Our Movie Trailer (Poem)

Imagine this with me...

God has a video that’s full of human history.

Scenes of our past and future repeat continuously.

In His keen desire with us all to commune,

He’s streamed a trailer into which we could tune.

We call it The Bible.

Every movie comprises scenes and transitions,

Some more pivotal in unfolding progressions.

While all His highlights to us are in transcriptions,

We supply pictures to decode His transmissions.

Our version of this vid needs a bit of editing.

To understand story lines, shifting and emerging.

In the hearts of all Christ believers lives our ‘Editor’,

Who ‘renders’ this vid so understanding is easier.¹

Our Editor is The Holy Spirit,

Who reveals to us God’s open secret.

God’s Word daily read, studied and meditated,

Ensures our Editor remains activated.

The full trailer to us is very L-O-N-G.

Knowing our impatience is soooooo headstrong,

God has sprinkled snippets of what the end will be.

Activate The Editor, this is what you’ll see...

For most of us, t’will be one of dark, lamenting torment,

For believing lies about Jesus that devils foment.

For a wise few, t’will be one of perpetual beauty,

For finding grace simply before Christ...

to bend our heart’s knee.

You see...

It all comes down to one clear, simple choice,

One that God will record in ‘your heart’s voice’.²

It’s all about Jesus, what you’ll decide—

Him, will you embrace, or Him will you deride? 

The Bible...

God’s movie trailer highlights of human history.

Read it often. Learn its Truth. Play your role heartily.

As you read it, you it will read, reward and record,

Whether it you have adored, or it you have abhorred.

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¹ Rendering is the final step in producing a video.

² Indeed, your heart has a voice, and it speaks... through your mouth.

(Proverbs 4:23, Matthew 12:34, Luke 6:45

Life, Redefined and Redesigned (Poem)

Friends,

There is a considerable ‘fine’ extracted,

For each part of God’s design we have redacted.

God defined us ‘male and female’, with no ‘blur’.

We’ve ‘crossed’, and even push to erase...gender!

To God, Christians repent of sin and accept Jesus as their Savior.

We redefined them as ‘admiring some of what Jesus stands for’.

We ignore ‘I AM The Way!’ that He said near His life’s end.

Our president doesn’t recall ever repenting of sin!

Jesus made believers ‘evangelicals’ with His Great Commission,

But we redefined ‘evangelicals’ as ‘right-wing’ Republicans.

God says ‘Workers are worth their hire, so pay up!’ ¹

The rich say, ‘I’ll stiff them when I file as bankrupt!’

God designed our life to learn of animals and tend the earth.

We redesigned life as raping the earth and animals’ worth.

‘Do justly, love mercy and walk humbly with Him’
is what God requires.

We say, ‘Be the best Type A, so YOU can be the one
who hires...and fires!’

There are seeds we all plant, whose fruit we absolutely hate,

Yet still we plant, even as fruit from past seeds are

on our plate.

Seeds of which I speak are what God calls sin, and their fruit

is death.

There are different kinds of this fruit, not just the

loss of your breath.

Though some may disagree, it’s still not too late for humankind,

To get our lives back on track, and heed our Creator’s design.

It will be quite a challenge, and things will

not change overnight.

From His seeds in hearts of ‘good soil’, we’ll have fruit that

He calls, ‘Right!’ ²

By now it should be clear -- our cumulative history,

Proves our life redesigns are not working so perfectly!!

Could repeating actions while expecting different outcomes,

Suggest that of insanity... we’ve likely become victims??

Revelation mentions sins ‘reaching to Heaven’.³

Here’s a question that I hope may be a beacon.

Ask yourself this: Have ours? Or have yours?

Before they do, let’s change our life’s course.

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¹1 Timothy 5:18 and James 5:4, paraphrased

² Righteousness

³ The Book of Revelation 18:5

Dad, I Wish You Were Dead (Poem)

Has anyone ever said that to you?
Or have you ever said words like these to your Dad?
These words reveal a very deep heart view,
And sentiments that sound mean, but really are sad.
 
