Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner
Working overtime and some other obligations made this a week of few projects. The first and biggest was to remove a stump I’ve been mowing around since we moved in. When I started on it, my wife had the car grocery shopping, and I had no gas for my chain saw. I did most of the work armed only with a shovel, an axe, and a bow saw. After the wife got back, I bought some gas and finished with the chain saw.
What: FoodSaver FM5480 2-in-1 Food Preservation System.
Cost: $120
Purchased From: Costco
Last fall, I discovered that about the time that the guys at work get their deer back from the processor (none of them do their own butchering), they are very willing to give away whatever’s left of last year’s deer. That was one consideration. Another is that we intend to freeze a number of vegetables from the garden this year. I’ve always used ziplock freezer bags in the past. Finally, this thing has the ability to vacuum the air out of a mason jar, and seal it with a standard canning lid. We’ve been looking for a way to seal my wife’s homemade sauerkraut that doesn’t require heating it and killing the cultures. This fits the bill. Now we can give friends and family sealed jars of kraut that they feel “safer” with, while still giving them a live culture product. Also, I will use it for my homemade wines, to prevent vinegar formation after racking and bottling.
This week was extra productive due to having some extra time off of work.
A while back, I received a mailer from the Arbor Day Foundation offering me 10 Colorado Blue Spruce seedlings and 2 Lilac seedlings for a $10 donation. I am a big fan of lilacs, and so I sent them a check for $10. This week the seedlings arrived, so I spent a day digging and turning 12 3-foot diameter holes and planting my seedlings.
When we moved in last fall, there was a pile of plant debris in the back yard which I assumed was the burn pile. I added to it, then burnt it to the ground. I mentioned to the neighbor how badly located it was, and he told me it was the former owners’ garden–not burn pile. Who ever heard of an 8-foot diameter round garden? I moved the burn pile, but still had bare ground in this area until this week. I wheelbarrowed all the sod from the tree-planting here, and had almost enough to cover the bare patch.
What: Kitchen-Aid Pro 600 Series 6 Quart Bowl-Lift Stand Mixer.
Cost: $330
Purchased From: Costco
This purchase was made a while back, and is essentially a luxury purchase for us. Courtney loves to bake, and often sends bread, bagels, English muffins, and other baked goods with me to work to give away and “sell” for donations. Our main goal here has been to cover the cost of flour and other baking supplies, so that the bread we eat is at no cost to us. While we haven’t made much by selling bread/baked goods, we make more than enough to make our own bread free.
To the best of my knowledge, I have never heard anyone refer to me in real life as “traditional” or a “traditionalist.” However, I and my family have often been called “old-fashioned” and occasionally, “Amish.” Here are some of the reasons I and my family have been called “old-fashioned:”
In my interactions with others who want to bring back virtue and order, I have often encountered the idea that separation of Church and State is antithetical to this goal. I have heard the same theory espoused by those of the opposite persuasion; claiming that Church and State must be kept separate–or driven further asunder–in order to prevent a return to virtue and order.
Donal has a post out about not being angry due to realizing truth about women:
Exposure to the “Red Pill” can have a variety of emotional consequences for men- some short term, and some long term. At first it is usually a slew of negative emotions, including but not limited to: anger, sadness, disgust and despair. Pretty much every one of my male readers, with an exception or two, will be familiar with this. For some men those emotions will subside over time, and in time the “Red Pill” can pave the way for positive emotions. Sometimes this is because of the knowledge and understanding acquired. Other times it is because men use that knowledge to try and improve their life somehow. And for others it is simply a process of matured acceptance of the way things are. However, for a not insubstantial number of men there will be some lingering negative emotions. Sometimes the result is truly ugly- I am sure all of us have seen a man who couldn’t handle the truth, and became an emotional wreck as a result. However, not everyone tailspins like that. Sometimes those lingering emotions are flickers most of the time, with the occasional flare-up.
Here’s the rub. If you’re angry at the nature of women, it is because you want to turn women into goddesses rather than women.
Do you get angry at dogs because it is in their nature to bark?
Do you get angry at your dog because he refuses to shit in the toilet?
Or do you accept the nature of dogs, and work and train with a knowledge of that nature?
You are a Christian, after all. You believe that women have a sin nature–as sinful as yours, but different.
A zebra is an interesting and beautiful animal. But you cannot appreciate the true value of a zebra when you are angry at him for having the audacity to not be a unicorn.
(For the spiritually autistic, I am not saying that women’s sin nature is good or desirable. I am stating that is is a part of the human condition, and you can’t wish it away anymore than you can wish a zebra into a unicorn.)
