A Short Ramble about Personal Flaws

I was thinking today of the importance of admitting and being honest with my struggles and flaws as being an important part of submission to the Cross of Christ. 1 John 1:5-10 repeats this idea over and over again that the person who says he has no flaws (or sins, depending on how you translate "hamartia") is lying to himself, and also calling God a liar. In our society, this is completely counter-intuitive, and even within most churches it is frowned upon unless it is done in the past tense. "I was this bad person with this many flaws, but then I came to Christ and now I don't do that any more."

I get confronted with my flaws, my anger, my inner demons, my continued difficulty with interacting with people especially when I'm stressed on a regular basis. I can't say they've ever really left because they're still very much a part of me just as they have always been. Denying that would be lying to myself, to God, and frankly to everyone else.

I think perhaps though that instead of looking at them as negatives, per se, rather they provide a distinct contrast to when it is Christ expressing and working through me. In my flesh, biologically, I have ASD. Yes, I've undergone treatments for it, and I can socialize a little more easily under the right circumstances, but the underlying disorder has never gone away and I get reminded of it when I am put into stressful circumstances. I get frustrated, sometimes I get angry, paranoid, and withdrawn. I become socially awkward and worn out quickly even around people I'm used to. Talking to someone in a relational manner is difficult.

Contrasting this is when Christ works and speaks through me. Suddenly, I'm able to empathize. Suddenly, I know when to speak, and when not to. Suddenly, I know what to say and can even know things about the person I'm speaking to which I shouldn't be able to. Suddenly, this overwhelming care, compassion, and love start moving through me for the other person. It's like a cooperative dance in some respects where He leads and I follow, where He's in control but has me say and do what is said and done. And suddenly it appears like I can do things, feel things, say things, and be things that are otherwise simply not physically possible for me even on the best of days.

I am also reminded by my biological flaws, the limitations, paranoia, fears, and attachments of my own brain, that I must remain in Him, otherwise things go wrong and harm is caused. Feelings get hurt. Someone might get snapped at. Fortunately, I appear to be past the stage of physically harming people as I might have when I was a kid. My flaws, as painful as they are for me to see and acknowledge help me to keep a right perspective, and push me back to Christ as I cry out, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner" when they manifest.

Truth is, my flaws scare me, but sometimes they don't scare me enough. Sometimes, I fall into the faulty thinking that I'm this great person because of what happens when it is Christ through me. This is when He allows them to manifest plainly in my mind, and then if I don't turn back, letting them follow their natural course in my actions. I have been blessed that He has kept them from causing more harm than they have.

As much as I would want Him to take them away permanently, He allows them to persist for the moment to provide this contrast, not just for myself but also to be a living example of both to other people that Christ can be seen the more plainly against the backdrop of my own faulty darkness.

I think maybe I'm coming to understand what Paul meant when he said he rejoiced then in his weaknesses. I can't say I rejoice in mine, and they are many, but I think for Christ's sake I'm coming to appreciate why He doesn't remove them entirely.

A Ramble About Gay Conversion Therapy

I was reading an article about conversion therapy tonight. It’s not the first article I’ve read, nor will it likely be the last. I have also seen several videos told from the perspective of people who have been subjected to it. Conversion therapy is the attempt to use psychology to “convert” a person’s homosexual attractions to heterosexual ones. It is mostly practiced by churches and religious institutions and is based on the idea that one’s sexuality is a psychological choice, conscious or unconscious, based on childhood experiences and trauma rather than a difference in brain organization and chemistry. Generally, this type of therapy is a combination of counseling techniques, though there have been reports of psychological manipulation and “guilt-tripping”. This kind of therapy stems from the idea that homosexual attraction itself is morally wrong.

First, before I continue, let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way as this is what it’s always going to come back to. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 states:

“Or don’t you see that the wrong will not inherit the Kingdom of God, neither prostitutes, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor receiving homosexuals, nor penetrating homosexuals, nor greedy, nor thieves, nor those intoxicated, not abusive people, not those who plunder; they will not inherit the kingdom of God.” (my translation, modified literal)

There are other passages in both the Old and New Testaments which could be drawn from, but this one is representative of the general idea. In the Old Testament, homosexual intercourse was explicitly forbidden in the Mosaic law and punishable by death regardless of whether it was male or female homosexuality. Where this prohibition on pain of death is concerned, I will only say that this was a part of the contract God made with Israel on Sinai as to the rules they were to keep, both civil and sacred, and that St. Paul, along with the author of Hebrews, was explicit in that this contract was superceded and made of no effect once the New Covenant or Contract was put in place through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In other words, as Paul put it, if you are in Christ, you are not under the Law, but under grace. The Torah prohibitions and proscriptions were Israel specific to begin with, and now simply no longer apply because of Jesus Christ. They’re done.

That leaves the New Testament passages.

The understanding of what Paul is saying turns on what he means by “inherit the kingdom of God”. Traditionally, this phrase has been interpreted to mean alternately “be saved” or “enter heaven” depending on one’s denominational theology. But I don’t think that’s necessarily what’s being talked about, and I think you have to understand Paul’s thought processes here to understand what he’s saying.

