Branded

Still in use today the old wild west method of branding livestock. Using a hot branding iron, burning into the hide so ownership is always clearly determined. With sheep or animals whose coat is of value, an ear-mark is used and, with a dairy herd, an ear tag in the ear. In this age of technology, a small chip less than the size of a grain of rice is installed in the hide of many pets and, according to the Obama plan, healthcare in the future will be determined by a small chip in the hide of human beings... a chip showing your identity, health history, etc.

When meeting a fellow disabled person, I often say, you are wearing and bearing your brand well. I truly believe that God has branded many of us for His own purpose, with the brand of blindness, deafness, crippled infirmity. Eternal life does not depend on your doing anything, God will take care of everything and, if it means wearing a certain brand, enduring a disability like the Christian life itself, we will handle it well.

The Christian life is an journey not a destination. I can tell you this without fear of contradiction, that if your family, friends, associates do not call you a nut, because of living your faith, you can be sure you are not a Christian. YOU NEED TO GET SAVED.

Jesus preached Himself. His resurrection authenticated His message. His resurrection was an eclismic experience to those who knew Him best. History tells us that Jesus lived, even the agnostics agree to that but, you must believe that He was raised from the dead.

Everything in the universe proves the existence of God, the heavens declare the glory of God. (Psalm 19:1) Our sins were forgiven before Jesus was born, but He expects repentance. And, the world, the flesh, the devil... the sophisticated. Comfortable church members want nothing to do with repentance. The Christian, disabled or not, is branded forever with the eternal security of knowing that in life or death we are protected by His powerful right hand. (1 Peter 5:6) Peter knew the powerful right hand, in the shortest prayer ever spoken, save me. One can always tell earnestness in prayer by it's shortness. Jesus did not ask him about his faith, He just saved him. Most of us depend on Jesus when we have run out of our own resources

They were on a boat in the sea, with storm, wind and waves. Jesus came walking on the waves toward them. Impetuous Peter stepped out of the boat to walk toward Him, and Peter did walk on the water. (Peter walked on water further than any of those who have criticized him) but, like most of us who are branded, he took his eyes off the Lord, looking at the wind and waves. Jesus reached down His hand for him, saved him and, as with us, he got into the boat with him, accompanied them all and, as with us, available for the next miracle.

As with us, the circumstances are always there before the miracle, before our time of need AND they were there afterward. God does not change the circumstances before or afterward, only us. Not one giant in God's Word was changed because of a change in circumstances.

Terrible Roman tyranny, terrible social problems, all fled the crucifixion scene except John BUT, something that proves the resurrection, something that fortifies your faith, those who witnessed His resurrection, amid the circumstances, experienced a radical change in life, they were never the same again. I have seen the Himalayas, I have seen India, one can only imagine the disciple Thomas walking that distance as a witness. Bartholomew, skinned alive in Armenia; Luke, hanged from an olive tree in Greece; Mark, dragged through the streets of Alexandria, Egypt; Peter, crucified, hanging upside down in Rome. There was no communication, no one had conjured up the resurrection story. They were alone, knew they would never see one another again. Men may die like this for truth, but not for a lie. They were witnesses, knew that He had come out of that grave. Molecular displacement was nothing to our blessed Lord, He created it. Near the very end of the Bible, we have these words which should be branded in your heart. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. (Revelation 21:4)

I thought I understood the eternal security of God through Jesus Christ. Then, I saw a father walking down the street holding on to his son's hand. Then, I knew eternal security. It was not the son holding on to the father but, the strength, the eyesight of the father holding on to the son... Branded.

Roach Motel

The most resilient life, able to adapt to any environment, the greatest distributor of microbiology, found throughout the world: the cockroach. Some species are several inches in length and can live for many days without food or water, their females continuously hatching offspring. From my study of parasitology, these pests are probably the most dangerous lifeforms in existence. One would think that with all the technological advances, with out chemical and biological expertise, such dangers to mankind would have been eliminated long ago.

