What Do We Do Now?

August 12, 2011
Post 211 (temporarily posted)
Continued
* * *

I am in a very real and personal way beginning to understand the conflict of the disciples in the very tangible storm that was sure to sink them as Jesus lay sleeping in the back of the boat (Matthew 8:23-27, Luke 8:22-25).
They look at the horrific storm, then at Jesus sleeping, then at each other and had to wonder; "What is going on here? Are we supposed to fight this one out as the seamen we are? No, clearly that is impossible, this storm is just too big even for us" “And they were filled with water, and were in jeopardy” Luke 8:23.
"Are we supposed to just shrug, going down with the ship in the attitude of C'est La Vie?" No, that is hopeless surrender.
"Are we supposed to wake the Lord as if he really doesn't know what is going on?"

At the time, they simply ran out of options and picked the one that that seemed less wrong; they woke the LORD.
And what was Jesus' reply? "...Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm." Matthew 8:26, “…Where is your faith?...” Luke 8:25.
What was the cause of such a reply? The circumstances clearly warranted such a logical reaction from them of all people; men of the sea who know the difference between a good blow and a deadly storm, and they did the right thing by turning to the Lord for help. So why rebuke them?
The focus of the rebuke was on their faith. They were actually with the Creator of the universe, the Son of God. The condition they found themselves collectively in was really no different than Peter walking on the water to the Lord (Matthew 14:29). Everything has a different scope when the perspective is focused on the Maker than it does when our personal circumstances come clearly before our eye of focus. If they really comprehended who was in the boat with them they would have been excited to experience the boat sink to the bottom with them all just to see what Jesus would do in giving them life on the sea floor! This is God were talking about who was their personal companion in that moment! If he wanted them all to die in the sea that night taking them with him to paradise should that have bothered them? But here in the flesh our eyes are stuck to our personal comforts and appearance of safety and what our eyes see gives the motive of our response.
This is why Jesus replied as he did, their focus and comprehension was not yet where he wanted it to be, and so he arose and calmed the sea and their comprehension was expanded by his rebuke.
So what if they had the next level of faith using my marksmanship analogy? What if they did not wake the Lord at that time?
I'm betting things would have gotten worse. Its quite possible the ship would have sunk from under them and they found themselves bobbing around in the great storm until they then cried out to him in panic, at which time Jesus would have still responded the same. Why? Because the purpose of the event was to grow their faith beyond wherever it was presently. Remember, no matter what level our skill, the degree of difficulty remains the same because the parameters of acceptable grow smaller at each level.
How do I know? because later when their faith was much greater so was the circumstance in which they found themselves.
* * *

Jesus, the long awaited, prophesied Messiah, the Savior of the Jews, their personal master and flight instructor.... was killed. Not in some metaphorical way, the man was brutally killed in suffering and was DEAD.

