The house of the Lord is the temple of God, which is the body of Christ, which is comprised of those who have trusted in Jesus Christ to be Lord and Savior of their lives. It is not a building, and it is not a human organization, nor a church denomination, nor is it a not-for-profit corporation of the federal government of the USA, or of any other country.

The church is a living organism with Christ as her head. And the sanctuary of God is within the lives of Christ’s followers. God does not dwell in buildings built by human hands. Thus, when we enter into a building called “church,” we are NOT entering God’s house nor have we suddenly walked into the presence of God, because God’s presence lives within us who obey him, and he is always with us. And we, the people of God, are the Lord’s house.

So, if zeal for the Lord’s house consumes us, it means that passion and fervor for Christ and for his church, his body, so fills up our lives to where we are fully engaged (involved) and committed to the Lord’s service and to ministering to the needs of his body. We are committed to serving and to ministering to and exhorting and encouraging one another in our walks of faith and in obedience to our Lord in holy living.

It also means that we are fully involved and committed to our personal relationships with Christ, to our times of personal worship with him, and to obedience to his Word. We are entirely dedicated to walking in the Spirit, and not according to the flesh, and to allowing the Lord to use us in other people’s lives according to his will and purposes for our lives.

As well, it means that we feel what God feels, we hate what he hates, and what he loves we love. We weep over all the junk that is presently going on in the world and in the worldly church in the name of God, and in the name of Jesus Christ. So, we will expose these fruitless deeds of darkness so that other believers are not led astray to what is false. And we will pray for revival!

Zeal for Your House

An Original Work / August 1, 2016
Based off Jn. 2:17; Ps. 69:9

Zeal for Your house, it consumes me.
Lord, I love my times with You.
I love to worship You and sing Your praises.
Time in Your Word brings me closer to You,
List’ning to You speaking to me,
Gently guiding me in truth.

Lord, You are my life’s example,
Showing me how I should live.
I love to walk with You where’er You lead me.
No greater joy have I when serving You.
Loving, giving, resting in Your strength,
I’m yielding to Your will.

Zeal for Your house, it consumes me.
See the church turned upside down:
Marketing ventures taking place of worship,
Men of the gospel turning into clowns.
Gospel message made appealing,
So the world will feel at home.

Lord, we need a great revival.
Turn their hearts, Lord, back to You.
Open the blind eyes, turn them all from darkness,
Lord, to the light. May they return to You,
Turn from their sin, forsake idols,
Be restored to God again.

Login to view embedded media

So, what is the context here? A man within the gatherings of the church was apparently in a sexual relationship with his father’s wife, which could be his mother or his stepmother, but still this was regarded as incest. And this was being tolerated by the church, for no action was being taken against the man. And the church, instead of mourning and grieving over this blatant sin happening amongst them, were proud of their gatherings.

Now this is a long passage of Scripture here in 1 Corinthians 5, so I have divided it up into three sections, and so this devotion will be in three segments, the first of which was “Blatant Sexual Immorality Among You,” which is where I deal more with our current situation in the church, at least here in America, where so many are sexually addicted, but where not much at all is being done to correct the situation, and so lives are being destroyed.

And this destruction of human lives and of the congregation of the saints is what I will cover in this writing, for that is grossly being overlooked and ignored these days. For many are ignoring the damage being done to human lives in order to “draw in large crowds of people” from the world into their gatherings. So they entertain them so that they will come back for more, and they dilute the gospel message to make it more appeasing to the flesh.

And it isn’t as though the leaders of these “church” congregations are not aware of the blatant sexual immorality going on within their members, nor that they are unaware of the destruction that this is causing to marriages and to families. But few seem to want to do anything to correct the situation which has now gotten way out of hand, for the “leaven” has worked its way all throughout these congregations of what are called “churches.”

I see that a few make some effort to correct this by providing self-help groups for men (usually just men) who are addicted to pornography, but many of these groups are following humanistic philosophy and don’t even allow for the reading of the Scriptures nor do they allow for biblical solutions to be taught among them because they don’t want anyone to feel uncomfortable or to be offended. So many men continue in addiction.

Now I am not excluding women here. I am just not aware of groups for women having the same issues being provided by church congregations, but there may be. I just don’t know about them. And generally speaking, porn addiction or sexual addiction is more of a male issue than it is a female issue, but there are women and children who are addicted to porn and to other sexual deviances and practices which are sinful.

