The Emperor Has No Clothes

              Courtiers....lords and ladies in waiting....squires....counts and viscounts....viceroys....retired knights....and assorted vassals....these folks follow President Trump from the Winter Palace to the Summer Palace and back again. Although duly elected in a democratic fashion the assemblage of this administration has taken on a monarchical flare as when King Henry VIII was following the hounds on a fox hunt....but it's President Trump following a little white ball on the golf course. It was JFK's administration where 'Camelot' was coined but here it's more of a 'camel lot' where assorted sheiks and caliphs and sultans sit at the Round Table at the behest of Princess Ivanka's consort.....and mime court jester.....Jared.
              Hans Christian Andersen's The Emperor's New Clothes seems written for what is going on in conservative talk radio today as the hosts have consistently over two years painted a picture of a president who keeps promises when in reality it has mostly been candies thrown from a gold-plated carriage while the President and Ivanka wave from the windows.
              There are those of us out here who are trying to put the Trump administration in proper perspective....shouting as loud as we can that the emperor has no clothes....but each and every day a rabid Leftist mob shouts "to the guillotine" which gathers all the headlines....and distorts basic decency and reason in the public square in the process.....but most importantly gives Rush & Friends an excuse to avoid and obscure President Trump's utter failures as they rebut the taunts.
              It's time for a 'shout out' of sorts to Bretbart News Daily radio hosted by Alex Marlow. It hasn't been stellar reporting on the President by any means as it still avoids the overall deception that is the essence of Donald Trump but Marlow has....along with the most knowledgeable expert on the border in Brandon Darby....brought the issue of 'the wall' right smack dab to the fore.
              In what has become a non-existent occurrence on the major conservative talk radio shows....President Trump was taken to the woodshed....as Ann Coulter was interviewed. Among the opinions that she expressed was that along with all the promises made that somehow the weirdness and the coarseness and the vulgarity of Donald Trump's primary campaign drew us in but all that seems to have remained since taking office is  "the coarseness and the vulgarity." She added that his tweets enrage her.....which was good to finally hear someone in the conservative movement say. She called the President a "BS'er"....and she said that if the wall were a golf course it would have been built! All in all it was a great forty-five minutes....a waft of intellectual honesty from out of the past.

Just A Pamphleteer

           Ten years ago tomorrow I sat down at a computer and started these posts....the first of which was titled A La Carte Cable. It had been my contention....and still is....that Christian discernment is directly related to the ratio of time spent dwelling on the things of God vs the amount of time spent on pastimes and entertainments. Television therefore was a main culprit!
           Our son wasn't even a toddler yet back in 1987....one evening he was sitting on the living room floor staring at the TV set as I called out his name. He didn't respond so I came closer and ran my hand between his face and the television. He didn't even blink so I umplugged the set and put it in the basement for nine years. Since then we have had only a handful of channels with basic cable. Today our son has no television in his home!
           There are just too many channels available to us to fight this temptation while at the very least we are wasting our time and in the process greatly hindering our discernment in an age that demands that we be able to sort thorough the confusion and deception. A la carte cable would have at least given us the opportunity to pick only the channels that we deemed necessary....and in the process we wouldn't be supporting cable networks with which we wanted nothing to do.
            Anyway.....I had a follower right away but didn't like that idea so I disabled the link. Since then I try often to point people to ligonier.com which was R. C. Sproul's ministry....and to great Christian writers from the past....along with other books of today written by those much more capable than I am.  Then all of a sudden comments were appearing. They were nice and polite for I hadn't really entered into any controversial areas as of yet but I also immediately knew that....one....I would have absolutely no time to respond.....and two....I wanted to be a conduit for my thoughts....and not those of others. It wasn't until months had passed when I said to myself...."hmm...I don't even have my name on this." I decided to keep it this way because this is certainly not a blog....but mere pamphlets.....and I'm just a pamphleteer! Like it or not....right or wrong.....it's been ten years.
           The hits are over 100,000 but that's deceiving because 'bots' started to make an impact a year or so ago....so I pay more attention to the hits on my profile page. The following was my second post:

The Written Word....December 3, 2008:

           We've become a society that relies more on visual sources of information than the written word. Newspaper circulation is near crises point. Libraries continually add more computers and rely on their DVD collections. Books publishers continue to struggle while their biggest source of sales is novels where we are not gathering information. The Discovery and History channels grab the attention of the youth more than reading a book....and we learn how to cook and to do home improvements from television. Michael Moore and Bill Maher have become our political science teachers. The golden arches tell us that it is McDonald's. In the evangelical world, impressive sanctuaries draw people to a church where the absence of a pulpit that hides the stylish clothes of the preacher is more important than proclaiming God's Word in keeping those people in pews. (excuse me...cushioned seats)
           President Bush is an evangelical but from his comments in interviews it doesn't appear that he has read much....if anything....in the faith that he proclaims. (President Trump's ghostwriter for The Art Of The Deal....Tony Schwartz....who spent eighteen months with Donald Trump in preparation for the book....is reported to have said that "I doubt that Trump has ever read a book straight through in his adult life."
           Barack Obama on the other hand has written two autobiographies where even liberal commentators are amazed that he has revealed nothing of who he is in these books. We have been able to delve deep into the mind of great historical figures through their collected letters but the closest that we come to that today is in the collected emails of some business or government figure as revealed in their court trials. (today we also have the Tweet!)
           

Tempests And Doldrums

Folks this a very weak church age for preaching....and awash in easy-believism....fad doctrines....and gnosticism....entertainment driven at times on the one side....on the other side fearful of any real emotion....guarding their doctrine with everything within them.....but at the expense of possessing an unction.....they have "left (their) first love" without knowing it. The following post is from a Saturday evening in December of 2014:

          May God have mercy upon our nation. From small vessels bearing cramped pilgrims we developed into an empire. We surpassed every empire this world has ever seen in not only power and might but in knowledge and scientific skills. More than that even as God used us a conduit for the Gospel of Jesus Christ to every corner of the earth. We fought Him all along the way, this is true, but we were a very large piece in His grand design, and he would use His rod and His staff on many occasions to both chastise us and to gently but forcefully bring us back.
          As I sit here in my study and pause, my eyes lift to a photograph on canvas on the wall in front of me. The camera is on the teak deck. The thin rails give the impression of a much older vessel. I stare right into the sea as billowing waves heave the ship at about a 40 degree list. Clouds dominate the sky but the sun found an opening as the shutter was clicked. In the foreground, barley visible, are rolling hills where possibly a safe harbor awaits. I look at this photo often and wonder in awe at the power of God's seas and the safe harbor of His grace.
           We in America are on a ship but it may as well be anchored in Boston Harbor next to the USS Constitution for it no longer guards our freedoms and liberties. I've related this story before. Fifteen years ago, sitting in a classroom of mostly younger fellow members of our cohort working for a degree in Higher Education, we were discussing the issues of the day as they related to colleges and universities. I remember standing up for emphasis and warning that a division was coming within America. Two different peoples were emerging, two different methods for thinking, two opposing opinions on what truth is and what it is not. If anyone agreed they did not speak up but unfortunately I was right. Our American Creed is not even a memory. Our heritage is almost spat upon. Our traditions are deemed useless in a world that mocks God.
       As it often seems to happen as I write, the XM radio plays something that relates to the topic at hand and in this instance it's classical music and Edward Elgar's Coronation March written for the coronation of Great Britain's King George V in 1911. There is no pomp and circumstance in this piece. The music seems to roll along with the hills and the ship in my photograph. 1911! A new century was underway, a century that would hurl England into two World Wars within three decades. Bombed....but never into submission....no, it would lose in other ways, even as we are losing now.
       Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the Prince of Preachers, had warned them but they would not listen. Their pulpits were not vigilant and the gospel was being modernized. Today, over a century later, England is surrendering....surrendering to confusion. Awash in chaos, their heritage trampled underfoot by foreigners who take advantage of a malnourished liberal tradition; they fight back but there is no Churchill to rally them, no Thatcher to prod them and face down the enemy's threats and lies, and although many faithful preachers-no Spurgeon...Ryle...or Martyn Lloyd-Jones to call down fire from on high on their (our) arrogance!
       Some see the world today as simply a new paradigm, that the world will indeed go on. Others actually see it as progress, but all the evidence, if allowed to be submitted, shows a crumbling Western Civilization.... puzzle pieces added almost every day where a frightening picture of our future is beginning to appear. It's one of a dystopian society ruled by Herbert Spencer's 'survival of the fittest' and birthed by Charles Darwin's On The Origin Of Species. In the background, behind the robotic movements and hollow faces of the people, above the gay-colored storefronts that have absolutely nothing to sell that can enliven that people or that can inform, and movie theaters with films that preach the chimera of a nation adapting without God, is an onrushing sandstorm obliterating all vision and discernment....a tsunami that sucks in the surf before it exposing a soft underbelly of a nation that once acknowledged, reverenced and relied upon its benefactor and at least tried to navigate by His written Word.
         Twelve hours from now men and women will fill the pulpits of America. Well-exercised healthy  specimens, pastors of the First Church of the Fit and Buff, tolerant of everything except that written Word; they will smile and preach peace oblivious to two previous millennia of pulpits that extolled the glories of Christ, warned of hellfire and offered salvation bought on a bloody cross.
        Not all pulpits have decayed. Many of God's ministers shed tears throughout the week and reach out as if to grab the hem of the cloak of their Saviour seeking power from on high to awaken those given into their charge. Seeking a revival, even a reformation and seeking mercy, their work is not in vain. Christians in America are as strong and faithful as they ever were but far, far fewer in percentages. Almost isolated, often ridiculed, sometimes persecuted, they sense that the King of Kings is mounted, that His mighty angels are silent, awaiting the voice of thunder that beckons them forward. May God have mercy upon America. May He use us one last time, according to His will, for His purposes....and for His glory alone!

