The Hero's Words of Rebellion and Truth

George Bush

2008-10-03T09:45:00.002-04:00

I get things in my email box all the time that are forwards. Sometimes they are cute or thoughtful. Most of the time I just skim them and move onto the next email. I got one today that made me pause to think. I think it adds some perspective to George Bush and his legacy. We often blame him for everything. If the economy is bad its his fault. If a hurricane hits the US, he must have created it or the very atleast allowed it to happen. If you wake up in the morning and stubb your toe on the corner of your bed post, then he must have put the post in your way. Now I don't agree with everything he has done but I can respect him atleast for the position that he holds. It seems many people have lost respect for public officials. Much of that respect has been lost due to scandals and the like but I think my generation needs to gain a respect for the positions. We need to have people who will seek public office with a sincere heart. We need people who will take the office with respect and dignity. Anyways Im going to post the email I got below. It should give you something to think about.

There were 39 combat related killings in Iraq in January. In the fair city
of Detroit there were 35 murders in the month of January. That's just one
American city, about as deadly as the entire war-torn country of Iraq

FDR (DEMOCRAT) led us into World War II. Germany never attacked us; Japan
did. From 1941-1945, 450,000 lives were lost ... an average of 112,500 per
year.

Truman (DEMOCRAT) finished that war and started one in Korea. North Korea
never attacked us. From 1950-1953, 55,000 lives were lost ... an average
of 18,334 per year.

John F. Kennedy (DEMOCRAT) started the Vietnam conflict in 1962. Vietnam
never attacked us.

Johnson (DEMOCRAT) turned Vietnam into a quagmire. From 1965-1975, 58,000
lives were lost ... an average of 5,800 per year.

Clinton (DEMOCRAT) went to war in Bosnia without UN or French consent.
Bosnia never attacked us. He was offered Osama bin Laden's head on a
platter three times by Sudan and did nothing. Osama has attacked us on
multiple occasions. (Think about what else was going on during that time in
the Clinton Whitehouse!!)

In the years since terrorists attacked us, President Bush has liberated two
countries from oppressive regimes., has al-Qaida out of Iraq, put nuclear inspectors in Libya, North Korea without firing a shot, and captured a
terrorist who slaughtered 300,000 of his own people.

Nahum and the Bail Out

2008-09-29T00:53:00.004-04:00

Ok you may be looking at the title of this blog and thinking to yourself what in the heck is this blog going to be about. Nahum is the name of an Old Testament book named after a prophet. The bail out of course is a reference to the financial "crisis" and the proposed 700 billion dollar bail out. So your asking yourself what do these two things have to do with each other.

Nahum (the book) is about the message of God sent through the prophet Nahum to the Assyrians whose capital was Nineveh. A century earlier, Nineveh had been at the center of the controversy surrounding God's commands to Jonah. Jonah refused to go to Nineveh but after much convincing by God, he finally went. The people of Nineveh listened to the message and turned to God who spared them. God blessed them and they were a huge empire. By Nahum's time, The Assyrian empire was a force of unstoppable might. They had conquered the Kingdom of Israel and were laying siege to Judah. Evidently they had forgotten about the message Jonah had sent them and were now a nation of evil rulers and pride. They had an army that caused every one to tremble. In the eyes of most of the world, they were a super power. But their kings became greedy and selfish. They became filled with pride. They were also beginning to get stretched thin in the regions fighting as far south as Egypt. Most importantly they had turned their back to God. So God sent the prophet Nahum with a message. This message was quick and to the point. God was going to destroy them. It was basically the same message that Jonah had brought a century earlier. But this time they didn't listen. Within 50 years Assyria would be laid waste by Babylon. Nineveh would cease to exist. In fact the destruction was so bad that for many years, archaeologists were hard pressed to find any traces of this great empire. In more recent years, archaeologists are able to piece together the last days of Nineveh.

Here is a passage from Nahum 1:2,3:

God is serious business.
He won't be trifled with.
He avenges his foes.
He stands up against his enemies, fierce and raging.
But God doesn't lose his temper.
He's powerful, but it's a patient power.
Still, no one gets by with anything.
Sooner or later, everyone pays.

We learn that God is patient. Elsewhere in the Bible we are told that God is patient not wanting any to perish. I am very thankful for His patience. Often times I wonder why God doesn't punish evil more quickly but then I look at my own life and realize that everyone would perish if He wasn't patient. But there does come a point that God's patients runs out. Sooner or later He will be just.

That brings us to our present situation. The United States stands alone as the superpower in the world. We have a past of turning to God just like Nineveh. But we are also in a point where pride can take over. Corporate greed and power hungry politicians have created a mess. And we are now seeing the fruits of this corruption. Wall street is struggling and our economy is sinking.
We have a problem were the poor and homeless are being preyed upon. Politicians talk about helping the poor but really are using them as a means to power. Now we have congress freaking out and in order to fix a broken system they are going mess with it even more. This bail out might work in the short run but soon or later everyone pays.

Two things need to happen.
1. We as Christians need to be a light in our country. We can not expect to push our every belief on the country but we can hold our politicians to a code of justice, moral behavior, and integrity. We need to pray for our country and our country needs to become a place where the justice and integrity are our motto. Otherwise we will fall just like Nineveh. Every unstoppable empire in history has fallen but God's truth remains.

2. Specifically in this problem, we need to learn from the past with wisdom. Quick outs are not going to work. It is government that created this problem, more of it won't solve anything. A true free market is the moral road to take. If we let these companies that were greedy fall it might hurt the economy in the short run but it will be a deterrent for future greedy practices. The free market works itself out because people will not want to repeat bad business practices. A bail out will only prolong the suffering and eventually we will pay a lot more.

In conclusion, America can stand and fall by how we react to God's law. Are we acting justly and with integrity in how we treat other countries. Are we acting justly and with integrity in how we deal with financial problems. Or are we going to push the mistakes of greedy people into the hands of all the people? Most importantly are we going to look to God for guidance or to our own pride. If we continue to look to ourselves and pride for the answers, this financial crisis is going to be a picnic compared to the judgment eventually handed down by God.

Nahum 1: 7
God is good,
a hiding place in tough times.
He recognizes and welcomes
anyone looking for help,
No matter how desperate the trouble.
But cozy islands of escape
He wipes right off the map.
No one gets away from God.

God is good. Even in the midst of his judgment to Nineveh we see His love.
But the end is so fitting. We can't look for what appears to be the easy way out.

Walking in Islam's sandals. A book review I did for seminary.

2008-09-16T12:32:00.001-04:00

In April of 1993, British electronic band Depeche Mode had a hit single with “Walking in My Shoes,” a song about experiencing life through someone else’s eyes. If the listener would just walk a day in someone else’s shoes they would face the same temptations and come to the same conclusions that the other person did. “Walking a mile in someone else’s shoes” may be a clichéd phrase but at its core is a real nugget of truth. It is with this truth in mind that Dr. Nabeel T. Jabbour writes his book on walking a mile in a Muslim’s shoes entitled, “The Crescent Through The Eyes of The Cross.” In this book, Dr Jabbour takes the reader into the mind of Muslims and exams the world around us. He challenges western preconceived notions about Islam and current affairs. Peeling back the mystery that has surrounded Islam in the west, he confronts the reader often giving cause to pause in argument with both the author and the reader, himself. Using composite characters of Islamic people he has met and known along with scripture from both the Koran and Holy Bible, Dr Jabbour succeeds in pushing Christians to “go beyond mere tolerance to a passion for Muslims.”
Dr. Jabbour begins the introduction of the book with a saddening description of a sculpture from Santa Fe, New Mexico.
This piece of art had two interrelated scenes back to back, separated by a door. On one side was a Native American man in a fierce snowstorm, knocking at the door of a log cabin and pleading for refuge and warmth. On the other side of the door was a warm room with a terrified mother holding a shotgun while the woman’s frightened three-year-old daughter clung to her dress. The terrified mother was refusing to open the door.
This sculpture is saddening because fear and distrust have kept the woman from giving the Native American the one thing he needs most. This sculpture is a metaphor of the relationship many Christians have with Muslims. In the west, Islam is looked upon with a sense of fear and distrust. This fear and distrust have kept many Christians from taking the gospel to Muslims in sincere and effective ways. In this book Dr. Jabbour attempts to move the reader from fear and distrust into love and passion. To go beyond mere tolerance into understanding, will help Christians become effective in ministering to their Muslim friends.
Dr. Nabeel T. Jabbour is an Arab born-again Christian who was born in Syria and lived in Egypt as a missionary with The Navigators, “ an interdenominational, nonprofit organization dedicated to helping people navigate spiritually, to know Christ and to make Him known as they look to Him and His Word to chart their lives.” In addition to living among Muslims for many years, He has a doctorate in Islamic Studies. Drawing from these experiences as well as working with Muslim international students who have come to U.S. study, he has come to know and love many Muslims. He admits that a few have become his heroes including Rabi’a al- ‘Adawiyya, a slave whose famous prayer led many women to be mentored by her. In order to convey in a quickly and timely manner how Muslims feel about a number of issues, he creates a composite character of many of his Muslim friends. Ahmad Abdul Mun’im is a fictitious person but what he has to say is very real and timely. Beginning with a story about meeting Ahmad after a service that Dr. Jabbour spoke at, the reader is introduced to an Arabic student in a PhD program.
Ahmad has a small family who gave up many things to help him come to the U.S. He is very curious to learn more about America and have a multi-cultural experience while in school. After 9/11, it become harder for him to fit in and many people were either downright mean to him or just suspicious of his motives. Ahmed had met some good people who invited him to church, and he became interested in the Bible. Ahmed has many questions and it is through his eyes that the reader gets to know and love the people of Islam.
Through the course of friendship with Ahmad, Dr Jabbour is able to listen and understand Ahmad’s position. Many people are not able to understand why Muslims do not immediately become Christians after hearing the gospel. Ahmad in his last meeting with the author prepares a written statement that expresses exactly how he feels about Christians, Christianity, and the West. In his own words Ahmad explains:
One of those who tried to convert me asked me to explain to him why is so difficult for me to convert and get integrated into Christianity. My response to him was, “There are three major reasons: Your message; you, the messenger; and me, the receiver.”
Throughout the rest of the book, Dr. Jabbour unpacks two of the three areas while leaving most of “the messenger” to the addendum, which he will send to anyone in an email who has read the book.
First, Ahmad gives a brief description of each category. One of his greatest problems understanding Christianity is its vocabulary and content. Even when reading the Bible in Arabic it seems foreign to Ahmad because it uses distinct Christian terminology. He wonders why Christians expect Muslims to learn all of the Christian vocabulary first in order to receive the message. Another problem that Ahmad has with the message is the use of legal jargon. Christians when explaining the gospel only use a paradigm of guilt and righteousness. While this is in no means a wrong view it is not the only view of salvation in the gospel. Ahmad asks if the gospel has anything to say about shame, honor, cleanliness, and power. Ahmad also feels disrespected by Christians who make assumptions about Islam. Christians compare Muhammad to Christ and the Koran to the Bible. Christians who present the message to Islam do so with a skewed view of Islam. Ahmad’s last problem with the message is that He thinks that the Koran is more reliable than the Bible because the Koran is the exact word of God dictated to men. “Why should I leave my superior message and replace it with an inferior message that relies on a less reliable book?” he asks.
Many readers may then be faced with some criticism that is hard to swallow. Ahmad then describes why he has a problem with the messenger. For most Muslims, Christianity is synonymous with the Western world. Because of this correlation, past and present circumstances between the west and east present a huge obstacle in receiving the gospel. Ahmad begins with the Crusades. Many readers may find themselves arguing with Ahmad’s recollection of history, but to argue would miss the point. Dr. Jabbour is quick to point out that Ahmad is presenting his view and it may or may not be correct but these views are still obstacles to overcome in reaching Ahmad for Jesus. Ahmad believes that Western Christian countries sent wave after wave of armies into the Islamic east on Christian jihad. He also compares the current U.S. Middle East policy with those same crusades. He wonders, “In your neo-Crusader attitude have you unleashed Islamic fanaticism and escalated violence?” Adding fuel to the fire of crusades was the period of time when European powers colonized much of the Islamic world. This period still leaves a bitter taste in the mouth of Muslims and many wonder if the War of Iraq is another attempt at colonizing the Middle East.
Ahmad also paints a very different picture then the Western media of suicide bombers and Palestinians fighters. He has a hard time looking past the apparent contradiction of support for Jewish men who join the army and fight and the rejection of Palestinian men who use their only available weapon, their body, to fight. He even compares them to Samson. Ahmad then asks, “Why do you feel theologically closer to the Jews than to the Muslims?” For many his questions will be hard to bare. Deep convictions that many Christians hold are challenged. For example, Ahmad does not separate church from state. In Islam it is church and state. For Ahmad to accept Christianity he feels that he must accept capitalism, democracy, and many other values that the west hold dear to. He especially does not like what he views as immorality that is presented in the name of freedom of press.
In the last segment of Ahmad’s written statement he discusses himself, the receiver. Ahmad almost sadly asks why he could be expected to leave his current culture and people. He would feel like a traitor and would be ostracized from his family and friends. He expects that he would have to give up his culture and appreciation for Arabic art. He feels like being asked to convert is being asked to change his name. He asks, “How did you feel, as Americans, when you heard about the American man, John Walker Lindh, who joined the Taliban in Afghanistan and took a Muslim name?” Ahmad ends his discussion with saying that he would be committing high treason. After this meeting with Ahmad, Dr. Jabbour is left speechless and with many questions. Dr. Jabbour promises to go into greater detail in further chapters but first he will have the reader meet Ahmad’s father and see the struggles he faces.
Ahmad’s father brings an even different prospective. He is a semi-retired physician from Egypt who strives on keeping up with the world events around him. He his views have grown and changed over time into a disturbing direction. In the beginning, he was opposed to radical fundamentalism but as events have changed his opinion has too. Ahmad’s father is disturbed by recent trends of globalization and the growth of American power. While he does see some good in American values, he is fearful of the freedom of expression without limits. He watches television and is bombarded with programs attacking Islam and the prophet Mohammad. Because he is not an American citizen, he does not get to vote in American elections. This leaves him with a sense of helplessness as American leaders decide policies that many Middle Eastern countries must follow. To Ahmad’s father, it is no wonder why some people have begun taking up arms and using their bodies as weapons.
The reader will notice that many of Ahmad and his father’s objections are not theological but cultural. They associate western culture with Christianity. In other words, they are against Christendom. Christendom can be described as the places and political powers associated with Christianity. It is the geographical realm of Christian culture. Dr. Jabbour then begins to show the difference in Christendom and the kingdom of God.

Dr. Jabbour defines the kingdom of God as:
• The invisible rule of God
• The expansion of the gospel irrespective of who rules the land,
• Living with Christ like attitudes and behaviors
The question is asked, “Are Christians confusing the kingdom of God with Christendom?” What is more important to God? Dr. Jabbour challenges the reader to think outside of Christendom. He describes the growth of the church in China as it is persecuted. A simple reminder is given that Christians are called to be Christ like in every situation. It is a challenge to reprioritize the reader’s goals towards the kingdom of God, to live an example of Christ in the midst of persecution. The main point in the challenge of Ahmad’s father may not be to agree with him but to spend time listening. The western world is very quick to speak but slow to hear. If Christians are willing to listen and understand Muslims view point they will be strengthening a bridge that will be able to carry the truth of Christ to them.
The reader is introduced to Ahmad’s sister who also brings a unique perspective. The western media are very quick to denounce what they view as sexism and mistreatment of women. Ahmad’s sister, Fatima, is the first to recognize that sadly there are people who claim to be Muslim who mistreat women just as there are some men in the west who do it to. She is also quick to point out the many advances that women have made in Islam. She points to great leaders in Islamic history including Khadijah, the first wife of Mohammad. One point in particular that she wants to point out is the wearing of the hijab. She takes great pride in wearing it and does not feel oppressed. She feels a sense of empowerment in knowing that she is not treated as a sex object. She also does not reject arranged marriages but understands the importance that family plays in the lives of a committed couple. Her parents will choose wisely with the input of their daughter. Most importantly, she points out verses in the Koran that teach equality and opportunity for both men and women.
Now that Ahmad and his family have given their views on many things, Dr. Jabbour begins the process of breaking it down and shedding Christian light onto it. To begin with, the author makes some assumptions. He first assumes that the reader’s loyalty is to the Great Commission and the kingdom of God. He also assumes that moderate Muslims will be more open to the gospel to than extremists. Another assumption is that it is all Christians’ responsibility to behave justly with love and humbleness while believing the sovereignty of God. The final assumption is that most Muslims are moving into one of two directions, moderation or extremism. It is this last assumption that is the most vital. If Christians are to be effective in reaching Muslims then they must work to move Muslims towards moderation. Christians must remove the outer wrapping from the gospel that keep moderate Muslims from becoming Christians and push Muslims to the extreme end.
As having been shown from Ahmad’s perspective, Muslims pay closer attention to the cultural trappings of Christianity. They are fearful that they will have to leave behind all of their culture and jump headlong into Christendom. Will they have to give up their Arabic name and family? These outer garments of the gospel are really just cultural elements that are not essential. But for fear of losing Christendom, many Christians do not present the gospel in a way that is culturally accessible to Muslims.
The scriptures are then opened for the reader and presented to show an alternative to cultural Christendom. Dr. Jabbour points to such important passages as Matthew 5: 13 where Jesus talks about being the salt and light of the earth. Another important passage is John 17 in which Jesus prays that his followers would not be taken out of the world but would be sent into it. Christians are called to reach past ethnocentrism and into the world. The reader is then given two scripture examples from the Old Testament representing ethnocentrism and mission living. The first example is of the captivity of Israel in Egypt. When Israel first came to Egypt they had a friend in leadership. But instead of integrating with Egyptians and being the light, they chose to live in exclusion. Four hundred years later, they were still outsiders and looked upon with suspicion. This resulted in the enduring of slavery until God rescued them. The second example comes from when the people of God were exiled in Babylon. In the book of Daniel, the Israelites were not able to live outside of Babylonian life but were integrated into its structure. Even with this integration, people like Daniel did not compromise in respect to God but because of their willingness to engage the culture, God moved the king of Babylon to praise him. “It is a challenge to live in the world and not be of the world “
Using this idea of integration and contextualization, how should Christians present the gospel to Muslims? Paradigms play an important part in this process. The Western world has focused on a legal paradigm when presenting Christianity. In doing this, they have limited the message of the good news. While it is true that the cross represents forgiveness and freedom from guilt, it also has other dimensions. Dr. Jabbour suggests that these other dimensions might be more effective in reaching Muslims. In particular, the cross is able to bring honor from shame. The shame and honor paradigm plays a huge role in Islamic culture. Many times family discipline involves shaming children when they are wrong. This is an element that Muslims can understand and appreciate. They are able to see the shame in the cross. In fact, Islam goes out of the way to remove the cross from its belief because of this shame. If Christians are able to show how Jesus took upon Himself the shame of the world so that they might have honor, it will go a long way in reaching them.
Lastly, Dr. Jabbour addresses Ahmad’s final obstacle to the faith. For many years, Christians have expected Muslims to drop all ties to Islam and become Christianized. While it is true that in order to follow Christianity one must leave behind teachings that are contradictory to the gospel, for Ahmad, Islam is much more than a religion. It includes his family, his heritage, his language, and culture. Should he be expected to leave his culture and join the “holy huddle” that many Christians live in? Ahmad has seen many times people who claim to be former Muslims, denouncing Islam and its culture.
Once again, Dr. Jabbour points back to the Bible for an answer. This time the answer comes from a curious text. Using 1 Corinthians 7:17-25, the reader is given a new and insightful look at a passage mostly about marriage. The passage is instruction for new believers who are in a marriage to an unbeliever. Paul instructs the believer to remain in the marriage out of love and hope that their partner may become a believer themselves. Paul is instructing the person to remain in the situation in which they found themselves. Using this wisdom, Dr. Jabbour says that new converts from Islam should remain in their culture. They should not remove themselves from the situation but become the salt and light to those around them. In doing this, they will reach their family and others who will not be reached by an outsider. This suggestion is both controversial and hopeful at the same time. Muslim background Christians are able to use familiar Islamic names for Jesus and the prophets. They are able to spread the love of Jesus from the inside.
The message of this book is ultimately love. Many people who read this book will find themselves challenged to see the world through a different lens. The western notion of Christianity is confronted all the way through. Readers will find themselves arguing against some of the assumptions that the composite characters make. Some of the hardest teachings come against Christendom. An allegiance to political powers is confronted and a mirror is shown to the west. By doing this, a transformation will occur in the heart. The internal struggle to listen to Islamic concerns should cause an outpouring of love for the Muslim world.
Not only does the book bring change of heart, it also offers practical advice on reaching Muslims. The chapters on integrating into the culture and becoming examples to Muslims will provide much insight into reaching this mysterious world. Christians are able to see Muslims as people who need Christ. They are able to see bridges that can address the concerns of Muslims. Advice about presenting the Gospel in paradigms important to Muslims is an example that all Christians should heed. God has used Dr. Jabbour to present a case for loving and reaching Muslims. The author has succeeded in his goal of moving the reader to compassion. By challenging and confronting western notions and giving a peep into the mind of Muslims, Dr. Jabbour has opened hearts for Muslims. Walking a mile in Ahmad’s sandals will give the reader reason to pause and to contemplate justice and love. This book has truly taken the time to look at Muslims through the eyes of the cross.

