#1953

Who's Fooling Who?

(Edward Payson, 1783-1827)

"How is your Beloved better than others?" Song of Songs 5:9

Does not our Friend as far excel all other friends . . .
  as Heaven exceeds earth,
  as eternity exceeds time, 
  as the Creator surpasses His creatures?

See all the fullness of the Godhead--dwelling in One who is as meek and mild as a child. 
See His countenance beaming with ineffable glories--full of mingled majesty, condescension and love. 
Hear the soul-reviving invitations and gracious words which proceed from Hislips. 
See that hand in which dwells everlasting strength--swaying the scepter of universal empire over all creatures and all worlds.
See His arms expanded to receive and embrace returning sinners.
While His heart, a bottomless, shoreless ocean of benevolence--overflows with tenderness, compassion, and love.

Such, O sinner, is our Beloved--and such is our Friend.

Will you not then embrace Him as your Friend? If you can be persuaded to do this--you will find that half, nay, that the thousandth part has not been told to you!

All the excellency, glory and beauty which is found in men or angels, flows from Christ--as a drop of water from the ocean, or a ray of light from the sun.

If, then, you supremely love the creature--can you wonder that Christians should love the Creator! Can you wonder that those who behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, should be sweetly drawn to Him by the cords of love, and lose their fondness for created glories? All that you love and admire and wish for in creatures, and indeed infinitely more--they find in Him!

Do you wish for a friend possessed of power to protect you? 
Our Friend possesses all power in Heaven and earth, and is able to save even to the uttermost!

Do you wish for a wise friend? 
In Christ are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Do you wish for a tender, compassionate friend? 
Christ is tenderness and compassion itself.

Do you wish for a faithful, unchangeable friend? 
With Christ there is no variableness nor shadow of turning. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

His unchangeable love will ever prompt Him to make His people happy!

His unerring wisdom will point out the best means to promote their happiness!

His infinite power will enable Him to employ those means.

In all these respects, our Beloved is more than any other beloved!

Addition, Dr. Morris:

To even compare today's church members, pew warmers with Saints of old is like comparing my mothers wood-cooked stove to a microwave.

One of my friends' described it this way my brother sings so loud during worship service "Oh, how I love Jesus" but then, on the way home, in traffic, he goes into pagan rage, calling other drivers such ugly names.

No soldier ever won a battle fighting from an air conditioned foxhole.  Do today's church goers, sitting in the comfort of an air conditioned building, powdered and perfumed, dressed in their very best, listening to trained choir voices,  professional musicians, a preacher softly "cooing to the crowd, SO AFRAID he might run someone off , AFRAID that he might limit the offering AND UNAFRAID that many of these people will go to hell.  Dr. R.G. Lee, longtime pastor, Bellevue Baptist, before he died, (a congregation of thousands) said he wished he knew that ten percent of his membership would meet him in heaven. 

The road to hell is paved with religion.  Salvation comes through an intimate-personal relationship with Christ.  Much of this relationship comes through suffering.  When this writer looked at his mother and grandmothers the last time, before they were returned to the Good Earth, I knew that they experienced suffering.  Christianity is not complicated, very tough.  Ninety percent of all Christianity is just raw courage.  Do today's church members have the courage to suffer for Christ sake?

#1953

Cannibalizing the Future

Others, Lord, yes, others --

Let this my motto be;

Help me to live for others

That I may live like Thee.--  

Hymn- Others

In George Orwell’s 1947 book Animal Farm, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

God wanted this country boy, raised in impoverished Eastern North Carolina, dirt roads-no power, phone, or water lines destitute country school 13 in my graduating class with the ambition to work through 8 years of University education, paying every cent of his own way, to have a Doctor in front of his name and later Lieutenant Colonel.  

SUCH AN EQUITY:But, and many times in his word, we have these words”But God” wanted me to see the inequity of the world and I have traveled through every continent, both poles and seen poverty that bureaucrats, in all their liberal fantasies, can not imagine.  Even in this country, most millennial Americans do not realize that 9 million Americans died from starvation during the Great Depression.

Often, in a third world nation such as the Central African Republic where I was the first visitor to that nation since the Jean-Bedel Bokassa emperor (Bokassa declared himself emperor of his nation, I saw him ride up and down the street in a chariot pulled by horses and all the people had to kneel. I went to his fortress, outside of Banjol, surrounded by a moat, where he fed his political prisoners to crocodiles.) I was invited to the American Ambassador quarters inside a fence, the gate closing behind the vehicle where I was served tea by  a retired general who was the ambassador also there to meet me, a United Nations official. The thought occurred to me, “How much did they pay to get these jobs from Washington and do they know anything at all about what goes on outside the walls of this embassy”. To the uninitiated, everything is obscure and most of the seven being inhabitants of this Earth are unaware of what is going on...nor do they care, if it does not affect them who cares?

Twice, as a sightless traveler of the World (Dr. Morris has been around the world 8 times, passport stamped in 157 countries) I got lost from my guide. Once, in France I got on the wrong train, a train filled with school children on a fieldtrip. The conductor came through checking to make sure all the children had tickets I was attempting to speak French to him, to tell him I was lost. One of the smart French boys said “he is with us” so, I arrived in Paris, actually made my way out of the train station, actually found a taxi and made my way to the hotel where I thought I was staying. My guide and the hotel officials were in panic mode. I think they were ready to call out the French Army to find me. I said, “Surely a man who has traveled the world can move around France .