Prepare To Stand Alone

The Old Testament book of Job may be one of the least read books of the Bible. It's a series of conversations between Job....three of his friends.....if you can call them friends....one younger man who very humbly jockeys for time to give his thoughts on what he has witnessed....and God. I've seen the book of Job summarized in only a few paragraphs! That's not a lot gleaned from 42 chapters of God's Word. I have to wonder if Job will not be referenced much more often in the short period just before the Lord returns....as much of the established church pressures true believers with bad advice....much of it political....and utterly fails to see the delusion in the world....in our own desires.....and even in the demonic. Whether or not this is the case we have to be prepared to stand alone if necessary....or at least in small numbers....as many from the past have had to do.....for a severe winnowing within the church may be coming. We live in a poor church age for preaching where doctrines of men and gnostic false doctrine are everywhere.....but how would one know if one did not have something to compare it too? Reading J. C. Ryle and Charles Spurgeon can serve that purpose! The following post is from April of 2017:

"Prepared To Stand Alone"

         I think that I say accurately that I have not only enjoyed but have been thoroughly edified by every word that I have ever read by Iain Murray....and I've read quite a few of his books....including his latest....J. C. Ryle, Prepared To Stand Alone.
        Great Britain was blessed by two great preachers in the last half of the 19th century. The word 'blessed' may not do justice to what their ministries did for Great Britain during that period, and all of Christianity, not only in the last half of the 20th century but right up until today! England's church was in the initial stages of collapse. The ministries of both of these men, and many others of course, not only kept the church afloat but provided an invaluable warning and prophesy of total collapse of the church that should speak to us today....for that collapse did indeed occur. The sermons and the writings of both men, thanks to the 'electric telegraph' as J. C. Ryle described it, enabled their work to compass the world.
        J. C. Ryle attended Eton, that famous boys boarding school that has produced 19 British Prime Ministers. You may have heard the phrase...'the battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton.' There is some doubt as to the veracity of this statement but J. C. Ryle's education gives support to it as his experiences at Eton produced a man who later was uncompromising on the gospel of Jesus Christ....wise....tolerant when appropriate..,.but uncompromising on the essentials of the faith which are many.
        Ryle then matriculated to Oxford where he excelled and would probably have moved on to a service life in Parliament had not he visited a church on a Lord's Day morning where a Bible passage stirred something in him that would agitate until a Christian and hero of the Christian Faith was born. That passage was the second chapter of Ephesians which includes...'By grace are ye saved-through faith-and that not of yourselves-it is the gift of God." It's interesting in that the other great preacher in England, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, had a similar experience of conversion where a disjointed unconventional service in a blizzard did produce but a single verse of Scripture that would change a young man's life from the moribund to the extraordinary.
        J. C. Ryle was raised in a family that he described in this way..."My father's house was respectable, and well-conducted, but there really was not a bit of religion in it." He continued..." The plain truth is, that for the first 16 or 17 years of my life, there was no ministry of the gospel at the churches we attended....we had no real religious friends or relatives and no real Christian ever visited our house" and "for about the first 18 years of my life, neither at home, nor at school, nor college, nor among my relatives or friends, had I anything to do good to my soul, or to teach me anything about Jesus Christ." This in spite of the fact that his family did attend church and actually give occasional homage to God in their home.....so similar to America today.
       Ryle became a minister more out of financial necessity than anything else. His father was not happy with his decision...."the consequences of this change were very great indeed...it caused great uncomfortableness in my own family, and made my own position very unpleasant indeed. In fact no one can tell what I had to go through, in hundreds of petty ways....It made an awkwardness, and uncomfortableness, and an insensible kind of estrangement which no one can comprehend but those who have gone through it. I had the constant uncomfortable feeling that on account of my religious opinions I was only a tolerated person in my own family and somewhat alienated and estranged from all my old friendships among my relatives."
        It should be noted that these words come from a rather informal autobiography that he penned primarily for his children. Other than this book J. C. Ryle was not into exalting himself in any way. He experienced many sorrows. His father lost all of his money, necessitating the young man quickly choose employment.... he sacrificed to help his father with his debts....his first wife died young and his second of three spouses died after ten difficult years of illness. Although he doesn't mention it as such, the greatest disappointment may have come after decades of ministry, when as the church was collapsing into much doctrinal error, this stalwart of the faith was criticized ridiculed and isolated for his persevering proclamation of the true gospel of Jesus Christ. He was not a preacher at a small church at the time but the Bishop of Liverpool in the Church of England! So the beginning and end of his ministry was similar to Charles Spurgeon's, for the great Baptist pastor was also isolated, censured and relegated as inconsequential in the modern church of his day.
        The American Christian of today would do well to pick up this book and read for we also may be called to 'stand alone' if necessary. Our church has gone modern, our gospel is diluted, and our nation is suffering as a consequence.
        J. C. Ryle, Prepared To Stand Alone by Iain Murray is much more than a biography. It is, just as every tract that Ryle wrote and sermon that he gave, an evangelical call to faith in Jesus Christ. If the reader here is a young person then this is a book you must read! If you are of middle-age it will strengthen your resolve for the days ahead, and if you are really old like me...it will fortify that which hopefully you already know, that "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever."....that this life is short and in the words of a famous poem..."Only one life, will soon be past, Only what's done for Christ will last"....and that only reliance upon the words of the captain of our faith will guide us through the increasing storms and unseen shoals to our right and to our left.

      

Let Them Eat Cake

The following was posted this past April as Emmanuel (God with us) Macron was wowing the United States Congress. I thought it apropos to bring it back today:

Bad Moon Rising

Dispatch.....Emmanuel (God With us) Macron mentioned the 21st century world order twice in his speech....someone in his entourage probably wisely told him to drop the word 'new.' I think that Republicans were gleeful at first but a bit confused as the speech went on.....standing and clapping at familiar patriotic phrases.....but then the French President said that he was sure that the United States would come back to the Paris Climate Accord. There's a bad moon rising....but Emmanuel Macron and Donald Trump think that it is a harvest moon.

            Well who all is sick of all my warnings in these posts......show of hands please....whoa....it looks like the wave at a football stadium! Who'd a thunk it....peace in North Korea.....and maybe with Iran? Everyone seems to be thinking 'peace and safety.' North Korea has their weapons....and I'm among those who have said that Iran has already had them (nuclear) for a while. The only issue left is when they pick the moment to get things rolling.

            What we are seeing right now with state dinners and Joint Sessions of Congress is a very concerted attempt to build an alliance. French President Macron is referencing the Marquis de Lafayette in his speech as I type. Lafayette was my first hero as a young person....and a biography on him one the very first books that I ever read. I remember being on a walking tour of Paris and asking the guide where the statue of Lafayette might be....she never heard of him. We are today more the children of the French Revolution then they are children of the American Revolution.....and Emmanuel Macron is Voltaire....not Lafayette.

            We put pressure on our representatives in Congress.....vote our way or you are out....but it is a Sisyphean quest. To my Christian brothers and sisters who are reading this.....the pressure should be applied to the men in our pulpits.....preach the cross of Christ or you are out.....or we are gone....and remind us of God's warnings to us.....for God will hold you to account for this.

