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PMotion necesitaba un nuevo diseño de logotipo y lanzó un concurso de diseño en 99designs.
Un ganador ha sido elegido entre 24 diseños de 9 diseñadores freelance.
Mule Deer Research
Mule Deer Research is a site that helps sportsman, land owners and outdoor enthusiasts understand the needs and habits of the North American mule deer species. This species has declined in numbers over the recent years due to climate change, competition from other species of deer, predators (big cats) and dwindling habitats.
Mule Deer Research wants to provide a platform for the discussion of mule deer conservation between sportsmans, biologists and eco-historians. We believe that everyone's interests can be served but only through understanding the pressures on the species and the role this animal plays in the balance of nature.
We are in a very sportsman dominate niche and we need of a logo that will appeal to all those in are market. So we need a logo that is a little bit edgy, mixed with wilderness or rustic look and the prominent mule deer outline.
Here's a link to a couple of logos in this market that exemplify the sportsman appeal; http://www.squidoo.com/muledeerresearch.
Start with red, black and yellow in the color scheme. Then perhaps some more neutral earth tones as an alternate. It needs to be sized and in a format ready for business cards, shirts and hats.
We also need a header, background and color pallet for a new blog page; we're using the church theme from studio press. This will be a seperate job, but we'd like to find a designer that could integrate the logo into an overall theme for our new blog.
please let me know if you have any questions. We're a little shy on technical experience and graphic software applications, but we will try to find the answer to help you with the process.
Descubre cómo funciona un concurso de diseño u obtén más información sobre nuestros servicios de diseño de logo.


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College of Biblical Studies 7000 Regency Square Blvd., Houston, TX 77036
The College of Biblical Studies-Houston provides biblically based education for the Body of Christ, with primary focus on African-American and other ethnic minority groups, and equips its students with a biblical worldview for Christian service to the church and the world.
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subset: commoncrawl


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Inhabitants of The Oceans: Fish
The house in which we live, the school we attend, the pavement on which we walk, the parks in which we play, the air we breathe are all things that belong to our world. There are birds, people, trees, plants and animals in this world. However, there also exists another world with which we are not very familiar. We know the existence of this world and sometimes see it on TV. There are also animals and plants that inhabit this world. These animals and plants have no idea about our world. Neither could we live in their world nor is there any chance that they could survive in our world. We could not even breathe one time in that world.
The "other" world we are talking about is the underwater world in which fish live. But, there is something we need to remember. Fish are not the only living beings inhabiting the underwater world. The underwater world harbours reptiles, insects and plants and shelters millions of kinds of creatures. The creatures living in this world have particular methods of eating, breathing and sleeping peculiar to them.
The respiratory system of fish is different from that of all other creatures. Instead of noses fish have gills. By means of gills, they can use the oxygen in water. The water that is continuously taken into the mouth passes through the gill arches. Meanwhile, capillaries in the gills take in the oxygen dissolved in the water and release the carbon dioxide of the body to the water. Most fish have nostrils but these are not used for respiration. The nostrils open to tiny sacs by which fish detect the odour of the water that fills these sacs. Sharks, for example, find their prey by means of their odours.
A fish does not have eyelids as do human beings. It looks at the world through a transparent curtain covering its eyes. This curtain resembles a diver's eyeglass. Since they usually need to see objects very close to them, fish's eyes have been created to meet this need. The spherical and hard structure of their eyes are adjusted to see objects close to them. When they want to look at an object at a distance, the lens system is drawn backward by means of a specific muscle mechanism in the eye.
Beside its five basic senses of sight, smell, hearing, touching and taste, the fish also perceives the outside world through its "lateral" lines. Sensitive nerves that lie along these lines perceive the size and direction of objects the fish passes by. In this way blind cave fish can move very easily in the dark. This system is a kind of underwater radar or "sonar" system.
Furthermore, many fish species have a long and slender balloon-like air-filled sac in the abdominal cavity. They maintain their balance in the water with the help of this sac.
Fish of various kinds created by the will of Allah amaze people with their beautiful colours and movements. You can hardly find such vivid colours as those seen in many fish in any other animal.
You may be familiar with what has been described so far. But, there is another piece of information about fish which will astonish you.
Larger fish usually need tiny cleaner fish to cleanse them of parasites. Sometimes, these cleaner fish readily enter the mouth of a much bigger fish without fear. They clean the teeth and gills of the host fish, a service in return for which the host causes them no harm.
Well, how can the cleaner fish be sure that the big fish will not suddenly swallow it? How does it know that the big fish will not cause it any harm? How can it trust it? It is as if they had an agreement. Let's assume that there exists such an agreement; how could the little fish be sure that the host fish would not violate this agreement and eat it, once it renders its services?
The truth is that the cleaner fish is always vulnerable to its host, but, because Allah has inspired both of them to co-exist, neither does the big fish cause harm to the cleaner fish nor does the little fish feel fear of the larger one. The large fish is cleaned while the little fish feeds on the parasites it cleans. By Allah's inspiration to them, both of them lead their lives in harmony and co-operation.


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The 1970s once again rule the Billboard Top 200 album chart. The No. 1 album this week is the soundtrack to the Marvel Comics superhero blockbuster film, "Guardians of the Galaxy." The album, "Guardians of the Galaxy: Awesome Mix Vol. 1," contains a dozen hits from 40 years ago.
The songs including Blue Swede's "Hooked on a Feeling" (a hit first in 1968 for B.J. Thomas); Norman Greenbaum's "Spirit in the Sky" that sold more than 2 million copies in late 1969 and through 1970 and became the unofficial anthem for the Reborn Christian Jesus Freak movement (although Greenbaum himself was and is Jewish); Redbone's "Come and Get Your Love," The Five Stairsteps' "O-O-H Child," Eric Carmen and The Raspberries' "Go All the Way," English group 10cc's "I'm Not in Love" and teenage L.A. party girls The Runaways' "Cherry Bomb."
Also in the Top 10 are veteran Austin rockers Spoon's "They Want My Soul" (No. 4), "Hypnotic eye" from Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers (No. 6), and "The Breese — An Appreciation of JJ Cale" from Eric Clapton & Friends (No. 7).
In Britain, at age 68, Dolly Parton continues to enjoy the greatest success of her 47-year recording career. Her latest album, "Blue Smoke" that's combined with "The Very Best of…" dropped from No. 2 to No. 3 after spending more than two months at that second position. Oft-times confused or confusing Irish alt-pop and folk rocker Sinead O'Connor has her greatest chart success in 20 years with "I'm Not Bossy, I'm the Boss." Her album debuted at No. 22, the highest she's scored since "Universal Mother" reached 19 in 1994.
Upcoming albums
Detroit rocker Bob Seger, a member of both the Rock and Roll and the Songwriters Halls of Fame, will release his first studio album in eight years this fall, "Ride Out," according to a press release. The 69-year-old's first 45 from the album, John Hiatt's "Detroit Made," was released to radio stations last weekend.
In a statement, Seger says the album is about, "finding our place in a more complicated world — from how we appreciate things as simple and pure as love, to navigating through the corruption and violence that permeates the news." The exact release date wasn't given and it's unclear if he'll tour to promote the album.
Robin Gibb's final studio album, the 17-song "50 St. Catherine Dr.," will be released Sept. 30, Rhino Records announced. The title is the address on the Isle of Man (located in the Irish Sea between Northern Ireland and England) where he was born in December 1949 (he died of cancer in May 2012 at age 62). The album was compiled from Gibb's widow, Dwina and his son RJ from recordings the Bee Gee made between 2006 and 2008 (including a remake of "I Am the World" that was the B-side of The Bee Gees 1966 single, "Spicks and Specks"). The exception is "Sydney," that he recorded late one night at home in August 2011.
Of "Sydney," Dwina writes, "He missed his twin brother Maurice, who had passed away (in 2003, also of cancer); but when he closed his eyes the three young brothers were back in Sydney, Australia, happy together with their dreams and hopes for the future. The fragment of song is poignant, wistful, beautiful, and unfinished. It belongs on this album as one of his last works. He cried when he wrote it, and I wept when I heard it."
Ten songs that rock and roll pioneer Jerry Lee Lewis recorded in the late '70s will be released on Sept. 23 as "The Knox Phillips Sessions: The Unreleased Recordings." They were recorded at Phillips Recording (aka the Sam Phillips Recording Studios) in Memphis, owned my Sun Records founder Sam Phillips. Back then, Lewis would occasionally call Phillips and ask him to open the studios after midnight and the Killer would record a variety of songs.
The album includes Lewis' take on Jim Croce's "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown," a Chuck Berry medley of "Johnny B. Goode" and "Carol," and a version of "Beautiful Dreamer" that was published in March 1864, two months after the death of its composer, Stephen Foster.
"Partners" is the title of the upcoming album from 72-year-old Barbra Streisand, the singer wrote on her Facebook page. The album, the latest in the new crop of duets albums, comes out Sept. 16.