NOW what do they do?
What were they supposed to do?
Everything they thought they had been learning from him suddenly made no sense at all, and he was no longer around to ask for an explanation. Its as if in the middle of flight lessons the instructor just suddenly jumps from the plane with no parachute!
What do you do now?
Suddenly all the wisdom from this man you thought was quite wise, comes into question as he just bailed out. What kind of a fool did you have instructing you?
At this point all the good theory and learning in concept suddenly must be fit into a whole new realm of reality through a new reason to seriously investigate its worthiness. This is like starting over entirely in all that you thought you knew so well as you now take control of the plane for the first time even though you had long been flying it with the instructor sitting next to you. First Solo is virtually nothing new but everything seems new by reason of responsibility.
These great doubts of the disciples were hard not to see as validated by the logic of those standing around at his crucifixion;
"He trusted in God; let him deliver him now, if he will have him: for he said, I am the Son of God." Matthew 27:43
and as the disciples watched they had to be wondering too. Their gauges had been blackend out and they were now suddenly flying by the seat of their pants, captain of their own choices.
What were they supposed to do?
This is really no different that the event in the sea, which was really no different that the servants given talents before the master departed; only the degree of difficulty had increased to challenge their level of increased faith.
The scriptures tell us what the disciples did as recorded in Luke 24:11-14,19-24, and John 21:2-3. None of these things were actions of sound faith but neither were they faithless, they simply went about what is done naturally while they contemplated how to apply it all to the reality they knew.
So lets not continue to lean on them for their confusion, we have the record of events that played out. We know how it all worked out. Now we must apply what we know to our own level of testing, in our own circumstances of very real challenge.
And so I find myself in my personal challenge apprehensive to share it now before its all completed because until the end the logic of my conduct is all just speculation seen by some as foolish and other as ignorant and me as faith. The world is melting down around me and I don’t at all like the obvious outcome. But knowing what I know of the gospel story and seeing my own miraculous provision in the work I have been called to, can I now panic in thinking Jesus is asleep and unknowing of my circumstance? Have I cried out to him for help? You bet I have though not yet in panic, and he has remained silent. Am I concerned? Of course I am, I would rather avoid capsize if possible but at this point avoidance is not possible without His aid. But If the Lord wills that my ship sink from under me it is because he has something else in mind for me that the ship cannot do. I am declaring my faith is practical and I am putting to action what my words of philosophy declare is true.

As I now find myself at the controls with the gauges blackend and the instructor sleeping I see a great mountainous box-canyon I am already flying into. There is no way to gain altitude over it and no room to turn around in it. This is looking bad. But is this not God himself who intentionally placed me in this situation before leaving me to myself? My gut reaction is to find the nearest grass patch and put her down, but that is not the scenario given to me so I maintain my present heading and wear myself out looking for the option I am supposed to see all the wile knowing things are quickly getting worse. How long do you go before your faith fails you and you cry “Uncle” in disbelief? Time will tell, and I don’t like this one bit…. But I’m in because I am in the hand of the LORD. I actually now want what he wants for me even though I don't think I like the flavor of whats coming. This is trust.
“Cast thy burden upon the LORD, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.” Psalm 55:22

Don’t imagine this verse says he wont let you suffer. Hardly. In fact it seems that most of the righteous are allotted to suffer. It is the sustenance it is the stable position in Him that he promises to maintain. Often it is suffering itself that solidifies the position. But I have blathered on too long as it is. Only at the other side of this will my words be more than theory. I simply wanted you to know a bit of the circumstances that have delayed my blogging while I sort this out.
*

How Do We Follow Where We Don’t Understand?

August 11, 2011
post 210 (posted temporarily)

Follows both post 208 “Two Masters” and temp. post 209 “6th 7 Maintenance”

Going from where we see the map shows we are to where we are going is quite simple, Following instructions that make sense is easy, Doing what you are told is not hard… once you agree with the directions.
The trouble in these three scenarios comes if we don’t agree, if we have a differing opinion:
“I might not like the destination, I might not prefer the rout, I might think there is a better way, I’m not confident the instructions are correct.” With these “second master” conflicts the trouble is a divided leadership. The first decision then should be to wholly choose the leader to follow (Revelation 3:15).
This conflict has many factors and as many resolutions to choosing the master. Is the master trustworthy? What kind of trackrecord does it have? What makes my differing opinion better or worse? What are the consequences of failure? etc. etc. In this case choosing the master is the conflict, once that is decided most if not all the conflicts disappear. The scriptures are full of wisdom and clarification and logic and reason and history and prophecy to aid us in making that decision.

But after we have fully made the choice and elected God to be our master and have spent years of learning to trust his directions, what do we do when suddenly where and how to follow is not clear? “I want to follow with all my heart, I choose to follow with all my mind, I determine to follow with all my will, but I have no idea HOW to follow because the GPS seems to be broken, the instructions don’t make sense or seem to be missing entirely.”
You change the batteries and bang on the unit, you call the emergency phone number but it doesn’t ring through, you recall all your memories of what you heard but nothing seems to fit your present situation. You find yourself half way to nowhere, and with no direction.
What do you do then?

