Protect us from the Protectors

Here's the Problem.

 

Yesterday all the news was aglow with the story that a major spammer of your email was arrested.  That we are now protected from receiving information about our male members.  

 

There's a dark side to this.  It's not what it seems and it's a power grab.  Remember after 9-11 the TSA?  TSA, a joke with no funny punch line.

 

Now when you buy an airplane ticket you see a charge for security.  Started out at $5.  Now $7.  Soon $10.  It's a tax.  And it employs people who couldn't find other jobs.  It's control.  Take your jells and shampoos and toss them.  Off with your shoes.  Take out your laptop.  Remove your belt.  Stand in line.  And the bombers haul GUNS thru the scanners with abandon while grandma gets wanded down for nuclear devices.  

 

This is what kind of idiocy happens when the government begins to protect us.  We aren't protected, just harassed and taxed.

 

OR

 

Remember Cell Phones?  Looked at your bill lately?  My cell phone bill is $45 per month.  But I write a check for $65.  Howcome?  TAX!

 

I would blame Clinton (he's easy) but most of this happened in the last 5 years.  All in the name of security and equalization.  It's all a lie.  My and your cell phone bill is the most taxed service we pay.  

 

NOW, we are going to be protected by some idiots against spam on the internet.  Really.  Is this going to be free?  Get real.  Every click, every email, every new page you open is going to carry a fee.  Oh, it hasn't happened YET.  It will.  All in the name of protecting us.  

 

If you look behind the great Oz's curtain you will discover that Mr really bad spammer mostly did tools, services and other things.  Not much about my male member.   He just did it better than most.

 

We are going to discover that most of this hoopla is just so much bulloney.  He didn't steal identities, he didn't cheat anyone. 

 

This is about money, your money, this is about controlling the internet, this is about censorship, this is about the big shots using the power of the state to crush free expression.

 

I'm not fan of spam.  I am a fan of unfettered exchange.  I'm a big boy, I have spam filters.  I'm not easily fooled.  I don't need to pay someone to protect me.

 

This is the dumbest thing since the Scooter Libby case. 

 

Hang on to your pocketbooks and enjoy what's left of freedom on the internet.  Life is about to change.

 

 

A Crisis of Faith

Francis Frangipane is a Pastor I have known for some years.  He pastors a church in Cedar Rapids.  He does great work.

 

Before he took the church he is in now and before he became "Famous" he went thru a crisis of faith.

 

I read this and understood exactly what he was talking about.  You probably will as well. If you are a pastor or any church leader you need to read what Francis says.  It's not about us.

 

By the way, this all appeared on Elijah List.  I enjoy the downloads they send but your must be good at separating wheat from chaff.   If you get 10 emails from them, 2 will be worth reading.  But the 2 will really be worth reading.

 

So, if you have the patience or if you do as I do and use a gmail or hotmail account and let the stuff pile up there for later sorting so as not to mess with the email account I use for real email it's worth getting.  You can subscribe somewhere on this website,  or just send an email from one of your nonprime email accounts and you will get tons of interesting stuff (and megatons of chaff).  mailto:subs@elijahlist.net?subject=(B)Subscribe

The Climate is Changing

With almost NO comment from me, this story from ABC news about the head of NASA declaring that Man has nothing to do with global warming. The resultant political backlash is telling. Global warming politics is just a corrupt money grab.

The climate is changing. Read the comments here. People aren't buying it anymore. Thank God.

Now, maybe we can spend our time developing zero net CO2 emissions by using bio-renewables from the ocean. Bio-renewable zero CO2 i= if you grow a tree and burn it there are zero new CO2 molecules in the atmosphere. We can do this if we stop trying to keep the sky from falling. Now we are getting somewhere.

My friend Terry (Post Below) keeps me posted on bio-resourse development. This deal is going to happen. Soon.

Why I do it - It's like a Fire, Shut Up in my BONES

I just spent a wonderful afternoon with a newly renewed friend and Pastor.  Terry and I went to school together in Ellendale ND a million years ago.  We have come to know each other again pretty well in the last couple years.  It has been rewarding.

 

Terry is a true pastor with the ministry gift of pastor.   He has a church in Michigan he leads as pastor.  His gift is greater than he knows.  I believe God has some things in store for him.  The light he brings won't be kept under a bushel by God. 

