#1922 Merriment and Mystery

#1922

Merriment and Mystery

"Paul Revere’s Ride" - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

Listen, my children, and you shall hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-Five:

Hardly a man is now alive

Who remembers that famous day and year....

So through the night rode Paul Revere;

And so through the night went his cry of alarm

To every Middlesex village and farm,--

A cry of defiance, and not of fear,

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,

And a word that shall echo forevermore!

For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,

Through all our history, to the last,

In the hour of darkness and peril and need,

The people will waken and listen to hear

The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,

And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

We are sick and tired of being sick and tired.  There are not many things in life we have control over.  No matter how many vehicle accidents we pass by, "it is not going to happen to me."  No matter how many times we hear the fire truck-ambulance, "it is not going to happen to me."  Last year, Americans spent $1.5 trillion dollars on "sick care".  The more money we spend on doctors and at drug stores, the sicker we get.  In this article, I want to discuss mysteries, which I want someone to explain to me. 

We live in a nation of merriment, as was the case with the Roman Empire, before it fell, the powerbrokers-politicians-ruling class making sure, the working class kept their minds free of their actual problems.  This was the reason for the building of Circus Maximus, still standing, seating one hundred fifty thousand spectators.  (Seating more than most modern arenas.)  Can we even imagine such at that time in history?  But just think, even before that extravaganza, the great walls around Babylon, walls although high, so wide, that chariot races took place on them.  The mystery of the ages, that most of the world's population was slaves even when Jesus walked the Earth, that man cannot determine his future...what is happening to him.  Most people are just content to be pawns of others, just as long as there is enough merriment in their existence to make life tolerable.  Who do our politicians, so-called leaders, think they are fooling?  And, it is a mystery to a few, that we will have a President Trump.  Many people are tired of criminals...another mystery, those with the supposed education, should have figured it out but those with the money, education, talent are the victims.  For example, one of my friends has a son who is student at NC State University, after the Trump win, the female professor came into the classroom, having evidently suffered all night, she was still in tears, told her class they should sign up as having attended but she was unable to lecture that day, she could not recover from Trump winning the election.  And to think, that we as taxpayers are paying for such mediocrity at a state tax supported university.  I understand there were actually grief counselors at many universities to accommodate academic types (students and professors) who could not accept the elected winner...choice of the Electoral College. 

Work of any type is a calling.  We are not stuck where we start but I am so thankful that I grew up knowing the honor of hard work.  I saw hardworking parents, grandparents, relatives, neighbors.  Of course, this was before the time of television, national addiction to sports and sports teams.  Today's world, grown men and women taking every holiday possible to sit around in la-z-boys and watch millionaires play ball.  Government workers, college professors, even school teachers and pastors use every excuse for a holiday.  It sickens me when I hear a preacher talk about taking Monday off because he preached for thirty minutes on Sunday.  The great preacher, George Whitfield, preached four sermons everyday, travelling place to place by horseback.  He preached to thousands in every state, it is believed that eighty-percent of the American colonials heard him speak.  The people who heard him speak, mostly farmers, knew that livestock must be fed everyday and the cow must be milked everyday.  I never knew my parents to take off any day...even Christmas.  Ours was not a world of merriment-entertainment.

The mystery of the ages, for people with nominal intelligence; people who can read and write, how and why you spend the few years you have on this Earth, and in so many cases very limited years.  (There are as many short graves as long graves in the graveyard.)  Not busy doing the work which God placed us here to do, but finding excuses for laxness-merriment.  Then, at life's end, whether you are a young corpse or an old one (dead is dead) to spend a very certain eternity in splendor or in horror.  So many mysteries as we study actions of men...supposed concerns for souls, supposed concerns for health-welfare of others.  It is much like President Obama who wanted to do so much for his race and country...yet, spends most of his time on the golf course.  It is like the church, so concerned about heathen in foreign lands.  But when these heathen come to this country to find jobs and work, an example of real family life, these heathen, send back to their families six hundred billion dollars from their pay (more money than is given in foreign aid by all countries).  Another mystery, needing interpretation, iconography, figures and paintings of religious types, as with merriment, we expect some response, some comfort from these idols.  It is time to realize that mystery in all things lies within the human heart, the greatest distance on Earth, the fourteen inches between your heart and your brain.  

#1921 Gourmet and Garnishment

#1921 

Gourmet and Garnishing

 "Humpty Dumpty" Mother Goose

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, 

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; 

All the king's horses and all the king's men 

Couldn't put Humpty together again.

Lord, I don't want to make everyone as unhappy as I am.  I just wish that even family, friends, neighbors could understand my concern about their unconcern.  

In other articles, my own personal life has become much too personal, perhaps, even self-serving, I just want others to know why I have the obligation to share many experiences with you.  God help those who have never had the desire to share life's sorrows as well as life's joys.  God help those who have never wanted for anything, who never got rid of the old man of sin and rejection and became a new creature (2 Corinthians 5:17) filled with the righteousness of Christ...attempting to see what Christ would see, what Christ would feel about those who did not win life's lottery...those with the DNA of the African, DNA of the Native American Indians.  God help those who overcame poverty, addictions, and the many other challenges which God used to glorify him.  This old, blind, disabled veteran will never understand how so many take life so casually, as if they are on a "merry-go-round" from which they can disembark at will, you only go around one time, and it is so fast.  I will never understand those, who think that God is made in their image, not they in God's image.  

I don't claim any special incite along with my lack of eyesight, but I truly believe God had in his plan for me, and we are all chosen for a special place in his plans, a reason for my existence, I think he wanted me to see special people, as they are, as I sold Bibles door to door every summer, to pay my way through college.  Why would he have made the arrangement for me to travel the world?  Every continent, studying people with whom I could not relate because they were all so different: yet, so much alike.  

I was selling books, in a little place near the Black River called Council, an ancient black woman was sitting in a rocker on her front porch, and she certainly did not look like a prospect for buying anything...everything destitute.  But, as was my experience, so many times, she possessed within her persona neither haplessness nor hopeless, only holiness which only God, in his mercy can provide.

She was so enthralled by my presence, my personality, my wanting to share with her, some words she said to me, which I have used a thousand times in speaking before groups, "Son, if I miss out on Heaven I have really missed out."  She told me that she had lost her husband, a hauler of logs, in a terrible accident.  She said, "I was left with three small children, two boys and a girl.  The landowner who owned this house told me I could live here as long as I wished, all I was required to do, work on the farm when needed and help his wife at her house when needed."  She said, "My children and myself foraged all the fields for potatoes-corn-beans, anything that had been missed.  We dried the food in the sun and stored it in large paper bags hung from the ceiling so rats could not get at our food.  The boys roamed the woodlands picking up broken limbs and lighter pine knots for a large wood pile, so we could stay warm and cook.  This is the way we survived, by God's mercy and the help of friends who knew our situation.  My children and I were always in church, my children were always in school."

