Trijicon drops Bible verses from scopes to save military contracts

Money speaks louder than Christian witness. So sez Trijicon, manufacturer of the ACOG scopes used by our military on M4s and other battle rifles.

Trijicon Drops Bible Lines From Scope

Rifle scopes bearing references to the New Testament no longer will be issued to American troops, and scopes already in service will have the references removed.

Military optics manufacturer Trijicon Inc., of Wixom, Mich., apparently concerned that a Pentagon review of the situation could lead to a loss or interruption of its multi-million dollar contract for the Advanced Combat Optical Gunsight, said it is ending the practice begun by the company’s founder more than 20 years ago.

Trijicon “has offered to voluntarily stop putting references to scripture on all products manufactured for the U.S. military – and will provide, free of charge, 100 modification kits to the Pentagon to enable the removal of the references that are already on products that are currently deployed,” the company said in a statement obtained by Military.com.

“In response to concerns raised by the Department of Defense, Trijicon Inc. initiated this action to ensure the war-time production needs of the troops are met as quickly as possible,” the statement added.

The scopes are being used by American Soldiers and Marines and allies in Afghanistan and Iraq, including by Iraqis and Afghans. The scopes came under criticism from religious, civil liberties and watchdog groups -- and even from senior military leadership -- after they were featured in an ABC News “Nightline” segment on Jan. 18.

As the King James Version says, that sucketh.

Sinister plot by Jesus freaks at Trijicon uncovered by ABC

I don't know how many of my fellow gun nutz are Christians, I suspect many.

But even if you aren't here's a good reason to buy Trijicon products, such as night sights and scopes: Because the company is driving the media leftwingnuts ballistic by including Bible verses in their serial numbers!

ABC News has reported this "scoop" on the military contractor that supplies the ACOG scopes used by our troops on the M4 carbines and other long guns in the field.

ABC calls it "Secret Jesus Messages On U.S. Military Weapons" as if that is somehow alarming.

Meredith Jessup at Townhall.com reports on this sinister plot by the Jesus freaks at Trijicon.

A Michigan-based company that sells rifle scopes to the U.S. military is being investigated by ABC News and recieving of backlash from "religious freedom" activists after admitting it has added small biblical references to its products.

Trijicon of Wixom, Michigan, confirmed to ABCNews.com that it has always added biblical codes to sights and scopes it has sold the U.S. military. The company says the practice began under the company founder, Glyn Bindon, a devout Christian from South Africa who was killed in a 2003 plane crash.

These coded references to New Testament Bible passages about Jesus Christ include examples like 2COR4:6. Though this combination of letters and numbers tends to blend in with regular serial numbers, this code is an apparent references to Second Corinthians 4:6 of the Bible's New Testament, which reads: "For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."

I may just order some Trijicon night sights just because. I need some for some of my pistols anyway.

And I got another "scoop" for ABC News, most if not the overwhelming majority of our troops in the field are either Christians or at the least have a great respect for the Bible. The old saying that there are no atheists in foxholes is quite true. When the hot lead is flying around your head, it sorta comes natural to have a chorus of "Nearer My God To Thee" come to mind.

Been there, done that, heard the music in my head, 1968-69 U.S. Navy WestPac Cruise to lovely Vietnam, lived to come home in one piece.

Israeli Jews wake up to Obama's plan to abandon Israel

President Obama's approval rating here at home has sunk into negative territory, largely due to his Obamacare "healthcare reform" plans to socialize America's health insurance industry.

But there's one part of the world where his approval rating is down to single digits, nearing zero, in the nation which has been America's only faithful ally in the Middle East, Israel. There Obama has also managed to vastly improve the popularity of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who Israelis now see as a hero for standing up to Obama's demand that growth be immediately halted in all Jewish settlements under dispute by Palestinian Arabs.

Aluf Benn, editor at large of the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, pens an op-ed in the Noo Yawk Times to ask the question: Why Won't Obama Talk to Israel?