Im back! Similarities and Differences between Christianity and Islam

2008-09-05T02:33:00.005-04:00

Its been a while since I have posted anything on here. Ive been busy with work and taking a seminary class. I am still working on recovering from anxiety but I am feeling much much better. Anyways I wanted to post a blog comparing Christianity and Islam. I also wanted to describe some ways that Christians can reach Muslims for Christ. For many people, Christianity and Islam seem like two completely opposite religions, but in truth they have many things in common. As Christians, we can use these commonalities as bridges to reaching Muslims.
Christianity and Islam both trace their lineage back to Adam, Noah, Moses, David, and Jesus. With that said, they hold many of the same historical narratives found in the Bible, including a literal creation and the flood. Many Muslim scientists have researched and debated against evolution and for creation. Both Christians and Muslims are in awe of God's sovereignty and power. True wisdom is the fear of the Lord. Both believe that God is just and will punish evil and reward good. We both hold a high view of our respectable scriptures. The ten commandments are very much alive in Islamic teaching. The first pillar of Islam is very similar to the first commandment. Jesus holds a very important place in Islam. We both believe that Jesus was born of a virgin and is the Messiah. We both believe that He lived a perfect life and will return one day.

We differ however on the facts that matter most, namely that Jesus in the One True God in the Flesh. Jesus is not just another prophet but is the actual God in human form come to redeem His creation. While Muslims hold a high view of God's justice, in my opinion they do not hold a high enough view. For Muslims, God can just forgive whoever as he pleases with no real reason. That would be completely unjust. To write off sins, without any punishment makes God into a liar and a unfair judge. The Bible teaches that the wages of sin are death. If God doesn't keep his word than, He is a liar. Christianity teaches that God is true to His word and punishes sin. He however is loving and took the punishment upon Himself. At the cross, God showed He is both Just and Loving, King and Friend.
Islam denies the deity of Christ and the sacrifice He made on the cross. It also teaches a wrong view of the trinity. Islam teaches that we view Jesus, God, and Mary as the trinity. I believe that has a lot to do with how Christians began idolizing Mary and the Saints in the period of Mohammad's life. Islam like Christianity also teaches that Christ will return but Islam teaches that Christ will knock down all crosses (end Christianity) upon His return and institute Islam everywhere.

To reach Muslims, we must begin with God's eyes. We must pray to see them like He does. We need to have the love of Christ abiding in us. An old saying goes, They wont care how much you know until they know how much you care. Developing friendship and seeking opportunities to change misconceptions they may have about Christianity. Many Muslims feel that if they are to accept Christianity they they must give up Arabic names, become die hard conservative capitalists and give up every aspect of their culture. We can also build bridges by pointing out their worship for God and showing our motives when we worship. Nothing will win them over to Christ, better than living a life of love motived by the joy of a relationship with God. We must see them as a person first and foremost. We can then ask them about what the Koran says about Jesus. Once we are friends with them we can be free to show them our faith in more detail.

I will be posting more in the future on this topic.

A dark week

2008-07-27T19:26:00.002-04:00

This week began last sunday with a great day at church. The morning service was good. It was especially good to see my brother Josh step in at the last moment and lead worship. He did a great job and I was proud of him. After church I went with a group called the vine to give out sandwiches and drinks to some people at the city mission. It was really good to be able to put my faith in action. Then the sunday night service was amazing. Our pastor has been starting a new series based on Mark Bells Nooma videos. They are very educational help start group discussion. The sunday was great over all. And thats when the evil attacked. Sunday night, I laid down to go to sleep and found my mind racing. I couldn't stop thinking about everything. I am usually a very calm person but some reason my mind began attacking itself. I couldn't stop thinking about a movie I had watched. There was nothing in the movie that made me upset but my mind just wouldn't shut off. Thats when all hell broke lose. For some unknown reason my mind began panicking. I began to worry that I would never be able to sleep. My heart beat increased and before I knew it I thought I was going to die. I couldn't breath, I couldn't see straight, and I couldn't shake the feeling of imminent death. Every time I would close my eyes, visions of people dieing would come into my mind. I finally went for help and my parents helped calm me down. With the help of a tylonel pm I was able to go to sleep. But then the morning didn't bring help. I woke up feeling on edge. I found that the only respite from anxiety was by staying in bed asleep. Tuesday night, I had another panick attack. On Wednesday I went to the doctor, and he gave me some medication to help with anxiety. It is now sunday, and I am still struggling. Everytime that I start to feel ok, I start to wonder if I am indeed ok, and that restarts the cycle of anxiety. But the good news is this, I have not been alone through this week. My parents have been more than supporting as I have gone through this week. They have been there as I have broke down crying for no reason. They have been there when I just knew I was going crazy. My brothers have both been supportive as well. One thing this week, Satan has been using this time to attack me about my past. I have done a lot of stupid things in my past that I regret more than anything, and Satan has been playing them in my head. But there is good news, God has forgiven me. The bible says, that Whoever Jesus sets free is free indeed. I am free and I am forgiven. So as I am waiting on the medication to kick in and help lift a bit of the anxiety, I am still going to praise God. God is still good and great. No matter how dark I feel, I want to praise Him.
Also as a side note, my pastor (whose blog can be found on my links to the right) has been very helpful to. I was able to talk to him today and he reminded me of God's grace and His love. It is also good to be reminded of that.

Anyways, the reason I wanted to kind of air all this out there, is I hope that if there is someone else out there who is going through anxiety or panic attacks that they will know that there are other people like them. I also want you to know the truth of the gospel. No matter what you have done, God is most powerful and merciful to forgive you and give you a new start. If you have any other questions feel free to leave comments or email me at movieguyjoe@gmail.com
BTW please pray for me as I am still struggling really bad with all this anxiety and panicking.

Antichrist?

2008-07-24T23:29:00.003-04:00

So the other day, I watched several videos on youtube saying that Barrack Obama is the antichrist. Now of couse, the videos were full of misinformation and half truths, but they did get me thinking. I won't got as far as to declare Obama the anti-christ, but I will say that he is a very bad choice. He is the most liberal senator in the senate and would gladly put an end to capitalism. A lot of his ideas are old outdated ideas about wealth redistribution. It is about taxing the rich, just because they are rich. He talks of hope and change, but his real message is government dependent living. JFK once said, ask not what your country can do for you. Obama's message is demand all you can from your government.
But the scary thing, is his rise to worldwide fame. His cult like status among the electorate. Just today he spoke to thousands and thousands in Germany. I will applaud him on his cunning use of media. The media have been eating out of his hand. Some of the photos from his road trip have been downright inspiring works of art. It is creepy. The following news story is about Obama's campaign plastering the western wall in Jerusalem with campaign posters. This is disrespectful and would be something that the anti-Christ would do.

The real problem for me with Obama, is that he shows how easy it would be for a very evil person to rise to power in our world. I do not know if Obama is as evil as alot of the conservatives make him out to be, but I do know that the path he is taking is scary.

Great interview

2008-07-15T14:17:00.002-04:00

Here's a great interview with my presidential candidate

The People Behind the Hero

2008-07-08T01:18:00.007-04:00

I want to take the time to blog a little about some of the people who have been there for me from the beginning. I have been blessed to have been given two of the greatest people on earth as parents. I know most people will say nice things about there parents and but I am so thankful to God for them. They have been there with me every step of the way helping me, cheering me on, and loving me.
My father has been a great example of someone being obedient to God. He has been faithful to God's call on his life, even when that meant quitting a 20 year job to go back to college and become a minister. That had to be a hard thing to do. But my dad was faithful and God has rewarded him by taking care of him and his family. My dad is now the WV State Music Director for the WV Convention of Southern Baptists. I have learned to be faithful to God because of him. My dad has also taught me patience and gentleness. I can honestly say that I do not know anyone who does not like my dad. He goes out of his way to be kind and helpful to everyone. My dad also taught me a respect for the outdoors, guns, and BEES! My dad and I are terrified of wasps. I can remember one time, when my father, my brother and myself went squirrel hunting. After a long day of hunting without seeing one squirrel ( we saw about a million deer) we were going to bed down in the hayloft of a barn. All three of us climbed up the wooden ladder into the loft and began to lay out our sleeping bags. I began to notice that there seemed to be a lot of flies buzzing about the air. My brother David noticed it too, and said "Dad how are we going to sleep with all these flies up here?" That was when the look on dad's face changed to sheer horror as he said, "Those aren't flies, those are hornets." And thats when I not only saw the hornets but felt them. What happened next is a blur but I can remember dad throwing our sleeping gear out of the loft, jumping out, and running. While we were running dad was patting us down, trying to get the hornets off. I know it hurt but I couldnt help but laugh. We finally made it out and spent the night sleeping under the stars. Im still afraid of hornets.

My mom has been an awesome mother. She has shown me an example of Jesus's humility and hard work. She has put in many thankless hours cooking, cleaning, and taking care of me. My mom in her relationship with my dad, has shown me what a biblical wife should be like. As the song goes, I want someone like my dear ol mom. She has been supportive of my dad and I know he wouldn't be able to be the minister he could be without her. She cares for her family like a mother lion cares for her pride. My mom is also someone I can take my cares too and she will listen. We have not always seen eye to eye but she has always been on my side and my biggest fan. She can also make great desserts and has been to known to be the "light" of the birthday party. One time my brother Josh was celebrating a birthday. The entire family was gathered around the table to wish him a happy day you were born day. My mom had baked a delicious cake and decorated it with candles. The candles were lit and we sang happy birthday. My mom leaned in to give Josh a hug but her hair got a little too close to the cake. I wanted to move to help but all I could do was laugh. Her hair was now ablaze and no one did anything but laugh. She patted it out and then joined us in the laughter. We have never let her live it down.

I am so very thankful for the parents God gave me. I have not been the best son. I have had some very heated arguments with them, but they still love me. I am most thankful that they have shown me God's love and grace. No matter how stupid I have been they have shown me forgiveness. They have also shown me the Gospel. They took me to church from the first week out of the womb. They have constantly prayed for me and I appreciate them. I know that no matter what this life has in store because of their faithfulness to God, I have come to know Jesus personally. I hope and pray that one day I can be a parent as good as them.

Tablet ignites debate on messiah and resurrection.

2008-07-06T23:30:00.006-04:00

A new article appeared in several news agencies today claiming to ignite debate about Christianity and the Resurrection.

A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.

The tablet, probably found near the Dead Sea in Jordan according to some scholars who have studied it, is a rare example of a stone with ink writings from that era — in essence, a Dead Sea Scroll on stone. Continue

To summarize the article, a few scholars believe they have found a fragmant of a pre-christian jewish view on the messiah. They say the tablet talks of a messiah who would die and be resurrected 3 days later. Many people are saying this find will cause a heated debate about Christianity and its roots. I've read several blogs claiming that this find blows the lid off of Christianity and shows that Christianity was just copying other beliefs prevalent at the time. I want to offer two refutes to these arguments.

1. The first thing is that this supposed tablet has yet to be completely verified for authenticity. It has yet to been held up to the scientific community for complete verification. Also some of the tablet's words are not entirely recognizable and require some speculation to translate. We must be careful to not make hasty decisions based on opinion instead of fact. Every few years some "find" is touted as the next nail in the coffin for Christianity to only be phony and counterfeit. But if this find does past the test of verification then there is a second defense.

2. The find really doesnt say anything that Christians don't already believe. Christians since the disciples have been claiming that Jesus fulfilled prophesies and traditions long held by the Jewish community. Jesus himself claimed to be God and to fulfill old testament scripture. Christians would have no problem with the idea that the Jewish community was looking for a messiah that would suffer and be killed. We know from the Bible that not all Jews were looking for this but if a small sect were to be looking for this, then it would not hurt Christianity in the least. Actually it does the opposite. And shows that the idea of the messiah being killed and then resurrected was not created by Paul or the apostles but was part of Jewish tradition. This would just show another way that Christ completed prophesy and is the Messiah.

I do not know why some are claiming the end for Christianity but to me this looks like it has the possibility of being a big find for Christianity. What ever happens, I know that Christ is the messiah. He completed the old testament prophesies. He completed His own prophesies of death, burial, and resurrection. And I look forward to His return.

Traveling

2008-07-05T00:03:00.001-04:00

With the state of airlines and such sometimes people get a bad deal with their luggage. When CJ and I were traveling to the philippines we were afraid our luggage would be lost. Thank God it arrived safely. This guy wasnt so fortunate. check it out.

Why I am a Libertarian

2008-07-02T12:44:00.006-04:00

The 4th of July is coming upon us and it is a time to celebrate our country's independence. It is a time of flag waving, fireworks, and cookouts. This year I am sure it will be a time of much political discourse. Unless you've been living under a rock, you know it is election year. This is the year that we elect a new president. And just like mason said to dixon, the line is drawn.
On one side we have Barrack Obama. To many people he is a savior, an inspiration, and their hope. To others he is the antichrist. Obama's platform is an inspirational message of change and hope. He brings with him the hope that someone other than rich white men can be president. For many that is enough to vote for him. He also brings about promises of help to the poor. He promises to take on big business and show the might of our government. He is the middle class's best friend.
On the other side, we have the war hero John McCain. He's of irish decent so that is a plus. He brings with him a track record of standing up to the establishment. He promises to use the might of the government to stand up to terrorists and ruthless regimes. He hasnt made a lot of conservatives happy but he has been working on moving closer to that side.
On both sides we have people making promises. We have people pandering to their own cult of ideals. And it has both sides angry and scared. If Obama is elected republicans will be forced to deal with democrat ideals. If McCain is elected democrats will be forced to live with republican ideals. Accusations fly left and right. If republicans win, religious nuts will inflict their morals on the "more educated". If democrats win, then heathen athiests will push their lack of morals on everyone. Its gay vs straight. Right vs left. All vieing for the power of the federal Government.

Wait a minute, I have an idea. Actually its not my idea but the idea of people like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin. The idea is this, what if the federal government didnt have all the power. What if the president didnt have all the power to enforce one sides opinion over the other. What if people had the power. What if people could live in liberty and make their own decisions.
That is what our constitution is all about. It is what the bill of rights are all about. Today we worry so much about who will be president because the federal government has become something it was never meant to be. The United States was meant to be just that. States (sovereign entitites) coming together to unite in the area of defense and foreign diplomacy. That didnt mean that every state had to look the same, have the same ideals, and make the same laws. This meant that West Virginia didnt have to worry about New York making laws that didnt go with the culture in WV. It also meant that New York didnt have to worry about WV making laws that didnt work in New York. But something happened. The federal government stopped following the constitution. And now we are left in a point where each state and every person is worried about losing their culture and values. The president and the federal government are supposed to be limited. The constitution was made to limit the government. It says exactly what powers are given to each branch. It then leaves everything not specifically given to the federal government to the people.

We need to get back to the heart of true conservatism. A place that give freedom to people to make their own decisions. A place that respects the power of the state governments. Patrick Henry said, Give Me Liberty or Give me Death. We need liberty.
Today liberty is under attack by both democrats and republicans. The constitution is trampled under by both sides. John F Kennedy once said Ask not what your country can do for you but ask what you can do for your country. Unfortunately both parties have taken to the opposite. Republicans want to take away our rights under the name of national security. Now let me state that I am for national security but only as it falls under the guidelines of the constitution. Republicans want to take away the right to a fair trial and the right to privacy. Many people gladly give up their rights because they want security. But once government is given a power it never gives it up. That means that even though the government may not be abusing this power today, it will have the opportunity to do so in the future. Democrats take away our rights in another way. The take away our right to bare arms for safety reasons. And they take away our right to reap what we sow by taxing us to death. They do this in the name of helping the poor. They want to steal from one person and give to another. They want to take from the Rich and give to the poor. And once again, just because this power is not be abused today doesnt mean it wont in the future.

