God - Longing Logos

April 8, 2020April 30, 2020

Who Is a Christian?

It is a harmless question. Are you a Christian? Yet, it invites responses that are not harmless. They are often judgmental and inappropriate. Christianity started as a Jewish sect, and it retains features of this origin in numerous respects. One of these is related to identity. People often identify themselves as Christian if they come from Christian families. In fact, the concept of religious identity as part of one’s lineage can be found in numerous faith traditions.

When some Evangelicals speak about being born again, they often refer to John 3, and I would argue without actually understanding what Jesus was explaining to Nicodemus. The author of this post declares, “No one, however, is ever automatically a Christian by birth.” In case the author is confused, no one person decides these matters. The church, in its entire body, does, and ultimately, God decides.

John 3:5-8 “Jesus answered [Nicodemus], ‘Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, “You must be born again.” The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.’”

Christian – Societal Definition

Children born into Christian families can definitely claim to be Christian. They are Christian by birth. Many of them will have been baptized, i.e. born of water, as infants, and they will often have received Christian names. (In this context, Jesus might mean “born of water” with a double meaning, baptism by water and born of the womb. The latter is supported with “flesh gives birth to flesh.”) Their parents are choosing to carry on their religious tradition, to define them as followers of Christ, as their own parents might have done for them. This is the societal and literal definition of Christian, and it is an entirely valid one.

Christian – Spiritual Definition

Jesus was talking about a spiritual definition when he added “and the Spirit.” He was talking about a transformation that occurs within the person in response to the grace of the Holy Spirit. However, the Holy Spirit is a mysterious force, and it is entirely possible that a person goes through his or her life, living piously, without ever having a noticeable or profound experience with the Spirit.

Would Jesus say that this person is not a “true follower”? I will leave that up to him to determine, but some Evangelicals seem to have already decided that for him. They might consider that we do not always recognize the Holy Spirit at work. In which case, how would we be able to ascertain whether one meets this criterion of being a Christian or not? On the other hand, one might have been born again only to fall away again.

The following statement, like many of Jesus’s statements, can be hard to understand: “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” I understand it as the nature of the Holy Spirit becomes manifest in the person, and depending on one’s relationship with God, one might be called to take unpredictable paths to fulfill his will. You hear God’s voice. Whether or not you can tell where it is coming from or where it will take you is not important. What is important is that you can hear it.

Becoming Christian

I am a nondenominational Christian and consider myself born again. I have no vested interest in the answer to this question. However, I do care that the Christian faith is protected and that it welcomes others with open arms. To become a Christian in a societally defined sense might involve some steps and some time, which are determined by each denomination. To become spiritually Christian, however, is determined by God and God alone, no matter what others might claim.

For a different interpretation of the last verses quoted: Piper (2009)

April 7, 2020April 29, 2020

Monasteries and the Art of Quieting the Disquieted Mind

For those who are struggling with self-isolation, they might consider that this life has been the choice of many deeply spiritual people for millennia, such as Christian (cloistered nuns or) monks, who still live in monasteries around the world. (I highly recommend visiting them, particularly for a retreat.) Granted, a house full of noisy children and/or pets is hardly conducive to quiet reflection. However, one can adopt many of the monks’ daily habits. From what I could tell, their days are quite structured and oriented around prayer and productivity.

Quieting with Prayer

Praying is centering. If there is one thing I highly recommend practicing, and it does require practice, it is prayer. For those who struggle with it, as I did and still do, just to a lesser extent, I suggest having a prayer that you like, memorize it, and start praying regularly by reciting it. My “go-to” is The Lord’s Prayer. I have known it by heart since I was a child, and it is like the “comfort food” of prayers for me, deeply familiar, complete, and I can linger on each word as if Jesus were saying them with me. The Hail Mary is another familiar prayer.

Praying a rosary, which includes both of these prayers and some others, is another way to pray by recitation. Since the structure is laid out, one does not need to think about it. One might need to get used to moving through the rosary’s beads without looking, but it will come with practice.

Our own prayers, “free form” prayers, can be about anything. They are actually just one’s communication with an omniscient God, so there is no point in trying to hide anything. Just speak your heart, mind and soul to the Lord. Praying with scripture, which I would describe as mediating on the Word, is one of my favorite ways to pray. Catholics call it Lectio Divina. I actually made up my own style of it.

