Merry Christmas!

I love this meme.

I asked William J, Federer, noted historian, author, radio and television personality, host of American Minute, to talk about that event in American History.

In the second half of the show, Bill talks about St. Nicholas, who he was and who he became :)

I hope you listen, because this really is a good show and I went to a lot of effort to prepare it for you.

https://anchor.fm/your-american-heritage/episodes/Your-American-Heritage-12-26-2020-eo4dlo

Once again, Merry Christmas to you and your families.

All You Can Eat! Health Care

I worked with a guy a while back, and we went down south to a plant and the town had a farmers market in which was an All You Can Eat! restaurant.

Rocky was a tall thin guy and when he went to the buffet for the third time, I asked the waitress to tell him he had hit his limit.
That was all he could eat.
She did.
He had such a perplexed look on his face, and then he got it and turned to look at me and grinned.
It was perfect.

I wonder if our nation's obesity problem is aggravated by Golden Corral, The Sweden House and every Hampton Inn (and other hotels) in the country.

But I digress.

I just got back from vacation.
The hotels had  breakfast bars.
The Christmas meal was a buffet.
All I could eat.
Not almost all.
All.
I met the challenge.
I ate more than I would if I had ordered a la carte.
At least I cleaned my plate.
Others, not so much.
Plates of food and cups of drink abandoned on vacated tables.

Now imagine all these people getting free health care.
See the problem?

My Confession

I wrote this to a friend recently.

I thought I'd blog it.

I was raised Catholic.

Good priests as family friends.

One of these took on the parish we were in after the priest that came on to me in the confessional (when I was a teenager) resigned the priesthood.

I went into the service and became agnostic.

I was in a hotel in Germany when in the middle of the night I had some sort of abdominal attack that reminded me of the appendix I had previously had removed.
I had nowhere to turn for help.

I then called out to that invisible "god" that if he fixed this, I would find him and serve him.

The problem went away immediately.

I then began my search for him.

It took a few years.

I never considered Christianity, as it had no power (it seemed).

I read about black magic, Eastern Mysticism, New Age, all kinds of stuff.

I took to reading the Bible to be literate. The first words of Moby Dick (Call me Ishmael) were a biblical allusion that I was ignorant of.

One day, a girl I was dating gave me a tract that listed all the prophecies concerning the "Messiah" of the Jews, and every thing that Jesus did that fulfilled them.

Shortly after, in my living room, as I read it, I became convinced that Jesus was the One I was looking for and submitted myself to Him.

That is how I became a Christian. I made Jesus my Lord.

I later learned I had a sin problem I was unaware of (I thought I was "good enough") and made Him my Savior.
Like Catholics, I believe that Jesus died on the cross as the payment for my crimes against God (sin). He broke down the barrier that separated me from God.

Unlike Catholics (or the majority of) I believe (and this is what is regarded as Protestantism) that our right-standing with God can not be earned by what we do (keeping rules and regs, or the "Law") but only on what Jesus did for us.
If what Jesus did for us was not enough, then He isn't much of a savior.
But in turn, I live my life for Him, because he gave it back to me.
Catholicism turned what should be a personal relationship into a version of the Old Testament with works, structure and a priesthood between man and God.
God wants an individual relationship.
I do not espouse a religion.
I attend a church of a particular denomination, but could join (and have served in for awhile) another, easily. 

As I type this, and thanks for the opportunity to do so (I may post this), I am filled with the joy of knowing that I am safe with God and am reminded of the many times He has delivered me.
God made us for a purpose out of love. Not to blindly "serve" Him. He'd like the love returned.
He wants to fellowship with us like when Adam and Eve were in the garden with Him.

I don't know if you know this, but when Israel was in captivity in Babylon, a man named Daniel (who wrote the eponymous book) prayerfully asked God if what the prophet Jeremiah had said about Israel returning to Jerusalem in 70 years would be fulfilled (which it was). 

Daniel was told not to worry about that, but that in 70 times seven years, Messiah would come.

That prophecy was what inspired the Wise Men to seek the Babe when they did.
Jesus was born in the right year, in the right town, fulfilling what had been written hundreds of years previously.

It's stuff like that that convinced me of who He was/is.
When he broke the power of death and left an empty grave behind, He proved that He was the Messiah.

His disciples went to their torturous deaths avowing that they had seen Him after His death when all they had to do to live was deny Him.

Well, thanks for listening.

The takeaway about Protestantism is that Martin Luther, a priest, realized that we are saved by God's unmerited unearned favor (grace) towards us through faith in Jesus.
Saying so many prayers, paying so much money, denying yourself so many things doesn't cut it with God. To think that It's Jesus + anything to get into God's organization, devalues and scorns the gift God gave us for free.

Happy Thanksgiving.

A Merry Christmas to You!

A white Christmas morning!

I've got some white privilege to shovel.

Pray for our troops who are forward deployed please.
I've got a nephew in Guam. Carry on Andrew, and thanks.

I remember being away for a few Christmases.
There was the time I found out I was going to be deployed to Iran for 6 months.
I decided to fly home for Christmas before going to that hellhole.
I flew home space available, waiting in Frankfurt at Rhein-Main Air Base for over a day (many had been waiting over 48 hours!) until they scheduled a cargo plane just to clear the terminal of all of us waiting.

When I flew back to West Germany with a pre-purchased ticket, I was a little later getting to the airport than I wanted to be due to waiting on family who wanted to see me off.
Dad dropped me at the door of the airport (no TSA!) while he parked.
I entered the terminal to hear last call for my flight announced.
I ran like O.J. Simpson through the terminal, in wool uniform with a coat on, carrying my duffel bag. I don't know why I didn't use my B-4 bag, which I still use to this day.

I arrived at the gate just as they close the door on the plane.
The stewardesses looked at me, smiled and opened the door to let me in.
I went through First Class to find a seat in economy and to my horror, as we were taxying away, I saw that all the seats were taken!
In panic I asked the stewardess whether this was the correct flight.
She asked for my ticket (no one else had yet!) and pointed out that I had been bumped to First Class. Oh Yeah :)
And then I saw that the flight had been changed to an earlier time and I hadn't noticed.
Dad, my brothers and nieces and nephews wondered what had happened to me.

That wasn't the first time my dad was upset with me concerning picking me up or taking me to the airport.
I once flew home from South Carolina for Christmas on short notice and could only book a flight to Toledo, not Detroit.
Dad was to drive there to pick me up.
Except the heavy snowstorm that closed Toledo diverted our plane to Detroit!
Dad drove for hours through a blizzard to the Toledo airport only to find I was in Detroit.
Dad was a highly intelligent guy, but it still took him a couple days to calm down and understand that I couldn't book to Detroit in the first place.
My sister picked me up. 10 minute drive from her house to Detroit Metro. :)

I spent one Christmas in a hotel in Nurberg one year. What a pretty town that was. That's the one where the Nurburgring race track is (drove that!).

My team was working on a mountaintop nearby.
We bought roller skates in town and built skateboards out of crate boards.
Skateboarded down that hill into town. The locals were amazed. I don't think they had ever seen a skateboard.
I took a turn too fast and slammed into the side of a parked bus. Fun times.

 

Spent one Christmas Eve with friends in Il Duomo in Florence at Midnight Mass in an attempt to get warm. The Oil Embargo caused a lot of hotels to turn off the heat.

I was deployed to a lot of nice places, but those places were far from home and family.
For all the happy memories, I remember the feeling of wanting to be with family and loved ones.

May God comfort our troops and protect them from our enemies and from depression and loneliness and return them safely to their families and loved ones.

Merry Christmas!