E-Mail 'Horizontal Relationships: The Key to True Independence- Part 2, by J.E.' To A Friend

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1. One of the issues facing ‘The Johnsons’ in suburbia is the existence of Home Owners Associations (HOA), and the control wielded by them. We experienced this personally and moved out specifically so we could keep animals. Many in suburbia are trapped by the need to be close to employment, versus the ‘nice neighborhoods’ have these overzelous HOA’s that are like miniature communist governments.

   Want to know who your petty tyrants are? Look to the HOA.

   Yes, they keep abandoned refrigerators off lawns, but they allow no freedom and this inpacts on any plans for limited self sufficiency.

   In fact, it was this house I refer to that I based the Berenger’s house off of in Patriot Dawn.

2. Yes HOAs can be bad and they are a constant source of irritation. Just like people, right? But my retreat is in an HOA. In return for my yearly 400 bucks in fees I get road maintenance to my 15 acres of heaven where I cleared an acre of forest and built my off grid shack and started a small orchard, 3,000 linear feet of community shoreline and tide lands which we seed oysters onto and harvest every few years, we shotgun harvest a deer each year on my acreage, our own airfield with daily FedEx delivery, a mail shack with daily delivery by boat, our own long fishing pier with attached docks for boats, and harvest fresh shrimp and dungeness crab in abundance. We have our own small park and some common areas open to wood harvest for members. Within the HOA there are some real pain in the ass people but at the same time there is a community here with skilled craftsman and mechanics and backyard farmers and off-road electrical technicians. Communities are dynamic and you need people skills. And there are always some good people who become good friends if you do your part. Yesterday the island at large held it’s second annual Independence Day parade and potluck. A John Deere tractor with Old Glory mounted on a vertical staff lashed to the loader bucket led the parade.

   1. Sounds wonderful, how fortunate you are. It also does not sound like suburban life, or a suburban HOA. And thus is no help to ‘The Johnsons’ who may in fact make up a larger readership here than those fortunate to live in a ‘retreat.’

      Perhaps the exception that proves the rule?

      As mentioned, we solved it by moving out of suburbia. Many are not in a position to make those changes, without significant changes to their modern way of life. There is the problem.

3. Freedom and prosperity are blessings from the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ’s title right now is “Lord of lords and King of kings and is a very political title. After His ascension, Jesus sat down at the right hand of the Father where He rules from Heaven above. This is the establishment of the only good vertical form of government that at the same time gives the most liberty to men.

   I do hope and pray that Christians will once again see the beauty of Christs government as it is centralized in heaven while being decentralized here on earth. Christ ordained and rules through three primary spheres of government among men; the family, Church and civil governments. These spheres of government are to be in submission to Christ and His law which defines, decentralizes and limits them. Men are called to rule in their particular sphere of authority as servant / kings & priests while Being in submission to the Law of their Creator God. This system provides great liberty while providing the accountability, checks and balances of the other spheres while at the same time having a high level of independence from each other.

   This delegated governmental authority in no way diminishes Christ’s omnipresence and direct hand in His rule over His creation.

   Satan the usurper and liar from the beginning has deceived Christians into thinking the Moral Law of God has no further use once a Christian is saved. Because of this, we have abdicated our horizontal leadership roles to a vertical overbearing highly centralized satanic state that is attempting to usurp the authority and rule of Christ. Federalism and globalism are satanic to the core. The majority of the modern American Church gives lip service to Jesus as Lord but openly rejects Him in practice. We would rather be ruled by the tyranny of satanic men because they give us “free stuff”.

   The Moral Law of Christ must remain as a standard for our sanctification and as a definition of sin for individual, Church and state.

   I must say it again; “To have civil freedom, the Moral Law must be used by a distinctively Christian State as a standard for morals and law in order to provide righteous justice and to be a proper terror to evil doers”. Look and see how the satanic federal government is now declaring good to be evil and evil to be good!

   The horizontal freedom given under the reign of Christ allows families to freely contract and trade with others for goods and services. The civil government has no authority to be in business (or to be in bed with them) or to control free trade. This allows the diversity of talents given by God to individuals to benefit the community and allow us to rise above a very basic substance existence.

   I used to be a typical loner prepper and now see that mindset as a failure waiting to happen. Of course individual preparedness is important, but building a distinctly Christian community and culture that freely trades goods and services will provide what most preppers are seeking.

   Lastly, in a SHTF scenario, families that know,love, trust, worship and serve Christ together will also be able to have the numbers to network and provide a mutual community defense. Ultimately safety is of the Lord.

4. “50 years ago, we sewed, knit, grew our own food”. Actually that number is more like 70. And those people are aging out and taking their knowledge with them. 50 years ago, I was 15. My family wore handmade clothes. All the women of all generations in my family could sew their clothes, including me. We could all knit or crochet or both. But my grandmother did the bulk of both the sewing and knitting. My other grandmother did the mending. We had home ec in school but we were already moving away from making our clothes. I continued to do so, but my friends didn’t. And I was the only one of my friends who knit.

   Although my mother had grown up with a victory garden, neither she, nor her parents continued the trend after it was no longer mandatory. And I never learned. It wasn’t until it became trendy for a short while in the early 70s that I attempted to grow anything. And not til I moved to a rural area of the redoubt (by accident and long before it was popular) that I learned to grow and store my food, simply because people there did.

   But even so, I figure most of the people who routinely used those skills growing up and as young parents are likely in their 80s now. Thankfully there is still a remnant that has either hung on to the lifestyle or wants to return to it. I’m looking forward to returning to the redoubt next summer, but here in suburbia, I’m thankful for the retired and the newly adult who at least try and keep our older neighborhood from falling into the HOA trap.

   These skills

5. Ironically, our devotion this morning (by Chuck Swindoll) was titled “Hope for Survival” and focused on Acts 2:44-45 and 4:32. This passage discusses early Christians living in such a community, voluntarily helping meet one another’s needs. There can be little question that this is how God wishes for His Church to exist, similar to the horizontal relationships described in this article.

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