Posted in bible, Christian compassion requihomosexuality, gay agenda, gay marriage

All gay all the time: God gave us over

Posted on by elizabethprata
With the approval of the NY State Legislature and governor in legalizing homosexual marriage last week, the floodgates are already opening. The voices decrying the moral equality of anything gay are increasingly voices in the wilderness. Yet the numbers are truly, TRULY embarrassing. Let me show you:

In the Christian Posts’ “All Gay All the Time” essay, they stated “A Martian who visited modern America today might well think that half the population was homosexual-and the other half wished it were” and then backed it up with numbers. They wrote the statistic that only about 2% of the US population identifies itself as homosexual. And that 2% figure is already rounded up from 1.8%.

The population of the US is 311 million. 2% of 311 million is 6.2 million people. Taking aside objections that the homosexual population isn’t distributed evenly, for the sake of argument, 6.2 million divided by 50 states is 124,670 gays per state. Enacting a state-wide agenda because of the wants of 124,000 is disproportionate in the extreme! 

Let’s look at Christians in America, every one of which should recognize that NOT all voluntary sexual relations are equal… and who should claim homosexuality as a sin … and homosexual marriage as against God’s model for marriage as shown to us in Genesis 2. Seventy-five% of Americans say they are Christian, which I don’t believe. We know that there is a huge apostate church that accepts homosexuality. We further know from the proportions of the saved vs unsaved in the bible that many are not truly saved (parable of the Sower in Mt 13). Further, there will be many who will claim to be one of the Lord’s children but aren’t. (Matthew 7:22). So let’s knock that 75% Christian figure down to 35%.

Thirty-five percent of Christians in the general population of America is one hundred eight million. 108 million who stand for opposite gender relations as opposed to 6 million who don’t. 2% versus 35%. If I was to use the generally accepted standard of 75% of the population being Christian the numbers get so embarrassing I don’t even dare to go further.

This tells us several things. First, Christians need to do a better job of maintaining biblical standards in their minds and hearts and mouths pertaining to the gay agenda. I’m not insisting we go forth in social Gospel activities. It is a spiritual problem, not a social one. Here is what CARM says:

“As a Christian, you should pray for the salvation of the homosexual the same as you would for any other person in sin. The homosexual is still made in the image of God — even though he is in grave sin.  Therefore, you should show him the same dignity as anyone else with whom you come in contact. However, this does not mean that you are to approve of their sin. Don’t compromise your witness for a socially-acceptable opinion that is void of godliness.” 

The same essay says: “Homosexuality is clearly condemned by the Bible. It goes against the created order of God. He created Adam and then made a woman. This is what God has ordained and it is what is right. Unlike other sins, homosexuality has a severe judgment administered by God Himself. This judgment is simple: They are given over to their passions. That means that their hearts are allowed to be hardened by their sins (Romans 1:18-32). As a result, they can no longer see the error of what they are doing. Without an awareness of their sinfulness, there will be no repentance and trusting in Jesus. Without Jesus, they will have no forgiveness. Without forgiveness, there is no salvation.”

In listening to John MacArthur the other day, in his sermon about Jeremiah  “Prophetic message for an ungodly nation” (GREAT SERMON!) he mentioned a lot of people wonder if America is under judgment. There is the famous quote from Billy Graham, ‘If God doesn’t judge America he needs to give an apology to Sodom and Gomorrah.’ We expect judgment. Yet, we don’t see brimstone falling, nor earthquakes ravaging, nor thunder booming. Where is the judgment? MacArthur said that the Romans verse (quoted & linked above) is a judgment. God gives them over to their perverse lusts. So, how can a disproportionate population of 1.8% push an ungodly agenda onto a population of 311 million, 75% of whom claim to be Christian?? God’s judgment. He gave us over.

–A good opinion piece by Pat Buchanan The death of moral community
–Christian Post: All Gay All The Time

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Posted in cornwall tsunami, end time, how bizarre, la palma, static electricity

Bizarre tsunami in UK, along with static electricity

Posted on by elizabethprata

HT to Anonymous who passed along this UK Telegraph news link of a bizarre event that occurred this week along the southern coast of England. Scientists are still unsure of what caused a mini-tsunami to occur along an enormous swathe of coast, from Penzance to Portsmouth.

The UK Telegraph reports:

“Witnesses said the sudden movement around 200 miles out to sea caused the tide to suddenly shift by 50 metres, creating walls of water. The change in air pressure also generated static that left onlookers’ hair standing on end in the extraordinary environmental events earlier today. There were even reports that the conditions caused fish to leap out of the water. Experts said the phenomenon, which was felt from Penzance in Cornwall to Portsmouth, was likely to have been caused by a landslide on the continental shelf under the sea. Simon Evans, 45, who was digging for bait on the beach at Marazion in Cornwall, said: “It was really eerie, like nothing I’ve ever experienced.” The weather was really foggy but extremely warm and close and the sea was as calm as a mill pond.”

“One minute I was literally stood at the water’s edge, then when I turned around the water had retreated around 50 yards. “It was surreal and I couldn’t believe what had happened. I had no idea what had caused it, but I didn’t really want to hang about and find out. “The only time I’d ever heard of anything like it was hearing about tsunamis so I jumped in my car and got out of there.” Tourists visiting St Michael’s Mount in Cornwall were also caught up in the events as a metre-high wave surged up rivers. Bob Hunt, head guide at the National Trust site, said: “One minute they were happily walking across the walk way and the next they were knee deep in water. It was bizarre. “I’m not sure what caused it but everyone’s hair suddenly stood on end. It felt as though there was suddenly lots of static in the air.” “The sudden change was so strong there were two walls of water, with the eastern side around 8 inches higher than the other.” Bob Brown, who was launching his dinghy at the time said a landowner had seen “lots of fish jumping out of the water.”

