Tag Archives: faith

Hoping for Salvation

August 20, 2013 James Pyles

Each day we hope for Your salvation.

-Shemoneh Esrei

The Talmud states that one of the questions that will be posed to each person on his or her day of judgment is, “Did you look forward to salvation?” While the question refers to anticipating the ultimate Redemption, it can also refer to the salvation of the individual.

Positive attitudes beget positive results, and negative attitudes beget negative results. Books have been written about people who have recovered from hopeless illnesses because, contrary to medical opinion, they did not give up hope. On the contrary, they maintained a positive attitude. While this phenomenon may be controversial (for many people are skeptical that cheerful outlooks can cure), people certainly can and have killed themselves by depression. With a negative attitude, a person suffering from an illness may even abandon those practices that can give strength and prolong life, such as the treatment itself.

I have seen a poster that displays birds in flight. Its caption comments, “They fly because they think they can.” We could do much if we did not despair of our capacity to do it.

Looking forward to Divine salvation is one such positive attitude. The Talmud states that even when the blade of an enemy’s sword is at our throat, we have no right to abandon hope of help.

No one can ever take hope from us, but we can surrender it voluntarily. How foolish to do so.

Today I shall…

…try to always maintain a positive attitude and to hope for Divine salvation.

-Rabbi Abraham J. Twersky
“Growing Each Day, Elul 11”
Aish.com

Recently, I’ve written a number of reviews on portions of Thomas Schreiner’s book 40 Questions About Christians and Biblical Law. If you’ve read them, you know my feelings about Schreiner’s point of view on the Torah of Moses and how (or if) the Torah carries forward for the Jewish people into Apostolic times and beyond.

I want to take a step backward from that perspective this morning (but not too big a step). I’ve commented previously on the commonalities between Hebrew Roots, Messianic Judaism, and Christianity, as well as the fundamental platform upon which all who have faith in Yeshua (Jesus) as Messiah (the Christ) stand. While ultimately there is a dividing line between people who have faith in God through Jesus and those who do not, we can’t afford to dispense with authentic people of God who differ from us based on our opinions on “the Law” or how we understand God’s Word.

All people of faith face the same struggles. We are opposed by people who deny the existence of God, who deny that there is a core morality that is never-changing, who believe that human beings are the ultimate moral and intellectual force in the universe.

How can one be certain of the authority of the T’nach in all its particulars? The answer to this is based on common sense, and if one approaches the question open-mindedly and without prejudice, one must come to this conclusion. To put it very briefly, and going back from our present generation to preceding generations, we have before us the text of the T’nach as it was transmitted from one generation to the other by hundreds and thousands of parents of different backgrounds to their children. Even during the times of the greatest persecutions, and even after the destruction of the Beth Hamikdash, there always survived hundreds and thousands of Jews who preserved the text of the T’nach and the traditions, so that the chain has never been broken.

-from correspondence by Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson
27th of Shevat, 5723 [February 21, 1963]
posted at Chabad.org

The Lubavitcher Rebbe has critics not only in Christianity but in different branches of Judaism, but the struggles he describes are the same as ours. Although I wouldn’t make a good Chabadnik for a number of reasons (not the least of which is the fact that I’m not Jewish), I often find their published writings and philosophies to be beautiful and reflective of God, especially when contrasted against criticisms against Torah and Judaism. No, it’s not that Judaism isn’t also critical of Christianity.

Furthermore, there is a basic difference between our Jewish tradition and those of other faiths, such as Christianity or Islam. For, whereas in the latter cases the traditions go back to one individual or a limited number of individuals, our traditions go back to a revelation which was experienced by a whole people at once, so that at no time did we have to place our trust in the veracity of one, or a few, individuals.

The Rebbe is being very “even-handed” in his response to Christianity in this letter. Some Jewish criticisms are far more biting.

I’m not saying we should compel religious Jews to abandon the practices of their faith or attempt to drive Christians from their (our) views on Jesus, but I am saying that we should stop trying so hard to jockey for position in order to establish our “lead” in the “race” by forcing the “defeat” of others.

Similarly in regard to the Torah. For the Torah, too, already contains the methods and principles whereby it is to be interpreted. Therefore, the traditional interpretation of the Torah is already contained in the Torah itself, and it is nothing but a continuation of the written Torah itself, so that only both together constitute one living organism.

I know one of the criticisms Christianity levels against religious Judaism is that Judaism interprets scripture according to a set of prescribed traditions. The assumption is that, by comparison, Christianity (in all its flavors and forms including Hebrew Roots) uses a Biblical hermeneutic that objectively examines the text and arrives at conclusions based only on what the words are saying in their various original languages.

But if anything convinces me that Protestant Christianity is also plumb full of traditions, it is theological texts such as Thomas Schreiner’s book. Only the fact that Schreiner must speak to a specific tradition of Christian Biblical interpretation can explain why he must base his theories on certain portions of the Bible, while ignoring other scriptures that directly refute his conclusions on the Torah’s purpose in ancient and modern Judaism (including Messianic Judaism). Also, the widely varying denominations that span the realm of Christianity are no different than the multiple streams of Jewish transitions and communities. How can one tradition criticize another when we all employ the same dynamics?

When Jews read in the Shemoneh Esrei, “Each day we hope for Your salvation,” it summons visions of the Moshiach coming to redeem and restore the Jewish people and Israel. And yet, those words should also bring to mind the second coming of Christ for anyone in the church. We may not agree as to the identity of Messiah, but the fact remains that we are all awaiting his ascent to the Throne of the King in Jerusalem, and his reign of peace throughout the Earth.

Right now, we all exist like a handful of sand slipping out from between clenched fingers, or millions of tiny shards of shattered glass strewn across a cold, dark ground. We’re broken apart. We’re disconnected. We’re separated and isolated. Each tiny shard cries out into an infinite universe, “I am the only one who truly knows God!” For the atheists, the “god” is themselves, the human being as final authority. For each religious person, it is the claim that we each “own” God. We claim Him exclusively as our private possession and denigrate all the other people in all the other faiths as mistaken, wrong, bad, evil.

