a Fall morning.

This morning is so beautiful.  The weather has cooled...though it will still climb to 85 degrees today...but now it is about 60 and I bundled up in my robe and slippers (don't laugh!  To us desert dwellers, this is chilly.) and slipped out the back door to sink into my white adirondack chair and spend a little time reading my Father's Word.

The weeks have been so busy and I've been squeezing schoolwork into the cracks as we've been here and there.  But it's all good.  I do however miss the times to just read for fun and not have an agenda.  This is constantly out-of-blalance for me.  I am so driven to avoid "twaddle" that sometimes I think I am not letting my boys be children: enjoying fun and amusing and beautiful and cute children's stories.  I need to balance this and manage my time better.

Thankful for Fall and the feeling it brings.  The anticipation of the greatest of all American holidays: Thanksgiving, and the build up to Christmas.  Made my first Christmas purchases last night and am excited to see the radiant faces of their recipients when the time comes.

Bless you as you embrace this season in your own way.

Happy Fall!

today God healed my dog

Today was Borrego Days and the first in 6 years that I wasn't organizing and staging the parade.  So, the boys and I readied our bikes for a ride to the parade route.  I asked them to go into the car and grab umbrellas to keep the sun off of them.  Lily (our dog) had been out with the boys and Jamie.  I was inside gathering things together for our day out in Borrego enjoying the Festival.
We loaded our bikes and were about to leave when Jamie said that the dog was missing.

We looked through the house and called for her but to no avail.

She likes to roam the neighborhood so we figured she was out and about and would make her way home soon.   So, the boys and I set off and were gone until about 4pm while Jamie periodically stopped by the house to check to see if Lily had returned.  She hadn't.  We were getting very concerned...especially as the day was nearing dusk.

We had planned a barbecue at our house tonight.  I decided to pull the bounce house out of the garage for my boys to play on.  I went back and forth between the front yard and the garage a few times and was on my way back for one final time to retrieve an extension cord when I heard a noise from inside of my car.  I ran to the back driver's side door and opened it, and there on the floor was Lily!  She had been in the car for 10 hours...and our high temp here in Borrego today was 98.  Needless to say she was incredibly disoriented and weak. I couldn't believe she was alive.

Apparently when the boys went to the car to get their umbrellas, Lily had jumped into the car so she wouldn't be left at home.  Jamie and I never knew she was in there and the boys...being children weren't paying much attention.  I had asked Jamie earlier in the day to check the cars in case we had opened any of them up to grab something and didn't realize she was in there.  He checked, but never saw her.  She is black and the interior of my car is black.

I ran to get her some water but she was too disoriented to drink so I carried her into the house and gave her water from my hand.  She slowly regained some of her strength but was incredibly wobbly and seemed confused.  We began to be concerned about neurological damage and severe dehydration, so we beat feet to an animal urgent care hospital in Escondido.
I was so upset and emotional and blamed myself over and over for not looking hard enough for her.  I sat in the backseat with her while Jamie drove.  I texted several friends and asked for prayer.  She was so unsettled and kept moving, adjusting, and being anxious.  I knew I should pray fervently for this dog.  I felt ridiculous doing it for a dog but I placed my hands on her little head and prayed that God would heal her brain wholly.  Soon, she settled into a comfortable position and rested until we arrived at the animal hospital.  Jamie was rushing to get to the hospital and he said, "Every time I think of passing another car, I hear, 'Oh you of little faith.'"  So, I prayed aloud and we calmly proceeded to our destination.

As soon as we got there, she was checked out and everything seemed completely normal.  They ran some blood tests and other than signs of dehydration (duh!) she was perfectly normal.  She even ran out to us and jumped on us and cried to leave and sniffed around the lobby, etc.

It is now 12:39 A.M. and Jamie and I just returned home from the vet (a 3-hour drive roundtrip).  Our Lily is back to normal.  I do not want to be ignorant of God's work here and so I want to record this here and now.  I can not believe the dog I pulled out of that baking hot car is home, eating, chasing a fly around the kitchen, and now sleeping in her bed beside me.  God, thank You so much that You care for our silly doggies.  Thank You.

Evil is good?

below is an article in a recent CWA newsletter.  Have fun!

EVIL GOOD

Isaiah 5:20

by Mario Diaz, Esq., Legal Counsel

I suggest you brace yourself as we enter the theater of the absurd.

Dateline: McIntosh County, Georgia. A seven-year-old girl is causing quite a stir at her public school by demanding she be allowed to use the boys’ restroom.  Why, you ask? Well, according to her father Tommy Theollyn, the now-second grader told him when she was just 18 months old that she was in fact a boy.

So when school officials made his daughter use the girls’ restroom, Mr. Theollyn took her out of school. He wrote in a petition that "Forcing [his "transgender" daughter] to use a bathroom that does not match [her] presentation effectively discloses [her] status as a transgender child and thus endangers [her]."

One small detailed buried in the many reports of the story is that the "father" is, in fact, her mother!  She actually gave birth to this little one before she became transgender herself.

You cannot make this stuff up.  Enter ("stage right") the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Georgia, of course, which is very concerned about this situation and has promptly sent a letter of intimidation to the county.  It reads:

[F]ederal law requires that every public school student have access to a free and appropriate public education.  The McIntosh County School System's recent decision regarding restroom access consistent with a student's gender identity appears to conflict with these expectations.

