Guys, I could use a little assistance

[buckee]

Here's one of my answers to an anti hunter who came in here once, a while back.

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The whole anti-hunting, anti-gun, anti-war, anti-this and anti-that movement has it's base rooted in FEAR of the unknown.

Because you have NO faith in God, and have NO faith in what Jesus did for you on the cross, and NO faith that He is coming back and will judge the world someday ....You are FEARFUL for the world.

I don't blame you, in that sense, because if I had NO faith in Jesus, and what he has done and still going to do, I would be fearful too. After all...without faith, I would have to come up with my own belief system (like you have) to justify my existence.

When you take God, completely out of the picture, you are left with a very troubled world indeed, with no hope, no faith and a very, very uncertain future.

This godless uncertain future is what has spawned all of these "Saviors of our environment & our world Movements"

You have a deep want to live forever, but because you don't believe in life everlasting through faith in Jesus, the best you can do is try to figure out some way of at least staying alive a few days longer than the rest of us. You bought into the" NO RED MEAT" in your diet, as a way of hopefully prolonging your miserable life.

You look at wars and what has caused them, but because your eyes have been made blind by your unbelief, you accuse Christianity and the belief in God as the culprit of war, instead of studying the other side of the coin.

It was Godless tyrants and dictators, that have been the cause of every war in History. They thought just like you do. They had a vision of a better world, but because of their disbelief, they fell into their own dilutions of what their idea of a perfect world was going to be for them. They forced their beliefs on others, until God stepped in and stopped them through war.

You are one of these little dictators, who has succumbed to your own (or should I say someone else's) delusional idea, of how we (mankind) can create our own utopia (without God) here on earth.

Without a firm foundation to build your faith, your life and your actions on, you have this need to explain your own existence and define it somehow.

Since you turn from God at every corner in your life, you run from him and find yourself in the arms of the demented and delusional anti movement, who seem to have all the answers to your perplexed mind.

I do agree with you on one account, and that is that yes, there have been terrible things done in History, in the name of God, that were not of God. The inquisition, for example was performed in the name of God, but totally inconsistent with Gods word, so you can't blame Christianity for it and you can't blame God for it, but you can pin the blame on mans dictatorship.

You come in here, not to share some great insight with anyone, but to stir up emotions.

You obviously didn't come here to have a discussion with us, because it is clear that you don't even possess the skills to debate or discuss. Instead you rant and chant your personal dilutions.

My suggestion to you is to take yourself out to dinner tonight. Sit down and order the surf and turf (steak and lobster). Then stop at a store and pick yourself up a copy of "The Holy Bible" and "In Defense of Hunting" and go home and read.

Because of your deep-seated disbelief, I would suggest you ask God to remove the scales from your eyes and unblock your ears, so that you may understand what your reading.

Just because you are sincere, doesn't make you right ...You are just sincerely wrong

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Romans 14:6

He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord. He who eats meat, eats to the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who abstains, does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God.

1 Corinthians 15

38But God gives it a body as he has determined, and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. 39All flesh is not the same: Men have one kind of flesh, animals have another, birds another and fish another. 40There are also heavenly bodies and there are earthly bodies; but the splendor of the heavenly bodies is one kind, and the splendor of the earthly bodies is another.

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So you see, God condones both what you do and what we do, as long as we do so, and give our thanks to him.

Here is another Bible scripture that is referring to the times we live in today, and specifically to this discussion.

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1 Timothy 4

1 Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;

2 Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;

3 Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.

4 For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving:

5 For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.

6 If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained.

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[buckee]

Re: Guys, I could use a little assistance

Here is also another truly great response from someone else that I have saved for just such an occasion.

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Thank you for sharing your candid thoughts expressing concern over products like our coon tail cap and rabbit skins. Please understand that we are always grateful to hear from our readers, not only because we benefit from their insights, but also because it provides a forum for us to further explain our mission and our beliefs. I cannot hope to fully address your concern in an e-mail, but I would be happy to offer a few thoughts on why we are so thankful before the Lord for the opportunity to include animal skins in our catalog.

First, our approach is to build our catalog based on biblical precepts, patterns and principles. We are aware for example that it was God who performed the first animal sacrifice and who used animal skins to make the first coats for Adam and Eve; It was God who placed the animals under subjection to Adam and told him to have dominion over them and use them wisely for the glory of God; It was God who specifically sent seven of certain types of animals to Noah for the sole purpose of using them for sacrifices after the flood subsided; It was God who blessed Abraham as he took a knife to the throat of a ram; It was God who commanded animal sacrifices throughout the Bible; It was God who wanted the blood of the lamb to be sprinkled on the door-posts of the Hebrews; It was God who specifically blessed the harvesting of all types of animals for food in the Mosaic law; It was God who blessed men like David for killing predators who threatened the flocks; It was God who helped the disciples to trap and execute thousands of unsuspecting fish. I could go on and on.