Why are the scriptures so silent on this topic yet Christians periodically find themselves in this situation? Surely God must have said something about this situation.

The reasonable Christian will immediately point to the questioner as having been the cause of the breakdown in the instruction chain, you ran over the GPS or didn’t charge the batteries, you didn’t pay the phone bill, you misunderstood the directions, etc. and usually this is indeed the case. We should always begin here to search out the cause of how we got off track, make the necessary correction and get back to known ground to then proceed by the instructions this time with greater attention. This is understood,
but have you not tried to put together a product where the instructions appear to have been translated from Chinese to English by a Pakistanian who speaks Arabic and has never seen the product let alone put it together? You really are trying hard to follow the instructions with no self-confident assumptions of wisdom but the parts you have and the instructions just don’t seem to relate properly though you try and try and try to no success? The road you find yourself on by carefully following the map suddenly does not seem to correspond to what is on the map. It simply does not make sense. You back track until the map does match your location and then carefully move forward exactly as the map shows but you find yourself right back in the same confusion. What are you supposed to do then?

Let me explain it with a parable of scripture Matthew 25:14-30:
There are three servants of a single master. He gives each servant a different amount of money/talent for the purpose of making it increase. The scriptures are silent on any instruction that might have come with the cash/talent and the story makes it clear that he then went away and was no longer available for consultation so we must assume they were free to determine the means on their own according to their individual ability. Could they have sold drugs to make the best profit? I don’t think so because every master has his known principles that the servants must follow or be reprimanded for violating just as the parable states in the end. So leaving behind illegal or immoral choices, the servants went about using the money/talent to increase the bottom line for the master. Since the master was wise, he understood the servant’s abilities quite well and gave to them differing amounts directly proportional to their abilities. And so upon his return he called them all in for a reckoning.
I have long been troubled by the fact that there is not a 4th servant given a responsibility that though he tried real hard he still lost money and failed. The only one that failed simply did not try. So what is with that? Are we to suppose there is never a time when we Christians fail to succeed at anything? Are we to imagine we have all knowledge in every situation, and so if we find ourselves confused we must have failed God? Does this not breed foolish arrogance, a thing God clearly condemns? So why do we not see in the parable a servant struggle but fail? I believe the answer lies in what is “between the lines in the parable and I will later explain why.

