“But thanks be to God…”

But thanks be to God!
He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:57

(Lynch Creek Farms)

Twas the week before Christmas and all through the land
Democrats, and even some Republicans, seemed mad at the man…

Articles of impeachment were hung in the chamber with glee
in hopes that all votes would pass as quickly as could be

The nation tried to carry on with its holiday of cheer
while Democrats greeted the President’s supporters with half-hearted sneers

With Madame Speaker dressed in her mock funeral black
I wanted nothing to do with this presidential attack.

Despite a time that was to be merry and bright…
I avoided all news keeping this debacle from sight…

…..

And thus this entire governmental spectacle has taken hold…

It’s taken on the heaviness of a thick black cloud hanging wearily
over an otherwise merry and joyful time.

All except for those who had “merry impeachment” parties and
dinners last night…and those who clapped in the house upon the resulting vote.
Shameful and boorish behavior by folks who just don’t grasp the magnitude.

This brouhaha that kicked off on election night 2016, has consumed our news outlets,
it has divided this nation deeper and further, it has overshadowed much more important
issues affecting the entire nation and it is doing its darndest to steal
our Christmas joy…

I oddly think that that is indeed Speaker Pelosi’s mindset…
to steal the joy, hence the black and now they’ve all left town…
heading home for parties and fun while leaving the nation and
their unfinished business, hanging in a lurch.

However, could this not have waited until say January…when we’re all already
depressed from dealing with our post-Christmas letdown and seasonal affective
disorders stemming from the lack of light, the gray days and cold winds???

Yet the stealing of joy is exactly what Satan would like.

I am, however, still left feeling very sad as well as mad…
or is that more angry than mad?

I am mad at our governmental leadership.

They have forsaken their duties to govern, write legislations,
vote to pass or pass on various laws…
all because of an obsession that began three years ago along with
a fast leaning slant toward socialism.

Everything about governing has been put on hold all in order
that ‘they’ may “impeach” a president who has committed no crimes.

Now I must confess, I missed Andrew Johnson’s impeachment
as it was slightly before my time…
but the near impeachment and ensuing ‘abdication’ of office by Richard Nixon
made a deep and lasting impression on me.

It made me sad seeing the uglier and smugger side of our politicians
at an age when I could understand what divisiveness was all about.

It was not so much from President Nixon, who I was deeply disappointed in,
but it came from the ensuing three-ring circus that followed the discovery of the
Watergate break-in, clandestine figures like “deep throat” and
the infamous Watergate tapes.

I had never felt so remorseful for our Nation as a whole as I did then—
only to have been surpassed had I been living during the Civil War,
which undoubtedly would have left me feeling fractured just like our country.

For you see, I don’t get mad at the Democrats as a whole nor do I get mad
at the Republicans as a whole…instead, I get sad for our Nation as a whole.

This is so much more than a them vs them…it is rather an us vs us.

I did not care for Bill Clinton.
He looked directly into a camera lens and lied to a nation.
I had to keep our young son from the room during the news lest he
wonder about the constant talk of blue dresses and oral sex…
How would you have explained all of that to a young child who hadn’t a clue about sex
and then have to also explain that was all about our President?

You can’t and you don’t.

I also hate the fact that I feel as if I have to defend the fact that I am a woman
who is conservative.
Yes, I am college-educated.
Yes, I am well-read.
Yes, I have a deep understanding of history.
No, my husband does not tell me how to vote.
Yes, I am a Christian.
No, I do not like how often immature and childish our President acts.
Nor do I not like his tweets or lashing out…

But I see his childishness as the direct reaction to equally childish behavior…
for our government has become a place for children’s tantrums and their tit for tat.

I do, however, like the fact that this President has made good on his promises…
promises that other politicians seem to forget once they come to power.

Think Jerusalem.

And the issue is perhaps not in ‘coming to office’, but rather the ‘coming to power’…
because so much of our troubles stem from not office but power.

I also like the fact that we have a strong economy, a strong stock market, the lowest
unemployment rate in ages and a President who fights for the little guy.