Yet we’ve all ‘said’ them in one manner or another,
In words or actions toward people with whom we disagree,
In disobeying both our Mother and our Father,
And in rejecting God, who and how He wants us to be.
 
‘God, die!’ That’s how we act, wanting His blessings and benefits,
Without having to be bothered with Him.
‘If only He’d just move out the way, Him and all His hypocrites!’ 
And thus we live life’s Godless paradigm.
 
This is what one son said, him who would become prodigal,
As, for his Dad to die, he just could not wait!
For him, getting his hands on Dad’s wealth was so palpable.
He was blind to what sin would heap on his plate! 
 
Many have even acted this out much more directly,
Destroying their parents in some devilish craze.
For the sake of some short-term benefits, so worldly,
They destroyed those who gave them the start of their days.
 
Imagine the fruit that will sprout from such an evil deed,
Whether in this life, or that which is to follow.
That is unless this child falls on bended knee, 
And repents for the sin of being... satan’s hero.
 
This points to Heaven’s greatest enterprise,
During this Age of Grace through which we now walk.
That is one sinner to find and catalyze,
To repent and stop cold sin’s repayment clock!  
 
‘God, die!’ Like this toward God, are you still talking? 
Of this sin, have you wiped clean your slate?
Or down sin’s ‘payment promenade’ are you still walking?
If you’re still breathing, it’s not too late!  
 
For the child who has destroyed his parents,
For his ‘peace’ or a ‘piece of their wealth’,
And for you who are satan’s ‘God, die!’ clients,
Receive God’s forgiveness. Free yourself!  
 
Again..
It’s still not too late to escape being satan’s sin toy,
To accept this opportunity life to you NOW presents,
To be the center of, and enraptured within the Joy,
All Heaven experiences when just... ‘one sinner repents’.*

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* Luke 15:10

Other Than Money

Have you ever thought, ‘There just must, must be a better way, a better system for living other than the pursuit of money to pay bills and meet needs’?

Money, it turns out, is likely the greatest test, trial and temptation we encounter...whether and how we pursue it; how we use it; and how we think about it.

Earth is man’s very brief testing and proving grounds where eternal rewards are being determined. God directly orchestrates or allows testing situations designed to expose to the world what we, knowingly or unknowingly, have hidden in the deepest recesses of our heart/spirit. The entire earth realm is designed to receive and crack open seed or seed equivalent, expose the hidden DNA (physical, spiritual or conceptual) therein, and facilitate its growth, development and eventual replication. Look around, read the news, consider your own life and community. As you do, you are witnessing the fruit of collective seeds, planted long ago, whose DNA material has successfully found their sources of growth and development.

How we think about money is likely the primary source for growing and developing our inner spiritual DNA. And the real issue isn’t money at all. Rather, it is what money represents, the ability to acquire goods and services. If money did not exist, there would be alternate systems for doing this, such as barter, raiding parties (as David did before becoming king of ancient Israel), pirating, and attempts at enclosed, self-sustaining communities.  As a result of sin, God’s original need-meeting system on earth collapsed. He was to be our source, literally and comprehensively. In exchange, we were created to love, adore, praise, worship and fellowship with Him to a degree angels could not. We caved; He withdrew. Thus, we needed an alternate god-supplying system. We developed ‘markets’, and money to serve as the ‘oil’ of markets.  Interestingly, money is not only the oil of markets. It also shapes and distorts markets. Consider the unimaginable number of decisions we make daily, solely in response to money, decisions that would be totally different, or not made at all if money was not the issue.

How would you structure your life if money was not an issue? Imagine how this might impact the entire world! How many products and services would be deleted or new ones created because of decisions to restructure our lives around something .... ‘other than money!’ Imagine the new world that would be created if money was not the ‘whip that daily cracked across our backs.’ There might still be markets, based not on money, but on our purest interests and desires as to where and how to spend our days, pursuing our perceived purposes.