Among those joining her are Michael Buble on "It Had to Be You," Stevie Wonder on "People" (her first hit in 1964), Billy Joel on "New York State of Mind," Lionel Richie on "The Way We Were," Josh Groban on "Somewhere," and Elvis Presley on "Love Me Tender." This is Streisand's 64th studio album. Of the prior 63 albums, 30 have gone platinum and 13 more have gone multi-platinum.
More upcoming albums
Former Euthrymics singer and four-time Grammy winner Annie Lennox, who was awarded an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 2010, is the latest contemporary singer to mine the standards of the 1930s and '40s. "Nostalgia" will be released Oct. 21. It's her first album since her holiday release, "A Christmas Cornucopia," came out four years ago.
Included in the dozen songs in the collection are her takes on Hoagy Carmichael's 1930 "Georgia on My Mind," Johnny Green's 1933 "I Cover the Waterfront" that was recorded that year by both Billie Holiday and Louis Armstrong, Holiday's own 1939 classic "God Bless the Child" that was a smash in 1969 for Blood, Sweat and Tears, the 1952 standard "You Belong to Me" that became hits for both Jo Stafford and Patti Page, and Harry warren's 1937 "September in the Rain" that The Beatles recorded during their infamous Jan. 1, 1962 audition for Decca Records in north London.
British Invasion hitmakers The Hollies will celebrate their 50th anniversary with the release of a 3-CD box set, "50 at 50," out Oct. 21. Mostly during the '60s and '70s, the pop group with the high harmonies from Lancashire, England notched 22 hit singles here (six of them reaching the Top 10) and 30 in Britain (18 that made the Top 10 there) and just about all of them are in this box set, including 1966's "Bus Stop" and "Stop Stop Stop," 1967's "Carrie Anne," 1969's "He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother" and 1972's "Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress."
Soft rock troubadour Leonard Cohen will celebrate his 80th birthday with the release of his 13th studio album since 1967, the nine-song "Popular Problems" that contains all original songs. His birthday is Sep. 21 and the album comes out two days later. Cohen has already indicated that he's taking 2014 off from performing, so it's not clear if he'll do any concerts in support of this new album. Cohen is a member of the Rock and Roll, the Songwriters, the Canadian Songwriters and the Canadian Music Halls of Fame, and was the recipient of a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010.
Steve Smith writes a new Classic Pop, Rock and Country Music News column every week. Contact him by email at email@example.com.


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Set at the Nash Community College Business and Industry Center in Rocky Mount, the annual conference is one worth attending.
Whether you're a farmer looking for continuing pesticide credits or a consultant, an Extension agent or allied with the agricultural industry, the Southeast Cotton Conference will have topics that should help you and your business this coming season. Admission is $20 at the door, $10 in advance. Send checks to Southeast Cotton Conference, Farm Press, P.O. Box 1420, Clarksdale, MS 38614.
Topics ranging from the second-generation of biotechnology in cotton to petiole analysis from how farmers can benefit by using conservation incentives in the new farm bill to drip irrigation will be covered at the conference.
The Carolinas Cotton Cooperative will give away a bale of cotton.
The conference begins at 9 a.m. Breakfast, sponsored by Bayer CropScience and FiberMax Seeds, begins at 8 a.m., along with and pre-registration. The conference will end around 3:30 p.m.
The conference has been approved for four hours Certified Crop Advisor CEUS and five hours pesticide credits with the North Carolina Department of Agriculture. Stoneville Pedigreed Seed Company is sponsoring the morning break and John Deere is sponsoring the lunch.
On the topic of biotechnology, a North Carolina State University entomologist will discuss how farmers can best benefit from the second wave of technology. Representatives from Monsanto, Bayer CropScience, Syngenta and Dow AgroSciences have been invited to speak about the benefits of the new offerings in the field.
On the conservation front, Mary Combs, head of the North Carolina Natural Resources Conservation Service, will discuss the many opportunities farmers have under the new farm bill.
Extension entomologists from South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia will give an insect update. Extension cotton specialists from North Carolina and South Carolina will discuss the previous crop year and give variety updates.
For more information, contact Cecil Yancy at 910-938-3061 or e-mail at email@example.com


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Posts Tagged 'combines'
Sounds of My Childhood – 52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy & History Challenge
by Sherry Stocking Kline
March 17, 2011
Many of my childhood sounds still surround me.
I grew up on a wheat and dairy farm in south central Kansas and I've not moved so very far from where I grew up, so the turtle dove that sings in the evening near my city home reminds me of nightfall on the farm.
When I visit friends or family in the country I hear bobwhite quail calling their mates, cattle lowing as they crop the grass, and occasionally the mournful midnight howl of a coyote.
We actually have fox, deer, and coyotes that roam in our little area of our small city at night, especially near the creek that runs through town. Wander around near my neighborhood after midnight, and you may spot a deer family grazing in someone's yard or a fox or coyote hurrying to get out of the headlights of your car.
In the spring, summer, and fall in the country you can hear the sounds of tractors running in the fields, and see the dust they stir up blowing in the wind. It reminds me of when I used to ride on the fender of the tractor with either Mom or Dad while they worked in the field, or when I ran barefoot in the furrow behind the plow with our collie dog, Lassie.
In June and July, if you drive by Kansas wheat fields with their golden stalks blowing in the south wind, you can hear the sounds of wheat harvest: combines running and spewing out the spent stalks from the back and trucks traveling in low gear to get out of the field as they hurry to deliver the grain to the nearby elevators.
It reminds me of hot, sweaty, but fun days riding the combines first with my daddy, then with my brothers, and later my husband as they kept an eye on the clouds, worried about the weather, and hurried to get the wheat cut before the rain or hail came.
It brings back memories of the field picnics we had, much like today's tailgate parties, with sandwiches and potato chips on paper plates and trying to catch the potato chips that were blowing off your plate. Nothing tasted as good as the cold iced tea from the gallon field jug and no picnic was as much fun as eating in the field when the men stopped for a few minutes to eat, talk about the harvest, eye the clouds for rain, and predict the yields before climbing back on the combines and cutting late into the night.
At night, the combine's lights shine on the golden stalks as the reel pulls each one hungrily, whooosh, whooosh, whoossssshhhhhh into the combine's auger and then threshes out the grain and dumps it into the bin behind the driver.
I loved to ride the combines, especially at night, when the heat of the day was gone and the breeze combed your hair with its fingers and cooled your skin with its touch.
And the wheat beards whispered secrets in the wind.
The Big Green Tractor… Music Monday
Sherry Stocking Kline
January 8, 2009
I grew up around tractors. Lots of them. Big ones. Little ones. 'Tricycle' front end ones like my dad used to cultivate the cattle feed and squatty little red and green tractors with big wide fenders perfect for children to ride along with their parents.
I don't remember my first tractor ride…
I don't remember my first tractor ride. I was much too young for that to 'stick' in my memory.
I do remember countless hours riding on the fender, hanging on, then getting off when mom or dad stopped (yes, they had his and hers tractors) and running in the furrow behind the plow, my bare feet pounding the sun-warmed damp earth.
I watched out for fishing worms (and picked them up if there was any chance we might go fishing soon). Little baby bunny rabbits ran to get away from the tractors (and me).
Back then, the long, muley-eared jackrabbits were a common sight in Sumner County, Kansas. Now, jackrabbits are pretty rare. I've not seen one in a good, long, time, but I have it on good authority that they are still around.
Nowadays children would be taken to a baby sitter…
Nowadays children would be taken to a baby sitter while mom and dad worked, but mom was a 'work at home' (or in the field) mom, and I went along. Mom and Dad's day began at 5:00 a.m. when Mom and our collie dog Lassie brought the dairy cattle in to be milked.
After they milked, dad took the truck with silage in it out to the pasture and the feed bunks to feed the cattle while mom came in and got ready to feed the people in our home, which in the time period I've got in mind included Dad, myself, and my brother, Gary.
After breakfast, if it was spring, summer, or fall, Dad and most often Mom would head to the field on a tractor. Not the fancy ones like they have now with air conditioning and GPS, just plain red, then later yellow, and much later the green John Deere's made their way onto our farm.
I always felt sorry for city kids…
Those were good days, and good memories. I know some city kids would feel sorry for me, no swimming pool around the corner, and no park to go swinging in.
But I always felt sorry for city kids (like my own kids later on) who didn't get to ride on tractors and combines each summer, who had to play in a postage-stamp-sized back yard instead of a quarter section with pasture and creeks full of pollywogs and crawdad, and who never got to watch baby chicks scurry around after the mama hen, and baby calves grow from awkward to adult.


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Prosecutor: Musician's $500,000 prize money stolen
NEW YORK (AP) — Authorities have arrested a suburban New York man on charges he stole nearly $500,000 in prize money belonging to famed jazz musician Cecil Taylor.
Brooklyn prosecutors say Noel Muir was facing a court appearance Tuesday.
The Uniondale man is charged with second-degree grand larceny. The name of his attorney was not immediately known.
Prosecutors say Muir is a general contractor who befriended the noted pianist while repairing a home next to Taylor's Brooklyn residence.
In 2013, the 85-year-old Taylor was named a recipient of the Inamori Foundation's Kyoto Prize. Muir allegedly accompanied Taylor to Japan to accept the award and had the money sent to his bank account instead of Taylor's.
