It Ain't Me Babe

I in general will probably not too many "troubles of my life" kind of posts, but its the freshest thing in my head right now so bear with me.

Last night i got some news i have been afraid of for awhile. A girl i had liked and how had been a close friend of mine said she was not interested, and that basically we should not talk for awhile. The thing was we had gone on a date last week, even though she had never been particularly comfortable with the idea. The date itself, all things considered, was not too bad considering my lack of dating experience. But it was clear even at the time and certainly in hindsight that see was not interested. However, despite the obvious signs, my own greed and desperation meant I was determined to play my hand out to its losing end, hoping i hit on the river on long odds. 

She said the date itself was good, it was just that she didn't date friends and that i was not spiritually her equal/ was weak spiritually. I guess people can say worse about you, but the issue got me thinking about my faith and my friendship and many things. It made it clear that life is not a movie, no happy ending is required. In the moment of our life, we are so often unable to gain perspective of the truth, as our feelings cloud our perceptions and how we perceive others. It made me realize i know so little of romantic relationships and their intricacies. That my faith is weaker than i could have ever imagined, and my knowledge more shallow than i dare admit. In general I ate much humble pie, and i did not enjoy it one bit.

Beyond the rejection itself was the issue of how i moved on with my life. Last night i felt like renouncing God and throwing it all away to accept the cold and unforgiving void of space and time that seemed to dominant my thoughts in those moments. Parts of me wanted her to feel as I did, worthless and alone, unable to bridge the gap between themselves and the rest of humanity. Yet, I have not turned from God. I am unsure how to proceed, this person was in my aspects of my life the guidepost I used to judge my progress and to know how to proceed. Through them i allowed myself to take risks that i would have been too scared to do alone (Like dressing better or eating healthier). How I muster the courage now, through God or something else or not at all, remains to be seen.

In a practical sense, i should put aside romantic thoughts about woman from my thoughts as much as I can, since it just leads to more pain than anything, and until my social skills improve, trying to establish a relationship is likely a futile effort. As well, her assessment of my spirituality makes me wonder if i was ever really a Christian or just a boy with a crush. While I do not believe myself utterly faithless, its bad enough to wonder if I can ever be a "real" Christian, or just lazily intellectualize it. I feel like I'm an outsider to secularist who live without the restraint of Christian life, but that most Christians think i'm too secular or suspect because i haven't grown up in an evangelical setting and don't know the culture.  

On the other hand, perhaps this is what i need, less temptation and a greater focus on God and serving Him. I have never been good at being faithful emotionally and spiritually, i'm too cold and analytical usually, but maybe this time is different. A start would be to tell my parents, or my mom really, who is a Catholic and may feel i am betraying her. But i'm a fairly big coward so i don't expect to say anything. 

Finally, I basically lost one of my best friends. Mostly because of my actions. If I had continued with the cowardice I have displayed until the last little while then we would still be friends and we would be able to hang out and things would be better. Surely she would meet someone in the near future and left anyways, but I would have had a little longer. I know things happen as they do and not any other way, but its hard to accept that right now. The odds of finding that good of a friend, never mind a girlfriend, are quite small. But such is the way life goes.

In the end, I'll be fine. i will live my life, hopefully be better for it and maybe happiness exists for me somewhere. Until then I keep searching for apples of gold.

Growing Pains

                Before one becomes a great Christian thinker they must become a great Christian person. This is relevant indirectly in most professions, that excelling at the skills and work ethic of a craft comes before the success, at least long term success. But I think that the above is especially true for Christians in that Christian thought is more than an intellectual exercise but merely one expression of a larger pursuit of Christ and holiness. Theology is not the ends of the exercise, but merely a means of better appreciating God’s work and understanding His plan. Knowing Christian theology and truths is for all practical purposes largely a meaningless exercise if one is not already embedded in the Body of Christ.

                I state all this because this because this blog is mostly about issues and thoughts on Christianity, and it occurred as I have read other religious blogs that my own writings are not much more than surface level theology. I have come to realize that I have much to learn when it comes to my faith and that while this blog may be useful, I have a long way to go in my spiritual journey in both as a person and writer. The issue is that I won’t be solving any of the great theological issues any time soon, as capable intellectually as I am, until I know more about Christianity and more importantly, have grown as a Christian man. While I will keep writing, I feel my emphasis as a Christian needs to be on doing works and growing in my faith rather than simply analysing doctrine and Christian ideals.

