This 'n that

• The Social Gospel Church. Read a great quote from a solid article by Bill Murchison today (here). It very nearly stood alone as a QotD (quote of the day post). He writes about those churches that have abandoned all semblence of doctrinal coherence for feeding the poor and healing the sick.

"The Peace Corps in ecclesiastical drag is what modern churches often resemble."

Hard to argue that, sir.

• The Right Words. Human Events Online has a caption contest every week. Last week's was a hoot. Here's the photo:
  

And here's the winning caption:

"Pictured here, a committed Socialist who aggressively silences opposition. On the right is Hugo Chavez.”

• God's perspective. Andree Seu wrote a bit about how we ricochet through the tough times in life knowing we don't have God's perspective on it all but wishing we did. Good read and an awesome tie-up at the end. Read it here.


• Film Review: "A Face in the Crowd." We're a Netflix family. It's the only place you can find classic movies in any quantity outside of major cities. So for those of us in small-town America, Netflix! Anway, "A Face in the Crowd" proved a treasure. It's Andy Griffith like you've never seen him and it's a haunting look from 60 years ago at America's hunger for celebrity. It's very intense movie, not suitable for younger children (our teens watched it). No cursing. No flesh. Lots of smoking and drinking. Power corrupts. Watch for other notable actors, too.
  

Well, that's 100 days. Seems like months. Thanks for stopping by.

Earth Day/Hour vs. stewardship

An actual nighttime satellite image of the Korean peninsula...read the fine print.

Leave your lights on, and give the glory to God.

QotD: Bigger than a bread box

You might think the following quote comes from the keyboard of a right-wing blogger. Nope. While not directly from the horse's mouth, it comes from another horse of like stripe. Same stable.

In his memoirs, Senate Majority Leader, Harry Reid, recounts commenting on a speech by the then freshman senator from Illinois (here).

"'That speech was phenomenal, Barack,' I told him. And I will never forget his response. Without the barest hint of braggadocio or conceit, and with what I would describe as deep humility, he said quietly:

"'I have a gift, Harry.'"

Ahh. So that's it.

The Church

Where should the Church stand on homosexual marriage?

What should the Church say about abortion and choice?

What should the Church say is the way someone can get to heaven?

What should the Church say about those who hold convictions opposed to the Bible?

Such questions as these led to Time's on-line article, "Will Gay Marriage Pit Church Against Church?" (here if you must). This is only an issue because so many churches in the 19th and 20th centuries diluted or neutered God's word to man, the Bible.

Principally speaking, the Bible is plain. The only proper sexual relationship occurs between a married man and woman. On topic two, human life is sacred because it was created in God's image, therefore the taking of innocent life constitutes murder. The Bible makes plain that Christ is the only way to secure a place in heaven for there is no other name under heaven by which man may be saved. And lastly, the Bible asserts that it is all the inspired and inerrant word of God and to teach or live contrary to what is written therein constitutes heresy or willful sin.

Those are not my opinions. These are what God declares in His recorded word. Contextually.

So here's the deal. If a religious organization asserts a position contrary to what the Bible makes plain, can it be called a church? The Bible makes plain that many will enter the scene spouting doctrine to scratch their itching ears but doctrine that runs contrary to what the Bible states. They will be wolves in sheep's clothing looking to devour and divide.

When I was a child, I heard about excommunication within the Catholic church. "How dare they!" I thought in my pubescent sensibilities. As I grew and studied the Bible, I learned that Jesus speaks about discipline within the church and that if one continues in an unrepentant state with regard to their sin, the church is to have nothing to do with that one (Matthew 18). Paul affirms the same point to the Corinthians church as they coddled a young man incestuously involved with his father's wife (1 Corinthians 5).

I am NOT saying that the Church is a home of perfect people. Hardly. It is the union of people who have been saved by and through the atoning work of Christ's sacrifice. It is of people indwelt by God the Holy Spirit to grow day by day in their obedience to God. It is of people who submit themselves to God and His word that they might become more and more Christlike.

Were the Bible merely a guide to gutting a deer or how to get up and down out of a sand trap, you'd get opinions and techniques as wide and diverse as the people wielding the knife or the wedge, but it's not. We conform to it. We don't conform it to ourselves.

As groups continue to reject what the Bible says, they cease to become churches. That's why when denominations like the Episcopalian Church condone the act of homosexuality and ordain its practitioners that churches within the denomination that hold to the teaching of the Bible splinter off and away from the denomination.

