God is the Designer and here’s the design: My son Noah, who is 8 years old, was in our van in a Marsh parking lot along with his five sisters and one brother, plus myself, when he saw an elderly white-haired lady walk out of the store and get into her car. She had a couple bags of groceries in her arms and she got along just fine to her car. Upon seeing her, Noah shouted loudly, “Wait! where’s that old ladies crotch?” Every one of my children along with myself, gasped in horror of his question. Then his big brother, who’s 11 and knows him very well, said “Noah, you mean a crutch! And not every old lady needs one!” He was referring to a cane I think, but this kept me giggling as I kept playing the shock over and over in my head. This was not something you hear your kids say very often! It was also an opportunity to redirect his minds image of the elderly. (they are not just wrinkled people with white hair who carry sticks——–they are amazing human beings who have the experience that everyone else could and SHOULD learn from!). And besides that, God willing, you’ll be elderly one day!

We have a Cherry colored Baldwin baby grand. It is very pretty. It needs a tuning but it works just fine for my purposes. I open the top cover to the soundboard and I expose the keys. I adjust the bench and then I sit very still for a moment just taking in the elegance of the instrument. Very carefully I select the positions at which my fingers will make the initial sounds and press down the foot pedal. Down go the thumb and forth finger on my left hand while my right hand press down the three notes I have selected. The sound launches from the soundboard and into the space of the vast room and the notes seem to be racing to be in all places at once. The sound is full and majestic. Just like the God for which this instrument serves. Gently and slowly with great care I select the next series of notes and send them chasing after the other notes still echoing off the walls. Wow! I pour out that which is in my heart the best I can at it feels like the Lord is actually listening.

Holding down the foot pedal as I finish the little piece I let the final notes ring into infinity. When I can no longer hear the faintest of sounds I quietly, as if ceremonially gently, bring the cover down over the keys and slide off of the bench and with the tenderness of a surgeons hands I lower the cover over the soundboard. All is quiet once again. In those quiet moments I tell the Lord I love Him. That I thank Him for the gift of music. I can’t help but remember what God says about praises, that He inhabits the praises of His people. I wonder, as I listen to those notes dancing all around like children on a playground, is God there? Is He there in the music as well?

The whistle is pretty similar to the recorder and to a degree sound similar. Probably the most famous of the whistle family is the Clarke Tin Whistle. This Whistle has been around a very long time and continues to be a favorite especially for whistlers just starting out. It has a warm smooth tone and in the hands of a skilled player can bring someone to dancing or lull them to sleeping. It is one of my favorite instruments because I think it is a very intimate instrument. I have one of these along with 2 Walton’s. You can get them in a variety of keys but the most common are D and C.

I spend a significant time alone. My daily job requires me to do a lot of driving. Often times my lunch breaks are spent in my car. I sometimes spend the time for prayer and meditation time, I sometimes listen to the radio, and very often it is a time I get my whistle out and let go. I have discovered that the whistle brings a very soothing state over me. This whistle has a way of filtering my spirit and bringing out what I am feeling inside. Helps me to reflect. Sometimes I even imagine I am at the edge of Grand Canyon or in the hills of Ireland or Scotland. You have to know, however, that I am a beginning whistler myself.  I have been playing for about two and a half years but I still have so much to learn. I too often hit bad notes or I completely get into what I am doing and forget to breathe resulting in me nearly passing out.

Since I started I have been made fun of for my tin whistles. Often from other musicians who have never ‘experienced’ that type of music. I don’t know why, maybe if I let them listen to recordings from some of the whistle masters it may change their minds. Maybe it is because they are so cheap to buy? Is it because they think the whistle requires a minimum amount of skill to master? Is it because you will never attend Julliard to learn to play one? Beats me. I just know I like it. It is the tin whistle which caused me to build in interest into Celtic music. But why would I be so into this little thing so much as to give it a place here on this website? Because I feel it deserves it. And there are a lot of other whistlers who agree.If you are a fellow whistler I would like to hear from you

