Latter Day Pharisees

Isn't it fascinating how history repeats itself?
In nearly all arenas; social, political, cultural, discernible patterns repeat themselves with varying cycle lengths.
Spiritual matters are not immune. Throughout the scriptures we find repetition in how Heavenly Father deals with His children, and how Satan seeks to destroy truth. Perhaps this is at least partly due to our apparent unwillingness to learn from the past. It's no wonder one of the most often repeated words in scripture is 'remember'.

During some time recently spent studying the New Testament, and specifically the 4 gospels, I've noticed undeniable parallels between the Scribes and Pharisees that sought to destroy Jesus Christ and the movement He began, and today's self-anointed "Evangelicals" that seek to destroy His restored gospel. Granted this applies to a minority of Christians. I hope.

**Orthodoxy -- During Jesus' ministry the Mosaic Law had gradually been mutated from its original intent. The orthodoxy of the time, defined predominantly by the "experts in the law", the Scribes and Pharisees, had drifted so far from truth that Jesus Christ, the great I AM, even He that was the author and giver of that law was labeled a blasphemer by them.
Predictably, that pattern has repeated. After centuries of misinterpretation and diversion, sprinkled liberally with power broking, Christian orthodoxy also mutated so that many precious truths were lost. Along the way many recognized this drifting and attempted to correct it through Reformation. These attempts were incomplete at best. Alas the fullness of the gospel of Jesus Christ was restored through the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The Saints are often told they are not Christians because we don't align with current Christian orthodoxy. But that is exactly the point. In our day, just as in the Master's earthly ministry, it is the orthodoxy that is incorrect. It is a common human weakness to not recognize truth when it doesn't conform to preconceived notions.

**Misinterpretation -- Much of the cause of the mutation of The Law was the misinterpretation of scripture. The Pharisees intently studied the Torah and vehemently fought against any interpretation other than theirs. They could quote the Torah and regularly used passages from it to attempt to prove Jesus a fraud. They were certain they were correct. Clearly Jesus' ministry demonstrated that despite all their study and vehemence, they had missed the point. Latter-Day Pharisees also study the scriptures and are equally certain their interpretation, or Hermeneutics, is correct. They likewise attempt to use select, out of context Bible verses as blunt instrument weapons. If they truly understood the Bible they would be eagerly searching for the restoration of all things foretold therein.

I find it very interesting also how in both cases, people that had long been persecuted became the persecutors. The Jews had been persecuted for centuries. Modern day Christians are victimized all over the world, and even increasingly so in the quickly liberal-moving society in Western cultures. Many even hold their persectutions up as evidence that they are correct. And yet the experience of being persecuted and hated unjustly hasn't prevented the Latter-Day Pharisees from becoming persecutors any more than it stopped them in Jesus' time.

I find these comparisons to be fascinating. I also find them to be testimony that Lucifer's tactics for combatting truth haven't changed.

Hindsight being 20/20 we now know that Jesus of Nazareth IS the promised Messiah and that the Pharisees missed the boat. In time the Latter-Day Pharisees will likewise find themselves regretting.

Ideas: dangerous economic indicators

With all the economic challenges our nation faces, ie. recession, inflation, debt limits, entitlement spending, excessive regulation, etc., I believe most dangerous and least recognized in the belief system held by the left wing of society.
To borrow from recent headlines, this dogma is well illustrated in comments recently made by Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In an angry diatribe against a fellow congressman for supporting the "cut-cap-balance" legislation she stated that the effect would be to "take away" benefits for Medicare and Social Security (wait, I thought they had a 'lock box'), while "giving away" tax cuts to the rich.
The comments, which are all too common today, represent a belief system that I'm afraid this nation may not be able to survive.
It is the belief that the nation's wealth belongs first to government, which then has the moral authority dole it out 'fairly'. Fairly of course means giving it to those that have less.
It ignores the fact that the only reason the government has any funds to give anyone is because politicians confiscate them from the very people they then berate for having too much. Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth.
The debate over taxation/spending has evolved into a matter of math, with the competing positions arguing over what levels will best serve the economy. Apparently both sides of this debate have conceded that setting tax levels designed to maximize revenues is moral. I make no such concession.
I understand the congress has the legal authority to establish taxes for nearly any activity, including income. But why is the moral authority not in question? At best, presuming the left has the best of intentions, it is the forcible taking of property for the benefit of select others that are selected by the pick-pockets as worthy. More cynically it is legalized theft of wealth for the purpose of purchasing the loyalty (votes) of those that envy and resent the wealthy.
It is a system whose result, even if not its design, is to punish the hard-working, risk-taking, time-investing, forward-looking producers, while rewarding those that, through their own fault or not, produce little. Hence the comparisons to Socialism.
How long can any economy expect to survive such a system?
Take up pen and paper. Draw a circle which gradually spirals inward until in eventually collapses in on itself and disappears. You have just accurately grafted the economic forecast for any nation in which this dangerous belief system gains dominance.

An armed society is a polite society.

