Prayer Team Issues

I started working with my church’s prayer team last week, and there were some excellent things about it.

First of all, NO RAP MUSIC. My church reaches out to kids, and that means a lot of blaring music, including rap. The kids who run the sound and lights come from a generation that has no understanding of the importance of conversation, so they keep the music blasting even after services, and it’s really annoying. I know it brings kids in, but I have always hated loud music, and it’s very hard to sense God’s presence when all you can think about is the pain in your ears.

The prayer team uses proper worship music, which is much gentler.

Second thing: the attitude is very serious. One of the pastors teaches straight from the word, and he doesn’t tell us we’re good enough and smart enough and people like us. He doesn’t tell us we’re wonderful just as we are. He tells us we have to know the word and remember God’s promises, and he expects us to work at our walks with God.

Third thing: tons of prayer in the Spirit. The Bible teaches that this is perfect prayer, and it charges believers like batteries, filling them with the fruit and gifts of the Spirit.

Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be able to keep going. The reason is this: I’m afraid we’re picking fights we can’t handle. I don’t want any part of that.

Perry Stone has written a lot about spiritual warfare, and one of the hazards he mentions is taking on gigantic spirits without God’s prompting and without the right preparation. Christians don’t like to hear it, but Satan is extremely powerful, and so are many of his underlings. You can say “Greater is he that is within me than he that is in the world” all day, but if you attack a big principality without authorization, you are going to get hammered into the dirt, and your family may get hammered right along with you.

If we had the kind of unlimited power some Christians think we have, I could walk outside right now and order every evil spirit to leave Florida, and they would have to go. Thousands and thousands of people would be healed of diseases and mental illnesses and addictions. It would be the greatest story in the history of journalism. But I can’t do it. Let’s just be honest. Satan is the god of this world, and God has not given us the power to deal death blows to his kingdom on a daily basis. Satan is going to rule until the return of Jesus, so let’s get used to it. A war is made up of battles; you don’t win in a day. Every day you face what your commanding officer tells you to face, and you don’t run around like a chicken with its head cut off, firing random shots behind enemy lines.

We see this in the Bible. In Daniel, a great angel said he had been restrained by one of Satan’s helpers for 21 days. Jude says Michael himself had to fight with Satan in order to hold onto the body of Moses. Paul says the Holy Spirit ordered him to stay out of Asia Minor, even though he wanted to go there and win souls. The Bible also says the Holy Spirit warned him to avoid Jerusalem. If no weapon formed against us will prosper, why didn’t he dash up there, order Satan out, and do his thing? Obviously, there are some battles we can’t win at the times of our choosing.

The pastor who leads our prayer team battles out loud with the spirits that rule Miami and the area of the church. He battles the spirits of idolatry, which is very widespread and intense in Miami. Voodoo, including Cuban voodoo, is no joke here. He addresses Satan personally. I just don’t believe what he’s doing is a good idea, and I don’t think we have the supernatural support to prevent it from hurting the church and the members of the prayer team.

On top of that, there is the subject of “binding and loosing.” Jesus told Peter that what Peter bound on earth would be bound in heaven, and that what he loosed on earth would be loosed in heaven. At least, that’s what the King James Version says. Messianic Jews see it differently. They prefer terms that mean “forbid” and “allow.” The Jews have always believed that God gave them the authority to make rulings on religious questions here on earth. When Jesus told Peter he could “bind” and “loose,” he was probably telling him God would support his decisions regarding spiritual matters.

Somehow, modern Christians got the idea that they could “bind” Satan. So we run around yelling things like, “I bind the spirit of pornography over my city in the name of Jesus!” Question: is there any evidence that this has ever worked? We still have pornography, drugs, prostitution, alcoholism, violence, and every other sin in every American city. I think we’re wasting our air or provoking retaliation. So it makes me nervous when the pastor starts “binding” and “coming against.” I see no examples of these behaviors in the Bible. I know we have the power to bless and curse things, but that seems very different.

The pastor also also said something about “loosing angels of our provision.” Again, I have never seen this in the Bible, including the New Testament. And I believe giving an order to an angel is idolatry, just like praying to a saint. I ask God to send spirits to help me all the time, but I would never give one an order.

I thought my family and I needed corporate prayer, and I suppose that is true, but I don’t want the kind of prayer that will make things worse.

Personally, I think prayer–the type where you ask for things, not the type where you search yourself or converse with God about other things–should be specific. Instead of “binding and loosing,” ask for the things you need. Ask God to rebuke the spirits that work against you. Fast and pray. And cast the spirits out, if you think you have the authority. Jesus ordered us to do that. But don’t make up doctrine.

You wouldn’t walk out onto a battlefield, shoot your rifle in random directions, and yell, “I COME AGAINST THE NORTH VIETNAMESE.” That would be what military historians call “a real bad idea.” But you might locate a tank and radio your commander for air support to take it out, or you might ask for permission to blow it up. I think the supernatural world is a lot like the natural world, and common sense should apply there, the same way it does here.

The conclusion I come to is that I am probably causing more problems than I am solving by getting behind rash spiritual warfare, so I better stay out of it.

Perry Stone says he knows of ministers who have tried to fight the big spirits ruling their cities, and he says the enemy mashed them like bugs, ruining their churches and causing all sorts of problems for their congregations. That’s good enough for me. He knows more about this stuff than I do.

Another thing that worries me: ministers insult Satan. Jude tells us not to do this. Satan has rights, and God generally does not support trash talk. Every time I hear a minister use words like “stinking” or “lousy” when referring to Satan or an evil spirit, I cringe. I believe Satan has the right to take these things before God and ask for permission to retaliate. Why open the door? What is the point?

I think you fight at your own level of power. Overcome the spirits that manipulate your body; that’s a good start. If you can’t control your body, how can you hope to de-pornographize your city? After that, get your home and family in order. THEN maybe you can start thinking about bigger targets. That’s my guess. The Bible says we are not even supposed to be deacons unless our houses are under control, so I think I have the right idea.

I think Jesus began by fighting small battles. His first move after being baptized with the Holy Spirit was to fast. Why do you fast? To drive off the spirits that corrupt your behavior. It’s self-improvement. He was cleansing himself before taking on the task of cleansing the world.

