THE LAST DAYS OF SODOM

The Last Days of Sodom

Patterns behaviors what we run to when the chips are down. When life gets ugly and sometimes yes when we are treated unfairly. For people like me and some of you who read this we know all to well how easy the fix is. What was once a harmless retreat into the recesses of the mind turns into obsession that will kill everything good. I have been very open and candid about my drug addiction because it brings me to a place of healing. The more people that know I struggle still even in my sobriety and recovery with thoughts and desires to retreat to the simple ways of life (meth). Is the more people who can help me and guard me and hold me accountable.

I have also written about the plight and desolation of our society as we know it from domestic violence from prostitution and human trafficking.. I have been pretty much on a soap box about issues that won’t be fixed simply by attacking the supply of  the sin. We are supposed to be on a mission to take out the demand. Starting with me.

I have challenged all who read my blog to consider the times we live in. How evil actually does prevail over good in our country. How men have become lovers of  themselves forsaking the truth for a lie. I have brought to the forefront in my blog issues that are not pulpit topics nor should they be. And I have challenged all of us to become better at loving the next closest person to us without prejudice or fear of rejection.

These are the LAST DAYS OF SODOM. And I believe there is a voice crying in the desert saying behold the KINGDOM OF GOD IS AT HAND!! It is the voice of a remnant few. The few that read the few that pray the few that reach out despite colossal failure rates despite appearing to lose the battle. I don’t believe the message of repent is one for the world in general today I believe it is for me and for you the believer. Are we like Sampson who slept with the enemy the very thing he was at war with. I think in some sense it is all of us.

Being in recovery is not just pinpointed to drug addiction or alcohol addiction. All you have to do to be in recovery is to have lost something which sin one sin committed puts all of us in the same boat. We all are in some form of recovery and we all in some way need that supernatural touch of Jesus to heal our land and our people.

There are things I did not write about as well and until now have never spoke of them. Like the rising unemployment rate. The decreasing value of the dollar aka yen. The fact that despite all the corrections and rate reductions property values are continuing to plummet and people are still being foreclosed and kicked out of their homes.  I have not ventured into the political arena and spoke about Gay marriage legal in six states. I have not talked about Medicare and social security crisis our country is in.  Have we not heard enough I think we are all desensitized to this message its like beating a dead horse. But yet look close brothers and sisters ..all these things we complain about we are guilty of. Yet we think we can brow beat the world with the Bible and make changes. Our actions should always and will always be louder then our words. We cannot continue to mix seed good and bad and plant it in soil and expect a great return.

I have written over the last yr of my blog about loving people. Reaching people because I need encouragement in that area. We are all hurt we are all wounded in some way. But its in our actions of love that Jesus said the world will know you are my deciples. Not in how well you pray in the Church or how elegant your testimony is spoken from the podium. Not in doing a million outreaches (but by all means continue to do them) but by your love for one another.

In the LAST DAYS OF SODOM there has to be something different about what we as Christians do if we are going to make a difference in our community family city town and in the world. We cannot just be the sounding board of change without being the vessel of loving the people we are called to change. Why is this such a hot topic for me? Because I have been guilty of doing nearly every sin known to man. I have committed sins of the social acceptable the ones we say were just human. And I have done the very grotesque and socially unacceptable. And I struggle with desires to go back to the old way of life nearly daily. What keeps me here is the love of God that was shed abroad in my heart starting with the people who met me in my junk and rejected me not. The people who loved me despite my drug addiction and the behaviors that accompanied it. What helps me continue to transform is the true discipleship of love that were all required to partake in both in giving and receiving.

Asking for help is never easy. Its easy sometimes to be fake and pretend everything is ok when its not. My ambition is to be accepted and trusted and you know what its healthy and good to strive for those things. But in the process of desiring to be accepted and trusted sometimes when I need help I have not gotten it out of fear of being judged or condemned.

Today I took a step in the right direction I am going to get the help that I need. At all costs I am going to stay sober and alive. And I am not ashamed to admit I skipped some things in my initial recovery because I wanted to fit in I wanted to be seen as healed and whole. And I placed my self into a denial state in some areas of my life to hide my shortcomings.

