I was in my late 20's.
Devan and I had been married for around 4 years.
I worked two jobs, one full time and one part time. The full time job was the breadwinner. The part time job was the insurance provider and hope of a stabler future.
I worked commercial construction during the day, driving to work in the dark morning, falling asleep at stoplights and often having to park half a mile or more from the job site.
I was a hod-carrier (mason tender) and ran the grout pump every other day or so.
The hopper of the pump received soupy concrete from the trough of the cement truck and vigorously forced the grout up through a 4 inch reinforced rubber hose.
Up on top of a high block wall, I either straddled the wall, walked it or ideally used scaffold walk boards. The concrete laden hose, sometimes several hundred feet long, would retract and thrust with every cycle of the pump, roughly every second, and you had to somehow pad the hose at every contact point with the masonry or scaffolding to prevent a hole from wearing through from the constant friction.
Around 3:30, it was time to shut down for the day and I would jog back to my little Ford Ranger and speed home to get a shower and supper before heading back into town for work at the UPS hub at 5.
From roughly 5-10, I loaded semis with boxes.
When my head hit the pillow, sleep was only a matter of seconds out, surging in to pull me out into an irresistible riptide.
Consequently, I had little time for anything that was non-essential to survival, certainly not introspection.
Sometimes, if you ignore the act of simply breathing long enough, the odd arresting moment when silence falls is all it takes to become suddenly aware of what is sustaining your hyperactivity.
We lived in a cramped townhouse.
I was in the living room taking a rare glance out into the parking lot when a passing breeze animated the leaves of a small ornamental bush in the flower bed and then passed through the closed window into my soul.
Spearheads of ripples moved across my consciousness.
Something was happening to me without my direction or summons.
I don't know which direction the wind came from, or where it blew, but it passed through me, invisible and scentless, only apprehended by the dust it stirred.
Genesis 8:1 is the first usage of the word that we translate into "wind."
But the first reference to wind is in the second verse of the entire Bible.
"The earth was without form and void and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters."
In the previous verse, God who created the heavens and the earth is named Elohim.
In the second verse, we translate "Spirit of God" from the Hebrew "Ruach Elohim".
"Ruach" is one of those never-ending Hebrew gifts.
The most physical definition is simply "wind", but it also means "breath" and, most arrestingly, the "function or expression", elsewhere "personality trait" of a rational being.
It is in the second verse of the Bible that God has a thought. And the hateful placidity of the formless deep shivers in response. "Nothing" births something.
The Cause affects.
A dream is dreamed within a dream.
In Job 1:19, the wind takes it's form as "blast" or "tempest" and moves upon the house of the children of Job, collapsing the walls and killing them all.
At the end of Job, the sufferer's questions and agony and anger are engulfed and overwhelmed by the voice of God from out of the tempest.
In Mark 39, God held his breath and the Lake of Tiberius was calmed.
David almost certainly heard the wind in the poplars as the sound of marching and went to battle with the Philistines.
Elijah endured the wind that shattered stones and withered the gourd and was finally taken up by it.
In Acts, Ruach Elohim swept through a gathering of the longing faithful and came to live with us.
I was born in Oklahoma, where the wind never stops sweeping down the lane, dehydrating in the summer and relentless in the winter and where I attended a campmeeting where the evangelist recounted the testimony of an equatorial convert upon reaching God at last, "It's like a cool breeze down in my soul.", a metaphor that strikes me randomly on a humid summer day when a breeze falls from the icy heavens and soothes my fever and prickles my skin.
"The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear it's sound, but you do not know where it came from or where it is going."
Next time you feel a bitter gale, a driving rain, a hot blast or a cool breeze, remember.
Thursday, January 24, 2019
Sunday, May 20, 2018
Conscientious Rebel
I have been in revolt my entire life.
Roughly the first half I spent in rebellion against God. The second half has been a more careful insurrection, against anything I perceive as being wrong, particularly if that wrong is widely accepted and/or taught.
As a child and then as a teenager I was extremely conscientious, even fearful. I was afraid to do anything that in my limited understanding might even possibly be wrong. I walked the line, not out of a desire to do good, but out of mortal dread of the consequences of doing anything wrong. This is not to say that I never did anything that I thought was wrong, but they were "lesser," secret sins. Contrary to Martin Luther's admonition to sin boldly, I sinned timidly, and asked for forgiveness not at all, only occasionally sought a guarantee that I wasn't doing anything that would send me to hell. And while fear of consequences may bring many who lack understanding to a point of reckoning, it is no substitute for forgiveness and living gratefully.
When I was converted, I was scuttled in a bottomless grace; grateful, euphoric and eager to show my love for my Savior.
After a time however, the fearful part of my phsyche reinflated, displacing gratefulness with a cold legalism and I shot back to the surface where lashed a storm that still has not abated.
If a fish is a person who lives on grace, I am a dolphin.
I can only remain submerged in grace for so long until my mammalian lungs burn with the need for the oxygen of real world, merit based reassurance.
I have often joked that the teenage rebellion against the establishment that so many people engage in was also mine to experience, just delayed a couple of decades.
But my rebellion is driven by my conscientiousness. It's not that I look for every opportunity to be set apart, it's that so much of the time, the crowd, the establishment, the status quo is wrong. And it is not sheer coincidence. If an idea or practice is widely accepted, it is often because it holds within it an insidious element that appeals to fallen human nature. In addition to that inherent virus, popularity itself has a corrupting influence. There is a dangerous unity in the pulse of the mob. Even good propositions, such as the Church, can be become unrecognizable powers for evil when left unquestioned.
There is also a deep personality trait that spurs my rebellion.
