Christian based commentaries and observations.

Quote of Note

Billy Graham's Prayer For Our Nation



: 'Heavenly Father, we come before you today to ask your forgiveness and to seek your direction and guidance.
We know Your Word says, 'Woe to those who call evil good,' but that is exactly what we have done.

We have lost our spiritual equilibrium and reversed our values. We have exploited the poor and called it the lottery.

We have rewarded laziness and called it welfare.

We have killed our unborn and called it choice.

We have shot abortionists and called it justifiable.

We have neglected to discipline our children and called it building self esteem.

We have abused power and called it politics.

We have coveted our neighbor's possessions and called it ambition.

We have polluted the air with profanity and pornography and called it freedom of expression.

We have ridiculed the time-honored values of our forefathers and called it enlightenment.

Search us, Oh God, and know our hearts today; cleanse us from every sin and Set us free.
:
: Amen!'
:


Wednesday, March 25, 2009

A Higher Shoe


Well, no sooner had I made my last post when Ben Bernacke of the Federal reserve announce that the "Fed" would buy up 1 trillion $ of those bonds floating around out there. Bernie Madoff's lawyer just fell out of his chair. The government has entered the Ponzi scheme business. The Fed is printing money to buy up the printed money of the Treasury. HHMMMM!
Here on Cape Cod, and I'm sure in other places too, a scheme became popular where a criminal would open up several checking accounts at different banks with overdraft protection. After drawing down the majority of the required opening deposit, he/she would begin to write checks to themselves rolling one bank at a time. The proceeds would be dumped into the last bank in the chain. The checks would get bigger and bigger until, finally they withdrew the funds and left the second to the last bank holding the bad paper. Timing for banking holidays and week ends was the crucial part of the whole scheme. One bank on Nantucket got stuck with a $14,000 bad check.
One has to wonder if "Bernie Bernacke" and "Ben Madoff" ever shared a ferry ride to the island for a summer vacation, picked up the newspaper, on a certain day, when the check ponzi scheme on that Nantucket bank was announced. I wonder if the both went, "HHMMMM"!
One has really got to wonder how the Fed plans to eventually unwinde thier new position in junk securities. You cannot even sell a million a day to get out of a trillion. Some congressman recently made the statement that, " if you spent a million dollars a day since Jesus was born, you still would not have spent a trillion"!
The shoe to drop just got raised a little higher!

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Next Shoe: Answer to Prayer

Praying to a God of Free Will
If you have ever prayed for another, who is in desperate need of God to repair/restore their lives, you know that you are dependent on that person allowing God to come in and work. This is because God is a gentlemen, a God of free will, and love uncompelled. There is no love in compulsion! You pray and pray for God to cause that person to give up what ever destructive habit they have, and it seems like they just do it all the more. You start to think that God is not answering your prayers, when in fact he is. Be encouraged, greatly encouraged! When the object of your prayer hits bottom and realizes its death, or God rehab and revival, then you will get the answer you have longed to hear.
How many of us are praying for friends, relatives, neighbors, and country, to return to God. How many times have we quoted 2 Chronicles 7:14 ? 2CH 7:13 "When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command locusts to devour the land or send a plague among my people, 14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 15 Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place. 16 I have chosen and consecrated this temple so that my Name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there.
Is not the present economy and advance by America's enemies the result of the shutting up of heaven? Are we not God's people called by the name of CHRISTians? And are our bodies not "temples" of the Holy Spirit so that his "name may be there forever"? Of course, and it follows that his "eyes will be open his ears attentive", and " his eyes and heart will always be there"!

Bonds
Now then we have heard whispers this week of a collapse in the Bond Market. The debt of this nation is supported by selling treasury bonds. Companies, states, and municipalities also sell bonds to raise money for projects. In the past these have been the single safest way to save money and receive a small return on your investment. A portion of all good investment portfolios should have some bonds. The percentage of bonds, compared to other types of investments, should increase with the age of the investor.
The Bonds of the United States, of late, have been mostly purchased by China and the Arab oil producers. (See my post "Pieces of the Puzzle Nov. 19, 2008 for more on that subject http://meditationsfromthethirdshift.blogspot.com/2008/11/pieces-of-puzzle.html) Those bond holding nations are a little nervous about the value of our dollar right now. There is no possible way that the United States could sell enough bond to finance the last two economic stimulus packages. They are just too huge. Those stimulus packages are being paid for by straight out printing of dollars! We are currently getting away with it because much of those packages is in the form of loans to troubled industry (fannie, freddy, GM, Chrysler, Ford, AIG, Citigroup, etc) And because other important currency nations such as the E.U. and England have done the same thing, helping to keep our dollar stable comparatively.
If U.S bailed out industry were to begin defaulting on their loans, and go into bankruptcy, two things would happen: the dollar would fall, and interest rates would race upward.
Interest rates would rise because those nations buying/holding our bonds would lose money if they continued buying and holding. When they stop buying our debt and start selling it we have to pay a higher yield (percentage rate) to continue borrowing (finance the deficit). Private interest rates you pay on small business loans, home mortgages, and credit cards are set by adding percentage points to the interest rate of U.S. Treasury Bonds. If the cost of U.S. debt goes up so does yours!
The falling dollar and rising interest rates will have a second major impact on the lives of Americans: INFLATION! Since we run a trade deficit,(buy more than we sell), we will have to pay more dollars for everything we import.

