Saturday, August 14, 2004
Division is not Love.
Division in the True Church of Christ, is not bearing witness to the Spirit, and breaking the very foundation of the Law of God. And crucifying Christ anew, by throwing back His words in His face, when He made his High Priestly Prayer in John 17
11 And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one.
Matthew 7
14But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
A Tree and Its Fruit
15"Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. 16By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles?
1 Corinthians 13
Love
1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.
The sum of the Law:
The direction in which all the commandments of the law tend, Christ our Lord sufficiently declared when he taught that the whole law was comprised under two heads. "We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our soul, and all our strength. Then we are to love our neighbour as ourselves." he took this interpreation from the law itself. For the first part is in Deut 6; the secodn in Lev 19
From Calvin's First Catechism.
I Peter 4:8
8 And above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.
Here, Peter builds upon a passage from the book of Proverbs: "Hate starts quarrels, but love covers every wrong." (Proverbs 10:12) And this is what Peter means: If you don't restrain your sinful nature and desires you will easily become angry with others. You will be unable to forgive others easily. So make sure you curb your evil desires. Then you will be able to love and forgive others, for love covers sin.
Some interpret this verse as if it goes against faith. They may say, "You claim that faith alone makes a person godly and that no one can can get rid of sin through his works. They why do Solomon and Peter say that love covers sin?" You can answer them this way: "Solomon is saying whoever hates another person doesn't stop quarrelling and bickering. But wherever love is, it covers sin by gladly forgiving it. Where there is anger you will find a defiant person who won't reconcile and and remains full of hatred. On the other hand a person full of love doesn't become angry no matter how much someone tries to offend him. He covers all these sins and pretends not to see them. Thought he can overlook his neighbors sin he cannot make God overlook it. No one can cover his own sin before God. Only faith can do that. But with our love we can cover our neighbors sin. And just as God covers our sins with his love if we believe so we should also cover our neighbors sin. Peter says that we should love one another so that one person can cover the sin of another. Love doesn't just cover one, two or three sins, but a whole multitude of sins.
From Martin Luther's By Faith Alone
FROM THE LARGER CATECHISM.
Q122: What is the sum of the six commandments which contain our duty to man?
A122: The sum of the six commandments which contain our duty to man is, to love our neighbor as ourselves,[1] and to do to others what we would have them to do to us.[2]
1. Matt. 22:39
2. Matt. 7:12
THE WCF
I. All saints, that are united to Jesus Christ their Head, by his Spirit, and by faith, have fellowship with him in his graces, sufferings, death, resurrection, and glory:[1] and, being united to one another in love, they have communion in each other's gifts and graces,[2] and are obliged to the performance of such duties, public and private, as do conduce to their mutual good, both in the inward and outward man.[3]
1. I John 1:3; Eph. 2:5-6; 3:16-18; John 1:16; Phil. 3:10; Rom. 6:5-6; 8:17; II Tim. 2:12
2. Eph. 4:15-16; I Cor. 3:21-23; 12:7, 12; Col. 2:19
3. I Thess. 5:11, 14; Rom. 1:11-12, 14; I John 3:16-18; Gal. 6:10
II. Saints by profession are bound to maintain an holy fellowship and communion in the worship of God, and in performing such other spiritual services as tend to their mutual edification;[4] as also in relieving each other in outward things, according to their several abilities and necessities. Which communion, as God offereth opportunity, is to be extended unto all those who, in every place, call upon the name of the Lord Jesus.[5]
4. Heb. 10:24-25; Acts 2:42, 46; Isa. 2:3; I Cor. 11:20
5. I John 3:17; II Cor. ch. 8-9; Acts 2:44-45; 11:29-30
(11) In the kingdom of heaven we shall be freed from all
divisions. The saddest thing in the world is to see divisions among
them that are good. It is sad that such as have one faith, should
not be of one heart. Ephraim envies Judah, and Judah vexeth Ephraim.
It is matter of tears, to see those who are united to Christ,
divided one from another. The soldier's spear pierced Christ's side,
but the divisions of saints wound his heart. But in the kingdom of
heaven there shall be no vilifying one another, or censuring. Those
who before could hardly pray together, shall praise God together.