I don't remember the exact age, but somewhere around 8 years old, I made a self discovery. I was conversing with someone who has also been lost to memory, and was suddenly struck by a realization that I often said yes, nodded or otherwise offered affirmation or at least acceptance of things said with which I did not necessarily agree. It seemed lazy, and weak.
Why am I pressured to go with the flow and, more importantly, why do I give in to the pressure?
It's perhaps an unusual thought for an eight year old, but it was and is an integral part of me: the guilt of doing things the easy way. Even at that age, my conscience was overactive, and in charge. Then, as now, I've little doubt that I overcompensated for that perceived weakness. In fact, only a few short weeks later, as I recall, someone asked me why I always had to challenge everything that was said. I have since learned to choose my battles more discriminately, but I am still driven to challenge everything, driven by my conscience to be a rebel.
My Dad, who was also crucially involved in my spiritual development, was influential to my own development of independence. I distinctly remember him recounting a conversation with my Mom, who told him that while she could not say that he was always right, she could definitely say that his thoughts and conclusions were always his own. I took that to heart, particularly since it reinforced my own determination not to be a follower, as difficult as it might be.
And then, as if I needed encouragement, I began reading after Kierkegaard, and was electrified by the following:
"Moreover living as the individual is thought to be the easiest thing of all, and it is the universal that people must be coerced into becoming.
I can share neither this fear nor this opinion, and for the same reason.
No person who has learned that to exist as the individual is the most terrifying thing of all will be afraid of saying it is the greatest."
There is always a danger with being your own man. The danger lies not in a greater likelihood of going wrong than if you were in larger company, but in becoming arrogant. And, while my recalcitrance is a matter of conscience, I cannot deny that I sometimes find a perverse pleasure in being THAT guy. In moderation, it's harmless gratification, but it always bears watching.
Roughly the first half I spent in rebellion against God. The second half has been a more careful insurrection, against anything I perceive as being wrong, particularly if that wrong is widely accepted and/or taught.
As a child and then as a teenager I was extremely conscientious, even fearful. I was afraid to do anything that in my limited understanding might even possibly be wrong. I walked the line, not out of a desire to do good, but out of mortal dread of the consequences of doing anything wrong. This is not to say that I never did anything that I thought was wrong, but they were "lesser," secret sins. Contrary to Martin Luther's admonition to sin boldly, I sinned timidly, and asked for forgiveness not at all, only occasionally sought a guarantee that I wasn't doing anything that would send me to hell. And while fear of consequences may bring many who lack understanding to a point of reckoning, it is no substitute for forgiveness and living gratefully.
When I was converted, I was scuttled in a bottomless grace; grateful, euphoric and eager to show my love for my Savior.
After a time however, the fearful part of my phsyche reinflated, displacing gratefulness with a cold legalism and I shot back to the surface where lashed a storm that still has not abated.
If a fish is a person who lives on grace, I am a dolphin.
I can only remain submerged in grace for so long until my mammalian lungs burn with the need for the oxygen of real world, merit based reassurance.
I have often joked that the teenage rebellion against the establishment that so many people engage in was also mine to experience, just delayed a couple of decades.
But my rebellion is driven by my conscientiousness. It's not that I look for every opportunity to be set apart, it's that so much of the time, the crowd, the establishment, the status quo is wrong. And it is not sheer coincidence. If an idea or practice is widely accepted, it is often because it holds within it an insidious element that appeals to fallen human nature. In addition to that inherent virus, popularity itself has a corrupting influence. There is a dangerous unity in the pulse of the mob. Even good propositions, such as the Church, can be become unrecognizable powers for evil when left unquestioned.
There is also a deep personality trait that spurs my rebellion.
I don't remember the exact age, but somewhere around 8 years old, I made a self discovery. I was conversing with someone who has also been lost to memory, and was suddenly struck by a realization that I often said yes, nodded or otherwise offered affirmation or at least acceptance of things said with which I did not necessarily agree. It seemed lazy, and weak.
Why am I pressured to go with the flow and, more importantly, why do I give in to the pressure?
It's perhaps an unusual thought for an eight year old, but it was and is an integral part of me: the guilt of doing things the easy way. Even at that age, my conscience was overactive, and in charge. Then, as now, I've little doubt that I overcompensated for that perceived weakness. In fact, only a few short weeks later, as I recall, someone asked me why I always had to challenge everything that was said. I have since learned to choose my battles more discriminately, but I am still driven to challenge everything, driven by my conscience to be a rebel.
My Dad, who was also crucially involved in my spiritual development, was influential to my own development of independence. I distinctly remember him recounting a conversation with my Mom, who told him that while she could not say that he was always right, she could definitely say that his thoughts and conclusions were always his own. I took that to heart, particularly since it reinforced my own determination not to be a follower, as difficult as it might be.
And then, as if I needed encouragement, I began reading after Kierkegaard, and was electrified by the following:
"Moreover living as the individual is thought to be the easiest thing of all, and it is the universal that people must be coerced into becoming.
I can share neither this fear nor this opinion, and for the same reason.
No person who has learned that to exist as the individual is the most terrifying thing of all will be afraid of saying it is the greatest."
There is always a danger with being your own man. The danger lies not in a greater likelihood of going wrong than if you were in larger company, but in becoming arrogant. And, while my recalcitrance is a matter of conscience, I cannot deny that I sometimes find a perverse pleasure in being THAT guy. In moderation, it's harmless gratification, but it always bears watching.
Monday, April 2, 2018
What Is That To Thee?
Raise your hand if you saw conservatives react to the recent student walkout in protest of mass shootings and in support of gun control by urging us to focus more on the root causes of these tragedies, specifically bullying.
If you're anything like me, your initial reaction was agreement, then mild surprise since the last you might have heard from this particular person on the subject of bullying was that kids these days were just too soft.