She explained that all of her children graduated from high school and with the help of the government and their church, went onto college.  She took great pride in telling me how they excelled in college, how both boys became medical doctors, her daughter a PhD professor at St Augustine College.  "Would you believe from this old house, this old woman, three children with doctors in front of their names?  Of course, in their prosperity they wanted me to move away from here, but I am happy here in my familiar surroundings, my friends, they keep my house stuffed with food and other things.  They come home to see me but have never forgotten the bigotry and discrimination abutted them."  

Most people, unlike this woman and her children, even, unlike this blind veteran, do not have the scar tissue to understand what has happened and what is happening in their world.  You must have some scars, some healed over tissue, to understand the world around you: most sit in light, the light of truth, yet wear blinders to everything going on.  EVIL ALWAYS DISGUISES ITSELF AS GOOD.  Can we even imagine the mental processing of Blacks or Indians who were so mistreated?  And we think, that since a few things have changed (we all drink out of the same water fountains-we all go to the same toilets-we all ride in the same transportation-allowed to eat in any restaurant we choose-can spend our same colored money at any store we choose) that magically, our brains have become rewired by laws "supposedly" of justice.  

There is no sewer of injustice more evident to the senses of eyes or nose than that found at courthouses, statehouses, and certainly the nation's domed house of power.  In our nation's capitol even the statues of George Washington or Thomas Jefferson mean nothing.  Even the painting of Pocahontas being baptized, found in the Rotunda, means nothing.  "In God We Trust" on our currency, means nothing.  The power brokers of America, local, state, national are only interested in one thing and one thing only, reelection and staying close to the money pot.  We get so nauseated with "talking heads" who have an unholy alliance with the politicians, in a deceitful ability to never offend, always "politically correct".  I just pray to God that with a plain talking President Trump some of this deceitfulness will find a "hiding place".  I cannot believe it is just veterans, I believe most hardworking, taxpaying, God-fearing citizens, and victims of that boring gaze of bureaucrats found in every government office...the disdain-disgust-indifference with which they are treated will soon have reason to "run for cover".  

It is encouraging for those of us from poverty, who worked our way through higher education, to know, that those students living "grandly" from government handouts (more free stuff) will repay their government loans from the garnishment of their social security checks.  This 86-year-old, blind, Army medical officer worked his way entirely through eight years of professional education...surviving on spending $1 a day for food, there was nothing I could do about it, but can you imagine how it infuriated me to help staff Army hospitals where most of the staff were Nazi-German officers brought to this country after WWII.  Hitler's great program of rockets was being continued at Red Stone Arsenal, Alabama.  The closest Army hospital was at Fort McClellan, Alabama, I was assigned there, numb with unbelief, under the command of former Nazi officers wearing American Army uniforms...such names as Marx, Brauer, Gottlieb, etc.  I remember the officer I replaced, and what he said on his way out, "I don't know what is going on here but the inmates have taken over the asylum."  Now, as those in government, industry, even preachers eat gourmet food.  Those who wore the uniforms, live with the injuries, whose ancestors did not have the DNA to impress the masses, we just survive, and wait for the ax to fall.  

#1920 Horizontal Bunny Hop

#1920

Horizontal Bunny Hop

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military industrial complex."  (Farewell Address President Eisenhower)

From the very beginning, both on the other side of the cross and this side of the cross, the consistent inconsistencies in mankind, even Jesus said, "...whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness."  (Matthew 23:27)  We live in a world of nasty livers, listen to the lyrics of their music, the fraud of movies, sexual innuendo of every type in television programs.  Even worse, news people no longer even attempt to hide their deceit.  No matter your party registration, if you have any intelligence at all, you should be bothered by the fact that the national news people (CNC, NBC, CBS, ABC, etc) are just bunny hopping with the democrat party.  Most people know that adultery-fornication-pornography is against the law but because, of political correctness, because, if it feels good do it, because, everything must be fair, we have a society bereft of all moral values.

This writer was in his own car, returning from a trip to a veteran's hospital, where I had been for treatment.  My driver stopped at a gas station to fill up my car with gas, he went inside with my credit card to pay for the gas, another car drove up next to me, filled with young black boys and one white girl, the radio was loud enough that it could be heard faraway, all of them jumped out of the car, jacked-up on some type drugs, using language which no one should hear, running into the store.  My driver came running out, jumped in my car, and said," Let me get you away from here."  This girl was some parents' daughter, these hooligan boys were some parents' sons. 

When will politicians-pastors-physicians and even parents, learn that the world is controlled by the mind of Satan?  When will Americans awaken to the fact that politicians are more interested in the control of the taxpayer's money than they are in the taxpayer?  When will church members realize that pastors are more concerned with the control of tithes and offerings than they are in the hardworking, God-fearing members who give their money to God's work?  Politicians and pastors are not concerned with those from which money comes, but in the money and the control of the money. 

My best friend, as a totally blind Christian, is the radio.  There are many marvelous ministries of messages and music to which I listen.  There are many churches and evangelical programs to which I listen, I have noticed, in the past twenty years, that a large part of each program's time, some in segments of fifteen or thirty minutes, some even one hour, more time is spent asking for money than is spent on the message.  It is a common practice now that in each message, divided halfway, to put in a plea for more money.  Fundamentalist-evangelical churches are so afraid of government interference, but, I noticed that every time a ministry asks for money they always impress upon us that the money given is tax-deductible.  If a church or a ministry of any type, cannot see its way clear to pay its bills, without asking the public for funds, WHY START THE PROGRAM?  If the money you give to God is given as a tax write-off, you have not given God anything.  The giving of money is one of the truest forms of worship; we give money because of worship (worth-ship) not seeking a tax deduction.  Certainly, a religious ministry should have some concern about the origin of any funds sent for its use. 

I made it a practice long ago not to give to any individual or group, secular or spiritual, where the recipients live better than I live.  God knows how frugally I live, only thrift store clothing, only secondhand house furnishings, food always on special.  I cringe with righteous indignation, when I hear the poor preparation of many "so-called" preachers.  I become stupefied when I think of the salaries they are paid.  Everyday, everyway, and anyone with any of the senses still functioning, can know this, we see people all around us on the broad road to Hell.  And, most of us are not the least concerned.  Pitiful the sermonettes I hear, but I realize they are for Christianettes.  Pitiful that I never hear concern about sin or salvation, the decadence taking place throughout the world, and the church's indifference about it.  "For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?"  (1 Peter 4:17)  There are always goals, secular as well as spiritual, we hear about the struggles to control the results of these goals.

