For some reason lately I have been reflecting a lot lately on my experiences in the Marines during Panama and the Persian Gulf War- Desert Sheild/Storm.
Panama was a cat and mouse game that we had to play with the PDF that required us to be very alert and sober, but Desert Storm was a battle the big guns won and where we had air supremacy and this truly allowed us to run Sadaam's men out of Kuwait. Here is an experience of a Marine out there who came so close to the enemy that he practically had to call down fire on himself:
I never came that close and never even saw the enemy although I was a front line infantry Marine. I did survive two scud missile attacks and was involved in mine countermeasures and this makes me a combat veteran although I never once shot my weapon or killed anyone. I did have a close call in Panama and had to protect two locals who were being shot at by the PDF but chose not to fire on the PDF that night due to the tight rules of engagement along with knowing a firefight would get those men killed. As a battalion we had a confrontation with Noriegas men in the jungle as well and I sort of know the fear that this man speaks of here, but when people ask me if I killed anyone, for which some reason I get asked a lot; I just don't know what to say; but I do know that although I was trained to kill I was also trained to protect lives and in Panama I completed my missions safely and saved two lives. A lot of you may not know that prior to the invasion there were a lot of secret operations, and I was involved in some of them. Study the history. God was good there as well as we were operating around Araijan and in a very hot area where firefights were sporadically breaking out and where some Marines did get killed.
Just the other day I made a delivery down in the Jacksonville N.C. area, to a retired Marine who was in the same unit with me in Desert Storm. To help you understand something I must tell you that I was released when I returned and medals were passed out a few months and years afterward; and so he told me of all the war medals we received that I did not get. I have sent away to the retired records division to ask for them. He informed me that they count as points in some civilian jobs dealing with the government and it is important for my VA benefits as well. Please pray for me in receiving those please.
Then....
Just this week I heard the late Pastor Adrian Rogers speaking about his memories of how Americans were flooding into church during Desert Storm and calling out to God.
Truly it was a time of great fear and I can remember getting things right with God out there as well and God was faithful to see us through these attacks and mines and I also survived a fatal catastrophe out there where 10 lives were lost. It breaks my heart sometimes, when I think about how faithful God has been in my life and how unfaithful I have often been in return.
Adrian Rogers went on to point out in the message, that we build our golden calfs because at the heart we want to give the glory to ourselves or something else besides God and he reminded us that the whole country during Desert Storm was giving glory to God and then at the end of it we turned away to our golden calfs again.
We grow impatient and forget that the battle belongs to the Lord. I can remember being out there and giving thanks to God that we had air supremacy in this war, but still knowing I was in harms way. Still, if you have air supremacy, then you have the upper hand. Sadaam had 1 millon and we were only 574,000 strong and outnumbered even though that is the biggest build up we have had for any war.
We were promised the "Mother of all battles" but it ended, as the honorable Mr Cheney put it, the "Mother of all retreats". We ran the bully out of town. God was good and merciful to us back then.
I've only gotten myself into trouble when I forget that God has Air Supremacy where we can call down fire on the bullies that tempt and taunt us as believers and that the battle belongs to the Lord.
I never fired my weapons out there and came away from that war feeling like I did so little and that I had nothing to boast in, but I guess that is the whole point and God's way of grace to make it known to mankind. The medals are really the Lords doing. My combat action ribbon and the Liberation of Kuwait medal and Saudi Medal, Southwest Asia and a couple others he told me about. It was all the Lord's doing. Truly, whatever we pin on our chest or on our walls belong to Him.
The battle belongs to the Lord.
Grace upon grace,
Brian
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Have You Struggled In This Area?
Our dear brother David has posted about something that may be helpful to many of us who have struggled in this area, but for fear of intimidation from other brethren, we have not had the courage to vocalize it and rest upon Jesus instead of others and their experiences.
Truth rules over experience. We are saved by a Saviour; not a day.
Good post David!
I Don't Know?
We may not know exactly when, but we do know WHO saved us:-)
Grace upon grace,
Brian
Truth rules over experience. We are saved by a Saviour; not a day.
Good post David!
I Don't Know?
