I have been putting this off, waiting for an announcement of another child in our family. So far, it has not materialized, and the month is nearly over, so I will go ahead with the currently known ones.
March 3 – Bobby – my brand new great-nephew, son of Bob and Suzanne
March 12 – the birthdate of my half-sister Lucille who died as a child – born 1920, died 1923
March 16 – Marlin, my ex-son-in-law, with whom I stay connected
March 23 – my nephew David, youngest son of my brother Paul
March 25 – my great-great-nephew, Sekander, great-grandson of my sister Lois
March 30 – my nephew Richard, older brother to David
March 30 – my niece Amy, daughter of my brother Gale
My father's only child by his first marriage, Mary, was born in March of 1907 (I haven't got the exact date), and died in October of the same year.
Still waiting to hear about Lena and Travis's child who was due to be born this month. Lena is the step-daughter of my nephew Richard.
Well, I blew it – here it is April and I haven't posted the March blog yet. And I still haven't heard about Lena and Travis's baby.
For the currently known April birthdays:
April 1 – Lois's granddaughter, Meghan
April 1 – also Meghan's step-sister Taryn
April 11 – my sister Mildred (Middy)
April 19 – my great-nephew (grandson of Paul) Paul III
Guess that's it for now. Maybe I'll have something new to blog about one of these days.
OK, got info on the new baby – Harper Sara. She was born February 27. Lena and Travis's baby.
Monday, April 25, 2011
Monday, February 28, 2011
February
I guess I have to get at and write another blog, since the month of February is almost over, and I haven’t posted birthdays yet. I have been working as a township auditor, and every year the records are worse than the previous year. We’re getting a new secretary, so hopefully, that will improve things.
So, here are the February birthdays:
My mother’s was February 1. She would be 113 were she still living.
February 4 – my great-niece Emily
February 20 – my brother-in-law George, who went to be with the Lord over 5 years ago.
February 25 – my sister Lily
February 28 – my brother Gale
February 28 – my niece Jenny (Gale’s daughter, and Emily’s mother)
We expect 2 brand new entries next month!
I’m trying to get Mike to submit some of his writing for publication, and he thinks it’s not good enough. He says he doesn’t have enough knowledge to write publishing quality stuff. The last story he wrote was absolutely fantastic, but it wouldn’t qualify for publication for other reasons – it’s of the “fan fiction” genre.
Guess that’s all I have to say for now, to get this posted before the month is over!
So, here are the February birthdays:
My mother’s was February 1. She would be 113 were she still living.
February 4 – my great-niece Emily
February 20 – my brother-in-law George, who went to be with the Lord over 5 years ago.
February 25 – my sister Lily
February 28 – my brother Gale
February 28 – my niece Jenny (Gale’s daughter, and Emily’s mother)
We expect 2 brand new entries next month!
I’m trying to get Mike to submit some of his writing for publication, and he thinks it’s not good enough. He says he doesn’t have enough knowledge to write publishing quality stuff. The last story he wrote was absolutely fantastic, but it wouldn’t qualify for publication for other reasons – it’s of the “fan fiction” genre.
Guess that’s all I have to say for now, to get this posted before the month is over!
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Starting Over
I have been neglecting my blog quite a bit lately. For a couple of years, I was posting family birthdays for every month, and sometimes that’s all I had to post. But my sister Lois said she liked that, so I’m going to try to proceed with the same this year.