So we have this serious sin addiction and porn addiction situation ongoing within the gatherings of the church. And the leaders do know what is going on, at least generally speaking, though they may not know all the specifics. But it appears that few are taking action to remove from their congregations those who have had plenty of time to repent but who have continued on in their addictions, some of them for a lifetime, if truth be told.

And little appears to be being done to work with these broken marriages and these households to help them to come out from underneath their bondage to sin or to rescue those who are not living in sin but who are subject to the abuses of those who are living in addictive sin and so are sinning against their family members. And often or sometimes the spouse of the addicted is treated as the enemy if he/she dares to try to get help for their situation.

Often or sometimes the counsel given is just to leave the addict, but that isn’t the biblical solution, and that only puts more hardship and more suffering on the ones who are subject to abuse by the addicted. And so the spouse feels abandoned, not only by the addicted, but by church leadership who are supposed to be there to help and to heal and to not cast off. And sometimes the leadership just heaps even more abuse on the spouse of the addicted.

So all of this is the opposite of what it is supposed to be. But honestly, if “the church” literally did a “house cleaning” today of all those who are living in sin, in practice, who have had plenty of opportunity to change, but who have continued in their addictive practices, I fear there would not be too many people left in the gatherings. For so many are following a diluted gospel which is giving them permission to keep on sinning without feeling guilty.

But we as the body of Christ are biblically responsible before God to be addressing these issues, and to be calling for repentance, and to be calling for our leaders to be pure in heart and mind and behaviors themselves so that they can clean out the old leaven so that the church may be a “new lump” for God’s purposes and for his glory in walks of holiness and in righteousness and in obedience to our Lord and no longer in deliberate sin.

[Matt 7:21-23; Lu 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14; Rom 12:1-2; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 1 Co 10:1-22; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Gal 5:16-24; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-32; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:1-17; Titus 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6,24-25; 1 Jn 3:4-10; 1 Pet 2:24; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Heb 10:23-31; Heb 12:1-2]

Songs in the Night

An Original Work / December 18, 2013

“About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them.” Acts 16:25 NIV ‘84

Lord, I praise You forevermore.
You, my Savior, I now adore.
Hope in heaven awaiting me,
Because You died at Calvary.

I have been forgiven,
And I’m bound for heaven.
Jesus set me free from
All my sin, I say.
I will praise Him always!

Lord, I love You for all You’ve done:
Overcame death, my vict’ry won!
Jesus saved me, and now I’m free!
I rejoice in His love for me.

I will walk in vict’ry!
My sin is but hist’ry!
I am free to please Him
With my life today.
I will love Him always!

Lord, I thank You for giving me
A new life bought at Calvary.
Loving Jesus, I meet with Him.
Tender mercies now flow within.

Lord, I am so thankful;
Through my Lord, I’m able
To sit at His table;
Fellowship with Him.
I will thank Him always!

Login to view embedded media

Oh, how hearts breaking.
Sinners are faking,
Lies they are making,
Love they’re forsaking.
Broken hearts aching.

Liars pretending,
And not hearts mending,
And not love sending,
Sin they’re defending,
Truth they are bending.

Shooting their arrows,
Not good bedfellows,
Not on road narrow,
Lies they do swallow,
All this foreshadowed.

Immoral are they,
E’en though they do pray,
But faithful not stay,
In practice they stray,
From then to this day.

Their words not believe,
For they do deceive,
No pardon receive,
Their sins do not grieve,
Their idols they cleave.

They lie and abuse,
And others misuse,
Repentance refuse,
With lies they amuse,
Their sin they now choose.

The hurting forsaken,
Advantage of taken,
And now they’re awakened,
Although they are shaken,
In Christ’s love partaking.

An Original Work / September 15, 2022

Sexual immorality is on the rise and is at enormous proportions even among those calling themselves Christians, at least here in America it is. With the invention of the internet and then smartphones, most anyone has 24 hour a day, 7 days a week, access to a whole world of evil, in particular to a whole world of sexual immorality and deviation. Surely we are living in the days of Sodom and Gomorrah or the days of Noah before God flooded the earth.

Our men have been so emasculated by pornography and all forms of entertainment promoting sexual deviation and/or sexual immorality and sexually explicit material and adultery that it appears there are not many godly men left among us who truly fit the biblical qualifications of overseer or deacon. And this isn’t just about men. Many women and children are now caught up in these types of things, too, and it is on the rise.

