2nd carpal tunnel op…SO different :(

Had my second op (on the left hand this time) last Monday and just got the plaster/dressing off a few hours ago so now finally able to type more easily, although have to take it easy for a while yet.   In comparison to my first one tho (read details here) this time I’d a different surgeon and a very different surgery and outcome.   Where the first op was over with fairly quickly and caused me no pain, this was an hour of painful torture from beginning to end.    Started off with the doc only putting in a small amount of local despite my having told him I’d required a lot on the right, and in fact that my entire hand had been frozen – he insisted I shouldn’t require that much, so it was a bit of a surprise to him and a shock to me, when he made his incision and I almost leapt off the table.   A few more cc’s of local later he started in again, this time only managing about another 10 minutes of exploration before I once again was feeling it.   This went on for a bit until he finally did stick in a fair bit more local and left me more comfortable, but that was an ill-founded feeling on my part, and about to change very rapidly.   About 15-20 minutes into the op, I ran into a lot of discomfort from my primary disabilities (fibromyalgia, myofascial pain syndrome) because I’d forgotten to bring in my air cushion with me to lie on, and the pillow they’d put underneath me just wasn’t doing any good ( I require continual positive pressure flotation equipment for comfort).  So that started the downward slide into the rather rough half hour that followed.    The doc had asked me beforehand about how the last op had been achieved without a tourniquet, and whether I’d have any problem with one this time if he needed it.   As my right arm has always been my worst for trigger points, and although I have one TP in my upper left arm, I figured I’d be able to cope with the tourniquet, and told him so, but obviously had no real idea whether or not that would actually be the case.   So when he determined he wanted to use it because I was bleeding too much to let him get anywhere easily, I agreed.   If I’d had any idea what I was in for I’d have told him to forget it.   I should have realised I’d find it impossible given I can’t even cope with a BP cuff for more than 30 secs, and so it was with the tourniquet (which for the uninitiated, is just like a triple strength BP cuff) – as soon as it was on I started feeling more uncomfortable, and within 30 seconds it was combining with the pain in my pelvis to make for an overwhelming torture experience.   Fibromyalgia is a condition of hypersensitive pain responses anyway (allodynia, hyperalgesia) but I like to keep deluding myself that I have a high pain tolerance (sounds so much better than saying you’re a wuss now doesn’t it!!).    So when I started tearing up and the staff started asking if I was alright as I’d gone suddenly very quiet, I just kept saying I was okay and to continue.   Oh the madness of pride and stoicness (is that a word!?)!!   Unfortunately for me, between pain and hormones perhaps, once the floodgates opened to any degree (I ordinarily never cry and esp not in public!!) I was lost and ended up losing it completely with convulsive sobs that only served to self perpetuate the feeling of being out of control in a situation I was beginning to wish I’d never put myself into to start with!

Hell for everyone! – well, except a chosen few that is…

And I don’t think the people involved in that statement consider us born again Christians even fall into that category!!   I gather that Fred Phelps is somewhat famous in the US, but we here in the UK certainly hadn’t heard much about him or the church he’s founded until quite recently when the Beeb ran a documentary by Louis Theroux about the weird and mad cult that he runs.  

And for those in the UK or elsewhere who’ve not run into this character, I’ll provide you a brief outline.    Fred Phelps (now in his 80s) was ordained into the Southern Baptist Church initially before moving on to start his own church (Westboro Baptist) in 1955.   He’s termed a 5-point Calvinist but seems less interested in promoting any form of evangelism to the masses, than preaching hellfire and damnation on a grand scale to all sinners (better than the bould Ian Paisley ever could!!).    He has propagated rather a large family of 70 odd (incl grandchildren), most of whom make up the church membership, and who are totally beholden to him, their families and the church structure for guidance and instruction.   They see the current push of the gay lobbyists in particular a warning sign that the good ol’ US of A is doomed unless they do something to make people turn away from their sin and return to God.   And so they take it upon themselves to picket anywhere and everywhere they feel is appropriate – from funerals to weddings, to congress activities etc.   They also consider almost every tragedy, act of nature or terrorist alike, as God punishing the wicked, and thus something to be joyful over (again using one or two verses in the OT to justify that stance).   Fred Phelps is quoted as saying this:

The Sky Report has secretly filmed one of America’s most controversial Christian ministers praising the London bombings.

Fred Phelps says that terrorist outrages and natural disasters such as Hurricane Rita are examples of God’s wrath against countries such as America and Britain for tolerating homosexuals and homosexuality.

Fred Phelps, who set up the controversial Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas, told our undercover reporter about the attacks, which killed 52 people:

“Oh I am so thankful that happened. My only regret is that they didn’t kill about million of them. England deserves that kind of punishment, as does this country (America)”. 

In all of this they’ve managed to gain themselves the reputation of being one of the most hated families in the US, and if truth be told it’s not hard to understand why.