Quieting with Art

One of the things I used to do quite often was look at art, and I was reminded of how infrequently I do so now when I read this post. I used to even copy others’ drawings, which creates a certain intimacy between the original creator and the copier – you.

Your hand, temporally removed, tries to trace outlines that originated in their minds, which could be some of the greatest there ever were, before making it onto their canvas or other material. It is not just an artistic exercise but also a spiritual one that connects us to ancient friends and to a past to which we should always try to belong. It is our collective history, our memory of some of the best aspects of being human: the true, the good, and the beautiful.

As an example, the story of the Good Samaritan can be rendered in a myriad of ways, and whichever way the artist chooses provides insight into the person while also, hopefully, illuminating the Way. Biblical art is really an artistic rendering of the Word without words.

Quiet Unity

I could tell you that the Good Samaritan is a story about prejudice and compassion, or you could gaze upon the image of a man struggling to lift another helpless, vulnerable man and wonder why did he do it. Why did he help someone he was taught to hate and who was taught to hate him? The artist chose to depict the physicality of the moment, which heightens the solitude of both men, the difficulty of a sole man to lift another, and simultaneously their unity.

One could describe the art of quieting a disquieted mind as finding unity in solitude. It is the art of binding our fragmented mind, weary with worry, distracted with stress, with the rest of our being, and bringing our entire being into a quiet state of unity with our creator.

The inspiration for this post: Oakley (2020)

April 6, 2020April 30, 2020

Songs of Trust Spoken by Children

Our children, meaning all of the children on this planet, are our future and our light. Many children around the world are suffering because man can be evil. Adults are betraying our little angels. As we move through Holy Week, one that is particularly emotionally intense, let us try to be more like the most holy among us; let us cherish their innocent grace and emulate their natural resilience; let us live up to the trust they place in us.

Psalm 23 from the Hebrew Bible has been translated, reworked and interpreted numerous times. The words bring comfort to the reader not necessarily because of the language or the structure of the psalm but because of what it declares – trust in God. A simple message that transcends the song and the original context. Better than a harp, a child’s voice can elevate the psalmist’s trust with its delicate musicality.

“The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul. He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake. Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me. You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”

Losing Trust

However, David, the psalmist, became sinful and fell from grace. He lost trust; he betrayed God. Like Adam and Eve, he did not dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Societies from time immemorial have feared the gods, which they often regarded as petulant and easily provoked. Contrary to some opinions, the Christian God is not fickle. We are fickle, and Jesus knew this.

John 2:23-25 “Now while he [Jesus] was in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, many people saw the signs he was performing and believed in his name. But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people. He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person.”

Become Like Children

We are called to love God unconditionally and to follow the Way, and if we do so, we will have no fear and no want. God will not betray us. Instead, we sin over and over again. We do not follow God’s commandments. Additionally, we expect and condition our love, mainly on matters related to our earthly existence. Who are we to expect anything of God? God is God, and we are but mere sinful mortals. Jesus taught us complete trust and love, and we have reminders of him everywhere in our children, in God’s children.

Matthew 18:2-4 “He [Jesus] called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.’”

Becoming like a child is not to abandon the reason, knowledge or wisdom we might have gained over the years, but it is to render our spirit open and accepting to the Lord. It is to give without asking, to pray without expecting, to love without conditioning. It is to be God’s child again.

As Easter approaches, let us pray for peace and remember that we have a responsibility to our children, the innocents, to protect and to love them because they belong to God. No matter where we may dwell, they still dwell in his house.

https://www.opendoorsusa.org/christian-persecution/stories/extremists-killed-her-mother-but-hearing-this-young-girl-read-psalm-23-inspires-hope

April 1, 2020May 1, 2020

Eternal Truths: Grief, Death and the Cross

I won’t pretend to speak about grief with any real knowledge, as I have never experienced it on a deeply personal level. However, I find Good Friday the saddest time in the liturgical calendar and, for me, it best approximates a feeling of grief. Like the rest of us, I know how the story ends, it ends joyfully with Jesus’s resurrection on Easter Sunday, yet it is so moving and hard every time.

Harrell writes, “the manger is not the central symbol of our faith. The empty tomb isn’t either. Christians decided early on that the sign of their faith would be a cross.” He goes on to say, “We hang on to our crosses, even at Easter, because it is in the hard places of life where Christ’s presence with us proves most holy.”

