Monthly Archives: March 2013

The New Dog

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A Baptist preacher and his wife decided to get a new dog. Ever mindful of the congregation, they knew the dog must also be a Baptist. They visited kennel after kennel and explained their needs. Finally, they found a kennel whose owner assured them he had just the dog they wanted.

The owner brought the dog to meet the pastor and his wife. “Fetch the Bible,” he commanded. The dog bounded to the bookshelf, scrutinized the books, located the Bible, and brought it to the owner.

“Now find Psalm 3, “he commanded. The dog dropped the Bible to the
floor, and showing marvelous dexterity with his paws, leafed through and finding the correct passage, pointed to it with his paw. The pastor and his wife were very impressed and purchased the dog.

That evening, a group of church members came to visit. The pastor and his wife began to show off the dog, having him locate several Bible verses.

The visitors were very impressed. One man asked, “Can he do regular dog tricks, too?”

“I haven’t tried yet,” the pastor replied. He pointed his finger at the dog. “HEEL!” the pastor commanded.

The dog immediately jumped on a chair, placed one paw on the pastor’s forehead and began to howl.

The pastor looked at his wife in shock and said, “Good Lord! He’s Pentecostal!”

Spare Time

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What happens when you have:

1) nothing to do

2) a sharp knife

3) a large lime

4) a patient cat

5) too much tequila

6) and it’s football season?

ANSWER:

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.

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.

.

feline_football

Christians Packing Guns

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The article below is as Jeff submitted it years ago. The pics were lost in a site defacement attack. We’ll rebuild it completely, the Good Lord willing. In the meantime, here’s the text and it is, after all, the thoughts that count…

I have been asked on occasion how I can justify carrying a gun and being a Christian at the same time. This is always posed by someone who is trying to trip me up. It can either be a devout Christian asking the question, or a Hedonistic heathen; it doesn’t matter. There are those who believe, or choose to believe, that a Christian must be absolutely passive in all things. I am not just referring to those Christians who ride a horse and buggy. I have been asked about my views on self defense by Christians of most every denomination. Some are genuinely seeking an answer. Others just want to chastise me for not being as “faithful” as themselves.

Many will accept every modern worldly convenience, but scoff at the idea of trying to protect oneself or the life of another. Their attitude seems to be that “God will protect us”. They do have a valid point. God will protect us from the evils of this world, if he so chooses. I would rather have God on my side than a battery of Sidewinder missiles. Indeed, our God can protect us. However, that attitude would lead one to believe that he could walk through Harlem wearing a Ku Klux Klan
outfit campaigning for George Wallace, and that “God will protect us”. God could get you through that, but Jesus said that we should not tempt God. I tend to agree with his assessment.

In the saddlebag of my motorcycle, I have a tiny cross with the inscription “Faith Moves Mountains”, but I also ride in the mountains of East Tennessee and the western United States, and I make sure that my brakes are in good working order. I could just trust God to catch me, but again, that could be construed as tempting God. God gave us brakes on our motorcycles, and that is sufficient.

Faith Moves Mountains

God can indeed protect us. He can keep us safe on the highways, and he can also keep us safe from those who would intentionally do us harm. I am not speaking of politicians here, but of the evil that is in the souls of some human beings. Be certain in this; there is true evil in this world, and it sometimes manifests itself in the form of a low life predator. Being a Christian, it is difficult to believe that people, made of the same composition of flesh, bone, and blood as ourselves, could be truly evil. We have a Heavenly Father who has filled us with basic goodness, but Jesus said that there are those “who are of the synagogue of Satan”.

No sane individual would hesitate to defend himself from a rabid dog or a poisonous snake, but are the two-legged vipers of this world any better than an animal? An animal does that which comes naturally to him. Children of Satan do that which comes naturally to them: that being evil.

Can God protect us from those who would do us harm? Absolutely. However, just as he has given us brakes to save us from the mountain, he has also given to us the tools necessary to defend ourselves, and those whom God has given to us. As Christian men, God not only allows us to protect our families, but he expects us to protect those whom he has placed in our care. This may seem contrary to the mandate for us to “turn the other cheek”, and I too have pondered over this. It takes great strength to turn the other cheek as Jesus intended. That is not a commandment to be weak. Jesus did not operate from a position of weakness. In fact, nothing ever happened to him that he did not allow.