A Jerusalem Post poll of Israeli Jews last month indicated that only 6 percent of those surveyed considered the Obama administration to be pro-Israel, while 50 percent said that its policies are more pro-Palestinian than pro-Israeli. Less scientifically: Israeli rightists have — in columns, articles and public statements — taken to calling the president by his middle name, Hussein, as proof of his pro-Arab tendencies.

What went wrong? Several explanations come to mind.

First, in the 16 rosy years of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, Israelis became spoiled by unfettered presidential attention. Memories of State Department “Arabists” leading American policy in the Middle East were erased. The White House coordinated its policy with Jerusalem, and stayed out of the way when Israel embarked on controversial military offensives in Lebanon and Gaza. This approach infuriated America’s Arab and European allies, which blamed Washington for one-sidedness — something they were willing to forgive of Bill Clinton but not of George W. Bush.

Mr. Obama came to office determined to repair America’s broken alliances in Europe and the Middle East. One way to do this — to prove that he was the opposite of his predecessor — was to place some distance between Israel and himself.

Second, Mr. Obama’s quest for diplomacy has appeared to Israelis as dangerous American naïveté. The president offered a hand to the Iranians, and got nothing, merely giving them more time to advance their nuclear program. In Israeli eyes, he was humiliated by North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests. And he failed to move Arab governments to take steps to normalize relations with Israel. Conclusion: Mr. Obama is a softie, eager to please his listeners and avoid confrontation with anyone who is not Mr. Netanyahu.

Third, Mr. Obama seems to have confused American Jews with Israelis. We are close emotionally and politically, but we are different. We speak Hebrew and not English, we live in the Middle East and have separate historical narratives. Mr. Obama’s stop at Buchenwald and his strong rejection of Holocaust denial, immediately after his Cairo speech, appealed to American Jews but fell flat in Israel. Here we are taught that Zionist determination and struggle — not guilt over the Holocaust — brought Jews a homeland. Mr. Obama’s speech, which linked Israel’s existence to the Jewish tragedy, infuriated many Israelis who sensed its closeness to the narrative of enemies like Mahmoud Ahmedinejad.

Fourth, as far as most Israelis are concerned, Mr. Obama has made a mistake in focusing on a settlement freeze. For starters, mainstream Israelis rarely have anything to do with the settlements; many have no idea where they are, even when they’re a half-hour’s drive from Tel Aviv.

More important: in the past decade, repeated peace negotiations and diplomatic statements have indicated that larger, closer-to-home settlements (the “settlement blocs”) will remain in Israeli hands under any two-state solution. Why, then, insist on a total freeze everywhere? And why deny with such force — as the administration did — the existence of previous understandings between the United States and Israel over limited settlement construction? There is simply too much evidence proving that such an understanding existed. To Israelis, the claim undermined Mr. Obama’s credibility — and strengthened Mr. Netanyahu’s position.

I fear we're seeing the beginning of the end of America's future. As an evangelical Christian and a fundamental believer in the Bible, I firmly believe what the Bible says is true about the nation of Israel, whoever is a friend of Israel will be blessed by God. And the reverse, the nation that abandons Israel will be abandoned by God. The Israeli people have woke up and seen their abandonment coming. I pray the American people will realize the consequences of Obama's coming abandonment of Israel and speak out before it's too late.

North Korean woman executed for handing out Bibles

Here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, here's something to ponder as you decide tomorrow morning whether you're going to get up and go to church. From North Korea:

SEOUL | A Christian woman accused of distributing the Bible, a book banned in communist North Korea, was publicly executed last month for the crime, South Korean activists said Friday.

The 33-year-old mother of three, Ri Hyon-ok, also was accused of spying for South Korea and the United States, and of organizing dissidents, a rights group said in Seoul, citing documents obtained from the North.

The Investigative Commission on Crime Against Humanity report included a copy of Mrs. Ri's government-issued photo ID and said her husband, children and parents were sent to a political prison the day after her June 16 execution.

Note the woman's crime, handing out Bibles. And for this she was murdered and her husband, children and parents all rounded up and slapped into a "political prison." I'm willing to bet that prisons for criminals are very bad in North Korea and that political prisons are even worse.