We may not know exactly when, but we do know WHO saved us:-)
Grace upon grace,
Brian
Sunday, March 1, 2009
It is coming folks----->The Prime Minister Calling For A Global Order
As the world cries out for an Anti-Christ saviour and new union order, may we call out to our God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who has begotten us into his New Covenant union, to return for us quickly and to re-create the new heaven and earth so that we will finally have true order and peace.
Until then, we remind ourselves that we do have peace and that Jesus has already overcome the world and he lives within all of us who have been begotten of Him in His death, burial and resurrection into the love of the Father and that He loves us as He loves His own Son Jesus that He gave for us to redeem us back unto Himself. We are his precious possessions and we need not call for a peace here on earth now that the world desires only to live in rebellion longer and without Him.
Grace upon grace,
Brian
As the world cries out for an Anti-Christ saviour and new union order, may we call out to our God and Saviour Jesus Christ, who has begotten us into his New Covenant union, to return for us quickly and to re-create the new heaven and earth so that we will finally have true order and peace.
Until then, we remind ourselves that we do have peace and that Jesus has already overcome the world and he lives within all of us who have been begotten of Him in His death, burial and resurrection into the love of the Father and that He loves us as He loves His own Son Jesus that He gave for us to redeem us back unto Himself. We are his precious possessions and we need not call for a peace here on earth now that the world desires only to live in rebellion longer and without Him.
Grace upon grace,
Brian
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
And For Love Of My Wife
Happy Valentines Day"After All These Years"
A faded wedding photograph
You and me in our first dance
Our eyes are closed
We're lost in one sweet embrace
Since those days the world has changed
But our love remains the same
God knows we've had our share of saving grace
And I'm proud of all the blessings you have given me
The mountains we have climbed to get this far
We've learned to take the laughter with the tears
After all these years
You make it feel brand new
After the fires that we walked through
Against the odds we never lost our faith
In a house we made our home
Where our children all have grown
Precious moments time cannot erase
Make a living up and down the gypsy highways
The seasons that we had to share apart
Somehow in my heart I always keep you near
After all these years
After all these years
You stood by me the days and nights that I was gone
After all these years
You sacrificed, believed in me, and you stood strong
Cause with our love there's nothing left to fear
After all these years
After all these years
You stood by me the days and nights that I was gone
After all these years
You sacrificed, believed in me, and you stood strong
Cause with our love there's nothing left to fear
After all these years
-Journey
....still livin on love by the grace of God honey:-)
I love you
God even gave us a sweet memory from our first blind date where we walked along the beach and I gave you my sweater to keep you warm on that chilly night as I watched you see the ocean for the first time in your life:-)
Friday, January 23, 2009
The New Earth Movement
Now that Obama has risen to power, calling all of us to be more and more accepting of all religions and non believers; and with Oprah Winfrey's strong support; It behooves us to be harmless as doves in respect to these people, with the understanding that God has sovereignly placed them into such place of power and influence; but to also be wise as serpents; with the understanding that God also tests the hearts of men to see what gods we will follow:
The God of the bible or the gods that the world, the flesh and the devil are continuing to construct after the imaginations of the human mind, that is foreign to God?
The carnal mind is at enmity with God.
In this strong day of falling away, may we see through the deceptions and apostasy and be found in Christ having faith with nothing wavering.
Dr Lutzer does a good job exposing the deceptions and calling us to stay awake in our faith:
On The New Earth Movement
The God of the bible or the gods that the world, the flesh and the devil are continuing to construct after the imaginations of the human mind, that is foreign to God?
The carnal mind is at enmity with God.
In this strong day of falling away, may we see through the deceptions and apostasy and be found in Christ having faith with nothing wavering.
Dr Lutzer does a good job exposing the deceptions and calling us to stay awake in our faith:
On The New Earth Movement
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Happy New Year
Do you like Holidays?
I love Christmas and I love New Years as they give beautiful fragrance to the wonderful sweet smelling offering of Grace through the finished work of Christ and magnifies what is written in the book of Revelation where Jesus says, "Behold I make all things new!"
Newness of life.
This is our only hope.
New life in Christ;
But there are some who do not like holidays. It is an enigma to me that so many of our founding fathers, mainly in the Puritan heritage, did not like to honor these days. In fact the Puritans outlawed Christmas. Of course we know however, that the Bible says that some honor the day to the Lord and some do not and in that regard we need to understand this.
