What it means to be Christian

1 Corinthians 9:19-27 (my translation, modified literal)

“Because, being free from everything I enslaved myself to everyone, so that I might gain more; and I became to the Judeans as a Judean, so that I would gain Judeans; to those under a rule as under a rule, not being myself under a rule, so that I would gain those under a rule; to those without a rule as without a rule, not being without a rule of God but within the rule of Christ, so that I might gain those without a rule; I became weak to those weak, so that I would gain those weak; to everyone I have become everything, so that I would rescue any of them at all. Yet I do everything because of the Gospel, so that I would become one who holds in common together with it.

Don’t you see that, on the one hand, everyone running in a stadium runs, yet on the other hand one receives the award? Run such so that you seize it. And every person who competes abstains from everything, those on the one hand then so that they would receive a decaying crown, but we an undecaying one. I then run such as not uncertainly, I box such as not hitting air; but I wear out my body and and lead it into slavery, lest I myself become somehow unqualified after preaching to others.”

This is St. Paul living out what Jesus taught in every Gospel,

“If anyone wants to follow behind Me, let him disown himself and pick up his cross and let him follow Me. Because whoever would wish to rescue his soul will destroy it; yet whoever would destroy his soul because of Me and the Gospel will rescue it.” (Matthew 8:34b-35, my translation, modified literal)

St. Paul removed from himself everything that he had once held an attachment to, everything with which he once identified himself with, in order that he might gain Jesus Christ:

“But those things which were a gain to me, I have held these things to be damages because of Christ. But on the contrary I am also holding everything to be damages because of the superiority of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my owner, because of whom I lost everything, and I have held it garbage, so that I would gain Christ...” (Philippians 3:7-8, my translation, modified literal)

St. Paul just let go of everything which got in the way of Jesus Christ, whether it was a personal possession, a heritage, a doctrine, or a religious rule which might have been dear to him. Like Christ, he emptied himself even as he told the Philippians:

“Be mindful of this thing among you which is also in Christ Jesus, who existing in the shape of God didn’t treasure being equal with God, but emptied Himself taking a form of a slave, becoming in the appearance of a human being;” (Philippians 2:5-7, my translation, modified literal)

St. Paul emptied himself becoming everything to everyone because Jesus Christ emptied Himself becoming everything to everyone. He recognized that those rules, cultural, societal, or religious with which we make to bind ourselves and to which we cling are arbitrary and must give way to Jesus Christ living His life through us. What good is a Gospel preached with which we ourselves are not participants? What good are we if we disqualify ourselves by holding on to other things and not sacrificing ourselves, disciplining our own minds and bodies to adhere to Christ instead of everything else?

Pardon my French, but St. Paul wasn’t screwing around. His adherence to Jesus Christ was no joke. Because of this, he wrote:

“Become mimics of me just as I also am of Christ.” (1 Corinthians 11:1, my translation, modified literal)

And this is the heart of what it actually means to be a Christian. Listening to, following, and imitating Jesus Christ and giving up everything which gets in the way of Jesus Christ regardless of what it may be. The heart of what it means to be a Christian is Jesus Christ.

A Ramble About Sylvanas Windrunner

I’m a World of Warcraft player. That should be no secret to whoever knows me. I really started playing Warcraft way back with Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness, and have played in the world of Azeroth on and off ever since. I’m also something of a “Loremaster” for the World of Warcraft, both as a titled achievement in-game and as someone who actually has researched the story and lore behind the storylines and world it is set in. As such, I’m pretty familiar with the heroes and villains, and what made them that way within the stories which Warcraft has to tell.

As someone who knows the story behind the undead playable race and their queen, Sylvanas Windrunner, the more it crosses my mind, the more I think the game’s creators and story tellers at Blizzard should be ashamed of themselves, and should really have thought twice about the direction they have taken this character and the people she leads.

Sylvanas Windrunner started her life in the Warcraft world as a hero of the elven peoples of Quel’Thalas. She was a ranger-general of Silvermoon, and a protector of the elven nation. In the story of Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos, during the campaigns, she is brutally murdered by the Lich King while defending her people. As a further insult and violation of this woman, he held her ghost in thrall and forced her to serve him as a banshee, hiding her body from her. Yes, Sylvanas Windrunner was a victim of a brutal crime and a horrendous violation. In some ways, you could even compare her to a rape victim. In spite of this, she was eventually able to break free of the Lich King’s control, find her body and restore herself to it, though still a corpse, and then free a large number of her people from his control as well, establishing the Forsaken nation as the remnants of the former kingdom of Lordaeron. Instead of exercising control over those undead people as the Lich King did, forcing them to serve her, she gave them back their free will to live out the rest of their existences as they so pleased.

Something also which must be understood about the undead race within the lore of the game. These are essentially plague victims who themselves were murdered in mass and then forced to serve the Lich King until they were freed. They had no choice as to what they became. Many had families who did not rise from the graveyards with them. More still had human family members elsewhere in the world who turned their backs on them when it was learned what had happened to them. These undead people, through no fault of their own, were hunted by self-righteous fanatics in their own lands. All rights to their property had been stripped away from them by the remaining human legal authorities because of the plague of undeath which had infected them. Though retaining who they were prior to the crime which had been imposed upon them, they were treated as monsters before they even had a chance to prove they were still the people they had been.

So, this is the background for Blizzard’s choices in their new storyline for the expansion, Battle for Azeroth where Sylvanas Windrunner is now unquestionably evil, slaughtering her own people when they dare to defy her and murdering thousands of people just to watch the hope die from a single person’s eyes.

And here is what I find particularly offensive, the message that Blizzard is sending by stating that because she is undead, because her people are undead, they must be evil. Think about that for a second. Not because of who they are, but because they are a certain race they must be evil. Because they are different, they must be bad. And this against a woman who was brutally violated and against a people who suffered and were brutalized horribly to begin with! And it flies in the face of all the lore and story which came before which portrayed heroes and virtuous characters from either faction and from every race: Thrall, the heroic Orc warchief; Bishop Alonsus Faol, the heroic undead priest of the Light; King Varian Wrynn, the heroic human king of Stormwind; Varok Saurfang, the heroic Orc general, and many others.

The whole point of there being two playable factions in Warcraft is to see that it is not always as simple as good and evil. It’s to see that there are reasons behind people’s motivations, and that you are not “good” or “evil” just because you happen to have been lucky enough to be born into a certain race or gender.

The writers at Blizzard, I believe, have totally forgotten this simple principle. They have, in a way, further brutalized the character of this woman who suffered horribly and yet still managed to somehow survive and try and make things better for her people who suffered with her. In my opinion, that is abominable and the writers at Blizzard should be ashamed of themselves.

A Ramble About Karmic Weather Patterns

I shared this in an email with a pastor friend of mine years ago before I had this blog. With everything which has happened with us lately, I was reminded of it and wanted to post it here.