The award is given annually for achievement in science, technology, and arts and philosophy.


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Would you look with me at Matthew, chapter 9. Matthew, chapter 9. We're continuing in our examination of verses 18 through 26. Matthew 9, verses 18 through 26, and we've entitled this section, "Jesus' Power over Death." Nothing is more wonderful to us than to know that Christ has conquered death. The writer of Hebrews tells us that Jesus came to "destroy him who had the power of death," and as a result of that, to "deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage." Hebrews 2:14 and 15. In other words, the writer says that men live their entire lives subject to the bondage of the fear of death, but Christ has come to deliver them from that fear. Death is the specter that haunts every person's life. The longer you live, the more inevitably it looms in the future. To know that Christ has conquered that is the ultimate joy. For most of the world, they have no such knowledge and they fear death.
I suppose in my lifetime, the man who seemed to have it most together, the man who throughout the whole specter of the world's lifestyle, world's religion, throughout all of the demonstration of popularity and media and all of those things, the man who stands out as the man, at least in my lifetime, that the world thought had it most together, was Mahatma Gandhi. Seemed to be at peace. Seemed to have absolute tranquility of soul. Seemed to know nothing of fear. Fifteen years before Gandhi's death, he wrote this. "I must tell you in all humility that Hinduism as I know it entirely satisfies my soul. It fills my whole being, and I find a solace in the Bhagavad and Upanishads that I miss even in the Sermon on the Mount." Utterly at peace, utterly comfortable with his Hinduism. Just before his death, he wrote this. "My days are numbered. I am not likely to live very long, perhaps a year or a little more. For the first time in 50 years, I find myself in the slough of despond." Footnote: It was interesting; he must have been reading Pilgrim's Progress. Then he said this. "All about me is darkness, and I am desperately praying for light." Even Mahatma Gandhi, who seemed to have it all together as he began to face the inevitability of death, saw it all falling apart.
People do silly things when they think about dying, because of their fear. One man that I read about is a Turkish watchmaker who decided that he wanted to build himself a special grave with an eight-inch window on top and he planned to install a push-button, electric, alarm bell inside the grave; because, if he was buried alive by mistake, he could push the button and ring the cemetery's guard room. He also planned to have an electric light bulb in there, and he instructed the people who buried him to be sure they left the bulb on for seven days, came back, and if he was dead, they could then turn it out. In Brazil, an architect has designed a 39-story skyscraper cemetery. There are a lot of skyscrapers in Brazil. Most of them have living people in them. But this one is going to have bodies in it, with a capacity of 147,000 corpses. It has a heliport, so the bodies can be flown in quickly. There will be two churches and 21 chapels and comfortable beds for grieving friends. There will also be soothing and somber background music piped in 24 hours a day. This to deal with the incredible burial problem in the crowded portions of Brazil.
You know that Great Britain is the first country in the world to have more cremations than burials? They're facing the fact that there are no places left to put the bodies. In Japan, the graves are so crowded that only if you are in the imperial family can you be assured of or guaranteed a grave. Russia has the world's largest cemetery. It has one cemetery that contains 500,000 corpses. They just built a mausoleum in San Diego. In that one mausoleum, they have room for 70,000 bodies; and adjacent to it, they have a garden; and in that garden is a replica of the tomb from the garden in Jerusalem where they believe Jesus may have risen; and alongside the mausoleum will be that replica. It'll be empty, and the door is always open, so that you can be notified visually that Jesus' tomb is empty; and the message seems to be that those other tombs, wherein lies one who knows Him, will be emptied someday, as well.
Nonetheless, the earth is pockmarked with graves. They go down. They go up. They're everywhere. Death looms on the horizon of every individual's life. How marvelous it is to realize, then, that Jesus came to conquer death. If you're to look at John, chapter 5, that perhaps would be as good a place as any to get a focus on this, although we could discuss many passages. Just listen to several verses from John 5. Verse 21: "For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and giveth them life; even so the Son giveth life to whom He will." Verse 24: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life." Verse 26: "For as the Father hath life in Himself; so He hath given to the Son to have life in Himself." In chapter 11, He says, "I am the resurrection and the life: He that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die." In other words, Jesus claimed to have power over death. He said, "The Father has power over death, and He's given Me power over death." He also said, "Because I live, ye, too, shall live, also."
Now, the work of the Messiah was to conquer death, to remove the fear of death, to do. As the apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15: To take the sting out of death, to take the victory out of the grave, the Messiah would come. Ultimately, the Messiah would bring about an eternal state, says Revelation 21:4, where "there will be no more death." The Messiah would conquer death. If that's true, then anyone who claims to be the Messiah should demonstrate his power over death, right? Look with me at Matthew 11, verse 5. John the Baptist was concerned to know if Jesus was truly the Messiah, the Son of David, the Promised One; and so John sent a couple of his disciples to find out. And in verse 3 of Matthew 11, the disciples came and said, "Art Thou He that should come, or do we look for another?" Are You the Messiah? Are You the Promised One? Are You the One John has been heralding? "And Jesus answered and said to them, 'You go and show John those things which you hear and see. [And what are they?] The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, and the dead are [What?] raised up." Messianic credentials; that's how we know He is the King.
Now, Matthew wants us to understand this, so in chapter 8 and 9, Matthew has presented the miraculous power of the Messiah. He has shown us that Jesus had power over disease in chapter 8, verses 1 to 17. He has shown us that He had power over disorders, physical, spiritual, and moral disorders, in chapter 8, verse 23 through chapter 9, verse 17. And now in chapter 9:18 down through verse 35, he shows us that He has power over death. Disease, disorder, and death. He can give sight to the blind. He can give hearing to the deaf. He can make the dumb to speak, and He can raise the dead; and therein lies the credential of the Messiah. He can do, by way of preview, what He will do in His Kingdom and throughout eternity.
Now, in our text, beginning in verse 18, we focus on His power over death, the ultimate enemy, and there are three miracles here. The first one is the raising of a dead girl. The second one is giving sight to blind eyes, and the third, giving a voice to one who is dumb. In some sense, they all illustrate His power over death. In one case, He gives speech to a dead voice; in another, sight to dead eyes. And then pulling it all together, not only can He raise the parts of the body from deadness, but the whole of the body from deadness as He raises this little girl from death. Now, as we said two weeks ago when we began our study of verses 18 to 26, we not only want to focus on the miracle itself of the resurrection, but we want to watch Jesus, because we will learn here how He worked with people. We not only see the factors involved in His power as God manifest, but we also see the tenderness of His working with people, and that becomes abundantly clear as we look through the passage.
Now, let's review just briefly the pattern of Jesus in dealing with people, and this is the outline we want to follow. First of all, Jesus was accessible. Verse 18, look how it begins: "While He spoke these things unto them." Stop right there. You remember last time that we pointed out to you that Jesus was busy in conversation with the Pharisees, the followers of John the Baptist. Everywhere He went was a mass of humanity crowding and circling around Him. Always in the midst of a crowd, always surrounded by people; we see this throughout the flow of the book of Matthew. You start back in chapter 4, for example, verse 25, and it says, "And there followed Him great multitudes of people." And you come to chapter 8 and verse 1, and it says, "And when He was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him." And you come to chapter 12, verse 15, "And great multitudes followed Him." And you can go all the way on to chapter 19 and just the second verse there, and it says, "And great multitudes followed Him." And in chapter 20, verse 29, "a great multitude followed Him." And in chapter 21, verse 8, a great multitude followed Him.
In other words, His whole life was in accessibility to people: answering questions, meeting needs, preaching, teaching, healing, casting out demons. This is a marvelous principle, people. God is accessible. He's there. He can be found. He can be sought out. He is not the god of the pagans. He is not the god whose people cannot find Him, and the god of the Old Testament people to whom the prophet said, "Maybe he's on a vacation, maybe he's asleep. You better yell a little louder and wake him up." Our God is not so. When Jesus Christ came into the world, and He was God incarnate, God became accessible.
Second, He was not only accessible, He was available; and we move from the crowd to the individual in verse 18. It says, "There came a certain ruler." One man out of the crowd; and down in verse 20, "And behold, a woman." Out of the mass of everything, the focus is on a man and a woman, an individual. He's not just accessible, that is, you can attend His meetings. He's available. You can confront Him individually, and you can move into His life, and He into your life. He came to individual people. He touched a leper. He went home with a centurion who had a paralyzed servant. He touched a woman with a fever, and He dealt with a demon-possessed man. He healed a paralytic. And, here, He meets a, a father who has a dying daughter, and a woman with a severe hemorrhage. I mean, He's always available to the individual, and there are two things that that availability involves. One is need, and the other is faith. Where there, wherever there's deep need, wherever there's great faith: He's available.
Look at verse 18. It says, "There came a certain ruler," and the other gospels tell us he was the ruler of the synagogue. He was the epitome of the religious establishment. He was probably the leading citizen, the most respected and honorable and religious man. He was a part of the establishment that usually was identified against Christ; and, yet, in absolute desperation, because his daughter was dead, he came to Jesus. First time, as he came, the daughter was only dying; but, by the time Matthew picks up the account, the daughter's already dead; and the man is desperate. And he comes, therefore, out of deep need; but he also expresses great faith, because in verse 18, he says, "My daughter is even now dead, but come and lay Your hand on her, and she'll live." This is great faith. Great faith. He had a deep need and great faith, and therein lies the ground necessary for the meeting of a soul with God. Notice the middle of verse 18. He worshiped Him. He worshiped. This man had the faith to be saved. Worship is one of Matthew's favorite words.
