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Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good People

12/1/2016

As usual just my opinions especially when I mention the character of God as none of us will know until we actually see him. The above question is probably asked by millions of people each day. Atheists certainly use it to try to shake our faith. If you were asked this question could you provide a good answer? As Christians shouldn’t we have a good answer?

A lot of people don’t understand why a loving God would allow such pain especially with Christians who are his children. First of all they are confused about free will and why it’s so important. If you had a baby and had the ability to program your child to be perfect would you do it?

The fact is we want our children to make their own choices including telling us they love us on their own not because they were programmed to do so. It’s not rewarding when a child doesn’t make the decision to love you but your programming did. Isn’t it rewarding when you see your child do something nice for someone else…once again not because of your programming but because you raised a good child?

I believe God is like a parent in so many ways. He could’ve programed us to do whatever he wanted (i.e. loving, kind, unselfish, etc.), but he didn’t. I’m sure like us he loves seeing the choices we make and the outcomes.

Haven’t we told our children what they should do and they do just the opposite? We know the long-term implications but they’re living in the moment. I believe God cringes when he watches us but this is much more enjoyable than if he already programmed us for success…the bottom line is how much joy is in that? I certainly wouldn’t want to be programmed, what a terrible life it would be to not make my own choices.

I think a lot of people don’t understand that God has feelings. It’s written all over the Bible in both the Old and New Testaments. David was a man after God’s own heart. Jesus pleased him when he was baptized. God has also gotten mad numerous times like with the Children of Israel complaining after he freed them from slavery…thus the 40 years of wandering. He flooded the earth because he was angry. He destroyed Sodom and Gomorra for turning their backs on him. God has feelings and I believe it’s critical we understand this.

I have a friend who lost his 16 year-old son (Brandon) to cancer. We prayed and prayed but he didn’t recover. Why did God let Brandon die when there were so many people praying for him? This is a very tough question. Not all our prayers are answered…well they are but not always in the way we want.
Scott and his family said they would’ve never have made it if it weren’t for the help from a woman who lost her little girl to cancer. She was with them from start to finish (she was there as Brandon passed away). She brought them an enormous amount of comfort and knowledge and she’s still helping other families now.

I couldn’t have helped Scott because I don’t have a clue how to deal with the terrible things he and his wife experienced. So if it weren’t for the woman who jumped in and helped I don’t know what would’ve happened. Why was she so qualified to bring comfort? The reason is she had the same awful experiences but something good has come from it. I don’t know how many families she’ll end up helping because she lost her daughter so good can come from bad.

What if God did heal everyone? If he’s going to do that then why wouldn’t he have placed us on earth without us ever having any medical problems? How would we treat our bodies if we didn’t have any worries about becoming ill; as for me, probably not good. How could we handle the population explosion because everyone was being healed…God would need to step in again so when would it stop?

Just like with any parent he hopes that after all is said and done we make our way back to him…that we return home. More importantly that we choose to go home…this is rewarding to God (the prodigal’s son).

The choices we make in all things including who we hang out with direct our lives. The education levels we pursue impacts our lives. How we treat other people affects our lives. I could go on and on; the reason I mention this is there are so many variables in everything we do so the outcome of our lives isn’t completely controlled by us; so when should God step in? Should God always save us from bad things that happen to us thus changing the direction of our lives? The only way he could do it is to take away our free will.

So why do bad things happen to good people? It’s because bad things happen to all people. Whether you’re bad or good is a free-will choice and that’s the way God wants it, once again because he wouldn’t want to program us just like we wouldn’t want to program our children. He’s our father and he acts this way.

There’s way more to it than what I just shared but I hope it gives you directional insight. Like I said this question is probably asked by millions of people each day so as Christians I think it’s our responsibility to have an answer to this very important question.

Paul Newman

12/1/2016

Paul Newman was an awesome human being. He was an actor, director, entrepreneur, professional race car driver and team owner, environmentalist, activist, and philanthropist.

He has been in so many block buster movies including: The Color of Money, The Hustler, Cool Hand Luke, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting, The Towering Inferno, and The Verdict. His first real breaks came when James Dean died in an automobile accident and Newman was given Dean’s two upcoming movie roles which included playing Billy the Kid and Rocky Graziano.

Newman was nominated for more than 28 awards winning various Emmy’s and Golden Globe’s. He’s one of only three actors (one is Jack Nicholson), to receive acting awards over four decades; Cher accomplished the same thing in the music industry.