From God’s point of view, what must we look like except a crowd of kindergarteners on a playground, each one of us chasing after the ball and screaming, “Mine! Mine!” I’m embarrassed to be reminded of the cartoon seagulls in the film Finding Nemo (2003).

And that is the much vaunted human race, religious and otherwise. No wonder in the Bible, we people are often compared to sheep.

And yet, every once in a while, someone among the “seagulls” and “sheep” rises higher and climbs above.

At the final ascent,
he clings to any crack or crevice
to pull higher.

That is where we are now:
Any spark of light that comes your way,
squeeze all you can from it.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Mountain Climbing”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe, Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

It is easy in the study of the Bible to get caught up in the mechanics and lose our connection to the spirituality. When we “know” God, is that knowledge supposed to be exclusively intellectual, or is knowing God a transcendent experience…or both? Either extreme has its pitfalls and, as I’ve been trying to communicate, can lead us to believe that our little group, church, congregation, denomination, whatever, is the one, the only one that has the corner market on God.

We must become more than the sum of our doctrines. We must become the people God made us to be. We must seek Him with unbridled desire and not be tempted to control His image and put it into our box. In longing to fly, we must be willing to fall.

“One who romanticizes over Judaism and loses focus of the kingdom of Heaven can be compared to a carpenter who is infatuated with the hammer, rather than the house it was meant to build.”

-Troy Mitchell

“Our work involves trying to dance when others only know how to wrestle.”

-Rabbi Carl Kinbar

“Do not seek Christianity and do not seek Judaism. Seek an encounter with God.”

-Tom

Each day, I hope for your salvation, God. How long, O’ Lord, how long?

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Where Does Faith Go When It Is Lost?

July 30, 2013 James Pyles 13 Comments

What happens when one day a rabbi discovers that he has lost his faith? Dr. Paul Shrell-Fox, a clinical psychologist and researcher asked himself that question – which turned into to a fascinating study.

Seven rabbis agreed to “talk about it” – three Conservative community rabbis in the United States, and four strictly Orthodox rabbis who live in Israel and have a double identity: Secretly atheists, and rabbis and believers openly.

-Tali Farkash
“Atheists in closet: Rabbis who lost God”
Published 07.28.13, 11:13, ynetnews.com

Over a year ago, I published a blog post on a very similar topic called When We’re Left Behind. It was based on an article written by Barbara Bradley Hagerty for NPR.org called “From Minister to Atheist: A Story of Losing Faith”.

How crushing would it be to love your Pastor or Rabbi, having attended his (or her) congregation for years and growing close to him (or her) as a model of faith, and then to discover that this “Holy person” has no faith in God at all and in fact is an atheist? What would that do you your faith (or mine)?

I don’t want to recycle something I’ve written before, but this brings up some new questions about the nature of religion (as opposed to faith) and how we live it out in our lives. While I certainly can’t deny the social role of church for Christians, we lack (in most cases) the connection to our religious community based on ethnicity, culture, and sometimes race. It is true there are churches that have such a basis, such as African-American churches and Korean churches, but for the most part, the Church as a social entity is just a group of people who (in theory) share the same theology and doctrine about God but who otherwise come from a wide spectrum of social, economic, educational, and employment backgrounds (this probably isn’t true in an absolute sense, but I’ll use it as a general principle for the sake of this essay).

Jewish synagogue life is a different thing because what is being shared is a lot of cultural, ethnic, traditional, religious, and even national and DNA components. It goes back to the difference between “What is a Jew?” and “What is a Christian?” You can’t just say people who have different religions. Being Jewish is enormously more complicated and in some ways, elusive in definition.

So I can see a Rabbi who becomes an atheist having a tougher time in leaving his/her community than a Pastor in the same situation (not that it wouldn’t be really hard on the Pastor as well). From a Rabbi’s point of view, if you are leading a shul in a small community, leaving the synagogue would be leaving behind your entire social, friendship, and possibly family circles. Your entire life, or most of it, probably flows through synagogue life. I suppose something similar could be said of a Pastor as well, but perhaps not quite to the same depth.

How about extending the topic beyond Rabbis and Pastors? My wife says that at our local Reform/Conservative synagogue, the Friday night service is aimed at more secular Jews who connect socially and through traditions, while the Saturday Shabbat service is more for “religious Jews.” The missus even says that some of the synagogue members wish that the current Rabbi would retire/move on (he’s still in his 40s, so is nowhere near retirement age) because he’s “too religious.”

At the opposite religious extreme are the Ultra-Orthodox or the Haredim, who seem to take the slightest infraction of the mitzvot, even among those Jewish people who are not Haredi, so, so seriously, to the point of being abusive and assaultive. It seems like something has gone horribly wrong in certain corners religious Judaism where, on the one extreme, God is all but ignored, and on the other, God is exceptionally tightfisted and punitive, and adherents experience no problem in actually attacking other human beings.

I don’t know if you get that exactly in Christianity, although to be sure, we have churches that are so extremely liberal that God seems like an afterthought and Biblical standards are as fluid as quicksand. We also have churches and groups so hyper-conservative that they too don’t care who they hurt or what damage they do to other human beings, even desecrating the funerals of military men and women for the sake of their distorted theology and need to push their weight around. I’d call that going horribly wrong, too.

It’s enough to make me lose my faith in religious people.

But what makes a person lose their faith in God? Of some of the folks and groups I’ve just mentioned, they probably didn’t have faith as such to begin with. Their religious venues are more a tradition-based, cultural, and social outlet, as opposed to a gathering where an encounter with God is sought. At the opposite extreme, it may not be God that anyone is looking for, but the need to impose internal punitive, restrictive, and ultra-conservative standards on the entire environment of human beings. As far as I can tell, God’s chosen method of operation isn’t to either ignore His standards or massively exaggerate them and then force them on others without so much as a by your leave.