And what is being done to stop it? Not much, from what I can ascertain. Even if some institutional churches have programs, usually for men, to help them overcome sexual addiction, often times these are not being led under the power of the Holy Spirit and in accord with the Holy Scriptures, but they are following the psychology and humanistic thinking and reasoning of human flesh, and so some of these groups just continue to enable them.

And so we have many statistical records on this subject which vary from group to group, but all of which have very high counts of Christian men, including pastors, who regularly visit porn sites. And this is not including all the other avenues of sexually explicit entertainment and activities readily available at the touch of a fingertip on a smartphone in the corner of a room where no one else can see what you are looking at.

And so is it any wonder that the gospel of Christ and the character of God have now been so diluted to where they are barely recognizable in comparison to what the Scriptures teach? And the gospel has been altered with the express purpose of not offending human flesh and in order to not condemn those who choose to make sexual immorality or any other sin listed in the Scriptures as their addiction of choice.

And so they teach them that a confession of faith alone forgives all sins, even future sins, but without genuine repentance and without walks of obedience to our Lord and to his commandments. So they go on living in sin, believing all their sins are forgiven and that heaven is now guaranteed them, but regardless of how they live. So there is no motivation to change. And very few are telling them of the consequences if they do not change.

So we don’t see much mourning over sin anymore. The focus seems rather to help alleviate any feelings of guilt for the one who is living in sexual addiction or in any other sinful addiction deliberately, without conscience. And few want to even hear about this or to have it mentioned because it makes them uncomfortable and it is not “positive” and they want everything positive, and the feel-good stuff is what is being preferred.

And so the vast majority of what are called “churches” here in America are indeed tolerating blatant sexual immorality going on within “the church” amongst its “members” by hushing it up, and sometimes making the spouse of the addict out as the enemy if he/she dares to bring up the subject and to try to get help. And so the addicts go from bad to worse, and marriages are being destroyed and families are falling apart, but “the church” is happy.

And I am certainly not saying that this represents every congregation of people in America who call their gatherings “church.” But from all outward appearances it appears that this represents the majority of them. And this is HUGE!! But it brings in large crowds of people from the world when you hide these truths and when you hide the truth of the gospel from them so that the world will be at home in your gatherings. But God forbid!!

But what is the church supposed to be doing? The church is supposed to pronounce judgment on those who are living in sin and who are living in adultery and in sexual immorality. And I am not saying that we must condemn everyone who might sometimes sin. But the Bible makes it clear that these things are not to exist among us and that we are to purge ourselves of these things so that we can live holy lives pleasing to God.

[Matt 7:21-23; Lu 9:23-26; John 10:27-30; Acts 26:18; Rom 2:6-8; Rom 6:1-23; Rom 8:1-14; Rom 12:1-2; 1 Co 6:9-10,19-20; 1 Co 10:1-22; 2 Co 5:10,15,21; Gal 5:16-24; Gal 6:7-8; Eph 2:8-10; Eph 4:17-32; Eph 5:3-6; Col 1:21-23; Col 3:1-17; Titus 2:11-14; 1 Jn 1:5-10; 1 Jn 2:3-6,24-25; 1 Jn 3:4-10; 1 Pet 2:24; Heb 3:1-19; Heb 4:1-13; Heb 10:23-31; Heb 12:1-2]

Should I Not Preach Jesus

An Original Work / July 4, 2013
Based off 1 Corinthians 9:16-10:13

Woe to me should I not preach Jesus.
I’m compelled to preach the full gospel.
I make myself a slave to ev’ryone
To win their hearts to Christ.
All this I do for my Lord Jesus,
And for the sake of His Name;
Do it for the sake of His gospel,
So that I, its blessings gain.

Scripture notates the sins of others;
Written down for us as examples
To keep us from setting our hearts
On evil as did those of old.
Do not worship other gods of man;
Do not give your hearts to them;
Not partake in immorality.
Do not test your Lord and King.

So, be careful if you think you are
Standing firm in your faith in Jesus.
God has given his word to warn us,
So through faith we will not fall.
No temptation has o’ertaken you
Except what is commonplace.
God is faithful to not let you be
Tempted past what you can bear.
He gives the way of escape.

Login to view embedded media

I'm also continuing Shy, Tower of God, and Our Last Crusade, along with NieR Automata.

ATRI -My Dear Moments-
This one's about a guy who finds and inherits a cute android girl. They live in a time where the ocean levels have risen to cover coastal cities, probably due to global warming.

