Interrogating the Interrogator

Would thou still stand before me? , asked God, 
If I can no longer wash thy sins. 
Would thou still read my scriptures? , 
If I can no longer offer thee a place in heaven. 
Would thou still sing my praise? , 
If I can no longer grant thy selfish desires. 
Would thou still want to meet me? , 
If I no longer have my magical powers. 
No! Never! , said Man, 
Otherwise, I am not Human. 

Pradeep Dhavakumar

Our most valuable possession, our soul created for our conversation with God. It has been my experience in dealing with believers and nonbelievers that our greatest failures, we talk with God but do not listen when God talks with us.

Possession is far greater than professing, and we all have had our days of doubts and fears when all we need to do is just TRUST JESUS.

One of my first experiences in learning to trust Jesus, freshman college student, UNC-Chapel Hill, there at this great university, where I was completely unprepared for any college (from a small country school, 13 in my graduating class, less than 100 in the entire high school) but, there I was competing with the states best from large city schools/prep schools/wealthiest, most powerful families in the state and, it was necessary for me to work as well as take courses. My money had completely run out and my job (at the medical school) was not to pay me for several days and I needed money for food.  I was sitting on a stoned fence behind the Wilson Library, across from the Bell Tower, interrogating my interrogator whether I should call my father to come get me. I knew there was plenty of food at home. Having been given this great opportunity for education and, for the first time in my life, feeling that I was truly where I should be for mental challenge I was so ashamed to give in and give up. But, I told God, just as Job told God, "though you slay me, yet will I trust in You" (Job 13:15). God said to me, just as if he were speaking from the Bell Tower across the street, "in the library of the medical school where you work are large leather chairs. Money falls out of the pockets of those who sit in those chairs, you might want to search those chairs". And so, that night at work, (I worked in the medical school library) I found enough money to keep me going for many days. And so, from pulpits in churches, speakers platforms at civic clubs, my message has always been "though I have failed God many times, He has never failed me". And, now at age 87, body eaten up by cancer, a totally blind veteran for 50 years, I still listen when He speaks.

I was raised in a country church, built 1874 by great-grandparents on both sides of my family, fortunate enough to have known many saints in the family and community but I do not remember as a child, ever hearing preachers talk about this. What a shame that today's parents, today's church members, today's preachers do not talk to the disabled/dying about listening as well as asking. It is like the phrase, homeless veterans, there should be no such person as a  homeless veteran. What is wrong with the veterans groups, American Legion, American Red Cross, BVA, DVA and even churches and civic clubs who put out so much propaganda about their concern for veterans, not yet, has 1 veterans group, 1 church, 1 civic club ever come to my front door about helping me with anything but that is all right, God reminds me every day that He is all I need and we all know the assorted story about veterans administration ineptness. As a medical officer, army hospitals, veterans hospitals, politicians, they just don't care.

No matter what has happened to you, life cannot be afforded. you just thank God for life and living. I write on a piece of paper my prayers and 1 line is always there "take my life and let it be consecrated Lord to thee".

Yet, there must be laughter and enjoyment along with responsibility and the serious side of life. There is nothing wrong with enjoying good food, a good joke, good entertainment, even good clothing and an expensive car or expensive home. God does not bless us in order for us to live like paupers. He expects our best and will load us down with His best. I have seen ships go through both the Panama and Suez canals. They do not always wait for the locks to completely fill with water. There are times when God allows us to cut corners. We are all waiting for 84,600 seconds a day and He does not expect us to keep our nose to the grindstone every second; have some fun/a hobby. Just remember at the end, you cannot relive/purchase back 1 second that you have just thrown away; not even if you have as much money as Oprah or Bill Gates and his wife.

When you get my age you realize just how short life is but for believers we have already started living an eternal existence. This is just a "boot camp" here on this earth where God is determining if He wants us around forever, if we are worthy of His Glory. Just think, the Creator of the universe, the power, grace, mercy who through the stars into space, can measure the Himalaya's with his fingers, who actually took time to dictate a book for us live by "The Holy Bible". And most believers do not even take the time from a life of frolic with unbelievers to read and rejoice in this answer book...the 1 book in the world that has answers to every question, the 1 book in the world that tells us about a Savior by whose life we obtain salvation as a gift, by whose birthday every check/every document is written. Millions of dollars are spent each year by mystified human beings seeking answers from a psychologist or psychiatrist. One of the greatest mysteries of the modern day church, to a member or other having problems, a believer in God sends them to someone who does not believe in God to get an answer. God has told us "Let us, therefore, come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need" (Hebrews 4:16).

