The most down-to-earth, comprehensive and crucial post you’ll read today!

The world is a pretty big place, but it grows smaller by the day.  Not because of overpopulation, but because of increasing accessibility through travel, and real-time satellite internet.  Cultures may seem very different, and I will admit that I have not had the blessed privilege of being immersed in a culture vastly different from my own.  But I believe that people who do spend time in different cultures would tell you that in essence, people all over the world have many basics in common.  Most people want to be loved, have family, be able to provide for themselves and their family, live in peace and freedom.  Most people pursue some recreation, but are fulfilled in productivity, enjoy some fellowship, appreciate nature and beauty, music and art of some form, and most people still believe in some higher power.

The Bible claims to be the Word of God, and I believe that it is.  I believe that God, our Creator and the Creator of all that is, who had no beginning and has no end, who is Himself the Alpha and the Omega, gave this Word to mankind by divine inspiration to men of old, prophets, who wrote it down as they were instructed by God, and that God Himself has preserved it.  I believe that God is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-seeing and omnipresent.

I believe that Lucifer, otherwise known as Satan, the anointed cherub that covereth, is the most cunning, most powerful created being among the order of angelic beings, who coveted God’s place, led rebellion in heaven in his pride, in a foolish doomed ambition to ascend above God.

I do not believe the Earth or universe are “millions of years old” as science (so-called) claims, but closer to 6000.  I believe that everyone, from the most remote and isolated tribe on distant continents, to the Native Americans, to all past civilizations, carried/do carry among their civilization, remnants of knowledge of God and history that included dinosaurs/great lizards, a world-wide flood, and beings from outside this world.

I believe that like anything that is handled by humans, the knowledge gets distorted, added to, subtracted from, and where there is or has been conflict, different sides have taken different perspectives, not always honest, but as to the victor goes the spoils, also the victor writes the history books.

We humans have been created in God’s image, and thus, similar to Him, we have a vast capacity of imagination.  But that has often been to our detriment, since He gave us each a will of our own as well.

I have come to believe that absolutely nothing in life is random.  Despite the fact that I jokingly insist hat my mind itself is pretty random.

Here’s the thing.  Lets say you used your own hard-earned resources, and invested your own efforts and time, to write some great novel, or create some great city.  Was it not solely Dickens’ prerogative to write the characters in “A Christmas Carol” just as he so choose, and give them the adventures he pleased to give them?   Wouldn’t a man who was building a city, owned the property, supplied all the materials, be the rightful one to decide the plans for that city?  Where does our sense of “prerogative” come from?

Many people disagree on questions of morality, death penalty, gun ownership, homosexuality, but even the most hardened criminal has been known to beat a child-molester to a bloody pulp, in “righteous indignation” over the abuse of power and tormenting the innocent and weak.  We like the idea of self-determining what is right and wrong, but where does our universal sense that there is such a thing even come from?

It comes from the fact that there is a God, and quite simply, He said so.  He was quite specific about it, but beginning with the fall of Satan, and the subsequent temptation of Eve, mankind has been compromising and redefining it ever since.

The thing is, God never changes.  And His Word is full disclosure, He has warned us to that effect.  Just because mankind has chosen not to believe Him, doesn’t alter the fact one iota.

God will do what He will do.

He inspired the writing of His book, the Holy Bible, for our edification, for our good.  God created humankind for one reason.  He desired fellowship.  God is not subject to time.  Like a story in a book, from ancient history to future yet-to-be, He stands outside and above, and sees it all at a glance.  He knew who would obey, preserve His Word, pass it on to future generations, and He knew who would rebel and reject it.  This is what is meant by “the sins of the father being visited upon the children to the third and fourth generations”.  One patriarch’s disobedience, could doom many generations of that family line to blindness to God’s truth.  God has told  us in His Book that a day of judgment is coming.  Science says “matter is neither created nor destroyed”.  But science is wrong. God created everything from nothing.  God breathed all that there is, into existence by commanding it to be, by the Word of His mouth.  The same body of science, claims in blatant contradiction of the first principle mentioned above, that essentially, in the beginning, there was nothing, and nothing “exploded” and then all manner of rudimentary life forms or building blocks suddenly were, and that with the addition of the passage of time, these unintelligent life forms “evolved” all on their own, into more advanced life forms.

It takes a lot more “faith” to believe that everything came from nothing, than to believe an intelligent pre-existent being created it all.  Yet that is what rejection of truth will buy you.  Blindness.  The problem is not that people “can’t believe the Bible”.  It’s that they don’t like what the Bible tells them, so they won’t believe it.  Every person who comes of age makes that decision, whether it is done thoughtfully and consciously, or carelessly and not-so-consciously.

I submit for your consideration that if you landed on this post, on this particular blog today, there just may be a Divine reason for that.

There is a dis-integration taking place in this world.

Through out history, empires and nations have risen and have fallen.  Some have  had impressive staying power.  Governments too, can be quite different one from another, but underneath it boils down to certain leaders, parties or factions, having power and dominance over other ones.  They may be benign, or malevolent, they may promote freedom, or forbid it.  We are all subject to some form of governmental entity.  But there is a whole other realm of principality.  The Bible calls them “principalities and powers”; these are the rebellious ones, and they are your enemy.  Then there is God and the tens of thousands and thousands of thousands of angels who do His bidding.

