You Can’t Help Others Without Helping Yourself

Got several things to talk about today.

First of all, let me apologize to all the people who have patiently tried to make me part of their Facebook and Myspace experiences. I just can’t seem to get into social networking. I don’t get it. Maybe there is something wrong with me. I will log in today and try to catch up.

Second, someone emailed and asked about good gun shops in the Miami area. I can’t recommend any of the local places all that highly. I’ve bought guns at Garcia’s National Gun, and they’ve given me good prices and competent service, and I have nothing critical to say about them, but I wouldn’t say the experiences were inspiring. Bass Pro Shops has a store in Miami, and the gun area is pathetic, probably due to the yankees who still exert a disproportionate influence here. Their Hollywood store, however, is much better. I think I’d consider going there, if I needed advice or smithing as well as a good price.

Third, happy Fourth of July! Enjoy your burgers and don’t even mention Cinco de Mayo.

Fourth, I saw an interesting guy on Fox News today. He’s some kind of shrink. He was talking about the heartbreaking Brooke Bennett story. This young girl was apparently lured into the hands of murdering perverts by another girl who is only fourteen. And that girl had stated that she wanted to see Brooke suffer.

Megyn Kelly asked the shrink how a girl that young could have that attitude, and the shrink said that people from abusive environments learn to shut off their feelings in order to avoid feeling pain. Then later on, the same trick prevents them from empathizing with the pain of others.

I had never heard it put that way before. I had heard the phrase “cycle of abuse,” but it always seemed like a platitude. Now I see how it could make sense.

I had a miserable childhood, and I learned to put off feeling things that upset me. I’ve written about this before. After I became an adult, I realized I was not responding properly when I was presented with the suffering of others. For example, I remember watching footage of Nazi concentration camps. I disapproved of what I saw, but I didn’t think of each person–each body in the mass graves–as a human being with a name and relatives and a history and so on. I thought maybe television and movies had desensitized me. That was probably true, but I now wonder if the defense mechanisms I used as a kid were also to blame.

When I realized I wasn’t feeling the distress a healthy person should feel, I started making a point of trying to think more deeply about other people’s suffering. Today, for example, if I’m watching the History Channel and I see that old concentration camp footage, I look at the faces and I wonder about the lives of these dead individuals. I wonder if they were married. Whether they had kids. What their achievements had been. And what I feel is much more appropriate. The other day I saw a show about the B-29, and they showed footage of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs going off. I thought about the people burning under those clouds, and the fact that the gas was partly composed of human beings.

It’s a better way to live. Not as comfortable, maybe, but more likely to lead to constructive thoughts and actions. I find it helpful as I try to improve myself. For example, many times in my writing, I’ve said things that were unbelievably stupid and seemingly cruel, and I’ve been trying to pick up on these things as they appear, instead of being bitten in the ass by them later.

I was thinking about this today, and I realized that I knew of a way other people could protect themselves from becoming jaded and insensitive. Charity. I think this is one reason God demands that Jews and Christians give money to charity and take care of the needy. It’s not just to help others. It helps the giver as well. When you decide to give, and you start looking around for a good opportunity, you will find yourself presented with a burdensome smorgasbord of human misery. Babies with worms. Jews trapped in Muslim countries. Girls forced into prostitution. The list is virtually endless. And when you try to decide where to send your aid on a given day, you can’t help but feel empathy for the people you try to help.

If you, too, feel as though you’ve become calcified from movies and television and Internet rage, and maybe from the bad things that have been done to you during your life, consider charity as a way to heal yourself. You might try the links on the left side of my blog. World Vision and the IFCJ are especially good; they will present you with specific opportunities that may touch you in special ways. You might buy a family a few chickens or help a Jew leave a squalid camp in Ethiopia.

The Internet is making all of us less sensitive and civil. Maybe charity can help you fight back.

Final note: Russ Emerson put up a review of my book, Eat What You Want and Die Like a Man – The World’s Unhealthiest Cookbook. Thanks, Russ. Your loyalty means a lot to me. Hope the physical therapy is going well.

You Think You Have Enemies?

I continue to work on the New Testament today, in The Complete Jewish Bible, with accompanying commentary. I just got up to the stoning of Stephen. I don’t like calling him “Saint Stephen,” because I think the whole “saint” thing is a bad mistake. Anyway, my father (who claims to be a Druid) says I was named after various Stephens in his family. My mother told me the Bible’s Stephen was the inspiration. I suppose it’s flattering to be named after a martyr, but the choice doesn’t scream “good luck.”

I almost wish they had gone with “v” instead of “ph.” As I have noted before, one constant reminder that people are becoming more and more ignorant is that increasingly, people pronounce my name “Stephan” and even argue with me about it. It’s terrible, seeing what liberals have done to education. How can you make it to the age of ten without noticing all the famous Stephens? And what does this say about people’s knowledge of the Bible? I guess I’ll worry even more when people lose the ability to pronounce “Moses” and “Jesus.” If you’re young, you may think Americans have always been stupid, but that’s not true. I remember a time when a lot of us were not total ignoramuses.

