If Jesus Had A Say

-We would never go to war-ever!
Jesus said in the sermon of the mount:

But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?


We would be the most anti violence country on the planet!!


-We would have happy tax payers.
Tax payers that willingly gave to the government what ever it asked for
Jesus answered when asked about taxes:
"Whose portrait is this?(on the money) And whose inscription?"
"Caesar's," they replied. Then he said to them, "Give to Caesar what is Caesar's, and to God what is God's."


-We would have no poor people and health care for all
Jesus said very clearly when asked about the two most important laws:

Love God and love your neighbor as yourself

And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles. Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

He did not mention if the neighbor was black, poor, on well fare, gay, a single mom, sick in need of care, or just plain lazy, so we have to assume the neighbor could have been any of that!

-And maybe we would even not be that afraid of the word socialism?
When you read Acts, which takes place after Jesus have left his followers, you can read what they with Peter as their new leader decided to do.

All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they shared everything they had. With great power the apostles continued to testify to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and much grace was upon them all. There were no needy persons among them. For from time to time those who owned lands or houses sold them, brought the money from the sales and put it at the apostles' feet, and it was distributed to anyone as he had need.

Sounds pretty close to socialism to me!

To give you a hint on what God thought about the "followers" that didn't give everything to the apostles to distribute to them in need...

Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. With his wife's full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles' feet.
Then Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? Didn't it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God."
When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. Then the young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him.


I like your Christ,
I don't like your Christians
Your Christians are so unlike your Christ
-MK Gandhi

I'm tired

Now I'm getting really frustrated.

I see all these town hall meetings with Hitler signs and Obama as the Joker. The people holding the signs are mostly white, ultra right wing, religious nut cases. They get their share and more of publicity in the media. Much more than what they deserve.

I'm going to tell you right now, there's not anything even close to Christ like with people like that.

Have any of the ultra conservative so called religious people even read the bible? Have they read Matt. 5-7?

Can give me a more hateful, close minded, further away from Jesus, person than a Limbaugh, Beck and Hannity follower?

Let's break it down:

Public Option Health Care.

If they have their health care and are happy with it, what in Jesus' teaching is telling them that letting others have what they have is bad? And if government run Health Care is just not the way they want it, why don't I see them and their church out helping them without health care, getting the care they need, the money they need?

As a matter of fact, why don't I ever see them and their church outside helping others?
No, instead they sit inside their churches, patting themselves on the back.

They're appalled by the gays, by the abortion doctors, by Obama. But they loved Haggin's teaching, they cheered on Bush's preemptive strike on Iraq, killing Innocent Iraqis is somewhat pro life?

They see the right to use their gun and kill to protect themselves and their property even though Jesus said, turn the other cheek, and if someone ask for your shoes, give him your coat as well?

They're against abortion but for death penalty?

They are against government' taking their money but think it's OK for the government to direct others what they can do in their bedroom and with whom?

If they strongly believe everyone that don't share their faith go to hell, why do they still sit in their pew instead of being out helping others, and spreading the gospel?

I tell you why, because there's nothing Christ like in them!

They try their hardest to suck everything out of the government, run the system, find loop holes, cheat on their taxes, just like everyone else.

So, I'm a firm believer in the 1st amendment so I by no mean want them to shut up, I have one request though, until they have read the bible, and fully understood the Sermon on the Mount, I just ask them to drop the Christian part, because they as their Muslim extreme counterparts, are giving the true believers a bad name.

To Lose Your Past

Yesterday I was reminded of a silly game we used to play when I was younger called halvnisse/helnisse. The frightening thing was that though I remembered the name very well, I had absolutely no clue what it was about, nothing about the rules, nothing.

The same thing happened a couple of weeks ago, I stumbled over a phrase in Swedish I hadn't heard in about 15 years and though again it was very familiar somehow, I had no clue what it meant and the correct use of it.

Both of these words/phrases are absolutely meaningless and will not affect my life in any way, but it scared me.
It's like my past is crumbling up in fragments that if I don't keep up pasting them together, soon will be a jig saw puzzle with too many pieces, I don't longer know how to put together and have forgotten what the finished product show

Religious Extremist or just plain wacko?

An Army guy has been shot dead outside a recruiting center here in AR and an other wounded, how badly I'm not sure, lets hope not life threatening.

On the very first news about the story it said it could been religious and political motives that caused the suspect killer to do what he did.
We later found out that the guy that fired the shots is a Muslim, an American born, guy that used to be a regular Joe, converted to Islam and now is a Muhammad something.
We don't know more than that, really.
But today on the news he's all of a sudden a Muslim extremist.

He might very well be a Muslim extremist, but he don't have to be, he can just be a wacko, or an idiot or a what ever, that happens to be a Muslim, right?

The other day a doctor was shot during church by a man who claimed he shot the man because he's a doctor performing abortions. The doctor had been targeted before, his clinic bombed. What that doctor used his medical skills for is questionable for sure. I read he performed late term abortions, something I totally disagree with, there must be other solutions for women being pregnant in a late state, right? But the laws are allowing late term abortions in some states and I guess he was performing them in a state where it's allowed. The man who killed the doctor didn't agree with that law so he decided to make the doctor quit on his own. A pro life guy that kills... don't make much sense does it?

