What's Wrong With The Gospel?

To the question, "What's wrong with the Gospel?" I can easily answer, "Absolutely nothing!" That is, of course, if you're talking about the Gospel of the Bible - the very message that Jesus preached - what the apostles Peter, Paul, John, and the others devoted their very lives (and deaths) to. (Phil. 1:20-21)

No, there's nothing at all wrong with this message from heaven. But what about the stuff that's being preached today? Is it truly "gospel-preaching"? Are the evangelists that preach in churches and arenas, on radio and television - are they preaching what Jesus called the Gospel?1 And what about the mountains of modern "gospel literature"? You know, the tracts, pamphlets, comic books, newspapers, etc. Do they really contain the same message - the whole message - about the salvation that Jesus offered? How are we answering the awesome question that people are still asking the Church, as they asked on the day of Pentecost, "Men and brethren, what shall we do to be saved?"


Is Our Gospel The Gospel?
I believe with all my heart that Jesus would be ashamed of most of the "gospel" messages and sermons that are being preached today, mainly because they lack almost every major point He Himself preached on. (Mark 8:38; Rom. 1:16; II Tim. 1:8) How dare we try to change the Gospel. We remove most of its vital parts, and replace them with artificial limbs of our own. (Gal. 1:6-7)

Isn't Jesus the master evangelist? Shouldn't we judge our evangelism by His example? Was His message anything like what we're hearing today? It is my intention to try to briefly cover in Section 1 each of the major parts of the Gospel that have been "surgically" removed in most of today's preaching. And in Section 2, we will go over each of the "new additions" that have become a very part of our modern gospel.


The Removed Parts Of The Gospel
The Blood of Jesus. It's a fact that the very word blood scares people. It's also a fact that the blood of Christ scares the devil, because it is the only cleansing agent for a sin-sick soul.4 Can you imagine what the preaching and writings of Paul would have been like, if he had been as squeamish in proclaiming the magnificent power and beauty of the blood of Jesus as our generation of preachers are? What we have now is a bloodless gospel!

Today, people are afraid to think and preachers are afraid to make them. The whole concept of Jesus being the Passover Lamb of the Old Testament5 has been lost - "It takes too much time and thought to explain," you will hear some say. (Heb. 5:11-14) "We need to simplify the Gospel so that we can reach the masses." Oh, what logic! Remove the blood from the preaching of the Gospel, and you remove the power to conquer the devil for the souls of men!

The Cross of Jesus.
Paul said, "I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified." (I Cor. 2:2) Nowadays it's "Jesus Christ and what He can do for you!" You cannot have more exact opposites than the Bible's Christ-centered Gospel,6 and our modern, cross-less, me-centered gospel.

Today, if anyone preaches self-denial as a condition of discipleship, you can hear the comments afterwards: "old-fashioned," "harsh," "legalistic." I dare say that our Lord would have as much trouble finding acceptance among our preachers as He had among the religious leaders of His own day.

Here's what A.W. Tozer says about the cross...

"The cross is the most revolutionary thing ever to appear among men. The
cross of Roman times knew no compromise, it never made concessions. It won all
its arguments by killing its
opponent and silencing him for good. It spared
not Christ, but slew Him the same
as the rest. He was alive when they hung
Him on that cross. and completely dead
when they took Him off of it. That
was the cross the first time it appeared in
Christian history.

"With
perfect knowledge of all this, Christ said, 'If
any man will come after Me,
let him deny himself take up his cross and follow
Me.' So the cross not only
brought Christ's life to an end, it also ends the
first life, the old life
of every one of His true followers...this and nothing
less is true
Christianity. We must do something about the cross, and there's
only one of
two things we can do - flee it or die upon it!"

Pages could be written on this subject, but there is room for only one brief example. When the rich young ruler came to Jesus, he asked a very direct question: "Good Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" Can you imagine what our preachers would answer him today? "Just admit you're a sinner, accept Jesus as your Personal Savior, go to church, pay your tithes, try to be good, and you're in!" But what was Jesus' answer? "You know the commandments... if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments." (Matt 19:17; Mark 10:19) The commandments?? Why they went out with Cecil B. DeMille! Isn't this the "age of grace"?

Well, the truth is Jesus wasn't preaching the commandments to him as the way of salvation, He was using the commandments to specifically convict him of his particular sin - greed. That rich boy loved the bucks, and Jesus knew just how to flush him out of the bushes - preach the Law! And that's exactly what the Law is for- "For through the Law comes the knowledge of sin" (Rom. 3:20), that's what Paul said. The Law must be preached - not as the way of salvation, but as a searchlight put on the sinner's heart, so he can see how utterly rotten he is, compared to the way God requires him to be. (Gal. 3:24)

But today again, we are wiser than God. Our preaching isn't filled with "dos and don'ts." No, we don't want to scare the "liberated generation" away. Why, if we said that fornication was wrong, or drugs, or abortion, or any other specific sin, people would feel all condemned and then how could they get saved? But that's just it, Jesus preached the Law to the rich young ruler so that, after feeling condemned about his greed, he could turn and obey Jesus and find true treasure in heaven. "Go and sell all you possess and give it to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven, and come, follow Me." (Mark 10:21) Unless people are truly convicted of sin, if they do not fully see that they are totally condemned by the requirements of God's Law, then it is virtually impossible to show them the need for a savior. Why, what would they need to be saved from? Fun?

That is why our modern gospel must dwell on "all the good things God'll do for you if you'd just accept Him!" We can't convince a sinner that he needs a savior by just getting him to admit that, "Well, generally, yes, I am a sinner." He must see how the Law of God totally condemns him as a sinner,9 and then the beauty of the Gospel, the glory of the cross, the marvelous power of Christ's blood will be able to penetrate his anxious, waiting mind and heart. Only by the preaching of the Law can a man fully desire to be saved from his sin. For, "I would not have come to know sin except through the Law. "(Rom. 7:7)

Repentance as Necessary for Forgiveness.
It has always amazed me how the Church could have evolved to such a state as it is in now, with such clear, direct teaching from the Lord Jesus as to what is necessary to be right with God. Please read the first five verses of the 13th chapter of Luke. Here, Jesus is told the news about some Galileans who were executed by the Romans. He then says, "Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish." Using another example, He then repeats the same exact sentence.

I cannot conceive of conversion without repentance. The teachings of Jesus and the apostles are full of commands to "repent and be saved!"11 Repentance is not just "being sorry" - that is only conviction. Repentance is not merely a change of heart and a change of mind, it is a change of action! God requires that if we are sincerely convinced that sin is wrong, then we will turn from it to God, and commit ourselves to not take part in sinful deeds any longer. God blesses such decisions and commitments with abundant grace. And it is by that grace that we can fulfill the desires of the Spirit within us.

But because there is so little real conviction of sin brought about by the preaching of our modern gospel, we cannot truly require repentance anymore. If we did, no one would "come forward" at all. For repentance is easy to him who sees how ugly and horrible sin is, but repentance is impossible where the Law does not convince the sinner of his wicked heart, compelling him to turn from his sin into the arms of a waiting, compassionate God. You see, all these removed parts of the Gospel are connected. In God's wisdom, every aspect of the appointed way of salvation is irreplaceable.

It is true that without God loving us first, we could not be saved. He made the first move, He always does. But He will not do what He requires of the sinner himself to do - and that is to repent!

God's Sorrow and Broken Heart Over Sin.
The picture of God as presented today by evangelists is that of an optimist - a positive-thinking good ole boy who lives in heaven, high above the trouble on earth, where everything is rosy, "and the skies are not cloudy all day." Why, how could anything bother the living God? He isn't really troubled by all the mess down here, He has everything under control!

But again, the Bible paints a different picture of our King. Just look at Jesus weeping over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41), or the pleadings of God with the nation of Israel through the prophets Isaiah or Ezekiel.12 This God, the one in the Bible, is continually striving with men through His Spirit. It says in Proverbs, "The eyes of the Lord are in every place, watching the evil and the good." (Proverbs 15:3) That means that God saw every rape committed today, He saw every murder, every person that starved to death, every pornographic film and book, every abused and battered child. How can anyone believe that He sees this and does not grieve? Of course God can grieve. Doesn't the Bible implore us not to "grieve the Holy Spirit of God"? (Eph. 4:30)

You see, God is the most hurt and dishonored being in the universe. He could stop all this mess, all the perversion and crime and corruption any time He wishes, but He doesn't! Why? Because He waits for the souls of men and women. "Regard the patience of our Lord to be salvation," Peter said. (II Peter 3:15) But the Church, which doesn't have one millionth of the compassion that God has, has turned around and created a god in its own image and likeness. A carefree, cheerful, above-it-all God. And then the Church has conveniently removed from the "gospel" it presents all reference to the pain and sorrow in God's heart. The Church doesn't want a God who's grieved with sin, because then this God would be grieved with them... (and He is!)13

The Necessity of Holiness to Please God.
Hebrews says without holiness "no one shall see the Lord." (12:14) It is true that Jesus commands us to be perfect. (Matt. 5:48) It is also true that you most likely have never met a perfect person, nor do you probably ever expect to be perfect yourself. Nevertheless, we still have those uncomfortable words of the Lord, "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect"!

Now, because of our dilemma in finding ourselves to be such numskulls, and seeing the demands of Jesus, we have invented some pretty interesting and caraaazzeey doctrines. Some Christians have said, "Well, when God looks at us, He doesn't really see us anymore, He sees Jesus instead. And when there's ever sin in our hearts, if God should happen to look at the wrong moment, He'll see a smiling face of Jesus there, instead of seeing our sin. So God sees me as holy - even though I'm not! But...I really am...er, well, you know what I mean!" (I don't happen to believe that God is that easily fooled, not even by Christians.)

