Thoughts on heaven.

I wrote this as a facebook note about three years ago, but it seems relevant.

I don't know why, but the other side has been on my mind recently. I've been
thinking about different things at different times. My bad shoulder, where I
broke my arm when I was a kid was bothering me. As were my bad knees. As were my flat feet. As was by bad back. As was my TMJ. Boy, I have all the medical
problems of a 60 year old. Anyway, I was thinking, a lot of these problems that
I've had most of my life. I was thinking, what will my life be like when I get
to heaven? I've had constant, but slight pain my whole life. I just don't know
how my body will feel without it.

Then I've been listening to the CD "Iris to Iris" by Building 429. That got me thinking about what it will be like when we awaken after death. You wake to feel a warm, strong, gently hand cradling your head. You open your eyes to the most intense light you've ever seen. Its incomparibly brighter than the sun. Only this light doesn't hurt your eyes. Its the light that your eyes were always meant to stare at. That light is coming from a human face. You have never seen the face before, but the face is more
familar to it that even your own. It is the smiling face of Jesus. You are aware
that around you is a crowd of people gathered. Some are past family. Other are
past friends. Others are part of the "cloud of witnesses." The shining face of
Jesus speaks to you. The voice is louder than thunder, the crashing of waves, or
a roaring lion, but causes no fear, but loving reassurance as He says, "Welcome
child."

What will that by like for those outside Christ? That light will reveal
their every sin. There will be no shadow in which they can hide. That voice will
fill then with terror. They will know that Christ loves them, but they will feel
this intense self-harted for having rejected him. I hope to never know that
agony.

Keep in mind, most of this is theory. A lot of this I can't argue, it is just sort of a feeling (and if you know how much I hate feeling vs. thinking as a rational for an argument, you'll know how it pains me to admit this). St. Peter being at a pearly gate, or being surrounded by clouds isn't biblical either, if anything its anti-biblical.

I do know this, a lot of people don't understand heaven. They think you will perpetually relive the best time in your life. Nope. This world, even at its best, is imperfect. God isn't. I've also heard it described as a perpetual church service. Sounds like its designed for 60 year old women. What about for men?

Here's what I know, I serve an infinite, amazing, creative God. Why would I believe that I could hope to comprehend the scope of a heaven created by an incomprehensible God? We can't even understand our own universe. Why would we think we can better understand the afterlife?

I was asked the question if I could live in a heaven with no pain, no evil, no arguing, no death, etc., a perfect world but without God/Jesus, would I want to go there? My answer is no. What makes heaven amazing is the AWESOME God who makes it his dwelling. I can't wait to get there to spend time with God face to face. Now, I worship at a distance, pray often, and read the Bible. I talk to God, and His Spirit speaks to me. There, I will worship face to face. I will finally understand how small I am compared to Him with my own eyes, not just with deductive reason and inspiration.

Recent convo

I have been watching a recent conversation on facebook between a teenage boy I know and three girls. One girl is not talking to the boy. The other two are on her side. The boy has no idea why. The girls refuse to tell him, keeping him lost.

This is SO STUPID. Yet, it also happens daily. I said in my first post that I believe the genders are equal, yet completely different. There are barriers which keep us from understanding each other. Now I don't think we need to be the same. If we were, one would be unnecessary. I believe that God reveals different parts of his character through each gender. I also believe Satan attacks us through these differences. One example, in a survey of different married couples across America, a doctor (who happened to be a woman) asked couples to do a simples exercise. "Imagine you had to chose between love and respect. If you would rather have love, go to my right. If you would rather have respect, go to my left." The women lined up, not surprisingly, on the right, wanting love. The surprise came to her when EVERY MAN SURVEYED went to the left, wanting respect. This result caught her completely off guard.

I have experienced the same. My ex-girlfriend of years past showed me little trust. She asked me if I believed in the passages that teach for wives to submit to husbands. She assumed no, because of my great respect for her. I answered "well, it is in the Bible..." I tried to teach her several thing, like first NO WHERE does the Bible tell me to force their wives to submit. This is a willing act of the wife. Second, men are supposed to love their wives with the self-sacrificing love of Jesus. We argued for a long time, her failing to believe what I said was my belief on those passages. "Bottom line," I told her, "is if you cannot submit to me and trust that I will not abuse that, we have no business getting married." I gave her a chance, but broke it off. She did not trust me. She would not respect me as I needed. We loved, but she could not respect me as I needed.

Back to the conversation. I have heard many women (who I only partially blame. TV and women around them have trained them behave like this) make similar statements like "If you don't know, I'm not going to tell you." Speaking on behalf of all men, IF WE KNEW, WE WOULDN'T NEED TO BE TOLD! Let me say this about women. Women are wonderful and beautiful and complex. But I think part of the problem comes that women assume that men are complex too.

