There are 466 blog posts for you to enjoy.
Why I don't go to church anymore
June 6, 2017
First let's look at the word 'church'. Where does it come from? What does it refer to? The Greek word 'ekklesia' is the root word the English translated to 'church'. But what does 'ekklesia' mean? The literal meaning is 'called out', or 'a calling out'. It does not refer to a building of any kind, nor does it even refer to a place, or location. It refers to a group of people (Acts 19:30-41), the children of Israel (Acts 7:38), and the body of Christ (Ephesians 1:22; Ephesians 5:25, 32). In the bible ekklesia can refer to the group of believers in a particular location(1 Corinthians 1:2; 2 Corinthians 1:1; Galatians 1:1-2), it can refer to individual believers (1 Corinthians 15:9; Galatians 1:13), and it can also refer to the universal group of all people who have trusted Christ through the ages (Matthew 16:18; Ephesians 5:23-27).
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Some say: If you don't vote, you can't complain. The real truth is this
November 24, 2016
Some say: If you don' vote, you can't complain.
The real truth is this: If you DO vote, you can't complain.
Think about this: The person who does not vote (and does so out of thoughtful deliberation and self-education of all the issues, rather than mere laziness), is governed without his consent. This person never took any positive action to accept this "social contract". If government gets its "just powers" from the consent of the governed, then the government can have no just power over the person who didn't vote, or voted for the losing candidate. Yet the fact that the government has power over him is unfortunately undeniable, but there is no justice in that power - and so, no injustice in any actions the non-voter may take to limit or evade that power, except those actions which are, at face value, lawless regardless of the current status of the Government.
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Bogota Trip
October 24, 2016
We got home sunday in the afternoon, after a long bus ride. It must have been the milk run route - the driver stopped in just about every little town along the way. It was about 20 hours, if not more, for the trip home. We have many photos which I have posted in the photo album, just look for the Bogota album. And some videos as well.
While we were in Bogota my landlady contacted me to tell me she found my neighbors cat in our apartment. She said it appeared to have not done anything bad inside, but may have been there for 3 days, just crying to get out. The only possible way for the cat to get in is from the patio. Which means the cat had to be on the roof, then jump down to a steel-bar grate over the top of the patio, then jumped down through the grate to the laundry sink, then to the floor. I had left the patio door open just so the room would have some fresh air while we were away. But, when we got home, we found things were a bit dirtier than we'd hoped or expected. And after that very long bus ride we were mopping, 3 times, the apartment. Then I found that the toilet tank wasn't refilling with water after a flush. So, the next task was to dive into the tank and find out what was wrong there, and I did - the valve inside the tank was plugged. Not a great way to start our evening back home.
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A mixed bag of thoughts and musings.
July 17, 2016
To start with a short story. One typically beautiful day when I was walking to a students home for their lesson... I am walking along and up ahead of me, maybe half a block, are two women also walking, in the same direction. I didn't really notice anything special or particular about them as I could only see them from behind and a half-block back. But I see one of them stop under a tree alongside the road, between the sidewalk and the road. I thought maybe they were just stopping to rest in the shade, it was a hot day as is normal here. But then one of the women starts jumping, so right away I knew she wasn't resting, and it was too hot to start exercising, even in the shade.
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Politics, coffee, and an update from David
June 18, 2016
Here are my thoughts about the current state of affairs in the US and an update from David (at the end of the blog).
What on earth is happening up there in the US?
Trump is a man out of his mind. Clueless about anything that has to do with politics and running a country, has no idea what foreign policy is, and has many unrealistic ideas of what he will do as the President, none of which are actually possible. Just look at his "policies" on his web site (I have), they're ridiculous.
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