Love Joy and Peace from an Icon of the left

Bill Maher, radical leftist crackpot has a solution to the economic crisis. I'm sure he's already advising Obama. Read this:

On the 2009 debut of his HBO show Real Time on Friday night, Bill Maher proposed his new solution for the economic crisis: legalize marijuana. In an interview with Rep. Ron Paul, he lectured: "When FDR came into office in '33, one of the first things he did was repeal Prohibition. He said we can’t afford this any more."

Paul was puzzled, so Maher continued: "When he was making radical changes, he said ‘look, we’re serious now. We’re gonna get serious, and people like liquor." Well, in this country, people love pot...[applause]...and if we ended that Prohibition, it’d be a giant boon of money."

He had an utterly straight face, no smirk. Paul denounced all the drug laws to such effect that Maher went back to joking. "Amen, stoner," he said to Paul.

Maher ended his show with another stirring solution to the financial crisis: executing two random rich guys to set an example: "If we killed two random, rich greedy pigs; blew them up at halftime at next year’s Super Bowl. Or left them hanging on the big board at the New York Stock Exchange, you know, as a warning, with their balls in their mouths, I think it would really make everyone else sit up and take notice."

That last image just makes me feel warm and fuzzy all over.


I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT ANYONE ON THE PLANET THINKS I ENDORSE THIS NUTCASE OR HIS IDEAS. I'M MAKING HIM THE FOOL HE IS. Just for clarification.

Steve, however, I actually agree with you. Other anon. Helloooo?

Obama beats out Jesus as Hero - This is just getting silly

I have been poking fun at the Messiah Worship of Barack Obama by the Undiscerning left. The Sun Times has now confirmed that he is is Number One among those folks.


Here's the problem, it isn't with Obama. If I were him I would be embarrassed. He is trying to manage the problem by lowering expectations.

He can't save you, he can't heal you, he can't get you to heaven, he can't forgive your sins. He's just a man. This is pure and simple idolatry. I would fear for him, God is a Jealous God. Having other gods before Him is bad for the Idol. See Dagon. See Priests of Baal. It's not good.

The Death of The American Lutheran Church ELCA

Now the decline starts. The ELCA is going to ordain openly homosexual pastors.

I guess the lessons of the Anglican Episcopal Church have been lost on leadership.

Everything from here on out is down hill.

Watching a slow slide into apostacy

I have a man I consider a friend. Someone I have had a good relationship with. I don't think he reads this blog anymore. I am concerned about him.

Over the last couple years I have watched him slowly but surely slip into apostasy. Not all at once. It's never all at once. Just drip drip drip drip....

No crisis initiated this. Some people become apostate as Darwin did at the loss of a child. No, this apostasy comes from pollution. Nothing horrible to start with. Just continuing to pour worldly things into his spirit until now he has hardened his heart towards God. Too many books. Too many movies. Too much TV. Too much sports (yes sports can become a God replacer) and too much politics. The last one is one I have to watch. I can go over the top in that area.

I would speak to him about this, but he's not ready to hear. He's the classic frog in the pot that is beginning to boil.

Part of his spiritual demise is his intellect. He's a very smart man. So much so that he believes he can play Russian roulette in the spirit and just dump anything in there and his intellect will save him. It won't. It can't.

He has a blog, I see by his blog that he is beginning to have others question his drift. I will stay out of it. He no longer hears my input. He has succumbed to the spirit of Jezebel that always tries to silence the voice of the Prophets.

I am sad about him. He was on the verge of breakthrough. He had become connected in the spirit with some Christians of real power. The Devil knew he would be dangerous if he entered into this realm. This man was targeted in spades. Just like Adam and Eve. I can't imagine the levels of deception that must be going on in his head. People like him are most targeted right at the edge of a spiritual breakthrough.

I am believing God that he will repent. That he will come back. That we won't become a Spong, Ehreman or like the Episcopalians that have fallen by the wayside.

I'm hoping he will find the true God once again and not just find knowledge about God. I know this about the Father's dealings with us, when we drift too far, the Father in heaven will discipline us, it will be harsh and sudden. It will be very painful. Then. he will return. or he will die.

Of course he can avoid all this pain by repentance. That will be humbling. Right now his prideful state won't allow for that kind of humbling.

Come on Home Brother.

