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God Bless Him
One day I woke up and realized my mother is evil and so is the rest of her family. They cheat, steal and hurt my younger brother for fun, all they do is take from him and try to up set him, or treat him so bad that he gives up. I am sorry he was ever born because life has not been good to him at all. Now he is alone, no income and a fractured spine, and has to relocate soon. His year already off to a grand start, and my mother broke the car on his window to upset him, after dropping her car off to have work done on it. I hope he dies in peace. No one loves the guy. How do I know? Well, I have seen it with my own eyes. And no one steps in to help him. They all pretend not to see or call him crazy if he speaks up. I bet it feels good to know you all helped in making his life hard. Good job.
2 Kings 2.19: They are Afraid
Good sees the deepest dissembled thoughts, nay sees the thoughts before they are thought. God is just to exercise his might, and mighty to perform his justice. None should take life but him who gives it. God is good security of all the debts of the poor. There is no cause but one why one man’s nose is longer than another’s, but because that God pleases to have it so. The unlovely may work against us, but God sends us men when we want them. God has always been to me not so much like a father, as like a dear and tender mother, he turneth the shadow of death into morning. How much kinder is God to us than we are willing to be to ourselves! In 1760, John Michell, a British engineer and seismology pioneer, reported that Earthquakes and their resultant energy were produced by shifting masses of rock miles below the surface. The planet has seven major tectonic plates, which correspond with the seven continents, and about a dozen smaller ones; upon these tectonic plates sit all the continents and oceans. The plates represent a barrier between the Earth’s solid surface and its liquid core. Their various fault lines separate them from one another. Along these lines there are constant motions, so there are Earthquakes all day long, but many of them cannot be felt by humans. This is moderate, but highly consequential activity: During the past three million years, movement along the San Andreas Fault, on the California coast, which demarcates border between the North American Plate and the Pacific Plate, has shifted at a rate of approximately two inches a year (about the same pace it takes for a finger nail to grow).
How can we argue about God’s power in the other stars from the laws which he has given for our rule in this one? This Summer, 24 August 2014, at 3.20am, Napa, California USA was hit by a magnitude 6.0 Earthquake, on the Richter scale. Scientist are now using Napa as a laboratory because the closest, previously mapped fault was farther away, and was considered by state officials to be too old to be active, as the last time it ruptured was more than 11,000 years ago. When the fault ruptures—when plates crash or pull apart, when the Earth’s crust is broken—energy moves in waves throughout the planet, and we feel the outcome on the surface. However, inactive faults can awaken. Even if there are not clues, faults can exist. And Evidence of recent movement can be washed away, or, as in the case of this section of Napa Valley, buried deep underneath soil deposits eroding from the mountains. Scientists had their suspicions that a fault could be buried in this area of Napa, but held back from mapping it because there was not enough evidence. Earthquakes are measured by the Richter scale, which was developed in 1935 by Charles Richter of the California Institute of Technology. It registers Earthquakes from micro (2.0 or lower) to massive (8.0 or higher). The largest ever recorded was the Chilean Earthquake of the 1960, a 9.5 magnitude on the Richter scale, which caused a phenomenon known as the free oscillation of the Earth. Seismic waves traveled around the planet for days after the initial shock. Scientists often have limited access to dig trenches and study possible faults, in areas filled with homes, that were built decades ago.
The Napa Earthquake woke several small previously unrecognized Napa Valley faults. The Earthquake tore up to the surface, producing a 9-mile-long scar that sliced through vineyards, asphalt and even homes, as the magnitude 6.0 on the Richter scale was the largest Earthquake to shake Northern California, in 25 years, injuring more than 170 people, killing 1 woman, who died from brain bleeding caused by a falling television. There were also 800 homes damaged, 103 were deemed too dangerous to enter. Most of the damage was centered on the West Napa Fault. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) found that the West Napa Fault moved a total of 18 inches (46 centimeters) along a 9.3 miles long (15 kilometers) length, and the estimated damage is anywhere from $362 million to $1 billion. While these newly found faults let off the region’s pent-up strain, an Earthquake with 30 times more energy is expected to hit the region in the future. The Napa Earthquake on 24 August 2014, marked the first time, since the 1971 Sylmar Earthquake, that a temblor in California has caused surface rupture in a residential area. “We are going to be taking a really hard look now, everyone should always be aware of where all of these faults are when they’re building. However, we can’t go around just doing it on a gut feeling. We draw the lines with the best information that we have available,” reports state geologist John Parrish. As of December 2014, more than 160 buildings, in Napa California, were still red-tagged, or severely damaged, and more than 1,640 yellow-tagged, or moderately damaged. The city has issued about 980 earthquake repair permits, with many homeowners still waiting to see whether they can get some federal help for the repairs. At least people in Napa have someone to help, other victims of Napa are not so lucky.
In 1906, San Francisco, had a population of 400,000, and was the largest American city on the West Coast. On Wednesday, 18 April 2014, the San Andreas Fault began to rupture at 5.13am, , the 7.9 magnitude Earthquake, on the Richter scale damaged electoral wires, and overturned candles and coal stoves, which sparked huge fires, as dozens of fires merged into one. In a desperate move, the city’s 585 firefighters were helpless in the face of the conflagration, and the underground water mains had been destroyed, so they decided that houses, like the Hopkin’s Mansion, which were standing in the path of the blaze, would be destroyed by cannon fire and explosives, creating a firebreak 175 feet wide. Many beautiful mansions were lost, but huge sections of the city were saved by the unfortunate act, and it took four full days to extinguish all the fires. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of refugees fled the city by rail. With the New King’s basketball arena being built in Sacramento, any wonder why the city tore down perfectly good buildings, and historic buildings for this project, as the infrastructure is not adequate, and if there was a disaster, and rush hour traffic, it is possible that police, firefighters, nor emergency services will be able to respond. Look our Lord, this town is well situated, as you can see, but the water is bad and the land is unproductive. The city of Sacramento is already in debt $2 billion, the new arena has no parking, and after it is all paid for will have a grand total of $1 billion more debt for the city and investors (taxpayers) to pay off. And they know what happened once could happen again.