Our reading of Scripture leads us to conclude: (1) Man is to have dominion over the animals; (2) Such dominion includes using animals for food, clothing, preparation, training and other activities which bring glory to God include child training; (3) Dominion presupposes responsibility and resource management, which is why everything, including the pelts of the animals, should be used to the fullest extent possible and practicable given the circumstances;(4) While it is cruel to torture an animal, it is not cruel to kill him through trapping, hunting, etc; and (5) Finally, we believe it is important to give our children a distinctively biblical worldview. This is why we specifically hope to train our children to love self-sufficiency and environmental stewardship (both of which are dominion principles) through hunting, and to reject the philosophy of the animal rights activists, a belief system which is not only rooted in two Satanic dangers (Evolution-ism and the New Age movement), but is inconsistent, intellectually indefensible and incoherent as a system of rational thought.

Please note that we are not advocating the senseless killing of animals, or the death of a rabbit to provide a mere "toy" to our children. In fact, the entire philosophy of the All-American Boys Adventure Catalog is rooted in the notion that the way a boy plays is the way he lives. Each product is selected because it can be a useful tool in building father-son relationships, inspiring a child about the past, or teaching a dominion skill. This is precisely why we stand behind our decision to include skins in the catalog. When a boy takes a pelt and uses it for clothing, for decoration, or even for pretend as he imagines the adventures of Lewis and Clarke, he is doing what wise, well-trained boys have done for thousands of years----preparing for manhood, stewardship and dominion. When a boy takes a pelt and sews it into a pouch or a hat, he is learning valuable skills, growing in self-sufficiency and learning respect for the value of God's creation. When he places animal skins in his room he is emphasizing his future role as a provider and protector of his family. When he puts on a coonskin cap, he is imagining what life was like as a frontiersman and showing appreciation for the spirit of bold manhood which made America great.

I would offer you a gracious challenge: By what standard have you determined that it is o.k. to eat a hamburger, but not o.k. to wear a raccoon on your head? By what standard have you determined that it might have been o.k. for trappers to hunt in the past, but the same activity today is barbaric? Moreover, permit me to observe that it seems to me a very strange philosophy indeed to say that it is barbaric to wear a coonskin cap, but not barbaric to wear those nice leather shoes you have on right now. Equally strange to me is the idea that somehow it is inhumane and cruel to give a boy a rabbit pelt with which he can learn to make a trail pouch, but not inhumane and cruel for you to strap on that nice leather belt you might be wearing. My question is this: by what standard do you reach these conclusions, and are you really prepared to live consistently by them?

It would be my view that any Christian who eats a hamburger at McDonald's from cows that were harvested for mass cow execution, or who dons a pair of leather shoes, or enjoys a Purdue chicken should pause before criticizing hunters, trappers, etc. To offer such criticism is really to be hypocritical. Such individuals do not have to look at the execution and harvesting of turkeys for Thanksgiving, chickens for McNuggets, calves for shoe soles....but they enjoy the end result every day in a thousand ways. Because they do not see the blood and hear the cries of the animals, somehow the death of these animals has become sanitized in their mind. Still others do not object to killing a cow, but do object to killing an Arctic Fox because it appears fuzzy and cute. But is this a biblical distinction? Is it wrong to trap a predator like a fox, tan the hide and use it for clothing, play or whatever, but O.K. to brutally smash a fly that buzzes around your french fries, then toss the bloody fly carcass on the ground where it will never be utilized? Doesn't that fly have as much value and as many rights as the cute little fox, or does the size and fur quotient of the animal give it special value? Can this be defended biblically? Are we really advocating an evolutionary ladder of worth based on progress, development, or, even worse, cuteness?

You argue that these animals are killed in an inhumane manner. What do you base this on? Are you aware how they are trapped and killed? What constitutes inhumanity? Is it inhumane to slice the neck of an animal--this is what is done to most cows that are processed for hamburger, and it is the method that appears to be used and blessed by God in the Scripture for animal sacrifice. Personally I am aware of precious few cows, fish, chickens, lambs or any other animals which are peacefully euthanized prior to their death. For the most part, they are killed in the same manner that animals have been killed for 6,000 years by man. My point is, that it is wrong to make an accusation without knowledge, or to substitute human opinion to create a sin (in this case "inhumanity") when God does not do so. It is also wrong to object to the killing of a varmint like a coyote on the grounds of inhumanity, but to enjoy hundreds of products from executed animals.

