Don’t Shop at Mohammed’s Secret

Wheeeee my brain is still floating in a viral mist. I may go back to the doctor today to see if he has better drugs to help me breathe while I sleep. The virus is doing what they so often do. It’s touring my body, with a different stop every day. First, the throat. Then the bones. Then the sinuses. Then the lungs. I suppose I’ll get well when it runs out of new places to go.

I have to wonder if I’m one of the lucky people who get the flu in spite of being vaccinated. I don’t think so. I haven’t had much of a fever. But this is no cold.

I think I made a mistake yesterday, getting up and fooling with tools. Maybe doctors really mean it when they prescribe rest. I thought they just said that so they could feel like they were helping.

I’ve looked at the news, and it appears that we will all have to expose our genitals to airport screeners from now on. For some this will be a degrading nuisance. Others will think, “Finally, I have an excuse.”

No one ever listens to me. I solved the screening problem a long time ago. We need an express line for people willing to eat a slice of ham in front of airport employees. People who eat pork don’t blow up airplanes. And it’s not racial profiling. Oh, no. It’s DIETARY profiling. Totally different.

I know I’m eccentric, but I can’t shake this mysterious hunch that says terrorism is somehow connected to Islam.

It’s disturbing how underwear has evolved into an offensive weapon. First, the Unabomber tried to kill himself with his underwear. That wasn’t so bad. Now underwear is going tactical, and they’re using it to kill other people. Do you know what this means? We’re all carrying concealed weapons now. Except for hippies who don’t wear underwear.

Sensible underwear laws NOW! Where is Sarah Brady when you need her? We need an advocate to take a stand before people start going to underwear shows and using loopholes to buy armor-piercing cop-killer underwear. Studies show that over 99% of violent crime victims have underwear in their homes. Even more disturbing, very few of them store their underwear properly, in underwear safes.

Don’t make me connect the dots.

I posted my new terrorism remedy on Twitter. Are you ready for it? Here’s how we punish terrorists from now on: exploding underwear activated by calls from Dick Cheney’s cell phone.

We’re going to have to refine our jargon. From now on, going without underwear will have to be referred to as “NOT going commando.”

We’re going to have to ban assault underwear. That much is clear. And we’ll have to come up with classifications, such as automatic and semi-automatic underwear.

I estimate it will be about three days before we hear about an anonymous porn message board featuring backscatter photos of attractive tourists. It would be wise to prepare. The next time I fly, I plan to sell ad space on my belly. For the right sum, I’ll get glue and sequins and spell out “This Bud’s for You” or “Palin 2012.” How about, “Ask me About Herbalife”?

I’m trying to figure out what Muslims could to to humiliate us further, but I’m drawing a blank. Well, that’s not true. I forgot about the butt bomber. Remember him? He hid his bomb in a very unfortunate location. When his specialty gets popular, we’ll have privacy invasions that make backscatter scans seem about as offensive as passport photos.

Here’s a theological question. If a Muslim wears exploding underwear on a plane, but he sits next to Mitt Romney, who is wearing magical Mormon underwear, which underwear wins? Will the magic underwear prevail? I hope Mormons never get into terrorism (beyond producing Harry Reid). Their underwear is so big, one pair could take out a city block.

I foresee a day when no American will be able to go anywhere, for any reason. When that happens, Muslims will walk to your house and blow their underpants up when you open the door.

You know who must be embarrassed today? The guy who made the Flight 253 underwear bomb. His pal trusted him to give him a nice clean blast, and instead, the terrorist is now basically a lady. Fat lot of good 72 virgins will do him now. How do you apologize for a thing like that? I’ve had friends let me down, but generally it involved things like failing to repay small loans. When a buddy char-broils your entire crotch, de-friending him on Facebook doesn’t really express the extent of your hurt feelings.

Stay in on New Year’s Eve. I think it’s safe to assume there will be an exploding-underpants flash mob at every celebration in the United States. I’m glad Dick Clark isn’t alive to see this. Oh, wait. He is alive. Hope he has ear plugs and a polycarbonate face shield. As the premiere rock and roll impresario of the Fifties, he is very familiar with the sight of flying underwear, but in the past, it usually contained hotel keys and love notes, not homemade napalm.

Hey, I just realized who we need to call to fix this crisis. Tom Jones! If anyone knows how to deal with airborne underpants, it’s Tom.