First of all the religion of focus in the movie is that of Zen Buddhism. The whole concept of the balance between good and evil, light and darkness, and white and black. The religion of the ninja type Jedi’s teaches that there needs to be a balance brought into the universe driving Force. The Force is a mystic power that is actually is carried by midi-chlorians which are symbiotic beings that live in host. This hosts ability to use the force has a connection to the amount of midi-chlorians he or she has. So anyway, there is a strong reference to the Force throughout the movies. There is all the rest of the makings of any other movie such as a western, an adventure movie, or a war movie. All of the elements in those movies are in the Star Wars series. So, if we take that into consideration; that if you as a Christian can watch Westerns, adventure movies or even war movies that it would be acceptable to like the Star Wars movies. It’s that Force thing that gets in the way. So, if I site other movies as examples please understand that I am not questioning ones Christianity because they may like the movie The Wizard of Oz or Fantasia. It’s just that I am trying to make a just judgement.

As a young impressionable boy Star Wars made a monumental impact on my life. I had the toys, the posters, the games, and even some of the weapons. I read the books and I saw the movies. I even watched all of the TV specials and shows that starred any of the Star Wars characters. I also, during playground talk, would discuss the Force and how cool it would be if it was real. Catch that? How cool it would be if it was real. I never for once thought that this Force was real. I mean, here were space ships flying around, strange creatures never before seen, and a battle station the size of a moon. None of that was real, although I fantasized, so why in the world would I consider a religion like that to be real?

Well, as time went on I did begin to wonder about the validity of a belief system that was like the Force. The native American Indians had a similar belief system as did some from the orient. So, maybe there was something to it. Maybe there was some validity to it. Well, I gave that about a week of thought before I dismissed it as fantasy. Even if I had believed that there was a similar religion out there the fact that these Jedi can have powers to levitate themselves and other objects was ludicrous so, I was never in any danger of falling for a false religion. My sense of reality kept that from happening. Even though I was not a Christian during that time.

Now, I have a family. My two boys love the Star Wars movies and even the stories that go beyond the movie series. Favorite characters like Kyle Katarn, Mara Jade and Dash Randar have captured a bit of my sons hero status but never has anything these characters done or believed in the stories influenced the fundamental belief system they have. They know that there is no real Millennium Falcon flying around and there is no Rebellion or no Empire. In fact there has been some acknowledgement by them as to the similarities of the Empire and Nazi reign of WWII. But, again no consideration of the Force in their lives. As a Christian I really love the Star Wars movies. It is a wonderful escape from reality from time to time and it does teach some good lessons of loyalty, honor, family, and yes the triumph of good over evil. But, you know what I like best about it all? It is one thing me and my sons can share that allow us to spend time together and have fun too.

I was reading the various news sources I have this morning as I prepare to take my daughters to their acting practice and became somewhat discouraged. Most of the news I read comes from Christian sources. Occasionally I will read from other sources such as Fox. I will not read from liberal sources unless the subject matter is sterile and can’t somehow be blamed on Christians, Bush, or Republicans.

I have been grieved by some of the subject matter I have been seeing. Killings by the hundreds, perverse stories that you would have never dreamed would even be covered, and well, just so many other things I can’t list here. What I have been noticing is that everyone else is not noticing that we are heading toward a stop with destiny- the soon return of Jesus Christ.

I sometimes stop and ask myself, ‘what happened’? What made homosexuals so bold that they would even think that any right thinking person would think thier lifestyle is ok? What made Islamic people think that they had dibs on the world? What makes minorities think they have the right to take from others what does not belong to them because they have not earned it? Why would American born blacks want to be called Afro-American? Do they not see that by title alone they are seperating themselves from others? Makes no sense. What makes Catholic Priests think that they are going to get by with molesting kids? What makes teen perfomers think that we want to see a kid looking like a sex starved whore? What makes talk show hosts think that people think its cool to do degrading things on the air? Why do people think that government owes them anything? Why do kids hate thier parents? Why do parents hate thier kids? Why is material things so important to people? Why do people invest so much to become wealthy on earth but invest nothing in God’s kingdom. Why is it so important for churches to grow like corporations and there to be a church practically on every corner now but no evidence in society that they are getting the gospel out? Why on God’s green earth would a church have a coffee stand and donoughts in the foyer before the service? Why do church leaders fall for the Satanic “seeker sensitive” crap permeating the church today? We are indeed a very sick and dying world and Christendom is part of the problem.

