I’m in Here Somewhere

I have to run a fairly joyful errand today. It’s time to give away these huge, baggy, size 32 cargo shorts and get some in 30.

Pick your jaws up off your keyboards. I don’t know what the real size of these pants is, but it’s not 32. It’s probably 34. Manufacturers mislabel clothes because they know fat people like wearing small sizes. Still, this is pretty great.

This weekend I had to go to the Gap and get a 32″ (nominally) belt. That felt nice.

I was worried about my weight because Mike came to town. We did all-you-can-eat ribs at Sonny’s. We tried Five Guys. You can imagine the carnage. But I’m okay. I may have picked up a pound or two, but the crisis is past, and the trend is still downward, as far as I know.

I should have realized: only fat people have to worry about occasional excesses. I’m not a fat person. To a fat person, a visit from Mike would be a pivotal event leading to disaster. To me, it’s a speed bump and a pleasant break. The miracle God gave me is not going away. I will not be brought down by a few days of good eating.

Listen to me and try to get this for yourself. Don’t let me sit here and blather about it, to no constructive end. Put it to use. Fast and pray. In particular, pray in the Spirit every day, for a good long time. Cast your little visitors out. I’m free. You should be able to get free, too.

Don’t assume it’s limited to food. Do you have allergies? Depression? Chronic illness? Unforgiveness you can’t shake? Anger? I would think that any problem originating in the flesh or the spirit realm would be vulnerable to attack. God gives us the fruit of the Spirit (strength of character) to beat the flesh, and he gives us faith (a fruit of the Spirit and also among the gifts of the Spirit) to beat demons.

My nighttime allergies have disappeared. Can’t figure that out. I didn’t do anything. The other day I awoke and realized I had been sleeping on my back. That’s new. Allergies and a fat neck make sleeping on your back difficult.

Perry Stone said something interesting. Demons like to try to come back after certain amounts of time. He mentioned six months as one such period. I can’t recall the others. They were shorter. I think one interval was two weeks.

This makes sense. Satan is called the Lord of the Flies. What do flies do when you shoo them away? They buzz around and then return. And Jesus informed us that demons like to go back into their hosts.

Some believe “Lord of the Flies” is a corruption, and that the original term meant something like “Lord of Poop.” I am not an expert on the devil’s names, but I saw a spirit stuck to the wall of my house, and more than anything else, it resembled a winged insect. More like a beetle or roach than a fly, but it had wings, and it flew.

And like demons, flies are attracted to rot and death. Some types bite and sting and suck our blood. So I think “Lord of the Flies” is probably correct.

I think it makes sense that as you grow in the Spirit and drop chronic sins, certain negative things will start to fall off without explanation. The other day it occurred to me that increased righteousness will make you “slippery” to Satan. Sin is like a handle he can use to control you, so the less you sin, the harder it is for him to get a grip. And the spiritual power that grows inside you probably drives a certain percentage of your tormentors off, even if you don’t address them intentionally. To a demon, it must be like living next door to a poorly shielded nuclear reactor.

I really look forward to driving all of my giant pants to Goodwill.

Book Recommendation

I want to recommend a book. It’s called A Warrior Culture, and the author is Donny Prater. It’s about the militant attitude Christians should be taking toward Satan’s kingdom. When I say “militant,” I am referring to supernatural warfare. I mean things like prayer and Bible study, not forming a militia to shoot up federal buildings. Let’s not put me on a no-fly list, okay?

Not that I ever go anywhere. To affect me, you would need a “no sit” list.

If I had to sum up the book quickly, I would say it’s about the need for Christian men to get off the couch, go to services, form groups, and stop forcing their wives and daughters and mothers and sisters to do all the work at their local churches. If heaven is anything like the church, there will be three women there for every man. Imagine how miserable it will be. The TV channels will all be about decorating and sewing. The food will be salad. There will be no gun ranges. You won’t be allowed to put your feet on anything. Come on. Are we going to stand for that?

How did the church get so feminine and fruity? Look at the Bible and tell me that makes sense. The Apostles carried swords–on orders from Jesus–and Peter whacked a guy’s ear off. David put a rock through a man’s skull, into his brain, and sliced his head off. Then he carried it home. All of this was God’s idea. Elijah had 450 defenseless idolaters held down and slaughtered like pigs. The temple in Jerusalem could be described accurately as a combination barbecue joint and slaughterhouse; the blood ran like water, all the time. Prophecy says it will run again, so let’s not make up a false vegan New Testament ethic that has no scriptural basis.

Christianity and Judaism were never intended to be built on feminine models. Authority has always been a masculine concept, and God is at his most masculine when he exercises his authority. This ought to be clear to any conservative. Leftism is a perversion which feminizes government, and look at the misery it causes. A leftist nation is like a family where the husband has abandoned his responsibilities and forced his wife to lead.

Evangelist John Gray put it well. He said, “I don’t HAVE a feminine side.” He said God removed man’s feminine side when he opened Adam up and used his flesh to create Eve. We have the ridiculous idea that sensitivity, compassion, and caring are feminine traits. That’s just not true. Women seem to be designed to nurture and comfort and support, and they do those things better than men do, but that doesn’t mean every type of love or unselfishness is feminine.

We have been taught that Jesus was an emaciated little guy who should have had “Push me in the Mud” tattooed on his forehead. A person who would have made a fine wedding planner or hairdresser. Mind you, we are talking about the guy who sent an angel to kill 185,000 Assyrians in one night. This is an all-powerful being who, according to prophecy, will personally massacre so many of his enemies that his robe will be drenched in their blood. That’s one tough florist.

