Celebrating the Unsupportable

The Fourth of July became the occasion for Jay and Noelle Zmuda to call their friends from the four winds of heaven for a commemoration of their singular friendship at a lake side cabin in Sandpoint, Idaho. My eldest flew in from Manhattan ("The City" as he calls it) and my daughter flew in from the village of Portland bypassing their parents who stood savoring the bitter dregs of rejection a mere three hours south. If we wanted to see them we would have to coax an invitation for ourselves to bask, be it so briefly, in their youthful vigor. We just got back from three days in this resplendent company of careers and minds on the ascendant.

In between wake boarding and fireworks (or during since I did not leave the cabin deck) discussions with these alert minds covered the grand topics. Themes such as the hierarchies, can humans be "better" than others, open theism, allegorical silliness, political trends, political oughtness, and St. Paul or friend in the third heaven, fought side by side with the trenchant claims of Metallica. These young adults have better minds and rhetorical abilities and ask better questions than I have heard in much of Christian America.

(first pic is of The Amazing Missus with the hostess Noelle and her sister Loni)










(pirate Tim with lovely Helen and her son Levi)










(Davis of the City, Gunn, and Andy of Los Angeles, soon to be of The City)









(My three sons, Graeme, Davis, Gunn then Andy, Brian of Portland soon of Japan, and Jason, father of Levi and defender of Metallica)

Back in the Saddle

The SCL conference went well. My talks were well received in general. A couple of folks walked out of my last lecture when I inadvertently let it slip that Christianity was post-pagan and not, as we Protestants tend to think, post-Catholic. I think I then used "post-apostasy" as a synonym. Otherwise good times were had by all. The cigar and drink evenings in the cooling mugginess were great. I was threatened with bodily harm by a New York Times reporterette. The exact quote (leaving the newspaper of record an example) was "Sometimes, Evan, I just want to smack you." I assured her that the line was long for those who shared similar intentions.
Had another invigorating debate with an old friend whose shares the nonsensical notions of the allegorical interpretation of Holy Writ. If this is serving as powerful interpretation in the pulpits of the land, God help us all. As I have said before, it is an epistemology based only on the hubris of the speaker and the near infantile credulity of the hearer. All I had to ask to send its advocate into spiral of unsupportable claims was the simple, "How am I supposed to know that what you claim is true?"
My text did not get much attention but people, without prompting, came up to me to ask for copies of something I spoke on last year. That was The Word of a Gentleman and the Way of a Lady. So eager were these expressions that I have returned to the Abbey inspired to finish the new, combined edition which will also include a simple preface to mannered conduct which might be beneficial in most American social moments. I'll let you all know when it is done.

Mind Fried over Easy

Sorry for the absence of postings but I have been preparing to speak at the Society for Classical Learning conference in Raleigh. I leave tomorrow and will be back in Moscow later on Saturday. I will be giving four talks .
They are:
1) From Dusk to Dark: The Fall of Rome
2) The Discarded Image: Lewis on the medieval model of the universe
3) The High and Lifted Up: Hierarchy and Egalitarianism
4) Education to Order the Soul

Pray for my audience. I will be saying the unthinkable.
Pray for me. The unthinkable needs to be well thought and well spoken.

I will also be taking copies of my new edition of A Biblical Antiquity to see if schools might be interested in using it. If you are interested in using it, I have posted a minicatalog at the Big Haus website with an order form.
GO HERE.

Are You Annoyed Yet?

Annoyance bugs the heck out of me.
You too?
The annoyed are an unpleasant lot.
Let us dissect their importune contribution to our social life.

This is a low level emotion that seems less controllable for that lowness.
Let us define what, in the Oracle's world, emotions are all about. Emotion is the directional, axis specific valuation of the impact Reality has on your view of it. The intensity of said emotion varies in the distance which your "view of reality" discovers itself to be relative to Reality and the inevitable insult that discovery is.
Now back to the annoyed.
Someone did something wrong, incorrectly, without consulting the handbook you mentally published on the topic.
You are annoyed.
Is it because you hold ultimately true opinions and your love for truth automatically measures those that failed?
Is your heart, both pitying and seeking justice, wrestling with their failure and the needed correction?
Are you only seeking to bring Reality into conformance with your "view of reality"?

I think I see what you see as the problem. You say it is an "Is and Oughtness" problem. Reality is, and your intentions for Reality is described as the Ought.
Where do I place the problem? Naturally the annoyed are a greater problem in my world. It may be because I annoy so many and am annoyed by so few. Forgive me this one time.
The annoyed have posited that those that failed are the failure that bothers them. I think that what annoys the annoyed is their own failure. The unwillingness, the incompetence, the outright rebellion of those that messed up the assigned task, is due to the unwillingness, incompetence and outright uppityness of those that claim governance over the tasked region.
The suggestion I make regarding the annoyed's annoyance at the failure of task efficiency, quality, and correctness is easy to spot when the task is not ultimate or moral. To not sweep the sidewalk "correctly" is not a violation of cosmic standards. It is felt like it is when the annoyed look on from the side. Annoyed people treat it like a slap in the face. Why? Because it is like a slap in the face. It is an insult to their will. Will is the center of all that a person is and this annoyance grabs them like some stranger had bossed their wife or child.

So it is, O Oracle, but now what?
The place annoyance holds on the sliding scale of negative emotions is due to the distance the annoyed's "view of reality" had to the impertinence of Reality. If this is you, you are actually annoyed ( in a way that those of us who watch do not enjoy) because you have discovered that you are not the god of sidewalk sweepage. You thought you had such great views on sweeping that the universe and all opinions therein, should seek out your abiding wisdom and conform to it. You would rather have your standard examined in your annoyance than your claim of governance. Reality did not tell you were wrong in the standards, it told you were not in charge. The offended majesty of kings is a noble thing. The offense your majesty endured is petulant and above itself.
You would not be annoyed so much? Accept Reality's suggestion. They, the task idiots, just told you that you were not able to govern or it wasn't yours to govern. Find out if you really are the lord of all sweeping. If you are not, shut the heck up and be about your own business. If you are, find out how to govern that laudable arena. That responsibility steps past the pettishness of your discovery that you, not they, were doing it all wrong.

You Want A Peace of Me?

There is a lot of Evil in the world. We see it all round and we see it in ourselves. Since there is Evil and must be a God (or nothing would exist), we have two choices about who He is.

Either God’s omnipotence is irresistably necessary to the existence of all phenomena, evil included.
or
God’s potency (whether omni or just poly) functions monarchically and relationally with an Other and is, because of the presence of such Other wills, phenomenally resistible (if only temporarily), hence evil.

So you have, in the most subjective of wordings, an omnipotent demon or a thwartable benevolence.
I am less interested (in this post) in the selection between the two positions with reference to the arguments, subjective or otherwise. I was thinking about something else today. I consider that the chief end of man in a futile world is the pursuit of peace. I was wondering which kind of peace was offered by each.

It would seem that he who realized he worshiped an omnipotent demon (aside from the knowledge that his knowledge regarding this omnipotent demon was suspect, since that thought was itself the result of some irresistible external power) would realize that the best, nay only, rational response is impotent resignation (which of course you could only feel if the demon decided it was in his best interests to so design). The Stoics (whom I admire) took this tact. You weren’t gonna dodge the bullets that Fate shot at you, so step into them like a man. If peace is the emotional condition of being in order, the impotence of man steps into a peace by letting, without cavil, the god to do his whatever and agree with it. Order (crafting pattern) could not be divined (no pun intended) if any nonacceptance of event is kept. All that is, is the expression of the omnipotent will, all that is, is His pattern. We see Evil and Chaos because His will is unreachable by the human participant. But our chief end is not Peace conceptually gained in the heavens by some other agent, we want Peace felt in ourselves because we feel things, dang it. In the pantheism of the exhaustive omnipotence, the only felt peace for the man is in fatalistic acceptance. The order/pattern is found by matching one's own will with the obvious Over-Will known by what happens.

