Choosing Hell

In the garden of Eden, man was sinless, sin had no place, had no power and was merely a concept, unrealized.  Yet when man sinned, death took control and as an act of mercy, God allowed man to live for only a certain length of time and then be committed to the grave.  We understand this to be an act of mercy, for if man was to live forever, he would literally be in hell.  For he would continue living in the immediate presence of God, yet unable to die, would continue under the domination of sin with no means for escape. 
As we move forward in time, Jesus has come, died and risen from the grave, having defeated death.  Man now can live in the presence of God, free from the domination of sin and death is defeated, yet to be destroyed.  When death is finally destroyed, those men who have used their time on earth to refine themselves, to fight against sin and to strive for holiness, they will be preparing themselves for a glorious eternity.  But those men who waste their time, do not fight against the influence of sin and enter eternity, embodied, yet not striving after holiness, will endure a literal hell, for eternity.  This state will be the state in which man would have been, had God not introduced the mercy of death.  But at this point in time, death will have been destroyed, and those men who have not taken advantage of the resurrection of Christ, of the church as a hospital and of the power and direction of the Holy Spirit to prepare for an eternity with Christ, will suffer an eternity in eternal life, yet despising the very glory of God, who fills all things.

Distraction

If one steps back and observes, one will see a commonality with all men, regardless of race, age or economic state. That point of commonality is "distraction". Of course, there are always exceptions, but in general, all men will have something to which they focus their attention, which draws them away from thoughts of eternity and immortality. Some men know and understand these concepts, but delivered choose to look elsewhere. Sometimes briefly, sometimes lengthy.
Other men have been raised from childhood to never think on these things and have developed into creatures of distraction, moving from one distraction to the next, never settling to focus on depth. On one hand, it could be argued that their state is not of their own doing, that they were raised from day one, to seek after the shallow it even the inane. But on the other hand, all men were created in the image of God and created to commune with him. Without excuse, all men are creatures of free will, inherently moved to sell out God.
I am not arguing that this distraction is necessarily bad. It, like any other option before us, can be used to help us or harm us. We must be mature and responsible and handled this freedom wisely. One could possibly relegated it to the same category as sleep. A necessity but only to be used as necessary.
And again, as I've said many times before, this must be attended to for ourselves and not others. What are we doing with our time? With what are we distracted? And for how long and how often? Do we use distraction to refresh and prepare for another round of progress? Or do we use distraction, over and over, to avoid reality? Ask yourself and be honest.

Born this way

One of the arguments of the “alternative lifestyle” crowd is, “We were born this way.”  In essence, the argument is built on the idea that one is born with certain passions/desires/preferences in regards to sexuality, therefore we ought to follow this path.  But is this really a valid pursuit?  Is this the way we ought to handle the passions or desires we have?  Is it valid to argue that these desires exist therein, therefore we ought to fulfill them?
What if our desires include pedophilia, bestiality or cannibalism?  Obviously, I am choosing extreme and/or perverse categories, intentionally.  One can include any desire one wants and the argument remains the same.  Does the simple existence/presence of a desire automatically legitimize that passion?  Does the possibility of a moral standard have any say?  We can offer arguments as to why it would be wrong to simply give into the passions of bestiality or cannibalism and most would agree.  But why do we agree with these arguments, based on particular foundational arguments, but not others?
It comes down to what we hold as foundational or authoritative.  For the Christian, the Bible and the teaching of the historic Christian faith has always identified LGBTQ as sin.  Can one really look to personal preference for foundational truth?  If we reduce truth to individual preference, we have gutted truth of any authority or legitimacy.

What works

In a strictly practical approach to analyzing life, we can simply ask, “What works?”  In other words, we can look at a variety of lifestyles, life choices and worldviews and ask if any of these “work”.  But in order to answer the question, we have to know what “works” means.  I would guess that most haven’t given thought to the criteria they use to determine if a particular lifestyle or worldview is successful.  Can we say the man who chooses homelessness as a lifestyle is successful?  We can if his goal was to be free of financial responsibility  and material ownership.  Can we say the pansexual is successful?  We can if his or her goal is to satisfy the sexual drive at any cost.  Can we say the business man is successful?  We can if earning their first million by 30 and ten million by 35 and they do so, at whatever cost.
But if we shift the goals of these life choice one space to the right, we would have to say that they have all miserably failed.  What really is at stake here is determining how we define success and upon what ground that definition is built.  Are we willing to define "success" upon our own thinking?  Are we willing to build our entire life and influence the lives of those around us, simply because we think we are doing the right thing, based on our own wisdom? 