In New Delhi, India, a country I have traveled from Trichy in the North to Sri Lanka in the South , by train and otherwise( MArk twain said that India is the ultimate travel destination), the world’s most populated nation, poverty beyond comprehension, I was lost from my guide in New Delhi where streets are thronged night and day with every type humanity. I was panicked, all these lepparous people pulling at me, trying to steal my white cane. I kept walking and listening. Most people in India speak English because they were under British rule for so long but none seemed to speak English that day. FINALLY I heard a man speaking English “This ends our tour for the day I will see you back at the hotel tomorrow morning, be here at 8:00 sharp”. I thought this was a travel group there must be a hotel here and I made my way into the hotel. I went up to what I thought was a desk and I pleaded I am an American and I am lost, I must have help. A woman almost jumped at me and hugged me and said I will help you, do you have any idea where your hotel is. I said, I have my room key, she said, that is all I need that hotel is not far from here. She and one other person, one on either side, almost in tears, they were so captivated by my situation (a blind man lost in the murrace of the streets of New Delhi). Again, my guide and the hotel was panicked because I was lost.  

When all around you there is nothing but trouble, your only escape- help is looking up. To the sightless person, when you can see nothing around you your only “salvation” is upward. God so built this world, troubles and trials all around us- sickness, poverty, helplessness, our only way of escape is upward. This is the message of Christianity.  

Losing your temper must be a sin because it is so pleasurable. When I was a child, and when we were enjoying anything, in a home- school- workplace, I felt that we must be sinning if we were enjoying ourselves. There is more to life than hard-work, study, the fear of displeasing God in all actions, the righteousness of God in our lives should be our greatest joy...and there should be nothing but smiles on the face of every believer. After all, we have been born again...twice birthed, and only one time to die...the clinical death of a believer. The scripture tells us that the unbeliever is already dead...once birthed, twice dead. This is why I cannot believe that the Muslim has any joy at all in life...rules about everything. Five times praying each day with nose on ground. Laws about clothing, food-drink-every area of life. The real followers of Islam, those who are the real believers in Muhammad, those who really follow the Quran, are the radicals. The only reason Islamists have not conquered the world is because they so enjoy killing one another...the various groups shiites, the Sunni, Shia, Sufi,Salafist and Wahhabi they so enjoy killing one another and their entire religion if true believers based on killing other infidels who do not believe like them. So, Americans so intent on being politically correct, so intent on turning the other cheek, so intent on loving everyone:have opened our borders to these cultures and religions and soon, like this blind writer lost in the blender of unknown bodies around me we will be looking for the way out of the entitlements-hodge-podge that has enveloped our nation, erased our constitutional freedoms. Freedoms paid for at such a high price. God told us, “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” John 8:32.

#1951

Street Smart OR Levels of Incompetence

"A child educated only at school is an uneducated child." -Unknown

This writer, giving a graduation address at one university, started by speaking about Sir Winston Churchill, telling his biographer that his mother was his first and greatest teacher...  Once, when he was asked to speak at a famous boy's school, the audience was so excited about what the great man would say.  Sir Winston was introduced, went to the podium, and then in his very loud voice said, "Never give up", and then again, "never give up"...  Then he went back and sat down and this was considered to be one of his greatest speeches. 

In a world inflamed by uncertainty, the church, if it still has any importance at all, is considered an oasis, different from the world, the hypocrisy of the world.

In early Christianity, monks, are touching to give all to God would escape to a pile of rocks on an island, away from an island of rocks.  All Christians, all patriots, I might even add all Americans should have a hungering and thirsting not just for biblical truth but for justice...the courage to seek justice AND, not give up.

I often consider the hypocrisy of the "so called" prayer breakfast.  These events are much like the semantics of "so-called" fundraisers.  Government-politics has degraded fundraising.  It is difficult to listen to an evangelical radio ministry without most of the program being devoted to the semantics of fundraising.  They preach about faith and do not have faith to believe that God will supply their needs. In fact, many preachers on ministry programs even take a break half way through the sermon so there can be fundraising in the beginning, at the end, and even in between.  Don't even think about running for political office unless you have several "fat-cats" willing to fill your pockets with funds. Plus, I have never known an elected politician who did not come away form the well with the bucket full. 

Law enforcement is more about money than policing.  Everybody counts or nobody counts.  Those with the money who fill the bucket at the well always count most. 

The best example I could ever give of this and I have written about this in several other articles, an unconfident Realtor who did not do her investigating, rented one entire floor on one of my office buildings to a "so-called" psychologist with her group (Circle of Courage).  After a year, my handyman came to me with the news that this woman and her employees (occupying 14 rooms) had abandoned the space. When I went over, no one there, all expensive equipment (desk-computers-electronics) abandoned, and electricity off.  Patient records (raw data), just scattered everywhere, they were dispensing drugs, which were scattered.  On one telephone was a message for her to call the NC tax division.  They told me that she owed hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid taxes.  I sought help from my lawyer who called psychological groups in Raleigh.  It turned out that she nor were any of her employees licensed to do anything.  The entire operation was a Medicaid fraud.  From the records read to me, there is no estimation of the millions paid to her by the government.  My driver made photographs with my phone I attempted to ascertain some of the damage to my property.

Recently, a lawyer talked to me about our local sheriff, that he was such a great Christian.

After my dilemma, after I could not locate anyone connected with the operation I wrote letters, sent photographs to this local sheriff-local chief of police, to the state SBI, to the state attorney general, to news media and many other people who I thought could read...to date no response from anyone, including local law enforcement, including...this "Christian Sheriff".

It was explained to these people that I am an old, blind, veteran...needing help with this terrible government situation.  It took one year for me and an assistant to clean up the mess, to haul off all the "stuff" left behind.  In our nation, everyone has become street smart, everyone has levels of incompetence most of this comes from political correctness.  I know, just as you have already surmised that no one would touch this situation (not even with a ten foot pole) because all the actors in this hoax were African-American.  

There are levels of incompetence, silliness, fooling around with the brain wiring of people in every area of expertise.  Some doctors are much more interested in the golf course than the examining room. Some car sales are people more interested in the commission than their reputation.

