Christmas Is A Waste of Time, Isn’t It?

So much is made over Christmas. Pageants, plays, church services, gifts, decorations, and music.

Maybe it’s a waste of time.

Maybe it’s just a bunch of malarkey. I mean maybe Christianity is just a fairy tale. It’s nice and all, but what if I’m wasting my time?

I mean there are other religions, what makes Christianity so special?

There’s Hinduism, the religion that says it’s the oldest religion, and “Hindus believe that no religion teaches the only way to salvation above all others, but that all genuine paths are facets of God’s Light, deserving tolerance and understanding.” (From himalayanacademy.com) In other words, they believe it doesn’t matter what you believe, as long as you’re sincere. And that you’ll be reincarnated over and over again until you get it right.

So that doesn’t seem to offer much hope. Maybe you’ll get it right, maybe you won’t. And by whose standards do we decide what’s right?

There’s Islam, which teaches “the purpose of life is to live in a way that is pleasing to Allah so that one may gain Paradise. It is believed that at puberty, an account of each person’s deeds is opened, and this will be used at the Day of Judgment to determine his eternal fate.” (From religionfacts.com) In other words, if you have enough faith and you do enough good works, you get to go to paradise. But you won’t know till you get there if you’ve made it.

Again, not a lot of hope there either.

Or maybe there’s just no god at all and religion is irrelevant. Talk about a bunch of malarkey, huh? I suppose it’s possible that the universe just “happened,” you know, the Big Bang theory and all that. Maybe the world spins on its axis by coincidence, maybe the seasons happen every year just by happenstance. Maybe human beings grew from amoeba, or rocks, or both. And we evolved perfectly with all the necessary organs and body parts, all in the right place, at the same time.

Definitely no hope there.

That brings us back to Christianity.

The religion that has spawned hospitals in the name of Jesus, charities too numerous to count. Christian charities which help anyone in need unlike Muslim charities which only help other Muslims. And to be fair, there are secular charities, but not nearly as many as Christian ones.

But that’s not the point, let’s get back to my original question: is Christmas a waste of time? Was there a baby named Jesus born in Bethlehem 2,000 years ago and if so, is he worthy of a holiday?

I’m sure many could point to supposed facts pointing to how Jesus wasn’t born in Bethlehem, how it was impossible. And of course we don’t know the date of his birth. To that I say, “so what?” I say that because, while much is made of Christmas, it’s not the Super Bowl of the Christian calendar – Easter is!

Oh now you say, “that’s a whole other set of issues!” You’re correct, but let’s postulate that if Easter is true, then Christmas is worthy of celebration.

I’m just going to give you some things to think about regarding Easter:

First of all, except for the most staunch atheists, the majority of people agree that Jesus lived, and that includes most of the other major religions, including Islam.

If Jesus lived, and he was crucified according to the story in the Bible, and the disciples lied about his resurrection, why would the majority of them die for a lie? Who dies for a lie? The disciples who ran away when Jesus was arrested, these same went on to die rather than recant.

If Jesus didn’t really rise from the dead, why didn’t the Jewish or Roman authorities simply produce his corpse to put an end to the nuisance of this new sect, as they called it?

To this I say, bring on the festivities! Let’s honor the birth of the One who came just to die for us! let’s have the pageants and plays! decorate the tree! exchange gifts! Wish one another Merry Christmas! Because the One whose birth we celebrate is the One who loved us enough to die for us.

And if you still aren’t sure, consider this: if I’m wrong I’ve lost nothing, but if you’re wrong, you’ve lost everything – for eternity.

