Monthly Archives: August 2025

War and Peace…

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War and Peace is a novel written by Leo Tolstoy in 1869. It show life in Moscow when Napoleon attacks Russia. It’s a moral play about the purpose of life. The book is 1400 pages long. There are many plots and twists in the book. A lot of people say this is why it is difficult to read the book. It is considered a masterpiece in literature. Tolstoy wrote the book to show everyday life, despite the war.

Everyday life has not changed since the beginning of time. Children grow up and marry, have children, who have children and so on and so on. The only thing that has changed over the years is our technology. I was watching this farmer who has a YouTube show. He lives in up state New York. He has a small farm of 45 acres. His passion is restoring old Farmall tractors. His latest video was at Tractor show. It had over a hundred years of tractors, from steam to gasoline to diesel. All the tractors did the same thing, but the technology kept improving. The stream tractors were almost as large as trains. Where the gasoline and diesel ones kept getting smaller. Now tractors are getting bigger again. But life goes on.

Everyone can remember the crazy guy on street corners holding a sign saying the world is ending. As he tries to convince people to prepare for the end of the world. Everyone thought he was crazy and paid him no mind. If you are old enough to remember the Y2K pending disaster. All digital framework was based on Cobalt code. When year 2000 was going to come, all digital framework was going to reset itself to the year 1900. Had not the people figured out how to change the computer language, it would have a disaster. But life goes on.

Everyday life counts on all situations being normal. And if the situation changes, it seems that our life becomes tenuous. Thus the Covid-19 pandemic. There are still lasting effects from the pandemic. And I am not talking about the medical side of it. People became deathly afraid. Many people did die from complications of the virus. But depression settled on people and it still hasn’t gone away. So how do we counter these abnormal situations? In all my life I have found only one way to counter the end of the world as we know it. That is to have peace in your heart. Not the peace that man brings, because it doesn’t last. It is the peace that only God can bring to your heart. And the only door to the peace of God is through Jesus Christ. It is when we surrender our lives to Him and let the peace reign and rule in our lives.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

To Thine own Self be True…#2.

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Shakespeare’s famous quote from Hamlet was “This above all, to thine own self be true.” What was Shakespeare talking about? And why be true to yourself?  King Solomon talked about the same subject. He said, What was before, shall be again…there is nothing new under the sun. Evil is not just for one period in history. People have lied and betrayed others since the beginning of time. Shakespeare wrote a whole play about betrayal. It’s called a tragedy because everyone died because of betrayal.

We have all known people who have lived a lie. It is a sad situation where they believe how they are living is the truth. But it really isn’t. Everything they are doing is a lie. You want to shake them up and show them that they need to wake up. But they are deceived and believe the deception. For the most part people are the same. They may have different backgrounds. But people are basically the same. We were born with parents. We need to be reared and taught how to live. We learn a skill or job to be able to eat, clothe ourselves and have a home. We learn the language of our parents. And if we are fortunate, we learn other languages. We do so to go out into this world and communicate with others. When we do we find that people have different beliefs than we do. It seems that their truths aren’t the same as ours. If we don’t have strong belief system, things can become complicated. I have seen people switch their beliefs to other cultures. I don’t have to defend myself. I know who I am and where I am going. I know where I will end up. I am being true to myself. Because 45 years ago, I was drifting through time. I had no anchor and didn’t belong anywhere. Now I have a worldwide family and I belong. To Thine Own Self Be True.

Crain Blanchard.

www.joseph1637.com

joseph1637@juno.com

Not Remembering the Past.

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There is a saying by George Santayana from The Life of Reason. It says, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” King Solomon said the same thing in the book of Ecclesiastes about 3000 years ago. He said, “The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.” The difference is what we choose to remember and do. It is so easy to forget about this detail or that one. Life crowds in on us and we just forget. But time has a way of catching up with us.

Everyone knows what due diligence is. It is being mindful of what is going on around us. It is being particularly aware of what we have to do and how it is going to be accomplished. Sometimes that acute awareness starts when we are young. But sometimes people remain clueless as their life drifts into the void.

I have studied my families history. How 4 families over 400 years have come together in my family. You know what I have seen over those 400 years? I have watched them grown up, be educated, marry, have children and eventually die. They build a life for their immediate family and around their extended family. Some were farmers, some merchants, some pirates, some doctors, but all believing that they were providing for their family. One thing struck me is that they all learned from their previous family, whether good, bad or indifferent.

And in that remembering, we can not only see our ancestors, but we see ourselves and our children and grandchildren. It is because there is nothing new under the sun.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

Life is it’s own Reality show.