This writer may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but even as a child, I recognized hypocrisy: street-smartness: levels of incompetence.  I thank my Creator God every day of my life that I was raised in a Christian home.  Our family church, built in 1874 by my great-grandparents was the center of our family life.  But, I still remember the incompetent pastors.  He was a wonderful man, as a doctor, one of my patients BUT, I will never forget, as our pastor, him standing outside the church smoking cigarettes- laughing and talking with lazy unbelievers who recognized the church house as a secular gathering place...NOT, God's house of worship. 

There are 1189 chapters in the bible, Gods Word.  The chapter exactly halfway the bible, is Psalm 118.  The eighth verse of this chapter says, "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man."

It is a sad day in my life and in the lives of our fellow men that we can put trust and confidence in so few people.  Everybody counts or nobody counts.  This sheriff, certainly some police officers, certainly some veterans or church people should have been willing to help me with this "mess".

#1950 Trench Warfare

#1950

Trench Warfare

"The heavens declare his righteousness, and all the people see his glory" Psalm 97 

It is so easy to look at the hardship-harshness of life- through eyes of disillusionment.  There was a time in our history, even during my lifetime when most information about the world and its condition came by way of the printed page, newspapers.  I still remember when I was a graduate student in Memphis, that there was both a morning and afternoon newspaper.

Maturing as a young man in impoverished Eastern North Carolina almost every family subscribed to the Raleigh news and observer.  A newspaper still printed but one which does not have the influence it had when it was called the "Democrat Bible."  Its editor, Joe Josephus Daniels controlled "solid south Democrat politics in North Carolina".  It was said that most subscribed just to keep up with the obituaries.  For over one hundred years the winner of the Democrat primaries ruled the state.  Republicans were insignificant.  You could not get job involving state money unless you supported the democrat part...school teaching, state highway commission, state hospitals.  You could not drive a public school bus unless you were a voting-supporting democrat.  My family was the only republicans in the township but, according to state law there must be republicans as "poll watchers" at the voting precincts (places where people voted).  My mother and her cousin would alternate this job, as the only republicans every other election.  She received two dollars for that days work.  My own mother, sixth grade education would come home and cry about the corruption she witnessed.  Democrats would go out into the "hinterlands"(down paths-into swamps) to haul to the voting precinct black people who they would not speak to otherwise and mark their ballot for them.  DEMOCRATS WERE SO GENEROUS. If a white supporter of one candidate were allowed to mark a ballot for so long the black citizen would get a candy bar...the white voter would get a tray of barbeque.  Of course the registrar(person in charge of voting) knew ahead of time who they wanted to get elected so it was all a fixed election and there was not a scent-hint of justice in the NC election process. This is the way citizenship was handled in the solid south for most of history, until recently when good sense finally took over and republicans became a voting force.  Now, the solid south is more republican than Democrat.  Now, the nation has become trench warfare in determining political direction.  

Much of the migration of thinking, once controlled by the printed press, is due to the internet. We cannot give any credit to public education, I do believe that students are dumber than ever. With the invent of television, stupid programming from stupid- stymied, caused graduates(most of whom know little about real life)- even more adults have been dumbed-down. But, as with the cessation of window shopping giant stores (Macy's, Sears, JCPenney) not being able to charge ridiculous prices for their merchandise: drowning because of excesses, the public has become smart enough to shop online-internet. 

In the bottomless ocean of technology not the cell phone- not the talking box, but perhaps one great feature of modern living buying with an attitude of bargaining from pictures and descriptions on the computer-online.  Buying from the quietness of home is not exactly new, there was a time when every family received in the mail a Sears and Roebuck catalog.  This huge business operated for many years. At one time.  Before I sold them, I had a collection of 250 old sears catalogs.  You could buy anything from a corset to a cook stove, from a horse collar to a house, but you had no choice in what you paid. You paid the asking price plus shipping.  It is a far different story with the online-internet sales: auction-competition and usually free shipping. 

This writer has been to communist China three times since it has been reopened by the efforts of President Nixon.  All stores in China are like Wal-Mart stores here...just big piles of stuff with no thoughts of presentation.  You will never see a mannequin in a Chinese store. Online, you can order from Wal-Mart and this very sophisticated well-run business model will get your purchase to you almost instantly. Remember, it all started with one man in one store. Now, Wal-Mart stores are at every crossroads.  

Of course money is still money, thievery is still thievery, in my lifetime, social security checks started coming to older people: FICA taken from the checks of working people and then at retirement age being able to get a sustaining check.  These were called "Mothers day checks" because the only time some mothers saw their children was at the first of the month when they knew "momma" had gotten her check and had some money for them to "pervert".  There have been many other changes in the trench warfare of financial survival...checks for illegitimacy, checks for food and housing supplementation. Words which were one time not in our vocabulary, now a part of modern living, vacations-holidays-retirement.  Almost every public advertisement, all political rhetoric, your future, your comfort, and solitude in the future.

Most educators and those who should have a rudimentary knowledge of science never advocate for physical and spiritual survival. You hear little about the warfare of disease never the word cure, only treatment.  The burgeoning "sick-care" industries (big-medicine-big-pharmacy) want all people on many pills.  The mortality rate is still 100% and there is still more hospitals-hospice-nursing home beds filled than ever before.  Most American earned dollars are spent on sickness.

So much of our sickness has come from the same science community that has provided so much comfort and entertainment.  In an effort to provide food as easily as possible (large crops few weeds) our crops were poisoned with "round-up"...a herbicide that kills weeds as well as insects.  Our smart, university educated- highly paid scientists...even our brighter foundation scientist never considered that they were eventually killing us with a cancer producing chemical.  Now, we are all in the trenches in warfare of survival.

