The strong smell of dirty socks on a hot, funky day,
Permeating the closed up, dark-colored rooms
In the house of the freaky seventies people.
Bushy beards and big belt buckles,
And gas pedals shaped like chrome bare feet,
In a scary van, ran by the freaky seventies people.
Headband visors? Baseball caps without a top!
T-shirt slogans that made even less sense.
And so many sandals, to protect all the feet
From the beer-can pull-tabs dropped by the freaky seventies people.
Gold-colored, round medallions worn around the necks,
Bringing in the luck? Or warding off the hex?
Separating the Jesus People from all the other freaky seventies people.
And then last night, I woke from my 10,000th nightmare of the
Freaky seventies people and finally figured it out!
That sickly-sweet smell
That seemed to fill every darkened house but ours:
That was not stale dirty socks after all.
VM - 09/06/2018
Thursday, September 6, 2018
Monday, March 26, 2018
Will America Ever Learn Her Lesson?
One day about three thousand years ago, 400,000 men all left their wives, homes, jobs, farms and fields to gather together in unity and find out what was the grievous sin they had heard about. They decided this sin required the death penalty of just a handful of offenders, and they were willing to fight and die in order to carry out the sentence. 26,700 men gathered against them to defend the handful of wicked men and not give them up for sentence. 22,000 men of the larger side were slain in the first day of battle, then another 18,000 the second day. Then there was a national day of fasting and sacrifices declared, with many costly livestock given in burnt offerings. The next day, 30 men gave their lives in a suicide mission to ensure the victory for their side.
The other side then lost 25,100 men, nearly all the men of the entire tribe. The offending city was then sacked, and all their tribe's cities were burnt to the ground. Only 600 men escaped and hid in caves, having lost all they ever worked for their entire lives.
The world's perspective would be to shake the head and wonder why all this was done over the gang-rape and murder of one lowly slave girl and the threat of sodomy gang-rape against a travelling man. The pragmatic approach, the results-oriented approach would say it was unreasonable for these 65,000 men to die over this, along with so many other costly impacts to the national economy, not to mention their now-weakened position against foreign military.
God's approach, however, was that such an evil as this needed to be dealt with and purged from the nation, for the entire nation's sake. It wasn't about the girl, or even about the threatened perversion. It wasn't about vengeance. It was about maintaining purity to stay in the favor of a holy God. The nation could not sit by and let this slide and then expect God's blessings to continue to flow. From God's perspective, and therefore from the perspective of anybody committed to honoring God above all else, the nation was far better off losing all these men and all the rest, but maintaining God's favor for their commitment to holiness.
The lesson for our nation is obvious from Judges 19 and 20. We can do whatever we like to stimulate our economy. We can do whatever we like to promote job growth. We can do our best to keep our military strong. But without God's people committing to holiness and the favor of God in everything they do, it is all for nothing. We cannot approve of gross immorality and public sin by our silence, or by a wink and a nod to capitulate to "the greater good."
There is no excuse to go against holiness for fear of what might happen otherwise.
There is no excuse for anybody who claims to know the Bible to vote for "the lesser of two evils" as if there is no other choice, and a choice for evil of some kind has to be made.
There is no amount of pragmatic wrangling that can justify the Christians of America promoting a man of known immoral character to the highest office in the land, despite all the attempts to justify it like the article linked here does.
Say what you like. Justify it all you want. Set up your golden idol. I will give honour where honour is due, but I will not bow when the music plays. And when our chickens finally come home to roost for what we've done in November 2016, I will not have to say, "I told you so." You'll know.
VM
The other side then lost 25,100 men, nearly all the men of the entire tribe. The offending city was then sacked, and all their tribe's cities were burnt to the ground. Only 600 men escaped and hid in caves, having lost all they ever worked for their entire lives.