There seems to be a pattern in the culture war these days.
Whatever we might call the opposite of the Left, (the Right, conservatism, etc) it is almost obviously being led around by the nose by the Left.
The Left makes a move, the Right reacts.
One of the most jarring examples of this is the overall loyal opposition's response to the many character issues with President Trump; for example, the Stormy Daniels story. Many, conservative, even right wing evangelical responses could almost have been plagiarized word for word from good old southern Democrats defense of Bill Clinton's character issues, with "media" standing in for "right wing" in the phrase "vast right wing conspiracy."
(In fairness, there were those who supported Bill Clinton, considered his infidelity insignificant, who now feel the same about Trump. They seem to feel that character is not something to be considered in a political leader, and they definitely have a point. To expect integrity from power brokers is foolish, but my argument here is with the overwhelming remainder of the population which seems to at least pretend that their chosen champions are not high paid thugs.)
But there is a much larger group who felt deeply that Bill Clinton's liberalism was an assault on traditional American values and that his loose moral character was proof of that assault, who now either completely dismiss the scandal swirling around Trump as a pack of lies, or, more likely, simply see it as insignificant in the big picture.
At any rate, they certainly do not see Trump's character as proof of an assault on traditional values. Many of the same people who cheered the impeachment of President Clinton as a a fit reprimand for his behavior now have apparently no qualms saying that they will continue to stand behind president Trump 100% regardless of his dalliances.
Is this just fighting fire with fire, tit-for-tat, or is the Right being led slowly, unconsciously but surely down the path of moral relativism by the Left?
Another possible example is the Right's subconscious acceptance of the blurring of the gender roles lines. The result of part of the radical feminist agenda that ostensibly wanted to equalize the sexes was to actually lower women to the point that it was perfectly acceptable for a woman to get down in the dirt and mix it up with the boys. While the Right is still more or less insistent that gender is binary and distinct, they seem to have quite willingly accepted that part of the feminist agenda that allows them to fight women the same way they fight men.
Someone may protest that this is some political fragment of the Socratic method, trying to point out hypocrisy or inconsistency, as one conservative mouthpiece used to delight in "illustrating absurdity by being absurd." (And, yes, there is hypocrisy, inconsistency and absurdity in spades on the Left.)
Or perhaps they may even consider it strategic, using the useful parts of the Left's agenda against them.
Still someone else will doubtless say that women have become just as coarse as men and so we must deal with them accordingly. I won't argue that. I will simply point out that they have in fact capitulated on what used to be a key point of traditional values, the ideal of gentlemen placing women on a pedestal (whether or not individual women were actually treated as such.)
In fact, much of the conservative and libertarian single male response to the #metoo movement was downright bitter towards women in general, indicating that a significant portion of the non-left male population is quite willing to accept the reality of a gender war.
The pattern that emerges is one of nothing but reaction.
It is an inherent weakness of conservatism: that of being forced to continually play defense. After all, the aim is to "conserve." When we are relegated to trying to preserve a culture that we feel was better, the wagons will always be in a circle.
While conservatives may recognize that not everything was perfect back in the good ol days, most of them just wonder why things just can't be like they used to be.
But whether or not things were overall better back when, it must be acknowledged that time will never stand still. It carries on ceaselessly and carries society, and culture, along with it.
What to make of this?
The problem is not a new one.
It's one of the fear that "they" will win, while not being certain of what is at stake, and not even certain of who they are, since we have certainly lost track of who we are.
It's one of trends and fighting trends.
It's one of missing the trees for the forest.
It's one of fear at the loss of identity overwhelming the virtue that ever made that identity valuable.
It's one of being too concerned with things out of your control, and making deals with devils you think CAN control things, or at least limit the damage to things until such time as they relinquish control back to you, back to us, the rightful overseers of culture.
My solution to this problem of losing track of what we are fighting for will come as a surprise to practically no one.
Stop worrying about "we" and "they."
Your concern over the culture has almost certainly distracted you from your greatest concern: yourself and your relationship with the truth.
We tell ourselves every vote counts, but don't seem to realize that our individual adherence to the highest standard we can attain will go a lot farther in preserving what we treasure.
And don't concern yourself when "they" fight dirty, because...
"If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:......
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son!"
Rudyard Kipling
If you're anything like me, your initial reaction was agreement, then mild surprise since the last you might have heard from this particular person on the subject of bullying was that kids these days were just too soft.
There seems to be a pattern in the culture war these days.
Whatever we might call the opposite of the Left, (the Right, conservatism, etc) it is almost obviously being led around by the nose by the Left.
The Left makes a move, the Right reacts.
One of the most jarring examples of this is the overall loyal opposition's response to the many character issues with President Trump; for example, the Stormy Daniels story. Many, conservative, even right wing evangelical responses could almost have been plagiarized word for word from good old southern Democrats defense of Bill Clinton's character issues, with "media" standing in for "right wing" in the phrase "vast right wing conspiracy."
(In fairness, there were those who supported Bill Clinton, considered his infidelity insignificant, who now feel the same about Trump. They seem to feel that character is not something to be considered in a political leader, and they definitely have a point. To expect integrity from power brokers is foolish, but my argument here is with the overwhelming remainder of the population which seems to at least pretend that their chosen champions are not high paid thugs.)
But there is a much larger group who felt deeply that Bill Clinton's liberalism was an assault on traditional American values and that his loose moral character was proof of that assault, who now either completely dismiss the scandal swirling around Trump as a pack of lies, or, more likely, simply see it as insignificant in the big picture.
At any rate, they certainly do not see Trump's character as proof of an assault on traditional values. Many of the same people who cheered the impeachment of President Clinton as a a fit reprimand for his behavior now have apparently no qualms saying that they will continue to stand behind president Trump 100% regardless of his dalliances.
