Views, Visions and Values.

Thursday, 4 September 2014

Fashid Fathi is imprisoned for his faith in the notorious Rajai Shahr prison. He is 35 year old today. If you are on twitter please petition Iran's supreme leader so he knows Fashid is not alone. The following is the tweet I have sent that you may wish to copy and paste

We appeal to Iran's supreme leader @khamenei_Ir to intervene in the release of Fashid Fathi @presstv ‪#‎happybirthdayfashidfathi‬

Oswald Chambers, My Uttermost for His Highest , His

They were Yours, You gave them to Me . . . —John 17:6

A missionary is someone in whom the Holy Spirit has brought about this realization: “You are not your own” (1 Corinthians 6:19). To say, “I am not my own,” is to have reached a high point in my spiritual stature. The true nature of that life in actual everyday confusion is evidenced by the deliberate giving up of myself to another Person through a sovereign decision, and that Person is Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit interprets and explains the nature of Jesus to me to make me one with my Lord, not that I might simply become a trophy for His showcase. Our Lord never sent any of His disciples out on the basis of what He had done for them. It was not until after the resurrection, when the disciples had perceived through the power of the Holy Spirit who Jesus really was, that He said, “Go” (Matthew 28:19; also see Luke 24:49 and Acts 1:8).

Read more here:

John 17:6-19New American Standard Bible (NASB)

6 “I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. 7 Now they have come to know that everything You have given Me is from You; 8 for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me. 9 I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom You have given Me; for they are Yours; 10 and all things that are Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. 11 I am no longer in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are. 12 While I was with them, I was keeping them in Your name which You have given Me; and I guarded them and not one of them perished but the [a]son of perdition, so that the Scripture would be fulfilled.

The Disciples in the World

13 But now I come to You; and these things I speak in the world so that they may have My joy made full in themselves. 14 I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 15 I do not ask You to take them out of the world, but to keep them [b]from [c]the evil one. 16 They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. 18 As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. 19 For their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth.

Matthew 28:16-20New American Standard Bible (NASB)

The Great Commission

16 But the eleven disciples proceeded to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had designated. 17 When they saw Him, they worshiped Him; but some were doubtful. 18 And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 [a]Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you [b]always, even to the end of the age.”

Tuesday, 2 September 2014

The nationalists’ welfare plans: What the experts say | Better Together

“The DWP might say you can use our IT and administrative systems but it will come at a cost — particularly if you start differentiating welfare policies, because that will create an administrative burden that someone has to pay. That someone would be the Scottish government.” The Times, 12 June 2013

Northern light?

Beware the SNP’s false promise of social democracy, argues Gordon Brown

Progressives looking to an independent Scotland as the standard-bearer in the global fight against inequality will be sorely disappointed upon a closer inspection of the facts.

One of the propaganda devices of the Scottish National party has been to persuade left-of-centre opinion that breaking free from London rule would create a ‘northern light’ for social justice – a Scotland that is more just, more humane and more socially democratic. However, a Scotland which followed the policies outlined in the SNP’s white paper for independence and ended the system of pooling and sharing resources across the United Kingdom would quickly find that income and wealth would be more unequally distributed than in the country they abandoned.

It may seem paradoxical but the Scottish people’s much-vaunted egalitarian instincts are not reflected in the SNP’s prospectus for a separate state. Myth or reality, Scotland has always prided itself on both its democratic intellect – equalising opportunities in education – and its role as a pioneer of a civic society built on the idea that if the strong help the weak, we all become stronger. And although recent surveys have found Scottish and English opinion similar in their support for the NHS and for help for the unemployed – the difference lying only in a greater Scottish dislike of privatisation and private education – the idea of a socially concerned Scotland is a powerful one that influences how we act.

DANIEL HANNAN: Banning vacuum cleaners isn't about saving the planet - it's about Brussels grabbing even more powe. Daily Mail

Extremist parties are on the rise across Europe. The disaster of the French economy threatens to re-ignite the euro crisis. Russia is invading Ukraine. And what is the EU doing? Banning high-power vacuum cleaners.

Customers have been thronging High Street stores, like Boxing Day crowds, snapping up the last legal appliances that use more than 1,600 watts — the maximum power-limit decreed by Eurocrats and national politicians (including our own).

But it doesn’t stop there. Brussels is methodically working its way through our homes, proscribing any household machines that are deemed to use too much electricity. Televisions, dishwashers, tumble-dryers, toasters: all must now conform to the new low-power rules.

School sixth-formers used to debate whether the State had any place in the bedroom. Well, never mind the bedroom: I want the Government out of my bloody kitchen.

The last time we saw similar panic-buying was when the EU banned proper lightbulbs in 2009. A kind of dual stockpiling followed: retailers amassed the soon-to-be-outlawed incandescent bulbs, and consumers did the same.

Only now, five years on, have we ploughed through both sets of reserves. As a result, our rooms are lit by the strange light that comes from the low-quality halogen or LED versions.

Of course, the dimming of the lights may be useful when it comes to hiding the muck that vacuum cleaners are meant to remove. Various consumer organisations, including Which?, recommend the high-suction cleaners as the best way of extracting dirt rather than pushing it around.