I know my Pastor will disagree with me, but I believe we have a choice. I believe we have lots of choices in life, the first or at least the most important being whether or not we are going to have a relationship with God. After that, other choices follow. I believe God is like a Father or teacher (sometimes the roles overlap). Certainly if we act foolishly, we should fear Him, but fear isn’t the primary foundation upon which our relationship is built. Neither is hate. Neither is casualness and pandering to social agendas.

Once we have faith in God, and more importantly, trust, how can we lose that? Some folks say you can’t unless you never had it in the first place:

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.”

–John 10:27-30 (NASB)

That creates a problem because here we see people, Pastors and Rabbis, who have lost their faith (although Jews, because they are born into covenant, are accountable whether they have faith or not). Did they have it in the first place or did something else happen? What if they actually have faith somewhere at their core, faith in God that is, but lost something else instead? What if they lost their faith in religious people or the mechanics of religion?

I don’t think I could lose faith in God but there are days I’d throw religion and religious people out the window, slam it shut, lock it, and never look out again. A life in community, whether in person or online, can be really frustrating at times. We have all of these high ideals about love, companionship, worship, and holiness, but our real lives are so messy by comparison. We don’t always treat each other well, even when we intend to.

Some people are cranky by their nature or because they have adopted a victim stance and out of that, are perpetually defensive (I know bloggers who write out of that position pretty much all the time). Some people are generally OK until you hit one of their “hot button topics,” and then watch out (I wonder if that’s how I’m going to be next week in Sunday school?). Being in community with religious people is like walking through a mine field or living in an alcoholic family. You never know when the peace will be shattered by an abrupt and devastating explosion.

If I ever lost my faith, it wouldn’t be in God, it would be in human beings.

“You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”

-Mahatma Gandhi

There are times when I think it’s the ocean that’s dirty and only a few drops are clean.

Until you can see the good within a person, you are incapable of helping him.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Helping”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe, Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

And sometimes that’s an amazingly difficult thing to do. Reading quotes from Gandhi and Rabbi Freeman present a very pleasant picture, but life in the trenches of religion is anything but, at least for those folks who are struggling with faith (and don’t we all at some point).

I know why a Rabbi and Pastor (or probably just ordinary people) would stay in their religious communities after they’d lost faith in God…because of the continued social rewards. Most people who lose faith in people but not God would just leave the community and either try to find another or bail on community life entirely. But what if community life fails you but you still find God is present within the synagogue or church? What do you do then? Are you even aware that it’s God who’s holding you there? Maybe what feels like losing faith in God is just a protracted silence? God doesn’t always talk. But we’re supposed to have faith in the desert too.

I don’t have all the answers. Sometimes I don’t even know the right questions to ask. I just know that this religious life that is supposed to bring us closer to God isn’t pain-free, and it seems for some folks that the pain increases exponentially as we strive to approach Holiness. Maybe that’s why most religious people hit a comfortable plateau and just stay there, neither being too hot or too cold in their spirituality, but only lukewarm. Maybe that’s why some people quit completely, because being numb is better than being set on fire and writhing in the flames.

Where are the Gandhis and the Freemans with their soothing, supportive words? Where is the so called “community of faith?” Where is God?

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves…

-William Shakespeare
“Julius Caesar (I, ii, 140-141)”

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Revisiting Calvin and the Gift of Choice

July 25, 2013 James Pyles 13 Comments

He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will…

–Ephesians 1:5 (NASB)

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

–2 Peter 3:14-18 (NASB)

I thought I was through addressing the Arminianism vs. Calvinism debate, having explored it extensively in my multi-part blog series and topping it off with the rather metaphysical Schrödinger’s Free Will and God’s Sovereignty. Then we had a guest speaker give the sermon at church last Sunday. He covered the first eighteen verses of Ephesians 1 and spent considerable time supporting his belief in the Calvinistic argument. He had to make God subject to linear time to do it, and otherwise said pretty much what I’ve heard before.

Then, in Sunday school class, we studied part of 2 Peter 3 including the above-quoted verses and I started to wonder. If the names of those chosen by God for salvation are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life and we have no choice in the matter, then why did Peter write what he wrote? He’s encouraging believers (supposedly people already chosen and “sealed”) to be “diligent…spotless and blameless.” He also cautions his readers to “be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness.”

What? How is that possible. I thought once chosen, no one could “fall” from “steadfastness.”

My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

–John 10:27-29 (NASB)

Can you have it both ways? Can you be “unsnatchable,” so to speak, and still be able to fall from steadfastness?

Actually, during the sermon, I thought about the whole idea of being chosen. Israel was chosen as a nation. God chose corporate, national Israel, not each individual Israelites.

Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob and tell the sons of Israel: ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings, and brought you to Myself. Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel.”

–Exodus 19:3-6 (NASB)

But now listen, O Jacob, My servant, And Israel, whom I have chosen: Thus says the Lord who made you And formed you from the womb, who will help you, ‘Do not fear, O Jacob My servant; And you Jeshurun whom I have chosen.

–Isaiah 44:1-2 (NASB)

I don’t think anyone can argue that the act of God choosing Israel and Israel’s acceptance of God’s choosing involved corporate Israel, not each individual Israelite. That means all of the Israelites present at Sinai and all of their descendents were and are chosen by God and members of the covenant beyond any “unchoosing.”

Well, of course, there is this:

For whoever eats the fat of the animal from which an offering by fire is offered to the Lord, even the person who eats shall be cut off from his people. You are not to eat any blood, either of bird or animal, in any of your dwellings. Any person who eats any blood, even that person shall be cut off from his people.

–Leviticus 7:25-27 (NASB)

No one is exactly sure what it meant for an Israelite to be “cut off from his people,” but I found an interesting discussion on the topic at Biblical Hermeneutics. It may not mean that the guilty individual would be removed from the covenant. According to Jewish Virtual Library, it could mean a premature death “at the hand if heaven” (Rashi, Ket. 30b, et al.), however there are other opinions. The upshot, as I understand it though, is that even the Israelite who has committed a sin so severe as to be “cut off” is still, on some level, accountable for the conditions of the covenant, including the curses, just because that person is an Israelite.

