"Much can be accomplished when no one is concerned about who get the credit." - Ronald Reagan

"Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can't ride you unless your back is bent." - Martin Luther King, Jr

Post Total Knee Replacement, Day 16: My quads finally "reawakened" yesterday and I am now able to lift my leg off the bed to nearly vertical. Praise God for modern surgical medicine!

"Socialists cry 'power to the people,' and raise the clenched fist as they say it. We all know what they really mean: power over people, power to the State." – Margaret Thatcher

"If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time-a tremendous whack." - Winston S. Churchill

Interesting article.

townhall.com

Killing Democracy to Save 'Democracy'

Britain started arresting people for tweeting unapproved things, and France decided to arrest its le

Good morning from the Texas Hill Country! Q. 32. What benefits do they that are effectually called partake of in this life? A. They that are effectually called do in this life partake of justification, adoption, sanctification, and the several benefits which, in this life, do either accompany or flow from them. Rom. 8:30; Eph. 1:5; 1 Cor. 1:26, 30.

Westminster Shorter Catechism Q. 31. What is effectual calling? A. Effectual calling is the work of God’s Spirit, whereby convincing us of our sin and misery, enlightening our minds in the knowledge of Christ, and renewing our wills, he doth persuade and enable us to embrace Jesus Christ, freely offered to us in the gospel. 2 Tim. 1:9; 2 Thess. 2:13-14; Acts 2:37; Acts 26:18; Ezek. 36:26-27; John 6:44-45; Phil. 2:13.

"We've waged war on work. We have collectively agreed, stupidly, that work is the enemy." – Mike Rowe

Real Value In Real Work by Michael Quinn Sullivan I’ve never needed someone with a Ph.D. in Gender Studies; urgently or otherwise. Yet we’ve all had moments when we were willing to pay a king’s ransom to get an honest plumber or roofer to the house. In the cultural economy of the 21st century, we celebrate the pursuit of even the most meaningless of degrees while dismissing critical professions once known as the trades. The cultural elite would have us believe it is better to be unemployed than to do real work that serves others. We have turned the notion of honorable work upside down, devaluing practical labor and exalting trivial knowledge. We celebrate someone pursuing an advanced degree in a meaningless topic, but look down our noses at the high school kid who wants to be a mechanic. From a very early age, our schools subtly—and sometimes not-so-subtly—communicate to children that anything less than earning a four-year college degree makes them something less than useful. As a result, those students find themselves pressured into loading up on unnecessary debt that mainly purchases four years of suffering through indoctrination by leftist college professors. The free market operates best when people are working at their passions with their naturally gifted skills. Conversely, when individuals are pressured to ignore their interests, skills, and talents to appease an elitist mandate, everyone suffers. The hostility of the educational and cultural elite, subtly belittling individuals if they don’t seek a college degree, has had a devastating effect on individuals and society. None of this is particularly new; it’s just recycled garbage from the past. The ancient Greeks believed labor was a curse. Aristotle taught that it was preferable to be an unemployed beggar, so one could be devoted to contemplation. The Bible turned such thinking upside down. It begins with the understanding that human beings are created in God’s image and are called to practical work. The Old Testament placed a high value on what Aristotle would see as “menial” jobs: Adam and Eve were told to work the land; King David was a shepherd. In the New Testament, Jesus was a carpenter who used examples from daily work as the springboards for His teaching, rather than subjects to be avoided. After the old lie reared its ugly head in the Middle Ages, it took 16th-century Christian reformer John Calvin to reclaim the biblical doctrine of work. He held that all labor is glorifying to God. Yet that elitist Greek snobbery keeps coming back. Public policy incentivizes young adults to take on massive debt to earn economically meaningless and socially dubious degrees unrelated to the jobs they might actually enjoy. We have adopted policies that make it more advantageous to follow Artistole in the handout line than join the Apostle Paul as a self-sufficient tent maker. Indeed, Paul was unapologetically clear on the subject in his second letter to the church in Thessalonica: “If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies.” Many of our social and political problems can be attributed to idle busybodies. In a republic of sovereign, self-governing citizens, each of us should be about the high calling of real work. Those engaged in productive labor meeting the needs of people in our communities should be celebrated. All work is meaningful when we are serving others with the gifts and skills given to us by God to His glory.

The summer of 2025 will be the summer of renewal for me. Right now, I am recovering from Total Knee Replacement on my right knee. After a 2-3 month recovery, the same on my left knee. I won't get a lot of the projects I had planned done, but I will hopefully be ready physically to do them and more next summer. Thank God for modern surgery!

Q. 30. How doth the Spirit apply to us the redemption purchased by Christ? A. The Spirit applieth to us the redemption purchased by Christ, by working faith in us, and thereby uniting us to Christ in our effectual calling. Eph. 1:13-14; John 6:37, 39; Eph. 2:8; Eph. 3:17; 1 Cor. 1:9.

"One great object of the Constitution was to restrain majorities from oppressing minorities or encroaching upon their just rights." – President James Polk

"Make no little plans; They have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized." - Daniel Burnham

Good morning! Have a blessed day and stack sats!

Q. 29. How are we made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ? A. We are made partakers of the redemption purchased by Christ, by the effectual application of it to us by his Holy Spirit. John 1:11-12; Titus 3:5-6.

Today in History  On May 7, 1945, the German High Command signed an unconditional surrender to the Allies, bringing the war in Europe to an official end.