After a rather intense week following the wake and funeral for my mom, thinks have gradually returned to a state of normalcy.

Such as normal goes.

At work, we have had a few of the senior management foks retire and get moved up to fill the slots of the bosses that left; and a bit further down the (rumour) turnpike, is coming the periodical "contract analysis study" which we get to compete against various contractor firms that offer lowball bids for outsourced Pakistani labour vs. us "lazy government employees".

Or in following the example of private-sector corporate America, "ye olde downsize contest" for who gets to keep thier job. Apparently the first ripple is going out for this with our section being "field tested" to use a new time tracking tool. That kind of makes me a tad nervous, especially as I cannot always track every minute of my time that I have spent each day, especially for when I do non-work like things (such as making long blog entries, or searching for geeky Star Wars trivia…)

But on the total upside… we got back from the OB/GYN with news that we will be having a boy this September.

About 10 or 15 years ago, there was a really popular REM song, "It’s the End of the World As We Know It (and I feel fine)". It had a video centering on some ADHD-skateboarder kid clunking around some old shack.

For some reason, that song sticks in my head quite a bit these days when I flick on the news and hear some bit about the Middle East, Iraq or Iran. Needless to say, I cannot say that I "feel fine" at all.

Brad, a fellow blogger… has recently posted a pretty long post about what he fears will turn into WWIII, starting in the Persian Gulf.

I have had a lot of really wicked dreams over the past several months involving a devastated USA, and a nuclear war in the Middle East… much of it over (peak) oil.

Please forgive me if I take a generally pessimistic view of humanity at large: although we have had quite a few shining stars arise from among our race… we are not exactly the smartest creatures. (My pre-Christian self would have tnodded to the dolphins at this point).

Our overall lack of sense as the would-be dominant species is especially apparent when we function in the aggregates we call "nation-states".

The prophet Jeremiah said it best some 2600 years ago:

"All mankind is stupid, and devoid of knowledge…" (Jeremiah 51:17, NASB)

As I watch pump prices skyrocket (unleaded, #87 octane is now at $3.05 ~ $3.15 at most pumps around NYC; slightly cheaper in NJ) … I begin to wonder if Bush and Co. will get nervous enough to cross the nuclear Rubicon. That is to say, will he use the threat of being held economically hostage (sic) as a pretext to nuking the Iranian R&D sites?

I am an isolationist at my core: I have long said that America would do best to have sealed its borders, pulled out our military to behind our borders, scrapped our involvement in globalist treaties, and armed ourselves to the teeth, developing a totally self sufficient economy along with domestically produced, ecologically sound, renewable energy sources.

Of course, I’ve a better chance of transforming into a white flying elephant than seeing that realistically happen, much less actually be succesful without incurring other harsh economic problems. We are simply in it way over our heads as it is.

But even if we moved in the direction of securing more of our future for ourselves and our grandchildren, we would have done much better though. (For all the wisdom of European/American culture… the Iroquois Nations had a really nice idea: think things through as to how they will affect seven generations of descendants before dropping a planet into global wars. Then again, I tend not to think they were terribly interested in geopolitical power wars anyway).

We are armpits deep in the oil economy with no way out. Peak Oil is biting us: we are running out of dead, liquefied dinosaurs and crushed up Mesozoic plant matter. It will dig its fangs in with terrible strength in the weeks and years to come. And, as Americans (so Bush & Cronies have us believe) we "can’t take that lying down".

Will we attempt a "regime change" at the risk of igniting a conflagration that will see a Crusade vs. Jihad that could see much of the Middle East rendered into a radioactive wasteland, much less the political turmoil that would surely follow… up to and including Russian and Chinese nuclear attacks on the USA? Quite possible, if they see thier legitimate oil interests in the Middle East threatened.

We could very well see the USA come under external, international management if Bush gets too far out of control. In this turn, that might be affected by any domestic insurrection that could develop here in the USA itself: as a massive backlash mounts against upper middle class "christian" white Americans. Those prison/resettlement camps that dot the midwest might have more than one function.

It will take nothing short of a miracle… or a messiah (even if it is a false one) to de-fuse this thing from developing into a nuclear nightmare. 

Let us take a look at the players involved in this showdown:

• Bush nukes Natanz, Bushawher (sp? ) and sundry other Iranian nuclear R&D sites. Iranians rally around thier warped president, and the mullahs call for Holy Jihad vengeance. (Bear in mind Iran is a VERY powerful country, far stronger than Saddam’s Iraq when we toppled him in 2003… and we can barely contain that mess as it is).
• Events like 9-11 are repeated around the world, but especially in the US and Israel on horrific scale. 
• OPEC (especially the Arab nations) may more or less unanimously cuts off the USA from its oil. They really don’t need our business when China and India are dying to get thier mitts on cheap(er) gas. And the other countries will buy it with Euros since that old American Dollar will become worthless with inflation that ensues as the Federal Reserve cranks out the green in a dying attempt to keep the economy afloat.
• Bush orders a STRATEGIC (as in the big city-killing nukes, not the nice-guy "tactical nukes") nuke attack on various Islamic holy cities, in an attempt to disembowel radical Islam via destroying its holy sites (no Mecca = no Kaaba = no Haji pilgrimage…) which may or may not have its intended effect.   But one thing it will do, is open the door for Russian or Chinese intervention: they would love nothing more than to displace USA from its position of dominance (however much of that might remain at that point)… to say nothing of its "moral high ground". Or China might be busy wrestling Taiwan into quick submission as part of a side deal from the USA. Lots of oil in them Spratly Islands, or so we are told.

