Immigration journey...

I posted this on Quora but it seemed fitting to post it here. Future posts will add some detail to this series of events. It is enlightening and will shed light onto the current immigration debates taking place in the media.

What has been your most expensive travel mistake and what did you learn from it?

Arthur Ort, 20 years wrestling with religious truth, voracious reader

Updated Wed

The chain of events started when we arrived at the gate in Heathrow after an 8 hour red-eye from Boston in February of 2015.

“Can I see your UK Visa?” we were asked after the customs agent looked at my wife’s Jamaican passport.

“We don’t have one,” I replied.

“I’m afraid I can’t let you in,” was the reply.

Our worst fears were realized.

As a US Passport holder this wasn’t an issue. I was good to go. For my wife, a Jamaican citizen and US Green Card holder, this was not to be. We had the Schengen Visa which had taken us on some late night, rapid fire trips to New York, Washington DC, Cleveland and Chicago to obtain. With the Schengen Visa arriving the Wednesday before our departure, we thought we were finally good to go.

The following night while surfing the Web I found a site that mentioned the need for a UK Visa as the UK is not a part of the Schengen countries.

Curiously, my wife overheard a conversation about the need for a UK Visa as she was filling out papers for the Schengen Visa while we were in Chicago as I drove around the block several dozen times waiting for her. One was not needed was the consensus on the subject.

That was apparently not true. I had a meltdown. We were were flying out early that Saturday.

I called my wife’s sister-in-law who is a British citizen who had worked for Customs twenty plus years ago when she lived there and she said that sometimes the agents have latitude as to who they’ll let in.

With airline tickets, train tickets and a two-week itinerary planned canceling just didn’t seem like an option. With the feeble hope of her words we decided to brave it.

We got through Boston without incident so thought maybe, just maybe, we’d be ok.

At 7 a.m. in the morning (2 a.m. eastern US time) in Customs at Heathrow my wife was denied and escorted away. I went out to face my wife’s sister and her husband and tried to explain what had just unfolded.

Several hours later, a canceled Euro Pass and the purchase of a pair of plane tickets to France (hundreds of dollars on such short notice) our stay was extended.

We were able to experience the vacation of a lifetime through England, Wales, Belgium and northern France with her sister in Bristol and a good friend in Lille, France.

On the last leg of the journey, a p.m. return trip from Charles de Gaulle to Heathrow after our two weeks were up we were met with words that sounded very familiar when we presented our tickets to board:

‘We can’t let you board,” said the gate agent.

Denied again, this time at the gate. The transit visa through Heathrow expired at midnight on the day of travel, not 24 hours upon landing. The flight was held, our luggage removed. Add a hotel room to the bill.

So very grateful for Isabella from Air France who booked the hotel for us and changed our flight times to the next morning or we would have had to book new tickets as well.

After a whirlwind night, an early flight from CDG to Heathrow and a scramble and last minute decision to avoid having to go through security and missing a flight, we ditched our luggage at Heathrow and headed back overseas, elated at being free.

Upon arrival in Boston, we were once again met with words that were becoming hauntingly familiar:

“Please come with us,” my wife was told by two individuals who approached her at the booth where her passport and biometrics were scanned.

I was left dumbfounded. She was, once again, detained. You’d think my wife was a universally wanted criminal.

Hours later we learned that immigration law is different than US law and ‘did the crime, did the time’ does not apply. Petty crimes from thirty years ago in the moral purity of immigration law as it applies to those deemed worthy to be in the US are still relevant today and have the potential to make a green card holder inadmissible and, ultimately, removable.

Four years and thousands of dollars later (and still accumulating) we are still dealing with the trip with an immigration court date looming in January of 2020.

What have we learned? Aside from the particular ‘how not to travel' advice of that trip and more about immigration law than I can ever have imagined, we have felt at a deeper level than the media narrative at least one of the ways in which immigration law is broken.

We met incredible people through this journey, from the initial customs agent to those customs agents at Heathrow we talked with, to Isabella at Air France at CDG, to all the people we met through our doing it wrong travels and through all the people we’ve met navigating immigration law.

Though it is not easy, we have learned to find joy, hope and celebration in the midst of trials.

