Bear with me while I give the definition of phishing and then read the story about how we almost became a victim of a phishing scam.

First, here is how Wikipedia defines phishing:

“In the field of computer security, phishing is the criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication.”

In other words, you are ready to sign into your e-mail account, but you mistakenly type in the wrong web address (maybe inputting two “n’s” where there was supposed to be only one “n”). Now you are ready to log in. All appears normal except you are not really at your e-mail provider’s website at all.

You are at a FAKE website that only LOOKS like your e-mail site. You put in your user ID and password, but nothing happens, or perhaps you are (unbeknownst to you) re-directed to the REAL site and a screen that says you entered the wrong password. You try again, and you are successfully and happily logged in.

But what you don’t realize is that you have now become the victim of a phishing scam! While you are merrily checking your e-mail, the phishing website owner is preparing to hi-jack your account. After all, everyone knows that if someone has access to your e-mail account, all they have to do is go to the websites you hang out at (They can find that out by looking through your saved e-mails), and even if those other sites use different passwords, all they have to do is click the “Lost Password” button and in most cases the password will be instantaneously sent to…you guessed it…the e-mail account that has been compromised.

Things could get pretty ugly in a hurry. Here is my story…

Yesterday my son was going to his Google Adwords account. He normally does that when he is logged into Gmail and from the Gmail interface, but since he already had Google open, he simply typed in “adwords” in the search box and (as usual) the top listing was adwords.google.com.

In fact, it was both the top “organic” and top paid ad. Well, he clicked on the top paid ad and went on to what he thought was Google’s Adword page and since he wasn’t already logged into his Gmail account, he entered his user ID and password. Nothing happened for a few seconds, but then he was immediately re-directed to a REAL Google page that informed him that he had entered the wrong password.

Since it was a re-direct he was suspicious and hit the Back button on his computer. Here is the URL where he really was:
http://adwords.googlen.com (The site is already down.)

It was a phishing scam site and now they had not only his Google Adwords account info, but also his Google Adsense and  Gmail profiles…since they all rely on the same log-in profile. Thankfully, he was able to get to his account first and change his password, but the results could have been disastrous!

We did some further research by going to Google and searching on Adwords again and now TWO ads came up at the top of the page:

• the URL mentioned above and this one…

• ebaypartnernetwvork.com (Notice the misspelled “netwvork”.)

Here is a link to a screenshot we took of the search results:
http://www.imageuploads.net/ims/pic.php?u=32201LsGqu&i=167811

The top two are fraudulent (EVEN THOUGH the top one looks JUST like it is
Google’s).

We notified Google immediately about the phishing scam, but I wonder how many hundreds of people compromised their security during the period of time that these ads were running?

So, if you are feeling lazy and want to type in your URL or do a search for
it (ESPECIALLY when your destination is going to require a log-in profile),
think again…One mis-type or “bad search” result and you are a step away from someone getting your password.

Instead, use a program like RoboForm (www.roboform.com) that automatically goes to the website that YOU have pre-defined and enters your log-in profile without you having to enter a single keystoke online.

ALSO…if you are one to use a public computer, such as one at a hotel business center, library, school, or public kiosk, you had better use RoboForm’s portable USB solution (RoboForm2Go) because who knows if someone hasn’t installed a spying software on that public computer and now your every keystroke is being logged so that a phishing scammer can steal your identity and wreak havoc on your life.

But don’t solely rely on software to protect you. Sometimes phishers employ cleverly worded e-mails, disguised as notifications from companies you already do business with, enticing you to click a (fraudulent) link so that they can capture your log-in profile. Slowing down and using a little common sense can also go a long way towards helping you avoid becoming the next victim of a phishing scam.

In a way, his 5-year struggle with cancer was a blessing, as it was a wake-up call that we all recognized as a message from God saying, ‘Life is short. Live it while you can. Family matters. God matters.”

I don’t know if I ever would have kissed my Dad again, had he met his demise in some other way, such as a heart attack or sudden accident. Sure, he displayed affection to me when I was a little boy. I remember him taking me in his arms and swinging me around and hugging me when he was proud of something I had done. But sadly, somehow, when boys start to grow into men, many lose the ability to show affections that were once perfectly natural in our younger days.

So, with him lying there, I bent down and kissed him. It was so hard because men are not supposed to do that, right? But I am glad that I was able to overcome my inhibitions and do it.

Dad taught me a lot about emotions. His favorite emotion (if you can call it an emotion) was laughter. He loved jokes – clean ones. And there are some of my dad’s jokes that I probably heard over 100 times. Most were pretty corny. In fact, many of the times when his jokes elicited laughter…his audience was not laughing with him, but at him and how stupid his joke was.

