For many this is a very different and tumultuous Thanksgiving Day. Despite the circumstances, we who have given our minds and hearts to our Heavenly Father, will find our joy in giving Him our thanks for our eternal lives in Him. Keep Looking Up!
I pray your day was blessed in the Name of YeshuaJesus.
Here’s an article I found interesting regarding America’s Founding 400 years ago this year:
Why we chose 1620 as the year of our true founding, not 1619.
Church services, as well all know, have been disrupted for most of this year. While the internet certainly has offered a wonderful way for Bible teaching and preaching, it is not the only one. Additionally, watching or even listening to a church service via the internet is not available to all.
Pastor James, SlimJim, wrote about the need for equipping church members with the means to receive internet church here: Donate Electronic Device so At-Risk Members can have Church service online.
How have other churches reached their members apart from the internet? I’d like to hear about it. Please comment.
When Parkside Church began limited services at the end of August, it did so outside. Church was on the grass, with families physically distanced (don’t you like that term better than socially distanced? Courtesy of a Minnesota Epidemiologist.) Those who chose could simply park in the parking lot and listen. What, open windows and try to hear? No. On their car/truck radios.
Using a very low power FM transmitter is legal for use in the United States. Not all low-power transmitters on the AM and FM broadcast band that are sold on Amazon are actually legal, as they are not “Type Accepted” by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FCC regulates broadcasts over the air in America.
Parkside’s transmission of a Sunday evening service to the parking lot was probably stretching the distance for which these low-power transmitters are useful. Of course, that’s the idea. License-free broadcasting is designed for a very limited use, also limiting its interference capabilities.
Some American manufacturers claim their products reach much farther, even a couple miles. However, this is pretty misleading, as the specifications by the FCC are such that the transmitters are not capable of such range. In fact, they must produce only the most minimal received signal at even 200 feet. Parked in a car under 200 feet from the church, the service might be heard, if the transmitter is legal in the US.
So Parkside, for instance, isn’t going to be able to broadcast throughout its community using its FM transmitter.
Pastor James might be able use a transmitter like this to reach at-risk members of his congregation, but only if they park in front of the church. This is possible. However, during the Spring, in Michigan, just parking in a parking lot was “illegal,” and subject to law enforcement action.
So, any other ways to reach out without internet?
The FCC has opened up a pathway for community broadcast stations. The licensing fees aren’t cheap, but much cheaper than commercial broadcast licensing, which is hard to get and can cost in the millions of dollars. Unfortunately, these community broadcast licenses aren’t all that easy to obtain either. From what I’ve read, the application process and review by the FCC is difficult, usually requiring experienced legal teams. And then there is the FCC review process, making it more difficult.
Two long-standing ways to broadcast a sermon are “buying air time” on local radio and television stations. Radio is by far cheaper. In Susanville, CA, in 1985-86, Lassen County Christians made thirty-second public service announcements (PSA) to reach out Christian messages. Local churches aired their sermons on Sunday morning. And larger churches in more populated cities had their Sunday service broadcast on a local television station.
For the last twenty something years I’ve not watched TV over the air, having subscribed to either cable TV or Satellite TV. These days, my wife and moved entirely to internet use. Perhaps there are some Sunday church services that are viewable in your area. As for the local radio broadcast stations near me, there two FM stations that broadcast exclusively Christian content, one mostly music, while the other does broadcast syndicated content from the large ministries.
Would a local radio station broadcast a pastor’s Sunday service, like back in the days before internet? Might be worth asking. However, it’s not going to be cheap. It’s not going to be affordable to a small church pastor that just wants to make sure his people are able to at least hear the Sunday Word.
Any other ideas? Yes. Next time, L-RD willin’
L-RD Bless, Keep, Shine. . .
To the choirmaster: according to The Sheminith A Psalm of David.
1 Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone;
for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man.
2 Everyone utters lies to his neighbor;
with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.
3 May the LORD cut off all flattering lips,
the tongue that makes great boasts,
4 those who say, “With our tongue we will prevail,
our lips are with us; who is master over us?”
5 “Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan,
I will now arise,” says the LORD;
“I will place him in the safety for which he longs.”
