Has Abundant Life Done Its Duty By God And Pastor Paul?

I have been in countless exchanges with people from around the U.S. and world regarding the resignation of Pastor Paul, among other issues, and one of the most insightful, yet simplistic ones was with brother Dave Courtney.

In a nut shell, he asked me whether Abundant Life accepted or rejected Pastor Paul’s resignation? Because if we did, then that means us members are complicit in allowing him to run away and hide from the very healing Christ wants us to receive.

Wow!

This actually hit me square in the chin. Why didn’t I recognize that? I mused.

In Dave’s own words he first wrote:

“Did that church accept his resignation? If so, that would seem like that church is condoning hiding. After all, he admitted his sin, asked for forgiveness. Why was he allowed to add an additional condition?”

Frankly, I didn’t understand “condition,” and so I replied with:

“That is an excellent point. I had not thought of that. Do you have any biblical references on this? And what do you mean he was allowed to add an additional condition, do you mean sin or what?”

With the patience of a master instructor, Dave responded: “Let’s see, a Biblical reference; the LORD said that He will put our sin away from us as far as the east is from the west (Ps 103:12). The additional condition I alluded to was, “You must accept my resignation.” He’s the one adding the condition. The LORD didn’t add a condition with forgiveness, why would the church? Maybe he has to work on repentance or whatever. Where better to work on an accumulation of attitudes pre-disposing him to sin than in front of the congregation…so that all can gain insight into how to effectively confront sin. When the LORD had to deal with sin, how did He do it? “Your sins are forgiven. Go and sin no more.” He didn’t say go and hide and sin no more.”

Look at the implications. Yes, Pastor Paul presented Abundant Life with his resignation, but over 80% of its membership wanted him to stay; however, we were never actually asked. We were asked to forgive him as a church body, but not asked whether we should accept his resignation.

Aside all the feel good stuff Pastor Paul brought to his listeners, Dave Courtney raises a substantially higher, spiritual point. Should Christians go into hiding when we sin or otherwise make an error? Should we run away from our church family body? Is God glorified by such? Bottom line: does God wish for us to resign from the Church?

On the human level it would obviously be extraordinarily painful – perhaps embarrassing – for Pastor Paul to come to church and sit among the very sisters and brothers he taught the Word to so well. An additional question would be whether that is a sufficient excuse to go into hiding?

And keep in mind that I am not using the word hiding as him actually truly to hide something from us, in fact I would replace Dave’s word hiding with “Self Imposed Exile.”

I wrote in Practice What You Preach about the incredible example that Pastor Paul left us with, but truthfully it never crossed my mind that we as his members, and even followers around the world, actually have a say in whether to accept his resignation or not. Of course the Elders of Abundant Life did so, ostensibly on our behalf, but the contract is between us and God. So are we faithfully performing our duty by God by accepting such?

In either case, I would love it if one of you wise minded folk out there would share your input on this question.

David Merritt is the Executive Director of Insight Beyond Sight Institute and author of 20th Century American Struggle, 21st Century Hope. www.insightbeyondsight.com.

“Practice What You Preach”–An Ultimate Lesson By Paul Shepard

Just weeks  before 2009 was over, Abundant Life Christian Fellowship had a kind of bomb dropped on them in the way of their chief pastor resigning due to what  appears to be an extra marital affair.

For years and years Pastor Paul Shepard preached and taught faithfully from the bible. He is not one of those Spin Pastors who “interprets” the word of God to satisfy a New Age type of mentality. Whatever the Bible mandated, Paul Shepard only updated into contemporary vernacular. And one of his most powerful and focused on messages involved sexual relations outside of marriage as well as adultery. He exhorted us all to maintain our sexual purity by only having sexual relations in the bounds of marriage or not at all.

Everyone who followed Paul Shepard over his more than 25 years in the pulpit, developed a sense of high respect for the integrity that he openly displayed. He  had always given followers the impression that he was down to earth and real. Over and over he informed us that he was just a man who sinned as everyone else. That in truth, he was no higher or lower than others who followed Christ and he sinned just as everyone else. Ironically, we all understood this intellectually, but we did not digest fundamentally.

