Thursday Update - 18 JUNE 2020

Wow!  I posted on social media about FATHERS DAY last Sunday, thinking I had missed it... and finally realized it is on the 21st... this next Sunday.  Ooops! 

I posted how I had forgotten it as a special day, noting that I have never really had a father, except GOD... If I can, I will try to find the link.

I tried to find a link address to share... found the post. No copy link option so I copied and pasted the text section... I was surprised by the NAME part !!

This shares the text.
I also added my "Servants" writing for the graphic.

Deborah Martin

@work2gather

·

Jun 14

I missed Father's Day. Must be because I never had a real father. GOD has been the consistency in my life, the Guide through all things hard, the One who showed me the best I could ever be. Those without fathers should find Him in the Bible. It changes everything.


Then I found this...
https://twitter.com/work2gather/status/1272408177305202689

This was the web address at the actual post.  It should be a direct link to the post.  If not, I will keep looking for how to do this.

FATHERS are so important to the growing up process... nothing can really replace them, or mothers.  GOD made the family to be that way... the nature's of the male and the female blend in different ways to make the whole of the family a special unit.

I have often said that the arguments of the gay family being just as "normal" as the nuclear family designed by GOD are not true.  It's impossible.  No matter how great a DNA MALE may look in trying to be a female, he will never possess the genetic and personality traits of a true female... he will remain a biological male with the appearance of a female.

The same is true for lesbians and women who try to "become" male.  It is a masquerade. 

Broken families create their own set of problems... messing up the people inside them.  It is a generational destruction of all that GOD wanted us to be.  It is also prophesied as part of the End Times... part of the demise of our existence.

Nothing is going to save us.  It is just a matter of time. 
What GOD says will happen, always does happen. 

Christians are like everyone in the world that is human... we want to find happiness, meaning, success in work and life, families, friends, and fellowship.  We want to find these things in a different space than the rest of the world.  We are looking for what GOD teaches is the best for the human being.  That is why all the study about GOD in the Bible and in our lives matters to us.


I don't really understand all the hatred of GOD except that it is associated with the battle between Satan and GOD... for our souls, for eternity, for revenge, for that big thing we call personal "success" and goals.  We are the victims in this battle between GOD and Satan.  

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I have been working on my budget some more... I need to go shopping for food again.  I keep trying to find a way to spend less and save more, buy the things on my lists, and grow my income.  

I was looking at my CHRISTMAS budget tonight.  I am trying to save $10 each month for Christmas spending.  My list of giving needs $300 minimum.  I need to work on ways to gift without spending cash.  Shipping costs could take up all my savings for the holidays.  Such a pain.  I will also be trying to save more cash, but my minimum goal is the small $10/month.

I didn't get a stimulus payment but I am looking for the ways I can figure out what happened to it and why, and go from there.  I may let you know what I find out in a future blog post.

My CONTENT PLANNING activities are getting figured out.  I haven't found the best way to chart all the details yet, but I am figuring it out as I try to make my draft forms work.  Maybe I will share the final version as an email list freebie.  :-)  Still working on that, too.

My OFFICE 365 problems are partially resolved.  I was able to connect to the website and do the "download" thing, finally.  I haven't worked out the new file issues yet.

In my planning efforts I am moving into the spaces where income might become a reality... art... jewelry... and related products.  They will ship the easiest.  I might be able to send them off from my home mailbox... or get them picked up by the USPS (online registration).  If I can get my label printing figured out, that will all become easier.

What else am I working on?

• More posting at other sites (Patreon tiers and blogs)
• FOOD options for emergency foods.
• Ongoing efforts to improve my recordkeeping.
• Looking for GOD to answer my constant prayers.
• Wondering how long I will live since I am planning so much.  haha
• Freebies to offer email list subscribers.
• Freebies for my PATREON supporters.
• Posting designs for now, the election, marketing...
• Products to sell for income and sharing my messages.
• Surviving.

There is always something to work on, but I also try to rest when I need to... and have started trying to do some yardwork for my blackberry patches.  (My potato is still alive... that is good!)

I hope your life is going well, that GOD is leading you into His Plan for your future, and you will be prepared for any unknown disaster we might face as individuals, families, communities, nations, or as the planet earth.

Until next time,

In Christ,

Deborah Martin

work2gather.us

and more...

