For Christs Sake!

We often hear people (or ourselves) using religious phrases when cursing. For example, a common usage is the phrase "For Christ's sake!". I always found this usage strange and intruiging. I never understood why a person might use this sort of phrase. Where did it come from? What was its origin and why did people persist in using a phrase that not only had no relevance to its usage, but also didn't seem to make any sense in its own right?

I have an athiest friend who had the nasty habit of cursing with blasphemous phrases. His favourite phrase was simply "Jesus Christ!". After hearing this vocal expostulation numerous times I could no longer ignore the absurdity of it. I replied with the following statement. "Do you realise that every time you say that, Jesus Christ has to get down off His throne in Heaven, and come down to find out what you want, only to realise that you didn't really want to talk to Him at all. Don't you think that would really piss Him off!"
Of course this response was not meant to be taken seriuosly because it was given in jest, but my point was nevertheless very serious. If a person didn't even believe in God then what was the purpose in using a phrase that actually referred to that God. Wasn't it in fact the most absurd thing that an athiest could say. I added that it would make no more sense if he were to blurt out "Mohammed!", or "Hare Krishna!" yet strangely you never hear people say that.
Well I suppose he felt rather sheepish and guilty from my comments and I don't recall hearing him blaspheme from that point on. I think this points out that we often do and say things that are truly based in nonsense from our point of view, and that expose the fact that we often don't think before we speak or act. I think it is a very important thing to self reflect on our behaviour and speech, and to ensure that they match our belief system. An atheist speaking religious phrases is just as non-sensical as a Christian speaking satanic phrases. In fact it is probably more ridiculous since at least the Christian acknowledges the existence of the devil whereas the athiest denies both.

Now despite being able to rationalise the ludicrous situation of religious phrases being used in the wrong context and by non-religious people I was still left with the mystery of the phrase "for Christ's sake" to ponder. Then one day I heard someone finish a prayer with the phrase "for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ". Aha I thought. This sounded very similar to the "for Christ's sake" expression, and I wondered if they were related. Some time later my suspicions were confirmed when I heard the very phrase used at the closing of another prayer.

Later I discovered that this exact phrase actually appears in the Bible.
In 2 Corinthians 12:10 (NIV) it says
"That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.".
Its all about doing something for the benefit or sake of Jesus Christ. This is pure unselfish servitude to Christ, to honour His name and glorify His power and dominion over all things. In contrast to this, when blaspheming with the same phrase we find it is almost always about the person speaking. In other words, it is not at all for Christs sake that they swear, but rather for their own sake.
In another version (NASB) I found further references.
1 Corinthians 4:10
"We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are prudent in Christ; we are weak, but you are strong; you are distinguished, but we are without honor."
Philippians 1:29
"For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake"
Philemon 1:6
"and I pray that the fellowship of your faith may become effective through the knowledge of every good thing which is in you for Christ's sake."

Its sort of funny you know, how the level of intensity can change based on the word you use in this phrase. For instance, you might say "for goodness sake" and nobody would be offended because you are appealing to peoples sense of justice for the better good. Even "for Pete's sake" is not too offensive and probably conveys a marginal level of frustration, but certainly not rudeness (presumably this is a reference to the Apostle Peter). Yet when someone says "for Christ's sake", you know that they are at the end of their tether, and this cursed utterance becomes highly offensive and manifestly more intense. I wonder why the level of obscenity increases as we substitute "goodness" with "Pete" and then more so with "Christ"?
My suspicions are that, much like a weapon, the more powerful it is, the more devastating it can be in the hands of a person with ill-intent.

I find it typically disturbing how a phrase initially used for the honouring and glorification of God is used in precisely the opposite manner with the result of blaspheming His name and disgracing its speaker. It is through the lack of clear and logical thought that brings us to misuse such phrases I believe. My friend who prided himself in cold, clear, logical thinking was ashamed, I think, to have been caught out, and to his credit made a conscious change in his speech to reflect his thinking and beliefs. Perhaps we should do the same.

It's time we started saying what we mean and meaning what we say. Otherwise we should just shut up. Especially when it comes to speaking out the name of the one true Almighty Creator and God of all things. Certainly many people are unclear about what they truly believe and it takes someone to point it out to them, so they can see how their speech or actions are out of step with their worldview. Or perhaps to show them that they don't even realise that their worldview, or belief system, is horribly flawed.