Ok, I know that I am being a bit much here. But, it really seems that the world is coming apart at the seams. I have never seen so much selfishness. And, how quickly we have forgotten the 911 wakeup call. Churches were busting at the seams and the leaders FAILED! Hello, newsflash…you don’t want to hear that that was a wakeup call, a judgement? Are you really that blind? Think about this a second, you really think that a bunch of radical killers could just pull off a stunt like that on thier own power? We kill babies, legally, we laud sodomites, we tolerate killers by giving them light sentences, We allow suspected killers such as OJ to write books on how he would have killed his wife had he done it to profit himself? Are you freaking serious? We allow an immoral president who swore he did not have sex with a woman other than his wife to come on and later apologize because he DID have sex with her, and many others, and today he is still a powerful political leader!!?

I am 39 and have had a very close brush with death. I can see the value of life. I see the value of giving that life to the One who made it. I am so much more grieved now by the foolishness of men. Everyday, so many people are going to eternity into fire- forever! We are worried about retirement when just a few short years after the retirement we will be dead. worked all that time just to have all the good stuff when your body is tired achy and well, decaying- makes no sense to attempt to live extravagantly does it?

I know I have offended. If so, I am sorry for that. My frustration is not aimed at any particular person but rather our world at large. I am thankful to God for all the little things that bring blessings like a smile from a child, a purr from a cat, a dinner with the family together. Why can we not live more simpler lives? Why can we not all love the Lord and put Him before ourselves? Imagine what the world would be like. Imagine, John Lennon had the solution to that song all along and he had some power to do something about it, but he missed it. Now, he knows the truth and well, I imagine he is regretting so much.

Enough of my ramblings.

I heard a sermon once about a prayer closet. Jesus made reference to going into a place and pray in secret and saying the your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. I love that verse because it tells you that God wants that alone time, just you and Him.

I found my place early on. It was my car. I drive all day long. I visit many places and at any given time I could literally be anywhere in the state. What is neat about my secret, sacred place is that the view from the window is always different. It allows me to see Gods handiwork from a new perspective each time. It gives me a chance to see His tremendous power. It is sort of like a live postcard from Heaven showing me places where God presence is and is working.

Sometimes the worship is totally mind blowing. Often I will hum a song or a melody. Sometimes I will whistle. Sometimes I play my tin whistle. Other times I just deeply meditate. Each time learning more about God and developing a more meaningful relationship.

What is your secret sacred place? In what ways do you spend quiet time with the Master? In what ways to you worship? I would be interested to hear.

Let me start with this: There are Christians everywhere. They are doctors, lawyers, policemen, salesmen, and musicians, and much more. I think that as a Christian we should note that we are a Christian first and then a what-ever secondly. Meaning that the branding that Christ put on us to make us His should be evident in any and everything we do. We should attempt to honor Christ in everything so that others will take note. Ultimately we want the opportunity to share Christ and what better way to do so than to display His character as much as we can in our lives.

Ok, now that that part is out of the way let’s taking a look at Christian music. From what I explained so far, Christian music is to exalt and honor Christ, both the music itself and the performers. Now having said that, we can throw out a large percentage of Christian music you hear played on the radio, because it isn’t Christian. It is secular music repackaged for Christian consumption. I want to point out that if you listen to most Christian radio and then flip the channel to a secular pop station you will hear a bunch of similarities. Why? Because the current ‘latest thing’ in secular music that is making money can also make money from the Christian crowds. So, that is what they do. I have been a musician since 1982 and I have listened to a variety of music and appreciate most of it. But very little in contemporary Christian do I appreciate.

