The Organic Nature of Reality

The reality and objectivity of Jesus' incarnation, death and resurrection doesn't seem to garner enough attention with the Protestant/Evangelical/Roman/Orthodox world.  For sure, these branches talk about Jesus and his work, but the objectivity does not seem to be embraced as it should. 
When we read in the gospels and the epistles that Jesus died to save the world or that God loves all men and sent his son to die for the sins of the world, we need to understand what is being said here.  The question should come to mind, "Did Jesus succeed in what he set out to do?"  Of course we will say yes, but how that "yes" is defined differs between branches.  The Calvinists will argue that Jesus' saving work only applies to "the elect", while the Evangelical/Roman world will argue that Jesus' work was comprehensive, the actual application only pertains to those who choose to embrace it.  But the Orthodox world sees it differently.
Far too often, the dichotomy of "universalism" or "unconditional election" is given as the only two options, but this is false.  If we take the words of the gospels literally, we would have to say, "Yes, Jesus died for all men", but that does not mean that all men will be saved.
To cut to the main point here, Jesus' work was not about a legal transaction or a fee paid to an angry God.  God is love, not a bank ledger or an angry judge. Man's problem was not about paying a fee, but about being in bondage to sin and death.  Jesus' death and resurrection was about defeating the power of sin and death and freeing man from that bondage.  Now that ALL men are free from that bondage, it is now each man's responsibility to make use of the tools that God has given us through the church by the power of the Holy Spirit, to transform his soul into the image of Christ. The Orthodox church calls this theosis.
So really what it comes to is two things.  First, Jesus actually accomplished all that he set out to do, he defeated the power of sin and death for all men. Second, man too has responsibility to transform his soul by the power of the Holy Spirit.  This two fold responsibility has always been the situation/relationship between God and man.
This is not a matter of man "earning" his salvation.  Jesus did that already, free and clear.  It is a matter of someone formerly in bondage, now freed, using the tools to transform himself into what he was created to be, that is, in perfect, loving communion with God.

Sin is sin

The title seems to be one of those things that kind of goes without saying, but I do have a specific point herein.  When we read the newspaper, when we hear from someone else about this or that "sin" or "crime", we really shouldn't be surprised.  People sin, people commit crimes and, unfortunately, doing so is typical.  Our fallen nature has turned us into selfish creatures.  And even worse, we are quick to judge and condemn others for their sins and crimes, but we are also quick to excuse or explain away our own sins.
When we hear of someone else's sins, our first response should not be "oh, what a horrible person", but rather, "oh yeah, I have sins in my own life that are uncomfortably similar to that." If we would only have as much grace and forgiveness with others that we would like to have for ourselves.

Needs

I typically don’t understand other people very well and I don’t understand emotions, in myself or in others.  Granted, from a logical perspective, I can understand why certain events or situations can cause duress and grief in someone (myself included), but emotionally, not so much. 

That being said, I do understand that people have needs (myself included) and I’ve come to realize that those needs, when not met, can cause horrible things to happen.   “Not seeing the forest for the trees”, “blind to oneself”, “one cannot watch oneself from the outside”, these sayings and more go a long-ways to explain what takes place.  When any one particular need is not met, one, through self-blindness will reach out, sometimes in very bizarre and destructive ways, in an attempt to fulfill those needs. 

The big question, in my mind at least, is what does one do to alleviate/avoid these situations, especially when seeing or understanding these needs does not come naturally?  And secondly, how does one respond “after the fact”?  What does one do when damage has already been done, when personality has already been formed, when decisions have been made that cannot be undone? 

Speaking retrospectively really is not that helpful, but can be for other situations. So to recognize and avoid the problem, the first step would be to ask the question, “What are the needs?”  I cannot even begin to articulate just how difficult this process can be (or typically is).  Learning to ask the question (to one’s self) and then knowing how to take care of the needs of that person, all the while doing so in a loving, non-invasive, non-derogatory manner.  Maybe this is simple and straightforward for some people, but certainly not for me.  

Ask the question, “What is the need?”

Age, sin and a possible worldview

I have three different thoughts/concepts that I would like to examine and eventually possibly bring together into a unified concept/explanation. I had never thought of these three concepts tying together as I have now come to see them.  They are:
1) Giving honor and respect to the elderly.
2) Thinking through why our culture has an obsession with youth.
3) The destructive effects of sin upon man.

