101 Days and Counting Down...

This is a strange place in life. It's like trying to drink from a fire hydrant. You try to focus and take in and fully grasp all that you can, but so much is happening that you feel like you're a spectator in your own life. Spring of senior year feels completely different...and for sentimental old farts like me it's particularly poignant. Everything is the last something.

I will (hopefully) graduate from Stephen F. on May 16th, 101 days from today. I'm still in the process of narrowing down exactly what and where God wants me after that. I've spent the last 18 years of my life being a full-time student, and now that is all about to change. There's a very good chance I'll be going back for post-grad work, but we all know that's a whole different ballgame.

Later on this semester, I will sit down and write out my "autobiography of the college years" or whatever you want to call it. I'll save most of the thoughts for then. Suffice it to say that college has turned out like most other things in life usually do: just as you finally start to get it all figured out and get to fully enjoy it, it's over.

I'm going to Carpe Diem like a madman the next 101 days. For those of you whose college shelf life is longer than mine, consider yourself blessed. Make the most of it, because once you get to spring of your senior year you don't get to play the ostrich with your head in the dirt any longer.

Work hard.
Play hard.
Love hard.
Pray hard.
LIVE HARD.

On The Eve of History

Tomorrow morning, in Washington, D.C., America will swear in Barack Hussein Obama as the 44th President of the United States of America. Friends, regardless of your political opinions, tomorrow we will witness a very pleasant and positive kind of history in the making. A black man will live in the White House, not as a slave as in times past, but as the resident for the 4 (or potentially 8) years. Incredible.

I didn't vote for the man, for many reasons that don't matter right now. That being said, I am very proud to be an American right now, even more so than normal. I just want to stand and cheer for America as a whole, that we have finally leveled the playing field enough that this is even possible.

The picture to the left here is of President-Elect Obama standing in front of the Lincoln Memorial, paying homage to a man who literally gave his life for the cause of equality in America. I can only the imagine the conversation that took place between President-to-be and that large chunk of marble. Tomorrow's events couldn't have been anything more than a distant dream in Lincoln's day. He would undoubtably be smiling were he breathing today.

Let tomorrow serve as a reminder and as evidence to every person everywhere who thinks that they can't accomplish something simply because of the color of their skin or where they came from. This abolishes every possible excuse or complaint. To every welfare mooch swinging on a front porch today, here's your wake-up call. If you don't make something of your life, don't blame America, or us. Point your finger in the mirror, because you're the only one to blame. After tomorrow, no more complaining that you didn't get a fair shot. Mr Obama got to where he is through hard work, eloquent speech and the blessings of Almighty God. You can do the same. We don't owe you anything, stop asking for a hand-out and look for a hand-up. If you don't think it's possible, just go ask soon to be President Barack Obama.

Blessings...

Think

Why are you breathing right now? Is there a reason that blood is flowing through your veins at this moment?

What is your purpose? Why are you here?

You have 168 hours to live next week. That's the same number of hours that George Washington, Billy Graham, Albert Einstein, Michael Jordan and Mother Theresa had in their weeks. What are you going to do with your next week?

Does this scenario sound like fun to you? : Born, grow up, have some fun, spend your time looking for "fun" and trying to make money, "win" someone to marry, struggle for stuff and things for 40 or 50 years, have some kids, just "try to do your best" and then some day assume room temperature and join humanity past on the other side of eternity's door?

The one thing that scares me most in all of life is insignificance.

Any problems that come along, whether financial, relational, physical, even death. They can all be dealt with in due time. Our God has been and will always be completely faithful to see us through trials under His provision. That will never change (Deut. 31:8 "The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.") & Joshua 1:5 "I will never leave you or forsake you".

You and I have a choice every day, hour, minute and second we're given. The question is not whether you are sinning or trying to live righteously, that's the easy part. The question is, are you daily seeking God's face and His will for not just your life, but your day? Many days I fail miserably. That doesn't stop me from getting up the next morning and starting off right.