Grief and the Passion

I agree, but I think that Christians chose the cross to symbolize them and the faith because the crucifixion is the most selfless aspect of Jesus’s life. It is an incomparable sacrifice, and if you have the courage to engage with the Passion fully, it can bring you to your knees, maybe to the ground completely.

During Catholic masses on Good Friday, priests will lie prostrate before the altar, above which often hangs a cross or a crucifix. Just to watch that act of devotion and humility can bring one to tears. Theirs is a gesture of grateful submission that invokes Jesus’s gracefully submission to God the Father’s will.

This is also why Christians around the world literally walk Jesus’s path, the Stations of the Cross, year after year. They want to remember his pain and suffering, his divine grace, his love and compassion at the most difficult moment of his life, at his death.

To remember Jesus’s beauty in death is also a way of vicariously engaging with our suffering and our mortality. When death calls us, will we respond with bitterness, resentfulness, anger, fear, or depression? Or will Jesus’s steps to his Father remind us that we can bear the momentary weight of the cross because each step ultimately brings us closer to another life, one free of everything that burdens us in this one.

Grief and the Coronavirus Pandemic

The coronavirus pandemic has not fundamentally changed death’s calculus, as it is always and forever a possibility. Really, what has changed is our awareness of the possibility of death or serious illness and our daily lives. As a thought-exercise, imagine if the probability of death were always at a relatively heightened level, as it is now. Imagine that it were even higher, such as during the Bubonic plague.

If this were “the new normal,” would we alter our lives permanently? Constantly hiding in our homes, practicing social distancing, or would we just resign ourselves to a lower life expectancy and a higher likelihood of death, and simply change psychologically or spiritually instead? Would we make peace with death?

If it is the latter, what would the shape of the peace be? Would it take the shape of the cross? Ultimately, the death that awaits us is unlikely to be anywhere near as hard as Jesus’s. And for many people around the world, they might view death as easier than their present lives.

For all of us, Jesus’s life and death is a source of comfort. In our darkest moments, we can find him there, or we can choose to go to him. To kneel in a quiet church, alone, staring up at the cross with his dead, tortured body hanging from it, and in our gratitude and submission, we can escape everything else because, ultimately, nothing else really matters.

I have no standard words of comfort to offer those in fear of death or those in grief, no angels or other well-meaning but essentially hallow allusions. I have only the truth, Jesus’s truth, and I hope that in his divine truth, one can find the shape of peace. It is the shape that Christians everywhere wear with pride, strength and full knowledge that the way, the truth and the life leads one out of this world and into the next.

March 30, 2020May 1, 2020

Serving Mammon and Selling the Faith Down River

It is not about right or left. It is not about socialism or capitalism. It is not about power or money. It is not about politics or culture. It is about the faith – Christianity. If one proclaims to love Jesus, this prioritization would show in various aspects of the person’s life.

When practiced, evangelical Christianity focuses on Scripture, a personal relationship with Jesus who is to be the center of one’s life, accepting Jesus as one’s savior and being born again. The orientation is not supposed to be toward controversial topics, legalism, economics or political positions and persons. It is about one’s relationship with God, in particular the Son of God, plain and simple.

The end of the Constantinian bargain was good for the faith, and the separation of church and state should be respected. In the more recent past, this separation has reverted to an unholy alliance between church, particularly within evangelical Christianity, and state, in this case, the Republican Party.

Huntington (2020) argues that this unfortunate trajectory was triggered by the election of John F. Kennedy, not out of fear of his Catholic faith but of losing influence, power and a hold on the American culture that they thought was veering into a liberal abyss.

The Start of the Faith’s Decline

He writes, “Kennedy’s speech has been cited innumerable times as one of the clearest calls for a separation of church and state, not to mention religious liberty. But, religious conservatives conceived of an America in which Protestant Christianity formed a central, immutable core. Thus, they fought to keep church and state separate while creating their own right-wing blend of religion and politics. They accomplished this by preaching Christian nationalism at the pulpit, organizing campaigns through conservative religious groups, and coordinating their actions with the faith-friendly business community. Eventually, when pressed by broader societal change, Protestant and Catholic conservatives joined forces with the Republican Party, forming a national pan-Christian movement to wage war against political and religious liberalism.”