Systems fail and bad decisions are often made but people remain awesome.

P.S. Our luggage that we assumed was lost forever showed up at Pittsburgh the Tuesday after our return.

Evangelicalism vs Orthodox?

The title applies to my perceptions which are, in terms of EO, limited and, in terms of Evangelicalism, not universal. These are my observations. 

In church today it dawned on me that there is quite a difference between the preaching at churches such as mine (nominally allegiant to a denomination) and what I perceive to be the essence of the liturgical approach. The liturgy seems to be about Him; we are small in comparison. It is 'awe' inspiring in that regard.

Modern churches seem to be about His impact on our lives. What has He done for us. Things such as 'victory' and other such sentiments are specific to His action in our lives to encourage others and build up faith. I suppose that is the 'Protestant' ethic of applying that to 'earthy' concerns and building a better future. This isn't to say that it is self-ish necessarily. It is less awe inspiring and more centered on feeling. Generalizing, certainly, but there is a difference.

To many in these churches, the EO church and its liturgy is 'dead' because it isn't bumping and jumping and exciting. But I don't want enthusiasm and jumping and similar expressions to represent 'praising' God as if by sitting and meditating upon Him I'm not praising Him. Praise is too often associated with clapping, shouting, dancing and other such expressions which, if not careful, rules out anything else as 'dead' worship.

I get more of a thrill when my mind locks in on something about Him, even during such 'worship' and I'm carried away in it whether or not my body is moving an inch. Some of the most substantial intuitions (revelations? move of the Spirit?) about Him come during these times. I'm either focused on a particular lyric or trying to interpret a cloudy or sketchy lyric through my filter and it leads me to clarity. 

I've lately begun wearing earplugs whether due to age or because I'm comfortable saying it's too loud and distracting. Actually, at an oratorio a few years ago I had earplugs in and people thought it was rude. When I put the earplugs in their ears and they could hear the singing and the music with discrimination and clarity that accusation vanished. Not only did it save my ears, I could enjoy the music. Loud = praise. 

A few years later during an ordination for a minister I walked out because it was so loud. I was not alone on this met others in the hallway who shared similar sentiments and eventually someone older and wiser had them turn down the mics so people could actually hear.

"If I hear one more Chris Tomlin song..." (Sorry Chris but 'God's Dance Floor' jumped the shark, fun as it may be)

Does that mean I am not that into God or that I have become ungrateful or lost sight of what He's done or Who He is? Perhaps. But the deeper I go, the more silent I become. Isn't that what the hesychasts and monks say is the epitome of true worship? 

I feel no obligation to imitate, to do what others are doing. If I am so moved I will; if I'm not, I won't.

But I appreciate the Gospel background of my journey and the acoustic driven sounds of the CCM sound in my journey along with the chant of orthodoxy and all the other influences in the stream as they have carried me this far, deeper and more grounded in my faith than ever, restless and unsettled as I often am in my pursuit of more of Him.

We are all at different places in the journey and we are all on the same team if we're focused on Jesus as the access to 'God'. It seems, though, that the EO (and, for others, the Catholic Church) provides a repository for those who are longing for something deeper.

My journey through Islam...

In 1999, having been a "born again" Christian at a Oneness Pentecostal church in the heart of the inner city in Youngstown, I was journeying toward Islam. That is a story in itself. In 2005, having just been interviewed for the CBS Saturday Evening News, I contributed an article to my local newspaper about my experience as a "Muslim" for a weekend.

At some point I will rewrite it through the lens of time and experience. It's pretty airy but if you read between the lines you can get a real point of view. Though it's pretty much as I wrote it, I hated the title and found it interesting to see what was edited ("conflated" in the original was changed to "blended" which completely changed what I was saying).

Even more interesting was the interview on the CBS Saturday Evening News. I was interviewed in my home for about fifteen minutes by an interviewer from New York via phone. The camera man was in my house and I had to look as if I was talking to the interviewer as if he were in front of me. Fascinating the prep and posing we see on the news. Though a great experience, it reinforced my skepticism of the news as selling a point of view.