The Magical Girl and the Evil Lieutenant Used to Be Archenemies
A comedy romance with a high-ranking member of an organization devoted to world domination falling for a cute but dysfunctional magical girl.

No Longer Allowed in Another World
A comedy isekei. A nihilistic poet tries to commit double suicide, but he ends up in another world. He keeps trying to commit suicide there too, but his new, powerful female companions do their best to keep him alive as he keeps inadvertently solving problems.

Wistoria: Wand and Sword
A young man tries to succeed at a magic academy despite being unable to cast magic spells. He relies on skill, knowledge, and physical prowess, and hopes to earn the right to go where his elf girlfriend is.

Dahlia in Bloom: Crafting a Fresh Start with Magical Tools
An isekai where a young woman is reincarnated in a magical world. She commits herself to creating useful magical items, many inspired by her former life.

A Nobody's Way Up to an Exploration Hero
Somehow modern Earth now has access to D&D style dungeons. One guy goes it alone in the dungeons, and isn't very good at it, but he gets lucky and finds a couple very useful summoned allies.

The Ossan Newbie Adventurer, Trained to Death by the Most Powerful Party, Becomes Invincible
Yeah, he's a 30-something guy who got a late start in adventuring in his standard fantasy world, and can't cast higher level spells, but he is still waaaay better than his fellow rookies thanks to his insane training.

I start the day, the war begins
Endless reminding of my sin
And time and time again
Your truth is drowned out by the storm I'm in

IceJad said:

Mention it not, for we are all in the body of Christ.

Click to expand...

Amen to that.

Lord we pray for the nation of Bangladesh that peace and calm be returned. We pray for wisdom for the leaders to make wiser policies. We pray for the Bangladeshi people that they may find recourse from any unfair laws and regulations in peaceful manners. We uphold this nation to You Lord, Amen.

Our Father in heaven,

We come to You to uphold Multifavs and family in prayer. Place upon the mother Your healing hands. Grant her relief in times of pain and discomfort. Strengthen her body Lord that she may recover from her illness. We ask too for Your grace to be upon Multifavs. Let Your Presence be felt in her troubled times, a leading hand on uncertain paths and a piecing light during clouded minds.

Grant Lord Your protection and grace on the whole family. In the name of Jesus we ask, Amen.

Hello folks. Today marks the second installment in the hymn per week series, which will happen on most weekends. Today is an 18th century hymn known as God Himself is Present. All hymns are freely available from the Open Hymnal Project.

Open Hymnal Project (2014 Hymnal PDF): http://openhymnal.org/OpenHymnal2014.06.pdf



Video (Lutheran hymn, but works well for all denominations including Catholics):
Login to view embedded media

Bible Portion: “Balak” NUMBERS 22:2-25:9

This is the famous story of Bilam, who was asked to “curse” Israel, and instead, “Blessed” Israel, yet before this, his donkey spoke to him. The name “Bilam” or Balaam” might be a shorter version of the name “Baal-haAm” (lord of the people). Some believe that he was a true prophet of G-d, while others believe he was a false or corrupt prophet. It seems like he was the latter, yet YHVH used him to bless Israel.

The princes of Balak, king of Moab, offered money to Balaam to curse Israel, so, Balaam consulted Adonai as to what he should do. Elohim answers;

“Thou shalt not go with them, thou shalt not curse them for they are blessed” (Num 22:12) What the LORD has blessed, stays blessed, what the LORD has cursed, stays cursed UNLESS the LORD himself lifts the curse and changes the curse to a blessing. Or, a person can go against God's Word and become a rebel, thus, inviting a curse into being.

Balaam tells the princes, “I cannot go with you” yet Balak is stubborn, and wants Israel cursed, he offers more money, and fame, re-sends his princes, and asks them again to propose to Balaam; “Stay here tonight and I will see what the LORD will tell me” says Balaam.

But didn’t Adonai already say NO? What more is there to ask again? Or…is there a hidden reason? Maybe a money reason? We can see perhaps a greedy prophet trying to see if “God will change his mind”. Just a little curse for a lot of money? However, Adonai says; “Go with them, but only say what I tell you to say”. So, the word of God says that in the morning, Balaam saddled his ass and went with the princes of Moab, BUT…God was angry because he WENT!