If Daniel Prayed for America

Daniel, author of a book of the Bible bearing his name, prayed a prayer for his nation which can be found in chapter 9. Israel was in captivity because of the many sins they committed, including idolatry and child sacrifice. They were near the end of the foretold time that the captivity was to end and Daniel, a great man of God prayed for his nation. I was thinking that prayer applies today. Below is a modern version of the prayer found in Daniel 9.
“O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with all who love him and obey his commands, we have sinned and done wrong. We have been wicked and have rebelled; we have turned away from your commands and laws. We have not listened to your servants who spoke in your name to our leaders, our fathers, and to all the people of the land.
“Lord, you are righteous, but this day we are covered with shame because of our unfaithfulness to you. O LORD, we and our leaders are covered with shame because we have sinned against you. The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against him; we have not obeyed the LORD our God or kept the laws he gave us through his Word. All America has transgressed your law and turned away, refusing to obey you.
“Therefore the curses and sworn judgments written in your Word, are being poured out on us, because we have sinned against you. You have fulfilled the words spoken against us and against our rulers by bringing upon us great disaster. Under the whole heaven nothing has ever been done like what has been done in America. All this disaster has come upon us, yet we have not sought the favor of the LORD our God by turning from our sins and giving attention to your truth. The LORD did not hesitate to bring disaster upon us, for the LORD our God is righteous in everything he does; yet we have not obeyed him.
“Now, O Lord our God, who brought your people out of Egypt with a mighty hand and who made for yourself a name that endures to this day, we have sinned, we have done wrong. O Lord, in keeping with all your righteous acts, turn away your anger and your wrath from us. Our sins and the iniquities of our fathers have made America and your people an object of scorn to all those around us.
“Now, our God, hear the prayers and petitions of your servant. For your sake, O Lord, look with favor on your us. Give ear, O God, and hear; open your eyes and see the people that bear your Name. We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. O Lord, listen! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, hear and act! For your sake, O my God, do not delay, because your people bear your Name.”
And God said,”If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
Amen.

Pruning the Rose Bush

I have this rose bush in the front of my house that I’ve had since my first mother’s day, and my oldest is 20 now. In spite of my best efforts, I can’t kill this this thing. (That’s sarcasm – I have the opposite of a green thumb.) It’s survived several blizzards, neglect, and a transplant. Apparently, rose bushes aren’t supposed to be transplanted. I did not know this until after I transplanted it. They say ignorance is bliss, and in this case, evidently so, since it thrived in its new home.

Today, I decided it could do with a bit of pruning, since it had many blooms at the end of their cycle, dead branches, and I wanted to plant some flowers around it, to make my own pretty little flower bed. (I like impatiens – I can’t kill them either.)

As I was pruning it, I realized this was similar to how our heavenly father prunes us. He takes whatever is useless in our lives and trims it away. He takes the dead things, our bad habits, and lovingly removes them. At the time He does it, it may seem painful, but eventually we’ll see the fruit of His labor and realize we are the better for it.

Even as I removed the overgrown weeds around the rose bush, it made me think of God’s work in us. Some of the weeds had deep roots which required lots of effort to get them up, while others came right out. Some of the things God removes from our lives are like that: we hold on to some bad habits and easily relinquish others. At any rate, once we invite God into the garden of our lives he will continue to work on us until we are His perfect and most beautiful masterpiece.

Jesus said in John 15: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you.  No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”

Let’s remain in Him and allow Him to do His work in us.

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America the Beautiful?

America, the Beautiful?

When I was a schoolgirl, we used to sing “America, the Beautiful.” Remember that song? I suspect it’s not sung in public schools anymore. The first stanza goes:

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

When I was a schoolgirl, we believed God had indeed shed His grace on America. We knew America was the best place to live, and we appreciated that fact. We learned American history and studied how the early settlers thanked God for making it through the hard times.

When I was a schoolgirl, the civil rights struggle was in full force. Thank God people finally realized how stupid it was to keep someone out of a place because of their race. To be sure, prejudice still exists, but no longer on a grand scale. Hello? We have a black president.

When I was a school girl, some people lived together before they were married, and they might have been friends of our parents, but it was still considered shameful, and not something people normally did. And it was not common to have a child “out of wedlock.” Now it’s totally commonplace to do both. 40% of babies are now born out of wedlock.

When I was a schoolgirl, they barely showed people kissing on TV, now they practically have sex right on prime time TV. And things shown in R rated movies today would not have been allowed in regular theaters back then. I remember the first time I saw a scene on TV where a woman was in just a bra and I was shocked. Now it doesn’t even phase me. We have been desensitized to such things.

