Chess – “The Game of Dictators”

I’ve been thinking about the game of Chess lately. As I was thinking about it, it suddenly hit me how much this game is like dictators and their people. As I was doing some research about the game, I came across a website that said it has sometimes been called “The game of Dictators”.

For those of you who do not know much about the game let me try and explain how the game is played. It is a strategy type game played on a checker board. There are two players and each player try to capture their opponent’s king to win the game. The two players start off with an equal number of pieces to play with. Each piece can only move in specific directions and can capture opponent pieces in specific ways. Some pieces are considered more important than other pieces because of their power. Next to the king, the queen is the most important, the pawns are least important.

Here is what struck me about how this game is much like dictators and their people. In the game, it is just as important to protect your own king as it is to try and capture your opponent’s king. Every piece is expendable. Everyone, even the queen, can and will be sacrificed to gain the upper hand against the opponent, or to protect your own king.  

With dictators, the same is true. Every member under the dictator’s control is expendable even those closest to them. If it is prudent to eliminate someone, the dictator will do everything in his or her power to make that happen.

In the United States of America, our forefathers understood this and tried to design our government to help prevent us from ever having a dictator in control. They were smart to separate the three branches of government, Judicial, Legislative, and Executive. They also saw the value of ALL people. Abraham Lincoln said it most beautifully when he wrote ‘The Declaration of Independence’. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that ALL men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights (See note below), that among them are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” This idea is the soul of our US Constitution. We have made some steps over the years towards this end but we have a long way to go and there are always people who make us go backwards, our present president included. 
Note to above: The original version said that all men had certain inherent natural rights. When it was changed to 'endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights', it was meant to exclude slaves because slaves were considered property.

In this present world of dictators, the most important person under the dictator (king) is just as expendable as the least important. We fight and do all the evil things we do to each other for what reason? To keep dictators in power or to try and become dictators ourselves? It makes no sense. We will all be judged by the things we have done in this life.

I have said this many times and will say it again. Our Heavenly Father and Jesus are so different and worthy of our adoration. If I were to put Them, Father God and Jesus, in a chess game, here is how it might look. God, our Father would be the One playing the game, Jesus would be our King, and we the playing pieces. God would sacrifice King Jesus in order to save us, game over.

Our Heavenly Father's desire is that there were no chess games at all. Instead, that there would be peace on earth. But, we are too stupid to achieve peace on our own or even to desire it. 

What sets Yahweh (Father God) and Yeshua (Jesus) apart from all else.

When I go through my ‘almost daily’ exercises, I think a lot and I talk with God too. I have to keep up with my exercises because of the issues I am having with my spine. If I don’t exercise, I will regret it sooner or later with debilitating pain. My thoughts sometimes are centered around my medical issues I am going through right now. Thoughts like why are these things happening to me. I think about the book of Job in the Old Testament of the Bible. I think about my dream (Funny Dream) how the Lord and I shook hands with Him saying my spine issues won’t be as bad as I think. I think about Satan, why he is the way he is and why does God leave him be. So many questions.

In my last post ‘Dictators And Wannabes’   I talked about dictators and their characteristics and what happens when they are in power. As I was thinking about Satan, he is just like a dictator. In a way I think of him as a dictator wannabe in heaven. He wants to be like God Most High where he gets the praise and others fall down to worship him.

In the book of Job (Job 1), it shows that Satan is free to move about on Earth and in heaven. He has great power because it was he who caused the bad things to happen to Job, his children, and all that Job had; everything that God had blessed him with. Satan was able to do this only because God the Father allowed him to. Even with all that Job went through, he still blessed God.

Job 1:20-22 Lexham English Bible (LEB)

²⁰ Then^[a] Job arose and tore his outer garment^[b] and shaved his head; then^[c] he fell upon the ground and he worshiped. ²¹ Then^[d] he said, “Naked I came out from my mother’s womb, and naked I will return there. Yahweh gives, and Yahweh takes. Let Yahweh’s name be blessed.” ²² In all this, Job did not sin and did not charge God with wrongdoing.^[e] 

I wonder, is it maybe Satan who causes much of the pain and suffering that we humans experience and it’s God Who gets the blame? From the story in Job, it seems possible. But still, God would have to allow it. I don’t think it is always Satan who causes our pain and suffering. A lot has to do with us and our evil hearts. I think about how we humans are. If there was no Satan doing what he does, would we ever turn from our evil ways?

