Wisconsin Leads The USA

Wow ! I never thought I would say that because I live in Minnesota, but the truth is the truth.
The Wisconsin Senate passed three bills through the Senate that were distinctly pro-life.
I am quoting Breaking Christian News on this.

1. A bill requiring doctors to tell women seeking abortions after more than 20 weeks that their fetuses will be able to feel pain during the procedure was approved 21-11.

2. A bill that would force public schools to teach that abstinence from sex as "the preferred choice of behavior" for unmarried people was approved 24-9. The bill also requires that schools would have to devote more time to abstinence than birth control.

3. A bill allowing health care workers to refuse to participate in stem cell research or withdrawing a person's feeding tube if they feel the procedures may violate their religion was approved 21-12. It would also protect workers who abstain from abortions, sterilization and assisted suicide.

Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle says he will veto the first and third bills but is still undecided on the bill requiring schools to teach abstinence as the preferred choice of behavior.

This "spoiler" role of Jim Doyle will cost him a lot of support. (Except in Madison) These three things are just the tip of the iceberg in what American grass roots wants from government in the way of sanity.

Sometimes I do feel like the whole world has gone insane. In a "domestic partners" escalation in the Netherlands, a man has been allowed to marry two women. In Texas, a boyfriend stomped the stomach of his pregnant girlfriend. At her request. And the list goes on and on. Madness!

You can read more about the Wisconsin story here.

89th Christian Carnival

The 89th Christian Carnival is up at In The Spirit of Grace. Stop by and look at all of the new posts concerning Christian thought from the last week. Here is the link.

Money and Birth Control / Abortion

40 out of the 42 countries and territories in Europe have declining birth rates. Their birth rates are below replacement levels. This is a stunning fact when you realize that these are some of the richest countries on the earth. The excuse of "we cannot afford children" simply does not work.

France has started offering women the equivalent of $916 per month for a year if they will just have a third child. 65 countries now have birth rates below replacement levels. As a matter of fact, the number one predictor of birth rates is the secularization of the country. The more secular ( non-religious ) a country is, the lower the birth rate.

If this subject interests you, you can read more about it here.

Societies worse off 'when they have God on their side'

Here is a disturbing post. This social scientist is either a spin master or else he started with bad assumptions and came to a bad conclusion, but the "facts" speak darkly any way you look at it.
I think it is because of the "curse of the law." People in the US are busy either fighting or serving the law instead of resting in God's grace and allowing His Holy Spirit to sanctify them.
That is, if we can trust this guys data.

You can look at the post here.

Soldiers Spooked by New Orleans Spirits

Here is a news video clip about the soldiers who got spooked by spirits down in New Orleans.
I still had not seen a clip and so I figured some of you hadn't either. I am posting it here

Evolution: Belief Posing As Theory

I just read an article in Live Science. com titled "intelligent Design: Belief Posing as Theory"
It serves only to make me angry. I could write an article and title it "Evolution: Belief Posing as Theory" and be absolutely and factually right.

I am not a scientist but I have studied science all of my life. I am unconvinced. If evolution is more than a belief then it has not made its case. Instead, what I have seen is speculation, bad science, imaginative artistry, and even criminal fraud. Whenever these things are pointed out it seems that the facts are tortured by the evolutionists until they confess what the evolutionists want them to say.

If evolution is so solidly fact... why not get the evidence out there ? Am I too dumb to understand? Should I be pitied ? Just give me the facts. Prove your case. You cannot. You lie, defraud, twist and defend your positions in academics like a child caught with his hand in the cookie jar. If evolution is anything more than belief prove it. Make it simple for dumb people like me. But don't lie. Just the facts please.

There is no fossil evidence of species change into another species. Species change, yes, but not into another species. You have only imaginative artistic renderings of the evolution of horses, embryos, apes. They are founded on speculation. Entire species of humans are constructed out of small chips of bone and rendered to look like apes. Rocks are dated by bones and bones are dated by rocks. Seems a little circular. Especially when there are many cases of fossils that protrude through many millions of years of sedentary layers. I guess they must have just been treated with powerful preservatives?

Ideas have consequences. I think it went like this. First we believed in a creator. Then some anti God atheists took over science through mockery and intimidation. Now there is tyranny in the halls of academia. Stand back and take a look. Pull back and get the broad perspective mister specialist. God is laughing. (Ps. 2)

I saw a special on public TV. It showed how a man proposed a catastrophic and overnight creation of the "scablands" of the upper West via an ice dam and a huge lake that it formed. He was mocked and scorned for this theory until he was in his 80's . Now it is accepted fact.

