Thursday, January 21, 2016

One More Element

Post 348

Here is another example showing the variety of seats in the kingdom of heaven, and our ability to choose the section we will sit by our choice of conduct in the here-and-now:

“Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven”… Matthew 5:19.

Have you ever considered that there will actually be least commandment breakers in the kingdom of heaven? Yet those least commandment breakers will nonetheless be more righteous than the Scribes and Pharisees:

…“For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven” Matthew 5:20.

Are we yet seeing things of the kingdom of heaven that you had no idea were even possible? Are you beginning to see that the Kingdom of Heaven is far more complex than the cloudy fairytale in your mind?

What might be the circumstances that would cause someone who gets into the kingdom of heaven, by the only door of salvation through the sacrificial blood of Christ Jesus our Lord, to nonetheless practice and teach people to break one of the least commandments? Could it be this doctrine of dirty grace-- that so capitalizes on the sovereignty of God and his free gift, that it negates the sovereignty of man’s accountable conduct?
“Go ahead and sin, it’s OK, because you don’t get to heaven by any works,” vs.: “No! We must do good works or our faith won’t get us in!”
Are we still struggling like children to earnestly prove to the opposition that light is a particle and not a wave, or vise-verse? Why can we not stop beating this dead horse of limited vision, and instead start exploring the mystery of what the impossible-reality actually means?

By the explorations of our previous Post we see a complex and troublesome relationship between Want-to, and Duty-- that has effect after salvation is secured. In the OT days the focus was on duty at the expense of liberty because the path had to be walked into a rut by repetition before the way could be remembered and identified. But in these NT days, after the rut was well established to the point of making a religion of it where “any deviation was punishable heresy,” the focus on liberty evidently comes at the expense of duty as we delight in exploring where duty alone would not permit.
Having our salvation secure-- even in spite of ourselves by human frailty and weakness-- we are now free in the NT age to determine our degree of want-to without feeling oppressed by the former bondage and fear of consequences that come with duty. But the problem soon shows that without a feeling of obligation we naturally end up with two various unfavorable results:
We either get lazy and self-focused concluding that; “If my efforts are not consequentially important then why bother?” or; taking the confident reins of duty in both hands with great earnestness of liberated good-intentions and ignorance, we drive to ruin even what could almost run itself.
Humanity has shown a strong propensity to rise to expectations and fall to aimlessness. Said another way; We are great followers but lousy leaders to anywhere but destruction. We get to our destruction by the childishly limited two-option mentality of; masters or slaves.

God is showing us by experience, the third path of maturity that by complexity has to be discovered rather than taught. There is an entirely “other” option that is nonetheless still based upon these two foundational options. It’s why God designed the Age of Women here at the last, and why Satan is working diligently to corrupt it to unrecoverability.

Let us return to our civil leaders as an example to make a point.
Do you suppose that our local majority assembly-persons are devil-worshipping shifty and evil people just looking for ways to destroy our community and our Country? I don’t. In fact, other than the very unusual deviant-- and not counting the secret conspirators that move the masses-- I think even the Progressive radicals and Environmentalists do-gooders think they are doing needful things as they force upon us what we do not want. I have no problem believing the average small town assembly member, in earnest want-to, is doing the best they know how to do in the role of duty they have been given. So evidently the problem at this stage is not a lack of want-to, nor is it a lack of commitment to duty. Under the mature two-part want-to and duty concept, things should be working extremely well in this last Age of liberated know-how.
So why isn’t it?

There remains one more very important element needed to discover success, much like the smooth topcoat of pavement on the new highway. It’s not an element that trumps the others; it’s not intended to apply alone. It’s an additional element, like an Electron joined with the Proton and Neutron that completes the Atom, making it an entirely new entity of mystery and function. The Atom is the smallest known building block of all matter in the known universe. Without the negative Electron-of-action those other central parts are just parts. So what is this additional element of action to be remotely connected with the core positive Want-to and neutral Duty? It is the negative value of perspective called Servitude.