I’m eagerly waiting to see what fanatical Islam can do to make air travel more disgusting and ridiculous.

Rube Goldberg Drills a Hole

I think it is just barely possible that I ordered the wrong drill press vise.

Here is my cross slide table, which I finally installed today. I had to make those slabs of aluminum from a 4″ square bar. Then I roasted a new countersink trying to make holes for the bolts that attach to the sides of the table. Apparently 1000 RPM, while fine for a 1/2″ 2-flute end mill, is not a great speed for a zero-flute countersink. Fortunately, there was a bigger one in the set, which I did not roast.

Here is my ancient Home Depot drill press vise, which probably has 2 1/2″ jaws. It’s too small.

I figured 4″ would be about right. But check this out:

I guess I can make it work, but it looks a lot like the Grinch’s sleigh on the way up Mount Crumpet.

Maybe I should see about a 3″ vise.

I’m very pleased with the mounting job. It was not easy. I had to saw the slabs out. Then I had to mill them to size. After that, I had to drill the holes, and then I had to do the countersinking. I had to go to the hardware store to find bolts and stuff that would work. The cross slide table is designed as though the engineer who created it knew someone would try to put it on this type of drill press, and he was determined to stop them. I had to sink bolts into the aluminum slabs from below, because there was no way to go through the drill press table without cutting into it.

A more suitable base for the cross slide table would be a viable and useful project, but I’d need a big chunk of steel, and if I screwed up once, I’d have to trash it and start over.

The more I worked on this, the more I understood how much I needed a drill press. Drilling on the mill works extremely well, but you have to play around with a four-foot-long table and a gigantic vise. It would be much faster on the drill press.

I received a VFD for Christmas, so I’m going to slap a 3-phase motor on this puppy. I can’t live without reverse. I just can’t. You understand, right?

I feel like the king tool stud of the universe. And it will be nice to have this junk on the drill press table instead of scattered around the garage.

Plus Boring Virus Whining

I guess people think I’m dead because of the gap in my blogging. Sorry to disappoint you. The virus has left me in a strange mental state in which I sort of drift around like a cloud. I just don’t feel like doing anything.

I’m not complaining. The soreness went out of my throat yesterday, and I haven’t had chills or aches since Saturday night. I’m caught up in a dreamy state in which I lack motivation. And I don’t feel like exerting myself mentally. This must be how liberals feel every day.

I’m so happy I can swallow and breathe, I don’t care much about anything else. I can almost taste food.

My doctor says about 4% of sore throats are strep throat, and the remainder are mostly viral. I tested negative for strep, so I guess I’m in the majority. I had both flu shots, and I haven’t had a high fever, so it’s probably not the flu.

The medicine I use causes much of my suffering. I loaded up on Afrin night before last, and after I got up in the morning, I had the notorious rebound effect, so until about nine p.m., I felt like I had rudder-box packing stuffed up each nostril. I also had problems with 12-hour Sudafed waking me up at three in the morning.

I decided to try guaifenesin. It’s supposed to loosen things up. Seem to work, but not all that well.

The guy who runs security at my church sent an email to everyone who works with him. An organization that trains security people will be having a two-day seminar in Fort Lauderdale in January. I think it would be great, but the $300 price is a bummer.

I think our church needs to have a few members packing heat at all times. We’re in the ghetto, and we collect cash offerings. Besides, being unarmed is almost never a good idea. Remember Jeanne Assam. Better yet, remember the people who were killed before the gunman ran into his first armed Christian.

Whenever I go into the building, I have to leave my carry piece in my truck, where it can be stolen by crackheads. I’m unarmed, the church has one less potential defender, and the crackheads have a chance to steal a nice pistol. This is not a good situation for anybody, except the crackheads. Plus, it’s a pain.

On the subject of guns, allow me to bring you good news. Federal FMJ 9mm ammunition is back down to $9.95 per box, where it should be. What a relief. You can find it at Outdoormarksman.com. They also have Wolf 7.62mm x 39 for $200/thousand. That’s helpful, if you need to sweep your church’s parking lot with a Vz 58. That will learn the heathens respect.

If I can make myself stand up long enough, I may finish my Saiga 12 conversion today. I would be really embarrassed if a burglar showed up before it was finished and all I had to offer him was a 1911.

I try to be a thoughtful host.

My Nose Hairs are Smoking

I think I killed my digestive tract. I’ll have to replace it with PVC.

