Whispers

There is something on the winds
There is a breeze coming out of Bethlehem
There are whispers in the air

Out to the East
There are whispers
"Look up to the sky"
They softly say
"Look up and see
The celestial celebration
Hidden in plain sight"
A sigh goes out to the East
"Look up and see
The sign of the Anointed"

Out to the mountains
To the forests
To the depths
There are whispers
"The Maker is back"
They say with gentle ferocity
"Can't you feel the Artist's touch?
Can't you feel the slow return to completion?"

Up into the Temple
Into the very Holy of Holies
There are whispers
"The Child is coming"
They proclaim into the solemnity
"The One with the authority
To break the seals
He will make you new
He will clear away
That by which you are shamed
And He will pour you out into the world"
They drift into the ancient tombs
Inserting themselves
Into the sleep of the prophets, the judges, and the kings
The dark silence of Sheol
Is interrupted by single message
"The Promised One is born"

Down into the streets
To a child born blind
Among others
"A day is coming soon"
They announce cheerfully
"The Prince has been born
So that He may deliver to you
Your inheritance
You will be cut off
Marked by the Angel of Sorrows
Cut off from the world
So the Prince of that world
Will not find you"

Across the skies
Upon the breeze
The whispers go out
They break open
The breeze unlocks
Over shepherds in the night
And the song of angels
Is heard with all its terror and wonder
"Glory to God in the Highest!
And peace on earth to those
On whom His favor rests!"

There are whispers on the air this night
Of a baby lying in a feeding trough
Of a Savior who cannot speak
Or care for Himself
Or control His own bladder
There are whispers this night
Of the God who
By His greatness
Became small
Who in His wisdom
Became ignorant
The Baby
That would destroy
And the remake
This wretched world
The God of all-comsuming
Undignified Love

Parables: The Two Villages

Once there were two tribal villages, and in these villages there was a man found guilty of having murdered a son of the other village's leader. There was no doubt that he had done it, there had been no provocation, and there was no one who had tricked him or egged him on. In short, there was no one to blame but the man in question. Not only that, but his act had driven a wedge between the villages so that the friendship that had existed between them could only be restored if he was given up to be executed, and if his village did not offer him up there would be war.

As it was, there was another man who was the elder brother of the murdered boy. This man (let us call him Blameless and the other Guilty) had been living for a year in the village of Guilty and was regarded by all as an upstanding fellow who was true to his word and was joy to everyone he met. Now, when Guilty was brought forward and his punishment was being prepared Blameless came forward and volunteered to take his place. If anyone else had stepped forward it would not have been allowed. However, because Blameless was the most loved and righteous man in either village his greatness was a match for Guilty's sin. He was also loved by all so that the woe and mourning necessary to seal such a reconciliation would be present in his death. Finally, as the brother of the murdered boy the offense was against him more than it was against any living member of the village except for his father.

There are two ways that this story can end. The Disney ending would be for the willingness of Blameless to be enough and for Guilty to be let off the hook. This is not inconceivable as a real scenario, and it would be enough to restore the status quo of the villages. However, that is all it would do. On the other hand, Blameless could be taken up on his offer and executed in the place of Guilty. If this were to happen the villages would be reconciled but there would also being something more. For on thing, the relationship between the two would actually be greater than it had been originally as they would be bound in kinship through the blood of Blameless. And this bond is one of blood that is spilled, not of blood that is mixed; it is one thing to be brought into a kinship through marriage and another thing entirely to be brought into a kinship through costly, irreversible sacrifice. For another thing, there would be a difference in the character of Guilty. He is now indebted to Blameless in a way that he can never just shrug off so long as he has even the slightest bit of goodness in him. Moreover, to return to his old self is not something that he has any right to do even if he had some right to begin with; even if all his sins never hurt another living person he would be giving the greatest possible offense to Blameless. He is convicted.

Peekaboo

The darkness closes in
Like a converging sea of claws
A canopy of ashes blotting out the stars
A manifest gloom smothering the candlelight
An army of unseen horrors
Toppling the places of law
And raising up their infernal banner

There was a hope
A hero to save the day
A plan to break the curse
A revolt to restore the King
A light to fill the darkness
But it all failed

The hero is dead
The plan is in ruins
The soldiers are cornered
The light is dimming

We had hoped this was a comedy
But the approaching end
Can only be tragic

The fairy tale is over
The dread witch has won

But then the sun comes out
Not slowly
Not peeking fearfully over the mountains
But instead faster than all perception
As if with instantaneous speed
It leaps to its zenith
And blasts the night away

We were holed up in the highest tower
With the enemy filling up every chamber and corridor
The whole fortress filled with depravity and despair
When we made one last suicidal charge
And now the gates are all closed
And everywhere
The gargoyles are waking up
Opening their jaws
stretching out their claws
Waking to the sight of enemies

From the heights
The shofar sounds
And in answer
From the depths
A song rises

As if it were all
A divine game of peekaboo
As if God had covered His face
For just a moment
During which we
Of little faith and little mind
Thought He had disappeared entirely
During which the vile
Thought it safe to come out

Now the Hands come apart
Now the Face is shone
With delight for the beloved
With victory for the faithful
With deliverance for the poor
With unending joy for the sinner
Caught in the snares of repentance
And the schemes of grace

But what of those
Who would hurt
His bride?
They will be caught
In traps which they laid
They will fall before His fury

The veil is parting
And on the other side
Are chariots of fire

My Firm Foundation

You want to know why I'm out here?
Why I'm taking this risk
Putting my reputation
My name
On the line?

It's not because I'm brave
And there's no way in Hell
That it's because I'm so wise
Or strong

I've been told
That everyone I ever trust
Will fail me
Including myself
But that wasn't quite right
It was understated
Because out of everyone I've trusted
Out of every named I've staked my fortunes on
The greatest failure is me
No one ever betrayed me
Like my very own self

You want to know
Where I get my knowledge?
How I can discern these things?

It's not my own intellect
It's not my education
Have you seen that mess out there?
The hundreds of philosophies?
The wonders and miseries of history?
The billions bits of trivia?
I don't care how smart you are
I don't care how educated you are
There's still so much you don't know
So much you can't account for
I don't care how good your aim is
You can't hit that bullseye

You want to know
Where I get my hope?
How I can care about these things
And not go hang myself?
How I can look at death
Without fearing
The vast unknown?

It's not positive thinking
It's not some politician
Some hero who's here today and gone tomorrow
It's not some twelve-step plan
It's not some national plan
Sure a few of those might be okay
But what they leave behind
It spoils
Withers
Burns
I can give my life
To an earthly cause
But if I give it my soul
Then I'm just screwed

You really shouldn't have asked
You know the answer
It's the same as the answer
To the question your rolling eyes ask
"Why don't you ever shut up
About that Jesus?"

He is my Rock
My Firm Foundation

If I am ever bold
It's because I'm under orders
From the Maker of mountains
It's because I'm not fighting
With my own strength
If I look brave
It's because I've been praying for hours
Shaking and trembling and weeping
And the I Am has answered

If I have any wisdom
If my thoughts on a thing
Are within even a thousand miles
Of the thing as it really is
It's because I'm not wandering in the dark
For metaphysics I start with Genesis
For ethics I start with the Sermon on the Mount
For history I start with the Empty Tomb
To know the heart of all meaning
To answer the ultimate "why"
I look in Exodus
To the I Am

If I have any hope
It's because my ransom is paid
It's because my King
Has already squared off with death
And He let everyone know
Who won that war
It's because my inheritance
Will never decay
Will never be lost
Will never be stolen
It's because there is nothing they can do to me
That will not vanish in the coming dawn
It's because my fate is in the hands
Of the I Am

He is my Rock
My Firm Foundation

Gotta Stop the Cycle

A train heads to Auschwitz
With prisoners
Sentenced to be stripped of their humanity
With soldiers
Singing of the glory of Germany
Riding along to their own damnation

A broken home
It doesn't matter why
Ambition
Alcohol
Anger
It doesn't matter which
The child gets lost
Can't see the sun
For that big bitter cloud
Bad things happen
More misfortune means more shame
More shame means more blame
More bitterness