Newman was a huge race car fan and won several national championships as a driver in The Sports Car Club of America road racing, and his race teams won several championships in open wheel Indy Car racing.

It would be difficult to find someone as charitable and kind-hearted as both Paul and his wife Joanne Woodward the famous actress, who he had been married to for 58 years! They had six children many also involved in philanthropy along with their kids (he left an amazing legacy). His food company was called Newman's Own and he donated all post-tax profits and royalties to charity. His daughter was instrumental in starting an organic division of products for the company. As of 2016, these donations have totaled over $460 million.

He was also a co-founder of Safe Water Network, a nonprofit that develops sustainable drinking water solutions around the world. In 1988, Newman founded the Serious Fun Children's Network, a global family of summer camps and programs for children with serious illnesses; it has served 290,076 children since its inception. He and Joanne have also given tens of millions of dollars in college scholarships for people in need. Good luck finding someone who cared so much about other people. He wasn’t a religious man per se but he sure lived a life every Christian should want to immolate.

Not widely known, Paul Newman served in the Air Force during WWII. He wanted to be a fighter pilot but they found out he was color blind in one eye so he couldn’t do it. He ended up becoming a crewmember on Torpedo Bombers firing the machine guns at enemy planes. The pilot of his crew got an ear infection at one point during the war and their plane was grounded for a few days while the rest of their squadron flew to an aircraft carrier. The Japanese attacked the ship and all of their friends died. Not long after this draft replacements came and Newman received an honorable discharge.

Now I wrote a lot of nice things about Paul Newman but here’s the bad part, and when I say (or write), bad, I mean it. Are you ready? He was a life-long active Democrat. Yikes! J So in some ways, ideologically, we had our differences but he walked the talk on the most important thing of all and that is to take care of our fellow man. Hollywood is filled with people who focus on self-gratification. Paul Newman was a tremendous example of how to be an extremely successful person without being self-absorbed. How many of us can say we’ve had a positive impact on millions of people? We lost a really good one!

Blinded Democrats

12/1/2016

I often hear Democrats say that Obama has done a good job with the economy because they think things are so much better than what they were in 2008. No doubt it's better than 2008 in some ways but the financial and mortgage crisis weren't solely caused by Bush and the Republican Party. The Democrat Party’s fingerprints are all over the crises the American people had to go through and put us in the economic shape we were in back in 2008.

Democrats love to say that Obama has fixed things but they choose to forget that Republicans have had most of the control over legislation over the last six years so if they’re saying things are good shouldn’t they thank Republicans? What tax plans has the Democrats put in place to stimulate our economy? What Executive Orders has Obama issued that directly impacted the success of our economy?

Obama hasn’t really done anything specific with the exception of the Stimulus Plan which was a bust and he didn’t save the auto industry as Ford was doing just fine. If the federal government bailed out my main competitor I wouldn’t be happy as this certainly isn’t a capitalist ideology. G.M. should’ve filed for bankruptcy and restructured; they would’ve become a much more effective organization than just being bailed out with money.

All I’m trying to get across here is that Democrats pointing to how much better things are from where they were in 2008 can’t prove it had anything to do with just Democrats. If you're happy where you are now or you aren’t, it’s due to maneuvering by both Democrats and Republicans. I think that neither party really did anything to help our economy because they refused to work together to get anything done.

Democrats complain that the rich have gotten richer and they want to change the tax codes to punish the wealthy. They don’t want people to know that the gap between the 1% and the rest of taxpayers has gotten substantially larger during Obama’s two terms. Democrats had control of the Executive Branch and Legislative Branches for close to two years and they never changed the Bush Tax Code, instead they extended it. Why? I remember them saying they thought it was working.

I have a friend who is a die-hard Democrat and she said her business has done great since Obama has been office. I told her that it’s fantastic that she’s doing so well but the fact is poverty in the U.S. under Obama is at an all-time high. Our GDP has been stagnant not keeping up with inflation thus the impact of annual incomes has gone down. Certainly costs going up while income increases aren’t keeping pace is a terrible thing. More people are stuck in part-time jobs. College graduates are finding themselves in a terrible situation as job growth isn’t keeping up with the new number of graduates entering the job market. Education infrastructures in many African American and Hispanic communities are deplorable. The bottom line is my friend might be doing well but she is by far the exception to the norm.