I'm forever frustrated that experienced, supposedly intelligent adults can't seem to wrap their brains around the unique dynamic of gun control laws. They believe that strict restrictions on guns make society more safe and that easing such restrictions creates danger, despite that belief being exactly opposite of EVERY recorded statistic.
They believe guns are inherently bad and should be prohibited in every possible circumstance. The truth is that guns are neither bad nor good, but are tools. Criminals will use them to do bad things, and good people can use them to do good. No gun restriction ever has been or ever can be enacted that will prevent criminals from arming themselves. Criminals, by definition, don't respect laws and they prefer unarmed victims. Any restriction gives a tactical advantage to the criminals. Mass shootings nearly always occur in locations where guns are prohibited, primarily schools. Simply allowing good guys to carry guns, even if none did, would reduce these occurances.
The frustration is the ideological and uninformed commentary. Despite the fact that the cities and states with the most restrictive gun laws consistently have the highest rates of violent crime, it is states like Arizona and Texas that get labeled "nuts".

The Lord works in mysterious ways

I hesitate to make this post because of the nature of a very powerful experience I've had. But I post it because the excitement of the experience makes me want to shout it from the rooftops.
Julie and I have our 25th wedding anniversary coming up on April 18th. We're going to celebrate it, in part, by going on a cruise to Cabo San Lucas. It will not only be our first cruise, but will literally be the first time in those 25 years that we've gotten away together, without the kids, for any period of time. (Our current record is about 36 hours)
It seems an appropriate time for my experience. Appropriate, but not coincidental, I think. It was, and is, certainly a tender mercy of my Heavenly Father.
Without getting into unnecessary details I'll suffice to say that we recently had a confidence betrayed by a former in-law that seemed determined to hurt us. Julie in particular. It ended up all working out well, so no more worries there.
But there was a completely unexpected side-effect. After nearly 25 years our marriage had slipped into a comfortable but unremarkable relationship. That's probably not that unusual. What happened next I cannot explain other than to declare it to be a Gift of the Spirit. Circumstances thrust upon us sent my thoughts back to those days when we first fell in love (see pic), and I have since been absolutely overwhelmed with feelings of love and gratitude for this woman with whom I am blessed as my eternal companion. I'm crazy in love all over again.
Thank you Father for the example of turning a sow's ear into a silk purse.

Read the instructions

Today is Christmas Day. Those of you with families know that the true meaning of Christmas is assembling, programming, and/or operating. :-) This morning my daughter was trying to figure out her new cell phone. She called out to me asking me how to activate a specific function. When I replied "Read the instructions", I was met, but not surprised, by a chorus of laughter from all my kids at the thought doing such a thing. I bet you're thinking the same thing right now.
It seems to be extremely common to want to bypass reading the instructions and just figure things out on our own. How much more wise would it be to read the instructions written by the creator of the item? How much more useful and fulfilling would the item be if thoroughly understood?
Deciding to go it on our own is always a risk. We know that instinctively. But the stakes vary. Putting together a $10 toy with 6 parts is low stakes. Assembling a $1000 workout machine, with lots of moving parts, is more likely to inspire one to read the instructions first.
We are all here trying to build ourselves into something that will more closely resemble our Heavenly Parents. There are lots of moving parts and sometimes it's hard to distinguish the right ones from the wrong ones. Failure brings an awful price. Father has provided us assembly instructions, if we'll take time to study them.
What will you do?

D.A.D.T still exists, but with a twist.

This week Congress repealed the 17 year old policy, Don't Ask Don't Tell. I have several concerns about this.
*I don't understand the necessity. Gays were already legally permitted to serve in the military. They were only prevented from making an issue of their sexuality. It seems to me that what Congress and Pres. Obama have really done, perhaps unwittingly, is to open the door for activist, in-your-face gays to begin stirring up strife from within. Does anyone believe that this tactic, or any other, would be beneath the anti-military left?
*At one time it was illegal for gays to serve at all. Any homosexual serving in the military, if discovered, could be discharged. Don't Ask Don't Tell seemed a good compromise, permitting gays that truly only wanted to serve to do so provided they didn't make a spectacle of their sexuality. But as is usually the case with liberal activists and movements, it still wasn't enough. They want the force of government to force people to accept their lifestyles. Anyone believing the movement will stop here is naive to say the least.
*Through this action our federal government has made the transition from tolerating the homosexual lifestyle, to endorsing it. For those of us that believe scripture, the biggest threat posed by homosexuality to our nation, particularly as it gains mainstream acceptance, is the potential it represents for bringing God's condemnation.
*Now that homosexuals have basically become a specifically protected class in the military, those that do believe in scripture and traditional values now become the ones that must remain silent about who they are.
I guess you could say that Don't Ask Don't tell is still the policy, but with a twist. It will now be illegal for military to be openly Christian.

What's in a name?

Last week, while driving on the freeway, I passed a billboard advertising The Nutcracker. Apparently there were only 7 performances left.
A few thoughts hit me.
The Nutcracker is a ballet.
It is a Christmas tradition.
It is often the only ballet that many people ever see.
Having never seen it (nor any other ballet) I began wondering how a performance, apparently about Christmas, came to have the name The Nutcracker.
I came to the conclusion that it got the name "The Nutcracker" because that is what has just happened at home to any husband/boyfriend that is attending his first ballet.