Something's gotta change
Gotta break the cycle

A man out in the streets
Running from his father
Full of spite
And self-sufficiency
He took what was his
And left
Now it's all gone
And his wounded pride
Is angry as hell
Now he's desperate
And he does desperate things
And hates everyone with more than him
And he's high on anything that'll make him forget
That unbearable shame

Something's gotta change
Gotta break the cycle
Gotta stop that train

Some idiot
Decides to make a buck
Off exploitation and injustice
Then some more people do it
They say it's more efficient
They'll be out of business otherwise
Then everyone's doing it
And it's just the way it is

Something's gotta change
Gotta break the cycle
Gotta stop that train

A little boy grows up
With the accumulated sins
Of human history
Blotting out the sun
Pride
War
Nonsense
Greed
Envy
All of it
Every little bit
There's nothing really wrong with him
Except for everything

Something's gotta change
Gotta break the cycle
Gotta stop that train

Falling into the nothing
The endless noise
The final despair
Everything
Falling
Falling
Into the pit

Gotta jump into the grinder
Jam up the machine
Gotta run into the middle of it
Do something crazy
Change the equation
Gotta make something new

That's why He came
The Nazarene
The Man out on the tracks
Digging in His heels
Waiting for the train
He came to make something new
To bring in the light
To interrupt the routine
To the stop the cycle

Angels' Shout

Rejoice!
Look to Bethlehem
And sing a song of joy
The King is come
Heaven's Prince
Lies in a trough tonight
The fulfillment is begun
The restoration is in motion
Ancients
Beauties of the cosmos!
Look to the earth
Where your Maker lies asleep
Don't you recognize Him?
Then shine down in celebration
Announce your Lord
Shepherds of Israel!
Come and hear
The voice
Of the One who breathed you
Into your mother's womb
Laughing and crying
Children of Jacob!
Can't you feel it?
A shoot has risen from the stump of Jesse

Come out!
Messiah is on the streets
Sacred wisdom
Is shouted in the square
Drop your things of labor
Forego your mourning
Go out and see
The coming of the Kingdom
Go out and celebrate
The coming of the Bridegroom
You whom He calls
"Beloved"
Take off your bandages
Uncover your shame
The Healer is here
Come be made new
Receive the gift He gladly gives
Come out of your homes!
Forget your usual business
Let go of your reservations
Come out and celebrate!

Wail!
Scream and cry out!
Emmanuel is dead!
The wonderful Deliverer
The delightful One
The Promised Child
Is murdered
Mutilated on a cross
Wail
You wretches
You who betrayed and forsook Him
How can you be quiet o earth?
Tremble!
Can you rest
O prophets?
Get up
Out of your tombs
And testify

Wake up!
Wake up and go see
The tomb is empty
Death is dead
The mourning is over
The feast is begun
He is back!
The beautiful One
He is returned
And He has broken
The throne of Hell
Go and see
Dance and laugh and sing
He has ransomed His bride
He has made her
Has made all things
New

He has Endured

My hope is secure
My soul is guarded
My faith is well-placed
In Messiah

He was born amidst bloodshed
Into a persecuted people
In the homeland of the bloodiest
Of pagan idols

The strictest examinations
Could find no fault in Him
The most cunning of traps
Failed to snare Him
He fulfilled every prophecy and law
And when they killed Him anyway
The grave could not bind Him
Defeat could not claim Him

My King is alive

Faction did not erase Him
Heretics failed to conceal Him
And all the pains Rome could inflict
Were not enough to halt Him

The barbarians attacked
And found their idols overcome
The Muslims advanced with sabers rattling
And were pushed back

Men of worldly piety
Tried to muffle Him
Sold His name
For gold and girls and good repute
And made to bury Him
In a golden tomb
But His words fell upon every language
His faithful sanctified houses of worship
and drove out the world
With a red-hot iron
And all the wealth of the world
Was not enough to hold Him down

Voltaire tried to replace Him
The Nihilists tried to ignore Him
Statists, Feminists, Communists, Transcendentalists
Skeptics of every kind
All tried to erase, supplant, refute
All passed away into ages past
While the object of their scorn
Remained

Kings covered Him
In imperial banners
Merchants locked him up
In the deepest bowels of slave ships
They tried to steal His name
To own it

They went the way of all mortal things

Persecution
Scorn
Subterfuge
Even Death
My King endured it all

The history
Of Emmanuel
Is a history of empty tombs

Polytheism is too Civilized and Pantheism is too Wild

Polytheism is too civilized and pantheism is too wild. The polytheist gods are appeased with offerings because their laws are arbitrary; there is nothing really meaningful or eternal about their commandments. On the other hand, the laws of the Pantheist God are completely unchanging but they are also impassive. They are completely natural in precisely the same way that the laws of gravity are natural so that no matter how eternal they are they still have very little to do with righteousness. But the God of the Bible is something else entirely. His laws are both eternal and good; it is true that to ignore them naturally leads to spiritual death just as ignoring the laws of the forest naturally leads to death, but it is also true that they should lead to such a thing and it is likewise true that to follow them should lead to eternal life. His laws are unbending, for they are holy and wise, but His love has rescued the accused. While not defying the old ways, He made a new way.

Extravagant Giving

The men of wealth
Are not too extravagant
Dumping buckets of gold at the altar
The widow is not praised for her long face
It is the wealthy donors
Whose giving is not extravagant enough
They are the ones who scorn the celebration
Settling for mortal trumpets
And human praise

It's not about fasting
It's not about penance
It's about celebration
It's about dancing and shouting and giggling

It's about manna from Heaven
That is to be spent the day it arrives
It's about perfume on the feet of our Lord
After all, He set the example
Though every gift He received
Was rightfully His from the beginning
With the gift of a poor boy's lunch
He gave out a feast
And what He did save up
The prophecies and stories and miracles
Which He had stored up since the Fall
He poured back out
In the most extravagant gift of all
The blood
The body
The empty tomb

It should absolutely be costly
At times it might even be painful
But it's not about the pain
It's about the celebration

Our God delights
In extravagant gifts

Legion

An army
Stretching out into the horizon
Of eternal horrors
More ancient than the earth
Armed with every imaginable temptation
Every conceivable ailment and scourge

They were old when Adam was young
They were there when Jerusalem fell
When Daniel prayed they met Michael in battle
They were there in the court of Solomon
And they made their homes in the Baal temples
Gorging themselves on infant blood

They are the princes of the earth
The lords of gold and steel
The monsters in the shadows
The destroyers of love and worship
The enemies of our souls
Assembled in two tormented hosts

But then He comes into view
Jesus of Nazareth
The Man of Galilee
The Emmanuel

There is no rattling of sabers
He does not shout or threaten
They do not roar and pound their feet
While He is still on the horizon
They fall flat on their faces
Begging for a merciful defeat

Three Weeks

I've been waiting
For something
A verse
A sign
A feeling
Anything
Anything to let me know
That I am not alone

Everything's going gray
The monuments still stand
But I've forgotten what they mean
I reread the message
And find no flaw
No sign of deception
But I still think
That it's a bad joke

I look around
And I'm scared
I see the sands
And the feeble things that thrive in them
I see them and I shake with idolatrous fear
Trembling before them
As if they had authority
Even as I recall the stones
And remember where they are buried
I think to take off my shoes
To sift the sands with my toes
Until I feel the rocks underneath
But I don't bother

It's all coming back
Every little sin
Every last temptation
They're all rushing back
And I can't stop them
I don't even want to

I'm ready to drop it
I've been waiting for three weeks
Holding on to this message
I've asked in faith
And seen nothing
I'm ready to throw it aside
Call it a bout of lunacy
Or call it nothing it all
And just pretend it never happened
I know that I've been here before
I've seen it all before
The same old sham
And I can't give any reason
Why this time should be any different
Why the raucous whispers
Should be telling anything but lies
But I'm buying into them anyway
I'm ready to desert my King for them

Then comes the light
The glory
The terrible, wonderful messenger
The servant of the Lord Most High
I trembled
And dead skin is shaken off
His words are like honey on my tongue
They always were
Even if I could not taste them
Or would not

I asked
And He answered
With power and love
He wiped all else away
And left me overflowing again

Sleeping and Waking

Dreaming in one hour
Waking in another
But which is which?

