All In the Head?

So, I’m having a bit of writer’s block on the novel, so I guess another day or two will pass before the next installment(s), though I think I’ll be picking up steam on that project again soon. In the meantime, I’ll go and get spiritual instead today, since Miz Pink seems to have dropped off the radar again temporarily (I blame the dang kid that insists on being changed and breastfed regularly…two activities that I’m sure make typing pretty near impossible).

So, what I want to talk about is the whole idea of sinful thoughts being as bad as sinful actions. A popular belief among many conservative, Bible-belting-you-over-the-head types.

A belief which, I have to say, is a total load of horsecrap.

Jesus talks about this notion a bit, supposedly, as chronicled in the Gospel of Matthew, and here’s one snippet:

Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh o­n a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart. (Matthew chapter 5, verses 27 & 28)

Now, by way of an aside, there’s an interesting discussion about what adultery really means, right here, but you can look at that later. It doesn’t have any bearing on my arguments here. Also, before I start making my arguments, I’ll remind those of you who are still confusing me with a theologian that I’m neither a linguist nor biblical scholar, so take my ravings here with an appropriate dosage of salt.

I don’t think that Jesus’ argument was really that thinking about sex outside of marriage, for example, or thinking about killing (which he mentions right before the adultery thing), for instance, are as sinful as actually doing the acts.

First, Jesus talks about the heart, not the mind. That is, we’re talking about true feelings. Intense motions. Intentions. Not mere passing thoughts. Fact is, as humans, it’s pretty much impossible to never look at someone with sexual desire. Flat out impossible. The issue is more this: Did you think about sinful activity with a real fervor and serious consideration about doing it?

If so, there is where your sin may lie.

But more to the point, perhaps, let’s look at the context in which Jesus is speaking. This was the ancient world. People didn’t typically live in cities, and cities of the time were still much smaller affairs than what we have today. Therefore, to look at, say, a woman with serious lust was a problem in part because this is a woman you have access to.

If I look lustfully upon a woman on the commuter train of a major city, chances are I won’t really have a chance to act on my desires. I don’t know where she works. I don’t know where she lives. The most pressing danger of “sinful” fantasies is that you might actually act out the sin. In the ancient world, looking at some dude’s wife with lust meant you might have a very real chance, regardless of which woman in town you chose, of knowing how to find her and giving yourself an opportunity.

So, the mere thinking of a thing isn’t sinful.

Because, let’s face it, if that were the case, good intentions would be enough to save us in the eyes of God. Because if thoughts are as good as actions, then wanting to do something good is just as powerful as actually taking action, right?

Of course not. We are supposed to take positive actions, not simply intend or wish them.

Finally, another nail in the coffin of the notion of sinful thoughts being as bad as sinful actions: Jesus thought sinful things.

Oh, don’t get ready to stone my ass, now. Satan tempted Jesus. Jesus led a sinless life, despite knowing the power and allure of sin. Jesus couldn’t possibly have gone his whole life without considering the possibility and implications and consequences of doing a sinful act. He had to be capable to considering the possibility of sin, or he couldn’t be tempted. He had to know what it felt like to desire things that were wrong, or he couldn’t have understood his human side. Plus, if he was incapable of even considering sin, then what was the big deal about his sinless life? If it was some cakewalk for him, then the whole exercise meant nothing.

Just because you think a thing doesn’t make it so.

Nor does it define your true intentions.

The Nature of God

A lot of people get hung up on the concept of any kind of god, much less an all-powerful creator of the entire universe. They scoff at how ridiculous it is that such a being could exist, even as they don’t skip a beat accepting that they live in a universe that must, then, have popped up infinitely out of nowhere.

But you know what, I’m going to cut folks some slack for having trouble believing in an all-powerful, ominprescent universal God, and I’m going to tell you why it doesn’t matter, pratically speaking, whether you make God “infinite” and maybe, just maybe, it will be easier for you to consider He might exist if you can scale the possibilities down to something more manageable.