We are born sinners. We have evil thoughts in our hearts right away in our youth (Genesis 8:21). Our inclination is not to seek after God (Romans 3:11), it is God who seeks after and wants to save us  (Luke 19:10). This is what stands God apart from all else, that God can continue loving us when we do nothing to deserve it. He sent His only begotten Son, Yeshua Jesus, to Earth to take all our sins upon Himself, He who knew no sin. Jesus didn’t have to do that. He could have told His Father no. He could have said, “Why should I go through all that pain and suffering for humans who care nothing about You, Dad?” But He was obedient. He came to Earth and took our place so that we could live. Would a dictator ever do such a thing for his people? Dictators only care about themselves.  

Ezekiel 34:16 King James Version (KJV)

¹⁶ I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick: but I will destroy the fat and the strong; I will feed them with judgment.

Dictators And Wannabes

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it – George Santayana.

Hitler promised the Germans that he would make Germany great again. He did do that; great and powerful, but at the expense of millions of lives. Hitler was a dictator. People are forced to obey dictators. Any opposition to dictators is quickly squashed. During Hitler’s reign no one could say anything bad about him without being severely punished, they even wanted to know about private conversations of people talking about Hitler. With dictators, the only law of the land is the law of the dictator. Putin is a dictator. He has said that the only law in Russia is Putin’s law.

President Donald Trump is a dictator wannabe. Anyone can see that. You just have to open your eyes to the things he says and does.  During the presidential debates he made the comment that he sees nothing wrong using torture on people. He praises dictators because he likes the control they have over their people. After meeting with Kim Jung Un, Trump said this about Kim on a Fox News interview, “He’s the head of a country, and I mean he’s the strong head. Don’t let anyone think different. He speaks and his people sit up at attention. I want my people to do the same.” He likes and wants to be praised. After he was elected president, right away he started campaigning for his 2020 presidency. I watched one of them. It was a big production of him flying in on Air Force One, the door of the plane opened and Trump descended the stairs, and as he walked to the stage to speak, they played “The Battle Hymn of The Republic” and the words sang out, “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord” (lord Trump.) He has double standards for law enforcement; severe punishment for those he doesn’t like because they speak out against him and leniency for those he likes, even though they have broken the law and have been convicted in court. He calls most all news agencies “enemies of the people” because they say things he does not like. He wants loyalty from those close to him and confidentiality agreements to be signed by those who work for him. There is much more I could say about him to show that he envies dictators and desires to be like them and I believe he is working towards that end with Putin’s help.

We are living in dangerous times. All our US national security teams agree that Putin and his people worked in our 2016 election to help get Trump elected. Putin has said out right that he wanted Trump to be elected. There are no other Americans in the room when Trump and Putin gets together to talk, usually for multiple hours at a time, so we do not know what they talk about. If Trump succeeds to kill our constitution then there will no longer be anything in place to prevent him from becoming a dictator. If this happens, I foresee that Putin will eventually own the United States of America. Dictators can take control of another dictator’s domain simply by throwing out bigger and better bones to the other dictator’s people or infiltrating that dictator’s domain with his own people. If this happens, Putin can control the world.

I’ve painted a pretty bleak picture, I know, but I believe there is hope for all who will be alive during this time, those who will keep on believing and trusting God the Father and in Yeshua Jesus. All through the New Testament of the Bible there are words of encouragement to persist in believing during the troubling times and you will be blessed. It is another way of telling us that if we continue believing even though it may appear that there is no God, no hope, we will be glad that we did, we continued.

 The book of Revelation in the Bible is a tough book to understand and I believe God made it that way for a reason. It is so that even Satan cannot understand. Satan uses things about God all the time to deceive us. When he tempted Adam and Eve (Genesis 3), he said, “surely you wont die if you eat the fruit. Your eyes will be opened and you will be like God.” When he tempted our Lord Jesus (Matthew4:1-10) he tried to get Jesus to question who He was/is, he used scripture, and lastly, he offered Jesus earth if He would just bow down and worship him (Satan). 

Matthew 4:8-10 Lexham English Bible (LEB)

⁸ Again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, ⁹ and he said to him, “I will give to you all these things, if you will fall down and^[a] worship me.” ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to him, “Go away, Satan, for it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve only him.’”^[b]

In Revelation 20:8-9 it tells that God Himself will act on behalf of His people.

Revelation20:8-9 Lexham English Bible (LEB)

⁸ and he (Satan) will go out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to assemble them for battle, whose number^[a] is like the sand of the sea. ⁹ And they went up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the fortified camp of the saints and the beloved city, and fire came down from heaven and consumed them.

