Best of 2018: Real Help for Addicted Vets

Imagine an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. People sit in a group. My name is _________. I’ve been sober for three years. . . . I’ve been sober for six months. . . . I’ve been sober for ten years.

Then one stands and says, “I’ve been coming to these meetings and I’d been sober for two years, but this week I fell. I got drunk two days ago.”

Further, imagine that the other members tell this person he has to leave. He can no longer receive the help and encouragement of the group because he failed–once.

And because of this failure, he becomes homeless.

Continue reading “Best of 2018: Real Help for Addicted Vets”

How Much Tech Is Too Much?

Manhunt: Unabomber on Netflix is an excellent series about the search for Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber. Tightly woven storytelling, great performances, and an accurate, balanced rendering of Kaczynski’s story bring us to his purpose–even his prophecy–that technology binds us more than it frees us.
But his violence muted his message.
Kaczynski had been a math prodigy. He had not been a popular child in school. But because of his high intelligence (an IQ higher than that of Stephen Hawking), he moved up two grades. He suffered torment, partly because of his awkwardness, partly because children can be so cruel. Continue reading “How Much Tech Is Too Much?”

BLOGPOST:Drug addiction, a form of slavery

“The Moth don’t care when he sees The Flame.
He might get burned, but he’s in the game.
And once he’s in, he can’t go back, he’ll
Beat his wings ’til he burns them black…
No, The Moth don’t care when he sees The Flame. . .
The Moth don’t care if The Flame is real,
‘Cause Flame and Moth got a sweetheart deal.
And nothing fuels a good flirtation,
Like Need and Anger and Desperation…
No, The Moth don’t care if The Flame is real,”  —Aimee Mann.
Typically translated as witchcraft or sorcery, pharmakeia appears in the New Testament three times: Galatians 5: 20 and Revelation 9: 21 and 18: 23. Its earlier meaning related only to medicine. But by the time of Christ, the word had developed multiple meanings, including the use of drugs, poisoning, sorcery, or the seduction of idolatry.
Paul’s use of the word in Galatians–as he lists the “acts of the flesh”–refers to the “evil use of drugs.”It indicates a mixture of illicit drug use and the occult.
Today, drug addiction holds all the connotations of pharmakeia. Oh, it’s not directly connected to the occult as it was in the days of the apostles. But the evil it carries is profound. It is physically, mentally, and psychologically damaging. It carries all the menaces of an evil spell. Continue reading “BLOGPOST:Drug addiction, a form of slavery”

Flying on Splinted Wings

Yet those who wait for the Lord Will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary. Isaiah 40:31. 
Flying was the “forgotten dream” of a bird with a broken wing.
As he was walking one day, my grandson saw a bird that couldn’t fly. He wrote the incident in verse. The wounded creature could see other birds aloft but could not join them in the “fields of blue and white.”
People are supposed to fly. I don’t mean in the theoretical sense of the old saying that if God had intended our flight, He would have given us wings.
He did give us wings–wings of heart and soul. Sometimes, life crushes those wings. Crushed spirits can only watch others fly. Pornography is a monster that crushes the spirits of men, women, and children.
But America is double minded about pornography. Here is an example: Continue reading “Flying on Splinted Wings”

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