Surely the absurdity of all the doctrines of religion, and the iniquity of man, are sufficiently evident. To fear a being on account of his power is degrading; to fear him if he be good, ridiculous. How can we argue about God’s power in the other stars, from the laws, which he has given for our rule in this one? Agree with your adversary quickly. Do it quickly—bring yourself to judgment now. In moral and spiritual matters, you must act immediately. God is determined to have His child as pure, clean, and white as freshly snowed powder, and as long as there is disobedience, He will allow His Spirit to use whatever process it may take to bring us to obedience. The fact that we insist on proving that we are right is almost always a clear indication that we have repoint of disobedience. This is what the LORD says, “Bring me a new bowl and put salt in it. I have healed this water. Never again will it cause death or make the land unproductive.” And the water has remained wholesome to this day.
Inner Invincibility
These are the final days, and many will appear to have lost their souls, so intense will the nature of the changes be that those who are weak in spiritual awareness will go insane, for we are nothing without God. These ungodly people will disappear, for they are just hollow vessels for anything to use. Life is so bad in the city of Sacramento that many have chosen to leave this plane, as we are in the time of arrival of the Purifier. Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift. This is to allow God to examine you closely, do you have anything to hide from God? If you do, then let God search you with His light. If there is sin in your life, do not just admit it—confess it. Are you willing to obey your Lord and Master? I am here for God to send me where He will.
Unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of society, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. Those who are of God do good things, but they have to also be good in their motives, having been made by the supernatural grace of God. Your motives must be so pure that God Almighty can see nothing to rebuke. The purity that God demands is impossible, unless I can be remade within, and that is exactly what we are undertaking to do through our redemption.
Love, in general, arises from the pleasure which all men naturally take in whatever they judge or perceive to be good and perfect. To be wise and love is hardly granted to the gods above. Love is capricious and involuntary; reason cannot direct its choice. There are people who never do anything that is not worth watching; they cannot eat an apple or button a shoe in an unnoticeable, unsuggestive manner. If they embark on anything, they do it so symbolically so you will feel in debt to them for it. However, the texts of scripture are not to be strained, but are to be construed naturally.
Many of us would read in the stars, if we could, something hidden from us; but none of us so much as know our letters in the stars yet—or seem likely to do it, in this state of existence—and few languages can be read until their alphabets are mastered. Signs are small measureable things, but interpretations are illimitable, and in girls of sweet, ardent nature, every sign is apt to conjure up wonder, hope, belief, vast as a sky, and colored by a diffused thimbleful of matter in the shape of knowledge. In natural science there is nothing petty to the mind that has a large vision of relations, and to which every single object suggests a vast sum of conditions. It is surely the same with the observation of human life. One part of a community must inevitably hang upon another, and it is a farce to call either independent, when to break the chain by which they are linked would prove destruction to both.
We exist only in so far as we hang together. We are bound to think well of one another, in this World. Our mental business is carried on much in the same way as the business of the State: a great deal of hard work is done by agents who are not acknowledged, for a wanderer’s repose or a sinner’s reformation should never depend on a fellow-creature. Direct the total energy of your powers so that you may achieve everything your election as a child of God provides; rise every time to whatever occasion may come your way. You did not do anything to achieve your salvation, but you must do something to exhibit it. You must work out your own salvation, which God has worked in you already. The Almighty God is here, and He will reach to the last grain of sand and the remotest star to bless us if we will only obey Him. Does it really matter that our circumstances are difficult?
Why should not they be! Learn to lavish the grace of God on others, generously giving yourself to the divine nature. Be marked and identified with God’s nature, and His blessings will flow through you all the time. Take possession of your own souls, and build your own souls in accordance with the new life God has placed within you. You have to pick yourself up, relax and become strong; then you will find that you can do what you believed you were unable to do. The problem, however, is you simply will not. The Christian life is one of spiritual courage and determination living out in your own flesh. Who shall separate you from the love of God? God does not keep His children immune from concern. It does not matter how real or intense the adversities may be; nothing can ever separate him from his relationship to God. Tribulation is never a grand, highly welcomed event.
On 30 May 1889, a rainstorm started in the western Pennsylvania county of Cambria, and during that day and night, it became a torrent, dumping as many as 10 inches of rain in 24 hours. Years earlier, a dam had been built and a reservoir created 14 miles upstream from—and elevated 450 feet above—Johnstown.
In the middle of the afternoon, on 31 May 1889, the 72-foot-high dam gave way, and some 20 million tons of water pour forth and headed toward the city. No one knew what was coming. However, soon they began to hear it: first a distant rumble, then a thunderous roar, as the wall of water, which had built to a height of 60 feet and a speed of 40 miles per hour, crashed upon Johnstown at 4.07 p.m. Lumber from shattered houses, boulders, dead animals—even people—were already part of the onrushing water, which would claim many more victims. Above the black wave, there was a swirls of spray that looked like smoke and would be forever remembered in the city as death mist. The drowning and devastation of the city took just about ten minutes.
God saw that the wickedness of man was great on Earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Mankind’s depravity had reached a level that evil entirely permeated every part of his being. His wickedness was great, his actions were wicked. Every mind was evil—his mind was wholly corrupted. Every thought of his heart—his will, his desires, his emotions, his passions, had all become so sin stained that there remained nothing within them that was not evil. These people upon whom God poured out the Flood were not merely dabbling in sin here and there, everything that they were doing was an horrific abomination! The Earth was corrupt before God, and the Earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the Earth, and behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the Earth.
And God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh is come before me; for the Earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the Earth. The Earth was corrupted and filled with violence! The evil depths that the people who lived before the Flood had sunk to is strongly emphasized and amplified here. For most people, they were in the most desperate minutes of their lives, snatching children and struggling through the water, trying to reach the high ground, running upstairs as houses began to quake and split apart, clinging to rafters, window ledges, anything, while the whole World around them seemed to sin faster and faster.