And this is no isolated incident. God only knows how many other Christians are being persecuted and killed in North Korea.

"What religious practice or venues exist ... [are] tightly controlled and used to advance the government's political or diplomatic agenda," the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom said in a May report. "Other public and private religious activity is prohibited and anyone discovered engaging in clandestine religious practice faces official discrimination, arrest, imprisonment, and possibly execution."

The commission report cited defectors as saying an estimated 6,000 Christians are jailed in "Prison No. 15" in the north of the country, with religious prisoners facing worse treatment than other inmates.

Mrs. Ri reportedly was executed in the northwestern city of Ryongchon, near the border with China.

The South Korean rights report also said North Korean security agents arrested and tortured another Christian, Seo Kum-ok, 30, near Ryongchon. She was accused of trying to spy on a nuclear site and hand the information over to South Korea and the United States.

It was not clear whether she survived, the report said. Her husband also was arrested and their two children have since disappeared, it said.

Pray for the Christians in North Korea and while you're at it, pray for persecuted Christians around the world. We don't appreciate the freedom to worship we have here in America.

And when the sun comes up tomorrow, get out of bed, get ready and go to church.

The Bible verse that stopped a home invader in his tracks

This widow lady had a bedtime habit of memorizing a verse of the Bible every night. She would pick a verse, read it and say it aloud several times until she had it memorized, then turn out the light and go to sleep.

One night she memorized Acts 2:38, in Peter's sermon on the Day of Pentecost.

Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

Then she turned out the light to go to sleep. But before she was asleep, she heard a noise. She raised up and looked and a man had raised her bedroom window and was climbing inside!

She shouted out the first thing that popped in her head: "Acts 2:38! Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit."

The burglar froze, halfway through her window. She waited a minute and when he didn't move, she picked up the phone and dialed 911. The burglar still didn't move. He stayed frozen in her window until the police arrived and arrested him, put him in a squad car and headed to jail.

As they were driving away, the policeman asked him, "Why didn't you run?"

The burglar replied, "You didn't hear what she said! She said she had an ax and two .38s!"

Now, memorize Acts 2:38 and you'll be ready for a burglar. But keep two .38s loaded too.

What's A 'Fairly Conventional' Christian Faith?

I'm sick of politics, ain't you? Let's have some preaching for a break. Here's Rev. James Meeks.


Rev. James also throws a little politics in with his preaching and any man who gives Chicago Mayor James Daley a hard time can't be all bad. Of course, I gotta admit I wouldn't be posting a preaching video instead of writing about politics if Barack Obama wasn't looking like such a sure bet for the White House while John McCain and Sarah Palin are looking like they're headed for the outhouse come Nov. 4. But that's the way it looks right now.

Or at least that's what the "experts" in the media keep telling us about the polls. Steven M. Warshawsky at American Thinker still stands by his prediction that Obama will lose. He explains why the "experts" might be wrong as he goes into detail on what recent polls really show. But let's just take a break from politics for a bit.

So let's talk theology a while. Theology is defined as "the study of God." Some famous atheist once described a theologian (by definition a student of theology) as "someone who's searching for a black cat in a coal mine that ain't there." Well I have no formal training in theology but I do know a little something about "the study of God" by reading and studying God's best-seller for 31+ years, The Holy Bible.

I got saved, born again, washed by the precious blood of Jesus Christ, on Feb. 28, 1977, when I was 29. See my testimony page for the full story about what happened that day. And as a Christian, I have spent a fair amount of time daily since then reading and studying God's Word, because that's how I came to be saved, by reading and believing what God said about how to be saved in His Holy Bible.

Being an evangelical, fundamentalist, conservative Christian, I believe every single word in the Bible is truth, God's truth, from "In the beginning..." in Genesis 1:1 to the last "Amen" in Revelation 22:21. I've read and studied it from cover to cover several times -- I haven't kept count of how many times I've read it all -- but my study continues daily. I may not understand it all and as a fallible human I realize I never will until this corruptible flesh puts on incorruption and then and only then will I understand it all. But right now I believe it's all true.