I’m disappointed, but there is no way I can change the way things are done in the prayer meetings, so I see no option except withdrawal. Maybe the answer is to start my own group. The church likes that. Right now, I AM my own group.

I’m Stuffed

If there is one thing I feel sure about as a Christian, it’s this: if you want God to reveal things to you, you are going to have to spend a lot of time praying in the Spirit. The less I do it, the less I receive. The more I do it, the more I hear.

Yesterday was a remarkable day. I’m going through the Bible systematically this year, and right now, I’m working on Jeremiah. “Coincidentally,” Perry Stone has been doing a lot of teaching about hell. It turns out this stuff fits together in an impressive way.

The book of Jeremiah compares us to clay in a potter’s hand. It says that when we’re “marred,” God re-shapes us.

Jerusalem contains a valley known as the Valley of Hinnom. This is a deep spot where the ancients burned their trash. Long ago, it was the place where Canaanites burned their children alive as sacrifices to Moloch. God took Moloch’s holy place and turned it into a trash dump. Fires burned all the time in the Valley of Hinnom.

Judas hanged himself in this area. In all likelihood, he hanged himself near the top, and he fell into the valley, and this is what caused his intestines to burst out.

When Judas realized Jesus was not going to escape death, he tried to give his payment (silver, symbolic of redemption) back to the High Priest, but it was rejected as blood money. The priests used it to buy a place called “the potter’s field,” to be used to bury the poor.

The potter’s field was in the area of the Valley of Hinnom. Potters worked there. They discarded bad merchandise there, in the form of broken pottery, or potsherds.

The Bible calls us “vessels,” and it refers to “flasks.” The first miracle Jesus performed involved turning water into wine, at a wedding in Cana. That water was in seven vessels used to fill mikvehs (sanctifying baths). The Bible tells us the Holy Spirit has seven parts. Christianity involves receiving the Holy Spirit, which is referred to as “living water.” The Holy Spirit fills us and changes us. It’s an internal mikveh. At Pentecost, when the baptism with the Holy Spirit fell for the first time, people declared that they believed the recipients were “full of new wine.” The miracle at Cana showed what Jesus intended to do to his church.

The Bible calls proud people “stiff-necked.” When a flask or other earthen vessel is fired, it becomes impossible to mold it, and the neck becomes stiff.

In the Bible, the Valley of Hinnom is used as a symbol for hell. And it just happens to be a former center of Satan worship, where fire used to burn all the time, and where malformed vessels were shattered and discarded because they had become too stiff to repair.

Sometimes God paints a picture for us, and all you have to do is open your eyes and look. Hell is reserved for Satan. It will also receive people who are too hard to allow God to change them. And God gave us the Valley of Hinnom to prove this is all true.

This is a pretty good explanation for the phrase “stiff-necked.” Pride doesn’t make your neck stiff. People don’t respond to pride physically by stiffening their necks. But it makes sense when you’re talking about pottery.

Incidentally, Moloch worship was Satan’s imitation of damnation and the lake of fire. God does not want to cast his children into eternal fire, so what did Satan do? He created a form of worship in which people threw their babies into burning pitch, in the belly of an idol. Satan always parodies God, even when he doesn’t realize it. And as Perry Stone says, the modern replacement for Moloch worship is abortion. A womb is supposed to be a place of nurturing and growth, but Satan convinces women to turn their wombs–their bellies, just like Moloch’s–into slaughterhouses. Places where beings are destroyed. What could be more perverse or disgusting?

I’ll bet there are many women out there who have had abortions, yet who would not live in a house where a murder has occurred. If you kill your unborn child, aren’t you such a house? Strange.

In lighter news, I came up with a shocking improvement for my garlic roll recipe. I made kimchi a while back, and I realized it was full of lactobacillus (taken from a jar of kimchi I bought), so it might be a good source for bacteria to make bread. I put some kimchi liquor into a jar with flour and water, and a day later, I had sourdough starter.

I mixed some of the starter into a batch of dough, without yeast. I let it sit for a day, and then I mixed yeast in and made rolls. They were incredible. The texture was different; the rolls were more transparent and satisfying to chew. The smell of sourdough filled the kitchen as they baked. I love it. And while I was eating them, I realized I finally had a great way to make dough in advance. If you put yeast in dough, it’s hard to freeze it well because of the CO2 that escapes, but if you make dough without yeast, it will work great with vacuum bags.

I’m going to make pizza this way from now on. It will be incredible.

I credit God. He just drops this stuff on me. I also have a new way of assembling the rolls, which gives them a much more complicated and pleasing structure to pull apart and eat. I recently received two ideas along this line. I got one a few days back, and another improvement came to me as I was typing this.

Unfortunately, I am not going to be cooking for my church any more. They’re going to miss out on all my new creations. I’m sure God will show me what to do with them. It’s too bad, because the new dough will make prep extremely easy and efficient, and I would have been able to streamline pizza production enormously.

This week someone asked me to make one of my banana nut bread/pineapple upside-down cakes for her birthday, but I had to turn her down. The nature of the food I cooked was somewhat sensational. It always made a splash. I think that spark is gone from our kitchen now. The food will be good, but not exciting.

I have two new chef friends. These are real chefs, not sous chefs or line cooks. They compete in nationwide contests held by the company that employs them, and they’ve won expensive vacations. They go to my church, but they won’t go near the cafe. Very sad, because they both run commercial dining facilities for big companies. I know of three chefs who go to my church but avoid the kitchen, and now I’ve joined them.

When smart, unselfish Spirit-filled people avoid an enterprise, it’s not a good sign.

These ladies have all sorts of training and experience, but they treat me with respect, and I appreciate that. I know I don’t have their superior knowledge and training.

On Saturday, one of them is cooking for a bunch of people, and I’m invited. She just asked me to make rolls! How about that!

I finally have a decent mixer. A long while back, I recommended a Bosch Universal Plus for my church, and I’ve used it for pizza, rolls, and cheesecake. It’s so great, I got one for myself. I’ve never had a stand mixer before. It’s my understanding that a more conventional mixer may be better for cakes and so on, but the Bosch is unbeatable for dough. I’ve tried a Hobart Kitchenaid for dough, and it’s horrible. Throws flour all over, has a small capacity, leaves tons of residue in the bowl, and turns the dough into a fist that climbs up the dough hook. With the Bosch, you turn it on, turn it off, empty it, and toss the parts in the dishwasher. Bam, you’re done. And it has a lid that locks on. It even has suction-cup feet so it won’t wander around the kitchen.