Is this just fighting fire with fire, tit-for-tat, or is the Right being led slowly, unconsciously but surely down the path of moral relativism by the Left?
Another possible example is the Right's subconscious acceptance of the blurring of the gender roles lines. The result of part of the radical feminist agenda that ostensibly wanted to equalize the sexes was to actually lower women to the point that it was perfectly acceptable for a woman to get down in the dirt and mix it up with the boys. While the Right is still more or less insistent that gender is binary and distinct, they seem to have quite willingly accepted that part of the feminist agenda that allows them to fight women the same way they fight men.
Someone may protest that this is some political fragment of the Socratic method, trying to point out hypocrisy or inconsistency, as one conservative mouthpiece used to delight in "illustrating absurdity by being absurd." (And, yes, there is hypocrisy, inconsistency and absurdity in spades on the Left.)
Or perhaps they may even consider it strategic, using the useful parts of the Left's agenda against them.
Still someone else will doubtless say that women have become just as coarse as men and so we must deal with them accordingly. I won't argue that. I will simply point out that they have in fact capitulated on what used to be a key point of traditional values, the ideal of gentlemen placing women on a pedestal (whether or not individual women were actually treated as such.)
In fact, much of the conservative and libertarian single male response to the #metoo movement was downright bitter towards women in general, indicating that a significant portion of the non-left male population is quite willing to accept the reality of a gender war.
The pattern that emerges is one of nothing but reaction.
It is an inherent weakness of conservatism: that of being forced to continually play defense. After all, the aim is to "conserve." When we are relegated to trying to preserve a culture that we feel was better, the wagons will always be in a circle.
While conservatives may recognize that not everything was perfect back in the good ol days, most of them just wonder why things just can't be like they used to be.
But whether or not things were overall better back when, it must be acknowledged that time will never stand still. It carries on ceaselessly and carries society, and culture, along with it.
What to make of this?
The problem is not a new one.
It's one of the fear that "they" will win, while not being certain of what is at stake, and not even certain of who they are, since we have certainly lost track of who we are.
It's one of trends and fighting trends.
It's one of missing the trees for the forest.
It's one of fear at the loss of identity overwhelming the virtue that ever made that identity valuable.
It's one of being too concerned with things out of your control, and making deals with devils you think CAN control things, or at least limit the damage to things until such time as they relinquish control back to you, back to us, the rightful overseers of culture.
My solution to this problem of losing track of what we are fighting for will come as a surprise to practically no one.
Stop worrying about "we" and "they."
Your concern over the culture has almost certainly distracted you from your greatest concern: yourself and your relationship with the truth.
We tell ourselves every vote counts, but don't seem to realize that our individual adherence to the highest standard we can attain will go a lot farther in preserving what we treasure.
And don't concern yourself when "they" fight dirty, because...
"If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:......
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son!"
Rudyard Kipling
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
The Individual Christian
"Christendom has done away with Christianity without being quite aware of it."
-Soren Kierkegaard.
Christianity is harmed by the incessant attempts to yolk it with "us, them, we" or any personal pronoun other than "I".
It invariably leads not to closer brotherhood among believers, but to sectarianism, pride and judgment.
As an individual, a Christian is more likely than most to be humble, peaceful and understanding.
As a collective, or as a demographic, we can tend to be proud (of our Christianity), hostile (to anyone or thing perceived to be hostile to us as Christians) and judgmental (to anyone who does not hold our values).
As the individual Christian, we have a better sense of who we are in relation to world, and to God himself.
As "Christendom", we tend to find safety in numbers, establish insular subcultures, and hide behind our own theologians and teachers.
Christians lose something of the peculiar shame of the Cross when Christianity becomes accepted, respectable, a movement or even, God forbid, official.
We become quite at home in the world, and even begin to claim portions of it as our own. And become quite defensive and even combative when we feel that holy ground is being invaded.
-Soren Kierkegaard.
Christianity is harmed by the incessant attempts to yolk it with "us, them, we" or any personal pronoun other than "I".
It invariably leads not to closer brotherhood among believers, but to sectarianism, pride and judgment.
As an individual, a Christian is more likely than most to be humble, peaceful and understanding.
As a collective, or as a demographic, we can tend to be proud (of our Christianity), hostile (to anyone or thing perceived to be hostile to us as Christians) and judgmental (to anyone who does not hold our values).
As the individual Christian, we have a better sense of who we are in relation to world, and to God himself.
As "Christendom", we tend to find safety in numbers, establish insular subcultures, and hide behind our own theologians and teachers.
Christians lose something of the peculiar shame of the Cross when Christianity becomes accepted, respectable, a movement or even, God forbid, official.
We become quite at home in the world, and even begin to claim portions of it as our own. And become quite defensive and even combative when we feel that holy ground is being invaded.
Tuesday, October 24, 2017
Boredom is perhaps the environment of hell.
It is similar to Chaos, because it is the state of an unfocused mind.
It is the inverse of the excitement of countless possibilities. It is the despairing certainty that every one of those potentialities will end in disappointment.
Every child has known the horror of boredom, as well as they have known the exasperation of an adult who scolds them for being ungrateful, as any adult would be profess to be profoundly grateful for a moment's peace in which boredom might be a welcome change to busyness.
This is hogwash on the part of the adult; partly because busyness is the unconsciously agreed upon crowning virtue of adulthood and would never be so easily traded for a mess of potted boredom, and partly because even in an adult's "leisure" time, he would be terrified to encounter boredom as he did as a child: that ennui, that dissatisfaction with all things and no remedy for it, not entertainment, nor opiate, nor sleep, nor sex, nor any other stimulation that a grown-up engages in when his mind has reached the end of that ultimate high, the Validation of Work.