One of the deepest and constant teachings from Paul’s pulpit was that when we sinned we must confess the sin not only to ourselves and God, but to those whom we have sinned against, then ask for their forgiveness before seeking restoration from God.

In all the decades of the 20th Century, there were dozens upon dozens of religious, political and corporate leaders who had been found to have committed extra martial affairs. There are probably exceptions, but for all the publicly recorded ones, none of these leaders voluntarily came forward to announce that they had sinned. From Bill Clinton on down, they had to be busted or otherwise exposed. And even once exposed they would deny the affairs until enough evidence was produced to convict them.

Less than a month ago, Pastor Paul gave his congregation the most powerful lesson of all. He openly admitted his sin first to his wife, without being ‘busted’ by the media or others, informed his congregation when he could have hidden it until his grave, and sought our forgiveness.  From there, he voluntarily resigned the very position that God inspired him to build – Senior Pastor of Abundant Life  – from less than 40 to over 4,000 members in California alone . At least 90% of his congregants took his resignation very hard and would have accepted him to stay. Over 60% at least would currently accept him back. This is determined from a sampling I took from speaking with more than 100 congregants over the past week.

So when you come right down to it, what seems to be a significant negative and downfall of a great servant of God, has given us all a clear living example of what all followers of Jesus should apply in their private daily lives. After all the words upon words he spoke, Pastor Paul actually demonstrated them and showed us all that he practiced what he had preached, at least in this instance. This is utterly refreshing when so many of our leaders cling on to their petty little power bases.

May we all be so blessed to follow his example.

Airport Screening – Yeman

Everyone throughout the world knows that not all Muslims or Arabs, or even most, are terrorist, but … all terrorists’ who threaten America are in fact Muslim men. This begs the obvious question:

Why in the world is Home Land Security wasting critical resources on searching Americans who neither look like nor come close to being a terrorist? Yeah, yeah, we have the bill of rights and equal protection laws. The fact is that none of these apply to non-americans. Furthermore, we need to be more concerned with those who are coming into the U.S. from foreign airports and not Americans flying from L.A. to New York.

If my private residence is being attacked repeatedly by a gang of boys on my neighborhood, what sense would it make for me to go out looking for others who are non-gang members? Not only would this be ineffective, but very silly.

Likewise, why should those who are not in any way part of the gang, suffer the adverse consequences that only the gang members deserve?

The only possible way to make American flights truly safe is to first of all target non-American Arabs and Muslims from other countries with full scrutiny. Getting the CIA and other intelligence organizations to work directly with all other agencies is a no-brainer, but more importantly, we need to take effective more accurate measures. The more people we have in our scope to scrutiny, the less likely we will be effective. The smaller the number under our microscope the better chance we will have in catching terrorists’.

Once you have all Muslims under a general scope, you can then have more substantive and specific criteria such as data on where they went to school and obtained religious training or exposure from. This will reduce our pool down to less than 20% of all Muslims who travel.  Those who pose a real risk should be place on No-Fly list. The remaining part of this group should be all subject full scanner body searches that penetrates through cloths and can detect any potential threat.

This does not mean that we should not change our aggressive policies which produces hatred against us in the first place, but since we’re put in this position by very shortsighted officials, we have to deal with it. I feel a whole lot better flying from Pakistan and elsewhere when myself and others are severely searched and searched again. In leaving Lahore, Pakistan, the military stops every vehicle and person coming into airport, every person catching a flight must go through at least 4 more military/police barriers and many are stripped searched–unless you are native American–before you are allowed to waiting area.

They profile people leaving their country because they cannot afford any negative publicity of course, but more so because they are constantly under attacked internally by terrorists’.

When entering or exiting Israel, everything is searched. There is no possibility to carry explosives or weapons. They do not waste time, energy and resources on everyone, but mostly on those who meet a certain profile. Everyone will get scrutinized, but the real meaningful scrutiny is left for those who belong to the group who are actually a threat.

