DON'T SUCCUMB TO PRESSURE
By Coach Dave Daubenmire
November 13, 2008
NewsWithViews.com
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Ephesians 6.
I wish you knew me. I am about as common of a guy as you will ever meet. One of five kids raised by a factory-working father and a stay at home mom we were the text-book Ozzie and Harriet family so common in the sixties. We attended public schools in the days of local control of education, all matriculated to higher education, and were encouraged to start a career, raise a family, and attend church.
I married in 1979, began the child-raising gig in 1982, and have tried to live as my parents trained me, to “follow the rules.” Michele and I have been married 29 years; we have three-wonderful children, a family dog that we recently lost at age 19, and a strong desire to leave our children a better America than the one we inherited.
In 1987 Michele and I had a powerful “born-again” experience which radically changed our lives. We had been raised “in church” but never knew Jesus. Stale, man-made religion had poisoned our soul. A new birth in the Spirit transformed our lives.
In 1997, while coaching at a public high school in “cornfield” America, I was attacked and sued by the ACLU for praying with our football teams. When forced against the wall we all have the same choice to make…fight or surrender. By nature I like the former.
“Who do those guys think they are?” I asked whoever would listen in regards to the god haters at the ACLU. “They are not some government agency, like the IRS. They are a private group trying to tell us what we can and can’t do. Doesn’t anyone want to stand up and fight?”
Blank stares. That was the usual response, especially from ‘Christians.”
In 1999 I left the government schools and started Pass The Salt Ministries. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I knew somebody had to do something. During my two-year battle with ACLU I recognized two truths: The “Church” was painfully silent in regards to fighting for the culture, and the god-haters were intent on destroying Christianity. I felt that my experience could be used to “awaken the Church” and exhort Christians to unite for the sake of our children.
One of the first things I did was start a radio program. As is my nature I jumped in hard with both feet, just a rank amateur with a lot to say. As I look back I am amazed at how little I knew. Many in the “Church” hated me because I challenged their status-quo, sissified Christianity. The pastors were the worst. They didn’t appreciate my “tone.” But it was much deeper than that.
Many of the listeners of my program began to ask their pastors some hard questions. “Hey Pastor, don’t you think we should go to the school board meeting and question the recent comprehensive sex-ed program they are trying to bring in to our elementary school? From what I heard on Coach Dave’s show much of the curriculum is controlled by Planned Parenthood. Shouldn’t we speak up about it? After all, it is our money they are spending.”
You can see why they hated me. Confrontation does not fit the mold of the cowardly. It is easier to call “the Coach” radical, unbalanced, or mean-spirited, in order to justify one’s apathy. But I am a coach. I’m used to criticism. Like most coaches I understand that true-Biblical leadership does not require an opinion poll. When it is fourth and one and time to either punt or grunt, the last thing on a coach’s mind is who he is going to offend. Fear paralyzes. Any one can lead in the absence of opposition. Strong leadership requires swimming upstream, even when it would be more fun to jump in the raft and float with the crowd.
The opposition from those who should have been on my side only hardened my resolve. One of the coaching principles we always used with our guys was the need to “fight pressure.” If someone is trying to get you to move in a certain direction you only have a short time to figure out why. “Push back” we told them, “fight pressure.”
I began to read and study. I spent hours searching the net. I turned off the dead-stream media and began to search out truth for myself. What I began to find disturbed me. Something was seriously wrong behind the scenes in America. I didn’t believe every “conspiracy theory” I surfed upon, but I began to connect enough dots to realize how sinister the plot that was unfolding really was. From Waco to Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City to Vince Foster, The New World Order to the Trans-American Highway, The Truth of 911 to The Federal Reserve, Government Bailouts to pre-selected Presidents.
I read them all.
“Oh, you’re in with the black-helicopter crowd, huh?” My Christian friends would ask me. “How can you believe those conspiracy nuts?” They’re not laughing today.
But I always kept those opinions to myself. I rarely even broached the subject on my radio shows. I prided myself on bringing a Christian perspective to hard-hitting talk radio. Not the kind of radio that “Sister Susie Sweet” would enjoy, but hard hitting, “talk radio with a sting” that would attract the more “culturally engaged” members of our society. The harder I hit, the more the “Church leadership” closed me out. I “made Christianity look bad,” and of course the last thing the Church would ever want to do is look bad.
