The Best Gift

There virtually isn't a person alive, who doesn't want or appreciate getting or receiving a gift from someone, especially when that gift is something desired strongly or needed.  The gifts that we give and the gifts that we receive vary depending upon all sorts of circumstances in regards to such things as who we are, our age, and the gift givers themselves.  In this world, based upon our upbringing, tradition, and all the commercial advertising of all sorts that we come across day-by-day, the giving of gifts follows a pretty standard set of rules, of which, foremost amongst them is that gift giving is considered to be an obligation, sort of, as a way of expressing your love or affection from one person to another which is demonstrated in practicality by the gift itself.

There are, however, many, many people that often simply do not have the means to provide the desired gifts to others, and then because of this lack, are unfairly brushed with the aura of unconcern or uncaring.  This is most unfortunate, because usually the desire to please another with an appropriate gift is there, but the monetary means to do so, are sorely lacking.

Yet, through it all, there is something fundamentally out of sorts in many aspects of gift giving and that is the fact that material gifts are actually seldom the best gift of them all.  The thing about gifts of the material kind, is that even if wholly appreciated, that initial rush of feeling, that initial rush of appreciation, will invariably fade over time, so that even if the gift is something as expensive and impressive as a brand new car, one day that car will not be so new, it will be surpassed by many another car, and over time, it will fade, get tarnished, and become just another car, and while definitely appreciated, the car itself and typically your feelings for it, will have definitely depreciated.  That, in a nutshell, is the issue with all tangible gifts which is that all of them will invariably lose their luster and their utility, no matter how much they were initially appreciated.

Then there is another type of gift, a gift more meaningful than others, a gift that allows a man of any material worth, to match a man with ten thousand times that worth, and that gift is the gift of your sincere concern for another expressed through human contact. Sometimes, the nice present beautifully wrapped for a good friend or loved one is the expedient way to provide something tangible to someone, and thereby does not demand much of anything from the giver other than money and a little forethought, whereas in actuality, what has been circumvented is the truly important thing, which is a meaningful conversation, a dialogue, a meeting of the minds, and simply time spent together.

None of us can take any of our material gifts with us to the next world, meaning that at best, we appreciated these gifts while here on earth, whereas there are indeed gifts that transcend space and time, and those gifts are love, respect, empathy, concern, patience, and sincere communication.  When we take the time to listen to others, to help to guide others, to mentor others, to be a good neighbor to others, to be there for others in times of their trouble and stress, to sacrifice our free time to be of service to others, and to will the good of another, this is when we have stepped out of our small little finite world and have stepped into something of far greater expanse, into a world without end, and have provided the best gift of all: love, expressed in all of its many splendors.

The Rulers and the Ruled

Lincoln's Gettysburg address in 1863, declared that we: "… shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."  Today, more than 150 years later, how many Americans truly believe that this is a government, of, for, and by the people?  While it is true that our government most certainly has not perished, in fact, unfortunately, quite the opposite is true, that our government in all of its many forms and colors, has actually become far more intrusive, far more demanding, and far more commanding of its citizenry, so that today the people have little concept of what a properly formed government should really be like.

Presently, we live in a country to which the most vital and important activities that our government is often participating in, are things that we as citizens, are not privileged to really even know about; things such as our endless involvement in the foreign affairs of other nations, as well as our many governmental covert activities that are often deliberately hidden or obscured from the public's view.  Additionally, the government makes it policy to spy domestically and extract all sorts of data on all of its citizens, under the false flag, of protecting the homeland.

The thing is it is impossible for the citizenry to hold the government accountable if the citizenry is essentially held clueless about what the government is actually up to, and with layers upon layers of secrets and misdirection that no one could possibly work their way through, in addition to the endless lies and deceptions at the highest echelons of our government, to which none are ever held accountable, makes the entire show of accountability a hopeless exercise in futility.

The present government is in reality and intent not of the people, but rather it is a separate government, sovereign only to those that are part of that same social milieu, to which the good of the people, is not even conceived of, in fact, it isn't even considered.  Instead, this government and the parties to it, go about their business for the sake of their own aggrandizement, and if there is hell to be paid for stupid or miscalculated decisions, it will be paid by the blood, sweat, and toil of the people, in their faithful devotion to their country, which asks for their patriotic dedication to a government that sees them at best, as subjects, born to serve those that are their betters.

None of this should be happening nor should it have ever come to this, in a country that once truly was the beacon of hope for the tired and the poor, but now its own people are too often exploited, manipulated, used, and then tossed away as damaged goods.  Unfortunately, we live in a land to which the leaders of such in conjunction with the almighty military-industrial complex work hand-in-hand to do what they believe should be done so as to gratify their selfish objectives, preferably behind closed doors, with access restricted to only those with a need-to-know, creating position papers that twist and turn clear rules into whatever the government wills instead to perform, because this government cares not at all for the welfare of its people, for it's the new American Caesar, a law unto itself.

Money and Power on their Collective High Horse

In this country there are some people with plenty of money, so too there are some people with the right connections with the right people, as well as there being some people that are powerful in their ability to forge law and public policy, and then there are the other people.  It would be one thing entirely if these well-placed privileged people, simply kept to their selves and didn't interfere in the day to day operations of everyone else, but too often people who believed that there were either born with a silver spoon in their mouth or somehow have obtained one, are very interested in seeing that their viewpoint of what people should or shouldn't do should be the de facto viewpoint for everyone else.

This means, in effect, that there are a select few that want to lord it over everyone else, so that if the current belief, is that obesity in all cases is wrong, than obesity must be legislated out of existence, so too this goes for smoking, or drinking, or just about anything that these busybodies can come up with.  While it may be true, conveniently so, to be able to demonstrate that certain things are bad for you physically, or that certain behaviors or bad for you psychologically, the problem with this interference in other people's behavior is that those that are creating this intrusion are not doing it because they truly believe that it is the right thing to do, but because they want to be able to tell and thereby mandate what you do, period. 

These know-it-alls, that pound the tables that smoking is an unmitigated bad, that intemperate drinking is the inherent downfall of many a man, and that eating too much is catastrophic, will do everything within their power, of which they have a lot of, to see that you don't do any of those things, at least not easily, and in order to accomplish this mission, they propagandize, pass laws, create penalties, and enact regressive taxes to effect their vision about what is best for you.  While it is one thing to have a parent, express parental concern for their children, it is an entirely different thing when the government or certain special people dictate to you what you are or are not permitted to do especially when you are effectively "off the clock" so to speak.