If the master was gone for a week we would be obligated to conclude the servants made one simple successful investment, but since the concept of interest on a loan comes into the parable with the last servant we can conclude the master was gone for an extended period. So what kind of investments did the servants make? We are not told. How many ventures did they make? we are not told, can we not then accept the idea that just maybe they each made a few unprofitable investments in the effort to succeed? Do you suppose they had all knowledge of finance before being given the job or did they learn a few things in the process? Why did God give each of them different amounts? Because of their different levels of ability. Clearly they did not have all knowledge of business but they did have enough to manage what they were given. Is there room to allow that they found themselves with decisions that troubled them in the process? I think so. But the point of the parable is that inspite of the conflicts faced and overcome through the process they succeeded in the end and the end result is what matters. In this parable is the message that no servant of God will end in failure if he actually tries. But don’t miss the side point that there are servants of God who will utterly fail because they dwell on fear of failure and so don’t try. These will not go unpunished as they are highly offensive to God. Try and fail is a successful instructor that can lead to success by eliminating unsuccessful paths.
Is your GPS broken at the moment? Is the map you have lacking in clarity of your present situation? Is the instruction you received not answering your condition at the moment? After first diligently attempting to resolve error on your part, but failing to find the solution, Use your current level of wisdom to make the best effort following what you know of the nature of God, and wing it.
Might it lead to momentary failure? Sure. But there is one thing you can bank on; the failure will not destroy you, it will be a useful tool in future efforts that will indeed end in success. The Jews are the people of God. They have gotten way off track but have not stopped trying. They have failed a lot, yet God has promised them success in the end. It’s going to be pretty hard to try honestly but still mess up as bad as they have so you have lots of room if your heart is right. The greater the possible consequences the more earnest we try to make the right choices, this is a good motivator but don’t get frozen in fear of failure; apply your faith in the practice of practical wisdom and see what you get. If that doesn’t seem to work give it another try with another angle of approach. Your master has not given you anymore responsibility than he knows you can deal with to success, to think otherwise is to question the wisdom of God.
Suddenly what seemed to be utter gridlock opens up to a plethora of options to choose from. Stuff the map in the glove box and toss the GPS in the back seat, you know you have the acquired wisdom to make an informed educated guess. See where it goes.
The reason why this is not a thickly discussed topic in scripture is by this time you are wise enough to make right choices in faith. The scripture is more focused on instructing the more common less wise people incapable of good choices without handholding, and the appearance in both cases is remarkably the same. If your GPS is not working and the map is not giving you useful information and you have gone over all the normal possible errors but find nothing, it is because you need to get your eyes off the cockpit instruments and fly by observation, you now have the skills to actually enjoy the flight with the confidence of good training. God, like the instructor, has blacked out the instruments for a time to encourage a next level of skill called Dead-Reckoning or flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants.
Does this mean you are done with the instruments and maps? Of course not! They should be regularly referenced to ensure the proper course is maintained, but they are simply tools of the flight and not the purpose itself. Enjoy the flight and the new level of piloting. God has not left the plane and he is not concerned that you have usurped his command; he has given you the talents to use as you see fit and actually interested in how you choose to use them. By nature you complain that you need the needle-and-ball instrument or the altimeter, or whatever it is that has been blackend out, but God says no, now it’s your job to find another way to get the same job done without that instrument. At this level of training he will periodically black out different instruments for the sake of making your mind and comprehension expand beyond the blind obedience to a gauge. Sure it’s disconcerting at first but you are learning a whole new dimension to piloting. Is the instrument broken? No. Is it unnecessary now? No. Is proper dead-reckoning in conflict with the gauge? No, but by your experience of trusting the gauge while learning, you gained a “feel” for the way things should be even without the direct and constant observation of the gauge *1. At this point of training you simply know by feel if things are right or need correction and so the same job gets done with less effort and restriction. The gauge is now there as a short but frequent reference to insure your “feel” is still correct, and it is there for the times when your “sight” becomes obscured or uncertain. The gauge is always right while your “sight and feel” can become deceitful in bad weather or "off" by slothfulness.
The tug-o-war over leadership is not a question here and a thing of the past, and God now takes pleasure in your “management” of his money/talent. You are no longer a simple laborer doing exactly as told, and are now a trusted servant. Rejoice! Learn to take pleasure in the success of your training and the confidence the master has placed in you. Simply don’t ever forget that when your “feel” and the gauge are in conflict, it is the gauge that is always right, The Scripture is the gauge and you should never fly believing otherwise.

Posting such an article causes me great concern as perhaps 1 out of every 1000 might actually apply it properly though 900 of those 1000 will feel it applies to them *2. Perhaps this is why the scriptures are relatively silent on the topic, but the days now upon us are of such deception that they will even be able to corrupt our comprehension of the instruments if we have not learned how to fly so well that we don’t recall directly observing the gauges though we actually scan them constantly as every good pilot does.
Isn’t it curious that our founders spent years in school reading and studying the scriptures themselves, then spent a few hours privately every day in the same as adults, yet when writing the Constitution for the Government of the new Christian nation, we find virtually no direct religion written into law although the entire document is bursting with the practical application of scripture. They did not preach their faith, they lived it. They were skilled pilots and trusted servants able to accurately fly by the seat of their pants from the skill of understanding the gauges and how to use them in flight without fixating on them.