Just as there are weather patterns produced by air currents, temperatures, moisture, etc. So also there are a kind of "weather patterns" of Karma. Now, the word "Karma" comes from Sanskrit (karman), and literally means "work" or "action". It is the 1:1 equivalent of the ancient Greek word ergon. It also has the connotation of the consequences which result from the action which is taken. You walk out in the rain without an umbrella, you get wet. You have sexual intercourse, there's likely to be a pregnancy. You help someone with the groceries, they're likely to be thankful. Here I take Karma to mean, not only the actions one takes, but also implying the consequences which result from those actions taken.

On Earth, there exists several different kinds of weather patterns depending on where you live in the world. In some parts of the world it happens to be sunny skies and temperate conditions most of the year, such as Southern California. In other parts of the world it happens to rain most of the year and can be wet and miserable, as in such places as Papua New Guinea or the Amazon. In some places, the weather is always hot and dry, such as Yuma, Arizona, or such as in Egypt or the African Sahara. All of these things depend on the currents of air pressure, moisture, ocean temperatures, and how they gather and move across the surface of the Earth so that weather in such a far away place as Australia may have a direct impact on farmers in Canada whether that seems possible or not. In some places, the weather patterns become so violent that hurricanes and tornadoes form, ripping through anything which stands in their way.

Every action taken by a human being has real effects and consequences, not just for that human being, but also for every other human being who may or may not come into contact, direct or indirect, with the one who acted. When you have X number of actions taken by Y number of people not only alive today, but also throughout history, what you get is a kind of Karmic weather system of chain reactions and "currents" which impact different people in different ways. Around some people these currents coalesce into a stable, pleasant environment where everything seems to just go right for that person. Around others, it creates storm systems and even hurricanes in which the person must hold on for dear life. For some, they receive an even mix of fair and foul weather. For others, it's heavily weighted in one direction or the other. Now the first thing which must be noted is that these currents may be affected by the person's own actions, and most certainly will be, but they are not necessarily caused by that person's own actions.

I think the way I think, and live the way I live largely because of all the different influences and interactions in my life, positive or negative, from my parents, grandparents, teachers, world events, textbooks, friends, enemies, wife, children, and a host of other people with whom I have had direct and indirect contact over the course of my life, and of course God Himself. I speak English because of the actions of English immigrants and settlers almost four hundred years ago in settling along the northeast coastline of North America. I am mostly culturally Californian because of the actions of my grandparents in moving and settling here in Southern California long before I existed. Who I am is largely made up of the consequences of the actions taken and choices made by other people, including even my physical body which is the direct result of the choices my parents made as to who their sexual partner was to be. This holds true for my grandparents, great-grandparents, and every ancestor I am aware of or am not aware of. And not only this, but this holds true for, not only myself, but for every human being who has ever existed, does exist, or will exist. The only one for whom it does not hold true is God Himself who is entirely "other". The consequences even of the actions of kings or beggars thousands of years ago still continue to swirl around us and impact who we are today whether we know their names or not.

We have the option to react one way or the other to these Karmic weather patterns. The choices we make will send new currents and chain reactions out to other people as well as ourselves. This is why it is so important to choose compassion and not selfishness. To choose either to help or be still and not to harm. To give, and not take. It is not only us who reap what we sow, but everyone else has to harvest it too.

A Ramble About Feeling God's Presence

Recently on Facebook, twice now on my feed I have seen a meme which says something to the effect of “You can really only ever enjoy two things in life, Serotonin and Dopamine.” For those that don’t know, these are two neurotransmitters in the human nervous system which have to do with feelings of pleasure and well being. Chemically or neurologically speaking, you can’t feel happy without these two chemicals being released into the synapses of your brain..

I was reflecting on this at church this morning during the worship part of the service. The church we currently attend has a contemporary type worship service with a band and regular worship leaders and singers. Those who sing and lead worship are very good at what they do and I dare say could probably sing professionally. The music being sung and the feeling in the room are positive, uplifting, and as I was watching, most people participating had their arms outstretched and were singing with profound emotion lead in various ways by the meaning of the words, the sincere expressions of those leading it, and the melodies and beat of the music.

There is nothing wrong with feeling sincere emotion during a church service. People are frequently affected emotionally in a positive way and are moved to devotion, love, faith, and repentance by that emotional outpouring. Let me be clear about that before I go on so that I am not misunderstood.

Frequently, in many church services and in many churches that I have attended, people make the mistake that what they are feeling at the moment is the Holy Spirit. Now, it is perfectly possible for the Holy Spirit to bring about those feelings in the same way that being with a much loved friend or significant other can bring about those feelings. But where the problem comes in, and I have seen and heard this from people, is that when those feelings die down, they feel like somehow God has left them. In response to this, they then do whatever they can to bring about the return of those positive feelings and “get pumped for Jesus” in order to “revive” the Holy Spirit within them.

It is a mistake to confuse the Holy Spirit's presence or control with emotion. I have experienced both enough times in my life to have established a baseline for recognizing both. Emotion feels great for a time and makes you more susceptible to follow the crowd around you. It's a little like intoxication, removing inhibitions and making you feel more than you are due to the increased flow of those neurotransmitters I mentioned at the beginning of this Ramble. When the emotions die down however, it's like crashing after a high and the person wonders why the "Spirit" has left, sometimes even doubting their salvation or whether or not God really loves them.

The control and presence of the Holy Spirit is an entirely different experience. When this has happened with me, there has rarely been any change in my emotional state, but I often suddenly know things or say things that I wouldn't or couldn't have before. I am able to empathize with and see into other people in ways that are not naturally possible for me. There is a lovingkindness and compassion that projects from within out towards the other person, or towards me personally. This possession by Him tends to be calm, and if there are any emotions attached to it, they never originate with me. I have felt both His overwhelming love, and His intense anger, as well as His resignation to a humanity that is hell bent on destroying itself. But there is always that knowing sense that it is a cooperation and not from me.

The truth is that God does not leave. By the very nature of His existence, He is literally everywhere you are, and everywhere any part of creation exists. There are times when He allows us to have an almost tangible awareness of this constant presence around and within us, but there are also times when it seems like either He withdraws our awareness of His presence, or we simply stop paying attention to His constant presence and lose our awareness of it that way. And when those times happen it can feel as though we have been plunged into a pitch dark room, and we can begin to panic.

The thing about rooms when they are pitch dark, there is no real difference to them than when all the lights were turned on. The design of the room hasn’t changed. The furniture hasn’t been moved. It’s exactly the same as when the lights were on. The only thing which has changed is our ability to sense it, and this is what causes the panic which rises within us.

The emotional lows which can happen through either the worship feelings wearing off or from bad circumstances happening around us can make it feel like we’ve been plunged into that pitch dark room. The crash from the high created by the dialing back of the Serotonin and Dopamine to be replaced by neurotransmitters dealing with stress and fear responses can be terrifying and depressing. But none of these chemical emotional reactions give any real indication of how near or far God is from us. Whether we are feeling positive or negative has no bearing on the reality of His presence around us or His concern or care for us or anyone else. Just because the light has been turned off, doesn’t mean the room has changed. Just because the music fades, doesn’t mean He’s not still there. God can stir emotions, but He is not emotion. There can be good feelings associated with Him, but He is not those good feelings.