We have no problem affecting the RU486 abortion pill which eliminates God's chief creation, babies. We have no problem with the technology that has almost eradicated the genetics involved in all seed production. The earliest forms of tobacco, like other herbs which you can inhale, were good for the lungs. According to the World Health Organization, lung disease is the greatest killer in the world, yet over 500 chemicals were added to tobacco, including benzene and arsenic, and tobacco became a killer. The most successful area of mind control in the world: the smoking of tobacco products. Anyone who has ever seen the autopsy, the lungs, of a tobacco smoker, anyone with knowledge about the growing of tobacco, (constant dusting and spraying with poisons to kill insects, the sticky stomata on the leaves holding fast the poison, the leaves then dried) would know that tobacco with its poisons and toxicity could not be good for anyone. Primitive civilizations used it, along with other herbs, medicinally.

As a young student at the university, I had to work. My first job was working in the university cafeteria, I have never forgotten the warehouse where the food for the cafeteria was stored. There were rats everywhere, one cannot comprehend so many rats. Rats, like cockroaches, urinate and defecate everywhere they move. There is nothing more poisonous than the defecation of cockroaches and rats, yet, think of it, a prestigious university staffed with highly intelligent people, a nation spending millions of dollars on public health projects and clinics, and still to this day, rats and cockroaches in places of commerce, and more maddening/sickening of all, thriving in the homes of citizens.

On my many trips through Asia, particularly China, where 66% of the people smoke cigarettes, I was shocked at the many smokers, their variety of cigarettes. They do not poison their tobacco, but they do put out poison to eradicate rats and cockroaches.

The poet William Cowper said, “God moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform.” God must blush and snicker to watch the unexpected actions of His chief creation...consistent inconsistencies. We know that radiation causes cancer and yet continue to cling to radiation treatment for cancer treatment. We know that God's most prized creation, His most prized possession are children, yet we spit in His face by killing children and even glorifying same-sex marriage (marriage of those who cannot have children), marginalizing and putrefying the education and development of children. Only insane people would expose young, sensitive minds to putrid television. Only insane people would buy putrid food for a child's ingestion. Only insane people, knowing the consequences of hideous, sinful activity, prisons full of people convicted of such, would allow their most precious possessions, their children, to be exposed to such depravity anywhere.

We pray that God will forgive this country, the citizens of this world, those who know better, for such insanity. The greatest example of forgiveness: Christ and Peter. Catholics should cling to this truth, Peter so close to Christ, yet at the trial, as His Savior was being flogged, sat down with the accusers and warmed his hands by their fire and denied knowing Him. God always warns us, He used a rooster to warn Peter, true repentance to such sin, leads to much weeping, but on Resurrection morning, Christ said, “go tell my disciples, and tell Peter.” Why did He specify Peter? Such marvelous forgiveness is available to us.

In our brilliance, the roach motel, they go in and don't come out. So should it be with our living, our giving, using the sanity of being able to determine right from wrong. You go to poor people to hear purpose in prayer, you go to needful people, those who want to understand God's message, to hear purpose in prayer.

Yo-Yo

First made popular in 1920, the Yo-Yo is a spool on a thread with a knot at the end where you put your finger. Yo-Yos come and go, about every 10 years, there is a growth of popularity with Yo-Yos, learning to do tricks with them, etc...The American government is very much like a yo-yo, coming and going, producing tricks. From its inception, some of the world's smartest men differed in their opinions... President Thomas Jefferson, a great believer in state's rights, Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, a great promoter of federalism.

