Shoulder To Shoulder

Rush Limbaugh put it this way, that Barack Obama "Doesn't want to govern; he wants to rule." Fellow radio talk show host Jim Quinn (Sirius XM 166-weekday mornings) added that he treats Americans more like subjects than citizens. These are two important statements that should be seriously considered by those who, in 2008, voted in a new form of government in the United States of America, for a pattern has long since emerged of censorship, subterfuge and arrogance that reeks of third world dictators and Soviet block Comintern initiatives. The latest circumvention of Congress by this White House was to effectively stop deportation of illegal immigrants by essentially, through a maze of requirements, ordering its immigration lawyers to bypass the illegals in order to concentrate on, what they cleverly described as, real criminals. In effect it was amnesty by fiat; this change of heart only weeks after Barack Obama told the national Council of La Raza "Now, I know some people want me to bypass Congress and change the laws on my own...". Arizona Governor Jan Brewer said that "We need to remind President Obama that we elected a president that serves beneath the law and did not anoint a king that is above the law." Texas Congressman Michael McCaul added "It's just the latest attempt by this president to bypass the intended legislative process when he does not get his way." I personally do not know a whole lot of people who still support the Manchurian President in this White House. I do know many who hold to a strict change of venue in the debate in that they continue to defend their original decision to vote for Barack Obama but can no longer actually defend the man who they voted for. This particular blog is addressed to that person. Partisan politics is one thing but we, differing on many issues though we do, are in the same boat in that our nation is under assualt from both within and without and our children's futures have been downgraded to "D". This not because of the differences between liberal and conservative philosophies but between truth and lies, federalism and communism....between liberty and tyranny. Barack Obama is anything but a liberal in the traditional sense and much less a democrat in its historical context.  He is a Progressive but he is more. He and David Axelrod, Bill Ayers, Eric Holder, Valerie Jarrett and select others have duped those like Janet Napolitano, Joe Biden....and much of his cabinet, while even they themselves are merely pawns of others who have long hated what America stood for. There is a cohort now in charge that has no intention of instituting change through the Constitution but  rather eliminating the pertinence of that constitution. Today Facebook apologized for deleting Arizona Governor Jan Brewer''s Facebook comments that were critical of Barack Obama's taking the law into his own hands, for they "apparently"... "violated Facebook community standards." This slip should alone wake many up to the dangers of huge information-oriented corporations that not only have access to our personal information but the ability to design the information we receive in ways amenable to their cause. They also are merely recruited pawns. Surely there are a few reading this, who are not conservatives, who know that there is indeed an insidious agenda being acted out, not only in boardrooms, dachas and mountaintop retreats, but in our very capitol. You may not agree with my politics or my religion, you may not like me from what you read, but we are alike in that we want America to survive, we want the same opportunity for our children that we ourselves had. This cohort that I mentioned is not interested in the well-being of minorities, women or immigrants for these groups are also being used. Their only concern for you is that you continue to oppose us to the extent that you do not focus your gaze on them. The information is out there in abundance. Should you decide to go there it will not be a pleasant journey but satisfying in that you will see that many of the differences between us have been fabricated, stoked and fueled. Two weeks ago today, our family was travelling south along I-77 at Charlotte the same time that flash floods there took three lives. Yesterday, in Pittsburgh, flash floods took four lives. The roar of an approaching flash flood throughout America can be heard right now, for a storm has moved over us and stalled, the rains of tyranny raising streams from all quarters as they converge on the National Archives that houses our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. We need to be shoulder to shoulder and not face to face, for the sake of our children.