Look, I get it. You were told zebras had wings and shit rainbows so long that it seems outrageous to you that he instead wears a ridiculous striped suit and poops digested grass–but the zebra isn’t the one who gave you the outrageous idea of him. He’s just been standing there eating grass and making manure the whole time you’ve been enamored with your vision of him.
A zebra isn’t a unicorn. He’s dirtier, smellier, and exists in our damned and imperfect world. But a zebra is an interesting animal, and one worth studying, photographing, or hunting in his own right.
In the same way, a woman isn’t a goddess. She’s as feeble, sinful, and human as you are–in fact a little more so (of the first two). But women are still worth getting to know after you’ve disabused yourself of your goddess delusions. They are worth marrying, having sons and daughters with, and guiding in the faith.
They are worth it, not worthy of it.
That’s a vital distinction to make.
No man has ever brought a dog into his house because the dog was worthy of living there. The very idea is laughable. A man brings a dog into his house not because he deems the dog worth it, rather than worthy of it. Worth it for the joy, companionship, and maybe some added security. Yet he knows full well that it is the nature of the dog to chew the piano leg and poop on the carpet.
Again, remember you’re a Christian.
Very God of Very God didn’t become incarnate and die for you because you were worthy. He did it because you were worth it, and if you say that you weren’t worth it, you contradict the decision of value made by the arbiter of all value.
If you can be unworthy, yet worth it; if your dog can be unworthy, yet worth it; don’t you think the same could be true about women?
If you are angry because you can’t find a woman worthy of becoming your wife, you are as ridiculous as the man who is angry that he can’t find a dog worthy of becoming his pet.
When you understand how ridiculous that sounds, you will hold the key to releasing your anger.
Your national church will continue to confront the evils of pride oppression and lust marginalization, wherever they are found. We will continue to fight against greed racism, envy sexism, gluttony heterosexism, wrath ableism, sloth classism, blasphemy xenophobia, and adultery religious intolerance wherever it is found. We will continue to challenge assaults on the divinity of Christ marriage equality, the personhood of the Holy Spirit LGBTQ rights, the doctrine of Original Sin environmental justice, the authority of Scripture economic justice, the Creatorship of God immigration, and salvation healthcare coverage for all who will receive it. We will continue to challenge laws, and political appointments, and to boycott and divest resources from businesses and regions where Christianity and Christian practice are under attack cries for justice go unheard, always holding space at the table for hearts and minds to change. We will continue to stand against sin hate.
(source)
…Continuing my previous thought:
For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh:(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ. —2 Corinthians 10:3-5 (KJV)
He that has an ear to hear, let him hear.
If your weapon of choice cannot divide asunder soul and spirit, how will you win against a spiritual enemy?
Which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. 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. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. —1 Corinthians 2:13-15 (NASB)For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the Spirit is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him. —Romans 8:5-12 (NASB)
For those slow to hear and slow to understand: Spiritual weapons can be used in the material world. Indeed, as the material is but a shadow of the spiritual, only spiritual weapons will have lasting effect in the material world.
For the childish and the mockers: I am not speaking against owning or using firearms. If you believe I am, you cannot discern spiritual things. Repent, and turn to God, and He will give you the mind of Christ.
It seems, in my observation, that many Christian men are starting to wake up to the fact that they are under attack. As they awaken, they realize this attack is everywhere. Their wives and children are rebellious. Their churches encourage and laud the rebellion in their homes, and attack them for their faith, calling them bigots for opposing the new openly lesbian pastor, and heretics for taking their family out of that toxic environment and into a “hateful, backwards, non-accepting church.”
The government teaches their children to disrespect and disobey them, and so do the expensive private Christian schools. It forbids them from buying and selling if they are true to their Christian beliefs. It offers their wives cash and prizes as the temptation to blow up the marriage.
Realizing this, many Christian men are beginning to try to fight back.
They’re taking their shots as they appear.
Wife is rebellious? Fire a shot back. Kid is rebellious? Fire a shot back. Pastor encourages rebellion? Fire a shot. Christian school is teaching the children that be “accepting” of gays is a Christian value? Fire a shot.
Scarecrows and human shields are being riddled with bullets, while the enemy remains untouched and laughing.
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. —Ephesians 6:12 (KJV)
Remember who the enemy is.
Remember that spiritual battles are fought in the spiritual realm.
If you aren’t viewing your enemy as a spiritual force, and fighting in the spiritual plane, you are seeing only a sliver of what is actually occurring.
When you see an attack, look for the spiritual force behind it.
You are a Christian man. You believe in demons and the devil. Take them seriously. Be prepared to cast them out. This is where the battle lies.