The questions got to be pretty in depth and the interviewer was genuinely curious as to how a Christian firm in his faith could genuinely study and participate in Islam without feeling threatened and without, in the end, losing faith.

But this wasn't the topic of the piece on the news.

CAIR was giving away a free copy of the Qur'an to anyone who was interested and the news piece covered this. A professor of Islam at my local university who I had gotten fairly well had been contacted by CBS News and asked if he knew of anyone who was a non-Muslim and a non-scholar who had read the Qur'an in its entirety. He gave them my name. Imagine the surprise when CBS News called my house for an interview. I didn't really care so much about that. I was more honored that he thought of me.

Here's a copy of the transcript:

Thousands of Americans Seek Copies of Qur'an

Out of everything I said, they took one snippet, out of context, and highlighted it. I learned a lot about media and how they "sell" a point of view. Though I meant what I said, without the context it is easy to see how soundbytes get misconstrued. Requests for the videotaped interview were denied and the video of the clip from the news (June 5 or 12, 2005) have disappeared from the Web.

The copies they were giving away was the Yusuf Ali translation (which is the "safest" translation to give away to an American audience). They ran out and sent me a copy of Muhammad Asad's translation, The Message of the Qur'an.

I already had a copy of his so kept the one sent from CAIR (it's beautiful) and listed the other copy online. Were I to become a Muslim it would have been Islam as presented in Asad's translation. In fact, Islam as I had come to understand it aligned with his view even before I had found his translation.

I hold an "if only..." nostalgia for his translation and Islam as presented by the Traditionalist school. On occasion I do read it though certainly not as much as during the period of time in which I lived and breathed Islam.

This period of time radically altered my view of both Christianity and Islam for the better.

Bottoming out again...

How can this be? After such a spiritual rush the past few weeks, it seems odd that I am feeling so low now. Has my perception changed? Am I being an ungrateful brat again? Were the past few weeks an illusion of the ego, a rush of emotion high on intellectual stimuli?

I really don't know.

All I know is that I feel lower now than I have in a long time. I suppose it is a step better than being completely numb, a state I had been in a for a long time previously. Maybe this is a necessary step of the epurging of the ego, a stripping of desire, not just to be free of stuff but to be free of attachment that makes us slave to emotions whether or good or bad. After all, there is a payoff to being in a bad mood, a reason to isolate ourselves, to crave attention and comfort either from others from whom we seek sympathy or solace or channeling these feelings into various forms of distractions.

We could channel the energy into positive things such as washing the dishes or exercise but how often we thrive on the mood itself because it gives us feeling.

Given the choice between being numb or in a bad mood, which would we prefer? Which makes us feel more alive?

Every so often, a single line from a song contains a universe within it, open to many interpretations. One of my favorite song lyrics ever is from the Goo Goo Doll's Iris:

"When everything seems like the movies, you bleed just to know you're alive."

Not sure what it means within the context of the song and am not sure it is about literal bleeding, even going so far as to analyze it in the context of cutting, as such, but it certainly captures the surreality of modern life. It's about numbness, certainly, but it seems to me to be more about the fact that most of us live our lives not here, not now, but in some illusion we buy into that is a work of fiction created from within and without.

Personally I hate being in a bad mood but I suppose I should listen to the energy of the mood and dig more deeply into why it is so. It isn't the event that put me in the bad mood necessarily as there was something already there triggered by the event.

That is the level we must get to in order to really move beyond being slave to the emotions. What lies beneath the veneer? Why am I so agitated, my mood so altered, by something that in the course of things really doesn't matter?

Is worry just lack of faith?

"For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, {as to} what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, {as to} what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?" (Matthew 6:25, Luke 12:22, cf. Matthew 6:31-34)

The Greek word for 'worried' means anxious, troubled with cares, care or provide for. The term does not render judgment to being anxious or troubled with cares. But caring takes energy. The Greek term for no (me) is used in the sense of "don't even think about it" rather than a negation of the thing itself. In other words, don't dwell on the concern. Concern and care is the human condition. We aren't to deny these things or feel guilt over them but are not to dwell upon them for where we focus, there are our concerns.

