Everything is not all it seems

Is What We Believe Limited?

I have a haunting sense about the seen world. It is more than it seems, so far historically anyway. The earth is not flat, it is the exact opposite. Our perceptions are altered by our changing positions. In one instance alone. I learn this from an assumed authority in the physical world.

Stars, like our sun, twinkle while planets do not. I suppose planets like the earth are reflected glory. But do stars twinkle? Not exactly, we twinkle, not the sun or the other stars. It is our atmosphere. Do we twinkle seen from the stars? 

Our sun is the smallest of all the stars, it is believed. But it looks larger since it is closer? So, in that case we do not believe? I believe also we project our perceptions. what more can we do with that?

Maybe space is not the universe. It is not just expending. It is perhaps shrinking?  The universe is getting larger and smaller at the same time. Only our microscopes limit our perceptions of what is smaller.

A common dust mite looks like a fearsome giant dragon the further into a deeper quantum we can descend. It looks to me that at the core of all this is wrapped in a strange believability scale. 

It is not easy to believe accurately, that is, to believe in what we will ultimately desire. It is not easy to believe the greatest ideas. It is likely harder. 

Cannot believing manifest itself into what is believed?

Blaming God

Having Faith in the Work

Before I would blame 

God for anything

I 'd blame myself  

There is little faith and there is great faith. Since God is eternal does He have the same sense of time I have? 

Circumstances may instead require greater faith, same as more persistence faith. Persistence is forever faith, no matter what. Whatever one is praying for is established on persistence. If I believe God can heal, for example, do I have the belief to believe God that He can heal? 

If God can heal is one thing, but will He heal me? Will I have to entreat Him? Maybe I will have to convince Him. Not likely, He is not the one I have to convince, it is myself.

I have prayed so long that I forgot about it all and suddenly realized I was healed. I did not know how long. Talk about the disciples falling asleep the last night before Jesus went on the Cross. And He knew it. No forgetting that.

Prayer Talk

I enjoy God. But, if I am intense I always find myself wrestling with the Holy Spirit. If I am thankful, I talk to Jesus. If I want healing, I talk to the Father. I always try to accept healing and include Jesus in my acceptance, gratitude, and belief. I always speak to the Father under instruction and permission of Jesus. I wonder sometimes if I am more comfortable with God as Santa. I'd rather think of it as exercising my faith.  from Manna

Some Smart

Smart is as Smart Does

Whenever I hear someone tell anybody that, that Spence, he is some smart, I cannot help it, I instinctively sense they must be stupid. If I am told directly, I always agree however. You are right! I tell them, in point of fact, I outsmarted myself every single day this week alone.

I love it. I mean, what do they suppose I am so smart in? Generally speaking, I am so smart...  in everything? Well,  privately speaking, I am more stupid in the smart things than I am smart in the stupid things.

I can say without fear of correction that I will never have enough information to decide, on intellect alone, whether there is a God or not, not at all touching on how smart He is.

Existene

Why do living entities want to continue living? 

Everyone wants to exist, even those who ultimately commit suicide. I contend that even those who elect to end their lives amid matters of honor, focus on living under certain conditions rooted in a concept of living forever memorially the way they want to be seen permanently.

Since God is Existence and is the source of all existing, one has to ask why anyone would have no hope beyond the body. The mind directs the body on a short leash, and it can be caught up in the short term demands of the body's comfort & entertainment.

So God is concerned with good and with eternal life, which was why He spoke us into existence. God cannot negate Himself, therefore only those who choose to be like Him, seek continued existence. Existence is good, but those not all those, who are spoken into existence may choose to be so directed. 

For them it would be rule or ruin. Everything God suggests is for our benefit to continue existing in the long run.

Definition of art

Jesus is the Way

I am not a chapter and verse character in some weird spelling bee. Words are more important than numbers, altho the opposite may seem to be the case.. But numbers are helpful if I want to recall something. For that purpose I carry at hand a voice recorder to jog my memory up a pace. Speak about this now because while I was reading abruptly ran across an wonderful sentence that struck me in the heart. But I lost the notation. 

Very rarely will I find a single sentence among so many others that carry with it such drama as that one sentence did. Only it strikes me that I am in this drawn to the drama, rather than to the wisdom. Is it art that carries the message if it is to be remembered?

Art, if one cares to spearhead the definition of art, is not what we do, it is the way that we do it. So from that I gather the art of it all is where the power of the passion comes. 

