Atonement 2012

Greetings, One, and All:

We are waking up to a very fine morning and the coffee, huh; well wait a minute there seems to be something missing. It’s the coffee, there’s no coffee, no water, no milk, and there is no food either. Today is Atonement; it’s that day, the day we as Gods people look forward to every year. At sunset yesterday we began a 24 hour fast, in addition to being a fast day, it’s a high holy day. We are command by God on this day to come together in a holy convocation and worship God.

To ancient Israel, it was a time of the year they would as a nation seek forgiveness of their sins and a cleansing from God; the high priest would enter the holy of holies on behalf of Israel taking the blood of the sacrificial goat as an offering to God. If it wasn’t accepted for some reason, Israel would have a bad year ahead of them.

When Christ was crucified the vale was torn symbolizing we have access to the throne anytime we wish because Christ is our sacrifice, advocate, and savior, and not to mention our high priest.

This day foreshadows something else as well, it is the reason we as Gods people still observe atonement to this day. But, I can’t put it all in this small reminder; you have to view the services to find out why this day may be the most important of the year. You don’t do Gods holy days, you believe they’ve been done away with or they have already been fulfilled, or you don’t do them because you think they are Jewish and you aren’t Jewish. The bible addresses all of those reasons and more, but one element is always missing in folk’s salvation plans, belief!

You have to believe what you read and not what someone else says, and that takes something else, faith! Open your eyes, it’s a very fine morning, I mentioned that already, didn’t I.

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Fading Freedoms

Greeting:

We’ve all been hearing the news coming out of regions of the Middle East giving graphic details of the murders of four US embassy personnel one of which was our Ambassador to Libya. The administration immediately jumped upon the opportunity to lay blame on the whole incident to a fifteen-minute film. Hardly anyone in that region of the world has a TV or goes to the movies so most of the population hadn’t even seen the clip that was actually posted on Utube. Late this week the administration finally admitted it was a terrorist attack and not the movie clip that was the center of the uprising. It seems the king of America has been shown to have no clothes, the question is, “will it matter?” Will it matter to those that have spent a lifetime on the welfare system, or those looking for the next government program to avoid work?

In the process of all this going on little attention was being given to the fact a man in this country was arrested for his expression of free speech. It seems a minority of folks in this nation, that was founded on the principle of free speech, are willing to give that freedom up to appease the wacko’s. When the curtain is pulled back and the wizard of Oz is exposed we will discover our freedoms left us a long time ago, we are just now seeing the fruits of the evil coming into being. This nation turned from the course of individual freedoms decades ago, no one stood up then and very few are willing to take a stand now, that’s how it works in socialist countries.

Before its over and the smoke clears, we may see things like, banning the internet, shutting down certain TV stations and radio programs. Folks may be arrested for preaching the word and expressing themselves about their beliefs in public. Gods word may be reduced to a house to house witness once again.

Turmoil and chaos has come to the shore of our once great country and the government has become our oppressor, this didn’t happen over-night and it won’t go away with one election. Only when the hearts and minds of the people of this nation changes, will things truly get better.

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Get off the Bus!

Sabbath Greetings:

Most folks need directions now and again finding where they’re going in a strange part of town or a place they’ve never been before. It isn’t unusual or out of place to pull over and ask someone for information, unless you’re a man of course, just joking. We have signs that direct and help keep us on course, markers that signal we’re where we need to be during our journeys. While in driver training obeying signs and marker are pounded into our minds as being necessary and the law of the land, we don’t need a lot of lost men roaming around out there not being able to find their way home, just kidding.

God has fashioned his own set of signs and warnings, he has his directional guide and map to the Kingdom. We are instructed to follow the directions given; we are told by scripture which way is the right way. We are told through scripture even nature and happenings around us are road-markers that are our guides. I was using the old jokes about men not wanting to pull over for directions because they’re too embarrassed to acknowledge they might get lost, but the world wants their religion to be like riding on a bus with someone else driving and observing the signs for them. They want little or no responsibility for they’re journey in this world and they will tell you, its better not to know how they got there, just that they arrive at their destination.

We are entering into the fall holy days and it is a time of celebration, prayer, and fasting. It is a time where journeys are made, new friends are made, and hope is fulfilled. These Holy days are also road-maps to the Kingdom, they show us what God is doing with mankind, they’re the key to the mystery of mans existence on this planet.

It’s truly a shame most folks only desire is to ride on the bus of ignorance, watch the scenery, and wonder about God hoping they make it to the kingdom. If you decide to take a chance and get off the bus, it may be a harder journey and you may lose your course on occasion, but God will be always there to give you directions back onto the road to the Kingdom and the rewards are unimaginable.

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Deja’vu

Greeting;

Deja’ve all over again; I looked on the news this morning to discover the Libyans have stormed our embassy in Libya and killed the ambassador. It’s eerily reminiscent of 1979 and the Iranian revolt that culminated in a hostage ordeal involving our embassy folks lasting for months. It didn’t end until Reagan entered into office in 1980 and our folks were finally released.

To me, it shows the inept attitude of our foreign government under this administration and their unwillingness to be firm in the face of threats. The Carter administration traveled the same road of appeasement thinking in dealing with rouge nations and it got us nowhere fast, just like today.