I learned interesting stuff about stoning. Somewhere the Talmud describes it. The defendant was taken to a place from which the fall was twice the height of a man, and then he was shoved off. If he landed face-down, they turned him over. Then the first witness dropped a big rock on his chest. After that, the stoning was carried out by others present, I think. So it wasn’t a Life of Brian affair, where women in false beards threw pebbles.

I had always assumed that one virtue of stoning was that no single individual bore the responsibility. But if a witness has to be the first to harm the defendant, that’s not true. It makes a lot of sense to force a witness to drop the first rock. It would tend to discourage lying cowards who are willing to accuse but prefer that dupes do the dirty work. In other words, it might make the bearing of false witness less likely.

A peculiar thing about stoning is that the Jews have been reluctant to do it. For example, I have been told they didn’t obey the order to stone homosexuals. One of the commandments says your eye is not to pity those who are to be stoned; you’re supposed to do what the written law says. I don’t know how they came to the conclusion that it wasn’t necessary to go through with stonings. I haven’t read the Talmud. I know they didn’t make the decision lightly. Jewish law, like civil law, should never be taken at face value.

The Muslims, of course, see it differently. Stonings, beheadings, mutilation without anaesthetic…Muslims are very sincere and fastidious about observing their obligation to do these things.

I also learned that a man named Daniel Zion saved most of Bulgaria’s Jews from Hitler. He was a Messianic Jew, too. He was a religious scholar and a rabbi before he decided Jesus was the Messiah. In fact he was the chief rabbi of Bulgaria, and he retained that position even after confessing his faith to another rabbi. He never considered himself “Christian,” however. I guess he’s a thorn in the side of those who say no Jew with a religious education can go Messianic. Anyway, he helped about 45,000 people escape the camps, so he must have been quite a man. I found a page about him. I can’t vouch for it, but I have no reason to think it’s not factually correct.

He ran a synagogue in Israel after the war, but his status was not recognized by Israel’s rabbinical court, which took away his credentials.

Interesting man. Flogged by the Nazis for his Jewishess. Stripped of the title “rabbi” by a Jewish court, for his belief in Jesus. They gave it to him coming and going.

Good Monday Topics

First item today: TC sent me a link to a story about Christianity in China. The Chinese have repressed Christianity, going so far as to commit widespread atrocities. But it looks like it hasn’t worked. It never does. About five percent of the Chinese people are Christians. That’s a lot, in a nation five times the size of the US. And their numbers are growing.

More exciting: the Chinese churches teach the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s extremely important. A lot of the older churches behave almost as though the Holy Spirit were an embarrassment, and that is what has torn the heart out of them and made them so disappointing to believers.

On a personal note, I was struck by the realization that once again, God was answering my own prayers, on a giant scale. The evangelization of places like China is something I include on my prayer list regularly. Looking at this story, it occurred to me that God must be guiding millions upon millions of Christians to pray for the same things, because over and over, I see my global-scale prayers answered. I don’t think God looks down and says, “Steve wants to save China, so I better do it.” I think He must be guiding huge numbers of people to pray for big-ticket items, like change in China, and answers to our energy problems, and victory over militant Islam.

Why mention it? Because it might encourage people to pray for things they think are too big for God to grant. Don’t assume you’re the only one on the job.

I’ve been very pessimistic about China. On the whole, China is our enemy. And if China ever has enough wealth and power to cause us real problems, we’ll be in big trouble. It represents a fourth of the world’s population. You don’t want an enemy that big, with a sound economy propelling it. The rise of Christianity in China is very encouraging, because it could lead to better relations and a profitable alliance. At the very least, it will weaken China’s efforts to harm us.

On the gun front, I got a comment from someone putting down the M1 carbine. As if to confirm what I said this weekend about the dangers of criticizing other people’s guns, people are firing back! They’re seriously annoyed! The commenter compared the M1 to a .22 rifle and essentially described it as worthless.

I’m not stupid; I know the M1 carbine isn’t a battle rifle. But it looks like it would be tremendous fun to shoot. It has a cartridge big enough to be considered a real rifle round, making it more fun than a .22, and it should be much more pleasant to shoot than a K31 or M1 Garand or Moisin Nagant or Mauser.

I don’t know, but my guess is, it would be an easy and fairly inexpensive reload. And each gun has history. Some have been through World War Two AND Arab-Israeli conflicts, on the proper side.

If I get one, I want a Rock-Ola, an IBM, or maybe a National Postal Meter. Simply because those are funny names to put on a gun.

Yesterday, I mentioned the fact that joining the Garand Collectors’ Association would enable me to buy Civilian Marksmanship Program surplus rifles. In a comment, a reader says he thinks a carry permit will get me in the door, with no club affiliation. If I read the CMP’s site correctly, this is not true. To buy their guns, you have to prove you’re actively involved in marksmanship, and they’ll accept a carry permit as evidence. But you still have to join an affiliated organization. Correct me if I’m wrong.

