guest book review: "The Book of Love"

Book Review

The Book of Love

by Kathleen McGowan

Watching action movies, and even classic fantasy films, like “The Lord of Rings,” I have often wondered what a female “action” story would be like.  Kathleen McGowan’s novel, The Book of Love, answers the question.  The story might never be made into a movie, but it’s filled with conflict between good and evil.  Instead of swords and guns, the heroine uses intuition and negotiation.  (A secondary heroine does lead armies and brandish a sword very effectively, under the tutelage of her best instincts and in service to the greater good.)  Cunning, bravery and risks inhabit the pages.  The tension between pursuing truth and hiding truth stalks both the outer and inner worlds of the characters.
McGowan’s deft handling of a tremendous amount of material—imaginal as well as  historical—creates a page-turner.  I learned more about the Middle Ages, art, architecture, the labyrinth and Chartres Cathedral in this one piece of fiction than in all the reading and studying and memorizing of a lifetime.  I am not a historian by nature, and don’t read about those topics of my own volition.  Because they are woven seamlessly into the narrative and move it forward, and because I cared about the story and the characters, I gleaned an education.  
In addition, I felt the love and humility with which the author approached this project.  Her characters ooze humanness.  The “quotes” from “The Book of Love,” a gospel written by Jesus, serve up poetic instruction that speaks to our current world and the individual seeker’s place in it.  McGowan re-visions old tales, infusing new meaning and fresh understanding into stories that have been overlooked or deadened through patriarchal bias.  After I finished the novel, I wanted to go back and type out every legend and teaching recorded in her “Libro Rosso” (Red Book) so that I would have the beautiful writings together in one place, at my fingertips.
The story follows a modern-day woman who is given a task by something/someone greater than herself.  In this way, Maureen reminds me of Frodo.  Like him, she grows weary, makes mistakes, and needs her companions to keep her going on the right course.  Like The Lord of the Rings, McGowan’s The Book of Love encourages us—mere mortal readers that we are—to say yes to what life asks of us.  It’s a tale that feeds the heart, the head and the soul.  
This is the second in a series of three.  The first is The Expected One.  The third, The Poet Prince, is due out soon.

Peggy Voth
Nov 28, 2009

book review: The Twelve, A Novel

The Twelve: 12.21.12, Time is Running Out, by William Gladstone.

A very interesting take on the 2012 phenomenon. A mix of allegory and fiction, a lot of spiritual truth is contained in this story. Max has a near-death experience as a teenager, which begins a lifelong search. This search culminates in the year 2012, with Max in his 60's.

It is fascinating to contemplate our own existence in the light of this story. I believe that each one of us has an agenda for our life on earth. I believe we are involved in determining what that agenda is prior to coming to earth. But, like our role-model, Jesus, we are emptied of this knowledge before we are born. We then spend our lives attempting to discover our purpose for being here.

That is the essence of The Twelve. I don't want to give too much away; I wish each of you would read this story. It is well worth it.

Suffice it to say that this story will encourage you, will strengthen your faith (even if it challenges some beliefs!), will dampen the fear we may feel when contemplating the future of the earth, and our lives upon it.

The scenario in this book is a potential, positive shift in the consciousness of the human race. As I have outlined in previous posts, there are two possible end times. The earth could end through a cataclysmic apocalypse, or it could shift into a new level of life as we awaken to our God-given abilities. Let us pray that this story is a model of what we achieve.

book review: God is Not Great

God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, Christopher Hitchins.

A first for me! I listened to this whole book on audio, read in its entirety by the author. This old dog is still learning new tricks!! I am old-fashioned enough to prefer printed pages, but it was interesting to hear the book, especially since it was read by the author and presumably included his own emphases and inflections.

Christopher Hitchins uses a life-time of experience and research to outline in great detail all the horrors done in the name of religion and God. His delightfully articulated knowledge leaves little room for disagreement. I found myself fascinated again and again at the ways he put things together and made sense out of vast sweeps of time and place. (I would never want to be drawn into an argument with this man! It would be a losing proposition.)

And Hitchins is indiscriminate; he is lambasting not only Christianity. While tending to focus on the three great monotheistic religions, he also has words for the pantheistic ones.

And yet, while agreeing with him thoroughly throughout the book, I am not in the least inclined to abandon my involvment in church. I know all this horrible history, and am still part of it. Despite its chequered past, church holds meaning for me and countless millions around the world. From the book I would expect Hitchins to think me imbecilic for such an illogical conclusion!

But, thank you Christopher Hitchins for this enlightening book.

book review: The Family

The Family:  The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power, Jeff Sharlet, HarperCollins, 2008.

Growing up in the United States we always suspected there were power people behind the scenes, and that the actual people in office were often not much more than puppets. This book reveals just a little of the powers-behind-the-thrones who pull the strings.

The scary thing about all this is that it is cloaked in the language and images of conservative, evangelical Christianity. It is about people getting together to pray for each other and pray for the people in power. It is about following Jesus and his call on each person's life.

Yet, there is something about The Family that doesn't "feel" quite right. Jeff Sharlet began uncovering some of it's more sinister aspects. For one thing, the "gospel" they are promoting is that of unrestrained capitalism. They are against any help to the poor and disadvantaged of society; they fight welfare laws. They believe that if men in power do the right things (that is, gain power and influence to enact the right laws and make the right corporate decisions) it will "trickle down" to the poor.  Where have we heard this concept before?!!

God's leading, answers to prayer, are all couched in gaining power. Relationships are nurtured solely for the sake of access to powerful people. "The 'teachings of the Nazarene' for such politicians amounted to deregulation, the removal of government intervention from matters they thought firmly taken in hand by Jesus and His chosen representatives." (p142) "His chosen representatives", of course, are hand-picked to join The Family, also formerly called, The Fellowship. One cannot volunteer to join this group.

The Fellowship began under the leadership of Abram Vereide in the 1930's. Doug Coe took over after Abram's death in the late 1960's. Today, as Coe gradually retires, leadership is being assumed by Dick Foth. The main public event they organize is the National Prayer Breakfast. Vereide began this tradition during Eisenhower's presidency. Ike attended, as have presidents to this day.

