Hi,
My name is Jim, I am from Ohio. I grew up in Massachusetts (near Plymouth) and lived in New York for 3 years.
School/Education Attended:
Boston School for the Deaf from 1963 to 1972
Graduated from Duxbury High School(MA)in 1978
Graduated from Rochester Institute of Technology(NTID)in 1981
Currently working for State of Ohio for the past 25 years
I like ot live my life "simple" and I am a "home person".
My lovely and beautiful wife's name is Carole. We have 5 kids.
Our son is in the Navy with a wonderful woman who is expecting. (I am going to be a grandpa soon)
We have a daughter who is attending OSU
We have another daughter who is working at ARC
We have two daughters still in High School
Some of my kids see me as a "boring" person. I admit, I am a boring guy. That's who I am
About my faith.....
When I was younger, I believed that God will always protect me but as I got older, wiser and learned what God have taught me. I like this quote by Paul Little
"Faith recognizes the fact that God is in control of my life. Whether I believe it or not, it's a fact that God is in control of the world. If I don't believe it, I'm just robbing myself of the enjoyment of the fact." I attended Catholic school for 7 years. Other denominations I have visited over the years are several Baptist Churches, Grace Brethren (Anabaptist), Missionary & Alliance, Mennonite, Methodist, Pentacostal, Congregational and many others. I also got mixed up with "Word of Faith" for a short time. My life filled with trials including disabilities that taught me that the greatest good of the Christian life is not absence of pain, but Christ-likeness and to do His will.
And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. For those God foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:28-29).
I have learned in my trials that God is more concerned with the character He is building in me, He comforted me in His arms through His power of Grace on the journey to His destiny for me as Paul explains:
Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. (Romans 5:3-4). God's divine intervention (i.e. trials) goes BOTH WAYS. All circumstances can turn people to God. Scriptures reveals that no trial, no disease or illness, no accident or injury reaches us apart from God's permission. Christians can answer like Joseph to his brothers who sold him into slavery,
As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. There are some who seem to look on the gloomy side and never able to do respond in faith to life's problems, instead, they grumble about the trials that they forget God's powerful grace. There are two worlds, set over against each other, dominated by two wills, the will of man (me) and the will of God, respectively. Trials (of all kinds) are often a two-sided coin. One side trials may be viewed as coming from God to bring out the BEST in us (See: Gen. 22:1-2, 15-18; Hebrews 11:17). On the other side of the coin, Satan attempts to tempt us and trials to bring out the WORST in us (see: James 1:13-14).
My view of Conservative Christians believe what the Bible teaches in context which are the basics of what Christians believe and unite on. I thought it meant the belief in the Bible as the written standard for Truth and the belief that God IS truth, and everything that is good, right, and true comes from HIM. Beliefs are biblical and doctrinally orthodox. God's Word (the Bible) sometimes wounds us deeply and it is imperative because through the Bible, God speaks loudly. Do we accept the Bible as the Word of God, as the sole Authority in all matters of faith and practice, or do we not? It should be remembered that acceptance of the Bible as the sole authority for teaching comes not from rational arguments or human traditions. Its not the scriptures that are corrupted. Its a man's heart that is corrupted. Intelligence, reason, and choice. God reveals Himself primarily through the pages of Scripture; that is why I believe the Bible as my absolute authority. I do believe very much in being a responsible Christian, however that responsibility is defined for the Christian by the Bible but no humanism reasoning. We should all take a long hard look at what things we consider to be important from God's perspective rather than man's perspective. We must be careful not to disobey God's Word to any church reasoning.
Quotes regarding Conservative and Liberalism.
All theology of the liberal type involves at some point - and involves throughout - the claim that the real behaviour and purpose and teaching of Christ came rapidly to be misunderstood and misrepresented by His followers, and has been recovered or exhumed only by modern scholars. C.S. Lewis
I have been suspected of being what is called a Fundamentalist. That is because I never regard any narrative as unhistorical simply on the ground that it includes the miraculous. C.S. Lewis
No matter how far back we may press our researches into the roots of the gospel story, no matter how we classify the gospel material, we never arrive at a non-supernatural Jesus. F.F. Bruce
The mind which asks for a non-miraculous Christianity is a mind in process of relapsing from Christianity into mere "religion." C.S. Lewis
Liberals insisted that the ultimate authority in theology must be man, either in his reason, his will or his feelings. Unknown
It has been observed thus far that liberalism differs from Christianity with regard to the presuppositions of the gospel (the view of God and the view of man), with regard to the Book in which the gospel is contained, and with regard to the Person whose work the gospel sets forth. It is not surprising then that it differs from Christianity in its account of the gospel itself; it is not surprising that it presents an entirely different account of the way of salvation. Liberalism finds salvation (so far as it is willing to speak at all of 'salvation') in man; Christianity finds it in an act of God. J. Gresham Machen