I find myself
In the midst of angels
The whole of Creation
Is all lit up with heavenly light
There is joy
Boldness
Love

Then I am in normalcy
The horizon is blocked from view
By the thousand little things
And all I am
Is fixed on the everyday
The routine
The minute troubles
Of the common struggle

I dwell in the towering city
The land of today and tomorrow
And in the electric light of hallways
I see the life of the spirit
The story of souls and scriptures and prayers
To be a fantasy
A flight from reality
Hours of denial and daydreams
Which it is not wise to make sacrifices for

I find myself in the mountains
The place of hope and terror and joy
Caught up in a rush of life
I look to the city
And shout
"Lies! Lies!"
That is only a veil
To be at any moment
Ripped aside
It has never been anything
But a medium
For the matters of eternity

I float at the surface
Between sleeping and waking
Looking to find
Just what is real
And what is false
In my mind I already know
But my heart feigns ignorance
Clinging to the things of comfort
I can only pray for the strength to let go
And wake to the world of the great I AM

The Testimony of the Thief

I saw Him preaching one day
He said He had come for the lost
He said He would bring new life
And some cold, bitter part of me broke
I was flooded
Overcome
For a moment
Everything that had been me for as long as I could remember
Was delightfully destroyed
By this Man of Galilee

Then I ran
I pulled back
In hate
And fear
And pride
I fled to dark corners
To darker deeds
To anything that could drown out
That terrible light
I smothered its memory
In sins and distractions of every kind
Until they lead me to my execution

He was there too
The One I had been so desperate to escape
Beaten and brutalized
As if my every hateful thought against Him
Had been dealt to His body
As if after every theft
I had carried an ounce of His flesh away
In addition to all my other prizes

All my other hopes were dashed
All my illusions had crumbled away
So I let the last of my burdens drop
A little too late
And asked
Only that He would remember me
And He said what I had feared to hear
All my life

"You will be with Me in paradise"

There was something in His voice
An agonizing gurgling sound
Which I realized
In the midst of both our torment
Was a laugh

I heard it all
In that one sentence
In that painful laugh
I heard how He had watched me
How He had made me
How I had broken His heart
How if He had not been so contorted
Had His body not been so stretched and ripped
He would have grinned and giggled
Would have embraced me
And lifted me into the air
I heard how He would love me forever
And I would never be apart from Him ever again

The Whirlwind

One moment a gentle breeze
The next moment a hurricane
One night I am dwelling in the glory of the Lord
The very next day I'm drowning in normalcy
All it takes is an extra-long essay
A good manga manga
A bit of attention
A lethargic urge
And I turn back to disobedience

His Word is my anchor
By knowledge I am held firm
But a thousand arguments turn against me
By days end they shall be proven frauds
Like all the others before them
Fallacies and lies
But still I sway and stumble

I find myself in obedience
After a week of urging
And constant reluctance
And in a moment
My pride steps in
To spoil all my offerings
When I am on my own
Even my acts of righteousness end in destruction

My very best is not good enough.
It is inadequate
But the El-Shaddai is my King

Is it Enough?

So you say you're not ready
You're too afraid
Too weak
Too uneducated
It's a mistake
He can't be calling you
Surely He meant ten years
Not just one

Then tell me
Before I lose control
And kill you where you stand
By what name
And by whose blood
Were you saved?

Heaven's Beloved
Came into an unclean world
In an unfit body
Endured scoffers
And faithless followers
Was beaten
And disgraced
Was tortured
Was even killed
All for your sake

So answer me
Without excuses
Face the issue
Without disguise
Is it enough?

The Chain of Sin

One of the most complaints against Christianity is directed against the doctrine that we are all depraved and unable to become righteous before God by our own efforts. One might point out the many apparently righteous people throughout history, but it is more common to simply claim that the average person is not "evil" and appeal to the idea that the moral standard which we call "decency" should be enough. In order to explain why our human goodness is insufficient, it is important to understand the nature of sin.

In the Old Testament, great importance was placed on ceremonial cleanliness. To be disabled, sick, or maimed was to be contaminated with the physical mark of the Fall, and to touch anyone or anything that was ceremonially unclean was to be infected with that same mark. From a cultural standpoint, the Israelites were commanded to completely wipe out the Canaanites for the same reason, and when they failed to do so they were infected with idolatry, witchcraft, and infant sacrifice. This is because it is logically impossible for there to ever be a compromise between righteousness and sin; they can only meet each other in war.

Imagine that there are three apples. The first apple is a normal, ripe apple that is perfectly good to eat; the second one is brown and wrinkled; and the third one is shriveled up and black, not fit to even be in the same room with. While we can all agree that the third apple is more rotten than the second one, that does not make the second one good to eat. We might eat the second apple anyway if we are in a famine, just as we settle for decency under the conditions of a fallen world, but it is insane to think that we would do anything except to throw it out in times of health and prosperity. In other words, the second apple is not nearly as rotten as the third one, but that does not change the fact that it is rotten. For the first apple to be healthy and ripe, it must have certain very specific qualities, but for it to be rotten all it needs is to be lacking in any one of these qualities (though if it is lacking in one it is almost impossible for it not to be lacking in another).

It's the same way with sin. Someone who shoplifts once on a whim or dare may not be "as much of a thief" in one sense as a professional burglar, but if you are simply asking a yes or no question of "is that man a thief", then the answer for both the shoplifter and the burglar is "yes." The thing that matters to the buyer is not how close an apple is to a state of absolute rottenness, but rather whether or not it is healthy. Likewise, if we are to earn our way to Heaven then the thing that matters to God is not how close we are to a state of absolute sin, but rather whether or not we are righteous. Once again, there is no compromise, no middle ground, between good and evil any more than there is a round square or a shadow which stretches toward the light that casts it. It is logically impossible. If Heaven and Hell are to meet, it must be on the battlefield.

In addition to this there also tends to be a downward spiral that emerges out of sin. In my own experience, I have seen this in procrastination where the act of putting of an assignment increases my anxiety towards it either because of fear from the increased difficulty of the same work with less time, shame at having put it off, or some combination of the two. This may also manifest in a general feeling of lethargy or depression which leads a person to choose to skip a given activity with the result that the feeling continues to grow and solidify whether the activity was of a social or dutiful nature. Once we have entered these cycles, we can only get out with the help of an outside force such as a person who might motivate us, a deadline which sets an absolute standard beyond our ability to fight, or sometimes even a simple change in circumstances such the weather or finances. In the absence of such outside influences, or at least the absence of sufficiently strong influences, we simply continue on and on until we are destroyed. When the Bible tells us that "the wages of sin is death" it is not telling us about an arbitrary mandate which God could change if He wanted to; it is simply giving us a plain description of the basic essence of sin.

There is a problem here. If we are to escape not only the sinful cycles of procrastination and drugs and hatred, but the sinful chains of the entire fallen world, then the power by which we are saved must come from outside that same world. Friends are not enough. Family is not enough. Prisons are not enough. Even wisdom is not enough. Only the indwelling presence of God is enough to break this chain.

When the prophets and the priests touched that which was unclean, they themselves became unclean. The mere reflection of Goodness which dwelt in them was not enough to overcome the infection of sin. But there was one man unlike all others. Phillip Yancey once noted that in the story of Jesus the old pattern is reversed. When that Man of Galilee went out among the lepers, the adulterers, the tax collectors, the Gentiles it was the unclean that were transformed. As vessels of righteousness we had been fighting a losing battle from the very start, but now Righteousness Himself was entering the battlefield and where He went the infernal hosts begged for mercy. And He has gone past it. The King of Heaven charged all the way into the fortress of the Sheol.

There is a new wind blowing in from Jerusalem, and a trembling in the world. The line is broken. The wall is breached. The chain is rattling and breaking in places, unable to restrain the things of Eden that are coming back to life.