Another stranger-than-truth doctrine is that blessed refuge of backsliders called "the carnal Christian." In this example of pretzel-logic, we are led to believe that any "believer" who isn't really "walking with the Lord" at the present time, and is indulging in the things of the world and the lusts of the flesh, can still be considered a "Christian," but not a Christian of the 1st class, no, a Christian of the 2nd class... a "carnal Christian." Here we have a case of the "believer" who doesn't believe. Oh, he still "believes" that God is God, and that there is a heaven and hell, and so on (but don't forget, the devil believes all these things too!-James 2:19). He knows all the right things to say to convince granny, the pastor, and his Christian friends that he's still hanging in there. He even sort of believes it himself. Seems he's got everybody fooled - everybody that is, except God! The Bible is clear that "If we say we' have fellowship with Him, and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. " (I John 1:6)14

Today, possibly the greatest insult to the Gospel has been the almost total neglect of the preaching of holiness for the Christian. Jesus doesn't want to make believe that we're holy, He wants to impart His holiness to us by the Holy Spirit. But because people are not being driven to the cross, convicted by His Law to repentance and real rebirth, then we have to spend hours in our seminaries trying to find suitable, complicated ways to explain away the obvious meanings of Scripture.

To all this you might be saying, "But what about all those people getting saved by the efforts of good men and ministries out there? They're not preaching the way you say they should, and they still have converts!" Well, the immediate answer to that question is, "The people are not getting saved because of their messages, they're getting saved in spite of them." But unfortunately, many of the people who make "decisions for Christ" through large evangelistic crusades, do not even attend church regularly in the years that follow. (And as you probably well know, "attending church regularly" does not guarantee that one is a true believer.) But let's take a closer look at what kind of "converts" today's gospel usually produces.


What's Specifically Wrong With Our Modern Gospel?

It's Me-Centered Instead of Christ-Centered.
First and foremost, it is the gospel that appeals to the selfish. Instead of honoring God, it places the sinner at the center of God's love and plan. But the Bible places Jesus at the center of God's plan, not the sinner.

One of the most well-known phrases of modern evangelism is "God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life!" But the sober, biblical truth that needs to be presented to the sinner's mind is "You have made yourself an enemy of God, and in your present state of rebellion there is absolutely no hope for you." In fact, God's "plan" for the sinner at this point in his life is to separate him from His presence forever, in hell. However unpopular or unlovely that may sound, it is the only truth and reality about anyone who is an enemy of God through sin.

The whole line of reasoning in our modern gospel continues on and on in this mistaken way. "Sin has separated you from God, 'and His wonderful plan for your life.' Jesus came and died on the cross, so that you may experience 'His wonderful plan for your life.' You must accept Jesus now, so that you will not miss out on 'His wonderful plan for your life!'" You, you, you, you!!! It's all for YOU! I'm not sorry to say this, but Jesus did it all in obedience, for His Father's glory. (Phil. 2:8-12) Of course, it infinitely benefits those who love, serve, and honor Him, but that was a secondary consideration, not the primary one. (Please read Ezek. 36:22-32.) If people come to Jesus mainly to get a blessing, or only to get forgiveness, they will ultimately be disappointed. But if they come to give Him their lives in honor and worship, then they will truly have forgiveness and joy - more than they could ever imagine! (I Cor. 2:9)

It's Shallow, Cheap, and Offered as a "Bargain."
Our gospel reduces the good news to a "come and get it while you can" sale. We make every effort to take all the bones out - everything that might offend someone, might make them hesitate or put off their decision. Jesus didn't do this. He never lowered the requirements for anyone. One had to be completely sincere, totally humbled, having counted the cost, willing to leave everything, family and property, "count all things loss" so that they might "gain Christ." (Phil 3:7-8) When that same rich young ruler "went away sad, for he had many possessions" (Matt. 19:22), Jesus didn't go running after him shouting, "Hey, wait a minute! Let's talk this thing over, it isn't as bad as it might sound. Maybe I was a little too harsh!"

Maybe we're so eager to "see the converts," to publish "how many got saved at our last concert" in the bulletins to our supporters, that we'll do anything to rush someone into a "decision" before he's had a chance to really make one. The problem is, if you have to rush him into it, he probably will change his mind later anyway. For as a friend of mine says, "If somebody can talk them into it, somebody can talk them out of it!" (I Cor. 1:17)

Salvation is Shown as a Barter or Trade, Instead of the Result of Obedience by Faith.
We offer forgiveness of sin like on "Let's Make a Deal." I've even heard, "You give Jesus your sin, and He'll give you salvation in return!" No one in the Bible ever thought so low of the grace of God to talk about the gift of eternal life like it was for trade. It is a gift! You can't earn it, or buy it, or give anything in return for it. How it must offend the Holy Spirit to hear people talk of His Jesus so. (Acts 8:18-23)

It Produces Selfish, "Blessed," and Feelings-Oriented "Converts."
Anyone who is made to believe he becomes a Christian under such preaching will seldom bring forth the true fruits of a real convert. He will remain just as selfish as he always was, only now his selfishness will take on a religious form. If he wants something for himself, he will say he "has a burden" for something, or he will say, "It is the desire of my heart," or some other religious-sounding phrase like that. He will pray selfishly, desiring blessings for himself, and even if he does pray for others, it usually will be for selfish reasons. After all, when he "accepted the Lord," he was told how much Jesus wanted to bless him and how much God had stored up for his account, and how the Bible was like "a checkbook full of promises, just waiting to be cashed!"

Such a person always seeks to "feel" good about himself, his own church, his own pastor, etc. His whole world is built on feeling blessed. He was never shown how he was created to bless God... God was not created to bless him. (Psalm 149:4; Phil. 2:13)

As you can see, the "converts" described above are not like those pictured in the book of Acts, when the Church was new and the fire was hot. Take a look at Acts 2:41-47 and 4:31-35, and you will see the tender spirit of love, and the mighty spirit of power that prevailed among the brethren in those early days. I believe that one of the great reasons that "everyone kept feeling a sense of awe" (Acts 2:43), was because "they were continually devoting themselves to the apostles' teaching and to prayer. "(vs. 42) I believe that Peter and the others made every effort to convey the whole message of the Gospel when they preached and taught, and that is why the Spirit of God could anoint and bless the new converts so powerfully- God always anoints the truth! (Isaiah 55:11)

by Keith Green

Obama Rising

President Barack Obama's approval rating with voters is now at 60%. Most impressively he is seen now as a strong leader on national security and protecting America from terrorists.

In polling for re-election against all Republican candidates for president in 2012 he leads by double digits.

http://www.pollingreport.com/wh12gen.htm

This is the black liberal "socialist" president the wingnut right have been frothing out the mouth about. Lol. Gotta love it.

Finding God When You've Failed

Honesty is indeed a prerequisite to effective prayer. But it can also be cleverly guided on a boomerang path by our arch opponent.

"How can I pray when I know I've failed God?" I may ask myself. The awareness of recent sin or even a remote memory can haunt the mind and cripple all confidence in prayer. Further, I will never feel guilt but that Satan, whom God's Word labels as the accuser as well as the adversary, will hound my mind with added evidence of my unworthiness and, therefore, of my hopelessness if I do pray. "You've botched it up so badly, how can you seriously expect a hearing from God? You don't deserve anything. You know it, and He knows it! Forget it!"

Some of us will even press beyond that lying attack to the point of praying something, somehow, but the words - when the mind is bombarded by guilt and condemnation - have a way of falling to the floor. Absent is that sense of the creative power when we speak boldly in simple trust to the God of all the heavens. We feel instead like someone who seeks an audience with the head of state of a nation whose flag we have just trampled.

Fat chance of a favor! Thin hope of a hearing! The devil's right. Forget it. But wait a minute. Think clearly for a moment. What suddenly changed Satan's nature that he would defend God's glory by urging you to keep your dirty distance? Nothing. He is consistently opposed to my union and yours with the Father. When the devil contests a believer on seemingly righteous grounds you can count on it that there's a trap in the system somewhere. Truth starts to surface. The God of all glory is also the God of all grace. We need to learn how to handle our biggest obstacle to effective prayer: guilt - the sense of having failed and thereby being disqualified for bold approach. How can I handle my dirty linen when I want to come to the throne room of the Almighty?

Any correct teaching of God's infinite mercy has a way of sounding to the presumptuous like a license for sin. But we don't enter God's presence by presenting an admission card certifying our sinlessness. Nor does one stamp into the throne room with muddy feet and a glib, "Sorry about that." A proper balance of humility and boldness is needed. Sin, by whatever description, cannot be skirted. Neither should sin be honored by allowing it to inhibit our praying. Here's how to handle the problem:

First, understand God's posture. He's on the side of sinners. Jesus' critics puzzled that He was so frequently in the company of people who lacked religious pedigree and moral status: "This man companies with publicans and sinners!" The amazing thing was not only that He was willing to move among the sinful, but that He affected them and not the other way around. God never condemns sinners, and He never condones sin. "My little children," John begins, "I am writing these things to you that you sin not." (1 John 2:1). The message registers, and could produce a guilt feeling just by casual reading…except for the next sentence: "But if any man sin, we have one pleading our case before the Father - Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is our sin-covering." (vs.1-2). In other words, the Word of God says: "Absolutely, do not sin," then turns right around and says, "But when you do..." Although the heavenly Father does not hold a casual attitude toward sin, He is not shocked by it either. He has made provision for it, not as an invitation to sin, but to receive His freedom from its guilt.

Second, we make a serious mistake if we think God's mercy is the result of some "smile-and-forget-it" bent in His nature. Humanistic theology features the Father as a somewhat doddering, near senile, harmless old man who forgives because He couldn't do much else in His defense anyway. Or it says that God forgives whenever He is asked "simply because it's right and He ought to." It's a part of a gentlemen's agreement: We'll forgive God for letting the world go on in the generally messed-up condition it is, if He will be fair about it and forgive us for those times we've contributed to the mess.

Most people never express such ideas or, for that matter, bother to discover what they do think about forgiveness. But to experience the full peace of forgiveness we must understand the key to its power.

God's forgiveness is available and adequate because it cost an infinite price: the blood of Jesus.

