QotD: Chesterton

"The modern revolutionist, being an infinite skeptic, is forever engaged in undermining his own mines, in his book on politics he attacks men for trampling on morality; in his book on ethics he attacks morality for trampling on men.  Therefore the modern man in revolt becomes practically useless for all purposes of revolt.  By rebelling against everything he has lost his right to rebel against anything."

~Gordon Keith Chesterton, Orthodoxy

State supreme

I have said this before, and I'll probably say it again.  Having freedom means that I am free to fail.

Where this gets dicey in our modern American minds is when it comes to children.  If my failure means difficult circumstances for my children, should I still be free to fail.  Again, I say yes.

Consider those who founded our nation.  They left the civilization of western Europe at great risk to themselves and their children to find a place where they could live in freedom.  In most cases, they sought a place where they could worship the God of the Bible as their conscience and understanding of the word dictated.  During the voyages across the Atlantic, fathers died.  Mothers died.  Children died.  Should that state have stepped in to prevent this "abuse" from parents?

The real abuse, though, in the mind of the Church of England and the mind of the Vatican, was that the parents would have the arrogance and the audacity to presume to teach their children what the Bible said.  Only the "Church" had the authority to do such a thing, so they believed.

We look back on those pages of history and shake our heads that anyone would allow a nation to become like that and worse, that we would let the Church become like that.

Fast forward 500 years.

It's happening again.  Consider this from the California Law Review*:

• There are legal and constitutional limits on the ability of parents who home school “to teach their children idiosyncratic and illiberal beliefs and values."

Oh, really?  As a parent I'm limited as to what I can teach my child?!  How 'bout this from a George Washington Law School professor:

• "The growing reliance on homeschooling comes into direct conflict with assuring that children are exposed to such constitutional values."

The value she lauds is tolerance.  Continuing,

• "Indeed, the long-term consequences for the child being home schooled or sent to a private school cannot be overstated. The total absence of regulation over what and how children are taught leaves the child vulnerable to gaining a sub-par or non-existent education from which they may never recover."

What is the solution to this problem of parental autonomy where dad and mom teach their children as they see fit?

• "[T]he more appropriate suggestion for our current educational dilemma is that public education should be mandatory and universal."

Ah.  No private school.  No home school.  Just public schools.  Shall we use an adjective that adds a bit more clarity?  Let's try state schools.

We reel in our minds over what the Catholic Church and the Church of England did during their darkest days.   We shake our heads in disbelief that Nazi Germany made little Nazis out of the children by imposing formal training and creating the Hitler Youth.  So why do we not shudder when the UN and educators in our own country begin asserting that state education be mandatory and that it be mandatory at a younger and younger age?

Here's the deal.  Every education form has some fundamental worldview as its foundation.  Whose worldview will undergird the education of my children?  At this point, parents have a choice in how their children will be educated.  They can opt for the state school.  They can opt for a private school with a worldview that has birthed that private school in the first place.  Or they can opt to school their children at home.

(By the way, where are all of the atheistic private schools?  Is their lack because there is no need?)

So here, again, we speed toward an historic crossroad.  Will parents be allowed the freedom to fail by educating their children in the manner that they see fit, or will the state step in to prevent such abuse by insuring our children get a "proper education?"

I can't believe I'm asking that on the threshold of 2011 America.
-------------------------
* All quotes taken from a speech by Michael Farris and transcripted here.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Nothing sweeter than Linus Van Pelt taking center stage and explaining what Christmas is all about:



Here's the entirety of the Christmas story from Luke 2. Savor the Savior on this most historic of days!

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.


And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying,

"Glory to God in the highest,

and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!"

When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us." And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

Luke 2:1-20

Moral inconsistencies: homosexuality & pedophilia

From time to time, I peek in on left-leaning America to see what issues they have been considering, the positions they take, and the support they offer.  Sometimes I come away understanding their position, not agreeing with it but following their train of thought.  Sometimes I just end up befuddled.

Like the other day.

On the Huffington Post, two articles stood comically side-by-side, one by Billie Jean King, that '70's symbol of I-am-woman feminism, lamenting the fact that so advanced a nation would still have such knuckle-dragging laws on the books like "Don't Ask/Don't Tell" (here) and the other by Sinéad O'Connor, that Irish minstrel who earned fame and fortune by shredding a picture of the Pope on Saturday Night Live, continuing her loathing of the papacy for their poor handling of the priestly pedophiles (here). 

Why so funny?  How is it that the military would be hammered for opposing the homosexual lifestyle but the dramatic leftists should be lauded for opposing a pedophiliac lifestyle?  Why is homosexuality acceptable but pedophelia intolerable?

That's what happens when you loose yourself from an objective moral determinant.  You can have it your way.  Orange is good.  Yellow is evil.  Why?  Um, because.  Upon what do you base that.  Folks who like orange are just happy people so that's good, but I find yellow morally reprehensible therefore bad on the church for not crucifying all of those in favor of yellow.  When you have a moral standard given by the One who embodies those standards, the colors come into clear focus.

Dismiss the standard and you get Billie Jean (homosexual Billie Jean) praising homosexual advocacy for the military while Sinead rails against pedophilia.

I guess HuffPo missed the joke.

The blood-red moon

My wife and I set an alarm last night.  1:20 a.m.  It wasn't as painful as I thought it might be.  The minor sleep interruption proved well worth it.


Joel 2:30-31

After throwing on some clothing and stumbling into the front yard, we craned our necks straight up and beheld the moon near full-eclipse.  As we watched, the bright white along the right edge faded into dusty red.  The heavens spread out with breathtaking clarity, the stars twinkling in wonder at the moon's transformation.

I know that scientists knew this would happen.  That's why I didn't sleep through the thing; I believed their calculations.  The sun, moon, and stars seem to work with clockwork precision almost as though they were set in place to help us determine times and seasons.

Wait a minute.  They were.

And God said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night.  And let them be for signs and for seasons, for days and for years."

Genesis 1:14

Few would argue with the fact that our years and months have their definition in the cosmos (interesting to note, though, that the seven-day week didn't spring from the heavens but from the pages of Genesis 1).  As my neck began to cramp and the moon slipped into a darker shade of red, I reconsidered the second half of verse 14, "...let them be for signs..."