Yes, Dad taught me how to laugh; but he also taught me how to cry. He wasn’t afraid to cry in front of his children. He would always cry when a movie ended happily. Dad would weep for joy when he heard about our accomplishments and accolades.

I remember when our dog got hit by a car when I was in the 7th grade. Dad cried louder and harder than me or younger sister.

In the final months of Dad’s life as he battled valiantly with cancer, Dad kept telling us how he wanted to go home. “I want to go HOME,” he would say over and over again. “Dad, you ARE home, ” my sisters and I would answer. “No, I’m not. No, I’m not. I want to go HOME.”

They say there’s no tears in heaven, but my family knows that this is not true…because on May 15th at 5:16 p.m., 2007, my dad was probably so excited that he cried as he embraced Jesus and heard the words, “Welcome HOME.”

Growing up, I received few spankings from Dad. That was mainly Mom’s territory; but the ones I DID receive are quite memorable, each one dealing directly with a specific form of behavior Dad disliked. Dad did not tolerate disrespect. I remember the one time that I failed to call him “Sir”, yelling “Huh” down to him from upstairs. I never knew Dad could climb stairs so quickly. That was the last time I ever used that word around him.

Another memorable spanking was when I kept saying the line, “I can’t.” Dad HATED those words. He “taught” me never to say them. I wish I could say that I have always adhered to those instructions. Many times, even when I don’t mouth that hated phrase, my mind says it for me, which is just as bad – or even worse, I think.

When I was 9 years old, I signed up for the Dixie Youth Baseball League. I did it mainly because all of my friends were joining, too. Now, I would like to say that I was an immediate star, but that would be lying. I would love to say that I was just so-so, but that would disingenuous as well.

The truth of the matter is…Dad was pretty lucky. All other kids’ parents had to be at the game by 6:30 pm if they had intentions of seeing their kid play baseball that night. Dad didn’t have to show up until an hour or so later…just in time for the 7th inning (which was the last inning in little league baseball) because that was the only time the coach would put me in the game.

Still, Dad was always so excited when I got up to bat and would talk to me from the stands, as I stood in the batter’s box, waiting for a called strike three. As far as I remember, he never showed embarrassment that his kid was the worst person on the team with the exception of the 8-year old daughter of our coach, who was the team mascot.

That first year, I had a grand total of “0″ hits. But at Dad’s urging, I signed up for the next season anyway. But this year, my fortunes changed drastically: I had “1″ hit. Dad was thrilled. ‘You’re getting the hang of it, son,” I can still hear him say as he drove me home the night I had my career-changing single. (In this league, they scored it a hit – even if you hit it between the first baseman’s legs.)

After turning 11, I graduated to the 11-12 year-old little league – now known as “Pony League.” Dad attended every game and watched me do something quite spectacular: two hits, not including a line drive that almost made it through the hole, but was speared by the shortstop to end an important game.

It was then that I decided to end my career on a high note and retire at the age of 12. Dad was livid. He never talked me out of it, but this is what he said, “Son, just look at it…you are only 7 years away from a 100-hit season. You could be an all-star some day and maybe even go pro…” The sad part about his statement was that he really believed it!

The way he explained it to me was that all I had to do was keep doubling my total like I did from before.

-1st year – 0 hits
-2nd year – 1 hit
-3rd year – 2 hits
-4th year – 4 hits
-5th  year – 8 hits
-6th year – 16 hits
-7th year – 32 hits
-9th year – 64 hits
-10th year – 128 hits

• drinking
• cussing
• smoking
• chewing tobacco
• doing drugs
• speeding in my car

You see, I , like many of my friends, had been “indoctrinated” through exposure to religious services, books, tapes (Yes, we had tapes back then) and other forms of media. But that’s not all; a majority of the influence I received that helped me mold my beliefs originated from Hollywood – in the form of sitcoms, cartoons, and movies that represented “Christian” stereotypes.

And sometimes people only believe what they WANT to believe anyway; it is far too easy to call out a list of sins of the “flesh” than to ponder what God REALLY says.

But guess what? We don’t HAVE to wonder what God does not like. He tells us plainly in Proverbs exactly which sins he hates most:

¹Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
(Hebrews 11:1 NLT)

And it IS sometimes very hard to believe something that you don’t yet see. Maybe it’s hard for you to believe that your financial situation is going to get better when you don’t see any money in the bank or that your relationship with a spouse or child is improving – even when the evidence you see is to the contrary…

But sometimes it is equally hard to believe that something is NOT what you see. That involves faith, too. Let me explain…

Many years ago, my grandfather, who ran the community grocery store in a small but growing town, was cleaning the public restroom of his business. As he labored in the small, dimly lit room, he noticed what looked like a whiskey bottle in the window sill, that was evidently left by a customer who did a little more than relieve himself when he used the facilities.