Next time you hear someone say "For Christ's sake" point out to them the absurdity of their speech, and encourage them to be more consistent with their beliefs. It is my opinion that if we are this honest, then people will realise that their flawed belief system is unworkable in practice, and they need to re-visit some deep and serious issues regarding what life is all about, and who is really incharge of it all.

In the true meaning of the phrase, I say these things FOR CHRISTS SAKE!

Regaining Awe

When my youngest daughter was four she made a startling discovery.
We had been out late one night, and as we arrived home and climbed out of the car, she looked up, probably for the first time, at the night sky. The look on her face was priceless. Her eyes widened, her eyes sparkled and her mouth fell open, agape at what she had just seen. She was almost bursting within, as she exclaimed with utter awe "WOW, what are they".
I looked up quickly to find what she has seen. Perhaps she had seen a comet, or a shooting star or a strangely lit aircraft. Maybe one of the closer planets was at perihelion or a satellite had become visible at perigee. No, what she had noticed for the first time in her life was that there were stars in the night sky.
Perhaps she had often looked up at the daytime sky and noticed the sun, and some clouds, maybe a storm brewing in the distance, but she had no reason to think there was anything else up there. But now she had noticed them and she was utterly awestruck. It was one of those magical moments amongst many in a child's life when for the first time they discover something amazing.
It got me to thinking that it is a shame that we become so accustomed to awesome things to the point that they become ordinary objects, or worse something to be despised in our darkness of thinking. What would it be like if we were able to maintain this sense of appreciation our whole lives, of each and every discovery that we made as a child that stirred in us an overwhelming awe. Of course once you have discovered a thing for the first time you can never return to that same incredible moment of discovery (until perhaps you reach old age and begin to suffer Alzheimer's Syndrome), however I believe we can maintain a high level of appreciation for it.
I think it is similar to a child's reaction when they see something magical in the sense of the inexplicable.

Lewis wrote of the "magic" in the world in both his novels and other books, as did Tolkien in his fantasy novels.
There are some who are eager to criticize Lewis and Tolkien for their fantasy writing, specifically the inclusion of magic in their stories. They say that God abhors magic and all magic is evil, and that we should ground our children in reality.
I suspect they don't realize that even the real world is quite full of magic. In the stories a magician will make an incantation and magically cause something to happen. In the real world God speaks and things come into being. Is not God the greatest of Magicians, and ultimately the only true Magician? We can change the form of things but only God can bring them into being out of nothing. The Word of God is the most magical thing there is for it is flawless and can reside inside my heart, it can make even the simple to understand profound truths, it imparts the very wisdom of God with knowledge and understanding, it can shield a person from harm, give joy and delight, it is like fire, or a hammer that smashes rocks to pieces, it can combat temptation, give spiritual life, teach us and admonish us, it is living and active and can penetrate even to separating the soul and the spirit, it judges thought and the attitudes of the heart, and is enduring and everlasting.

I think part of our adult inability to appreciate things with awe is because we believe that it is a mature and proper thing for a man to grow up and put aside the silly childish fantasies that once captivated our imaginations. We think that science or advancements in thinking have taken us to a place where it is foolish to see the magic in things. The things that we can explain in some way whether it be in scientific or psychological jargon are what we accept. Anything outside these areas is labeled as childish fantasy. Sadly, when we think we can explain something in concrete terms (whether we understand it or not) we tend to lose our sense of amazement. I think this is because we think a thing is amazing because it is not understood rather than appreciating it for just being amazing, hence a loss of wonder in things that are explainable. This is what we do when we "grow up".
However Jesus called us to be like children. He said:
"Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."
And
"Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

I think one of the ways we need to be more like children is in an attitude of unfettered mind-blowing awe for the magic in this world, and to give the recognition and appreciation that is deserving of the one and only true Magician in this universe.

Everything You Know Is Wrong pt6

There were things about Christianity that I initially discovered in much the same way that most other people did.
I heard from people on the radio who discussed it either directly or indirectly, and I didn't miss the sarcasm or derision in their tone. I watched television programs that gave me information about the church, and I heard opinions from friends, teachers and acquaintances, all of whom added to the picture of what the Christian religion was all about. Much of it made sense, and most of the arguments against Christianity were appealing to my non-conformist side, and I found it all to be a most excellent view on religious things, except for one small detail; none of it was true. As often as it happens, there are few things as unfortunate as a compelling argument that happens to be false.

