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When Jesus heard this, He was astonished and said to those following Him, "I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith."
Matthew 8:10

"... faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."
1 Corinthians 13:13

Untitled fiction
 Son, you are confined to a small space.  You cannot move; you are unable to walk about or even breath on your own free will.  The seed with which I used to create you was in this exact same situation.  He was freed, like you will soon be, but then became confined to a space not as small as this, but not nearly as big as the ones he was accustomed to after he'd been freed.  I wept as he cursed my name, but all he could hear or cared to hear was the sound of his voice cursing me.
 Father, why would anyone curse you?
 O son.  There is so little you can know at this point in your life.  You will soon forget me.  I will try to find you --- Son; why are you crying?
 Father, I cannot bare what you are telling me.  Say it is not so.
 Son, you know I would not lie to you.
 Father, I love you too much.  Please spare me this pain.
 Son, there are people out there that need you.  This world is obscured by lies and hatred.  If I reach them directly with my own hands, I will die.  We will meet again one day, my child.  Go to sleep.
 Father, please...
 Son, you're making this harder than it has to be.
 I'm sorry, Father.
 I'm sorry, too, son.  These feelings are temporary.  There is indeed happiness outside this confine.  Why are your eyes widening?  Your skin is too pale.  O, my son.  This work I have begun in you is unraveling.  Please let go of my hand...before it's too late.

A lukewarn Sunday

Today started out great.  I don't know what happened.  I feel like today has been a dark day.  My mom was talking under her breath while the worship leader was leading prayer and since then I've been consumed with varying levels of negativity, ranging from boredom, impatience and judgement as well as sadness and regret.  Yesterday I snapped at a Target employee who was either very inexperienced or wasn't all that bright.  She almost took my entire $10 bill when I had already made it as clear as anyone could that I wanted to pay $11 out of the $13 total with my EBT card.  Thankfully I noticed that she was about to make that mistake, but I could have handled myself better.  She responded to my anger with more anger, and I felt ashamed, but of course there was nothing I could do about it.  I prayed to God this morning and I think I prayed to God sometime since that particular time yesterday, but the fact and memory remains.
I just woke up from a 2.5 hour nap.  I ate a bunch of sandwiches for a snack of sorts, and I don't feel too hot about that either.  I wasn't happy while I was doing it and I don't even remember what it was that was mad about.  Obviously nothing worth additional weight gain.
I have no idea what to make of what the pastors were saying.  Nothing they said made any sense.  Someone might go to Hell if I don't tell them(him/her) about Christ.  I thought about efforts I could make on the way home and I thought any random person I say "hi" to and responds could be an opportunity to create a friendship that could lead to salvation for either them or someone they know.  So I thought for a moment; what if I walked and just kept looking forward?  Obviously I''m not committed to making friends or I would have done it by now or at least tried.  Then I thought ":baby steps".  It may not mean anything; right now, it doesn't.  Baby steps on their own mean nothing.  And I can't guarantee they'll ever mean anything, nor can God Himself.  However, there may come a time my baby steps may accumulate into a mini-walk that may slip into a sprint, and things could change before my third eye can protest too much.  I don't know.  I'm not even sure if I love God enough to be "earnest" in my prayers if I prayed a request for opportunity.  Pastor said something about people's attitude of themselves, using an analogy regarding windows vs. mirrors, the difference being windows you can see what's beyond your house and mirrors are just reflections.  Damn.  I listen to music an awful lot.  What is music other than a mirror?  I guess I need to go for more walks.  I'm definitely not committed enough to God to walk in this muddy water that's pouring from the sky.
Ok, I suck.  I don't know why I was about to type more.  It means nothing.  My feelings are so damn easily manipulated.  Tomorrow I may very well wake up as if today never happened.  I don't think so.  It's not like I'm shallow...not to brag or anything...idk...

more dumbness

got this in an email from gift card resale guru giftcardgranny.com
 https://www.giftcardgranny.com/blog/best-buy-rewards-money-saving-secrets/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=12%20days%20of%20savings&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Electronics%20Deals&utm_content=Day%204
This article makes no sense.  Why would someone want to shop at BestBuy and hesitate because they can get a better deal elsewhere and then hurt their heads trying to "think like a money-saving expert" when the obvious choice is to simply shop elsewhere?  If you want to support "local" businesses, do that.  If you want to support ACTUAL ***local*** businesses, you're going to need to spend more money than you otherwise would, which is the whole point, right?

The World --- past and present...