We elected a businessman, not a politician…
and in that lies much of the angst.

We know and understand the leadership, or perhaps that is the lack of leadership, from our
politicians…many of whom are lawyers…we don’t necessarily understand
governmental leadership from a business mogul.

For the record, I am not a deplorable nor am I ignorant.
And as a Christian, I would like a Christian leader…but I’ve yet to find one.

David was at times a most wretched king who made very evil and selfish decisions…
but God still used him to lead a people.

Am I suggesting Trump is a David?
No.
But it shows us how God can use bad for good.

Oh and by the way, this is not Nazi Germany and Trump is no Hitler…
I do not want to hear that comparison ever again because there is no such comparison.
That demeans the 6 million people killed in the Death Camps.
As well as the approximate total of 75 to 85 million killed simply due to the war…
add to that the millions killed or sent to gulags following the end of the war by Stalin.

No, that is not Trump.
That is not our country.

I am a Reaganite…plain and simple.

But I will never be made to apologize for who I opt to vote for or not vote for.

So don’t scratch your heads as to why this latest impeachment has some folks
sad and not gleeful.
Do not demean those who do not share your excitement.
Do not shame others for their right to vote and right of choice.
Some elected officials leave me wondering but the vote was not mine to make.

And no Speaker Pelosi, you are a lifelong politician, I do not buy
your theatrics of solemness or sadness.

This is not a happy time in our Nation…

Yet I was reminded last night that I am to give thanks unto God.
He has already overcome the world…

“And I saw that truly nothing happens by accident or luck,
but everything by God’s wise providence …
for matters that have been in God’s foreseeing wisdom, since before time began,
befall us suddenly, all unawares; and so in our blindness and ignorance
we say that this is accident or luck, but to our Lord God it is not so.”
St. Julian of Norwich

Salvator Mundi

“Secularism is no friend of Christ.”
Melody Phillips, journalist for the London Times

(Salvator Mundi / Leonardo da Vinci cica 1500)

Salvator Mundi, or Savior of the world….

A haunting image is it not?
Soft, other worldly and ethereal yet also equally powerful.

Look into those eyes…

At first glance the sockets appear gauzy, almost empty or perhaps out of focus.
Yet upon further inspection, the eyes seem to be like a window, opening into a
different realm or dimension..as in, they invite the viewer to look further
and venture deeper to someplace else.

This particular painting by Leonardo just set a record sale at Christie’s Auction
House, fetching the highest amount ever paid for a single painting…
approximately 450 million dollars.
The buyer is so far undisclosed.

And there is an entire post alone waiting to be written about this particular painting,
of this particular version….but that is for another day—
for today we have more important issues to discuss.

Savior of the World—-
that is indeed, for the Christian believer, Jesus Christ.

He was not simply a moral teacher, a philosopher or Jewish rabbi…
He was, just as He said and just He remains today—
The Savior of the World.

He is of one point to the three pointed triangle of the Trinity.

It is through Him and Him alone that anyone is to be saved.

It is not through good works, it is not through thoughtful actions….
it is only through the blood of Jesus Christ.

Therefore to repent.

To die unto self.

To believe in His Resurrection and His saving Grace.

Grace.

As in nothing done by one’s self…for Grace is beyond self.

Saved from self, from sin, from death…..

That is the summation of the Gospel.

The Bible, particularly the New Testament is the Holy inspired, written retelling
regarding that summation—the Good News.

It is the lynchpin of Christianity.

There is no Heaven, no Salvation, no Grace, no Hope without Jesus Christ.

He is the only way.

And yet today we have mainline churches who are pushing, have pushed,
that one key integral component to Christianity to the side.

It has become secondary to their now all consuming main focus of secularism.

For those who adhere to the progressive Christian narrative,
they are the ones who have decided to make an alliance with those who
push for all things secular…

Progressive, uptick, Christians who now believe and embrace the stance that
the world would have them embrace….and that is to see Christianity in a 21st century,
more modern image.

Yet what they fail to understand is that such a “friendship” will be the death of the Christian Church as we know it.