Let me give some examples to illustrate this.
Firstly the claims that were made were as follows.
1. Christianity is irrelevant in today's world and to today's modern person.
2. If the church had its way it would take us back to the Dark Ages of ignorance.
3. Religion is the cause of the majority of the world's bloodshed.
4. Church is full of pious hypocrites singing boring hymns.

These claims made sense considering the arguments and evidence that seemed to support them. Unfortunately for the proponents of these claims, they are not true.
1. Christianity is very relevant to today. Have you ever read any of the Bible? Everywhere there are pieces of wisdom that provide cultural and sociological answers to our current problems that are the root of our unhappiness. The sermons of Christ alone if applied to modern life would transform the world through every person that lived in such a way as Christ suggests. Of course there are many things not mentioned in the bible, such as mobile phones, and computers, but all these things are just stuff. How we deal with stuff, and people for that matter is what is important, and the Bible covers these topics comprehensively.
2. The church was actually responsible for the world coming out of the Dark Ages. It was the Christians who built up libraries of books, and the Monks who were almost solely responsible for the preservation of ancient documents. When I look at how many brilliant people throughout history have contributed to the progress of society, science, and humanity in general, I find that overwhelmingly they are born out of a Christian framework of thinking. The majority of great scientists over the years were Christians or believed in a biblical framework of the world. A ranking of the 100 most influential scientists can be found at http://www.adherents.com/people/100_scientists.html which contains a clear majority of believers in God. To name just a few: Isaac Newton, Louis Pasteur, Galileo, and Copernicus. In fact, in the top ten of the most influential Scientists of all time, 9 out of the 10 are theists with possibly 8 of them Bible believing Christians.
3. Again, has anyone of these people who say these things actually read the Bible? Christianity is the antithesis of war and bloodshed. Every doctrine and belief is the opposite to that which creates war and bloodshed. The truth is that men in their foolish thinking create wars, and even the Crusades could not have possibly been supported from biblical teaching no matter how obtuse. There may however, be a valid claim against Islam for inciting war and bloodshed, because their scriptures, the Koran, actually supports violence and murder against unbelievers, and promises eternal glory for those who die in such an endeavour. Christianity on the other hand with its "turn the other cheek" and "love your enemies" attitudes is peace promoting and reconciliatory.
4. The church is not full of hypocrites, in fact there is plenty of room for more. Jokes aside however, the truth is that people who understand the basic doctrine of Christianity never claim to be perfect, and in fact honest believers will say that they are poor representatives of the beliefs that they hold, but they are daily being transformed into the people that they ought to be. True Christians are not pious in the negative sense that most people think, rather they are humble about their abilities, and honest about their shortcomings. Most of the churches I have been to have had very modern up-tempo music, some to the extent of being almost like rock concerts. Just do a search for contemporary Christian music and you will find all styles of music represented, some of it every bit as good as their secular counterparts. Of course you will find some churches echoing with ancient hymns, strange chants, and legalistic rituals, but that is the beauty of the diversity of God. Even people with bad taste in music can find a church that suits them.

There are plenty of other claims about Christianity out there, and easily as many refutations of these false claims. So where do you stand?
Is everything you know about Christianity wrong? Or have you never bothered to check the facts for yourself?

Nature of the Foul

After watching a few of the world cup matches I have to confess to feeling a little disappointed. Was I disappointed because Australia didn't make it to the quarter finals? Yes, but that was not the source of my biggest disappointment. A work colleague of my wife said that she was not a soccer fan, but that she had watched every Australian match in the World Cup. Sadly she now claims that she will never watch another soccer match ever again, such was her disappointment and fury.
Why was she so angry? Simply because of the unfairness evident in the game.
Refereeing decisions that were short sighted and sometimes blind, mixed with blatant cheating in the form of rugby tackles, hand balls, intentional take outs, and fake falls all added up to a viewing spectacle that was nothing short of disgraceful. Not to mention the bad publicity that surrounded the Australian team with regards to claims about their rough tactics and physical play, of which I saw absolutely no evidence in their actual playing. Despite this, it seemed as though Australia had been judged and executed without a trial, as referee after referee penalised them many times, with quite a few of them unjustified.

But should we be surprised?
Should we really be shocked at the underhanded tactics of some teams and individual players? I say no, it is exactly what we should expect. It is simply a case of people living according to their beliefs. In fact, they are one of the commonest set of beliefs in our day. You have probably heard them expressed in any number of pithy statements such as the following.