Now in our presently confused age of Politically-Correct thought and always-positive terminology, this additional element is pushing up-hill against the trend on three fronts: First; that we already pushed this concept into confrontational ground by using the female gender as a Type of Humanity in our submissive relationship with Christ. Then, we add the negative concept of Slavery to extend the comprehension into deeper ground. And that, in a positive light! What hope is there to sell this concept to today’s liberated citizen looking for answers?
But until our scientists figure out how to eliminate the negative poles of magnets and batteries perhaps we should just allow nature its right to dictate reality and accept that the negative is also necessary if properly quantified and applied.
Atoms need the opposing negative sum of the Electrons to balance the positive sum of the Protons. Only then can the atom be said to be stable. Too much negativity and some of the Electrons flee, too little and some liberatable Electrons are interested in joining the party-- which changes the nature of the whole thing into a new kind of wonderful atom with new and different purposes and functions, all within God’s grand design: “Some of Gold, and some Silver, some Wood and some Clay.”

The positive want-to perspective of the Bride of Christ should not be over played, as it is today. Too much emphasis on the power of liberty creates the anarchy of boundless Protons without the bonding Neutrons of duty to constrain them. It unbalances the spiritual atom and utterly destroys it on a foundational level (Psalm 11:3). The neutral duty of Neutrons (*1) is what binds the positive, enthusiastic, Want-to Protons together. But it’s the remote negative servitude perspective of the Electron that makes the whole thing identifiably functional as the building-block of all matter.
What kind of an atom is it? What is its function? That all depends on the balanced relationship between all its parts (Matthew 13:23). We are not here trying to say all atoms must consist of an identical standard number of its parts and thereby making all atoms “vessels of gold” with a one hundred fold return; What we are saying is that for every atom there is a very specific balance that must be found or the atom fails to be an atom. This is mathematical, it is not arbitrary, but there are whole tables of complexity showing the wide variety of options available, making it seem to the ignorant as if it were arbitrary.

So how do we incorporate the importantly remote Servitude element into the core Want-to/Duty composition? Let’s review a popular song from the 60s that, by its charted success, seemed to reflect the feelings of the majority at the time:

“Love him, I love him, I love him
And where he goes I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow

I will follow him, follow him wherever he may go
There isn't an ocean too deep
A mountain so high it can keep me away

I must follow him, ever since he touched my hand I knew
That near him I always must be
And nothing can keep him from me
He is my destiny

I love him, I love him, I love him
And where he goes I'll follow, I'll follow, I'll follow
He'll always be my true love, my true love, my true love
From now until forever, forever, forever

… [repeating elements of the same single-minded declaration].”

- I Will Follow Him, by Little Peggy March, 1963 (http://www.lyricsfreak.com/l/little+peggy+march/i+will+follow+him_20343791.html).

While we may easily assume this is a Christian song talking about our relationship with Christ, this is actually a secular song about a girl madly in love with her man. So let me ask you; Does this song represent Want-to or Servitude? It sounds to me very much like in this case they are one in the same. She just can’t help herself; she is in Revelation 2:4 first love.
What do you suppose duty has to do with it, other than an exciting opportunity for her to show her love to him in a way that she knows is appropriate? Do you suppose that this girl loves this guy because he is worthy of her love? What has he done that might reveal her love is justified and deserved? “He touched her hand”?~ Clearly her love is irrational, emotional, blinding… and so wonderfully powerful.
At this point in the relationship I bet he could yell at her for burning the pancakes and she would just try harder to get it right for him. There is almost nothing this guy could do to kill her love, even if he malevolently broke her heart. In this early state, want-to and duty are inseparably blurred into function. Such a blurring creates the element we call voluntary servitude. At this state he truly is this girl’s “lord-and-master,” a positive perspective of a negative station.
Back in the day, when Christian principles were the undeclared law of the land, men were generically considered honorable, hard working, benevolent providers for their women because they were raised to that expectation. Generally you could; “Pick the guy you like and learn together how to have a happy marriage.” But today, by the high volume of “bad guys” out there, the picking is far more hazardous, and so we have a natural program of self-defense to place a negative perspective on voluntary servitude. But while this does indeed create a degree of protection from abuse, can a woman experience that rapturous love of her man like the girl in the above song? No. She automatically sacrifices rapture for security. Enters the suspicious heart and the mature pre-nup agreement.

