Good people all over the world are wondering what to do next. I won't even try to speak for all the good people in the world. They all need to do something in response to the rising tyranny in our world. But I'll just speak for me and my house.
We will serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
One American Christian leader stands out to me over the past thirty years. His name is Flip Benham. I never paid as much attention to him during my career as I should have. He appeared to my coiffed pro family professional manners as an odd character. One time he walked across America with a donkey in tow, for example.
I now realize he was the most prominent Christian man in America who got it.
Most Christians still don't know that his ministry work saved Jane Roe. Norma McCorvey is a pro life warrior today because of Flip's faithfulness and courage.
I think it was Richard Nixon who coined the phrase "nattering nabobs of negativism." We've got lots of nabobs in the pulpits and well-paid "pro family" leadership seats of America. They're the ones who have mastered the art of fund raising or passing the offering plate on defeat after defeat after defeat after defeat.
They are all sending out fund raising emails and promising to fight to the death now that five "justices" have "ruled" that sodomy can be the basis upon which a marriage and civilization can be built.
Also, many of them are finding fancy sounding words and ideas to invite sodomy into the Christian Church. They say its inevitable, among other things.
Uh huh. I don't think so.
America may be a corpse, as some say, but that doesn't let Christians off the hook. They still have to fight for the Gospel. The Gospel is about dying to self. There is no better way to die to self today than to proclaim the truth about sex and gender.
It is now time for the frustrated majority culture of Maine to rip out the heart of the lurching "gay" Frankenstein that occupies Augusta. This is much bigger than Maine. This will begin the healing of the West.
Since the politicians cannot confront the monster the good people of Maine will have to do it. We've done it many times before. We can, and we must, do it again. We can never stop. Our children and our grandchildren are too important to us.
What we need to do is very simple. The beating heart of the "gay" agenda in law and politics is a phrase -- "sexual orientation." Erasing that phrase from the law will stop the heartbeat.
And that is what we are going to do in the next year and a half. We're going to cast out this demon.
Do you want to assure that your children and grandchildren don't have to wonder whether their body parts are real or not? While the society seems to have completely collapsed into nonsense we know better. As citizens we must continue to believe in, and work for, righteousness and common sense. The darker it gets the brighter the light shines.
It is simple. Many hands make light work. Here is what we must do specifically:
Gather 100,000 signatures before the end of 2015.
Win the vote in the Presidential election in November 2016.
Maine is very special because the people have an uninterrupted and very open path to the ballot. The politicians have no mechanism to stop the vote from happening. Once the signatures are gathered the politicians either approve the proposal (to erase "sexual orientation" in Maine law) or they put it on the ballot.
We also are a small state with relatively inexpensive media markets. And we are leaning in the conservative direction politically. Paul LePage's comfortable victory in last year's voting is the most recent example of this reality.
Very soon I'll open a political action committee called Equal Rights Not Special Rights. This committee will lead the campaign.
Maine people know, especially after watching the foolishness spread over the past couple decades, that the "gays" are only interested in special rights. They are hiding behind the noble idea of equal rights. They are using the government to force normal people to accept their evil.
The effect of this change in the law will be dramatic, real and righteous. Maine people will once again be equal. Citizens who choose to make their bedroom antics a matter of public approval will no longer have a leg up. The government will not be their ally in sin any longer. We will all have equal rights. The first ones in line to sign the petitions will be thinking "gays." They know that privacy in sexual matters is their best protection. Christians and private homosexuals are not enemies. All this public stupidness about marriage and transeverything is really an attack on their liberty.
A reasoning civilization rewards and protects marriage and family formation. It doesn't undermine it. Even freedom loving non-Marxist "gays" know this. They just want to be left alone.
Christianity will never view sex outside of marriage as anything other than sin and evil. The enemies of this idea who are both inside and outside of the Church must be defeated. And the most potent enemy in this war is Satan and his demons. We are aiming our attack at him, as Christians have done for 2,000 years.
We are going to stop this ugly monster dead in his tracks. This is not a fight we will leave to our children. We're going to finish it in 2016.
Call me, or send me an email, if you want to help. 207-620-4371 or mike@mikeheath.net
A friend sent me the flier advertising the ten day "gala." I guess you can learn lots online at www.prideportland.org I'm not proud enough to click through right now. But maybe you are and you can let me know what you learn.
Based on the flyer I have right here I already know that you'll learn that Bangor Savings Bank is proud to be a public sponsor of all things sodomy. And so is Hannaford, the Portland Public Library and the University of Southern Maine. Isn't it delightful to learn of these connections between the services you and your children rely upon and the joys of sex outside of marriage? I just love it.
And so does my Brazilian friend Julio. Here's what he wrote about America's plan for passion (sexualized of course) in the world:
“For Obama, gay rights are priority,” said Randy Berry, U.S. Department of State Special Envoy for the Human Rights of LGBTI Persons, in an interview to Istoé, one of the largest liberal magazines in Brazil.