I guess the one in my church will sit and rot in my absence. I was the only one who knew how to use it.

If you get a Bosch, I recommend getting the stainless bowl. It usually comes with a plastic job. The version I ordered comes with both, so I won’t have problems if I need to mix two different things. You can also hook a meat grinder to it. That would be fantastic. Homemade sausage is the bomb.

I better get off my butt and make dough. I have to be ready for Saturday.

More

Gallery of sourdough rolls:

Bring Your Keys

Recently I posted something about some problems that occurred at my church, and the way God was leading me through them. I decided to take it down. There is a 0.001% chance that someone from my church might read my blog, and if they did, they might find what I wrote divisive. I don’t want to risk it.

It’s hard to know when it’s okay to give your testimony regarding fellow Christians who cause you problems. It has value as testimony, but it can also inflame them and their friends against you. It can also come off as self-righteousness or schadenfreude, which is a tempting dish Christians are not allowed to touch. The Bible says God may turn his wrath away from your enemies if you celebrate their defeat.

I don’t cook at my church any more. Very sad, but there it is. My role was suddenly reduced to the point where it would have been foolish to do all that work. I used to sell 15-20 pizzas per event, but I am down to 9, and the display area has been sharply reduced, so it would have gotten much worse. It reached a point where instead of making the church $250 a day (or over $10,000 per year), I would have been bringing in 50 bucks. In order to do that, I’d have to miss working as an Armorbearer, and the leader of the Armorbearers would really like me to spend less time in the kitchen. The economics don’t make sense.

My participation in special events was cut out entirely.

On top of that, I suddenly became aware that the church has a paid chef running the kitchen. No one told me about this until this week. Last I knew, we were all volunteers, and I answered only to the pastor running the cafe. I was exceeding my authority, but I had no way of knowing it.

One of the fundamental rules of institutional cooking is that there has to be a single authority in charge of any kitchen. I was an unnecessary hindering authority, and I didn’t even know it. I had been trying for weeks to get information on what was going on, but I couldn’t get emails or texts answered, and there were no meetings.

I also learned that although I had been encouraged to increase the professionalism of the kitchen workers, I was going to be expected to stop resisting the lack of order. I would have had to work in an regime that conflicts sharply with my work ethic. When you take joy in doing things right, and you’re passionate about it, it’s extremely difficult to work in an enterprise where low standards are defended and promoted.

Maybe I expected too much. I hoped to be a kind of Jaime Escalante figure, helping people rise to meet greater expectations. Instead, I learned that we were expected to go along to get along. I think the fear was that if we pushed people to excel, they would simply go home. And maybe that’s right, but I’m not suited to work in that kind of environment. I felt like Howard Roarke would have felt, pasting Parthenon replicas to the facades of his elevations.

In a nutshell, I faced a constructive discharge, and I left in order to avoid adding to the entropy. And there are other reasons why I couldn’t remain, but I don’t think I should reveal everything.

It’s still a sticky situation, because before I found out all this new information, I talked to the head pastor. We agreed that I would cook for visiting VIPs from then on. I doubt he has any idea I’m out of the kitchen, and it’s not my place to butt in and let him know. He’s in charge of the whole church. His word is law, but he runs the kitchen through a subordinate, and that’s the person I was under.

I learned some wonderful lessons from all this. I knew that the supernatural battle has to come first, and I was trying to implement this knowledge, but I learned that you have to get reinforcements sometimes. We’re constantly taught that God, in us, is greater than the world. But I learned that no matter how good your prayer life is, Satan is still extremely strong, and sometimes you will need reinforcements. Many Christians would consider that a repudiation of faith, but it’s reality. You can get in big trouble fighting strong spirits on your own, even with God on your side.

Someone sent me to meet with our church’s prayer team over the cafe mess, and it was like going to a hospital after being pulled off a raft in the middle of the ocean. I can’t tell you how refreshing it was. They had the kind of worship the main services lack. There was no rap. There was no rock. There was real worship music. There was prolonged prayer. There was serious teaching of scripture, not just the soft stuff we serve out front. I had been hoping to find this kind of atmosphere somewhere in my church, and on Wednesday night, I found it. Or it found me. I’m going to join the team if they’ll have me. This is what I really wanted. Working with your talents is very nice, but it’s garbage compared to working with your faith and drawing near to God.

It’s funny; the temple had a main area where ordinary people could come and go, and then behind that, they had an area for the priests, and behind that, they had the Holy of Holies. Our church has a sanctuary for services, but the prayer team meets in a smaller room behind it, pretty much where the priests would be in a temple. That’s where I want to be. That’s where things happen.

I also found out that a person who seemed to be causing most of my problems was actually a relatively minor player. The biggest source of chaos and strife was someone else. I knew Satan liked to fool people and pit them against each other, but now I have new respect for his abilities in this area.

My involvement with the Armorbearers is increasing. I’m back where I’m supposed to be, and it feels fantastic. I can’t describe the relief. I got some great rewards from cooking, and I’m sure my time in the cafe was God’s idea, but I am loving getting back to my earlier calling. And there are so many unpleasant repetitious problems I won’t have to face any more. I go in, I do my job with a spiritual crew that understands responsibility and authority, and I go home. It’s like a vacation.

I’m planning to work with the prayer team to fix the cafe. Some of us are thinking of going in when the place is closed and praying the paint off the walls. That will be fantastic. The leader of the prayer team is taking the issue to God, so I don’t know if the plan will be put to work.

When I was with the prayer team, several of them kept telling me I needed to go back to the cafe. The problem was that I had already made a commitment to the Armorbearers, and my leader and I had prayed about it, and I had prayed about it, and leaving seemed correct. I came to the conclusion that returning as a prayer warrior was the best thing. I’ll still be there, and I’ll be doing something extremely important, but I won’t be in the way, cooking and imposing my standards in someone else’s kitchen. The chef has to put her stamp on the place, if she is to succeed and get any kind of respect, and for that to happen, I have to be gone.