But while that kind wisdom may be good enough for the whorishly experienced lover, the young virgins really crave the rapture of first love. But in looking around they find the pickings very dark and dangerous, and by the same culture of cause, they are themselves prepared to accept, and even want this, as the standard fare of relationships. Enters Brittany Spears’ I’m A Slave 4 U:

“I know I may be young, but I've got feelings too.
And I need to do what I feel like doing.
So let me go and just listen.

All you people look at me like I'm a little girl.
Well did you ever think it be okay for me to step into this world.

Always saying little girl don't step into the club.
Well I'm just tryin' to find out why cause dancing's what I love.

Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOOOA) (Do you like it)
Get it get it, get it get it (OOOHHHH) (This feels good)

I know I may come off quiet, I may come off shy.
But I feel like talking, feel like dancing when I see this guy.

What's practical is logical. What the hell, who cares?
All I know is I'm so happy when you're dancing there.

I'm a slave for you. I cannot hold it; I cannot control it.
I'm a slave for you. I won't deny it; I'm not trying to hide it.

Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(I just wanna dance next to you)
To another time and place.
Baby, don't you wanna, dance upon me,
(Are you ready)
Leaving behind my name, my age.
(Lets go)


I really wanna dance, tonight with you.
(I just can't help myself)
I really wanna do what you want me to.
(I just feel I let myself go)

… I'm a slave for you. (Take that) I cannot hold it; I cannot control it.
I'm a slave (It just feels right) for you. (It just feels good)
I won't deny it; I'm not trying to hide it. (Baby)
Get it get it, get it get it (WHOOOA)
… [more of the same]”
- (http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/britneyspears/imaslave4u.html).

Nobody can deny this is the same “rapture of abandonment” as the previous song of a previous time, but neither can it be denied that the details and results are very different due to different parameters. The first song is focused on a life with HIM, and the second is focused on the experience itself-- HE being only a tool to get the self-focused experience desired. Many previous Posts discussed the difference between these; this Post is discussing the foundational motive itself.
Clearly, in spite of today’s strong emotional feminine aggression of rights against a God or man who asks for such abandonment today, our young virgins, still lacking bad experiences, do not see such voluntary slavery in principle as all that negative. So we must be willing to approach this topic with a far more neutral perspective than we are programmed to have by the bitter “liberated female society” of today.
Isn’t it odd how easily we can see, understand, and accept the complexity in this Type, but find it so impossible to then figure it out in what it actually types? I was gently and carefully leading my reader to accept the idea that voluntary servitude is actually a good thing, but Brittany has already declared openly that voluntary slavery is already there without a problem. Why? Because it’s what she wants.

So while we earnestly attempt to convince our young virgin to change her mind before she becomes another victim of bad experience, we can also earnestly attempt to convince our experience hardened women to accept that, when done right, there is indeed great worth in such a rapturous abandonment. The “being done right” part is all about the particular HIM, and his rules of duty that govern fire in the fuel refinery. Want-to, Duty, and Servitude.

“Get wisdom, get understanding: forget it not; neither decline from the words of my mouth Proverbs 4:5,
(see also: Deuteronomy 4:5-6, and Job 28:12-27<28 + Job 39:13b-18 = Proverbs 3:12-13-26).