Bill Moyers = Liberal Sleeze

I have had my issues with Bill Moyers. I have often thought his sanctimonious ways were way over the top. Even for a liberal.

And he is arrogant.

And I don't like him much.

Turns out he's as slimy as I thought. Not that it shocks me much. I'm glad to see his comeuppance.

The Spirit of Homelessness

I have a friend who recently was rendered homeless. At least in common jargon. He and his wife are OK, but it caused me to thing for a moment. They aren't homeless. Not by any means.

I have been homeless in the same way. I know what it's like. To be more accurate; I know what it's like to NOT own a house or a place to live. To live out of a suitcase. To live without a place that we can call our own. To have no address. To have to go pick our mail up at the post office because there is no postbox to put it in. Homeless? We didn't go to a shelter. We didn't live in a motel. We stayed with friends for a while till we had a place to live. It's important to have friends. To us they were Mi Casa es su Casa.

Please don't feel sorry. It was long ago. We came thru it. It was cleansing. Kinda like the comment the Joker makes to Batman in the first Batman movie of the modern age. "I've been dead once, already. It's very liberating. You should think of it as therapy."

Once you've been thru it, the fear is gone.

I have come to the conclusion I no longer believe in Homelessness. It doesn't exist if you really understand home.

An old saying was, Anywhere I hang my hat is home. OR. Home is where the heart is. Both are true. Neither talks in terms of an edifice A building. A structure.

So, if a person is focused on the main thing being the main thing, he or she can never be homeless. It's impossible. They may have no place to live. But never homeless.

In this economic change we are going thru many people will be turned out of the structure they live in. It will be difficult. But not terminal. They will be out of a house, but not homeless if they are not demonized by a spirit of homelessness.

Homelessness doesn't exist except in the heart. It's a state of mind. One of the reasons I object to some of the ministry to homeless is it fills a need without dealing with the heart issue. I am glad people reached out to us in our time when we had no house. I'm glad there were options. We never felt deprived or lost. We were always whole.

Some people who show up at homeless shelters are offered a bed and something to eat. What they really need is heart help. Both are good too, but one fills a wrong need.

Homelessness is a state of mind. I think about that woman who cried to Obama about being homeless a week ago in Florida. You might have heard of it. It was a sad pitiful tale. She got a place to live. Free. From a local businessman. She is living in a house with her family now. But I know her heart from people who have tried to minister to her. She knows how to work the system.

She's still homeless, even though she now has a place to live. She is demonized with a spirit of homelessness. Unless that spirit is dealt with, nothing else matters. She is still homeless.

This is the problem with much of the foolishness the Obama program for stimulus and saving of "homes" is generating. It's dealing with the manifestation of a homeless spirit, not the empty heart that caused it. A true home cannot be saved or destroyed except in the heart.

I no longer believe in homelessness as a lack of a building.

Why I don't support open Homeless Shelters and Random Prison Ministries

Jesus was pretty clear, we were to provide and minister to his brethren. He assumed we would know which is which. I'm not sure we do. We shotgun minister and become enablers.

Yesterday I had a visit with a man I work with from time to time. He told me he went to a church pantry for food. He got what he could. He was cynical about it all. He "Suckered them".

So, the food pantry did what they do. He may even end up in a homeless shelter.

It's a sad commentary on what we have become.

I do not support random prison ministry and random support for the homeless and destitute.

Not without accountability. Something the Church is really bad at.

Grandkids. Get out your checkbook - I need a bailout

My grand kids are great. I have pictures of them on my fridge. Cute little buggers they are.

So, according to the OBAMA administration I need to thank them for bailing me out.

Isn't that cute?

The De-Leveraging of America from Consumer to Saver - Producer

We are going to go thru some hard times. It will be good and not good. This is changing the USA into a different country. Some of the changes are not good. The march to socialism is just evil. Led by men and women who do either do not know what they are doing or they are insidious conspiritors who are trying to make America into a communistic form of government. I hope it's the former, I can understand stupidity, I fear it's the latter.

What this means is as the playing field is leveled some will prosper and some will fail. For those who know how to make it work, let's hope for prosperity.