My grandfather, a very devout man and known city-wide as an itinerant preacher and the chairman of the deacons at the local baptist church, held the whiskey bottle to the light in order to see the label and see if it smelled as he suspected.

At that precise moment, the bathroom door opened and a man who knew my grandfather very well walked  in. Both men were startled, and my grandfather’s friend exclaimed “Why, Henry, if I hadn’t seen it with my own two eyes, I would have never believed it to be so.”

“Wait, you don’t understand,” my grandfather pleaded…

“Nope,” said his friend, “I would not have believed it unless I had seen it with my own two eyes.”

And so his friend could not be convinced that his eyes had betrayed him and he left believing that he had caught the chairman of the deacons of the local baptist church with a bottle of spirits.

Now whether you believe it is okay or not to drink…that’s beside the point. The point IS that sometimes what we see…or what we THINK we see is not reality.

Sometimes real faith involves NOT trusting our five senses, but believing our one Savior and the work he has done, is still doing, and will do in our lives and the lives of those we love.

So about a year later all the wise men came back with scrolls and scrolls of information and the king asked them to transfer everything onto one scroll. They did, and boy, was it a long and heavy scroll! It took three of them just to carry the scroll into the king’s throne room. When he saw it, he said, “No, no; this won’t do; it is WAY too much information to know. Condense it for me.”

Three months later they came back with the abridged version, all the wisdom of the world fitting neatly on one small scroll. They began to read it to the king, but again he complained, “No. Too much. Make it even smaller. Leave out any wisdom that isn’t absolutely necessary.

A month later they came back to the king with a very small scroll where all the writing fit on just one page. But still, the young king was not satisfied. “Now reduce this wisdom down into one sentence. I want one sentence to live my entire life by so that I can govern my entire kingdom using its guiding principle.”

So the wise men thought and thought and after much deliberation and argument amongst themselves they finally decided on the one sentence that contained the wisdom of the ages. They happily entered the king’s presence the next day and the wisest of them read to the king the one sentence that represented the words of wisdom he so sought after:

“There’s NO free lunch.

Happily, the young king, shouted and jumped for joy. “That’s it!” he cried. “This principle is what I am going to do all of my governing by.” Immediately, he recognized faults in his own life, where he was living leisurely when even a king should be working to improve himself and his kingdom. He called all of his counselors and the palace staff, including the guards into his chambers and explained that from now on that everyone would pull their fair share and work as hard as they could to improve the kingdom.

He made a proclamation and sent it out to all the royal subjects, proclaiming “There’s No Free Lunch” and everyone was to do their fair share if they wanted to prosper. And for those who were too sick or frail to work, they were to be helped by others, but never to forget that what they shared was the result of hard work by someone else and the least they could do was be thankful for the bounty given to them by the generosity of others.

Soon, everyone’s attitude changed and the entire kingdom became prosperous and successful. And in the process, everyone became kind and thankful.

What a story! Too bad our elected officials don’t think like this young king more often. But then again, this is not a political rant. I just wanted to tell the story about how someone was able to condense all the wisdom of the world into four short words.

Once when Jesus was asked by someone what was the most important commandments, he responded:

“You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ ³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ⁴⁰ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
(Matthew 22: 37-40 NLT)

So in about three or so sentences, Jesus summed up the entire Old Testament, which consists of over 900 chapters, 23,000+ verses, and in excess of 600,000 words.

No, Jesus didn’t condense the wisdom of the world to four words like the young king in our story, but Jesus happens to be THE king of the entire universe, so I think I will trust his abridged version of wisdom instead.

So you don’t speak French and you want to know what I mean by the word “marquee”? “Marquee” is the fancy word I use for church signs. You know…the ones you pass on your way to and from work every day that have these “clever” sayings on them, as well as perhaps church services times or which gospel group is singing at that church 3 months from now.

I pass by several marquees when I drive down the main road that connects to our neighborhood. I am always amazed at what I see. A big beautiful sign on the side of the road that has the ability to captivate passersby with words of faith and encouragement, words of wisdom and consolation, or with words of praise and grandeur.

Companies pay hundreds of dollars a month to advertise their wares on billboards in every city, so there must be a reason that they fork over incredible amounts of money per year to sign companies – probably because the words on them (if properly crafted into an offer and a call to action) work!