To state the obvious, it is blatant hypocrisy to practice the very thing one condemns, the intertwining of church and state, and attempting to evangelize the faith while prioritizing power and money will likely be unsuccessful, which the data seem to support. Also, I would argue that this affinity between what is termed the “Christian right” and the Republican Party is now primarily about power and money and less about cultural changes such as the growth of secularism.

Dishonoring the Faith

Balmer (2020) states, “Socialism, they argue, is somehow antithetical to Christianity. Some have even argued that capitalism is sanctioned in the scriptures. Jerry Falwell, one of the founders of the Religious Right, declared that ‘the free-enterprise system is clearly outlined in the Book of Proverbs,’ and his son, Jerry Falwell Jr. recently said, ‘I believe in Jesus’ teachings to do what’s in the best interest of the corporation.’

Clearly, these evangelicals have never read the Acts of the Apostles. ‘All the believers were one in heart and mind,’ Acts 4:32 reads. ‘No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.’”

I would argue that they have heard of and read Acts, but they do not really care about Jesus or Scripture, but themselves. They have become corrupt and power hungry. The serve mammon – not the Lord. They hold their Bibles high not to evangelize the truth and the way but to obfuscate their sins and their self-serving manipulation and exhortation of theology in superficial gestures of piety.

Segal (2015) writes, “But is money more spiritually dangerous than theology? The answer may be trickier than we think, especially within the numbing comfort of a proudly affluent and educated American church. Money is a tangible, countable, often visible god. Theology, on the other hand — if it is cut off from truly knowing and enjoying God himself — can be a soothing, subtle, superficially spiritual god. Both are deadly, but one lulls us into a proud, intellectual, and purely cosmetic confidence and rest before God. Theology will kill you if it does not kindle a deep and abiding love for the God of the Bible, and if it does not inspire a desire for his glory, and not ultimately our own.”

Jesus said, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon” (Matthew 6:24). The question is: Who do you serve? Honor with your lips and your heart or else it is not honoring but dishonoring the faith.

March 27, 2020May 1, 2020

Annihilation Is the Greatest Punishment

Is life or death the greatest punishment? Is the possibility of hell or the certainty of nonexistence scarier? It depends on who you are and what you believe. Consistent with being a slightly (or more than slightly) strange person, I have been contemplating my mortality since I was a child. I am still less afraid of dying, if I am afraid of it at all, than I am of living. I understand that this might seem backwards to most people, but I find it quite logical.

I find humans more terrifying than death. They are capable of all manner of evil, and I would feel relieved to not fear them any longer. Contrarily, God is love. If one believes in God, then one is finally returning home.

When I was a child, I did not think of it as returning home to God since I was too unsophisticated to think of it in those terms but as my soul continuing in a different, non-earthly form. This was a comforting thought, not because I was suffering physically, but because I would simply be free of a corporeal existence and everything it entailed. Life is a great gift, but everlasting life, in whatever form, is peace – the greatest gift.

If one is Christian, one’s worst fear is likely hell (gehenom in the Jewish faith). One might also fear God’s judgment since that would be the determining factor. Perhaps I have too much confidence in gaining entry into heaven or perhaps I just trust God I would argue as one ought, but I do not fear hell nor I do I fear God’s judgment in this sense. I fear disappointing him, which is quite different. It has almost nothing to do with the afterlife and everything to do with fulfilling my purpose while living.

If one does not believe in God, one’s worst fear is likely death. In this enlightening conversation, Vidas (2020) said, “…the utmost punishment in traditional Judaism is not such eternal torments but the complete annihilation of body and soul — the lack of any type of afterlife.” In fact, this is what people who do not believe in God are contemplating – complete annihilation. They are effectively facing what I would argue is the greatest punishment. It is odd that many atheists pray (to whom or to what is unknown), but if one’s worst fear is death, i.e. oblivion, it would paradoxically increase the desire to pray.

I do not intend to write a comforting post on this topic since I am aware that my particular perspective is most likely not broadly shared. However, I put forth that one has two frameworks to choose from: heaven or hell (setting aside the concept of purgatory) to be determined by God or certain and total annihilation, body and soul, for all.

Given these two options, I think one is better off with the former framework and with the perspective that living is about purpose and death is about peace. Also, these concepts death/life and purpose/peace are really more about states: active versus still. I would also argue that the greatest punishment is in fact annihilation since it possesses neither activeness nor stillness. It is nothingness.