· Look after number one.
· A small indiscretion is acceptable if you don't get caught.
· Most rules were made to be broken. (under certain circumstances)
· Winning is everything.
· You have to do what other people are unwilling to do if you want to get ahead.
· Everybody does it so it is acceptable.
· Nobody is perfect anyway so you might as well accept it and adapt.
· Do it if it feels good to you.
· Personal autonomy is the most important thing.

I could go on with many more, but these few give an idea as to modern thinking in many peoples minds. It may sound a little pessimistic, and jaded, but the reality is that many people think maturing as a person means absorbing the phrase; "this is life, get used to it". We even say these things to our children as they are approaching adulthood because we want to prepare them for the harsh realities of life. But I wonder if we are doing them an injustice.

By accepting these philosophies and merely adjusting to them we are doing a disservice to our children and ourselves. Indirectly we are justifying and validating dishonesty and deception.
As my friend keeps reminding me, through a quote by Edmund Burke - "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for enough good people to do nothing. The only thing necessary for the triumph of good is for enough good people to do something extra."

I often hear people say something like "I just don't understand how a person can be like that". It is not pessimism to reply "Of course, what else did you expect". The fact is, that man as a creature is a damaged being. He is not as he should be, and every time we are surprised when he behaves accordingly, we are reinforcing the lie that man is basically and inherently good. Man was created good, but has become tainted and corrupted, and can only be redeemed by a transformation through the renewing of the mind. It is false to believe that it is only environment, lack of education, poverty or any other external factor that sends a man bad. The badness comes from within, so this is where we must tackle the problem. We can try to legislate and moderate and castigate, but until we meet the source of the problem within the heart and soul of the man, we will only be window dressing a persistent evil that refuses to diminish. And the only way to do that is to continue to refute lies with sound correction, so that people are convicted of the truth, enough to take appropriate action that will lead to a transformation in their lives. I know of no other way for this to occur except through acceptance and submission to God through Jesus Christ. Man can alter the physical, but only God can alter the spiritual.

Everything You Know Is Wrong pt5

So now I had compiled a list, a series of circumstances, that I found unsatisfactory, especially in the light of the current popular philosophy. Now as an aside, if you don't believe you have a philosophy, or think philosophically, then firstly you probably wouldn't be reading this anyway, and secondly by philosophy I just mean a world view. Eveyone has a world view, whether you are an atheist, a agnostic, a theist, an existentialist, or hold some other belief. Everyone thinks something about the world, but few people can articulate it. Just the same, everyone has a theology, despite many people not being able to tell you what theirs is. Theology is simply what a person believes about God, and eveyone has a theology simply because they believe something about God, even if that belief is that he doesn't exist.

Now back on topic, the purely scientific-based, atheistic, materialistic philosophy that is so common today simply could not answer any of my questions that I have raised in the previous discussion. I had the dilemma of holding evidence for something that the current philosophy did not even attempt to address. It was like half the world was blind to half of reality that existed. To me, the spirituality of man (in his morality, valour, love, compassion, nobility, and culture) is simply not addressed in the evolutionary model, nor any of the other secular worldviews that pervade our culture. The different between man and the beasts is not a small gap but rather a vast chasm. Without attributing some external factor, nothing made sense, and there was no reason or purpose in life; something that I had a great need and desire for.

Sometime before I had thought all this out, I had this absolute, permeating sense of God's presence. I don't know how or why, but somehow God had impressed upon me the reality of His existence and presence in this world; in His words, "I am". I did very little with this piece of knowledge for quite some time. I suppose that the concept of submission to Authority was unappealing, as the reality that my life would be controlled by some power did not seem like fun. I liked being the controlling one in my own life, and resented the idea of God interfering, and although I couldn't avoid His existence, I could still refuse to submit. And for a while I succeeded, but a time came when I could no longer ignore the truths that kept becoming evident in my mind. Long before I had all this worked out (and I confess that I still really don't have it all worked out), I made a decision to give in to the compelling pull of a God who would not give up on me. Over the years, I began to realise how all these problems that I had identified within myself and the world, were answered, everyone of them, by Christianity and Christianity alone.
It wasn't that the other worldviews attempted to address the problems and had come up short. No, the fact was that they didn?t even try to address them at all.

My sense of disconnectedness to the world: answered by Christianity.
My sense of disconnectedness with myself: answered by Christianity.
My conviction that all mankind was disconnected from nature, both more noble and more base at the same time: answered by Christianity.
The fact that half the world was unaware of most of this: answered by Christianity.
The problem of evil, pain and injustice in this world: answered by Christianity.

