In Defense of Soft Drinks

In our modern "enlightened years," the poor soft drink has been attacked as the initiator of all social ills. Our nation is fat - because of soft drinks.1 Our nation is diabetic - because of soft drinks.2 Our nation is weak and lazy - because of soft drinks. Our nation has lost its immunity to disease - because of soft drinks.3

Someone may even claim that soft drinks are the cause of our economic crisis!

To counter, we have created a myriad of "corrections" to the soft drink problem. We have diet soft drinks in all shapes and sizes. We have "diet", "low," and "zero" and "absolutely nothing." We have water flavored to taste like our favorite soft drink. We no longer use sugar, but so many other sweeteners.

Regrettably, the problem has only gotten worse. Diet soft drinks are now credited with more obesity that regular soft drinks ever were.4 Somehow, if our eagerness to fix our soft drinks, we created worse poison. We no longer use sugar, and are left with sweeteners that are now claimed to reduce or stop body functions, create toxic poisons, and cause cancer.5
In the midst, the poor soft drink has become the enemy of all societies good and moral. We blame it all of the soft drink, and none upon the amount consumed.6

I, for one, am a supporter of soft drinks. I do not admire them because they are fattening, or even because they are diet. I appreciate soft drinks precisely because they are soft.
Soft drinks are so common in our society that to simply ask someone if they would like a drink is generally recognized as referring to a soft drink. This varies, of course, by the context of location.
Before the days of our ill-fated soft drink, the word "drink" itself had one distinct meaning. It meant an alcoholic drink, or "hard" drink. To ask someone for a drink resulted in alcohol, in one form or another. An option aside from hard drinks, of course, was water. But in many eras of history, water itself was a carrier of more sickness and poison than our poor soft drink ever thought to invent. The alcoholic content of hard drinks was needed to purify the water, so again, your drink contained alcohol.7 Fruit juice was an option, but with lack of refrigeration, all fruit juice soon became "hard."
In various places, the primary exceptions would persist. Teas and coffees became the standard non-alcoholic drinks, but none ever attained to the social status deserving the title "drink." These, of course, became easier as pure water was more available. But now, with the option of purified water, there would soon be another competitor.
In the face of this optionless society, our culprit-of-social-ills, the soft drink, appeared. It was referred to as a soft drink, to clearly distinguish it from the hard drinks that ruled the world. Here, for the first time, one could choose flavors of beverages, without the encumbrances attached with alcohol. Soft drinks have since become widely popular. They have attained the title "drink". And for all their harm, no one has yet called for a prohibition.


1. http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060305/news_1n5soda.html
2. http://xpress.sfsu.edu/archives/news/001739.html
http://www.medfinds.com/healthnotes.php?org=medigrative%2Cmedigrative&page=newswire/newswire_2007_04_12_3.cfm
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/22/health/nutrition/22real.html?_r=1&em&ex=1201410000&en=66790a693871559a&ei=5087%0A
3. http://thetruthaboutsleep.com/soft-drinks-disease-in-a-can/21/
4. http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/319258/how_diet_soda_causes_weight_gain.html
5. http://www.docshop.com/2008/10/30/does-diet-soda-truly-lead-to-cancer/
http://www.healthandfitnessnaturally.com/archives/2008/05/entry_52.html
http://cbs2chicago.com/health/benzene.carcinogen.soda.2.328353.html
http://cancernewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2007/01/does-soda-cause-cancer.html
6. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19918336/
http://media.www.thetriangle.org/media/storage/paper689/news/2007/09/28/HealthAndFitness/Study.Diet.Soda.Causes.Problems-2999705.shtml
7. http://logosresourcepages.org/Believers/alcohol.htm

What's it Matter? -- Really?

Thoughts from some time ago, but I can't say it any better:


So, tonight, a prospective student, Tommy*, told me he's planning to come to KMBC.  He's not growing much where he is, and he really feels that God wants him at KMBC.  I am very very happy to hear this.  I often worry about the youth I get to talk with, and the decisions they are making in their lives.  I have been praying for Tommy.  I am overjoyed that he is wanting to follow the Lord and grow in his spiritual life!

Then, I walked into my closet, and saw the grille for my still-in-the-shop VW Jetta. It has provided several frustrations for my life, and been the opportunity for removing some financial excess.  However, tonight, it meant nothing to me.  The cost, the frustration--all meant nothing.  I would gladly take much more of that, if only it meant more Tommys become strong in God's kingdom.

Take all from me if you will, but use me to bring many sons to glory.  May the Lamb that was slain receive the reward of His suffering!


*not real name

Muse: Children, Choices, and Growing Up

Recently pondering children, and the process of growing up . . .

