A society that promotes its own ideals by disowning its ancestors’
Is a society that has a present, but no past
God Reaching for God
God is the standard to strive for, but He is also the activating agent that makes the striving possible. God lives outside of us, but also part of Him lives inside of us. Thus, it is God that reaches for God and God that raises God, and we simply are pulled along by the part of Him that is inside us.
Hell Within
If you live every day with a level of physical comfort, security, wealth, and peace that almost no one in history has ever enjoyed, yet every day is filled with anger, anxiety, and despair, then perhaps it is time to consider that your hell comes from within.
Rebukes of Today’s World
Permitted does not mean equally valid.
Not all disparity is injustice.
Civil rights are a distraction when the soul is left enslaved.
Only God Matters
If God isn’t real, then nothing matters.
If God is real, then nothing else matters.
God is all that matters.
The Day We’re Not Trying
The day we’re not scared of the changes we’re making
Is the day we’re not really trying
Fundamental Error
Many feuds in our society today are a lost cause no matter which side of the debate you are on, because both positions are built on a false surface-level paradigm. To find true solutions we must first go deeper, identify the faulty paradigm, and dismiss it entirely.
For example, many of the most common disagreements in marriage, such as who gets their way between high- and low- sexual desire partners, the proper management of finances, and the conditions that justify getting divorced, are typically predicated on the misconception that even after the marriage union has occurred the individual is the supreme entity whose interests must be secured above all others.
People get married today, still believing that their individual happiness is what should be protected first, that their own interests must be sought most, and that their own preferences should drive their decisions. Then man and wife argue about how their individual egos are being bruised, how their individual desires aren’t being met, how the marriage isn’t justifying itself to them on an individual level. Whoever gets their way in such arguments, the answer is wrong, because this is not the paradigm that Jesus affirmed when he was tested by the Pharisees.
And he answered and said unto them, Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and female, And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
-Matthew 19:4-6
Our Lord’s words shows that the correct view is that the man and the woman are “no more twain, but one.” They are supposed to subjugate the individual to the marriage, and protect that union’s happiness, seek its interests, and let its preferences drive their decisions.
So long as one holds onto the individual-supreme view, then any position they hold in every disagreement is wrong, and even the opposite positions are wrong, too. There are, therefore, no good options left, at least not until that person goes deeper inside and corrects their core paradigm.
Ideals Made Alive
Truth, mercy, justice, hope, love, and courage.
These ideals belong to a higher plane of existence: what the spiritual man calls heaven, the philosopher calls metaphysics, and the mathematical man calls abstraction. Though immaterial and conceptual, these concepts are not sealed off from the living world.
When we lend our lives to these ideals, these ideals become alive. We are the vessels to speak truth, show mercy, enact justice, raise hope, share love, and stand in courage. These principles take form through us.
Wresting the Truth
The frustration and suffering in our lives is directly proportional to the lies that we have come to believe. Complicating matters is that the lies are woven into our society before we were even born, becoming so indoctrinated in us that we can’t even see them for what they are half the time.
The word of God is therefore an essential standard. Whenever we read an eternal principle in the scriptures that seems uncomfortable to our modern sensibilities, we have just identified a lie that rests at our foundation. That is the area where our conception of Truth has been twisted, and we will find greater peace only as we correct that perversion.
So, what do you see as “problematic” in the scriptures? That men and women are meant to function in different roles? That divorce should be virtually unheard of? That fornication, homosexuality, and every other sexual deviance is abominable? That we should not provide preferential treatment to one group over another? That sometimes God declares war? That sin makes us deserving of death? That Christ is the only path to salvation? That spiritual freedom is more important than physical liberty? That all of our possessions and life decisions properly belong to the Lord?
If we see any of these tenets in need of “being fixed,” then we live in a “truth” that is actually a lie. We will forever be frustrated because we are trying to twist the fabric of reality against itself, which is doomed to failure. True reality will not tear. It will snap back and tear us instead. And when that happens it is actually an act of mercy, as each of us needs to be broken before we can rebuild ourselves on the actual Truth.
Choice in the Time of Proving
Our lives are defined by a few pivotal choices, special moments where we are presented with what is easy on one side, and what is right on the other, and then we prove to ourselves and anyone observing whether or not we are a person of principle, someone who will stick to conscience no matter what.
It is important that we don’t see these moments as predetermined by who we already are, though. It is not as if our quality of character is already locked in, and we simply behave according to our predetermined nature. No, these are moments of active free will. Suppose we have a moment where the right thing is to divulge a difficult truth. We can say to ourselves, “I’ve always struggled with honesty, but I wish I were the sort of person who told the truth, no matter what, and here in this moment I can behave as if I were.” Then, we can make the choice to be that person of honesty just in that moment, and that decision transforms us into really being that way.
Do not worry whether you will have the necessary qualities when the time comes, simply resolve to make the choice that is right, whether you think you’re ready for it or not. No matter the hesitation and doubt, you can choose to be the person that you always wanted to be.
Spiritual Wanderings 