Therefore, I hope that my writing will focus less and solving and proving and more on learning and growing in Christ, and I hope this will be a step in the right direction.

"Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do & die"

The title is an excerpt of the Lord Tennyson, "The Charge of the Light Brigade"


I suppose i should state first and foremost that i'm not really sure where i am going with all this, sort of like the protagonists of the poem cited above. Orders are to move charge and hope for the best, to put faith that what one does is for the right cause at the right time and that it is not all in vain. There is no guarantees, no promises of success, so why bother at all you might ask? Well i will let you know what i think tomorrow...

Can't buy me love

Western capitalist society is overall the wealthiest, freest, most privileged society in the history of humanity. While it is by no means perfectly equal, even the worse off have a chance, a small chance perhaps, but a chance indeed to better themselves economically and socially in ways that were impossible even a hundred years ago. Consider for a moment the last 3 or so years, having survived the “worse” economic disaster since the Great Depression, yet even at the worse of the economic crisis there was not a third of the poverty and chaos that the Great Depression experienced for more than half a decade. For all the talk of unemployment and banks folding and bailouts to the car industry, it seems that the hurt, while bad for those out of work or with foreclosed homes, is really in historical context laughable in the overall harm caused.   My point is not to argue about the economic issues of our day, but to put them in context and to deal with the real issue of my essay. That is, the real problems society faces in these days is the slow moral degradation of our society, the melting glacier that the effects of are slowly becoming apparent.

My reason for bringing up the economic recession that hit North America, Western Europe and affected in one way or another most the globe was that what became apparent was our moral depravity more than economic. A western society that has begun to shed its Judaeo-Christian roots for consumerism, with Capitalism as the new God and money as the means to glorify ourselves in its name. As a society with virtually no material needs that cannot be met, we have made the new survival social in nature, that food eaten is not a practical act as much as symbol of “traditional” living or modern liberation. The brand is as important if not more as the good that carries it, for the brand is infused with social capital that can be spent with family, friends, co-workers or the whole world through mass communication. Fame is no longer the merely the result of extraordinary talent and accomplishment but a means of its own, another skill like singing or dancing that can be utilized to build up immense social capital. Now I do not mean to say that the above are new phenomena per say, but that our narcissistic, hedonistic society has greatly multiplied the effects of this to more people in general and the ability of individuals to engage in such activity.

The problems with this become the most apparent at the lower income levels of society, not that moral depravity exists here more than in higher income groups, but the disease is more easily seen. This is because the people at the bottom do not have the ability to have their cake and eat it too in the way many wealthier western people are able to. What I is that these people must make a choice, between economic or social capital. That is, they can have blackberries and Plasma TV’s, or food on their plate and manageable debt. Now some at the very bottom can’t have neither, but even most of these can survive, however poor, on western nation’s social programs. So these people have a choice and the question is which to choice? Our modern media and culture promotes social capital accumulation, consume to keep the economy going, consume this pill to lose weight, this pill to feel better, where this brand or eat this food and be more respected. And if you are lucky and win the lottery, you will get on a reality show and become super famous and be lifted out of your meagre existence. Again I say that the above existed as temptations before the modern era, it was not nearly as prevalent or pervasive or as encouraged as ever before.

For those on the bottom, the alternative is to work hard, save your money, live rather modestly, maybe never much better your circumstances so your children or niece or just the next generation may be a little better off than they are. It means status symbols will be few and personal benefit will likely only extend as far as a little stability and a little better future. But in a globalized world with outsourcing and union busting and privatization, even the impoverished yet honest woman or man is increasingly unable to achieve such modest goals. So it is of little wonder that many go for the easier lifestyle and more self-indulgent existence, especially when morally is an increasingly relative term. This helps explains the failure of easy capital and easy pleasure in term so of lower income people. This is because what drives people to massive debt is rarely driven my economic ideal as much as social ones, the idea of social capital accumulation that comes with a bigger house and nicer possessions and the “American” dream, although most of western states could have their country name substituted into that. There is also the problem of deception involved by unscrupulous bankers and lax government regulators that allowed for practices to continue and sold an idea of every individual deserves success and the good life, largely regardless of their actions or behaviour.  