The world's perspective would be to shake the head and wonder why all this was done over the gang-rape and murder of one lowly slave girl and the threat of sodomy gang-rape against a travelling man. The pragmatic approach, the results-oriented approach would say it was unreasonable for these 65,000 men to die over this, along with so many other costly impacts to the national economy, not to mention their now-weakened position against foreign military.
God's approach, however, was that such an evil as this needed to be dealt with and purged from the nation, for the entire nation's sake. It wasn't about the girl, or even about the threatened perversion. It wasn't about vengeance. It was about maintaining purity to stay in the favor of a holy God. The nation could not sit by and let this slide and then expect God's blessings to continue to flow. From God's perspective, and therefore from the perspective of anybody committed to honoring God above all else, the nation was far better off losing all these men and all the rest, but maintaining God's favor for their commitment to holiness.
The lesson for our nation is obvious from Judges 19 and 20. We can do whatever we like to stimulate our economy. We can do whatever we like to promote job growth. We can do our best to keep our military strong. But without God's people committing to holiness and the favor of God in everything they do, it is all for nothing. We cannot approve of gross immorality and public sin by our silence, or by a wink and a nod to capitulate to "the greater good."
There is no excuse to go against holiness for fear of what might happen otherwise.
There is no excuse for anybody who claims to know the Bible to vote for "the lesser of two evils" as if there is no other choice, and a choice for evil of some kind has to be made.
There is no amount of pragmatic wrangling that can justify the Christians of America promoting a man of known immoral character to the highest office in the land, despite all the attempts to justify it like the article linked here does.
Say what you like. Justify it all you want. Set up your golden idol. I will give honour where honour is due, but I will not bow when the music plays. And when our chickens finally come home to roost for what we've done in November 2016, I will not have to say, "I told you so." You'll know.
VM
Saturday, March 17, 2018
What You Voted for When You Voted for Donald Trump
Before you read any further, please understand first of all that I support and honor the President of the United States as the man placed in that office by the hand of Almighty God in His wise Providential care. "The powers that be are ordained of God," Romans 13:1. I support and honor him as the man who rightfully sits in that office according to our cherished Constitution of the United States. I have sworn to protect and defend our Constitution and I would take up arms to protect Donald Trump's right to occupy the Oval Office. I am also in agreement with at least 90% or more of his actual policy decisions and directives since taking office. Further, I absolutely cannot stand the biased media's continual fixation against him. And this whole Russian "collusion" issue and the way it is presented by the Democrats is an absolute disgrace - on them, not him.
I have to say all of that because some of my readers who voted for Trump are going to get mad as soon as I say that I did NOT vote for Trump. I just want to be sure you don't get mad for the wrong reasons. Some of you are already so mad at me just for saying it, that you've already stopped reading or tuned me out. That's just how some of you Christian Trump voters are, that you would let this immoral man whom you don't even know come between you and a godly brother you've walked with for years. If that's how you want to be, there's nothing I can do about that.
But if you are open to listening and reading further, I would like to explain why I did not support Donald Trump as a candidate for President, and why no conservative Christian should have. I tried to explain this to many before the election, but they had already bought non-refundable tickets on the Trump Train and refused to get off long enough to listen.
Think of it like this: knowing what you now know about Richard M. Nixon, if he were miraculously alive and eligible to run for President again, and you totally agreed with the political platform he was running on, could you vote for him? I'd hope you would say "No way!" Or suppose Bill Clinton totally changed his politics to agree with you, but changed none of his ways and methods and schemes, and could run again. "No!" Or Hugh Hefner or Larry Flynt? Then how could you vote for Donald Trump, knowing what you knew or should have known about that man and his character?
Let's face it. You voted based on political expediency without considering the real long-term effects of your vote. You voted for your wallet. Or you voted for The Wall. Or you voted for America. But you didn't vote for Jesus Christ!
You see, you've got it all wrong! What's best for our country is not conservatism or a great economy, but a strong stand for godliness among God's people! Notice the following from the Word of God:
Proverbs 14:34 - Righteousness exalteth a nation: but sin is a reproach to any people.
