Friday, August 17, 2012


1894  HEROD- FAME- AND ONE COOL DUDE


I mentioned the other day that some of the street guys said ‘wow- were gonna be famous’ when I told them I was gonna post their pics to the site.

The next day I was watching the local news- and they did a report about 2 guys getting arrested for peeing- on a cop car- at the police station.


So- whenever I see a news teaser like this [you know- ‘coming up next’] I think ‘geez- wonder if I know them’.

Sure enough- it was Albert and another guy that I just saw at the mission.

They did want to be famous.



Right after I posted yesterday- I read an article that backed up my suspicion.

It was so obvious it was funny.


I wrote that I saw an NBC news clip that portrayed Romney as this angry- mean- loser who can’t stand the heat.

Then- they spoke about Obama as a very calm- almost messianic figure.


So- right after the post I read my paper- there was a report by the AP [associated press].

Let me quote the first paragraph- it’s right here ‘Romney is portraying THE OUTWARDLY CALM PRESIDENT as a man seething with animosity and power lust as the Repubs seek to undermine one of the Dems greatest strengths- his PERSONAL LIKABILITY’.


I mean it’s so obvious- you can’t take these guys serious.


I was watching MSNBC- Matthews was responding to the court ruling that backed the Repub rule that in Pennsylvania you need to show voter I.D.

This has been an ongoing political battle in a few states- including mine.

The Dems charge that there is absolutely never any voter fraud- ever.

[note- a few years ago they showed a tape of a Texas Dem- she was speaking to a room full of Mexicans- down by the border- she said ‘go out and vote- even if your not a citizen- they cant check!’]


They say the Repubs are doing this because they know many ‘poor Blacks’ who vote Dem- cannot get their I.D.’s

Once again- they don’t realize that this stereotype is racist.

Like when Harry Reid said of Obama- and Biden too ‘he’s the first CLEAN BLACK guy- on a national scene- he can talk good- he doesn’t SOUND BLACK- only when he wants to’.

Yeah- you tell em guys.

I’m surprised Biden didn’t kick in ‘yeah- you need a slight Indian accent in the 7-11’s and Dunkin Doughnuts too’- ‘I’m not kidding either’- yeah- we heard.


So Matthews goes on and asks his guest ‘tell us what this rule means for the poor voters in the state who usually vote Dem’.


The lady goes on and says that this forces them to travel across the country [huh?] in order to obtain their proof of birth from their state.


What about the fax machine?


Then she said many of these people were born by midwives [many- these people- hmm?]

And they don’t have birth certificates.


One of my daughters was born by a midwife- she has a birth certificate.


My homeless friends are constantly losing their picture I.D.’s- which is an important thing for them to have- and they regularly write- contact their home state of birth- without actually going there- and they get new I.D.’s


I really don’t know why MSNBC calls itself a news station.


Then the wonderful Chris Matthews says ‘they are going back to the days of King Herod- where he made all the world  travel back to their homeland to be taxed’.


Please- Please- try and stick with the news as best as possible- because when you guys delve into the faith- you really screw stuff up.


Oh- I forgot- I also cut out the picture from the article- it shows the most calm picture of Obama I ever did see.

He’s with his wife at some function.

She looks good too- like a happy- sweet angel.

Romney?

He is on a plane- doesn’t look that bad- but maybe a little stressed.

Now- I’m sure they searched high and low for a stressed pic of Romney- this was probably the best they could come up with.

I remember when Newsweek posted a cover picture of Michele Bachman- I mean it was the most insane shot I ever saw- like some wild eyed lunatic.

Yeah- the media do stuff like this- all the time.

People don’t realize they are affected by it- but they are.




Okay- this past week I posted some pics of old friends and I also shared a story about some of these friends with the homeless guys.


So I think I’ll post another ‘post’ right below- one that has some info about these old friends.

So- enjoy your weekend- Oh- if you’re a Black person from the great sate of Penn.- say high to King Herod for me.



[1646] I AM THE RESURRECTION AND THE LIFE-

 The other night I had a weird dream- 2 young guys showed up at my door. They rang the bell and as I opened the door one of the boys said ‘John, do you remember me’. Now- to be honest this has happened lots thru out my life. At the Fire House I would often show up for shift in the morning and the off going shift would say ‘John- one of your convict buddies stopped by yesterday’ [they eventually caught on that lots of the guys I worked with at the jail/prisons knew where they could find me when they got out- and they figured they would catch me at the Fire House].

So stuff like this has happened lots- and there are times when I simply don’t remember who the guy’s are- if you give a bible study 5 years previously- they might remember you- but you might not remember them. So in my dream I told the kid [around 19 years old] ‘to be honest I don’t really remember you- just a little’ [Yes- I admit at times I have said ‘yeah- I think’ just so I wouldn’t offend the brothers].

The boy tells me that I did indeed help him and he won’t forget it. So I fellowshipped a little while. Then the boy asks a strange request ‘John- will you draw me a picture’. Sure- it seemed like something a young boy would ask- but why not. So I drew a picture of the beach and us just sitting there- like Father and son- and he asked me to sign it for him. I gave him the simple request and he seemed like a little boy getting a present from his dad. He talked a little more and as he began to leave he told me his name. He said ‘I’m Texas Ruiz’. And he left.