How many more attempts or successes from terrorists’ must we face before we implement the obvious? For ultimately we will have to profile folks in such a way. And this has nothing to do with the racists’ police profiling of African-Americans and minorities in the past. There were no legitimate law enforcement concerns then, now we have national security interest domestically which must be protected.

Moreover, spending excessive amounts of money on security and wars does not contribute to America’s GNP. If we were not getting so-called world bank loans, we would in fact be a bankrupt country who would have to close its business’ doors. China on the other hand is laughing all the way to the bank. They love it that we are expending all our dollars on non-productive things because this allows all of their dollars to buy up things throughout the world. Our leaders are acting as if they are totally blind to all of this. It is amazing to think that they are actually intelligent creatures, for they are not behaving as if they are.

We need to let our representatives and president know that we need them to enact real safety measures and not this superficial window dressing that spends a whole lot of money for little return. We would owe no appologies to anyone. Until all Muslims take proactive steps to shut down the schools, Mosques’ and other traning facilities which are programming hatred, coupled with Americans demanding that our leaders stop projecting negative foreign policies internationally, the root causes of this problem will not be addressed.

This is a patch until that day.

President Obama Is Not Our Leader–Terrorists Prove It

Barrack Obama’s presidency is clearly showing that when it comes to the functions, operations and policies of governments in general, and America in particular, that Presidents do not truly run or really guide their country. His presidency also shows that Albert Einstein’s famous Insight that insanity is: “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Terrorists’ are largely being motivated by U.S. Foreign policies to target people, places and things American. The officials in Washington know this, the world at large knows this, yet the same policies which have been producing hatred and justification for attacking us for decades, continues with the Obama administration.

Mostly everyone who voted for and supported Obama for president, had varying degrees of hope that it would bring a major shift from hitherto policies and direction of our country. His health care achievement is hands-down historical and much-needed. His bailout to bankers, a significantly poor move, as I noted elsewhere. Our visual perception told us that since he looks totally different from any of our preceding “White” presidents, that he would behave differently and thereby alter how we conducted governmental business. After all, everyone knows that brown-skinned people have been oppressed and abused throughout history and Obama would bring a real change from our past since he derives from this oppressed group.

Historically, America has been a kind of Closet Imperialist. The United Kingdom, driven by the British, came to your door, you knew that White Supremacy was coming because they plainly told you so. The U.S. have gone into places under the auspices of fighting the “evil” of Communism, Drugs and Terrorism. When the great evil empire of USSR fell, leaders panicked because there was nothing which threatened us, therefore, no way to galvanize Americans — i.e. dupe  us — into seeing some great threat which had to be attacked and invested in. Drugs rose quickly on the list and billions went into growing our military missions throughout the world, particularly South America, our Prison Industrial Complex and more.

It is an absolute miracle that we have not suffered additional terrorist attacks on American soil. We have managed to contain it outside since 9/11, but this should not minimize the fact that there are thousands who would commit their lives to killing us and millions who disliking what we represent. In fact many are back to hating us with a similar intensity that George Bush produced in them. When I go into the Arab world, whether in its cities or most rural regions, I’m able to directly feel the pulse of them.

In December 2008, when I visited Pakistan and other countries, the natives had a sincere hope that America’s election of a brown-skinned man to its helm, would reflect a fundamental change in its aggressive dominating nature. i.e. White Supremacy was dead.

After all, their eyes told them that the policies of the United States was perpetrated by “White” men and that others within the U.S. were just as much of a victim of these policies as those on the outside. So surely, they reasoned, an African-American president would institute policies that would cease all aggression in their part of the world and either help them to overcome their own government’s ill-treatment, or at least cease supporting them so the people could take their countries over.

Staying in Afghanistan was a clear error, increasing troops there is a horrible crime against the American people and their safety in the world. It is all about show, not substance.

The United States would actually be more effective to either open up real dialog with locals, coupled with infusion of social and business building; or to send in small hit teams who can quietly go in and take out those who are a threat. More specifically, Hit Squads who operate as a surgeon with a scalpel versus demolition man with his bombs. But this would not be for public consumption, and hence public control. Promulgating an effective policy to kill terrorists’ leaders would prevent justification for transferring billions from Tax coffers to military industrial corporations that dictates to all presidents to go to war.