Understanding the difference takes time and experience getting to know Him, and it’s very easy to allow yourself to make this mistake as you try and discern the distinction between Him and your own thoughts, emotions, and inner demons. His voice and promptings, His “cues”, are frequently quiet, and all too easily ignored or missed if you’re not intentionally paying attention, and can be missed altogether if you’re too caught up in your own “stuff.” They may be of profound import, or they may even seem somewhat mundane but in your best interests.

The other night, I wanted to go and get some kind of cereal. I’ve been having more stomach issues lately due to stress, and sometimes it can help settle my stomach. But instead of going to the “cheap” supermarket I normally would, I got the distinct direction to go to the store that I knew would be more expensive. Since I also knew that I’d be able to get my wife’s salad mix there cheaper (ironically) than at the “cheap” store, I headed over to the more expensive one, and if I were to be honest, not really expecting to find anything. When I picked up the salad mix, I headed over to the cereal aisle to find something. Lo and behold, the only cold cereal which my whole family can eat (my family having severe food allergies) was on sale for $1.99 a box, almost half off the regular price. It was a little thing, and certainly not earth shatteringly important, but He directed me to that particular store against all conventional wisdom to find the only cereal we could eat on sale. It was not an emotion, it was not a feeling positive or negative, it was just this inaudible understanding that I should go to the other store instead of the one I had intended to. No further explanation, not telling me what I would find there, or even what I was looking for exactly. Just “I think you should head to this place instead of that place.”

There is a term used among ancient Christian writers called a “Holy Darkness”. It’s used to describe this inability to use our senses to experience God as He is. It’s the pitch black room we have to navigate in our getting to know Him personally. It’s the understanding that He is something “other” than our brain trying to interpret the world around it. This Holy Darkness can be disorienting much as the room without light. But with experience and patience, it can be navigated and explored and in the process of doing so we discover the One who has been there all along.

More Thoughts on Hamartia

So, I’ve been going through this series on neurology and the origins of human individuality from the Great Courses recently. In the last set of lectures I was watching he was discussing the role of the amygdalae and the frontal cortex play in aggression. As I was watching, the list which Paul gave in his letter to the Galatians of the "works of the flesh" came into my mind. And as I was thinking about it, what I realized was that everything in this list in Galatians can be attributed to a limbic system response, and in particular is an aggression response governed by the amygdalae and the frontal cortex.

The human limbic system controls the base responses which in psychology and neurology are known as the four “f”s: feeding, fleeing, fighting, and… sex. To take my initial observation further, we can also say that virtually every Hamartia response, everything we can functional describe as a “sin”, is also controlled by the limbic system, the amygdalae and frontal cortex in particular, because every response which is considered to be a hamartia response invariably involves fear, aggression, sex, or feeding in some way. Murder, theft, adultery, outbursts of anger, jealousy, etc. are all ultimately limbic system responses.

I have written about my hypothesis that the amygdalae in particular might have something to do with the hamartia disorder because this is the first thing which stands out when comparing the size of the human brain and its components to the size of the brain of our closest genetic cousin, the chimpanzee, who does not appear to have this disorder. The human amygdalae, relatively speaking, are larger than the chimpanzee’s. Related to this is the frontal cortex which is also larger in humans, relatively speaking, than in chimpanzees. The human frontal cortex is larger and more developed than any other animal, and is responsible for inhibition and disinhibition of behaviors. You could say that it is the human frontal cortex which is the gatekeeper for “right” and “wrong” behavior and is responsible for holding back “inappropriate” behaviors based on societal and cultural norms.

It is also the frontal cortex which is partly implicated in ADHD, Clinical Sociopathy, and Autistic Spectrum Disorder. The frontal cortex is not fully developed until age 25 in human beings, and explains why children and young adults are prone to impulsive decision making because their frontal cortices are not complete.

This latter point reminds me of when Jesus said, "unless you become as a child you will not enter the kingdom of heaven." Consider how children behave and their decision making. It also brings to mind the long standing idea of the age of accountability where a young child is not held as responsible for their “sins” because they are too young to understand. It also reminds me of Jesus’ teaching, and Paul’s, of non-judgment. Non-judgment is virtually the exact opposite of what the human frontal cortex wants to do. It wants to say “this action is correct” and “that action is incorrect” and it appears like it wants to do this for not only its own person but also for those others with whom it comes into contact.

The thought also occurs to me that in thinking about hamartia, we tend to have it backwards. We often define hamartia by its symptoms: selfishness, theft, murder, anger, etc. But many of these things are demonstrated in the animal world, and most animals evolved in such a way that they instinctively prioritize the passing on of their own individual genes at the expense of their rivals. Consider this. For Billions of years, animals have behaved like animals and the planet has been no worse the wear for it. For at least one hundred thousand years, homo sapiens also more or less behaved this way, even with a larger cerebral cortex than most animals, and there was no detrimental impact to the planet as a whole. And then Hamartia was introduced by what I am coming to believe were an enlarged frontal cortex, amygdalae, and a reduction in mirror neurons due to a toxin consumed by the ancestors of all homo sapiens currently living. Within the span of a blink of an eye in evolutionary terms, homo sapiens have overrun the planet, driven massive numbers of other species to extinction, and are on the verge of damaging the planet’s environment beyond repair. Hamartia is not the existence of wrong actions, it’s the error in processing that arbitrarily determines something to be right or wrong.

Lastly, I am reminded too of Paul’s teaching that God judges a person based, not on His arbitrary code of conduct or behavior, but on the code of conduct or behavior which that individual person recognizes. God counts as sin, or Hamartia, what the individual counts as sin or wrongdoing according to Romans 2. But where there is no such code of conduct, there is no “sin” to be held accountable. Thus, even though animals kill, steal, rape, and run around naked etc. they do not “sin” because their frontal cortices are not shouting at them that their actions are wrong in some way.

So, if the frontal cortex is the problem, isn’t it surgically possible to correct it? No. It isn’t, and this is why; human society is based around this concept of societal rules and norms. It’s based on actions being either right or wrong. Without a functioning frontal cortex governing this, human civilization would collapse completely, and while that might be best for the planet as a whole, it would be horrendous for every human being alive right now. Millions of people would die. There is literally no way for a human being to return to a pre-Hamartia state biologically speaking. The damage was done thousands of years ago, and human beings have adapted to it in such a way that it is biologically and sociologically irreversible. Paul himself acknowledged this in his letters when he spoke about death as being the only way to be released from the Hamartia disorder.

Thus the need for Jesus’ own death on the cross and our entanglement with His death so that it becomes our own.

A Ramble About Being Powerless

I feel powerless right now. Totally and utterly powerless as I sit here typing on my laptop. The circumstances surrounding myself and my family feel like they’ve reached a crescendo which there is literally nothing I can do. The demons, whether they be literal or figurative depending on your point of view, which seem to have habitually harassed myself and my family for decades now seem to be on an all out no holds bar assault on multiple fronts and I just feel totally powerless against them.