It can be phony worship. It can be. In chapter 18 of Matthew's gospel and verse 26, I think it's a phony worship. Remember, Jesus was telling a story about a man who owed so much he couldn't pay it. He came and he worshiped the master, and he said, "Oh, please forgive me. Please forgive me. Please forgive me. I'll pay it all." And the man forgave him, and then that man turned right around to a man who owed him a little, tiny bit, and threw him in prison when he wouldn't pay. Man was a phony. He was a hypocrite. In verse 26, "The servant [that man] fell down and worshiped him, saying, 'Lord, have patience with me, and I'll pay thee all.'" And that worship was phony. So worship can be faked. It can be external. It can be self-serving. We find a selfish worship also in Matthew 20, verse 20, because there came the mother of James and John. James and John decided they want to sit on the right and left hand in the kingdom, and they wanted to be elevated above all the other disciples. And so they sent their mother, and she comes to Jesus. And it says she came "worshiping Him, and desiring a certain thing of Him." Now, that was a self-seeking worship. Worship can be phony or self-seeking, but it can also be real and genuine; and I believe when this man came, he came in a genuineness of heart.
If you were to look, for example, at Matthew 14, verse 33, I think you'd see a genuine worship. Jesus had walked on the water. And when He got to the boat, it says, when they were in the boat, the people who were there "worshiped Him, saying, 'Of a truth Thou art the Son of God.'" Now, there's the real stuff. True worship. You see it in 15, don't you? Chapter 15, verse 21: Jesus departs into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, and there comes a Gentile woman and says, "Have mercy on us, O Lord, Son of David! My daughter's grievously vexed with a demon." He didn't answer her a word. He was going to give a dramatic illustration here. And the disciples said, "Send that woman away." She's bugging us. "And He answered and said, 'I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.'" He was showing them how important it was, first of all in His ministry, before He went to the Gentiles, to go to the Jews, and to offer the kingdom to the Jews. But she came persistently, verse 25 "and worshiped Him, saying, 'Lord help me.'" And I believe her worship is real and genuine; and, in a sense, His sort of ignoring her forces out the reality of her faith. "He answered and said to her, 'It is not right to, to take the children's bread and cast it to dogs.'" Do I owe any obligation to you? A Gentile? "And she said, 'Truth, Lord.'" What do You mean by that? You're right. I don't deserve anything. I don't deserve anything. Now, there's a meek spirit. I don't deserve anything, but, "'Lord, even dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.' Jesus answered and said to her, 'O woman, great is thy faith.'" Now, that's real worship. Not self-seeking. She knew she didn't deserve anything but the crumbs. So worship can be phony, can be self-seeking, or it can be real. And go back now to Matthew 9, and I think what you'll see here is real worship. "He worshiped Him and said, 'If you just lay Your hand on her, she'll live.'" He really believed that.
And back in chapter 8, remember in verse 8, the centurion said, "My servant is sick, and if You'll just say the word, he'll be well." And Jesus said that was the greatest faith He'd ever seen in Israel. But that man only believed that Jesus could heal. This man believes that he can raise the dead. He must believe that He is, in fact, the Christ of God.
By the way, this is more faith than the disciples showed on a lot of occasions. You know that? Chapter 8, the, the waves were rocking the boat. Verse 26: "He said unto them, 'Why are you afraid, O ye of [What kind of faith?] little faith?'" And He said that to them again and again. Chapter 14, verse 31; chapter 16, verse 8, He says, "O ye of little faith. O ye of little faith." Chapter 6 verse 30: "O ye of little faith."
If the disciples believed and had little faith, and this man has this kind of faith, he must have passed the point where his faith was adequate for redemption. I believe the man really believed. He had a deep need. He was desperate, and he had a great faith, and Jesus responds to great faith. Verse 19: "He rose and followed him," and so did the disciples. The other gospels add, and so did the whole crowd. So there's a big mass bulging through the little streets as they wind their way down to this fellow's house. Jesus was accessible, and He was available. He moves away from the mass to follow this one man who had a deep need.
But, thirdly, I love this, Jesus was also touchable. He was touchable. The crowd had heard. The individual man had worshiped. And now we meet a woman who touched. Verse 20: "Behold, a woman, who had been diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind Him," and literally, grabbed or clutched the tassel hanging from His garment. She had had an issue of blood. That was some kind of a hemorrhage, some uniquely female bleeding problem, probably caused by a fibroid tumor. Could have been carcinoma, but it's likely that if it had, she would not have lived for twelve years. The Levitical law said that when a woman has an issue of blood, when she has this kind of a problem, her clothes are unclean, the bed she's on is unclean, anything she sits on is unclean, and anything she touches is unclean. She was put out of the synagogue, out of a family, out of a marriage relationship. She had been isolated for twelve years as an unclean person. A desperate condition: shut off from family, friends, fellowship, the synagogue, no one could touch her without being defiled. But she had heard about Jesus; and she, too, had a desperate need; and she, too, had faith. And she kept saying to herself, in verse 21, and the Greek says she kept saying it over and over, "If I can just touch His garment, I'll be well. The Man has so much power, that if I can just touch Him."
And a Jew had four little tassels hanging from an element on his robe, and they were made of blue, and they symbolized, according to Numbers 15 and Deuteronomy 22, they symbolized the identification with the law of God, and they marked a Jew as a Jew. And, as Jesus moved through the crowd, the little tassel would flap back and forth on His back; and she lunged out and grabbed that, and held on. Verse 22: What happened? Jesus turned around, and He saw her, and "He said, 'Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee well.' The woman was made well from that hour." He responded to that. He was touchable. He was, He was sensitive and responsive. You know, when Sir James Simpson, great saint, lay dying, a friend wished to comfort him and said to him, "Well, James, soon you will be able to rest on the bosom of Jesus." In his consummate humility, he said this, "Well, I don't know that I can quite do that, but I do think I can take hold of His garment." The woman didn't want to be exposed in her embarrassment and shame. She just wanted to reach out and touch, but she had the faith to believe that that was all that was necessary, because there was so much power. The ruler had somewhat of an inadequate motive. He really wanted his little girl alive. And the lady had somewhat of an inadequate faith. It was a little superstitious. But Jesus took them where they were, redeemed them both.
Now, look for a moment. When it says at the end of verse 21 that she thought she could touch Him, and then Jesus turned around, something happened in there that Matthew doesn't record. But Luke does, and I want you to see it in Luke chapter 8. There's a lot of interplay that, that the other gospels touch that we can't cover. But I, I want, at least, show you this. Verse 44 of Luke 8 says, and when she "came behind, and touched the border of His garment: immediately the issue of blood stanched," or stopped, was over. She was healed instantly, and I love this. And Jesus said, "Who grabbed Me? Who grabbed Me?" When everybody denied it, and "Peter and they that were with Him said, 'Master, the multitude crowd Thee and press Thee, and sayest Thou, 'Who touched Me?'" You got to be kidding. You're being shoved and pushed and jostled all the way down the street, and You're saying, "'Who touched Me?'"
But Jesus knew the difference between the jostling of the fickle mob and the grasping of a faithful soul. "Who touched Me?" And I love this in verse 46, "Jesus said, 'Somebody has touched Me, [Somebody grabbed Me.] for I perceive that power is gone out of Me.'" It's an incredible statement. You know what it tells me? That Jesus was so much the channel of the will of the Father that the Father could heal through Him before He even knew who was involved. When He said, "I came to do the will of Him that sent Me," He meant that. He felt the power go. He was touchable, so sensitive to the one who touched. He knows the difference between somebody who bangs up against Him and is curious, somebody who's a thrill seeker, and somebody who hangs on in desperation and faith. He knows the heart to connect up with. He knows the person to pull out of the crowd, and say, "You're the one."
Let me take you to a fourth thought. Not only was He accessible, available, and touchable, but He was impartial. He was impartial. When He turned around to get involved with this one woman, He showed that He was so impartial. He could have said, "Look, lady, um, could, could you let go of My tassel? I'm, I'm trying to get down to the ruler's house." As somebody said, "Don't hassle my tassel. I'm trying to, I got, I got this, listen, if we can get this guy converted, see, this guy runs the synagogue. I mean, we can have a revival in this town. I mean, please let go. I mean I got to be on My way here. This, this is very serious." No, you see, God has never looked for the superstars and the bright lights and the famous people. He's always been content with folks like us. The Bible says that the prophet Isaiah predicted when the Messiah would come, He would preach the gospel to the—What?—poor. And Paul said, "Not many noble, and not many mighty, but He's chosen the base and the weak and the ignoble and the foolish things." I mean, we are a motley crew, you know that? Really.
