lift

torchie sent me an email recently
I’m sitting here, enjoying some good conversation with my youngest son, some internet reading on incarnation, and a glass of Captain Morgan. I had a good day at work and I know that God and my wife still love me.

How can life get any better?

So, I began thinking, “Would we be celebrating Christmas, or, would Jesus have come even if me and humankind would not have sinned?”

Don’t feel obligated to respond, or, if you do to respond at great length, but whattaya’ think?

***

i suppose we're safe in that this has a built-in shock absorber in there:
the question is simply 'whattaya think?'

think? whew- pressure's off.

so many things seem to be separated in the curse of genesis 3. it causes me to wonder whether the word 'curse' simply means separation when used in scripture.

it reads in genesis 3.14-19 as the antithesis of blessing.

here's the thing, though.
there is something sanctificatory about both:
with either blessing or curse, something or someone is set apart.

i would even argue that a case could be made (and has been by a few speakers and writers under whose teaching i've sat) that this setting apart- whether circumstantially delightful or tragic- is in accordance with God's greater purposes for his universal creation; part of God's exaltation of it.

3.14: the serpent is separate from all livestock and animals of the wild. 'above all' it reads. typically when we use a phrase like 'above all', we are not talking about something or someone that we see as the lowest of the low. perhaps this a simple reinforcement of the idea that our perspective is pretty limited and pretty linear.

3.15: there is higher level separation (enmity) between the woman/ the offspring of the woman and the crafty antagonist. the context is set for the messianic promise to be announced for the first time.

3.16: there is greater understanding of this human experience, for we have this whole paradox and sexual conflict that seems to open up for the woman: desire for the man and yet 'increased pain' in childbirth. whatever the case, this life experience just went from black and white to colour for the woman.

3.17-19: for the man, there is work and toil and sweat and ultimately death. however, these things have become the essence of our cultural identity. whether it is in our fallenness or simply as the result of a life steeped in it as we continue to strive here, just east of eden, most conversations with strangers move into the realm of chosen occupation relatively early on. i know that i typically remember this about a person quite easily, but his or her name takes a bit more work. there is something functional here that fits into our understanding of the way things work quite naturally, affording us a relatively uncomplicated, safe causeway to further relationship.

(interesting- i believe in some recent comments on an earlier blogpost here we delved briefly into the whole trouble with equating 'being' with 'doing', yet it seems to be ingrained as part of our perspective.)

one writer observes that
'Meeting the needs of a self in a world of other selves is an anxious enterprise. Even short of death, there is much to be anxious about in life.'
(robert gerzon, in his book Finding Serenity in the Age of Anxiety )

gerzon contends that humankind chose natural anxiety over existential anxiety (he calls it 'sacred anxiety' in his book) because reporting solely to God was a burden too great for mortals to bear. in any event, life seems to take on new meaning and significance now that there is something precious to be lost. it is no longer a given and so an exaltation of sorts- a lifting up 'above all' similar to 3.14- takes place.

so if curse means separation and separation means curse, then is God somehow cursed by the changes that go down in the garden? have we, in our disobedience, cursed God as well as ourselves?

well, there does seem to be a separation of the personalities of God that takes place here- is required as a result of all of this action in the garden. it appears that free will and technicolour living will require even God to undergo a radical change in how the trinity interacts within itself as well as within the world created. somehow the son needs to be torn from that place of perfect relational balance and compliment in order to address the great challenges imposed by God's decision to abide by the free will of everyday people who have no clue who they are or what they're doing most of the time. happens again when the Holy Spirit is given at pentecost. it appears that somehow the triune God is affected by the gift of free will as described in genesis 3.

so would Jesus have had to come?
no. not in my view.

i can't see any need for God the son to have been separated from God the father and God the spirit apart from the need that is ushered in as a direct result of humankind's swiping of the freewill card for the first time.

the question that eats away at me is
would we even be able to notice?
living in the cozy, pre-fall balance, would we value the stasis-
in God or in ourselves?

what if our ultimate failure as the God's very-goods in a world of goods was simply a rite of passage into the coloured and contrasted existence that God actually desired for us? what if this fall of man was actually a lifting up by God to a deeper experience of life and relationship, with each other as well as with God? what might this suggest about God's love for his crowned of creation?

as messy as all of this is most days, i think i love God more when i think of God's activation and honouring of my free will like this- especially considering the cost to God.

ideally?

torchie and i were talking about ideas and actions when he made an interesting statement:

knowing something philosophically and experientially are distinct from each other but not mutually exclusive for both are necessary to knowing something fully. (torchie)

hmm... the fullness of knowledge.