This is why Jesus tell us to seek first the kingdom of heaven. In so doing, the cares of this world will not consume us. When focusing on the cares of this world, it is too easy to be consumed and dragged down.

That is the goal.

But how do we do it that when the bills are piling up, when the job security is disappearing, when the bill collectors are daily at your door, when food is scarce and everything seems to be slipping away?

We often feel guilt when worrying, as if in so doing we lack faith. Perhaps in an idealistic sense, we have not yet attained that perfect faith. But it doesn't mean we lack faith. It isn't so black and white; it's more of a continuum.

Perhaps what worried us in the past doesn't worry us today and so our faith is actually stronger than it used to be but it isn't quite strong enough to bypass the worries of today. Perhaps in days to come what worries us today will not worry us tomorrow, even though the circumstances themselves may be no different.

So the kingdom of heaven, whatever that is, should be our focus. That is the goal. Without a goal of some kind we drift and are blown about like the wind, consumed with the things of this world which are never ending and are never resolving, any comfort and solace found only temporary.

The human soul longs for something long lasting, something eternal, absolute. It is what drives us and the reason that "things" never satisfy. In focusing on the kingdom of heaven, we help alleviate the problem of attachment and desire.

It is the desire, the craving, that is the trouble and it is freedom from desire that is one of the true commonalities of all religious traditions.

First the high, then the low...

And so it goes that with a great revelation, a great experience in the presence of God that we come back "down" and find ourselves feeling alone. So great an experience comes with the withdrawal.

There is a great desire to share the experience but a sadness that comes in the inability to express it. Living it takes time and we seek the immediacy of talking about it and the disappointment that follows in our inability and lack of response from those to whom we talk about it.

And this is the ego talking. And this is the great trip up. We take pride in our experience and feel privileged, special. This isn't to say that we aren't those things but the trick of the ego is to isolate them and take them and hoard them out o need, desire, lack. We seek to make them "our" experience.

The difficulty comes in remaining humble. Just as we are not to react to negative circumstances or things that happen that make us uncomfortable, so too must we remain the same when we experience great things. This isn't to say we mustn't experience the joy as it is a Biblical injunction that we are to experience the "joy of the Lord" but to say that we must not dwell on it. Whatever we experience, whatever we feel, we must continue to move on.

Remember it, meditate on it, even share the lesson learned, but do not stay there as to stay there is to risk becoming static, allowing pride to puff up our ego, our intellect, the feeling of somehow being above others leads to us separating and isolating us from others.

I have been feeling low. Having had such a great experience over the past few weeks I let my guard down and allowed my ego to get the best of me, allowing myself to be frustrated which is just another way of saying being selfish and spoiled. I'm not getting what I want right now so I'm frustrated.

What is it I felt I wanted? Attention, profound writing, more attention, accomplishment, freedom from seemingly dead end work.

But what I really want is God. And this requires faith. Faith = trust. So my impatience is really a lack of trust.

And that, my friends, is humbling.

Debt to income ratio...

Debt:

Four times my income. Whatever your income is, multiply it by four.

And this does not include the mortgage (with taxes and insurance) nor the daily living expenses (auto insurance, utilities, food, fuel, etc.).

Think about that.

Wow.

Worst (or perhaps best) case scenario, assuming nothing changes:

As it currently stands, debt one will be paid off in the year 2015.

As it currently stands, debt two will be paid off in the year 2024.

And we live simply. Modest house. Modest car (one of which is paid for...). Simple clothes. Simple diet. Rarely eat out. Pizza is a luxury.

How does it get to this? And how, at 40, does one not look back and think, what is the point?

And a Springsteen song pops into my head...

"Now judge I had debts no honest man could pay..."

From the song "Johnny 99", a song about Johnny...

"...wavin’ his gun around and threatenin’ to blow his top."

For some, fairly obvious reason, there is resonance there at an uncomfortable level.

But hope it not gone.

It's just that faith is messy.

And I have this illusion entrenched, indoctrinated even, that some day life will be comfortable, kicking back on easy street, living off the interest of my ever ascending IRA.

But life is never easy. And this illusion of kicking back is a destructive one. It's a myth. It's a lie.