Wisdom and Understanding are in the positive acquisition approach in the likeness of the core Proton and Neutron, while the path-making “words of my mouth” are presented in the negative “don’t loose these” likeness of the escapable remote Electron of action. As King Solomon discovered too late; the trio is vital to a good outcome.
Do I dare to judge Solomon as if I were wiser than the wisest man, do I have better understanding that he (I Kings 4:29-34)? Of course not. But, if nothing else, since I have the New Testament, I do have the capacity for a better and more complete inclination toward the words of God’s mouth. In my lack of wisdom and my lack of understanding, my servitude toward God through voluntary obedience to his word protects me from my own lack, which I am diligently attempting to resolve through valid means (II Timothy 2:5). Voluntary servitude to God’s guiding words is the key to uncorrupted alignment toward that end. Getting in that rut, when you are used to free-range aimless wandering, seems alarmingly restrictive and undesirable, but after that path is well trod by familiarity, that rut can be filled in and overgrown with grass because, though you are free to use the entire field without fear, you still know the path and where it goes, and are happy to go there (I Corinthians 6:12, 10:23, Romans 8:1-4, 5:18-19).

In the OT-law age of duty, the want-to was secondary to obligation. It worked because she (God’s people) was prepared to accept the purpose of her role, and the declaration of duty just helped her fulfill it without the confusion of uncertainty. When he yelled at her for burning the pancakes it never crossed her mind to throw the pan at him and yell back “make them yourself!” She just figured that his yelling was a tool to help her learn how to make good pancakes, which she wanted to do.
That doesn’t go over so good today. Today, in the NT age of liberty and angry men, we rightly teach our daughters that she has more worth than to let a man yell at her like that. But instead of using that new perspective of dignity to look for a good man, she just learns how to fight back as an equal with a bad one. That is missing the whole point, and she never does learn how to make pancakes, because now, making pancakes is beneath her. So he has to make them or they will starve. And isn’t that right? because; “Even God says he is supposed to be the provider!”
This is how Christianity treats Christ today. We play the pathetic helpless card, begging him to do for us what duty declares that we are supposed to do. and when he refuses, we get angry and play the liberated Equality card of marriage.

Let’s rewind this whole thing back to the fork in the road where we made the wrong choice.
Clearly there is Duty. Duty is not eradicated by Liberty (Matthew 5:17-18). But the stress of Duty is eradicated, allowing Liberty the freedom to do, with the confidence of expecting a favorable outcome. The confidence is not found in a self-bondage to Duty but in voluntary servitude to the least commandment rules; the change of perspective from “It’s all about ME!” to; “It’s all about HIM!” turns our; “I’M THE PRINCESS” mentality to; “I AM A VERY FORTUNATE UNWORTHY SCULLERY MAID.”

“And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.
I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exhalted”
Luke 18:13-14.

This is such an important factor in the kind of atom we are laboring to make, that Satan is going to great lengths to destroy by corruption the prototype and blueprints. If he can use the basic design to create a great and offensive perversion, then in earnest confusion God’s faithful people will scrap God’s design as demonic. This is the whole purpose for the rise of feminine Babylon that corrupts our perception of human liberty, rising to defend the world against Islam, which is the perversion of God and his kingdom. As complex as God’s design is, Satan’s perversion is necessarily as complex.

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom. Servitude forces that lesson to gain understanding. Knowledge provides the willingness to make that servitude voluntary. The result is a people who work with God, not against him.

In the next section of Posts we will be exploring the foundational theme of desirable Servitude as a long forgotten but indispensable element to the Christian perspective as it relates to the Kingdom of Heaven. I really think you will be amazed at an entirely new perspective that produces unimaginable results.
* * * * * *

(*1) “Neutrons are found only in the nucleus of the atom, where they play an important role in keeping the atom [nucleolus] stable. Since protons are positively charged, there is an incredibly strong repulsive force between all the protons in the nucleus.” - http://www.Ic.brooklyn.cuny.edu.
*

Saturday, January 2, 2016

What is Maturity?