For those that believe that smoking or drinking or eating certain foods are wrong, for reasons good or bad, but reasons just the same, than those people should do not do those very things.  It is entirely different thing, however, to take your belief and insist that a free man must submit to it, as if your belief, because it comes from you, is thereby always valid, whereas my belief, because it comes from me, is invalid. 

While to take a brotherly concern about someone else most definitely has its merits, it is pig-headed to insist that your brotherly way is the only way, the right way, and the only sensible way.  The thing is those that claim that they are looking out for our best interests are too often, doing nothing of the sort, they are simply and straightforwardly trying to dictate to everyone else that things should always be their way, because their way makes for a perfect little convenient life and fit for them, and consequently they just really want us to shut up, acknowledge their greatness, and subsequently dismiss our freedom of thought and actions as the disobedience that is never permitted in their twisted small world that brokers no dissent.

The Illusion of So Much to Do

In America, we are served the same illusion again and again, that we just have to get all sorts of things done, such as cleaning, cooking, working, bills, bringing our children up right, helping with the community, and so forth, to which each of these things most definitely have their merits, but life actually is in effect, much more straightforward than we might think.  The first clue that perhaps we shouldn't be so intimately involved in the rat race, is to understand, that Jesus the Christ, time and time again, took time to contemplate by himself so as to recharge his batteries and to stay focused on the meaningful things such as in keeping His oneness with our Lord, to which we read in Luke5:16: "And he withdrew himself into the wilderness, and prayed."  After all, you would think that the Messiah would have all sorts of things that He just had to do, that would literally keep Him busy night and day, but intuitively He understood that the greatest power and wisdom attainable necessitated both quiet meditation as well as concentrated attention to our Creator, or else He would not be the Christ for His people.

So too, there is the story told of Martha and Mary, to which, when Jesus entered their house, Martha took it upon herself to do all the necessary work, that she just had to do, in order to properly receive and serve a guest as great as our Messiah, whereas Mary, on the other hand, merely sat at Jesus' feet.  Yet, when Martha complained that it was unfair that she was not getting any serving help from Mary, and thereby Martha was unable to benefit or appreciate the words being spoken by Jesus, "And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: but one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her," (Luke 10:41-42).

To a certain degree, hearing this gentle rebuke, seems a bit unfair, after all, it would appear that Martha is doing all the things that a host should do for an important guest, whereas Mary is doing nothing, and logically you would think that Mary has an implicit obligation to do her part, because two heads working together can accomplished much, and having done so, thereby both will be able to equally receive the words of Jesus.  However, that isn't what Jesus said, He makes it very clear that life is far simpler than being an accomplished busybody, or being anxious, and that in fact, life can be summed up into this understanding that rather than us having so many things to do, of which many of those things are not so much for the good of ourselves but more for selling the illusion of our vitality to others or to feed our self-righteous vanity, we should instead focus less on this world that does not last, and more on the eternal things that will never end.

While it is true that God does desire that we be good for something, so too God desires that we stay focused on the true prize, which is our re-uniting with His Kingdom, and while there are fundamental things that we need to attend to in our everyday activities, the correct priority should be to always keep in mind, that we must first serve Him for it is the choices that we make day by day that take us either closer or further from His eternal love and grace.

Great Britain's Royal Africa Company

America, until its independence, was a colony of the British Empire, to which, initially there were not any slaves in America, but typically instead there were indentured servants brought here to provide necessary and desired labor help.  Great Britain, however, created the Royal Africa company that worked under the aegis of the Majesty of Great Britain, to which one of the functions of the Royal Africa Company, besides the perpetual search for and lust of gold, was the trade in human flesh, to which, part of that process, was to forcefully take Africans from Africa and then export them to either the Caribbean or North America, not as indentured servants, but as human chattel.

Of course, like most government enterprises, there were rules, regulations, taxes, and money involved in this particular trade, so that the government of Great Britain, had a vested interest in the success and the regulation of the slave trade specifically in regards to the Royal Africa Company, to which its British investors of such, demanded a fair return on their money at risk.  This meant that each slave brought into America was subject to a tax payable to the Crown for this importation, over and above the actual trading, bargaining and commerce for the slaves themselves.  In short, the trading of slaves was not some sort of willy-nilly adventure of arbitrary taking of peoples from Africa, without any rhyme or reason, but something instead that was deliberate, pre-planned, and executed essentially with the stamp of approval of Great Britain as deliberate policy.

While there were plenty of valid reasons why slavery was popular with the planter class, even within that class, at the highest echelon there was an increasing unease with slavery, to such an extent that States such as South Carolina and Virginia, desired to significantly reduce or eliminate the importation of slaves into their respective States, not so much because slavery didn't make economic sense to them, and certainly not because they collectively saw slavery as a blight upon mankind, but primarily because of their anxiety in having so many slaves within their State, that they felt that they were unwittingly sowing the seeds of potential economic destruction, rebellion, uprising, ruin, or revolt, as the sheer amount of oppressed black slave faces in their presence was considered to be quite troubling.  In lieu of the continuous importation of slaves, these States, concerned about the unprecedented growth of slavery, hoped to utilize more indentured white servants which would not only more easily assimilate into society but would pose far less of a physical threat than blacks.

In any event, the Royal Africa Company, did not give in to American desires or demands, mainly because the monies that they were making from this trade was quite lucrative for the coffers of the royal treasury, it created steady and dependable profits for its investors, as well as the fact that there were powerful vested interests in America that profited greatly from this trade in human flesh.  Had it not been for the Royal Africa Company, there probably would have been far less slavery thrust upon American soil, as the powerful combination of explicit British governmental support, mercantile interests, and the lust for undeserved profits, inevitably led to the wanton trafficking of human subjects from their country of origin in order to be exploited in a country ironically founded upon freedom.

Driving a Vehicle should be Regulated, but not Considered to be a Privilege

Nowadays, we live in a land to which our fundamental rights, such as the right to travel from one place to another, especially when utilizing a motor vehicle, are skewed in such a perverse way, that driving a car is considered to be a privilege, and not thereby a right.  To understand this better, a privilege is as defined by Merriam-Webster.com: "a right or benefit that is given to some people and not to others," which succinctly summarizes the issue.  

