Spiritual Mathematical Knot
December 26, 2015

Spiritual Mathematical Knot

A conversation on Facebook helped me appreciate the ultimate spiritual mathematical knot – drawing closer to God. Baha'i RingstoneResponding to a Baha’i quote on the challenges inherent in searching for God a friend posted this tongue-in-cheek response “So. Pretty easy overall.” A mathematical formula to describe how easy it might be came to me in a flash. The difficulty we have in finding and drawing near to God equals our actual distance from God divided by how close we think we are. Let’s unpack this spiritual mathematical knot.
 

Thinking we have God in our back pocket creates a mathematical impossibility. You can’t divide by zero. This is the challenge facing those who, like I once did, think they are comparatively closer to God than others. 

A group I once belonged to was über-obedient. We kept many Torah Commandments, like the Sabbath, Holy days, and food laws. By having both the law and the testimony of Christ we believed we were closer to God than anyone else on earth. In some ways, maybe we were. We took God at His Word and organized every aspect of our life around obeying, following and worshiping Him.

impossible divideAnd yet belief in proximity to God kept us from drawing any closer. My personal battle with this is described in painful personal detail across the pages of the first two books of my Trilogy.  The People of the Sign describes my involvement with the Worldwide Church of God and its 1995 implosion. That devastating fail was underscored by many members blaming the other side instead of becoming introspective. Being a victim of divorce and kidnapping helped me understand the two sides. Detachment helped me realize I was nowhere near as close to God as I had thought, opening up the “valley of search” described by the Baha’i quote that led to this blog.

Spiritual Proximity Sensor 2

My personal search around the world is described in The Hardness of the Heart. How we view and treat our fellow man is directly related to how open our heart is to God. Self-sufficiency, judgmental attitudes and the belief that we already have enough of God in our lives creates an impassible divide between us and God.

There are many ways to conclude we are as close to God as possible, which becomes self-fulfilling. How close are you to God?Fear of turning to God due to feelings of guilt and inadequacy are but mirror images of this arrogance. They are also expressions of a focus on ourselves. These too are fetters of ego that create distance.

Yet anyone who thinks they are far away from God can easily draw nearer just by deciding to. Recognizing the distance allows us to instantly decrease it. Think of how Christ welcomed and embraced sinners, while condemning the Pharisees. Apparently such spiritual equations function more like quantum mechanics than classical physics.

How close are you to God?This makes searching for God  sound easier than it is, of course. But on the other hand, we usually make it harder than it is. And I think that was the point of my friend’s cheeky, and well-timed response to my Facebook post. Thank God for friends who help us untie spiritual mathematical knots. Or tie them, as the case may be.

Are you as close to God as you want to be? Or knot? John 13:35 says everyone can know who follows Christ by a simple test. Do you know what it is?
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The Iran Reset is a Boiling Frog
September 7, 2015

The Iran Reset is a Boiling Frog

Powell IranColin Powell is cautiously in favor of the Iran Reset, so we who oppose it on rational grounds must sit up and take notice. Yet the most telling quote in the linked article was “With respect to the Iranians, it’s don’t trust, never trust, and always verify,” Powell said. “And I think a very vigorous verification regime has been put in place.”

Setting aside the fact that our past verification regime has failed because of the advanced refinement of Iran’s capabilities in subterfuge, deception and duplicity, this key question demands an answer. If we don’t trust them, at this point, and should never trust them, and we FINALLY had them (through all the international sanctions) at the point of negotiation, why have we offered so much, for so little, to a nation that clearly has NO intention of adhering to the agreement?

Obama reset IranIn my view it boils down (pun intended) to whether or not the US feels it has behaved so badly that we have to give Iran a mile-high-stack of get-out-of-jail free cards on past behaviors – the kind of “reset” that the Obama administration gave Russia.

And while no nation on earth, including the US, is squeaky clean – by any stretch of the imagination, that is no reason to give one of the most cancerous regimes on the planet, in terms of global security and peace, such a windfall of new opportunity to reveal its spots. These spots are, after all, already so much on display that they have become a kind of boiled-frog camouflage. The rest of the world is jaded and accepting of them.

Given where all this is clearly trending, despite Powell’s “balanced” position – I still say nay. And to the Colin Powells of the world, those who are principled and who seek rational, moderate, and peaceful paths, within the ambient temperature of today’s waters, I offer the following thoughts. As we seek to retain objectivity and approach our current situation rationally we must include a broader historical perspective.  Here, for example, is an article that challenges convention by pointing out a number of “inconvenient truths” from the past, that should ABSOLUTELY be considered in any present-day decisions. A few of the bulleted highlights are included below:
  • Forgotten is that the “Palestinian people” and the “Palestinian cause” are a mythic narrative invented by the KGB and Nasser’s secret service propaganda machine in the 1960s.
  • Hamas has an even more genocidal goal: the destruction of Israel and all Jews. For many journalists, that is also a detail not worth mentioning.
  • The Iranian regime claims non-stop that its main objective is the elimination of Israel and Israeli Jews. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has just published a book, Palestine, detailing his plans to destroy Israel.

Frog Iran ResetThat these points possibly seem hysteric, or have the taint of conspiracy theory makes my point for me. Rather than reject them because they are outside the mainstream, try to prove them factually wrong, if you can.  And be aware that myopic present-situation-colored reset buttons are the ideological equivalent of boiling a frog in water. We accept the increased heat as the new norm. This is very risky approach – one which all warm-blooded species should avoid at all costs.

