Welcome to my World. Even though I stated
that originally in my "Roadrunner" blog, this world focus is different.
"Roadrunner" is writing, thinking, poetry, devotions, and on and on.
This one, Dumpster-Diving, has connected to my main heart ministry officially that was laid on me in the 1990s.
It's referred to in different locations by different terms, some
appreciating the ministry, and happy that we are digging away -- and
some thinking that my friends and I are nuts, deceived and deceptive. I
personally refer to it, formally, as spiritual historical research ... however, now I more often refer to it in my casual term, dumpster diving.
The
photo background is a large source of what could be considered
spiritual research ... for the world. It is at Lake
Victoria, a source
of the Nile River, in Jinja, Uganda. The
Nile has flowed through so many cultures for so many thousands of years
and influenced so many nations, and nearly every continent, either
directly or indirectly. [I took this photo near sunset, January 25, 2004, during a 1/2 hour boat sole-tour, a very blessed and enjoyable time.]
The
purpose of spiritual research [AKA Mapping] is to uncover the spiritual
rituals and worship in various geographical areas. The attempt is to inform pastors, intercessors, prayer walkers, and spiritual
leaders in a region of the historical background that might influence
the cultural and social activities that have been challenging to them
and theirs. The next step is to use that knowledge to determine God's
focus and plan for an area, sometimes back thousands of years, and see
where the enemy has managed to gain control, either obviously in our
faces or subtly hidden under the surface and camouflaged --- lots of
information, PILES of it, can influence the thinking, sorting, sharing
process. The playout can be intercession, determining the "gold" mixed
in the garbage, the redemption process, and, hopefully, restoration and
transformation.
Lots and lots of work, reading, sharing, thinking, praying, writing and more and more. Never bored...
My
spiritual direction: Amos 2:9 -- Yet I destroyed the Amorite
before
them, whose height was like the height of the cedars and he was strong
as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above and his roots from
beneath.
So, that's one of my God-jobs. I go for roots. Others go for
fruit... porn, abortion, abuse, power-control, and on and on. That will
weaken the tree and is absolutely necessary. But, my job is to seek
the roots and then hope for partners who will go "digging" with me. Not
being independent or "Lone Ranger-ish" -- just working as God lays out
the plan.
I stopped filling the blog a few months after I began working in it. Why? I didn't want to have people "fighting" against my opinion and my overviewing and my connections. Don't like to argue. Even after all these years, when driving around and about from here to the Northwest, the Northeast, parts of Uganda, and parts of other nations, history and "pictures" have been dropped into me on a regular basis. Then I can spread the word and the Word around to people in the area.
After 4 years, I decided to re-write my original blog post, and re-adjust, re-organize, re-share. It's still a "me" thing. I have piles of photos, spiritual and historical books, local and worldwide historical issues, file cabinet filled with topics national and international. I don't add as much, but sometimes get a call or an email or fb question and am able to move along. God called me to do the job. So, He's the Boss. All I can count on forever!!
Read through this patiently to see where "Will" finally hits the report.
=================
I nearly always think too much (according to my husband and all my close friends). My brain never turns off and a lot of the thinking is very serious. It’s also difficult to summarize the “thoughts”, especially to do with spiritual mapping and the other elements connected therewith. For instance, processing the differences and similarities between land defilement and redemptive giftings, between the fruits of sin and the spiritual roots that produce that tendency to specific sin in certain areas, etc.
Some time back, while re-reading a biography of Hudson Taylor, one of my all-time heroes, right at the end, a statement was made that expressed the concept of what I’ve been trying to explain for these past ten or more years.
It also explains quite possibly why certain events occurred here in Omaha and why they have continued to affect us. So I thought I would pass this on.
The subject of this quoted paragraph is the imminent anti-foreign terror in China during 1900 referred to as the Boxer Rebellion. Many missionaries and their family members and Chinese Christians were killed or wounded before the horror ran its course.
“Since Hudson and Jennie had left China, in September 1899, the political situation had deteriorated. The country’s defeat by Japan, the seizure of ports by European powers, the beginning of railway construction by foreigners, fear that the Empire would be partitioned by European powers, bitter feeling against some missionaries, and outbreaks of famine all contributed to a growing sense of unrest. The hostility to missionaries was stirred up, as so often, by rumours about cruel and immoral practices and disturbance of cherished customs. ... ‘Boxers’ ... became associated with secret societies, and indulged in charms and occult practices which they believed would protect them from foreign weapons.”
In terms of Omaha and our region, the following is an example of how this might work.
At the end of the 19'teens, major world-wide, national, regional, and city elements converged to result in, among other events, the tragic lynching of Will Brown on September 26, 1919.
