New Prepper needs advice

Who is wise choice?

I'd never go to some link from a person with only one post...got burned on that here at CF beaucoup years ago...still can't get that image out of my mind

YO GDBranch if you are really interested enter into conversation....

Start here....

http://www.thesurvivalpodcast.com

Basics...
faith
clean water
food
clothing
shelter

GDBranch said:

It’s very clear to me that God wants us to be prepared. The part I struggle with is that most of the posts I read on survivalist forums leave me with an image of some Rambo type guy sitting on his cache of water, food and guns willing to shoot anyone who gets too close.

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Better prepare to meet Jesus while Rambos think their guns will save them.

"At midnight they were roused by the shout, 'Look, the bridegroom is coming! ... the night there was an outcry, “Behold, The groom has come, go out to meet him.

May Jesus bless u all HalleluYAH

GDBranch said:

It’s very clear to me that God wants us to be prepared. The part I struggle with is that most of the posts I read on survivalist forums leave me with an image of some Rambo type guy sitting on his cache of water, food and guns willing to shoot anyone who gets too close. And that’s just not me. In fact I feel equally compelled by James’ urging to take care of widows and orphans in their distress. So where does one go to get good clear information?

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You can't take care of anyone if you are "just another victim" . . . I think this is the great misunderstanding you, Another Lazarus & many others have about prepping. Here, let me explain:



Charity can only come from a position of having other, more basic needs met. You can't take care of widows and orphans if you can't even feed your own family. What are you going to do, take the shirt off your wife's back and give it to a widow, take food out of your child's mouth and give it to an orphan? While it may seem devout to say "don't prepare for anything but Jesus" or "Rambo types sitting on . . . " both of those ideas lead to being "just another victim", wholly unable to render aid to them that need it & even unable to take care of your own. It is selfish! Selflessness is becoming independent so you won't be a burden on others & prepared so that you can, from a position of having. . . give charity. You can't give what you don't have. . . that, is pretty basic.

Food: Good, storable food that will last 30 plus years is worth the money. Wise foods isn't known for its quality, shelf life or taste. The gold standard of long term storage is Mountain House foods. They were a pioneer in freeze drying foods and they are great at what they do.

The complexities of long shelf life foods could take a book to explain but go to Mountain Houses web site and read their info then go on YouTube and watch the hundreds of taste tests and reviews. Mountain house will cost you a bit more but when you need to eat it will be there for you. Paying less for cheap food that gos bad is throwing money away money pay a few bucks more and invest in piece of mind.

Mountain House uses REAL protein in all their meals that have meat, many other brands including wise use soy which isn't digested by your body the same way and if you have family members with thyroid issues it can harm them.

Mountain House #10 cans are great for bulk long term storage, if you don't want to shuffle food back and forth based on used by dates this is the way to go. I've eaten mountain house that was a little over 22 years old and after adding the hot water and giving it 15 minutes and stirring it was actually quite good.

Mountain house makes pouches as well and just upped their shelf life to 12 years minimum. Shelf lives are extended by keeping the pouches or cans out of the sun and in a dry, cool place.

Calories: Make sure you account for calories needed and remember that cold weather and stress require more calories. In the coldest of weathers an active male can consume 4500 calories a day. Mentally a huge boost is good hot food when things are bad nothing beats a hot plate of food that has a lot of protein.

Don't skimp on food, it will bite you in the butt if you pinch pennies on this part of prepping you will regret it. I've seen people spend thousands on cheap food and after a few years checked it only to discover it had gone bad. Spend a few extra bucks and buy food that won't let you down.

Don't let prepping freak you out, when you first start it can seem over whelming. Make a good plan and stick to it, there are a million resources to help but you can get mired in just reading about it so those first steps are essential.

Im not a prepper but i like the simple lifestyle that peppers often follow. Things like food growing and preservation, off the grid living, and improvising, or using what we have on hand.

Im not against the idea of Christian prepping as long as we also know that we must live by faith not fear. Work is good and spiritual if our motivations are spiritual, and prepping is just work. Its good to be prepared as well, it seems like wisdom to me, not faithlessness. Greed is faithlessness, but prepping is just wisdom, i think. Everyone prepares. They save up for retirement for example. That's no different than other prepping activities. The only question would be, is saving up for retirement faithlessness, or is it just practical wisdom?

Maybe this forum should have been about simple living lifestyle instead of about prepping. Prepping could have been a sub forum perhaps. Maybe then it would be seen as something positive.

Poster0 said:

Maybe this forum should have been about simple living lifestyle instead of about prepping. Prepping could have been a sub forum perhaps. Maybe then it would be seen as something positive.

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I think it is positive~~~prepping is what our grandparents did. To let the "media" turn it into something negative isn't our problem...

