordingly got down to business to secure her—just like God did for us.

It’s easy to get carried away while alone with another person, to let emotions rule over what is right. Dating can even become an emotional “fix”; an activity that people need in their lives to feel loved and secure. Oftentimes, purity is violated during and/or after a date. One or both people probably walk away fantasizing about the other person; again, I don’t know everyone’s thoughts, but thinking comes natural to the human brain. And even during the date, it’s easy to think, “one little kiss won’t hurt” but kissing was meant to awaken passion, not be an individual action. And think about this, you are most likely kissing someone else’s husband or wife. What if you’re happily married to someone else someday and you see this person again; wouldn’t it be hard to act natural around them? The bottom line is that being alone with someone from the opposite sex for romantic purposes (dates) invites thoughts and maybe even actions that aren’t pure. God made us this way, he wants us to have feelings for one of the opposite sex, but only in the context of marriage, as the Bible so clearly states. “Sadly, dating today directly leads—almost universally—to premarital relations. ‘Leads to’ is probably not even the right term, because ‘dates’ today often involve said ungodly behavior on the first date! Actually, more often than not, immorality is the expected norm as part of the first date, and most of the ‘dates’ that follow.”1

The older, more proven Biblical model of courtship will lead to a healthier marriage, free from the guilt of the “break-up” mentality, and past emotional attachments of casual dating.

“For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light—for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord.”

-Ephesians 5:8-10

1 http://www.modernghana.com/GhanaHome/lifestyle/lifestyle_details.asp?id=VFZSRk5RPT0=&menu_id=16&sub_menu_id=0

Article on Dating and Courtship by David C. Pack

S L E E P

2010-10-04T17:51:00.000-04:00

Want a Good Night's Sleep? Then Never Do These Things Before Bed

Posted By Dr. Mercola | October 02 2010 | 79,777 views

By Dr. Mercola
Sleep is one of the great mysteries of life. Like gravity or the quantum field, we still don’t understand exactly why we sleep—although we are learning more about it every day.
We do know, however, that good sleep is one of the cornerstones of health.
Six to eight hours per night seems to be the optimal amount of sleep for most adults, and too much or too little can have adverse effects on your health.
Sleep deprivation is such a chronic condition these days that you might not even realize you suffer from it. Science has now established that a sleep deficit can have serious, far reaching effects on your health.
For example, interrupted or impaired sleep can:

Dramatically weaken your immune system
Accelerate tumor growth—tumors grow two to three times faster in laboratory animals with severe sleep dysfunctions
Cause a pre-diabetic state, making you feel hungry even if you’ve already eaten, which can wreak havoc on your weight
Seriously impair your memory; even a single night of poor sleep—meaning sleeping only 4 to 6 hours—can impact your ability to think clearly the next day
Impair your performance on physical or mental tasks, and decrease your problem solving ability

When your circadian rhythms are disrupted, your body produces less melatonin (a hormone AND an antioxidant) and has less ability to fight cancer, since melatonin helps suppress free radicals that can lead to cancer. This is why tumors grow faster when you sleep poorly.
Impaired sleep can also increase stress-related disorders, including:

Heart disease
Stomach ulcers
Constipation
Mood disorders like depression

Sleep deprivation prematurely ages you by interfering with your growth hormone production, normally released by your pituitary gland during deep sleep (and during certain types of exercise, such as Peak Fitness Technique). Growth hormone helps you look and feel younger.
One study has even shown that people with chronic insomnia have a three times greater risk of dying from any cause.
Lost sleep is lost forever, and persistent lack of sleep has a cumulative effect when it comes to disrupting your health. Poor sleep can make your life miserable, as most of you probably know.
The good news is, there are many natural techniques you can learn to restore your “sleep health.”
Whether you have difficulty falling asleep, waking up too often, or feeling inadequately rested when you wake up in the morning—or maybe you simply want to improve the quality of your sleep—you are bound to find some relief from my tips and tricks below.
**If you are interested in more information about sleep or any of the 33 items listed, I invite you to delve into the links that follow, which are grouped by subject.

Optimizing Your Sleep Sanctuary

Sleep in complete darkness, or as close to it as possible. Even the tiniest bit of light in the room can disrupt your internal clock and your pineal gland's production of melatonin and serotonin. Even the tiniest glow from your clock radio could be interfering with your sleep. This will help decrease your risk of cancer. Close your bedroom door, and get rid of night-lights. Refrain from turning on any light at all during the night, even when getting up to go to the bathroom. Cover up your clock radio.
Cover your windows—I recommend using blackout shades or drapes.
All life evolved in response to predictable patterns of light and darkness, called circadian rhythms. Modern day electrical lighting has significantly betrayed your inner clock by disrupting your natural rhythms. Little bits of light pass directly through your optic nerve to your hypothalamus, which controls your biological clock.
Light signals your brain that it’s time to wake up and starts preparing your body for ACTION.
Keep the temperature in your bedroom no higher than 70 degrees F. Many people keep their homes and particularly their upstairs bedrooms too warm. Studies show that the optimal room temperature for sleep is quite cool, between 60 to 68 degrees. Keeping your room cooler or hotter can lead to restless sleep.
When you sleep, your body’s internal temperature drops to its lowest level, generally about four hours after you fall asleep. Scientists believe a cooler bedroom may therefore be most conducive to sleep, since it mimics your body’s natural temperature drop.
Check your bedroom for electro-magnetic fields (EMFs). These can disrupt the pineal gland and the production of melatonin and serotonin, and may have other negative effects as well.
To do this, you need a gauss meter. You can find various models online, starting around $50 to $200. Some experts even recommend pulling your circuit breaker before bed to kill all power in your house.
Move alarm clocks and other electrical devices away from your bed. If these devices must be used, keep them as far away from your bed as possible, preferably at least 3 feet. Remove the clock from view. It will only add to your worry when you stare at it all night... 2 a.m. ...3 a.m. ... 4:30 a.m.
Avoid using loud alarm clocks. It is very stressful on your body to be suddenly jolted awake. If you are regularly getting enough sleep, an alarm may even be unnecessary.
I gave up my alarm clock years ago and now use a sun alarm clock. The Sun Alarm™ SA-2002 provides an ideal way to wake up each morning if you can't wake up with the REAL sun. Combining the features of a traditional alarm clock (digital display, AM/FM radio, beeper, snooze button, etc) with a special built-in light that gradually increases in intensity, this amazing clock simulates a natural sunrise. It also includes a sunset feature where the light fades to darkness over time, which is ideal for anyone who has trouble falling asleep.
Reserve your bed for sleeping. If you are used to watching TV or doing work in bed, you may find it harder to relax and drift off to sleep, so avoid doing these activities in bed.
Consider separate bedrooms. Recent studies suggest, for many people, sharing a bed with a partner (or pets) can significantly impair sleep, especially if the partner is a restless sleeper or snores. If bedfellows are consistently interfering with your sleep, you may want to consider a separate bedroom.

Preparing for Bed

Get to bed as early as possible. Your body (particularly your adrenal system) does a majority of its recharging between the hours of 11 p.m. and 1 a.m. In addition, your gallbladder dumps toxins during this same period. If you are awake, the toxins back up into your liver, which can further disrupt your health.
Prior to the widespread use of electricity, people would go to bed shortly after sundown, as most animals do, and which nature intended for humans as well.
Don't change your bedtime. You should go to bed and wake up at the same times each day, even on the weekends. This will help your body to get into a sleep rhythm and make it easier to fall asleep and get up in the morning.
Establish a bedtime routine. This could include meditation, deep breathing, using aromatherapy or essential oils or indulging in a massage from your partner. The key is to find something that makes you feel relaxed, then repeat it each night to help you release the tensions of the day.
Don't drink any fluids within 2 hours of going to bed. This will reduce the likelihood of needing to get up and go to the bathroom, or at least minimize the frequency.
Go to the bathroom right before bed. This will reduce the chances that you'll wake up to go in the middle of the night.
Eat a high-protein snack several hours before bed. This can provide the L-tryptophan needed for your melatonin and serotonin production.
Also eat a small piece of fruit. This can help the tryptophan cross your blood-brain barrier.
Avoid before-bed snacks, particularly grains and sugars. These will raise your blood sugar and delay sleep. Later, when blood sugar drops too low (hypoglycemia), you may wake up and be unable to fall back asleep.
Take a hot bath, shower or sauna before bed. When your body temperature is raised in the late evening, it will fall at bedtime, facilitating slumber. The temperature drop from getting out of the bath signals your body it’s time for bed.
Wear socks to bed. Feet often feel cold before the rest of the body because they have the poorest circulation. A study has shown that wearing socks reduces night wakings. As an alternative, you could place a hot water bottle near your feet at night.
Wear an eye mask to block out light. As discussed earlier, it is very important to sleep in as close to complete darkness as possible. That said, it's not always easy to block out every stream of light using curtains, blinds or drapes, particularly if you live in an urban area (or if your spouse has a different schedule than you do). In these cases, an eye mask can be helpful.
Put your work away at least one hour before bed (preferably two hours or more). This will give your mind a chance to unwind so you can go to sleep feeling calm, not hyped up or anxious about tomorrow's deadlines.
No TV right before bed. Even better, get the TV out of the bedroom or even completely out of the house. It’s too stimulating to the brain, preventing you from falling asleep quickly. TV disrupts your pineal gland function.
Listen to relaxation CDs. Some people find the sound of white noise or nature sounds, such as the ocean or forest, to be soothing for sleep. An excellent relaxation/meditation option to listen to before bed is the Insight audio CD. Another favorite is the Sleep Harmony CD, which uses a combination of advanced vibrational technology and guided meditation to help you effortlessly fall into deep delta sleep within minutes. The CD works on the principle of “sleep wave entrainment” to assist your brain in gearing down for sleep.
Read something spiritual or uplifting. This may help you relax. Don't read anything stimulating, such as a mystery or suspense novel, which has the opposite effect. In addition, if you are really enjoying a suspenseful book, you might be tempted to go on reading for hours, instead of going to sleep!
Journaling. If you often lay in bed with your mind racing, it might be helpful keep a journal and write down your thoughts before bed. Personally, I have been doing this for 15 years, but prefer to do it in the morning when my brain is functioning at its peak and my cortisol levels are high.