As Donny Prater points out, Jesus was a carpenter, and he worked without power tools. Think about that. A typical table saw runs at 3600 RPM and has something like two hundred carbide teeth on the blade. My saw has a 5-horsepower motor. Imagine trying to do that saw’s work without electricity. Imagine cutting mortises and tenons by hand. Imagine shaping furniture legs and planing boards. Six days a week. We’re talking about a fit, muscular man who worked with razor-sharp tools. Jesus was not a wimp, and he does not expect us to be wimps.

We need to meet regularly and acknowledge God together. We need to admit we can’t do it all on our own. We need to summon our determination and grit and start doing supernatural warfare together. This is what I took away from the book.

When I read about the lukewarm men’s ministries Donny Prater had been part of, I realized how blessed I am. Every Saturday, I meet with a bunch of men. We have breakfast together, but that’s not the point of the gatherings. We open and close with prayer. Our leader presents scriptures and other materials (like A Warrior Culture) for us to discuss. We give our testimonies. We encourage each other. We do exactly what we should be doing.

The book has stories about men who get together, make small talk, stuff themselves, and leave. Prater talks about the difficulties he experienced, putting a real men’s ministry together. Thanks to God and the faithful leaders at my church, I’m not dealing with that.

I also belong to the Armorbearers. We support the pastor from behind the scenes, and we keep the church safe. Some of us carry arms. We just got our first female member, but the organization is primarily male. It’s fantastic.

Every church should have men who work together the way we do. And we’re not the only ones. We have lots of male volunteers in other areas, and there are other prayer groups. The women are way ahead of us, but I think my church is doing better than most.

We have to remember that Christianity is a war. Very literally. It’s the only real war there is, and it’s the oldest and largest war. There are beings we can’t see, attacking us day and night. And we are not independent. Each of us has others depending on him. We need to think about things like that when we’re tempted to slack or give in to sin. The dumb things we do hurt others. You can’t sin against yourself or against God without harming someone else.

Check the book out. You can find it on Amazon. It’s short; you can knock it off in a couple of days. It will help you remember what you were intended to be.

Tic Tac, Please

I’m dying, here. I just made more rolls, and this time I pretty much got it right. I had to eat SIX GARLIC ROLLS. I could not stop. This is the way I usually become aware that a recipe is out of the conception stage and ready for public consumption and fine tuning.

I’ll just tell you what I did. Why keep this from the world?

INGREDIENTS

1 cup high-gluten flour
1 teaspoon instant yeast
3/8 cup water (roughly)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar

I do not know why, but it seems like bread tastes better when you make the dough without yeast and then knead the yeast into it. If you have the patience to do that, go for it. Mix everything but the yeast, using whatever method turns you on, and then fold the yeast into it. It’s okay (preferable, in my opinion) if the yeast is distributed in the dough a little unevenly.

As for the water amount, you want dough that is wet enough to work but not too sticky to handle. You’ll figure it out.

You can go two ways from here. You can make a dough ball, oil it (cheap olive oil, not green) and let it rise, or you can roll the dough out, make it into rolls and then let it rise under a sheet of plastic. The second way is how I just did it. The first way may be a little better, since you get two rises and more yeast flavor.

Either way, you will eventually want to flatten the dough into a rectangle about 9″ by 14″. Cut it down the middle, the long way. Cut each half into three strips. Pick a strip up. Double it back on itself. Tie the resulting double strip in an overhand knot and put it on a seasoned pan. Repeat with the other strips.

Cover the pan and let the dough poof up until it looks ready to bake. Put the pan in a preheated 550° oven. Rolls this size will bake in about 5 minutes.

SAUCE

3 oz. (weight) peeled garlic cloves, pureed or pressed
3 oz. oil
salt and parsley to taste

You don’t have to cook the sauce. Mike taught me that. Just dump the hot rolls in a bowl, pour the sauce over them, and toss. Use lots of salt.

If you can use less yeast and let the dough rise for a day or two, it may be a lot better. I will never have the patience to find out.

I truly stink. I have probably eaten an ounce and a half of garlic today. I love it.

Make sure you let the rolls rise enough to prevent them from being heavy and hard. Do NOT put oil in the dough. It adversely affects the flavor of the rolls.

I am dizzy with pleasure. And I can quit making rolls now, since I have the puzzle beaten.

God helps me with this stuff. I am convinced of it.

No photos. I ate the rolls before I could get the camera out.

Stank

I am working on garlic rolls, in hopes that I will be able to produce a recipe that in some way compares to the one Mike uses. My church NEEDS garlic rolls.

I made a couple of batches today. The first batch came out great, but I was not satisfied. They tasted wonderful with the sauce, but without it, they were pretty ordinary. That’s no good. I don’t want mediocre rolls made great by sauce. I want great rolls and great sauce.

The second batch was about the same, except for two things. I cut the dough in thinner strips and doubled them before tying the knots. That makes the rolls more complicated, which is a good thing in rolls you pull apart. I also sprinkled them with kosher salt before baking.

The kosher salt was a really bad idea. It was too much.

Now I’m working on a third batch. This time, I made dough by hand and then kneaded dry instant yeast into it. This makes wonderful pizza crust, so it might be good for rolls. I also omitted the oil from the dough. In the first two batches, I used one tablespoon per cup of flour, and I thought the flavor was inferior to that of the pizza crusts I usually make with this dough.

