Turn Not to the Right Hand Nor to the Left

The Secret Place

1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

2 I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.

3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.

4 He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.

5 Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day;

6 Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.

7 A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.

Psalm 91:1-7 (KJV)

Sometimes we Christians get so caught up in the spiritual aspects of God's Word that we forget that when He promises things to us, He's talking about this world as well as the realm which we can't see with our fleshly eyes.

My friend—Henry (a pseudonym)--and I are both retired United States Air Force NCOs and we have known each other for almost thirty years. Back in 1996—well before he retired--Henry received an assignment to Saudi Arabia. He was sent there to replace a man who had been injured in the Khobar Towers terrorist attack. Khobar was an eight-story housing unit which was built in 1979 for Bedouin tribesmen. However, the Bedouins didn’t want it, so, during the first Gulf War and afterward, US Armed Forces and other Allied personnel were housed there. In the attack—perpetrated by Hezbollah--nineteen American airmen and one Saudi national were killed and over 500 were injured. From GlobalSecurity.org:

Estimates of the size of the bomb range from the equivalent of 3,000 to more than 30,000 pounds of TNT. The Downing Task Force estimated that the bomb was between 3,000 and 8,000 pounds, most likely about 5,000 pounds.

Henry arrived there 7 days after the attack.

As is well-known, all things of Christ are banned in Saudi Arabia, including, most especially, His Word. The US Armed Forces abides by this edict and doesn’t allow its personnel to bring Bibles into the country. But Henry has long been a man of God and he told me that, back then, the faithful had created a fellowship gathering which they dubbed the Stealth ( Secret) Chapel. It wasn’t really a secret, but it wasn’t advertised and was conducted in an underground garage. Anyone who desired to attend could do so.

 Not long after he got there, Henry was attending Stealth Chapel services. Memorably, he related the story of a Jordanian contractor—a Muslim—who intermittently attended services and who, in spite of Saudi Arabia’s restrictions, kept a copy of the New Testament on his office desk.

But here’s the most important part of the story that Henry related to me.

The man whom Henry replaced was only nominally injured and had been part of the Stealth Chapel. When the attack occurred, he had been in his sixth-floor dorm room, lying on his bed. The explosion took down a wall of one of the buildings and that wall belonged to his room. As a result, the man went flying outside of the building into the air and landed on his bed which had also been blown out of the building. He had no serious injuries— only aches, and pains. He was evacuated mostly for the perceived emotional trauma he probably experienced.

The man who related the above story to Henry had also fellowshipped in the Stealth Chapel. When the attack occurred, the former had been in the day room watching television. (In military dorm buildings, a day room is a common area in which residents congregate; it usually contains things like TVs, stereos, video games, and vending machines. It has been a very long time since I lived in a military dorm, but I'm sure that modern ones have computers.) This particular day room had an attached balcony composed of tempered glass. 

When the man heard and felt the explosion, he looked toward the balcony and saw it bulge outward. Then it bulged in the opposite direction, broke into countless pieces and the man saw pieces shooting toward him. The only reactions he had time for were to shield his face by putting one of his arms and to say, “Jesus, shield me!”

When it was over, the man took his arm down and looked around at the wall behind him. Like daggers,  pieces of the balcony were embedded in the wall.  Then he turned back to his front to survey the damage, but something on the floor directly in front of him caught his eye:  a pile of glass which had fallen in the shape of an oval.

Not one piece of the balcony glass touched the man, not even the tiniest shard.

And, finally, no other members of the Stealth Chapel were seriously injured by the attack.

Does God mean what He says?  You be the judge.

It's a Trap!

Recently, a friend of mine mentioned the concept of being “caught up”--being “in love”—that which is defined as Eros, "passionate love in the narrow sphere of sexual desire and longing."   Since that conversation, I have been thinking about how we sometimes call ourselves being “in love” with another and how such relationships almost always fall to failure when one or both parties fall out of love.

Much of what we call being “in love” is, in reality, delusional selfishness if the other types of love are not shared between the two parties.  Minus friendship and, most importantly, minus the desire for growth in the Holy Spirit for one’s beloved, Eros is mere fantasy and when that fantasy fades in the face of reality and you find that you really don’t like the other person and you really don’t care whether that person lives or dies—or whether that person will have to experience the Second Death, the relationship ends.