Creator of the Universe

OK, so what if He isn’t, really? Technically speaking, the Bible really only spends significant time talking about His role in creating the Earth and managing it, and spends precious little time on anything temporal beyond our little corner of our little galaxy.

By considering that He might “only” be creator of the Earth and the life here, I don’t think I’m exactly de-powering Him that much. Relatively speaking, any being that might have arisen in the universe and possessed the ability to create life and give that life a spiritual side as well is still a creator that is, for all intents and purposes, the ultimate creator…at least relative to our puny human abilities.

All Powerful

All right, maybe God isn’t everywhere at once. Maybe He isn’t all powerful with infinite abilities. Maybe He doesn’t reach beyond this planet. Regardless, this is still a level of power that might as well be infinite. I know I’d certainly give more than a passing bit of respect for such a being.

Perfect

A common criticism of God is that if He were so damn perfect, why is the world so messed up? I’ll pass on my usual argument that we humans messed it up, really. Instead, let’s define perfection. Still working on it? Good luck. Do phrases like “without error” or “faultless” really help here? If a being exists who created this world, whether as a sick game, or a social experiment, or a proving ground for spirits that He will send forth, or the setting for a strange conflict, or whatever, the fact that He created this all would make Him more perfect than any of us.

Look, if I create a story on the page, I’ve created my own world. It is, in a sense, perfect. Even if I make a continuity error or contradict something, those things can be changed to bring everything back in synch. The story hasn’t been changed substantially, but it loses the jarring element(s). If I start an ant farm in my house, I might as well be “perfect” because the changes made in those ants’ lives are being dictated by someone with almost total control over the environment.

So, perfection, like the other things I’ve mentioned, is a relative thing.

I know this post isn’t likely to turn any agnostics or atheists my way. In fact, it is probably much more likely to get me branded a heretic by some Christians for even considering these possibilities.

The point is that it doesn’t matter whether my God is master of the universe or master of the world. If the former seems too much to stomach, the latter…while easier…still makes God so much more powerful than I am that it hardly matters.

And given the level of creative and destructive powers we humans have, is it really so hard to consider that a being might exist who found it fitting to create life on this planet and who finds it necessary to remain largely invisible to us?

Aren’t we, as humans, striving toward reshaping worlds and perhaps creating our own? Don’t we conduct experiments without the knowledge of the animals or people involved sometimes? Don’t we change the nature of the game midstream at times for very good and proper reasons?

Why is it so hard to imagine a being greater than us that might do similar things for even higher purposes than our own? And wouldn’t such a being be worthy of some kind of respect, for any number of different reasons?

Drive-by Scripture, 2 Timothy 3:16

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness

Been a while since I’ve posted a drive-by scripture, so here we go, with Second Timothy, chapter 3, verse 16.

Much is made about how the word of God is infallible. In other words, the Bible is the final word and it’s not wrong in any way, shape or form.

I believe that. And I don’t believe that.

Having spoken recently on the translational issue with my post “Lost in Translation,” it should be clear that I have differing levels of regard for various translations. To some degree, even differing levels of trust.

I wholeheartedly believe that the structure of the Bible as it stands is pretty much inspired by God. The Catholics and the Protestants have a slightly different take on books that should or should not be included, but the differences are minor in the end. I believe there is value in some of the books that are not in the Protestant version, as well as some important books that are not in either Catholic nor Protestant translations of the Bible.

But at the same time, humans have had their grubby little hands all over the word of God, and mistakes, personal interpretations and the like are inevitable when human error gets brought into the mix.

But this, I think, can be a good thing as well as a challenge. While I believe that we can never truly understand God while we are in this world, tethered to our bodies and our carnal needs and desires, I believe we are meant to search for Him and seek Him continually, even if we are among the faithful.

Perhaps especially if we are among the faithful. For I believe that true faith and a closer relationship with God forces us to really think about what the Bible is trying to tell us, instead of expecting it to give us simple answers. And I think that truly coming to God forces us to question our faith, ourselves, and even the version of the word of God that we open to read.

The Plot Thickens

So, I don’t know how deep today’s message will be, but at least it has a spiritual bent to it.