So silently I read and I studied. For the last 10 years I have been watching as Christianity has gradually become less and less effective in fighting the culture. In 1997 they came after me for praying with our football teams and today, we are holding on by the skin of our teeth to try and keep Christmas celebrations in our schools. Here is the conclusion I have reached.
Like it or not, believe it or not, there is a conspiracy at work in this nation. All that we hold dear is under assault. Banks are crumbling, our dollar is on the death bed, huge corporations are closing, and “government”, which caused the problem, is riding in to rescue us. I fear for this nation.
To respire means to breathe. To expire means to stop breathing. To conspire means to breathe the same air. Working together can be good. All government, by its very nature, is a conspiracy. Read what my friend Al Cronkrite wrote.
You see folks; conspiracy in itself is not a bad thing. It is WHO is conspiring, and WHAT they are conspiring to do that matters.
Let me shoot straight. Many of you think that Zerobama was elected President. Not so. Oh, he may be the man that was placed into office, but he is really nothing more than a pawn in this world-wide chess game. The battle wasn’t and isn’t between the Republicans and the Democrats.
They have just convinced us that it was. No matter who won the election, the evil plan was designed to move forward. There is “spiritual wickedness in high places”, an evil conspiracy, that is working to destroy America. The battle has not changed for over 2000 years. The battle is for the souls of men.
Good verses evil, right verses wrong, Jesus against the Devil. It breaks my heart that Christians cannot see it. We have believed the hype. “Republican good, Democrat bad, conservative good, liberal bad, Obama good, McCain bad, government good, Jesus bad.
“Woe to those who call good evil and evil good.”
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Matt. 6:24.
Prayer moves heaven but money moves earth. We have chosen prosperity over Truth. Our children will suffer the cost.
The god of money is melting away like the Wicked Witch of the East. The ATM is about to run dry. We have backed the wrong horse.
For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. I Timothy 6:10
My Christian friends, when the epitaph for America is written the underlying story will be how easily and completely the evil-one deceived the “people of the book.” When the Christian Church most needed to “fight pressure,” we chose instead to go with the flow.
I weep for my children and what has come upon us. We have sold their birthright for a pot of stew.
By Coach Dave Daubenmire
November 13, 2008
NewsWithViews.com
For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Ephesians 6.
I wish you knew me. I am about as common of a guy as you will ever meet. One of five kids raised by a factory-working father and a stay at home mom we were the text-book Ozzie and Harriet family so common in the sixties. We attended public schools in the days of local control of education, all matriculated to higher education, and were encouraged to start a career, raise a family, and attend church.
I married in 1979, began the child-raising gig in 1982, and have tried to live as my parents trained me, to “follow the rules.” Michele and I have been married 29 years; we have three-wonderful children, a family dog that we recently lost at age 19, and a strong desire to leave our children a better America than the one we inherited.
In 1987 Michele and I had a powerful “born-again” experience which radically changed our lives. We had been raised “in church” but never knew Jesus. Stale, man-made religion had poisoned our soul. A new birth in the Spirit transformed our lives.
In 1997, while coaching at a public high school in “cornfield” America, I was attacked and sued by the ACLU for praying with our football teams. When forced against the wall we all have the same choice to make…fight or surrender. By nature I like the former.
“Who do those guys think they are?” I asked whoever would listen in regards to the god haters at the ACLU. “They are not some government agency, like the IRS. They are a private group trying to tell us what we can and can’t do. Doesn’t anyone want to stand up and fight?”
Blank stares. That was the usual response, especially from ‘Christians.”
In 1999 I left the government schools and started Pass The Salt Ministries. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I knew somebody had to do something. During my two-year battle with ACLU I recognized two truths: The “Church” was painfully silent in regards to fighting for the culture, and the god-haters were intent on destroying Christianity. I felt that my experience could be used to “awaken the Church” and exhort Christians to unite for the sake of our children.
One of the first things I did was start a radio program. As is my nature I jumped in hard with both feet, just a rank amateur with a lot to say. As I look back I am amazed at how little I knew. Many in the “Church” hated me because I challenged their status-quo, sissified Christianity. The pastors were the worst. They didn’t appreciate my “tone.” But it was much deeper than that.
Many of the listeners of my program began to ask their pastors some hard questions. “Hey Pastor, don’t you think we should go to the school board meeting and question the recent comprehensive sex-ed program they are trying to bring in to our elementary school? From what I heard on Coach Dave’s show much of the curriculum is controlled by Planned Parenthood. Shouldn’t we speak up about it? After all, it is our money they are spending.”
