Dear KMAG: 20200614 Open Topic

It’s not just a difference of political viewpoint.

The Gospel is hidden to those who are lost,
whose unbelieving minds the god of this world has blinded.

This Sanctuary Sunday Open Thread, with full respect to those who worship God on the Sabbath, is a place to reaffirm our worship of our Creator, our Father, our King Eternal. It’s an opportunity to let the events of this world grow increasingly dim, while we focus on things above – God’s glory and grace.

“Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”

It’s also a place to read, post and discuss news that is worth knowing and sharing. Please post links to any news stories that you use as sources or quote from.

In the QTree, we’re a friendly and civil lot. We encourage free speech and the open exchange and civil discussion of different ideas. Topics aren’t constrained, and sound logic is highly encouraged, all built on a solid foundation of truth and established facts.

We have a policy of mutual respect, shown by civility. Civility encourages discussions, promotes objectivity and rational thought in discourse, and camaraderie in the participants – characteristics we strive toward in our Q Tree community.

Please show respect and consideration for your fellow QTreepers. Before hitting the “post” button, please proofread your post and make sure you’re addressing the issue only, and not trying to confront the poster.

Keep to the topic – avoid “you” and “your”. Here in The Q Tree, personal attacks, name calling, ridicule, insults, baiting and other conduct for which a penalty flag would be thrown are VERBOTEN.

In The Q Tree, we’re compatriots, sitting around the campfire, roasting hot dogs, making s’mores and discussing, agreeing, and disagreeing about whatever interests us. This board will remain a home for those who seek respectful conversations.

Please also consider the Guidelines for posting and discussion , outlined here. Let’s not give the Internet Censors a reason to shut down this intellectual haven that Wolf has created for us.

The Storm is upon us.
Please remember to Pray for our President.

Our movement is about
replacing a failed and CORRUPT political establishment
with a new government
controlled by you, the American People.

~ Candidate Donald J. Trump

Also remember Wheatie’s Rules:

1. No food fights.
2. No running with scissors.
3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.

And,

On this day and every day –

God is in Control
. . . and His Grace is Sufficient, so . . .
Keep Looking Up

Hopefully, every Sunday, you can find something here that will build you up a little . . . give you a smile . . . and add some joy or peace, very much needed in all our lives.

“This day is holy to the Lord your God; do not mourn nor weep.” . . . “Go your way, eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to those for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

The Signs of the Times

WuFlu Spreads – Nursing Homes Decimated – Isolation – Social Distancing

Excessive Force – Racial Prejudice – Riots – Looting – Burnings – Injuries – Death

Throw Water, Then “Shakes” – Then Bottles, Bricks, Bullets and Bombs

Hands Up – Take A Knee – Defund Police – Sign Black Agenda

Demonstrate In Parks, Then Streets – Occupy City Hall, Then Precinct

Antifa – Black Lives Matter – Marxists – Socialist Bureaucrats

Lying Media – Corrupt Politicians – Traitors – Anarchists

Millions in the U.S. either personally believe or support people who believe that:

• Although the threat of spread of COVID-19 requires that businesses and churches must be closed, families isolated in their homes, people prohibited from using parks or walking alone on a deserted beach, it’s acceptable for thousands of people to gather together for hours to protest police use of excessive force, and, in the process, killing and injuring people, looting and burning businesses.

• Although 3,000 Black Americans are murdered by Black Americans every year without public protest, it’s acceptable to riot, causing multiple deaths, hundreds of police injuries, and hundreds of millions of dollars of damage, because systemic racial prejudice by police is baselessly assumed as the root cause of the death of a drug addicted, porn acting, counterfeit money-passing career criminal with multiple convictions and jail sentences.

• Although pets and other animals must be treated with care and compassion, it’s acceptable to strike people you disagree with politically with bike locks, hammers, 2 x 4s and the like.

• Although micro aggressions must be identified and stopped because they’re hurtful, it’s acceptable to loot and burn down businesses as a means of protesting policies or actions you disagree with.

• Although COVID-19 requires that extreme isolation and quarantine actions be taken to prevent its spread, it’s acceptable to require that COVID-19 positive patients be placed in nursing homes with elderly patients with comorbidities who are the most vulnerable group for death in the U.S. population.