But most of their work is behind the scenes, not only in Washington DC, but also around the world, as they seek one world order. "Jesus must rule every nation through the vessel of American power." (p218) Coe was anointed as Vereide's successor because, ". . . he would pray with anyone, and he would bless anyone, so long as they had the strength to submit their nation to God. That was his greatest virtue in Abram's eyes: he . . . never questioned whether Jesus really cared most for men with power." (p218)

If you want to know just a little about what is really going on in the halls of power in the US capital and around the world, I recommend this book. Sharlet has done a tremendous amount of research about the history of Vereide, The Fellowship, Coe and others. He infiltrated The Family for a few months to discover more of their inner workings. It all sounds so Christian, so righteous and Biblical, but oh, so sinister. God's Kingdom in their own image!

The Sign of Jonah

I know there are some of you Biblical literalists out there who will say that the prophecies in Revelation and Daniel must come true, they are inevitable. Destruction and upheaval are foretold and will happen (see previous post).

But hold on a minute! There are a couple things I want to say about that.

First, those two books especially, are written in a genre called apocalyptic. There is a lot of symbolism, numerology, literary conventions which go with apocalyptic writing. In today's world we don't always understand all of this; and we certainly do not often take it into account. So we must be very careful about interpreting these writings. There are thousands of preachers out there declaring confidently that "this" is what they mean. And they come up with a thousand different interpretations all proudly proclaimed as God's Word. Please, please, please, dear reader. When you encounter one of these, take the words with a huge grain of salt, if you take them at all.

The second thing I want to say is scriptural. Jesus says, "No sign shall be given to [this generation] except the sign of Jonah." (Luke 11.29)

Jonah is an "Old" Testament prophet sent to the evil city Nineveh to proclaim judgement on it. His message (at least what is recorded of it in scripture) was one line:  "Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" (Jonah 3.4) This prophecy was not proclaimed as conditional, as in, "If you don't repent, you will be destroyed." Nope. It was, "Destruction is coming." Period.

Well, the people repented, and God relented.

And Jonah got angry! He wanted to see the destruction of Nineveh.

I believe the "sign of Jonah" principle still applies today. I believe that no matter how certain seem the prophecies outlined in scripture, if people repent, even a small percentage (a "tipping point"), God will not bring about his judgement. We have a part to play in our future. It is not set in stone. The Earth does not necessarily have to endure all the dire predictions proclaimed so vociferously by so many. God is still the Source who is full of grace, who still relents.

And, as in Jonah's story, I believe there will be Christians today who will get resentful if these prophecies don't happen in the way they anticipate. Get a grip, people! What is more important here? Our "precious" little interpretations of scripture, or what God chooses to do?

As I have said before, we live in interesting and exciting times. I look forward to seeing what Source has in store for us! I want to have an open mind to see God at work, not be so close-minded that I miss him when he appears (the problem of the pharisees).

The Tipping Point

Following up on my previous post, my wife, Peggy, and I have had numerous discussions about the coming shift in our world. Currently two possible threads seem possible. One thread says that the coming historical culmination will contain violent upheaval. Another thread moves more along the lines of a gradual transition to a higher plane of existence, a spiritual evolution, if you will.

Obviously these two are mutually exclusive.  Which path is it to be?

Looking at world events, it sure seems the upheaval thread is more likely. Violence increases, wars continue, cultural upheaval is the norm, nothing appears certain. The growing gap between rich and poor has always been an indicator of social unrest, so why should our age be any different? There is greater inequity in so many areas of life, especially economic, than ever before. This has got to lead to conflict between the have-nots and the haves. And people in developing countries now have access to media allowing them to become increasingly aware of these inequities. Higher awareness fosters unhappiness and dissatisfaction with these inequities.

On the other hand, we are aware of increasing numbers of people growing spiritually. There is a greater spiritual awareness and hunger than ever before. People are rushing to experience spiritual growth in unprecedented numbers. More and more people want to know about the spiritual dimensions of life, and experience and participate in what God/Universe/Source is doing.

But looking at the overall picture, the numbers of these latter seem so small compared to those involved in the paths of violence.  How can we hold any hope that the spiritual evolution will ever catch up with and surpass the violence spectrum?

Then one day Peggy ran across the concept of a "tipping point" in her reading. This caused a huge spark of hope to flare in us. The essence of a tipping point, in this case, is that it doesn't necessarily require an equal number of spiritually evolved people to overcome the violent ones. In other words, we don't need to wait and hope for a 50-50 split. It only requires a small percentage of spiritually mature to influence and change the world's course, to overcome the evil in this world.

Well, if that is true, then we can have hope!  I don't know what the "magic" number might be, but even if it is as high as 10%, that sounds a whole lot more hopeful than 50%.

I thought of the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham bargains with Yahweh for the salvation of the cities. He begins by asking Yahweh if he could spare the city for the sake of fifty righteous people within it. "And Yahweh said, 'If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.'" (Genesis 18.26) Abraham keeps bargaining, obviously realizing there is little chance of finding fifty righteous in such a sinful place. He bargains down to 45, then 40, 30, 20 and finally 10. "For the sake of ten I will not destroy it," says Yahweh. (Gen 18. 32)

There's the principle. A small percentage of righteous people will be salvation for the whole. And I believe this principle is still at work. If enough people begin to awaken spiritually, and seek their part in the salvation of the Earth, it can be saved. A "tipping point" of spiritually mature people can lead this Earth through a natural transition to a higher plane of existence. It does not have to undergo calamitous upheaval and destruction.

"As anthropologist Margaret Mead famously said, 'Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.'" (The Great Awakening, Jim Wallis, p.65)

Our Life's Task

In my previous post I layed out the idea of us having pre-existed in the spiritual dimension before we ever came to earth to be born in human form.  I believe there is a lot of evidence that this is a true portrayal.  Now I want to look at another dimension of this idea.

That dimension, mentioned in passing in the previous post, is that we not only pre-existed our earthly incarnation, but that we actively participated in the decision to enter the material world.  I believe that in our prior spiritual state we were part of the discussion about the stage we were in along our spiritual progression, what lessons we needed to learn, and what sorts of experiences we could use to learn those spiritual lessons.  I believe that we then participated in the decision as to where we would be born, at what time, and to whom, in order to give us the best chance possible to go through these tests and experiences and learn from them.

You've heard the saying, "I didn't choose my family, but I sure as shootin' can choose my own friends!"  Well, now I wonder if that is entirely true!  Maybe we did have a hand in choosing our family.  Oh dear!