Obama will not be known for his economic genius. Most indicators were good under Clinton but keep in mind he enjoyed the dot.com boom that went bust when Bush was in office. Neither of them should take credit for the good or bad in that situation it was just the market at work. There was also a lot of new investment in lower-end housing as Clinton and the Democrats relaxed loan restrictions. Clinton benefited but it went bust under Bush. Also, economic disparity between the top 1% and the lower income brackets became extremely widespread under Clinton which goes against the Democrat platform so his economic policies weren’t accomplishing what they said it would.

I wrote this article to address pretty much three things. 1) Democrats bragging that things are better since Obama has been in office are neglecting to accept some important economic indicators. 2) Democrats have had every opportunity to change the tax codes and they haven’t done it yet they demonize the Republican Party for the rich getting richer. 3) Bill Clinton was not an economic guru he benefited from the dot.com boom and the housing boom because of relaxed regulations on lower-income housing. Both of these went bust when Bush was in office and he was blamed for it when he did nothing to cause them.

You ever notice when watching a football game that you see the other team fumble yet they swear their running back didn’t fumble, that he was already down? The same play and there’s only one truth but thousands of fans see it one way and thousands of other fans see it another. It’s the same in politics. Most hard-core Democrats will not see the truth no matter the facts. But if given the opportunity I hope you’ll throw some of the information at them that I shared above because every once in a while you can help a Democrat see the light. The odds are long, but the joy of accomplishing it makes it worthwhile.

Florence Henderson

12/1/2016

"Here's a story, of a lovely lady, ..." After all these decades I still remember the Brady Bunch theme song. Florence Henderson just died unexpectedly from heart failure at the age of 82. She attended Dancing with the Stars three days before her death watching "Marcia Brady" dance. A sad loss as people loved her personally as well as professionally. She was a devout Catholic who sponsored the Sisters of St. Benedict throughout her life.

We think of her as the mom on the Brady... Bunch but she had an amazing career beyond this performing on shows like: I Spy, Little Women, The Love Boat, Murder She Wrote, L.A. Law, Ellen, Rosanne, King of Queens, and 30 Rock to name a few. She was on Broadway in 14 different musicals...she was a singer before she was an actress. She also had a hit cooking show. Anyhow, we lost a good one. She was a bright conservative light in a liberal industry. Her husband died in 2002, but she had four children and several grandchildren who could use a quick prayer. Thanks.

This Sheep Farmer Could Run

12/1/2016

The world’s toughest race for runners is a 544 mile ultra-marathon that stretches from Melbourne to Sydney, Australia. In 1983, a 61-year-old sheep farmer named Cliff Young decided to participate in it. There were around 150 world class athletes running in the race and they had to be amused at the old man wearing overalls with galoshes over his work boots thinking it was some kind of a stunt.

As soon as the race started, everyone took off leaving Cliff slowly trekking along. Most of the people watching the race thought he was a crazy old man and were afraid he’d hurt himself but he kept going.

Normally the contenders run about 18 hours and sleep 6 hours during the seven-day race; but no one told Cliff he was supposed to sleep. So while the other runners slept he kept running, gaining on the pack a little more each day. By the last night, he passed all of the world-class athletes. By the last day, he was way in front of them. Incredibly, not only did Cliff run the Melbourne to Sydney race at age 61 without dying, he won first place, breaking the race record by 9 hours and becoming a national hero!

When asked how he could run all night, Cliff said. “I grew up on a farm where we couldn’t afford horses, and whenever we had to get the sheep in, I’d have to go out on foot and round them up. We had 2,000 head, and sometimes I would have to run those sheep for two or three days nonstop.” Throughout the race, he just imagined he was chasing sheep. When Cliff was awarded the first prize of $10,000, he said he didn’t know there was a prize and insisted they split it among the other lead runners. The nation fell in love with the 61-year-sheep farmer who came out of nowhere to defeat the world’s best long-distance runners.

Joe Montana

12/1/2016

Joe Montana pound per pound and height per height, is probably the greatest quarterback of all time. He was a little guy who played bigger than life. One of the things that players commented on is that Montana had a mystical calmness in the huddle. He never got rattled.