One thing is certain, our children and our children's children will be better for this. The bad lessons of the past will be unlearned. No one after the Great Depression was over longed for the Roaring 20's. That to them was a bad dream they didn't want to relive. They had taken the punishment, or better said, their children had taken the punishment and now it was time to build again. This article says much:

K. Esther Szabo was a small child when the recession of the early 1970s sent her family's fortunes into a tailspin. Her father, an economist, struggled to find work, and her mother worried about paying the bills. The family eventually filed bankruptcy.

The tensions at home put a permanent mark on Ms. Szabo. To help her family, she started working at age 8, doing chores for neighbors, and has been working ever since. When a personal-finance class in college introduced her to the idea that calamities like the one that crippled her family could be avoided with careful planning, she found the idea "mind-blowing," she says. She now co-owns a Los Altos, Calif., financial-planning firm.

In this current recession, we may be creating a new generation of Ms. Szabos. Economic downturns leave enduring marks on the career prospects and aspirations of children. Some youngsters will face lasting setbacks, while others will emerge more focused and motivated, based on studies of past recessions. The outcome depends partly on a child's age, on the example set by parents, and on whether young people can be empowered somehow to help their families through the crisis.

College students may be among the hardest-hit. Graduates who entered the job market in the recession of the early 1980s made significantly less money for at least a decade, compared with those who graduated in more prosperous times, says a study by Yale University's Lisa Kahn. Another study, a 21-year look at 39,000 father-son pairs published last year in the Journal of Labor Economics, found sons whose fathers were laid off had annual earnings 9% lower than comparable youths whose fathers kept their jobs. Recession-era grads also tended to remain stuck in lower-prestige jobs, even after the economy recovered, Dr. Kahn found. While the reasons aren't clear, some may have invested too much in their original jobs to try to move to a more prestigious job and start anew when the economy picked up. Others may have felt loyalty to the employers that harbored them in hard times.

Small children, too, are vulnerable psychologically in ways that shape their aspirations. Glen Elder, a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, found in studies of the Great Depression that the self-image of small children of that era was shaped by the morale of their same-sex parent. Amid the traditional gender roles of the time, young boys suffered most, from seeing their fathers deprived of work and a sense of identity, says Dr. Elder, author of "Children of the Great Depression." Because preschoolers and pre-teens were too young to understand the causes or to help out financially, they risked growing up with "a lack of initiative, of confidence, of self-efficacy," he says.

Those who fared best, Dr. Elder says, were teenagers when the downturn hit -- young enough to avoid the worst blows, but old enough to work for pay. "They were in an opportune time ... to pick up some of the lessons of the period," he says. Depression-era hardships also led youths from hard-hit families to grow up faster; many committed to a vocation shortly after high school, earlier than offspring of more prosperous families.

Past isn't necessarily prologue, of course. Also, applying the lessons of the past will be hard; kids today who try to find work face tall hurdles, with teen employment hitting new lows, says Andrew Sum, director of Northeastern University's Center for Labor Market Studies.

Nevertheless, parents are already finding lessons in the current troubles. Based on a study of 77 white-collar layoff victims published last year in the journal Social Forces, jobless parents are urging children to equip themselves to survive hard times, by developing transferable skills or learning to be entrepreneurs.

With luck, many youngsters will take the cue. "It's a joy for me," says Ms. Szabo, the financial planner, "when I help people see they don't have to be a victim" of a bad economy. A big reward, she adds, is seeing anxious customers leave her office with renewed confidence in their plans for the future.


To help kids cope during a downturn:

* Include children in planning solutions.
* Give kids a way to help out by doing chores or taking part-time jobs.
* Explain the crisis in age-appropriate terms.
* Set an example of hopefulness and resiliency.

We will be like those leaving Egypt, like the people crossing into the promised land, like Lot's family leaving Sodom, we will not look back in longing. We will not pine for the past. We will live in and look toward the future.

This 'stimulus money' will stimulate just as 'protection money' protects - Chicago Politics at Work

The stimulus bill just passed has hurt us beyond belief. It was so ill advised. Now the automakers are coming back, the drunken sailor needs more money to stay drunk. Time to sober up. From the Wall Street Journal:

Only in the world of politics does one "tar" an issue by calling a spending bill a spending bill. But Republicans and conservative activists are doing more than that. They're denouncing the bill's enormous size – larger than the combined cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan up until now! They're also focusing on how it's light on actual "stimulus" items and heavy on grants pleasing traditional Democrat special interest groups.