The problem with driving being considered as a privilege is that privileges are fairly easy to revoke because a privilege is considered for the most part to be a special dispensation provided to the citizen upon accomplishing a certain thing, or exercising a certain action, but are also subject to specific rules, laws, ordinances and regulations, and to a lesser extent arbitrary law.  On the other hand, a right is something that belongs to you, to which for the government or its authorities to take away any of your rights, typically means a surrender of that right voluntarily or the confiscation of that right through a court of law judgment or its equivalent.

Currently, the driving of a vehicle on a public road is enforced as a privilege, and not a right, to which this is why each driver of a vehicle applies for a basic driver's license which will enable them to travel the roads subject to specific restrictions.  However, should that driver be found later to be in violation of the laws of the respective State in regards to their driving, that driver's license and thereby their ability to drive on the public roads in America, can be confiscated, restricted, or revoked.

Depending upon the city or town that you reside in, driving a vehicle may or may not be critical for your overall everyday activities, however, for most adults that have commitments to a job or school or whatever, there is a fundamental need to be able to drive a vehicle as the alternatives to doing so, are often rather inconvenient, too expensive, or unreliable.  This means, that the fact that the government treats driving as a privilege, to which this privilege can be revoked by the same government and/or never be issued in the first place, creates an undue burden against certain members of society.

Rather than seeing driving a vehicle as a privilege, the government, should regulate the business of driving, and while some people may see this as essentially being the same thing, it isn't.  In point of fact, a regulation properly written, is something created by the Legislative branch of government, to which there would be little merit for using State coercion in order to get citizens to comply to a given driving regulation, as long as the regulations were written broadly enough so that the statue would allow car insurance companies as well as the lien holders of vehicles themselves to tack on their own additional rules or regulations upon the driver of the vehicle, to which the driver would then weigh the tradeoffs of this or that so as to get the best fit for their budget and corresponding rate. 

The driving on the public roads of America, should not be treated as a privilege, but rather should be subject to reasonable regulations, so as not to interfere with the reasonable right for citizens to travel freely along the public roads of America which they as taxpaying citizens have already paid for.

The Law of Karma

If there was no eternal justice, than life would be an endless series of careening from one event to another, all without purpose, and all without end.  Fortunately, that isn't the way that life is constructed, there is eternal justice, there is eternal morality, there is eternal love, and there is eternal forgiveness, to which we are constantly reminded of this, through that still small voice that helps to guide us in our conscience.  Yet, we are endowed with free will which is a truly wonderful gift provided to us by our Creator, and free will, means exactly that, that we are free to choose, and it is through those choices and our actions that our life writes itself into the annals of time. 

In this world, the unceasing opportunity to fool ourselves, consciously or not, to 'game' the system, to seek all sorts of shortcuts and illusions that we create and ultimately live in, makes us falsely believe that when it comes to that time when we stand before our Lord, that we will still be able to stand tall and thereby withstand the withering bright light of the absolute clarity of love, truth, and justice.  This viewpoint will not hold true to the tests of time, and it is then, if we have not first admitted to it, that we will recognize for a certainty that the crown of glory that we wish to partake of is something that our tarnished hands cannot grasp, and we know it.

The reason for karma, is the innate understanding, that illness cannot create health, that wrong actions can never be right, that evil is not good, and thereby the false roads that we have taken cannot be effectively erased, that instead, we must first straighten up our spine, so as to thereby straighten our path to find the only true road to eternal glory.  If, on the other hand, within our soul, we believed, that evil is good, that wrong is right, and tried to force this belief into the folds of our eternal destiny, we would discover that it simply cannot be done, that the bright light of eternal bliss is tainted by sin and our wrongs, so that try as we might we cannot possibly pry open the golden door.

We need karma, for the exact same reason why a helpless toddler needs both supervision and direction, which is for its own good, upbringing and protection.  If, in our endeavors we are never corrected, if in our endeavors, we are unable to acknowledge the hurt that we are creating for ourselves and others, than we will inevitably continue to do it again and again.  Karma is there for each of us, so that we will through thoughtfulness come to the reasoned conclusion, that the bad that we see so often in our lives is actually correlated to the bad that we have either already done or contributed to in other's lives.

The law of karma allows us to understand and to comprehend that we are all in this for the long haul, and that therefore brick by brick, stone by stone, deed by deed, we build our pathway back to God's eternal love.  The race most definitely is not to the swift, to which it is to be better understood, that wrong actions necessitate correspondingly right actions. God reminds us of this, day by day, by the suffering we so often feel by the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, to which our proper response should be to serenely arm ourselves with truth, justice, and brotherly love.

The Stairway to Heaven

Here, in the Western world, mainstream religion does not often believe in reincarnation, instead, they believe in essentially that there is only one life, and therefore when this physical life is over, long or short, good or bad, fair or not, that this is all that there is, on this physical plane.  There are many reasons to believe that this belief is flawed, even tellingly from passages in Scripture, such as "But I say to you that Elijah has come already, and they did not know him but did to him whatever they wished…" (Matthew 17:12).  So too, even a cursory glance at the world at large, demonstrates the reality of the circle of life which is all around us; an endless cycle of birth, death, and re-birth, again and again and again.

For those that do not believe in reincarnation, one would be hard pressed to see the world as anything other than extremely unfair, to which some people are born into not just significantly better material circumstances, but also better educational, justice, fairness, looks, and health situations.  While our Creator asks nothing more from us but to do the best with what we have, circumstances can make this extremely problematic for certain people and hence it would appear to be inherently unjust.

So too there are people, that have remarkable skills or inclinations even at a young age for medicine, mechanics, music, mathematics and so forth, so much so that we consider them to be child prodigies or similar.  In a significant amount of cases, the parents of such children, wonder where these talents originated from, because they know in their heart, it was not in truth from their parenting or upkeep, instead it seems to have come from within the child, itself. 

The best explanation for the reason why there are certain powers and predispositions inherent within each one of us has everything to do with recognizing that while the physical shell of our body changes from life to life, our soul remains consistent to what it was in previous lives.  That is to say, if you have previously demonstrated a high degree of skill as a practitioner of medicine, than all things being equal, this same talent will be there in your present life like a rich oil well, available for you to tap back into it. 