“The Tidal Gauge Anomaly recorded higher tides than forecasted in Newlyn, Plymouth and Portsmouth. Dr Martin Davidson, coastal processes expert at the University of Plymouth, said the wave was probably caused by a sand or mud slide at sea. He said: “They are quite rare and it was probably not a tidal phenomenon but more likely a tsunami of some kind. “It was probably not due to an earthquake, which is the normal cause of a tsunami. This one was probably more likely to have been caused by a landslide.” The Met Office said there was no evidence of weather variations and The British Geological Survey said there was no seismic activity in UK waters over the weekend.”

Are you familiar with the situation at La Palma? It is an place in the Canary Islands that is called a “geological time bomb,” where land in a fissure at the volcano Cumbra Vieja that is twice the size of UK’s Isle of Man slips precariously each year. It is said that if the volcano ever erupts, half the island will slide into the sea, causing a massive tsunami wave that will swamp the east coast of the US. More about the geology of landslide-induced tsunamis, here, and information about Cumbra Vieja is also at the link. The revered BBC science documentary series Horizon did a show on it in 2000. CNN did a story about La Palma’s Cumbra Vieja in 2001, here.

In reading about the mini-tsunami at the UK,  La Palma was the first thing I thought of. I have no clue why there would be static electricity, but the comments from the YouTube page indicate that people did feel it, and that the barometric pressure was also affected. The one-minute Youtube video below is also at the UK Telegraph page.


from Youtube comments

–“Between 10 and 11 am. There were a series of waves and tidal changes during the whole day.”

–“Noticed here in West Wales the barometer rocketed to 75% relative humidty, from the usual upper sixties just before last monday morning, and with not much reason when checked the weather forecast. By the afternoon it had fallen back to upper sixties. All very peculiar it was, and must be related to this mini-tsuami. No thunder and lightening though as Cornwall got, nor hair standing on end.”

How bizarre how bizarre!
How bizarre
How bizarre, how bizarre
Ooh, baby (Ooh, baby)
It’s making me crazy (It’s making me crazy)
Everytime I look around
Everytime I look around (Everytime I look around)
Everytime I look around
It’s in my face


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Posted in bible, diane sawyer, end of days. prophecy, end time, joplin, men fainting in terror

Cowering under His power: prophesied astonishment and terror appearing on the scene

Posted on by elizabethprata

I look at language in the bible and look deeply into the meanings and I’m struck with how plainly it tells us what the Tribulation is going to be like. And then I look around at people who report current news and I see the same kind of stunned silence. It’s starting.

In Matthew 12:33 it says, “And when the multitude heard this they were astonished at his doctrine.” Look up the word astonished in the New Testament as it relates to what Jesus said and what He did, and you will see how much they were astonished. It doesn’t mean just that the people were dazzled or amazed, briefly tickled and then went their way. The Greek word means “strike out of one’s senses” , i.e. with the outcome of being utterly amazed (dumbfounded) or left “at a loss” from witnessing the incredible (causing the viewer to gape in astonishment).” Strong’s Numbers. In other words, just listening to Jesus preach or witnessing Him do miracles caused them to go outside their senses and be struck dumb, unable to cognitively cope with what they were hearing or seeing.

This is a link to a page showing how many times people were “astonished” (ekplesso) at Jesus and His preaching, and in Matthew 19:25, they were not just astonished, but greatly and exceedingly astonished. If you’re already out of your senses after hearing Jesus how much more can you get out of our senses? How much more at a loss can you be? It is superlative atop superlative.

We know from the reaction of every prophet or Apostle taken to heaven to view the proceedings, that their reaction was to fall on their face. Isaiah, John, Ezekiel, Paul, and the others fell dead in a faint. Isaiah shouted “O I am undone!” (Isaiah 6:5). The word undone means utterly destroyed, completely unraveled. Not many people have had the privilege of seeing heaven in a vision while in unglorified body, but we can see the reaction of those and of the people who witnessed Jesus even as a man, that the reaction is to cower under that power. All the people seeing Jesus immediately recognized His great power and authority. They had different reactions to it, with the Pharisees choosing not to accept it, and many believers turning away. But they were all “astonished,” gaping, after witnessing the incredible.

We read in the bible that in the Tribulation men will cower upon seeing incredible power. They will be astonished, equally unable to cope with the incredible, their puny brains unable to take it all in. God’s might is astonishing;

“And great earthquakes shall be in divers places and famines and pestilences and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.” (Luke 21:11). That ‘fearful sight’, in Greek is phóbētron – a fearful sight, emphasizing its terrifying impact on people trying to withdraw or flee from it. It is used only in Lk 21:11. So from the Age of Grace we move to the Tribulation. We go from the astonishing, amazing enough to knock you back on your senses, to the terrifying, so much so that they try to flee.

In Luke 21:26 we read, “Men’s hearts failing them for fear and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth for the powers of heaven shall be shaken…” (Luke 21:26). That word fear is a panic flight, terror. The word is most often used to indicate negatively withdrawing from the Lord (His will). Men will see what is happening and they will have massive heart attacks on the spot. Their bodies are unable to absorb the shock of seeing such power.