#1949 Enough is Enough

#1949

Enough is Enough

"Fast food is popular because it's convenient, it's cheap, and it tastes good. But the real cost of eating fast food never appears on the menu".  Eric Schlosser

Modern living is built around the concept of convenience. It is convenient to wear clothing which requires little effort, such as the tying of shoe strings...much easier to slip on loafers. For you fathers out there, I still remember the day my own father taught me to tie the shoe strings on my shoes. Now, every time I wear a pair of athletic shoes with shoestrings, I think of my long dead father. I also remember one of my two younger brothers asking me to show him how to tie the strings on his shoes. He was eighteen years younger than me, I was already in college. I said, "Let daddy show you," I wanted him to have the same memories. 

In our lives seeking the easy way out, the fast way of doing everything (fast-foods-fast-carwash-drive-in-bank), we don't take the time to consider how much interaction we are missing with our fellow men. Some of our greatest memories, helping someone when it is so simple. This totally blind, one hundred percent disabled, medical officer, veteran so appreciates hearing someone jump up from the table and opening a door when my driver is helping me out of the restaurant to my car. We all have internal blisters- stains- warts- from bad experiences. We all carry around baggage from bad experiences...always with fellow human beings. Most of our problems result from other people. It is so  convenient to just push by- say something hateful rather than just realizing that everyone has a "bad hair day." Even Christians don't always show Christianity (Christ-like). Recently, this old man embarrassed himself in front of his employees, I was anxious to get out of the door with my friend who was taking me to lunch, but one of these unsolicited telemarketing calls came in (I get more than my share) and I said to the caller, "why in the hell are you calling me?" Then I said to one of my employees and friend, my lawyer, "now was that not someway for a Christian to act, someone who knows better, someone who was taught better, someone from whom God requires better." After all, the person on the phone, in the boiler room making calls, like most of us, just making a living...following a procedure...doing what they have been told what to do.

Most of us are very reluctant, very cowardly to even talk with people we know well about matters with which we should all be concerned: the future of our nation: preparing for old age: the way our relatives train their children. Christians believe that unless anyone, father, mother, sister, brother, neighbor, anyone, who does not believe in Jesus Christ is headed for eternity in hell. We are reluctant to speak to the ones we love about our horrendous future.

One man in England told me, when I was talking to him about my Christian beliefs, "If I believe what you believe knowing that my family would go to hell because they do not believe, I would cross England crawling on my hands and knees begging them to make a change in their life. 

AT my own fathers large packed church funeral, as the oldest, I lead the family into the church. One of the funeral directors came over and handed me an envelope which I put in my pocket. I had no idea what was involved and could not see anything of course going on. Later, I asked my driver to read me what was in the envelope. Obviously, just before the service I understand a large memorial wreath had been brought in with the note attached. On the note was written these words, "In memory of the only man who ever thought enough of me to ask me about the condition of my soul". It was signed by the local state senator, only my father would have asked him such a question when he cut his hair (my father was a dirt farmer, large farm, but barbered on the weekends at a local barber shop in a small town). Very few people, even those of us who should be concerned of others, are brave enough- concerned enough, saved enough to be alert enough to seek the eternal security-safety of our loved ones, let alone people we hardly know. Ninety percent of all missionaries in the world originate from America...going to the far corners of the world.  Can we even imagine the courage it takes to do this BUT ninety percent of all Christianity is just raw courage. My only son, Dr. John Morris, and his wife, were long time missionaries to Korea. They live here teaching in a seminary now. Their words, " America needs missionaries more than Korea", Africa now sends missionaries to America. This writer is convinced that most pulpiteers (preachers in the pulpit) are more concerned with their pastoral package then the people in the pews.  But, I don't know I hope that I am wrong BUT, "judgment must begin at the house of God". Enough is enough, there was a book written called "Games People Play" it is time for Churches to stop playing games with God.  Enough is enough, it is time for Americans to stop playing games with the government. Every time I think of my hardworking tax-paying, God fearing ancestors...that they just wanted the opportunity to work and succeed...that they did not want a handout form anyone including the government, that they just wanted to live responsible lives, when I think of their sweat and then the fact that most of today's young people are just mourning and preparing for entitlements, I get patriotically nauseated.  As Margaret Thatcher said, "Socialism is good until those who do not work spend all the money of those who do". In the world of the talking box (television-computer) the world of the la-z-boy chair, the world of convenience everything, it is long past time for young people to realize that God chose us for a reason.

It is easy to see the cuts and bruises of people on the exterior. Most pathology- diseases come from the interior. It is much more convenient to eat junk than real God given food( but salty potato chips taste so good). Real God given- inspired real food gives you the nutrition you  need for health( it is so much fun to watch movies and such on the tube). You went to school for  many years to learn how to read, there is nothing more rewarding than the reading of a book. Get the feel, the feel of turning pages, the image-inspiration of mental pictures from paper...not electronic optics.  Enough is enough.  Life is as real now as it was when the Dead Sea scrolls were written: when my ancestors with a few tools that they brought over from England on a very small ship (S.S. Kent) grew their vegetables around the trunks of trees because this was the place that good soil was located.  It has taken a long time to grow the American spirit; it is past time for America to learn its value. 

#1948 Featherbed Warrior

#1948

Featherbed Warriors

Don't you wish you had purchased Microsoft stock when it came out 30 years ago, Microsoft stock has gone up 89,000%: $1000 invested then would be $1million now.

There are one billion people of the seven billion people on the face of the Earth now on Facebook.  Why are these social media sites so valuable?  This writer remembers the time when you could send a message on a one cent postcard...that was all we had; I was raised in impoverished Eastern North Carolina on a dirt road without power-phone-waterlines.  AND, we doctors wonder why aged people of that time in history possessed such clogged up insides: filled with toxicity.  Whatever the weather they had to go outside to an outhouse for elimination and they suffered with the toxicity of lack of elimination which poisoned their bodies...led to their deaths. 

