Category: life

Do you surrender all?

In my Humanities course I was asked to comment on this story.



“A man went on a walk one day along the edge of a cliff, as he often did. This day, however, a strong wind came and blew him over the edge. Before falling to his death, he managed to grab a shrub. There he dangled, too weak to climb back up; his fate certain. Then he spied a beatiful flower nearby. It was like nothing he had ever seen before. The image of this flower seized him. Its brilliant blossom, its shape and size, its colors, its scent, its intricate design; for the few moments he had left, he caught a vision of absolute beauty. His grasp weakened, and he fell to his death.”



Here are my comments:



“It is said that in death, all things become clear.” – (Dan Brown, Digital Fortress)

It is unfair that I can’t comment on Tolstoy yet (or can I). 🙂

For now, I’ll stick with Dan Brown’s illustration. In our lives we spend so much time trying to get to a target destination that we often forget to enjoy the scenery on the way. When facing our ultimate demise, when facing the final rung on the ladder (so to speak), when, as humans, we are forced to come to the realization that our time on this earth is indefinite, when we come face to face with that realization, there is inevitably the awakening of the inner soul. The point where one begins to look around and realize what is most important. While not everyone can, or will undergo this during their lifetime (or even at the point of death), it is at the point of this surrender that all things become clear, and life has been put into perspective.

In reading this story, I have to wonder, as often as this young man had walked on this cliff, had he ever stopped to take the time to enjoy the breeze, the smells, the sounds, and the loftiness of the heights below him? How often do you think he passed that flower, just within view (or perhaps even reach), and yet, he had never seen its likes.

Studying the humanities gives me the opportunity to learn how to appreciate even the most simple and wonderful things about the world around me. Over the years, I have been a work-a-holic, driven and mad trying to control my own destiny, and make of the world, what I want it to be. Through this study, I hope to learn to better live my life, in what Bob Jacks in his book “Divine Appointments” calls “relaxed anticipation”. I hope to find more direction within myself to, as the colloquial statement goes: Learn to stop and smell the roses. I desire to come to the point of surrender, before I’m holding onto the edge of a cliff, waiting to take the plunge into the unknown.

Is it well?

This is a true story – I have copied it from http://chi.gospelcom.net/GLIMPSEF/Glimpses/glmps064.shtml.


May the Lord always give me the comfort to say “It is well with my Soul”, no matter the circumstance…



In the 1870s Horatio Spafford was a successful Chicago lawyer and a close friend of evangelist Dwight L. Moody. Spafford had invested heavily in real estate, but the Chicago fire of 1871 wiped out his holdings. His son had died shortly before the disaster.


Spafford and his family desperately needed a rest so in 1873 he planned a trip to Europe with his wife and four daughters. While in Great Britain he also hoped to help Moody and Sankey with their evangelistic tour. Last minute business caused Spafford to delay his departure, but he sent his wife and four daughters on the S. S. Ville Du Havre as scheduled, promising to follow in a few days. On November 22 the ship was struck by the English ship Lochearn, and it sank in twelve minutes. Several days later the survivors landed at Cardiff, Wales, and Mrs. Spafford cabled her husband the brief message, “Saved alone.”


When Horatio Spafford made the ocean crossing to meet his grieving wife, he sailed near the place where his four daughters had sunk to the ocean depths. There, in the midst of his sorrow, he wrote these unforgettable words that have brought solace to so many in grief:




When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll,
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.


Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blessed assurance control,
That Christ hath regarded my helpless estate,
And hath shed His own blood for my soul.

When can I write about something happy?

I am filled with disgust and anger at the hard hearts and the cultish minds of those that belong to the local fundamentilist unorthodox Campbellites (also known in their own circle as the Church of Christ).


They are blinded by their own minds… they can’t even see past their nose to look at their face in the mirror. They are filled with a mix of so many unchristian attitudes, and unbiblical teachings – they are as much of a cult as a cult can be – I really can’t figure out which emotion I am more overwhelmed with Anger, or Sorrow…




In truth, as much as the local group of Campbellites accuse me of trying to draw their members away – I am beginning to wish nothing more than to be able to do just that… to snatch each and every one of them out of the fire that is burning all around them.