I can make great garlic rolls already. But what’s the point in making great rolls when you can make rolls that make people faint? That’s a much better goal.

I smell incredible. I wonder how long that will last. I bet chicks will dig it. Yeah.

So Far

These are the rolls with kosher salt. I omitted parsley because I didn’t have any.

He Will Nail You if You Spill the Beans

I have this feeling. I can’t shake it. The feeling tells me that today, I have to WORK ON MY GARLIC ROLL RECIPE.

Can the feeling be right? I better go to the kitchen and see.

Sunday was not a good sales day at church. A young man showed up to be instructed in the black art of pizza-making, and it turned out that the teaching made the process so slow, we missed part of one rush. But I did make progress toward the day when I don’t have to be in the kitchen every single minute, and I helped a young person learn a vital and rare skill.

Jesus the crazy parking lot volunteer showed up and told the young man that if he revealed my secrets, he would be hunted down like a dog. So I guess he won’t be blabbing.

Down here about 25% of the men are named Jesus. This particular Jesus is a lot of fun. He’s not really crazy, but he can easily convince you otherwise. And he has a tattoo.

Go Away, or I Shall Taunt You a Second Time

God is freaking me out again.

I went to my weekly prayer meeting this morning. The other guys kept talking about scriptures and ideas that had been on my mind in recent weeks. They talked about things I have been thinking about over the last couple of days. Over and over, they seemed to read my mind.

I told them they had to knock it off. That was humor, however.

I keep thinking about the concept of strongholds, and more generally, about doing to Satan what he does to us. He has strongholds, so we should have strongholds. He uses plagues and blights and locusts to ruin our lives, so we should be his plagues and blights and locusts and ruin his life. He lures people into false religions through the promise of supernatural power, so we should fight him with God’s greater supernatural power.

For all his pride, he has never had a thought of his own. We can learn a lot by looking at the tools he stole. We can take them back and use them against him. Turn yourself into a stronghold, and fire into Satan’s kingdom from cover.

God is a creator. Satan is just an imitator. Hey, let’s put that on a shirt.

My newest Cafepress thing is a T-shirt with the world “STRONGHOLD” in the pocket area. That says it all, as far as I’m concerned.

Finish the Day on a Positive Note

Two things.

1. Peg Kaplan lost her pet budgie, Sunny, to an accident the other day. Sunny was perched on top of a door, and Peg closed it. You can imagine how she feels. If you would like to offer a prayer and comment on her blog, she could use the help.

2. Shepherd’s Gate, a California charity which shelters abused women and their kids, found a donor who will give them $5.00 for every Facebook user who becomes a fan of their page. Here is the page.

Fill Your Barn Until it Bursts

Have you ever had a day that started on a perfect foundation? It happens to me more and more often. If you get up in the morning, pray in the Spirit, take communion, pray with your understanding, and do a little Bible study, it will put a base of granite under the rest of your day.

I’m sorry to say I fail to do a good job when I get to bed late the night before. I hate the idea of abusing my body with sleep deprivation. Maybe I need to get used to the sacrifice.

This morning, I did fine. So now I feel like I’m ready for whatever comes, and I know that today’s events will work out to be a blessing.

I have some stuff that seems to be worth repeating here.

I haven’t studied scripture today, in the usual sense, but I still feel pretty good. Why? Because I’ve memorized a bunch of psalms. This morning I spent a long time going over them in my mind.

This is a tremendous blessing. It’s fine to learn a paraphrased verse or two (if you don’t screw it up or take it out of context), but there is no substitute for having the actual scripture handy. Approximations and snippets just don’t compare.

The Psalms are very powerful. They are not just idle words. The New Testament quotes them a lot; the authors knew God spoke these words directly through his servants. The Psalms contain many promises and explanations, and if you’ve memorized a psalm containing something you need, the Holy Ghost will remind you of it when the right time comes.

Let’s see. “He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.” “Blessed is he who considereth the poor . . . thou wilt not deliver him unto the will of his enemies.” “The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them.” “Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him. I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.” How many do you want? The supply is huge. I only know something like 20 psalms, and I never run out of material.

I actually had to correct two of those after I typed it, but I got the essence right.

Today I was thinking of my needs and picking out psalm verses to “remind” God of his promises. It seems pretty clear that he expects us to do this. It’s for our own good. He knows our needs, and he knows his promises, but he wants us to know his word and use it.

While I searched my mind for material that would help my prayers, I realized I felt as though I were walking in a garden, picking fruit from trees. Every psalm is like a tree, and every helpful verse is like a fruit you can feed on. Isn’t that strange?

For a long time, I’ve believed that we are supposed to live like Adam. He made his living by managing the earth and serving God. It wasn’t a struggle; the toil and frustration came after the curse. When Adam had a need, he didn’t fill it by his own might, which would have led to pride. He took it from a tree God had planted for him. His living was a birthright; an inheritance. It wasn’t something be built up by burning the midnight oil and straining his back.

Psalm 127 says, “It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows, for so he giveth his beloved sleep.” In The Complete Jewish Bible, it says he gives believers good things while they sleep. Life isn’t supposed to be perfect. We face persecutions. But where does it say we’re supposed to be slaves who live in penury and defeat?