An organization called the Democratic Socialists of America, in its October 2009 newsletter said they have 70 (Democrat) members in the House of Representatives, 11 on the House judiciary committee. Eleanor Roosevelt, wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “if America were to go Communist, it would have been during the Great Depression.” FDR was doing everything in his power to bring on Communism through his Vice President Henry Wallace, an avowed Communist, and his Chief of Staff Harry Hopkins. Then and until now, there has been a slow but sure take over of American lives by American government, the takeover will be complete with the microchip in an identification card. The objective of Socialists in government, Socialism leading to Communism, always begins with labor unions; Stalin's Russia, Hitler's Germany, and everywhere else it has been tried. Many of us remember the bushy eyebrow-ed John L. Louis, President of the United Mine Workers Union, even then the mine workers were not as rabid in their decadence as supposed “quality people” teaching school, like those in Wisconsin.

Democrats have promoted and passed everything possible leading to Communism. Their Democrat leadership, led by President Lyndon B. Johnson, wanted civil rights, but it took Republicans to pass the law. Democrat votes have socialized healthcare, the gay agenda, abortion, and as certain as the sun rises in the east, euthanasia. Most healthcare dollars are spent during the final years of a citizen's life. The fastest growing population is those over the age 85. If Democrats will vote to kill the most innocent, the unborn, they most surely will vote to eliminate the most expensive, those who they think have been here long enough. Every book, every movie, every direction of our indoctrination system points to elimination of the old and disabled, costly citizens.

Your political party is a reflection of you. If you call yourself a Christian, support and vote for the Democrat party, you should question your salvation. Don't look for justice in the world, as long as those who legislate justice are deceived by the master magician, Satan himself. Has it bothered anyone that America has been unable to win a war since 1945? Has it occurred to anyone that the 53 million babies killed, if they had been allowed to live, would have families, and would be paying taxes and in every way contributing to this republic and preventing this present recession?

When the children of Israel crossed the Jordan on dry land, entered the Promised Land, confronted the seven civilizations there, they immediately conquered Jericho, the largest fortified city there. Joshua could not understand the loss of life when they attempted to conquer Ai, since there had not been the loss of one Israelite life at Jericho. On his face before God, God let him know that there was too much sin among his people.

America has become a profane nation: abortion, pornography, greed, homosexuality, apostate churches, useless warfare, killing of the innocent with drones and chemicals such as depleted uranium. America has sent $500 billion to Israel, $500 billion to Egypt, spent trillions on other wars, while the home front disintegrates. With heart attacks, cancer and strokes leading the list, 50% of the population diabetic and/or obese, more suicide among young people, addictions of every type, alcoholic children from alcoholic parents, 50% of all marriages ending in divorce, more annulments in the Catholic church in America than all of the rest of the world combined, we have sown to the wind and we have reaped a whirlwind. (Hosea 8:7)

This week begins Lent, the time Christians celebrate the second greatest event in the history of the world, the Resurrection of Jesus after He had been crucified. His disciples had watched His miracles, they knew Him best. At His crucifixion, all ran except for Peter who watched from a distance. Later, as an old man, Peter could say that our faith is more precious than Gold. (1 Peter 1:7)

Today's Christians do not need the yo-yo, rather they need to make a trip to the potter's house, watch the potter with the wheel, creating out clay. (Jeremiah 18:1-4) The potter never takes his eyes of the wheel, his creation, burned in the heat for service.

The Fisherman

The greatest joy of the Christian life is in studying God's inspired word. It is beyond my comprehension that those who have the audacity to call themselves “Christians” do not find everything they could possibly want in this ONE BOOK. This is the only book in the world which speaks directly to you, by your own Father, the Creator of the Universe, words which can give you fulfillment when nothing else can. We love to read about our Savior, the world's only perfect human being, (God, who put on a tent of human flesh and dwelled among us) to think that in this world of 'haves and have nots', the one who created everything owned nothing but the one robe he was wearing!

