"I think our people are posessed with a bloody devil far above anything that I could have imagined." [Robert Ballie]
Archive for July, 2006
Bloody Devil (Quote)
July 31, 2006On Making wills
July 30, 2006I was told yesterday by family members, that in the fullness of time but not to leave it indefinitely, I need to make a will. And its something I been intending to do for a while anyhow, just never gotten around to it. But, the way things stand currently, since my dad has gone, either a brother I have not seen, (neither has no one else in my family cos he was a bad'un) for almost 30 years would get my estate if I popped off, assuming he's still alive, and failing that, or if he could not be traced, then Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the Exchequor would get it!! I not like our government, but I would rather Gordon Brown have it, than the other option!! 
I don't know if these laws are the same the world over, but its also recently come to my attention, that anyone who dies without leaving a valid will here in England, anyone can come along and contest what happens to their estate and try to do the next of kin out of what would be their inheritance. The law is indeed an ass at times. My family told me, that if I not want my brother or Gordon Brown to have it then I could name the local dogs home as sole beneficiary when I pop off this mortal coil. I could think of worst places or less deserving folks to be beneficiaries than my local dogs home. Not saying that's what I shall do mind, though it was what I had planned to do for many years, but could still think of much less deserving beneficiaries, my brother and Gordon Brown being two such!!
And I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has expressed their sadness at my dad's passing the past few days, whether on my blog, at groups, or personal email. Its been a source of comfort. Many folks when they know what age he was say "he had a good innings" and I half want to answer what's that got to do with anything? same as the doctor at the hospital when I got real brave and told him how appalled I was at the standard of care for a man that age my dad recieved, all he could say was "he's an 88 year old man with cancer in an acute bed" (they wanted him out cos they needed the bed but couldn't find anywhere suitable for him for a long time) all I could think, well that maybe true that he's an 87 (then) year old man with cancer in an acute bed, but he's still my dad. So, thanks, friends.
Faith and Obedience
July 30, 2006Q: For what two things are the Scriptures our rule?
A: The scriptures are our rule for faith and obedience.
Q: Why are the Scriptures our only rule of faith and obedience?
A: The scriptures are our only rule of faith and obedience because as the written word of God they are unique and infallible, and therefore no other rule of faith and obedience maybe placed along side of them. The principle of course does not rule out such subordinate standards as the Larger Catechism itself, which present not another rule in addition ot Scripture, but merely a systematic summary of what Scripture teaches. The Larger Catechism for example, is a legitimate rule of faith and obedience only because, and only so far as, it is faithful to the teachings of the Scriptures. It posesses no inherent authority of its own. [From Johannes G. Vos commenatary on the Larger Catechism]
Vulnerability
July 29, 2006For the first time in my entire life, I feel completely vulnerable. Its not my dad dying per se, though don't doubt that has bought it to the forefront. Sometimes we try to hide or bluff our way through things that can be too hard or difficult to accept, we do the best to cover ourselves in any way we see fit. I'm sure in reality, I've been just as vulnerable in my life on previous occassions, yet, the thing that has lurked there for years, always being able to be covered, or hidden, or joked away, seems now as if my dad going, leaves me completely wide open. A dear friend said to me a while ago, they thought I feared being stupid more than death, and how right they were. I don't want to say too much on this, as its bad enough its now becoming open knowledge in my family etc. Or if they did know, then I wasn't aware of it. Or maybe I chose not to be. Sometimes when we have been stripped of pride, which has led us to act ungodly and sinfully, we can feel naked and bare with where that leaves us. And though this isn't a sin issue, but rather a weakness, one outside of my control, suddenly I feel naked, and as if I have no control, in some ways, and that so many years of chasing after the dream of normality, was just that, a dream that could never be caught. And I just want to run, and hide, and to find some way to protect myself from being so exposed in my weakness, but, theres nowhere left to run, dad going, has taken my last shelter in that way. As I'm alone now, day to day, and already its become only too obvious, in just a few days, and I never realized or thought it would when dad went, it never even occurred, but, the great pretender can no longer hide or blather my way through, as theres just no way to do so and not run into great difficulties or troubles, or worse. I'm thankful at least, to have some family members who will do what they can to help, but, I hate the way I feel naked and exposed, and vulnerable, and how the dream of normality seems to have finally been snuffed out. God give me grace to be humble, when I know I can't do well. As I only ran from it, as its so hard to accept.
Some of my online friends may put 2+2 together and find the missing link. I don't want to say too much on my blog, as though I do share my struggles, and triumphs its too raw right now,
Sometimes…
July 29, 2006Blessings come from the least expected source. I don't want to say too much, as its rather personal, but, since my dad's passing, my remaining family, my mom's sisters and their husbands are being very caring and helpful in how to tackle some difficulties my dad's going has left, day to day. Not that they weren't caring, just we never saw a great deal of them. And my disability does leave me vulnerable in some respects as in knowing what is the right decisions to make, (big life changing decisions) so its good to feel I don't have to make it without having someone to ask or who will advise.
