Stocks Start the Year With A Bang - washingtonpost.com

This article was written by my son and of course I am honored to post it on my blog.  I am proud of what he has to say:

Well a jolly good start, in comes a new year and a new hope. Not looking at the financial aspect, or at what our government has tried to do to jump start the system, simply looking at the hope communicated. Just looking what the media and our leaders are saying and pointing out. The message is simple; a new year changes everything. We all want the problems of 08 to stay in the past, and to start new in 09. Despite the fact that, as anticipated, this Christmas shopping year was the worst in decades the market too is hoping for blue skies ahead.

Happy talk, the concept of bringing good news where it is wanted, whether it is needed or not. We are all hoping that’s not what is happening, that we really have seen the bottom and we are coming out of all of the troubles last year. Still you can see that desire even in this article as Fred Dickson says “here's a psychological lift to starting off the year on solid footing." there is a desire to look at the bright side and for everyone to spend, lend and quote, shift us back up to our potential. One of the most watched statistics is the consumer confidence level, and this is the goal to boost that level in order to get us spending again so that nothing has to change. I guess it is as close to looking into the future as we can get. By glancing at how consumers are feeling they decide on whether they need more products, what orders to place and maybe even if they need to make some hard designs. Yet, it is not the future for no man really knows what tomorrow holds.

About this time, I am most likely sounding as if I not only think the glass is half-empty but that we need to worry because it is almost gone. That is simply not the truth I am glad the market is off to a good start and I would love for the economy to pick back up us to get our jobs back and just hit a restart button on last year. What I am longing to hear is not that we need change, or that it is not that bad. We need to hear a solution to what is happening, and I am not talking about a quick fix, about the short term, about re-inflating a dangerous bubble. No, I am talking about a true solution, for our leaders to start leading the way into the New Year. Not by saying it is all ok, putting on a new suit and trying to look as though it is not happening, but setting the example taking off the jacket rolling up the sleeves and getting to work. For our leaders must be willing to do what needs to be done, not to be afraid to offend some people, if it is what we need! But I am getting off topic, the point is that there is a lot of talk and still no one knows without a doubt what will be done.

I said that no man knows what the futures holds and I meant it. No human knowledge can look into tomorrow and know what to do today. Yet for the Christian we know that there is one whose Vision time cannot cloud out. We recognize that Our Lord knows what is to come, as well as what has passed. Though it looks dark, we know that if we trust in the Lord we cannot go wrong. If we put our trust in the Lord, we will be all right. We can put our trust in the Lord, knowing that in our darkest hour He is with us. We can trust that The Lord rises up leaders. The Lord works in the hearts of kings. The Lord used Babylon to bring Israel back to Him, He used a Roman Emperor to bring Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem where Jesus was to be born.  The Lord can use who He wants to accomplish His will. Trust in The Lord, not in a candidate or some piece of Monetary Policy. We don’t know, maybe 09 will be the year we have been waiting on for 2000 years, the year he brings us all home. What we do know is that the old year is over a new year is here. Although there is nothing magical about January 1 it does have a since of a clean slate ready for what the Lord will do. So as we start a new year don’t put your trust in what people say or do, and whether this is the time we are pulling up or if we have to go farther down before we start to come up, nevertheless trust in the Lord.

By Dubin Marks

http://mindworthy.mypodcast.com  

Stocks Start the Year With A Bang - washingtonpost.com

Uneasy triumvirate behind Gaza strikes - Washington Post- msnbc.com

So what if Israel uses this defense politically.  What ever their motivations are, one thing is clear, they are defending themselves.  I am of the opinion that they should do what ever it takes to secure their boarders permanently.  I believe that this action would ultimately bring peace to the region as a whole.  The issue is these terrorist must be stopped. 

This feuding isn't for land, it is because as long as the Jewish people exist, a lot of these Palestinians are the children of Ishmael son of Hagar and Abraham.  He is a son of another mother and not the descendant that God choose.  It was Isaac who was born of Sarah and Abraham.  Isaac is the one that God chose to be the descendant's of the Messiah.  If you read the Bible you will see God offered a covenant for Ishmael and his descendants too.  The question is, did they honor the covenant then or today?  To read for yourselves its in chapters 16-19 of the Book of Genesis

Bill Collier

http://mindworthy.mypodcast.com

Uneasy triumvirate behind Gaza strikes - Washington Post- msnbc.com

Israel mulls halting Gaza strikes, official says - Israel-Palestinians- msnbc.com

With all of the rhetoric out there, the one and only fact remains.  Lets say that the country you live close to is controlled by the Hamas.  You found yourself very close if not in the line of fire where these rockets were landing and exploding.  Would you continue to cheer for those poor little people who continue to launch the rockets?  Or would you be crying out to your government to do something about it? 

