Arjay's Weblog

Good Life, Great Price

I was surfing around a few days ago at Spurgeon.US, the web's largest repository of quotes by the Prince of Preachers, and I ran across the following quotes.   Already the Sunday edition of The Grand Rapids Press is weighing in at around 73.5 pounds.   We've not even finished the month of October and already the paper is chock full of "gift ideas".  In other words, "Hey you lemmings, it's that time again!"

Just like Halloween, "...whatsoever is not of faith is sin."  Show me a mandate for the celebration of Christmas day in Scripture, and I'll feel much better about the whole matter.  Maybe Christ would be more honored by us if we endeavored to obey His commands all year long, rather than indulging our selfish American materialism and calling it a "celebration of His birth".  Americans love combining idolatry and worship and calling it good.  Hey, I'm quite guilty of it myself, but I can at least see a better way through the fog generated by Madison Avenue.

John 14:23
Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching.  My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.

Here are two quotes from Spurgeon on Christmas:

I hold it to be one of the greatest absurdities under heaven to think that there is any religion in keeping Christmas-day.   57.25

We have no superstitious regard for times and seasons.  Certainly we do not believe in the present ecclesiastical arrangement called Christmas:  first, because we do not believe in the mass at all, but abhor it, whether it be said or sung in Latin or in English;  and secondly, because we find no Scriptural warrant whatsoever for observing any day as the birthday of the Saviour;  and, consequently, its observance is a superstition, because not of divine authority.  1026.697

The Valley of Vision

Family and Friends,

I recently began using a little book called The Valley of Vision in my morning devotions.  It's a great little leather-bound collection of Puritan prayers and devotions.  Here is the piece I read this morning.  I hope you find it to be an encouragement.

God the Source of All Good

O Lord God, Who inhabitest eternity,

The heavens declare thy glory,
The earth thy riches,
The universe is thy temple;
Thy presence fills immensity,
Yet thou hast of thy pleasure created life,
  and communicated happiness;
Thou has made me what I am, and given me
  what I have;
In thee I live and move and have my being;
Thy providence has set the bounds of my habitation,
  and wisely administers all my affairs.
I thank thee for thy riches to me in Jesus,
  for the unclouded revelation of him in thy Word,
  where I behold his Person, character, grace, glory,
  humiliation, sufferings, death, and resurrection;
Give me to feel a need of his continual saviourhood,
  and cry with Job, 'I am vile',
  with Peter, 'I perish',
  with the publican, 'Be merciful to me, a sinner'.

Subdue in me the love of sin,
Let me know the need of renovation as well as
  of forgiveness,
  in order to serve and enjoy thee for ever.
I come to thee in the all-prevailing name of Jesus,
  with nothing of my own to plead,
  no works, no worthiness, no promises.
I am often straying,
  often knowingly opposing thy authority,
  often abusing thy goodness;
Much of my guilt arises from my religious privileges,
  my low estimation of them,
  my failure to use them to my advantage,
But I am not careless of thy favour or regardless of
  thy glory;
Impress me deeply with a sense of thine
  omnipresence, that thou art about my path,
  my ways, my lying down, my end.

Anti-Biblical UAW Advice

The Detroit Free Press, October 28, 2005
Action by UAW Could Slow Work at Delphi

I'm sorry, but not going above the call of duty is what got these people in the abyss they're in now.  It is nothing but sinful for a so-called labor organization to advise men and women to do less than their best in the workplace.

Above my computer on the wall where I work is a piece I posted there when I came to that place of employment some 4 years ago, and it reads:

"Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverance for the Lord.  Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward.  It is the Lord Christ you are serving.  Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism."   The Apostle Paul in Colossians 3:22-25

I'm not perfect in obedience - no one is - but Paul's words have stood me in pretty good stead over the years.  We should set our sights higher than work slowdowns.

The whole concept of organized labor works against this principle of Scripture and as with laws of physics such as gravity - it hurts us when we disrespect them.

R.J.

Fading American Glory - Revisited

The quote below by UAW leaders reminded me of a piece I had written back on September 8, 2001.  For years now I have been watching America take a fast train to third-world status. Look at our manufacturing situation.  Look at the gulf region.  Look at our Congress.  Look at all the scandals, from Worldcom to the Catholic Church.  It has to be getting clearer and clearer to people that, if nothing else, God seems to be telegraphing powerful signals to us that He ain't pleased with the status quo down here.  I don't claim to have some insight into His mind, but we should all take advantage of these situations to kneel in prayer before Christ and pray for this once-great nation - that God would again cause us to repent.

R.J.

Union Leaders Blast Delphi Contract Proposals      {emphasis mine}
The Detroit News
http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/22/autos-357085.htm

"UAW President Ron Gettelfinger and Vice President Richard Shoemaker said the proposal "displays a total lack of concern about the impact it would have on Delphi workers, their families, their communities and our nation."  The UAW represents most of Delphi's 30,000 hourly workers."

"The plan "is designed to hasten the dismantling of America's middle class by importing Third World wages to the United States," they said in a statement."