And all I can do is pray.

Often, this last line is seen as something which is said out of desperation. Often, many people see reaching out to an unseen higher power, regardless of the higher power in question, as one step removed from lunacy. I have actually been accused of this when defending my faith against a friend once.

All I can do now is pray.

Thing is, I feel powerless, but amidst all the anxiety and depression which that feeling brings on, I also feel a strange peace as well. In recognizing that I am powerless amidst all this, I am only accepting reality as it is… as it always is. It is an illusion that we cling to to say that we have power over our own lives. We are responsible for our choices, but we cannot control the storm of choices, decisions, and interactions among other people and events which affect our lives. That storm constantly rages even when we are oblivious to it and we are affected by it even if we had nothing to do with creating it or the direction it takes; much like the hurricanes which recently hit the eastern coast of the United States, or the fires which are hitting northern and southern California right now destroying thousands of buildings, taking lives, and creating devastation which none of those in its path were responsible for in any way.

As a Christian, the recognition of my personal powerlessness is a necessity for drawing closer to God through Jesus Christ. You see, human beings have this habit of not relying on God for anything unless they feel it’s impossible for them. We have this contradictory habit of thinking that we know what is best, we have the power to chart our own course, we can somehow alter the storm or somehow we are in command of it. As a result, God allows the storm to surround us and overwhelm us at times in order to bring us to our senses and make us realize that we have control of nothing. He doesn’t ask us to surrender our control to Him. We have no control to begin with. He asks us to surrender our illusion of control to him. He asks us to face reality, something which human beings frequently do not want to acknowledge is different from what they want it to be.

The only one who is truly not powerless is God Himself. But He will not interfere with human free will. He will guide, He will direct, He will attempt to get us to see reason, sometimes the hard way; but he will not override our free will however far into the depths of lunacy that free will might take us.

I am much reminded in the midst of feeling utterly powerless, that this is where I actually need to be. All my illusions dispelled and reality laid bare. And once I let go of those illusions, that is when peace begins to settle in. Once I cease to be attached to the way I think things should be, that’s when the storm within begins to settle down regardless of the storm without. I am powerless, but God is not. And He hears the voice of those who cry out to Him and responds.

A Ramble About Theology and Translation

I've been thinking today about Bible Translation, Theology and how the two inform each other.

In the first and second century Southern Europe and Near and Middle East, almost everyone spoke Koine Greek in some form, and they all had basically the same socio-cultural worldview with a few local tweaks here and there. When the writings and letters which would become the New Testament were originally disseminated, just about anyone who got a hold of them knew exactly what they were saying and what they meant for the most part. When they were translated into Latin by Jerome in the fifth century, there was still that more or less common cultural worldview understanding between Latin speakers and Greek speakers that enabled them to understand what was written without too much further explanation.

This immediate familiarity with what the writers of the New Testament were discussing, the immediate familiarity with concepts like "pneuma" and "sarx" and "logos" even, informed the theology and practice of those first and second century Christians and their writings reflect their immediate understanding of what was meant by Paul, Peter, and John when they wrote.

But fast forward to when the Scriptures began to be translated into other vernacular languages such as English, German, French, etc. and it is a different story. Many people in the western world from the fifth century on thought the original texts were in Latin. It was only after the fall of Constantinople in 1451 and the exodus of scholars and educated men from the Eastern capital into Western Europe that the Greek texts of Holy Scripture were "rediscovered" and translation attempts began within a couple hundred years.

These people, a thousand years later, did not share the worldview of the original texts, much less the spoken or written language. And the vernacular languages into which they were translated were never 1:1 with the original meanings. Furthermore, the theologies which had been developed over the course of that thousand years informed the translators as to what the texts meant, and the translations which emerged reflected both their imperfect understanding of the ancient language and their own theologies.

And this is my point, that it is ideal that the original Biblical text should inform theological understanding, but what I see far too often in most English translations is theology informing how something is to be rendered so that the reading in the translation reflects the theological worldview of the translator and not the other way around.

As a result, there are still large numbers of archaic English words in modern translations because theologically conservative translators refuse to part with them. As another result, the same word "pneuma" is translated as either "spirit" or "Spirit" depending on when the translator believes it is talking about the third Person of the Holy Trinity or "spirit" in general, and John 3 in this regard is just a mess to translate because in English "pneuma" represents completely unconnected concepts in the modern worldview, "breath, wind, spirit," where in the ancient world view they were all one and the same.

The consequence of this mess is a never ending circular theological reasoning. The translation of Scripture informs theology, but then that theology informs how we translate Scripture, which then informs our theology. Sooner or later, we translate and interpret the Scriptures in such a way that they will always justify our theological bent. And you see this in many Christian faith communities now, as many will refuse to use any English translation but the one which confirms their theological viewpoint even when they know that it is, after all, only a translation of the Scriptures, and not the original words of Scripture themselves. There is even the theological justification for this given in the idea of certain translations being divinely inspired or a transference of divine inspiration from the original texts to the translations!

Jesus said, "You search the Scriptures because in them you think that you have life, but these are they which testify about Me." For the Christian, the center and foundation of his or her theology must be Jesus Christ. The Holy Scriptures inform us about Jesus Christ, but they cannot take the place of interaction with Jesus Christ. They cannot take the place of listening to Him, talking with Him, and spending time with Him. The Scriptures are not Him. They are a sign post to Him.

Theology, by definition, is not a study of religion or religious concepts. Theology is, by definition, a study of God. The best way to observe and study your subject is to actually observe and study your subject, to interact with it under various circumstances and take notes. This is no different in the study of God. You can read about Him all you want to, and formulate numerous theories and hypotheses, but until you get to know Him, until you interact with Him, all your theological theories remain just that. Theories.

I believe the Scriptures should inform us, but I also believe we should stop trying to force them to speak our language (and for that matter stop trying to interpret them through our own modern western theological worldviews), and start learning to see the world through the Scriptures' eyes so to speak. We need to converse with them in their language in order to really understand what they're saying, especially if we're responsible for explaining it to others.

I do know this, the Christian writers of the first and second centuries, the ones who did speak the language of the Scriptures, had a very different understanding of what they meant, and their Church looked very, very different from the various churches today. I would encourage anyone reading this to take a look at the Ante-Nicene Fathers, and especially the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. "A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs" is a very good place to start as well. This was the Church where the miraculous charismata were still a daily occurrence, even routine. This was the Church that went to their executions joyfully, and sang hymns even as Nero burned them for torches in his gardens. This is a Church whose understanding of the original Scriptures I don’t believe we can ignore any longer.