Speed Reading Through The Bible

The visions had troubled Daniel so much that if this were today he would probably be rebuked for his anxiety....and for not putting all his concerns in God's hands. After a short period he had another vision and was told this...."Do not be afraid, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart on understanding this and on humbling yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to your words." One thing that we can glean from this is that if we....pastors and the rest of us....have no desire to understand God's prophetic Word....if we are not interested in God's warnings.....then we shouldn't worry....for God will not trouble us. That unfortunately is where most Christians in America are today. We are far more interested in sports or the stock market....or concerned about politics or the cellulite buildup on our thighs....then in what God may be saying to us about the catastrophes that seem to plague us on a weekly if not daily basis. We have heard rumors that God is judging America but if we just ignore them then maybe there won't be anything to them. On the other hand....if we are more than concerned about the crumbling of our nation....and on an American populace that is hopelessly adrift on one absurdity after another....then God will show us enough of the whys and wherefores of what is going on that then we truly can put everything in His hands! The following was first posted this past July: 

            My prayer....as it is on this day of every week...Saturday....is that tomorrow might be that Lord's Day where He awakens His pulpits.....and where His Holy Spirit moves over this land as a strong wind over ripened wheatfields.....and that as a gentle summer breeze produces soft tones on the wind chimes of our patios that we might....in increasing numbers....look up from that which occupies us....and gaze off to the distance where a cloud so ominous is moving in so fast that even the birds of the air are scurrying for their last meal before the storm of biblical proportions begins.
            Folks....it is rather startling....to me anyway....how in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians that he describes his oratorical skills in such a humble way.....more than humble....almost debased. Yet in Athens on the Areopagus....his words....as they were written anyway....were powerful. In spite of this we seek pastors who exude confidence.....not necessarily in the gospel.....but in those very same oratorical skills that Paul admitted that he lacked. We want the appearance of some kind of success....an impressive building with state-of-the-art technical gadgets. This is how we intend to entice people to come in.... and they do come in....but they then are given only a facsimile of the gospel that saves....little warnings of what is to come....and often not even a hint of the cost of discipleship that they are about to sign onto. Ultimately they are ushered into ministries to make them feel a part of the body....not realizing that as Christ suffered so will we.
            How are we to read Paul's letters as they pertain to the Second Coming....and Peter's letters....and John's Revelation....not to mention the very words of Jesus on the end times....or the major prophets....or the minor prophets....or the Psalms....how are we to read these in a world around us that is coming apart at the seems and the fault lines? The answer that have come up with is that we speed read...and essentially gloss over all of this that is so very important to us.
             Friends....do you realize this....that there has only been 60 centuries since Adam was placed in the garden of Eden...the last of which has been one complete century of wars and calamities and terror to go along with a world citizenry that has turned away from God....and technological advances that threaten the very existence of man.....this being anything from nuclear warheads to artificial intelligence? That is 1/60th of the history of mankind! Yet we somehow consider the Lord's return now....in our generation....as akin to the odds of winning a lottery! If we consider a generation to be 40 years than there would have only been 150 generations.....300 if is we use 20 years as a generation. I'd play that lottery!
           It really doesn't seem that long ago since I would lay out my Davy Crockett rug to take a nap in kindergarten....funny how we begin life taking naps.....and then end life taking naps. Six thousand years.....that's a nice round number.....but ask us what we might estimate when the Lord might come back and we most likely will add another century or two. All these numbers aside and there is a more telling way to look at all this. I'm going to segue here just a little bit....in just one example of millions. My brother-in-law and his wife just took on the responsibility and care for a ten year foster child who is blind and cannot talk. My heart breaks for this child.....Lord Jesus come!

 Note: I wanted to take the opportunity to recommend R. C. Sproul’s daily audio titled “Adopted Heir”. You can access it in seconds at ligonier.org

Donald Trump's War

              The past two weeks have not been good for President Trump. The elections were an absolute disaster....(even though he said that they were a great victory?)....and that was followed by a disastrous trip to France. The President's generals....(not the military ones but the talk radio ones) ....rallied the troops when a reporter was purged from the White House but then that situation turned sour also as Fox News took the side of the purged reporter....and it didn't help that the President's wife purged one of her own enemies. There was good news from the President's perspective though as his allies.....the Republican establishment....retained control of Republican leadership positions in the majority Senate and now minority House.
               We....conservatives....had over a month to celebrate the results of the November 8th 2016 election. My concern in December was in what direction conservative talk radio would go now that we won. Would they humbly be thankful for Hillary's defeat and try to encourage a reverence for our Creator who had sustained us in our dalliances for so long....the reaction of our government in the midst of America's first civil war....or would they atrophy in victory....or worse yet would Donald Trump become their god? None of us could foresee with any great detail what would transpire with the Mueller probe. Although we are only now nearing the conclusion of the investigation we have already witnessed disastrous repercussions....(this my opinion of course)....in the complete and utter collapse of the value of Rush Limbaugh.....and others in talk radio....to the discernment of conservatives on America's greatest problem....our refusal to accept or even consider that God alone causes nations to rise and to fall. Many of these hosts are mere sycophants now.....with no objective or journalistic investigative intent other than in protecting President Trump against mostly his own foibles....the absurdity of his outrageous tweeting....his new agenda which bears little resemblance to what it was on the campaign trail.....and even his continuous habit of telling untruths.
               All that these hosts of talk radio had to do was to hold President Trump to candidate Trump's promises....all of them....not just the few that go hand in hand with his empire building....and to reel him in when it became apparent that he was close to becoming unhinged in his excessive need for not only approval but adulation.....but they.....for whatever reason.....did not do this. They would have had plenty of time to address FISA warrants and still critique the many missteps and betrayals of President Trump. They could have lauded his legitimate successes while reporting on his errors of judgment....but they opted solely for the former while obfuscating the latter. They emboldened the President by ignoring his many absurd statements (Ivanka would make a great Ambassador to the UN) and irrational actions (the Kim Jong-un summit)....thus encouraging him to keep it up....and are now almost daily forced to defend outrageous at times proclamations of promises kept and an agenda that only vaguely resembles the campaign agenda....and often outright departs from it. Instead of continuing the fight for what was right....they simply accepted reassignment as generals in Trump's personal war....which wasn't our war.
              Folks, the following are words that I wrote about conservative talk radio back in December of 2016 under the post title of "Your Mission....Should You Accept It." Please take note of my hopeful comment on Donald Trump at the time. We needed conservative talk radio to at least hold firm....but even more than that we needed our pulpits to preach a Holy God calling a rebellious people to repent and to warn us not to place our trust in politics but only in Jesus Christ. We got neither:

         "This mass of kinetic energy that covered the landscape with Trump signs from Easton to Boise (east of Easton and west of Boise...eh...not so kinetic), this army of Minutemen, this patriotic, educated and intellectually armed throwback to Valley Forge would not have survived the winters of our discontents had not conservative talk radio been leading the way.
         This was our Publius, our Thomas Paine, our Benjamin Franklin and our John Locke transmogrified into waves of electromagnetic radiation travelling at the speed of light into every kitchen and workroom and automobile in America. The mainstream media, our betters as they perceive themselves to be, tried to keep the truth from us but utterly failed. We went through basic training all the way up to OCS at the instruction of radio and books and our own Constitution....all synchronized by common sense and reason....rare in the cities but abundant outside of them. The only thing that we needed was a George Washington to lead us. Well...we didn't get him.....but we did get Donald Trump. Considering that you could probably count the George Washingtons that America has had on the fingers of one hand...I guess we could have done a whole lot worse.
          These stellar stars (Limbaugh et al) that we navigated by as we passed through a perfect storm wrapped in a cosmic disturbance that threatened every foundation laid in the latter half of the eighteenth century....these men and women kept the heat on and their powder dry. Their mission now....a much more difficult mission this time....should they accept it....is to bring God into the equation....but first they themselves have to realize that God alone rules in the affairs of men....and that is where our pulpits come in. Please pray for the men in them!