Lifestyle Suggestions That Enhance Sleep

Reduce or avoid as many drugs as possible. Many drugs, both prescription and over-the-counter, may adversely effect sleep. In most cases, the condition causing the drugs to be taken in the first place can be addressed by following guidelines elsewhere on my web site.
Avoid caffeine. At least one study has shown that, in some people, caffeine is not metabolized efficiently, leaving you feeling its effects long after consumption. So, an afternoon cup of coffee or tea will keep some people from falling asleep at night. Be aware that some medications contain caffeine (for example, diet pills).
Avoid alcohol. Although alcohol will make you drowsy, the effect is short lived and you will often wake up several hours later, unable to fall back asleep. Alcohol will also keep you from entering the deeper stages of sleep, where your body does most of its healing.
Make certain you are exercising regularly. Exercising for at least 30 minutes per day can improve your sleep. However, don't exercise too close to bedtime or it may keep you awake. Studies show exercising in the morning is the best if you can manage it.
Lose excess weight. Being overweight can increase your risk of sleep apnea, which can seriously impair your sleep. (CLICK HEREfor my nutritional recommendations.)
Avoid foods you may be sensitive to. This is particularly true for sugar, grains, and pasteurized dairy. Sensitivity reactions can cause excess congestion, gastrointestinal upset, bloating and gas, and other problems.

If you have already tried all these other things then:
Have your adrenals checked by a good natural medicine clinician. Scientists have found that insomnia may be caused by adrenal stress.
If you are menopausal or perimenopausal, get checked out by a good natural medicine physician. The hormonal changes at this time may cause sleep problems if not properly addressed.
Increase your melatonin. Ideally it is best to increase levels naturally with exposure to bright sunlight in the daytime (along with full spectrum fluorescent bulbs in the winter) and absolute complete darkness at night.

Trust Not in Man...

2010-09-30T08:31:00.002-04:00

"Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.
When his breath departs he returns to the earth: on that very day his plans perish.
Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God,
who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, who keeps faith forever;
who executed justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets the prisoners free;
the Lord opens the eyes of the blind. The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;
the Lord LOVES the righteous."
-Psalm 146:3-8

I am reading my Bible rather early this morning, and since my Bible journal is in a dark room with someone sleeping, and I don't wish to wake her up, I decided to put my thoughts on my blog (perhaps not the SAME exact thoughts as would have gone in my journal, but I assure you they will be very similar *smile*).

As I read Psalm 146 this morning, I was struck with the memory of the way people looked at President Obama during his speeches and election. It was literally like they saw a god--a savior. I thought this extremely disturbing at the time of course, but these verses, even though I've read them so many times, have suddenly presented themselves as a wonderful passage AGAINST a big government that has the ability to provide EVERYTHING you need.

OK, maybe that's a bit of a stretch :) But these verses above most definitely speak against putting one's trust in MAN and instead command trust in God. Simple, huh? I wish! When was the last time you found yourself asking GOD for what you needed, instead of just going and getting it yourself. When you really saw God as providing everything you have rather than your dad, or co-worker, or boss, or (this is my biggest one) yourself. Sure God can use these people to provide, but ultimately the providence comes from HIM and from him alone. I find myself convicted that I don't thank God enough for the little things, the basics. And I also find myself wanting in the communication area: God wants us to ask him for what we need. It's like a father/child relationship that he finds very precious...

And then, as I always like to do, we can apply these verses to our government/political system... Working at H&R Block, I saw people come in there all the time who looked on the government as their provider, and were plenty ticked off if they ended up OWING taxes rather than getting their "fair share" from the government. As a side note, I think lots of people are fed up and ready to expose the government for what it is, but perhaps for the wrong reasons... Anyway, there is a mindset fed by our political leaders promising us everything under the sun if they get elected, and ending with us as human beings becoming so easily ensnared and tricked by the promises of mere men.

The long and short of it is that we as humans should never put our FULL trust in men. We shouldn't look to our fellow humans to provide what we need. This is a major error on our part since God alone has providentially provided everything good. Give God the praise he is due--trust not in man.

2010-09-08T15:08:00.002-04:00

No men in the pews? Could be church's fault

By: John Longhurst

Posted: 4/09/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/life/faith/no-men-in-the-pews-could-be-churchs-fault-102210019.html

Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Evangelical practices mean more women attend church than men, writes David Murrow.

RICHARD VOGEL / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Enlarge Image

Evangelical practices mean more women attend church than men, writes David Murrow.

Do men hate going to church?

David Murrow says yes. "Christianity's primary delivery system, the local church, is perfectly designed to reach women," says Murrow, author of the book Why Men Hate Going to Church.

Noting that studies in the U.S. show that women make up 60 percent of a typical congregation, he asks: "What is it about modern Christianity that is driving men away?"

For him, the answer is simple: Churches today are designed for women.

"Christianity's primary delivery system, the local church, is perfectly designed to reach women," he says of the warm colours, robes, candles, flowers, sharing, tapestries, long sermons and soft, romantic worship music that are the hallmarks of many churches today.

"This church system offers little to stir the masculine heart, so men find it dull and irrelevant," he states, adding that men who do go to church seem passive and bored.

Why is church not inviting for men? According to Murrow, it's because men are drawn to risk, challenge and adventure. "But these things are discouraged in the local church," he says. "Instead, most congregations offer a safe, nurturing community -- an oasis of stability and predictability."

At the same time, he maintains, the very definition of a good Christian has become feminized. Christians, he says, are supposed to be gentle, sensitive and nurturing, focused on home, family and hospitality. The godly are supposed to be calm, gentle, polite and sociable.

Men who grew up in the church hardly notice this "feminine spirituality," he says. "We hardly notice it; we can't imagine things any other way. But a male visitor detects the feminine spirit the moment he walks in the sanctuary door."

Murrow is particularly critical of the style of music found in many evangelical churches today.

"Here's one of the great, unspoken assumptions of worship today: The more emotional the response, the truer the worship," he says. "Great worship results in sensation, passion and good feelings. The worship leader's job is to help the people generate a warm, gooey feeling in their hearts about Jesus.

"Whether passionate emotion equals true worship is not what I'm here to debate. I'm merely pointing out the fact that if ooey-gooey feelings are what we're shooting for, worship will be much easier for women than men."

All this adds up to making church a place where men don't feel welcome. "It's hard for a man to be real in church because he must squeeze himself into this feminine religious mold," he says.

Murrow is aware that his observations might offend, particularly when you consider that the church is almost entirely led by males -- and entirely by males, in the case of the Roman Catholic Church. All that means, he says, is that "the modern church is an army of women led by a few male generals."

It's not just Americans who are exploring this topic. "How do we communicate life with Jesus to the average Australian bloke?" asks Brian Winslade, National Director of Australian Baptist Ministries. "If they turned up at church next Sunday, would their experience make them want to come back for a second look?"

His answer: No. "The style of our communication, language, décor and cultural climate is much more appealing to women than to men," he says, adding that many of the songs sung in Australian Baptist churches "appeal to a feminine motif of love and intimacy."

Interestingly, a study in England found that there is no gender gap in Islam, Buddhism, Judaism or Hinduism in that country; slightly more men than women attend worship services in those religions.

You may not agree with everything Murrow says; I don't. There are lots of churches with lots of spiritually fulfilled men, and lots of people who defy the stereotypes he promotes in his book.

