Thomas Jefferson was an incredibly intelligent man whose mind saw far beyond his years. Perhaps not the most politically correct observation to make, he definitely spoke the truth when he said,

Times were hard throughout the entire country, as well as internationally, and everyone began to suffer in one way or another. The economy was struggling. The law of supply and demand was in full effect; the supplies were getting low, and the demand was as high as ever. The nation had been enjoying a time of unprecedented prosperity, and suddenly, things were going south in a hurry.

Fortunately, there was a man whose meteoric rise to power defied all logic, and he had a plan to fix the economic problems, ease civil unrest, and meet the needs of all the citizens. Surprisingly, he was also very popular among the foreign nations.

No. This is the story of Joseph in the land of Egypt, as found in the 47^th chapter of Genesis.

When I was a small boy living in Miami, Florida, occasionally Mom would take us to the local greyhound dog race track. Dad was on the far side of the world doing his part during the Vietnam war, so we had to rely on Mom’s less-than-professional guidance on how to choose a dog to root for at the races.

People are still using that very same method today to choose who to support in a race.

I am not sure if there is anything significant about the timing on this, but I had just gotten home from preaching at the local prison, when I turned on my computer and was blasted with the news that McCain had conceded the election, and American had chosen Obama to be the new leader of the free world.

I cannot help but wonder about the next election four years from now, if voting for the president of the United States will mean we are still electing the leader of the free world.

Or will we even be a free nation anymore?

It seems to have become fashionable of late, especially at Missions Conferences, to use the phrase “mission field” interchangeably with the word “responsibility.” This misunderstanding of terms is causing harm to the cause of world evangelism by allowing people to deceive themselves into thinking they are actively involved in missions when they are clearly not.

All too many times it been said that “my children are my mission field” or my family, my workplace, my (fill in the blank here) is my mission field. But since when did ordinary Christian responsibilities become a mission field? And when did taking care of these responsibilities make everyone a missionary?

My lovely wife Renee and I were sitting in a Mexican restaurant recently for lunch. The waitress had already brought us menus, glasses of water, chips and salsa, and had taken our orders when she asked us a rather strange question.

“Are you two married?” she asked.

Renee and I both glanced at our ring fingers to ensure that our wedding rings were in fact still there and easily seen.

Not being able to resist, I replied, “Yes we are, but, do you mean to each other?”

I thought it was pretty funny, but she was serious. In fact, she was more serious than I realized.

I was reading in Joshua and this jumped out at me. I am really troubled by these thoughts. I believe that it is obvious that our nation is in trouble with God these days, and Joshua laid down some instructions that the USA has completely disregarded.

Jos 23:6 Be ye therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses, that ye turn not aside therefrom to the right hand or to the left;
:7 That ye come not among these nations, these that remain among you; neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them, neither serve them, nor bow yourselves unto them:
:8 But cleave unto the LORD your God, as ye have done unto this day.

A major problem from this passage is that we have among us many people whose way of life makes them enemies of God, we give them protected status, and we allow them to remain.

The public is going wild over the selection of a female conservative politician as a vice presidential running mate. This is the culmination of a series of “historic” choices in the 2008 presidential election cycle. For the Democrats, the historic choice was between a black man and a woman for their candidate.

The Democrats chose the black man, who is without question the most liberal member of the US Senate, and a very junior senator at that. It was a very hard fought battle, and the female candidate came close to winning the nomination of her party.