I’m still debating the purchase of a Golani, which is a Century Arms parts-bin copy of the Israeli Galil. As I understand it, this is basically an AK with some real improvements. The big knocks are a. parts gun, and b. heavy. I like the idea of buying Israeli products, even if they’re assembled somewhere else. I like the idea of a military-style rifle with cheaper, lighter ammunition than the stuff I’m used to. And I think the gun will appreciate, simply because they’re not available often. But it’s not a real Galil.

Last note on guns: pray that the Supreme Court will get it right and expand our Second Amendment rights to the greatest extent possible, without alarming Congress to the point where they can get a majority and amend the Constitution. I have to tell you, there is nothing like the sensation of walking around in stores and malls with a loaded gun. This is the power the framers wanted us to feel. Let’s not let effete wimps and hippies on our coasts take it away from us. I hope everyone at the BATF and the Brady Center has indigestion for the coming month.

Speaking of the BATF, I’m holding my breath until I get the go-ahead to cruffle. Once that happens, look out.

Once again, I apologize for falling behind on email. I’ll try to fix it up today. I have been distracted by BS, but things have cleared up.

Bother me Tomorrow

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA it’s the Sabbath. Every time I call Sunday the Sabbath, I cringe, expecting wise guys to post pointless corrections in the comments. Still, for me, it’s the Sabbath. And I reiterate: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Why “HAHAHAHAHAHAHA”?

Every week, since I started setting Sundays aside for God, I have had some sort of revelation about the nature of the Sabbath, or the rewards or consequences of keeping it. And this week, payoff is a renewed understanding that the Sabbath is a sanctuary. On the Sabbath, you escape your problems. The busted pool pump, the sidewalk that needs to be repaired, the emails that should be answered…they will all have to wait. I refuse to even think about it. And I count on God to prevent me from suffering because of my sanctioned procrastination. Somehow, He will work it out. The Sabbath is His idea, not mine. I’ll worry about His concerns today, and He can do the same for me.

For the last two weekends, I’ve been unable to do a full-blown Sunday observance. First there was Father’s Day. Someone explain why we let the retail industry force Sunday holidays on us, knowing it will interfere with worship and rest. After that, there were horrendous plumbing problems that could not be ignored. This weekend, things are back to normal. I’m safe again. I can take the day off! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

In addition to plodding through the New Testament in The Complete Jewish Bible, with commentary, I’ve been reading the books of Samuel and Judges. Unfortunately, there is no companion commentary. And it’s pretty confusing. Generally when you read the Bible, it makes sense. You can see the point of each story. That seems less true in these books. The people seem much more worldly and corrupt and aimless than the folks in much of the rest of the Bible.

Some parts, like the history of Saul and David and Solomon, are not hard to understand. But other parts seem to have an almost random nature. The Jews and Fundamentalists tell us that isn’t true, however. Every letter in the original Hebrew is supposed to have a meaning and a purpose. I take it on faith that they’re right, and I read it and assume there will be some benefit eventually.

I can report one benefit. I got to talk to my Dad about it. He’s extremely hostile to Christianity, and to religion in general. But he and I ended up having a conversation about these books during this period, and he was surprisingly willing to listen. That was great. You never know when you’re going to plant a seed.

I think any reasonable person who sat and listened to an explanation of the Pentateuch and the New Testament and maybe the Psalms would eventually have to agree that all these books are connected, and that when read in pari materia, they are convincing proof of the existence of God. But you can’t bind and gag people and make them listen. When it comes to religion, listening is not nearly as popular as talking. I try to think about that when other people talk and expect me to listen, but I often fail to live up to my own ideals.

Here’s a pleasant piece of news. The weather has brightened up. I spend time reading the Bible on Sunday, obviously, and I very much prefer to do it outdoors. There is something about outdoor air that indoor air ordinarily can’t match. The weather has been terrible all week, and I figured today I would be stuck on the couch. But it’s sunny and not all that terribly humid for Miami. Maybe I’ll manage to spend a few hours outside.

“Tough”

Condi Rice is upset because Israel is building new housing in the eastern section of Jerusalem, THE ANCIENT CAPITAL OF THE JEWISH NATION.

What nerve they have. After all, isn’t the land sacred to Muslims, too? I mean, a Koran verse refers to an imaginary mosque–a mosque in a dream–which kind of, sort of, in some feeble way, could be said to resemble the Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, which DID NOT EXIST UNTIL LONG AFTER MOHAMMED DIED.

Never mind David and Solomon and the other JEWISH kings of Israel and Judah who ruled in Jerusalem for centuries.

The Dome of the Rock was established on the site of a Christian church, which itself was built on the Temple Mount. The Muslims put a mosque there for the purpose of humiliating Jews and Christians, much as they sealed Jerusalem’s Golden Gate and placed a cemetery just outside it. They sealed the gate to prevent the Messiah from fulfilling prophecy by entering through it, and the cemetery was intended to prevent the Messiah and Elijah (who must precede Him) from approaching the gate. The theory is that the Messiah and Elijah are both cohens and can’t legally enter a cemetery. Oh, yeah. That will work.

The Road Map to Peace is a Road Map to Appeasement. It’s a remarkable invention: a map which helps people get more lost. It’s worthless and offensive. Condi is smart, and I’m sure she has good intentions, but even the Secretary of State has to defer to God.

