Binge Reading the Bible

"I borrow my basic concept from binge-watching television series. In other words, set a ridiculous goal, a goal that seems a few steps beyond what’s reasonable or doable. Try to get through the entire Bible in as short a span as possible."

The author discusses how important it is to see the Bible as a whole book. How easy it is to forget one part by the time one gets to another part. First he suggests doing it in three months, then one month. And then finally one week. Which he did -- 

What will reading the Bible in a week do to you?

For the very interesting rest of the story go here: 

https://www.biblestudymagazine.com/novemberdecember-2021-arnold

a Silly Ritual -- Changing Clocks

"In the coming days, tens of millions of Americans and their children will participate in a silly, unhealthy annual ritual rooted in mysticism and superstition. And they’ll also celebrate Halloween."

https://capitolism.thedispatch.com/p/enddst

Organic Farming Imposed

"Sri Lanka’s organic farming mandate leads to food shortage, economic emergency.

"One needn’t take a position on organic farming to see the folly in Sri Lanka’s decision. This is a classic case of fatal conceits run amok — of lofty ideas and one-dimensional strategies that hold little regard for localized knowledge and the complexity of the human person.

"In April, the Sri Lankan government banned the import and use of fertilizers and agrochemicals, including insecticides and herbicides, marking a significant step in their goal to become the world’s first country to produce 100% organic agriculture.

"According to President Gotabhaya Rajapakse, the move was necessary to reverse the country’s overuse of harmful chemicals, which he says has led to “environmental degradation, water pollution, and has caused increased greenhouse gas emissions.”

"Now, just months after the decision, the country’s food supply is already in crisis.

On Afghanistan Biden still blames Trump

The Biden administration has consistently blamed the Trump administration's 2020 Doha agreement with the Taliban for the Afghanistan debacle. The agreement, the Biden team insists, left the president no choice but to remove U.S. forces unconditionally from Afghanistan by Aug. 31. In fact, President Biden's failure to hold the Taliban to the terms of the Doha agreement contributed to this disaster.

The agreement promised the Taliban an earlier U.S. departure, by May 1, 2021, in return for a pledge that they would prevent the use of Afghanistan soil by any group against the security of the U.S. and its allies. Mr. Biden managed to extend the date by four months but was still bound by the basic terms of the agreement. The Biden administration believed that if the U.S. failed to remove forces by Aug. 31, the Taliban could renege on their commitment and allow attacks on U.S. troops remaining in the country, so the only way for the U.S. to avoid this danger was to withdraw, honoring its end of the Doha deal in the hope that the Taliban would spare American forces.

The Biden administration has made this contrived argument repeatedly, and Mr. Biden reiterated it at a press conference last week, following the deaths of 13 U.S. service members in Kabul. But the administration misrepresents the Doha agreement. The U.S. promised to withdraw from Afghanistan by May 1, 2021, but only if the Taliban met commitments of their own. One of them was a pledge to participate in an "intra-Afghan dialogue," to achieve a "permanent and comprehensive ceasefire" and to agree upon a "political roadmap" for Afghanistan's future. If the Taliban didn't honor this commitment, the U.S. had no obligation to withdraw.

Trump administration officials emphasized the conditional nature of the U.S. commitment when the Doha agreement was signed. As Defense Secretary Mark Esper put it in March 2020, Doha "is a conditions-based agreement." If "we assess that the Taliban is honoring the terms of the deal," including "progress on the political front between the Taliban and the current Afghan government," the U.S. will "reduce our presence toward a goal of zero in 2021." But Mr. Esper made clear that the American withdrawal wouldn't be automatic. "If progress stalls," he warned, "then our drawdown likely will be suspended, as well."

The Taliban didn't honor its political commitments and ultimately took Afghanistan by force. The Biden administration's claim that the Doha agreement left no choice but to quit Afghanistan unconditionally is false. Given the Taliban's behavior, the U.S. wasn't obligated to withdraw by May 1, by Aug. 31, or any other date. Withdrawal was a choice. And the Biden administration's announcement of this choice in April triggered the Taliban offensive to retake Afghanistan and set the disastrous U.S. departure in motion.

Neither the Doha agreement nor its implementation was perfect. Even former members of the Trump administration argue that it failed to protect the interests of the Afghan government adequately and put too much faith in the Taliban's willingness to share power. In addition, these critics maintain that President Trump's determination to reduce U.S. forces, despite the Taliban's failure to honor its commitments, undermined the agreement and strengthened the Taliban's position. But under the terms of the agreement, Mr. Biden could have insisted that the Taliban meet its obligations or face renewed U.S. military pressure.