In all, 2,209 people perished in the Johnstown Flood. The emotions of those who survived the tremendous deluge were simply inexpressible. It was vain to undertake to tell the World how or what many felt, when shoeless, hatless, and many naked, bruised and broken people stood there and looked upon that scene of death and desolation. An uprooted tree is thrust into the Schultz family’s house in Johnstown. Ninety-nine families were wiped out entirely, in the disaster, and 98 children lost both parents. More than 300 men and women were widowed by the Flood. In considering why God sent the Flood, it is because those living upon the Earth were completely and utterly wicked beyond the hope of changing. There were no innocent bystanders caught up in the Flood; everyone was guilty of the most deplorable sinfulness. Much like the Banjaregara , Indonesia flood, on Monday 29 December 2014, which killed 51 people and there are many more missing, and displaying more than 40,000 people. The rebellion against God could not be overlooked.
And We Move on
All relationships are unique. There is nothing innocent, or good, that dies, and is forgotten. Much like death, moving can be traumatic to a young child. I have stood aside to see the phantoms of those days go by me. They are gone, and I resume the journey of my story. Memory, however sad, is the best and purest link between this World and a better. Sometimes when you uproot and move children, they are unable to form new attachments because they cannot deal effectively with emotions and are attached to the relationships that they lost, and this is a common phenomenon with children. When you try to replace a person, this creates a model that becomes the unfortunate habit for dealing with that loss and future relationships. It is crucial that you try to understand what your child is feeling and what they are going through because they are highly emotional.
Each person is different and unique, much like a rose, no two will ever be exactly the same. The idea that we can mitigate the inevitable pain of loss by attempting to replace the loss of a person sets up tremendous conflict with the child. First of all, it dismisses the importance of the relationship between the child and their friend. Secondly, this deception introduces the idea of disposability about valued relationships that the child has with the lost friend. No two people can have identical relationships with anyone or anything—we bring our individuality into every relationship. Even people who are blessed with twins see differences between their children. Just because people resemble each other, does not mean they have the same attributes or qualities. A parent knows which are bold, shy; crave more attention, and which ones are loners.
When you pay attention to the uniqueness of a person, you will recognize that the exclusivity of the relationship is irreplaceable. The new friend or relationship will never be exactly the same because the individual is new and different than the last one. So the notion of replacing the loss is a very dangerous concept because it translates into substituting the new relationship, for the former one, which is impossible. What is conceivable is to have a new and unique relationship with a different individual. However, before you move on, one must complete the emotional relationship with the object that or person that has moved on. Failure to complete past relationships can make one feel participation in a new relationship is too difficult or impossible.
One may recreate a person or experience because they have not been shown how to complete the prior relationship. The memory has as many moods as the temper, and shifts its scenery like a diorama. It is unfair to the new friend, which is simply being itself, and is being pressed to be like the original. Also, remember, people have different personalities, and trying to make it be the same as the former individual puts one in conflict with its own unique and individual nature. You do not have the knowledge, authority or permission to deal with the consequences. What you often end up with is an angry recipient and bewildered presenter.
All because our society keeps trying to convince us that we do not feel bad about losing a friend or possession, and that negative emotions are bad; the social order wants you to believe that we can replace the loss, and this will make one feel better. However, you need to feel and release the pain. Children do not need to be fixed, but they do need to be heard. Feelings of loss are normal and natural; there is nothing that needed fixing, just affirming. When their heart is broken, or they are hurt, children need to be able to feel bad—do not try to fix them with replacement.
As a parent, it is your task to help raise your children so that they can be constructive members of society. You also need to transmit your cultural values to your children so they succeed in life. Often children require the care and training of their parents, for a relatively long period of time, before they are able to survive on their own; you attack and bring your own children down, and society will do the same to them, creating a cycle that they cannot escape from. When this happens, some turn to religion because everywhere they go for help, no one will help them. And then you have other cultures, in America who do not believe in God, and try to criminalize religion. Do not hurt the Lord. Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, World?
It is highly probable that we are hurting Jesus by what we ask. Lord, show us the Father. We look for God to exhibit Himself to his children, but God only exhibits Himself in His children. I have to get to the point of the absolute and unquestionable relationship that takes everything exactly as it comes from Him. God never guides us at some time in the future, but always here and now, and the freedom you receive is immediate. Lord Jesus, I know I am not perfect and ask you to forgive me of my ungodly ways and prepare for me a new heart. I surrender my life to you. The unfaithful cannot tolerate anything that originated from God’s creation. In the current political environment, there is no effective leadership in the World. Every nation lacks strong and competent leaders, able to deal with issues at home or internationally.
The United States of America is starting to be viewed in the same light as Mexico—poverty, corruption and murder, and Americans are losing their influence with other nations because political leaders, in the United States of America, have no moral center to direct their decision making process. However, a man will arise, who will achieve victory (Rev 13.7). To maintain friendships and faithfulness, we have to be more careful and make sure we have the moral and vital relationships, to God, above everything else, including obedience. People come nearest unto God, who show mercy and compassion.
Nature’s Fury–the Call of God
The ground fell from under me, like a trapdoor beneath the hangman’s noose, a sudden, sharp drop, then the jerk of the rope. I was lost; bewilderingly, heart and soul, lost. So they were not aware of how much you have suffered? People often do the idlest acts of their lifetime in their heaviest and most anxious moments. I held out for six years, but it came in the end, my breakdown, collapse, whatever one calls it. December 2014, I was taken to a private hospital, a sanatorium for men with nerve problems, neurasthenia, and other consequences of having survived in the trenches of Capitol Avenue. The medical staff was kind of efficient. I glanced at Collin. However, honestly, I did not want to get better if it meant losing what little I had left of my brother. There. I had said it. I exhaled. My shoulders sagged and my lower back hurt, worn out by the act of confession, physical attacks and all the drama and sad stories.