Economist and blogger Robert Brusca estimated that only about 24 percent of the spending in the Senate plan can be categorized accurately as "stimulus," and the rest is either "cushion" for the hard times, or categorized as "agenda" spending, advancing Democratic policy dreams. Even the stimulus is delayed, he quipped: "Does the administration go to Hallmark and buy us taxpayers a belated stimulus card?...This is no Muhammad Ali plan (float like a butterfly, sting like a bee). It's more like float like a lead balloon, bite like a flea."

Dentists and Dentistry

I read long ago a turn of the century novel, McTeauge. It was about a self taught dentist. Greed and Murder.

Painful stuff.

Growing up, dentistry was not as it is today. Mostly it was remedial. You had a problem they fixed it best they could.

Then somewhere as I was getting older the dentistry industry sold us all the idea that cosmetically we must have perfect teeth to get that perfect mate and live that perfect life.

It wasn't true and isn't... but we were told that. And culturally we bought it.

So now, decades later people my age who have teeth less than perfect are looked at as if we are just off the river in Deliverance.

I never noticed that my wonderful and beautiful wife had less than perfect teeth. It never occurred to me. Nor did she notice that of me. In fact, I was a bit of a freak. I had a tooth missing right in the front and wore a partial plate that kept slipping out.

Not until I was in my mid adulthood did I get it fixed.

Yesterday, I went in and had my second root canal ever. I lived thru it. I had been so impacted I could no longer drive. That's how bad the infection had spread thru my whole body. Even taking a strong regimen of Antibiotics I was barely able to keep it all at bay.

Now the dentist has done what he does. It was remedial. And, knowing what to expect it wasn't as bad as the first one which in hell would have been considered punishment. OK I'm kidding.

Anyway, once again your faithful gleaner is strong like bull once again. Whole and ornery.

Good to be back.

Moses turned down as Pastor of First Gospel Tabernacle

Moses, come back from the mountain, decides to become a Pastor. First Gospel Tabernacle has an opening. He applies. Here is the letter he received from the Search Committee:

Dear Moses,

We have been working hard to find the right man for our church. We have put in a lot of hours and looked over all that you sent in. While we feel you are a qualified man, we just don’t think you are a good match for our needs. We wanted to share with you some of our thoughts in hopes that it will help you find a better fit.

We listened to your sermon tapes and while the content was very good, we felt that your stuttering problem was a hurdle we just could not overcome. Our people are accustomed to really quality preaching, and we feel that your lack of polish and clarity would distract from their ability to listen to you week in and week out. Our people need more than good content to learn. We really need an entertaining and dynamic speaker who can connect us to God’s Word.

While we trust that God has called you, we also understand that you have resisted God's leading at key points along the way. We want a guy who is passionate about doing this ministry and who will never question God’s call on his life. We also understand that your wife does not totally support your calling and has acted out against you on at least one occasion. These doubts you have both demonstrated over time give us pause about your potential effectiveness as a leader.

You seem to have some good people skills Moses, and everyone says that you have a certain glow about you that really reflects God’s presence. However, we also found in talking with some of your references that you have struggled with some anger problems. It was reported to us that you once threw down, and broke, some important Church property when you saw your congregation doing some bad things. This is clearly not the way to handle those kinds of situations and we really need a pastor who is always in control of himself in tough situations because our people really do a lot of sinning.

Probably most disturbing of all is your clear lack of leadership ability. While we appreciate the difficulties of leading a mega-church with millions of followers, we were not impressed with the many instances of rebellion under your tenure. We understand that in one case of embezzlement, you forced the congregation to make a public declaration of whose side they were on and then you struck down all those who disagreed with your policies. We agree that keeping high moral standards is important, but your methods seem a bit harsh and unloving. In addition, your lack of vision seems to have kept the people wandering about for the past 40 years. Our people tend to be a bit stubborn so we really need a leader who has demonstrated more skill in guiding his congregation.

Thank you for considering us as a potential match to your call and we hope you find the right congregation that will better match your gifts and experience.

Thanks,

The Search Team

Courageous 12 year old girl speaks out on Abortion

And, what is more interesting, the school folks disqualified her, not because of the quality of the talk she gave, the topic. I guess thought control by the left is full on.

The good news is, in anger the leftist judge that was most adamant, quit. Stomped out.