Not too unexpectedly, our lives are a mixture of good as well as bad habits, good as well as bad decisions, so that when re-entering this life after having exiting a previous one, those bad traits that we have previously demonstrated of perhaps lacking in patience, having a hot temper, and so forth, are carried with us, the same as if they never left us.  This, more than anything, is the reason why reincarnation exists, because we know whether we want to recognize it or not in this world, that in order to get right with our Lord, we have to have demonstrated right actions and behavior in this dimension.

For those that dismiss reincarnation, recognize this important point, if you were excessively jealous, covetousness, prideful, lustful, and so forth on this material plane, do not think even for a second, that somehow in Heaven, that these traits of yours will miraculously disappeared, as they won't at all, but rather will be seen to be dark clouds that perpetually follow you. Therefore it is these faults that will preclude you from truly entering into holy fellowship with our Creator, not because He will not accept you, but because you recognize that you still have work to do in order to climb that stairway into God's heart and Heaven.

Is God In Heaven?

The viewpoint of where God is, depends upon so many factors, so that the answers that one is wont to receive will vary all over the place, to which, though, mainstream thought is often along the line that God is somewhat removed from planet earth, so that He is often pictured on a celestial throne, to which He may well send down to us, great souls and great prophets, but for the most part God is not pictured as walking amongst us. That's fine for what it is, but probably isn't the best way to view God and certainly isn't a very personal way to see God, to which humans have an innate need to picture God as something far more personal.

While there are certainly many passages in the Bible that speak of Heaven, of God, of ascending and descending, so too there is one very special passage: "Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you." (Luke 17:21).  It is this scriptural passage which is so crucial for developing a different mindset, something that is of value to children and adults alike, which makes God much more personal, makes God much more tangible, and makes God much more real to us.  The fact of the matter is when you believe that God is part and parcel of you, meaning that He is as close to you as a best friend could possibly be, never to leave you, you thereby make God much more meaningful for you and your subsequent behavior in this life.

There are few advantages of having a detached viewpoint of God, a sort of a disinterested God, who may or may not respond to our prayers in times of crisis or whenever, and is overall seen more like a gentle, slumbering giant, who takes a bit of pleading or plodding to get revved into action.  That isn't God!  In point of fact, God is always with us, each one of us, from the time of our conception, to the time of our physical death.  God will never leave us, never forsake us, never to not love us, God is all that we could ever ask or desire for, and He is right here with us, right now.  This is the truth of the matter, that each of us has God available to pick us up when we are down, to guide us through troubled times, to comfort us in times of sorrow, and to celebrate with us when we have done right.

The better understanding that God is always with us, allows us to have a more, meaningful relationship with God, so that rather than placing God on a pedestal to which we must continually bow down to Him in servitude and abject surrender, instead we see God as our greatest Friend, someone to trust and to open our hearts to, who will never forsake us and will always be there for us, no matter how events may transpire on a given day. 

God should be our best friend, and this isn't meant to say that we should ignore nor not desire human company, as God is not here with us in human form, but rather we would all be better served to believe that God is imminent within us and that thereby "… If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth." (Mark 9:23)

British Convicts Imported to Colonial America

Most everybody are quite aware that slavery was part and parcel of American life, till the end of the civil war; of course, somewhat forgotten, is that slavery in America, was originally initiated when America, wasn't the United States of America, but was instead an English colony.  Also forgotten in the sands of history, is that Britain decided that colonial America was a valid destination to send their convicts to, and subsequently in the 17th and 18th centuries England transported over 50,000 convicts to their American colony.

A significant amount of the convicts shipped to America, landed in Virginia and Maryland, to which their labor was put to work specifically to help the tobacco trade, to which at that time, tobacco was the most important exported product produced in America, as well as being used occasionally as a cash substitute to transact financial matters at home.  In an era in which machinery played a very minor role in crop production, much labor therefore was necessitated to cultivate tobacco, and for those planters that lack deep financial resources, the indentured servitude and thereby employment of British convicts, was actually significantly cheaper than the purchase of slaves, so that in return for a modest fee upfront to the transporter and/or trader of convicted labor, the planter received an indentured servant whose term with him would be from five to seven or even fourteen years, to which at the end of such service, the planter would owe the indentured convict, no money, and the convict would now be free to make a living on his own or to somehow return back to England.

Not too surprisingly, since these were convicts, they weren't treated well during their passage on the Atlantic Ocean, to which, they were often chained, subject to infectious and debilitating diseases due to the poor sanitary conditions, and/or subsequently died from privation.  Upon their arrival in America they were not accorded any respect as they were seen for what they were, convicts.  They were, as indentured servants, exploited heavily, to whom most were paid nothing for their labor, except to receive in return room and board, and often hired as field hands and thereby worked the hard labor of cultivating tobacco.  For the few convicts that had notable skills, their options were more accommodating, in which they might receive a modest compensation for their craft, but would legally still be an indentured servant.

While there was some controversy and complaint by respected and notable Americans, that this colony should not be a dumping ground for convicts, this was mainly overshadowed by the fact that the tobacco plantations recognized the utility of cheap convict labor and were only too happy to be an active participant and party to this trade.  In addition, the sheer number of convicts exported to America as well as the color of these convict's skin, helped to effectively reduce the pricing of African slaves, because both these forcefully imported labor forces competed within the same general market.

The importation of convict labor to America that were transported here by England could not have occurred without the active complicity of American plantation owners, who saw these convicts as a lucrative source to increase their wealth upon the bent backs of those in a country not of their origin and without the resources or wherewithal to effectively stand up

Fair Weather Believers

A significant amount of Americans have a professed belief in a particular faith, be it Christian, Catholic, Jewish, Islamic, and so forth.  This belief in God, and a respect or love for God and his prophets often brings comfort for many people as well as a source of solace in times of pain and difficulty.  The thing is that every religion, somewhat akin to a learned trade, demands something in return from those that are practitioners of that particular faith or work.  That is to say, to really be a good Christian, you must not only have a basic understanding of what the religion represents, but you must also live up to that representation in your life and your actions, as well as for those that have a degree in Engineering, for instance, must know their craft and exercise their skills and knowledge in a competent way so as to make their living by it.