My sort-of life verse is 1 Corinthians 13:12, from which I took the title for Bible study and social commentary columns, Seen Through A Glass Darkly, which I wrote for various newspapers I worked for during my 25+ years career in print journalism. I also write Bible Q&A columns.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall know even as also I am known.

The "then" Paul refers to is the day all Christians shall see Jesus Christ "face to face" clearly, not through a dark glass as now, but clearly.

OK, enough about my theology or my understanding about what it means to be a Christian who believes the entire Word of God is truth.

Let's talk about another fella's "faith journey" as the popular description today goes. This fella was interviewed in 2004 on that topic.

First question: "What do you believe?"

His answer:

"I am a Christian..." (he begins, then is interrupted in the cafe where the interview takes place) before turning his attention directly back to the question.

"So, I have a deep faith," (he) continues. "I'm rooted in the Christian tradition. I believe that there are many paths to the same place, and that is a belief that there is a higher power, a belief that we are connected as a people.

The reporter reveals her own knowledge of the Bible with her reply to his statement as she asks him to explain his "unlikely" theology.

It's perhaps an unlikely theological position for someone who places his faith squarely at the feet of Jesus to take, saying essentially that all people of faith -- Christians, Jews, Muslims, animists, everyone -- know the same God.

That depends, (he) says, on how a particular verse from the Gospel of John, where Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me," is heard.

That depends on how it is heard? Is that sorta like Big Bill's sworn testimony in court: "That depends on what the meaning of is 'is' is"?

How else can you hear John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth and the life"? Jesus didn't say "a way, a truth and a life." "The" is exclusive. And if any doubt remained to the exclusivity of His statement, He clarified it even further by saying "No one comes to the Father but by me."

If there's some other way to "hear" what Jesus said about His way being the only way to salvation and to come to the Father, 'splain it.

OK, enough with the charade. You've probably figured out by now that I'm quoting a 2004 interview with Barack Obama by Chicago Sun-Times columnist Cathleen Falsani. Obama had just won the Democrat primary for U.S. Senate and with only Alan Keyes for an opponent in the fall election he was a shoo-in to win. So he sat down for this interview with the friendly Chicago hometown reporter on his "faith."

Even the headline is revealing: Obama: I have a deep faith, Barack Obama credits his multicultural upbringing for his theological point of view

Obama's "faith" became an issue in June when the brown stuff hit the fan as his 20+ years pastor, the not-very-rev. Jeremiah Wright became a youtube celebrity. Obama expressed puzzlement at first over the controversy, describing black-liberation-theology as his "fairly conventional faith."

But after making "the most important speech on race since Martin Luther King Jr." defending his pastor and refusing to disown him, the Wright controversy refused to go away. So Obama chunked him under the campaign bus where he joined a host of others gone before, including his own white grandmother whom he chunked there during that "most important speech on race" which was also then disowned.

But let's get back to the interview.

Obama is unapologetic in saying he has a "personal relationship with Jesus Christ." As a sign of that relationship, he says, he walked down the aisle of Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ in response to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's altar call one Sunday morning about 16 years ago.

The politician could have ended his spiritual tale right there, at the point some people might assume his life changed, when he got "saved," transformed, washed in the blood. But Obama wants to clarify what truly happened.

"It wasn't an epiphany," he says of that public profession of faith. "It was much more of a gradual process for me. I know there are some people who fall out. Which is wonderful. God bless them.... I think it was just a moment to certify or publicly affirm a growing faith in me."

These days, he says, he attends the 11 a.m. Sunday service at Trinity in the Brainerd neighborhood every week -- or at least as many weeks as he is able. His pastor, Wright, has become a close confidant.

An epiphany is a moment of clarity, a moment when the light breaks through and you realize some significant truth. I don't want to quibble over another person's personal testimony, but when someone says he never had that moment, that raises a big red flag of doubt with me.

But let us move on (no political pun intended) past that.