The reality is that we all struggle. Some more than others. The reality is that the figures above are probably representative of many, the silent majority. The deeper reality is that we are well off. Very well off. What we often see as complaints are in fact the luxuries of many.

Our debt (personally and collectively) is symbolic of a deeper problem - selfishness. I want what I want and I want it now, consequences be damned.

The way out is not to make more money (even though it will certainly pay down debt). The way out is to give out of what we have. Not sure how that works but I can see it, though dimly, blurry, vaguely, ok, darkly.

So has my faith really gotten stronger? If so, it it simply out of desperation? Or has my faith gotten stronger in spite of my circumstances?

Better yet, am I finding true faith, faith that comes in the midst of the circumstances, the source of strength and not a default?

So I remain grateful, trying to see the debt thing not as the end of the line but as a puzzle, a mystery, a challenge to overcome, to rise above, to conquer.

And the key is to find joy in the midst of the storm. If in fact happiness hinges upon the 'comfortable' life, upon things external, then we will never be happy. Ever. But to find joy, not happiness, in the midst, therein lies the key.

"For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst." (Matthew 18:20)

Faith may be messy, it may often be mysterious, but one thing is for certain - it is relevant.

Life, faith, love, health, sanity. Blessed are we.

The economy hits home...

A little over four years ago I lost a job as a glorified manager for a non-profit facility whose board of directors (well, one person in particular...) viewed the facility as a tuxedo-laden opera house when, in reality, it's a public auditorium. I left the job of being a grocery store manager an hour's drive from my home with insane hours, either early morning start time or late night end time, along with physical exertion (which actually, minus the weight loss, got me in decent shape).

Anyhow...

When I lost this job, rather than go for unemployment, something I've never done, I took a temp job. From a suit and tie in the public spotlight to a day laborer running presses in a metal stamping plant, my career muttness took a strange twist. At the time, however, and at far less than half my previous salary, I found contentment in it. Perhaps it was shedding the suit and tie, perhaps it was leaving the hassle of a board of directors looking for a puppet, but I enjoyed the rhythm and monotony of putting a part on a press and pushing a button. I enjoyed the people I met and found getting my hands dirty to be a form or therapy.

At the time I also picked up a weeekend job working midnights. Not a hard job, mind you, but the midnight shift was rough, especially considering the fact that it was Saturday/Sunday midnight, Sunday leading right into Monday morning for a 16-hour shift to start every week.

But between the two jobs, we made it work at about half the salary I had previously. There were cuts in usual activities, bills that fell behind, medical bills that accumulated with the loss of insurance, filing for assistance with utilities. I soon learned what it was like to have bills go to collections, to have collections agencies calling my house and to watch my credit fall from immaculate to being rejected for credit card applications, things which had never previously happened. My credit score was a symbol of my identity, an indication that I was responsible and had financial freedom when it came to credit options.

But I was living on the edge. Not dangerously. No. Just my debt to income ratio was higher than was wise. But the bills were being paid so it was ok. Due to a life of relative modesty and not too much interest in "stuff" we were not devastated by the turn of events. We struggled, certainly, and had to change things, but overall we managed to be ok.

Over time I was fortunate enough to move up in various positions at the company, surfing the changes and doing quite well. Not quite the salary I had previously but, between the two jobs, getting pretty close. My hours adjusted, I began obtaining training and a viable career path. I picked up an additional shift on the weekend, working 24 hours over the course of a weekend for a 64 hour work week.

Realizing that I had been very fortunate in terms of my career muttness, I began to realize how privileged I had been without being aware of it. I spent a few years "slacking" but I still had the cushion, untouched, of an IRA accumulated from reaping the benefits of working in the cellular industry during its early 90s boom. This was a security blanket of last resort, a "well, if I lose everything I can cash this out..." kind of thing.

However, I had to tap out the IRA to fix the roof on the house and pick up another beater to replace my other beater. So we began to get the bills under control again, the long process of cleaning up collections accounts and past due bills began.

And then came late 2008. The economy tanked. The facility I work in was not exempt and, as a manufacturing facility tied to the automotive/truck industry, the business felt its impact. It impacted my wage and, as of this week, hours at job two. I have now lost roughly 25% of my income. Add to that the need to raise the withholding tax as we owe the IRS this year and life has gotten interesting.

