Search This Blog

Monday, July 27, 2015

Pro-Life's "Frederick Douglass Moment"

     In 1845, Frederick Douglass wrote his best-selling autobiography titled, "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave".  His book lifted the vale off of the public's eyes as to what black slaves had to endure under the hardships of slavery.  He detailed how he had limited contact with his mother and how he watched other slaves being whipped to keep them under control.   He showed how slaves were in constant fear from their "masters" and prevented from learning how to read and write in order to keep them ignorant of their true condition.   As humans we often cover our eyes to the truth of how brutal we can be as humans.   In the 1800's the public had adopted a humanitarian view of slavery in which slaves were well taken care of, fed well and given opportunities that they would not have had if they had been left back in the African jungle.  Like the Germans of the Holocaust who had pretended that the Jews were simply being moved to other locations in the railroad boxcars and not to their certain death and destruction in the cremation ovens so we too kidded ourselves as to how horrible slaves were treated on a daily basis and how families were torn apart and treated like cattle for breeding purposes.  Douglass's biography blew the lid of that lie and made the American public come to grips with the reality it was willing to live with so it can have cotton to make their clothes, curtains, bed sheets, towels and other necessities of modern life.

    Now today, a series of videos of Planned Parenthood doctors has emerged showing them to be heartless bargainers of human tissue and organs for their own profit.   We are horrified to see these woman doctors talk about the details of their work as they enjoy salads and glasses of wine.  As they crunch on their salads they discuss how they can use "less crunchy methods" in order to harvest larger amounts of tissue for the buyers to purchase as if the product they are providing was apples or tomatoes and not human beings at all.

   The vale has been pulled and many wish it was put back in place.   Many wish they didn't know what they do now know.    It was easier to pretend that the service rendered was that of removing a cancerous growth and not something with "hearts, lungs, kidneys, livers" which can be utilized for human medical research.   Those who want us to feel "good" about these harvests would have us pretend that its for OUR good.   They tell us, "Think of all the good these woman are doing!  Think of all the countless lives they might save by offering these organs for medical research!".

    Does that sound familiar?   Did America not use that same argument for why slavery should be kept in place?   Were our ancestors not given the same bull-shit lines of the economic necessity of slavery and how we were doing these uneducated brutes a better life here in America?  Were they not told to "Turn away. Nothing to see here"  as we are?

    But thankfully our ancestors did not turn away.  They faced their atrocities and went to war to end it all.  They sought to correct their error in judgment and repair their humanity that had been lost.  For you see,  both the slave and the slave-owner were damaged by slavery.   The slaves damage was to his body and his mind, but the slave-owner was damaged in his soul.   Through the atrocities he inflicted he chipped away at his own soul and humanity until there was nothing left.   By his mistreatment of another human being, he himself became less of a human being himself.

    Likewise, in the abortion industry, there are 3 people being harmed at the same time: the mother, the child and the doctor.    Do you think that Dr. Gosnell (the now infamous late-term abortion doctor who treated his female patients with such lack of medical care that he is now behind bars) went in to the medical profession to abuse woman the way he did?   I don't think any person who goes into the field of medicine does so with the intentions of becoming a medical monster.   But somewhere in the story of Dr. Gosnell, he went from a doctor wanting to help others to a doctors who cared for no one but himself.   When and where  that transformation occurred, only Dr. Gosnell knows, but now we see that abortion takes a toll on the human soul as well.  Like the pounding waves of the ocean wearing away at the coast and turning the largest of rocks into pebbles and sand, so also aborting human life and disposing of arms, legs, feet with tiny toes, hands with tiny fingers, heads with eyes and ears developed chips away at your humanity until nothing is left.

    I do not hate these woman on these videos who see nothing wrong with what they are doing.   I feel sorry and lament for them as much as the little children they seek to sell to the highest bidder.   I pray that they regain their humanity and see what they are doing as wrong.   But now the question remains for the rest of us.   Will we seek to regain our humanity and our soul or will we turn away and try to pretend that it never happened.   Will we go on pretending that what is being extracted is just a gob of tissue that only turns into a live human being seconds upon entering the birth canal and exiting outside the mothers body or will we admit to ourselves that that miracle happens seconds after the joining of sperm and egg?    






Thursday, July 9, 2015

Does God have a split personality?

    This has always been a concern of mine since I was just a kid.  It often dumbfounded me as to why in the OT (Old Testament) God lays down harsh laws and punishments and then in the NT (New Testament) God is all about grace and forgiveness.    Does God have a multiple personality disorder?  Why does he in the OT put restrictions on eating, dressing and circumcision and then in the NT says none of that matters anymore?

    It occurred to me later in life after having children that God does not have a split personality.  Instead, he is merely a Father on a mission to save the world.    We fathers are often like that.   We can be reading our kids the riot-act and threatening them with all kinds of punishments one minute and the next minute jovial and kidding around with them.   The difference is the context.   If you have ever been in Disneyland or Disney World you will have undoubtedly witnessed one of the transformations.   All it takes is a father who realizes that they have 5 minutes to make it across the park in order to make their Fast-Pass scheduled time for a ride they have been waiting for all day and suddenly the jovial, happy-go-lucky parent turns into a strict, do-as-I-tell-you-or-else parent who threatens their kids with all kinds of punishments if their actions prevent them from arriving at their destination as scheduled.

     God is no different in the OT.   We forget that God is a man on a mission.  He has already decided to come to earth through the Israelites at the time of the Roman Empire.  He needs to get his people from where they are at in Egypt (around 2000BC) to where they need to be to enter our history and set all things straight.   Like the children in Disneyland, they have a lot of distractions along the way that could cut that trip short.   They will have to wade through cultures that run counter to God's directions.   Those cultures will suck them in and try to dilute them and turn them into one of the many other cultures that don't exist anymore such as the Hitites, the Amonites, the Caananites and many more.   Can you point to anyone today and say they descended from the Amonnites?   Of course not!   They are all gone and assimilated into the other cultures around them.  The same could have happened to the Jewish people as well.  Likewise,  the worship of other gods like Baal and Moloch could cause the Israelites to forget God's mission and his promises to them.   Too often we fail to see that their culture was nothing like what we have today.   We often make the mistake in our minds of thinking that all that is different for the people in the OT is the year and that they don't have our modern conveniences.   But nothing could be further from the truth.   They were dealing with cultures very much far removed from what we deal with today.

     Take for example the god Baal.  Baal was a fertility god who was worshiped by paying money to a
priest and then having sex with a temple prostitute.   How does God compete with that?  The line of men outside of the temple must have gone on for miles.  Now imagine being surrounded by thousands of Baals followers who keep telling you that you are missing out on some really good worship at the temple.  Is it really any wonder at all that in the OT the Israelites are constantly being pulled back in the Baal worship?   Also ask yourself where did the Baal priests get the girls to be the Baal prostitutes?   Most likely they came as offerings from families looking for additional blessings from Baal and so offered their own daughters to the temple for service since girls were held in such low esteem by these other cultures (an ancient letter from a Egyptian nobleman to his wife suggested drowning the baby if it turns out to be a girl).  What should God do about this?  Nothing?  Do you think that these people will end their worship of Baal with just a harsh talking to by their Jewish neighbors? 

     And let's not forget about the god Moloch.  God warns them in multiple places to not sacrifice
their children in the fire to Moloch.  Let that sink in for a while.   These people were offering up their very own children as a burnt offering to an idol to help insure their crops come in at harvest time.    For some time, people thought that this was pure hyperbole on the part of the Jewish people.  But in recent years , altars built in honor of Moloch have been uncovered and the burnt bones of children 2 years old and less were found  (my guess is that most of these children were girls as well).   God's need to remove these people from the land the Israelites were going to inhabit was necessary not only to prevent them from getting involved in this religion, but also as a way to bring the worship of Moloch to an end as well.

    Given all of these problems that could prevent God's people from reaching their goal, God uses a system of "blessings and curses" to help guide his people and keep them on course.   He's not doing this just to be a "mean God" but to bring salvation to the world through these people.    

      But what about all those silly rules about not eating shell fish, pork, etc ?   Why do those go away in the NT as well but not the other commandments like "Do not commit adultery" ?   To answer this you must understand that there are 2 sets of laws in the Jewish culture.   The first is the legal or social laws.  These consist of the 10 commandments and the laws that God gives under these to help them clarify what they mean.    The other laws are religious or dietary laws.  Unlike the former laws, these do not have blessings and curses attached to them.   They are merely told that God detests them.   For a Jew these can be practiced or not practiced, but if you are a "good Jew" you will.    But why did God have them do these things?   So many of them seem so silly to us today.