But his message seems to be resonating with many, and finds support in an unexpected place. A study from the Hartford Institute for Religion Research found that the presence of involved men is statistically correlated with church growth, health and harmony, while a lack of male participation is strongly associated with congregational decline.

As congregations "become increasingly populated by women," the report says, "those congregations that are able to even out the proportions of males and females are those most likely to grow."

Concludes Murrow: "Men, if you've felt out of place in church, it's not your fault. If you've tried and failed to get a men's ministry going in your church, it's not your fault. If you can't get your buddies interested in church, it's not your fault. The church system is getting the results it's designed to get. Until that system changes -- radically -- men will continue to perish, both inside and outside our congregations."

KATIE NOTES: This is an interesting point. Of course I know there are many godly men who attend church, and many churches that aren't "feminine" but I do see this person's point... Masculinity in general is sadly lacking, period, in our culture...

2010-09-01T19:49:00.000-04:00

Evangelicals and Coulter

Exclusive: Joseph Farah explains why it isn't enough to call yourself Christian

Posted: August 23, 2010

1:00 am Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=194425

Sunday, August 22, 2010

By Joseph Farah

I don't have any intention of beating to death my personal dustup with Ann Coulter, but I continue to receive a heavy volume of e-mail over this controversy – and some of it requires further exploration.

One insightful reader made this observation: "I think the most significant part of the note from Ann (about her speaking to a homosexual Republican group at an event called Homocon) is this: 'also, FYI; my fellow evangelicals – and I know lots and lots of 'em – all think it's great that I'm doing this. (Of course, they know I'm not changing my mind on gay marriage even though I like gays.)'"

It's true that much of the church is lacking the moral discernment it should receive from the Holy Spirit and the Word of God. Much of the church is as blind to right and wrong as the world is. That's alarming. But Jesus did warn us:

In Matthew 7:20-24, He says: "Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.

"Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.

"Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?

"And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

"Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them …"

Those should be alarming verses for all professing Christians. But I don't think many American evangelicals give them much consideration.

In other words, it's not enough to call yourself a Christian. It's not enough to go to church on Sunday. It's not enough to say some magic words. You've got to be sincere in your repentance and be obedient to His will.

(Column continues below)

I have no doubts that many who call themselves Christians have encouraged Ann Coulter to take this speaking assignment. I can't judge their motives. Maybe they are enamored of her celebrity. Maybe they put their friendship with Ann above giving her what they know in their hearts to be sound advice. Maybe they're afraid of being called names and cast out of impolite conservative company. Maybe they are misguided or immature or carnal Christians. Maybe they are not Christians at all.

I don't get my notion of what being a Christian is or how to be one from other Christians. I get it from the Bible.

And understand what I am saying here: I do not suggest it is wrong for Christians to associate with homosexuals, as some have charged. In fact, if we love them – or, as Ann Coulter suggests, "like" them – we should engage them. We should bring them the truth. We should share the good news of the Gospel. And that, however uncomfortable it is, means confronting them with their sin – just as we would any other sinner.

I believe that's what Jesus meant when He told us to love our enemies. The ultimate demonstration of love for a Christian should be to evangelize the lost.

There is no indication Ann Coulter has ever used one of her paid speaking engagements to do this. In fact, I'm not even sure a paid speaking engagement is an appropriate forum for evangelizing.

Nevertheless, I have heard from a few Christians who compare Coulter's paid speaking gig to Homocon with Jesus sitting down with tax collectors and sinners.

That is not good discernment.

Coulter is a political activist, a pundit, a satirist. She is not Jesus. And she is not an evangelist. No one is likely to get saved at Homocon because Ann Coulter gives a conservative stump speech.

What will happen as a result of her appearance is that a compromise will be made with sin. Sin will be condoned or appeased. A conservative icon will find accommodation with a sin that would undermine the foundations of Western civilization, the Judeo-Christian ethic and the most basic biblical standards of sexual morality.

KATIE'S NOTES: I know I am posting a lot lately, but I am getting so many good articles! I personally have never really respected Ann Coulter, finding her to be too loud and obnoxious for me--although I do admit she is very intelligent. But this has clinched the deal, so to speak. And what's the most shocking is how many Christians will blindly follow her lead and "tolerate" gay marriage. Folks, Jesus was not tolerant. Yes he was kind, yes he was loving. But he was not tolerant, and too many Christians seem to have put the supposed virtue of tolerance up there with the ten commandments! Forgive my tirade. My heart is deeply grieved and I NEVER want to "get used" to the idea of gay marriage. I want it to always shock me, always cause me to mourn for the state of our country when this defilement is not only allowed but PROMOTED by some Christians. Lamentations 3 comes to mind... "²¹ Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:

²² Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail."

A Clever Word is worth A Thousand Words

2010-09-01T19:36:00.000-04:00

I liked these quotes I got in an email newsletter... ha ha!!

"Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it, misdiagnosing it,

and then misapplying the wrong remedies."

(Groucho Marx)

"If a politician found he had cannibals among his constituents,

he would promise them missionaries for dinner."

H.L. Mencken

"Surrender is essentially an operation by means of which we set out

explaining instead of acting."

Charles Peguy

"He who does not bellow the truth when he knows the truth

makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers."

Charles Peguy

2010-08-31T16:13:00.004-04:00

Today's 'conservatives' and the sin problem

Exclusive: Joseph Farah wallops 'leaders' of movement caving to homosexual agenda

Posted: August 19, 2010

1:00 am Eastern

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?pageId=192761

Thursday, August 19, 2010

By Joseph Farah

I can't even count how many times I've written in books and columns about why I am not a "conservative."

No matter how many times I do, I am still saddled with the label by friends and adversaries alike.

It seems everyone must be a conservative or a liberal in America today.

Today I write with a new reason: "Conservatives" don't recognize sin when they see it. Nearly the entire "conservative" establishment, such as it is, fears even mentioning this word or acknowledging its existence. And, I'm afraid, without that recognition, this is a movement that is hopelessly lost.

Let's take the issue of homosexuality.

In the Judeo-Christian biblical worldview, there can be no doubt that homosexual behavior is a sin – even a particularly grave sin in God's eyes, one He characterizes as "an abomination." God's Word is unequivocal on that point – New Testament or Old.

"Speechless: Silencing the Christians," by Don Wildmon, lays out determined strategy of coalition of liberal secularists, homosexual activists and Fortune 500 companies

Yet, increasingly it seems, American "conservatives" are shy about calling this sin what it is. They also seem oblivious to the societal costs of affirming homosexual behavior as acceptable, normal and morally and legally equivalent to heterosexual behavior – sexually transmitted diseases, gender confusion among children, the breakdown of traditional marriage and the family unit, child molestations, military cohesiveness, the spread of moral relativism and, as history has shown, cultural decay.

When was the last time you heard a "conservative" leader with a high media profile speak out against what can only be described as the pervasive glorification of the homosexual culture in our schools, media, entertainment industry, Madison Avenue and, of course, government in all of its forms?

There are a few, to be sure – Pat Buchanan and Michael Savage come to mind. Any others?

Meanwhile, the oldest and most prestigious "conservative" weekly in the nation is owned by a corporation run by an activist homosexual.

Ann Coulter is gleeful about speaking to a group called GOProud, which bills itself as a "conservative" Republican homosexual organization that supports same-sex marriage and open homosexual service in the military.

GOProud was accepted as a sponsor of the last annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C.

Maybe she was persuaded to speak to that group by "conservative" leader Grover Norquist who sits on the board of GOProud.

"Conservative" icon Glenn Beck, in a conversation with Bill O'Reilly, said basically he doesn't care about the attack on traditional marriage. Asked if the California ruling will harm the country in any way, he responded: "No I don't. Will the gays come and get us? I believe that Thomas Jefferson said: 'If it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket what difference is it to me?'"

Rush Limbaugh, the iconic leader of American conservatism, hired the noted homosexual singer Elton John to perform at his wedding. He has not aired one of his bitingly satirical "gay community updates" in years.

"Conservatives," it seems, are on the verge of not only accepting homosexuality's domination of the culture, but embracing it.

Not me – another reason I would prefer not to be considered or labeled as a "conservative."

Personally, I can't even imagine a world in which same-sex marriage becomes accepted, either by judicial force, or routine, through society's capitulation to pressure. It simply won't be the same world we have known throughout our lives. The natural order of things will be irrevocably altered and broken.

(Column continues below)

It's a very big deal, and, sadly, "conservatives" are letting it happen. They aren't fighting. They are capitulating. They are compromising. They are becoming part of the problem, not the solution. Their standards are being destroyed.