There is a problem here, didn’t Adonai already give his permission for Balaam to GO, yet he was angry because he WENT! What is the root of interpretation here? Adonai gave his permission for Balaam to go PHYSICALLY with the princes of Moab, Yet, Balaam in his heart was GOING ALONG WITH THE IDEA, to curse for money, greed was in his heart. One thing is to GO, another is to GO ALONG WITH THE IDEA or be in unison to do evil. This is why the anger of the LORD was kindled, Balaam had in his heart the IDEA or the DESIRE to GO CURSE ISRAEL for riches. It was all about the “inner motive” of Bilaam, Adonai knows the heart above all things. We can all “go” places, but if our hearts carry evil intentions, then, the “going” will bring a curse upon yourself.

Here is another idea. God gave permission for Bilaam to go, only that he made known the plan to bless Israel, yet Bilaam did not tell the second group of emissaries that he would bless Israel. He allowed them to think that he would pronounce a curse upon Israel. In this type of deceit, Bilaam would “blaspheme” the name of God, knowing one thing, and hiding it on purpose. Perhaps Bilaam thought that if he told the group that he would only “bless” Israel, then, he would not receive payment. It would then be a “financial setback”. (ill-gotten greed).

Now Adonai used Balaam’s donkey to “wake him up” as to what is happening. Then, “Malach-YHVH” the (Angel of the LORD) stands in the way, and the ass avoids him, three times until Balaam strikes his donkey three times for going off the road. Finally, the LORD opens the mouth of the donkey and the donkey is made to speak;

“Why have you smitten me these three times?” Wouldn’t you wonder that Balaam would have been impressed that an animal would speak? Hebrew at that? Even the Angel spoke; “Why have you smitten your donkey these three times?”

Some wonder about the number “3” does it have meaning? There are “3” entities in Elohim, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Yeshua was in the ground for 3 days, there are 3 parts of the Bible, the Torah, the Prophets and Hebrew poetry, and the Brit HaDASHAH (New Testament) Yeshua asked Kefa 3 times “Do you love me?” The Angel of Elohim gave “3” warnings to Balaam, yet he did not SEE, or perhaps, did not WANT to see or heed the warnings, until his donkey, “alerted him.” So, the donkey saw the danger, the Angel of the LORD with a sword in hand, and Balaam did not! So, who's the real "Jackass?" the "stubborn guy who needed to be "awakened?"

Another thing we can see is that God is concerned about the treatment of animals. Those who have pets should treat them with love and tender care, not mistreat them, for if the angel saw the donkey being struck and called Balaam’s attention on that, the LORD sees how YOU are treating your pet, (hopefully, no one has a pet crocodile running around the house, yet there was a case of a family that DID have indeed a PET CROC in the house) Also, a man had a pet Tiger in his NYC apartment.

Balaam meets Balak, and again, they go to “3” separate places to view Israel, and Balaam orders “7” altars to be built. 7 bulls and 7 rams would be sacrificed. “7” is the perfect number, yet all three times, Balaam opens his mouth to BLESS Israel, Whom YHVH has blessed, no man can curse. Even in the third blessing, Balaam echoes the blessing of Abraham; “Blessed be every one that blesseth thee and cursed be everyone that curseth thee!”

What can we learn from all this? We must always support and bless Israel, bless our brothers and sisters in our congregations, not let money be the main interest in our doing “good” if we wish to bless our neighbor, with our prayers, labor, favors, etc., let it not be guided by monetary gain, but our sincere desire to bless and be a witness to Yeshua our Messiah. Oh yes, and treat your cats, dogs, birds, turtles, tropical fish, etc. with TLC! Adonai is watching! (Tarantulas too?)

But let’s look at the blessings that Bilaam said to Israel, and Yes, Balak was fuming! This is to show that G-d even works among heathen prophets, to shower blessings on his people; (23:8-10) We see various things of interest here: Bilaam states:

“How can I curse whom Elohim has not cursed?” “It is a people that shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations” “Who hath counted the dust of Jacob or numbered the stock of Israel” “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let mine be like his”

“A people that dwell alone.” One might think about the meaning of this. One way to look at this is that Israel is a “unique’ (Yachid) people, that is not given to worship idols like the other nations, but given and chosen to worship Adonai only, therefore, “Not reckoned among the nations.”

Adonai did not curse Israel, but later, Israel brought upon itself a curse because the Israelites hooked up with the prostitutes of Moab and entered into the pagan rites of the Moabites (persuaded by Bilaam) He must have said to the king that God cannot curse them but they can bring a curse upon themselves though!