That fear, astonishment, and panic is beginning. You see it in Journalists. Reporters are at the forefront. The are at the front lines of witnessing terrors coming upon the earth, which will worsen in the Tribulation. They have to absorb and internalize what has happened, make sense of it, and then report comprehensibly to you and me. At some point the ability to absorb the scope of what is happening will outstrip cognition, as it did those disciples and prophets and followers who witnessed Jesus’ power. Here are two examples:

Weather Channel’s Mike Bettes was the first to arrive on scene in tornado devastated Joplin, MO. Surveying the scene around him, he was overcome with emotion. Though reporters are supposed to appear unengaged and unaffected, reporting the news unemotionally, I was touched by his obvious pain in witnessing the scene. It is the only humane response to what he was seeing. And just what was he witnessing? The power of God. I dare to say that the word ekplesso can be applied here. One is “struck out of one’s senses”, i.e. with the outcome of being utterly dumbfounded or left “at a loss” from witnessing the incredible.”

Also reporting a little while later from Joplin was Diane Sawyer. She is under a tent and rain is pounding on the canvas. Thunder booms above them, and briefly she and the crew debate whether it is even safe to be there. There is no power, the printer had stopped working, and ongoing the technical difficulties of reaching the NY office from a destruction zone are apparent. At one point Sawyer- seeing that she’s going live in moments, and despairing of ever getting paper copy- begs for a Blackberry at least. With time ticking away, Sawyer says repeatedly, “I have nothing.” The crew to me seems unorganized, dumbstruck, and fearful. Others have said that Sawyer looks “anxious, tentative, and confounded” but I think Sawyer looks composed. She refers to the area as a moonscape. Certainly the area outside the tent is a pile of unrecognizable rubble. Truly, how does one report on a massively emotional story in a few moments of air time? How do stories like this affect a person emotionally? One does absorb the tragedy no matter how one tries to filter it. A journalist IS the filter. The Joplin tornado news story is one that is on the edge of ability for humans to report it emotionally, technologically, humanely.

If you read Matthew 24 or Revelation, you know that the severity of natural disasters will ramp up considerably until absolutely nothing is left. Even the mountains crumble. We rely on people to report these disasters and we rely on technology to carry the pixels and the voices back to us. The impossibilities of continuing to be able to do that on an organized basis are rapidly coming to a close.
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Posted in bible, fragrance, God, incense

Do I smell good?

Posted on by elizabethprata
image source

The bible talks about fragrance, smells, ripening, and odors. “Then another angel, having a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.” (Revelation 8:3)

God smells us, like in this verse:

“But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? ” (2 Cor 2:14-16)

I think that’s funny because God doesn’t have a nose, but He can smell. He wanted us to be able to smell, so He formed us with a nose so we could.

I’m intrigued by smells. See, I have no functioning olfactory sense. I cannot smell the world or anything in it. I can’t smell my dinner burning, (which happens a lot) nor the grass when it’s mowed nor a bakery nor my clothes to see if they are dirty nor the food in the fridge to see if it is safe to eat. I can’t smell and I never could. But God can. He can smell me. The unsaved can smell us Christians.

I’m talking metaphorically, of course. But, when you awaken each day and you pray, do you think God will be pleased with your prayers? Are they sweet smelling to Him? Or are they so pale they have no fragrance at all?  Do they have a stench as in Isaiah 3:24 and Amos 4:10?

I’m looking forward to heaven, when I will be able to smell. Won’t that be wonderful, when all the paralyzed will walk, all the deaf will hear, all the blind will see. All the autistic children will speak, all the sick will be healed. There are no handicapped parking spots in heaven! But back to the fragrance.

One of the good, old fashioned preachers in 1904 said, “Every saintly life on earth, is a sweet fragrance unto God; and every sinful life, is a stench in his nostrils. As the rose scents the evening air — so a pure life scatters a sweet Christian influence and a knowledge of God throughout the world. The literal translation of 2 Corinthians 2:14 reads thus: “But thanks be to God, who leads me on from place to place in the train of his triumph, to celebrate his victory over the enemies of Christ, and by me sends forth the knowledge of him, a stream of fragrant incense, throughout the world.” A saintly life diffuses a sweet, heavenly fragrance throughout the world, and brings a knowledge of God and the nature of his salvation to the minds of men. Let me exhort you, therefore, to a pure life — a life full of devotion and reverence to God. You can make your life, by God’s grace, a constant, flowing stream of fragrant incense, whose sweetness will linger long on the air after you have passed to higher realms. So may it be.”
[source Charles Ebert Orr]

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Posted in jeremiah, judgment, sermons

A great sermon

Posted on by elizabethprata

I listen to several preachers but most often I listen to John MacArthur. I quote him a lot, as you know if you are a regular reader of this blog. MacArthur is one of only a handful of preachers, if that many, who preach through the bible verse by verse. He doesn’t speak topically and apply or overlay a few verses to make a point. He takes a verse or two or maybe three, and he spends 50 minutes teaching it.

He is the only preacher in the world now, I believe, who has preached through the entire New Testament, verse by verse. He started 43 years ago, and he finished in June. It was a poignant moment and I watched and celebrated with him and with his congregation via internet.