Ancient Israelites and modern Jewish people are born into the covenant and are responsible to God whether they want to be or not. They have been chosen because they belong to a group. That seems to be a permanent condition, as I read the Bible:

Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.

–Matthew 5:17-18 (NASB)

And as you may have noticed, heaven and earth are still here, so the Torah is still in force for the Jewish people…all of them.

But what about us? What about the Gentiles who are called by His Name? If Israel was chosen corporately, why, according to Calvinism, are we chosen individually?

One reason might be the vast number of nations on the earth. Could God choose some nations (besides Israel) and not others? I suppose, but by what criteria would He choose? Of course, we can ask the same question about why He would choose one individual and not another. It’s certainly not by merit or anything we have done or could do. That’s the same for Israel, as I understand it. Midrash aside, God did not choose Israel because of her merit, either:

The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but because the Lord loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the Lord brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

–Deuteronomy 7:7-8 (NASB)

God didn’t choose Israel because of her merit but in order to keep His promises. What promises?

Then behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir.” And He took him outside and said, “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” Then he believed in the Lord; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness.

–Genesis 15:4-6 (NASB)

God made His promise to Abram (Abraham) in a vision after the encounter with the Priest-King of Salem, Melchizedek (see Genesis 14:17-20, though in actuality, God first directly interacted with Abram and promised to make him a great nation at the beginning of Genesis 12). The text seems to indicate that it was Abram’s faith that was the key factor in God making a covenant with him, but if we accept that as fact, then we have to admit that Abram had a part in his being chosen by God. If that’s so, following the inevitable logic, then God renewed His promises to Isaac, and then to Jacob, and then to the Children of Israel through Moses, all of which culminated at Sinai.

This choosing echoes down through history and will ripple even further and into the Messianic Age (all this is summarized in The Jesus Covenant: Building My Model). I can’t seem to find a way to pry the Jewish people or even one single, individual Jewish person out of the covenant promises that started with Abraham, continued into Sinai, and that were renewed for the future in Jeremiah 31 and Ezekiel 36.

Non-Jewish believers are attached as one of the conditions of the Abrahamic Covenant (but only one, not the whole thing), which, if we were to apply the same “logic” to us as we do to how the Israelites were “chosen” by God, seems to indicate that faith is also the “glue” connects us to God.

But how does God choosing Abraham filter down to God choosing Gentiles?

… and after he brought them out, he said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.” And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house. And he took them that very hour of the night and washed their wounds, and immediately he was baptized, he and all his household. And he brought them into his house and set food before them, and rejoiced greatly, having believed in God with his whole household.

–Acts 16:30-34 (NASB)

That seems pretty simple. But if the jailer and his household were “pre-chosen,” so to speak, why would he even ask that question? He’s been pre-selected. He has just come to the point where he has realized it. What if he wasn’t one of the chosen and he asked that question? Would Paul have said, “Sorry, pal. You aren’t one of the elect. You are out of luck”?

Probably not, but then I don’t think we have an example in the Bible of a person asking how to be saved who wasn’t going to be saved. Oh wait!

And someone came to Him and said, “Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?” And He said to him, “Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” Then he *said to Him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not commit murder; You shall not commit adultery; You shall not steal; You shall not bear false witness; Honor your father and mother; and You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The young man *said to Him, “All these things I have kept; what am I still lacking?” Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving; for he was one who owned much property.

–Matthew 19:16-22 (NASB)

But then again, the rich young ruler was Jewish and was already chosen by God because of Sinai. I’m not even sure how that’s supposed to work relative to the Jewish Messiah except that anyone who would come to the Father has to go through the Son. Did the young fellow lose salvation because his wealth meant more to him than obedience?

Questions remain. First of all, the idea of being chosen is rather “mushy.” Why was Israel chosen corporately but the rest of us must be chosen individually? Can any Israelite lose their chosenness? Evidence seems to say not, but my exploration of that area was hardly exhaustive. If a non-Jew is chosen can he or she lose that chosen status? Depending on which verses you read in the New Testament, the answer varies. What was the mechanism or process by which God chose Abraham and does that process apply to Gentiles since it is through Abraham that we are attached to the Messiah and thus to God?

Faith seems to play a part in both the choosing of Abraham and of the rest of us.

…and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform. Therefore it was also credited to him as righteousness. Now not for his sake only was it written that it was credited to him, but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification.

–Romans 4:21-25 (NASB)

Ephesians 2:8 says that even faith is a gift from God, so we can’t say that our faith is what we bring to the table, so to speak. God gives us the faith we need in order to be chosen by Him. But then, I found a counter-argument to this point at faithalone.org:

From a cursory reading of this verse, it appears that the relative pronoun that (v 8b) has faith (v 8a) as its grammatical antecedent. However, in its Greek construction that is a demonstrative pronoun with adverbial force used in an explanatory phrase. This particular construction uses a fixed neuter singular pronoun (that) which refers neither to faith, which is feminine in Greek, nor to any immediate word which follows. (See Blass, Debrunner, Funk, 132, 2.) What all this means is that the little phrase and that (kai touto in Greek) explains that salvation is of God’s grace and not of human effort. Understood accordingly, Ephesians 2:8 could well be translated: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, that is to say, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.”

Moreover, there is a parallelism between not of yourselves in v 8b and not of works in v 9. This parallelism serves as a commentary to v 8a (“For by grace you have been saved through faith”) which speaks of salvation in its entirety. It is difficult to see how faith, if it is the gift of God, harmonizes with not of works of v 9. We must conclude, then, that in Ephesians 2:8 salvation is the gift of God.

You can click the link I provided above to read the entire explanation, but if this analysis holds water, then I can say that faith is what we bring to the table. Salvation is the gift which we cannot earn through works so we cannot boast.