7) The kingdom of heaven excels in unity. All the inhabitants
agree together in love. Love will be the perfume and music of
heaven; as love to God will be intense, so to the saints. As perfect
love casts out fear, so it casts out envy and discord. Those
Christians who could not live quietly together on earth (which was
the blemish of their profession) in the heaven shall be all love;
the fire of strife shall cease; there shall be no vilifying, or
censuring one another, or raking into one another's sores, but all
shall be tied together with the heart-strings of love. There Luther
and Zwingli are agreed. Satan cannot put in his cloven foot there to
make divisions. There shall be perfect harmony and concord, and not
one jarring string in the saints' music. It were worth dying to be
in that kingdom.
From Thomas Watson's the Lord's Prayer
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Wednesday, August 11, 2004
And we thought this was normal?!?
Most folks when Michael Jackson was a little lad, thought he was normal. yet he had this crazy afro hairstyle and clothes to match, one can't help but wonder if our perceptions of "Normal" have changed over the years!
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Monday, August 09, 2004
Life In Limbo: 
Being allegorical, a few nites ago, during the depths of despair, and waiting for God to show some way ahead, and before He did several hours later, I wrote:
"My theory is life is one big storm. Some folks are in quieter waters some of the time, some folks are tossed and turned, on the crest of a wave forever. They can't jump out, or they will drown. So, life on the ocean waves ,tossing and bumping, looking for dry land, and its always there, like a mirage, but never attainable. And the mirage becomes there biggest demon on the boat. So, they cling on , trying not to be tossed over-board, and their head comes up briefly, like the sun on a dark day, but the storm clouds almost always rush to gather again, and threaten to sweep them over-board again. And the demon, the mirage, is once again there, tormenting, mocking, but they can't jump out the boat, or else they'll drown.
And the worst part of the mirage, is that every time they see it, they see their family, friends loved ones in the mirage. And they become part of the problem. They are glad they have their dry land, and the thought of and memory of them is a comfort in some kind of way. Yet, cos of the difference in this stormy sea, which no one should have to travel alone, the mirage serves to make them more alone, in thoughts and memories. And the sea is cold and choppy. And no one else can sail in this boat, no one else can take their place either. So, they lay in the boat, being tossed and turned, and gaze up into the Heavens, seeking the face of the Lord. And they know He could pour forth dry land, but for reasons not plain He doesn't. Life in the boat, in the cold, on the edge of life, begging for mercy. . Tis a sure road to insanity. But they can't jump out, or else they'll drown. "
The essence of what I meant, even if not expressed well at the time, holds very true. If things are extreme with my health, suchas today, I tell people I have extreme pain, which tho true it is the least of my problems, but the only communicable and easily understandable thing of this whole thing to people not on the boat. Because pain is constant, 24/7 I think perhaps folks think that's the biggest issue in itself. Well, it is responsible for my loss of mobility, but on a day to day level, yes it drives me crazy sometimes, but on days like today, the pain in my body is the only evidence I have of being alive. My brain is not working at all in a normal fashion, holding a verbal conversation seems impossible. Intereacting where you say something and someone says something back. The pain proves I am alive. And the ability to reason is there, but there's some kind of machinataions going on, maybe seizure stuff who knows, that makes life terribly hard on days like this. I've been sat reading Thomas Watson's "The Lord's Prayer" and today reading was an option tho how much actually sank in is anyones guess, but sometimes days like this even reading is not an option as they are just words on a page and tis like a two year old trying to read joined up writing in that it makes no sense. The pain proves life, yet, is this life? Yes, but its hard to go sailing through the choppy seas on this boat, all alone in one way, as its just entirely out of most folks sphere of understanding. Yet, a disaster in life, of most kinds, most folks will understand on some level, or at least someone will. If my home got robbed, many people would understand. A family death. Many people would understand. But because you can't explain the unexplainable in a real conveyable way, as its just outside of most folks sphere of understanding, in fact its not within many peoples at all, and I know no one, in a real sense who could have any imaginings of it, you are destined to stay in your boat, still seeking God's face, and trying to rest in the knowledge, that on a human level, this thing that's attacking me, I may have to cope entirely alone for the most part of dealing with it and living through it, and trying to on days like this just survive, but One went before us who does understand. you try to cling to that, but in our human weakness, when we are at our lowest, sometimes you wish for more. And cry out to Him, to keep you until the storm has once again quitened.
Psalm 77
For the director of music. For Jeduthun. Of Asaph. A psalm.
1 I cried out to God for help;
I cried out to God to hear me.
2 When I was in distress, I sought the Lord;
at night I stretched out untiring hands
and my soul refused to be comforted.
3 I remembered you, O God, and I groaned;
I mused, and my spirit grew faint.
