Bah, humbug, get me on a flight to Pandora

I am so not in the Christmas spirit. Not really sure why. The extent of my decorating this year was to finally put the tree up last Sunday (the 13th). I still haven't finished Christmas shopping, altho a trip to the mall tonight should pretty much take care of that.

Of course, I could have gotten more done this past weekend if I hadn't gone to Avatar... twice...

...and I'll prolly go see it AGAIN...

We got Starbucks, favorite drivers...

So according to some guy in Seattle, NASCAR fans wouldn't know a venti mocha frappuccino if it bit them on the rear. Apparently we are all trailer trash whose entire wardrobe cost less than said frappuccino, except for the merchandise advertising our love for our favorite driver, and who can't imagine using a Starbucks cup for anything other than a receptacle for chew.

Well then. Apparently Mr. Seattle Know-it-All hasn't sat down with Purdue grad Ryan Newman lately, or asked Elliott Sadler about his basketball career (shortened by a knee injury) at James Madison University, or queried Darian Grubb about how his mechanical engineering degree from Virginia Tech helps him make Smoke's car as good as possible, or indeed made any effort to find people who have an education and love stock car racin'.

I suppose we're not allowed to enjoy wine either? Should I be cancelling my Wine Spectator subscription now? And cancelling my wine clubs? Apparently my palate should not extend beyond Coors Light.

Or...

...maybe we should just take it upon ourselves to educate the poor sod, who clearly is missing out on the finer things in life. Seattle Dude, wanna join us at Daytona? I'll bring a nice Malbec and my espresso machine for tailgating.

Smoke gets in your eyes...

Qiviut/wool smoke ring:







Cashmere/silk/alpaca smoke ring: (I can't remember what pattern this was)

Whoever isn't working...

So after reading one too many health insurance thread on Ravelry, I got to thinking (yeah I know, scary thought). I've seen several health insurance arguments against a robust public option or other public health insurance, usually based around the following: "Health insurance is important enough to me that I've always made sure I was in a job that had good health insurance." The implication of course being, "if it were really important to you, you'd have good health insurance through your job too, and if you're too lazy to go out and get a job with good bennies, that's not my problem..."

That got me thinking about 2 Thess. 3:10, which says: "While we were with you, we gave you the order: 'Whoever doesn't want to work shouldn't be allowed to eat.'" (GWT) This has become a popular verse among conservatives opposed to government-funded social service programs. It's been cropping up in the health insurance debate.

But what does that verse mean? What did it mean when 2 Thessalonians was written?

I've been reading through The First Paul: Reclaiming the Radical Visionary Behind the Church's Conservative Icon by Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan. Borg and Crossan argue that Christian communities in Paul's day were "share communities," that is, "communities in which there was a sharing of material as well as spiritual resources" (Kindle loc. 2756-58). The author of 2 Thessalonians, according to Borg and Crosssan, was addressing the problem of freeloaders. They write that freeloaders are a problem that "often occurs in share communities" because such people think it's a good deal - "hey I don't have to do much and I'll get taken care of." (Kindle loc. 2773-76.)

Read in context, the statement "whoever doesn't work, shouldn't eat" makes more sense:

[W]e worked night and day, laboring and toiling so that we would not be a burden to any of you. We did this, not because we do not have the right to such help, but in order to make ourselves a model for you to follow. For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “If a man will not work, he shall not eat.”

We hear that some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies. Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the bread they eat. And as for you, brothers, never tire of doing what is right.

2 Thess. 3:8b-13 (NIV) (emphasis mine). The author is saying, "Dude, some among you are taking unfair advantage of the rest of you. They're perfectly capable of working but they're too darn lazy. They need to get off their duffs and help contribute to the good of the community." But listen to what he's NOT saying. He's NOT saying, "Dude, there are some people who don't have it as good as you because they can't work or their jobs aren't as good as yours. You don't have an obligation to help those guys out 'cuz they're no better than the free-lunch crowd."

Elsewhere in the letters traditionally attributed to Paul, there are references to the community being charged with helping those who can't do for themselves. E.g., 1 Tim. 5:3, 5, 9-10. So 2 Thess. 3:10 really shouldn't be read to say that those who can't earn their keep, shouldn't be supported by the community.