I know that nothing I’ve said here will convince a hard-core Calvinist that the whole “election” thing is wrong, but I think, once again, I’ve thrown enough monkey wrenches into the machine to keep Calvin and his supporters from thinking they’ve made a “slam dunk” with their arguments. Yes, the guest speaker at my church last Sunday provided a number of Bible verses that seem to support the “divine election” position, but there are just as many other parts of the Bible that support the idea that God, in His sovereignty, mercy, and love, has allowed human beings to participate in their own salvation by faith (or lack thereof, sadly).

God chose Abraham for a wonderful destiny, both as an individual and as the Father of the Hebrews. That promise passed down to Isaac, to Jacob, to Jacob’s twelve sons, to the twelve tribes, and ultimately to the Jewish people corporately. Non-Jews are grafted into a single condition, the promise of the Messiah, in the Abrahamic covenant, through faith, just as Abraham had faith, and that is our link to being chosen.

We’re chosen because of faith. Salvation is the resulting gift. I believe God loves human beings in a unique way, and out of that love, He chooses to allow us room in the universe to make independent decisions, much like a father will allow a child to make choices, even when the father knows some of those choices won’t be for the good.

There are times when love can kill. There are times when you love someone so much, you cannot allow him to breathe. He must do things the way you understand is best for him—because you cannot bear that one you love so much should be in any way distant from the truth as you know it.

“After all,” you imagine, “I must do for him what I would have done for myself!”

But true love makes room for the one you love.

-Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
“Love in Not Doing”
Based on letters and talks of the Rebbe, Rabbi M. M. Schneerson
Chabad.org

As for how God can write names in a book “before” Creation if both the book and God exist outside Creation and thus outside of time, you’ll have to see a certain cat in a box for the paradoxical answer.

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Getting Dressed One Mitzvah at a Time

July 11, 2013 James Pyles 6 Comments

So I walk into a random office and ask a guy to put on tefillin. Perhaps just to get rid of me, he agrees. I strap him up, help him read Shema, shake his hand and leave. In and out in 3 minutes.

I’m at a circumcision. During the inevitable ten-minute delay waiting for the baby to be sent down to the ceremony, I persuade the nervous father to put on tefillin. I explain to him the connection between circumcision and tefillin, which are both referred to in the Torah as a sign of our connection to G‑d, and he confides to me that this is the first time he’s worn tefillin since his bar mitzvah.

But what have we gained from guilt-tripping a guy into tefillin? It’s just a one off, with no guarantee of any followup. Is he any more religious, committed or switched on than before I started nudging him?

-Rabbi Elisha Greenbaum
“What’s the Point of a One-Time Mitzvah?”
Chabad.org

This sort of article makes a lot more sense to Jews than to Christians since we in the church focus more on faith than activity. This isn’t universally true, but it’s all too common.

I’ve been following the conversation over at Judah Himango’s blog and he has a point in echoing James the Just in saying “faith without works is dead.” (James 2:17)

But can you approach a “lukewarm” Christian and inspire him or her by “guilting” them into a single act of Christian compassion? Even Rabbi Greenbaum asks if “guilting” a Jewish person into a “one-off mitzvah” is worth it. Would it do any good to twist a believer’s arm to donate a can of soup to the food bank or give ten dollars to help a kid go to summer camp? Once the “motivation” is gone, won’t any further “good deeds” go with it?

This question was once posed to the Lubavitcher Rebbe by a not-yet-religious individual. The Rebbe had compared adding extra mitzvahs into one’s daily routine to wearing a tie, which adds beauty and splendor to one’s whole ensemble. In response, the man asked what seems to be an ingenious question. He pointed out that the Rebbe’s analogy would hold true only for someone already wearing clothing; however, were a naked person to don a tie, rather than looking better, he’d look completely ridiculous.

The Rebbe agreed that a naked man wearing a tie might indeed look silly, but contended the very act of putting a tie would probably wake him up to the fact that he’s naked in the first place. Sometimes the incongruity of being simultaneously underdressed but over-accessorized can lead you to rush off to cover yourself up.

I can’t help but be reminded of this:

When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.” And He said, “Who told you that you were naked?

–Genesis 3:6-11 (NASB)

What shows us that we are naked? We might never notice except when we put on an article of clothing, an accessory of some sort perhaps, and realize the rest of the outfit is missing. I think it’s that way for a lot of people who profess a sort of faith, both Christian and Jewish. We show up at our houses of worship, socialize, go to the obligatory classes, give charity, eat and drink together, but all that can be accomplished without the slightest awareness of God. Even if we are doing good deeds, are we performing such actions just because it’s expected in our social context? Are we doing so only because it makes us look like good people?

I agree that a life of faith as merely an internal state isn’t going to do much good to anyone, even ourselves. But faith and deeds must go together. Sometimes deeds happen without faith, even among religious people because we treat religion like a social club.

No, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying the company of others, but in the end, if that’s the only reason you go to church or synagogue, and if the only reason you give to charity is to impress your friends, then you’re doing everything in vain. The primary reason to congregate among our fellows is to experience an encounter with God. Then out of that encounter, everything else we do including charity and good deeds makes a great deal more sense.

If we’re religious for poor reasons, then being compelled into a “one-off mitzvah,” even as a Christian, can expose our nakedness. We’re forced to look in the mirror and realize that all we are wearing are the Emperor’s New Clothes, which is to say, nothing at all.

Making this illustration may be somewhat easier for a Jewish population than a Christian one since the mitzvot that define Jewish identity are more documented and apparent. Christianity does not have a “Law” as such, since most church-goers have been taught by tradition that grace has replaced behavioral expectations.

But it can still be done because most of Torah actually applies to the church, too. Christians are all too familiar with Torah, we just don’t call it that.

Here are some ideas:

Carry ten dollars in ones in your wallet. Give one dollar each to the next ten homeless people you see on the street (I’ve actually seen this done). If you don’t encounter many homeless people throughout the course of your week, it’s OK. Just keep giving until the money’s gone. Then repeat periodically.
Go to your local supermarket and buy some canned goods, then drive to your local foodbank or where food is being collected for the poor (your church may even have a donation site). Deposit canned goods in donation bin. Then repeat periodically.
Carry jumper cables in your car and, when you encounter someone who has a dead car battery, volunteer to help out. (if you pay attention to your environment, this opportunity happens more often than you might imagine).
Google a phrase such as “how to do good deeds.” Click on one of the links returned such as 21 ways to do a good deed. Read and follow the instructions.