I can’t wait for the day when the Jew-hating con artists are back on their own soil, and their poisonous arguments are no longer taken seriously by anyone. And I truly look forward to seeing that mosque demolished and scraped off the Temple Mount.

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I respectfully request that people quit putting the term “raghead” in comments.

Here’s Another One for History’s Dung Heap

Here is an appropriate Sabbath topic: Iran’s delightful president has repeatedly stated his intention to destroy Israel, and the MSM does a very poor job of covering it. Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein of the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews has put up a page of Mr. Ahmadinejad’s threats, and if you haven’t read them, I suggest you take a look.

The Book of Enoch says people from Iran will be annihilated one day, as they approach Jerusalem. It’s not clear how much, if any, of this work should be considered scripture, but you don’t have to be a prophet to predict that Israel and Iran are going to have a confrontation.

When do You Give Up?

Let’s have your opinions on a religious issue.

Imagine you know someone whose behavior is truly vile. Let’s say this is someone who has had ample–even exceptional–opportunity to turn to God. And you keep this person in your prayers for years. And it doesn’t seem to help, probably because free will is a barrier even God will not breach.

The Apostle Paul referred to abandoning unrepentant people to Satan for the destruction of the flesh. It sounds like he meant he gave up praying for them, in order that they might suffer and be motivated to change. Does that make sense? Do you ever give up praying? Maybe it’s okay to stop, because prayer takes time, and you can overload yourself, and time from which one person will not profit can be given to another person who will change. It just seems a little odd, refraining from praying for someone, in order to help them. And helping was part of Paul’s motivation.

As a Christian, you want to see miserable, hate-filled people change. And Jesus encouraged people to be persistent in prayer. But eventually, you want to move on!

It seems to me that the danger of giving up on a hateful and unpleasant person is that you may be depriving that person of the help of the only human being who cares at all. People like that live in loneliness, darkness, complete cynicism, bitterness, spite, and envy. Other people can’t stand them and feel contempt for them. They remove them from their lives. Seems to me that a person like that is better off being the subject of prayers uttered purely out of obligation than no prayers at all.

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I guess I should have read up before asking. It looks like Paul was referring to driving people out of churches. One example was a Christian who had a sexual relationship with his father’s wife. This person presumably had to be cut loose for the good of the church, where he had somehow managed to find approval and encouragement. And I think Paul was talking about an official act, performed by the assembled church.

Maybe an individual should never completely give up, although I can certainly understand expelling God-hating, continually offensive people from your life.

Starts Tonight

Here is more proof that I need to find a church. Tonight will be Shavuot, AKA Pentecost, and I didn’t even know it. I forgot all about it. Fortunately, Aaron reminded me.

Catholics believe Pentecost was on May 11. But the correct dates for Jewish holidays are determined by the Jewish calendar, and the Jews say Shavuot starts tonight. It’s the Festival of the First Fruits. In Israel, Jews bring out newly born sheep and calves and also items of produce. Christians believe “first fruits” refers to the mass baptism of the Holy Spirit, which descended on the assembled disciples on this day. If memory serves, the disciples themselves were considered the first fruits of Jesus’s harvest. Which makes sense, since He referred to Himself as a seed that went into the ground in order to produce much grain (John 12:24).

This is arguably a more important day than Easter. Easter brought salvation to the Gentiles, but if I understand scripture correctly, Gentiles ignorant of God’s existence were in no danger of condemnation. Pentecost, however, made it possible for every human being to receive the power of the Holy Spirit, on demand. Something that used to be reserved for people like Jeremiah and Daniel became available to all of us. On this day, God made the existence of a race of prophets possible.

And of course, we’ve forgotten all about it, focusing instead on salvation. Jesus clearly wanted every person to experience the baptism of the Holy Spirit. He told Nicodemus we had to be reborn of water and the spirit, if we wanted to enter the Kingdom of God. In other words, if we wanted to live in, and exert, God’s power here on earth. This is the most hateful thing you can mention to people still ruled by the prince of this world, and it’s the thing misguided church leaders have worked the hardest to conceal. It’s probably the thing which is most likely to get you martyred.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, but you’re interested, find yourself a pentecostal or charismatic church and ask about the baptism. I believe the usual procedure is for people who already have it to lay hands on you.

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Aaron points out that the biggest significance of Shavuot in the Jewish calendar is that it was the date on which the Torah was given to the Jews.

And of course, Christians believe that the baptism of the Holy Spirit is what the Old Testament refers to when it says God will write the Torah on men’s hearts.

Not that I would suggest that there is a connection or anything.

Popular Stuff

I’m getting a lot of input RE hummus.

Once I added the tahini Jonathan recommended, the hummus improved. But I didn’t realize until today how much it had improved. It’s really very good. Better than store hummus. I didn’t expect that.

He says fresh hummus is best. I should email him about that. I’m wondering if he’s talking about the style they serve in kibbutz dining halls. Call me a traitor, but the best food in Israel (unless things have changed) is Arab food. It was worth getting dysentery for; I can tell you from experience. The falafel they sold in Afula was beyond description. I used to look forward to getting off the kibbutz just so I could have food made by Arabs. The hummus they had in our dining hall wasn’t spicy. I can see how a mild hummus like that would be better on the first day, but it seems like my hummus is getting better. And it’s loaded with garlic and cumin and hot sauce. Highly seasoned foods tend to improve in the fridge.

