Random thoughts and questions from tonight.

-Putting thought to paper (or blog) is an amazing thing to do. It takes a lot of effort but bears rich rewards if you can apply reason to reality to find wisdom. In fact, much like praying before a God who knows you perfectly, writing your thoughts out helps in the process of obtaining wisdom by exposing hypocrisy in your thought processes. The best way to find wisdom is to ask questions and discover certain principles that never change. Once you've found those principles, you have an immutable foundation upon which to build your life. This foundation leads to a strong conscience and character and a hatred of deceit.

-A friend writes concerning the scriptures: "Okay, whatever. I'm done talking about the Bible because I don't know anything from it. I am useless."

My response: "That's foolish to say lil' sister! Ask me for scriptures for proof instead of lambasting yourself. Ask questions, ask questions, ask questions! You won't gain wisdom by denying your creation as a daughter of God, made in His image!"

-A question I asked on Facebook: "How does gay marriage infringe upon our rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Does another person's marriage take away your ability to live life as you see fit?"

A friend writes: "I feel that if our nation was to legally endorse gay "marriage" then the judgment of our heavenly father would be upon the whole nation."

My response: "Doesn't the judgment of God fall upon people for every sin? Does God deem one sin as more worthy of eternal justice than another? Doesn't our allowance of abortion as a country place us under God's judgment already? We are either under judgment already or we are not."

(The picture above is an illustration intended to reveal conceit and is not in alignment with my beliefs)

Another friend writes on this topic: "A gay man thinks the same as a straight man. Therefore no limitation [on marriage] should be made. But what about those with a mental disability that could cause harm to oneself or another? Is it okay then to have limits?"

My response in part: "Who determines mental disability? Even mentally disabled people can be wise and make proper decisions. I know plenty of mentally enabled people who make incredibly destructive choices. Wisdom is not constrained by one's ability to think but rather by one's ability to have empathy towards others. Mentally disabled people I have known are some of the most loving people I have ever met."

-A third friend ask how I got on the topic and I said: "[My reason is] anger over the conduct of judgmental Christians who would rather judge their unbelieving neighbor instead of loving their enemies as God loved them when they were His enemies!"

Government by coercion or conscience?

Government should have a very specific and limited jurisdiction which can be expressed using the idea of natural law which is a characteristic of the Creator. We will get back to natural law, but for now, this begs the question: What is government? There are two types: An impartial, coercive external government and a personal, internal, conscience-driven or spirit-led self-government. Relating to external governance, the institutionalized type we have all encountered I will simply call "the government." This encapsulates the regulatory, bureaucratic, legislative, judicial and executive authorities of national, state and local governments. In defining these two types, it is now possible to determine the authorities of each.

According to natural law, the authority of the external governance must extrapolate an order of individualistic natural rights according to human nature that it is authorized to defend. Because natural rights are vested in the person and not the government, the authority of the external governance comes from a society of moral individuals. Using reason, this can only be done by a community through the application of rational thought and techniques to observe the universe. Because all created things bear a partial image of their creator, we can discern that there are things we humans have in common with our own. One of these commonalities is reason and it is shared with no other creature.

Because we can discern aspects of creation, we see around us a reasoned universe that obeys certain laws. Our Creator vested interest and skill into us as His creation and provides specific natural laws for us to abide by. Just as the laws of physics apply equally over time and space, natural law, by definition of being a law, applies to all people equally. Thus, an edict is handed down by our Creator that obligates those under natural law to protect the unalienable rights of all by "[organizing the government's] powers in such form as to them shall seem most likely to affect their Safety and Happiness." (Declaration of Independence)


No governing structure has the authority to bind and loose one law-abiding individual over another. It is necessary then for the government's power to be universally enforced over the law-breaker. When relativistic social laws are allowed to discriminate between people, class and race warfare erupt and justice is lost. Natural laws and the rights given therein must transcend class and race. The Declaration of Independence states that among these rights are "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."

We are not given the gift of life so that it can be arbitrarily taken away by another recipient of the same gift. Having been given life, we have a cosmic expectation and the liberty to enjoy it as we see fit insofar as it does not infringe upon the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of others. We exercise the liberty of enjoying our life through the pursuit of happiness (or property as the Founders would also have said). Thus, without the protection of our pursuit of happiness, or fruits of our labor such as land and wages, we are stripped of the liberty to pursue happiness in our lives. Without the right to pursue happiness in our lives, the right to the gift of life has little meaning.