Boredom is not quite merely the absence of stimulation, it is a tangible thing: a paralyzing banality that leaves a mind stricken and sometimes in search of renewal in the strangeness of the new and unfamiliar and even unappealing.
If we were created with purpose, there can be few pains equitable to purposelessness.
A child avoids this void in any number of ways, almost all of which are more honest than the ways adults avoid it. The dishonesty of adults in their frantic attempts to escape from boredom is motivated by guilt. An aimless child may be scolded, but an aimless adult is judged, and pitied.
Equating boredom with damnation may seem hyperbolic, but only if you have forgotten what boredom is, and think of it as free time when no one expects anything of you.
It is the opposite of freedom.
It is the state of mind so bereft of the excitement of possibility that it imprisons itself. And self imprisonment is the most hopeless of all jails.
Kierkegaard said Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom, thus pointing out the silver lining back of the cloud of the Unknown.
The bleakness of Boredom's cloud is the certainty that a distant star has exploded somewhere in the universe that will at last drag every ounce of meaning across it's event horizon.
It is similar to Chaos, because it is the state of an unfocused mind.
It is the inverse of the excitement of countless possibilities. It is the despairing certainty that every one of those potentialities will end in disappointment.
Every child has known the horror of boredom, as well as they have known the exasperation of an adult who scolds them for being ungrateful, as any adult would be profess to be profoundly grateful for a moment's peace in which boredom might be a welcome change to busyness.
This is hogwash on the part of the adult; partly because busyness is the unconsciously agreed upon crowning virtue of adulthood and would never be so easily traded for a mess of potted boredom, and partly because even in an adult's "leisure" time, he would be terrified to encounter boredom as he did as a child: that ennui, that dissatisfaction with all things and no remedy for it, not entertainment, nor opiate, nor sleep, nor sex, nor any other stimulation that a grown-up engages in when his mind has reached the end of that ultimate high, the Validation of Work.
Boredom is not quite merely the absence of stimulation, it is a tangible thing: a paralyzing banality that leaves a mind stricken and sometimes in search of renewal in the strangeness of the new and unfamiliar and even unappealing.
If we were created with purpose, there can be few pains equitable to purposelessness.
A child avoids this void in any number of ways, almost all of which are more honest than the ways adults avoid it. The dishonesty of adults in their frantic attempts to escape from boredom is motivated by guilt. An aimless child may be scolded, but an aimless adult is judged, and pitied.
Equating boredom with damnation may seem hyperbolic, but only if you have forgotten what boredom is, and think of it as free time when no one expects anything of you.
It is the opposite of freedom.
It is the state of mind so bereft of the excitement of possibility that it imprisons itself. And self imprisonment is the most hopeless of all jails.
Kierkegaard said Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom, thus pointing out the silver lining back of the cloud of the Unknown.
The bleakness of Boredom's cloud is the certainty that a distant star has exploded somewhere in the universe that will at last drag every ounce of meaning across it's event horizon.
Sunday, August 27, 2017
Greatest Fear
Like the white tail of a fleeing doe is caught in the corner of a headlight beam, there is a fear, at odd intervals, that crosses my mind, almost gone before I recognize it.
"What if I, in spite of everything and of all people, should become an atheist?"
It's an old dread, the Fear of No God, the Realization of Nothing, that first stole over me in a Christian bookstore at the age of 17.
I had recently come to know God, important to note since prior to that introduction, my greatest fear was that He DID exist.
I must be unwittingly bound to consider the worst. In everyday matters, I rarely deal in worst case scenarios, because that extreme perpetually beats on the walls of my lowest mental dungeon. Consciously, it's warden makes no admission of those muted howls.
But the fear of nothing had it's humble beginnings in my earliest remembered nightmares, which featured exceedingly common sights, such as the the fabric of my blanket, in sudden and inexplicable dream like fashion, growing very, very large. Awakened by my own screams, I could never explain why non threatening, inanimate objects became sinister when enlarged. It was much later when I realized that it was not the size of the objects, but it's implication to MY size. Which was, obviously, that I was really very small and growing smaller (as in the dream I always was frightened awake while the thing was yet growing) and, if left alone, I would surely fade at last into nothing.
In Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, the protagonist, Gabriel Syme, faces a similar fear when meeting Sunday, a God type.
"The form it took was a childish and yet hateful fancy. As he walked across the inner room towards the balcony, the large face of Sunday grew larger and larger; and Syme was gripped with a fear that when he was quite close the face would be too big to be possible, and that he would scream aloud. He remembered that as a child he would not look at the mask of Memnon in the British Museum, because it was a face, and so large."
The fear of a man who does not know God is that God's greatness will diminish himself and that the self opposed to God will never cease shrinking.
My young nightmares are troubling because I was so young and still under the protection of Adamic innocence. Syme was a grown man and thus seemingly responsible for his unfamiliarity with God. But Syme was also a fictional character, representative of the yet innocently ignorant child: a child under God's protection is not the same as one who has eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and been bought back.
But with the fear of diminution, of irrelevance, there is something in common with the choice not to believe in something greater than the self.
Nietzsche speaks: "God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looks. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives; who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves?"
Nietzsche was as terrifyingly honest as an atheist may be, grappling with the stygian fear of causeless effect, of meaningless existence. Yet, as honest as an atheist may be, he still does not recognize how deep the abyss is that stares into his soul, for though he says that "Hope, in reality, is the greatest of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.", he also insists that although "To live is to suffer," still, "to survive is to find meaning in the suffering."
Hope, then, is evil because it is false and yet meaning is still attainable. Such a titanically irreconcilable statement is understandable when you begin to understand that there is no such creature as a living nihilist. True nihilists are far more rare than Scotsmen of the same fidelity, for all true nihilists are dead, and by their own hand.