Promises Made......Promises Spinned

            President Trump Tweeted the name of Congressman Adam Schiff....only he spelled it "Adam Schitt." This is our President. I've heard Rush Limbaugh say it quite a few times....and I don't even listen to his show that much anymore. You can hear the frustration in his voice....he'll say that never Trumpers "hate" Donald Trump....because "of his style."
             I think that we all have known someone like this at one time or another in our lives....usually when we were in our teens....it seemed like they couldn't conduct a simple conversation without greatly embellishing something or outright lying about it. We felt sorry for them. They had this overwhelming need for personal approval....with absolutely no concept of truth....and we would try our best to avoid them. They had a serious problem....it wasn't just their style. There is not a word that President Trump tweets out every day that we can just take at face value....not a word. This man who pummeled us for three years with the phrase "fake news' is the biggest fake of all.
            There was a popular CBS television show when I was young called To Tell The Truth. Apparently it lasted for a few decades in various incarnations. There were three contestants of which one had something very interesting attached to them. Four celebrity panelists would ask questions where the central character would tell the truth and the other two contestants would lie in an attempt to get the celebrity panelists to vote for them. The game ended as the host would ask...."Would the real (main character) please stand up?" This was our Republican primary campaign in 2015/16....and Donald Trump got the votes....as truth and honor and integrity were skunked! We didn't lose our way in the general election....we lost it in the primaries!
            As for his daughter Ivanka.....in December of 2016.....just after the election....in response to Lesley Stahl asking her what her role would in the administration....she answered "I'm....no....I'm going to be a daughter"....but we don't care! We've entered Donald Trump's orbit and cannot get out of it. The following post is from the morning after the election:   

            Have you read President Trump's tweets this morning? One might think at first glance that this is an unbalanced individual as the tweets are absurd and even idiotic....but unbalanced is not the word....for this is the essence of the man.....and he's been the same man probably since his late teens.....or eight years of age if you accept his own testimony on the subject. There is no 3-D chess in this man.....no statesmanship.....and not even any political machinations as we are used to. He is at the center of this universe in his own mind.....and whatever he says has no obligation to truth or even common sense. As sad as this is it gets worse....for so many people had listened to his spiel.....signed the contract.....and went out like gangbusters to recruit others in this Ponzi scheme from Hades.
            President Trump's rallies have two banners hanging high to the left and to the right. The one reads "PROMISES MADE" and the other "PROMISES KEPT." If you keep repeating a lie.....boldly repeating it......and the bigger lie the better....the people will believe it. In March of 2017 the Republican elites brought a fake Obamacare repeal and replace bill up for a vote. President Trump tried to rally everyone around it. The Freedom Caucus in the House stood up to protest. President Trump then threatened to work against them....(the only good people we have in the House of Representatives)....in what would have been yesterdays elections....if they did not get on board. This was a promise where we were stabbed in the back....and yet today he tries to present this as a valiant effort....and even a promise kept.
            Probably the biggest promise of all was the wall. Trump could have had much of that wall built today if he really wanted it but he could care less. He only blusters about it when his back is against another wall....another promise that he had no intention of keeping.
            If any issue rivaled the wall it would have been "DRAIN THE SWAMP." What has transpired on this is absolutely ludicrous....and yet he has the audacity to continue to make that pledge and actually tell us that he is doing it....and we believe it.
            Had President Trump really cared about the location of our embassy in Israel the move would have been done much sooner. He has made so many promises that he saves some for when he needs a change in the news cycle. Israel's capture of Jerusalem's Old City during the 1967 Six-Day War has prophetic implications of the highest order....but Jerusalem is Jerusalem to God....while capitals and embassies are but political maneuvers.
            French President Emanuel (God with us) Macron.....who President Trump not that long ago described in yet another ludicrous comment as "almost perfect"....he and others in Europe are pushing....and have been pushing.....for their own united army. Macron said that they need it to defend against Russia and China and maybe even the United States. We cheered President Trump's tough penny saving stance with NATO but he is building up animosity all over the globe.
           One national security official only a few days ago came clean on President Trump's ill-advised summit with Kim Jong-un. President Trump made a mess of that situation and yet we still buy into the line that it was a brilliant deal making maneuver. We are far worse off than we were two years ago.....and it was almost as bad it could get back then.
           We have two conservative Supreme Court judges that we would have had with any of the candidates who were in contention in 2016. Stifling business regulations would have been eliminated with any of those candidates had they become president but to listen to President Trump he alone accomplished these things.
           So today the President describes what happened yesterday as "the great Midterm Election....a very big win"....and inconceivably conservative talk radio hosts who I have heard so far are pretty high on it also! In reality President Trump has his rabid....and newly formed....Trump base. Gone are those of us who had the audacity to hold the President up to any kind of scrutiny. Fortunately the gavel was kept out of the hands of a Democrat Senate's majority leader but the loss of the House was a major defeat for the "winning" that has been shoved down our throat. This should be acknowledged but it won't be.
          President Trump has been a judgment from God and not a blessing. We Republicans are no longer defending the high ground.....we gave that up for a couple of pots of gold down in the swamp. We need to go back up on that hill....our pulpits need to get off of their high horse of moral superiority and plead in front of their congregations for God's mercy upon our many dalliances with the world....and we need to think for ourselves once again....seeking God's wisdom....instead of Rush Limbaugh's wisdom.



            

Ahab....Jezebel....Jehu....And Nebuchadnezzar

           Donald Trump is a godsend to America....and so was Barack Obama! God has given us both of these presidents as He said to the one side...."This is what you wanted...look at your America"....and then He said to the other side....(us)...."This is what you wanted....look at your America." Both men are destroyers. Both men blaspheme God when they reference Him. I understand how it happened that so many looked to Donald Trump as some kind of champion....Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are enough to do that....but that doesn't fully excuse us for jumping on the greed and power bandwagon. Politics is not our answer and even if it was it would not be Donald Trump. My hope is that there is a Nebuchadnezzar moment ahead for him where he is humbled by the sudden turn of events.
           The references in the following post from a Saturday in May of this year to Ahab, Jezebel and Jehu are concerning Jonathan Cahn's very popular book The Paradigm where the author pointed out remarkable similarities between King Ahab and Bill Clinton....Jezebel and Hillary Clinton....Jehu and Donald Trump....along with a number of other pairings. We don't know much about Jehu but readers might want to consider the little that we do know.

Ahab....Jezebel....And Jehu

           O that this Lord's Day would be the day....that today would be the day that many pastors around the country would sit at their desk looking over the sermon that they had prepared for the morrow....that they would bury their face in their hands in the grave concern that they had somehow missed that calling that had given them so much joy back when their faith was new.
           This would be the work of the Holy Spirit should it happen. These pastors would take up that sermon on 'building bridges' or 'snapping out of the doldrums' or some other milquetoast psychological encouragement....complete with humorous anecdotes....and toss it in the waste basket. "What have I become?" they might ask of no one in particular.
           America is what it is today....because its shepherds have failed the sheep....and we....none moreso than I....have failed our Good Shepherd. When paradigms change it is like a glacier slowly moving south....crushing everything in its path. The church of a nation is not immune....as education and the law and politics and everything else in that path is not immune.
           Yes we are totally divided in America today but that division is one of degree as both sides have drifted away from the origins of America.....only one side has drifted away faster.....completely forsaking God and any concepts of liberty and freedom that used to be a signature of this nation.....while the rest of us are trying to cling to vague memories of John Wayne's America....unaware that America came about primarily through its pulpits.....not its patriotism.
            We would now use politics to save us from the evil opposition. Yes, that's the ticket, we would anoint us a champion and smash the temples of the Baals.....but of course we would be like Jehu and keep the golden calves in the church and in our own lives. Jehu destroyed everyone associated with Ahab and Jezebel. God....we presume....has today commissioned us to do that in America.....that's all we need to know......we would smash the idols of the bad guys.....not our own....but that was not God's directive to us. He commanded five of the seven churches in Revelation to repent....but we conveniently bypassed that which mentioned us.
             So we have our champion....not exactly what we pictured....and his championship season record has asterisks all over the place......but at least we still have our golden calves....and that golden cup awarded for making America great again seems within our reach....but unbeknownst to us the lord whose name is given to that cup is not the name our LORD!

   

President Kennedy's Last 'Official" Words

This year Thanksgiving falls of the anniversary of JFK's assassination....the fifty-fifth anniversary of that terrible day that would get my vote for the beginning of the end for America....where rogue elements of our own government planned and carried out the unthinkable. The remaining 1960s were tragic and calamitous but were only a portent of the complete collapse of culture, government and society. We had a respite in the late 70s and early 80s. I wrote in a recent post how I viewed an old Dick Cavett interview with then Governor Ronald Reagan from June 5th of 1971. Cavett asked him if he was going to run for president in 1972. Reagan replied...."No....Lord willing I'll complete my second term as governor." That would make two United States presidents....in a row....Carter and Reagan.....who could naturally use the phrase...."Lord willing." Charles Colson was sent to prison n 1974 on charges of obstruction of justice in the Watergate affair. Only two years later in 1976 he wrote an absolutely beautiful book titled Born Again. Working three shifts at a coal-fired power plant....about a dozen of us would meet after a midnight shift for a prayer meeting.....and this was only our crew! God was doing marvelous things and had brought many into His kingdom at that time who are now watching the ripping asunder of this nation of ours....and knowing why it is happening....and how we all bear some responsibility in our own demise as a nation. We may have been given a clue about what was imminent in America in what are known as the last' official' words of President John Kennedy. The following post is from January of 2107:

             Every American, old enough of course, knows where they were and what they were doing when President Kennedy was shot. As for me, I was in my eighth grade homeroom when one of the Sisters came in crying with the news. We all then immediately went home.
             Many of you remember that magazine sized book Four Days, The Historical Record Of The Death of President Kennedy. I think that just about everyone had it back in the months and years following that tragic day in November of 1963. In that book the editors reveal what were "President Kennedy's last official words-the conclusion of the speech he was to have delivered in Dallas." John Kennedy was to give this speech but never did... for assassins (plural) ended his life.
             That speech never given concluded with these words, "...the righteousness of our cause must always underlie our strength. For as was written long ago: 'Except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain'." That Bible excerpt is the last half of the 1st verse of Psalm 127... from the King James Version, which begins with this "Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it." So the full verse is:

             "Except the LORD build the house, they labor in vain that build it. Except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain."