One of the first things I ever wrote said Recovery is a way its not to be taken lightly. And that is the realist thing I have ever written. That battle largely is waged in our minds. I am sharing this with you today because we have to be willing to be exposed like Christ on that Cross if were going to defeat the devil. The Last Days of Sodom are upon us. And I am not willing to be turned to stone because I keep turning back. 

I also expose this part of me because there are a lot of people in recovery who keep falling despite being saved. Despite all the public performance. I am not saying they all need intensive counseling like me but if you do don’t be afraid to admit to your self and seek it. Its time to heal once and for all.

I am making through this time in my life because I am willing to admit this and act on it. I am sober and alive because I have a great support system in place that loves me for me. I am so thankful there is solutions to problems today. And I am going to walk into the solutions. Thanks for reading this. I am going to take some time off from blogging. Because it is time to go back to square one and do things the right way for me.  I love you all for your support. While I am away please share anything I have written with other people who can benefit from this and please post praise reports and prayer requests on our DADDY SEES ALL WALL.  And don’t be afraid of change or crisis because its in these things Gods love and mercy are shinning the brightest.

Love you all.

LIVING TO DEATH

Living to Death

Why continue to try? Why not give up? Shoot it is what people expect right. 70% of all marriages in my county end in divorce…Every tv show my wife and I watch is hosted by a homosexual..(which is designed by the enemy this way to soften our defenses and become more acceptance of that lifestyle) Crime is up ..the economy is getting worse not better (despite what you will hear during the election that is forth coming) People aren’t just losing their careers they are losing their homes and families. 51% of all evangelical Pastors in an anonyms survey confessed to be dealing with some sort of Porn obsession. Children are being molested abandoned and left to raise them selves by parents who have not caught on to the concept no matter how many incomes you have coming into the house it will never be enough…If you look close to the facts statements statistics and stances that I take you will be left to agree I am actually portraying it in a modest light.  What is it all for? Why continue to fight.

My wife and I went to a movie this Sunday. And it dawned on me that people spend more money at a movie theater then they put in their local churches offering plate…We spent 7.00 on popcorn 3.75 on a soda and 3.50 on goobers 15.00 to get in that adds up to roughly 30.00 Then we went in and we were assaulted by language and sexual innuendo one after another to the point where we had to leave 25 minutes into the movie.  We come home to watch tv and it’s a TV show with an ultra positive story line about people overcoming obesity and if you pay attention to the details in the show you will notice that the host is a homosexual and his friends in the show are homosexual. Without becoming totally facebook spiritual here I have to keep it real. Christians this is our fault.

Not because we did not write enough books because Lord knows we sure have done enough of that…Not because we did not put enough conferences on or make enough DVD series …or because we did not create the right variety of ministries …its because while we were sleeping at the wheel while we were watching porn cheating on our husbands and wives while we were working two full time jobs…while we were buying property painting the inside throwing some new shingle on and selling it for 4 times what we paid for it while we were busy being distracted by debating values and beliefs with people who have no morality (our state and fed god.)  We were not busy using our gifting in the arena God designed us to…We were not raising our kids and were still not we allow the TV to do so and by doing this our children are being raised by homosexuals and fairy tail princess and princes (the bachelorette) and reality tv that is anything but reality. While we were being enticed by ever greed and lust. We gave our country to Satan. While we were busy worried about an atomic bomb or the Taliban taking our country over while we were watching for this troll looking Staten to enter the room we were seduced by the smooth speaking silver tongued beautiful thing that gave us a lot of money and ability to indulge…we have been living to death.

Do you remember that part in the Matrix where the guy decides that reality sucks and he wants to go back in so he does and he says I know this isn’t a real steak but it sure tastes like one. And you can feel the bliss and pleasure as he takes a bite….

We have been duped. This is why I don’t watch tbn or daystar or prescribe to just anyone in a set of gator or snakeskin shoes with a silk suit. Because I am no dummy there is no place the enemy hasn’t infiltrated and I am not willing to compromise myself into listening to man any longer. Chasing man and his word like I did when I was a crack head on the street.  Pookie from New Jack City just give me a hit B. Sorry not me …

I am no longer living to death. Sure I watch TV go to the movies and I am going to keep my job and support my family but I am no longer whisked away by the charm and deceit of the enemy and when the Lord says move from my job I am out like last yrs federal budget…I make money today but I don’t serve it and im not a slave to it either. It is brought to me to be put to use by me not the other way around.  