World-wide – the end of WWI and the return of veterans back to their nations. In the States, adjustments to family structure and the job market gradually created tense situations resulting in race riots, an huge upsurge in the KKK, and other social ills.
The Influenza Pandemic of 1918 had ripples in nearly every community in our nation. In Omaha, where a normal death toll for the months of October to December would have been approximately 130, about 1,042 died.
Omaha was under the control of the Tom Denison/Mayor Jim bossism political machine. When reformers managed to get their own mayor in, the tension increased. The reformers did not have the power or the political expertise to maintain peace in a very non-peaceful town.
Where people had been bonded together socially by the common element of WWI, even though the US entered the war late in the game, afterward, the reality of everyday life set in, first, with family difficulties and unemployment, and, then, was exacerbated by the influenza epidemic with its loss of life -- and the bond fell apart.
Will Brown became the scapegoat for all of Omaha’s ills. He was set up by the powers that be – and as a result of his death, the Denison machine was reestablished in political power, mostly on its claim that the Reformers were to blame for the lynching and riot because they couldn’t control the crowds. Mr. Denison and Mayor Jim -- and their cohorts -- were back in power for several more years.
Today, we continue to deal with the results of these ungodly choices, these knee-jerk responses to heavy situations, and lack of seeking the will and protection and wisdom of our Father.
========================
Again, as I try to bug your brains/hearts/spirits, see where these aspects might apply to your town, region, or nation.
As you can see, this was posted in August, 2010, when I began my Dumpster Diving blog. The reason I was doing it, was to share about the needs of spiritually historical issues and who and what could deal with it. Since I also mentioned Pastor Job in my Caryjo-Roadrunner a couple of times, I decided to show this. You might actually know "him". He was/is wonderful. Now, posting on Hazel's, because I know she and some of the others truly understand spiritual warfare. Thank you.
=====================================
“Sticks and stones can break my bones, But names will never hurt me.”
Did you know that’s a lie? I expect you do understand it, in the natural and even as it affects the spiritual side. I could give so many examples it would take piles and piles of “paper” to cover the main ones. However, one in particular has stuck in my head since I was in Soroti in January, ‘04.
I was in the ministry office one day, working by myself, and one of my favorite pastors came in. Pastor Job w
as with the Deliverance church, and a real treat. I so enjoyed my time around him. He came in to request some petty cash for a small need.
While he was there he asked me how I was involved in spiritual warfare and I told him that I did what is sometimes referred to as spiritual mapping or what I often refer to as spiritual/historical research. So he asked for more information and I spent a bit of time talking about how important it can sometimes be to dig through the layers in sensitive geographical locations to see what the issues’ root source might be.
I told him that, for instance, I recognize that the fights between his tribe, the Ateso, and his neighboring tribe, the Karamojong, seems to have been going on for a long time. I knew the Karamojong are “cousins” to the Masai in Kenya – they have a couple of the same thoughts, among which is that “all the cattle in the world belong to us” so they feel free to steal from everyone and kill anyone in the way or who attempts to interfere with them as they “restore” the cattle to themselves.
Job nodded his head and told me where the division between their two tribes occurred, although they didn’t know exactly when it happened. Unlike the majority of Uganda, where most of the tribes are Bantu... language and customs are similar to that overall ethnicity ... the Karamojong and Ateso originate in northeast Africa, and are from the Nilotic ethnic group. When they were migrating southwest, out of the Ethiopian area, their group came to a point of division. The older folks/older generation said they needed to stop moving onward. The younger generation said they needed to go further. The older ones called the younger ones something similar to “stupid kids” and the young ones called the older ones “cowards.”
They split and the animosity has stayed in place for hundreds of years. Killings, invasions, theft, hatred have been active.
In the mid-1990s a YWAM leader was sharing the gospel in the Karamojong region and some of them came to the Lord. One man was quoted as saying, with a bit of surprise and totally new thinking, “Oh, now I know we are not allowed to kill people.”
The Teso are not as violent, overall, as the Karamojong, but when I was there to help in the rebel situation, the Teso mili
tia – the Arrows – were tough beyond belief when it came to dealing with the LRA [Lord’s Resistance Army] and the rebel invasion. Much tougher than the Ugandan national army that tended to run away when battles were too dangerous... at least for the first stretch. After the Arrows managed to wear out the rebels, then the Ugandan army was much more active. At any rate, the fact that the Tesos are not cowardly or passive... and the Karamojong are not only the fighters, but most of the time the victorious killers, it is an indicator of strong warriors on both sides.
A British doctor had lived up in northeast Uganda in the Karamojong district for about ten years. He told Dave and I some funny stories. Although he had been there for a fairly long time, he mostly felt forced to leave and come to the Kampala area because it was just too dangerous for his family. When they went out for a “safari” on Sunday afternoons [which in its colloquial definition simply means taking a Sunday family drive – nothing such as we see in movies], they would sometimes be shot at while the K.s were target practicing. The K.s often were seen nude and wandering around villages carrying AK-47s.