So what do most of the church marquees that I see say? Let’s see. Here is a list of a few I have seen over the years:

• Soul food served here
• Forbidden fruit creates many jams
• CH CH  What is misssing? UR
• God answers kneemail
• Try Jesus…if you don’t like him, the devil will always take you back

Those are some off the top of my head. There are many more, but it pains me to try to remember them all. You get the picture.

Now don’t get me wrong. These are definitely well thought-out sayings and they CAN be attention-getters. But there is one thing that they are not. They aren’t the word of God. Kind of reminds me of what Elijah the prophet said to the king of Israel when the king was seeking advice from another god:

“Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?” (2 Kings 1:3 NLT)

If I could ask a question is to the ones who are responsible for putting these messages on church signs around the country I would ask a similar quesiton:

“Is it because there are no good Bible verses that you resort to putting cute little sayings on your signs?”

Maybe I am a little old-fashioned, but I can’t help but remember a Bible verse that I learned long ago:

“Is not my Word like a fire?…and like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces?” (Jeremiah 23:29)

You see, God’s word is powerful. It has the ability to pierce someone’s thinking, to permeate a mixed-up mind, and to soothe a troubled soul. Jesus said it best when he said that his words were “spirit” and that they were “life.”

Hebrews 4:12 says that God’s word is “alive and powerful” (NLT). I believe that OUR job is to give someone a word…and not just ANY word….but THE WORD. That’s where our work ends. That’s all we can do.

Next, we should rely on the Spirit of God to do the rest. Why not use one of the many thousands of verses (perhaps translated into a version that the average person can understand since most of us didn’t take Elizabethan English in High School) and then let God do the rest. I, for one, would sure be grateful, but I can think of many more people that would be effected positively as well.

The other day I heard a preacher saying that if you were one of God’s children then you would “ride above the storm” and remain unaffected by the troubles around you. While that may be true to some degree, I think that we need to look at what the Bible actually says about prosperity.

True, God wants his servants to “prosper and be in good health” (III John 1:2), there was also a wee little condition that goes along with that passage. It actually says, “…I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul prospers.

I would contend that sometimes it takes a little hardship to make us wake up and recognize who is the source of our prosperity and strength. And when we truly recognize the blessings that we have and the source of those blessings, then our soul does benefit.

Let’s see what Ecclesiastes has to say about the subject of prosperity in Chapter 7:

¹⁴ Enjoy prosperity while you can,
but when hard times strike, realize that both come from God.
Remember that nothing is certain in this life.

Oh, wow…maybe some of the “prosperity preachers” need to read a little out of Ecclesiastes every now and then. According to the Bible hard times DO come from God sometimes.

Now, the only problem with this sort of thinking is to go too far the OTHER way. It may be bad enough that “prosperity preachers” leave out lessons from Ecclesiastes, but it is just as bad to err on the wrong side. Make no mistake about it…MANY of the hardships you may be facing is simply you reaping what you have sown.

Hosea 8:7 tells us about people who “…sow the wind, And reap the whirlwind. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but in the game of sowing and reaping, the harvest is always greater than the seed planted. Have you ever planted a row in a garden with a few handfuls of tiny seeds, only to reap buckets and buckets of vegetables in return. Many of us like to blame God for our troubles when we are actually reaping the whirlwind for that little bit of wind we have sown.

BUT EVEN IF YOU ARE DOING EVERYTHING RIGHT, there WILL come times of testing and hardships as we see not only in Ecclesiastes 7, but other passages throughout the Bible. God is doing this to test us, to see if we will still follow him when things aren’t going so well.

Here is the key to navigating through the difficult time: Our RESPONSE. Are we going to be whiners and complainers or are we going to be thankful for what we still do have, no matter how bleak the situation may appear? I pray that all of our responses to these economic times may be like that of the prophet in the Old Testament book of Habakkuk:

¹⁷ Even though the fig trees have no blossoms,
and there are no grapes on the vines;
even though the olive crop fails,
and the fields lie empty and barren;
even though the flocks die in the fields,
and the cattle barns are empty,
¹⁸ yet I will rejoice in the Lord!
I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!

Now, I personally believe that the only effective prayer is one that is made earnestly to God through Jesus Christ. James 5:16 says that “…the prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective (NIV). Another way of saying it is “…the earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available…(Amplified Bible).

So we know prayer can be powerful when used effectively and applied the right way, but what if there is no prayer at all? It’s kind of hard to benefit from the power of prayer when we don’t pray at all or very little, isn’t it? Well, I believe there is a little solution that can go a LONG way in helping us with our prayer life (or lack of it).

The power of 10. 10 minutes a day multiplied by 365 days is 3,650 minutes a year. That equates to roughly 60 hours a year. Now what is 60 hours a year? Suppose your boss told you that you were being sent to a conference to learn about a new piece of software…and that you were going to sit for 1 1/2 weeks 8-hour, 5-day weeks to learn and practice this new software.