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Life starts out the same for most people. We grow up going to school and learn what we can do in this life. If life hasn’t beaten you down by the time you graduate from high school. There is a chance that you will be able to accomplish your dreams. There was a big fade 25 years ago, to begin teaching your children at 4 or 5 years old. Wanting them to have an advantage over the other children in school. What happened is that all the children seem to catch up to each other at age 7. In Texas, every child must be 7 years old to start 1st grade. Their high school graduation rate is 90%. Then 62% go on to college. College diploma doesn’t mean that you will be successful. There are plenty of examples of people with a high school diploma that went into technical work that have succeeded. Did you know that Caterpillar Equipment company is paying 6 figures for high school entry jobs. It’s not about your education that counts. It’s is about what you want in life and are willing to pursue it.

I look at the news and it hasn’t changed since I was a kid. Someone is always threatening to go to war over something or other. This restaurant has a bigger, better burger than any one else. Everything is always to expensive and prices are going up. And the President of the US, that we elected, isn’t worth anything. The strange thing about all that is that life goes on. People are being born, growing up, going to school, getting married, having kids and getting old. It doesn’t stop for anyone. Life in every generation repeats itself. And if you astute enough to recognize this, you can take advantage of it.

You know what the sad part of this whole drama, is that with all the getting, education, money, things and power, people still don’t know what they are looking for. We have heard the saying, that being rich is never enough. The answer is very simple. It isn’t always easy, but it is simple. And simple isn’t stupid. There is a hole in us that can’t be filled with education, money, things or power. There is only one thing that will fill that void in us. It is the love of one man, Jesus Christ. With that love, we can live our lives because it will have meaning. Then when we are through with this life, we can go home to heaven with a grateful heart. This is the reality of life.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

Prophesy, Good or Bad…

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People love to get prophesy. They want direction in their lives. When someone prophesies over you, it is meant to encourage you. The thing about prophesy is that it is only a reminder of what God has spoken to your heart already. It is to encourage you to do the will of God. When someone receives the unction of God to speak to another, the prophesy is conditional. The condition is that you do the will of God. If you are not in the right place at the right time, the prophesy will not come pass.

There are prophesies about pending disasters. These aren’t personal direction in you life. Even though, it will effect your life. When God talks to us about his plan in life, He expects us to use faith to live our life on this earth. We can’t live our lives on prophesy. The Word of God gives us specific direction to live godly on this earth. The last word in any decision we make is the Word of God.

There are things that the Word of God doesn’t say. Like whether to turn left or to turn right. The Word of God says that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. To obtain wisdom, we must understand the Word of God first, which is knowledge, reading and studying. Then we must experience the Word the God by doing it. Then comes wisdom. In others words, it is called discretion. Once we have discretion, then we will be able to know which way to turn. It is not getting the cart before the horse.

But back prophesy, there is nothing wrong with it. And as we obtain wisdom, we will know whether or not if the prophesy is true. You can’t live on prophesy. You can only live by the Word of God. Jesus is the Word of God. He wrote everything in the bible. Jesus said, no man comes to the Father but by Me. He also said, I am the bread of life. He that comes to Me will never hunger or thirst. God encourages us to prophesy, but we can’t live by prophesy. Everything has to depend on the Word of God. Then everything will be decent and in order.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

Wanting to go Home…

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I am talking to believers now. There is nothing more important in my life than wanting to go Home. Home isn’t my place on earth. This is just a temporary place on my journey Home. The yearning to go home in my heart grows louder every day. There are some days that I can harder do or think of anything else. The first time I verbalized my desire to go home is when my wife and I brought our 3rd son, just 3 months old, to the hospital. It was there that we found out he had spinal meningitis. As I was walking into the hospital, I said to the Lord, I want to go home. His answer was direct. He said to me, I can’t wait until you get here. That was 40 years ago. God healed him on 3rd day in the hospital.

God’s plan for our lives are laid out in front of us. Most people have no idea what those plans are until we stumble into them. When God tells us to turn left, don’t turn right. If He says to stop, He knows what He is talking about. If we will listen and obey, we will find out what God wants and how it going to unfold. Very rarely will God lay out the plan in detail before us. He is wanting us to use our faith to change the world. When we do God’s plan unfolds not only for us but for everyone around us. You see God is using us to affect the world in a positive way. I have seen instances where God called good people home early. There was a young man, age 35 in California, an evangelist, who did mighty works in the far east killed in a motorcycle accident. Another young man, 20 years old, who would have been a pastor or evangelist, killed in war.

The Apostle Paul said in Philippians 1:23-24 “For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.”

This is the real point of the story. We may want to go home early and miss the mess of this earth. But God has a plan for each of us. That plan sometimes means that we stay until our task is finished. Moses was 120 year old, when God called him home. This is what faith is for. We are to believe God and let Him decide how our lives will end. I talked about my younger brother who died of cancer. He knew the Lord. When his time came to go home, he was in his bed with his family around. He simply closed his eyes in peace and woke up in God’s arms.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com