Longest Thread Ever

[The Midnight]

Somehow I tend to try to take you seriously, like you're a missionary or something, incapable of or disinclined to "joke" about stuff. Holdover from your recent trip to Thailand I suppose.

So when you comment about night life it puts it in the whole frame of UN conference goers in places like Phu Ket. Serviced by underaged gangland slaves. Somehow, whenever the UN comes up I see that kind of place and activity.

So of course I'm not there. JazzFanz is seriously about as raunchy as I can stand.

LOL .. long story short I've been lead astray a bit but I'm slowly 'getting back on'. It's been good... it's really important to have support and I'm really glad I'm getting it from some unexpected places


It's really quite amazing how the Lord is always there and he brings you back to who you really are using the most surprising of ways... an injury to an eye for one, an unexpected news from a friend another.... just to make you see the world in a different light, a glimpse if you like into God's eyes...

 

[The Midnight]

Alright about that unexpected news..


I've known this girl for a while, she's finishing off Uni doing Economics and Finance.. the same as what I did at Uni so I've been helping her and that online.. she's in Thailand so we've never met but have always chatted on the phone, giving her support, etc. Really smart, really bright future, good/decent family with money too.


Then just last week I talked to her she had been staying with a friend in Singapore for a month, have got a new bf there, and is now working as a 'model' at one of the night clubs there. Said her friend who also has a bf there is also doing the same. Wouldn't say what this 'modelling' job entails, but yeah she finishes work around 4am... so... your guess is as good as mine. Asked if her parents know - said she hasn't told them.


Just.. I dunno, felt really sad about it all, here is this girl who has a really bright future, but now seems to be joining this 'friend' along a totally different path. It really got me somehow, how someone's life can change just like that for better or worse without having a solid core of belief.


Here is the 'glimpse into God's eyes' I was referring to before... What it must feel to have your children strayed so far away from the path he has planned for you...

 

[babe]

Well, that's a pretty sad story, Nick. As you know I a bit of an old Asia hand myself and I think I get the way it is.

Here is how I think our Heavenly Father deals with us. If you will notice, there are a lot of things said in the Bible, and if you spend much time there, thinking, you will notice how the moral injunctions can sometimes have a sort of point/counterpoint to them, with intrinsically opposite values cited in different places. Yes in the OT there seems to be an emphasis on submitting to God's law and trying to do righteous things and all kinds of required things. Yes in the NT there seems to be an emphasis on issues of our hearts and conscience and our duty to walk rightly based on principle in the sense of following the example of Jesus. In the OT the grace of God seems centered on the nation or the calling to separateness from the world as a people of God, a kind of "grace" given by God because He has chosen Israel, while in the NT it is given for us to chose God, to choose faith in Jesus, and to claim adoption into the family of Abraham and the family of God.

I think we blink and look at one aspect at a time, in almost every idea we have.

I think God knows us for what we are, and tries to help in every way He can or every way we will accept. your Thai friend I assume might be Christian and you might have assumed that a lot of "Christian" or western values had been assimilated already and so you are disappointed to find her "going with the flow" of Asiatic life, The apparent fact is that that way of life was there all the time, perhaps hidden in a way for a while.

I don't know what we can do about the way people are when God Himself sees things in the light that we are our own judges whether we will choose Him and follow Him or not. It could take a lifetime in serving God to bring just one soul with you back home to God. But God values us in a way we mostly fail to comprehend, in that it would be worthwhile to labor a whole lifetime to just find our own way back home to God. And if we could bring just one person with us, it would be worth another lifetime.

Do whatever you can for anyone who cares to listen. Try to do as much for anyone who just simply is there where you can make the effort, whether they will listen or not.

In the movie Charlotte's Web, at the end, the same point is made. It would take a lifetime to be a friend as valuable as Charlotte was, but a lifetime is what we have.

 

[The Midnight]

Well, that's a pretty sad story, Nick. As you know I a bit of an old Asia hand myself and I think I get the way it is.

Here is how I think our Heavenly Father deals with us. If you will notice, there are a lot of things said in the Bible, and if you spend much time there, thinking, you will notice how the moral injunctions can sometimes have a sort of point/counterpoint to them, with intrinsically opposite values cited in different places. Yes in the OT there seems to be an emphasis on submitting to God's law and trying to do righteous things and all kinds of required things. Yes in the NT there seems to be an emphasis on issues of our hearts and conscience and our duty to walk rightly based on principle in the sense of following the example of Jesus. In the OT the grace of God seems centered on the nation or the calling to separateness from the world as a people of God, a kind of "grace" given by God because He has chosen Israel, while in the NT it is given for us to chose God, to choose faith in Jesus, and to claim adoption into the family of Abraham and the family of God.

