Religion and Politics!

I am probably going to get in trouble for posting this but it is time for me to put my 2 cents in to this discussion. With the upcoming election and political wheels in full motions people from all sides of the pulpit and pew in churches are getting involved in to political scene. Some democrat some republican. I personally don't really care for all stances of either party because parts of each party are correct. Thus to quote one of my favorite comedians, "What is the similiarity between the two(Democrat and Republican), the fact that they are both wrong!"

Now as I was reading this morning on my news sites and blogs I came across this article on CNN from the very intelligent and informed Lou Dobbs. (Article)This is a very respected and respectable man but in his article he claims that is wrong for the churches to endorse a political candiate. I AGREE WHOLE HEARTEDLY. But Mr. Dobbs makes the same arguement about why that I have heard a hundred times and it is wrong!!! He says the first amendment is there to keep the government out of religion and religion out of government. Now this is true but only partly. For someone as smart as he is surely he knows and has researched the history of this but incase he hasn't let me put it plainly with this next paragraph.

Why did the pilgrams leave England? For religious freedom! That is it. They where being told my Henry the 8th that they had to become church of England and that they had no freedom to worship how they choose but only as he saw fit. Thus they came to America. Now in the consitution it does not say " Total Seperation of Church and State" it doesn't even say "seperation of church and state" at all. It says "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This was to keep the government from making a State Sponsored church!!!! I am completely for that and if you are under the impression that the United States should make Christianity the religion of the country you are WRONG! Period and if you don't like it I don't care!

Now let me address christians on this quickly as well. We "vote our morals". Well guess what, your morals transend a party. Democrats want to help the poor with more government programs. This is a very christian act. Replicians want to help protect marriage. This is a very christian act. Neither of which provide salvation! Thus politics is not the place for our morality to work thru this country. That is not to say your should not vote because you have an obigation in my opinion to do so but you can not legislate morality. That is impossible and it not the place for it. Morality, and better yet Christian morality, should be seen only thru JESUS CHRIST! So the next time someone the the Christian right tells you to vote for one canditate because they are the moral one tell them they are wrong. Jesus needed no government in his time on earth to expand his kingdom and not time after that either. No law will help this country come to know God any quicker. That can and will only be accomplished by God's will working thru the hearts and minds of his people.

Sin is at your Door Step

This morning on the way to work I was listening to the Truth for Life radio sermon. I sometimes listen to this on my way to work because it does tend to put me in focus on my way to work. But this morning was really intresting to me. It was title "Why good people do bad things."

"Humans do bad things because we make bad decisions." Now I really like this because some people want to make that old statement , "The devil made me do it." That is a load of hogwash. Satan has no power in thie world other than what we give him. Now he did go on to say that other factors are in effect, like the pleasure of sin. Lets face it sin is appealing and if we try to say it isn't then we aren't reading from the same bible.

This sermon was basically about personal responsibilty. One of my biggest problem in our culture, the Christian faith, and in our work is that we as human beings try to put the blame on someone else. But that is is just a pathway to sin. If you flirt with it enough you will be burned. Same applies for all sins, sexual impurity, anger, envy, etc. So remember sin is pleasureable and appealing, "knocking at your door step", but thye choice is yours.

Meebo Me

Ok I am now on board with the testing of a really cool product, or so I think. Meebo is a all in one HTML/web based chat client for the major chat services, ie. AIM, YAHOO, GTALK, etc. But the cool feature about it is that it also has a plugin that you can post on your website/blog that allows people to talk to you when you are signed in. I want to encourage anyone who reads this to send me a chat and let me know what you think about it. Please change your name at the bottem of the chat client so I will know who is talking to me.

When did I become a Geek!

Ok I must confess.....I used to get really REALLY mad at the stupid best buy Geek Squad. It gave IT people like me a rap as a geek just because I work in the IT field. I hated the thought that I was a geek because I didn't feel like I was one. I guess that goes back to high school because no one in high school can be cool if you are a geek. But then I really thought about that and I was not cool either so it was a failed attempt anyways.

Well I think now my opinion has changed. The other night I was driving to watch a play with my wife and some friends and I received a phone call from a family friend. He was having some problems with his computer and accessing the internet. So while driving I started talking with him and troubleshooting the problem. After about 10 minutes I was able to find the problem and give him a detailed list of steps to resolve this issue. Ok some of you might ask the same question he did...."How do you know all this?" I mean I could literally see the desktop and the icons and telling him what to do. At that moment it hit me.....either I am incredibly gifted at what I do or I am a GEEK!. Well I don't think I am incredibly gifted because I know a lot of people who could, can, and do the same things I do. Thus the only other solution is I am a GEEK!
This all got me thinking thus I had to find the definition of a geek and I found this at dictionary.com

"A person who is single-minded or accomplished in scientific or technical pursuits but is felt to be socially inept."