So what is the answer. The answer is to follow the constitution. The constitution protects our rights. Many people think that bill of rights gives the people certain rights. But actually it doesnt give us rights. The rights are already ours. It just protects those rights from the government. We need to continue to uphold these rights. We also need to stop trying to place our demands on the government. Christians need to quit expecting the government to do our job of teaching good morals, and taking care of the poor and the sick. The Church needs to step up in those departments. Im sick and tired of hearing Christians complain and boycott anytime a non christian does something wrong. People who are not christians will not behave like christians. It is up to us as christians to show the gospel and the light.

Finally, we do have an option. There is a third candidate. Now I know what your thinking. Your thinking if I vote for a third party candidate I am throwing away my vote. There are two answers to this. One, your wasting your vote with the other two candidates. They both do not follow the constitution and will both take away your rights. Second, dont be a person who votes because they want the lesser of two evils, vote for what is right. Please read up on the libertarian party. Please vote for Bob Barr. Do the patriotic thing and vote for liberty.

The Civil War

2008-06-25T23:15:00.004-04:00

There's a civil war going on right now inside my very being and it is anything but civil. It has been raging since the day of my second birth. The day I was born again marks the first shots fired in this internal war. On one side are all the forces of the flesh and sinful nature, supported by Satan and the entire realm of darkness. At a first glance it may seem like that side has the upper hand. But on the other side is something infinitely greater and more powerful, namely the Holy Spirt, Christ, and the Father. There will be many victories and defeats for me spiritually but what the dark side doesnt realize is that the war was one in the opening shots. The day I was born again, the day the war started, was the day the war was won.
Even though the war was won, the enemy will still fight until the final breath. There are many times in my life when I seem to be coming off of victory after victory to only be landed with defeats. It seems that in the moments after my biggest victories, I am handed my biggest defeats. These defeats are very dark times and almost seem to be the enemy winning the war.
But there is great news, God can turn our biggest defeats into victories. In fact our biggest defeats to the flesh can become in the hands of God, our most triumphant moments. If I stand out of the way and let God do the fighting, then He can turn these darkest moments into brightness.
In fact, one day Satan will think that he has landed the fatal blow. My body, my flesh, and the armies of darkness will work together and defeat me for all time in death. I will be killed. It is in this moment, the moment when the enemy will begin to celebrate their victory, that God will accomplish the most miraculous event ever. The defeat of death, will not be a defeat at all, but will be my final victory. The civil war will be completely over. In death, God will give me life.
Satan and darkness, will not be triumphant. They will be embarrassed and left completely dead.

The victory was secured at the beginning of the war, and it is secured at the end of the war. It is only up to me to claim victory throughout my life. God has given us victory over sin. God has cut off the chains of bondage.

Thank you God for saving me. Your love shown on the cross has defeated death, sin, and I love you for it.

Tomatoes

2008-06-10T13:36:00.002-04:00

I love tomatoes. I couldn't imagine eating a taco, hamburger,salad, chicken sandwich without one. But thanks to 100 people getting sick from I can't get them at any restaurant. Now I am all for safety and keeping good cleanliness with food, but I think the food market is overreacting. They are blowing the whole thing out of proportion. I believe they are making 2 mistakes.
1. 100 people out of how many million people eat tomatoes daily. I like my odds there. I have better odds of winning the lottery. I will take my chances that the tomato on my hamburger will be ok.
2. The real problem I have is they don't even know if it is the tomatoes causing the salmonellae poison. Yet stores by droves are recalling tomatoes and hurting farmers in florida and other great states. A couple of years ago we had a scare about green onions and it ended up being spinach that was the culprit. Taco Bell to this days doesn't serve green onions.

I know the sensible thing is to stop selling until we know for sure. But dangit, I want tomato.

Philippine Slideshow

2008-06-08T17:32:00.003-04:00

Heres a lil slide show I put together from pictures of our May 2008 mission trip to Dumaguete City, Negros Oriental, Philippines.

Lost Wallet

2008-06-06T13:21:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was the worst day of my life or at least it felt like that yesterday. The day began really the night before with the loss of my wallet. I can remember driving to walmart for toothpaste, mouthwash, and a pack of blank dvds. I went through the self checkout line. I scanned my items and put them in the bag. I pulled my brown wallet out of my front pocket, pulled out a 20 and thats where my memory stops. According to the security cam which I had to beg the manager to watch, I put the wallet in my pocket and headed out the front door. I was slightly distracted by the cute girl who walked in front of me and tried not to laugh when another customers bag broke open spilling out its contents everywhere. I guess karma is true because somewhere between that moment and driving to my friend's home, my wallet disappeared. I know it was genuine leather and the cow it came from had been long dead, but my wallet still had some run in it because it completely vanished. I combed completely over my friend's house. I drove around the parking lot of his apartment complex. I accused my friend of taking it as a joke. I flew to walmart and demanded to see the security camera. I then went home empty handed and empty pocketed. I tried to sleep but to no avail. Then as if to make my day/night even better the power went out. So I sat in my room, pouting. I had lost my driver's license, social security card, debit card, speedway rewards card, library card, and 100 dollars. I also lost a few email addresses from people in the philippines, so if you are reading this and I don't send you an email, I'm sorry. Well as the day progressed, it got hotter and hotter. I got angrier and angrier. Then it hit me. There have been far greater travesties in the world then the lost of my wallet and electricity. I had just come from a place a few days earlier where people are happy to live off 5 dollars a day. I am still blessed to have life. I can still talk, walk, and use my arms. So yesterday was bad, but God still deserves praise on even our worst days. I am sure that there will be many more days, that I will come to rue. I am sure that the loss of my wallet will not compare in the slighest to the loss of friends and family. But even on those days, God will still deserve praise.
It reminds me of a song, called Jury Duty. Its by the OC Supertones. Its a story about another guys bad day. Here it is:

God will give and take away, still I will say, blessed be the Lord.

Update: My wallet is still missing but the power is back on.

Home

2008-06-03T20:27:00.001-04:00

I made it home and have already gone back to work. I am missing every one of my filipino friends so much. I want to thank everyone who helped in offering up prayers and financial support. I was so blessed to be able to go on the trip. It flew by and I am still trying to process in my mind everything that happened. God worked in great ways and our team saw a lot accomplished. I feel that God used this trip to not only leave an impact on the filipino people but on me. I have a deeper appreciation for the blessings God has given me here. I also know that we were able to bring new people into the kingdom of God. Thank you so very much for your help.

I am already excited about the possibility of a return trip in January. I am pre-planning for a longer term mission trip. I would like to go for 2 months instead of 2 weeks. I would also like to have some people join me on my trip for atleast 2weeks out of the 2 months. If you are interested in even the slightest bit, let me know and I will help you raise money and plan ahead.

Sitting Halfway from Both Homes

2008-05-30T20:14:00.003-04:00

Im in LAX (Los Angelos Airport) waiting for my next flight. It's 5:00 PM here and we have to wait till 11:00 PM to fly to Charlotte. Sitting here I am missing both my home in WV and my home in the Philippines. Looking back over the trip, it has flown by and in way has felt like one long day instead of 2 weeks. I am physically worn out and emotionally drained. The trip was a nonstop 2 week explosion of sights, sounds, and smells. I did my best to take in every moment and savor it. Right now I feel overloaded and overwelmed with emotion. While the trip seemed to have lasted for such a short time, it seems like years of thoughts and experiences have filled it. I made new friends from both the US and the Philippines. I really enjoyed getting to meet the rest of the mission team from New Orleans. We had a great time getting to know one another. We played spades every night, and Bobby and I beat Jay and Daniel everytime. I also met new people in Dumaguete City including Giavani who was a great help in door to door evengalism. I really enjoyed being able to hang out with my girlfriend Rowina "Weng" in the evening time. During the day, she had to work but she would join us for the eveing meal and other mission activities. I miss her quite a lot. I also enjoyed learning more Cebuano. I took four semesters of German in college but I know more Cebuano in just two trips to the Philippines. My brain kind of hurts from thinking so much. I am looking forward to begin home with all my American comforts but at the same time I feel guilty because many of my Filipino friends will never get to experience anything like that. I have a lot of work ahead of me in editing the video footage. I will try and get it finished as soon as possible.
The flight out of Dumaguete was so sad. I hate having to say goodbye to Weng and the rest of my friends. They all are sad and crying. To see their beautiful brown eyes and smiles crying because I am leaving is overwelming. I can not wait to go back. Please keep me in your prayers , as I try to raise the money to go back in January for a longer trip.

Adios sa Pilipinas

2008-05-28T22:34:00.001-04:00

The trip so far has been amazing. We have accomplished quite a lot. We built an extra room and entrance way onto the church building at New Life Christian Church. We held 4 block parties/crusades and many people where saved. We held a pastor's seminar for two days in which 60+ people showed up. I made many new friends and was reunited with old ones. I have felt so blessed to be able to be a part of this. I have learned a lot of Cebuano. If you were tired of me talking about the philippines before then I apologize in advance for when I get home. Today we will be leaving the island of negros and going to Manilla for one day, then flying home. The trip has flown by and I am very sad to be leaving. I miss my friends and family at home but I really feel like I could stay here. I want to thank everyone who has helped me in finiancial matters and in prayer. I can never thank you enough.

When I get home, I am going to be working at raising the money to come back in January. On that trip, I would like to stay for a lot longer than 2 weeks. I am praying that I will be able to stay for a few months. Please continue your prayers. The plane ride is a long one home and will be a very sad time. I will be working on the documentary of the trip and I hope that I have a lot of good footage and stories. Once Again thank you so much.

The last full day

2008-05-28T03:22:00.002-04:00

It is Wednesday at about 3:30 PM here. We had some unexpected news in that our flight on friday from Dumaguete City to Manilla has been cancelled. It would be perfectly fine with me to stay a few more days but the rest of the team have committments back home. So in order to make it home in the required time we will be flying out tommorrow afternoon. This means we will be staying in Manilla over night tomorrow. Today is a day of retrospection as we have most of the morning and afternoon free. Looking back over my time here, it has flown by. It seems like we only stepped off the plane earlier today. I have met a lot of good people and reunited with old friends. My grasp of the cebuano language has gone up a bit. We have been very busy working on construction, crusades, and seminars. God has been at work here and He will continue when we leave. I am very sad to be leaving because the love that we share here is amazing. I have never felt more at home or welcome then in the midst of my filipino friends. I am dreading the flight tommorrow but it will be good to see my family and friends at home too. Please continue your prayers for the crusade we have this evening. We are going to be doing a crusade/block party in Sibulan. It is in the middle of the town and will hopefully draw a good crowd. I am praying that God will use tonight to really energize His work in the people here. I love the people here with all my heart and desire for God to bless them abundatly. We can learn so much from there contenment, patience, and long suffering.
I am going to end this post by copying and pasting Pastor CJ's blog. It describes a bit more what we did.
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Dumaguete City

Day is dawning on our last full day here in Dumaguete. The long journey home begins tomorrow when our Philippine Air Lines flight departs for Manila at 2:45 PM (that’s a quarter to 3:00AM Wed. night/Thurs. morning back home). Our departure from Negros was moved up one day due to Philippine Air Lines cancellation of the Friday flight upon which we previously held reservations. This will require an overnight stay in Manila. As far as we know, the remaining flights will all be on schedule for our return – with the New Orleans team arriving home very late on Friday night, and Joey and I returning to Tri State Airport around 10:30 on Saturday morning.

Today is basically a free day for our team until the scheduled outdoor crusade at 5:00 PM. This is a very welcome occurrence, since we began intensive activities here the night we arrived. On past trips we have always had a day of rest before the mission activities started. We did not have that luxury on this go around. The entire team is exhausted, especially after the last two day’s activities.

Billy Cox and Bobby Wood have worked like borrowed mules for the past two days, constructing an entrance canopy at Pastor Valdez’ New Life Church in Upper Batinguel. The project was 95 percent finished when the heavy rain washed out their activity yesterday afternoon. Billy indicates that only one piece of the metal roofing remains to be installed on the 24 foot wide structure, The necessary materials are there on site, and Dave Valdez (along with James Enclonar and other men of the church) will be able to complete the work with no problem. Billy and Bobby not only built a structure, but also a great relationship with Pastor Valdez’ son Dave, who worked along side them and spent some extra time with them, taking them for lunch to some really nice local places.

Please pray for Dave Valdez and his wife Michelle and son Genesis David. Michelle and the 8 year old boy are in California, where she is working in a dental office while holding down two other part time jobs. It is not unusual in Filipino families to have family members working in other countries to provide financial support for their families. Dave has graduated from nursing school and will soon test for his board certification. He is praying that is visa will be approved and he will be able to join them in America soon. As it is right now, they are only able to see one another once per year. I just cannot imagine how tough that must be on them all.

The Seminar, while not hard physical labor, was still exhausting. Both of the Seminar days began for Jay and I around 6:00 AM and did not end until 6:00 PM. Getting ready for the classes required a good bit of set up each day, and attendees began arriving as early as 7:30 each morning. Daniel, Amanda, and Janna took care of registration and provided worship music in the morning and afternoon sessions. These young people are tremendously talented and have a great spirit to serve. The girls also provided unofficial child care for a beautiful little boy whose parents attended both days of the seminar.

Joey Spurgeon, with video camera always in hand, split time doing several tasks during the seminar. Joe did everything from filming, to running the sound, to running the power point slides for the sessions that Robby Pearson and I taught. Joey is also most valuable as a team member who connects with the Filipino people. He is especially gifted in regard to children and youth ministry. He has been a valuable asset to this team in everything from house to house evangelism to the crusade activities. He preached one night in Bais City and 28 people responded with decisions to accept Christ.

Jay’s morning sessions in the seminar, dealt with Bible study, text selection, exegesis, and sermon preparation and delivery. The pastors in attendance soaked it up like a sponge. Some have had some Bible school or a little seminary experience, but most have very limited formal Bible education. I wish each of you could have seen the intensity with which they listened and took notes.

My two afternoon sessions included lessons on the Characteristics of an Effective Leader on Monday, and Developing Leaders Through Discipleship on Tuesday. These were also well received by everyone in attendance. Robby Pearson’s two personal evangelism sessions on Casting the Net and Drawing the Net were simply outstanding. Robby is a likeable guy with a sharp sense of humor and an infectious laugh. For those of you who may be NASCAR fans, you might be interested in knowing that Robby’s father and grandfather were both drivers. In fact, his grandfather, David Pearson, was the top rival to superstar Richard Petty, back in the day.

Bethel Guest House was the perfect venue for this event. Their central location and reputation as “THE CONFERENCE CENTER” in Dumaguete lent an immediate air of credence to the event. Most of these pastors and their wives live in the most humble of dwellings and rarely have opportunity to be treated as special as they were here at Bethel Guest House. It was a real treat for them to spend two days in these comfortable surroundings, and it was fulfilling for us to be able to “pamper” them a bit.

I could go on and on about the seminar, but suffice it to say that I believe it may have been two of the most valuable days we have ever spent here. The other activities were important as well, but this was a special time of intensive training for the men who are on the firing line here all the time. The 71 in attendance were most appreciative of the event and many voiced their hopes that we might be able to do another seminar in the future.

Every attendee extended their gratitude for the free opportunity to learn and to have fellowship with one another. No one went away empty handed as nearly $1,000 worth of Bibles, Bible Reference books and other printed aids were distributed to everyone in attendance. Many shed tears of joy. I was most touched by a lady named Muffett Villiagas who is the wife of Pastor Andrew Villiagas. Muffett is a very talented lady who is a local radio and television personality and also writes a column for the Negros Chronicle newspaper here in Dumaguete. She is fighting a battle with cancer very similar to my own. Her prognosis is uncertain and she is pretty weak, yet she managed to attend most all of the sessions. On Tuesday afternoon she called me aside and gave me a plastic bag that contained seven small framed water color pictures that she had painted. She wanted each of our seminar team members to have one as a token of her appreciation for what we were trying to do here in Dumaguete. I cherish that little picture.

Thank you for helping us – both prayerfully and financially – to bless these precious people.

May God bless you!

Maayong Buntag

2008-05-26T20:49:00.002-04:00

Good morning from the great sunny island of negros in the Philippines. We have been very busy and I have not had much time to post. It is now Tuesday morning and the second day of our pastor/church leader seminar. Yesterday we had a good crowd for the seminar. Jay, CJ, and Robby are the speakers and they are teaching about how to prepare sermons, be effective leaders,and reach the lost people here. This seminar is very important because it is helping to keep the work going when we leave here. We have done quite a lot since arriving. We have done door to door evangelism, block parties, construction work, and of course the seminar. I have met so many good and loving people. I have also heard many stories that have encouraged and uplifted me. I want to take this time to share about Dave Valdez.

He is the son of pastor Dominggo Valdez. He is 35 but you could not tell that by looking at him. In a lot of ways he and I are very much alike. He has grown up his whole life in a family known for ministry. He was raised in a very good christian home. He also knows the expectations placed on a pastor's son. And like me, he has been some what of a rebel. He loves american music and dresses like many american 20 yr olds. He has known the pain that rebelling against God's love and the happiness that only embracing that love can bring. Dave is a bit of wild child. He is the one who had me try coconut wine which ferments in less than an hour. He loves to cruise on his bike and feel the wind on his face. But there is something even more going on his mind. Dave is married and has a 5 year old child. The problem is that Dave's wife and child live in America and have been there for 3 years. Dave has been trying to get a visa to be with them but because his wife is not a US citizen it is very difficult. Dave worries that his son will grow up and not know his father. Dave shows true love though in wanting the best for his family. He knows that his family can live more comfotable and in better conditions in America. So Dave sacrifices his time with his family. Dave told me that there are many times when he feels all alone here. His family visits once a year and I am sure it is a very happy time but also a sad time because He knows they will leave again and he will be alone. Dave said it may take him 2-3 more years before He will go to America. He told me that He sometimes wonders why God would test him like this. Even though Dave may question the circumstances, he knows that God is in charge and control. Dave's love for God and his family is a great example of selfless sacrifice. So even though Dave is rough around the edges, his testimony is a story of faithfulness. Please pray for Dave that he will be reunited with his family. Please pray that his son will not grow up angry at his father but that he will understand. Please pray that Dave will trust and rely on God's love even more.

There are many many more stories like this, that I have picked up here. God is using these people to create in me a humble heart. We only have a short while more here and then we will be coming home. For me, I am dreading that trip. It is my most sincere prayer that God will let me come back and stay in a more long term trip.