Thing is, on the way to Little Girl Blue’s daycare today, I was thinking about some of the novels I’ve been reading lately. And, for that matter, thoughout my life. And it struck me that many of the novels I read have a “hero” or a very small number of heroes. That is, there is one person or a couple people who hold the fate of the plot in their hands. It might be the prophesied deliverer in a swords and sorcery epic or the brilliant tactician in a space opera or the detective who puts all the pieces together in a crime novel.

And then there are other novels and series I read, where it is more an ensemble thing, much like I am doing in my own novel. There are key characters, but no single person is the lynchpin and in some cases, critical characters will never meet or have any reason to interact.

I don’t prefer either type of novel, really, though I do appreciate the reality and complexity of an ensemble piece, even as I relish the focused drama of a hero-oriented story.

The Bible, my friends, has both aspects. Now, I’m not calling the Bible a fiction, mind you. While I think some elements are symbolic or metaphorical, overall I think it is an honest account of God’s plans and the history of humans. Yes, you can quibble over whether God really created the Earth in seven days and made Adam from the dust of the Earth, but then you’re just arguing semantics. Some very complex things are couched in simple terms. But the fact is that God created things, God has a plan for us, we have gone astray from that plan, and He made a way for us to get back in line with it.

But getting back to my original observation, the Bible gives us an epic ensemble piece in the Old Testament, and a hero/savior one in the New Testament.

The OT gives us this sweeping account of where we went wrong and all the missteps we took along the way. There are victories and defeats, successes and failures, love and anger, joy and sorrow, and so much more. Many players, some more effective than others, shape the flow and direction of the story.

And yet it is all a set-up. It’s really a prelude to the NT, when Jesus arrives. Because then we have the hero that everyone else has been paving the way for. The story God gives us takes a sudden and dramatic turn, and becomes very focused. What we end up with is Jesus’ story, and even though there are other people in the NT who are movers and shakers, they are all responding to (and uplifting) Jesus and his role in things. It’s all about the Christ and the fallout from his arrival (most of that fallout good, but with its bitter and bittersweet aspects, too).

It’s interesting that the Bible gives us the harder to absorb and more thorny ensemble piece first, and only gives us the more personal and in some ways easier to digest hero tale last.

I don’t know what that means, if anything. I just thought it was interesting to note.

For the Hell of It

So it was just a couple days ago I posted on My Black and Secret Heart, and as I noticed in the comments, and as I’ve encountered before, there is a point of view that the idea of Hell is incompatible with the idea of a loving God.

I would disagree. In part because I think we attach too much tradition and perhaps incorrect assumptions about Hell. Really, it isn’t described in detail in the Bible. Its role isn’t fully explained. It doesn’t even seem to be permanent, as it apparently gets tossed in the Lake of Fire eventually. And the Lake of Fire, for that matter, has to be at least somewhat allegorical, because I doubt that God is literally maintaining a huge lake of flames in which to toss everything.

Now, one might argue: If Hell isn’t a punishment for not following God’s rules, then why doesn’t the Bible tell us that explicitly? Well, note that the New Testament talks much about love and a relationship with God, whereas the Old Testament treats the relationship more as a master/servant or lord/subject model. And yet, God didn’t start out in an authoritarian mode with Adam. What we fail to see is that God had to snap us to attention when we broke trust, and He had to call attention to the error of our ways, and He had to bring about a way to heal the damage. It would be nice to think that the New Testament would just say, “Hell isn’t about punishment; it’s about the choice between growing and being part of God’s plans, or separating yourselves from those plans because you don’t like them.”

But you know what? That would have been kind of a hard and huge transition for the Jews of the time, or even the Gentiles. I think we are expected to have grown in our spiritual outlook and divine God’s intent to bring us into a family mode. The New Testament was written in a time of transition from the old convenant to the new convenant.

So, with that notion in mind, I’m not so sure Hell is about suffering or punishment. It may be. But I think we shouldn’t assume that. I do think that at the very least, it is separation from God, for either a very long time or forever. Again, I couldn’t say for sure either way.