================

Excerpts from Fading American Glory, which I wrote and sent out on September 8, 2001, three days before the events of 9/11 rocked our nation:

"The Soviet Union is gone, but darkness now has many homes.  Middle Eastern countries like Iran, Iraq, and Egypt - all former Soviet satellites - are now homes to evil, radical and fundamentalist Islam, a false religion - a religion that in its radical form HATES anything Christian, anything Jewish, basically anything good, especially American or Israeli."

"Is America's glory fading?  Has she allowed the slaughter of over 23 million children within her midst?  Do her judges dispense justice?  Do her leaders oppress the poor and fatherless?  Most importantly, do her Christians pray like they used to?  Do we seek His face or have we turned away from Him to experience other pursuits?"

"Those are some big questions, all of which I think we know the answers to.  It's really no big deal for God to raise up an Egypt or a China in order to do His will.  America has been the primary agent for good things in this world for most of her life.  When she ceases to be good, I believe she will cease to be.  Vile sinners like myself come to Christ every day and are changed.  Who's to say China won't be raised up and become a beacon to the nations, a light on a hill?  The American Patriots threw off Imperial Britain in the 1700's with Sovereign aid.  Why can't the Chinese do a similar thing in the twenty-first century?" "As an American who loves this country and the things she used to stand for, it pains me to say it, but let Thy will be done, and not ours."

Good News at Delphi Corporation

I awoke this morning to learn that Delphi Corporation, the world's second-largest auto parts manufacturer has filed for bankruptcy protection.

While I do not rejoice to learn how many workers and their families will soon be without income, this is a very good thing.  Marxism has been tried and everywhere it has been tried, it has failed.

As a former UAW member I can tell you that the philosophies held by the UAW and other labor unions are Marxist and these unions promote and defend all manner of laziness and shoddiness in the workplace. 

One summer when I was 19, I worked at the General Motors Technical Center in Warren, Michigan as a shipping and receiving clerk.  My job there was salaried, and my duties included receiving packages and shipped items at one of the loading docks and placing them on carts for UAW employees to deliver throughout the center.   My dad was a UAW forklift operator at the center's main loading dock and he often delivered prototype car models and larger items throughout the vast facility.  From my dad's accounts around the dinner table at night and what I saw with my own eyes while working there, the attitude some of these folks had towards their work was appalling.  I saw management practically beg workers to do their jobs - jobs they should have been EXTREMELY grateful for.  I know that back in 1985 my dad's wages were FAR above what a non-UAW forklift operator would earn and my dad's benefit package was unrivaled anywhere on earth. 

Several years later I was hired as a CAD detailer at General Dynamics Land Systems Division in Sterling Heights, Michigan.  This was a UAW position and was probably one of the most awful jobs I ever had.  Before I quit that job I was so agitated that I wrote the Secretary of Defense about the things I had seen and experienced there.  I was regularly berated by co-workers for "killing the job".  Killing the job is union terminology for putting in a day's work.  Older co-workers knew that if you finished a job too quickly, the gravy train might run dry.  I made pretty decent money there, but the whole project seemed like government make-work as we were entering outdated battle tank drawings into a clumsy automated CAD system.

And getting rid of a ne'er-do-well UAW worker is darn near impossible.  I think an act of Congress is required to fire one.  Space here at Typepad is almost unlimited, but I doubt I have enough space to tell you of all the instances I knew of where drunks or drug abusers - extremely dangerous people behind heavy equipment - were repeatedly brought before management (at the G.M. location) only to be given second, third, fourth and fifth chances to reform.

Now that I've given you a little of my union background, back to the Delphi matter.  This is going to be very painful for Delphi and its supplier network.  Short term it is very ugly, but long term, people are going to realize that Marxist Communism fails everywhere it is tried.  The days of paying forklift operators $25/hour with full benefits in America are gone; non-union shops and the Mexican labor force have made sure of that.  Smart companies dumped the union years ago and are now competitive in the marketplace.  Here's a quote from the September 26, 2003 Detroit News:

"Currently, UAW workers at Delphi and Visteon are paid equal to workers at the automakers they spun out of, General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co., respectively - meaning a typical wage around $24 an hour.  Currently, Visteon and Delphi workers start around $18 an hour, while those with higher seniority or in skilled-trade posts earn $30 an hour."

Unions work against the grain of the open marketplace.  In my opinion, contract negotiations are little more than shakedowns or extortion on behalf of workers.  If a job has value it should be compensated according to basic laws of supply and demand.  When wages are inflated, a false sense of value is given to a job and union bosses line their pockets with the increased revenue from union dues.  For these union leaders to bemoan executive incentive packages is hypocrisy at its worst.

Every American taxpayer who worked during the Cold War helped via their federal taxes to defeat Soviet Communism.  Why would any American want to see the legacy of men like Marx and Lenin enshrined in such uncompetitive labor forces?

"Mr. Gettelfinger, tear down this wall!"

R.J.

 

2 Excellent Al Mohler Columns

Here are links to a 2-part piece by Al Mohler, the president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.  I thought they were flat-out awesome.

R.J.

Homosexuality in Theological Perspective - Part 1

Homosexuality in Theological Perspective - Part 2