Scripture, including the Psalms, is an inheritance. We receive it as welfare recipients receive their checks. We did nothing to deserve it. Like the trees of Eden, it was provided for us before we were born. If you don’t learn at least some of the Bible by heart, you’re throwing away a fortune. You didn’t have to plant the trees. The least you can do is harvest the fruit and store it.

Wow, I feel like an ingrate now. But I am an ingrate. It’s impossible to fully appreciate what has been done for us.

Isn’t that the usual curse, for an heir?

I had some other thoughts this morning, which, I believe, came from God. Here’s one: preachers often describe us as though we were battlefields, where we fight Satan and the flesh for control. I don’t think that’s quite right. I think we begin as battlefields and end as fortresses, or “strongholds.”

Think about it. Before you accept Jesus and get filled with the Spirit and clean up your life, you have no walls. Any spirit can enter and raise Cain. People can defeat you. Diseases can have their way with you. All sorts of misfortune came come your way, and you won’t have the weaponry to deal with it.

Afterward, there is a battle. There is a process during which you fast and pray and give and do good works and study, and the spirits start leaving, because you defeat them. Your habits and inclinations improve. Your thought life gets purified. You sin less. Your prayers get answered. Curses end. Blessings come. Your walls rise up to protect you. You begin as an open battlefield, but you finish as a protected, heavily armed enclosure. Maybe it isn’t completely clean, but instead of sewer rats breeding in your pantry and sleeping on your couch, you have timid ants hiding in crevices. Ants are better than rats.

When I thought of this, I thought of monks. Back in Europe, they used to build walls around their monasteries. What did they do once the walls were up? They grew things. They studied. They wrote. They created music. I’m not endorsing a monastic lifestyle. I’m just pointing out one characteristic of strongholds. They often contain gardens. In fact, Eden probably had walls. When man was exiled from Eden, God protected it with cherubs stationed at the east. If it had no walls, they would have been all around Eden. There must have been a gate at the eastern side, and “gate” implies “wall.”

The stronghold concept is fascinating. Temple, fortress, “walled city,” whatever you want to call it; a stronghold is a good thing to make of yourself. And if you pull it off (by God’s power), your children are likely to pull it off, too. Describing the children of a God-fearing man, Psalm 127 uses the term “arrows” and says, “They shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.” They will speak–presumably prayer and God’s word–to keep enemies out of their strongholds. A flashing sword guarded the path to the Tree of Life after the fall; the sword of the Spirit guards the path into our hearts. Makes sense, doesn’t it?

A funny thing has happened to me lately. Increasingly, when I find myself thinking thoughts I know I shouldn’t think, I see a door in my mind. A steel door. It’s just a plate, like the brown steel plates you see over holes in roadways. The wall around it is green, like the green of a pool table, only darker and with less blue in it. I see that door, and my thoughts change direction. That’s a good thing, because I know that when I open the wrong door to go out, while the door is open, someone else can come in. And that being won’t be a good guest.

If you like hearing the promises of the Bible, you might consider buying some of Wayne Cochran’s CDs. They’re really neat. He recites Biblical promises, over soothing music. He has divided them by category. Some are about protection. Some are about overcoming fear. You might have concerns about the “Word of Faith” flavor of this material, but my guess is that it can’t harm you if you take it the right way. Something to think about.

One of the reasons I loved The Book of Eli is that it encourages people to memorize scripture. I can’t explain that without spoiling the movie, but I can say that there are scenes that show how a knowledgeable believer can have his access to printed scripture taken away, without missing a beat. Some day Bibles will probably be outlawed. It has already been done in some places. They can take it out of your carry-on, but they can’t take it out of your heart.

Right now, Robert Morris is challenging people to spend 40 days memorizing and meditating on a scripture. Got a notice in the mail this week. Funny coincidence.

Set your feet upon a rock, and let God establish your goings. That’s my advice.

Oh, Wait. Was He a Great Big Fat Person?

I did a very bad thing today. I hit GFS on the way home from church.

I’ve been making pizza for our Tuesday night services, which are enormous, but they lock the cafe during the services, so instead of selling 20 pizzas, I’ve been selling 8. That seemed like a waste of time, and I need to free myself up so I can work as an armorbearer once in a while, and I recently learned they’re opening during the week for lunch. So I went in today and cooked.

I don’t think this was a great idea. I sold 5 pizzas. They scared me by talking about a lunch time rush, so I made 12 dough portions, but I ended up throwing 6 out.

At least I got on the road to go home early.

The kitchen was very low on olive oil, so I decided to visit Gordon Food Supply. I went to the one in Little Havana. For some reason, they have an exceptional selection of pizza products.

I bought Sinatra brand Italian tomatoes, on a gamble. I thought they might be like Cento Italian tomatoes. I don’t need them. In fact, they’re too expensive to use at church. But I got them anyway, because I JUST HAD TO.

I bought a can of Escalon 6-in-1 tomatoes. I tried them a long time ago and decided not to use them, but I couldn’t resist refreshing my memory.

I got a 25-pound bag of GFS Primo Gusto flour. It’s supposed to be sort of like All Trumps, which makes excellent Sicilian. I got bags so I can freeze the excess. I know this is crazy, but it beats paying a much higher per-pound rate for dubious grocery flour.

I picked up FOUR GALLONS of pomace oil for the church. Now I can relax for a while. And I bought my new secret sauce ingredient. Which is a secret.

I got a can of Saporito sauce. I use it at church, so I think it’s best to use it here when doing research. I also got some Primo Gusto 50/50 mozzarella/provolone. That was stupid, but it had been so long since the last time I tried it, I could not resist.