The Celestial Charge

I saw an angel
Named Sorrow
Who shone like all the stars
With gleaming white skin
And silver hair

In her hands she grasped a sword
Forged from the bones of Abel
The remains of the golden calves
And the treasures of the kings of Israel and Judah
It cut the air
Not with a whistle
But with a song
Taken from a Galilean mountain
She called the song Conviction
And the blade she called Despair


I saw an angel
Called Terror
With wings of flame
And eyes like the ocean depths

In one hand he held a shofar
That bellowed like thunder
And in the other he clutched a whip
As fierce and bright as lightning
The shofar had sounded when Moses returned to Egypt
It had announced the births of the prophets
And had called Babylon out against the Israelites
The whip had driven Lucifer from Heaven
It had been sent as a gift to Elijah
And had struck the money changers at the Temple
It was in the light that brought Saul to his knees


I saw an angel
Whose name was Joy
With a form like a child
And wings colored like the dawn
And a woolen tunic covered in dirt
And a ring shaped from a cherry blossom

In one hand was a bloody rag
Which she called Grace
In the other was a jar of honey
Which she called Glory or Delight


Sorrow glided down
Impossibly fast
On a gentle breeze
The idols fell to dust at her approach
She came upon a feast of Baal
And cut down the shadowy lords of the dance
And scattered the celebrants
She came upon an emperor
Who lit torches to obscure the sun
And built monuments
To distract from the mountains
With one stroke
She made of his empire
A mere ruin

Terror descended
In a raging storm
He sounded his horn
And stacked bricks tumbled down
Unable to contain their resonating song
His whip lashed out
And profane lips fell to kiss the earth
Wherever he went
That which was mild
Became fierce
That which was safe
Became dangerous

Together
The two made war
Against every human heart

Joy went down to earth
Following after her parents
They went before her
To break the crooked things
And she came after
To make them straight
When Despair cut away every illusion
She emerged to show the one true hope
After Terror brought men to their knees
Joy gave them a new strength to lift the weight of their inheritance
On the foundations of palaces that could not stand against her parents
She built strongholds for her King
To voices robbed of nonsense and boasts
She gave a new song of love

When Sorrow had pierced my heart
And Terror broke the pillar of my pride
And the two turned to fight relentlessly
Against the Enemy of my soul
She made me to taste
of the Delight of the Lord

Song of Joy

Set to the beat
Of the stomp of David's feet
And the clapping of his hands
Before the Ark of the Covenant
It bursts forth

The rousing noise
Which wakes the Spring at Winter's end
And moves all the world to be reborn
With every passing year
Amplified a hundred thousand times
First for the birth
And then for the rebirth
Of the Anointed
Pounds through the halls

It stirs every heart
Drowns out all nonsense
And resonates with every living thing

It is grand
And terrible
And wonderful

Song of Sorrow

It drifts out
It seems slow
But in an instant it overtakes you
Fill up every corner
Finds every hiding place

It's the echo of a teardrop's fall
A thousand mournful sighs and dying gasps
Which snatch up your own breath in an instant

It silences all clinking coins
Breaks every enchantment
Stills every crowd

And it is beautiful

The Divine Pursuit

He is coming
He who breathed life
The King of all kings
The Light of all the world

He rescues us
He romances us
He wars against us
He pursues us relentlessly

A thousand times
We discover our smallness
The fickleness of worldly foundations
When we are in the muck and mire
He pulls us out
When we are outnumbered
And sick and weary and hungry
He has turned away our enemies

When we were lost in the wilderness
And collapsed under a burden we could not bear
He chased away the wolves
And carried us home


The sun rises
Upon a lush green morning
Bejeweled with dew
The flowers open up
A delightful array
All of it
The canvas of the sky
The dynamic sculptures of the earth
And everything in between
Are not given only in the hour of need
They are gifts
Received on morning walks
In day-to-day business
He gives it all freely
Delightfully

Whether the beauty of Creation
Or the joy of His Spirit
On a random Sunday
His gifts are cheerfully given


I have gone out
To a temple of my own making
Dedicated to my own glory
And every detestable thing
I hear His approach
And I flee
Down whatever bloody alley presents itself

So He draws His sword
He calls on a legion of seraphim
He lays a thousand Bibles open
On the shelves of the mockers
He anoints an army of saints
He positions all His forces
And then He moves

No brick is left upon its brother
No idol stands before His glory
All that can be shaken is shaken
All that can be broke in broken
He beats me down
Relentlessly

And when I am on my knees
He lays the royal robe on my shoulders
And places the ring on my finger

He had pursued me
In His terrible
Wonderful
Love

He has rescued me
And romanced me
And warred against me

Bui Doi

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’"

Matthew 25:34-36

"The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name."
Acts 5:41
“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."
Matthew 5:43-48




In addition to the unconditional love and sacrifice preached and demonstrated by Jesus, the Gospels tell us three things about servanthood. First, they tell us that we are to serve our enemies, the people who insult us, abuse us, and would likely kill us. Second, they tell us that we are to serve the poor and lowly; in fact, they say that we are serve not just the lowly but the lowest of the low. Thirdly, they tell us that if we are persecuted and disgraced in our service, we are to rejoice.


Those are three things that we who have been in the church long enough tend to be very familiar with. They are subjects of good, vigorous discussions. And yet it seems like we still don't understand them.


I recently saw a musical called Miss Saigon and one of the songs in it was called "Bui Doi." The phrase refers to Vietnamese children conceived by American soldiers who had hooked up with local girls. As one would most unfortunately expect, these children were targeted by the Communist regime after we pulled out and they lived in abject poverty and mortal danger. We're always told that the people suffering overseas are our brothers and sisters and that the children in the World Vision commercials are our children, but how would we react if that was actually a biological fact? Imagine that you had a child and that he or she was living in a refugee camp, as a slave (no, that little problem is absolutely not gone from the world, not even from the U.S.), or in an overcrowded city with food and water that you wouldn't give a pet snail. I hope your reaction would be a little different from the one you have when you see those commercials.


I'm discovering now that one of the most terrifying moments in a Christian's life is when that person realizes that Jesus meant what He said. In my experience, whenever God has told me to go and do something that requires serious sacrifice and risk I have immediately tried to tune down my interpretation. And then I tell myself I'm being somehow clever or realistic for doing that. If anything, we need to tune our understanding of God's mission for our lives up. Way up.


Think about what it means to serve the lowest of the low. Think for a second about the fact that Jesus told us not only to serve them but that anything we did for them we would be doing for Him. If you're looking for Messiah, I have great news. He's right over at the nearest homeless shelter. He's waiting around that strip club waiting for someone to answer the call. He's on the other side of the world in a crowded camp full of people who had their lives ripped away from them in an instant. If you want to find the One who gave you a second birth, the God who have you the victory you could never claim on your own, the Man you say is your savior and king, that's where He is. Don't you want to stop by?

Then there's the whole deal with the enemies. The Bible says to love the people who hate you and that means every single obnoxious, revolting weasel that you meet in work or school and whom you want to punch right in the face. It's not enough to like the idea of loving your enemies (which is one of the most popular aspects of Christianity), you have to do it (which is one of the most unpopular aspects). It also means that you have to love and forgive the enemies of your nation or your people. At the same time that we are commanded to serve the people in refugee camps, we are also commanded to love the people who put them there. When Osama bin Laden died and we Western Christians celebrated, we failed. We had an opportunity to show the same kind of heartbroken, unconditional, terrible love to those in Radical Islam that Christ showed for us, and instead we showed them exactly the kind of enemy they expected to see.


Finally, consider the cost of servitude. We live in a culture that is terrified of the very thought of suffering. The Bible tells us that if we don't suffer for God we're doing something wrong. Our own personal difficulties and persecution can be large or small depending on what God wants us to do at the moment, but we should be ready for it to be big. Imagine that God told you to go into the ghetto or some turmoil filled region of Africa in pursuit of a particular individual. Now imagine that He told you that you would be tortured in the process. Worse yet, imagine that He said you were going to be martyred. Both of these experiences are called glorious in the Bible. When we see historical figures who endured such things we call them saints. But what about in our own lives? If you had a friend who told you that God was sending him into martyrdom, wouldn't you try to dissuade him?

Mind you, one of the great things about being Christians is that we have the Holy Spirit to direct us. We don't have to be in a moral panic burning through all our energy and resources trying to solve all the world's problems and failing miserably. If God wants you to go overseas and minister to starving orphans then you can do that, but if he just wants you to serve your local school or neighborhood you can do that too. There are no small tasks in the Kingdom of Heaven. However, that "if" does not justify turning a blind eye to the radical commands of the Gospel.

I want you to imagine for a moment that you had your own Bui Doi out there somewhere in the world. I realize this may be difficult if you're a college student like me, but imagine that you were one of those Vietnam veterans who left a child behind in the midst of war and poverty and persecution. Imagine watching a World Vision commercial or a special report on some third world country and thinking to yourself that the child you see could literally be your son or daughter. What if you knew that they were your child. Wouldn't you sell off anything to fly over there and find them and hold them and make sure that they were safe?