Frankly, the problem is that it is not Barrack Obama running the country in this regard. No president actually ever does. We like to pretend that they do, but the reality is that there are men who are completely behind the scenes who dictate what does and does not happen policy-wise. Just think, what would you do if you were in office? Mostly everyone who gets elected starts off with a similar wish list; however, once in they can no longer win their own agenda, but must push the agendas of others who are the top 1%.

The Detroit Almost-Bomber of Northwest Flight 253 failure, was only a single defect away from making our X-mas a veritable hell. But the lands he has travelled sees hell everyday through rampant poverty pretty much caused or sustained by governments supported, in varying degrees, by U.S. policies that our very own officials make. We call them terrorists’, but this is what they call us. We say they are twisted and insane, yet, it’s exactly how they perceive us. Americans who never travel out of the U.S. do not have a real idea just how negative our policies are overseas. From what I see, our policies are designed to produce hatred towards us and the only real people who will be killed are us little folk. Not the officials who are catering to the 1%.

Janet Napolitano ignorantly stated Sunday that our screening process worked well, after the firebomb successfully went off. How bureaucratic. Why didn’t she just say we failed and some heads needed to roll? Clear state of denial there. Would they truly truly care if that bomb went off and killed those hundreds of passengers? I believe they would, but there are some who see dollar signs in the rise of military and other expenditures, when such a catastrophe occurs.

Change can only come if the majority perceive what’s actually going on and demand, in a constant sustained way, that officials reverse policies. We are doing the same things over and over against expecting a difficult result. Our foreign policies are clearly suffering from retardation and we’re going along with it….

Pastor Paul Returns To Abundant Life

It turns out that pastor Paul Shepard of Abundant Life Christian Fellowship has been observing for quite some time that there was a significant number of Church goers who actually came to Church only to see and hear him. In essence, no matter how many times or different ways to expressed to people to not focus on him, but on God, they continued to credit him and not God.

In fact, many of these very people unconsciously idolized and worshiped him just as Rock star fans do for those they follow. Pastor Paul was acutely aware that this was stunting the growth of not only those persons idol worshiping him, but stunting the Church itself. And so, in the interest of building something solid for the Kingdom, he prayed to God for what must he do to shake out the weak fruit, separate the wheat from the chaff.

God answered his prays with a solution to test the Church. If there was a basis for his leaving Abundant Life in order to give everyone a clear sense that he would not be coming back, then those who were not there for God, but for him would be weeded out. You know, a kind of religious house cleaning.

**Now to reality.

This was the image my 81 year old mother had when she woke up this morning. It was my dad and she who guided me to start going to Abundant Life although it was not their Church. She was very much affected by it because he had a delivery which was on par to my grandfather Robert Johnson, who was a prominent minister from Baltimore to Boston back in the 1930s through 50s.

Let us rejoice! Not for Pastor Paul’s quitting his position at the Church, but for the god-sent opportunity to profoundly examine ourselves. For God has revealed to those who held up the Pastor before Him that Pastor Paul is a mere mortal man, and not a perfect creature.

I myself had felt neglected in my early days whenever Pastor Paul was not there. I never called the administrative offices to ask whether he was going to be preaching or not so I could decide whether to go to Church or not, but I was guilty of being disappointed more than a few times.

Abundant Life is about to be put to the test. Whether or not it fails or succeeds shall be determine by how serious congregants are about following God versus man….

But admit it, it would actually be very funny if Pastor Paul’s resignation was all set up just to clean out the chaff from the wheat. I pray day and night for this brother. He is suffering in a hell that few can relate to. Our duty is to walk with him through this trial. Satan has tempted him around every corner, none of us were really there to strengthen him so he could withstand the constant onslaught of temtations, we only looked to him to strengthen us. Yet in the end he shall not prevail, but victory shall be won in Jesus.

Pastor Paul shows us all that we are humans who have limitations. Just as Moses sin against God prevented him from crossing into the Promise Land, it seems that Paul will not be taking this Church into its promise land and a Joshua shall have to be provided.

