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Ex-NFL Player/Major University Coaches Come To Inner City Dallas For Camps

NFL and Major University Players/Coaches Set To Train Inner City Athletes in South Dallas July 21st. An incredible opportunity awaits inner city athletes in the Jubilee Community of Fair Park this July 21st. The event entitled “A Day of Champions” will reach 150 inner city kids from the age of 8-18. The camp, sponsored by the Greater Dallas Justice Revival and Heart of a Champion, will provide kids an opportunity to meet sixteen current college coaches and former NFL players who will teach youth sports and character development. The “Day of Champions” is run by Josh Heupel’s 14 Foundation. Coach Heupel was the quarterback when the University of Oklahoma won the National Championship. Josh is now the quarterback coach for the University of Oklahoma. Throughout the day, former NFL players share their personal stories of triumph in the midst of adversity and encourage the young people to strive for excellence in life. Your help is needed to sponsor these inner city children. The cost per camper is $100 for the day event. Please consider being a part of this life changing event by making a donation today. Your gift is tax deductible. The Greater Dallas Justice Revival sponsors events such as “Day of Champions” throughout the year as part of its FEED 3 program. The nationally known Heart of a Champion character development program is a major part of the FEED 3 program. Please make checks payable to “Strategic Justice Initiatives” and designate the memo line to “Day of Champions.” Your gift is tax-deductible. Please send your check to: Randy Skinner Strategic Justice Initiative - 2114 Iroquois Drive Dallas, Texas 75212 Click here to see a list of coaches and players who will be training. Blessings, Randy Skinner Director, Greater Dallas Justice Revival

Texas School Rankings - Education, not sports

Independent rankings of Texas Schools from top to bottom (1-2399).
http://www.texastribune.org/library/data/texas-school-rankings/

Here's a description of some of the ranking methodology.
http://www.texastribune.org/stories/2010/apr/26/school-rankings/

The Good Old Times

http://oldfortyfives.com/DYRT.htm

Haiti Special Request

This is from a friend of mine and Tracie Gray Jernigan's former pastor/boss in Houston. He is now in Maryland. Please pass this on to anyone who might be interested.

Paul

-------- Original Message --------

Subject:	Haiti Special Request
Date:	Thu, 14 Jan 2010 21:26:18 -0500
From:	Long, Gary

Hello friends,

Thank you for being a reader of my weekly column, "Long Story, Short."  Tomorrow I'll be sending you the regular edition, but tonight I'm writing with a prayerful request for you to help the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship with their relief efforts in Haiti following the horrendous earthquake this week.  CBF has field personnel on the ground in Haiti.  First Baptist Church Gaithersburg, the church I pastor, is being called to aid the victims of the earthquake in Haiti.  Our mission partner, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, has field personnel in Haiti and is challenging us to do four things:

• First you can pray: Prayer requests will be updated regularly.  CBF is updating prayer requests from Haiti at this link:  http://www.thefellowship.info/Pray

• Second you can give: Your gift will go to earthquake relief. Give to CBF online at www.thefellowship.info or give to your church and ask them to send along your offering.

• Third, you can get involved: If you want to help directly with response efforts, please let us know your skills and experience.  CBF is building a disaster response team and an application is available athttp://www.thefellowship.info/Disaster-Response-Application

• Fourth, you can stay connected: Read the latest news release,  updates on the CBF blog, and connect through CBF's Haiti ministry network's Ning site. That link is http://fellowshipportal.ning.com/group/haitipartnersforchrist .

This is one of those times I'm very proud to be a Baptist.  Members of the larger family of Baptists are joining together to do something bigger than we could ever accomplish alone.  Won't you consider participating in at least one of the ways above?  If you have trouble with any of the links, please respond to this email and I'll be glad to help you get where you're trying to go.

Prayerfully, Actively,
Pastor Gary

The Other Plot to Wreck America

By FRANK RICH
New York Times
January 9, 2010

THERE may not be a person in America without a strong opinion about what coulda, shoulda been done to prevent the underwear bomber from boarding that Christmas flight to Detroit. In the years since 9/11, we’ve all become counterterrorists. But in the 16 months since that other calamity in downtown New York — the crash precipitated by the 9/15 failure of Lehman Brothers — most of us are still ignorant about what Warren Buffett called the “financial weapons of mass destruction” that wrecked our economy. Fluent as we are in Al Qaeda and body scanners, when it comes to synthetic C.D.O.’s and credit-default swaps, not so much.