All of us are at different places in our journey through life.  For many of you, these ideas may seem acceptable and true.  But for others they may seem really "out there".  Ideas like this open up dimensions to the spiritual world around us that we may never have considered.  Living in our scientific, material world, it is often difficult to conceive that there may be a whole other dimension surrounding us.  The writers of the scriptures and other ancient works had no such trouble.  To ancient cultures the spiritual dimension was as natural and real as the physical dimension.

I believe that our last couple centuries of living with a predominantly scientific, material mindset  has radically dimmed our perceptions of the spiritual domain.  As Christians we give lip-service to this domain, but do any of us truly believe that it exists?  Do we wonder about it?  Do we fantasize what it might be like?  Do we seek to explore this dimension?

Well, I offer some observations and conjectures of this dimension, perhaps opening the wee-ist of glimpses into the spiritual world around us.

You may or may not have picked up from previous posts that I believe quite strongly that history is heading pell-mell toward some sort of culmination.  Our time on this planet is limited.  Things cannot and will not continue to go on as they have.  There is coming a shift of some sort, a change in our world, a transition into another way of being.  I don't know what this will consist of.  I do not know what life will be like on the other side of the turning which is coming.  I do not know if this transition will be gradual or sudden, violent or benign.  It might be convulsive, or it might be smooth.

And I believe that we who are alive today have all participated in the decision to come be part of this transition.  I believe we came to earth deliberately to facilitate this shift.  I believe that we live in a tremendously exciting time in Earth's history, and that we have a very important role to play in this time.

There are many among us who are very in tune with God and the spiritual plane.  I mentioned those who have experienced NDE's in my last post.  There are many others who are intuitive, who can hear God's Spirit speak clearly, who receive messages and visions from the spiritual dimension.

Over and over I am reading and hearing that the message from God to us in our day is that we are tremendously privileged to live during this time period.  We are especially gifted and equipped to aid in the coming transition time.  Many of us are highly evolved spiritual beings who have made the decision to come to Earth at this time for very important tasks.

I don't know, dear reader, how you are receiving all of this!  For myself, I feel incredibly encouraged and heartened to contemplate these sorts of things.  When I read these kinds of encouraging messages from beyond I feel excited; bring it on!!

We each have our part to play in the coming events.  Our part may be small; there may be a few of us called to play large parts in whatever is coming.  But I believe that for all of us, we are called to live lives of integrity, love, hope and compassion; we are called to reach out to each other, to depend on each other, to live in community with one another.

By the way, the whole concept of sin, that great bugaboo of the Church which messes up so many minds, is linked to this concept.  The clearest definition of "sin" is:  missing the mark, or falling short.  In this context, "sin" can be seen as missing our life's task, falling short of the goals we came to this Earth to accomplish.  It is so easy to get sidetracked by the agenda of this world we live in.  It is so easy to get sucked into the fear and anxiety which prevail in our culture.

Our Life's Task, number one, is to live without fear, to live in trust!

Our Life

The other day a young man got onto my bus wearing a t-shirt which read:   A Soul is a terrible thing to waste.  I asked him the background for this.  He said it had sounded deep; he liked that. I kind of gathered that he had not thought deeply himself about this saying!  But it did make me think.

A soul is a terrible thing to waste, eh?  Is that the same as saying that a life is a terrible thing to waste?  Quite universal is the sense that our lives carry some sort of meaning, that we are here for a purpose, that we have tasks to do, work that needs accomplishing.

I once heard a friend talk about working on a task, some emotional or spiritual issue.  She kept feeling that maybe she could "cheat" death by not finishing this task too early!  Like, if I complete my work, I will transition to the other side, I will die.  I am not sure this is true, but it shows that we have this sense that we have work to do in our life on earth.

Let's carry this a step further.  What if we participated in the process of deciding what that work would be that we are to accomplish while incarnated on earth?  Is that so far-fetched?  There does seem to be growing evidence that we are pre-existent souls, that we existed in a spiritual dimension prior to our coming to earth to be born.

First, there is direct evidence this was true of Jesus.  If he is our forerunner, the one we follow,  "the firstborn of many brothers and sisters..." (Rom 8.29), "the author. . . .of our faith" (Heb 12.2), can we not use Jesus' experience as a blueprint for our own?  The scriptures tell us he ". . . emptied himself, . . . being born in the likeness of men." (Phil 2.7)

The second source of evidence that we are pre-existent souls, is from many who have come back from the other side, in the form of NDE's (near-death experiences) who have mentioned experiences similar to Jesus'.  The most vivid experience I have read is probably Betty Eadie's.  She talks in her book, Embraced By The Light, of meeting with her Spirit friends, guides, angels, and being shown what her task had been during her life on earth.  She was then shown that she was not yet done with this task, and was encouraged to return to complete it.

When she returned to earth she went through an "emptying", an erasing from memory of these conversations with her "support group" in heaven.  She returned just like each of us do when we are first born; we carry with us no memory of what our heaven-assigned task is for our lives.  We then spend most or all of our life learning what this might be, and doing what we feel we are "called" to do with our life.

I do not believe it is essential to our well-being (salvation?) that we believe we existed prior to our incarnation.  But, what it does, is to add an entire layer of seriousness to our lives.  So many people wander through life aimlessly with no sense of purpose.  If we believe we came here deliberately, that we chose to come to earth as material beings for a specific purpose, it can profoundly change our outlook.  It can begin to give us direction, a reason to be, something to do.

A popular poster in the nineties read, "We are not so much physical beings having a spiritual experience, but rather spiritual beings having a physical experience."

book review: The End of Days

The End of Days, by Zecharia Sitchin, is a very interesting book!  Sitchin takes knowledge from various sources and puts it together in unique ways.  The results are often astounding, intriguing to be sure, insightful, and seem to make a lot of sense.

The sources of his ideas:  ancient writings, including the Bible; archeology; science, etc.  Sitchin appears quite expert at reading and interpreting ancient pictographic languages.

His core idea:  that extraterrestrial beings who live on a planet named "Nabiru" have come to earth for periods of time in the past, and are actually the objects of many ancient stories of "the gods".  Sitchin names these beings, "Anunnaki".  The Anunnaki have ruled various parts of earth for long periods of ancient history.  They have argued and fought with each other, often using humans as instruments and certainly victims of their wars.  They came and went between Nabiru and Earth via space travel, and used some type of aircraft to travel around on the Earth.