There are plenty of people who work hard, work long hours, but can't get ahead because their pay is low and their benefits are negligible or non-existent. There are plenty of other people who can't find a decent job in the current economy. Should society refuse to help these people just because, for whatever reason, they're not working at a high-paying job with great benefits? Should society punish their children because the parents aren't riding the gravy train? How is it consistent with Jesus' word to say, "I got mine, you best work harder to get yours, if you don't it's your own damn fault, and I have no obligation to help you out"?

Respect the Spindle - Update

I ordered a copy.

The Swine-ish Flu Chronicles

OK. I don't know for sure that I had swine flu. I wasn't tested. But my doc said my symptoms were consistent with novel H1N1.

That was nearly a week ago.

I'm still tired, sluggish, somewhat nauseated, and completely unmotivated to do anything.

So here's the symptoms, as I experienced them: really really tired (do I have to open my eyes? That takes so much energy), achiness (someone get the number of the freight train that hit me), nausea and loss of appetite, headache, and a lovely dry hacking cough. Apparently the nausea and the dry hacking cough were what made the doc decide it was most likely novel H1N1 and not seasonal flu.

I was too tired to knit, much less spin.

I fell asleep watching Sprint Cup practice on Friday. And again during qualifying.

I think I fell asleep sometime during the UW-New Mexico game.

It's been a week, and I still have the cough. Sounds like I may have the cough for awhile yet.

Disaster Porn!

OK, so after a Ravelry thread about Conservapedia's misbegotten plot to rewrite the Bible to make it, um, not liberal (huh?) which got threadjacked into a sort of discussion of Roland Emmerich's latest disaster porn 2012, I went searching for 2012 trailers for fun watching.

This parody is made of win...



I ganked that video from this automotive blog post that advises that, when California falls into the sea, you'll be wanting a Lincoln Town Car. I dunno. Seeing some of the actual CGI-enhanced footage from 2012, I'm thinking you don't want a real long vehicle that could potentially slide into a huge crevasse. You want something small and mean and bad fast. Or at least you want a Sprint Cup driver behind the wheel. Or the best of both worlds, a small, mean, bad fast car with a Cup driver behind the wheel. Oh Tony...

BTW the music from that parody is "Okey Dokey" and "Bongolia" by Michael Viner's Incredible Bongo Band.

You're welcome.

A Choppy, Yet Insincere, Apology

So I've had the Riverboat Gamblers stuck in my head lately.



Which gets me thinking.

What's up with all the rudeness lately? Yanno, Addison Graves "Joe" "How Many Diseases Can I Be Named After" Wilson, Kanye West, Serena Williams.

Granted, I'm hardly the first to address the Trifecta of Rudeness. The Chicago Tribune, Crain's New York Business, Andy Borowitz, and the Seattle Times, among bazillions of others, clearly beat me to the punch. But still, here I am...

One would think Joe Wilson's behavior would have won him no fans. Especially since he refuses to apologize on the Congressional floor. But a simple search of Facebook groups shows no dearth of pro-Joe Wilson groups, lauding him for Standing Up to Da Man, Speaking Truth to Power, blah blah blah. And he's apparently received over $2 million in campaign contributions since exposing himself as a total asshat. TWO. FREAKIN'. MILLION. WTF? Explain?

Kanye West got promptly turned into an internet meme. Regardless whether he continues to get laughed at or not, his next album will doubtless go multi-platinum.

And Serena will continue to grace the tennis courts and draw crowds, no doubt.

Hm. A trend here?

Maybe the problem here is - NO FREAKIN' CONSEQUENCES FOR ACTING LIKE SPOILED BRATS???!?!?!??!?!?!

(P.S. The actual title of the Riverboat Gamblers' song is "A Choppy, Yet Sincere, Apology." Just in case you were wondering.)

Oh and I know I still need to post pics of my qiviut smoke ring. I took pics, I'm just too lazy to download them to The Beast. It will happen. At some point. I promise.

Someone please tell me...

...how a lavender fluid can somehow turn my hair auburn?

I'm touching up (OK, completely redoing) my hair color. I'm about 3 weeks overdue, so I decided fine, just redo the whole thing. L'Oreal Excellence, color 5RB. So you all know my secret. Not that I've ever kept it a secret, mind you...

What I can't figure out is this.

You mix the color with the base. It looks lavender right after you mix it. Just exactly how does that become reddish-brown? WTFOMGBBQ? Let's just say chemistry wasn't my favorite subject in school...

So anyhoo.