Last year, I located a lady in Trinidad for the purpose of obtaining obscure peppers. I hooked her up with a pepper forum, and she ended up supplying a lot of people in the US with Trinidad Scorpion and 7 Pot pepper seeds. Last week, out of the blue, she sent me seeds for yellow 7 Pot peppers, which I had never heard of. They’re usually red. That was nice of her. I better get them growing.

I’m thinking about peppers because of that and because of the hummus. My habanero gold bush has already produced a second crop of huge peppers, and I need to do something with them. I’m thinking that the next time I make hummus, I should toss a minced habanero in there. Hot peppers are supposed to have health benefits, such as decimating digestive-tract cancers. And this week I learned that hummus can neutralize a tremendous amount of pepper heat. So by eating hummus regularly, it should be possible to get a decent dose of hot peppers without burning holes in my gullet.

Cayennes would surely be better, though. It still irks me to know that peppers from Home Depot taste better than most of my exotics.

People are telling me to add butter beans to make the hummus creamier. As I recall, the better recipes I had in Israel were very creamy, but here in the US, it all seems a little grainy. I’m not sure. I don’t really care, though.

Today is the sabbath, and every week, the sabbath teaches me something new. This week I am coming to appreciate the pleasure of having the sabbath rescue me from something I don’t want to do.

Yesterday I slaved in the garage, trying to organize things and repair my workbench. It was a long, sweaty ordeal. Were today not Sunday, I’d have to go back in there and get back to it. Hey, I’m not lazy. I’m just pious. No, really.

Heh heh. That worked out pretty good.

As good as a kibbutz-style breakfast is with pita, it would be way better with hot naan or poori. But those breads are so greasy it would be like eating a stack of pancakes.

The Usual

Someone asked me for my hummus recipe. I’ll tell you what I’ve got so far.

Yesterday I glanced at some online recipes. You can probably guess how much I trust them. I did my own thing. I wrote about the results, and I inquired about tahini, which I had not yet added to the recipe. Johnathan said tahini was essential, so this morning I added some, and it did the trick. It adds a peculiar bitterness you can’t get from lemon juice or vinegar. He was absolutely right.

The results are good enough to post, but you may be able to do a lot better. I think I’m going to add more garlic next time. The reason this is worth posting isn’t that the recipe is so great. It’s that prepared hummus is obscenely expensive, and this stuff is nearly free.

INGREDIENTS

2 (around 14 oz. each, I guess) cans garbanzo beans, drained
juice of 2 lemons–buy 3 just in case
1 tsp. cumin
4 cloves garlic
3 tbsp. olive oil
1/4 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. tahini (not prepared sauce)
1/2 tsp. paprika

I also added a ton of Crystal hot sauce, which I can still barely taste. I’ll bet I added a quarter of a cup.

Toss this stuff into a food processor and blend until it looks like hummus. Save the water from the canned beans until the end, and add it judiciously if you have to. The mixture may be dry. I’ll bet cooking your own beans would make it better.

If I had it to do over again, I think I’d omit the Crystal and toss in part of a habanero, or maybe–better–three or four fresh cayennes. I don’t know if the paprika serves any purpose. It’s just ground-up red peppers. It’s a nice thing to dust on the top of a mound of hummus, with a little olive oil and a couple of black olives, before you serve it.

Johnathan says hummus should be fresh. He knows more about it than I do. My plan is to make it once a week and eat it for five days. If it’s not as good as fresh, I’ll survive. It sure beats oatmeal. I think he also said the cumin was not standard, but I like it.

Here is what I had for breakfast today. I cut a quarter of a big sweet red pepper in strips. Did the same with an entire carrot and a quarter of a big cucumber. Meant to add a tomato, but I forgot. I put three globs on my plate: sour cream, cottage cheese, and hummus. Added two boiled eggs. I tossed a big whole-wheat pita on it and made myself an iced tea. This is pretty much what I used to eat for breakfast and dinner on the kibbutz, except that they served white toast. I think it’s better than oatmeal, which is carb soup. And it’s better than the five eggs I used to eat, because it’s lower in cholesterol, for which my gall bladder will hopefully thank me. You don’t really need a fork. That’s what the pita is for.

I find that if I eat too much pita with the meal, I feel bad afterward. Damn carbs.

I’m thinking I should slice up carrots, cucumbers, and peppers every Sunday night and cram them in spoilage-resistant containers for the rest of the week. That will give me a good head start and make breakfast easier. They have new chemical-impregnated containers you can buy, which are supposed to keep vegetables fresher.

I don’t use low-fat dairy stuff. It’s disgusting.

It may sound crazy, me eating vegetables. A lot of people don’t know how much Southerners love vegetables, whether cooked or fresh. My mother used to make forty-mile round trips to Homestead, Florida, just to get tomatoes and onions and corn. I remember watching a prosecuting attorney up in Kentucky, telling my grandfather about his home-canned collard greens. You would have thought he was talking about canned diamonds. Southerners get as excited about good vegetables as Yankees do about great desserts. Very strange.

