Living Toward the Garden: Part 2

Back before my recent battles against the hellish dragons of modern Christian theology and politics, I was ruminating on my ‘fishy’ eating habits ;-):

Hear about the ugly friar at the monastery, who visitors said looked like a chipmunk? He got kicked out of the monastery because he preferred fish and chips instead of meat, not just during Lent, but year round, and would often sneak fish and chips into his room at night.

He was known as a “’finished’ ‘chip monk’ who got ‘cod’ eating.” Groan…

Photo by Joachim Muller

My fairly recent move toward vegetarianism (in the last 10-15 years, since turning 50) isn’t intellectually driven, but more of an emotional/ethical intuition, an inclination toward the ideal world of Creation before death and decay, before tooth and claw, before kill or/and be killed. The move is toward the perfect world of the future in the Chosen One.

And on the levels of commitment, my choice is only an educated opinion, not doctrine or conviction. When I began the move, I didn't even tell anyone of my change--just stopped eating pork, then beef, and finally cut back on chicken and turkey. Only when family members asked did I briefly mention I was focusing on fish, but didn’t explain.

I still do eat some ‘foul’ food sometimes with my family and relatives. In harkening toward Heaven in the field of cuisine, I’m not a legalist at all; it's more about heavenly and healthful eating. And if medical professionals—not likely—came out with a scientific study proving that humans should eat chicken or sausage or even steak, I probably would.

I don’t inhabit health food stores, don’t try and find “organic” food, but often buy my eats at Wal-Mart:-)

Though I am amazed by and sometimes buy from Whole Foods Market.

Another feeling and reason why I’ve made the move down the food levels toward non-sentient life is I empathize with conscious animal life. I suppose so, more than many humans.

However, I'm not an animal rights activist, or nearly as concerned with animals as the biologist Richard Dawkins is (on the valuable worth of monkeys), or as much as C.S. Lewis was against animal vivisection. Though in the case of both I do think animals are of worth and that vivisection ought to be stopped.

Also, our insurance provider and our doctor have emphasized that I need to fill up on anti-inflammatory food, medicine, etc.

So I do.

Now where’s that salmon I want to smoke with the nonalcoholic mixed drink of Mountain Dew/Strawberry-Lemonade and wedge-fries from BJ’s?

I’m not in the least famished by what I choose not to eat, but am now fin-ished;-).

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox

Why I Don't Call Myself Quaker or Christian Any Longer

NOW:
"As a Quaker Pagan, I'm often accused…of being a closet Christian. Nope.
I am not now, nor have I ever been, a member of the Jesus Club…
and being Quaker myself has taught me how to approach Christian messages by "listening in tongues," I have yet to feel a call to Jesus."

And “We didn’t need Jesus.”

Quaker Writer Cat Chapin-Bishop

VERSUS

THEN:
“When all my hopes in them and in all men were gone, so that I had nothing upwardly to help me, nor could I tell what to do, then, oh, then, I heard a voice which said,
‘There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition’; and when I heard it, my heart did leap for joy.”

George Fox
__


NOW:

“The world for whom Christ died cannot mean the entire human family."

R.C. Sproul

“Christ died for….some men…he died for the unbelief of the elect so that God's punitive wrath is appeased toward them.”
…the death of Christ was designed for the salvation of God's people, not for every individual."

Christian John Piper

“What does this famous verse [John 3:16] teach about fallen man’s ability to choose Christ? The answer, simply, is nothing. The argument used by non-Reformed people is that the text teaches that everybody in the world has it in their power to accept or reject Christ. A careful look at the text reveals, however, that it teaches nothing of the kind.”

Christian R.C. Sproul


VERSUS

THEN:

“For God so loved the world [in Greek: Cosmos], that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

John 3:16

To be continued,

In the Light of God’s love through Jesus the “Chosen One” for every single person!

Daniel Wilcox

Time for a Romantic Interlude:-)

Getting tired of the seemingly endless tragedy and horror and absurdity of religion and politics...?

How about a time's timely romantic interlude...

Canoe on over the stream of love to vox poetica where my new romantic poem, "two hands" has just been published.
http://poemblog.voxpoetica.com/

Share the lyric with your sweetheart.