The planet Nabiru is in an elliptical orbit around the Sun.  The apogee of its orbit is way beyond the orbits of the planets we know about, and one orbit takes several thousand Earth-years.  It is when it nears the Sun (perigee) that its orbit comes close to that of Earth, and is the period of time when most of the coming and going of the Anunnaki takes place.

Zecharia Sitchin's ideas throw light on a lot of the unexplained events of ancient history, including the connections between Mayan and Egyptian cultures, a puzzle I have long wondered about.  The Anunnaki are the ones who built the great structures, such as the pyramids.

Sitchin finds a lot of clues to the existence of the Anunnaki in the Bible as well as other Ancient Near East writings.  He often treats these ancient "myths" as real, factually true.  Generally, when scholars come across events that they can't explain, they chalk it up as "myth", pure story or allegory, but certainly not factual.  Sitchin's treatment is quite refreshing.

A bit of literalism which I found really intriguing is from the Hebrew scriptures.  The Hebrew word translated "God" in English, is Elohim.  The im ending in Hebrew denotes plural.  And yet nowhere do you find Elohim translated "gods".  It is always "god".  This is something I have wondered about ever since my own study of the Biblical languages.  It seems so inconsistent.  Every other Hebrew word with an im ending is plural except for that one word.  Why?  

Sitchin treats it as it is written, plural!  And I like that.

The one complaint I had reading this book is that there is way too much information.  In order to make his points, Sitchin takes an absolutely massive amount of information and condenses it down.  I often had to wade through pages of obscure writing to come to some fascinating conclusion.  Obviously the author has done a tremendous amount of research and knows what he is talking about.  But being relatively new to the subject if was often a bit much for me.  But he is convincing!

His conclusion:  that the end of days will be the return of the Anunnaki to Earth.  Sitchin does not agree with the current speculation of this happening in the year 2012.  He points out some inconsistencies with the mathematics of how scholars have arrived at this date.  But he does believe it is coming in the next century or two.

My conclusion:  the book is certainly worth reading.  Zecharia Sitchin takes seriously the ancient writings.  He in no way discounts the Bible.  Everything he says is consistent with the Biblical writings.  And he does not treat the Bible in a vacuum; he looks at it in the context of other Ancient Near East writings and archeology.  He also does not use the other information to try and "prove" the Bible.  He simply uses the Bible as equally valid stories of events.  His assumption is that what we read in the Bible happened.  It tells a certain story of certain peoples and events in history.  Putting that alongside the stories from other sources of other events and peoples gives us a more full picture of ancient history.

Sitchin has written a whole series of books, and I had the impression several times while reading this one that he has taken information gleaned from a life-time of research and writing and put it together around this one topic, the end of days.  It has certainly made me think and question some of my own interpretations of prophecies and knowledge about the end-times.

Check it out!

scriptures

So if the Bible is not "the Word of God" (see previous post), what is it?

And please, please, please:  DO NOT MISREAD ME!  I am not in any way, shape or form demeaning or undermining the Bible.  I revere the holy writings; I love the scriptures.  I have been a scholar of the Bible all my life.  

I am merely trying to put scripture into its proper perspective.  I believe that two thousand years of Church history has elevated the Bible into a place never intended by God.  As I have said in previous posts, too many Christians have become worshippers of the Bible instead of God himself.  Jesus condemned that in the Bible-worshippers of his time, and I believe has the same attitude to Bible-worshippers of our time as well.

So, some thoughts on the scriptures.  My pastor last Sunday in his sermon held up the Bible, referring to it as the inspired Word of God.  I cringed inside.  You know my position on "the Word of God" from my previous post.

And "inspired"?  2 Timothy 3.16, if I am correct, is the one verse which speaks to the "inspiration" of the writings.  "All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for. . . ."  But think about that, my Christian sisters and brothers.  What was the "all scripture" which the author was referring to?  What "scripture" existed in the time this was written?  The only scripture to which this could possibly apply was the Hebrew scriptures, what Christians call the Old Testament.  The Church teaches that this applies to the entire Bible.  But that is not Biblical!  Arguing from the Bible itself, you can only claim inspiration for the Old Testament.  Most of the writings which make up the Christian New Testament had not even been written when this letter to Timothy was penned.

So, I still view the scriptures (including the New Testament) as special writings.  I read them, study them, learn from them, understand God through them, etc. etc., just as I have done all my life.  But I view them a bit more realistically than I have before!

I once heard a respected Biblical scholar say that the Bible is a Church document.  When I first heard this phrase, I was a bit threatened, taken aback.  And that was many years before I came to the understanding of the scriptures I have outlined above.  But I truly think that it was that statement which started me down the road to truth.  After all, I still remember it!  Decades later.  And that is something for a greybeard like me!

Yes, a Church document.  It was the Church who put together the scriptures as we have them today.  This process began around 300-400 AD.  But even in Reformation times (1500's) there was still room to argue for the inclusion or exclusion of certain writings.  The official Roman Catholic Bible contains books that Protestant Bibles do not.  And there are other Hebrew writings which the Jewish people would accept more readily than we Protestants.

In other words, there are writings which were being circulated among churches which were excluded from the official Bible.  Once this decision was made, often those writings were destroyed.  Many of the discarded writings are beginning to come to light in our day.  And the Church is still threatened by them; they seek to keep them under wraps and prevent their wide distribution.  Is God trying to say something by allowing all these "heretical" writings to be rediscovered?

More thoughts on the scriptures:  I believe that God speaks to us through the things which have been written.  But I do not believe that the Bible is the only way God speaks to us.

I believe that God can and does speak today in words which are just as "inspired" as any we find in the Bible.  I don't think God is any different in the present than he was in the past.  He still works in the same way, still speaks in the same ways.

The scriptures, especially the "inspired" ones (the Old Testament), began as oral tradition, not written.  God's Word is alive, active, etc.  Once it was written down it became static, unchanging; not the dynamic, alive thing that the Word is.  Is it coincidence that the Old Testament prophets pretty much disappeared from history around the same time that the Old Testament scriptures were written down?  This happened around 500-400 BCE.