•Blood is the only price adequate to cover payment for sin. (Heb. 9:22)

•Jesus knew and announced that His death on the cross was that instrument of payment. (Matt. 26:28)

•It was the Father's plan and the Son's agreement to this redeeming event that produced Calvary. (Acts 2:23; Matt. 26:39)

•This message was foretold by the Old Testament prophets and confirmed by the preaching of the New Testament apostles. (Is. 53:4-6; Jn. 1:29; 1 Cor. 15:3, 1 Pet. 1:18,19)

•Both justification (acquittal for our sins) in the present and eternal blessing in the future are granted through the blood. (Rom. 5:9)

•Therefore, peace of mind and a clear conscience before God are available through the blood. (Eph. 2:13,14; Heb. 9:14)

Forgiveness is abundant, but it isn't the splash of a supermarket display. It's the overflow of the cornucopia of His love designed to prompt our praise and thanksgiving...and our bold approach to His throne, even when we have sinned.

That's the third point: Handling dirty linen in the throne room is not accomplished by attempting to hide it, but by openly spreading it before God. That's what confession means: acknowledging exactly what we know to be so. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." (1 Jn. 1:9)

"Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need. " (Heb. 4:16)

"In time of need." That's the time we are most encouraged to come. But when need arises - and is compounded by our own sense of sin and failure - that is the time we're least inclined to come boldly. But it's the time we're most invited! Has your desire to pray been blocked by a sense of guilt? Be done with that blockade!

Let the truth about the blood of Jesus, the truth about the Father's mercy, set you free!

I can come and be cleansed by the miracle of His creative working through the blood:

"Purge me... and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

Create in me a clean heart, 0 God; and renew a right spirit within me." (Ps.51:7,10)

Welcome to the throne room of heaven, sinner.

-Jack Hayford

This Tax Day, Make THEM Pay

Do you wonder (like I do) what the tax accountants and executives are doing over at GE this weekend? Frantically rushing to fill out their IRS returns like the rest of us?
Hardly. They're taking the weekend off to throw themselves a big party and have a hearty laugh at all of us. It must really crack them up to see us like suckers scurrying around to make sure we report everything to Uncle Sam -- and even send him a check, if necessary.

The joke's on us, folks. GE and tons of other corporations will have a tax bill for 2010 of ZERO. GE had $14.2 billion in profits in 2010. Yet they will contribute NOTHING to the federal government while every last dime is soaked from us.

In the latest budget deal, our politicians could have tackled the deficit by stopping the flow of these ill-gotten billions to corporations. Instead they cut billions from "wasteful" programs that do "wasteful" things, like create new jobs, drive economic growth, and help the needy and our nation's children. It's Democracy in reverse and it sickens me.

GE spends $20 million a year to lobby Congress to throw themselves this party. But do you know what speaks louder than $20 million? 20 million votes! 20 million people, and more, standing together and taking to the streets. That starts now, with you.

This coming Monday, April 18th is Tax Day -- and that's the day when "we the people" will demand our country back from these corporations in events all across the country. You can find the nearest event to you here.

MoveOn members -- along with union, community, and environmental allies -- will gather outside the headquarters and local offices of the biggest corporate tax dodgers to deliver tax bills from the American people. And we'll demand that our leaders make these corporate deadbeats pay.

We're doing this because we don't buy into the Big Lie: that greedy teachers caused the crash on Wall Street! That the selfish firefighters sent millions of jobs overseas! That pregnant woman, infants, and children are sending us into deficit!

No, it was the big corporations that did this. It was the CEOs and the top 1% of the country. THEY brought on the mortgage crisis. THEY made off with trillions of dollars from our economy. THEY are systematically destroying the middle class. And THEY have bought and sold the very people elected to represent us!

On Monday, we will have something to say to Exxon, Chevron, and the big banks that crashed our economy and got billions in bailouts, like Citigroup and Bank of America, who pay little or no federal income tax. In fact, the IRS will likely give them a tax REBATE. If that doesn't boggle your mind then nothing will.

The Tax Day events are about sending this message: We are coming after you, we are stopping you and we are going to return the money, jobs, and homes you stole from the people. This is your tipping point, Corporate America. And I, for one, am glad it's going to happen this Monday.

If you've never been to an event like this before, this is the time. And don't go alone, because none of us can win this fight by ourselves. Plus, it's more fun and exciting to go along with friends and family to be part of real democracy in action -- not the store-bought kind Big Business gets on Capitol Hill.

I really hope you can make it. This is our chance, my friends. Take the time on Monday to make your voice heard. I can guarantee you I will. Please join me.

-Michael Moore

150,000 in Madison Wis. Continue Protest For Workers Rights

150,000 protestors, the largest yet, assembled in Madison Wisconsin Saturday to show opposition to the states new anti-union bill removing collective bargaining rights for government workers and to show support for the 14 Democrat senators returning from their own exile protest.
There are those who love to claim this is only a republic so satisfied with the corporate union busters buying off Republican congressmen that ignore,on ideology, what the people want 3 out of 4 years but I guess we will find out soon just how much of republic we are stuck with or how much of a democracy we can make.

Gov. Walker & Republicans In Service To Plutocracy / Oligarchy

Brazen service to the wealthy elite by the rightwing is what is going on and has been going on for far too long now. Are you ever going to see it? It has been the direction the Republicans have been taking the country because they know that they will be the prized and honored lifelong secure servants of the ruling elite if they, the Republicans, can establish elite rule. They are under the power of this just as they were under the power of greed in bringing the nation to economic collapse unconcerned about the consequences for the people of the nation just as long as they got their money from wall street for inhibiting regulators. The Republican party has been serving the wishes of the rich and powerful and in the process turning what was once a vibrant democracy into a plutocracy,oligarchy or corporatocracy. Whatever you call it, it's providing the rich with control of the direction of the nation.

-In Wisconsin,despite the crystal clear opposition of the people to taking away people's rights, Gov. Walker and the Republicans take them away anyway.

-With regards to national healthcare reform where the polling shows the people are against cutting funds for the new healthcare law and against repealing the healthcare law which provides low-income people with assistance to get healthcare and rights for all people to fight healthcare abuses, the Republicans are attempting to re-peal and de-fund the healthcare law that will provide these desperately needed rights to the people.

-After the people had been devasted economically by the abusive scams of the wall street bankers the Republicans worked under cover of the gulf oil spill to stop any punishment of these corporate criminals and now as if that was not enough they are working behind the scenes, hiding behind budget restraint, trying to cut funding for the financial reform laws that will discipline the wall street crooks that bilked the American people. For the Republicans it is unimportant that not one of these CEO bankers is in jail.

-At almost every turn the Republicans vote to take away rights from the people and give rights with favors to the rich and powerful. They vote corporations massive subsides and tax loopholes so that nowhere near the fair share of tax will be paid by corporations to properly fund government then complain there are not enough government funds, and all this during a time of record corporate profits. Then under the power of their oligarchic precept procede to cut government workers wages and benefits to remedy the shortfall originally caused by corporate under tax-funding of government and then to top it off eliminate those workers bargaining rights. This list could go on and on.

Will you ever wake up America?. If the people clearly understood what was going on here the Republican party would be fleeing to set up shop in Libya or Iran where they can openly show their facist face allegiance to a "republic" instead of continuing here in America.

GOP On Wrong Side of America & Wisconsin Voters

Voters Oppose Gov. Walker, Favor Wisconsin Government Workers

Even the Rasmussen Poll which usually favors Republicans and the rightwing, now reveals what other polls around the country have clearly shown; that the voters support the government workers of Wisconsin in opposition to Wisconsin's Gov. Walker and his Republican congress's attempt to eliminate government workers collective bargaining rights. 52% to 39%

The poll goes on to show that 49% believe that the pay of state workers is about right.
Rasmussen also concedes that the reason Walker even won in November is because in mid-term elections fewer Democrats turn out. All this from the Rasmussen poll. Hmmm.

The resulting truth is that Governor Walker and his congress do not represent the voters will and should relent from behaving as if they do. The polling clearly shows there is no support for a silent majority as Wisconsin Gov. Walker and his Republicans contend and if they continue to try to shove their extremist ideology down the peoples throats perhaps they should be recalled as is now stirring around.

Heres the proof: -http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_state_surveys/wisconsin/wisconsin_poll_support_for_budget_cutting_not_for_weakening_collective_bargaining_rights

Recent surveys by the New York Times/CBS, Wall Street Journal/NBC, Pew, and Gallup all found majority or plurality support across the country for maintaining the collective bargaining rights of unionized state workers:

NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll
"Do you think public employees who belong to a union and work for state government, city government, or a school district should have the same right to bargain when it comes to their health care, pension and other benefits as employees who belong to a union and work for private companies?"
Americans support this - 77% to 19% Wow!


Quinnipiac University Poll
"In order to reduce state budget deficits, do you favor cutting the pay or benefits of public employees, or do you oppose that?"
Americans oppose cutting pay or benefits of public employees - 56% to 37%


CBS News/New York Times Poll
"As you may know, collective bargaining refers to negotiations between an employer and a labor union's members to determine the conditions of employment. Some states are trying to take away some of the collective bargaining rights of public employee unions. Do you favor or oppose taking away some of the collective bargaining rights of these unions?"
Americans oppose taking away collective bargaining rights - 60% to 33%


Pew Research Center
"From what you've read and heard about the dispute between Wisconsin's governor and public employee unions over collective bargaining rights, do you side more with the governor or the public employee unions?"
Americans side with the unions - 42% to 31%


USA Today/Gallup Poll
"As you may know, many U.S. state governments are facing large budget deficits this year. Please say whether you strongly favor, favor, oppose, or strongly oppose each of the following ways state officials could reduce their budget deficits. How about reducing pay or benefits the state provides for government workers?"
Americans oppose reducing pay or benefits for gov't workers - 53% to 44%


USA Today/Gallup Poll
"As you may know, one way the legislature in Wisconsin is seeking to reduce its budget deficit is by passing a bill that would take away some of the collective bargaining rights of most public unions, including the state teachers' union. Would you favor or oppose such a bill in your state?"
Americans oppose taking away even some bargaining rights - 61% to 33% -

Proof for above poll numbers - http://www.pollingreport.com/work.htm

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/03/03/rasmussen-poll-wisconsin-voters-support-collective-bargaining-rights/

It needs to be shown that although the Republicans won elections in November they are not winning over the hearts and minds of Americans the way they think they have and the way they are behaving. This is true across the country.