I truly believe America has just witnessed the beginning of the end of indifference, both political and spiritual.  Our people may not be the brightest bulbs on the tree, the sharpest knives in the drawer, but those who can think and are thinking, have enough sense to know that there is poison in the well.  We know that the politicians are concerned only with their reelection, that religious types are only concerned with their easy life, that those with cushy jobs are only concerned with keeping the boat from rocking.  Perhaps, and it is a big perhaps, in a blunt speaking Donald J. Trump, the hero of the common man has finally been found.  If Trump cannot save this nation, then all of you content with the "bunny hop" should prepare for terrible times.  How many Christian-patriot-children's heads must be chopped off...Christian edifices must be burned...women and children terrorized before we realize that the enemy has us surrounded?  And, we are at their mercy.  So far, terrorists are winning, worldwide, six trillion American tax dollars have been spent in the Middle East and the Middle East is worse off than ever before. 

This writer comes from a Baptist heritage; I was raised-baptized-worked diligently all my productive life in Baptist churches.  Like the democrat and republican parties, they left me; the Baptist Church has left me.  Baptists have gone the way of Satan as did the Lutheran-Methodist-Presbyterian-etc. 

The last Baptist church in which I was a member, gave myself totally, until God one morning told me to never go back.  Had a pastor who left town in an affair with a girl about the age of his daughter.  One church member, a lawyer, paid this pastor's dues at the country club.  One member paid this pastor's bills for clothing at an expensive clothing store.  The last morning I was there, one of the deacons had to go to the "well-paid" church organist's apartment to awaken him from a drunken stupor; one lady was playing the piano for the church service when the organist, frazzled and frizzled, slid onto the organ bench, about halfway the service.  This is a good picture of today's modernistic-liberal-pretending Christendom.  With all my personal warts-calluses-imperfections, I will have my own personal communion-prayer-worship alone, and at home.  God knows where to find me.

#1919 Tabula Rasa

#1919

Tabula Rasa

(Latin- Blank Slate)

            "Ye Call Me" - unknown

            Ye call Me Master and obey me not,
            Ye call Me Light and see me not,
            Ye call Me way and follow me not
            Ye call Me Life and desire me not,
            Ye call Me wise and acknowledge me not,
            Ye call Me fair and love me not,
            Ye call Me rich and ask me not,
            Ye call Me eternal and seek me not,
            Ye call Me gracious and trust me not,
            Ye call Me Noble and serve me not,
            Ye call Me mighty and honor me not,
            Ye call Me just and fear me not,
            If I condemn you, blame me not.

From start to finish, no neutral ground, the world will try to make you think that history is not true but every experience; everything around us tells us that it is true.  And, truth is truth whether anyone believes it or not.  Real smart people just will not believe that the Creator of the universe actually wrote a book, the Holy Bible.  There is some awkward language; Adam "knew" Eve and she conceived.  The first born was Cain, the first born child in the world; can we even imagine how Eve made of him a spoiled brat?  Her second child was another boy named Abel, and Abel pleased God.  Cain did not like this, and so he killed his brother, Abel.  Just think the first two children born in the world, brothers and one killed the other.  (Now we expect nations to get along.)  Each of these boys was a blank slate.  Have you ever looked at a newly born baby?  Unlike these first two boys, babies are now blessed with extensive DNA, genetic entanglements of ancestry.  But, when you look at a newly born baby, you think, "Blank Slate".  How is it that in a time of about twenty years, pampering, experience, development of every type...spirits of rebellion, spirits of competition, talent, teasing, even treachery, we have adults in our midst. 

Chosen by God for life, most of us having the same homeostasis in body function-physiology-morphology what a difference in abilities: one, hands that can handle any ball, hands that can play any music instrument, or hands that can perform surgery.  The great atheist, Friedrich Nietzsche (God is Dead, fame) who could play the piano, could never understand why he could not play as well as his friend, Johannes Brahms.  In spite of everything, life's unequal playing field, the fact that many of us are not winners in life's lottery, God expects a positive return on his investment.  AND, there will be a final accounting. 

Have you seen so many beat themselves to death chasing wealth, believing there are pockets in shrouds; seventy percent of the public hates their jobs.  Get little pleasure from work or even living.  The first book of God's Bible, Job, he had it right, "And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." (Job 1:21) 

The greatest mystery of my lifetime, 86 years, and, man is the only animal that can blush, that there is no longer any shame about anything.  Just one day's news, the atrocities at Aleppo, the shame of Russian-doping athletes,

The first time I was in Russia, when it was the USSR, a friend traveled with me who was a New York City television reporter, we were amazed at the public drunkenness of just ordinary Russians, people were drunk everywhere, on the trolleys-up and down the streets, later, I said to him," If I could not escape living in this God-forsaken place, I would stay drunk too." 

Have we reached a place in our civilization that clean, "blank slates" have become so disoriented-disgusted with the world that we just want to escape?  Just think of a mother and father, going to prison, deserting their own precious children because of drug addiction. 

It is a basic fact of biology that group functioning is best...family life, teams, and congregations.  When the children of Israel, escaped the bondage of Egypt, after 400 years of slavery they left in groups of five, just think, over two million people led by Moses out of Egypt, across the dry land of the Red Sea, water piled up on each side, moving toward the "Promised Land".  There is always strength in numbers, unbelievers believe in counting numbers instead of making numbers count.  In a group, you have cohesion, cooperation; you look out for one another. 

At what point in our maturity did we begin to discriminate?  Many white children are nursed by a black "mammy".  In old Southern homes, before the time of baby food, a black would often chew up food to be fed to a white child.  The most elitist white families were cared for, cooked for, by the same black people they discriminated against.  How could "supposed" white Christians observe separate colored and white water fountains, toilets, doctor's reception rooms, and yet go to their separated churches and sing "Onward Christian Soldiers" knowing full well that most of their soldiers had deserted: while taking up an offering to evangelize black people in other countries: knowing full well of a black church across the tracks, in need.  Perhaps, it is the paradox-hypocrisy everywhere we look, that has caused seventy percent of young people, raised in "Christian" homes, to be antagonized by and later desert the church. 

Compared to most disciplines, psychology is a very new science study, I so remember one of my professors at UNC-CH, the actual writer of a much used textbook on psychology.  The science was new and I was sitting next to Dr. Guy Phillips, noted professor, as we listened to a PhD psychologist, describe his new science, he then showed film involving the human brain, of course, back then, the old fashion reels and projector were used.  One of the film broke and this esteemed psychology professor took out his belt and began to beat the projector.  Dr. Phillips said to me, "This does not speak well for his science."  The human brain, God's greatest creation, is magnificent beyond all words to describe.  Think of what the human brain has produced, when I was a young practitioner, sulfur drugs were important.  Now, most scientists know nothing about such.  When I was young, there were healing evangelists, and yet, the pontiff-Pope of the Catholic Church, still prays in a private chapel, as he has done for thousands of years.  In a world of technology, there are still people who forage for food, human beings who walk many miles to get potable drinking water.  In the complexity of the neurons, every homo sapien's brain, there is a Negro spiritual that comes into play, "Remember me when these chains get broken, set my body free, oh Lord remember me."  