Obama says he reads the Bible, though not as regularly as he'd like, now that he's on the campaign trail. But he does find time to pray.

"It's not formal, me getting on my knees," he says. "I think I have an ongoing conversation with God.... I'm constantly asking myself questions about what I'm doing, why I am doing it.

"The biggest challenge, I think, is always maintaining your moral compass."

So he reads the Bible and prays, but not formally on his knees, and sees his biggest challenge as "maintaining your moral compass."

So who helps him maintain his "moral compass" in addition to the not-yet-disowned pastor Wright, who "has become a close confidant"?

Obama cites two other pastor friends in Southside Chicago, "the Rev. Michael Pfleger" (remember the spooky white Catholic priest who ranted about Hillary in Rev. Wright's pulpit?) and another black-liberation-theology preacher in Chicago very similar to Wright and Pfleger.

Another person Obama says he seeks out for spiritual counsel is state Sen. James Meeks, who is also the pastor of Chicago's Salem Baptist Church. The day after Obama won the primary in March, he stopped by Salem for Wednesday-night Bible study. (See Meeks video above.)

Obama wraps up the interview with one more "unlikely" bit of theology. He doesn't believe in hell and he's not sure at all about heaven.

Obama admits it's not easy for politicians to talk about faith.

"Part of the reason I think it's always difficult for public figures to talk about this is that the nature of politics is that you want to have everybody like you and project the best possible traits onto you," he says. "Oftentimes, that's by being as vague as possible, or appealing to the lowest common denominators. The more specific and detailed you are on issues as personal and fundamental as your faith, the more potentially dangerous it is.

"The difficult thing about any religion, including Christianity, is that at some level there is a call to evangelize and proselytize. There's the belief, certainly in some quarters, that if people haven't embraced Jesus Christ as their personal savior, they're going to hell."

Obama doesn't believe he, or anyone else, will go to hell.

But he's not sure if he'll be going to heaven, either.

"I don't presume to have knowledge of what happens after I die," he says. "When I tuck in my daughters at night, and I feel like I've been a good father to them, and I see in them that I am transferring values that I got from my mother and that they're kind people and that they're honest people, and they're curious people, that's a little piece of heaven."

In rebuttal to that, I'll go to the only source that's absolutely authoritative about the Christian faith, The Bible. Jesus Christ believed in hell during his earthly ministry here and preached about hell a whole lot more than he ever mentioned heaven, which he also believed in.

In Luke 16:19-31, Jesus tells the story of "a certain rich man," indicating it is not a parable but the truth about an actual person.

"...the rich man also died, and was buried; And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments... And he cried and said... I am tormented in this flame." Luke 16:22-24.

Hell is real and its flames are real, too, just as real as heaven is real. And we're all going to one or the other for eternity, politicians, too.

A Republican redneck church-lady I know here in North Carolina read Obama's "deep faith" article and wrote me the following question:

What does deeply spiritual mean? Reminds me of the time when (her oldest son) Jeremy was quite small and we happened upon a Hindu camp on the Washington Mall, they had a herd of cows alongside them.

I tell Jeremy that these people worship the cows to which he responds, "Let me get this straight -- these people worship cheeseburgers?" Humanist fools.

My response to her question, "What does deeply spiritual mean?" (If you'll allow me to quote myself):

Hitler was “deeply spiritual.” He honestly believed a "spirit" had empowered him to take over the world. Really. He nearly did.

One of the more interesting books I read back in my college days was one I ran across entitled "The Occult History of Adolph Hitler." (Amazon has 67 books on Hitler and the occult. I'm not sure of the exact title of the book I read 37+ years ago in college.) I wasn't a Christian then, but that book scared me spitless. It certainly cured my stupid adolescent curiosity about Nazis and the Third Reich.

It cited records of seances and pretty much outright devil worship by Hitler and the inner circle of his Nazi party leadership and tells a chilling story supposedly recounted by Hitler himself of a pivotal event in his life before he came to power as chancellor of Germany.