It seems that the universe God wickered runs with amazing precision, so much so that I was able to set my clock to behold the wonder in the heavens.  At the same time the One who set the celestial clock a-ticking indicated that happenings on high might portend other events, a warning light on your dashboard, if you will.

No, I'm not going to give you eleven reasons why Jesus will return in 2011, but consider this (full article here):

This (2010) was the year the Earth struck back.


Earthquakes, heat waves, floods, volcanoes, super typhoons, blizzards, landslides and droughts killed at least a quarter million people in 2010 — the deadliest year in more than a generation. More people were killed worldwide by natural disasters this year than have been killed in terrorism attacks in the past 40 years combined.


"It just seemed like it was back-to-back and it came in waves," said Craig Fugate, who heads the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency. It handled a record number of disasters in 2010.

And consider this:

For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there willl be famines and earthquakes in various places.  All these are but the beginning of the birth pains.

Jesus Christ said that to his disciples as to the sign of the end of the age (Matthew 24:7-8).

Am I hiding 'neath my desk?  Nope.  Am I putting all my money in a mattress and heading for the hills?  Nope. I have IRA's and 401k's I hope to see mature one day.  I will say that we are one day nearer to Christ's return than we were yesterday, and the pages of Scripture paint a horrifying picture of what the days will be like before his return to set all things right.

When I see the moon turn into a deep red warning sign right over my head, it gives me pause.  God is calling all of humanity back to himself having provided them forgiveness for their rebellion and sin through his Son, Jesus Christ, the One who will set all things right.  The time is short.  Will it be today?  Dunno.  Tomorrow?  Dunno?  I plan my future on earth like I will be here for another forty years.  I try to live my days on earth like he'll return in fifteen minutes.  I can only do that because my eternity is secure, taken care of by Christ himself.  On that alone, I rest.

Don't ignore the light on the dashboard.

I will show wonders in the heavens

and on the earth,

blood and fire and billows of smoke.

The sun will be turned to darkness

and the moon to blood

before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD.

Joel 2:30-31



Who's your Eve?

In Genesis chapter 2, God allows Adam to discover that he’d been created alone.  Despite perfect fellowship with Almighty God and despite an earth teeming with enough flora and fauna to flabbergast the mind, Adam was alone.

When the light bulb went on over Adam’s head, God turned it out, put him to sleep, and crafted that which would complete Adam.

God didn’t make another animal.

God didn’t make another tree.

God didn’t make another man.

God made Eve.

Take special note; God did not create five lassies from which Adam could pick his favorite.  He didn’t create a few lassies and a few lads for Adam to try and determine his gender.

God.

Created.

One.

Woman.

For one man.

For Adam.

“But what if they hadn’t clicked?” you might ask.  Or how about sexual incompatibility?  What if he snored?  What if she was a winter and he liked summers?  What if he liked ski vacations and she liked Broadway?

Acck –ptooey!!  Hairball.

For Adam, God made Eve and presented her to him.  She entered the world created from and as the unique and special gift for one man, the only man.  She for him.

Adam had NO choice.  Eve had NO choice.  In breathtaking understatement, Adam exalts, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”  If I may loosely paraphrase, “WOW!  Are you kidding??  That’s for ME??”  You can use your imagination with the rest.  Some would argue that they could have rejected each other, but that would be as likely as Sarah Palin opting for Dillards over Denali National Park.  Or me aching for Jerry Jones to become owner of the Vikings and the Twins.  Not gonna happen.  Ever.

God himself indicated a few thousand years later that his intention had always been that what he had joined together man had no business tearing apart (Matthew 19:6).  In other words, God joined Adam and Eve together.  Adam for Eve.  Eve for Adam.  Christ equated that union with the union of every man and woman of his day, and because it transcended those four preceding millennia, it reaches forward two more and applies to us today.

*Revelation warning*-- God’s not surprised that you’re married to the one you married.  Jesus exposed that he joined you two together.

How’s that flesh out (so to speak)?  One woman for him.  One man for her.  No other.  God ordained.  God designed.

Really, I could and should be able to end right there, but we in our sinful nature immediately vomit out, “Yeah, but…”  In all honesty, a lot has happened since Genesis 3.  There’s a lot of filthy water that’s passed under that bridge.  Why do we not sit at work and think about what awaits us at home with an “ooh, boy!  She’s for me” kind of Adamic excitement.  Why does our woman not have excitement and anticipatory butterflies hammering her stomach while she waits for her man’s eyes to fall upon her face and form after being apart for the day? 

Two things thwart our hunger for one another.  The first and biggest problem is you (and "I" as I write this, that pronoun sticks an enormous finger out of my monitor and into my chest).  We carry so many scorecards around in our pockets regarding snubs and neglect from the past that we cannot love our spouse.  Love keeps no record of wrongs.  That hurts.  Yep, it might.  God's command to love my wife and lay my life down for her and his command to her to respect and submit to me do not come with an “If only they love me to my satisfaction” clause. 

Face it.  We are selfish, but Christ calls us to servanthood.  My life is not my own.  It’s Christ’s.  He purchased me.  As such, I lay myself down for him in submission by laying myself down for my wife.  The wife does so in respect and honor to the husband.  Until we get rid of all of our scorecards, our marriages will only be mediocre…at best.

The second roadblock to a Genesis 2 thrill about our spouse is trust.  In a jaded, post-modern, post-Christian 21st century America, we don't trust God.  God made us.  In marriage, he made the other for us.  He knows how best that marriage thing should work.  He went so far as to write some of those things down for us.  Problem is, we don't trust him.  Don't believe me?  Chomp on 1 Corinthians 13 for a few days and see how you measure up.  Gnaw on your part of Ephesians 5 and let God have his way with you (5:25-33 for the men and 5:22-24 for the women). 

If I really trust the God who made me, I will live out his guidance for me and my marriage in loving trust that he knows what's best.  I will keep no scorecard.  I will lay down my life for my wife to the glory of God...and trust him for the rest.