You know what I miss? Falafel. The falafel they make in Afula, Israel is worth handing the country over to the Arabs for. Nearly. But it’s a huge pain to make. I think I made it too hard by using way too much oil. I’ll bet I could come up with a recipe that would stomp restaurant falafel, but I’d still be unable to duplicate the giant assortment of condiments falafel joints in Israel use. Oh, man. Falafel with ground-up habaneros in it? Are you kidding me? That would rock.

In other news, I got my Caldwell HAMMR machine rest put together. Sort of. This is like a Ransom rest, only cheaper. It must be fairly good; some magazine writers admit they use it. It turns out you have to attach a piece of wood to the bottom of it, and then you clamp the wood to your shooting bench. Oh, no. Oh, woe is me. Work. The thing I dread. Oh, well. I get a chance to fire up the table saw. I have an old piece of plywood (sign from my realtor days) that I plan to use. What’s the best way to seal up the edges of a piece of 3/4″ plywood so splinters don’t shed?

I don’t know yet whether Trail Glades will let me use this thing. I plan to set it up and start shooting, and they can raise hell if they want.

In addition to gluttony, I am trying to get a grip on laziness these days. I feel like it’s sneaking up on me. I should be somewhat more active than I am. There are things I’ve been putting off. I used to have this idea that refraining from sinning all that much was all I had to do to be a good Christian, but now I realize you have to be conscious of all of your weaknesses, and you have to try to overcome them

I read from the book of Luke last night, in The Complete Jewish Bible. The editor says the Acts of the Apostles follows from Luke as though it were a second volume. I didn’t know that.

One of the interesting ideas in the commentary is that we are too hard on the Pharisees. The editor, David Stern, believes that scriptural criticisms leveled at the Pharisees are aimed at specific groups and individuals, not the Pharisees as a whole. And that makes sense, because the Bible says some of them supported Jesus. One of them gave Jesus his own tomb. And supposedly, they were reformers, and Jesus may have been associated with them. I think things like this concern Stern, because Jewish behavior in the New Testament has been used as an excuse for anti-Semitism and the ridiculous “replacement theology.”

I don’t really worry about it, because I don’t think I was put here to punish people who offend God.

Hope I remember how to use that saw.

Too Much Tofu?

Before you run off and enjoy your weekend, let me inform you: Val Prieto has gout. So say a prayer for him.

It’s a total mystery, how this could happen to a guy who cooks entire pigs.

I say it’s time to sue Anheuser-Busch.

Remember Those who Suffered

Reader Pam reminded me via email that today is D-Day. It’s odd that I wasn’t thinking about it already, because Marv, Maynard and I watched a couple of documentaries about it last night, and they made a deep impression on me.

It’s peculiar; the farther you are from God, the more cable and the Internet seem to be tools of the enemy. The closer you get, the more they become assets that help you grow. I tend to think of the web as a devastating, unstoppable, pervasive tidal wave of porn, sexual perversion, cruelty, youth worship, and arrogance. But it’s also making the word of God available to more people than were ever reached by other means. Similarly, cable TV is full of good things, if you can figure out how to work a DVR.

What I’m leading up to here is the Military Channel. I believe the greatest thing a person can do is to give his life for God, but after that comes giving your life–or the integrity of your body–for your others. And that’s what soldiers do as a condition of their employment. They are the finest, most worthy people among us, which is why it makes my blood boil when I see pampered, ignorant, rebellious, immature people insult them. But like most people, I don’t do much of anything for the military, and I don’t think about their sacrifices nearly as often as I should. And the Military Channel is a great tool for refreshing your gratitude and restoring your perspective.

I’ve reached the point where I now longer watch any network TV. I can’t name a sitcom currently in production. I have never seen more than one or two minutes of American Idol. Thank God, literally, I have managed to find better things to allow to enter my mind. It’s not that I have discipline; that ought to be obvious to anyone who reads this blog. It just happened. If you’re still watching the video equivalent of Skittles and Froot Loops, you might consider making an effort to root through your schedule for improving things to record.

If what I have learned about D-Day is correct, many of the troops who made the initial landings suffered for days even before the attack. They were seasick and miserable. Surely they lost sleep. And their accommodations were pretty bad to begin with. After days of nausea and fatigue, they were ordered onto the beaches, where they were chewed to pieces.

Oddly, yesterday the pre-attack misery made a bigger impression on me than the slaughter. Maybe that’s because I’ve heard about the landing itself all my life, or because it’s easier for me to understand the things that happened outside of battle. Thinking about these boys confined on rocking ships, with only machine gun fire and mines to look forward to upon release, I realized how spoiled we are. Or at least how spoiled I am. If I miss an hour of sleep, I feel cheated. If I spend half a day without air conditioning, it’s a catastrophe. I have to wonder how a person like me would hold up in the belly of a ship waiting to sail for Normandy. To some people, the scary thing about war is the possibility of physical harm. To me, the scariest thing is the possibility that I would let everyone else down. I am impressed beyond words by the courage and toughness of men who slogged out of landing craft and planes and gliders, into the face of Germany’s deadliest fortifications.