But what if Hell isn’t about making us pay for our sins but about protecting creation itself? Bear with me here, as I make a slight aside.

If you haven’t seen the movie Defending Your Life, I highly recommend that you do. It’s a brilliant romantic comedy, in my opinion, and poses some interesting theological questions in the process of tickling the funny bone. The basic premise is that when we die on Earth, we go to Judgment City, where we basically stand trial to prove we have overcome our fears in life. If you prove that, you move on to the next intellectual/spiritual plane and evolve to the next level. If not, you get reincarnated to do it all over again.

Albert Brooks, sitting in the office of his Judgment City defender, is confused about all this. His defender explains that the universe is like a big machine and people are the cogs. The universe doesn’t want faulty parts, so people get sent back until they get it right. Appalled to find out just how many times he’s been sent back already through the ages, Albert Brooks’ character asks, basically, “So if I don’t prove I’m over my fears, I just get sent back over and over and over again?” To which his defender responds, “No. Eventually the universe will just throw you out.”

My point?

God doesn’t need or want people who are broken and want to stay broken. He doesn’t need people who are going to be contrary to his purpose for creation.

Let’s remember, for a moment, that we are “created in God’s image.” The angels were not. So what sets us apart from them in Heaven? I suspect it’s the fact that we have the power and potential to access and alter creation in much the same way that God can. We are far from God’s level, but imagine what we each could become, given eternity in which to develop.

Imagine what damage could be wreaked by selfish or hopeless people with even a smattering of such power.

What if the point of Heaven vs. Hell is the decision as to whether you want to move on and evolve or whether you don’t give a damn. If you don’t want to move on, you won’t. And that, I believe, is when you go to Hell.

Do you get a chance to rethink? I don’t know. Maybe in that decision you are basically saying, “Just throw me out, because I don’t want to change or grow.” Maybe you are simply erased at that point; a faulty part that had to be thrown away. Or maybe you are placed somewhere you can’t do any harm, but can continue in that static existence that you won’t shrug off.

God isn’t trying to keep people out of Heaven, but I do think He wants to ensure that those who go there really want to be there, and to be there for the right reasons.

Hell of a thought, eh?

My Black and Secret Heart

So, I was involved in the running commentary at a post over at Deus Ex Malcontent (at which my brother-in-blogging Big Man dropped in to say a few words, too) in which religion, faith, science, life, the universe and everything else is being hashed out. I think we all, over the course of things, sorted everything out that’s been bothering people for a few thousand years, so that no one needs to debate the topic again.

Or not.

But what I really want to address is a comment that I somehow evoked from someone merely, I guess, by my existence on this planet. The comment: 

Dear “Deacon Blue” spare me. All that talk about “the point is not I’m right, you’re wrong, man. I respect you.” I just spent too long browsing your blog, man.

Why don’t you tell us how we poor sinners (that you totally respect, man) burn in hell, tortured forever because we don’t think like you think. How does that gibe with your whole respect bullshit “I just ain’t sayin’ I’m right” crap? Because seems to sinner me that you think you’re right. No matter what you say, in your black and secret heart you know everyone, but your own personal groupthink will burn.

You’re full of shit, bro. Why do you feel the need to misrepresent, yo?

Religion sucks. (What is the difference between a Methodist and a Presbyterian anyway?) But if it wasn’t about god, people would still kill each other for equally stupid things.

My reply to Clessie in that comment thread could be described as less than diplomatic, since I don’t see how anyone could actually spend any significant time perusing my blog and getting this impression of me and I loathe being misrepresented. If any of y’all agree with him/her, and really think that I’m that much of an ass deep down (or not so deep) around here, by all means point out where I have failed. But really, that’s not the point of this post.

The point is to discuss my BLACK AND SECRET HEART.

Apparently, I believe that everyone outside my personal “groupthink” will burn. So, is Clessie right? Is that what I believe? Yeah. No. It depends.

Does she mean that I believe that people who don’t read the Bible and haven’t verbally claimed Jesus as Lord and been baptized and all that are definitely going to Hell, every last one of them?

