Love is waiting

This song really spoke to my heart, and I wanted to share it with y'all. :)





You can find the words here "Love is Waiting"

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Guest Post: -- "God's view on Gun control"

This guest post is by request per my sister-in-law and for any of you who would be interested in a young man's biblical take on gun control.


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The year was 1984. The cloaked Arab slid through the dense Jerusalem crowds. His heart would have been pounding, but his religion and experience in this sort of thing overruled his more natural nervousness and fear. He glanced across at his partner on the other side of the square; he was ready. Where was the third? Panic gripped his heart, but then he saw the other member of his team. Why were his palms sweaty? He brushed them off, leaving dirty smudges on his hands. He had mowed down crowds of innocents before with no qualm, why would now be different? He gritted his teeth against his urge to hesitate, and threw back his cloak. The bark of his machine gun exploded across the dusty street, sending death biting into the Israeli populace. His two team members opened fire on his signal and joined him in what they thought would be carnage. Suddenly flashes and sharp cracks echoed around him, and a burning pain ripped through his chest. Six shop owners had returned fire with their sidearms. His two comrades fled as he lay in a pool of his own blood… and died. Only one Israeli had fallen with him. After that, terrorists preferred long range attacks on Israel: machine-gunning armed civilians was too risky.

That is my rendition of a true, historical, factual event that really did occur. ‘The Seven Myths of Gun Control’ by Richard Poe was my source for the history of the event. This book is highly recommended by me to help you to understand clearly, from many statistics, logic, and history, how gun control increases crime.

Here is my article on the subject.

I could go about this in the same way that the aforementioned book did. I could use perfect logic, irrefutable statistics, and solid research, gleaned from reputable sources. But that has already been done quite well, and the best I can do right now is refer you to them. I am instead going to take a different tack.

I am going to look at it Biblically.

Basically I am going to be examining the question: Is it a crime to own and carry weapons?

If it is a crime, then of course government should punish those who do so.

If it is not a crime, then what sort of justification does government have to prohibit it?

Basically put, a crime is a sin that government can punish. Many sins it cannot punish (if you disagree with that, I hope you get out of the lunatic asylum soon ). Many sins it can (if you disagree with that, you are an anarchist, and that is a whole different discussion). The debate is which sins it can and cannot punish, for the most part.

Of course, if something is not a sin, it cannot be a crime. This is something that is painfully obvious, but which many many people miss utterly.

If God does not tell us that something is a sin, it is not a sin.

If God commands someone to do something, it is not a sin.

So, if God tells someone to carry a weapon, or if He does not tell them not to, then it is not a sin for them to carry a weapon.

And is therefore also not a crime. And government cannot punish them for doing so.

Now, of course, it is impossible for someone to prove that something is impossible or non-existent (theoretically). And so of course I might have missed it…

But.

The Bible does not forbid people from bearing arms. And there are very few passages that might be even construed to say that. I might be forgetting some, so if I am missing a couple, let me know in the comments and I will do my best to address them. Thanks!

In reality, the Bible consistently assumes that people have weapons, or that, in a normal situation, they would. And in one place, Jesus actually commands his disciples to carry swords (Luke 22:36-38)! I am pretty sure those weren’t for plowing or making fancy shish kebabs. And of course guns are the modern equivalent of a sword.

God gives several laws to the Israelites regarding their swords, such as the one mandating that they all have a special tool on the back to serve as a digging implement (Deuteronomy 23:13). This was to prevent the camp from being defiled, and is thus a sort of ceremonial law, and should not be construed as license for governments nowadays to mandate the manufacture of weapons.

It was assumed that every man had weapons in several places (i.e. Genesis 34:25, Exodus 32:27, Deuteronomy 1:41).

Granted, when Jehoiada masterminded the overthrow of Athaliah and set up Joash in his rightful place as king, he had to arm the Levites who were to guard him (2 Kings 11:10, 2 Chronicles 23:9). But realize however that Athaliah was a murdering tyrant who was mortally afraid of revolt (which is a valid fear for every tyrant), and she might very well have banned weapons (like the vast majority of other tyrants in history), which would explain why Jehoiada had to arm them out of the treasury.

There are multitudinous passages that could be examined on this subject, but they all come to the same conclusions as above given: the Bible assumes that in normal situations the average man owns and carries weapons.

Now I know of two passages that people generally bring up when weapons are mentioned. The first is in the Sermon on the Mount (which is representative of the other similar passages that they bring up), and the other is when Jesus was arrested. First we will talk about the arrest.

