To get the most out of this devotion, set aside time to read the scriptures referenced throughout.
It’s
common to hear Christians say, “You don’t have to be perfect—God loves
you just the way you are.” And that statement is true, except it’s not
the whole picture.
Yes, the Lord’s love is unconditional; we can
do nothing to change it. At the same time, His plan for all believers is
to make us increasingly like Himself. It’s a perfection that transcends
our understanding of the term—a perfection found not in how we perform
but in our willingness to surrender our life to Him.
In Matthew 5:48
(NIV), Jesus says, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is
perfect.” Instead of hearing those words as an impossible expectation,
think of them as an invitation. He’s welcoming you to the abundant life,
the healing of your soul, the recovery of your true self. It’s what we
know as the process of sanctification.
To be sanctified—in other
words, to become holy—is not a pursuit of faultlessness but rather one
of becoming more and more like Jesus. And there’s just one way to do
that: Say “yes” to His invitation each day.
A
video from a ring doorbell camera captured a deadly encounter between
two men. One of the two men involved walked away, the other is dead.
Looking at the brief encounter gives us a good perspective of just how
fast your day can go from routine to extreme.
Not what you want to see when you reach your front door.
Before we get into the video, I think it's important to point out a
few things. First, I don't have any information about the men in the
video or what led up to the shooting, other than what we can glean from
the video.
Next, anytime we analyze one of these types of incidents, there are
some people who think that I'm just “Monday morning quarterbacking,” and
that is not the intent. Rather, I think we can learn a lot about
violence and civilian defensive gun uses, that we can then apply to our
defensive strategy.
Lastly, I just want to point out one of the many observations we can
get from this brief video clip. Most likely, you'll have opinions and
observations of your own. Feel free to share those thoughts in the
comments below.
Some Gunfights Are Won Before a Round Get's Fired—
In no way am I discounting the importance of training with and using a
reliable everyday carry (EDC) gun and holster. The one of the many
things we focus on here at Concealed Carry dot Com, is to help people
become safer and more proficient with their firearm. However, many
well-trained professionals and civilians have died in an ambush.
Because, mostly, as defenders, we are reactionary in that we respond
to an attacker. We don't typically get to choose when, where, or how a
defensive gun use will go down. Try as we might, training can't really
replicate real world violence in a safe way. Even force-on-force
training, which is some of the best training one can participate in,
can't recreate the suddenness of an attack. You're either in the
training scenario or you're not. You know something is likely going to
happen when you're training. In real life, it can happen just at that
brief moment you drop your guard or mentally check out.
No one can have 100% situational awareness every moment they are in
public. Lots of people think they do, but it's not only impossible, but
unhealthy. Consider a thing called the Dunning-Kruger Effect,
which essentially describes how we have a propensity to overestimate
our abilities. The lower or ability is, the higher people tend to
estimate their abilities.
But this doesn't mean we shouldn't be aware of our surroundings. We
absolutely need to pay attention to who and what is around us. The point
in all of this is to point out that in the video, it was the victim's
awareness that gave him the best chance at winning this fight.
The Victim's Awareness—
We see the victim return home with grocery bags carried in his left
hand. We can see he has a semi-auto handgun tucked into his waistband on
his right hip. He has his door keys in his right hand and uses them to
unlock and I think, open his apartment door.
As he's doing this, we hear someone calling out to the man saying
something like “hey bro.” He turns to look and grips his handgun with
his right hand. He sees the man, which we later see is wearing a
t-shirt, pants, mask and hat. I don't know the timeframe of this video,
but it doesn't seem like the guy was wearing a mask because of cold
weather, as he was also wearing just a t-shirt. Now it's possible it
happened when it was fashionable to wear face diapers. Even after 3
years of 15 days to flatten the curve, I don't feel comfortable when I
am around someone wearing a mask.
The Draw and Holding Items in Your Hands —
The victim here blades his gun away from the masked man and draws his
handgun with his right hand, keeping it shielded from the attacker's
view as he engages the man is brief conversation. I think it's important
to note that the defender grips his handgun while still holding onto
his keys in his right hand. He may even be still holding the grocery
bags in his left, but we can't see this. I bring this up because there
are some different schools of thought on carrying items in your hands.
We can see the keys still dangling from the shooting hand fingers of the defender.
Method One —
One method is to carry items in your non-dominant hand. This way you
can draw your firearm even if you have something in your hand. However,
if you're carrying concealed, you need to clear a cover garment, and
typically this is done with your non-dominant hand. And while it may be
easy on the range to practice dropping things to free up your hands
during the draw stroke, it's not uncommon for people to hold on to
things in their hands during a stressful incident.