God has entrusted us with the care of our brothers, whether those “brothers” be the children that he has given to us, or our wives, or our friends. We could set our children outside in the cold and trust that God would keep them warm. We could abandon them and trust that God will keep them fed. We could let them loose on the city streets or send them off for a week at Neverland, and trust that no sick, evil freak would abuse them. As Christians, we do not do these things to our children. God expects us to clothe them, feed them, and protect them from the evil that is inherent in this world. He gave to us the ability to buy clothes, grow food, build a fire, and to fight off those who would do us harm. In the time that Jesus walked the Earth in the form of man, the short sword was the
state-of-the-art weapon. He told his followers that the time of living carefree was over, and that the time had come for those without a sword to “sell his garment and buy one”.

Homestead Defense Rifle
Modern Day Sword

Today, we have better than a sword. We have more modern weapons at our disposal, and so does our enemy. Keeping a good rifle to defend one’s homestead and a reliable handgun to ward off evil that finds you when you least expect it is not only prudent, but expected. A Christian man is not mean, hateful, spiteful, or quick to anger. Neither is he weak. God never told us to let the evil in this world run over us like a train. He never told us to stand by idly as those whom he trusted to us are abused or killed. A Christian man who packs a gun does not look for trouble, and avoids it if at all possible. However, evil can seek you out.

A well-armed man operates from a position of strength. He is less likely to have to fight than an unarmed man. The predators in this world look for easy prey. God did not put his people on this Earth to be prey for the sons of Satan. God expects us to stand up for what is right, and he gives us the tools with which to do so. When you defend the life of one of God’s children, you are defending good against evil. Use your good sense and God’s word to avoid trouble. If necessary, use the gun at your side to stand against it.

Properly Armed

Jeff Quinn

Good Memories

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Good Memories…

My Mom used to cut chicken, chop eggs and spread mayo on the same
cutting board with the same knife and no bleach, but we didn’t seem to
get food poisoning.

My Mom used to defrost hamburger on the counter AND I used to eat it raw sometimes too, but I can’t remember getting E-coli.

Almost all of us would have rather gone swimming in the lake instead of
a pristine pool (talk about boring).

The term cell phone would have conjured up a phone in a jail cell, and a
pager was the school PA system..

We all took gym, not PE…and risked permanent injury with a pair of
high top Ked’s or Converse All Stars (only worn in gym) instead of having cross-training athletic shoes with air cushion soles and built in light reflectors. I can’t recall any injuries but they must have happened a lot because they tell us how much safer we are now.

Flunking gym was not an option…even for stupid kids! I guess PE
must be much harder than gym.

Every year, someone taught the whole school a lesson by running in the
halls with leather soles on linoleum tile and hitting the wet spot. How
much better off would we be today if we only knew we could have sued the school system.

Speaking of school, we all said prayers and the pledge and staying in
detention after school caught all sorts of negative attention. We must
have had horribly damaged psyches.

I can’t understand it. Schools didn’t offer 14 year olds an abortion or
condoms (we wouldn’t have known what either was anyway) but they did
give us a couple of baby aspirin and cough syrup if we started getting
the sniffles. What an archaic health system we had then. Remember school nurses?
Ours wore a hat and everything.

I thought that I was supposed to accomplish something before I was
allowed to be proud of myself.

I just can’t recall how bored we were without computers, PlayStation,
Nintendo, X-Box or 270 digital cable stations.

I must be repressing that memory as I try to rationalize through the
denial of the dangers could have befallen us as we trekked off each day
about a mile down the road to some guy’s vacant 20, built forts out of
branches and pieces of plywood, made trails, and fought over who got to
be the Lone Ranger. What was that property owner thinking, letting us
play on that lot? He should have been locked up for not putting up
a fence around the property, complete with a self-closing gate and an infrared intruder alarm.

Oh yeah…and where was the Benadryl and sterilization kit when I got
that bee sting? I could have been killed!