At any given time in history, in any location on this earth, the “powers that be” may have attained their power by conquest, but only because God granted it.  Here in America, where men who worshiped God, who had been oppressed in that worship in England, came and established a new nation based upon Biblical truths.  Obedience to God affords the protection of God to the obedient.  It promotes access to the blessings of God.  Disobedience and rebellion do the opposite.  God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and of Jacob, is the only “god” known to man, who does not require for you to make your way to him.  Krishna, Buddah, Allah, the god of Mormans (which is not the same God but an imagined god with different attributes and requirements) the god of Jehovah’s Witnesses (their doctrine, like that of the Mormans, Muslims, Hindus, etc, were imparted by “angels” (of darkness) but God says in His Words, that if even an angel came giving a gospel other than that found in His Word, as preached by the Apostle Paul, it must be rejected.

God’s Word says in His Book, that many deceivers would come, and many false Christs.  Christ is not a name, it is a title for the Messiah, the Savior of the world.

Over 300 prophecies were spoken in the old Testament about Jesus, the Christ and Messiah, and all of them were fulfilled.  (More here)

It is Friday of the week, and often times I try to “lighten up” the mood on Friday, but the truth is, time is swiftly running out.

For those of you who came to this site as a source of news only,  it is about much more.  It is my hearts sincere desire to share with you the gospel of Jesus Christ, that you might be saved from the wrath that is to come upon this earth very shortly.  Without the gospel, the news can only engender despair.  The economy through out the world, is in serious trouble.  Many new diseases, viruses, and bacterial infections are cropping up, as well as resurgence and mutations of old ones previously nearly eradicated.  There are mass animal deaths the world over.  There have been unexplained sounds and sights for several years, that have people puzzled, alarmed, scratching their heads in bewilderment.  Wars are being threatened on every side, and there are thousands of ongoing conflicts, some stretching back a century, that are in progress now.  Basic human compassion, civility, and morality is eroding at an alarming rate.  Science and technology have ventured into areas that should make anyone nervous; A replacement living ear is about three years away from reality, nano body parts can be reproduced the same way using a newly announced microscopic 3D printer, brain scans can tell what a person is thinking, fetuses with the DNA of 3 instead of 2 “parents”.  Governance and order are breaking down, and Police State tactics are rising in even the free-est of nations, while dictatorships have fallen in more oppressed areas of the world only to be replaced by regimes more evil than the previous ones.  There are water shortages, famines, bizarre, extreme and out-of-season weather conditions, sinkholes all over the world, volcanoes waking up and erupting, fault-lines becoming active that had been quiet, and increase of “U.F.O” sightings, and reports of demonic encounters, including and most disturbingly, in children.  Suicide is up.  Corruption is spreading.

There is one absolute certainty in the life of every human being:  Death!

God created us with an eternal soul.  It is a lie that life ends at the grave.  It is a lie that souls re-incarnate into new bodies and live multiple lifetimes until they attain heaven.  It is a lie that there is no hell or that hell is a temporary place you can eventually earn your way out of.

God who made you, does not want you to go to hell.  He didn’t create hell for humans.  Hell was designed as a place of eternal punishment for Satan and the 1/3 of the angels who joined him in his revolt.  But Satan is determined to take you with him.  He knows God pretty well.  He had plenty of time to observe and witness all God did when he held his anointed cherub position.  He knows human nature pretty well too.  He knows that we have an innate “knowledge” that we were made for something more than this existence.  He knows God wrote His law on man’s heart, which is why we have a sense of justice and right and wrong at all in the first place.  So Satan works within the confines God has subjected him to, using the knowledge he has, and he creates customized counterfeits according to your propensities.  He perpetuates the particular falsehoods of a given culture.  He offers the particular temptations that suit your personal proclivities.  He lures you in and traps you, either with false religion, or with distortions of the good things God created, rather than the marriage bed and satisfaction with your mate, he offers you a “banquet” of options which promise fulfillment but only feed your lust and reinforce the chains of your addiction.  He caters to your desire to be righteous in your own right, and feeds you reams of requirements to strive towards, to “earn” salvation, or penance to suffer.

When in reality, the way to reconciliation with God is so simple it seems almost to good to be true, and it cannot be earned.  One must merely believe Jesus is the Son of God, who while equal with God, became a man in the flesh, and having never sinned, took the punishment for our sins, satisfying God’s wrath paying the fine, so to speak, that we owe for our transgressions of the law, which cannot save us, but can only show forth our guilt.  We must repent, (that is, make a 180 degree turn from, and go in the opposite direction) of our sins and rebellion and transgression of God’s law, and ask forgiveness and ask for the atonement bought by Christ, to be applied to our “account”, for God is keeping account.

I know that time is short before  Christ removes all who are saved from this Earth, (to be followed by 7 years of the most horrific conditions Earth has ever known, and then the return of Christ to establish His Kingdom) because Jesus told us in Matthew 24 what the signs would be, and Daniel and Isaiah, Ezekiel and other prophecy books of the Bible, including of course, Revelation, tell us some of the events that will happen just before, and during that period of the very end.