The only other thing I wish to report, is that I rarely buy books currently. I am somewhat in financial straits currently, so the one book I had bought this year was an unabridged copy of Samuel Rutherford's letters, and it has blessed me richly. But, I bought another book last weekend which arrived today, and it is Johannes G. Vos commentary on the Larger Catechism. I have heard very good reports of this book, from trusted sources, (you know who you are!) and so I look forward to being able to spend some time in it over the coming weeks/months/years, as, I think the Westminster Standards, catechisms etc, are the best way to have a road map through the Bible I know, as in applying it to every day life, and have wanted this particular book for a while, and finding it at a good price last weekend, made it possible.
I also have two full tubs of triple chocolate iced cream in the freezer. What more could anyone want, huh?
Give me a manly man
July 28, 2006after having registered my dad's death today and having got the death certificate home, looking at it, and other papers to do with his dying, one can see how the society of our day is putting same sex relationships on equal footing to the Biblical covenant of marriage. Evey time there is a checkbox for someone being widowed, divorced, separated, there is also a box for civil unions. I believe recently in the UK "civil unions" were recently acknoweldged legally so that if one in the union dies, the one left behind, of the same sex as the one who has died, gets all the same benfits and entitlements as a husband or widow would in Biblical Covenante marriage. Makes me want to throw up. As my dad was a manly man, and doesn't need to be distinguished or included with the likes of "civil unions" I was reading this article, which is pretty good on the theme of these apostate marriages.
Marriage: "The act of uniting a man and woman for life ; wedlock ; the legal union of a man and woman for life. Marriage is a contract both civil and religious, by which the parties engage to live together in mutual affection and fidelity, till death shall separate them. Marriage was instituted by God himself for the purpose of preventing the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, for promoting domestic felicity, and for securing the maintenance and education of children." Webster 1828
Move over mom and dad you are officially being rendered obsolete. According to the New York Times, December 5, 2002, the American Law Institute "has wielded an extraordinary influence over American legal practices, since its founding in 1923." That is putting it mildly. In 1955, the led a nationwide penal law revolution with its model penal code recommendations. This May, the ALI published yet another a guide book for lawyers and courts, after spending 10 years evaluating Family Law. According to the NYT report on the ALI Recommendations:
A person's sexual orientation should not be considered by courts in custody matters.
Homosexual couples in long-term relationships should have to make alimony or child- support payments if they split up.
Among other recommendations, the institute said judges should not consider marital conduct during divorce proceedings. {For decades, courts frequently punished cheating spouses by burdening them with higher alimony payments or denying them custody of their children.)
The institute said judges should instead divide up property and decide alimony based on how long a couple had been married and how much each spouse was dependent on the other for financial support.
The NYT's article goes on to say, proposals to repeal sodomy laws, give same-sex partners inheritance rights and extended health benefits to "partners" which have stalled in many states, but the ALI's "findings may carry tremendous weight in U.S. courts." "Even before its formal publication, the report had been cited in more than 100 law review articles and two dozen court decisions." Despite some 35 state legislatures having passed laws to define and defend marriage as between a man and a woman, the ALI has hardwired "gay marriage" onto American life through the courts.
The ALI's principal author, Arizona State University, law professor Ira Mark Ellman, said the goal was to "close holes in family law that have left judges guessing as to how to deal with nontraditional families." That is interesting since the ALI created the non-traditional family in law. It's time for law to catch up with human progress. Doesn't law mean fixed in all languages?
In 1955, the ALI paved the way for "non-traditional families" by disparaging fathers. Citing to Alfred Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948), legal elites parroted Kinsey claim that 95% of American males were sex offenders under the then current state penal laws and 52 laws protecting marriage needed to be changed to reflect "normal" human behavior. The ALI recommended legalizing no-fault divorce and decriminalizing fornication, cohabitation, sodomy, etc.
If you can't pass the laws in the legislature, then the courts have to become a legislature. In 1955, Columbia law professor Herbert Wechsler, the ALI's principal author, boasted of the ALI's work, as private entity, on a Model Penal Code; "we mean to act as if we were a legislative commission, charged with construction of an ideal penal code." Misrepresented to state legislative bodies as simply "clarification" and "revision" of the common law based on objective "scientific pursuit," the influential ALL model code served as a guide to legislatures as laws, many in place since statehood, were eliminated and/or penalties lighten thus removing protections for women and children from violence and poverty.
To mobilize the local legal rank and file in their advocacy for the new law code's sex offense section, in 1948 ACLU lawyer Morris Ernst, called upon "every bar association in the country" to "establish a Committee on the Laws of Sexual Behavior and consider its own State's legal system in this field…to adjust our laws to the growth of scientific knowledge and the changing needs of the people. Ernst comments further:
[N]o bar association, law school journal, or lawyers' committee can consider laws . . . on sexual matters without reference to the Kinsey study. Kinsey's first volume ended an era…
At a time when sodomy was illegal and an "unnatural" act in all state penal codes, Kinsey was the ALI's stellar authority to recommend that sodomy laws be eliminated because it was, he claimed, quite "normal." Section 207.5 of the Model Penal Code (1955) addresses "Sodomy and Related Offenses," Kinsey is cited 9 times in the main text and in Apendix A to section 207.5 is entitled "Frequency of Sexual Deviation," and consists of 21 quotations, 19 of which are taken from Kinsey's book Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. In 1997 Kinsey was exposed as not the average married mid-western academic Indiana University represented him to be, but rather a sado-masochist sodomite with sexual appetites difficult for the University to conceal in order to protect propriety, prestige and the large Rockefeller grants and taxpayer support for the state's premier university.