I am saying all this because there is a difference in people.  Bill Gates, world's richest man, founded of Microsoft-operating out of a car garage.  Would present himself to anyone as just an ordinary man, but in his 10 Rules for Success, his first rule is that there is no such thing as fairness. 

Most of those on Facebook are just ordinary people but you never know when one is going to stand out.  Our Puritan forefathers ALL used outhouses; such was the case at the White House until the presidency of Abraham Lincoln.  Today, all over the world in a bottomless ocean of technology ordinary people use a handheld phone which contains more technology than the module which landed on the Moon.  Were these ordinary men?  Was John Glenn an ordinary man?  Men, who were willing to be blasted off the face of the Earth with power equivalent to an atomic bomb...perhaps to never return.

The first telephone was placed in the White House by President Hayes in 1877.  Its number was number one.  Hayes did not think it was very useful.  This writer was raised in a community where there was only one telephone for many miles: at my cousin's country store.  But, very ordinary people live life, did the best they knew without inside plumbing, telephones, or computers.  All this has happened in my lifetime, can we even imagine what the future holds...everything invented-produced-used by ordinary people? 

I so remember, as a small child, helping my grandmother "make-up" the feather beds in our house, there were no sophisticated mattresses with programming for softness and hardness.  Much birdlife had given their feathers, one of the most intricate of God's creations in order that one could sleep in comfort on a very soft bed.  The bed, filled with feathers was fluffed and smoothed to give the tired worker some measure of sleep.  Today's spoiled young people cannot imagine the hard ground on which soldiers slept while fighting for the facilities-pleasures which they enjoy in this country. 

I am a rare book collector, own a collection of thousands of antiquarian books, there are books about everything.  I once had two young college intellectuals-millennials who were shown the pictures of a farm outhouse, they had never seen such.  They had no idea what a slit trench or other facilities soldiers had to use could not even be imagined.  They looked at a book showing the butchery of animals, hogs and cows, which they enjoy eating but the pictures of the butchery process mad them ill.  Most children have no idea about the origination of the eggs which they find on their plates...that the shells of eggs are the most intricate processes of God's creation.  Yet, ordinary people, all over the world, know about the fowl-gallus species-bird with their intricate feathers, egg shells-a marvel of physics, hollow bones which make them lighter in flight.  This writer, at the North Pole, saw the hills blackened with birds called terns, with all our knowledge of physics-geography-physiology we still cannot understand how this bird life can fly continuously from the North Pole to the South Pole in a resolution of tracking (those at the front moving back, everyone taking their turn at the front in order.)  The most sophisticated zoologist attempts to explain how the baby chick knows when to peck himself out of the eggshell, knows immediately how to hold his head in order to get water down this throat, and knows his own mother's clucking pattern from any other hen.

Many years ago, I heard Dr. Margaret Swanton, professor in the UNC-CH medical school make the statement that I have never forgotten, I don't think she realized at the time what she had said, she said, "The human body does not function the way it is written in books, every doctor worth the piece of paper he holds knows the truth of this statement."  If all science were so simple, so many things, such marvels of God's creation, so easily understood...everything fitting into a design of scientific reasoning or certainly some laws of nature.  It takes ordinary people to realize that man does not have the answer for very many things...what makes some of us so different, many so indifferent, MOST SO ORDINARY.  Letters behind your name mean very little just as rank on your shoulder means little on the battlefield.  Most war heroes were very ordinary men, most people who have the mental wiring to make great discoveries have no special metabolic structure, only blessed with an innate desire to pursue and accomplish.  Young people could still be fluffing a feather bed, which would still feel so good to a tired body but there was someone who had the ability to seek-study-select a better source of sleep-rest-comfort.  Thank goodness there was someone who pursued the idea of pushing water through pipes, using the physics of airways for sound travel, the magnanimity of electronics to bring electronic messaging into a home via a talking box: the ever present television set, the completely dependent computer (every person-business-warrior now completely dependent on the computer...a system which even a small child can operate: a child which has never seen a chick escape from an egg, an outhouse, a dial telephone).  Those of you with degrees-military rank-much wealth-good looks-gravitas of every type GOOD NEWS, remember, God loves the ordinary as well as the extraordinary, the color-scent-texture of a rose as well as the plainness but essential quality of grass. 

#1947 Spinning Top

#1947

Spinning Top

            "Open My Eyes" - hymn

            Open my eyes that I may see
            Glimpses of truth Thou hast for me;
            Place in my hands the wonderful key
            That shall unclasp and set me free.

Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but soon enough people will discover what has happened to our world.  Most of our problems are a result of our forgetting the reason for education, to stop the spinning of which we call progress and get back to the essentials which our ancestors called common sense. 

The one with the real healthy and active uterus possesses the power of the universe, not those who gave their life away to debauchery and pleasure.  We have all seen children play with a spinning top...such a memory.  Now, having traveled many miles along life's rocky road, we look at life's experiences as a spinning top...our relationship with God as a spinning top.  Many of us in prayer, never say "Amen" because every breath-thought-action depends on the guidance of God and we thrive in the consolation of "praying without ceasing" (1 Thessalonians 5:17). 

One day the top will stop, it will all be over as far as the trials-thoughts of this Earth are concerned.  Don't forget to leave behind, through letters, transmittals, through recordings things which you wish to share with those who will follow you.  Every day of my life I remember relatives and others who I knew as a child, I just wish their young, those who never knew them could have known what wonderful ancestry they have in their DNA. 