OR…. none of this might happen. This could all have been engineered to artificially inflate oil prices for some perverse reason. Who can really be certain exactly what is going on here? 

Will some saviour pop up to defuse this madness? Boy, that would be gravy for some people’s train. 

Putting it all together:

There is a particular branch of beliefs within the many religions of man that deals with "eschatology", or in simpler terms, "the end times". Christianity and Islam both have a vision of the end times involving world-wide war, and a messiah that arrives toward the end of it that wipes out all the bad guys, and prospers the kingdom of its messiah in a new world he builds after the Big Messy End. 

Of course, the Islamic extemist post-apocalyptic view envisions Maudib (Islamic messiah) ruling over a global Caliphate, with all things subornated under a lovely Taliban-style paradise. 

I do not purport to know exactly how things will end up, nor could I adequately explain my views in a way that makes sense to the casual reader: end times prophecy is pretty convoluted within Christianity. I could easily pick one of the various endings that are popular… but to do so may mean chasing down a version of man’s theology that is not true.

But one thing is certain: we are heading down a very scary path. I do think that God is sovereign (He is in control over all things) and time will tell if this is the trigger by which we will see the return of the Lord Jesus.

A part of me believes that much of what happens in Revelation has already passed (preterist view/amillennial view), and the "coming of Jesus" essentially amounts to what we see next when we finally close our eyes in death.

The other part of me rather expects to see all the wonderful, and awful things describing the condition of the world right before Jesus returns. I am genuinely willing to admit that I do not have a solid answer for how I think "the endgame" will play out.

I certainly do not believe in the fantasy known as the "Pre-Tribulation Rapture" ala Tim LaHaye’s Left Behind series. It seems not only extremely arrogant, but also mocks God to suggest that (American) Christians would get zapped out of harm’s way when countless numbers of Christians before them have "endured to the end, holding fast thier testimonies and the testimony of Jesus Christ".

The thing is… if Jesus is to return at a time like this… who will really be ready to face Him?

Very long day… lots of running around tying up loose ends.

Mom finally passed on, and I have a very strange set of mixed feelings at the moment. Some grief to be sure…. I visisted her at the nursing home last night, she really looked as worse as I had ever seen her. Emaciated, even.

I could only bear to spend about a half hour with her, and prayed Psalm 23 over her… and prayed that she would have a safe trip to Heaven. Strange thought, I guess… but she was not feeling any pain in the last hours left to her.

I kissed her goodnight, said goodbye… and left to head back home. She passed away early this morning, so out of the family members who have been regularly visting her… I was probably the last to see her alive.

I’ll be looking up at the Pleiades cluster once I finish this post and make a few replies to the last one.

And she is with Jesus now, which is a far better place for her than her sufferings here. 

Putting last week’s (rather draining, yet very interesting) discussion of people’s views on God behind us… I have another idea forming in the back of my wee little head.

A story, in an age long gone, perhaps?  Or I might script out a story and do it up as a podcast. Be still, my creaky hard drive!

Easter was rather pleasant, with nice weather here in the mid-Atlantic northeast (New York). Perfect gardening weather!

Unfortunately, my cherry tree sapling I planted last year died from frost in the root system; so I took another stab at it, and this time shoved two new Yoshino cherry saplings in the whiskey-barrel planter. On the very likely chance that these too, die the death… I will probably have to give up on my dreams of sitting under a blooming sakura (cherry) tree strumming the Tsugaru Jyongara Bushi on my shamisen whilest sipping saké with my wife… and plant some strawberries next spring.

I also visited Dad, who is still adjusting to life with Mom slowly dying. We all had a nice lamb-crown roast dinner, per our usual family custom. Later that evening, we stopped in to see Mom.

She isn’t doing very well at all… she has lost the ability to talk, and spends most of her day slumped over in her resting chair, or in bed sleeping. Well, actually - in terms of her personal comfort, it is probably an improvement - she hasn’t been screaming in pain, nor has she been particularly "agitated" lately.

Dad and I think she is finally starting to let go of her desire to live in this world, and she is spending more time on the spiritual plane - what I regard as a threshold zone between life and death. This is my own belief, not one grounded in scripture.  Based upon her confession of faith, I am certain that she will go to Heaven where she will see Jesus.

When we arrived at the hospice center, she did not recognize any of us - which kind of made me sad. Mourning for a family member that is close to me is kind of a new emotional experience for me. Let me digress for a moment, after the fashion of Persian Guy’s "Way Back Wednesday" segments:

I never knew any of my grandparents very well, so thier passing was really a non-event for me. All but my great-aunt had died when I was very young, due to some huge generation gaps in my family. Great Aunt Winifred (Winnie) was the last of that generation to pass, at the age of 94. Her age was easiest for me to remember, since she was born in 1900.

She was my mother’s aunt, younger sister to her mother, and a spinster. Although she had survived into my 20’s… I never associated much with her, since she smelled kind of like moldy carpet (this had more to do with the basement of her house being very moldy than her smelling bad) and to her last breath, had been a chain-smoker. Definitely a think that kept me at a distance - I can’t stand cigarette smoke. I do remember seeing Aunt Winnie a few weeks before she did pass on - quite a decline in her health, a weak husk of a stronger woman whom I vaguely remembered serving us (grandchildren at a family barbeque) something like charcoal briquettes that were supposed to be hamburgers.