1. False Christs and false teachers/prophets
2. The “fig tree” will put forth leaves this is a reference to the Nation of Israel reborn and a regathering of Jews of each of the 12 tribes into Israel (in progress)
3. False Christs and false teachers will show false (lying) signs and wonders (miracles)
4. Many wars and rumors of wars with nations rising against nations
5. Famines (and drought) in diverse (different from usual) places
6. Pestilences in diverse places
7. Earthquakes in diverse places
8. Many shall be offended, shall betray one another, and hate one another
9. Iniquity shall abound (as the days of Noah and Lot)
10. Mankind’s love for one another will grow cold
11. Many shall run to and fro about the Earth and knowledge shall increase. (This speaks to population numbers, ease of travel, and huge advances in science and technology)
12. The gospel of the Kingdom will be preached throughout the whole world
13. Israel will stand alone without ally, a burdensome stone in the world
14. Jewish temple worship will be reinstated (which requires the rebuilding of their temple)
15. Mankind’s weapons capability will be so advanced that if God did not set limits on this period of global warfare and tribulation, no human flesh would survive
16. Revelation and Daniel predict the rise of a global order of government on the order of ancient Rome (will require the collapse or conquering of all current sovereign states)
17. A great false influential religious leader will arise
18. The Jewish temple will be desecrated for the final time.
19. Faith will be a matter of life and death, mandatory allegiance will be required to a false messiah.

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Isaiah 17 news:

Brennan Makes Surprise Visit to Israel over Syria

Syria Begins to Break Apart Under Pressure From War

Note: The Isaiah 17 battle which destroys Damascus could happen any day now, but it also could happen after the snatching away of the church of blood-bought born again believers.

Increase in lawlessness:

$625,000 Gold Shipment Vanishes

Hundreds of Illegal Immigrants with Criminal Records of Federal Offenses, Released

Brazilians Fight Back as Regulatory Agency Tries to Impose “Homosexual Marriage” on Entire Country

Religion a matter of Life and Death:

Saudi Arabia Sentences Men to Lashings for helping woman convert to Christianity

Blasphemy Charges Becoming New Weapon against Egyptian Christians

Militants Kill Nigerian Christian Leader

Growing Military State:
National Guard Air Exercise over Myrtle Beach next week(Should be interesting as it overlaps with Bike Week!)

Florida Garbage Truck Drivers Trained to Snitch on Citizens (It was only a matter of time)

Like the Days of Noah And Lot/Iniquity abounds:

Teachers vote to make everything LBGTTQ-friendly

Wars/Rumors of Wars:

Hezbollah Pledges to Boot Israel from Golan

Russia Provides Assad with Ship-killing missile

Assad Plans to Retaliate Next Time Israel strikes Syria

Russia sends at least 12 war ships to Syria

IAF Planes Circling Above Lebanon

Syria-Israeli War of Words via Putin, edges into Syrian-Hezbollah war of attrition

CIA to Israel; “Syria Making us Nervous”

Israel stands alone:

Israel’s one real ally, the U.S. is unreliable at best under Obama

Expect Israeli strike against Russian Arms shipments to Syria-Hezbollah

Iran Doesn’t recognize Israel’s red line

Breakdown of current order of governments/corruption/economies:

BREAKING: Obama White House Just Caught In HUGE Lie/Contradiction – See Proof Here.

Cashless Society Arrives in Africa with National ID Card

François Hollande calls for ‘European political union’ within two years

Earthquakes in Diverse Places:

Is a Massive Canada Quake on the Horizon?

Surprise New Zealand Quake a 4.2

New Sinkhole:

16-foot sinkhole swallows part of I-80 near Wyoming border

Won’t be posting much today. (Guess who has jury duty?)

Duck Dynasty Star: Fame Is Fleeting; What Matters Most Is Jesus Christ

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Great free resource:

Through The Bible Radio Network  For free Mp3 downloads of J. Vernon McGee’s sermons.

You can also order them on disk at this site, as well as PDF notes.

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This is also chemo week,  prayers for hubby appreciated.  Isaac got his hard cast on today and will return to school Wednesday. Still non-weight-bearing for another 4 weeks.  Pray for him to catch up on all his missed work.  I tried but it took until today to get any of that work from teachers.

The “God told me” crowd-satan’s tares are doing very bad things to the church

 

 

 

 

 

Friday, April 26, 2013 By Elizabeth Prata

The “God told me” crowd – satan’s tares are doing very bad things to the church

 

Why did Paul so often tell his people to persevere? We often suppose that it was because of the persecution they were undergoing, and that is surely true. But there is another reason, also.

“It is so hard, to know – that’s why the work of the church is difficult. The work of the church isn’t difficult because of what Satan’s doing in the world, it’s difficult because of what Satan’s doing in the church.” ~John MacArthur, sermon, “The Faith that does NOT save“.

Here is a biblical example of what satan is doing in the church- the Parable of the wheat and the tares Read the Rest at The End Time

Off the Cuff

I wanted to let you guys know that I’ve made my book “Purple Morning
Glories and Gold Lady Bugs” easier to navigate by starting in the sidebar on the title, and each successive chapter has a link at the bottom for navigating to the next chapter in proper order.