I remember when Bill Clinton raised minimum wage toward the end of his presidency.  I was 16 or 17 then, not old enough to vote, a little too in the clouds to be much aware of politics.  I was aware of the debate about guns, the debate about abortion and the debate about gay people.  My mom brought up a pretty good point the other day; most people that have guns don't know how to use them.  They either kill themselves or firing at another person that was not the intended target.  Since the ascent of vegans and animal rights groups, along with Nintendo and cable TV, hunting is not the past time it once was.  It seems most of the forestry has been replaced with McDonald's' and Burger Kings.  I'm not as vehement about my prochoice and gay rights stance.  If this nation were to be dedicated to God by its people, I'd say sure.  Once a true revival has been accomplished, if it ever happens, then I would encourage legislation to prevent another downfall.  People are way too worried about Sodom and Gomorra's fate happening to the USA.  It is true that the floodgates are opening.  Gay people are officially accepted as kosher by the U.S. gov't, and now people are trying to push the boundaries further.  Eventually, this will tear us apart.  I think perhaps I now understand what people meant in the '90's talking about "treating women as objects" in reference to porn.  I had a hard time understanding it because I've always had a difficult time connecting with people.  People technically speaking are objects, physically speaking.  Just like a piece of electronic equipment is used to entertain us, people are used to make the household goods that our homes contain in this nation and many other developed nations.  The difference is love.  Your TV can't love you like another human being can.  That thought makes no sense in modern youth since sex and love have become synonyms to some extent.  After all, if your TV has the Pamela Anderson/Tommy Lee sex tape showing you "love", what argument can one make when someone says "Close enough"?  I don't think society is anywhere near barbaric enough to warrant a S&G scale cursing.  The people of those lands were not merely in a sex frenzy party mode 24/7.  They were rude and demanding.  They demanded to have sex with the newest arrival in town.  They didn't ask for consent.  They didn't have any interest in anything other than satisfying their libido.  Dating was once generally understood as getting to know someone before marrying them.  Then it became an attempt of an emotional connection that may or may not lead to sex and/or marriage.  Now it's like a code word.  Most men are more coded than I am, but women are even more so.  Their bodies are more graceful, both in motion and stillfullness and their ability to detect subtleties is sometimes staggering, in a good way sometimes...Which is why it's never clear what one can expect when you say "Wanna go out on a date?" and the woman accepts.  She may pick up on something about you that you yourself weren't even aware of.  "Wait, she said I have the eyes of a stalker?  Well, she ought to know I'm not a stalker.  I only left her 3 voice messages since yesterday..."
(sigh) anyway.
I started this post talking about minimum wage going up in the '90's, didn't I?  I think it went up again during W.'s admn.  I don't remember.  My head is still a little too in the clouds.
Yeah, little more trivial, I suppose, since it's really just a question more so than a narrative of thought/feeling.  I have no means of knowing the answer.  I know everybody wants more than they've got even though they have all they will ever need except in a lot of cases a lofty retirement.  I know there are a lot of people that are misappropriating their money with the latest gadgets and hitting up food pantries for assistance.
However, since  I've never had a job --  My limited ability to connect with people is just one reason for that -- I cannot objectively answer the primary question pertaining to the minimum wage debate:  My pondrence is pertaining to: for those who were working minimum wage during or before the most recent mnm wage hike and are still making minimum wage today (does such a group exist?):  Did the most recent minimum wage increase help you?  In other words, is your life better as a direct result of minimum wage going up back then?
I know businesses are at odds with the Democrat agenda.  I do think businesses should pay their fair share.  Just like gay people should seek God's counsel and abstain from their urges, the people that own WalMart should also be empathetic and generous toward its employees and those less fortunate.  However, the same greed that WalMart and its peers exhibit is not something the common man is immune to.  Heck, I've been guilty of greed many a time and I've been on welfare all of my adult life.  The more you have, the more you think you deserve.  It's a tragic tale that happens over and over again, and The Bible shows it plenty and so does less controversial sources of history. 
Obviously we as a society need to continue wanting what we don't have.  It's a given.  That's why capitalism works for those who have a job or some kind of income.  But the degree of want is another story entirely.  That people are so discontent with their lives that they sacrifice food and shelter to pay for the newest technologies is absolutely absurd.  No smartphone is going to be useful enough to make it worth going without a nourishing meal.  Heck, any kind of telephone is not really needed, although writing a letter or visiting a neighbor to get your fill of after-work social interaction is just too much to expect of people, right?