Selah
4 You kept my eyes from closing;
I was too troubled to speak.
5 I thought about the former days,
the years of long ago;
6 I remembered my songs in the night.
My heart mused and my spirit inquired:
7 "Will the Lord reject forever?
Will he never show his favor again?
8 Has his unfailing love vanished forever?
Has his promise failed for all time?
9 Has God forgotten to be merciful?
Has he in anger withheld his compassion?"
Selah
10 Then I thought, "To this I will appeal:
the years of the right hand of the Most High."
11 I will remember the deeds of the LORD ;
yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.
12 I will meditate on all your works
and consider all your mighty deeds.
From Thomas Watson's "The Lord's Prayer"
(20) If God be our Father, he will not disinherit us. He may
for a time desert his children, but will not disinherit them. The
sons of kings have sometimes been disinherited by the cruelty of
usurpers; as the son of Alexander the Great was put out of his just
right, through the violence and ambition of his father's captains;
but what power on earth can hinder the heirs of the promise from
their inheritance? Men cannot, and God will not cut off the entail.
The Armenians hold falling away from grace, so that a child of God
may be deprived of his inheritance, but God's children can never be
degraded or disinherited, and their heavenly Father will not cast
them off from being children. It is evident that God's children
cannot be finally disinherited, by virtue of the eternal decree of
heaven. God's decree is the very pillar and basis on which the
saints' perseverance depends. That decree ties the knot of adoption
so fast, that neither sin, death, nor hell, can break it asunder.
'Whom he did predestinate, them he also called,' &c. Rom 8: 30.
Predestination is nothing else but God's decreeing a certain number
to be heirs of glory, on whom he will settle the crown; for whom he
predestinates, he glorifies. What shall hinder God's electing love,
or make his decree null and void? Besides God's decree, he has
engaged himself by promise, that the heirs of heaven shall never be
put out of their inheritance. His promises are not like blanks in a
lottery, but as a sealed deed which cannot be reversed; they are the
saints' royal charter; and one promise is that their heavenly Father
will not disinherit them. 'I will make an everlasting covenant with
them, that I will not turn away from them; but I will put my fear in
their hearts, that they shall not depart from me.' Jer 32: 40. God's
fidelity, which is the richest pearl of his crown, is engaged in
this promise for his children's perseverance. 'I will not turn away
from them.' A child of God cannot fall away while he is held fast in
these two arms of God - his love, and his faithfulness. Jesus Christ
undertakes that all God's children by adoption shall be preserved in
a state of grace till they inherit glory. The heathens feigned of
Atlas that he bore up the heavens from falling; but Jesus Christ is
that blessed Atlas that bears up the saints from falling away.
Goodwill says to Christian in Pilgrim's Progress:
From Chapter 4 The Pilgrim Enters the Gate:
"Goodwill told him, "Concerning your burden, be content to bear it until you come to the place of Deliverance, for there it will fall from your back by itself"
From the Pilgrim's Progress in Modern English Page33
And the Interpreter says to Pilgrim in chapter 5
"The glory of the next world will never wear out, but other glories are soon gone. Passion, therefore, didn't have as much reason to laugh as Patience--as Patience will laugh at Passion---because Passion had his best things first---as Patience had his best things last. First must give place to last because last must have its time to come, but last gives place to nothing. for there is nothing more to follow. So he who has his portion first must of neccessity have time to spend it, but he who has his portion last, must have it permanently. Therefore , it is said of Dives, "In your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted and you are in agony."
Page 39
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Only in the Psyche School!
The aspiring student psychiatrists from various colleges were attending their first class on emotional extremes. "Just to establish some parameters," said the professor, to the student from the University of Houston, "What is the opposite of joy?"
"Sadness," replied the student.
"And the opposite of depression?" the professor asked of the young lady from Rice.
"Elation," said she.
"And you sir," he said to the young man from Texas A&M. "How about the opposite of woe?"
The Aggie replied, "Sir, I believe that would be giddy-up."
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The Leading Cause of Death? 