Although it is fair to say that many of us do not feel qualify to proselytize or to teach someone the art of our particular trade, there is an incumbent responsibility for every believer to stay consistent with, as well as to uphold their beliefs in the public sphere.     That means that those that are Sunday believers, or perhaps only for the actual time spent within that church on Sunday,  andthen on all the other days of the week, they are their "real" self, are at best, nominal believers, and for all practical purposes, hypocrites to their faith.  The type of belief that is painted so faintly upon a person's demeanor is lukewarm at best, "So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth," Revelation 3:16.

Most believers, however, actually do believe that they are of the flock, and will justify their belief by demonstrating actions that they have done on behalf of their faith, such as monetary donations, donations of time and labor to their church, the bringing up of children in the faith, bible study, prayer, and the observance of faith-based limitations on their behaviors, as all being representative examples of their good deeds and good works.  While one must respect this type of devotion as having substance, the true test of any substantive faith is when it is tested in the cauldron of life's vicissitudes.

There will be times, perhaps even every day, but more often not, to which your faith will most definitely be the real issue of your test, whether recognized by yourself or not.  It is in these times, that your real implicit belief will be shown to be incorruptible and thereby strong like a shining shield or on the other hand your belief will cower down and fade as if it never existed.  If, when given to the test, you know explicitly that something that you are being challenged to do, challenged to conform to, challenged to be or not to be, and you conform to what it is because you fear for your bodily safety, suffering, privation, or similar, you have effectively written in stone exactly the type of man that you really are.

Do not fool yourself, and claim that you are what you are not, because those that will not stand with their faith in times of a significant test which harbors a significant cost will surely reap exactly what they have sowed.  True faithfulness, means true commitment, and if you are not a good and faithful servant to your Lord, than you never truly were part of the faith or part of the flock, rather instead, you represent in truth: fool's gold.  So too you cannot ever be a secret believer, believing that your faith is your own little private secret between you and your Lord, thinking that God will understand your discretion and applaud you for it, whereas in truth, it's a house made out of straw, unable to withstand either wind or fire.

Meet your New Family, the State

Today's State is often at odds with families, for a lot of reasons, some valid, most not, to which the most important reason why the State wants to be the de facto kingpin of your family is that by so doing, the State puts themselves into a far better position in order to indoctrinate children, for after all, it is written, "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it" (Proverbs 22:6).  While it is true that both the State and parents want obedience from their children, only one of these parties truly has their children's best interests in mind.

Although your children do live with you, their waking hours, especially during the school year, are not spent exclusively at home, but rather are spent Monday to Friday predominantly at school, to which, you, the parent, are the outsider, as to what actually transpires within the school grounds.  This, in itself, isn't necessarily bad; it may well be desirable, since parents have work and other obligations to attend to during school hours, as well as the fact that there is a necessity for some sort of educational responsibility to be shouldered by some entity, in order to properly educate children.  

The problem with most public education today, is that the educational system itself, answers for the most part, to their master, and that master is not the taxpaying parents of the children in aggregate, but the State, to which these schools ultimately get their funding, their infrastructure, and their rules. The upshot of all this, is that in many cases, the State and the family are not really on the same page, with the children being caught within the crossfire.  The State has relentlessly, over time, aggrandized onto itself, more and more responsibilities that typically were once the exclusive domain of the family, which to a significant extent, have very little to do with the actual true education of children.  This means that the State wants to provide meals for children, immunization for children, study halls for children, State-sanctioned educational agenda for children, teacher's aides or tutors for children, after school care for children, outside activities for children, intrusive supervision of the family life of these children, and through all this an abiding interest and obligation to track and collate everything about these students and their family.

While on the surface, these things provided for students by the State seems beneficial, maybe even appropriate, it isn't a fair game, or right, to wrest parental authority and structure from the parents.  For instance, the thing that the State has ready access to is a monetary credit system which provides the State with essentially unlimited resources and money, whereas most parents' means are somewhat limited or very limited.   This access to money is very important for the State, so as to make it clear to the children as well as the parents that without the State's help, that the parents and children would suffer.  Unfortunately, this means that the more that the State provides in services and aid to your children, through the borrowing of governmental funds and misappropriation of the taxpayer's monies, the greater their influence on your children, who perceive the State as the great benefactor.

The State has a master plan to inexorably replace family units with the State so that the State can indoctrinate what use to be your children into the proper mindset to serve the State.  In order to accomplish this, the State first ingratiates itself with your children, and then it incentivizes poor people to give up their parental rights for the good of their children, so that the State can clothe, feed, and house these children under mandated conditions authorized and enforced by the State.  Once, the State has effectively assumed those rights, parents will be parents in name only, and each family unit will be effectively subsumed by the State, having merged into this brave new world.

The Ultimate Success

Life in America, seems to be a constant race to achieve this or to achieve that, to overcome this or to overcome that, to become this or to become that, or perhaps to mentor for this or be mentored by that, and so forth, until we breathe our last.  There isn't necessarily anything wrong with having this basic viewpoint, at least at a minimum, for those that are motivated and goal driven, it certainly seems sensible, but life at a fundamental level is beyond the somewhat bleak belief that we are in a constant race against our own mortality.  It is fair to state, then, that if we don’t know what life is about, than it will be problematic, at best, to live a life that is most productive for ourselves as well as the people that we interact with and care most about on an everyday basis.

The issue that so many have, living in a country that is as rich as America, with so many material things as America, that often give us pleasure or satisfaction in our daily activities, is that we get drawn into believing that what our five senses relates to, must be the very meaning of life, but alas, that isn't even in the ballpark.  For those that identify strictly with the material aspect of their body, their mind, their toys, their house, their job, their family, and so forth, life at best, is wonderful as long as the mind, prosperity, and health are good, while often it is despairing or tragic when not.  In any event, good or bad, time has a way of marching on, so that even for the best of us, effective life comes to an end sooner than what we would wish, and for those struggling or meandering, the end seems interminable or endless but comes nevertheless.