      To answer, let's go back to our Disneyland example.
You often see families do strange things
when they visit large theme parks like Disneyland.   They will often dress their kids in bright (some would say gaudy) clothes and even put name tags and even have them wear silly looking hats in some cases.  Why?  So they stick out in a crowd and therefore can be more easily identified by the others in case they get lost.    The same goes for the Jews and their religious laws.   It's meant to distinguish them from all the other tribes in the area and remind them on a daily basis about who they are and what they stand for.   Imagine every time a Jewish man goes to the bathroom and they look down and see that their wee-wee is different from every other wee-wee.  Instantly they are reminded, "Oh yeah! I am a Jew".   Then imagine every time they go to the market and they see shell fish for sale or pork.   Again they are remind, "Oh yeah! I am a Jew!".   Other laws as well not only remind them of their heritage but also as a prophecy of what God will do in the future.   Take for example their laws requiring that all debts be forgiven every 50 years or that every year they were to take a spotless sheep and sacrifice it to God for the atonement of all their sins.

    Similarly,  just like the family takes off their "Disney attire" when they leave the park because its not needed anymore so also after Jesus has accomplished all that the Father has destined him to do we no longer need the religious laws such as not eating pork, shell-fish or circumcision.   In fact, the early Jewish-Christians dropping of these laws illustrates to the rest of the world just how real Jesus life-death-and-resurrection are to them as they are willing to go against their Jewish tradition and upbringing for the sake of the Gospel.

     In conclusion, when you take a step back and look at what God's mission is and the various mind-fields he has to walk these people through you begin to understand the purpose of these "silly laws" and you begin to see God for who he is.   Loving, caring and concerned for our well-being and not having a split-personality.

Tuesday, June 23, 2015

We must remember history's villains as well as its heroes

    Some day people will no longer remember General Robert E. Lee.   As politicians jump on the "Erase the Civil War History bandwagon" names of the Confederacy leaders are being erased faster than you can say "Forrest Gump".    Statues are being removed, flags pulled down, parks schools and hospitals are being given new names all in the name of helping us feel good about ourselves. 

    But erasing the villains does not change history or what was done.   These symbolic gestures do not change who we are or what happened but only seek to cover it up.   Like a crime scene being wiped down with a a clean rag to erase all the evidence and fingerprints we lose important information for future generations to comb through and learn from.   What happened to the villains is as important as what happened to the heroes in any story.   Who they were and what they believed give us a point of reference to compare and contrast.   Like using an object in a photograph in the fore-ground helps give dimension to the objects in the background that you want to highlight.   So also, these men and battles provide us with a sense of immenseness to what the northern union had to overcome in order to win freedom for the slaves. 

    Also, we have become very one dimensional in our thinking and view of the world.  Hollywood in its movies quite often presents us with simplistic villains that have no redeeming qualities.   They are bad asses and that is all.   No more.. no less.  But the real world isn't so one dimensional.   Yes people can have some bad ideas on race and slavery.   But that doesn't mean they did not have any good qualities to admire.   General E. Lee for example was the lead of the Confederate Army for the entire war and nearly defeated the Union early on despite the Union's unmatched factories and population to draw from.   Compared to the Union, Lincoln had to replace his top general on several occasions before giving the job to Gen. Grant.   Lee was able to inspire his men in many victories against the north and his knowledge of military fighting was clearly and advantage for the south.   Do we erase all of that because he espoused slavery?    Would we erase the history of Lincoln because as a lawyer he represented a slave owner and argued for the slave to be returned to his home state?  I hope you would say "Of course not!".   But that is what you are requesting when you erase the history of people like Lee.   And what happened to Lee after the war?   Was he imprisoned by Lincoln and hung for crimes against humanity?   No.  He retired quietly and never again tried to rally troops to break from the Union again.   He showed honor and grace in losing and brought peace to the South during the restoration.   Are there lessons we can learn from him today?   Can our future politicians learn how to handle defeat and how to put their country and their people ahead of their own egos?

I think we can.

Friday, June 5, 2015

The benefits of shame


SHAME ON YOU!

   How do those words make you feel?  Angy?  Upset?  Embarrassed?    Parents for eons have used those words directed at their children when they feel their children have stepped out of line.  They may have lied, cheated, stolen, hit someone, skipped school, saw a dirty movie or magazine or a thousand other ways kids get in trouble. 

    Shame has long been used as a societies way of fixing small problems before they become larger ones.  A child may steal a candy bar at a store and the parent marches them back to confront the store manager with what they have done and promise they will never do it again.  My daughter when she was in junior high got caught up in the wrong group of girls who liked to take things from the store.   They got caught the first time she was with them and I had to go into to get her because mom was visiting relatives back home.  My daughter was embarrassed to say the least and was required to sign a paper stating they would not frequent that store anymore.  Shame did its work and she stopped hanging with those girls from then on and she had learned her lesson.  A little shame now for those other girls hopefully would prevent a future larger crime requiring a larger penalty to be used such as jail.   Speaking of jail, there have been other cases where judges have used shame to correct a persons behavior.  It usually was a minor offense but the penalty was one they would not forget.  In many of these cases the person was required to hold a large sign on a busy road telling all the world what they had done and why they were stupid to have done it. 

     But shame in modern society has been utilized less and less and therefore our children will reap less of its benefits.   Yes.  You read that right.   I said BENEFITS.
     Take for example, Bruce Jenner.   He (I refuse to say "she" as 100% of his chromosomes will
always say XY and therefore from a scientific perspective Bruce Jenner will always be MALE) has benefited from shaming in his life.  Ask yourself this.  What caused him to hide his desire to wear women's clothes for so long?  Shame of course.  He internally new it was not normal for boys to want to wear women's clothes and so he hid it out of shame.   That "shame" allowed Bruce Jenner to go on and become the World's Greatest Athlete by breaking (and still holding) the record of the Olympic Decathlon.   That "shame" allowed him to make millions of dollars in TV and magazine  endorsements and appearances.  That "shame" allowed him to become a broadcast journalist for ABC during future Olympics and sporting events.  That "shame" allowed him to become the famous person he is and without it, he would have just been another transvestite walking around with fake boobs and wearing women's clothes and makeup.   No Olympic medal. No endorsements.  No fame.  No "Life with the Kardashians".   Nothing.   You can also assume as well that without all that money he would not have the necessary funds to pay for the expensive surgery and procedures to do his transformation process and Catlyn would just be another dream unfulfilled.

    So what about future Bruce/Catlyn Jenner's that are out there?  How many other boys who are unsure about their masculinity will choose to assume a different persona instead of hold their inner demons at bay and strive to make something of who they are as men?    We've already seen so called parents who are willing to let little Joey dress up like sister Jamey.  They don't want to "shame" their son into behaving as he should.   To them, there are no social boundaries that should be adhered to.  It's easier for them to demand that the "world change" and not their son or daughter.   They abdicate their responsibilities as parents for fear of being labeled bigots or intolerant.  They let so called psychological "experts" determine their actions as parents and so leave their children to the vices of the world.

    We will never understand all the mental illnesses that inflict people of our society.  That is how I see Bruce Jenner.  I don't see him as a hero.  I see him as a poor mentally ill person who in his aging years has decided to stop fighting his illness and give into it.   He has decided to put aside his children and family who now must come to grips about their "father".   Their feelings are inconsequential to him now.   He may shed tears of sorrow for them, but those are just alligator tears and nothing more.  His actions say "SCREW THEM! ITS MY NEEDS!".  They must be dragged into this whole circus and be paraded around like a bunch of trained elephants for all to see and question.  Their needs have been weighed in the balance and "Catlyn's" needs must come first and foremost.  After all, in our current societies view it's no longer considered to be an illness.   It's now viewed to be a great triumph for mankind.  One small step for Catlyn... one giant leap for all things strange and perverted.  Our children no longer have heroes to look up to like Neal Armstrong,  Jacky Robinson,  John Wayne or Hank Aaron.  Now in our politically correct world it's a parade of mentally ill people who grace our magazine covers.   Break a 100 year record?  Who cares!  Find a cure for cancer?  Big deal!  Stop a terrorist from killing hundreds of people?  So what!  But break some social convention and make people grimace as they contemplate your decision to come out of yet-another-closet.... HE'S A HERO!  LET'S CELEBRATE!!