I was reading this week a very interesting book called Fearfully and Wonderfully Made, written by Dr. Paul Brand and Phil Yancey. It's a book you ought to read. Tremendous. In one section of it, he talks about how the people of God are such an unlikely bunch. And he quotes from novelist Frederick Buechner, who said this: "Who could've predicted that God would choose not Esau, the honest and reliable, but Jacob, the trickster and heel? Who could have predicted that God would put his finger on Noah, who hit the bottle? Or on Moses, who was trying to beat the rap in Midian for braining a man in Egypt. And if it weren't for the honor of the thing, He'd just as soon let Aaron go back and face the music. Who could have predicted that God would choose the prophets who were a ragged lot, mad as hatters, most of them."
And then Paul Brand adds, "The exception seems to be the rule. The first humans God created went out and did the only thing God asked them not to do. The man he chose to head a new nation known as God's people tried to pawn off his wife on an unsuspecting Pharaoh; and the wife, herself, when told at the ripe old age of 91 that God was ready to deliver the son He had promised her, broke into rasping laughter in the face of God. Rahab, a harlot, became revered for her great faith; and Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, went out of his way to break every proverb he so astutely composed."
Even after Jesus, the pattern continued. The two disciples who did the most to spread the Word after His departure, John and Peter, were the two He had rebuked most often for petty squabbling and muddleheadedness. And the apostle Paul, who wrote more books than any other Bible writer, was selected for the task while kicking up dust whirls from town to town sniffing out Christians to torture. Jesus had nerve in trusting the high-minded ideals of love and unity and fellowship to this group. No wonder cynics have looked at the church and sighed, "If that group of people is supposed to represent God, I'll quickly vote against Him." Or as Nietzsche expressed it, "His disciples will have to look more saved if I'm to believe in their Savior."
We are a motley crew, aren't we? The ignoble and the weak and the foolish. We all have this in common: we have a sense of desperate need, and we have faith to believe. So Jesus is impartial. "God is, [says the apostle], no respecter of [What?] persons." There's neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, bond or free, rich or poor. All are one.
So Jesus Christ pulls everything to a halt to deal with the outcast woman; and as He deals with her, He doesn't deal with her from a distance. Watch what He says to her. Verse 22 of Matthew 9: "Daughter." Daughter? Wait a minute, that's so intimate. That's so personal. That's so familial. That's so tender. That has so much warmth, so much affection. Daughter. That just pulls her in. "Be of good comfort." Be comforted, daughter. What tenderness. What impartiality. Then He says this. I love this. "Your faith has made you well." And the woman was well from that hour. Now, wait a minute. She'd already been healed. This is in addition to that. She was healed the minute she touched, but when He pulled her out, He said, "There's something else. Your healing didn't have anything to do with your faith, not really. That was a sovereign act of God." If you study the gospels and the record of Christ, you will find multitudes upon multitudes of people who were healed, and it says nothing about whether they believed or not. Did the little girl who was raised from the dead have faith? Afraid not. How about the paralyzed servant of the centurion who was healed, did he have faith? No. In fact, you can go through the gospels and find many, many, many places where people were healed, and there is no indication that they particularly had faith. Healing was a sovereign act on God's part as Jesus demonstrated His deity, and healing is still a sovereign act on God's part. But in addition to the physical healing, He said, "Your faith has," and He did not use the word iaomai, which means to be made well physically. He used the word sodzo, which is the New Testament word to be saved. "'Your faith has saved you,' and she was saved from that hour." Yes, there's a sense in which she was saved from the horrors of the disease, but there is also a redemptive issue here. She was saved. There was a more than a physical healing.
Look at Mark 10. Let me see if I can demonstrate this to you. This, to me, is a thrilling truth. Mark 10:46; and we're going to draw this thing together. Mark 10:46:
"They came to Jericho: As He went out of Jericho with His disciples and a great number of people [as always], blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the wayside begging. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out and say, 'Jesus, Thou Son of David, have mercy on me!' [He'd identified Him by His Messianic title.] And many charged him that he should hold his peace. [Be quiet, Bartimaeus.] But he cried the more a great deal, 'Thou Son of David, have mercy on me!' [This was the cry of his great faith.] And Jesus stood still, and commanded him to be called. And they called the blind man, saying unto him, 'Be of good comfort, rise; He
calleth thee.' And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus. And Jesus answered and said unto him, 'What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?' The blind man said unto Him, 'Lord, that I might receive my sight.' And Jesus said unto him, 'Go thy way; Thy faith hath [and He uses sodzo] saved thee.' And immediately he received his sight, and he followed [Whom?] Jesus in the way."
I think, in that case, the word sodzo is used to indicate that, not only was the man healed, but the man also received salvation. There was a saving element—his soul—if he had that kind of faith, that was sufficient to save his soul if he believed that this was the Lord and this was the Son of David.
Look at Luke 7 verse 44, tremendous account. Thrilling, and I want to show you this is a most important parallel. Luke 7:44: There's a woman. And it says in verse 44:
"Jesus turned to the woman, [and you'll get the story as we go] and said, 'Simon, Simon, do you see this woman? I entered into your house, You gave Me no water for My feet: but [she washed My feet] she has washed My feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. You gave Me no kiss: but this woman since the time I came in has not ceased to kiss My feet. My head with oil you did not anoint: but this woman has anointed My feet with ointment. Wherefore I say unto you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much: But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.' And He said unto her, 'Thy sins are forgiven.'"
Listen, this woman demonstrated so much love and so much worship and so much respect for Christ that it was enough to bring her redemption, and He forgave her sin. And when they were eating, that were eating with Him "began to say within themselves, 'Who is this that forgiveth sins also? [Who can do this?]' And He said to the woman, [Watch this, same identical phrase used in the healings that we've read before.] thy faith hath saved thee.'" There is no healing here. There is only the forgiveness of sin; and that phrase, with the word sodzo in it in the Greek, is used to speak of her salvation. That's why I say we have to see that aspect when the phrase uses the word sodzo.
Luke 17, you remember the story? Ten lepers came to Jesus. "He saw them. He said, 'Go...to the priests.' [In verse 14 of Luke 17: "Go...to the priests."] It came to pass that as they went, they were cleansed." Now watch. Ten came, ten were sent, ten were cleansed. That is katharizo, katharizo, to be washed, cleansed. "One of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned around, and with a loud voice glorified God, fell down on his face at His feet [the feet of Jesus], giving Him thanks: and he was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering said, 'Were not there ten cleansed? Where are the nine? There are not found that returned to give glory to God, except this stranger.'" Just one came back? What'd He say to that one? "Arise, go thy way: Thy [Same phrase, thy] faith hath [and He uses sodzo] saved thee." It's one thing to be katharizo. It's something else to be sodzo, see? There is a cleansing of ten. There is a saving of one. Of one. So when the word is used for saving, it's unfortunate the English Bible doesn't make that distinction, because I believe it implies a redemptive aspect. As I said before, faith is not necessary for healing. Do you know there are people who have diseases who get well who aren't Christians? And there are Christians who die. That is a sovereign thing. Sometimes God does honor our faith in healing; but always does He honor our faith in saving. Well, you see, Jesus loved people. He was accessible.
You can turn back to Matthew 9 now. He was accessible. He was available. He was touchable. He was impartial. Little outcast lady was as important to Him as the ruler of the synagogue. God deliver us from playing to the expensive seats—You know?—and ignoring the needy.
In the book A Night to Remember, Walter Lord tells about the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, I think, think it was in the month of April. And when it hit, The American, which is the New York paper, the headline said, John Jacob Astor, millionaire, drowns. Other people also drowned, but that's the way it is with the world. Only the rich and the famous get the press. Not so with Christ. If you learn anything from this, will you not only learn how powerful He is, but will you learn how accessible, available, touchable, and impartial He is? That's how it is with God. That's how it should be with those who represent Him.
And I want to close with this. Fifthly, He was powerful. He was powerful. He was powerful. We can be the first four, but it gets a little sticky here. I can sympathize with you and hold out my hand to hold onto yours; but if you're sick, I can't heal you; and if you're dead, I can't raise you. This is what sets Him apart.
Verse 23, I just love this. "And Jesus came to the ruler's house." Now, the interlude has taken so long, the girl's dead. "And He came and He saw the musicians and the people making a noise." Now wait a minute, this is, this is a girl dead. What's all this racket? You know, have you ever gone to a funeral home. Somebody's dead. I mean it's so quiet in there. Everybody walks around whispering, black suits, very quiet. You go sneaking down little halls and little rooms, little quiet caskets, little organs playing; very quiet. Somebody drops something, you just, you know, oh. Our, our culture is that you get real quiet. Their culture, you get really noisy; real noisy, racket all over the place, people making a whole bunch of noise. Now, let me tell you what went on. Three basic things went on in a Jewish funeral. By the way, the girl's been dead long enough for the funeral to start, so they knew she was very sick, and they've already been on call ready to move in. So you have professional mourners and they came in. They were professional shriekers. They screamed and shrieked and wailed and all this. But let me tell you the three things that were part. First of all, there was the rending of garments. You were supposed to rip your clothes. That was symbolic of your grief, and they had 39 different rules and regulations on how to rip your clothes, according to the Talmud. You had to do it while you were standing up. You had to do it over your heart or near your heart. If you were a mother and father, it had to be right over your heart. If you were not the mother or father, it could be anywhere near. And you had to rip it big enough to stick your fist through. And then you had to leave the rip for seven days. And for the next 30, you could stitch it with big stitches, but you couldn't sew it permanently, so people would know you still felt bad. And in order for women not to expose themselves in an indiscreet manner by ripping their clothes, they would rip their undergarment and then wear it backwards. And there were 39 different things.