My only child, my son, seminary professor, for many years a missionary on the mission field, said that on the mission field, an illness, new believers would pray before they even consulted a doctor. One of the last times I was ever in a churchhouse, a men's bible study, and they were all so happy to have me there. I began to feel like I was going to pass out. Patients have told me that when they get that feeling they soon hit the floor. So, I said to the fine man sitting next to me, I am very ill, I must leave. I apologized to the group and told them I was too sick to stay. The entire group began to pray and by the time I was driven to my house I was fine. 

God can heal cancer if he chooses to do so. "For with God nothing shall be impossible" (Luke 1:37). And to think there are so many so-called believers who never go to the Lord's table. "But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes, we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5 King James Version)

Cardinal with Purple Stripes

“Deliver me, O Jesus:

From the desire of being esteemed

From the desire of being loved

From the desire of being honored

From the desire of being praised

From the desire of being preferred to others

From the desire of being consulted

From the desire of being approved

From the desire of being popular.

Deliver me, O Jesus:

From the fear of being humiliated

From the fear of being despised

From the fear of being rebuked

From the fear of being slandered

From the fear of being forgotten

From the fear of being wronged

From the fear of being treated unfairly

From the fear of being suspected

And, Jesus, grant me the grace

To desire that others might be more loved than I

That others might be more esteemed than I

That in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I decrease

That others may be chosen and I set aside

That others may be preferred to me in everything

That others may become holier than I, provided that I, too, become as holy as I can.” 

                                                  (Mother Theresa, A Simple Path)

You want to raise a child not just with the absence of pathology but with the presence of virtue. How many times have I heard a parent say that he or she is a good kid when I knew they were as rotten as they could get. I always felt when I met a nice boy or girl...polite, industrious, the greatest compliment I could give a parent is "you have done a good job".

We are all just a car crash away, just a choking from a piece of meat away, just a strike of lightning away from eternity. Like finding a canary with purple stripes, we just don't think it will happen to us. Those of you who are sighted when you look in the mirror, it is always you. Those of us who are blind have no use for a mirror. Purple striped canaries could fly all around us and we would know nothing about it. and, mentally sick, deranged evil people, young and old are all around us and we want to pretend that they are not there; schoolhouse, courthouse, church house, even your house. Where did the people come from that fill our prisons? And they are the ones that got caught.

Every human being, from the beginning of time, is an individual. Of the 7 billion people living on earth today not another 1 is like you...even identical twins. You have a soul/assigned a guardian angel. The best surgeon in the world, using the sharpest scalpel cutting your body into very small pieces and using the most powerful microscope, cannot find your soul. Your soul is you given to you by God. The difference in the specie homosapiens from other species of animal life, both with back bones and without back bones, We have a mind and a soul, we know we are going to die. We have a brain of trillions of cells multiple trillions of synapses, can we even imagine someone killing the most magnificent creation of God, whether abortion or murder? What does a worm or termite "think" as he looks at 1 of us? And yet, we have evil, mentally sick people who will kill 1 of us as if we are a paramecium or housefly.

There is no such thing in the world as a purple striped canary, only the human mind could imagine one. No mother would believe that her sweet, innocent child, black or white, privileged or poor, smart or stupid, would mature to kill anyone, and yet, in this "so called" christian nation, our prisons are full of criminals.

Many years ago, your writer, world traveler (passports stamped in 157 countries ,8 round the world trips including both poles) went on a gorilla photography safari into mid-Africa...the Congo. My God told me, advised me ahead of time that I would be protected by Pygmies "real small people"; no education-never shoes-never  hygiene. Their fellow man in Africa actually roast them on fire and eat them. I went to a thrift store before I left and bought many used, college t-shirts, used advertising ball caps as gifts for them.My God said, "this is the greatest day of their life". I got into a wasp nest and they completely covered me, protecting me from stings". We invaded the gorilla  habitat but they were civil about the whole thing, much more than the wasps.

We live in a world where we mortgage tomorrow for today. We think that things are so important to us, cell phones/computers/bottomless ocean of technology.

The Holy Spirit of God wants no part in pride. We must get humble enough to pray for God's help with these tragedies such as the killing of school children. Every church should have special prayer, every civic club should have special programs about parenting because the value of life starts at the home.

During WWII even at our poor country church, a banner hung in the front of the church with a star for every boy in the community away at the war. Every church service those old people would go to the altar and pray for them. If 1 were killed  a gold star would be placed on the banner. At the end of WWII there was not 1 loss, not 1 gold star on the banner. We must approach the raising and maturing, preparation for life with its trials, of our young people the same way.