I know some folks who have found that degree of peace. Sometimes it is academically peace-giving (if God’s greater glory is impugned in an argument that theorizes a spouse running off with the neighbor) or circumstantially peace-giving (should your spouse actually do it). “Who can make straight what God has made crooked” but you can at least align your opinions with His.

The peace potential of the Polypotent (potent in many ways) or the Omnipotent (if He created an Other) is different. Since it is a relational power of the God, (potential thwarting is necessary for Other to exist), His benevolence is possible to acknowledge discreetly since all that happens is not necessarily His doing. Since He can be averred to be good and one who desires peace for me, (acknowledging a commonly understood good that we both desire), his great power is an aid and a lordship to mine own potency. I can have a potent hope in crafting a peace unintended by the Nature of things or the evil will of others. If God’s power can be thwarted (in the phenomenal moment), most certainly, so can all other powers.

This is certainly incomplete. It was a morning coffee thing which ended up on scratch paper. Correct away! Spare not my feelings! I think that "polypotent" may be a new word.

If you comment, discuss what I have missed in the pursuit of Peace aspect of each theory, not which theory is true about God.

postscript,
As C.S. Lewis said, “The doctrine of Total Depravity — when the consequence is drawn that, since we are totally depraved, our idea of good is worth simply nothing — may thus turn Christianity into a form of devil-worship.”
and “I am going to submit that not even Omnipotence could create a society of free souls without at the same time creating a relatively independent and “inexorable” Nature.”

An Oracle: On the Effect of your Company

Now or tomorrow
Lift or descend
Broaden or narrow
Light or dark
Touch or shun
Immortal or moment
Deep or shallow
Language or lingo
Venture or hide
Conquer or bow
Fit or divide
Find or lose
Better or worse

Vanity on Top of Vanity

In the publishing world, the self published go to vanity presses which gouge their customers for copious amounts of money because these under appreciated artistes so want to see their efforts (Collected Songs of Kansas in the Quiet Solitude of Love by Eleanor Spasm) in print.

Here is mine.

Feeding off rejection like it were the Breakfast of Champeens, I have rewritten, edited, combined into one volume, what Logos Materials used to publish as two.

A Biblical Antiquity
Ancient History in Context with the Bible
190 pp.
Coil bound
Covers antiquity from Egypt and Mesopotamia through First Century Rome and illuminating where it interfaces with the Biblical record.

The Amazing Missus is doing the final edit for comma abuse and insensible sense.
If you want one (or twelve) badly, it'll cost you $25 each plus $3 shipping.

Write for more info or to demand your fair share of my vanity.
My email should be at the top of this page.

The Groove

I spoke to the graduates of Montrose Academy this year. I centered my speech on the Groove.
The note below sums it up.

The Groove is a good place to be. You are “on” and everything goes well. People like you and are willing to consider and even agree with your positions. People thrust jobs and accolades on you when you find yourself in the Groove. Eligible young women stand slack jawed at your approach. Or conversely, valiant young men nervously stand, with hat in hand, and consider calling your father. It is the result when, out of your piety and education, a moment happens when the theories of correct loves and of ordinate placement becomes an effective, lived action matching a moment perfectly. You get it right and you are on the beat, in harmony, and you know the words of the song that’s playing.
A brief and cursory examination of the phenomena gives us immediate things to consider
Here are four parts I’ve recognized from when it happens.
“The Groove” has...
Modesty, which is not busiest declaring oneself.

Peace has ordered, successfully and wisely, the life you have thus far.

Morale involves losing well because losing tells the wise needed realities about themselves.

A Light heart is the emotional sum of meeting Futility with Modesty, Peace and Morale. How could you not be rejoicing? You have pleased God not merely by having a good quality or an educated mind but by arranging it all with Life. “God has made everything beautiful in its time.” Solomon says in Ecclesiastes, shortly after he had said there was “a time for every matter under heaven.”. Do not be anxious for tomorrow. Today has enough trouble but God's grace is for today. These are the lyrics of the Kingdom. These are virtues of the Kingdom. Make them metrical.

A Cry for Help

Now we're talkin'.

I am an Unimportant Man

This is a gift to those my thoughts annoy. Proof of my singular unimportance. The photograph is a record of my key chain. If someone were to say "Let me borrow the car keys," I would have to correct them. "It is the car "key" you wish to borrow" I have access to a 1996 Ford Windstar. I don't have a key to the other car. I don't have a key to my own house. Even the doodad attached doesn't open bottles very well.
Now you can disregard the potency of my views.
Smile to yourself and gossip it around the nation.
"This man, he has only one key."

For Christ's Sake!

What is Faith?
Its important.
Hebrews 11:6 "And without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him."
That seeking of faith leads to what Romans 10 teaches ("the word of faith we preach") the Lordship of Jesus Christ and His resurrection. It is truth concluded by an unbeliever through the "preachers" of the good news for "Faith comes from what is heard and what is heard comes by the preaching of Christ."
The conclusion the person of faith reaches is clear and definite.
Hebrews 11:1 "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen."
We know from James that faith must have its effect
"Faith without works is dead." and "Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith."

So faith, made up of those parts, is through which grace is imparted and we are saved.
You remember this, don't you? It is called Christianity.

A number of you are nodding in approval.
Some might not.
Some who claim Christ, baptize infants.
Infants haven't got a clue, let alone faith.
But some claim that "faith" is somehow present in the baby's life?
They must have stopped recognizing the faith described above. Such a faith described is impossible to the 10 lb. sack of enzymes that is a newborn baby. They are barely cognizant of the quantities of poop they have evacuated into a diaper. "Assurance?" "Conviction?" "Seeking?" It is to laugh.

Those who choose to religiously sprinkle or dip an infant are doing, it seems, one of (or a combination of) three things.
1) A rite representing things not yet present
2) A rite accomplishing things by the magical value of the rite and its wielders
3) Or a rite accomplishing things according to the baby's condition.
Number 1 is just damp dedication, a parental prayer for the child's future salvation.
Number 2 is apostasy, being a "gospel" not that preached by the apostles. It is not just salvation by works but it is necessarily someone else's works. (This is not the argument over baptism conferring any grace to the believer. That is a separate discussion. With infants it is whether grace is imparted without belief or repentance. )
Number 3 is trying to be Christian regarding faith with any slack created by such an unconvincing claim picked up by the magic of the rite and the wielders.

So how have these last managed, given that faith is necessary to salvation, to claim "faith" in the baby?
First, they soften the use of the word "faith". They let it mean, not the individual decision to pursue and find Christ as a remedy for sin, but they mean the sum of Christendom's Faith, the creedal claims, not "MY faith" but "THE faith". They do so dogmatically for that will help distract from Scriptural objections and they become the rhetorical attendants of the conservative and orthodox. It also gives standing to those who practice the rite as representatives of THE faith.
Second, they massage the imprecision of the remaining term until, like a marshmallow, it goes from softened to taffy like stickiness that will cover any pious burp your child can be patted into releasing. Whatever assent deemed possibly personal in the baby must be vague, and that is tacitly admitting that the demanding concepts like sin and the resurrection and God are not to be expected from the young'un.
Third, knowing that they have redefined "faith" so broadly and loosely that a man glancing sideways at any steepled edifice will find himself transported by grace into the Kingdom, they try to shore it up, narrow it by developing a theology that offers to transport the sum of faith of the closely related. It is an easy belief to sell to concerned parents. In other realms parents help their child's lack and credit the child. We have all completed a late night project the overly demanding second grade teacher assigned, for we knew that our little sack of witlessness would never completely build a scale model of the Arc de Triomphe to the satisfaction of the instructor.
Our little beloved must get a passing grade! If the church tells me that I can improve my child's chances by "standing on my head and playing cymbals with my feet" then I, if I don't know what Christianity is about, will do it.