Hot Humid Fun

2008-05-23T00:15:00.003-04:00

Stepping off the plane was like stepping into a sauna. Immediately every pore in my body opened up and started gushing sweat. I am not sure but I think that my body even created new pores to let out sweat. To look out the window you would see an overcast day and think it might be a cooler day, but that could not be further from the truth. Yesterday was just like the first day here. It was hot but very fun. We woke up after a cold shower and a good nights sleep to have breakfast. I had chicken, rice, eggs, and the most savory fruit on the planet, mango. We then met for a short devotion and then jumped on the oxymoron named , Easy Ride. It's a lot like riding in the back of a pickup truck. We then drove through several towns and for about 2 hours. The traffic here is still crazy, with no stop lights or stop signs. We then stopped at a little diner called Wonka's Diner. It was basically in the middle of nowhere. Being the adventerous person that I am, I tried squid, pork something or other, and rice. I was half tempted to try the pig intestines but i just couldnt bring myself to do it. My roommate here named Bobby, was afraid to try something so he got a cheeseburger. Big Mistake, because when you say the word cheeseburger you might picture a big patty of beef layered with cheese, lettuce, tomatoe, and ketchup. But in the philippines cheeseburger means something completely different. I am not sure what it was but it did have a bun. But the pink sauce and strange patty would take an iron stomach to digest. Actually he ate it and said it wasnt too bad. There was also a monkey hanging around outside the awning. I got some great footage of Jay giving it a bananna. I hate spelling the word bananna because I can not do it right.
We then hopped back on the easy ride and headed to Bias City. We stopped at the church and picked up some helpers and then headed into the country side. We stopped at a basketball court, which they have probably more basketball courts then buildings with indoor plumbing. We split into groups of three and headed down 3 roads. Our task was to go house to house. Now I have done house to house evengalism in the states, and I hate it. If you go to someone's house in America and ring the doorbell, they open the door and look at you like you just interrupted them in the middle of a very intrisic surgery where any interrruption will cost 400 people there life. American's love their privacy and don't dare invade it. Most people in America will answer as abruptly and do there best to be rid of you.
I am thankful that the rest of the world is not like that. Everyhouse we went to except maybe one invited us into their homes. These people do not live in anything we would call relaxing or sanitary but they would offer all they had to a visitor. As we entered their house they would bring out plastic chairs and invite us to sit, or more like make us sit while they stood. They were polite and welcoming. With the help of our interpritor we would invite them to the crusade or block party we were going to have that evening. We would also talk with them about what it means to be christian. Just like in America, where a large percentage of the population would claim to be christian, most do not know what it means to be christian. They wanted to talk about denominations or religious rituals. But we know from reading God's word, that to be a christ follower is not a matter of outward appearance and ritual but of an inward heart and relationship with God. We would share with them that good news and invite them to accept God's free gift of salvation. At the houses we went to a few people decided to accept for the first time that they needed Jesus's love and power in their lives.

We did this for a few hours and I was sweating so much that I lost about 40 lbs. Everyother house had a small store in the front of it. When I say small, I mean very small. But they would sale baked goods, vegetables, and thankfully bottles of pop. I am talking glass bottles with a straw. For 7 pesos or 30 cents I was able to buy what I would say was the best pepsi I have ever had. It was somehow the coldest drink. They must have used liquid nitrogen to get it so cold. And I drank it down in less then 10 seconds. That pepsi was almost worth the cost of the flight alone.

Then later that evening, we set up speakers and a drum set at the ball court. A filipino band played pretty good music with the reincarnate Jimmy Hindrix on the guitar. This guy was tearing it up on songs like shout to the lord, and lord I lift your name on high. Then everyone and their uncle came to the court. There had to be atleast a hundren kids. The little kids listened intently and loved my video camera. I would turn the view screen so they could see it and they would have wrestlemania trying to get infront of the camera. I taught them the good ol song father abraham. They taught me the philippine version of head and shoulders knees and toes. We then had one guy from our team give a message. He spoke about barnabas and how he old had one possession in the world which was a blanket. When barnabas saw jesus he tossed that blanked away like garbage to run after him.

I noticed that a lot of the older youth hung around the back smoking and talking. I introduced myself and they were very interested in knowing about America. One boy had an mp3 player and was listening to switchfoot. I was able to talk to them about all kinds of this including about what it means to be a christian. During this time, I saw a young woman walking toward the group. As she got closer, one of the more fluent english speaking youth said I want you to meet my best friend and pointed at the girl who I noticed was much bigger in frame then the other filipino girls. The fluennt english speaker then said, His name is Michael. And that is when I realized I had just met my first lady boy. It was very strange. I felt like I was in the twighlight zone. It is one thing to see that behavior in America or maybe in the cities here, but out in the country was bizzare. From what I can gather, filipinos see what is happening in America under the name of civil rights and in our entertainment and they are modeling that.

Anyways the night ended with an opportunity for people to accept Christ and about 100 people went forward. We can never be certain who was geniune or not but God knows. One thing we do know is that God was working there. We may have also witnessed the beginning of a new church in that small village. Since pastor cj has been coming, he has seen many churches start just like that. With people coming to the Lord and then meeting as a family.

We then returned to our hotel late and tired. We got to sleep in a bit today and will be headed back to bias city to do a similar thing in a different part of the area. I will be speaking tonight so please pray for me. Thanks for your prayers and concerns.

Maayong Buntag

2008-05-21T20:23:00.004-04:00

Good morning from the Philippines!

We made it finally. After several long hours on a plane we made it to the philippines yesterday afternoon. I was very tired but more than excited to be here. We recieved an amazing welcome at the airport. It was so amazing to see all my philippine friends. I have never recieved a more loving or happy welcoming. It was alot like coming home after being away for a long time. Today we will begin the ministry that we came here for. We are going to take a 2 -3 hour drive into the mounatins to a place called Bias City. We will then go house to house. Thank you for your continued prayers and thoughts for us. I am very excited about being here. I don't have much time right now to write but I will try and update you later this evening (if your reading this back home in the morning).

Beverly Hills well almost

2008-05-20T00:15:00.002-04:00

We made it to LA and are waiting on the super long flight to Hong Kong. So far it has been a great trip. Flying abov the clouds I noticed something. What makes me most fearful of flying is having no control. Unlike when Im driving the car on a plane I am at the mercy of the pilot. I have no control of what happens and my life is in someone elses hands. It takes faith and trust that the pilot knows what he is doing and how to get you there safely. A walk with God is a lot like that. Ultimately we are not in control but God is. The key is to put complete trust in God. To have faith that God knows the destination and how to get you there safely. To trust in Christ is the the Ultimate goal of a christian. Anyways I dont have much time because im using one of those pay computers in the airport. I will see you in the Philippines. Thanks for the prayers.

The Day has arrived.

2008-05-19T09:44:00.002-04:00

I didn't sleep at all last night. I rolled around in my bed until it was morning and then I got up ready for today. I am stoked about this trip and can not wait to be on the plane out of here. I will be headed to the airport in 2 hours and will be flying out not long after that. Please keep me in your prayers. Please keep our team in your prayers as well. Our team consists of Jay Adkins, Robby Pearson, Daniel Savage, Bobby Wood, Janna Johnston, Amanda Lindsey, and Billy Cox all from New Orleans. Also on that List is my pastor CJ Adkins and myself. I am looking forward to the trip and what God has in store. Here is a quick run down of the scheduled activities.

May 21 - arrival
Lee Plaza needs
Dinner, Get Acquainted and Planning Meeting at Shakey's, Dumaguete City

May 22 - 23 - Bais City
8:00 A.M. - start trip to Bais City lunch at Amorganda's Won restaurant
1:00 P.M. - to Joan & Ptr. Ugdoc's church mission area doing House to House Evangelism
5:00 or 6:00-8:00 P.M.- Evangelistic Crusade

May 24 - Mayaposi, Mabinay
8:00 A.M. - trip to Mayaposi lunch at Amorganda's Won restaurant. House to House Evangelism 4:00 P.M. - Evangelistic Crusade Mayaposi Church vicinity

May 25 - SUNDAY - Mission Team divides into 3 groups:
NLCC (Ptr. Valdez and Villa) – Robby, Jana, Billy
Mayaposi (Ptr. Zerna and Juvy) – CJ, Amanda, Bobby
Bais City (Joan and Ptr. Ugdoc) – Jay, Daniel, Joey

(The Bais and Mayaposi teams will leave Dumaguete at 8:00 A.M.)

4:00 P.M. - 7:00 P.M. - Seminar Workshop at NLCC

May 26 - 27 - Pastors/Church Leaders Seminar - Bethel Guest House

May 28 - Sibulan, Negros Oriental
8:00 A.M. - 11:00 A.M. - House to House Evan. Ptr. Pleider de la Pena and Ptr. Neri Rio's areas
2:00 P.M. - House to House Evangelism Ptr. Silorio and Ptr. de Jesus areas
5:00 P.M. or 6:00 P.M.-8:00 P.M. - Evangelistic Crusade - Sibulan Auditorium

May 29 - Bais City Bay - Dolphin Watching Farewell Fellowship Time
6:00 A.M. - trip to Bais City Bay
3:00 P.M. - trip to Bethel Guest House, Dumaguete City
5:00 P.M. or 6:00 P.M. - 8:00 P.M. - Evangelistic Crusade - Sibulan Auditorium

May 30 - Homeward Bound

As you can tell there is a lot of stuff crammed into a short period of time. Please pray for us.

I will update as much as possible. I may be able to update in LA before we head out to Hong Kong, but if not I will see you all in the Philippines.

PS. Check out my pastors blog. He will be updating as well.

Day befor Flight

2008-05-18T10:36:00.002-04:00

Today is Sunday May 18th and I am at church waiting for the service to start. I thought I would throw up a quick update. We are flying out tommorrow at 1pm from Huntington. We will then undertake several flights totatling to about 37 hours. Tommorrow will be one of the longest days for me in my life literally. We will leave here 1:30 and arrice in California at 6:56pm. We will have gained 3 hours in the day and it only gets longer from there. We will fly out later that evening at almost midnight but it will remain monday for about 15 more hours. Then through the miracle of flight and time zones we will skip tuesday all together and arrive in Hong Kong on wednesday. Then from there its a couple hop skips and a jump to manilla and our final destination of D City. I am very excited for the trip and havnt slept in the past 2 nights. I will try to finish packing today and hopefully get some rest before tommorrow. I may be able to post tommorrow morning before I leave but if not I will post at the next available opportunity. See you then.

The Philippine Mission Trip (prequel)

2008-05-16T15:12:00.004-04:00

Welcome to the first entry in my Philippine Mission trip diary. My name is Joseph Spurgeon and I am a film maker/dj in Huntington, WV. I also work with autistic children and do several other things around the town. My biggest passion is serving God through missions. I have been on several mission trips throughout the United States. In January 2007, I was given the opportunity to go on a mission trip half way around the world in the Philippines. It was on this trip that my love for international missions began. Even on the flight home I was plotting out my return trip. I was wanting to go back in January of this year but no matter what I did I couldn't seem to raise the funds. I know now that God had a plan and that was for me to go in May instead. Thanks to the help of friends from church and through facebook, I was able to raise the money to go and in 3 short days I will be jumping on a plane and headed back to my friends in the tropical isles of the Philippines.

I wanted to begin this blog with a bit of information about the philippines for those who will be following along with me via this diary. Wikipedia says, The Philippine archipelago comprises 7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean, bordering countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Palau and the Republic of China, although it is the only Southeast Asian country to share no land borders with its neighbors. The Philippines is the world's 12th most populous country with a population approaching 90 million people.

The Philippines was formerly a Spanish then an American colony. The Philippine Revolution was an attempt to gain independence from Spain, and later from the U.S. in the Philippine-American War. The Philippines ultimately gained its independence from the United States on July 4, 1946.

Today, the Philippines has many affinities with the Western world, derived mainly from the cultures of Spain, Latin America, and the United States. Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion, although pre-Hispanic indigenous religious practices still exist. There are also followers of Islam. The two official languages are Filipino and English.

The philippines are a paradox of sorts. The islands have been gifted by God with great beauty. The many beaches are like scenes from a tropical paradise.

The people are also blessed with beauty. The Smiling faces of the children will melt any heart. The people are also some of the most gracious and hospitable people on the planet. Everywhere you go someone is smiling and saying hello.
The paradox comes because most of the filipinos live in poverty. Most people work for what would be the equivelant to a 2-3 dollars a day. There is some good news as some technological jobs move to the region but many people are far from seeing that economic growth. Even while living in poverty, the people I met never once complained or grumbled. Instead they went out of their way to make me comfortable.

On my trip, I will be headed back to the same city that I went last year. It is called Dumaguete City. It lives up to its nickname of the City of the Gentle people. It is a college town and will afford many opportunities to share the gospel. The people of the region speak Cebuano. I have learned a little bit.

I will be accompained by my pastor, CJ Adkins, and about 10 other people from New Orleans seminary. We will be flying out of Huntington on monday and headed to LAX where we will fly onto Hong Kong and then the Philippines. On our schedule for this trip is a pastors seminar to help train local preachers, a large outdoor crusade, and trips to various villages to speak to people. Last year God brought 300 people into his family through the trip. We are excited about what God will do this year. One of the things I like to do is work with the children. I like to teach them english and tell them Bible stories.

Please pray for our team and for the people of the philippines. Please pray for good weather. They have been experiencing some monsoons and we are hoping that we will have clear and sunny skies for our time there. I will post as much as I can to update you on our trip. I will be filming it and posting pictures as well. I have posted below the documentary from last year for you to enjoy.

Number 7 Strikes Back

2008-05-14T15:34:00.003-04:00

Christian Rock music has been plagued with two problem since the 80's. In recent times the problems have diminished but the memory of them still haunt us. What were the problems?

1. Christian music was behind the times. Contemporary christian music was anything but contemporary. It was a least a few years behind the general music scene. In 1992 when the general market was moving towards alternative music and grundge, the Christian rock market was playing hair metal and power ballads. It wouldnt be until 2 to 3 years after grundge that DC talk would release Jesus Freak laced with a grundge attitude. This is not to say that all christian bands were cheap knock offs of the general market but most were. If the general market released an album by a white rapper named marshall mathers, the christian industry would rush to find a christian version. This meant christian music was behind the times and not apart of the scene. Nowadays this is not much of a problem as bands like switchfoot and mute math have not only broke into the secular market but they have led the market. More and more christian artists are becoming original.

2. The second problem was that early christian rock was just poorly made and cheesy. The plethera of second rate copycats was the laughing stock of the general market. To be sure there some quality bands and music, but once again those were the exception rather than the rule. Also this problem has diminshed due to original groups and real artists pushiing for quality.

Anyways while those 2 problems are no longer with us as much but in the mid 90's they were the rule. A few bands came out of the woodwork to help shatter those problems, such as DC Talk, Jars of Clay, Audio Adrenaline, Newsboys. But it was really want style and scene that changed the first problem, and that was ska.

Ska (pronounced /ska/ or in Jamaican Patois /skja/) is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s and was a precursor to rocksteady and reggae. Many people assume reggae came first but it was actually ska that did.

Ska combined elements of Caribbean mento and calypso with American jazz and rhythm and blues. It is characterized by a walking bass line, accented guitar or piano rhythms on the offbeat, and in some cases, jazz-like horn riffs.

There have been three waves of ska music so to speak. These three periods were times of peak interest in ska in terms of popularity and sales. The first wave came straight from Jamaica in the late 1950s and helped lead to the creation of reggae. The second wave was in the late 70's and 80's and was mainly a British thing. The brits took ska and added some punk attitude and stylings to it. They also added a little new wave flavor. Dexy's Midnight Riders scored a big hit with Come On Eileen.

In the midst of the second wave, the 3rd wave was already in its infancy. The third wave was basically an American thing. It reached peak popularity in 1995-1998. It took the punk elemenets even farther and added hiphop as well. It was in the midst of this third wave that Christian music shined. Because for once, christian music wasn't behind the times. Instead they were right in the midst of the scene. With bands like Five Iron Frenzy, The Insiderz, and the W's, christian music was for the first time just as good as the mainstream and right on time with it. My number 7 album is the cream of the crop and for me is my favorite ska and christian album of all time.

The Orange County Supertones was a Christian ska band hailing from Orange County, California. duh. In the late 1990s The Supertones achieved wide popularity in the Christan Rock community. Their second album, 1997's release Supertones Strike Back, was a surprise smash hit, peaking on both Billboard's Heatseekers and Top Christian Albums charts at #3 and #2 respectively.

I can still remember the first time I heard this album. It was on mission trip to Daytona Beach during the big wildfires. On the way back, we stopped at Carowinds Theme Park. Guess who happed to be playing a concert that day. I have since seen the band about 7 times. Each time was an amazing experience, including the final time in Huntington. It was during that concert which was their 2nd to last show ever, I got to pray 1 on 1 with the lead singer.

Anyways back to the album. Album incorporated the best of third wave ska. It is danceable or good to skank to. Skank is a funny little dance almost like something charlie brown would do. The album begins with the title track, that just sets the tone for what the band is all about.

The best part about this band, is that even though they were thick in the middle of the ska scene, they didnt water down their lyrics. Every album contained track after track of biblically inspired lyrics and challenge and uplift. The lead singer today travels and speaks on apologetics.

My favorite songs in this album are Unite, Shut Up and Play, and Grace Flood.

Coming in at number 7 is The OC Supertones with The OC Supertones Strike Back.

I will be taking a break for 2 weeks from our top ten list to go to the philippines. I will be blogging here about the trip as much as possible. So keep your eyes opened.

After Much Internal Debate Number 8

2008-05-07T19:56:00.007-04:00

It is time for number 8 on my all time album list. For this spot I wrestled with myself for a while on which album to include. There was really 2 debates going on inside my head. The first debate was based on the fact that this album is more recent inclusion into my favorites. It has only held a place of great esteem in my collection for the past six months. I struggled over whether it was too new to be included my top ten. There are many albums that I had listened to in the past that would be knocked out of my top ten if I included this, but on the other hand this is all I have listened to for the past 6 months and I will always love this. I finally settled on including it in my top ten.
The second debate was that the album was not one album but several different albums by the same family. Reggae has quickly become a favorite genre of mine, and of course when one thinks of Reggae they immediately think of Bob Marley. Bob Marley is the legend in Reggae. But not many people will know that Bob had about 11 children and 5 of them do music and do it well. They each through their own flavor on Reggae and I love every one. Ziggy is the most like his father in that he does more roots reggae, while Ky-Mani is the farthest away by doing hiphop. Julian is a lot like Ziggy. Stephen and Damian both add hip hop, dancehall, and jazzy elements while keeping the Reggae. Of the sons, Damian is my favorite. He has released 3 albums and 2 have won grammys. It is his 3rd album, "Welcome to Jamrock" that I love the most. That album and Bob's album exodus have battled in my mind for which album should hold this place. I am going to give a short review of both below and then make my pick at the end.