He isn’t going to go verse by verse through the Old Testament, he said. But he did do a wonderful series on the 7 days of Creation, here. You can listen or read the sermon. It is a fantastic and very uplifting series. He is now beginning some Old Testament sermons by using the verse from Luke 24:27, “And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.” This means that in all the books from Moses and all the books where the Prophets spoke, Jesus is present. He is in the Old Testament, everywhere from beginning to end, in actuality. Jesus is in Genesis 1:1 and He is in the last book of the OT, Malachi. But MacArthur is beginning his series limited to Jesus through the Old Testament akin to the Road To Emmaus, the place where He said he “expounded on these [Old Testament] things concerning Himself.” MacArthur’s begins with Jeremiah, here.

His aim is to show the parallels of Jeremiah the man and Prophet in his time amid an ungodly nation to our time here in this ungodly nation. Judgment came in Jeremiah’s life, and we who are burdened with the spiritual pregnancy of imminent labor feel judgment will come in ours too. Knowing that and listening to MacArthur’s preaching that won’t mean it’ll be a feel-good moment but it does give context and meaning to why and how God worked through this very human man, so sorrowful, and the doomed nation, but preserved in a remnant! Just as it is today.

I recommend the series to one and all.
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Posted in emergent church, pre-tribulation rapture

Emergent church questioning tactics are bad leaven

Posted on by elizabethprata

I’ve written before about the emergent church and its apostasy. One of the tactics of the apostate emergent person is to constantly question the bible and its doctrines. “Does hell really exist?” “Would a loving God punish?” “Is hell really eternal?” These and other doctrines are opposed not from a hatchet, but from lightly sprinkled leaven. Leaven-questions are designed by satan to diffuse into the person’s heart and chip away at the authority of the bible, the certainty of the Word, and by extension, the questioner’s faith.

Here is one example of the questioning tactic, best perpetrated by Emergent Rob Bell, lately known for his book “Love Wins”. This quote is from his book ‘Velvet Elvis’ in which he likens the membrane of Christianity to a trampoline where we all jump and jump:

“But what if, as you study the origin of the word ‘virgin’ you discover that the word ‘virgin’ in the gospel of Matthew actually comes from the book of Isaiah, and then you find out that in the Hebrew language at that time, the word ‘virgin’ could mean several things. And what if you discover that in the first century being ‘born of a virgin’ also referred to a child whose mother became pregnant the first time she had intercourse?”

Bell’s ‘what if’ questions continue:

“What if that [trampoline] spring [the virgin birth] were seriously questioned? Could a person keep on jumping? Could a person still love God? Could you still be a Christian? Is the way of Jesus still the best possible way to live? Or does the whole thing fall apart? . . . If the whole faith falls apart when we reexamine and rethink one spring, then it wasn’t that strong in the first place, was it?”

What he is saying is that the bible is confusing, the plain meaning of virgin could mean several things, and if you apply one of those several definitions to Jesus’ birth then the whole ‘thing’ collapses. But God is stronger than one word, “one spring” in Bell’s trampoline he calls Christianity, and the only thing actually falling apart is faith.

One question leads to another. Taking away the plain meaning of a word under the guise of deeper intellectual study of the passages is a very good tactic for chipping away at faith, because the questioner can lull himself into thinking he is performing intellectual study with honestly spiritual intentions. You can read more about the false doctrines of Rob Bell and how to spot them,here.

I had a conversation the other day with a person who has been a Christian for 50 years. She is a pastor’s wife. Her husband is not pastoring a church right now and hasn’t been for a long time, but he teaches in a community ministry and also teaches adults at a Sunday School. Their son in law is going to seminary. In other words, they look like a faith filled family, but her certainty in the basic doctrines are slowly being chipped away by her husband and son-in-law’s constant questioning in a pattern that exactly mirrors what I showed you in the Rob Bell method of hermeneutics.

‘I used to believe in the pre-trib stance’ she said, ‘I was taught that growing up. But now I’m not so sure.’ That lack of certainty is torturing her, because as a good Christian she knows the bible isn’t unclear, and as a good Christian wife she submits to her husband’s teaching. There’s a dissonance there that hurts. She didn’t say it, but I could see it.

The bible is tightly woven. It is a perfect book. That means you believe it all or you believe none. Once you start disbelieving a central doctrine, like the pre-tribulation rapture, then you have to adjust your thinking in many other doctrines to accommodate your new stream of thought. If you think the rapture will happen later, into the Tribulation (it doesn’t matter if you think it will be mid or post tribulation, satan is happy just to get you over the threshold in the time of Jacob’s Trouble) then you have to start questioning all of the following:

2 Thessalonians. In that letter, (esp. verses 1-10) Paul sought to reassure the believers there who had been infiltrated with false doctrine. They had been told falsely that they missed the rapture- ‘our gathering together to Him’ as Paul terms it. Persecution had begun, and so thought that the Tribulation had started and they were out of luck on the rapture doctrine. They were deeply worried. Now, if the default position is that we all go through the Tribulation, why would Paul need to even reassure the Thessalonians that they hadn’t missed the rapture?

