Hey There!

It's OK. We all get lost sometimes.

As we continue our journey's, many travelers get sidetracked on their own personal road trips. Some of the most common and favorite tourist locations are places such as:  

In New York - The Grand Central Station of Worldly Affairs.

In Egypt - The Tomb of Regular Church Attendance and The Mummy's Curse of Tithing. 

In Washington DC - Political Rallies: (and who could forget) The Charitable Organization Water Falls?  

There are many other stopping points for travelers, but I am only mentioning a few of the most common. Make sure that you realize though, that these are all stopping points and your journey will end there and not continue. No matter how attractive they may seem to you, I must warn you that they are tourist traps and they only exist to rob you of your money, efforts, and time. Time that should be spent on your original journey of finding, knowing and serving God.

If we travel to London England to visit Big Ben, we can watch and see how quickly time goes by, and how little time is devoted to God. Why let tourist traps take more of our time from us?  Here is a portion of the reasons to avoid tourist traps and continue on the right paths of our journey.  

New York's Grand Central Station of Worldly Affairs: In Romans 6:12 the Bible tells us, "Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof." Keeping us from worldly affairs.  

Egypt's The Tomb of Regular Church Attendance is designed to keep you from having time to serve God. Oh sure, they tell you that you serve God by attending church, and that you’re not right with God if you don't attend regularly. Let‘s see, how does this go? The average, mediocre Christians show up on Sunday morning, the dedicated to God, come back Sunday night, as well, and the ones on fire for the Lord, come back on Wednesday night for bible study/prayer services. (Sound familiar?)

Take a few minutes with me and do some math in your head. 

If you work 40+ hours a week, go to Sunday school, 3 church services a week, weekly church visitation, Saturday men's prayer breakfast, women's league, senior meetings, men's meetings, prayer chains, vacation bible school, children's programs, marriage retreats, men's retreats, women's retreats, youth camps, choir/band practice. Work on class lessons or sermons, church board meetings, maintenance nights, dinners, buffets, revival meetings, missions meetings, evangelist meetings, music cantatas, softball games and practices, bowling leagues, golf leagues (and how they think sports serve God, is beyond me) and special holiday services. How much time is left for God?

Don't forget you have to spend time sleeping, eating, showering, shaving, grocery shopping, preparing meals, doing laundry, mowing the lawn, maintaining your home and vehicles etc. AND if you have children, WOW! look out, because 24 hours a day just doesn't cut it anymore. 

The churches tell you that you must be faithful in church to serve God, but the Bible doesn't even tell us to attend church.

II Corinthians 11:13-15, || Timothy 423-4, | Timothy 4:7, Titus 1:14, Matthew 7:15, I John 4:1, I Timothy 1:4, Matthew 23:13-15, Luke 11:42-43.

Remember that it was the church leaders of the day, (Scribes and Pharisees) that wanted Jesus DEAD, and Christianity done away with. Nothing has changed in 2,000 years, except that now we all them Pastor, Reverend, or Priest.

Here are a couple of No-Brainers:

Special Holiday Services: Why would anyone want to spend time with their family on the Holidays? How silly of me to think such a thing!

Church Camps and Retreats: They hold marriage retreats, then they turn around and separate families by holding a men's retreat, which leaves the wife alone to fight temptation, and then send the women off to ladies retreats, this time leaving the men at home to fight temptation. They then send off to youth camp 40 or so teens, with only a few adults, so our kids can experience many of the world's temptations, that they didn't even know existed. In all the church services and activities overall, do you spend quality time with your family? NO! You and your children are in different rooms, husbands and wives may get to sit together, but have minimal conversation. It is no wonder church marriage counseling is in such demand. You pay the churches money to pull your marriage apart by constantly separating your family, then go to counseling services that quite often come with a fee. What a racket! It is also no wonder that the divorce rate is just as high among Christians, as it is among the lost Maybe if you didn't spend as much time at church functions, you could spend your time doing things together with your family and bonding with them and God. Read the fourth commandment Exodus 20:8-11. It says to rest on the Sabbath, not to rush around fighting with your family to get ready for (between one and three) church services. Spending all day Sunday in and out of church. That never seemed very restful to me.

P.S. The Sabbath always was and always will be Saturday.  We will cover The Mummy's Curse of Tithing under 'Las Vegas'.

Washington DC's Political Rallies Supposed Christians keep getting on the political bandwagon trying to enforce their morality on others through the passing of laws. It will be a sad day if the moral majority, or the Christian Coalition ever gets total control. We will be as a communist country with no freedoms or rights. It is funny how the religious world gets upset when their rights are taken away (such as the Ten Commandments), yet fight to take away the rights of others. Church goers constantly picket and protest abortion clinics. but, what gives them the right? Hypocrites! "ye who are without sin cast the first stone" Don't get me wrong, I believe abortion is sin and probably angers God, but the answer is not in condemning those who choose to have an abortion. Most churches believe that freedom of choice and free will are given to us by God. If this is so, then women getting abortions have that right, whether it is right or not, isn't the issue.

You can vote and protest all you want, but remember that all authority is ordained by God. Romans 13:1-2. Even bad leaders are placed by God. You have no Biblical right to criticize God's appointed leaders, but you are to pray for them. Even Pharaoh was performing God‘s will without realizing it If Pharaoh was president today, the church crowd would want him impeached, and would be having rallies to make sure that the public knows how bad he is. in Exodus 9:16, it states regarding Pharaoh "And in very deed for this cause have I raised thee up, for to shew in the my power; and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth."  

If the supposed Christians could have their way, this website would be shut down. I had one pastor tell me that to remain in his church, I could not discuss my Bible beliefs with anyone, or we would have real problems together. This shows me how he wants people to serve God in his church: sit down, shut up, throw money in his checking account, (oops, I mean offering plate) and go home. Is this a man of God? You decide. Go to Acts 4:17-20. Many pastors want me to shut up. Some have even threatened me, and I've been run out of many churches because of differences in beliefs. Come on guys, don't I qualify for the same freedoms you fight for, freedom of religious beliefs, freedom of speech and of press??  

The charitable organization water falls: There are far too many organizations to discuss which ones are good or not, and many I have never even heard of. If you volunteer your time or money to any organization, check it out and make sure that it would glorify God. A very large United organization which I won't name. has a Way of doing good by giving out food, but is financially supporting abortions and has ties with certain churches. it is very Biblical to feed and help the poor, the orphans. the widows. and the homeless. If you are doing this. then great! Just be cautious and don't get so involved that it becomes a humanitarian effort and God is left out Also, be cautious of religious organizations who may be doing good for the community, but whose beliefs are very anti—God, of such, Christians should have no part.

Hopefully, you can get past all these stumbling blocks without breaking down, and we can continue with our travels.  

Let's move along to our next stop, the great city of Las Vegas