Please understand that I am not trying to debase our American Godly Heritage, as there were many Godly men who loved the Lord, yet History records that there were still many who were trying to mingle the law with grace, and there were indeed Puritans that screamed horrible, blood curling screams at their deaths and many feel that they could never get over their fears and instead embraced and tried to mingle the law with grace, never fully accepting the love and forgiveness of God, but instead spending their lives trying to devote themselves to God through fear.
What is it that keeps us bound up in fear and never come to rest completely in the finished work of Christ alone?
I was contemplating this much over this past week, when my boss called me to ask me to do something close to impossible that would violate the law and I had to say no. He understood, but was very upset.
You see, the law states that wide loads are not to be on the road after 12 noon on New Years eve. The purpose is to protect citizens, but the customer as well as the shipping department wanted their wide loads there immediately and because of Christmas and New Years, we have gotten backed up and the cranes at the jobs are also waiting. I am thankful for the work load lately because of this, but God also calls for us to wait on Him and obey Him and trust Him. That is why grace can only accomplish this and give us the heart to obey Him, not because the law is there, but because He has been so good to us that we want to obey Him in His new life and as a result we will be sensitive to Him and not wooden, trying to obey through only a sense of duty which may actually help serve us to disobey him through duty and not love in sensitivity to the Holy Spirit.
This holiday section in the law is there to protect other people who are traveling and as a truck driver who needs grace in my truck, I have to ask God to help me drive for others and not for myself. Please pray for me here.
I am told to obey my employers as well, so I was at a crossroads in this decision. I haven't always made the right ones, but as I bask more and more in God's acceptance it does help me make the right ones.
My boss wanted me to make two wide load runs by noon and it was simply too risky and would have required me to violate speed limits as well.
He stood behind me yesterday as I loaded up and began to curse me under his breath and then I sensed he tried to catch himself. He is under a lot of pressure.
I understood he was under pressure from his boss and so it was hard for him to release me, but thankfully, he took a breath and did the right thing as well, but as I left the yard that day he said to me, "I hate holidays!"
The escort who was with me that day also tried to talk me into this risk and he reiterated to me as well, that he hated holidays too.
Still, I was thankful, because we barely made it with this one load and as we took the trip a wind advisory came up that caused driving conditions to be more serious and once that happens the law requires you to get off the road with wide loads as well. I had a very little window of time. The holiday actually served to keep us all safer and to do the right thing, but the pressure to conform and not wait on God was all to real. Human nature wants God on their timeline and not us on His. Grace gives us strength and peace of mind to wait and learn to trust Him in what He wants to do and not what we think He should do.
The holiday releases us from our task masker. If I had his job, I am sure I would be tempted to do the same thing.
For now?
One job at a time and may I learn more and more to wait on Him.
Grace opens our cold dead hearts to trust in Christ. Grace means charity for the beggar. It has absolutely nothing to do with our efforts, will or merits. Grace must be received as a free gift or it is simply not grace.
If you add any other element at the door of salvation then you have frustrated the grace of God and if after you have been saved by this grace and are tempted to add another element because you feel you need to get God to not honor His holiday so that you can get done what you feel you need to get done, then you may possibly be sending others aways from His grace without realizing it. This is a very serious thing.
Grace is a holiday for our hearts and cold cold water in the middle of a desert of task maskers.
I have been working a second job lately and it has been hard work. As I worked cleaning out ditches the other day and listening to BBN while I did it: Amazing Grace came on the radio and a dear brother came on and continued talking about how self-righteousness finds no place in our salvation. In fact, grace gets under the skin of self righteousness and causes the human nature to fume against this holiday for our hearts.
As I continued working and raking up debris and leaves with a rake and pitchfork; I came to a stopping point and as I began to look around and see what I accomplished, I began to take pride in what a good job that I felt I did. With one of my last runs to clear out these water ways, I raked up a dirty bloody bounty cloth. It sure gave me the heebie geebies and a cold chill of ambivalence went up my spine.
Blood was everywhere and I began to think of who would put something so gross like that there.
Then I began to think of my pride. How gross it must be to God when we boast in ourselves.
What foolishness!