You maybe surprised: Click HereInterestingly, I have got into fight after fight with Brits, and a Candian guy I used to know, (ah.. Mikey.. where are ya when I need you!) but, Sir Winston Churchill 
highly esteemed (by some) and DO NOT UTTER A WORD AGAINST THE GIANT HERO OF WWII FAME!!! was a leading proponent before his political career, and had very strong ties with Margaret Sangster and Planned Parenthood. He was on the board at one time. Now this is the bit that normally finds someones boot a little too close for comfort, BUT, A little known fact too, is that Winston Churchill, who stomped out Nazi'ism (all on his own if you listen to some folks!) was also an advocate of getting rid of "less than perfect" human beings. The disabled, handicapped, and any other defect which took from mankinds perfectionism. If it had have been left up to him, (HA!) I would now be poofed, for many years, and plenty of people would not make it into the world who have lived full productive lives. And he went up against Adolf Hitler, (and rightly so!) about stuff like that, (among other things) and yet he held very similar principles. One thing I can't stand, is a hypocrite. when people blot out the hypocrites flaws after their death and paint them as St. Winston, or whomever the person is, then they too join the ranks of hypocrites.
"Those who welcome death have only tried it from the ears up".
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Sunday, August 08, 2004
Prozac Pilgrim!
"He finally revealed to his wife and children what was going on his mind, saying, 'Oh, my dear Wife and Children, I'm suffering from inner turmoil because of a burden that lays heavily upon me. And, what's worse, I've been reliably informed that our city will be burned with fire from Heaven. in that fearful disaster, I with you my Wife and you my sweet Children will come a miserable ruin unless some way of escape---which as yet I do not see--maybe found by which we may be delivered.'
His family members were deeply troubled at this declaration, not because they believed what he told them but because they thought some form of insanity had gotten into his head. Therefore, since it was nearing nightfall, and hoping that sleep would settle his brain, they quickly got him to bed. But the night was as troublesome to him as the day; and, for that reason, instead of sleeping he spent it sighing and weeping. " [end quote] A sure, sure sign, that Pilgrim is deranged huh? A sure, sure sign he needs some chemical kosh so he can no longer think, no longer feel, and will be too zombified and none functional in brain power to make any good judgements or choices, and will most likely just ride along on a wave from day to day, maybe from year to year, depending on how long the chemical kosh gets delivered! What should we suggest? Prozac? Maybe Haldol? Maybe sleeping pills too, so that he can't search his heart and soul to find the root of his despair, but is incoherently snoozing the night away, under the influence of brain damaging drugs!
[restart quote] "When morning came, they wanted to k now how he was; and he told them, "worse and worse." [end quote] time to call the psyche team in, before he has time to take desperate measures and fix his problem on his own. The nanny state we live in now, has taught us all that someone else can fix the problem we created, right? It is not our fault and WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE!! IT IS A MYTH THAT MANKIND IS HELD ACCOUNTABLE AND WILL REAP WHAT HE SOWS! Right? [restart quote] "He started talking to them again, but they began to be hardened to his words. They thought they might be able to drive away his insanity by harsh and bad tempered behaviour towards him." [end quote] Now ain't that reality? Someone is hurting and in pain, and in the cruel world we live in, those they love kicks them while they're down, all in the name of love. Is it any wonder there are so many emotionally hurting people out there? But the answer isn't to have a caring society, one founded on the Word of God, its to zap 'em with pills and dope 'em up. that way you can forget about the real person. And only have to connect with the person the pills make. A half asleep, still hurting but has not enough level of consciousness or cognitive ability to find a way out. Oh yeah, good answer! [restart quote] "Sometimes they would make fun of him, at other times they would criticize him, and sometimes they would simply ignore him." [End quote] Ignore the problem it will go away, right? Bury your head in the sand and get OSTRICH DISEASE! As well as the sickness all our societies are run through and through with. [restart Quote] Because of this, he began to withdraw from them to his bedroom to pray for them, pity and comfort his own misery. He would also walk by himself in the fields, sometimes reading and sometimes praying. He spent his time doing these things for several days. [end quote] Oh all this time on his own, using his brain and trying to find comfort without the use of psychotropic drugs, is really, really a sign of ole pilgrim needing prozac, or haldol, or maybe if he gets worse, they should just shoot electric volts through his brain in the name of treatment, that will be sure to cure him, right?
Yeah, right! All Pilgrim needed was a happy pill and a psyche to call his own, and he'd have been okay wouldn't he? No! Pilgrim knew exactly what he needed. He needed the way to Heaven, found only in our Lord, and the truth as founded on the whole word of God. And all he needed was a psyche to show him the way, huh? And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch. -- Jesus Christ (Matthew 15:14) Wrong, a psyche would have led him to the pit, as psychology is absolutely categorically, against the Word of God. And founded in atheism. Freedom from all kinds of things can be found in the Lord. But only based on and as revealed in the Word of God. John 14
6Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
John 8
32Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
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