The chicken curry was magnificent. I was actually able to taste it through the viral infection. I used three habanero gold peppers in 2 pounds of chicken, and it was perfect. Any hotter, and I would not have been able to eat it. Any milder, and it wouldn’t have gotten the job done. I needed something to scorch my sinuses and open up all the little holes in my head, and this stuff did it.

I wish I had some chicken fat to add to it. That would make it even better.

I Attempt to Melt a Slotted Spoon

I found a doctor who works on Saturdays. This guy is open twelve hours a day during the week, plus Saturday mornings. Crazy. Seems like a good doctor. Very efficient. I commented on his schedule, and he says his friends can’t make a living because they don’t want to work.

He says I have a viral throat problem, so I have to avoid people for a few days. Unless they are people I want to kill. He also said you should always see a doctor when you have a sore throat, to make sure it’s not strep, which can affect your heart. This is pretty much why I showed up.

My blood pressure bordered on high, so he gave me a sheet of dietary instructions. I took a look, before giving it to Marv to chew on. He could have just said, “You know what you do all the time? Stop it.”

My diet is actually pretty healthy these days.

Last night was a fun ride. It started with a scratchy throat. Then it got worse, and I got unbelievable bone pains. I got so cold I could not get warm. I put three blankets on the bed and cranked the heated mattress pad to its highest setting, and my hands were still like ice. The air temperature in the room was 75, but it didn’t matter. Then, of course, I woke up frying. I slept about fifteen minutes.

I can’t drive for the church tonight. I guess they’ll find someone else to drive people from the shelter.

There’s one nice thing about being sick. It gives me an excuse to make blistering-hot food. When you have a cold or sore throat, spicy food and ice cream are the only things that taste good. I have to decide what I want. I’m thinking curried chicken.

The great thing about this opportunity is that I don’t have to share this, so I can make it so hot it glows. And I’m going to pile sour cream on it.

Soon the viruses will wonder what hit them. This body will not be a pleasant place in which to make a home and raise little viruses.

I feel pretty good today, except for the throat and a little mental fog.

Stand Upwind

My throat feels funny and I have a fever of 99.4°. You are advised to shun me until further notice. If you are female and therefore already shunning me, you may disregard this message.

What’s a good cocktail based on Nyquil? Can I make a frozen daiquiri from it?

Don’t Try to be This Holy at Home

PRIME RIB! PRIME RIB! PRIME RIB!

Time to put the roast in the Showtime oven!!!!!

Another Miracle? Ho Hum.

How many times do I have to write a blog post that begins with me saying that God has freaked me out?

I guess I’ll never stop.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately, for the people who just want to read about tools, food, and politics), I can’t say much about the things that are freaking me out this week. They involve problems another person is having. I am working on a solution to some debilitating, life-ruining difficulties in another person’s life, and as he so often does, God is hammering me with one “coincidence” after another. And this time, my dad has a front-row seat. He can rationalize nearly any move of God away, but this one will be a special challenge. Man, I wish I could blog it.

My church is having a ten p.m. service tonight, and I would rather die than stay up past 9:30, but I’m going to go. I want to be there to show my gratitude for the things that are happening to me and around me.

I walked by faith back in ’84, when I lived on Kibbutz Geva. I never knew what I was doing as I made my way across Europe and to the kibbutz, but I found that as I continued putting one foot in front of the other, things simply worked out. When I returned to the US, that all stopped. I started to get it together about 20 years ago, but I abandoned ship because I got offended. Lately, I’ve been getting back on track. And once again, God seems to be right over my right shoulder, steering me around obstacles and opening doors. This is what life is supposed to be like, but it’s hard to make your mind up to live this way.

Yesterday a guy asked me if I wanted to write a book about his life. This happened as a result of the problems I mentioned above. I was in his office, trying to get help for someone else, and he dropped this question on me out of the blue. In front of my father! Incredible. I want to do it. I’m sure it’s a good project. I don’t know if there is any cash in it, but it’s exactly the kind of thing I want to do with my life from now on.

The person with the problems doesn’t know it, but a “perfect storm” of God’s contrivance has developed. Circumstances and timing are arranging themselves in such an extraordinary, odds-defying manner that this person will have no choice but to make a defining decision that will either end the problems or lead to perdition. Either way, the boil is coming to a head, and the collateral damage–the torment that has bled outward onto other people–is going to be cut off abruptly.

