Financially Independent in Seven Years: a Divine Strategy

Five years ago a book I read defined financial independence as owning your home outright by paying off the mortgage years ahead of schedule. The now-forgotten author counselled eliminating needless expenses, as well as semi-needless expenses such as buying a new wardrobe every season. She even envisioned a near future saving strategy of borrowing new music legally almost free of charge. This now exists through Pandora.com. I find music--lots of it--to be priceless to avoid stress and a host of other problems. Pandora costs $10 a month, let's me access every song I've ever loved and saves me oodless of cash by not needing to buy CDs.

I too have resolved to be "financially independent" in seven years using as many cost-cutting strategies as possible.

A spiritual formula to achieve this is as follows:

1. Have faith in God.
2. The "impossible" is meaningless as far as God is concerned.
3. One responds best to vision if it is "clear, crisp and concise."
4. There is power in prayer. 1
_______

1 "Southern Tidings" p. 25. November 2010

Radical Jihad and Its Implications Depending on Different Paradigms

Muslims are some of history's most important benefactors. It is said that were it not for Arab and Muslim culture, in part, the European Renaissance would have been delayed for decades, if not centuries. The Arab culture gave us algebra as well as important advances in science and literature. Our world is richer because of both Arabs and Muslims.

Having said that we can proceed onto more challenging matters. First let's consider the implications of jihad presupposing that Allah (God) exists. If that is our chosen paradigm then we have several possibilities and implications regarding jihad. We are told that among moderate and progressive Muslims jihad is a noble endeavor with the betterment of humanity at issue. Jihad can be seen, then, as a positive and good force that respects not only fellow Muslims but those of other faiths or of no faith at all.

We can try to understand the meaning of jihad for some, not all, conservative Muslims. Due to the hedonism and godlessness of some aspects of western culture, some conservative Muslims feel compelled to counter the deleterious impact of western culture, as they perceive it, by any means necessary, including but not limited to, terrorism.

We must now consider the paradigm at the other end of the spectrum. Let's consider for a moment, though I do not share this belief, that there is no God or Intelligent Design Agent in control of our fragile planet and its diverse peoples. Let's imagine, if you will, simply for argument's sake that when we die we simply die. Our bodies decompose and we go to no other place or sphere or Paradise because this was the only paradise or hell we'll ever experience.

If this is the case then we have a most disturbing and alarming conclusion. Radical jihadists and their supporters are endangering, both permanently and needlessly, the only Paradise or free world humanity will ever know.

If that is the case may Allah (God) have mercy on our fragile and irreplaceable world.

Theistic or Non-Theistic Evolution?

Evolution may very well be how we all got here, whether you believe in theistic evolution with its main complication being that God used death to accomplish the development of life and intelligence on Earth. If that is the case, you can't really think of him as being a loving, benevolent father.

On the other hand you could believe in non-theistic evolution which requires more faith in that all the order, design and intricacy of nature are the result of pure chance. Such a beginning for life makes it seem quite pointless. Intelligent beings developed by chance and may become extinct also by chance. If so, then their entire existence would be quite pointless and meaningless. There would never then have been any master designer to witness humanity's birth pangs or to bemoan their death throes as a species.

If Adventism accepts evolution as the Catholic church did after finally considering Teilhard de Chardin's ground-breaking studies, how would we evangelize the third world? Would we present our charts of bible prophecy side by side with charts of humanity's common ancestor(s) with primates? Or would we leave that for special seminars after we had convinced potential candidates for baptism that Christianity, Adventist style, is the way to go?

It sounds like Adventism is at a cross-roads. It could either stay afloat or sink. Let's pray it is the former, for God's sake, and for the sake of those of us who have invested most of our life's capital in the Seventh-Day Adventist church.

How to Overcome Cultural Adventism in Three Easy Steps

1. Pray morning, noon and night.
2. Study God's word diligently.
3. Wait on the Lord for his favor.

More to follow. . . .

Great Controversy

GOOD } evil } GOOD

On the Street on the Christian 7th-Day Sabbath

Christ, let me be sure of my salvation; it's the only thing I've got. These words came to mind after I had spent the first hours of the Sabbath, not like a happy hermit in my home but out among the masses strolling along on a mild Floridian night.

Anything is Posible

This is the first real post from my non-smart phone. Now I can blog on the go. God, thanks for this small but useful miracle.

Science Fiction Messiah

This blog post is not about any science fiction messiah, per se,  though the most famous of SciFi messiahs does come to mind. I'm referring to Muad'Dib aka Paul Atreides from the classic novel, Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert. More recently popular culture has given us Thomas A. Anderson (alias Neo) from the Matrix film trilogy. For decades the world has been fascinated by, perhaps, the most famous of SciFi messiahs, i.e., Kal-El (alias Superman) from the planet Krypton. Humans, by nature, need messiahs at every stage of their development.

What if a new real-world messiah would appear in our midst? I'm not talking about an anti-Christ type of messiah, and, of course, he would not take the place of the quintessential messiah, Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Would this theoretical messiah one day be reading a secret text, or praying to God, or walking among us and, suddenly, the awareness that (s)he was a new 21st century messiah would dawn on him or her? It would be wonderful to have a female messiah, for a change. This line of questioning also applies to potential new genuine prophets after the biblical tradition. Examples that come to mind throughout history are the Buddha, Mohamed, Joseph Smith and Ellen G. White. How did these individuals realize that they were the genuine article and not just imagining things. Perhaps a test of their worth is that they helped found important world religions. In contrast, those who imagine themselves to be prophets or messiahs, and contribute very little to world history that is also beneficial, can be sure that they are probably wasting their time, and ours, and would do better to seek another vocation.

If a modern prophet or messiah is out there, please make yourself known as soon as possible. The world would be in a better shape with your ministry in place.

Death of My Personal Computer

Dear friends, it pains me to inform you that my beloved PC of eight years has gone to meet its cybernetic maker somewhere in the Matrix where all "dead ghosts in the machine" go when they expire. For that reason I will attempt to blog from my non-smart cell phone as it has unlimited data usage though it features a lousy browser. If the next couple of months produce very succinct posts it is because the 9 pad keypad is slower than entropy when inputting text. I may enjoy the challenge of tightening my prose beyond belief. God bless. Thank you for your patronage.

Early Adventists Used Popular Songs and Set them to Sacred Words

One way of addressing this issue was to set new hymns to well known popular tunes, and early Adventist hymnals display several examples of this practice. “Land of Light” was written by Uriah Smith and first published in 1856. Smith’s hymn focused on heaven and was set to the popular secular tune “Old Folks at Home” by Stephen Foster. Smith also penned “O Brother Be Faithful” and set it to the popular tune, “Be Kind to the Loved Ones at home” by Isaac Baker Woodbury. [1]

How many times I have changed the words to songs from my youth and enjoyed--as though a secret vice--the joy that these Christianized pop songs gave me. Perhaps the earliest instance was in the mid-70s when I found a particularly transcendent sentence from Steps to Christ [2] and mysteriously started singing those words to the tune of "I've Seen All Good People" by the Progressive Rock group Yes. For me, that combination of a song by a group that had altered my reality and had introduced me to the music of Igor Stravinsky, with the much loved words from Steps to Christ will forever remind me of, perhaps, the most natural and spiritual time of my life.

References:

1. I Have Heard the Angel's Sing
2. Steps to Christ. See Chapter 9, "The Work and the Life." which contains these words: "God is the source of life and light and joy to the universe" which I adapted to the Yes song I've mentioned above.