It seems to me that when a relationship is based solely on Eros, two people aren’t really having a relationship with each other.  On the contrary, each individual is having a relationship with himself or herself.  At first, neither person wants to see the “beloved” with characteristics apart from those which personal fantasy projects; and we certainly know the definition of projection: “the attribution of one's own ideas, feelings, or attitudes to other people or to objects.”  He is relating to his fantasies—most likely sexual—and projecting them onto her.  She is relating to her fantasies—most likely emotional and/or status-related—and projecting them onto him.  Initially, neither person sees the other as a separate individual with needs and wants of their own.  One might as well masturbate.

Inevitably, fantasy gives way to reality and the “beloved” turns out to be a real person who is different than our fantasy man/woman.  And when fantasy has been disabused, it can sometimes get ugly.  As I said to my friend, when we discover that the person is different than our fantasies—when we discover that the other person is a real person rather than our self-created phantom--we often get angry at that person for not being what our fantasy is or we keep trying to make that person into our fantasy.  Both are losing propositions.

The Bible calls this “vain imagination” and it is necessary to my point to give the definition of the adjective ‘vain:’ “having no real value : idle, worthless .”  Additionally, the pertinent definition of the noun ‘vanity’ is useful:  “inflated pride in oneself or one's appearance : conceit.”  (Emphasis mine.)

It always seems to come back to pride, doesn’t it?

At any rate, this concept of being “in love” seem to be an inversion of one of Jesus Christ’s two greatest commandments: to love one’s neighbor as one loves oneself.  If you know that you have needs, wants and desires, you can be sure that others who you may claim to love have them as well—and you can be sure that those needs, wants and desires are different from your own.

Therefore, if you are using another person to gratify your own personal desires, physical or otherwise, regardless of his/her own and when your desires have been sated you walk away, uncaring, you are committing a grave sin—almost an act of hatred.  You are treating that person as an animal or a thing and not as a sentient being.  And the irony of this is, the person to whom you are doing the greatest harm is yourself—your own soul.  Repeatedly hurting others and being hurt in this manner builds up deafness to the Word of God and to the Holy Spirit contained in the hearing thereof—it produces fear rather than faith and we all know the origin of fear.

We see this pattern over and over again in so-called love relationships—using others to gratify oneself or to promote self in the eyes of other human beings.  People who are familiar with the biblical proscription of sex outside of marriage but don’t want to follow it seem to think that God is trying to keep us from having fun.  But, personal experience and observation should tell us otherwise—that God prescribes this standard to keep us from hurting each other and hurting ourselves.

And, it seems to me, that the “fun” waiting to be had can be so much richer and fulfilling when one cherishes the person having that fun also—when one loves and likes the real person’s spirit and soul rather than a phantom.

I don’t, however, know that from personal experience—but I will.  :)

Flock of One

Recently, I've had three people opine that I would make an excellent pastor.  My joking reaction was "la-la-la," fingers-in-the-ears.  However, when  one is seeking the Kingdom of the Lord and  is trying to walk in the path which He lays out in this life, there is no stepping off of that path--not unless you want to end up sleeping with the fishes like Jonah.

But it also occurred to me that I already have a ministry consisting of one person: taking care of my eighty-nine-year-old great-aunt who had a falling accident on September 24.  (She is recovering very well and I will talk about it later at baldilocks.)  My pastoral task is to make things easier for her and to be an efficient caretaker for her home. (A trusted friend/construction worker and I started on this today.)

It seems to me that when God has something for you to do, He starts "small."  So it is that I am, at present, leading my flock of one.

Prison Break

 

In the world of Chaos

Camouflaged poison

And diaphanous oaths

 

Are the Dinner of death

Purchased with 30 pieces

Of not-silver

 

Simmered in fear

One seasoning: bitterness

 

Carnal men lust for evil women

As both avenge their tears

On each other

And move on

 

"People come and they go

"It's just the way that it goes"

Says Chaos's Prince

Channeled by a singer

 

The walls are high

In the Prison made of nothing

Where the Warden wields

An Air-Powered baton

 

But...

 

In the unbroken circle

Hopes are fulfilled          

Beauty equals Truth

And Forgiveness is the gift

Received by the Giver

 

"I am the Way, the Truth

"And the Light"

 

Carved in the Cornerstone

Of the lone refuge

 

The meat is sweet

The Water Lives

And the Comfort is endless

 

Love is the specialty of the house

 

So...

