To embrace the concept of unconditional love, one has to also embrace the concept of total freedom!

Think about that one for a moment. Who has not wrestled with man’s free will? Who has not questioned why bad things happen to good people? Why must it rain on the just and the unjust (Matt. 5:45)? Why do evil and wicked people have so much money and expensive things? If God is love and God is good, why don’t the righteous (and that definition would be?) prosper and have life much better?

Did God create the universe and doesn’t that prove His omnipotence? My answer is YES! And in the end, whenever that will come, it is the Creator to whom we will ALL return. Spirit will return to Spirit. And the before life and the after life are the book ends of God’s omnipotence. But what about our “time” here on earth? If God is ALL POWERFUL why did he allow the Holocaust? Why did God allow the tsunami? Why, why, why does a Being who is all-powerful allow bad things to happen?

My answer is because God is love! His grace is amazing!

And love must allow for free will, for freedom- while here on earth.

But, when we return to our Source, our true nature, there is but ONE POWER. It’s not really a matter of two powers, except for here on earth as the allegorical story of Adam and Eve tells us when they (who were not historical creatures) ate of the tree of good and evil.

But what about prayer? Can God step in (from where?) and change things? Or is it us aligning ourselves with not what we see that’s temporal, but what really IS and thereby bringing that which appears not, but IS, into reality? Good questions, few answers. So, while God is totally and unequivocally omnipotence in the fourth dimension, the Creator has given us full reign for good or bad (free will) and also told us that we CAN (if we so choose) loose that which is “on the other side” (4th dimension) into “this side” (3rd dimension). But to do so requires of US (not HIM) an intimacy and lifestyle beyond simple religious commandments.

The Creator is “at the door” and for those that “know the knock” (hear His voice) can answer it as co-creators should, do, have, and are: just not nearly as often as we’re able. Those “greater works” are awaiting OUR INITIATIVE, not God’s self-imposed Omnipotence.

The garden allegory (there was no historical Adam & Eve) introduces us to the only true sin which is “thinking” that we’re separate from our Creator. When humanity bit into the lie that there was good and evil, a daulity was established that really isn’t. And we’ve been granting power to that which has no power, of its own.

The metaphorical evil one who offered all kinds of opportunities in the forty day wilderness trial that Jesus went through didn’t have the power to offer any of those things. But, we still hold fast to the two power concept and thereby pray with words for God’s help all the while our emotions and feelings are broadcasting FEAR which cancels out the spoken words.

Religion has furthered the two-power paradigm with the description of a HOLY Spirit.

This of course advocates two concepts. First, there is the religious-moral principle that the church in it’s “sin management” environment likes to promote. Spiritual life has been boiled down to MORAL life! Morality has become the goal instead of intimacy and ONENESS with our Creator! Who thinks they can really be HOLY anyway when even Jesus said there was only ONE who was GOOD and that’s our Creator.

We embrace too many faulty religious interpretations.

Second, when we put the adjective (even if in capital letters) HOLY in front of Spirit we’ve indicated that there is another force to be dealth with and that would be the EVIL spirit. We all know that in this world, in the third dimension there is good and evil, but why the fixation with the two powers? When we TURN TO our Creator thre is only ONE POWER. When we look at things and define them as evil, we’re instantly giving power to them and to have done so is to turn away from our Creator.

Living the one power concept is not easy.

Living with the two power concept is not only more difficult, but invalid as well. I’m not advocating living in denial. Here on earth there is much evil, but I don’t have to acknowledge it to the point that it consumes me, as many do. When we transition to the fourth dimension, there is only ONE. And that would be you, me, and ALL others with the Creator regradless of what name you have called the ONE BEING that IS, WAS, and always WILL BE!

That which is true is true and that which is not known is true as well.

And that which was not known by our forefathers (and promoted by Aristotle), but which has come to be understood as true is that the MALE SEED isn’t the “whole meal deal“! Had Matthew & Luke known what we know today, the first two chapters of the book attributed to them would not have been so written.

There would have been no Mariology!

There would be no virgin birth stories!

There would be no need to “cover up” untruths with the likes of Immaculate Conception or Annuncion.

In our forefathers lack of knowledge of how a child was brought forth, they saw the MALE as the only “source“. In a male chauvinistic society such as the we had 2,000 years ago (and some would say even today), there was added the biological ignorance of the fact that procreation needed both the twenty three chromosomes of the MALE and twenty three from the FEMALE!. Once that was discovered, there had to be a new theory of how Mary was birth ad well and thus the immaculate conception theory.

But, as Charles Hartshorne (1897 – 2000)put it, “The theory (one finds it in Aristotle) was that the mother furnishes merely the soil in which the SEED is planted. The father furnishes the form, the mother the mere matter. The father is thus the real cause of the child, not the mother. Sheer ignorance was turned into a theory insulting to women.”

And theologically wrong-headed for many!

The option, once enlightenment was revealed, would have been to admit the “father favoring fault“, and rejoiced that TRUTH was setting us free of yet another false religious belief. Unfortunately, more spit and glue was added to try and reinforce older claims no longer valid- by some.

Others have moved on!

Christology is determined by a balance between the historical Jesus and the Christ of faith!

Another way of putting it would be as Marcus Borg has so done in dividing the approach to Christology into the pre-resurrection Jesus and the post resurrection Christ. It makes so much sense to me. While I appreciate the contributions of people and groups like the Jesus Seminar, I think they place too much emphasis on the historical Jesus. I may be wrong.

It’s happened before.

On the other hand, I think too many fundamentalists spend too much time on the Christ of faith.

If we can embrace both views and not divide or separate just because we have a differing opinion there might be hope that the Christ in us might get accomplished what He wants to do. For that to happen though, we’re going to have to LOVE a lot more and be far more tolerant than we currently are.