All the emotions, all the regrets, memories and questions I had allowed to decay inside me for so long, lay scattered about, like discarded gifts. So great a torment is anxiety to the human mind, that we always endeavor to relieve ourselves from it by guesses, however doubtful or uncertain; on which occasions, dislike and hatred are the surest guides to lead our suspicion to its object; all bodily attacks and torments are nothing compares with certain states of the human mind. Anxiety is a fear reaction, usually without any actual threat or real cause. Anxiety is the same as worry, dread, or apprehension. Some people have so much anxiety that they are on the verge of having a nervous breakdown, and sometimes, when others know you are at the point, they pile even more on your plate.
Anxiety can get so bad that you feel the urge to run out and buy a bottle of booze, drugs, or go to the doctor and get a prescription like Xanax. While these may sound like good idea, there could be a better solution. Let us look at the root causes of your anxiety. Often times people want to get ahead in life, so they start off by being very nice and respectful and obeying the rules that they were taught growing up. However, you have to remember that society was not raised as well as your family and a lot of people are thugs and savages, and they will prey on you. Nonetheless, you keep being nice to them and letting it go, without truly dealing with the issues because you do not want any drama. Conversely, you are holding onto the pain, and just like a BMW X5, sitting on a frozen lake, in the spring, the ice is going to break and you are going to sink because you are just sitting in the mess and not addressing the problems.
Drugs may sound like a good idea, and you may need the legal ones, but it is a lot like placing a tarp over a hole in the roof, in a Victorian mansion, they do not really solve the problems and could make it get worse. A lot of those medications are not good for your kidneys; they alter your personality, and can be addictive. Therefore, if you are holding your emotions inside, you need to politely address the situation. Now, I know when dealing ignorant and hustlers, they are not reasonable, and sometimes you may have to get at them on their level, at your own judgment, but never let it lead to violence. However, another problem with anxiety medications is they can damage your short term memory, while you are still young; and senior citizens may suffer increased chances of developing dementia. So, unconsciously, you may slip away by forgetting your identity, or some part of your identity that is threatening, anxiety-producing, embarrassing, entrapping, or otherwise unwanted. Usually the person remembers most of their past experiences, such things one cannot remember that are clues to your problem.
However, what about the everyday, ordinary person—like you? You are not senile, have not had a blow to the head, nor are you repressing any wicked secret. What makes you forget things? Why can you not remember your sixteenth birthday party, when you got your first kiss? Her hand was so close to yours. You noticed how the diamond ring she wore, on her wedding finger was too big for her, and your girlfriend bragged that your mouth tasted like cookies, after they made you two play spin the bottle, in your parents empty house. You forgot every detail about that day. Her beautiful eyes, and long lashes, you got lost in the instant. She had dark hair, which tumbled in loose curls around her porcelain face, unspoiled by power or rogue, and she had such pretty lips, so appealing. The moment your hand brushed against hers, so intense, so profound was the feeling, everyone in the room could feel the passion, as if they had been burned. Every sinew, every muscle, every vein in your boy seemed suddenly to vibrate, to be alive. A wave of lightness and gratitude washed over the room, this beautiful angel, understood you so clearly.
Sorry! It is not just time or disuse that causes tricks of memory, as logical as that might seem. Our evidence indicates that, under hypnosis or drugs like sodium pentothal or sodium amytol, forgotten experiences can be recalled to almost letter-perfection. If time really erased or damages those memory traces, these artificial means could not being them back. No, we need other explanations. The state of mind oppressed with a sudden calamity is like that of the fabulous inhabitants of the new-created Earth, who, when the first night came upon them, supposed that day would never return. Time is a factor, to be sure. However, not time or disuse alone. It seems that it is the events or experiences that filled that time period that interfere with total recall.
If I cannot recall my magical sixteenth birthday party, it is likely to be because since then I have had many others—plus a million other experiences that either were more significant or otherwise get more attention than does that poor sixteenth party. Perhaps your eighteenth birthday was so outstanding that you are unable to remember any others. Your brother took you to Idaho and you got to see his family’s beautiful home and all the land and the trees and the snow. You eighteenth birthday was so outstanding that you are unable to remember any others—it inhibits you from remembering any earlier parties. This is called retroactive inhibition because it inhibits earlier remembrances. The opposite is called proactive inhibition—if you cannot remember your nineteenth, twentieth, or later birthdays because the eighteenth was so outstanding. Anxiety-based problems cause misery and seriously disrupt people’s lives.
However, they rarely bring about a total breakdown. Actually, the term nervous breakdown has no formal meaning, much like crazy. What many people have in mind when they use them term is properly called an adjustment disorder. Adjustment disorders occur when ordinary life stresses push people beyond their ability to cope effectively. Examples of such stress are prolonged unemployment, intense marital strife, and chronic physical illness. The presence of an adjustment disorder is signaled by extreme irritability, sleep disturbances, a loss of appetite, physical complaints, and apathy, anxiety, or depression. Often, these issues can be treated with rest, prayer, meditation, religion, sedation, supportive counseling, and a change to talk through fears and anxieties.
May the God of peace, Himself, sanctify you completely. When we pray, asking God to purify us, are we prepared to measure up to what that really means? The cost will be deep restriction of all our Earthly concerns, and an extensive cultivation of all our godly concerns. Sanctification means to be intensely focused on God’s point of view. It means to secure and to keep all the sinew (strength) of our body, soul, and spirit for God’s purpose alone. Are we really prepared for God to perform in us everything for which He separated us?
Life up your eyes on high, and see who has created these things. The everlasting God neither faints nor is weary. Because we are both biological and social creatures, it is not surprising that sometimes we can become susceptible to anxiety-based disorders. Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than dwell in the mansions of the unlovely. For the LORD God is a Sun and a shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless. LORD Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in you. God will show you favor and restore your fortunes.
What are you doing in a World like this?