So the crime and family breakdown and that make the poor the story so often the story of the nightly news is really just a reflection of being unable to hide their malaise. The middle/upper classes of society suffer just as greatly if not worse; however, in their collapse of moral respectability. Since their economic needs are essentially met at a basic level, the goal then becomes rather simple, which is social capital accumulation, when has no God to consider but themselves. They act essentially the same as the lower classes, but look better doing it, without suffering from poverty issues in the same way such as poor health and education and can hid the drug addicted kids and abusive or uninterested  parents with cars and good schools and BBQs and therapists and the like. The unwanted pregnancies are aborted, the career parents hires nannies and buy video games for the kids, the lying and cheating and stealing are just children being “unique” individuals that should be set free or adults doing their jobs well. Are any willing seriously to argue that the sexualisation of our youth or the dissolving of marriages has no negative effects? That economic growth can hide sad lonely children desperate for love and sad lonely adults searching for meaning in it all? For all those that say that I exaggerate or am being an alarmist, I say our entitled society has yet paid our dues for its sins and the real crisis lay ahead.

In any case, the indivisible unit of modern society has become the individual, not the family or society. In the Christian tradition, the individual is really just one organ of the body of Christ, in theory not greater or less than another person, and the goals of people were not meant to be solely focused on ourselves but the other and most importantly to God. The Christian tradition is one that values helping others as greater than helping the individual, and that searching for the meaning of life without God leads to staring in a hopeless empty and lonely void, devoid of meaning or purpose. The Christian tradition is restrictive in the sense that you cannot always do what you feel like doing, but has doing everything you feel like doing made us any happier or content as a society, or only increased our guilt and sense of loss? For whatever brief hedonistic pleasure one loses in propelling oneself towards God and the spiritual life, he or she will find a lifetime and beyond of simple, glorious grace and beauty that will fill one’s heart and soul, giving them something they could never buy or find at the store.

Now for Something Completely Different

All the posts on my blog up to now have been about theological/philosophical issues. I don't plan on stopping that per say, but i do want to post more often and i honestly don't have enough brilliance to do weighty pondering every day. Plus the blog has no real audience to offend, so change is in the hands of the beholder as it were. Therefore i plan on talking about something more personal and less explicitly religious.

I decided today to be more confident in myself.

More specifically, my goal is to work towards being happy with me, and accepting me as all right as i am, for the most part anyways. It seems rather simply and not terribly interesting, but the problem I, and i think many people have is to be our own unique creatures under the pressures that society, friends, family and community can impose. I'm not to say that anything goes or that conformity is evil, but that conformity for the sake of pleasing people on its own is generally not good. What i mean is conformity to society's expectation of respecting your parents is good, because it has a moral and practical basis behind it. But conforming to a  clothing style or lifestyle that you do not want but feel you have to in order not to get beat up or mocked, or is the only way to be liked is not ideal. I know why people do, and in some cases its necessary practically to survive, but in most cases its our own insecurities and fears that push us to do what we may not want to do. As well, the important fact is not only to resist such conformity but to be confident in the person you are.

Its the later that has always got me. I did a decent job as a child, to a harmful degree in some ways, of resisting what society, particularly peers, said i should be. This lead to increasing my social isolation, although i myself must take some of the blame, as well as circumstances, why this was so. To be fair, in terms of how children are supposed to be studious and hardworking and not disobey mom and dad, i conformed fairly well, as most would hope for. But i never allowed myself to be me, partially because i got burned somewhat as i child being "myself", but  also because i never though the world would accept someone with my likes and interests.

So what is the plan you might ask? Well my plan is to do more things i enjoy or think i will, and be less afraid what people might think when i do them, like going to a bookstore or trying different eateries out or going to concerts or being active in a religious way. The point is to be more active in my own life, and to be secure in who i am. The truth is that as long as i'm being a kind, caring and moral guy God doesn't care if i like reading science fiction or listening to 80's alternative rock or obsessively following politics. Since i'm mostly beyond the point where most people care or can be bothered to bug me about such things anyways, i need to let go of those old fears and anxieties of my old self and embrace a new way of viewing myself in the world. The truth is that confidence is what is preventing me from enjoying life more for the most part, and i think people much rather be around confident people, or at least the people i want around me are okay with people being themselves. 