You game?

Equal care must be taken to mine the spiritual truths from the various genres that make a literal interpretation unworkable. Poetry, prophecy, and prose weave in and out of the fabric known as the Bible, as well as another dozen plus forms.

The need to restate the ancient Christian doctrines comes with great danger, but to live in 2,000+ year old language, cosmology, and superstitious belief systems is to fail our task of bringing the GOOD NEWS forward into the decades and centuries in which we live. A world is waiting for us to make sense of what seems nonsensical.

Many are struggling. Many more have simply given up!

How shall we help them and us? We must be both faithful and credible. We must be led by the Spirit while keepig our feet on solid ground. God help us all.

I’m an outdoor person, a nature lover, an animal lover, and one who is ONE with all that God has created. I can’t help but believe that we all are, but few realize it. As I sat in my lawn chair this morning looking up at the trees in my side yard (of which there are about 100), I could help but glance at certain ones and ask, “what’s your story”?

I’m not losing it. Really, I’m not!

I’m just drinking diet coke with a splash of lemon from my lemon tree that sits beside my lime trees, my apple trees, my plum trees, my two puny orange trees, and my lone tangerine tree. I really do have them all and I planted them all. But that’s another story.

It’s the 100 year old pine trees, the various oak, and an assortment of varied varieties that caused my mind (and I think my spirit) to ask of them what they knew and what their historical life had seen. You’re probably not surprised and maybe even relieved that they didn’t talk back. But, I did hear this in my spirit. They are God’s creation, anchored in God’s creation, as we all are. How easily we today, rip out millions of acres of tress in the rain forests around the globe with no thought to what we’re destroying, but only that economic gain need be considered.

Is it any wonder then that killing tens of thousands of people, even millions of people in various genocidal acts over the past few decades, doesn’t seem to bother us? A proverbial tree-hugger I am not. But a respecter of how all of God’s creation I am becoming more aware- even to the level of thinking they have something to say to us.

Onward down the hallway!

Does anyone think that everyone in the world is going to be made a Christian?

Hey, that was the prevailing attitude prior to WWII. Remember the big one? Guess what. Islam thinks it’s going to make everyone a Muslim. Houston (world), we have a problem! Which of those TWO religions is destined to take over the world? Did I mention there are a couple of other religions in the world as well? The violence of Western imperialism, and terrorism of Eastern Arabic groups isn’t sitting well with Buddhists or Hindus.

Our “role modeling” isn’t convincing people.

Here’s a thought. Could salvation (however you want to define it) become a reality for people outside the church, for people not under the Pope, for people who have never heard the name of JAY-ZUS?

Talk about pure heresy!

Unless, when Jesus said “It is FINISHED“. He really meant that INCLUSIVELY!

Talk about a “bummer” of an idea for a works-oriented fundamentalist!

The Bible is the church’s book!

The Bible contains the Old Testament which is the book for the Jewish community of faith as the New Testament is the book for the Christian community of faith. It’s not a scientific manual. In an odd sort of way, G. K. Chesterton (Chesterton (1874–1936) an influential English writer of the early 20th century), got it right when he said, “The Bible is not to teach us how the heavens go, but how to go to heaven.”

Of course we now know that “going to” is even a bit outdated, don’t we.

His premise though was correct. The Bible isn’t there to teach us science. Have you read the first three chapters of Genesis? Or, have you read about the heavens above, hell below, the sun standing still, and all those things that we know are myth, not science?

The Bible is a guide to faith’s discernment of God. While the Bible has more nuggets than we can grasp on how to live life, here on earth, it’s more about how to develop our relationship with God: bringing the Kingdom of God to earth. Did I mention the Bibe is a lot more than just a book of morals: do this and don’t do that.

It’s a BIBLE!

Norman Pittenger put it this way, “The science of the Biblical writers was not ours! The way they saw things, the concepts they inherited, and used, the ideas that were in the air, inevitably had their effect both upon their own understanding and also on their actual writing.”

Our final claim to kingdom living circles the wagons around LOVE.

Isaac Watts (1674 – 1748) was recognized as the “Father of English Hymnody“, and he was the first prolific and popular English hymnwriter, credited with some 750 hymns. He wrote,”His mercies shall endure when this vain world shall be no more.” We really don’t have to strive. We’re being offered the world, if we’ll just receive.”

We have been accepted and affirmed by the Creator of the universe. What more does one need?

Schubert Ogden, Teacher of the Year, Southern Methodist University (1981-82); said it this way, “Only when we affirm all beings even as God Himself affirms us can we claim we’re following Jesus.” We’re to esteem others greater than ourselves. We’re to embrace and love others unconditionally. You and I are accepted in the Beloved. Isn’t it about time that we believe it and start acting as such?

When we do, it’s then easier to pass the baton to others.

I make mistakes because I was born into a world of hurt, a world of trouble, a world wherein people do dumb stuff. I sin (theologically speaking) because of the social environment that I come into, not because of some genetic blood flaw from thousands of years ago.

Let us not forget-
1-I am made in the image of God.
2-Thus, I am an original blessing.
3-My nature or roots are not flawed.

We are naturally, by the fact of our creation, members of one another and so what is true of society is true of us. This makes far more sense (intellectually and spiritually) to me than a biological premise. The real defect in man is not biological, but the fact that we’re not living out our true nature of God- LOVE! St. Thomas Acquinas put it this way, “The spirit of charity is in our hearts”. When we don’t respond to that spirit, all sorts of “sins” enter the picture.

Bottom line? You can’t be the LOVE that God is and sin.

Show me the LOVE and I’ll show you God!

As one loves, grace grows!