Here is a harmony of the gospels (a compilation of a passage from each of the gospels), showing in context with each other everything that is said to have happened in this passage under question:

“When they which were about him saw what would follow, they said unto him, Lord, shall we smite with the sword? Then Simon Peter having a sword, stretched out [his] hand, and drew his sword, and smote the high priest’s servant, and cut off his right ear. The servant’s name was Malchus. Then said Jesus unto Peter, Put up thy sword into the sheath: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then shall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be? The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it? And Jesus answered and said, Suffer ye thus far. And he touched his ear, and healed him.”

The passage that most people quote, out of context, is Jesus’ words: “all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.” Or, as it is sometimes put: “All those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.”

This last version is either absolutely wrong, or not absolutely true. David lived by the sword (which is why he could not build the temple, 1 Chronicles 28:2-3) and he died not by it, but peacefully with his son on the throne. The same for many others (Samuel, who hewed Agag in pieces, and did other similar things, died peacefully of old age), although many of those who lived by the sword did die by it (Joab for one).

In the context of this passage, it is very clear what Jesus was saying: it was God’s will and His will for Him to be taken away. He was laying down His life willingly. God would not fight on His behalf, and He would not ask Him to. And a handful of fishermen would be slaughtered by the trained soldiers if they tried to resist. It is actually very simple: Jesus was protecting them.

As for the other passage, it is in reality the strongest argument that I have found against bearing weapons, although it is weak enough.

Matthew 5:38-47 Ye have heard that it hath been said, An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth:
39 But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.
40 And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have [thy] cloak also.
41 And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.
42 Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.
43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more [than others?] do not even the publicans so?

This is more against using a weapon than having one, but of course they are connected.

The context here is talking about behaving unselfishly, being charitable, and being longsuffering. Now, of course it would be not very charitable or longsuffering for you to shoot someone merely because they called you stupid. That would be merely proving their point. But is that really the question?

In NT Israel, a back-handed slap was an insult, an attack on your pride. If you are slapped on your right cheek, then that is a back-handed slap: an insult. Which you are to ignore… and turn the other cheek.

A palm slap is a direct challenge to combat. A serious threat to your life. It is a clear overture of intent to kill. This is a slap on your left cheek: your other cheek.

In other words: ignore insults, but check to make sure that the person isn’t really about to kill you. But what then?

Each of these things listed here are merely superficial, things that are “less than your life” (Matthew 6:25), not your life itself, which is interestingly excluded from the citation of lex talionis: An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth. The original included Life for Life. The original was also directed towards the government, not towards regular citizens. So it seems that we are supposed to forgive and let things slide as much as possible… up to a certain point.

Which is when we would need a weapon to defend ourselves.

Exodus 22:2 If a thief be found breaking up, and be smitten that he die, [there shall] no blood [be shed] for him.

Intriguing…

Genesis 9:6 Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.

Important.

Now of course at about this point people start panicking: “But then there will be chaos!” “Everyone will be shooting instead of being nice!” “All the criminals will have free rein!” “There will be anarchy!”

Notice that all those are gut reactions, not stemming from any sort of experience or research, but merely from propagandist hype that has embedded its sophistries into the natural instincts of the populace. The fact of the matter is that the exact opposite of all of the above exclamations are true. The reasons why are sadly outside the scope of this article, and I must again refer you to something like ‘The Seven Myths of Gun Control’ by Richard Poe.

If something is outlawed, only outlaws will get it.

No limitation of righteous liberty can bring about anything but tyranny and rampant crime.

With joy and peace in Christ,
Jay Lauser

Jay hails from Ireland and has an excellent blog chock full of thought provoking ideas and discussions! Find this and more here : Sir Emeth Mimetes

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Simple Love

"I want a simple love like that,
Always giving, never askin' back
For when I'm in my final hour lookin' back
I hope I had a simple love like that"

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Guest Post: -- "President Obama and Hasty Vows"

A learned guest post for all of my politically inclined friends and readers. :)

"Hello all!

Today, while reading (and watching) some material covering questions of whether President Obama has been as transparent as he promised during his campaign, I was struck by a few things that I would like to “throw” out for y’all to take or leave. :)

Without getting into all the nitty-gritty details of the charges and response (which I will admit I am not as familiar with as I would like to be) I believe that during the campaign Senator Obama made more than a few rash vows, and as a result I think the accusations have a lot of merit. However, with that said, I also can easily understand and agree to the statement made by White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs that, “Not everything the President does is for the cameras and for the press.”