Why this self deception?
1) You love your children and you're ready to believe anything.
"Believe anything" It sounds like a parent whose child was kidnapped. Usually we resort to such desperate measures and excessive redefinitions when we feel massively threatened. Why do you think that your children need it?
Why not just preach the Gospel to them when they can understand sin, righteousness and judgment and when they can have faith as is described in the Bible?
2) Parents are unsaved themselves and/or are acting unsaved and they know if they wait until their child needs God's grace, that the Gospel from their lips ("Johnny, if you repent and believe in Jesus the Christ for the remission of sins and Life Eternal, you will receive the peace so evident in your parent's lives") is horrifically uncompelling.
3) Because of the doctrine of Original Sin. If they died as infants they would go to Limbo or some such nonsense.

This is your lucky day! These are your new marching orders.
Keep loving your child.
Quit believing every promise the "authorities" offer in defense of your children. It sounds so Hillary to say "Its for the children!" or "Vote Yes for Kids!"
Become a Christian yourself. You can experience God's grace in such a way that the Gospel would be compelling to your child.
And lastly (with fanfare and a drum roll), there is no Original Sin. They are under no threat until they sin before God and die the spiritual death.
Romans 7:9
"I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died"
No need in the infant, therefore, no need to bastardize the language of Faith.

You can thank me later.

"Gave the Last Full Measure of Devotion"

Memorial Day in a time of war. Ceremony and stirring military tributes on the television and radio. And always, as if there is no other way to speak of the death of our soldiers, newscasters, politicians and high ranking officers announce to our softened American brains the phrase that titled this piece.
Now the Gettysburg Address (from which this phrase comes) is a tidy little bit of speech making. The phrase above nicely dodges the harsher personal realities of a loved one lying much too early beneath the sod. It is also dodging the reality of what it means. "Gave", "Full", and "Devotion" all play positivities as our eyes well up with tears to the sound of Taps played by a lone bugler standing faithful but barely seen in the mist that fell on the manicured fields of white headstones. You get the picture. It is a good thing, that picture. But it is the civic undertakers efforts to make a good restoration of the body for which there must be an accounting, even if it be a Nazi, or Islamic Insurgent, or Confederate or American soldier's body. All of them offered, unto death their devotion. It makes us feel good without us actually able to feel moral. It is as true for the immoral cause as it is for the moral, for the Assyrian and the Israelite.
The good we feel is the good of glory. In battle the highest desire of man (the submission to our wills) is expressed at the highest level on this earth (that of nations) with the price exacted and paid being the highest possible (death). For all the horrors, for all the loss, this devotion to mankind's greatest urge is always measured to we who stand and wait as a glory, which the mere mention of, can move us. It is not the sadness of a man dying, known to us or no, it is a man dying for the will of his people being maintained this side of the battle line that claimed him.

A Thought I wrote on my hand Last Night while my Father was speaking

You may have gathered that I am not a huge fan of worldly religion. Here is another shot across its bow. Have you noticed how their standards for personal morality are relative and function along a gradient compared to both the standards and to others attempting the same moral construct? There is lots of room in worldly religion for folks to be considered devout without moral precision. Oddly, you might also noticed, these same sloppy moralists are complete autocrats about religious merits. These, O faithful one, are absolute! Pilgrimage to Mecca. Bathe in the dang Ganges. Fulfill the sacraments. You can be grading on a curve that would embarrass a state university in your morals but not be able to budge on your absolute necessities in religious function.
"God can't expect that I would rejoice all the time!"
"Nobody's perfect"
"Everyone fights with their husbands."
Such will come out of the devout mouths clogging the pews of the nation.
Now try to change the wine of the Eucharist for orange juice.
Or suggest that it need not be taken for some or any reason.
Why are relative moralities and absolute religion the combination?
Because the world's religion can't fix the soul and the heart. It can get obedience on ritual.
Matthew 15 "And he said, "Are you also still without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth passes into the stomach, and so passes on? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a man. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a man; but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man."

It is easier to involve the broken world in attempts to fix itself with mere moral posturing and wishful thinking while giving the followers duties to accomplish which make them feel like they are successfully religious. And they wonder why, as they look around their lives, wives,and children at the end of a few decades and find it has the surprising likeness to the bottom of a ditch.

Earlier an Matthew 15 "And he called the people to him and said to them, "Hear and understand: not what goes into the mouth defiles a man, but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man." Then the disciples came and said to him, "Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?" He answered, "Every plant which my heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up. Let them alone; they are blind guides. And if a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit."

The Christian version of worldly religion makes what goes into your mouth a necessary (for salvation and orthodoxy) while what comes out is measured without any necessity and much mercy without repentance and relative allowance. If that is Christianity, I'm a Hottentot.


"Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying?"

Nominalism

I am not introducing a discussion of nominalism as a philosophic claim, or the variety of usages in scientific fields, but only as it attaches itself to valued realities which occur in groups. These valued realities have names but often the value is claimed by having the name only.
In political circles, a RINO ("Republican In Name Only") is a negative description. (Could there be a positive nominalism anywhere?)
How would one create nominalism?
It quite easy in fact. You become convinced or convince another that certain acts or claims attain to an actuality so named when, in fact, they do not. You or they, (and the more "they" the better for that helps convince all that the life of the fake is the life of the real) live and insist that you enjoy the complete claims of the real. Those who are the real are told they are not being sufficiently ecumenical (Christians) and are dividing the party (Republicans).
A question:
How, if one wanted to, would you go about creating a nominal Republican/Christian?
I mean if you intended to do it.
1] Get them to register as a member, going through whatever rites are normative.
2] Have them go to the expected meetings.
3] Encourage them to speak in the the special terms current in the party.
4] Invoke the past heroes of said party.
5] Express shock and offense if any suggest the above is insufficient.

Would such a nefarious plot be any different than what you are doing now?
Republicans tolerate the RINOs because they want the gains a broader party will bring. In a sense this is the "positive" nominalism that I wondered if possible earlier. But an actual, ideological Republican feels so dirty when someone calls Senator Arlen Specter a Republican.

When you think that a real Christian is one who has passed from death to life at the end of a repentant road by giving their will up on the altar of Christ's great sacrifice, don't you feel just as dirty when you look at the local Christian school or youth group or congregation of evangelicals and call the whole motley crew Christians? Walk the aisle, baptize the baby, sign the card, and even attend a concert or go on a youth mission trip. Everybody will start calling you a Christian regardless of how dark your life is. We so desperately want to count these patent unbelievers as on our team, we shore up the great magics of nominalization. We think that nominal is the Christian marijuana. It is the entry drug. The entry from fake to real, some believe, is a seamless transition, like taking more of the drug. Will it be because they have such fun faking the Christian life that they will want to have the greater fun of a real Christian life? With drugs, a little bit of the real thing is the real thing. The marijuana gets you stoned and heroin gets you more stoned. Nominalism has none of the real but the name.

I remember in high school some dopers trying to sell (successfully) chopped up maple leaves in a baggie into which they had blown marijuana smoke. It was no entry drug. No one got stoned. But what if the deceived thought he had as good as it got? His claims of how ripped he became would be the laugh of the true doping contingent. And the dopers would make easy money off the abundance of maple trees hereabouts. Pretty soon, most of the dopers would be nominal "dopers", and the real experience of being high would be lost in the social cult of maple leaf smoking dorks.

The transition from this nominalism, this Christianity for dorks, this unimpressive fake, is not seamless nor is it merely an enjoyed step deeper. A fake Christian must come to know the damnable state of the fake Christian, the blasphemy of its claims, the apostasy of a Gospel which brought them "in" without belief in the work of Jesus Christ for their sins? He must say "I've been smoking maple leaves because someone who looked like they knew what was going on told me that the smell of the real made it real." Will they become a real Christian at last, like all who are real Christians became them, by repenting, believing, and calling on the name of the Lord?

Romans 2:17-28
But if you call yourself a Jew and rely upon the law and boast of your relation to God and know his will and approve what is excellent, because you are instructed in the law, and if you are sure that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth -- you then who teach others, will you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you steal? You who say that one must not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? For, as it is written, "The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you." Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law; but if you break the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will condemn you who have the written code and circumcision but break the law. For he is not a real Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. He is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart, spiritual and not literal. His praise is not from men but from God.

