Majoring On Major Things

The head of the Catholic church, Pope Benedict XVI, is visiting in Benin, West Africa. This writer has traveled to Benin, and once is enough. I have seen poverty all over the world, but none as stagnant as Benin. Most of it's inhabitants live on a bend of the Niger river called cape St. Paul, a bight confluence affording houses on stilts above filthy water. In one city I visited, 20,000 people live in this debris pile of stagnant water, one can readily understand why so many African children die of malaria, dysentery, skin infections. Their only habitation involves the water into which goes their garbage and from which comes their food. I can still see boys throwing out nets, catching fish, topless women going to the market, paddling a boat. Like sea creatures, these poverty ridden people live in the garbage-stench of water their entire life... no animals, no plants, no beauty.

The Pope, Cardinals, Bishops, hierarchy of the world's richest church as well as people from evangelical denominations should see these sights. I learned early in my travel experiences that no one wants to hear about them. Catholics had rather bask in the gold and silver splendor of St. Peter's. Fundamentalists, guilt peddlers, such as Baptists had rather just put some coins or folding money in the collection plate and hope that magically, some good will come of it.

In the roller coaster tract of life, bends and turns, bumps and bruises, the church, like government, becomes very impersonal. We pretend that magically everything will work out. We surmise, from evidence, that Madoff (jailed, defrauder of $60 billion investor dollars) and Corzine (defrauder of $1.2 billion gambling with euro dollars of investor's money) just screwing over the public, as well as stealing billions of tax dollars, while the SEC and authorities were watching but, “lets just move on”, everything will work out.

We surmise that in the towers of denominational headquarters, their are those, duly elected, who take the responsibility seriously for using God’s money to help the forsaken souls of the world.

The higher the office this writer obtained in every area of endeavor (profession, civic, military), including the church, the more I realize just how much money was just flitted away by promoted people engaged in high living. Expense accounts are so inexcusable. 37% of the citizens of the people of any state or province, have never left their locality. In churches, with real believers, the greatest part of their ministry is the satisfaction of thinking they have helped others. The junkets of politicians, the mission trips of pastors, very much like the exorbitant-decadent vacations of Michelle Obama get us quickly to the root of real sin - pride, envy, greed, gluttony and the general theme of enjoying oneself from the gifts or membership fees of others.

I asked the chairman of one charity once, “how do you figure your expense account?” He said, “when I return home, I determine how much money from my wallet I spent plus all credit card receipts.” I had noticed the extravagance of his eating, the marvelous gifts he was buying for his family. If he had been paying the hotel bill from his own personal funds, he would have stayed in a less expensive suite, less expensive taste buds of food and drink. Every time I experience “so called” Christians gorging themselves with expensive food they do not need, whether at the church house or restaurants, I think of the vast numbers who never have enough food for survival.

The early temple, (Hebrews 9) the holy of Holies, the Holiest place, was secreted from the Holy places by a four thickness veil hung from gold. The most inner layer white, purity: next scarlet, atonement: next: purple,royalty: next blue, eternal nature. When Christ died on the cross, the veil was rent from top to bottom... not almost bottom... not a few feet from bottom... all the way, no need for Catholic works, no need for Mormon or Christian science books, no need for man made catechism. His perfect life, an example, saves no one. We know His worthiness, the liberty afforded us in going directly to Him.

God puts on the spectacles of Christ, looks at us through His faithfulness. We look back through the eye of thankfulness, atonement for sins forgiven, healing, past, present and future. (Isaiah 53).

Peter, Paul, talked about Jesus, there was nothing else to talk about. Jesus preached Himself... way, truth, light, bread, water. Jesus Christ was the greatest faker the world has ever known OR He was who He said He was. There was an eclismic change in the lives of everyone who knew Him. His disciples, who would never communicate with one another again, martyred for His cause. When will the Christians of the world stop playing church, start Majoring on Major Things? There is one thread through the new testament, the giver of life and the resurrection of life. We have one life because of being twice born.