We played king of the hill on piles of gravel left on vacant
construction sites and when we got hurt, Mom pulled out the 48 cent
bottle of Mercurochrome and then we got our butt spanked. Now it’s a
trip to the emergency room, followed by a 10-day dose of a $49 bottle of
antibiotics and then Mom calls the attorney to sue the contractor for
leaving a horribly vicious pile of gravel where it was such a threat.

We didn’t act up at the neighbor’s house either, because if we did, we
got our butt spanked (physical abuse) here too, and then we got butt
spanked again when we got home

Mom invited the door to door salesman inside for coffee, kids choked
down the dust from the gravel driveway while playing with Tonka trucks
(Remember why Tonka trucks were made tough…it wasn’t so that they
could take the rough Berber in the family room), and Dad drove a car
with leaded gas.

Our music had to be left inside when we went out to play and I am sure
that I nearly exhausted my imagination a couple of times when we went on two week vacations. I should probably sue the folks now for the danger they put us in when we all slept in campgrounds in the family tent.

Summers were spent behind the push lawnmower and I didn’t even know that mowers came with motors until I was 13 and we got one without an
automatic blade-stop or an auto-drive.

How sick were my parents? Of course my parents weren’t the only psychos. I recall Bucky Finsky from next door coming over and doing his stupid tricks on the front stoop just before he fell off. Little did his Mom know that she could have owned our house. Instead she picked him up and swatted him a few times for being such a goof. It was a neighborhood run amuck!

To top it off, not a single person I knew had ever been told that they
were from a dysfunctional family. How could we possibly have known
that we all needed to get into group therapy and anger management classes?

We were obviously so duped by so many societal ills, that we didn’t even
notice that the entire country wasn’t taking Prozac! How did we survive?

Walking Rifleman

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When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
It adds not a bit to his load.
It makes him in fact somewhat lighter,
For he walks as a free man, unbowed.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
He’s master of all he can see.
A good man won’t abuse the position,
Still–a master’s a fine thing to be.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
He’ll keep his eye sharp, his wits keen,
For that’s not just a tart he’s escortin’
No, that lady beside him’s a queen.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
Its condition doesn’t matter to me.
He can load it however he chooses,
So long as he lives by Rule Three.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
And he needs a second shot quick,
He’ll be glad of the time spent on homework,
When he mastered reflexive bolt-flick.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
And he’s hunting, to feed him and his,
Well, he’s living the way God intended,
And that’s just the way that it is.

When a man takes his rifle awalkin’
As some say he should not be allowed,
Well, they’d better be saying it softly,
For a man with a rifle is proud.

So if you take your rifle awalkin’
Realize what you’re saying, my friend.
You’re saying that you are a free man,
And woe be to him who butts in.

So let’s take our rifles awalkin’
With pride–defiance if need.
If we don’t want to be the last riflemen,
Then we’ve got to re-sow freedom’s seed.

Yes! Let’s take our rifles awalkin’
And we’ll walk in the light, so they’ll see.
And if they come to tell us we cannot,
Then we’ll water the liberty tree

Joe Sledge
Grand Junction, Colorado

If I Knew

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If I knew it would be the last time
That I’d see you fall asleep,
I would tuck you in more tightly
and pray the Lord, your soul to keep.

If I knew it would be the last time
that I see you walk out! the door,
I would give you a hug and kiss
and call you back for one more.

If I knew it would be the last time
I’d hear your voice lifted up in praise,
I would video tape each action and word,
so I could play them back day after day.

If I knew it would be the last time,
I could spare an extra minute
to stop and say “I love you,”
instead of assuming you would KNOW I do.

If I knew it would be the last time
I would be there to share your day,
Well I’m sure you’ll have so many more,
so I can let just this one slip away.

For surely there’s always tomorrow
to make up for an oversight,
and we always get a second chance
to make everything just right.

There will always be another day
to say “I love you,”
And certainly there’s another chance
to say our “Anything I can do?”

But just in case I might be wrong,
and today is all I get,
I’d like to say how much I love you
and I hope we never forget.