To be sure, there are many things I’m glad are different today. I love the gadgets and the ease of communication, but I’m sad how low our morals have slipped. More and more couples live together without being married, they have babies out of wedlock, and it’s cool to be gay.

Our society has been transformed from a once primarily Judeo-Christian one, to one that is so accepting of anything that anyone who tries to speak sanely is considered to be hateful. No just wrong – hateful. Discourse is no longer allowed, we are to accept whatever society comes up with.

There is a tremendous amount of debate on both sides of the major issues. Will gay marriage destroy our society? Does it matter whether couples live together or not? Do children need a mother and a father?

But that brings us to the song I first mentioned. I believe God once did shed much grace on America. We were the city on the hill. Now, in our efforts to please everyone, and be politically correct, we have turned our backs on God.

And He has turned His back on us.

The Truth or Not The Truth

The church has existed for 2000 years and since day one we have been persecuted. It will be so until Jesus returns. Even so I will not stand idly by and watch it happen.

The church has stood for good since its beginning yet we are accused of being haters if we dare to speak the truth. There is something wrong with that mindset.

If we dare to suggest that homosexuality is wrong, as are other sexual sins, we are called haters.

How can be wrong to speak the truth in love? If someone is at heading toward a cliff would we not warn them? If we see a house on fire wouldn’t we call for help? Do we not have the right and yes the responsibility to speak up?

The hot button issue today is homosexuality. Do we not have the right to have a discourse on this or any subject? Yes the Bible says homosexuality is wrong; it says a lot of things are wrong. People like to bring up the that the Old Testament calls for the killing of homosexuals and other sinners. But when they brought an adulterous woman to Jesus to stone her, Jesus prevented it by pointing out that they were sinners too. This shows us that we are to treat all sinners with love. Christianity teaches us to love all people matter who they are or what they are or what they do. Unlike Islam which teaches to kill sinners especially homosexual but no one seems to bring that up.

Some call God a cosmic killjoy because he tells a certain things are sins. Is a parent a killjoy when he tries to prevent his child from doing something that will bring harm? God said one man and one woman married for life for a reason. It is a way to stop the spread of sexually transmitted diseases. If everyone was monogamous there would be no sexually transmitted disease. If you live a promiscuous life you will likely get an STD, possibly a fatal one. Even if you’re straight and have sex with multiple partners you will most likely end up with a sexually transmitted. Or an unwanted pregnancy.

You have the right to not believe in God or the Bible. You can decide to live your life any way you chose, but if you find there is a God you will have to answer for your actions. You will not be able to say that no one told you.

This is not the time for the church to be silent. We need to stand up for what we believe in. And God willing until Jesus returns we should do that till the day we die. Even if that means dying at the hands of someone who disagrees.

Review of Simple Secrets of A Happy Life

If you’ve ever been fortunate enough to see Luci Swindoll speak, you know what a dynamic person she is. She’s the kind of speaker who makes you hang on the end of your seat listening to her, and she writes the same way.

Simple Secrets is an easy to read, concise, yet right to the point, guide to living. Many people go through life miserable, and Luci offers 50 ways to be happy. This is not a crazy guru telling us to sell our possessions and move to a mountain top. No, these are 50 common sense ideas to make sense of life. Like “Honor your mother and father,” and “value what you have,” and my personal favorite “build yourself a small library.”

Luci writes likes she’s talking to a friend, and indeed as you read you begin to feel as though you are reading a letter from a good friend. She writes warmly and honestly. She’s about eighty years old and has the kind of wisdom you’d expect from someone who’d lived that long, with old fashioned values, but yet thinks like a modern person.

Overall, it was a thoroughly enjoyable and thought provoking book. I highly recommend it. I was given a copy to review, but the opinions expressed are my own.

Spiritual Thoughts on Titanic’s 100th Anniversary

I have always been fascinated with Titanic. When I was a kid I read every book in the library about it. Now it’s been 100 years since she sank. We now know how she sank, why she sank and where she sank. And thanks to James Cameron’s movie of the same name we can truly see the reality of it.