If the passages in 1 Corinthians 13 and Ephesians 5 do not exemplify my marriage and I call myself a Christian, I am the hypocritical Christian the world so loves to hate, that James speaks out against  in James 2:14-26, and that Jesus himself indicts in Revelation 3:1-3.

Trust God.  Love your wife.  Honor your man.

Dawn Treader lite

When the Lord of the Rings films buzzed the country, I remember hearing Christopher Lee, Peter Jackson's "Saruman," say that he read the entire trilogy every year.  Thus, if Mr. Lee said something about Tolkien's classics, you would do well to hear him.

Liam Neeson?  Not so much.

Mr. Neeson has had the honor of voicing Aslan, the central figure in C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia, in the saga's first three films (due to a weak opening weekend, there will likely be no others).  In the weeks before the opening of the newest film, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Mr. Neeson opined to salivating reporters that,

"Yes, Aslan symbolizes a Christ-like figure, but he also symbolizes for me Mohammed, Buddha and all the great spiritual leaders and prophets over the centuries."

Now, Mr. Neeson claims to have read these books and others by Lewis, but how does he get around the substitutionary death and resurrection of Aslan in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe?  What about the constant and consistent representations of Aslan's deity?  Mohammed?  He's dead.  Buddha?  Dead.  Aslan in the stories, like Christ, is very much alive.

You don't see Aslan taking a harem of lionesses.  He doesn't lop off anyone's head or self-detonate.  He doesn't sit in the lotus and try to cleanse himself of the impurities of the physical world.  Seeing Mohammed or Buddha in Aslan is like seeing Mao or Lenin in Captain America.  You've completely missed the point.

But it's not just Mr. Neeson.  Georgia Henley, the young lady who plays Queen Lucy, comes to Mr. Neeson's defense.

"I can see where he is coming from...Aslan represents more than Jesus or God for a wide range of people...He can be the epitome of wisdom or the epitome of courage, for instance, and it is very important that people can have their own interpretation of what he represents rather than have something forced upon them."

I'll chalk that up to youth, but I can't get around producer Mark Johnson's ignorance. 

"...resurrection exists in so many different religions in one form or another, so it’s hardly exclusively Christian."

Wow.  I must have missed all those others where God condescended to become man, suffer the penalty for his creature's sin, and then be raised to life to guarantee their future hope.

**Spoiler Warning:  VDT's ending discussed below**

It is no wonder, then, that Hollywood has seen fit to neuter the most vivid depiction of Aslan as Christ in the book.  At the end, Edmond, Eustace, and Lucy come across a lamb, and the lamb is cooking fish upon a fire.  Hmmm.  I guess there must be lamb-figures in many different religions, too.  Lambs that cook up fish for their followers.  Oh, yes, and this lamb transforms in their presence into the great golden lion, Aslan.  Lion-lamb?  Lion-lamb?  Where have I heard that before?  Thus, when Aslan utters, "But in your world I am known by another name" in the book, the reader knows full well whom Lewis intends his lion to represent.

When Neeson voices that line in the movie, apart from the appearance of any lamb, one is free to insert the name of your choice.  Perhaps he represents Vishnu for you, and for you over there, he represents Imhotep.  That rube in the corner thinks he represents Jesus, but those enlightened folks over there think that he represents Oprah.

The story is that it is Christian allegory.  That's what makes Narnia so powerful on all levels.  When you snip out those uncomfortable scenes, you neuter the story.

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader does a reasonable job of tying all the scenes together in a semi-coherent movie.  The characters are nicely developed while the acting remains as obvious as the first two films.  The true message of the film, penned in Lewis' final two pages of the book, was left on the cutting room floor leaving the door open for you to decide who Aslan is for you.

Alas.

Polishing marriage

Sometimes you need an outside look to sober up your perspective.

American marriage has hit the rocks. Disillusionment and infidelity have left many to wonder, “Why bother? Three things help me focus on the wonder and beauty that marriage can and should be.

First, take stock in a good marriage. Do you know someone with a great marriage? Talk to them. Find out what makes them tick. Translate that into your relationship. If you want to get better at golf, talk to Tiger Woods. If you want to get better at marriage, talk to someone else.

Second, understand that there are weeds on the other side of the fence, too. Take note of the amazing surprises in your own yard. In Sunday’s paper, columnist Betsy Hart responded to Time Magazine’s article which wondered “Who needs marriage?” with brevity. “I do,” she declared.

Married for seventeen years, Ms. Hart has been divorced for the last four. I don’t know the cause of the divorce, but she was very transparent about some of the things she misses. Like a husband who disciplines the children in support of his bride. Or someone to simply come along side and help with the highs and lows of life, from “putting up Christmas lights” to “killing spiders.” Then there’s this crystalline insight.

"But marriage is certainly not, ultimately, about sharing parenting -- which has a limited shelf life. At least, it shouldn't be. It's about sharing a life. As a woman, I want to feel protected and cared for by a husband. I believe I'm -- gasp! -- built to want that. But it's also about what I'm built to uniquely give to one man committed to me: my support, respect, admiration and encouragement, and all without ever trying to make him my best girlfriend! Without a spouse, right now I'm not able to give full expression to those things."

But what about the tough times when his/her jerk-meter is pegged?  She wisely noted,

"I even need the conflict of marriage. Really. Bearing with a man, with someone so different from me, giving him the freedom to fail and still loving him, would again stretch me as a human being. A lot. Humbly receiving that same forbearance from him? Well, that's part of what I need, too."

Wow. She recognizes something, though, that most people and most married people miss about marriage today. It’s not 50/50. It’s a 100% investment, and that’s the third thing to help understand the wonder and beauty of marriage. Get God’s perspective on the deal.

You see, marriage is of God. If not, then we might as well go the way of the critters where each gent corrals as many fillies as he can handle. But God designed one Eve for Adam.* The word of God is chock full of great passages on marriage and the roles of the husband and wife. If you’ve never taken the time to ponder these passages, grab a Bible or go online, and meditate upon what God has to say about YOUR role in marriage (let your spouse worry about their role).