Tomorrow is not promised to anyone,
young or old alike,
And today may be the last chance
you get to hold your loved one tight.

So if you’re waiting for tomorrow,
why not do it today?
For if tomorrow never comes,
you’ll surely regret the day,

That you didn’t take that extra time
for a smile, a hug, or a kiss
and you were too busy to grant someone,
what turned out to be their one last wish.

So hold your loved ones close today,
and whisper in their ear,
Tell them how much you love them
and that you’ll always hold them dear

Take time to say “I’m sorry,”
“Please forgive me,” “Thank you,” or “It’s okay.”
And if tomorrow never comes,
you’ll have no regrets about today.

Most places I’ve seen on the ‘net claim that this poem is “Author Unknown” or “Anonymous”I found one page where it is credited to “Jaque”

God, Give Us Men

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“God give us men…ribbed with the steel of Your Holy Spirit…men who will not flinch when the battle’s fiercest…men who won’t acquiesce, or compromise, or fade when the enemy rages.

“God give us men who can’t be bought, bartered, or badgered by the enemy, men who will pay the price, make the sacrifice, stand the ground, and hold the torch high.

“God give us men obsessed with the principles true to your word, men stripped of self-seeking and a yen for security…men who will pay any price for freedom and go any lengths for truth.

“God give us men delivered from mediocrity, men with vision high, pride low, faith wide, love deep, and patience long…men who will dare to march to the drumbeat of a distant drummer, men who will not surrender principles of truth in order to accommodate their peers.

“God give us men more interested in scars than medals, more committed to conviction than convenience, men who will give their life for the eternal, instead of indulging their lives for a moment in time. Give us men who are fearless in the face of danger, calm in the midst of pressure, bold in the midst of opposition.

“God give us men who will pray earnestly, work long, preach clearly, and wait patiently. Give us men whose walk is by faith, behavior is by principle, whose dreams are in heaven, and whose book is the bible.

“God give us men who are equal to the task. Those are the men the church and the world needs today.

We have not been able to track down the author for this excellent piece. If you know who wrote it, please drop us a note.

The Lake

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Whose Lake it is I do not know,
I only know that’s where I go
When seeking a refuge from worry and doubt,
And sick of confinement, within and without
It’s waters are purest, it’s color and bluest,
It’s simple beauty I can attest.
It’s a symbol of peace and serenity,
of contentment, love and blessed obscurity.
Surely, in His infinite love and pity
The Magnificent God Almighty
Placed on the earth such gems of beauty to be
used when needed, by men like me.

The Breath Of God

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I wrote this and I will share it with you: you may send it where ever you will.

In a mist on hills and valleys below,
the breath of God creates the Snow.
In colour-flow, its not the same,
as a picture, painted, laid in a frame.

Boughs heavy laden, yet they have not broke,
as Sunshine has risen to take up the yoke.
Before the Snow melts, the die has been cast,
shadows will fade, and in part, they have past.

A season of spring, pure waters delight,
thawing, a river that ripples with might.
Freely it flows and to all who partake,
drink to its depths, refreshed, then awake.

For this is the morrow that bids us be well,
to live in a place and never to dwell.
A mist on a hill and lo,
the breath of God creates the Snow.

This Little Light

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As stars to an approaching dawn,
Like candles burned too long,
Every light fades out with time
And so ends life’s sad song.

It may be just a flicker
Or what seems eternal flame.
Each life serves, to light the gloom
Though all end, just the same.

Burn a candle out and see –
Just how much did it light?
With just that little flicker,
Could you find your way at night?

With just the glow of tiny stars
Sailors navigate the seas,
And though they burn out with the dawn,
Ships sail on with the breeze.

What are you doing with your light
Who navigates off you?
If they set sail with just your glow
Would their course end up true?

Check your course, and then your lantern
Be a light to guide the way
Never have it said about you
That you led some soul astray.

Know your light won’t last forever,
What you do counts when you’re gone
Take a real good look around you
What your light is shining on.

Live your days, but keep it with you,
Someone follows where you lead.
That in mind, walk in a manner.
Others have the light they need.