What we don’t know will hurt us, and quite possibly on a more devastating scale than any Qaeda attack. Americans must be told the full story of how Wall Street gamed and inflated the housing bubble, made out like bandits, and then left millions of households in ruin. Without that reckoning, there will be no public clamor for serious reform of a financial system that was as cunningly breached as airline security at the Amsterdam airport. And without reform, another massive attack on our economic security is guaranteed. Now that it can count on government bailouts, Wall Street has more incentive than ever to pump up its risks — secure that it can keep the bonanzas while we get stuck with the losses.

The window for change is rapidly closing. Health care, Afghanistan and the terrorism panic may have exhausted Washington’s already limited capacity for heavy lifting, especially in an election year. The White House’s chief economic hand, Lawrence Summers, has repeatedly announced that “everybody agrees that the recession is over” — which is technically true from an economist’s perspective and certainly true on Wall Street, where bailed-out banks are reporting record profits and bonuses. The contrary voices of Americans who have lost pay, jobs, homes and savings are either patronized or drowned out entirely by a political system where the banking lobby rules in both parties and the revolving door between finance and government never stops spinning.

It’s against this backdrop that this week’s long-awaited initial public hearings of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission are so critical. This is the bipartisan panel that Congress mandated last spring to investigate the still murky story of what happened in the meltdown. Phil Angelides, the former California treasurer who is the inquiry’s chairman, told me in interviews late last year that he has been busy deploying a tough investigative staff and will not allow the proceedings to devolve into a typical blue-ribbon Beltway exercise in toothless bloviation.

He wants to examine the financial sector’s “greed, stupidity, hubris and outright corruption” — from traders on the ground to the board room. “It’s important that we deliver new information,” he said. “We can’t just rehash what we’ve known to date.” He understands that if he fails to make news or to tell the story in a way that is comprehensible and compelling enough to arouse Americans to demand action, Wall Street and Washington will both keep moving on, unchallenged and unchastened.

Angelides gets it. But he has a tough act to follow: Ferdinand Pecora, the legendary prosecutor who served as chief counsel to the Senate committee that investigated the 1929 crash as F.D.R. took office. Pecora was a master of detail and drama. He riveted America even without the aid of television. His investigation led to indictments, jail sentences and, ultimately, key New Deal reforms — the creation of the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Glass-Steagall Act, designed to prevent the formation of banks too big to fail.

As it happened, a major Pecora target was the chief executive of National City Bank, the institution that would grow up to be Citigroup. Among other transgressions, National City had repackaged bad Latin American debt as new securities that it then sold to easily suckered investors during the frenzied 1920s boom. Once disaster struck, the bank’s executives helped themselves to millions of dollars in interest-free loans. Yet their own employees had to keep ponying up salary deductions for decimated National City stock purchased at a heady precrash price.

Trade bad Latin American debt for bad mortgage debt, and you have a partial portrait of Citigroup at the height of the housing bubble. The reckless Citi executives of our day may not have given themselves interest-free loans, but they often walked away with the short-term, illusionary profits while their employees were left with shredded jobs and 401(k)’s. Among those Citi executives was Robert Rubin, who, as the Clinton Treasury secretary, helped repeal the last vestiges of Glass-Steagall after years of Wall Street assault. Somewhere Pecora is turning in his grave. Rubin has never apologized, let alone been held accountable. But he’s hardly alone. Even after all the country has gone through, the titans who fueled the bubble are heedless. In last Sunday’s Times, Sandy Weill, the former chief executive who built Citigroup (and recruited Rubin to its ranks), gave a remarkable interview to Katrina Brooker blaming his own hand-picked successor, Charles Prince, for his bank’s implosion. Weill said he preferred to be remembered for his philanthropy. Good luck with that.