Seeing my mom slumped over in her chair, hollow eyes not engaging anything particular… reminded me of that image in my mind of Aunt Winnie before she died. In fact, the resemblance… was uncanny. In her youth, my Mom was something of a thickset woman (probably where I get my stockiness from) with a surprisingly strong build, despite her short height. Later in life, she had tended towards 150-ish pounds or around 70kg.

To see her now, she must not have been an ounce over 110 pounds (about 50kg).

We spent about 20 minutes with her, hoping that she would recognize one of us… it was sad to watch her bat Dad’s hand away. Somehow, we came up with the idea of letting her put her hand on my wife’s belly, in hopes she could sense the baby growing inside her… no sooner did I mention the baby, did she come back to a little of her old self… although she could no longer enunciate a single word, she made a noise that seemed to border on happiness. It wasn’t like her normal groaning noises.

How frustrating it must be to loose the ability to communicate with those around you. 

Lest I let this post get too depressing, I’ll conclude by saying that I hope we did something to make her feel a bit better on Easter Sunday… in all likelyhood, next Easter dinner, there will be one less place at the table, but hopefully my son or daughter will be there to fill a new seat.

Brad wrote an incredible spread of info on his beliefs in God. It makes for quite a read.  The link goes to the specific post he made (God and Me, Part 3) … so if you are reading this and link to it - you shouldn’t stumble accross any of his nudie pics.

Brad asked four questions in his post, which I will answer here (for myself).  Brad, please understand that I am not berating you for beliefs… I speak out that which I have come to know, and out of a concern for all people who might read this at some point.

1. You believe Christ died on the cross for your sins. You think your place in Heaven is secure. There is no pain in Heaven right? You believe that you will be reunited with your family in Heaven right?

So let me ask you this Batman. YOU make it to Heaven… but Brother or Sister or Mom or Dad doesn’t because they didn’t “make the grade for whatever reason.” You are going to be good with that? Remember there is supposed to be NO PAIN in Heaven. You don’t think that would cause you some pain for ALL ETERNITY to know someone near and dear to you didn’t make it?

My response:

There is only one way to know if my place in heaven is secure: by faith in Christ, (1 John 5:1) and knowing Him as the Son of God. And by continuing to abide in God’s word, which is to keep my life according His words:

He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have I written unto you that believe in the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.

1 John 5:12-23

The First Epistle of John  (1 John) has much to say on the subject of the assurance of our salvation. Being obedient to God’s word is a key test of this:

And hereby we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He that saith, "I know Him", and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth His word, in him verily (truly) is the love of God perfected (completed) : hereby we know that we are in Him. He that saith he abideth (lives in) Him ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked.

1 John 2: 3-6

This simply means that if we are truly Jesus’s followers, then we act like it. We will show the love of Jesus in us by living godly lives in imitation of Christ.

God did love us enough to send HIS Son to die a horrible, excruciating death… a torment we entirely deserve. It is the subject of the "Easter" holiday many "christians" will crowd into churches in a couple of days to observe.

I will elaborate a bit more on Jesus’s work of atonement shortly; however, it is an individual choice that all of us have to make: what shall we do with the message of Redemption?

As I mentioned in a previous post, God did not make robots. He wants us to CHOOSE to live according to HIS plan for us.

I am not accountable for the choices of my family, or anyone else… (unless I fail to warn them of the judgment due to us for sin, Ezekiel 33:6)

But I love them enough to warn them of Hell, and of God’s way of escaping that Hell. I certainly do not want for them to suffer in eternal torment forever. Yet… I cannot force thier decision! It is entirely thier decision to make.

The Apostle Paul strove always to have a clear conscience, preaching and teaching the message of salvation. He did not fail to warn the people around him of the danger of Hell! And Jesus… warned of Hell so much more than any other topic He taught on.

Will my family "make the grade"? I believe my mother has, not of her good Catholic works, but because she has heard God’s word of salvation, and believed upon the Son - Jesus - whom the Father sent. I will see her in heaven.

Dad is another story… he is an extremely smart guy, very wise in the ways of the world… perhaps too smart for his own good. He hears the message, but for now, he is brushing it aside. Does it sadden me to see him reject the same God that saved his wife? You bet it does.

Will I weep in heaven for his choice? If he chose wrong, I cannot say that he hasn’t been warned. God will wipe away my tears, as He promised. Then I will rejoice at spending eternity with my Redeemer King.  How much more my joy, if Dad does choose to accept Jesus’s gift of saving grace!

And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away

Revelation 21:4

2. I am Gay. Ok so all I have to do is accept Christ as my Savior and CONTINUE being Gay even though our Bible as it is now indicates that is a sin…. And I am good to go now for Heaven right? Oh….NO??? Ok, I just have to admit I am sinning and STOP being Gay? I can be Gay once in awhile just because I am weak and can’t help it? What?????????? But I am Gay! It isn’t what I CHOSE TO BE. IT IS WHAT I AM. Am I doomed then regardless? Is it ok to say hey this is what I am, but I believe Christ died on the cross for my sins so I will keep doing what I want and I am ok?