For St. Paul, as I have written about before, the problem of Hamartia was located in the “flesh”, that is, it is biological in nature (Romans 7). If you look at his description of of the “works of the flesh” in Galatians 5, they all can be attributed to fear, aggression, feeding, and sexual responses governed by the human limbic system. They are all in fact responses seen, not only in human beings, but in other animals in nature. In other words, what he is describing are natural biological responses to stressful stimuli. With these he contrasts what he calls the “fruit of the Spirit” which he sees as something else entirely.

Paul dedicates much of his writing in Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians to these contrasting concepts. In his writings, he describes the Christian experience as one where the Christian lets go of everything else which could possibly hinder his union with Christ. He describes the Christian as having died with Christ, and everything after that had to be Christ expressing His life through the Christian.

So what does this have to do with “inheriting the kingdom of God”? It is my belief that this phrase is synonymous with “walking in the Spirit” which Paul contrasted with the “works of the flesh” or these natural biological responses. Inheriting the kingdom of God is where one steps back and allows Christ to express through the Christian, His energies working in cooperation with the Christian’s own energies. This requires asking Him, and then internally (and externally if necessary) letting go of one’s personal attachments (as Paul described in Philippians 3), and surrendering the control of oneself to His energies working within. Paul was contrasting when someone presents this way as opposed to presenting with their own natural biological responses. It is how you can consciously gauge whether or not it is He or you who is in control at the moment. St. John described the same phenomenon using different language in his first epistle.

So, what then is Paul saying in this passage? That those who are presenting in this fashion are presenting with their natural biological responses and are not surrendering themselves to His control. It is a similar gauge to what Jesus used when He said, “You will know a tree by its fruit.” It is instructive that in the Galatians passage he also includes things like anger, jealousy, factionalism, discord along with murder, adultery, and sexual immorality when he says those practicing them will not inherit the kingdom of God. Consider how many church members could be convicted of just jealousy and factionalism, yet how many excuse their behaviors which are listed by Paul in the same category as murder and adultery? The passage in 1 Corinthians 6 and the passage in Galatians 5 are giving the same kind of information along with the reminder that if one is presenting in this fashion then they are not cooperating with and surrendering to His energies, or “walking in the Spirit” in that moment. This was something Paul taught consistently in every church he planted and was involved with and those churches he wrote to knew what he was talking about, except for Rome to which he had never been. This was the reason why he went into so much more detail about the mechanics of it between Romans 6-8.

So, Paul is saying that those who practice such things aren’t surrendering to to His energies and are therefore functioning in their own, natural biological responses.

Consider that fact for a moment. Paul’s expectation and teaching was that the whole practice and function of Christians was to surrender themselves, abandon themselves wholly and totally to Jesus Christ, and cutting off from themselves anything, anything, which got in the way of that. Christian practice is, fundamentally, a discipline of denying yourself and surrendering yourself to Him so that He would act, speak, and express through you.

In 1 Corinthians 7, this idea becomes very clear where Paul has to tell the Corinthians, yes, it’s okay for you to marry if you feel the obligation to, and that it was better to get married than to be inflamed (presumably with one’s sex drive which varies from person to person). But just the fact that he felt he had to clarify that it was okay, and his statement in this chapter where he says it is a better practice to remain unmarried if you can help it should demonstrate his mind and teaching on this subject. Being married required that you split your devotion and attachment between Christ and your spouse. In other words, he didn’t want it to become a hindrance to their spiritual practice and the goal of their faith which was, in his words, “the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3).

Allowing your natural biological stress responses (flight, fight, feeding, sexuality) to dictate your actions is an impediment to union with God through Jesus Christ. One’s natural responses are frequently harmful to oneself but more so to those around you physically, emotionally, and mentally. Furthermore, they engage the Hamartia disorder described in Romans 7, causing guilt, self-justification, and a whole host of ever deepening psychological disorders and further harmful actions as the psyche seeks to defend itself in a downward spiral of destruction. Surrendering yourself and allowing His energies to take over circumvents and short circuits this and brings one into a closer relationship with Him as you get to know Him better.

So, going back to the initial topic of conversion therapy. There is a wealth of medical and psychiatric data which demonstrates that one’s sexual attraction is a combination of factors. Yes, environment and personal experiences may play a part, but there is clear evidence that in many if not most cases there is a real neurological component as well. The brains of homosexual persons tend to resemble their heterosexual counterparts of the opposing sex rather than those of their own sex. A homosexual man’s tends to resemble a heterosexual woman’s, and a homosexual woman’s tends to resemble a heterosexual man’s.

In other words, in many if not most cases, homosexual attraction is as much of a biological response as heterosexual attraction which isn’t going to change regardless of how much counseling the person receives. It’s like trying to counsel the autism or ADHD out of someone. It just isn’t going to happen because that’s how their brains work. It’s a case of the neurology at work affecting the psychology of the individual.