I have hope because there are other people who believe like me that we don’t need more fake facebook updates that we post the latest cool phrase that we find on Google…that there are real people who are making the same changes I am and guess what they are all internal…they are not standing on a soap box at the state capital wasting our tax payer dollars trying to change a system that is destined to only bring death…and they are turning to their next closest association and doing acts of love to them…they don’t get bitter bear faced they are not negative. and when hell breaks lose instead of infighting they find ways to solve problems.

I think we have heard read and seen enough of the best that man has to offer…and now its time to listen to Gods bid on this job site. Let him clean up this mess and if were fortunate He just might use one of us in the process.

SHALOM

SHALOM

Sweats, chills, shortness of breath, light headedness , dizziness, lack of focus, lost sleep, memories and images of long ago. My attitude sucks I am grumpy irritable and want to isolate myself and be alone. I am becoming somewhat paranoid. Having delusional thoughts from time to time. As much as I try to fight them off they seem to make sense in all this. I have been going through this escapade for some time now. This is what I would call a colossal craving.

I am not one to make excuses nobody did this to me. I did this to myself. This is the price you pay when you think you can do drugs even one time and quit anytime you feel like it.  I have been fighting this addiction from relapse to relapse with one goal in mind to only fight it from craving to craving. Today is graduation day I guess huh. I have never in my life ever resisted anything this powerfull. Anyone who tells you that methamphetamines is not addictive is a liar. That was a myth I used to prescribe to. Yet look where I always end up when I use.  Last time I used I took pictures of a wall with my phone because I honestly thought there was writing on the wall for me and I wanted to prove I was not hallucinating …only I was hallucinating . I have blacked out several times lost lots of time that I cant account for. And this is me saying how lucky I am to maybe not remember anything.

Today I went to work I kept my job I preformed at a high level and still my mind was obsessed. This is not a plea for sympathy it’s a fact read this share this with your kids if you do drugs you might die. But for certain if you do drugs you will have to eventually go through exactly what I am going through. Its not a joke its not something to be taken lightly.  This is a regular battle that I placed my self in.

The most difficult thing I have to do in life is the simplest thing that I once did. Stay Sober. Once you cross the threshold of sobriety to insanity even once you will never be the same. Your life is forever altered and changed and there is nothing you can do about. But endure. Statistically speaking getting clean for the rest of your life would be an abnormality. Recovery from meth has a 98% failure rate. That saying that only 2% of people like me actually make it without using again.  I honestly don’t know anyone I have ever met who used meth even once who has ever maintained sobriety.

Sometimes the most effective thing you can do is hold on and pray cry and speak to the Lord. Its my sin that brought this on so Its my sin that is breaking my heart. I am just thankful today to be forgiven and justified and hid in Christ.  I am so thankful for the life the wife the job and the friends God has given me…what is so sad is in a moment with a lost focus I would throw it all away.  I am just being real here because I think for once someone has to. There is so many questions. I get an inbox message at least once a week with someone asking me how they can get clean stay clean or help a family member or friend. I can’t fake this any longer the truth is I don’t know. The only thing that I have found that works for me is putting myself on blast to my wife (who always loves and accepts me) to journal like I am now or to a good friend. There is something about confessing my weakness that takes the sting away from the enemies darts. But honestly people there is no fancy formula…If there was and I knew it I would not have went through what I went through this week.