My response:

Ooog. Here is a tough one to answer. But not impossible!

Here is somethng that will sting most people’s ears:

God… did… not… make… anyone… gay.

But people can choose to do what they want: God made us with FREE WILL.

What…? No lighning bolts…? I’m still here…. the Lady Cher has not struck me down! Of course, that is utter blasphemy into the ears of anyone educated and sympathetic to the views of modern queer theory. 

Of course, this is conclusion I had come to years and years ago: it was always a choice I made whether or not to sleep around with various strangers (regardless of gender)… and a choice I made to lay down in bed with other men.

But what about my desire for gay (or straight) sex?  It was there. And I tell you the truth, I still struggle with it from time to time. I’ve got about 15-20 years of it under me already; I will likely continue to struggle with those temptations until Jesus calls me home to heavenly perfection, or He returns to this earth in total victory first.

But "where sin abounded, God’s grace abounded more".

Because I have Jesus living within me, I can rely upon His grace to overcome my many sin habits, be it fighting a temptation to go scope out that cute intern in HR, or be it not to tell filthy jokes with my co-workers.

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh, but they that are after the (Holy) Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded (always thinking about sin and how to sin) is death; but to be spiritually minded (setting your mind on the things of God’s Holy Spirit) is life and peace. 

Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

Romans 8:5-8 

It is impossible to please God while walking in sin. Therefore, it is not okay to continue in our former sins as a follower of Jesus. Again, I stress that this is inclusive of all of our sin habits, be it hetero- or homo- sexual immorality, or drunkeness, or violence against others, or lying, etc.

But God is the giver of much grace! 

He has made me able to walk in His Spirit so that I can be victorious over my decaying, vile sinful flesh, and finally have mastery over my wicked, carnal mind.

But God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us (made us alive) together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved) and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ: that in the age to come, He might show the exceeding riches of His grace toward us through Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 2:4-7

All this means is … in spite of our wretched selves… God loved us and has made us alive in Him, able to overcome both sin and death.

3. Let me ask you this. If you are a parent (and if you aren’t try to imagine) and your kid f***s up… are you willing to throw him into a pit of … fire? You are a parent and if your kid f***s up, what do you feel??? Bottom line is nothing but LOVE for them STILL right? Yes, they might need to learn a lesson and be punished to some extent to learn it… but would that lesson EVER be you are no longer mine and I am going to cast you into eternal torment? … But we can so easily accept an all loving God would do this? … Do you REALLY think he would throw US away EASIER than you would throw YOUR own child away?

 
My response:

God does not want to throw anyone away. Not a single person. Read this:

…"As I live", saith the Lord God, "I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked"…

Ezekiel 33:10a

Hmmm. God doesn’t like destroying people… sounds good so far. What exactly did he take pleasure in? That verse concludes as follows:

"…but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, (repent) turn ye from your evil ways; for why will you die, O house of Israel?

Ezekiel 33:10b 

And what did Jesus say in the New Testament:

For the Son of Man is not come to destroy men’s lives… but to save them…

Luke 9:56 (KJV) 

I find that verse… one of the most beautiful things in the Bible. 

Yet, not everyone will hear the call to salvation:

Enter ye at the strait (a strait is a passageway of small, confined dimensions) gate: for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go there(at) :

Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

Matthew 7:13-14 

As for the issue of parents and discipline go… 

Earthly parents have done some surprisingly ugly things. Too easily, we find in our enlightened, humanist culture… a willingness of parents to destroy thier children. Some are very obvious, such as the stories we hear on the news every so often about a mother leaving her children in a car with the windows up… and the kid(s) in said car get roasted.

A less obvious, but much more prevalent evil… is the millions of unborn children pumped through the abortion mills for the convenience of "birth control".

To answer the literal instance of when parents would toss thier kids into flames… there was a Canaanite ritual in the worship of the false fertility god "Molech": parents worshipping Molech would make thier children walk through fires to prove thier devotion to this bronze idol:

And they built the high places of Ba’al, which are the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause thier sons and thier daughters to pass through the fire unto Molech; which I commanded them not to, neither came it into My mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin. 

Jeremiah 32:35

But most earthly parents wouldn’t go so far. Instead, in the fine tradition of American Mediocrity™… we have our present school systems which despoil the minds of our youth, leaving many youths without either a basic knowledge of God, or even a knowledge of how to read and write. Lacking discipline (for thier parents refuse to properly discipline thier bratty kids) these kids grow up without any guidelines, cast into the world around them relatively less prepared than our fathers were.

And yet, we love these children much. Even if we are generally evil in our disposition to them, as Jesus said:

If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is father, will he give him a stone?  or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

Luke 11:11-13 

God wants us to draw near to Him. Because He knows we have sin, and we continue to screw up… He wants us to come to Him, and believe.

To the unbeliever, who is falls under wrath, as a child of the evil one, Jesus says:

And this is the will of Him that sent Me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.

John 6:40 

But to the believer, He counts as a child of the living God, and when the bleliever strays, God disciplines him as a son:

It is for discipline that you endure. God deals with you as with children, for what son is there whom his father doesn’t discipline?

But if you are without discipline, of which all have been made partakers, then are you illegitimate, and not children.

Hebrews 12:7-8 (World English Bible) 

The King James is even stronger:

But if ye are without chastisement, of which all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not children.