Among his causes is Carnegie Hall, where he is chairman of the board. To see how far American capitalism has fallen, contrast Weill with the giant who built Carnegie Hall. Not only is Andrew Carnegie remembered for far more epic and generous philanthropy than Weill’s — some 1,600 public libraries, just for starters — but also for creating a steel empire that actually helped build America’s industrial infrastructure in the late 19th century. At Citi, Weill built little more than a bloated gambling casino. As Paul Volcker, the regrettably powerless chairman of Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, said recently, there is not “one shred of neutral evidence” that any financial innovation of the past 20 years has led to economic growth. Citi, that “innovative” banking supermarket, destroyed far more wealth than Weill can or will ever give away.

Even now — despite its near-death experience, despite the departures of Weill, Prince and Rubin — Citi remains as imperious as it was before 9/15. Its current chairman, Richard Parsons, was one of three executives (along with Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs and John Mack of Morgan Stanley) who failed to show up at the mid-December White House meeting where President Obama implored bankers to increase lending. (The trio blamed fog for forcing them to participate by speakerphone, but the weather hadn’t grounded their peers or Amtrak.) Last week, ABC World News was also stiffed by Citi, which refused to answer questions about its latest round of outrageous credit card rate increases and instead e-mailed a statement blaming its customers for “not paying back their loans.” This from a bank that still owes taxpayers $25 billion of its $45 billion handout! If Citi, among the most egregious of Wall Street reprobates, feels it can get away with business as usual, it’s because it fears no retribution. And it got more good news last week. Now that Chris Dodd is vacating the Senate, his chairmanship of the Banking Committee may fall next year to Tim Johnson of South Dakota, home to Citi’s credit card operation. Johnson was the only Senate Democrat to vote against Congress’s recent bill policing credit card abuses.

Though bad history shows every sign of repeating itself on Wall Street, it will take a near-miracle for Angelides to repeat Pecora’s triumph. Our zoo of financial skullduggery is far more complex, with many more moving pieces, than that of the 1920s. The new inquiry does have subpoena power, but its entire budget, a mere $8 million, doesn’t even match the lobbying expenditures for just three banks (Citi, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America) in the first nine months of 2009. The firms under scrutiny can pay for as many lawyers as they need to stall between now and Dec. 15, deadline day for the commission’s report.

More daunting still is the inquiry’s duty to reach into high places in the public sector as well as the private. The mystery of exactly what happened as TARP fell into place in the fateful fall of 2008 thickens by the day — especially the behind-closed-door machinations surrounding the government rescue of A.I.G. and its counterparties. Last week, a Republican congressman, Darrell Issa of California, released e-mail showing that officials at the New York Fed, then led by Timothy Geithner, pressured A.I.G. to delay disclosing to the S.E.C. and the public the details on the billions of bailout dollars it was funneling to its trading partners. In this backdoor rescue, taxpayers unknowingly awarded banks like Goldman 100 cents on the dollar for their bets on mortgage-backed securities.

Why was our money used to make these high-flying gamblers whole while ordinary Americans received no such beneficence? Nothing less than complete transparency will connect the dots. Among the big-name witnesses that the Angelides commission has called for next week is Goldman’s Blankfein. Geithner, Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke should be next.

If they all skate away yet again by deflecting blame or mouthing pro forma mea culpas, it will be a sign that this inquiry, like so many other promises of reform since 9/15, is likely to leave Wall Street’s status quo largely intact. That’s the ticking-bomb scenario that truly imperils us all.

What Makes a Great Teacher?

Great article.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/201001/good-teaching

Letter from Jesus...

Amen.

Letter from Jesus about Christmas --

 

It has come to my attention that many of you are upset that folks are taking My name out of the season.

How I personally feel about this celebration can probably be most easily understood by those of you who have been blessed with children of your own. I don't care what you call the day. If you want to celebrate My birth, just GET ALONG AND LOVE ONE ANOTHER.

 

Now, having said that let Me go on. If it bothers you that the town in which you live doesn't allow a scene depicting My birth, then just get rid of a couple of Santas and snowmen and put in a small Nativity scene on your own front lawn If all My followers did that there wouldn't be any need for such a scene on the town square because there would be many of them all around town.

 

Stop worrying about the fact that people are calling the tree a holiday tree, instead of a Christmas tree. It was I who made all trees. You can remember Me anytime you see any tree. Decorate a grape vine if you wish: I actually spoke of that one in a teaching, explaining who I am in relation to you and what each of our tasks were. If you have forgotten that one, look up John 15: 1 - 8.

