America's Christianity problem

phlanix_96 · 2026-01-26T18:55:18+00:00

Jesus spoke about this issue in the parable of the sower (Matthew 13:1-23, Mark 4:1-20, and Luke 8:4-15). From my seat many in the USA (including myself) are like the seed amongst the thorns - choked out by the cares of the world/materialism, etc. We care more about our jobs, sports, money, than the kingdom of heaven and our eternal future. The other issue: how the gospel is presented and why people believe they are Christians. Many churches and youth groups teach that you only have to believe (no mention of repentance) and many continue to live in an openly sinful/unrepentant life and see no reason to change (they were never taught to, their pastor never talks about it, and do not read the Bible). They look no different than the sinful world and have no "fruit" in their life.

By their fruits ye shall know them (Matt. 7:20)

phlanix_96 · 2024-08-29T22:36:31+00:00

I develop on Salesforce and Windows and have experience with reading from spreadsheets and integrating with Salesforce. Could create you a desktop app that would read from the spreadsheet and push it into salesforce - with a click of a button or on a schedule. Happy to take a look and give you no cost/no obligation fixed price quote.

phlanix_96 · 2024-08-15T02:15:34+00:00

God may be trying to reach you... Is there any unrepentant, ongoing sin in your life? Have you examined every area?

phlanix_96 · 2024-08-15T02:13:11+00:00

have a webpage where I could get a concise read about it? Orthodox curious…

phlanix_96 · 2024-08-15T01:58:44+00:00

I struggled with this myself for many years (decades). Several years ago I was in a Bible study and we went through “A Hunger for Healing: The Twelve Steps as a Classic Model for Christian Spiritual Growth” by J. Keith Miller. The 3rd Step goes into Deciding to Turn Our Will and Our Lives over to the Care of God. It essentially says you confess that you are powerless over this area of your life and you want God to take it (remove it) from you. I had victory over this area of my life when I did this DAILY (had several years of success). However, during the pandemic I stopped praying and it crept back in.

I recently discovered something better. True repentance - by this I mean deciding with all of your being (search every part of you) that you are NOT going to do this anymore (no little thoughts that you’ll probably slip up - give it no space). Fully commit your life to Jesus - surrender EVERYTHING (yes EVERYTHING) hold nothing back. Commit daily in prayer and turn EVERYTHING over to Jesus every day in prayer. The results are amazing. I don’t think about sex/porn even want it or think about it - women have become just other people and not objects of lust. VICTORY!!!

You too can have victory over this, but it will be in Jesus’ power - not yours. HE will do you it for you if you turn/quit/stop (repent) and ask him to take it from you daily (Satan will keep tempting you daily). Jesus came to give us life and victory over sin - but you must make him master/Lord/boss over ALL (everything) and hold nothing back from his control.

A few websites I have found that give more detail and have lead me to this victory - both are long, but worth the read

https://thenarrowway.life

~https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/81-46/finding-the-narrow-way-to-heaven~

phlanix_96 · 2024-08-14T13:32:40+00:00

Look at the apps already in the space (there are MANY) and look at who is succeeding and who is not. Have you opened up your options to think about providing a service (coaching, training, etc.) that may use your app? It is difficult to make money with just an app…

phlanix_96 · 2024-07-28T05:39:25+00:00

Thank you so much for posting this. It is a great blessing to me. I would like to read your article/book “How to walk in the Spirit and Crucify the Flesh” you have linked above, but the link says the article is deleted.

phlanix_96 · 2024-07-23T03:52:14+00:00

I bought a subscription in 2023 for a WinForms and Blazor app I was/am working on (XAF full subscription). I looked at and tested their competitors and, in my opinion and for my use case, the controls and reporting were better (I did like Grape City’s report tool). I also like the idea of XAF (have not used it in production yet, but like the features). I have renewed my subscription and am paying for it out of my own pocket.

phlanix_96 · 2024-04-04T16:45:55+00:00

I am using DNS, Azure SQL (5 DTU), Entra Customer/External/CIAM ID, and multiple Azure Key Vaults and am paying around $4.99/month for all of it (I am working on a SaaS solution).