Hebrews 12:8 (KJV) 

Bastards, indeed! We are either children of the Adversary (the devil), which is our default condition…  or we are Children of God, having received the washing of the Blood of Jesus, and the Regeneration of His resurrection.

That’s pretty black and white, isn’t it?

4. WHAT IS HELL? What is it to you? Again the literal translation in the Bible? Fire and Brimstone? Or could it just possibly be that Hell, if such a thing exists…. is like a thousand times better than the life you are living right now? BUT…. With the exception being… that you find out in the end that God WAS for real and that for all eternity you are going to simply be SEPERATED from him? Nothing horrible and torturous…

The ONLY thing you need worry about is how you TREAT OTHERS because THAT is all HE has ever tried to teach us. EVERYTHING about the Bible as it exists in its incomplete form even has been nothing more than a blueprint on HOW TO TREAT OTHERS. HIS whole message has been slapping everyone in the face forever and it is just how to treat others. Your family, your friends, everyone. It is the overriding theme and lesson about EVERYTHING he tries to show us. HAVE A GOOD AND PURE HEART!

 
My response:

Insulting God?  Yah wanna know what is insulting to God…?

It is a horrible, horrible lie… the idea of a "stateless existence of soul-sleep"… or the wishful thought that we will die and be "separated in some painless limbo away from God", if we aren’t good enough to have "made the grade".

Friends…. that is the biggest lie of the devil that has been perpretrated on humankind. That is an even graver and far worse insult against the God who cannot lie, than accusing Him of being some vindictive man waiting to toss people into Fiery Hell for the slightest infraction.

To say that God does not judge sin… that means He is no longer an omnipotent, all-knowing, and yet full of mercy… a God of Justice who avenges wrong!

This lie against the truth makes Him into some sad, maudlin, little godling who would allow sin and iniquity to go unpunished.

It also makes a mockery of His mercy, and His love which you have (rightly) said He has for us.

It demeans and makes of none effect the most heart-rending sacrifice a Father ever had to make: giving up His Only Begotten Son to die a death worse than a criminal.

And it is a lie against everything Jesus taught about Hell.

Of course, the devil LOVES the idea of millions of souls pouring into Hell daily, those souls passsing out of existence under the illusion that Hell it is just some kind of benign "cosmic time-out" for not being nice enough to widows and orphans… people, just doing nice things and good works IS NOT GOING TO CUT IT!

Our attempts at righteousness… of earning points with God based upon our good deeds are like the stench from a menstrual rag… worse than a pile of week-old dead skunks:

But we are all as an unclean thing , and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

Isaiah 64:6 

Hell was originally created as a place for the angels that rebelled against God (namely, Satan and his minions) and were cast out of Heaven. Since Jesus is the Creator, it follows that He also created this place. A loving God creating a place of eternal torment?

Jesus is a loving God, but let us not neglect one of His other titles and roles: He is the Judge of the Living and the Dead. God the Father gave all things under Jesus, wherefore He is titled "King of Kings and Lord of Lords".

Because He is the Judge, He MUST judge (the unredeemed) for thier sin, and He MUST cast them into Hell. Think for a minute He will enjoy doing that? Consider this then, if you do not imagine Him weeping for lost humankind on the Day of Judgment, while also burning with Righteous Vengeance for thier sin: 

Because Jesus loved us (humans) enough to leave His holy heaven to visit us in the flesh… because he SUFFERED and DIED a GRUESOME DEATH, being beaten with Roman whips (these were leather straps with pieces of sharp metal and bone embedded into them)… the selfsame GOD who humbled Himself under the hands of sinful men, and died like a CRIMINAL on a cross, to SAVE US FROM ETERNAL HELL…

…this same Jesus spent a very large portion of His earthly ministry preaching about and teaching about Hell.

This same Jesus … became our sin sacrifice…. He who was Holy, and knew God His Father face-to-face… was separated from His perfection in order to purchase the souls of all humanity, for all time…. to Himself. 

To keep us from Hell.

But what exactly did Jesus teach about Hell? This following quote is oftened referred to as the "Lazarus and the Beggar Parable".  That margin note is incorrect: this is no parable, but a true story!

In the parables Jesus typically stated, He used riddles and speech that was not plain. Here, Jesus is very plainly talking about Hell. If this were a parable, no one would have been specifically mentioned by name, nor would they go into detailed discussions with other named persons:

There was a certain rich man, which was clothed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously (meaning he at like a king) every day: and there was a certain beggar named Lazarus, which was laid at his gate, full of sores, and desiring to be fed with the crumbs which fell from the rich man’s table: moreover the dogs came and licked his sores.

And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom (paradise, or a type of heaven) : the rich man also died, and was buried; and in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.

And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.

But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence.

Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father’s house: For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment.

Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.

And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent.

And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.

Luke 16:19-31 

Make no mistake, my friends…. Hell is a VERY REAL PLACE, and Jesus died so that we might not have to spend eternity there.

Let’s pick that story apart, we can see a few things:

1) Hell is a place of TORMENTS.

2) Hell is a place that has FLAMES.

3) Hell is a place that we will be tormented forever, without hope of relief from the fire. No  ice water for you!

4) In Hell, you will have a physical body (with eyes and a tongue) of some sort that will feel thirst and the sensation of being burnt. 

5) There is NO ESCAPE from Hell once you are there… it’s game over.

But here is the kicker:

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.
   