             John Fitzgerald Kennedy was nominally religious as was I. He would have respected the Bible and believed those words but he could not have truly understood their significance, nor timeliness, nor even seen his own part in attempting to build a city (a country) without the LORD. The 60s were an absolute disaster, the effects of which nearly brought my own life to an end. They produced college professors for the next few decades who gave us many of our problems today. The gave us Barack Obama and the Clintons....two Bush presidents....and Donald Trump.
             President Trump will 'labor in vain' as he attempts to make America great again....unless we as a people see our own culpability in our troubles (past-present-and future) and seek His forgiveness and mercy....and even then our hope would be wisdom and strength through judgments....and not the suspension of those judgments. Looking at America now where half of the voting electorate just cast ballots for known corruption in order to keep God out of society while much if not most of the other half championed a man who apparently could not care less what God has written in His Word.....looking at us now....and looking at America over the past 150 years....we have been laboring in vain. Even in the constitutional fervor surrounding Donald Trump we are but watchmen that waketh in vain unless we humble ourselves and look to God and not man for our strength. 
             

The Chosen Frozen

         It would have been January of 1987.....almost thirty-one years ago. I was a relatively new Christian of about five years and on a short-term mission trip to Paraguay. It was hot......as every day was over 100 degrees. Our group had visited about a half a dozen churches while there.....all Pentecostal....of which was our group. The worship music in the services that we attended was very lively....hands were raised and shouts of 'hallelujah' rang out.....very typical of the American Pentecostal church. That's how I worshiped back home....with no inhibitions. These were wonderful people that I met and it was a blessed time.
         Something happened on that trip that had a profound effect on me. Let me set the stage. The temperature was probably in the 90s on the evening in question. We had finished our work for the day which was continuing on the building of a brick Christian school that other groups had started. The work entailed painting......mixing mortar....laying brink.....and lifting beams. We had just eaten dinner at a local restaurant as we did every evening.....(they were all wonderful).....and three of us decided to just walk through a small local town.  What I remember of that community was South American music playing.....a lot of colored lights....and general gaiety.  (I just had to laugh to myself as I'm sitting here in my living room typing this post with SiriusXm on the Bose next to me tuned into channel 76.....Symphony Hall......and just as I typed these words about South American music a piece came on titled Scherzino Mexicano....classical guitar played by Manuel Ponce.....funny how things like that happen.)
         OK....back to my story.....Picture a small South American town's main street with storefront next to storefront.....then picture a building offset somewhat.....I'm guessing twenty feet back from the road.....and then more storefronts next to each other. We passed that building....my two friends and I.....but only I had to stop. As I remember it it was a church that was offset from the street....a very humble structure. The front doors were open and a golden glow caught my eye. I saw people sitting on folding chairs set in a circle. They had their heads down and were obviously praying. I asked my friends to go on without me. Looking back on it.....which I have done many times over the years.... it was the gay music....contrasted by the stillness and intense soberness of the scene inside the church....that I could not get out of my mind.
        I remember that evening even after three decades. Wherever I was in my Christian walk back in 1987.....I wanted what these people in this small church had....I needed what they had.....and I didn't even know what it was.....but I would find out maybe four or five years later. Meanwhile my wife was very good on this as she simply allowed me to work this out. We first wound up at a small Baptist church plant back home.....twelve members tops.....one child....ours....no piano player....one guitar player....me....the least capable fingers in the history of the world that ever touched six guitar strings....and I challenge anyone to prove that statement wrong. We called a pastor and he became a friend for life.
        Why am I bringing all this up you might ask? I'm Presbyterian today....(that's a long story).....and we are often referred to as the 'frozen chosen'....and it's usually a pretty accurate description....but that's not the way that God designed it. I think that He would more likely call us the 'chosen frozen'....those once frozen in spiritual death....but chosen to come alive by grace alone....through faith alone.....in Christ alone!
         My testimony here.....(we all have one)....having experienced both extraordinarily lively worship....and profound stillness at the preaching of the person and work and majesty of Christ....is that the difference is one of intensity....and that the greater of these two joys....the greater of these two celebrations.....comes from the words.....not the music.....not anything else.......just the words. The stronger that Christ is preached....the weaker our ability to stand.....or even raise our arms.
         Musical scales and singing are wonderful and glorious in the worship of the Lord but only the words and not the notes have been passed down to us. Yes there will be a 'new song'.....and we yearn and pant for that day....but it is the Word of God that we are told that is life and truth and living and active and shall stand forever.

Do They Even Read Their Bibles....Beyond Preparing For A Sermon?

         It's volatility....or instability. Everything looks great for a month or so but then some things change and everything looks terrible. A month ago President Trump was at the top of the world....now it looks real bad for him again......but a couple of good news cycles and he may be on top again! This is the life of a gambler.....and this is what conservatives have chosen over consistency...and what Christians have chosen over a straight and narrow path.The following post is a few weeks old:

          I think that the thing that bothers me most about Donald Trump is what he has done to the conservative movement and to Christians who had trusted in him. Two years ago we.....conservatives and Christians.....knew very well how bad things were. We saw our nation crumbling right in front of us. Many of us were on our knees or praying in whatever manner is our habit.....praying for God to have mercy on us. This discernment....limited though it was....that was brought on by eight years of a Marxist president and the probability of Hillary Clinton taking control for another eight years....this discernment that we were a people who were in rebellion against God....was shredded and discarded by a man who now tells us that things are better than they ever were. This is the rantings of a false prophet....and false profit....but Christians fell it.
          He sold us on MAGA and America First so much that we forgot what we were all about before he came along. Our eyes are fixated on economic figures that can vanish as a morning fog....and when it does we will be standing there with no armor and no banners and no weapons. The President has absolutely no concept of truth for truth's sake....and we could not care less.
          By his own admission Donald Trump hasn't changed since he was eight years old. There are probably dozens of biographies out there....I've read quite a few of them.....they say the same thing....he's a bully who has to get his own way. How many people lost money in his bankruptcies.....getting 30 cents on the dollar of what they were owed....but this....also by his own admission....is just the way its done. How many people were stiffed by his unethical business practices?
          His self-love is so similar to that of Nebuchadnezzar....'Look what I have built!' His meanness is troubling....or should be troubling.....but we ignore it. We ignore everything....for he is our leader....our champion. We would stand up and shout "I am Spartacus!" if it came to that. He has turned us against all information that does not first pass over his desk. He purposely stirs us up every single day.....and pokes the opposition in the eyes every day. He bears some responsibility for the anger that is everywhere. Our cause has become Mad Magazine's Spy Vs. Spy only in red and blue. He demands loyalty but possesses none. He'll summarily discard an ally if need be.....and become fast friends with those who hate his guts as long as they play the same game.
          Here's a favorite tactic of his.....we have faced evil in so many ways in America over so many years....he identifies that evil....(the Kavanaugh hearings for example)....and then becomes the antithesis of that evil....the perceived guardian angel of righteousness....simply by identifying it.....and we fall for it!
          He says that other nations now respect us. They don't respect us. They may respect the power that he may wield....for a time....until they can get even....but they don't respect us as a nation. So whereas at one time not too long ago we were separated into two groups....one that bought into the lies of socialism.....and conservatives who fought these lies with all of our might.....we are now still two peoples.....with the former being the same only more enraged and intellectually disoriented.....and us who have given up that which had previously driven us....for the lure of power and money! Our sincerity and our humility and our righteous earnestness was our strength but we have given all that up.
          This cannot last.....but President Trump will figure out a way to put the blame somewhere else....and we will buy into it.....unless our pulpits awaken. They have become too far detached from our culture to worry about the suffocating gases spewed from this volcano which erupted off in the distance. Nearly half of them think that they are going to be raptured out before it reaches us....(I hear them say all the time...."these are exciting times we live in.") These are not exciting times! These are treacherous times! The others are mostly as our politicians.....'know thy constituents (or congregation)....and give them only that which soothes them.'
           Men....you who are in the pulpits of America....God's judgment is evident everywhere. You should be aware of this from the Bible that you preach from every week. Warn your flocks to prepare and once again seek those mercies of which not that long ago we pleaded of Him. Do you read your Bible other than when preparing for a sermon....or are you now part of an elite class who knows everything....whose only purpose is to pass on your knowledge accumulated in seminary and your first five or ten years of ministry? Is there nothing you can possibly find in Daniel....or Nahum....or the 24th chapter of Matthew....pertaining to our nation today.....or dozens of other books of the Bible and hundreds of other chapters? Is there no common laborer who God can use to correct you? Have you become that exalted in your own mind? Is there no precedent in God's Word that might point to shepherds that do not warn their sheep? Is there no way that you may have missed something?