No.

But if she means that I think those who are not ”born again” will receive some sort of punishment that we only have the name “Hell” to really go by at the moment…well…

Yes.

So, now that I’ve been thoroughly confusing, let me explain. My father-in-law, a pretty spiritually conservative Christian preacher, likes to say that there are plenty of people who are born again and don’t even know it. Not just Christians who don’t think they are worthy enough for Heaven and assume they will burn who are born again. He means people that aren’t Christian at all. Who might not even have given two seconds of thought to whether Jesus is literally the son of God.

Personally, I believe that there are Jews who are born again. Atheists who are born again. Indigenous people along the Amazon River who are born again. Yes, even some lawyers and politicians who are born again. Believe it or not. Being born again is a spiritual thing. It’s about seeking to shed the sinful, hurtful self that is bogged down in base desires and letting the spirit in and letting it shine through.

Now, personally, I think Jesus is the son of God. I believe that he died for all of our sins, past, present and future. I believe that the surest way to Heaven is to turn to Jesus with an open mind, heart and soul. To put your faith in him.

By the same token, I think the surest way to career success is to take a lot of AP classes in high school, get into a good college, apply yourself there, and then apply yourself to life with everything you’ve got. That being said, there are some pretty successful folks who didn’t apply themselves much early in life or, for that matter, even obtain college degrees.

But the notion that God is going to send every single person to Hell who doesn’t verbally proclaim His son their personal savior while still here on Earth is patently absurd to me. Not everyone has access to the Bible. Not everyone even has access to missionaries. Not everyone even knows that there ever was a guy named Jesus of Nazareth and that there is any reason to take him seriously once they hear about him.

There are people who are raised in homes with other belief systems. There are people raised in homes with no faith-based upbringing at all. There are people who only encounter idiot Christians and obnoxious Evangelists in life. There are people who have too much despair to even consider the life hereafter because they can’t imagine getting through the one on this planet.

I’m not saying that all you have to do is “be a good person” to get salvation. Some mean and rotten tempered people will get into Heaven, too. And some folks you would categorize as the sweetest people around won’t get in at all.

Some people will burn in Hell, if indeed burning is what happens there. Or they’ll be erased from existence. Or they’ll have some eternity of more of the same of what they lived through on Earth, over and over. Or they come back as bugs. Or they create their own personal hell. Or, for all I know, they’ll sit on hunks of ice being forced to deep-throat porcupines.

I just don’t know those details. But not everyone is going to make it to Heaven. Frankly, deep down, I think there are plenty of people who don’t want to be there or accept God even if He reveals Himself to them. I wholeheartedly believe going to Hell will be their own choice in that matter. No one’s getting tricked into Hell. No one gets some sucker punch from God, as far as I can imagine. God isn’t trying to damn people. He wants them to choose the right path. But that’s just it, He gives them a choice.

I don’t know what Judgment Day is going to look like for any sinner, myself or otherwise. But I believe that what it’s going to come down to is whether you want to hold on to all that crap you had in life or not. Do you want to remain anchored to your conceits, your desires, your hates, your fears and all other nastiness and pettiness that you and I hold so dear down here on Earth?

Fine, hold on to that anchor if you want, and it will pull you down into whatever damnation is. Or, let it go, embrace God, and choose love, knowledge, growth. I admit that I’m attached to a lot of things here on Earth, but no so attached that I want them for eternity. I want more than this world offers. I want to know what it is like to truly love, to truly shed things that hold me back, to truly touch the universe and not just see it.

Is all of this strictly biblical? No. It isn’t. But the Bible is, sadly, frustratingly vague on some details, and archaic in its imagery. Jesus healed people of illnesses of the body and mind. But when he freed a person’s mind from madness, he didn’t talk about using his powers to reset their neurotransmitters. People believed in demons. So he couched it in those terms. The Bible wasn’t written for the kind of knowledge and awareness we have today; God expects us to be able to fill in the blanks in a lot of places and make the connections.