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God is All Powerful. Who shall I fear?

Our World ---> Going towards peace or war? (2/22/19 -- added stuff)

There is scripture in the Old Testament of the Bible (same as the Jewish Bible called the Tanakh) that I think about sometimes.

Isaiah 11:6-9 Lexham English Bible (LEB)

6 

And a wolf shall stay^[a] with a lamb,

    and a leopard shall lie down with a kid,

and a calf and a lion and a fatling together

    as a small boy leads^[b] them.

7 

And a cow and a bear shall graze;

    their young shall lie down together.

    And a lion shall eat straw like the cattle.

8 

And an infant^[c] shall play over a serpent’s hole,

    and a toddler^[d] shall put his hand on a viper’s hole.

9 

They will not injure and they will not destroy on all of my holy mountain,^[e]

    for the earth will be full of the knowledge of Yahweh,

        as the waters cover the sea.

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What a picture of perfect peace. This kind of peace has not happened yet. I wonder how close we are to this. The way our world seems to be heading right now is towards war, not peace.

Whatever it is going on between Putin and Trump concerns me. If I didn't believe in an All Powerful God who has a plan of saving us, I would be more than concerned. I have no problem with our United States of America becoming friends with any country as long as the leaders of those countries are looking after the welfare of all people of the world, both poor and wealthy, great and small. I just don't see this in any one of our two leaders.

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Had I read these scriptures a little further, I would have seen when this peace will happen.

Isaiah 11:10 New International Version (NIV)

¹⁰ In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious.

2/22/19

I was thinking about this post, mainly about the picture of perfect peace as described in Isaiah 11:6-9, about when this would happen as described in Isaiah 11:10, and about my most resent post "God Hates The Deeds and The Doctrines of the Nicolaitans -- Revelation 2:6 and 15"; mostly about Jeremiah 31:34. 

It hit me how these seem to be interrelated. Jeremiah 31:34 essentially says that man will no longer teach man about Yahweh (God) because God will place that knowledge into everyone. Isaiah 11:10 essentially says that Yeshua (Jesus) will become evident to everyone and that evidence will lead to the perfect peace; 'the nations will rally to him, and his resting place will be glorious.'

Love Thy Enemy

Love Thy Enemy

Walking the narrow way of Christ’s love — even toward those who oppose us.

“You have heard it said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies…”
(Matthew 5:43–44)

Loving those who love us is easy. Anyone can do that. But loving those who oppose us, wound us, or stand against us — that is the work of Christ formed within us. That is the narrow way.

Jesus doesn’t call us to tolerate our enemies. He calls us to love them. Not because they deserve it, but because He loved us first.

⭐ Why Love Your Enemy?

Jesus reveals the heart of the Father:

“He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good…”
(Matthew 5:45)

God does not withhold His goodness from those who oppose Him. When we love our enemies, we reflect His nature, not theirs.

⭐ The Real Enemy Is Not Flesh and Blood

“Our struggle is not against flesh and blood…”
(Ephesians 6:12)

People are not the enemy. They may act like enemies, speak like enemies, or wound us like enemies — but behind every act of hatred or division is a spiritual force seeking to destroy unity.

When we love our enemies, we refuse to participate in that destruction.

⭐ Love Is a Weapon of Light

“The weapons of our warfare are not carnal…”
(2 Corinthians 10:4)

Love is not weakness. Love is warfare. Love disarms darkness, breaks cycles of retaliation, and exposes the schemes of the enemy.

⭐ Let God Be the Judge

“Vengeance is Mine; I will repay,” says the Lord.
(Deuteronomy 32:35)

We do not need to defend ourselves or settle the score. God sees. God knows. God will act. Our calling is not vengeance — it is love.

⭐ Becoming Children of the Father

“Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
(Matthew 5:48)

This “perfection” is not flawlessness — it is wholeness. To love our enemies is to grow into the likeness of the Father. It is to become whole. It is to become one.

⭐ A Prayer for the Journey

Lord, teach us to love as You love — to bless those who curse us, to pray for those who oppose us, and to see people not as enemies but as souls You long to restore. Make us children of the Father — whole, healed, and filled with Your love.

Amen.

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Another School Shooting.