We aren't. You are talking to a gender that farts for entertainment. We are simple. Some might even say (fairly accurately) we are dumb. Bottom line is that we are clueless. When we say we don't know, we aren't lying. We have NO IDEA. Also, ladies, I want you to understand something. When you ask a man what he is thinking and he says "Nothing," he ain't lying! Men require time of thinking nothing. Its like defragmenting a computer. I know women are incapable of understanding that men shut their brains off (well, maybe you can understand by watching America's Funniest Videos). You are a jumble of wires, with serveral thoughts buzzing around at the same time. We are a stack of boxes. We can only think of one thing at a time, and before we can move to another box, we have to put away the previous one. Trying to get us into multiple boxes only frustrates us. And allow us our time in the "Nothing" box. Why do you think we invented TV?

So here's the thing ladies, when we have no idea, just explain it to us. Otherwise, you just have to accept our "I'm sorry" when you and we both know we have no idea what we're supposed to be apologizing for. Just accept the effort and move on.

Health Care

Ok, I have a few minutes to weigh in on this. There's a lot that could be said. I think it would be apparent where I would land on this issue. But I might surprise you.

Let me start by saying I think this thing has problems. First of all, a health care bill that includes a government takeover of student loans? What does that have to do with anything? It seems this has provisions that have nothing to do with health. It bothers me that in the name of providing for those who can't provide for themselves, they did many things that have nothing to do with caring for people. In fact, after Obama's signing of the bill into law, the white house press secretary admitted that it had nothing to do with health, but with redistribution of wealth. No one has any idea what is in the thing. They didn't read it. They just passed it.

Or we could move into how it was passed. There was some strong arming, with the president mocking the Tea Party Movement (named after the Boston Tea Party, the start of the American revolution), calling them the Tea-bag movement. The President mocking Americans? How about the State of the Union, where Obama said people that are against it just don't understand it, basically calling his opposition stupid.

That I can get over. Realistically, I think Obama is an idealist who is standing up for what he believes in. I respect him for that, even if I don't always agree with policy or his tactics. What I CANNOT stand is congress. Many were given MILLIONS in campaign contributions if they would vote for the health care bill. That's called BRIBERY where I come from. This is the most corrupt, immoral congress in the history of America. They don't care about what they believe in, only about who will line their pockets. Many in Congress should be prosecuted. Almost all, regardless of party, are corrupt to the point that it is time to be sent home. We need public servants, not people who think the public exists to serve them. Republicans for years manipulated Christians to make them vote in fear of abortion. They didn't care. They did nothing to stop it. The Religious Right in response became anti-democrat on any issue. The democrats have oppressed the "minorities" as well as Republicans, because if they convince them "we'll take care of you" then of course the poor will vote for Democrats, but if they actually got a leg up, well, then they won't need us anymore so they might stop voting for us, so we have to keep them down.

Here's the bottom line. Congress is corrupt and worthless. I believe that the time of America is over. I just hope that our economy lasts long enough to help build up Haiti or rebuild Chile. If you want to talk about a "right" of health care, what about the right of clean drinking water? We will spend trillions on "health care" (when incidentally, if you walk into an emergency room, you will get the health care you need) when if we spent only millions everyone in the WORLD could have clean drinking water. Do you know what the number 1 cause of death of children under 5 is? Diarrea caused by unclean, diseased drinking water. Diseases like Malaria, polio, and TB also ravage third world contries, when they are COMPLETELY PREVENTABLE. They want government funded lyposuction, but others don't get the basic right to live.

Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce

Today is my day off, and I decided to watch the movie Amazing Grace, which is about William Wilberforce (apologies if I spelled it incorrectly). If you have not seen this, buy it today. This is a great, inspirational story of how one man took on the British Parlament and overcame.

I think this is a story that has great meaning for today. For many, it is a true story of overcoming great evil singlehandedly, an inspiration to all to be brave enough to fight for what one believes in. When all odds were against him, when he was called a traitor for speaking, he stood on faith alone to fight the evil of slavery.

Where are the Wilberforces of today? Slavery in the British Empire was focused on the production of sugar, unlike in America where we think of cotton. Brits love sugar in their tea. Today, the comparison can be made to choclate in America. Hershery, Mars, and other major chocolate makers grow chocolate in Africa by use of slavery. They claim it isn't, because they pay them LESS THAN A DOLLAR A DAY. How many of you can live on that? They pay them enough to return tomorrow for another 18 hour day of labor, but not enough to live on.