As I woke up [around 3 a.m.] I didn’t think too much about it. As I started the coffee, getting ready to go in the yard to pray. I remembered who Texas Ruiz was. I mentioned a few weeks ago that I pray for the cases I see in the paper- or on the news- the severe cases of crimes that have been committed. I have a wall of names [around 30 or so] that I paint the names of these people on. They will forever be on my prayer list- so I try and pick cases where the criminal [or victim] has a long lasting result/penalty- so as I pray for them over the years they can benefit from it.

One of the cases was a local one- here in Corpus Christi. The stepdad called 911 and his stepson [around 1 year old] had died. At 1st they thought it was from some natural cause- then they found out the step dad abused the boy and he died from this abuse. I saw the boy on T.V. a lot- being it was local. As Protestants we usually don’t pray for the people who have died- but I actually have felt the Lord challenge me about this over these last few years- and I do pray for the victims sometimes, even though they are dead. When I saw the boy on TV I would just raise my hand towards him and pray that God would be with his soul- I felt real bad for the kid. I did this a few times over about a week. I felt like a ‘dad’ to the kid- just praying for him. The boys name was Texas Ruiz.

There is a verse in Ezekiel 37- God says ‘in the day I raise you up and bring you back from the dead- in that day you will know that I am God’. I wrote this verse down on an ongoing journal type thing- every week I add whatever verse/book I’m studying from- whatever I feel might be significant. So I stuck this verse on the top of the page. A few days went by and I wrote the dream on the same page- I felt it was significant so I wrote it down.

After a few days- while reviewing the page- I saw that on the top it said ‘in the day I bring you back from the grave’ and in the dream- yes one of ‘our people’ did come back- it freaked me out.

In John’s gospel, chapter 11, we read of the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus and his sisters- Martha and Mary- are good friends of Jesus. They lived in a little town named Bethany [the name of my oldest daughter] and for the Jewish people to openly embrace Jesus at the time- it was a sacrifice. Many of the religious leaders already had turned against Jesus.

So one day Lazarus gets real sick and the sisters send word to Jesus ‘Lazarus- your friend- is sick’. Now- Jesus is going all over the place- healing sick people- opening blind eyes- multiplying bread and fish. I mean the sisters must have thought ‘well- at least all the flack we’ve taken over openly befriending Jesus will finally pay off’. But when Jesus hears about Lazarus the bible says he purposefully waited 2 extra days before heading towards Bethany.

Now- after a few days Lazarus did indeed die. The sisters are mad- ‘wow- he healed all these others- strangers- yet no time for us’. When he gets to the outskirts of town Martha goes out to see him ‘Jesus- why didn’t you come? You could have prevented this from happening’. Eventually Mary says the same thing to him. Jesus tells them ‘I am the resurrection and the life’.

The sisters only saw Jesus thru the lens of ‘why didn't you fix the problem when it was still possible’ Jesus was saying ‘it’s still possible’. He was telling them ‘Just because the thing you thought I would do- in life- didn’t happen yet- I can still overcome the devastation that it has caused you’. Jesus of course will raise their brother- it becomes a huge miracle to the point where the religious leaders conspire to kill Lazarus too- because so many Jewish people begin believing in Jesus because of this miracle.

In Ezekiel 37 God told Ezekiel [and the nation of Israel] ‘in the day I bring you back from the dead- in that day you will know I am God’. Today we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. A real event that took place in time and has stood the test of historical examination [too much to cover right now- but take my word for it- the evidence is overwhelming].

Sometimes we are like the sisters of Lazarus- we expected God to prevent the disaster from happening ‘Lord- if you were here this would not have happened’. The test of faith is to continue to believe- even on the other side of the disaster. The problem with Mary and Martha was they felt like Jesus simply did not come thru in time- they heard all these great stories about how Jesus helped all these others- yet they sat at home- with a dead brother and a funeral to attend.

Today I want to challenge you- are you like the sisters? Did God not prevent the disaster from happening? Did he not do for you what he did for the others? You might not see the ultimate ‘healing’ until the resurrection- the ‘last day’- but be assured- in the day he raises you from the dead- you will know that he is God.







[1645] THE CHINGALINGS-

Got an email the other day from one of my old buddies who I haven’t heard from in a few years. He must have googled my name and found the blog site- it’s not hard to find me being my name is on a lot of the posts that I publish.

He was surprised to have heard that I retired; he used to call me up a lot over the years when I was at the fire house. We grew up together in N.J. and he was one of the friends I always kept in touch with. He told me that a mutual friend was still in prison [Rahway, N.J.] I told him ‘yeah- I know’ I have been writing him in prison ever since he first told me about it a few years back.

He finally sent me the ‘rap sheet’ I knew our friend was doing time for a serious offense, just never knew the whole story. As I read the link I pictured in my mind the whole scene. They




Note- Do me a favor, those who read/like the posts- re-post them on other sites as well as the site you read them on. Thanks- John. Don’t forget to scroll down on the timeline [Facebook] - I have posted lots.







No comments:

Post a Comment