David Merritt is author of 20th Century American Struggle, 21st Century Hope. www.insightbeyondsight.com

Pastor Paul Shepard–Abundant Life Christian Fellowship

THIS IS A VERY DEEP PERSONAL OPINION-EXPLORATION OF WRITER WHICH IN NO WAY EXPRESSES VIEWS OF ABUNDANT LIFE CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP

In less than 2 weeks being back in the United States, I am hit with an onslaught of incidents where men and women I know are facing problems with the men having an affair with other women. I thought my post on Tiger Woods would be the last time I wrote on this subject for the foreseeable future, but this past weekend the issue hit a hell of a lot closer to home.

I’ve only been saved with the blood of Jesus, consciously, since 2005. Before than I was a full fledged runner for the Devil who left devastation in my wake. Church in general, has been a great resource and blessing for me. For the first time in my life, I have become grounded in the reality of God and the Son of God. Specifically, it’s been a higher university of training for me under the leadership of Pastor Paul Shepard of Abundant Life Christian Fellowship–the most diversified churches in the U.S. Typically, I separate them from my professional life. This is mainly because of my training in Jurisprudence and history which gives me the notion about the separation of Church and State.

Picture as a backdrop: I’m getting the silly news about Tiger while I’m over in Pakistan and Dubai. An area of the world that has starvation, bombings and water that is less safe than Mexico’s water. I return a Friday mid afternoon after 16 hour flight and as I try to sleep that evening I receive a phone call from one of my best friend’s wife who says he just dumped her for a 30-year-old young thing. I’m pissed at him and pissed at the media for being so trivial. Then I go to my church’s first Saturday service–we have a need to serve 2 on Saturday and 2 on Sunday.

We were told to prepare ourselves in order to care for congregants who will be told that our Senior Pastor shall be resigning. We were left to our own imaginations as to why and presumed that no one would actually tell us why. But we speculate that it must be some politics that forced him out. You know, the Elders not wanting to go along with his plans for the church or some other trivial human affair. But as always, speculation was not on point.

This is a man who took me to the highest university of training: Spiritual development. When I describe my pastor to others I will ultimately say that he has an umbilical cord tide to God. I have overcome spiritual ignorance due to his powerfully meticulous instructions. In fact, I have clearly come to see fornication and adultery as moral shortcomings that should be avoided or overcome with the help of the Holy Spirit. He is, in my eyes, a genius for God.

At the end of the first service, without any forewarning or even the smallest inkling of such, we are told that he has failed in his marriage vows! That is right, another minister bits the dust.

My instinctive reaction was: what is the big deal? He doesn’t have to deprive us of his spiritual prowess simply because of this. He’s a man. It just shows how powerful God designed testosterone. But this is not a man such as the politicians or other church leaders who commits what society or the Church sees as morally wrong and selfishly cares only about himself. He is a man of God who gives far more to the congregation he was instrumental in building, then he takes for himself.

Pastor Paul Shepard is personally one of the few men I have ever met who I can say is truly humble. Jimmy Carter I met decades ago and he impressed me as such. My uncle Gilbert was another–now deceased–and Barrack Obama conveyed this when we met in Detroit’s Cobo Center in 2008. I have met others, but their names would be unfamiliar to you.

Following up on my earlier post regarding monogamy, this seems to only confirm for me that God did not design men to have only one wife. I must investigate this further, but it seems that it is abnormal for men since the beginning of recorded history. Our social model now is designed to prefer the devastation of women and children. It says that men must get rid of one to get a “younger model.” I am questioning this because it seems more sensible to recognize that it is far more healthy for the husband to be obligated to never divorce her and always service her physical, emotional and financial needs. Pastor Paul is not going to be dumping his wife, but millions of men do. This is very, very detrimental to our society. It leaves a wake of disaster with children, women and men. See Is Monogamy of God?

There are so many beautiful sisters in the Church throughout the world, who truly would make excellent wives if only given the chance to become one with a responsible caring man.  But such men truly fall into a small number for a variety of reasons. In early biblical times, both Jews and Christians, if a man’s brother died leaving a childless wife behind, it was the duty of the surviving brother to support that sister in law in many ways.