They said that God Himself couldn’t sink her and then irony of ironies she sank on her maiden voyage! I used to wonder if maybe God did sink her because people said that just to prove a point, but I don’t believe God is cruel. However, that being said, last night while I was watching the movie in IMAX 3d (very cool by the way) I was thinking there are some spiritual lessons that can be observed. For the sake of argument, lets assume the movie of the same name got the details correct, since most people have seen it.

Imagine that Titanic was a representative of the world: the ship contained people from all walks and all classes of life; many different nationalities; and all different ages. The people aboard Titanic believed they they knew what they were going to do on April 15, 1912 much as we believe we know what we’ll do tomorrow.

The people aboard Titanic went about their lives – some were working, some on vacation, and some on their way to start new lives or visit relatives. Some were just on their way home. Like us, they never gave a thought to the future, just as many of us never give a thought to our future – as in what happens when we die.

When Titanic hit the iceberg, lives were changed forever. The shipbuilder, Thomas Andrews, told Captain Smith the grim reality, “No matter what you do, from this point on, Titanic will sink.” When we’re born, from that point on, no matter what you do, you will eventually die.

The captain gave the order to load the life boats. The people, not believing the ship could actually sink, at first milled around like it was a party, They didn’t want to be bothered to leave the comfort and warmth of the ship just to float around in life boats for no good reason. Just as most people don’t want to leave their comfort zones in order to hear the Gospel.

When it became apparent that perhaps there was a problem, people were more willing to enter the life boats, but still some help out hope that either Titanic would not sink or that they still had time. Similarly, many people don’t believe that their soul is in danger – they believe their own efforts will be their own reward or that there is another way to be saved other than faith in Jesus.

Unlike Titanic, which did not have enough life boats to save everyone aboard there really is room for everyone who will believe in Paradise. “Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. (Romans 10:13)

Aboard Titanic, many of the crew continued to work to save as many as possible, even at the peril of their own lives. The crew and officers continued to load life boats as long as possible, and it’s said that the musicians played until Titanic sank, in order to help people keep calm. Much of the crew chose not to board life boats in order for there to be room for more. Many people give their lives to spread the Gospel. There were more Christian martyrs in the 20th century than in all the the centuries before put together.

Like the passengers aboard Titanic, your life can change in an instant. At 11:40 PM, they were sleeping, partying, or working. By 2:20 AM most were dead.

Won’t you choose the true life boat – Jesus? He is the way, the truth and the life, through Him i the promise of salvation, you only need to trust Him as if your life depended on it – because it does!

If you’ve seen the movie Titanic, near the end a priest is comforting some passengers by quoting Revelation 21:

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”*

“From this point on, no matter what you do, Titanic will sink.”

The Ant and The Grasshopper

NOT MINE – FROM PATRIOT POST – HAD TO SHARE

The Ant and The Grasshopper
TRADITIONAL VERSION:
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY:
Be responsible for yourself!

MODERN VERSION:
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving.

CBS, NBC, ABC and CNN show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so? Kermit the Frog appears on MSNBC with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing, “It’s Not Easy Being Green.” Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant’s house where the news stations film the group singing, “We shall overcome.” Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper’s sake.

Democrat leaders, in every media outlet they can find, exclaim that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper and call for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.

Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity and Anti-Grasshopper Act retroactive to the beginning of the summer! The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.

Hillary Clinton gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Barack Obama appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients. The ant loses the case.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant’s food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant’s old house, crumbles around him because he doesn’t maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow. The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.

MORAL OF THE STORY:
Be careful how you vote in 2012.

http://media.patriotpost.us/humor/2012/04-03.html

Modern Day Child Sacrifice

In ancient days a false god called Molech was worshipped. This god is mentioned in the Bible (Leviticus and Jeremiah) and in secular texts. One of the requirements made of adherents was child sacrifice. Yes, worshippers would sacrifice their own living children to this detestable god. Indications are that the children were burned in fire – alive. Not even quickly and mercifully (if we can even use that word in this case) with a slice to the jugular, but burned alive. They would play loud drums during the “ceremony” to drown out the screams of the child, no doubt.

