SerenitySeekers

“One who was there had been an invalid for thirty eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and learned that he had been in this condition a long time he asked him, “Do you want to get well?” John 5:5-6

Invalid, unacceptable, worthless null and void!!  Have you ever felt the powerlessness that those words convey? Is there a “little child” inside you that reflects on such things? Don’t we still hear the voices of childhood? “You’re stupid, fat, ugly and dumb…you’ll never amount to anything…you’re a zip, a zero, a nothing.” Is there a wounded child inside us that still stings from the critical voices of the past? If you grew up in a “normal” American family, the honest answer can only be, yes, yes, yes! It can be a very weird experience reflecting on those days. One’s family can appear to have it all together: servant hearted, servant minded, doing good for the community. And yet there resides within the walls a quiet monster known as Dysfunction that erodes the family from within. Dysfunction demands unspoken rules like “don’t talk about it, don’t think outside the box, the only feeling allowed here is anger (which Dad typically owns). There are certainly other feelings in the family, most notably depression, but that is an unseen and unheard pain that has no voice of its own. One other rule Dysfunction foists onto the family is “don’t trust anybody outside the family.” We must keep our secrets. Isn’t it amazing that we can be paralyzed by more a physical infirmity? But then Jesus asks us the same question, “Do you want to get well?’

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

“and you will … [be] powerless to lift a hand.” Deuteronomy 28:32 (NIV)

We’ve spent a lot of time looking at the First Step; “We admitted we were powerless over our dependencies and that our lives had become unmanageable.” This passage in Deuteronomy, I believe, is the first one in Scripture to be so pointed and direct about First Step issues. Deuteronomy 28 is that legendary section of the Bible that lists the famous “Blessing and Curses.” If you haven’t read them for a while, it would be a good review. (http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Deuteronomy%2028&version=NIV) After a cursory reading, it would seem that powerlessness comes from disobedience to the Law. Gee, what a surprise!! In Paul’s dissertation on grace, he asks, “shall we sin (violate the law) so grace shall abound?” He responds with a definite “God forbid.” Do you think he knew about the powerlessness that follows disobedience? I would certainly think so. So then it seems that all our troubles come from disobedience and rebellion after all. In spite of God’s grace and goodness, consequences follow bad behavior. Or is it because of God’s grace that consequences follow bad behavior? You be the judge.

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer

September 22

“I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country” were the last words of 21-year-old American patriot Nathan Hale, who was hanged by the British without a trial on SEPTEMBER 22, 1776.

A Yale graduate, he almost became a Christian minister, as his brother Enoch did, but instead became a teacher at Union Grammar School. Nathan Hale fought in the siege

of Boston, capturing a boat of provisions from under the gun of a British man-of-war. After the British left Boston for New York, General Washington was desperate for

information. Nathan Hale volunteered to penetrate the British line at Long Island, but was captured upon return. General Howe ordered him to be hanged the next morning.

Hale wrote a letter to his mother and brother, but the British destroyed them, not wanting it known a man could die with such firmness. He asked for a Bible, but was

refused. Nathan Hale was marched out and hanged from an apple-tree in Rutgers’s orchard, near the present streets of East Broadway and Market in New York City.

Nathan Hale’s nephew, well-known author Edward Everett Hale, wrote: “We are God’s children, you and I, and we have our duties…Thank God I come from men who are not

afraid in battle.”

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer September 21

On SEPTEMBER 21, 1924, America’s 30th President, Calvin Coolidge, addressed the Holy Name Society in Washington, D.C., saying:

“The worst evil that could be inflicted upon the youth of the land would be to leave them without restraint and completely at the mercy of their own uncontrolled inclinations. Under such conditions education would be impossible, and all orderly development intellectually or morally would be hopeless.”

Calvin Coolidge continued:

“The Declaration of Independence…claims…the ultimate source of authority by stating…they were… ‘appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the rectitude of’ their ‘intentions.’…The foundations of our independence and our Government rests upon basic religious convictions. Back of the authority of our laws is the authority of the Supreme Judge of the World, to whom we still appeal.”