A wise man once said, "the bad is not the enemy of the best, it is the good." I believe the God that called the men and women of the Bible to genuine greatness, the God who created you and I...that same God has a vision for your day. Today! Right now! How exciting...

Please let this little ramble encourage you. There is nothing aimless about your days. Don't allow insignificance to claim one single moment of your life. Get out there and be a blessing to those who cross your path. Make them laugh, give them your ear, pray for them, be the godly man/woman you and I are called to be.

The world doesn't need any more lone ranger Christians. We are in this together. Be blessed today...

The Fairwell Victory Tour

Well, this is it. After all the up and downs, career plans failing, and changing and failing again...it is inevitable. I can't avoid it any longer. They are forcing me out.

4 months from today, I will be a college graduate. I will save the emotional re-cap and closing thoughts for another day. This is just the formal declaration of the spring semester being officially dubbed the "Farewell Victory Tour: 2009".

Everything between here and graduation is the "last ______". I intend to make the most of the next 120ish days.

Cheers...

Gaza Strip Incident

Today marks one full week of a full-scale Israeli air assault on the Gaza Strip. In case you're not familiar with the events currently happening, you can click here, here or here. I thought it was worthy of writing a short blip of my thoughts on the subject.

First off, I should state that I'm not the least bit objective in this matter and that I fully support Israel on a fundamental and idealogical level. I find it laughable how most the Middle East is trying to make this whole incident look like unwarranted Israeli aggression when it's Hamas terrorists who are responsible for starting the whole thing.

I applaud Israel for showing as much patience as they have in the previous months. I guarantee if you shot rockets into my backyard it wouldn't take me a day to respond with every bit of force available to me. Hamas should be glad that Israel hasn't done more in response.

Hamas continues to issue threats and warnings even as they are currently 95% without power and almost completely without any basic utilities functioning. It just goes to show again the blind, unfounded arrogance of the modern terrorist. Do they just not realize that most of their land has been reduced to rubble in the last week?

Even more amusing is that the leader of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal, is exiled in Syria...yet he keeps running his mouth, declaring a "day of wrath" against Israel for the attacks. What are they going to do, throw more rocks at Israeli tanks as they roll past?

It really is a shame that there has to be so much violence and hate in the region. Unfortunately, we all know that there will never be lasting peace in the region. The fact that some limp-wristed pacafists in the UN are calling for a cease fire...again...is definitely worth a sigh and a good roll of the eyes. Terrorist cowards, which is all Hamas is, will never stop being terrorist cowards. They are raised on a doctrine of hate and violence. They are simple-minded creatures who only know how be angry and blow things up. Trying to reason or negotiate with them is pointless. They will only do what Hamas did during the last cease-fire (which lasted about 6 months), stockpile weapons and supplies in preparation for the next time the little rats decide to crawl out of their holes and blindly fire their crude, homemade weapons into Israel.

Hamas should be glad that I don't have any say in Israel's strategy. Were it up to me, I would have brought troops and tanks into Gaza long ago, swept the area completely clean and executed every member of Hamas as the terrorists that they are. It's a real shame that politics get in the way of justice and the safety of innocent civilians.

At a time like this, it is important to remember the innocents on either side of the offensive. Allowing 270 Palestinian civilians who hold international passports to leave Gaza was a classy move on Israel's part. I hope and pray that the offensive will be successful and that Hamas will be fully neutralized.

Pray for safety and protection for the civilians in Gaza, and for the armies of Israel as they deal with the terrorists swiftly and forcefully...

The Brilliance of Obama, and other thoughts

I am a team player. I am a disciple of Jesus Christ and He is where my primary loyalties lie...but country comes right after faith and family on the totem pole of life. I want the very best for America, regardless of who is in the White House. I do not believe that America is now, or ever has been, supernaturally-favored over any other nation on Earth. The Bible is very clear that God's "most favored nation" pin is on Israel's lapel. I firmly believe that God's sovereign plan for our nation is still firmly intact, and that for some reason beyond my understanding, God wants Barack Obama running this country for the next 4-8 years.

