Christianese Unease

    Christianity has its own jargon--propitiation, atonement, witnessing, etc. There is nothing wrong with the words except that they are not understandable to people who did not cut their teeth on a Bible. It does little good to witness to a non-Christian using words that are only understandable to a Christian. After decades of studying the Bible, I am fluent in Christianese, but what I overheard in the grocery store last week made me uneasy. Creeped me out actually. A married couple and another man who were obviously Christians and obviously well acquainted were speaking, but they were not conversing. They were quoting scripture and Christian sayings to each other without any normal conversation in between. Even though the verse responses did not really fit with each other, they seemed satisfied with the con-verse-ation. It was like overhearing a discussion in a foreign language I understood, then finding out it was a bomb threat.

     The encounter made me think about God though. I thanked Him fervently, soberly and persistently--that I do not belong to their church.

That Answers That

     I have wondered from the beginning why the CDC was making no attempt to control Covid spread and overcrowded hospitals by treatment instead of isolation and vaccination. I thought they were afraid to endorse anything Trump said, even retroactively, or they were just plain stupid. Turns out they were sly. Even though I have never done this, I am posting this very informative editorial letter here. Since I am not computer savvy enough to link the whole article, I have copied it. I do not have his permission, but I figure if he was willing to publish it for 36,000 subscribers, he probably would not mind my four followers reading it too. 

 

Therapeutics    by Gary Goers    Letter to Editor Daily InterLake 1/20/22

The gold standard of care for viral infections is early treatment. From the start of the Covid pandemic, there were none. Patients were sent home and told to come back if their condition deteriorated.

There were early reports of promising therapeutics. Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin are known to be very effective in the first several days of infection. Further studies showed Ivermectin to be very effective in all stages of the infection. Multiple studies have shown that Vitamin D blood levels above 50mg/ml (along with Vit. K2, zinc, and magnesium) would reduce hospitalizations by approximately 80%. All of these protocols are cheap and safe.

Anthony Fauci along with NIH Director Francis Collins attacked these treatments with a vengeance, even going so far as having any mention of them censored and doctors threatened if they dared to prescribe them.

Why was the public not informed about these therapeutics? Why the push to vaccinate the least vulnerable age group — kids? The answer is: money and liability.

Once a vaccine is added to the childhood schedule, the vaccine maker is shielded from liability for injuries. The current Covid “vaccines” are under emergency use authorization. Under EAU, the vaccine maker is shielded from liability. To get EAU they must meet four criteria: there has to be an emergency; vaccines must be 30% to 50% effective; benefits must outweigh risks: and there can be no adequate, approved, and available alternative treatments. This last requirement was the most threatening to the rabid push to vaccinate everyone. Billions of dollars would be at risk if the therapeutics were recognized. Greed and corruption seem to be the logical culprits.

— Gary Goers, Kalispell

[Editor’s note: The FDA’s explanation of emergency use authorization for vaccines can be found online at www.fda.gov/vaccines-blood-biologics/vaccines]

    Now I know. That answers that.

     

 

Passing the Baton

    When my oldest child was close to graduating from high school, I panicked that time was running out to pass on the baton of faith. Then I realized that not only was she not in position to grab the baton, but we were not even running on the same track. There was nothing wrong with my desire, Christian parents are commanded to share their faith with their children. But there was also nothing wrong with my children not being ready to receive it at the same time they got their diplomas, because the Holy Spirit is the one who solidifies their faith into something that will carry them to their finish line. Which is a good thing because my brother and I are among many first generation, or skipped generation, Christians. There was no family member to hand the baton of faith to us. But the Holy Spirit is really good at it, because I came to faith in Christ without previous knowledge of the baton, or even the race. I was raised in a church where we tried to climb toward heaven on a fragile ladder of our own good deeds. 

     The Bible shows the line of faith through Israel, but it is not an unbroken line, especially in the time of the Judges and Kings, and some outsiders were chosen, not only to be in the race, but in the lineage of the Savior. My husband picked right up spiritually where his parents handed off, but that seems to be the exception in families, not the rule.

    Now that my children are grown and two of them are parents, it is their job to teach their children about God. As grandparents we have wonderful opportunities to share Jesus with our grandgirls, but we might not be around to see that baton picked up, and that is okay. The Holy Spirit will not leave the earth when we do, and He is the One who holds out God's gift of faith until we recognize it as the only prize worth having, even when we are running on the wrong track.

The Logistics

     Recently my brother-in-law, who has both a pilot's license and a son who is an airline pilot, was joking about the secret chemicals being spread by jet pilots in contrails, a conspiracy theory that has been around since contrails appeared. I started thinking through the logistics of what such a plot would require and, thanks to the internet, I found some statistics to go with the logistics. First, plagiarism--a con(densation)trail is defined as a visible condensation of water droplets or ice crystals from the atmosphere, sometimes occurring in the wake of an aircraft, rocket, or missile. Not every aircraft can form contrails, only jets, and only under certain conditions. They only occur between altitudes of 25-40,000 feet and only (there are no good synonyms for only) then with the right combination of low vapor and low temperature. Our breath does the same thing on a cold day--chemical free (unless you are a smoker or a toker).

