Tag Archives: life

The Gift of Christmas

Christmas is a wonderful time of year. Time off from school or work. Time with family and friends. Inspiring music fills the air and soul with joy. Dramatic plays direct our minds to real meaning of this holiday.

The history of Christmas go back beyond the man named Saint Nicolas, who went around giving gifts to make people merry. He is as real today as in medieval times. A number of years ago he was seen driving a red and white Cadillac and visiting hospitals and orphanages throughout the United States. Yes, his white hair, beard and mustache are not fake, neither is his fat belly or name: Saint Nicholas. Santa Clause must be a modern make-over for commercial reasons. How St. Nick got the name Kris Kringle is anyone’s guess. What we do know is history leads us back to ancient times when Christmas actual began.

It was around 4 BC, when angels appeared to a group of shepherds, most likely on their way to the annual Jewish Festival of Booths, announcing the birth of the long awaited messiah. During this festival, people of Israel celebrated their freedom that began with the Exodus experienced by their ancestors. Around the same time, Parthia’s ambassadors, also called Magi, came to Jerusalem accompanied by a military escort, looking for the newly born Messiah-king of Israel. Along with indigenous Jews, they too came to celebrate the prospect of liberty from Rome’s imperial influence. The disturbing problem for King Herod and Caesar by the magi’s visit was the fact that Parthia was an independent kingdom with whom Rome has a military truce based on formal treaties. What could they do about representatives of a foreign power creating expectations of a new messianic era of independence?

The expectations and hope spread by the magi, shepherds, and even priests were not to be fulfilled. The boy conceived during the Festival of Lights–a celebration of freedom and salvation–and born during the festival of the an even more ancient experience of God’s salvation and independence from dehumanizing bondage—was destined to save the world from an even more ancient evil: bondage to sin. It is this power over human thought and behavior that Jesus was sent by God to destroy, and not the empire of Rome. This would come in God’s predetermined time.

The power of sin is the prevailing source of all the human atrocities, wars, moral crimes, envy, jealousy, pride and greed that motivate violence and murder, resulting in poverty, social disintegration, distrust, alienation, divorce, and the like. In infant innocence, Jesus came via the manager to deliver humanity from the power and consequences of sin.

The real difference between Exodus and “the Cross” is this: Exodus liberated socially, politically and economically; it changed social status, resulted in a new political amenability, created greater potential for economic independence, and was intended to produce a new social morality reflecting God’s nature. Jesus’s birth, death and resurrection accomplishes the same but by changing human nature, which is accomplished by the overmastering power of God’s spirit. This is the Spirit who created the first sinless human, and recreated a second sinless human to redeem the progeny of the first, which includes us. If this babe who came via Bethlehem’s manger is taken seriously as God’s light and covenant, then God is free to accomplish his redemptive goal in and through our lives, society and world. For the life of baby Jesus is a model of the God who delivers from every form of bondage and the power behind it. Amenable to his word and rule, liberty and prosperity of soul and society produce peace, joy and good will. As God leads the way through adversity and opposition, Christ empowers loyal believers to a good and eternal life in God’s kingdom.

Why not accept God’s Christmas gift.

Presidential Candidates’ Stand on Life Issues

Live Action, known for its investigative journalism,came out with a guide to the position of the candidates running for president and vice-president. Those candidates are Republicans Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan as well as Democrat incumbents Barak Obama and Joe Biden.

After stating each candidate’s stand of the right to life, the guide present historical statements and positions of each candidate to prove the validity of each candidates views.

To read or download a copy of the guide, go to http://liveactionadvocate.org/LAFLYER.pdf.

Arizona Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood, While Defunding Efforts Continue in Ohio!

The Arizona senate passed (18-8) the Whole Women’s Health Priority Act last week, which would defund abortion providers like Planned Parenthood of state family planning money. This bill has passed through the House and Senate, and is now headed for the desk of Governor Jan Brewer to be signed into law.