In fact the book of Isaiah says that our righteousness is as filthy rags. I am told that the meaning in Hebrew is that of a bloody menstrual cloth. Yes, that is what our good deeds and hardest efforts look like in the sight of God. That is why the Bible says in the book of Romans, that it is not of him that willeth, but of God that showeth mercy. That is why the holiday God placed in the middle of the writing of the law got under the skin of the human nature that always seeks to lord it over the other. Consider how our human natures; rich in heart, boast against what is received poor in spirit. That is why our salvation is a free gift of charity for a beggar. There is something also about our human nature that despises beggars; isn't there? It feels like the other doesn't deserve charity and so it lords it over the other.
Here is the holiday that God knew many would despise, because He knew the holiday would cause us to release the captives.
"Beware that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying. The seventh year, the year of release is at hand: and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him nought; and he cry unto the LORD against thee, and it be sin unto thee." Deuteronomy 15:9
In truth....when we receive the grace of God, we release ourselves into the love and presence of God. We hold ourselves captive when we don't receive this blessed truth.
Years ago, my father gave me a book from what is known as the green letters. It was extremely helpful to me and continues to be so today. Here is a small article from it on acceptance:
Acceptance
My how my heart is encouraged to obey God as I bask in how much he loves me and how much I forget about my pride and bloody rags.
I hope you are encouraged in this.
Every year we make resolutions which are good things for us that we want to do, but we often fall short of those self-sufficient dead runs that often end in failure. We look around and wonder how others have been able to do it and then learn years later that they failed later as well. It really only means that others can hold their breath longer in the end, but all of us need to breath the air of grace at some point and stop boasting against it. It is so hard for us to see this...especially for those who can hold their breath for a really long time.
This year, I pray that we all delight ourselves in this wonderful holiday and see this new year as a slave saw the year of jubilee and not how the master saw it.
Grace upon grace,
Brian
I love Christmas and I love New Years as they give beautiful fragrance to the wonderful sweet smelling offering of Grace through the finished work of Christ and magnifies what is written in the book of Revelation where Jesus says, "Behold I make all things new!"
Newness of life.
This is our only hope.
New life in Christ;
But there are some who do not like holidays. It is an enigma to me that so many of our founding fathers, mainly in the Puritan heritage, did not like to honor these days. In fact the Puritans outlawed Christmas. Of course we know however, that the Bible says that some honor the day to the Lord and some do not and in that regard we need to understand this.
Please understand that I am not trying to debase our American Godly Heritage, as there were many Godly men who loved the Lord, yet History records that there were still many who were trying to mingle the law with grace, and there were indeed Puritans that screamed horrible, blood curling screams at their deaths and many feel that they could never get over their fears and instead embraced and tried to mingle the law with grace, never fully accepting the love and forgiveness of God, but instead spending their lives trying to devote themselves to God through fear.
What is it that keeps us bound up in fear and never come to rest completely in the finished work of Christ alone?
I was contemplating this much over this past week, when my boss called me to ask me to do something close to impossible that would violate the law and I had to say no. He understood, but was very upset.
You see, the law states that wide loads are not to be on the road after 12 noon on New Years eve. The purpose is to protect citizens, but the customer as well as the shipping department wanted their wide loads there immediately and because of Christmas and New Years, we have gotten backed up and the cranes at the jobs are also waiting. I am thankful for the work load lately because of this, but God also calls for us to wait on Him and obey Him and trust Him. That is why grace can only accomplish this and give us the heart to obey Him, not because the law is there, but because He has been so good to us that we want to obey Him in His new life and as a result we will be sensitive to Him and not wooden, trying to obey through only a sense of duty which may actually help serve us to disobey him through duty and not love in sensitivity to the Holy Spirit.
This holiday section in the law is there to protect other people who are traveling and as a truck driver who needs grace in my truck, I have to ask God to help me drive for others and not for myself. Please pray for me here.
I am told to obey my employers as well, so I was at a crossroads in this decision. I haven't always made the right ones, but as I bask more and more in God's acceptance it does help me make the right ones.
My boss wanted me to make two wide load runs by noon and it was simply too risky and would have required me to violate speed limits as well.
He stood behind me yesterday as I loaded up and began to curse me under his breath and then I sensed he tried to catch himself. He is under a lot of pressure.
