In times of economic hardship the best thing to do, according to some in the US, is to buy a gun!!

I just blogged how a mother who had no money to feed her children, yet had money to buy a gun, kill herself and fatally injured her children. Now, I just found out that this year's gun sales broke all previous records. That's in an economy that needs fixing.

Let's see the news:

(NEWSER) – This year's Black Friday gun salesbroke a record set in 2008 by nearly a third, and while fears about President Obama outlawing some types of firearms are thought to be behind 2008's record, analysts say this year's surge in sales is part of a long-term trend. Gun ownership was "politically incorrect" five years ago, but "what seems to be changing is social acceptance," an analyst at investment firm Avondale Partners tells MSNBC. "I think there might be a changing view of firearms."

"Politically incorrect?", well, it is not safe to carry a gun, period. If we trust our government, then we pay our taxes so they can hold social cohesion, but Americans don't trust not even their next door neighbours.

But if some type of guns are going to be outlawed, the alternative is not to pile on those guns, since if you are found with them, you are going to be braking the law. What sort of thinking these people apply to themselves, is beyond me!!

Every state except Illinois now allows residents to carry concealed weapons, and a recent Gallup poll found that 47% of American households own a gun, up from 41% just a year ago. Analysts say the number of first-time gun buyers and women buying guns has been rising for several years, with handguns selling especially well. The director of communications at the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, however, says this year's surge is sales is a "one-time event" which may be "the result of marketing."

So, marketing death goes far, as we can see. Notice, "women buying guns has been rising for several years, with handguns selling especially well". So well, that they can try to kill their own children with them!!!!

In a country where anger is going through the roof, and people are willing to kill one another just for a parking space, carrying a gun, makes things way more dangerous.

Mother shoots herself and her children for food stamps. A society where guns are freely allowed is dysfunctional

I am not against owning a gun, but I am against that some people seem to use their guns as a last resort, not to fix a situation, but to destroy it totally. Look at this example:

SAN ANTONIO — A Texas woman who for months was unable to qualify for food stamps pulled a gun in a state welfare office and staged a seven-hour standoff with police that ended with her shooting her two children before killing herself, officials said Tuesday.

And why this woman did what she did? Because she didn't get support for food stamps from the state of Texas:

Grimmer first applied for food stamps in July but was denied because she didn’t turn in enough information, Texas Department of Health and Human Services spokeswoman Stephanie Goodman said.
Goodman didn’t know what Grimmer specifically failed to provide. In addition to completing an 18-page application, families seeking state benefits also must provide documents proving their information, such as proof of employment and residency.

Isn't it crazy, that it is easier to get a gun that kills, but it is almost impossible to get  food stamps!!!

The woman and the children apparently had recently moved to Texas from another state, and that made it harder for her to provide the info the state wanted.

“This wasn’t like a knee-jerk reaction,” said Baeza, adding that Grimmer felt she was owed restitution of some sort.
Grimmer let a supervisor go unharmed around 7:45, but stayed inside the office with her children. After hanging up the phone around 11:45, police heard three shots, and a SWAT team entered the building. Inside, they found Grimmer’s body and her two wounded children.
The children were “very critical” and unconscious when taken from the scene, Baeza said.

I see two problems, a woman who somehow had a gun, yet, not food to feed her children, and a government, who is full of bureaucracy, and  did not want to help a family in need.

I lived on food stamps when I was a teenager in California, and I could see the desperation in my aunt's face when we didn't have anything to eat. But she never went out and bought a gun, she knew better, that money would be used to feed us, not to kill us.

Let's pray that those two kids make it, and that gun laws are tightened, and that the states have better trained people to avert this incidents in the future.

Wisdom, something not many people desire today

What do you desire to posses the most? In some people’s case, it’s to have the latest automobile. In others, it’s to have the latest computer, or mobile phone. Yet others, is to have their own house, or better kitchen.

All of us want something, and it is usually material. We don’t usually pursue something that is not material, like knowledge, respect, and in this case, wisdom. It is easier to get a car, than to get the respect from our friends, and sometimes, our own family. With a car, you work, and you get money, and then, you can purchase a car. But to get respect, it takes effort. 

Wisdom works in the same way. You cannot buy wisdom. I have a friend who has attended the best apologetics conferences, and mingled with the best apologists of our time, yet, he can’t do apologetics. Wisdom does not grow on us by osmosis, but we have to learn it through observation, experience and application.

True wisdom does not puff us up. Wisdom itself guides us not to impose any knowledge on others, rather, to impart our “wisdom” on others. Let’s seek wisdom, Godly wisdom from God’s Word.

Luis A. Jovel

Racists churches are still alive today

Once I was told I was not welcomed in a church because I had Jewish blood. They were Ukrainians, and didn't like my "sort of people". Still, I attended until they accepted me.

But this is a bit out of line, but if you grew up in the USA like me, or know anything about the USA, you can expect anything from people from the Appalachians. I know, it's a stereo type, but hey, not all Jews are rich and stingy. I have never been rich, and stingy....well, I will let others decide.

Let us see a bit of this news:

A small Appalachian church in Kentucky is being called racist for passing a vote that banned interracial couples from the church. 

The Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church voted 9 to 6 on Sunday to ban interracial couples from church services or functions, with the exception of funerals. 

Stella Harville, 24, and her fiance Ticha Chikuni, 28, are the couple that prompted the church's actions. Harville is white and Chikuni is black. The couple met at Georgetown College in Kentucky where both went to school and are scheduled to marry in July 2012.

What a relief, isn't it? You have to be death in order to be accepted in this church!!!!

