MInTheGap

Crazy Friday (Multiple Posts– My Comments on Multiple Articles Last One!)

Judith
Reisman finishes up my multiple article Friday.  I hope that this
different format has been interesting for you– if you would leave a
comment on the tag board, that’d be great.

Anyway, to her article. 
I am also stunned that a pornographic actress and promoter was invited
to the White House.  I understand that the woman also campaigned for
the position of Governor of California– but even then she stated that
her platform was legalized prostitution, etc.

The stats are
shocking.  Judith talks about just how many cases of abduction into
sexual slavery there are.  As she states, many of these abduction end
in a pornographic collection to record the event.

For a
President and Administration that wants to promote abstinence until
marriage, they have to realize that that is only part of it.  We live
in a society that’s way too oversexed.  Take the following examples:

• Most
  of the most popular actresses have been in playboy.  If not that, then
  one of the other men’s magazines that leave not much to the
  imagination.  It’s gotten to the point that it’s a “entrance cost” into
  the business.
• Playboy has gone into taking normal workers and paying them to bare it all.
• There are groups of people out there driving around the country to photograph women who will show their breasts to someone.
• There’s the internet and cell phones where people are sharing intimate pictures that they wish they could take back.

This is not something innocent.  This is all trained at arousing the
male/female desires.  They know what they are doing.  Some sites that
help people with porn addiction talk about how it starts there, and can
end up in rape.  Not that it does, but as all sin, you keep needing
more to get a bigger thrill.

Our President shouldn’t be
encouraging this, and should’ve sent a strong signal here– but instead
he did not.  What signal will you send?

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Crazy Friday (Multiple Posts– My Comments on Multiple Articles 4)

Linda Harvey comments today
about the effect homosexuals are having in our schools and a the
Southern Baptist Convention’s resolution that would encourage a stand
against it.  She gives figures and facts about so called “diversity”
training and what they are really trying to do to children in public
schools.

I don’t think that I can emphasize enough the
importance of godly upbringing of our children.  Public schools preach
humanism, and now have gone so far as to be selectively quoting
“Christian” sources that support their positions.  They belittle those
who have come out from homosexuality dismissing them.  They foster the
“fact” that homosexuality is something into which a person is born.

We must remember that children are impressionable.  They will pick up
and they implicitly trust adults.  That’s why we have to teach them not
to go with strangers.  When I was a child, my kindergarten teacher had
me convinced that you counted starting with the number 0.  (Maybe all
the retailers that label their product for 19.99 had the same
teacher?)  My dad had to straighten me out, but when he tried to say it
started at 1, I told him that he had to be wrong because my teacher
said so.

Let these thoughts spur you to be more involved. 
Like the article said, if all of the SBC pulled their kids out of
schools that considered diversity programs in the like, the school
would either die or capitulate.  There is power in numbers for those
that use it.

Crazy Friday (Multiple Posts– My Comments on Multiple Articles 3)

Kevin Mccullough’s article touches on a recent study done of Christian school boys.  In this study, they survey found that “Three
quarters of Christian pupils said it was wrong to have sex before the
legal age of consent at 16, compared with 29 per cent of other
teenagers.”

This shows that education does cause a
difference, and the difference is different than what we’ve always been
told: mainly, that assuming that it’s “just something that they are
going to do” isn’t correct and actually becomes a self-fulfilling
prophecy.

Kevin talks about a girl that he was talking on a
long trip, and she asked why someone should wait.  He talked about the
risks of disease and that the only way to avoid it was abstinence.  I
would add that the most important reason to me is that God said so. 
But also, it is easier to stay away from something like that if one
never does it or plays with doing it than it is once you start!

Crazy Friday (Multiple Posts– My Comments on Multiple Articles 2)

Rebecca Hagelin’s article today encompasses the next step in the life of a child–
their relationship with their parents and the culture that continually
tries to influence them.  Starting with the discussion of the 8 year
old girl that this week was found in a dumpster after a 17 year old
abused, used and left her for dead, she blames culture and lack of
solid parenting for this problem.

I tend to think there’s a
further problem– the erosion of a core set of absolute values.  In the
current culture, we are constantly told that there’s nothing that is
wrong if it is not wrong to you.  We live in a permissive society. 
Anything goes except for Christian morals– we can’t have you being
taught those.

I see it in the fact that my family, first for
monetary reasons, stopped getting cable TV.  I found that I could
always find something on to watch– though because it was not something
planned, it may not live up to my standards.  Now, being almost a year
without tv coming into the house, I found that I’m not missing the
commercials, and other side effects from TV.  I do have DVDs of some
old favorite shows.  I’ve almost finished the first season of Greatest American Hero.  But DVDs and tapes have a few distinct advantages:

• No commercials
• You can watch an episode or multiples at any time (up with sick kids!) and not have to plan your schedule around the tube.
• You control what shows you get, and you never miss an episode!