It is my personal belief that your greatest fear must stand as the gainsaying of your chosen purpose. Therefore, I believe that nihilists must somehow find comfort in utter meaninglessness, and be really terrified by meaning and purpose.
Now that I know God, and am found in Him, the fear that He does not exist is also the fear that the self I surrendered to Him will also cease to exist. In that fearful fancy, some dim and distant star is imploded which will quickly drag every ounce of meaning across it's event horizon.
C.S. Lewis imagined that Hell is a very confined space. In The Great Divorce, an inhabitant of Heaven explains the geography of Hell. "All Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this world, the Real World."
As small as it is, it continues to shrink; a very intuitive speculation, corresponding conversely with Hubble's Law. Listen to the visitor from Hell's objection and the citizen of Heaven's response
"It seems large enough when you are in it, sir."
"And yet all loneliness, angers, hatreds, envies, and itchings that it contains, if rolled into one single experience and put into the scale against the least moment of the joy that is felt by the least in Heaven, would have no weight that could be registered at all. Bad cannot succeed even in being bad as truly as good is good. If all Hell's miseries together entered the consciousness of yon wee yellow bird on the bough there, they would be swallowed up without trace, as if one drop of ink had been dropped into that Great Ocean to which your terrestrial Pacific is only a molecule'"
Consider then the horror of being trapped in oneself, in one's Hell, the fate of continuing to shrink, but never to cease.
That is the fear that I face, that love has not yet cast out.
Logically, if God does not exist, the fear of Hell should disappear along with it. And yet, the fear persists.
Cessation, I fear, is the greatest myth of them all.
"He had turned his eyes so as to see suddenly the great face of Sunday, which wore a strange smile. "Have you," he cried in a dreadful voice, "have you ever suffered?" As he gazed, the great face grew to an awful size, grew larger than the colossal mask of Memnon, which had made him scream as a child. It grew larger and larger, filling the whole sky; then everything went black. Only in the blackness it entirely destroyed his brain he seemed to hear a distant voice saying a commonplace text that he had heard somewhere, "Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?"
"What if I, in spite of everything and of all people, should become an atheist?"
It's an old dread, the Fear of No God, the Realization of Nothing, that first stole over me in a Christian bookstore at the age of 17.
I had recently come to know God, important to note since prior to that introduction, my greatest fear was that He DID exist.
I must be unwittingly bound to consider the worst. In everyday matters, I rarely deal in worst case scenarios, because that extreme perpetually beats on the walls of my lowest mental dungeon. Consciously, it's warden makes no admission of those muted howls.
But the fear of nothing had it's humble beginnings in my earliest remembered nightmares, which featured exceedingly common sights, such as the the fabric of my blanket, in sudden and inexplicable dream like fashion, growing very, very large. Awakened by my own screams, I could never explain why non threatening, inanimate objects became sinister when enlarged. It was much later when I realized that it was not the size of the objects, but it's implication to MY size. Which was, obviously, that I was really very small and growing smaller (as in the dream I always was frightened awake while the thing was yet growing) and, if left alone, I would surely fade at last into nothing.
In Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, the protagonist, Gabriel Syme, faces a similar fear when meeting Sunday, a God type.
"The form it took was a childish and yet hateful fancy. As he walked across the inner room towards the balcony, the large face of Sunday grew larger and larger; and Syme was gripped with a fear that when he was quite close the face would be too big to be possible, and that he would scream aloud. He remembered that as a child he would not look at the mask of Memnon in the British Museum, because it was a face, and so large."
The fear of a man who does not know God is that God's greatness will diminish himself and that the self opposed to God will never cease shrinking.
My young nightmares are troubling because I was so young and still under the protection of Adamic innocence. Syme was a grown man and thus seemingly responsible for his unfamiliarity with God. But Syme was also a fictional character, representative of the yet innocently ignorant child: a child under God's protection is not the same as one who has eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and been bought back.
But with the fear of diminution, of irrelevance, there is something in common with the choice not to believe in something greater than the self.
Nietzsche speaks: "God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looks. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives; who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves?"
Nietzsche was as terrifyingly honest as an atheist may be, grappling with the stygian fear of causeless effect, of meaningless existence. Yet, as honest as an atheist may be, he still does not recognize how deep the abyss is that stares into his soul, for though he says that "Hope, in reality, is the greatest of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.", he also insists that although "To live is to suffer," still, "to survive is to find meaning in the suffering."
Hope, then, is evil because it is false and yet meaning is still attainable. Such a titanically irreconcilable statement is understandable when you begin to understand that there is no such creature as a living nihilist. True nihilists are far more rare than Scotsmen of the same fidelity, for all true nihilists are dead, and by their own hand.
It is my personal belief that your greatest fear must stand as the gainsaying of your chosen purpose. Therefore, I believe that nihilists must somehow find comfort in utter meaninglessness, and be really terrified by meaning and purpose.
Now that I know God, and am found in Him, the fear that He does not exist is also the fear that the self I surrendered to Him will also cease to exist. In that fearful fancy, some dim and distant star is imploded which will quickly drag every ounce of meaning across it's event horizon.
C.S. Lewis imagined that Hell is a very confined space. In The Great Divorce, an inhabitant of Heaven explains the geography of Hell. "All Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this world, the Real World."
As small as it is, it continues to shrink; a very intuitive speculation, corresponding conversely with Hubble's Law. Listen to the visitor from Hell's objection and the citizen of Heaven's response
"It seems large enough when you are in it, sir."