Church against church? Not so much. What we find happening is that groups are fighting against God Himself and what He has declared. You'll be hard pressed to come out on top of a battle like that.

QotD: Napolitano's terrorists

It's interesting when a public servant softens the word used for enemies against our country and then begins to bandy that word about toward our own citizens like she were juggling tennis balls.

In commenting on Janet Napolitano's indictment against a large segment of our population, Andree Seu concluded (here):

"My daughter and I are reading Orwell’s 1984 together at bedtime and it is barely keeping up with the news developments."

Let's hear it for the boys! Go Navy.

Israel: Between Scylla and Charybdis

Every morning I wake up, I'm surprised Israel hasn't turned Iran into glass. How long can you tolerate someone threatening to push you into the ocean or obliterate your nation before you smash them in the nose and tell them to "shut up"?

For years the madman of the Middle East, manic Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, president of Iran, has threatened Israel with such carnage. Until a couple years ago, he packed no more bite than a rabid mosquito. Now, with the help of mother Russia to the north, the Persian pecan has nuclear weapons very nearly ready to go. Perhaps Kim Jong Il, Ahmadinejad's muy loco counterpart on the Pacific rim, ops tested the very same weapons vehicle the Irani military has in its possession. Perhaps it is ready to go.

Regardless, Israel faces a very real sunrise tomorrow morning of the nuclear variety. When will she decimate those stockpiles as she did Iraq's and Syria's?

But then there is the enemy at her back. That would be world opinion. Should Israel waylay Iran, the outcry from Russia, China, France, and the rest of the usual suspects would make the earth tremble, and considering how President Obama has cozied up with Chavez, made overtones to Castro, and capitulated to Kim Jong (Mr. Il?), I don't 'spect he's going to be siding any time soon with Israel.

For years, the US and Israel stood astride world opinion not really caring much what Russia or China thought because they were totalitarian regimes that put their own people in gulags and really did torture their own for punitive reasons. The only nation that gave their people a real vote, Israel became our staunchest ally for freedom in the Middle East. We became the only ally Israel could rely upon. With the new administration, that alliance sadly seems tenuous at best.

So what is Israel to do? Do they strike Iran and risk the fallout from the rest of the world? Or do they appease world opinion in hopes that someone might restrain Iran and risk getting nuked before they have time get to the Western Wall?

Something's gotta give.

Men: The Proverbs 31 woman

The other night, some very special friends celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary. My bride of near 24 years and I stopped by to enjoy the festivities and to rejoice in the Lord with them for what He has done in their lives.

Late in the evening, that’s about 10:15 for me anymore, I glanced around the room. Six couples mingled and chatted in various groups, some sitting some standing. Most of us were within five years of one another. All of us had been married for at least a decade, most two.

I was stunned by the caliber of women in that room. It wasn’t their attire. It wasn’t their makeup or their ‘do. These women were 100% invested in Christ and thereby were 100% invested in their men. They were beautiful ladies.

They were Proverbs 31 ladies.

Gents, I’m not going to read the chapter to you (I’ll link it here if you don’t have a Bible handy), but I’d like you to read it. Notice something. It’s not written by a woman about women. It’s written by a man. I don’t know if it continues what King Lemuel began in verse 1, stuff his momma taught him that has hung with him. I don’t know if it’s Solomon’s postscript to his book of wisdom. I suspect that one of these kings began to ponder his bride and simply wrote an ode to the glory of the woman at his side (that would leave Solomon’s authorship suspect).

Imagine how our wives would glow if we praised them as Lemuel praises his wife. This man has examined every nook and cranny of her life and adored her in each of these aspects. When’s the last time our woman has heard such consistent and sincere appreciation as this from our lips? Do our souls stir when praised for our labors at work? So, too, do our wives’.

You see, as a man, I don’t look at Proverbs 31 as being for the woman. Gents, how would you like to live up to that ideal? I see this as a passage for men on how they are to recognize and praise their brides. As my eyes circled the room, each of the women was a Proverbs 31 woman. I only hope they knew it. I hope my bride knows it.

Does yours?

Taxing my soul

Our Constitution is a restrictive document. It defines the boundaries in which our government may act. If it is not specified, our government (President, House and Senate, and Supreme Court) may not take it upon themselves to act with regularity and impunity outside that boundary. James Madison declared:

"The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the are federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The (federal government) will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State."