If Governor Brewer passes the bill, Arizona would join nine other states that voted to strip Planned Parenthood of tax-payer funding in 2011. These nine states were responsible for pulling over $61 million from the abortion giant PP over the course of a single year. Planned Parenthood’s latest annual report shows that they receive over $487 million in federal funding every year. Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion chain in the United States and commits over 300,000 abortions each year, so with each defunding, the lives of innocent unborn children in each of those states could be saved.

The efforts to defund Planned Parenthood are going strong in other states, as well. Last week, a provision to strip federal funding from Planned Parenthood was abruptly stopped by lawmakers in Ohio, but efforts are underway for an amendment to defund Planned Parenthood in Ohio in the near future. Other states are working towards a full defunding of Planned Parenthood, and we must continue to encourage them to follow the lead of Arizona and the eight other states who have claimed pro-life victories over the past year.

Source: Email from LifeAction.org on May 3, 2012.

Why Ron Paul Is the Best Candidate for President

By Daniel Downs

Ron Paul is one politician America needs in the top spot of American government. Paul may not be the best-looking candidate but he is the most qualified. Besides, a stately appearance is too superficial a criterion by which to elect any candidate. If it were not so, Romney or Santorum would be the two best choices. Maybe that is one reason why they are promoted by mainstream media, but not by XCJ.

Oratory is an important skill required of any political leader. It is especially important our president possess it. The president is not only commander-in-chief of the military but he is also the top executive overseeing our nation’s business and the chief public and foreign relations officer. The president must speak to many different types of audiences including hundreds of Congressmen and women, thousands of White House staff, thousands of military leaders and their soldiers, thousand of foreign officials and millions of their people, as well millions of Americans. Although during some of the debates, Ron Paul seemed to conduct him as if in Congress. Yet, his campaign speeches demonstrate him to be a capable statesman.

As a competent statesman, the president must a model representative of America’s best. He must be the best at protecting and defending the rule of law as defined by the U.S. Constitution. Ron Paul is America’s finest example because he has over 20 years of proven experience.

As defender of the Supreme law of the land, the President’s function is to review every legislative act of Congress ensuring conformity to Constitutional law. This Ron Paul has been practicing since he entered politics.

As top executive of our national government, the president creates administrative law and institutional means through which congressional laws will be carried out efficiently and effectively. It’s true only executives of states, municipalities, and corporations could possess such experience. However, passing laws, making treaties, committing acts of war, and writing executive orders that in effect make laws in order to thwart the authoritative will and law-making power of the legislature and thus defy the rule of law are acts that should disqualify any candidate. Ron Paul has proven he is not among those who condone or performs such extra-legal acts, but some past presidents and most current presidential contenders have or says they would. For example, Romney’s solution to ending Obamacare would be to issue an executive order.

Excellence at articulating the American vision informed by the principles that our laws are meant to implement is another quality the president should possess. Over the course of his public service, Ron Paul has and is articulating that vision of life, liberty, happiness by means of a government limited to enumerated powers, laws limited to constitutional conformity, maximum freedom for states and individuals, and sound fiscal and monetary policies that ensure responsible prosperity for all. These define American democracy and moral capitalism and they distinguish our principled democracy from the socialist and humanist versions of Europe and many who espouse them in America. Ron Paul is an ardent proponent of America’s form of democracy.

While the media and political opponents want Americans to believe that the views of Ron Paul are ludicrous, his views actually are in-tune with historical and current realities. For example, Paul says we should close our military bases around the world because doing so would increase American prosperity by reducing our national economic burden. It would also reduce global animosity that has resulted in increasing violence against us, which in return would reduce the growing economic burden of homeland security while increasing the freedom and prosperity of Americans.