Then, get to the heart of sweet romance with other love poems at these urls:

"Summer of Love in Philadephia"
http://www.wildviolet.net/blue_moon/summer_love.html


"A Song of Songs into Olding"
http://outwardlink.net/features/danielwilcox/song_of_songs_into_olding.html



Later if you are still in the need of commentary on theology and philosophy and politics and science and nature by all means check out my main websites:-)

http://www.psalmsyawpshowls.com/

http://www.selahriver.com/

http://lightwaveseeker.weebly.com/

http://buddingzin.weebly.com/

http://lastthings.weebly.com/


In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox

Part #2: Receding for God

Once a career, but twice in diapers, however the second time around often leads down to dementia and always to demise, where we humans lose all our learning and skills and achievement so diligently accomplished. Gone with the leaving...barren winter approaching, white and none.

But why? All that work gone and us receding physically, and worst of all mentally…So despairing like Poe spoke of in his hauntingly powerful meditation on loss and death.*

What a tragic losing, often, pathetic, indeed absurd lessening…
Again, for what purpose?

There seems none. Over 2,500 years ago, Qoheleth, (“Gatherer”) in the pessimistic Jewish book of Ecclesiastes (“Qoheleth”) concluded, “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity”, “Vapor of vapor, all is vapor” (a more literal translation of the Hebrew). Sometimes this seems more accurate than the hopefulness of Paul’s Philippians’’ “Rejoice always.”

In the end, Life will leave us breathless...all our accomplishments a transient vapor.

Without serious doubt this is why biblical faith and vision brings hope to many of us in the midst of this life’s worst, when Jesus speaks of God’s everlasting love for all of us, every single human, every last one, and that we can have trust in God’s promise to bring us into glory. Revelation 21; 3-4 “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.”

But the glorious future isn't now. This week I asked my wife about her great grandparents. She knew nothing of them. Not a single story, not a memorable moment, nothing, gone like a vapor vanished in the past. Same for my relatives. Gone with the wind, with the morning's vapor, with the transient breath.*

True, we do have a genealogy book in the garage stacks of her father’s family going back hundreds of years, but all that’s left in that volume here in this present now are the squiggles of meaningless names covering many pages—begetting/begatting one to boredom.

Gone forever (except in the Mind of God) are their vivid stories, their unique contributions, deep inner thoughts and special reflections, their fun times, and shared moments, those time of communion with loved ones and God.

So what of Life in these the olden years (nothing golden there—unless its fools’ gold)? And for what purpose does God have us here when we seem good for nothing, unable to accomplish the most basic of our own needs, let alone achieve new goals? And all past accomplishments a dissipated vapor?

We are created in God’s image but with the onset of dementia, where is that beauty of form and creativity and achievement any longer?

For everyone time lessens, and we recede.

Every several days when I pass down the line/hall in the convalescent home (isn’t that an irony of words?), there lined down against the wall in wheelchairs sit hunched over old codgers* and old maids with slack jaws and vacant eyes. I say, “Hi” and wave but most don’t register or respond. They’re physically present but absent. No one home:-(

Are they immersed in memories or only vegetating like shriveled potatoes, long past their prime in the musty cellar of life?

But then one dumpy lady—looking a little like sallow clay in her countenance--suddenly brightens, her whole face going aglow and responds, “Hello.”

And my own dark mood lightens/brightens. She’s brought hope, showing how even in her final receding, she can still—however small and brief—-bring help to another passing her way, a momentary communion. "Where 2 or 3 are gathered..."*

And maybe that’s in the last analysis, the one hope we can rejoice in no matter how hard our lot in life, no matter how far down toward the last negation we fail, there is the spiritual communion of a fleeting moment, the beauty of a vapor, however brief.

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox

--


*A Dream within a Dream

by Edgar Allan Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-

You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;

Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?

All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-

How few! Yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!

O God! Can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! Can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?


* Codger
The origin of codger seems to lie in the complex links between cadger and codger (not as a contraction of 'coffin-dodger', as one of my more inventive correspondents has suggested). In some parts of England the two words were used interchangeably, whereas in other regions they were separate words, one meaning 'beggar' and the other 'eccentric/grotesque fellow'. The latter meaning is the one used in an early example of 'old codger', David Garrick's farce Bon Ton, 1775: "My Lord's servants call you an old out-of-fashion'd Codger."