Day is going to break for me, and it will probably break for my father, because of the effect this spectacle will have on him. The only doubtful issue is whether it will break for the afflicted person. That depends on free will. God can be extremely persuasive, however, so I am not losing hope. God blinded Paul in order to wake him up. He has penetrated some very bony heads (mine included) and crushed many revolting egos. Defiance requires effort and strength, and God knows how to weaken people who need to be humbled. He put Lester Sumrall on a deathbed when he was in his teens. He has put many people on the floors of rehab facilities and jails. He has twisted a lot of arms in order to turn people around, and it often works. It’s a mistake to overestimate the impregnability of free will.

The other day I saw an Internet video where some guy was asking Kari Jobe questions, and she grinned and said God was “just wrecking” her life. I know what she meant. When God moves powerfully and quickly, it can be like an episode of Extreme Makeover, only without the ensuing foreclosure and divorce and arrests, because God does a better job than ABC.

If I will just listen, my life will be on rails from now on.

Dinner was fantastic. The pig was gorgeous. Everyone loved the flan. And Val’s aunt made ambrosia, which is…a COINCIDENCE…because Mike was asking me for a recipe yesterday. Maybe I can get her to spill the beans.

Talked to Val’s wife Maggie again about visiting church. I’m going to get them. And their little dog, too. Wait and see.

I have to poke Marv before I get in the truck. Merry Christmas Eve.

This Year’s Noche Buena Pig

I write a lot about tools and religion. Today I thought it might be interesting to talk about medicine. Here’s a look at the latest advances in prostate surgery. First, the surgery itself:

Second, the patient relaxing with a caring OR nurse.

I guess some of you realize this is not really prostate surgery. It’s the pig Val Prieto is cooking for tonight’s Christmas Eve feast. I helped him for a couple of hours, and during that whole time, I didn’t see a single kitchen implement, other than a spoon. It was all tools. Isn’t that how cooking should be?

This year he’s doing a small pig at his parents’ house. That’s a 50-pounder. And he cheated by buying congri instead of having me make it (thank you, Lord).

I know this does not photograph well, but here are some shots of the pig prep, in case you want to try this yourself. He got the pig at Winn-Dixie instead of the matadero, and he said it smelled fresh and was very clean. Until we got ahold of it.

The older gentleman in the photos is Val’s dad. The younger guy is his nephew, whose name I can’t spell. The OR nurse is Val’s sister.

There is some seismic instability in the pig, so I may have to run to Home Depot for some hardware cloth or chicken wire.

I prepared two pans of coconut flan, which I delivered this morning. Here’s a tip: if you cook your flan in disposable aluminum pans, put a heavy dinner plate on top of each one to keep it from floating in the water bath. If it floats, the flan will flow to the lower side of the pan, and you get a flan that is tall on one side and short on the other.

If you use my recipe, you might try adding an additional cup of half and half and maybe a tablespoon of sugar. I think I may have made the version in the book slightly thicker than it should be, and the added half and half will loosen it up.

Today is my dad’s birthday, and I got him a crappy fanny-pack-type thing for concealed carry. It’s perfectly nice, and it will be a great convenience, but it was cheap. He’s always telling me not to spend money on him, so I figured I’d let him see what happens when he asks for things he doesn’t really want. TOMORROW, on the other hand, he gets something better. A Glock 26 with Tru-Glo sights. I figure 24 hours of suffering are enough for him.

He’s 78 today, and I know he probably won’t live forever, so I figured I’d get him a gift to remember. On Father’s Day, he gets a pair of socks. Second quality. On sale. I am not made of money.

I know he’ll like the Glock, because he shot mine when he went shooting with me and my Christian buddies, and he loved it. I’m hoping this will give him incentive to keep shooting with us. I remember telling him we should take my pastor fishing, and he said, “I’m afraid he’ll get the Holy Ghost on me.” Maybe the same thing can happen at the range.

I have a prime rib roast in the fridge, for tomorrow. I salted it down and covered it with butter and mashed garlic. I’m hoping some of the salt will get into the meat. This will be the first time I’ve used a roast with the ribs cut off and tied back on. It will also be the first time I’ve used my dad’s Ronco Showtime rotisserie oven to do prime rib. The unknown variables scared me, so I called Mike for a consultation. He says he puts a little additional twine on the roast to reinforce it. That will keep the ribs and the meat from separating and falling apart.