I still have not done an extremely thorough proof-reading but I did correct a few misspellings.  It sort of took a toll on me emotionally in writing it all out and today was the first day I went back through it since I finished the last chapter. I also fixed the order of the chapters showing in the sidebar. If you haven’t read it or you started reading and got side-tracked with news posts between the chapters while the writing was in progress, I just wanted to let you guys know it’s a little more user-friendly now.

One of the most common positive feed-backs that I get from folks is that they like the variety that they can find here on this blog.  There is only so much of the news we need to see, to know things are still suspended on the razor-edge of world chaos, and there are plenty of sources of that Christian/prophecy-related news who do a more thorough and consistent job of keeping all the latest coming to your inbox (or reader, or feed).  So if you see me pulling back from that, it is because I know that most folks are only going to read 1-3 posts from any given blog in a day and I am happy to embrace that “less is more” perspective at this juncture.

I can’t remember what I wrote last about Garrett’s chemo.  I was thinking the last session was his sixth and that put us halfway, but he reminded me last night that this Wednesday- Friday’s session will be the 6th and halfway point.  It is wearing him down quite a bit now, making it hard for him to concentrate at work and that is frustrating for him, especially in that every little thing can effect his bonuses (which is a key piece of income when you are in collections).

You know how it is.  I think he and I are both like a couple of over-stretched rubber bands.  When you have been under strain for a very long time, it makes you a little fragile.  It can get to feeling like it wouldn’t take much to break you.   I just keep reminding him the chemo sessions will come to an end and eventually he will feel better again.

If anyone would like to encourage him with a note or a card, you can send them to the physical address of our church listed on the bottom of the “About” page of this blog (in red letters, easy to spot).

Spring has been creeping in a little tiny bit at a time, here.  One week the daffodils came up, then we had the ice and snow, and they turned brown, then the few crocus and hyacinth bloomed, and lasted about a week.  Now my Jasmine is flowering, which smells sweet, and the Dogwood is finally popping out some poor pitiful little buds.  Everything looks faded like the Earth itself can hardly muster it’s normal show of color.  And my Azaleas can’t seem to make up their minds whether they’re going to bloom at all.

Garrett has already been putting in his garden.  He has collards and broccoli, strawberries and onions, tomatoes, beans and parsley, cilantro, basil, and sage, and peppermint, and lots of different peppers all getting started.  He always enjoys gardening, coming home and looking to see what’s coming in, spending a little time with his hands in the dirt.

I am in my New Testament Historical Survey now, and specifically Paul’s Epistles.  There is always so much more to glean from them. What about you?  What are you studying in the Word right now? Share in comments below!

 

Are You Saved? Have You Been Born Again?

I have been saved, born again by the grace of God, by faith. You can read the story of my life, and know that I am not some goodie-two-shoes who thinks I’m better than someone else, nor am I someone apt to get in your face and try to convert you.  I just care.  The opportunity for you to escape the horrors that are coming upon this earth soon, are running out.  Yes I do believe the Bible is God’s written Word to man, so that we may know Him, and know the things that are coming.  The world as a whole, for the most part, and much to their detriment, have rejected God.  They have bought into the lie that “in the beginning, there was nothing, and that exploded, and from nothing, came all that there is”.  They have believed that a baby is not a baby until it is born, and before that it is merely a blob of tissue not viable on it’s own.  That is the same logic that leads people to believe it is acceptable to kill someone because of their heritage or skin color, or because they have gotten old and can’t do much if anything to “contribute to society”.  There is right, and there is wrong, there is good, and there is evil, and the further mankind moves away from God, the less they even recognize the difference.  God has said those who will not retain God in their memory, will be given over to believe lies.  If the Lord has been tugging at your spirit, if some friend or loved one has told you about your need to be born again, and you have wrestled with it, I’m asking you now, now is the time, please do not put it off.  Someone is praying for you.

Truly there is coming a moment when those who have been saved, will be taken out of this world, and those who have not, will be left here.  Revelation is full of the horrors that will take place on this Earth at that time.  Yes, I know plenty of people laugh at this.  But they will not be laughing on that day when it actually does take place.  And they won’t be laughing for the ensuing years of Tribulation.  Animals will die on a massive scale, famine will envelop the world, millions of people will perish. The “insanity” of weather and nature we have seen in recent months and years will be nothing compared to what will take place then.
A man will appear on the scene with supposed solutions to all the worlds problems and the world will be so desperate they will bow down to him.  He will be believed to be the Messiah which the Jews have long awaited, but they will learn that he is not, when he turns on them.  Are we in that period even now?  Some Christians believe that we are.  However, I believe what we are seeing now are mere foreshadows.  These things are not going to “settle down” and “return to normal”.

I am just a 48 year old mom with an upbringing in which I was blessed to be exposed to the teachings of the Bible from a young age.  I walked away from that for a time, I tried the world’s way of living, and my patient Lord and Savior welcomed me back like the prodigal that I had become, but with open arms and undiminished love for me.  You can read my blogged book in the sidebar and my testimony above.  This blog is mostly about news as it relates to these “last days” we are living in, but it is also my own personal expression of gratitude to God, who I know to be a God of love and compassion.  Life is not always easy.  The way is not always smooth.  Matthew 7:1³ Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: ¹⁴ Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.  Jesus Himself is that Gate.  You don’t have to understand that fully in order to accept it.  I hope you will do so today.