11:47pm - Thursday, 11 JUNE 2020

I waited to post because I wanted to finish watching some videos about  INCOME INEQUALITY  in Germany. It's a three-part series.

1  https://youtu.be/AFIxi7BiScI  --  posted  18 AUG 2018
2  https://youtu.be/cYP_wMJsgyg  --  posted  12 DEC 2018
3  https://youtu.be/wEufTD39xrw  --  posted  24 MAR 2019


I watched the first one last weekend I think, then I discovered the other two parts today. This seems to be a popular cry in struggling nations, including the USA. I wanted to see what it looked like in Germany.  DW is a news channel I use to watch on PBS in the past, so I am a little familiar with their reporting.

It is interesting to listen to the tones of people's voices as they report... sometimes the anger is toward the rich, sometimes the government, sometimes... I can't remember them all. I noticed the most negative impressions were connected with anyone who had money.

The focus of the videos was one man, who has risen to his wealth from a construction job. The needs of business take over.  Family is sacrificed, but the children are able to enjoy the best of benefits wealth provides.  If I had wealth, I would want to give my children the best, too.  It is what we do as parents. 

I think the war against the rich is misguided.  It seems to lead to revolutions through out history... I didn't study history enough to know why, and I don't care that much about it to study now. I feel it is wrong to expect the rich to just give up their money because the poor and the government have decided they need it.

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Earlier today I listened to my Christian music videos in my LIKE file, too...  I decided to post one at my Facebook Prayers page.  I called it Worship in music. It is one of my favorite songs. If I had a copy on a disk, I would put it on repeat for a long time.  I hope you try to listen to it.    (facebook.com/work2gather.Prayers) 

I also listened to the FARMER ad from the 2013 Super Bowl again... Had to post that on my regular social media pages.   (facebook.com/DeborahMartin.2014) (twitter.com/work2gather) 

The other day I posted at my FOOD blog, and then my SHELTER blog.  I am catching up.  My planning pages are growing, and I am getting my details collected.  I didn't get a list for today, but I did try.  I discovered it is hard to make a list.  Over the weekend I will be able to work on that.

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I finally signed up for  Microsoft 365  and have been trying to learn and relearn the Office suite of products I use to know well.  I am happy that they still have PUBLISHER for PC's as I want to use it again.  I am trying to decide if it will be better to save the documents as ADOBE pdf's or just leave them as WORD documents -- for eBook options.

The final event that made me sign up was trying to create a PRESENTATION with Open Office. I have problems with Open Office when I am attached to the internet.  It's not their fault, but it made me want to try Microsoft.  So I am discovering all the problems with MS365 now.  :-)   

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I'm not sure what I am feeling about the spiritual issues I see in our world.  I am praying a lot these days, hoping GOD will provide for us.  I watched at least one more video about the economy today, with references to the Great Depression.  It was a look back at the 2008 Housing Crisis, with the people who were there invited to gather and share their experiences for the documentary.  It shows how little the people know about what is happening in government.  We were protesting the rich, housing losses, and the pain we were going through economically, the government was desperately trying to save the nation.

• It also showed me that the options we had then are gone now.
• It made me wonder if the stimulus was a hidden effort to save the economy again. (I watched a couple investment videos about the economy from more recent times today, so they were fresh on my mind.)
• It made me hope that TRUMP is re-elected and will be able to help us survive an economic crisis.

Today was a hard day.

I keep wanting to tell people to move their retirement funds to their home... to make sure they own their home and won't lose it for tax payments. I hate the thought of people losing their lifetime investments in their homes... and retirement funds. Stocks are not a guaranteed income. If you have the mortgage paid off, you at least have a place to weather the long recovery that will happen.

Sorry to get so serious... but homelessness is not fun. I still remember scenes from videos I have been watching on the housing crisis... when you lose your house, everything gets tossed out on the street. They just don't care.  One young man still cried about the memory he had of that moment.  The videos show discarded possessions like baby walkers.  It is such an awful thing to happen to anyone, rich or middle class or poor.

We don't really have a safety net with the debt level anymore.  Watching other countries battle these same issues, seeing how our country is becoming more like them... we are not immune from economic disasters.

I hope the church will be able to help, whatever happens.  People who don't have anything to share can't help the church.  It's a very connected problem.  We will all be suffering.

Pray for all of us.
Maybe GOD will have mercy on us.

In Christ,
Deborah Martin

work2gather.us
and more...

JUNE is here!