Just exactly what is it that "conservatives" are trying to "conserve"? Free enterprise? Why? Because it works? So does traditional marriage. It's been proven for 5,000 years. It's the building block of any self-governing society. Without it we have chaos – sexual anarchy. I like free enterprise, too. But I know it's best because private property is affirmed by the Bible. So is marriage between one man and one woman. That's my standard.

I feel very lonely fighting this issue today – very isolated.

But fight I will – until the last breath.

Acceptance of the government imposition of same-sex marriage will be like the proverbial crossing of the Rubicon. The foundations of our world will literally be shaken.

You don't have to be a prophet to realize God will not be mocked in this manner. We won't be the first civilization to collapse because of its approval of this sin. But we might be the last.

KATIE'S NOTES: I too feel hopeless sometimes talking to other "conservatives" who seem to find no problem with different sins. The whole of the conservative movement is rooted in Christian principles without which we become just like the liberals, right??! But this article encouraged me that I'm not the only one (like Satan sometimes tries to trick me into thinking) who feels forsaken by my fellow conservatives. :)

It's been right under our noses, Christians...

2010-08-30T18:54:00.000-04:00

John W. Robbins, Ph.D.

Retrieved 8/9/10 from http://trinityfoundation.org/latest.php

or, see http://trinityfoundation.org/PDF/Review%20295-Sine%20Qua%20Non%20Enduring%20Freedom.pdf

Editor’s note: This essay first appeared in A Man of Principle: Essays in Honor of Hans F. Senholz, the Festschrift for Dr. Robbins’ Economics professor at Grove City College, which Dr. Robbins co-edited in 1992. It has since been published in Dr. Robbins’ Freedom and Capitalism: Essays on Christian Politics and Economics (The Trinity Foundation, 2006).

Dr. Robbins was blessed by the Lord to see the logical implications of the policies of our federal government long before others saw where we were heading and now are. The Bible gives us all we need to know for life and godliness, which includes the limits on governments. If we wish to see God bless America with freedom again, then the church needs to (1) repent of rejecting the Bible as its only source of truth and authority, (2) read it, (3) believe it, and (4) live according to it.

Hans Senholz is a greater defender of freedom and free enterprise than most of his teachers, peers, and students. The reason is simple, though little mentioned in polite society: A logically competent defense of a free society requires divinely revealed information; all other defenses fail. Sennholz, almost alone among eminent free enterprise economists, rests his defense of a free society on revelation.

Failed Defenses

There are four principal methods of defending a free society: economics, Natural Law, Utilitarianism, and Biblical revelation. In this essay, I shall briefly point out some of the fallacies in the first three defenses, beginning with economics.

Economics. A competent defense of freedom and free enterprise cannot rest on Austrian economics, Chicagoan economics, Keynesian economics, or any other body of economic theory. The reason is quite simple: Wertfreiheit. Economics, as a value-free science, simply is not and cannot be a source of values. Like physics, economics describes (or purports to describe) what is, not what ought to be. An economist qua economist, even (or especially) if he be the purest Austrian, cannot logically say that free markets, wealth, and increasing productivity are good, or that price controls, shortages, and unemployment are bad; at best he can only point out the consequences of price controls and free markets. An Austrian economist cannot logically say that John Maynard Keynes was wrong in preferring the short run to the long run. An economist cannot even say that economics is good. Economics can establish no values, including its own. An economist, qua economist, can make no ethical statements whatever. He can, however, give technical advice; and the better the economist, the better the advice. If a ruler wishes to impoverish a people, he would do well to listen to his Austrian advisers: They would be able to advise him how best to do it.

Utilitarianism. Since economics is a descriptive science, those interested in defending a free society must find their means of defense elsewhere. Ludwig von Mises chose Utilitarianism. It was an odd choice for a refugee from totalitarianism, for if Utilitarianism could justify any political regime, it would surely be totalitarianism. The “greatest good of the greatest number” is a slogan that has been used to justify all sorts of (at the time) politically correct murders and depredations in the twentieth century. But Utilitarianism, though it purports to offer ethical guidance, is an ethical failure. It can provide no ethical guidance, for the calculations of pains and pleasures that it requires are simply impossible.(1) Utilitarianism commits the naturalistic fallacy as well, for the fact that men are motivated to act by pain and pleasure does not imply that they ought to be.

Natural Law. Other students of Mises have chosen some form of natural law theory as the basis for their defense of a free society. But natural law, whether in its Aristotelian, Stoic, Thomistic, or Lockean form, rests on a logical blunder of the first order, first pointed out by David Hume: Natural law theory violates the rule that conclusions of arguments can contain no more than the premises.

John Locke unwittingly illustrated the naturalistic fallacy when he wrote that persons in the state of nature, “being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his Life, Health, Liberty, or Possessions.”(2) If the premises of an argument are descriptive (as in Locke’s statement), the conclusion must also be descriptive. Ought cannot be derived from is. The Marquis de Sade illustrated what happens when one tries to base ethics on nature. It is not surprising that natural law has been used by various natural lawyers to reach various conclusions on such issues as the rights of women, children, and animals; slavery, abortion, infanticide, and marriage. Natural law, being unwritten, is very much a wax nose that can be used to “justify” any conclusion one prefers.(3) Actually, of course, it justifies no action and offers no ethical guidance. Natural law is not a logically competent defense of a free society.

A Logically Competent Defense

In contrast to his secular colleagues, Sennholz rests his defense of a free society on information revealed by God. In that, he has displayed far more perspicacity than most other contemporary apologists for freedom.

In a 1987 book, Debts and Deficits, he wrote, “A [political and economic] reform…would have to restore the harmony of interests and repair moral standards. It would have to rebuild the economic order on the old foundation of the Eighth Commandment – Thou shalt not steal – and the Tenth – Thou shalt not covet anything that is thy neighbor’s.”(4) In a discussion of Social Security, he wrote: “When public assistance seems to be called for, the children of a retired worker should be given an opportunity to contribute to the support of their parents. As parents are responsible for their children, so are children responsible for their parents. No Social Security System should eradicate this moral law and Biblical Commandment.”(5)

Discussing the burden that AIDS is placing on government health and welfare programs, Sennholz has written: “In ages gone, when moral obligations meant conformity to the will of God, carriers of contagious diseases who knowingly and willingly infected other individuals, and thereby inflicted great suffering and early death on others, would have been treated as criminals, yea, even as murderers, and been promptly quarantined from the healthy community….”(6)

Sennholz uses Christ’s story of the Good Samaritan to make another point:

A helper and benefactor to the unfortunate and poor, the Good Samaritan binds the wounds, nurses the sick, and helps them get back on their feet. He does not call for government programs that make poverty a permanent social institution playing a central role in politics. He does not favor progressive income taxation, nor depend on poverty administrators consuming the lion’s share of the poverty budget, or poverty politicians enacting minimum wage laws, occupational licensing, and union power or privilege. To be a helper indeed is to lend a friendly hand to a needy person; it is personal effort and sacrifice.(7)

In one of his most recent works, Three Economic Commandments, Sennholz asserts that

Both economic systems [capitalism and socialism] rest on the foundation of an ethical order that provides answers to questions such as: Why and when is an economic act called “good” or “bad,” “right” or “wrong”? What standard of conduct is acceptable and commendable or distasteful and repugnant? What is virtue in economic life?

The market order or capitalism finds its answers in the Judeo-Christian code of morality. Private ownership in production is squarely based on the Ten Commandments. It obviously rests on the Eighth Commandment: Thou shalt not steal. The private-ownership system also builds on the solid foundation of the Sixth Commandment: Thou shalt not kill, which includes every form of coercion and violence.... To freely exchange goods and services, the contracting parties must not deceive each other. They must not bear false witness, which is the Ninth Commandment of the Decalogue.(8)

These quotations from Sennholz’s writings – and there are many more – clearly teach that it is information revealed in the Bible that forms the basis for capitalism and freedom. It is the purpose of this essay to summarize some of the Biblical information on the nature, power, and limits of government; specifically, what role government should play in money, banking, and foreign affairs.

The Hebrew Republic

The Old Testament, in particular the book of 1 Samuel, is the oldest textbook in political freedom. Absent from its pages are the communism of Plato, the fascism of Aristotle, and the democratic totalitarianism of Rousseau. Written about 1000 bc, the book of 1 Samuel may be the first handbook in republican political theory.

God established a model government in ancient Israel, and it is the only government for which he gave explicit rules. While many of those rules applied solely to ancient Israel – cities of refuge, for example – others apply to all governments. The judicial laws of Israel expired with that nation, but it is possible to discern general principles in the Old Testament laws that may be applied to modern governments.