By going against the vast majority of public opinion Gov. Walker and his Republican congress are showing their facist face in removing people's rights against the will of the people

Tea Party & Republicans Out Of Sync On ObamaCare

Here is another reality check for the Tea Party and the Republican rabid rightwingers frothing at the mouth over repealing Obama's healthcare law.
Bottom line is Americans want to go nowhere near repealing or de-funding ObamaCare. They want to require everyone to carry healthcare insurance but are divided on how to enforce it. And obviously Americans, thank God, are not biting on the foolish claims by the wingnut right that ObamaCare is ushering in socialism or communism.
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The Republican governors threaten to kill Obama's healthcare law by defunding it.

In the latest poll Americans oppose de-funding the healthcare law 55% to 35%
In another poll it was 61% to 34% against de-funding it.
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Republicans claim they will repeal ObamaCare or replace it with their own plan.

In the latest poll Americans favor keeping the law or even expanding it - 50% to 39%.
In contrast to the negative media hype Americans actually favor expanding the law as compared to just keeping the new healthcare law as it is. The 50% is made up of 20% keeping it as is and 30% expanding upon it. Wow!
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The American people believe Democrats will handle healthcare reform better than the Republicans by - 44% to 31%.
Republicans don't even care enough to try and they won't even though the CBO, the Congressional Budget Office which has been the bipartisan agreed final arbiter forever, says with ObamaCare the deficit will be reduced by a quarter trillion dollars and with out it the deficit will suffer a quarter trillion more dollars in red ink. Republicans are scarred to death that should ObamaCare become effective in 2014 the truth about the law will become clear making the Democrats difficult to beat. They care more about that than they do you or the deficit but by now you should already know that.
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This flys in the face of the Republicans hyperactive opposition to everyone being required to carry health insurance

In the latest poll Americans favor 50% to 46% requiring everyone to carry health insurance

Americans have a different reaction when you add the word "fine" but how do you require something without penalties. You put it in taxes and thats how they will do it, not write you a ticket. Gotta articulate this one out.
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On the most important key points of keeping ObamaCare alive and funded Americans are clearly in support.

Heres the proof -> http://www.pollingreport.com/health.htm

So Gingrich,Palin,Limbaugh,Beck,Pawlenty,etc., put this in your pipe and smoke it!

Wisconsin Protest Not About Wages, It's About Rights

It is Friday, February 18, 2011 ----- All Democratic senators have fled the state capitol to stop the vote because the Republicans are trying to end all collective bargaining rights for government workers.
For the last 10 years corporations, who if not for Republican voted subsidies and corporate tax loopholes would be funding their fair share to government, have been making record profits while the gap between rich and poor has been growing. This should not be a problem but...

... the protest is not about the money..

********IT'S NOT ABOUT THE MONEY, IT'S ABOUT THE RIGHTS********

...It's about the Republicans trying to eliminate collective bargaining rights of the workers.

But the establishment media(CNN, FOX, the networks and of course the nearly total rightwing neural network control of radio talk) are trying to portray the protest as being about wages and benefits in order to turn the American people against the government workers of Wisconsin using reports trying to compare government workers wages with private sector wages. Wage per wage the private sector makes more but overall, counting benefits, government workers come out slightly ahead but....THAT IS NOT WHAT THE PROTEST IS ABOUT. This is about protesting a government body trying to eliminate the right to bargain period. Wisconsin government workers have already made significant concessions to Republican govenor Walker but it was not enough.

Once again the Republicans are showing their weakness for facist tendency as they did in eliminating parts of the Bill Of Rights installed to protect the citizenry and curtailing privacy rights resulting in the ability to spy on all Americans with surveillence cameras now installed nearly everywhere. Now once again with their aversion to citizen's rights and fully immersed in their false anti-government ideology the Republicans want to completely eliminate collective bargaining rights for government workers in Wisconsin trying to start a tide of such decisions across the country. If the Republicans had their way they would reduce worker wages so that few competent people would apply for government work thereby neutering government's effectiveness. It is all part of the ideological rightwing plan to put the nation in the hands of money and the private sector and make the government a sideshow but we saw the fruit of such ideology in the total economic collapse of 2008 didn't we!

Government is not a sideshow - Romans 13: 1-7

GO TO THE WISCONSIN STATE CAPITOL IN MADISON AND MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOR THE TRUTH!

And I should add that the Tea Party will be there Saturday to counterprotest the workers protesting to protect their own rights but the Tea Party surely didn't understand the purpose of the protests. That would be bad P.R., more like pig P.R.
You don't undercut someone protesting in order to save their own bargaining rights. To the Tea Party one has to ask; where in the world is your sense of discernment when it comes to what is honorable and dishonorable?

The Religious Right In "A Christmas Carol"

I wonder how the religious right were able to deal with their conscience this christmas season as they witnessed the Christmas Carol story and other similiar stories on TV or experienced them in plays. I wonder just who do they think they are in these scenarios. Do they see themselves as the persecuted, the rejected or denied or perhaps as the compassionate peripheral observer. Maybe they see themselves as the messenger ghosts of Christmas but I have to wonder just how many setting there experiencing these stories begin to see themselves as the old crank himself, Scrooge, the man that would not empathise and would not relent.

If the religious right were to experience a modern story about a family without healthcare they just might see where they do stand, for they, the religious right have done all they could not only to ignore healthcare reform but have worked to prevent thousands of poorer American families suffering without health insurance to continue suffering without health insurance by preventing reform. Have you ever seen a family devastated because of lack of health coverage, losing their homes, their quality and dignity of life and then their lives?.
With that a modern version is not really necessary because the Christmas Carol is essentially analagous to the plight of many families today except that is to the necessary evasive minds of many on the religious right needing to avoid the connection to today surfing the thin membrane of realization that keeps them from seeing that Tiny Tim could be someone they know without health insurance and so as it goes for the religious right it's, hey, no way...and why? Because they are the tough guys whose leader is George W. Bush, the guy who does not relent, no longer repents and does not regret, his 3 R's and their 3 R's. They wear their callousness of heart with pride and honor and their political ideology like God so that their concience can bear the load. You have to wonder what kept Scrooge going for so long and no doubt it was some of the same. Just as the greedy Scrooge dweedled in his mind to put his money over the needs of his own workers, the religious right follow that self-centered characteristic in their political ideology into the darkness of indifference where there is little empathy or insight into the suffering of poor American families without healthcare. For them the love of God has been rationed out and can only be under exploitation but the good news is....

Proverbs 31:8 - (Commandment to kings.) Open your mouth for those that cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all the unfortunate. Open your mouth, judge righteously, and defend the rights of the afflicted and needy.

Proverbs 22:9 - He who has a generous eye will be blessed,
For he gives of his bread to the poor

Proverbs 28:27 - He who gives to the poor will not lack,
But he who hides his eyes will have many curses.

The love of God is not what they think...

Matthew 5:40-42 - says if one compels you to go a mile with him go two instead and if one would steal your cloak give it to him instead.

Luke 12: 13-15 - When you give a dinner do not ask your relatives nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, but invite the poor and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you.

Matthew 18:21-22 - says if one offends you forgive him not seven times but seventy times seven. (Yea and it's sure not what the world thinks either, is it?)

Would it be so hard for the religious right to support subsidies for low-income and poor families and do the supporters of healthcare reform have to make it sound so economically palatable for the religious right to accept it and in a Christian light isn't that kind of pathetic. Must every initiative to help the poor have a concrete economic advantage? Cannot the religious right even discern the blessing that would come from God when helping the poor. Have they abandoned the words of Jesus?
For the religious right it would be better all this were only about a traveler, a thief or trespasser as in the scripture but it is not, it is about our own fellow families in desperate need.

Now the religious right generally claim to be fundamentalist Christians and one of the principle teachings of fundamentalist Christianity that we hear preached frequently is that of stepping out in faith when the goal sought appears too difficult to attain. If the religious right will practice their own teaching and put faith in God and His love for people over their idolatrous economic and political ideology they will begin to find the inner constitution to support healthcare help for the poor and the blessing that it will bring to this nation. One way of practicality and surely of little faith, is putting the priority of healthcare over funding again and again a defense budget that can destroy the world umpteen times and then never getting an outlet to relieve the pressure of that military buildup must then unnecessarily invade someone but the religious right's teachings are not about the concrete and practical, they are about trusting in the words of Jesus and stepping out in faith. God will reward this nation, as He has many times, through channels and means this people cannot yet perceive when we follow His commands to help the poor.

Even if it doesn't appear the bridge can be gapped God will provide a way if only we step out in faith. You see, its not that we want the religious right to just hold their position and lose this fight, we want them to be with us because we need their help and their faith to achieve the just and right thing that does indeed appear difficult to attain but with faith can be attained. It is about doing the right thing and not shying away from the challenge of the love of God.
Will we and shouldn't we work together? Will we step out in faith?

Are any of us in a position to ration God's love when seeing desperate need in the wealthiest nation on earth and is it not to Christianity's benefit to not only get out of the way of God's love but to fully support it's manifestation?
2nd Cor:9: 8-13

The Father Heart Of God

Have you ever wondered what God thinks of you? Is it hard for you to believe He loves you as much as the Bible says He does? God is so big and He sometimes seems so distant - but what is He really like? Do you really know Him? You've heard His instructions, but do you know anything about His emotions or His character?

One of the most wonderful revelations of the Bible is that God is our Father. What do you think of when you hear the word "father"? Do you automatically think of protection, provision, warmth, and tenderness? Or does the word "father" paint different kinds of pictures for you? God reveals Himself in the Bible as a gentle, forgiving Father, intimately involved with each and every detail of our lives. It is not only a beautiful picture, but a true one. However, every person seems to have a different idea of what God is like, because they unconsciously tend to attach the feelings and impressions that they have of their own earthly father to their concept of their Heavenly Father. Each person's own experience with human authority is usually transferred over to how they relate to God. Good experiences bring us closer to knowing and understanding God, just as bad experiences create distorted pictures of our Father's love for us.