I'm sure you can pull up multiple videos of officer involved
shootings at the window of a vehicle, where the officer draws his gun,
engages the bad guy, all while holding an FI pad in their other hand. I
have experienced this same phenomenon as a patrol cop in a busy southern
California city. This is a good plug for practicing your draw from
concealment using only one hand.
Method Two —
The other method is to carry things in your dominant hand. This way,
it somewhat forces you to drop items from your hands when you move to
draw your gun. It also leaves your support hand free to begin the draw
stroke by clearing the garment. I see this as a viable option that I've
seen work, however that didn't actually happen in this case. Now, to be
fair, the keys might have been entangled in the defender's fingers, so
he might not have been able to drop them easily. This could happen with
other items besides keys.
The point is, when we're focused on defending ourselves, we may not
perform exactly how we thought we will in respect to dropping things
from our hands. My advice is still to practice carrying and dropping
items from both hands, and working on drawing one handed so that you
have reference points to access, no matter what hand you might have
something in when you need to draw.
The Defender was Ready —
The defender felt something was off and drew his gun before the
attacker drew his. He didn't draw it and immediately shoot, but he had
it in his hand, ready to go. The defender also positions himself,
placing a bit of the building's corner between him and the bad guy.
The defender was ready, the bad guy wasn't.
The bad guy's “draw” began from his left pants pocket. This isn't
ideal, as he was a right-handed shooter. So the bad guy needed to draw
the gun, then transfer to his right hand, then raise it to bear on the
defender. This gave the defender perhaps an extra second of time to
process what he saw, and then react. What's telling is that even though
the defender already had drawn his gun, the bad guy was able to bring it
to bear on him at almost the same time he broke his shot on the bad
guy.
Fortunately for the defender, the men were just outside arms length
distance, and he was able to break a shot on the bad guy and get the
first significant hit. That hit seems to impact the attacker in the face
or head. The attacker's head goes back and he begins to slump forward.
The defender is able to break a second shot which is difficult to see if
it impacted the bad guy or not.
If the second shot missed it likely missed horizontally, and not
vertically. Meaning that it could have entered the apartment directly
behind the bad guy. Another side point, this is a reason jacketed hollow points are preferred
for your everyday carry gun. Over penetration of a human body is one
concern for sure. But misses are something that while we want to avoid,
are a reality in many defensive shootings. At most, there is probably a
60% hit rate when looking at all defensive shootings. This means upwards
of 40% of rounds miss the mark. If our defender missed here, a JHP
projectile is still going to penetrate the apartment walls, but ideally
with much reduced velocity, compared to a full metal jacketed (FMJ)
projectile.
Reasonable Questions —
Understanding that this doesn't
represent every defensive gun use, I still think we should ask ourselves
a few questions. I'm not going to include my personal answers here. I
would rather use this as an opportunity for you, the reader, to come to
your own conclusion.
—Would the defender have survived had he not preemptively
drawn his gun? That is to say, recognized something was wrong, and
acted on that intuition.
—Do you regularly pay attention to people and things going on around
you? How about when you reach your home? We've covered many DGUs on the Podcast
that involved a suspect following the victim's home and attacking when
the victim is about to enter their home. What steps do you take to
secure your home? Do you even have a home defense security plan?
—Had the defender been carrying the gun without a round in the
chamber, would he have been able to rack the slide before using it?
—Do you think the defender thought this was the day he would need his
gun? Do you carry every day, or just when you go to “the dangerous part
of town?”
In Conclusion —
Again, I just wanted to focus on the defender's mindset of readiness and situational awareness. We talk about having a wholistic defensive mindset.
Do you have one? I don't know, but don't suspect the defender was a
master class IDPA competition shooter. He didn't have a tricked out 2011
with a fancy red dot. He might not have even been using a holster, or
at least if he did, it was one that collapsed when he removed the gun.
Yet he survived an intense, deadly confrontation. It all started with
being ready. The question is, are you?
Many
people in the world—maybe even you—are facing terrible storms in their
life. Broken homes, joblessness, loneliness, loss, financial struggles,
and world crises slash at the very fabric of hope. Some may even feel as
though they’re lost, adrift at sea in a small boat during a hurricane.
And many wonder, How on earth will we be able to reach the shore safely?
The
disciples faced this fear as well. While they were crossing the Sea of
Galilee in their boat, the weather took a frightening turn. In
desperation, they woke Jesus and cried, “Save us, Lord; we are
perishing!” (Matt. 8:25). He rebuked them for their lack of faith and
proceeded to calm the storm, showing Himself to be Lord over all
creation.
