A Conversation at the Gate
“ I don’t understand, Lord! Why am I over here with the goats and not in that flock of sheep headed for heaven?”
The Lord replied, “Truly I have tried to make humans understand what I really want, but they have refused to hear my message and they make up their own doctrines. That is not what I want.”
“But Lord, haven’t I studied the Bible daily, found the TRUTH in the Adventist church, always kept the Commandments faithfully, went to church on the correct Sabbath day, the seventh day, and believed in the spirit of prophecy?“
The Lord replied, “I have never forgotten anything, and I don’t remember saying any of those things. I gave you new commandments--love God, love your fellow man. I made examples of the priests and Levites, who kept those old commandments to the letter, but had no love for anyone but themselves.
“But Lord, weren’t they God’s chosen people?”
“That was an early misunderstanding from the very beginning. As any parent would, I told them they were special and loved. They mistook that to mean they were better than all the rest of my children. So many make that mistake!”
“So there’s nothing special about being Adventist?”
“The Lord said, “The only thing special is how much harder it is for Adventists to quit worrying about keeping that old law to the letter, and quit acting like they are something special. That was the sin of the Levites, and I abhor self-righteousness.”
I said,”Well then, I guess I don’t have to keep the Sabbath any more.”
God said,”Have to? Have to? Have to? I made the Sabbath for man, not the other way around! That law was given to slave owners who worked their slaves all day every day. I was trying to show them that loving people should allow their workers at least one day a week off for rest and relaxation. But the religious leaders made it a test, a burden--something for people to watch and judge others by. That rule was to give your employees a break, not so some people could feel more righteous than others.”
“In every way I tried to point out that the Sabbath is a joyous day off from the regular grind. I pointed out that it is OK to prepare food if you are hungry, it is OK to go out and rescue livestock that are stuck in the ditch, that it is OK to pick up your bedroll if you need to move it, in spite of what the Levites think.”
I asked, “Were the Levites really so bad? You seem to have it in for them.”
He said, “Yes, but only because I love them so much, and like wayward children, they are so stubborn and hard headed they will not listen to me. I told a parable of the Good Samaritan, and they missed the meaning entirely! They just thought we should like good guys like the Samaritan.”
“I was contrasting the priest, a great leader of the church, who was in a hurry and didn’t have time to stop and help the wounded man beside the road; the Levite, who was of the tribe of the temple men, who were proud that the Ten Commandments were entrusted to them and who strove to show how righteous they were, and how correctly they kept every detail of the law; and a heathen Samaritan who did not know or keep any Jewish law and were hated by the Jews just like the Palestinians are now. The Samaritan was the one who stopped to help the wounded man, bandage his injuries, and take him to a place of refuge.”
“So you like the heathen Samaritan better than the religious Jews?”
God said, “I made them all and I love them all, but only the Samaritan had my spirit of love inside him. I wish all humans could just accept my love in their hearts, and quit fussing about the details of religious doctrines.”
I wondered, “Surely there is one religion that is the TRUE religion. Which is it?”
The Lord replied, “All of them and none of them. LOVE is the true religion, and if you have my love in you, you have the true religion. I have faithful loving children who are Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, heathen and even Adventist. Look around and see the love pouring out of my followers all over the world.”
“My apostle Paul wrote a whole chapter on the fruits of the spirit--the things we should see if a person has my spirit of love in him. Not once in the whole chapter did he write ‘doctrinally correct’, or ‘law keeping’. In fact, in another of his letters, the one to the Galations, he makes it plain that righteousness does not come from law keeping. Having your name on the membership rolls of the Adventist church is not a ticket to the kingdom. In fact, as I mentioned before, it might be an impediment.”
“It sounds hard to do.” I commented.
The Lord replied, “Only if you refuse to turn loose of the things of this world, to quit grasping at false objects of desire. There is no lasting happiness in money or the things that money can buy. How many rich people kill themselves every day learning this lesson too late? The only lasting joy is in loving other people and working together with fellow humans.”
“But some of them are lazy, no good bums!” I countered. “They’re hard to love.”
“Yes, sometimes it seems that way, doesn’t it?” God said. “But the rule is to let me judge--not you. Men look on the outside, but I can see the heart and I know the end from the beginning. If you have love you will feel the need to do the right thing.”
“Compassion will compel you to help feed hungry children any way you can, even if their mother is trapped in drug addiction. Love will cause you to visit those in jail, even though they may have committed some horrible crime. When you see a beggar on the street, your non-judgmental love will push you to buy an extra burger and drink and take it to him. If you have love, this will not be much of a trial to overcome.”
“But Lord, what if they are taking advantage of my goodness?”
He reminded me that he had covered that topic in the Sermon on the Mount. He said, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you.”
“I want to believe, but I need more faith. Can you help me?” I asked.
God said, “You must only believe that my grace and mercy are sufficient to cover your doubt. I once found a pagan Roman Centurion who had more faith than all of Israel.”
“Is it too late?” I asked, still standing on the wrong side of the gate.
“I am not willing that any should perish.” said the Lord. “With me, all things are possible! Since you have asked, be filled with my love, and enter into the kingdom.”