Post 347

Humanity-- in all its maturity, here in the last days of our existence as we know it--, while imagining ourselves dying of old age, is really just the young girl only now blooming into womanhood and looking for a husband, for another kind of life than what she has always known; We are the fully-mature fetus eager to be born into a whole new world. Here in the last days of preparation, Humanity-- in all our maturity-- is still but a child. but don’t tell her that; it will offend her feelings of long worked-for mature readiness for what comes next.
Why do we weep and ache for our daughters when we give them away at the alter in joy and pride? How can we be both happy and sad, full and empty, at the very same moment? How is it both a loss and a gain? It’s the same reason why a woman screams in utter agony yet wants the cause so earnestly when she is giving birth. It’s the same reason why we Christians break down and sob in the most horrible suffering imaginable when a loved one dies, yet be so overwhelmed with peace and joy at knowing they have just been born into a whole new life that they spent all this time preparing for.
Is our daughter ready? Well it’s a little late to do anything about that now, so just enjoy the moment and let what comes come. The maturing preparation period is over and the future is theirs to experience in all its new youthful hopes of the next phase. A bride is a bride when she is married; not when she has reached a certain age. Even children die. We only have between now and then to do all we can to make them as ready as possible, all the while knowing that there is no point before the time comes when we run out of preparing to do. And the effort, while often painful, is supposed to be a joy to us: not by the law of duty, but by the yearning of love. Yet a lot of times we simply cannot see the joy in the struggle until she is standing at the altar and the purpose comes clear in the sudden loss of a job. We are never really ready when it finally comes, but there is a difference between ready and prepared.

As in the image of a parent among many, I have the opportunity to give such instruction to my spiritual children that some other shepherds as parents don’t have available to them, not because I am superior, but because I, like Paul, have counted all things but loss so that I might experience the most excellent knowledge of Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:8). It is my privilege therefore to pass on these special learned things that other preoccupied parents have never found and cannot comprehend (Philippians 3:14-15). Do I have all the answers? Of course not; I never claimed to, but let me boast a little and say that I think my spiritual children are in a class above the rest because they have been better prepared to fundamentally be excellent and useful citizens in that great kingdom.
I know this is true by principle because in its physical Typology; my dad did not abandon me to my piers as a youth to raise itself, but instead employed me before and after school as a kind of “indentured apprentice” in his own company, to learn from him principles, and conduct, and maturity, and skills, and character, while my piers were drinking and partying and getting into unguided mischief from a lack of long-range purpose.
I am not saying that I did not often feel “cheated out of my youth” or oppressed by the obligatory labors that my piers did not face, but I can say that at the same time I could understand the value, and submitted willingly if not joyfully for what it would return. I early saw the advantage by experience of having been thus brought up. And today I would not trade it for the world.
It is no different spiritually, and I know that my regular readers can intimately understand this as true.

In the last Post (*1) you may have been a bit disappointed to contemplate that marriage to the Lamb has more obligations attached to it than we really want to contemplate right now; “I just want to be married!” And to be frank; that simplistic and joyful feeling is really OK. In fact, Don’t ever loose it!
But what kind of a parent would I be if I didn’t help prepare you as best I could to have a happy and full marriage by instructing you in the mindframe that will insure you are ready to play that role in all its meaning?
Some earnest and faithful parents never learned many of those secrets from their parents, but I have had the privilege of both being guided and seeking them out by costly exclusive focus (Proverbs 25:2+Daniel 2:27-28=30) and so can pass them on to you if you are willing.
My little sister learned as a youth to cook from my mother, who was a universally acknowledged extremely good cook. As a pre-teen my sister was a virtual little wife in the kitchen. Did her ability to cook qualify her to be a wife? Nope. But it sure didn’t hurt in the desire to make a pleasant home when she was. The skills she learned as a child in preparation are still daily applicable in many ways; while other wives and mothers and friends glory in their ability to make Mac-n-Cheese from a box so they don’t always have to eat at McDonalds.
What is maturity? It really depends on what you are asking. Is the Earth’s humanity finally mature? In the eyes of the given timeline of expectation, the answer is "Yes." But that doesn’t mean she is well prepared for the next phase that that maturity has been reaching. So we see a distinction between maturity and coming of age.