A Translation of Romans 6-8

So, I had an insight today. I've never liked the translation "flesh" for "sarx" in Greek because it's an archaic word which is rarely used in modern vernacular. And there really isn't any good modern literal translation for "sarkikos" either for the same reason. "fleshly" might be accurate, but it's not a word which is used. My insight was to just use the words "biology" and "biological" instead and it flows much better. Also, I've elected to use the words "energy" and "energy-based" for "pneuma" and "pneumatikos" given my recent observations of the meaning and worldview behind these words. Here then is Romans 6-8. The words in brackets are there for flow and clarity of meaning.

6

What are we saying then? We continue in the disorder, so that His charity would increase? Absolutely not. Such ones as we who died to the disorder, how will we still live by it? Or are you ignorant that, as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus, we were baptized into His death? We then were interred together with Him through the [act of] baptism into [His] death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, in the same way we also should walk in a fresh newness of life. Because if we had become grafted together [with Him] in the likeness of His death, then we should also be [grafted together in the likeness] of His resurrection; knowing this, that our old humanity was crucified together with [Him], so that the malfunctioning body would be nullified for us to no longer be slaves to the disorder; because a person who has died had been corrected from the disorder. And if we died together with Christ, we believe that we will also live together with Him, having seen that Christ no longer dies being raised from the dead, death no longer owns Him. Because the person who died has died to the disorder once and for all; and the person who lives, lives to God. You also in the same way figure yourselves to be dead in the way to the disorder and living to God by means of Christ Jesus.

Don't then allow the disorder to reign in your dying body resulting in obedience to its longings, neither offer your body-parts [to be] armaments of incorrect behavior to the disorder, but offer yourselves to God like living from the dead and your body-parts armaments of correct behavior to God. Because the disorder will not be your owner; because you are not subject to the rule but subject to His charity.

What then? Should we give in to the disorder because we're not subject to the rule but subject to His charity? Absolutely not. Haven't you seen that to whom you offer yourselves slaves for obedience, you are slaves to whom you obey, either [slaves] of the disorder resulting in death or [slaves of] obedience resulting in righteousness? And thank God that [though] you were slaves of the disorder, you obeyed from the heart the type of teaching to which you were surrendered. I am speaking humanly because of the frailty of your biology. Because just as you offered your body-parts [to be] slaves to dirtiness and [from one] lawlessness into [another] lawlessness, in the same way you now offer your body-parts slaves to correct behavior for being made devoted to God. Because when you were slaves of the disorder, you were free to correct behavior. What fruit did you have at that time? You are now ashamed by them, because the goal of those things is death. And at present being freed from the disorder and being slaves to God you have your fruit resulting in being made devoted to God, and the goal eternal life. Because the compensation of the disorder is death, yet the charitable gift of God is eternal life with Christ Jesus our Owner.

7

Or are you ignorant, brothers (because I speak to those knowing the Torah), that the Torah dominates a human being for as long of a time as he is alive? Because the married woman has been bound to the living man by the Torah; but if the man should die, she is nullified from the Torah’s rule regarding the man. Therefore then when the man is living she is revealed an adulteress if she comes to be with a different man; but if the man dies she is free from the Torah’s rule, so as for her to not be an adulteress when she comes to be with a different man. So as, my brothers, you have been put to death to the Torah’s rule by means of the body of Christ for the purpose of you coming to be with a different person who is raised from the dead, so that we should produce fruit for God. Because when we used to be in the biology, the malfunctioning emotions of that bioogy were, by means of the Torah’s rule, produced within our body-parts, resulting in the production of fruit for death; yet at present we have been nullified from the Torah’s rule having died by means of what we were held down, so as for us to be slaves with energy-based newness and not lettered oldness.

What then are we saying? Is the Torah’s rule a malfunction? Absolutely not. But I didn't used to know my own disorder except by means of the rule; because I didn't perceive the longing for something if the rule didn't used to say, “you will not long for things.” And taking the excuse, the disorder achieved in me every longing by the command; because without the Torah’s rule the disorder was dead. And I was living at one time without the Torah’s rule, yet when the command came the disorder lived again, but I died and the command which was found for me for the purpose of life, this [command brought] death, because taking occasion by the command, the disorder deceived me and by it killed [me]. So as the Torah’s rule is holy and the command is holy and right and good.

Has the good thing then become death for me? Absolutely not. But the disorder, so that the disorder would shine, achieved death in me through the good thing, so that the disorder might become overblown malfunctioning by means of the command. Because we have seen that the Torah’s rule is energy-based, but I [myself] am biological having been sold [as a slave] to the disorder. I don't know what thing I'm accomplishing; because I am practicing what I don't want, but I am doing this thing I hate. And if I am doing this thing I don't want, I am agreeing with the rule that it is good. And at present I [myself] am no longer accomplishing it but the disorder residing within me. Because I saw that the good thing doesn't reside within me, that is, in my biology; because the willingness is at hand in me, but the accomplishing the good is not; Because I am not doing what good thing I want, but I am practicing this bad thing I don't want. But if I [myself] am not doing this thing I want, I [myself] am no longer accomplishing it but the disorder residing within me. I am finding therefore the rule, for me who is willing to do the good thing, that the bad thing is at hand in me; because I sympathize with the rule of God with regards to the inner human being, but I look at a different rule among my body-parts at war against the rule of my mind and taking me prisoner to the rule of the disorder being in my body-parts. I am a miserable human being; who will rescue me from the body of this death? But thank God because of Jesus Christ our Owner. Therefore then I myself am on the one hand by the mind a slave to the rule of God, yet on the other hand by the biology to the rule of [my] disorder.

8

Nothing therefore [is] a judgment against those who are not walking according to the biology but according to the energy within Christ Jesus. Because the rule of the energy of the life in Christ Jesus set me free from the rule of the disorder and of the death. Because the powerless thing of the rule by which it was frail because of the biology... God, having sent the Son of Himself in the same form as malfunctioning biology and about the disorder, judged against the disorder within the biology, so that the requirement of the rule would be fulfilled within us who don't walk according to the biology but according to the energy. Because those existing according to the biology think about the things of the biology, and those according to the energy the things of the energy. Because the mind of the biology is death, and the mind of the energy is life and peace; because the mind of the biology is an enemy for God, because it doesn't submit to the rule of God, neither is it capable; and those existing in the biology are not capable of pleasing God. Also, you do not exist in the biology but in the energy, since the energy of God resides among you. And if someone doesn't possess the energy of Christ, this one is not His. Yet if Christ is among you, the body is indeed a corpse because of the disorder but the energy is life because of the correct behavior. And if the energy of the One who raised Jesus from the dead resides within you, the One who raised Jesus from the dead will also make your dying bodies alive through His indwelling energy within you.

Therefore then, brothers, we are debtors not to the biology because of living according to the biology. Because if you live according to the biology, you intend to die; yet if you put the practices of the biology to death by the energy, you will live. Because as many as are led by the energy of God, these people are sons of God. Because you didn't receive an energy of slavery again for fear but you received an energy of adoption with which we cry out, “Abba, Father.” The energy Himself testifies together with our energy that we are God's young. And if [His] young, then also [His] heirs; heirs indeed of God, and co-heirs of Christ, since we suffer together with [Him] so that we will also be glorified together with [Him].