Taking action

When we are moved to act, what is that which generated the need to act? Either external or internal doesn’t matter, what does matter is source of the move to act. Are we moved to act because of an emotional response or an academic response? In other words, have we thought about how we respond or are we simply acting from a state of passion?
It really does come down to this either / or situation.  Upon what is our response grounded?  As an Orthodox Christian, I believe that a response ought to be built upon that which is true, not that which is felt in the moment.  And this sort of thing doesn't just happen.  One must exercise or practice this response.  When spoken poorly to, when lashed out against, when criticized or mocked, how do we respond?  We must stop and think about what is the right thing to do, not merely respond, because a response like that will merely be based on flesh.  Of course, when one practices responding according to faith, eventually our immediate response will be based on faith,  But this we must practice and think through.

That which we call reality

It has been in my mind to a larger degree, as of late, that our reality is far greater than those things we take in via our senses. The Christian worldview is made up of much more than simply physical behavior. To be a faithful Christian, we must learn to direct our thoughts and our actions by our spirit's leadership rather than that of our flesh. Of course, this is completely contrary to the average American way. It seems that our direction, almost from day one, is physical comfort and ease. In other words, what can we do to make ourselves more comfortable and find more free time.
Alternatively, the Christian ought to approach life as an opportunity to learn self control and to learn to love others. This really points to the primacy of the spiritual over the physical. When we focus on making ourselves comfortable and on being entertained, we are giving in to the leadership of our flesh. The reality of life after life after death cannot be ignored.
The pattern of our life, following birth, is three-fold. We start with our initial life on earth, the typical "go to school, get a job, get married, raise kids, retire and then die." Second is life after death, the period of time that most people (errantly) think of as eternity. But this disembodied state is very temporary and very unnatural. Third, is life after life after death. This is what we actually need to think of as eternity. When time finally comes to an end, all men will be given new resurrected bodies (remember, Jesus took the power of death when he resurrected and ultimately death is to be destroyed). Upon receiving our new bodies, we will pass through the final judgement. From this point forward is eternal life, either enjoying the immediate presence of God, as God is everywhere and in all things OR we spend our eternal life hating being in God's eternal presence. And this is the point of this blog.
If we spend our short time here on Earth focused on pleasing and entertaining ourselves, ignoring the spiritual side of reality, we will spend our eternity unprepared for the presence of God. Alternatively, if we see beyond the tiny sliver of reality we think of "it", and embrace an approach that realizes the spiritual and the physical, we will be prepared to enjoy an eternity rather than a mere century (at most).
Reality, for the Christian, is about using this time on earth, preparing our souls for eternity. If we have limited ourselves to comfort and entertainment, we have believed the lie sold to us by the world.
And we really ought to be better than that.

Don't confuse

In a recent conversation with an acquaintance, the term 'love' came up. I immediately responded with, "Love is not an emotion", with which he wholeheartedly disagreed. But alas, as is often the case, people don't think through and carefully articulate their terminology.
The way one may feel about love is an emotion. But love itself is an action and a state of mind. If we are faithfully following Christ's command to love our neighbor, we do so regardless of how we feel about him. Our feelings, in this case, are irrelevant. We love because it's the right thing to do. And no one dislikes love, giving or receiving.
But there are two other terms here to consider. One, "like", is completely an emotional response. We may hear a beautiful piece of music and because it emotionally moves us, we like it. We may really like to be with a particular person, because of the feelings we have when we are with them. That's all fine and good, but it not love. It is a focus on ourselves.
Two, "romance", is closer related to love, but still distinct from it. You may feel madly "in love" with someone, but it is really just an amplified "liking" of them. And if our marriage is built on romance, it is doomed to fail, for romance is fickle.
Our marriage shouldn't be built on liking someone either. For sure, we should like the person to whom we are married. But that will fluctuate as well, depending on our mood, on their mood, depending on the weather, or even depending on how our day went. But none of those things have any bearing on our love for someone else.
We love others because it is right and because it is a manifestation of who we are, as Christians. Jesus said it, let them know you by your love (John 13:35).