Good morning, it is another day that we have been blessed with life. However, with 2015 coming up, so many people are worried about the global economy and personal finances. Apprehension is the feeling of uneasiness and negative thoughts that may happen in the future. If an individual consistently fails to reach one’s ideal goals, one may have to reevaluate the image and decide whether it is unrealistic. There once was a man name Chad, he was a Banker, making $180,000.00 a year. He had an elegant home, in a good neighborhood, a loving family, and always took time for his children and he got along well with his beautiful wife. From the perspective of others, Chad had it made.
Chad entered therapy, despite his own feeling that real men works out his own problems. Chad went to therapy, several times, because when he was driving home late at night, he would feel the urge to floor his Mercedes-Benz and run head on into a brick wall. He constantly felt depressed and thought often of committing suicide. He felt hopeless, and his life seemed to him a failure. Exactly two weeks before Christmas, he got a noticed that he may be laid off 1 January 2015, and has no saving or unemployment insurance.
Then a week later, just days before Christmas, his office sent him another warning threatening to fire him for no reason. Frequently, Chad had the fantasy that he was worth more dead than alive because of his insurance policy. Why? Well, in therapy, it came out that Chad had always had the idea that by age forty, he would be able to retire as a wealthy man. At the time he came to therapy, he already was forty-five, and far from rich.
Chad found himself resentful and depressed and angry because he had been put on warning, had tons of bills to pay and wanted to make his family proud of him and he wanted to enjoy their Christmas. Chad even started to resent the money had to spend on his wife and children. That depressed him because part of his ideal image was that a man must support his family to be a good family man. Chad admired wealthy people. Although he claimed to feel as good as Donald Trump, Ricky Hilton, or Shemar Moore, Chad knew he could not move in wealthy circles and might loss his family and be homeless any day now.
Failure in a success-oriented culture is hard to take, especially if you work hard and are being singled out because someone does not like you. Worry defeats us when it replaces wise action or needed rest with fearful emotion. Reacting in fear based only on our emotions will detract from the present while doing nothing to prepare us for the future.
Anyone who takes responsibility seriously cannot help, but consider what might happen, much like Chad. People who claimed not to have a care in the World are either lying or in denial. During our periods of high self-esteem, we are capable of successfully meeting just about any problem that comes along, but when someone threatens to turn your World upside down and have you thrown out on the streets during the holidays, one may feel defeated by the World and start to hate society. Many people only feel valuable when they accomplish something, but that was not the point, Chad was about to lose everything her cherished.
So first of all, if this happens to you, start off by telling yourself, I love and accept myself. Threats cause us to worry. There is no way to be completely safe from harm. Then we start to think about choices and things we could have done different. We also tend to worry about past experiences, and medical conditions can cause feelings of anxiety that do not respond to reason.
If you every find yourself in Chad’s position, I recommend that you pick up your Bible and spend days reading about the miracles of God, for we walk by faith, not by sight. A higher state of mind and spiritual vision can only be achieved through the higher practice of personal character. The Sovereign Lord says: They do not know how to do right (those who are attacking Chad, or you), they who hoard, plunder and loot in their fortresses. An enemy will overturn the land; he will pull down your strongholds and plunder your fortresses. However, as a shepherd saves a man from the lion’s mouth, God will save you and he will punish them for their sins.
After you have relaxed your mind, pick up the phone and call your manager, or the manager of the person threating to fire you and tell them what is going on. Officials may have no idea and someone may be actually harassing you. As the best institutions are liable to be abused, so are the best people to be vilified. Sin has a habit of persisting, and is remorseless in its choice of vehicles. Every noisy evil is missed when it is take away. Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Faith laughs at the impossible. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
The Purest Expression
The gifts of God are to be enjoyed, when the Giver is remembered. To prevent disease and promote well-being, health psychologists first try to remove behavioral risk factors. All the medicine in the World may not be enough to restore health, without changes in behavior. We all know someone, who has had a heart attack, or lung disease, who cannot or will not change the habits that led to their illness. Health-promoting behaviors include such obvious practices as getting regular exercise, controlling smoking and alcohol use, maintaining a balanced diet, getting good medical care, and managing stress. For example, here is how stress may harm you and cause illness. There is a Drug Enforcement Agent (DEA), called Princess, and she claims that the DEA sent her to Colombia, on an undercover assignment, in 1995; despite the fact that her life was in danger, and she had been receiving death threats and her identity had been exposed. During the investigation, Princess was kidnapped by a Colombian guerrilla group and taken to an unknown location. While being held captive, Princess’s captors tied a noose around her neck, for days, and locked her in a small room with a dirt floor, and a bed made of dried grass.
Princess was tortured and held for three and a half months. Soon after, Princess started having serious health problems. She was diagnosed by her doctors with multiple sclerosis, which medical experts said was caused by stressed related to her capture. The woman was awarded $1.1 million to cover her medical care for 25 years. Basic health practices should extend a person’s life. The LORD works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed. The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the Earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the East is from the West, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are made in his image. This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Because people acted in vengeance and took revenge with malice in their hearts, and with ancient hostility sought to destroy Judah, I am about to stretch out my hand against these people, and I will cut off them off and destroy those who remain. I will carry out great vengeance on them and punish them in my wrath. Then they will know that I am the LORD, when I take vengeance on them. Darkness is more eligible than light to those whose deeds are bad.
The Man of Lawlessness
Calamities have been heaped upon us. An explosive growing human population, already over 7 billion, is using up natural resources, stripping the land of forest, and polluting the air and water. Most of all, humans are adding tons of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, changing the relatively stable climate humans have depended on for tens of thousands of years. That could mean devastating floods, scorching droughts, and superstorms that could wreck economies and cost lives. A warmer atmosphere can hold more moisture, so as the climate gets hotter, more water will end up circulating above us. Storm systems become supersized, and when the rain comes it inundations the environment. The result can be damaging floods like 2013 floods in Alberta, Canada, which cost $5 billion, killing four and displaying over 100,000 people. Expect those numbers to increase in the future as the population increases, in coastal cities, which are prone to floods, leaving more people to lie in wait for disaster to strike. Also, drought is another serious condition, which can last for years or even decades, and cost billions in lost productivity. The United States is in a major drought, and has been since 2011. As a result, we have seen massive wildfires in California, Colorado, Montana and Texas, killing animals, leaving communities without drinking water, and ruining crops, as well as drying up Folsom Lake, American River and Sacramento River. In Texas, Lake Travis dropped 26 feet below normal level. And Sacramento, California has lost 80 percent of its water capacity in 2.5 years, and causing at least $667.4 million in damages. Years of reduced rain, have caused these problems and are stressing the remaining water supplies. As the climate warms, droughts will get worse. It will devour the Earth and its harvests and set afire the foundations of the mountains. Yet, the recent rainfall has been a blessing.