Monday, July 21, 2014
Sunday, July 6, 2014
Observations
Observations:
Did you ever notice that most of the Liberal Colleges and Universities are located in the wealthy and prosperous East and West Coasts, and the Conservative Christian Colleges and Universities are located in the poorer South and Central states? Wonder if there’s a connection?
Did you ever notice that when the country was governed by tax and spend Liberals from 1940 through 1980, the country has never been so prosperous, even as the top tax rate was over 90%? And when the supply side conservatives came to power in 1980 and started to cut taxes, the country has been struggling ever since? Maybe Friedman and Laffer were wrong, and so was Herbert Hoover? Judging by the broad macroeconomic results, I think Galbraith and Keynes were onto something.
Have you ever noticed that in fundamentalist Christian colleges they read books telling how old the earth is, they listen to professors and preachers expound on the age of the earth, but they never, ever, pick up the scientific tools and go out and actually measure the age of the earth? They only do that at the Liberal colleges.
I was raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church, whose prophet (Ellen G. White), taught that someday Catholics and Protestants would unite and tear down the religious freedom in the USA. She predicted that Sunday would become the national day of worship, and religions who kept other days holy would suffer persecution.
It was not an especially prescient prediction, looking at history. The USA was exceptional in being the first country to guarantee freedom of religion, and the founders all knew that only eternal vigilance would prevent religion from becoming part of the government again. Every religion, it seems, has an overwhelming desire to impose their dogma on everybody.
I came to doubt that it would happen in my lifetime--the gulf of suspicion and hatred between Protestant and Catholic was so huge. Now I’m having doubts about my doubts. I remember when JFK ran for president this same church was aghast at the thought that the end was near. Some were counting the years from 1844 to 1964 and deciding that span of time related to the text “as it was in the days of Noah.” Yes, he preached 120 years and then the end came! Some were disappointed yet again.
Now the majority of the Supreme Court is Catholic, they are eagerly tearing down the wall of separation between church and state, and Adventists, or at least those members I am still acquainted with, seem to love it. I find their blindness to the potential religious takeover ironic and somewhat amusing.
The first move was to declare a corporation is a person, able to hold religious beliefs and rights. Corporations are a legal construct meant to separate human owners of a business from legal liability for the actions of the business. Not answered by the Supreme Court is if an owner of a company can declare the religious beliefs of the corporation, can plaintiffs sue the owners now because they are no longer a separate entity from the corporation?
Could there be a connection in the future between the text in Revelation about being unable to “buy and sell” and the elevation of corporations to personhood? That was always difficult to understand before, but with corporations being persons, not so much.
Most Judeo-Christian-Islamic religions subordinate women, including my former church. I have been watching for a couple of decades as they wrestle with whether to allow women to be ordained into the ministry. Adventists don’t share the utter contempt for women that the Catholic church displays when they stand by and allow a woman to suffer an agonizing death from an ectopic pregnancy rather than abort the fetus.
But many Protestant religions seem to transfer blame to the woman if she gets pregnant, even if by rape or incest. If she accidentally gets pregnant outside of marriage, there will be no end of judgement and condemnation, and she will be punished by being forced to bear the child. Abortion has become the wedge to insert religion into this once secular, religiously free country.
Actually, not just abortion, but all birth control, as the Justices “clarified” the day after the momentous Hobby Lobby decision. They confirmed the right of any “closely held” corporation with a “deeply felt, sincere belief” to refuse coverage for any form of birth control--the exact Catholic dogma of the five Justices who ruled for the the majority.
The priests of Jesus’ day had no love or compassion for the woman caught in adultery as they brought her to Jesus for condemnation and stoning. Modern day religious leaders still have no love or compassion for the woman who wants to enjoy sex without pregnancy. The only feeling they have for the woman is disgust, as they call her a slut, a whore, a sinner. Nothing has changed except, because of scientific knowledge, they can now transfer the love and mercy they should be showing the woman onto a single cell they arbitrarily define as a human being, even though they can’t see it without a microscope. All the love goes to an ovum, and all the hate goes to the woman. Not much has changed in two thousand years.
Today I read that the Pope has urged his people to stop working on Sunday. In an article by Mark Oppenheimer of The New York Times,
Pope Francis said, ”More and more people work on Sundays as a consequence of the competitiveness imposed by a consumer society.” In such cases, he concludes, “work ends up dehumanizing people.”
In Catholicism, Pope Francis suggests, the Sabbath actually is supposed to matter — the whole day, not just Mass. For as the catechism teaches, in Paragraph 2185, “On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord’s Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.”
Who better to carry out the wishes of the Pope than five Catholic Supreme Court Justices and corporations with religious rights to impose on their employees?
Revelation says “even the very elect” will be deceived. I am wondering when the light will dawn as they realize they have helped to bring on the very thing they have been warning against all these years.
********
I need to make a correction on the reference to ectopic pregnancy. The case to which I was referring was actually a case of pulmonary hypertension. The link is here for further study: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excommunication_of_Margaret_McBride
Did you ever notice that most of the Liberal Colleges and Universities are located in the wealthy and prosperous East and West Coasts, and the Conservative Christian Colleges and Universities are located in the poorer South and Central states? Wonder if there’s a connection?