And what does the fact that the scriptures come out of an oral tradition mean?  Does knowing that information and truth was passed on orally change anything for us?  In our current society we emphasize the veracity of written documents; "a man's word" is not worth as much as his signature on a document.

Putting the Bible into its proper perspective also helps with some of the current-day misuses of scripture.  The Bible was never, never, never intended to be either a science text-book, or a history book.  It is a worship document.  It details the story of God's dealings with humans.  When the Bible is used to try and force an artificial view of the beginnings of this planet and life on it, it is a grossly sinful misapplication.

And history:  the Bible records a very specific history: that of his dealings with his people.  It is not intended to be a comprehensive history of the entire world.  It records only a small slice of time and looks at a narrow slice of human society.

But once again, I come back to my "vision".  Even with all my frustration over the gross misuses and misapplications of scriptures in modern-day Church, I still have to trust that God is overseeing all of us in love.  He loves us in our foibles and our feeble attempts to grow in understanding of just who he is and who we are.

The Word of God

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. . . .And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory. . ." (John 1).

"For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart." (Hebrews 4.12)

"Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse!  He who sat upon it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war.  His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems; and he has a name inscribed which no one knows but himself.  He is clad in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God."  (Revelation 19.11ff)

Please, do me a favour!  If you ever hear me refer to the scriptures as "the Word of God", stop me.  Since seeing the connections in these verses I cannot view "the Word of God" as mere black marks on a page.  "The Word of God" has to be something more than a book.  It is alive, dynamic, active.  Scary, even!

And seeing "the Word of God" this way raises some questions:  Has God's Word been spoken on earth in ways other than that which the church proclaims?

For example, China.  Having a son live in China for five+ years has opened my eyes to this huge group of people, their vast culture, their immensely long history.  Has God just ignored them?  Or is there a possibility that his Word has come to them in ways we are unfamiliar with?  And we could go on and on.  The Americas pre-European invasion.  Africa.  Other parts of Asia.  Etc.

I know that I myself am responsible for responding to the Word of God as it comes to me.  I am not responsible for any others' responses.  But I certainly do like to contemplate the possibilities!

I am coming more and more to believe that the so-called exclusivity that exists in Christianity belongs not to the scriptures themselves, but to the Church.  It is the Church which wants to be the only path to God. I no longer believe that the scripture teaches that.  I think there are allowances for other appearances of "God's Word", in forms other than what I have been taught.

For more on my view of the scriptures, the Bible, see my next blog!

Reflections on The Vision

Well, it has been over two weeks since I posted my vision on this blog. I guess it is high time to satisfy all of you who are sitting on the edges of your seats waiting to find out what the vision is all about, eh?!!!

I offer four reflections, indicated by underlined words.

The overall message to me is that the Church has taken the place that Law/scriptures had for the Jewish people prior to Jesus' coming. As it says in Galatians 3.24: ". . . the Law was our custodian until Christ came . . ." I think in a very similar, parallel way, the Church has been a custodian, a guardian if you will, of God's people. I see this as having begun, of course, in first-century Palestine, with Jesus' followers, in the aftermath of his time on Earth. It has lasted until the present day.

Another strong message in this vision is that the Church is a human institution. Granted, the Law as originally given by God was not, at least not in the same way that the Church is human-made. The Law originated with the commandments given to Moses at Mount Sinai. But, the people had made of it a human institution. The Law had taken on so many extra constructions and provisions, that it needed a specialized body of teachers (the scribes and pharisees of Jesus' day) to understand, interpret, and teach. And I think it was this, the human additions, that Jesus reacted to so strongly during his time on Earth.

In the same way, the Church has taken on much more than certainly Jesus intended while with his disciples. It has taken on a life and character of its own, to be defended, promulgated, expanded, built-upon, etc.

Now this is not all bad. I think the vision I received is saying this. The Church has played a role through history of caring for peoples' lives. And we should not be too quick to jump to judgement over this role. Everyone knows that the Church has not been perfect; there have been many faults in its makeup. Much evil has been done in the name of the Church throughout history. But even so, it has had a role to play in human society.

This role for the Church is time-limited; it will not last forever. In fact, some see the Church's role as all but irrelevant already, perhaps having come to an end mid-twentieth century or thereabouts. And in response many have abandoned ship; they have left the Church and are pursuing spirituality and religion outside of organized Religion. I see nothing wrong with this, and strongly encourage people to seek the Divine, to seek God, in whatever way is meaningful to them.

As I said in an earlier post, I myself continue to be amazed that I am still participating in this fading institution we call Church. I have been very critical of it all my life, and usually outspoken in this criticism! My vision cautions me to be a bit more careful with this criticism. The Church has played an important part in western society throughout history and is not all bad!

But, Church is human. It has never been, and certainly is not now, perfect. It has made many mistakes. It has left many damaged and injured people in its wake.

One other reflection: Since the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the scattering of the people in 70AD, there have been no sacrifices offered in the Temple in Jerusalem. And sacrifices were the center of the Law. It was in the offering of sacrifices that people encountered God. It was in the blood that YHWH spoke to his people. And all of this came to an end in 70AD. We still have the Law written, but it is not fully practiced.

If my interpretation of the vision is accurate that Church plays a parallel role to Law, what does this say? That the Church's time is limited? There is an end-point toward which we are moving? That there will come a day when Church will cease to exist?

I am not sure about all this. I do feel that history is moving toward some sort of culmination, that our time is limited on this planet. Is this part of the message of the vision?

A Vision

About a year and a half ago my pastor asked me to preach for him one Sunday. I informed him I was totally dry; there was nothing on my mind or in my spirit which I felt needed sharing with the congregation. That very week, during a time of contemplation/prayer, I received a vision! It was a very dramatic, vivid vision; it occurred totally visually. It happened in about a minute or two. So, even though it takes five minutes to describe, keep in mind that this all occurred very quickly, in a very short amount of time.

Later I called my pastor and said that indeed, I did have something to share! I am going to share the vision itself in this posting, and leave any commentary or interpretation to future postings. I would, however, love to get some feedback: what do you see in this vision? What is God saying to us through this?

Here, then, is that vision:

Edge of the desert; a large tent at the edge of a village; the tent is quite fancy and rich looking, for a tent. Inside this tent works a teacher guild which has grown up over the centuries in their society.