Featured Blog: J.S. Park

There was something I meant to post yesterday, but forgot!  You guys know how I like to point out interesting blogs.  I have been following this particular one for nearly a year.  The gentleman refers to himself as “The Atheist Pastor” and his tagline says “A Blog For Struggling Believers”.

I know as does the blog author, that the moniker “Atheist Pastor” is at once controversial, but he doesn’t seem to be doing that as some sort of  schtick or gimmick.  Frankly I think there is more honor in admitting that even as he believes, he still struggles with doubt, than feigning “certainty”.  Faith is called faith for a reason.

This going around acting like we have it all figured out, really needs to stop with Christians.  The idea that “knowing Jesus” makes everything okay, is a bald-faced lie.

It is easy enough to be put off by it in the “name-it-claim-it” culture of a lot of churches today, but the more conservative, traditional and “fundamental” churches are often just as bad in their own way in that while they admit salvation doesn’t guarantee peace, prosperity, or smooth sailing, they still demand you smile your way through it all.  I didn’t sign up to be an actress.   God made us with an entire range of emotions for a reason.    I don’t have any bone of contention with those people who have real peace.  But real peace cannot be faked, imitated, emulated in any way.  And even someone who has never heard of Jesus, can spot the difference.  I think that we have done a great disservice to the Great Commission by this tendency.   The Proverbs are full of warnings against this type of thing.  Laughter in the ears of a person who is grieving, is like putting salt into an open wound .  Pretending life is easy and all it takes is  “enough faith” and any and every obstacle will move out of your way, is an insult to the intelligence of the people of the world who live in reality and know better.  I have seen God do great things, but miracles are called miracles because they don’t happen every day.  For the most part, God works in ways we can’t comprehend.

So anyway, I didn’t mean to get so far into all of that, because Mr. Park’s blog speaks for itself.  I just find it extremely refreshing as someone who is a Christian and has wrestled my own boatload of frustrations with “churchity churchianity”.  I resent the game-playing of those who wear the Name, but don’t live by the Book.  I can only imagine how it makes others feel who are new to the whole thing.  People are starved for something REAL.  The apostles walked with Jesus, talked with Him, saw Him die, saw Him alive again afterwards, and watched Him ascend into heaven, and they still had doubts.  The children of Israel saw many miracles, and the Holy Spirit pillar of smoke by day and fire by night.  They had lots of doubts.  I do understand the Biblical call for separation from the worldly things, however, Jesus did not come to Earth to clean people up.  He came to redeem and justify us, and create us “anew”.  Clean heart, new man/woman.  Sanctification is a process the we have little to do with other than the yielding to it.  Check out the Atheist Pastor for yourself, and let me know what you think.

http://jsparkblog.com/

Serve Him In The Waiting also now on Facebook!

My Picks from the Inbox, and an update on the book!

I just wanted to let you folks know that the chapters of the book are going to keep coming over this next week.  As I weeded through my inbox I found these six links (below) that I feel are most significant out from among the 80 or so posts that came in today from blogs that I follow.

I continue to skim and delete, as the news is moving so fast right now, and the lord has me doing something else in getting my book out there.  I can hardly describe the burning in my spirit, to get this all written down.  I kid the family that I’m working on my Magnum Opus.  The more that I write, the more “waves” of the next and the next and the next thing that I want to put in here, just keep coming.  I know that Chapter 2 was pretty heavy.  This is the ‘Deep and Wide” of my tagline.  We have adopted a saying at our house.  We look at something we need to do, but never quite get around to it, like re-glazing windows, and then we say something like this:  “Well, I still haven’t gotten to that yet, but it will probably make it until Jesus comes.”  Or “Wow, the bottled water must have been on sale.  That’ll probably last until Jesus comes!”  I think writing my book might last until Jesus comes.

It was a good day in our house today.  Isaac had his dad and me in stitches just being Isaac.  Ben had an early study session around 6 am until 2:40 or so, and then went to work until 10 pm.

Garrett had a little run of his arrhythmia tonight.  I was concerned the chemo might bring that on.  We have some things we know to do that help, and if we do them right away, we can prevent an E. R. visit, but most of the time his arrhythmia starts up in his sleep so by the time he wakes up with it, the heart and it’s electrical impulses are so irritable that the minor steps won’t help.  The longer it stays out of rhythm,  the harder it is to get it to convert back to normal sinus rhythm.  We appreciate you keeping him in your prayers.

I am hoping for him to do some more posts soon.  We plan for him to write up some of his memories of the kids childhoods around Mother’s day.

Well, lets all keep praying, do some fasting if you are able, and look forward to meeting at the wedding soon! Have a blessed Lord’s day!

Why Ezekiel 38 Will Precede Daniel 9

Finally! U.S. Asks For Jailed Pastor’s Freedom!

Possible Muslim Approval of Building of3rd Temple!

Video: Tornado in Victoria 22 March 2013 – Australian driver

Government Cover-up of Ammo Buys Implodes

Video: Paul Craig Roberts: Triple Bubble Implosion Coming

Chapter 2 From Potter’s Clay to Predator’s Putty

I put a pretty high premium on being honest and real.  As such, this is a hard chapter to write.