I so remember "Aunt Sewanee", she never married, lived with a sister's family, earned money doing house cleaning and farm jobs.  She never had a child of her own, put all her love on the children of others.  Every baby born in the community, rich or poor: black or white, received the gift of a cap from silk cloth she purchased, she made the cap with its intricate embroidery; blue for boys, pink for girls.  I wonder how many mothers kept those baby caps that this wonderful "saint" made as her life's duty to show her love for families and babies.  She was my first Sunday school teacher.  I so remember Aunt Sarah, who died at 98, one of my other younger aunts made a recording of her talking about her long life story.  (She was born while her father was away fighting in the Civil War.)  Surely, one family member should have valued that recording but I would be willing to venture any amount of  money that it cannot be found...they simply were not interested.  Even at the graveyard, before her casket was put in the ground one of her granddaughters asked that the casket be opened, so her daughters could see their great grandmother, whom they had never seen before.

There are so many writers of smut, some stories, some books, I never could understand why church people especially young women (this was the time before the talking box) would spend so much time reading movie magazines and so little time reading stories in books, even the Bible, which would bring fulfillment to their life.  Celebrities are not going to do one thing for you, their uninhibited sexual and sensual excesses...an embarrassment to their own relatives.  Biographies of people who contribute to the world, hymns of faith based on scripture never fail to find a crevice of comfort in a time of storm.  Every person who claims the name of Christ should read the proverbs of Solomon several times each year, written long before Jesus made his appearance on Earth, this man known for wisdom-wives-wealth produced a framework of words that no modern human mind can duplicate, let alone appreciate. 

After you have tried every doctor, every treatment, try fasting.  I am convinced that people eat far more food, especially the wrong kind than they need.  One day a week of fasting, just eating bread and water and you will be amazed at the improvement of your health.  I have advised so many sick people to read the Gospel of John once every week for one month; they were not that sick that they would even read the Bible.  There is biological-spiritual rejuvenation that will amaze the homeostasis of your body.  Don't tell me you are Christian and then ignore the Lord's Table.  When you partake of the bread at His table you are ensuring your healing "with His stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5).  Peter, looking back, said, "By whose stripes we were healed" (Peter 2:24).  His precious blood from which we partake at His table, cleanses me of my rotten sins but, He has taken care of my sicknesses and if He chooses not to heal me, "Jesus paid it all." 

Most doctors and caregivers know absolutely nothing involving the care of real food...food that has not been overcooked.  The blood and water gushing from the heart of Jesus is a fount of blessing and healing mercy for all our diseases even though the spinning top will eventually end its electrical life force, just as will our redeemed existence.  The ratio is so small between those who enjoy life and those who consider life just a burden.  All the years I was a medical student in Memphis, I was a member of the great Bellevue Baptist Church, where the great preacher-pastor Dr. R.G. Lee led us...at the end of his long life he said that if he could have improved on any part of his ministry, he would have given more encouragement.  This writer offers you encouragement, not just "spin".  

#1946 Satan Never Sleeps

#1946

Satan Never Sleeps

"Ah broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!  Let the bell toll!--a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river" - Edgar Allen Poe - Lenore

Some Americans are still tuning the radio as they drive across the cliff: when will the average American discover that they are just existing to exist. 

Each day presents us with more information than we can begin to understand.  One third of a trillion dollars is spent each year by Americans...going into the pockets of psychiatrists and drug stores for mind-altering drugs.  Satan never sleeps, when he and thirty percent of the angelic host were kicked out of Heaven by God.  God allowed he and his followers to gather into their fold just as many human beings as God would allow him to have.  Satan has nothing to give to his followers except the eternal quagmire-futile

destiny of Hell.  His quest, and the quest of his conquered is to get just as many into Hell as possible..."Broad is the way" (Matthew 7:13).  AND, living the satanic hell bound life is so easy-so filled with popularity-so attractive.  To those in Satan's army, to the atheist, to the indifferent; God has given the believer one promise-one assurance HE IS NOT AFRAID OF THE IMPOSSIBLE; HE IS STILL IN CHARGE; HE WILL ONLY ALLOW SATAN TO GO SO FAR AND NO FURTHER.  The holy spirit of God will convince enough real believers, those without a vacuum in their head.  Satanic forces will never take over; this is the blessed assurance of which we sing. 

One of my longtime friends, a mortician, we will call him Jack, told me he showed just as much privacy, love, and consideration to a dead body as he did to anyone who is alive.  This will answer your questions as to why God shows so much kindness to those who despise him.  Family emotional tears have "stretch hormones".  It is essential to feel and heal your emotions but there is nothing wrong in showing them.  Even Jesus wept at the death of a friend (John 11:35).  My same mortician friend told me that most family members now just want to get the death in a family finalized.  He said most families no longer even look at the dead family member...that they will just tell them to put the body in "next to the cheapest casket" and put a flag or church pall over it.  

At the age of 86, I could never have imagined even in my wildest hallucination, what has happened to my country in my lifetime...same sax marriage, don't ask don't tell, unisex bathrooms and showers...boys thinking they are girls and girls wanting to be boys.  Worst of all, parents allowing such thinking among their small children: our courts, all the way to the Supreme Court burdened with horror stories about sexual foolishness. 

Diversity has become more important in education, politics, and even religion than divinity.  There are more opportunities in most universities (state and private), for young people from abroad than for those who ancestors bought-fought and paid for this country. 

During the governorship of Terry Sanford this writer was appointed to go with a group of citizens to New York seeking to start in the state of North Carolina a local vocational training system (now has become the community college).  We stayed at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, visited certain large corporations in and around Manhattan encouraging them to open factories in North Carolina, where there was plenty of land and highway access, the trip was successful.  Small schools opened to train workers for sewing and other factories.  Of course, Satan got involved and turned these schools opened to train workers to wanna be universities teaching sociology-psychology-hair dressing.  So, we are right back where we started, students with pieces of paper given by a school which mean nothing.  They cannot get a job.  How many sociologists-psychologists does this state need?  In the meantime, the plants have all closed and moved to other countries.

Now, last few days, even the Waldorf-Astoria is closing, turning itself into apartments.  Once, the world's greatest hotel (Waldorf Salad-The Bronx-etc), now just a memory like so many earth matters, when Satan gets involved. 