Huge canyons were formed. Mammoth geologic features were caused by this flood, overnight.
Now it is accepted as fact. But they still insist that the Grand Canyon, a similar feature, happened through the erosion of the Colorado River over millions of years. They refuse to allow books showing alternate theories to be sold in the National Park bookstore. It is simply intellectual tyranny by intellectual elites who don't believe in God.

Makes me mad enough to spit.

Nasty Staph Infections Kill Quickly

One of the most deadly infections seems to be growing in occurrence. New drug resistant strains of Staph infections are killing young children quickly. Before antibiotics can affect a comeback.
These new staph strains have mutated and picked up genes that make them able to avoid most of the drugs that are available to treat them. This is a disturbing trend.

I once visited a man in the Chicago area who had, what was then known as, the "flesh eating bacteria." I must say, even though I believe and have seen many healings, it was a very intimidating time. We were robed, gloved, and masked, but to go in and lay hands on this person and pray required an extra dose of faith. He had acquired the staph infection when he cut himself on a piece of metal while doing a roofing job. He did recover but is one of only a few at that time that ever did recover. I believe he was the first in the Chicago area.

For a time, these sort of infections only were acquired in a hospital setting. The constant use of antibacterial soaps and cleaning supplies has bred a new generation of drug resistant staph. Now these infections are beginning to be often found outside of the hospital setting and in the general population. Children seem to be the ones who acquire these infections during their play. Often they are dead within days.

Staph bacteria are the ones that cause pimples or boils and normal wound infections. They are found almost everywhere and are very common on the skin and in the nose. This trend towards staph that are resistant to antibiotics and capable of great toxicity is very disturbing.

You can read the University of Chicago article here.

The Big Four

OK, I know that these things are open to arguments but....
The four largest universities in the nation are (in order)
Ohio, Minnesota, Arizona, Texas.
If we Minnesotans would just forsake birth control and
abortion we could be number ONE in just 19 years.
Think about it... NUMBER ONE !

New U of MN Stadium To Cost More Than Thought...Can You Imagine That !

The new football stadium at the U of MN will not be a reality until 2009 ( or later if things run like they usually do ) and it will cost about 13 million more than thought. (Isn't that shocking?)

You know, I think I would fall out of my chair if they ever said it would cost LESS than expected and will be done BEFORE the scheduled date. So much BS should make the soil around the new stadium very fertile.

I wonder how much this new rise in costs is related to the cost of acquiring the land from the railroad ? I understand the U is threatening to use "eminent domain." But wait a minute, isn't that new Supreme Court ruling only for taking the property of normal citizens? Isn't big business exempt? Or was that just my imagination ?

Oh, I just read the rest of the article in the Minneapolis (Red) Star-Tribune. Of course it is the Republicans that have caused the delay and increase. You know, those guys cause trouble all the time. I know it is true because I read it in the newspaper.

Female Asian Increase In MN Universities

In 1996 there were 4,050 Asian American women enrolled in the Minnesota public and private colleges and universities. In 2003 the number was 6,042. This is a 50% increase. The increase is mostly seen amongst the Hmong women in Minnesota. Read about it here in the Pioneer Press.

88th Christian Carnival

The 88th Christian Carnival is up and running. Jeff has done a great job of entertaining us as we look through the different lights of Christian thought. You can look at it here.

Tornado ? Or Straight Line Winds ?

Six blocks from our house a man died when trying to dodge from his car into his house as a storm climaxed last night. A tree fell on his head and killed him instantly. How quick and fragile life is. It is like the grass. Here one day and then dried up and gone the next.

My daughter and son-in-law lost at least 2 big trees in their yard and had the screens blown out on their screened in porch but, like myself, were saved from the worse that the storm brought. Others had their houses and cars crushed by falling trees.

Last night the power was out and all of the neighborhood was totally dark. It was spooky. I thought of all the people in New Orleans who's neighborhoods are still like this and even worse. The night the storm came through they sat there in the total dark searching for flashlights that would soon be drained of power but they suffered even more than this. Houses floated off of their foundations and thus broke their gas mains. They were surrounded by 10 feet of water and were forced to their rooftops and upper stories if they had them. The rain and wind didn't just last a couple of hours but went on non-stop for over 16 hours. Electric lines were down everywhere and might not be back up for a month yet. Ours should be all back up by Saturday.