There's been another tragic school shooting. This time a short distance from my home in the small town of Santa Fe, Texas.The shooter, a kid himself, a student from the same school of the students he murdered. It is so very difficult to understand how this could happen. What causes someone to murder without empathy for those they kill? ….. There have been more mass shootings since I started this post, almost a common occurrence. Will we ever see a time of peace?

As I was thinking about these shootings, I've seen some similarities between them. The shooters are pretty much loners and have a hard time fitting in and are drawn into groups which are not the right groups for them to be in. These groups are residual groups from the Hitler and Nazis era.

These groups are centered around Nazism, Fascism, Supremacism. I read that Fascism was first used during WW1 in Italy. Hitler and the Nazis successfully used it to gain control of Germany. It is a type of propaganda that manipulates the mind. I don't know if these groups are really aware of the hate they breed, or is it their goal and what they believe in? They usually pick out groups of people to blame for the problems we face. Even the problems themselves get over exaggerated. They also stir up hate towards anyone who goes against them. The more they blame and the more that people listen then things happen, like they did when Hitler was in control of Germany; millions of people are murdered. People get pulled into believing something and when evil things happen, it becomes like a run away train; it is almost impossible to stop.

Let me give you some fuel for thought. I am a Vietnam vet. When I got out of the service, there were no welcome home ceremonies. I wanted friends but it was like I had a curse on me and people didn't want to associate with me, at least that was my impression then. I found a few friends, just not the right ones. One was a gay male. I didn't really know he was gay until he invited me out to go to a bar one evening. I expected we were just going out for some drinks. When we went inside, I could see this was not the typical bar like I had frequented before. Men were with men and girls with girls, for the most part, a gay bar. It took me by surprise. I didn't know there was such a thing as gay bars. I could have left the bar when I understood but I didn't. I had some drinks and at some point passed out. When I came too, my gay friend was carrying me into my apartment. He had his way with me, I let him, he left to go back to his apartment, and I cried. I talked with God and cried. I remembered asking Christ into my life as a teenager and asked God how did my life get to be the way it was at that point. I thought maybe I messed up somehow the first time I asked Jesus into my life and that is how I got to this low point in my life. So, I asked Jesus back into my life, I started to attend a non-denominational church that my brother was going to and my life changed for the better. I met good friends there and felt welcomed into the young singles group. It was here I met my wonderful wife. We have been married now 44 years this coming August. We have two wonderful girls. I feel so blessed to have such beautiful children. One is married and has a very good relationship with her husband. They have four marvelous children who we adore. Our other daughter is nothing like her sister. I think one might say that she is a free spirit. She is not married so does the things she wants to do. She has and is still traveling the world and has seen beautiful amazing places. We love to see the pictures she's taken.

Let me go back to the time I met this gay man. What happened with him is really what changed my life so in a way, I consider that to be a blessing. I think he must have had misgivings about me and I of him. I feel no animosity towards him. He is gay, I am not. I can't say I really understand homo sexuality but I believe it is real and something that can't be changed for those who really believe they were born into the wrong body. How does one explain people who are born with both sex organs? It happens, it's real. I leave the things I don't understand to God Who knows everything about everyone.

God has said that we are all sinners. We have all disobeyed His teachings, His laws. We don't seek after God or want to get to know Him. After all, we can't see Him. But, Jesus being in the image of God the Father came into this world to tell and to show those who were with Him what God is really like. He fervently cared for people. He healed them, fed them, made the blind to see, made the dead to come back to life, and He taught them all about God and told us how we should live. He gave us two commandments which sums up all of God's commandments; love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, and with all thy strength, and to love thy neighbor as thy self (These are all peoples, even our enemies.) What is so amazing is that while we were all doing our thing, sinning against God, He (Jesus) died for us, in our place. All our transgressions were laid upon Him. He loved us so much that He did that for us all! This doesn't mean that we are free to go on sinning. After knowing this and accepting His gift, if we go on sinning, it is like putting Him to death all over again. We all need help not to sin. Inviting Jesus into our lives is how we get help. The Holy Spirit is our helper and Jesus our teacher.

Let me just close with this that has to do with those who may become future mass murders. If we as individuals could see others who have a hard time fitting in and could just love them the way they are. Bring them into good groups who will welcome them in as they are and not try to shove religion down their throats. They first have to be able to see something different in this group as appose to what they know. Let me just say this too. People can sense when others are not genuine, that they are just doing it out of a sense of obligation, it's not from the heart.

This about the heart brings to memory of another post I wrote about the heart, "The Heart - It's Not Just A Pump". You might find this interesting.