In 1999, Exodus was voted as the most important album of the 20th century by Time magazine. This is the visionary Bob Marley's masterpiece, a concept album that distills the myriad experiences of both our daily lives and collective unconsciousness into 46 minutes of aural perfection. Of the 10 tracks, 7 were released as singles, a feat not copied until Michael Jackson's Thriller. Exodus was written and released in 1977 as Bob Marley was literately in hiding for his life, after an assassination attempt. Marley was always known for being very spiritual but it seems as though the hit on his life brought him closer to his faith, songs like the angelic 'One Love' the equaly big hit 'Three Little Birds' and the albums incredible opener 'Natural Mystic' are excellent examples of this. Marley had also been known as some what of a rights activist for his people, but living in another part of the world seemed to have brought peace to his mind about the harsh conditions back home because he was more focused on his universal truths such as fate.

Songs like 'Jamming' and the beautiful 'Waiting In Vain' brought Marley & The Wailers to the masses. These songs along with basically the rest of the album made the group giants in the United States and in the U.K. To me you can't help but be lifted emotionally and spiritually while listening to this album. Bob was a Rastafarian most of his life but in the latter days he joined the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Below is one of my favorite songs.

Damian "Jr Gong" Marley is the youngest son of Bob and maybe the most talented. His album "Welcome to Jamrock" released in 2005 is an amazing mixture of dancehall, reggae, hiphop, and jazz. It was controversial because it brought attention to the poverty of Jamaica. Also like Bob Marley, this album is uplifting. I can not listen to this without smiling. The first track is the only weak spot in the entire album. The title track was the biggest single but other stand outs are Keep On Walking featuring Nas, Beautiful featuring Bobby Brown, The Master Has Come Back, and Move with a sample of Exodus.

This album went on to win the Grammy for best Reggae album and best Urban Performance. I have listened to this album almost everyday for the past 3 months.

So who will be number 8? Will it be the Legend? Or will the son trump over the father?

Drum Roll........................................................................

Coming in at number 8 is Damian Marley's Welcome to Jamrock.
While Bob Marley is definitely the legend and exodus is his best album, I prefer his greatest hits album, Legend( which I would put in my top 3 greatest hits albums) So therefore I am going to give this spot to his son. When I listen to the album it lifts me up. While this is Jamaican it reminds me of the Philippines.
Both albums are amazing and I encourage everyone to go get both of them and make up their mind for themselves which they like better.

Number 9 Number 9 Number 9...oh wait wrong album.

2008-04-27T14:04:00.002-04:00

Coming in at number 9 on my all time top ten album list is non other than The Beatles Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by the British rock band The Beatles. Recorded over a 129-day period beginning on December 6, 1966, the album was released on 1 June 1967 in the United Kingdom and the following day in the United States. Sgt. Peppers is often described as The Beatles' magnum opus, and one of the most influential albums of all time by prominent critics and publications. It was ranked the greatest album of all time by Rolling Stone in 2003.
Being one of the most influential albums of all time, it is quite hard for me to say anything about it that hasn't already been said. For me this was my first rock album. I grew up in a family that did not allow rock music but I was able to listen to oldies. Since the Beatles were from the 60's they counted as oldies. This album opened my mind to the many joys of rock music. One thing that was so overwhelming was its strange sounds and orchestral parts. As a young child, I listened to classical, jazz, and gospel music. This seemed to combine parts of those genres into an aural explosion. Stand out tracks for me are A Day in the Life, Lucy in the Sky, and Getting Better. Also belonging to this era but not on this album are strawberry fields, penny lane and I am the walrus. The latter being my favorite Beatles song. All three can be found on Magical Mystery Tour which I was tempted to list here instead of Sgt. Pepper.

Anyways that is all I am going to say about the album. If you havn't heard something from it you probably live in a hole somewhere.

Finally, I want to finish up with a few rules for my top ten list. I will not be including live albums, various artists albums, or best of/greatest hits albums. Unfortunately, that will leave out some of my all time favorite bands and songs. I will do another top ten list for bands and songs some other time. One last note, some of these albums I havn't listened to in a while but they still deserve their place in my all time top ten because of their importance in my musical journey through life.

Stay tuned for number 8, number 8, number 8.

Number 10: Exodus by Andy Hunter

2008-04-04T17:53:00.003-04:00

Coming in at number 10 on my all time top ten albums is Andy Hunter's Exodus. This may be the most obscure of my top ten listing but most people will recognize a few tracks. If you have seen The Italian Job or the trailer to The Matrix: Reloaded, than you have heard Andy Hunter. Hunter is a DJ from the UK who came out with his debut CD, Exodus, in 2002 on the Sparrow and Nettwerk America labels. Along with films, his music has been in car commercials and video games.
Exodus is a voyage into the expanse of creation and uncovering the Creator. It begins with the bold and energizing "Go" which renowned DJ Tiesto uses in his set. "Go" is also featured in The Italian Job. It begins with a slow emotional synthesized strings intro then leads into a classic electronic dance music beat with "Go, Go" vocals by Hunter himself. "The Wonders of You," which was featured on The Matrix: Reloaded trailer follows "Go". It is just as energizing as "Go" throughout the song but employs more vocals provided by Hunter as well as a short rap by Lyle Day. "The Wonders of You" then fades into "Radiate", which also has some vocals by Hunter. After "Radiate" a beautiful string-quartet intro leads into Hunter's 1st single: "Amazing." This song truly is amazing with outstanding vocals provided by Christine Glass. This is probably my favorite song on the album, because the lyrics speak for the soul and musically it's flawless, energizing and beautiful, making any listener want to get up and dance. "Amazing" ends with the same beautiful string progression as in the beginning.

After this "amazing song" comes the one flaw on the album that keeps it from being higher in my top ten. It is a song called "show me" and it a bit downtempo. It is not really a flaw in production or song quality but the first time I was listing to it, I mistook the lyrics of " Show Me" to sound like " Joey". It kind of creaped me out because it is in a whisper voice. So now every time I hear it, I can't help but think of it that way.
This leads to "Translucent" which is similar to "Show", but this time with beautiful vocals provided by Cathy Burton. "Translucent" then fades with another flawless transition into "Angelic" which retains the feel of the previous two songs but has an upbeat edge with a steady drum beat. A piano solo of a simple but appropriate theme continues throughout the whole song. It then fades into "Sandstorm Calling" which is quite upbeat and sounds like a classic Trance song, but it is not quite as energizing as the first three tracks. After a quick transition, "Strange Dream" begins with an obscure looped vocal sample that retains the trance-like quality of "Sandstorm Calling." It also has continuing vocals of "Strange and funny dream" repeated throughout the later half of the song. Another awesome transition leads to the final track, "Intercessional" which is another classic Trance anthem. By the conclusion of the album, the journey is complete and the listener has been ushered into the very presense of God. While this album is not "praise and worship" so to speak, I find myself praising God all through out it.
So coming at number ten on my top ten albums is Exodus.

Stay tuned for next time as we go back into the 60's for Number 9: Sgt Peppers Lonely Heartclub Band.

The Hero's Top 10 Albums

2008-04-02T14:29:00.003-04:00

It's been a while since I've posted and I apologize. I have been very busy with work, practicing with my band (Attack Flamingo), and DJing. It's been hard to keep updating daily like I want to. Anyways I have been wanting to post some more music related stuff so over the next few days and weeks I am going to be posting The Hero's top ten favorite albums of all time.

If you know me, then you know that The Hero loves music. I can't drive a mile in my car without having the right cd in. If I could I would listen to music 24 hours a day. I love to make mixes for different occasions and with different themes. I probably have over 20,000 songs on my computer. It is very hard to narrow down a list of favorite songs and artists. I was going to first make a top 5 list of albums but I found that to be impossible. But after much thought and self arguing I have come up with a list of my top ten albums. I am going to write 10 blogs, 1 for each album. I will find youtube videos of songs from each album and post them too. So anyways stay tuned to this blog for some good music in the new future.

Check in next time for the number 10 album.......... Exodus by Andy Hunter.

Happy Victory Day

2008-03-23T10:20:00.003-04:00

Celebrate the day that death was defeated. Christ Jesus died and came back to life. He arose and defeated evil, sin, and death in one amazing victory.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

2008-03-17T15:56:00.006-04:00

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Today is my favorite holiday. It a day to celebrate life and Irish Culture. It is unlike so many other holidays in that it isn't even a recognized national holiday in the US, yet it is celebrated here. For me, my affection for St. Patrick's day began back in kindergarten. My mum had told me that on St. Paddy's day you have to wear green or you will get pinched. Now I hated to be pinched so of course I wore green. My mother always says wearing green brings out the color in my eyes which are green and the reddish tint to my hair. I also thought that since I wore green I was given authority to pinch anyone who didn't. I learned the hard way that was not so.

It was in kindergarten class that I spied a guy named David Wolferd minding his own business and not wearing the color of Ireland. So I made my way over to his desk in the middle of class and got my fingers ready. I grabbed a large chunk of baby fat and flesh and gave it a big squeeze. Oh Dave would know from then on out to always
wear green on St. Patrick's Day. He let out a whelp and my teacher looked at me with demon eyes. It was in that moment that I realized David was of German descent and probably didn't have to wear green. I probably should not have pinched him either. I was marched straight to the principals office where I was informed that not everyone celebrates St. Paddy's day. Well the Luck o' the Irish was with me that afternoon because David accepted my apology and I was allowed to go back to class unpunished. In a side note, it would be about 7 years later that David would get his revenge by writing with a pen on my brand new leather cowboys jacket. I should have pinched him harder. Well since then, I have worn green and celebrated St. Paddy's day.
So as you are drinking your pint of Guinness, eating some shepherd's pie, and listening to celtic music today, remember don't pinch the Germans because they will get revenge.

Converting to Christianity in Germany

2008-03-10T20:28:00.001-04:00

Christian persecution in Germany

Here is a short video about Muslims converting to Islam in Germany who are being persecuted.

Its a rainy day

2008-03-10T18:31:00.001-04:00

Its a rainy day here but my mind is at a beach in Hawaii, the Philippines, or off the Florida Keys. Here is a song just for the occasion.

Missionaries in Iraq

2008-03-07T17:43:00.002-05:00

Here is an article about southern baptist missionaries in Iraq

This is a cause that is near and dear to my heart because I consider myself a missionary. I am very proud of the people who put their lives on the line to go to some place like Iraq and tell others about Christ. They are also spreading humanitarian aid. What infuriates me most is people who view this as some kind of evil work. Here is a video on youtube that is so overwhelming biased against christianity. At first it made me mad but then my mind changed. I am happy to see christians answering God's call. Watch the video and see if it makes you mad at its bias but happy about what it is ultimately reporting, that is lives being changed.

Big News Day March 06, 2008

2008-03-06T18:00:00.002-05:00

Today is a big news day on several fronts.

I will begin with a piece of personal news. I purchased my plane tickets to the Philippines today. I will be headed there in May for a mission trip.

A jewish seminary was in the heart of Israel was attacked by terrorists today. To me this shows that the struggle is not about creating a two-state system but about eliminating the Jewish state and having only an Islamic state. Islamic nations will not give up until they succeed or die trying.

Hamas does not take credit for attack but calls it heroic.

A bombing at a military recruiting office in NY today. It is a little too early to connect this to any terrorist group but the act is still stupid.

Speaking of the Philippines, an arrest was made today stopping an attempt by terrorists to bomb several embassies.

Moses on Drugs ?

2008-03-04T16:15:00.004-05:00

Heres a short news article about a professor in Jerusalem who is making waves about his theory on Moses.

High on Mount Sinai, Moses was on psychedelic drugs when he heard God deliver the Ten Commandments, an Israeli researcher claimed in a study published this week.

Such mind-altering substances formed an integral part of the religious rites of Israelites in biblical times, Benny Shanon, a professor of cognitive psychology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem wrote in the Time and Mind journal of philosophy.

"As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday.

Moses was probably also on drugs when he saw the "burning bush," suggested Shanon, who said he himself has dabbled with such substances.

"The Bible says people see sounds, and that is a clasic phenomenon," he said citing the example of religious ceremonies in the Amazon in which drugs are used that induce people to "see music."

He mentioned his own experience when he used ayahuasca, a powerful psychotropic plant, during a religious ceremony in Brazil's Amazon forest in 1991. "I experienced visions that had spiritual-religious connotations," Shanon said.

He said the psychedelic effects of ayahuasca were comparable to those produced by concoctions based on bark of the acacia tree, that is frequently mentioned in the Bible.

Ok so the first thing this guy does is immediately throw out two alternative theories because he doesn't believe them. I put those theories in bold type for you.
Throwing out answers just because you don't want to believe in them is bad science and just bad logic. It would be like an historian saying George Washington wasn't our first president because the historian didn't want to believe it. So this "researcher" comes up with some wacko theory on how Moses was on drugs. If anyone is on drugs it is this professor, which he admits to using. What is most frustrating about this, is how this guy is able to be a professor in Jerusalem of all places.

Saddening News Story

2008-02-26T14:08:00.002-05:00

Im going to post a full news story here. Usually I just link to it but I think this news story is especially disheartening. Following the story i will comment on its importance.

Teens losing touch with common cultural and historical references

By Greg Toppo
USA TODAY

Big Brother. McCarthyism. The patience of Job.

Don't count on your typical teenager to nod knowingly the next time you drop a reference to any of these. A study out today finds that about half of 17-year-olds can't identify the books or historical events associated with them.

Twenty-five years after the federal report A Nation at Risk challenged U.S. public schools to raise the quality of education, the study finds high schoolers still lack important historical and cultural underpinnings of "a complete education." And, its authors fear, the nation's current focus on improving basic reading and math skills in elementary school might only make matters worse, giving short shrift to the humanities � even if children can read and do math.

"If you think it matters whether or not kids have common historical touchstones and whether, at some level, we feel like members of a common culture, then familiarity with this knowledge matters a lot," says American Enterprise Institute researcher Rick Hess, who wrote the study.

Among 1,200 students surveyed:

•43% knew the Civil War was fought between 1850 and 1900.

•52% could identify the theme of 1984.

•51% knew that the controversy surrounding Sen. Joseph McCarthy focused on communism.

In all, students earned a C in history and an F in literature, though the survey suggests students do well on topics schools cover. For instance, 88% knew the bombing of Pearl Harbor led the USA into World War II, and 97% could identify Martin Luther King Jr. as author of the "I Have a Dream" speech.

Fewer (77%) knew Uncle Tom's Cabin helped end slavery a century earlier.

"School has emphasized Martin Luther King, and everybody teaches it, and people are learning it," says Chester Finn of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank. "What a better thing it would be if people also had the Civil War part and the civil rights part, and the Harriet Tubman part and the Uncle Tom's Cabin part."

The findings probably won't sit well with educators, who say record numbers of students are taking college-level Advanced Placement history, literature and other courses in high school.

Today we are finding more and more American's who are ignorant about the world around them and of the history of it. This ignorance will become even worse as "wolves in sheeps clothing" begin teaching their versions of history. To bring to an example we will look at the Middle Ages and Crusades. If you ask the majority of people now to tell you anything about this period in time, you will find the most common answer to be that it was a very dark period for europe and especially Christianity. Most Christians will trip over themselves apologizing for this period of our history, yet these same people can not tell you any details around it. Revisionists and liberal historians have already succeeded in painting this period as evil and in general painting christianity into a corner. Our ignorance does not end there. Now revisionists are repainting the American revolution and founding to be something completely different. Many of the great christians who helped found America are being written out of the history books.
Whoever said that ignorance is bliss was wrong. Ignorance especially in historical matters is atrocious. Those who do not learn from it are doomed to repeat it. And everyday I see ignorant Americans who give away their freedoms. I see people who vote for elected officials based on what they look like or what sex they are.
I hope this blog will be a place to learn about history and current events from around the world. Education leads to freedom.

If this doesn't anger you

2008-02-21T13:42:00.003-05:00

The following videos are videos that all people need to see. But beware if you are a Christian they will anger you.

The first video is of Islamic terrorists burning down a church in Serbia.

This is of Islamic militants desecrating an eastern orthodox church.

Kosovo becoming a bastion for Al Queda and Islamic Terrorists

Video of Persecution

Dreams and visions

2008-02-20T17:38:00.000-05:00

Check out this website.

Dreams and Visions

This is a site devoted to something great going on in the world today. In many Islamic countries, people are converting to Christ because of dreams and visions they are having. In these visions a man is appearing telling them to follow Christ. I won't go into much more detail but to implore you to check out the site.

More news Feb 20 2008

2008-02-20T16:25:00.002-05:00

Islamic Prayer tower being build in Iowa causes stir.

Christians arrested in Jordan for helping poor and spreading Gospel.

Violence in Mosques in France.

check this out

2008-02-14T14:52:00.002-05:00

Check out this video of one of the contestants from American Idol.
His name is Josiah Lemming. His story is inspiring. He lives in his car and has been traveling across the US trying to make it. He was able to Audition for American Idol and made a huge impact there. But unfortunately he was cut last night. I found his myspace and his music is good.

Message from the Past

2008-02-13T20:31:00.002-05:00

Boston Man Receives Postcard from Past

BOSTON (AP) - The message on the postcard to a "Miss Margaret McDonald" was short. Its path to the intended address was much longer. Nearly 79 years after it was sent, a postcard of Yellowstone National Park's Tower Falls arrived in a Boston mailbox recently with the one-word message, "Greetings."

Its intended recipient had long since left the Victorian on Sparhawk Street, and the sender was not identified by name.

Michael Cioffi was shocked to find the card dated June 1929 in his mail. He says the McDonald family did own his house for generations, but he doesn't think there is anyone left in the family to pass the postcard to.

A U.S. Postal Service spokesman says it's impossible to know what happened with the card. It somehow got into the mail and was sent with a one cent stamp from Seattle earlier this year.

**********************************************************************************
I always thought the US Postal Service was slow but this is ridiculous.

Islamic Spies

2008-02-12T14:58:00.000-05:00

News report that some terrorists have managed to infiltrate England's government.