For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Ephesians 2:8-9

Getting the picture yet?

It is NOT by good works that we escape Hell, but through belief in Christ’s work on the cross.

HE is the one able to change us, He who shows us how dirty we really are…. and it is HE that cleanses us from sin, and gives us white robes, fit for the Feast with the King of Kings:

HE is the one that can cause us to walk in good works that are a pleasing aroma to God! 

Brad, this is not the work of an "unknowable God"…. this is the work of a God that so deeply cares for us… He gave up His life for us! 

What a Saviour! 

5. Here is one last strange thought for you to ponder. How do you explain the weird metaphysical things some humans can do? All the bizarre things certain folks are capable of doing with their minds for instance. Of course some would say it’s of the devil… but I would hope we left the witch burning times well behind us. It DOES exist and we all know it. So how to explain those things most of us find impossible to explain? Well here is a thought.

This goes back to what I believe I was shown and what the Gospel of Judas hints at. That we ALL have a spark of the divinity within us. Let’s look at the Gospel of Mark.
Chapt: 11: 23. For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea: and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass: he shall have whatsoever he saith.

My response:

I won’t dwell too long on this one, other than to say that God (and the demons and angels) operate on a spiritual plane that is generally beyond our grasp. People can exhibit those kinds of spiritual abilities only if they are given those abilities from a spirit entity such as a demonic spirit. The various demon-possessed people in the Bible exhibited superhuman strength and spoke with demonic knowledge. In other cases, they were a bit more subtle, and worked to stir up strife among humans, or propagate false prophets and thier lies.

Scripturally, I do not know of any instances where holy (unfallen) angels granted abilities to mortal men.

Angels might perform supernatural acts that are visible in the physical world, (such as the angel that struck Peter, and loosed his chains, and led him out of in the jail he was incarcerated in… [Acts 12:6-11]) or they might appear to execute a judgment on a sinner in the Old Testament. But generally, they were messengers.

And that leaves us with the Holy Spirit of God, who is able to do very mighty work of God through sinful, but redeemed men (and women).  The faith you referenced Jesus speaking of, is only possible through a faith in the true God, and is effected by the Holy Spirit according to His purposes.

God will not allow His glory to be usurped by men, nor will He be used just to do "parlor tricks"; people you see using supernatural powers that only benefit themselves and do not bring glory to God are most likely demonic counterfeits. 

Wow, this ran longer than a planned…. I do hope that this helps clarify my position (and as I seek to conform my thinking to the mind of Christ…  the part of my arguments that agree with Scripture are God’s arguments).

Peace be upon you. 

Side note: "Abraham’s Bosom" or Paradise, is a reference to the place where the Old Testament righteous people waited for Jesus to redeem them. Although thier faith looked to Jesus, until He died, they still had sin, and therefore could not see God. But because they trusted entirely on God for His salvation, they too were saved. When Jesus rose again from the dead, He took those righteous souls with Him. Now all that is there is left in that realm is Hell; therefore, the redeemed souls in Heaven will not see the people suffering in Hell.

I’ve noticed an ongoing trend with some bloggers is this thing called "HNT" or "Happy Nekkid Thursday". The general idea is, the prospective blogger looking to share his (or her) usually clothed body posts a semi-nude pic of him or herself each Thursday on thier blog.

From what I have seen, there are only a few boundaries to it… some sites may "bare all" quite a bit more liberally than others.

There is a particular blog that tracks participation in this, and it appears to have attracted quite a hefty following.

Seeing as today is Friday (and I’ve already posted a rather heavy, ranty post earlier)… I’ve missed the boat. Being the ever enterprising cat that I am… I’ve decided to co-opt this tradition for myself, and re-package it.

I will refer to it as: "Fully Clothed Friday".

These FCF pics may be a tad risque, and as such… I can’t guarantee that I won’t remove the links to these later on. 

For my debut, I’m pulling out all the stops. Enjoy.

Seeker’s_really_really_hot_FCF_piccie.jpg 

The story I had earlier deleted was a re-working of an older fan-fiction I had set in the Star Wars universe, shortly after the "Order 66" was given by Emperor Palpatine for the clone armies to kill off thier Jedi generals. The basic idea was about a particular lower-ranking Jedi Master who manages to escape from his clones and manages to eke out a living on an outer-rim planet at the end. NYPD Detective Sorenson was lifted from my would be Jedi, Soren Lar’ko. The "Fundies" were wrested from the loose idea of the other Jedi that Order 66 killed… and the New World Order/Antichrist figures were typed from Darth Vader and the Emperor.

I couldn’t end it very well, because I would have had to get into a lot of Christian Eschatology (end-of-the-world beliefs) that probably would turn off a lot of folks. But I digress (as always)… 

I dropped developing the original (Jedi) story after Dark Lord: The Rise of Darth Vader by James Luceno was published; my idea was not so much similar to his, but with that book and a series of Dark Horse comics revolving around the Great Jedi Hunt… I figured my little attempt at writing in the SW universe would be laughable at best.

One thing that does stand out to me, is how George Lucas tends to parallel his SW movies somewhat with the politics of the real world. At the time of the Original Trilogy, we lived in the grip of the Cold War. The forces of the Galactic Empire, and the uniforms of the Imperial Officers, along with the countless millions of stormtroopers evoked the "Evil Empire" that Ronald Reagan alluded to in his eponymous speech against the Soviet Union of the 1980’s. Likewise, the Rebel Alliance, with its optimistic, ever-do-well spirit and overcoming impossible odds was intended to paint a similar picture of how we Americans may have seen ourselves during this period.