Men who had fallen on hard times and had resorted to any means possible to keep body and soul together were often those who were too old to find work. A cadger was likely to be a grizzled character wanting to borrow or steal from you; a codger was a peculiar and unfashionable chap, and both were likely to be old. 'Old codger' is most likely to be the linguistic merging of all those images.
David Garrick's farce Bon Ton, 1775: "My Lord's servants call you an old out-of-fashion'd Codger."
Urban Dictionary

*Nothing like throwing a heavy-handed allusion into the mix;-)

*“For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” ESV

May God Comfort the Grieving People of Oklahoma, and Censure the Lies of Calvinists

May God Comfort the Grieving People, especially the Parents in Oklahoma and
may God Severely Censure
the Lies of the Calvinists

The Good News of Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son…”
John 3:16

“Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, 14but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 19: 13-14

Contrast that
with this Horrid News of the Reformed:-(

May 21, 2013
“Here is…the formation of the tornado that began in Newcastle, Oklahoma which later moved to Moor, Oklahoma…it is the finger of God.”

Calvinist Joel Taylor

And March 5, 2012, during last year’s tornados:

“Why would God reach down his hand and drag his fierce fingers across rural America killing at least 38 people with 90 tornadoes in 12 states, and leaving some small towns with scarcely a building standing, including churches?
…God alone has the last say in where and how the wind blows. If a tornado twists at 175 miles an hour and stays on the ground like a massive lawnmower for 50 miles, God gave the command…

Jesus rules the wind. The tornadoes were his.”

Calvinist John Piper

And John Calvin says “…no wind ever arises or increases except by God’s express command.”
Institutes of the Christian Religion Chapter XVI

Here is an opposing comment on this abusive theology of Calvinism:

“Piper’s god is like an abusive father, filled with unpredictable rage. His family must walk on eggshells, afraid of suddenly enraging him. Should he be provoked, this god will lash out with deadly, earthquakes, tsunamis, violence and war."

"When his family cries out in anguish, he reminds them that they deserve no better. They are despicable, rotten to the core, so even in their pain they are doing “better than they deserve.” The fact that any have been spared merely proves his “love.”

“This theology is, in a word, abusive, for it blames the victim for whatever calamity, abuse, or tragedy she suffers and says it is deserved."

"According to this theology, the children who died in Oklahoma this week got what they 'deserved.'”

"The victims of the Boston bombing got what they 'deserved.'"

"The people caught in the Twin Towers on 9-11 got what the 'deserved.'”

"The victims of the Holocaust got what they “deserved.”

"If you think this theology is merely cerebral, with no real-world implications, consider the case of Sovereign Grace Ministries...”

From Rachel Held Evans
http://rachelheldevans.com/blog/abusive-theology-piper-mahaney

May God deliver us from all this horrific theology.

We pray for all of you in Oklahoma. Lift you up in the Light.

Daniel Wilcox

Learning How to Recede with One Little Talent

When I was a kid I had grandiose hopes and dreams for the future, way beyond my years, and as it turned out way beyond my ability…probably beyond reality;-)

So long ago and far back then, I had Lamborghini-like expectations—a Lamborghini Aventador Convertible costs nearly 1/2 a million dollars—

but I was born only with an affordable self,
(a “Ford” brain and body) and only one talent:-)

Now that the rising sun of youth is far gone, and the mid-day glory of marriage, children, and career,
and I am fast receding into old age—
and experiencing the tragedy of the untimely deaths of my loved ones and their dementia,
and the twisting by false Christian leaders of all that is of worth and value...

yes, now that I am diminishing, part of the outgoing tide of Life and history,
a parable by Jesus comes back to me with new force—
the one which compares the Realm of God
and us humans with a story about talents.

[The Realm of God] “…will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted to them his property. 15 To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability.

Then he went away. 16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. 17 So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. 18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master’s money.

19 Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. 20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five talents more.’

21 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’

22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here I have made two talents more.’

23 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’

24 He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’”
Matthew 25: 14-25 ESV

Thank God, I didn't behave like the man who got only 1 talent, even though I only did get 1 fairly average talent. But why couldn't life have been all different or even mildly so?

When I was a kid, I always wanted to be the guy who was got 5 talents.