The New Loyalists....And The New Minutemen

The following post is almost a month old. Right now conservative talk radio hosts control not only the microphone but the flow of information. They can call us 'Trump haters' all they want but they didn't call us that as we flooded the polls in support of him on November 8, 2016. It is Donald Trump who has changed.....not us.

           I have rarely if ever over these posts of nine and a half years written about elections that will take place years in advance....and certainly never presumed upon God in that we can continue to ignore His warnings and expect to just carry on....but I'm going to mention a 2020 presidential campaign here to hopefully get our minds off of it....and on to today's grave concerns.
           Donald John Trump would have the fight of his life in getting through a primary season. Some conservative would challenge him....even if we had to draft someone into service....and we do not want anyone who would be timid as to what has transpired.....for whoever it is would have an arsenal available to him (her) in calling out President Trump on not only his failures but the outright deception that he perpetrated upon his conservative base.
           Now the Trump supporter today might brush this off....but that confidence would soon be shattered. They think that they have facts to back up President Trump's claims....but that's only as long as they control the microphone....and we have answers to those 'facts'.....and unlike today where our own conservative media protects their man just as the mainstream media protected their man......those answers would be heard. The pep rallies will be of no help this time around! The tweets will be utterly worthless.....if not evidence for that challenger that President Trump uses his tweets only to keep things stirred up and avoid the realities of what he actually does.
           What would be revealed and proven is that Donald Trump does not believe in the issues that he won on in 2016. He could not care less about Obamacare....or a wall....or illegal immigration in general....or tax reform....or the national debt....or the cleaning swamp....or the Johnson Amendment....or any one of a number of other promises that he buffaloed conservatives with in 2016.
           He could walk around the debate stage all that he wants.....but he would no longer be a brash challenger who could promise the world....but an incumbent with a paper trail. He would be questioned....face to face.....where he can't just point to a different reporter as in the press conference. He wouldn't be able to catch his breath as every nuanced explanation on 'Luther' strange type decisions would be clearly and utterly refuted. Rush Limbaugh won't be able to steer the conversation. Conservative talk radio can take whatever position they choose to. Congressional candidates can run on the robe of his royal coattail. None of this will carry the day for a nomination to a second term!
           This man who thought himself too smart to need daily security briefings.....who golfed to his heart's delight.....who contradicted himself and his advisers and his own campaign promises on almost a daily basis....and who thinks that he just has to twist a few arms to get a deal.....and toss a few table scraps when the dogs bark....will find that the adoring crowd of supporters will come to their senses when that primary challenger calls out loud and clear....."The emperor has no clothes!"
            Donald Trump would lose a primary....and then another....and then a few more. Ivanka and Jared could then pack their very expensive luggage and go back to their jetsetter friends. President Trump will have to deal with grave and ominous issues in the days ahead. The last thing we need would be for him making his typical 'where the ball stops nobody knows' decisions based on how they might effect his poll numbers or a 2020 election.

            It was difficult even typing out these thoughts. If it were just that America were rudderless but it's much worse than that for even Christians have fallen for this fake prophet. We did not heed the warnings against greed....or power. We did not seek God's approbation as we marched to the drum beat of  'Make America Great Again.'
            Every single piling in this once beautiful pier where God's bountiful fertile land surrounded the tranquil bay teeming with food....every piling has rotted away. The trees have withered as the fig tree that Jesus cursed....and dead fish stink up the shore. An enemy armada sails right into the bay.....as the earth shakes and distant volcanoes come alive....but we can see none of this as we party in a thatched conical roofed restaurant at the end of the pier. The winds and surf rise as the pier buckles and collapses. Unaware of this we continue to tap our feet to the playlist of songs from Donald Trump's political rallies.
             I sit here typing and occasionally glancing over to the news on the iPad set up next to me....praying as yet only the latest news bulletin announces more violence in this our land that has become just as in the days of Noah. The 2020 election....or even the elections later this year are the least of our worries. This man....Donald Trump....will likely take us through either the hurricane or tsunami that we have brought upon ourselves....and not prepared for. May God humble this President as He humbled Nebuchadnezzar....and humble us. May He remove veils from Daniel's visions. May we finally pay attention to the warnings given in Scripture of a nation.....once blessed by God....that rejected God.....whom God then took His protective hand off.....for that nation is us!

   

For Whatever Reason....God Only Knows

I just watched the wild reception at the rally in Cleveland as Ivanka was introduced. The conservative movement is dead.....dead in the water....as Donald Trump has sucked us in with his skills of manipulation and indoctrination on a level that I had not previously witnessed in America.

         It was thirty-nine years ago yesterday....November 4, 1979....that fifty-two Americans were taken hostage in Tehran. It proved to be the end of President Jimmy Carter's hopes for a second term. Ted Kennedy's presidential aspirations were effectively destroyed on that day also as he had given two interviews to Roger Mudd....who was at the time a prospective candidate to succeed Walter Cronkite....and those interviews were combined and broadcast on the same day....November 4th of 1979. It was utter disaster of which Ted Kennedy....thankfully.....never recovered.
         I was a volunteer for Senator Kennedy in that campaign. My Kennedy roots go way back....for as an elementary student I saw John Kennedy's motorcade go by the Our Lady Help Of Christians grade school in Cheektowaga, New York. Robert Kennedy was later my hero....(and Beto....you're no Robert Kennedy.) My wife and I honeymooned on Cape Cod after being married at Heinz Chapel on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh. I picked up another book on the Kennedy assassination just yesterday......this book being only the latest in a half century of on and off studying that fateful day in November of 1963....and my conclusion formed long ago.....is that no sane....reasonable.....and logical person.....who had seriously researched the assassination......could come up with any other conclusion than that Lee Harvey Oswald was a 100% dupe.
         I didn't know on that day in November of 1979 about the hostages taken in Iran....nor did I watch the Roger Mudd interview....for I had watched the heart monitor next to my father's hospital bed slow down and then stop. He was buried at Arlington National Cemetery not far from where John and Robert were buried.....and where Ted Kennedy would later be buried. I started a new job a month after my father died.....a job that would last a month short of thirty-seven years before retiring. I was 'born again' three years into my new job with guidance from other Christians who worked there.
         For whatever reason....only God knows.....I went into the study of Christian apologetics almost immediately after becoming a Christian. For roughly ten years my studying emphasized research into 'Christian cults'....those being religious sects that claim to be Christian but deny the essential doctrines of the Christian Faith. To piggy-back a little on those hilarious Farmers Insurance commercials....'I know a thing or two because I've seen a thing or two'....and I've seen something like this Trump mania before where a charismatic individual starts his own religious sect....claiming to be Christian but bearing no visible traits to Christianity.....demanding that his followers do not read opposing opinions....'fake news'......and elevating himself (herself) above all of us mere mortals.
          I learned this in those years of study....(and thus early on spotted Ted Kennedy's deviation from his brothers along with where the Democrat Party was heading)....that in order to recognize the counterfeit one must first know the genuine. So in order to identify the very problematic themes and counterfeit statements of belief from Donald Trump....one must read their Bible more than they listen to Rush Limbaugh....Sean Hannity.....Mark Levin.....and all the others combined. If we do not do this.....we may as well put on a saffron robe as we go to the rallies.....chanting USA...USA...USA!

Note: To those who wonder why someone would not let the Kennedy assassination go after 55 years I give this one explanation: JFK was a direct threat to the plans of those who orchestrated his murder. Whatever evil that was behind that despicable act....it has not simply gone away. If this was part of America in 1963....then it is still here now....so we must add this to the many reasons that God's judgment is indeed upon us....for this....whether we want to admit it or not....is part and parcel of who we are....and thus we cannot ignore it.
        