Birthdays for January:
January 12 – my great-nephew Colin
January 16 – an unnamed niece
January 22 – my twin nieces, Judy and Jackie
January 26 – my niece Connie and my new great-great-niece – Elena – born today! Jackie’s granddaughter
I had been going to write a blog about the Golden Rule, comparing “versions” of it from various religions – many of the non-Christian, non-Jewish religions having forms that are “less” than what we know as the Golden Rule. For instance, some say “Do good to others so that they will do good to you;’ others say “Do good to others so they won’t do evil to you.” These are based on self-preservation, while the “real” Golden rule is based on doing for others – regardless of how it affects oneself. I decided not to go into that in detail after reading C.S. Lewis’s “Mere Christianity.” He describes the universal nature of the golden rule on the fact that it is born within us – part of our nature as God made us. He says every culture, every religion has a sense that some things are right, and others are wrong. They are not necessarily correct in specifics, but they have the general view of right and wrong. Only Christianity – and to an extent, Judaism – tell us the real reasons why some things are right and others are wrong. I highly recommend this book by Lewis. I don’t agree with every detail that he says throughout this book, but, as he says, if it doesn’t help, drop it.
Birthdays for January:
January 12 – my great-nephew Colin
January 16 – an unnamed niece
January 22 – my twin nieces, Judy and Jackie
January 26 – my niece Connie and my new great-great-niece – Elena – born today! Jackie’s granddaughter
I had been going to write a blog about the Golden Rule, comparing “versions” of it from various religions – many of the non-Christian, non-Jewish religions having forms that are “less” than what we know as the Golden Rule. For instance, some say “Do good to others so that they will do good to you;’ others say “Do good to others so they won’t do evil to you.” These are based on self-preservation, while the “real” Golden rule is based on doing for others – regardless of how it affects oneself. I decided not to go into that in detail after reading C.S. Lewis’s “Mere Christianity.” He describes the universal nature of the golden rule on the fact that it is born within us – part of our nature as God made us. He says every culture, every religion has a sense that some things are right, and others are wrong. They are not necessarily correct in specifics, but they have the general view of right and wrong. Only Christianity – and to an extent, Judaism – tell us the real reasons why some things are right and others are wrong. I highly recommend this book by Lewis. I don’t agree with every detail that he says throughout this book, but, as he says, if it doesn’t help, drop it.
Monday, October 25, 2010
The King James Cult
“The Authorized Version” – the KJV cultists use this as their main base of claiming this to be “the” Word of God.
The truth is that it is called the Authorized Version because the translation was made on an authorization from King James to a group of people who wanted a standard Bible for usage at their time. It was a very good translation – no doubt the very best translation of its time. It is still a good translation. But it is not, all by itself, God’s Holy Word exclusively. Much of the language is obsolete, so that relatively few people can understand some parts of it. Also, there have been new discoveries of older manuscripts of parts of the Bible that were unavailable at the time this translation was made. As I understand it, because some parts of the Bible were not available in the original language to the translators of the KJV, they copied those portions from existing translations that they deemed reliable. Therefore, there is an indication that new translations or upgrades of the old translations are indicated. The New King James Version is one of those. It keeps most of the poetic language of the KJV, but changes some of the obsolete words to modern words with the same meaning. I understand, too, that it has corrected some minor errors by using old manuscripts that were not available to the translators in 1611. For this reason, it is rejected by the KJV cultists.
God will preserve His Word – the KJV cultists insist that this refers to the KJV and to the KJV only.
God will preserve His Word – through every honest and holy intended translation; despite possible small errors, the essential gospel and the Word of God is maintained. Even through multiple translations, He will still preserve His Word. The Douay-Rheims translation was made roughly at the same time as the KJV. It was translated from the Latin, which was translated from the original languages. There is truth in the saying “It loses something in the translation,” because most languages are not equal to one another in specific nuances and sometimes even deeper meanings. Based on this, all translations should be quite faulty, and especially a double translation, such as the Douay-Rheims. But put the KJV and the D-R side by side, and, except for the Latin influence on many of the words in the D-R, you will find them amazingly similar. God will preserve His Word!
All great revivals have occurred using the KJV
Aside from those recorded in the Bible, this may be true – but to attribute this solely to this version of the Bible is overlooking one very great occurrence that happened almost simultaneously with the KJV translation – people started reading the Bible on their own, and seeing for themselves what God’s Word says.