Berry’s focus, in the interview published in Brazil on June 12, 2015, was on gays as an oppressed class, the classical Marxist and ideological view. Berry believes that his post is secure regardless of whether a Republican or Democrat wins the White House in 2016. His view is that the U.S. is solidly committed to the gay agenda.
He talked also about Russia and Saudi Arabia. He refrained from condemning the Saudi dictatorship, which murders homosexuals. Even though Istoé portrayed Russia in a bad light on the homosexual issue, the only “crime” of Russia is to have a law banning homosexual propaganda to children. Is it a crime to protect children from such propaganda? In my view, no. But in the U.S. government’s view, yes.
The only way for a future conservative U.S. president to prove that there is something conservative left in the U.S. is by appointing a global envoy to encourage nations to ban homosexual propaganda to children. The U.S. has done too much for the homosexual agenda. It is past time for the U.S. to do too much also against this wicked agenda.
What about appointing Scotty Lively as a U.S. Special Envoy for the Human Rights of Children and their Protection against the LGBT Agenda?
The U.S. has been very bold in the use of homosexual propaganda. It is past time for the U.S. to be very bold against this propaganda.
Yet, if Berry is right, the next possible Republican president will do nothing to change the wicked course of homosexual diplomacy by the U.S.
Do you know what? I believe him. Some time ago, John Boehner, the most prominent Republican in the U.S. Congress, said, “We won’t fight gay marriage.” Reportedly, he basically said the Republican Party will no longer stand in the way of gay “marriage.”
Such “beautiful” opposition! Democrats and other socialists advance their socialist evils, and “courteous” Republicans let them go forward.
I believe Berry also because conservative George W. Bush called socialist Bill Clinton his “brother.” How can the gay agenda and other evils be defeated when Republicans and Democrats are brothers who have only ultra-nationalist concerns? Boehner is right: there will be no resistance.
According to Scott Lively, ancient Rabbinical tradition holds that homosexuality, more specifically “homosexual marriage,” was the “final insult” to God which caused Him to bring the Great Flood. What will happen to America now that even her alleged conservative political leaders refuse to fight one of the causes of her destruction?
Here is Berry talking to Istoé about Russia, Saudi Arabia and Republicans.
Istoé: The U.S. has criticized Russia for being so authoritarian with women and homosexuals, but, at the same time, the U.S. keeps close relations to nations as Saudi Arabia, whose acts are worse. Are you uncomfortable about this situation?
Randy Berry: Our display of values and the sharing of our embrace of diversity are consistent. In Brazil, there is a big confluence of visions. Our message does not change when we talk to nations, but, evidently, the talk will be different in Saudi Arabia. The ability to make changes and the approach varies from nation to nation. I do not think that there is an only approach working for any circumstance.
Istoé: Next year, there will be presidential elections in the U.S. If a GOP candidate wins, will your post be threatened?
Randy Berry: No. The issue I am working, against the worst forms of discrimination and violence against homosexuals, is not much controversial. I would describe my work not as bipartisan, but non-partisan. To work with human rights is not a political issue and I do not see a change therein. Because of the next elections, people tend to stress differences, but I do believe that this will not be among the polarizing issues in the U.S.
Yea, really. It's in Proverbs 31. It's one of the attributes of a wife of noble character.
The Proverb actually says that the wife of noble character considers a field and buys it. Paulie couldn't afford a field ... so she shopped for a Keurig, and bought it.
She presented it to me, along with the most wonderful story of discovery, last night. That chapter in the Proverbs ends with, "Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. Honor her for all that her hands have done, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate."
A lifetime of honoring my wife wouldn't be long enough. She is incredible.
A week or so ago I emailed her and suggested that I'd like a Keurig coffeemaker for Father's Day. Without me knowing she went to work. First she determined that she wasn't going to pay a hundred bucks for one. Then she put out the word on Facebook, and on other online forums, that she was on the prowl for one.
I didn't hear the whole story, but I did hear the ending which included a surreptitious rendezvous with a stranger in front of the Post Office in Gardiner yesterday morning. The greedy stranger would not get the best of this noble wife. Paulie negotiated the price of the field, I mean Keurig, down from forty bucks to thirty and got the guy to throw in the pod holder!
As I sip my second cup of Keurig here I salute the writer of the Proverb:
“Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.”
The question being asked these days by the secular community is, are Christians asleep at the wheel? In many demonstrations fueled by societies peeves, whether it is gay rights, abortion activists or a plethora of politically induced campaigns, the involvement from a human perspective borders on a riotous atmosphere numbering in the thousands.
Yet, when it comes to rising up and speaking out on their own beliefs centered by a righteous plumage Christians are far and few between. That doesn’t bode well in a lost and dying world that is only getting darker by the day.
You couldn’t convince the 150 plus Christians that took up refuge at the steps of the Untied States Superior Courthouse in Washington D.C. on Sunday in an effort to shed light on the decadence that is crippling this nation over the argument of same sex marriage.