In the latest interview of Gavin Ashenden on Anglican Unscripted, he makes this
point perfectly clear.

Bishop Ashenden notes that the “anti Christian Secular Narrative is being
swallowed whole as if it is Christianity—
and it is most certainly not”

That narrative being the open acceptance of same sex marriage, openly gay clergy,
the embracing of transgenderism, newly defined family units…
all the while making it clearly known that, anyone opposed to such, shall be
labeled as a hate mongerer…anti love, anti accepting, anti whatever…..
never mind that the lies offered up as a new progressive gospel run counter to
the actual word of God.

In steps a woman named Lorna Asworth.

Lorna is Saskatchewan by birth and was raised as a Mennonite.
But as Life has its way, she married a Brit who was Anglican and so
the UK and the Church of England have now been her home ever since.

That is until most recently.

Lorna has been an active member of the laity who works very closely with the clergy
as she has risen in the lay ranks within the working body of the Church of England.

Yet when someone like Lorna tenders her resignation from said working body of the
Church of England, such a resignation, one would dare assume,
would not, should not, be cause for some sort of henny penny
the sky is falling sort of reaction…yet that is exactly what has happened.

This mild mannered wife, mother and church lay worker who considers herself
a conservative Evangelical Anglican has been active on the Archbishop’s
Council as well as serving in the General Synod for the past 12 years,
has found herself at the center of a growing maelstrom and as somewhat of
a poster child if you will, for the Orthodox voice of the Church.

Lorna recently granted an interview with Anglican Unscripted where she explains her decision to ‘abdicate’ her position from the Church’s working body as
she explains what is currently happening to the Church.

She explains that the Church has lost its way.
It has left behind those who continue to claim the Gospel as the true teaching of the Church. “The Glory of the Lord has departed as the Church of England
is moving outside the presence of God.”
“There are now two different Religious communities.
One is rooted in Christ and its right to ask for the Holy Spirit.
The Second is not—and is where Glory has disappeared.”

Lorna verbalizes so clearly what so many others now feel.
“What am I to do?”
I didn’t leave them, they left me”

She spoke of meetings where those more conservative members would actually
cite scripture to reinforce a point only to be met by rolling eyes and even jeers
from the more progressive attendees.

She cites that the Church is no longer talking about Jesus and the saving message
of Christ as she actually uses the word heresy when describing what is taking place
within the Church.

And in order for the Church to save herself from the inevitable implosion,
Lorna warns that there must be repentance, from the top down.
“We have lost what it is to fear (respect in some translations) the Lord.
If you fear the Lord, you will fear nothing else…and we have lost that.”

And so we leave it to a Jewish woman, one who leans a bit right in her
journalistic style, to write an article for the London Times noting that the departure
of Lorna Asworth from the Church is putting the Church of England on a trajectory
involved in self destruction.

As in it appears everyone gets it but the Church herself….

https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2017/17-november/news/uk/lorna-ashworth-resigns-from-general-synod-over-revisionism

Might a new day be dawning????

“When the church redefines sin and eliminates repentance,
it can no longer offer the good news of eternal salvation from sin in Jesus;
the church no longer remains distinctly Christian;
it is no longer salt and light in the world,”
(excerpt from the Southwark Declaration nailed to a Cathedral door)

(recent Southwark Declaration grievances nailed to the doors of Rochester Cathedral)

And so it has begun…

And I for one rejoice!!!

Almost 500 years to the day, over the course of the past 48 hours,
a band of “back to the Bible” disgruntled, dare we say it, Orthodox Anglicans
have followed in the footsteps of Luther and set about nailing,
or in most cases tacking or taping, a two page document of grievances
to the doors of Anglican Cathedrals across the UK.

The document is known as the Southwark Declaration named for the
Diocese of Southwark in which the original letter was composed.

