Plus Neat Tools

Sorry I haven’t been around. I use my garage computer most of the time now, so I rarely check my blog email address, and I am also lazy about looking up the password when the garage computer decides to log me out! Today I decided to face this horrible 20-second chore, and when I brought up the login page, my info was already there.

So there is not much to brag about in that little episode.

First thing: I got my CNC mini-lathe going. I’m afraid people would jump out of windows if I wrote about all the kinks I had to work out of it, but I can mention a few briefly.

For one thing, the x axis (the cross slide) insisted on running backward. This would work if I ran the lathe backward and put the tool on the wrong side of the part, but it’s not so good for normal operation.

I’m using Mach3 right now, because it’s supposedly the easiest way to get off the ground, and Mach3 has several settings that allow you to change the axis direction. They don’t work. I also tried changing the sign of the gain (please don’t die of boredom) in KMotion, but nothing happened. I finally gave up and switched the wires on one motor. That reverses it. Done.

Before this I had other problems. For one thing, I stepped on the USB cord that goes to the controller and pulled the female USB port out of the board. That was a bad moment. I had to take the board out, remove the port, suck out all the solder, put the port back on, and rig something up to replace the support tabs I destroyed in the accident.

Last night I got the thing going and figured out a few things about making Mach3 work, and I made this:

Impressive, right? Guess what it is!

Keep guessing if you want, but it’s nothing. It’s test scrap. I used one end to test OD turning, and I used the other end to test the ball/radius wizard. The hole in the end existed before I put the part in the lathe.

The steps per unit on the motors are wrong (probably) because I set them by eyeball. You’re supposed to do a calculation based on the number of turns of the lathe screw per inch. For my x axis, I should have gotten 5000 steps per inch, but I think I’m using 75000, which is a BIT high. My guesswork settings appear to be really close, but they still have to be fixed.

I was worried that this lathe would not be useful, but last night I realized it’s going to be very handy. It can swing parts up to about 4″, which covers a great deal of ground, and it will do all sorts of shapes. It may take a long time to cut each part, but who cares? It’s automatic. I don’t care if each part takes three hours.

I plan to improve the mechanics of it. I am not thrilled with the bearings.

Finally, I can think about something else.

Last week, a teacher named Andrew Wommack came to town. He rented a hall at the Miami Beach Convention Center. He does that because churches that hate the gifts of the Spirit are not lining up to let him speak in their buildings.

This guy is fascinating to me, because he teaches things I believe. I don’t hear much of this stuff on TBN (although he has a show, so maybe I should watch). It just comes to me by revelation, and my pastor also teaches it. The same teachings come to different people independently, which is exactly how the Holy Spirit is supposed to work.

A bunch of folks from my church went (nobody from Trinity showed up), and we listened.

It was wonderful to see him say so many liberating things. He reinforced things I believe, and he also cleared a few things up. It was as if there was stuff stuck in the pipe, and he knocked it loose.

He explained some scriptures I didn’t understand. For one thing, he said that when the Bible says people who are in Christ don’t sin, it refers to our spirits, which are cleansed and made like Jesus at the moment of salvation. The mind and flesh may continue sinning. He also explained the remark Jesus made about agreeing with your adversary quickly. He said it means that if Satan accuses you of something you’ve actually done, you should admit it and quit crippling yourself with self-righteousness.

He also taught that prayer in tongues is essential. It is what makes us strong. Effort is nearly worthless.

I don’t want to get too deeply into what he said, because I’ll remember it incorrectly. He has a website where you can hear his stuff for nothing. Here is a link.

Since the event, I’ve felt even more faith and power than I was feeling already. If people will get ahold of this stuff and use it, great things will happen.

Unfortunately, people like Joel Osteen and my old pastors have conditioned us to go to church just to feel good, so as long as what we hear makes us feel good, we wave our hands and have a great time, but we don’t really listen. We listen for slogans, not advice we actually expect to take. I don’t know how many people who were at the event will remember to apply what they heard.

I can tell you this: the reason the promises in the Bible don’t work is lack of faith. If you pray in the Spirit, you will develop faith, and you will get a revelation of who you are in the supernatural hierarchy. When you understand what you’re allowed to do, and you have the God-given faith to do it, you will see the promises function.

People will fight you if you tell them they can’t cast out demons, but it’s true for many of us. If you don’t know who you are, and you only have human faith, when you assert your authority, the spirits will just laugh. Or they will strip you naked, give you a beating, and chase you down the street. If you know who you are, so will the demons. Then they’ll listen.

Faith, authority, and sovereignty are manifestations of the same thing. Get faith, be honest with God, learn, and you will succeed. And to get faith, you’re going to have to pray in tongues.

Andrew Wommack baptized maybe two hundred people with the Spirit. On South Beach! That’s like doing it in Sodom.

I went up for prayer. A man prayed for my gallbladder issues, and he told me I was a seer. He said I saw darkness, and that I also had to see the light. He didn’t tell me everything was fine, and that THE REST OF MY LIFE WOULD BE THE BEST OF MY LIFE, or anything else that might have been cribbed from Stuart Smalley.

In the future, we won’t have to concentrate and work to have faith. Because we are built up, faith will flow easily. The mind will be aligned with the spirit, and we will be able to let God do the work. This will be a major problem for Satan, and it’s why he hates prayer in tongues. This is the kind of teaching that leads to major persecution.

If I had to say one thing seemed to be lacking, I would say it was teaching on love. I’m sure he does teach about it, but I have noticed that even the best teachers are not giving love enough attention. When God came to me in 1986, the things that I noticed immediately were not might or healing power. They were overwhelming love, total peace, and an absolute certainty that I would be protected and cared for as long as he was there. We need to remember that these things are important, because they’re not luxuries or rewards. They are essential defensive weapons.

Check out his website if you think this is appealing. He was very helpful to me.