#1918 Seeing Beyond the Decorated Tree

#1918

Seeing Beyond the Decorated Tree

"Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel."  (Isaiah 7:14)

This now totally sightless veteran, who fifty years ago did have some sight in one eye, still remembers the enthusiastic glint when a grandmother talked about her grandchildren.  This world traveler still remembers the "yearning" gleam in a communist's eyes when I talked about capitalism and freedom.  I so wish I could see young children's eyes when they look at the decorated Christmas trees, I so wish I could see my own great granddaughter's eyes when she has her first experience opening a Christmas gift. 

Christmas is thought process, not a day.  Intelligent people realize that December 25 is just a guess, Jesus was probably born in late August, this writer was in Bethlehem on Christmas Eve, forty years ago, and it was so very cold.  We know the shepherds would not have sheep in the fields during that type cold weather. 

One large newspaper did a feature story about my travels at Christmas time: the various places I have visited at Christmas...such as the Antarctic, Holy Land, Greece, Spain, Italy, and many other places.  There is one truism about Christmas celebration; Christmas is only celebrated in countries which Christianity has awakened.  There is no celebration of Christmas in Muslim or Buddhist countries.  IF CHRISTIANS ONLY KNEW WHAT THEY HAVE TO CELEBRATE.  There are 300 prophecies about the first coming of Jesus in the Old Testament, every one of these prophecies-promises have been fulfilled.  Just think of how Christians should celebrate the soon second coming of Jesus.  Is today's church (the bride of Jesus), are today's Christians so self-satisfied pretending to watch for him, serve him, and above all, trust him, that Christians have forgotten the real meaning of his birth?  He came to save us from our sin; the sinless one took on himself our sins, so that we could bask in his righteousness now and eternally. 

For a long time, in my Christian maturity, I objected to unbelievers bringing their spending and spreeing, rocking and rolling, into OUR celebration of our Lord's birth.  How could an unbeliever have any concept of Christmas?  Now, I just accept the fact that most unbelievers realize that the only thing that separates them from us, a matter of their unbelief.  Just perhaps hearing the Christmas carols, over and over, may cause some seeping of the Christmas message into their soul.  It just might be that seeing all the Christmas lights, the red berries and the thorns of the holly tree might awaken in the unbeliever the thoughts of Jesus as the light of the world, the thorn crown on his head, his precious blood shed for sin. 

I was a little judgmental about a decorated Christmas tree inside the church house; I have seen Santa Claus dragged down the aisle of modern wealthy churches, just as I have witnessed the second greatest event in the history of the world, Easter, characterized by rabbits laying chocolate eggs.  It becomes a vital part of our Christian witness to explain the difference in traditions, fantasies, and rituals. 

I so remember the Christmas tree in the old country church where I was raised.  For many of the poor children who attended Sunday School at that old country church (built by my great grandparents in 1874) they would have had nothing to celebrate except just wishing and wanting from a Sears Christmas Catalog.  Some of these children had never seen an orange, I remember my own "daddy" showing them how to peel an orange.  I just do not believe our Blessed Lord frowned on my old Uncle Blunner (my grandfather's brother), always in his Santa Claus costume, beating on the front door of the church and someone letting him in, and he carrying a large bag of candy and presents for all the children.  This was the only Christmas which many of the children knew anything about.  I just do not believe our Blessed Lord was too upset when one of the old men in the church put a nicely wrapped gift on the Christmas tree for one of his friends.  When the friend opened the gift, which he was so happy to get, a rabbit jumped out and ran all over the church.  Surely God rejoiced in the laughter of the children and the smiles of the old folks. 

Jesus is at every crossroads of your life before you get there; your belief in him determines your circumstances, rather than your circumstances determining your belief.  Jesus will not be relegated to a bellhop...just called on when you need him.  Christians should not be too peeved when unbelievers infringe on our holy day.  Too many Christians are linked too closely with unbelievers in their frolicking fragility of their holiday.  The Christian, banker, businessman, doctor, lawyer enjoying a lavish cocktail party in the home of an unbeliever, one who has nothing at all to do with God and certainly not his son Jesus, should not be too aroused when the unbelievers start singing "Silent Night, Holy Night..." or even, on some other occasion, "Jesus keep me near the cross..." the line of demarcation between pretenders and the defenders has grown very narrow.  Beyond the tinsel-mistletoe-decorated trees, cakes and pies, toys and trivia, this season and every season the Christian's determination a testimony not only of a holy day but everyday as our Savior's day.  

#1917 Unfiltered View of the World

#1917

Unfiltered View of the World

"The people recognize themselves in their commodities; they find their soul in their automobile, hi-fi set, split-level home, kitchen equipment."  - Herbert Marcuse

"This is the record of the ancestry of Jesus Christ who was the descendant of both David and Abraham: Abraham was the father of Isaac, who was the father of Jacob, who was the father of Judah and his brothers, who was the father of Perez and Zerah (whose mother was Tamar).  Perez was the father of Hezron, who was the father of Ram..."  (Matthew 1:1-3) and this begins the Book of Matthew, first book of the New Testament...God's message to the world, after 700 years of silence, the time between the last verse of the book of Malachi of the Old Testament and now Matthew.  To every unbeliever, and unbelief is your only condemnation before God, the Creator of the Universe, the world and everything in it, actually wrote a book, 2000 years on this side of the cross, on which his son died, the Bible is still the world's best seller. 

Now, twenty-first century, life pursuits of escapism, whether the pill bottle or soap operas from a talking box, the hearts and minds of most real human beings with which I come in contact is a need for truth.  Our prayer at this Christmas, as well as everyday of the year, in this time of just going through the motions, we plead, we beg for politicians-pastors-physicians-and even parents, those who are responsible for truth, we just want truth. 

We know this present world is not a utopia, communism promises utopia and we see what has happened to communism everywhere it has been tried...Russia, Cuba, Yugoslavia, Burma.  Manmade solutions always fail.  Satan always pays off with counterfeit. 

With the idols of technology, God's air filled with messages (texting, world web) have we forgotten that God already knows everything?  Should hacking be such a mystery: one billion bits of information stolen here, another million stolen there, thousands such as with Mrs. Clinton, somehow lost?  An unfiltered view of the disasters brought upon ourselves, just USA, $200 trillion debt in entitlements and other obligations.  A debt that can never be repaid, every child born in America, is born into slavery, while financial junkies take satisfaction in a nineteen thousand Dow average. 