does this soundbyte speak of a difference between intellectual ascent and actually living the dream? i love that they cannot be separated from each other and still be true- excluding one while embracing the other is simply hypocrisy is it not?

okay, here's the kick: is all hypocrisy bad, or is hypocrisy sometimes simply indicative of one's faithlessness? i mean, until someone points it out in me, is the log in my eye a bad thing for which i must take responsibility, or is it just blindness... the presence of which being possibly the responsibility of others to identify in me? this is how people discover that they are colour blind, right? the awareness of this 'blindness' is impossible within a relational vacuum because basically perspective gone unchallenged is personal truth. we have no reason to question something from our own point of view because it's our own point of view and we hold to its accuracy... perhaps this is yet another reason establishing the importance of graciously receiving the investments that others make in us as we labour together.

example? the other day i was meeting for breakfast with this 'bob the builder' guy that i haven't hooked up with in a long time. as we spoke of about many things, i started to notice that he had a particular verbal habit. no workaday vocalized pauses like 'um' or 'er' or 'd'Oh!' in fact, he kept inserting the word ideally into the beginning of sentences. after two or three of these i called him on it...

can an ideal ever be attainable?
or is its unattainability that which makes it an ideal?

in other words, is 'ideally' a verbal shock absorber that allows you to say how you wish things could be, but have no faith in the possibility of the realization of this dream?

see, in bob's case, i think that his use of 'ideally' connoted the 'settling for' something less than the best. it was philosophically there, but experiencially non-existant even in his imagination... he had already signed off on the dream, settling instead for something commonplace and ultimately unsatisfying.

so when we speak of spiritual walks and healing journeys and possible differences between what we are envisioning and what we are experiencing, i say hold on and receive these things as they are offered... remembering that the vision of healing is fuel enough to see the realization of this vision. circumstancial and relational realities cannot withstand the restorative vision that God places in one's heart as hope for the future.

it's not ideal- it is simply yet to come.

free

"Nothing wrong with the truth
when the truth can set us free"
(societyVS)

hmmm. what if that truth doesn't set us free? what if that truth actually imprisons us in a causality cage where we are sentenced to live in a box with the consequences of our actions/decisions?

how's that truth feel? is that freedom?

a friend of mine is living there now... and yet would argue that he is experiencing the first actual freedom he's had in years. there's something amazingly liberating about no longer having to check over your shoulder; no longer having to run from the facts that may yet overtake you; no longer having to remember the lies you've told to cover up the lies you've told.

mark twain had something to say about the virtue inherent in that of kind of truth.

i don't think that it is truth that is hard to work with in the classic adage (taken from a larger passage on cause, effect, integrity and identity in john 8.31-40 that is a crucial read) alluded to by societyVS...

it's this whole elusive notion of freedom.
***
words from the cell- YOU decide what freedom means:

I have not felt this "alive" for a very long time.
If my wife and closest friends were asked how I am doing
(and by the way, theyre reading this)
I would bet the farm that theyd say
"Torchie has really changed for the better. He went MIA but he has now been found. We have him back again!"
I am enjoying the freedom Jesus meant for me to have over [addictions, indiscretions] and the damning accusations that are associated with these. My freedom is a by-product of the rich satisfaction that comes from knowing and loving God. My knowledge of and love for God has been significantly influenced by a daily diet of Scripture and prayer as well as the encouragement and counsel of my wife and trusted friends.
Listen Everyone:

I DONT EVER WANT TO GO BACK TO WHERE I HAVE COME FROM.
(torchie)
***

i rose above these sterile sheets
a cold sweat left behind
a departure from a living death
delivered just in time
the plot had thickened to the point
where there was little hope to see
the antagonist had raised his fist
no option was open to me

but for a deus ex machina
a god in the machine
an unexpected reversal comes about
like awakening from a bad dream
with the swing of the playwright's pen
life returns to me again
now the show can have a happy ending
by faith, for freedom's haste, the seasons change

it's never too late to whirl around
move the other way
i have seen mornings robbed of light
nights as bright as day
the future is changeable- the past is set
finally i understand
hardest to grasp is that circumstance
is successfully countermand

by deus ex machina
God in the machine
an unexpected reversal comes about
like awakening from a bad dream
with the swing of the playwright's pen
life returns to me again
now the show can have a happy ending
by faith, for freedom's haste, the seasons change

by faith, for freedom's haste, the seasons change