In every article I’ve read, men and women who are genuinely seeking God by faith go into these conversion therapy programs, which range from the mildly psychological to the patently abusive, hoping that these sexual feelings they have will go away. In every article I’ve read on the subject as well, there is a near 100% rate of recidivism. In other words, these programs fail 100% of the time, and leave their participants more confused, angry, and guilt ridden than when they started because their natural sexual attraction happens to be towards their own sex. My understanding is that the suicide rates of those coming out of these programs is relatively high as well.

It is my opinion, but I think perhaps a better course of action would be to simply accept that for some people it is natural for them to have a sexual attraction towards the same sex. This does not make them worse sinners than anyone else. There is no such thing as a “better sinner” or a “worse sinner”. It means their brains work differently from the typical brain and do not need to be corrected by us, just accepted.

Where Christian practice is concerned, I do not see this as working any differently for the biologically homosexual as for the biologically heterosexual. The goal is the same, union with God through Jesus Christ, and the method of getting there, denying oneself and surrendering control and cooperating with His energies instead of allowing for one’s own natural biological responses, is also the same. For the heterosexual, it is expected in Holy Scripture that they are to remain chaste in all ways, ceding control to His energies as opposed to their own biological responses, as they pursue Jesus Christ, and there is no change in expectation for the homosexual either. Marriage at the time of Paul’s writing was not an option for the homosexual. It is in today’s society, at least some of today’s societies anyway.

Regardless, the goal of the faith of Jesus Christ is union with God through Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is our goal and our means of reaching it, letting everything else go which impedes us from getting there and which impedes us from ceding control to His energies. This does not change based on how our brains operate or how we present biologically, and unrestrained heterosexual behavior is just as much of an impediment as unrestrained homosexual behavior.

New Book

So, for those not aware, I've been working intensively on a rewrite of a fan fiction novel I wrote back in January for a couple of months now with the intention of changing it into an original fantasy fiction novel which I would be able to publish. I finally finished it and put it up on Amazon through their Kindle Direct Publishing site. Here's the Link if you're interested in checking it out (you may need to copy and paste):

https://www.amazon.com/Lightborn-Epic-Fantasy-Tale-Messiah/dp/179293291X/ref=sr_1_2_twi_pap_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1546923975&sr=8-2&keywords=Lightborn

Here is also the Introduction:

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is a well known story to most people in the civilized world. If they have not heard it within the confines of their own church or religious community, then there is a good chance they would have heard it through cinema or television. It is the story of all powerful Divinity taking the humble form of a weak human being in order to heal and rescue the world from its darkness through not only that human being’s life and teachings, but also and especially by means of his brutal death and miraculous self-resurrection. It is the story of human beings misunderstanding who that Divinity truly is, and that Being showing up on their doorstep to set the record straight. It is also a story of that Divinity’s redemptive love and forgiveness for those thought lost to the darkness by those who professed to represent that Divine Being’s will and interests.

It is a story which deserves to be told again and again.

The story you hold in your hand began life as a fan fiction writing set in the world of a popular massively multiplayer online fantasy role playing game (MMORPG). I had first thought of the idea of setting a Gospel story within an epic fantasy world of dwarves, elves, humans, and orcs decades ago and things finally came together about a year ago to where I could put it down into words through the medium of fan fiction. To be honest, I didn’t know how it would be received at first, and thought maybe I would be asking for trouble in posting it. But as it went live on the fan fiction website, it started garnering hundreds, and then thousands of views with heartfelt, emotional reviews by readers, fans of the original game in which world it was set, who didn’t consider themselves religious or spiritual at all. It was then that I realized why.

It wasn’t because of my fabulous turns of phrase or great skills at writing. It is my belief that it was because they were seeing and meeting Jesus in a way that spoke to them apart from the stained glass windows and preacher’s sermons.

After watching this phenomenon and reading their comments for almost a year, I began to wonder if maybe I should try and rework it for a larger audience. The original RPG world of the story in which the fan fiction work was set borrowed heavily from traditional epic medieval fantasy tropes and archetypes which by their very nature as ideas and concepts cannot be copyrighted or trademarked. With this understanding, I began the undertaking of reworking this novel into an original work of fiction apart from the intellectual property of the world in which it was set. All names, origin stories, and material that referred specifically to the copyrighted material found in the fan fiction story world in which it was set have been changed, removed, and rewritten so as not to infringe on the rights or trademarks of the owners of that material.

Here you will not find Roman soldiers, Pharisees, and Tax Collectors. Here you will not even find a “cross” in the traditional sense. Instead, you will find within these pages magic, elves, lycanthropes, a nation of undead zombies, and holy knights devoted to their faith. Here also within these pages you will find a very human man, born of a virgin and called by Divine Light to redeem and save a lost people and a world on the brink of war.

Hopefully, as it is my intent, you will also be able to meet and see the One who is Light that I have come to know in a language and a way that speaks to you.

-Allen Martin Bair

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.