Seasons

According to scripture as well as life and living, everything is divided into seasons.

Perhaps the most famous season, the Christmas season; when friends/family/associates spend money they don't have on things that people don't particularly need or want...just to be able give someone something. There was a time I found on this heathen practice, having turned a holy day into a holiday, the most important day of the year celebrating the birth of Christ, into giving and getting but I changed my mind about that years ago. God, the greatest giver gave those he chose, life; and Jesus has given us, through his sacrifice, eternal life. This miracle must be evident even to unbelievers, those who never put a foot inside a church house.

Just before Christmas, and rapidly overshadowing Christmas and spending and spreeing, Halloween. When even children from christian families and churches go about their community in costume, "trick or treat, trick or treat". I understand more money is spent on Halloween than on Christmas. I will never understand how a church can celebrate a satanic event.

Then, there is the Easter season, the 2nd most important holiday/holy day of the year, when Christians celebrate a risen savior. What do rabbits laying colored eggs or chocolate eggs have to do with Easter? And yet, as with Santa Claus, as with ugly haints, perhaps there is a place for such in a child's life. As poor as we were, my mother would go to town and get us a chocolate egg with our name on it. This is a wonderful memory, but let's get to real seasons. Those of us in the USA, at least most of the USA, have real seasons to the year, spring, summer, fall and winter with the guidelines of temperature change.

Spring season; new life, seed in the ground, the ever lasting hope of a harvest. Summer; heat and the frustration of outdoor labor, sweat, which is the best anti-toxicity remedy in the world. Most of today's young people have never known a real summer job...sweating in the fields...even sweating cutting grass. Like the golfer who wants exercise, they want to ride a lawn mower just as a golfer rides a golf cart. I know I am peculiar. I have peculiarities you do not know anything about but I always cut my grass with a push mower. No engine at all, just my pushing it. I never put up a Christmas tree, not one; but for those who want to spend their money on trees and lights to celebrate my saviors birth, that is their business. Some communities are completely lit up with 1000s of lights spread over houses. All that equipment/light bulbs/electricity, and they probably don't give anything for God's work such as the needs all around them, hungry children, etc.

Then there is the flu season when people spend so much money in Dr's offices, hospitals, fighting a "wee beasty" which gives them much suffering for a few weeks. Just taking supplements and basic hygiene would eliminate most flu. Yes, I know, your Dr has probably told you that if you eat a good diet you do not need supplements. I know how little we Dr's are taught about supplements. Today's soil is depleted of most important elements. Plants will grow, USA or Brazil or Mexico but they do not have the nutrients needed to keep you healthy and, the animal products you eat, meat, no longer has the nutrition which you need. Our founding fathers could grow beautiful, healthy, nutritious vegetables in soil which had not been depleted. They ate meat from animals which were healthy. Even ate healthy seafood.

Perhaps the most radical season of change that I have witnessed in my lifetime, the political/presidential election season every 4 years. The less important, mid election, every 2 years. The founding fathers did not seek office. After much encouragement, they would just stand for office (stand) supported by people who knew them, knew their integrity/ability/honesty. Today's politicians are like dragging the bottom of a hog pen and as Joseph Kennedy said, (father of President Kennedy) it takes 3 things to get elected president, 3 rules. First is money, 2nd is money and 3rd is more money. Most political offices from the local courthouse to the state house, to the white house, are bought and paid for. From the lowly local commissioner, alderman/mayor, to the legislative senator or representative...all you have to do is win an election 1 time and you are set for life. My friend, governor, Terry Sanford, then senator, then president of Duke University, got rich...not from politics or anything else he had done with his life, rather, being appointed to so many corporate positions on boards. The lowliest corporation pays their trustees at least 1$00,000 and most former politicians sit on several. Plus, former presidents/vice presidents/senators/representatives all get wonderful retirement checks. The Clinton's claim they had no money when they left the white house. It is amazing how rich they got afterward just giving short speeches before wealthy people.

Ecclesiastes 3 King James Version (KJV) 3 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: 2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; 3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; 4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; 5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 6 A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; 7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; 8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. King James Version (KJV) Most of us who live long enough will live through all these seasons. There is nothing wrong with laughter, nothing wrong with weeping. Death is a matter of life. The mortality rate is still 100% and we all need the experience of seasons...feeling hot, feeling cold, feeling happy, feeling sad, disappointments, celebrations. Life is not about falling but about learning to pick ourselves up when we do.