It is definitely not, as one otherwise well-spoken person claimed, anything to do with recreating reality. If reality is real then it cannot be recreated nor resurrected. But art, as a action verb, is the spirit in the, way that we do it, not an inert subject. Anyway, that is the way I slice my bread. 

Faith in Greatest Danger

Easier to lose one's faith

In the Church Than Anywhere Else

Where would the devil be the first to go if he wanted to do harm to the church and to Christians? If you've read the Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, you know the answer to that question. And, as it is written, he would blame Christians for what he had done.

God Critics

and Church Reviewers

Those who do not believe in God often focus on the long-term history of churches. The history of the primitive Christian churches is not generally entirely attractive. This history exists however, alongside those who gave their lives willingly in order to gain a greater glory. This has been maintained from opposite quarters, one favorable and the other not.

Churches today, from my many experiences, are doing more to undercut the individual attraction to worship together than to strengthen and experience a greater articulate faith, 

I've discussed the error of Christians who think they will go to heaven based on their good works. They were solidly entrenched is this view. How basic can it get?

I've even met pastors who believe God changes His mind, essentially believing God fails to heal, one rather than another, for a greater good of some sort. Others carry sin around like a badge of humility, and so it goes. 

No wonder so many churches send their Sunday School Scholars defenselessly entering college as victims, sacrificial lambs to strange spirits. I was one of them. 

Seeing what is seen

Only If One Believes

I suspect all of us will get whatever we believe. There may be many who will ultimately hope this is not true. This is because there are probably quite a few who do not believe there is anything or anybody to believe in.  That is, except maybe themselves. Who else is there? 

I myself could not really believe in myself doing duty as God since much of everything was already here when I arrived in the first place. So if one does not believe in God what does one do then?

Although God will not influence anyone's decision, he will however, already know what that decision will be already. This is what I believe. Anyone who does not agree with me on this, will have to believe what they have worked out themselves. They should not look to me or anyone else, only in particular to themselves.

No one created anything whatever, God did not create anything because this can only be understood within the concept of time.. Rather\, God, just as it says in the ancient writings, spoke everything into existence because He is Existence Himself. We see at work around us the ideas of God. The ideas of God, not those who were tempted by knowledge they did not completely understand and so reaped whirlwinds of their own making.

Creation as a word suggests a concept rooted in time. There is no beginning nor end to existence since God is not in time, He is eternal without time, beginnings or endings. This is hard to experience since we are subjected to time in the seen world. Time really fools us all.

We know God is a Spirit who, unseen, is called the Holy Spirit. I believe Moses' report, who told Moses who He was and what He wanted to be called throughout all generations. I think this is true because it is the only answer. God is known for His answer.

The law came through Moses but grace and love came through Jesus, who told us only those could come to God who were drawn to Him by God Himself. If anyone believes in God, God will talk to them and they will hear His voice and follow Him. The tree will be known by its' fruit, just as the sheep by the Shepherd.. 

Only those who will do this, will believe in Him and will hear His voice. Everything surrounds faith. Everything circles around belief, like lighter orbiting heavenly bodies will orbiting around a bodies with a greater mass. Unedited Time Out! Coming: Blaming God, the great critics and their great fallacies.

from the Quoteblokes

If anyone takes an offense, they are automatically an offensive person by reason of having taken it. 

Even if one is annoyed, it is a sign of weakness. Pleasantness belongs to the strong. 

The virtual believer

Justified by Faith

It does not matter what is true in the larger context.  There is not enough proof to verify truth by itself, only if it satisfies the believer. It is only in the individual is there found any place where the truth can possibly purely exist. That is because the truth exists only in what one believes.

We have to actually believe it. Jesus said if one had enough belief then they could move a mountain into the sea. Many, what I would call solid Bible believing Christians, believe Jesus was speaking metaphorically. In other words, symbolically speaking the truth. 

This might be called virtual truth. It is like virtual money they speak of in the markets today. 

It represents money, but not real money, rather 

almost like real money. So it is, when a Bible story is hard to believe then it is either unbelievable or only true as the meaning of truth. Sort of like virtual money, is it not?

Anything hard to believe requires very great belief. Many Christians believe whatever is easy to believe. Some believe anything they can prove is true, the easy to believe truth.

Everything seen came from the unseen. 

1 John 3:1-2

Children of God: Behold what manner of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God. And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. Beloved, we are now children of God, and what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know that when Christ appears, we will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is.…

We, being the children of God, are sons and daughters of God. (Favorite verses, in Manna)

God is Existence

God is the Spiritual Personification of Existence.  

