Obama & The Woman

Final Count:

Change: 15 times.
Hope: 6 times
Thank You: Lost count
Promise: 30+

While we watched the Obama speech the other night, the only way we could make it interesting was to play a sort-of drinking game minus the drink.

We all took bets. I bet that Obama would say 'change' 23 times and 'hope' 11 times. I lost the bet.

Obama fails me again. And he didn't even say 'Martin Luther King.' Which I had bet on as well. How can you not mention Martin Luther King? Obamas black. It was Kings anniversary.
He totally blew it there. And I probably wouldn't care as much except that I had bet on it and now I have to buy Cassie something nice.

Cassie in some sad turn of events beat me on all counts. Sometimes she is hard to live with.

Overall the speech was boring. It was proof that people can get themselves al worked up as long as you promise them things that are not tangible.

And just when I thought I couldn't be less interested in the current state of politics -



McCain chooses a woman as his running mate.
My thoughts:

Hillary must be ticked off - a hellish inferno of rage that the blasted Republicans chose a woman after her astonishing and close campaign against the current savior of the world Obama.

Hillary must also be laughing a little bit that Obama's thunder was stolen when he had a prime oppertunity to choose a woman himself and he blew it.

Sure, McCain is after some of the Hillary vote - no doubt about it.

But so far this woman - Mrs. Sarah Palin - is the best thing since sliced bread.



First of all - she rocks.
A mother of 5 including a downs baby. How totally awesome. She hunts moose. She knows how to use a gun. She was previously Mrs. Alaska. She lives in Alaska. Her husband works in the oil industry. And when she speaks, she isn't polished. She's like a mother teling her children how its gonna be.

She is such a fresh breath of air.

The only sad thing is I still have to listen to McCain, Obama drone on and on without substance, and watch Bidens overly-polished politicians face.

Is there anyway I can just vote for her?

The Green Beasty (Part Three)

Who hands are these under the earth?




OK.
So we are back at the beginning. God has made the world and man (Genesis 2:1- 2:7).

In 2:8 God plants an orchard called 'Eden' and then 2:15, "The Lord God took the man and placed him in the orchard in Eden to care for and maintain it." The Hebrew word here ( pronounced shamar) could also mean "to work it and keep it."

Shamar is used hundreds of times throughout the Old Testament. Shamar is often used to mean "Protect , watch, guard, careful to keep, Pay attention, make necessary precautions, keep track, Be attentive, be careful, Take note, obey carefully, and so on.

So Adam is in the orchard in Eden and he is Shamaring.
It is interesting to note that here, Adams job is to maintain (all of the above) the trees in the orchard. It is not until he sins is Adam commanded (pronounced) that he will toil in the ground for all his days which happens in 3:17-19.

Now, I bring this up for a reason. God originally had a plan for man - to cultivate that which God had created. To maintain the orchard.

For those of you who don't know (I didn't know so I did some research) - maintaining an orchard isn't easy.
It requires pruning the trees. Checking the fruit. Seeing which trees are growing best. Finding the best soil. Aerating the soil. Fertilizing. Managing the pest population. And so on.

Adam had a tough job ahead of him.

So then, Adam and Eve blow it big time. For us too. And Adam is cursed to toil, making his food grow from the dirt with which he came. A truly sad and ironic turn of events.

And any good business manager will tell you, its easier to maintain than start something new.

But NOTICE this. Adam was originally put in Eden to maintain it. And he failed.

Now he is forced to work the ground. Toiling in dirt all day is a consequence. A punishment. But he must do so if he wants to survive. No more easy free living. No more maintaining fruit already growing nicely on trees.
Nope. He starts with seeds now. And everythings different.

I bring up this story for several reasons.
First, it is one of the only stories in the Bible where we see nature and man in their prime at the same time. Nature is blooming, man is maintaining it, and also benefits from eating the fruit. Its all good, even if for only a moment.

After the fall, the earth and nature aren't benefiting man. Not really. The ground is producing thistles and thorns, and man is having to work his little naked butt off to survive.

This is where we currently are. Or maybe where we should be. But indulge me for a moment in adding what could have come next in the story.


"Then Adam learned how to farm. He built big machines that could farm entire fields in hours. He discovered how to track fish and catch them hundreds at a time. And Adam over produced because he made a fortune selling his food to other people. And rather than working for what he needed - Adam got all he could. He lived by the motto - Get Rich or Die Trying."

Ok - true. Maybe a little far fetched.

But God made the garden, orchard, and put man into it. And man was given the responsibility to maintain it. And he failed.

Does his failure mean we also shouldn't do our part in maintaining nature as God has created it? Should we live by the philosophy - We do because we can?

I don't think so.

I think God's original setting is what we should be going for. Even if we can't achieve it fully. We should try to maintain, to take care of, to watch over nature.

But I can't just leave it at this. I have to make my final point.
God didn't put Adam in the garden to maintain it and worship the garden. To obsess about the garden. To put the garden above the one who created it.
It is easy to get so obsessed with trying to save a fallen world and in the process forget how all this nature got here to begin with.

And the really scary thing is this.

What do you think will tick God off more? Doing a crappy job at maintaining nature which he created? Or forgetting about God in the process of mission go-green?

To sum up.
We only have one world to live in. One world that produces that which humanity needs to survive. We should respect nature and do our part in Shamaring it. We shouldn't be overfishing, overproducing, overeating.
But most of all, we should honor the one who is the true provider - God. The one who created it all to begin with.

Peace out homies.