Wow, have we gooned up the original intent! Plainly, the Founders (and authors) intended the US Constitution to restrict the federal government

Income tax, one of the forms of taxation protested during the recent Tea Parties, is not enumerated in the Constitution. It is sanctioned in the 16th Amendment ratified in 1913 making it some 130 years older than the Constitution in violation of the direct taxation of the people (Article I section 9). To sustain the ever-growing size of the federal government, William Howard Taft and his ever-growing size proposed congress' ability to tax the citizen's income. And so we have lived with the beast near 100 years.

Here's the rub: if we are going to tax income, how are we going to tax it? This question exposes the mess that is income tax. Three possibilities exist and are known by other names in other sectors. They are:

1. Equal Income Tax. Here every man pays the same amount.
2. Equal Percentage. Here every man pays the same percentage of his income.
3. Proportional (what we live under now). The more you make, the greater percentage of your income is taxed.

I've started a poll at the top right of the blog. Before I continue and argue what a mess income tax is, I ask that you choose which is the best income tax (if we have to live with one...hence no "none of the above" in the poll) for our nation. Feel free to argue your point in the "Comments" to this post. You are more than welcome to do so "Anonymous"-ly.

Let the fun begin.
------------------

ADDED: Mark Steyn has a great look at Tea Parties and income tax in his weekly article here. It might help guide your decision.

The aftertaste of tea (parties)

In all the coverage or the dearth of coverage on the tax protests yesterday, did you notice what was absent? The crime. Had the tax protesters been violent in the least, such an event would be headline news. If one idiot in one location had committed some atrocity, he would have become the tea party poster boy. No such conduct.

I can't imagine something like this happening across Europe without cars ablaze or storefronts shattered. And in continuing the European theme, if American liberals launched nationwide protests would there have been near the civility? I don't think so.

Books and covers

I have never watched American Idol. Not once. Haven't seen five minutes of it while channel-surfing. I was tipped off to this extraordinary video through World on the Web. It's not American Idol but the Euro version, Britain's Got Talent, also hosted by the tersely-tongued Simon Cowell.

A couple of favors. Watch all of it. As you do, listen to Susan Boyle's hope. She wants the opportunity to just once sing before a large audience. Never been kissed. 48 years old. Charity worker with bad hair and thick brows. Very "British." Note the cynical eye-rolls from the audience as she walks on stage. Note Cowell's snide cheek when he asks her name.

Then note his and everyone else's expression as she opens her mouth. Watch when she concludes. Happy just to have had the opportunity, she turns to leave as if she were satisfied just to have had the experience.

But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature ... For the LORD sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart."

1 Chronicles 16:7

I am such a superficial man. Watch the video here.

You are a "Radical Extremist"

Over the last thirty years the greatest evil wrought upon America and Americans fall into two general categories, the school shooting and the terrorist mass-homicide.

Isn't a school shooting a terrorist mass-homicide? Well, yes, but the perpetrators of these heinous acts against God and humanity are distinctly different. School shootings have generally come at the hand of kids from broken, messed up homes, while terrorist mass-homicides crash upon us from those who hate us, our government, or our way of life. Essentially, they hate America. In the last three decades, apart from Tim McVeigh, everyone in the latter category has one thing in common. Islam.

So if you were the head of Homeland Security, where would you focus your attention to thwart acts of terror on our soil? Would you home in on a little hamlet west of New York City founded upon the tenets of the Koran and that doesn't permit outsiders or would you delve into the seditious activities of the Veterans of Foreign Wars? Would you focus on Islamic charter schools and mosques where those who have fomented terrorism have trained and been trained, places that refuse to raise the American flag, or would you delve into the shady character of that radical James Dobson and his chillingly named organization "Focus on the Family?" If you're Janet Napolitano, the actual Secretary of Homeland Security, you choose the latter in both cases.

If you haven't heard, you can catch her statement released to police departments across the country warning them of the grave threat posed by radicalized right-wing groups here. It's worth our time...and it's creepy.

What would cause such folk to be targeted by Ms. Napolitano's henchmen? You might be "hate-oriented." Well, you may be thinking, I'm not hate oriented. That may be so, but it has been a common slander from the left that those who hold to a plain reading of the Bible by calling sin "sin" propogate hate speech. To call homosexual conduct "sin" is already criminal in Canada and is becoming so in our nation, if not de jure then certainly de facto.