The KJV cultists disregard all Bible commentators of the past. They claim they were just “showing off their knowledge of the languages.” Well, it seems to me that if they know the languages so well, they must have a good idea of what they are commenting on. Furthermore, nobody writes a Bible commentary to “show off.” How many people read Bible commentaries? Precious few! If they wanted to “show off” their knowledge of the language, they would be translating what might be considered great secular works, not “wasting” their time with musty Bible commentaries that practically no one reads!
The KJV cultists do not even accept the “authenticity” of a Bible translated into another language. This is one of their greatest travesties, to deny God’s Word to people who do not speak English.
The KJV cultists spend their time trying to convince people that the KJV is the only true “God’s Word.” This breeds division and dissension. This is a Satanic influence, not a godly one. These people spend their time going around telling people, “you must accept this version of the Bible as the only true Word of God.” They have forgotten the great commission – “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” They are “preaching” their own gospel, not the gospel of Jesus Christ. If the disciples had asked Jesus if there would be any problem with translating the Bible into different languages so that the people they ministered to would have it available in their own language, or even to make changes when the language changes, I am sure He would have said, “Absolutely not! Do whatever it takes to bring the gospel to every person on the face of the earth.”
These people think they are doing God’s will, but instead, they are causing division and dissension. They need to have a Damascus Road experience. Saul thought he was doing God’s will, too, until his Damascus Road experience showed him otherwise.
Whether or not the following is true throughout the KJV cultists, I don’t know. But the one I know quite well believes that the book of James was written by the brother of John. It is generally accepted by scholars that it was written by the Lord’s brother James, who was the head of the church in Jerusalem. The above-mentioned person claimed that James wrote about works because he didn’t know about grace, implying that “grace” became known only through Paul’s ministry, and James (the brother of John) had died before that, thus “works” was all he knew. Of course, among experts on Biblical history, it is known that the gospel of Mark was the first book of the NT that was written, and it was written in AD 65 - long after the death of James, the brother of John.
Another issue of the KJV cult is that not all of the Bible is for everybody, that parts are for different peoples, most specifically, Jews or Christians. That is doing one of those things the KJV cultists are constantly harping on about people who consider other translations OK. They are taking from God’s Word.
The person I know who is involved in this cult has told his children that they don’t need to go to church – that he can tell them everything they need to know. The book he gave me (which I burned) I glanced at briefly, and saw that it had a great deal condemning the apocrypha – but the apocrypha is included in the (original) 1611 King James version.
A caveat: It appears to me that some of the modern translations, although very good, try too hard to put the Bible into modern language that they sometimes use words that lose the nuances of the original. However, I don’t believe that these necessarily distort the gospel. Also, beware of “paraphrases,” because some of them read the writers personal interpretation into what they write. Nevertheless, I don’t think they necessarily distort the gospel, either.
GOD WILL PRESERVE HIS WORD – NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES IT IS TRANSLATED, AND WHAT LANGUAGES IT IS TRANSLATED INTO.
The truth is that it is called the Authorized Version because the translation was made on an authorization from King James to a group of people who wanted a standard Bible for usage at their time. It was a very good translation – no doubt the very best translation of its time. It is still a good translation. But it is not, all by itself, God’s Holy Word exclusively. Much of the language is obsolete, so that relatively few people can understand some parts of it. Also, there have been new discoveries of older manuscripts of parts of the Bible that were unavailable at the time this translation was made. As I understand it, because some parts of the Bible were not available in the original language to the translators of the KJV, they copied those portions from existing translations that they deemed reliable. Therefore, there is an indication that new translations or upgrades of the old translations are indicated. The New King James Version is one of those. It keeps most of the poetic language of the KJV, but changes some of the obsolete words to modern words with the same meaning. I understand, too, that it has corrected some minor errors by using old manuscripts that were not available to the translators in 1611. For this reason, it is rejected by the KJV cultists.
God will preserve His Word – the KJV cultists insist that this refers to the KJV and to the KJV only.