 

His gift is Pastor.  I appreciate that about him since I need to have a pastor in my life.  We talked about all kinds of things.  Mostly about what has been going on with the ministry areas I am over involved in.  He did what a pastor does best, asked questions, listened, prayed, asked questions and let me sort thru issues I have.  Last time we got together he unraveled some areas that I needed to see more clearly.  This isn't counseling as such.  This is more laying my stuff out and picking over the carcasses to see if we can learn what there is to learn from all the evidence.  I am transparent with him because I know he's safe and neither of us has anything to gain or lose if we offend or irritate.  Safety means infinite transparency.

 

He's gifted in his area of ministry.  I have not heard him preach but I'll bet he's pretty good. 

 

That visit made me reflect on the ministry gifts of Ephesians Four and how the Body of Christ accepts them.

 

If a person is gifted as an evangelist no one questions his motivation.  Just that he has a burden for lost souls and would do all he could do to save them.  A noble cause.  He is celebrated.  Even respected by the ones who are the subjects of his efforts should they fail.

 

If a person is gifted as a teacher, as long as he has a class he will teach. In fact, most teachers I know spend time learning the Word of God as recreation for some future teaching time.  Study is joy.  I find myself in this role often.  Sometimes the pure joy of digging out a truth or a mystery is rewarding enough.  People who enjoy the Bible nuggets a teacher delivers respect him.  Kind of like the drive thru at McDonalds.  Fun.

 

If a person is gifted as a Pastor, he works to help people who have limited resource or someone who just needs encouragement.  He takes people under his wing and teaches them to fly.  He is needed.  And, he deserves the respect he gets because of the patience and love a Pastors gift carries with him.

 

All of those 3 Ministry Gifts are applauded and supported by the Body of Christ.   HOWEVER, there are 2 other ministry gifts identified in Ephesians 4.  The Church denied them for a long time.  They were just too inconvenient.  They caused too much trouble.  So the church has for the last several hundred years bumbled along with Pastors, Teachers and Evangelists while silencing the Apostolic and Prophetic.  I am a member of a group who claims to be a proponent of all the gifts of the Ephesians Four model.  In fact, it only really recognizes the first 3.  When I have asked I am told, that even though the name is Ephesians Four, the focus and support of the organization is from Churches.  Churches for the most part fear the two suppressed Ministry Gifts and seldom embrace them.

 

If a person is gifted as an apostle he is accused of being controlling, domineering and un-yielding.  If a person has an apostolic call on his life, he will be difficult to understand by the other ministry gifts.  People will rebel against his direction and leadership.  They will all think they could do it better.  Moses is the prototypical Apostolic Leader.  Even Aaron his own brother murmured against him. 

 

Apostles bear marks in their body, the same marks Jesus carried.  Maybe not always physically, but in abuse, in rejection, they bear the marks of an apostle.  They are not loved universally.  They are often persecuted.  People forsake them.  It's lonely and can be unrewarding as a calling.  The ones I know personally have had serious rebellion in the ministries they lead.  I know several and the ones who have made it work suffer much for the faith.   They are victorious men of God and rise above it but there has been pain and woundedness.  They have suffered stripes at the hands of men. 

 

If a person is a prophet he is accused of being arrogant for saying what God says.  He takes slings and arrows of people who are offended by the idea that a prophet hears God differently from them.  Or from the world, the prophet gets ridicule for even hearing from God.  The world, flesh and the devil will always strive to silence the prophetic.  Sometimes a person with an immature prophetic gift has a fear of man.  If so he or she will be silenced.  The prime temperament any prophet must have is to be bold and strong in the face of all opposition.  Even if that opposition is 600 prophets of Baal and a Queen that wants to kill you.  A true prophet must at all times regard God above man.  Even if an Angel should appear he must be able to test the spirits and listen for the confirming voice of God or ignore what might have been an angel of light (The Devil). 

 

In the days of the Old Testament prophets there was constant criticism of men and women who prophesied.  They spoke in riddles, in mysteries, without specificity, in types and shadows.  That the only way to really comprehend the prophesies of the Old Testament and even of the book of Revelations is after it happens.  Jesus birth was prophesied for centuries but not until he appeared did the Prophesies become evident in fulfillment.  That's why Jesus on the Road to Emmaus had to explain to the two disciples by the fulfilled prophetic who HE was. 

 

As a prophet I know the sound of those accusations.  Prophecy is always multidimensional in it's vision.  There is a personal application, a church application, and a global application.  AND there is a immediate application, someday application and ultimate application.  It's much like looking at a panoramic picture of the Rocky Mountains and trying to describe them from that picture.  You see the ones in the foreground, the ones, further away and the ones way off in the distant.  Yet they all appear immediate in the picture.    So the (description) of what is seen is distant and nearby all at once.  Only as one travels thru the mountains can one understand what has been described. 