Seriously– we need to be better parents, and realize that the world is working against us.  This from Hagelin:

Crazy Friday (Multiple Posts– My Comments on Multiple Articles 1)

Jill Stanek’s column is a must read for me.  It’s easy for us in the
pro-life movement to become complacent when there is so much at stake–
the lives of millions are effected by the killing of babies in the
womb.  You think I exaggerate the number, but when you factor in what
the babies that have been terminated with government permission since
1973 would be doing now (since I was born after that ruling, it’s
particularly striking) and who they would be in society– It’s just
staggering.

Jill cuts through the fillibuster compromise this week
and links it to the battle over judges in the courts of America.  She
makes the case that we did get a few judges that believe in upholding
the Consitution, but since Row v. Wade was produced in the courts, it
seems that it can only be undone by the courts.  With this compromise,
it will be more difficult (especially when it gets to the Supreme
Court) to get the votes.

She makes a good point here– one
that cannot be understated.  We need to put some pressure here on
people that say that they are pro-life, but don’t put feet to it!

Note: This is my first Crazy Friday– I’ll be posting smaller editions
through out the day, so stay tuned and see what other articles I
comment on!

God’s Mercy Towards Us

One of the most interesting things, to me, in looking at the kings down
the line of Judah is God’s mercy to His people.  He told them the
consequences of their sin, and yet He allowed them to continue in it
for many years before finally bringing judgement.  Here are some others:

• Manasseh was a wicked king, yet when he was in trouble and called out to God, God saved him.
• Hezekiah
  was a great king, but he was told he would die, and he called out to
  God, and God gave him an extra fifteen years of life.
• Jehosophat was a good king, and he called out to God, and God killed all his enemies without the kingdom having to fight.

I sometimes think it would be easier nowadays if a prophet could just
tell us what God wanted to say instead of relying on the Holy Spirit
working through His Word.  And yet, whose faith is greater?  Is a king
who hears from a prophet greater than a believer?

How do you
react to prayer and the events that follow?  When you pray for healing
and are healed, do you go on your own way?  Do you think that “well, I
guess I would have just gotten better on my own”?

How do you
react when you don’t see events you are praying for come to pass?  Do
you believe God doesn’t hear?  Do you check your heart to see if you
are in His will?

In what way do you react when something good
happens to you?  Is it something that you are due?  Do you recognize
that God is blessing?

May the Judean kings serve as a
reminder that God is merciful, just and hears our prayers and answers. 
May we rely on Him more each day to function, and give Him the glory
for what He does.

Josiah and the Use of Non-Believers

Josiah was the last good king of Judah before God sent Judah into
captivity.  He became king at a very young age, and was moved in his
heart to remove all of the idolatry from the country and to restore
temple worship.  He commanded the Levites to bring the Ark of the
Covenant back to the temple.

With the heart he had for God, God spared the kingdom’s destruction
until after Josiah died.  In all of these things, Josiah had two faults:

1. He failed to realize that God uses both good and evil to accomplish
his will.  Had he read the earlier chronicles of Joshua’s battle in the
land and the judges, he would have known that God left some enemies for
Israel around to keep the Jewish people in check.  He would also have
known that, at times, people that were non-Jews were used of God to
accomplish His tasks.  Had he taken this into account, he should have
let the king of Egypt take on Assyria instead of going after him.

2. His son that followed had an evil heart, so Josiah did not invest in
his children the save desire for God.  Maybe his son’s apathy or
idolatry was a result of the fact that God didn’t save his father from
death by the Egyptian king.  I don’t know that this side of glory we
will ever know.  The point is that we need to make sure to invest our
children with the things of God.

At
whom in your life are you looking and not getting an appropriate
perspective?  Some peope that don’t approve of the President (or the
last President for that matter) need to realize that the king’s heart
is in the hand of the Lord, and though we may not agree with what he
does, God has him there for a purpose.

For whom are you an example?  Are you a good one?

Jehosophat and Compromise

Our Bible reading has brought us up to Jehosophat. Now, Jehosaphat was a good king when the times were tough. He got rid of some of the idols, restored temple worship, and God won a major victory defeating two much larger armies without Jehosophat even raising a sword. But he also allied himself with the wrong people.

Believing there to be a bond with Israel– since they were also God’s chosen people– he allied with evil king Ahab. It almost cost him his life in one battle, and was ultimately the cause of his downfall.

As Christians, who are you allied with? What venture do you lend your support to? Are the leaders of said group truly glorifying God, or are they serving some other God.

A major group nowadays to beware of joining yourselves with is Promise Keepers. Although the premise behind it may have initially been good, a quick look at some of the pillars of it, and who is praising it requires that we consider how it is being used.

This organization gets praise from Mormons and the Roman Catholic Church. In fact, both of these “cults” have taken up positions of leadership in this organization, and watered down whatever truth was there. These are the kinds of groups that we need to avoid. They have some commonalities with us– they claim to preach the Word, they want focus on men keeping promises, and they claim to share the gospel. Many Christians believe and support this organization.

Just like Israel of old, they were Jews, there were some there that still worshiped the true God, but God stated that Jehosophat should not have aligned himself with them. I would encourage you to be careful which groups you align with– it’s important.