No one in the press called him a Christian extremist though. I'm pretty sure he's of some faith, don't you? By the standard used to describe the soldier killer here in AR he's a religious extremist, right?

There are wackos everywhere that take other people's lives, some are of faith, some on mind twisting drugs, and some just mentally troubled and ALL of them need to be put away.

LAGOM, a very useful word

I think it has it's origin in an old Viking term, describing an amount enough for everybody lag-om, team around. For example: the mjod horn is going around the camp fire. The amount of mjod in the horn is enough to give all of them to drink is LAGOM.
The Swedes use the word for everything. Lagom temperature of the bath water, not too hot, not too cold. Lagom has defined Sweden for decades in politics. And I think it's about time it comes to us here in the US too.

I listened to Glen Beck the other day on the radio and he said it perfectly. We have two ways of thinking in this country and both ways are ran by the radicals.

The radical left wants government in everything, health care, retirement, Unions, your wallet...
Let ME decide, not anyone else, OK?

The radical right wants government in my bedroom, in my family decisions, in my personal life...
Let ME decide, not anyone else, OK?

It's like San Fransisco vs the bible belt small town.

I'm neither of them, nor are the rest of America. San Francisco wants to believe America is like them, but America is not!
The bible belt town people want the rest of America to do it their way, but we don't want to!

Here's where we need to be LAGOM.
Let the radicals on both side be the way they want but don't impose any of it on the rest of us.
Leave it open, let the laws be as far away from the radicals as possible.

I don't want to live in a Swedish way, where they are more concern about what others think than to preserve their own traditions. Where the flag has become a racist symbol. Where it's OK to wait for 12 hours at the emergency room. Where a rapist gets 5 years in prison and better food than old Miss Greta in the nursing home.

I don't want to live the bible belt way either, where they try to implement their twisted religious views in politics near and far. Where I have to drive over county lines to get a beer. Where gays have to hide. Where the teens get pregnant because they teach abstinence only.

I was hoping to get to more of the middle ground of America when we move to Colorado Springs... maybe the Mega Churches of radicals and all the migrated Californians have learned to live in peace, learned to keep their views to their blog spots and otherwise keep them to themselves...

Can you belive it?

OK, so the phone just rang, it was a lady from Cabot School district asking for my daughters mom... that would be me.

yes, she says, I have a man here saying he's Alyssa's boyfriend and he wants to bring her lunch...

I start laughing and saying, OK?

The lady says, well he's not on the emergency list and is not supposed to bring her lunch....

Pause here for a second....

Alyssa's boyfriend is a Senior at the school, or was until Friday when the graduation took place.
He's bringing her a subway sandwich or what ever it could be, not a cake with a hidden file in it..
She is almost 18 and does not need my permission to buy what ever she'd like from the school cafeteria or else where for lunch.

What is wrong with the school?

OK, back to the phone conversation.

I tell the lady while still smiling in disbelief that it's fine for him to give her lunch, and the lady says with a great portion of sourness to her voice that I need to come in and put his name on the emergency list asap.....

Sometimes you don't know if it's best to cry or laugh or just lift your hat and move on...

Count Our Blessings

On this Friday the 13th, let's get away from all the scary movies and bad times.

One of my favorite songs ever is "It's A Great Day To Be Alive" with Travis Tritt.
Recently I think I've forgotten that life theme but today I'm determined to make it my banner again.

World Recession:
The other day on the radio show with Dave Ramsey he asked the audience for people that refuse to participate in the country wide, and soon global wide recession, and My husband and I looked at each other and said, "we're not participating!!" And we're not. We're not worse off than we were a year ago.

I have lost one of my jobs, my weekend job has been laid off for the last two months, but my boss says they might let me come back if business picks up. I have two other jobs anyway and they bring in a little bit of money every month, and my husband after years of long, hard work finally got promoted, and to see the the relief in his eyes are more worth than anything.

We have lost some money in the 401K but I didn't have that much there to start with so it's not bothering us that much.


Family wise:
I'm not very happy with Erik's school as you as readers well know by now, but Erik said the other day that he's having a little bit more fun at school now and summer is almost here, and if we're staying here in AR I'm considering Home Schooling for the fall.

Not knowing if we're moving or not is hard on me, but I've come to realize that what ever happens we're happy, we love it here, and we would love it somewhere else.

Living so far away from my parents is very tough. My dad is in poor health and every time the phone rings at a weird time I freak out and thinks something have happened to him.
But I get to talk to my parents every day on the phone. What if I was an early immigrant from Sweden in the beginning of the 1800? When they left their home country it was to never ever return. The only way of communication was with letters that could take months and months to reach their destination.
Even though the plane tickets to go over there are outrageous expensive I can go with in a couple of hours if something would happen.

I stopped for coffee this morning and remembered the news the other week of what people in Starbucks drive through were doing and decided to do the same, pay for the following car's coffee. Hopefully that made his or her day a little brighter.

So my challenge for myself and for you the reader is to start count our blessings in these hard times and hopefully we can turn all the negative news we hear every day back to every day being "a great day to be alive, and know the sun still shining when I close my eyes"

My iPod's loading some Travis Tritt right now...