A good historical example showing the effects of big government is the Roman Empire. Like America now, Rome had strategically placed military bases throughout the world. The economic burden of maintaining a colossal effort at policing the world eventual led to it falls. In the process of decline, many other aspects of life also declined. Moral decadence added to the decline and fall of Rome. Roman elites delighted in the uniqueness of other cultures and embraced those cultures in Rome. According to journalist Amy Chua, the disunity created by multiculturalism also contributed to its eventual demise. Like aids in Africa, deadly disease depopulated native Rome, which increased Rome’s dependence on foreign militias and foreign workers. This opened the door to those who hated Imperial Rome and who eventual conquered her. Moreover, because Rome readily employed military intervention to create peace and economic stability, Rome experienced the same kind violent blowback America now faces. As with Rome and the USSR, American interests of this nature costs millions of Americans a very high price: increased poverty, public debt, and alienation. All others candidates favor maintaining the economically disastrous efforts of world policing. Keeping a strong military policing force is not the same as maintaining a strong national defense. Ron Paul knows this and wants the opportunity to help change course of America’s future.

If elected, Ron Paul will seek to right America’s wrongs with the goal of restoring America’s future.

Why Ron Paul Is the Best Candidate for President

By Daniel Downs

Ron Paul is one politician America needs in the top spot of American government. Paul may not be the best-looking candidate but he is the most qualified. Besides, a stately appearance is too superficial a criterion by which to elect any candidate. If it were not so, Romney or Santorum would be the two best choices. Maybe that is one reason why they are promoted by mainstream media, but not by XCJ.

Oratory is an important skill required of any political leader. It is especially important our president possess it. The president is not only commander-in-chief of the military but he is also the top executive overseeing our nation’s business and the chief public and foreign relations officer. The president must speak to many different types of audiences including hundreds of Congressmen and women, thousands of White House staff, thousands of military leaders and their soldiers, thousand of foreign officials and millions of their people, as well millions of Americans. Although during some of the debates, Ron Paul seemed to conduct him as if in Congress. Yet, his campaign speeches demonstrate him to be a capable statesman.

As a competent statesman, the president must a model representative of America’s best. He must be the best at protecting and defending the rule of law as defined by the U.S. Constitution. Ron Paul is America’s finest example because he has over 20 years of proven experience.

As defender of the Supreme law of the land, the President’s function is to review every legislative act of Congress ensuring conformity to Constitutional law. This Ron Paul has been practicing since he entered politics.

As top executive of our national government, the president creates administrative law and institutional means through which congressional laws will be carried out efficiently and effectively. It’s true only executives of states, municipalities, and corporations could possess such experience. However, passing laws, making treaties, committing acts of war, and writing executive orders that in effect make laws in order to thwart the authoritative will and law-making power of the legislature and thus defy the rule of law are acts that should disqualify any candidate. Ron Paul has proven he is not among those who condone or performs such extra-legal acts, but some past presidents and most current presidential contenders have or says they would. For example, Romney’s solution to ending Obamacare would be to issue an executive order.

Excellence at articulating the American vision informed by the principles that our laws are meant to implement is another quality the president should possess. Over the course of his public service, Ron Paul has and is articulating that vision of life, liberty, happiness by means of a government limited to enumerated powers, laws limited to constitutional conformity, maximum freedom for states and individuals, and sound fiscal and monetary policies that ensure responsible prosperity for all. These define American democracy and moral capitalism and they distinguish our principled democracy from the socialist and humanist versions of Europe and many who espouse them in America. Ron Paul is an ardent proponent of America’s form of democracy.

While the media and political opponents want Americans to believe that the views of Ron Paul are ludicrous, his views actually are in-tune with historical and current realities. For example, Paul says we should close our military bases around the world because doing so would increase American prosperity by reducing our national economic burden. It would also reduce global animosity that has resulted in increasing violence against us, which in return would reduce the growing economic burden of homeland security while increasing the freedom and prosperity of Americans.