This story teaches us where we should turn when storms
arise in our own life. Sometimes people interpret challenging events as
an indication that God isn’t paying attention. That’s what the disciples
thought until Christ calmed the turbulent waters. But even when the
world seems out of control, remember that Jesus is in the boat with you,
and He’s still Lord of all.
Ways to Make your Freeze Dried Coffee Super Healthy
We all love coffee and what is better
than having the healthiest form of coffee without having to worry about
any side effects? It is densely packed with antioxidants and holds
great value in terms of many health benefits. Not only is it a powerful
stimulant but also rules to be a great source of antioxidants for
optimal growth of cells in our body.
Taking a spoonful of coffee powder and
adding it to your cup with some hot water and milk gives you the
perfect warm hug whether you are looking forward to the day or you have
just come back from a long day at work. Having coffee has a vibe and
therefore, it tastes even better when it is shared with friends and
family, over a heart-to-heart conversation or a good show on the screen.
Freeze dried coffee
refers to instant coffee that has been dried out so that it gets
instantly dissolved in water or milk. It holds the same nutritional
value as regular coffee but the caffeine content is a little lower. Not
only is the preparation easy but also it is much more convenient to
store and use.
You can prepare it within seconds and
sip through your cup while planning the day in your mind. But sometimes
you might have thought of making your coffee healthier. If yes, then we
have got the perfect ways for you to have the best version of coffee so
that you can make the best out of your health. Some of these tips are
mentioned below:
Avoid it Before you Sleep
You must have heard people saying
that they can sleep even after they drink coffee. It might be true
because it works differently for each individual however, for most
people, the caffeine content in freeze dried coffeeinterferes
with the regular sleep cycle. It gives you a strong wave of energy
because it is a strong stimulant and helps you stay awake and more
vigilant. Therefore it is best if you take it in the morning or the
afternoon so that you can revive your energy. It is better to go for a
decaf option which is equally tasty and beneficial.
Switch to No Sugar
Coffee is a healthy beverage and you
should not ruin its benefits by adding loads of sugar to it. The white
processed sugar that we use is highly unhealthy and leads to obesity,
cardiovascular problems, diabetes, etc.. If you have to use a sweetener,
you should go for a natural one such as Stevia. There are many other
types of sweeteners available that can help you in maintaining a healthy
body, especially if you are on a diet.
Go for a Premium Quality Brand
The quality and the brand of coffee
are one of the most important determinants when we talk about its
advantages. Make sure that the source of the coffee beans is highly
reliable so that you can get the best out of it. The benefits and the
quality depend upon the brewing andprocessing method
of the coffee beans. The way they are grown, and the way the different
species are mixed also make a huge difference. If you’re wondering, “What
is coffee powder?” It is either the extract of coffee dried in the air
or frozen to dehydrate so that a fine powder can be obtained. In this
way, you can enjoy coffee with almost no effort required.
At The Grateful Earth, our goal is to
grow and supply premium quality coffees and teas so that our customers
get true value for money. We specialize in many types of coffee with a
special emphasis on organic ingredients and highly hygienicmethods of preparation.
Sound Healing Secrets: Picking the Gong That Best Suits Your Therapeutic Goals
Gongs are complex instruments that offer as much audible diversity as they do aesthetically and culturally.
And the instrument’s complexity is nothing to take lightly.
In the case that you are scouting out a sound healing sidekick, it is important you take the time to understand the specific therapeutic qualities you are looking for.
Are you seeking a sensory experience that is grounding and deep rooted?
Or is your focus to find peace and whimsical tranquility?
Once you understand your therapeutic
objectives, you can be confident that the gong you go with is best
suited to your healing practice. Keep reading.........
Proverbs
9:10 says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”
Initially, however, the connection may not be clear, and we may wonder, How can fearing God make us wise?
First,
let’s look at what the expression means. “To fear God” conveys awesome
reverence for Him. And that mindset moves us to acknowledge the Lord as
the sovereign Ruler of heaven and earth, submit to His will, and walk in
obedience.
Those who commit themselves to living for God’s
purposes will gain greater understanding of Him. The Holy Spirit will
enable them to see circumstances and people from His divine perspective.
This kind of wisdom reaches beyond human perception and gives us
discernment to make decisions that fit into the Lord’s plans for our
life.
What is your attitude toward the Lord? If you truly revere
Him, you will listen for His directions and heed His warnings. A desire
to honor and please Him will motivate you to turn from evil and seek to
live in obedience. And the result will be wisdom beyond human
understanding.
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