 

Prophets are accused, silenced (attempted at least), killed, and put out of churches.  They nearly always have people sniping at them who hate who they are.    Being a prophet is never profitable.  In fact it costs everything to carry the mantle.  The only sure thing is to operate as a prophet one must know to do the will of the Father without fear.  The Lord is the only reward a prophet needs.  He requires no human to offer affirmation.  I can report that as a prophet, the prophecies are shut up in my bones like a fire and the only way you will stop me or any true prophet from prophesying the truth of God is to kill him.  All prophets I know are careful, orderly, respectful and do not prophesy except as it is allowed and embraced.  But they will prophesy to those who have ears to hear.  Those with those ears to hear are blessed and encouraged by the prophecy.  The ones with stopped up ears live far below the potential God provided for them.

 

The church was destined by God to be built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets.  If there's too much dependence on one gift or the other the church will founder by tipping into legalism and formalism or into chaos and indirection.  The apostle needs the revelation of the prophet and the prophet needs the steady hand of the apostle.  If that is missing the church will be unbalanced.   Satan loves an unbalanced church.  He will do all he can to create this unbalance and allow the church to fall of it's own weight.

 

None of the other ministry gifts can operate with much fruit without the firm hand of the apostle and the visionary encouragement of the prophet.  This is the way God set it up in the first place and only in denominational America do churches refuse to see or receive the gifts God urgently wants to give.  That's why so many churches in America are dying. 

 

There are a few fellowships that receive and embrace the apostolic and prophetic.   They have great destinies in God.  For the rest, I am not very optimistic.  This is a day when the prophetic and the apostolic must work hand in hand to accomplish what God wants to do.

 

The fields are ripe for harvest and the combine needed to harvest them is broken.  I'm thankful for every legitimate ministry gift I know. 

 

I'm thankful for the Gift of Pastor that is Terry.  I know he is thankful for the Gift of Prophet that is Gene.  Shouldn't it be always that way?  Shouldn't the Gifts work in concert with one another and accomplish the work of the ministry? 

 

I hope and pray that day will come soon.  We need to get the team back on the playing field.  Time to push back the Devils. 

 

Go Team.

You CAN be FOR a Clean Healthy Environment and AGAINST Environmentalism

If you are of two minds when you hear the word environmentalism you are not alone. On one hand, we all want clean water, clean air, clean food and healthy environs.

We don't want the state telling us what we can and can't do because of junk science even if it is promulgated by a former Vice President of the USA.

We have been there before. I remember as a teenager being told that DDT was killing all the birds. Silent Spring, Rachel Carson. There was some truth but it was not the whole truth.

Just like today. There is some truth told, but that truth is using fear to enslave and even destroy people using questionable science.

An article written on Lew Rockwell comes to these conclusions. You can read the whole thing here.

Environmentalism is a mainstream, activist, political movement, endorsed by both major political parties. It uses and endorses the state’s monopoly on violence as its primary means of action.

Environmentalist doctrine is anti-free market and anti-libertarian. Its doctrine cultivates and has succeeded in attaining a moral dimension among its adherents.

Environmentalist doctrine blames various current and fancied human woes on our economic way of life, relating them to natural resources, and promising deliverance from those woes by state regulation and control over resources and economic life.

Environmentalist doctrine is anti-life, anti-value creation, and anti-wealth creation.

The religious overtones of environmentalism are clear: Mankind is sinning against the environment, being punished for those sins, and redemption lies in environmentalism. Environmentalism is basically a pseudo-religion and a false religion at that.

I hope the people who have bought into this lie will see it for what it is soon before it's too late. It's all about control. Others controlling YOU.

Word of the Lord This Memorial Day Weekend

This weekend in Services I delivered a word of the Lord to several hundred people.  I believe this word is critical to the body of Christ.  The word burned in my bones until it was given.  I post it here so that anyone who reads and understands it will be encouraged, warned and comforted.

 

The Great Clash - Heaven's Glory and the World's System

 

In Revelation 8 the scene describes a time when there is silence in Heaven for about half an hour.  Many people who operate in the prophetic have felt a silence in the spirit for nearly 2 months.  I know that it was about the second week of March for me.  Suddenly downloads from the throne stopped.  Not because of sin.  Just quiet.

I Know God was not angry, just silent for a while.