EDGE OF FEAR

The Silken Tent by Robert Frost

She is as in a field a silken tent
At midday when the sunny summer breeze
Has dried the dew and all its ropes relent,
So that in guys it gently sways at ease,
And its supporting central cedar pole,
That is its pinnacle to heavenward
And signifies the sureness of the soul,
Seems to owe naught to any single cord,
But strictly held by none, is loosely bound
By countless silken ties of love and thought
To every thing on earth the compass round,
And only by one's going slightly taut
In the capriciousness of summer air
Is of the slightest bondage made aware.

Portray something around those who are supposed to know and you will find that they don't always know. You must live an entire life before you know about life and living.

When I was a child, I loved to build fortresses, a protective barrier to get behind. and then, after a long education/military career, I was blessed to travel the world and saw the many walled cities...such a part of history "Jerusalem, Jericho, Dubrovnik", and many others which I have visited. Early history, those working in the fields outside the walls, always had a fortress or barrier to which they could flee. Protecting oneself is almost as part of human nature as breathing. Most young people think history began the day they were born. People of my age (87) knew what it was to daydream. The escape of daydreaming and, I must admit, even in my youth, many escaped the realities of life looking at the bottom of a liquor bottle or an addiction to soap operas on radio and then television. So many people of my age can still talk about "Stella Dallas", "Ma Perkins" or "Portia Faces Life"; then came General Hospital or Guiding Light.

Today, the escape is addictive drugs, both prescription and those purchased on the street. My biggest problem with VA nurses sent to my house by the VA, the theft of my meds. The biggest problems in hospitals, nursing homes, the theft of opiates which can be easily sold. Now all those crocodile tears from the fake liberal newscast about addiction/the opioid epidemic and warnings about not being able to buy over the counter meds for fear that one's home or car will be turned into a meth lab business.

It never ceases to amaze me the escapism of modern day living, alcohol/pills/food, and brain manipulation via modern technology (tv, computers, pornographic and other magazines).

Next to my beach house, a house full of young college men who played games day and night. They even got into the insanity of portraying the characters; weird costumes; comic book addictions. So many young boys and girls wear black all the time... even attend conventions where fantasy and fantasizing is lauded.

It is impossible to penetrate these minds, doors without handles. investigating these anti-social human beings you find that you are drilling dry holes in a vast desert of fantasy land.

Such a change, the time when young men acted like gentlemen and young girls were debonaire. Girls actually held dance cards. At Wake Forest, professors would walk around with a ruler; boys and girls had to dance 12" apart. At Meredith, the girls could not wear black patten leather shoes for fear boys could look up their dress. Now, anything goes...just hook up. It is much like hooking up a mule to a plow, life in the raw.

So, why is this Dr., military officer, writer, world traveler, so cynical? We become cyncical because we become both amused and disgusted with what goes on in the human brain...so called normal people. We know that there are the mentally ill. One of my medical officer friends who worked in an asylum told me that he did not know how in the world they handled the mentally sick before the time of tranquilizers. AND it is something you must learn to do yourself. In the answer book which God took time to write and give to us, He speaks of our keeping a "clean mind", thinking good thoughts, love, and trust. Don't expect the government to clean minds at the church house, schoolhouse, White House or even your house. We are all sitting on the edge of fear concerning Alzheimer's and other mental disorders. 365 times God told us in His word not to fear. It is so important for children to have healthy hobbies. Mental health is as important as physical health.

When Dogs Talk

Take a look at your past and thank God. Then look to your future and trust God. Now, take a look all around you and serve God. Look within yourself and find God.

Your writer has traveled the world, 8 around the world trips, passports stamped in 157 countries, I have never been in a country, even Muslim, where there were not dogs. If 1 dog ever talked, then we would know that dogs can talk. I had a long time employed bookkeeper that declared to me, that she loved her dog more than family, friends or anything else on this earth, and he talked to her. But she never disclosed what the dog said.

Some people believe that you can predict the weather with a groundhog or the outer coating of a caterpillar. The 1 in the picture has a very dark coat which predicts a hard winter. God has control of the weather like he has control of everything else. When anyone tells me that they want an explanation for the unfairness of God "deaths of small children-horror stories about hurricanes or earthquakes" I tell them that these events are as impossible to predict as the weather.