There were also many other deeply philosophical questions, as well as more frivolous ones, of which I have not discussed here, that were answered comprehensively only by Christianity.

Perhaps later I will discuss how Christianity so thoroughly and convincingly addressed these issues, but for the moment, suffice to say that every difficult question I had about the reality of man and the world was comprehensively answered in Christianity and the person of Jesus Christ.
I had taken a journey and made a discovery, only to find that my discovery was already discovered. Men had discovered it 2000 years ago, and so many foolish people today were passing it off as old-fashioned and irrelevant, not realising that they had just thrown out the baby with the bath water.

Chesterton wrote:
" In eradicating all remnants of God from the world we have stripped our own lives of meaning. We want to remove the Ten Commandments and yet we want to be able to cry injustice. We want to remove the Cross, and yet we want people to live lives of forgiveness and freedom from guilt. We have become so open minded that we fail to see the inconsistencies in our own declarations. We are chewing on imaginary food and complaining about the flavor."

In context of this last comment, I was starving to death, and now I had finally found real food!

Everything You Know Is Wrong pt4

Then I made an amazing discovery. Well, perhaps I already knew this but it came upon me with such clarity considering my line of reasoning and frame of mind at the time, that it seemed like something new. The discovery was this; not only was I an alien to this world, I was, in a sense, an alien to my own body. I realised that as much as this world didn't live up to my expectations, and made me feel peculiarly out of place, I myself was also alien to, and couldn't live up to, my own expectations.

I had this set of standards that seemed fundamentally bound within me, which for some reason I could not live up to. I wondered why so many more people did not realise the strangeness of this juxtaposition. Certainly it is no big deal that other people could not live up to my expectations, simply because people are varied in their thinking and have vastly different ideas about what is the best way to live. This is inevitable. But what was staggering was my inconsistency with meeting my own ideal. This is on another level beyond the simplicity of me not fitting in to the world; I did not fit myself. I was an alien to my own body. The things that I desired to do to satisfy my sense of rightness, or that which I knew I ought to do, I found I could not always do. Also the things that I desired to avoid, (knowing full well that they were damaging to me), I found I was actually doing. Why was it that even my own body rebelled against me. This I found to be a most unsatisfactory and distressing situation which surely other people must experience even if they cannot arcticulate it. In fact, I suspected that there was nobody who could live up to their own standards all of the time, hence this universal concept of some sort of Utopia which never comes to pass, despite many peoples extraordinary efforts to achieve it.

Now some people might say that my sense of "ought" was bound in my desire to live up to my parents expectation, or to in some way satisfy the behaviour that was taught me as a child. They might say that my disappointment, and inability to meet this ideal is borne out of unrealistic parental expectation. However it runs deeper than that. Certainly there is some expectation that is laid upon us from our parents, but the truth is that my parents never pressured me with difficult or hard to obtain ideals. Theirs was simply to be myself and live the way I thought was good and right. But I already had this feeling deep within me anyway. It is not something that I learnt through my environment or upbringing, or even something embedded in my genes. I believe it is something that was born in me the moment that I began to exist, and perhaps in every person the moment they begin to exist. We nurture this sense, or we crush it depending on our choices in life, and I felt that I wanted to nurture and fulfil it. That also seemed to me to be right, and a good thing to do.

So I was certain that I had this integral sensitivity for rightness, and believed that all men and women also have it to varying degrees. Even Athiests have morals, so it was not peculiar to religious people alone. What we decide to do, and how we deal with it seems to be an individual choice. I suppose the outcome can possibly be one of guilt because we cannot satisfy our own standards, and guilt is not a thing that can be tolerated within us without it damaging us. So I felt that there were two choices. Firstly I could justify my failings by redefining my standards and hence eliminate the guilt from affecting me. But I suspected it would manifest in other ways if I did this, and it seemed unnatural to beat back my conscience merely by force. Secondly I could somehow find a way to deal with not only this sense of guilt but the very real truth of guilt. You see there are things that you can feel guilty about even though you haven't done any wrong. This is not the sense in which I mean guilt. I am referring to actions or lack of actions that by their very nature imply the certainty of guilt. Unquestionable, irreversible guilt, not mere feelings. To deal with this guiltiness I could begin to meet my standards (as impossible as that seemed) but even if I succeeded in this endeavour, that would not undo the wrong that I had perpetrated in the past. I felt that this might be something I just had to live with unless there was some miracle that could remove or undo all my failings, which I thought was impossible.