To my thinking, the real problem here is not that the President isn’t allowing the media to cover all the things they want to cover, or think should be covered, — the real problem is/was the rashness of the vows made by Senator Obama on the campaign trail. As a Christian, I believe that the Bible clearly teaches that a rashly made oath is foolishness. Leviticus 5:4-5 clearly teaches that rashly making an oath, be it for a good purpose or with a good intent, is a sin:

“Or if a person swears thoughtlessly with his lips to do evil or to do good in whatever matter a man may speak thoughtlessly with an oath, and it is hidden from him, and then he comes to know it, he will be guilty in one of these. So it shall be when he becomes guilty in one of these, that he shall confess that in which he has sinned.”

Proverbs 20: 25 says…“It is a trap for a man to say rashly, “It is holy!” and after the vows to make inquiry.”

I believe that the promises made by Senator Obama were in large part good and I understand that in a campaign you are trying to paint a best case picture of what your administration would be and would do. However, Senator Obama should have more prudently and/or thoroughly considered the ramifications of his rash vows and considered whether the promises made by ‘Senator Obama’ could be upheld by ‘President Obama’. His promises of transparency were clearly more than could have or should have been reasonably promised. Perhaps the problem is that President Obama has never differentiated between the things that should require transparency, the things that ought to be kept and done out of the view of the public and simply promised over-arching transparency in general. I can see this being the case, but at the very least the President created an impression (purposely, I assume) and never clarified or defined the exact intent and extent of his stated purpose and goals.

Probably no segment of our society demonstrates the ease and carelessness with which rash promises are made (and broken) more than the political world. As Christians, it is our responsibility to clearly advocate for integrity and prudence in vow making and then to hold our elected officials to their word. Most importantly though, it is up to us, in accordance with God’s word, to demonstrate the integrity and prudence in our own lives that we expect of people around us and representing us.

God bless and veritas supra omnis!"

You can find the original post and a wealth of other insightful details here : 'Mark Hutchins Weblog'

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Sleepy Time Baby

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Baby and Birds

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Rosie

Today is Rosie's 6th Birthday. It amazes me that it was actually 6 years ago when I was rudely awakened with the news that the house was on fire. Oh joy! Little did we know that several hours later we would welcome a red little bundle of joy and kisses safe and sound into our home. (After the fire was put out of course ;-)

Rosie has been growing up into such a lovely young lady and princess!






Love you Rosie posie! I miss you!

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Katie

Thank you so much for the lovely weekend with you and being such a hammy model! You are simply gorgeous inside and out! Daniel is so blessed to have you! Love you!!

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A first look at Seattle

Fruit pasta in the market.



The happiest flowers I have ever seen! They were so sunny and cheerful!




Fish!





"Berries, Berries, Berries...." =)





Freezing to death at the top of the space needle trying to to blow off the observation deck!

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What am I doing?

"The rains in Africa have been few. Children are dying there, what about you? A night out to eat instead could give them water for years. So what are you doing, what are we doing, what are we doing here? They are watching us from afar. What are we working for so very hard? If I had nothing and you lived like a king. I'd be so grateful if you shared something with me." --Bringing Joy To the World

What are *you* doing?

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*smile*

This was the top of cupcakes! They were so delightfully cute and happy!

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"God pours life into death and death into life without a drop being spilled. " ~Author Unknown

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Cook in the kitchen

They say a picture is worth a thousand words...I don't know about y'all, but I see a future chef here!

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I think I have fallen in love....

His name is Solomon and he turns nine weeks old on Monday the 22nd.
I will be moving out to Washington state on the 9th of March to be his nanny for a little over three months.

It looks like I should have ample opportunity to expand my photography a bit while I am out there, and hopefully some of that will appear here!

You will never get tired of seeing that darling face; now will you! <3

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Valentine's Dance

Yesterday Leah, Timothy, Benjamin, and myself went to a Valentines dance put on my some dear friends of ours. It was English Country Dancing which we had done a little of in Texas and some of the foundational steps were the same. It as a bit of a challenge however, thankfully they are going to hold a dance once a month so we can keep getting better. I think the next "Ball" is scheduled for September, so come and get practiced now!



I was asked to be the photographer which was wonderful for me and I had a blast.





The Duff family, who put on the dance, had this beautiful table set up in the front with pictures from the couples in their family history.




My Fellow Photographer!




Several of the guys came dressed in costume from the same era as the girls. Kudos to Mrs.Grady for Aaron's dapper vest!


Mr. Larsen looked quite dashing himself in his outfit; a team effort between Mrs.Larsen and Alatheia!


I risk boring the boys with clothes commentary, but Anna's Dress was exceptional! The sleeves were so intricately sewn to perfection!
I wish I had pictures of all the other girls dresses! Angela made mine and hers was simply stunning!