Are you feeling more dressed yet?

Of course, as I said, none of this is as effective as it could be if you’re doing it for the right reasons. I don’t recommend that you tell anyone about your project. That way, you can avoid the temptation to brag about yourself. I do recommend that you tell God about it (not that He doesn’t know) by praying for your heart to be softened by your performance of these mitzvot. Although doing good deeds helps those you are helping, the person who really benefits is you, the good deed doer. For in giving to others, you are not only learning how to love your fellow human beings, but God as well, which is another mitzvah.

Aside for the intrinsic standalone value that each mitzvah has, mitzvah observance can also be contagious. Agreeing to opt in, even just once, can have far-reaching effects. There have been untold thousands of Jews who have made permanent changes in their lives for the better, just because they agreed to try it once.

Now that you’ve put on the tie, you might want to follow up with a pair of pants and a shirt.

From my father’s sichot: When Mashiach will come (speedily in our time, amein), then we shall really long for the days of the exile. Then we will truly feel distress at our having neglected working at avoda; then will we indeed feel the deep pain caused by our lack of avoda. These days of exile are the days of avoda, to prepare ourselves for the coming of Mashiach, speedily in our time, amein.

“Today’s Day”
Wednesday, Menachem Av 3, 5703
Compiled by the Lubavitcher Rebbe; Translated by Yitschak Meir Kagan
Chabad.org

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Save Me!

May 7, 2013 James Pyles 7 Comments

A guy is riding his motorcycle down a mountain road when suddenly he loses control and goes hurtling off the cliff. As he’s sailing through the air, he shouts out: “God! Please make a miracle! Save me!”

Within moments his shirt gets caught on a protruding branch – and he is left dangling thousands of feet above the ground.

There’s no way out, so he looks heavenward and shouts: “God! Please save me!”

“Do you trust Me, my beloved son?” calls the voice from heaven.

“Yes, God, I trust you. Just please save me!”

“Okay then,” says God. “Let go of the branch and I’ll catch you.”

The man thinks for a moment, looks around, and calls out: “Is anyone else out there?!”

“Recognizing God”
-from “Ask the Rabbi”
Aish.com

I’ve been writing a lot lately on topics that seem to inspire not only conversation (which is good) but emotional disagreement (which isn’t always good). I thought I’d back off a bit and discuss something that we all have in common: trusting God. I say we all have it in common (assuming you have faith in the living God of Israel), because trusting God isn’t always easy. The little story I quoted above is a joke but jokes are funny because they contain a truth we all understand.

Not only is trusting God difficult but the worse the situation is we find ourselves in, the more difficult of a time we have in trusting. Hence the punchline, “Is anyone else out there?”

Trusting God isn’t a matter of how well our lives are going. If we trust God only when things are doing well with us, it’s not trust. Trusting God is about the relationship we have with Him and to some degree, who we are as an individual personality.

The Aish Rabbi continues:

The key to forging a relationship with God is to trust Him. God is not some vindictive, punishing old man in the sky. God is our loving Creator, who wants only our best. Sometimes that calls for Him to “test” us with difficulties; but the intention is only to bring out our very best.

When we are children, we think we are the center of the universe. Then, through experience and trials, we become increasingly aware of the fact that there are things in life beyond our control. Whether it’s earthquakes, cancer, the rise and fall of fortunes, circumstances of our birth – and even birth itself… this can only be ascribed to a Higher Power.

Maimonides writes that there are two primary ways to attain recognition of God: by observing the wonders of Creation, and by performing mitzvot. Through nature, we see the beauty, splendor, and perfect unity of the world. Through mitzvot, we see how humanity can likewise attain unity and perfection.

In a way, we learn to trust God by acting the way we want Him to act (speaking of mitzvot). If we live a life that is upright, generous, charitable, merciful, compassionate, and wholesome, we will tend to think of God in that way. If our natures (which are sinful and thus very bad) are stingy, mean-spirited, cruel, hard-hearted, base, and immoral, we tend not to think of God that way, but we think we are going to be struck down any second by God. We expect, when hard times come, that we deserve it and we can’t trust God to help us out.

Trusting God depends on how well we can trust ourselves and how well others trust us.

Rabbi Mordechai Kamenetzky at Torah.org has a commentary based on last week’s Torah reading that also illustrates this point.

My dear friend Rabbi Benyamin Brenig of Golders Green, London recently related this wonderful story to me: Reuvain and Shimon were two men, who lived on opposite ends of town. They each inherited a fortune of gold. Each of them decided to bury their fortunes in their backyards. They wanted to make sure that they would have something to sustain them in their old age. On their respective properties, they each picked a landmark, paced twenty steps due north and dug a large hole.

Reuvain, the more nervous of the two, was careful to make sure that no one was watching. Every other second he glanced furtively over his shoulder to make sure that no one saw him bury the treasure. No one did.

Shimon, by nature, was trusting and carefree and he was not so careful. He was not worried that anyone would steal his fortune. But he was wrong. He was spotted by a nosy neighbor, who was also a thief.

In the middle of the night, the thief dug up the fortune. Out of mercy, he left few coins at the bottom of the pit, and removed the coins. He refilled the hole and packed the ground perfectly as if nothing was disturbed. Then he took off with the fortune.

Reuvain’s fortune, however, remained intact. But he was, by nature, a worrier. And so, the next day he decided to dig up the hole to make sure that the gold was still there. Accidentally, he counted only fifteen paces from his landmark and dug. There was nothing there. Reuvain was frantic. Someone must have seen him dig the pit, he figured. For the rest of his life, he worried. On his property, he had a pit filled with gold coins, but all Reuvain did was worry!

