Dangers of the Occult

There shall not be found among you anyone who makes his son or his daughter pass through the fire, one who uses divination, one who practices witchcraft, or one who interprets omens, or a sorcerer,  or one who casts a spell, or a medium, or a spiritist, or one who calls up the dead.  For whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord; and because of these detestable things the Lord your God will drive them out before you.  You shall be blameless before the Lord your God.  For those nations, which you shall dispossess, listen to those who practice witchcraft and to diviners, but as for you, the Lord your God has not allowed you to do so.  (Deu. 18:10-14)

Training for Life

How to bear much fruit and avoid the burn pile

Fruit trees on large commercial farms are shaped and trained from saplings to meet the needs of the harvester in later years.  This is an ongoing process that must start when the wood is green and pliable because after a few years there is no bending wood that has become hard.  Though this is costly and time consuming it has been proven that it saves the farmer labor costs and medical bills that may accrue when pickers once climbed tall ladders harvesting large trees.  Now much of the tree can be harvested from the ground or from a short ladder which also helps keep the fruit from being bruised during the process.

This is much like teaching small children good habits and social skills.  Once they have become set in their ways it is very difficult for them to unlearn bad habits.  Antisocial behavior costs society because there is a spillover affect.  Many innocent people may be harmed and ultimately everyone has to pay the price for reckless behavior.  Insurance costs go up and more police and first responders have to be hired to deal with the fruit of unruly people.  Churches and social workers often find themselves at their wits end trying to help people function in a civilized society.

When the Rapture never came

Americans are often citing verses about the rapture with the idea they will be delivered from persecution in the last days.  For fourteen hundred years Muslims have been burning churches and slaughtering Christians for whom the rapture never came.  Even in our day Christians in Muslim countries are having their throats cut, burned to death, raped and sold into slavery while western Christians live in a fantasy world of video games and Hollywood fiction.  And many talk big words of faith and power yet they have never been to a third world country where they would be killed for being a Christian.  It is easy to talk big until the fire gets turned up.