I pray for my pastor, but I pray more for America to get rid of this primitive mind-set and evolve into a social structure that even the Bible seems to support. Statistically, 90% of men who get married between 18 and 30 end up either divorced and or involved in extramarital affairs. Now women in the West do not wish to acknowledge this, they selfishly want one man to themselves. But its a pipe dream. That man is theirs exclusively only for a very short period of time. In the end, they not only lose that man, but become emotionally damaged. Some resort to homosexuality giving up men all together, or go into isolation with devastated and profoundly disturbed minds.

The Godly inspired word found at Exodus 21: 10-12 authorizes followers of God to have more than one wife. It is conditioned with a very strict mandate to provide for the original wife–i.e. not dump her and certainly not divorce her as we do everyday in America. Jesus did not come to destroy the Law as written by Moses, but came to fulfill it. Christ is in fact married to us all Born Again followers. He is the One husband married to millions of brides. He’s a polygamist, not a monogamist.

We need to be more honest and free ourselves from these artificial  man-made artificial constructs. We need real Insight Beyond Sight.

David Merritt is the author of 20th Century American Struggle, 21st Century Hope. www.insightbeyondsight.com

IS MONOGAMY OF GOD?

Health Care In America

A clear sign that someone is insane is when they do the same thing over and over expecting a different result.

My family’s health care deductable was doubled from $450 to $900 starting January 1.Fortunately we are economically viable and it will not hurt us. The increase is what we would spend on a weekend night out at a restaurant. But I cannot help but wonder what about all those folks who will have to make real sacrifices when hit with such an increase.

We are dealing with deeply corrupt government and even deeper ignorant populous. We have decades of evidence which shows that insurance companies, HMOs, pharmaceuticals and others have perfected the science of bribing our Senators, Congressmen and others in order have laws passed, or not passed, which will directly ensure that they charge us multiple times more than what is needed to earn a decent return on their investment. In fact the salaries that these corporate execs garner is indicative of just how much they rake in from us.

What is so incredible is how so many Americans have allowed themselves to see attacking this problem as an unpositive thing. In essence they are saying, don’t fix it, don’t touch it, just let it continue on its path to greater and greater cost for us. Not surprisingly, the greatest naysayers are those who will never have to worry about the cost of health care.  NBC polls report that 55% of Americans support spending billions for sending troops to Afganistan, and only 47% support the passing of health care. We rather invest in killing people than improving the lives of Americans.

Isn’t this picture retarded?

We complain about the direction that Obama is taking the country, yet how many of us actually stood up to their representatives to make their voices heard. He told us that he could not improve America by himself, but that each one of us would have to step up to work collectively.

As long as we keep allowing the same interests’ to run our health care, as well as other major areas of lives, things cannot get better. Things only become better when we are intentional about them becoming so.

Men and Women, Women and Men

Being a native of the United States, who is temporarily, over here in Pakistan hearing about the Tiger Woods debacle, seems to be so very trivial for several reasons:

First of all, this is Islamic land where the chief Holy Book, Quran, authorizes for men to actually have basically as many wives as he can afford and care for sexually. Secondly, there are significantly bombings occurring throughout the country and region by men who are also practicing Islam. It may not be as dangerous as south Bronx or Chicago, but its in the top 10.

Regarding the first. I must admit that it has me thinking about the issue in a very deep way. Just as Tiger Woods story was unfolding, I get a call from one of my good friends wives. She told me that Earl had issued her a 60 days notice for her to move from their principle residence to which her name is solely on the deed!

I was shocked to say the least. Earl and I go back a long ways. I counseled him through his first marriage, which just so happens to have been with one of my seven sisters, and truly believed that his current wife and he would be together until he died–he’s fifty, she’s in her 30’s.

Then the Tiger Woods story broke and it got me profoundly thinking about the issue of why we men end up with multiple wives or women throughout our lives. During my own first marriage I found it impossible to only be with my wife. Ironically, I loved the hell out of her, but this did not stop my attraction to other women. In fact, the more sex and intimacy I had, the more I wanted a whole lot more. It was insatiable. One woman simply could not quench this drive.