An update from Ron Paul on his campaign

2008-02-12T13:25:00.000-05:00

Here is an update video from Feb 12, 2008:

Education

2008-02-11T19:18:00.000-05:00

If you have been following the life of this blog you will have noticed a change since the beginning. At first this blog consisted mostly of short essays and has progressed to a more of a news story format. I wanted to write a short post to explain the though process behind this change.

I believe firmly that one of the greatest gifts God has given us is our ability to learn. I think one of the greatest responsibilities a Christian can have is to educate them self. Does this mean that one has to be a great theologian or scholar to be a Christian? No. The Bible says that unless we come to Christ with the faith of a child then we can not inherit the kingdom. This means that someone does not have to know everything there is to know about Christianity to become a Christ Follower. They just need simple faith. But the Bible also encourages us to grow. The problem today is that too many Christians have come into the faith like a child and have not matured into Christian Adults. There are various reasons for this lack of growth but I think one reason is malnutrition, so to speak.

I firmly believe that Christians above all people should be encouraged to learn. We should first and foremost learn God's word. Without the knowledge of God's word, all other pursuits of knowledge will come up short. But a Christian's education should not end with Bible knowledge but should continue to all realms of life. Church goers today suffer from a lack of understanding in History, Science, Current Events, and the Arts.

In the middle ages, Christian Europe gave rise to universities. This is one of the many lasting legacies we owe Christianity. Christian's today need to take charge in the efforts of education and learning. With a better understanding of The Church's history, Christian's can learn from past mistakes and triumphs. I also think that we should have a proper view of the world around us. By looking at current events we can see the design of God and the influence of Satan in the world.

So with that said, I hope to help in this area. I will continue to try and provide thoughtful essays on Christian life, history, and theology. I will also attempt to provide a home for current news stories that hopefully reveal something about the world around us. I hope that this blog will continue to be a place of learning for both you and me.

quote

2008-02-11T13:46:00.000-05:00

Heres a quote for you

"Those who stay in America should be open to society without melting, keeping Mosques open so anyone can come and learn about Islam. If you choose to live here, you have a responsibility to deliver the message of Islam ... Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faiths, but to become dominant. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth." - Omar Ahmad Co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations

Feb 11, 2008 News

2008-02-11T12:55:00.001-05:00

Your being watched by the Eye in the Sky. Why we trade in our civil liberties for "security" I will never know.

Reports of success in Iraq. Al-Qaeda is losing.

Israel in peace talks to give away Jerusalem. Israel wants peace so badly that they will give away everything.

And finally reports from the voting over the weekend has Huckabee walking away with two wins and what the media won't tell you is that Ron Paul got the most delegates out of Washington. Now it is still a 1 in a million chance for RP to win but at the very minimum his message will continue.

Good Speech

2008-02-09T13:40:00.000-05:00

This is a great speech by Ron Paul. This shows why I support him. Even if he doesn't win the presidency, the message will continue.

Archbishop Update

2008-02-09T13:04:00.000-05:00

This is an update on the news story from the other day about the Archbishop who suggested Islamic Law in the UK. Thank God some people have sense in the UK.

Relax

2008-02-08T16:16:00.000-05:00

Sometimes its easy to get overwelmed with life and stress. When ever I get that way, I just take some time to get out in nature and relax. One of my favorite places is the beach especially at sunset or sunrise. But its the middle of winter here and I'm inside. So heres the next best thing. Enjoy

wow major news Feb 07, 2008

2008-02-07T12:51:00.000-05:00

Wow two major news stories today. But first of all, if you clicked on the video of the last post... I got you. haha! i hope no one was offended but it was just a joke to lighten the mood. Anyways now onto some real stories.

Adoption of Islamic Law in the UK? Can you Imagine what would happen if Christians or Jews wanted to adopt their own laws and courts to try them in?

Mitt Romney to quit race.
This is bad news across the board. This will help McCain seal up the victory. The media is declaring this a McCain victory. We will see how this pans out in the next few days. I was hoping for a brokered convention. Hopefully Huckabee will stay in.
If we can keep Huck in and get some more support for Ron Paul maybe this thing can still be turned around.

Video showing proof that Obama is Islamic

2008-02-06T18:48:00.001-05:00

This video gives proof that Obama is Islamic.

Update on delegates

2008-02-06T17:35:00.001-05:00

Ron Paul got 46 delegates yesterday which works for his plan in a brokered convention.
Click here for more.

News from Feb 6, 2008

2008-02-06T14:03:00.000-05:00

Jihad around the world
2/5/2008 (Rangpur, Bangladesh) - A convert to Christianity dies from burns suffered when a Muslim mob set fire to her house four weeks earlier.
2/5/2008 (Mogadishu, Somalia) - Two women are among four killed in a marketplace attack by Islamic militias.
2/5/2008 (Kandahar, Afghanistan) - Two Afghan police are killed in a Taliban bombing.
2/4/2008 (Yala, Thailand) - A 30-year-old civilian is shot to death by Muslim militants.
2/4/2008 (Helmand, Afghanistan) - Two children and two women are among five members of the same family killed in a roadside attack by religious extremists.
2/4/2008 (Abu Saida, Iraq) - Jihadis kill a 7-year-old boy and one other civilian in an attack on a minibus.

Christians in Malaysia try to keep Government from Confiscating Bibles.

Gas price could drop? Lets hope we are that lucky.

Ron Paul News
Well yesterday was not the best news for Ron Paul but it was enough for him to stay in the race. He did very well in the caucuses and picked up some delegates. He did not do as well as he would have liked in Alaska and Montana but never the less the campaign moves on. If things continue to a brokered convention then this election could get very interesting. Also his home state of Texas is going to be voting soon. We will see what happens. Realistically his chances are very slim but his message is good. Congrats to Huck who picked up some key southern states. He is my second pick .

More conspiracy theory

2008-02-05T19:41:00.001-05:00

It seems that a new story is coming out about the cutting of fiber optic cables to the middle east. I find it interesting.

Good article about Ron Paul

2008-02-05T17:07:00.001-05:00

What is it about Ron Paul that the Establishment finds so disturbing?

This is a man who perhaps personifies Christian character and integrity, American patriotism, and family values more than any other public figure. Ron Paul is a committed family man whose marriage to Carol has lasted for more than 50 years. He is a lover of families and children. As an OB/GYN physician, Dr. Paul has delivered more than 4,000 babies into this world. His life demonstrates a commitment to life and marriage.

Furthermore, Ron Paul's devotion to Christ is very personal and deep.

Unlike many politicians (especially in the Republican Party), Ron Paul does not wear his religion on his sleeve. He doesn't need to. Anyone who knows him knows his faith is exhibited on a daily basis. His life and family are testaments to his Christian faith.

Beyond that, Ron Paul's record in Congress is so unblemished, so honest, so full of integrity that it is difficult to describe. This is a man who actually takes his oath to the Constitution (an oath every congressman, senator, and President also takes--but then ignores) seriously. So much so that he has never voted to raise taxes, never voted for an unbalanced budget, never voted for a congressional pay raise, never voted for a federal restriction on gun ownership, and never voted to increase the power of the executive branch of the federal government.

In addition, Ron Paul has never taken a government-paid junket. Even though he is a 10-term congressman, he is not accepting a government pension. He also returns a portion of his office budget every year to the taxpayers. No wonder Ron Paul was declared to be the "Taxpayer's Best Friend."

Now, how in the name of common sense can a man such as Ron Paul be hated? Maybe it is because he is a man of integrity and honesty.

Remember, our Lord said that men who love darkness hate the light. And if there is a word that describes the Establishment in America today, it is DARKNESS.

Update******
Article on Ron Paul getting 3 delegates in WV convention.

Ron Paul Press release on it as well.

Middle East News Feb 5, 2008

2008-02-05T15:39:00.001-05:00

Iran to have nukes in 3 years

Palestinian vs Egypt
Egypt tries to close border and has confrontation with Hamas. The Arabic world is so upset about the Palestinian crisis yet will do nothing to help their cause. They do not want the Palestinian refugees anymore than Israel does. Arabic nations just want to see Israel wiped off the map.

Elderly convert to Christianity from Islam is burned to death.

Muslim Apologists sometimes spread the lie that Christians and Jews were treated better under Islamic government during the time of the Crusades. Lets see how they are treated today in an Islamic government. click here to see how Christians are treated as second class citizens in Pakistan.

One last story. Click here to go to a terrorist website. This site hosts video of terrorists training and killing americans. It is quite disturbing but it shows the lengths that they will go to. The Site is called Baghdad Sniper and is used to recruit terrorists. Some of the videos of have really good production quality and are used as propaganda.

Huckabee Wins!

2008-02-05T14:36:00.000-05:00

Huckabee wins the state convention for WV. This is good for both McCain and Ron Paul. Ron Paul gets three delegates from Huckabee for helping Huck win the convention. Congrats Huck.

More news from WV Convention

2008-02-05T14:25:00.000-05:00

I have some more news from inside sources that says Huckabee will win the WV convention. Since McCain was losing, his campaign staff are encouraging his delegates to switch to Huck. They think that if they can keep Romney from winning the state it will hurt him overall. Good news for Huck fans but bad news from Romney. As a Ron Paul supporter I'm not sure yet. I think it may be good if the national results are split this bad.

Update: Ron Paul is going to get 3 National Delegates from Huckabee for having his people vote for Huckabee in WV.

WV Repubican Convention

2008-02-05T14:11:00.000-05:00

So today is the day of the West Virginia Republican Convention. This year marks the first year that West Virginia has tried something like this. At the convention delegates who were selected earlier in the year will cast their votes for a presidential candidate. Since it is a new process, it is also a complicated and confusing process. Click here to learn more about the process.
This morning Senator Ron Paul spoke at the convention as well as Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney. I was looking forward to going to the convention but my grandfather is in the hospital due to complications from an appendix surgery. Early news out of the convention is pretty bad. Ron Paul came in fourth and thus will be eliminated from the next round of voting. The Good news is that John McCain got third. The best news for Ron Paul today would be that no single candidate comes out ahead in all of the national results. It would also be good for WV republicans like myself who feel shafted by the convention. In may we will have a primary will all republicans will get a chance to vote. I have my fingers crossed that nothing will be decided by then.

Random Stuff

2008-02-04T13:34:00.000-05:00

Congrats! New York Giants for doing the unthinkable. While everyone is amazed at them beating the unbeaten Patriots, I am just as amazed at their run through the playoffs. They beat the top 3 NFL teams in a row. They beat the Dallas Cowboys who had the best NFC record. They beat the Packers who were on a dream year themselves. And then finally the Giants knocked off the NFL's Goliath The Patriots. This goes to show that the underdog can still win. Also a short note from the superbowl. The leading rusher was Ahmed Bradshaw, a former Marshall University player. Marshall University had a staggering amount of players in the Super Bowl. Only Miami U had more players.

Now for some quick news stories.

Ron Paul is going to be in Charleston, WV at 9:30 AM on Tuesday. The WV Republican Convention is that day and Dr. Paul is the only presidential candidate coming.
Go here to learn more about this revolutionary candidate.

Hillary Clinton let loose how she is going to force everyone to have medical insurance. She is going to garnish wages. I thought we defeated communism back in the 80's.

Terrorists continue there suicide bombing of Israel

Two women convicted of Adultery will be stoned to death in Iran. They are most likely innocent but will be stoned to death anyways. Reminds me of a story from the Bible where Jesus saved a woman from stoning.

2/4/2008 (Pattani, Thailand) - Islamists detonate a bomb outside a boarding school, killing one person.
2/4/2008 (Dimona, Israel) - A Palestinian suicide bomber murders an Israeli woman at a shopping mall.
2/4/2008 (Rawalpindi, Pakistan) - A suicide bomber rams his car into a minibus carrying medical personnel, killing at least eight.
2/3/2008 (Baquba, Iraq) - Suspected al-Qaeda gunmen attack a home, killing four young Sunnis.
2/3/2008 (Mogadishu, Somalia) - Islamic militia blow up a minibus, killing eight civilians and maiming nine more.

Super Tuesday

2008-02-03T16:01:00.000-05:00

Check out this video and go vote on Tuesday for Ron Paul

Calvinism vs Arminianism

2008-02-03T10:30:00.000-05:00

Have you ever seen something so beautiful that you were just awestruck? Have you ever seen a beautiful sunset or a shooting star and had your breath taken? Have you ever seen something so amazing that it left you speechless? How do you describe to someone who has never been a parent, what it feels like to hold your newborn baby for the first time? How do you describe to someone who has never been in love what is like to fall in love for the first time? These type of events and many more are hard to describe. But if you try hard enough to you could probably find words that though imperfect would be appropriate. Sometimes words are just not enough however. In the case of God, words can not convey everything there is to Him. We as humans are imperfect. God's word is perfect. For years now, two school of thoughts have been trying to state in imperfect words, something that is perfect. I am talking about Calvinism and Arminianism. Some baptist churches accept all of one side while others accept all of the other side. But most baptist churches fit somewhere in the middle of these two schools. So what follows is my imperfect attempt to describe the differences in Calvinism and Arminianism.
First of all we are going to start with a little bit of history. This is by no means comprehensive but just the basics. The history of Calvinism starts with John Calvin who was a French Protestant theologian during the Protestant Reformation. In Geneva, his ministry both attracted other Protestant refugees and over time made that city a major force in the spread of Reformed theology. He is renowned for his teachings and writings, in particular for his Institutes of the Christian Religion.
Calvin had a great commitment to the absolute sovereignty and holiness of God, thus his teachings and writings serve to constantly remind us of these attributes of God. While Calvinism bears his name, it really did not form into a complete school of thought until after his death. Many of his students further developed Calvinism in the years after his death, especially at a council called the Synod of Dort. The Synod of Dort was in part a reaction to Armenianism.
Jacobus Arminius was a dutch theologian who was orphaned at a young age. He was adopted by a priest and spent his years learning theology. He was actually fond of some of John Calvin's teachings but disputed several key point. After Arminius's death, his students would also go on to further develop Arminianism. Arminianists or The Remonstrants as they liked to be called would go on to develop 5 key points on doctrine. At the Synod of Dort, Calvinists stated their 5 points in response. Even though Arminianists had the 5 points first, today Calvinists are more known for their 5 points.
Ok so that leads us to the debate. Now the debate on these 5 points actually goes back further to St. Augustine and Pelagians in the fifth century but it really did not pick up steam till Calvin and Arminius. (I'm tempted to call Arminius, Hobbs because spell check does not like his name.) One further thing before jumping into the debate. Both schools of thoughts have been instrumental in the foundings of several denominations including Methodists, Presbyterians, and Nazarenes. It is also becoming a bigger debate in Southern Baptist seminaries today.

The Debate centers on theological cornerstones of soteriology. What is Soteriology. It is the study of salvation or more importantly the process of salvation. Neither side disagrees that salvation exists or that salvation can only be found in Christ. Both sides are just trying to put into words the process of salvation. The best way to describe it is to relate it to gravity. Scientists know it exists and know what it does but they differ in the process and mechanics of gravity.
We are going to begin with the 5 points of Hobbs aka Arminius since they technically came first.
(I) conditional election - This means that even though salvation is a gift of God and completed by Christ it is conditioned on our faith. That means that we must decide to be saved by our faith.
(II) unlimited atonement- This means that Jesus's death and resurrection were meant for everyone. His sacrifice is sufficient for all of humanity. But in going back to the first point, salvation is conditioned on faith.
(III) total depravity - Arminius states "In this [fallen] state, the free will of man towards the true good is not only wounded, infirm, bent, and weakened; but it is also imprisoned, destroyed, and lost. And its powers are not only debilitated and useless unless they be assisted by grace, but it has no powers whatever except such as are excited by Divine grace.
(IV) resistible grace - Free will allows us to resist the grace that God offers us. God takes the initiative in Grace and offers it to all people, but we must take the step into faith.
(V) possibility of apostasy- All believers have full assurance of salvation with the condition that they remain in Christ. Salvation is conditioned on faith, therefore perseverance is also conditioned. Apostasy (turning from Christ) is only committed through a deliberate, willful rejection of Jesus and renouncement of belief. Some people like John Wesley took this further to say that unconfessed sin could cost salvation.

So that was the 5 points of Arminianism with some minor explanation. Here are the 5 points of Calvinism. What I like about them is that they fit into a neat acronym called TULIP. See if you notice that some of the points are the same or similar as Arminianism.

T: Total Depravity- The doctrine of total depravity (also called "total inability") asserts that, as a consequence of the fall of man, every person born into the world is enslaved to the service of sin. People are not by nature inclined to love God with their whole heart, mind, or strength, but rather all are inclined to serve their own interests over those of their neighbor and to reject the rule of God. Thus, all people by their own faculties are morally unable to choose to follow God and be saved because they are unwilling to do so out of the necessity of their own natures. (The term "total" in this context refers to sin affecting every part of a person, not that every person is as evil as possible.)

U: Unconditional Election- The doctrine of unconditional election asserts that God's choice from eternity of those whom he will bring to himself is not based on foreseen virtue, merit, or faith in those people. Rather, it is unconditionally grounded in God's mercy alone. While those called by God will have faith and develop virtue, these are the effects of the call and not the cause.

L: Limited Atonement- This doctrine states that Christ's sacrifice is definite and specific for those called. Calvinists view the atonement as a penal substitution (that is, Jesus was punished in the place of sinners), and since, Calvinists argue, it would be unjust for God to pay the penalty for some people's sins and then still condemn them for those sins, all those whose sins were atoned for must necessarily be saved. Or in simpler terms, Christ's sacrifice was just for the saved.

I: Irresistible Grace- This means that in God's sovereignty all that He calls will be saved. When God choses someone , God's call will overcome that person's total depravity and resistance to salvation. Calvinists point to Paul's conversion as an example.

P: Perseverance of the saints- This simply means that those that God saves He is able to keep. For my catholic friends, saints means all believers or all of the elect. All true saints will remain till the end. Those who apparently fall away either never had true faith to begin with or will return back to that faith.

Ok so that about covers everything. You will notice in both lists, they seem to be saying the same thing but differently. Ultimately the debate rests on the issues of Free will vs Predestination. One side focuses heavily on our ability to choose and our responsibility while the other side focuses on God's Sovereignty and His Ability to Save. Like I said earlier, most Baptist churches fall somewhere in the middle. My paster calls himself a Calminian. I would have to agree with that as well. There are vasts amount of Biblical evidence for both sides of the argument. The Bible does point to predestination while at the same time pointing to our responsibility. The Bible also points to Christ's redemption being for the Church but also available to the World. The Bible also points that salvation is not by works or by man's power. But it also points to faith as an ingredient in salvation. With this all said and just for the fun of it I am going to end with the 5 points of Spurgeon. I just made them up but who knows maybe someday in the future someone will be arguing over them.