Have we reached the place of no return, a return to sanity?  Are our lives totally out of control OR, totally in control of others?  Where is the freedom that our ancestors crossed violent oceans, fought violent wars, worked-studied-prayed for the liberty of personal responsibility? 

I was just a child when socialism reared its ugly head in America, it started with the controls of FDR and his communist vice president, Henry Wallace.  I still remember my mother and grandmother standing in the front yard crying, as government officials, after their measuring tapes, cut down wonderful growing crops-killed pigs to respond to a certain number-killed chickens to respond to a certain number on each farm.  On our farm, they cut down the crops at the end of each row because corn-cotton-beans-tobacco would often get damaged at the end of row crops.  But, that hardworking black farmer who owned a small farm near us, they controlled his farm operation (agricultural stabilization control) by cutting down his crops midfield...his best tobacco-corn-etc.  And so the controls of our lives began.  And now it worsens everyday...a permit-license-payoff for everything you do.  AND, the majority around us who vote, think we are a land of freedom and liberty.

We think we vote for representative government, that someone at the courthouse, statehouse, and White House loves us.  We are loved like birds love road kill, you are lucky to even get a written response from your local government representative anymore.  The main concern of every elected official is just one simple thing, reelection. 

One of my best friends, Robert Futrell, NC3, assistant to the congressman, Robert was killed in a plane crash, he was raised in a village called Grantham...just as Margaret Thatcher was raised in a village called Grantham, in an apartment above her father's butcher shop.  Robert, an attorney, told me that the congressman's entire day and that of his large staff was punctuated by free buffets and cocktail parties furnished by lobbyists.  He told me that the only letter his congressional staff ever got really excited about was one that a black farmer had written them on a brown paper bag...probably his only stationary. 

This writer is often invited to speak before conferences or meetings of pastors, years ago, just the beginnings of the computer craze, one pastor waxed eloquently about megabytes.  Later, I told these pastors that this blind, once sighted, world traveler had been to both the North and South Poles, I told about the millions of square miles of just glaciers at the top and bottom of the world.  I said, all these millions of square miles of ice encapsulation were formed by individual snowflakes.  Do you know that there have never been two snowflakes found that our Creator, God designed exactly the same?  I said, I have crossed Siberia on the great Russian Trans-Siberian Railroad, everything covered with snow."  I saw Lake Baikal the world's largest lake, totally frozen.  This puts the manmade computer in its place.  I said, even the hairs on every head are numbered (Luke 12:7) not just yours, but every human being ever chosen for life. 

Forget the tinsel and mistletoe, forget the decorations on the tree...the spending a spreeing of a holy day that has become a commercial holiday.  Is it not enough just to think of the gift that God gave to the world?  And this baby, putting on a tent of human flesh, dwelled among us AND, in every one of his 35 miracles, God was revealed through him, to us.  

#1916 Elisha's House

#1916

Elisha's House

The Indescribable Christ
By Dr. S.M. Lockridge

Dr. S.M. Lockridge was the Pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, San Diego CA from 1953 - 1993. He entered heaven in 2000. He is well-known for a passage out of his sermon titled “He’s My King”:

“He’s enduringly strong, He’s entirely sincere, He’s eternally steadfast. He’s immortally graceful. He’s imperially powerful. He’s impartially merciful. He’s God’s Son. He’s a sinner’s savior. He’s the centerpiece of civilization. He stands alone in Himself. He’s unparalleled. He’s unprecedented. He’s supreme. He’s preeminent. He’s the loftiest idea in literature. He’s the highest idea in philosophy. He’s the fundamental truth in theology. He’s the miracle of the age. He’s the only one able to supply all of our needs simultaneously. He supplies strength for the weak. He’s available for the tempted and the tried. He sympathizes and He saves. He guards and He guides. He heals the sick, He cleans the lepers. He forgives sinners, He discharges debtors, He delivers captives, He defends the feeble, He blesses the young, He serves the unfortunate, He regards the aged, He rewards the diligent, He beautifies the meek. Do you know Him?

Well, my king is the king of knowledge, He’s the well-spring of wisdom, He’s the doorway of deliverance, He’s the pathway of peace, He’s the roadway of righteousness, He’s the highway of holiness He’s the gateway of glory, He’s the master of the mighty, He’s the captain of the conquerors, He’s the head of the heroes, He’s the leader of the legislators, He’s the overseer of the overcomers, He’s the governor of governors, He’s the prince of princes, He’s the king of Kings and the Lord of Lords.

His life is matchless. His goodness is limitless. His mercy is everlasting. His love never changes. His word is enough. His grace is sufficient. His reign is righteous. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. Well. I wish I could describe Him to you. But He’s indescribable. Yes. He’s incomprehensible. He’s invincible, He’s irresistible. I’m trying to tell you, the Heavens cannot contain Him, let alone a man explain Him. You can’t get Him out of your mind. You can’t get Him off of your hands. You can’t outlive Him, and you can’t live without Him. Well. The Pharisees couldn’t stand Him, but they found out they couldn’t stop Him. Pilate couldn’t find any fault in Him. Herod couldn’t kill Him. Death couldn’t handle Him and the grave couldn’t hold Him. That’s my king!

He always has been, and He always will be. I’m talking about He [who] had no predecessor and He [who] has no successor. There was nobody before Him and there will be nobody after Him. You can’t impeach Him, and He’s not going to resign. We try to get prestige and honor and glory to ourselves, but the glory is all His. Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, and ever, and ever, and ever. How long is that? And ever, and ever, and ever, and ever, and when you get through with all of the forevers, then 'Amen'."

“Oh I wish I could describe him to you.”

The greatest miracle of grace, that God would not only save our souls but his second greatest gift, the love of parents.  Life's greatest disappointment that some children forget parents love so quickly.  Mortals are fallible, remembering parental risks-sacrifices only on that trek to the grave.  Do forgetting children actually think a dead mother or father can smell the flowers placed around a casket? 

Perhaps this is just one of the reasons that so many young people, and even older survivors, often attempt to fill a "void" with pills OR find solace at the bottom of a liquor or prescription bottle. 

Mankind's only venture into Godliness is showing kindness to others.  It is nothing new, in spite of everything: economic differences-skin color-mental and other disparity, it has always been there, perhaps that is why Jesus said, "Blessed are the meek."  (Matthew 5:5)  Those of us who have worked with the less gifted of the world have found that those with limited mental ability-different skin color-peculiar charisma often bless us most...their contribution to our lives a matter of giving us pleasure-joy-assurance.

