Perfect Words, Sustained Trust

Frequently you’ll hear people in the news say “Well Memorial Day is the unofficial start of summer”. Maybe. But for me it strikes a bit closer. For me, and many of you, it is a time of reflection for those who have given-as Abraham Lincoln said in his Gettysburg Address-”the last full measure of devotion”.

I could wax on about this. But why try to improve on what is perfect. Read President Lincoln’s words yourself and think about the moms and dads, sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, grandparents and other loved ones who will have an empty place at their table from this point forward. Let these words sink in. Let them nourish your sense of freedom and the sacrifice that comes with that liberty.

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us-that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion-that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain-that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom-and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

We must never forget those who have given their all, less we will have broken a trust that is so fundamental to a free society that we will no longer be worthy to be called a great land and a noble people.

God Bless America.

GLUTTONY

Gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins. In Conquering Gluttony, John Piper, observes that we generally associate gluttony with obesity.

But “gluttony” is a better word to use in this context rather than “obesity,” because overeating is where the problem is, not how much you weigh. There are all kinds of reasons why a person might weight too much or too little that is not a result of gluttony.

Gluttony is having a craving for food that conquers you.

In Rx for Gluttony, Dennis Okholm of Christianity Today provides a history of the Christian attitude towards gluttony making this curious observation.

Eating is also a problem in our culture. In one poll, 40 percent of the respondents said that “getting fat” was what they fear most in the world. This may be one reason that each day approximately 65 million Americans are dieting, and the sales of diet books outrank all other books on the market except for the Bible.

But few books, even those by Christians, spend much time on the topic of gluttony. In Whatever Became of Sin? (1973), Karl Menninger described how cultural, psychological language has replaced moral language in our culture. The dieting industry, even the Christian version, talks a lot about nutrition and eating disorders while sidelining gluttony.

Even as we sideline gluttony, we overeat. We sin, and we pretend that disorder is not sin. Yet gluttony is a rather difficult sin to avoid. Consider how the Catholic Encyclopedia begins its definition.

(From Lat. gluttire, to swallow, to gulp down), the excessive indulgence in food and drink. The moral deformity discernible in this vice lies in its defiance of the order postulated by reason, which prescribes necessity as the measure of indulgence in eating and drinking. This deordination, according to the teaching of the Angelic Doctor, may happen in five ways which are set forth in the scholastic verse: “Prae-propere, laute, nimis, ardenter, studiose” or, according to the apt rendering of Father Joseph Rickably: too soon, too expensively, too much, too eagerly, too daintily. (continued here)

What does Piper suggest we do to avoid being conquered by gluttony? That is quite interesting and makes it worth reading his article. Here is how he concludes Conquering Gluttony.

A lot of gluttony is born of boredom. Life is not satisfying or stimulating, relationships feel empty, and work is boring, but food is always there and tastes so good.

So we need to cultivate a range of appetites for great and good things, things like good literature, people’s fellowship, reading the Bible, nature, work, etc. Discover these other appetites so that things other than food can satisfy you. Then pray earnestly and cultivate and nurture these satisfactions.

Thinking in Christ

As Rx for Gluttony noted, gluttony as a sin is not much discussed as such.  Google the word gluttony, and you will get over 8 million hits. Many of those hits will promote overindulgence as a virtue. Yet overindulgence is a sin, and overeating — gluttony — is just one form of that sin.

Few websites, even Christian websites, speak of gluttony as a sin. However, when Russ White of Thinking in Christ spoke of the flesh yielding to the sin of homosexuality in One Way Free Will, he compared homosexually to gluttony, and he spoke of sin.

The technocrats, the elite, tell us the way to solve this problem is to turn our lives over into the tender hands of those who have made a science out of controlling people. What we need is someone who specializes in making us civilized, using drugs and technique to overcome our genetic disposition. Man’s future is, essentially, completely in the hands of these few elite technocrats. The goal is a communally organized state that furthers the evolution of humans.

Christianity has a different view of this problem. This genetic disposition towards anything is called original sin. Some people might tend towards sexual sins, and others towards sins of gluttony, and other towards sins of anger, or mental attitude, or many other things. But we all have a sin nature; it’s part of our genetic makeup. There is no way we can, on our own steam, overcome this genetic disposition.