I think we blink and look at one aspect at a time, in almost every idea we have.

I think God knows us for what we are, and tries to help in every way He can or every way we will accept. your Thai friend I assume might be Christian and you might have assumed that a lot of "Christian" or western values had been assimilated already and so you are disappointed to find her "going with the flow" of Asiatic life, The apparent fact is that that way of life was there all the time, perhaps hidden in a way for a while.

I don't know what we can do about the way people are when God Himself sees things in the light that we are our own judges whether we will choose Him and follow Him or not. It could take a lifetime in serving God to bring just one soul with you back home to God. But God values us in a way we mostly fail to comprehend, in that it would be worthwhile to labor a whole lifetime to just find our own way back home to God. And if we could bring just one person with us, it would be worth another lifetime.

Do whatever you can for anyone who cares to listen. Try to do as much for anyone who just simply is there where you can make the effort, whether they will listen or not.

In the movie Charlotte's Web, at the end, the same point is made. It would take a lifetime to be a friend as valuable as Charlotte was, but a lifetime is what we have.

Thanks Babe some good thoughts there. She's a typical Thai so like about 97% of the country is a Buddhist by denomination. I guess my point of view is that this is only 1 person of millions and millions of girls nowadays who 'buy in' to the culture of 'easy money'. They are into that crowd now that they need the Louis Vuitton bag, they need that iPhone, and the best and easiest way to get them is via working in these jobs. The situation there is so bad that at the moment if you work in those industries for just 2-3 days, that's equivalent to sitting in an office job for 1 month.


Granted, in most cases these girls have no education or opportunities therefore this is a way out for them. But it is hard for me in this particular case because I think my friend has such a bright future. As part of her University requirement she was interning for this finance company which is more than I can say coming out of college without even 1 hour of actual on the job training, LOL.


Coming back from my holiday in thailand I knew this was a problem but it wasn't until it happened to somebody I know that it really started to hurt.

 

[The Midnight]

^^^

And knowing this what can we do? (I think to myself). It is such a big issue affecting millions and millions and we're losing the battle.


Spreading the Gospel is absolutely one of the ways.


Are there other ways? I was watching David Stern's acceptance speech at the HOF last night. He said something that caught my attention at the very end. He said that the NBA is now involved in enrolling a million Indian children into junior NBA and junior WNBA in teaching them about discipline, about hard work, about sacrifice about teamwork and a sense of accomplishment (which is important for increasing self esteem and thereafter self worth). That is really really good to hear because here is the NBA, I never thought would be involved in doing anything like this for millions of people across the other side of the globe.


May be there is something we can do after all...

 

[The Midnight]

Hey Babe, have you seen the Danish movie "The Hunt"? It's a very good movie and the underlying theme (from what I gather anyway), is about whether or not you can seek true Justice in this life, or is it really the role of God (as only he can see all the situation, circumstances, etc).


My brother often says to me "How can Christians just repent and get away with doing something wrong? There must be justice for the victim. Forgiveness makes no sense".


But really only God can see all the circumstances surrounding a particular situation, the only logical action is to rest assured that he is in charge, leave all consequences to him, and in your heart find a way to forgive those that have wronged us in this life.

 

[PearlWatson]

Hey Babe, have you seen the Danish movie "The Hunt"? It's a very good movie and the underlying theme (from what I gather anyway), is about whether or not you can seek true Justice in this life, or is it really the role of God (as only he can see all the situation, circumstances, etc).


My brother often says to me "How can Christians just repent and get away with doing something wrong? There must be justice for the victim. Forgiveness makes no sense".


But really only God can see all the circumstances surrounding a particular situation, the only logical action is to rest assured that he is in charge, leave all consequences to him, and in your heart find a way to forgive those that have wronged us in this life.

There is forgiveness and meaningful forgiveness.

If someone has hurt another person they have to do 4 things before they should be offered forgiveness.
They have to take responsibility for what they've done, have remorse, do everything they can to repair the damage (<---justice), and never repeat the same action

If the offender doesn't do these things then offering "forgiveness" is meaningless.