As for the form of government, God established a republic in Israel. The nation was divided into twelve tribes, much as the United States is divided into fifty states. Each tribe had its own territory and border; each had its own local government; and the nation as a whole had a national government. There was no king; there was no powerful central government. The government consisted mostly of judges; there was no legislature to create new laws each year, only judges to settle disputes in accord with the laws that God had already given.(9) There was no standing army. There was no military draft or national service. Education was not a function of government, but of parents, schools, and synagogue. Charity was handled privately. Taxes were extremely low. Money – gold and silver – was provided by private merchants, not by the government.

The remarkable thing about this political arrangement is that it apparently was unique in ancient times, at least in the Middle East. This very uniqueness became an objection to it during the time of the prophet Samuel. The people of Israel rebelled against their model government. The story is told in 1 Samuel 8:1-18:

Now it came to pass when Samuel was old that he made his sons judges over Israel. The name of his firstborn was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah; they were judges in Beersheba.

But his sons did not walk in his ways; they turned aside after dishonest gain, took bribes, and perverted justice.

Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, “Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make for us a king to judge us like all the nations.”

But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” So Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them.... Now therefore, heed their voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, show them the behavior of the king who will reign over them.”

So Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who asked him for a king. And he said, “This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots. He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties; he will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots.

“He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers. And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants. He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants. And he will take your menservants and your maidservants and your finest young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants. And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the Lord will not hear you in that day.”

Despite this detailed and explicit warning from God, the people of Israel persisted in their demand to have a king “like all the nations.” So God instructed Samuel to give them what they wanted. In Augustinian terms, big government is both the result of, and the punishment for, sin.

God’s warning against monarchy makes it clear that God despises all earthly monarchies: The people of Israel rejected God as their invisible king in favor of a visible, human king. This account in 1 Samuel makes it clear that human kings, powerful governments, are ersatz gods; they are idols of a wayward people. Subsequent verses in 1 Samuel repeat God’s disapproval of monarchy:

But you have today rejected your God, who himself saved you out of all your adversities and your tribulations, and you have said to him, “No, but set a king over us!” (10:19). “Is today not the wheat harvest? I will call to the Lord, and he will send thunder and rain, that you may perceive and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in the sight of the Lord, in asking a king for yourselves.” So Samuel called to the Lord, and the Lord sent thunder and rain that day…. And all the people said to Samuel, “Pray for your servants to the Lord your God, that we may not die; for we have added to all our sins the evil of asking a king for ourselves” [12:17-19].

But God’s warning was directed at more than monarchy: It is a warning against big government generally, a warning of what happens when God’s model government, a republic of limited powers, is rejected. Rather than the governors being servants of the people, the people become servants of the governors. There is an echo of 1 Samuel in the New Testament:

But there was also rivalry among them [Christ’s disciples] as to which of them should be considered the greatest. And He said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and those who exercise authority over them are called ‘benefactors.’ But not so among you; on the contrary, he who is greatest among you let him be as the younger, and he who governs as he who serves” [Luke 22:24-26].

The American notion that government ought to be the servant of the people, not exercise dominion over them, may be traced directly to 1 Samuel 8 and Luke 22.

Taking

In the warning God gives the Israelites through the prophet Samuel he uses the phrase “he will take” six times. The monarchy, the strong central government demanded by the people, will be a tyrannical government. The king will take:

…their sons and their daughters; their best fields, vineyards and olive groves; a tenth of their grain and vintage; their menservants, their maidservants, their finest young men and their donkeys; a tenth of their sheep; and the people themselves to be his servants.

Through this warning we can understand more clearly what the Hebrew republic was like, for none of the evils about which God warned the Israelites characterized the republic. First Samuel is the earliest historical account that contains such a detailed analysis of the overweening powers of big government and explains the powers of such a government as the result of a defection from God and from the divinely revealed model government.

Notice that the people of Israel demanded a change in the form of their government because of corruption among Samuel’s sons, whom Samuel had unwisely installed as judges. Rather than eliminating the corrupt officials, as they ought to have done, they blamed the system of government itself and exchanged their unique republic for the pagan system of monarchy.

The king they demanded would take their sons for himself, for his chariots, to run before his chariots, to be captains in his armies, and to work for him growing food and making weapons. The primary difference between the Hebrew republic and the later monarchy was what we have come to call a military-industrial complex. The growth of this establishment would begin with a draft and national service, for the king would need enormous quantities of cheap labor to sustain his war machine.

The draftees would be the servants of the king. Some would work closely with him; others would be part of his personal entourage and palace guard. A standing army would be established for the first time – there would be captains of thousands and captains of fifties. Chariots, which at that time were offensive weapons, would be added for the first time to Israel’s defense forces. Other draftees would work to support this military machine, tending the crops in the fields the king had taken from the people, reaping the harvests for the army and the bureaucracy, and making weapons of war and equipment for the king’s chariots.

The first warning that God gives to the Israelites who were demanding a king is a warning against the militarism of the king. Militarism is not an exclusive characteristic of monarchies, but it is a trait of all large governments, whether they be called monarchies, people’s democracies, or welfare states. The military draft, a standing army, weapons factories, a large government bureaucracy, large government farms – all these were absent from the Hebrew republic, and all were disapproved by God.

But this military-agricultural-industrial complex was merely the first of the oppressions the king would impose on the people. He would compel their sons to serve him, and he would take their daughters as well. They would feed his troops, his bureaucracy, his weapons makers, and his own appetites: “He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers.” The taking of both sons and daughters for the king’s service would be the monarchy’s version of national service.

Forced labor, however, would not be enough to support the new central government. There are three factors of production, and the new king would take all of them: labor, land, and capital – land and capital in the form of fields, vineyards, groves, and grain. Eminent domain, the right of the ruler to take private property for public use, became, for the first time, a policy of the government of ancient Israel.

After the king had taken all this property from the people of Israel he would give it to his supporters: “He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants” (1 Samuel 8:15). Today we might call such a program a transfer or entitlement program, redistributing the wealth, or, echoing Bastiat, legalized theft. The last phrase is the most accurate, for God regarded these actions of the king as violations of the Eighth Commandment, “You shall not steal.”

But the king, God warns, will take more. In addition to their children, land, and capital, he will take their servants, their servants’ children, and even their farm animals “and put them to his work.” When this massive program of compulsory labor and taxation is finally in place, God continues, “You will be his servants. And you will cry out in that day because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the Lord will not hear you in that day.” The kind of government that God had created for ancient Israel, a government in which the governors were the servants of the governed, would be changed into a pagan form of government in which the rulers would exercise dominion over the people.

In his detailed warning to the ancient Israelites God explains, by way of contrast, the kind of things governors are not supposed to do. Rulers exceed their authority if they:

1. Use compulsory labor, either for their armies, bureaucracies, or households.

2. Establish standing armies.

3. Establish government production facilities.

4. Redistribute property.

5. Impose taxes of ten percent or more.

6. Nationalize the means of production.

From this warning we can see how far the United States has moved from the Biblical model: Our taxes are far higher than ten percent; they are closer to forty percent. Our government, although it is not drafting anyone at the moment, is registering young men for the draft, and it asserts its right to compel them to serve at any time. We have an enormous standing army of more than 2.6 million. There is an even larger federal bureaucracy, to say nothing of the state bureaucracies. Altogether, nearly twenty million people work for the local, state, and federal governments. The federal government owns factories, power plants, banks, and one-third of the land in the United States. More than half of the federal budget consists of transfer programs by which the government takes property from taxpayers and gives it to tax consumers. Our kind of government, in brief, is the one about which God warned the ancient Israelites.

The Hebrew Constitution

While 1 Samuel 8 establishes the limits of governmental power in a negative way by warning against the consequences of rejecting a republic and establishing a monarchy, Exodus 21-23 and some other important passages establish the limits of governmental power in another way, by telling rulers what they are permitted and required to do. As one examines these chapters, one is struck by the preponderance of laws about domestic and internal affairs. There are laws about murder, accidental killing, kidnapping, assaulting and cursing one’s parents, negligence, stealing, trespass, seduction and rape, witchcraft, idolatry, lying, bribery, and the treatment of foreigners. There is little mention of either foreign or commercial relations.

This dearth of information is in itself important. It means, first of all, that the Hebrew republic was to be primarily concerned with its own affairs, not with either economic or foreign interventionism. It was supposed to mind its own business. Its business was to see that justice was done within its own borders. The judges of the republic were not to be concerned with establishing similar governments elsewhere, even in neighboring states, nor with rectifying the enormous injustices that must have occurred daily in the pagan nations that surrounded the republic. The borders of Israel were the limits of the jurisdiction of the republic. Even within those borders, government was not to concern itself with commercial regulations; its primary interest in commerce was to punish fraudulent weights and measures.

