Are You a Good Person?

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Turbulent Times

The following is a treatment of several things that we are dealing with as September ushers in the beginnings of Autumn. Together they represent some turbulent times.

Item One: Ground Zero. One of the big things in the news right now is Muslims pushing to build a mosque at ground zero in NYC. While, Constitutionally, they have the right to do so, allowing them to do this will only further the terrorist agenda. There is the issue of putting up this mosque in an area that has been the site of nearly 3000 deaths due to actions by radical Muslims. I agree with the people who believe they should not be allowed to do so. My reasoning may be a bit different than some others. Most talk about the emotional issue of rubbing the survivors of the victims of that tragic even. This is definitely one point of the issue. The point that I come at this is more historical. Wherever Islam has waged jihad and won they have built a mosque on the holy site of that region. If you don't believe that, tell me what is now sitting on the Temple Mount, the very place where the Jewish Temple was built. The Dome of the Mosque now resides there and, if my intel is correct, it is a violation of the law for Jewish citizens to even stand on top of the Temple Mount. So, historically, we see that radical Islam always builds a mosque on a site of high prominence to raise their victory banner. Don't let them do this. I'm not saying we should hate the Muslims. Some people think that's what I'm saying. It most certainly isn't. We should love them, as Jesus told us to, especially the radical Muslims responsible for much death and hardship. The love of God, as shone through His people, is the only sure weapon against radical Islam.

Item Two: Tied in with this is a pastor in Florida who plans on burning Qu'rans on the 9th anniversary of 9/11. Again, this is a display of a lack of love for our enemies. Attacking the Muslim holy book, which incidentally instructs them to follow the teachings of the Bible and proclaims Jesus as the highest prophet of God, is terrible. I want people to realize that this person is acting religiously, not in accordance with the Word of God. This man has even been warned how such an action may cause problems for our military overseas, specifically in Afghanistan. I personally have asked Muslims about what the Bible and the Qu'ran teaches, and showed them that Jesus is God. Incidentally, if Jesus, who the Qu'ran teaches is the highest of prophets, and the Bible teaches that a false prophet is known by a single false prophecy, and Jesus claimed to be God, but their prophet Mohammad teaches that Jesus is not God, then either Jesus is not God, but a false prophet. Yet Islam teaches that Jesus is a prophet yet not God. You can't have it both ways. You either except both or reject both. And if Jesus is a true prophet of God and God Himself, then Mohammad is a false prophet. And if Mohammad is a false prophet on what foundation do you place Islam? Now I can discuss this with Muslims and give my opinions and viewpoints precisely because they HAVE the Qu'ran to check it out. Still, the bottom line is we shouldn't be depriving people of their holy book. What are we going to do about the holy book for Buddhism, who are putting Christians to death in Sri Lanka? or the Hindu holy books because they are putting the Indian and Pakistani Christians to death.

Item Three: The economy. Obama and the Democrats, and some Republicans, think that the way out of our economic difficulties is to raise taxes to meet the deficit. Don't they realize that doing this INCREASES our deficit? How? It's really very simple. Our economic strength has to do with how much we, as a people, have to invest and spend. The less the population has the weaker our economic structure becomes. So why in the world would anyone want to take more away from that population. To put it in even more simple terms, if I have an extra $10 then that is going to make its way into the economy. I'm going to buy something and that store is going to have an extra $10 to pay off their debts, maybe hire more employees, etc. When I am taxed, that $10 is automatically reduced t0 around $6, and that's before local and state taxes and other fees that may apply. When all of these fall into place I'm lucky to have $4 left to spend. Where has the $6 gone? It has gone to pay for programs that don't work, are non-existent, to public officials and to the poor who should be out finding jobs. So take away most of the taxes, require healthy people to work for a living and if you're going to put a cap on anything, put a cap on what our Representatives, Senators, Federal Judges and the President and Vice President make. Stop spending all this money like it's growing on trees. It isn't. The working people are tired of having the government's hand picking their pocket and then turning them over to the "poor" to have our pockets picked once again. This is what I call "top down blessings from a bottom up responsibility" which simply means, we as individuals have to stop demanding government pay for this or that, and work it out ourselves. Find ways to get it done, and in so doing we will rely less on State taxes and the states will not have to demand money from the Federal government asking for funds, which will only increase Federal taxes. We have to find people with imagination, vision and insight, not politicians who have forgotten that they are to represent us and that their salary is paid for by our tax dollars. We need people who will show us how to lead ourselves. Democracy is the strongest (human) form of government because we lead ourselves and are not dictated to. This has been changing to the point where Washington, DC now calls most of the shots. We need to severe this bond with the Federal government, while maintaining a healthy trade and communication with them. Then we can once again rise.

There is a fourth issue, and that is of turning to God. If all we do is the best we can do and leave God out of the equation then we are dooming ourselves for destruction. If you don't believe me just watch. You can see it happening right now.