This guild of teachers is very careful about the qualifications of who gets admitted to their exclusive group. Years of instruction and preparation occur before new members are allowed to participate in their craft.

The primary task of this guild is the construction of an elaborate model of a building. The structure is made mostly of wood, some stones. Each individual piece is exquisitely crafted with great care before being placed. And prior to each new piece being added there is much discussion and debate. The entire structure is looked at, and discussed, ad infinitum.

Centuries have gone into this project. Great pride is taken in the structure, and its meaning and place in the life of their society. And the teacher guild is proud of their mandate of taking care of the construction and developing it, elaborating on what has been previously built. Each generation of teachers is conscious of building upon earlier foundations. Great respect is given to what has come before. Because of this respect and care, it takes longer and longer as time goes on, to effect any changes in the structure.

It is understandable, then, that extreme anger was ignited when one of the new, younger teachers came dashing into the tent one day, robes flying. As he burst into the tent through one of the flaps, he bumped against one corner of the elaborate structure, causing that corner to collapse. After a brief moment of shocked horror, all of the teachers present immediately tackled him, throwing him to the ground, shouting accusations at him. After subduing him, and securing him from causing any more harm with his recklessness, they began discussing his penalty. The trial was brief, since it was clear to all of them that the young man must die. Still incredibly angry, they dragged him out into the open to stone him.

Unnoticed, in their haste to exact justice, was a tent flap left undone. As they were stoning the young man to death, a great wind blew in from the desert, completely destroying the entire structure. All that was left was an unsightly pile of sticks and stones. Centuries of work was undone in a matter of moments. There was much wailing; cries of despair could be heard for miles, as not only the teachers, but the entire society beat their breasts in grief.

There were, however, a few friends of the young teacher who was killed, who had supported him in his rash teachings. As things began to settle down following this tumultuous day, these friends gathered quietly in the tent. They began to put together some of the sticks and stones left from the old, elaborate structure. Tentative and small at first, they were persistent.

Once again, as generation after generation continued to work in the tent, the structure took form. They realized, right from the beginning, that the new structure could never duplicate the beauty and complexity of the old. So they took what they could salvage out of the pile of rubble, and fashioned an entirely new structure. New pieces were crafted, and fitted together with the old.

As this new structure grew and took form, the teacher guild also grew, once again taking on great importance in their society. As before, great care was taken in preserving what was already built, protecting and developing it, spreading messages of its glory throughout the countryside.

Although very different from the earlier structure, it was impressive nonetheless. They had only dimming memories of the original structure, but through much debate and discussion, they were able to recapture some of the glory and beauty of the old structure. Indeed, many were of the opinion that the new structure was even more glorious and grand than the old had been.

Once again, there were complex arguments raised for each new piece added. Nothing was done without great care and deliberation. As before, the more time that passed, the longer it took for each new addition or modification to be accepted. Greater disagreements with new pieces meant more ponderous processes to get any changes made.

Babylon threads

If you copy and paste the link below (you may have to create a "new tab"), you will be able to listen to a very powerful song, one of the threads which began to come together for me the past few days. Even though it is a YouTube clip, the only video is a cover of Sinead O'Connor's album on which this haunting song appears. So, you can listen while you read, without missing anything!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5xYnBghap4

Hearing this song on my iPod brought back a memorable sermon heard way back in the seventies! It was a prophetic message, preached by a dearly loved mentor/pastor, John Ratzlaff. (I believe he was basing his teaching on a prophetic book he had read, but I can't remember this source.)

The essence of Rev Ratzlaff's message is that Babylon, as portrayed in Revelation 18 & 19, can be interpreted today as the world of international business.

The original meaning of course, the way the Revelator's message would have been understood by his readers, is that Babylon was Rome. Throughout history, readers of these Biblical words would have interpreted Babylon as whichever oppressive regime they happened to find themselves under. These are words of hope for every generation of Christians for 2000 years! In the seventies, in the USA, it was easy to see Babylon as referring to Washington, to the US military/industrial complex, etc. The US was just coming out of the Vietnam fiasco, and we were trying to deal with that.

John Ratzlaff comes along and says, no, the USA as Babylon is too limited. In today's world the oppression and dominance comes from more than just the USA. There are powers at work in our world which are beyond any one government, beyond any one country. These powers are best described as international business corporations, unaccountable to any one country. They are beyond the controls and limits any national government may want to impose.

Can anyone tell me anything has changed in the last 30 - 35 years?!!! It appears to me that the dominance of international finance has increased hugely. It has become more overt, less hidden than it might have been three decades ago. There is more awareness and discussion of this trend than ever before.

Another "Babylon" thread: During the last few years I have become more aware of the power-behind-thrones of our world. Through books, articles and radio interviews, I have heard of groups of powerful people (mostly men) like the Tri-Lateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations and The Bilderberg group. These are the ones who pull the strings, who control governments, who make global decisions, who manipulate events in order to consolidate their dominance of the world. It is not difficult to sympathize with conspiracy theorists who speculate that these power-mongers deliberately created last fall's global financial meltdown as a means to further consolidate their power.

Another thread: Last winter I joined a small group working their way through a study of Daniel in the Bible. This study was led by Beth Moore, in a series of videos. She began every video with a little talk about walking the halls and streets of Babylon. Daniel, of course, is full of Babylon imagery.

I really think Beth Moore was onto something. I don't think she fully understood the depths to which we are living in Babylon; her take on it was along the lines that our obsession with consumerism is Babylon. I am saying that Babylon is a much more perverse, all-encompassing power seeking outright world dominance.

To summarize: I believe that these powerful figures behind the scenes who are seeking world dominance are repeating the Genesis 11 scene. They are building a tower. In Genesis, of course, it is portrayed as a physical tower of bricks and mortar, usually called the "Tower of Babel". In the 21st century I believe that the "Tower of Babel" is financial and political.

The world players seek to consolidate power in a few. They seek to control the direction the entire world goes. In so doing they are setting themselves up for power in direct opposition to the desires of our Creator, the Source of all power. They are swiftly moving the world into a position of defiance of this Source. And I also believe that as in Genesis 11, Source will not allow this to go on forever. A showdown looms!

We, as people of Spirit, are called to participate in this contest of wills. Will we respond to this call of increasing spiritual awareness, of a growing sense of membership in God's kingdom? Will we seek first God's kingdom, trusting that he will provide us with our needs? Will we cease worrying about tomorrow trusting that Source knows what we need?