A finally point is that this means being more open about my faith as well, as i am relatively new reconvert to Christianity and have feared people will judge me if they knew. But what i said above about my behaviour also applies to my openness about my beliefs, because in reality one leads the other. 

So wish me luck and here i come!

Things are not as they seem

These were part of a bigger write-up i did about reality and our perception of it. Its a little rambling than is desired but i don't feel like doing something original tonight. Plus is anyone reading aways?

It alone searching for truth, either all perspectives are valid, none are valid, or some are valid. Clearly no one believes they are wrong, or else why would they do that? They believe in some justification for their actions. But what do we judge them on? Our own beliefs? How do we know what we believe is valid? I suppose many appeal to objective facts, but can anyone really appeal to them unobjectively? What comes first, out beliefs or the proof for them? If you are searching for truth, or following your own moral compass as it were, using knowledge as best you could to guide you, then obviously you must believe there are better ways to live and/or better beliefs to hold than others. So clearly there is some mechanism to determine the relative validity of any religion, regardless of your own location and situation. There is either a best way or there is not. If there isn’t, then how many acceptable ways exist? What if two ways are contradictory but you cannot deem either more or less valid, how do you pick which one, especially as it relates to other people? The truth is that society needs some level of conformity to function, so total anarchy is not really an option. 

If you speak, will anyone listen?

The other day a friend of mine asked me about a talk she was asked to give in the near future to a youth group, basically on the topic of here choice. Mind you, this is a Christian group, so the focus is on Christianity, or at least a topic related to such. Her problem was not a willing to do so, or least a lack of good ideas, but trying to think of a message that would resonant with the intended audience. The issue was that the audience consists of mostly teenage boys, and she is a young woman (over 18), and a above average intellect. While an engaging personality, she fears her views and message will fall on deaf ears, or perhaps cause confusion as to the proper doctrine, as some of her ideas would require more nuance to fully comprehend them than the audience that she will be speaking to.

I bring this up because often we are faced with in our everyday lives with times when confronted by the issue of our faith or any number of things where we are unsure if to proceed boldly and confidently, even at risk of offense or confusion, or to ignore the elephant in the room as it were and talk around an issue or in such a manner that all possible grounds of offense are eliminated, even if the resulting message is mostly diluted of meaning.

In terms of what scripture says, i think its relatively clear to first and foremost to trust in Christ and the Holy Spirit to speak through us and help us deliver the gospel clearly, succinctly, and truthfully. There are numerous examples in the New and Old Testament of the gospel being delivered to hostile crowds and in ways that did not mince words but put the word of God first and foremost and unapologetically. From Jesus to Paul to the apostles to many of the prophets of the Old Testament, the words they spoke were typically received poorly by their intended audience, or ignored, and embraced by a few. Regardless of the audience, the message was the same, and while the location or style of delivery or number of people being reached, it was always the gospel being preached.

Now my point is not that the my friend's talk or any talk has to be confrontational or controversial, but that it should be truthfully and from the wisdom received from scripture. No matter the topic, if it makes sense scripturally, then all audiences should be able to take in and accept the message, although how that message is delivered and how detailed or deep the discussion can be varied. I don't profess to often myself have this courage, so i could not demand it of anyone else, but i would implore my friend and anyone else faced with a difficult message he or she is not sure if should be delivered or how to put faith in the Holy Spirit to guide you as to the best way to proceed.      

The Flaws in Perfect Systems

The following is a topic that can be looked at many different ways, depending on your orientation and preference. This is not a doctrine or deeply held belief, more like general musings and pondered thoughts. I rewrote it several times because my arguments were and probably still are flawed in places, but as you read it that is someone the point.  