Can a young bride learn to be a good cook on the job? It’s entirely possible, but like the under-qualified elected official who never pre-read the Constitution let alone can apply its principles in daily practice; it certainly is not as easy now that the daily obligations of the job are upon her. And while she is quickly learning that among her other duties; “My sister” is easily learning more advanced and timely things by focus because she has long had those basics well in hand. Who doesn’t want to marry a good cook? But who wants to marry a good cook that is so fundamentally unfaithful that she spits in his food while preparing it, because she is mad at him over a momentary issue? Who wants to endure hearing his new bride learn to play scales on the piano, rather than delight his heart with her timely pre-obtained talent and delivery that reveals far more than just the effort she put into preparing to be a good wife?

“Well done, though good and faithful girl, thou hast been faithful over your preparations, I will give you mistress authority to govern my whole house: will you marry me?” Matthew 25:21 applied.

Right now we are trying to stay focused on making a highway for our God, and I was going to wait and divulge this next tid-bit when I later expanded on the parables of the kingdom of heaven, but let me just here say that the “many things,” referenced in the Matthew 25 parable, are “children (*2),” couched in quotes for deeper meaning. A young woman really, really wants to be a wife… until she is. Then she really, really wants to be a mother.
A parent already knows this, and prepares the child for the natural future that they might not be interested in right now. Otherwise, the child will most certainly enter the job unprepared, and psychologically limited in far more ways than simply a missing list of skills. The first works is the disciplined mentality to learn, in the selfless desire to be pleasing and useful to your spouse: i.e. Humility in love as a simplistic description (James 4:10, I Peter 5:5-7).
If you get on the job without this foundational perspective of servant, you have a very high probability of turning out to be a childless, selfish, bitter tyrant of willfulness to cover for the suddenly blaring inadequacies. Or so we see revealed in both marriage and politics today.

There are certainly a lot of pleasures to be had in marriage. And marriage can take on a myriad of wonderful variations in the experience. But nature itself shows us that offspring are among the few foundational purposes of marriage. Yet the deceitfulness of sin can easily beguile us into thinking that marriage is to provide me with the utmost in happiness, and children would just steel my self-indulgent pleasures. If you get to heaven with the psychology that despises “childrearing” as a theft of self-indulgence, you may be surprised when heaven has no use for you! (Matthew 25:41-46).
Maturity is that which is rightly prepared to serve its purpose.
* * * * * * *

(*1) In response to Matthew 25:21: “’Hmmm a ruler huh? and over a lot of things? That’s the reward for being a faithful steward of a few of the master’s things? Where’s the luxury in that!?’-- Right?”

(*2) It has been quite a while since I posted the foundational reason for using Cinderella as a Typology, so I thought I would re-post a link to that root: Post 248, The Cinderella Story (http://when-did-reason-die.blogspot.com/2012/06/cinderella-story.html).
See note "(*1)" at the bottom of that post for an insight into the “children” described in this Post.
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Wednesday, December 30, 2015

What Are We Preparing For?

Post 346

“Well that’s all fine and dandy for some,” you may say; “but I have no desire or intention of being anybody’s governor or assembly member in the kingdom of heaven. That stuff has nothing to do with me, so I cannot be included in the fault.”

Really?~ (said dryly).
Have you ever contemplated then just what it is that you want to be doing in the Lord’s kingdom? Will you be lounging on pillows and waited on by servants hand-and-foot for all eternity having finally arrived at your deserved luxury so long kept from you? Have you forgone all those temporal gratifying experiences here so that you can reap them in abundance for eternity there as a kind of “delayed payment for services rendered”? Is it really, in the end, actually all about YOU?
It’s a curious thought isn’t it? What do the Scriptures have to say regarding your activities in the kingdom of heaven? You would be surprised! I mean REALLY surprised.
But we are not ready to go into all that just yet. For now, let’s just get our basic thinking straight by briefly reviewing some details in a few related parables of scripture:

“His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant:…enter thou into the joy of the lord.”

What Christian is not well familiar with this verse as a motivational longing to hear on the day we enter heaven to reap our reward that makes it all worth it? But even in your enthusiastic confidence of clear understanding, are you not just a little curious to recall the missing part made evident by the three dots? Let’s try again:

“His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things,…enter thou into the joy of the lord.”