On the plantation where my mother was raised, her father before her, his father before him, AND the old family house is still there.  That big old-drafty house survived the Civil War because it was the only house in the countryside that was used mostly as a hospital as well as funeral parlor.  Even Sherman's troops, the world's worst and most evil enemies, did not burn down that house...even though they were burning down all the houses and barns all around.  When I was a boy, all the chimneys left from burned homes were called Sherman's Monuments.  My grandmother told me that her mother was just a young girl, at the time; it was her job to take the milk cow way down in the woods to keep the troops from stealing the cow.  It was her brother's job to take the mule team way down in the woods to keep the troops from stealing the mules.  Of course, they cleaned out the smokehouses of all their meat, their hog pens of all their pigs and hogs, their chicken houses from all their chickens, and the corn crib from all its ability to feed Yankee horses.  You see, the Yankee troops lived off the land to make lives of the surviving southerners even more wretched; they would throw a dead dog into the well.  So, all the wells had to be camouflaged, so survivors would at least have water to drink, a cool place to put a bucket with milk for a baby or desperately ill person.  Can we even imagine young people way down in the woods, holding onto livestock-work animals, seeing nothing but great black smoke in the distance as Union troops burned and destroyed homes-barns-crops and anything else southern people needed for survival? 

One of my cousin's said to me (I am the oldest grandchild), "Who will we go to...to ask questions after you are gone?  You are the only one who knows about early family history."  I said, "Yes, while you young boys were out chasing a little white ball on a golf course or listening to some trash on modern technology, I was always listening to the conversations of my old relatives."  My grandmother told me about her mother telling her stories of the Civil War...the Yankee troops beautiful horses, how they hated everyone-everything that the country people held dear.

On the plantation, even when I was a child, far from the main house, much nearer the barns was a real old house, many would have thought it was a slave house but there were no slaves on my ancestors land, paternal or maternal, they were land owners but worked the land themselves.  However, there were black families who lived on the land with them.  In this particular old house, still surviving the erosion of time and weather...the large cooking fireplace, no glass in any windows (glass was very expensive and there was little glass in any pre or post Civil War houses, even my great grandfather's country store building did not have any glass in it) lived an old black man survivor named Elisha, the house was always called "Elisha's House".  Many of his family moved away, even into the towns.  But he chose to continue living and working on the farm.  There was a large cedar tree just outside his house, where he would sit in the shade on Sundays after he had worshiped at the church, built by my ancestors after the Civil War (1874).  At the church, the white men and boys would sit on the right-hand side of the building, white women and girls would sit on the left-hand side: the division petition was still there in the building when I was a child.  Black members of the community would sit in the balcony of the church.  The only time all would sit together, white families alongside black families, at a funeral.  Death was the great equalizer-broke down all segregation barriers.  Grief hits every human soul equally.

One morning, my great grandfather found Elisha dead in his house.  Other men on the farm dug a grave under that old cedar tree, which was still there when I was a boy and, Elisha, wrapped in the blanket which he was wrapped in during bad weather his entire life, was laid to rest.

Probably noone knew anything about Elisha's family or life, he had probably never been out of the county, at that time in history, had never heard a radio-airplane in the sky, but God knew all about him.  Then or now, with all the history around us-wars-travel-technology, has anything improved very much, would Elisha been better off knowing and exposed to all of what we call, today's progress?  Or content in his faith-work ethic-meek manner of living?  Was he wealthy?  It is good to remember, that you are at your very best this very moment.  You will never look better than you do right now, feel better than you do right now.  Now is all you have.

#1915 Lightning Rods and Dark Energy

#1915

Lightning Rods and Dark Energy

"The UN humanitarian aid agency decries the “complete meltdown of humanity” in Aleppo. Its children agency says there could be more than 100 unaccompanied children trapped in a building under fire." www.TheStar.com

Blindness is often mutual, not always sightlessness, the dehumanization of others. 

The "normal" person never considers handicapped safety bars in a bathroom.  Why they are there?  What they are for?  The "normal" person never thinks of what it is like for the "cripple" or blind to use bath facilities, to get dressed, to crawl around attempting to survive. 

My daddy was a great follower of Dr. M.R. Dehaan (Grand Rapids, Michigan) he was a physician, in private practice, but first in his calling was his radio ministry of Bible teaching (Radio Bible Class).  He said that one morning he and his wife Priscilla were very estranged by an argument, they normally would read aloud their daily devotional at breakfast, but this morning they did not even speak.  Finally, she read their daily devotional to herself, saying over and over, yes...yes and then passed the book over to him.  The devotional was on kindness and the forgiveness of one another and it so happened that it had been written by Dr. Dehaan himself. 

There is a very dark cloud of energy around most of us called "indifference".  It would be so easy to show kindness to those who did not win life's lottery, who God chose for disability, who God chose for impoverishment.  Last year, 4,600 human beings from Africa drowned in the Mediterranean attempting to escape the impoverishment of Africa...many of these human beings were women and children.  Can one even imagine the poverty of thought-impoverishment of despair in getting aboard a boat to cross a large expanse of water, such as the Mediterranean Sea?  Can we even imagine such destitution, leaving everything known behind?  Venturing toward the unknown with all the risks and dangers involved?  Now, at 86, looking towards the sunset of my life, I truly believe God wanted me to sense what life on this planet is all about...the reason I went on so many round the world trips, every continent including both the North and South Poles.  God left me with a little vision in one eye, so that I could see some of the disparities of life: the horror story of life's inequalities.  It is difficult for me to even describe these things and I know that most readers will not believe what I am about to describe. 

In darkest Africa, among the poorest people I have ever known (and this writer was raised in the poverty of impoverished Eastern North Carolina: dirt road, no power, no phone, or water lines).  I could not believe what my little bit of sight saw.  It was up to the women of the African village to take a large molded basin and catch the urine from cows.  They used this "water" along with the manure from the cows and clay to build their houses...shelters from storms-shelters from wild animals.  The cows were their method of survival.  Then, I would see them with jugs walking long distances just to find water for their children to drink.  Water for bathing or cleaning was completely out of the question.  I found that even in delivery, at birth, very little water was available.  I witnessed the village "witch doctor" with a distraught chicken diagnosing diseases and maladies.  In addition to this struggle for physical survival, the desperate need for spiritual help and this is where the real capture of human depravity comes into focus.  Have you ever considered why so many African men are called Mohammed?  You see, in the Islam religion, a boy named Mohammed is assured of Heaven.  The disparity of everything in human living is impetus-necessity for escape. 

In the predominantly Muslim countries of the Middle East and North Africa the largest non-Muslim religious group, Coptic Christians.  Coptic comes from early Egyptian.  Until recently, even under Saddam Hussein, Iraq, and other Arab rulers, Coptic Christians and their places of worship were protected.  It is no longer this way; all Christians are considered the enemy by Muslims. 