An interesting thought came to me yesterday regarding human nature when I was reading The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. It was the fact that people are deeply complex beings that cannot be placed into any system and expected to all just function properly, like cogs in a machine. There is a myriad of influences, rational and otherwise on the reasoning of any one person, and no system can be designed to take this all into account to develop a “flawless” system. The best any system can do is limit the failing (materialistic and moral) of individuals and society and function as effectively, efficiently, and economically as possible. This means ultimately compromise of any system from a theoretical ideal. It also means that systems that take little or no account of the failure of human character and ability are likeliest to fail. This is why communism failed so badly, because it assumed people were basically perfect except a few bad apples at the top, and that bad behaviour wasn’t an inherent quality of humans but merely a reaction to the system.

My point is to say is that people enjoy pointing to such and such problem that once eliminated, humanity will be far better off. Whether its “big” government, capitalism, religion, or any number of possible bogeyman that is slowing or stalling human progress from reaching human utopia, the truth is that people are too complex for any one thing, or for that matter, any number of solutions to fix us completely. I think at its best Christianity understands the inherent fallen nature of humanity, both as a society and as individuals, of our inner competing impulses of good versus evil and the conflict between natural and spiritual desires. While humans should strive to better ourselves spiritually and improve the welfare of fellow humans, we should never expect perfection of earthly beings. Understanding that people are fallible means being able to develop a system that has mechanisms to deal with humanity in these moments, which can support the weak and vulnerable and suffering with grace and mercy, but also that there will always be humans trying to cause chaos and harm, and to deal with such elements properly.

This is why I think a society without a moral system derived of something beyond humans is necessary, since only God could create a perfect ideal for us to work towards, even if we cannot reach it. Otherwise we are only left with the arbitrary ideals of other flawed humans and ourselves, doomed to failure and too often blind to our own inherent failings. 

We'll Start at the Beginning

A profession of faith, you could call it my awakening to God. I wrote this a little while ago to a friend, and it seemed a good place to start my blog. 

Can We Be Saved?

Yes! Of course we can! Through faith in Christ we can eliminate sin and live in Union with Christ. 

In the beginning, God created Man and Woman, free of sin and with all the gifts of the Father bestowed upon them. But they turned away from God and life, and accepted sin and death. But yet God did not leave them to die, he allowed them to make sacrifice to so that they may be forgiven of sin, and gave them the Law to follow to know how to be devote to him and avoid sin. This was the gift God gave to his chosen people, the Israelites, but to free humanity ultimately of their sins He sacrificed His only Son, Jesus Christ, so when he was crucified, he was sentenced to death and to suffer the sin of all humanity, and when he rose to heaven, he was free of sin in heaven. God through this sacrifice allowed us to be saved through faith in Christ, therefore accepting the Holy Spirit and God’s grace and mercy.

For indeed, our human nature turns us away from God and towards sin, as we accept our free will over God’s will. In order to conquer death and have everlasting life, we must accept God’s will over our own, and as Paul says “you were set free from sin and became the slaves of righteousness” (Romans 6:18). It is not that we chose God, but that He chooses us. Indeed the only choice we make is to turn away from God and his mercy. And for those that believe that “being good” alone will save you, you have turned from God, For as Paul says” For no one is put right by doing what the Law requires, what the Law does is to make us know that we have sinned. For identifying sin and eliminating sin are two different things, which is why no Jew can be saved that doesn’t accept the Lord, for as Paul says they may be devote to Him, they do not understand and have turned away from Him.  

In choosing God’s will and grace through Christ, we must choose not to be afraid of faith and in spreading God’s message of salvation through his only son, Jesus. Indeed those that judge us for our faith in fact judge themselves and it is them that have turned away from God. We have nothing to fear, it is them that think they are beyond the Lord. When others have more wealth and success and fame than us, do not be jealous, for you are judged by the spiritual, not the material.  For those that have earthly power and success in excess, if they have not devoted to living their lives in union with Christ they have nothing and are empty. In their time spent amassing the material and enjoying earthly pleasures, should they not have been serving the Lord?  Like Egyptian Pharaohs surrounding themselves with their earthly riches and power in death, they will discover they will be empty before the Lord. For if the Lord wanted gold and wealth and power, could he not create a thousand times a thousand to infinity more wealth and riches than you could ever dream? Is He not supreme over all, the creator of Heaven and Earth? The Lord does not ask for those things that can be dissolved into nothingness, like a mountain turned into an anthill, but rather eternal life, which he offered and we turned away from, then he offered his only son so we may yet reclaim what he gave at the beginning in the end. For that is the only gift he gave us that cannot be destroyed, so long as our faith in God through Christ and in fellowship with the Holy Spirit endures.