"And yet all loneliness, angers, hatreds, envies, and itchings that it contains, if rolled into one single experience and put into the scale against the least moment of the joy that is felt by the least in Heaven, would have no weight that could be registered at all. Bad cannot succeed even in being bad as truly as good is good. If all Hell's miseries together entered the consciousness of yon wee yellow bird on the bough there, they would be swallowed up without trace, as if one drop of ink had been dropped into that Great Ocean to which your terrestrial Pacific is only a molecule'"
Consider then the horror of being trapped in oneself, in one's Hell, the fate of continuing to shrink, but never to cease.
That is the fear that I face, that love has not yet cast out.
Logically, if God does not exist, the fear of Hell should disappear along with it. And yet, the fear persists.
Cessation, I fear, is the greatest myth of them all.
"He had turned his eyes so as to see suddenly the great face of Sunday, which wore a strange smile. "Have you," he cried in a dreadful voice, "have you ever suffered?" As he gazed, the great face grew to an awful size, grew larger than the colossal mask of Memnon, which had made him scream as a child. It grew larger and larger, filling the whole sky; then everything went black. Only in the blackness it entirely destroyed his brain he seemed to hear a distant voice saying a commonplace text that he had heard somewhere, "Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?"
Thursday, May 25, 2017
A Plain Account Of Myself
The Christian heroism (and perhaps it is rarely to be seen) is to venture wholly to be oneself, as an individual man, this definite individual man, alone before the face of God, alone in this tremendous exertion and this tremendous responsibility...
Soren Kierkegaard
Preface to Sickness Unto Death
A good part of my contemplative beard stroking has had to do with the objectivity of truth. In an age where the sides in moral disputes are often picked according to one's political affiliations and favorite decades, the lines drawn up hard based upon whether you prefer the 1950's (or any era prior to that) or the dizzying contemporaneity of the last second, it seems that so much of what we say we believe is either rooted merely in the discomfort with change or the impatience with inertia.
Conservatism being more often the champion of what is supposed to be Christian values (indeed, the two designations have become almost an inseperable demographical duo), it has leaned hard on the objectivity of truth; as have I.
It has been and is still important to me to have a fixed point of reference, without which one must wander with the predictable aimlessness of a snowflake in search of the ground on a very windy day.
With it, one may, probably will, still wander but at least knows it came from above and is headed for below.
I have often taken issue with American christian conservatism, partly for being intractable, nationalistic, xenophobic, authoritarian and partly for being too much like the moral relativists they claim to oppose, especially when justification is needed for a compromise.
But as it is presumed that I as a Christian must hold more in common with conservatism than liberalism, in the popularly slightly erroneous definition of the terms, I accept that presumption for a jumping off point.
There is such a thing as absolute truth that is objectively true. God, in fact, stands as the Absolute Objective Truth. God has many attributes, but all of them are shot completely through with a truth that ultimately cannot be adjusted, not to say that it will be completely attained. In fact, it won't, thus the scriptural apologetic His ways are past our finding out.
In hoisting the banner of objective truth, it may be supposed that I would find subjective truth to be the gospel of the Adversary. What is supposed, however, is not completely accurate.
I have referred to a fixed point of reference.
The importance of this monolith is found not only in the fact that it doesn't move, but also in the fact that due to its immobility, by it we know where we are. I may be on one side, you on the other, coloring our perception of course, but more importantly for my purposes here, casting each one of us in a unique relationship to it.
I have also referred to snowflakes. Quite apart from the current perjorative sense in which it's generally meant, I would like to take from this comparison the one-in-an-existence distinction that snowflakes enjoy.
Every last one is distinctive, bearing the signature of divine design.
As do we.
Bearing these distinctions in mind should make us appreciate the unique position in which every one of us stands in relation to the absolute.
There are several aphorisms that apply: Be your own man, Think for yourself, Don't be a follower.
My aim in life is this: To take all responsibility for myself upon myself.
No Christian would dispute that at the final Judgement, there will be no one to advocate for you before God, unless of course, you have chosen to be represented by Christ, which will entail holding nothing back from your Lawyer. In exchange for His representation, He asks that you stand in integrity before Him, so that He may plead your case unabashed to His Father.
You must give an account of yourself.
To do so, you must shoulder an enormous responsibility.
Think and believe for yourself, recognizing what a grave concern it is, while recognizing that not thinking and believing for yourself is a sin.
Here is where I begin to differ from conservatism. It's in the term itself. Taken literally, it is to "conserve" what is reckoned to be good and beneficial to society. The "good and the beneficial" is often, almost always, in fact, embedded in tradition, in creeds, and in the wisdom inherited from the previous generations.
But, the problem anyone faces when conserving is the problem of stagnation and rot. Wisdom can't really be inherited. Wisdom is subject to a 90+% inheritance tax. It does not transfer from parent to child. Customs, ideals and traditions are tax free and even times accrue interest.
Wisdom is manna from Heaven, and we all remember what happened when proactive Israelites tried to conserve leftovers.
There is also a sense in which conservation can contribute to the laziness and irresponsibility of consecutive generations. There is a good comparison to be drawn here between trust fund babies and second, third, fourth and so on generations of a movement. A loving parent will have to fight the temptation to cushion the life of the child. A loving parent knows that wisdom is self-activated. Telling your progeny to do this, and not do that, to avoid mistakes and heartache is as natural, and helpful as a passenger who knows where the destination is telling the driver what turns to make. It will get you there once, but if the driver has not driven it himself, looking for landmarks and orientating himself, he will likely never find it again.
Much has been said by more learned and familiar men than I about Rene Descartes, with some vanguards of Western Christianity even declaring that the delicate philosopher introduced a virus into that institution.
But there is a courage in what he did that I can't help but admire. He burned down the suppositional structure of epistemology and sifted through the ashes until he found the indestructible grain of existence.
A man must have belief, before all.
Belief in something precedes all logic, as a foundation underlies a structure.
That belief itself must be personally attained and attested.