• Genesis 1:26-31
• Genesis 2:18-25
• Proverbs 5:15-23
• Proverbs 18:22, 19:14
• Proverbs 31 (a great passage on how a husband should praise his woman)
• The Song of Solomon (all--oh yes, all!)
• Matthew 19:3-9
• 1 Corinthians 6:12-7:5 (you can go all the way through ch. 7)
• (You knew this one was coming) Ephesians 5:21-33
• Colossians 3:18-19
• 1 Peter 3:1-7

Some things do get better with age. Marriage is one of those things. When one or both partners is willing to give the 100% sacrificial love called for by Almighty God, it can be a truly great thing.

Make contact with those in great marriages. Keep your eyes on your side of the fence and appreciate the wonder and beauty in your marriage. And seek out God’s counsel on what it takes to make a marriage and what it takes to make it work.

Then, enjoy the fruit!

*The polygamy within the Bible ALWAYS birthed chaos and was not God’s design.

No, he's not

Ladies, you just might want to skip this post.  I know that merely saying that will pique your curiosity.  Trust me.  This ones for guys who've played football or hockey or baseball.

If you've worn a cup, this one's for you.

When my family and I traveled to Wisconsin for Thanksgiving, my brother and I commiserated over the darkness of the Minnesota Vikings' season.  Brad Childress had yet to be canned.  We got to talking about when we played football as kids when I mentioned to him that I was amazed that so many of the pros no longer wore knee pads or thigh pads.


"No way!" he countered.

"Oh, yes," I maintained.  "And it gets worse.  A lot of them have stopped wearing cups."

He looked at me like I had just declared the earth to be flat, like I'd just revealed that I'd lived an alternate life in an alternate universe with Rosie O'Donnell, or like I believed Bud Grant to be a closet Packer fan.


Oomph....ommm...breath...

A brief trip to the internet and a peek at the pics from the previous weeks' games, and my brother shook his head in utter dismay.

Do knee pads and thigh pads restrict speed and agility so much as to aschew them altogether?  We could see cornerbacks getting away without them.  Maybe the safeties.  But most linemen and running backs still wear them. 

But--take a deep breath and think on this--most do not protect their ability to procreate. 

I remember hitting an opposing player during a hockey game, and as he flew off his feet, his knee came straight north into Mason and Dixon.  I dropped like a sack of potatoes and that while wearing a cup!  I horror to think on what might have been.

In trying to prove my story to my brother, I came across this gem on ESPN (btw, the ESPN blog is titled "Page 2."  The article starts right there).  David Fleming tries to come to terms with the collective insanity that has overcome NFL players.  He summed it up nicely.  "If you ask me, they're all nuts."

We were gay soldiers

"For the nation and kingdom that will not serve you shall perish."
Isaiah 60:12

Admiral Mullen

Admiral Mike Mullen and Senator John McCain went nose-to-nose in the Senate Armed Services Committee meeting on Thursday over whether homosexuals should be able to serve openly in the military. 

A post-modern Chief of Staff and a former POW turned career senator.  The one welcomes, "Swing open the door!" while the other cautions, "Not so fast with Pandora's box."

On Friday, the Commandant of the Marine Corps and the Chief of Staff of the Army sided with the Senator.  "Not so fast, please."

Here's the sober truth.  Apart from a people who strive to live their lives in honor of the God who created them and thereby in accordance with his word, homosexuality and every imaginable sexual knotting will become accepted.  Without an objective source of truth to which we can appeal, all bets are off.  If homosexuality is now okey-dokey, why is polygamy frowned upon?  Why do the NAMBLA folks get such a bad rap?  Who's to say when the age of consent should be?  Try running openly homosexuals by Curtis LeMay or George Patton.  But Mike Mullen's just ducky with it.

Senator McCain



Who's to say, apart from an objective determinant for right and wrong?

Well, Christian, get over it.  In case you've been napping the past thirty years, America civically, culturally, academically, and spiritually has dismissed the God of the Bible (who happens to be the God of our heritage).  I challenge you to find a commandment (of the Big Ten) that most Americans still accept as valid.

American Christians have never known persecution, but the lions are roaring.  Consider what's happening in the military:

• A military friend noted today that he can't talk too openly about his relationship with Jesus Christ and what that means, but he could chat openly about his homosexual relationship (if he had one).
• Chaplains will either stop preaching the Bible or they will be speaking openly against a policy endorsed by the Department of Defense and their Commander in Chief.  Most chaplains don't preach the Bible anymore anyway, but those that do will now face military discipline for disobeying a superior's directives.

So what's a Bible-believing Christian to do?  Some thoughts.

First, we are sojourners.  While I passionately love the United States of America, her vistas, her cities, and her heritage, this is not my home.  Should she decide to turn her back on the living God, I will weep and grieve for the death of such an ideal and for her people, but I will not follow.  That said, I will continue to be the very best citizen that I can be until that conflicts with the word of God.

Consider Daniel, Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishael (aka, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego).  Those gents lived in about as pagan a land as you could hope to live.  We refer to moral trash heaps as Babylon for a very good reason, and that was the land where they were dragged and made to serve within the government.  They did very well, thank you, and did not compromise despite high-temperature quarters and gruff and growly roommates.  They served and served with distinction in a land hostile to their convictions.

I alluded to it above, but the second point is the most important; a Christian cannot compromise when the world (or his country or his commander) demands him to do so.  Daniel, when told not to pray, continued his habit of thrice-daily prayer with windows wide opened.  The three amigos, when told to bow, stood tall in a sea of genuflecting moral mice.  How's that for standing out in a crowd.  Both instances would have brought certain death but for the amazing intervention of God.

But as the three declared, it didn't matter whether God delivered them from the furnace or not.  They knew he would deliver them--ultimately.  Peter and John faced the same issue.  Either buckle under the Sanhedrin's threats and omit the politically incorrect name of Jesus Christ in their preaching or face cultural alienation and disciplinary beatings.  Their response?  "Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard...We must obey God rather than men" (Acts 4:19-20, 5:29).  Jesus' disciples took a beating for that, happy that they were "counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name" (5:41).

Cutting to the chase, the Christian soldier, like Daniel and his three friends, should still be able to serve and honor God.  Crossroads may loom.  Chaplains, too, can still serve, but they know that they will be required to stand before the military Sanhedrin and declare their higher allegiance to God.  The only way the military will be able to handle that pile of goo is by either dissolving the chaplaincy in its entirety (for the first time in our nation's history) or only enlist a chaplain corps that holds to a neutered version of the Bible.