I missed the Sprint Cup race last night because of coming back from Laramie (the Texas game). I forgot to set the DVR, plus I kind of figured that by the time I got home I was going to be too tired to watch anyway, what with having to get up for soccer today. As for soccer, Will's team finished second in their division at this weekend's tournament. I don't have pictures unfortunately. Next weekend I need to take pictures.

I finally blocked the smoke ring I made with the qiviut/wool blend I bought in Alberta. Pictures will go up next time. Pattern here.

Thinking about getting this book: Respect The Spindle: Spin Infinite Yarns With One Amazing Tool by Abby Franquemont. Signed copies (once the book is released) are available on Abby's site...

RESPECT THE SPINDLE! RESPECT IT!!!

Which reminds me... I think I have a prospective victim or two to asspinerate... hehehe...

Back to School Left-Wing Indoctrination from NASCAR

So. The nattering nabobs of negativity on the right are screaming bloody murder about the President's webcast to schoolkids scheduled for tomorrow morning. Clutching their pearls, they wail that the President is threatening to report them to "some enemies' list" and that he's somehow some sort of unspecified "threat to our inalienable rights" or that he'll somehow come across looking like Big Brother. (I just got a mental image of Max Headroom...)



Mhm. Yep. Telling kids to stay in school and work hard is a left-wing threat.

So, therefore, you should be shocked to learn who else is helping indoctrinate your precious kids so that they will be softened up and ready for the AmeriCorps re-education camps:



Yep. Dale Jr., Carl, Jeff, Smoke and Juan Pablo... NASCAR, sport of rednecks, is helping de-redneckize your kiddos...

Oh noes!!!!!11!!!eleventy!!! Pretty soon, our kiddos will be going to Purdue and getting engineering degrees like Ryan Newman...

The only thing that would have been better would have been if that video had been on during last night's race. I didn't see it during the race, sadly...

Baptism

Well. Once again I haven't been here in awhile. I need to post more often...

Will got baptized today. In the river. Pics:

Where have I been????

Holy hand grenades Batman, it's been nearly 3 months since I last posted!

I don't have much fiber related stuff to share. The socks from 3 months ago are pretty much my last FO's. I got sidetracked last week and bought some Noro Silk Garden and a Noro pattern book and started in on a cardigan. I have so many UF socks it's not even funny. I think I'm a little socked out for the time being.

I wish the weather would warm up. It's been chilly, cloudy and rainy the past week. The sun is finally trying to come out today. I have been so tired and sluggish from the yucky weather.

Oh well, summer will be here soon... In a few days, I'm off to Colorado Springs and Denver for 4 days or so. It's time to get out of town and do something fun.

New socks

Go Tony Stewart!



Sense and Sensibility (and Zombies!)

Slacker Truth

I love Fred Clark. Srsly. If he weren't already married, I'd propose to him. In his latest Left Behind (ok, Trib Force) deconstruction, he totally pwns LaHaye and Jenkins and RTC theology:

This reimagining or repackaging of the TF's mission seems to show that the authors recognize, on some level, that their normal concept of the Christian life isn't very exciting. ... LaHaye and Jenkins' version of life, mission and ministry is neither difficult nor adventurous.

It's pretty dull, actually, consisting mainly of sitting around praying and abstaining from a long list of things until finally Jesus comes back to get us before we die.

Even Jerry Jenkins seems to realize that prayer, compulsive abstention and lots of sitting around and waiting would make a lousy plot for a series of novels. I'm not sure he appreciates that it also makes a lousy plot for anyone's life story. As such, it also makes a lousy basis for evangelism. "Want to join us?" "Join you doing what?" "Um, well, not much of anything, actually." Not a compelling invitation.

In earlier posts this week, Fred addresses Young Earth Creationism. YEC is one of my personal peeves. Fred's peeved too. And dismayed. All I can say is, Fred articulates what's wrong with YEC far better than I ever could.

Socks

Sense and Sensibility, thus far:



Seven Chakras:

A man, a plan, a really cool YouTube

Posting this just because I can.

I knew that new Pepsi logo was lame...

... and apparently someone else thinks so too...

love (eleventy bazillion and one)

Sense, Sensibility and Getting Incensed

So on teh Rav I got sucked into Yet Another Fiber Club... the Castle Fibers Jane Austen yarn 'n' book club. The first installment came last Friday in a cute little box... the Sense and Sensibility sock kit. Pretty, isn't it? Plus it came with really cute stitch markers. I'm on about the 4th rep of the cuff pattern, it's a ripple/lace sort of like (but not exactly) Feather and Fan. Also I'm on about chapter 13 or 14 of the book. I can really relate to Elinor's and Marianne's romantic woes...