Excessive violence in the media is generally a bad thing. But I believe we should be more honest in our depictions and coverage of war. Because until we see what it’s really like, we don’t appreciate the sacrifice. It’s odd; when you see footage of Iwo Jima and the Normandy invasion, you see bodies, but you don’t see the horrors veterans talk about. You never see a severed head or a set of intestines stretched out on the ground, far from a body. Maybe censors withheld the most frightening footage in order to avoid harming public morale. Our soldiers saw things like that, and they still had to plod forward and fight. And we paid them very little, and when they came home, we forgot they existed, and we didn’t even set up decent hospitals for them.

They went through that so people like me could live in a country where life is so good, it seems to make sense to complain about things like four-dollar gasoline.

The sad thing is, instead of remaining grateful and humble, we have become degenerate and proud. We don’t respect the people who bought us our freedom. We don’t respect the moral principles laid down by the God who established this country and gave us prosperity. If we keep sliding downward, we are eventually going to pay. Four-dollar gas, expensive food, a weak dollar, and foreign wars are almost certainly just the warning shots.

Here is something I came across yesterday, from The Complete Jewish Bible:

Be careful not to forget Adonai your God by not obeying his mitzvot, rulings and regulations that I am giving you today. Otherwise, after you have eaten and are satisfied, built fine houses and lived in them, and increased your herds, flocks, silver, gold, and everything else you own, you will become proud-hearted. Forgetting Adonai your God–who brought you out of the land of Egypt, where you lived as slaves; who led you through the vast and fearsome desert, with its poisonous snakes, scorpions and waterless, thirsty ground; who brought water out of flint rock for you; who fed you in the desert with man, unknown to your ancestors; all the while humbling and testing you in order to do you good in the end–you will think to yourself, ‘My own power and the strength of my own hand have gotten me this wealth.’ No, you are to remember Adonai your God, because it is he who is giving you the power to get wealth, in order to confirm his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as is happening even today. If you forget Adonai your God, follow other gods and serve and worship them, I am warning you in advance today that you will certainly perish. You will perish just like the nations that Adonai is causing to perish ahead of you, because you will not have heeded the voice of Adonai your God.

That was directed to Israel (Deuteronomy 8:11-20), but the same principles apply to everyone. One of the worst things that can happen to you is to succeed in life without realizing you owe it to God.

In the past, when I wondered why other nations were so poor and weak compared to America, I used to put too much emphasis on our work ethic and our dedication to education. And our capitalist system. The truth is, there are countries where people work and study harder than we do, and where capitalism exists (or used to exist), yet which have historically fared very badly. The real difference between us and them is that we have been blessed. And no matter how smart we are or how hard we work, that blessing can be revoked. Right now, we are probably seeing the beginning of that revocation, or at least the threat of it. It happened to England, and it can happen to us. If we continue insulting the power that put us at the forefront of the world’s nations, we are going to sink back into the pack and lose the things that make us special. Once that happens, you might as well move to Mexico or India.

The same arrogance and selfishness that make us forget God make us forget the sacrifices of others who have established us. Like our parents. And like the men who fought for us on D-Day and in a thousand other battles. That is what I have gleaned from thinking about this. I am trying to do better, and I hope that if you have been as remiss as I have, you will try, too.

Forgot

I guess I’m a giant idiot. I forgot to tell everyone that June 2 was Jerusalem Day. It’s the day when Jews celebrate the 1967 reunification of Jerusalem, much of which had been off-limits to Jews since the 1948 attack by Israel’s relentless, savage, and unprincipled enemies. I assume the date is solar, not lunar.

I’m not sure why they celebrate, since they give back every piece of God-given land their enemies force them to conquer. They gave much of Jerusalem back. Sooner or later, though, the world will have a better Jerusalem Day to celebrate, because the entire Holy City will be controlled by the Jews. And so will Israel–the real Israel, not the little sliver we call “Israel” today. And it will stay that way.

In a related matter, Ed Koch reveals a mind worthy of a good yeshiva, as he explains why it is stupid and completely backward to accuse John Hagee of anti-Semitism.

Hagee thinks God played a part in the Holocaust. Perhaps he’s wrong. But either way, why do people get upset every time a preacher says God may have been involved in something resembling punishment?

Read the Bible before you react without thinking. The Babylonian captivity, the Egyptian captivity, the siege of Jerusalem, numerous failures in battle, famine and plagues in Egypt…the Bible says God caused or allowed these things. Where is it written that He has changed?

And before you claim that ended with the Old Testament, ask yourself when the last temple in Jerusalem was destroyed, and who predicted it.

Hagee thinks the Holocaust ultimately had a purpose. Is it somehow better to believe it was absolutely meaningless?

One of the big tactics enemies of religion use is the denial that God could do or consciously allow anything that would cause anyone pain. One goal: it helps them deny that sin exists. It excuses all human behavior and contributes to touchy-feely moral relativism. And the worst thing is, many issue this denial from pulpits, while claiming to be Christians.