I guess the definition sums it up...I am a partial geek but is that any better in the eyes of the world than a regular geek?

Ministry vs "Church Ministry"

OK This is a very personal post for me and I am really searching for answers so if you have some input please post. When I was 17 I "accepted a call to ministry on my life". Now at the time I thought that might be Church ministry, aka Youth Ministry or something like that. But over time I came to realize that the Lord had not called me to that type of ministry. He called me to ministry for my life. Now I realize that is a little hard to understand so I will go a little further in depth.

In college I began to realize the Lord had gifted me in the area of computers. Programming, hardware, support, etc. I love to work with computer, ticker with them, and enjoy educating myself about them. Then over time it became apparent to me that a job in the field of computers was not "ministry" and was afraid that the I was being disobedient to the "calling" I had received. But was I really?

This was a struggle for a while in college until I got my internship with the KY Baptist Convention. I then began to realize the calling God had placed on my life. I am performing that ministry everyday by serving those in this building and providing computer support to them. But that is where things then get a little gray for me.

Is there a difference between being a Church Staff and being in minister? A lot of people I talk to say yes but I am not sure what I think at this point. I view my job not as a job but a ministry and if you aren't sure what I mean I will say it this way...I view the KBC as the body of Church and I view what I do as the legs of the body. The ministers here are the head and arms. So please give me your input.....Am I am Minister or not?

Self inflicted pain

This title pretty much sums up the triathlon experience. Many of you may be aware that this weekend I competed in a triathlon. Crystal and I have been training for about 5 months. The training went very well and it was an over all good experience. I learned a lot about myself and the differences between different athletic events. I was a swimmer and trained a lot for my sport. I will confess that I did not train as much for this as I would have trained for a conference championship in swimming but none the less I trained a good amount.

So the results are in......I FINISHED. This was my goal from the beginning. Now I am my father's son and my competitive nature took over and I thus even though I finished and I was HAPPY about that I was unhappy about my place of finish. I finished 41st out of 96. So I was in the top 50% of the field but I think with more training, a little better bike, and better practice of transitions I could easily improve this finish. But either way I am very happy and proud that I can say I finished.

Now I started this post by calling this event self inflicted pain. This is a true state and it was the most athletic event pain I have ever experienced but.............I am HOOKED. I can't wait to start training again and Crystal and I will be competing in a triathlon in bowling green on Labor day. I will post the distance and splits below from the event

Swim 500 meters (approximate) = 6 min 29 sec
Bike 12.5 miles = 36 min 45 sec
Run 3.1 miles = 26 min 12 sec
overall transition time = 3 min 25 sec

Overall time 1 hour 12 minutes 49 seconds
Overall place 41st!!!

I am in Shock

I had heard on the news that a vaccination had been found to prevent HPV. If you don't know HPV is a sexually transmitted disease that "can" cause cancer. Ok I understand the want to prevent cancer but this is absolutely crazy. I have a sure fire way that will prevent the spread of this type of cancer. It is call don't have sex if you aren't married and if you are going to then at the least don't have unprotected sex PERIOD. This vaccine is 99% effective, well with abstinence or not having unprotected sex is 100% effective. Now I would not be on a soap box about this except for one thing. The government "could" make this a requirement for all girls and boys who wish to be admitted in to public schools!!!! So we have gone past the diseases that kill themselves, such as polio, to required vaccinations for things that "can" turn in to a disease that kills! The government would be over stepping its bounds if it required this for kids. See this article below if you are interested in this at all.


HPV Article


** Addition to Original Post **
I best be stating something about this post. I am not against a vaccination that will help with the reduction in cancer but what I am against is the government telling me that my kids, when I have them some day, they have to have this vaccine because they "will" be having sex. I hope and pray that my children will adhere to the teaching of Jesus Christ and keep themselves pure and holy for the spouse that God has put on this earth for them. It is my responsibility to teach them this lesson and do all in my power to prevent harm from coming to them. What requiring this vaccination will do for parents is undermine the lessons they are trying to teach with regards to purity and holiness. Do I not have a right to not have my authority undermined by the government? Please if you read this start a little fire in your circles about this....