Without effort, victory is meaningless

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

That is one of my favorite quotes, it popped into my head today and I once again realized how I love being that man in the arena. I love the effort you have to put in as you push for something. For me a battle is almost more fun than a victory and a loss only makes me want to try harder the next time. I know the enthusiasm, the rush, you get when you are devoted to a cause or task that is worthy, it is one of the greatest feelings on earth.

More and more the world is becoming a place of "cold timid souls" who do not understand the thrill of doing something great even if it ends in defeat. The lion chasers are scarce and becoming more so. I know this is a common theme in my "thought" posts and that is probably because it is an ever pressing thought in my mind. How do you show or express to someone the greatness of something if they have never done it and have no desire to? It is a quandary for us humans which has been around since the earth was created.

God loves us, wholly, unconditionally, regardless of the fact that we tend to be ridiculously selfish and sinful beings. He knows what is best for us in our lives and wants us to follow Him, yet so often we don't recognize the amazing potential we could have if we just surrender. We live our lives having never fully surrendered with no real desire to and that causes us to be "cold and timid souls" spiritually. This is going to sound harsh but that is what I feel has happened to a lot of churches today.

There is no more worthy cause than to be enthusiastically dedicated to being a shining light for God in this world. Yet how can churches be so timid about proclaiming the Gospel and Biblical viewpoints in our society? Because they have not experienced the joy and thrill that comes from being in that arena, they would rather sit back with their 501c3 status and build their church membership.

Somehow this post has gone way off topic, all I wanted to do was post the quote and say I love it and somehow it has bounced around to churches building their membership! So I end it now with another quote:

"There is not in all America a more dangerous trait than the deification of mere smartness unaccompanied by any sense of moral responsibility."

Religion is killing us???

This is a post I have wanted to get out for almost a week but I just have not had time to get all I wanted to say typed up. Just as a warning I know it is going to be long but I feel it is worth it... I don't exactly frequent USA Today's website, reading their slant on the news tends to just get me riled up. I do on occasion read their articles though, usually found when I am looking at headlines on other sites. There was an article published last Monday by a Rev. Oliver Thomas that I honestly read with my mouth open in amazement. It starts off like this:

"Is what we preach — and ultimately, what we believe — hastening the destruction of our planet? The answer appears to be a resounding yes. Be fruitful and multiply," says the book of Genesis, and Lord knows we have. To the tune of more than 300 million at home and more than 6 billion abroad. But as we go about the heavenly task of multiplying, a poignant question arises: Might our religion be killing us?"

It continues:

"We all remember the Aztecs. Some say their religion, with its penchant for violence and human sacrifice, played a critical role in the destruction of their civilization. We moderns are far more sophisticated, of course, but if we persist with some of our religious practices, we could be heading down the same disastrous dog trot. Sort of a reverse Noah story. Noah is credited with saving humanity during the big flood. We could be the ones who get blamed for destroying it.

Here's why. The hundreds of scientists who make up the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned recently that the environmental crisis is more dire than originally believed. We might have reached a tipping point."

I am going to snip it there and just say that I do not believe there is a environmental crisis. A majority of the people pushing this scare-a-thon are also happen to be evolutionists and thus I'm immediately suspect as to their scientific reliability. Besides that, even secular scientists are widely divided on the fact that carbon emissions are causing global warming. Further, many reputable scientists remain unconvinced that the current warming of the earth is the result of any human contribution at all.

On top of all that, this past winter has been one of the coldest in memory for folks in the northern US or so I have read, which just another reason against a supposed environmental crisis. Yes the earth may be warming up slightly, at the same time 20 some years ago wasn't everyone worried about the world cooling off? The earth's temperature obviously fluctuates, like most things on our earth, it has a cycle. But in the interest of the article lets assume global warming is a serious issue.
Back to the article:

"much of our environmental problem is due to overpopulation. There are simply too many people for the planet to sustain — at least the way we expect to be sustained. Each new person requires more food, water and oxygen. At the same time, each is producing more carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and methane. For each additional human, planet Earth (and the rest of us) pays a price.
Now, consider the Roman Catholic Church's continued opposition to modern birth control or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' (i.e. Mormons) encouragement of large families. This might not alarm you unless you realize that nearly one in every five humans on the planet is Roman Catholic and that the Latter-day Saints belong to one of the fastest-growing religions in the Western Hemisphere. Many Orthodox Jews and some Muslims also eschew birth control."