You might believe that our Constitution holds that states have greater responsibility to govern than does the federal government, that the Fed gets its power from and came into being by the states and not the other way around. Such thinking would make you "radical."

You may have served in combat, and since Oliver Stone has given us the truth about war, you are now seen as a threat to your country. Just look at Timmy McV.

This is getting surreal. North Korea launches a vehicle that could hold a nuclear payload, and the President calls for the free world to denuke itself. We get throttled by Islamic fundamentalists for decades and Homeland Security casts the hairy-eyeball at folks that look an awful lot like our Founding Fathers.

A warning to you. Be careful what sites you visit on the web. You may be ID'ed as one of "them" because you read the posts of a God-fearing, Bible-believing, gun-toting, one wife, six kids, conservative, small-government kind of guy.
------------------------

As an aside, here's a great article by Walter Williams on why our Founders shunned democracy in favor of a republic. Be smart about who we are. It may not be long before we aren't.

Satan's counterfeit: The 23rd Psalm

The government is my shepherd:
I need not work.
It alloweth me to lie down on a good job;
It leadeth me beside still factories;
It destroyeth my initiative.
It leadeth me in a path of a parasite for politic’s sake;
Yea though I walk through the valley of laziness and deficit-spending,
I will fear no evil, for the government is with me.
It prepareth an economic Utopia for me, by appropriating the earnings of my own grandchildren.
It filleth my head with false security;
My inefficiency runneth over.
Surely the government should care for me all the days of my life,
And I shall dwell in a fool’s paradise forever.

—Author unknown

Wish I'd have written it!

He is risen!

Despite the fervent futilities of the last two centuries to diminish its veracity, the resurrection of Christ remains the indisputable fact of history.

Now what will we do with that truth?

QotD: You can't hide those lyin' eyes

Regarding the bow heard 'round the world, this from John Romano on the White House Press Secretary's outright lie:

"..Can anything that comes out of this White House be trusted if they are willing to lie over something so small?"

Oh, to be faithful in the little things. (Read all of Romano's take here.) Also, here's an added bonus on the event:

Gary McCoy on the genuflection of the President
before the king of one of the most civil rights-challenged
nations on the planet...and our ally.

With whom are we at war?

Imagine if this came across CNN or Fox News:

"This just in. Focus on the Family has taken responsibility for the terrorist explosion that ripped a marketplace in Berkley, California. Seven were reported dead and dozens injured. This brings the 2009 total to 97 innocents killed by the army led by born-again Christian preacher, James Dobson.

"Elsewhere in the world, rockets continue to rain down on the peace-loving hamlet of Greenwich Village. Pat Robertson, charismatic leader of the militant Christian organization, the 700 Club, has vowed to continue the rocket attacks until "Greenwich is turned to a heap of rubble." The fanatical Christian group has been at odds with this tranquil homosexual community ever since Robertson rose to power when the heavily Christian Moral Majority came to power and began screaming its venomous rhetoric in the mid-70's.

"Samaritan's Purse, the organization begun by Franklin Graham, son of the well-known Christian zealot, Billy Graham, has taken to piracy on the high seas. With a fleet of ships with a blood-soaked lamb emblazoned on the side, the junior Graham and his rabble have terrorized the high seas off the coast of Martha's Vinyard, hijacking toys and supplies destined for the impoverished children of Madonna and Brad and Angelina and the children in Oprah's schools."

If these fictional scenarios had any truth behind them, would there be any doubt about who had declared war upon our nation? Let's say, too, that the Vatican was battling the Romans and that moderate Christian Americans were mostly silent in the wake of the horrors wrought by their Christian brethren. Would our media and our leaders tap dance around the common denominator behind all these events?

It would be much easier, in this fictional instance, if the majority of Christians rose up and cited chapter and verse of God's word in opposition to the "terrorists," but if that majority remains silent, what are we left to surmise? They have given tacit approval.

In the mean time, our leaders continue to play Scrabble with terms and thereby remove the true identity of those who hate America and Americans. And the media lets them.

Neurosurgery

I am not an organized man. A few years back, I got a day planner and despite hit-or-miss usage, have come to affectionately know the object as "my brain." My whole family knows it by that moniker.