Because I figure that the emotions of the time now aren't worth it compared with the glory intended to be unveiled for us. Because the creation's earnest eager expectation waits for the unveiling of the sons of God. Because the creation was submitted to pointlessness, not willingly but through the one who made it submit, because the same creation will also be set free from the slavery of the corruption into the freedom of the glory of God's young. Because we saw that all the creation laments together and suffers agony together up til the present; and not just [this], but possessing the birth certificate of the energy we also ourselves lament within ourselves waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our bodies. Because we have been saved with hope; yet hope being looked at isn't hope; because who hopes for what he is looking at? And if we are hoping for what we're not looking at, we wait for it with endurance.

And in the same way also, the energy comes to our aid in dealing with our frailty; because we haven't seen what thing we should pray for insofar as it is necessary, but the energy Himself pleads with unspoken groanings; and the Person who investigates hearts perceives what the mind of the energy is, because in relation to God He appeals [to Him] for the saints. And we have seen that, for those who love God everything works together for a good thing, for those being summoned according to public plan. Because those whom He knew about ahead of time, He also decided ahead of time for them to have the same form as the image of His Son, for Him to be firstborn among many brothers; and those whom He decided ahead of time, these He also summoned; and those whom He summoned, these He also corrected; and those whom He corrected, these He also glorified.

What then are we saying with these things? If God is on our side, who is against us? The Person who indeed did not spare His own Son, but surrendered Him for us all, how will He not charitably give us everything together with Him? Who brings charges against God's chosen people? God is the one who makes [them] correct. Who is the person who judges against [them]? Christ Jesus is the person who died, and more was raised, who is also at the right side of God, who also appeals on our behalf. Who would separate us from the love of Christ? Tribulation? Or distress? Or persecution? Or hunger? Or a lack of sufficient clothing? Or danger? Or the sword? Just as it had been written that, “For your sake we are put to death the whole day, we have been figured as sheep for the slaughter.” But in all these things we are superconquerors through the Person who loved us. Because I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor rulers, neither thing imminent nor things intended, neither powers nor height nor depth nor some different creation will be capable of separating us from the love of God which is by means of Christ Jesus our Owner.

A Ramble About Qi

Recently, I’ve been learning more about the Chinese concept of “qi” (pronounced “chi”). It’s often demonized by both western science and Christian theologians for various reasons, but it has an uncanny track record for prediction and use in the healing arts which neither can explain. The human body’s qi reacts negatively or positively to different objects, substances, and materials. I haven’t thought a great deal about it until a recent, repeatable experiment I performed where the rubber of a cell phone case was able to insulate a negative qi producing object so that the reaction was neutral rather than negative. This was performed on separate objects whether the control reaction was positive or negative. One would think that if it was all psychological in nature, this would not be the case. So it caught my attention and I began reading trying to understand what it is I observed.

One interesting thing which I learned is that “qi” literally means “breath, air, energy, spirit” while defying quantification or absolute definition. I found this extremely interesting because it highly resembles the definition of the Ancient Greek word “pneuma” and the Latin word “spiritus” on a near 1:1 basis. That is, “qi” is a drop in replacement word every time the word “pneuma” is used and is the literal Chinese equivalent.

Consider then the rendering of Galatians 5:16-18 using this drop in replacement:

“But I say, walk by qi and you won’t bring the desire of the flesh to completion. Because the flesh is against qi, and qi is against the flesh, because these things are opposed to one another, so that not whatever you might wish these things you might do. And if you are led by qi, you are not subject to Torah.” (more or less lit.)

And also Galatians 5:22-23:

“Yet the fruit of qi is love, joy, peace, endurance, kindness, goodness, faith, gentility, self-control; there isn’t a Torah against such things as these.”

This reminded me of a quote from The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon in one article I read on the subject (Flowers, James. “What is Qi?” Advance Access Publication. ECAM 2006;3(4)551–552. doi:10.1093/ecam/nel074). It cites:

‘It is from, calm, indifference, emptiness, and non-

desiring that true qi arises. If the spirit is harboured inside,

whence can illness arise? When the will is at rest and wishes

little, when the heart is at peace and fears nothing, when the

body labours but does not tire, then qi flows smoothly from

these states, each part follows its desires, and the whole gets

everything it seeks’

(From Farquhar J, Zhang Q. Biopolitical Beijing: Pleasure, Sovereignty and Self-Cultivation in Beijing’s Capital Cultural Anthropology. Academic Research Library, 2005)

It is a common interpretation of this passage in Galatians that it is referring to the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Holy Trinity. But the word “pneuma” in this passage, as is frequently in Paul’s writings, is used ambiguously, often frustrating translators who want to be able to distinguish “spirit” from “Spirit” on theological grounds. The text itself is not accommodating to this dichotomy.

But what if Paul’s understanding of “pneuma”, and Jesus’ in John 3, was not as categorized as this? What if they didn’t understand it as a dichotomy? What if their view of pneuma was more like the Chinese view of qi where each thing had a personal qi both alongside of and as part of a larger universal or cosmic qi? In truth, the modern western theological view of pneuma or spiritus “spirit” is quite nebulous to begin with. We cannot actually define it to any reasonable, scientific satisfaction and often toss the word about as though everyone knows what it means without any hard definition, often relying on analogies and illustrations like wind.

What if, on some level, all pneuma is pneuma hagio? What if, on some level, all spirit is Holy Spirit? All energy is merely borrowed for our use from His eternal energy because without it we simply would not be? What if Almighty God is generous and tolerant of our use of His energy regardless of what we are doing with it because He knows we would cease to exist without it? We are created by Him and for Him, and within Him we live and move and have our being.

I don’t have the answer to this question any more than I understand what qi is, or why there is a measurable effect for something which is otherwise immeasurable and unquantifiable. But it is a compelling thought, and one worth ruminating on.

Maybe as Christians, our fear of concepts like qi have less to do with its foreign or pagan origins and more to do with bringing a concept like spiritus into the real world. As long as it remains indefinable and nebulous, it remains safe. Once it is proven measurable and usable then we have to respond to it, and if most modern Christians have proven anything, its that they prefer their theological notions to remain nebulous, out of reach, and non-interfering in their daily lives. As long as Jesus remains safely in the Sunday School cartoons, everything is fine.

The problem is that’s not what either Paul or Jesus Himself taught, and neither lived safe, practical lives.

A Ramble About the Future

What I am about to say isn't going to be popular. I suppose few things I write here are. But I feel like they need to be said, especially now. If you're reading this, you're probably a friend of mine who occasions around to this blog when I post the link on Facebook, or else you're one of the tiny few who, in the past several years have taken an active interest in my ideas, rambles, and rants. To either group, I salute you for your courage to keep reading, and to either group, I only ask that you hear me out and consider what I'm saying like you always do whether you agree or not.