     Now in order for the chemtrail conspiracy to work there would need to be a way to get the chemicals into the jet, a way to disperse the chemicals in flight and, the most difficult to manage, a way to silence all those involved. Now for the statistics for the U.S:

 

   734,911 pilots including civilians and military 

   160,860 private pilots, 103,879 commercial pilots, 43,300 military pilots

   6882 commercial aircraft, 13,300 military aircraft (many based overseas)

   5271 public airports

   3000 fixed base operators (gas stations for airplanes) distributing fuel from:

   Shell, BP, Total, Chevron, Exxon Mobil, among others

   306,300 aircraft mechanics

   5 major manufacturers of civil aircraft

  12 aircraft and engine specific training schools at 5 separate locations

 

     Of course, the conspiracists would say that since the world wide web is controlled by the same secret forces spreading the contrail chemicals, internet data is not reliable. But having married into the aircraft world I can tell you:

 

  Pilots are mostly mavericks.

  Mechanics cannot be muzzled.

  Everything in and on an aircraft will break.

 

  So here are some of the logistical problems:

•   If the chemicals were in the jet fuel, thousands of fuel production employees would need to be sworn to or coerced into secrecy.
•   If the chemicals were procured from a secret supplier to be injected during flight, the pilots who flew the jet would have to be trained how to use it and the mechanics who worked on it would have to be trained how to fix it. 
•   Therefore, the instructors who teach pilots and mechanics would have to be in on the secret. The injector would also have to be in the schematics because neither pilots nor mechanics are allowed to just wing it with airplane operation. Realistically, who would be willing to keep the secret knowing they were being dosed with the same chemicals? The sky is a pretty hard thing to avoid.
  
•   The military has greater ability to protect secrets, but that would cover a much smaller area than commercial aircraft and they buy their fuel where everyone else does. Also, military planes can detect when they are leaving contrails so the pilot can change altitude to eliminate them, because it is not a good idea on a military operation to leave a trail for your enemies to find you.
  
•   Civilian employees would have no reason to keep silent after leaving their jobs, and lots of fame and financial reasons to expose the secret. Anyone who thinks thousands of people are capable of keeping  secrets for decades has never tried to plan a surprise party.
  

    Logistically, a conspiracy dependent on the collaboration of thousands of people will never get off the ground. But what I find interesting is that some of the supposed effects of the chemtrails are the same ones now attributed to the Covid vaccine--sterility, mind control, shortened life span. The upside is, conspiracies are apparently made of recyclable materials.

Scar Tissue

     I ran into a friend at a restaurant today and asked how her holidays had gone. This was her first Christmas, wedding anniversary and New Year's without her husband, what I call "sadiversaries". Her answer--Really bad. I knew it would be painful because pain is not optional in the healing process. The analogy I shared was that memories of special times pick the scabs from wounded hearts, but I realized that was wrong, it is more like breaking up scar tissue. I have not lost my husband, for me that is a dreaded someday thing that I hope will be far off, but I have torn scar tissue. When my left leg healed after knee replacement, I noticed my foot was turned slightly inward.  Not a big problem, I was just happy to have a knee that worked again. But a couple years post surgery, I was getting up from a chair when I felt a sharp pain in my left knee. I limped into urgent care, where the P.A. inserted a needle to drain the excess fluid. When fluid came out bloody, he knew scar tissue had torn.

    That is why I think scar tissue is a better analogy. A scab covers a superficial cut. Scars come from deeper injuries, the wound will mend, but never be the same as before. The evidence of pain will always be there. For the grieving, the firsts, the holidays, the memories, pierce that scar tissue. My scar tissue needed to tear for the sake of my leg and it needs to happen for the sake of a widow's heart. The analogy also fits because the pain is mostly hidden, the bleeding is under the surface. Analogies can do little for grief, but they help those of us who have not experienced such loss understand a little better, and be gracious, not glib, with our comfort. Because there are many around us whose scars we cannot see.

    

 

Weed Pulling

    My sister, who is one of the stressed and depressed news junkies I mentioned in the last post, recently shared that the Lord has been convicting her about praying for judgment on political opponents. He told her, in the way God speaks to our minds, that it was not her place. I struggle with those same desires, so the message was for me too. And just in case I was not paying attention, God repeated it several more times in the notes from this week's Bible study on the parables of Matthew 13. The briefest and most convicting statement that zinged me was, "The primary calling of God's children is to plant seeds, not pull weeds."  Oh how we long to be the ones to judge those soils, pull those weeds, sort those fish. But God has already assigned that job to the angels at the end of the age. He is neither upping His timetable nor taking volunteers. That stinks worse than the fish.