According to an article in PJ Media written by Tyler O’Neil…
On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, anonymous evangelical Anglicans posted
a 95 Theses-style complaint on the doors of five British cathedrals.
The first complaints went up on the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s posting
of the 95 Theses on the door of the Wittenberg Castle Church in Germany,
and the documents pinned to the doors referenced Luther in calling for the Church of England to follow the Bible on LGBT issues.

“500 years ago Martin Luther nailed 95 Theses to a church door in Germany,”
one document reads.
“He did it because the church had become corrupt.
Today a Declaration is being fixed to a cathedral door here in England because the Established Church in our land is becoming corrupt.”

“The Church of England claims it has not changed its doctrine but its practice
on the ground has already changed: clergy are adopting lifestyles which are not
biblical and teaching that such lifestyles are holy in the sight of God,”
the document explained.
“This revisionism is causing a crisis not only in Southwark Diocese but across
the whole of the Church of England.”

You can read the full article here:
https://pjmedia.com/faith/anglicans-pin-95-theses-style-complaint-on-lgbt-issues-to-doors-of-5-uk-cathedrals/

The Vicar of St. James’ Church of Westgate-On-Sea, The Reverend Stephen Rae, has
opted not to remain anonymous but rather has publicly admitted to nailing the
document to the doors of Canterbury Cathedral….the Cathedral at the very heart of Anglicanism and the Church of England.

“It is with great sadness that I posted the Southwark Declaration in Canterbury
Cathedral,” Reverend Stephen Rae, vicar of St. James’ Church, Westgate-On-Sea,
told PJ Media in a statement.
“This building that stands sentinel over the Church of England has been a symbol of Anglican leadership with, perhaps, the greatest global reach for centuries.”

“Now it has become synonymous with abdication and dereliction of duty;
it stands accused as a distracted and negligent parent that has abandoned
its children,” Rae added.
He quoted Ephesians, noting that the apostle Paul called “the faithful
under-shepherd” to “guard the flock against the wolves that would seek to
enter the fold.”

Citing the ordination oath the Church of England, Rae added,
“We are not merely to assert biblical truth.
We who have been entrusted with the precious gospel that speaks life into the
hearts of wretched sinners are also called to drive away anything that would lead the flock away and into judgment.”

“God never calls his people to innovate in matters of first importance,”
the vicar concluded.
“If a leader of the church does this, he has misunderstood his calling.
We are to hold out the radically inclusive gospel that leads to repentance and faith. Playing fast and loose with what God really meant when he said what he said never
turns out well.”

The Southwark Declaration

As clergy and lay people in the Diocese of Southwark:

We affirm the divine inspiration of the Holy Scriptures and their supreme authority
in all matters of faith and conduct.

We affirm with Canon A5 that ‘the doctrine of the Church of England
is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, and in such teachings of the ancient Fathers
and Councils of the Church as are agreeable to the said Scriptures.’’

We affirm, with Article XX, that ‘it is not lawful for the Church to ordain any
thing that is contrary to God’s Word written.’

We affirm the teaching of Scripture (Genesis 2.24, Mark 10. 7, Matthew 19.5),
the Book of Common Prayer, and Canon B30 (‘Of Holy Matrimony’)
that marriage is the union of one man and one woman for life.

We affirm it is the one God-ordained context for sexual intercourse.

We affirm resolution 1.10 on human sexuality of the Lambeth Conference (1998).

We call upon all the Bishops, Archdeacons, and the senior staff of the Diocese,
alongside all clergy and licensed lay ministers, to affirm these truths,
live by them, and to teach in accordance with them.

We call upon the Bishops to appoint to positions of teaching authority
only those who hold to these truths in good conscience.

“Where leaders refuse to repent and submit themselves to the Word of God, the Lord raises up new leadership for His church and new structures: just as He did through Martin Luther 500 years ago.”
(closing excerpt from the “nailed up” Anglican Southwark Declaration)

More on all of this tomorrow but for now, let us allow all of this to sink in…
slowly…
as we pray for the brave vicar and others who are speaking up,
stepping up and letting it be known that the Gospel of Jesus Christ
and the Word of God will stand…despite man’s attempt to alter it or change it
to suit his or her desires….