Then I had/have to be honest now.

I am happily married. And love my wife dearly. Yet, I am constantly tempted towards other women. The truth is that the only thing that prevents me from having relations with other women is that I am so busy doing things to make a living. If I did not have to bother much with that, or generated enough revenue where I wouldn’t have to worry about becoming a pauper, I would most likely find myself having another significant woman, in addition to my wife.

For the first time I am recognizing that this one wife thing is wholly a social creation. Let’s set aside all the Holy books that sanction multiple wives and simply look at creation.

God intentionally set in motion a system that produces more females than males. If there was an ironclad law which prohibited any man from having more than one woman during his entire life, then millions of women would never know what it is to be with a man. For it is only the exchanging one woman for another which allows most women to experience sex and possibly a taste of love.

Additionally, if there was such an ironclad law, then it would result in more female homosexuals. As it is, most female homosexuals become inclined because they have been through abusive relations with one or more man and these abusive men may be abusive because they are limited to only one female at a time.

Here’s a stat for you. Women who are legally or openly part of relations with man who has multiple wives/women, are less likely to divorce him than women who have monogamist men.

Now on the second point. When bombs are going off in your country, city, neighborhood, church and market place, to here others cry out about how Tiger has had multiple affairs with women is not only trivial, but down right insignificant. Every one of those women had consensual sex, and it is certain that his wife already knew. Her only pain is that it’s all in the public face now.

CNN and the other agencies are suppose to be reporting on news. And doing so objectively. Why don’t they present a holistic versus narrow view. Sure there are a lot of women who hate the thought of men having multiple women, but the reality is that it happens already. Just not all at one time usually. People are dying over here. The Obama policies do not look that different from the Bush era. And so we are still creating a lot of antagonism against Americans. It was hopeful this time last year, but now a growing anti Obama perspective is growing more and more.

My fellow Americans, we truly need more Insight Beyond Sight

Men and Women, Women and Men

Sitting over here in Pakistan hearing about the Tiger Woods debacle, seems to be so very trivial for several reasons.

First of all, this is Islamic land where the chief Holy Book, Quran, authorizes for men to actually have basically as many wives as he can afford and care for sexually. Secondly, there are significantly bombings occurring throughout the country by men who are also practicing Islam.

Regarding the first. I must admit that it has me thinking about the issue in a very deep way. Just as Tiger Woods story was unfolding, I get a call from one of my good friends wives. She told me that Earl had issued her a 60 days notice for her to move from their principle residence to which her name is solely on the deed!

I was shocked to say the least. Earl and I go back a long ways. I counseled him through his first marriage, which just so happens to have been with one of my seven sisters, and truly believed that his current wife and he would be together until he died–he’s fifty, she’s in her 30’s.

Then the Tiger Woods story broke and it got me profoundly thinking about the issue of why we men end up with multiple wives or women throughout our lives. During my own first marriage I found it impossible to only be with my wife. Ironically, I loved the hell out of her, but this did not stop my attraction to other women. In fact, the more sex and intimacy I had, the more I wanted a whole lot more. It was insatiable. One woman simply could not quench this drive.

Then I had/have to be honest now.

I am happily married. And love my wife dearly. Yet, I am constantly tempted towards other women. The truth is that the only thing that prevents me from having relations with other women is that I am so busy doing things to make a living. If I did not have to bother much with that, or generated enough revenue where I wouldn’t have to worry about becoming a pauper, I would most likely find myself having another significant woman, in addition to my wife.

For the first time I am recognizing that this one wife thing is wholly a social creation. Let’s set aside all the Holy books that sanction multiple wives and simply look at creation.

God intentionally set in motion a system that produces more females than males. If there was an ironclad law which prohibited any man from having more than one woman during his entire life, then millions of women would never know what it is to be with a man. For it is only the exchanging one woman for another which allows most women to experience sex and possibly a taste of love.

Additionally, if there was such an ironclad law, then it would result in more female homosexuals. As it is, most female homosexuals become inclined because they have been through abusive relations with one or more man and these abusive men may be abusive because they are limited to only one female at a time.