Let me make a distinction between contemporary Christian music and contemporary Christian worship music. Worship music is a means by which music is used to express our love to God. As a worship musician I am not playing for my glory. I am not playing to please the congregation; rather I am playing to honor God with the talents and the abilities He has given me to serve Him with. I in a sense help lead believers into the throne room of God. It is a tremendous honor and is quite an awesome a task. I play my heart out so that He can accept the gift I am offering Him. I will not sell records to make me rich, you will never have a t-shirt with my name on it, and you will never hear a radio announcement of me touring the world. It can’t happen that way. But, I hope that after listening to the music I play you will feel drawn to God or it will minister to you in a way God can use. Now, on the other hand there are Christian musicians that will have all of these things associated with them, these are they that fit in the CCM category. These individuals are out to make money with the talents that God has given them. And, that is not wrong. But a bunch of the music they do has noting at all to do with Christ. So, I would not say they are Christian artists but rather they are Christians, supposedly, that are performers/ musicians that make a living doing so. They should never tour or make an album under the banner of Christ just so they can make money. They should do what they do and leave Christ out of it since most of what they do already leaves Him out any way. And while I am on that note I am embarrassed by Christian artists that live an anything but Christian life. You see, I believe as a talented gifted person in this area, God has by default given you a leadership role. If you are in the public eye and you are going to influence people, particularly young people. If you screw up and fornicate with someone or you steal or do drugs or whatever, you should do the honorable thing and that is to repent publicly and step down from your position. Show humility and brokenness. Let the Lord work through that. Let Him restore you to another position, you have no business being in the limelight again unless God puts you there. By the way, this applies to worship musicians too as you have been called to an even higher position.

Ok, what do I think about CCM? Well I wish it would go away- The title that is. I wish that if they are going to carry the title Christian artist the music and lifestyle better be in check otherwise best wishes to you in the secular market and I pray you do have a positive influence there.

We have a Cherry colored Baldwin baby grand. It is very pretty. It needs a tuning but it works just fine for my purposes. I open the top cover to the soundboard and I expose the keys. I adjust the bench and then I sit very still for a moment just taking in the elegance of the instrument. Very carefully I select the positions at which my fingers will make the initial sounds and press down the foot pedal. Down go the thumb and forth finger on my left hand while my right hand press down the three notes I have selected. The sound launches from the soundboard and into the space of the vast room and the notes seem to be racing to be in all places at once. The sound is full and majestic. Just like the God for which this instrument serves. Gently and slowly with great care I select the next series of notes and send them chasing after the other notes still echoing off the walls. Wow! I pour out that which is in my heart the best I can at it feels like the Lord is actually listening.

Holding down the foot pedal as I finish the little piece I let the final notes ring into infinity. When I can no longer hear the faintest of sounds I quietly, as if ceremonially gently, bring the cover down over the keys and slide off of the bench and with the tenderness of a surgeons hands I lower the cover over the soundboard. All is quiet once again. In those quiet moments I tell the Lord I love Him. That I thank Him for the gift of music. I can’t help but remember what God says about praises, that He inhabits the praises of His people. I wonder, as I listen to those notes dancing all around like children on a playground, is God there? Is He there in the music as well?

The word Hell is an interesting one. You know, when I was a small boy I learned that Hell was a bad word and I was not allowed to say it. In school we would do the 7734 thing on our calculators and giggle because we spelled a naughty word and we could not get in trouble for it. I would hear things like, ‘Go to Hell!’ or ‘you’re going to Hell if you don’t change your ways!’ or ‘I hope you burn in Hell!’ and I thought that it was just something grown-ups said when they were mad at each other. I was even told that Hell is where the devil lives and when you die if you weren’t a good person that is where you went.

Lets take this time and talk about Hell. At the moment I am writing this there are people literally dying everywhere. Death surrounds us. There is a war going on, there are miners trapped in Utah, cancer patients, heart attack victims, AIDs victims, auto accidents, plane crashes…all sorts of death. So, what does death and Hell have to do with each other? This is what I am going to attempt to explore here. I want to tell you about me first. I am not a theologian. I am not a scientist. I am not a philosopher. I am not a scholar. I am just a family man who has a concern about his eternity and the eternity of his wife and children. I do happen to be a born again Christian and I have put my faith in Christ. So, I will be looking at the topic of Hell from a Christian perspective.

I am going to refer to myself by three different names. First, there is Jimmy. Jimmy is me up to the time I turned about 14. Then there is Jim. Jim is the person I was from 14 to 24. Then there is James. James is the person I am now. The reason I am doing it this way is to be able to distinguish between the varying views I have had in life. I honestly believe that apart from what your beliefs are on who Jesus Christ is, what you think about Hell is the most life altering factor there is. What you believe about Hell will help shape your life and your morals. So, lets begin this study.