He told me he likes to make prime rib and slice off a big portion of the fat and the underlying meat. You know the part I’m talking about. The extra-fatty meat around the outside of the cut. He likes to eat a sheet of that, basically. I was amazed to hear it, because one of my dreams has been to cook this and call it something like “filet of prime rib.” It’s unquestionably the best part of the meat.

I asked Mike what his wife and kids get when he does that, since it pretty well butchers the meat. He says A) he doesn’t care, because he does all the work and therefore makes the rules, and B) they don’t mind, because for some insane reason, they don’t want the fatty part.

Mike is a storehouse of that sort of manly wisdom.

Hope you and yours are having a fine Christmas Eve.

Entry Removed

I decided to take down the post I wrote last night because I have a long list of things of which I am repenting, and one of them is mocking people. If I keep cutting back on speech and writing that offends God, there may be little left for me to say or write, but I want to be serious about changing. Sorry your comments had to be dragged down with the entry.

I’m about to get in the car and help Val Prieto put together a pig roast. I’m also delivering two delicious coconut flans. No time to blog.

Pre-Christmas Gift

This is a beautiful day.

Yesterday I did something stupid. I slipped a little. This morning I was afraid it would interfere with my walk with God. Instead, I had a remarkable morning prayer session. I felt surges of new faith with regard to issues with which I needed help. I got mercy.

This makes sense. The Bible predicts this kind of thing. The 32nd psalm says, “Many sorrows shall be to the wicked, but he that trusteth in the Lord, mercy shall compass him about.” And there are other passages that make it clear that God will overlook missteps when you are earnestly and habitually seeking to do his will.

I worked on memorizing that psalm today, and this part turned out to be particularly significant: “Thou art my hiding place. Thou shalt preserve me from trouble.” God doesn’t speak idle words. He means everything he says. This verse is not just something he told us to make us feel good. It’s a contract more reliable than the US Constitution (especially under the Obama administration). I thought about this verse today while I was asking for God’s protection, and I felt waves of faith telling me that today, God is preserving me from trouble. I don’t know what’s up, but I know he is looking out for me, and that I’ll be protected.

This psalm is extremely instructive. When I first started working on memorizing it, I didn’t really understand it. It’s about protection and forgiveness, and that’s obvious, but what it’s really about is the necessity of admitting guilt. It says God may make you completely miserable while you pretend you have no sin, and that you will get relief and protection if you confess completely (without guile) and ask for forgiveness. It elaborates, saying God will teach you and guide you, but only if you allow yourself to be taught. Otherwise, “many sorrows.”

“When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring, all the day long. For day and night, thy hand was heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the drought of summer.” That means a person who won’t admit fault before God will suffer and will not receive mercy.

“I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a day when thou mayest be found. Surely in the floods of great waters they shall not come near unto him.” Confess and be forgiven, and God will stop afflicting you and begin protecting you.

It disturbs me when people I know tell me they haven’t sinned. What they say is that they haven’t sinned, but what I hear is, “God, punish and frustrate me until I want to die. Make me poor, let me be alone, take my house, and give me diseases. Give me neurosis, anxiety, depression, and conflict. Make me unable to enjoy the good things in my life; turn them into liabilities. And let me lose to people I should beat.”

I believe God deals with us the way caring people deal with addicts. We get a certain amount of slack, and if we don’t repent, God backs away and lets us fall. The 141st psalm says, “Let the righteous smite me; it shall be a kindness: and let him reprove me; it shall be an excellent oil, which shall not break my head.” Sometimes punishment is literally better than gold. In fact, material success can be the worst poison there is. It robs you of the incentive to change and confirms your self-destructive inclinations. Look at Elvis and Michael Jackson. If they had hit bottom instead of being inundated with money and power, they might be alive today. Look at Chris Farley and John Belushi.

It’s always tough to know how to deal with rebellious people. We’re supposed to intercede, and we’re not supposed to be like Jonah, who wanted bad people to be punished. But Paul turned a rebellious man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, and Elisha cursed his servant with leprosy for conniving to take money from a man Elisha healed. Sometimes standing between another person and punishment is actually evil.

I am grateful for many of the bad things that have happened to me. I’ve learned a lot from them. It won’t hurt others to go through similar things.

Mercy is wonderful, and I’m glad whenever I receive it. But a lot of people have been saved by a good dose of God’s belt.