The rest of the judges had a change of heart and gave her the well deserved first prize. These young people will be the salvation of our country.




WND

F-16 Churches out of fuel crashing and burning

Ron McKenzie of Blessed Economist has written an insightful post about the Church and the Economy. He paints a pretty bleak picture of what much of the American Church will look like when the economic disaster hits.

Many Christians assume that the economic crisis will turn people back to God, but this is not inevitable. The escapades of the Christian Right have turned many Americans off the church, so they will be more like to turn to alternative religions in time of need. Many people are now so secularised, that God does not even cross their minds when troubles come. Church is not even on the radar. Troubled times might benefit the religions more.

Modern people look to the state when things go wrong. If Obama can kick start the economy, that faith will be further boosted. A worse crisis will just turn people to the state. People in Africa and South America know that government leaders are crooks, who will look after their mates, so their only hope is in something supernatural. Americans have gone the other way. They see the church as crooks, looking after their mates. They will look to the state when troubles come.

To experience a harvest in times of trouble, the church will have to demonstrate a life that is viable, while all others are failing. In an economic collapse, pastor-centric, building-centric churches will be too busy worrying about their overdrafts and mortgages to be able to reap the harvest. Their members will be to busy struggling with their own hire purchase payments and credit card debt to reap a harvest. Non Christians who are struggling with debt will not take seriously churches and Christians who are stuck in the same sinking boat.

To reap a harvest during economic troubles, you will need a model of church that can bring life and hope to where people live. The point of the Commando Vision is that an economic crisis cannot produce a harvest, unless radical Christians get ready to function through tumult. The reason is that most modern churches will be wiped out by the crisis and will not be in a position to help others. I expect that the American church has too many F16 Christians and not enough commando Christians to bring in a harvest in troubled times. Therefore, I doubt that the Lord will put his church through a real economic crisis, because the risk of disaster is just too great.

I will be speaking to the body at Faith Center on this topic in a few weeks in the evening service. It's a hard word. I met with the Pastors and we discussed if what was about to be shared was too difficult for the people. It is difficult and we certainly don't want to be fear mongers. But, these are mature people ready to hear the truth. I'm not certain I would bring this to every church. We will see. Things are changing and only the churches that are ready will survive this. I don't agree with Ron that the Father will hold back the disaster to protect the church, I believe he will allow it to refine and reveal. There are enough commando Christians on the ground to make a worthy assault. The F-16 Christians and Churches will run out of fuel, be grounded or destroyed. Some of those high fliers will become commandos as they realize that it's their only hope.

I hope. If we can offer enough insight we can help them enter into this without surprise. That's part of my job.

Obama's worst enemies voted for him

I find it ironic that the very groups that elected Obama in the first place will fanatically stymie his attempts to get anything done that is “shovel ready” towards his goal of renewable energy. It’s slogans, nothing more. As soon as there will be some difficulty with quick implementation, ready for short-spanned news consumers, he’ll change the goals into something more newsworthy. He doesn't really believe it matters anyway.

Also - these types of fights “fund” the left in the first place - they provide fodder for advertising campaigns for NGO’s, lawyers to “fight the power” - these are their cash in trade. It will be fun watching the semi-pragmatic democrats going to war with the loony left who fight all construction anywhere and everywhere.

There is that famous line that the best thing to do when your enemies are infighting is to do nothing and wait. I am garbling it exactly but you can understand the intent. The problem with letting them fight it out is that they don’t really have any concern for the general productivity or freedom of the society. They are blind drunk King Kongs stomping thru Manhattan leaving destruction in their wake.

As the collapse and stagnation of the Great Lake states into the Rustbelt shows, leftists work from an economic and political version of Milton’s “it's better to reign in hell than serve in heaven.” They would rather dominate in a crippled, poor and unproductive society than be equals in an effective, wealthy and productive society.

They will block projects like power transmission and power generation simply to force people to deal with them. They will invent reasons why people have to consult with them and give them veto power over new projects simply so they can have some power and position. They’ve positioned themselves to only gain by putting the breaks on development.

The situation is identical that of the mandarins versus everyone else in the final decades of failing Chinese dynasties. The mandarins mandated vast amounts of ritual and paperwork purely to justify their own positions. Unable to contribute materially, they instead created positions of power based on saying no more than saying yes. As a result, the governments of the dynasties grew progressively more paralyzed and incapable of action. Eventually they fell to internal revolt from the hinterlands or foreign invasion. The mandarin dead wood got cleared out and the process started all over again.