Queen

The suspicion present that I speak to the qualities of the band Queen notwithstanding, I must turn instead to Her Majesty's presence in our country, at our White House, this very day. Or rather Ann Coulter's comment regarding Her Majesty on Fox News this morning. Ann, (and I believe we are on a first name basis since the Amazing Missus, as another steely eyed article of female intensity, has read all her books) commented with a tone that presumed (and probably got) agreement from even the most leftist sack of atrophied gray matter in the country. She said that as an American she had no use or respect for the royals. Her lean, blond, leggyship has ceased to hold me in thrall. Some of you reading this have said to yourself that although you never agree with Ann Coulter, on this one point you do, and here it is that the Oracle abandons her. What is up?
It tells us in the Book of Jude that certain false teachers (of Jude's concern) were those who "reject authority" and live that out by reviling the "Glorious Ones". As an example he gives the Archangel Michael and his treatment of Satan in the Pseudepigraphal work, (no longer extant) "The Assumption of Moses". It would seem that respect for a position is irrespective of ones necessity of submission. We are to honor Satan's kind whether or not we agree or needs submit. The same is true of a young lady who marries. Under the different headship of her husband only the most pretentious of abandoned patriarchs would insist that the command to obey ones parents was still in place. It is a matter of citizenship in a given fiefdom that would require obedience. I am no longer a citizen of Satan's kingdom, nor is my wife a citizen of her parent's arena of rule and the lovely Ann and I are not in England but in America. Ann's and my geographic and historic definitions still agree. But Michael honored Satan. A wife will honor her father. Ann Coulter should honor Her Majesty Elizabeth II, the Queen of England. Miss Coulter, while she is not your queen, she is yet a queen. A father-in-law is still a father. And Satan, a Glorious One.

Lost Cause

O'er several years some several souls
And sundry friends of such, had certain found
A darkness in the doings of all else
And that, of ample years. But ample hearts,
Are able in the arts of war. They spied
The several in a single, lonely cave
Where ample minded several to subtract
Each severally to make a sum indeed.

by Evan Wilson

Summertime

Last year, while at the Society for Classical Schooling conference in Greensboro, I resigned from their board. I couldn't afford the financial demands attending the conference placed on The Big Haus. But, lo and behold, out of the kindness of the SCL, I am going to be speaking (4 talks) at the conference again this year on their nickle. The conference is in Raleigh this year and the plenary speaker is Peter Kreeft. Do you wanna go? I recommend this event for any person who loves the Western Tradition and,via education or lifestyle, wishes to see it advanced. Look it over at the website for the Society for Classical Learning. It will be June 28-30.

Of Baptism

If salvation is the baptism in the Holy Spirit by Christ, graciously given to those who repent and believe, calling on the name of the Lord, and if it does not need water baptism to be effected, then what might water baptism be?
1] One can do it in raw obedience without a theology. "Jesus said to do it so I'm doing it."
2] It can be like John's baptism, a statement of repentance.
3] It can be a repentant someone who has come to belief and is calling on God as St. Peter said "Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ..." (I Peter 3:21)
4] It can be symbol of our baptism in the Holy Spirit and our participation in the death and resurrection of Christ. See Acts 10 and Colossians 2:12

Hebrews 6:2 suggests that the deeper instruction for Christians includes that on baptisms plural. The variety of causes and symbols water baptism enjoys provides that possibility of plural water baptism. Why then do the Scriptures say "One Lord, one faith, one baptism" ?
When the Scriptures speak of "one baptism" it must be that baptism which all the regenerate have necessarily encountered, that of the Holy Spirit. I Corinthians 12:13 "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body -- Jews or Greeks, slaves or free -- and all were made to drink of one Spirit."

Simon Magus believed and was baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus and yet St Peter told him, " You have neither part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God. Repent therefore of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity." Acts 8:21-23

The core of the Gospel, as far as what God has asked of us in it, is to repent, believe, and call on God. Water baptism can coexist (and does in the Scripture) but only as a reference to either repentance, preparing the way for the Holy Spirit baptism (John the Baptist's) or the convicted person calling on and appealing to God for forgiveness (in other words, acting as and outwardly decorating your prayer for salvation) or as a symbolic statement of what you know has already happened (died and raised with Christ /baptized in the Holy Spirit). In each case it is not necessary to the thing it references. A man can repent, call on God, be baptized in the Holy Spirit without this referrer of water baptism. But Biblically we also can and obediently will use it to so refer. Without the baptism of the Holy Spirit you have "neither part nor lot" in the Kingdom of God and Christ. Baptism can symbolize what we believe but can't reference that alone. It doesn't effect, it represents and it must represent that which has happened or is happening.

Those that can't or won't or haven't repented and called on God should not be baptized. Even if they say that they have, and it is clearly not evident that they have been baptized of the Holy Spirit, baptizing such devalues it. Passed from death to life did you? Big whoop. It is like making baptism a currency (which represents value) and deciding that, while the gold standard is desirable it is too rare, so your parishioner "dollars" will now be backed by mud. You can get it everywhere and even make it yourself!
These "cant',won't, haven'ts" includes 14 year old Southern Baptists who know it is time to walk the aisle cuz mammy knows that Elvis did or the baby of parents trapped by the fears attendant to original sin or unconditional election and want some peace of mind, or your boyfriend who is willing to do what it takes to make you believe that this love will last.
Because of promiscuous baptism, these, and these are without number clogging our assemblies, will misunderstand (how could they not?) and think, with the rest of a superstitious world, that the magic has been done and they will never pass from death to life.

Faith Alone

Acts 11:15-18
As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them just as on us at the beginning. And I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, `John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.' If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?" When they heard this they were silenced. And they glorified God, saying, "Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance unto life."

This is St. Peter speaking of his encounter with Cornelius in the previous chapter. The connections in this tight little remark are legion.
1] What happened to them is revealed to be the superior baptism to that of water.
2] It is the same as the disciples encountered at Pentecost.
3] It was God's response to their belief.
4] This baptism of the Holy Spirit in response to faith is labeled "repentance unto life."
5] It was convincing enough a salvation that the Jews concluded that Gentiles could be saved.
6] Someone rejecting the obvious is trying to "withstand God".
7] This marvelous work of faith and grace, 'repentance unto life", occurs before they were water baptized.

Let us look at the event itself, shall we? See chapter 10"43-48 (St Peter is speaking)
"To him all the prophets bear witness that every one who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name." While Peter was still saying this, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word. And the believers from among the circumcised who came with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles. For they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, "Can any one forbid water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?" And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days.

As St Paul says in Romans 10, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the preaching of Christ".
1] St Peter preaches that "belief" gains "forgiveness" in Christ
2] Since it is while telling them to believe for forgiveness that they receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (in chapter 11 identified as "repentance unto life") we can declare that they believed and were saved right then.
3] Believing Jews could tell.
4] A believer obviously regenerated is the most natural claimant to water baptism. (Conversely, one could say that the most natural disqualification would be the reverse, no belief and no evidence of regeneration.)
5] Soooo, these people were saved by God's grace, who responded to them for only belief.
6] They had already been good (see 10:34-35) but good wasn't enough.
7] They had not even time, before God mercifully saved them, for even an immediate baptism let alone a lifetime of smells and bells ritualism or works righteousness. Uh.. you know,...by grace.

If someone can be given saving grace with only their faith in view, what graces are brought by the additional works, rites, ideas, theologies, sundry hoop-jumping-through? Are those folks just "more" saved? Repentance-unto-Life XPPro? Or do they get a special decoder ring?
In spite of the obvious, drop you on your head, qualities of this passage, baptism is often, still, the most offensive addition to the Gospel. It occurs in the highest of the high church sacramental followers of Baal and it frequents the bo-hunkus theology of places like the Church of Christ.