I had to make a pie with Sorrento cheese today, because we ran out of Costco cheese. I have to say, it’s very good. Nothing wrong with it. Just as good as Grande, as far as I can tell. But the flavor is as mild as Grande. If you like that, buy Sorrento. It’s the real thing. It’s just not Kirkland!

Now this stuff is sitting here, staring at me. I can’t make pies and stuff myself. All I can do is make test pies and eat tiny amounts, possibly even spitting the food out before I swallow it. My intellectual and artistic curiosity will be satisfied, but nothing else will be.

I can’t make thin pizza because I blew up my stone in an experiment worthy of Beavis and Butt-head. I need to get to Bed Bath and Beyond so I can buy a new one.

When I left GFS, I took a photo of the food I had bought, and I sent it to Mike. This is what male friends do. We make each other suffer. I had no choice.

I actually ate pizza for lunch. These days that rarely happens. I had a slice and a half. I feel like a glutton. The first slice was mainly for sustenance and partly to test the Sorrento cheese. The half-slice was just a test. My lovely beverage? The usual. Water.

Even though the pie had sat on top of the oven for a long time, it was sublime. I am sure God’s hand is in the recipe. Who else could make me love pepperoni?

I’m glad God has given me control over my diet. Thrilled and amazed, actually. But when I describe what I eat, it sounds pretty boring.

I’m thinking I’ll have wings for dinner. They’re fairly harmless from a caloric standpoint (if you go easy on the butter and dressing), and I could use something tasty and light with lots of meat in it.

Today at church, one of my friends ordered two slices and dipped them in a mixture of wing sauce and ranch dressing. I couldn’t believe it. It was a little gross. But brilliant.

Deep in your heart, I know you agree.

Here’s an unexpected reward that came from watching him eat: I saw how beautiful the underside of the pizza was. I don’t get to see much of that when I’m eating, since I hold the slice right-side-up. It was breathtaking.

Have to go Make Pizza

Reader blindshooter says:

I feel like a prayer bum asking again but please add my Dad to your prayers, he is getting a heart cath today.

Unleaded Starts my Day

I think I’m falling in love with decaffeinated coffee. I can get up and drink as much as I want while I start my morning routine, and nothing happens.

A while back, I started feeling I should give up caffeine abuse. I’m attention deficient, and I quit taking drugs about 14 years ago, and when I got to law school, caffeine helped me overcome the boredom and concentrate. It also helped in my practice. But lately it has been keeping me up nights, and I think it makes me crabby during the day.

For a while, I’ve felt like God has been cleaning me up. I had to quit smoking cigars because they kept me awake. Who ever heard of such a thing? But it happened. Now coffee is out. I am a man without vices. It is a strange sensation.

Drugs connect us with the spirit realm, somehow or other. Tobacco was a ritual herb smoked by pre-Columbian heathens. Peyote and psilocybin are used in worship. Hippies used to get high and say they had seen God.

I don’t think cigars and coffee are going to give me visions of demons, but there must be something about them that God doesn’t like, because I really had to quit. I had no choice. Something would not leave me alone, and I think it was God.

Maybe weak drugs are sharp tools Satan uses to open little holes in your temple. Search me.

I suppose this is undeniable: drugs that affect your mind are substitutes for things you should be getting from God. Maybe that’s the problem. God fixes people, better than caffeine ever could. Maybe caffeine was in the way.

I don’t have any reason to think other people should give up cigars or real coffee, but it seems to be true in my case.

Coffee is a comfort drink. If I can’t get up and have hot coffee when I first turn on the computer, my morning is damaged. Decaf solved that problem.

Coffee–even real coffee–is supposed to bring health benefits. So I suppose I’m still getting those.

I have been getting comments about the AR rifle. This has been bugging me lately. I don’t need any more rifles, and I don’t think an AR will change my life significantly, but I feel this nagging urge to get one.

I’ll tell you something weird. I think God is driving his people to arm themselves and prepare for hard times. Over and over, I see it. I’ve written about it before. I have a new friend who works for a religious charity, and she travels the country talking to Christian donors. She says lots of people–and this is not a tea party thing; they’re independently motivated–are getting guns and tools and rural land. She told me she met with two elderly sisters in northern Florida who inherited a ranch complete with a gun range. These women are retired missionaries! They can’t figure it out.

I do not believe God tells people to shoot at the FBI or the mailman or any other federal agent. I don’t think we’re going to have a last stand where we all go down fighting, while Janet Reno watches on cable news and claps her hands. I have no interest whatsoever in shooting people. In fact, I am not sure I’d shoot in self-defense, since a criminal is likely to need time to repent and turn to God, while I’m ready to go. I’d shoot to defend others; that’s a moral obligation. But I can’t swear I’d kill someone to protect myself. Still, I think God is somehow involved in the increasing interest Christians have in firearms.

If we are not intended to use these guns against others, I’m not sure what the purpose is. But I think that purpose exists. I suspect it, anyway.

Getting back to the AR, a commenter says a couple of interesting things.

1. I should get an AR15, because 5.56/.223 is sort of mandatory. I don’t really understand that, but there it is.

2. Good AR15s are “cheap” right now, so I should get a Rock River and then add a Grendel upper later.

I know almost nothing about the AR15. I know there are “uppers” and “lowers.” I think that means the lower is the part we think of as a gun, and the upper is the barrel and some other stuff. But I don’t know how interchangeable these things are, or whether combining parts from different companies is a good idea. And I don’t know what he means by “cheap.” Are prices about to shoot up? Have they been reduced recently? No clue here.