No longer in the position to which I was promoted, I am back running presses. But I still run the hell out of them. There is a sense of pride in running them quickly, looking for ever more efficient ways to do things.

Standing and bending for eight hours a day now while breaking in a new pair of steel toe boots and going home and continuing P90X at a high level of intensity did a number on my hip. Now I can't even exercise at the moment.

So at once my faith has gotten stronger, independent of, or at least not causally related to, my job and at the same time my other forms of security to which I once clung so tightly, has slipped.

Add to that the darkness of an addiction coming to light and I feel the power of resurrection.

Irony indeed.

I believe it...

Not sure when this happened but I believe. It's the strangest thing. As I contine digesting The Roots of Christian Mysticism with highlighter in hand, I get it. And I believe it. And slowly, every so slowly, I am healing.

Where is the proof? In my life. The more I find myself immersed in it, the more I find the things of this world to be illusory and I am less and less attached. This is not hating the world. That's not it at all. More and more I begin to see the real value in it.

Life is relationship. And as I heal I am able to relate to people in ways I haven't been able to when locked up inside my shell. My hope is that as I come out of my shell what people see is not me but Christ in me.

A few years ago I would have thought such a sentence sounded fundamentalist, looney even. Now, as I say it, I get it.

Jesus died for you? Continued...

But now [are they] many members, yet but one body.
And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if {one} member is honored, all the members rejoice with it.
Now you are Christ's body, and individually members of it.
(1 Corinthians 12:21, 26-27, NASB)

We are part of a whole. If one of us is ill, we are all ill.

This passage may be talking in context to a particular group of believers but if Jesus died for the sins of the whole world then the whole world is, in essence, his body. If one member suffers, all the members suffer. This is the heart of compassion. I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together...

The choice is ours as to whether or not to participate. The "mission" of the Christian is not to "get people saved" but to bring people back into the fold, to restore them to their rightful place as children of God.

When Jesus told those he healed to go show the priests it, the healing wasn't the point. The larger picture was that Jesus reintroduced those outcasts (and the list of those outcast was large) back into the community.

With this change of focus we realize that it really isn't about me. I am only a part. So it isn't about how much stuff I can accumulate, how spiritual I am, how cute and charming I am. The only thing that matters is others.

What a hard task! But Jesus emptied himself to the point of death on the cross. Even as he was being crucified he sought the forgiveness of those crucifying him.

What does it mean to say that Jesus died for you?

Jesus did not come to save you. Jesus came and restored fallen humanity, of which you are a part. This doesn't mean God isn't thinking of you, nor that He hasn't thought of you before you were formed.

But it takes the emphasis off of the great em ee, away from this "personal" salvation which Christianity has become. It's about me. I am saved, I am going to heaven, look what God has done for me. Me, me, me.

To say that Jesus has restored fallen humanity, of which we are a part, places his finished work in a greater context. It is about us only as much as it is about everyone else. We, as a whole, are his body. Not just you, not just me. All of us.

Found this in Olivier Clement's The Roots of Christian Mysticism:

...for it is not the isolated individual but humanity in communion, or rather, all human beings together, who truly constitute the image of God. (p. 81)

And, quoting, Gregory of Nyssa, from his On the Creation of Man:

"It is the whole of [human] nature, extending from the beginning to the end [of history], that constitutes the image of Him who is." (p. 82)

Christ thus provided human nature, as a whole, with what Gregory of Nyssa called "the capacity for resurrection..." In other words, the 'body of Christ' is not you and me but all of us, everyone, throughout history, whether or not they have participated or not. Clement again:

"He rose from the dead in secret, and is recognized only by those who love him. In the Holy Spirit, he walks at everyone's side, but he waits for the response of loving faith, that Yes like Mary's, by which our freedom is set free." (p. 57)

The work is done. Once and for all.

The Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit.

I have been captivated by the Trinity. It is not thinking about the Trinity but thinking in the Trinity.

Yes. I do believe.

How do you define success?

