Choice

By Dr.Ted Hallum

The book is an overview of the various things going on in our deteriorating society with appropriate descriptions and with the opportunity to make appropriate choices during the process as one reads from chapter to chapter. The book combines the political world, the philosophical world, and the Christian world, as well as includes references to the deceptive practices currently underway to attack the Christian faith and the Christian church by Progressives, Democrats, and left-wing agitators. The hope for the world is revealed and discussed with the opportunity for a final decision based upon the evidence of the book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 10, 2019
• ISBN: 9781796032543

Dr.Ted Hallum

Dr.Ted Hallum is a native Oklahoman. He was born in Sapulpa, Oklahoma, and was educated in Sapulpa Schools until his parents moved the family to Tulsa. He graduated from Tulsa Webster High School in 1958 and then worked his way through Northeastern Oklahoma State College (now a university). He graduated with a degree in history. He quickly earned a master’s degree in education from the same school and then entered St. Louis University where he earned a PhD in education. He worked in school administration in Illinois and Oklahoma and finished his career in the Los Angeles Unified School District, retiring in 2007. He took advantage of the areas in which he lived by continuing his education at some twenty-three colleges and seminaries during his career. After retirement, he entered the Trinity Graduate School of Apologetics and Theology and studied online until he received the M. Div, D.D, and Dr. Apologetics degrees. He presently serves as honorary chancellor of International School for Distance Education and Training (ISDET) located in Kochi, India. Ted currently lives in Southern California where he writes nonfiction Christian books. Choice is his third publication, joining Anticipating the Rapture and Deception: Twisting Truth.

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Copyright © 2019 by Dr.Ted Hallum.

Library of Congress Control Number:   PENDING

ISBN:          Hardcover             978-1-7960-3255-0

                    Softcover               978-1-7960-3256-7

                    eBook                    978-1-7960-3254-3

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorized Version). First published in 1611. Quoted from the KJV Classic Reference Bible, Copyright © 1983 by The Zondervan Corporation.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Rev. date: 08/14/2019

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CONTENTS

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Challenge

Chapter 2: The Philosophical Problem

Chapter 3: Political Disintegration

Chapter 4: The Cristian Church Under Persecution

Chapter 5: The Art Of Deception

Chapter 6: Misguided Rhetoric

Chapter 7: Time To Choose

Bibliography

DEDIC

ATED

TO

THE

Memory

OF

PASTOR H. D. PIERATT

PREACHER AND

TEACHER,

A MAN OF GOD!

INTRODUCTION

We make many choices in life of where to go and what to do, what meals to order, what events to attend, what medical doctor to see, where to live, and what kind of a job would be a better fit. We choose schools, automobiles, states and cities we would like to live in, and we choose what to think.

We also choose whether to believe in God or whether to buy the line that all life is here as a result of an accident in space. We can choose to enter debates about whether Space was an accident or whether it has the earmarks of a magnificent creation by a supreme being.

Whatever we choose, we must engage the question in an intelligent and highly focused manner by using all of the resources that are close at hand or easily obtainable. One should want to use extreme caution in arriving at decisions; particularly so when our very souls hang in the balance, held there by indecision.

For many, the Christian church is a major part of daily life for family and for the purpose of worship. Individual churches represent Sanctuaries where we can commune with God in a congregation, or in a group. Most Christians maintain a schedule for Bible Reading and Prayer; which may be in public or in the privacy of our homes.

We choose to worship God and to attend His House, a church; and we choose to associate with other Christians who feel likewise. This writing is about making the most important choice in one’s life. It is hoped that this writing proves to be of assistance for people making that choice in the time in which we live.

What other choices must believers make in the near future? Are you being led to respond to the changes being forced upon this nation by ill-informed members of the radical politicians? If so, how will you respond? What decisions will you make? Will you choose wisely or will you fall for the deceptions being sent your way? As we face the truth of what is happening in our society, you will come to a place of understanding that requires a series of choices.

Americans of this time and place in history are being coerced to make choices that will lead to tyranny, here, in the land of the free and the home of the brave. While the choices must be made, there are no emergency circumstances that would require the blind obedience to the radical ideas of the progressive left. We face an issue in doubt, a battle not yet enjoined, and hatred from the left followed by irresponsible charges of hatred charged against the right. It reads much like a Mussolini, Stalin, and Hitler Cobbler laced with incoherent suggestions from the darkness.

Who makes choices without long and deep thought? And who turns his back to God while considering the evil of the wisdom that comes from the darkness, like the stench of the bottomless pit? Who is it that seeks to obscure truth in the skin of a lamb while seeking all guns and the means to defend oneself and our families from the evil seen lurking about in this new wayward society of the progressive left? Who is it that seeks to appear blind to the coming darkness of the end time?

CHAPTER ONE

THE CHALLENGE

No totalitarian authority nor authoritarian state can tolerate

those who have an absolute by which to judge that state and its actions.

The Christians had that absolute in God’s revelation.

Francis Schaeffer

Our country is experiencing difficult times marked by extreme divisions in society, divisions within the church, and increasing tension within a growing lawless time that seems to teeter on the very edge of collapse. The ongoing dance of confusion by the major competing political parties has left the nation bewildered and with a bitter taste in their mouths. While a growing number of people have simply been deceived by propaganda, fake news, twisted truth, and by the technological advances that continue to pull families apart, as the push toward the new world order continues.