Consider it pure joy, brothers and sisters, when you encounter various trials...

Purple agony

On this, the threshold of another gloomy Sunday, I can't help but share these Q&A's I got from my brother, another long let down Viking fan...

Brett and the grass:  Old friends



Q. What do you call 47 millionaires around a TV watching the Super Bowl?

A. The Minnesota Vikings

Q. What do the Vikings and Billy Graham have in common?
A. They both can make 70,000 people stand up and yell "Jesus Christ".


Q. How do you keep a Minnesota Viking out of your yard?
A. Put up a goal post.

Q. What do you call a Minnesota Viking with a Super Bowl ring?
A. An Imposter.


Q. What's the difference between the Minnesota Viking and a dollar bill?
A. You can still get four quarters out of a dollar bill.


Q. How many Minnesota Vikings does it take to win a Super Bowl?
A. Nobody Knows

Q. What do the Vikings and possums have in common?
A. Both play dead at home and get killed on the road!

And in case you're thinking of heading to Minneapolis to attend a game, The Minnesota Highway Patrol is cracking down on speeders heading into the downtown area.  For the first offense, they give you 2 Vikings tickets. If you get stopped a second time, they make you use them.

TSA: Just ordinary folks--gone horribly awry

I remember as a kid the Vesuvius-like joy that filled my soul when Dad said we had to go pick up someone from the airport.  The wide-open terminals, the cool little shops (to include the arcade), and airplanes!  What was not to like for a little kid?  I didn't even have to be the one flying.  Airports were great places to be.

Not any more.

In fact, it took us two days to drive to Wisconsin.  You could have handed me five round-trip tickets from my front door to my mom's home and I still would have taken the two-day drive and night in a hotel to get here.

First, I can leave when I want.  I don't have to cater to whenever I can get the tickets.

Second, we have a 'burb full of goodies to snack upon when we travel.  Good eats and sweet fellowship with the family.

Third, my woman and I read to one another while driving.  Not much better way to pass the miles than to read with your bride.  The teen hibernated.  The girls watched movies.

Fourth, and the impetus to this micro-venting, I don't have to go to the airport.

What has become of our airports?  While I never traveled in Eastern Europe in the days of the Iron Curtain, I imagine that getting through the Brandenburg Gate back in the day proved far easier than getting from the front door of any big-city airport in America to the departure gate in 2010.

The fact that my government sees all of its citizens as suspect grieves my heart the most.  While I can seldom bear Ann Coulter's screaming-meemie approach to political observation and discourse anymore, she sums the problem up nicely in a recent article.  In a nut shell, howz-about we target those most likely to target us?  Not the nuns.  Not five year old children.  Not the WWII vets trying to visit their great-grandchildren.  Considering every major atrocity committed against the US in the last three decades has been committed by someone of a conservative Islamic persuasion with a heritage that usually springs from a locale well east of the Mason-Dixon, what say we scrutinize folks like that?

That would require a fundamental shift from the top down not likely to happen in the next two years.  Janet Napolitano has studied internal national security from the likes of old Heinie Himmler and Joe Stalin.  Nope.  She's set and President Obama doesn't appear to be reigning her in.


An American Travesty


So what happens when the order comes down to the TSA agents that they MUST do a nude scan or full-body grope of Sister Mary Catherine before she can board her plane?  Have any balked?  Have any of them quit their job in an economy where jobs are scarce because they could not carry out such heavy-handed tactics against friends and neighbors?

Personally, and like many others, I believe what the TSA is doing to American citizens is criminal, a shaking down of individuals who have provided no impetus to the government for this unreasonable search and sometimes "seizure."  At this point, I come to understand how ordinary men and women could lead other human beings into gas chambers.  Really, it's not that extraordinary a leap.  When national leadership tells you that it's for the good of the nation, that the safety of the country depends upon what you are doing, a sense of civic duty rises up and you answer the call.

Until you take a hard look at what you are really doing.  Unfortunately, I have heard no stories of TSA Agents quitting over what they've been tasked to do.  My heart grows heavy every time I see a picture of the TSA groping folks that ought never be groped, body-scanned or metal detected. 

When will this all end?  I don't know.  Our government of the people is doing this to us.  We have let it tether itself around our freedoms.  It's up to us to say, "No more."

Until then, I'm steering clear of airports, getting out on the wide-open road, and praying they don't institute highway checkpoints between states.

Chipped plates

On a cool afternoon this fall, I puttered away on the computer in our den, and my wife sat on the futon editing a presentation she would be giving to the women in our church.  Chatting and writing, we could hear the typical noises of a house with children and thought nothing of it.

Soon my bride arose and left the room for a moment.  When she returned, she said, "Come see."

Conspirators

I took her hand as she led me to the kitchen.  There, stacked neatly on the counter, sat the clean dishes from the dishwasher.  I recalled hearing the dishes being clanked about but thought my teenage son had taken to the unloading.  I was wrong.  My six-year old daughter conspired with her eight-year old sister to surprise the folks.  They can put away most of the Tupperware, silverware, and plastic glasses themselves.  The plates' home they cannot reach.  And so the neat collection of saucers and bowls betrayed their act of love.

I gathered my eight-year old, Emma, into my arms and squished the stuffing out of her.  "Thank you, Sweetheart, for unloading the dishwasher."  In a glorious confession, Emma declared, "It was Kara's idea," and went on to explain how the plan unfolded.  Kara the six-year old stood listening in the hallway with her perennial smile.  I squished her, too, which isn't hard considering her petite stature.

Lifting the plates into their cupboard home, I noted chips on a quarter of them (none of them new).  Should you have the opportunity to dine with us, you'll not find china before you, and be careful because you might nick yourself on the edge of your dish.  That's just the way it is.  Nicked dishes abide within the residences of families. 

Sometimes things get chipped through carelessness.  Sometimes they get broken through disobedience.  From time to time, they get chipped because in learning to do a task, a child lacks the strength and grace to accomplish the task that their seasoned sibling can pull off without a thought.  The broken dishes are discarded and the sins forgiven.  The chipped plates remain as a testimony to the growth and maturity that comes as part of being in a family.