The truth is God chooses those to be saved, but then we ask “who then can refuse God and his will”, and the answer is “whoever refuses Christ does so, and is condemned to death, and whoever through Christ, opens their heart and soul to God’s eternal mercy, will see He is righteous, and they will be saved”. But we must say constant in our faith, and realize that we must stay facing God and His will, less we fall back to sin and death. For while God pardons us from our sins and declares us righteous, we remain in the flesh sinners* .we must stay vigilant to separate our own desires and wants from God’s, for when we turn to ourselves and not God in our lives we turn away, even for a moment, from Him, and towards sin and death. God will always take us back, for he NEVER abandons us, it is us who abandon him time and time again.

Ultimately, this means if you allow your faith and devotion to Christ infuse you with God’s grace, whatever happens will be through him and be of His will, so we can put complete trust that whatever happens is meant to be, even if it doesn’t appear always obvious to us. It is only when we turn away and accept our own will as supreme should we are afraid, not only of losing salvation, but that our lives will dissolve like a sugar cube in water. Indeed, we must not take the unlimited Grace and mercy of the Lord as excuse to turn away when we feel like it, because He will forgive us later. For the Lord can see into your heart, and will judge you accordingly, and you will not be saved if you are not committed to God’s plan, for knowledge and belief in it alone cannot save those that refuse to abide by it when they chose. For when YOU chose, and not God, it is DEATH and not LIFE you will receive. God knows we’re weak, and yet will save us yet, but we must stick to his plan, his one and only plan for our salvation and everlasting life.

The logical question next is to ask, what happens when I do sin, when I do turn away, when I’m weak and feel lost and disconnected from Christ and faith in him. Can I still be saved? Certainly! There is no doubt the Lord will NEVER abandon you, that why we have prayer and church communities and the Scriptures to help bring use to the path of righteousness he has laid out for us. There is no doubt we will fail at times, and be tempted and turn from God, but it is critical to remember that faith is about a relationship, that so long as we work within the bounds of it and respect that relationship redemption is ALWAYS possible.   But there is only ONE relationship to God, which is through faith in Christ, and whether we access it through scripture, prayer, family, and our church community, we must make this relationship supreme over all if we have any hope of salvation. So while we may conflict with God and one another about doing God’s work, must we remember only through the structures HE set out can we hope to properly resolve them.

Yet even if we believe ourselves to be righteous, may we not yet be quick to judge and condemn, for there is only ONE judge, who will make His decision in the end of days. Until then, we must be prepared to forgive those that sin, for us ourselves are sinners and if we ourselves are not worthy except through the grace of God, and then we stand on no ground to cast stones on others that sin. Instead, we are obligated to open our hands and hearts to all, to share with them the message of Christ and the glory of God, and those that chose not to listen condemn themselves far more than we could ever wish to condemn them. Through God’s infinite grace, may He work through us to fix what is broken and rebuild what was destroyed, so that at the end of days he sees what we have done through Him and judge us accordingly. And may we as well never view God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit by humanity and our actions, for as Isaiah says “because of you Jews, the gentiles think poorly of God”. Instead do not judge or question God’s plan at all, only look to how you can better fulfill it and accept it into your life, and correct those that bear false witness against Christ and faith and all that is holy.

In closing, rejoice and be glad! For through Christ, God paid the burden of the chains of sin so that we could be free from sin and have eternal life! What more could one ask? What have we done to desire such a gift? Yet God blesses us anyways, because he Loves us so much. May we yet turn to God and accept him completely and utterly with the whole of our being. Praise be to God!

"justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus" (Romans 3:24)

“ God offered him, so that by his blood(or sacrificial death) he should become the means which people’s sin are forgiven through their faith in him. God did this in order to demonstrate that he is righteous. In the past he was patient and overlooked people’s sins; but in the present time he deals with their sins, in order to demonstrate his righteousness. In this way God shows that he himself is righteous, and that he puts right everyone who believes in Jesus.” (Romans 3: 25-26)

*http://www.hpac.org/