Proverbs 29:2 - When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice: but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn.
I believe that Donald Trump's rise to the presidency will have excellent results on our economy (as is already appearing to be the case), wonderful strides forward in foreign relations, solutions to many problems facing our nation, and an absolutely disastrous impact on the morality of society in general and the upcoming generations of Christians in particular. The economic and political good wrought will be but temporary and fleeting, spoken of in past tense when Trump is a memory like Reagan. But the moral decline will be long term or permanent, and much more damaging as our country moves farther and farther from the blessings of God.
Multiple Christians told me before the election that they were voting for Trump because there was "too much at stake." Yes, there was a lot at stake, only not what they thought!
The various objections such as "not voting for Trump is effectively voting for Hillary," all boil down to this: You just don't trust God!
Pay attention to this:
Psalms 118:9 - It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes.
Psalms 146:3 - Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.
And this:
Deuteronomy 28:1 - And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the LORD thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth.
You think Trump is going to "Make America Great Again?" America will never be great again until America is Godly Again! That is not anything Donald Trump can help with! In fact, his election, with the blessing of most Christians, is a step in the opposite direction.
You see, Christian, here is what you voted for when you voted for Donald Trump:
You voted to trade God's blessings on holy choices for the world's blessings on smart political moves. How is the Trump economy boost going to help us if our vote for the ungodly forfeits even more of God's blessings? How is Trump's forceful foreign policy going to keep us safe if we discount our need for God's protection?
You voted to forever surrender the right of all conservative Christians to express moral outrage at sexual immorality, adultery, lewdness, bikini contests, serial divorce, etc. You voted for the reigning prince of these things to be the governing President of your nation. Ten, twenty or fifty years from now, not only you, but all conservative Christians by association with their collective vote, will have zero credibility with the unsaved world in trying to take any kind of stand against these things. Yeah, some salt and light we are now! I hope you like your tax cut. Give the extra money to foreign missions; it won't do as much good here any more. We'll all feel like we have to zip our lip and bite our tongue, thanks to the overwhelming vote of Christians for Trump.
You voted to impress to your children that character is important, unless there is a difficult decision to make (between a rock and hard place, like not letting Hillary win, for example), and then character is not really an issue after all. But you should have been teaching them that in the midst of such difficult decisions, character should be a paramount issue!
You voted to teach your children that taking a godly stand is only important if your stand will actually win. If your godly stand would cause your preference to lose, then hold your nose and take your lumps. But that has been the pragmatic problem that has been chipping away at the holiness of our Bible-believing churches for decades. What will the churches in fifty years look like that are run by the children who learned this from Trump-voting parents?
You say, "What would have happened to us if Hillary had won because Christians refused to back Trump?" First of all, Trump wouldn't have been on the ticket in that case, so the problem goes back before the conventions. But even so, a question like that misses the point. It is again putting trust in men and not in God. Whatever results from taking a godly stand is always a VICTORY for Christ and Christians. WHATEVER RESULTS. Three Hebrew children being thrown into a fiery furnace for refusing to bow, would have still been a victory even if the flames consumed them. Look at it from an eternal perspective, not a temporal one. Hillary winning the election because Christians cast a third-option vote in protest would have been a major victory for a godly stand -- and a bigger wake-up call to the Republican party than Trump ever was.
You didn't want wicked Hillary Clinton to win. Neither did I. But our nation would be in a better spot if a wicked woman won without the support of Christians than if a wicked man won with their support. In such a case, history shows God's blessings and protections on our families, our churches, and even our nation (for our sakes, Proverbs 11:10) would have more than made up the difference.
I don't know what exactly would have happened if Hillary won, but my hands would be clean. Are your hands clean of the mess that's coming from Trump's win? Is your vote going to come up for review at the Judgment Seat of Christ? Didn't you owe it to your country before the election to stop and sit down and figure out exactly what you were voting for?
NOW... you can get mad.
VM
Thursday, February 1, 2018
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