Yancy (2020) – https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/26/opinion/judaism-life-death.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

>>https://longinglogos.com/the-powerful-and-mysterious-holy-spirit/<<

March 24, 2020April 30, 2020

The Powerful and Mysterious Holy Spirit

It is a dangerous endeavor to try to describe an event or concept that is beyond our words but belongs to the Word. Although I was raised Catholic and come from a devout family, I was not particularly religious until fairly recently. I have made the sign of the cross, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, since I can remember, and yet, I never understood what the Holy Spirit was. As I was preparing for my confirmation, I sought clarity from others on exactly what the Holy Spirit was, even attending a seminar, since my lack of understanding seemed to me a glaring omission. However, even after these attempts, I still did not understand.

The Holy Spirit was integral to my conversion. The person of God is Jesus, and I felt visited by the Holy Spirit for the first time in my life when I realized that I actually love Jesus. This realization itself remains a mystery since it is hard to believe that I, someone of skeptical heart hardened by cynicism and who is far more comfortable in my head than in my heart, could actually love someone I had never met and who had existed until that point as a concept.

It was like standing before a threshold with the only thing preventing me from taking the necessary step to cross it being myself. Instead of fearfully or even consciously crossing it, I just found myself on the other side of it, profoundly altered, slightly disoriented and completely assured all at once. What greeted me on the other side was not God the Father or the Son but the Holy Spirit. Although I have since come to rely on the Holy Spirit for guidance and have a better understanding of it now, it remains, like God himself, powerful and mysterious.

If all of this sounds incomprehensible, that is likely because it is. It is not a relationship of this world. I do not even know how to address the Holy Spirit: he, she, it. It does not matter. What I know is that it will come to me when God deems it to be so. Until then, I hope that my will has been reconciled to his; I pray and wait. Perhaps one day, you and I will find ourselves on the other side of another threshold.

This piece by Bloom (2020) triggered my reflection on the Holy Spirit – https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/receive-the-holy-spirit.

>>https://longinglogos.com/annihilation-is-the-greatest-punishment/<<

March 21, 2020April 30, 2020

Our Self-Defeating Jealousy

God gave us everything. We have the most beautiful planet. It teems with unimaginably diverse life. It dances with the sun and the moon to a divine rhythm. From bold ocean waves to timid creeks, water traverses the planet, carving into rocks, sustaining life, with a music that is a reminder of our beginning. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, we will return to the earth from whence we came. One would think that until then, we would bask in our great, unmerited gift, glorifying God at every opportunity.

Instead, we take it for granted or even seem to have no reverence for it. We think we can do better. We are men and women after all. We can create technology, buildings, cars, factories, and more, weapons. We can destroy each other. We can destroy our planet to the point that it is barely habitable. We think we can do better than God. We think we are more powerful than God. However, it is a false sense of power, buttressed by narcissism and self-delusion. After all, it is so much easier to destroy than to create.

We make a mockery of ourselves, and yet we persist in this self-defeating jealousy, forever repeating the original sin. Why? Evolution is a myth. There has been no real evolution. True evolution is understanding and accepting that God is God, and we will never be God no matter how hard we try, no matter what we create.

If we could genuinely humble ourselves, we could then love him as he deserves to be loved and appreciate the undeserved gift of abundant life that he gave us. We would then cherish it because we would understand that no matter how great we think we are, no matter what we think we can create, we cannot recreate our planet. Like our entire universe, it is God’s creation and God’s alone.

>>https://longinglogos.com/a-divine-constellation-of-ideas/<<

March 18, 2020June 9, 2021

Death in the Time of Spring

Aside from some weather anomalies, spring seemed to start normally. The snow began melting, and the days grew longer. Then, came the novel coronavirus. The specter of death now looms over the world as nature enters a period of rebirth. It might seem paradoxical, until one considers that it is also Lent, and life, death and rebirth have been married together in that context for approximately 2,000 years.

It is also a fitting topic as the first post on Longing Logos. It is heavy; it is deep, and it is a timeless, universal truth that death is a part of life. Whether one believes in God or not, this is a fact. In this time of panic, I have been calm and at peace. Whenever and wherever death comes, I hope to maintain that peace. I have seen the light, and I know that in death’s darkness, another light will shine.

I pray that peace be also with you.