 

1 WHEN HE [the Lamb] broke open the seventh seal, there was silence for about half an hour in heaven.

 

I know this is true of others because the place (Elijah List) where many of these things are posted is vacant.  It seems like just before God is about to make a great change he goes silent.  Before Jesus came to earth as a baby there was a great and long silence in the prophetic.  Then suddenly heaven came to earth and everything changed.

 

At the turn of the year the Lord showed me a vision of the year.  I saw a vacuum after February.  I wrote on that empty place in this blog and in the blog which contains the word of the Lord for 2007.  I said at that time that I didn't know what that meant, it's just that I saw NOTHING.  Now I understand.  Prophecy is best understood in a rear view mirror.  I thought at the time that the nothing was an event. It still may be. 

 

Looking further in Revelation 8 we see a picture of the prayers of all the saints contained in great bowls.  Stored up.  Not yet answered.  But standing ready.  The incense from them goes up before the throne.  Then the order is given by the Lamb that the bowls be emptied and cast down upon the earth. 

3 And another angel came and stood over the altar. He had a golden censer, and he was given very much incense (fragrant spices and gums which exhale perfume when burned), that he might mingle it with the prayers of all the people of God (the saints) upon the golden altar before the throne.

    4 And the smoke of the incense (the perfume) arose in the presence of God, with the prayers of the people of God (the saints), from the hand of the angel.

The angel throws the to the earth. Great catastrophe takes place.  Mountains move, earthquakes.  Heaven's glory released thru the prayers of the saints encountering all that is on the earth today and suddenly things change.  The prayer Jesus taught, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven" suddenly becomes reality.  Heaven's "as is" comes to planet earth.  The great clash takes place.

 

 5 So the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and cast it upon the earth. Then there followed peals of thunder and loud rumblings and blasts and noises, and flashes of lightning and an earthquake.

 

Many will look at these changes and say, "God is angry".  "Why did God cause this to happen"  or "Why would God allow such a thing".   The realignment shifting of reality looks like loss to the unredeemed.  To the Child of God it looks like order out of Chaos as Jesus restores all things thru his Holy Spirit. 

 

There will be many who will be offended in that day.  Some will be in the Church.  Their nice little world will have been disturbed.  It's disturbing when heaven comes to earth.  Jesus said that a sign of the end is the spirit of offense IN THE CHURCH.  We see that today.

Matthew 24

8  All these are the beginning of sorrows.

9  Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.

10  And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.

11  And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.

12  And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.

13  But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

14  And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

Our hope must be in the living God when it all comes down.  It will all come down and now is the time to determine NOT to take offense when it does. 

 

Who do we have but him anyway?  All our colored dreams, all the mountains we have depended on will be thrown into the sea.

 

Psalm 46 is best in all these things.  We are at this time right now as these changes come to pass, answers to prayer, shifts and potential for offense. 

    Psalm 46  

    1God is our refuge and strength,
         A very present help in trouble.
    2Therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change
         And though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea;
    3Though its waters roar and foam,
         Though the mountains quake at its swelling pride

 

Evenso, Come Lord Jesus.

Memorial Day Flowers

Memorial Day was first a day picked for its date because it was the center of much of the floral display season.  General Logan who was in Carbondale IL selected the date which was to be May 30.  This was in 1868.  He selected it because the roadsides and hedgerows would have the most wild flowers.  This was to commemorate the dead mostly from the Civil War.

 

Now of course we have many more wars behind us.  We decorate more from the Wal-Mart hedgerow garden center.  But the tradition goes on.

 

I look around and think of how apt that day was.  General Logan was right.  So much is in bloom right now in Illinois.  If he were to pick a time of year to do this today is that day.  What's in bloom right now:

 

Peonies.  Spectacular peonies. I have some that were given me 30 years ago from Ruth Redlin in Ellendale ND.  I have moved them every time we've moved.  They are pink doubles and rich reds.  And fragrant, breathtaking fragrant.  They hate the fact that we had rain.  Hanging their heads not in shame but in recognition that breeding a flower like that and not breeding in a stem to support it is a pity.  But they are wonderful.  Thanks Ruth.

 

Clematis.  I have a half dozen cultivars in my yard.  But, there are some new ones out of Holland, doubles, composite looking that are amazing.  I saw some yesterday.  Size of a small dinnerplante. I'll have to kill something to find a place in my yard to put them, but I will.  They like sun.  I have a apple tree that if I cut it down would be a great place for a clematis.  HMMMM.

 

Daisies.  Many are later in the season.  But the roadsides are alive with a few varieties right now.  It seems like summer can't be far behind despite the normal weather on Memorial Day.  We will cook out with a hooded sweatshirt again. 