I don’t know why I need a 5.56. I’ve seen people call it a “poodle shooter.” For self-defense, I really like my Vz 58 in 7.62x39mm, which is fairly powerful yet easy to shoot. What are the advantages of the 5.56? Do they really exist, or is it one of those things, like a 1911 in .45 ACP or a .22 rifle, that you just have to have, no explanation needed?

I looked at my PSL last night, and sure enough, the hammer is in backwards. I think the same could be said of my brain. I’m going to reverse it and take the gun to the range, but I’ll need ammunition first. I’m not going to shoot the rest of my 7N1 until the Russians release more of it. I could sell the remaining rounds and buy a Corvette.

I don’t know where I can get cheap accurate ammunition for it now. There is lots of surplus out there, and Wolf is not too expensive, but I would really like something that will do 2 MOA out of an ideal gun. That way, I can work on my shooting without wondering if the ammunition is holding me back.

I guess I could drive over to Samco and see what they have.

The glass for the AR is a problem. The gun itself is not cheap, and I would want a scope which would work well at long ranges. Prairie dog range, in case I ever get off my butt and go varmint hunting. I assume such items are not cheap.

Maybe the urge will go away.

Shooting poodles…isn’t that a public service? Is there some way we could train them to pop out of prairie dog burrows? Just a thought.

More

To clarify, I would like an AR in a good long-distance caliber, so whatever I get, I want it to work with a varmint barrel and a good scope. But if I also get a 5.56 upper for shorter ranges, do I have to worry that the original lower will not be appropriate for long-range shooting?

On the Loose

I have free time! I have free time! Can you tell? Was it a clue when I blew up my pizza stone in a pointless backyard experiment?

Mike’s visit is over. I will not be making pizza at church today. I do not have to serve as an Armorbearer tonight. I do not have to get up super-early tomorrow or go to bed late tonight.

I have free time!

I think I’ll hit the garage and try to finish the butt attachment thing for my Saiga 12. Look out for flying swarf.

Tap In

Stilton Jarlsberg did a wonderful thing when he drew this strip: CLICK.

I guess he didn’t draw it, exactly, but still. He is obviously aware that increasingly, Israel is alone in this world, and Barack Obama is among her enemies. This will probably be my big political post for the week. I will try not to discuss President Obama’s pitching arm, in spite of the overwhelming temptation.

My traffic keeps dropping. I think the people who used to come here for snotty political humor got bored. I’m glad I got out of that mess, however. I used to find it frustrating when I wrote well and didn’t get picked up by other blogs, but now I think God’s hand was in it. I was walking into a trap.

The political side of the Internet is turning into a real snakepit. I can’t believe the stuff that goes on at the Breitbart sites. Bloggers used to call each other mean names. Now bloggers are getting arrested, and operatives are throwing eggs (on camera) at buses belonging to people they disagree with. It’s like the SEIU is running things.

Where would I be, if I had really caught on? I’d be writing silly, vitriolic, embarrassing things that contributed to the contentiousness in the world without benefiting anyone. I’d be hanging around with adults who make a living behaving like children. That kind of thing doesn’t do a lot for your self-respect, in the long run. And some of these people are on TV now! You can live writing down, but it’s hard to put video behind you.

Contentiousness is a work of the flesh, according to the Bible. It grieves the Holy Spirit. That’s bad. You want to avoid that. Putting God far from you is one of the most damaging things you can do to yourself.

The other day I read a chapter of my cookbook, and part of me was glad it didn’t sell better. I thought it was fairly tame stuff when I wrote it, but it looks worse in retrospect. I can’t imagine Job or Daniel writing material like that.

I hate to say this, but conservative and liberal bloggers are starting to look alike to me. Conservatives are not as vicious, and they’re right about most things, but the difference is not big enough to make them look mature in comparison to their liberal counterparts. Being right matters, but the way you go about being right is just as important.

“Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest thou also be like unto him.” I probably should have studied that a little harder before I started blogging.

You can overcome your past, no matter how stupidly you acted, given enough time and a sufficiently sharp change of course. That should be a comfort to anyone who reads it. In fact, I would call it the central message of Christianity. One reason God does not care about your past is that the baptism with the Holy Spirit will eventually turn you into a different person, and it will no longer make sense for you to bear the full responsibility for what you’ve done. It would be like spanking a ten-year-old for soiling his diapers when he was six months old or refusing to eat his peas when he was two.

A person who has not been transformed by the Holy Spirit is like an unfertilized egg. Raw material. Jeremiah’s piece of marred pottery. Given what you can become in the future, through God’s power, it doesn’t matter all that much where you started. The reason for the crucifixion was that it was necessary to preserve God’s raw materials so he could craft them into finished goods.

There are some earthly debts that are extremely hard to void. If you’re on death row, even if you undergo a total transformation, you shouldn’t expect to be released. Unpaid taxes and student loans will follow you until you die. If you commit a sex crime, you might as well be branded on your forehead. But a surprising amount of mercy is available, if you have faith. And even if you can’t outrun your past, life as a Christian is still the best possible option. It’s the only option that really works.

I saw an interesting message on Manna-Fest (Perry Stone’s show) the other day. He was preaching about the miraculous irrigation they’re doing in the southern part of Israel. The Dead Sea has changed. Hidden sources of fresh water have been found. Farms are popping up in unlikely places.