It's true that a "righteous plumage" set us apart. The group spent three hours at the Court engaging in forms of prayer and action that the Bible describes many times. For example, it is not uncommon for Christians to assume postures that speak of humility. Lying prostrate is one example.
I threatened to do it just over ten years ago, in 2004.
I wonder if it's time.
Maybe it's past time.
After reading the book "Homosexuality: Good and Right in the Eyes of God?" by Earle Fox I decided voters in Maine needed to know the marriage status of their rulers. I sent out an email back then declaring my intent. I wanted to create a website on which I would publish the marriage status, especially the sexual orientation, of people in the State House.
The charred embers from that firestorm are visible today. Maine went on to enact the "gay" agenda through public voting. It wasn't the judges or the politicians that did it in Maine. It was a majority of the citizenry that voted in 2005 and 2012. And the political lessons that "gay" activists learned in Maine are being used globally.
Evangelicals (aligned with the Christian Civic League of Maine) in the pine tree state decided in the early 1990s to force "gay" issues to the ballot box. We reasoned that institutions and the state house were already lost. We determined that our only hope lay in appealing to the people.
Unfortunately, Obama’s strategy has worked and Russia has been forced from its former trajectory toward global cooperation with the west into an increasingly adversarial posture as Obama and the GOP Establishment Neo-Cons (united by perversion) continue to portray Russia as a pariah state while simultaneously attempting “regime change“ within its borders.
Scott argues that Obama and neo-conservatives are pushing Russia away from the West and into a strengthening alliance with the East -- China. He laments this development and believes that more cooperation between Russia and the West would lead the world in a positive direction on family formation and morality.
Russia has reacted to the LGBT agenda in recent years more strongly than western nations. For example, Putin's Russia created a law making it illegal to propagandize children about homosexuality.
The 2004 Honda Accord sedan that my wife and I drive was compromised by a couple annoying issues. One of the issues was a non-functioning cruise control. Another was an intermittent radio. It worked sometimes, and didn't work other times.
I spent $150 to find out that the cruise control problem was a broken throttle body connector. The Honda garage specifically described the problem and recommended putting in a new throttle body. $700. That seemed extreme to me, since they described the problem as a broken connector between the cruise control cable and the throttle body.
Reasoning that it was a mechanical problem, and knowing that my wife's brother is a genius with mechanical issues, I gave him a call. He offered to take a look at it Saturday morning at 9.
George Jr. is an INDEPENDENT trucker, like his father. They were partners in business until dad, George Sr., died a couple years ago. While Jr. understandably took the passing of his father harder than some in the family, he bounced back quickly. And like the man he was raised to be he kept right on truckin.
I spent the days leading up to Saturday morning looking forward to being with Jr. I love to watch him work on cars. He is good at it. But more important to me -- and the part I enjoy the most -- he is passionate about it. Over a lifetime he's been granted the blessing of being able to accumulate the tools he needs to get the job done. This is a singular accomplishment because tools aren't cheap and INDEPENDENT truckin doesn't leave much disposable income.
Well, Jr. went to work on the car right at 9 am. Within minutes he had unscrewed, pulled, twisted, dismantled, lighted and wrenched his way to the precise 1/4 inch wide spot on the throttle body that was the cause of the problem. The top part of an embedded plastic fastener that secured the cable to the throttle body was no longer there. Hence the cable was detaching from the throttle.
As I anticipated he would Jr. literally twisted his way, using his hardened dirty hands, to a brilliant and simple solution using a wire tie. Failing to discover a way to use a wire tie he hit upon the idea of using a tool I'd never seen before to bore a groove into the remaining plastic. Reasoning that the groove and tension from the throttle body spring could be relied upon to secure the cable he put his tool to work.
He was done with the fix in one hour. I was $700 richer. Jr. had fed his passion. His hands were dirty. And that was only the beginning.
As he was withdrawing from his workplace deep under the hood he noticed corrosion on the battery terminals. He unbolted the battery cables and cleaned the battery posts.
Now the radio works.
I love Mike Rowe's work. For many years he traveled America and spent time yucking it up with guys like George Jr. He brought along a camera crew who filmed him working and bantering with the men and women who literally keep America running. He called his show "Dirty Jobs."
Men like Jr. don't get the respect they deserve anymore because of people like Wendy Chapkis. She spends her days indoctrinating our youth at the University of Southern Maine. She is one weird dudette, or whatever. She gets more respect from our society mostly because she has letters behind her name instead of dirt under her fingernails.
In a youtube promoting the University Chapkis whines about how some people in America are judgmental about her mustache. I think Wendy is a woman, but it's hard to tell. She proudly sports a blonde mustache. Her official title at our taxpayer funded University is "Professor of Sociology and Director of Women and Gender Studies."
You and Jr. pay her salary. You pay her to "teach" impressionable youth.
Chapkis and her ilk are quite literally -- like a demon does -- possessing America with their wicked ideology. They must be cast out.