His father died when he was just a kid. His mom and sister were church-goers, he and the brothers were not.  His oldest brother was about the same age as my parents.  His middle brother, sister, and mom were somewhat mentally and/or socially challenged, and all but one of whom still lived together in the one house, which could have easily qualified for an episode of “Hoarders”.   At that particular juncture I wasn’t going to church very regularly myself.  He liked to call himself an atheist, but had a seething resentment toward God. It was irrational to hate  a god he didn’t believe in, but somehow that fact was lost on him.   In hindsight it is no surprise that someone who felt that way toward God could be used of Satan to inflict so much damage in my life, and it is human nature to take what others easily give up.  That’s particularly true for those who feel they’ve been cheated somehow.  Not everyone who gets a raw deal in life turns it into a sense of entitlement, but he did.   He was prideful, an overachiever, a narcissist, and a card-carrying dyed-in-the-wool cynic.

Even though I was disappointed with God, myself, when we met, I was still the friendly, trusting, seeing-the-best-in-people, happy to be helpful, sort of young lady I had previously been. Disappointment would turn to disillusionment, and I would develop my own cynicism.

It has taken a lot of years for me to make sense of all that happened from the time he entered my life.  I have struggled to forgive myself for ever getting into a position that could lead up to what eventually took place, and to get past resenting the lack of guidance and protections that someone raised in a Christian home and in Church ought to have been able to count on.

I don’t know if this sounds strange or not, but I have never really felt anger at the guy.  Maybe because I was initially so devastated by what took place, then later so angry at God and at myself, and  just trying to survive took all the energy I had.  By the time that I “came back to myself and to the Lord” after the ensuing (and very long) detour was over, I understood much more about my own sin nature, why Jesus needed to die for me personally, and really couldn’t condemn someone who was just a fellow-sinner  like myself.

He didn’t so much win me over, as wear me down.  He was polite, charming, a clever conversationalist. Honor student, pre-Med.  Doors just seemed to open before him.  Association with him opened up a new world to me.  He appreciated the fact that I wanted an education, and he was  happy  to show me the ropes as far as applications, financial aid, etc, and tutor me in area where I struggled, like math.  In hindsight, I think that had we remained “just friends”, I could have looked back with some gratitude and count having known him as a positive experience at that time of my life. I might not have gone to college or nursing school otherwise. I still credit him for that.

He spent money on me, lavished me with praise and attention, made me feel beautiful, and after a while, I got comfortable with those perks.  When he became possessive, I felt a heady sense of empowerment that comes with realizing I could have that effect on anyone on the basis of God-given “womanly charms”, and that he could be jealous over me.    He didn’t like it when I spent time with anyone other than him.  Particularly he didn’t like that I insisted on continuing to abide by my parent’s rules about coming and going, checking in, things like that.  My parents never had to have the “while you are under my roof” lecture with me.  I wanted to respect and honor them.   I  did sort of like the sense of shifting over into the adult mode where I had an association with someone other than my parents, and that between he and I, we’d decide things.

As far as I could tell, my parents seemed pretty neutral about him.  They didn’t go to any effort, as I recall, to really get to know him, (nor he, them) but never expressed any opposition to my seeing him. (My parents are humble folks from humble beginnings and I now know that they were probably a little intimidated by his confidence themselves.)  After we had been seeing each other for several months, even though they still wanted me home at a decent hour, they seemed okay about him coming in and hanging out with me after we’d been out, even if they were turning in for the night.  They trusted me, and apparently they trusted him.  But really, I was in something way over my head and so naïve  I didn’t have a clue.  He resented that they still had such control/influence in my life and really encouraged me to move out.  I also felt ready to do that, but since I wasn’t working full-time,  I found a room to rent in the home of an older lady that I worked with.

I felt like I was living a little, having freedom for the first time, making my own decisions, but really, I just went from being under my parents authority, to being under his thumb.

I had zero experience, and what I knew about the “birds and bees” I’d picked up from idle talk heard in school, a very limited one-time discussion with my mom, and from a cousin when were maybe 7 or 8 who should have been as ignorant as I was, but what was demonstrated to and upon me proved otherwise.  Further, the demonstration was accompanied by the assertion that “you have to learn how to do this because you have to do it when you get married”.    I did realize that it was something meant to  take place only between a man and a woman who were married to each other, and that if it happened outside of wedlock it earned (somehow only) the woman her “scarlet letter”.

As you already know from chapter 1 my favorite book is Gone With The Wind, and I had read it several times by the time I was 19, so I had ascertained the general perspective that the whole “intimate business” was messy and unpleasant for the woman, and a rather unfortunate but also unavoidable duty.  I never got that “it is a natural, beautiful special gift from God” angle from anyone, so it left things pretty open for someone to come along and fill in the blanks.

Suddenly my previous standards and beliefs were challenged in ways I was profoundly ill-equipped to counter.   I was in the midst of my very first crisis of faith when I met him. After feeling God had rejected me in my desire to serve Him by going to Bible college and the mission field, I lost sight of any reason to live a “separated” kind of life. I  was as good as conquered (and that was his aim) as soon as I could no longer come up with any better reason to continue “trying to be virtuous” than, “it was the way I was raised/what I was taught/what I believe”.   He did a pretty good job of isolating me, positioning himself in a way that I was becoming dependent upon him. (His own idea, or coached by the master-manipulator Satan?)  For him, there was no confusion, no conflict, no moral question. But maybe he was just following the natural course his hormones led him on. In his mind, he was entitled.  He has no idea what his selfishness cost me, to this very day, I am sure.   He determined that “what was mine, was his” if you catch my meaning.