We are headed toward this revolt from inside and invasion from our south.

A Rant about Stupid Liberal Beliefs in Myths

A wind farm can be very successful, from the standpoint of a liberal political leader, even if the are no transmission lines to connect it to anything. It provides jobs for those who make & install the equipment, and it makes alternative-energy believers very happy. You can always say that the transmission lines will be built later, following appropriate environmental review, or that a new, “planned” community (centered around electrically-powered mass transit) will be built right next to the wind farm, or that “green” manufacturing will be located there. It doesn’t matter if these things ever actually happen: you will still get the glory and someone else can worry about paying off the bonds.

I hate that some people smoke in their cars with little kids in them and that people drink and drive

Some times out of ignorance people do things that are dangerous, ignorant, counterproductive, harmful to others, reckless, unthinking and bluntly just plain stupid.

To be clear, I do not hate the people, I hate their actions.

It's like I hate what's happening to our country because of the incompetence and stupidity of our leaders. Yes even the ones prior to the current occupant of 1600. I hate that unthinking reckless people like Chris Dodd, Charlie Rangle, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid are smoking in the car windows rolled up, driving drunker than a skunk 120 miles per hour down a residential street with little kids on it.

Are they evil. Not intentionally. They are just dangerous and harmful people.

I hate what they stand for, what the left stands for in this country, what has become of a beautiful country like Venezuela that I visited once now being ruled by an evil communist despot for life. We are not far from this in the USA.

This is beyond belief and I grieve. I would apologise to my grand kids for what we have left them. They wouldn't understand, yet. I will not be able to explain how we let the American dream slip right thru our fingers.

Meanwhile the left keeps on drinking that hard stuff, loads up the Buick with kiddies, and looks for that playground to drive thru as fast as they can. They don't seem to care who they kill and destroy.

How did this happen? Who are these people? Why do they hate America so much?

What kind of civil war will set in when the populace realizes what has happened? It won't be elections, it will be insurrection. Maybe that's why the current crop of socialists are so intent on shutting down any opposition voices and taking away people's guns.

This is not a good thing. Our country has been stolen from us... yes even over the last 10 years.

We are in peril.

Healthy Church or NOT

How to Spot a Healthy Church - Quickly

Ray Pritchard

Keep Believing Ministries

In the last 18 months I have come to a few conclusions about how to quickly gauge the health of the churches we visit--either to preach or simply to participate in a worship service. The Lord has allowed us to travel from coast to coast and to visit country cities, city churches and suburban churches--some large, some small, and many in-between. I don't know if doing this sort of itinerant ministry makes you more qualified to evaluate churches, but the very fact of being in a different church almost every Sunday inevitably forces you to think about where you've been, what you've seen, and what you've experienced. On one hand, it's obviously true that coming in to preach and then leaving doesn't allow you to do an in-depth analysis. But when your schedule takes you from Tupelo, MS to Muscle Shoals, AL to Baton Rouge, LA to New Brunswick, Canada to Arlington Heights, IL (my current schedule), it does allow you to worship in a variety of settings and it gives you a birds-eye view of how things are going in various churches.

I have come to the conclusion that there are two very obvious indicators of church health that the one-time visitor can gauge very quickly.

1. Hearty congregational singing.
2. Obvious affection between the pastor and the congregation.

I have written quite a bit about hearty congregational singing. That's one factor that I never fully appreciated until I started traveling and preaching in different churches. Healthy churches love to sing. This is not a statement about worship style, hymns vs. choruses, Power Point vs. hymnals, and it has nothing to do with denominational preference, church size, location, or the beauty or lack thereof of the sanctuary. I am not suggesting that healthy churches have great "music programs," a phrase I don't much like because it tends to emphasize the performance side of things. I'm not talking about excellent "special music" or beautiful choir anthems or praise bands or organ music, as good as those things may be. Lots of churches with big "music programs" hardly sing at all, although they may have big choirs and put on excellent Easter musicals. I am speaking of a church that truly loves to sing, where the music is based on good theology and the whole congregation lifts its voice in song, where a visitor can't help but join the rising chorus of praise to God. That's easy to check because it's obvious. If the people aren't singing, you can tell it. If the singing is anemic, preaching is generally more of a challenge. I think there is a lot of theology here and some insight into the human heart and something about the work of the Holy Spirit that I don't fully understand, but I have experienced it over and over again. Healthy churches love to sing. I've yet to visit an unhealthy church or a troubled church with strong congregational singing.