We will know we are on a healthy trajectory as a society when the chattering class starts honoring men like Jr. and firing idiots like Wendy Chapkis.
To cleanse your spirit forget Wendy's insanity and take a moment to meditate on this image of Jr's impressive man cave.
And withal they learn to be idle, wandering about from house to house; and not only idle, but tattlers also and busybodies, speaking things which they ought not. -- 1 Timothy 5:13
I've been thinking about Barnabus lately. He is mentioned in the Bible in the book of Acts. He reaches out and assists others.
In an online article titled "Barnabus: An Encouraging Early Church Leader" Robin Gallaher Branch observes, "Often these other individuals and groups are believers in Jesus who, for whatever reason, run a bit against the grain of mainstream thought and action. Instead of ostracizing them, Barnabas not only deliberately encounters them, but also listens to them and welcomes them warmly." Gallaher specifically mentions Paul the Apostle and John Mark as men he helped.
Paulie and I named our ministry "Helping Hands Ministries." We have always aspired to be like Barnabus. It is gratifying work.
I am loathe to write about those details here. I will not repeat everything Peter reveals in his excellent article. I do want to quote the warning at the top of his article:
Some stories about the homosexual movement are so grotesquely perverse that they are difficult to report. This article by necessity describes some deeply disturbing sexual “fetishes” involving homosexual adult sadistic sex with children and teenagers–and vile, unnatural acts like “fisting” practiced for decades by by sadomasochistic homosexual “leathermen.” One book cover below contains an obscenity, another a highly offensive image. Keep in mind that the “Leather Archives & Museum” in Chicago that houses and celebrates these depraved works is located in the middle of a residential neighborhood within a short distance of three public schools and a day-care center.
He then includes a quote from Romans:
“[S]landerers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil….”
One of the greatest evils of our time is the willful ignorance of Christians, especially Christian leadership. Some, perhaps many, will not take the time to truly inform themselves about this "museum." They will, instead, glance down through the article and sensing the grotesque nature of the content refuse to truly understand Peter's work. We turn away from the detail. This is somewhat understandable. But in a day when it is only a matter of time before the Supreme Court upends marriage don't you think we have a duty to understand?
This willful ignorance is destroying us.
This ignorance enables "professionals" like University of Southern Maine professor Wendy Chapkis to spin these perversions into allegedly benign private and personal sexual practices. Peter highlights Chapkis in the article. She wrote the introduction to one of the books Peter purchased in the "museum." The book is titled "Macho Sluts." Peter writes:
This book of lesbian S&M fantasies is the twisted creation of prolific, self-styled “sex-radical pornographer” and BDSM enthusiast Pat Califia, who became “Patrick Califia” after becoming a “transman” (female-to-male transsexual). “Macho Sluts” intentionally pushes the envelope to promote sadomasochism of the sort practiced by homosexual “leathermen” to lesbians. In one story of the book, “The Finishing School,” a mother in her “early forties” sexually tortures and beats her pubescent daughter, Clarissa, who, it turns out, is also her sex slave. The mother, Berenice, shackles up her daughter for a BDSM scene and berates her, as is the practice of sadistic “masters” humiliating their “slaves.” After being manipulated by various means into a state of sexual excitement, Clarissa begs to be manually penetrated by her mother. Instead Berenice beats her child’s bottom with a yellow cane to the point of causing welts and bleeding – which, in this wicked tale, makes Clarissa proud and happy. The sadistic mom also is the dominant “master” over her sister Elise (Clarissa’s aunt), another love “slave.”
An introduction celebrating the salacious “Macho Sluts” is written by University of Southern Maine professor Wendy Chapkis (USM page HERE). ”Nowhere in this collection does anyone sacrifice their own pleasure for another,” writes Chapkis. Indeed. The professor writes that she could “barely get through” “The Finishing School”– not because of the pedophilic, incestuous exploitation and child molestation in the story – she is no prude! – but because of “my preference for sci-fi over Victorian school-girl fantasies.”
Peter concludes:
For such grotesquely reckless judgment in championing Califia’s book with its pedophile porn, this professor should not be allowed to work among young adults or children.
We must conquer our fear of these forces in our society. These evil ideas are concentrated in the rich, supposedly educated, sectors of our society. Christians should be immune to the lure of riches and a lust for knowledge.
Paul the Apostle writes of Christianity in his first letter to the Corinthians:
For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel—not with wisdom and eloquence, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power.
For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:
“I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.” 1 Corinthians 1:17-31 NIV
Peter LaBarbera may be the most ridiculed man on the planet when it comes to this issue. The "gay" movement has even coined a pet name for him. They hatefully refer to him as "Porno Pete." They accuse Peter of doing this important journalistic work because he secretly approves of these vile practices. With a gentleman's bow in their direction Peter closes his article:
*The writer went as a pro-family reporter and as a critic – and has zero prurient interest in anything homosexual or BDSM, contrary to the vicious assertions of homosexual activists trying to “kill the messenger.”
Well done thou good and faithful servant. It is an honor to continue offering a helping hand!