You see where he is headed don't you? We as humans are supposedly killing the very earth we live on with our very lives. So what is Rev. Thomas' solution? (If you have not guessed it, you might want to sit down)

"In the interest of preserving our planet and our species, shouldn't religious organizations be encouraging smaller families? Do our spiritual leaders need additional divine revelation to realize that our current doctrines — which threaten to take the entire world down with us — have become ethically and theologically questionable?"

"Shouldn't religious organizations be encouraging smaller families?" :o Yeah, that is right, because the population is contributing to the theory, the theory mind you, of global warming and humans obviously must be the leading contributors to this bogus cause. Religious organizations should be happily encouraging smaller families for the sake of our planet!!! The Bible is obviously outdated and the spoken word of our very Creator is ethically and theologically questionable. Right?

I SERIOUSLY DISAGREE! The Rev. Oliver Thomas is speaking blasphemy in the very truest sense of the word, claiming to know better than God. It seems Rev. Thomas is part of the growing group of liberal "Christians" who feel the need to either re-interpret the Bible or even worse, completely disregard it as being behind these modern times in favor of a more "Politically correct" religious worldview. He continues on later in the article to say:

"we must stop having so many children. Clergy should consider voicing the difficult truth that having more than two children during such a time is selfish. Dare we say sinful? The average American might not listen to his elected representatives, but he darn sure listens to his pastor."

I guess in Rev. Thomas' mind I would be pretty sinful, because I certainly want more than two children! I would not be so rash as to tell God the exact number of children I want but, whatever number He sees fit to bless me and my future wife with I will take. Though if I were lucky enough to have 13 the transportation situation might become interesting. :p The article closes with another look back in time at the Aztecs:

"When Aztec society was threatened by disease and military defeat, their religious leaders appear to have let them down. Most likely, these leaders encouraged even more human sacrifice to appease the gods, thereby further weakening the society and ultimately facilitating its collapse. Let's hope we can learn from their mistakes."

That closing statement adds yet another flaw to the entire article's thought process. First, the Aztec were a carnal society which followed false gods, we trust in the one true God, the command's we receive from Him far outweigh some crazyness an Aztec witchdoctor told the people about sacrifices. Second the last sentence, "Let's hope we can learn from their mistakes." is almost an oxymoron of the article.

A sentence before he is talking about how the Aztec's desire to appease their false gods through sacrifice resulted in the weakening of their society in numbers and it's ultimate collapse. Yet for the whole article the main theme is for a limiting of children, forgetting our Biblical mandate of being fruitful and multiplying, isn't limiting the number of children we have doing the same thing the Aztec's did with their sacrifice, weakening the number of people with our beliefs and our society as a whole?

Environmentalists who value the earth above everything else, who view humans as expendable, would do well to remember Psalm 24:1 The earth is the LORD’s, and all its fullness, The world and those who dwell therein. Yes, we should take care of the earth, nobody wants to live in a nasty pollution filled earth, but we also should remember that it is the Lord's, if He wants to cook our current earth, (which will happen eventually, Revelation 21:1) nothing we finite human do will stop Him.

To say I disagree with Rev. Thomas' article would be a understatement, I vehemently disagree in every sense of the word. To be opposed to having a quiver full of arrows, one of God's greatest blessings, is I feel, a serious offense towards all of humanity and God Himself. The fact that this man also is a Baptist minister as well as a constitutional lawyer only worsens that bitter taste in my mouth.

The whole article can be read here, I only took pieces from it as there were several other things said which I could continue ranting on but I knew this post was going to be long from the start without having a whole article pasted in my post.....