Tonight, my bride and I enjoyed a date. We usually imbibe a good cup of coffee to round out the evening and did so tonight as well.

As we sipped, chatted, and people-watched, I shared with my bride that I often remember at work things I need to do at home and at home things I need to accomplish at work. I simply don't remember when I get to the various destinations what it was that I was wanting to get done.

With all seriousness, my love suggested, "You have a brain. Why don't you use it?" And then she realized what she'd said.

Glad she wasn't drinking milk!

QotD: Knee-slapping hi-larity

When I was a wee lad, back in the day when as a six-year old you could leave the house at 8 a.m. and not return until 6 p.m. and mom's heart wouldn't skip beat one, I hung out with Guy Loushin (loo-sheen'). I think we were a bit more mature, probably going on eight, when we strode into Target's food nook in Crystal, Minnesota. Guy was one of the funniest kids I've ever known. Sometimes it was intentional, other times not.

The latter: My family took him on a camping trip one weekend. En route, my dad, hearing us talk of our father's military exploits, asked Guy what outfit his dad was in. Guy thought for a moment and shrugged, "I don't know. A green one I guess."

The former, the intentional humor, often cost him. I wish I could remember what he said. We had gotten our goodies and sat down when he cracked his comedy. Problem was I was in the middle of chugging my milk. You know the line about shooting milk out your nose? Yeah, well it came out the nose and out the mouth in a fine spray that would make Estee Lauder proud...all over Guy. I wish you could see the look etched in my mind. He just stared at me, head slightly atilt, eyes screaming, "You are the biggest moron." I just laughed harder.

I thought of that episode as I came across the following quote on Breitbart last night (here).

"I don't see any threat to the United States coming from Iran anytime soon."

What made the quote so charming was that it came from Sergei Kislyak. You likely gathered from the first name that he's not from Tucson. No, Sergei is the Russian Ambassador to the United States.

Those crazy Russkies! I'm sure glad I wasn't drinking milk when I read that one.

"Random Thoughts"

Thomas Sowell is an aging economist with a mind as incisive as a laser beam. Once a month or so he pens a column titled "Random Thoughts" wherein the first line always fleshes out the thoughts as being upon "the passing scene." He pens a sentence or two on a wide array of topics from Brahms to bailouts and history to histrionics and then moves on. His pen points at the President and Iran today among other things.

Savor some classic Sowell here.

Adjacent to Sowell this evening on Townhall.com sits an article by the man of a thousand jokes, Chuck Norris, though I first read his piece at HumanEvents.com. He has the audacity to write about Jesus during Holy Week. Harumph! It's sure to delight your soul...unless of course you're a liberal or a member of the ACLU, but I repeat myself.

Check out Mr. Norris' latest here.

QotD: Fantasy Island

"We will convey our deep appreciation for the Islamic faith, which has done so much over so many centuries to shape the world for the better, including my own country."

Barack Obama, President of the United States

Okay, Mr. President, can you name one thing Islam has done for the betterment of the United States in say, oh, the last 500 years?

The fruits of Islam within the US and Europe today show it to be the most divisive force to national and cultural identity the civilized west has ever seen. Yes, peaceful Muslims to abide within our borders, but they are not the tidal wave within Islam today. They are not standing against the advocates of Sharia law. They are not shutting up the cabbies who won't take fares that tote whiskey. They don't stifle those offended by the blind bringing their seeing-eye dog into Walmart.

Until Muslims unite vocally and forcefully against those who seek to impose Islamic law upon the west, Islam will continue to divide and fragment western civilization.

Please name just one thing, Mr. President.

Divorce

My son retrieved the Saturday mail and dropped it on the kitchen counter. Rare are the personal letters that grace our mailbox anymore. No doubt the same goes for you. We don't hand write. E-mail and texting have robbed us of the thought out, time-taking, penmanship-testing personal letter. I think we are the weaker for it.

My eyes lit up when I saw a personal letter in Saturday's mail. But then I opened it.

Many folks get too busy during the holidays to crank out the Christmas form letter (does not equal a personal letter, btw). Springtime is a bit more quiet so they'll craft an Easter missive to send to the masses. Such was this letter; it did carry a personal note within it though.

The noted stated in a single sentence and in a chipper tone discordant to the content that the writer and her husband had legally separated. It then continued with the other nifty things going on in the family.