The Restrainer: The rapture is to occur prior to the Tribulation. When disbelievers start questioning this, they have to resolve the sign that Paul gave in 2 Thessalonians indicating the Day of the Lord. The rapture is distinct from the Day of the Lord. The Day of the Lord is the period of time when Jesus punishes the corrupt earth. While the rapture can happen any time, The Day of the Lord cannot occur unless and until three things happen and one of those is the Restrainer is taken out of the way. In 2 Thess 2:6-7 Paul says the Day of the Lord won’t happen until and unless the antichrist is revealed, and the antichrist won’t be revealed until the Restrainer is taken out of the way. That’s a reverse timeline. The Restrainer is the restraining influence of the Holy Spirit, indwelling you and me as salt and light in the world. We act as a preservative from the Spirit’s influence in us and in the world. Once He is out of the way, the antichrist can come to the fore in all his corruptness. Now this is timeline presents problems to the post trib believer. Dismissing the plain meaning of the verse is hard to do, so instead they re-define who the Restrainer is. They say ‘maybe the restrainer is a lawless governmental system. Yeah, that’s it!’ [Note: the Spirit doesn’t leave the world in the Tribulation, He simply changes ministries, dispensing with one of them: His restraint of evil].

Encouragement: Paul explained in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 about the Day of the Lord in a passage titled, “The comfort of the Lord’s Coming”. He ended with saying to encourage each other with these words. Jesus said the Tribulation would be worse than a time ever experienced on the earth and never will be so bad again. It will be so bad that no flesh would be left alive if He didn’t cut the days short for the elect’s sake. Are you encouraged or comforted by the words that Christians will go through the worst time ever, be squashed by hail, have our head chopped off, get hunted, starved, and then martyred? “Be of good cheer! It will be awful but then Jesus will come!” I’m not encouraged. I’m not comforted. It is counter-intuitive to think that Paul would try to cheer up the Thessalonians by reminding them they would be appointed to go through the worst time in the history of the world, even worse than the Flood that wiped out everyone!

Wrath: Paul had written earlier in 1 Thess 5:9 that we are not appointed to wrath. His sentence is very simple: “we are not appointed to wrath.” But rather than accept that statement plainly, the emergent questioner poking holes in the pre-trib stance must now resolve that statement to coincide with the fact that the Tribulation is wrath and we will be appointed to it. Indeed, my friend said, “I wonder, what IS wrath, really.” Because the bible is tightly woven, one re-definition of a doctrine elicits another. Now they have to figure out what wrath really means. Like Rob Bell wondering what ‘virgin’ really means. Soon we’ll have people saying ‘that depends on what the meaning of is is.” Oops, we already had that happen. That was President Clinton trying to escape the plain meaning definition of sexual intercourse.

There are more things a post-tribulation believer has to re-define but you get the idea. You can see how, once you drift away from the solidity of the bible’s plain doctrines, supported by each other throughout the entire book (“Scripture interprets scripture”), that you have to begin an alternate construction which, because it is a man-made structure, is a house of cards on sand. Believing in the pre-tribulation rapture satisfies all questions and upholds all other doctrines in the bible. Believing in mid or post tribulation rapture elicts more questions … that must be answered … which causes more questions … which induces re-definitions … and you see how “a little leaven leavens the whole lump.” (Galatians 5:8-9). The evil diffusive properties of bad yeast permeates and spoils.

People have said to me, “It doesn’t really matter when the rapture takes place, before or in the middle or at the end, does it? It’s only a matter of timing.” Yes it matters. It is not a matter of timing. It is a matter of leaven.

The glorified properties of truth and the leading by the Holy Spirit into wisdom and understanding uplifts and solidifies, He doesn’t create confusion. “Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.” (1 Corinthians 5:8).
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Posted in fort calhoun, gavins point dam, jesus, los alamos

Three US nuke plants on edge of disaster

Posted on by elizabethprata

The horrors of the Fukushima Nuclear disaster in Japan after the March earthquake and tsunami are vivid on American minds. Almost immediately it was apparent that the government was not telling near to the truth about the scope of the disaster. Soon the evacuation zone was widened, crops grown near the plants were recalled,  and not long after that, mutation began appearing in the animal ecosystem. A bunny was born without ears. And now, residents who had lived within 40 km are emitting radioactive urine.

From across the Pacific, which proved to be little comfort as a barrier, Americans watched in horror as this nuclear disaster unfolded and as the nuclear cloud wafted our way. The power of the quake and the enormous force of the tsunami shook many people to their core. I know that it did for Christians, who knew they were watching the majesty of the Lord warn us again.

Well it wasn’t long before American shared in nuclear horror, as for the last month we have been hovering on the very knife’s edge of a similar kind of tragedy. Three nuclear plants are under the Sword of Damocles and no one knows when or if the horsehair will let go. The National Weather Service reports significant flooding is occurring in Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas and Missouri. Portions of the Interstate in Nebraska was closed. CNN has a good overview here. Here are some pictures to ground us on where these things are happening and how they impact each other

Here is the news roundup:

Cooper Nuclear Station: Snowpack and rain runoff continue to swell the Missouri and Mississippi rivers. This flooding has damaged or ruined thousands of acres of farmlands, and spring planting was interrupted. Hole cities have been evacuated, homes lost and lives destroyed. Along these waterways are oil refineries, and nuclear power stations. Cooper is one of those nuclear stations that is inches away from inundation. As we all learned from the tragedy at Fukushima, water and nuke plants do not mix. However, unlike Fukushima, the Corps of Engineers and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission knew of the coming flooding weeks ahead and began to prepare. Whether their preps will be enough remains to be seen with at least another month or tow of flooding to come:  “One of the biggest threats to the safety of any nuclear power plant would be a prolonged loss of electrical power because the plants need to be able to continue pumping water over the radioactive fuel to keep it cool…Cooper also has two main lines of outside power, at least three generators on site and a battery system that can power the plant in an emergency. Flooding remains a concern all along the Missouri because of the massive amounts of water the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has released from upstream reservoirs. The river is expected to rise as much as 5 to 7 feet above flood stage in much of Nebraska and Iowa and as much as 10 feet over flood stage in parts of Missouri. The corps expects the river to remain high at least into August because of heavy spring rains in the upper Plains and substantial Rocky Mountain snowpack melting into the river basin.”