A good historical example showing the effects of big government is the Roman Empire. Like America now, Rome had strategically placed military bases throughout the world. The economic burden of maintaining a colossal effort at policing the world eventual led to it falls. In the process of decline, many other aspects of life also declined. Moral decadence added to the decline and fall of Rome. Roman elites delighted in the uniqueness of other cultures and embraced those cultures in Rome. According to journalist Amy Chua, the disunity created by multiculturalism also contributed to its eventual demise. Like aids in Africa, deadly disease depopulated native Rome, which increased Rome’s dependence on foreign militias and foreign workers. This opened the door to those who hated Imperial Rome and who eventual conquered her. Moreover, because Rome readily employed military intervention to create peace and economic stability, Rome experienced the same kind violent blowback America now faces. As with Rome and the USSR, American interests of this nature costs millions of Americans a very high price: increased poverty, public debt, and alienation. All others candidates favor maintaining the economically disastrous efforts of world policing. Keeping a strong military policing force is not the same as maintaining a strong national defense. Ron Paul knows this and wants the opportunity to help change course of America’s future.

If elected, Ron Paul will seek to right America’s wrongs with the goal of restoring America’s future.

Ron Paul, Biblical Values and American Values, Parts 1 & 2

Once part 1 is finished, nine embedded screens will appear. Click on the top left screen to start part 2.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qKQ1xXobJc&w=560&h=420]

Ron Paul, Biblical Values and American Values, Parts 1 & 2

Once part 1 is finished, nine embedded screens will appear. Click on the top left screen to start part 2.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qKQ1xXobJc&w=560&h=420]

Why Ron Paul Is the Best Candidate for President

By Daniel Downs

Ron Paul is one politician America needs in the top spot of American government. Paul may not be the best-looking candidate but he is the most qualified. Besides, a stately appearance is too superficial a criterion by which to elect any candidate. If it were not so, Romney or Santorum would be the two best choices. Maybe that is one reason why they are promoted by mainstream media, but not by XCJ.

Oratory is an important skill required of any political leader. It is especially important our president possess it. The president is not only commander-in-chief of the military but he is also the top executive overseeing our nation’s business and the chief public and foreign relations officer. The president must speak to many different types of audiences including hundreds of Congressmen and women, thousands of White House staff, thousands of military leaders and their soldiers, thousand of foreign officials and millions of their people, as well millions of Americans. Although during some of the debates, Ron Paul seemed to conduct him as if in Congress. Yet, his campaign speeches demonstrate him to be a capable statesman.

As a competent statesman, the president must a model representative of America’s best. He must be the best at protecting and defending the rule of law as defined by the U.S. Constitution. Ron Paul is America’s finest example because he has over 20 years of proven experience.

As defender of the Supreme law of the land, the President’s function is to review every legislative act of Congress ensuring conformity to Constitutional law. This Ron Paul has been practicing since he entered politics.

As top executive of our national government, the president creates administrative law and institutional means through which congressional laws will be carried out efficiently and effectively. It’s true only executives of states, municipalities, and corporations could possess such experience. However, passing laws, making treaties, committing acts of war, and writing executive orders that in effect make laws in order to thwart the authoritative will and law-making power of the legislature and thus defy the rule of law are acts that should disqualify any candidate. Ron Paul has proven he is not among those who condone or performs such extra-legal acts, but some past presidents and most current presidential contenders have or says they would. For example, Romney’s solution to ending Obamacare would be to issue an executive order.

Excellence at articulating the American vision informed by the principles that our laws are meant to implement is another quality the president should possess. Over the course of his public service, Ron Paul has and is articulating that vision of life, liberty, happiness by means of a government limited to enumerated powers, laws limited to constitutional conformity, maximum freedom for states and individuals, and sound fiscal and monetary policies that ensure responsible prosperity for all. These define American democracy and moral capitalism and they distinguish our principled democracy from the socialist and humanist versions of Europe and many who espouse them in America. Ron Paul is an ardent proponent of America’s form of democracy.

While the media and political opponents want Americans to believe that the views of Ron Paul are ludicrous, his views actually are in-tune with historical and current realities. For example, Paul says we should close our military bases around the world because doing so would increase American prosperity by reducing our national economic burden. It would also reduce global animosity that has resulted in increasing violence against us, which in return would reduce the growing economic burden of homeland security while increasing the freedom and prosperity of Americans.