Another Lazarus said:

Better prepare to meet Jesus while Rambos think their guns will save them.

"At midnight they were roused by the shout, 'Look, the bridegroom is coming! ... the night there was an outcry, “Behold, The groom has come, go out to meet him.

May Jesus bless u all HalleluYAH

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When Jesus comes there will be no need of preping all things will be given under his kingdom the world will be blessed by Israel salvation

There will be no starvation in the millennium unless you fail to honor tabernacles and no rain comes then crops will not yield fruit ...

But with the knowledge of God covering the entire planet and trees bearing 12 manner of fruit and living waters flowing out of Jerusalem ... It will be as if the kingdom of heaven is on earth ....paradise

GDBranch said:

It’s very clear to me that God wants us to be prepared. The part I struggle with is that most of the posts I read on survivalist forums leave me with an image of some Rambo type guy sitting on his cache of water, food and guns willing to shoot anyone who gets too close. And that’s just not me. In fact I feel equally compelled by James’ urging to take care of widows and orphans in their distress. So where does one go to get good clear information?

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If you feel compelled to take care of widows and orphans ... by all means, do so.

The basic theory of preparedness doesn't change whether you want to care only for yourself or you want to care for an entire community. (I'm a disaster preparedness consultant & trainer working with Fortune 100 and government clients as well as families.) As an analyst, I would think that fact would be fairly obvious to you.

One thing I have noticed in the "prepping" community is that people often focus on things rather than skills. For a counter-balance, you might want to look into the bushcrafting community. Don't get me wrong, bushcrafters still love gear. However, they tend to focus more on their craft (skills) than they do accumulating large quantities of stuff they don't know how to use.

So, I take a view on this.

Once a year, I catch a cold, or the water supply is cut-off for a day for maintenance, or the inter-web thing is down for 'upgrades', and I rely on my stores.

Occasionally, say, once every ten years, there are sustained power-cuts, civil unrest, or the local shops out of basic supplies like salt, sugar, flour, pasta, rice and beer, for a few days.

Even more occasionally, though I've never experienced this, say once every hundred years, several or all of these things may happen at once, for some sustained period of time.

I guess what the moral of this observation is: in the rich west, serious prepping is a long-shot insurance policy that you probably won't need in your lifetime. That's not to say don't bother. I'm all for any measures that keep the civil society resilient. Just, have some common sense, and keep it in proportion. So, for example, the more likely you think your sudden unemployment, the more preps relevant to that scenario you will want. Just recognise that the more solid your preps, the less likely you will need them all. When prepping becomes more than having a well stocked larder, and appropriate hand tools, when it becomes survival-at-all-costs-against-the-zombie-sheeple-hordes, then your reality has become a fantasy, and you're welcome to it.

I'd rather give away my excess to people who never had the wealth to prep, who need it, and need it now.

Best wishes, Strivax.

Strivax said:

I'd rather give away my excess to people who never had the wealth to prep, who need it, and need it now.

Best wishes, Strivax.

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Prepping doesn't require wealth. It requires hard work and discipline. I grew up exceptionally poor. We were well prepared because we knew how to grow, make and prepare virtually everything we needed.

GDBranch said:

I’ve been dabbling in prepping for that past several years, but I finally decided to get serious.

But I have a bit of a problem. See I’m a business analyst by trade and I like to do my research before invest in anything. I’ve looked around on the internet, gotten a couple of books and magazines and I just haven’t found any clear direction. There’s tons of information, but it seems to be pointing in all different directions. I'd really like to find something written from a Christian point of view.

(staff edit)

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I will tell you what my wife and I have done.

We bought 3.75 acres of virgin forest in a remote rural area, which still can be serviced with phone and electric. We built as we could afford, winding up with about 1650 sq ft. We have a well we share, and store quintiles of water, we have a septic system. we found a new Waterford heat stove that we heat with and can cook on. (these are almost impossible to find now, but and Amish supply house sells similar things Lehman's is the name.) At times due to ice or snow we lose power and we are totally prepared. We have the Coleman Electric lights not the cheap ones, they can be charged by car lighter, house power, or batteries or rechargeable batteries, Kerosene lamps smell up the house and get heavy to breathe. We store about 30 days of water that we refresh on a regular basis. We store food , and can live for a good while depending on how much company we have. I have two rifles and a 9mm hand gun, I have about 300 rounds for each. Until recent years we grew our chickens, goats, geese, and ducks. We have a garden, this year mainly tomato's. We keep about 3 1/2 cords of wood for the winter. We do have A/C and all the things you would have in town. The nearest town is 20 miles away. This has taken us 20 years.

So I would say steady as you can afford things. We started with the land and for us that seemed the best place to start. We lived about 100 miles away for about four years before we moved here full time. What ever you do, I would pray each step to stay in Gods will for you. Gods day to you.