 

If you want to give Me a present in remembrance of My birth here is my wish list. Choose something from it:

 

1. Instead of writing protest letters objecting to the way My birthday is being celebrated, write letters of love and hope to soldiers away from home. They are terribly afraid and lonely this time of year. I know, they tell Me all the time.

 

2. Visit someone in a nursing home. You don't have to know them personally. They just need to know that someone cares about them.

 

3. Instead of writing the President complaining about the wording on the cards his staff sent out this year, why don't you write and tell him that you'll be praying for him and his family this year. Then follow up... It will be nice hearing from you again.

 

4. Instead of giving your children a lot of gifts you can't afford and they don't need, spend time with them. Tell them the story of My birth, and why I came to live with you down here. Hold them in your arms and remind them that I love them.

 

5 Pick someone that has hurt you in the past and forgive him or her.

 

6. Did you know that someone in your town will attempt to take their own life this season because they feel so alone and hopeless?  Since you don't know who that person is, try giving everyone you meet a warm smile; it could make the difference.

 

7. Instead of nit picking about what the retailer in your town calls the holiday, be patient with the people who work there. Give them a warm smile and a kind word. Even if they aren't allowed to wish you a "Merry Christmas" that doesn't keep you from wishing them one. Then stop shopping there on Sunday. If the store didn't make so much money on that day they'd close and let their employees spend the day at home with their families

 

8. If you really want to make a difference, support a missionary-- especially one who takes My love and Good News to those who have never heard My name.

 

9. There are individuals and whole families in your town who not only will have no "Christmas" tree, but neither will they have any presents to give or receive. If you don't know them, buy some food and a few gifts and give them to the Salvation Army or some other charity which believes in Me and they will make the delivery for you. (In Plano we have our Christmas Cops boxes everywhere)

 

10. Finally, if you want to make a statement about your belief in and loyalty to Me, then behave like a Christian. Don't do things in secret that you wouldn't do in My presence. Let people know by your actions that you are one of mine.

 

Don't forget; I am God and can take care of Myself. Just love Me and do what I have told you to do. I'll take care of all the rest. Check out the list above and get to work; time is short. I'll help you, but the ball is now in your court. And do have a most blessed Christmas with all those whom you love and remember:

I LOVE YOU,

 

JESUS

Preserving Planet Earth, an Interview with Jane Goodall

What is our responsibility?

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/11272009/watch.html

God Issues: Caesar and the Secret Service

By Dr. James C. Denison President, Center for Informed Faith, Dallas, Texas November 30, 2009 Topic: intimacy with God   Caesar and the Secret Service   What did Julius Caesar really look like?  The image you remember from high school history class comes from statues made long after the conqueror was assassinated in 44 B.C.  Historians have never been quite sure of the man's true appearance, since Romans tended to idealize their leaders after their death.   Today's New York Times shows us what is likely the earliest known bust of Caesar, made during his lifetime and excavated two years ago in France: "The Roman appears with little hair, a wrinkled forehead, a prominent Adam's apple."  Not exactly the stuff of legend.  Apparently his portrait was sculpted on a Monday morning after Thanksgiving.   Are you having a hard time getting motivated today?  Eating turkey until you never want to see another drumstick?  Shaking off the dopamine in turkey meat and 29 football games?  Cheer up: At least you don't work for the Secret Service.   Washington continues to be preoccupied with the Virginia couple who sneaked into a White House state dinner last Tuesday evening.  Today's Times tells us that Michaele and Tareq Salahi are apparently trying to be selected for a new reality show, "The Real Housewives of D.C."  They met the president and other dignitaries, but no one is quite sure how.  Or what to do to prevent a similar security lapse as the busy holiday party season approaches.   We may never know personally the Caesars of our day, but take heart: the real King of the universe wants to know us.  Romans 5:8 contains the good news of Christmas in a single sentence: "God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."   The One who came at Christmas wants a personal, intimate, continual relationship with you and me.  He wants to be more than the subject of a Sunday morning worship service and occasional prayer or Bible study.  He wants to be the center of our lives, the Object of our thoughts and affections, the King of our choices.  He wants to lead us into "life to the full" (John 10:10), but we must open his gift.   This morning's reading in Oswald Chambers' My Utmost For His Highest is my favorite essay in this classic devotional guide: "There is only one relationship that matters, and that is your personal relationship to a personal Redeemer and Lord.  Let everything else go, but maintain that at all costs, and God will fulfill His purpose through your life.  One individual life may be of priceless value to God's purposes, and yours may be that life."   How will you maintain your relationship with Jesus "at all costs" today?  _____________________________    _____________________________ Join Our Community:             Copyright © 2009, Center for Informed Faith. All rights reserved. Read previous essays