Recently I read two articles online which I can't get out of the back of my mind. The content of the articles really shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. It's been reported again and again, and warned about again and again for decades. The first was an article about the World3 prediction which was made by a computer simulation back in the 1970s. I hadn't know about this prediction until I read the article and looked up “World3” online and saw that it was indeed real. Long story short, it predicted a collapse of human civilization by 2040 based on various political and societal factors. At the time, global warming wasn't included in the calculations just good old human nature. According to the article, we're right on target at this point in the latter half of 2018 to fulfill that computer's prediction.

The second article I read was the recent United Nations report on Climate Change which basically stated that unless we reverse all carbon emissions right now, we are looking at a catastrophic climate change by 2040-50. This isn't some fringe scientist saying this. This is the official United Nations report on the subject which every nation got a copy of.

Add into this the possible total depletion of most of the world's light crude oil reserves by 2062 (yes, this is a real projection). Add into this the rise of bacteria and viruses which are increasingly resistant to even extreme antibiotics and medications. Add into this our increasing reliance on electronically based technology which itself depends on a reliable (and easily sabotaged) power grid. Add into this a total human population on Earth of at or near 10 Billion, more than twice what the Earth can reasonably sustain without sever ecological consequences and mass shortages.

Human beings are going to reap the fruit of what we as a species have sown over the last 10,000 years of civilization, and it looks to be nothing short of apocalyptic on numerous fronts from extreme, uncontrolled weather, to diseases raging uncontrolled, to a potential economic collapse due to political considerations and resource mismanagement and shortfall.

And it looks like it will happen within the lifetime of my generation. I will be 65 years old by 2040. More importantly, my youngest child will be 38.

There are those who believe and accept the Star Trek scenario where science will eventually solve all these problems and transform Earth into a paradise. However, I'm a trekkie. I know Star Trek history. And I know that, in order for humanity to pull itself out of the apocalyptic world it had plunged itself into, it had to experience first contact with an advanced alien race, the Vulcans. After this, it engaged in interstellar commerce and found cures for diseases and learned to work together as it engaged with new intelligent species.

How many out there seriously believe we'll make first contact with a logical, intelligent alien species by 2061 who will help us pull our heads out of our collective human hind ends? If you're seriously betting on the Star Trek scenario or the collective good will and conscience of human beings, you've never studied human history or human beings in general, and waiting on Vulcans to solve all our problems is... illogical, and problematic at best.

We are now, at this point in history, on the cusp of apocalypse from a number of directions which human psychology and nature appear to make unavoidable. This is not new information. It's not sensationalist. It is a valid and well established scientific projection.

Which brings me to my point. Why are we still educating and training our kids as though nothing is going to change? We're preparing them in the High Schools for the world we knew as kids where people appeared more rational, there were fewer people as a whole, and everything worked more or less. We're preparing them for an economic and societal system that we know will likely break down within the next three decades. We're preparing them to survive in the world we knew and know and not the world we know is going to be.

Already those born around the turn of the millennium are feeling the pinch, so to speak. They are heavily in college debt to get degrees for jobs that won't hire them for their lack of experience. Many can't afford to pay rent, much less buy a house regardless of their level of education. And according to projections, this is only going to get worse.

I think we need to be honest with ourselves and our children. We need to be honest in how to possibly prepare them for the future which we know is going to happen. Prepare them for the immediate future and society now, yes, but also keep a plan in their back pocket, a set of instructions for when it all comes crashing down and they have to literally focus on day to day survival in a world gone mad. When those times come, I don't want my kids or grand kids starving because they don't know how to find food, water, shelter, etc.

I don't know for certain what 2040 and beyond is going to look like. Maybe I'm wrong and by some miracle everything will just keep chugging along. Maybe all world leaders will have a change of heart and begin to work together to solve our problems instead of making sure they look great for the cameras and their constituents... Yeah, you can stop laughing now. I don't think so either.

We need to take responsibility for what we've done as a species and give our kids real tools to try and survive the future we and our parents and ancestors created for them.

A Ramble About My God

I have written a great deal about Who and What I understand God to be. Mostly though, what I want people to understand most is that this Being whom we commonly call “God” is real. He exists, and in fact the very name in Hebrew that He gave Himself, Yahveh (hayah/havah, 3^rd person masculine imperfect piel: Y'haveh → Yahveh) means just this, except in an intensive form, “HE EXISTS!”

Yahveh isn't a fantasy, and he doesn't just exist in people's minds like an imaginary friend. His Being is impossible to understand and this inability to comprehend ends up looking like a darkness as we try and compare Him to things to which He is incomparable. But our inability to fully comprehend Him does not negate His reality, nor does it negate His personality or His attempts at reaching out to us to break through our own collective insanity.

What is most disturbing to me at times is how much those who profess to believe in Him treat Him as though He is imaginary, and I have seen this from both layperson and clergy. They do not expect Him to interact or respond to them when they pray or when they ask for anything, and see it as some unusual or great thing when He does, or else they cannot explain it at all. This latter is especially true when He responds in a way which contradicts the way they believe the world and He work, as though He is a mechanism or a law of physics.

This latter concept is fundamentally ridiculous.

Yahveh is a person. He is a person with will, emotions, intelligence, and self-awareness. He acts when and how He thinks is best regardless of what human beings think He should or would do. What is more, He acts with the best interests of everyone in mind, as both individuals and collectively as a species, and as I have written previously, He is in a unique position to know exactly what that may be. It is this overarching compassion, justice, and mercy more than anything else which informs and constrains how He will respond to any given human request or situation, and quite frankly He doesn't answer to us or anyone else. He answers only to Himself and His personal character.

He knows how many times I have struggled with the circumstances of my life, and how many times those circumstances have resulted in pain and hardship for myself or my family. He is responsible for neither my decisions, either helpful or harmful, nor the decisions of other human beings which caused me either pleasure or pain. Those circumstances He is responsible for were put in place with my best interests in mind, as well as the best interests of all those around me and the best interests of the human race as a whole. Just because they cause me pain or I don't like them doesn't make them bad or wrong (it is the hamartia disorder which twists my mind into seeing them this way). It means I'm having an adverse reaction to them instead of accepting them and moving on, and that is a malfunction of my own human psychology.

Why does He allow human beings to hurt each other? Because He respects our free will more than we do, and the truth is that He has gone to several lengths to keep the damage at a minimum in spite of us. He has in the past culled several groups of human beings when they have gone too far past the point of no return so that those who are less harmful or self-destructive can thrive. The only cure for human derangement is death. The symptoms may vary, but the underlying problem is hereditary and ingrained into human DNA.

I've known Him, talked with Him, been talked to and at by Him, and interacted with Him now for decades. I have no idea what His long term plan is, or even His plan for the next five minutes. His instructions are a lot like a GPS system that won't tell you what the destination actually is, but continually tells you to “turn left” “turn right” “go straight and turn when I tell you.” When He tells me and my wife to trust Him (something He says a lot), He virtually never tells us what's going to happen when we do. Thus, we need to trust Him that it's the right move to make or the right thing to say.