God will preserve His Word – through every honest and holy intended translation; despite possible small errors, the essential gospel and the Word of God is maintained. Even through multiple translations, He will still preserve His Word. The Douay-Rheims translation was made roughly at the same time as the KJV. It was translated from the Latin, which was translated from the original languages. There is truth in the saying “It loses something in the translation,” because most languages are not equal to one another in specific nuances and sometimes even deeper meanings. Based on this, all translations should be quite faulty, and especially a double translation, such as the Douay-Rheims. But put the KJV and the D-R side by side, and, except for the Latin influence on many of the words in the D-R, you will find them amazingly similar. God will preserve His Word!
All great revivals have occurred using the KJV
Aside from those recorded in the Bible, this may be true – but to attribute this solely to this version of the Bible is overlooking one very great occurrence that happened almost simultaneously with the KJV translation – people started reading the Bible on their own, and seeing for themselves what God’s Word says.
The KJV cultists disregard all Bible commentators of the past. They claim they were just “showing off their knowledge of the languages.” Well, it seems to me that if they know the languages so well, they must have a good idea of what they are commenting on. Furthermore, nobody writes a Bible commentary to “show off.” How many people read Bible commentaries? Precious few! If they wanted to “show off” their knowledge of the language, they would be translating what might be considered great secular works, not “wasting” their time with musty Bible commentaries that practically no one reads!
The KJV cultists do not even accept the “authenticity” of a Bible translated into another language. This is one of their greatest travesties, to deny God’s Word to people who do not speak English.
The KJV cultists spend their time trying to convince people that the KJV is the only true “God’s Word.” This breeds division and dissension. This is a Satanic influence, not a godly one. These people spend their time going around telling people, “you must accept this version of the Bible as the only true Word of God.” They have forgotten the great commission – “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” They are “preaching” their own gospel, not the gospel of Jesus Christ. If the disciples had asked Jesus if there would be any problem with translating the Bible into different languages so that the people they ministered to would have it available in their own language, or even to make changes when the language changes, I am sure He would have said, “Absolutely not! Do whatever it takes to bring the gospel to every person on the face of the earth.”
These people think they are doing God’s will, but instead, they are causing division and dissension. They need to have a Damascus Road experience. Saul thought he was doing God’s will, too, until his Damascus Road experience showed him otherwise.
Whether or not the following is true throughout the KJV cultists, I don’t know. But the one I know quite well believes that the book of James was written by the brother of John. It is generally accepted by scholars that it was written by the Lord’s brother James, who was the head of the church in Jerusalem. The above-mentioned person claimed that James wrote about works because he didn’t know about grace, implying that “grace” became known only through Paul’s ministry, and James (the brother of John) had died before that, thus “works” was all he knew. Of course, among experts on Biblical history, it is known that the gospel of Mark was the first book of the NT that was written, and it was written in AD 65 - long after the death of James, the brother of John.
Another issue of the KJV cult is that not all of the Bible is for everybody, that parts are for different peoples, most specifically, Jews or Christians. That is doing one of those things the KJV cultists are constantly harping on about people who consider other translations OK. They are taking from God’s Word.
The person I know who is involved in this cult has told his children that they don’t need to go to church – that he can tell them everything they need to know. The book he gave me (which I burned) I glanced at briefly, and saw that it had a great deal condemning the apocrypha – but the apocrypha is included in the (original) 1611 King James version.
A caveat: It appears to me that some of the modern translations, although very good, try too hard to put the Bible into modern language that they sometimes use words that lose the nuances of the original. However, I don’t believe that these necessarily distort the gospel. Also, beware of “paraphrases,” because some of them read the writers personal interpretation into what they write. Nevertheless, I don’t think they necessarily distort the gospel, either.
GOD WILL PRESERVE HIS WORD – NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES IT IS TRANSLATED, AND WHAT LANGUAGES IT IS TRANSLATED INTO.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Heaven or Hell
This is based on some discussion going on on RO. A number of skeptics worry about God "sending" people to hell for eternity when they sinned for such a comparatively short time.