Look to what the pastor says about this issue, or we should say, former pastor:

The next week, Cathy and Dean Harville met with the Thompson and were shocked to hear their pastor say that members of the congregation had said they would walk out if Chikuni sang again. The parents wanted to know exactly who had a problem with their future son-in-law. 

"'Me, for one,'" Cathy Harville said that Thompson replied. She said he added, "'The best thing [Stella] can do is take him back where she found him.'" She said the pastor would not tell her any names of people who took issue with Chikuni.

What a disgrace! Discriminating people because of the color of their skin!! I pastored an Aussie church once, and was told by the time I finished there, that I could never visit some members, because they didn't agree that I was not white, and had a different accent. At least they didn't ban me. How could they, I was their pastor!! It was a good thing that they didn't have a meeting, and ban me from serving there, like this church did:

Harville said that of 42 members, very few stayed for the meeting after church and even fewer voted. She said most congregants wanted no part in the vote. 

The motion read, in part: "The Gulnare Freewill Baptist Church does not condone interracial marriage. Parties of such marriages will not be received as members, nor will they be used in worship services and other church functions, with the exception being funerals." 

And: "The recommendation is not intended to judge the salvation of anyone, but indicated to promote greater unity among the church body and the community we serve."

Interracial marriages? Then, if they are two blacks people married, will they accept them? So you are not doubted of your salvation, but you are not good enough to be a member of the church if your spouse is of a different race? Madness, these people who voted in favour are full of evil.

And the Appalachians know that everybody else see them as weird and out of step with the rest of humanity:

Randy Johnson is the Pike County/Pikeville Area Ministerial Association president. The association is made up of about 60 churches. Johnson said that many people already have "stigmas" and "stereotypes" that they associate with Appalachia and that this decision does not accurately represent the vast majority of the community. 

"This really is an anomaly. This is not in any way, shape or form the sentiment of any other local churches or church leaders," Johnson said. "It really has saddened many people. It goes against almost everyone else's philosophy and theology of what it means to be a church."

Of course, God did not come to only save white Free Will Baptists Appalachians, but the whole world, John 3:16.

Hopefully this Sunday, more people attend the church so they can repel the wrong decision taken by 9 of their members:

This weekend, the matter will be up for discussion again at the Sandy Valley Conference for Freewill Baptist Churches. After it is discussed, it may go before the congregation again on Sunday for a vote to repeal the decision.

Let's hope that by making this public, other churches will finally come to their senses, and see that in Christ, we are all the same:

Galatians 3:27-28
New International Version (NIV)
²⁷ for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

A good way of explaining my self

Good on you Newt Gingrich, Fox news analyst are plain ignorant

Well done Newt, you do say it like it is, at least on this issue.

People who watch Fox only for their source of info, are among the most ignorant people on earth, even more so than those people who have never watched TV in their lives!!!

37% of Churches Will Have No Services Christmas Morning and Evening. Family-olatry the new Idolatry?

This year, Christmas and New Year will fall on Sundays, and creates a great dilema for some churches, if they will hold a service on Christmas Sunday. This is how Jim West sets out the issue:

The folks at Lifeway have just released numbers from a survey they did among 1,000 Protestant pastors. They were asked, “Christmas and New Year’s Day both fall on Sunday this year. As a result, does your church plan to have services on the following days: Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day?”
The results:
6% – Christmas Eve but NOT Christmas Day
27% – Christmas Day but NOT Christmas Eve
63% – BOTH Christmas Eve and Christmas Day

Do note what this means- 6% of churches won’t bother to have any service of any kind on Sunday, Christmas Day.   And 37% of Churches will abandon one service or the other on Christmas Day.  Family-olatry trumps commitment in 43% of Churches… (combining the 37% which will cut a service with the 6% that won’t bother having any).

Hum....family-olatry? I think he is coining a new term, which is very appropriate as to the issue that I have seen in the last couple of years. Christmas and Easter, are the feasts when you see less families at church!!

And if you had a look at my picture, you can see the hypocrisy, contradiction, non-sense of wanting to keep Christ in Christmas, yet, not celebrate the date.

Another blogger, puts it in another way:

The good news here is that the vast majority of Protestant Churches will be open for worship on Christmas Day (the Catholics and the Orthodox I'm sure haven't even raised the question). The bad news is that some churches have decided that the worship of God on the day in which we celebrate God's self-giving in Jesus Christ will get in the way of family plans, what Jim West calls family-olatry.
Some may think that Jim's words are too tough, but Jesus also had some difficult things to say about family loyalty when it got in the way of divine devotion (Matthew 8:20-22; 12:47-49; Luke 14:25-27).
What do you think? Is it acceptable for churches to cancel worship on Christmas Day? If so, why? If not, why not?

Yes, this is a very Protestant thing wanting to cancel everything just to go out to the beach, or the park, or just stay home playing Wii, Play Station 3, X-Box 360, or whatever pretending to be relaxing with their families, and not inducing their families to go and worship the maker of heaven and earth.

Go to church, follow Christ, put his kingdom first and all these things will follow, 

Mugabe may be looking forward to a lonely Christmas.

Wretched does a good job, again

I don't agree 100% with his take on things, but sometimes, he is, in my view, 98% on the spot.

Take a look at this:


Well, the word is better translated "tabernacled" in the Greek if we want to translate "literally". This guy, better stick with his rock climbing and quit trying to impress his lack of Greek skills.

On Judas Maccabeus

Ever wanted to know more about this period in Jewish history? Here it's a chance for you to listen to a lecture on the subject.

Thanks to the friends at the BBC.