RICKY SINGS..A SONG HE DID NOT KNOWWritten by Irvin L. Rozier
RICKY SINGS...A SONG HE DID NOT KNOWLuke 1 verse 37 "For with God nothing shall be impossible." I have been ministering at nursing homes for over 17 years. I have seen God move mightily during these times. I want to tell you what God did yesterday...it was a genuine miracle on 10 October 2004. Ricky is a young man in his early 40's. He is mildly mentally handicapped, but he loves to sing gospel songs. His favorite is Victory in Jesus. His voice is so sweet, although he would get words mixed up. Charlie, a cripple at nursing home, died over two years ago, and Ricky sang Victory in Jesus at Charlie's funeral. I had privilege of speaking at Charlie's funeral. A few months back, Ricky had a stroke, and it affected his speech....he quit talking. About four weeks ago, I was at nursing home for our Sunday morning service. After service, I saw Ricky in hallway. I spoke to him, and asked him to sing Victory in Jesus..he did and everyone was amazed. Well, yesterday (Sunday), I had a service at nursing home, and Ricky was sitting in back in his wheelchair. I always play gospel music on stereo before we start. That morning, LORD told me to take CD with music of song I had wrote. The words to song was not on CD, just music my son, Joel, had wrote. The title of song is "When Will Answer Come". The first verse goes, "When will answer come, What will answer be, Where will I be waiting, On LORD's answer to me, So long I've been anticipating, on answer I'm awaiting, Many sleepless nights spent talking, To my LORD with whom I'm walking." The chorus goes, "The LORD hears and answers my prayers, I cast on Him my cares, I know somehow, somewhere, The answer will surely be there."
| | Freedom of ReligionWritten by Skye Thomas
We were all taught in school that our forefathers left England to escape religious dictatorships. Okay, there was a lot more to it then that, but it was a big enough deal that they made sure it got honorable mention in our rulebook. They clearly made point that we were to have freedom of religion here in America. They also used word "God" in some of their formal paperwork and even on our money. I don't want to argue politics here, but rather semantics. They didn't say "freedom of Christianity," they said "freedom of religion." The boys who wrote up all of our formal paperwork were wordsmiths and they debated long and hard to find perfect set of words to govern ourselves by. It wasn't decided that we had freedom to choose whichever form of Christianity that we liked, but whichever form of religion. Religion is in and of itself a much broader concept then Christianity. "God" can mean a lot more then just Christian definition too.No, I don't agree with all bickering and arguing over whether or not there should be prayers in school or if Pledge of Allegiance is constitutional. You can't stop someone from praying whenever or wherever they choose. Nor can you force a prayer out of someone either. It's a dumb thing to argue about and not worth being offended over either way. I think it's important to teach out children what our country's Pledge of Allegiance is, but I don't know that it's right to force anyone to state a pledge, especially children. Seems a bit dictator like and kind of like brainwashing. Teach them what it means. Teach them what prayer means. Teach them what making a pledge of any kind means whether it's a pledge of one's allegiance to their country's flag, a pledge of fidelity to a spouse, or a pledge of loyalty to a boss. But also teach them that in this country we have freedom to make pledges or not. Teach them that in this country we have freedom to pray to whoever or whatever we like and freedom not to pray. Teach them just how important that freedom is. I'm saddened when I hear of Pagan's being persecuted for their spiritual beliefs in this country. Did Sunday school teachers forget to mention that using colors green and red for Christmas is Pagan? Did they mention that Christmas lights, yule logs, and wreaths are all Pagan? Did they mention that almost every single Christian holiday is celebrated ironically on top of a Pagan festival? Why do you think we have bunnies, baby chicks, and pretty flowers as part of our Easter celebration? Because it coincides with Pagan's celebrations of Spring's renewal. From what I can see, Pagans aren't all evil ugly witches anymore than all Christians are white supremacists. I don't have a deep knowledge of all of different religions of world, but I can tell you that it doesn't take much research to see that they're all very much same. Get past which church uses which secret handshake and which rule book you should follow, and you find that they're all teaching us to respect each other, to love each other, to conduct yourself with honor, and to be good to planet and animals that we're blessed with. The rest is all dogma and debatable. Nobody has any real concrete proof that their particular form of God is only one. Who's to say that God or Jesus isn't wise enough to visit more than once using different names and different forms? Wouldn't it make sense given size of planet that rest of world would need to be given a fair chance at knowing about God too? Is Buddha so very different from Jesus? Their teachings are incredibly similar. Why limit God to a concept that only fits what your particular culture or region of world knows about?
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