The Sacramento River has risen 3 feet, and Folsom Lake has climbed 5 feet, but is still 66 percent empty. As of 19 December 2014, Sacramento has gotten 11.5 inches of rain this month, so we need another 60 inches of rain to end this drought. However, we ought always to thank God for being alive, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing. Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring. All this is evidence that God’s judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the Kingdom of God, for which you are suffering. God is just: He will pay you back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from Heaven in blazing fire with his powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shout out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power on the day he comes to be glorified in his honorable people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you. With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith. We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Do not be alarmed or easily unsettled by some prophecy, report or letter supposed to have come from us. Do not let anyone deceive you in anyway, for that of the Lord will not come, until the rebellion occurs and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the man doomed to destruction. Basically, these people running around doing all of this slick and illegal stuff are being monitored and punished. They will not be allowed to keep harming you. This lawless man will oppose and exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up to be God. Do you not remember that when I was with you, I used to tell you these things? And now you know what is holding him back, so that he may be revealed at the proper time.
For the secret power of lawlessness is already at work; but the one who holds it back will continue to do so until he is taken out of the way. And the lawless one will be revealed, who the Lord Jesus will overthrow with his truth and power and the lawless will be destroyed by the arrival of Jesus. The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of the ungodly, displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of wrong perish because they refused to love the truth and be saved. For this reason, God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned, who have not believed the truth, but have delighted in wickedness. However, we ought always to thank God for you all because everyone is loved by the Lord. From the beginning, God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. He called you to this through our gospel, which you might share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So then, people, stand firm and hold to the teachings we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter. May our Lord Jesus Christ, himself, and God, our Father, who loved us and by his grace gave us all eternal encouragement and good hope, encourage your hearts and strengthen you in every good deed and word. Pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Do not lose your faith, do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid anything that is bad. Pray that for us that the message of the Lord may spread rapidly and be honored, just as it was with you. And pray that we may be delivered from the things that are not good for us, for not everyone has faith. However, the Lord is faithful, and he will strengthen and protect you from those who wish you harm you. We have confidence in the Lord that you are doing and will continue to do the things we command. May the Lord direct your hearts into God’s love and Christ perseverance. Give thanks to the Lord, call on his name; make known among the nations what has been done. Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of all his wonderful acts. Glory in his divine name; let the hearts of those who seek the LORD rejoice. Tremble before him, all the Earth! The World is firmly established; it cannot be moved. Let the heavens rejoice, let the Earth be glad; let them say among the nations, “The LORD reigns!”
Love Must Suffer in this Stern World
Sectarians are prone to substitute their own narrow notions of right and wrong for the Law of God, confounding acts that are perfectly innocent in themselves with sin. American culture is amazing, while bullying and school massacres are a major problem, Seth Rogan produced a movie called The Interview, which is a film whose plot is to assonate the political leader of North Korea. North Korea promised retaliation if the film was released, so Sony canceled the film. However, Americans complained that no one should censor them, so the film is now being released again. Yet, the theme of killing a political leader is not a good idea, or much of a Christmas movie and it really makes Americans look like bullies, hypocrites and instigators. The World is saying with all the murders of young unarmed African American men, police and children, The Interview is the last film that should have been produced. Americans need to learn how to love each other and reduce conflict. The American culture is so violent. There is only one right and one wrong; and I do not understand, and may God Keep me from ever understanding, how two things so totally unlike can be mistaken for one another.
The grand principles of virtue and honor, however they may be distorted by arbitrary codes, are the same all the World over. So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this World rather than on Christ. Perfect love has a breath of poetry which can exalt the relations of the least-instructed human beings. Love does not aim simply at the conscious good of the beloved object: it is not satisfied without perfect loyalty of heart; it aims at its own completeness. We do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of me, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself, will come down from Heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive, and are left will be caught up together, with them, in the clouds, to meet the Lord, in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.
We are all born for love. It is the principle of existence, and its only end. The true lover’s mind is completely permeated by the beloved object of his affections. Now brothers, about times and dates, we do not need to write to you, for you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a New York minute. Whole people are saying, “Peace and safety,” destruction will come on them suddenly, as labor pains on a major project for work, and your computer gets hacked and all your data is stolen, and they will not escape. However, you brothers, and not in darkness so that this day should not surprise you like a thief. You are all the sons of light and sons of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. So then, let us not be like others, who are sleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, get drunk at night. Weak men, who, meddling with things too high for them, do suddenly fall into distractions; which distractions do not only unman men, but they run upon desperate ventures to obtain they know not what.
However, since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath, but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore, encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. Society in America means all the honest, kindly mannered, pleasant-voiced women, and all the good, brave, unassuming men, between the Atlantic and the Pacific. Each of these has a free pass, in every city and village, good for this generation only, and it depends on each to make use of this pass, or not as it may happen to suit his or her fancy. To this rule, there are no exceptions, and those who say Abraham is our father will surely furnish food for that humor which is the staple product of our country. Man was not born to live alone.