The first thought, that of honoring the elderly is a age old concept that is common in most cultures.  The idea is that we honor and respect the elderly is a good idea, but I began to wonder why it is held in high regard.  So first, why is the idea of honoring the elderly embraced?  We do not honor them, simply because they are old.  We do not honor and respect only certain elderly persons, but all.  So what is it?  I believe the idea is that, as elderly, they have worked through life, they have "put in their time" and, hopefully, have come to a place of wisdom and have some life lessons that could be passed on to us, to our benefit and to the benefit of culture at large.  We honor them because they have earned it.  But really, even behind that, is even though old, decrepit and no longer contributing in some sort of temporally productive way, they are still people created in the image of God, therefore they are worthy of our love and respect.
The second point, that of our cultures obsession with youth, either "being it" or pursuing it even into our old age, is a curious one.  Some of this obsession comes from fear.  The fear that we will grow old, decrepit, lacking value in the eyes of the general populace and no longer "beautiful" by the standards of the world.  But then a new thought came to mind in this regard.  What if the desire for youth is that, but is also something else.  What if the desire for youth comes from a natural (and right) desire for life?  When we look back at the time prior to our fall into sin, death was unknown.  Adam and Eve did not suffer the slow decline into old age and death.  If the power of death was unknown, Adam and Eve would not have know the decline that comes with the progression towards death.  People die because the body wears out and fails.  If man had not fallen into sin, that decline would be unknown.
So the thought is this.  What if obsession we have with youth is, in some small part, a longing for the life of "life before sin".  To be honest, I personally find the idea not very likely, as most people downplay or outright ignore sin.  But the seed of the idea, a small bit of knowing that reality could be buried somewhere within us and may be coming out in this obsession, even if it is smothered in the vanity and foolishness of American culture.
The third point, that of the destructive effects of sin upon us, is closely tied to the previous two points.  As Scripture tells us, sin brings death.  We see the ever approaching finality of death in the first fruits of old age.  Our bodies wear out, decline and eventually fail.  This physical failure is inevitable and is the fruit of sin in our lives.
So how am I suggesting that we tie these three together?  Our respecting of the elderly comes from two things, the presumption that they ought to be honored and respected because they have attained a level of maturity and wisdom that is very, very beneficial for us as individuals and for the culture at large.  Secondly, they are to be respected because they are created in the image of God.  But they are not to be respected or emulated simply because they are old, as the decline that accompanies old age is a fruit of sin.
What if our desire for youth actually stems from a desire for life that is free from the effects of sin?  What if we love youth because it represents, not simply beauty and physical fitness, but a life prior to the effects of sin?  One has to wonder what a life free from sin would look like after 100 years.
The destructive fruit of sin is death.  That fruit manifests itself, initially, in slow decline. It is because of sin that death eventually.  Sin is always destructive.
My conclusion then, though unattainable, and most likely not even really a factor of any significance in our thinking, is that man was made for life, that death is unnatural and we know it, deep within us.  Our love for sin, for selfishness and for the temporary, destroys our ability to live a life that God made us for.
But even if we can never attain a life untouched by sin, in this life, we can know that eternal life can be ours because of what Jesus Christ accomplished and purchased for us.
A life free from sin was lost forever, at least on this planet in this physical life, once Adam fell into sin.  But a new life, a life given to us in baptism, can be lived free from the ultimate fruit of sin.  Death eventually will be destroyed.  We then need to recognize that life and pursue it. 

Environment

Contrary to what may seem obvious, this post is not about environmentalism.  A very large (and legitimate) concern in many cultures today is concern over the environment.  We are concerned about the quality of the air, the quality of the water (both fresh and salt water), we are concerned with the quality and health of the atmosphere, we are concerned with climate change.  With the exception of the last one (a buzzword really), we ought to be concerned with the creation that God has given us.
But I believe, even more importantly, is the spiritual environment in which one lives.  It is very easy to see the quality of air (smog), the quality of water (clear or clouded) and the changes in global temperatures.  But what is not easy to see, unless one has been trained to see, is the spiritual quality of life.  This is especially true in the US.  The United States, supposedly a Christian county, presents an image of freedom.  But with freedom comes responsibility and we are not responsible.  We use the freedom we have as a license for sin.
When someone is free to flaunt sexual perversion as a right, the mentality of the culture has gotten away from thinking Christianly.  The last thing I am arguing for is a draconian state that crushes anyone and anything that disagrees with it.  That would be bad.  We no longer live under the law as they did in the Old Testament.  But this does not mean we are then free to indulge in whatever our imaginations can conceive.
Ask yourself, what is the spiritual environment in which you live?  Does love for God and love for neighbor control and direct the culture?  Or is the culture motivated by comfort and entertainment?  Try to step back, look at the spiritual health of your environment by comparing to the life Jesus taught and the life that the Orthodox church teaches.  We are all a long ways away from faithfulness.

A practical objectivity

We need to start living by acknowledging that certain things are objectively true. Contrary to the typical sentimentality of modern American evangelicalism,  God actually is king of the world, Satan has actually been defeated and Jesus actually died for the sins of all men.
What does this practically mean?  It means that when we sin, we are rejecting the leadership of God,  we are following a defeated rebel and we are submitting to sin that genuinely has no power over us. We sin, practically speaking, because we want to. No one is forcing us. No one can make us sin. Forced sin is not sin.
We far too often fall down and wallow in our sin because we don't make use of the tools that God has given us for our sanctification.  Prayer,  confession,  repentance, worship,  and the sacraments.

Sin

Every person, every community, every situation has its sins.  This somewhat falls into the “grass is always greener on the other side of the fence” category.  We can live in a particular context and seeing the sin therein be disgruntled and desire after something else.  Seeing the sin and being grieved by it, is a good response. But in doing so, we must realize that all situations and persons after afflicted by sin.  We cannot escape it.  While it is true that some sins are more or less grievous than others (on both a personal level and a corporate level), the sin is still there and is still problematic.

Wisdom requires that we respond rightly to the sin that is in us and surrounds us.  There is something very right about fleeing from the potential influence of sin.  But we should never use the sin of others (either individuals or community) to justify our own sin.

Again, it’s about love for God and love for neighbor.  Our response to sin must be motivated by love.