    What of children?  Who will they be, and what will they become?  When once they are transformed in body and soul by that dreadful process known as growing up, will they still exist?  Children are  innocent.  But how can you know, and how can you prepare?  How can you ensure they will not die, just as they are becoming an adult?  So many, when once they are granted the power to think abstractly, the emotion to like and to love, and the surging energy driving them to become an adult, have then, at that point, chosen a way I will never understand.  So innocent, so pure; now so vile and wicked.  It is a spiritual thing indeed to look at their pictures from when they were young.  Who were they then?  Were the seeds of rebellion and wantonness already planted?  Or what was it that turned them into that way at that crucial age where we all begin our own paths?  Oh dear God, the lostness of so many-- trying to find a way, and knowing no course.  Trying to understand a world, with only a partially-developed sense of reason.  Forced to make crucial decisions while drowned with emotion that almost controls every thought and action.  How are we to understand?

    Five or ten years later, when emotion has cleared, reason has developed, and youthful passion has passed its crest -- regret.  Stamping down crying in the realization that the course is already set – barring out brooding, because of the overwhelming cataract of “what ifs” and “if I had onlys”.  And yet, the passion is gone.  The trail is not abandoned, the course is not altered.  “Que será, será. -- Fate has now my destiny set.  This is now my lot.  I shall continue in the path I began; I know how to do nothing else.”

    A person can die in so many ways.  I've seen it happen.  So many have died.  The person they once were no longer exists.  Somewhere, back there in those lost years, they died.  Not a murder, no, but a slow starvation, life ebbing away until it is finally gone.  What is left inhabiting the body can be more terrifying than a corpse.  Sometimes you find a monster, sometimes a mouse.  Sometimes there is a hostage in the midst of fierce warfare, sometimes there is nothing at all.

    I fill with anger at this silent killer; this indefatigable stalker and relentless foe.  But the battles are fought so silently, so isolated.  Help is often barred out, and the one who cares, despised.  

Dear God, be with our children, precious, innocent, and pure.
May each ever learn to love and serve you, Father, Guardian, and our Guide.
May your Spirit fill and keep them, ever, always, by your side.
Dear God, I pray thee, keep our children, may each make heaven sure.



This post revisits some ideas from earlier blogs:
http://dlorimer.livejournal.com/49340.html
http://dlorimer.livejournal.com/50911.html
http://dlorimer.livejournal.com/55584.html

Change is in the Air -- Election 08

"Has the wind changed, or did our boat turn?"

How is it that the one nation that could bring about the fall of the Soviet Union could so quickly embrace those very ideals and philosophies that made the Iron Curtain so repugnant to us?


We see in this year's election the results of the choices we have been making as a country.  Our country will not go downhill because of this election.  Our country came to this election because we have already gone downhill.

We have abandoned our dock, we have abandoned our moorings.  We have abandoned our character and principles.  We have abandoned our beliefs that this country was founded upon.  We have abandoned our God.  We have abandoned ourselves.

"The United States stands at this time at the pinnacle of world power. It is a solemn moment for the American democracy. For with this primacy in power is also joined an awe-inspiring accountability to the future. As you look around you, you must feel not only the sense of duty done, but also you must feel anxiety lest you fall below the level of achievement. Opportunity is here now, clear and shining, for both our countries. To reject it or ignore it or fritter it away will bring upon us all the long reproaches of the aftertime."
--Winston Churchill, in his famous "Iron Curtain Speech," 1946
http://www.famousquotes.me.uk/speeches/Winston_Churchill/1.htm

"Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
--Ronald Reagan, President of the United States, 1987
http://www.reaganlibrary.com/reagan/speeches/wall.asp

We have gone from "Tear down this wall!" to "Spread the wealth around," in a very short time.

Are we like ancient Israel, who having defeated a pagan nation, immediately began worshipping the gods they had just defeated?

Deuteronomy 8:20, NKJV
    As the nations which the Lord destroys before you, so you shall perish, because you would not be obedient to the voice of the Lord your God.

Deuteronomy 12:29-30, NKJV
     “When the Lord your God cuts off from before you the nations which you go to dispossess, and you displace them and dwell in their land, take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to follow them, after they are destroyed from before you, and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their gods? I also will do likewise.’

2 Kings 21:9, NKJV
    But they paid no attention, and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than the nations whom the Lord had destroyed before the children of Israel.

Have we received that judgment of God where he allows that which we are victorious over to become our own downfall?

Judges 2:12a NetBible
"They abandoned the Lord God of their ancestors who brought them out of the land of Egypt. They followed other gods—the gods of the nations who lived around them."