The Only Job Creator

Republicans tend to care for the poorer elements of society through promoting economic policies that, if enacted and allowed to run their course, would strengthen the economic fabric of the nation thereby giving opportunity to most, if not all, of those willing to take advantage of it. Democrats tended, at one time, to push for safety nets where all of those who cannot find that opportunity will at least be taken care of in the essentials needed. Conservatives tend to work as guardians of the free market, fully confidant that if there are no restrictions, growth and prosperity will naturally take place. Democrats now tend to don the chef's hat and apron, take up utensils and cut and stir while they add seasonings with one hand then the other as they attempt to be caterers to the disadvantaged, their wages being political support from those catered to. Republicans tend to defend the Constitution at all costs in order for freedom and liberty to flourish. Democrats tend to labor more for the rights of the underprivileged, at the expense of the constitution if necessary, who they perceive to be discriminated against, if in nothing else, a disadvantaged starting position in the quest for prosperity. Republicans tend to exalt Capitalism as an essential organ in the body politic, and are satisfied with the results even if, as it is today, it has been shown that many cannot play this game. Democrats tend to take full advantage of that Capitalism while denying it to others who are more valuable being dependent on entitlements. In either scheme, the plight of the poor is not on the front burner. Theoretically the Republicans are correct but that theory has been greatly weakened by events in the course of human nature. The Democrat loses in the battle of theory, for theirs (socialism) has proven, time and time again, ineffective at best and disastrous at worst. Compounding the problem for the Democrat, they have proven to be ethically challenged as the entitlements originally meant to benefit the poor, with the advent of the radical progressive, now benefit themselves through their reelection coffers. The Capitalist model failed to take into consideration the dark elements of human nature, the machinations of the globalist (a prime example being George Soros,) the nefarious inventiveness of Wall Street and the corporate executive married to the stockholder after divorcing their employees and the public well-being. The Founding Fathers, on the other hand, most certainly did take human nature seriously in their formula of checks and balances. So, our freedoms and liberty have a fighting chance in the Constitution but our economies do not have a fighting chance for Capitalism relies on the DNA of the free market and is oblivious to the DNA of man for it has no checks and balances other than recessions and depressions. Normally this works but in this globalist economy, and in this particular economy that is built upon the continual need to purchase-purchase-purchase, not essentials but non-essentials-often entertainments. We have put ourselves into the unenviable position of needing to curtail this personal spending, knowing full well that in doing so, our economy will sink even further into the abyss. Primarily because of the fallen nature of man, albeit for differing reasons and in different applications, both the Republican and Democratic answers to poverty cannot succeed. The former because it places compassion at the doorstep of the free market formula, acceptable in a mostly agrarian society and somewhat beyond but woefully lacking in the age of Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nike and Abercrombie & Fitch. The latter because, the safety net now is used to insure that everyone has the funds to purchase these products. We cannot avoid the plight of the poor and disadvantaged, in fact it should be an all-consuming passion to address these needs. We cannot relegate them to the hope of a functioning economic model nor throw entitlements at them for dubious reasons. God gave words to one particular prophet (Isaiah) in advising a king of Judah (Ahaz) who was seeking to buy redemption from Judah's enemies. Among those words were these "If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all." Our poor will not receive compassion, our enemies will not be turned away and we ourselves will languish in misery and instability, if we are not firm in faith of whom Isaiah described this way, "and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."

Who Is The Evangelical?