Now imagine that you saw a hooker on a street corner and God told you that you were to marry her and that He let you see her for even the briefest moment the way He saw her. Imagine spending months just trying to get her to trust you, taking on a second job so you can pay for her to have good food and shelter, enduring ridicule and slander on every side as you desperately try to win over and care for this outcast. Wherever you look out into a hurting world, imagine that it was literally your friends and family that were looking back at you.

I know this may sound like one giant guilt trip but it doesn't have to be like that. The reason those commercials and sermons make us uncomfortable is because we sit there waiting for normal life to resume and the distractions to flood in and  we fail to recognize what should be the most obvious of options. We fail to understand that we can act on that message. Before any of us were born, God prepared for you a victorious battle for the lost. The joy and glory of the salvation of the needy is our inheritance. If you do throw away everything you own for the sake of an infant halfway around the world, that loss will perish just as the mortal treasure you gave up would have, but that infant will be your precious delight for all eternity. C.S. Lewis was right; our desires are far too weak!

I'm done now, but there's one thing I'd like you to do. I would like you to pray for God to reveal your Bui Doi to you. Pray for God to reveal your inheritance and the path laid out to claim it. If this is something you have already received then I praise God for you. If you feel moved to action but you don't believe God is answering, I will pray for discernment for you and I would advise you to wait and to seek advice. If you pray and know that you are answered then I will pray for you to be encouraged and equipped for the battle ahead. Whatever the case, to God be the glory for ever and ever.

Shattered

It's all gone now
Broken into a thousand
Glittering pieces

The fairy food
No longer enchants
And the paper covering
No longer astounds

It's all shattered now
The glass house
In a glass world
All of it
The prize
The pleasures
The foundations
The things of decency and normality

They have all lost their gleam
The illusion is gone
And only worthless trinkets remain

Every stable thing is gone
A thousand feet below
The make-believe world
The true landscape is splayed out
Awesome and fierce
With heroes and monsters

It's all so terrifying
But what else is there to do
But to jump
It's all or nothing now
No
Not even that
How could I go back to that sham?
That time is past
Now it's just
All

1 Kings 19:11-13

You should run now
My God is coming
I know I can never hurt you
I know that you are stronger
That you are smarter
That as long as I stand
On my own strength
You have nothing to fear from me

But the El Shaddai is coming
The Annointed One
My Bridegroom approaches

There is a wind
A wind as sharp as any blade
As strong as any machine
It splits boulders in two
And blasts mountains to rubble

But God is not in the wind

There is an earthquake
A trembling as if a thousand giants
Were all dancing in celebration
Or as if the Hosts of Heaven
Had broken down into the infernal depths
And the celestial armory displayed it's terrible might

But God is not in the earthquake

There is a fire
Like the blazing sun
Like Baal's furnace
Blazing like never before
And sent out in mockery
Against those who lit it
The waters disappear
Stone walls turn to ash
When I close my eyes
I see them still
And just as bright

But God is not in the fire

There is a whisper in my ear
So beautiful I weep to hear more
And a cool, soft touch
Like a rose petal
Falling across my cheek

Every word melts away the lies
Every touch softens the calluses
His kiss undoes my pride

God is in the whisper

You should run now...

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. ¹⁹ For it is written:
   “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
   the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
 ²⁰ Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? ²¹ For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. ²² Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, ²³ but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, ²⁴ but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. ²⁵ For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
 ²⁶ Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. ²⁷ But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. ²⁸ God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, ²⁹ so that no one may boast before him. ³⁰ It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. ³¹ Therefore, as it is written: “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.”
1 Corinthians 1:18-31


18- Like the rest of the passage, this verse is cheifly concerned with the simple fact that the wisdom of God is not the wisdom of the world. Since the epistles consistently demonstrate submission to the laws of logic in the way that they are written, it can be safely assumed that those laws are not the issue, in which case the disagreement between the wisdom of the world and the wisdom of God must lie not in the structuring of thoughts but rather in the basic axioms of the two. Basically, this means that the problem with worldly wisdom is that it starts out with a false understanding of what is good, what is trustworthy, and other such things.

At the same time that this verse discusses the contrast between worldly and heavenly wisdom, however, there is also something more subtle which sets this verse apart from the rest of the passage. That is the claim that the wisdom of God is power. This means that, unlike the wisdom with which the Greeks were accustomed, the wisdom of God is active. Not only the subject of that knowledge, but the knowledge itself is an active force upon the believer.

19- Essentially this is about the greatness of God and the fallenness of the world. On the one hand, we see how God surpasses all human wisdom, displayed here by the way in which the worldly authorities failed to recognize Jesus and the way in which He frequently proved His greatness through His teachings and discussions. The Lord also displays His supremacy by actively confounding and thus making a mockery of the wisdom of the age. However, that particular example of God's greatness occurred in response to human sin since such action would not have been necessary if the intellect of the world had not been a stumbling block and a distraction from God.

This verse also establishes the Old Testament as holy scripture for Paul's Gentile audience and shows how the Messiah was anticipated by it.

20- The particular rhetorical question of where the philosopher or teacher of the law is seems to imply a particular answer which is both obvious and favorable to Paul's argument. At this point in history, we can say that the wise men would have been the Greek philosophers and the teachers of the law would have been the Pharisees. Both of these groups are clearly past their prime at this point, overshadowed by their greater predecessors, and are also under the rule of Rome which has similarly past its prime by entering its imperial age.

21- Here is becomes particularly clear that it "pleased God" for the wisdom of the world to be blind to the Gospel. There's a lot that can be said on this, but to me it seems that this verse breaks down to the issue of pride. God wanted the wisdom of the world to be at odds with true wisdom because He did not want the gift of His Son to be a point of human pride for us. Even on an intellectual level, accepting the Gospel constitutes a complete and total surrender and an abandonment of worldly understanding.

22-23- Since the Gospels are overflowing with both wisdom and signs, it cannot be that signs and wisdom are somehow inherently sinful in God's sight. The problem is instead that the Jews were more interested in signs that in the One giving them and the Greeks were more interested in wisdom than in the One whom wisdom is ultimately about.

24- No matter how many times I look at this I still can't make sense of the grammar so I'm just going to ignore that aspect. This verse once again affirms Christ as the Savior and the one for whom we have all been waiting but it also adds on that He is the "power of God and the wisdom of God" meaning that He has all that the Jews and the Greeks were both looking for, even though they were too focused on the characteristics of the Messiah and not enough of the actual Messiah.

25- This passage is a powerful statement concerning Christian humility, love, and faith. In the eyes of the world, all these things are weak and foolish and sometimes they are if they are taken out of context, but at the same time history has shown us that these things which the world sees as foolishness and weakness can overturn the institutions of the world.

26-29- There are a lot of things packed into this passage. First of all, there is the affirmation of the Beatitudes as we see that it was the poor and the lowly of the Corinthians who have been called by Christ; the rich and esteemed have found their most renowned features to be nothing more than a stumbling block. After this there is a commentary on the way in which God functions. Throughout history, God has consistently chosen to raise up the weak and lowly as heroes of His Kingdom (David, Moses, Joan d' Arc, etc.,) and in these verses Paul tells his readers that this has not been done thoughtlessly or by accident but instead that it has been done deliberately as a demonstration of God's power and the world's futility. In fact, in describing the victory God gives His servants Paul says that He chose "the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are." This to me is a very shocking statement as he says that God (to put it in my own words) "uses the things of no substance to undo the things of great substance." It is as if the person being used was literally nothing but a shadow or a reflection in the mirror being given the power to not only defeat the "great" people of the world, but to wipe away every trace of them. And when it comes down to it, what is left of so many worldly kings anyway?

30- And now we are reminded of something we absolutely must never forget and something which we seem to never remember: that all our salvation and all our goodness comes from God. Yes, we did choose Messiah, but it was He who chose us first, it is He who transforms us into His image-bearers now, and it was God who provided us with enough goodness to want salvation in the first place. In other words, all that we have is a gift.

31- But finally, we are reminded to celebrate. In these final words we are told not just how to boast but that we are able to boast at all, that there is glory to be had and to be delighted in. And that is the glory of God.