    There's an old saying that says "If you promote something you will get more of it".  If this is true, I guess we will be seeing a lot more "Catlyn's" in our future. 

    So all I can is "Pass the barf bag".

         

Friday, May 22, 2015

Don't raise your children in a "Truman dome"

    If you remember the ending of the movie "The Truman Show", we see Truman who has been for his entire life lied to by everyone around him.  He is the only person in the show that is not in on the joke that he is living out his life inside a giant dome where everything is controlled (including the weather).   His life is one magical encounter after another.  He is smiled at by everyone and he is told by everyone how great a person he is.  But then he starts to wake up to the reality of his situation.  Things don't add up and by the end of the movie he must make a decision to stay inside the dome or exit into the REAL world.  (We don't get to see what happens AFTER he leaves but we assume all is well and good for him).

   This decision is the same one our kids make as they graduate from college.

   Which brings me to a trend I have noticed lately on the internet.   This is the season for graduation commencement addresses to be given all across the land.  Colleges are promoting their students to the next level in life and to do so bring in a variety of speakers to do the task of inspiring them for their future endeavors.   What I have noticed is a increase in commencement "truth telling" that we have not seen before.   We hear less of the "you are special", "you can do it", "you are the bright stars of our future we have been waiting for.." and more from truth-tellers are willing to stand up to their podiums and pronounce the hard facts to the youth robed and sitting in front of them.   They tell them things like:
  1. You are not special
  2. Life is hard
  3. You will fail
  4. Life is more than awards
  5. You need to work hard to get anywhere
   These facts are important for them to hear.  But I am afraid for many of them they are too late to be taught.  They have spent the last 21 years of their life coddled, pumped up, lavished with trophies, told they are 1 in a million, excused for their failures and given grade that are meaningless.  Those lessons have been taught in classrooms, soccer fields, playgrounds, at awards ceremonies and at home.   When they lost a game they were told the other team was just a little better and they are really a good team.   When they got a bad grade on a report card they were excused because either "that class was really tough" or "that teacher was not fair" but not because "they failed to turn in assignments or study for quizzes and tests".   At the end of their soccer or baseball seasons we handed out plastic participation trophies most of which are now wasting space in either attics or garbage dumps.   But no matter, it made them feel "good about themselves".

     Now we delude ourselves into thinking that a 20 minute sermon from a Hollywood star or a multimillionaire will undo all those years of damage?   To me, that's like you weighing 400 lbs from spending your whole life eating nothing but McDonald's fast food and you think eating a couple of celery sticks is going to slim you down to a normal weight.   But that is our mode of operation here in America these days.   That's life in the Delusional States of America where we think a motivational speaker can change everything if we pay them enough money.

     Your kids have a long hard row to hoe and many of them are picking up their hoe now for the first time in their life.   They will get blisters on their hands and their arms and backs will hurt.  Many will give up and come back to your nests because the worlds is too painful for them.  My hope for them (and you) is that you don't "rinse and repeat" the same mistakes.   My son came back for a couple of years too (I have written about it before) but he realized how much harder the world is and that he needed that slap of reality to wake him up.  He has worked very hard to change himself and make a life for himself.   He faced his mistakes and bad decisions.  He has surrounded himself with like-minded people who want to travel that "road less taken" to make something of themselves and has since ventured back out on his own to take on new challenges.  He knows he will fall down again at some point.  He knows that both failure and success are in his future and he needs to work through those failures when they come.

     For those of you whose kids are still in elementary school there is still time to change course.  You can be your own child's "truth-teller" and "inspirational speaker" if you want to.  Maybe it starts with you telling your soccer coach that they won't be going to the award pizza party (or at least they don't need a plastic participation trophy).   Maybe it's not rewarding your kids for getting B's when they could get A's.   Maybe it's simplifying their birthday parties and keeping them simple (even just within the immediate family).   Or it is talking about your failures and not just your successes to them so they know that you didn't always have it so easy.   Whatever the case, don't wait for their college or high school graduation to come for unlike "The Truman Show" there might not be so happy of an ending for them.

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Bowling for sinners

    Ever since I was about 6 years old I have loved bowling.   I can still remember my family going to a bowling alley in Carlyle Illinois to bowl a few games.   I remember it well because it was the first time I ever bowled a STRIKE!   Back then we didn't have gutter-bumpers to keep the ball in the alley either for the kids.   In those days, it was as difficult for the kids as it was for the adults to get the ball all the way down the alley and hit the pins.  That night I bowled a 52 and I kept the score sheet tacked to my bedroom wall to look at for weeks on end.

    Bowling is a strategic game where you try to hit the front pin (#1) in just the right way that that ball knocks enough pins such that they ricochet in a manner that all 10 get knocked down.  If you don't hit that first pin, your are not going to get a strike unless you are very very lucky.   Also strikes are beneficial in bowling because you add the next 2 balls you bowl to the current frame you just got a strike in.   So if you bowl 2 more strikes after this one (referred to as a "turkey" ...don't ask me why... it just is), you get to add 20 more points to the 10 you got for this frame and that adds 30 points.  Call it the compounding effect.

    Satan uses this same compounding approach in our lives as well.  Our sins have a tendency to replicate and increase in scope those they impact.   A one-night affair for example can lead to divorce, divorce can ruin the children's lives and cause them to hate their father (or mother) and lead to drug abuse, teen pregnancy and even suicide.   Children of divorce also are more likely to stop going to church (if they did before) as they associate their father being a hypocrite and a phoney-baloney christian which they want nothing to be a part of.   Once this is accomplished it may be MANY generations until that family ever has a member darken the doorway of a church ever again.

     The effect of the one sin is thereby multiplied many times over.   This is why parents need to be so careful.  They are not just looking out for themselves but also their children and grandchildren as well.  What caused me to write this blog was I just read a story of a Lutheran pastor in Michigan who is married and has 5 children was found to have a profile on a dating website and had apparently several hookups.  How did this happen?   My guess is started by him using porn, but that is just my guess.   For whatever the cause, his sin has tragically destroyed not only his marriage and his children but also untold hundreds of his members.   Many congregations that go through such an upheaval will lose members by the droves and might end up closing their doors for good.

     I call this Satan's "bowling for sinners" and it's extremely effective. 

     I can recall one time when I was faced with a similar situation.   It was late at night (10:30 or so) and everyone else was in bed (my kids were 6 & 7 at the time) and I needed to go do some grocery shopping because we had nothing to make for their lunches the next morning.   I went to a store called Food Source and did my shopping.   When I reached the checkout counter I saw a very beautiful blonde woman checking out in front of me.  Because Food Source allowed 2 people to bag their food in parallel at the same time, we were both bagging our food and exchanged simple pleasantries ("Hi. Nice night").   Since I had less groceries I finished first and exited the store.  As I pushed my cart out to the car I could hear a cart coming up quickly behind me and noticed it was her running with her cart.  She said, "Oh this is nice! I am parked right next to you!".  I put my bags in the car and was intrigued as to what she wanted (I won't lie).   As I was about to pull out she tapped on my window.  After I rolled down my window she asked if I could wait a minute and so I did as she put her cart away.   She then came back and said "I would be really happy if you followed me home.  Hope to see you later!" and with that she got into her car and drove slowly off waiting for me to catch up to her.   As I pulled my car out of my parking space a simple thought came to me:

Nothing GOOD can come from this

     And with that as she exited the parking lot, she turned right and I turned left and I never saw her again.   I don't know what she had in mind.  Maybe it was sex.  Maybe it was all a joke.  Maybe she had a bet with a friend and I was a way to win it.  Maybe she was nuts. I really don't know.   I think that in that moment God spoke to me in those few words inserted into my brain.  Like Joseph  confronted with Potifer's wife asking him to lay with her and him saying "How can I do this and sin against God!" and then running out of the house half naked.   That is how I felt.   Yes, to some of you it would have been better if I had said that suddenly I saw the face of my wife and kids flashing before my eyes or something of that line that made me change coarse but it wasn't.   This isn't a scene from a Hollywood movie and frankly, I don't think men's brains are built that way.   Robin Williams once put it this way when talking to Johnny Carson: 
"God gave man a brain and a penis but only enough blood to run one of them at a time"
     That is how I always feel when I see men destroyed by their decisions they make.  Take for
example Tiger Woods.   The man had everything you could want.  Fame (everyone knows his name).  Fortune (worth millions).  Great wife (a super model).   Now, he's lost it all.  His golf game crumbled (hasn't won a major tournament in years), his wife left him with the kids, he became the butt of late night comics and he lost all his TV/magazine advertising endorsements.    All this because he wanted to spend a few minutes with women who, in my opinion, were nothing more than discount prostitutes. 