The biggest trap that mankind puts itself into far too often, is that they self-identify with the person staring back from them in the mirror; and while that is certainly understandable, they fail to recognize often enough that the real you is actually your invisible soul encased within your physical body, which is quite unfortunate, because it is the soul that is immortal and the body that most definitely is not, so that those that spend an inordinate amount of time feeding the mortal and ignoring the immortal have veered significantly off the narrow path.  We read in Genesis 1:27 that "…God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him…" to which a reasoned contemplation of this wisdom necessitates the conclusion that the image we are made in, cannot be our body, which is mortal and ever changing, and not even our mind, which is constantly cogitating all sorts of different information, instead it can only be that still, small voice within. It is that still and constant voice that is ever there, never to leave us, always with us, that is our real self, and this voice is the touchstone that allows us to recognize that the image of God is within each of us.

The cares and concerns of this world, troubles us, baffles us, engages us, to which, so many trap themselves into believing that this world is all that there ever is, and thereby it is a never ending task to make the world conform to what we believe it should be.  Perhaps that goal is noble, perhaps misguided, or a bit of both, but clearly it is missing the big picture, which is the fundamental purpose, the fundamental success, is to first recognize whom that we are and upon that recognition to fulfill that ideal.   When we truly understand that our neighbor is our self, because our neighbor is made in the same image of God, no better, no worse, it is then that we become enlightened, and is then that we recognize as if for the first time, that our real self, is part and parcel of God, and knowing this, we have unlocked the door that will through mindful devotion bring us to the ultimate success, which is the re-uniting of our soul to our Creator, which is how it was, in the beginning.

The True Cost of Free Trade

In any country, to which contained within its basic motto, is the phrase "land of the free", something like free trade sounds just like what epitomizes what it is to be a great American.  The problem is that free trade and freedom aren't the same and there are lots of reasons for that belief.  First off, free trade, in its most naked form, means trade between nations that does not charge for imposts, duties, excises, tariffs, or initiate quotas on imports and in theory both nations operate within those same rules and regulations.  This means, that each country is pretty much operating with open borders, allowing the unlimited import and export of goods and without a doubt, by so doing, the end result will most definitely be, more cost-effective goods and thereby a net savings for these goods which can be quite considerable.   That does sound great, but it's one thing for the United States not to charge imposts and such for trade between one State to another State, which makes sense so that goods can transfer and be sold seamlessly by State to another State without governmental interference, but it is an entirely different thing to open up our borders to anyone and anything that is not an integral member of and subject to the laws and regulations of the United States.

For instance, there was a time when slavery was legal in America, to which those that utilized slaves, were able to extract labor from those slaves, for free, subject to the procurement and basic upkeep of said slave.  Not too surprisingly, when Europeans began to migrate in numbers to America during antebellum times, most of those immigrants chose to migrate to the Northern, non-slaveholding States, because those immigrants often came here with nothing more than the clothes on their back as well as a deep desire to earn their fair keep by their labor in this country of opportunity.  This meant that all things being equal, immigrants did not wish to or felt they could not compete against slave labor, and wisely chose not to do so.

Today, in America, there are all sorts of laws, rules, regulations, taxes, and so forth that cover a whole host of circumstances which for the most part are fair, sensible, and knowable, within America.  The thing is once the free trade door is open, this means that many businesses and labor within America have to compete against other sovereign nations, to which, the playing field is most definitely not fair, because their rules, circumstances, and conditions are often materially different than America.  To make matters far worse for many citizens of America, as the equipment and knowhow that we create here through our ingenuity, is exported to other nations, than there is virtually no hope that our labor will be cost effective against those same developing nations.

For major corporations, free trade is often a godsend, because they benefit from being able to produce and create products at a lower cost point, while increasing their gross margins, which serves to boost their stock price and market capitalization value.  This means that free trade definitely benefits certain parties which would be: the upper echelon of multi-national corporations and their stockholders, the idle rich, the non-working retirees, and wards of the State, because goods overall are cheaper.  The people that lose because of free trade are all those working in jobs to which they are threatened by or subject to wage compression, job loss, insecurity, non-advancement, trade union erosion, and so forth.

Those that have-- love free trade, because free trade most definitely gives them even more; whereas those that have not, are caught in a perpetual catch-22, as they do get more bang for their buck, but they have far fewer bucks to try to get that bang.

TSA Precheck and other Gimmicks to separate those with money and connections from everyone else

There are several modes of transportation that a given individual can utilize on any given day such as an automobile, bus, train, subway, or airplane; but it is only those that travel via airplanes that have to suffer through endless bureaucratic security lines that often seem disorganized, inconsiderate, and completely pointless.  The reason for being for these security lines is in theory to help keep us safe, but it seems simply to serve no other purpose than to waste countless hours of time from everyday citizen's lives without any real effectiveness. 

Not too surprisingly, just like about everything else that happens in America, security lines, and how you have to deal with them, depends a lot of whom you are.  That is to say, if you work for the government, the military, an important corporation, have money to spend on privileged treatment, or a person with real connections, and so forth, you aren't going to be treated like a "commoner" when arriving at the airport, instead, you will be permitted to walk though expedited lines, because you are special, or have paid extra money, or gone through some sort of vetting process, which allows you to circumvent the airport security lines set aside specifically for the rest of us.

This means, in effect, that there are two basic classes of people at the airport, those that are treated differently as special and privileged people, whether through connections or a monetary payment, and those that have to suffer through circuitous lines, harassment, body scans, pat downs, and the general annoyance of being treated as "presumed guilty" when going through security.  Because of the fact that people are treated differently depending upon their security classification or status, the situation for most of the citizens of the United States at airports, is rather intolerable, while for those that don't have to go through the time wasting and indignity of being treated like sheep, are blithely unconcerned, and feel that this sort of special tribute given to them, is the least that their country should do for them.

In theory, this is supposed to be a country that treats all of its citizens equally, with laws equally applied, but airports are a prime example of how this is completely untrue.  While the government can give or site all sorts of reasons for allowing TSA Precheck, and other assorted programs, that allow certain people to have privileges, and thereby are given a green light of "presumed innocence" while all others, by virtue of the fact that they are none of these things, are all grouped as "suspects", that sure doesn't seem right.

When laws are unequally applied and those that write those very laws and their most important constituents to them are the primary beneficiaries of such laws, than those laws will not be changed, because the power brokers of America are unaffected by them; whereas, if it was the other way around, that the elites of this country in order to fly commercially, had now to be subjected to immeasurable lines, basic disrespect by security personnel that their taxes pay for, as well as groping and strip searches by these very same poorly trained and weakly reasoning personnel, then it all would change the very next day.