Reasonably, any use of a sovereign's self-government that infringes upon the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of another is cause for the coercive authority, or government, to engage itself in order to protect the victim, bind the law-breaker, reestablish order and force restitution. In a two realm system of governance in which natural rights are extended to individuals and the protection of those rights given by the people to the government, this is consistent. Quite simply, the protection offered by the government provides for equality of all people as a gift from God, equality before the law, and equal protection of rights.

Government operates by the consent of a moral, law-abiding citizenry in order for it to punish behaviors that infringe upon the natural rights of others. Government being instituted by the people, it is a fundamental responsibility of said people to dispel any government that fails them in such a duty. As our Declaration states, "...Whenever any form of government becomes destructive [of securing our rights], it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new government." Is our government operating under the consent of the governed and protecting us?

Those in charge or protecting us are unwilling to label evil.

President Obama has allowed a murderer to get off lightly in public opinion after massacring 14 people at Fort Hood by telling us "not to jump to conclusions." The Chief of Staff of the Army, Gen. Casey, has allowed a murderer to get off lightly, thus destroying the morale of our war fighters, by telling us "it would be an even greater tragedy if... our diversity becomes a casualty here." The FBI has allowed a murderer to get off lightly in the eyes of justice by saying it's "not an act of terrorism." Well what the hell is it exactly when you have psychotic, terrorist links to your murderous actions? It is treason mixed with a healthy dose of terrorism and if not dealt with we will all be victims of its deadly embrace. Call evil what it is and fight it or say goodbye to the tenuous liberties that others earned for you to enjoy. All it takes is one generation that lacks the willingness to stand for truth to lose liberty for themselves and all those who come after.

An excellent article by Mark Steyn can be found here.

The judgment of Lindsay Lohan?

I just read an article about Lindsay Lohan and her father that really troubled me. Her dad has publicly denounced her with comments such as:

"No wonder why God is taking her entire career away from her, because she's forsaken everything He's given her and she's done nothing but misuse all the gifts she's given."

The writer reporting on this responds with appropriate sarcasm about the intentions and hypocrisy of her father when they write, "Following this logic, could another of God's punishments be giving Lindsay a father who is making a career out of trying to destroy his troubled daughter in the press?"

I'm reminded of a passage from Ephesians 6 where Paul is exhorting the followers of Jesus to Godly living between parents and children. He writes:

"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 'Honor your father and mother'—which is the first commandment with a promise— 'that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.' Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord."

The training begins with the parents, of course. They raise their children and are encouraged to do so with grace and mercy; just as Jesus taught us, His own children. A child does not need to be taught how to sin, after all, but must be trained in righteousness and truth.

In 1 Corinthians 6 followers of Christ are told not to bring judgment on their own outside of the church. We read, "If any of you has a dispute with another, dare he take it before the ungodly for judgment instead of before the saints? Do you not know that the saints will judge the world?"

What a wicked man to make a name for himself by heaping condemnation upon the daughter whom God gave him stewardship to raise! No wonder Lindsay Lohan is the way she is with a father who publishes their private conversations and shows by his very actions that he hates her! Why would she serve her father's god when it is apparent that his god is merciless and unholy? Who is deserving of the greater punishment? But you children of the Most High, remember even while you were still enemies of God and in active rebellion against His goodness that He came in the flesh to offer His forgiveness and love. It belongs to those who will simply come to Him for a relationship that will never fail because He loves us perfectly for who we are.

Isn't that love the sort that changes our hearts? For instance, imagine a disrespectful and hateful child on his deathbed for lack of a needed organ donor. The child, though spiteful, is terrified of dying. Yet, at just the right time, a person, seeing the need and not judging the child's nature, finds that he is a match and willingly gives the necessary organ to save the child's life. Can you imagine that child waking up from surgery and spitting in the face of his savior? Does it not seem that the child would be incredibly grateful instead and work to be pleasing to the one who saved him?

If Lindsay Lohan knew of the True God who loves sinners and transforms them because of His love would she not respond as one grateful for having a new life? But instead, she has responded to the cruel and unforgiving God that her dad represents and has run away from that terror! May she and her father come to know the grace and peace of God that transcends the rivalries of the flesh and brings reconciliation to those who are far off and lost.