A more important question to be asked has to do with the implications of your conclusion on biblical record of God the Father and God the Son. To argue that it is inhumane to skin an animal for clothing is to declare that God Himself is "inhumane" and cruel. As noted previously, it was God the Father who performed the first animal sacrifice by shedding the blood of an animal to give coverings to Adam and Eve. (Please note that God had more than a few resources available to him--He is God---He could have made those coats out of anything, but he specifically shed blood of an animal as an example for Adam, and declared that "without the shedding of blood there is no remission for sins"). It was God the Father who sent a ram to be sacrificed in place of Isaac, and who commanded the death of birds and animals as blood sacrifices. It was Jesus, the Son, who facilitated the trapping and execution of thousands of unsuspecting and innocent fish at the hands of his future disciples. The Bible is replete with God-blessed testimony of hunting and trapping for the purpose of helping man take dominion over the earth. To argue that it is wrong kill animals for human benefit is to argue outside of a biblical worldview.

In fact, the animal rights movement, with its opposition to "species-ism," its advocacy of vegetarianism (by the way, why should animals have more rights than plants?), its opposition to hunting, and its hypocritical pleas for animal safety is a direct attack on Genesis and the dominion mandate. Every time we train a boy to hunt for the glory of God and teach them the biblical implications of such hunting---we strike a blow against the Devil! Every time we train a boy to be self-sufficient on the environment, we prepare him to be a better man and a better leader and protector and provider for his family. Every time we teach a boy to respect God's creation, and therefore to wisely and without waste harvest and cultivate the animal resources God has given us for our use, we advance the Kingdom of God because we are obeying the dominion mandate of Genesis.

In my own family, we go out once a year and hunt for deer. I put one bullet into the neck of the deer, I harvest the meat, I use the hide, and my family has enough low-fat, high protein meat to last us for months. This saves us money, provides a healthy diet, teaches my son self-sufficiency, and saves human lives by decreasing the excess deer population which causes numerous injuries and fatalities to humans every year because deer love nothing better than to stare headlong into the lights of a speeding car.

Let me conclude with an interesting observation: Many years ago, certain activists led a campaign in the United Nations to prevent the ivory trade. They believed that if elephant hunting were prohibited, that the elephant population would increase. In point of fact, the exact opposite happened. Prior to the ban on elephant hunting many local tribes survived from killing and using the entire elephant, including the ivory. These tribes and local governments had a vested interest in perpetuating and protecting the elephant herds. Elephant herds often struggle with survival in Africa, not primarily from hunters, but from environmental pressures and problems. By banning all elephant hunting and harvesting, these peoples were economically ravaged. More importantly, they lost all incentive to protect, cultivate and wisely harvest the herds. Today, the only people doing the killing are poachers who care little for the elephants and certainly do not wisely use the entire elephant for the glory of God. The end result is that by banning the killing of elephants for ivory, we have practically condemned the future of the elephant to a slow death. This is the problem of supplanting the wisdom and revelation of God for the sentiments of man.

The best thing that could happen to rodents, varmints and wild animals of all stripes is for Christian boys to grow up and teach others how to wisely care for and harvest such animals, and how to use every part of the animal for a productive use whether that be for food, for industry, for protection or even for decoration. When thinking Christians get involved in animal husbandry the result is a better environment and the perpetuation of the animal herds through wise management. This means that deer will not suffer mass starvation because of overpopulation, that animals like elephants will not be harvested just for their ivory, and that predators and pests like the fox and the coyote (whose tails we proudly sell) will neither become extinct, nor will they harm the lives of farmers and families.

It is our mission to encourage such hunting, trapping, skinning and self-sufficiency skills to give our children a greater appreciation for the wonders of creation, to give them a love for America's history, to assist them in their stewardship of the earth, to rid them of the hypocrisy of the modern environmental movement and to replace such hypocrisy with a distinctively biblical ethic for environmental dominion and stewardship. We believe that this is biblical and hope that you will join us in our mission.

Thanks again for your candid comments. In the spirit of dialog and discussion I offer the above thoughts. I hope you will feel free to write or communicate with me again.

Blessings, Doug Phillips

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[LifeNRA]

Re: Guys, I could use a little assistance

This is your custom 404 "Not found" Error page. This page is displayed whenever a file that a web browser requests is not found on your website.

Can not see the web site!

[tedicast]

Re: Guys, I could use a little assistance

I can't getto it either skip. I get the same page as LifeNRA