Ft Calhoun: This is more of an issue. The waters have indeed encroached upon the plant, actually inundating parts of it and there has been a fire, power outage for a short time, and failure of a berm yesterday. This local news report from KLKN-TV insists “all is well, no worries and no threats exist.” I truly hope that is the case.

The Gavins Point Dam: “Record water flows of about one-point-one million gallons per second are still jetting from Gavins Point Dam into the swollen Missouri River, with no sign of a break ahead for many weeks.” This dam is under a lot of pressure as historic, even epic, flows have kept the Corps of Engineers busy for weeks. Nuclear consultant Arnie Gunderson said recently that the issue is the dams and levees upriver. Controlled releases mean more water downstream, which is bad for the Ft. Calhoun and Cooper Station plants, just mere feet away from total inundation. Gavins Point is under pressure, and as a result, the wild rumors going around the internet is that that particular dam is cracked. This article mentions it in an interview with a nuclear regulatory chairman who was on site, inspecting the Gavins Point dam, and the answer is short and to the point: “See that YouTube video about a supposed crack in the Gavins Point Dam? Ruch said that’s hogwash. “It’s crazy,” he said. “The dam isn’t cracking, it’s performing as designed.” Other mentions in that same article are as follows:

* A berm burst near the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Station early Sunday, but government officials say the plant remains safe. It has been closed since early April for refueling.
* Flood water surrounded two buildings at the plant, but officials said those buildings can handle flood waters of 1,014 feet above sea level. The river is now at 1,006.3 feet and is expected to crest at 1,008 feet.
Jaczko will visit the plant Monday.
* The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is working to secure the levee at Cass County’s Lake Waconda, Col. Bob Ruch said.
* Several sand boils, or leaks, have been spotted in the levee that holds the Missouri River back from the dam.

Sand boils or Sand Volcanoes occur when water under pressure wells up through a bed of sand. The water looks like it is “boiling” up from the bed of sand, hence the name. Sand boils can be a mechanism contributing to levee failure during floods. This effect is caused by a difference in pressure on two sides of a levee or dike, most likely during a flood. This process can result in piping, whereby the removal of soil particles results in a pipe through the embankment. The creation of the pipe will quickly pick up pace and will eventually result in failure of the embankment. A sand boil is difficult to stop.” [Wikipedia]

All is well, we keep hearing. In my opinion, the news is mixed. Now let’s take a look a bit south and east.
Los Alamos Nuclear Lab: Wildfires rage 50 feet from Los Alamos. On the right of the map is the Missouri River basin with the affected dams and nuclear plants.On the left of the map where the pin is shows the Los Alamos Center. Notice that in between is Joplin MO, where the tornadoes were last month. The mid section of the nation has been hit hard.

“The wildfire that surrounds the nuclear lab in Los Alamos, N.M., has grown to at least 61,000 acres amid mounting concerns about what might be in the smoke that’s visible from space. Such fear has prompted the Environmental Protection Agency to bring in air monitors, along with a special airplane that checks for radiation levels. So far, officials have not been able to find anything. “Our facilities and nuclear material are protected and safe,” Laboratory Director Dr. Charles McMillan told ABC News.”

All is well. All is well. Here is a photo.

It does not look as though all is well. Not at all.

The Iranian state news outlet, Press-TV has a good summary here of the situation with American sources noted.

One last thing. I noticed in the above article where there is video also, that the newscaster noted that the smoke can be seen from space, and they show a NASA satellite photo of all the smoke. The Eritrea volcano (Nabro) erupted for the first time ever and the way that the populace knew it erupted was the satellite photo. (News from the sparsely populated and tightly controlled Eritrean civilization rarely makes it outside the border). And the Chilean volcano eruption caused a bunch of satellite photos to be circulated…And the floods can be seen from space, too. (here). If we were astronauts I’m sure I’d be looking at a planet under a lot of smoke, strife, and overall visible negative activity. Our planet is groaning!
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Posted in bible, bible jesus, end time, nehemiah, prophecy

The only proper response to the Word

Posted on by elizabethprata

I read Nehemiah 8 this morning. It is a short book in the Old Testament, and it is good. Nehemiah was the fellow who supervised the rebuilding of Jerusalem and alongside Prophet Ezra help to purify the Jewish community that had re-gathered there. Nehemiah was governor and Ezra was the priest and the scribe.

The day came when Ezra called all the adults, and all children who could understand, to come and listen to the reading of the Law. They stood and listened. The Levites were there to help them understand what they were hearing. Soon there were tears, weeping, and crushed hearts. They fell on their faces. “For all the people wept, when they heard the words of the Law.” The Jews realized how far they were from God. But Ezra said not to weep, for it was a day of rejoicing. The Festival of Booths was born, and the people celebrated, giving gifts to those who had nothing, and went their way eating and drinking. It is a short chapter. I recommend reading it.

The response of the people was the only proper response but it is one from which we can gather strength and praise our Savior all the more. First, the people listened to the word. Any walk with the Lord should begin with listening, either by reading yourself and listening with your mind and heart, or listening to a pastor. The people were instructed, and that is a good start.