Our military was crumbling in disrepair and becoming obsolete when Reagan took the reigns in 1980 and brought us back to number one in the world. The same chore will fall to Romney providing he wins in November because the number one function of our government is to protect its citizens and maintain a strong military for the defense of the nation. This nation’s number one function isn’t welfare distribution and any policy in my opinion to the contrary is undermining the sovereignty of this nation.

Is God leaving the outcome of this great nation to the people? We choose Reagan a moral upstanding man over Carter in 1980 and this nation flourished because of that choice. Is God setting the stage for us to choose a similar path with Romney or a continued downward spiral with Obama? We who remember the late 1970’s and the Carter years remember the despair and hopelessness it brought similar to today’s atmosphere. Has God set the same stage all over again to see if we are still moral people? A nation can survive a bad leader but it can’t survive corrupt citizenry. If change comes like it did in 1980, will it look like a moral change or one of self-indulgence and decline?

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Political Heat

Greetings:

The first cold front is moving through here in Texas and we are feeling relief from one-hundred plus thermometers. Heat in Texas is as natural as mom’s apple pie to most Texans who have been here for a few years. Truthfully, you never, ever, get to where you enjoy the searing heat, but you get to a point where you expect it.

Heat is a relative term, as I just mentioned, like the heat in Texas, there is also heat of a different source occurring. Heat from politics is brewing stronger than ever before and the forecast is for fifty-plus more days of blistering rhetoric. We just saw two weeks of meltdown after meltdown with bloviating bags of hot air expelling promises of cooler days ahead. The heat from these dusty storms of party pledges is causing a drought of plentiful enthusiasm and a lack national awareness.

The political front is hard to pin down it seems to be popping up in unexpected places causing damages in folk’s natural way of thinking. Sensible folks tend to lose their moral direction when these storms occur in their vicinity; I think for most, it’s because they are trying to hold onto anything they can. The overwhelming force of these political disasters, depending on their direction can strip away any sense of hope.

There is relief on the way for those suffering from the damaging effects of heat, and it’s one many choose to ignore. Until we put God back into our lives and country we will suffer these interminable droughts, heat, and storms. Until Christ becomes our shade in times of trouble we will endure storms of immorality. The truth about climate change is us changing who we are and what kind of land we want to live in. Oh, did I mention there is a front moving through and it really feels good.

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Entropy

Greetings:

What is entropy, the definition according to Websters is as follows: (1. measure of disorder: a measure of the disorder that exists in a system). When I think about the nation’s pulse, I think entropy. Has order gone up or down, has disorder taken a more center stage within peoples lives? The Republican party is asking the question, “are you better off than you were four years ago”, and the answer from so many folks is, NO! Entropy is hard at work in our society and is proving there is increasing disorder in governmental functions.

The second definition given is: (2. physics, measure of unavailable energy: a measure of the energy in a system or process that is unavailable to do work. In a reversible thermodynamic process, entropy is expressed as the heat absorbed or emitted divided by the absolute temperature.) We have a large amount of disorder and an ever increasing amount of energy unavailable to work within our society. It sounds like the perfect word to describe the condition of our society and culture. With less and less folks on the employment rolls and more and more on government subsistence, we are in a state of entropy.

There is a great amount of enthusiasm lost towards our Politicians these days, and there is little energy in being applied towards trust or hope that things can get any better.  There is no great fire from the total masses to drag our nation back to a moral center. There is a segment that cry out but divided by the absolute population within our borders, one must concede entropy is dragging us down to a point of no return.

Entropy has found a home in religion, we find more and more disorder in the nations churches. Pastors conceding their social responsibilities to the government and giving in to degenerate ideas such as, same sex marriage.

Our only hope is God will interject moral energy back into the land and create a new balance where the good out-weighs the bad once more. Pray for the good of our land, and the soul of our nation.

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Anti

Greetings:

Anti this, anti that, why is everything anti in our culture today. If your against something, your anti (fill in the blank), its as if everyone is carrying a grudge according to the news media. It makes you wonder if common folks can have an opinion about anything and not be labeled anti, bigot, or a host of other derogatory names. Anti is commonly used when someone is opposed to something or it can mean in place of something or someone.

If I was truly opposed to something being anti wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing, because I am anti-abortion, anti-homosexual, anti-big government, anti-smothering regulations and anti-deficits, just to name a few. But the way in which conservatives are portrayed because of certain values engrained within our mental and physical makeup makes us look like we’re part of Polpot’s Cambodian regime in the 1970’s ready to shoot anyone with differing opinions.

You can have your beliefs, just let me have mine, and believe me when I say conservatives are no threat to your beliefs. We are anti certain things we care about, but we are also anti-against taking away our rights. Conservatives and liberals alike have rights to free speech, the right to assemble, the right to free commerce, freedom of religion and to bare arms. We conservatives are inclusive in our anti-isms not exclusive like some of our friends on the left would be in these matters.

The anti-everything crowd seems to be setting us all up for something because we use anti way too much in our descriptions these days. Is anti the buzzword for evil; are we being anti-marked, is our lives about to change. Satan is referred to as the anti-Christ, the anti-savior, is he coming in place of the real Christ? Has the demonic world begun its preparations for a day in the near future when anti will seem like a heavenly blessing? How will you know if it happens this way, how will you be able to tell the difference between the anti and the real? Well if your anti-reading the bible, and anti-believing scripture; then, you probably won’t be able to recognize the real Jesus Christ when he comes. On the other hand, if you read the bible daily, it will probably make you a little anti-evil as well, and that would be a good thing.

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