Walking by Faith

A man walks along an island of sand. All around him there are fruit-bearing plants and bushes with twigs and leaves that are perfect for building fires, but he knows he cannot build a home there because even though the island is very large it still never rises more than a few feet above the ocean and there could at any moment come a wave capable of completely reshaping the whole place. As he goes along, the man drags his feet through the sand, feeling his way along. Eventually he finds a rock buried beneath the sand. He still can't see it, but after a while he is able to get a rough understanding of size and shape of the rock. He may look around and see fruits ripe for the picking in the distance while the only trees that grow on the rock are thorny and uninviting, but he will make his home on the rock nonetheless. He does this because even though his sight is telling him that the rock is a barren place, he knows from experience and from speculation that when the storms come the sand will simply wash away and give him no safety while the rock will hold firm. The trees may look unpleasant, but if he can build a shelter using them for support or rely on them to discover the rock's hidden holes and crevices, that shelter will easily outlast any built in the appealing places of the island.


"For we live by faith, not by sight." 2 Corinthians 5:7

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” Matthew 7:24-27

Neither can I

To the people
Who say
That's great
For you
It's so awesome
But it's not for me
To all the people
Who say
I just can't do that

Neither can I

I can't carry that cross
I can't live that life
I can't surrender everything
I can't even begin
To want to do it

I can't make that jump
Or walk that road
It's too far
Too hard

I can't open the closet door
And look that monster in the eye
Much less
The one in the bathroom mirror

I can't face the light of day
Without a thousand little lies
Without those many other truths and ways
I can't do it

I can't break these chains
Or even admit their existence

Not out of my own Strength

But there is Someone else
Whose movements shakes the world
Whose words have authority
To rebuke every evil
Whose breath
Gave you birth
Whose death
Can give you it again

He can carry you
Across burning deserts
Over treacherous mountains
And through thorny wilderness

He can crush
Every single thing
That is pressing you down
That is keeping you from Him
All your chains
Are like paper in His hands

Your monsters
All assembled together
And multiplied by a million
Can do nothing before Him
But beg for mercy

And
The most wonderful
And terrible
Thing of all
Is that He
Can break
My cold
Wretched
Evil
Heart

The Terrible God

Do not ask where God has gone
Do not plead for His presence
You do not know what you ask
You do not know the mercy He is showing

For He is a terrible God

Terrible
Able to incite terror
To make the foundations
Of the earth
Tremble

He will come for you
Be assured of that
He will save you
Romance you
Rescue you

But that is not the end

Know this
You are in rebellion
You are at war with Him
You have taken up every good thing
And every worthless thing
All the delights and treasures
Which it is His joy to bless you with
And placed them upon an altar

So if He comes to save you
He will also come to conquer you
He will not do it any other way
He cannot

So tremble
He is not a genie to grant your wishes
He is not a kindly grandfather
He is not a tame lion
He will take you as you are
But He is not content to leave you there

The sun is rising
And we have lived too long in darkness
Our eyes are dull
And our skin is sickly
The light is good
It is wonderful
But it shall burn
It shall sting and ache
And we must leave our darkness behind
The things made for the night
Must perish
We must let them go
All of them
Without exception
For in the light of day
They will crumble

Our God is a terrible God
He will have no part
In the comfort
And safety
And good repute
Of this dim, rebellious world

He will not stop short
He will not ease up
In His war

His wrath burns bright
Against all that turns us from Him
Whether greed or lust
Or lies
Or ambition
Or relationships
Or the very powers of Hell
He will smash it all to ruins

The love of the Cross is not weak
It does not incite mere "ooh"s and "ah"s
It is a love that convicts
A love that unmakes
The strongholds of the world
A love before which
All pride must perish
It is a terrible love

Our God is a terrible God
And He is all the greater
All the more wonderful
All the joyous
Because of it

The Mouse's Search for the Cat

Man's search for God
What a joke
As if we haven't been hiding out
Always trying to get away
From that terrible radiance
What drug won't we take
What idol won't we build
To conceal His face?

We were made to be with Him
Made for love
For eternity
And yet we can't bear to look at Him
Perhaps it is because of that glory
It reminds us how unclean we are
And our pride is irked
By it's own sinfulness
Or because our inheritance
Is unearned
Our dignity
Cannot accept such a gift

No
We are not searching for Him
It is He who searches us out
In His mercy and humility

Sweet Enough

Another piece is off the board
Taken in an instant
Without hesitation
I try to defend
And in one move
He crashes through my lines
My every piece is in jeopardy

The lies are flowing freely
Desperately
Building up layer
After layer
Of defenses
All the arguments are assembled
Lined up and ready

He is unimpressed
He dismisses them all
One after another
Systematically
Relentlessly
Rebuke after rebuke
Devastates my stronghold

The tables are overturned
Gold spills out across the floor
Your friends are nowhere in sight
The monument to your strength
And sweat
And willpower
Lies in ruins
No stone is stacked upon its brother
All of it has failed
Strength, knowledge, friendship, love, money, ambition
All of it
It has all failed
It has all been overturned

He is relentless
Whatever chains are binding you
Whatever idols you have bowed to
Whatever it is you rely on instead of Him
He is sweet enough to make it crumble

Secularist Myths About the Bible

The Bible is Obscure

The best example of how this is blatantly wrong is in the Book of Daniel. For the very beginning, this book is about how God gives us knowledge and clarity as Daniel gains the king's favor by explaining the meaning of a dream the king had been given. In the later half of the book Daniel has a series of visions which are beyond his understanding, but each one is followed up by a simple and understandable explanation from God, usually delivered by an angel. In addition to these visions, the Bible also makes of point of explaining why many of the people portrayed in it have the names they do, why God does some things or allows things to happen (for example, God hardens Pharoah's heart in order to display His wonders and ensure that the Hebrews leave Egypt entirely instead of simply going into the desert to worship, Satan is allowed to torment Job so that Job's faithfulness can be proved, and the Jews are scattered in order to be disciplined), and what certain symbolic actions or ceremonies mean.

Skeptics also make this claim about the laws of the Bible, and while many laws are not explained (sometimes because they are so basic they do not need explaining) there are still many that are. The New Testament is a good place to look for learning how to understand the Law, especially in the teachings of Jesus and the writings of Paul. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus explains the basic essences of the major laws, and the two greatest commandments He tells the Pharisees of explain the essence of the Law as a whole.

The Old Testament God is Too Harsh and the Ideas of the New Testament are Inconsistent

Firstly, if you actually read the Old Testament with an open heart you will be surprised at how merciful God is. When Cain was sent into exile, he was given a mark so that everyone would know God loved him. Jacob was extremely sinful and deceptive, but God forgave him and gave him the name of Israel along with a nation to bear that name. The Hebrews whom God delivered out of slavery with quite possibly the most astonishing and spectacular series of  miracles in history complained that they had been led out of Egypt to starve in the desert, built pagan idols to worship when Moses was up on the mountain for too long, and backed out of their inheritance because they feared big soldiers more than they trusted God, and the Lord still kept heaping blessings on these people.

There are still many bloody parts of the Old Testament, but in reading them we must realize four things. Firstly, we have to realize that we live in a post-pagan world; our views on how to properly treat one another, love for the less fortunate, and ethics in general have all been shaped by Christian doctrine. In other words, when we imagine the people who were put to death in the Old Testament, a decent, average person is not the image that should come to mind. In fact, even the decency of the modern world is a moral sham; Nazi Germany was filled with decent people. Secondly, we have to understand how tribal the ancient world was. The reason that many enemies of the Jews were judged as a people was that they were, in fact, very unified by their ethnicity and in that respect "innocent" parties were both responsible for the behavior of their kin and were almost certain to avenge any judgement carried out against those kin, leading to endless, bloody feuds (in fact, this precise process is at the root of many biblical conflicts). Thirdly, God is not just a really good person who happens to have infinite power, but is rather the source of all goodness and worth. I won't go into detail on this, but basically when we ask what our purpose is, the only answer that works is God; if someone has turned away from the ultimate purpose of their life and everything else (and no, we are not good enough to be our own reason for existence, otherwise we wouldn't keep asking what our purpose is) what value do they really have? Plato is a good source to learn more about this characteristic of God. Finally, we must keep in mind that every time God commands the deaths of either those who turn away from Him or the enemies of the Israelites, He is doing it to set the stage for the coming of Messiah, whose life and death are the ultimate demonstration of God's love.