     I often pray to God that I never do anything that would destroy my marriage or my kids faith in Him.   I know how easily it can happen today as marriage is held in such low esteem these days among people and so few care if a man has a wedding ring on or not (and for some women it can actually serve as a dinner bell).   I don't want to be pin #1 in Satan's sights with my wife, kids and future grandchildren following close behind. It is for this reason these 10 words in the Lord's Prayer mean so very much to me every time I say them.
"Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil!"
    Let me be very clear here.  I am not saying that I never sin.  I do.  I sin hundreds of times a day.  Just ask my wife and she will tell you that the last thing I am is a saint.  What I pray is that I never commit a sin so grievous that would harm my family or their faith beyond repair.

    That "strike" I could never live with.
   

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Christians thinking small rather than BIG.

     We've all seen the commercials where a star athlete has just won a major victory and the camera comes up to them and says, "Hey ___________! You just won ___________!  What are you going to do NEXT?"  and of course the answer is always the same.  "I'm going to Disney World!".

     You might say the same happened to Jesus after the resurrection.   In Acts 1:6 it says
"So when they met together, they asked Jesus 'Lord are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?' "
     I find it interesting that the passage does not indicate any one disciple asked him the question.  So it must have been a group request that they had been discussing.  Here Jesus has just gone through a excruciating ordeal of beatings, floggings, mocking, crucifixion, death and ultimately being resurrected and now he is being asked what he's going to do NEXT for his "hat trick".    Many of them joined Jesus because they had visions of him ruling from King David's throne and kicking the Romans out.  To many of them, being under Roman rule (or any Gentile rule for that matter) was an injustice that needed to be rectified by God for them to realize their full potential and purpose as God's chosen people.  Maybe they thought there was still a chance Jesus will do that very thing.  After all, in their minds all he had to do was march back into Jerusalem (they could even get another donkey for him to ride in on) go to the Temple, show himself to all the priests and then to Pilot and then "BOOM" he would be made King and no one would dare touch him. 

      Jesus response is simple (Acts 1:7-8)
"It is not for you to know the times and dates the Father has set by his own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth"
     He in effect is telling them that they are thinking "too small" and they need to think bigger.  They were not just going to sit back in Jerusalem and enjoy the glory days of old.  They were going to get sent out to the very ends of the earth to proclaim the good news of Salvation.  They were not going to "Disney World" but instead to the WHOLE WORLD.   Their eyes must have popped out of their heads when they heard these words. 

      We today often think small too.  We want heaven on earth now just like the disciples did.  We see injustice all around us.  We believe these injustices need to be remedied by God for us to realize our full potential as his children.  Some of us, like the disciples, long for the glory days of old and want God to restore them ASAP.    We may ask God:
  • Lord will you at this time restore our country to the 1950's (or 1980's)?
  • Lord will you at this time end poverty?
  • Lord will you at this time end unemployment?
  • Lord will you at this time end racism?
  • Lord will you at this time end cancer?
   Even within the church we see people thinking small instead of big.  For years the Lutheran Church has been under fire to allow woman Pastors (I am talking about the LCMS and WELS).   We see other churches change course on this in modern times.  The ELCA Lutherans have.  The Presbyterians have.  The Episcopal church has.  So why not our church?   To some this may be seen as an "injustice" that needs to be rectified for them to move forward.  Maybe their request would be "Lord will you at this time allow woman to serve as pastors?".   But given our position on scripture and that there is no clear command from Jesus that this is to change from the old covenant to the new covenant, I would have to say the answer from God would be the same,
"No.  But you go and be my witnesses to the end of the earth!"   
     God knows we have a limited amount of time (he has set the date) and a limited amount of energy to use (cannot be created or destroyed according to Sir Isaac Newton) and therefore we must make the most of the time and energy we have to reach as many as we can with the good news we have.   When we strive to make our heaven here on earth we waste our time and energy.  Yet I see so much of this today in the church as it struggles with non-gospel related subjects.  Many churches have decided that the world is better and fairer than the church and they seek to bring the world into the church.  Even though Jesus had warned us to be "in the world but not of the world".  Like a boat moving in the ocean is in the water but does not let the water into it or else it sinks, so also we must be careful to not let the worlds ways distract us from our REAL mission.
 
      Not that these injustices are small in scope at all.  Poverty, hatred, disease are all immense and important issues and God wants us to be involved in.  But our goal is not the idea we can eradicate these injustices (even Jesus said, "The poor you will always have with you"), but that we as his disciples and witnesses can use these injustices to reach the people with the Gospel of God's justice of paying the penalty of all our sins through his son, Jesus Christ.  We know that these issues will ultimately be fixed when God creates a new heaven and a new earth.  We must therefore be his witnesses to reach the unsaved and give them true eternal justice.

      We need to think BIG as Christians and stop thinking small.

Wednesday, May 6, 2015

You're asking for it!

      I can still remember the news story as if it was yesterday.   A congressman had brought to the
attention of Congress that money had been paid under the Endowment for the Arts to an artist who took a picture of a crucifix dipped in a glass of urine.  The piece was called: Piss Christ.   After seeing it, I was the one who was "pissed".   How could someone do something like that and call it "art".    Congress's phone lines went on overload from other angry citizens like myself.   But our anger was not so much that an artist would do such a thing, but that our tax dollars went to pay for this work of art which meant I paid an artist to slap me in the face and call it art.   Did the Pope send out an order to kill the artist?  Did Billy Graham post "Wanted" posters with the artists face and address on it?   Did the artist have to go under FBI protective services?  

     No.  No and No.

     Recently some cartoonists in Texas decided to hold a contest to draw a picture of Mohammad and 2 jihadist from Arizona drove to kill them all and were only stopped by a police officer with excellent aim and precision.   Some, like Bill O'Reilly, in the media have said that the contest members had it coming.   They say that their contest was unnecessary and was "asking for it". 

     Is that what it has come down to?   Is FEAR now the gauge we must use when deciding what to say and what not to say?    Won't this give any other group who doesn't want their views mocked or ridiculed the rationale to commit violence to end all discussion?   Where will it end?  We know many Muslims are against alcohol and scantily dressed women too.  What if Muslims become enraged about how we dress or what we drink?   Would we say a girl in a bikini was "asking" for it if she is killed on a beach?   What if a person like me writes that Muhammad was NOT a prophet and his writings are pure fiction?   Should I be killed for mocking them?   Am I asking for it too?  What if I show up at a Yankees game wearing a Boston Red Sox jersey and I get knifed by an irate fan?  Would it be considered "justified murder"?   I guess using Bill O'Reilly's logic all the cases mentioned herein would be people "asking for it".

     In my opinion fear should have no basis in Free Speech decisions.  Our nation is built on not just the ideal of free speech but also the ideal that citizens who hear speech they disagree with are able to control their emotions and allow others who do not share the same view to voice their opinion without harm to their person.  Those who wish to live here in this country must be willing behave in such a way or be asked to leave.   

     As I wrote in a previous blog, the last line of our national anthem says: "O'er the land of the FREE and the home of the BRAVE".   The BRAVE in our country are not just those who wear military uniforms and go to far off countries to fight for us, but also those here at home who choose to use our freedom to voice our views in the sight of those who would use FEAR to take our FREEDOMS from us.

    
  

Thursday, April 2, 2015

Internet resonance can be destructive



     Even though I am using the Internet right now as I write the blog and even though as a computer engineer I owe much of my living because of it,  I can say without a doubt that I absolutely detest it.   It reminds me of a famous video I had to watch in college in an "Introduction to Engineering" course where we watched how bad engineering can have disastrous effects.   Take for example the infamous Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse



     This famous video shows the destructive force wind gusts and "standing waves" can have on a steel and concrete bridge structure.  This happens when the gusts of wind happens to match the natural resonance of the bridge and the wave grows bigger with every little gust of wind.   This resonance builds and builds until finally the bridge cannot take it anymore and it rips apart and collapses into a pile of rubble.