6 The words of the LORD are pure words,
like silver refined in a furnace on the ground,
purified seven times.
7 You, O LORD, will keep them;
you will guard usb from this generation forever.
8 On every side the wicked prowl,
as vileness is exalted among the children of man.
Psalm 12
Evangelist Franklin Graham is urging Christians to partake in a day of fasting and prayer on Sunday, October 25, just 9 days before the 2020 Presidential election. Graham, who leads humanitarian aid organization Samaritan’s Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, announced the event on social media. “I am urging followers of Jesus Christ to […]
WE NEED TO CALL OUT TO GOD’: FRANKLIN GRAHAM CALLS FOR A DAY OF FASTING, PRAYER AHEAD OF ELECTION — jesussocial
Today I am reposting “Peace On Earth,” which was written and posted four years ago.
There’s a scene from some movie that just popped itself into my mind. There’s an angry man spouting off about something, and another man says to him, “Ah, does someone need a hug?” Anger isn’t exactly an emotion; rather it attempts to cover an emotion. And a hug from “Mom” can go a long way to rid one of anger, expose the underlying emotion, and sooth it. Unless, that is, that a person has a problem with Mom. Dr. Sigmund Freud was hung up on “Mom” and sex, and peoples Oedipus-like desires to have sex with their moms and kill there fathers. He thought that while we were still babies our fantasies centered around having Mom all to our selves and not letting Dad near her. It didn’t work too well, and some people never got over it all. They grow up to find other ways to get even with their moms and dads.
So with 300 million people living in America and a social media that puts everyone in everyone else’s face all the time, feathers are going to be ruffled as we play out our Oedipus fantasies on each other. People have their underlying emotions stirred, that then surge, and the result is that angry words spew forth. People discover there are other people that feel the same way, and they gather together to protest someone they feel has offended them. Lately it’s been presidential candidates who’ve modeled the use of verbal assault weapons, and become the object of protests. Conflict. And the television/internet media gets to watch, film, and report all of it to an eager audience, perpetuating the cycle of conflict.
Why can’t people just get along? Why isn’t there peace on Earth?
Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. [Jesus said]
— Matthew 10:34
Why? Why does it seem there needs to be conflict? In a writing class, I was once instructed on the use of conflict and resolution. In a story the author allows conflict to drive the story along. building a certain tension. At some point the author must allow the reader to feel resolution, too. There must be some form of resolution after conflict has built or the reader will feel let down.
Just as conflict drive an author’s story, so does it drive our lives. But conflict is only useful if we are able to find a resolution to the conflict. A solution. An answer. Conflict drives us to look for answers.
On the back of a Jeep was a bumper sticker that summed this issue up well. It read:
Sunday morning President Trump addressed the nation on the Special Ops raid on the IS leader who was responsible for many murders, including four Americans.
“He just can’t speak right,” said someone who’d listened to the speech also. “He doesn’t sound like a president should sound.”
Having learned the impossibility of actually speaking about anything to do with religion or politics with a liberal, I didn’t say much, and totally ignored that baiting comment. Baiting, as it would lead to a discussion that one can’t win against a liberal. One doesn’t argue facts against emotion. Yet I couldn’t resist saying just one thing.
“Perhaps. But he speaks the way most Americans speak,” I said. He doesn’t use ten dollar words when a dime word will do—I didn’t add that, though.
A neighbor, who is from New York City, once told me that President Trump speaks just like a New Yorker. Does President Trump have the oratory gift of, say, President Reagan? No. Certainly not. So what. As I see it, what President Trump said came across loud and clear. What he said, as I see it, made sense.
I thought about it a bit later, and remembered a recent American president that could captivate an audience. From the first time the man spoke at a party convention, he seemed to enthrall listeners. Later, as president, he could almost entrance me. I remember hearing him speak and realizing he was nearly mesmerizing, yet he didn’t actually say anything, and what he did say didn’t make a bit of sense to me at all.
I remembered, too, something that the Apostle Paul wrote the the Corinthian Believers.