In regards to claims that the love of the New Testament is inconsistent with the rigidity of the Old Testament, there is the simple fact that both parts of the Bible have more of the quality frequently attributed to the other part than is widely believed. In the Old Testament, God frequently extends forgiveness to those who do not by any means deserve it, while in the New Testament, Jesus and the Apostles are very strict concerning the behavior of believers. In fact, while we tend to think of love and judgement as being totally separate, the topic about which the New Testament is actually most strict is love. We are commanded to submit with humble love to one another, to love our enemies, and to go out of our way to show love and grace for one another.

Jesus was a Hippie

Jesus was not a Hippie, primarily because the love of Hippies is an easy love. Hippies treat human beings as being their own moral authorities (except when their behavior directly harms others or goes against Hippie philosophy) and hold that everyone is really good deep down. Jesus, on the other hand, upheld a shockingly high moral standard (to look at a woman lustfully is adultery, love your enemies, do not swear oaths at all but simply stand by what you say, etc) and taught that we are all sinners who have rebelled against God. In other words, Jesus held that we absolutely do not deserve love but He still gave it away freely and delightfully. Morever, Jesus also rebuked his disciples quite sternly at times ("Get behind me Satan!") and on one occasion went absolutely beserk at the sight of what He deemed a desecration of the Temple. In fact, Jesus was so terrifying that when Legion saw Him approach he immediately surrendered and begged for mercy.

The Bible is Just Metaphorical

There are certain parts of the Bible that can be taken as metaphorical, such as the story of Creation for instance, but even in those cases critics must remember that to say something is a metaphor is not to say that it means nothing and most of the time the really controversial issues remain. More importantly, most of the Bible is clearly not written metaphorically but is written as historical accounts. Secularists may debate whether or not those accounts are accurate, but unless they can give good reasons as to why a particular passage was intended metaphorically and not literally, the intentions behind those accounts are another matter entirely. This is especially true when dealing with well-recorded and important moments in history since we can know that in those cases the story as a whole is not intended to be metaphor and as such it is unlikely that specific parts of those accounts can be picked out and said to be merely symbolic.

The claim that the Bible is metaphorical basically stems from the assumption among secularists that miracles do not happen and that the belief in them is inherently irrational. In making this claim, the skeptics are trying to force their own views on the biblical authors, but any objective reading of the Bible will find that those writers really did believe that God can and does perform miraculous wonders.

The New Testament was Written Hundreds of Years After Jesus Died and it is Mistranslated

As for the first part of this claim, the Bible was canonized hundreds of years after Jesus died, but the individual books were all written within a few decades after His death and resurrection. Granted, those few decades may still be considered untrustworthy by some, but in regards to the Gospels these doubts are unfounded for three reasons: the Israelite children were required to memorize the entire Torah and as such the Jews were highly reliable witnesses (studies have shown that cultures with oral traditions are well-equipped for precise memorization), the events recorded in the Gospels are nearly all either extremely memorable or easily committed to memory, and many of the key events had very large audiences. The remaining books are nearly all letters to various churches from one apostle or another and as such would have been kept and treasured by those churches.

In regards to the claim that the Bible is mistranslated, there is very little evidence in favor of the critics. For starters, there's the fact that we actually have quite a few original copies of the Bible and the individual books that make it up. If you happen to pick up a Bible and read through it you will find it filled footnotes saying "this could also be translated like this" or "it's unclear what this word means" because the scholars who issued that Bible had copies of those documents available to them (and no, the really important verses don't have those footnotes). In terms of the number of original documents, the length of time between when those documents were written and when the very first copies were written, and the amount of damaged or unclear text the Bible is literally thousands of times more reliable than any other ancient texts.

God is in the Storm

God is in the storm
With the mercy and the rage
The lightning dances
With His delight
The thunder shouts
Of His glory

What eagle dares to fly?
And what fool dares to boast?
Both will be made low
For such haughty ones as that
The wind and rain
Are a mercy
Because lightning is the last resort

God is in the battlefield
In the clashing of steel
In the dying gasps
Where love and hatred meet
Where the zealot shouts
Where brave men cower
And the strong fall before the weak
In the place of passion
Where deceptions fall to dust
That is where He makes his camp

God is in the storm

John Green Missed the Point

A while ago, author and internet celebrity John Green made a video about religion. The video was very respectful and it reflected great care and thought. However, as a Christian, I felt that John had really missed the point of the whole issue. The part at which this became most apparent to me was when he compared religion to a voice shouting at a person that their house was burning. His point was that it doesn't really matter whether the voice came from God or a fireman so much as it matters that the person get out of danger, and he ended the video by saying that he felt discussions about God were not as important as the issue of trying to find purpose in life. As far as I could tell, the basic disagreements between myself and John were centered around two points, namely the nature of purpose and the nature of God.

First off, the issue of purpose has been a major question in my life and when I became a Christian, the answer I found in that doctrine became one of the foundations of my faith. Until that point I had found every answer wanting: science, while being highly admired in our culture, simply didn't seem to cut it; happiness was no good because it wound up saying that we were our own reason for existence and if that were the case then it wouldn't make any sense for us to keep looking for something outside ourselves; and being good to people and helping one another failed because when serve one another we do it out of love, but love involves desiring the loved one's happiness and so that led right back to the failed answer of happiness. But I am getting ahead of myself.

The important issue is the nature of purpose. The chief of these characteristics are goodness, transcendence, and timelessness. Goodness is an obvious characteristic and does not need to be discussed the other two are worth a moment of explanation. The transcendent nature of purpose means that it is above us in some metaphysical sense and is of greater value than us. A man may dedicate himself to the cause of an injured animal, but he must do it in obedience to moral law and not in obedience to the animal. In the same way, whatever we derive our purpose (if we have it at all) from must have natural authority over us and the right to demand our obedience. The timeless nature of purpose means that purpose does not perish; when a person on the verge of death is trying to find meaning, they are trying to find something that will not simply outlast them but something that is entirely outside of mortality, outside the power of death.

Next there is the nature of God. In John Green's view, God seems to be simply a human who happens to be all-knowing and all-powerful and always does the right thing. This view is really not that different from pagan mythology except that instead of many gods there is only one, and I assure you that paganism did not perish simply because its mathematics were unappealing. All three of the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) agree that God is good not simply because of what He does, but because of who He is. To really understand this idea, the best place to turn is to Plato.

Plato's philosophy was founded on the simple principle that we cannot have knowledge of things that do not exist (even with stories and myths we find that every individual component of the tale is rooted in reality) and that things like the laws of logic, beauty, and goodness must be as objectively real as the ground we walk on. Really, this is not that big a claim, but it is one that our Naturalist conditioning is quick to reject. What Plato ultimately concluded from this premise was that when we say that something is good, it is such because it reflects some ultimate reality called Goodness Itself. After all, if a morning is beautiful, that morning is better because of the beauty and as such it is nonsense to say that the beauty arises from the morning since the morning is clearly the inferior of the two. Or, to give another example, when someone like Martin Luther King does something good, his goodness comes from his obedience rather than from his own inner nature; his own goodness comes from the fact that he tries to make his choices according to a higher standard which is outside of himself. While it is not good to accept all of Plato's ideas, the concept of God's identity being that of Goodness Himself is not in any way at odds with the Bible. In fact, scripture actually provides a lot of support for this idea as it holds that all good things come from God, that our own abilities and goodness are derived from Him, and that "God is love."

Now that we understand the nature of purpose and the Christian understanding of God, we are able to see how John Green's statement misses the point. First off, the claim that we are trying to create meaning in this life may not be wrong, but if it is true then it is also true that we are engaged in a futile venture. Purpose is above us and therefore cannot come from us. Second, there is the idea that God and purpose are two separate issues. If either of these two exist, then that cannot be the case. God is the only possible reason for existence that makes any sense (look back at what I said earlier about my own search for meaning and see if you can come up with another workable option) because in order for there to be any meaning there must first be something which is good in and of itself simply for what it is, just as in logic there must be a premise which cannot be explained because it is itself an ultimate explainer.