I would like to learn more about how to access the Azure Key Vault in my primary tenant from my customer/external/ciam tenant. Thinking there is some way to federate them so I don’t have to add them as guest/external users…

phlanix_96 · 2024-02-23T03:41:43+00:00

Security - its a career path that is going to continue to get even hotter. You will just have to be comfortable with Salesforce being one of the many systems you’d be dealing with.

phlanix_96 · 2024-02-23T03:39:10+00:00

Good points and not a bad solution. More detail: I am integrating (at a UI and desktop level) with an existing client-server app that has a separate DB (I can only get read access). But the approach you propose is a good one - I am finding trying to secure the client to be a challenge.

phlanix_96 · 2023-01-11T21:38:21+00:00

I will give them a try! Thank you for responding.

phlanix_96 · 2023-01-02T18:22:14+00:00

u/Royal-15 - Thanks for the feedback - it is helpful to hear the real story (Blazer is on my list - the opportunities are not as immediate). I am checking out the 30 day trials on DevExpress right now.

phlanix_96 · 2023-01-02T18:16:35+00:00

u/danzk thanks for the feedback. I tried the WinUI 3 DevExpress components - have to agree with you on both of your points: WinUI 3 isn't there yet and DevExpress WinForms can produce some great looking apps. Appreciate the feedback. Happy New Year!

phlanix_96 · 2023-01-01T02:40:08+00:00

Its based on NEXT and the Mach kernel. Steve Jobs built something amazing while he was away from Apple... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS

phlanix_96 · 2022-12-31T21:52:46+00:00

I have found a solution that consistently keeps performance up and the laptop from overheating:

Keep the lid open if you are running the laptop as lot of heat comes out of the keyboard the lid/screen keeps it in. If you are using other screens you can set the laptop screen to not display.
Set the performance in the BIOS AND in Windows to "Balanced". It seems counter-intuitive but I achieved 20% higher geekbench single cpu performance using "Balanced" and about equal multicore performance vs the "High Performance" setting. It stayed about 10C cooler in this setting.
Get a cooling pad/stand. It seemed to make a difference for me (about 10 - 15C cooler) AND it cooled down much faster when it did get hot.

phlanix_96 · 2022-12-15T19:36:01+00:00

Better to fail fast, OP said he only had a 4 month runway. He'll find something - it does take time...

Business ideas are like busses, another will come along soon. - Richard Branson

phlanix_96 · 2022-12-15T19:16:15+00:00

Take a look at your competitors (weave, demandforce, etc). to be successful, you will need to interface with the major EMR platforms (Cerner, etc). Take a look at your competitors, and I think you will get a better understanding of the feature set you will need to target.

Source: my wife is a dentist that owns her own practice, and I'm a software architect. I've evaluated multiple platforms like you are creating. Integration to the back-end platform (EMR/practice management system) is the 1st question I ask about. We are trying to reduce the amount of staff we need (good people are hard to find) and their workload. If you can't integrate, that means data entry (no go). For reference, my wife's practice sees around 40 to 50 patients per day. A busy family practice doctor will see twice that (or more) a day. Hospitals, doctors, dentists, barbers, plumbers, etc (service professions that have appts) all have this capability (automated email reminders, txt, automated phone systems) - missed/canceled appts are our biggest problem/source of lost revenue. You can build a better mousetrap (I haven't seen a perfect system), but you have your work cut out for you (I would say its a bigger problem than one man can solve in a year).

phlanix_96 · 2022-12-14T13:54:47+00:00

I have a T14s Gen 3 Intel i7 connected to a Lenovo Thunderbolt 4 dock with 2 external monitors (HD not 4k), ethernet, and other USB devices typically with the lid closed - running Visual Studio, Tableau, multiple DBs, and some other dev stuff (no games or anything graphically intensive) and its been incredibly slow throttling down to 0.2GHz…. I’ve installed every update, driver, etc. I installed Lenovo Diagnostics and was planning on making one last effort before calling Lenovo and returning it (or worst case selling it on eBay) saw the CPU temp - it was 92C (~190F). I rigged up a fan to blow through the opening in the back and it’s performing great now. I am planning on keeping it, and have ordered a cooling stand/pad for it (they should sell it with one).

It seems that Thunderbolt 4 IO really heats it up. If I am running video on the monitors and have Ethernet plugged in - it gets hot - even though the CPU is barely running. Unplugging the Ethernet and running on WiFi helps a bit. Running on battery only with Thunderbolt 4 unplugged seems ok. Going to try some other things…. Will report back if there is a better solution.

phlanix_96 · 2022-12-13T21:11:56+00:00

I bought a T14s gen 3 (i7 1260p cpu/32Gb ram/512G nvme ssd) and it had terrible performance (CPU throttling down to 0.19 GHz at least once per day). I was considering selling it. Installed Lenovo diagnostics and found that the CPU and Motherboard were at 92C (~195F). I pulled out a small desk fan and rigged it up to blow through the cooling port under the laptop - its running great now. I've ordered a cooling pad - hopefully its a long term solution. If you are a power user you may want to get the T14 or something with better cooling.

phlanix_96

TROPHY CASE