Holiday Prayer

I just had a visit from Val Prieto. He was borrowing a cooler to marinate this year’s lechon for Noche Buena. His mom is having health problems, including a hernia. If you would like to offer a prayer, he would appreciate it.

Thanks in Advance

If any of you can direct me to good Christ-centered help with dealing with addicts, I would appreciate it. Books, websites, organizations…I want to learn all I can. Thank you.

Flea Confrontation

Give me your opinions on a vital issue.

You have a dog. You find flea bites on the dog’s butt. The dog’s butt is sore.

You have a flea-killing product called Advantix, but you have not been using it. It works like this: you put a drop on the dog once in a while, and it kills the fleas.

Would you:

A) Take your dog to the veterinarian and ask if medical science can cure his butt, regardless of cost?

B) Give the dog a flea dip, put Advantix on him, and see how his butt looks in a couple of days?

I think you will be able to predict my answer. I have a spider bite on my back, and it’s a big boily knot of a thing. I probably have a low-grade fever, and it may be the reason I got a kidney stone yesterday. I am not going to the doctor. God healed me of the kidney stone before I could get treatment, and I don’t care about the spider bite.

If I’m not deserving of a trip to the ICU, neither is a dog. That’s how I see it.

How Charismatic Christianity Looks From Inside

Today I got a comment from a longtime reader who is considering looking for the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I thought I should write a few things, because I’m sure other people are curious.

There are a lot of people who claim the baptism and tongues are demonic. If that is the case, every believer in the New Testament who received the baptism was a demon-possessed heretic, because every Spirit-baptized believer in the New Testament spoke in tongues. Some spoke in earthly languages others recognized, for the purpose of glorifying God before potential converts, but others spoke words no one understood and which were never intended to be understood. This is clear from Paul’s writings.

If you don’t believe in charismatic Christianity but you read this blog and applaud the changes in my life, maybe you need to ask yourself why you’re enabling a heretic who may be on his way to hell. I have had the baptism for almost a quarter of a century, so if it’s a demon, he has had a long time to corrupt me and turn me into Satan’s tool. With that in mind, let me say this: BOO!

Prayer in tongues has been a big part of my life over the last couple of years. If you have been reading this blog for a long time, think about the difference between 2009 and 2005. Do I seem MORE evil now? Do I seem LESS free? Less happy? More tormented?

Please. If this is the devil’s doing, maybe he’s not such a bad guy. Surely you don’t believe that.

Back in the Eighties, I grew a lot in the Spirit. But I quit going to church, and I quit praying, both with my mind and in the Spirit. So I atrophied as a Christian. The result was a highly critical, angry person who wrote very funny but unproductive things. Over the last couple of years, I have spent more and more time praying in the Spirit, and I think the improvement in me is hard to miss. I did not do this myself. It offends me when people say I did, because whether they know it or not, they are tempting me to deny God. Christianity is not about changing yourself to make God happy. It’s about allowing God to change you. It’s 90% him and 10% you.

I don’t believe you will get a demon if you make a proper effort to get the Holy Ghost baptism. As I said in a comment, if Satan is powerful enough to do that to you, he is stronger than God. God requires us to do a lot of things, and he expects us to have a fair amount of knowledge, but every once in a while, you have to trust him and count on him to cut you a little slack. If you think he’s going to sit around and watch a demon jump into you while you beg in earnest for a gift that will help you serve him in humility and gratitude, I’m not sure why you think he would ever do anything good for you. What kind of God would he be, allowing himself to be tortured to death for us and then looking the other way as we filled ourselves with demons while begging for his help? Does that make sense to you?

You already have demons. Face it. If the Holy Spirit moves in, they will not get up and leave instantaneously. They will stay as long as they can and do whatever they can to hinder the Spirit. They may lead you to do stupid things while claiming the Holy Spirit is controlling you. This has happened to other Christians. It does not mean you got a demon at the moment of baptism.

A Spirit-filled believer is like Joshua and the Hebrews, just after they crossed into Israel. The land was full of heathen strongholds, just as a newly baptized believer has powerful spirits affecting his life. The Hebrews had to go forward, submitting to God and attacking the strongholds supernaturally as well as physically. You have to do the same thing. You are supposed to clear out every stronghold you can discern, leaving no room for a metaphorical Amalekite remnant to build back up, the way bacteria build back up in a wound that hasn’t been cleaned thoroughly. The more strongholds you break, the more you will resemble Jesus, both in power and in character. But you are going to make mistakes, and for some people, that means barking like a dog or even kicking another believer on stage and claiming God said it was okay.