God designed the human body to respond to certain things in certain ways, and whether this happens in the proper context or not,  His design functions just in the way it was meant to.  That type of intimacy is also very potent by design, meant to meld “two into one”.   Thus it creates ties at a soul-level.  It is also true, and probably intentional on God’s part, that first experiences imprint certain things into a person’s development which become indelible.

I can’t help but recognize how calculating Satan was as he orchestrated the addition of that particular “Pandora’s Box” at that exact juncture of my life.  There is no question I was already depressed at that time. But regardless of how much coercion may have been applied, my own free will  cannot be dismissed as a factor.  Viewing my quashed dreams as a rejection by God, I felt hurt, and it was deep.  Pride, of course, is something which often requires a long time and a lot of heartache for God to get us to see in ourselves.  The understanding of that aspect of it wouldn’t come until much later.

The shifting sands of transitioning into adulthood had left me  desperate to feel some “sense of place”.  My association with him provided me an identity to replace the one that seemed to have disintegrated.   I was raised, like a lot of people my age, in the “do as I say, because I am the parent” school of child-rearing.  This  tends to discourage a child from learning to think for themselves.  Asking “but why?” was a good way to get in hot water at our house.  Being a parent now, I can see the logic in that response, and there are times when it is appropriate, but it is not good if that is the only answer a child ever hears because it doesn’t allow for that child to develop good judgment, confidence in their God-given intuition, nor strong decision-making skills.  The child who has only heard “because I said so” when and if he/she moves out from under the parent’s influence, will naturally seek that next person who will fill that role of telling them what to think and do, and won’t learn accountability. If a child is never allowed to make a unilateral decision, how can anything ever possibly be their fault?

When a vast world opens up, and you suddenly learn there are endless other ways of “believing and being” than what you have known thus far, it is easy and probably normal (and in a safe environment, maybe even healthy), for your own beliefs to be called into question and challenged and re-examined.  They aren’t your own, really, until they have been tested and proven in your own life.  Learning “the hard way” is not ideal, but it is the most common and age-old method for the majority of people, unfortunately.  And God knows this about us.

Years later,  when people I’d grown up with, shared that they’d been victims of incest or molestation, (It was sadly much more common than I knew) I was surprised to discover that accompanying their sense of shame and indignation at having been violated, there was also some  guilt and feelings of complicity.   However, in light of God’s design, it probably shouldn’t be surprising that there be a pleasurable aspect to the experience.  Once Pandora’s box is opened, once sexuality is awakened it can’t be put back into that box for the more appropriate day.  It therefore becomes something that must be dealt with, managed, constrained, and doing so without benefit of maturity and contextual understanding, well, it is a daunting task, and enormously damaging to say the least.

Though I was technically an adult when the rape took place, by then he had put in months worth of preparatory “grooming” and I found that I had that same kind of internal conflict.  In trying to work through all the fallout, I was hard-pressed to pin down the line between his manipulation and my submission to it.  Where did his guilt end and mine begin?  I finally realized it didn’t matter.  Sin is sin, it must be confessed and repented of, but it is Christ alone who makes propitiation for it.  If only I had understood that, maybe I could have done that much sooner, and got on with my life, and avoided years of heartache.  The fact it happened when I was already a professing Christian, led me to mistakenly assume I had utterly blown my life for good.

(My understanding about a lot of things was just wrong, wrong, wrong!)

I heard a “Focus on the Family” broadcast  in which Fran Sciocca said something like this (and I paraphrase): “Guys will play at ‘love” to get the sex that they are after, while girls will skirt the edges of sex, to get the love and affirmation they so desperately want”.  That rang true in what happened in our situation.  I could see how, for him, having no greater guide than his own hormones, with no motivation for restraint, could move unhindered through each step in the continuum, just following where his body wanted to go.  I could see how he professed love in an effort to move closer to that goalpost.   And I could see that I was willing to allow certain concessions (letting him hold my hand and kiss me, when I didn’t even want him to)  in order to feel that I was experiencing love and for the affirmation that seemed to establish; a mark of measuring up, if you will.  I actually laughed the first time he said “I love you” and said, “no you don’t you just think you do”.  I knew we were both calling something that was not, as though it were.  I went along for the sake of appearing normal, which I thought I was not, but which I desperately wanted to be!

It doesn’t help that society crams a false “measuring stick” in our faces and pressures us to judge ourselves by their arbitrary standard.  I desperately needed someone to help me navigate the passages of life that were opening up before me.  He was willing to fill the role, and I submitted myself to his influence if only by my failure to flee.  Hand-holding and kissing were the “price of admission” to being part of a couple, and I counted the cost to my integrity, which was seeming less beneficial all the time.  I wasn’t happy.  But I did feel like less of a misfit in light of his affirmations.