We can say a lot of things in our testimonies. Look I grew up around drugs. I watched my loved ones do drugs and did drugs with them. I have sold drugs I have associated with almost every kinda of scum you can imagine and at one time I was that scum. I am no victom. None of us are. This is where in the boat storm raging rather then God calling out to stop the storm I am choosing to draw out and receive His peace. He did say get in the boat lets journey to the other side. And I am going to grit my teeth and endure this. I want what HE has for me on that other side. It aint a beauty pagent its life and I am in it for good. It might look ugly to someone out there but I hope my ugly can help atleast one person not do drugs. Thanks for reading this and caring about my life. Shalom

JOURNEY TO THE ABYSS

The Journey To The Abyss

Peace love joy charity tenderness kind heartedness think on these things and you won’t gratify or fulfill the deeds of the flesh. Each journey to the abyss of sin is always preceded by a thought. Each journey to the place of sin is always followed by some form of separation and death. Not the literal type but the type that still can leave you cold like a corpse but walking around in life.  There is a cost a steep cost a horrible price that is paid by all of us when we take that journey. Your journey might be different then my journey but the destination is all the same. 

Having a good preventative maintenance plan is very critical. Take myself. What do I do with the thoughts that wake me up at night sometimes. The desires that through no fault of anyone but myself I have to fend off. Well honestly I don’t have those answers down pat. The super spiritual world of Sundays School that place where we like to sound wise and educated says those are the moments when I take them to the Lord. Ok I do that but then I still fall. I struggle with a ton of duel associations. So as soon as I overcome one I am slapped in the face with another. How many people struggle in a similar fission only Chrystal Methemphentimes and Porno isn’t the vehicle that you have used to take your trip to the abyss. How many people got dumped on the phone and every time they hear a phone ring it triggers a fear and a memory. The association is with pain so to prevent having this triggered memory one might keep their phone completely off. That’s not freedom that’s avoidance.

We have got to start dealing with root causes and real issues. Question How does one go about doing just that? Well I think the  Paul put it best when he says to not even speak of the deeds done in the darkness and basically not to even spend anytime discussing it or entertaining it either. But to instead of fighting evil by focusing on the evil I think the secret ingredient is so counter to what our natural instincts tell us that we miss it when he wrote and said to set our minds on the things above.  Focus on the fulfilling the fruits of the spirit….get busy doing something good speaking something good and edifying someone else’s life.

The trips I have taken back to the abyss were so costly not just to my own personal testimony but to the hopes and dreams of the great cloud of witnesses who are looking for an example of someone who can display the Grace and courage of Christ in the midst of all hell breaking lose. I have to be the first to admit Satan never had to push me too much to get me over the edge. He just had to provide the opportunity and means and the choice was so easy. Endure discomfort and pain or get immediate pleasure. At some point and time in my own walk the journey and the cost of the journey has got to become so pointless and senseless that the temptation is not even an issue.

What I have learned is this no matter what my circumstances no mater how life is going for me at the time. Good or bad. I have found a way to justify myself in the moment of choice for choosing to gratify the deeds of the flesh. Have I ever seen what is on the other side of the storm ..mabey a couple of times at most. 

I have to be honest there are times weekly that I struggle with my grip on sanity. I am baffled by my own immaturity and broken at the thought of my sin and betrayal of the Lord.  And its those moments moments like last night and tonight when I realize I am exactly where God wanted me to be and who God wanted me to be. That despite my failures and my downfalls I am not junk I am a child of God.  And its in the moments of lack of control when I realize I never was in control.

Peace be still are the words Jesus used to calm the storm. But today He would say those words to the people in the storm. Peace Be Still. No more trips to the abyss. No more hiding from pain or confrontation. Today the Lord declares a new day. WE don’t even have to discuss the deads that were done in the darkness because we have so much goodness to discuss about the works done in the light. Where is your focus?

INDEPENDENCE DAY

Independence Day

Independence day. A day that represents freedom. A day that signifies and exemplifies what America stands for and a day that is set aside to remember what our forefathers fought died and stood for. Yet when you look across our embattled land we see through flesh stained glasses people committing atrocities against each other. Abortions , Gay marriage, Divorces, Incarceration, Drug use, the list goes on. It goes on in more controversial issues the consequences of these things spread out and carry penalties to 4^th and 5^th generations on down the line.  We have a national debt. That exceeds the trillions. We have teen pregnancy out of control which imprisons families into poverty. Houses being foreclosed on left and right. Unemployment rates on the rise. This is our country the land of the free?  Freedom of what? Were more free in our country to today then ever to get food stamps and social services and benefits then ever. Recently it was asked of people in my Fellowship to write briefly on a wall what we love about our country. And people when challenged to do such a task might not be referring to the country we live in today. But the country that we were once before.