Oh yah, there’s the missing part. So if we contemplate the meaning of the parable, we see that, while the pleasure of entering into the joy of the Lord may arguably not be; getting the commendation of praise is unquestionably contingent upon being faithful over a few things.
“Sure, I already got that concept in the “good and faithful” comment, even without the missing part.”
Yes, but I don’t think you yet comprehend what it’s actually saying. Did you see the additional three dots? Let's try it one more time:

“His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, (therefore) I will make thee ruler over many things: (and to that end;) enter thou into the joy of the lord” Matthew 25:21.

“Hmmm a ruler huh? and over a lot of things? That’s the reward for being a faithful steward of a few of the master’s things? Where’s the luxury in that!?"-- Right?
So let me ask you; IF your Lord and Master, wants you to forever be a “governor or assembly member” of some sort or another, what happened to your dream of pampering luxury in consuming upon yourself the pleasures of the eternal kingdom with just you and your Lord living happily ever after? Just how secretly wicked-stepsister is your Cinderella heart anyway? Apparently we have some work to do before your Prince comes to find you by trying on that spiritual slipper of identification; It seems that your foot must have swollen since the ball, it looks to be uncomfortably pinching.

You see, the child’s fairytale always ends at; “they lived happily ever after,” because all we need to help get us through the bitter trials of our child-like struggles in the here-and-now is a glimpse of that great and wonderful eternity where all our trials will be turned into gold (James 1:12+Romans 8:28, I Corinthians 9:24-25, Jeremiah 29:11, Isaiah 61:3, etc.). The simplistic version without all the complicated details, gives us a very clear and sufficiently strong Hope to cling to, when, by the struggles, we have no capacity to contemplate more (John 16:12). It is enough (Revelation 2:8-9a,10-11, 3:4-6, 3:7-8,10-13).
But there IS more if we want it. Why?

The details are hidden from the simple in faith so that they do not get discouraged in the struggles of their early maturation: Hold firm to the faith of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and you will be counted among the citizens of his kingdom (Matthew 10:22). Period.
But we are speaking simplistically of a very sophisticated spiritual topic. Simply speaking: The more of the details in our maturity that we gather and comprehend in application, the greater our qualifications for the job we apply for. If you don’t see yourself as a “ruler over many things” in the kingdom of heaven then don’t apply with anticipation for the job that gets the; “Well done thou good and faithful servant,” commendation. Public correction for being comparatively under-qualified is embarrassing to say the least (Revelation 3:17-18):

“When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down in the highest room; lest a more honorable man than thou be bidden of him; and he that bade thee and him come and say to thee, Give this man place; and thou begin with shame to take the lowest room (G5117)Luke 14:8-9.

“In my Father’s house are many mansions (G3438: a staying, i.e. residence (the act or the place))…” John 14:2. We may translate this as stations, or seats; Occupations.

The concept of this parable is not to discourage anyone from seeking the highest seat they are qualified for, but to refrain from overreaching expectations of self worth. I understand that the above passage is a parable, and I have seemed to borrow it’s intended point for another application; a very dangerous use of parables indeed. But the parable is speaking of pride in imagining oneself greater and more qualified that one actually is, and in this way I have not abused it’s point. Especially because, even though the event in which it was delivered was not a wedding, the parable of that event is centered at a generic wedding, and can therefore be easily applied to THE wedding in the Kingdom of Heaven. So let’s try a non-parable verse regarding various seats in the kingdom:

“And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold” Revelation 4:4.

If you are anything like me; it never even crossed your mind to sit in one of those twenty-four seats. Of course not! That is a position of which I am far under-qualified to fill. But those seats are there for somebody to fill. That means there are seats: greater and lesser seats. So, if we are not going to sit there in those very high seats, where will you sit; what room --(G5117; a spot, general in space, but limited by occupancy)-- will you fill at the great wedding of the Lamb?

“And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: that ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises” Hebrews 6:11.

“What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?” James 2:14.