    This is how I feel our world is being ripped apart by the internet and those who think that there little pushing and shoving doesn't do much but when combined with thousands of others pushing and shoving at the same time it can have a disastrous affect on our country and societies foundations.  Every little sarcastic tweet, every little nasty comment in a comment section of a blog or news article, every little hurtful comment on a pizza restaurants Yelp page, every little lie about a person or group of people on Facebook or other social media outlets.   All of these build and build on each other an will eventually lead to our own downfall. Take for example the case of the pizza restaurant under siege because their teenage daughter answered a hypothetical question about if they would cater a gay wedding.  Her answer was sincere and it launched a tirade of hateful comments on Twitter, Yelp and Facebook.   The restaurant has had to close because they could not answer the phone anymore for orders.  Their Yelp page was loaded with bogus ratings and comments.  Even a person from Wisconsin tweeted out if anyone was interested in going down to Indiana to burn the place down.  All this over one innocent comment on a hypothetical situation that would never occur (Really?  Pizza for a gay wedding???)

    In the case of the bridge, the answer to the problem was to design the bridge to interrupt the wind gusts and change its natural resonance frequency to a frequency that was highly unlikely to ever occur in nature.    Maybe such an answer is needed here as well.  Maybe what we need is to have Twitter, Facebook and other social media tools randomly delay our messages to when they are posted so that they do not immediately affect society in destructive manners.   This allows your message to still be posted, but it removes the instant gratification we get that can be so harmful because it feeds our egos to post again and again ... and again!   It will also serve to interrupt our posts destructive effect on others who may see our post and be emboldened to either retaliate or say something even worse. 

    But maybe a better answer is to just turn off social media altogether and live our lives like the world DOESN'T depend on me.   After all isn't that the feeling you get when you are plugged into the internet?   That it all depends on me?   We develop a god-like persona when we flip it on.   I am instantly heard by thousands or even millions.   I can see everything going on in the world.   I am prayed to by thousands of "followers".  I am loved (or at least "liked") by many people.   I can make myself into an expert on any subject with a simple click into Wikipedia and a quick perusal of the first paragraph without needing to dig to deep into the content.  Along with this god-like feeling of omnipotence, I have the added feeling of superiority over all who disagree with me because I am not alone either for there are many other gods like myself who also agree with me because we all read the same websites that reinforce our views.

    Maybe we just need to chill and be nice to one another again before this bridge falls apart.

Thursday, March 26, 2015

A conscience is a terrible thing to waste!

    Back in the 1970's an ad-campaign by the UNCF (United Negro College Fund) had a very simple and catchy phrase:
Because a mind is a terrible thing to waste
    This meant that wasting anyone's mental abilities to contribute to society would hurt us all in the end and therefore we should try to help ALL people become more educated.   The campaign worked and blacks enrolling in college increased through scholarships offered by the UNCF.

     Today we may need a new ad-campaign:
Because a conscience is a terrible thing to lose
     Martin Luther, the 16th century Christian reformer, was what you might call a conscientious objector.   He was called before the Catholic hierarchy and the politicians to re-cant (take back) all he had written as he revealed how far the church had strayed from its roots and teachings.   Martin Luther asked for one day to formulate his answer and he was granted it.   After a night of prayer Marin Luther returned to the court to give his answer and here it is:

Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason (for I do not trust either in the pope or in councils alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves), I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and will not recant anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. May God help me. Amen.
     We owe much to his bravery to stand up to the powers as he was branded a "heretic" and had a bounty put on his head for anyone to collect.   He was given refuge by a German nobleman who agreed with his teaching and lived in his castle attic for many years while he took on the work of translating the Bible from Latin into German.   His willingness to stand up for his conscience freed many more like him who also no longer agreed with the Catholic churches teachings.

    A conscience is a very personal thing.   It is at the very heart of our Freedom of Religion and to have our own set of beliefs to follow.   It was once said that,

 "If you can't live with yourself then who CAN you live with?".   

    A dead conscience will eat you alive from the inside like a maggots eating rotting flesh of a deceased person.  A conscience drives us each to do what is right in our own eyes despite the opposition.   We've all been there at some time in our lives.  We were in a position to speak up for someone or some group and we chose to be silent.   We  remember those times vividly as we play it over and over again in our minds. We agonize over our choice knowing we chose wrong and the repercussions of us doing so were obvious.  It's a difficult thing to do.   Often it is occurrences like these that cause so many our war-weary-soldiers so much depression and guilt that it incapacitates them and prevents them from rejoining society.

     Today, people around our country are being asked to go against their consciences as well.   For example, people who own bakeries are told they MUST make wedding cakes for weddings they do not agree with.   You may not like their position any more than the Catholic church did not like Luther's.   But at odds is their conscience verses your insistence that they bow to your edicts that gay marriage is no different than traditional marriage.   Should they stuff their conscience away and never listen to it again?   What kind of country will we become if we force all of our citizens to ignore their consciences when they go counter to the governments or the majority's wishes?  Should they only care what the government believes is right and follow orders?   Should such people be jailed for having a difference in opinion or view?  Should they be put out of business for their faith?  Should the churches they attend be taxed or fined since it was those institutions that undoubtedly influenced them to have such a narrow view of marriage?

    Another thing to consider when you decide to use the blunt force of the government stick to get people to do your wishes is you build increasing amounts of anger and animosity towards you group rather than acceptance.  Of course you can force their physical bodies to perform the deeds you asked for, but their hearts and minds will be forever against you.   This will only require you to use increasing amounts of force over time to move the pendulum further to your side of the room.   But watch out for the day will come that you will not be able to push it any further and the pendulum will swing the other way and all that pent up energy will be released in ways that can be very destructive.   Other countries have witnessed this in their own countries (mostly African countries where one tribe rules another for so long and then it flips on them).    In South Africa this almost happened against the whites after the blacks gained control of the country and only by the grace of God through the work of Nelson Mandela did it get diffused.

    I am glad to see people of reason from the other side standing up for people of conscience and telling their people to "knock it off!" in attacking these people in the court of law and also the court of public opinion.     We need more of these people to come forward and I hope and pray they do.   I believe they recognize the value of a conscience and how it is one of our most basic rights as human beings to be nurtured and protected.  After all, a society of citizens whose consciences have been numbed will be a terrible place to live.


Friday, March 20, 2015

Words forgotten in the American dialect

    There are 4 (well 5 actually since one is a conjugate of 2 words) words that we seem to have gone out of style in our normal dialect that if we brought them back might solve of a lot of our problems today.   Those words are:

  IT'S A FREE COUNTRY...

   We used to hear that phrase all the time back in the 60's, 70's, and even 80's.   Anytime someone took an issue with another persons personal behavior or activities this phrase would seemingly put an end to the argument almost immediately.

   You see a person smoking....                                                     IT'S A FREE COUNTRY!
   You see a person wearing skimpy cloths ...                               IT'S A FREE COUNTRY!
   You see a person living out of their car....                                 IT'S A FREE COUNTRY!
   You see a person handing out flyers for a church...                  IT'S A FREE COUNTRY!

    When did this phrase go out of style?    When did we become such a country of nannies where everyone's business is OUR business?   So what if a person decides to send a 10-year old and a 6-year old to the park on their own... that's the parent's decision ... not yours!    So what if a parent sends their kid to school with a sandwich and a Hostess Ho-Ho for lunch.... that's their business and not yours!    So what if a high school student wants to have their rifle or archery bow in their senior picture... that's their business and it's not hurting anyone.    So what if eating fast food is not as healthy as making my own home cooked meal.... it's my body and my business.

    Imagine the different results if a person concerning themselves with each of the cases above said the words "It's a free country!"  as they contemplated what to do next.   I believe it would change their outlook and their decision making in each of the cases.   But instead we have a world where everybody has their fingers in everybody's pie and making an awful mess of things while we are at it.   There isn't a day that goes buy that you don't hear a story about some person somewhere reporting a person for some violation of their social-contract.   Either they are not raising their kids they way you think they should or you think they might possible offend someone somewhere and they should be stopped before that something happens.