How do you know if you are given the instructional dead-reckoning training or have run aground in error and find yourself where you don’t belong? Good question.
Primarily there are two answers;
1st How well versed are you in flying by the instruments? If you are low hours or still shaky with confidence in the gauges (scripture) I’m betting you simply are in error and need to find your way back to solid ground where the gauges tell you you should be but aren’t.
2nd How hard have you tried to find your error? Since this is most often the cause of the condition this is the place to make a diligent investigation. And after investigating and finding nothing… investigate again trust the gauges they will help you find your error.
Continued.
* * * * * * *

*1 “Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.” II Corinthians 3:6

*2 Because of the great possibility to misapply this post I must also declare that flight instructors also have in their bag of tricks a long narrow hood. Unlike the suctioncup like gauge covers for the student fixated on the gauges, this hood is worn by the student to block his view of anything but the instrument panel. Many student pilots want to prematurely fly by dead reckoning looking out the window and must be forced by the hood to learn to understand and trust the gauges by the inability to look out the window. In fact far more students are susceptible to this weakness than the other but this simple example of two different tools for two different students learning to fly the very same plane is an example of both the law and grace or obedience and salvation promoted in scripture. Many have a tough time with the apparent contradiction not realizing they are different focuses of learning for different weaknesses of students to the same end of successful faith. If you are naturally good at one angle, that is not the angle you should pursue in scripture. You should study the angle that chafes you until you understand it too. The LORD is not Calvinism or Armenian; those are both elements of the same faith viewed from different weaknesses. Are you easily Armenian? Study what scripture has to say in favor of the Calvinist view. Are you Calvinist? Learn what God meant by the passages that are clearly Armenian. I knew a wise man of God who claimed he was Cal-menian, not because his faith was schizophrenic in indecision but because he understood the balance of both angles in Christ’s salvation. When the Apostle Paul said he was under to law to those under the law and under grace to those under grace, he was showing that each view is based in scripture but missing the fuller understanding of the other element. This may sound a bit Pluralistic but it is not; it is a fuller understanding of the singular Jehovah. When God made man in his own image he made them male and female (Genesis 1:27). So is God male or female? He is neither and both. God simply gave each gender different elements of himself and by only giving part of his being to each, he created genders; men have these characteristics of God and women have those characteristics of God. God has them all. God is both provider and nurturer, both strong and gentle, etc.
It is human nature to fixate on what makes us most comfortable and ignore or reject what makes us uncomfortable. The faith is more complex than a simplistic fixation on one element. “Study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” II Timothy 2:15
*

Two Masters

Post 208

Why have I regularly gone off on these tangents while attempting to reach the interpretation of the Beast of Revelation 17:7? Am I actually ever going to get there?

The purpose of my writing is not actually the delivery of the clinical interpretation though that is primarily what the reader wants. Although the revelation of the prophecy is very exciting to me, what I am really excited about is the revelation of the understanding behind the prophecy.

In a reversal of perspective, my “rabbit trails” in getting to the interpretation are not the tangent, the clinical interpretation desired is the tangent *1.

What I am laboriously showing is the deceptive spirit of the lie that makes up the nature of the beast and the whore that rides it. The intent is to show the system of the lie that provides a great and terrible evil which the majority will naturally run from, and the apparent lesser evil appearing good in comparison as the designed trap that will be run to *2.

This evil is not some future entity we are to be looking for to avoid (though that entity is indeed rising now); rather this is all a part of Daniel 7s - 4th Diverse Beast with three parts, described in greater detail as the three part Daniel 2:33 Beast of Iron that first came upon us way back at the rise of Rome and has been growing by degree ever since (with a short setback in a chronological period of respite by the birth of America; that nation built on the principle of Jesus the Christ in the image of the Kingdom of Heaven).

Now at the useful end of that nation by her schizophrenia of faith (two masters), we cannot deny that by the evidence of our current condition the fault lies at the feet of the Christians who have departed from the right way through a subversion (overturning) of the faith. The faith itself has not been destroyed, but it’s use has been as we saw in the previous post.