In short, the voice in the fire does not simply tell us to escape. The voice in the fire is the escape.

Walking by Faith

Everything looks calm now
It's comfortable
Safe

That place looks scary
It's uneasy
dangerous

I try to look beyond
Here, in the meadow
I can lay out plans
I can anticipate changes
But out there
I've no idea what's coming
But whatever it is
I'm afraid of it

Or at least
It seems like that

I know
That this year
Is not what I
Anticipated
So many things
So many normal things
Caught me by surprise
Every year of my life

But it's so hard
To believe that
Looking to the flow
To the temporary

I know
That's He's stronger
Than all my fears
He loves me
He has plans for me
And He deserves my servitude
I know it all
From experience
From friends
From books
From basic reasoning

I've seen it proved
A thousand times over
But it's so much easier
To trust sight
Than knowledge

I need to get out
Before I forget it all
I push my feet into the sand
Feeling around
Dragging my feet
As I walk

There!
I find it
A mere inch below
One little stepping stone
And then another
And another

The path is laid out
Though I can't see where it goes
I'll walk by faith
And not by sight
I will trust my mind
And not my heart

Servanthood

Why are you coming to me?
Don't you know
How screwed up I am?
Do you know
The sin in my blood?
The darkness
That bubbles through my mind?
Can you even begin to count
The wicked rebellions
I fight in just one day?

It's a wonder
An astonishment
But I guess I have no choice
If God tells me to serve
Worthiness is irrelevant

It's a blessing
To speak kindness
To listen to an open wound
To feel a weary confession
It is a delight
To be there
To be the answer to a prayer
To put on the image of the Master

Needy

Out among the needy
The lowly
The hungry and the sad

Out with some small gift
And a prayer
Under the rule
Of the Upside Down Kingdom

What reason do I have
To feel proud?
For what possible reason
Could I be patted on the back?
Why the Hell should I be smug?
Seriously
Which lie from the Pit do you want to throw at me?

I wouldn't be here
If He hadn't called me
Sometimes I dread going
It's not in my heart to go
It all comes
From the renewing
The rebirthing
The cleansing and sanctifying
That I cannot do myself

But most importantly
I am the one who benefits
Whatever is done
For the lowest of my brothers
Is done for Messiah
And is it not a privilege
Beyond imagining
To serve Him?

I come to serve
But I am served
I come to help
And I am helped
Out in the streets
Messiah takes me from the world
He cuts away the sign of Moloch

I am out
In a congregation of the needy
Needy
Beyond all understanding

If I am to be the helper
If I am the giver
The provider
The one who tends their wounds
Then we are doomed

I do not meet needs
I myself am full of needs
But the One who does
Who gives the water of life
Who baptises in the spirit
Who dispenses with delight
He who is needed
Is out among us

Please
My fellow sufferer
Honored image bearer
By the Lord's grace
Would you please bless me?

A Journey of Awe

A journey of discomfort
A journey of obedience
Every Wednesday
Or at least
Every Wednesday
That something doesn't come up

It's been done
Three times now
Once with no responses
Once with a handful of compliments
And once with a word of encouragement
And a word of bitter scoffing

A sign
With "God is desperately in love with you"
Scribbled over it
A couple bottles of water
Three or four songs
Sometimes mumbled
And occasionally shouted
And a whole lot of prayer
This is what I take

There's been equipping
Of the mind
Of the tongue
Of the heart
But the only test so far
Beyond the simple act of going out
Suggests that there is still
Much skill to learn

I look like a freak
I know it well
So why am I out there?
It's all so strange

I'm not out there because I like it
I put up a good bit of grumblings at times
But I also sing
And sometimes
I really mean it
Sometimes
I stop to pray
Shaking back and forth
With unearthly joy

It's otherworldly
It's from the Upside Down Kingdom
It's the pain
And lowly servitude
Which is sought after delightfully

And it's also quite natural
It makes perfect sense
To take to the streets
To share such a message
With everyone you can
Because it is the current world
That is obscene
And unnatural

It's a strange
Uncomfortable
Otherworldly
Holy
Journey
With a message of grace
And driven by awe

Before, Behind, and Beside Me

He goes before me
Preparing the way
Softening a hardened heart
Setting a trap for my pride
Making a space at the Father's feast

There is an adventure ahead
An eternal romance
And He is preparing my role
The magic trinkets
The dragon-slaying sword
The dragon to be slain
The fellowship to be formed
The hero-to-be
Whom it is my privilege to rescue

His voice beckons
His scarred hands
Have marked out the path


He goes behind me
Watching my back
And mending the broken twigs

I am called away
From tasks half-finished
And trust that He stays back
And knows what He is doing

I stumble
I falter
I give in to evil
But He is behind me
And I can go on
Leaving behind
All worries
And guilt
And fear
For He will fix it
And keep the fiends in their place


He goes beside me
With a helping hand
And a warm touch

In the Valley of the Shadow of Death
He lays me down
In green pastures
Beside quiet waters
Amidst my mortal enemies
He sits me down
To feast without worry

I call His name
And in an instant
I am in His arms
And the wolves flee

I go and dine
With the Enemy of my soul
And He sits there
The whole time
As I ignore
And slander Him
Sometimes He strikes me
Sometimes He just waits
But He is always there
And if I hurt Him
It is because He allows it
If my words cut
It is because He
Has chosen to be soft


Messiah Yeshua
Jesus Christ
The Lion of the Tribe of Judah
The Risen Son of God
The Lamb that was Slain
Emmanuel
Deliverer
The King of Kings
The Man from Galilee
Before Whom mountains bow
Oceans cease to boast
And the rocks burst into song
It is He
Who is before
And behind
And beside me

Overflowing Joy

I don't know where it came from
I've been distracted
Dwelling on my ego
Full of every manner of sin
There's been some obedience
There's been some worship
But all watered down
With vanity

I guess He didn't care

It can only have come from Him
This delight
This sheer
Overflowing
Joy

In an instant
I am all giggles and grins
It bubbles up without warning
It lights up my whole being
So that even my pride is redeemed
And thoughts of my own worth turn
To how He can use me

Fairy land is tumbling round in my chest
The squeals and laughs of a little child
Are ripening in my throat

The Enemy is at my elbow
Tugging at my shirt
Pouring in
Every conceivable distraction
Pricking me
With every available pin

But what weapon
Earthly or infernal
Can pierce
My Daddy's arms?

Our Inheritance is in the Desert

Go
To the place of hunger
And of thirst
To the land of harsh winds and feral beasts
Go and sleep upon the jagged rocks
And walk barefoot
Beneath a sweltering sun
For that is where you will find your inheritance

Lift a song of praise
With a parched throat
And raise emaciated arms
And joy will overflow

There
Where you have been stranded
Knowing your home is ransacked
And all your accomplishments have fallen to dust
There
The veil is torn


Why do you look out anxiously
Over the city walls
Hoping for an opening?
Don't you know
That this is the Lord's gift?
Celebrate!

Give thanks for the siege!
Isn't it the hungry that receive manna from Heaven
And loaves and fishes?
Why do you long
For the wealth and strength
To save yourself?
How can you fail to delight
In the opportunity
For the Lover of your soul
To come and rescue you?

And what about the others?
What about your neighbors
Who are hungry and sick?
If you will just stop worrying
And get on your knees
You get to be part of the miracle
You have the eternal privilege
Of being the answer to their prayers

Stand up
Shout for joy
Scream with delight
Grin from ear to ear
And weep with tears of heavenly celebration
For you are surrounded on all sides
And only God can save you now


I know that you're afraid
And I know that you had plans
And there are people that you will leave behind
But He knows what He's doing

You'll be surprised how easy it is
When you trust in Him
And let all the rest go
And so will they
It will confound them to no end
How you can continue to bless them

There are no more distractions
There is no more chance of falsehood
You know this is real now
That it's not just appearances
Now that every worldly thing
That attached itself to your faith
Is on the other side
You know who you are now
You are His beloved

It is a blessing
To suffer disgrace for the Name
Even to suffer death
No one forgets the hanged man's sermon
What can they do anyway?
They can break your bones and cut your flesh
But they cannot touch your spirit
They cannot touch you


The water of life is in the wasteland
The bread of life is available amidst the siege
There is treasure in the gutter
And victory in the final defeat

Our inheritance is in the desert