Israel is unique, no nation like Israel. The word for “unique” is “Yachid” and is different from the rest of the nations, because Israel believes and worships only “One G-d” YHVH! The rest of the nations at that time were pagan idolatrous nations.

Why is Jacob/Israel compared to dust? Can anyone count “dust?” yet dust will last forever. The desire of all is to “die like a Tzadik!” a righteous person, but Bilaam did not die like a Tzadik, he died like a pagan prophet who was, unwillingly, used by YHVH. The next blessing is from 23:19-24.

“God (EL) is not a man that He should lie, Neither the Son of man that He should repent”

The word for God in this verse is “El” (the strong one who leads and instructs) and through the Torah, Adonai shows us the way to Mashiach! Yes, God is NOT a man, He is Spirit in the pure essence of His being, yet He became flesh, in Yeshua, to die for our sins, and Yeshua never needed to repent of anything since He was and IS sinless!

‘None hath beheld iniquity in Jacob nor seen perverseness in Israel”

Yet didn’t YHVH want to wipe Israel from the earth for past sins and rebellion? Yes, BUT, Moshe interceded for them as Yeshua intercedes before the Father on our behalf. YHVH was looking at Israel through Messiah Yeshua, He sees Israel as if Israel had never sinned, being righteous! Are we any different? Our flesh is black like sin (figuratively) because our flesh is dead and dying, yet inside us lives our soul-spirit, and it is white as snow, purified through the Blood of Yeshua. The third blessing is from 24:3-9.

“How goodly are thy tents O Jacob and thy dwellings O Israel”

This is the beginning of one of our daily prayers. The tents and dwellings symbolize the whole people of Israel, the ones who dwell inside the tents. “Water shall flow from his branches, and his seed shall be in many waters” Yeshua is the “Living Water” (Mayim Chayim) many waters can symbolize the “multitudes” of peoples since the Hebrew letter “Mem” symbolizes both ‘water’ and the “masses” (of people) His is the “Seed of faith” which has been scattered among all the nations of the world. The blessing ends like the promise of Abraham, “blessed be those who bless thee, and cursed be those that curseth thee” and in HIS SEED shall ALL the world be blessed, “HaZeman Yeshua” (the seed of Yeshua) the seed of “Faith”

I could go on but I have to end this somewhere. Balaam pronounced three great blessings, plus the demise of Midiam and Moab at the end.
He said what God told him to say, yet gave evil advice to King Balak, that they send their prostitutes to the camp of the Israelites so as to entice the men and bring a curse upon themselves. Israel takes vengeance and in the end, Bilaam is killed with the sword of justice! (Joshua 13:22)

We must remember to evaluate our service to God. What are our motives? are we serving out of love and obedience? or for money's sake?
Money comes and goes, our service and godly influence will bring rewards in the World to Come. Are you investing in the "here and now?" or in the "here-after?" Don't be a "burro" like Balaam, make the right choice!

Ben Avraham

Welcome, that's a cool name; "Wewoka". Is that from the Oklahoma town?

Welcome!

Anonymous9090 said:

Praise & Thank Jesus Christ for ensuring that President Joe Biden used Godly Wisdom to exit from the presidential race due to his health problems:

Joe Biden drops out of election, upending race for White House

President says decision is in interests of country, but endorsement of vice-president to take over is not a done deal.

www.bbc.com

Click to expand...

Amen to this.

Jipsah said:

I don't find any references to Creation in the Creeds of the Church, nor do I find any record in Scripture or elsewhere that the disciples taught anything out of Genesis to 1st century Roman converts. Maybe the Gospel of Christ is sufficient, reckon?

Click to expand...

Romans 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

Romans 8:22 For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.

ViaCrucis said:

So in this I am opposed to violent action in general, and believe in choosing non-violence and non-violent solutions as a matter of moral imperative, and principle. I confess that there can come times when, tragically, violence is necessitated by extraordinary circumstance; in which case it may be justified in order to prohibit greater evil. If I know that someone intends to kill many innocents, and if my only option is to violently stop them, then I believe such is justified. I consider this an extraordinary, rather than ordinary, act however.

Click to expand...

The problem I have been pointing out can be brought against your own position. You say we should not kill anyone, except in grave circumstances. The OP then asks, "Does this rule apply equally to Christians and non-Christians?" Obviously the first part applies to all, Christian and non-Christian alike. The second part, "...except in grave circumstances," would seem to also apply to Christian and non-Christian alike. Thus the question arises: In what way does it matter at all whether our potential victim is a Christian?