I nearly urped. My lungs felt like the vacuum of space had just sucked all the air from the room. More than twenty years of marriage tossed upon the dung heap.

The writer and her husband worshiped with us a number of years ago. They believed the Bible to be God's word, and they believed what it said about marriage. "God hates divorce...what God has joined together, let not man put asunder." You can't fall out of love. You can stop choosing to love. You can steer the ship of your marriage onto the shoals of your selfishness.

I guess I made some audible expression. "What's up," queried my son. I asked him if he knew the family. He replied with concern in his voice, "No, did (he) die?"

Did he die? Hmmm...natural death versus divorce. Give me the latter any day of the week. The former brings pain and great difficulty, but death comes to all men. Natural death is expected, you just don't know when your partner will be taken. The ship remains intact, still on its course, and the hands that remain do their best to hold the tiller. The latter shatters the hull. The ship is destroyed upon the rocks of self-interest. Often the shipmates never see it coming. They don't know one of the crew has betrayed them. He escapes on his dinghy leaving his marooned former family to fetch for themselves.

I don't know the circumstances behind this marriage's foundering so I make no assumptions in their case, but it caused me to think back upon the divorces whose circumstances I knew about in detail. In every case of divorce I have been close to in my adult life, every case, infidelity has been causal. In most of those situations, the man has betrayed his bride. Paring those situations down, if you'd have asked the man a year or two prior to the treachery, he'd have been offended at the postulating that such could ever be the case in his life.

To the married men whose eyes grace these words and to myself, I call out: Keep your eyes on the prize! Remember the wife of your youth. Let her breasts satisfy you. Drink water from your own cistern. Love your wife as Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for her! A fool scoops burning coals into his lap. A real man will not, must not, break his vow to his bride. A coward and a brigand dallies outside his home.

I scream this at myself as loudly as I scream into cyberspace. Infidelity (unfaithfulness) often brings grisly death to a marriage and wreaks devastation upon a family. Is it any wonder that the misuse of the special treasure God meant to bring life, physical union, should be punishable by death in the Law?

Gents, keep it zipped. Make a covenant with your eyes as Job did (Job 31:1-12). Keep them off the magazines. Keep them off the secretary or coworker. Keep them out of the dark alleys of the internet. Guard your tongue. Let your flattery be only for the lovely filly who nestles beside you in bed each night. Keep your steps far from those who might entice you. Have the courage to flee when so required (2 Timothy 2:22, 1 Corinthians 6:18) Oh, man in the mirror, are you listening?

I pray that God empower us toward single-mindedness toward our spouse as we seek to honor Him with our lives.

And I pray that God would bring healing to the families devastated and shipwrecked by divorce and/or infidelity. Oh, that through God's grace my family would never pen such a letter much less during the Easter season. And so, too, for you, my friends.

Spiritual discipline: I dare you

I read one of the most impressive challenges to spiritual discipline today. And it shamed me something fierce.

I challenge you to give it a few minutes of your time here.

Just another day: Choir preaching

I suppose that most whose eyes grace this blog differ little in opinion with me. That's the cost of writing. Those who don't like what you write will go someplace else. Sadly, it is those who disagree with what I write that I would most like to bandy ideas with.

Alas...

• "WE ARE THE WORLD." Have you noticed that secular hymn playing in the background of the G20 this week? Never before have nations been so ready to abdicate their national identity into the global community.

When I was a kid, I put food coloring in my vanilla ice cream. Nothing light bright blue ice cream! From Minnesota, I could not resist; in went the red to make Viking Purple. How about a little green? Ew. Maybe yellow will help. Not so much. Nothing so hideous as blending all the food coloring into one dish of ice cream.

So it is with the G20. Every nation wants to blend itself into every other nation. It's like all the crayons in the box jumping into the melt down put to make a super crayon. We need purple crayons. We need orange crayons. And yes, we need gray crayons, too. We don't need one big, gnarly-colored gray crayon. Let France be France. Let Kim Jong Il keep his North Korea and drive it into ruin. These peculiar

little lands and color to the map. Let's not become them.


• The Constitution. A good read from Bill Murchison of the Dallas Morning News here. A linked a couple of other articles on Facebook, but for those who don't troll that domain, check out Walter Williams' piece on how to handle Constitutional abuse here and Larry Elder's piece on media bias here. I try to not inundate you with reads, but there are some smart guys who can blow away the fog to expose the true nature of a thing. These guys do that.