DISPATCHES

Why college students should pay more attention to North Korea and the Middle East than fantasy football: Bringing back the 'draft' is not only a distinct possibility.....if these two areas of the world ignite then America may need that draft right away. Think about what that would entail! Student deferments are not what they were during Vietnam as the student would now only be able to finish the current semester. Who would get drafted....and who would get to remain in the workforce? There's been a lot of changes. How would immigration and gender issues be handled? A half dozen or so European nations are right now considering reinstituting the draft to go along an equal number of nations who already have one.

How is one to pray for President Trump? Well for one thing we can pray that these official faith advisers of his are replaced by men who will speak to the president as they would to anyone in his state of rebellion to God. Franklin Graham told reporters that he spent election evening with President Trump. If his conversation with the President was only along the lines of politics....and if he in the course of the evening did not tell the President of his....and America's....need to turn to Jesus Christ....then he wasted this precious time. Should President Trump not appreciate this then he need not invite Rev. Graham. Franklin Graham has a wonderful ministry....I was blessed by visiting the Billy Graham Library only a week ago....but in his relationship with the President of the United States he might recall his own wonderful prayer given at a Trump rally last year....a prayer that I posted on and bring back often. President Trump does not need a smile or a pat on the back....and especially not political advice....from a minister of the gospel. He needs the truth presented to him. (I'll put that post at the end of these 'dispatches.')

The White House suspended the pass of CNN White House reporter Jim Acosta. Other reporters may become more aggressive because of this. Jim Acosta and CNN are the worst of the worst but who will be the next to be purged as the President warned that others could get the press passes revoked!

Update on the above: After the White House released a video of the Acosta incident, an IT person noticed that there was a slight difference in the original AP video and the White House video. He said that it appeared that the White House video was altered as a few frames were sped up to make it appear that the journalist's actions were more aggressive than they actually were. The President promptly denied that the video was altered. Yesterday Kellyanne Conway seemed to admit that the video was sped up.....just like they do in sports she said....and that that was technically not altering.....just speeding up? This is why....after two years of continuous lies on anything big or small....not a single word that comes out of this President's mouth can be believed without some kind of verification!

I would like to apply for the job of CNN White House Correspondent to replace Jim Acosta who was banned. My first question would be this...."Mr. President.....it has been widely reported that North Korea is still maintaining secret nuclear sites. You tweeted...'we know fully about the sites being discussed....just more fake news.' Please clear this up....if there are such sites then how is it fake news? It might be old news to you....but how is it fake news to us?"

Hopefully President Trump will not try to abort the Mueller probe for that would be intolerable.

Losing the House of Representatives was a political disaster. Republicans should this. The old adage of the party in power always loses at the midterms does not apply in this current climate.

Conservative talk radio hosts have dug themselves a hole that they may not be able to get out of. The reason that they made the decision long ago to go all out for President Trump without any critical analysis....this in my opinion of course....was because they do not trust their listening audience. They will tell their listening audience over and over again how smart they are but then they treat those audiences like they cannot be trusted with the truth.

Ivanka and Jared Kushner will never be accepted by anyone who still holds to conservative principles. President Trump needs to send them back to New York.....along with Donald Jr.

I have no idea if Jeff Sessions has ever contemplated running for President but right now he is the de facto lead contender to pick up the conservative banner and challenge President Trump.

Sarah Sanders....for her own sake if nothing else....needs to return to her former life

The CIA countermanded the orders of President Eisenhower on at least one very important foreign policy directive in the 50s....and probably more. This is why Ike gave that warning concerning the military industrial complex in his farewell address. The CIA did the same thing to President Kennedy at the Bay of Pigs invasion. We celebrated the huge military spending bill of late without considering that military spending bills can easily be done.....with the monies distributed......for reasons that are not necessarily in the nation's interest. All I'm saying here is that we believe these people too quickly.

There are people out there whose well-paid job....(their employer a party or a president)....is to take note of what people like me....and like you....are saying. They don't know us....they don't want to know us. They're are simply looking for a pulse and maybe a trend. If they read my posts....and are employed by the Republican Party.....then you can bet your bottom dollar....that they are hoping that there are not too many of us out here....(I don't know how many of us are out here)....because as they analyze our thoughts and our words.....they would know also that we are not going to be fooled.....we are not going to compromise beliefs....and we are not going let this new Republican Trump Party go on without being challenged with the facts that talk radio suppresses. In short they know that if this is a legitimate trend then they are in big trouble.....the same trouble that the Republican RINOs were in in the years leading up to the 2016 election.

If Only Our Pulpits Would Do The Same

I find myself uttering this prayer from time to time...."Lord open our eyes to this man." It usually comes out spontaneously when I hear President Trump's rally speech words followed by a raucous chorus of cheers....shouts....and chants. We are in the midst of a psychological phenomenon very similar to that which put Barack Obama in office. Both men as presidents were judgments from God but in totally different ways. Both sides of the spectrum display blindness brought on us for refusing to turn first to Christ rather than fallible princes and our own powers of determination....and refusing also to accept any culpability in what we have become....therefore we conservatives project sole guilt on the opposition party....and believe that we have made atonement of sorts by electing a Republican President....where we as a people have not changed one iota for the better since November of 2016. The following post is from last year:

             It was powerful....it was what we needed....not the Donald Trump pep rally from Phoenix....but the prayer that Franklin Graham offered before the President would be introduced to the tune of the Rolling Stones....You Can't Always Get What You Want. (At least it wasn't Sympathy For The Devil) I tried to type the text of the prayer as fast I could....praising God as I typed....for not only the people in the arena would hear these words but who knows how many people that were live streaming the rally. Christians would be hearing these words of repentance that they should be hearing from their pulpits each and every Lord's Day.
            The crowd was quiet as Reverend Graham spoke....I prayed "Oh God thank you for letting us hear these words!" Franklin Graham then walked off the stage as the arena remained hushed. Vice President Pence followed him to the microphone....and within minutes the crowd was once again in unison yelling....USA....USA....USA! As I wrote at the time....the power of that prayer was gone.....but many had heard it......and will offer that same prayer some day in the future....only it will be as chaos reigns....and maybe war.....and not beforehand.....where we could have petitioned God for discernment and vision for what was ahead of us. The following was the best that I could do on that transcript....

             "Our Heavenly  Father.....you've blessed our country more than any nation on earth and we acknowledge that apart for you we have no hope....we come tonight....as a troubled nation....we're broken spiritually....were divided politically....we're divided racially....we are adrift morally..... following whatever direction the wind of popular culture blows....with no regard for your word or the consequences of our disobedience....we ask tonight for your help....our sins have paralyzed us....as a country we have seemed to have forgotten right from wrong.... you warned us in your Holy Word the Bible that there would come a time when truth would become a lie....and lies would become truth....we come to you this evening confessing our sins as a nation.....we confess the sins of our past.....of injustice....of pride.....of self-indulgence.....we have failed to protect our young and our innocent.....and we ask for your forgiveness.....we ask that you would unite this country for your glory.....Father we need a shepherd.....I pray that you would be the shepherd of our nation.....you are the God who restores our souls.....your rod and your staff they comfort us....and I pray this all in the name...the powerful name....the name of your son....the Lord Jesus Christ."

 

Lifeguard On Duty

The following post is from May of 2017 and I bring it back as my Lord's Day sermon:       

         The Psalmist pondered this question in the eighth Psalm...."What is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet.....O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!"
          If I have learned anything about man in the thirty-five years of my Christian walk it is the intellectual frailty of him....not in technology and the various professions and crafts....for here man's abilities only amaze....but in common sense and logic is where our weakness can show up....and even here it can be great and honor God at times but when it is absent all hell breaks loose.....and that is where we are today.
          I was a blue collar middle class union member my whole adult life and there is nothing that I desired that I could not have. I couldn't buy a Maserati...but I didn't desire a Maserati. I don't live in a mansion overlooking the sea but I'm very happy in my home in our little town. I have been blessed so much that I weep at God's mercy upon one who deserves none of it.
          How is it possible that God is not in our minds every hour of the day? How is it that we cannot see Him in the majesty of the sea, the grandeur of a fertile valley, the beauty of a flower and the wonder of a bird? How can we even stand erect in His presence without the aid of an angel? And how can we focus on the mundane necessities of life when His glory is everywhere? The answer is in our frailty which encompasses too much to adequately describe in a post such as this.
          I write this to the reader who might somehow apply the word 'fanatical' to many of my Christian posts. On the contrary, whatever this rapt attention to God, you must go out and get! You must see what drives a Billy Graham or an R. C. Sproul! You must read the life of a Luther or a Spurgeon! You must read His Word with His Spirit forming your thoughts! You must do this before you take your last breath of which you have absolutely no idea when that will be.
         The Christian who is not deemed to be fanatical by those who do not know Christ is in need. The happiness the world provides is not only temporal and fleeting but a poor substitute for what God offers. I'm writing this overlooking the sea, and directly overlooking a kiddie pool with contraptions that toddlers have fun in. One such contraption is a post with a bucket that is constantly being filled with a stream of water. Every minute and a half the bucket is full and then being top-heavy turns over and spills the water near or on the toddler to his glee. This is part of the Christian faith and the Christian life. The bucket is always being filled with the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Tipping it over is hopefully pouring it on others.
           There is a lifeguard directly in front on me watching over everyone, and a yellow flag is perched next to him on the stand signifying calm but care is to be taken anyway. The surf is gentle right now but six hours from now he will put a black flag in the post that warns of dangerous currents as the tide is low and the waves are huge. This also is the Christian life. God's Word is the flag and right now in America it is blood red. A storm is approaching...or a tsunami...either way we have to be on full alert. I've lived sixty-seven years and have never seen this flag.
           Friends, take joy in Christ if you truly know Him. Revel in His glory, prostrate yourself before His holiness, and stand with His sword at your side at times such as are quickly approaching.