Now THIS guy deserves being visited in Jail

Jesus said, "when you do it to the least of these, my brethren, you do it unto me". Like indiscriminate welfare, he didn't mean that every person in jail was his Brethren. Some were, many not. If one of his brethren ends up in jail, he needs to be consoled and helped. He will be.

This guy is who Jesus was talking about:

Pro-life pastor prepares for sentencing

Charlie Butts - OneNewsNow - 2/15/2009

An Oakland, California, pastor could face jail time for expressing his pro-life views.

Pastor Walter Hoye ran into trouble with an abortion clinic while doing an informational picket. Dennis Howard, leader of The Movement for a Better America, believes Hoye is innocent.

"His approach was simply to carry a sign that said 'Jesus Loves You. Can We Help?' and offering those who wanted it some information about alternatives to abortion," Howard explains.

A complaint was filed and Hoye was found guilty in spite of proof to the contrary. "There was a video taken of him doing this, and it shows that he was not harassing anybody," Howard points out. "In fact, he was being harassed by escorts from the abortion clinic."

Pastor Hoye faces up to two years in jail and a $4,000 fine. Howard is calling Christians into action. "We feel that pro-life organizations around the country ought to take up this man's cause and pray and fast between now and February 19," he concludes.

That is when Hoye is due to be sentenced.

Persecution is accellerating. Be prepared, get involved or stay on the sidelines.

Root Canal or Extraction ... no choice at all

I have a toothache. A big one.

On antibiotics.

I go in on Tues noon.

Neither outcome is exciting.

How Lies, Deciept and Evil Intent Causes Death to a nation and to you

Over the weekend, Vladimir Putin, King (or something) of Russia warned Obama NOT to go on careeningdown the road to rampant socialism. He said, "We tried socialism, it didn't work, it won't work for you".

Never mind the warnings, it's like Obama is on autopilot. He is beyond help now. The bridge too far has already been crossed, Obama lied, people will die.

This from Joe Farah:

The lies are piling up after only 30 days.

The campaign promises are being broken so fast, it is making the America people's heads spin.

No one is capable of compiling them all.

And most of my colleagues in the media have no desire to do so.

But let's just take one big one that is likely to be broken tomorrow.

Late Friday, the Senate passed the $790 billion so-called "stimulus package," which discerning American citizens realize is nothing but the same old-fashioned, pork-laden, redistribution-of-wealth, spending bills for which the Democratic Party is infamous.

Let's go back in time, for those who care, to June 22, 2007. Obama was in Manchester, N.H., campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination.

He said government would be different with an Obama administration.

"When there is a bill that ends up on my desk as the president, you the public will have five days to look online and find out what's in it before I sign it," he said. His campaign called the idea the "sunshine before signing promise."

You can watch the video of that speech if you have the stomach.

Guess what?

Tomorrow, exactly one business day after the approval of the bill, Obama has signaled he will sign it. (Remember, today is a national holiday – and Washington government offices will be as empty as the noggins of Obamaniacs.)

But that's not all.

In that same speech, Obama promised there would be no more pork!

He promised there would be "no more secrets."

Yet, as we all know, this 1,000-plus-page piece of legislation was passed without being read by a single member of Congress. It was posted online in a form that could not be keyword searched.

So much for the promise of "transparency," too.

Not that I expected Obama to keep his word.

In fact, for my money, he's keeping far too many promises in far too little time. This administration is acting like it wants to bankrupt the country, convert it to an entirely socialist economy and end all meaningful debate about it before the year is out.

But, just for the record, he did lie – big time. And while no one has yet died as a result of his actions to date, they will.

• They will die because of scarcity and rationing of medical care.
• They will die because of unrestrained abortion and infanticide.
• Eventually, I believe, they will die because of hunger and exposure brought on by a collapsed economy ravaged by command-and-control centralization.
• But what has clearly died already – after just 30 days – is the very "democracy" Obama championed and pledged throughout his campaign.