Why doesn't He tell us? Truth be told, because there are too many factors at play that can be altered if He does. Things that need to happen, and things that shouldn't happen. It's kind of like quantum mechanics where you can measure either a particle's position or its velocity but not both, because measurement of one changes the other. Us knowing the outcome or the reasons why we need to follow His directions would or could change the outcome He desires, and this could cause a cascade of outcomes which would result in circumstances which would be worst case scenario for everyone. This is also, I believe, the reason why when He does reveal something in the future, its usually only a snapshot of a scene or a short clip like a video without any context to the events leading up to it, if not an outright obscure riddle. These things are far less likely to affect the outcome than straight up explanations. He knows all possible outcomes and timelines and steers us towards the best one possible under the circumstances, even if it doesn't feel like the best one possible to me personally.

The Being I know as “God” (and this is a serious understatement calling Him that, capital “G” notwithstanding), is real. He exists. Not within space and time, because dimensional space and time rely on His Being for their own existence, but that is another discussion altogether. What is more, He wants you to know this and to understand it even if you can't understand the how and what. He wants you to try and get to know Him as a person. He understands the difficulties involved in it, but He wants you to try anyway, and He is patient with both honest mistakes, and explosions of frustration or anger when you don't understand or when what He does or says seems to hurt. He knows why you do it, and where it comes from because He knows every thought and emotional process which happens in your brain. He knows with precision the firing of each individual neurotransmitter in each synapse between each neuron. He knows exactly how you feel, how you think, and why that is. He knows this for everyone on the planet.

My God is real. He is fundamentally incomprehensible to the human mind. He is the underlying existence for all other existences. There is no box, no mental image, no constraint by which we can control or “make use” of Him and such thinking is ridiculous. To truly contemplate what He is, the depths of power and control He has over everything that exists is more than mind-boggling, it is paralyzingly terrifying. Moreso if you don't really know Him, and believe Him to be angry with you for something. But if you do get to know Him, and understand that what He does He does because He gives a rip about you and those around you (which thought should be paralyzing in its own right), then it should give you at least some peace to know that He is, at His core, on your side even when you aren't on your side.

Finally, my God is so real He caused a human virgin birth to show us what He is really like, and give us something to work with as to His personality and character instead of the myths and legends and misunderstandings which grew up over the millennia. He is so real that this singular human being's impact continues to reverberate throughout history. He is so real that He wants you to get to know Him as a person through this one person who demonstrates everything He is as a person. He knows you won't comprehend His “physical” existence. He doesn't expect that and it's not important that you do. He wants you to get to know Him in a real relationship with Him which involves give and take, highs and lows, good times and hard times, spending time with Him as you would in any serious relationship with any friend.

This is my God. This is the Being I know and have gotten to know over my lifetime as Yahveh, and very personally as the person who became a father to me when I was a teenager. Anyone who says He is something different than this, as far as I'm concerned, doesn't actually know Him at all and is talking about some figment of their imagination.

A Ramble About Answers

One thing which motivates me in going some of the directions I do where Scripture and theology are concerned is simply finding answers to questions. I can't count how many times I've either seen or heard of someone asking a perfectly rational question like "how can God be everywhere at once?" and then told he or she doesn't have enough faith or is just looking to make trouble (or some other similar defensive response) when they (reasonably) can't accept the "spiritual" answer they're given because it doesn't make any sense. What is worse is that often they're given such answers by pastors and Sunday School teachers who themselves don't actually know, and feel the question is a direct challenge to their own faith because they've always just accepted the "spiritual" answer and been told that should be good enough for them.

People don't question unless they really want to understand something, and Almighty God is worth attempting to at least try and build a framework with which to, if not fully understand, than to have enough of an understanding to work with. The Holy Scriptures are important enough to try and develop this framework as well.

Another question which might be innocently asked by an intelligent mind when told that "God is Spirit" is "What is spirit?" I will bet money that this is another question which throws people off when asked directly. You see, this word and its adjectival form "spiritual" is bandied about in church circles frequently. More often than not, it is used to describe or defend something which may either seem imaginary, or actually be imaginary. The dangerous thing here is how frequently pastors and preachers do this, building whole doctrines around "spiritual truths" that when closely examined disappear into thin air and are wholly unsupported by any measure or standard of either scientific analysis or contextual Scriptural interpretation.

The truth about this word is that it comes from the Latin word "spiritus" and means "breath". It is the direct Latin translation of the word used in the Greek New Testament "pneuma" also meaning "breath." But in the Greco-Roman worldview (and in the Hebrew for that matter), breath was more than just the air which was pushed in and out of your lungs. It was also the force which animated a body and gave it life. Thus "spiritus" is also the root word for the term "aspirate" meaning to breath. So, in the ancient worldview, one's spirit was the animating force which gave the body life.

Today however, we understand the human body to be a complex system of which the breath is only one part of and which has little to do with the unseen "essence" of the person and more to do with supplying oxygen to the bloodstream and removing carbon dioxide. A more modern analogue of the idea of "spirit" might be the electrochemical signals which run by way of electrical charges and neurotransmitters through the brain and central nervous system. In other words, the energy exchange system which not only powers the human body but carries all the thoughts, muscle commands, emotions, and memories through the firing of synapses.

So then perhaps from a modern viewpoint, rather than breath, "spirit" can be defined as "energy." "Energy" is something we can define and use in our framework of understanding and build off of (and lest someone balk at the idea of "God is energy" rather than "God is Spirit" on the grounds that it is equated God with a created thing let me remind you that energy can be neither created nor destroyed but, like God Himself is described, appears to be eternal; it's the first law of thermodynamics). It makes no sense to continue to use a first century Greco-Roman understanding of how things work two thousand years later when that understanding has been soundly disproven.

Here's the thing, I follow these trains of thought because I do believe, not because I don't. I try to understand and explain because I believe there are reasonably sound explanations out there without having to resort to disparaging people or doubting one's own beliefs, and I also believe that its okay to incorporate new data to help flesh out those beliefs or even modify them where they don't fit all the data presented so that you ultimately get a richer, more full picture rather than a Sunday School cartoon, however comforting it might be.

God says "trust Me" a lot, but He rarely ever says "don't question." He always works within the framework or worldview the person He's communicating with has and doesn't appear to see the need to correct misunderstandings about the universe or even His own nature where they don't conflict with His intentions towards the person. It is a truth that no human being will ever fully understand who or what He is, and that's okay. But it's equally true that it's okay to be curious and to want to know more about Him as He fits within reality, not some imaginary fantasy. In my opinion, and within my own framework of understanding, the closer you look and the more pieces you put together the more awesome and mind blowing He really is.

So go ahead and ask those questions which don't appear to make sense on the surface. Do the digging. Ask about that rock so big that God can't lift it and other uncomfortable questions about omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, transcendence, eternity, and all of the other things attributed to Him, but then look for the answers and be prepared to adjusted your framework of belief when you get them. It's okay to do it. I'm pretty sure He would rather you spend your time trying to get to know Him better than ignoring Him completely.