 

Weigelia.  They are in amazing bloom this year.  I love the OLDER varieties.  I'm not much into dwarf plants.  If you want them dwarf buy a shear.  Some of the Wine Weigelias are peaked in flowering.  The old vaneckii varieties give a wonderful show.  All red all over.

 

American Highbush Cranberry are still flowering.  I know it's not showy.  But, it's a regal plant with it's umbel of flat floral expression.  And knowing that what follows is the berry makes it all the better.  I like the highbush cranberry since I was skiing in Manitoba and the hillsides were lined with them all red and pendulous.  Good to eat too.

 

Queen Anne's Lace fills the eye wherever you are right now.  I know it's darn near an invasive weed but It's a great addition to any floral arrangement.  Sort of a poor man's babies breath.  It's homely later.   But, that's the way it goes.  People are the same.

 

We are just a week away from the beginning of the tree lilacs kicking off.  I have one that this year will bloom for the very first time.  The tree is 8 years old.

 

And, Roses.  The early Carolina roses are in full bloom.  Same with the Hansen's hedge and the Arkansas rose.  I planted some 50 roses this spring.  Many are natural hybrids between native roses and hybrid tea.  This will be interesting.  Native and rugosa is not unusual.  This is.

 

I also created a small bed of un patented hybrids that are about to bust out.  I'm not a big rose grower, but I like the rose. 

 

All this floral expression does not mask the reality of the day.  I have so much respect for every man and woman in uniform today, and those who wore it in the past.  I honor you all.  Your memory is better expressed in my safety and freedom than in anything I can do to decorate the place your shell resides.  But I'll do that too.

 

Have a memorable Memorial Day.

Advice I'll Probably Ignore

The last few days I have been peppered with advice.  Advice on how to write better via email. I'm up for learning to write better if I think it's good advice.  I'll decide that for myself however. 

 

Then I have received advice about how to blog from another blogger,  someone I respect.  Nevertheless, I'll decide on what part of that advice I'll follow or not as well.  I am my own best counsel.

 

The reason I publish this blog is for purely personal purposes and those alone.  I am NOT trying to build readership except when I write something which I thing is significant, then I spam people who I think should read it.  They can then make the decision.  Most do.

 

I do not write this blog to make people feel good, make them happy or avoid controversy.  In fact, It seems I'm the king of controversy.  I do not enter into controversial areas to generate comments or links.  I write this blog to air out what I am thinking.  Sometimes I'm angry.  Sometimes I'm amused.  Sometimes I wax philosophical or theological.  Sometimes I have a remembrance to tell or a story that just happened. 

 

So for that reason what, how and in which fashion or format I write is my choice.  I write about things that get my attention.  If it gets yours that's fine too.  If not, well, I'll never know now, will I.  I have never been particularly critical of people's artwork because I know much I don't get.  That's a blind spot for me.  Same with how or what I write.  I don't expect everyone who reads me to love what I say.  That's the way it goes.  Just like Art or Music.  I might have lots of opinions on what might make better art or music in advice to give.  If you were amused or unimpressed with my sage advice you just might ignore me too.  That would be expected and appropriate.  Turnabout is fair play.

 

I do have a hidden counter.  I get all the hits I deserve or desire.  I'm not looking to build reputation.  This is an electronic bulletin board where family, friends and interested others can look into Geneland and see what that old guy is thinking about.

 

I somehow don't measure up to the standards of niceness or kindness that anyone wishes I did, I am sorry you feel that way.  I'll not change my stripes. 

 

I learned a long time ago that my primary gift in life was not niceness.  I have had more than one person who know me personally say, "Gene, you aren't very nice to people, but you are always kind".  I take that as high praise.  For that reason there are many who avoid me.  Pretty much out of fear that I might tell them the truth.   And, know what?  I would.  It might shock you to know I can be pretty direct (in a kind way).

 

On the other hand, those who don't fear being told in an kind way what they may need to hear will come to me for a word.  I always have one and it's nearly always encouraging.

 

That's why I was not great in a pastoral role, but even tonight in Church I spoke to several hundred people a message that may not be nice to hear, but is kind in the telling. 

 

So, as a pastor and as a nice person I'm a failure.  As a prophet and teacher I do pretty well.  I'll keep doing what I do well.

Like Popeye, "I yam what I yam and I can't takes it no more".

 

But then, I didn't create this blog 2 1/2 years ago as a way to become popular with everyone.  It appears I have succeeded.