Ok, pleasantries out of the way. I'm going to set aside my political preferences for just a bit and offer a hearty congratulations to the entire Obama campaign. As a member of the 18-34 demographic and one who appreciates a good marketing ad...I am truly impressed at the job Obama did on winning over the American people.

He utilized every conceivable avenue to get his name out there and stir up support for his campaign. Never before has the internet and technological fronts been anywhere near properly utilized in a presidential campaign. Obama has forever raised the bar on what is expected to win a presidential election.

A thirty minute long ad on 3 major networks the night of a World Series game? brilliant.
An application available on the iPhone whose sole purpose is propaganda and publicity? brilliant.
Finally awaking the untapped voting monster that is the 20-something crowd? brilliant.
Creating such a fervor among young people that their support is almost cult-like? brilliant.

I could go on, but I think you get the idea.

McCain's deck was a few cards short from the beginning. He didn't have full support of the evangelical right from the beginning. He never sufficiently distanced himself from George W. Bush to be able to call anything he wanted to do "change." If I had a penny for every time I saw that clip of him saying "I voted with the President more than 90% of the time. Much more than many of my fellow Republicans did." I could probably buy a Happy Meal.

As much as I like Sarah Palin as a person, there is a 0% chance I would trust her decision-making as President of the United States of America. She is a great governor, no doubt. She is a pretty face and a fairly intelligent debater...but that is about it. McCain's choosing her was the beginning of the end. It was a gutsy and dangerous move that backfired badly.

I have extreme reservations about Barack Obama's motives and intentions. I do not trust that man. That being said, I have to admit that he did a nearly flawless job of running a campaign for the presidency. He performed wonderfully on camera. He said the right things at the right times to the right people. He was trendy without being cliche. He was classy without coming across as pious. He is an extraordinary orator and I have confidence that he will do a good job of regaining our good reputation on the world stage.

Do I respect Barack Obama? Yes. He has come from the humblest of beginnings and had walked a rocky path to get to where he is now. He has made very powerful friends and convinced a strong majority of almost 300 million Americans to elect him as their leader. While I strongly oppose most of his beliefs and policies...he will be the President of the USA. As 3rd-generation Armed Services brat and a future member of the United States Air Force, I am honor-bound to respect the office of Commander-in-Chief.

As a disciple of Jesus Christ, it is my responsibility to represent Him well to this world. It is my goal to act how He would act and respond how He would respond. In the last few weeks, I have failed miserably at both of those goals. I have done the very thing I've accused the masses of: Letting my emotions get the best of me. I have strained friendships and caused people to lose respect for me on account of my overly strong stand on political matters. I don't believe that if Jesus were walking America today, he would care at all about politics. A good friend quoted me a verse which rung in my ears, "rend to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's", speaking on Jesus' politicality (if that's a word.)

Having said that, since this is the venue where most of my opinions have been displayed, this is also the venue where I feel it is appropriate to offer an unconditional apology for the way in which I expressed them.

Please note that I am not apologizing for having opinions or feeling the need to express them...merely in how I went about doing that. I was wrong and I lost sight of my purpose. I was more concerned with being right and winning an argument (with people who will never admit to ever losing any argument) than I was about representing Christ well.

Done.

---

President-Elect Obama, I offer my congratulations. I sincerely hope that you are able to fulfill your campaigning promises and that through your leadership America will return to its prior greatness. I hope that God himself would thwart the plans of the people that are undoubtedly already plotting how they are going to kill you. I will praying for you as often as your name comes to mind for as long as you are in office. May God bless your presidency and may God bless America. May America in turn bless God with her actions and attitudes.

How you must vote...