Mortgage debt, leverage, and Housing Prices

According to the federalreserve.gov the total mortgage debt as of the 1st Quarter of 2016 for family residences, nonfamily residences, and farms was $13,848,359 trillion dollars, to which the overall GDP of America is only about $18 trillion dollars.  This signifies that American mortgages are still highly leveraged despite the previous meltdown of housing prices in America from 2007-2009, as well as taking into account, the historic low interest rates available for present-day mortgages.  The problem with this high amount of notable mortgage debt is that the America that we currently live in, suffers from low GDP growth, to which America has been unable to grow on a yearly basis of at least 3% since 2005, yet home pricing, home indebtedness, and home sizing has continued to inexorably increase for the most part quarter by quarter, until the present time.

The investment in housing by mortgage debtors is typically the largest investment, by far, of any material asset that anybody will ever purchase at any time, yet, America continues to provide relatively easy paths for Americans to own the American dream without insisting upon or mandating that a significant down payment for such an asset be the very foundation that our housing market should count on.  It almost goes without saying, that the less "skin" that any purchaser of a home has in the game, the less due diligence of finances that is done, the less verification and consideration that takes into account a litany of factors when someone applies for financing of the purchase of a home, the greater the risk of any particular loan of not performing as expected.   

You might think that banks would do all of these things, without the need of governmental oversight or knowledge, because the largest banking institutions in America are in the business of making money for their stockholders, and that they therefore will as a matter of principle, do all the necessary things to assure themselves of making fiscally sound loans.  This would be true if the mortgages issued by private banking institutions, were backed by those same institutions, but in fact, banks believe in their safety first, which means that their loans are typically packaged and re-sold to other financial institutions and therein lies the first chink in the armor; the second chink is the fact that the government implicitly backs mortgages by utilizing Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae to provide both financial support as well as liquidity to the financial market under the aegis that home ownership is the American dream, and should be actively encouraged by the federal government.

The thing that is often not recognized by this enormous amount of mortgage debt, is that the more people that buy homes that are either under qualified and/or highly leveraged the more homes that will be built because the market of buyers has increased, and by virtue of the fact, that Americans wants typically exceed their means, the bigger and the more bells and whistles each home will therefore have.  This means that the encouragement of excessive mortgage indebtedness increases the price of homes as well as their size, because the more borrowed money that is available, the more chasing after homes that there is; whereas if mortgage qualifications were more stringent, more fiscally demanding, and with far less flexibility of banks being able to pass the bulk of their risk onto other parties, would necessitate more affordable homes, in price, function, as well as size.

Murder can never be abolished by Murder

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines murder as: "the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought."  By this definition, this would clearly mean that lawfully killing someone, as compared to unlawfully killing someone, is not murder.  The problem with that type of flawed thinking is that the State's laws may not meet with moral law.  That is to say, if you live in some sort of country, to which certain crimes, are sanctioned for death, as given by the laws of that country, than you as an instrument of that country, are permitted to kill, without having to worry about being later indicted for murder, even though you have taken another human being's life. 

In America, members of the armed forces, certain other associated military and governmental personnel, as well as law enforcement officers, are either explicitly permitted to take another person's life under certain circumstances, or implicitly allowed or even encouraged to do so.  That sort of power, that is to say, the power to take away life, is a power that trumps all other rights, because without life, you are no longer of this world.

It is always a lot easier to kill people, if first you demonize them, trivialize them, ostracize them, or do just about anything to make the case that these people appear to be something less than a human being and thereby not really deserving of a fundamental right to life.   That is to say, if you strip a man of his humanity and dignity, then you are that much closer to transforming that man into prey.

All of these things to which lethal force is used against another human being, to which, that killing force is neither necessary in order to defend oneself or necessary in order to defend one's country are in a significant amount of cases, morally wrong, whether they are legally sanctioned by the State, or not.  The big picture that most countries and many people seem to miss is that murder has been part and parcel of how human beings, tribes, and countries have treated each other through the eons of time, and all of that killing, and all of that bloodshed, and all of that misery, has yet to bring peace and harmony to families, communities, and countries--and it never will.

There is a mistaken notion demonstrated by the actions of basically good men with reasonable common sense, that evil, or the bad guys, have to be stopped with bullets, no matter the cost, and therein lies the problem.  There is a cost for every bullet shot, there is a cost for every action of revenge, there is a cost for hatred for your neighbor, and that is as long as you participate in the cycle of killing, by approving of it, aiding and abetting it, or participating in it, than the killings and the murders will never end.

Murder is like an argument, to which, one party just has to get the last word in, and they wrongly believe that by killing a fellow man, the dispute has ended there, and all will be good.  But, you can't end murder by murder, you can't end killing by killing, you can't end any negative action by responding in like, because it will end nothing.  The only possible way to abolish murder is to walk away from all of the killing, to not participate or partake in any aspect of it, but instead to make your life an exemplar that each of us is granted life by our Creator and that each of us is birth with "…the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:21) to which that kingdom is a world without beginning and a world without end, of which murder is the trade of those who are left behind.

Do you really believe what you claim to believe?

In America, there are all sorts of people that consider themselves to be Christians, or honest, or good citizens, or good parents, or good children, or hard workers, and so forth, but it is one thing to claim these things verbally and it is an entirely different thing to actually demonstrate through your actions and through your behavior that you represent the epitome of those very same things.  The first thing that must be understood, is to say that you are anything, would implicitly mean that you must meet the conditions of being that very thing, so that if you claim to be a good plumber, you must actually have received training, have competent and comprehensive experience, and demonstrated that you actually are a fairly good master of your trade. If that can't be seconded by some neutral third party, who is competent to judge your actions, than you are probably not a good plumber, although perhaps in the future, you may become one.

There are in this country many, many people that claim to be all sorts of things, of which, some of those people are outright liars about their claim and know it, some of them are claiming things that they are in actuality taking on faith, some are absolutely clueless about who or what they really are and don't seem to want to acknowledge it, and some actually are who they claim to be.  The thing is, words are words, and they are not actions, and beliefs are beliefs, butbelief without action behind it, is the type of belief, that as the Christ spoke about in regards to the sower sowing his seed, that "Some fell on rock; and as soon as it sprang up, it withered away because it lacked moisture," (Luke 8:6), signifying that those that don't have true beliefs, in which their roots take hold of good soil, than they will subsequently not be able to withstand the weather as well as the vicissitudes of real life and thereby their beliefs will when they are tested, as they will invariably be, will blow away like chaff.