Shimon on the other hand had nothing but the remnants of a few coins. Everything else was stolen. But he never checked the fortune, and was merrily content, assured that when the time would come he could dig up the pit and retrieve his fortune. Reuvain, the millionaire, died heartbroken and frantic. Shimon, the man with but a few coins left for his old-age lived his life content as if he was the wealthiest man in the world.

The Torah tells us about the different types of blessings. For the faithful, Hashem says, “I will command my blessing in the sixth year,” in which Rashi assures us that even a bit will feel like a bounty. But we must acknowledge that despite Heavenly assurances, there are those who always worry. They need to see the money! They ask, “What will we eat in the seventh year? Behold! We will not sow and not gather in our crops!” Hashem must assure them that he will increase their bounty in a way that is visible to them.

Some of us can believe without seeing immediate results. We can sleep well, with full satisfaction on empty stomachs. The greatest expression of faith is when we do not see the blessing, but we feel it in our hearts and even in our stomachs. That blessing transcends tangibility, and the fear of deficiency. I think that is a noble goal.

For the rest of us, those who keep looking over their shoulder and check their fortunes every day, they need a different type of blessing. Sometimes we dig for tangible salvation, even though the treasure is sitting undisturbed in our own backyard.

I know that was a long quote, but I think it’s a good story and it tells us something about God and who we choose to be in God. Once you bury gold in the backyard, you can no longer see if it is there or not unless you dig it up. You can be like Shimon who lost most of his gold but because he trusted in something more precious than gold, lived his life in security and happiness as if he were a wealthy man. Reuvain, by contrast, didn’t lose a dime, but because he thought he had lost everything due to his untrusting nature, he could not trust the One who is worth far more than gold coins, and thus he lived out his life, though wealthy, as if he were a pauper dressed in rags.

We can’t control the circumstances of our lives with any certainty. Yes, we can invest in IRAs, spend cautiously on personal comforts, give generously to the poor, treat the lonely and grieving with kindness and compassion, but like the residents of New York and New Jersey, we cannot anticipate when the next superstorm Sandy will come and wipe all of our material possessions away like a sandcastle on a beach.

Like Job, we can learn to trust in God whether he grants us much or little. And we can strive to learn to trust God as did Paul.

Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

–Philippians 4:11-13

I’ll freely admit that I sometimes have trouble with matters of trust, but that’s my problem, not God’s. God is not only immensely trustworthy but infinitely so. And even if I were to lose everything, I could only try to aspire to be like Job when he said, “Though he slay me, I will hope in him; yet I will argue my ways to his face” (Job 13:15). The part about “argue my ways” may seem a little off base, but if I trust God, then I can trust Him with my heart, which includes all of my emotions, my disappointments, and my anguish, even my problems of trust in Him.

But in the end, we all will arrive at the same destination. In the end, we must all trust God and cry out to Him, “Save me!” Will we “let go” and let Him catch us?

141 days.

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Love Loses: The Aftermath of Terrorism and Humanity

April 17, 2013 James Pyles 11 Comments

“You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is like an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”

―Mahatma Gandhi

Two bombs exploded near the crowded finish line of the Boston Marathon on Monday, killing three people and injuring more than 140 others in a terrifying scene of broken glass, smoke and severed limbs, authorities said.

CBS Boston station WBZ-TV reports one of the three who died from the attack was an 8-year-old boy.

“Deadly bombs rock Boston marathon”
CBSNews.com

Normally I can bounce back from the impact of events like this one but not this time. I wrote about the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings more than once, and managed to recover my balance, my relationship with God and humanity, and keep on going, but somehow, this time is different. I don’t think that the specifics of the Boston Marathon horror are different, I just think all these events are cumulative. They’re piling up inside of me and crowding out my soul.

In every human being there is only so large a supply of love. It’s like the limbs of a starfish, to some extent: if you chew off a chunk, it will grow back. But if you chew off too much, the starfish dies. Valerie B. chewed off a chunk of love from my dwindling reserve … a reserve already nibbled by Charlotte and Lory and Sherri and Cindy and others down through the years. There’s still enough there to make the saleable appearance of a whole creature, but nobody gets gnawed on that way without becoming a little dead. So, if Cupid (that perverted little motherf**ker) decides his lightning ought to strike this gnarly tree trunk again, whoever or whatever gets me is going to get a handy second, damaged goods, something a little dead and a little crippled.

-Harlan Ellison
from “Valerie: A True Memoir” (1972)

Ellison doesn’t leave his commentary on personal tragedy and untimely death like that and continues by saying, “Don’t close yourself off, but jeezus, be careful of monsters with teeth.”

Harlan Ellison used to be one of my favorite authors about thirty to thirty-five years ago or so, but eventually, the anger, abrasiveness, and lawsuits that characterized his life began to take their toll on mine and I had to move on. However in moving on, I failed to take into consideration that Ellison just writes as a reflection of our human environment, and the cynicism, dissatisfaction, and out-and-out rage at life he expresses is merely the sea we’re all swimming in. That sea is full of hungry sharks and they smell blood.

Oh, these thoughts and feelings aren’t new to me and in fact, I wrote my own starfish story not too long ago.

Since this latest act of terror, two predictable messages have dominated the news and the social media outlets: encouragement and blame. Gandhi is only one example of the encouragement type message that you can find on Facebook lately. In fact, after Newtown, I based one of my meditations on something attributed to Fred Rogers:

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

I’m sure that’s true, but there seems to be only a few helpers left. The rest of us are just “helping ourselves,” usually to things that don’t belong to us.

I actually wrote on this theme, disappointment in the human race, days ago, and that “meditation” will appear on Friday morning as my commentary on this week’s Torah Portion. But the sinking feeling that we are all sinking won’t leave me and I’m not going to wait until Friday to complain about it. I slept pretty well last night, but the night before was consumed with dreams of death, blood, kidnapping, and violence. I finally woke up at 3 a.m. and was glad to do so. Sometimes sleep is the only escape I can find from the battering life dishes out, but not always.

Sometimes living is a battle and the only thing you can do is fight back, maybe hoping to win, or maybe hoping just to survive the defeat.