He is linked to his to his brethren by a thousand ties; and, when those ties are broken, he ceases from all genuine existence. Now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you, who are over you in the Lord and who admonish you. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Live in peace with each other. And we urge you, brother, warn those who are idle, encourage the timid, help the weak, be patient with everyone. Make sure that nobody pays back wrong for wrong, but always try to be kind to each other and to everyone else. Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Do not put the Spirit’s fire; do not treat prophecies with contempt. Test everything. Hold on to the good. Avoid hurting others. May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through, and through. May your whole spirit, soul, and body be kept blameless, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it.
The strength of a king is the love and friendship of his people. So, affection and love, of all kinds, are really central in the whole issue of mental health. Three paramount ingredients of love and affection are knowledge, friendship and acceptance. I have found that truly to accept another person, and his or her feelings, is by no means an easy thing. All that is involved in acceptance does not come easy. I believe that it is an increasingly common pattern, in our culture, for each one of us to believe that every other person must think, and feel, and believe the same as we do. We find it very hard to allow or parents, children, friends and spouses to feel differently than we do about specific issues. We cannot allow our clients, students to differ from us or to utilize their experience, in their own individual ways. On a national scale, we cannot permit a nation to think, or feel differently than we do. Yet it has come to seem to me that this separateness of individuals, the right of each individual to utilize their experience in their own way, and discover his or her own meanings, in this experience is one of the most priceless potentialities of life. Each person is an island unto himself, in a very real sense; and he or she can only build bridges to other islands if he or she is first willing to be an individual. However, real strength never impairs beauty, harmony, but if often bestows it; and in everything impossibly beautiful, strength has much to do with magic.
The Birth of Sacramento, California, America
In a revolution every man thins he has done all. Human history, in California, begins with the indigenous Americans first arriving in California some 16,500 years ago. Exploration and settlement by Europeans along the coasts and the inland valleys began in the 16th century. The remains of Arlington Springs Man, on the Santa Rosa Island, are among the traces of a very early habitation, dated to the Wisconsin glaciation (the most recent ice age) about 13,000 years ago. In all, some 30 tribes or culture groups lives in what is not California, gathered into perhaps six different language family groups. These groups included the early-arriving Hokan family (winding up in the mountains far north and Colorado River basin in the south) and the recently arrived Uto-Aztecan of the desert southeast. The cultural diversity was among the densest in North America and was likely the result of a series of migrations and invasions during the last 10,000 to 15,000 years. While expanding through natural increase, the colonial population also received waves of new immigrants. They were not English, however. The last sizable group of settlers from England had arrived at the end of the seventeenth century. The eighteenth-century newcomers, who far outnumbered those emigrating before 1700, came overwhelmingly from Germany, Switzerland, Ireland, and Africa, and they were mostly indentured servants and slaves. Africans, who numbered about 15,000 in 1690, grew to 80,000 in 1730 and 325,000 in 1760.
By the last date, when they composed one-fifth of the colonial population, their numbers were growing far more from natural increase then from importation. Of all the groups arriving, in the eighteenth century, the Africans were the largest. At the time of the first European contact, Native American tribes included the Chumash, Maidu, Miwok Modoc, Mohave, Ohlone, Pomo, Serrano, Shasta, Tataviam, Tongva, Wintu, and Yurok. Tirbes adapted to California’s many climates. Costal tribes were a major source of trading beads, produced from mussel shells, using stone tools. Tribes in the Central Valley and surrounding foothills developed an early agriculture, buring the grasslands to encourage growth of edible wild planets, especially oak trees. The acorns from these trees were pounded into a powder, and the acidic tannin leached out to make edible flour. They also ate salmon from the Sacramento River. From 1776 to 1848, the Germany’s occupying the territory used warships as hotels, and warehouses along the early waterfront. Since the beginning of time, human beings have been drawn to the beautiful, powerful, and mysterious sea—yet, if we do not respect its power (and sometimes even when we do), it can easily kill us. This caveat certainly applies to the Pacific Ocean, which is often stormy despite its name. As you might expect, ghostly legends from the sea are plentiful all along the California coastline. The La Grange sails on Saturday, and will proceed from a port Germany to California. There was $12 million in gold bullion, from Berenberg Bank, and $32 million in gold bullion from H.J. Merck & Co. and 550 passengers aboard, the crew was ordered to cover all the ship’s portholes.
The lives of all on board now depended on the ship remaining undetected. No lives were lost by the grounding; however, the ship’s captain committed suicide after getting all the passengers safely off the ship. During their occupation, British forces capture or arrested thousands of soldiers and civilians, some after battles fought around Sacramento and some for simply refusing to swear allegiance to the Crown. In addition, the Continental government had authorized a number of privately owned, armed ships to serve on behalf of the patriotic cause; some 55,000 American seamen would eventually serve as merchant marines or privateers. Whenever the British captured these privateers, they gave them the choice of joining the Royal Navy or going to prison. Germany-speaking settlers, about 90,000 strong, flocked to the colonies in the eighteenth century. One of the most gruesome chapters in the story of Sacramento’s struggle for independence from Germany occurred in the waters near the Sacramento Harbor, near the current location of the “I” street bridge. Captain Reuben Harris, Sr., a German one of the pioneer shipmasters, whose connection with California dates back to 1850. Many were Protestant farmers of Swiss and French extrication, feeling God’s three arrows—famine, war, and pestilence. Among the many sailing ships bound for California, was the La Grange, a three-masted bark from Salem, Massachusetts, home of the Salem Witch trials.