And sometimes, when eight-year olds and six-year olds show a character beyond their years, everything happens as it should, and two little girls stand beaming at what their hands have wrought.

I am not knowing

A friend mentioned to me this morning his distress over the death of civil discourse in our country.  People can no longer discuss the merit of an idea, the conduct of a person, or any other topic whatsoever without hostilities breaking out. 

What has happened that two individuals can no longer construct and assess arguments on a particular topic without volcanic emotion?  Might I suggest that this should come as no surprise in a post-modern and now a post-Christian era?  For example, I read a little blurb earlier in the week. In it, the author tried to argue against those who used truth as a weapon and indicted those who failed to embrace or comprehend the simplest truths.  Then he regurgitated this hairball:

"...you cannot possibly know if any absolute truths exist, because we simply cannot be absolutely certain. Yes, I firmly believe this postulate that we can never know for certain anything."

If I cannot know that absolute truth exists, why pursue it?  If I did pursue it and found it, how would I know that it was indeed absolute truth?  This recent phenomenon, the idea that there is no truth or that absolute truth cannot be known, puts man in the position of beast.  If I can know nothing for certain, as this teen and many lettered university professors assert, then why should I not eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow I die (Isaiah 22:13, 1 Corinthians 15:32)?  And if I can know nothing for certain, why should you and I bandy arguments about?  What a waste of breath and time!

This know-nothing attitude has murdered logic and rhetoric.  If you don't like my position, you're stupid!  What a moron.  Oh, yeah, you're one of them born-agains.  If people had a modicum of education, they would understand why evolution is brilliant and global warming a fact.  Um, excuse me, do you have any support for anything you are saying, or will you merely assault my character and my identity?

I wish this were merely true outside the church, but such no-nothingness has infected the Body of Christ as well.  Listen to the author's next statement:

"This is the beauty of life, where faith has to step in, lead us, and strengthen us when we are faint of heart."

Francis Schaeffer referred to this as an upper-story leap of faith.  If we can't know anything certain about our current plane of existence, we're going to jump into the realm of illogic and unreason and hope something will be there to encourage my soul.  As the Church has jettisoned the word of God, it has abandoned the only source of objective truth it had.  Today faith and religion is true as long as it is true for you. 

On the contrary, biblical faith is a foundational and fundamental trust in a God who has proven himself over and over to his creatures.  Biblical faith is the child who will leap from the side of the pool into daddy's arms because a) the child knows his father, b) the child has seen his daddy catch him and take care of him many times before, and c) the child applies those facts forward by trusting his daddy to catch him when he leaps.  It's not an irrational leap into the abyss but an absolute trust in the One who is there.

How important is knowing things certainly?  Paul said, "If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins" (1 Cor. 15:17)  Whoa.  He anchors our hope as Christians in the FACT that Jesus has been raised.  He says that very thing two verses later, "But in fact Christ has been raised..." (1 Cor. 15:20).

So serious were the apostles about this that John wrote at the end of the first century, "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life" (1 John 5:13).  God himself emphasized evidence throughout Ezekiel where over and over again the fulfillment of prophecy would show Israel and others that he is who he said he is.  "Then you shall know that I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord" (Ezek. 37:14).  Jesus described eternal life as knowing God the Father and God the Son (John 17:3).

How, though, can I be certain about anything in this world?  If I begin with myself, I cannot be certain of anything for how would I know if my faculties were revealing things to me as they truly are?  Perhaps our world is nothing more than a snow globe in the mind of an autistic child as depicted on television's St. Elsewhere.  The only way we can be certain is if someone with an objective perspective conveys to us what reality is.  And someone has.  That someone in fact created the cosmos and each of us as individual masterpieces. 

That Someone is God.

His revealed word, the Bible, provides man with his only sure reference in the cosmos.  While the grass will wither, the flowers will fade, and the North Star may supernova, God's word will remain forever (Isaiah 40:8).  It's no wonder the psalmist declared that God's revealed truth was a lamp to his feet and a light to his path (Psalm 119:105).

The blurber concludes:

This is the journey of life; searching for truth, finding the path to our chosen truth, and watching in prayer as the path unfold before our eyes...We pray that we have chosen to follow the right truth and hope that we haven’t wasted our short life on meaningless treks.

There it is, the maxim of the 21st century.  "Whatever is true for you."  Such a starting point will continue to lead to deteriorating discourse because we begin from two different planets, one anchored in created reality and revealed truth and the other knotted in the wastelands of sin and self.  Pilate shrugged his shoulders asking "What is truth?" and then proceeded to walk away from Truth incarnate and have him crucified.

Guest help: What's love got to do with it?

In days of yore when flying was my vocation, we would have pilots fly with us from other organizations.  We called them "guest help."  This noon I read a musing that I thought would be worthy of your time.  I may be biased as the author is my son.  Nonetheless, some incisive observations on love and relationship from one married less than a year.

"What's that Love thing again?"
by Drew Pond

If love is butterflies, goosh, giggles, and smiles….if love is holding hands while walking through daisies….if love is dancing in the rain…if love is eros, fire, and heat…if love is a hidden kiss….then love is garbage.

Work recently granted me the opportunity to instruct my fellow employees in the ways of love.  I occupied the only seat for a married person at the round table of conversation.  I do not remember how the conversation was spawned, but one of my esteemed coworkers made the observation that, in a marriage, you do not always love your spouse.  There are times when you even hate them, and that is ok.  The important thing is that you hold the knowledge that you will be there at the end of the day.   This individual labeled marriage as a lifelong exercise in turmoil.

Recently married, I hated what I heard.  I realize now that the people, including many professing Christians, have no concept of true love.  So often our definition of love and our attitude towards it varies with our moods.  I will love my wife just so long as I am in a good mood and we always agree.  That sounds more like a friendship between five-year olds.  “You made me mad, so I’m gonna take my ball and go home.  You’re not my friend anymore!!”  “We yell, bicker, and call names, but it is ok.  At the end of the day we will still be in the same house.”   How is that for quality of life?