What did God do for us and to us and why
The crucifixion & resurrection:
It was not “just” death on the cross, and 3 days, and then all over. Jesus, the sinless One, paid the penalty and bore the sins of all man kind – from creation to now, and to the end, whenever that is. Can you imagine, being completely innocent, and yet bearing the guilt for the worst person you know? Multiply that to all the guilt of all people whoever lived and ever will live. I don’t think we are capable of even beginning to comprehend what Christ suffered from his arrest until the resurrection.
Heaven and Hell:
They are not simply “reward” and “punishment;” they are what we choose. We have the 70+/- years here on earth to make a decision. Make no mistake, it is our decision, not His. If we do not choose to make that decision for Christ, there is no place left for us except Hell. Hell was not originally meant to “house” human beings – it was made for “the devil and his angels.” But for people who refuse to choose Christ, the only way to Heaven, there is no other place for them. In Isaiah 5:14, it says that “Hell has enlarged herself.” This was necessary to accommodate the people who choose it. It is not necessarily a punishment. It is our choice. It is true that there are degrees of punishment and reward. The degrees of punishment seem to be based on knowledge more than the degree of the sin we commit – if we can even divide sin into degrees. Jesus said that more will be required of those who know more. This is in the Christian life, as well as in the non-Christian life.
We have all this life to make the decision. We can’t lay the blame on God if we make the wrong one. God is not punishing us for 70+/- years of sin. We have brought the punishment upon ourselves for refusing to accept the free gift he purchased with his blood, and is offering to us.
As for, why did God make us with free will? Because he wanted us to serve him by our own choice, not because we have no choice.
And who is eligible for salvation? The answer is in I Peter 3:9 – everyone – “He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” We all – every single one of us, every person who has ever lived and who will ever live – have that choice. If we make the right choice, we will spend eternity with Him in Heaven. If we don’t make a choice – well, that is impossible, because by not making the right choice, by default, we make the wrong choice.
What did God do for us and to us and why
The crucifixion & resurrection:
It was not “just” death on the cross, and 3 days, and then all over. Jesus, the sinless One, paid the penalty and bore the sins of all man kind – from creation to now, and to the end, whenever that is. Can you imagine, being completely innocent, and yet bearing the guilt for the worst person you know? Multiply that to all the guilt of all people whoever lived and ever will live. I don’t think we are capable of even beginning to comprehend what Christ suffered from his arrest until the resurrection.
Heaven and Hell:
They are not simply “reward” and “punishment;” they are what we choose. We have the 70+/- years here on earth to make a decision. Make no mistake, it is our decision, not His. If we do not choose to make that decision for Christ, there is no place left for us except Hell. Hell was not originally meant to “house” human beings – it was made for “the devil and his angels.” But for people who refuse to choose Christ, the only way to Heaven, there is no other place for them. In Isaiah 5:14, it says that “Hell has enlarged herself.” This was necessary to accommodate the people who choose it. It is not necessarily a punishment. It is our choice. It is true that there are degrees of punishment and reward. The degrees of punishment seem to be based on knowledge more than the degree of the sin we commit – if we can even divide sin into degrees. Jesus said that more will be required of those who know more. This is in the Christian life, as well as in the non-Christian life.
We have all this life to make the decision. We can’t lay the blame on God if we make the wrong one. God is not punishing us for 70+/- years of sin. We have brought the punishment upon ourselves for refusing to accept the free gift he purchased with his blood, and is offering to us.
As for, why did God make us with free will? Because he wanted us to serve him by our own choice, not because we have no choice.
And who is eligible for salvation? The answer is in I Peter 3:9 – everyone – “He is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” We all – every single one of us, every person who has ever lived and who will ever live – have that choice. If we make the right choice, we will spend eternity with Him in Heaven. If we don’t make a choice – well, that is impossible, because by not making the right choice, by default, we make the wrong choice.
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