Total Crash
The effect of these forces on the U.S. and eventually the rest of the world will be TOTAL CRASH! A useless dollar would send the U.S. and the World from recession into global depression. I would expect that some psychopath politicians and nations would, as in the past, take military advantage of such a global situation.

Prophetic Expectations

We expect that some scenario just like this will lead to the rise in prominence of the E.U. world throne of the coming AntiChrist. The U.S. must take a back seat for that to completely happen. We expect that to all lead to a global cooperative government.
We expect a great "latter rain" revival to prepare the Bride of Christ "without spot, wrinkle, or blemish". The latter rain ripes and prepares the crop for harvest. The wheat and tares can easily be separated when the heads become ripe.
We expect an attack against Isreal by Gog, Magog, Meschesh, and Tabul.
It is not possible to know for certain if this is the moment, but we see the signs and know the seasons. It sure looks like the time is at hand. A crash in the U.S. bond market could set it all off: humanity racing like lemmings off the cliff of Revelations and Armageddon. The stage is set. The actors are in place.

Back to Praying for Revival
So you've been praying for a great awakening revival. God is hearing you. This materialistic, narcissist, hedonistic nation still is not ready to face the death of self and submission to the God who made them great and rich. America has not hit bottom yet. The next shoe to drop is dangling high in the air, held onto by just the tip of the laces. Don't lose heart now keep praying. And keep preparing, getting ready, to disciple the coming prodigal sons back into the Fathers house. They are about to begin eating pig slop to survive. Then will their thoughts turn back to their loving Father and his care for his servants. Then will they drag their motley humbled selves back into his waiting loving arms!! Lift up your hands and praise the Lord he is about to pour out the blessing of answered prayer upon America.

Saturday, March 07, 2009

Quote from Feb. 09

“There are five Gospels. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and the Christian, and some people will never read the first four.”
Irish Evangelist Gypsy Smith

Friday, March 06, 2009

Moving Faster

In...his 2010 budget plans, President Obama proposed limiting the value of the tax break for itemized deductions, including donations to charity, to 28 percent for families making more than $250,000. In other words, taxpayers would save 28 cents on their federal income taxes for each dollar donated.

That would reduce by as much as 20 percent the amount wealthy taxpayers could get in tax breaks. Under the current system, taxpayers who are in the 33 percent or 35 percent tax brackets use that rate to claim deductions.(The Chronicle of Philanthropy)

Why do I even bring this up? It seems like a small "limit the deduction and tax the rich" piece of legislation. Look a little deeper and beyond the present. Think of this as just the begining. In a Socialist nation the government takes control of everything. It is cradle to grave care for the people, but it is also cradle to grave dependence on the government: enslavement.
Imagine if this popular trend were to continue on a slippery slope. Deductions for charitable contributions were reduced further, and people greatly reduced thier giving. After all this is an increasingly selfish generation. The services now provided by the losing charities would be replaced by government $$ and programs. Those in need of the services would become more enslaved to the government, but more importantly THE GOVERNMENT WOULD CONTROL WHICH CHARITY GOT TO CONTINUE ITS WORK!!
Government replacement of charity work of course would completely be secularized. No religious organization would be allowed to receive anything! I'd say take the word charity, meaning love, out, and replace it with "social program", or in a word: SOCIALISM!
Now I don't think that this means all ouf our churches would close up. It doesn't matter if there is a tax deduction or not, our tithe belongs to God. The little people who go to church and love God are still going to give to its support. Its the bigger organizations that receive large sums from wealthy individuals and corperations that will be lost. Another group that will suffer are the politically and legally active pro-God organizations. I think these are the main targets of this begining legislation.
It is amazing that only 6 weeks into the Obama government, the thought process is so well developed and planned, that this idea would already be into the works. With a Socialist controlled Senate, House and White House, there is nothing in the way to stop this downhill race. This nation is certainly moving fast toward a Godless fate!

I had to edit this post because I forgot to include that the United States is giving 900 million dollars to rebuild the Gaza strip. This money will all end up in the hands of Hamas and be used to rocket and bomb Israel. Why will Hamas get the money? Because they are in complete control of the Gaza strip. The more Israel is backed into a corner alone, surrounded by its enemies, the closer to the end we get!
In addition to the Hamas money, the Obama Administration has announced that it will begin negotiations with Assyria and the Taliban! That right the same Taliban that is responsible for Osama Bin Laden and thre World Trade Tower distruction of 9/11.
If Hillary Clinton, Michelle Obama, and Nancy Pelosi put on a Burkka, I'm moving to Australia!!!