“And my word and my preaching were not with persuasive words of man’s wisdom. . .” (1 Corinthians 2:4)
Please don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying President Trump is like the Apostle Paul; I’m not saying his words are the inspiration of G-D. However, as Apostle Paul wrote to the Believers in Rome:
“. . .there is no authority except that which G-D has established.” (Romans 13:1)
Disagree with President Trump for his policies, his actions, okay. But to discount his actions simply because he isn’t a polished orator seems foolish.
This whole thing makes me sad, too, as I think that people can so easily be fooled by fancy speech, mesmerizing personalities, who whip up an emotional response that, if analyzed, is illogical. I think of 1930s Germany, and the fiery speeches that fueled heinous crimes against humanity.
I think, too, of the warnings about the antichrist that deceives the world. I’m sure that person will have a gift of oratory, and that the world will be mesmerized by empty, vain words.
The world will be deceived. Even Believers can be lead astray until they are awakened by the Spirit of G-D.
Let us watch. As Yeshua said:
“But know this, that if the master of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have left his house to be broken into.” (Luke 12:39)
And the Problem
“Yet a little while and the world will see me no more,
but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.” —John 14:19
YeshuaJesus said that those who believed in Him would live again. They would also see Him again. While Yeshua was going away, He was going to come back to Earth. And though His followers may die, like Yeshua, they would come back from death into life and be with Him. They would see Yeshua in the flesh, physically.
Yeshua also revealed a problem that was going to happen. He said that the world would see Him no more. Yeshua, during His time on Earth. was a thorn in the side of the religious leaders. He presented a problem for them. There are accounts in which those leaders felt they couldn’t act against Yeshua for fear of the people. Yeshua’s mere presence was a problem for all people. He stood before people, in the flesh, and showed the Love of G-D, Father. As it was then, it is today, the love of the G-D of Israel is shown through Yeshua. And it is rejected because too often people want their own way.
Today the world cannot see Yeshua. This is a problem for the world in at least two ways. First, it is a problem in that it is much more difficult to believe in what isn’t seen. Thomas, a disciple of Yeshua, had the opportunity to place his finger in wound Yeshua received during His death. The other disciples physically saw the risen Yeshua, walked with Him, talked with Him. Today we don’t physically see Yeshua. Hard to believe what you don’t see, isn’t it? After Thomas said he believed, Yeshua said to him,
“Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
The second way that it is a problem that Yeshua isn’t physically seen is that any restraint that might have been present when Yeshua was here in the flesh is removed. Unbelieving people, political leaders, even the courts of the land, seemingly are able to do as they please, unconstrained. Also, within the Christian community, leaders do as they please regardless of Scripture. They feel as though they are no longer constrained. Life. Liberty. Happiness. Do what we please. Yippee! We’re Free!
Early in America’s foundation, we were considered a Christian nation. Even in my public school days, children stood in the morning, faced the flat, the symbol of America, and pledged allegiance to the unity of our country under the Name of the G-D of Israel. When did things change? When was it that things became more unconstrained? I believe a mile marker on our path toward destruction came in 1973.
1973 was a very good year for me, overall. It was not a very good year for a whole lot of babies in America, however. It was a death sentence issued by the Supreme Court in its decision in the case of Roe -v- Wade, which allowed the murder of babies simply because a person didn’t want to give birth to, and raise, the baby. That set us on the proverbial slippery slope, on a path toward destruction. Or as Barry McGuire sang, Eve of Destruction.
What we can’t see, can’t hurt us, right?
Wrong!
L-RD Bless, Protect, Shine upon y’all, and then He will give His Peace. . .
In a recent post at Thinking Out Loud, Mr. Paul Wilkerson shares his dismay that a particular television show contains inappropriate material and is aired during television’s prime-time hours.
“U.S. network prime time begins when locally produced or locally acquired programming ends at 7:59 and runs to 10:59 before local news. The first hour, from 8:00 to 9:00 was once called ‘the family hour,’ ” he wrote in Superstore on NBC: Not a Family Shopping Experience.
Mr. Wilkerson says he’s “not the type of person to get into Moral Majority-styled rants about the filth on TV and calling for networks to cancel shows and everyone else to boycott sponsors.”
“I don’t understand how NBC continues to get away with showing this at 8:00 pm,” he wrote.