    Take for example a 17 year-old girl who had cancer who wished to refuse treatment (see here ). 
The state stepped in and denied her wish to be let alone and forced her to be given medical treatment.  Her body belongs to the state in their opinion (at least until the age of 18) and they could dictate to her what must be done.   Today, her cancer is in remission and now a precedent has been laid for others to follow.  Many new cases will point to this case and say "See?  We were right about that case and so we must be right about this one as well!".   Combine this case with the topic of vaccinations and dangers to "public safety" and you will have a dangerous 1-2 punch against parental control.  If vaccinations must be enforced, then why not ADHD medicine or other psychiatric drugs?   Why not contraception or sterilization?   If the doctors are always right, then why have parents in the doctors office at all?   Since their only purpose would be to agree to whatever the doctor prescribes they could save a lot of time by just staying in the waiting room while their child is taken care of and they can pay the bills (or the government pay them).  

    Of course many will say, "I don't think that will ever happen in THIS country!"  but none of them will say it CAN'T happen.   They say, "I was just trying to help this one girl.   I didn't want to see her die needlessly".    But like the old adage goes, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions".   

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

When everything becomes "political"

      Yesterday, Starbucks announced their new "race together" campaign in which they encourage their baristas to engage with their customers on the topic of race relations.   They were told if they wanted to start a conversation on race with a customer they should write the words "race together" on the cup before handing it to the customer.  This seemed like an idea that came straight out of academia because it makes no business sense.  The news articles sent out on Facebook did not take the idea to kindly as many people lamented that the LAST thing in the world they want to do when they buy of cup of coffee is spend an hour discussing race with a 20-nothing who is stuck behind a counter pouring coffee.  What if I don't want to talk about anything at all and I decline their request?   Will the barista take me for a racist and as a result put a little "special sauce" (spit) into my cup?   Do I now have to order my coffee "non-political" as well as "decaf"?    Sometimes you just want a cup of joe and that is all.  

      It seems today everything we do is seen as political in nature.  Where we shop.  What we buy.  What we eat. What we do with our free time.   People want us to constantly think about our actions in terms of political repercussions.   Unions want us to boycott Wal-Mart because so much of their products come from China,  but all I want is to buy some new underwear.   Environmental groups want us to not use plastic bags because it "may" effect "climate change" when all I want to do is make sure my stuff doesn't spill out into the parking lot.   A Hollywood celebrity wants us to contemplate a topic such bullying, or domestic violence in the middle/start of a movie when all we want is to be entertained for 2 hours.   Another group wants my children to talk about the election and why I should vote Democratic at the Thanksgiving table when all I want to do is sit down with my family, make some warm memories and thank God for how he has watched over us the past year.  

      We need to stop the insanity!  Maybe we should delegate the one month before an election as "political-discussion-month" and have ALL the other months declared off limits.   We need to stop badgering people and having "conversations" (which is just a code word for "a debate to shutdown an opposing side")  and just talk to one another about whatever comes up.  Maybe it's just the weather or how you are feeling at the moment, but it's a conversation without an agenda.

     Whatever happened to just polite conversation anyway?   Have we spent too much time on our phones reading stories on political websites that we have forgotten how to initiate them?    Do we need a phone app that knows who we are coming in contact with that can look up their political, religious, and intellectual persuasions and then based on it come up with a list of 3 topics you should discuss with them?   (I could just see it now with pop-ups coming up in your Google-glass). 

     The English used to consider political discussions to not be polite in nature.  Your thoughts were your thoughts and that was all.   You were expected to be informed by books, the newspapers and various public lecturers and then make up your own mind based on the information you were given.  You were not allowed to use your neighbors house party to lecture others on their view political views.  To do so was considered to be in bad taste as you would be hijacking their friendly forum for your own purpose and thereby ruining the event.

    But such is not the case today.

   Maybe we need to bring the English way back into style again and just serve the coffee.


Monday, March 16, 2015

We need more Ambassadors

    What comes to mind when you think of an Ambassador?

    Some common attributes:
  • Lives in a foreign country
  • Speaks their language (if not completely... at least some)
  • Seeks ways to build bridges to those cultures from our country
  • Nominated by the President
  • While they live there, they are always a U.S. citizen
  • Communicates the Presidents Foreign Policy to their leaders
  • Participates in their culture to a certain degree (parties, festivals, seminars etc)
  • Maybe has a family connection to that country (ancestors came from there)
   Ambassadors play a vital role in our foreign policy so it is important to nominate people who can express those views in a way that does not offend the people he is trying to reach out to.   Also, they must be people-persons (extraverts and not introverts) who like to get out and meet people.   If they think they can just go and live in the Embassy the whole time they are there they are seriously misguided in their thinking.

   In 2 Corinthians 5:20, Paul writes:
We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.
    Paul could not have picked a better word (led by the Holy Spirit how could he not!).   We are ambassadors for Christ in our lives.   As we live out our lives in THIS world, we are living in a foreign land reaching out to a foreign people be receive the reconciliation that God is giving them.   Jesus in his high priestly prayer prayed for his disciples to "be in the world, but not of the world".   Like an ambassador who while living in a foreign country must always remember they are citizens of the U.S. and they represent the President at all times, we too are always God's children.  Also, while an ambassador can go to parties, luncheons and other meetings, at the same time he can not participate in activities not allowed by the US.   For example the ambassador to the Netherlands cannot use drugs or go to brothels even though those activities are legal in the Netherlands they are not legal for us in the U.S.    It is a delicate balance he must maintain at all times.

    An ambassador must also learned to speak the truth to the leaders in those countries when asked about US concerns.   He cannot for the sake of  "friendship" minimize problems we have with their country.  If an African country is committing genocide or sea-piracy we cannot pretend it doesn't matter to us in the US.   They must be told that if things don't change the US will get involved and it won't be a pretty sight.  So also, we as Christ's ambassador's must speak the truth to those around us.  We cannot pretend the Bible is mum on various topics that are of concern with them.   However we must strive to remain friends with them and be there for them when the time comes.  Like the ambassador to a somewhat hostile country staying connected to them until the day comes when a volcano erupts, or a tsunami hits their coast, or dam breaks and wipes out a village, we can be there to help and give them aid.   We too, need to be engaged with our non-Christian friends and neighbors ready to help them in there day of need.  

Be IN the world but NOT of the world!

    Embassies are like miniature US retreats for the ambassador.   Many embassies provide them with American food, books, TV and entertainment for while they live there.  In fact,even the very soil they live on is considered to be US owned and is guarded by US Marines with that conviction.  But embassies are not meant to be where the ambassador spends 100% of their time, but only serve as a retreat for him/her.    Likewise, we as Christians seek to create Virtual-Embassies where we try to separate ourselves from the world around us (man has always sought to be closer to God by separating themselves from other humans).   But this is not what God desires for his people at all ("Be in the world, not of the world").  We do this by closing ourselves off from those around us who are not Christian by creating Christian-schools (K-college), Christian-day-cares, Christian-music, Christian-radio, Christian-TV, Christian-movies, Christian-books/magazines,  Christian-clubs,  Christian-gyms, Christian-coffee-shops and even Christian-dating-sites.    How are we to reach a world we have nothing in common with?   An ambassador that secludes themselves away inside the US Embassy and never venturing out into the country they are sent to, is of no use to the President who sent them.  So also, we are of no use to God who has sent us ("As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you!"  John 20:21) if we don't engage with the world around us. 

What we an learn from Paul

    Paul writes in  1 Corinthians 9:20
20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.
    Here we see "Ambassador Paul" giving us advice on reaching the world around us.  Nowhere in the book of Acts does Paul illustrate this better than when he was asked to speak at the Areopagus to a group of Greek philosophers.  Paul went and gave them a short dissertation on the Christian faith, but he did not quote scripture to them at all.  Instead he quoted an inscription on the base of an idle ("TO AN UNKNOWN GOD") and one of their own poets ("We are his children").   By doing this, he showed them that he was connected to them and engaged with their culture and not some nut-job-preacher from another country.   In fact he only gets to talking about Jesus until the very end of his speech to them at which point they tell him that they want him to come back later and some who heard him received the Gospel and became followers.   We can see from other writings by Paul he took part in the Gentile life as he uses analogies from athletics (running, wrestling and boxing) and even quotes Greek philosophers ("The stomach is made for food and food is made for the stomach" - 1 Corinthians 6:13).  Paul uses these worldly-props as springboards for the Gospel to reach as many people as possible.   When we choose to disengage with the world we lose these opportunities altogether.  We may try to relate our world to them but much will be lost in translation.   Like an ambassador trying to use a "American football" as an illustration to a country that knows only soccer,  they just won't understand what they are talking about.