He mentioned Isaiah 35:

1 The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.

2 It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.

3 Strengthen ye the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees.

4 Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompence; he will come and save you.

5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.

6 Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert.

7 And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water: in the habitation of dragons, where each lay, shall be grass with reeds and rushes.

8 And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein.

9 No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall not be found there; but the redeemed shall walk there:

10 And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

Perry Stone was talking about the physical changes taking place in Israel, but I believe this passage also refers to the baptism with the Holy Spirit.

Over and over, the Bible refers to the Holy Spirit as “water” or “living water.” Jesus used this metaphor with the lady at the well. Many prophetic passages about water describe the Holy Spirit baptism. When you pray in the Spirit, the stream of speech that pours out of you flows like water; this is an illustration of what the metaphor means.

What is a person who is far from God and lacks the Holy Spirit? A desert. A land that is not fertile. He may do what he thinks is good, but without God to guide him, his works may be vain, and his harvest may be an illusion. He is also blind, because the Spirit opens our eyes and helps us understand things, including the Bible. He is lame, as far as God’s works are concerned. He lacks the Spirit-provided power to serve God ably. He is dumb; he can’t say what the Spirit would have him say. Instead, he is likely to use his own puny and unreliable mind, which leads to terrible mistakes.

As for the highway, it refers to the Spirit’s guidance. As Psalm 37 says, “The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his way.” The Holy Spirit guides believers. He will literally tell you where to go, which way to turn, and what to do. Maybe you’ll hear a voice, or maybe it will be something subtler, like an urge or a desire, but it will happen.

As Robert Morris has pointed out, we wash in the Spirit, not just the blood. So it makes sense that Isaiah would say the unclean could not travel the highway. They lack the Spirit’s indwelling; they are not washed by living water.

Isaiah says that even fools who travel the highway will not err. I believe that means that even humble believers who are not well educated or highly intelligent will still behave wisely when the Spirit guides them. I’ve seen this to be true. A genius who is new to Christianity can learn a tremendous amount from a ditchdigger who is farther along. It’s amazing how many wise things come out of the mouths of simple Christians. You don’t have to be smart to be a powerful or knowledgeable Christian. It’s incredible; no other religion has a similar power.

It’s a great gift. It will make it possible for you to rise above your limitations as you make your way in life and raise your kids.

Man’s unaided thinking gets us in a lot of trouble. It brought us great ideas like conversion by the sword, celibacy, indulgences, the pantheon of saints, gay clergy, and anti-Semitism. It brings us modern Biblical “scholarship,” which is full of error and denies the power of God. It brought us replacement theology and divestment from Israel. It even gave many of us the crazy notion that leftism was somehow acceptable and even favored by God.

I hope I get to go to Israel again soon. I would really like to see what God is up to over there.

Rest, at Last

I can’t believe I went two days without blogging.

A Mike visit is always a whirlwind of food, guns, and church. You end every day exhausted. We went to the gun range. We tried Five Guys. We hit Sonny’s barbecue. We ate at Krystal. On Saturday, we went to my 8:00 a.m. prayer meeting, and it turned out the head Servant Leader from our church was qualifying some Armorbearers on the pistol range, and I was invited to that. Then we went to a classic car rally. Then I attended church on Saturday night. Yesterday, we got to church at 8:30, and we made pizzas until 3 p.m.

Now I can’t move. Mike just left for Delray.

I’m thrilled that I got Mike to go to the prayer group, because most of the benefit of belonging to a church comes from things you do with other church members, and I wanted him to see what I was getting from time with my friends. I’m not knocking sermons, but pastors can’t be with you 24 hours a day, and you can’t expect to prosper on forty minutes of teaching per week, with nothing more.

Easter services at church were insane. They did one on Good Friday, the regular Saturday service, the three regular Sunday services, and an extra Sunday service. The place was so full, they put chairs in the cafe. Yesterday we recorded 922 salvations. Not bad.

Mike volunteered to make garlic rolls, so I turned him loose with the old Kitchenaid mixer, and I made pizza. By the end of the day, we had sold 22 dozen rolls and 19 pies. We ran out of dough. I’m almost glad they closed the cafe before the last service.

The rolls were unbelievable. You can’t get rolls that good anywhere in Miami. I don’t know why. It’s not brain surgery. But people raved about them.

Not only did he make the dough and sauce from scratch; he tied each roll in a knot before baking it. Very fancy.

We set the roll price too low, at $1.00 for four big rolls. A local chain called Mario the Baker is known for rolls, and they get $4.00 for half a dozen. And Mike’s rolls are bigger and much better. We should have charged fifty cents a roll. As it is, we netted somewhere around sixty bucks. Should have been over a hundred.

Five Guys is very good. The food is a little better than Wendy’s. The fries are much better, because Wendy’s makes really bad fries.The big problem with Five Guys fries is that there is almost no oil on them, and they get no flavor from the fat. The portions are too big, too. Their regular fry order comes in a large drinking cup.

The preparation was very slow, and they had the radio on so loud we couldn’t talk, and they had no drive-through. Other than that, very nice.

I didn’t see any shakes on the menu.

When I went to the range with the Armorbearers, I only fired 50 rounds. The range allows rapid fire, so I practiced three-shot drills. I did very well. I have no doubts about my ability to deal with any assailant within 25 feet, and I would be very surprised if I couldn’t do well at 75 feet. Better than a crackhead who shows up without training, anyway. That’s the kind of person we worry about.