Some people swing back and forth within the political process as though they have never heard of slavery in the Southern states nor the name of the Political party that maintained that sad part of American history. Of course, if one knew the basics of the two major political parties, they would know the name of the party of the left and their new friends: leftists, progressives, and widely divergent groups that seek the destruction of the United States.

How naïve do they think the American people are; that they would even consider trading the greatest freedoms and individuals rights ever known in earth’s history for the sake of a few handouts and the opportunity to be ruled by a totalitarian government? The ignoring of personal rights and freedoms seems to be moving to a position perched on the very edge of a Margaret Sanger- style Eugenics program. The gathering of guns simply is an attempt to remove the ability of the people to defend themselves against the horrors of genocide and projected length of life in future generations. All in order to create a society with two classes; those who have and those who have not!

At birth we find ourselves on planet earth in a human family, with familial characteristics and some inherent abilities awaiting to be activated and chosen through one’s ancestral heritage, parents, and one’s deeply felt religious beliefs. But, are the choices we make limited by our environment, by our language, our nationality, by the size of our family or are they equally effected by interference of obstinate rulers and their adopted national programs which are designed to keep them in power or to justify power grabs? What choices remain closely-held within the human heart? What determines the quality of choices in life? What challenges do we face?

HISTORICAL REFLECTIONS

When compared to other countries that have passed into history, having passed the test of time; our history may not have the classical record of ancient history of times past, but it does possess the lingering dreams of a people who constantly sought freedom from tyranny in all of its forms; both of church and of the state. And, having come together from far and wide; this nation became one people unified and thus one people and one nation.

That is not to say that we have reached any level of perfection but over the years from the colonial period until about 100 years ago, we became a united people and began trying to deal with lingering societal difficulties brought on by a time of slavery. Difficulties that came as a desire by someone, somewhere, to profit from the growth of cotton.

We live, today, in a time of constant trial; and a time where so many deceptions are being played on so many people that one should not be surprised by the massive amount of confusion that is made far worse by the massive hysteria that some exhibit and the illicit attempts to remove tolerance and the freedom to speak that reflects upon a democracy. Who is directing this blatant attempt to tear our society apart and to marginalize the Christian faith?

What keeps people awake at night are times when the days are blessed but rest flees, as we have seen almost a choreographed representation of what is happening in our nation today; seemingly every day? It’s a growing realization that we are not seeing the full story with our government; that things are going on that we are not aware of, things we are going to find to be very difficult to accept. It bothers a person most in the middle of the night when the human mind begins to function rapidly and points to multiple inconsistencies of the acclaimed political fight between the democrats and the republicans that seems to have paralyzed our government.

Something, deep in the human heart, seems to speak in a halting manner that points to things that are appearing to be different than what we are told they are. Why do we see and hear so many obvious lies and falsehoods from the controlled media? Why does the left continue to tear the moral fabric of this nation while promoting the alien version of government; globalization? Why are those who love this country ridiculed by the left and denied their rights of Freedom of Speech? Is society being forced to acquiesce to the new socialist government demanded in globalization?

Why do we see almost a total and absolute conflict in a nation that is becoming known for its unbridled chaos? Who is managing the so-called caravans of refugees from Central America and pushing them to the American border? Why is evangelical political power diluted and split by radical liberalism/ progressivism? Who is managing that devious program? Has the political world suddenly flipped out over the liberal challenge to the conservative agenda?

Dinesh D’Souza explains the difference between socialism, capitalism, and progressivism in his book, The Big Lie:

…Is progressivism really a middle path between socialism and capitalism? Of course not, any more than fascism is. The whole middle path nonsense is part of the big lie. In reality, socialism, fascism, and progressivism are three similar—not identical—forms of leftism. All three march in the same direction, away from liberal capitalism, so there is no middle at all. (D’Souza, 169)

From where comes the intense hatred and violence directed at conservative citizens? Why is our nation floundering as if it suddenly found itself in a huge liberal-created swamp, both socially and politically? Are we so different, suddenly, that pseudo-revolution has to be waved each time the American flag is waved across this country? When will this nation, once again, become as one for all the world to see? What does tomorrow hold for our nation, for our people, for the Christian church, and for our way of life?

James Gregor, writing in his book, The Faces of Janus, shares these thoughts:

Somehow or other, only the Right figures in the catalog of horrors that make up contemporary history. Yet, almost everyone now acknowledges that the regimes of Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot were stained with the blood of millions of innocent victims—more than those of the extreme right. We are left perplexed. Even the most generous estimate would be the left is at least partially responsible for the mayhem that distinguishes our century. The political Right and the political Left seem to share something of a common malevolence. (Gregor, ix)

Will it be conflict or unity, hatred or tolerance, common values willingly shared or the implementation of forced change along the lines of Nazi Germany or Stalin’s Union of Socialist Soviet Republics? Will prison camps once again litter the land as the Christian faith is held captive to the cries of the world?

FAITH OF OUR FATHERS

Generations of our ancestors have lived in this world and heard the Gospel of Christ preached far and wide; becoming the unifying structure