    Will it mean that we might have our sensibilities offended some?  Probably.  Paul undoubtedly attended Olympic sporting events given the numerous times he talks about running a straight race and throwing off everything that might entangle him.   These foot races were run entirely in the nude and woman were barred from viewing them (except the Vestile Virgins).   Did Paul grow up seeing these races?  Probably not, but he obviously did now as a missionary and God was able to use his attendance to give his people a visible form of how we should conduct ourselves in our Christian life. 

Modern day opportunities

    Recently I was watching the last episode of the Matrix trilogy (for some reason I never got the chance to watch it before).   When I did I was astounded at how much of the movie's ending mirrors that of the gospel.   If you have not seen it, I urge you to go and see it for yourself.   Not only do the characters names have Christian meanings (Trinity, Neo) but also the hidden city of the free-humans is called Zion.   In the last scene when Neo is taking on Smith (who represents Satan) in the virtual world controlled by the machines, Neo is laid out on the ground in front of the mainframe (which represents God) in a cross formation with wires connecting him to the virtual world.  The machine wants to rid itself of the Smith-virus but it cannot without a human to "bridge the gap".   Neo realizes that the only way to destroy Smith is to let him kill him and destroy him from the inside.  Neo becomes Smith and then destroys Smith ("He who knew no sin, became sin for us") and the mainframe machine says "It is done!".   The people in Zion rejoice saying "It's done!  The war is over!  The war is over!".   

    What a wonderful springboard for us to reach our non-Christian friends as they will not go see a Christian-movie, but they will talk to us about one of their most popular science fiction movies of all time.  But we can't talk to them about it unless we have first seen it.   Does the Matrix contain graphic violence and foul language?  Of course it does.   But if Paul can watch naked men run across and open field, I think we should allow ourselves the opportunity to watch movies or listen to music that connect us with the world around us.

   It's time for us to venture outside the Embassy and engage with the people we are sent to share the Gospel with around us and be the ambassadors Christ wants us to be!

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

A lesson on "Mental Toughness"

   Okay, I admit it.  I am a die-hard New England Patriots fan.  So those of you who aren't will be quick to go on to your next blog, but I URGE you stay and read on the rest of the article as this article is not one of the "gloat in your face" type sports articles but instead is a "What can I learn from this and use in my life" type of article.
  
   I was watching the post-game interviews and one phrase kept popping up in several of the interviews of the Patriots team.  That phrase was: MENTAL TOUGHNESS.  Given that so many of the team members used it, it became obvious to me that it was because it was a concept ingrained in the team members brains. 

   So just what is "Mental Toughness"  and what is its importance it in getting a team to the Super Bowl.    From my view, mental toughness can simply be defined as:

Keeping focus on a goal despite what happens or what others say about you or your team
   What I mean by "what happens or what other people say about you" does not only mean "bad things" or "negativity".   It can equally mean good times and good things being said about you or to you as both can derail you from your ultimate goal.   We sometimes think only bad events can do this, but often people derail themselves when they make progress and get good vibes from their friends, family or other sources.   In some ways these factors can actually be more divisive than negative ones as we don't necessary recognize them for what they can do to us.  We don't see that we take our eyes off of our long-range goal to take in our short-term-feel-good-at-the-moment-strokes.   Instead of practicing and training we spend more of our time reading about how good we are or how good we played during the last game etc..   We begin to think that we are invincible and that our skills and talents will carry us through any future adversity we meet.  I call this the "Apollo Creed
Problem" for just as the character Apollo Creed in the movie "Rocky" did not prepare for his fight with Rocky because he thought himself to be so much better than this low-life-fighter-from-no-where that he spent more time with his investors than in the gym.   Negative events are more easily spotted and often force us to address them than positive events.    I believe it's for this reason that so often the Patriots team give such lack-luster interviews after their wins.   Coach Belichick is notorious for this and sports writers hate this as he gives them so little to write about.  His after-game interviews almost all go the same.  "It was a good win. We are happy for it, but we need to get ready for next week".  It's a valed effort to prevent them from becoming to cocky and reminding themselves of what really matters.  That "this game they just played" will be forgotten by next week and all that matters is the long range goal of reaching the Super Bowl. 

I see that Mental Toughness is required on 3 levels: 

Level 1: Long Term Mental Toughness (LTMT)

    The first 4 games of a season are vital to NFL teams.  It's an early indicator as to how the season may end up.  The first 4 can show trends on how the teams are fairing over all.   All the teams would love to be 4 and 0 but that can't happen.  Some will be 0 and 4 others, 1-3,2-2,3-1.    At the beginning of the 2014 season, the Patriots were a mere 2 wins and 2 losses.  For some teams that might be a good start, but not for the Patriots or their fans.  They expect to be 4 and 0 and nothing else will do.     Their last game against the Kansas City Chiefs was horrible.  They lost badly to them and Brady's effort was lackluster to say the least.  Sports writers were all saying that maybe Tom Brady should retire this year and that he just didn't seem to have the fire in the belly as in the past.   With 12
games left in the season it was do or die and the next game for them was against Cincinnati who were 4 and 0 and looking to be a contender this year.    But something happened that week and a totally different team emerged the following week against the Bengals and they won in a decisive way and ended all the speculation on Brady's career being over with.   Was all fixed?  Was the Super Bowl now in plane site?  No.  They still have 11 more games to go and they would have to face even tougher challengers along the way.  But LTMT would have to prevail and they would have to go after each game as if they were still 2 and 2.

     To end the discussion on LTMT here would be to only explore half of the problem.  For it's not just the 2-2 or 1-3 or the 0-4 teams that must deal with it, but also the 4-0 and 3-1 teams that need to use it as well.  As I mentioned before, they have an even harder problem as they are the teams on the top.  They are winning their games.  The sports writers and talk shows are highlighting all the things they are doing right and how they are all looking like contenders.  LTMT means that you have to always see yourself for who you really are: just another team/person contending for a title/trophy.  Too often the teams on the top stop seeing this and begin to think that their own talent or skill will carry them through.  Maybe they don't pay as close attention to the scouting reports or game films.  Maybe they forget that it only takes a few key players to be injured to change their fate. 

    Where does LTMT play a role in your life?   One example was in my own life.  In grade school I
was mostly a B student.  My brother, who was 4 years older than me graduated from high school with honors and I was going into high school the next year.  I remember telling myself that if Jim could do that I could do it as well.  I made a goal for myself to be a straight A student and to prove I could do it I made a goal of getting straight A's my first semester of my freshmen year.  I reasoned that if I could do it for 1 semester I could do it for 8 semesters. I accomplished my initial goal and was on my way ... one semester at a time.  Another great example is Steve Jobs.  He was fired from his own company, Apple, after he could not make the transition from entrepreneur to CEO.   He went on to start his own company Next and was re-hired by Apple years later having learned from his mistakes.  LTMT is needed to take a "dream" and make it reality by not giving up and making intermediate goals to get you there.

Level 2: Short Term Mental Toughness (STMT)

    For the NFL, this takes place on the day of the game.  Like LTMT, teams have their ups and downs during the game.  Plays that work and plays that don't.  You can be up by 7 and then down by 7.  On both sides of the field STMT requires players and coaches to stay focused and in the game.   But as the game wears on, fatigue sets in  and it becomes harder to do.  Maybe you are up or down by 20 points and its nearing the end of the 3rd quarter.   Either its looking really good for you or really bad.  Regardless of the situation STMT says to stay on focus and stay on the march for the full game and not give up.   We have all seen plenty of games where that is not the case.  For example, just in the prior game where Seattle played Green Bay.  By all rights Green Bay should have won that game but they lost focus and allowed Seattle to not only score a touchdown but also an extra 2 points on a lobbed pass high in the air with no one trying to bat it down.    STMT means you keep trying despite what the scoreboard says or what happened during the last play.   During the Super Bowl when Seattle was up by 10 points, I happened to notice Pete Carroll and Wilson having a what looked like a casual conversation during a timeout when there was just 5 minutes left in the game rather than a intense conversation of a team still in the heat of battle.  Did they think they had this one in the bag?  Was the pressure off now? 