Things keep improving for me. That’s how walking by faith is. You grow and improve and gain strength. My tool chest gets bigger and bigger, thanks to God’s generosity and patience.

We Should Have a Pie Fight

Things are going great here.

Over the last few weeks, I started to feel I was doing too much work at church. That’s not really correct. I felt I was doing too little supernatural warfare, compared to the amount of mind-and-hands work I was doing at church. I was getting up and taking off for church without prayer, and I was coming home too late for prayer. I was letting natural work push supernatural work out of the frame.

I knew this was no good. It was driving me crazy. All my strength comes from prayer, study, fasting, giving, and worship. When those things slide, the foundation of my life collapses.

I felt like gluttony was trying to get ahold of me again, and I was generally dealing with a flesh uprising I wanted no part of.

I ramped things up. I started increasing my morning prayers and making time to pray in the afternoon. As an Armorbearer, I’m allowed to drink liquids like protein shakes while fasting, but I went back to water and unsweetened, zero-calorie liquids. I resumed taking communion. I made sure I read the word.

Things have improved greatly. God is really fighting on my side now. My flesh is taking the beating it deserved. My appetite is under control. The sensation of the Holy Spirit’s presence is strong. A week or two back, he surrounded me for a whole evening. I felt like I was full of codeine.

If you don’t believe in the baptism with the Holy Spirit, all I can say is, consider my testimony. I would not make my experiences up. What’s worse? Having to admit your church is wrong, or becoming a spiritual stillbirth? The Gospels tell us “living water” refers to the Holy Spirit living inside us, as a result of the baptism with the Holy Spirit. They say that expressly. Oral Roberts didn’t invent it. Don’t let the nuttiness of some Christians lead you to discount the most powerful gift God gave us.

The Holy Spirit is not Hitler; you can resist the improvements he wants to make in you. This is why some charismatics are so embarrassing. They’re not listening or improving. They use God as an excuse to satisfy their greed and lust. It doesn’t mean the baptism is a hoax.

It’s 2010, and people still think Christianity is about work. About being good. That’s not it. That’s not even a fair description of pre-Christian Judaism, which was much more work than any type of Christianity I know of. Christianity is about being inseminated with the Spirit of God and allowing him to grow inside you until you resemble the father. It’s conception and gestation. It’s supernatural change. That’s what it’s all about. You can’t improve yourself. You have to let God do it, and the baptism of the Holy Spirit is the mechanism.

If you have ears to hear, you will understand.

I feel like God is turning me into a supernatural wrecking machine. For some time, I’ve been very impressed with the importance of becoming a supernatural warrior. This life is war; our primary function is to fight. As my relationship with God improves and he crucifies my flesh and helps me behave correctly, I become more powerful. I become slippery to Satan; sins are the handles he uses to grip us. I can tell I’m getting a lot stronger, and I wonder what the reason is. I feel like God is preparing me for a major battle. Or maybe this is just how we’re all supposed to be, all the time.

I’m learning that persecution can come from within the church. I should have been ready. This weekend I realized that most of the persecution I recalled reading about in the Bible came from believers. People who believed in God delivered Jesus to the Romans and insisted he be killed. They slaughtered the prophets. Heretics in the early church persecuted Paul, who began as a persecutor and murderer. Sometimes the heathens got some licks in, but recall that David was more afraid of Saul than the Philistines.

I think God gave me a ministry involving food. He gave me fantastic recipes which were clearly better than anything a person of my background could be expected to create. He got my cookbook published. He gave me supernatural weight loss. He had his pastors ask me to work in a church cafe. He gave me a loyal following among the people at church. I can’t walk through the place without people telling me how great the food is. People tell me I’m the best cook on earth. I made cheesecakes for some visiting VIPs a while back, and some of them said it was the best they had ever had. This kind of praise has become routine, and it’s fairly obvious that the recipes are gifts from God. They should glorify him, not me.

Lately, as I let the supernatural part of my walk decay, I started having problems. People were opposing my work in the cafe. I don’t want to get into particulars, but it has been a real problem. I feel unwelcome, and I have to fight in order to donate my time and talent. That’s insane.

A little while back, we had a major event at church, and there was an effort to keep me from cooking for it, On top of that, my work area was buried under piles of supplies and equipment, and I was told I might not be able to get supplies to cook the following week. And I was treated very rudely when I inquired about getting the work area cleared. I couldn’t even get the person who treated me rudely to accept my apology, and I didn’t do anything wrong to begin with.

I didn’t lift a finger against anyone in the natural. I tried to get a little support from the people above me, and it didn’t work, and I felt led to stop. I felt that God was holding them back so he alone could deliver me. He came through so powerfully, it shocked me. I actually felt sorry for the people who had come against me. Now at least one of them thinks I planned it. I had nothing to do with it. I didn’t see it coming. All I did was bake two cheesecakes in order to help my pastor. As a result, I got promotion and honor, and things went badly for the people who opposed me. Their own efforts got a lot of criticism from people who attended the event. People–friends and mere acquaintances–have come to me unsolicited and criticized their work.

The people who worked against me should be on top. They have tons of training which I lack. But God put me over, like you would not believe. With no warning to me, he used me to chastise people who went to cooking school. My natural tendency is to feel that a self-taught cook shouldn’t cross swords with people who have studied, but I am developing a powerful reputation.

An anointing is a job. When God anoints you, it means he has hired you. When you hire someone, you support them. You give them what they need to get the job done, and you fight anyone who gets in their way. That’s what happened to me. It doesn’t matter whether I went to culinary school. God wants me to cook, and he is going to see to it that I do it. If I end up doing something else, it will be because God has something else for me to do. No one can take away what God wants me to have, and it’s a sin to try.

I don’t care whether I cook at church or not. I could use some rest, and I’m not anxious to pour more money into the cafe. If the people in charge decide placating the venal and arrogant is easier than backing the faithful and obedient, hooray. I’ll be an Armorbearer and continue helping the pastor write books. “In God I have put my trust; I will not fear what flesh can do unto me.”

If I am asked to leave now, I will leave in victory. If I stay, I’ll be able to do more cooking for God. I can’t lose. God has gone before me and prepared my path.