    But it does make me feel better, or should I say right? about limiting my Christian radio listening to programs that sow the seed rather than buying their books and videos to make me a better informed weed wacker. I was once in a church that devoted an entire service to the evils of Pogs, collectible discs with characters on them, and no more evil than marbles. If I see a friend wandering into a weed patch, I will let them know, but most of the time, it is a big enough job checking the soil and weeding out the sins of my own heart. Maybe the reason God uses angels to sort the righteous from the wicked is that they do not have the sin nature that corrupts our judgment. But the fact that I don't get to help leaves me out--of sorts.

(P.S. I did hold onto one prayer that is judgmental but supported by the Bible--May the schemes of the wicked come back on their own heads.)

    

  

 

Connie Is Always Right

    Okay, make that Connie Always Thinks She's Right. My Dad's brother has a habit of giving a short bio when a person's name comes up:  Laziest man I've ever seen.  She's a good 'un., etc. I've often wondered what he says when my name comes up. I hope it's "She sure is good to her Dad." But for people who know me well, the synopsis would probably be "She always thinks she's right." That is one of the main reasons I do not often read or watch media that simply reinforces what I already believe. My arrogant, carnal nature cannot get enough of being told how right and smart I am, and exposing myself to such things feeds it. I am already a 5'4" (undisclosed) weight Pillsbury dough boy of arrogance, the last thing I need is more puffing up.

    My second reason probably springs from the same arrogance, but I would like to believe I am intelligent enough to sort through objective information and find the truth. There is no true objectivity in media, of course, every writer brings their own set of assumptions to an article, but as long as they have researched the material, there should be enough information for me to draw my own conclusions. I enjoy the many labor saving devices of modern life, but I do not want either cut-and-paste news writers, or even genuine journalists, to do my thinking for me. 

    I do not read liberal slanted news if I know it will cause me to waste my day composing rebuttals in my head. And I do not read conservative slanted news for the same reason I do not exercise only one side of my body. My mind may be unbalanced, but my body does not have to be. If a picture in my living room is tipped down and to the left, the solution is not to hang it slanted down to the right, but to make it straight and level. Christians have an alternative to being stressed and depressed news junkies or ignorance is bliss ostriches, we have the option to trust God regardless of the world news. Everything is going exactly as planned.

    At least that is my opinion, but remember, Connie is always right.

    

   

Do You Know Your CDC?

    Unless you have been hiding under a rock for the last two years, which is a really appealing idea, you have heard a lot from the CDC. But what do we really know about them? To learn the ABC's of the CDC, I have prepared an educational multiple choice test.

 

 

1.  What do the initials CDC stand for?

     A.  Center for Data Confusion

     B.  Continually Destroying Credibility

     C.  Creating Doom and Chaos

     D.  Changing Directives Constantly

     E.  (Bureaucrats Promoting) Covid Danger Continually was too long. 

2.  What is the vision statement of the CDC?

     A.  We're scared you won't be scared.

     B.  Where the answer to every question is--Vaccine.

     C.  Covid protocols work . . . unless you're exposed to Covid.

     D.  If we do enough things that don't work, they will work.

     E.  Where we follow the science--if we agree with it.

3.  Where are the CDC headquarters?

    A.  In a government bunker untouched by the U.S. economy.

    B.  In Fauci's guest room.

    C.  In Pfizer's pocket.

    D.  Atlanta

    E.  Atlantis

4.  The CDC's authority comes from

     A. The Mayflower Compact, Constitution or other Important Document.

     B.  The small print in the user agreements no one reads.

     C.  Brainwashing chemicals implanted in hand sanitizers and masks.

     D.  Federal regulations influenced by C.

     E.  C, D and a higher power whose name begins with B.

    

5.  Is the CDC a non-profit organization?

    A. It was, before the secret vaccine kickbacks.

    B. Yes, and it is trying to make the U.S. a non-profit also.

    C.  Not since trademarking the words "mask, protocol and vaccine".

    D.  All government entities are not only non-profit, but losing money.

    E.  All government entities have endless amounts of free money.

 

6.  How does the CDC enforce their guidelines?

    A.  Unlimited, repetitive advertising

    B.  Frightened, but powerful county health officers (not in Montana)

    C.  Pathetic, whining county health officers (many in Montana)

    D.  Mask Nazi citizen volunteers

    E.  Unlimited, repetitive advertising.

7.  Why has the CDC shortened isolation for Covid exposure?

   A.  No one in America was following them, except the mask Nazis.

   B.  They learned they were crippling the economy.

   C.  Until now, they thought economy was a rental car agency.

   D.  They fear Omicron, in case it is not a rental car agency.

   E.  The science they were following wandered off.

      

    There is no answer key for this test because, if I follow the strict, unbiased scientific methods of the CDC, I would have to revise it continually and that seems hard. But here is my handy key for interpreting CDC guidelines--Remember, if we follow the science, when the data to support the science comes from us, we are actually following ourselves. And now I'm going to wash my hands and hide under a rock.