Epistemological beginnings

How Knowledge Became Known

Based on everything I knew at the time; I was in a perfect situation. Everything was being taken care of perfectly, there was nothing missing whatever. How much comfort did anyone need? 

Suddenly, without warning, I learned I had to get out altogether. There was nothing for it, I was going to be forcibly thrown out as I said, in the altogether. 

Why? I wondered why! So I could be strung up by my heels, wacked on my bare ass, and come face to face with hunger? This was definitely new information to me. I did not want anything of that project at all. I mean I was not stupid, no one was going to fool me. 

However, I found out differently as new information came flooding in. In a flash later, long before the invention of time, I discovered I knew everything that was ever known. It did not take much learning for me to figure that one out. When you know everything that is known by everyone else, what else is there?

Great Heroes of All Mankind

Bringing Down the House

In the Hall of Conquerors

Late one night, I found myself in a mystery, I knew not why. It seemed I was invited, perhaps to record the event I thought, I was not sure. I was in a great hall and there were statues of great men all along a grand richly appointed corridor. 

A voice rose up and with august dignity announced the great deeds of one famous man after another who each gave a short speech highlighting his famous accomplishments. There was Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Winstin Churchill, a seemingly endless array of the greatest men all through history, remembered by everyone for their great victories.

Then my name was called! Everyone turned to look at me, everyone! There was nothing for it but to stand in front of them all to remind them of my greatest achievement in the history of men, greater than any man that had gone before.

I paid compliments to all the great things that they had described before. Then I spoke with great pride and confidence, 

I kissed Peggy Davis!  

Instinctual forces at work: updated Monday

Day Coming for the Articulate Literalist

Christianity must beef up belief so perceptions will promote "believing is not just believing meanings". 

Technologies are changing perceptions and it seems to me the popular organized religions are gaining little acceptance while physical sciences solidify greatly, I wonder if it is possible science and the spiritual may ever even somewhat merge their perceptions. Possible that UFO views could bring them together as respect for the unseen gains awareness.

I detect some increase in the comments favoring a designer on the scientific side as against the randomness more accepted in simplistic concept such as the  "big bang."

Since war is always with us how does war enter in? War is the most primitive competition. Success here has a purpose. This is llikely why the utopian societies fail. Their energies are consumed by instinctual competition. Some attempt to achieve it by force and others predominately by sleight of hand in a weaken field. If another group succeeds too successfully than they are a threat to the weaker groups. War feeds on fear. 

War is necessary for the group psychology which operates out of fear of any and all other groups. There is nothing like two groups agreeing with each other. It reflects and even guarantees the opposite of what they ostensibly are trying to achieve, like a deadly poker game.

How does the individual maneuver in this struggle? I do not see much to protect the individual unless it is the electoral college which was first designed by the U,S, founders to benefit minorities. 

All these forces wrestling with each other are important to appreciate the more technical age we are living in today, as opposed to the world of the ancients and those the Bible spoke. 

I believe the effect of technologies on all our perceptions will require an adaptation of some kind, to understand a more articulate concept of faith than is accepted today. In this new mixture, the Bible, if it is not to be under cover changed in the turmoil of translations, must translate the original belief of the ancients. Not yet edited Sunday. First edited version Monday.

Spirit of time has changed

Analog to Digital

In order to predict a future anyone wants to create, increase or manipulate in any way, they would want to influence the language and redefine the vocabulary.

Language used extensively is a living language and being alive, is buffeted by change constantly. In regard to Christianity, we are for some time now, leaving a prior age and entering a new age where information is instant, and microscopically accurate. Nevertheless, prior to the increasingly technical era absorbing the greater ancient emphasis on spiritual information it was not necessarily more accurate.

In order to become a rabbi, one had to be thirty years old, which is why Jesus's ministry began at that time. Also, it was customary to retreat into the wilderness to be alone. This should be a long time, which was forty days ad forty nights, but not with any rigidity.  

We can surmise then that because of the lack of technical accuracy, numbers entered the discourse with some loose traditions. Even today, there are some great quotes attributed to famous people, actors for instance, that were never said. What famous person said, Judy Judy, Judy? Everyone used to know that one instantly.

For a long time, this was attributed to a specific actor, but it was never said by him. It was said by an impressionist. Point being made is that the impressionist caught the spirit of the actor better than the actor. 