The Biden administration's hope to succeed where others had failed, finally ending America's long war in Afghanistan, apparently blinded it to the pitfalls of committing to an unconditional withdrawal from Afghanistan by a date certain. The administration's subsequent attempts to shift blame to the Trump administration have led it to misrepresent the Doha agreement and to claim falsely that it made an avoidable disaster inevitable. This falsehood has exacerbated the current crisis.

By S. Paul Kapur  Sept 1 AD 2021

---

Mr. Kapur is a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution and is a Vandenberg Coalition Adviser. He served on the State Department's Policy Planning staff, 2020-21

Mealtime Grace

1. Father, we thank you for our food,

For life and health and every good;

Let manna to our souls be giv’n,

The Bread of Life sent down from Heav’n.

2. Be present at our table, Lord;

Be here and everywhere adored;

By your own hand may we be fed;

Give us this day our daily bread.

3. Spirit of Life we wait for you.

Cleanse us of sin, our souls renew.

Baptize the peoples far and nigh;

The Name of Jesus glorify.

Tune: 

Praise God from whom all blessings flow;

Praise him, all creatures here below;

Praise him above, ye heav'nly host:

Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

The USA Still Has the Death Penalty for Murder --"the harshest penalty that a just society can impose"

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit issued a per curiam [unanimous] decision on Wednesday upholding the death sentence for Roof, saying that no legal record "can capture the full horror of what Roof did".

The panel rejected various claims by Roof in his appeal that errors had been made when the court concluded that he was competent to stand trial for the nine murders.

“Roof murdered African Americans at their church, during their Bible-study and worship. They had welcomed him. He slaughtered them. He did so with the express intent of terrorizing not just his immediate victims at the historically important Mother Emanuel Church, but as many similar people as would hear of the mass murder,” concluded the panel.

“No cold record or careful parsing of statutes and precedents can capture the full horror of what Roof did. His crimes qualify him for the harshest penalty that a just society can impose.”

Full Article

"Sir Francis Drake's" Prayer

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly, to venture on wider seas where storms will show your mastery; where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars. We ask you to push back the horizons of our hopes; and to push into the future in strength, courage, hope, and love. Because we have dreamed too little when we arrived safely because we sailed too close to the shore. Disturb us, Lord, when with the abundance of things we possess we have lost our thirst for the waters of life; having fallen in love with life, we have ceased to dream of eternity and in our efforts to build a new earth, we have allowed our vision of the new Heaven to dim. Amen.

Attributed to Sir Francis Drake 1540 - 1596

Very likely not his.

See discussion

 

The Martyrs under the Altar - Matthew Henry

"The sight this apostle saw at the opening of the fifth seal; it was a very affecting sight (Rev.6.9): I saw under the altar the souls of those that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held. He saw the souls of the martyrs. Here observe,

(1.) Where he saw them-under the altar; at the foot of the altar of incense, in the most holy place; he saw them in heaven, at the foot of Christ. Hence note,

[1.] Persecutors can only kill the body, and after that there is no more that they can do; their souls live.

[2.] God has provided a good place in the better world for those who are faithful to death and are not allowed a place any longer on earth.

[3.] Holy martyrs are very near to Christ in heaven, they have the highest place there.

[4.] It is not their own death, but the sacrifice of Christ, that gives them a reception into heaven and a reward there; they do not wash their robes in their own blood, but in the blood of the Lamb.

(2.) What was the cause in which they suffered-the word of God and the testimony which they held, for believing the word of God, and attesting or confessing the truth of it; this profession of their faith they held fast without wavering, even though they died for it. A noble cause, the best that any man can lay down his life for-faith in God's word and a confession of that faith."

Matthew Henry

An Early attempt to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem

" Julian’s plan to restore the Temple contradicted a central Christian tenet that the Temple’s destruction proved the Christian claim that they, not the Jews, were the Chosen People of God."

More

Our Cities Cry -- by Margaret Clarkson

Our cities cry to you, O God,

From out their pain and strife;

You made us for Yourself alone,

But we choose alien life.