Ahh the sweet victory of mastering a complicated dance move! ~
You can hardly see the one fellow but these two gentlemen were dressed to the nines! Their waist coats and lace and knickers and everything! Perfect ensembles!


Come on boys... dance... :-)





My escort. I told y'all he was strikingly handsome! I was so proud of both boys and the class and grace they demonstrated! I only danced with Benjamin once as he was being such a gentleman and asking all the other ladies he either did not know or did not know very well, to dance.
Bravo, young man! There are many who could learn from your example!

Thank you so much for asking me to accompany you! I love you! ;-)

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Ponderous thoughts of Snow...

"No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible." -Stanislaw Lec


"A snowflake is one of God's most fragile creations, but look what they can do when they stick together!" - Anon

"Advice is like snow -- the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind." --Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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Black Dress +sisters + sunglasses = (see below)

Love ya!





PS: Dudes: You break a Hipps' Girl's heart... you know what happens... ;-)

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Happy Birthday Daddy!

His faith encourages me,
His unfailing love inspires me,
His wisdom guides me,
His diligence provides for me,
His encouragement drives me,
His honesty assures me,
His patience never ceases to amaze me!
Surely no one else has been so blessed nor so privileged to call such a man Daddy. I love you Daddy! You are the best! God is faithful! Happy birthday!!

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"My First Love"

My First Love

Tessa Kate Rayner



"A long time ago, a prince came to the village where a young peasant girl lived. As she sat out on the cobble stones playing with her wooden toys, the prince rode up beside her and reached out for her hand. As he gazed deeply into her eyes, he glanced over her shoulder to where her father stood, protectively watching over her. Slowly, he came forward and shook the prince’s hand, bowing slightly. Then the prince spoke to the young girl’s father in a compassionate, yet authoritative tone, “Thank you my good and faithful servant. You have raised this child, that the King my father sent to you, in the way that she should go and when she is old she will not turn from it.” As the prince then knelt down before the young girl, he softly spoke, “I love you, dear child. Will you let me be your first love? Will you give me your heart and when you are of age leave all that you know to follow me?” The child studied the handsome prince for a few moments before turning apprehensively towards her father. He gave a nod of his head as tears of joy trickled down his cheeks; this was the moment he had been waiting and praying for. The young girl turned back towards the prince, widened her big brown eyes and replied, “Yes, I would like to give you all of my heart.” The prince then returned to the castle, until the day when the young girl became of age that she would be able to fulfill the purpose that the King had prepared her for. But even as the young girl continued to spend her days in the small village playing with her toys and helping her father, she knew that in the castle her prince was waiting, watching her and that he would come again someday soon. But for the mean time, she felt the warmth of his compassion and never forgot that her heart has been given to him. He was her first love.

~

As winter turned into spring, summer into autumn and the years briskly moved on by, the young girl began to blossom into a beautiful young woman. She spent her days serving people around her and still remembered that day many years ago when the prince had come to call – the day her heart was won. But because it was so many years ago, the young woman had become very familiar and carefree about the prince. She knew deep in her heart that he was still there watching her, but she was growing restless waiting for him to come and take her to fulfill her role in the kingdom. So as she waited day after day, she began to get distracted. One day, as she was talking with her mother a young man from the village approached her. As she gazed into his eyes, she was overwhelmed by the feelings that began to stir deep within her soul for this young man with the captivating pale blue eyes. She was quickly caught in the obsession of trying to please the young man, hoping that one day they would be married. However, she could not seem to get her first love out of her head. As she went about her daily chores, she was torn between what she knew was rightfully hers and what she selfishly desired. As weeks turned into months she battled these emotions, all the while the prince observed – his heart twisting with jealousy and compassion for the young woman. He desired to intervene, however, he knew that the decision that was to be made could only been made by the young woman. As she began to reflect back on her times with the prince and the purpose for her in his father’s kingdom, she began to discover that the village boy could simply not compete with her first love. He would make an amazing friend, however, she had a purpose to fulfill and the prince would be coming one day soon to welcome her as a servant into the king’s kingdom. As she looked over at the village boy she smiled with joy as she declared the promises made so long ago. He nodded with sincere understanding as she bowed down on her knees, lifted her hands to the heavens and said, “Speak Lord. Your servant is listening.” With the power of that wistful prayer the gates of the castle opened and the prince rode down the cobblestone path to welcome the young woman into his father’s kingdom, where she would serve him with all of her heart.



People may ask what happened to the young village man. He too went on to serve the king’s kingdom and he too loved the prince with all of his heart."

Tessa is a member of the Rebelution forum (which is where I found her excellent story). I would encourage you to add her blog to your "Follow" list if you can! God's Gospel Girl

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