Hitler said he was visiting a museum in Austria where he saw a spear point that was supposed to be the head of the spear the Roman soldier used to pierce the side of Jesus Christ to verify his death while hanging on his cross on the hill of Golgotha, outside the walls of Jerusalem. (See also this weird, occultish site)

Hitler said a "spirit" entered him at that moment and he somehow "knew" he would become chancellor and would found "The Third Reich."

One of his first acts as chancellor was to "liberate" Austria and reunite it to Germany. And the book said the day he entered Vienna as conqueror, he took possession of the spearpoint from the museum and kept it in his possession right up until the day of his death in 1945.

Don't get me wrong now, I'm not calling Barack Obama "Hitler," even though the lunatic left has been calling President Bush that for eight years. The comparison I'm making is that Hitler could fairly be described as "deeply spiritual." Whether that's good or bad depends entirely on what spirit we're talking about. The Spirit of the Lord, the Holy Spirit, is always good. The spirit of the devil, Satan, is always evil.

I'm talking about theology here, not politics. And from the perspective of the Bible Belt, Obama's "faith" is not "fairly conventional."

And as we say down South (and probably up North, too) if the shoe fits, wear it.

Jan LaRue at American Thinker has more details in Obama's Faith, Family and Variable Values Tour in which she looks at Obama's record.

Those seeking further illumination about Obama's Christian beliefs, beyond his 20-year indoctrination by the most left, Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright and Rev. Michael Pfleger, might mull over Newsweek's cover story, "Finding His Faith," with a Bible in hand. I also offer for consideration my own musings in "Sermon from Mt. Obama Raises Big Questions."

Obama Mocks America's Christian Heritage

Noted Bible scholar Barack Obama explains that America is not a Christian nation. He learned well in his 20 years at the feet of the not-very-reverend Jeremiah Wright's "G-- D--- America!" pulpit.

Will we see our lost pets in heaven?

Will Rogers used to say, “If there are no dogs in heaven, I want to go where the dogs went.” The most-often asked Bible Question I get is “Will see our lost pets in heaven?” Below is my response to that question. Other Bible questions and answers are in my online archive. If you have a Bible question, check my Bible Q&A archive first and if I haven’t answered your question, send me an email and I will research it and respond.

Bible Answer: I have taught before that man is the only creature with a soul, while animals do not have souls, based on the ending of this one verse in the King James, Gen. 2:7, “and man became a living soul.” But that is not what this verse really says.

W.E. Vine’s "An Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words" says the Greek word translated “soul" is psuche, which means “an animate creature, human or other.”

The Hebrew word used here for soul is “nepesh,” according to "Vine’s Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words," which says, “The KJV alone uses over 28 different English terms for this one Hebrew word. The problem with the English term “soul” is that no actual equivalent of the term or the idea behind it is represented in the Hebrew language.”

Vine says the use of “soul” in Gen. 2:7 is “an unfortunate mistranslation of the term.”

"The KJV Parallel Bible Commentary" says this about the KJV use of “living soul” in this verse, “A better translation would be ‘a living creature or person,’ as the phrase (identical) is also used of animals (Genesis 1:21, 24). Thus, soul is not a reference to the concept of body, soul/spirit, but rather to the fact man became a living being. Man is distinguished from animals by being created in the image of God.”

So, do animals have a “soul”? When Adam sinned, the penalty of death came upon the entire creation, so does that mean we can assume animals did not die until that time?

Romans 8:19-22 refers to when man will be redeemed with new, spiritual bodies, and says the other parts of God’s creation will be delivered also, referring to all other life.

“¹⁹For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God. ²⁰For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope; ²¹because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. ²²For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.”

Does that mean animals will be resurrected into new life, like humans? I don’t know.

Perhaps the writer is accurate who wrote, “Heaven is the place where when we first arrive, we will be greeted by every animal we’ve ever loved.”

It is certainly within the power to God to resurrect any of His creations, man or animal. Heaven will certainly be a perfect place where we shall want for nothing.

(John Myers has been a Christian lay speaker, Sunday School adult teacher and avid student of the Bible for more than 30 years.)