Learning to Balance

1) information in the world around us

2) acting on that information from a Christian foundation

3) offering prayers on that information

4) understanding that most things are beyond our control

5) understanding that all things are ours to pray about

Religious Freedom

I have been reading about the large scale resurgence of Orthodoxy in Russia.  Technically, Russia has been an officially Christian Orthodox nation since AD 988, when the government embraced Orthodoxy as the national religion.  With the exception of the small blip of soviet atheism beginning around 1920, Russia has been Christian.  Since the fall of communism, there has been a massive building process currently taking place.  In Moscow, currently, there is an official plan to build 200 Orthodox churches.

But some people are complaining.  The claim is that the government is showing favoritism to the Orthodox, at the expense to the religious minorities in the country.  But I have to ask, “would you expect anything different?”  The country is historically Orthodox.  There are currently no laws in place that forbid any citizen from believing and practicing a different faith.  But there are laws that limit the activity by those practicing other faiths.  Why would it be otherwise?

One important thing to remember in this regard is that Russia is not the US.  Russia was not built upon the supposed religious freedom of Protestantism.  We cannot judge the Russian nation by Protestant standards or ideas.  The nation of Russia is Christian Orthodox.  The depth of that religious practice in its people is not a discussion topic at this point.  I am talking about the official religious status and the structure of the culture.

Should not a nation be free to choose its own religious path and/or be free to practice that faith without interference from other foreign religious influence? No one seems to complain that Saudi Arabia is officially Muslim, or that India is officially Hindu or that Thailand is officially Buddhist, or even China’s official atheism.  All of these places have official positions of religious tolerance, but practically speaking, differing religious practice is difficult.  But it is a situation that one would expect, especially in a nation that takes its religious faith seriously.  Perceived truth ought to be embraced and practiced truth.

I would suggest that “political correctedness” has taken control.  We need to strive to be Orthodox, not culturally PC.  There may be a difference.

Instruction

In the Protestant world, particularly within Calvinism, the standard approach is to learn as much as you can.  It is a very academic world, built around knowledge and understanding.
But the historic Orthodox world is quite different.  This is not to say that Orthodoxy is anti-intellectual, far from it.  The historic church contains some very brilliant minds.  In Orthodoxy, the emphasis/goal is theosis. In short, we are to become a much like God as is humanly possible. So this means we must strive after purity and holiness.
With that in mind, the idea of obedience comes to mind.  Two things here: The Orthodox faith is very organic and we do not lose our individuality when we become part of the church.
Very high on our list of things to seek, is a spiritual father.  This is someone who has been a faithful, mature Christian for a long time and has much wisdom.  When we find that spiritual father, his wisdom and instruction is for us. We cannot, safely, take the specific instruction from another father and apply it to ourselves, indiscriminately.  Specific wisdom is for specific people at specific times.
In short, we no longer live under law, by which we follow a set of rules.  We are now under grace, filled with the Holy Spirit. God has given us godly examples we are to emulate and learn from.
Find a spiritual father and learn to obey.

Seeing but not believing

In my multiple interactions with atheists,  I often become frustrated at their varied responses, which really summarize down to one thing,  "give me some verifiable proof, so that then I will believe."
But it just occurred to me (literally). When we read in the gospel accounts of Jesus' resurrection, in three different responses we see a common theme.  When Mary saw Jesus at the tomb,  when the disciples saw Jesus on the road to Emmaus, and when Thomas was told of first hand accounts of Jesus' resurrection,  none of them believed upon "seeing" Jesus.  It wasn't until they interacted with him, that they recognized him.
It will be the same with atheists.  No matter how strong or passionate our explanations and arguments, they will not believe.  Atheists need to interact.  The atheist needs to seek out and interact with God before they will believe.
Let us pray that they have that opportunity before they pass into eternity.

What Jesus accomplished

There exists a wide variety of thoughts concerning what exactly it was that Jesus actually accomplished in his death and resurrection.  None of the answers or explanations of the Protestant world ever really sufficiently answered it for me though.
And then I became Orthodox. It's funny how different things appear when looked upon from a different angle.  Stranger still, in becoming Orthodox, I became much more covenantal in my thinking, moreso than I ever was as a Calvinist.
We see it like this.  Jesus died for the world.  This means that Jesus' death was exhaustive and complete. His blood was shed for all mankind,  for every single human that ever lived or ever will live.  Does this then mean that all men will go to heaven?  Am I arguing for universalism?
No.
We can look back through the Old Testament and observe how God had always dealt with his people.  When we look at the Jews, coming out of slavery in Egypt,  they were, all of them, the people of God.  They were in covenant with him.  But in Old Covenant typological fashion, those who were unfaithful to their covenantal responsibilities did not enter the Promised Land.
Another example is seen in the "once a year Levitical sacrifice.  Once a year, the high priest would enter the holy of holies and offer up a bloody sacrifice for every single Jew.  Every single one of them had his sins covered.  Does this mean that every single Jew enjoyed the covenantal blessings? No, but only those who were faithful to their covenantal responsibilities.
I hope by this point you see where this is going.  Even though Jesus died for every single human being,  we still have responsibilities.  We are called to purify ourselves, to love God and to love neighbor.  If we spend all our time building our portfolio to ensure a comfortable retirement,  we have our priorities wrong.
Jesus died and rose again, not so we could be comfortably well off, but so that we could pursue holiness and love.

Uphill battle

I may have written about this before, but it is in the forefront of my mind, so I'll bring it up again.  Forgive me if I am repeating myself.
I'll start by saying that I believe my present lamentation "is the way it is supposed to be." In other words,  the longer we are Christians and really trying to progress in our sanctification,  the worse things around us will seem/be.
There are many analogies that could be used to describe this.  For example,  a bank teller handling cash,  an art expert assessing fine art, the symphony conductor criticising his musicians.  All of these situations share at least one thing, exposure. The more one is exposed to "the real thing", the more glaring and repugnant the imitations become.
For the Christian,  the longer we focus upon, strive after and long for an ever deepening relationship with God,  the uglier and detestable the things of the world become.  The really difficult part in all of this is our sinful nature.  Our stupid, fallen flesh constantly drags us down and lies to us. And far too often, we believe it.
The other hard part is our lifetime here among it all.  We are here in fallen America, with all of its comfort and ease,  having to struggle against the "normalcy" of our culture.  It it's a difficult, uphill battle.
If I would only keep my passions at bay, follow my heart instead of my passions and flesh,  I might actually make some real progress.
But alas, stupid me,  wallowing in the ease of modern day America. Pray for me, a sinner.

New President

I believe that this election is possibly unprecedented in US history.  I have never seen such an extreme difference in candidates, to the point that the followers of one candidate despise the other.  Be that as it may, the reality is that Donald Trump is our new president.  Love him or hate him, he is the man, so we better get used to the idea.
This leads me to the protesting and rioting that is taking place in highly Democratic areas.  I really have to wonder, do these people actually believe that rioting, violence and vandalism is an appropriate response to their dislike for Mr. Trump?  How does spray painting “F*ck Trump“ on someone elses vehicle constitute a reasonable protest?
Trump is our new president, but will not take office until January 20, 2017.  Why don’t we simply wait and see what kind of president he will be?  Instead of responding to what we think he might do/be, why don’t we wait and then respond to what he is actually doing?
We have been using the electoral vote process for over 200 years and everyone has been pretty much happy with the process.  If you don’t like it, then pursue legal (and effective) methods for changing it.  Breaking the front window of a local business is hardly a reasonable response to the success of the presidential candidate that you don’t like.