Anyhow, one of the suggestions I made to Pastor Job was that, even though they couldn’t change the names of their tribes, the Christians in the tribes could meet and repent for the curses attached to the names and seek forgiveness from each other and ask the Lord to redeem the negative actions and traditions and show them ways for active reconciliation and bring this hundreds-years antagonism to a halt.
We discussed this from several standpoints for about an hour. When he was leaving, Job said, “I thought I was coming here just for the money; that is not why I was to come. This is one of the most important spiritual lessons I have ever heard.”
I’ve often wondered where things went... Job and I have lost contact. But we had a great deal of respect for each other.
Think about how this might fit into your family, neighborhood, region, nation. I believe very strongly that it is the truth. It’s a huge battle we must keep in mind.
Through my personal story on my roadrunner blog, I described how "godly" gems or valuable items might be mixed into the dumpster trash. I've thought for quite some time about how to describe this in a geographic ["spiritual mapping"] manner and North Platte has been on my mind.
Overall, N.P. has a pretty mixed background that goes back centuries: layers of battle and bloodshed and bossism. Conflicts between the various groups that lived or passed through the area -- Native Americans crisscrossing, conflicting over hunting and territorial demands; N.A.s and Anglos confronting each other as the Westward Movements came through --California, Oregon, Mormon trails; Union Pacific RR construction with the vices attached to that "job" -- gambling, drinking, prostitution, fighting; "bossism"--mobster control-- in the 1930s, the town known as "Little Chicago". And, as in normal life, murders continue.
OH, and an unusual UFO experience in November, 2008.
But thrown into the mix of all of this is what North Platte is most known for in our present time. A Gem. Big Time.
One of the most amazing God-focused activities I've ever heard of occurred in North Platte -- even if they didn't know it was their "God job". I have seen the story on PBS and have heard more about it from others. And read a book and articles. And the Internet. Tried to get a pretty clear focus.
I was sharing this with my ministry partner Gary N. recently and he said the thought he would describe this town's Redemptive Gift [God's plan/infusion when the city was founded] as "unselfish." I agree with that, but also with the thought that there is a true history of "hospitality."
Right after the beginning of our involvement in WWII, the Pearl Harbor attack, the troops were being sent across the country from coast to coast and from station to station and military base to base. Flooding our railroad system. The people in North Platte, in those days a population of approximately 12,000, decided to greet each train that came through town. They began this "ministry" on Christmas, 1941. They stayed on their schedule from 5AM to midnight until the end of the war. A total of approximately 6.5 million service personnel were greeted, fed, given a chance to dance, take a break. Whether it was ten minutes or a couple hours, they were provided with all the food and friendship they could have imagined, including birthday cakes. The North Platte Canteen was a welcome center beyond belief.
One of the aspects I've thought of often is that this was during the war. There was no federal financial input. The people surrounding North Platte were farmers or folks in much smaller towns. Their own finances were limited and their food, gas, and other basics were either controlled by the seasons or were rationed by the government. And, yet, committed to this act, they continued faithfully for those years. Between their input and the contributions by others they received nearly $138,000. Beyond the family budget, I'm not a financially-oriented person, but I have a hunch that it would be equal to some millions today.
The canteen did not close until April 1, 1946. Even though the vast majority of the WWII service personnel have died by now, their stories are still surfacing. They were blessed beyond anything they could imagine at the time.
When we look at a town, a neighborhood, a region, a nation... often we see nothing but what is the result of sin or simply not turning to our Father for His purposes. YET, one of the tasks we have is to dig through history to determine God's plan for that location.
This is a very good example of a community "living for God" and being a blessing to many, many others.
I don't know what else to title this-- Just based on bits and pieces from what I was reading. It was in the book by Michael Green, "Exposing the Prince of Darkness", which was published in 1981, and he was quoting a British author, Ronald Higgins, a governor of the London School of Economics, among other leadership positions. Higgins' book "The Seventh Enemy" according to Green "may likely prove to be the most formidable assessment yet made of the way the world was likely to go in the next twenty years or so." Here's the list: overpopulation, famine on a massive scale, shortage of non-renewable resources, rapid destruction to our environment, growing nuclear threat, and technology racing out of control. His book title is based on what he considered, in a sense, the worst enemy/threat -- man's inertia and blindness -- which would lead to an increase in immorality. Higgins was not a Christian and was not writing it based on a Christian perspective. Even at that, he hit it right on.
