Tag Archives: accountability

Apples Do Not Fall Far

21 Thursday Oct 2021

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Your children only do what they are allowed to do. They become what they are allowed to become. The children reflect the parents. As parents, what are you teaching them? We live in a society that has a philosophy of victimization. “It’s not my fault! They did what they wanted to do.”

We teach children to become what they become when we employ a discipline (or lack of) method to shape them as they grown up. In my growing-up years, the law was laid down by dad, and “Brother, you’d better not break that law!” There was accountability. The role my mother played was crucial. She was firm and tender. As a boy going into a young man, her tenderness took more of a shaping route to help me understand things I only thought I understood.

When I was young, I went to college to play football. I did not go to school to learn, except in so far as I needed to play my favorite sport. While in college my interests varied (like a lot of young people), and some of that interest was in the opposite sex. If there was a way for me to spread my wings, I would have traveled that path to do so.

Compared with some of my peers, I was rather tame. Still, I had my head in these worldly activities that were of great interest to me. As it turned out, the worst of my activities was that I dated two girls at one time, one of them a daughter of a preacher. Of those two, I married the better one (she was merciful to me) and 41 years later (married 38) we have two daughters and four grandchildren.

As I was shaped in my earlier days, while on my own in college, it took root.

Here I am 61 years old reflecting on my course and the paths I see many others walk.

Apples do not fall far from the trees upon which they hang. I reflect my parents, and our daughters are a reflection of us. That is not to say that everything I do and did as an accountable adult directly reflects on my parents (deceased), but there is a reflection. Years ago, I heard a preacher say, “You carry three names: you own, you parents, and the Lord’s. Be sure you honor each.”

Regrets are part of life; but many of the regrets we have, how many of them need not to have occurred if only a better decision was made? Can you think of any? I can, and still do think of them every now and again. Why did we make them? There is really only one reason: because we wanted to make them. There are many now who are still paying for those decisions.

The apple does not fall far, let us not be rotten apples.

A Generated Outlook

15 Thursday Feb 2018

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Because the ACLU (and similar groups) reject God, such sentiments like Daniel Webster’s fall to the ground like a mother’s tears. He once wrote, “There is nothing we look for with more certainty tha[n] this principle, that Christianity is a part of the law of the land. Everything declares it” (The Christian Life and Character of Civil Institutions of the United States, p. 245). There are many groups who reject God, such as the one identified (their denials not withstanding).

Rejecting God, such groups insist on secularism that generates little accountability that has any ultimate consequence. Thus, a deranged person thinks he (she) has nothing to lose when there is engagement in evil. Under the Lord’s way of thinking, there is only one penalty if conviction results. Under the way of thinking in this country, ambulance chasers instill doubt. With little accountability and no purpose or meaning in life, one takes a gun and levels all who stand at the other end of its barrel – for secularism’s philosophy (progressives/liberals) generate such an outlook. RT

No Justification, But A Contribution

29 Wednesday Nov 2017

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Angela Lansbury, a female actress into her tenth decade of life commented in an interview that some women must take some blame for the sexual harassment problem in society. “There are two sides to this coin,” Lansbury, 92, said. “We have to own up to the fact that women, since time immemorial, have gone out of their way to make themselves attractive. And unfortunately it has backfired on us — and this is where we are today.”

In this she is correct.

There is no justification for sexual harassment, violation or any kind of wrong-doing that might be perpetrated against another person. Yet, there are many contribution factors.

  1. On November 4, 2017, there is a report from Paris with the headline “Paris Opens its First-Ever Naked Restaurant.”
  2. Hooter’s restaurant now has a change in strategy because older patrons have more interest in breast than younger patrons.
  3. In May of 2016, a report spoke of provocative dress and sexual responsibility.
  4. “A Democratic Congresswoman is under fire after saying that women are partially to blame for sexual assault and harassment in the way they dress and act.”

Thoughtful people see this as well as they see the sun shine in the sky. Agenda-oriented people, however, can’t see this at all, even as it stares them in the face. Why? Because that demands accountability/responsibility, and some think even if a woman walked naked down the street there is no justification to violation. This is true.

No justification, but a contribution.

In the earliest days of human history, the Lord said this will occur: “To the woman he said, ‘I will greatly increase your labor pains; with pain you will give birth to children. You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you” (Genesis 3:16, NET). One expositor said about this passage, “…a conflict between the man and the woman. She will desire to control him, but he will dominate her instead.”

How does she do this? There are many contributing factors. Negatively, generally speaking, she can’t overpower him physically, but she can drop him to his knees sexually.

Of course, not all females are like this, and neither is it the case that all men are brutes.

There is no justification for sexual harassment or unwanted advances by one toward another. However, this will occur, and it will never stop when men (people) have no interest in the Lord’s way, though there is great interest in the ways of man. “They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world’s perspective and the world listens to them” (1 John 4:5).