We once were free to express our faith in public forums. That right has been replaced by political correctness and the agenda of the far left to restrict or Christian heritage from being expressed because we might offend the atheist Muslim or Homosexual. The complete perversion of our cause now because we no longer get to state our cause but they do for us on extreme political tv shows and they use bazaar examples of one guy burning Korans to say that Christians are against Muslims and homosexuals. Which is completely false. Real Christians are no such thing we are against the acts of homosexuality but we stand for the homosexual and pray with and for them in love for their repentance and salvation because our savior hung for them. Yet if we do this in public we can be arrested in some places now.

We have allowed our freedoms to ruin us in other areas. Were free to divorce and divorce we have and this has caused tremendous strains on our economy too. LOOK IT UP FOR YOUR SELF. And because we have not honored marriage we have no credibility to say even what it means the enemy has hijacked the word which is a biblical word and perverted and now six states have legalized gay marriage. Our freedom to divorce has destroyed the fabric of the Christian home and ruined family trees everywhere.

Freedom to choose life or death abortion or no abortion…the economic strain abortion has caused to me is painfully obvious. A whole generation of people have been disallowed from pursing goods and services because we have taken our freedom to choose and used it to choose wrong.

These three freedoms the freedom to live without being killed at conception the freedom to pray and express our real faith which is love the freedom to stay married to one woman and raise up Godly offspring has been stripped and replaced by the counterfeit.

Yet today I am so thankful because today I am still in a country where writing this does not get me thrown into prison. Where even if most Christians think it to be extreme exaggeration I am free to still disagree in love and say that I am free to repent and live my life free to love and express it the way God tells me too.

I read in the bible about a whole nation of people who prayed for independence and were granted it but knew not what to do with this independence. And eventually even wished they were still in bondage..

We can make choices with our independence and freedom that consequences lead straight to bondage. When we stopped fearing God and started serving mammon we made choices that did just that.

Today my challenge to all who read this is to seek true independence by repenting. Let our House get cleaned and circumcised today. There is no better freedom then the freedom found in Christ. Happy Independence day to all who choose to do just that. Its never too late and were never too far. 

DIRTY WATER

Dirty Water

When I was a child I used to get thirsty when I was playing outside. And as much as I wanted to go inside and get some water or juice the hose connected to the  water spicket outside was much more inviting and accommodating to me. I was lazy.  The one thing I remember about that darn hose or any hose for that matter even though systematically I was full my thirst was quenched for the moment the water though never was very satisfying in fact it was bitter. I was a child and like any child I had no clue what was in the water that I had been ingesting.  Any number of things could have spawned from this ..dysentery,  the runs, hepatitis, shoot maybe even good ole fashion e coli. As I got older and learned of the junk that is in spiket water I made an educated change of strategy and begin drinking good water straight from the facet. Hehehehe . Then I graduated to bottled water and filtered water.

How does someone change their culture their confession their perception from negative to positive.. Well just like the water I used to drink that was in some cases only meant to be used for irrigation …I have discovered it is vitally important for me to spend a lot of time considering the words I ingest the images my brain gets exposed to and the conversations I allow my self to listen too. You can take a perfectly clean cup right out of your cabinet and if you fill it with nasty toilet water it is going to be dirty as well. The same concept applies to us as people we can be perfectly cleansed forgive and set free from many strongholds and bondage but by the things we examine and allow our selves to listen to we can by proxy or directly become re infected again. How powerful are words anyways one might ask? Well words are so Powerful God chose to use words to create all things.

I have seen this played out in my life. If I am honest usually before every fall or every set back for me it is preceded with a conversation that is just complete junk. I allowed words to settle into my earls flow into my brain like a seed they take root and without fail I am all screwed up in most cases in worse shape then the day I first accepted Christ. And if people took notice they would never know I was a Christian. Proverbs says to guard your heart with all diligence because out of it springs the issues of life.  I don’t believe that proverb is referring to sharing things that we love or care about with others. I believe it is referring to an outside attack that can and will take place. It is spoken in a defense mode to guard is never referred to in any language or in any text in an offensive manner only in defensive portrayals. Well to begin to do this we must set up boundaries with our ears and eyes. Not let anything that could take root in our heart negative enter.