Then they wept. There are a lot of reasons people weep when they read or hear the Word. It is precise,  beautiful, true, and convicting. It is a gift delivered once for all to the saints, and it is good for reproof, exhortation, and education. The Word also reminds us how far we are from Him, Him as savior and we as sinners forgiven by His blood and His grace. But the Word also reminds us of how close we can be to Him!

Then the people were glad. He restores us! He hears prayer, he regenerates us in His likeness, and we are glad, going forth in joy to know that we CAN know our Savior personally. They celebrated, and they gave gifts. We should do that as well, always being on the lookout for those who are in need to fill that need. Giving the gift of the Word, or our time, or our love or all three!

Finally, the people went away rejoicing but their response to hearing the Word did not stop there. They DID something. In this case it was to begin the Festival of Booths (Sukkot). The Israelites evidenced an emotional response but the instructors encouraged them to apply the words to a spiritual response, and they did so.

What is your response to hearing the word? Do you remain unaffected? Do you fall on your face? Do you weep? Do you rejoice….but remain inactive? Or does hearing the word motivate you to a response in the world that in turn affects others?

Our joy should be all the greater because not only do we have the word, we have the promise of the Word.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.” (John 1:1-5)

May He shine brightly in your heart today. If it has been a few days,…weeks…months since you have really listened to the Word, do it today. In Him is life!

Posted in bible jesus, end of days. prophecy, end times, lightning

18 Children killed in lightning strike

Posted on by elizabethprata

Lightning kills 18 kids at primary school
“A LIGHTNING strike at a primary school in western Uganda has killed 18 students and injured 50. Lightning hit Runyanya primary school in Kiryandongo district, about 225km northwest of Kampala, killing 15 girls and three boys yesterday, police spokeswoman Judith Nabakooba said. “The injured were taken to hospital nearby and 15 of those who were seriously injured were transferred to Mulago hospital,” in Kampala, Nabakooba said. Local media reported that a further 21 pupils were burned after lightning struck at a second school in Zombo district, about 380km north of Kampala. Police could not confirm the incident. Nabakooba could not provide an exact figure for the total number killed by lightning in recent weeks, but local newspaper The Daily Monitor reported a total of 28 killed and scores injured in the past week, including Tuesday’s incidents. Uganda is experiencing unseasonably heavy rainstorms and concern about the number of recent lightning strikes has prompted lawmakers to demand an official explanation from government.”

In this article, though it is stated that lightning strikes are common in that locality, the fact that so many had occurred at once shook the town leaders:

“The lightning hit the victims in a classroom at a school in Kiryandongo, 130 miles north of Kampala, police said. Another 38 children were admitted to hospital. The East African country has suffered a wave of fatal lightning strikes in recent weeks during unseasonably heavy rains. The deaths were debated in parliament on Monday, with MPs calling on the government to come up with strategy to deal with what several termed “a crisis”. “I don’t know which minister is in charge of the lightning but let the government come up with a statement to inform the country on what is going on and how we can manage it,” Speaker Rebecca Kadaga said. Local meteorologists have criticized the government for not providing enough lightning conductors for buildings in storm hotspots. “The 19 were killed in single lightning strike on Monday,” a police spokesman said. “They were ready to leave school but there was a heavy downpour and so they sheltered in the classroom and then, all of a sudden, it struck.”

In early June, a lightning strike at Camp Shelby in Mississippi sent 77 cadets to the hospital. Lightning has been busy lately. Similar lightning strikes have occurred in Northern Nigeria, also. “15 killed by Nigeria lightning“

I was heartbroken to read that it was children who were killed, and shocked to see that they had been inside a structure. However, I was not surprised to see the reaction of man, that a ‘natural’ event had to be managed or even could be managed.

In The Language of God series, I wrote about lightning. You can read that essay here, with scriptures and my interpretation of what lightning strikes may mean. Meanwhile, we can also pray for the families of the little ones taken from earth. I can’t imagine the horror and sorrow of the families who learned that eighteen of their children had been killed. In the US, 18 children comprise an entire classroom. Imagine what the headlines would be if a bus filled with children slid off a bridge, killing the kids on board! Or if there had been a fire, or a shooting, or similar tragedy where so many children had lost their loves! It is terrible.

But worse is the response of man. To make statements that lightning must be managed, to refer to man’s strength instead of Jesus’ mercy, is a worse state of mind and heart. We know that soon, after the rapture, the ‘natural’ events will not be able to be explained. Until then, brothers and sisters, remain strong and sure of His calling and election in your life, and witness through that strength. Peace and calm He gave to us and in addition, He gave us the Spirit, salvation, and an eternal blessing to dwell with Him. I look to and through and beyond the events like the Ugandan lightning strike, to His hands who holds the lightning bolts, and count my blessing He calls us friend.
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Posted in end of days. prophecy, gay, homosexuality, sodom

Why ‘gay pride’ is an oxymoron

Posted on by elizabethprata

I’ve written many times about how language alters perception. How we say words, and the frequency with which we say them, penetrates the brain and footholds are begun. From footholds, we get strongholds. Satan knows this and from the first to the last, he attempts to get us to change meaning. Hell isn’t eternal torment… Wrath isn’t really wrath… ‘Did God really say’?