• Although your psychological health and physical well-being must be protected, it’s acceptable to mechanically tear apart babies in the womb or cut the spinal cord of their exposed heads with scissors to kill them, and then to sell their body parts for thousands of dollars.

• Although Socialist leaders and regimes have ruined the lives and caused the deaths of millions of people in the last century, it’s acceptable to insist on more and more Socialist policies be included in the laws and services of our democratic constitutional republic, the most successful government on earth.

These “Although” and “it’s acceptable” examples are just a few of the many inexplicable dichotomies that are integral to the destructive mindset of millions.

Most of us are bewildered at the lack of facts and logic that are inherent to this mindset.  We can’t comprehend how these harmful views can be held by any rational person, let alone millions of them.

Our laws are generally based on our Judeo-Christian heritage, principles and beliefs.  And therein, I believe, lies the root of the problem.

The two great principles that form the basis of Jewish and Christian thought and practice are:

Deuteronomy 6:5  You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

Or, more expansively,

Deuteronomy 10:12-13  And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good?

And,

Leviticus 19:18  You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:34  The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.

And, of course, as summarized by Jesus,

Matthew 22:36-40  Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?  Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

Love God and love your neighbor.  These are simple in concept, but, because we are weak, flawed and fallible humans, impossible in practice. 

But, these are God’s commands for us and, because He knows they are impossible for us in practice, “He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”  This is the Gospel that forms the beginning and foundation for our Christian beliefs.

If you try to apply general Christian teachings to support any of the “Although” and “it’s acceptable” examples above, you will fail.

Do we have Christian principles that tend to support forming crowds to protest certain actions . . . crowds that are first merely disruptive, but then lead to disobeying police, physical violence, looting, burning of businesses and injury and death?

1 Peter 2:17  – Show proper respect to everyone, love the family of believers, fear God, honor the emperor.

Romans 13:1 – Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.

Romans 12:18  If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.

1 Timothy 2:1-2 – I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people – for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.

Do we have Christian principles that would in any way condone policies that endanger then result in deaths of thousands of elderly?  The elderly are not people who have become a burden on society and who are now subject to removal.

Leviticus 19:32 “You shall stand up before the gray head and honor the face of an old man, and you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.

Do we have Christian principles that even remotely permit the killing of a baby in the womb, let alone allowing a born baby to dehydrate and die over a period of days after birth?

Job 31:15  Did not He who made me in the womb make him, and the same One fashion us in the womb?

Jeremiah 1:5  Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you;

Do we have Christian principles that mandate or support Socialism as a form of government?

There are many Biblical examples for those that have material goods to remember and even be generous to the poor.  But there is nothing that mandates or supports local government in confiscating the wealth of those that have more and distributing it to those that have less.

We are guided in our ethics, our morals, and our sense of right and wrong by God’s Word, our parents, our pastors, our friends and associates and the influence that God’s Word has had on society as a whole and our general precepts and specific laws.

But, referring back to the destructive mindset, there are millions in our country who don’t seem to be influenced by Judeo-Christian principles.  They seem to live at a different level of understanding than we do.  They don’t need and won’t accept facts or logic that contradict or show the negative consequences of their destructive mindset.

It’s as though they have fallen under the influence and control of something or someone else.  Well, perhaps that is exactly the answer.

John 1:5  The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

Romans 1:28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done.

1 Corinthians 2:14  But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.

2 Corinthians 4:3-4  But even if our gospel is hidden, it is hidden only to those who are lost, whose unbelieving minds the god of this world has blinded, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them.

And that, I believe, is why it is entirely appropriate to label the violent demonstrations, the physical attacks on police and on the people supporting President Trump, the looting and burning of businesses, the resultant injuries and deaths, the recent calls to defund or disband those that enforce our laws, . . . all these actions operating in opposition to the Judeo-Christian principles that guide our lives . . . as evil, absolutely evil.

We may sooner or later get out of the messes that are near or at the level of a direct threat against the continued existence of our country, but we must not forget . . .

“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 I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.

Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
His truth is marching on.

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps,
His day is marching on.

I have read His fiery gospel writ in rows of burnished steel!
“As ye deal with my contemners, so with you My grace shall deal!
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,”
Since God is marching on.

He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat;
Oh, be swift, my soul, to answer Him; be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free!
While God is marching on.