Why would a parent do such a thing?

They believed if they sacrificed to this god, they would be blessed financially – better crops, and future fertility (kind of an oxymoron there). So the main reason for the child sacrifice was economic. There was probably a social side too: everybody else was doing it. Had to keep up with the Joneses you know.

As far as I know, modern people aren’t sacrificing there children to Molech. Or are they?

I submit that abortion is nothing but modern day sacrifice to Molech.

Think about it – what are the reasons that women have abortions? Economic: “I can’t afford a baby right now.” “If I have a baby now I won’t be able to finish school.” “A baby would just make my life so inconvenient.”

Social: “If I have a baby now I won’t be able to spend time with my friends.” “If I have this baby my boyfriend will leave me.” “None of my friends have babies.” “My parents will be mad-ashamed-upset at me.” “I just don’t have time in my life right now for a baby.” “My boyfriend is pressuring me to ‘get rid of it.'”

So as far as I can tell having an abortion is just a way to keep from messing up your life with an inconvenient “thing” so we have these abortions just as the ancients did to bring possible prosperity to their lives.

Sadly, since abortion was declared legal over 53 million babies have been eradicated. Possible cures for diseases, scientific advances, great literature, music, all lost in the minds of 53 million children who were not even given a chance. What’s that you say? Some would have been born in poverty. So was Ben Carson, Some may have had disabilities. So did Beethoven. Some may have had profound conditions. So does Stephen Hawkings. (While I disagree with him philosophically I will agree he has a great mind.) Some may have been handicapped. Who are we to judge a valuable life? I know someone who has Downs and is retarded but she brings more joy to peoples’ lives that I do.

An unborn baby is not really a person you say? Then why do young women show off sonograms of their unborn babies? “Look at my baby! Isn’t he precious? They said it’s a boy! Look!” We all either have done that or know someone who has. We celebrate the life in them. It’s not a life? Tell that to the father who puts his hands on his wife’s belly to feel the baby kick.

A baby is not really a person you say? Then why do women considering abortion change their minds when shown a sonogram of their unborn child?

Planned Parenthood was founded in 1916 ostensibly to help the poor and make every child a “wanted child.” Don’t be deceived, PP is a business in it to make money. And they have been rolling in the dough since 1973. THEY ARE NOT A CHARITY. They are a business. Like the priests of Molech who were the real economic winners in ancient days, so are PP. Speak to women who’ve had abortions and ask how they really feel about aborting their child. Only PP prospered from their decision.

Further, know that PP was founded by Margaret Sanger who was a eugenicist who believed that eradicating blacks, handicapped, and other “undesirables” would create a race of thoroughbreds. Nice white kids. Sounds like another mad 20th century person – Hitler. Here’s a link to Margaret Sanger quotes. Words from her own mouth: http://www.dianedew.com/sanger.htm,

KIt is sad that in America we think we can better our lives by sacrificing the unborn. We are no better than those who sacrificed to Molech.

 

Vote Your Conscience People of Faith

As of this writing there are 276 days until November 6, 2012. In case you’re not sure of the significance that is the date pf the next presidential election. I want to urge you to please register to vote, if you haven’t already. And then vote your conscience.

If you’re a person of faith what does that mean?

Look at the current president’s record:

1. He has astronomically raised our debt, enslaving future generations.

2. Although he claims to want economic recovery he constantly holds back business growth. He favors his “green” backers over business. Case in point the Keystone XL pipeline which he nixed.

3. He is anti-Christianity even though he claims to be a Christian. He rammed Obamacare down our throats and has now informed all faith based hospitals that they are required to offer abortion pills against their beliefs. All faith based employers must cover abortions against their beliefs.

4. He is pro-Muslim.

5. He is either totally incompetent or he is purposely leading us down a path of ruin.

I don’t even know who’s going to end up on the Republican ticket but st this point I will vote for anyone who’s NOT Barack Obama.