The Ship arrived at Sacramento, California 3 October 1849. La Grange is one of the best built ships that ever entered this port; made of white oak, and measuring 1,800 tons, and costing $128,000. When it is considered that many eastern-built ships of equal tonnage are built at an expense of little over $75,000, the faithful style of the construction will be appreciated. First voyage was 110 days; second, 120 days; third, 124 days. The best run is rather astonishing — 300 miles, in 16 hours, or 18 3-4 miles as hour for that length of time! This rather excels the celebrated time of the Sovereign of the Seas between New York and Liverpool, which has been called the fastest sailing in the World. It was, if we remember right, 18 miles an hour for 24 hours. In the above instance, the La Grange was suddenly becalmed in the seventeenth hour or would have made the best day’s run ever recorded. The above distance and time are folly warranted by an examination of the log. The dimensions are 235 feet length overall; 46 feet breadth beam; 30 feet depth hold. However, by 1837, many of the ships were abandoned or decommissioned warships anchored just offshore to hold those soldiers, sailor, and private citizens they had captures in battle or arrested on land or at sea (many refusing to swear an oath of allegiance to the German Crown) they too bowed to and were no longer safe to use. Some 11,000 prisoners died aboard the prison ships over the course of the way, many from disease or malnutrition. Several of the inmates of the La Grange, which was called Hell, for its inhumane conditions and the obscenely high death rate of its prisoners, and the area was deemed too hot for colonization, by a number of explorers and as a result remained relatively untouched by the Europeans, who claimed the region.
When John Sutter arrived in the provincial colonial capitol of Monterey in 1839, Governor Juan Bautista Alvarado provided John Sutter with the land he asked for, and John Sutter established New Helvetia (Spanish: Nueva Helvetia) meaning New Switzerland, which he controlled absolutely with private army and relative autonomy from the newly independent Mexican government. The grant extended from present day Sacramento, Sutter County, and Yuba County, to Maryville, California, southwards along the Feather River, to the confluence of the Sacramento River and the American River. Space in British jails on land soon ran out, and the British began housing prisoners aboard the abandoned or decommissioned warships anchored in Sacramento and American River. The ships were over crowded, and conditions aboard were inhumane. Food and water were scarce, and diseases including smallpox, ran rampant. More than 1,000 men were kept aboard the Le Grange. As many as six hundred Indian worked at New Helvetia during the wheat harvest. There was also a distillery, hat factory, blanket works, and tannery. The following June, the La Grange was retained by the city of Sacramento for a prison and war reparations. In preparation for its new role, the ship was stripped to the masts and holding cells built inside of the ship to lock up prisoners. Conditions on the ship and at Sutter’s fort were described as very poor, and have been said to mirror enslavement.
People were being whipped, jailed and executed. Housing for workers living in nearby villages and Rancherias was described as somewhat better. The settlement was defended by an army of Miwok, Nisenan, and Mission Indians, all consisting of 150 infantry, 50 cavalry, and German-speaking white officers. This group, wearing Russian uniforms purchased from Fort Ross, marched to the Pueblo Los Angeles area, and briefly defended Governor Manuel Micheitorens from the revolt of the Californios. The LaGrange served as Sacramento’s jail until November 1859 when it sank during a week-long storm, killing 449 people. There were more than 950 suspected witches and Jewish refugees on board also, many drowning in the freezing water as they watched the larger ship sail away in compliance with the strict orders not to stop and rescue those in peril. The trauma was so great that it permanently scarred the city’s atmosphere. It became all-too aware the colonist that the city of Sacramento’s varied past had left it extremely haunted. In recent years, nautical archaeologists have explored three gold rush vessels and several later boats that are submerged in the Sacramento River. There was tight packing on the ships. Crammed between decks in stifling air, prisoners suffered from smallpox, and fevers, rotten food, impure water, cold and lice, children between the ages of one and seven seldom survived, bemoaned one German immigrant, and parents must often watch their offspring suffer miserably, die and be thrown into the river, 250 succumbed. “I have never seen such parcels of poor wretches, some almost naked and what had clothes was as black as chimney sweepers and almost starved,” one Virginia observer remarked.
The shipboard mortality rate of about 15 percent in the colonial era made this the unhealthiest of all times to seek American shores. In February of 1986, archaeologist located what is believed to be wreckage of LaGrange, which was imprisoned by the rip-rap and mud, just south of the “I” Street Bridge. They found enough evidence–floor frame, hull planks, copper sheathing, curved timbers, and a keelson– to confirm that the vessel was an ocean-going sailing ship of LaGrange’s size and age. A television news crew left their audio and visual recorder running overnight, in the exact location where the two ships collided. As the tape played back the next day, incredible sounds of pounding could be heard. Others have claimed to hear voices and blood-curdling noises from the same area. Many people have reported hearing the ghostly sounds. Some describe the pounding in the area as a frantic knocking or strange tapping. Others say that they have heard water gushing and metal smashing—the sounds of that fatal accident relaying into eternity. Even more distressing are the phantom shrieks and moans emanating from that area of the Sacramento River. The anguished spirits of the sailors, who were either killed on impact or left to drown when the two ships collided, have become a part of the city of Sacramento itself. Upon hearing the noises, investigators have made extensive searches to locate the source, but despite great skill and efforts, no one can find a reasonable explanation for the sounds and concluded that we must being hearing ghostly echoes from the horrible tragedy more than a century before.
In addition to the psychic damage wrought by the wartime deaths (and a fatal accident on the La Grange) there have been at least 48 untimely deaths near that area of Old Sacramento, many of those spirits are reported to have stayed. On 1 June 2013, A former Air Force officer, Joe Kolaski, said that he saw a man get crushed on the rocks and thrown into the river, and then a manifestation—a clean shaved young man, in clad blue overalls, walking in the depths of the water, he had extremely white skin and complete lack of facial expression. Then the man vanished before his eyes. Joe Kolaski, saw the boy in trouble and heard his mother cry for help. He jumped in to attempt a rescue, only to be stopped by very cold water. “I went up to my chest, but it was just too cold. Nobody should be in that water at 50 degrees, he said. Someone who had heard of the boy’s fate even intimated that his premature death might have been murder—murder at the hands of the cuckolded husband, whose wife was having an affair with the boy. Witness Michael Kinder said “Several boys were swimming together, the little kid could not swim, and they were trying to get him out of the water and his brother just got lost and went under.” He had apparently died of a broken skull, most likely sustained when he fell off a pier. His remains, it was judged, had been in the water for 10 or 12 days. There is a rebellious soul in thing which must be overcome by powerful charms and incantations. Youth and beauty never can be paired with age and coldness without danger of revolt.