Forward GodIssues to a Friend Center for Informed Faith | 333 N Washington Ave | Dallas | TX | 75246

Ku Klux Klan - Blonde Version

A Blonde in a Baptist Church   An Alabama preacher said to his congregation, 'Someone in this congregation has spread a rumor that I belong to the Ku Klux Klan. It is a horrible lie and one which a Christian community cannot tolerate. I am embarrassed and do not intend to accept this. Now, I want the party who did this to stand and ask forgiveness from God and this Christian Family.'   No one moved.   The preacher continued, 'Do you have the nerve to face me and admit this is a falsehood? Remember, you will be forgiven and in your heart you will feel glory Now stand and confess your transgression.'   Again all was quiet.   Then slowly, a drop-dead gorgeous blonde with a body that would stop traffic rose from the third pew. Her head was bowed and her voice quivered as she spoke, 'Reverend there has been a terrible misunderstanding. I never said you were a member of the Ku Klux Klan. I simply told a couple of my friends that you were a wizard under the sheets.'   The preacher fell to his knees, his wife fainted, and the congregation roared!

 

God Issues: 156 billion years of grace

InformedFaith.com   By Dr. James C. Denison President, Center for Informed Faith, Dallas, Texas November 11, 2009 Topic: unconditional grace   156 billion years of grace   World War I formally ended on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, when Germany signed the Armistice.  As a result, Veterans Day is observed each year on November 11, a holiday honoring all military veterans.   In a tragic reminder of the price our military pays to defend us, the Associated Press is reporting this morning that divers have found the body of one of two American soldiers missing since last week in Afghanistan.  They were attempting to retrieve airdropped supplies that fell into a river when they were swept away by the current.  The second soldier has not been found.   If God is all-loving and all-powerful, why is our world so broken?   This week we have considered the shortest verse in Scripture: "Jesus wept."  He proved his compassion by his Christmas incarnation.  He was the only baby who chose his parents and place of birth, and he chose peasants in a cave.  If he would be born there, he would be born again in your heart and mine.   This is not a God the world knows.  Muslims have a God of legalistic enforcement but not a weeping heart.  Buddhists and Hindus have no category for a personal, suffering God.  Most Americans think that God helps those who help themselves.  Honestly, do you picture the Lord of the universe with tears in his eyes?   And tears in his heart?  God's word says, "We do not have a High Priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are-yet was without sin" (Hebrews 4:15).   I know it seems nonsensical to say that Jesus faced every temptation we do.  The first century didn't have marijuana, or sexually explicit movies or web sites.  But sins in principle have not changed, just their expression.  Substance abuse, sexual temptation, integrity issues and moral failures were just as real then as today.   Jesus faced them all, and more than we do.  The longer you withstand a temptation, the harder and more subtle it becomes.  If you won't embezzle funds at work, perhaps you'll shade an expense report or tax deduction.  Because he never sinned, Jesus faced sin and temptation we know nothing about.   And so he knows your temptations, your pain, your suffering, your disappointments, your problems and questions and dilemmas.  He knows them better than you do.  He sees them with the infinite insight only possessed by God himself.  He knows your hurting heart.  And he weeps.   Why do you need a God of such empathy today?  What temptations or trials are you battling this morning?  Name them, and give them intentionally to Jesus.  Tell him that you are placing your problem in his hands.  Know that "nothing is impossible with God" (Luke 1:37).  Claim the biblical fact: "greater is he who is in you than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4).  Rejoice in the truth that you can "do all things through Christ who gives you strength" (Philippians 4:13).   Some scientists believe that it takes light 156 billion years to cross the universe.  Scripture says that God measures all of that in the palm of his hand (Isaiah 40:12).  Now, what's your problem?  _____________________________   The Center for Informed Faith is sponsoring a Bible study tour of Israel February 21-March 2, 2010.  The "In His Steps" tour brings Scripture alive as it traces the steps of Jesus and his early followers through the Holy Land.  Sites include Nazareth, Bethlehem, the Sea of Galilee, Capernaum, the Jordan River, Jerusalem, Caesarea, and other sacred places.  This walk through biblical history and culture will deepen your faith and understanding of Scripture as Dr. Denison explores the historical and spiritual background of each site and Dr. Mike Fanning discusses its archaeological significance.  A $300 per- person deposit is due by November 20, 2009 to insure a spot on the tour.  Inquiries after that date will be filled on a space-available basis only. All monies paid before the December 20 final payment date are fully refundable except for a $100 cancellation fee per person. For more information, please visit www.InformedFaith.com. Copyright © 2009, Center for Informed Faith. All rights reserved. Read previous essays