I countered the misguided meanderings of the ignorant with the Biblical perspective.  Many of you, I am sure, are familiar with Ephesians 5:25 “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it,” as well as verse 22 of the same chapter, “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord.”  I refuse to get too involved in all the in's and out's of these verses now.  Many people have written many books to that end.  I simply want to highlight what love is.  In both of these verses an illustration is given commanding a practice we all tend to do very naturally.  (Please sense the sarcasm in that last phrase.)

SACRIFICE.  Yeah, I know that a complete sentence requires a subject and a verb, but try to lose yourself in the dramatic effect of the capital letters.  Sacrifice and servitude are concepts utterly foreign to our humanistic, hedonistic society.  However, these principles exemplify TRUE LOVE, they are the practices that make a marriage last.  A desire to submit, love, and sacrifice comes from sensitivity to the Holy Spirit and separation from sin (the lusts of the flesh).   Familiarity with the ultimate show of deference, Christ in Gethsemane, spurs the one born-again to follow the example of their Savior in exhibition of love.  John 15:12-13 “This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.  Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”  Not only did Jesus give up his life by death, but he gave up his desire for the cup to pass from him in order to fulfill the will of the Father and provide salvation to all.

If a marriage is to work, if we are to exhibit true love, we must be willing to submit ourselves to the will of the Father, to defer our wants and needs out of love for another, and to sacrifice ourselves for another.  It is possible, it is hard, but it is commanded, and it is amazing.  Woe to the marriage where it is absent or viewed as optional.

Well said, Drew.

(Reprinted without permission with minor editions from his Facebook page)

What to read, what to read...

Flying is a perishable skill.  That's why the Thunderbirds, Blue Angels, Snowbirds, and the like practice, practice, practice.  It looks glamorous, but it is gruelling, exhausting, demanding, meticulous, exhilarating work.  I don't speak first hand, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.

So I sit and stare at my keyboard.  It looks as though all the letters have remained in the same place.  That's encouraging.  Plunking out a blog entry a couple of times each week does not compare to the demand of flying fighter aircraft inches from one's wingman at g-loads that would put most folks right to sleep.  No, but it is my hope to not put you to sleep either.

So why did I stop writing?  I didn't.  One day simply heaped upon the next for an extended period of time.  I guess it's the same reason we missed Christmas cards last year.  One morning it was September, the next it was February.  Guess it's a little late to send the cards.  Well, here July blinked into November.  Truly, I hope that November doesn't blink into May.

Many thanks to those of you who lurk across these pages and wondered about the silence of the previous months.  When I began these musings three years ago this January, my intent was to look at the world around me through the lens of God's word, the only lens that would provide clarity to the situations of life.  I did not mean for there to be such a distance between ponderings.  Thanks to those who spurred me back to the keyboard.

In the event that these pages stagnate again--no promises--let me recommend a book to you.  I'd never read anything by Randy Alcorn, he's written both fiction and non, but his title, "If God is Good:  Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil," deserved a look.  With the drivel written in the past about why bad things happen to good people, I hungered for a book with a rock-solid biblical foundation that addressed the topics of the title.

I was not disappointed.  Clearing 500 pages, it's a daunting book, but it needed to be so.  Alcorn doesn't shy away from hard questions.  He doesn't sweep them behind the bushes.  Nor does he seek answers from sources that shift like San Andreas' fault.  No, he plumbs and scours the depths of God's word to find sure answers to the essential questions of our existence.

This is not a book that merely wades into dark swamps never to return.  On the contrary, in examining these places, Alcorn had to examine the character and nature of God.  Few books I have read in my life so exalt God outside the Bible as this one does, and it does so by highlighting God's revelation about himself in the Bible.

I mentioned the size of the book.  Yep, it's a big'n.  That said, those 500-pages are broken down into 45 chapters comprising 11 sections.  Each chapter is further broken down in five to ten bite-sized sections.  The way he has broken this book down makes it a very manageable read; don't let its size deter you.

On top of all of this, it's not a pie-in-the-sky, unapplied book.  The book is replete with stories of those who have been through and are currently within the crucible of suffering and tragedy.  Through it all, the faithfulness and the sovereignty and the goodness of God shine like stars in a moonless sky.

If you have nothing to read, let me steer you toward this book for many reasons (by the way, I do not know Mr. Alcorn, nor do any proceeds come back to me).  If you have plenty to read, let me encourage you to move this into the top three of your pile.  It is that good.

And stop back by here.  I hope to not be a stranger to my own blog.  I might even get my Christmas cards out this year.

The five-year old "Why?"

Much of the anarchy in public schools today rests squarely upon the shoulders of the parents who have ill-disciplined their children.  Demand no standard of conduct in the home and you make it quite challenging for Mr. Mathteacher to demand a held tongue or focused attention amidst his lecture on the nuances of the null set.

Parents began giving teachers children ill-prepared for the classroom when they jettisoned the principles of biblical discipline for the pop-psychology du jour advocating self-esteem over self-discipline.  Rather than restrain the toddling tyrant with a loving dose of corporal punishment parents ceded the reign of their domain to their child leaving their home and subsequently the schools to look like the whirlwind they had sown.

One of the ways parents have neutered themselves is by feeling the need to explain to Little Joanie the reason behind everything she is told to do.  Newsflash:  when a child is told to do X by the parent, the only acceptable response is to accomplish X right away, all the way, and with a good attitude (a "happy heart").  Allowing the child to delay the task's completion by asking "Why?", while paying you as much attention as a brussel sprout, feeds and corrupts the inquisitive nature of the child.  Kids want to explore.  They're discovering the world.  The first half-dozen years of a child life ooze magic and wonder as adventures and discoveries dot the landscape.

Really, though, do they want the rationale behind why their socks belong in the dirty close hamper instead of decorating the floor of their bedroom?  When told to go to bed, do their hearts ache to hear the biological and spiritual need for the human frame to rest? NO!  They have discovered the means to delay the inevitable.  Ten more minutes of play become twenty.  Perhaps Mom will even forget the initial command and pick up Little Joanie's socks herself.  Cool.