( The rest of the hymn )

Legalism - Grappling with the Term

"As Sinclair Ferguson observes, legalism abstracts the law of God from God’s gracious character. The commands of Scripture divorced from God’s gracious character become not the good and gracious gift of a loving God who has given us everything in Christ and knows what is best for us, but a burdensome duty assigned by a God whose love has to be earned—a God whose commands keep us from real joy."

from:

https://www.9marks.org/article/church-membership-among-former-mormons-a-9marks-mailbag/#_ftnref1

The Sanctifying Work of Pregnancy

A few quotes from a book review of Showing: What Pregnancy Tells Us About Being Human. This reviewer gets into far more than just physical matters --

"...pregnancy looks a lot more like a clinical condition than a natural season of a woman’s life. In the standard prenatal care model, a pregnant woman becomes a patient."

She gets into spiritual matters --

"Even as a woman shapes the child growing within her, the joys and trials of pregnancy are shaping her, sanctifying her, and teaching her how to depend on others during this season of peculiar service."

Here's the book review.

GLORIOUS THINGS

Glorious things of thee are spoken,

Zion, city of our God!

He, whose Word cannot be broken,

Formed thee for His own abode;

On the Rock of Ages founded,

What can shake thy sure repose?

With salvation’s walls surrounded,

Thou mayst smile at all thy foes.

2

See, the streams of living waters,

Springing from eternal love,

Well supply thy sons and daughters,

And all fear of want remove:

Who can faint while such a river

Ever flows their thirst t’ assuage?

Grace which, like the Lord, the giver,

Never fails from age to age.

3

Round each habitation hov’ring,

See the cloud and fire appear,

For a glory and a cov’ring,

Showing that the Lord is near;

Thus deriving from our banner

Light by night and shade by day,

Safe they feed upon the manna

Which He gives them when they pray.

4

Blest inhabitants of Zion,

Washed in the Redeemer’s blood!

Jesus, whom their souls rely on,

Makes them kings and priests to God;

’Tis His love His people raises

Over self to reign as kings,

And as priests, His solemn praises

Each for a thank off’ring brings.

5

Savior, if of Zion’s city,

I through grace a member am,

Let the world deride or pity,

I will glory in Thy name;

Fading is the worldling’s pleasure,

All his boasted pomp and show;

Solid joys and lasting treasure

None but Zion’s children know.

Paraphrase of Isaiah 2:2-4

Behold! the mountain of the Lord

In latter days shall rise
On mountain tops above the hills,
And draw the wond'ring eyes.

To this the joyful nations round,
All tribes and tongues, shall flow;
Up to the hill of God, they'll say,
And to his house we'll go.

The beam that shines from Zion hill
Shall lighten ev'ry land;
The King who reigns in Salem's tow'rs
Shall all the world command.

Among the nations he shall judge;
His judgments truth shall guide;
His sceptre shall protect the just,
And quell the sinner's pride.

No strife shall vex Messiah's reign,

Or mar those peaceful years;

To ploughshares men shall beat their swords,

To pruning-hooks their spears.

No longer hosts encountering hosts,

Their millions slain deplore;

They hang the trumpet in the hall,

And study war no more.

Come then! Oh come from every land,
To worship at his shrine;
And, walking in the light of God,
With holy beauties shine.

- Michael Bruce, 1768

Tune: Glasgow CM

To the Coy Mrs.

While awaiting the LORD bringing about reconciliation, here’s my feelings from the poem I’ve reworked to call 

To the Coy Mrs. --

Had we but world enough and time, 

This coyness, lady, were no crime. 

We would sit down, and think which way 

To walk, and pass our long love’s day. 

Thou by the Indian Ganges’ side 

Shouldst rubies find; I by the tide 

Of Humber would oblige. I would 

Love you ten years before the flood, 

And you should, if you please, refuse 

Till the conversion of the Jews.  

The Day is Past and Gone

1

The day is past and gone,

The evening shades appear;

O may we all remember well

The night of death draws near.

2

We lay our garments by,

Upon our beds to rest;

So death shall soon disrobe us all

Of what is here possessed.

3

Lord, keep us safe this night,

Secure from all our fears;

May angels guard us while we sleep,

Till morning light appears.

hear Aunt Molly Jackson sing it

Fill the World with People?

Does God want the world filled with human beings? Thinking about what C.S. Lewis said (in Screwtape Letters, one demon to another) "One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth. He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself..."

Will beat you up.

Jealousy

And most all of your sufferings

Are from believing

You know better than God.

Of course,

Such a special brand of arrogance as that

Always proves disastrous,

And will rip the seams

In your caravan tent,

Then cordially invite in many species

Of mean biting flies and

Strange thoughts-

That will

Beat you

Up.

- Hafez 1300s A.D.

All truth is God's truth.

Wounded Soldiers

"In love’s service, only the wounded soldiers can serve."

- James Stewart