It cannot now be denied that faith and righteousness go hand in hand, and that getting through the gate is not the same thing as finding your seat; as great or as least as it may be. So let me ask you; “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
It’s a question for contemplation asked of almost every kid in their adolescence long before their life station is acquired. Some know at a very early age exactly what they want to be, while others graduate from college still not knowing. Far too many, sort-of drift along and let the random winds of life give them whatever comes. Well maybe these people do get by, but who dreams of flipping hamburgers as a life’s career? I suppose that some might. and the world needs burger flippers. and garbage collectors. and sewer treatment operators. So I suppose it’s good that there are so many who have no ambition but to survive life on the lowest rungs, grateful to have a job at all.
It is likewise in the kingdom of heaven, which this life Types parabolically (*1):

…“Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.
But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour. If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto every good work”
II Timothy 2:…19-21.

So we see (in the fuller passage) that successfully departing from iniquity, and shunning vain and profane babblings and strife in pointless conversations, are among the significant factors of qualification for a better job position in the kingdom of heaven, while conversely, a failure to avoid these things, though maybe not disqualifying us from a place in the larger kingdom of God (I John 5:17), certainly keeps us from an honorable seat.

Do you suppose that Cinderella; the bride of the Prince, would be considered a vessel unto dishonor? Yah~, me neither. Can you suddenly see that not everybody who enters heaven is the bride of Christ? Does that shake your very perceptions of the faith and your eternity? It should.
Like the kid who is asked; “What do you want to be when you grow up?,” you need to contemplate this thought for longer than a moment. It’s very important to your eternity. It goes hand in hand with the earlier question regarding the first generation Hebrews of Promise who crossed the Red Sea in baptism but never crossed the Jordan in the righteousness of faith. In Post 247 we asked; “Are They In Hell?” (http://when-did-reason-die.blogspot.com/2012/05/are-they-in-hell.html), and we are still discovering the HUGE answer that opens the door to that kingdom for a peak inside. The Grand Tapestry shows us what that kingdom looks like and why.

So I ask you again: If not everybody who enters heaven is the Bride of Christ, where do they all sit: what is their station; their room; their seat? But more important to ask personally is: Where then do I sit with my slightly “Wicked Stepsister” heart?

“How is the gold become dim! How is the most fine gold changed!...The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!” Lamentations 4:1-2.

It seems that even “magically perfect” Cinderella can indeed fall from her glory if she is not diligent (I Corinthians 10:12, II Thessalonians 2:3, II Peter 1:10, etc.). What her wicked stepsisters assume is “just the way she was born,” is actually a very earnestly built persona of choice; a robe of righteousness chosen with care from a closet of options (I Corinthians 6:11).
Spiritually precious fine-gold vessels of honor can indeed deteriorate to be esteemed as mere clay vessels of dishonor as they are manipulated by molders not God. After it is made, I am persuaded that the regressive transformation is not contingent upon what it’s made of, but what you put in it (Romans 12:2, 6:16). My computer may be a lofty fine-gold spiritual tool of God, while my neighbor’s computer may be a mere earthy tool of base-nature pornography and wasted time.

Our personal question above that sprung from a sudden realization that we are not all the bride of Christ, should be quickly followed with; Is there anything I can still do to improve my designated seating before my name is called? I’d rather not collect garbage for eternity, if I have a choice in the matter.
The above II Timothy 2:21 seems to tell us that we do indeed have a say in the matter!

“But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ, IF we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end;” Hebrews 3:13-14, (underlined capital type emphasis added).

Does that warning admonition of retaining the beginning confidence ring any Revelation 2:4 “First love” bells? The deceitfulness of sin is the very great bump that will throw you from the train without so much as spilling your tea! But that mystery is a topic for the next Post. This Post is your wakeup call as we prepare for the bump.
Applications are being reviewed and placements arranged as we speak! (John 14:2b).
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(*1) Parabola: Greek: parabole; a place beside. See Parable.
Parabolic: 1. Allegoric. 2. [From parabola] Geometry a. Resembling, relating to, or generated or directed by, a parabola. b. Hence, having the form of a parabola; as, a parabolic course. - Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary 5th Edition 1948.
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