And so we arrive at this post; a further clarification in an attempt to help the confused identify themselves thereby allowing a departure from the iniquity and a clear and earnest return to the LORD left behind in the subverted faith.

“No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise 2706 *3 the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon” Matthew 6:24.

This short, simple verse speaks incredible volumes of which I will only touch the surface here.

In an overall comprehension of its clear meaning the first and last parts cannot be stated any clearer: Pick your God, you cannot serve both.

But we are a people who by nature work a concept to death as cattle trampling a spring; “If the simple statement conflicts with my life, I don’t change my life but rather massage the concept in great detail until somehow it does.” The fact we end up swallowing polluted mud does not seem to matter.

So God provided some detail in the center of the grand concept to help us understand what was made so clear just in case we can’t see ourselves in the accusation of serving two masters:

If you try to serve two masters you will not be able to avoid one of two outcomes; in serving both you will hate the one and love the other, or else you will cling to the one and despise the other.

I would like to paraphrase it so you might understand it better but it cannot be stated any clearer.

It is easy to naturally assume we are loving the right one and hating the wrong one, or clinging to the right one and despising the wrong one. In this way we  allow ourselves to feel we are doing the best we can under the circumstances of being trapped, but the very fact that we are serving two masters means that we are choosing the wrong one! It is the right one that is hated, it is the right one that is despised because we HAVE TWO MASTERS; its not about a right choice between them, its that we shouldn’t have two.

* * *

Hate and Love or Cling and Despise.

So what is actually the difference between the two outcomes of hate or despise? They seem about the same:

Why would someone stay with a master that he hates?

There are actually many reasons that compound as such a relationship continues in its course, the best descriptive word of them all is “Trapped”.

We are a people caught in this trap of serving two masters and the result is indeed one of these two outcomes in every case: We hate our jobs but don’t quit because we have become dependent on the money. We hate our marriage but are obligated for the children’s sake, etc., but in each case the problem lies in the service of two masters and not actually the entities themselves:

WHY do you hate your marriage; because it does not provide what you want, thus the second master; your inordinate desire. WHY do you hate your job; because it does not fulfill your idea of the way things should be: as an employee you want to run the company that employs you, but since you don’t have the ability, you have two masters. At the chosen service of a second master grows a hatred of the first, and the first is hated because you just can’t break away entirely. The first master, that was once served in favor, is now seen as a predator that demands your service and so receives your hate.

Why would someone serve a master they despise?

Clearly the verse shows these have made their choice by clinging to only one and despising the other, yet for some reason they cannot make the break from the one they despise.

“Cling” is not love but a result of desperation of something desired. Since what is clung to is not based on love but a self-centered desire of return, then hate is not a resulting emotion either but a despising because it does not provide what the one clung to does *3.

If the second master clearly stripped the authority of the first there would be no two master problem, but because of the inability to leave the first master there is evidence that we know the first master has value, but the second master gives us what we want. So we continue to serve the first master though we despise it because of the clinging to the second.

But Jesus does not say it will be a struggle to serve two masters, he says it cannot be done. The hated or despised master is not actually a master at this point but an anchor you cannot cut loose because you know it is actually the right one that you should love, it is the one that you should cling to, but you don’t. Therefore it is a troublesome master in your heart and mind only but in reality it is not your master.

The focused meaning in the verse is made easier by the last clarifying statement: “Ye cannot serve God and Mammon (3126).”

So what exactly is mammon? (Luke 16:9, 16:11, 16:13).

Mammon 3126 mammonas; of Chaldian origin; (confidence, i.e. figuratively wealth, personified); mammonas, i.e. avarice (deified).

Avarice: Excessive or inordinate desire of gain; greediness after wealth; covetousness; cupidity.