 

[The Midnight]

There is forgiveness and meaningful forgiveness.

If someone has hurt another person they have to do 4 things before they should be offered forgiveness.
They have to take responsibility for what they've done, have remorse, do everything they can to repair the damage (<---justice), and never repeat the same action

If the offender doesn't do these things then offering "forgiveness" is meaningless.

Yep a very good point here.

 

[PearlWatson]

babe's response would be better and more all ecompassing

 

[babe]

Hey Babe, have you seen the Danish movie "The Hunt"? It's a very good movie and the underlying theme (from what I gather anyway), is about whether or not you can seek true Justice in this life, or is it really the role of God (as only he can see all the situation, circumstances, etc).


My brother often says to me "How can Christians just repent and get away with doing something wrong? There must be justice for the victim. Forgiveness makes no sense".


But really only God can see all the circumstances surrounding a particular situation, the only logical action is to rest assured that he is in charge, leave all consequences to him, and in your heart find a way to forgive those that have wronged us in this life.

As a Mormon growing up, I encountered the four steps of repentance, and forgiveness, much as Pearl has outlined. In the 70's Spencer W. Kimball did a book entitled "The Miracle of Forgiveness", which I refused to read. . . .

somehow I developed a bad taste for LDS general authorities all writing books for the LDS captive market and to stock the shelves of Deseret Book. Somewhere around then I studied Russian literature for a couple of years, including the era after the Revolution, when everything was changed. Before the Revolution, Russia had perhaps one of most robust literary traditions, second only to Great Britain, where everybody of social consequence apparently was a writer somehow. . . .

Communism forced all the creativity underground, and generated a lot of "literature" which was call "Soviet Realism", meaning no realism but serviceable state propaganda. Writers who couldn't cook up something that would please the bosses were starved, or sent to Siberia. Thankfully, some were smarter than the bosses, and a few very good books were produced in a way that the State couldn't figure out how to stop. "We" is the top of that line, and was actually the idea that was copied by some Western writers in the thirties who dealt with the issues of big government.

Mormonism has created a sort of "literature" that is comparable to Soviet Realism, and for the same reasons. . . . the LDS Church has a public relations department and a "correlation committee" who's all-judging eye must be pleased with the work if it's going to be used to line the shelves of Deseret Book and faithful LDS home libraries.

To me, that literature is like having your daughter turn out to be a w****. I simply cannot bear it, especially on the subject of religion. I suppose the Catholic and Protestant churches have some kind of intellectually-stunting societal forces as well, but not near as effective in doing the stunting as an actual commissioned censorship authority. . . .

Well, anyway. . . . .

In my view, we are all so messed up we all need forgiveness. Jesus taught that we should forgive others as we would want to be forgiven. That pretty much dictates we clear out all the hatred and resentment we possibly can. . . . but hopefully without throwing out our values and sensibilities at the same time.

I've found it necessary to form realistic appraisals of the state of mind or intents of other people and to expect them go on being themselves, while doing all I can to limit the damage they can do to me.

I cannot realistically expect the LDS Church or LDS people to accept me as I am, speaking the truth they will not hear, so I just don't participate in the Church any more, even though I have good friends who are LDS. I just don't discuss the things I know they can't handle, and respect them for the good that is there and try to treat them the way I hope to be treated.

The LDS Church is all messed up on it's moral values. If you pay tithing and attend the meetings and go along to get along, they will practically overlook any of your offenses or sins. But if you speak the truth they cannot bear, they will do whatever it takes to destroy you from their "community". Doesn't matter if you live all the highest ideals of the faith, if you take it one step too far. . . . .

So, to my understanding, the only judgment that actually counts, or ever will count, is God's judgment. And seeing I'm really not in a class ahead of the rest of us, I make it my devotion and worship to invite God into my life and to shape me. I pray I might see my failings, of every kind, including my wickedness and sins. . . . that God will show me those things and show me how to deal with them best, and how to eventually overcome those things, through the atonement of Christ.

The only real merit my critical observations in regard to others can have. . . . is that hopefully I'll learn to do right.

No extra credit in God's books for repenting of other peoples' sins.

 

[babe]

So here is the Wikipedia synopsis of "We", by Eugene Zamyatin

One thousand years after the One State's conquest of the entire world, the spaceship Integral is being built in order to invade and conquer extraterrestrial planets. Meanwhile, the project's chief engineer, D-503, begins a journal that he intends to be carried upon the completed spaceship.