As I thought about these who get more confident when wet, and their ecstasies of bowing and scraping before the muttering of eunuch priests, I gathered that they were admitting something they knew not. Priestcraft makes up for failures of faith. If faith is all God needs to proceed to your salvation, those who belief that you must be baptized as well are not only in danger of damnation for the falseness of their gospel (see Galatians 1). They are in danger because the addition of works to faith is a measure of their faith. Like St James says of works (of righteousness not ritual), it shows your faith. But bad works show what kind of faith as well. If I abuse others, I show that I don't believe. If I practice ritual I admit my faith (which I know can bring me salvation all by itself because I read Acts 10-11) can't stand on its own feet. These are not people who merely "like a little beauty, thank you" in their services. These are people who tell you that their salvation depends on it. They don't object to belief alone saving someone. This is not, despite protests to the contrary, a theological fight. They've seen salvation happen, not only in Acts 10-11 but in people they know. They look at their own faith and realize, standing on its own, it is nowhere near what God requires of faith ("assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen"). They don't actually believe, at least, they know, not enough. A temple narrative in which they can suspend their disbelief, in which the aromas and robes beguile their senses into thinking, dear God, that they believe this malarkey. They have found what mankind can never, in his unbelief, give up, the elemental spirits of the universe.

Galatians 4:8-11 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were in bondage to beings that by nature are no gods; but now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and beggarly elemental spirits, whose slaves you want to be once more? You observe days, and months, and seasons, and years! I am afraid I have labored over you in vain.

Colossians 2:16-19 Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a sabbath. These are only a shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels, taking his stand on visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.

People have been suckers for it in Galatia, in Colossae, and the U.S. of A. They are, perhaps, incapable of a saving faith. But they can know and fear enough of the import of religion and the gods.

"No faith, you say? I'll call this ritual my faith. I'll tell myself the story over and over again that this action, this muttering of the Trinitarian abracadabra gets me membership in the club of Christendom. Sure it is a physical religion but we call it "incarnational living". Makes the narrative more plausible to the dim bulbs. This is what every one who is anyone has been doing for the last two millenia. All the saints, I'm tellin' you. How could it be wrong? Now you are tellin' me that there is some sort of secret society within all this information regarding Jesus that knows Him and is known by Him through faith without the doodads? Call it the "New Covenant" do they? Damn heretics!"

I Timothy 4:1
Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by giving heed to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons,

Keeping the Pedestrian at Bay

I am middle class. Public school educated and living in Idaho. Sure, it is a university town but the type of university that builds a recreation center with a climbing wall the size of Montana. While I have friends, some of whom are minds worth knowing in the pursuit of the sublime, the TV has channel after channel of mundane entertainments with educational attempts grappling with an early high school level curriculum. It comes into my Haus on a cable to make sure that no reality show is lost while trying to reach this this far flung corner of the Empire.
What is an aspiring oracle to do?
There are cigars as an excuse to sit around. That helps. Smoke them in the library (your own library) for that extra wallop. And have a somewhat eccentric philosophy. Make sure it is eccentric so that you never run into it in general Christian conversation or in a popular, current Christian movement. Your life is to be committed to this philosophy as a direct war on the inane. Make it true for extra benefits. The habit of your mind needs to create a groove, a well worn funk riff of truth which translates that pedestrian signal into affirmation of your thought. Look on the world of the Other through eyes which citizens of the Other, while chatting with you about sundry domestic or geopolitical concerns, catch a glimpse of what's behind your half-lidded gaze and start in horror. With practice you can raise one eyebrow.
Yep, that'll do the trick.

Living in a Land of Make Believe

"Narrow is the way to life and those that find it are few."
So said the Lord Christ.
"But Christianity is one of the world's leading religions"
So said you, correcting your Lord's dark mutterings.
If you decide not to correct the Lord (as I have decided) there is some 'splainin' to do. What are all these souls cumbering the pews of Christendom actually up to?
They are, for a large part, playing make believe. It is hard for someone who truly believes to see and understand that some of the most intense defenders of that belief are just playing religion and have happened to choose the true one to play. But pretending it is true is a sight different from faith. This is how faithful young people growing up in the youth group and a Christian home walk away from it so easily when they reach college. The little girls are all done playing "daddy's little chastity princess" and the young men find more important games to play. The parents keep on playing that game until their sexual needs in conflict propels them to deny the faith if just to get out of their marriage. This is why the children play the faith, pretend Christianity is all they have ever seen. So the church and the movement ramp it up. We have to make sure that the "make believe" is permanent. We will give them an entire culture, be it indie bands or colleges or prairie muffin values.

This effort is being done not just by those who don't know Jesus Christ but make believe that they do. It is also done by those who, by real faith, have passed from death to life. Why do they do it? They don't believe what Jesus said, that is why. Even the truly believing want a movement, want to win, want to keep score against the Philistines. "Hard to find", "difficult to attain", and "few achieving" are not phrases you can build a profession of ministry around. Not with a decent salary that is. How to get people on board? Step aside Jesus, we are gonna make this puppy easy to find, almost automatic to conclude, and we will be satisfied with nothing less than millions on millions buying the Jesus Extreme t-shirt.

No insistence on a movement equals no problem with the text.
Where did Jesus tell us that he came to start a movement?

The Oracle says: My father's Christianity had absolutely nothing to do with the church we attended. I believe because I saw a Man, not a Movement, who knew God. You either know Him or you are pretending to know Him.

The Quiet of Our Lives

Middle age did sneak up on the baron and baroness and did surprise us with a moment of quiet, reflective thought.
A couple of weeks ago, Spring Break descended on the Big Haus and with it the absence of university students normally seen in these environs. Our two eldest children had long since vanished and the younger two, in high school and possessed of monies and wheels, set off on a road trip to see their sister in Portland.
The Haus, beside what you see here, was empty.
In nigh on 27 years, we are not sure that we two, The Oracle and The Amazing Missus had ever spent a night alone on the estate. Stunned, we got a drink and sat down. A tripod and a timer captured the action.
That is me on the left.

What in the World?

I've been ill. I've been busy. Or perhaps my views have become more and more pedestrian until I have come to doubt that the reading public would be interested.

But what if I said that Satan had been cast into the lake of fire, oh, about a thousand years ago?

Or that monarchy is the preferred form of government?

Or that Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is a woefully incomplete work of fiction?

Or that people do not have inalienable rights?

Or that the Future does not exist?

Or that the people of Israel spent only 215 years in the land of Egypt?

Or that the snake in the garden was only a snake in the garden?

Or that Roman Catholicism is not Christian?

Or that I speak to the winds?

Or that God changes His mind sometimes?

Or that sex is a metaphor and a different metaphor for men and women?

Or that vitamins are a fraud?

Or that the metric system is of the Pit?

(And I won't even mention what I think of soccer.)

I'm just sayin', "what if".

Victory!

After five long years of leading Bella Jazz Ensemble (plus a few before that with the Logos School Jazz Choir) the Amazing Missus pounded, cajoled, and directed a fine group of young people to a First Place (B choir division) victory at the Lionel Hampton International Jazz Festival.

I bask in the slight warm light of their efforts and it is good to see the wife again.

"The One Saints Day Worth Observing"

Here they are. Sans the Missus and self, this is the company that foregathered of a Wednesday Night to strap on the feed bag and exchange pink hearts.
Good looking women and stern-faced men. It doesn't get any better.

The post title comes from a poem written for the occasion by Tom "Lord" Banks (standing with poetic dash to the far right).

More Than A Little Pleased

My daughter, the lovely Michal Angela, is a jazz vocalist. Most of you who read this know that. Over the last few years she has become friends with the jazz great and saxophonist Houston Person. He has been very kind to her in sending charts and jazz recordings. When she visited her brother in New York he hosted the two of them at a jazz club in Harlem. At the last Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival they got their picture taken together.
Blessings on that man.
All that is just a nice visual to announce that you can hear a demo of Michal Angela singing a one of Blossom Dearie's A Fine Spring Morning at
http://www.myspace.com/michalangelamusic

Do You Believe That....

Every Man has Sinned Against this Holy God?

