Whithout "this" you may not buy or sell...

This is just going to be a short post for the sole purpose of prompting a specific line of thought in the readers.

Revelation 13:16-17

King James Version (KJV)

¹⁶ And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:
¹⁷ And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.

The thought line I want you to contemplate is this... "What are you going to do when you can't go to the grocery store to buy food?" 

For a few out there this will be only a minor issue but for many it will be life or death. In places like New York City if they simply lost electricity for a long period of time thousands of people would die. Diabetics need insulin refrigerated, most people need food refrigerated and from a grocery store on a weekly basis...

I have no idea when this prophecy in Revelation will come to pass but I do know that it will come to pass. Culture as a whole is becoming more and more dependent on someone else to produce the things they need for life itself! A few generations down the road... what's it going to look like?  
     
So even if WE don't live through that time (which we might) maybe our children or grandchildren will. If we learn how to provide the things essential for life on our own (Clean water, food, shelter, warmth etc...) and pass that knowledge down to our children and grandchildren and they do the same... how many lives could we save? 

Growing a garden is the first thing that comes to my mind. Things like tomatoes, potatoes, grains, bananas, and others are actually almost a complete nutritious diet IF let ripen on the plant. (With the exception of the potato which does not in fact ripen.)  

Milk and eggs are also a complete diet. Though you may be deficient in some areas, depending on the diet of  the milk and egg providers, you can survive. This makes logical sense too. When a baby is born (animal or human) it eats nothing and drinks nothing other than milk and it is healthy and happy.  Baby chickens inside the egg survive off of the yolk and it is a complete healthy nutritious diet for them. 

Meat can be a complete diet in emergency situations , though you must eat the fat. The fat is where many of the minerals and vitamins are stored, though the toxins are too. I would only recommend this if there was no other option. 

Beyond gardens though... What if your land is taken, your seeds destroyed, your plants uprooted? We are talking about a tyrannical government run by satan who wants everyone to worship him or die. If they know you have a garden and are thriving and sharing with the community etc... they very likely will come in and destroy it and take your seeds. To an extent this is already starting with GMO and hybrid seeds making it harder and harder to raise healthy food and keep your own seed for the next year.

The number one thing, which I mentioned in a previous blog post Doomsday Prepping  is going to be survival knowledge. Since I've gone into that a bit I will just mention it here and not go into detail. What you have they can take what you know they can not...unless they kill you and then it won't matter anyway.

Regardless of whether your a city goer or a country type you might want to contemplate...What are you going to do when you can't go to the grocery store for food? Will you know where and how to get clean water? A person can only go about three days without it! 

So... contemplate and pray and maybe do a little learning.

The Function of Man

These are just some personal thoughts of mine and ponderings.  Make of it what you will but hopefully it will challenge you to look more closely at your life to evaluate what things must be changed. I have been trying to do this and I see things in my life I realize I would never want in the life of my children...and if I don't change how can I expect them not to inherit these actions and attitudes that I portray in front of them day after day.

 So to my pondering...
If humans were created to tend the garden and walked with God daily I am assuming that was our original function... the function of man.

So then, knowing that satan always creates a counterfeit, what can we suppose then other than that through sin we tend the "creations" of the devil and have communion with him?

When  we use our brains the electrical impulses that go back and forth dig grooves in the actual tissue of tthe brain.  The more we use a specific thought path the deeper the groove goes. Then, if we stop using it, it slowly starts filling back in. 

I would like to, if I could, liken this to our spiritual walk. The more we commune with God the "spiritual grooves" are dug deeper and wider, thus making the path towards God that much easier to follow. If we neglect that spiritual relationship then the pathway slowly starts to fill in and if we wait too long before we come back to God we have some trouble finding the way because the path is no longer well defined.

Likewise anything we do that is worldly (not of God) in my opinion is the devil's counterfeit. So as we tend satan's plans and commune with him (knowingly or unknowingly) our spirit is marked with paths that lead us unwittingly straight to hell. As we focus on these, the pathways to God grow fainter. 

In the garden when Adam ad Eve sinned they gave satan permission to overwrite their original purpose...so our original purpose is still there hidden deep beneath our sin nature. We already have hose grooves in our spirit, because of our sin, that lead us to satan. We are born with them because we are born into sin. (Not to discount that a child beneath the age of accountability sin unwittingly and is not held accountable)

So then our purpose becomes to discover our purpose. The thing which God first created us for. To worship Him, to commune with Him, to work for Him. (Granted there is much more than I understand still waiting for me to discover)

Along these thought lines, however, lets examine ourselves to see what there is in our life that might unwittingly qualify us as working for the enemy and communing with him. Messiah told us that anyone who is not for Him is against Him... so anything in this world that is not for God is against God. Whether they are willingly working for satan or unwittingly enslaved by their own actions that give satan a legal right to work through their lives.

Lets get rid of any legal right satan might have to our lives. If we lust does that not give the enemy legal right to work sexual immorality in our lives? If we are angry without cause and enter into a fit of rage does that not give the enemy a legal right to work hatred and murder in our life? 

Maybe if we play a computer game that just has a few questionable things? Perhaps it's a book or movie... anything that is not of God... if it is of satan gives satan that legal right.

So strive for that original function God created for us! Don't fall for the counterfeit and I'll be talking to God about showing me how to do the same in my life. ;)  

Shalom.  Peace be with you all!