What did God have in mind when He created the family? The Bible says, "God makes a home for the lonely (Psalm 68:6 NASB) A family involves a circle of relationship including an adult male and female, into which tiny, dependent human beings are born and raised. Why do we enter the world as such helpless, inadequate persons, and then slowly grow up physically, mentally, and emotionally into self-sufficient adults? Have you ever wondered why God didn't come up with some sort of reproduction system that would produce a physically completed person such as His original creation of Adam and Eve?
I believe God wanted us to come into this world totally dependent and helpless, because He intends the family unit to be a place where His love is demonstrated to both parent and child. As parents we begin to really understand God's heart towards us as His children. And as children, it is God's will for us to see His love revealed through parental tenderness, mercy, and discipline.
But what if the ideal did not happen? What if you have been failed in some way by parental authority? So many have suffered hurt and rejection by their families that it is hard for them to see God as He really is. Understanding the character of God is essential if we are to love Him, serve Him, and be like Him

I want to talk about six different areas of misconception concerning God and His love for us. For ease of communication I will be referring almost exclusively to God's qualities of fatherhood. However, a full revelation of God's parental love is incomplete without the presence of the male and female attributes of parental affection. "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." (Genesis 1:27 NASB) I want you to look back into your personal past and see if your relationship with God has been hindered in any way because of a failure or absence of tender loving care from one or both of your parents.

I. Parental Authority
Have you ever turned into the driveway of a friend's house to be greeted by the family dog? The foolish mutt will either cower away from you, trembling with fear, or leap upon you with an unwanted display of affection, demonstrated with tongue, tail, and dirty paws. The browbeaten puppy that cannot be induced to trust you has obviously been mistreated. The exuberant mongrel attempting to give you a facial with his tongue has obviously come from a loving home.
So it is when God approaches man. Our past experiences dictate our response when God reaches out to us. A weeping prophet named Hosea heard the voice of God saying, "When Israel was a child I loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son. But the more I called Israel, the further they went from Me. They sacrificed to the baals and they burned incense to images. It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms; but they did not realize it was I who healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love; I lifted the yoke from their neck and bent down to feed them." (Hosea 11:1-4 LB) God's authority is not harsh and vindictive, but to the contrary, He is unspeakably gentle and long-suffering.
The other day I rushed into my den urgently needing some information from my files. As I sorted frantically through my papers, my five-year-old son repeatedly blew his shrill tin whistle. I told him again and again to stop. There was a period of silence followed by a deafening blast right next to my ear, including a spray of saliva. I reached around, swatted him with the back of my hand and bellowed at him in anger. Immediately I felt that the Spirit of God had been grieved. I remembered the biblical statement that God is slow to anger and delights to be merciful. I took my son in my arms and asked him to forgive me. It was only right that I should correct his disobedience, but our children should always know that we discipline them because we love them, and not because we are venting our momentary frustration.
Our Heavenly Father is at this very moment being slandered and misrepresented all over the world by man's cruelty and selfishness. Not only in the home, but in all forms of human government. His laws of love have been ignored and our mangled hearts continue on in carrying out injustice to all those smaller and weaker than ourselves.
What horror is God seeing at this moment? A bedroom door bursts open. A small boy is slapped awake by a drunken and angry man in the middle of the night "The sprinklers are still on. It's a flood. I'll teach you, boy!" The terrified child is beaten mercilessly by the dark, hulking shape of a man he calls "Daddy."
A 15-year-old prostitute with blank, empty eyes, mechanically performs through a night of degradation on Hollywood Boulevard. She doesn't care what happens to her. She hasn't felt clean since the night she was molested by her own father.
A wounded generation stumbles through their youthful years, only to visit the same hurts on their own children. Generation after generation it goes on. Is there no one to comfort us? Who will father the children of men? Whose arms are big enough for all the lonely children of the world? Who weeps over our pains? Who will comfort us in our loneliness? ONLY GOD. A BROKEN-HEARTED FATHER who is rejected by the little ones He yearns to heal. Our problem is that we, like the browbeaten puppy, shrink away from the One who we assume will be like the other authorities in our lives. But He is not He is perfect love. It was God who gave this command to parents in Ephesians 6:4: "Parents don't keep on scolding and nagging your children, making them angry and resentful. Rather, bring them up with the loving discipline the Lord Himself approves."(LB)

II. Parental Faithfulness
Every promise of God will be fulfilled. He is consistently loving. His one heart motive remains the same through time and eternity. He never changes. He only desires to show love and forgiveness.
Do you distrust God? Our distrust hurts Him deeply. What if I came home to my wife and children after a long journey and they ran away from me when I opened the door and called their names. I would be terribly hurt.
You are God's child and even now He calls your name, but maybe deep in your heart you doubt His faithfulness. As a child you may have experienced the complete absence of a father because of death or divorce. Maybe you were orphaned by the demands of your parents' career? Or is it just the childhood memory of broken promises or neglect that haunts you? Some of you screamed for hours as babies but nobody came to relieve you of your discomfort and hunger. Some of you whimpered behind locked doors, a small child, forgotten and alone.
Do you have an inability to sense His presence with you? Is your heart soft towards God or hardened with cynicism and distrust? Look up into His eyes and see His love for you. "I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you... I am with you always even until the end of the age. "(Heb. 13:5; Matt.28:20 NASB)
You may say to me, "But if He has loved me so much, then why haven't I felt Him or seen Him?" It isn't God who has failed you my friend, but I and those who know His love personally. Too many times we have failed to become His voice and His hands to those who do not know Him. Far too few allow themselves to be driven by the broken heart of Jesus into the dark corners of this world where the poor and needy wait Jesus is not attracted to pleasant places, but to hurting people. He pursues us with His love from our first breathing moment until the day we die.
Your Heavenly Father was there when you first walked as a child. He was there through hurts and disappointments. He is present now at this moment. You were briefly loaned to human parents who, for a few years, were supposed to have showered you with love like His love. But you are and always will be a child of God, made in His image. Your loving Father awaits even now with outstretched arms. What would keep you from Him?
Few people know God in all His loveliness while living this brief life. Many of us are like the thief who died on the cross next to Jesus. Outwardly he saw a bloody, disfigured body, but soon he began to perceive the true nature of Jesus, and at the last minute, entered by faith into the family of God. We too must see past the religious and commercial mutations of Jesus, and behold the God of Love who still stands with open arms saying, "I came that you might have life and that more abundantly." (John 10:10 NASB)
"Even when we are too weak to have any faith left, He remains faithful to us who are part of Himself and He will always carry out His promises to us. "(11 Tim.2:13 LB)

III. Parental Generosity
A few years ago I stood in a native village in the South Pacific, watching the children play. It occurred to me that these children would very seldom hear the words, "Don't touch that! Leave it alone! Be careful!" Their homes were simple, consisting of earth floors, thatched roofs, and mats that rolled down to serve as walls at night.
In contrast, our modern homes are stuffed with expensive and fragile furnishings and appliances that represent a minefield of potential rejection and rebuke for inquisitive toddlers. How many mothers have exploded in anger at a child who has damaged a treasured object of great expense or sentimental value. Children are constantly reminded of the importance of things - their value, and how to care for them. Very few times do they hear the simple words, "I love you."
A repetitious and destructive chant is working its way into the subconscious minds of our children, "Things are more important than me. Things are more important than me!" What are we to do? Abandon our modem homes? Obviously not. But we do need to realize that our concept of God's generosity may have been crippled by our childhood experiences.
The truth is that God is innately generous. Creation shows an extravagance of color, complexity, and design that goes far beyond simple functional value. At this moment, high in the Italian Alps, a tiny white flower glistens in the sunlight. It has never been seen by the human eye in all of its seasons of bloom. It is not an essential part of the food chain. It was created by God in the hope that one day a son of Adam or a daughter of Eve might glance at it and be blessed by its beauty.
The greatest demonstration of God's father heart seems to come with His attention to the details of our life. He surprises us with those extra things, those little pleasures and treasures that only a father would know we yearn for. God is not stingy, possessive, or materialistic. We use people to get things, He uses things to bless people.
My family and I have worked as missionaries since 1972, trusting God for our daily needs. Our testimony is that in providing for us, God goes far beyond or basic needs of food, clothing, and shelter. We serve a truly generous God! The Psalmist said, "Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will do it." (Psalm 37:3-5 NASB)

IV. Parental Affection
Do you have any idea how attractive you are to God? One of the biggest hindrances to our walk with Him is a sense that our flesh is repulsive to Him because of sin. When my small son is covered with mud from the back yard, I pick him up and clean him off with the garden hose. I reject the mud, not the boy. Yes, you have sinned. Yes, you have broken God's heart. But you are still the center of God's affections - the apple of His eye. It is He who pursues us with a forgiving heart. We say, "I found the Lord," but the truth is, He found us.
Many children, particularly boys, have had no physical display of affection from their fathers, or no real compassion when they are hurt. Because of our false concept of masculinity, we are told, "Don't cry son, boys don't cry." Jesus is not like that. His compassion and understanding are measureless. He feels our hurts more deeply than we do because His sensitivity to suffering is so much greater.
I once had to hold my screaming two-year-old while a doctor stitched a large gash in his forehead. He quickly forgot his painful experience and fell asleep in my arms. But I was tormented by the experience and grieved for hours. You have forgotten most of your pains, but God has not. He has perfect recall of every moment of your life. Your tears are still mingled with His at this very moment
God was there when you experienced cruel teasing in the school yard and you walked alone avoiding the eyes of others. When you sat in a math class confused and dejected, He was with you. At the age of four when you got lost at the county fair and wandered terrified through the huge crowd, it was God who turned the heart of that kind lady who helped you find your mother. "I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love." (Hosea 11:4 NIV)
Sometimes we don't understand what a fussy, doting Father God is. Your parents may proudly display bronzed baby booties on the mantle, pictures in an album, or trophies on the wall - but how does that compare with God's infinite capacity to be overjoyed with your every success? It was actually God who heard you speak your first real word. The hours you spent alone exploring new textures with baby hands were a delight to your Heavenly Father. Some of His greatest treasures are the memories of your childhood laughter. There has never been another child like you, and there never will be.
Moses once invoked a blessing on each of the tribes of Israel. To one tribe he said, "You shall dwell between the shoulders of God." What a fantastic blessing! But that is where you dwell also. Whatever you become in the eyes of men, even a person of great authority, fame, or title, you will never cease to be more or less than a babe in the arms of God.

