The Great Separation

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Hey folks,

I haven't been able to post today and won't be able to post till Wednesday or Thursday rolls around.

A friend is in need with a serious problem so I'm going out of town on the road.

Please say a prayer for me.

In the Name of my Beloved Savior, Christ,
Hal

Today's Sermon Devotional.

Good Afternoon Everyone,

Here is the sermon devotional from my father's message today:

The Church is not something that exists separate from us and we go to it. We are the Church, the Body of Christ. We the people make up the Church and it is what we, with the power of God, make it to be. Jesus has chosen to work through us to build the Kingdom of God here and now.

The Church, the Body of Jesus, is a many faceted living Body. The Church is made of many different individuals that have different functions, but are still one Body. Individuals must work together, submitted to each other, to make the Body strong and Christ like. Each member of the Body is dependent upon the other members for growth and care.

The Church is the alternative to the kingdom in the world. The Church is in direct opposition to the kingdom of darkness ruled by satan. It is the fort we enter to be secure from satan and at the same time it is the army we join to battle satan and his army in the world.

The Church is a caring community in which we find hope and help to overcome the world. The Church is where we find help to meet our needs, physical as well as Spiritual. The Church is the family of God composed of only brothers and sisters. It is where each member receives what is necessary for strength and growth from God through the other members. EPH 4:16, "From Him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work."

EPHESIANS 4
JOHN 15
I CORINTHIANS 12
ROMANS 12
I CORINTHIANS 14
I PETER 4
PHILIPPIANS 2
MATTHEW 25

May you recognize the blessing of Christ in your life today. - Hal

Great Fisking of the Revolve Bible.

B. Preston at JunkYardBlog has a great fisk on the new Girl Teenzine Revolve which I mentioned back on 2003.08.27. If you recall it's a slick repackaging of the Bible that frankly trivializes the Word of God.

I suggest you guys stop by for a read. You'll get a laugh too.

UPDATE: Rock Group Planning Live Suicide Gets Plug Pulled.

(Source: The AP, Naples Daily News)
St. Petersburg, FL - Here's my original post on this story.

The newest news is that the plug has been pulled. The AP report reads:

"The owner of a theater where a band said it would stage a live suicide during a concert next month said Wednesday he isn't allowing the show to take place.

Meanwhile, the owner of another club where the band Hell on Earth said it intended to move its show, also said Wednesday he won't allow the show either, leaving in question whether the band will be allowed to play at all."

The owner of the first club was fairly certain it was just a stunt, but he was more concerned with,

"...what some other "nut case" might do during the show."

Can't say as I blame him.

Dust Your Shoes Before Leaving Turkey.

(Source: Ananova™)
Turkish Prison, Turkey - A German man has been,

"...charged with smuggling archaeologically valuable national treasures and put in a cell with 14 criminals."

Turns out the security guards in the Antalya airport discovered a bag of pebbles that the man's 9-year-old son gathered at a beach. The wife of the man tried to explain that the son was collecting the pebbles for a school project but her appeal fell on stone ears. She and her three children returned to Germany without the children's father. She said:

"It is unbelievable. I don't know what to do."

"Unbelievable" is the right word.

Ananova™ reports:

"German member of the European parliament, Hedwig Keppelhoff-Wiechert, has now appealed to the Turkish ambassador to the EU to personally see to it that the man is set free."

That's a Lot of Pigeon Poop.

(Source: Ananova™)
Santiago, Chile - Ananova™ reports:

"The roof of a house in Chile has collapsed under the weight of accumulated pigeon droppings.

Ana María Bustos said the roof crashed down into her living room in Santiago because pigeons had been using it as a roost.

She said she ended up with around a year's worth of pigeon droppings on her floor.

Mrs Bustos added there were also feathers and worms everywhere, and that the smell was disgusting."

Do you suppose that the pigeon that broke the roof's back feels sorry? He may soon. Residents are asking authorities if they can go pigeon hunting to thin out the large flocks of pigeons living on roofs in the area.

That's our gross out story for the week. Mmmm. Maybe the month. ;-)

UPDATE: Jupiter Man Won't Loose Home Yet.

(Source: Peter Franceshina, Sun-Sentinel.com)
Jupiter, FL - George Andres, who I previously posted about, was supposed to have his house sold out from underneath him on October 9th by his homeowners association because he put an American Flag in his front yard. He is a retired Marine.

The update: Chief Circuit Judge Edward Fine has put the foreclosure on hold while Andres appeals to a higher court.

Good news as The Great Separation continues.

Child Molesters Aren't Molesters According to Supreme Court and ACLU.

(Source: Stuart Shepard, CitizenLink Focus on the Family)
Kansas to Washington D.C. to the Molester down your street - Remember the Texas sodomy law that the U.S. Supreme court overturned, violating states rights? Well, here is another case where that judicial imprudence is having an affect.

The U.S. Supreme court threw an appeals court ruling on a child molester back at the appeals court, ordering them to rehear the case in light of their ruling on sodomy.

Stuart Shepard reports:

"Matthew Limon was 18 when he was convicted of criminal sodomy with a 14-year-old boy. It was his third conviction — all for sex crimes involving children. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison, but the U.S. Supreme Court, pointing to its recent ruling that overturned a Texas law against sodomy, has ordered a Kansas appeals court to reconsider Limon's case."

The ACLU is spearheading the effort to get Limon off the hook. Kansas Attorney General Phil Kline said this of the ACLU:

"The ACLU states specifically in its brief that it is a constitutional right for any child age 13 and older to consent to have sex with anyone."

So I guess the argument is that the molesting that Limon committed was ok because he had the children's ok.

According to an AP report by John Hanna on The Topeka Capitol-Journal, one of the arguments being made by the ACLU is that Limon was unjustly given too long a sentence because if one of the kids had been a girl he would have received a year and three month sentence as opposed to 17 years. Put I'm not so sure that the law they are referring to, the "Romeo and Juliet" statute, was meant to be applied to serial sexual offenders like Limon.

There are some days that I think a revolution is necessary.

The Great Separation continues.

Magic Paper.

(Source: Philip Ball for Nature | Hat Tip to Slashdot)
Netherlands - Now this is just plain cool. I've read several things on this kind of tech over the last couple of years and I find it very exciting.

Paper capable of playing videos has been invented at the Philips Research laboratory in Eindhoven, the Netherlands.

A single sheet looks pretty much like ordinary paper. But the ink can be rearranged electronically fast enough to show video movies.

Its devisers, Robert Hayes and Johan Feenstra, have also figured out how to create full-colour displays. Their colour screens would be four times brighter than the flat devices currently made from liquid crystals, they reckon.

The invention is the latest version of 'electronic ink'. Researchers hope to combine the convenience, robustness and readability of printed material with the vast and flexible information content of laptop computers.

Just think. You could carry around your entire library in a small note book. The fun really comes in when you think about making notes and doing searches.

I can't wait!

Weird Extinct Animal Living and Eating And Not Extinct.

(Source: The AP via Ananova™)
Cuba, of all places - This has got to be one of the wackiest animals God gave life too.

It is a male almiqui which was thought to be extinct. It was found by a farmer in Cuba where the species is apparently indigenous.

The AP reports:

"The creature looks like a brownish woolly badger with a long, pink-tipped snout and can measure up to 50 centimetres.

The nocturnal animal burrows underground during the daytime, explaining why it is rarely seen by people. After the sun goes down, it emerges to root out worms, larvae and insects."

I think it looks like a mini wooly mammoth crossed with an anteater with a bit of opossum thrown in for freakishness.