We fall short, and we remain apart from Him. But He wants us to reach out.

So, that, Clessie, is my “black and secret heart.” The belief that people too selfish to open up and throw off the crap will reap a bitter end. That people who want something better and can admit to their own failings and sins will reap something sweeter.

If that is indicative of a black and secret heart, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m not talking about Heaven being only for those people who learned the secret Christian handshake before they died.

God isn’t looking for Christians. God is looking for His children to come home. If you don’t want to be part of the family, Clessie, that will be your choice. And no one can take that choice from you.

Two-fer Tuesday: Extra Mustard by Miz Pink

So, I’m taking over this Tuesday and I’m picking the topic this time: Mustard Seeds.

I have to give credit where its due…to the pastor who preached this past Sunday on Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 13, verses 31-33 and verses 44-49. What I’m really interested in today is this part of that Bible study:

31 He presented another parable to them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field; 32 and this is smaller than all other seeds, but when it is full grown, it is larger than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that THE BIRDS OF THE AIR come and NEST IN ITS BRANCHES.”

To a lesser extent, I’m also going to talk about this one, even though it doesn’t have mustard as a condiment:

33 He spoke another parable to them, “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”

The pastor made an interesting point about the mustard seed, in that it doesn’t really produce a tree. I found some references to an actual “mustard tree” of some sort with some quick Googling, but mostly I think Jesus was talking about the herb, and various translations Jesus is quoted as saying something more along the lines of “herb” or “shrub” instead of “garden plants” which reinforces this.

I’m not going to fault Jesus for any confusion here. First, parables, much like metaphorical points we make in discussion and arguments, aren’t always precise, ya know? We use exageration and we gloss over inconvenient details because the point is to…well…make a point. Also, he may have been intentionally mixing the idea of the herb and the tree, even if they comes from very different seeds. Jesus was a deep and complex guy so who knows how many levels there are to this parable?

Anyway, the point the pastor made was that the mustard shrub is very much a weed, really. It is invasive and most people wouldn’t want mustard seeds sprouting in their gardens for fear that the mustard shrubs might choke out the desired plants.

And he made the point that Jesus did this on purpose to turn people’s expectations on their head and make them look at the world in a revolutionary way. He was telling his listeners that the kingdom of God was going to spread like a weed. And that in growing and spreading there would also be some chaos and some discomfort. And he didn’t compare the kingdom of heaven to something grand, like the cedars of Lebanon, but to something lowly instead which reminds me of how God make wisdom from foolish things and produces strength from supposedly weak people.

The leaven parable, he noted, was also something that used imagery that Jesus’s audience might not have found comfortable. Think of how in one of the most holy days of the Jews, Passover, the focus is on unleavened bread. And in general, many breads of the region in those days were unleavened. To some extent, yeast/leaven wasn’t a good thing. So for Jesus to use it as an example to describe the kingdom of God might, again, be a way to shake people up.

We like to see Jesus as some placid guy who was really sweet. We forget that he overturned the tables of the money changers in the temple and whipped them out with a length of rope. We forget that he cursed a fig bush for not having fruit on it. We forget that he could be sharp, short and even sarcastic with people.

Jesus was all about love but he also had a bit of mischief in him. He knew how to shake things up. We need to remember that about him and about the new convenant. It isn’t about peace and quiet.

It’s about turning things on their heads sometimes.

(Click here for Deke’s post on today’s topic)

Two-fer Tuesday: Extra Mustard by Deacon Blue

So, I let Miz Pink pick the topic this Tuesday, and it’s my fault that I’m posting our Two-fer Tuesday stuff almost at the end of the day, mere minutes from midnight, meaning it’s almost Wednesday. Partly my day has been busy; partly I wanted to see what Miz Pink would say about her passages from Matthew before I spouted off on another mustard seed parable, the one with which probably more people are familiar:

“Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, ‘Why could we not cast it out?’ He said to them, ‘Because of your little faith. For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.” Matthew chapter 17, verses 19-20

Or this one from the Gospel of Luke:

“The apostles said to the Lord, ‘Increase our faith!’ The Lord replied. ‘If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.’” Luke chapter 17, verses 5-6

I’ve always believed mostly, and made my points about these passages, based on the idea that what Jesus was saying that we don’t really need much faith to do big things, but that even so, most of us are so rooted in the real world and our daily troubles and doubts that we cannot even muster up a mustard seed’s size worth of faith.