The supernatural warfare has been incredibly helpful. So much so that I’m grateful for my enemies. How would I learn and grow without them? I can’t ask for life without conflict, because I was created to make war. That’s fine. All I ask is that God remain with me and fight for me.

Sandwich Idea Strikes

Don’t even tell me my recipes don’t come from God.

Months ago, I got the idea of making homemade pork sausage. I bought pork at Costco, plus smoked bacon to perk it up, and I made bulk sausage. It was incredible. Today I’m eating it; I thawed out a package because I needed to start rotating old stuff out of the deep freeze.

I was eating a delicious slice of this stuff when it hit me: BARBECUE SAUCE. I ran to the fridge and got some Sonny’s Smokin’ sauce and tried it on the sausage. BULLSEYE.

Here’s my idea. Fried sausage on a buttered, toasted onion bun. Add sauteed onions with barbecue sauce and butter, plus a few slices of thin dill pickle. OH YEAH! This will be far superior to barbecued pork, and I won’t need to smoke it!

Que Va? Indians Must Have Moved in Next Door

I had a wonderful inspiration this morning before I got out of bed.

What if I took my Indian-style chicken curry recipe and added orange, tangerine, or clementine juice, along with zest strips? That would be fantastic, right? And I could also add chopped red pepper for texture and flavor.

It wasn’t long before I found myself at the store. Walking to get the ingredients. Walking past the canned fruit. Seeing the canned pineapple out of the corner of my eye. Turning around. Going back.

What if I fried pineapple chunks in olive oil and added them to the curry?

I grabbed a can of pineapple.

I also decided to use garlic slices instead of pureeing them with the other sauce ingredients. Anything to make the sauce less monotonous.

Now the curry is simmering, and I have a saucepan full of basmati rice going. I make it with chicken broth, Coco Lopez, carrot strips and golden raisins fried in butter, cinnamon, and butter.

This is going to be amazing. But will it be too much like Thai red gang curry? Truthfully, I don’t care. That would suit me fine.

Surely these ideas come from God. I’ve already tried the sauce, and it made me weak.

Maybe I’ll post a photo.

Photo

It’s excellent, but it would benefit from three things. 1. More habaneros (I can fix that). 2. A day of rest. 3. Chicken stock made with bones.

Tomorrow, after the flavors mingle, it will defy description.

Help Out

From Heather:

Penelope isn’t going home today. Urologists have been called in & now they want us to start using catheters’ on her. She has to have more tests done. Please pray that the Lord will heal this problem. The urologists say that children who have Spina Bifida usually have nerve damage causing their bladders not to empty. They don’t know that Penelope has this, but will be testing for it. She will have to be cathed every four hours for the rest of her life. We are devastated.

My recommendation would be to remember David, who fasted and prayed as long as there was a possibility that God would heal his infant son.

Serious This Time

The news says Glenn Beck is having weird and scary medical problems.

I am putting him on the prayer list, and I hope you will do the same. I am not a Beck supporter, because I think he is basically an embarrassment time bomb waiting to go off on the GOP, but his medical issues sound very bad, and his work affects a lot of Christians. And he has already faced very trying problems in the form of alcoholism. He shouldn’t have to go through a second trial this severe.

I would also pray he becomes a Christian and receives the baptism with the Holy Spirit, so he will become what God really wants him to be.

You Can Help

Heather’s daughter (born with spina bifida) is having back surgery. Please pray.

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Penelope’s surgery was finished about 4:30. We didn’t get to see her until about 5:30. The surgery was more complex than they initially thought, because her spinal cord was connected to the skin(something that didn’t show on the myriad of tests that she has had). However they did not have to severe any of the nerves they all remained intact(the ones that control the bowel and bladder). They were able to close the spinal cord. They did leave the little bump because it had fat in it, and they are using the fat to compress the closure and help it to seal.
She has to remain flat at least until tomorrow, to lessen the chance of a spinal fluid leak.
The nurses kept trying to get her to wake up, she would wake for a second or two and then go back to sleep. When she was moved to the PICU the nurses there wanted to feed her, but she had thrown up after initially coming out of the anesthesia. The PICU nurses were so concerned about her eating and the Doctor’s orders that she be kept flat, that they called him and asked what to do about her eating. The surgeon gave them strict orders to keep her flat and ordered a glucose drip. He also advised them to leave her alone and let her sleep, because if she is agitated there is a greater risk of the spinal fluid leakage. So they are giving her morphine and letting her sleep. After they gave her the morphine she was able to rest and she seemed more content. That’s when the nurse told us that we should probably go back to the Ronald McDonald house and get some rest because tomorrow would be so much harder in fighting with Penelope to keep her still.
So keep praying for her and us.
God Bless,
Heather

Support the Chosen & Offend the Nutbars

The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews invited me to Washington in May to participate in the National Day of Prayer. It was a great honor to be included.

They sent me a photo in the mail. It’s a signed 8 by 10, featuring me and Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein. The rabbi autographed it and wrote a short message.

I considered having it framed, but then I thought, “Do I really want to advertise my support for Israel in my home?”

A new wave of anti-Semitism is coming. It’s already very bad in Europe, and it’s starting to get worse here. Google “BDS” and “Israel” and see. Prominent leftist websites come up, admonishing us to boycott, divest, and sanction. Punish Israel for defending herself against over a billion enemies who intend to destroy the Jewish homeland.

We will probably see a day when American Jews have to hide. When that day comes, will you be able to help them if you’ve already identified yourself as a supporter of the chosen? When the feds start looking for “troublemakers,” I’ll be easy to find.

I guess the photo won’t make any difference. I’m already pretty obvious.

I had some thoughts about this today. What will the future be like for American Jews?

Religious Jews are city people. This is unfortunate. They have to have synagogues, they can’t hunt for food, and they can’t slaughter their own meat. America is full of rural land where they should be able to hide, but rural living would throw their lives into chaos. Christians can be extremely self-sufficient, but religious Jews can’t. What will they do?

I guess they’ll have to establish small religious cells where they can practice their faith below the radar. And they’ll probably be eating a lot of grain and vegetables.