Kinsey's research was advocacy also. At a presentation at the 5th World Congress of Sexuality in 1981, Dr. Judith Reisman drew from Sexual Behavior in the Human Male to prove Kinsey's use of pedophiles in gathering sexuality data on children, some as young as 2 months of age. To add insult to injury, his data were cooked too: Of the 5,300 white males in Kinsey's sample 2,446 were convicts, 946 homosexuals and the rest an assortment of people categorized as boys, transvestites, special homosexuals and mentally ill leaving a total of 4,628 who were not easily not "normal." This is the data upon which Kinsey declared 95% of American males sex offenders. No surprise.
Deconstruct the American family beginning in 1955 with the Model Penal Code, culminated within the past 12 months. Courts have ruled that a gay person is entitled to adopt a partner's child, and that a homosexual who is not the biological parent of a child can be forced to pay child support after separating from a partner. These are relations, but not in a family sort of way. This latest ALI edict thwarts the legislative efforts to secure marriage, but don't miss the planned obsolescence of Mothers and Fathers based on Alfred Kinsey's tortured sado-masochistic view of the family. Fade family into the background. Gone the old notions of generations, "the act of begetting, a single succession in natural descent, as the children of the same parents; hence an age, a family, a race." Enter Brave New World. [Eunice V. Ray]
To Everything there is a season
July 27, 2006My dad passed away today.
1For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
2a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace
I will see God
July 26, 2006 "Though I cry, 'I've been wronged!' I get no response;
though I call for help, there is no justice. 8 He has blocked my way so I cannot pass;
he has shrouded my paths in darkness.
9 He has stripped me of my honor
and removed the crown from my head.
10 He tears me down on every side till I am gone;
he uproots my hope like a tree.
11 His anger burns against me;
he counts me among his enemies.
12 His troops advance in force;
they build a siege ramp against me
and encamp around my tent.
13 "He has alienated my brothers from me;
my acquaintances are completely estranged from me.
14 My kinsmen have gone away;
my friends have forgotten me.
15 My guests and my maidservants count me a stranger;
they look upon me as an alien.
16 I summon my servant, but he does not answer,
though I beg him with my own mouth.
17 My breath is offensive to my wife;
I am loathsome to my own brothers.
18 Even the little boys scorn me;
when I appear, they ridicule me.
19 All my intimate friends detest me;
those I love have turned against me.
20 I am nothing but skin and bones;
I have escaped with only the skin of my teeth. [a]
21 "Have pity on me, my friends, have pity,
for the hand of God has struck me.
22 Why do you pursue me as God does?
Will you never get enough of my flesh?
23 "Oh, that my words were recorded,
that they were written on a scroll,
24 that they were inscribed with an iron tool on [b] lead,
or engraved in rock forever!
25 I know that my Redeemer [c] lives,
and that in the end he will stand upon the earth. [d]
26 And after my skin has been destroyed,
yet [e] in [f] my flesh I will see God;
27 I myself will see him
with my own eyes—I, and not another.
How my heart yearns within me! [Job 19]
All out of luck and everything else…
July 25, 2006My dad's passing is days away. He's the only thing of any note I have left in my life, apart from life itself, and I don't want that, when I'm so unwanted and un-needed. I've lost everything else of any worth, now I'm losng my dad to make it final. I won't say what's in my heart, for fear I bleed all over my blog, but I have no idea what my life is about, its certainly of no value or worth to anyone else, and it heck as sure isn't to me either. My dad has needed me these last months, and family members have noticed how I've been there for him while fighting against the odds of dealing with my own illness, but once he's gone, I'll not be needed at all. Surplice to requirements. so, all my sufferng shall be in vain, as its achieving nothing beyond itself. I'm past caring what happens to me, just like everyone else is, but it would have been nice, if just for once, my heart ache mattered here on earth. It would have been nice, but only a fool dreams and hopes for the improbable.
Worthless – A Poem
July 25, 2006
Worthless
No one's ever believed in me,
thus it's torn my world apart;
words have crushed my self-esteem,
and broke my tender heart.All my life I have always been,
extremely sad inside;
searching for the love that I,
have always been denied.I never am quite good enough,
and I can't do anything right;
I am worthless and pathetic,
within my loved one's eyes.All I have ever wanted,
was to be accepted just for me;
I can't be someone I am not,
what you get is what you see.The hole in my heart is painfull,
for it's empty and hollow inside;
and everynight when I go to bed,
I pray that I will die.I am not special or worthy,
for someone to truly care;
I'm a misfit to society,
and this truth I have to bare.I have never known success,
for I fail at everything;
The song that once was in my heart,
I can no longer sing.As I ponder upon my failures,
which are much too many to count;
I wonder why I was ever born,
and what is my life all about? [Ruth Warren]