So here it all begins. Everybody is somewhere ripping their clothes. And believe me, this would have been a big funeral, because this was a very important man. And they're all in there tearing their clothes. The second thing was the wailing, and the professional women would come in and begin to wail. They would have been paid, and they would've learned the domestic history of the whole family, so they would be bringing up the names of everybody who had ever died in that family, and erupting old sorrows long ago buried. "Oh, remember Alice. Oh, remember Charlie," and would go on and on. They would bring everything up, and they would wail and shriek and scream and make all this racket. Trying to touch every tender cord they possibly could for every person who'd ever died.
The third thing were, you'll notice in verse 23, the musicians. Flute players. They had all different kinds of flutes, but they'd come in and play flutes. The Talmud says this, "The husband is bound to bury his dead wife and to make lamentations in mourning for her according to the custom of all countries; and also the very poorest among the Israelites will not allow her less than two flutes and one wailing woman." I mean even if you were in abject poverty, you had to hire one wailing woman and two flutes. Now, if you're wealthy, the Talmud said, it should be in accord with your wealth.
So here is a man who probably had a lot of means, and the place was filled with flutes, and you could imagine what a mess: Ripping and tearing, screaming and shrieking and wailing, and guys all over the place playing flutes. In fact, they did this in the Roman world, too, and they said, and Seneca wrote that there were so many flute players playing, and there was so much screaming at the death of Emperor Claudius that they felt that Claudius himself probably heard it, even though he was dead. So you can see what a funeral was like in those times. Jesus saw the musicians and the people making all this noise. Verse 24; watch:
"And He said to them, 'Go away. Get out." The Prince of Peace arrives. He says, "Go away."
"Why? This is proper. The Talmud requires all this. We're doing what we're supposed to do."
"Go away." Reason? "The girl is not dead. She's sleeping."
"What do you mean?" Look what it says at the end of verse 24: They laughed in His face. "What is He saying, the girl is not dead? Doesn't He know?"
Of course He knows she's dead. Been reported already that she's dead, and He knows He's going to raise her from the dead. Of course He knows she's dead, but what He's saying is, "You cannot treat her death as death. You must treat it as sleep, because it is so temporary." See? That's what He's saying: "You have to treat her as if she's just asleep." And the implication is, "Because I'm going to raise her from the dead," and that's why they laughed. They laughed in His face: "He's going to wake her up." That'll tell you a little bit about the fact that they were paid mourners—right?—when their weeping turned to laughing that fast. They could cry for this child, or they could laugh at Jesus in an instant; and so they mocked Him in the face. In fact, the verb means they laughed hard. They really laughed hard, as the scornful laughter of a superior who laughs over someone who is stupid. By the way, that verb is only used in this story, and it is used in this story three times. It is the kind of scornful laughter reserved for mocking a fool. Only a fool would think He could raise her from the dead.
And they had seen other miracles, you see, this crowd in Capernaum, but they still didn't believe. Just what Jesus said, "If they don't believe Moses and the prophets, they won't believe the One raised from the dead." But, anyway, He said, "Stop. Go away." And they laughed in His face. Verse 25, "When the people were put forth [He got rid of them.], He went in, took her by the hand...," and the other gospel record says, "He said to her, 'Talitha kum.'" Know what that means? Little girl, arise. Little girl, arise. "Took her by the hand, and the girl arose." You know what it says? It says, "The parents [in the other gospels] were astonished." And Jesus told them not to tell anybody, but they couldn't resist it, and they just put more pressure on Him as His enemies moved in closer.
Luke 8:55 has an important word to add to this. It says, "And her spirit came again." That means that she was truly dead, "and her spirit came to her again, and she arose." You know, Jesus didn't have to touch the little girl, didn't have to reach out His hand to her. Could have just said the word, but it is the way of God to be tender. Do you understand that? It is the way of God to be gentle. It is the way of God to be affectionate and loving. It is the way of God's people to greet one another with a holy kiss as an extension of His affection toward them.
And verse 26 says, "The fame of this went abroad into all that land." You know what they said about Him? "He has power over disease. He has power over disorders. He has power over death. He can redeem." And so Matthew reaches a pinnacle in his presentation of the power of Jesus Christ. "He is the One," says John, "who holds the keys of hell and death." Great truth. Beloved, we have no need to fear death, none at all. The poet put it this way. I love this. "No longer must the mourners weep, nor call departed children dead. For death is transformed into sleep, and every grave becomes a bed." As a young man, D. L. Moody was called upon suddenly to preach a funeral sermon. He decided that he would hunt the gospels to try to find one of Christ's funeral sermons, but he searched in vain. He found that every time Christ attended a funeral, He broke it up by raising the person from the dead; and so He never gave a funeral sermon. When the dead heard His voice, they immediately sprang to life.
We should rejoice in death, because we have conquered death. "He will not leave His Holy One to see corruption." He will show us the path of life. In His presence, His fullness of joy, and at His right hand, are treasures forevermore. I think Arthur Brisbane captured it for me when I look at a funeral. Arthur Brisbane wanted to demonstrate what a funeral was like, so he pictured a crowd of grieving caterpillars, all wearing black suits; and all these caterpillars are crawling along mourning; and they're carrying the corpse of a cocoon to its final resting place. The poor distressed caterpillars, weeping; and above them is fluttering around this incredibly beautiful butterfly, looking down in utter disbelief. Christ gives us hope.
Two weeks ago, when I preached the first half of this sermon, it touched somebody's heart; and they wrote me this letter:
"Dear John, My family and I have had a tragic loss. My younger brother was shot and killed Thursday afternoon. He was a professional auto repossessor for the last four years, first working in the Valley, and then in Los Angeles. He had just decided to move his work back to the Valley, because he felt doing the type of work he did, that Los Angeles was not a safe area. He had been working in the Valley since last week and seemed to feel much safer.
"On Thursday afternoon, he and his partner went to an address in Burbank, the city where our family has lived for the past 14 years, to repossess a car that the owner had failed to make his payments on. My brother's partner went up to the door where the owner of the vehicle lived to tell the man that his car was being repossessed unless he could make a payment on the spot. The man allegedly said, 'Take the car,' so my brother and his partner proceeded to take the vehicle when, suddenly, the man came out of his apartment with a rifle. My brother immediately told the man that there would be no problem. They wouldn't take the car. The man then fired one shot from the gun, hitting my brother in the chest and instantly killing him.
"I and my family are having a rough time dealing with this incident, even though we all know there was a reason why Jesus allowed this to happen. Your sermon today on Jesus' power over death was timely and brought great comfort to myself and my two sisters, who are both Christians; but we were attending Grace today for the first time. My brother was a wonderful, warm human being, who would help anyone, be it a stranger or a friend, in a time of need. He was one of those people that would stop to help someone who was stranded in their car, even though he might be on his way to work. Sometimes I feel like everything is okay, and that I'm at peace knowing he's with the Lord. But then there are those other times when all I can think about is my brother lying in the street, and I'd give anything to have him back. But I know that he will be back when Jesus raises the dead, and I have that joy to look forward to. I thank you and the Lord for the message today and the knowledge that my brother is at peace. In Jesus' name."
It's a great hope, isn't it? It's the only thing that can sustain, to know that He has power over death. Let's pray.
Thank You, Father, for our time this morning, for how You've ministered to us in the Word. Meet every need in this place. For those who do not know You, may this be the day they open their heart to believe. For those who do, may there be a deepening of commitment. For those You're calling to join and unite with Your church, may they respond today, be obedient.
While your heads are bowed, just in a final second, if you don't know Christ, right where you sit, just open your heart to Him. Invite Him to come in and save you and forgive your sin and show you His mercy and salvation, give you victory over death. He'll do that.
Father, bring those that You would have to come and touch every life with the great hope that is ours, because You have the power over death. Bring us together again tonight in anticipation that You're going to speak to us as we open up our heart to share the things that You've been doing there. Thank You for this day and this people. We give You all the glory. In Christ's name. Amen.
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text:
Well, well, well….
Remember when I posted the following, (after I went to Disney World) and many of you blasted me with hate emails????
Well, I hate to say it, but by the size of the humans that were
walking around, zipping around on motorized carts, in Disney World, …. Everywhere we went we were met with hoards of overweight people with Mickey Mouse ears on and fanny packs strapped onto their motorized carts.
"I'm sorry did I miss the episode of the Mickey Mouse Club when Mickey announced he loved fat people and soda?" I asked Mr. Gaga. "I don't get it." I said to Mr. Gaga as we were making our way through the crowds of obese people.