 

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Supporting the POTUS
June 26, 2015

Supporting the POTUS

ConstitutionIn a recent online discussion I voiced disagreement with the President of the United States (POTUS) and was reminded that since he is President of my country I must support him.

Yes, the POTUS is the President. But the US Constitution is built upon the separation of Powers – between the President, the Congress, and the Judicial system (the Law).

separation of powersThe President had Congress behind him, in an almost unprecedented way, upon his election 6 years ago. Under his leadership his party has lost “control” of congress, and he is now acting in opposition to Congress. This is one reason Congress invited Netanyahu to speak, to provide a counterpoint to negotiations the President is conducting which specifically do not have the support of a majority of the American population, which many, myself included, deem wrongheaded and reckless, and which endanger the security of America and the world. In the American democracy we have not only the right, but the obligation, to make these views known, in an effort to influence and moderate the President’s decisions.

Further, the global Nuclear Non-proliferation treaty is a legal document.

The President does NOT have the authority to unilaterally change that treaty, which (if the reports are accurate) he is undermining in his negotiations with Iran at this point in time. If he then proceeds to execute an agreement with Iran without congressional approval, he will be acting in violation of the law, and will serve to further destabilize the world which was made a safer place through the execution of that Non-proliferation treaty.

Already other nations are positioning themselves for the new “treaty-violated” world Obama is creating. Exhibit A is the agreement the Saudi’s reached with North Korea.

Thus, while my discussion partner made a valid point, it is pointless. I fully support the President of the US, so long as the President is acting within the constitutional rights we elected him to exercise and also uphold. To the degree he is acting outside those rights, or violating them, we need to support the Congress and the Judicial branch even if it means opposing the President.

That is the nature of the balance of powers which is what, even more than presidential leadership, has made this country great.

Nuclear NonproliferationObama betrayed that trust when he failed to take meaningful action to protect the sovereignty of Ukraine against the Russian aggression in Crimea, and he is apparently proceeding with a disastrous deal with Iran. I am very, very far from being a hawk. I think war is atrocious, and I do not wish to send American’s overseas to fight wars.

But I am also a student of history and geopolitics. As such, I know for an undeniable fact, that when we pursue the path of appeasement so infamously pursued by Chamberlain, vs. the path of opposition so famously advocated by Churchill, the result is more war, death, destruction and chaos, not less.

Unfortunately it has become very clear in the last 4 years that Obama is pursuing a path worse than that taken by Chamberlain. Obama is not only appeasing aggressor states, he is advocating for the expansion of their influence, power and even military capabilities, in the case of both Russia, which his “reset” and more importantly, the entire Muslim world, beginning with his support for the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which pushed that country towards the brink of chaos, from which it thankfully recovered, from his failure to adhere to his own “red line” in Syria, in favor of letting Russia’s role increase, his withdrawal from Iraq, leading to the rise of Isis, and now his overt efforts to empower, embolden and even encourage Iran to continue it’s aggressive regional expansion.

The story of The Old Lady who Swallowed a Fly comes to mind. We’re about to start choking on the Iranian horse intended to catch the ISIS cow we allowed by ignoring the Syrian dog when we swallowed the cat of withdrawing from Iraq.

The thinking that got us here einsteinDespite the president’s ludicrous claim, just a few months ago, that the world was a safer place, anyone who is able to assess the world objectively understands that nothing could be further from the truth.

Interestingly, the Virtue Card randomly chosen to conclude this blog was Initiative. Here are some of the quotes from the card: “Initiative is originality and creativity in action. When we have initiative we boldly express new ideas, discover a new method, or find a different way to solve a problem.”

We can fix this, America, but given how far we’ve strayed it’s not going to be easy. The time to take initiative is now.

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The Mastermind
April 28, 2015

The Mastermind

The MastermindTurkish leaders have produced an Anti-Semitic movie called “The Mastermind”, which resurrects the old lie about Jewish domination of the planet. What can I say about such a topic that hasn’t already been said? Not much.

So I’ll just give voice to my opinion that there is a Mastermind – a divine Being who holds the whole world in His hand – and has foretold the future of mankind, and its segments, such as the Jews and the Muslims and the Christians, and the Nations that have formed around and out of these major religions.

Buchenwald

Was Buchenwald part of the Jewish masterplan?

So while the new movie “The Mastermind” tells one version of the story, here is, in my view, a snapshot of why that story seems credible to one set of religious fanatics. The verses below are not the evil master plan of world domination, written and followed by those tiny tribes known as The Jews and the minor regional player known then, and now, as Israel. History shows us that they were decimated by the Holocaust and that the world threw the handful of survivors, barely clinging to life, onto the destitute shores of the postage-stamp-sized piece of desert real-estate they have claimed as their homeland.

Yes, they have worked hard to build a nation for their tiny sliver of mankind on that tiny sliver of land. But now, as it has been throughout their history, they look to God to grant them what He wishes them to have, rather than take it by conquest. Those whom Psalm 2 calls “The Heathen” would do well to recognize and honor this version of the story.

Psalm 2 – King James Version: Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure. Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion.

bytdvd house of david City of David Commons

Biblical Zion – the City of David. Per Turkey a building block of the Mastermind’s evil plan

I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel. Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth.

Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him.

The random Virtue card I pulled to close out this blog with was Purposefulness.  Honestly. Seriously. After fully drafting the above. As is the case with Psalm 2, and its fulfillment in broad daylight today – you simply can’t make this stuff up.

“Purposefulness is being aware that each of us is here for a reason. We value our lives by discovering the part we are uniquely meant to play. We discern our intention and focus on it mindfully”.

Amen.Celestial Signs of the Covenants

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