We are blessed. But we are also warned. It is easy for God to lift His hand of protection from our lives. We live by His grace.

Boxes Of Vomit For The Mayor

In a parallel story to the one I wrote yesterday about the freeloaders around the Harbor Light Mission and the Target Center, I am adding this one today. It seems residents of the neighborhoods around the University of Minnesota are thinking about gathering up some of the vomit that appears like manna each morning on their lawns and sidewalks and boxing it up and sending it to the Mayor. There is a lot of drinking that is going on around here.

Along with the drinking is the increased robbery/burglary and car break-ins. Crime is really up in the university neighborhoods. And not just soft crime. It is just a matter of time before someone gets hurt because weapons are being used in many of the incidents.

I have been on university campuses now since 1962. I have never seen the "homeless" (freeloader) population so high. Again, I think this increase in crime and drunkenness is related not just to the student population. It is the freeloaders who have invaded. Yes, kids will drink. And especially at the beginning of the school year. This is historically accurate. But there is something else added to the mix. Now there are experienced, jaded, street people who are begging money in the daytime and drinking until they vomit at night.

They drink from the outdoor faucets of the homes, urinate in the flower beds, and watch for any open window or door. They are bold, arrogant, and intimidating. They will not leave town until the snow flies. They will not leave the streets until the streets get too hard for them. They will choose the easy life as long as it is available to them.

The humanistic, tree hugging, pseudo-intellectuals of the university make easy pickings as they think, "it is not their fault, it is the result of Bush and the Christians that these people are out here so I need to help them." Then they give generously and drop their money into the buckets at the stop signs and stop lights. After all, what these freeloaders are doing is now legal.

The liberal minded people of the university are easily manipulated by guilt and refuse to judge the new sub class of freeloading single people. Trust me, these folks are not looking for jobs or trying to get an apartment and establish their lives. The only reason to get a place to live is so that you can have a place where you can drink and not get arrested or mugged yourself. Been there, done that.

All of this is a direct result of recent dipstick liberal legislation that makes it legal to panhandle in Minneapolis. What were they thinking? Oh yes, I remember, they think that man is basically good. He just needs a chance. He just needs education. You see, ideas do have consequences.

Maybe I will write more on this later. In the meantime, here is the link to this article in the Minnesota Daily.

An Out Of Control, Over The Top, Situation In Minneapolis

A number of people in our church have recently had necessity to drive downtown to the area of the Salvation Army's Harbor Light Mission. The address is 1010 Currie Ave. Minneapolis, MN 55403 It is about a block from the Target Center on the North East and a block from Sharing and Caring Hands, another shelter, on the North West.

This area of the city has become infested with homeless, alcoholic, beggars. And they harass anyone who dares to come into their area. Mocking, leering, intimidation of visitors is present everywhere and the police do nothing about it. Women are especially harassed. So much so that our church members cannot risk single women helping anyone from that mission shelter without an escort.

I believe that this is a direct result of the change of the law in Minneapolis that began to allow begging on the streets once again. Yes, that is right, it is legal for the people to stand at expressway entrances and beg for money. This makes liberal Minnesota a sweet place to spend a summer begging for money and drinking your life away.

The cold weather will clear most of these people out soon enough. They will head South and find a warmer place to sleep under the stars. These sort of laws only encourage irresponsibility. Trust me, the Southern states do not have silly laws like these.

Spare me your liberal, air headed, lamentations for these folks. These are not the folks that need our sympathy and help. Those good folks are the people who we are visiting and giving rides to from the Harbor Light facility. Harbor Light is a great place for those in need. But they have rules and the street people are not really looking for help to find a job. They just want life on their own terms with free tobacco and alcohol.

If you disagree with my analysis, send me a comment. I would be very happy to blow you out of the water. I lived in the streets myself for a significant period of my life. I know who is out there. Come on... Try me.... !

Ezekiel

I am preaching through the book of Ezekiel. This week we covered Ezekiel 8 to 11.
What an amazing section of this fabulous book. But it is very damaging to a Sunday school type of simplistic, popular Christianity. Here God is not a lamb hugging lover of all of the people all of the time.

One of the blessings of expository preaching is that you get the whole counsel of the word of God. You study through all of the word, not just the popular and pleasing passages. This passage in Ezekiel is especially troubling for those who have any understanding of New Testament theology. Especially if you understand that now that the temple in Jerusalem is destroyed (70 A.D.) we are the temple of God.