Nubs the Miracle Dog

Great story!

http://www.pawnation.com/2009/11/03/nubs-the-true-story-of-a-mutt-a-marine-and-a-miracle/?icid=main|main|dl3|link3|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pawnation.com%2F2009%2F11%2F03%2Fnubs-the-true-story-of-a-mutt-a-marine-and-a-miracle%2F

Dallas Justice Revival with Jim Wallis starts tomorrow!

Dear Paul, The Justice Revival begins tomorrow at 7 p.m. at Dallas Market Hall. If you haven’t already registered, we hope you’ll do so and come out to hear from Jim Wallis, Rev. Sam Rodriguez, Mayor Leppert, and Dr. Zan Holmes. You also won’t want to miss passionate worship each night led by Jaci Velasquez, Salvador, Israel & New Breed, and Fred Hammond. Register now for this free event. Come November 10, 11, and 12 when doors open at 6 p.m., or come at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday when the Ignite Greater Works Exhibition Hall will be open in the North Hall. You will have the opportunity to see the work of many local nonprofits and community organizations doing the work of justice. (Note: There will be no exhibition Thursday night). If you're planning to bring anyone with you who hasn't already registered, have them do so at http://justicerevival.eventbrite.com to expedite the registration process. However, pre-registration is not required for entry. For more information, click here to visit the Justice Revival site. Dallas Market Hall is located next to the tall Renaissance Hotel off I-35 E. The address is 2200 N. Stemmons Fwy., Dallas, 75207. There is plenty of free parking around the building. Please join us in praying for the success of this revival — that we might grow together in faith and in our commitment to pursue justice. Blessings, The Justice Revival Team P.S. On-site registration will be available, so make sure to bring a friend to the Justice Revival!  ________

God Issues: Tragedy at Fort Hood

InformedFaith.com   By Dr. James C. Denison President, The Center for Informed Faith, Dallas, Texas November 6, 2009 Topic: hope in grief   Tragedy at Fort Hood   The war has come home.  Fort Hood is home to 52,000 Army personnel.  Located halfway between Austin and Waco, Texas, it has lost more troops in Iraq than any other base.  Now it has lost 12 more.  As you know, an Army psychiatrist about to be deployed to overseas combat killed 12 soldiers yesterday afternoon and wounded 31 others.  Initial reports said that he was killed by police; later we learned that he has survived and is in stable condition.   Major Nidal Malik Hasan was born in Virginia to Jordanian parents.  Today's New York Times reports that he is single, and that he has listed no religious preference.  He was apparently distraught about his upcoming deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan.   Yesterday afternoon, he took two handguns to a deployment center where soldiers receive last-minute medical attention and instructions before they are shipped out overseas.  A few moments later, as President Obama said last night, the "horrific outburst of violence" unfolded.   We have learned again that no place on our fallen planet is safe.  The Pentagon and Twin Towers became killing fields eight years ago; now an Army base intended to shelter our soldiers will be marked forever by this tragedy.  If a military installation cannot protect its own, who of us is secure this morning?   This is a day to grieve with suffering families traumatized beyond words.  It is a day to pray for them and for those who are walking with them through this valley of heartache.  And it is a day to remember that life is fragile and brief, but eternity is secure.   Paul's testimony is our model: "We do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.  For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen.  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Corinthians 4:16-18).   This time yesterday, none of us knew that Fort Hood would lead this morning's news.  Today is the dot before the line, the moment before eternity begins.  The best way to begin this Friday is to surrender it to the God who redeems all we entrust to him.    Last night, Janet and I were discussing the Fort Hood tragedy and she showed me a statement which she included in an upcoming Bible study.  Esteemed biblical scholar William Barclay: "The only way to get our values right is to see, not the beginning, but the end of the way, to see things, not in the light of time, but in the light of eternity."   How do you see things this morning?  _____________________________   The Center for Informed Faith is sponsoring a Bible study tour of Israel February 21-March 2, 2010.  The "In His Steps" tour brings Scripture alive as it traces the steps of Jesus and his early followers through the Holy Land.  Sites include Nazareth, Bethlehem, the Sea of Galilee, Capernaum, the Jordan River, Jerusalem, Caesarea, and other sacred places.  This walk through biblical history and culture will deepen your faith and understanding of Scripture as Dr. Denison explores the historical and spiritual background of each site and Dr. Mike Fanning discusses its archaeological significance.  A $300 per- person deposit is due by November 20, 2009 to insure a spot on the tour.  Inquiries after that date will be filled on a space-available basis only. All monies paid before the December 20 final payment date are fully refundable except for a $100 cancellation fee per person. For more information, please visit www.InformedFaith.com. Copyright © 2009, Center for Informed Faith. All rights reserved. Read previous essays