This is an easy point to make by merely reading a daily newspaper, or a cursory glance at the history of man, or with a half an ear to our own conscience. We all know that we disapprove of other's actions and call them "evil" (while assiduously avoiding conscience for our own) and we know that when we so disapprove we are not merely saying that our opinions of their actions differ from those who did the dispicable deed. But in order to say that such is "evil" and not "I differ with that", we must appeal to a basic law of law.
"There is no law without police action."
Without this law of law Nazis are just "different" as are child molesters and wife beaters. Until there is someone who sits above the agents acting thus and has the ability to punish, it is all mere opinion. For those differences mentioned to be not merely "different" but be "sin,wrong, and evil" I must grant that there is a policing agent higher than man, (in other words, a god), that has, by His ability to police this world, the authority to dictate what is wrong and evil. For it to be evil we must affirm that such a god's dictates will bring reward and punishment.

Revelations 20:11-15
Then I saw a great white throne and him who sat upon it; from his presence earth and sky fled away, and no place was found for them. And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Also another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged by what was written in the books, by what they had done. And the sea gave up the dead in it, Death and Hades gave up the dead in them, and all were judged by what they had done. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire; and if any one's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

Since that God has a moral will, we find that it is only the moral will He has revealed about which we are able to speak. We can not claim someone has done "evil" without God letting us know, somehow, the content of that which He will police. All men know of evil and God has revealed it.

Genesis 3:23-24
Then the LORD God said, "Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever" -- therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to guard the way to the tree of life.

Romans 2:14-16
When Gentiles who have not the law do by nature what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.

If we examine that moral will (revealed in our conscience or through His Holy Apostles and Prophets) we find that it has condemned every man whoever lived, including, tragically, ourselves.

Galatians 5:19-21
"Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God."

As you look over that list, the temptation is to say, "Well, I'm no sorceror!" The judgment of God, His unavoidable police action, will be about what we have done, not what we haven't.

II Corinthians 5:10
For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive good or evil, according to what he has done in the body.

Suppose you are a sophisticated thinker and you reply, "What if there were an innocent man in Africa?" Cute. Picked up, no doubt, when you attended The Self Defense Academy of Nonbelievers. By this question you are admitting that everywhere you or I could conceivably check, we would find no innocence. You asked the wrong question. Your concerns do not rest in the Third World, in imaginary human ethical efforts.
Do not ask if there is an innocent man somewhere else but ask your conscience if you are that innocent man.

Romans 3:9-23
What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all; for I have already charged that all men, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin, as it is written: "None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside, together they have gone wrong; no one does good, not even one."
"Their throat is an open grave, they use their tongues to deceive. The venom of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood, in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they do not know. There is no fear of God before their eyes."
Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For no human being will be justified in his sight by works of the law, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction; since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Romans 5:12
Therefore as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all men sinned --

Payin' the Bill

Last Wednesday there appeared some water on the Big Haus basement floor.
I cleaned it up.
On Thursday, yet again, water. The floor drain, in tandem with the washing machine, conspired to "seek its own level" which was above the level of my basement floor.
The Amazing saith unto me, "O, what shall we do?" meaning "O, what shall you do?"
Liquid Plumber into the utility sink. Liquid Plumber into the gaping maw of the floor drain. Liquid Plumber ought to be poured into the forced open mouths of the corporate heads of the Liquid Plumber corporation.
Going outside to the shed I fetched the 25 foot plumber's snake. Kneeling in water I fed said snake through the bowels of the Big Haus.
Nothing.
My realizations regarding those who manufacture Liquid Plumber (disregarding my plans for their end) brought me, in discussion with Amazing, to conclude a need for serious chemicals. We are talking about chemicals which can't be sold off a shelf in a bottle. They have a acid resistant bag in which the bottle sits. They have names like "Mule Kick" or "Atomic Fire". The companies of origin do not believe that a slick corporate image or logo is necessary. The product sells itself.
I purchase some.
I read in very small but insistent print on the bottle in the bag, that under no circumstances should I apply this product to a drain which had ever, in the last century, had other chemicals applied to it. I had applied Liquid Plumber (if it can be called a "chemical" by other than women and the French) in the last few hours. Safety first. I put the "Mule Kick" on the shelf.
I called the sewer guys at Express Drain Openers and felt better.
Amazing does a load of laundry and reports that things seemed better.
Friday morning dawns. I lay there knowing but few things for my day. I must tag the garbage and I must remove the recycling (corrugated cardboard) from the basement to the street. It has become nicely and fragrantly damp from the ablutions of the last two days. Amazing addresses me from the bedroom door as I look at her sideways. "Would you start a fire."
"Certainly, my sweet."
"And would you vacuum up the water in the basement". Things had not gotten better.
Mr. Express shows up at 9 a.m.
He has got a bigger, motorized snake with a sludge and root choppy thingy at the business end.
We ran that snake out past Portland. It comes back bearing gifts whose presence could be ascertained by every sense man possesses but failed to create the free flow of water desired in all drains everywhere. Mr. Express fetches his sewer camera which is too cool. We get to see what has established residency in the Big Haus main drain, my link to civilization.
Oh My Heavens and all the Saints (including the lesser known)!
I can't look away. Fifteen feet of moving but immobile white has grabbed my attention. It is unresponsive to the snake, the camera (imagine the sight of pushing past decades of offal with the lens of a color video camera only to have it, as you watch closely, close back around the lens pulling back), and finally unresponsive to the application of a pulsing, water squirting, pipe sealing ball on the end of a water hose. This last has to be applied down another (unopened since the 1920's) drain cap.
It is Friday 3 p.m..
Mr. Express has to go on another call.
He will leave all his stuff stuck in my drains for me to fiddle with (ineffectively I discover) over the next hour. My feet hurt.
Mr. Express returns. He has news. He is having a high pressure water jet brought up from Lewiston and will bring this drain under submission.
It arrives.
It is inserted. They put on goggles which impresses this homeowner.
It has an gas motor. It has what they call p.s.i. and lots of it.
Fifteen minutes later, down goes the camera again. That pipe has confessed its many sins. That pipe is clean as far as the eye can see. That p.s.i. had introduced itself to the fifteen feet of "white". Words were exchanged, became heated, and the fifteen feet of "white" woke up floating down the Ganges wondering how it got there.
Mr. Express commented on how it was the worst drain he had seen in his born days. This may have been a "let-me-prepare-you" buffer for he said it as he handed me the bill.
$573.00 for the privilege of standing on concrete all day, inhaling the ripeness of the American sewer, and gaining only what I blissfully and ignorantly enjoyed three days earlier.

This morning Joe Mickler calls me.
He has dreamed of my drains.
"You had to pay a high futility bill this month," he says.

Eschatology, darn it!

I have concluded that a Christian could have one of two relationships with prophesy. One is a patient hope for those things yet to appear and the other is a praising of God handiwork for those things which have already come to pass. I had always been nervous about those who would confuse the categories. Anyone who tells a future story based on prophesy is trying to match the given vision to a narrative, yes, but their narrative is, by definition, a fiction. The latitude of fiction is that I can make anything happen(such is the magic of fiction) and it can bear a wonderful similarity to the vision it promises to “fulfill”. These Bible teachers think that in this God is glorified. God is only glorified in His having accomplished His will in history in a way which follows a preexistent vision to one of His prophets describing the same. These teachers have tried to glorify when they should hope. How is what they do any different from a false prophet. Any false prophet has the same latitude if he can craft both a prophesy and write book on how it will be fulfilled.
The authority of the prophets of God by what has come to pass.
Deuteronomy 18
[20] But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.' [21] And if you say in your heart, `How may we know the word which the LORD has not spoken?'—[22] when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word which the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously, you need not be afraid of him.”

The error of counting on the futuristic fictions is most evident in what the Jews were expecting in their Messiah. Even the prophets were limited in understanding, leaving the true knowledge to those who would see it occur.
I Peter 1
“[10] The prophets who prophesied of the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired about this salvation, [11] they inquired what person or time was indicated by the Spirit of Christ within them when predicting the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glory. [12] It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things which have now been announced to you by those who preached the good news to you through the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.”