Did you ever notice that when the country was governed by tax and spend Liberals from 1940 through 1980, the country has never been so prosperous, even as the top tax rate was over 90%? And when the supply side conservatives came to power in 1980 and started to cut taxes, the country has been struggling ever since? Maybe Friedman and Laffer were wrong, and so was Herbert Hoover? Judging by the broad macroeconomic results, I think Galbraith and Keynes were onto something.
Have you ever noticed that in fundamentalist Christian colleges they read books telling how old the earth is, they listen to professors and preachers expound on the age of the earth, but they never, ever, pick up the scientific tools and go out and actually measure the age of the earth? They only do that at the Liberal colleges.
I was raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church, whose prophet (Ellen G. White), taught that someday Catholics and Protestants would unite and tear down the religious freedom in the USA. She predicted that Sunday would become the national day of worship, and religions who kept other days holy would suffer persecution.
It was not an especially prescient prediction, looking at history. The USA was exceptional in being the first country to guarantee freedom of religion, and the founders all knew that only eternal vigilance would prevent religion from becoming part of the government again. Every religion, it seems, has an overwhelming desire to impose their dogma on everybody.
I came to doubt that it would happen in my lifetime--the gulf of suspicion and hatred between Protestant and Catholic was so huge. Now I’m having doubts about my doubts. I remember when JFK ran for president this same church was aghast at the thought that the end was near. Some were counting the years from 1844 to 1964 and deciding that span of time related to the text “as it was in the days of Noah.” Yes, he preached 120 years and then the end came! Some were disappointed yet again.
Now the majority of the Supreme Court is Catholic, they are eagerly tearing down the wall of separation between church and state, and Adventists, or at least those members I am still acquainted with, seem to love it. I find their blindness to the potential religious takeover ironic and somewhat amusing.
The first move was to declare a corporation is a person, able to hold religious beliefs and rights. Corporations are a legal construct meant to separate human owners of a business from legal liability for the actions of the business. Not answered by the Supreme Court is if an owner of a company can declare the religious beliefs of the corporation, can plaintiffs sue the owners now because they are no longer a separate entity from the corporation?
Could there be a connection in the future between the text in Revelation about being unable to “buy and sell” and the elevation of corporations to personhood? That was always difficult to understand before, but with corporations being persons, not so much.
Most Judeo-Christian-Islamic religions subordinate women, including my former church. I have been watching for a couple of decades as they wrestle with whether to allow women to be ordained into the ministry. Adventists don’t share the utter contempt for women that the Catholic church displays when they stand by and allow a woman to suffer an agonizing death from an ectopic pregnancy rather than abort the fetus.
But many Protestant religions seem to transfer blame to the woman if she gets pregnant, even if by rape or incest. If she accidentally gets pregnant outside of marriage, there will be no end of judgement and condemnation, and she will be punished by being forced to bear the child. Abortion has become the wedge to insert religion into this once secular, religiously free country.
Actually, not just abortion, but all birth control, as the Justices “clarified” the day after the momentous Hobby Lobby decision. They confirmed the right of any “closely held” corporation with a “deeply felt, sincere belief” to refuse coverage for any form of birth control--the exact Catholic dogma of the five Justices who ruled for the the majority.
The priests of Jesus’ day had no love or compassion for the woman caught in adultery as they brought her to Jesus for condemnation and stoning. Modern day religious leaders still have no love or compassion for the woman who wants to enjoy sex without pregnancy. The only feeling they have for the woman is disgust, as they call her a slut, a whore, a sinner. Nothing has changed except, because of scientific knowledge, they can now transfer the love and mercy they should be showing the woman onto a single cell they arbitrarily define as a human being, even though they can’t see it without a microscope. All the love goes to an ovum, and all the hate goes to the woman. Not much has changed in two thousand years.
Today I read that the Pope has urged his people to stop working on Sunday. In an article by Mark Oppenheimer of The New York Times,
Pope Francis said, ”More and more people work on Sundays as a consequence of the competitiveness imposed by a consumer society.” In such cases, he concludes, “work ends up dehumanizing people.”
In Catholicism, Pope Francis suggests, the Sabbath actually is supposed to matter — the whole day, not just Mass. For as the catechism teaches, in Paragraph 2185, “On Sundays and other holy days of obligation, the faithful are to refrain from engaging in work or activities that hinder the worship owed to God, the joy proper to the Lord’s Day, the performance of the works of mercy, and the appropriate relaxation of mind and body.”
Who better to carry out the wishes of the Pope than five Catholic Supreme Court Justices and corporations with religious rights to impose on their employees?
Revelation says “even the very elect” will be deceived. I am wondering when the light will dawn as they realize they have helped to bring on the very thing they have been warning against all these years.
********
I need to make a correction on the reference to ectopic pregnancy. The case to which I was referring was actually a case of pulmonary hypertension. The link is here for further study: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excommunication_of_Margaret_McBride
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