I still do believe that is part of what he meant, but I also now believe, after taking much of the day to digest Miz Pink’s post after she sent it to me, that there are other layers as well. Two of them, at least.

First, something I read here, which says that the mustard seed is “probably the most tightly packed seed of all. There is no place for air inside it. Later we shall see that air is the dominion of the devil. As a result it can withstand high pressures and high temperatures. Your faith may not be an all encompassing faith, that fills the totality of your personality, being and activity. Initially it is restricted to only a certain section of your being or personality or activity.”

Now, I’m not sure if Jesus really knew horticulture all that well. I know he is the only begotten son of God, and had access to all sorts of knowledge, but I’m not so sure he was pulling on such complex knowledge of the seed and expecting anyone to get that reference. But still, it’s an interesting point, so I thought I’d share it, and I think it is reasonable to think that Jesus might have hid something just this complex, deep and mostly incomprehensible to his audience in there for future generations to discover.

The second extra layer of this mustard seed parable is this: I don’t think it’s all about the size, but about where you go with your faith. Thinking of the fact that Miz Pink points out the mustard plant’s weed-like nature, and the fact that weeds grow like, ummm, weeds—I think that perhaps one of the bigger things Jesus might have been getting at in this parable is the potential for growth.

That is, the mustard seed starts small, but can grow much more abundantly and ambitiously than you might think such a small thing would be capable of doing. So, having faith the size of a mustard seed is to have a faith that might be small now, but has the potential and likelihood to grow much more. To grow to the point that you could make a mountain move with but a word from your mouth. But most of us don’t have the fortitude to generate that kind of growth. Most of us are seeds that produce, at most, a small flower or a blade of grass.

In any case, I have yet to produce the mustard-sized faith that Jesus talks about. Instead, I’m stuck with ketchup and relish, but as with all things, I will forge ahead with what I have and not be all “woe is me” about what I don’t have. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll find that mustard seed in me one day.

Old school part 3 – Look at them muscles!

Got so many things I’m juggling now topic- and series-wise in this blog I done forgot all about my “Old School” series on the Old Testament. Just a quickie today, and our star this time is Samson. His tale is told in the Book of Judges (chapters 13-16), but you can get a good summary about him at Wikipedia here if you’re not already boned up on the story.

OK, so do I buy this story? Absolutely.

I don’t have any quibbles with this story and I don’t feel any need to qualify it or couch it in “reality” or find a “plausible” explanation of anything in there. Samson was who he was and he did what it was said that he did.

And some of you shout: “But Deacon, c’mon! Magic hair? You mean to tell me you believe that Samson had his strength because of his long hair and lost it because his second wife Delilah cut it off? Jeez you’re a simpleton.”

I don’t have a problem with the Samson tale because he didn’t have magic hair. The hair doesn’t really matter when you get down to it. Not in and of itself, anyway. The issue here was obedience and faith. Samson’s hair had nothing to do with his strength except insofar as God had instructed that he not cut it. Much like in the Garden of Eden, God gave a really simple rule, and like Adam and Eve, Samson messed around and broke faith with God. And that’s why his strength went away.

Samson got cocky, he got involved with a woman who was drop-dead sexy (and married her for pretty much that reason alone it seems), and he ended up thinking with his dick and his pride in the end instead of keeping faith with God. So he told Delilah the secret of his strength and she cut off his hair. You could argue that since he didn’t cut his own hair off God should have let him keep those turbo-boosted muscles, but the point is that Samson didn’t take God’s rule seriously. He gave in to Delilah’s pestering and put himself at risk, and I guess he just figured it wouldn’t matter and God would just protect him.