Even St. Paul recognizes the future is unclear to him about such absolutely important truths as our resurrection.
Romans 8
“[22] We know that the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now; [23] and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. [24] For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? [25] But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. [26] Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with sighs too deep for words. [27] And he who searches the hearts of men knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

Futuristic fiction is, by definition, impatient. It wants desperately to "see" and have others see the same way, be it premillenial or postmillenial.

The Oracle:
Be patient in hope, knowing we are blind to the future.
Glorify God in His fulfillments, knowing we have sight into the past.

This Morning

The light was good this morning.
The snow was freshly fallen blue.
I, inside, from window took
This to post to you.

Do You Believe That....

God rewards those that seek Him?

And without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him. Hebrews 11:6

You have looked up into the heavens and down into the subatomic abyss. The Divine vision thunders with dread. This power to make, this power to order, this power to destroy is an Almighty, it is God. He is there and known. He is soul crushing and terrifying. But thankfully "the Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" There, subtly inserting itself into this vision of almighty power is an almighty benevolence. It was made with information transfer natural to it. We can understand the world outside ourselves. It was made with gifts of pleasure arranged to greet receptors on unexpected levels. Who knew but that a strawberry and the human tongue would meet and rejoice. Even the encounter with the Living God is fraught with pleasure. We look up into the sublime terrors and, answering His suggestion that He is good and wishes to be known, find a faith which offers us security in approaching Him. It is such security that it can stand before the power of eternal annihilation and have the thing that is the threat itself reach out to secure you. It is His power that is our greatest threat and it is His kindness that makes it sublime. Do you believe that He rewards the seeker? Does this joy surprise? Can we seriously claim any other satisfaction is greater than the pleasure of seeking the God, finding Him, and being welcomed by Him?

Hear, O LORD, when I cry aloud,
be gracious to me and answer me!
Thou hast said, "Seek ye my face."
My heart says to thee,
"Thy face, LORD, do I seek."
Hide not thy face from me.
Turn not thy servant away in anger,
thou who hast been my help.
Cast me not off, forsake me not,
O God of my salvation!
Psalm 27:7-9

"Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
Isaiah 55:6-7

"Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. Or what man of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! So whatever you wish that men would do to you, do so to them; for this is the law and the prophets. Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few."
Matthew 7:7-14

"He who has ears, let him hear." Matthew 13:9

Do You Believe That...

The Almighty God exists?

Either He does or He doesn't exist. The evidence of the world around you either suggests the presence of an infinitely powerful creator or it suggests a chance occurrence. It is not a question of which of these options you believe but which does this world's phenomena suggest. When we say "suggest" we mean that the evidence points, through some authoritatively logical principle, at one of the two conclusions. It has to be a logical principle otherwise how could the suggestion pass from the phenomena to you with meaning.
The position that God exists has as its "suggestion" the presence of an almost infinite order, macrocosm to microcosm, physics to ethics, at a level that in many cases reduces to an irreducible complexity that has to all exist or not at all. The logic followed is that which appears designed and ordered suggests a designer since any degree of chaos (the designer-less state) is defined by the degree of disorder.
If you need an example, science would be happy to provide one. In the attempt to find intelligent life on other worlds, we have pointed radio telescopes and launched unmanned craft listening for any message from the vastness that are the heavens. Can you imagine the elation and the claims of proof that a single ordered phrase of sounds or numbers, perhaps only ten seconds or digits long , would create in the expectant researchers? To them it would prove, as it should, that an intelligent being, sufficiently capable to transmit the phrase had to be on the other end and wished to be known. In fact the space craft we have launched bore an inscribed plate which we assume would be evidential (along with the craft) of our existence to alien life forms. We presume with William of Occam, that the "simplest explanation is probably the correct one". In another secular example, we know, in archaeology, that man has lived somewhere when we see the grosser forms of ordering, say a short stack of stones or a pottery fragment, that some ancient tribe (we rightly conclude) has left behind. The discovery of Order is evidence of ordering beings. With the creation we face a range and complexity of order that would take an ordering being only describable as an Almighty God. Such is the reasonable "suggestion" from creation.

Let us pause a moment. You might not choose to believe the suggestion measured out above. It did not claim to be a proof. It was merely a "suggestion" present in Nature in which you will or will not have faith. If you will not, you have not proved, in any adequate way, that God does not exist, only that you don't want Him to exist. The same level of rational demand placed on the God-believer is required of the God-unbeliever. To disbelieve rationally you must show how the evidence suggested that particular claim to you. Otherwise you are standing close to megalomania. If you do not provide a rational argument you must be claiming that ultimate truths arise unbidden to your mind, that you have a god-like prophetic and revelatory gift. I think we can agree that you don't possess such a remarkable quality.

To affirm God's nonexistence one has to have a "suggestion" in the World's being that rests on some logical principle as well. Remember that we are not discussing what you choose to believe but whether or not that belief was preceded by a natural and logical suggestion. What is it about things actually being within the complexity that scientists have devoted centuries to unravel on the assumption that laws and constancy keeps their discoveries true, what is it about all this that you see, which "suggests" an accident? I know you can tell a story of accident and chance but what about the changes of life in that story that requires that chance, or more accurately, the absence of will, was its cause? What principle tells you that this all has a self evident mindlessness? And also remember that this necessary "suggestion" of Nature must overwhelm the suggestion (which you accept as valid) that order must be willed. It must be huge, this suggestion and logical principle, to invalidate the reasonable suggestion of a very large, ordered, and interrelated universe brought into being by a infinitely powerful deity. Otherwise you must deny there is order (making even your thoughts disordered and consequently invalid) .

Christians tell a story of God's creation but back it with pointing to a valid suggestion we all accept, present in all the evidence. We will all accept it or face ruination of our humanity, only able to participate in life as animals. The Unbelievers tell a story of unwilled and accident based existence but when asked for a principle that sustains it merely point out more parts of the story. Telling us more of the fanciful accident story is like a simple Christian who claims the Bible is true because the Bible says it is. Wise Christians know that God's "eternal power and deity are clearly perceived in the things that have been made".

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse;
Romans 1:19-20

And without faith it is impossible to please him. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
Hebrews 11:6

"And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind; for the LORD searches all hearts, and understands every plan and thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will cast you off for ever.
I Chronicles 28:9

I'm "It".

I must be getting somewhere in life. Josh Gibbs, who knows everyone, tagged me first and referenced said tag in his preface. It is like getting a Golden Globe.

Four Jobs I’ve Had:

1. janitor
2. sailor
3. bookseller
4. graphic designer

Four Movies I Could Watch Over & Over:

1. The Three Musketeers (Richard Lester version)
2. Gladiator
3. What's Up Doc?
4. Incredibles

Four Places I Have Lived (Apart From Where I am Now):

1. Annapolis, MD
2. Ann Arbor, MI
3. El Centro, CA
4. Yokohama, Japan

Four TV Shows I Love:

1. House
2. The Office (British version)
3. Scrubs
4. The Prisoner

Four Places I Have Been For a Vacation:

1. England
2. Grand Canyon
3. Montana
4. Spokane

Four Websites I Visit Daily (or almost daily):

1. Effable
2. Michelle Malkin
3. Lucianne
4. Cedar Room

Four Favourite Foods Flavors:

1. Onion
2. Butter
3. Black pepper
4. Bacon

Four Places I Would Rather Be With My Wife:

1. alone
2. shopping for anything
3. Outback Steakhouse
4. Did I mention "alone"?

Four People I’m Tagging:

In Christian kindness (doing unto others as I wish I had been done by) I tag no one. Register your thanks in the comments section.

Carpe Caffe

At last, a coffee cup worthy of the name.
Matte black for that sober Big Haus sense of the sublime and yet, a glossy white inside so that you can see the heady, opaque seepage which graces your day.

It (or they, being 72 in number) arrived today and there was rejoicing in these environs.

In honor of their presence I dredged up a poem written over twenty years ago.