For the first time in a long time, listening to commentators on the radio, or just people with whom I come in contact, I am encouraged about the future.  I have often thought that when I look upon the face of Jesus I would want to wish that I had done more for his glory.  I truly believe that there were enough people like me praying in the last election to have the "almost" miracle of the election of Donald Trump as president.  So many times, it takes a bully to chasten and correct.  Anyone with an IQ above room temperature, anyone who wants to live a responsible life would have known that the criminal woman running against him would have been a further disaster for our nation.  There is nothing in the news to which we are alert that would say otherwise.  As in the Old Testament when God's chosen were taking over the Promised Land from the seven civilizations there, he told them that he would send hornets in front of them, to chase out the natives.  We desperately need a man with familiarity of hornets to cleanse-sweep out-cleanout the cesspool of our nation's government.  We cannot be too judgmental about the president elect's lifestyle.  We are hiring someone to clean up a mess, not to be humble, mild or meek.  Perhaps, an onlooker would have thought Jesus a real bully, when he chased the money changers out of the temple, in his day.  It should be so obvious to anyone observing the liberal news media, to anyone cognizant of the advancement of socialism, to anyone aware of the hatred of most liberal young people, such as university students have toward our country that the communist mantra of "the end justifies the means" is now a matter of national survival.  Americans can get things under control or we can get ready for American vanguishment from within.  Perhaps our greatest president, Abraham Lincoln, said, "I do not fear what could happen to America from outside but only what could happen from within."  

Under the scourge of indifference, the dark energy of discontent because of the grace given by God to this marvelous nation, we will find the energy to make corrections: to protect our borders: to control our enemies both foreign and domestic.  How many Christian heads must be chopped off?  How many places of Christian worship must be destroyed, before Americans realize that the choice is ours, a lightning rod for the world or surrendering to the powers of darkness?

#1914 Monopoly Money or Parcheesi Dice

#1914

Monopoly Money or Parcheesi Dice

"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. "- Theodore Roosevelt

Our world never fails to fascinate.  No matter how many automobile accidents we go by, we always think such will happen to someone else.  Religion is always a value expression...Jewish-Christian-Muslim-Buddhist-etc.  The Christian knows that his salvation is a gift, good works, keeping laws: if the world could be saved by good bookkeeping, we would worship Moses. 

In the life of this totally blind writer, everyday is a struggle and I often think I cannot take the solitary confinement of blackness one more day.  It is a fact that disabled veterans do not live as well as the convicts in a prison.  Beaten into submission by a bureaucracy of incompetence, disabled veterans-handicapped citizens-the hardworking poor of this world find some satisfaction in clipping coupons and buying needed things from thrift stores. 

Not only religion but blood, too, is a value expression.  The best example, paper money is worth nothing; worth is found only in what backs it up.  "For the life of flesh is in the blood" (Leviticus 17:11) and all mankind, any nation-any race-any skin color, finds honor in lineage of his blood.  It is a pitiful parent or child who does not honor his ancestry, his own personal DNA, anyone of his trillions of cells that can reveal thousands of pages about his own personal family, his own bloodline. 

The Christian rejoices, in knowing his kinship-joint heir with the son of God.  The Christian is embarrassed seeing the bride of the son of God, the church, being defrauded to that of a whore.  This committed-concerned-convinced Christian becomes nauseated by "so-called" pastors and pew warmers dragging Santa Claus into the Christian church building:  joining the world with the spectacle of rabbits laying chocolate eggs at Easter.  The twenty-first century believer, certainly the millennials, like even the people of the Old Testament have trouble comprehending that the blood of a goat or a dove can be considered a blood sacrifice for sin.  The Christian, however, knows about the blood of the lamb, knows about the first Passover, when the blood of the lamb was placed over and around the door of each of the over two million Jewish slave homes, so that the death angel would not touch that home, then they eating the roasted flesh of that lamb, shoes on, staff in hand, ready to leave, no questions asked, money paid, etc.  The grace of deliverance from bondage, forever, the splendor-miracle of it all, another lamb, blood sacrifice on a cross...redemption-deliverance, and, it is all a matter of obeying-trusting.  The over two million Jewish slaves, in groups of five, the number of grace, delivered from Egyptian bondage. 

Your money has become as fake as that found on your Monopoly board game.  Your future, if depending on government, is as dicey-risky-uncertain as your throwing dice on your Parcheesi game board.  The only hope of the world is found in our nation returning to its early Christian principles.  Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn when asked what happened to Russia, "They forgot God."  The twenty-first century American is witnessing patchwork.  Many are patching their lives with legal and illegal drugs.  Mrs. Clinton called us deplorables but, deplorables, as well as the desperate are seeking help everywhere but from a solid rock.  Most think that all twenty-first century problems can be solved by technology.  When you have technology, you have what technology can do.  When you have drugs, you have what drugs can do.  When you have sports, you have what sports can do.  When you have money, you have what money can do.  BUT, when you have God in your life, when you have the power of prayer in your persona, then you have what God can do and if there is anything in this world-those around us-those depending upon us NEED it is what God can do.  The only thing that will send any human being to a black lonely hell is unbelief.  We simply do not want to believe that money or chance-gambling will not solve everything. 

My parents were hardworking, God-fearing, taxpaying, citizens.  They were the workingest people I have ever known.  They wanted the best for their children.  When we reached the age in high school that we had started taking typing lessons (typing was big thing when I was young) they went into a store that sold office supplies to buy us a typewriter...one that could be used at the church.  Like this writer, who does not have one article of clothing-one article of furniture that was not purchased secondhand, instead of spending an enormous amount of money, for them, for a new typewriter, they purchased a used typewriter.  The machine was just a piece of junk.  The pica and elite keys transferred-mixed up, it was returned but they were told that the sale was final "no returns".  The old preacher, Dr. R.G. Lee whose church I attended when a student in Memphis, owned a famous sermon, "Payday Someday".  I am not telling you that every payday will be as blatant but the family who owned this office supply company owned a beautiful home on George Street, Goldsboro, NC, fire is a great equalizer.  One night that magnificent home burned to the ground.  To me, there will be many great-magnificent qualities in Heaven but, the greatest thing about Heaven will be the honesty of Heaven.  I remember the quietness at the South Pole, Heaven may not be quiet, may not be as colorful as I expect (I will be able to see then) but it will be honest.  I believe Americans, subjected to lies and deceit by the news media as well as everyone else, have a real hunger for honesty. 

#1913 Loose Ends, Driftwood at Christmas

#1913

Loose Ends, Driftwood at Christmas

"O Little Town of Bethlehem"

     O morning stars together
     Proclaim the holy birth
     And praises sing to God the King
     And Peace to men on earth

Pain has a price, how much has your faith cost you?  Pain gets us focused, even focused at this time of the year, the heathen spending and spreeing, as believers-"faithers" in humility gift the greatest sounds ever uttered on Earth, just five miles separating the cry of a baby in a manger at Bethlehem, the cry of a man on a cross near Jerusalem.  One cannot be humble without being intimate with God. 