• Kim Jong ILL. Speaking of the North Korean Dr. No, you know he's fueling up his new "satellite" rocket, right? You know it's got enough juice to reach Alaska or Hawaii, right? You know the Japanese have said no way in Hokkaido will they let the corn flake to their west launch a "satellite" rocket over their land, right? You know we have boats, Navy boats, nearby that have been threatened to be blown from the water by Mr. Kim, right? Sounds like Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky, right?


• Headlines. Okay, I'm a Drudge troll. A couple of headlines on his site this morning for your amusement.

"Saved the world today" with a picture of what looks like Dick Vitale with his arms around Obama, Medvedev, and Hu Jintao amidst what looks like a G20 frat party after watching the Final Four.

Across the page from that headline is this gem. "Capitalism needs to go down" with a picture of the Abbot and Costello of international mayhem Mahmoud "Dare me to launch" Ahmadinejad and Hugo "Presidente for life" Chavez.

Sandwiched between those beauts is a shot of Obama and Medvedev. "Medvedev hails 'my new comrade.'" That's just what we wanted to hear come out of G20.

There's a shot of Nancy Pelosi in there, too, that always gets me wondering why we don't see her face more on the cover of Good Housekeeping, Women's Day, or even Elle?

'Nuff for now. You were good to hang with me this long. Best to not abuse it.

The Shackled Man

There's a concept floating around Christendom and also American culture. I don't know if the one got it from the other or through different means. Since it doesn't have a term that I know of, I'll call it the "Shackled Man."

Here's how it goes. With the atrophy of the American family and the Christian family, some folks call for the man to spend quality time in the home, time invested well. Others will say it can't be just quality, there needs to be quantity. Our wives and children might not be able to abide our schedules and so we need to be there for them when they need us and that requires a lot of time.

Both of these ideas have merit...to a point, but when those ideas begin to metastasize or morph out of proportion, they lead to the "Shackled Man." When we become so preoccupied with quantity time and quality time, we can easily lose sight of the work that God has for us to do and often we abdicate that responsibility. Our families have become our idol.

Consider the men of the Bible. As Israel entered the Promised Land, two and a half tribes left their families across the river until the land was conquered. This was not accomplished in a day, a week, or a month, but though not specified, we get the idea that they were gone for many months to accomplish what God had called them to. So it was during the seasons of war that Israel faced thereafter, and it was one such time when David fell into adultery and murder.

What of the apostles? We know that Peter was married. As he followed Christ around, he and the other apostles did not bring their family along. They speak of leaving all to follow him (Luke 18:28). Yes, we see that they did get home, but they were gone for long stretches of time.

I spent the two nights recently watching "God's and Generals" with my sons. Great movie about the commencement of the Civil War, but also a great illustration of a man who loved God, who loved country, and who loved family but compromised none of them. That man, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson understood, as did his wife, that there were times when he must leave his family to do the duty God had called him to do, that of defending their homeland. Months passed between times that Jackson could be with his bride. His only daughter was born while he was away at war.

Translating this to today, most would be aghast at a man who would leave his family behind for any time. Shame on the man who is not there for his child's birth. Woe to the man who misses an athletic season not to mention a single game! Many, in making their family an idol, have become Shackled Men, bound to their family by sinful perspective, and neutered in the things of Christ

Consider the men who immigrated to our nation, the men who worked two and three jobs to provide for their family. I'm not talking two or three jobs for a bigger boat but just to get food on the table or to have a roof overhead. It is a huge sacrifice that men must make for the work God calls them to, for something outside themselves.

That sacrifice might be to establish a family, and it might require two or three jobs. To defend freedom, it might require absences of days, weeks, and months. To do what God has called you to do (me to do) almost always requires sacrifice or getting out of our ruts and routines.

We are men. Upon our shoulders and by our blood come the rich blessings of life. Am I willing to forsake all to follow him, to obey him? To my shame, I know I have not done so in the past. It is only through our obedience to God and what he has called us to that our families, our wives and children, will be truly blessed. Christ went on to tell Peter and the disciples, "Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life" (Luke 18:29-30).

Do not forsake quantity when it is available to you! Make the time God gives you with your wife and children quality time. But don't let yourself become a Shackled Man who has made his family an idol, a man unwilling to travel the hard roads God asks him to travel.

When called to, go out and slay dragons!