I look back now and can hardly conceive of such a lack of ownership over my own body, and couldn’t  figure out how that perspective came about.   I am no child-development expert, so I have no idea when or how a well-adjusted kid normally gains that sense of ownership, or whether it is something most are born with, only to have it conditioned out along the way.  I just know I didn’t have it in that moment when I needed it.  There was no burst of fight and superhuman strength.  I verbally protested, I even pressed him away, but where was the crazed creature that should have come out swinging for her life?  A Christian therapist I saw, said that is often an indication of prior repressed/forgotten abuse.  I don’t know about all that.  Psychology is fuzzy and I don’t trust it.  Outside perspective helps sometimes, and sometimes it only muddies the water, and as you may have noticed, I need not even go outside my own head to get a second and third opinion.

When you are small, adults necessarily dictate when and what you eat, where and when you go, what you wear, etc.  As you get older its normal to gradually get more “say” in those things.  I mean no disrespect to my parents, (Mom and I have talked about these things,  my parents were good parents, and they did the very best they knew how.  She has even asked me, how did you figure this stuff out?) but yeah, there are probably some clues to my sense of powerlessness, to be found in examining Mom and Dad and their ways of being.

My Dad was the smallest among his brothers, and his Dad was a “picker”.  (No, not the guys who make a living sifting through others junk for treasures).  He tended to “pick on” people. And I even recall that about my grandfather, though he died when I was in 3rd grade.  That was his way of giving you any attention.  I am not even saying he was a bully.  Probably it was the only means of interaction Pappaw learned in his own upbringing, but a grandpa that pops his little grand-daughter’s balloon with his cigarette, and then laughs as she cries about it, could possibly be considered a little mean. That, and him tickling me until I cried, are what I remember about him. I was very uncomfortable around him. That trait in my Grandfather really did a number on my dad’s confidence and sense of self-worth, according to Mom.  Being the youngest boy, the older brothers treated him in like manner, so he got a triplicate dose.

My mom, on the other hand, well, as I’ve said jokingly before, their two voices in my head alone were enough to cause a “splitting” within my mind.  Both extremely stubborn, (I inherited the double dose) both very opposite of one another.  My mom doesn’t consider herself to be  confident either, but as she would put it, she “didn’t know enough to know she didn’t know” how to do something, so she just did it!  (Helplessness is learned).  She could sew anything, swing a hammer, calculate angles, re-upholster furniture, taught herself music and how to play the organ, cut hair, is a talented artist, and she has always accomplished just about anything else she took a notion to do.  But she also has very set ideas of what constitutes the “right way”  On its face, that sounds virtuous, like a high standard, but in the real world it doesn’t always pan out so well to be inflexible. (Things that don’t bend, will break).

Though there were a couple of other vaguely “possible” indicators of “possible” repressed past experiences, solving that particular mystery, (if indeed there was one), wouldn’t necessarily help, and the way I figure if God gave us the ability to bury something like that and forget it, I certainly don’t care to dig it up.  I will say that the incidences I speak of, did unearth some history within the family line, things not forgotten by the ones who experienced them.

The fact remains, instead of physically fighting, I just went away inside my head somewhere.  I don’t mean for the duration of that moment, but for the next decade.  And I am, in fact, still retrieving pieces of myself from off that battlefield even today.

By the way, I wasn’t exactly Shrek’s Fiona (ogre version), or anything like that.  Self esteem issues seldom have any basis in the facts such as they are.  Society certainly sends us mixed messages, and those females who are least constrained by modesty certainly appear to possess a definite “edge” in attracting a mate,  the price of which can be hard to grasp when you are young and insecure.  I was perplexed by the mixed messages and double-standards, and stymied by the impossibility of measuring up to the unattainable air-brushed over-sexualized version of “beauty” peddled by society, and plastered wherever the eye turns.  I was as prone to comparing myself to those false indicators of  “real womanhood” as anyone.  If you weren’t willing or comfortable dancing to the tune of those societal parameters, the message was you could pretty much consider yourself “out of the running” as far as guys were concerned.  In the present day, girls can’t escape this even in the context of church.  For something that is not a competition, it sure can feel like one.  Even the most proactive and intentional effort to raise a girl with a healthy appreciation for her uniqueness and natural beauty, threatens to be drowned out by the worlds contradicting clamor.

It is the ultimate lie Satan has perpetrated against women.  And rare is the woman or young lady (and in this day, girls as young as 8) who hasn’t already bought into it to some degree or other.

Beautiful You

J.D.’s update

Folks, I am still in my sabbatical, however, I still check my inbox every day because I get hundreds of e-mails and I could not ignore the huge events which were in the news and blogs today.  I hope you are keeping up by visiting the other blogs I’ve told you about, but in case you missed any of them, I have reblogged the biggies.

Don’t forget to like and share from Servehiminthewaiting on Facebook and tell others about the blog.  The Lord is working.  He doesn’t want to leave anyone behind.

I personally believe the death of 2 of our beloved fellow watchmen were a matter of the Lord taking brother Kinsella and brother Graham home for a front-row seats for the events that they have so diligently studied and taught about all those years.

Like Donna Wasson said: “Stuff Just Got Serious“!

Please continue to pray.  So much prayer needed now.

Here is J.D.’s update for this past Sunday if you have not seen it elsewhere by now!

Maranatha!

Examine Yourself