Or will we take the other side, resisting attacks on "Babylon"? Will we support financial growth-without-restraint, ignoring ecological care? Babylon says economy first, environment second. Babylon says use all our resources as quickly as we can, make as much money as we can while the making is good. Babylon sees us as consumers, and wants to keep us compliant through fear of the future. Babylon does not want us to have any hope that things can change. "Yes we can!" is certainly not a slogan of Babylon!

We are living in Babylon; I have no doubt. But we are children of a different kingdom. We can live without fear; we can live in love and trust.

a "New Age" Church?

In the mid-eighties I became aware of an increasing search in society for the spiritual. For a century western society had been setting aside the spiritual, the mystical, the paranormal. Anything that could not be scientifically verified was deemed unimportant. This left a deep hole in us; our hearts were empty.

Accompanying my awareness of society's search is that the answers were not coming from Church; the ones searching were certainly not going to Church to find fulfillment. In fact, my sense of Church was that it was fighting this search which was happening in secular society.

I remember one conversation in which I expressed appreciation for a certain musician. "Oh, but his music is so New Age," as if categorizing it as such made it unacceptable for a Christian. Anything that could be labelled "New Age" was seen as non-Christian, if not outright "of the devil", at least back then!

That assertion was certainly a conversation-stopper! Later on I thought about that comment a lot. Isn't Christianity a New Age religion? Haven't we preached an upcoming New Age for centuries? Isn't the New Age what we are striving for? Then why didn't the Church embrace the "New Age" movement and give it some direction? Why could the Church not have at least engaged in some dialogue about the "New Age"?

I sense a rapidly growing spirituality in the world today. To me this is tremendously heartening. It is definitely not something to fight against! In fact, if we do fight against this I suspect we fight against God himself! I believe sincerely that what we are sensing is God waking up his creation.

If the Church doesn't participate in this awakening, it may well find itself on the sidelines in the most important game in history. The Source will accomplish his purposes; have no doubts on that score! If the Church fights what the Creator is doing, it will find itself shunted aside as God works.

For too long the Church has had a fortress mentality. It has tried to defend what it has, what it was; it has tried to regain ground it thinks was lost. "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" may be truer that we think! That is, it may be the mighty fortress which is our God, not the other way round.

We need to relax, people. We need to trust God that he knows what he is doing. We need to seek out the ways he is moving in our world and join him, not fight him.

Another disturbing pattern I have seen in Churches is fear of the devil. But that is another posting!

Another question raised here is, how many people need to awaken before society changes? What is the critical mass? Again, a posting for the future!

book review

Our Lady of Kibeho, Immaculee Ilibagiza, 2008

Most of us know Rwanda only from the appalling news of the 1994 genocide. Around one million Rwandans were brutally hacked to pieces in an orgy of killing of one ethnic group by another.

This book gives an entirely different view of this country. It is a young woman's account of several people who began receiving visions and messages from heaven in 1982 and following. These messages were overwhelmingly exhortations to love each other, and messages of how much God loves them. There were a few messages and visions of the coming slaughter, but most of the time the messages were inspirational.

These visions happened in the remote village of Kibeho, in southern Rwanda. They began with one visionary, a young student at a Catholic school. Soon several others begin receiving visions, including one girl who had bullied the first two visionaries!

Word got out and people began flocking to Kibeho to witness these apparitions. Over a period of years thousands and thousands of people saw and heard what was happening in Kibeho. The Roman Catholic Church, initially sceptical, soon had to acknowledge these apparitions as legitimate.

The apparitions were almost exclusively Mary, the mother of Jesus, appearing to these students. The feelings experienced by the visionaries was of unbounded love and peace. Though only the visionaries could see and hear Mary, they would relay messages to the audience. Often what the audience could hear was one side of a conversation. During these trances the visionaries were totally oblivious to outside stimuli. As the Church was investigating these apparitions they would try all sorts of things to try and distract the visionaries, including noise, pain, slapping, pinching, pouring water over them, etc.

I found this story very compelling. It was certainly a picture of Rwanda I had not experienced before. Immaculee's story is well-written; her dedication to broadcasting these events is very evident. She does not want her country known only for brutality. She has written of her own protection from the killing in other books; in this book the genocide receives only brief treatment.

As Rwandans have picked up the pieces of their lives and their society following the genocide, it is heartening to hear and see what is happening there. Again, using Kibeho as a focus, people have been healing from their torturous past by flocking once more to this village to honour Mary and Jesus. A shrine, a church, accommodations for guests, a school, have all sprung up in this village during the last decade.

My own reactions:

1) This story is written from a very Roman Catholic perspective. As such, I have to look past much of the RC piety and see the spirituality and messages contained in this story.

2) I think God's grace is evident: to Roman Catholic people the divine appears as Mary. This is what they expect, and Source accommodates! I must put aside my judgementalism of Catholicism.

3) Protestants have lost much sense of the feminine in the Divine by largely ignoring Mary. It was lovely to sense the motherly love the female visionaries received from Mary. We protestants have to work so hard to recapture some sense of the feminine in "God".

4) One of the threads running through the messages received by the visionaries is that our time is short. This corresponds with my own perspective. We as a human race need to get our s__tuff together! History is coming to a culmination of some sort.

5) God speaks in many ways. We cannot sit in judgement of how he might choose to appear or speak, or where or to whom.

6) God continues to speak today. The Creator still cares deeply for his creation. There is an unbounded love and acceptance of the Divine towards us. I think this story is only one of many ways in which the King of the Universe is speaking to his creation today.

7) It is ironic that it takes this, but in a way, the impact of the apparitions is increased by the genocide. If the genocide had not happened, would we be reading this book? Maybe the Divine knew this? Maybe the apparitions happened in Rwanda because of the upcoming slaughter?

I would recommend this book, with the proviso that the reader is able to look beyond the Roman Catholicism inherent in the story. It is a hopeful look at a country, a people, able to put behind them some of the worst imaginable atrocities and once again build their lives and their society into a positive environment.

"Church"

Just about a year ago I was searching for a new church home. I met with the pastor of a church in my neighborhood, to "check" him out. I told him that I did not need a church which would tell me how and what to believe; I wanted a church where it was okay to ask questions, a group of people who were comfortable living with questions, as opposed to needing to have answers.