One of my Jewish high school friends lost his dad in the Eighties. It turned out he had $900,000 of cash (unreported) hidden in the wall of his house. At the time, I thought it was just greed, but now I think there may have been more to it than that. Jews know they can’t trust the government or their neighbors. It’s strange that they consistently vote for big government, considering the way strong governments have treated them, but that’s how it is. Maybe this guy was saving for the day when America turned on him and his family.

We use cash less and less often now. What happens when the Nuremberg laws pop up and take effect, and you’re used to using credit and debit cards? If you use plastic, the government will always know exactly where you are, and the nature of the things and services you buy will tell them a lot about you. And the government will be able to turn your cards off. Not a good situation to be in.

I guess my friend’s dad was onto something.

I think Jews need to maintain reserves of cash and precious metals. The cash will work when the government turns on Jews. The metals will work if the currency goes bad. At the very least, a Jewish family will need enough wealth to get them to Israel.

The problem with cash and precious metals is that they attract thieves. Yet another reason for Jews to be armed, with guns Uncle Sam doesn’t know about.

I still believe silver will be the metal of choice. Gold is too hard to spend. You can buy bags of silver coins (90% pure) and hold them until you need them.

Because of Islam, the government’s surveillance capabilities are getting very strong. And the change is showing up in unexpected ways. You know those electronic toll things they have now? The government can use those to keep track of your whereabouts and your travels. Here in Miami, they scan license plates, and they send letters out to people who have problems with the toll system. I received such a letter. In order to make that work, they have to keep records, so obviously, they’re keeping records. This isn’t a big deal to me, but what if I were Jewish, and things were starting to heat up? How would I move my family around? I’d have to avoid every major traffic artery. Either that or borrow a vehicle.

Jews need to think about stuff like this. But 90% of them won’t.

It’s hard to believe anti-Semitism is getting this big. It’s mainstream in Europe now, disguised as support for “Palestinians,” and it’s considered very chic among American liberals. Today they attack Israel. Tomorrow they’ll be bold enough to attack the Jews themselves.

It’s strange that most Americans have never heard of “BDS.” Conservatives used to use this term to mean “Bush Derangement Syndrome,” but now it means “Boycott, Divest, Sanction.” Google it and watch the mainstream leftist blogs come up by the score. It’s the rallying cry of modern anti-Semitism.

How come there is no backlash? I think someone needs to start a “BIG” movement. “Buy, Invest, Go.” Maybe I’ll buy a domain.

Where are American Jews while all this is going on? Are they in a coma? Strange. They noticed Rick Sanchez, but they don’t say much about BDS. Which is the bigger threat?

It will be interesting to see how things play out. I’m glad I didn’t get caught on the wrong side, so I won’t face God’s wrath when the time comes.

Deletion

I decided to take down a post I wrote yesterday. A famous person known for his large ego made some anti-Semitic remarks and got fired for it, and I wrote a critical post. There is nothing wrong with that, but I also put up some videos in which a TV comedian ridiculed this person’s intelligence.

I just awoke from a terrible dream that got me thinking about the ugliness of cruelty, and I realized I had crossed the line on my blog. You can control egotism and anti-Semitism, but you have no control over your IQ, and it isn’t right to make fun of a person for a defect that isn’t his fault.

Sorry I set such a poor example for other bloggers and other Christians yesterday.

Milk and Honey, Cream Cheese and Sugar…Same Deal

The other day, Virgil warned me that I was once again within the CONE OF CERTAIN DEATH. A tropical storm was on the way.

It looked pretty bad. This thing was supposed to go right over me. And Miami hasn’t caught up with the mid-20th-century, so almost all of our power lines are still on poles. That means the city goes black when the wind blows. This makes complete sense, since there is no reason to think Miami would ever experience high winds.

Of course, being a big Christian and all, I prayed. And today the storm has shifted course, and it’s out in the Gulf Stream. It’s not even windy here.

Is it okay if I take full credit for this one? I guess not.

Life is pretty sweet here. Guitar practice is going well. Unlike most people, I believe in practicing too fast as well as slowly, and it’s paying off, big-time. I keep working on ZZ Top, and I got faster and faster without realizing it, and now when I play along with the recording, I feel like I’m crawling. That’s great, because it means the music seems slower to me, so I feel like I have more time to think about each note.

I think the computer screwed up my picking hand. I am working on that. I have always held the mouse between my thumb and ring finger, with my index and middle fingers on the buttons. This is extremely unnatural. It causes you to squeeze inward with your ring finger all day, and I notice that now I have chronic soreness in the muscles I use to do this. Flatpicking tends to stretch these muscles, so it’s not a big surprise. If you play the guitar, or plan to learn, you might consider changing the way you hold a computer mouse.

I ordered two sets of P90 pickups. One is for my grey History Les Paul copy; I ordered Z90 humbucker-sized pickups from Harmonic Designs. They’re not cheap, but the sound samples are great. I also decided to try some inexpensive P90s on my History ES335 copy. I chose Mean 90s from Guitar Fetish. These are Asian jobs. They cost about a third as much as American pickups. Worth a shot. They get great reviews.

I’m not sure why pickups cost so much. A pickup is a few magnets and a little wire. You would think they could be sold profitably for forty bucks each. And maybe they can. I doubt the people who make them are pure socialists.

I stuck a new tone capacitor in my Chinese Epiphone Riviera. This guitar does not have a very bright sound, and I have read that .022uF capacitors (the standard) are actually too big, causing high frequencies to die off. I stuck a 6800pF capacitor in the guitar, and it does sound brighter, but it lacks the overall tastiness of the Blues 90 sound I get from my Blueshawk. I may stick Lollar P90s in it. The guitar is definitely worth the effort. I don’t want to decide until I hear the cheap Asian pickups.

Changing the capacitor was not fun. You have to pull every bit of electronic stuff out through the F-holes. And I ended up putting a tiny crack in one of my knobs. It turns out you can remove a knob safely by wrapping a thin cloth around it and yanking. I did not know that, so now I have to order knobs.

“Coincidentally” (I use that word so much), there is a guy who did a long series of videos and blog posts about the Epiphone Riviera, and I learned the cloth trick from him. You can find him by Googling “planetz.” The info should be helpful for working on any guitar with F-holes.

I guess it sounds like I hate humbuckers, but that’s not true. I love the humbuckers in my Burny Les Paul. But I feel like one humbucker guitar is enough.