One comment Mr. Wilkinson received echoed the sentiment of “how can they get away with it.”
I agree with Mr. Wilkinson that these shows do not belong in a “family-time” slot, such as the 8 to 9 pm time.
My comment to Mr. Wilkinson’s column states:
Hum. Networks “get away with it” when we, the people, simply do nothing. What’s wrong with a little boycott? Not just “not watching” the program, but work to change all “prime-time” programs back to a more family-centered experience. Boycotting sponsors goes a long way toward making one’s voice heard. Yet how do we define “family-centered”? Perhaps the scenes described are the new family-centered experience.
Today the voice against immorality on television is but a small voice crying in a wilderness. Our current American culture is neither the culture of our fathers and mothers nor is it the culture of our grandfathers and grandmothers. The American culture has become degraded; the American culture is on the verge of falling.
“Father Knows Best” and “Leave it to Beaver” have made way for “Modern Family” and the altered reality of “Reality TV.” There is no longer a “moral majority” in America. There is only the immoral majority.
America can change, however. There is hope. The American people have to want to change, have to see the current situation as it is, that it is not what it ought to be, what it could be. Americans must turn to the G-D of Israel, through His Son YeshuaJesus.
When Jonah preached a country turned from its ways, turned to G-D, and was saved.
L-RD Bless, Keep, Shine. . .
What do you think?
Looking at other blogs in which Christian and Christianity is mentioned or is the topic, I ran across Nan’s Notebook. She posted an article with the title If you are a Christian. . . in which she relates and speaks about a comment she ran across in another blog: “I experienced a slow and somewhat painful internal struggle to accept that I don’t believe in God anymore. When I finally did, I felt free, like I could finally learn to accept who I was.”
Her post started a long sting of comments. 193 comments.
I commented:
Too many years ago now I enjoyed many conversations with a fellow from Australia, then residing in California. We didn’t discuss ‘religion’ per say, but simply talked about life and how we each saw it from a different perspective. He was not a Believer. I am. Yet we shared so much in common, and enjoyed each other’s company.
It seems to me that one of the most difficult things Believers and those who do not can do is simply appreciate each other, both similarities and differences without trying to change one another.
Nan, you and I could sit in a cafe and in similar manner converse with one another and enjoy ourselves. I appreciate you. I sense a kindness and gentle sincerity that comes from your heart.
Shalom.
As a reader of JonahzSong, you’ve experienced my life through various stories. Most of them I’ve attempted to bring an article—a post—to a Messiah-focused conclusion. I don’t think I make any bones about it, I believe in YeshuaJesus. As I’ve been “reconstructing” JonahzSong, I’m attempting to focus on Setting Sail for an Abundant Life.
Yet, in my comment to Nan, I say that she and I could sit in a cafe and have a conversation and enjoy ourselves. One might wonder if that isn’t a contradiction. One might wonder if I am, after all, a hypocrite.
You tell me. I really welcome your comments. For as I’ve said before, I question things. I question myself. I don’t have the answers. Yes, I know Who does. And our L-RD seems to allow use to search for them.
A short vignette illustrates my view, I think.
One evening, walking across a park in Jerusalem, I came upon two men talking.
“Brother, tell this man about Jesus,” one man called to me.
I approached to men and immediately notice the man who was speaking to the one who summoned me wore a kippa. He was Jewish. There were a few other things said as I stood before the men. And finally I responded.
“I can not to that. My brother,” I said referring to the Jewish man, ” has not asked me. I cannot impose myself upon him.”
The Christian who’d called to me seemed upset, and finally went on his way to “witness” to someone else. I was left standing with the Jewish man.
“I’d like you to meet my rabbi,” he said. He invited me to his synagogue.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’[a] For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Matthew 9:10-17 (NIV)
L-RD Bless, Keep, Shine upon you and give you a heart for truth and mercy.
Klip in Die Bos:Pastor Thabo, in South Africa, occasionally uses the Afrikaans term that means something like tossing a stone into the brush and seeing what pops out.
In his post on CNSNew.com, Mr. Daniels muses about a world were progressives and socialists get all that they ask. Continue reading “Charlie Daniels Muses”
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