Lingering in the back of my mind is the power of the invisible hand on the switch, so to speak, that can shut off access to this website in an instant. As the world moves increasingly to communications via electronic means it becomes easier for interests that control platforms like this one to simply turn off speech and ideas with which they disagree. Google owns this platform -- blogger. They are a private business. They have the right to just switch me off.
Writers like me assuage our fears that such draconian measures would emerge by imagining that we live in a free country. We tell ourselves that this means everybody has the right to speak freely. For now it feels like this is still true. But things are changing in the western world.
As the US Supreme Court prepares to issue it's declaration on faux marriage later this month the view from the north is not encouraging. Canada is further down the road than US.
I want to warn America to expect severe erosion of First Amendment freedoms if the US Supreme Court mandates same-sex marriage. The consequences have played out in Canada for ten years now, and they are truly Orwellian in nature and scope.
Here is the truly chilling section of Dawn's article:
In Canada, it is considered discriminatory to say that marriage is between a man and a woman or that every child should know and be raised by his or her biological married parents. It is not just politically incorrect in Canada to say so; you can be saddled with tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees, fined, and forced to take sensitivity training.
Anyone who is offended by something you have said or written can make a complaint to the Human Rights Commissions and Tribunals. In Canada, these organizations police speech, penalizing citizens for any expression deemed in opposition to particular sexual behaviors or protected groups identified under “sexual orientation.” It takes only one complaint against a person to be brought before the tribunal, costing the defendant tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees. The commissions have the power to enter private residences and remove all items pertinent to their investigations, checking for hate speech.
The plaintiff making the complaint has his legal fees completely paid for by the government. Not so the defendant. Even if the defendant is found innocent, he cannot recover his legal costs. If he is found guilty, he must pay fines to the person(s) who brought forth the complaint.
If your beliefs, values, and political opinions are different from the state’s, you risk losing your professional license, job, or business, and even your children. (Bolding mine)
And since you may not know anything about Dawn here is the opening to her article establishing her bona fides:
I am one of six adult children of gay parents who recently filed amicus briefs with the US Supreme Court, asking the Court to respect the authority of citizens to keep the original definition of marriage: a union between one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others, so that children may know and may be raised by their biological parents. I also live in Canada, where same-sex marriage was federally mandated in 2005.
I am the daughter of a gay father who died of AIDS. I described my experiences in my book: Out From Under: The Impact of Homosexual Parenting. Over fifty adult children who were raised by LGBT parents have communicated with me and share my concerns about same-sex marriage and parenting. Many of us struggle with our own sexuality and sense of gender because of the influences in our household environments growing up.
Even if the Supreme Court of the United States doesn't destroy civil marriage later this month we all know it is only a matter of time. Politics and law FOLLOW culture, they don't lead it. And all the hints from American culture point toward a quickening -- not slowing -- descent into madness.
And make no mistake, even the best people don't get it. Most people I know have resigned themselves to the reality of this vicious tyranny that is literally destroying their own families. They have decided not to go against city hall, even though they admit to me privately that city hall is very wrong on this one.
Maine evangelicals and lay Catholics (very few of them) took a stand against this demon until just recently. Now it feels to me that the possession of Maine is pretty much established.
The Christian Civic League has been tamed by political forces under the dome. They were the last institution to slip into the bridle. The grassroots that carried the torch during the years I led the fight switched loyalties. They decided to follow a leadership that has more confidence in Paul LePage Republicanism than I would ever have allowed myself.
I rest my hope and confidence in God and I look for leadership that is willing to call a spade a spade. The words of Jesus convicted me this week. I read them out loud as part of the spiritual preparation I have submitted myself to as I anticipate joining with other Christians on June 14th on the steps of the Supreme Court in Washington D.C. Here are the words of Jesus from Eugene Peterson's Message paraphrase of the Bible. This is from Chapter 7 of the gospel of Matthew:
Don't look for shortcuts to God. The market is flooded with surefire, easygoing formulas for a successful life that can be practiced in your spare time. Don't fall for that stuff, even though crowds of people do. The way to life—to God!—is vigorous and requires total attention.
Be wary of false preachers who smile a lot, dripping with practiced sincerity. Chances are they are out to rip you off some way or other. Don't be impressed with charisma; look for character. Who preachers are is the main thing, not what they say. A genuine leader will never exploit your emotions or your pocketbook. These diseased trees with their bad apples are going to be chopped down and burned.
Knowing the correct password—saying 'Master, Master,' for instance—isn't going to get you anywhere with me. What is required is serious obedience—doing what my Father wills. I can see it now—at the Final Judgment thousands strutting up to me and saying, 'Master, we preached the Message, we bashed the demons, our God-sponsored projects had everyone talking.' And do you know what I am going to say? 'You missed the boat. All you did was use me to make yourselves important. You don't impress me one bit. You're out of here.'
Following Jesus is not at all like building a big following for a website, church, organization or business. Living the gospel can often be about standing alone. Suffering. Poverty.