Cutting to the core, if a child does not do what he is told by one who has authority over them, they have rebelled, conscious or not (this assumes that they knew how to and were able to accomplish the given task).

One of the best tidbits of parental advice I ever received dealt with the "why" question.  It ran something like this.  When your child asks you "Why?" when they are told to do something, you tell them that they may not ask "Why?" when told to do something.  They must do.  Right away.  All the way.  And with a good attitude.  Anything but will be met with appropriate discipline.  Once the task is accomplished, then and only then, if the question still remains in the child's heart as to the deep secrets as to why a specific task was demanded of them, may they ask (with respect and honor) "Why did you want me to do that, Daddy?"  99.9% of the time, you'll never get the question.  They really don't care.

There are legitimate why questions.  The other night, my five-year old daughter asked, "Why can we only see part of the moon sometimes?"  It had nothing to do with a command she was given.  Her wonder had turned toward the heavens and she truly wanted to know.  Plunge in, Dad, and feed her curious appetite.

The why-principle remains in the teen years, too.  "Hey, Dad, can I...?"  As a parent, it's important that I understand their request.  Ask questions.  Follow up.  Get the whole picture.  Some questions will require time and prayer.  It might require you to counsel with someone else or search God's word.  After objective consideration, decide.  When you decide, your decision stands.  Your child (under your authority) has one response.  Abide that decision right away, all the way, and with a good attitude.  No "buts" or slammed doors.  No rolled eyes or deep sighs.  They might not like it, but that's life!  That's the real world, and my job as Dad is to prepare my kids for the real world. 

Here's where communication enters the picture.  If after a day or so they would like to know the rationale behind my decision that they carried out, they are free (with respect and honor) to ask me that very thing.  Perhaps the ensuing discussion with my child will cause me to amend such decision in the future.  Perhaps it will help them see clearly the foolishness (if so) behind what they wanted to do and the wisdom (hopefully) behind my counsel.

Walk the halls of most schools.  How many of the kids have been taught to respect the decisions of those in authority, principals and teachers, coaches and counselors?  What a blessing it would be to those in leadership if they encountered young men and women who, when receiving an unpopular or distasteful decision from on high, abided that decision with as much fervor and respect as if they had gotten what they had wanted!  Instead, they deal with deception, disrespect, surly attitudes and blatant disobedience.

As parents, let's squash the why-question, unless of course our kids are asking about the moon.

Yankee Doodle

My bride and I watched James Cagney's Yankee Doodle Dandy last night, the biopic of American entertainer George M. Cohan. 

I wept.

My boys would say, "So what, Dad?  You weep during every film.  You wept watching The Incredibles."  Well, yeah, that's true.  Truth be told, novels do it, too.

It's not just the good telling of a good story that yanks the tears from my ducts.  It's the character who sets aside his dreams for another.  It's the group that sacrifices all for others or for some ideal.  It's love, extraordinary, difficult, pained, strained, sacrificial love.

Yankee Doodle Dandy was a great film.  If for no other reason, it's a renter to see James Cagney dance with an energy and beauty I'd seen from Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor in Singing in the Rain.  Typically, folks breaking spontaneously into dance seems hokey.  When folks do it with the flare that these gents do it, it's worth the price of admission.  Cagney's dancing bits come during Cohan's stage acts, so they blend in with the storyline.  Even if they didn't, they'd be worth including.  Wow.  Here's a brief scene near the end where he does spontaneously break into a bit of tap.  His feet testify to his joy.



I was set to sobbing, though, because "they don't make movies like that anymore."  Like what?  Patriotic movies about patriotic people.  Cohan wrote plays, skits, music, and musicals that testified to the beauty that was America.  "You're a Grand Old Flag."  Heard any soaring songs lately about our nation's banner?  Lots of laments about what it's become but few to make the heart soar and the pride to swell.

Bald, unashamed patriotism.  Where have you gone Joe DiMaggio?

Here's another point.  Never once during any of the dance numbers did James Cagney grab his crotch.  Never once did he thrust his pelvis in mock intercourse.  He did write a song for Mary, the woman he so adored.  And when he proposed to her, he offered her, for the first time, a kiss of sweetness to seal the deal.  I only saw his tongue, though, when he spoke.  It was unnecessary for the director to convey the depth of love they felt for one another by showing them clenched in a Captain Kirk-dinner-eating kiss or disrobe into some knot of humanity achievable by Cirque de Soleil but not by any of us.  The film depicted their love through character development.  Through the eyes.  Through the dialogue.  Through the story (which is why Pixar continues to win the homerun derby).

Another point.  I saw depths of sorrow, depths of concern, depths of anger, depths of frustration, and not once did I hear anything that I couldn't type without symbols.  Not one blurp of profanity.  It wasn't needed.  My five- and seven- year olds could be in the room, and I didn't have to fear what they might hear or see.  They might not sit through the whole movie, but they could without my fearing what might be vomitted from the screen.

Can you name a movie, a movie targeted to adults, that kids could watch (if they wanted to) that wouldn't make your average parent blush?  Anyone?  Me, either.  In all honesty, it broke my heart a bit in Toy Story 3, a film targeted more toward children though a very mature (in the good sense) movie, when they included Barbie's admiration for Ken's ascot.  Over the kids' heads?  Some, not all.  Necessary to convey their attraction?  Nope.

There are thousands of movies of amazing quality (acting, cinematography, story, and sometimes song and dance) out there.  You'll not find them on ABC, NBC, CBS or Fox.  You'll not find them at the local cineplex.  You might find them in a small corner on a single shelf at your local movie rental store titled "classics" or buried as needles in haystacks among the fields upon fields of other films.  You might stumble upon a couple at your local Redbox.  You will find them en masse at Netflix if you are willing to pay the fee.  The best place I have found such gems is on Turner Classic Movies, and it's almost worth the price of cable.  I have little to commend Mr. Turner's politics, but he has created a special thing with TCM.

As I went to bed last night, I pondered the mythical land that birthed the likes of George M. Cohan, a land reflected and honored in his artistry, and a land chest-deep in sacrificial nobility when the movie commemorating him was filmed (1942). 

What a great movie.  There are still films and stories out there that tell about this legendary place called America.  It just takes a little work to find them.