President Calvin Coolidge concluded:

“It seems to me perfectly plain that the authority of law, the right to equality, liberty and property, under American institutions, have for their foundation reverence for God. If we could imagine that to be swept away, these institutions of our American government could not long survive.”

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer September 20

Fisher Ames helped ratify the U.S. Constitution. He sat beside George Washington during the service at St. Paul’s Chapel following Washington’s Inauguration.

Fisher Ames authored the final House language of the First Amendment. At age 46, Fisher Ames was elected Harvard’s president, but declined due to an illness which led to

his death on July 4, 1808. An orator, Fisher Ames stated no one could be eloquent “without being a constant reader of the Bible and an admirer of the purity and sublimity

of its language.”

In January 1788, Fisher Ames stated: “The known propensity of a democracy is to licentiousness which the…ignorant believe to be liberty.” In his Dangers of American

Liberty, February 1805, Fisher Ames warned that democracy without morals would eventually reduce the nation to the basest of human passions, swallowing freedom:

“A democracy is a volcano which conceals the fiery materials of its own destruction.”

In Palladium Magazine, SEPTEMBER 20, 1789, Fisher Ames wrote: “We have a dangerous trend beginning to take place in our education. We’re starting to put more

textbooks into our schools…containing fables and moral lessons…We are spending less time in the classroom on the Bible, which should be the principal text in our schools.”

Fischer Ames concluded:

“The Bible states these great moral lessons better than any other manmade book.”

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer

September 19

The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolken tells of man’s lust for “the ring of power.” George Washington had that power and twice gave it up.

When King George III asked American-born painter Benjamin West what Washington planned to do now that he had won the war, West replied

“They say he will return to his farm.” King George said “If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world.”

Washington later served as President and again returned to his farm, similar to Roman leader Cincinnatus, who twice led Rome’s Republic to victory in battle then returned to farming.

On SEPTEMBER 19, 1796, the world stood in awe as President George Washington delivered his Farewell Address, stating:

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism who should labor to subvert these great Pillars…Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.”

George Washington continued: “Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle…

Morality is a necessary spring of popular government…Who that is a sincere friend to it can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation?”

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer

September 17

 ”Done…the SEVENTEENTH DAY of SEPTEMBER, in the year of our LORD one thousand seven hundred and eighty seven.”

This is the last line of the U.S. Constitution.

A study by Professors Donald S. Lutz and Charles S. Hyneman, titled

“The Relative Influence of European Writers on Late 18th-Century American Political Thought”

published in American Political Science Review, 1984, revealed that after examining nearly 15,000 writings of the 55 writers of the Constitution, including newspaper articles, pamphlets, books and monographs, that the Bible, especially the book of Deuteronomy, contributed 34 percent of all direct quotes made by the Founders.

When indirect Bible citations were included, the percentage rose even higher.

Presiding over the Constitutional Convention was George Washington, who wrote ten days after his Presidential Inauguration to the United Baptist Churches of Virginia, May 10, 1789:

“If I could have entertained the slightest apprehension that the Constitution framed by the Convention, where I had the honor to preside, might possibly endanger the religious rights of any ecclesiastical Society, certainly I would never have placed my signature to it.”

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete

“O LORD, the God who saves me, day and night I cry out before you. May my prayer come before you; turn your ear to my cry. For my soul is full of trouble and my life draws near the grave. I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am like a man without strength.”  Psalm 88 (NIV)