Shades of Waco was all I could see and hear while watching it – if truth be told I was utterly horrified at 2/3 of the content.   Louis did a really good job on trying to find out information from each of those he interviewed, but nobody really opened up to him much.   Shirley (one of the daughters) who’s really the leader of sorts, refused many times to discuss questions he posed, other than to continually push forth her rhetoric that practically everyone in the US is a “fag” and she wasn’t aiming that title purely at the homosexual community either.  But on top of that what shocked me more was their insistence on picketing as many funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq on the premise that God had killed them because they were fighting an unjust war, and that we should all rejoice in His perfect Judgement on them for that reason (Go figure!).  

What’s in a name?

I’m seeing a lot of bad press nowadays about “Christians”, and have to say I’ve noticed that in many cases, the label is as often happens, being applied more to people in a culture as opposed to those who actually have ‘earned’ the title through recognition of their sinful state before a Just and Holy God, and repented of their sins before Him, accepting Jesus as their Saviour and thus having the ‘right’ to call themselves his follower. Big difference to those who call themselves this just because they don’t have any other specific belief, or because perhaps they figure they are by way of their Church e.g. Catholicism, their parents, or through some other means that somehow supposedly allows them to call themselves such. It actually gets me really annoyed, as I particularly hear of the term being bandied about in certain areas of the world in respect of terrorists of all things, which I’m just gobsmacked about.

Perhaps some of these people should go and live in a Muslim country – they might soon discover the cost of taking such a title and rethink whether it’s what they do indeed desire to be known as.    I appreciate though that many are called Christian only to distinguish them from any other belief system hence the error that so many Muslims do indeed think most of the West are such, when in reality probably only about 10-20% is in the truest sense of the term.

Not going to belabour this point except to make the distinction to those who may not be aware of it:   The name “Christian” should only be applied to someone who has made an active decision to submit to Christ, repent of their sins, be baptised (as an adult!) and spend every living moment desiring to serve Him and Him alone, and profess that fact to others.   So those who like to consider they are Christians because they’re “good” people, or by virtue of their family background, or church membership need not apply – they would do themselves more justice to state they are unbelievers with no interest in what Jesus has done for them,  although preferably they should reassess their position in this regard, and truly seek to become followers of Jesus rather than imposters.   

Eternal Gospel??

In this day and age of rampant apostasy, I was listening tonight to my bible reading for today which centered on Simon & Jesus where Jesus calls Simon to follow Him, and Simon replies that he’s too much of a sinner to do that, but thankfully Jesus persuades him otherwise. It got me to thinking of how nowadays the word “sinner” is rarely heard in our vocabulary – particularly in those churches that preach the now hugely popular “social Gospel” whereby church members and visitors are treated to a feel good sermon with no bite to it, and many would rarely hear such a term used in the pulpit. But Simon knew exactly what he was, and presumably felt (errantly) that Jesus was too important a Rabbi to want to have anything to do with him, because he felt his sinful state so keenly himself. We’re not told what may have prompted him to have such an acute awareness of his state, or whether most at that time would have felt similarly in the presence of any Rabbi, let alone one such as Jesus, but the point remains – he knew what he was, and knew that few Rabbis would desire to associate with such a one as him.

But that then led me on to thinking about how the social Gospel removes many other important aspects of our faith in order to tickle the ears of the congregation and have them continue to return faithfully (and pay their dues!!) each week. And the cry of many is that they have to make the church interesting and applicable to the generation of today. Why?? What is different about this generation over any other? Why did those in the 18th Century not feel a similar need, or any generation before them or indeed after them until now? And if you look back at those churches and fellowship movements of the 18th and 19th centuries in particular I doubt you’d find unfilled churches or people not interested in hearing the Gospel message. If anything, I find a lot of literature stating the opposite – that a preacher would only have to stand out in a field and preach, for him to have the field full of seeking sinners fairly quickly, and nobody complaining about the lack of comfort, or the sternness of the message. Sadly too many of today’s preachers are far more concerned with buildings and luxurious surroundings to preach in than the Truth of the Awesome Gospel which they are commissioned to go into the world with and give to the nations. Too many of those both in the pulpit and the pews want their ears tickled with interesting talks about how we can work together to provide a better future for mankind if we would only be nicer, kinder, more loving etc.

2Ti 4:2 Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
2Ti 4:3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
2Ti 4:4 And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.

Let’s get one thing straight here – man can never, never make the world a nicer place – only God can do that, and while He may use man to achieve that end result, the final outcome is never in man’s hands (although our arrogance and pride will always tell us otherwise)!

Are you in a social gospel church? Do you consider God will not hold you accountable to know His Word well enough to recognise when you’re being deceived by man (after all, we’re warned that “even the elect” will be deceived in these end times!), and do you consider you have no responsibilty before Him to change that situation if it is the case for you? I would urge anyone who feels their Pastor or Minister isn’t truly presenting the whole Gospel message to effect, to consider at the very least discussing the issue with them, and if no change is forthcoming, to pray hard about moving to a more fundamentalist church setting. The time may be upon us soon when choices will be much harder to come by, and our faith much harder to live out in any shape or form, as Satan continues to wage war on the saints here. Ask God for guidance on your own situation and whether He maybe does want you to move elsewhere, or to provoke a change within the church you’re in. If the elect don’t stand up for the Truth, who else will?? Check out this blog for some more challenging input on the “lovely lady” (!) above!