V. Parental Attentiveness
There is one attribute of God that not even the best parent can hope to imitate - that is God's ability to be with you all the time. As parents we just cannot give constant attention 24 hours a day. We are finite beings who can only focus on one thing at a time. Not only is God with you all the time, but He gives you His whole attention. "Let Him have all your worries and cares, for He is always thinking about you and watching everything that concerns you." (I Peter5:7 LB)
God is constantly thinking an uninterrupted stream of loving thoughts toward you as though nobody else in the world exists. You say, "How does He do that? How can He be personally involved with billions of individuals at the same time?" I don't know, but I know it's no problem for the Creator of the world. Perhaps the explanation is the speed of His thought. There are 5 billion people on this planet. God has created things in nature that pulsate at incredible speed. I have heard that the quartz crystal's molecular structure vibrates at the speed of 9 billion movements per second. If God could only think that fast, He could think a loving thought towards you about twice every second without straining His ability to relate to the rest of His children. Who knows how He does it? Just enjoy it! As far as you are concerned, it's just you and God. You don't have to get His attention, He's already listening. Don't worry about taking His time... it's all yours.
Your parents were often preoccupied with their activities, and sometimes showed no vital interest in the small events of your life, but God is not that way. He cares. He is a God of detail. Why does the Bible say that God has numbered the hairs of your head? Not because God is concerned with abstract mathematics. He's not a computer wanting data, it's just that He's trying to tell us in what detail He knows us and cares about our lives.
A little boy has worked all afternoon pounding nails into pieces of scrap wood. He finally emerges from the garage and shows a three-level battleship to mom. He can't wait until dad gets home. Dad is late. At 6:30 a tired, preoccupied man finally arrives. A cold dinner is waiting, and so are the income tax forms. The excited boy proudly displays his handiwork to a daddy who barely looks up from the calculator. Daddy never looked, never appreciated, but God did. Father God always looked, always took delight in the work of your hands. He's your real Father, always will be. Don't ever resent the failings of your human parents. They are just kids that grew up and had kids. Rather rejoice in the wonderful love of your Father God.

VI. Parental Acceptance
We live in a performance-oriented society. Acceptance is always conditional - if you make the football team, if you bring home a good report card, if you look pretty, if you have money, if you win. The kingdom of this world is a kingdom of rejection. The Kingdom of God is a kingdom of unconditional love. God's promises are conditional, we must obey Him to see blessing, but His love is unconditional. You don't have to wait to experience the love of God. Come as you are. Just be honest with Him about your sin - He delights to forgive you. Even in the depths of your past rebellion He still loved you. Even God's judgments are motivated by love.
Many of you have an inability to receive God's love and approval. You are trapped in a slave-like relationship with the harsh god of your imagination. A true love relationship involves the giving and receiving of love responses. There's one night I will always remember - the night I proposed to my wife, Julie. I kissed her and asked her to marry me. What if she had responded like this, "I'll wash your socks, I'll clean your car, and I'll type your letters." I didn't want to hear that! I wanted a response that matched my feelings of love for her. I wanted to know that she felt the same way about me.
What is your response to God when He simply says He loves you? Can you "Be still and know that He is God" without rushing into frantic activity to earn His approval? (Psalm 46:10 KJV) One of the greatest pictures of human peace and contentment is that of a baby asleep in the arms of a mother after having been fed at the breast. The child no longer squirms and demands, but rests in the embrace of loving arms. A deep mellow contentment wells up into the sound of a lullaby sung by mothers at times like this. The prophet Zephaniah described a similar emotion in the heart of God. "He will save, He will rejoice over thee with joy, He will rest in His love, He will joy over thee with singing." (Zeph. 3:17 KJV)
Don't be so restless in the presence of God. Corrie ten Boom had some simple advice to offer this generation. She who experienced so much suffering at the hands of the Nazis, yet went on to great spiritual victory, once said to my friends and me, "Don't wrestle... nestle." What a profound but simple truth.
God already loves you. All through life you have had to perform and compete. Even as a tiny baby you were compared with other babies. People said you were "too fat," or "too thin," or had "his legs" or "her nose," but God delighted in your uniqueness and still does. It's when you bask in the love of the Father that you cause God to "rest in His love and joy over you with singing."
Yes, there is much to be done in your life and through your life. There will be days when God comes bringing deep conviction of sin, showing you areas of your life that need to be changed, committed and submitted to Him. But God is not always demanding changes. He knows our limits and He gives us the grace and power to do the things He asks of us. He is tender and compassionate. Most of the time He just says, "I love you," and softly speaks your name.

Conclusion:
If you see that you have been hindered in your relationship with God due to some kind of failure of parental love, then take these things to the Lord. You must find forgiveness in your heart towards anyone who has hurt you. If you don't, your bitterness will consume you and you will find no peace with God. Realize, too, that you are not alone. I haven't met a perfect person yet, or a parent who hasn't made mistakes. Everyone has suffered some kind of hurts in their life. One of the keys for release is found in forgiveness. The important thing is that you go forward and get to know God for who He really is - not who you think He is. He is the Perfect Parent. He always disciplines in love. He is faithful, generous, kind, and just. He loves you and He longs to spend time with you. He wants you to receive His love and know that you are a special and unique person to Him. Will you receive God's love and affection? Won't you open up and enter into an intimate relationship with your true Father? He is patiently waiting for you to come. It is my prayer that you will realize His love for you and respond to the father heart of God.

from John Dawson

Obama Favorability Better Than Reagan or Clinton

Here is a reality check for those that are a bit over confident and a little encouragement for those that are disheartened.
Obama's favorability rating with voters is greater now than it was with two of our most popular recent presidents during the same time of their presidency.
In both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton's 7th quarter they were at 41% favorability with voters, Obama was at 44% in his 7th quarter and is now rising back to 48% favorability with voters.
Repeat and focus; Barack Obama was at 44% in his 7th quarter. Ronald Reagan was at 41% in his 7th quarter.

I know the Obama to Clinton stat is pretty much nil for you Tea Partiers but the Reagan part of it bugs ya don't it? Good.....and we know what gives it that extra little punch don't we? Now maybe if you can get Michael Steele removed as Republican chairman you will be able to relieve some of that pressure.

Talk Of Socialism is Food For Chumps

There has been talk from the rightwing and religious right that Obama is a socialist and the new healthcare bill is socialism but that is funny because Obama essentially offered this bill as a compromise to the Republicans. Do you want to know why?
You see, this healthcare bill is for the most part the same bill the Republicans were offering back in the 90's. It was their business oriented, free market oriented alternative they so strongly supported against the Democrats.

Here is the Republican healthcare bill of 1993: http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2010/February/23/GOP-1993-health-reform-bill.aspx

So... Hello!, it is the height of political hyprocrisy for the Republicans to cry such that they have and the way they have about Obama's healthcare bill, his offering to them and the religious right are at about the same height if they claim anything approximating honesty -Proverbs 12:17 and plenty more.
The Republicans are playing obstructionist politics for their self-centered interests and any talk of this healthcare bill as socialism is ludicrous because it is the biggest gift that the private healthcare industry has ever seen. It is a monumental offering to the private healthcare industry in the form of thousands of new premiums and it is so very much what the corporate serving Republicans wanted to offer the health insurance industry only a few years ago but now in the name of political revenge and bitterness the Republicans feign they are appalled by the health insurance bill, LOL!!
America should be laughing their heads off at the Republicans and some are but for the most part they are buying into the fear factor that is drummed into their heads at the hands of rightwing Republican talk radio shows that fill over 90% of the country's airwaves. It is a rightwing mantra that goes on and on through the airwaves of this nation with incredibly sensationalistic untruths and deception that on a mass scale can throw many people into a delusional and paranoid state of mind. One might be led to think that from all the tripe flying around out there the passage of this bill will mean American will no longer have a vote or any control over their government, that we are essentially signing off into Lenin/Stalin communism and socialism except that....this is originally the Republican's healthcare bill.

This all is of course why thousands of U.S. corporations and businesses contributed millions of dollars to get Obama and the democrats elected with Obama's healthcare mandate. These hardworking lifelong corporate capitalists wanted to give up their luxuries and priviledges so they could set as financial equals with all of us.

Want to be a chump? Keep believing what the rightwing talking "heads" are telling you.

It's A Wonder, America, You Even Remember How To Breath

The long litany of governmental failures from our previous president and his corrupt rightwing controlled congress that brought this nation to it's knees are too long to list and too exasperting and embarrassing to list again and the election is over but there is one thing we would do well to remember should God consider us worthier of the gift of recollection.

God never preached against big government, He created government, not small government, not big government but surely efficient government, healthy government, something about Romans 13:1-7....remember?
And Jesus never wailed against big government, He actually said "give to the government what is theirs and give to God what is his", hardly a treatise to disengenously whine the revolutionary slogan "don't tread on me" that you hear from the Tea Party regarding our government but a little education will show that "don't tread on me" was a reference to England not the American government, remember? England did not have checks and balances or a Bill of Rights for the people but America does and will we ever remember that the size of government is not so much the danger but rather the fear inspired attempts to change or eliminate parts of that Bill of Rights, that occured under the rightwing Republican controlled government, was the real danger.

Lodging under the mentality of fear that allows you to rationalize away the rights of people is the true threat to this nation but, to no avail, as most could have predicted, fear, paranoia,and the idiot wind come blow'in 'round again.

Pray we don't forget again.

