Inside and Out

I can't sleep right now... I know I should be, but my heart is just too stirred up right now. So much has happened in my mind today. I just can't help but be a little higher in spirit than usual on sunny warm days like today, but as the sun goes down, so does the temperature, and with the temperature my defenses. I've been particularly stirred by one issue that I encountered today. It is my moral foundation vs modern American culture. The modern American would argue that nothing is really wrong except for the attempt to set standards. People who set standards, especially moral ones, are closed minded, sheltered, ignorant, and intollerant. The issue is strong at hand in the field of art, and I was heavily involved in a discussion today in photography class about the limits of art. According to the modern artist, there is no limit to art. Everything is art. In a way I would agree. Everything can be looked at as both an art and a discipline, but one immediately assumes that because it is art, it is good. I do not believe this at all. I believe art is in the same rhelm as man because it is interpreted by man and man alone. Art is not perfect, and in this it has potential for evil. Thus, there is both good and evil art.

I might pause here for a moment to make a prediciton. The "open minded" will close theirs now while the "closed minded" will neither open nor close, but simply remain discerning. I suppose you are now my only audience.

A girl was arguing with me about the soldier decapitation videos, as art, should not be shunned from society, but embraced. I argued in return that that man has brothers, a mother, and a father. He sat there and begged for his life and they REALLY cut his head off. He had love and a future to live for and those men deprived him of that. THAT is not art! THAT is murder. Join the number of serial killers on death row who share the same sentament. Clockwork Orange is a movie that comes to mind in that aspect. What a sick mind! But American culture would say that there are no sick minds, just various diversitities. "To each his own." I always add in on that quote.
"To each his own... said Hitler to the Jews."
"To each his own... said the master to his slave."
"To each his own... said Stalin to his people."
"To each his own... said Bundy to his victims."
"To each his own... said man to God."
Obviously you look at these add-in's and struggle with the concept a little more. It doesn't sound as good when you throw Hitler's name in there does it? Hitler did something that we see as morally wrong. It is a natural law we hold in our souls. A law that we have attempted to silence and defeat for as long as we have exsisted in attempts to be our own gods. In doing this we are only living up to the lie Satan gave Adam and Eve at the tree... in the garden... at the very beginning.

"You will be as God"

It was not entirely a lie. It was the blood brother of lies: deception. Since that time we have attempted to defeat the guilty knowledge of good and evil into submission. The only way to defeat it is to declare yourself god and therefore justify all of your actions. This is so becuase internally we also know that there is nothing higher than God.

"To each his own." ("Don't judge me." (("I am God."))

What would happen to you if you were to go without shelter or cloths? Exposed to all of nature's fury, you would die. This is why you sleep with a roof over your head. This is why we have always done so. We cannot endure being exposed to everything. Now consider this. Do you think that if you expose your mind to everything that it will survive? Will you return unscathed? Surely not. The mental rhelm is far more brutal than the physical, and being that the mental has close ties to the spiritual, it is even more dangerous because the spiritual is eternal. As self proclamed gods we would see the establishment of mental and spiritual shelter as without purpose. Our minds would become as gluttons, never becoming full, and marveling at our own greatness. Why shouldn't we? On the other hand, the true Christian has resigned the persuite of godship and now relys on the one true God. Understanding their place here, the Christian sees and understands that the persuite of other things is a waste. All fulfillment comes from the true God where as the limits on being one's own god become ever visible.

Does man always stay indoors? No. He comes and goes, but with some means of protection. His cloths, his armor. Just as represented every day in the physical rhelm, such is true in the mental and spiritual. We are meant to step out of our comforts to understand our surroundings on occasion, but we are not to go naked, and even when you do go, do you not return to your comforts for the night?... Do it. climb Everest naked. I dare you. You would be the earliest recorded casualty on the mountain ever recorded. You wear armor to protect you so that you may reach the top. My physical armor is my health and clothing. My mental armor is my moral foundation. My spiritual armor is my knowledge and faith in the one living God. A man who lacks any of the three is quite visibly less. Immagine walking outside one day and everyone but a few people were naked. Not only this, but they were making fun of you for wearing cloths. It also is quite cold outside, and it begins to rain lightly. Do you feel guilty for wearing cloths still? Is their laughter now enough to strip you down? No. Because you are smart you keep your cloths on, and they suffer the consequences of being naked. They inevitable get deathly ill from being too cold and wet.

So in arguement of being called closed minded (or clothed), I would return arguement with the accusation of nearsightedness. Can you not see the clouds building? Can you not see the limits of being your own god? You feel pain, why? You get sick, why? You have all of these things, but no hope, why? You spend hours at night fearing the next day. You are your own god... why? There is a truth that I live in. It is glorious, but it is not happy. It is the truth that one of us is right and one is wrong. Right and wrong thinking... yet another thought discouraged by present culture. Yet another attempt to be "as God." If you are right in your attempts to become a self proclaimed god, to be exposed to everything, to wander around naked for the rest of your life, I have lost nothing when we meet in the grave. Both of us have lived under the banner of "to each his own" and have, in so doing, drawn out the fullness of the meaning of life. On the other hand, if I am right in yeilding my life to the one true God, embrassing His promises, depending on Him as my hope and salvation instead of myself, then I rightfully mourn for you and will do everything within my power to reach you. We missionaries do not go from one place to another speaking of Jesus because we wish to impose ourselves on other cultures. It is because we recognize this truth and all of the weight that rests upon it. It is love that compells us. It is a real battle that we fight.

And this... This is what seperates Christianity from all other religions. Yes, we all have a god that we worship, and we all have guidelines. That is what makes Christianity a religion. But Jesus was not kidding when he said "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through me." This is why. Christian standard of living is not a means of salvation. You do all the good you want, it will not get you into heaven because you are still trying to control your destiny. You are still racing for the same thing everyone else is racing for: godship. Be completely evil, you are in the same race. Islam's salvation: based on human achievement of holiness (self improvement... godship). Bhuddism's salvation: based on human achievement of holiness by a series of steps (self improvement... godship). Hindu's salvation: based on human achievement of holiness by a series of steps (self improvement... godship). Wikka's salvation: based on human achievement of power (self improvement... godship). Pagan's salvation: based on human achievement of pure indulgence ( self focused... godship). Agnostic's existence: based on human indulgence with no stadard of moral restraint while basking in the glow of one's own achievement (self focused, the undisciplined brother of religion... godship). All of the world is stuck in exactly what Satan promised. The persuite of godship. The ONLY way out is by the blood of Jesus Christ. There is no other. The true Christian knows this. The rest hide under Christianity, using it's guidelines for simple means of self improvement... racing for their godship.

Now I shall step down from the pulpit and drift off to sleep. My heart seems to have reached a peace now and I wish to get a little sleep before tomorrow's big day. It is Friday and the beginning of the ever so needed Spring Break. I hope that you were able to make it all the way through this journal, and I hope that you took something out of it. Peace and Love.