The State and Money

In his book Honest Money, The Biblical Blueprint for Money and Banking, Gary North makes an excellent point: “There is nothing in the Bible that indicates that gold and silver became money metals because Abraham, Moses, David, or any other political leader announced one afternoon: ‘From now on, gold is money!’...the State didn’t create money.”(10) This is quite true. The Bible is the oldest and most reliable history book we have, and there is nothing in it to indicate that the State originally created money. Rather, the evidence is that money originated in the market, when merchants offered their own coins and weights of metal in trade.

Those who think that the use of gold or silver as money evolved relatively late in human history might learn something from the history of Abraham. About two thousand years before Christ, he paid for a field by weighing out 400 shekels of silver. The account is given in Genesis 23.(11)

Honesty. From this example of Abraham we see that money in the Bible is a weight of metal. Talents were certain weights of silver. Now this historical fact does not require modern money to be a weight of silver or even of metal. But it does lead to another major teaching of the Bible on money: If money consists of weights, and throughout history it usually has, then the money must be full-bodied; less than honest weight constitutes fraud. There are several passages on this point in the Bible:

You shall do no injustice in judgment, in measurement of length, weight, or volume. You shall have just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt [Leviticus 19:35-36].

The Lord abhors dishonest scales, but accurate weights are his delight [Proverbs 11:1].

The Lord detests differing weights, and dishonest scales do not please him [Proverbs 20:23].

Do not have two differing weights in your bag – one heavy, one light. Do not have two differing measures in your house – one large, one small. You must have accurate and honest weights and measures, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you [Deuteronomy 25:13-15].

Any use of fraudulent weights was subject to the penalties imposed for theft: at least double restitution, with the ultimate penalty being required for recidivism. The dishonesty of fraudulent weights is a case of the broader principle that nothing is to be misrepresented.

Fractional Reserves. If modern money does not consist of weights of metal, and it need not, it must nevertheless not misrepresent itself. The Biblical requirement is not for metal money and one hundred percent gold reserves, but for honesty. So long as private (not government) paper money is not misrepresented by its owners, it is clearly acceptable. Government paper money, on the other hand, even when backed by gold or silver, is always wrong, for government has no authority to print money.

Retribution, not Regulation. There is another principle besides honesty underlying these rules. It would seem that there were no regulatory police in ancient Israel; buyers and sellers and their agents were responsible for making sure that they were not being cheated, and if detected in fraud, a person was subject to stiff penalties. Biblical law follows the principle of punishing wrong-doers rather than trying to regulate everyone in the hope of preventing wrongdoing. That is why Paul writes in Romans 13 that the purpose of civil government is to punish evil-doers.

Legal Tender. Another thing that follows from the restricted Biblical role of government with regard to money and banking is the absence of legal tender laws. I wish to make clear what I mean by “legal tender,” since it seems to have at least two different meanings. Of course, if a government is to collect taxes or payments of any sort, it must specify acceptable forms of payment. This is one meaning of “legal tender.” In the early years of the American republic, this problem was solved by the government publishing a list of monies in which it would accept payment. It did not restrict payment to one form of money, but published a broad list of acceptable means of payment. The constitutionality of this form of legal tender was not challenged.

But there is another meaning of the phrase “legal tender”: Usually it means that a creditor is compelled to accept whatever the government has declared to be tender as payment for outstanding debts. Each Federal Reserve Note bears the words, “This note is legal tender for all debts public and private.” Those words mean that a private creditor must accept them in payment for a debt. It makes little difference that the creditor may have a contract calling for payment in something else, for the courts do not, as a rule, order specific performance of contracts. Perhaps at one time they did. But today a creditor is compelled to accept the government paper as payment.

There is no warrant in the Bible for this sort of legal tender. Rather, the clear implication is that the parties to a contract may set the terms of the contract, so long as they are not illegal in themselves, and those terms must be obeyed. The Bible praises the man who makes a promise and keeps it, even though he might be injured by keeping it. It condemns the man who defaults on a deal, or seeks to substitute something of lesser value for that which he promised to deliver. Legal tender laws are an institutionalized form of defaulting on debts.

Mammon. Finally, there is another aspect of money and the Bible that we ought to consider: money as mammon. Everyone knows that the Bible strongly condemns mammon, and many people equate mammon with money. The two, however, are not the same. Mammon is money worshiped. That is why Christ said, “You cannot serve God and mammon.” Mammon is money become an idol, and even beneficial things can become instruments of destruction if they are regarded more highly than they ought to be. The Bible condemns all forms of idolatry, including the idolatry of money. Ayn Rand did not understand this when she wrote her books, but perhaps she has a better understanding of it now.

This Biblical view of money and banking is reflected in Dr. Sennholz’s 1986 book, Money and Freedom, in which he advocates the repeal of compulsory tender laws and concludes:

Sound money and free banking are not impossible; they are merely illegal. That is why money must be deregulated…. In freedom, the money and banking industry can create sound and honest currencies, just as other free industries can provide efficient and reliable products.(12)

The State and Foreign Policy

Any adequate discussion of the foreign policy of ancient Israel must deal with several subjects: treaties, alliances, diplomacy, colonialism, espionage, and war. I shall discuss each of these briefly.

Treaties. In Exodus 23:20-33 there is an explicit command to Israel not to make treaties with the nations of Canaan: “You shall make no covenant with them, nor with their gods” (verse 32). God intended to destroy those nations, and he did not want Israel fraternizing with them. The command does not imply that all treaties are wrong, only that it was wrong for Israel to make treaties with the nations God was about to destroy. It was a command intended only for ancient Israel.

When treaties are made, however, they are to be kept, even if one is tricked into making the agreement. A treaty negotiated by Joshua with the Gibeonites resulted from his failure to follow God’s instruction (“The men of Israel...did not ask counsel of the Lord,” Joshua 9:14), and Joshua was deceived by the clever Gibeonites. Nevertheless, because the Israelites had sworn an oath, they were bound to keep it:

But the children of Israel did not attack them [the Gibeonites] because the rulers of the congregation had sworn to them by the Lord God of Israel. And all the congregation murmured against the rulers. Then all the rulers said to all the congregation, “We have sworn to them by the Lord God of Israel; now therefore we may not touch them” [Joshua 9:18-19].

Alliances. God’s command to ancient Israel not to make treaties with its neighbors does, however, raise the question of the legitimacy of making treaties and forming alliances. On alliances the Bible seems to speak quite clearly:

Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, who trust in chariots because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very strong, but who do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek the Lord.... Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses are flesh and not spirit. When the Lord stretches out his hand, both he who helps will fall, and he who is helped will fall down; they all will perish together [Isaiah 31:1, 3].

This seems to be a general condemnation of alliances and of trust in armies and weapons. The Bible disapproves of political and military alliances because they are acts of faith in weapons and soldiers, and not in God; and it discourages treaties because they are serious agreements that must be performed.

Diplomacy. The limitation on government-to-government contact in the Bible is so restrictive that embassies and permanent diplomatic missions were not authorized for the Hebrew republic. Rather, when the necessity arose, an emissary was dispatched for the specific purpose of carrying a message or discussing a problem. For example, after the Israelites had escaped from Egypt, Moses sent out emissaries to the King of Edom asking permission to pass through Edom: “Please let us pass through your country. We will not pass through fields or vineyards, nor will we drink water from wells; we will go along the king’s highway; we will not turn aside to the right hand or to the left until we have passed through your territory” (Numbers 20:17). The King of Edom refused Moses’ request, and “Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his territory; so Israel turned away from him” (verse 21).

There are two things that ought to be noticed about this account: the use of emissaries for specific and unavoidable negotiations, and the refusal of Moses as the leader of God’s chosen people to cross the border of Edom without the Edomites’ permission.

Even when ancient Israel was a monarchy, it seems that it had no ambassadors or embassies abroad: “Now Hiram King of Tyre sent his servants to Solomon, because he heard that they had anointed him king in place of his father, for Hiram had always loved David. Then Solomon sent word to Hiram” (1 Kings 5: 1-2). Even between friends, Hiram and David, there apparently were no permanent ambassadors. King Hiram had helped David build his house, but he sent messengers to Solomon. There were no permanent ambassadors even under the monarchy.

No provision was made for resident ambassadors and embassies in the model government, the Hebrew republic; and even the monarchy, apparently, did not enlarge its meddling in foreign affairs to the point of sending and receiving permanent representatives.

Espionage. A related foreign policy question is the matter of spies, for perhaps the predominant function of embassies today (and perhaps whenever they have been used) is espionage. Ancient Israel used spies, but only during war and for short periods of time. Just as there was no standing army, so there were no standing armies of spies and diplomats. God commanded Moses to “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan,” one from each tribe (Numbers 13:2). Ten of the spies were worthless; two were useful. I suspect the same ratio has always held. Moses also sent spies to Jazer (Numbers 21:32), a Canaanite city. Joshua sent two spies to Jericho (Joshua 2:1).