In the movie, a woman tells Wilberforce she and her friends stopped using sugar in their tea. Are we willing to stop buying chocolate? What about the children who work in sweatshops in China? What about the ten year old girls (or younger) who are kidnapped and brought to other countries INCLUDING AMERICA to be used as underage prostitutes? It makes me sick to even write about. So the question is, what are you going to do about it?

Some suggested website include International Justice Mission, Slave Free Chocolate, and many other places. Open your eyes. Search for it. Slavery is around us everyday. The question is, will you stand up like William Wilberforce and fight for basic justice for all humanity, or will you, like many others of his day, allow your own convenience and greed keep others oppressed? Because we cannot say it is not our fault or that it is not our problem. "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." -Edmund Burke.

Yeah, I know

Sorry it has been busy at work and I have not had time to write. In the mean time, here is a blog entry that, well, I couldn't have said it better myself!

http://heseltonhappenings.blogspot.com/2010/03/demise-of-family.html#comment-form

A calling

I did not intend to ever write this post, but I fell compelled right now. In keeping this blog anonymous, I did not intend to tell specifics about my career. I have said before that I speak on behalf of a non-profit for a living. While that is true, that non-profit organization is a church. I am a minister.

Now in different circles, I hear many different terms used. In the Roman Catholic Church, its a priest. Some churches, its pastor or evangelist, or many other terms. I prefer minister or simply preacher. I work at a somewhat larger church, with multiple ministers on staff. I'm not the senior minister (usually refered to as the preacher), but I still like the terms preacher, even if I don't preach regularly.

Right now, I'm online watching a sermon done over a week ago at Southeast Christian church in Louisville, KY. In the particular sermon I am watching, Dave Stone and Kyle Idleman are discussing their own calls to ministry. A call to ministry is a powerful thing, as I have experienced for myself. I fought the call to ministry, I didn't want to do it, but finally after arguing with God for about six months, I told him that if that was what He wanted, I was in.

Funny thing is, God started to use me as a minister, even in high school. With 9-11 and two wars breaking out during that time, I was often brought into conversations about matters of faith, by both students and faculty. It was amazing how much I enjoyed life once I started following God's direction for it.

Now, after going to Bible college and having several years of ministry under my belt, I still love it. Ministry is hard. If it is only a job, a person cannot make it. But to me, my calling is not about a job. Its a large part of who I am. My boss recently said was discussing salary with out finances commitee and said about me "He would pay us to work here." Its true. I love it.

I love it so much, that it has cost me. I could make more money in a secular field. What I would do, I have no idea, nor do I want to ever have to make that decision. It has also cost me more. I dated a girl who I loved for a year. During that year, I learned that she had no desire for ministry, even to marry into it. That was one of several issues. Suffice it to say, she had built up an idea of who I was and loved that person, but the real me did not match up. It broke my heart and turned me off romance in general for a few years. She could not accept major parts of who I was, with ministry being one of those parts.

The truth is, I would sacrifice more to fulfill the calling my God has given me. I would follow Him to the ends of the earth but for the asking. I have a rare gift. I KNOW what I have been placed on this earth for. I know WHY I am here. That is an opportunity not many have in this life.

I really had to get this off my chest. I had to say how much I love my calling, almost as much as the God who called me. What else will he call me to be? A husband? I don't know, and frankly, I don't care. If I have to give up the prospect of ever getting married, ever having sex in order to keep my calling, I would do that without hesitation. So if God doesn't lead that way, don't be surprised if this knight never claims a lady. In the mean time, I'll stay in the fight, sword and lance.

New purchases

I'm a natural saver. Some would call me frugal. Some would call me a tight wad. I don't really care. This entry isn't really about that. The point is, when I spend money, it is RARELY on a whim (even that is usually eating out).

So this past week I was on a business trip to Knoxville, TN. While there, I went to one of my favorite stores, located in Sevierville. Its called Smokey Mountain Knife Works. They are the largest knife store in the world, and do sell other things.

It is the other things that interest me. I had been on the website and looked at things that I was thinking about buying. I boought a Gladius, the sword of a Roman soldier. This particular one cost around $80. It has a blunted blade (meaning not sharpened). I also bought a small medieval dagger. I was pleased with these purchases.

This is the same store where I bought my Agincourt sword, named after the famous victory by Henry V, immortalized by Shakespear. This sword is one of my two prized possessions. I have a collection of various similar items (big surpise based on the name of the blog huh?). The sword represented to Knights in the Medieval age much of who they were. The hand guard on the sword even represented their faith (looking like a cross). My sword represents similar to me.

Though I know not to romance what the Medieval age actually was, I like the ideals it was meant to hold to, things like social justice, love, protecting those who cannot defend themselves, and holding to your faith (though I will not do so through violence as they did, because that is not a teaching of my faith).