Solyndra

Yesterday Was Labor Day, 2011 Like my parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and ancestors before them, I worked. My driver pointed out to me that there were very few cars on the streets. In the Gingrich contract with America of 1993, (now running for president) the PHD history professor pointed out that American jobs-labor was the most important thing in our country. Republicans should never forgive George H.W. Bush (41) nor Gingrich that they were in the forefront of the NAFTA, GAT, CAFTA and other job destroying debacles which have led to the destruction of the American economy. I have supported two third party candidates, John Anderson and Ross Perot. Perot was right, a big sucking sound as American jobs went abroad... Mexico, China, India. Four of every ten American workers are now out of a job. The official unemployment rate is 9.1% but it is certainly double that.

A university student came and interviewed me about the Great Depression. I think it amazes some university types that there are still many people alive who remember the Great Depression (1930-1950). It was not the socialist programs of FDR an his avowed communist VP, Henry Wallace, and his avowed communist chief of staff, Harry Hopkins who brought us out to of the depression, rather the spending and debts of WWII.

I told the student, that at the beginning of the Great Depression (1930), 90% of all Americans lived on farms. Today 90% of all Americans live in the cities. On the farms, the people could grow some food, have livestock for food, (hogs, cows, chickens) even hunt for food in the woods which at that time still had much wildlife. Even so, nine million Americans starved to death, a large part of the population at that time.

I will remember the desperation of even those in the countryside. In the small towns, it was a matter of silence and inactivity. Most buildings were “boarded up”. Mules with carts and wagons tied to trees and light poles up and down streets. There were few cars. Those that owned cars could not afford to drive them. I remember so well, my own father putting many thicknesses of cardboard boxes all over the enclosed garage and storing our car. We used the mules for transportation. We used the mules for all farm work. Yes, Mr. Obama this was called clean energy.

I mentioned clean energy because this is what Mr. Obama called Solyndra in the Fremont, CA plant that manufactured the solar windows and doors. “it is just a testament to American ingenuity and dynamism and the fact that we continue to have the best universities in the world, the best technology in the world, and most importantly the best workers in the world.” (President Obama) The 1100 best workers in the world have been laid off and the Solyndra plant closed. This has been the history of the Obama economic recovery, month after month ZERO employees added to the workforce... an end to deportation of illegals. 1.2 trillion American tax dollars given in secret to New York banks... Barclays, Chase, etc. One of Obamas chief fund raisers was George Kaiser, a Solyndra board member and an Oklahoma billionaire, who raised $100,000 for the 2008 Obama election. (according to the news source Wizbang $535 million was loaned to this now defunct corporation by the Federal government) Government has become a matter of state and corporate powers.

The media now calls this a great recession not another Great Depression. By every classical measurement, every logical thought we are in a depression. The difference between the great depression of my childhood, the rest of the world was not in a depression in 1930. Today, rolling across Europe there is nothing but depression in fact, the EU s no more... now wanting to sell Euro-bonds. Who will buy them?

To this day, orthodox Jews, world over, observe the feast of the tabernacles. In this practice, Judaism, remembering the plagues, their delivery from bondage in Egypt, build temporary shelters outside their homes where they, in their discomfort, remember the trials of their ancestors. Old testament Jews, would give as many as 203 sacrifices in one week. They wanted God to know that they remembered and had not forgotten the efforts of their ancestors to prove themselves.

I have learned, that today, in South Korea, there are camps, to which children go to recover from technology... camps where there is no iPods, no cell phones, no computers. They learn about living before the time of such technology.

Once, following a family tragedy, (the accidental death of a child) the mother of the child took her family Bible and threw it across the room. Where is God during tragedy? Without God, there is no reason for human existence or even the existence of nature. God is not unaware of personal problems, the problems of men or nations. He knows about corruption in government (Christs' ministry was during the most corrupt time of Roman government). He knows about invincible-corrupt police... wars without congressional approval. He knows about inflation of food prices. He knows those who depend on Him. Trust in the Lord with all your heart . Lean not on your own understanding (Proverbs 3)