This isn't "democracy," not that democracy should ever be the goal of any true American who reveres the Constitution. It's just the old-fashioned "dictatorship of the proletariat" – a Communist euphemism for a war on workers not directly in servitude to the state.

Let's examine some jaw-dropping numbers:

* Before this bill is signed, actual federal obligations are already $65.5 trillion – exceeding the gross domestic product of the entire world.

* The Obama administration economic stimulus package is going to force the Treasury to borrow approximately $2.5 trillion in 2009 and another $4 trillion in 2010, with the result of increasing the current $10 trillion national debt by 65 percent in just two years. If the Obama administration increases the national debt by 65 percent every two years, the debt will be $16.5 trillion in 2010 and $27.225 trillion by 2012, the year of the next presidential election.

Let's consider the real meaning of these numbers:

* If you had gone into business on the day Jesus was born, and your business lost a million dollars a day, 365 days a year, it would take you until October 2737 to lose $1 trillion.

* $1 trillion dollars divided by 300 million Americans comes out to $3,333 per person.

* One trillion $1 bills stacked one on top of the other would reach nearly 68,000 miles into the sky, about a third of the way from the Earth to the moon.

* Earth's home galaxy, the Milky Way, is estimated to contain about 200 billion stars. So, if each star cost $1, $1 trillion would buy five Milky Way galaxies full of stars.

But you don't need to know all that.

Just let the "experts" in Washington figure it all out for you – the ones who are not even reading the bills, the ones who lied to you last year when they campaigned for office, the ones who are hiding this information from you even today.

After all, as Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., explains: The American people don't care.

Anne Coulter's take on this is on the money as well.

With the stimulus bill, liberals plan to move unfirable government workers into every activity in America, where they will superintend all aspects of our lives.

Also, thanks to the stimulus bill, the private sector will gradually shrivel and die. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the cost of servicing the bill's nearly trillion-dollar debt will shrink the economy within a decade.

Robert Kennedy famously said: "There are those who look at things the way they are and ask, 'Why?' I dream of things that never were and ask, 'Why not?'"

The new liberal version is: There are those who look at things and ask, "Why on earth should the government be paying for that?" I dream of things that never were funded by the government and ask, "Why not?"

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself - THAT'S NOT TRUE!!

Every American has over and over again heard this FDR Great Depression mantra. It's considered gospel. It's considered wise. I'm not convinced it's accurate at all.

I believe arrogance and ignorance are to be more greatly feared. What we must fear is the mistake of putting our faith in something not worthy of our faith. An example:

João Torto
The small European country of Portugal has a long history of aviation: Attempts at flight go back as early as Medieval times, and the Portuguese Air Museum dates back as far as 1909, only six years after the Wright brothers flew at Kitty Hawk, N.C.

One famous attempt, however, made the wrong kind of history, ending up in failure.

The man who took the hit for Portuguese aviation history was João Torto. A true Renaissance man, Torto was a man of many trades: He was a nurse, a barber, a certified bleeder and healer, an astrologer and a teacher.

Unfortunately, Torto a­lso had a big head about his well-rounded education, and decided he wanted another title added to the list -- aviator.

Using two pairs of calico cloth-covered wings attached to his arms and an eagle-shaped helmet, Torto jumped from the cathedral tower in St. Mateus square on June 20, 1540 at 5 p.m. (in front of a large crowd, of course) and fell a short distance to a nearby chapel.

Unfortunately, when he landed, his helmet slipped over his face and obscured his ­view. He fell to the ground, fatally wounding himself.

Torto had faith in the wings he created, he had faith in his own ability, he was arrogant, he was misled and it cost him everything. Somewhere there is an old black and white movie of a man who wearing a pair of wings is going to try them out by leaping off a cliff. I tried to find it. Just before he leaps off the cliff (to his death) he is seen pacing around, going to the edge of the cliff and looking over, taking a couple false starts, and being very nervous about the whole thing, as he should have been. He had doubts about the faith he was putting in the flying apparatus he was wearing.

That's exactly what is happening with people who are trusting themselves and have faith in the new stimulus plan that should be called the TORTO plan.

We need not fear FEAR. We must fear arrogance and ignorance. That's what the dimwits that came up with this abomination are made of. Now we will all leap off the castle wall and hit the ground. I hope we survive. I'm not sure we will.