In 1969 there was “a series of spontaneous, violent demonstrations against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 28, 1969, at the Stonewall Inn, in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of New York City. They are frequently cited as the first instance in American history when people in the homosexual community fought back against a government-sponsored system that persecuted sexual minorities, and they have become the defining event that marked the start of the gay rights movement in the United States and around the world.” (Wikipedia). The homosexual community itself marks Stonewall as their watershed moment when homosexual issue burst upon the cultural scene with force and violence. In other words, the gay agenda was launched.

One of those bullet listed items was to remove the word homosexual and to use the word gay instead. Though the term ‘gay’ had been in intermittent use, by the mid twentieth century it had come to be synonymous with homosexual and was considered less pejorative than ‘queer.’ By the end of the twentieth century various academic disciplines, medicine, journalism, the law, government, business, and industry were regularly including it as standard in their style guides. Once the word fell into common written use for standard disciplines, its verbal ubiquitousness was only a matter of time. The 1960s was the threshold for this word shift, and the Stonewall riots accompanied the bursting-in. Gay was in and homosexual was out.

Gay is so friendly sounding, Homosexual is so…clinical. Queer evokes oddness, but gay is so average, typical, and thus, is non-threatening.

We’re all familiar with the rest of the gay agenda. Even the language around the definition of ‘gay agenda’ is under contention. Liberals say that the gays advocate for rights, while conservatives say that the homosexuals militantly force a minority point of view on the larger society. Add to this linguistic battle, the iteration from deviant homosexuality to gay pride.

Gay pride is an oxymoron. Homosexuality is a sin. To march in parades under the gay pride banner is an open display of rebellion against culture, against morality and most importantly, against God that is so deep that the people doing it have no clue of the eternal destiny that awaits. Trumpeting pride in your sin is egregious and horrifying. It would be the same as if people organized for a parade and marched under banners shouting “Adulterers Awake!” or “Greed is good!” There is no pride in sin, any sin. But to be so militant about one’s homosexuality that you go through the streets unashamed, trumpeting carnal desires to one and all, is exactly the scene immediately prior to Sodom’s judgment.

Let’s take a look at that scene in Genesis 19:1-11:

Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them, and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground. And he said, “Here now, my lords, please turn in to your servant’s house and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.”

And they said, “No, but we will spend the night in the open square.” But he insisted strongly; so they turned in to him and entered his house. Then he made them a feast, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

Now before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both old and young, all the people from every quarter, surrounded the house.  And they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know them carnally.”

Source

So Lot went out to them through the doorway, shut the door behind him, and said, “Please, my brethren, do not do so wickedly!  See now, I have two daughters who have not known a man; please, let me bring them out to you, and you may do to them as you wish; only do nothing to these men, since this is the reason they have come under the shadow of my roof.”

And they said, “Stand back!” Then they said, “This one came in to stay here, and he keeps acting as a judge; now we will deal worse with you than with them.” So they pressed hard against the man Lot, and came near to break down the door.  But the men reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door.  And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they became weary trying to find the door.

Illustration from Figures de la Bible (1728)

Did you get all that? The Sodomites were attacking Lot’s house to get what was inside, to them, delectable new meat. This is no different than the animalistic rage a rabid dog goes into. They were predators, hunting prey. Then Lot tried to reason with them, and they would not listen. Not only would they not listen, they were further infuriated at Lot and hated worse that Lot was acting “as a judge”. Their reprobate mind was so complete that the mere mention of reason enraged them further and violent promises were made.

Now this last part really overwhelms me. The angels struck the men with blindness. Being supernaturally struck with blindness did not stop them for one moment. They knew it had to have been an angel, for so many been were struck at one time and instantly. Despite the nearness of God in their presence, and despite being blind, they kept trying to get through the door. “They wearied of trying to find it.” This means the perverted mob continued trying to find the handle to break in the door and got tired because of the futility of the endeavor and not because of the sinfulness of it! They did not stop because they realized they were being impolite. They did not stop because they realized it was wrong to attack a man and his property. They did not stop even when they were struck blind. (which of course is a spiritual metaphor for them being so deep in their sin that they could not find Jesus, the door). They stopped because they got tired.

So Gay pride. The definition of pride is “a feeling of self-respect and personal worth; satisfaction with your achievements.” Thousands of homosexuals march openly shouting of their satisfaction and feeling of personal self-worth in their sin.

Isaiah 5:20 speaks of this: “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!” Isaiah is telling us that at some points in culture, sin is so deeply embedded in the psyche they call sin good and sin-haters evil! It’s all reversed. Like “gay pride.”

Homosexuality is a sin. There is no pride in that, only shame. There is shame in all sin, and the glory of His grace is that He forgives it. But to dwell in sin so deeply that you are openly proud and actively recruiting for the culture around you to accept it , revel in it, and uplift is, in my opinion means we have come to that exact moment in Genesis. You all remember what happened the next morning God judged the city.

But there is hope! Jesus paid the debt for all sins, for all time!! He loves each and every person. Look at the verses here:

“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites,  nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.” (1 Corinthians 6:9-11)

It is true that no sinner inherits heaven. It is also true that any sinner can be washed! Any sinner can be sanctified! Any sinner can be justified! Paul says that some of the very people he is writing to were once sinning in the ways he describes, including homosexuality. But Jesus is bigger than all that. He forgives because He loves. It doesn’t mean a person never sins again after being forgiven, but a close walk with the Holy Spirit means that He helps and as you grow, it becomes less of a battle to resist the temptation.

There is no such thing as “gay pride.” There is only sinner’s shame, Jesus, grace, and forgiven sinner’s gratitude. Be part of the gratitude, showing pride in HIS achievements!
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