God Issues: Will you get the swine flu?

InformedFaith.com   By Dr. James C. Denison President, Center for Informed Faith, Dallas, Texas November 3, 2009 Topic: divine leadership   Will you get the swine flu?   According to today's Wall Street Journal, nearly everyone is exposed to influenza viruses in a normal flu season.  However, no more than 20 percent of the population contracts the illness.  Will you be the one in five this year?   Scientists at Duke University are working on a way to tell.  They have discovered the handful of genes which are activated by viruses in people who eventually become sick.  They are trying to develop a device about the size of a BlackBerry which can quickly determine if you are on the way to being sick.   If you're going on vacation, you could adjust your plans.  Schools could anticipate the spread of flu infections.  Soldiers could be tested before they are deployed for various missions.  People are contagious for a day before they show symptoms, so such a test could slow the spread of disease.   Unfortunately, current methods to detect gene changes usually take days or weeks-by that time you're already sick and hopefully well.  Researchers are working on a test which can detect gene changes quickly enough to be useful.   The Chinese have a saying: to predict is difficult, especially with regard to the future.  Thomas Edison said of his invention in 1880, "The phonograph is not of any commercial value."  Grover Cleveland announced in 1905, "Sensible and responsible women do not want to vote."  Thomas J. Watson, chairman of IBM, said in 1943, "I think there is a world market for about five computers."   Ken Olson, president of Digital Equipment Corporation, predicted in 1977, "There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in their home."  Baseball player Tris Speaker claimed in 1921, "Ruth made a big mistake when he gave up pitching."   The good news is that the Great Physician already knows whether you'll get the swine flu this week or catch a cold today.  As we learned in yesterday's essay, "even the very hairs of your head are all numbered" (Matthew 10:30).  You and I are trapped in the space-time continuum, bound to this moment, experiencing life as a series of chronological events.  God stands outside all of that, as a writer stands outside the characters whose lives he records.   As a result, the only safe way to step into this day is to follow the lead of our omniscient Father.  Speaking to his suffering people, the Lord promised, "Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, 'This is the way; walk in it'" (Isaiah 30:21).  Have you made time to listen for that voice yet today?  _____________________________   The Center for Informed Faith is sponsoring a Bible study tour of Israel February 21-March 2, 2010.  The "In His Steps" tour brings Scripture alive as it traces the steps of Jesus and his early followers through the Holy Land.  Sites include Nazareth, Bethlehem, the Sea of Galilee, Capernaum, the Jordan River, Jerusalem, Caesarea, and other sacred places.  This walk through biblical history and culture will deepen your faith and understanding of Scripture as Dr. Denison explores the historical and spiritual background of each site and Dr. Mike Fanning discusses its archaeological significance.  A $300 per- person deposit is due by November 20, 2009 to insure a spot on the tour.  Inquiries after that date will be filled on a space-available basis only. All monies paid before the December 20 final payment date are fully refundable except for a $100 cancellation fee per person. For more information, please visit www.InformedFaith.com. Copyright © 2009, Center for Informed Faith. All rights reserved.