Perhaps the Psalmist is nearing the end of his life. Perhaps hospice needs have finally caught up with him. Notice he is not having a conversation with Dr. Jack Kervokian, the Doctor of Death. The Psalmist is not looking for a way out of his troubles, but rather is making an appeal to “the God who saves me.” Is the Psalmist looking beyond the veil of his earthly suffering and pain and into the reality of eternity with the LORD? Perhaps. We can’t really know the mind of the Psalmist, but he certainly seems to know the mind and heart of the LORD God of his salvation. Questions certainly arise when considering life threading conditions. Does God really care? Is He familiar with human suffering like we are? Christians have claimed that God really feels our pain and is intimately acquainted with our suffering. Christ is called a “Man of Sorrows.” Can we discover the suffering of God? What do you think? Did God suffer the day Lucifer opted for rebellion and was cast out of Heaven? Did God feel pain the day the serpent came to Eve and led her to believe a lie? We must ask ourselves these questions or we fall short in our understanding of God’s compassion for the human condition. Do we feel the pain and agony of our children’s suffering? Of course we do. Do we feel the pain and suffering of family members who are suffering? Of course we do. Do we feel the pain suffering of our neighbors and friends? Of course we do. The most poignant scene of suffering I ever viewed was in Mel Gibson’s “The Passion.” Do you recall the scenes of the scourging and beatings? The Roman soldiers were animalistic and inhumane beyond all reason. And yet, there is this remarkable scene where Christ is struggling with His Cross, falls to the ground, and for a brief moment embraces it. Do you remember? A soldier quipped something to the effect of, “Look at the fool. He embraces His Cross.” Certainly God is a God who is extremely familiar with all human suffering. Can we embrace our suffering as a better means of coming alongside those who are still suffering from all the maladies and miseries that comes along with the human experience? The LORD of Salvation does, so can we. It is a way to get beyond the powerlessness and unmanageability of our own experience.

 Chaplain Pete

American Minute with Bill Federer

September 15

The only U.S. President to also serve as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, he had previously been appointed by President McKinley to be the first governor of the Philippines after the Spanish-American War and was later appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt as Secretary of War.

The largest President, weighing over 300 lbs, a bathtub was installed for him in the White House big enough to hold four men.

His name was William Howard Taft, and he was born SEPTEMBER 15, 1857.

On Thanksgiving, November 7, 1912, President Taft proclaimed:

“A God-fearing nation, like ours, owes it to its inborn and sincere sense of moral duty to testify its devout gratitude to the All-Giver for the countless benefits its has enjoyed.”

At a missionary conference, 1908, William Howard Taft stated:

“No man can study the movement of modern civilization from an impartial standpoint and not realize that Christianity, and the spread of Christianity, are the basis of hope of modern civilization in the growth of popular self government.”

William Howard Taft ended:

“The spirit of Christianity is pure democracy.

It is equality of man before God – the equality of man before the law, which is the most God-like manifestation that man has been able to make.”

“Save me, O God, for the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in the miry depths, where there is no foothold. I have come into the deep waters; the floods engulf me. I am worn out calling for help; my throat is parched. My eyes fail, looking for my God. Those who hate me without reason outnumber the hairs of my head; many are my enemies without cause, those who seek to destroy me.” Psalm 69:1-4 (NIV)

Here we go again! Will David ever get off his pity pot? “David, just get over it!!” Some of us have done exactly the same thing as David seems to be doing here in Psalm 69. In the face of our own powerlessness and unmanageability, we sar on our own pity pot and complained to God and anybody else who would listen to us grumble. There certainly are plenty of people out there that are willing to feel sorry for us. As they listen to our complaints, if we are paying close attention to their body language and verbal response, we can see that our demonstration of misery is having its desired effect. We get immense amounts of sympathy and pity directed toward our cause. “Oh you poor thing. That’s just about the saddest story I have ever heard.” These are just a couple of comments we hear. One of the most fun experiments I have ever done was to watch people’s response to my cane when I use it. People get out of my way, open doors for me and treat me with uncommon courtesy. I remember Dr. Charles Swindol telling a story about the time he sat in a wheel chair at an airport. One person patted him on the head in a demonstration of some kind of pity. The good doctor said it was the first and last time he has ever been patted on the head. Well, the truth is that pity and sympathy, while seeming to be good for the moment, never really provide solutions to the problems at hand, powerlessness and unmanageability. But then, Psalm 69:1-4 only tells part of the story. Reading the whole of the Psalm reveals that it is Messianic in nature; Christ Himself was to experience the same traumas that we all experience. Yet He, and David, learned to be dependent of our Heavenly Father to provide the solution. A reading from Serenity Seekers comes to mind, “The solution is to let God be the loving parent we seek.” It is a solution that works every time we apply it.

In Service to God and Country,

Chaplain Pete