But that’s the story of the Hebrews and God throughout the Old Testament. He saves them, they get complacent and disobedient, He lets them get enslaved or conquered again, they get to a point where they beg for help, He saves them…and the cycle repeats. Samson was a real person but he also served as a metaphor for the Hebrew people as a whole.

It isn’t until Samson is bound to those pillars at the end of the story, when he reaches out to God in faith and humility and sorrow, that his strength is returned. And it ain’t because his hair had grown back by that time, even though that Wikipedia entry I noted above sort of suggests that.

It’s because he had faith, and God answered that faith because it came from Samson’s heart.

God can be a hard father at times, but He does love us and does listen. But first, we have to listen to Him. 

Click here for Part 1 of the Old School series
Click here for Part 2 of the Old School series

Old school part 2 – Got an umbrella?

Today, we’re going to tackle the Great Flood. You know, Noah. The ark. Two of every beast. His sons and their wives? 40 days and nights of rain?

As we all know from the Bible, God was quite wroth with mankind for being so nastily sinful and for completely disregarding His will, and so He flooded the whole Earth and killed everyone and everything that wasn’t on the ark, and…

(Chuckle. Snort. Heh he.)

*Ahem* And those folks repopulated the Earth to the level of species diversity we have today, and billions and billions of people, and this was some 6,000 or 7,000 years ago. And so…

Ummmm….

And so this…

Hah ha. BWAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Heeeee. Whoo!

I don’t think so.

Look, I’m not saying God didn’t bring a flood. I’m not saying there wasn’t a Noah or an ark. What I’m saying is that while I don’t think the tale is metaphorical, given that Jesus actually preached Noah as a real person and wasn’t a person prone to lying, I don’t think it’s precisely as cut-and-dried as most fundamentalist folk would have you believe.

Look, there is just no way the ark that Noah built would have big enough for two of everything. Also, what about all the trees and bushes and stuff? I think 40 days of flooding would have done a number on the foliage, don’t you? And this very small sample of humanity and husbandry was able to spread across the world in several thousand years? Look, God can work big miracles. But this shit just doesn’t jibe with history and the archeological evidence of primitive people at all.

So, what did happen? I see two most-likely scenarios.

First, God did indeed flood the whole world, but it happened millions of years ago. That’s a nice simple answer. As I mentioned in the post for Old School, Part 1, the family trees laid out in the Bible likely skipped over untold numbers of generations to focus on the key predecessors to Jesus.

Second option is that God flooded the “known world” of Noah and the folks around him. That is, God flooded a very, very large region of land, most likely in the Middle East, and everything pretty much played out as described in the story. I still think this would have happened far more than 6,000 or 7,000 years ago, but way less than a million.

Frankly, I like the second option better. The thing about God is that while He can do very large, dramatic miracles, He doesn’t generally do that. God’s much more into subtlety and long-range planning. He prefers to put people and events into motion to create a chain, sort of like a huge bunch of dominoes that knock each other over across an unimaginably large landscape to form innumerable possibilities and eventually knock out certain results that God wants.

One of those results—the most important result of God’s planning in fact—was Jesus. God picked the Hebrews as His “Chosen People” for a number of reasons, but one of them was to define a specific group from which Jesus would be born. And it took a long time to get events to play out for the people and time and circumstances to be right for Jesus’ entry into the world.

What I believe is that Noah and his neighbors were one of the earliest precursors to the Hebrews. Way before Abraham and the first covenant and all that. God intended those people to keep on breeding and growing and eventually producing what would be his officially Chosen People when the time was ripe. But they were a foul bunch and not fit to bring forth Jesus at any point. People were just that bad. Seeing that there was only one really righteous man, Noah (and presumably his family was at least nominally righteous), God wiped out the rest of the folks in the region to start with a clean slate.

This makes the ark a plausible vehicle and the two-by-two crap no longer looks like crap. Yes, some repopulation was necessary because new entries of animals from other areas would take a while, but there was no need to repopulate an entire world—only the world of the pre-Hebrew folks that God had to mostly destroy to make the path to Jesus’ birth possible.

Click here for Part 1 of the Old School series