It’s a funny thing, but I don’t have any complaints about my Fender pickups. Both guitars have Texas Specials, and I have no desire to change them.

I didn’t buy expensive tone capacitors. I went to Mouser Electronics and ordered some sort of film jobs. I read that the obsession with expensive capacitors was probably pointless, and given my experience with other audio myths, I believed it. When I studied electronics in college, they didn’t tell us to change our calculations when we used $40 paper-and-oil capacitors. All that mattered was the capacitance. I have a feeling the engineers know more about this than the musicians.

On Saturday I had a great experience. I celebrated Sukkot with a bunch of Messianic Jews. I was only able to get one person from my church to go with me, but it was worth it.

The event took place at the home of Ben Juster, son of Dan Juster, the rabbi who runs Tikkun Ministries. Look him up. They had a big ol’ tabernacle in the backyard, and I brought a strawberry cheesecake that could not have been better had the angels themselves delivered it. Bringing a really good cheesecake to a gathering of Jews is a little like bringing whiskey to Indians, but it was well received.

Many Christians believe Sukkot presages the Messianic Age, when Jesus will return and live here with us. I think that’s probably correct. I suppose the sukkah (tabernacle or booth) represents the physical bodies of believers; Jesus will associate with us even though we are still flesh. Right now he does this through the baptism with the Holy Spirit.

The Bible talks about people failing to be obedient during the Messianic Age. Imagine that. Jesus himself is sitting on a throne in Jerusalem, and everyone knows who he is, yet some people still rebel. I have no problem believing that. Human beings have a limitless capacity for rationalization and self-deception. People wanted to stone Moses even after they saw God support him with miracles. Wait…that was in the movie, which is full of craziness. Well anyway, they defied Moses.

Yesterday I found out that my pastor’s daughter in law is a big student of the Jewish origins of Christianity. That was a surprise. Maybe I’ll be able to pry her and her husband loose one Saturday so they can visit the synagogue. It’s very hard for them to get permission to miss our Saturday service.

I managed to turn someone on to Perry Stone this week. The church friend who went to the Sukkot thing with me listened to Perry while we drove. He was talking about silver as a symbol of redemption. He has an interesting theory. Remember how David got in trouble for conducting a census? God hit Israel with a plague that killed 70,000 people. Stone’s theory is that the big sin here was the failure to pay the silver redemption cost. I don’t recall exactly how it works, but males have to be redeemed with silver, and when you have a census, you’re supposed to pay. Anyway, I ended up lending the CD to my friend.

Stone also says the word “tekel” in “mene mene tekel upharsin” is actually “shekel.” The shekel is a unit of weight, and God was saying the Babylonians had been weighed, and that they had been found wanting. This makes sense to me, because a lot of “T” sounds have been converted to “S” sounds by Western Jews. For example, they say “shabbos” instead of “shabbat.” But I don’t really know anything about it.

Stone’s audio teaching about the census is titled “Not Just a Shekel.” I highly recommend it. You may be unable to get it unless you’re a “partner” of his ministry, though.

I only know of two examples where God himself wrote on stone. One is the delivery of the Ten Commandments, and the other is the incident in the palace at Babylon. There is a funny parallel. God gave the commandments to Hebrews who were celebrating with a heathen idol made of gold. God gave the other inscription to heathens who were celebrating with golden items stolen from the temple and the Holy of Holies. I wonder if that means anything.

With Which Thou Mayest Blow Thine Enemies’ Arteries to Tiny Bits

Idolatry takes some unexpected forms. The most surprising one, in my opinion, is church-related idolatry. You can turn the work you do with your natural abilities into an idol. You can even turn prayer or the Bible into an idol.

I do a lot of volunteer work at my church. Lately it has become obvious to me that I have to start cutting back. Either that, or God is going to have to open up a door to permit me to keep it up. If I could, I’d just live at church and work there all day (surprising to see myself write that), but that’s not my situation. I have to choose the ministries in which I serve.

I’ve worked on a book and other written materials for the church. I’ve cooked a great deal. I’ve served as an Armorbearer. I’ve attended functions which really were not all that relevant to my walk. It’s too much. I know it’s too much, because my prayer life is suffering.

Prayer is the single most important thing a Christian does. Some people think Christianity is about being good and not going to hell. That’s wrong. The whole point of Christianity is to know God personally and to be changed by the Holy Spirit. Without prayer, that doesn’t happen. You end up detached from the herd, doing whatever seems best to your limited mind, when you should be guided by the gifts of the Spirit.

I used to go to bed early and get up early. Now I get up between 7:00 and 9:00 on most days. My commitments at church sometimes keep me up until past 11:00, so I can’t just flop into bed and get up at 5:30. I refuse to do it. Doing without sleep is like eating junk food or smoking cigarettes; it’s extremely unhealthy. It makes you fat, it ruins your concentration, it degrades your memory, it wrecks your mood and leads to anxiety and depression, and it raises your blood pressure. I get tired of hearing people brag about how little they sleep. It’s like bragging about not brushing your teeth. Why would you brag about destroying yourself? I know there are people who would tell me they care more about their wonderful walks with God than about sleep. Well, maybe they can explain this:

It is vain for thee to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.

Here is a clearer translation, from The Complete Jewish Bible:

Ps 127:2
In vain do you get up early
and put off going to bed,
working hard to earn a living;
for he provides for his beloved,
even when they sleep.

Here’s Matthew 11:29-30:

Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

Some people think it’s virtuous to live a life of chronic deprivation and misery. God says otherwise. I believe God. Call me crazy.

I know people will cite Paul, pointing out that he got beaten a lot and so on. I don’t recall Paul saying he slept three hours every night, or that he worked so hard he didn’t have time to pray and worship. And there is a difference between occasional persecution, or occasional hardship, and perpetual drudgery. If drudgery were the answer, we would be able to save ourselves through works, wouldn’t we? I believe we are all charity cases, and God gives us things we don’t deserve. I believe faith and gratitude are more pleasing to God than hard work. I believe too much hard work and deprivation leads to pride, and God has made it very clear he hates pride.

I have to get God’s guidance and then cut back on the stuff I do at church. I have to accept the fact that things will remain undone. That’s just how churches are. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Even God is unable to make the church run perfectly, without going against his own nature. If that were not true, the church would be perfect.