So just who, and what, is the Evangelical that we hear about so often in the mainstream media? The term, today, is used as a pejorative and if it were possible to do, would flash red to alert the reader to pay particular attention to what they are up to. Evangelicalism is a very big tent, a revival tent of sorts, with room enough for many diverse church goers. At times, most recently at the Iowa straw poll, it's more like a huge tailgate party. I was an Evangelical for the better part of the 1980s, my highwater mark when I went to $100 a plate fundraiser for Pat Robertson's 1988 bid for the presidency. We needed a Christian president, I thought, who was also informed and intelligent and Pat filled that bill. Contrary to the accepted opinion on the Left, Evangelicals do not merely march in lock-step to to the commands of their favorite televangelist. They all hold to the same social issues because those issues are very clear in God's Word. They tend to back candidates that openly admit to going first to the Bible. They are generally, model citizens. They pay their taxes, give generously to charities and proudly send their sons and daughters off to the military making our armed forces America's most distinguished and honorable group! The Evangelical has been a blessing to this nation who ushered in Ronald Reagan and kept Al Gore and John Kerry out of the White House. It obviously failed with Bill and Hillary Clinton, and with Barack Hussein Obama. Evangelicals are red state, or would it be more apropos to say red states are evangelical? Without the resurgence of the fear of God within the evangelical community from the 1970s to today, America would be already past tense as I write this. As if at a state fair, they can easily move from the Evangelical tent to the Tea Party tent and mingle without any questions. When they enter the Libertarian tent, they can be viewed suspiciously even though they tend to feel at home. They fill Ohio Stadium, Notre Dame Stadium, the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, Bryant-Denny Stadium and Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium. They fly the Stars and Stripes (as I do) in front of their homes. They often have blended, interracial families. They coach youth athletics and swarm to coastal beaches (when they're not repairing homes in Appalachia) without littering the sand with bear cans. They read, read, read and are more at home, in politics anyway, listening to the spoken word rather than watching carefully crafted television news reports. They hunt, they fish and they vote. Their children tend to be polite and respectful of their elders. For all of this, they are feared and ridiculed. The other day, while watering the flowers, my cell phone rang. I rarely get phone calls on my cell phone for to me it is more of a constant conduit of news with a quaint app that lets you make phone calls in an emergency. It was a Gallop/USA Today pollster and I was as excited as a Democrat chief-of-elections finding a box of votes under the ice cream maker in the back of the hall. One question asked of me was if I were an Evangelical. Futilely, I attempted to explain the problem with the concept of Evangelical but had no other choice than to answer...yes. Such is it with much of America. All who are part of "Christianity," who apply Biblical truth to social issues, are labelled...Evangelicals. As an aside here...as has happened so often, I left the computer to go downstairs to listen to the radio program the White Horse Inn, which we have done faithfully at 8:30 Sunday evenings (101.5 FM in Pittsburgh) for almost two decades, and returned to the computer with a quote. By the way, I highly recommend that you go to their web site (http://www.whitehorseinn.org/). C. S. Lewis once said "The problem is not so much the de-Christianization of England, as the de-Christianization of the church." This is the problem with much of Evangelicalism today. The American pulpit, to a great degree, has failed the church. Christianity and Christendom have been united. The cross of Calvary is not preached, rather the felt needs of the congregation. The name of Jesus is ever-present but the person of Jesus Christ is unknown, the blood shed on Calvary for our sins ignored. One glaring example of our lack of discernment is Glenn Beck. Here is a man who saturates his broadcasts with Biblical terminology and a near worship of the state of Israel but exalts a false christ of Mormonism. This doesn't seem very important to the Evangelical. In fairness, if they were properly discipled in their churches they might not be so enamored with the patriot Glenn Beck. The Evangelical is weak on doctrine and without doctrinal truth there is no Christianity. The Evangelical comes too close to thinking of America as God's nation thus failing to separate the declaration of our redemption in the birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ from the Declaration of Independence. Politically the Evangelical can be naive, as I was with Pat Robertson. The media often points to the belief in a Pre-Tribulation Rapture where the Christians are taken away, leaving the unbeliever to face the Antichrist. This false doctrine permits the Christian to adopt the attitude written on a t-shirt I saw in a Christian bookstore where a pair of sneakers was all that was left as the basketball fan was taken up, out and off of his seat at a basketball game. The Evangelical voter can all too easily be taken in by the evangelical rhetoric of a run-of-the-mill establishment politician whose evangelical words are so strong that vetting of their history is not necessary. Still, the Evangelical has been a blessing to America but only insofar as they are citizens who still have their heads above water in a culture that is drowning. Unfortunately, because of the confusion enhanced by the media, the unbeliever thinks that he must necessarily come under that Evangelical tent if he were ever to consider his fallen condition before God. Should God have mercy on us as a nation and should His Spirit move over this land with His convicting power of irresistible grace, that Evangelical tent will not even be noticeable in the mass of humanity, at least not in the definition it has assumed in the last 40 years.