Those are the qualities of saints and prophets.
Ron Stauble admiring the Chariot of Fire.
People like my good friend and hero Ron Stauble, a retired bus driver.
My tent making work is driving a van for a local non-profit called KVCAP. I transport people to programs and doctor's appointments in what I call the "Chariot of Fire." Pictured above, it is the only van in the Augusta fleet that is red. The rest of the fleet is white.
Yesterday I saw Ron after I dropped a client off at his doctor's office. I had a few minutes on my way to the next ride. Ron was dutifully and joyously performing his Thursday morning ritual of displaying victim images of aborted babies (one is pictured in the center of the snapshot) in front of the capitol city's murder center.
Ironically, Ron was unjustly fired many years ago by a virulent pro-abortion and anti-Christian leader of KVCAP after five years of spotless driving. The agency even tried to deny him unemployment. He challenged them in court. The agency admitted to the judge that the source of the complaint against him was the democratic party. The disgusted judge ruled in Ron's favor and granted him unemployment.
I assure you I mean no disloyalty to my employer in publishing this article. I am thankful for the job. And like any job one obtains in a radically compromised society I see both good and bad in the principles, practices and policies that govern the operation. I am thankful that the leadership does not today appear to be so aggressive against Christian pro lifers.
The source of a Christian's joy isn't the approval of KVCAP, the Canadian Government or Google. A Christian will be full of joy in prison, or under the most extreme forms of deprivation, because they have placed their confidence in God alone.
The writer of Hebrews in the New Testament discusses this by naming heroes of the faith and concludes:
I could go on and on, but I've run out of time. There are so many more—Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, the prophets ...Through acts of faith, they toppled kingdoms, made justice work, took the promises for themselves. They were protected from lions, fires, and sword thrusts, turned disadvantage to advantage, won battles, routed alien armies. Women received their loved ones back from the dead. There were those who, under torture, refused to give in and go free, preferring something better: resurrection. Others braved abuse and whips, and, yes, chains and dungeons. We have stories of those who were stoned, sawed in two, murdered in cold blood; stories of vagrants wandering the earth in animal skins, homeless, friendless, powerless— the world didn't deserve them!—making their way as best they could on the cruel edges of the world. Not one of these people, even though their lives of faith were exemplary, got their hands on what was promised. God had a better plan for us: that their faith and our faith would come together to make one completed whole, their lives of faith not complete apart from ours. -- Hebrews 11 from The Message
In 2012 God gave me one of the greatest gifts ever. I was granted the opportunity to drive a Truth Truck for the Center for Bioethical Reform. I did so in Virginia, mostly around Washington D.C. and Norfolk.
I consider this one of the greatest gifts ever because Christians have turned away from so many facts that are staring them in the face. I have been as guilty as the next Christian.
God said that He knows us when we are in the womb. Innocent human life is especially precious to Him. And there is no stage in our human existence when we are more innocent, or vulnerable, than when we are developing in our mother's womb.
Nothing I've ever seen challenges the death culture surrounding abortion more effectively than images of aborted babies in full color. All Christians should support the presentation of these images to the public. The lame stream media's suppression of these victim images is an indictment of those who rule over us.
Rolley Haggard gets this. Rolley is a Christian writer. I met him and his wife while driving the Truth Truck. They traveled up from their home in South Carolina. I trained them, and spent a week with them, presenting the images emblazoned on the sides of two large trucks to motorists in Virginia Beach.
It is a dangerous thing to presume upon the grace of God and say, before deliberately sinning, “God will forgive." Even if I am a genuine Christian, I am almost certainly going to be plagued, perhaps for the rest of my life, with unshakable feelings of guilt and doubt as to whether my repentance and faith was real and whether I am, indeed, a genuine Christian.
American Christians are addicted to the idea of cheap grace. How else do we explain what is staring us in the face.
In a few short weeks our Supreme Court will presume to decide on marriage. They take up this presumption at the behest of the perversion movement. Christians allowed this to happen. We enabled our rulers to do this.
I am convinced that one of the most powerful forces at work in this collapse into unreason is what Rolley points out in his excellent article. It is the choice we have made to live our 80 years believing God will forgive us. His grace and mercy trump his righteousness and judgment every sin (time).
During the cold war, I believe there were millions of confused people believing that it was the Russian nation and people we were supposed to oppose, not communism. Or rather, many felt that communism came with being Russian, just as freedom comes with being American.
Americans who tenaciously stick to this suspicious attitude toward all things Russian either no longer recognize communism when they see it or they aren’t afraid of living in a totalitarian state as long as it is orderly and they have enough to eat and as long as their keepers have Anglo-Saxon names and call themselves Christians on the campaign trail.
The truth is, what has happened in recent decades is an almost complete role reversal in terms of communist totalitarianism.
At the risk of oversimplifying, I think that essentially, Russia is becoming America and the West is becoming the Soviet Union.