To deify (make a god/master of) avarice, is to put your serious trust in what you desire greatly. Only a slight rabbit trail is the god cupid; the little cherub that draws to you the heart of one you want, implied; against their natural will. This “wish” to Cupid is avarice personified making Cupid mammon.

Anything of such an avarice mindframe is mammon though most easily recognized in the concept that wealth will provide what you want in life as Cupid brings whom you love in life.

So what is this verse actually declaring? It is explained from the other side of the issue in Romans 6:16; “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?”

You CANNOT serve both God and confidence in something else to provide your desire. In fact you cannot serve both God and your desire.

And since our short clear verse said it so perfectly, more words can only muddy the water. Yet if you don’t get it in the pure form perhaps a bit of trampling might make it more palatable to your acquired taste:

The desire for something is not what is condemned here. We all have God ordained natural desires. What is condemned is transferring the confidence that rightly belongs on God alone, to something else on which you trust to fulfill your desire. This transference usually happens when God will not provide what you want, and is what deifies that alternate confidence.

Are you unhappy because you just don’t have enough money? Are you confident that if you did you would be happy?

Are you unhappy because you don’t have a boyfriend/girlfriend? Are you confident that if you did you would be happy?

Are you unhappy because you are not lifted up in the eyes of those who know you? Are you confident that if you did you would be happy?

“For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world” I John 2:16 (see also Nehemiah 9:28-30-35 and just now entering 36-37).

Here John is making it very clear that these inordinate focuses have nothing to do with serving God but are sourced of this world. So what do you do now knowing that God is not there to fulfill your inordinate desires? Do you find another master to add to your faith that will give you what you want, or do you surrender your desires to your single Master's will that has other plans for you? Do not get so bogged down in the defined specifics to the missing of the point; Yes there are three specifics identified in the verse for the hard of hearing, but to the spiritual these are three principles of life that cover a larger scope. In an attempt to expose these three general areas I will reveal the three subversions of the minister’s faiths I referenced  in a previous post:

Timidity:

Just this week I witnessed a very sad example of this minister’s great internal struggle between serving two gods. Due to circumstance he simply did not have the strength to avoid he found himself preaching a Social Gospel of blasphemy to a godless audience. My meaning of Social Gospel is best defined as an empty religious message of false hope that is tailored to society's palate. The true gospel of Jesus Christ (which I am confident he thinks he follows) was completely lost in the Social Gospel he felt forced to preach due to the setting. While I could empathies with his situation I must condemn the choice that he made while here attempting to avoid the condemnation and address the cause.

This subversion of his faith is a result of his II Timothy timidity which Paul was instructing him to avoid. The minister has two masters: The Lord Jesus Christ and the praise of society. The fear of hurting people became a master equal (or apparently greater) than the clear direction of the Savior to preach Christ; the Word of the LORD (Acts 8:5, 10:34-42, Romans 10:8-9, I Corinthians 1:17, II Timothy 4:2-5, Titus 1:3, I Peter 1:25). I place this under the category of lust of the flesh because it is the inordinate desire to be liked without conflict that has weakened this minister’s faith unto ineffectiveness. His clinging to the wrong master makes him despise the other he is determined to follow in conflict.

Greed:

The second minister though having a great ministry built upon a great faith has compromised his great faith by the experience of failure. He knows beyond question that Jesus Christ is the right way but the persistent failure of God to “protect” him in temporal reality has subverted his faith.

He still has strong faith but it is subconsciously adjusted to accommodate perceived reality. To him it is clear that God does not protect us from the evils of the world and so the passages that promise such things must be reinterpreted to fit his experience of reality.

There is a supernatural willingness to turn a blind eye to the scripturally pre-explained causes of God’s apparent failure to protect and simply conclude that God does not protect. This is the very heart of the Jews in facing their horrible experiences. Endurance is now the extent of their faith.