Rioters.. All Of Us

The British Daily Mail had an article by Max Hastings, linked on the Drudge Report, that begins Years of liberal dogma have spawned a generation of amoral, uneducated, welfare dependent brutalised youngsters. Hastings brings a hard message on the riots that England is experiencing but a vastly incomplete one. He writes that the normal rioter lives a "life of absolute futility....illiterate beyond maybe some dexterity with computer games and Blackberries." He continued, "Nobody has ever dared suggest to them that they need feel any allegiance to anything, least of all Britain or their community...the welfare state has relieved them from hunger and real want." He lays the blame in Britain of the "breakdown of families...the social engineering industry (and) the judiciary (that sides with it) in that the law appears to be there to protect the rights of the perpetrator, and does not support the victim." "How do you persuade children to renounce bad language when they hear little else from stars on the BBC?" he challenges. His stated answer to this is "Unless or until those who run Britain introduce incentives for decency and impose penalties for bestiality which are today lacking, there will never be a shortage of young rioters and looters such as those of the past four nights..." One of those rioters arrested was an 18 year old girl, a possible future Olympian runner, and Olympic ambassador from Britain! This, as an American possible future Olympian skier was involved in a similarly hideous incident here. This problem transcends economics into our spiritual beings. Aside from a minority, strong and faithful as they are, Britain has long since forsaken the one who enabled them to rise in stature in this world. Their great preacher of the 19th century, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, warned of what was to come as he saw the watering-down of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in his country. The Victorian Age became the culprit and Britain has since descended into the quagmire of misplaced empathy that enslaves it. Yes, liberal dogma destroyed the foundation of Britain and is doing so here in the name of American Progressivism. In both cases it deemed itself so much more intelligent than its creator and so more savvy than the Word given to us by that creator. It attempted to assuage its own guilt in rejecting God by applying to itself the mantle of administrators of compassion on everything that runs contrary to God's commands, and also to man's law. It proclaimed that "we are here for the minority" but have only hurt and impoverished them more, that "we are going to advance women's rights" but have hardened the God given blessedness of woman and have in reality demanded for women the overbearing arrogance and hedonist character that we men have made an art form of, it has said "we will advance the cause of the immigrant" but has eaten away at the opportunity even the illegal immigrant comes here for while disparaging the blessings the legal immigrant had already given us, it has boasted that "we will protect the children" but has left them scavenging amongst the many predators who profit from their lack of guidance. Our best efforts, mine included, are tinged with self-preservation. Our gated-communities are not an answer, even for those who live in them, for they give only a temporary relief, a small geographic safe-haven from a world run amok. The toys of smart phones, computer games and Facebook hurt more than they help but we have elevated them, and the many other trivialities of life, to evidence of success and happiness. We have become experts in promoting health, building buff bodies and beautiful appearances to the detriment of our souls, any real peace of mind, and any true joy. Social programs and entitlements are not the answer and even law and order cannot contain a spirit of rebellion that wants no part of God. Max Hastings quoted another in using the term "feral humans" in describing the rioters, and that would be an apt description of us all if there were not a truer one, for it is man's fallen nature that every one of us deals with. So many in the history of Liberalism and Progressivism deny this. We are basically good they say, in need of only a sound mind that can be engineered, but we are basically bad, in need of a sound mind that comes only by grace. We all riot every time when we rebel against God. We all loot when we fashion a gospel of our own making, a god of our own liking and a christ of our own creative imaginings. There will never be a shortage of rioters until Christ comes again. Only God's grace can insure that the rioter is isolated where he does not feed on the ambivalence of the majority, nor is egged on by others of like minds, nor planted in total darkness where the light of the gospel cannot point the way. Both Britain and America teeter on the edge where riots will be the least of our worries. As bleak as the situation is, and it has never been bleaker, not during the Civil War, nor on December 7th, 1941, and not as Rebellion became our middle name as our visible collapse began in the 1960s, our only hope is in the omniscience and omnipotence and mercy of Almighty God. One way or the other America and Britain will prostrate itself before Him, either in fear as He comes in judgement or in thankfulness as His Spirit melts our collective hearts.

Pulpit...Not The Podium

One of the running themes in this blog is the need for America to humble itself before God, before God humbles us before our numerous enemies. Yesterday (August 6th,) Texas Governor Rick Perry hosted a major prayer event in Houston of upwards of 25,000 people with that very message. One might therefore expect the writer of this blog to wholeheartedly rejoice in this but that's not the case. I agree with the diagnosis, but not prescription of a media event. We are falling apart in every way imaginable. Our Congress is clueless which is a description far too generous to use on our White House. Our culture is in chaos. Our media is in denial while our enemies are certain of our collapse. Pep rallies are not the answer especially when politics is part of it. I'm not questioning the intent of the organizers or Governor Perry for I know what it is like to finally figure out that America is collapsing because its reliance upon God has vanished, because we have gone our own way and God is permitting us to reap what we have sown. I have probably written a dozen times in this blog on the need for America to humble itself before God and I hope in those blogs that I made it known that I was talking about myself as much as anyone who might read it. Ultimately, we do not have to see America's sins clearer...we have to see more clearly the one sinned against (God.)  A deficient view of the holiness of God can result in feelings of a satisfactory repentance and the consequent projection upon others of the need to do so also. A heightened view of the holiness of God will hardly get one off the hook so easily. The Puritan mind could see clearer... God and His character, hence repentance was an everyday occurrence as they humbly approached God for all their needs. The secular mind of today sees the Puritan mind as a lifelong quest to quench joy in anyone and everyone and the evangelical mind is a product of these times, on display in Christian bookstores, Christian music concerts and events, and fundraising telethons, and is much more susceptible to a good gimmick than what is really needed. The podium, the bookstore and the blogosphere can indeed address our inflated view of our minds and ourselves and the turmoil that lies ahead but only the pulpit can effectively deflate that view, soften the heart and ease the burdened soul through the proclamation of redemption through the blood of Christ as written in God's Word. The speaker on the dais and the soapbox tends to point out every culprit except the one standing on it and those gathered together to listen. We attended a Lutheran church (Missouri Synod) this past week while traveling. I scoured the local church websites looking for a Lord's Day sermon topic on Christ and, as I had done in the past, wound up choosing the Lutheran church, for the atonement is at least always present in the liturgy if not the sermon. As it happened, a "retired" minister was filling the pulpit for the regular pastor. In essence, his sermon was "Christ is the only answer." A worshipper came up to my wife and recommended that we should come back next week when the regular pastor is in the pulpit but I think that we were blessed with the right day, the right minister and the right message. In our storied past, calls for national days of prayer and fasting have been corporate, where the composer of the call was in need of repentance as any of the represented, but ultimately the pulpit is what God utilizes in calling individuals and nations to repentance. Unfortunately for today, our pulpits are in need of awakening. Such is our extreme dilemma.