And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” (Matthew 8:20) In a world fraught with possessions, to think that our blessed Lord never owned anything, never went many miles from the home where he was raised, but from 12 itinerant followers, has become the best known name, the name above every name. And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written: KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.(Revelation 19:16)

Every legal document, every check that is written on this day, is in memory of his birth. The wonderful, exciting characters of the Old Testament are ever in our mind. Abraham, ,whose name means father of a great multitude, the first Jew, the world's wealthiest man at the time; Joseph, whose own brothers sold him into slavery, and the very shackles that bound him, immunized him for the temptations and knowledge that determined world history; Paul, writer of most of the New Testament, 13 of the 27 books, probably the most educated man in the world at the time, but none can compare with Peter. What mortal man can fail to associate himself with this 'real' man with qualities which we all possess. I do not know how many books have been written about this great New Testament character, first Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, such as “Peter, Prince of the Apostles”, but none can compare with his epistles.

The epistles are addressed to believers in general, who are strangers in every city or country where they live, and are scattered through the nations. These are to ascribe their salvation to the electing love of the Father, the redemption of the Son, and the sanctification of the Holy Ghost; and so to give glory to one God in three Persons, into whose name they had been baptized. As a faithful servant of Jesus how very eminent Peter stands forth to observation; for who among the apostles so zealous, so attached to his Lord, as Peter? And that such a one should fall from his integrity, even to the denial of his Lord, what caution doth it teach to the highest servants of Jesus! But when we have paid all due attention to those striking particularities in the life of Peter, the most blessed and most important instruction the life of this apostle exhibits, is in the display of that sovereign grace of Jesus manifested in Peter's recovery. Hope, in the world's phrase, refers only to an uncertain good, for all worldly hopes are tottering, built upon sand, and the worldlings hopes of heaven are blind and groundless conjectures. But the hope of the sons of the living God is a living hope; not only as to its object, but as to its effect also. It enlivens and comforts in all distresses, enables to meet and get over all difficulties. All possessions are stained with sin, either in getting or in using them. How ready we are to turn the things we possess into occasions and instruments of sin, and to think there is no liberty or delight in their use, without abusing them! Worldly possessions are uncertain and soon pass away, like the flowers and plants of the field.

Whether naked in a fishing boat, warming himself by the enemies fire, or cutting off an ear with his sword, (I'm convinced Peter was aiming at the throat) Peter felt, at the end, unwilling to be crucified as was his savior, so, according to legend, he was crucified upside down. I know of no verse of scripture, that I have given to more people in times of troubles or sorrows, than the wonderful verse 1 Peter 1:6-7. “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ...” Particularly, in times of loss, whether by disability, (blindness, deafness, crippled, etc.) or otherwise, we find great comfort in knowing that Peter, like us, was a character of disappointment but who knew that “our trials are more precious than gold.” Satan has a way of molding people through his deceit, into people who find no satisfaction in anything, always out for a new conquest, sexual or otherwise (even to the molestation of children), never with enough money, willing to swindle/lie/cheat/steal.

I hear advertisements, as people are constantly bombarded with their desire for things, about such comforts as mattresses, a mattress which can be regulated for firmness, that can have different firmness for different sides for husband and wife. Have you ever considered, how many people in the world, have never slept on a mattress? I have been in hospitals, in remote areas of the world, where patients were laying on bags of leaves or straw. The answer to suffering is suffering, the most unfair act in the world was the crown of thorns slapped on our Savior's head.

Today, as with the first couple, (the only people in the world to not have navels) is the beguiling challenge by Satan, then and now, “Does God really mean what he says? When he draws a line, does he really expect us not to cross it?” Was Peter really sincere when he left us the message that we are to be peculiar people, strangers and pilgrims, that our citizenship is in Heaven. “Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul” (1 Peter 2:11) Peter, like Paul, could say to us as we struggle with our daily challenges, we are just here on a temporary visa, a holding pattern in our eternal flight. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ. (Philippians 3:20)

50 days after the crucifixion, Pentecost, when Peter gave his greatest sermon, had I been there, I think I would have said to Peter, “if I were you, I would stay quiet.” But, Peter knew forgiveness, after all, at the graveyard, it was Peter who went into the tomb, and it was Peter that our blessed Lord specifically desired to know of His Resurrection. But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you. (Mark 16.7)