You can see why they hated me. Confrontation does not fit the mold of the cowardly. It is easier to call “the Coach” radical, unbalanced, or mean-spirited, in order to justify one’s apathy. But I am a coach. I’m used to criticism. Like most coaches I understand that true-Biblical leadership does not require an opinion poll. When it is fourth and one and time to either punt or grunt, the last thing on a coach’s mind is who he is going to offend. Fear paralyzes. Any one can lead in the absence of opposition. Strong leadership requires swimming upstream, even when it would be more fun to jump in the raft and float with the crowd.
The opposition from those who should have been on my side only hardened my resolve. One of the coaching principles we always used with our guys was the need to “fight pressure.” If someone is trying to get you to move in a certain direction you only have a short time to figure out why. “Push back” we told them, “fight pressure.”
I began to read and study. I spent hours searching the net. I turned off the dead-stream media and began to search out truth for myself. What I began to find disturbed me. Something was seriously wrong behind the scenes in America. I didn’t believe every “conspiracy theory” I surfed upon, but I began to connect enough dots to realize how sinister the plot that was unfolding really was. From Waco to Ruby Ridge, Oklahoma City to Vince Foster, The New World Order to the Trans-American Highway, The Truth of 911 to The Federal Reserve, Government Bailouts to pre-selected Presidents.
I read them all.
“Oh, you’re in with the black-helicopter crowd, huh?” My Christian friends would ask me. “How can you believe those conspiracy nuts?” They’re not laughing today.
But I always kept those opinions to myself. I rarely even broached the subject on my radio shows. I prided myself on bringing a Christian perspective to hard-hitting talk radio. Not the kind of radio that “Sister Susie Sweet” would enjoy, but hard hitting, “talk radio with a sting” that would attract the more “culturally engaged” members of our society. The harder I hit, the more the “Church leadership” closed me out. I “made Christianity look bad,” and of course the last thing the Church would ever want to do is look bad.
So silently I read and I studied. For the last 10 years I have been watching as Christianity has gradually become less and less effective in fighting the culture. In 1997 they came after me for praying with our football teams and today, we are holding on by the skin of our teeth to try and keep Christmas celebrations in our schools. Here is the conclusion I have reached.
Like it or not, believe it or not, there is a conspiracy at work in this nation. All that we hold dear is under assault. Banks are crumbling, our dollar is on the death bed, huge corporations are closing, and “government”, which caused the problem, is riding in to rescue us. I fear for this nation.
To respire means to breathe. To expire means to stop breathing. To conspire means to breathe the same air. Working together can be good. All government, by its very nature, is a conspiracy. Read what my friend Al Cronkrite wrote.
You see folks; conspiracy in itself is not a bad thing. It is WHO is conspiring, and WHAT they are conspiring to do that matters.
Let me shoot straight. Many of you think that Zerobama was elected President. Not so. Oh, he may be the man that was placed into office, but he is really nothing more than a pawn in this world-wide chess game. The battle wasn’t and isn’t between the Republicans and the Democrats.
They have just convinced us that it was. No matter who won the election, the evil plan was designed to move forward. There is “spiritual wickedness in high places”, an evil conspiracy, that is working to destroy America. The battle has not changed for over 2000 years. The battle is for the souls of men.
Good verses evil, right verses wrong, Jesus against the Devil. It breaks my heart that Christians cannot see it. We have believed the hype. “Republican good, Democrat bad, conservative good, liberal bad, Obama good, McCain bad, government good, Jesus bad.
“Woe to those who call good evil and evil good.”
No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon. Matt. 6:24.
Prayer moves heaven but money moves earth. We have chosen prosperity over Truth. Our children will suffer the cost.
The god of money is melting away like the Wicked Witch of the East. The ATM is about to run dry. We have backed the wrong horse.
For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. I Timothy 6:10
My Christian friends, when the epitaph for America is written the underlying story will be how easily and completely the evil-one deceived the “people of the book.” When the Christian Church most needed to “fight pressure,” we chose instead to go with the flow.
I weep for my children and what has come upon us. We have sold their birthright for a pot of stew.
posted by shummer60 at Monday, November 24, 2008
2 Comments:
You and "Cockroach" Dave need to go back to the rock you crawled out from under. Your fear mongering is no longer relevant.
You should man up and not leave anonymous comments. We will see what is relevent soon enough. Sound like you will be first in line for the mark of the beast.
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