Destruction

Well, now the ISIS troops went and did it!!!  They are going after the holy places in Iraq and Syria, destroying temples, mosques and churches, smashing tombs, and promising to head to Mecca.

For a Muslim person, Mecca is the holy of holies.  A Muslim is to make it a priority to go to Mecca once in their lifetime at least.  The rock that Muhammad used as a cornerstone for the mosque in Mecca is still there, having been stolen once but finally returned after paying a hefty ransom.

I told my husband the other night that ISIS would destroy itself from within, because there is too much money, too much testosterone, too much anger.  They would never remain unified.  It appears that perhaps I was right.  So now what they are doing has angered some of the other factions, and even other Sunnis who more or less let them have a pass in Iraq.

It's going to get messy in the Middle East.  It's a civil war.

The planet is like a checkerboard right now -- with problems here and problems there.  Pick a spot and there's a problem. 

It shouldn't have surprised me yesterday when the Friday Akron Beacon Journal covered Lebron not making up his mind (and then he did), and all sorts of other stuff on the front page and yet not one article on the front page dealt with some of the most serious issues that face US and the WORLD.

One article on the conflict in Israel and Palestine was on page A-6.. 

So if we relied on the ABJ in this household to know what's going on in the world, we wouldn't have one single clue.

Well, enough about all of that for a minute.  Remember Ecclesiastes?  There is a purpose for everything under heaven?  There is a reason.  There is a time to be born and a time to die?  A time for war and a time for peace?  Ecclesiastes puts things into perspective in a poetic, rhythmic way.  It's probably my favorite book in the Old Testament.  There is a calm about it, a foreshadowing of the peace that Jesus brought to us by living on the earth, dying, returning to heaven and then sending the Holy Spirit.

This is the famous Rudyard Kipling poem that deals with the ups and downs of life and how we can control the only thing we can control -- ourselves!!

IF -- by Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream---and not make dreams your master;
If you can think---and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings---nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And---which is more---you'll be a Man, my son!   

Kipling was a Christian man, and critics blast him for that in various ways.  I won't. 

Have a wonderful Saturday and I'll see you Tuesday.