If we drink bitter water eventually we will become bitter. So if we continuously take in bitter communication we will become bitter. In all the reading I have done in all the sermons I have heard I have never in one passage or one sermon ever heard or read where Jesus entertained any kind of gossip or negative talk. Jesus took dominion over it. He guarded his heart by setting healthy boundaries.. He even once called peter the devil. Hehehe.

So much of my recent entries have been based on healthy outward communication. Yet to have healthy outward communication and expression of love we first must not just be a clean cup that will receive any kind of water. We must be the cup the refuses water that has not been filtered by the Holy Spirit. Because like a clean cup once dirty water gets in it the only thing we can do is contaminate other cups. Eventually all of our cups do over flow but its what were overflowing with that really matters. Hence the phrase garbage in garbage out.  Lets today decide that we are nolonger going to drink dirty water. Lets drink only living water.

UNLEASHED LOVE

Unleashed Love

The wealthiest people in life, the most successful people in life, the most sought after people in life, and the greatest innovators of life are all problem solvers. Not problem finders.

It needs to be stated that anyone with a pulse can walk into any room and situation and any circumstance and find problem and fault. There is absolutely nothing special about that.  The skill and gift of solving the problem is rare.

How many times have you called out to a friend. How many times have you had a situation you needed to talk about so you call a friend or go meet with someone. You pour your heart out you spill your insides out to them and without even a pause your friend is reinforcing all the negatives that you just shared. Or they pull their bible out and read scriptures to you and begin a venture of showing you how unspiritual you are.  We have a problem in the Body of Christ.  We have an issue. One that has been drilling my heart for some months now but I have not bothered to share because I am not a problem finder I am a problem solver.  But to get to the solution we have got to understand the totality of the problem we have to see this thing and the damage it is doing.

There is no shortage of books and Christian motivational speakers. And Mens ministry is on the rise which on the outside looking in or to the surface observer you would think that the Body of Christ is filled with a multitude of strong God fearing people loving men. And I will give you the bennifift of the doubt. I am not trying to be over critical hear. But there is a growing segment of men in our Body and locol fellowships that are hurting. They are wounded. And we have begun retreating we have stopped sharing our burdens with eachother and we no longer cofess our sins to one another the way the bible says to.  I believe its because we as a body have lost the art of just listening and loving.  We all want to be the solution minded people God created us to be and we all want to be the person with the golden nugget of truth that unveils sin exposes it and heals it all in one fail swoop. We read the books take the seminars sit in the front row take notes and get all fired up then when John from such and such church reaches out to us we hear the headlines of the stuff then we begin quoting him all the TBN footstomping good doctrine we just learned and show this man how spiritual we have become through all the books we have read…What happens next is crazy. John hurting recognizes that something is not right can’t place his finger on it exactly but doesn’t respond with oh my goodness your so right response. So what we do is throw a coleism at him or tell him to just man up.

We failed to listen …we failed to love this person. We failed to respond with the heart and mind of  Christ in compassion. Now John is not just wounded by the original thing but now has another burden to carry because we as his brothers did not sit silent and listen.

Listening to someone is loving them in a very intimate way. Not just hearing them. Right now I have my tv on in the background I hear it loud and clear but I am not listening to it. The art of listening is gone….It breaks my heart.  Now guyes like that fictitious John don’t share they keep their burdens bottled up they don’t confess their sins to eachother because we spend more time condemning the actions and judging the situation then we do seeing and loving the people in them. Jesus came and concerned himself not with the surrounding circumstances time and again. We read so often the verbal responses that Jesus shared but we gloss over the times he remained silent.  He listened. He did not just hear.

I want to get back to listening in my life so I can do a better job of loving the people I am around.  The solution is actually not more words they have already been spoken we have heard them all. The solution is not more books they have all been written.  The solution is more listening. I am so greatful that I have people in my life who care enough about me to just listen at times. I am so greatful that I am loved.