So too, how can people forget Peter, as foretold by the Christ, denying that he even knew Jesus, not once, but three times, yet, demonstrating later that those that fail in times of crisis, can learn from their failure, can rebuild themselves, and transform themselves to display indomitable courage and unassailable faith, so as to become the very rock to which Christianity build itself.  The fault for those that do not act consistent with their professed beliefs is not that they have failed and are therefore failures, but whether or not they have failed and then after such a failure, have made amends to become what they profess their belief to truly be.

If a man is unable to act upon or defend to his utmost, his belief, than what sort of believer is this, actually?  After all, a fair weather believer, is no believer at all, and isn't worth the designation of a believer, for a man that turns tail and runs when the chips are down, is hardly worthy of the distinction of being labeled a man.  It is far too easy, far too common, for people to say what they are but aren't, what characteristics that they are but aren't, as well as to make promises that are not fulfilled but are empty; for how many have said, that they will take their spouse "for better, for worse, till death do us part", yet later only to calmly walk away from such a solemn vow.

It is important to have beliefs, even more important to have correct beliefs, and then having these correct beliefs to stand behind these beliefs, to defend and proselytize for them in your own way, and finally to live a life consistent with these correct beliefs.  If you can do these very basic things, your life will be successful in the greatest measure of things, you certainly will be at peace, and you will have been a faithful servant to truth, honor, and your fellow countrymen.

Blasphemy and the Law

Blasphemy is defined by thefreedictionary.com as:  "The malicious or wanton reproach of God, either written or oral," and while this is no longer a crime in Western nations, it most definitely is a crime in some present day countries that do not broach disrespect of their God and treat blasphemy essentially as apostasy to their State religion and will enforce those that blaspheme, to such an extent, that those offenders' may actually meet State-sanctioned death. 

When you think about blasphemy, you might well ask the question, as to whom this crime is actually hurting, since in the scheme of things, you would think that God being omniscience, omnipotent and so forth, probably isn't taking our deprecations and cursing no matter how vociferously expressed, personally.  This leads to the thought that if God isn't striking us dead or mute, why should the government, or its representatives have laws against blasphemy in the first place?

The answer lies more in the fact that within our jurisprudence system, it is common practice, for those giving testimony, to swear an oath to testify to the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help them God.  While there are some that choose instead to "affirm" to the truth and subsequently are under pains and penalties of perjury, in either case, though, the point is held to be crystal clear, that a court of law is about the whole truth and woe unto him who would fail to recognize the solemnity of such a vow.  This means, that those that have a somewhat cavalier attitude in regards to their own swearing, blaspheming, or taking of our Lord's name in vain, are probably also the type of people, that have a tendency to bend truth as opposed to testify to it.

Additionally, history is replete with governments, typically monarchies, but just about any government consisting of this same basic footprint; to which there is the supreme leader, such as the King, who is God's representative here on earth, and that the power that the King has is power granted to the King by God. This than signifies that those that disrespect God are in point of fact, disrespecting the King, and the thing is, the King is a living, physical being, and most Kings demand respect as well as typically desiring to be feared by their subjects, so therefore they often feel that if they allow their populace to openly express disrespect, that it will only be a matter of time before absolute chaos ensues, so that is why there are such stringent laws against blasphemy on record in most countries of any note.

While a country such as America, has no King, it nevertheless has historically through its laws been against blasphemers because a man that is no respecter of God, is probably also someone that doesn't have any particular respect for authority in general, as well as most likely being a man that believes he is himself the best judge of what is right and what is wrong, and that type of loose cannon is not the type of citizen that any structured government wants to deal with.

Living in a Sea of Debt

The total federal government estimated debt is $19.3 trillion dollars, but this number probably is way under the true debt if one was to take into account legacy programs such as governmental guaranteed pensions, healthcare, and social security which could easily double or even triple our current debt levels.  To get an idea of how vast this amount of money is, consider that the entire Gross Domestic Product on an annual basis for America is around $18 trillion dollars.  While, some people might not be too concerned about our debt levels because it just seems as if the business of America is business, and that business appears to be functioning okay, the fact of the matter is, debt is money borrowed, typically with an associated interest rate and other miscellaneous payment terms, to which the debt-holder is not only legally entitled to that money being paid back but has rights to it.  This means, in short, when it comes to debt that it is never going to be a free ride that at some point, there will come a reckoning.

As reported by the newyorkfed.org, "As of March 31, 2016, total household indebtedness was $12.25 trillion," which represents how much debt in aggregate the citizens of America owe to their debt-holders.  This means that taken together the amount of debt between our federal obligations as well as our consumer obligations is a minimum of $31.55 trillion dollars, a sum which is truly unfathomable.   Considering on this staggering amount of debt, the question might well be asked as to what do we as a country own or we as people own, if we were to be honest and stipulate that things that we have not fully paid for, are not truly our own.  It should be recognized that in absence of timely payments to these loans, debt-holders can avail themselves of a multitude of options to enforce their rights to our property or things that we consider being our own which are actually contingent upon us making continually good on our obligations until the debt has been fully satisfied.

Perhaps, America has done it all wrong, that far better than living in a sea of debt, which appears to have spiraled almost completely out of control, that this country and its citizens, would be better served, if we were more fiscally conservative, which translated means, taking on far less debt, and living more within the means of our current situation and income.  While the argument against not taking on personal debt, would be that we would have to thereby postpone big purchases for items such as cars and houses, a reasoned response might be that loans and debts are never free, and at a minimum we need to seriously consider making far larger down payments on big purchases to demonstrate that we are fiscally responsible, as opposed to leveraging up at ridiculous levels, and hoping that everything will just work out okay.  As for the federal government, it needs to have a balanced budget so as to put an end to its current policy of actively encouraging a feeding frenzy at the public trough and instead get its fiscal house in order so as to set a prudent example for its citizens to learn from.

America and its citizens need to reverse its current course on debt as well as to remember the wise words of our Founding Father, George Washington, that: "to contact new debts is not the way to pay old ones."