Some of this spying was commanded by God, and perhaps all of it was, but we are not told that all of it was done at God’s express command. But spying was used exclusively during wartime. Spying on other nations was not a normal, peacetime practice of either the Hebrew republic or the monarchy. It seems clear that spying on one’s neighboring governments during peacetime, even more than maintaining embassies that harbor spies, is a form of prohibited foreign intervention. It can hardly be argued that God’s command to Moses justifies the regular use of spies, for the command was very specific: Spy out the land of Canaan. Espionage, except during wartime, is not a proper function of government.

Colonialism. In the nineteenth century the phrase “white man’s burden” was used to justify the colonial policies of the European nations. Because of his superior culture, intelligence, race, and learning, so the argument went, the white man has the burden of ruling the lesser breeds. Ancient Israel, by contrast, had no burden to rule over the benighted nations of the world. God’s foreign policy, even when he was establishing a political state in the Middle East, was very limited in scope.

This was as it had to be: A government of limited domestic powers must also be a government of limited international powers. The proper concerns of foreign policy cannot exceed the proper concerns of government in general: the safety and freedom of the territory and people within its borders. Israel, though it was the only nation specially chosen by God, had no authority to liberate Egypt from the Pharaohs. If ancient Israel did not have such authority, even though it had specific commands from God and occupied a unique place in human history, far less does any modern nation have such authority.

War. God commanded the ancient Israelites at different times both to refrain from war as well as to attack certain nations. In Deuteronomy 2:5 God says, “Do not meddle with them [the children of Esau who lived in Seir], for I will not give you any of their land, no, not so much as one footstep.... You shall buy food from them with money, that you may eat; and you shall also buy water from them with money, that you may drink.... Do not harass Moab, nor contend with them in battle, for I will not give you any of their land” (verses 5, 6, 9). Continuing commercial relations are not forbidden, but continuing military and political relations are. Borders were instituted for the purpose of separating rulers, not peoples, from each other.

From all these considerations it is clear that the people, not the governors, play the major role in foreign relations. The governors are to settle disputes by negotiation, if possible, and by war if necessary and justifiable. Free trade and travel between nations is the rule. The absence of both resident ambassadors and spies is the norm.

In foreign policy, the role of government in ancient Israel was not to make the world, or even the Middle East, safe for theocracy. The nation was simply to occupy the land that God had given them. Had God not commanded them to do so, in specific detail, they would have had no authority to act even as they did.

Conclusion

It is not to Plato’s Republic nor to Aristotle’s Politics, not to the Greek city-states nor the City and Empire of Rome, and not to the Code of Hammurabi or Solon that we must look for a model of good government and a competent defense of a free society, but to the Bible and the Hebrew republic. Because the Bible is divinely revealed information, it furnishes us with the principles we need to defend a free society.

Notes:

1.See Gordon H. Clark, A Christian View of Men and Things (The Trinity Foundation); Religion, Reason and Revelation (The Trinity Foundation); and Thales to Dewey: A History of Philosophy (The Trinity Foundation) for some destructive analyses of Utilitarianism and other ethical systems. It is remarkable that Ludwig von Mises, the economic genius who pointed out the impossibility of economic calculation under socialism, accepted Utilitarianism and the possibility of hedonic calculation. Utilitarian calculation is even more absurd than socialist economic calculation.

2. Two Treatises of Government, Peter Laslett, editor, 31. Locke tries to save his argument by appealing to Scripture. Modern natural lawyers generally make no such attempt.

3. The recent revival of natural law theory is more than remarkable; not only does it fly in the face of David Hume and logic, it ignores Charles Darwin and biology as well. If one accepts some variety of the theory of evolution (as many natural lawyers do), one has adopted a view of nature that undermines natural law theory: Nature and nature’s laws are constantly changing.

4. Hans F. Sennholz, Debts and Deficits,164; see also page 44.

5. Sennholz, 166.

6. Sennholz, 170.

7. Sennholz, 44-45.

8. Sennholz, Three Economic Commandments, 1-2.

9. Compare Bruno Leoni, Freedom and the Law.

10. Gary North, Honest Money, The Biblical Blueprint for Money and Banking, 22.

11. It is bizarre but not surprising that secular economists rely on fables about the origin of money while ignoring a reliable history book like the Bible.

12. Hans F. Sennholz, Money and Freedom, 83

What's Happened to Orthopraxy?

2010-08-17T13:26:00.000-04:00

Is It Time?

March 19, 2010

http://micahmandate.blogspot.com/2010/03/is-it-time.html

As I pen these words, the U.S. House of Representatives is poised to use duplicitous parliamentary maneuvering to essentially put into law the version of healthcare passed by the Senate in December and advocated by the Obama Administration. If passed under the so called "deem and pass" legislative sleight of hand, the initiative would be the single largest entitlement ever enacted by the United States government, overshadowing both the New Deal initiatives of President Roosevelt and the Great Society measures put into law under the Johnson Administration.

Practically speaking, the legislation will lay the foundation for fundamentally changing the landscape of American life as we know it. Most are simply not aware of the odious aspects of the bill that would seriously impinge upon individual freedom; mandatory compliance, with associated penalties for failure to comply, an astounding concept to consider given our history; hordes of new officers to "swarm and harass" (echoing the language of the Founding Fathers in the Declaration) the citizenry; the increase of an already oppressive and unbiblical tax burden, and the willful funding of abortion in the name of preventive care, just to name a few. At the risk of sounding trite and anachronistic, let me take a moment to respectfully proffer how we got here and what we now must consider next, neither one of which is pleasant to ponder.

First, how we got here:

The American Experiment with liberty was not developed in a vacuum. Concepts of freedom, individual rights, democratic capitalism, rule of law, consent of the governed and republican structures didn't just drop out of thin air as many are led to believe. Sadly, many Americans hold to the notion that modern freedom began in 1776, in some sense disconnected from the history that preceded it. Nothing could be further from the truth. The facts of history speak plainly to anyone objectively desiring to understand the origins of our experiment in freedom. The freedoms bequeathed us were the fruit of a particular worldview, one shaped, refined and centered upon biblical formations of thought. In short, the Founders imbibed the ideas of Western Christianity and put those ideas into practice in throwing off tyranny and establishing a new outpost of freedom. Many of the worn out arguments around this center on which Founders were Christians and which ones were not - that is not the point. What is clear is that they shared a common worldview that had been shaped, yes, in part, by Enlightenment thinking, but also heavily by Christian thought.

Sadly, over the past several decades (gradually over a much longer period of time), American life has become captive to humanistic thinking and has moved away from the dominant worldview that existed during our country's struggle for independence. All the while, the Church has been complicit in this shift, albeit not intentionally in most cases, but through the propagation of a seriously deficient and truncated theology expounded from the pulpit. No one spoke of this more forcefully and cogently than the late Francis Schaeffer. In his classic work, The Christian Manifesto, which diagnoses our dilemma in an eerily prophetic manner, Schaeffer opened with these profound words:

"The basic problem of the Christians in this country in the last eighty years or so,in regard to society and in regard to government, is that they have seen things in bits and pieces instead of totals."

His point was that Christians for the most part have tried to battle on particular fronts, i.e. prayer in school, abortion, breakdown of the family, etc., in isolation, without realizing that these were but symptoms of the seismic worldview shift away from biblical thought and toward a worldview that would inevitably produce opposite results. He said this had happened because most of Western Christianity had adopted a defective view of the faith that relegated it to matters pertaining to "spiritual" things and neglected "material" things. Don't think this is true??? Think about the vast majority of sermons you have heard lately. In fact, I dare say, think about the majority of sermons you have ever heard! In the heartfelt tradition of pietism, virtually most will simply speak to the need for salvation, forgiveness of sins, accepting Jesus as Savior, prayer, bible study, etc. Now don't get me wrong; man's greatest need is having his sins forgiven, something only Christ can do. Yet most don't consider that we, as Christians, are not only saved from something (our sins), but are saved to something as well. For what purpose are we saved ??? The typical evangelical response to this question usually takes the form of, "we are saved solely to tell others about Jesus." May I submit that this is seriously deficient? Again, telling others about Christ and his redemptive work is vital for the Christian, yet it is not the whole story. Christ saves us and restores us to do what he originally intended for man to do in the beginning: take dominion over every area of life for His glory. This means that the faith can't be relegated to the inner life; all of life is spiritual! How I work and play, eat and drink, make love to my wife, educate my children, what vacations I take, what books I read and movies I watch, all of these things fall under the Lordship of Christ, for His claims are total over a man. As Schaeffer said so eloquently, our faith does not reside in one story of the house (what he referred to as the Upper Story), with the rest of life lived out in the other story (Lower Story).

How does this have bearing on the current state of affairs? Simple. Christians have adopted the notion that issues pertaining to government such as legislation and taxes are neutral. Sure, higher taxes may be bad the thinking goes, but there is no longer a basis to say they are unjust and immoral. The foundations are destroyed and we are left trying to argue with no footing to ground us.