1.Total Depravity- Both Arminian and Calvin agreed on this point and I do to. The Bible says that All have sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. The Bible speaks of original sin and that as a result of Adam's sin, all men are born with a sinful nature. We are all born with a nature that hates God. We are incapable of saving ourselves though works. But yet we are made in God's image, so something of that truth remains in all of us, causing us all to yearn for Christ.

2. Unconditional Conditional Election- Because of our depravity we are unable to save ourselves. Salvation is 100% dependent on God. God is the author and sustainer of our salvation. He is completely behind the beginning, middle, and end of our salvation. No man can boast in regards to salvation. Faith is a gift of God given to us that we may use it. Our salvation is dependent on this faith. Our responsibility in salvation is faith.

3.Atonement for all who will- The Bible says who so ever will confess the Lord as savior shall be saved. Christ's atonement is for all to accept.

4. Grace- Grace is God's gift. He offers it to whomever He chooses. He would be no less loving or graceful to offer it to no one. But God offers Grace to whomever He desires. The Bible says He desires no one to perish. God's grace is irresistible to those whom hearts God has not hardened.

5. The New Creature- God's grace remakes us into a new creation. The total depravity is gone and replaced with a heart made by God. We are now totally free to serve God as He intended. God has made us a new creation and we can never go back to the old life because it is dead. Yes saints sometimes sin but God will keep all those entrusted to Him. Those who commit apostasy were either not new creations or are like the prodigal son and will return.

Thanks for taking the time to read all this. I hope it peaks your interests in Doctrinal studies. As you can tell from my 5 points, it is a mixture of both. Most baptists line up somewhere in there. The majority in fact probably about 99% would agree with my 5th point and Calvins 5th point. The Bible just says too much about eternal security. So anyways stay tuned for more discussion. Next time I will try to discuss eschatology differences.

2008-02-02T15:53:00.000-05:00

Sudan refuge tells story of persecution.

More News

2008-02-02T15:26:00.000-05:00

2/2/2008 (Yala, Thailand) - A rubber tapper is shot to death by Muslim militants on his way to work.
2/1/2008 (Baghdad, Iraq) - al-Qaeda sends two women with Down's Syndrome into two pet markets, then detonates each remotely, slaughtering about one hundred other innocents.
2/1/2008 (Mosul, Iraq) - A 12-year-old boy is taken out by Sunni radicals.
2/1/2008 (Kut, Iraq) - The Mujahideen fire into a bus terminal, killing two Iraqis.
2/1/2008 (Narathiwat, Thailand) - Two elderly men are murdered by Islamic gunmen in separate attacks.
2/1/2008 (Nouakchott, Mauritania) - Bearded Jihadis shout 'Allah Akbar' and open up on the Israeli embassy with automatic weapons, injuring three bystanders.

Hezbollah continues its threats against the existence of Israel in this video.

Tax Denier Movement (Click here to find out More)
Wesley Snipes is cleared of Tax Evasion giving strength to tax denier movement.

Tony Blair to be president of Europe?

People suffering from Downs Syndrome tricked into being suicide bombers.

In Defense of Cloverfield

2008-02-02T14:01:00.000-05:00

I just finished watching Cloverfield for the 3rd time. I know it is a bit excessive but I loved the movie so much. Plus this time, I didn't have to pay for it because my parents did. So anyways, each time that I watched it, I took along a different group of people who had not seen it. Each time, someone from each group had the same reaction to the movie. Now here is probably a good place to put in a spoiler's alert. So if you haven't seen the movie and do not want to have the experience ruined, then go watch it before you read on. Anyways, everytime I have seen it, someone has complained about the ending. The usual comment is, "what? that can't be the end?" Now the ending of the movie is a bit bleak, with all of the characters dieing or atleast appearing to die. Also the movie does not explain why or what is going on. This leaves many movie goers upset. I believe this is because people are so used to being shown the whole story. But lets look real quickly at the idea behind Cloverfield, to see why being shown the whole story wouldn't work. First of all, the premise behind Cloverfield is that we are watching an unedited tape filmed using a camcorder by a normal human being. That means the movie is liking watching a home video that someone recorded. In this movie, we are getting a personal view of a big event. In a way, the camera is a character in the movie. In most movies, the audience gets to see things from a position outside of the movie. We get to see things that the characters in the movies don't see. But in this movie, we are apart of it. We only get to see what the character in the movie gets to see. Thus we come the ending, if the ending of this movie had been any different it would have ruined the entire experience. If the characters suddenly figured out how to defeat the monster, then it would have ruined the idea that these were just normal people. In real life, sometimes we don't have all the answers. Sometimes events happen that are bigger than us. Sometimes we find ourselves caught up in something that we don't understand. That is what I like about this movie. It brings up into a normal persons life as something huge happens all around them. We are not told where the monster came from or what happened to it, because the characters in the movie do not know. That is how true life really is. We don't know everything. But thankfully, there is a God who not only knows what is going on, He is in control of it. So next time you watch Cloverfield, don't worry about trying to figure out why everything is happening. Don't worry about where the monster came from. Just sit back, put yourself in the movie, and be scared to death. It's all good fun.

help needed

2008-02-01T14:43:00.000-05:00

the following is an email from CJ Adkins, the pastor at my church.

I received an e-mail from Pastor Valdez' wife (Villa) regarding John Carlo Zerna (the 10 year old son of Mayaposi Baptist Church pastor Joseph Zerna). He is hospitalized in Dumaguete since January 27 with Dengue fever (a potentially fatal misquito borne illness). For more information on Dengue see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dengue

His hospital bills total over 20,000 pesos or $500. That is nowhere near what a hospital stay in the US would cost, but a HUGE amount for someone who has no insurance and earns about $6.00 per day. I have known this little boy since he was two years old. It was a blessing to see him playing a "beat box" (they don't have any actual drums) in the worship services there last month.

I do not know what to do about this except to give this matter to the Lord and share the need with each of you. I am planning to send them some money by next Wednesday. While I certainly don't have $500 to spare, I know that God does. If there is anyone out there who would like to help with this need, tax deductible contributions can be made to:

Beacon Ministries, Inc.
317 - 49th Street
Ashland, KY 41101

If you feel led to help with this, please do so before Wednesday. "Little is much when God is in it". A receipt will be provided for any contribution to this need. Above all, pray for John Carlo and his family. Whatever monies we can collect by Wednesday, we will purchase a moneygram and it will be wired to their account the same day. I am including Mrs. Valdez' entire email for your information. You can also see a photo of John Carlo and his family, Joseph, Juvy, and sister Rhea Mae by clicking on the link below to "For What It's Worth".
http://cjablog.blogspot.com/2008/01/joseph-and-juvy.html

Here is Mrs. Valdez' email (followed by today's devotional thought)
Thanks in advance for your prayers and for any possible financial help.
C.J.

Dear Bro.C.J.,
How is everybody?Pastor Doming is okay. We are all
well except for John Carlo who is still very weak up
to now. He was confined at the Silliman University
Medical Center since last Sunday,January 27th because
of "Dengue" sickness. He had severe complications of
the kidney,edema,leakage of plasma and hematocret
problem. His platelets went up to 27 which is very low
and very critical. He was closely monitored by the
doctors because of his very critical and dangerous
situation. This gives me a very big problem because
I'm so financially drain and hard up.
This is our urgent request, please help us. We need
your prayers and financial help for John Carlo
Zerna(son of Joseph Zerna,MSBC pastor in
Mayaposi,Mabinay,Oriental Negros,Philippines).
Today,by the grace of God, he is well and soon to be
discharged from the hospital as soon as we can pay the
very big amount of hospital bills and doctor's fee
that surprised and shocked me so much because it
amounted to twenty thousand pesos(P 20,000.00) as of
today January 31st. In this connection, we are
appealing to your kind hearts to please help us pay
this abovementioned amount to the hospital and to the
doctor handling his case.
I'm deeply sorry for having failed to inform you
earlier about this bad news about John Carlo. I hope
that you understand me. I look forward to seeing you
all in May 21st 2008 here in the Philippines.
Thank you so much and God bless you all!!!
Very sincerely yours,
Villa

Nasheed

2008-01-31T22:41:00.000-05:00

Ive been posting a lot of stories about terrorism and Islam, that it is easy to get angry and defensive and forget Christ's call to love. I think the only way to make a difference in the world is Christ's love. What does that love look like?
The Bible says, that true love is that someone would lay down their life for a friend. This is also love that while we were sinners, Christ died for us.
True love is sacrificial. True love overlooks faults and see the created individual. So even while I will be posting stories showing a lot of the atrocities being committed today, we need to remember that God's love calls us to the entire world. With that being said, I think we can also find good in people. The bible says we are created in the image of God. Now because of sin, we have corrupted that image, but something of that image remains in us all. Somethings I admire muslims for is their discipline. They are disciplined to pray 5 times daily. Now their discipline comes out of a desire to escape judgement while our discipline should come from a love of God. As Christians we are commanded to be praying continuously or without ceasing. But sometimes it seems like it would take a Miracle to find Christians who pray just 5 times a day. Another thing that I admire about Islam, is their reverence to Allah's name and glory. Any defamation to that name is taken as a direct insult. As Christians, we are commanded to Not take the Lord's name in vain. But sometimes it seems common place to do that. Another thing I also admire is a form of music they have called Nasheed. It is traditionally all acapella but sometimes percussion is allowed. Here is a link to some more contemporary Nasheed.
It is actually really beautiful music. I think it would be cool to see if Christians in the middle east use a similar type of music.
Anyways, I think that God's love can reach past boundaries. The only hope for Muslims is Christ's salvation. And the only way that Muslims will hear it, is by someone loving them enough to sacrifice. A love that understands the violent and evil tendencies of Islam, but looks past that to the person.

news from around the world

2008-01-31T18:04:00.000-05:00

1/30/2008 (Zamboanga, Philippines) - A woman is killed, and another injured, following an ambush by Moro Islamic terrorists.
1/30/2008 (Yala, Thailand) - Two men, ages 32 and 52, are shot to death by Muslim militants in separate attacks.
1/30/2008 (NWFP, Pakistan) - The bodies of thirteen soldiers taken hostage several days earlier by religious extremists are discovered.
1/29/2008 (Kandahar, Afghanistan) - Taliban militants kill three civilians in two separate landmine attacks.
1/29/2008 (Duluiya, Iraq) - Three schoolgirls are killed in a Jihad bombing as they are walking to school.
1/29/2008 (Muqdadiyah, Iraq) - Nine complete bodies and ten severed heads are discovered - suspected to be al-Qaeda victims.

Al-Qaeda fighting in Yemen at request of government

Arab nations eye control of US Economy

War in Australia?

Scary Stuff

2008-01-30T19:11:00.001-05:00

Check out this video. It is a lengthy but very scary.

Conspiracy Theory?

2008-01-30T16:34:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone. I'm still researching the calvin armenian post but in the meantime im going to start something new on my blog. I am going to start posting news stories that don't receive much coverage but should. These stories are hopefully going to provide just a little more insight into world politics. I believe that the world is heading in a direction where Christ's return is right around the corner. I have recently been researching a lot of conspiracy theories. There are a whole bunch of them including some that blame our government for 9/11.
Here are a couple of links that I think you should check out:
This is a very interesting video about 9/11
This is a very interesting video about a chip.

Now do I believe the conspiracy theories? Yes and no. I believe that people who follow conspiracy theories, look around at the events of today and see design. They see a flow that seems to fit something sinister. I believe that to. I believe that there is design in 9/11, the terrorists, and the North American Union.
and Verichip
But I do not believe that there is a group of people behind all this. I believe Satan is behind it. He is plotting, planning, and manipulating the world. The Bible says, Satan is like a lion, going about the world, looking for those to devour. The Bible also calls Satan the father of lies. He is the great deceiver. I believe that when we look at world events from a big picture point of view, we will see his presense. So with that in mind I am going to try and post news stories every once in a while that point to that big picture. I am going to post stuff that points to the goals of Islam in destroying Israel and subjugating the world to Islamic Law. I am also going to post stories that show how Satan is working through our own government to complete his ultimate goal. Hopefully on my way you will become a little more educated on prophesy and world politics.

so here are the first two stories:
This continues to show the goals that Iran and other countries have.

The next story shows our government giving Syria technology that they may use against us in the future. I'm not sure why our government would do this.

Maayong Buntag

2008-01-27T09:56:00.000-05:00

Hey, I thought I would take a break from writing such long posts for a couple days. I have another rather lengthy one in the works about Calvinists and Armenians. But in the meantime here is a slide show that I made. It of the january 2008 mission trip to the Philippines that my church takes. I was able to go in 2007 and will be going back in may of this year. Enjoy the slide show.

If you would like to help support missions in the Philippines, your help would be greatly appreciated. Just contact me at movieguyjoe@gmail.com for more info.

Baptist Doctrinal Differences For My Friend John

2008-01-21T14:22:00.000-05:00

On my way home last night, after watching the most intense movie that I have ever seen, I decided that I would blog about doctrinal differences of Baptists. Or in plain english, what makes all the baptist churches different. I suggest you go read my last post first to get a good understanding of how we have different baptist conferences such as Southern Baptist or American Baptist. Today I am going try and tackle the beliefs of baptists. With all the different baptist churches this is a scary thing to try, almost as frightening as Cloverfield. Btw, it is an amazing movie. Ok will once again I will mention that I am not an expert and therefor some of this will probably be wrong.
Baptists number over 110 million worldwide in nearly 300,000 congregations, and considered the largest world communion of evangelical Protestants, with an estimated 38.8 million members in the United States.[4] Other large populations of Baptists also exist in Asia, Africa and Latin America, notably in India (2.4 million), Nigeria (2.5 million), Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) (1.9 million) and Brazil (1.7 million).[5](wikipedia.org) Most Baptist churches choose to associate with denominational groups that provide support without control. Examples of such denominations are the Southern Baptist Convention, National Baptist Convention USA, Conservative Baptist Association of America, American Baptist Churches USA, American Baptist Association (Landmark Baptists), among others. What makes all these baptist groups different. Well the first thing we must look at is what makes all these groups baptist. So to find the difference we are going to look at the similarites. The most important similarity is that baptist churches do not have a central governing authority. Each baptist church is its own boss. I can not stress this enough. It means that the first baptist church down the street is in control of what it teaches, preaches and does. The people of that church choose their preacher. This is the one thing all baptist churches have in common. It is with this one thing that all the differences occur. Because Baptist Church A decides something doesnt mean that Baptist Church B has to. This concept is essential in understanding baptists. It is the ultimate ideal in democracy and personal relationships.

Ok with the first concept down, which means baptist are free to believe what they will, lets look at some other commonly held beliefs that most if not all baptists share. We are going to use the acronym B.A.P.T.I.S.T.S. to talk about them.
B. Biblical Authority: Meaning that the Bible is the ultimate authority in matters regarding Christianity. unlike Catholics who use tradition and scripture, most baptists believe that all matters including tradition fall under the authority of scripture. It is something that I hold very dear to. I love to read of church history and the traditions through out time, but any tradition that does not follow scripture, is just tradition to me. It is not something to be held onto dogmatically.
A. Autonomy of Local Church: Ive already worn that out.
P. Priesthood of all believers: This simply means that we are all called by God to live our lives to the highest calling. We can go straight to the father through Jesus without having to ask a priest or preacher. Each believer has the spirit of God living in them, so therefore God can speak through them much like a priest back in jewish time.
T. Two ordinances (believer's baptism and the Lord's Supper) Ordinances mean that these things do not impart grace nor salvation but are commands given to already saved people. They are Jesus's last commands for us as believers to do.
I. Individual Soul Liberty: Each person has the freedom to accept Christ's sacrifice for themselves. They are free to interpret scripture for themselves and have a responsibility to that.
S. Separation of Church and State: Most people will find this funny because most people view baptists as politically charged people. Once again this belief is one of various degrees. It also does not mean the elimination of church from state.
T. Two offices of the church (pastor and deacon): Most baptist's churches have these two offices, but this is probably the one that you will find the most differences in from church to church.
S.Saved Church Membership: This simply means that the church is the body of believers. For one to belong to a baptist church they must have accepted Christ personally. This doesnt mean that nonbelievers cant attend church services.

So most Baptists hold these views to various agrees. As with all neat acronyms they are imperfect. I must also mention two very very very big beliefs.
1. Salvation by Grace through Faith: This is mainly a protestant thing. But most Baptists hold this belief very firmly. It means that good works will not save us. It means that the lords supper or baptism will not impart grace. Salvation is a free gift from God. It needs to be only accepted by faith, like a child accepting a christmas gift.
2. Baptism: Baptists have some origins in a group called Anabaptists or as they were jokingly called rebaptizers. It means that these people did not beleive in infant baptism or baptism by sprinkly. The word baptism comes from the word meaning to dunk or be put under water. So a full immersion baptist is required in all but the most extreme cases. But this baptism is not an act that saves but it an act of obedience to Jesus. It is a symbol of one's faith, therefore it is only done by someone who truely believes.

Now that we have defined the most common baptist similarities we will now be able to look at the differences. The differences are basically various degrees of holding the above views. Southern Baptists have something called The Baptist Faith and Message. http://www.sbc.net/bfm/bfm2000.asp It is not a creed but is basically a list of basic beliefs that most Southern Baptist Churches hold to. So what makes Southern Baptist different then American Baptists, and Landmark Baptists different from General Convention baptists? It basically falls into the following categories:
Calvinism/Arminianism
Doctrine of separation
Eschatology
Hermeneutical method
Homosexuality
Ordination of women as pastor or deacon
The translation of Scripture aka which ones are allowed and not allowed
The extent to which missionary boards should be used to support missionaries
The extent to which non-members may participate in communion services
The nature of Law and Gospel

I am only going to touch on a few of these because they in themselves could fill whole blogs.
This a quick list of differences between Amercian Baptist and Southern Baptist since I know these two the most. Please keep in mind that many American Baptist churches believe what the majority of southern baptist believe and vise versa.
1. In American Baptist women can be ordained as pastors and deacons while in Southern Baptist they can not.
2. While both denominations do not accept homosexuality as a right and alternative lifestyle, a growing number of American Baptist churches have been open to accepting and ordaining them.