I understood he was under pressure from his boss and so it was hard for him to release me, but thankfully, he took a breath and did the right thing as well, but as I left the yard that day he said to me, "I hate holidays!"
The escort who was with me that day also tried to talk me into this risk and he reiterated to me as well, that he hated holidays too.
Still, I was thankful, because we barely made it with this one load and as we took the trip a wind advisory came up that caused driving conditions to be more serious and once that happens the law requires you to get off the road with wide loads as well. I had a very little window of time. The holiday actually served to keep us all safer and to do the right thing, but the pressure to conform and not wait on God was all to real. Human nature wants God on their timeline and not us on His. Grace gives us strength and peace of mind to wait and learn to trust Him in what He wants to do and not what we think He should do.
The holiday releases us from our task masker. If I had his job, I am sure I would be tempted to do the same thing.
For now?
One job at a time and may I learn more and more to wait on Him.
Grace opens our cold dead hearts to trust in Christ. Grace means charity for the beggar. It has absolutely nothing to do with our efforts, will or merits. Grace must be received as a free gift or it is simply not grace.
If you add any other element at the door of salvation then you have frustrated the grace of God and if after you have been saved by this grace and are tempted to add another element because you feel you need to get God to not honor His holiday so that you can get done what you feel you need to get done, then you may possibly be sending others aways from His grace without realizing it. This is a very serious thing.
Grace is a holiday for our hearts and cold cold water in the middle of a desert of task maskers.
I have been working a second job lately and it has been hard work. As I worked cleaning out ditches the other day and listening to BBN while I did it: Amazing Grace came on the radio and a dear brother came on and continued talking about how self-righteousness finds no place in our salvation. In fact, grace gets under the skin of self righteousness and causes the human nature to fume against this holiday for our hearts.
As I continued working and raking up debris and leaves with a rake and pitchfork; I came to a stopping point and as I began to look around and see what I accomplished, I began to take pride in what a good job that I felt I did. With one of my last runs to clear out these water ways, I raked up a dirty bloody bounty cloth. It sure gave me the heebie geebies and a cold chill of ambivalence went up my spine.
Blood was everywhere and I began to think of who would put something so gross like that there.
Then I began to think of my pride. How gross it must be to God when we boast in ourselves.
What foolishness!
In fact the book of Isaiah says that our righteousness is as filthy rags. I am told that the meaning in Hebrew is that of a bloody menstrual cloth. Yes, that is what our good deeds and hardest efforts look like in the sight of God. That is why the Bible says in the book of Romans, that it is not of him that willeth, but of God that showeth mercy. That is why the holiday God placed in the middle of the writing of the law got under the skin of the human nature that always seeks to lord it over the other. Consider how our human natures; rich in heart, boast against what is received poor in spirit. That is why our salvation is a free gift of charity for a beggar. There is something also about our human nature that despises beggars; isn't there? It feels like the other doesn't deserve charity and so it lords it over the other.
Here is the holiday that God knew many would despise, because He knew the holiday would cause us to release the captives.
"Beware that there be not a thought in thy wicked heart, saying. The seventh year, the year of release is at hand: and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him nought; and he cry unto the LORD against thee, and it be sin unto thee." Deuteronomy 15:9
In truth....when we receive the grace of God, we release ourselves into the love and presence of God. We hold ourselves captive when we don't receive this blessed truth.
Years ago, my father gave me a book from what is known as the green letters. It was extremely helpful to me and continues to be so today. Here is a small article from it on acceptance:
Acceptance
My how my heart is encouraged to obey God as I bask in how much he loves me and how much I forget about my pride and bloody rags.
I hope you are encouraged in this.
Every year we make resolutions which are good things for us that we want to do, but we often fall short of those self-sufficient dead runs that often end in failure. We look around and wonder how others have been able to do it and then learn years later that they failed later as well. It really only means that others can hold their breath longer in the end, but all of us need to breath the air of grace at some point and stop boasting against it. It is so hard for us to see this...especially for those who can hold their breath for a really long time.
This year, I pray that we all delight ourselves in this wonderful holiday and see this new year as a slave saw the year of jubilee and not how the master saw it.
Grace upon grace,
Brian
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