"Well they are fat because they drink soda and the fact that they are so fat and lazy that they can't walk doesn't help," he pointed out. I looked around and realized at the moment that about half of the people in the park were driving carts and half were walking. "Oh my God!" I exclaimed, "I thought everyone was injured!" Mr. Gaga stared at me like I was an idiot.
After a few days in the Magic Kingdom we made our way to Epcot Center. "Hey did you notice there aren't any motorized carts here?" Mr. Gaga pointed out. "Oh yeah…I wonder why?" I said as I looked over the map of the Epcot. "Oh!! I bet we will see them in "America!"
After enjoying music, culture and food in Japan, France, Italy and Mexico I was afraid to see what "America" had to offer.
"It's just going to be big enormous people laying on couches everywhere eating McDonalds and drinking huge sodas." I said to Mr. Gaga as we made our way.
"Or enormous children playing video games," Mr. Gaga offered.
We were pleasantly surprised that neither of those features were the focus of the America showcase in Epcot.
Thank God….it would be totally embarrassing if the world found out the truth about us.
It's best to keep this little soda problem a secret between you, me, Mickey Mouse and Mayor Bloomberg.
Well it looks like even OLD MICKEY MOUSE HIMSELF recognized that these motorized carters were imposters!!
Pretending that they can't walk so they can zip to the front of every line!!!!!
The jig is up motorized cart people.
The jig is up.
Disney World issued a statement this week that they would modify the rules that allowed everyone who is in a motorized cart to just zip in front of the 500 people who have waited in the hot sweaty lines for 2 hours.
While it is important to allow special needs children to get in front of the line – because clearly it is a priority for them – it is NOT a priority for people who abuse the system.
Funny enough – we chose this week to go to the BIG E – which is basically a the ultimate in New England fairs. It's much dirtier than Disney, and much less rides and much trashier food.
Also – there's no mouse – so they make do with whatever white trash mascot they can think of. Here – the kids begged me to play a game where they would win – what appears to be a banana that is a Rastafarian??
Also – this fair is pretty big – but not nearly as big as Disney, so there aren't as many motorized carts.
But I did take some time to actually observe the motorized carters when I saw them.
I noticed one couple had filled the basket in front of their cart with cigarettes, lighters and fried doughs.
The irony was not lost on me.
The main point of this fair is to eat ungodly things that no human should ever eat –
I kicked it off with fried pickles….
Remember when I blogged about Mr. Gaga's Irish tendencies??
Well Mr. Gaga took it one step further by ordering this…..
So then it was time to feed the kids.
Usual requests include burgers and pizza.
"I want one of those." Michael said pointing to a food stand.
"Are you sure? You have never had one…..you might not like it."
"I want one." he said positively.
"Ok." I answered hesitantly.
It was my first time too and it was fucking delicious.
While we were on a roll with the white trash foods – I took a gamble and decided we should try one of the Big E specialties.
It's called the Craz-E burger.
I have to say – it was pretty good!!
Now does anyone know where I can buy a motorized cart??


text:
Testimony of Martin H. Gerry
Deputy Commissioner
for Disability and Income Security Programs
Hearing before the
House Ways and Means
Subcommittee on Social Security
July 20, 2004
Thank you for inviting me to discuss the Windfall Elimination Provision, or WEP, and proposals that would modify or eliminate the current formula, and, specifically H.R. 4391, the Public Servant Retirement Protection Act. This bill would replace the current WEP benefit formula with a formula that would take into account a worker's non-covered earnings as well as covered earnings. The proposed modifications to the WEP raise a number of technical issues that should be considered.
The WEP is not well understood, so today, I would like to take some time to describe the purpose of this provision, how it works, and issues that should be evaluated when considering legislative changes to this provision. I will also discuss SSA's efforts to educate individuals about the impact that a pension from non-covered work can have on their Social Security benefits.
GPO Provision
However, before I discuss the WEP, I would like to briefly discuss the government pension offset (GPO) provision. The GPO also affects workers who receive pensions based on employment not covered by Social Security and is often confused with the WEP. For ease of discussion, when referring to government employment, I am referring to all levels of Federal or State government employment that is not covered by Social Security.
The GPO affects government retirees who are eligible for both:
- A pension based on their own work in a Federal, State, or local government job that was not covered by Social Security, and
- A Social Security spouse's or surviving spouse's benefit based on their husband's or wife's work in covered employment.
Under the GPO, a person's Social Security spouse's or surviving spouse's benefit is reduced by an amount equal to two-thirds of the amount of the person's government pension based on work not covered by Social Security. As of December 2003, about 390,000 beneficiaries had their benefits fully or partially offset due to the GPO.
In enacting the GPO, Congress intended to assure that when determining the amount of a spousal benefit (e.g., wife's, husband's, widow's, widower's), individuals working in non-covered employment would be treated in the same manner as those who work in covered employment. The GPO provision removed an advantage that some government workers had before the GPO was enacted. Before GPO, a person who worked in a government job that was not covered under Social Security could receive, in addition to a government pension based on his or her own earnings, a full Social Security spouse's or surviving spouse's benefit.
However, a person who works in a job that is covered under Social Security is subject to an offset under the dual entitlement provision. This provision, which has applied since 1940 when benefits were first payable to a worker's family members, requires that Social Security benefits payable to a person as a spouse or surviving spouse be offset by the amount of that person's own Social Security benefit. Thus, dually entitled beneficiaries receive the equivalent of their own worker's benefit or the spouse's/surviving spouse's benefit, whichever is higher.
The GPO acts as a surrogate for the dual-entitlement offset for workers receiving a government pension based on work not covered under Social Security because, if that work had been covered, any spouse's or surviving spouse's benefit would have been reduced by the person's own Social Security worker's benefit. The result of the GPO is that spouses and surviving spouses are treated similarly, regardless of whether their jobs are covered under Social Security or not.
Windfall Elimination Provision
I would now like to discuss the WEP provision. The Social Security Amendments of 1983 (P.L. 98‑21) included the WEP provision as a means to eliminate "windfall" Social Security benefits for retired and disabled workers receiving pensions from employment not covered by Social Security. Generally, while the WEP applies to any pension based on non-covered employment, it primarily affects government workers. (The WEP does not affect the Social Security benefits payable to survivors of workers who received pensions based on non-covered employment.)
The purpose of the WEP was to remove an unintended advantage that the weighting in the regular Social Security benefit formula would otherwise provide for persons who have substantial pensions from non-covered employment. This weighting is intended to help workers who spent their lives in low‑paying jobs by providing them with a benefit that is relatively higher in relation to their prior earnings than the benefit that is provided for higher-paid workers.
However, because benefits are based on average earnings in employment covered by Social Security over a working lifetime (35 years for retired workers), a worker who has spent part of his or her career in employment not covered by Social Security appears to have lower average lifetime earnings than he or she actually had. (In determining average earnings for Social Security benefit purposes, years with no covered earnings are counted as years of zero earnings, as if the person had not worked at all.) Without the WEP, such a worker would be treated as a low-lifetime earner for Social Security benefit purposes and inappropriately receive the advantage of the weighted benefit formula. The WEP eliminates this potential "windfall" by providing for a different, less heavily weighted benefit formula to compute benefits for such persons.
Computation of the WEP Benefit
Under the regular (non-WEP) benefit computation rules, a three‑step weighted benefit formula is applied to a worker's average indexed monthly earnings (AIME) to determine his or her primary insurance amount (PIA). The PIA is the monthly benefit amount payable to a retired worker first entitled at the full retirement age or a disabled worker. The PIA formula applicable to workers who reach age 62 or become disabled in 2004 is:
90 percent of the first $612 of AIME, plus
32 percent of the next $3,077 of AIME, plus
15 percent of AIME above $3,689.
Under the WEP computation, the 90‑percent factor applied to a worker's average earnings in the first band of the Social Security benefit formula generally is replaced by a factor of 40 percent for workers who are receiving a pension from non-covered employment. (Under both scenarios, the 32 and 15 percent factors are the same.)
For a worker first eligible in 2004, the maximum WEP reduction is $306 per month. Unlike the GPO, the WEP can never eliminate a person's Social Security benefit.
WEP does not apply to workers who have 30 or more years of substantial earnings under Social Security at all. For workers who have 21-29 years of substantial covered earnings under Social Security, the reduction under the WEP is phased out gradually.
The WEP provision includes a guarantee designed to help protect workers with relatively low pensions based on non-covered employment. This guarantee provides that the reduction in Social Security benefits can never exceed one‑half the amount of the pension based on non-covered work.
Educating the Public
As you can see, the WEP and GPO provisions are complicated and consequently, there have been misunderstandings about who is affected. In order to lessen this confusion, SSA has made revisions to the Social Security Statement that highlight and make clearer that the WEP and GPO may affect a worker's future Social Security benefit if he or she receives a pension based on non-covered employment. The Statement refers individuals to SSA publications that explain how benefits can be affected by the WEP and GPO. It also refers individuals to an SSA website, which was recently revised to make sure that there is ample information and links to fact sheets that explain the impact of the GPO and WEP. The website includes a benefit calculator that allows workers to estimate the effects that WEP may have on their monthly benefit.
Additionally, SSA offices nationwide provide pre-retirement seminars to employees who request them. If government employees request the seminar, we inform them of the potential impact that WEP and GPO may have on their monthly Social Security benefit.