Romans 5:6-11

"You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

"Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him! For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."

Christ follower vs. Christian videos

I stumbled upon some pretty funny videos on YouTube based upon the successful Apple advertising mold of the Mac vs. the PC. I thought they would be fun to post seeing as they depict the believer who lives by rules and the one who lives by liberty. I've come into contact with many of them and the strangest ones are always:

1) Those who proclaim the virtues of the King James Bible over all others.
2) Those who say that you should always wear your "Sunday best" to service.
3) Those who say that you shouldn't read secular books, watch secular movies, or listen to secular music.

Come on people! Don't you know that the law puts to death those who try to live by it? Is it not what comes out of a man's heart that defiles that man? It is for freedom that we have been set free. Give us Christian liberty or give us death!

Rule books and ethics manuals.



Slacks or pants?



Christian Jpod and secular Ipod.



Holy Spirit Hard Drive (HSHD).



There are other videos on this topic if you just follow the links that YouTube gives you. Enjoy!

Self-government or tyranny?

This comes a little bit late for the 4th of July but we don't have to celebrate the great ideas of this country founding on just one day a year!

I've been reading the Declaration of Independence and find it to be a wise historical explanation on the state of human nature. Take this quote for instance:

"Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed."

What are "light and transient causes" concerning Governments? They are quickly passing things that have little effect on the personal welfare of recipients. What does this welfare include?

In this document, welfare is simply "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" protected by Governments "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed" for the ultimate purpose that "when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

Reading farther on in the document will evince the "long train of abuses" that the crown of England had placed upon the people of the Americas.

In truth, the document was written to espouse the virtues of self-government over that of tyranny. Why else would the government get its power only from the consent of the governed? The Declaration was written to declare that man had a right to be free from government that did not warrant continued existence because it no longer protected one's opportunity to advance through one's own hard work.

We live in a day though where people vote themselves benefits by burdening the backs of others. The taxpayer is forced to work harder to subsidize the livelihoods of those who don't work. We have allowed some to take power over us that, in order to administer their own pursuit of "happiness," they whittle away at that same right for us. We should be goal-oriented creatures that strive to work for what we need and desire. That is our right. It is not the Government mandated "right" to education, health care, retirement, and such. There is much to be said for earning that which is of value.

Tocqueville said of such a Government that it is a "tutelary power" that is "absolute, attentive to detail, regular, provident, and gentle." It would duplicate the "paternal power" that would "prepare men for manhood" but instead will "keep them irrevocably fixed in childhood" in that it bestows "their security, foresees and supplies their needs, guides them in their principal affairs…"

Ultimately, a good government is given to protect the legitimate accumulation of wealth and private property through hard work; not the taking away of such to provide for those who vote themselves benefits without any of the necessary responsibility. Thus, our choices are clear: Will we suffer ourselves to greater increments of dispossession or will we fade slowly into the imposed slavery of a state that promises security at the expense of liberty?

Professor Paul Anthony Rahe defines our worth by saying that, "Human dignity is bound up with taking responsibility for conducting one’s own affairs." He states, "We can be what once we were, or we can settle for a gradual, gentle descent into servitude." Let us choose responsibility and strive to change institutions whose causes are not so "light and transitory" in our lives.

Superhero/Messiah Obama!

For a truly enjoyable experience you really should watch the brilliant embedded video recently published by Jib Jab! Personally, I was happy to see this video not simply because it made fun of the Obamessiah, but because I have the ability to enjoy and support media that pokes fun at the most powerful man in the "free world" without facing repercussions. Meanwhile, my heart aches for the protesters in Iran and their desire to escape from an oppressive regime that allows for the unquestioned murder of its citizens for the purpose of keeping a theocratic government in power. I will not post specifics on the murder of Iranian protester Neda Agha-Sultan on my blog but you may read the condensed version of her life here: < http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-neda23-2009jun23,0,6240992.story?track=rss >. My hope, apart from their obtaining salvation, is that they too would someday have the liberty to make fun of their government. With as bitter as I am towards mine at times I believe that, this side of heaven, humor is one of the most powerful tools used to dispel fear in the absence of God's grace and mercy. Wherever you stand, or sit, politically, or religiously, you will assuredly get a good respite from what concerns you when you watch this video!

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