Unbelievable! There are, of course, no laws that would even hint at requiring a school to accommodate this child’s gender confusion. The ACLU is notorious for intimidating schools into doing what the law never requires when it comes to their leftist agenda. We have seen it for years, for example, with religious liberty.


In fact, there might be another part of the law that could apply here.  There was a time when what this mother has done to this innocent child would be called child abuse or neglect.  Her daughter told her she was transgender at 18 months?  Come on!  Have we lost all common sense!


When I ask my daughter how many apples are on the table and she counts, "one, two, five, ten," it is my duty as a father to correct her and show her how to count to four.  I would be in fact harming her if I let her think there are ten apples on the table.


But the amazing thing is that my daughter is three.  I also have an 18-month-old baby boy, and he can barely speak!  He can't even understand that he is not supposed to throw his food on the floor.  And this parent wants us to believe her daughter knew she was transgender at 18 months.  My son doesn't even know he's a human for crying out loud!


Is it not more probable that this mother, considering herself a transsexual, actually encouraged her daughter to identify herself this way?  Is that too hard to imagine?  My daughter wants to be like her mom.  She puts on her dresses and walks around in her shoes. She wants to be "just as pretty as mommy."


But they tell us there are no consequences to children with all this, remember?  All children need is love and it doesn't matter if they grow up with a mother and a father, or with two mommies, two daddies, or with a mommy that becomes a daddy, or anything else they can come up with.

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil;

Who put darkness for light and light for darkness;

Who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!

~Isaiah 5:20

We can not stand silent while this type of incident continues.  We must be that light that exposes the darkness.  And we must be willing to pay the price.


May we never lose the will to fight for God's truth.

"Oddly enough, presidents who are children of privilege sometimes feel an obligation to reform society in order to give children of poverty a better break.  And...presidents who are children of poverty sometimes feel that there is no need to reform a society that has enabled them to rise from privation to the summit."

~Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., Childhood of the Presidents: Andrew Jackson 

COURAGEOUS

I know I'm being somewhat repetitive (especially if you follow me on facebook), but when something is this important and this good, it bears repeating.  I hope you will schedule right now to go see this movie.  It is not to be missed.  It is the key to freedom, hope, and life for future generations...particularly the one living under your own roof.

http://www.courageousthemovie.com/

Will you courageously influence your family for righteousness?

"I WILL!"

our D.C. excursion, part 7: the Grande Finale

(for the beginning of this series, click here.)

Tobi and Rich dropped us at our hotel in D.C.   After getting some laundry taken care of, we walked a mile or so to the most charming Irish Pub you ever saw...with real Irish people working there displaying their hospitality.

The next day, we headed over to the National Mall where we took in the Jefferson Memorial, had lunch with some of the CWA staff at their offices, visited the Star Spangled Banner at the American History Museum, pored over the greatest documents of freedom any nation has ever created at the National Archives (I tell ya, staring at George Washington's signature on the Constitution is something else), and eventually made our way toward Union Station to get some dinner and head back to the hotel.

This is, by far, the best exhibit in the Museum.
Take a minute to listen to this audio drama
(specifically the Star Spangled Banner episode)
before going to see this incredible work of history.

Thursday came and we set out for Mount Vernon.  We caught a bus from the Metro station and spent the majority of our day walking the grounds of the beautiful home of George Washington.

This is undoubtedly my very favorite place in America and perhaps the world.  Considering George Washington is indeed "First in war; First in peace; and First in the hearts of his countrymen," the opportunity to visit his home is a great privilege.  To walk through the rooms he resided and to stroll the land surrounding the mansion...well, it makes you realize why he loved it so very much; why he never wanted to leave his beloved Mount Vernon.

"I can truly say I had rather be at Mount Vernon with a friend or two about me, than to be attended at the Seat of Government by the Officers of State and Representatives of every Power in Europe." ~G.W.

our D.C. excursion, part 6: Black Tom

(For the beginning of this series, click here.)

We left NYC and made a quick stop (in the rain) at the site of Black Tom.

What is Black Tom, you ask?
A little bit of history that Woodrow Wilson wanted you to forget about...or never even know about.  In the words of Glenn Beck, "I hate that guy!"  Ok, as my Grandma always said, "'Hate' is a very strong word."  And Jesus said to hate someone in your heart is the same as murder, sooooo....  I'll just say he's far from my favorite and I don't like him.

This is the only thing that marks such an unknown and  tragic event in our history.
Amongst dozens of picnic tables, this marker is barely noticeable and hard to seek out.

Jamie stumbled across this story a few days before leaving for our trip.
Click here for the story.  In a nutshell, Germans exploded a bunch of ammunition and artillery on this Island in the New York Harbor which blew out windows well into the city and registered a 5+ on the Richter scale, yet no one knew what it was. Because Wilson was seeking reelection and didn't want to rock his boat.  So shhhhh... there's nothing to see here.  This is the reason no one (except the National Park Service) is allowed to tour the arm of the Statue of Liberty: it was pierced by ammunition and has been closed since this explosion.

We headed back to DC via Philly for a cheesesteak.

(For the final part of our trip, click here.)