Why The Republican Party Is Unfit To Lead

Those so manipulated by the rightwing establishment are often criticizing the government for being too big but they would not have to fear government so much if they the people had more control over it. If we had more real democracy the people influenced by the extreme right would not have to fear an uncontrollable central gov't but at every opportunity the rightwing republicans oppose giving the people more control over their government when they oppose campaign finance reform that would take the money out of politics. The danger is that the wealthy are buying off the government to the extent that they the rich and powerful can command the government to do whatever they would like. But why don't the rightwing Republicans want reform of money in government? Because they represent and are the rich and powerful. If all this were not so tragic it would be ludicrously funny but what is happening is the theft of control of the government by the rich and powerful from the people all the while brainwashing the populace with the notion that government is a problem but it is only a problem for the rich and powerful and the rightwing Republicans that represent them or are them.

In this complex crowded world we live in today it takes healthy government to help organize and integrate(Tea Partiers, no this does not mean racial) society in order to function efficiently. There is a need for oversight and regulation on larger influential entities that we know, now from even recent history, need oversight. In all this there are laws enacted in order to mete out justice appropriately across the board but there are also those who would like to see few laws exist so that people can be deceived, manipulated and exploited for gain.

This is not a case for big government but is a case for effective government or government healthy enough to fulfil these functions. There is always downward pressure from the rich and powerful on these ideals because they more often than not represent business and corporations that if they had their way would exploit the system and it's people to the farthest extent in order to maximize profits.

So the people who clamor and complain about big government are primarily the rich and powerful that stand to profit the most from the lack of responsible regulation lost in the downsizing of government. The rich and powerful oppose big government AND oppose honest(congressmen not bought off) government and it is this presposterous ideology that they through the establishment media continue to shove down our throats. So how long will we fall for this really stupid deception. The people do not want their government bought off ,they want congressmen truly answerable to them so that they can trust government more but isn't it so sinister that the Republican rich and powerful promote both point of views, that government is generally the enemy and that campaign finance reform is bad. Can you possibly see what is going on now? Can it be made any simpler than this. Is it this crowd that you would have back in power, the crowd that opposes healthy government and opposes removing money's influence over it, the very thing that corrupts it causing you to fear it.
I would submit that this is not even about competency or crediblity, this is more about good and evil and there are certainly more issues regarding good and evil but if you cannot get your voice/vote expressed to oppose evil you are already defeated and in American politics what is more evil than that. I would also submit that to support this continued state of corruption is disqualification for and betrayal of what our government stands for. It is the core reason the rightwing Republicans are unfit to lead.

Make no mistake if the Republican party is in power these issues of rooting out money's corruption of the election process will not even come up for the people to support and if the last Republican congress is an example just the opposite will occur, i.e. E street and Jack Abramoff as they fervently opposed campaign finance reform and now bless the Supreme Court for it's ruling in the case of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission which opens the door for mega-corporations to use all the money they want to influence elections.

The rightwing establishment certainly has it's influence on the Democratic party but if the Democrats, free from the lock-step mentality of the Republicans, retain power some Democrats will bring these issues about money's corruption to the fore and when they do it has to be our responsibility to make as big a noise as possible. It is the chance we get and this time we better take it. The old axiom is still in play, "Democracy is not something you have it is something you do, if you don't do it you don't have it".

Resist the amped up emotions from the manipulating pundits of fear and greed and go to the polls voting with clarity of head, strength of heart and the hope that we really can make a difference if we don't give up.

The Religious Right Standard - Tax Cut Money Over People

At one time in our nation fundamental christianity supported issues of social justice as well as issues of personal morality but today as it turns out too many, questionably under the mantel of fundamental christian, on the religious right have become a throng of political and religious hypocrites pining after their tax cut money. Under the churning and grinding of the prosperity doctrine against the integrity of fundamental christianity the particular issues of social morality have become little more than peripherial moss hanging on the granite boulder of tax cut MONEY in the hearts of so many selfish but deceptively quaint "me oriented" right-wing people about the heartland. Those issues are means and excuses to an end, the end of getting more money, the new creed Reaganism gave the American heart back in the 80's. It was no longer a shame to be greedy but it was time to look out for No.1 self and the No.1 issue of getting more money at any cost and the rise of that spirit killed the social stigma against greed that was a part of Christian teaching for 1,950 years and turned a real spiritual rebirth in the 70's into a waxing cool subservience to the "prosperity" creed of the 80's. Thusly you have the falling society you have today reaping as it should economic collapse.

So in light of all this why should the world be drawn to any Christian teachings when the world can see it's associates are just hypocrites that so easily accepted landslide legislation for the rich without mandate with a heart where money trumps principle and profit is honor. If only you could sell greed and it's pursuit as an honorable purpose in the christian life and so you have tried that too so that now you're converts can be at peace with selling out to money but finally destitute of any real spiritual foundation. What remains is just emotional fervent passion in a house of cards built on sand in the eye of a hurricane but without spiritual eyes from a spiritual foundation how will you ever see it.

Tragically you do not and you will not and so it is how you so easily accept rightwing ideology as your family and friends suffer without health insurance. You see health insurance for everyone means tax money going to them, not you, and in your heart money trumps principle as it has now so many times over so many years.

A Return To The Rightwing Is A Return To Idiocracy

Well we don't have to wait for the future to get dumbed down. We've got a present movement in the nation that wants to return to favors for the rich, favors for oil, favors for anyone with the dough to pay. A movement that wants a return to -
- Republican government that favors secret spying on US citizens; favors torture, so displaying its lack of character when the going gets tough,
- a government that squandered global goodwill after 9-11 for an ignorant invasion of a beaten down country,
- a government that would give over major metropolitan port security to a former friend of terrorists because...they have oil money influence,
- a government that drags its feet on it's own people it swore to protect in the Hurricane Katrina natural disaster because those people are not so rich, so influential, so white and priviledged,
- a government that sold it's soul to E street and Jack Abramoff,
- a government that pretends an ideology when it is really arrogant idolatrous service to the rich and if it had it's own way would continually oppose wise regulation of Wall Street, health insurance companies and offshore oil drilling but maybe worst of all would oppose reform of campaign finance corruption because the reform would remove the wealthy's means of influence, the bribery, the buy offs that prevent your will and your voice from being manifest along with necessary regulation of corporate recklessness and all this from those who would call themselves christian, right and responsible.
It is an "ideology" exposed built around the priorities of money instead of the priorities of people. Call it a return to oligarchy, a return to plutocracy, call it corporatocracy but whatever you call it, call it on it's own level. Call it what it is, a backward shadow of something worse, a return to Idiocracy.

Vote Republican and the future is a no-brainer.

Larger Deficits, Fewer Jobs If Republicans In Charge

Nothing is more important to Republican politicians these days than jobs and the deficit, that is, at least according to Republican politicians
The only problem with that is the things that Republicans have said they want to do won't actually boost employment or reduce deficits. In fact, much the opposite. If Republicans were in charge from January 2009 onward--and if they were now given carte blanche to enact the proposals they want to enact--the projected 2010-2020 deficits would be larger than they are under Obama, and fewer people would be employed. According to the CBO, The Congressional Budget Office that both Republicans and Democrats agree is the final arbiter in budget matters, Obama's stimulus plan is projected to increase budget deficits over the next decade by $814 billion. However Republicans opposed the legislation, refused to provide an alternative, and now insist that it's been a total failure. So let's be generous and subtract it from their side of the equation. Obama deficit, $814 billion. The GOP deficit, $0. Next up is health-care reform. Obama passed it; Republicans want to repeal it saying it will increase the deficit.

Unfortunately for the GOP, though, nonpartisan experts tend to disagree. Just this Tuesday, for example, the Congressional Budget Office released a letter saying that Obama's health-care reform legislation would "reduce the projected budget deficit by $30 billion over the next 10 years,” while repealing the law would generate "an increase in deficits... of $455 billion... over that [same] period." Factors those figures into the equation and the Obama deficit falls to $784 billion. The GOP deficit, meanwhile, rises to $455 billion.

The final piece of the puzzle is the Bush tax cuts. Obama wants to extend them for the 95 percent of taxpayers making under $250,000 a year; Republicans want to extend them for everybody but the Democratic proposal would add about $3 trillion to the deficit during the next decade, while the GOP plan would cost $3.7 trillion. That brings the total Obama deficit to $3.784 trillion over ten years, and its GOP counterpart to $4.155 trillion.

So assuming that the Republicans would've spent $0 to stimulate the economy in the wake of the largest economic collapse since the Great Depression--an unlikely scenario, given the very real risks of inaction--their proposed policies would still produce a deficit $371 billion larger than President Obama's.

With regard to jobs, it's a similar story. So far, Republicans have only said they'd do--or that they would've done--two large-scale things the Democrats haven't: 1) scrap the stimulus and 2) extend the Bush tax cuts for Americans earning over $250,000 so as not to (in Boehner's words) "impose job-killing tax hikes on families and small businesses."
How would these measures affect employment? Regarding the stimulus, the answer is pretty clear. In a report out this week, the CBO estimates that between 1.4 and 3.3 million fewer people would be employed right now if the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act had never made it through Congress. Split the difference, and the pro-stimulus Obama moves ahead of the anti-stimulus GOP by about 2.35 million jobs.

The effect of tax cuts on job creation according to the CBO, would lower unemployment by 0.3 to 0.8 percent over the next year or so but it's unlikely that extending the cuts for the richest Americans would have much of an effect on small-business hiring, which is a claim that Republicans make with some regularlity. Why? Because only two percent of taxpayers in the top two income brackets actually run small businesses. The other 98 percent of small-business owners make less than $250,000 a year and wouldn't pay higher taxes under Obama's plan.

History isn't on the GOP's side, either. If keeping the top marginal tax rate at 35 percent--the rate under Bush, and the rate that Republicans are fighting to preserve--spurs so much hiring, why didn't America experience any job growth at all during Bush's time in office? And if a top marginal tax rate of 39.6 percent--the rate under Bill Clinton, and the rate that Democrats are fighting to restore--is such a job-killer, why did payrolls grow by 20 percent during the 1990s?