As you progress, you will develop the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23). This means you will have positive traits like self-control, kindness, patience, and love. You will develop the miraculous gifts of the Spirit, such as the ability to heal others or the ability to give with supernatural generosity, or the ability to learn hidden facts directly from God (1 Corinthians 12). You won’t get all of this stuff at once, and you won’t be like Superman, wandering around working miracle after miracle and reading people’s minds. But these things will begin to become apparent in your life. You need these things in order to succeed. The fruit of the Spirit will make you a good person in all respects; you can’t do this just by trying. The gifts will give you power when you need it.

Jesus walked in the gifts and the fruit of the Spirit. He worked no great miracles before he received the baptism of the Spirit. Afterward, he was different. He knew things about people, with no natural explanation. He healed people instantly. He walked on water. He had supernatural bravery. I know of no evidence that he prayed in tongues, but since the purpose of that gift is to build you up, I don’t see why he would have needed it. He was perfect. The rest of us are fixer-uppers, so we have tongues as one of the tools that help us grow.

If you want to see an obvious manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit, consider my problems with overeating. They’re gone. They disappeared in one day, along with some other behavioral problems. I’m sorry I don’t have something more dramatic to give you, but to me, this gift is priceless. No man on earth could have given me this. Not for a billion dollars. No one…NO one…has ever solved the problem of compulsive overeating. We cut people’s stomachs up. We suck fat out of them. We give them amphetamines. We put them on regimes that fail when their willpower gives out. But nobody can do what God did for me. It’s a completely legitimate miracle. I know it would be more impressive had I followed up by putting up a Youtube of me break-dancing on the surface of the swimming pool, but I have what I have, so make the most of it.

Oprah Winfrey is a billionaire, and she’s promoting a false messiah named Tolle, and she knows every diet guru on earth, and if that’s the best help she ever gets, she’s going to die overweight, not to mention single, childless, and unsatisfied. When a demon leaves, it tries to return, and if there isn’t a bigger, tougher spirit waiting to drive it back out, it will succeed (Matthew 3:23-28; Matthew 12:43-45). This is what the secular world calls “the Yo-Yo Effect,” and it defeats Oprah about once a year. If man had the answer to compulsive overeating, wouldn’t she be free by now? If not, how many more dollars does she need to spend? Millions aren’t enough. Will a trillion do it? Of course not.

My freedom cost me nothing.

As for spiritual gifts, I have seen at least two spirits, and I saw one of them very clearly, and I got a good long look at it. That is “discerning of spirits.” God has explained incomprehensible scriptures to me as I’ve read them; that happens every day (Acts 8:30-34). And I know I’ve received wisdom when I’ve asked for it. I wish I thought to pray for it more often! Wisdom is one of the gifts. I believe I’ve seen five of the nine spiritual gifts in my life. And I’m nothing special. Jesus said we would surpass him in our miraculous works; do you realize that? Look at the Bible and see (John 14:12).

I think I should add one more thing. The Spirit will help you get answers to prayer. One of the gifts is supernatural faith, and faith gets prayers answered. On top of that, a clean, righteous life will help get prayers answered. You’ll be more likely to ask for the right things, and you will be giving the enemy less power to oppose you. The enemy is like a rat or a roach. He feeds on the garbage we leave in ourselves, and he gains power from it. Remember the man Paul turned over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh? That was the result of bad behavior. God expressly approved of Satan’s efforts to harm that man, because the man needed the pain in order to be corrected. A better life means weaker enemies and more protection. See what I wrote about Joshua, above.

A month or two ago, I was driving along, praying about something, and a wave of faith hit me, and it was so strong, I grabbed the truck’s center console and held on, to keep from being blown over. The same thing happened to me again, while I was lying in bed. I dug my fingers into the mattress and clung to it like a climber trying to keep from being knocked off a mountain. Call me a heretic if you want. I think that’s a wonderful gift.

I have explained charismatic (or “Pentecostal”) Christianity as well as I could. Maybe I can’t make you want it, but perhaps after reading this you will at least be willing to tolerate it. At worst, you could spend some time praying God will free me from my heretic, white-trash, holy-rolling demons. I’ll take prayer no matter how it comes.