I have a friend who told me he can’t attend church because he is so busy working as a volunteer. That’s crazy. Would you kick a patient out of a hospital bed and make him mop the floor of the ward? Better not to volunteer at all than to let volunteer work become an idol.

He told me he knows someone who secretly attends another church, because that person’s work at my church makes it impossible for him to sit in a service without working. If my pastor knew that, I think he’d blow a gasket. He doesn’t preach four or five times a week so people can miss his sermons because they’re selling sodas or sewing costumes for plays.

I’m not making pizza at church tomorrow. Tonight I have to go to a Sukkot celebration with a bunch of Messianic Jews, so I can’t attend Saturday night church. That means I have to attend tomorrow, and it means I’ll be up late. That all adds up to arriving late tomorrow and being unable to make the dough on time. That’s life. I’ve trained 7 or 8 people to make pizza. I prepared for days when I would be unavailable, but the helpers I taught haven’t taken up the slack, so when I’m not there, there is no pizza. Wish it were otherwise, but I have to get my rest and worship.

Maybe I should make a short formal list of my priorities and put it on the wall so I have guidance when I have problems like this.

I’m taking a beautiful strawberry cheesecake to the Sukkot thing. I expect it to be a hit. Jews will surround a good cheesecake like the Red Sea closing in on Pharaoh’s army. It’s hard for me to think of a gift that is likely to be received with more joy. You can’t buy good cheesecake in South Florida. If you think you can, it’s because you haven’t tried my cheesecake. I think God handed me that recipe, possibly so I would have it ready to use this very day.

I have to go reduce the sauce and slice the berries. Happy Sukkot, or whatever it is you’re supposed to say.

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Cell phone photo.

Give us Freedom or We Will Vote for Totalitarianism

Today I caught a video of Adam Carolla, talking to one of the guys from Reason.

One thing surprised me. Carolla is implementing an idea I had a long time ago. He bought a warehouse, and it’s where he hangs out. He keeps his tools and his cars there, and he has comfortable furniture. My dream is to have a big concrete building where I can put my tools, my musical stuff, and a couch and some chairs. Maybe some day.

Carolla had an AC Cobra replica in the warehouse, and the Reason guy had no idea what it was. Busted. If you’re going to pretend to be in touch with man values, you should have some idea what they are. Watching this guy flounder when asked about the Cobra was like watching Obama dump a 15-mph fastball ten feet in front of home plate.

It was not surprising, seeing a Reason staffer demonstrate that kind of ignorance. This is the crew that overwhelmingly voted for John Kerry and assorted fringe kooks, because they thought George Bush wasn’t libertarian enough. This is like hacking your foot off because your corns hurt.

I don’t get libertarianism. I used to joke that libertarians are Republicans who smoke dope, but then I found out there was a lot of truth to the joke. I mean a LOT. How can anyone care that much about drugs? Especially weed. To find a more boring drug, you probably have to look into laxatives.

I will never understand the popularity of marijuana. When you’re high, you smell bad and you annoy people. And you ruin social events, because you have to exclude everyone you’re ashamed to smoke in front of. All that, so you can giggle a little? I don’t get it. But some people can’t survive without it.

Carolla went on a quasi-libertarian rant about the awful government in L.A. It was obvious that he was really furious. When he talked about the crazy things Villaraigosa and the other dimestore socialists are doing, all the humor left him. What I saw bordered on hatred. He is not a happy person.

Naturally, I was reminded of my past as a political blogger.

When you get the idea that man has the answers to his own problems, you get sucked into fruitless, consuming activities that waste your life and make you miserable. It used to make me crazy when an election went the wrong way. Now I barely notice. I’m still conservative, and I criticize the other side from time to time, but I don’t really keep up with politics, and I have a lot more peace in my life.

If America serves God, politics won’t matter. We’ll do the right things, because we’ll have someone guiding and blessing us. If we don’t serve God, things will stink, and voting conservative won’t help. Without God, conservative government is no better than liberal government.

If you serve God and walk by faith, your life will work in spite of the state of your country. I think America is very likely to go down the toilet and end up like Italy or Greece, but I know I’m going to be okay, and that’s all I count on. If that seems unpatriotic, there is nothing I can do about it. I won’t apologize. I pray that we’ll have revival, and that God will give us Christian leaders, but I’m not going to piddle my life and my peace of mind away struggling to find nonexistent secular solutions for a nation that causes its own problems.

Adam Carolla is never going to get what he wants. L.A. will always be screwed up. There will always be bad traffic. The people will always be flakes. There will always be persecution of the successful. Illegal immigrants will be rewarded. Wealth will be wasted. Liberals will rule, and there will be no common sense in government. Carolla is wasting his bile. If he stays in L.A. and maintains his attitude, he will be just as miserable five years from now as he is today. There is only one way to get real peace.

I’m glad I’m no longer as angry as he is. I look forward to being even less angry.

Many Shubs and Zuuls Knew What it Was to be Roasted in the Depths of a Sloar That Day, I Can Tell You

I’m an Armorbearer at my church. We have a brother organization. It’s a bunch of guys who manage traffic and watch for criminals in our parking lot. Before you become an Armorbearer, you have to work with these guys.

Everyone used to call them “the parking lot guys.” Sounds like a bunch of bums who hang out at 7-11.

One day an idea came to me. I emailed my leader. I said we should call them “the Gatekeepers.” They stand in the gates and repel our enemies. Literally. What they do is very important. They solve more problems than we do, if the truth be told.

The idea caught on, and now they’re the Gatekeepers.

Today I was reading 2 Kings. Guess what I saw? Gatekeepers. In the story of the four lepers who spoiled the Syrian camp, the lepers went to the gatekeepers of Samaria to let the king know the Syrians were gone. The New King James version actually uses the word “gatekeepers,” and so does the NIV.

When the name idea came to me, I had no idea there were gatekeepers in the Bible. In fact, I have no idea where I heard the word. I can’t think of any other source.

I emailed my leader today, and he had me send the pertinent passage to the Armorbearer who oversees the Gatekeepers.

Strange story.

Wasn’t Sigourney Weaver the Gatekeeper of Zuul in Ghostbusters? Maybe that’s where I heard it.