A good historical example showing the effects of big government is the Roman Empire. Like America now, Rome had strategically placed military bases throughout the world. The economic burden of maintaining a colossal effort at policing the world eventual led to it falls. In the process of decline, many other aspects of life also declined. Moral decadence added to the decline and fall of Rome. Roman elites delighted in the uniqueness of other cultures and embraced those cultures in Rome. According to Amy Chua, the disunity created by multiculturalism also contributed to its eventual demise. Like aids in Africa, deadly disease depopulated native Rome, which increased Rome’s dependence on foreign militias and foreign workers. This opened the door to those who hated Imperial Rome and who eventual conquered her. Moreover, because Rome readily employed military intervention to create peace and economic stability, Rome experienced the same kind violent blowback America now faces. As with Rome and the USSR, American interests of this nature costs millions of Americans a very high price: increased poverty, public debt, and alienation. All others candidates favor maintaining the economically disastrous efforts of world policing. Keeping a strong military policing force is not the same as maintaining a strong national defense. Ron Paul knows this and wants the opportunity to help change course of America’s future.

If elected, Ron Paul will seek to right America’s wrongs with the goal of restoring America’s future.

The Abortion Industry’s Greatest Hits of 2011

By Kristan Hawkins, Executive Director, Students for Life of America

I think many will agree with me that 2011 was a pivotal year for the pro-life movement. Let’s take a moment to look back at some of the hits the abortion industry suffered during 2011:

January 2011: Kermit Gosnel and his staff were indicted on murdering 7 almost-born infants and 1 woman in their horrific abortion facility in Philadelphia. The District Attorney even remarked what we commonly say in the pro-life movement, “the real business of Gosnell’s clinic was not health, but profit.” The controversy was enough to cause Americans, many of whom still call themselves pro-choice, to question what the old-Clinton mantra of “safe, legal, and rare” really means.

January 2011: A youth organization lead by a former SFLA intern, Lila Rose, took their undercover work exposing Planned Parenthood a step further, releasing 7 videos of Planned Parenthood facilities, some that even receive federal taxpayer funding, aiding actors who were posing as human sex traffickers.

To continue reading, click here.

The Meaning of Christmas

By Daniel Downs

Christmas is a celebration of the fulfilled promise of a new life, a baby. Honoring this new born destiny presents to the world a universal hope. It is about God being with us now and we being with God in the future.

Christmas is about parents, parenting, naming, and the common work of fulfilling God’s revealed purpose for the world; their world of family, our world of common good relationships, and God’s purposed world.

Christmas is thus a celebration of life-giving. Life is God’s gift to the world–to each individual, to each family, and to society. Every morally and materially good relationship contributes to the creation of abundant life for all. This too reflects God’s good will for all people. Its revelation began with the divine promise to Abraham. It was institutionalized through Israel. Its realization was pronounced by angels and manifested in the new born babe of Bethlehem—the one the angels said they would see lying in a lowly manger (Luke 2:1-20). The irony of life is that it always begins in utter helpless poverty, but God gives everyone the natural riches of loving parents, caring society, and nature’s bounty.

Material and monetary gifts as well as profits are meant to serve the prophetic purpose of life-destiny. Even the three wise men brought gifts to the new born babe that not only made him and his family very rich but also provided the means to fulfill his purpose in life (Matthew 2:1-12).