The Prequel Trilogy, crappy acting and shoddy dialogues, and Jar-Jar Binks aside… painted a parallel to our current politics, although with some folks’ shoes being on the other feet:

Palapatine’s rhetoric about "becoming the first galactic empire", and the tremendous buildup and use of military manpower - as well as the weakening and corruption of Congress shadows Bush’s America and the so-called "Coalition of the Willing".

Count Dooku’s collection of states and corpornations does a less adequate job of playing the part of the "bad guys", although I am inclined to see them as two-faced "allies" we have in Saudi Arabia and a few of the other supposedly "friendly" Gulf States. 

Of course, this is probably more me reading into things than it is art imitating life. But a few things do ping heavily on my radar:

The slow, but quickening erosion of civil liberties and our personal freedoms as American Citizens.

It started out, seemingly innocently, as we ("good guys" ) rounded up a large bunch of those Taliban ("bad guys") and stashed them away in places like Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, and in other military prisons in undisclosed locations. Some of those guys have not seen light of day in nearly four years.

Then came the Iraq "action". Topple Mr. Saddam, we did… and then we had to find a place for all those icky terrorists we keep finding there. Abu Gharaib? Oh, my.

Yes, that was definitely a travesty. But no less appalling is the treatment of convicts - American Citizens - within our own domestic prison systems. There was a British television (Channel Four) special investigation done on a few of the more infamous prisons in the USA, showing extreme tactics involving the mauling of prisoners with police dogs, forced restraint in unusual positions in punitive chair devices (ostensibly a restraining chair used to subdue violent convicts) and spraying fire-extinguisher size doses of pepper/capsicum spray on single prisoners.

Some of the corrections officers  who broke the almost omerta-like code of silence regarding these atrocities suffered some backlash from thier cohorts.

Add to all of this, the latest thing down the pike: the status of Enemy Combatant, as it applies to American Citizens.

In the first two cases, the Taliban and the Iraqis… it was met with indifference because we were dealing with those "ugly terrorists and Islamic extremists". Great PR work has been done to build up a wall of hatred for Arabs in this country, so that few people really complain about this abuse.

When those Abu Gharaib pics were posted online, and the news feeds debuted, most people I talked to seemed to be of one of these thoughts:

1. "Serves the filthy ragheads right! We should nuke’em till they glow, and make Mecca into a parking lot!!"
2. "Well, that’s what they deserve for degrading thier women and people under a mediaeval code of Islam.." 
3. "It’s only a few bored MPs (Military Police)  having some good ol’ college-like pranking fun. See? It’s only a few nekkid Ay-rabs stacked together! Lighten up, already!"
4. "That’s a shame our soldiers did that… but it’s hard to blame them… war does that to people…"
5. And my favorite: "Better them than us."

Oh…. really? But it gets so much better! Let me shine some more light on this.

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

5th Amendment to U.S. Constitution

Jose Padilla. Arguably, this guy has a history. A criminal record, and a series of associations with shady, if not outright terrorist-supporting figures. A quick googling about him turns up this wikipedia entry with a lot of interesting information about the case.

He’s a hot potato: nobody in the courts really seemed to want to do anything that would really settle the issue of whether or not his detention for three years on a military brig (navy prison) was in fact, unconstitutional (and therefore illegal). 

Going off of the pull-quote I used above (5th Amendment) - Padilla was neither a foriegn military agent, nor a member of the US military; he may have posed some danger to Chicago, but it didn’t seem to me at the time that the government had much evidence to support that idea.

Legally, we are not at war. That’s a job that Congress gets, and hasn’t done since 8 December, 1941 which brought us officially into WWII. It could be argued that we are in a state of National Emergency, but that too, is not defined in the Constitution to include the right to suspend Habeas Corpus. Again, another job for Congress:

"The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it."

This is spelled out in Article 1 (Powers delegated to the Legislative branch), Section 9, Clause 2. Once again, we are not being invaded by a foreign army or other military, nor is there an active insurgency or rebellion in need of supression. While the threat posed by terrorist entities is a very credible, the scope of that threat does not meet the criteria of a "rebellion" or an "invasion".

If we are inclined to pick semantic nits over what an invasion is, the basic idea is this: the goal of an invasion is to secure land and hold it, for use by incoming rear-element forces. D-Day in Normandy was a proper invasion, as was the Blitzkrieg employed by the former German Wehrmacht. Pearl Harbor, and the various actions of the Luftwaffe over the UK were raids. As was September 11th, 2001… if you want to place it in the scope of a military operation. 

Raids are intended to either secure supplies or destroy enemy materiel. Or demoralize the enemy by destroying targets of psychological or cultural value.

However, we are in a cultural state of war, perhaps an eternal war of an Orwellian scope. A war not of our choosing: the culprits in the Whitehouse, and the "silent majority" (or would ignorant and fearful majority be more appropos?) keep Congress effectively muzzled. Hopefully, not past November of 2006. Psst! Register to vote if you haven’t already!

Supreme Court? Freshly stacked with all the latest from BushCorp and their happy little globalist secret boy’s clubs? Yessir, three bags full! 