In the 30 years since "Seventh Enemy" was published in 1980, it's pretty amazing to see what has occurred. And, at the very least, dealing with the everydayness of our constant "techy" increases, I expect even he is floored at how fast and far his guesstimate has proven true ... for better or worse. [I tried to find info re: him on the I-net, but, other than books, no personal info. -- the most I could guess is that he spends time in Australia and had written a peace-aimed book in 1990.]
I'm so focused on where we've been and where we're going, that it's difficult for me to spend much time simply "playing" and some folks think I'm too dead serious [which I do tend to be, I guess] ... but I'm very pleased when something unexpectedly drops into my vision/lap that is an indicator that it's been worth my "zeroing" mentality.
I haven't posted anything, but do need to state that my brain has been working overtime. For most of you, that won't be a surprise... I'm fortunate when it slows down enough so I can sleep. However, I've been digging and trying to determine where to begin... and what the Lord seems to have laid on me is to read and re-read the books that are appropriate to this topic.
A couple weeks ago, I began reading [for the fourth time in the past several years] George Otis' "Twilight Labyrinth." It takes so much concentration, but is so clear about so much!! I have used different colored pens each time I read it; interesting to see how much I've missed previously and how much didn't quite sink in. I think it is the best book out there on this overall topic.
Recently, several more books dropped onto my need-to-read list [mostly re-read]. Winkey Pratney's "Healing the Land"; Otis' "Last of the Giants"; Petrie's "Releasing Heaven on Earth", Michael Green's "Exposing the Prince of Darkness"; and Brown's "Unbroken Curses." It's going to take me a few weeks to plow through those books and others that are related to them.
My goal is to read these books by mid-June. I'll try to spend about 3 hours a day reading... away from my computer, so I don't become side-tracked. Since I've been at this ministry for nearly a dozen years, I think this is another opportunity to both review what I know and to learn more.
Anyone out there who has not read one of those books, especially Petrie's and Otis', and wants to learn more of this spiritual warfare topic, I suggest hitting Amazon.com or Abebooks.com. I've been able to get most of them for a buck or two plus shipping. But the insight of these authors, the spiritual sanity, the always-goal of freeing people to know the Lord more deeply can never be discounted.
I have no doubt that I was supposed to start this blog site. Originally, I anticipated filling it with thoughts and ideas and pieces of puzzles being put together -- locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally. Instead, I keep being prodded to read, write, and read and write some more.
Just thought I'd let you know that I haven't become sluggish about this. Buried in related projects, yes. And, with my tendency to become drawn down rabbit trails, trying to carefully maintain the overall goal, the ONLY important element -- to draw others to our Lord and bring glory to Him . Nothing else counts. Period.
Welcome to my World. Even though I stated that in my "Roadrunner" blog, this world focus is different. "Roadrunner" is writing, thinking, poetry, devotions, and on and on. This one is connected to my main heart ministry. It's referred to in different locations by different terms, some appreciating the ministry, and happy that we are digging away -- and some thinking that my friends and I are nuts, deceived and deceptive. I personally refer to it, formally, as spiritual historical research .
.. however, now I more often refer to it in my casual term, dumpster diving.
The photo background is a large source of what could be considered spiritual research ... for the world. It is at Lake Victoria, a source of the Nile River, in Jinja, Uganda. The Nile has flowed through so many cultures for so many thousands of years and influenced so many nations, and nearly every continent, either directly or indirectly. [I took this photo near sunset, January 25, 2004, during a 1/2 hour boat sole-tour, a very blessed and enjoyable time.]The purpose of spiritual research [AKA Mapping] is to uncover the spiritual rituals and worship in various geographical areas. The following step is to inform pastors, intercessors, prayer walkers, and spiritual leaders in a region of the historical background that might influence the cultural and social activities that have been challenging to them and theirs. The next step is to use that knowledge to determine God's focus and plan for an area, sometimes back thousands of years, and see where the enemy has managed to gain control, either obviously in our faces or subtly hidden under the surface and camouflaged --- lots of information, PILES of it, can influence the thinking, sorting, sharing process. The playout can be intercession, determining the "gold" mixed in the garbage, the redemption process, and, hopefully, restoration and transformation.
Lots and lots of work, reading, sharing, thinking, praying, writing and more and more. Never bored...
My spiritual direction: Amos 2:9 -- Yet I destroyed the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above and his roots from beneath.
So, that's my job. Go for roots. Others go for fruit... porn, abortion, abuse, power-control, and on and on. That will weaken the tree and is absolutely necessary. But, my job is to seek the roots and then hope for partners who will go "digging" with me. Not being independent or "Lone Ranger-ish" -- just working as God lays out the plan.
Is this too long? Probably. But gives an overview, so anyone who reads this will know whether it's worth it to follow and discuss or just push the "delete" button and be free.