This shift away from common sense and toward totalitarianism is seen most clearly on the sodomy issue. Russia has even produced a one hour documentary on the subject aptly titled "Sodomy." The video used to be available on youtube. I cannot find the video on youtube now. I watched it when it was available. It is an excellent consideration of the issue that features Scott Lively.
Screen grab of missing video
A DVD copy of the video was taken from Peter LaBarbera in Canada. It was considered "hate propaganda" and sent to the "Prohibited Importation Unit" of the Canadian government.
Peter's website still has an article up about the seizure that features a youtube frame. The youtube message that comes up upon a click on the frame says "This video has been removed by the user."
Youtube is owned by Google, an American corporation. Google is boldly pro-homosexual.
God's willingness to forgive is never in doubt. But His forgiveness is always predicated upon the genuineness of our repentance. And the genuineness of our repentance is severely suspect if, before we go through with it, we can say in our heart, “I know it's wrong, but since God is going to forgive me anyway, I'm going to go ahead and do it.”
Those who say such things aren't looking for grace, but for permission to sin. They assuredly will not receive the latter, and it is fearfully doubtful they will receive the former, either. Not because God is unwilling to give it, but because they clearly aren't seeking it.
The Supreme Court's decision on marriage may be just one more bit of evidence that America has no interest in seeking either repentance or common sense.
The mighty ramparts of Castle Media are toppling. It won't be long before the daily newspaper is just another discarded object in the dust bin of history. Facebook and the internet will replace it.
I'm thrilled.
Daily newspapers are megaphones for the Left. Socialist politician Chellie Pingree ran southern Maine's paper through her husband -- super-rich communist Donald Sussman -- until this year. Sussman dumped the Portland Press Herald, Kennebec Journal and Waterville Sentinel in another fire sale this month.
I never got addicted to newspapers or television news. I paid a bit of attention to them before the internet came along. But after the internet showed up I stopped paying attention. Now I could care less what they choose to print. I figure if the lame stream media is paying attention to it then probably the item came from the pool of information I label "All the news that isn't fit to print" (sort of apologies to the New York Times).
There are few institutions in our society today that offend me more than the TSA. The American public's nearly gleeful submission to their "pat downs" always makes me want to puke when I'm forced through their procedures at airports.
Seriously folks. Just this one aspect of air travel makes me want to avoid flying, it is so demeaning and evil.
And yesterday came news about how truly silly the whole thing is. Jim Kouri reports in a story headlined "BILLIONS OF TAXPAYERS' MONEY SPENT ON BOGUS AIRPORT SECURITY: NEW REPORT":
Undercover investigators working as part of "Red Teams" -- groups charged with testing security vulnerabilities -- were overwhelmingly successful in breaching airport security with fake explosives and banned weapons, according to reports released on Monday. The undercover agents were able to compromise Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checkpoints, in an investigation that revealed a massive, system-wide security failure at America's airports.
I grew up in Maryland nearly a half century ago now. There were black people in the schools I attended. I didn't get to know any of them. It isn't because I didn't want to get to know any of them. They grouped together and I remember feeling hostility from them. I didn't feel anything much toward them -- neither hostility or appreciation.
I do remember admiring their skill as members of the football team. I was in the band.
Bruce Jenner is nuts. He's obviously deranged. His personal madness, however, is nothing compared to what this story signifies about our society.
I have lived, as a "professional Christian," what I imagine it must feel like in the early stages of a demonic possession. In 2013 I wrote the following:
I started fighting the “gay” movement in the late 1980s here in Maine.
The Christian Civic League of Maine — the group I led from 1994 to 2009 — decided in the late 1980’s that the “gay” push would succeed in Maine’s legislature.
During the twenty five years that I committed myself to the fight, the devil never quit advancing on every front open to him.
My board of directors decided, as a political matter, that we had a better chance of winning if we could take the issues to the people in statewide referendums, bypassing the legislature. We argued the matter successfully in statewide voting from 1990 until 2005, prevailing in many single issue contests.
However, our victories came at great cost to the small evangelical movement in Maine. After years of faithful and sacrificial political work gathering signatures, distributing literature, and making phone calls, the resistance collapsed and the homosexual movement succeeded in enacting much of their agenda.
While individuals within the Republican Party and Roman Catholic Church fought nobly, the institutions themselves never fully dedicated themselves to the fight. Only one institution did so: The Christian Civic League of Maine.
Leaders of evangelical churches started finding every excuse they could to distance themselves from this fight in 2002, after we won our second statewide vote on the issue. Even though we prevailed in that contest the price that church leadership was being forced to pay by a softening “electorate” in the pews was starting to weaken the resolve of the League.
Now, there is barely any resistance left in Maine. The League lost many of its dedicated fighters, and the homosexual lobby — which completely controls the State House — is focusing its attack on Maine’s public schools.
Culture is more powerful than politics. Christianity surrendered the culture a long time ago.
It was only a matter of time before politics would collapse into unreason.