That pretty much sums up the place I find myself in right now. I am very comfortable not having all the answers, not being able to figure everything out exactly. I sense there are things happening in our world, and probably in the universe! I don't know where everything is going; I don't know how everything will turn out. But I trust (bolded to indicate a connection to one of the themes of this blogsite); I believe there is a force, a power in the universe which is in control of things. I believe this ultimate source of power is benevolent, a loving energy, if you will. I willingly place myself in the care of this loving, spiritual energy, and seek to follow its lead, and facilitate it in whatever way I am able. (Thus this blog!)

I believe that we are living in an incredibly exciting time; I sense things are moving towards some sort of culmination point. I feel very fortunate to be living in a time like this. There is much fear in our world right now; I do not share this fear. I have full trust that we are being taken care of, that we are being led towards some thing. And I believe that we are participants in whatever it is that is happening. We are each given tasks to accomplish.

Another thing I told the young pastor last summer was that while I have ultimate and complete faith in The Source, in "God", I do not have the same sort of faith in Church, in organized religion. I view Church (and I will use a capitalized "Church" when speaking of it in general terms, as in "organized religion") as a very human entity. As such it is full of human foibles and errors. It amazes me that even with such a jaundiced view of Church, I continue to participate in it! But, I guess I see myself as very human as well, with my own foibles, my own shadow side. So why not join myself with other humans who are seeking answers just as I am?

How this trust, or faith, in God, if not in the Church, plays out in my life during the present time will be the subject of future posts.

"God"

In his book, Soul Survivor, Paul Hawker details his search for deeper meaning in life. He goes on a spiritual quest, heading for the mountains to spend time alone with God. As he learns to listen to God speak, ofttimes directing his smallest moves, Hawker comes to realize that his previous understanding of "'God' just seems too small. It is lesser, definable, cloying, diminutive and excluding. What I experienced that day and from then on is expansive, inclusive, majestic and outrageous, an exorbitant and flagrant love, overwhelming in its capacity to accommodate and encompass anything - from the most monstrous evil to the highest good. All are contained by The Source." (p88)

I also, as I grow in my understanding and experience of who "God" is, find my past images of "God" to be woefully inadequate. So in my ramblings, I may often use other terms for "God" in an effort to move beyond the limits of a churchy, sunday-school image of "God". I really like the name Paul Hawker uses, "The Source". I may also use "The Divine", "The Universe", etc. However, given all that, I have grown up in the church, and find it difficult to move beyond the language at times! So, forgive me when I begin to sound jargony! I want to say things in non-churchy language, but will likely slip into default verbiage often.

Years ago a mentor was using diagrams in teaching about the spiritual journey we are on. He taught us that our image of God ought always to be drawn with dotted lines, never solid, fixed lines. I believe that if the image of "God" in our minds is too fixed, too solid, we come dangerously close to idolatry. We create "God" in our own image!

As I have grown spiritually through my life, my own image of "God" has changed drastically. I would say that at present "God" to me is more akin to "the force" as used in Star Wars, than anything else. "The force be with you, Luke." Was it Obi-Wan Kenobi saying that? I see God's force, or spirit if you will, as being present through all the universe, in every living thing, indeed, in every created thing.

So, keep your image of "God" fluid! And I highly recommend the book quoted above. Check it out; it is a fantastic story. The full title: Soul Survivor: A Spiritual Quest Through 40 Days and 40 Nights of Mountain Solitude, Paul Hawker, 1998, Northstone Publishing, Inc.

My First Blog!

Where to begin?! I have been thinking about doing this blog for so long now that I have quite a backlog of ideas swimming around in my head.

A fair beginning would be to explain the name of my blog: "T-L-P". Each initial corresponds to a theme I anticipate will run through my postings. I cannot promise every posting will fall exactly under one of these themes; rather I hope the themes will be recognizable in the overall flow of writings.

T: "trust". (You might be forgiven for thinking it should stand for "truth". I see truth and my search for it, is an umbrella arching over all I write.) Trust, trust in "God", trust in Spirit, trust in the universe, is a concept I have been growing in over the past few years. During our present age, trust is not something we specialize in. We tend rather, to rely on our own resources. To throw ourselves off the cliff, trusting the net will appear (as a popular poster proclaimed some years ago!), is considered supremely foolish in today's world.

"Trust", faith, belief, confidence in, all stem from the same root word. As any of you know who can communicate in more than one language, there is often not a direct one-to-one correspondence of a word in one language to a word in another. Thus we have three or four English words all stemming from one Greek concept.

I will share more personally some of the lessons learned recently in "trust"-ing that we are taken care of in a loving, beneficent universe.

L: "love". This theme almost needs no explanation. "Love" is the central message from the divine to us mortals. We live in "love"; we are to spread "love". We experience "love" in every aspect of life.

"Love" as opposed to "fear". Fear is used to undermine love. Fear is used to control. Fear is used to get us to do things which are not loving. Much of my vehement disagreement with the GW Bush reign stemmed from the fact that his administration used a conscious, deliberate policy of fear to increase its hold on power. Government people actually sat down to discuss policies and make decisions which would increase fear in the population. The fact these policies were covered in a veneer of religious piety made this especially diabolical.

P: "problem of the Pharisees". I debated long and hard with myself how to phrase this last theme. I wanted to try and come up with some way of expressing this with a "C" word so I could make my title "T-L-C". My preacherly training in alliteration failed me here!

At any rate, this is a problem I see as major in todays churches, especially ones calling themselves "evangelical", "conservative", or "fundamentalist".

Some years ago I joined a church and was told at the outset, "We are followers of Jesus Christ; we are not biblicists." Too many of today's Christians are biblicists. The problem, as I see it, is that the biblicists of Jesus' day were the Pharisees. And according to the gospel record Jesus' harshest words were aimed at the Pharisees.

The Pharisees were a group dedicated to the study of the Word. They devoted their entire lives to studying, teaching, practicing the Word of God. Nothing was as important to them as being obedient to the Word. And when God appeared in their midst? They missed him! I consider it supreme arrogance on our part if we think ourselves any better than they. So, if our religious/spiritual lives are based mostly or solely on a study of the Word of God, we are in deep danger.

I will share more detail in subsequent postings.