However as I grew to adulthood, I soon realized after struggling with algebra,
physics, and Spanish, passing, not failing, but flailing because so disappointed.

So I determined, at least, not to be like the guy given only 1 talent who wasted the gift by hiding it. But even here, after much learning, diligence, and long hours of work, I discovered that even my 1 talent was rather average in comparison to my hopes, dreams, and goals.
Such is life for many of us.

You see, I had dreamed of and wanted to be like Joseph in Genesis, who after many years of trial and labor, eventually became the prince of talent.

But Life didn’t turn out that way. No matter how much and hard I worked.

Not that I don’t love my penchant and ability with words, images, ideas and concepts that God created me with. I love language, literature, art, and poetry, history, and philosophy.

Yes, I suppose some would call my incessant philosophizing and study of history—a second talent, but often that ability seems more like a liability, even at times a curse.

Why did I have to be born with “why” as my first word;-)?

Why was I at 11 trying to figure out theology and biblical interpretation and ethics while most kids were preoccupied with their bicycles and Little League?

For instance, consider all the false worldviews from Calvinism to Atheism, the ones which twist our lives, destroying and wrecking havoc for millions, the ones which I think about and work against.

I feel the incessant need (and choose to) study tome after tome and figure out valid reasons why those leaders of specious worldviews are wrong, and then I write thousands of pages explaining so in great depth. And lastly, I seek to point all people to the truth of Jesus the Chosen One, the Image of the Invisible God.

...while in contrast all my relatives and friends wonder why I bother so much over what others think.

Why couldn’t I have been born a physicist instead of a philosopher, a plumber instead of a poet?

At least then I could have easily paid the bills, dealt more with the hard data of reality rather than the imaginative and the speculative and the incomprehensible.

But I trust in God who is love that God can bring good out of my only 1 little talent, far beyond what I perceive.

We are to be branches, or twigs;-)through which Life and Truth and Love can move...

To be continued

In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox

Living Toward the Garden

Murray Rose won six Olympic medals, including 4 Gold, 1 Silver, and 1 Bronze and held the world records in 3 different swimming races.

Because of his vegan lifestyle, he was nicknamed the “The Seaweed Streak.” And according to a biography written by his father, the meatless health food diet was largely responsible for Murray’s athletic success.

As a young adult, I was deeply impressed—I wanted to be very healthy and strong, too. How could emulating an Olympian’s health regimen not lead to a robust healthy life?

Furthermore, the main person who opposed my new way of eating was medical-nurse chain-smoker. Obviously, didn't know anything.

Besides, the deeper motivation was that a friend, who I wanted to bcome my girlfriend, had just embarked on the vegetarian life. And didn't Genesis speak of a meatless Garden before humans chose to do wrong?

“And God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food. 30 And to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the heavens and to everything that creeps on the earth, everything that has the breath of life, I have given every green plant for food.” And it was so. 31 And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. Genesis 1:29-31 ESV

Yes, “got to get us back to the Garden” like Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young sang.*
So I launched pell-mell into a healthy program of nuts, fruit, vegetables and grains, ostracizing ham, chicken, and beef.

Did I become an Olympic star? Hardly.

I lost about 50 pounds, dropped down to around 112 pounds at 6’3’’—looked like a pale, bony Gandhi…became malnourished…and so eventually forsook “health foods" living.

Oh, and the girl quickly quit vegetarianism, long before me, and dropped out of my emaciated life.

So much for youthful error and illusion. How had Rose achieved the opposite? Who knew?

Fast-track 35 years forward and I again decided to move down the food levels toward the Garden. Only I was going to do this slowly, not as a fundamentalist convert to "health foods," like in my disastrous past, but carefully and quietly.

Why this time?

Ah, that’s a another narrative…except to say I've become a fish-atarian this time around
and that our doctor thinks it’s wonderful, me eating all that salmon. Now if I would just stop the midnight doughnuts;-)

To be continued

*”Well I came upon a child of God, he was walking along the road
And I asked him tell where are you going, this he told me:
(He) said, I'm going down to Yasgur's farm, going to join in a rock and roll band.
Got to get back to the land, and set my soul free.
We are stardust, we are golden, we are billion year old carbon,
And we got to get ourselves back to the garden.”
by Joni Mitchell


In the Light,

Daniel Wilcox