In other articles, other years, this writer has talked about spending Christmas Eve in Bethlehem: visiting the cave under the Church of the Nativity where Jesus was born.  I had to crawl through a very small opening because the large doors of that great church have been permanently closed.  You see, the Muslim atrocities towards Christianity are nothing new.  Early Arabs rode their horses into the church and ruined it, just as King Herod would have killed that baby: think of the many small male babies he did kill: and he was a religious Jew. 

It is easy to trust in God, then and now, when all is going well.  Just think, Mary had ridden many miles on a donkey nine months pregnant.  Perhaps she knew the significance of the first worshippers of our savior, those very poor, very smelly, very despised shepherds.  They were the lowest of the low, could not even enter the temple, or give testimony in court. 

Oh, the wonder of it all, the holy of holies surrounded by curtains in the wilderness.  God could only be approached once a year by the high priests.  Now, a small baby, God in man, putting on a tent of human flesh to dwell among us.  Forget the malice of Herod, the worship of the traveling magi.  Again, now as well as then, the trials of this life are really blessings in disguise.  Think of the blessings resulting from brothers putting Joseph in a pit, the Apostle Paul knocked from his horse on the one hundred fifty mile road from Jerusalem to Damascus.  Again, now as well as then, we are left to mourn our country and what has happened to it.  BUT, never give into hopelessness.  Remember, that first cry in the manger, the greatest sound the world had ever known, that last sound on the cross, and the temple veil forever open to all of us for that close-intimate-communion with God.  "The wonder of it all." 

God is often revealed by the absence of God.  One of my assistants has another job working with law enforcement, on her way home from that job, at three in the morning, a small male child, by the highway, a rainy night, alone in the weather.  The hospitalized child is too traumatized to talk, if he ever had.  A popular Christmas carol, "What Child is This".  Can you even imagine the loneliness of this child-deserted-cruel weather, it is bad enough for any of us to go through life alone...think of that tender three-year-old child on a lonely deserted highway?  If anyone doubts the grace of God, think how easily the child could have been run over by a car.  We often hear "mouths on legs" expound on life's responsibilities and opportunities, here was an abandoned child by the highway: maybe by his own mother.  How many political types consider the millions abandoned-discarded everyday in the abortion holocaust of this nation, of this world?  There are three thousand babies killed USA, everyday.  The first time this world traveler was on the mainland of China, I was told that the creeks were full of girl babies, not wanted, because in China's one child policy, only boy babies survive. 

It all began in Bethlehem, from that stable, and I was there, it was the humblest of birth places, from that manger God has sought those valued, those saved, those who trusted that marvelous child, who became a marvelous man, who became sacrifice for the sin of the world.  Everyday, everyway, just as he requires trust from those who believe on him, he manifests trust with us.  This employee left early from her job to go home because she did not feel well, one precious child saved.  Do we trust enough to save others? 

The only difference between Christians and non-Christians, a matter of belief, the only thing that will send a soul to Hell, unbelief...it bothers me that Christians get caught up in the satanic traditions of the Christmas season.  Christ told us to remember him at his table; many of us choose the pilot syndrome, washing our hands of the artificial piety of the season.  But, if your Christmas means more with lights, because he is the light of the world: if your Christmas means more because of gifts, because he is the greatest gift known to mankind: if your Christmas means more when seeing the red balls on the holly tree, because his red blood cleanses from all sin, then you have not lost the true meaning of Christmas.  "But in this world of sin, where meek souls will receive him still, the dear Christ enters in."  (O Little Town of Bethlehem)

#1912 Vicks and Other Kicks

#1912

Vicks and Other Kicks

NORTH CAROLINA MINUTE

Pharmacist Lunsford Richardson

Invents Vicks VapoRub   

In 1894, a Greensboro pharmacist invented a cold remedy that would become world-famous.

Lunsford Richardson moved to Greensboro in 1890, after working in Selma, North Carolina, as a pharmacist for ten years. His three children caught colds "almost immediately," and Richardson treated then with poultices and a vapor lamp. But he wanted a better remedy, and began experimenting in his drug store, the drug store once owned by O'Henry's father.

Using the "miracle ingredient from Japan called menthol," Richardson developed a "vaporizing salve that combined the best features of both the poultice treatment and the head-clearing vaporizer." He used his brother-in-law's name for the product, and called it Vick's Croup and Pneumonia Salve…known today as Vick's VapoRub.

Addition Dr. Morris:

We live in a crazy mixed up world; it is good to hold onto a few things that are eternal, such as our faith and our knowledge that God left everything on this earth needed for our treatment.  There is one word no longer found in any medical literature, it is a four letter word called "cure".  With all the scientific knowledge, foundations, hospitals, and "do-gooder" groups, with all the medical and other healthcare schools, it seems that the only remedy in the doctor's bag, some exotic-high priced-much advertised chemical elixir. 

Early Americans were raised in houses where fresh air was not a problem; air just blew through via cracks everywhere.  We didn't worry about nebulizers, air purifiers my mother's best and most effective treatment for our colds-bronchial congestion-coughing, Vick's VapoRub.  I keep a jar of this wonderful mixture right next to my bed all the time and use it to keep my breathing difficulties under control.  I still remember those poultices which my mother would put on my chest.  You see, back then, you didn't have insurance or welfare card to trot to the doctor for any and everything.  You learned to take care of things yourself.  Vick's VapoRub and cough drops are like aspirin...MIRACLE DRUGS.

While I am on this topic, something I have dealt with for many years, the intolerance of many genus homosapiens, to milk and milk products.  Lactose intolerance is real; I believe the fundamental reason for the earaches in many babies.  This writer understood lactose intolerance years ago and stopped using dairy products.  An old family doctor told me, that milk was good only for calves, that man was the only species that utilizes milk from another species.  But, no one likes ice cream more than me and I went back to eating ice cream, kept some in my fridge all the time.  Then, I became so congested that I could hardly live with myself, nothing seemed to help.  But, as soon as I quit ice cream and milk, the situation cleared up completely.  I am throwing this out free of charge because you or someone you know may have such a problem. 

As I told many patients, you know your body better than anyone else, you must learn to take care of yourself, the few minutes any trained person spends with you, no matter how good the doctor, about all he knows is what he sees and what you tell him during that short period of time.  How long has it been since your doctor asked you about your eating habits?  Most of the time, the cure is in the kitchen not at the drugstore.  Of course, with the "outlandish" prices for most prescriptions, you can understand why doctors and pharmacists want you kept ignorant.  Money is not made from simple cures.