Don’t you think when you came back home 1 1/2 weeks later that you would know a lot more about it than when you left? Depending on the material to learn, there is a decent chance that you would be a bonafide expert on the subject if you applied 60 hours to it.

Well, that’s what can happen when you learn to harness the power of 10 in your prayer life. 10 minutes a day. Just 10 minutes equates to 60 hours a year. The fact is that most of us don’t pray 60 hours total a year.

Oh, we pray in little spurts. 5 minutes one day, two minutes a couple of days later. We may even pray for a solid hour on occasion…or perhaps pray really hard for something when we need it…but if God was to do a spiritual audit of most of us Christians, He would more thank likely find a lot less than 60 hours of prayer during the course of a year.

But now we can change all that in just 10 minutes. 10 minutes of prayer a day. Now let’s suppose that we don’t think we have 10 minutes. I, personally, believe we do, but just for the sake of argument let’s say that you work 90 hours a week and sleep or drive back and forth to work for the other 78 hours and don’t ever mindlessly surf the internet, make casual cell phone calls, play with Twitter or Facebook, watch your favorite television show or movie. I would still bet that you DO somehow make it to the bathroom a few times a week…and I certainly hope you take a shower once in a while. What about fixing your hair of brushing your teeth?

I found that when I did my own “personal” audit, that many of these times I was either daydreaming, worrying, or simply not using my mind consciously at all. I also found that when I was able to consciously say little focused prayers during these necessary activities that the time added up. In fact, it added up to a LOT more than 10 minutes a day – more like 30-60.

If we would look hard, we would find even more opportunities for prayer. What about the drive time to and from school or work? What about exercise time? What about the first few minutes after we close our eyes at night or the first few minutes during the morning as we get out of bed? As Ecclesiastes 8:5 says “…Those who are wise will find a time and a way to do what is right.” (NLT)

And for those religious people who believe prayer should only be done on one’s knees over long periods of time, I would ask: Could it be that the reason people don’t pray as much as they should is because of people like you who make them feel guilty when they don’t do it your way?

In fact, when evaluating the entertainment we choose there are three (3) questions we need to ask ourselves:
1) What is my entertainment?
2) What affect does the entertainment I choose have on my life?
3) Is that (affect) okay?

So..what ARE we choosing for our entertainment? You can’t say that it doesn’t matter, because it DOES. The the world is watching. Your friends are watching. Your children are watching. And the question is: What are YOU watching? What songs are you listening to? What books are you reading? What movies are you allowing to permeate your eyes and ears?

The next question is: What affect does my entertainment having on my life? Notice I didn’t say “spiritual life”. The word is “life”.

It’s too easy to draw a line and say, “Okay, THIS is spiritual and this over here is secular.” We like to put things in little boxes or draw circles or squares around things…or compartmentalize every activity in our life. That makes it easier to rationalize. We go to church… of course, it is wrong to watch a “bad” television show at church because…well…that’s church! We should only do “spiritual” things in church like sing or listen to a sermon or something “spiritual”.

But when we get home…that’s a different story. We’re tired. It’s easy to sit in front of the television or on an internet video website and remain immovable as we watch programs or clips laced with profanity, that poke fun at families, fatherhood and faith. But, truth be known, our entertainment DOES affect us. It affects our mind and our mind affects our spirits.

The last question is: “Is the affect that my entertainment has on me okay?” For example, if a certain song or movie elicits a certain feeling, is that a good thing? What if a movie deeply stirred us and made us take a certain action that was good, that is one thing, but what if a movie gave you feelings of anxiety – maybe a horror movie caused you to live in fear or a certain song aroused feelings of lust or anger? Then, wouldn’t it have been better if you didn’t participate in that type of entertainment?

Now, I’m not a purist in the respect that every single song we sing or movie that we watch has to be “Christian”. That would mean we couldn’t even sing the song “Happy Birthday” because it didn’t have “Jesus” somewhere in it. But the line between entertainment and Christianity is not as blurred as we think.

To willingly participate in forms of entertainment that are ungodly and harmful to our mind says a lot about who we really are. We can’t have it both ways (Luke 12:34; Matthew 6:21).

Yes, it’s easy to rationalize our entertainment by saying it’s just “part of our culture” and “that’s how I have fun”, but there really is one more question that begs to be asked in addition to the three originally outlined at the top, and that question is…”Is God happy with my entertainment?” Yes, it’s a tough question to ask…and in my case I have found that many times the answer I received was something I did not want to hear.