We are all blessed with natural talents and interest areas, but these are distorted or altogether ignored in the pursuit of money to pay for goods and services. Our raison d’être or incentive structures have been totally warped by the pursuit of money, rather than the pursuit of our individual God-given purposes. Imagine a world in which we pursue, identify, develop, and then walk in our God-given purposes, undistorted by money. Imagine how things would so easily flow and fit together. Does this sound like a planned economy? You bet, but not one planned and controlled by man, but by God. Selfish pride blocks our potential to desire or even imagine such! Adam’s sin gave birth to iterative ‘me, myself, and I’ generations on planet earth, and God has determined to allow them to run their course, until..... 

Hollywood has conjured up the concept of alternative worlds or universes. Well imagine an alternative economy, one undistorted by money, where the incentive framework for being, doing and consuming is totally different from the one produced by a moneyed economy. What might such an incentive be? The answer lies in discovering the original incentive framework created for Adam and Eve in The Garden of Eden. What if God intended that garden to grow and fill the entire earth, and possibly beyond? Moreover, what if it were possible to restructure your personal life as a quasi-enclave of this garden, a microcosm within our existing, distorted system incentivized by money?

This is possible, and desired by God, just as He established the nation of Israel to be a microcosm in Canaan, specifically, and ‘within context of’ the larger world, more generally; just as He established earth as a unique microcosm to sustain human life ‘within context of’ a vast, inhospitable universe; and just as an eye ball has at its center, a pupil, a hole, ‘within context of’ its mass’, into which a tiny bit of light can escape the outside world, strike a nerve in the back of the eyeball, and send lightning fast signals to the brain for interpretation! wOw!! 

This reveals a clear the Truth -- God IS NOT bothered by the broader contexts. Rather, He focuses precisely on His unique objectives ‘within the contexts’, which He then uses to change the context, slowly over time. Thus, He triggers the contexts to feed His objectives. This is the seed principle. To Him, the circumstantial or situational contexts are like soil, dirt, the supporting structure and resources to incubate, develop and grow His purpose, encapsulated in seeds. His seeds may be tangible or intangible. They are most often words, spoken in an inhospitable context (e.g., an unbelieving community or society), grasped and believed by a human spirit, and then incubated to produce their eventual, good fruit.

Since He has determined to allow our alternative, Godless, moneyed system to run its course until He ushers in His new system, God has established an interim approach that will give us a foothold into His coming need-meeting system. It is tithing a tithe of our income ‘to Him’. In effect, the tithe (10% of our gross money and non-money income) is the equivalent of ancient Israel in Canaan, or the pupil in the eyeball, or earth in the universe! It is a ‘seed planted in the contextual soils of our life’, by which He works His interim system. How?

Any seed does two things, chemically. First, it yields to the soil’s attacks to crack it open and return its components (inside and out) to their basic elements...dirt. But mystically, the seed then changes the immediately surrounding soil chemically, making the dirt work to enable the seed to ‘express’ (push out) the seed’s DNA. Once expressed, this DNA literally takes on a commanding role, forcing dirt to serve it… throughout its life!

As you submit your tithe (seed) to God, and send it into the world (dirt equivalent), you lose control of how it is used (dirt cracking open your seed), but your God-empowered faith (spiritual DNA in your seed) overtakes and ensures God-shaped outcomes, some of which you will know in this life, and many others you will only know in the hereafter!

Receive this typology as a ‘rudder’ to turn around your naturally distorted thinking about our moneyed market system. Changing how you think about money opens avenues for God to create ‘The Garden of Eden’ in your life. As the discipline of living on 90% of your income kicks in, your priorities will be influenced and shaped by His priorities. Your faith in His filling presence to meet your needs and your desires that correspond to His purposes, will then dispel fears about going without. With fears dispersed, you are then increasingly free to help others meet their needs, and most important, encourage and disciple them to ‘see the light’.  Not only is it important to cultivate the image of you as a seed sower, but also as a reaper of bountiful harvests, and not only for your own needs and desires, but also for those of others!