I was talking with a friend of mine today who is head of Catholic Charities Services, the agency I worked for while working with the homeless as an outreach coordinator. It was perhaps the pivotal period of time in my faith. I was a "new" Christian then, studying religion and Biblical criticism at the university level, my intellect outweighing my heart at the time until I began working with the homeless.

Anyhow, he has been involved with a group of local evangelical Christians who are business leaders/owners and the question in the title came up. All the men, though they struggled with the question, tended to answer it in terms of financial terms, i.e. their business is doing well, their needs and wants are filled, they have financial security, etc.

My friend point out Philippians 2:5-8:

"Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus,
who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, {and} being made in the likeness of men.
Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (NASB)

Now in many neo-Protestant circles, these passages are for one thing only: to prove that Jesus is God (never mind the Trinity, never mind theological subtles, just that Jesus is God). The finer point of the passage is glossed over.

"...but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, {and} being made in the likeness of men.
Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (NASB)

In other words, how does blessed (i.e. success) translated in material terms line up with Jesus? It would seem to me to contradict his message. His message was radical.

"Jesus said to him, "If you wish to be complete, go {and} sell your possessions and give to {the} poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." (Matthew 19:21, cf. Mark 10:21, Luke 18:22)

No getting around it. This is the ideal.

This doesn't mean we have to be poor. Just as being wealthy is not indicative of one's faith, neither is being poor. It's the other side of the coin. This is looking at the outside of the cup. It says nothing of what is in one's heart.

But any wealth is to be used for others. Give to the poor. We are vessels, stewards of what is God's.

"The earth [is] the LORD'S, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.

It is God's. We are thus stewards. If it is given to us, it is for a purpose and just as Christ emptied himself, so too are we to empty ourselves and become a vessel through which God can reach others. We are to be the light of the world.

Sadly, our notions of "salvation" and "saved" and "blessing" have become self-centered, personal, me-oriented with material/financial overtones. In other words, we define success by the standards of the culture at large and not the other way. No wonder people can't distinguish a Christian from anyone else, other than the oddball culture that many Christianities have birthed.

The oddest preachers, the celebrities on television or viral videos (think of the Farting Preacher) and that is the closest Christianity comes to a "culture" of its own.

Yet too often Christians go the other route and try to be cool, hip and down with the culture at large.

C'mon. Bumper stickers, crosses on chains, the ubiquitous Jesus fish, pamphlets, leaflets, flyers, business cards, hats, Jesus on a motorcycle, Jesus playing hoops and on and on and on they go cluttering up the landscape.



They are trinkets. You can be cool and be a Christian. The culture drives the faith rather than other way around.

Revolution...

Any longlasting and effective change has come when the people get together and speak up. Most recently we saw this in the U.S. elections. In 2004, the people spoke but everyone knows that election was basically stolen. That's ok, I'm not so sure Kerry would have been anything more than the not-Bush vote. Ditto 2000 with Al Gore.

Anyhow, in 2008 people actually voted for Obama. Sure there was a definite "we're sick of this Republican regime" sentiment but the people spoke and Obama was elected. The people spoke.

But the people cannot depend on government to effect change. This can only come from people.

But what is this revolution? What is it we want? There are so many revolutions to be fought that it renders them all ineffectual.

A spiritual revolution? We hear this in the Churches. But which Church? There are far too many denominations or non-denominational denominations, each with their own version of revolution, Catholic vs. Protestant, Oneness vs. Trinitarian, mainline vs. non-denomination, megachurch vs. storefront church, Christian vs. Christian.

An economic revolution? A green revolution? What is it we want?

I want less stuff. But it's not as easy as it appears as I type away on my computer, listening to my mp3 player with my special headphones, waiting to head for my house in my pickup truck where we are overflowing with stuff. We are not "into" stuff but when you live somewhere for a long time, stuff accumulates.

Perhaps that is my revolution. To make a move toward eliminating stuff. This would include my books. I've thinned out over the years but still have way too many books and way too many forms of media containing music. CDs, vinyl albums, cassettes, even the ethereal stuff of over 100 GBs of music on my computer.

No wonder Jesus says it's hard for the rich man to get into heaven. He's got too much baggage for the journey.