Someday this local group (not the physical building – but the spiritual people) are going to collapse in around themselves and all that will be left is charred remains of poor wayward individuals that never knew what it was truly like to be a Christian.


Should I be angry or should I be sad – I’m overwhelmed with both…

Hypocrites

To anyone out there, that will care about someone only as long as they agree with every minute detail of their theology (no matter how poorly their theology is built and supported) – all I have to say is “goodbye and good riddens”.



Mat 23:13 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.[c]


Mat 23:15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as you are.


Mat 23:16 “Woe to you, blind guides! You say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it means nothing; but if anyone swears by the gold of the temple, he is bound by his oath.’


Mat 23:17 You blind fools! Which is greater: the gold, or the temple that makes the gold sacred?


Mat 23:18 You also say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it means nothing; but if anyone swears by the gift on it, he is bound by his oath.’


Mat 23:19 You blind men! Which is greater: the gift, or the altar that makes the gift sacred?


Mat 23:20 Therefore, he who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it.


Mat 23:21 And he who swears by the temple swears by it and by the one who dwells in it.


Mat 23:22 And he who swears by heaven swears by God’s throne and by the one who sits on it.


Mat 23:23 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cummin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.


Mat 23:24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.


Mat 23:25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.


Mat 23:26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.


Mat 23:27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men’s bones and everything unclean.


Mat 23:28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.


Mat 23:29 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous.


Mat 23:30 And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’


Mat 23:31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets.


Mat 23:32 Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your forefathers!


Mat 23:33 “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell?


Hypocrites

The law of the Inner Circle

“The Law of Inner Circle teaches us that the leader’s potential is determined by those closest to him, or her.” – John C. Maxwell (A World Class Mentality).


What this says to me is: Find people that you would most like to be like, and spend your time with them.


I am not Jed, I am becoming Jed

Ok, sounds strange – but let me help you understand (it’s all pretty simple).


Each and every day of my life, I have experiences from the past, and experiences in the present that change me, that mold me, that make me who I am. The Jed of tomorrow, is not the Jed of today. Because of that, when you look at it from an eternal perspective, I am not who Jed is, I am becoming who Jed is.


So what is the point you ask?


Well, when God said “I AM”, what he was saying is “I EXIST”, that is, I am the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, he was saying that he can not change.


To explain this a little further, God, being outside the constraints of time, space and matter, is never becoming God. He is never a different God tomorrow than he was yesterday because a succession of moments and experiences (God can not have a succession of moments, because he is by the definition of God – outside of time which is required for a succession of moments, and change).


So when God said “I AM” – it was a declaration of what God is – what God has to be, it is so far from human comprehension, and yet, it gives us so much understanding about his nature. He is the creator that is not created, the mover that is not moved, He is One.


Praise be to God!

Scary…. but he survived….

If you didn’t see it on the news thursday night, my older brother came close to death in a motorcycle accident on I95 on his way home from work…


He was half way passing a Tractor Trailer at about 70 miles per hour, when it veered into his lane; forcing him off the road; hitting the rumble strip, loosing control of his bike, being thrown into the air and landing face down; bike going one way – him going another.


My father who was in front of him on his bike saw the whole thing in his rear view mirror and thought he had been killed.


“oh my God, oh my God” was his words of desperation, which is ironic, as it was the first thing I said hearing that he had been in a serious accident on I95 (I knew he never wears a helmet).


It’s scarey how life can be be pulled away so fast, so unexpectedly, it’s scarey to think this morning when I woke up, that I could have been waking up to a new day without someone who has been part of my life for the last 30 years.


It’s scarey to think that his wife and children may not have had a father if just one little atom was placed differently in that whole accident.


It’s scarey to think that someone might have had to tell his children or wife that he had died there on I95 a little after 4 in the afternoon, unexpected and instantly.


It’s scarey because any day it could happen to me or my father; as we both ride bikes too, and someone would be telling our families in our abscense.


It’s scarey – because he is my brother – and of course I love him.


It’s all scarey, but praise to the Lord that he has survived!


He has multiple fractures in his back and neck, and a broken wrist. He has shattered one ankle and had to have it replaced with hardware as well as his other ankle (which he is still waiting for surgeury on).


His life will never be the same again, but he is alive, and for that I am thankful.


Amen.