Meanwhile over the weekend I finished up Seven Chakras, a/k/a the tsuspense project. It's drying after being blocked so no pics yet. EDIT to add: At top of post is a pic I took today (Thursday) with my phone... yes that is my foot :-D

On getting incensed... somehow yesterday I wound up in a shitstorm on teh Rav. I won't go into the details, but the Readers' Digest version is that I got massively triggered by a discussion of Biblical submission in marriage, and should you submit to a husband who clearly doesn't deserve it, and blah blah blah, and I posted some stuff I probably shouldn't have. Or more accurately, the stuff I posted, I posted in anger or as a reaction to being triggered, not in love.

So. How does one keep one's cool when being triggered? Shit happens, even to the best of us. Paul wrote,

I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.

Rom. 7:15-20. A few verses later, Paul posits the question and the answer: "Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!"

Hm. Wonder if it's time to reread Romans? After all, it liberated St. Augustine, and it liberated Martin Luther...

Deep thoughts, or not

One should not have deep thoughts on a Friday morning. Especially not while driving to work when one can't write out those deep thoughts. Guess I should have dictated them into my Blackberry... oh well...

I finished reading Searching for God Knows What by Don Miller over breakfast. I got a lot out of it. I'll have to reread it, prolly in the not too distant future.

I wonder what God thinks about the people who get his message wrong, the people who screw up his message to the point that it drives other people away. I look at some of the posts on Ravelry to the effect of "this _________ (fill in the blank) bullshit is why I'm not a Christian (or why I'm not religious)." Yesterday one of the topics was a site that sells t-shirts that say things like "ex-adulterer" or "ex-fornicator" or "ex-hypocrite." I looked at the t-shirt site, didn't see any of Jesus' love anywhere on there.

Having been exposed to rigid, extreme, legalistic religious views, I now have only pity for those who hold those views to the point of driving others away from God. They're going to have an interesting conversation with God at some point...

All I know is, God wants a relationship with us, and I've let the stumbling blocks keep me from that for way too long.

More on this later...

Dyed, redyed, and renewed

'K, you know the sock yarn I dyed with Kool-Aid, that I blogged about here? I decided I wasn't happy about it and decided to overdye it with Jacquard dye in a mixture of vermilion and sky blue. The results:



Pretty, wouldn't you agree? A lovely wine-dark color, with some lighter reddish-purple highlights. I like it much much much better than the original.

And here's some Bare sock yarn I dyed in sort of a spruce green, blending Jacquard dye in sapphire blue, yellow sun, and a little black to mute it:



Been doing a lot of reading and thinking the past several days. Philip Yancey and Donald Miller have given voice to so many of my concerns, stumbling blocks, bêtes noires, etc. On the question of why God allows screwed-up teachings and heretical theologies: Yancey observes in Disappointment with God that God delegated His work on earth and His holiness on earth to us flawed humans. God takes a huge risk in doing so - the risk that we will "badly misrepresent him." And Christians have misrepresented God throughout history - the Crusades, anti-Semitism, slavery, misogyny, homophobia, the Religious Right. But that was still God's plan. Paul referred to that as "the foolishness of God" and observed. "And yet the foolishness of God is wiser than men." Somehow, it works more often than not, even if we humans screw it up from time to time.

On the subject of how some of God's delegates on earth really screw it up and make God look bad: Donald Miller writes about how Robert Tilton was exposed on TV as having stolen money from his flock, was disgraced, and lost his ministry. Miller observes, "[G]uys like Robert Tilton make me like Jesus more because the people Jesus had the least patience with were the people who said they represented God but didn't." Miller finds that he actually feels sorry for Tilton, for what Tilton will face when he goes before God at the final judgment. He notes that "God-imposters" don't really worship God, they worship their own little god that they have made in their own image, instead of the other way around. I'm still not sure what the answer here is, except that we shouldn't try to make God in our own image, not when He did it the other way around.

Anyway. I'm kind of feeling like my overdyed yarn. Not happy the way things came out originally (or the way things were for several years), but I'm being overdyed and coming out better. I know this doesn't make a lot of sense. I guess I'm still in the dye pot and haven't been rinsed and dried yet, so I don't know exactly what color I'll come out as. I just know it'll be better than what was.