As a boy I believed that there was Heaven and there was Hell. The way it was explained to me was that if you were good when you died you got to go to Heaven. If you did bad things you got sent to Hell. I was also taught that you could be in the state of going to Heaven in one minute and then in going to Hell in the next. Life was a constant state of flux. You had to be on your toes so that God would not have anything to judge you on when you got there and that He sort of graded on the curve and weighed your good deeds against your bad deeds. So, me as Jimmy, was actually a pretty decent boy because I wanted to go to Heaven and not Hell. I did my share of naughty things but I did not steal, I did not cuss, and I did not beat up on people, and I strove to please my teachers. I was afraid of God and that He wanted to catch me doing something wrong.

To me Hell was the place where the devil would poke you with a pitch fork and he looked like a small skinny man with horns and a forked tail. Hell was the devils home and he would come and go from there to get people that died and take them there. I heard men, mostly my uncles, say that they were looking forward to Hell and that their friends would all be there.

As Jim my views of Hell really did not change that much. I did believe that there was a Heaven and Hell still, but I was also and evolutionist. I somehow was able to blend a safe mixture of believing in evolution, that we evolved from nothing, with the idea of when we died we had two options of eternity. In truth though I actually though that when we died we just ceased to exist. But, just in case…in case I was wrong the thought of being in Hell did not sound appealing to me. There were bad things I did but again I thought that my good things would out weigh the bad ones.

As James something wonderful happened. I was presented with the gospel of Jesus Christ. I read the New Testament and was terribly convicted. I had never read the scriptures before. I had never heard the gospel before and here I was coming face to face with eternity in a powerful way. The message I got from reading the gospel- I am going to Hell and it will be very bad. I read the gospels and I did not find Jesus to be a kind gentle soft person- I found Him to be harsh and stern and the primary message was that I am going to burn. I learned there was no way I could do anything to change that. I was hopeless. The sermon on the mount was like a battery of hot arrows piercing me. Whoever says Jesus is just kind and gentle does not know what he is talking about. Jesus gave us the message just as a ship crewman would yell ‘all hands abandon ship!’ He was not giving a soft blow- His message was urgent. Hell is going to be very very bad. I also gathered that there are varying degrees of Hell. God is just and we will be judged based upon what we have done, said and thought. That would mean that a person such as Adolf Hitler would get a greater dose of Hell-fire than say someone who lived a ‘good’ life. Child molesters, adulterers, murderers will be burned based upon the deeds they have done. Their punishment will fit the crime. I saw that the whole purpose Jesus came was to save people from this eternal damnation. His whole ministry and purpose was to be the sacrifice for us so we would not have to suffer in Hell.

Hell is real. Think about standing in an open field in Kansas and looking out and see a large tornado that you can not possibly run from or hide from come straight at you. Imagine standing in the side of a mountain that has just errupted into a volcano spewing ash and lava that you can not possibly find shelter from. Imagine being in the midst of a six lane highway with vehicles racing at you at 70 mph and you can’t move. Imagine being in the belly of a great ship that is sinking and you have no means of escape, Imagine being in a tall building with the floors below you engulfed in flames and you feel the heat through the floor and you have no hope of rescue. Imagine being suspended over a tank of hungry crocodiles about to be dropped with your legs and arms bound. These are all scary scenarios and the outcome for these leads to inevitable ending of life- you are going to die. But now think of this, in all those scenarios the outcome results in death of the physical body, but after the body has died the soul goes on and it never dies. After the physical death which can occur in a heartbeat, what about the destination of the soul that lives forever? Can you now imagine yourself on fire, burning, in searing unbearable pain with the knowledge of why you are there with no hope of relief for eternity? Can you imagine this happening to your loved ones? Can you imagine it happening even to those ‘good’ people you knew but they did not accept the sacrifice of Jesus Christ? That is exactly what will happen. Don’t be mad at me! I am just the messenger, God is the One who said it so if you have a problem you will need to talk to Him about it. Go ahead, He will listen…

Ever since I became a Christian in 1993 one of the things I found fascinating is the naivety of Christians to fall for scams and other fads that go around. I have seen stuff that promote healing such as these special vitamins, I have seen kitchen stuff, candle stuff, and a host of other products. One of the big things right now is pre-paid legal services.