It is titled....

Coffee

It crawls from the pot echoing glory,
Victory as black as the night it defeats,
Raising the shades that blinded us. More we
Owe this gallant, this ambrosial treat.

This morning comes on Columbian feet,
Moves us to make us to run in the race.
A sacrifice placed on His mercy seat,
The God of all comfort judges its case.

Does he decry it as Stygian trace,
Or grant you the peace of St. Stephen’s face?

Annum

T'was one year ago today that I, the oracle of Big Haus, began to give my words unto the sphere of Blogo. It is time for you, from the Evantine acolyte to the anti-Futilitarian reader, to recollect, to lean forward on your keyboard, and ponder whether this year has been one well spent. Beneficial? Yes? No? Self absorbed nonsense? Got some choice terms and correctives dripping like venom from your tongue? Let us hear it, bucko. There are a lot of you out there. In this year we have had about 4,000 unique visitors so I am looking for about 4000 comments on this post. I am not so old that I cannot be chastened and I am not so full of myself that I cannot be made fuller still.

Farmer’s Prayer

The skies, on wind and blue crack’d grey,
Let low light shine at empty trees.
Warm with cattle and late stack’d hay,
In barn below the moss, his pleas
To timbers echo twice sincere,
Nay, thrice the prayers arise anon.
“Good gifts from solemn Autumn here.
My barn hath life to winter on.
The wind outside brings cold a-day
And freezing death to hill and pond.
With ample food for mine, I say,
Thy barns hast Life and Life beyond.”



by Evan Wilson

Real Thanksgiving

"Thank you for doing that," said she, smiling in a way that conveyed real sincerity.
"I didn't do it," you said, being that this was the only honest response.
"Well, I pictured you doing it, so thank you." Her smile was a little more fixed and insistent.
A pause settled down on the bistro table. Someone was smoking a cigarette somewhere nearby and it added a pleasantness with the noise of other patrons. Your coffee cooled a moment longer untouched. It was time to choose your words with diplomacy and yet carry the fragile child named "Admonition".
"You are, truly, a forty watt bulb." You smile in a way that conveyed ontological certainty and took a sip.

I suppose that someone at sometime has thanked you for that which you did not do. The thanks in that circumstance are nowhere near as valuable as being thanked for that which you did. In fact, they are not valuable at all. A presumption from the above illustration is that thanksgiving is only actual, not when we do it, but when it tracks directly with reality. People can only stand before God in honor and thanksgiving with a certain submission to realities that God has defined and made.
Romans 1:19-22
"For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools,"
This is not only applicable to the secular mind which fails to absorb the world that stares them in the face. This is for the Christian who shies away from the the obvious conclusions available in reality. Thanking God for your government "for there is no authority except from God" and thanking God for submission to your husband or parents. How many Christians fail to be thankful because they don't actually believe that they "look up" at parents, husbands, or kings. If you believe in that which God has made, you can render both honor and thanksgiving naturally. Have you accepted what is?
Thanking God for His grace is truly effective when you believe it is part of your reality. This is another evisceration of thanksgiving. There are things for which we know we ought to thank God (which we dutifully do) but about which we only hold doctrinal affirmation. It is not as much a part of our reality. When you drop a valuable vase on the concrete patio, you will find the difference between a reality based adoption of gravity and a doctrinal one. And when you sin do you search for grace with the same "real" alacrity with which you dove for the falling heirloom? You took that humbling and costly experience with thirty-two-feet-per-second-squared and never, ever will carry anything so clumsily and casually as you did that day. You seriously believe in gravity. You trust it every step you take. Is God that real? Is Sin? Is Grace?

Grandma gives you socks for Christmas. You thank her because you ought. It is not that you disbelieve that the socks or she exists but that you don't believe that such an action truly sufficed as a gift. It wasn't what you wanted. It wasn't really a gift in your reality so it wasn't really thanksgiving when the words trickled out of you mouth. That it is real, and you thanked her, is insufficient. Rich thanksgiving is offered according to the real by someone who has submitted to the real.

The oracle: Know what is, live no other, be thankful for it.

The Earth Trembles

A romance through the ages rang, as true
Blue belfreys clapped iron fists on five
Long tones of mood, tailing tales of virtue
Stood upon its head. Deaden’d men, though live
And married once, woo’d Fate next to the best
Of faiths. The husbands of this second wife
Were pitied souls, purblind in some protest
To some less hareem’d version of their Life.

These, "Mister Collins" each, would trip to fall
Into their lustings dark, made mud with tears,
And soiled nuptial garb for all. The gall?
They wore the stained same but naked fear
Had made their cap of sense forgot and gone.
Their shirt of mercy now meant naught but luck.
Holiness a cloak by “decree” withdrawn.
Feet shod in good news sank from sight in muck.

To woo this wench were wanton words of pride.
Her damp and dirty past, a lust refined,
Asked that the rival wife be put aside
So “maid succeeds her mistress”. Concubined
Till, by her bed, Fate addled all of thought.
They poemed her puddled beauty and her swamps.
We know it’s true that Love is blind but not
That mud is wedding cake. This grimy pomp
Is destiny that proved they knew not which.
When blind lead blind they tumble in the ditch.

by Evan Wilson

For Sin and Hell

I suppose that the question is less on whether we believe that God exists and more on whether we want Him to exist. The pre-Christian mind needs to conclude that "God exists and He rewards the seeker" (Hebrews 11:6). To be at that point one must have had a wanting for the benevolence that only a God can provide. The pre-Christian has to hope. They are described as "without hope or God in this world." If they always suspect, doubt, roadblock, stall, then the message of the Gospel will not meet eager ears. But they must hope, not for world peace or a cancer free Aunt Betty, but they must hope for the rewards of God.

Many people think that money will solve the calamity of their life. They start to imagine a rich uncle who will die and they will inherit the answer. They buy lottery tickets in flagrant abuse of the odds because the "answer" is money and they have hope. God can answer many of those calamities better than money but no one can see how and many Christians live with such similar calamities that it gives a negative testimony to the lost. But Hell, on the other hand, can't be fixed by money or cosmetic surgery. Forgiveness of sins cannot be accomplished with a Roth IRA. A tax-free lottery win can bury you in the Benjamins but you'll still be damned, and to be more clear, damned eternally. To create a hope that leads a soul to grace we have to preach a problem the answer to which only God controls. The testimony of our lives must be a testimony of righteousness gained and lived with the joy of Life Eternal. No more of the entertaining church that "seekers" (who are not seekers) will attend and decide to add bits of the Christian religion to their family's sense of purpose. They haven't sought God. They have no hope of God's answer in the Lord Christ for the sins of their benighted souls.
"Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the preaching of Christ." (Romans 10)
"Faith is the assurance of things hoped for." (Hebrews 11)
The kind of hope we offer and that we create in the hearer is the kind of faith we get from our "converts" Is it any wonder that the Church today is filled with unregenerate souls? What does your church offer in lieu of forgiveness and Life Eternal? Belonging? Neat culture? Modest dress code? Ethical authority? Family protection? Big answers to all your questions? Patriarchal humbug? A youth group pop replacement? Ritualisic juju?

I know, I know, not everyone drawn by these things has done so with such a shallow expectation. Many believe that somehow, somewhere in the magic back rooms of THE CHURCH the salvation machines are working overtime to guarantee salvific grace will ooze out of the pew and leech miraculously into their's and their children's unsanctified behinds. This is Christianity folks, not Baal worship. All the belonging, all the performance, all the passion plays are but filthy rags. You family's service in the temple is pointless. The church has no grace to give.

The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart (that is, the word of faith which we preach); because, if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For man believes with his heart and so is justified, and he confesses with his lips and so is saved. The scripture says, "No one who believes in him will be put to shame." For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and bestows his riches upon all who call upon him. For, "every one who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved." Romans 10:8-13

But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. John 1:12-13


Jesus died for your sins. When you hope against hope that that is precisely what He will address in you, you stand ready for the Faith that saves.