Is There A Cancer Growing?

From Homework Help website
"The quote “"Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it”" is attributed to the American philosopher George Santayana and it can be accurately quoted as "“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”" as stated in his work, The Life of Reason: Reason in Common Sense."

Why did I bring up this quote you ask? It is because I believe that we have forgotten the horrors that happened in World War II and how that cancer grew. Are we repeating history? I believe we are. The cancer is hiding and growing.

Our American forefathers came from countries that at some period of time had tyrants in control of their countries. When they came to this new land, they wanted to protect future generations from tyranny so they formulated our constitution. We were to have three branches of government; Legislative (Congress), Executive (President), and Judicial (Federal court system). These three branches were to stay separated to provide us with some checks and balances. If one of them strayed, hopefully the others would bring it back into compliance.

You can find out more about it at the following link:
America's Founding Documents

Let's go back to the 1930s as Hitler and the Nazis gained power of Germany. We need to understand how they did it so that we can identify similar things that are happening today and expose it, bring it out for all to see. Genocide happens because people become complacent and don't speak out about what they see. 

Here is one article I found in my research:
Hitler at home: how the Nazi PR machine remade the Führer’s domestic image and duped the world

I have seriously thought about what is going on in America right now with Donald Trump as president and I am deeply concerned. I have watch some interviews with James Comey and he is saying the same things about President Trump that I feel and see about him and am concerned about. Trump's thoughts are turned inward on self and not on the interests of Americans and defending our Constitution. America has been evolving into something better with the melding of all kinds of people. Trump is wanting to take us back into the past. I personally do not want to go there. There are things about our past that we should all be ashamed about. All you have to do is look. As Santayana said it best, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.

I don't think Trump understands what he has gotten himself into if indeed he is in bed with Putin. It would be better for him, his family, and for all of us Americans for the truth to come out if there really is something going on between him and Putin.

In closing, I would like to tell you about what is going on with me. My PSA numbers are going up which means I might have prostrate cancer; one of the leading causes of death among men. The only way to tell if I have cancer or not is to do a biopsy of my prostate. I could just forget about it and let things happen as they will or I can go ahead and get the biopsy test done (what I have decided to do.). If it turns out that I do have cancer, it may be early enough to do something about it before it goes beyond the point that nothing can be done.

It's the same thing with the Russian investigation. Until Mueller completes his investigation and is able to present us with what he found out, we don't know.

Our United States Constitution

Recently I've been thinking about our United States Constitution. Back in grade school we were required to memorize the Preamble to the Constitution and be able to recite it. This morning I tried to recite it to myself and was not able to remember the whole thing. It has been way too long that I have even thought about it.

Preamble to the United States Constitution

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence,^{[note 1]} promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

I wonder how many of our elected officials who swear to defend the United States Constitution can recite the Preamble or much more, to know the soul of our Constitution? I think it wise for all of us Americans to go back from time to time and review it so that we don't forget.

United States Constitution

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"The United States Constitution is the supreme law of the United States.^[1] The Constitution, originally comprising seven articles, delineates the national frame of government. Its first three articles entrench the doctrine of the separation of powers, whereby the federal government is divided into three branches: the legislative, consisting of the bicameral Congress; the executive, consisting of the President; and the judicial, consisting of the Supreme Court and other federal courts. Articles Four, Five and Six entrench concepts of federalism, describing the rights and responsibilities of state governments and of the states in relationship to the federal government. Article Seven establishes the procedure subsequently used by the thirteen States to ratify it. It is regarded as the oldest written and codified constitution in force of the world.^[2]

Since the Constitution came into force in 1789, it has been amended 27 times^[3] to meet the changing needs of a nation now profoundly different from the eighteenth-century world in which its creators lived.^[4] In general, the first ten amendments, known collectively as the Bill of Rights, offer specific protections of individual liberty and justice and place restrictions on the powers of government.^[5][6] The majority of the seventeen later amendments expand individual civil rights protections. Others address issues related to federal authority or modify government processes and procedures. Amendments to the United States Constitution, unlike ones made to many constitutions worldwide, are appended to the document. All four pages^[7] of the original U.S. Constitution are written on parchment.^[8]

According to the United States Senate: "The Constitution's first three words—We the People—affirm that the government of the United States exists to serve its citizens. For over two centuries the Constitution has remained in force because its framers wisely separated and balanced governmental powers to safeguard the interests of majority rule and minority rights, of liberty and equality, and of the federal and state governments."^{[4] "}