Satan was not content to destroy family life-courthouse-church house-political life but think what has happened to education.  When will foundations, university professors, those whose lives have been spent in education realize that children are being indoctrinated-entertained rather than receiving the fundamentals of learning.  Almost all college students must undergo remedial classes in order to compete in accepted collegiate matriculation.  Satan wanted police officers patrolling the halls instead of dedicated teachers reading the Bible as well as the classics.  Young people who work for me do not have a clue about real education...memorizing, handwriting, the spectacular literature of the past.  They know all about sexuality, try-sexual, most believe in trying anything. At Lagos, Nigeria, I was asked to speak at a nearby college.  Of course, it was evident that Satan had taken over; there was no such thing as education going on.  This so-called college was just a place for "interneting", visiting, and entertaining one another. 

The enemy is not always at the end of a gun or a bomb.  I have just as little confidence in an educator who does not educate as I do in a minister who is afraid to tell the truth about sin's ruin and Christ's redemption because he is afraid he might offend someone.  How can a Christian church not employ and enjoy the messages in classical hymns?  We have abandoned reason for unreason, morality for immorality. 

Life is a struggle, requiring optimism.  How can one survive these times thinking that Satan has taken over, that he has the upper hand?  Lifestyles are not more important than intellectual pursuits.  There has always been a veneer of class, an overlay of social acceptance.  A bed of petunias requires water and sunshine, the holiness of God.  It is time for mere mortals to realize that Satan never sleeps, that we must throw ourselves upon the sovereignty of God.  

#1945 Dowser in the Graveyard

#1945

Dowser in the Graveyard

Prologue/Addition Dr. Morris:

The geologists and many scientists think that there is nothing to it.  But, they did not think there was anything to the barber pole at the barber shop, showing a surgeon was available, even washing hands before surgery.  But, on the farm the dowser came in with his peach tree limb, walking a certain way and the limb-branches in his hands would turn and point towards the ground IF he were over a supply of water.  Then you dig down and you have a well.  It works, skips one generation but is in the DNA of many families.  So, like so many other things that smart people deny for centuries this has been the method for "simple-minded" people finding sources of water.  Neither can we understand the unsaved indifference and skepticism toward Jehovah God, Creator of Heaven and Earth. 

Most people I have met in my long life, even church pew warmers-even those in pulpits, have trouble explaining why bad things happen to good people or why good things happen to bad people.  They have never learned to trust God, that he is in charge.

This writer watched his mother and both grandmothers die of excruciating pain with cancer.  These women had never done anything but good for anyone, I never knew either one to use a bad word...worked hard...raised fine children...worshipped God in whom they had total belief.  Why do so many experience so much misery?  I am totally convinced that each of these wonderful women, like so many believers I have known my life, knew that mercy was their reward, that Jesus had paid it all.  If not healing here, total healing with graduation (death). 

I am convinced that most pew warmers are in love with this Earth, the things that this Earth has provided for them.  Most really do not have any desires or designs for Heaven...they just love it here.  The dowser walking through the graveyard would find that many interred there never really believed that there were better for them.  They did not believe that their citizenship was in Heaven.  (Philippians 3:20)

There are things that are etched in our minds forever; I will never forget the night that our barn burned...my hardworking, God-fearing, taxpaying parents loosing almost everything.  There were other times that the crops dried up or drowned in the fields, we knew the horror of hailstones crushing our crops.  The dowser walking over the graves of such people as this, not just my family but many others whom I have known, would point down at graves where just worn out remains are kept...their souls are in a much better place...forever peace and joy.  There is nothing on this Earth, the things of this Earth, even loved ones on this Earth that would lure them back to it.

Today's Puritan AUDIO Devotional:

Spurgeon's 'Morning by Morning' for March 4
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Father knows best!

(Charles Spurgeon)

"Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away--may the name of the LORD be praised!" Job 1:21

"Shall we accept good from God--and not trouble?" Job 2:10 

Let the Lord do as He wills to us! He will never be unkind to us! He has always been our friend--He will never be our foe!

He will never put us into the furnace--unless He means to purge the dross out of us. Nor will there be one degree more heat in that furnace than is absolutely necessary--there will always be mercy to balance the misery--and strength supplied to support the burden to be borne.

Oh, children of God, your Father knows best! Leave everything in His hands and be at peace--for all is well.

"I was silent; I would not open my mouth--for You are the one who has done this!" Psalm 39:9 

"He is the LORD; let him do what is good in His eyes!" 1 Samuel 3:18

"Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vines; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren;even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty--yet I will rejoice in the LORD! I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!" Habakkuk 3:17-18

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"How to Please God!" by Spurgeon, 55 minute audio. 
 Play Audio! Download Audio. Compliments of Gospel Gems.

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#1944 Words of Encouragement and Promise

#1944

Words of Encouragement and Promise

Prologue/Addition Dr. Morris:

A thousand times, as a totally blind man, I have asked the question, "Why me?" 

Raised in impoverished Eastern North Carolina, having seen needs which the modern day social worker could not even imagine, I ask the question, many times, "Why do people who have done nothing but live on this Earth go through the trials and destitution that they must endure...why them?" 

Then, God in his power-grace-mercy wanted me to see what life is really all about.  He, and He alone, made all the arrangements for me to travel the world and I really saw poverty and destitution.  If I were to describe these things as I have as I have attempted to do so in other articles like modern day "insane lies" by talking heads in the talking box, you would not believe me. 

I don't understand why the first two boys born on Earth-Cain and Abel, one killed the other.  I don't understand why Herod, attempting to kill the Christ child, murdered all those small boys around that little town of Bethlehem.  There are so many things I don't understand BUT almighty, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Jehovah God knows all.  It is just up to me to trust Him, in my not understanding-my blindness-my disappointments in life and everything else, all He asks is trust.  We take all our sins-problems-sicknesses to the cross and leave them there.