Embrace, apply and share this Truth in your life, and don’t be fooled into judging it by the degree to which your natural mind may assess whether it is ‘working or not working’. Truth is and remains Truth, and is not subject to your or my mere carnal assessments.

Finally, recall that God’s system starts, not with sharing your substance as a tithe, but with repentance of sins, and receiving His Grace-based salvation in Jesus Christ. Simply mimicking His system apart from this is ...futile.

Europe: Iron-Clay Mix (Poem)

There is lots of consternation these days about Europe,

About whether ‘Brexit’ may lead to its formal breakup.

Will the European Union survive

The pullout of the U.K. and still thrive?

Or will Brexit only serve as a draft - a model,

For others who from Europe may wish to uncouple?

And what of the ubiquitous issues of trade?

Will the current strings of world trade become frayed?

From the ashes of World War II, this Union was born.

Through integration, could regional peace be shoehorned?

Was this the first time the concept had been incubated?

Nope! Over eons, this notion has been iterated.

Rome, Napoleon, Mussolini and Hitler come to mind,

Each having his own European integration design.

Some came close, but they all eventually failed.

They all had ignored what The Bible had unveiled.

Long ago, in a bizarre dream... very mysterious,

God showed Nebuchadnezzar something quite precarious.

A statue of gold, silver, bronze, iron and clay conglomerate,

That would speak of world powers to come,

and of the odd penultimate.¹

Gold head, silver chest/arms, bronze belly/thighs,

iron legs, then a gimmick --

A conundrum in the feet where iron and clay

would try to mix!

The iron represents the ancient Roman Empire,

The feet represent today’s European quagmire.²

From Babylon-to-Rome, world powers would rise

and then fall.

Then after Rome, attempts to integrate would always stall,

Though many try, iron and clay really shall never mix,

But from these tries, one will arise with a deceiving shtick.

From Europe’s hodgepodge, a most cunning man will

at once arise,

Deceiving all nations to give him the world leadership prize!

He’ll be greatly honored when he conceives a plot,

To untie the Jerusalem Gordian knot! ³

But after a few years, over him many will NOT be awed,

When, in the new Jewish temple,

he declares himself... as God!

This will start the run-up to the global war, Armageddon,

When Christ returns to govern...

without human approbation.

For decades, there’ve been calls for a European president,

One on whose shoulders the integration quagmire

can be pent.⁴

But just as many around the world now are learning,

A strongman you will get, if strongman you are yearning!

So as you ponder the evolving story of Europe,

Study what The Bible reveals of its final breakup.

It’s the penultimate attempt in human governments,
That signals the coming devilish one Christ shall silence!

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¹ The Book of Daniel, chapter 2

² In many respects, Europe represents remnants of the Roman Empire, nations with significantly mixed political and economic strengths. As related to Nebuchadnezzar’s statue dream, it is interesting that the human foot has 26 bones and 10 toes, compared to the current 28 nations in the European Union, of which only about 10 are generally considered economically/politically strong. See for example: The Top 10 Most Competitive Economies in Europe  and also  Financial and Social Rankings of Sovereign States in Europe.

³ The anti-Christ. See Daniel chapters 7, 8, 9; 2 Thessalonians 2:3-4; and Revelation 13:5.

⁴ ‘We do not want another committee. We have too many already. What we want is a man of sufficient stature to hold the allegiance of all people, and to lift us out of the economic morass in which we are sinking. Send us such a man and, be he God or the devil, we will receive him.’ (Paul-Henri Spaak, former Belgian Prime Minister and President of the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe nearly 50 years ago. Europe in Prophecy)