My guess is that the reason it does not matter is because we are talking about strict obligations, without room for exceptions. On your view we have an obligation not to kill and we have an obligation defend "many innocents," and these obligations do not admit of exceptions such as, "...Unless the potential victim is a Christian." Forms of favoritism towards Christians (as well as forms of supererogation) can only obtain in a case where we are not obliged to act.

Valletta said:

In the case of Supreme Court justices the Biden administration did not enforce the law--putting the lives of Supreme Court justices in jeopardy.

Click to expand...

Non sequitur
That has nothing to do with the topic

Valletta said:

In this case the Biden Secret Service deliberately allowed Joe's political opponent, the leading presidential candidate in the polls, to go on stage despite knowing there was an imminent credible threat to his life.

Click to expand...

It is not Biden's Secret Service. It is America's Secret Service.

Valletta said:

People should have already been fired, not doing so sends the message it is open season on Trump.

Click to expand...

People should be fired? LOL!!!!

Trump should tone down the bitter and vicious rhetoric as he is making it very difficult for security to protect him.

dzheremi said:

A bit of a long story. I was Roman Catholic and not being well-fed in those circumstances. I tried to connect with various Eastern Catholic churches, but also couldn't really connect with those. At the time I was also taking Arabic language classes in college, so as part of my searching the internet for more Arabic-language Christian materials (since I didn't want to learn about Muhammad or Islam), I came across some sermons by HH Pope Shenouda III, the Coptic Orthodox Pope at that time (2008-2009), that had English subtitles, so I decided to study them to learn more vocabulary. But instead I was impressed by the faith that was transmitted through them, and became interested in the Church through that. I didn't live in an area with any Coptic Orthodox churches, so it took three more years before I could go to my first liturgy, but I used that time to really study and pray to try to make sense of where I should be.

I began attending a Coptic Orthodox parish (St. Bishoy, in Albuquerque, NM) in 2011 and was baptized in 2012. So now here I am, a dozen years later.

Click to expand...

Congrats on your journey. And hey, Catholics and Orthodox are still close brothers, and we both believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior.

Michie said:

My mothers family is from the South.

Click to expand...

A lot of Celts settled in the South. Celts are supposed to be red haired, aren't they.

I'll look it up

(Time passes)

Yes, they are.

Mikkadugeec said:

God does not care about the affairs of the people of this planet... He has self-acting Laws for this

Click to expand...

?????

The Bible says that there is no balanced scale on Earth. The righteous are poor and die oppressed while the wicked are well-fed and live long.
It is in the Judgment, and the coming of Christ in John 14:1-3 that the saints are rewarded. Dan 7 says the saints are tormented in this life and that this is the case right up until Christ comes and takes over. It says the entire time the judgment in heaven is going on - the righteous are treated poorly on Earth.

Mikkadugeec said:

and that is how the world and the universe have always worked!

1. The law of retroactive action = karma for a person, what you sow is what you reap.. Everything that a person sends into space has energy, like an electric current that flows and cannot be seen.

Click to expand...

?????

Mikkadugeec said:

3. Law of weight .. light rises, heavy falls .. This Law is manifested especially after death, because a heavy soul, too dark people will fall down to the low planets of darkness .. light souls, good and not dragged by the dark will rise up to the light, where is beauty, splendor, lightness

Click to expand...

?????

LayHong_Loves_Christ said:

Did church also mean Christianity?

Click to expand...

The Word Christianity refers to those who follow Christ and His Church. In 100 AD through 1500 AD it was pretty simple and evident. Today many call themselves Christian who are not.

Do a You Tube search on "Trump wanders off" and see what you find. Once, he even got lost walking off an airplane.

Astrid said:

What nonsense

Click to expand...

He was doing his best. He's a little less alert late in the day.

Puts him in with Lyndon Johnson, who also "saw the writing on the wall".

Here is an easily understood (and probably 99% correct) overview of what happened.

So, it looks like Cloudstrike Falcon got adminstrative permission from Microsoft to operate within the sacrosanct Microsoft kernel, but then gave itself permission to breach Microsoft's protection of the kernel to do a lot more in the kernel than Microsoft intended anything should do. I think that makes Cloudstrike Falcon a Trojan Horse by perfect definition.

Login to view embedded media