Without realizing it this minister’s faith has been subverted from real and practical to analogy and spiritually disconnected. This minister has fallen into the trap of the lust of the eyes. I put it here in this category because it is the lust to have what we see but don’t have that produces greed.

God has been faithful to, in a curse like way, take from him the “stuff” he puts his confidence in. The ownership of the stuff is not the sin but the confidence in stuff in order to feel successful is transference of deification that belongs only to God. This minister has two masters. As he clings to the  one, it causes him to despise the other.

This was similar to the problem of my own heart that caused God to remove all my confidences in mammon before I could comprehend that truly God is alone the only place where our confidence belongs. Similarly, I honestly don't think there is a person who knows me, including myself, that would think of my problem also as greed, but the confidence in things that can provide what I want belongs in this category.

Pride:

The third minister has a great amount of scriptural knowledge and by conversation has shown a great amount of comprehension of what it says. In general he conducts his life in an un-reproachable manner yet the spirit of his very Being, oozes general pride. It does not take a deep search to discover that what he does usually has an ulterior motive that centers around his own glory. This is the pride of life; “Associating with that which makes me look good". I have seen this minister actually fulfill the passage of Luke 14:8-11 in a very non-analogy way and it was not a surprise because it is in his nature to possess that place of honor by passive conquest.

This is not a condemnation of these men but an attempt to show that even while we commit to serving the Lord with our lives, through error we can ignorantly allow our faith to be subverted, thinking to be doing the right thing we are actually working for the other team by failing our job.

All this falls under the concept of showing you the nature of the last Gentile GDE Beast (Global Dominate Empire) and the Great Whore that in combination are THE LIE that cannot be avoided except for the diligent follower of Jesus Christ THE TRUTH.

Do not wait for the deception to come, it is already here and you are likely already an unknowing participant. If my writing seems to you as negative gloom and doom that encourages a choosing of sides among men, it is because you only practice one part of the two-part mixture:

“For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: But the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it” Hebrews 4:2.

This is not saying they just didn’t hear the gospel preached, it is saying that while they heard it and thought they understood it they did not get the produce (profit) it provides.

Why? Because they lacked the faith needed to combine with the knowledge that produces the useful comprehension.

The struggle of choice between the Yin and the Yang is a blindness to the fact that the whole circle is evil *2. Lift up your eyes beyond yourself and your overwhelming problems, to focus in the realm beyond the circle. That is where God is and it is only God that can transform the entire circle to become something else entirely where there is no Yin and Yang.

The very real and overwhelming problems of America today are no different. The solution is not found within the circle of “finance the debt” vs. “don’t raise the cap”, these are the Yin and Yang of the choices before congress. The solution is found beyond that problem because the source of the problem is also found beyond spend/don’t spend.

This economic problem is simply a national curse that comes as a bi-product for rejecting God and can only be fixed by a return to the perspective which gave us this great nation in the first place.

* * * * * * *

*1 Tangent: Touching; touching at a single point; specifically, Geometry, meeting a curve or surface at two or more consecutive points and hence having there the same direction as the curve or surface; -

*2 Yin and Yang:

“But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” Matthew 6:23.

Where is the light in this passage? THERE IS NO LIGHT FOUND HERE.

So if our perspective of light is “graded on the curve”, what we are sure is light by comparison to known darkness is not light at all but darkness, then contemplate the darkness of what even we think is darkness! There is nothing here that approves of the stuff we think is light in this context. What it is saying is that if you chose to live in the circle of Yin and Yang evaluating light and dark comparatively, your entire eye (comprehension) is evil and nothing you come up with is light even though you clearly see it as such. The white in the Yin and Yang circle is simply a different shade of the same darkness also found there as black.

*3 Despise 2706 kataphroneo; from 2596 and 5426; to think against, i.e. disesteem.

By definition this despising seems to come as a result of a new attention that takes the place of a previous. The thing disesteemed must have first been esteemed. The second master provides a new thinking that opposes the first master and belittles it in the despiser’s eyes.

*