I am 87 and cannot remember such a hard/cold winter as we have had this year. I believe we can attribute much of the flu epidemic to the weather. and yet, those of us reared in the country so remember those old houses where we lived, the outhouses, the severe weather on livestock. As a child, I was always listening. I still remember my mother and maternal grandmother talking about the great flu epidemic of 1918 when millions died. I'm willing to concede that probably about 1 percent of the population had indoor plumbing, even in the towns, they knew little about toothbrushes or toothpaste. Sanitation which we consider rudimentary. They knew nothing of supplements; few had radios or any formal education enough to read the few newspapers which could educate about prevention. Things stay in your mind that you never forget. My parents came from landowning homes, large plantations but they, like the people in town, like the schools, especially the black schools, and most churches had outside toilet facilities, hand pumps or open wells for water. Most of today's young people think history began the day they were born. They should think of what life was like 1000 or even 2000 years ago, just the basics of hygiene.

In the community where my parents were reared the flu hit very hard. Only 1 doctor, Dr. Hayes, would even go into the community. Both he and his horse (he had a horse and buggy) died from this plague. My mothers' young brother died. Her aunt, the schoolteacher in the community, died. (2 room school, aunt Cattie, for whom my mother was named). She gave birth to a baby boy just before her death. My great uncle Turner, her brother, whom I remember, took this newborn baby up to the aunt's house (aunt Lizzie) who had recently given birth to a baby.. called to them and told them to get the baby (the flu had not hit their house) and she nursed both babies. I had never understood why this man had a different last name from Aunt Lizzie and her family even though he was her son until I learned about his survival. My grandmother, the most saintly woman I have ever known, said those laying in the great plantation house, which is still there, which survived the civil war; when they started coughing they knew that death awaited them. The men, strong enough, were working building wood boxes to bury them. No preachers/no out of community family members would come into the community. It took the civil war for surgeons to learn to wash their hands before surgery. It took the flu epidemic for people to learn that exposure to those with it was the reason for contagion.

At civic clubs, scientific meetings, even AAAS (American Association for the Advancement of Science) where I have had memberships and where some would actually listen to me; I have "preached sanitation" as the only preventive to contagious diseases. Most children walk around with a telephone in their pocket that contains more technology than when man went to the moon. Yet the most fundamental of scientific facts are still neglected by the science community. These things at the end of your arms, with 5 tentacles called fingers, are the causes of most disease. Yet, because it is a habit we "charming" humans continue to grasp 1 another's fingers not knowing where they have been, not realizing that they are the poison in the well. It will take me a long time to forgive the 100's of medical schools and science foundations that have neglected prevention; willing to sit by while 1000's die from an easily preventable microbiology dilemma. Like malaria in Africa, where I saw so many die, like starvation in many parts of the world, like women carrying jugs all day long to find potable water, the dog has barked and we know that sanitation and prevention talks.

On 1 of my around the world trips, I had 48 flights...many airplanes...many people...some well, some sick. Planes are just germ crucibles that fly through the air. When will hospitals and Dr's offices learn that carpeting/overstuffed chairs/draperies serve as harbor refuge for germs? I do not get out very much, my blindness, my cancer, etc., when I go out to eat with my friend, here they come; people I know and love, wanting to shake my hand while I am eating with my hands. Have you noticed that most people go to the bathroom only when they go to a restaurant? Did they wash their hands? If you really want to get sick, if you really want to spend some government tax dollars, just handle a few stair rails, a few doorknobs and the dirtiest, the most loved item known to man, fiat money. I still remember in my practice when women would pull out money from all over their body to pay me. I still recline from the touch of money. "Paper money can harbor thousands of microbes from every environment it touches—whether that’s someone’s fingers, a waiter’s apron, a vending machine or the dank area under someone’s mattress. Other research has shown that some bank notes and coins contain pathogens like Escherichia coli (E. coli), salmonella and staphylococcusaureus, which can lead to serious illness". (http://time.com/4918626/money-germs-microbes-dirty/).

I get so tired of today's spoiled young people. My mothers only surviving sister died last year died at the age of 96. She graduated from Louisburg college, 1936. Now, remember my folks came from plantations with large plantation houses. She had met some young man who came down to visit her unexpectedly 1 day. He said he needed to go to the bathroom and all she could do was point to a path. He had never been to an outhouse like most of todays spoiled young people. He got into his little car and left. This small child tried to comfort her as she laid on the bed crying not knowing I would eventually face the same embarrassment; particularly at the church house (where we were ashamed to invite our friends) or our own homes. There was not inside plumbing in our home until long after I had graduated from college and served our country in the military. Today, poverty areas of eastern North Carolina and many places of the world, such still exist, in spite of banks-security dealers-universities.