Words of Truth

Yesterday it was finally hot enough that we turned on the air conditioning. It doesn’t work. I called our guy, and he came to look at it today (rather, a guy from his company did). Evidently it will cost us about $1500 to fix OR we could just replace the whole system for a few thousand more. They are going to have someone from their office call us and give us the details of our options. I’m guessing this is going to set me back 3-4K.  I wish the sale of our house had gone through last summer, but God knows best.

My son and I got in my car so I could drive him to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles to apply for his driving permit. We made it about a block down the road, when the stick shift lever started flopping around and became useless. I pulled over. Long story short: it was the shifter cable bushing. I thought I would have to scrap the car, but I only needed to buy a $25 little plastic piece and I fixed it myself. Of course the plastic didn’t work as advertised, so I had to jury-rig it, and finish the whole thing off by taping the whole thing together with electrical tape (we were out of duct tape….I know. I bought more last night). It works again.

I ordered my new laptop for school on Wednesday, the 15th. I paid a little extra for “Next day shipping” so I could get my laptop by Friday.

I’ll wait a minute for you to do the math on that one.

So I go to Dell’s website today to check the status of my order, and it still says “pending” (as in “Not shipped yet”). At noon I called Dell, and the kind Indian gentleman said, “I would like to be informing you that your bank has not approved this purchase. I would like to be informing you that if you call your bank and ask them to approve the purchase, we will ship your laptop to you.” I called my bank, who said, “Yeah, we didn’t know if maybe this was fraud.” I said, “When I ordered the laptop, you guys texted me to ask if it was really me. I said yes. Nobody has called me to ask, so you should have either called me to check this out, or approved the charge.” The guy approved the charge, so whatever, I guess he did what I wanted, even though I had to poke at them to get it done.

So I call Dell back, they put the sale through, and my laptop is in processing. There’s still hope it may arrive tomorrow (Friday), but if it doesn’t, it won’t get here til next week. If that happens, I’m going to call and demand a refund on my “Next day shipping.”

In contrast, I ordered something off Amazon.com for a friend of mine and had it shipped directly to her house from Amazon.com. I ordered it yesterday afternoon with my free “Amazon Prime two day shipping.” It was delivered today, less than 24 hours after I ordered it. Dell, you should be taking notes.

So I type this, waiting for my laptop, and it’s hot. There are an infinite number of ways that my life could be worse. I am thankful to God that, right now, these are the worst of my problems.

PS: The kid passed his test, and got his permit. Well, he got a paper printout of his permit. The actual plastic card comes in the mail now in a few weeks. Then I went to a vacant lot and gave him his first driving lesson. He did great.

Boston Police search Watertown, MA. (image from The Guardian website).

Like everybody else, I was horrified when two bombs blew up at the Boston Marathon last week. I was encouraged by the swift response of the general public in sifting through all the available footage, and locating the probable perpetrators quickly. My belief that they might be the guilty ones was changed to near-certainty when, in attempting to avoid capture by the police, they used an explosive device made out of a pressure cooker, much like the one used at the finish line of the marathon. I was relieved when they said one of these murderers had died as he tried to kill more innocent people.

Like everybody else, I watched the footage as the Boston police (and others) searched for this man. But as I watched and listened to the news reports, something bothered me.

The media said that the police commanded every person in a twenty-block radius to stay indoors. The police then went house to house, forcing the “house-arrested” residents to get out while the police searched their home for the perpetrator. And this is the part that concerned me.

The fourth amendment to the constitution states, “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

This means that the government does not have the right to enter your house or search you, your house, or your possessions unless they have probable cause to search. On April 19th, 2013 the Boston police forced people from their homes, and searched their homes without warrants. I did not hear of one case of someone refusing, and I’m sure if anyone DID refuse, a warrant would have been issued fairly quickly. This does not change the fact that the government wanted something, and they simply took it, with no regard to the rights of the homeowners in Watertown, MA.

But I have two other questions that maybe someone out there can help me with:

1. Why is this man being tried in federal court? He is a United States citizen who committed murder on a city street in the city of Boston in the state of Massachusetts. He did not commit this murder on federal property, he did not cross state lines, or do any other thing that would move him into the jurisdiction of the federal government instead of the state government. Is it simply because it is a “high profile” case? In this case, why weren’t O.J. Simpson or Casey Anthony tried in federal court?
2. This man is charged with using “weapons of mass destruction.” How does killing three people and injuring dozens qualify as “mass destruction”? I thought the term “WMD” was reserved for chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons. If pipe bombs qualify (IED, whatever you want to call it), then there WERE WMD’s aplenty in Iraq, thank you very much, liberals!

Don’t get me wrong: I am glad they found the perpetrator, and that he will be brought to justice. What concerns me is the manner in which he was apprehended. I can foresee a time when the government uses similar tactics to apprehend, arrest, and try someone who simply disagrees with them. What if a group of people felt that the government was not serving in the best interests of the nation, and the government needed to be forcibly changed? This is what our founding fathers did. In today’s world, the founding fathers would be hunted down, shot, or killed by the very government they founded.

I have worn corrective lenses since I was 13 years old. I remember at the time that I didn’t really think I needed glasses, until I went to the eye doctor and saw how well I could see with glasses. The same thing happened to me today.