This passage shows us a jealous God who has had it with the people's idolatry and so He rises up and leaves the house man built for Him and surrenders the temple to destruction by Nebuchadnezzar and his armies. Let's look at this briefly. God formed a people and made a covenant with them. He was their God and they were His people. So they built Him a house and He moved in. But they would not listen to Him and ignored what He said so He went silent on them and only spoke to them through the prophets. The result was that instead of the people getting more desperate for God, they simply set up other idols to serve them. And they set them up in His house.

God was driven out of His own Holy House by the idols. He rose up and left. The bible says that "the Spirit He caused to live in us envies intensely" (James 4:5) " Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?" (1 Cor. 3:16) " Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body" (1 Cor. 6:19 - 20)

Of course I know that God has also said that "(He) will never leave us or forsake us" (Heb. 13:5) But who of us will He never leave or forsake ? The ones who in a weak moment lift up their hands at the altar call in a high pressure meeting while "every eye is closed and every head is bowed?" Is every one of them saved ? Or will some of them erect idols in the temple and drive God away? After a short time of "being unable to hear God's voice" will they forsake Him and erect new gods? Will they provoke Him to jealousy ?

It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. (Heb. 10:31) God will not be mocked. (Gal. 6:7) If we are His people and He is our God then we should stay far away from anything that takes glory from God. Anything that demands our devotion other than Jesus.

87th Christian Carnival

The 87th Christian Carnival is up at Pseudo-Polymath.

What If We Lived 1000 Years ?

What if we lived close to 1000 years like some people before the flood? What would we have learned and experienced ? What would we know ?

I think we would finally "get it" in a lot of areas that we currently do not. I think we would finally learn not to put our trust in men.

Psalm 118:8 (It is) better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man.

Jeremiah 17:5 Thus saith the Lord, Cursed (be) the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord.

I think we would learn much, much, more about God's holiness and glory. He is "Holy, holy, holy" (not "love, love, love") To me the most important thing about God is His holiness. Yes He is love, but His greater aspect is His holiness. He will not compromise either aspect.

I think we would learn how far we fall from His awesome purpose for our lives. And thus we would learn how important and valued a Savior and Redeemer is.

We would know more about His creation. We would know the name for every tree, every flower, every animal. We would know the stars in their uniqueness. We would know man and his purpose better as we grew in grace and knowledge. We would know our place in the universe, space, and time.

We would learn to listen more and speak less. Maybe we would even stop blogging but that would probably take an extra 1000 years.

God's Light Show

As I have mentioned before, my family all goes camping together at least twice a year. We are tent campers and it gets to be a lot of work now that I am 60. But we just got back into town from camping up at Gooseberry Falls State Park on the North Shore of Lake Superior. It was great fun. There are 11 of us now (counting the grandson in the oven) and we simply reserve the group camp grounds when ever and where ever we go.

We have always liked Gooseberry because it has 0 mosquito's due to its proximity to the frigid Lake Superior. The skeets like it a little hotter so they go inland.

One year we went up there when my oldest child was about 8 and we saw a cool version of the Northern Lights that formed a circle directly over our heads. Clear in the center with rays radiating outward. This time God took out all the stops. If I were to rate all the Northern Lights I have seen on a 1 to 10 scale, the best of the other events were mere 5's compared to this full blown 10 that we saw last night. We even took pictures.

It was almost indescribable. It was a light show on such a level that I never even imagined it could be. At times you could see on the ground as clear as on a full moon. The types, colors, and dynamics were off the charts. There was so much to look at that you didn't want to look at one place too long because you would be missing what was going on in another place in the sky out of your field of vision. So we laid our heads back and tried to take in it all. One spectacular burst brought us all to our feet. Picture an open circle in the sky with feathers radiating out from it in a full 360, pulsing with colors and light moving in and out in rings of intensity and hues. Stunning. A family memory for the rest of our lives.

Thank you God. Your awesome.

Small Groups Warning

Josh McDowell has issued a warning directed towards the small group phenomena coursing through the church. He recognizes the growth trend but suggests that there needs to be a careful observation that there is a good chance that these sorts of groups might digress into the exchange of ideas born of a subjective and secular world view.