No justification for wrong, but many contributions generate wrong-doing. RT

GUN VIOLENCE SOLUTION

03 Tuesday Oct 2017

Posted by in Behavior, God, Morality

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In an editorial (10.3.2017), the Columbus Dispatch admonished readers “not to leap to conclusions about how best to combat this kind of violence” before the facts are all in. The kind of violence the editorial had in mind was that perpetrated by a morally deranged man in Las Vegas, having killed nearly sixty people and injured eight times as many!

One man, however, produced a commentary meme (on Facebook) about how much easier it is to own a particular firearm than it is at being a barber. He would resist my characterization of his commentary-jumping to a conclusion, but in this context, he certainly did. He has often spoken in favor of gun-control (as a very thoughtful man, though one may disagree with him, his words need to be considered).

The man guilty of a deranged act was himself morally deranged. He fires and hope to escape judgment. Escape, he did not. Though he killed himself to escape police arrest. He now is before the Lord Almighty! In a context where the writer speaks of why Jesus came to this earth, and that He is coming again, the Holy Spirit said this: “And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27, KJV). The morally deranged man did not escape judgment. Yet, in our society, one would not know this at all; apart from some religious folk, nothing is said about such things.

Though the Dispatch heeded us to be more discriminating in conclusion jumping, they also noted the frequency of gun violence escalating in society. What kind of solution is there to these violent atrocities? They admit there are no easy solutions, but a number of options are available to be pursued. Such options are 1) better mental health care, 2) “regulations making it harder for people with mental illness and those with violent pasts top own guns”, 3) “aggressive enforcement against illegal sales.”

Perhaps these suggestions are worthy of serious consideration, but the one solution that should have been proffered, but was not is what is most troubling. The solution I have in mind is much longer in implementation, at the very least a generation’s amount of time. But, given the “solutions” in place already, “the deep cultural rift that makes the problem so difficult to even talk about” will be, and currently are, a waste of time.

What solution do I have in mind?

In the latest issue of Apologetics Press (October 2017, p. 10), Kyle Butt wrote a brief article on how “people all over the world associate atheism with immorality.” It is true, and recognized within the article, that some atheists are moral people. Their morality, however, is not based on atheistic ideology, but an ideology that has its source in theism. It is theism, especially Christian theism, that speaks of transcendent love, kindness, courtesy, respect and behavioral qualities of this sort. Of course, atheists will affirm the same, but as mentioned, they have no foundational reason to do such. Moreover, what separates atheistic approach from the Christian approach is its lack of accountability.

Christian philosophy/ideology teaches that actions and thoughts lived on this earth are accountable to Almighty God, who will bring all into judgment. “For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:30-31, KJV). Atheism can’t give any good reason for a moral foundation that obligates man to act in a certain way; all atheistic ideology can hope to accomplish is that others agree with them, with society compelling behavior norms; of course, this is not a morality based on moral virtue of a righteous Judge, but a “morality” based on self-preservation. Yet, as we look at society as it has implemented this approach, not much is accomplished.

On the other hand, in accordance with the Lord’s way, Jesus said “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord” (Hebrews 12:14). In this exhortation from the Lord we have: 1) a community standard (peace), 2) there is a moral standard (holiness), 3) and accountability.

Yes, it is true the morally deranged will not heed the Lord’s counsel. It’s also true, the Lord’s way is the best solution known to man; man won’t implement, however, because he wants an atheistic society.

We have no idea!

22 Friday May 2015

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We live in a world that has no objective moral compass. By the word “objective” I mean a moral compass that says there is such a thing as right and wrong—and that there is always such a thing that is right or wrong. For instance, from the Lord’s perspective it is always wrong to murder; this is seen as far back as Genesis 4, and reaffirmed in Genesis 9 (to say nothing of passages after these two). Moreover, there is something that is always right, such as obeying the Lord.

We live in a society that hardly recognizes the Lord even exists! If there is a recognition there is hardly any acknowledgement of Him, and even more so His Word. This failure has brought us to this point wherein we, as a society, have no real idea about what is right or wrong.

In one area of life that is ever so confusing is that area of marriage. When the Lord established His institution in the Garden of Eden, He set forth the guidelines pertaining to it. The Lord Jesus had to address this matter on more than one occasion while He walked on this earth. For instance, in Matthew 19, the religious leaders actually sought to entrap the Lord in a moral/spiritual/legal trap (Matthew 19:3-9). This was recognized rather quickly by Jesus and He addressed their effort by taking them back to what was firmly established in the Garden a long time ago. Those who compromise that, the Lord said, have greater problems than is realized.

Marriage is God’s ordained institution that is the bedrock of the community. When that bedrock is compromised, then the moral force undergirding it becomes weakened in a person’s life. In other words, if one refuses to accept what the Lord said on that topic, how much more will there be a refusal with regard to what he has said on other topics? We have no idea how serious these matters are, and when we learn, it might very well be on Judgment Day. It will be too late!