I wear Acuvue Oasys contact lenses. These are the kind you can leave in for two weeks, then take them out, throw them away, and put in a new pair. Twice a month I have to mess with my contacts, and I have 20/20 vision as a result, with no fuss the other 26 days. I can always tell when it is time to change my contacts, because they start getting dirty and things get blurry. It’s kind of unpleasant to poke my finger into my eye a few days a month, but it’s worth it for the clarity of vision.

One day last week, I changed my contacts and went to work. I didn’t notice that there was a problem with my vision at first. Things were slightly blurry, but I didn’t think it was a problem, since my eyes were accustomed to the old, blurry contacts I had been wearing.

Today I tried to read some small text at a distance (like the title of a book from several feet away). Normally I have no trouble, but today I couldn’t make out the writing. So I took my left contact out (my “dominant eye”) and put in a new one.

It was like someone turned on the lights! Everything is sharper, clearer, and easier to see. I think there’s a problem with the old contact lens, and I’m going to try to get some credit for it, but for now I’m just glad that I can see well again.

As humans, we get used to “the way things are.” We don’t like change, because we fear the unknown. When God puts something in our lives to carry out His plan, and to make us into the people He wants us to be, it isn’t always a fun process. It doesn’t always seem like a “good thing” at first. It is only later that we are able to see how truly good He is (and was at the time, though we did not realize it). It is only when our vision is clear that we can see the goodness of His plan.

Maybe you are going through a trial. Maybe someone close to you has died, you have a serious illness, financial difficulties, or some other problem. It may not seem like it right now, but someday you will praise God for His wisdom and goodness. This doesn’t seem possible to you today, but that’s because you have blurry vision. Your vision is blurry now, but one day soon God will remove the scales and you will be able to see clearly. The pain will ease, the problems will disappear, and then we will have perfect vision, just like Christ.

I John 3:2

Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.

I understand the desire of gay people to be accepted. Everybody wants to be accepted.  But it seems to me that we’re on a slippery slope.  Let me explain.

At first, gay people just wanted to be left alone.  Society said, “If you think homosexuality is ok, there’s something wrong with you, and you should be punished.” Homosexuality was illegal. It was punishable by prison time, monetary fines, and other penalties. But then the view of society started to shift. We heard things like, “what is done in the privacy of the home is nobody’s business.” Movies promoted the idea that, well, gay people might be a little off, but they are kind of funny, and well, it isn’t really our place to say they can’t do whatever they want.  End result:  society said, “We will ignore homosexuality.”

Then people started to put forth the idea that homosexuality wasn’t bad, it was just “different.”  We were told that gay people were just like us, and that there was nothing wrong with homosexuality. Once again, Hollywood promoted the idea that gay was ok. End result: society said, “We will accept homosexuality.”

At some point in the past ten years, there has been a decided shift from merely “accepting” homosexuality, to actively promoting it.  Watching certain TV shows, reading certain books gives one the idea that not only are gay people “ok,” they are “better” than their straight counterparts. All of a sudden, people started thinking that being gay was not only “not bad” or “neutral” but that being gay was actually a good thing.  End result: society said, “We should approve of homosexuality.”

And now that homosexuality is promoted as a good thing, those of us who still believe that the words in the Bible actually mean what they say when they say God says homosexuality is sin are being castigated. We are getting the message, “how dare you say that homosexuality is wrong!” End result: society is coming full circle, and is now starting to say “If you think homosexuality is wrong, there’s something wrong with you, and you should be punished.” We have reached the point where people are being punished for disagreeing with homosexuality.  I have two examples of this.

Example number 1: Just Cookies. This is a bakery. They make cookies.  It is a family operation. In 2010 a local college (IUPUI) was planning a celebration for “National Coming-Out Day.”  The college decided to call Just Cookies and special-order some cookies with rainbows on them. The owner refused the order since he is a Bible-believing Christian, and he does not agree with homosexuality. He (rightly) believed that if people saw his cookies with a pro-gay message, they would think that he approved of homosexuality. The gay rights lobby told the city they needed to investigate this breach of the city’s “anti-discrimination” policy.  Never mind that they were asking the bakery to make something they don’t make.  They wanted this business shut down.  They wanted the business to be kicked out of their lease on city property. Thankfully the city backed down and this man was allowed to continue to run his business with his values intact.

Example number 2: Aloha Bed and Breakfast. In 2007 a lesbian couple tried to book a room at this bed and breakfast.  When the owner of the bed and breakfast clarified that they were a gay couple who wanted a room with one bed, she told them she was uncomfortable having lesbians in her house because of her religious views.  The couple sued her for discrimination. Yesterday, April 15^th, 2013, the first circuit court judge of Hawaii ruled in favor of the couple. The court has informed the owner of this bed and breakfast that she must allow gay couples to stay at her establishment. She now has two options: operate her business against her religious views, or close her business.

Many Christians, including myself, foresee a time in the near future when, like this lesbian couple in Hawaii, gay couples will come to our churches and demand that the church marry them. When the church refuses, there will be fines, prison time, or even closing the church down.  That’s when the real persecution will start.

Advocates for gay rights don’t see why this is exactly the same as what our society used to do: they forced people to comply with their point of view on the subject. Is this the way we should behave in a free society?

Tolerance isn’t tolerance if you don’t allow people to disagree with you.