Perhaps we are simply being allowed to pursue the course we have set for ourselves.

Psalm 81:12 KJV
So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.

In any case, here we are.  This is not the time to give up and go home.  We must continue to serve as citizens of heaven, "praying ... for all who are in authority" (I Tim 2:1-2).  God's work is not hindered by who is in office, and our work as ambassadors of Christ is also unaffected.  Sure, our money, our "security," our culture, and our country may all be changing, but that is all nothingness to a Christian.  Let us strive forward, as foreigners to this land, as citizens of heaven, as ambassadors of Christ.  The message of the gospel has not been "changed"!

"This is no time for ease and comfort. It is time to dare and endure."
--Winston Churchill
http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/winston_churchill.html

"Now is not the time to put up the white flag of surrender, but to strengthen our resolve." - Bill Muehlenberg
http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2008/10/10/never-give-up/

"These are not dark days; these are great days - the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race."
Winston Churchill, October 29, 1941.
http://www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=423

Welcome to the Good Ol' Days

Nostalgia -
"a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period or irrecoverable condition."
(Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, 2 November 2008  <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nostalgia>)

Welcome to the good ol' days.  I am glad to be here, and I hope you are too.
As I look back on the good ol' days, with honest face and open reflection, I am struck by a peculiar realization -- they weren't so great.  When I compare this same college with itself when I entered 7 years ago, I am stunned at the change.  These are the best days of our lives!  My class had the numbers; my class had the fanfare.  We were acclaimed, we were held up as examples.  We were carefree and we were sinful.  My class had more problems than any class I've observed over the last several years.  Many of us found our way through, and many of us are faithfully serving God today.  However, many have made shipwreck of the faith.  My heart breaks when I look back now.  I desperately wish I could have done something to help, but I was young and ignorant, and lacking understanding.  Oh, the painful stories of the good ol' days.

As I hear open and honest stories from my elders about the good ol' days, I am struck by a peculiar realization -- they weren't so great.  Oh, to hear of the pain and the trauma, the world of confusion and hurt, the fierce difference of opinion, prompting violence and mistrust!  The anguish that drove people mad.  The criticisms and questions that rendered them desperate and without hope.  Loss of faith, loss of feeling, loss of friends and family.  The years when emotion dried up in the face of stark reality.  The years, gaunt from lack of warmth, faith, and encouragement.  The times that turned our nation on its very foundation, and sent our youth flying every direction, seeking a real and solid place to perch.  The dark years where man, brother, and friend turned arms against each other, the disillusioned years where the One Nation and the people were marching opposing directions, the defying years, where all bases, morals, standards, modes, and values of life were challenged, changed, and carried out anew.
No one cries now.  The emotion has long since sunk into the hard earth of coping and continuing.  But I can hear the tears streaming down their voice as they share with me the painful stories of the good ol' days.


My friends, these are the good ol' days.  As I look at my alma mater today, where I live and work, I am both pleased and amazed with what I see.  I wish so deeply that I could have enjoyed the life these young people are blessed with.  Here, in this place, new classes arrive, more spiritually focused, more loving, and more godly than my class ever was.  They enjoy better surroundings, better instruction, better atmosphere, and better stability than I had the privilege of enjoying.  We have a share of problems and challenges, but none greater than we had in the past.  These are the good ol' days.

I look at life around us, and I do not quite know what I see.  We have great problems facing our nation, and the fear is once again that our nation is about to turn on its very foundation, and this time, fall off.  Some cry, "fear on every side!", while others speak, "peace, peace, in our time."  While we see our challenges and the momentous task that will face our generation, I yet see what may be the best days of our lives.  The whole national economy has corrected, and turned in our favor.  For the first time in years, houses, land, and the beginning of stable life is very affordable.  The housing market is perfect for rising young buyers to get quality homes without selling their life to the bank.  The stock market has corrected, and is currently at 10-year lows!*  What better time for promising young investors, who have long been avoiding the roller coaster market because they knew this was coming!  Our time is now, and it has been handed to us.  These days are not yet great, nor are they yet gruesome, for they are not yet gone.  My friends, these are the good ol' days.  What stories will we tell?

Were there good ol' days in the face of the trials, toils, and tears of the past?  Yes.  Were there good ol' days when life and nature together conspired against our predecessors?  Yes.  Were there good ol' days when brother fought brother, and mankind strove against itself?  Yes.  Were there good ol' days when our nation slipped out of its moorings, adrift in the open sea?  Yes.  Will there be good ol' days today and tomorrow?  Yes.

The good ol' days are made by how you live, who you love, and the God you serve.
My friend, these are the good ol' days.  What will you do with them?



* ~October 7, 2008