So anyways I hope that does a good job of explaining the differences. I have to go to work now but if there are any of the above topics you would like me to go in depth with I will do my best to do it. Now that you're finished reading this, go watch Cloverfield. It's amazing.

Baptist History kind of

2008-01-20T10:22:00.000-05:00

That’s the sound I make as I sit here eating Maple Pecan Crunch cereal. It is the type of cereal that lives up to its name. It is definitely mapley (if that is a word). And even with milk poured on it, it has a very nice crunch. Excuse me… I had to take another bite. It is really good cereal. It amazes me how all the different ingredients come together to make such a great breakfast or in my case a midnight snack. Each of the individual parts are definitely awesome by themselves but much better together. I could eat pecans like they are candy. Anyways… enough with the food. I am going to blog today about “The Baptist Church.” Now most of you are thinking… “which Baptist church”. Notice if I say The Catholic Church you don’t ask which one. Well my friend John asked me to write about Baptist churches and what makes them different. Now I am by no means an expert in this matter so what follows is an imperfect attempt atleast. I am going to write a little about history and then about the current landscape. I am going to try and reserve any judgment until the end.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth….ok lets skip a few thousand years and get right into the thick of Christian history. Now once again this is not a complete historical view and nor will I attempt to cover every major thing. Anyways, we are going to go all the way up to the 1800’s. Now the Baptist church was already in existence here so I am not going to be covering the initial founding. Anyways ,The United States of America had been charted in 1776 and by now people are moving west across the country. Because of persecution from tyrants who had taken over the church in Europe, many people came to America hoping to escape it. What you must understand is from about the time of Constantine to then, the church and government had been intertwined. It meant that if anyone had a different view then the denomination that was in power, then they would be prosecuted by the government. But America was different. The government would run separate from the church. In fact, Thomas Jefferson gave his now famous “separation of church and state” speech in a Baptist church to the great applause of the congregation. Since the government was in charge of political affairs, the church in America was left to personal affairs. Because of the charge for westward expansion in America, many people were moving further away from cities and church gatherings. A few men noticed this and felt a huge passion for these people. The men I am talking about are John Edwards (not the presidential candidate) and Whitefield. They began setting up tents out the rural areas and preaching. Because of their obedience to God’s calling, The Great Awakening or The Great Revival occurred in America. People from all over began accepting for themselves a personal Christianity. The Great Awakening marked a strong turning point in American Protestantism. From then on out, the personal relationship with God was the most important aspect of Christianity. This applies to most American protestant churches but Baptists especially are concerned with a personal relationship.
We are going to make a couple more quick stops on our way through history. The civil war marked a great turn in Baptist history. While the separation of church and state is an ideal that most Baptists uphold, they never meant for it to mean the elimination of church from the state. This is evident with the civil war. The church in America was split just as the nation. And so the formation of two Baptist denominations occurred because of the rift in America. The Southern Baptist churches formed the Southern Baptist Convention while the Northern Baptist Churches formed the American Baptist denomination. The churches were mainly split over the issue of slavery and loyalty to their perspective governments. You will notice that even today, the two denominations church government for lack of a better word, look like the two American governments. The Southern Baptist Convention operates much like the confederate government. In the Con Government, the states had all the power and were bound together loosely by a convention or a desire to work together. Southern Baptist Churches work much the same way. Each church is its own boss and they work together in a convention.
Ok the next stop is the early 1900’s. Something began sweeping across all American denominations. It had already started in Europe many years prior but it was now entering in the USA. This thing was liberalism. Now this isn’t the same thing that conservatives today call liberal but it is the roots of it. A thing called high criticism began appearing in seminaries and colleges. You will notice that a whole lot of colleges including Harvard started out as Christian colleges but today are no longer that way. Liberalism is a lot of the fault. Higher criticism is basically the movement to critique a writings background and sources. It is a desire to find out who wrote what and if what written was accurate. While that might not seem like a bad thing, when it is combined with naturalism it is horrible. Basically, this form of liberalism said that supernatural things cant happen so many of the miracles in the bible are either not true or can be explained by some natural phenomenon. Without going too much further into the nuts and bolts of liberalism, lets just say that it devalued the Bible and did not believe it to be inerrant or true. One backlash to this was the rise of fundamentalists. Now these were not the people you think of when you think of that word today but they were the founding fathers of those people so to speak.
Our last stop through history is the 70’s and 80’s. Oh the days of bellbottoms, punk rock, and new wave. Liberalism had spread by then to include every major denomination including Southern Baptists. Now most individual churches were just now beginning to accept the idea of liberalism but all of the seminaries had already taken a hold of it. Now what takes place in the Southern Baptist Convention is one of much debate and controversy but basically a few people decided to take matters into their own hands. They began fighting back the wave of liberalism. Many of the liberal professors were tossed out and conservatism was on the rise. By the early 80’s the Southern Baptist Convention had went from one of the most liberal denominations to one of the most conservative.
Ok that concludes our tour of history. Now I am going to try and explain what all of that meant for Baptists and for our current landscape. Beginning with the protestant reformation and up to the great awakening, Baptists began with the idea of a personal religion. One that is not ran by the government, but by the people. It is very similar to our U.S. government. Each Baptist church is its own boss. The church people are free to decide what they believe. They are free to decide what color they want to the building to be. They are free to decide who will be their pastor. Because each church is free to decide, it means that if you were able to be at four different Baptist churches on Sunday, you would probably get four different church services. Now with all these differences, what is it that Baptists believe? Well this is where the conventions come in handy. See Baptists believe in the universal church and Christians working together, so most Baptists churches belong to a convention or union. These conventions are held together by churches with common beliefs and goals. The civil war caused a large division. And liberalism also had the same affect. Today there are many independent Baptist churches. And these are the offspring of the fundamentalists. They are independent because they did not want to belong to the liberal conventions. The funny thing is that some independent Baptist churches formed a convention called….you guessed it… The Independent Baptist Church Convention. I explained a little about what happened with the Southern Baptist Convention and its return to conservatism to explain why there are even more conventions other than the southern Baptist, American Baptist, or Independent. Most of the liberals that were ousted from the Southern Baptist joined or created the General Baptist Convention. Ok so what does all this mean? It means that there are buttload of Baptist churches, each one striving to serve God. Is this a perfect system? No. There are no perfect systems. One of the things I find odd, is that Jesus did not give us a church government. He did not lay out plans for what each church should look like. So every church system created is mans attempt to create something. And each one is flawed. But each one also has its strengths. The Baptist church flourishes in spite of or because of its weaknesses. The Southern Baptist Convention (which I am apart of ) has many flaws and stuff that just gets on my nerves, but it is also a strong convention that strives to be built firmly on God’s word and to reach the world. The SBC sends the most missionaries abroad of any denomination in America. It is the largest denomination in America. I am glad to be a part of it. Besides with a name like Spurgeon, I couldn’t help but be Baptist. (For those that do not know, Charles Hadden Spurgeon, one of my great great great great uncles, was one of the most famous Baptist preachers. You can buy any number of his books at the book store and also about a million books about him at the Christian book store. He is also buried in the Westminster Abby. ) Its still good cereal

The New Reformation

2008-01-17T00:40:00.000-05:00

"That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me" (John 17:21).

I have been doing a lot of thinking lately about the Protestant Reformation. I have been rolling around in my head the causes of it and the effects that it has had on Christianity. I have been really trying to grasp what the reformation was. I think I have come to a conclusion about the reformation. The reformation was the reforming of the Christian faith. It was an attempt to return to the basic fundamentals of Christianity as taught by the Apostles. Without boring you with all the history of it, I do want to talk a little bit about why it was neccessary and planned by God. The Church had come a long way since its humble beginnings. It was no longer in danger of persecution and death but was now intermingled with the government. One of the major problems with this is that The church was now in a position that its leaders could profit off of their place with in it. While the church was facing persecution, it was not really profitable in earthy terms to join it. The people who did join were doing out of a pure motive. But as the church gained power many non-believers saw this as their opportunity to rise to power too. These people began using the church as a way to prey on the faithful. The church leaders could hold a monopoly on education and thus be able to control the followers. Education or the lack of education among the general populace was how the greedy were able to take a hold of the church. Martin Luther saw how the church had drifted so far away from what it was supposed to be and desired change. I believe that God placed it on his heart along with those from other areas who were seeing the same thing. Then something brilliant happened. The printing press gave the common people the ability of have The Bible in their own tongue for the first time. Education led many people to see that the Church was not what it was supposed to be. This led to the protestant reformation. People were able to think for themselves and understand the truth about Christianity. I think the Protestant reformation was very important. It did bring back an understanding of what Christianity truely is.

I also think that the Protestant reformation is over and we are in a great need of a new reformation. Just like the protestants shifted the course of christianity, we need a new shift. Infact I believe that the protestant reformation has now overcompensated and left us with maybe a greater problem than before. The problem is that of divorce. No I am not talking about divorce in a marriage since but a divorce none the less. I am talking about the constant divorces of churches in the protestant faith. One of the main beliefs of protestanism is that we can all decipher the christian faith for ourselves. While this is very true in the sense that Christianity is about a personal faith, this is untrue when it comes to the Church Body. If you take this belief that everyone is intitled to their own interpretation and couple it with a lack of education about the scriptures and history of the church you will have the problem that we have today. Divorce. To give you an example let me take you to a problem in baptist churches. Say that one half of the church wants to paint the walls blue and the other white. Because everyone is entitled to do what they want and there is no authority in the church, this baptist church splits into two churches over the color of paint. This is basically a divorce. If you look at my town of Huntington you will find about a million different protestant churches each with their own spin on the gospel. Most of the differences in doctrines are because of a lack of education and understanding regarding the scriptures. I believe this is the problem that the protestant reformation has inadvertently caused. It has led to the simplicity of the gospel becoming something so overly complicated. If I was an non-believer how would I ever know which message being proclaimed is the truth.

So what is the solution? I think it is time for another reformation. I call this the reunification reformation. What will the reformation look like? It will look like the end of denominations. It will look like christians truely loving their brother. It will look like people of different denominations getting together and working through the doctinal differences. It will not just be an acceptance of everything but instead of a group of people seeking God's answers to things. The early church has some doctrinal differences but because divorce was not an option they got together and worked through the differences. They searched the scriptures and through love were able to make an authoritive statement on beliefs. I believe this can happen again. Will it be perfect? no. There will probly come a time in which another reformation is needed. Why? Because we are imperfect people trying to follow a perfect way. So how will this happen? It is already happening with the collapse of the major denominations. All of the major denominations are losing members. As some of the older people who really are not educated about the scriptures die off some younger people who have a love for the scriptures will infiltrate these churches. A pastor of a baptist church will meet with the pastor of a methodist church and begin to dialogue. They will begin to seek common ground and then pray through the differences. They will seek to unite their congregations. Now I am not a prophet but I do think that as Christianity loses its power in America and becomes persecuted again, we will see the end of these splits. In fact I almost wish for the persecution to happen so that this unity will happen. People will truely seek to understand the scriptures by educating themselves on the culture it was written in. The Persecution will weed out those using christianity to prey on the week. It is during this that we will see the reunification reformation take form. It will be beautiful and will be an answer to a prayer, Christ's prayer.

I want to end on this. There are many people proclaming unity for unity's sake. I do not do that. I do not desire people coming together and neglecting the gospel and the truth. I do not desire to see Islamic people and Christian people united. I desire to see Christ Followers united under one message, and that is Jesus Christ. Please join me in praying for this reformation. A reformation that unites Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian, Greek Orthodox, into one body under one unified gospel. It will take love. It will take hard work. There are many doctrinal differences that will need to be worked out. These will take a lot of education, a lot of prayer, a lot of love, and a lot of God's grace to work through. But divorce is not an option. Unite.

Beautifully Dangerous

2008-01-13T10:12:00.000-05:00

Ever seen something so beautiful that you just want to reach out and touch it. The lion fish is a very exotic and beautiful creature. But to reach out and touch it would be dangerous. There are many things that are deadly and beautiful at the same time. I have recently been listening to a song that is beautifully dangerous. The melody and music is amazing. But the lyrics are dangerous. They are not filthy or obscene. They do not have any profanity. Instead what is dangerous about the lyrics is if we would listen to them, the word would be changed. Our comfortable lives would be threatened. We couldnt go on living the same way. Things would have to change. It makes this song very dangerous for the church. It is a song that is beautiful but if you listen too much it can be painful.
The songs is called, "Asleep in the Light" by Keith Green. Below are the words to this amazing song. See if they lyrics don't cause your heart to ache.

Asleep in the Night

Do you see, do you see, all the people sinking down,

Don't you care, don't you care, are you gonna let them drown,

How can you be so numb, not to care if they come,

You close your eyes and pretend the job's done.

Oh Bless me Lord, bless me Lord, you know it's all I ever hear,

No one aches, no one hurts, no one even sheds one tear,

But He cries, He weeps, He bleeds, and He cares for your needs,

And you just lay back and keep soaking it in, oh, can't you see it's such sin?

Cause He brings people to your door,

And you turn them away, as you smile and say,

God bless you, be at peace, and all Heaven just weeps,

Cause Jesus came to your door, you've left Him out on the streets.

Open up, open up, and give yourself away,

You've seen the need, you hear the cry, so how can you delay,

God's calling and you're the one, but like Jonah you run,

He's told you to speak, but you keep holding it in,

Oh, can't you see it's such sin?

The world is sleeping in the dark,

That the church can't fight, cause it's asleep in the light,

How can you be so dead, when you've been so well fed,

Jesus rose from the grave, and you, you can't even get out of bed,

Oh, Jesus rose from the dead, come on, get out of your bed.

How can you be so numb, not to care if they come,

You close your eyes and pretend the job's done,

You close your eyes and pretend the job's done,

Don't close your eyes, don't pretend the job's done.

Come away, come away, come away with Me, My love,

Come away, from this mess, come away with Me, My love.

Christian Unity

2008-01-11T13:42:00.000-05:00

In the Roman Catholic Church, next week begins "The week of Prayer for Christian Unity." I think this is a good thing for all Christians. Jesus, himself, prayed for our unity just hours before being crucified. While praying, Jesus was so broken for this unity and for us, that his sweat became blood. There is a scientific term for it but it basically means that do to stress and anguish his capillaries broke open and bled. This shows how important His desire for our unity was/is. I believe that at time, Jesus knew all the heartbreak and fighting that would happen over the centuries by his followers. I commend the Catholic Church for its prayer of unity. I think that all Christians should have an attitude of love and unity. Jesus said that people will know we are His followers because we love each other. Our love for each other needs to override any differences we have.

I think we should have the attitude of this french bishop who said, ""Some aspects of the Mystery of the faith have been developed better by each Christian tradition.

The Christians of the East have always emphasized the resurrection of Christ that already transfigures the world. Is it not because of this that in past centuries many of them were able to endure decades of suffering? The East has preserved the teaching of the Church Fathers with great fidelity. Monasticism, which it gave to the West, has breathed a life of contemplation into the entire Church. Can Western Christians become more open to these treasures?

The Christians of the Reformation have strongly stressed these Gospel realities: God offers his love freely and unconditionally; by his Word he comes to whoever listens to it and puts it into practice; the simple trusting of faith leads to the freedom of the children of God; singing together allows the Word of God to penetrate us. Are not these values essential for all Christians?

The Catholic Church has kept visible, throughout history, the universality of communion in Christ. It has constantly looked for a balance between the local Church and the universal Church. One cannot exist without the other. A ministry of communion at all levels has helped to maintain unanimity in the faith. Cannot all baptized persons go further in a progressive understanding of this ministry?"

I hope you will join in with our fellow Christians next week and pray for unity. May your heart be so broken for your fellow brothers and sisters that our prayers are like Christ's.

He's got the whole world.

2008-01-06T22:02:00.000-05:00

Sometimes when things get tough, its easy to forget that God is in control.
When you sometimes feel like Job had it lucky, its hard to see a need to praise. But God is not asleep and He has a plan.
The bible says He has a plan to prosper us and not to harm us. That doesnt mean we won't have trials but that God's plan will ultimately lead for good. Sometimes a song can say it better than words. Below is a song by Petra. It's got a classic 80's feel but the chorus is something to latch onto. He's still got the whole in his hands.

Welcome to the Hero's Blog

2008-01-05T18:23:00.000-05:00

Hey guys, Welcome to The Hero's blog. Iv'e been posting for a while on myspace but have decided to jump ofer to blogspot and start blogging here as well. So anyways this is now my home and I am going to be blogging about everything. I am going to start off this blog with a post I made on myspace a while back. I think it is one of my better ones. I hope you like.

The following is a story about Buddha. It is a neat story and I think it has a degree of wisdom in it.An ordinary guy came to see the Buddha to get help with his problems. " my roof leaks, I don't have enough money, my neighbors are noisy, my boss hates me, my kids are messy and disrespectful, my knee hurts and I'm losing my hair. And don't even get me started about my wife. " and he went on to describe all his problems in great detail while the buddha smiled and listened patiently.When the guy was done complaining, he asked the Buddha, "so, how can you help me ?""I can't help you", said the Buddha."HUH? What kind of teacher are you?", said the guy, "why did I come all the way here for you to tell me that? And what the hell are you smiling about?"The buddha said, "Everyone has 83 problems. Sometimes we fix one, but it is guaranteed that another will pop up in its place. It's just life. I can't help you with your 83 problems, but I can fix your 84th problem.""What is my 84th problem?"."Your 84th problem is that you don't want to have any problems."Buddhism teaches you that problems are a fact of life. And that our biggest problem is trying to escape all of our other problems. As a Christian, I see some wisdom in this. I have a lot of problems. Im not sure if there are 83 problems or not but Im sure it is close. The Bible says, "In this life you will have troubles." It is a fact of life. The sun shines on the good and the bad, The rain rains on the good and the bad. Buddhism teaches that our real problem is trying to avoid problems. It is focusing on our problems. And once again this is probably wise. Who knows how many times I have jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire by trying to escape pain. Who knows how much stress I have had by focusing on my problems. Focusing on problems and living our lives trying to escape them is wrong. How we handle the problems and stress is what makes us. For Buddhists they are taught to detach themselves and live in the here and now. To realize that now is the moment. To realize that the human is the person in charge and can make the difference. As a Christ follower, I believe I have a much better hope. then just becoming detached and living in the now. I have a bright hope in Jesus. My focus should not be on my problems but on Jesus. He is my vision, my goal, my zen. Jesus has secured victory. My problems are not just something to be detached from but they are victories. I can look forward to a day where Christ will reign victoriously over all my problems. I know that one day all 84 of my problems will be gone. That is reason to celebrate.