How easy it would be, even under the most severe and technically legalistic system, to lay the responsibilities for oneself upon another. Slavery is a comfort to those who fear anxiety as the dizziness of freedom, to paraphrase Kierkegaard.
Freedom is euphoria only if a man chooses to be free. If a man is lazy, freedom is a burden far more ponderous than chains.
"Free thinking" has often been derided as irresponsible and gratuitous. It has been maligned as a way for a heretic or a fool to justify his heresy or his foolishness. And, it often is.
But truth shows her paradoxical colors here, as in all things worthwhile. "Free thinking" can be a way astray, but it is the ONLY way to the Truth.
Soren Kierkegaard
Preface to Sickness Unto Death
A good part of my contemplative beard stroking has had to do with the objectivity of truth. In an age where the sides in moral disputes are often picked according to one's political affiliations and favorite decades, the lines drawn up hard based upon whether you prefer the 1950's (or any era prior to that) or the dizzying contemporaneity of the last second, it seems that so much of what we say we believe is either rooted merely in the discomfort with change or the impatience with inertia.
Conservatism being more often the champion of what is supposed to be Christian values (indeed, the two designations have become almost an inseperable demographical duo), it has leaned hard on the objectivity of truth; as have I.
It has been and is still important to me to have a fixed point of reference, without which one must wander with the predictable aimlessness of a snowflake in search of the ground on a very windy day.
With it, one may, probably will, still wander but at least knows it came from above and is headed for below.
I have often taken issue with American christian conservatism, partly for being intractable, nationalistic, xenophobic, authoritarian and partly for being too much like the moral relativists they claim to oppose, especially when justification is needed for a compromise.
But as it is presumed that I as a Christian must hold more in common with conservatism than liberalism, in the popularly slightly erroneous definition of the terms, I accept that presumption for a jumping off point.
There is such a thing as absolute truth that is objectively true. God, in fact, stands as the Absolute Objective Truth. God has many attributes, but all of them are shot completely through with a truth that ultimately cannot be adjusted, not to say that it will be completely attained. In fact, it won't, thus the scriptural apologetic His ways are past our finding out.
In hoisting the banner of objective truth, it may be supposed that I would find subjective truth to be the gospel of the Adversary. What is supposed, however, is not completely accurate.
I have referred to a fixed point of reference.
The importance of this monolith is found not only in the fact that it doesn't move, but also in the fact that due to its immobility, by it we know where we are. I may be on one side, you on the other, coloring our perception of course, but more importantly for my purposes here, casting each one of us in a unique relationship to it.
I have also referred to snowflakes. Quite apart from the current perjorative sense in which it's generally meant, I would like to take from this comparison the one-in-an-existence distinction that snowflakes enjoy.
Every last one is distinctive, bearing the signature of divine design.
As do we.
Bearing these distinctions in mind should make us appreciate the unique position in which every one of us stands in relation to the absolute.
There are several aphorisms that apply: Be your own man, Think for yourself, Don't be a follower.
My aim in life is this: To take all responsibility for myself upon myself.
No Christian would dispute that at the final Judgement, there will be no one to advocate for you before God, unless of course, you have chosen to be represented by Christ, which will entail holding nothing back from your Lawyer. In exchange for His representation, He asks that you stand in integrity before Him, so that He may plead your case unabashed to His Father.
You must give an account of yourself.
To do so, you must shoulder an enormous responsibility.
Think and believe for yourself, recognizing what a grave concern it is, while recognizing that not thinking and believing for yourself is a sin.
Here is where I begin to differ from conservatism. It's in the term itself. Taken literally, it is to "conserve" what is reckoned to be good and beneficial to society. The "good and the beneficial" is often, almost always, in fact, embedded in tradition, in creeds, and in the wisdom inherited from the previous generations.
But, the problem anyone faces when conserving is the problem of stagnation and rot. Wisdom can't really be inherited. Wisdom is subject to a 90+% inheritance tax. It does not transfer from parent to child. Customs, ideals and traditions are tax free and even times accrue interest.
Wisdom is manna from Heaven, and we all remember what happened when proactive Israelites tried to conserve leftovers.
There is also a sense in which conservation can contribute to the laziness and irresponsibility of consecutive generations. There is a good comparison to be drawn here between trust fund babies and second, third, fourth and so on generations of a movement. A loving parent will have to fight the temptation to cushion the life of the child. A loving parent knows that wisdom is self-activated. Telling your progeny to do this, and not do that, to avoid mistakes and heartache is as natural, and helpful as a passenger who knows where the destination is telling the driver what turns to make. It will get you there once, but if the driver has not driven it himself, looking for landmarks and orientating himself, he will likely never find it again.
Much has been said by more learned and familiar men than I about Rene Descartes, with some vanguards of Western Christianity even declaring that the delicate philosopher introduced a virus into that institution.
But there is a courage in what he did that I can't help but admire. He burned down the suppositional structure of epistemology and sifted through the ashes until he found the indestructible grain of existence.
A man must have belief, before all.
Belief in something precedes all logic, as a foundation underlies a structure.
That belief itself must be personally attained and attested.
How easy it would be, even under the most severe and technically legalistic system, to lay the responsibilities for oneself upon another. Slavery is a comfort to those who fear anxiety as the dizziness of freedom, to paraphrase Kierkegaard.
Freedom is euphoria only if a man chooses to be free. If a man is lazy, freedom is a burden far more ponderous than chains.
"Free thinking" has often been derided as irresponsible and gratuitous. It has been maligned as a way for a heretic or a fool to justify his heresy or his foolishness. And, it often is.
But truth shows her paradoxical colors here, as in all things worthwhile. "Free thinking" can be a way astray, but it is the ONLY way to the Truth.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)