High brow and middle brow faith...

Andrew Sullivan is teh awesome:

When theoconservatism inevitably retreats in the face of evolving human thought and enduring human faith, the full implications of Darwin for Christianity will emerge. In my view, both will be strengthened. Christianity can and will survive by embracing the truths of science for what they are. Faith and Truth cannot definitionally compete. What we are going through is an evolutionary moment of theological transformation. As it happens, we see more dust than light. In the future, more light.

Sullivan is commenting on this post by Jim Manzi on The American Scene, in which Manzi criticizes a Jerry Coyne review of two books on science and religion in The New Republic. Most trenchantly, Manzi writes:

By about the year 400, Augustine described a view of Creation in which “seeds of potentiality” were established by God, which then unfolded through time in an incomprehensibly complicated set of processes. By the 13th century, Aquinas — working with the thought of Aristotle and Augustine — identified God with ultimate causes, while accepting naturalistic interpretations of secondary causes. Today, the formal position of the Catholic church, incorporating this long train of thought, is that there is no conflict between evolution through natural selection and Catholic theology. So, in this example, we’re describing an orientation supported by those esoteric theologians Augustine and Aquinas, and promulgated today by that so-liberal-he’s-practically-an-atheist Pope Benedict in that weirdo minority Roman Catholic sect. You know, “unrecognizable as religion to most Americans.”

Random post...

Hm, what happened to the font thingy on here? I may have to edit this to get it into Verdana...

Obligatory knitting/fiber content: Let's see, last night I took the yarn I dyed with Kool-Aid and overdyed it with Jacquard dyes - vermilion with some sky blue mixed in. It's still drying but looks like it will be a lovely dark red-wine color. Pics to follow.

Also I'm still working on my clapotis.

Spiritual journey content: I'm still sorting through my issues. I do feel freer spiritually than I have felt in years. It's a great feeling, that I can be free to let God be God and not put him in a box, or a jar, or whatever.

Here is something I wrote late last week:

A couple interesting books I ran across this week (Amazon works in mysterious ways hehehe): Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller and What’s So Amazing About Grace? by Philip Yancey. The thing about Searching for God Knows What: I was just kind of hopping from book to book (I started out with Philip Yancey and that kind of led me into Donald Miller) and I did the search inside the book thing, and it took me to a passage about putting God in little jars… just like my metaphor of God-in-a-box. So of course I had to download the book to my Kindle. I’m about 2/3 of the way through it. He talks at length about how we try to create God in our own image, and how that gets in the way of having a relationship with God, and that hurts God because all he ever wanted was to have a perfect Relationship with us from the get go. (There’s an interesting exposition on Genesis 2-3. I had a little trouble with it at first since he appears to come at it from a YEC standpoint and I have a real problem with YEC theology, see above, but now I’m coming to realize that Gen 2-3 really talks about how God wanted a perfect Relationship with his blessed, created humans and how we humans fucked it up and continue to fuck it up.)

As for What’s So Amazing About Grace?: I skipped ahead to a chapter where Yancey talks about the passage in Leviticus about “don’t eat shellfish” and other holiness code passages about men with damaged testicles and women who have their period and people with open sores and people with physical disabilities – all unclean, and the passage in Acts where God tells Peter that what was once unclean, is now clean – both unclean foods, and “unclean” people like the Roman centurion. Yancey takes those passages and talks about how even today we make stupid rules about no dancing or no jewelry or no whatever, or no oddballs allowed (you have to be and act and talk a certain way to be a Christian) and those rules get in the way of a relationship with God. He points out that a “no oddballs allowed” rule would mean that NoBoDy could possibly be a Christian. We’re all oddballs. We’re all seafood in the diet of life. (Just as long as no one tries to eat me with melted butter or cocktail sauce.)