The 49'ers played the Cincinnati Bengals back in the 1989 Super Bowl and they were down by three points with 93 yards to go and a little more than three minutes to play. As the players got into the huddle for ...the biggest drive of their lives, Montana looked up in the stands and saw John Candy standing. He looked at his teammates and told them he saw Candy in the crowd. His players thought it was so funny that Montana wasn't worried about the drive. Of course Montana ended up orchestrating a drive that ultimately ended up with him throwing a touchdown pass with a few seconds left to win the Super Bowl. He was definitely one of the greats ever to have played.

One of the Fastest Crimes Ever Solved

12/1/2016

In 1989 a popular radio D.J. by the name of Debbie Dicus was murdered (an attempted rape as well but she fought back viciously), in Virginia. The murder took place in the middle of the day at a community garden where she spent a good amount of time. The police brought a K-9 German Shepard to sniff the weapon used which was a garden hoe. The dog then went immediately to the crowd of on-lookers up to a man who had a flannel shirt on over a t-shirt and began barking at him. The police had him remove his outer shirt and on his t-shirt in the front and on the back, was blood. The reason there was blood on his back is that it was splattered there when he swung the hoe.

Of course they did a blood test and it was Debbie's. Case solved within a couple of hours thanks to man's best friend. By the way, this particular dog had a 99% success rate of finding what it was set out to do including tracking down vehicles that were present at various crime scenes. They said it had the ability to smell the nuances of hormones in fear and adrenaline and could trace it back to an object or a person.

Is The NFL Tax-Exempt?

12/1/2016

The NFL is a strange animal. It's kind of like a corporate office and all the teams are various businesses reporting to them (32 NFL teams). Each team gives $6 million dollars each year ($192 million total), to provide services like broadcast rights, contract disputes, player and team discipline/fines, licensing, marketing, merchandising, etc.). Each team owner pays taxes but the NFL doesn't. The $6 million each team gives to the NFL isn't taxed as it is considered given to a... non-profit.

Why don't they pay taxes? This tax haven was created in 1966 and was tacked onto another Bill that had nothing to do with a non-exempt status (it was basically an earmark/pork), for the merging leagues of the AFL and NFL. Pete Rozelle was pretty much responsible for the deal being cut.

Keep in mind it's supposed to be a non-profit so what do they do to help accomplish this...they pay their people outrageous salaries like Roger Goodell (the commissioner), who will have a $20 million dollar salary per his contract in the next couple of years. Steve Bornstein who is the NFL Network President is making a comparable salary. It's a scam. Please contact your representatives and ask him or her why the NFL qualifies as a non-profit; according to the IRS's criteria, they don't.

Cuba

12/1/2016

Cuba has a population of around 11 million and those who work average making $20 a month or $240 a year compared to our average of around $50k. Their terrible standard of living reflects this. The Castro family has close to $1 billion in wealth and they and their friends want for nothing while many Cubans have to stand in line for bread.

Castro took a decent economy before he led a coup (farming), and got it to the point where they couldn't make it if it weren't for Russia and Venezuela helping them out. He has broken pretty much every human rights violation including murdering LBGT's. Yet Obama makes a nice statement about him. Barbara Walters said she found him to be funny and charismatic. No, he and his family are evil and are exploiting the citizens of Cuba.

Police Officer Shooting

12/1/2016

We had an police officer related shooting recently and the African American community went crazy having riots in the street. Witnesses said the man killed didn't have a gun, was just reading a book in his parked SUV when police came up to harass him, stepped out of the vehicle with his hands in the air, and that white police officers shot him. What really happened based on evidence? He did have a gun (unregistered), which was in his hand when he was shot and he had an ankle holster.... Even though his wife said he didn't own a gun the police proved she lied that she did know he had a weapon.

There were several police officers on-site and when they checked all of their weapons, the only one to have fired his weapon was an African American male. Keep in mind witnesses said he never pulled his gun. There was no book in his vehicle but there were drugs and extra bullets he kept in a cigarette pack. He wasn't just an innocent father, he was a felon who wasn't supposed to have a gun.

Anyway, the police officer was proven innocent and no charges will be filed. But the problem, and why I'm writing this post, is it seems every time something like this happens, several African American witnesses lie about what happened. Just like Michael Brown who never had his hands in the air. Think about what these people are willing to do in trying to get innocent police officers arrested. They're willing to ruin their entire lives even though they were protecting their communities. It also sets into motion civil law suits so lying can be worth millions. I find this absolutely disgusting. What happened to morals?

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Author: John Mann

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