There are many of them, notably "my horse, my horse, my Kingdom of a horse." It was better said by the historian than the participants themselves. So, I see in the development of technical recording, a move away from the spiritual into technicalities fogging the ease to realize the reality of my beliefs. 

The result was that many scholars employed aliens in their reasoned explanations, since they were of the opinion that almost everything in the past was a myth, only to be embarrassed periodically to find such was not the case at all.

All these considerations directly enter into the world of faith and introduces complications in my view to believe in a favorable future.  Still under editing.

Definition of virtual

Depends on one's point of view.

Imaginary?

Imaginary as in almost 'like reality'. It could fool anybody, not somebody but anybody. We are in a world where there is a struggle to redefine words to be most likely used for purposes of partisanship.  Nothing concrete arises out of 'virtually', unless it is imaginary. 

Making Virtual Concrete

Just by Saying So?

Now, however, we are going beyond redefinitions to enter space, creating new transitional concepts carrying us into a new world of the imagination, that favor missteps nudging us into slivers of chaos. The first one of this type of which I came to suspect was meta.  

Meta as a prefix to universe, for example comes, naturally, from the Greek meaning middle or beyond this known world prior to the next. In other words, we are entering someplace uncontrollably new. Good luck there.

The ancients believed that there was nothing new under the sun. I am not sure anyone really knows, that is, virtually knows, where all this word dancing will take us in all this. The only risk, it seems from my view, is that we will have another choir of symbols to hang our beliefs on.

I am of the mind crypto currency brings with it confusion into the pix. I am certain any new secret currency will quite publicly be to the benefit of a select few. Again, the only thing hinting dark clouds in all this is the following insignificant little question. What is the specific value our secret currency represents, that is, represents virtually?  I wonder with some intrepidation?

I can imagine one ding-dong strange spelling bee looming on the horizon. Best watch the Q's and A's. The game is changing. Unedited 5:05 am; edited noon time, editing continues indefinitely anytime.

When time is gone

Time, like art is not what,
it is the way we do it.

Will I Believe Eternity

The Way I Believe It Now?

Why is it when someone close to me dies that I can suddenly see and understand myself and our lives as I never could before? This is the prime reason I am convinced, when we lose this body that will not help us, as Jesus said, that I will exist in a new and marvelously aware form after death of the flesh.

Paul of the Bible knew this when he said, now we see things darkly, but then face to face. I am also convinced God places odeas in our hearts. If I did not believe in God where would that leave me? Understanding God is the present, not the past or the future. We yearn to exist eternally, and yet we cannot really express ourselves outside of time. 

Time calls for a comparison before it can exist. Physical science does not give us a clear idea of what time is, even though we cannot conceive in the flesh without it. Time is vast shortly before it is gone. After it is over, we can see our time is gone too quickly and we are dead so incredibly long. All this without understanding time? 

We understand doggerel like time is money. We always can know how much money we have, but never know how much time. 

Can problems consume the answers?

Doing everything God does is heavy lifting

When Jesus said we can only come to the Father if He, God, draws us, Jesus lost a lot of followers. This means that the idea everyone should be treated the same was just as firmly held among many in that day as it is in this day. 

It is not recorded that Jesus ever regretted His comment concerning this issue. The early Christians, the ones termed primitive Christians, formed a last day stand based on rather group-like attributes. But the only justification for it was born in the group convinced God would return any moment after Jesus's ascension. 

Decision for Christ

Christianity is based on decision making by each individual. So, we can by-pass this consideration and go to our goal of why Jesus said that one healed should go and sin no more. The parable of the ninety and nine underscores individuality right there.

But extending it to babies born joined together stretches me to explain why such responsibility is assigned to a time long forgotten by participants.

Does the fact we are all born in sin explain anything here? Well, based on this world our world of time, where change is illusory, I am not yet solid on this point. If one emphasizes collectively, that is rather than to individually, they could have trouble it seems to me. But it is even worse to think of it in the reverse. What a can of fish!

I am forced back into the position that if I do not understand it, I just have to accept that I've exhausted of my own chance for understanding and just hit the commentaries to see if there is anything there.

Smarty Pants

Then more likely, I am not any smarter now than I was all those times in the past when time and the flesh were wasting away at a truly fancy clip. This may be when the flashing green light of faith comes into play. What am I doing here anyway? Am I masquerading as smart as God, like one left totally alone, with just himself to be God? Maybe even smarter? Since it was tried before, would it have any different outcome this time? 