I can’t really say whether Jose Padilla is a very horrible, Allah-and-my-AK-47 loving guy that deserves to be locked up for the rest of his life, or be subjected to horrific tortures from the CIA, DIA, BATF and the NSA…  but he is an American citizen, and deserves his rights to a fair and speedy trial. Just like the rest of us.

Without the spectre of cruel and unusual punishment. No mutilations by police dogs, nor forced bondage, nor beatings, nor humiliating sessions of being sodomized with broom handles or urinated on by "corrections officers".

We hold the Islamo-fascist in derision for his mediaeval ways… but look how we are winding our own tolerance clock back to the Dark Age: what’s next, the public floggings and people put into stocks and pillories?

Bottom line: What we are looking at - short of any real changes (we can only hope and pray) following with a Democratic House, and some Democrat Senate chairs filled… is an Amerika where good people may just find themselves locked up for thinking about and saying the wrong things.

You have been warned: Let us return to the America we knew and cherished as a light of hope among the nations of the world, or we shall leave a nation of political slavery and oppression to our children.

Alright. I’ll be brutally frank here, and finally own up to an irrefutable, unstoppable fact.

There is nothing I can do about it; it is as futile as catching the wind in my hands or stopping the incoming tides with my body.

My mother is dying.

I once heard someone quote a Bible passage in reference to another person who was dying:

And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

(Hebrews 9:27-28, King James Version)

For a long time, I have scoffed at religion and thought it to be a useless vehicle for people too weak to think for themselves; and perhaps it is. There is a subtle area between "faith" and the pure intellectual grasping of things by our (limited?) abilities.

I was raised Catholic. (and I beg pardon of anyone reading this who might be Catholic: if you are a strong Catholic and wish to stop reading from here, I advise you to do so now.)

When I was growing up, I followed my parents to church and was quite content to park myself in a pew for an hour every Sunday for a nice nap… I never took what the priests had to say very seriously. There was the whole sit-stand-kneel thing, and the go-up-to-the-creepy-priest-and-eat-the-wafer business. About the only fun I ever had from it all, was my involvement with the CYO (Catholic Youth Organization) activities. Taking field trips, doing fun and often stupid stuff with my peers. Hardly religious stuff at all.

But after seeing what hypocrisies the priests tended to get into, I never really cared about what they had to say. Especially after the various child-molestation scandals came to light. That might be one of the few things that would ever motivate me to strike another human being down in wrath: one who would harm an innocent child like that.

Even today, I have my issues with the Church of Rome: As my mother lay in bed dying of cancer, my father had called for a priest to come administer the "last rites" (in Catholicism, this is a "sacrament" or a religious rite to prepare a soul to be received in heaven, have sins forgiven, and/or healed of whatever mortal affliction the person might have).

This priest was an absolute buffoon: stammering and questioning this sick woman who barely knows right from left anymore - asking her if she knows what she wants? And then, he could not make up his mind what he needed to do! Hello? We called your sorry, clueless butt out here to give LAST RITES. What was so hard about that..? the guy had to have stdied that in priest-school before he got ordained.

Mr. Priest, are you on crack? How dare you put someone who is near death and obviously suffering through a grilling as if she doesn’t "know what she wants…"

We actually had to chase the priest out of the hospital room. I’d have to say that whatever little shred of faith that I may have had in the Roman Church has been utterly destroyed. I actually told this priest to leave, saying that "there is no salvation in the Roman Catholic Church".

I’m sure that went over well with my Dad, and had my mother been in her right mind, she’d have lit into me. They are both arch-Catholic… and mother’s wish had always been for me to return to the "Holy Mother Church".  Except that I cannot in good conscience, return to a "church" that is built upon lies, misery and hypocrisy. 

This is really hard for me to deal with… every 20-30 minutes, Mom is screaming out parts of the rosary, saying "hail mary" and the like. I’ve always had a problem with Mary worship… sure, she (Mary) was a "good" woman and according to the tradition and scriptures, chosen of God to bear the Baby Jesus into this world.

But she ain’t nothing more than that, to me. She didn’t die on a cross, nor did she rise again from the dead. I simply cannot bring myself to pray that "hail mary prayer". 

Don’t get me wrong. I want her to "go to heaven". Perhaps more than most people, since I am her son. She has done many good things to others in her life, the least of which was putting up with a dumb mule of a son like me. But will her good deeds earn her a place in Heaven?

As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.

…Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God…

(Romans 3:10-12, 20-23, KJV) 

Why is she screaming "I don’t want to die… I don’t want to go to Hell!"??

She calls out to her Blessed Virgin, Holy Mother… but she has no peace. 

This "Queen of Heaven" did not hear her prayers… she is not comforted. And I am actually beginning to be afraid that she just might be heading to that other place. On an intellectual level, I had always forced myself to think that Hell was an abstraction, some medieval construct made for evil people in the afterlife … but to hear her talking about it so vividly…

Even when Dad and I finally left to get some sleep… she was still crying and murmuring how "I don’t want to get off the train…" This of course, is a metaphor for her awareness of impending death. Perhaps it was her fever talking… but she kept saying that whenever the train stopped… it was so hot… so unbearably hot.

Her Blessed Virgin did not help her, nor do I think she ever will.

Perhaps this is the result of some choices I have made, some things I know God isn’t pleased with.

I wonder: have I truly failed my mother, at such an important time?