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of ev’ry glove that layed him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
“I am leaving, I am leaving”
But the fighter still remains

-Paul Simon (recorded by Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel)
from the song “The Boxer” (1968)

In answering a question about “why bad things happen to good people” related to natural disasters, the Aish Rabbi replied:

Thank you for your thoughtful question. It is really a formulation of the classic: “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Let me try to explain:

The story is told of the king who commissioned a tapestry to be woven. In the middle of the work, someone came upon the weaver and saw a mish-mash of different colored threads, loose threads and, in general, a very messy piece of work. A complaint was issued to the king who then confronted the artist. The artist pleaded with the king for a few days to prepare his defense. After those few days he came before the king with a wrapped package and told the king, “Here is my defense.” Inside the package was the completed tapestry.

The moral is that we cannot judge the work until it is completed. Moses asked to see God’s face. That request was denied, but he was allowed to “see” God’s “back.” It is explained that Moses wanted to understand how God runs the world. The response was that it is beyond human comprehension until you see the “back.” That is, until we can see the whole picture; then in hindsight it will all make sense.

While this answer may seem a “cop-out,” it prevents us from trying to understand God’s actions from our very limited perspective. In order for us to be able to “judge God,” we need to consider God’s “ground rules” for existence. Using this premise, it becomes very difficult to judge God. Why? Because we are stuck in a finite perspective of time and space, and we can therefore never be sure which rules God is employing at any given moment.

In order to begin to make sense of this, one thing we must understand is that God is in control, and there are no accidents. There has to be intrinsic meaning in our lives; otherwise we are just a random collection of molecules whizzing through space, with no real direction or purpose.

We are living in a very complex world, and in such a world, God doesn’t only deal with individuals, he also deals with nations.

OK, I get it. God is a “big picture” kind of guy and I can’t see the forest for the trees, if you’ll forgive the mixed metaphor.

But when is enough enough? When do the encouraging messages and the happy platitudes become tiresome and ineffective? Is that why New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof blamed the GOP for the Boston Marathon explosions or why the Westboro Baptist (so called) Church is threatening to picket the funerals of the three people killed as a protest against the LGBT community?

That isn’t fighting back against injustice, that’s insane cruelty. It’s insane to hope that the bomber turns out to be an Arab Muslim or an ultra-conservative white American. The only person to blame for the explosions is the person to planted the bombs, just like the only person to blame for the Newtown School shootings is the person who pulled the trigger.

But if I truly believed that, then I could be like Gandhi, seeing these horrific acts as aberrations among a much larger humanity I can be proud to be a part of, and I could dismiss a few drops of dirty moisture as insignificant amid a sea of refreshing, life-giving water.

But it’s not just a few drops, it’s an endless flood, not of water but of gushing blood, ripped and torn flesh, and the screams and cries of the wounded and dying.

Reddit hosts specialty pages including one on Atheism which is used to make fun of religion and religious people. I guess that sort of thing floats their boat.

Anyway, I saw a photo a “redditer” posted the day after the Boston Marathon explosions of a person donating blood. The story that went along with the image said that the blood donor had been reading a lot of messages (presumably on Facebook and twitter) from Christians saying how they were praying for the victims of the explosions. He decided to do something a little more helpful by donating blood.

I couldn’t help but agree with him, not that I believe prayer ineffective, but the answer to prayer is to actually do something about it, like giving blood. Those type of people, Christians, Atheists, or otherwise, are the “helpers” Fred Rogers’ mother was talking about.

But, to recall Gandhi, are the helpers the ocean or the few drops of “clean” water that are left amid a sea of blood, mud, and fecal matter?

Jesus once lamented, “However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8 NASB). Rabbi Tzvi Freeman wrote, “One who does good brings in more light. One who fails, feeds the darkness.” I am more than aware that I am currently feeding the darkness but I’m hardly alone. For every ten people who are willing to donate blood for people who need it, the world summons ten-thousand who will be glad to shed more blood. If a hundred people hold candles in the night to defy the darkness, a million will extinguish the light, and then rape and murder the terrified victims trying to hide in the shadows.

There’s no one left to blame except ourselves, so we might as well stop pointing fingers at everyone else besides us. Our group, our political party, our religion, our gender identity, our race, our ethnic type is no more pure than anyone else’s and the one equalizing factor is that we are part of the grubby, trashy, filthy ocean of the human race. We all planted the bombs. We all pulled the trigger. We all spilled blood. We are all drowning in the pain and the death, submerged, begging for air, begging for mercy, begging for life.

Encouraging messages such those uttered by Mahatma Gandhi and Fred Rogers are meant to lift us up out of that ocean so that we can, by resisting discouragement and depression, rise above and lead others to be agents of change and optimism.

But Gandhi and Mr. Rogers are both dead. All of the heroes are dead. The world we live in now looks up to people like Honey Boo Boo, Snooki, and Kim Kardashian. Welcome to the “progressive” age of humanity. The Prophet Isaiah was correct when he said that in the last days good would be called evil and evil would be called good. The apostle Paul expanded on this:

But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power.

–2 Timothy 3:1-5 (ESV)

Paul wisely advised those reading his letter to avoid such people, but how is that possible when they are the only people in the world (or so it seems)? In Arkansas, groups are suing the state for the “right” to abort babies up until birth rather than banning abortions after twelve weeks gestation (as if killing a baby at any time could be considered a “good” thing to do). People are obsessed with American Idol and couldn’t care less about any suffering that CNN and the New York Times doesn’t deem worthy of attention. We greave now for the eight-year old boy who was killed in the Boston explosions, but next week, he’ll be replaced by the latest “reality TV show.” And this piece of obvious bigotry didn’t help.

The Joker, played by Heath Ledger is the film The Dark Knight (2008) was right: “When the chips are down, these… these civilized people, they’ll eat each other.”

And we will. Rob Bell (infamously) wrote a book called Love Wins. He was wrong.

161 days.

"When you awake in the morning, learn something to inspire you and mediate upon it, then plunge forward full of light with which to illuminate the darkness." -Rabbi Tzvi Freeman