Let me start this blog off by defining who I am writing to and who I am not writing to. I am not writing this for the people out there who have no care for matters of faith, the atheists, agnostics, pagans, etc. I am not writing this for people who, for some reason or another, have decided to discard one of the most fundamental of American rights by not voting (those people spit in the face of every man and woman who has ever stood in defense of American freedoms. They disgrace themselves and democracy itself with their laziness and lackadaisical attitude towards the responsibility of voting. Enough said.) I am not writing this for someone who does not consider the Christian faith and the Bible to be truth. I am writing this for every single American who considers themselves a follower of Jesus Christ, and for them alone.

Forgive me if I dispense with formality and the pleasantries of a politically correct discourse on this particular situation. I will merely present the truth as I see it from scripture and respected preachers of the Word of God.

If you consider yourself a follower of Jesus Christ, I declare with absolute resolution that cannot vote for Barack Obama. The reasoning behind that admittedly unpopular statement is quite simple. From his own actions, (I choose to completely disregard Senator Obama's word because they do not come close to matching up to his actions) Barack Obama stands in direct opposition to some of the most fundamental pillars of the Christian faith: Defense of the innocent, solidarity of the family unit, definition of marriage, etc.

Now, I know that many people have made these types of arguments before, but let me make it very plain. A follower of Christ's first priority when selecting their candidate for higher office MUST be the morals, ethics and character of the man/woman under consideration. For the race, social policy, foreign policy, economic policy, etc...are all very important, but they fall far below the importance of those mentioned before.

Barack Obama supports the "Freedom of Choice Act." He has declared that at Planned Parenthood rallies and other venues. The FoCA would completely eliminate all current restrictions on abortion and remove the need for parental notification. This abhorrent, blatantly evil and disgusting piece of legislation would swing the door wide open for all forms of infanticide in this country and completely undermine parental authority over their own daughters. Even Bill Clinton was against partial-birth abortions because of their obvious barbaric and brutal nature. Yet, Barack Obama fully supports this abomination. How can you, as a follower of Jesus Christ, vote for a man who supports legalizing such atrocities?

Barack Obama is against the "Defense of Marriage Act." He does not define marriage as being between one man and one woman as the Bible clearly dictates (Gen. 2:24 ; Mark 10:7 ; 1 Cor. 7:2 ; Eph. 5:31). In doing so, Barack Obama is standing in direct opposition to the Bible. Obama believes that homosexual couples should have the right to marry and enjoy all the social and financial benefits that come with that privilege. I choose to not address the issue of homosexuality here, as I have already done so elsewhere. The fact is that the traditional concept of the family is under direct attack from Barack Obama. If he is elected, there is no end to the list of traditional values he will do away with.

Barack Obama claims to believe in Jesus Christ, yet few of his actions serve as evidence of that claim. His "conversion" was administered by a radical, anti-American, anti-Christian "pastor" whose hateful venom has been poisoning the black community in Chicago for decades. In his own book, Obama wrote "I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction." Scared to have this guy in the White House? Yeah, me too. No wonder Iran, Syria and Pakistan want him as President so badly. In an interview with ABC, Obama "slipped" and referred to his "muslim faith" before being corrected by the interviewer. He tried to play it off and has since feigned offense that people are targetting that comment...however, Sigmund Freud would probably have his own opinion about slips like that.

Now, whether or not Barack Obama is a muslim doesn't mean much to a lot of people. But to a follower of Jesus Christ, it means everything! It means that there is a fundamental philosophical difference in thinking. It means that our values are different from his, our goals are different from his...he is not a man of the people, we are not his people.

I could write for hours about why you should not vote for Barack Obama. Please note that I am not saying that you have to vote for John McCain. I did, but that is your choice. What I am saying, and I will argue this until I'm passed out on the floor...If you consider yourself a follower of Jesus Christ, you must not vote for Barack Obama. The flipside is also true...If you vote for Barack Obama, you choose to disregard holy scripture and your Christian faith when you make that decision.

Please be politcally active, be informed and VOTE ON NOVEMBER 4th. May God bless you and this great nation.