Sell everything we have to follow him?

Why the Bible?

Am I any less of a believer because I don't look to the Bible to be the scientifically verifiable, mathematical precise truth? In other words, I am not a literalist.

Did Balaam's ass really talk? Did the sun really stand still for Joshua? Did Jesus really walk on water?

I hold open the possibility. That is my faith. Do I need these to be scientifically, verifiably true?

No.

But of course that opens up other questions: did Jesus really rise from the dead? If so, in what sense? Spiritually? Physically?

Yes.

I believe the claims that it happened according to the Bible. What that means through the lens of my post-enlightenment, post-modern mind is a different story.

It does, however, open up my mind to deeper levels of understanding of the human condition and our purpose on earth. It burrows deep into the soul, beyond the joints and marrow, to quote Hebrews 4:12. It gets in there.

The Bible is a book of community experience, of representative humanity, each book, each chapter, each person a "type" of each of us. We see ourselves, in various situations, in various characters, and it is through their lives as story we begin to see Truth. Truth, in this sense, comes through the pages of the Bible.

If we quote a verse that somehow quoting it means something, we miss the point, as if a mere quote of a verse proves something. It is the application of it that is important, the Word buried in our heart, transforming us into the likeness of He who inspired it. We become the living word. We, in this sense, become the Bible.

The Bible, as it stands, without application, is just a book.

The question remains: Would it be any less true if Jesus didn't walk on water?

Day 1

I can't believe I'm actually doing this. Blogging. I suppose it was inevitable. Got thoughts, lots of them, lots of thoughts that won't come up in normal conversation. What to do? Publish them for the anonymous masses to peruse, displaying what McLuhan hinted at when he said that our media are really our insides turned out.

I have come to realize that I am a mutt and proudly so. I tend not to be bound by convention. I'm no longer trying to be rebellious as a rebel is often slave to the very thing from which he rebels.

I am currently immersed in the midst of a spiritual/religious phase that has been ongoing most of my life, though more intensely so since circa 1996 as at that point I committed myself to (attempting to) be a Christian. But, as with most things, it wasn't too much longer after that that I found I had issues with the group think required to belong. So I'm on the outside of the inside looking in.

If I were to trace my interest in spirituality it would probably go back to hearing of God from childhood and living the majority of my life with fear, not reverence, associated with the word, as if "God" was out to get me, to punish me for being the mischievous person I was. In hindsight I realize that my self loathing and self absorption were manifestations of a narcissism that led me to believe that God was out to get me.

Self loathing and its manifestation as, in my case, depression were and are ultimately egoistic grasps at attention, sucking life out of the universe to satisfy in insatiable inner need, a bottomless vortex, akin to arrogance, both cries for help, both self-absorption to a distorted degree. I'm not sure when it started but at some point I found myself drawn to the eastern (from my western location) religions. This was probably more out of the appearance of being exotic, the hippy-dippy kind of thing I found myself gravitating toward.

In the late 80s I began stepping out of my comfort zone, aching for opportunities to break free from the suburban cultural Wonderbread in which I had been living. I was introduced to "New Age" music which, at the time, was a far cry from the big hair bands as the approved form of rebellion in suburbia. Such artists as Jean Michael Jarre, Kitaro and the Windham Hill catalogue became staples. In hindsight, these were as white bread as the big hair bands.

Eventually, circa 1991 or so, I would find the Dao De Jing, purchasing it because it seemed exotic, mysterious, enigmatic, cool. I would carry it with me, read it on the john, never really getting it. It was during this time that my drinking got heavier and I rendered myself an alcoholic, going cold turkey, substituting various chemicals in its stead. This would lead to a break with reality (i.e. leaving a $50,000 a year job to hit the road...literally). The little DDJ accompanied me in my travels.

Sitting in a rocking chair on a balcony at a youth hostel in Idaho one evening, the sun setting, in a moment, the entire book made sense. It was truly an epiphany. I can't remember which chapter I was reading but it was as if a flood gate opened. Quite literally, in that moment, I "got" it. The book suddenly made complete sense. I would be forever changed, my struggling in the confines of duality rendered asunder.