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Like an Eagle

Like an Eagle

by David Brollier (8-15-10)


Teach me your ways oh Lord, I pray. Show me the wonders of Your ways.

And I beheld the eagle soaring in the sky, majestic in every way.

Then the Lord said unto me, “What causes the eagle to rise? Is it the might of his wings?”

And I replied, “No Lord, but the winds, the currents of winds lift it up.”

The Lord answered me saying, “You have answered well, for it is not the strength of the eagle that causes it to rise, but the strength of My Spirit.”

Then I remembered how the Hebrew word for wind means both wind, and breath, and spirit. Likewise the Greek word for wind also means wind, and breath, and spirit.

“Have I not said in My Word, ‘Not by might, nor by power, but by My spirit, saith the LORD of hosts’? Therefore learn My ways from the eagle.”

I watched and all of a sudden the eagle plummeted to the ground with great speed. It turned neither to the right, nor to the left, but was as an arrow of Heaven sent down by the very bow of the Lord. Yet as I watched, and as the eagle neared the ground, it spread out its wings, lowered its talons, and snatched its prey off the face of the earth. With its mighty wings it now made its way back up into the skies. It found a cleft high up in the mountains, and there fed its young, then opened up its wings and it was as if it was lifted from that place and begain once again to circle among the skies.

“Do you understand what you have seen?” the Lord asked.

“The eagle dropped out of the skies, caught its prey, then brought it to its young. After this it returned to the skies,” I answered.

“You have seen well. Are not My people like this eagle? Do not those I anoint in service do as this eagle has done?” He asked.

“Please, Lord, make this clear to me,” I prayed.

“Those I call, those I anoint to My service I lift up by My Spirit. There they are refreshed and strengthened by Me. There they enjoy My presence and I enjoy fellowship with them. Then at the appointed time I send them forth with a mission, a task, whether great or small, and in their obedience they drop from the heights where I have lifted them to minister to those who are lowly. They are strengthened within their own spirit to do mighty things in My name, to trample upon the lion and the serpent, to proclaim My Word, to lift up those that are cast down, to cast out demons in the way, to bring healing in their wings to those who have suffered. They are empowered by Me, by My Spirit, to bring peace and love and mercy upon the face of the earth, for they are ministers unto Me. Then they enter that place where I again lift them up by My Spirit and bring them to My people, those who are yet young and untrained. With the victories I have worked through them they teach My people, they raise My children in the power of My Word. Then they go once more into that secret place, that place of thanksgiving and praise and are lifted up into My presence. There we fellowship as Father to son, for so they are to Me.”

Then I realized that the ways of God are for his people to humble themselves before Him, that He might lift them up. They wait upon Him as a servant waits upon his masters will, while at the same time enjoying the portions at his table. The Lord then sends them forth with a command, “Do this?” “Say that” and they fly like arrows from the bow of the Lord against the enemy, bringing back the spoils, that which they have learned from exercising their faith in the Word of the Lord, back to his children and teach them. After teaching they rest back in the Lord and He lifts them up once more and are refreshed, for they need refreshing, renewed, for our flesh cannot bear in and of itself the service they were called to. Praise and thanksgiving flow from their hearts, past their lip, and become the music of the Lord. There they wait again until they are again sent forth.

As I thought on these things the Lord spoke to me saying, “You have been taught of mountains and valleys. Others have stated that it is the mountaintops upon which you find your victories, but I say to you it is on the mountaintops that you bring My victory down into the valleys. Have I not said, ‘Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth’? Know then, that I am Lord of All. In Me you have all the strength you need for any tasks I assign to you. For I lift you up, and I send you forth, and I give you strength to rise on wings like eagles, and strength to walk the streets of the downtrodden. I lift you up and put My words in your mouth for My children. Truly I say then to you, in this I have made the mountains and hills low in your site, and I have filled the valleys with every good thing. I have taken every crooked way, and in My Son, and all those who follow after Him by My spirit, and made them straight.”

“What does this mean, Lord? I am slow, and do not understand?”

“Do you not understand these things? I tell you the truth that many times it is the valley you are in that I have proclaimed to Me your mountain, for there you will learn to wait upon Me. You will learn to rest in Me and I will lift you up, but those things you see as mountains, those victories you experience, you experience not on the mountains, but in the valleys. Just as light can be more clearly seen in dark places, so also can My strength in you be more clearly seen in the valleys. Therefore I have made both mountains and valleys one thing to you. I have set before you a path that I have made straight, walk in it, or there shall be valleys that you enter that I do not want you to go through, and mountains rise up in your way that I would not have in your way, but that I may bring you back to Me I allow even these valleys and mountains to exists so that even in them I may, in you, raise up those valleys into the Heavens, and bring low the mountains that you may walk safely over them.”

Then He spoke again before the vision left me saying, “This is the way, walk in it.”