Yes, gluttony is about overindulgence with food, but the sin is in the excess, putting more importance upon the sensation of eating than we do upon our love for God.  Thus, White urges us to glorify God, not to indulge in sin.

We are not to deliberately indulge in sin, nor are we to think about it Rom. 13:14). Rather, we are to think about how our lives can glorify God, and do those things. In doing so, we will stand out from the people of this world. Some might ridicule us, but others will be drawn to the light of Christ that shows in our lives. (from here)

What White promotes is Christian love. What White opposes is anything we would use in place of Christian love.

• Worth Reading notes that when a child knows motherly love, that child is less likely to become fat.
• Clothe Yourself in Christ explains the value of a making a conscious decision to think about the Lord and what He would have us do.
• Modern !Think explains that government provides no solution for gluttony or for overindulgence of any kind. If we are to become thinking beings, we must first turn to God.

Personal Observation

In 2007, as the Federal debt approached 9 trillion dollars, Congress’ own Government Accountability Office (GAO) warned of budgetary problems. That report contained lines like this.

• “In 1797, US government spending represented about 2% of the US economy and now represents over 20%.”
• “Government waste is growing and far exceeds the cost of fraud and abuse.”
• “Our current long-range fiscal path is clearly imprudent and fiscally unsustainable.”

Instead of heeding the GAO’s warning, Washington’s political establishment chose to recklessly to increase spending, spiking Federal debt upward.  Thus, in 2009, Congress increased U.S. government spending to 25 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Since then U.S. Government spending continues to remain above 24 percent of GDP. What this suggests is that the sin of overindulgence has become national crisis.

Reblogged from freedombytheway:

• 

in·teg·ri·ty:

noun. adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty

A 24-year old wins  $1 million in the Michigan lottery, purchases a home and a new car for cash,  yet she still uses her food stamp card to purchase $200 worth of groceries a month. Her lame explanation when confronted by a a local TV reporter is that she is out of work and needs the money.

Read more… 123 more words

Here is an example of why character education is so important. Consider that our government runs a secular school system. At best government school teachers properly instruct their students in reading, writing and arithmetic. At best their students go on to acquire further knowledge and skills. And why? Because they have been taught to desire money and status. Without the Bible teaching our forebears received, we lack knowledge of God. We fail to see we only have significance because God loves us. So we do not understand the need to return His love or to obey His commands. Thus, we lack the integrity He expects of us.

Reblogged from partneringwitheagles:

Here we have one man's explanation of what motivates a corporation. Consider that a corporation is a government chartered entity. Therefore, a corporation exists only so long as the government tolerates it. And what is corporation composed of? People. In one respect, a corporation is a soulless entity. If the people who own, run, and work for a corporation think of nothing more than what is required to make a profit, then their corporation will act as an amoral beast. Similarly, government can also behave as an amoral beast. Like a corporation, government too is collective composed of people. Citizens own government, leaders run government, and civil servants work for government. What is less clear is what motivates government. Profit clearly motivates a corporation, but what motivates government? The answer, I think, is power, the currency of government. Nonetheless, both government and corporations seem to operate checks upon their behavioral extremes. What are those checks? That, my friends, is each of us. So long as we as the owners of government and as the stockholders of corporations insist upon moral behavior, we can restrain the excesses of both government and corporations.

Check out this video from the BillWhittleChannel

Watched it? Then consider this question. What is government? When the average Liberal hears a Conservative complaining about big government, how does that Liberal respond? Doesn’t the Liberal usually respond with an accusation: “You hate government.” What Whittle points out is that what Conservatives detest is not government, its welfare and entitlement programs. What do welfare and entitlement programs have to do with governing a nation?

The term “entitlement” is in fact nothing more than a euphemism. What we call an entitlement involves nothing more than taking money out of one person’s pocket and putting it into another person’s pocket.

You say you are “entitled” your Social Security and Medicare? The money that was suppose to be set aside for those programs was spent by buying yours and other people’s votes. Government never saves any money; government spends every cent it gets. So you already got your entitlement. If you want Social Security and Medicare too, then you have to rob your children and grandchildren.