In the land of Israel every person pretty much has immediate family or close friends who have been killed or wounded by rockets, suicide bombers, or snipers.  Along there highway they have had to build these high concrete walls just to keep the snipers from shooting at people driving in their cars.  How would you like to live in this state of existence? 

The title of this article to me, seems weird.  I have difficulty believing that Israel would mull anything over when it comes to the safety of their country.  I hope they continue to bombard the Hamas until they are confident that the rockets cease completely.  If they start up again?  Well, start up the warplanes and put a stop to it.  The punishment must fit the crime for the criminal to realize their cost.

I say the long suffering and patients of Israel should be commended and the world should universally condemn the Hamas for being the evil that they are.  Come on, the desire for peace and the willingness to negotiate for that peace is the sign of innocence and honesty.  To continue to launch rockets while your leaders are negotiating?  Innocence, or honesty?  No, just plain old evil!

Bill Collier

http://mindworthy.mypodcast.com

Israel mulls halting Gaza strikes, official says - Israel-Palestinians- msnbc.com

Life’s Parasites, Pleasures, and Possibilities

We go through life living these peculiar lives, absorbing things around us, enduring the unknown.  Everything effecting us, influencing our actions, directing our paths.  It seems at times that it is quite insane, even the feeling of how can I go on with things like this.  Only to give way in the next moment to a feeling of bliss as something good happens.  It’s crazy at times, yea real crazy, but we go on, enduring and enjoying, being entertained if we can step back in our heads and take a look at the bigger picture.

I think the biggest problem we have is that we are so into ourselves, caught up in what we are going through, saying to others “you just don’t understand me”.  We live blind to the basic truth that is all around us, “Life”.  So we come back to that basic question that each one of us have to ask, and I believe do quite regularly.  What’s it all about?  Why am I here?  What for?  Even in this dilemma, we have the feeling that makes us say “Time please stop, so I can rest”

I don’t believe there is any human being that has the right or complete answer.  I believe it is something that is necessary for us to look away from ourselves, if we want to in any way understand this dilemma called Life.  There are those that do this in a partial sort of way.  Maybe give the appearance of doing this only to be discovered down the road of life to be stuck on themselves.  Maybe that is the best we can do to accomplish this task, maybe the point is to keep striving to accomplish this quest of perfection or completeness.

I have no clue what made me write this other than Inspiration.  A sort of boiling within me wanting to get out.  You see I believe I have found this Truth of Life, and I found myself so dissatisfied with what I had accomplished in my life that I had to look away, knowing there was nothing left in me that could answer my questions.  Being a realist and maybe I don’t know exactly what that means, but for me what ever I found outside of me had to be real.  I’m not a follower, nor am I one who can lye to myself, well not for long.  So it must be real, period.

To my surprise the Answer of Life was right next to me all the time.  He was there speaking to me in a soft voice that dripped like honey with His Love for me, the most perfect love that required me to learn about it, just to understand.  It didn’t happen all at once for me to understand, it took time, and I had to learn His Love.  Yes it took Life to do that, I had to begin living with Him involved in my life, I had to listen, and apply, and obey His direction for my life.  As I did, there was a sensation of awakening, a feeling like I had just got my sight, I could see for the first time.  My perspective on life had changed and I was no longer thinking like me, but I found myself thinking like Him.  Everything was new, everything was beginning to make sense. 

Thinking like me just caused me to live a life of wanting, and always what I didn’t have.  Contentment and satisfaction were impossibilities, and only my futile attempt at attaining this level of security which was just show for others.  Until I became honest with myself and confessed that I needed God to keep living.  Now I know that there is no life away from God, because HE IS LIFE!  His Love for us He expressed in His Son Jesus the Christ, not in words but in action, in Life. 

He came to our planet and lived like us, even looking like us, enduring life just as we do in all of the issues we face.  Not only did He survive, but endured the worst punishment that man can dish out, even the rejection of His own Father God.  Jesus could have just entered Heaven, because He lived the Perfect Life, but He choose to take my punishment which is death, because of my rebellion against God. 

So I understand and appreciate this life I now live.  To my surprise the life I lived wasn’t even life at all, I was just groping in the dark trying to find meaning.  Well Jesus didn’t let me stay there in that state of uncertainty, He lifted me up to a life with Him.  A life that is based on contentment and satisfaction in Jesus and living in His presence for the rest of my life in peace with God my Father.  No more rebellion insisting on my own way, but now God’s way because it is the right way.  And you know what?  I can’t help but tell you this, you know when you have a good thing you want everyone to have it?  Well Jesus is the “Good Thing”, and I can’t understand now, why anyone would want to live another minute without Him in your life.  So if you don’t know Jesus, or you have wandered away from Him.  Call His Name ask Him to forgive you and come into your life, and He will, I know it, because He is real.

Bill Collier

http://mindworthy.mypodcast.com