The implication here isn't that higher tax rates equal more jobs. Far from it. But there's simply no evidence, either in the history books or the latest projections, to suggest that extending all of the Bush tax cuts would provide an employment boost large enough to offset the number of jobs that would've been lost if the GOP had succeeded in blocking the stimulus--let alone lasting enough to justify adding another $700 billion to the deficit.

The bottom line, then, is that recent GOP proposals would produce fewer jobs and far larger deficits than the plans Obama has already passed or currently wants to pass.

The Deficit Now If Gore Had Been Elected In 2000

So what would have been the difference in the budget if Gore had been elected instead of Bush?
With Gore elected in the year 2000 there would have been no 700 billion tax cut for the very rich(those making over 200,000 annually) in which experts have shown did very little to stimulate the economy.
Because Gore believed in a stronger regulatory government than his predecesor Clinton, the economic disaster of 2008 would have been avoided saving the country another 700 billion from the first TARP bailout but also another 800 billion from the second bailout not counting the billions that would not have been lost because of the overall economic collapse.

Because Gore and his cabinet would have believed in the competent use of government the entire federal government would have been staffed with the best available people working together to make government work as well as possible (a game changing ideological difference from the Bush administration) and with all avenues of communication working together the terrorists that carried out the 9-11 attack would likely have been detected and foiled. Experts have testified that with just a little more cooperation between the FBI and CIA we should have avoided 9-11. And before considering the billions we spent recovering from this disaster here consider another 700 billion we would have not spent in Iraq and the billions we would have not spent in Afghanistan. Would there have been some kind of successful terroist attack?, perhaps but Gore would have garnered and cultivated the goodwill of the world multi-laterally together into any venture in Afghanistan thereby sharing the financial burden.
So you are looking at a clear savings of well over 3 trillion dollars(even without considering the billions in extenuating losses from the economic collapse) and that means a surplus instead of a deficit or more correctly a big surplus instead of a big deficit.
Thats right people, the reason we are where we are is because of the incompetence of the Bush administration, the Republican congress and it's rightwing ideology which has proven unwise to reckless to catastrophic. Their ideology that promotes staffing key government departments from bank regulators to FEMA directors with apathetic anti-government ideologues has yielded it's disastrous results.

Now if that is what you want to do, go back to that kind of government then you need some serious psychological counseling or treatment for amnesia. Bush and the Repubs devastated this nation but we can make this a much better country if we stay the course we are on and fulfill the healing we have began. There will come a time for balance from the right but there is too much to be corrected before we can do that. A collapsed economy with every major bank going down the tubes is not something you heal in just a year or two but surely we have learned something about scurrilous servitude to unbridled market greed and lack of regulation.

Being smarter in 2000 would have us with a healthy surplus right now not to mention the new health care plan and other programs easily paid for upfront. Don't be afraid, be smart.


--- over 3 trillion smarter

The Limbaughs And Becks Easily Exploit Religious Right

The Republican religious rightwing, unable to face themselves or the mistakes they have made the last 10 years, turn to anyone who can come up with an excuse(explanation) for why they failed the country/trashed the country. Those such as Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck understanding the rightwing inability to face themselves in the past implore any convoluted reasoning for the desperate rightwing to again avoid facing their failure exploiting this weakness to the max using fearful thinking in conjuring up conspiritorial possibilities for why things did not work for them. It becomes salve for the burned consciences of the rightwing lost in the darkness of failure as they grapple for anything or any reason to explain why their "god inspired" ideology failed.

The rightwing, so rarely ever able to admit they are wrong have pinned and equated their politics to God therefore trapping themselves in an "ideology that must not fail" predicament. People like Glenn Beck are perfect outlets for these religio-political failures that must have or find an explantion besides being wrong. Wrong is not an option. The rightwing crowd beg for an out and the Limbaughs and Becks oblige at every turn and every season as if the religious right should actually never be wrong and if they, the rightwing/religious right are in perfect agreement with God they cannot be wrong....ever!
And so these rightwing TV and radio pundits have job security.

It might even be that were it not for hucksters like Beck and Limbaugh many rightwingers would have become suicidal. Remember if your politics become as one with God in such a way then your politics become infallible and you cannot be wrong. Many of those on the religious right were probably about to lose their minds and if there is any benefit at all to people like Beck it is that he may have helped save some lives. (laughing but not too loud) Seriously, facing yourself and getting real before God is not just the best option it is the only option.

You would think that if those that profess to be Christians, and were in fact true Christians, they would have the wisdom to discern their exploitation but this nation has in deed fallen away from the true spiritual wisdom and strength of God because we have allowed money, flesh and material things to dumbdown and downgrade our spiritual soul and our spiritual eyes. It is people like Limbaugh and Beck that have deceived Christians into binding a love of money ideology with faith. Every thing they preach protects the interest of those who love money whether in private or public business. As one of them often loves to say "follow the money trail" ,as if to turn this axiom back on it's original intent, but I indeed encourage you to honestly follow the money trail in all this because it is not that complicated and if you really care about it you can see through all of it to the truth.
These rightwing pundits, out of the fear that money is losing it's influence, make claims like "the teachings of Jesus might promote socialism but to that I would say who is your God? Jesus or capitalism?, Jesus or money? Let the teachings of Jesus bear fruit to the truth and if they want to decry churches that support social justice I would say there was no social justice until God brought it into the world. The Limbaughs and Becks criticize social justice because it often involves using tax dollars from the rich and powerful or themselves to fulfill the programs that deliver social justice and they love to tickle the ears of those rich and powerful with anti-social justice rhetoric because they know their own deficient deceptive thinking will be promoted by the rich and powerful in order to sway the masses to serve the interests of the rich and powerful. For the Limbaughs and Becks it's scurrilous job security. Like I say really follow the money trail. These exploiters of a failed ideology and it's adherents want to make money any way they can and they know there are those like themselves that do not want to share little at all and that want to keep all their tax cut money and it is this that is at the root of it.

If a man does not have his soul, that is his honest conscience before God, he will not have the means for courage in resisting money or fear and what you should be wary of are those who exploit, manipulate and preach without that kind of soul.

The Joke Is The Tea Party Is Anti-Establishment

Headline after headline is trying to drum up support for the Tea Party in an anti-incumbant year by claiming the Tea Party is anti-establishment but LOL for frigg'in crying out loud, the Tea Party is the establishment trying to escape higher taxation because the establishment is the $200,000 and up a year crowd. The Tea Party is the $200,000 and up a year crowd. They are one in the same. They always have been. They want to keep the Bush tax cuts which mean more money for themselves and they don't want to help pay for health care for working Americans for the same reason. They don't want to change anything, they want to keep things established for the establishment as they were during the Bush years and before. There is nothing noble, nothing protesty, nothing anti-establishment about the Tea Party. They are just looking out for their miserable selves. They are in fact the Republicans in stupid disguise and when is the media going to get real about it. On that note much of the media is also the establishment and thusly the nurturing and caring for the image of the Tea Party as some kind of "heroic" anti-establishment movement, lol again.
The truth is this year it has been essentially about the establishment trying to take back power from the anti-establishment leftwing after only a year and a half following the establishments(rightwing,tea party,republican,whatever) worst economic disaster this side of the Great Depression. Only a year and a half after laying a once in a century jobless slum at Obama's doorstep the establishment Republican Tea Partiers are crying jobs.
For some Americans, heading out of the toilet for a year and a half is more than they can take and you can be sure if America votes Republicans(tea partiers) back in, to the toilet we shall all return. Come on people,lol Wake up!

Unbridled self-centered greed one way or another always collapses on itself and us.

Want to do it again?

George W. Bush's Campaign Manager Comes Out Homosexual

George W. Bush's campaign manager and former leader of the Republican party Ken Mehlman reveals he is gay. In fact he said he is going to begin lobbying in support of gay marriage right away. In a way it's not that unusual in that it shouldn't be so unusual for those that suck up and curry to those with wealth and power to be so corrupted. This could mean that a significant majority of Republican politicians are potential gays with their nice little neat haircuts and haughty indignant manner when confronted with the truth. As an independent I can honestly say that when I see the Democrats confronted they do not act this way, they usually seem to be up to the debate but the Republicans too often act like an old white bitty confronted.

Remember when they were in power and thought they could do whatever they wanted.

Sure we want to set that situation up again?

Somebody Chose To Break A Vicious Cycle

Somebody chose not to complete one of those vicious cycles of life. Somebody just refused to pass it on. Thats why there is a little light everyday someplace,somewhere, a breakdown in the thing that would suffocate us all if it could. Sometimes you can just feel it moving from person to person with each person obeying the primal order to send on the vengeful darkness again and again unable to resist the thing that must be satisfied but a little break in the circuit of the hypnotic trance of gossip,hate and mindless retribution can change everything. When you know what a difference it makes it is easier but it is never easy.

Don't think you can do it much without Jesus.
You can try but
I need all the help I can get.

Befuddle the dark ways of the world. Be the break.

Proof Americans Favor Keeping Obama HealthCare Plan

In the latest 6 national opinion polls out in July Americans favor keeping Obama's new healthcare plan. They may support changes but they reject repealing the new law. When you poll Republicans only you get clear rejection of the law which is clearly contrary to the will of the majority of Americans. The primary election in Missouri was mostly a Republican turnout so therein the deceptively magnified result by the Republicans caring more about serving those making over $250,000 a year(whose Bush enacted tax cuts will expire now) than the needs of working people unable to get healthcare.
Although voters do not approve of Obama's handling of it they favor keeping the bill and still they favor Obama handling it over the Republicans. LOL. Gotta love it!
Even in the new Fox opinion poll 57% of voters favor keeping or changing the new healthcare law as opposed to 36% repealing it.

The first question in the polls are about Obama's handling of healthcare with the second question usually concerning retention or repeal of the law.
Here is the proof Americans favor keeping Obama's new healthcare law.

Click >http://www.pollingreport.com/health.htm < for proof

:) put this in your pipe and smoke it Boehner and Rove.