And, make no mistake, all sex outside of marriage is unreasonable as a political matter. Societies that create and uphold sacred rules governing sexual activity succeed and prosper. Societies weaken and collapse if they don’t.
I feel to the marrow of my bones the collapse of reason in the nation I was raised to love more than life itself (that's called patriotism), and it makes me numb. A friend describes this feeling as snake venom. We are all being forced to confront in our hearts and minds the effect of a poisonous infusion.
Jesus Christ is the antidote. America needs an exorcism.
I preached on Sunday. I opened with a quote by President Theodore Roosevelt. He said, "We cannot rise to any true level of greatness, unless that greatness is based on a high and brave type of spiritual
life."
Courage is often measured by our capacity to choose suffering over security, safety and all money's promises. Jesus observed that you cannot serve both God and money.
MassResistance pointed out in a recent analysis of Ireland's collapse into sexual deviance, "The LGBT movement's biggest triumph has been their ability to cut off the money supply to frontline pro-family groups. The millionaires and billionaires ostensibly on our side could easily donate many times the money necessary to fight this effectively. But they have virtually all become emasculated by fear of the 'gay mafia'. It’s quite pathetic to see, and it has had terrible consequences. So we need to create new methods of funding. Average people are becoming more important than ever."
I experienced this firsthand.
During all the years I led this fight in Maine I had only two reliable donors who could be counted on for gifts of ten thousand dollars or more.
Two.
Nothing I said or did over three decades of very publicly ministering for common sense on sexuality and morality caused another stable funding source to emerge. And I never experienced a reliable year-over-year rise in support from what MassResistance calls "average people."
The support from regular folk stayed steady until 2009 when I resigned. I don't know what the support looks like at the Christian Civic League today. I do know that their work has been republicanized. They take their marching orders from Maine's Republican Governor.
If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me. If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin. He that hateth me hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father. But this cometh to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that is written in their law, They hated me without a cause.
A christianity that has no capacity to suffer for truth telling isn't Christian. Persecution is the mother's milk of Christianity. The symbol of our faith isn't a sword. The cross is at the heart of what we preach and live.
Pastors will be increasingly pressured by out-of-control courts to preach only part of the Word; some will stand before the courts of the nation as a result. However, this will wake up the church to her finest days as she finds her voice in the governmental arena once again.
Threats from all types of radical extremist groups will be posed against Christian leaders, resulting in a shifting and sifting of hearts as some will compromise to avoid persecution.
Those who do not compromise, though, will find their churches aflame with the power of the Holy Spirit as the new "not ashamed" generation of millennials takes the field.
Colleges and universities will experience major moves of God. Even now, we are in the beginning stages of the next Great Awakening. Prayer is being mobilized on college campuses, and young revivalists are preaching across the land.
God does not reveal these things to cause us fear or discouragement; rather, He invites us to partner with Him as He fulfills His purpose for our nation. Let the warnings move you to pray, and let the promises move you to hope.
In 2005 Maine voted for the gazillionith time on sodomy. I experienced the softening of our strategy that year. A program called "Love Won Out" gained prominence in evangelicalism's political resistance. I found their message to be nauseating it was so devoid of any notion of God's justice and truth.
In a few short years that movement collapsed as Exodus International was forced to close.
I am proud of my wife, Paulie. She started young loving Jesus. She gave her heart to Him when she was seven years old. Her mother guided her to the foot of the cross. And there she has remained.
Paulie's most recent song is titled Of the Father's Love Begotten. It is an ancient hymn that she discovered. She appreciated the words, and worked with Peter Vantine to create an original arrangement.
The hymn is a christmas carol that is based on a poem written by the roman writer Aurelius Prudentius. He lived in the latter half of the third century AD. After practicing law he retired to an ascetic life.
According to wikipedia his poetry is "influenced by early Christian authors, such as Tertullian and St. Ambrose, as well as the Bible and the acts of the martyrs."
While all the verses of the hymn are worthy of thought and meditation, this stanza tickled my fancy this morning.
Righteous judge of souls departed, righteous King of them that live,
On the Father’s throne exalted none in might with Thee may strive;
Who at last in vengeance coming
Sinners from Thy face shalt drive, evermore and evermore!
It is comforting to realize that Christians have a King. He is our loving heavenly Father. And He has a son. His name is Jesus Christ. And these sent the third person of the trinity to dwell within us. He is the Holy Spirit who empowers us.
We don't elect this King. He existed before elections, republics and nations. As Prudentius observes, "On the Father's throne exalted none in might with Thee may strive."
America imagines that, in her might, she can prevail over this King, over God. But our power is nothing. It is not a matter of winning or losing. It isn't even possible to strive with this King. This fight with God, this attempt to redefine marriage, is a figment of our imagination. God isn't even fighting.
None in might with Thee may strive.
And the answer to the oft-repeated question by all people of good will who ponder the trajectory of "gay" rights -- "What's next?" -- is:
Who at last in vengeance coming
Sinners from Thy face shalt drive, evermore and evermore!