Some dear friends have been asking me to consider getting involved with the program. At first sight it looks interesting but as I thought more about I began realizing something. It seems that the emphasis is put not on selling the product as much as getting people under you to sell the product- actually to get them to get people under them to sell the product- do you see where this is going? There is a startup fee for materials and then you are on your way.

The service itself sounds cool, sort of a legal HMO type thing. Any type of service I may need is just a phone call away with of course my installments paid up. But lets go back to the getting other people under you thing. You see, I realize now that the focus is not the product, its the people. You, as an ‘associate’ of the organization, can become financially successful by getting others involved with the program. The more people you get on board the more money you stand to make. The more people those people get on board the greater money you can make, so on and so forth. Sounds to good to be true? I mean for a relatively small investment of time and money your dreams can come true. Sounds like a get rich quick scheme to me. No hard work involved. All to familiar… a scam.

Jarod Martin of Citizens for Justice writes, “There are certainly some good multi-level-marketing companies out there – they’re the ones that push quality products or services over “business opportunities.” Pre-Paid Legal Services, Inc., on the other hand, appears to be a classic pyramid sales scheme. Class action lawsuits are now pending from shareholders for deceptive reporting to the Securities and Exchange Commission and from sales associates for false and misleading claims about income potential. The company recently paid a fine to the state of Wisconsin for making false income claims.”

Mr Martin also writes, “Robert L. FitzPatrick, President of Pyramid Scheme Alert, was kind enough to lay it out for us. “More than 50% of Pre-Paid Legal’s customers and sales representatives quit each year.” FitzPatrick went on to descibe the company, thus: “The pay plan is based upon continuous recruitment and is structured so that the top levels gain the majority of revenue. PPL has no sustainable customer base or sales organization. It is strictly a recruitment scheme. According to PPL’s 2000 Annual report, the company had paid out $139,891,000 in sales commissions over the past five-year period. The total number of people who have been PPL sales reps during this time is 472,189. That averages out to $296.26 per sales rep, per year, or $5.70 per week before taxes, training and other expenses are deducted. When training costs are deducted, the gross income average falls to $2.10 per week. In reality, the actual figure is far worse, since this “mean” average includes the huge incomes of the small number at the top. The majority of the sales reps never earn a penny of true profit.

As the customers and sales reps quit, those who have made some money by recruiting are charged back the loss of projected revenue.

In the last five years, more than 1/2 million people have signed up to be PPL sales reps. On average, PPL has a ratio of just 4 customers to each sales rep. The business is based not on sales, but on recruiting unwitting sales reps who do not understand the complex pyramid pay plan. This plan assures that only a small number of people can ever succeed.”

So, once again unscrupulous Christians are being suckered into something that will ultimately damage them not help them. Not only Christians but the general public as well. Simply put this pre paid legal service is just a pyramid scheme that has been repackaged. It is a lie that is retold over and over again. The idea of having legal services of this type is very appealing. Lawyers are not cheap. But that is just the point. Using the need- legal services, you can create something to get people excited about and get those people to get others excited about it.

In Matthew 10:16 Jesus says, “I am sending you out like sheep surrounded by wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” We would do well to follow this. If it sounds too good to be true it is. And as I close I would like to include one final thought. With all these efforts at hosting parties and selling services what if the gospel was presented instead? The greatest most wonderful gift in the world we don’t have the eagerness for but boy we can sure get excited about candles, baskets, and cookware!

http://www.pyramidschemealert.org/PSAMain/news/pplsclassaction.html

http://citizensforjustice.org/Pre_Paid_Legal/prepaid.html

http://www.thestreet.com/_mktw/stocks/melissadavid/10030240.html

By the way, if you attempt to refute me or anything that has been said here I welcome it but sincerely ask that you provide documnetation to support your statements. To date I have already seen the damage done and am curious how anyone can defend this. Thanks.