This leads to my second point: What to do next?

This is tough and I must warn you it is not for the faint at heart. While we, as a country, have been slouching toward socialism for over a half century now, something totally and unequivocally contrary to the teachings of Sacred Scripture, we are now facing the real possibility of tyranny on a level previously unknown in our history. If you are one that thinks this is not the case, don't read any further - stick your head in the sand, keep reading your Max Lucado devotion, say your prayers before bed, and accept in practice now what you will be forced to confess down the road if things don't change - that Caesar, not Christ, is Lord. For the rest that are willing to move forward, things must begin with God's people in our time.

First, as a believer, stop relegating the things of the faith to the "inner" life. Understand that true spirituality covers all of life. I am not saying that we ever achieve this in perfection, but we must strive more and more to understand God's mind on every issue. Learn what the Bible says about the sphere of government, taxes, economics, athletics, leisure, entertainment, family, education and a host of other issues.

Second, encourage you pastor and church leadership to begin to address these issues from a biblical perspective. There are numerous resources available from many who have been fighting on this front for several years now. If they are resistant, suffer long with them and continue to encourage and love them. If (and only if) over a long period of time, they refuse to address these issues, consider, after much deliberation and prayer, linking up with a like minded community of believers who do understand the importance of not relegating the faith to a compartmentalized area of life.

Thirdly, and this is to Pastors, let me say with all humility and love, that, for the most part, you have failed your flock, and by extension, your country for your failure to preach, teach, and proclaim the whole counsel of God (I am not speaking of all pastors; many are faithful and this is intended as a generalization, but one that I believe is nevertheless true). You have accepted the dualistic model of the faith and focused your attention on the "spiritual" over the "physical," as if God Himself was not concerned about the wholeness of His creation. As a result, God's people are woefully equipped for the battles of the day. In years past, the pastor of a parish was consulted over matters not just pertaining to the faith directly, but on matters regarding every area of life. Thomas Chalmers wrote on finance and business; Abraham Kuyper laid out an economic recovery plan for the Netherlands in his role as Prime Minister. Repent of this failure and begin to discern God's counsel in all areas of life and teach the flock you have been entrusted with those very things. In addition to the above, begin to seriously formulate a theology of civil disobedience. Yes, you read that correctly! Schaeffer's book is a great place to start, but don't end there. There is an entire wealth of work to draw upon, from Luther to Calvin, Rutherford's Lex Rex and numerous other works. If you think there is no place for civil disobedience, then may I respectfully suggest that you have already, in one sense, forfeited Christ as Lord and replaced Him with Caesar. Consider what Schaeffer profoundly said at the end of The Christian Manifesto:

"If there is no final place for civil disobedience, then the government has been made autonomous, and as such, it has been put in the place of the Living God."

Understand that I am not talking about anarchy and individuals taking the law into their own hands - that is patently unbiblical and totalitarianism would be far preferable to such conditions. I am speaking of biblical civil disobedience that draws attention to the repressive and unjust statutes that are arising and will arise over the next several decades. Be a part of the new "Blacked Robed Regiment" and emulate the previous one that was so instrumental in shaping the direction of the fledgling republic over two hundred years ago.

What might this look like??? Read beneath the headlines today of the healthcare debate and you will see that several of the State Attorneys General, such as our own in Florida, and the Attorney General of South Carolina, are already stating that their respective states will not implement the federal health care bill as currently configured, as they rightly believe that it is unconstitutional. As we recover the doctrine of sphere sovereignty (that different spheres have different responsibilities and jurisdictions), this will mean that lower elected bodies check and refute the overreach of higher bodies, which was the entire framework for the American War for Independence, which was not, as many believe, a revolution in the purest sense, but a just and legal interposition of one sovereign against another. We must begin to support such measures wholeheartedly, all the while holding local and state representatives accountable and continuing to seek change at the federal level as well to repeal unjust statutes.

Finally, if you think this is all academic, then, as I said earlier, crown Caesar as Lord now but don't scream for help when his so called "benevolence" enslaves you down the road. If you fall into another category all together and still think that the Bible doesn't concern itself with this, consider the words of the Psalmist in Psalm 94:20:

"Can wicked rulers be allied with you, those who frame injustice by statute? They band together against the life of the righteous, and condemn the innocent to death."

The relevance for our day could not be more clear. Is it time to act? I believe that it is. May God help us!

Posted by Todd Leonard at 4:46 PM

What's the Goal Again?

2010-08-15T15:24:00.003-04:00

Seven Reasons Not to Send Your Kids to College

By JAMES ALTUCHER Posted 10:00 AM 08/02/10

Retrieved 8/5/2010 from http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/investing/seven-reasons-not-to-send-your-kids-to-college/19572537/?ncid=webmail#

Imagine a retirement where you could have an extra $1million to $3 million in the bank with basically no effort. Now imagine telling your kids that you aren't going to send them to college. And, you go on, you want them to immediately start a business or get to work as soon as they finish high school.

These are difficult things to imagine because we've been so scammed by the "career industry" that tells us we need college degrees in order to succeed in life, regardless of how much money we spend for those degrees or what we actually do with our lives during the four to eight years it takes us to get those degrees.

But in my view, the entire college degree industry is a scam, a self-perpetuating Ponzi scheme that needs to stop right now.

Here Are Seven Reasons to Say "No College" to Your Kids:

1. More than 60% of people entering college take more than four years to graduate. So whatever you think your kids are going to cost you to go to college, add 20% to 100%.

2. The cost of the average college tuition has gone up nine-fold since 1976 versus seven-fold for health care and three-fold for inflation.

3. The differential in lifetime income between a college graduate and a non-college graduate over a 45 year career is approximately $800,000 (read on).

4. If I put that $200,000 that I would've spent per child to cover tuition costs, living expenses, books, etc. into bonds yielding just 3% (any muni bonds) and let it compound for 49 years (adding back in the 4 years of college), I get $851,000. So my kids can avoid college and still end up with the same amount in the worst case.

5. If smart, motivated, ambitious kids (the type of kids who get the most out of college) avoided college I'm sure the differential would be a lot less than $800,000 and may even be negative (i.e. they would make more if they avoided college and started going into the business world earlier).

6. The average debt burden of a college graduate is $23,000. Up from $13,000 10 years ago. Students with professional degrees can see their debt burden go higher than $200,000. Total student borrowing has topped $75,000,000,000. It's too much for young adults just starting their careers.

7. Alternatives to spending $200,000 per kid so they can waste four years of their lives:

* Give them $20,000 to start one to five businesses. Most businesses fail but that's ok. The education from the process lasts a lifetime and the network you build when you start a business will lead to many future jobs and possibilities.

* Travel the world. That would be an education that pays many dividends and is much cheaper. Your kids can then go to college with a much more mature view of the world.

* Work. They won't get the best jobs but they can make money, network, get a "hands-on" education, learn the value of money and go to college in their 20s when they can afford it -- and make every dollar worth it. Plus your kids will have a more clear idea of what they want to do in the world.

* Volunteer. Let them see a side of life that is harder and where they can add value. An education like that is invaluable.

* Do nothing but read. Get the benefits of a college education without paying the $200,000. I'd be happy to support a child that wants to home school a college education.

KATIE NOTES: I don't like the slightly arrogant and know-it-all tone this article has so I apologize for that aspect of it, but the LOGIC is good. That is why I posted it. So let me know what you think :)

Too Strong...

2010-08-15T15:03:00.002-04:00

"Lead me on
I will follow where you go
through suffering
May my faith never falter
Grace is too sweet
Your love too fine
That I could ever leave you behind
So lead on
Lead me on...

You won't let me fall away!
You won't let me fall away
You won't let me fall away

Lead me on
Though I often lose my way
I faintly see
So on this road I'll walk by faith
Your grace is too sweet
Your love is too strong
That I could ever fall from your arms
So lead on
Lead me on lead me on!!

You won't let me fall away
You won't let me fall away
You won't let me fall away..."

A little known band called West Coast Revival wrote and performed this song. I encourage you to visit their website and buy their CD if you appreciate quality music and VERY Gospel-centered rock :) (but not too rocky). Anyway, I'm not blogging this song to promote this band and give them more publicity (although I do wish more people knew about them). This song keeps coming up on my MP3 player's random play list and every time I hear the beginning, I don't skip it, but listen to it. And every time I feel chills (the good kind). I feel *good* chills because it's true: God has me. He has literally--completely and totally captured my heart. His love is too strong--there is no way that love will be cheated by me falling away. It's because of God's mercy and grace that I am in his hands, and that's how it's always been, and always will be.

And I am so glad. My heart rejoices in God my Savior.

Thank you Jesus....

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S L E E P

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