Jesus invited people from all walks of life – the seafood of society – to dine with him at the table. The ones he had a problem with were the theocrats who thought they were perfect and had God’s rules down pat. I can see Jesus today – he’d be hanging out with hookers and meth-heads and high school dropouts working graveyards at Loaf & Jug, and showing his love to them and helping them clean up their acts because he showed them love that they had never felt before, and telling the likes of James Dobson where to put it. (Man, that would be a beautiful sight to see…)

Yanno, the thing about James Dobson and the like: That’s long been a hangup of mine. I guess this is something to process or think about for another day. But I guess I see him and his ilk as the Pharisees of our time. Jesus sure didn’t have much patience with the Pharisees, their legalism and literalism. He had great fun challenging them to a battle of wits, and always coming out on top. And he reserved his harshest scorn for the Pharisees and the teachers of the Jewish law because they were so damn legalistic, and their legalism and literalism were barriers to a relationship with God. More God in a box, I guess… (Hm. I just turned to Matt 23 – “I’ve had it with you! You Pharisees, you religion scholars, you’re hopeless, frauds, your lives are roadblocks to God’s kingdom!” Woah…)

Anyhoo.

I did start an online meditation course Saturday. I am struggling with it some, when I sit quietly and meditate I find that fears and other negative feelings come bubbling to the surface. Things I've been trying to suppress for years, I suppose. It's kind of scaring me away from meditation. I've noticed in the past that when the quieting of the mind in yoga or meditation causes negative thoughts and feelings to surface, I shy away from activities that quiet the mind because I'm afraid of the thoughts and feelings. I think I need to face those thoughts and feelings head on tho.

God in a box

Warning, no fiber content in this post, and there's some back story that isn't in this post. I may post the backstory at some point.

The following is a condensed form of a journal I just wrote.

So here I go starting to try to sort out some of what I learned/discovered/whatevered over the weekend. I spent much of the weekend railing on paper about why God allows things to happen such as allowing a MI to masquerade as the Holy Spirit, and ranting about legalistic churchianity and stuff like the prosperity gospel. I did come out of the weekend feeling God’s presence, which was a big breakthrough for me. I hadn’t felt that presence for a long time.

I’m still struggling with the things that are stumbling blocks for me, which I think pretty much boil down to conservatism. I ran across a comment on Slacktivist that got me thinking, to the effect of “for some people, it isn’t Christ that they’re worshiping.” Hm, I’m starting to think that some conservatives, literalist, legalists etc. aren’t worshiping the living Christ so much as worshiping a political theory, or a particular translation of the Bible, (AV 1611 comes to mind here) or worshiping certain rules and regulations, cherry picking the verses in the Bible that support those rules and regulations or that political theory (shrimp cocktail, anyone?) or whatever.

I’m actually starting to feel sorry for such people, because they can never feel God’s grace and love so long as their object of worship isn’t the living Christ but is a man-made construct. False idols, much? I know there are verses about not worshiping false idols but I don’t recall them off the top of my head. And I don’t want to fall into the same trap fundamentalists tend to fall into – “if you violate verse X, you’re condemned” or whatever. Probably better to ask God’s grace and love to fill their hearts so that they aren’t trapped by fear and hatred.

Maybe some of the other Slacktivist comments got me moving in this line of thought.
In the latest LBTM post, Fred explores a scene between Rayford and Hattie and comments on an interview in which Tim LaHaye said that a RL encounter between an airline pilot and a flight attendant was the genesis of that plot line. Which engendered a number of comments to the effect of, LaHaye must think that it’s impossible for men and women to work together because ZOMG that will lead to sin… and therefore LaHaye must think that for him, any encounter with a woman other than his wife must be avoided, because he can’t be exposed to temptation because he doesn’t want to risk Being Left Behind…

Yanno, it must be terribly sad to live that way, to think that your every action could lead to being condemned to hell. Somehow I don’t think that’s what Jesus was here for and what he died for. He died to save us, not to scare the hell out of us (literally and figuratively).

And don’t get me started on whether people and dinosaurs co-existed. I do think that being trapped in a mindset that the world can’t be more than a few thousand years old, and that God literally created the world in 6, 24-hour days, and that dinosaurs HAD to be on the ark because Noah was commanded to bring critters of “every kind” on board, has to be incredibly constraining and difficult.

God is too big, too powerful, too wonderful to be squeezed into a box. And when we force him into a box of our own creating, we are forcing ourselves into that box as well. No wonder so many people reject God, they look at that tiny box and can’t imagine being squeezed into such a tiny, confining space – and they don’t realize that the box isn’t God.

I spent too many years seeing only God-in-a-box. When I rejected the box, I kinda threw God out with the box. I think by doing so, I created a box of my own. Only now am I realizing that God isn’t the box, and the box isn’t God.

OK, I know this doesn't make a lot of sense, but I'm still sorting things out.