Tea Party In A Perfect Storm

Should we make it intact to November of 2012, there should essentially be two elections in this country. Before I address this let me explain the "should we make it to November 2012" comment for I have prefaced sentences with this type of comment a number of times in this blog. A recent entry into our expanding collection of American phrases and idioms is "the perfect storm," alluding to a storm so complete, so surrounding, whose potential is so devastating that the worst possible scenario has to be considered. America is in the path of that "perfect storm." International issues are tearing apart the fabric of order everywhere. Europe is holding on by a thread, the Middle-East is in chaos, Russia is a hungry bear coming out of hibernation, China faces internal problems as it is finding out that it has created a monster that has to be fed continuously or that monster will turn on it, terrorism has one ability...to cause havoc, and one dream...bringing about that havoc in the world while favorable conditions for this have never been so ripe. All of these things are happening at the same time and some will be resolved, one way or the other in my estimation, in the fifteen months leading up to this election. So arriving at the November 2012 date without first having been thrown into a tailspin that endangers not only our national security but our Constitutional Republic form of government itself is anything but guaranteed.  But we must press on and as for the "two elections," one should revolve solely around Barack Hussein Obama. Here is a man who by all appearances has been a Manchurian Candidate" prepared by those who merely used him. Yes, he has utterly failed in the most basic duties of a president but even his failures advance their agenda. The mistake that we are making at this time is putting forth the economy as the sole issue to challenge him with, whereas Barack Obama's subverting of our Constitution, his failure to pay any attention to our national defense or national debt, the intense division he is bringing to this nation, the deceit and subterfuge his administration displays daily that no previous administration, not even Nixon's, had come close to, and his concealment of his academic and travel records along with who his closest associates were in his formative political years should be the primary focus of this election. It's the second election, or rather set of elections, that should revolve around the economy and that would be for seats in the Congress. One can see how close the new "Tea Party" members in Congress came to giving our nation a sound budget that would at least have stemmed the tide of financial collapse. They failed to stem the debt problem but succeeded in exposing a vacuum of wisdom in our Congress and absence of integrity in many who sit there. If we place the economy solely on the White House and fail to highlight the more weightier issues that lead to it, outside influences about to erupt may transcend that economy. If we fail to place the onus of this economy where it belongs, on the socialist, profane, nanny state that brings only poverty and tyranny, then we let the professional politicians responsible, who would prove to be very adept at shifting the blame and refusing that responsibility, off of the hook. Important as choosing wise leadership is, we need wisdom for ourselves for we also share in that responsibility for the perfect storm fast approaching. I originally added some book recommendations to the bottom of this blog but was convicted of writing about a perfect storm that threatens all of humanity without seeking the wisdom of humanity's Creator.

Psalm 111
Praise the Lord!
I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart,
in the company of the upright, in the congregation.
Great are the works of the Lord.,
studied by all who delight in them.
Full of splendor and majesty is his work,
and his righteousness endures forever.
He has caused his wondrous works to be remembered;
the Lord is gracious and merciful.
He provides food for those who fear him;
he remembers his covenant forever.
He has shown his people the power of his works,
in giving them the inheritance of the nations.
The works of his hands are faithful and just;
all his precepts are trustworthy;
they are established forever and ever,
to be performed with faithfulness and uprightness.
He sent redemption to his people;
he has commanded his covenant forever.
Holy and awesome is his name!
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;
all those who practice it have a good understanding.
His praise endures forever!