Government authority is a fashion statement.  No government exists outside of the people's will.  If people are wanting bad enough for their government to change, it'll happen.  There's a passage in George Orwell's book 1984 that perfectly demonstrates that fact.  Sure, people in China and USSR-era Russia had nothing to compare their lives to because of the strict censorship those governments impose(d).  But if they really wanted change, they could have made it happen.  Chinese citizens are too busy working and then shopping to demand change.  Same thing with the USA.  Until something bad happens to a family member or someone you love otherwise, it doesn't matter what the laws are.  There simply aren't enough victims to make any kind of change.  That's the kind of love The Bible speaks of.  Loving someone enough to step in and help out with what they need.  Not because of some forced familial connection, but because you are God's child and as an expression of gratitude, you treat others the same way Christ did --- died so he could keep us from having to go to Hell for the wrongs we commit, the nastiness in our hearts, both internal and outwardly projected.
 I know I'm a bit of a hypocrite.  I don't know if it's a harder road to walk because I resisted so long or if it's merely my dissassociation with society that still plagues me...I think it's a combination of the two.  I do know I am a coward.  I don't pray to God often enough about that.

  This is oft-stated Christian theology, but a fitting closing thought:
  The first commandment is NO IDOLATRY!  It's the first commandment because even though it's the hardest commandment to follow, it makes following the rest of them a gazillion times easier to accomplish.

chillin' w. the waves

Most of these "chill-wave" albums --- nostalgia-driven 21st century new wave --- start off great and then get boring after 4 or 5 songs.  They sound cheesy in concept, but it's hard not to like the songs if you ignore the song titles.  I was never into all the crap the 80's offered; RAMBO, POLICE ACADEMY, etc. etc...hair metal is OK, most of it is so shallow, I liked it more when I was a pre-teen and early teenager even though I've always been "deep" compared to my peers.  I mainly like a lot of the synth based 80's music, like "Take On Me" by A-Ha, HEARTBREAK CITY-era The Cars (the bulk of their 1985 overview THE CARS' GREATEST HITS is a blast)...there's a lot of music in the '80's that is synth based I don't like.  Some of that I liked a lot more before I came to Christ.  Berlin's "Take My Breath Away" is just too slow and simplistic, even though it's obviously a bonafide classic; some people ***really*** like that song.  It's never been a favorite of mine.  I eagerly await a more useful spending of my time when it comes on Pandora, since I keep creating stations hoping to find a blend of music that actually represents the song(s) that I selected as a jumpstart to the station.  They say "pick your favorite song or artist".  I don't have a favorite artist.  "Losing Your Memory" by Ryan Star is probably my favorite song, but I select that and it ends up a big mess of Coldplay like stuff, some of it IS Coldplay, which in and of itself is not a bad thing, they had some killer stuff in the early and mid-2000s, but nothing that compares with the likes of the station seed in question.  It just irks me that they never play anything from prior to 2001 when I select that song.  Personally I think the Billy Joel remake of that old song "And So It Goes" has a lot more in common with R.S.'s "Losing Your Memory" than most of this piano-jangle pop or whatever you call it.  I always have to skip almost a dozen songs because it's largely stuff I've heard way more times than I ever needed to.  The Fray's "How To Save A Life" -- and all the other 11 songs on that album -- are nothing new to me.  The Fray's 2nd album onward is mostly garbage songs with a few OK songs mixed in.  They NEVER played "And So It Goes".  I've used "losing your memory" as a station seed alongside other custom radio jumpstarters but never did it cause Pandora to play "and so it goes" --- neither the original from the '50s or whenever that was (don't remember the name of the group) nor the Billy Joel re-make.  Heck, I never even heard them play anything else of similar caliber and quality by Billy Joel.  He had some killer songs on his "GHv3" from 1997 that covered his later years before he apparently quit making music unless you count live recordings as "making music".  I think "The Downeastern Alexa" or "Shameless" would go great.  I think one time I heard Imogen Heap's "Hide And Seek" on a station that I used "LYM" as a station seed after like the dozenth attempt.  idk.  That would have been the most obvious choice as a song you play on a station named after that great Ryan Star song.
Anyway...I don't know what I'm typing about.  Music I don't like?  idk.
Most of the chill-wave albums are not available physically.  I did find one by a band called Gunship, which is probably the most boring chill wave album I've heard as of yet.  Amazon is selling it for $18 and some change + tax.  You can get it a little cheaper from their marketplace sellers.  The lowest prices are like $15 apprx when you factor in s/h.  Amazon offers free s/h, but if you opt out of that you have to pay $4 on top of the $20apprx (it might be slightly less depending on your local tax or if Amazon has a warehouse in your state.  When I was living in Missouri through 2015, I didn't have to pay tax on Amazon LLC orders, although there were some marketplace sellers that shipped from Missouri who Amazon's system automatically added tax to items I thought about ordering from those sellers.....)  I was considering ordering that Gunship CD b/c I had a real cool typically chill-wave cover, but it's in no way worth $15++.  I'd rather wait for ATLAS by FM-84 to come on CD or vinyl than buy a mediocre chill wave album on CD.  ATLAS isn't consistently riveting either, but it's better than CHROME BURNING by Mitch Murder, which I got done listening to 8 songs of this morning and found myself rather bored by that 8th song and the one preceding it.