Another Concert

On Tuesday my sisters told me that my posts of late have been boring, I say sisters because there are several. (No one probably will get that joke) Anyway, yesterday I sat staring at the computer screen and I never really had anything to post about. This seems to happen a lot on Wednesdays, it is like somehow the whole day my brain is just off somewhere. So sorry for no post yesterday. :p

On Monday I once again embarked on a journey to the state fair for a concert, this time though it was not a Christian concert. It was a country music concert. I will let those words sink in a bit..... :p Yes I listen to country music, I can almost hear the collective groans from readers as I type. I think I have said this before, but I love music and that love is not just restricted to one genre of music, I like to listen to everything under the sun, well to a point. Anyway on Monday some friends and I had tickets to see Josh Turner, a country musician.

While I do listen to country, there are only a few artists who I really would go out and buy a cd of. Josh Turner happens to be one of these, so I was rather looking forward to see how he would be live. The arena's lights went down and the band came out and started strumming, everyone around me seemed to to think this was the coolest thing in the world and were on their feet cheering. Then Josh Turner comes out and the sheer volume of the crowd was actually hard on the ears! I have been to country music concerts before so I pretty much expected this, but the whole thing suddenly just seemed wrong to me.

The Mercy Me concert on Friday was probably one of the best concerts I have been to, the whole atmosphere, the spirit of the crowd, was one of worship. Not for the band up on the stage but rather to the Lord. The Josh Turner concert on the other hand was such a stark contrast to that, that I actually considered leaving the concert. The actions of the crowd just really made me wonder about the people there. Throughout the whole concert, you had women screaming "Josh" or just screaming for no clear reason. Several rows in front of us there were these girls, I have no idea of their ages since all I saw was the back of their heads, but for almost the entire concert they were on their feet screaming and waving every time Josh turned their way.

I know this will sound harsh and I don't mean to judge people I don't even know, but one thought in my head during the concert was how disgusting those peoples actions were. I like Josh Turner's music and I clapped after some of his songs that I really like, but a lot of the crowd seemed to just worship him. After the song it was not like they were screaming/cheering for a well played song, rather they were screaming/cheering for the singer himself. The performance of the music did not matter, rather it was all about the artist.

I have been to country music concerts as well as other "secular" concerts and going in you know the crowd is going to be different but this is the first one where the crowd atmosphere was just sickening to me. About a month ago I wrote a post on music, secular and Christian, how we as Christians should listen to it and how the lines between each are blurred. I never published it, but writing it really has made me change how I view music and listen to it. So maybe the country and rock concerts I have been to in the past have always had this atmosphere and I just have not been as in tuned with the Holy Spirit and what is edifying as I am now, I don't know. One thing I am sure of is, I will not be going to a Josh Turner concert again.

Erroneously???

I had planned this morning to blog about the David Crowder Band but before I started, I noticed this article on USA Today's website and I realized this is something a little more substantial than a band with good music

From USA Today LINK
55% of Americans think founders wanted Christian USA

"Most Americans believe the nation's founders wrote Christianity into the Constitution, and people are less likely to say freedom to worship covers religious groups they consider extreme, a poll out today finds.

The survey measuring attitudes toward freedom of religion, speech and the press found that 55% believe erroneously that the Constitution establishes a Christian nation. In the survey, which is conducted annually by the First Amendment Center, a non-partisan educational group, three out of four people who identify themselves as evangelical or Republican believe that the Constitution establishes a Christian nation. About half of Democrats and independents do."

I love how USA Today gives it's opinion that more than half the United States is wrong in their belief. While not specifically spelled out in the Constitution, the idea of having a government not based on God would have been unthinkable to the framers of our Constitution. When the Constitution was written, the only possible explanation for the existence of the Universe was creation by God. The Constitution did not specifically mention God because to the founders it was a given that God created the heavens and the earth. By not adding God the founders were in no way creating a "secular" nation in the modern sense of the term. The concept of "secularism" as it is used today didn't even exist in 1787 when the Constitution was written. It is largely a twentieth-century concept, one that has arisen with the myth of Darwinism and a false belief that science should be our guild in the world rather than the Bible.

"Half of Americans say teachers should be allowed to use the Bible as a factual text in history class. Charles Haynes, a senior scholar at the First Amendment Center, says the Constitution "clearly established a secular nation where people of all faiths or no faith are protected to practice their religion or no religion without governmental interference.""