Here’s a stat for you. Women who are legally or openly part of relations with man who has multiple wives/women, are less likely to divorce him than women who have monogamist men.

Now on the second point. When bombs are going off in your country, city, neighborhood, church and market place, to here others cry out about how Tiger has had multiple affairs with women is not only trivial, but down right insignificant. Every one of those women had consensual sex, and it is certain that his wife already knew. Her only pain is that it’s all in the public face now.

CNN and the other agencies are suppose to be reporting on news. And doing so objectively. Why don’t they present a holistic versus narrow view. Sure there are a lot of women who hate the thought of men having multiple women, but the reality is that it happens already. Just not all at one time usually. People are dying over here. The Obama policies do not look that different from the Bush era. And so we are still creating a lot of antagonism against Americans. It was hopeful this time last year, but now a growing anti Obama perspective is growing more and more.

My fellow Americans, we truly need more Insight Beyond Sight

Men and Women, Women and Men

Sitting over here in Pakistan hearing about the Tiger Woods debacle, seems to be so very trivial for several reasons.

First of all, this is Islamic land where the chief Holy Book, Quran, authorizes for men to actually have basically as many wives as he can afford and care for sexually. Secondly, there are significantly bombings occurring throughout the country by men who are also practicing Islam.

Regarding the first. I must admit that it has me thinking about the issue in a very deep way. Just as Tiger Woods story was unfolding, I get a call from one of my good friends wives. She told me that Earl had issued her a 60 days notice for her to move from their principle residence to which her name is solely on the deed!

I was shocked to say the least. Earl and I go back a long ways. I counseled him through his first marriage, which just so happens to have been with one of my seven sisters, and truly believed that his current wife and he would be together until he died–he’s fifty, she’s in her 30’s.

Then the Tiger Woods story broke and it got me profoundly thinking about the issue of why we men end up with multiple wives or women throughout our lives. During my own first marriage I found it impossible to only be with my wife. Ironically, I loved the hell out of her, but this did not stop my attraction to other women. In fact, the more sex and intimacy I had, the more I wanted a whole lot more. It was insatiable. One woman simply could not quench this drive.

Then I had/have to be honest now.

I am happily married. And love my wife dearly. Yet, I am constantly tempted towards other women. The truth is that the only thing that prevents me from having relations with other women is that I am so busy doing things to make a living. If I did not have to bother much with that, or generated enough revenue where I wouldn’t have to worry about becoming a pauper, I would most likely find myself having another significant woman, in addition to my wife.

For the first time I am recognizing that this one wife thing is wholly a social creation. Let’s set aside all the Holy books that sanction multiple wives and simply look at creation.

God intentionally set in motion a system that produces more females than males. If there was an ironclad law which prohibited any man from having more than one woman during his entire life, then millions of women would never know what it is to be with a man. For it is only the exchanging one woman for another which allows most women to experience sex and possibly a taste of love.

Additionally, if there was such an ironclad law, then it would result in more female homosexuals. As it is, most female homosexuals become inclined because they have been through abusive relations with one or more man and these abusive men may be abusive because they are limited to only one female at a time.

Here’s a stat for you. Women who are legally or openly part of relations with man who has multiple wives/women, are less likely to divorce him than women who have monogamist men.

Now on the second point. When bombs are going off in your country, city, neighborhood, church and market place, to here others cry out about how Tiger has had multiple affairs with women is not only trivial, but down right insignificant. Every one of those women had consensual sex, and it is certain that his wife already knew. Her only pain is that it’s all in the public face now.

CNN and the other agencies are suppose to be reporting on news. And doing so objectively. Why don’t they present a holistic versus narrow view. Sure there are a lot of women who hate the thought of men having multiple women, but the reality is that it happens already. Just not all at one time usually. People are dying over here. The Obama policies do not look that different from the Bush era. And so we are still creating a lot of antagonism against Americans. It was hopeful this time last year, but now a growing anti Obama perspective is growing more and more.

My fellow Americans, we truly need more Insight Beyond Sight