The significance of Christmas is how God reveals and fulfills His part in the destiny of human life. Human destiny is not a search to find oneself. It is not a hunt for life purpose or meaningful work. Human destiny is a divine revelation that is manifest, reinforced, prepared for, and fulfilled. It is the life-work, a multifaceted employment, of living well. Living well is not best defined by financial worth but by the quality of life made and given. A good life is not made alone. The author of the first book of the Bible, Genesis, wrote: “Let us make man in our image and likeness.” If God made us within a community of others, it stands to reason that we must do the same. Good persons are reproduced in a redemptive society of families committed to forming each newly born child into a good citizen of our heavenly Father’s world. In God’s world, the divinely ordained work of living means being and making to be good children, good parents, good spouses, good neighbors, good laborers or entrepreneurs, good citizens. As God provided for Jesus through the magi, God wants to provide everything needed to fulfill our own destiny whether it be with spouse, home, material goods, and understanding of the divine purpose for life. This God did for humanity’s first parent. God gave him a wife, Eve. God gave them a home in the garden. He gave them all of nature’s produce for sustenance. God also gave them trusteeship over all the riches of nature including all living creatures (Genesis 1:26-31 &2:7-24). Then, God gave a world full of families to help each other fulfill life’s destiny.

The apostle Paul referred to Jesus as the new Adam (1 Cor 15:45-49). His birth was the beginning of a new humanity. The accomplishment of his life work ushered in the realization of God’s redemptive plan for all people. The revelation of Jesus his life-purpose was first given to his parents, Mary and Joseph. God’s prepared them to prepare Jesus for its fulfillment. Therefore, the life of Jesus Christ is the model of God’s plan for every parent and child.

Jesus’ life is a revelation and history, albeit a sketchy one, of how God fulfills His plan for the world through one family of chosen parents and chosen child (to be). The life-work of Jesus—the chosen child—could not have happened without chosen parents and the entire lineage of other chosen ones. Both gospels of Matthew and Luke clearly shows the ancestry of Jesus going back through King David, to Judah, Abraham, Noah, and finally to Adam (Matthew 1:1-17 & Luke 3:23-38).

The same is true for all of us. Whether seemingly big or miniscule, our individual purpose in God’s plan for the world is connected to a host of ancestors going back to Adam and Eve. Every one of them was chosen by God for our life-work to be fulfilled.

Like Jesus, every one of us was born to fulfill a specific part in the plan of God for the world.

As the new Adam, Jesus birth represents the rebirth of humanity. Every human being born since Jesus has been represented by Him to God. Everyone has had or will have the opportunity to experience the redemption, reconciliation, renewing, and parenthood of God, who never intended to father only Jesus. God wants all people to become His children, living in His household, under His authority and care. In one sense, all humans are children of God because all exist as God created them to exist. Yet, some children live without parents. Some people who have parents live as though they do not. Others exist without any sense of history, tradition, value, future hope, purpose or legacy, all of which begins in a family household connected to extended family within a society and world of families. Even though some discover it in social institutions like school, workplace, military, social mission, mosque, synagogue, temple or church, membership in them does not equate to being part of God’s household. Without a life forming relationship with God, hearing His defining words, and obeying His law or rules meant to direct behavior and work, no one can claim to be in the household of God. For life in God’s household is eternal and not limited to temporary materiality of the present.

Jesus represents life in the household of God. His birth was the beginning not the end. His untimely death was the means to a redemptive end, the fulfillment of God’s redemption of all people. His resurrection represents the future for a new humanity. As his apostle Paul taught, Jesus was the first born from the dead not the last (Colossians 1:18; Romans8:29). Every one of us will be reborn but only those who have been faithful to God will continue to live in His household.

Wayward people often behave in ways that land them in jail or prison. The faithless and unfaithful also will live eternal life behind bars in the prison called hell.

Jesus is the way of escape in the present.

Christmas is a mass celebration of eternal life. The end of life is to live eternally in and to the glory of God the Father. This is accomplished by living the good life in God’s household, doing what is right, and fulfilling one’s divinely purposed life-work.

What God revealed to Mary and Joseph, to Elizabeth and Zachariah, to Sarah and Abraham was the life work and purpose of their first born child. Each has to live so as to fulfill it. For Jesus to fulfill his life work and its purpose, he has to live without sin to the very end. We too have to learn to do the same. For without holiness (likeness of God) no one will see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14 ). That is, knowone will see Him after this life in heavenly city.