The church is so compromised in its understanding of the basics of faith that to turn over the leadership to those who are unaware of how deeply influenced they are by the worlds values is a disaster waiting to happen. A good example would be the Christian truth that man is not basically good. The world thinks otherwise. The world thinks that man is basically good and only needs education and a chance to do the right thing. But if he is educated and given a chance will he really choose to do right? History proves he will not.

Subjective Christianity is a great threat to the youth and the next generation.
That is why we must have the creeds at the core of the church.
You can read about it here.

Sound Projection

According to wired.com there are some new developments in the projection of sound. Sound can now be projected to a specific target, like a search light. This would have been very useful down in New Orleans to get the word out when the phone lines and media were down.

You can read about it here...

Christian Carnival

The latest Christian Carnival is up at Technogypsy.
Take a look at this weeks submissions here.

U of MN Drops Faith / Health Course

The National Freedom FROM Religion sued the U of MN on March 25th. It did not like the fact that a "state" institution took part in a "faith health consortium" and was planning to teach a course in "faith / health leadership." The anti-faith group won its lawsuit. The university caved in.

The university was attempting to combine religious and medical professionals to bring about a more diverse approach to medicine. All religions were included. This was NOT a Christian program. But there are those who want to exclude religion from all of life. The only religion to be allowed is NO RELIGION. Not very tolerant if you ask me.

You can read about it here.

Seven Wandering Children

In all of the news coverage I had not heard this one.

-- In the chaos that was Causeway Boulevard, this group of refugees stood out: a 6-year-old boy walking down the road, holding a 5-month-old, surrounded by five toddlers who followed him around as if he were their leader.

They were holding hands. Three of the children were about 2 years old, and one was wearing only diapers. A 3-year-old girl, who wore colorful barrettes on the ends of her braids, had her 14-month-old brother in tow. The 6-year-old spoke for all of them, and he told rescuers his name was Deamonte Love.

This is from the Charleston Daily Mail. It is an AP story. If it is real, it is stunning. Imagine, a six year old taking care of 6 other children. Where were the adults? Was there nobody to ask them who they belong to? 100's of adults must have seen them and walked on by.

OH MY ! You can read the whole story here.

The Clouds Turn Around And Around

Job 37:6 "He directs the snow to fall on the earth and tells the rain to pour down. 7 Everyone stops working at such a time so they can recognize his power. 8 The wild animals hide in the rocks or in their dens. 9 The stormy wind comes from its chamber, and the driving winds bring the cold. 10 God's breath sends the ice, freezing wide expanses of water. 11 He loads the clouds with moisture, and they flash with his lightning. 12 The clouds turn around and around under his direction. They do whatever he commands throughout the earth. 13 He causes things to happen on earth, either as a punishment or as a sign of his unfailing love.

The purpose of God's judgments are to bring redemption, not to destroy. Parents punish their kids to bring about a character change. Not to destroy them. Because they love their children they train them with discipline. The bible says that;

Psa 19:9	... The judgments of the LORD [are] true [and] righteous altogether.

What about the death and destruction ? The believers go directly to God and live eternally with Him. The unbelievers were warned. What about physically handicapped and those made to suffer? Believers are given a grace to walk it through. His grace will be sufficient for them although the focus of their ministry will change.

Ezekiel 33:11
...'As I live,' says the Lord God, 'I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die ...?

The proper response to the destruction and disaster in New Orleans is to return to the Lord and walk humbly with our God. Everything else will be met with frustration. We don't need mans strength now, we need God's grace, love, and mercy.

Illiterate College Students

The latest stats are in... Public college students were even more illiterate in 2002 in Minnestoa than in 1999. According to the Minneapolis (Red) Star and Tribune the rate jumped 3 more percentage points. Now 36 percent of the college students in Minnesota take at least one remedial ( think refresher on the basics) course. Of course the rise is attributed to growing enrollment and stricter screening of entering students. Ya sure ! You betcha.

The only school doing more screening is the U of MN. They have seen their need for remedial work declining.... Ya sure ! They just raise the tuition rates and jack up the standards and let all of dem public school educated folks who don't cut the mustard train to be assistant managers at McDonalds.

I don't get warm fuzzies anymore when I hear the words "educational institutions." Instead I think in terms of educational rip off of the common man. And corporate machines to produce service industry grunts by the 1000's. Keep 'em ignorant. We need more pizza delivery clerks to live in the overpriced rental housing.

Do I seem cynical today or is it just me? Read it here. Or here.