Some of the newer guys need to learn shooting fundamentals. I offered to go out with them and get them up to speed. I don’t think they need to be doing rapid-fire practice before they can shoot well slowly.

I read the book of Amos on Friday. It was very disturbing. In this book, God is angry with just about everyone. He pronounces judgment on Israel’s neighbors, and then he lays into Samaria and Israel, complaining of idolatry, backsliding, and corrupt departures from social justice.

Here is some stuff from chapter 4, directed to Samaria:

Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say to their masters, Bring, and let us drink.

The Lord God hath sworn by his holiness, that, lo, the days shall come upon you, that he will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fishhooks.

And ye shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her; and ye shall cast them into the palace, saith the Lord.

Come to Bethel, and transgress; at Gilgal multiply transgression; and bring your sacrifices every morning, and your tithes after three years:

And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and publish the free offerings: for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel, saith the Lord God.

And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered.

So two or three cities wandered unto one city, to drink water; but they were not satisfied: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

I have smitten you with blasting and mildew: when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, the palmerworm devoured them: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner of Egypt: your young men have I slain with the sword, and have taken away your horses; and I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord.

That made an impression on me. It reminded me of what we have gone through since 2001.

Fishhooks symbolize weapons that lure us in. When God chastises us, sometimes he creates situations that are so inviting or even compelling, we can’t resist. Then we feel the pain. A housing bubble is a great example. When you see your neighbors making five or six figures flipping houses, or you see them taking equity loans based on inflated values, it’s tempting to jump onboard. Then when the air leaves the bubble, you have the debt but not the assets to cover it. A lot of Americans did this over the last few years.

“Cleanness of teeth” refers to hard times, as does “want of bread.” We’ve seen a lot of that since 2007.

The reason this passage bothers me is that we have not learned anything. We have a socialist President, trying to finance our present by bleeding our future, and when you turn on shows about finance and investing, you’ll see that many “experts” think he’s succeeding. Mind you, these are the people who didn’t see the tech crash or the housing crash coming.

We don’t hear many people telling us to repent, or that our sins are connected to our problems. As far as I can tell, we haven’t changed. In fact, we are offending God more, in all likelihood. Socialism is inherently anti-Christian; it attempts to replace voluntary giving with taxes, and it tells us man, not God, can lead us into an age of prosperity. Our treatment of Israel now borders on persecution. And our morals haven’t improved at all. I have to ask: are we better than Samaria? Does God love us more than he did the ancient Jews? Should we expect to avoid judgment?

Tradition says Amos was murdered by King Uzziah, presumably because Amos refused to prophesy pretty lies about his people’s future. No surprise there. Today, we still heap scorn on any clergyman who has the guts to connect sin and misfortune.

This morning I read the book of Hosea. The idea came to me while I was praying, and I decided to go with it.

Hosea married a prostitute named Gomer. God ordered him to do this. Some believe Gomer was not a full-blown prostitute. They think she was merely an immoral woman whose flaws did not become known to Hosea until after he married her.

Needless to say, Gomer was not a faithful wife. Her purpose was to symbolize God’s people, who were also unfaithful. God gave them wealth and peace, and they backslid and turned to idolatry.

After Gomer ran off, Hosea redeemed her from her new man for thirty shekels, which was the standard price of a slave. Half the payment took the form of grain. I have to wonder if shekels are the same as the pieces of silver that constituted the price of Jesus. If so, there would appear to be prophetic significance to the figure’s appearance in Hosea’s story.

Gomer was a “bigger, better deal” girl. She gave her attention not to her husband, but to those who gave her money and things. She forgot her husband as we tend to forget God when we do well financially.

A lot of the book is devoted to God’s method of dealing with unfaithful backsliders. Hosea had two children, Loruhamah (“no mercy”) and Loammi (“not my people”). Through Hosea, God told them:

Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her whoredoms out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts;

Lest I strip her naked, and set her as in the day that she was born, and make her as a wilderness, and set her like a dry land, and slay her with thirst.

And I will not have mercy upon her children; for they be the children of whoredoms.

For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my drink.

Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.

And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now.

Shortly thereafter, he says:

Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.

And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope: and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt.

The message seems to be that God will afflict believers in order to get them to turn back to him so he can bless them. That’s encouraging.

Some of the language following this part suggests that a day will come when God will remove the Adamic curse and give us peace and plenty. It may be that this refers to the Messianic Age. It clearly follows repentance.

I don’t think America’s problems are ending. I think Barack Obama has managed to delay them and increase them. Denial is like a loan; you always have to pay interest. I believe we should be trying to clean ourselves up. Instead, we’re behaving exactly the way we did before the towers fell.

Maybe we’re getting a little time to pull it together, so the people who have chosen to return to God can get themselves prepared for the problems that lie ahead.

Amos 5:13 appears to describe the time of chastisement as “an evil time.” Psalm 37 says, “The Lord knoweth the days of the upright, and their inheritance shall be forever. They shall not be ashamed in the evil time, and in the days of famine, they shall be satisfied.”

Incidentally, The Jerusalem Post is offering a subscription deal for Americans. You get their Christian edition, their international edition, and something called the Jerusalem Report. I believe it’s $49 for a year. I had a hard time understanding the guy on the phone. I decided to sign up. If you’re interested, email me and I’ll give you his email address.

Psst…

Today I feel like I should read the book of Amos. Wonder if it means anything.