As you know, the Social Security Protection Act of 2004 provides that all Social Security Statements issued after December 31, 2006 will contain language to explain the maximum potential effects of the WEP and GPO to any person whose records indicate that they may be subject to those provisions. We are currently examining ways to use our administrative records of non-covered earnings to identify individuals whose benefits are likely to be affected by the GPO or WEP.
Legislation Affecting WEP
A number of bills have been introduced that would change the WEP. These proposals include:
- eliminating the WEP entirely;
- providing higher Social Security benefits for government workers whose pensions from non-covered employment, in combination with their Social Security benefits, are below certain levels; and
- replacing the WEP benefit formula with an alternative computation.
Each of these approaches raises issues that I would like to discuss. Let me start with the elimination of the WEP. If the WEP did not apply, approximately 680,000 retired and disabled workers would see their benefits increase. It is estimated that elimination of the WEP would have a 5-year cost of $10.8 billion and a 10-year cost of $29.7 billion. The long-range cost would be significant - estimated to be 0.06 percent of taxable payroll.
The second type of proposal that has been introduced would provide less of a WEP reduction, or no WEP reduction, if the combined amount of the worker's non-covered pension and Social Security benefits is below a certain threshold. Representative Frank has introduced two such bills. H.R. 4234, the more recently introduced bill, would exempt an individual from WEP if his or her combined benefits were less than $2,500 per month when he or she is first eligible for both Social Security and a non-covered pension. Workers with combined amounts of $3,334 or higher would be fully subject to the WEP in the same manner as under current law. And for those whose combined amounts are between $2,500 and $3,334 per month, the WEP would be phased in. This change is estimated to have a 5-year cost of $7.8 billion; the 10-year cost would be $18.7 billion; and the long range cost would be 0.01 percent of taxable payroll.
Because the threshold amounts of $2,500 and $3,334 are not indexed for future years, over time, more workers would have combined amounts exceeding $3,334 and thus would be fully subject to the WEP because their non-covered pensions and their Social Security rates will rise in nominal dollars. It is not clear if this effect is intended. Also, because of the link between the application of the WEP and a dollar amount of the person's monthly income from Social Security and the government pension, some have said that this change would be introducing a form of "means test" for Social Security benefits.
The third type of bill that has been introduced would replace the current WEP formula with an alternative computation. This is the approach embodied in H.R. 4391, as introduced by Representative Brady. Under this bill, a hypothetical primary benefit would first be computed based on all of the worker's covered and non-covered earnings after 1950. This hypothetical benefit would then be multiplied by the proportion of the worker's total earnings that were covered under Social Security to obtain the primary benefit payable to the worker.
The bill also includes a guarantee provision that would ensure that workers whose government pension is based on non-covered earnings in the year of enactment or earlier would receive no less than the benefit under the present law WEP provision. The bill would apply to beneficiaries already on the rolls, as well as to future beneficiaries.
I would like to commend Representative Brady and the co-sponsors of this bill for the thoughtful approach developed for eliminating the "windfall" that would otherwise accrue to workers with pensions from non-covered employment.
However, SSA has a number of concerns with the bill. The primary issue is that the computation would consider non-covered earnings after 1950, but SSA only has records of non-covered earnings beginning in 1978, when it began receiving Form W-2 information from employers, and some of these records are incomplete-particularly for the years soon after SSA began collecting this earnings information.
An analysis of the records of individuals with non-covered earnings indicated that there are many individuals who have gaps in their non-covered earnings patterns. It appears likely that, in many cases, those individuals remained in non-covered employment during those "gaps." An evaluation of the largest 155 non-covered Federal and State/local government employers showed that for about 30 percent of these employers there was either a complete gap for one year or more, or for one year or more there were substantially lower non-covered earnings posted relative to a surrounding year.
- Of the 47 employers that seemed to have a problem, 32 had a problem in one of the years in the period 1984-1986.
- For only 4 of the 47 employers, the "gap year" was for 1990 or later.
In addition, although State and local governments were supposed to file Forms W-2 for non-covered earnings for the years 1978-81, compliance for this period was generally inconsistent with regard to State and local entities because there were no enforcement activities.
With respect to a worker's non-covered earnings for years before 1978, it is questionable whether information about these earnings would still be available. The earnings in question would be for periods that are 27 or more years ago and employers are only required to keep records for the last 4 years. It would be a substantial workload for SSA to try to develop this information which would be needed to calculate the Social Security benefit under the bill. In addition, it could be quite burdensome for the government employers to access this information-if it still exists.
Further, there could be questions concerning willingness to cooperate, particularly when the agency needed records the employee might have, because including additional non-covered earnings in the computation could only serve to lower his or her benefit amount payable under the bill. Conversely, the benefit would be higher without such earnings. For example, a worker whose non-covered earnings were entirely before 1978 would fully avoid the WEP reduction under the proposed computation if those earnings were not counted. Counting such pre-1978 non-covered earnings in some cases but not others, based on availability, would not be equitable.
As indicated previously, the bill would be effective for those on the rolls, necessitating a recomputation of benefits for all current beneficiaries affected by the WEP in order to determine if they would receive higher benefits under the change. This would require SSA to review the benefits of up to 680,000 retired and disabled workers currently affected by the WEP to determine if their monthly benefits should be adjusted.
If the worker had non-covered earnings before 1978, these reviews would require SSA to attempt to obtain information from the former employer regarding those earnings. Because of the large volume of recomputations required and associated manual actions, the workload impact on SSA would be substantial-and would create delays in other workloads. We estimate that implementation of H.R. 4391, including development of pre-1978 non-covered earnings (when available), would require more than 2,600 workyears ($190 million) over 5 years. Further, the necessary systems changes would be significant and would require at least 18 months to implement.
The bill appears to recognize the problem associated with obtaining pre-1978 non-covered earnings. Although the effect of the bill language is not clear, it gives the Commissioner of SSA the responsibility for developing a "method" for determining the amount of non-covered wages used to determine the worker's pension. The Commissioner would have some latitude in determining what is reasonable, but the non-covered wage amounts determined for the year in question must be derived from employment records or from other information received by SSA.
We believe that the intent of this special language in the bill is to permit SSA to "deem" non-covered earnings to a worker's earnings record when such earnings are not available. It is not clear exactly how this would be done. Possibilities might include using the average earnings amount for the specific position held by the employee that year. Under this approach, SSA would need to verify the job position (e.g., janitor, teacher, bus driver) for each worker for each year in question. There would also be an issue of how to compute the average. That is, would the average earnings amount be based on the average at the State level for that position or at the level of the specific employing entity? (There are over 2,300 State and local government entities.) There is also a question of whether such historical average earnings data would be available for the myriad of different positions employed by State and local governments.
Another possibility might be to calculate a deemed earnings amount based on years of earnings that SSA does have on its records for the individual. However, because a worker's pre-1978 earnings would often be early in a person's career, the subsequent earnings used to compute the average would likely be higher than the actual amount of pre-1978 earnings. Therefore, the person's actual pre-1978 earnings would be lower than the deemed amounts assigned to those years. Because inclusion of additional non-covered earnings could only lower the Social Security benefit payable, the worker may well object if he or she believes that the deemed earnings amounts are too high-even if he or she does not have proof otherwise.
An additional point is that the bill provides for individuals to be guaranteed present law, if higher, for many years into the future. Thus, a worker who just recently became employed in a non-covered job at, say, age 22, would be allowed to retain the present-law WEP rules, if a higher benefit would result, 40 years in the future when he or she claimed Social Security benefits. Consequently, SSA would need to maintain two alternative WEP calculations for many decades to come.
SSA's Office of the Chief Actuary estimates that enactment of H.R. 4391 would increase program costs by $2.6 billion over the first 5 years; the 10-year cost would be $7.0 billion. The long-range cost of the program would increase by 0.01 percent of taxable payroll. These cost estimates assume that only the available non-covered earnings data on SSA's records, for years 1978 and later, would be used in calculating the proposed benefit. The actuaries used this assumption because they believed that the availability of non-covered data for years before 1978 would be problematic for at least some, if not many, non-covered workers. To the extent that workers' pre-1978 non-covered earnings are available and could be included in the proposed benefit computation, the cost of the bill would be somewhat lower.
H.R. 4391 proposes significant changes to the manner in which the WEP is calculated. These changes are intended to better target the effect of the offset so that the amount of the resulting reduction in benefits more closely approximates the individual facts in each case. Unfortunately, the data needed for these calculations - much of it wages paid to individuals as many as 30 or more years ago - will not be readily available for all cases, making it difficult for SSA to equitably administer the provisions of the bill. In addition, the workloads that would be generated by passage of such legislation would be tremendous and take years for SSA to complete.
I want to again thank the Chairman and the Subcommittee for giving me this opportunity to discuss the WEP and GPO provisions and to share SSA's analysis on legislation before the Congress. As always, SSA would welcome the opportunity to provide assistance to the Members and is more than willing to work with you to provide any additional information you request. I would be glad to answer any questions you might have concerning the WEP and GPO provisions.


text:
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