Today I have been working on my planning pages for all my posting.  I had to revise my forms/worksheets twice.  I may try to offer some of the pages I am creating as email list freebies or as benefits for my PATREON supporters... or both.  Not sure.  Working on those decisions.

I just discovered you can make "PAGES" at Blogger a little bit ago so I tried it out on three designs, one deleted.  After I figure out making the pages, I will figure out how they become accessible to my readers.  This is a new option.  I can see the possibilities.  Right now I will just work on this blog, then I will think about pages for my other blogs.

In my efforts to improve my content I read through my most recent blogs... here and the public post for May at Patreon.  I wanted to list the topics I have been sharing recently.  In time I may go back through 2020 to have a full year record, but that is a lot of work and I am not yet sure I need to do that.  My real focus is my posting in the future.

My form with seven format lines didn't work for the blogging options, but it will work for my writing goals. I ended up with a form that has FIVE format lines, which will be for the weeks of a month.  I am going to find out this month how that works.

In reading over my posts a lot of thoughts came back.  I checked on my Spiritual Resources page at Working Together today and visited some of the links.  Watched sermons by Adrian Rogers and D James Kennedy (Classics). 

I was looking for the dates of the Shoebox Collection Week for this year and checked on their STORE items... I decided to buy the $2 silicone card holder ($1 shipping) and see what it was like. I want an RFID holder, but not one with the Sam's Purse logo on it.  This one might be used for my annual efforts to do shoeboxes... it depends on the sticky things they have for it to go on a cell phone.

Then I was reminded of Ravi Zacharias and decided to enter a memorial donation.  I was waiting to do that.  I like to put the page links on my taskbar for things I need to get back to. So that is done.

All the memories of pastors who are gone now became part of my day. The topics I wrote about last month became part of my day.  Thinking about our future as a nation, the health of the Body of Christ, Prayer and how GOD works in our lives, and more, made my day very serious.  

FOOD became a topic again today.  If I wasn't forcing myself to live on what I have, I would want to be at the store every day, looking for easy food to make.  

I am seeing that survival in farm economies is really a desperate situation when you "run out" of things.  Dried foods (fruits and veggies) are a serious necessity to get through the year until the next harvest.  All this make me want to structure WT Communities better.

You can't "make" fresh produce when you want it.  It's easier to save rice and grains, which are good for our health, but what to put with them?  Making meals with emergency pantry foods has been a challenge for a long time... I keep discovering new ideas as I search.

HOW to change this is my quest, and eventually at a global level.  All those terrible photos of starving people, especially children, are so different now... just because I am discovering how it FEELS to have these problems in a very small way.

My PANTRY goals are different now.

I posted a video about the GREAT DEPRESSION at my Facebook PRAYERS page. It is a short video with testimonies about people who still remembered the times from their youth... it helps to remember that these things happen and we need to prepare the best we can. (I watched a longer one after posting this at my page, with a really good history of why it happened in the eyes of historians.) It would be worth a few hours of exploring this topic.

It helps to remember that good people suffer when they have not done anything to deserve it.  Watching videos on economic problems has helped me to remember what matters most.  It shows that everyone suffers in different ways.  It also shares that image seems to be the main thing for the rich, and poor people get very creative in trying to survive.  

Another good point to remember, some of the people in these videos didn't feel like they were suffering more than others because everyone they knew was struggling.  For myself, the really hard reality hit when someone shared that people had no money for shoes, even when they were provided clothes through some form of government charity... the video said people wrapped their feet in newspaper and then cardboard just to cover them... in the cold weather, I think.

You really should watch the short video I posted a link to... it may help to get through these times we face now.  People who have no back-up plan, no emergency fund, are going to suffer is we can't find a way to help them.



I watched videos about the 2008 recession as well... with topics about real estate and retirement and other income issues, including job losses and trying to recover.  Social Security is my only income.  I am very worried about it, especially since I haven't been able to supplement it with my many years of trying to sell online.


All these videos have been watched "along the way," over time, sometimes having marathons on the weekend, or a few hours during a day.  I don't know if you have access to my viewing history at YouTube, but that is where most of my watching happens.  Sometimes I get a vimeo response from a search, but I tend to explore YouTube most.

I guess that is enough for now.  My planning efforts should be done by next Thursday.  :-)    Who know what the future will bring you!!

In Christ,
Deborah Martin

work2gather.us
and more...