    To illustrate this, look at the last couple of plays during the Super Bowl.  When Wilson completed an incredible pass down at the 5 yard line that was bobbled but eventually caught,  Pete Carroll threw off his headphones and ran out onto the field fist pumping and congratulating his team.  On the other side, the Patriots coach, Bill Belichick rolled his eyes but went back to work looking at what he needed to do next.   Carroll lost precious seconds with his cheerleading that he could have used to prepare his team for what they needed to do next and with only 60 seconds left in the game those seconds mattered.  Belichick could have gone on a tirade and yelled at his players for letting that happen but he didn't.  What's past is past and he needed to plan for the future. STMT requires this.  You need to forget what has happened whether good or bad and keep focused on what you need to do next because time is of the essence and you are running out of it. 

     Another example happened just 40 seconds later when Carroll called in a pass play that ultimately was intercepted by the Patriots at the 1 yard line.  Carroll ripped off his headphones and put his head between his knees for several seconds while Belichick only gave a few fist pumps into the air and then back to work.  These few seconds mattered.   What should have Carroll been doing?  Well for one, all was not lost.  He had the Patriots on the one place on the field you could want them to be with 20 seconds left: the 1 yard line.  It would have been the 2 yard line but an early celebration by the Patriots cost them 1 yard in penalties (this was a example of a failure in the Patriots mental toughness). Carroll still had 1 timeout left as well.  The Patriots could not take a knee as that would be a safety in the end-zone which would be 2 points for Seattle and the ball back.  They had to run at least 1 play to get away from the end-zone.  The Seattle defense went out on field and rather than be prepared by their coach to remain cool and not jump off sides they lined up so close on the ball it was almost encroachment before the ball was even hiked.  STMT would have allowed Carroll to stay focused on the game and not be destroyed by 1 bad play.  

    STMT is needed in regular life as well.  We get sidetracked in life by what happens to us.  It might be a relationship (good or bad).  It might be a death in the family or a job loss.  It might be a promotion you didn't get (or do get).  It might be even as something simple like a flat tire on your way to work or something someone said to you in a meeting.   STMT allows us to put the past behind us and focus on what is right in front of us.  STMT allows us to not be "defined" by bad events or even by our own bad actions.  We still need to own up to it.  It doesn't mean we become emotionless robots either.  We just need to find a way PAST the event. 

Level 3: In The Moment Mental Toughness (ITMMT)

    This was best shown on the play of Brady standing in the end-zone when the team was on the 1 yard line.   The Patriots remained motionless waiting for Tom to give the hard count.  No one moved until a player from Seattle stepped across the line.   ITMMT means you don't let your emotions or adrenaline make your decisions for you.   You could see it on the field.  The Seattle players were huddled close to the ball and were as jumpy as a bunch of wild horses waiting in the stall.  You could
see what was going to happen even before it does.   This costs them dearly as the penalty moves the ball from the 1 yard line to the 6 yard line and plenty of room for them to take a knee.   But even after that play Seattle lost their ITMMT when they chose to initiate a fight with the Patriots.  This not only cost them a key player (ejected) but also a precious timeout that they could have used to give them 2 tries at causing a mistake by the Patriots on their kneel-down. 

    ITMMT is often the most difficult to work on for anyone.  We are fighting our own bodies and emotions in these cases and run on a more primitive area of our brains.  Also, these events don't happen everyday and so it's very hard to practice what to do in these cases.  Teams try to simulate these scenarios during practices but nothing every really comes close as being on the 1 yard line with 60 seconds left in the Super Bowl.    

    In our own loves ITMMT is needed when your boss or co-worker puts down your presentation or your ideas in a meeting you have been planning for a long time.   You have to restrain yourself from calling them out as a F***ing A**hole or showing them what your middle finger looks like.  ITMMT is needed when a person knowingly cuts you off in traffic and almost causes an accident.  Yes you need to beep your horn, but you don't need to run them down and ride their tail.   ITMMT is important when your wife makes plans to visit her family without asking if you want to or not.  ITMMT is needed when sales clerk won't let you get your money back on your item.  (Looking at the state of affairs on the internet I would say that ITMMT is in less and less supply these days).

   

Monday, January 26, 2015

Bill Nye the LYING Guy

     Lately a lot of attention has been placed on the air pressure of footballs.   A subject that normally would bore the crap out of you is now suddenly the most interesting subject for sports and non-sport newscasters to discuss.   All of this because the Indianapolis Colts complained that a football used by the New England Patriots during their Jan 18th "smack down" (that's what you call it when one team beats the other by a score of 45-7), had low air pressure.   The referees were alerted and they brought the ball to the locker room and found it to be 2 psi (pounds/square-inch) lower than the acceptable minimum of 12.5 psi.    People, all over the media, demanded answers as to WHO let the air out of the balls during the game.  Countless talking-heads were brought to the airwaves to find out who measures the pressure, when do they measure it, how do they measure it,  who has access to the balls etc..    Everyone had an opinion on the matter and most pointed their fingers at Tom Brady given he would have the most to gain from doing this.

   But no one thought to blame the most obvious culprit: the cold weather.   Yes, the cold weather.  It does get cold in New England and Jan 18th was no different.  Temperatures started out in the mid 50's and by the end of the game were in the upper 30's.   Coach Belichick even tried to point this out in one of his interviews as a possible cause.

   To clarify this claim, ESPN brought in the TV personality: Bill Nye "The Science Guy".   First thing I must ask ESPN before I go on is this:  Are there no other ACTUAL scientists out there who you could pull in to your shows to answer this question?  After all, MIT is just a few miles from Foxboro.  Would it be too hard to drive over there and ask a physics or engineering professor to get their take on it or were they all too busy?  None the less, Bill Nye was their go to man on this subject and Bill decided to use some props to illustrate what air pressure and temperature do to inflated balls.  But Bill did not use actual footballs, instead he chose to use regular rubber playground balls.   In his illustration he showed that heating or cooling the balls would only change the SIZE of the balls and not the internal pressure.  He even went so far as to say "the ONLY thing to change the pressure in the balls is by inserting a ball needle and putting more air in or taking more air out".  Check out the video here

    But is that the COMPETE TRUTH?   

    Far from it...

    There is a basic equation that is used in the study of Thermodynamics he never discusses:

                   PV  =  nRT

     Where :
                  P  =  Pressure  (pounds per square inch)
                  V  = Volume  of the container
                  n   = # of gas molecules
                  R  = Thermodynamic constant
                  T  = Temperature (measured in kelvins)

     In the case of the balls used by Bill Nye, the rubber is stretchy enough to allow the volume of the
container (V) to increase.  When the ball is heated/cooled, the gas expands/contracts and pushes the walls of the ball out allowing the pressure to stay constant (unless at some point the rubber becomes harder to stretch).  But this is not the case of the football at all which is wrapped in a hard leather made of cows-hide that keeps the ball from expanding beyond its predetermined dimensions.  This means the variable V is actually a constant for a mostly inflated football. 

    So if we make V, n and R all constants (which means we don't add or subtract any air from the ball) we have the following relationship

               P =  kT     (where is k =  nR/V)

    Given this relationship,   as T goes UP .... so does P.   Likewise as T goes down....do does P

    In fact, when the refs checked the pressure indoors (which is what they do) before the game and saw the balls had P = 12.5 psi at a room temperature of 75 degrees Fahrenheit (300 degrees kelvin) the balls pressure would drop to 10.5 psi  at a temperature of 45 degrees Fahrenheit (277 degrees kelvin). 

    This accounts for 100% of  the 2 pound drop in pressure

     Coach Bill was right and Bill Nye was wrong.

     So why would Bill Nye lie about this?  Certainly he knows this equation and how it works.  The answer to that question actually comes at the end of the interview when he mentions he is a Seattle Seahawks fan and says "Go Seahawk!".

     You are so pathetic Bill.  You often lambast Christians for putting their beliefs before their science, but you put something even more lame before your science.  You put your preference on a stupid football game.   You had an opportunity to tell the truth and set the record straight.  You had a chance to exonerate Tom Brady from any mischief on the playing field.   You were the "go to person" to explain a basic scientific principle to the masses but instead you chose a pathetic answer that would keep most Americans in the dark and forever brand a player as a cheater.

    Way to go Bill!   You have destroyed your reputation as a credible person of science for nothing.  

    Our problem in our country is not a lack of air in a football, but instead a complete and utter lack of basic science by those in our sports and also in our media and a lack of integrity of those in the media who the public looks to for answers.  It angers me to see a people rush to judgment without taking into account all the possibilities as to what could happened.  But for too many their motto seems to be:
    
                   SLANDER FIRST... ASK QUESTIONS LATER.