I don’t think Hagee claims the Holocaust was punishment. But I think people are trying to twist his words and make it look as if he were blaming the Jews for their pain. Not all misfortune is punishment. I’m sure John Hagee knows that. The Egyptian exile was not a punishment, for example.

It irritates me, seeing people try to drive a wedge between Jews and their most powerful allies, American conservative Christians. But it doesn’t surprise me. To the enemy, we are a dangerous combination. The slanders tend to suggest that the threat has been recognized.

If only more Jews understood. I still can’t believe there are American Jews who think the anti-Semitic left will protect them from the Israel-loving right.

Be Gracious, if You Can

Hope everyone will take a minute to say a prayer for Ted Kennedy, who is under the knife right now having a brain tumor removed.

Taking a Break From Resting

I don’t know if anyone paid attention when I recommended The Complete Jewish Bible and its accompanying volume, The Jewish New Testament Commentary–wow, it just occurred to me that the name of that book is going to make a lot of people upset–but in case anyone did, I have great news. The commentary picks up speed once you get through Matthew. I thought I would take a month to get through the first New Testament book, but it didn’t take quite that long, and I finished the second book in an hour or two.

To my Jewish friends who hate my use of the term “Messianic Jew,” let me point out that you have an unexpected bedfellow. Sort of. Dr. David Stern, compiler of these volumes, has a real problem with terms that sound too Christian. So he has taken pains to cleanse the Bible of words that would irritate Jewish readers. For example, he refers to the cross as an “execution stake.” That will make the Mormons happy, I guess. It’s kind of annoying, seeing familiar passages disguised by this kind of editing. But I know his heart is in the right place.

I grew up surrounded by Jews, so I tend to forget that they are, as the Bible says, “separate.” Reading this book helps me understand how separate they really feel. I didn’t understand their horror of Christianity until recently. No wonder they vote for Christian-baiting Democrats. No wonder they supported godless Joe Stalin, back in the USSR. I suppose anyone who believes in Jesus seems like a threat.

It’s not a rational attitude, though. While there are plenty of Christian anti-Semites, I am fairly sure that the bulk of the last century’s anti-Semitic behavior was carried out by socialists, Nazis, and Muslims. Who also despise the Christian church. The Inquisition was quite some time ago. And leftism is becoming more anti-Semitic by the year. If you don’t trust all Christians, you’re smart. If you distrust every Christian, you’re not thinking.

I have had a pleasant day so far. I read sixty chapters of Enoch, in addition to working on the Gospels. The book of Enoch existed before Jesus lived, and to a Christian eye, it’s all about the Messiah. I hope one day it turns out to be legitimate.

It talks about the Medes and the Parthians attacking Israel and being wiped out near Jerusalem. “Medes and Parthians” means “Iranians.” I checked. Interesting. Also, disturbing. One would hope that the present Iran/Israel friction could be resolved. Assuming Enoch can be taken seriously, I hope it’s referring to some future conflict, and not something that is already upon us.

Today I thought about the second, and most powerful, purpose of the New Covenant. The baptism of the Holy Spirit. This is the thing that poses the biggest threat to the god of this world, so naturally, it’s the thing that has been attacked and ridiculed and minimized the most. Salvation, salvation, salvation. That’s all we hear. But that’s only one piece of the gift, and in this lifetime, it is by far the smaller piece.

The Holy Spirit is what gives you power, and it’s what improves your character and enables you to conquer sin. And it doesn’t just happen automatically, regardless of what your church teaches; the baptism is an event separate from the event of receiving salvation. It’s available to anyone, and we’re supposed to have it, but not every believer gets it, and that’s the way the enemy wants it. You can be saved but weak and ineffectual in this life, and that’s how most Christians are. Jesus worked miracles and spoke prophetically and so on, and the Holy Spirit is what enabled Him to do it, and when He left, we were expected to receive it and continue His work.

I thought about it in connection with the improvements I’ve made in my own behavior and attitudes. I’m not dense; I have been aware that these things were caused by God. But today it really hit me, just how little credit I can take. I have been able to do some very good things lately, which were harder to do in the past. Or which I just chose not to do. And I know the change is not because I worked hard or read the Bible or got serious. It was the action of God inside me. Maybe I can take credit for a tiny little seed of desire, but that’s about it. Without God, I would have been happy to stay as I was (“happy” may be the wrong word), and I might well have given up and assimilated, taking on the entire moral view of godless people, instead of a limited version.

This is the wild thing about the Holy Spirit. It enables you conduct yourself better. And then God gives you credit, as if you did it on your own. So when people talk about the generosity of God, they don’t begin to do it justice.

That being said, it’s kind of a bummer, realizing how not-special you are.

Interesting thing to look for: in the Bible, the number seven often symbolizes the Holy Spirit. I think this is why the menorah in the holy of holies had seven lamps. I believe “menorah” is the wrong term for this particular lampstand, but I am too lazy to look up the proper term. Oil also symbolizes the Holy Spirit, and what do you burn in a menorah?

I better quit before I start sounding like a gematria nut.