Today's Puritan AUDIO Devotional:

Spurgeon's 'Morning by Morning' for March 3
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This city was a moral cesspool, a sink of pollution, filled with all corruption, and reeking with vileness!

(Charles Naylor, "In Christ, and in Ephesus" 1920)

"To the saints in Ephesus--the faithful in Christ Jesus" Ephesians 1:1 

Ephesus was one of the great centers of paganism. It was adorned with costly and magnificent heathen temples. It was rich and voluptuous. Both private and public life were utterly corrupt. Even the religious practices of the Ephesians were unspeakably vile. This city was a moral cesspool, a sink of pollution, filled with all corruption, and reeking with vileness! It was a second Sodom. Vice stalked abroad everywhere--and was honored and worshiped.

We might therefore well say, "Can any good thing come out of Ephesus? Can Christianity flourish in such surroundings?" 

Yes! There were saints in Ephesus--and faithful ones, too. They were such in their lives and characters as to win the commendation of that great apostle to the Gentiles. Out of that obnoxious cesspool of iniquity, were growing the pure white lilies of Christian character! That is the glory of Christianity and of Christ. Those who were now Christians were not superior to the other Ephesians--they were not by nature different. In fact, Paul tells them that they had been the children of wrath, even as the others--and that they had been such by nature. What a triumph of divine grace, which raised these people up out of such unspeakable filth--and made them faithful saints! And yet that is the power of our great Christ!

"For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord." Ephesians 5:8

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You may want to read the whole of Charles Naylor's practical one page article, "In Christ, and in Ephesus".

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#1943 Pushing Back on Pandora's Box

#1943

Pushing Back on Pandora's Box

"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths."  (Proverbs 3:5-6)

Satan can only go as far as God allows.  In my lifetime, 87years, I heard so much about the opening of Pandora's Box.  Satan's excesses, not just peeps but full eyesight vistas, there has been a complete revelation of what lies in Pandora's Box.  It is in Pandora's Box that we have the decadence-indecency-unconcern-insensitivity conjured into one box, the sick mind of man. 

It was just a few years ago, that sexual perversion was kept hidden in the closet.  Like one rotten apple in a barrel of beautiful fresh apples, enabled by perverted minds in charge (from President Obama right down to the lowest bureaucrat at the courthouse).  We now know why public libraries, public parks, public rest areas along highways, and now, beyond the belief of anyone with an IQ above room temperature, the public schools and universities, the manipulating-extorting-political astute-political correct perverted sex population (probably less than 1% of the population: but remember, it only takes one rotten apple to corrupt the entire barrel: one disease cell to start a cancer).  Those once considered "queer" have taken over. 

You don't think so, then kindly look at the 11 great stores which are drowning from lack of business.  These stores were stupid enough, cowardly enough to submit to the pressure of this small "rotten" percentage of the population that has sought to infect everything.  So, such stores as Target who willing submitted to their blackmail has lost a large percentage of their business...great drop in share price, you see, the mothers of the world, the decent women of this world enjoy the privacy of going to a women's bathroom without fear of being molested by some sick male, who thinks he is a woman, "Queen for a day." 

For many years, most families did their necessary "dry goods" shopping from the very reliable Sears-Montgomery Ward-Spiegel and other catalogs.  Certainly we have learned that online buying and selling has taken over the business world.  Even today, you can order something from Wal-Mart and it be delivered the next day-right to your house or can be picked up at the store.  There is still no shifting of basic human intelligence pertaining to privacy.  Most mothers still teach their daughters to be private...MODEST.  Even in a hospital we had screens which protected the privacy between the beds of patients.  At the church house, a place where love is shown to everyone regardless of soul condition, we find that homosexuals, like hummingbirds around a petunia, hang around the men's bathroom.  I heard one great preacher of the gospel use these words, to a great audience at a mega church, "We know God loves everyone in spite of what he knows about all of us.  We attempt to love everyone who attends this church in spite of the fact we know very little about anyone.  But we will not enable perverts hanging around our bathrooms.  A man who is right with God does not have perverted desires towards our young boys.  WE KNOW WHO YOU ARE; you know where the doors are.  We have one message for you, if you cannot change your sexual attitudes, GET OUT."

It is time for heterosexual parents, preachers, physicians, professors, to recognize what is going on in this country...promoted by a very small percentage of the population.  It is the heterosexual men and women God has chosen to live in this world.  Real men and real women with family values, real men and real women who do not believe in same sex marriage (marriages that can not reproduce anything), real men and real women who are producing future American citizens who will pay the taxes-defend the nation-reproduce those made in the image of God.  "Righteousness exalts a nation and sin is a reproach to any people."  (Proverbs 14:34)  There is nothing righteous about perversion-nothing righteous about destroying humanity AND humanity survives only through the reproduction and multiplication of our fellow human beings in the NORMAL reproduction by NORMAL sex. 

Long ago, those who claim the name of Christ should have taken a stand, not yielding one inch to those who have brought on the stress, anxiety, "horror story" promoted by the transgendered cult or culture.  It is impossible to know the holiness of God.  But we do know the purity of walking out of a place of worship, without any ambiguity at all, knowing right from wrong-good from evil. 

In the world of mental illness, there is nothing worse than necrophilia.  Impossible for sane people to believe, but it has been adjudicated, just as has other lunatic sicknesses, there are people who process all the legal documents to buy and preserve: even present-display for viewing another human beings dead body.  They own the body, they can do what they please...the indignity of it all.  Have we as a people lost all of our intelligence, all sense of dignity, privacy?  Would normal human beings, just 50 years ago, believe that it is dignified-justified for young people of opposite sex to shower in the same locker rooms: for children or even adults to use the same bathroom facilities?  How silent the church, the Christian College, "born again" parents and preachers?