The tree of knowledge bears' strange fruit. First edited version.

Is sickness a sin?

The problem is, while I can see sickness as a sin to Jesus,where and what is the sin to those to he healed? Well, if illness is a sin, and that is logical, how do the sick get registered in the mix? Sins of the fathers? 

I have not gotten too far into this question yet. But I am writing this, objectifying it, so I can start somewhere to bring more clarity to the issue. I probably should start researching commentary on the subject if I can find it. Never found commentary sources very sharply to the point however.

Why dos sickness need to be a sin? Now I am just begging the question. Apparently we can have sins and sicknesses without being personally liable for them. Of course, we were born in sin. I wondered if that was not too easy.

Because atheism is forced to be its' own God, they do not accept responsibility for original sin. I never myself did at one time but, of course, the sins were there in abundance under my nose, so to speak. Took me a long time to see under my nose.

I hate it when I get cute.

Substance and evidence

The KJV is stronger than more recent translations as reflected in Hebrews 11 and also in 2nd Cor 4. Where the KJV speaks about substance and evidence, the later translations speak about assurances and convictions. Maybe I am a bit hasty thinking this, but I notice a certain vagueness in the newer translations. I am afraid this points to a somewhat softening of Christian belief. More, see Manna today.

Coming next

One way or the other

Angels are always with us

I am avoiding several issues that either bother me a great deal or some that do not seem to be able to stay on my radar. The biggest tough nut that I would like to wrestle with is, what are the implications of what Jesus meant when he healed someone, often said Go and sin no more? 

Then there are some dimples in my field of doubt that present very few problems if any, like the subject of angels. The interest is so great however that quite a few books have been written on the subject of angels.

So here goes. Angels are the ideas of God sent to assist or comfort those who are at risk or facing some difficulties. I am very appreciative of them on their watch but cannot add anything very high up on the interest ladder other than incidents. Incidents may interest many, but they all make a generally greater point than the activities of angels.

Angels are guiding lights and mostly personal in their direction. Did an angel guide my epiphany? Some believe angels open up a parking space when desperate, so perhaps angels, being agents of God in number like the stars in the sky, attend to an infinite multitude of our very real anxieties both great and small. 

Angels are wating

Locked in Logic 

My atheistic mantra while in college said that since the New Testament does not agree, but is contrary to itself, that this proved it was not likely true. But if the New Testament does in fact have no contradictions, then that means it is likely not true also I subsequently discovered. My suspicion should have been aroused.

The first conclusion indicates contrary views, and the second conclusion indicates the other side of the coin, collusion. Since it looked like the fix was in, to get out of that foxy box, I had to eventually break out of the other round box.... later. 

Wondering about it all

Slippery Details

On quite a few occasions similar questions have randomingly occurred to me.

What in the world is God showing me now? Why did God let me see that? Or, whatever does some particular event mean? It is curious because I never seem to figure out any memorable answers. They are like little epiphanies slipping, dreamlike, in and away from my attention.

I have been embarrassingly slow attending the significant, and questioningly persistent with vague instances. An example recently has been angels looking out for me. I have never thought a great deal about angels. A lot of people think a lot about them. An aunt and uncle, long passed now, believed they saw angels guarding them. 

I saw it all then as a "down my nose myth" for my old people playbook I was following at the time. It was to my view that this was to protect them from the apprehensions of their advancing age. Condescension 101 fades, as I found like many, if we make it far enough.

Anyway, in order to figure things out I always like to divide my groupings in two. So, in this instance, I proposed those who like to do things and connected along a continuum, those who like to think things. I might call them desk people.

I could use some help, from time to time, from the doers. So again, I was wondering if this was all that fair to the doers. But they like doing things, accomplishing solid results, and they have justifiable pride in their finished goals. At least they do from my maturing perspective in any event.

But what about a minister who, I suddenly find, is confessing all his short comings to me? What can I do with that? Why is he taking over the conversation like this? I am well aware of listening for motives emphasizing details. Does, then, everything have to have a purpose? I suspect there are many purposes that I do not have enough information for me to understand. 

Maybe Heminway was right. When he wrote, I understand he felt, it was just as important, perhaps more so, that what was left out was more important than what was left in. Therefore, I guess, from that I can conclude the question is as important as the answer? Maybe God is nudging me along? (These slippery topics never stop trickling along and along.) Tomorrow maybe angels, maybe not.