When The Bloom Is Off The Rose

The first thing that conservative radio talk show hosts admitted about Donald Trump was that he didn't really have an ideology. They wanted us to believe that he was just overflowing with conservative gut feelings but just never really codified his beliefs. Time passed and they then admitted that the President is not really a conservative. They had no choice but to admit this as it was getting ridiculous but they tried to get out of it without having to actually identify what the President was. Well the latest thing that they are admitting is that yes Donald Trump is a liar......but as Rush added....."so what....I don't care." Folks....they're not done.....we'll just have to wait and see what the next thing they will admit about Donald Trump will be. The following post is about one month old:

          The conquest is complete....Donald Trump and the Republican elite have vanquished conservatives....another promise kept....only this one was made to himself. Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham have been on the other side of this battle forever.....and now we are exalting them as some king of heroes for something that they would have been hard-pressed not to have done...as would President Trump been hard-pressed not to nominate a conservative. Graham started wooing President Trump a while back by stroking his ego....Bob Woodward's book shows this very clearly....but we don't read books like that do we? The President thinks that he is playing Graham but it's the other way around.
           Donald Trump is a destroyer.....and I've mentioned this many times. If he is not actively trying to destroy someone because they do not bow down to him then someone else is being destroyed simply by flying into his orbit.....Brett Kavanaugh being only the latest. (more recently Kanye West) It'll be hard for Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Mark Levin to criticize Donald Trump for what he is when he finally pulls the mask off his own face.
           I personally know of only one instance....maybe there were others....when Donald Trump quoted the Bible....that in "an eye for an eye." He'll get you back if it takes forever....and he'll hit you "ten times harder." His narcissism is pathological. His lying is known everywhere.....except with those who have pledged blind allegiance to him....who are now relegating this serious psychological disorder as a cute idiosyncrasy.
           The problem originated in the primaries. We didn't really know who he was as he wooed us to death. The Democrats knew him but we generally don't travel the Howard Stern circuit so we wouldn't know. Had conservative talk radio not abdicated their responsibilities early in 2017 we would not now be further enabling a demagogue. All they had to do was report the good things that he did....as well report on the things he did that were not good. Had they done that he might then have settled down.
            The remaining question is this. Rasmussen is reporting a 51% job approval as of today. That's up 6% during the Kavanaugh hearings and final vote. By the way....any other conservative candidate in 2016....had they become president....would have nominated two conservative Supreme Court justices.....and maybe even better ones.....and there would not have been the debacle we just had....but somehow President Trump comes out smelling like a rose....just as he always does when the Progressive Left acts insanely....he mystifyingly becomes the personification of the righteousness that they protest against!
            I watched the most recent rally in Kansas and have to wonder when Christians are going to start to see what a bad situation this has become....and how many will discern this? However many there will be...they'll begin to back off. How then will President Trump react to this?  If it's only a few percentage points then the President will probably stay the chaotic course of deception that he is on. If it's more than a few percentage points then President Trump may do what is in his nature.....he'll completely sever ties which is a defensive mechanism of his....he attacks when he is attacked.....and in his case any criticism of him at all is perceived as an attack. The President has gone after the media....and the Mueller probe....and the deep state with much more than justifiable rhetoric....and we laughed. He tore apart and humiliated Jeff Sessions....Ted Cruz and we said nothing....you name those who have opposed him and he has gone after them....even the Freedom Caucus in March of last year....when will it be us?
           

"Hear This, O Elders.....And Listen, All Inhabitants Of The Land...."

           In that famous passage from the 2nd chapter of Acts, Peter quotes from the book of Joel....part of which is...."That I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind; and your sons and your daughters will all prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions...." Many of us mistakenly took that as the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements of the past 100 years....as I did for a time.
           Joel most likely prophesied during the latter part of the reign of Joash (Judah) and Jehu (Israel)....who many evangelicals today believe to be representative of Donald Trump. (this from Rabbi Jonathon Cahn's The Paradigm...but if this is so...the implications would not be what they expect) Joel writes about a great famine and drought that has just happened. This is a last days of the last days prophetic book that it meant as much for us today as it was for Judah and Israel.
            There are some other verses that we might contemplate.....chapter 1 verse 13 for example...."Gird yourself with sackcloth, and lament, O priests; Wail, O ministers of the altar! Come, spend the might in sackcloth, O ministers of my God." And....1:15...."Alas for the day! For the day of the LORD is near, and it will come as destruction from the Almighty."
            Our ministers of the gospel today....on the whole.....have failed us just as did these ministers of the altar. They missed all the signs.....they ignore the violence and the gods that we have set up as idols....and they prophesy peace and security....or at best ignore God's warnings of judgment.
            Joel does not end with the destruction of the land....for "Then the LORD will be zealous for His land, And will have pity on His people,. And the LORD will answer and say to His people, 'Behold, I am going to send you grain, new wine, and oil."
            God is speaking to the world.....and to the church today......and to Israel today.....in this book. The world will know in retrospect that the judgments were from God......the church....us....should heed this warning on what is about to come.....and Israel.....also in retrospect......will finally see their Messiah.....in the return of Jesus Christ. These descriptions from Joel on the workings of God's Spirit....may surely be starting....but the key verses mentioned here are still ahead.....and probably not that far off.....all praise and honor and glory to God for His hand upon those who look to Him!

And God Confused Their Language

         I can imagine what it would look like if William F. Buckley Jr. interviewed President Trump. Buckley would normally ask a question and then sit back....so to speak....and listen to the answer. He would then look up....maybe jab the air with his tongue a few times.....then slowly and deliberately respond. Now with President Trump he would get a quick and very short answer...maybe....followed by three to five addendums straying off the subject.....to confuse the situation. Buckley might pick one of those subjects and repeat his ritual which would be answered with another three to five additional topics from the President meant to bolster his case by changing the subject. So Buckley would have six to ten haphazard sound-bite responses to deal with.
          I don't think that Buckley would put up with it. He wouldn't play the game and stab at the President's comments as Leslie Stahl did....(a sorry imitation of a journalist by the way.) I believe that he would continue the conversation....but only with the listening audience. He would dissect President Trump's camouflage and speak to the camera....if the President wanted to come along....fine....if not....that would be fine also. Unfortunately few of us would be able to do this....for it would take tremendous powers of concentration that few people have on a level as did William F. Buckley Jr.
          Conversation is all but gone in America. Spin hammered down some nails....sound-bites some more....talking points almost finishing it up....the 'Tweet' was probably the final nail in the coffin....and political campaign ads then threw up all over the box. Conversation is just a board game today. All that's missing is a dial to spin and a thirty second sand timer. It's almost as if God came down and confused language just as He did at Babel. We had no choice but split off into two groups....and that's exactly what happened. If my theory is correct....or even near correct....then all this talk about America coming together is a waste of time. When two groups of people process information in totally different ways then it's not unusual that they come up with totally different conclusions.
           Only God can bring us back on the same wavelength again....but alas....we are the same as the rebellious Israelites whom God spoke to through Zechariah. Oh they talked a good game....as we do....'God bless America'....but God challenged them with...."When you fasted and mourned.....these seventy years, was it actually for Me that you fasted?" But they "refused to pay attention"....and...."stopped their ears from hearing......and made their hearts like flint so that they could not hear the law and the words which the LORD of hosts had sent by His Spirit through the former prophets; therefore great wrath came from the LORD of hosts."