 

Battered and fried

By Chaos

The prisoner returns to the Circle

Where the Door stands

Unguarded

 

And where the King of the Unseen bids her to stay

 

Doctoring

If you have accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, but you love something--or someone--more than the Triune God, that thing--or that person--has become an idol, and you have put it--or him--above God. 

How do you know when you have made a thing or person an idol?  You know that you have made this error when you are willing to ignore God's will for your life in order to hold onto that idol.

And if God knows that you are still teachable, still capable of being corrected, God will remove that thing--or that person--from your life.  It will hurt, as any radical surgery hurts, and you will have to heal.  You will have to take your medicine and you will have to be rehabilitated in order to get back to full spiritual health.  It will take a specified amount of time.

For those who heed the Holy Spirit, the prescription for wholeness is the Word of God, prayer, fasting and giving. And knowing that the Doctor is in at all times.

[Re-edited]

The Name of this Blog

23Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.

24Put away from thee a froward mouth, and perverse lips put far from thee.

25Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee.

26Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established.

27Turn not to the right hand nor to the left: remove thy foot from evil.

(Proverbs 4:23-27, King James Version)

 

I have long been in prayer over several issues--familial, personal and political--seemingly without receiving definitive answers.  There was a particular fork in the road for one issue and I did not know which path was the correct one.  Relying on worldly ideology and manner of living, I have made so many bad choices.  Now I wanted to do what God wants me to do.  But I could not discern what that was.

When I mentioned my conundrum to a Christian friend, she quoted Proverbs 4:27.  Funny how, when we have a problem, it never naturally occurs to us that doing "nothing" might be the correct way to proceed.  And that "nothing" which we can do is also known as walk forward in Faith, trusting in God to shine a light on our path, using His Word as illumination--and, therefrom, the knowledge of His Will will be as visible to the sojourner as the daylight.

 

What He Put in My Hands

I started Turn Not to the Right Nor to the Left for reasons that were implanted in me by the Holy Spirit.

I've been a Christian since the mid-1990s.  Unlike many others, I don't remember the day that I answered God the Father's call, drawing me to Jesus the Christ.  I only remember having the notion that maybe I ought to start reading one of the several Bibles that were lying around in my dwelling. After that, I remember thinking that, perhaps I should start going to church.  However, in hindsight, God the Father had been drawing me to his Only Begotten long before that--since the time when I began to be able to distinguish right from wrong in a clear manner.  I was eleven years old.  (Interestingly enough, that was the age when I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up: a writer.)

From the mid-1990s until 2008, I believed on the salvation of Jesus Christ, but I rarely got into the Word--except when I found a permanent church home in 2004--and I never put God the Father to the test with regard to faith.  I never asked him for anything and believed that I already received it. I never diligently sought first the Kingdom of God, much less believed that anything I might ask for through that seeking would be added unto me.

There have been many important events, however, since the beginning of 2008 which pushed me toward the quest for God's Kingdom.  Without getting too much into specifics--at least in this post--God has been pushing me to the point where He wants me to be since that time.  Adversity in the life of the Christian is meant for that purpose--especially when the individual Christian has strayed from God's intended path, as I had from 2008 to the early part of this year.

And though I have occasionally shaken my fist at God (while perceiving His indulgent laughter in my spirit), I know that His correction is an indication that He loves me and has not forsaken me.

Looking back on my walk with the Triune God in the last two and three-quarters years, I am astonished at the work which the Lord has done in me.  Much of it has been very painful, but like painful procedures and medications which heal the body, God's painful correction methods are healing my spirit.  And I am grateful to him for the discipline that He administers to me.

After much prayer and devotion, my aim is to give the Lord all of my love.  I hear some people reading this asking what that means.  What does it mean to love a being who is all-powerful and all-knowing?  Well, it doesn't mean the same thing as it means to love someone who can be seen with one's physical eyes.  One must love God in another manner.  The beginning point is real communication--as is so with fellow humans.  Praying is how we talk to Him; and reading His Word is how He talks to us.  Those I can do and have been doing; that is what pushed me to the point of creating this blog. 

So why did I create this blog?  It has been encoded in my spiritual GPS to do so.  I cannot see the purpose of doing so, but my faith is the evidence of the things I am unable to see.  Am I meant to bring others to Christ? I don't know.  I am merely trusting in God, being obedient to the instructions that He has put in my spirit, and picking up my "stick" --the metaphor which Glenn Beck used on 8/28/2010 in reference to the staff which Moses used when he obeyed God and led the children of Israel out of Egypt.

I am using  the things which God put in my hands.