I agree with Mr. Haynes that the Constitution gives freedom to people to practice whatever religion or none at all as they so desire. But as mentioned above, at the time of our Constitution the United States was a God fearing Christian Nation. The first reading textbook of that time was The New England Primer which starts off with, "In Adam's Fall, we sinned all" can it get any more clear than that? God was in almost every aspect of their culture! Most of the the first colonist were fleeing religious persecution in Europe. The Founders knew this and did not want that happening in America, so we have the First Amendment, giving us freedom to practice our religion as well as freedom of speech to talk in public about our religion. Even with this freedom to be "secular" if someone so chose, the framers most certainly did believe that religion and religious values should influence the government and its policies.

On the day that the first Congress finished its work on the First Amendment, George Washington was called on to issue a Proclamation to the people of the United States to thank God for the freedoms we enjoy. Eight days later the First President's opening paragraph in this Proclamation said: "Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor . . ." By stating "acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will" George Washington and the framers of our Constitution were clearly showing that they believed in the one true God and His will should guide us. Any suggestion that the Constitution "clearly established a secular nation" is false.

Still Secularists insist that the absence of the word "God" means that the Constitution created a godless government in America, never mind the fact that there have been multiple suggestions to amend the Constitution and add it. There were efforts to add "Almighty God" and "Jesus Christ" to the Preamble for example, and several members of Congress suggested that "In the Name of God" should be inserted before the Preamble. Even though Congress was never able to come to an agreement on how God should be phrased the individual states did. With the exception of Oregon where the words "Almighty God" appear in the state religion clauses rather than the preamble, all 50 states have God mentioned in one form or another in their constitutions with "Almighty God" being the most popular.

Unfortunately our spiritual culture has now shifted so far from where it was during our founding, that even if the word "God" was in the Constitution, it probably would not make any difference. Secularist would just dismiss it as a mere formality. There are 50 reasons to believe that this is true. Secularists dismiss all references to God in the state constitutions, so there is really no reason to believe that they would view things differently with our nation's Constitution.

LINK to the whole USA Today article

With this ring I thee wed

The past two Saturdays our family has attended 50th wedding anniversary celebrations. Last week's was for my great aunt on my dad's side. It was bit of a formal affair in their church, with everyone pretty well dressed up. It was a tad weird since most of the older relatives had not seen us in a long time (10+ years) and people I had never seen before kept coming up and giving me hugs telling me how they remembered when I was so and so tall and see how much I had grown. It was good though, I got to see a lot of pictures from my aunt and uncle's wedding and it funny to see how they have changed in 50 years.

The second celebration was today, the couple was a family my parents have known for I don't know how many years. Their kids are I guess around my parents age and they have grandkids around the same age as our family. Anyway this was a more toned down celebration in one of their daughter's homes. It was a lot of fun, I had not seen the grandkids around my age in over four years and it was good to see them again if only for a little while.

Even though both of these celebrations were different they both had the common trait of being a 50th wedding celebration. With nearly 50% of marriages ending in divorce today, to be married for five decades is is something to really step back and commend. I mean 50 years! That is twice my age! I pray when I get married I am blessed with a Godly wife who will be at my side after fifty years and more. To be married for 50 years, it just blows my mind, and at the same time I feel saddened.

We live in a society that almost frowns on the concept of marriage, it is one in which living together before marriage is acceptable, one in which sexual immorality is almost a given for relationships in the secular world. Morality is a dirty word. Who are you to question my lifestyle, whatever makes me happy or feel good has to be right...There is this song called "If it makes you happy" by Sheryl Crow and the chorus goes something like "If it makes you happy, it can't be that baaaaad"... There is no moral compass whatsoever in our society everyone is their own "moral master" there are no absolutes or a supreme God. There is nothing but confusion and chaos and yet the world wonders why we can't all just get along, why unspeakable evils are committed. We are lost with no compass in a sea of darkness, and that truly is something to be saddened about.

Ok sorry I got on a bit of rant there, it happens to me a lot when I think about our society :( It sometimes just seems like the world is on a train, building the tracks as it goes, with no clear direction. Unfortunately the church is still on the train, sure we will not go into some of the more evil cabins but we can't seem to just get off this long black train.