Like all other citizens of One State, D-503 lives in a glass apartment building and is carefully watched by the secret police, or Bureau of Guardians. D-503's lover, O-90, has been assigned by One State to visit him on certain nights. She is considered too short to bear children and is deeply grieved by her state in life.

O-90's other lover and D-503's best friend is R-13, a State poet who reads his verse at public executions.

While on an assigned walk with O-90, D-503 meets a woman named I-330. I-330 smokes cigarettes, drinks alcohol, and shamelessly flirts with D-503 instead of applying for an impersonal sex visit. All of these are highly illegal according to the laws of One State.

Both repelled and fascinated, D-503 struggles to overcome his attraction to I-330. I-330 invites him to visit the Ancient House, notable for being the only opaque building in One State, except for windows. Objects of aesthetic and historical importance dug up from around the city are stored there. There, I-330 offers him the services of a corrupt doctor to explain his absence from work. Leaving in horror D-503 vows to denounce her to the Bureau of Guardians, but finds that he cannot.

He begins to have night dreams, which disturbs him, as dreams are thought to be a symptom of mental illness. Slowly, I-330 reveals to D-503 that she is involved with the MEPHI, an organization plotting to bring down the One State. She takes him through secret tunnels inside the Ancient House to the world outside the Green Wall, which surrounds the city-state. There, D-503 meets the inhabitants of the outside world: humans whose bodies are covered with animal fur. The aims of the MEPHI are to destroy the Green Wall and reunite the citizens of One State with the outside world.

Despite the recent rift between them, O-90 pleads with D-503 to impregnate her illegally. After O-90 insists that she will obey the law by turning over their child to be raised by the One State, D-503 obliges. However, as her pregnancy progresses, O-90 realizes that she cannot bear to be parted from her baby under any circumstances. At D-503's request, I-330 arranges for O-90 to be smuggled outside of the Green Wall.

In his last journal entry, D-503 indifferently relates that he has been forcibly tied to a table and subjected to the "Great Operation", which has recently been mandated for all citizens of One State in order to prevent possible riots;[3] having been psycho-surgically refashioned into a state of mechanical "reliability", they would now function as "tractors in human form".[4] This operation removes the imagination and emotions by targeting parts of the brain with X-rays. After this operation, D-503 willingly informed the Benefactor about the inner workings of the MEPHI. However, D-503 expresses surprise that even torture could not induce I-330 to denounce her comrades. Despite her refusal, I-330 and those arrested with her have been sentenced to death, "under the Benefactor's Machine."

Meanwhile, the MEPHI uprising gathers strength; parts of the Green Wall have been destroyed, birds are repopulating the city, and people start committing acts of social rebellion. Although D-503 expresses hope that the Benefactor shall restore "reason," the novel ends with One State's survival in doubt. I-330's mantra is that, just as there is no highest number, there can be no final revolution.

Zamyatin is perhaps the most insightful political analyst the world has seen, and his fiction was as applicable to the Soviet State as it is to our New World Order.

The political truth "progressives", particularly "progressive socialists" of varying shades and intellectects, simply will not see. . . . is the actual fascist reality of not only Communism but every variety of State Socialism we have seen. . . . .

It is the biggest lie of human history to believe, or claim, that we are making progress somehow by giving government all the tools necessary to manage us.

The little Mormon lie that a "Church" can take the place of God and displace the process of human cognition and human choice, is merely a revelation of the fact that the LDS Church signed on with fascism over a century ago with fascists Heber J. Grant used to praise when he spoke of his banker "friends" in New York in the nineteen twenties.

Before then, the LDS people were politically different. . . . a sort of populist socialist dreamer bunch. . . .

 

[babe]

This is the first time I've had to dig my thread up from page 4. Really.

Looking at how many new threads are popping up, and the topics being discussed. . . . we have hit a new low. Pretty soon we'll have about a million threads about nothing, every day. New threads, mind you.

Who drinks lemonade?

Who in here drinks Sprite?

Who in here drinks Root Beer?

Who in here doesn't drink?

Who in here is bored?

Who in here has read a newspaper?

Who in here watches the News?

Who in here cares?

What is basketball?

hey folks, you can use this thread and keep it on page one.