Political Ponderings...

The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.
John Quincy Adams

Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost.
John Quincy Adams

In the Bible it says they asked Jesus how many times you should forgive, and he said 70 times 7. Well, I want you all to know that I'm keeping a chart.
Hillary Clinton

I'm not going to have some reporters pawing through our papers. We are the president.
Hillary Clinton

Let's not leave an educational vacuum to be filled by religious extremists who go to families who have no other option and offer meals, housing and some form of education. If we are going to combat extremism then we must educate those very same children.
Hillary Clinton

Soulful tune by Frederick Maker:

Dear Lord and Father of Mankind,

Forgive our foolish ways!

Reclothe us in our rightful mind;

In purer lives Thy service find,

In deeper re’rence, praise.


In simple trust like theirs who heard,

Beside the Syrian Sea,

The gracious calling of the Lord,

Let us, like them, without a word,

Rise up and follow Thee.


Drop Thy still dews of quietness,

Till all our strivings cease;

Take from our souls the strain and stress,

And let our ordered lives confess

The beauty of Thy peace.


Breathe through the heats of our desire

Thy coolness and Thy balm;

Let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;

Speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire,

O still small voice of calm!

Amen.

Some sound advice...

If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Just so you know....

A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell.
C. S. Lewis

Redeeming Creation

As many of the scriptures below will demonstrate, the Bible teaches that both "the environment" and humanity are part of creation. Both are inextricably linked to one
another, have been ever since God formed us from the earth (Gen. 2:7; 3:19; Ps. 104:27-30), and will continue to be in God's future when we will exist as resurrected bodies on a new earth (I Cor. 15:35-44; Rom. 8:19-23; Isa. 65:17; Rev. 21:1). In other words, humanity and the rest of creation are part of all of creation. Therefore, creation-care does not just mean caring for "nature," nor does it just mean caring for humanity; it means caring for both. A Biblical creation-care ethic is a holistic ethic. Therefore humanity's relationship to creation needs to be based on a Biblical understanding of God's relationship to creation. http://www.creationcare.org

Our relationship with all of creation must be in keeping with Christ's relationship with all of creation.

How do we make an impact on caring for creation without being sucked into secular mainstream viewpoints? How do we maintain a Biblical worldview of Grace over nature instead of nature: nature.
GRACE/ nature
nature/ nature

For too long many people in the church has acknowledged God as Creator but failed to care for the creation He made. Others have made the mistake of worshiping the creation instead of the Creator, replacing God with something less. [Van Dyke]

You have studied many aspects of Creation and man’s use of and misuse of it. What role does the Christian play in this? Have we been faithful stewards of God’s creation; or have we been neglectful in that duty, waiting for someone else to do something about it? It’s much like the Christian who wants to see people come to the Lord, but is willing to wait for someone else to go and preach the Good News to the lost and dying while we sit back and do nothing.
How much longer are we willing to wait-do nothing in hopes that someone else will come along and see the task through?

The recognition of our role as stewards is the role back to the obedience of God’s command to care for His creation. We do leave a footprint, as Al Gore and his friends like to say, not necessarily the carbon footprint he speaks of, but a footprint none the less, that tells a story of our obedience to God’s command.

Creation's final redemption awaits the return of the Creator. But our actions can reveal our obedience to God who will accomplish that redemption and upholds creation by the word of His power.[Redeeming Creation/ Van Dyke]

When my prayers begin "Dear Lord, I want..."

"There is…only one way to stop covetousness….
That is to want God so much that we cannot be bothered with inordinate wants for anything else."
~ Joy Davidman Lewis

Reflection of Grace

When I consider the heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which You have set in place,
what is man that You are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?
Psalm 8:3-4

That God is mindful of me? What a thought! Almost hard to grasp.
When I consider myself, wretched thing that I am, I am only mindful of my faults, my many mistakes-all the disappointments...

Yet God, the Creator of all things, even knowing me intimately, considers me.
Could it be that in His eyes we can find a reflection of ourselves that we have not known before? A reflection that we could never imagine for ourselves?
He loves me. HE LOVES ME! I see this now, and see a new reflection of me in His eyes.

I am not worthy on my own. I could not do anything to bring this about. I am but human, was dead in my sin-- until He considered me. Called me by name, raised me from death-and made me His.
The Maker of heaven and earth made me His.

"Amazing Grace how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost, but now am found-was blind, but now I see"