At any rate it seemed to me to be a universal ailment of man to conceive of, and lay down ideals, which inevitably he can never completely live up to. These ideals I believe are common to us all in the same basic core of who we are. Being compelled to meet our own inner standard, combined with our lack of power with respect to autonomous, moral self-control, leads us to an inescapable, irrepressible paradox of unfulfilment.

Everything You Know is Wrong pt3

The next question that followed was "Is this phenomena particular to just me?". In other words are there other people who are similarly displaced, and more than that, is the whole human race somehow out of place in this world?
Certainly mankind is unique amongst the animal kingdom. As much as evolutionists stress that we are something like 99% the same as apes, I just couldn't swallow such a materialistic pill. Surely we are much more different from a behavioural and ability perspective than we are similar in just a materialistic sense. I will use the words of G.K. Chesterton to explain what I mean. In "Orthodoxy" he writes:

"That man and brute are like is, in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma. That an ape has hands is far less interesting to the philosopher than the fact that having hands he does next to nothing with them; does not play knuckle bones or the violin; does not carve marble or carve mutton. People talk of barbaric architecture and debased art. But elephants do not build colossal temples of ivory even in a rococco style; camels do not paint even bad pictures, though equipped with the material of many camel's hair brushes. Certain modern dreamers say that ants and bees have a society superior to ours. They have, indeed a civilisation; but that very truth only reminds us that it is an inferior civilisation. Who ever found an ant-hill decorated with the statues of celebrated ants? Who has seen a bee-hive carved with the images of gorgeous queens of old.. No; the chasm between man and other creatures may have a natural explanation, but it is a chasm. We talk of wild animals; but man is the only wild animal. It is man that has broken out. All other animals are tame animals; following the rugged respectability of the tribe or type. All other animals are domestic animals; man alone is ever undomestic, either as a profligate or a monk."

So I am a wild animal, ever undomestic. I think I prefer the idea of being an alien, as it sounds less judgmental, but Chesterton is right. There is something about man that transcends the animal kingdom and sets him apart from it. He alone is able to break the bound of the natural order of things as so he is the only truly wild creature in this world. We have what C. S. Lewis refers to as the "Chest". In "The Abolition of Man" he writes:
"The head rules the belly through the chest - the seat, as Alanus tells us of Magnanimity, of emotions organised by trained habit into stable sentiments. The Chest - Magnanimity - Sentiment - these are indispensable liaison officers between cerebral man and visceral man. It may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man: for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal."

It is by this chest that we have attribute of honour, respect, patriotism, sense of duty, humility, romance, and passion (in the non-sexual sense). Not to mention creativity in music and the arts, our ability to decode nature in the sciences, and utilise its power in so many ways. The sheer invention and innovation of the human mind is utterly poles apart from the rigid impulse and instinct of the mere animal. In this we are so far removed from the animal kingdom that it is clear we are of entirely different stuff. I remember having discussions with friends about whether or not an animal has a soul or spirit. If having a soul means possessing the above attributes, then clearly the human race is unique in being spiritual. This spiritual side, which is strangely attached to a very carnal body through the "Chest" of man, marks him as both a creature of physical birth and inherent spirituality.
This clearly must be the reason why I felt so out of place in a world that I was continually told was merely particles of matter joined together by chance and modified over millions of years by random changes to culminate in the human race of today. This explanation not only didn't fully explain the nature of the world, it completely ignored who man is, and what it is that actually makes man, man. How could such a narrow view of the composition of man explain the unique, undisputed character of man, nor ever satisfy our inherent need for purpose and desire for that which is beyond.

Perhaps there are some very defective men who do not possess one, or even a few of these attributes, but is there any man who has ever existed that has never had even a hint of any of them. Perhaps at times we consider we observe, or read about someone who we believe is completely deficient in all respects (though in reality it seems unlikely), and what is our conclusion? That this person is inhuman: a remorseless monster.

So I concluded that for my purposes I had proven the idea that my situation was not unique, and that perhaps this dilemma was common to all mankind, at least to all who are not inhuman monsters, which by definition excludes them from a claim to humanity anyway. By Lewis' account, poor teaching about the nature of humanity, and in my opinion weak rationality from the many pseudo scientists that saturate our media, have brain-washed us into many false ideas about our world and ourselves, that we become no longer able to recognise the absurdity and paradox of our existence in this world. Perhaps this is why we don't realise that we are not of this world,that we are unique in this created existence. We are made of greater stuff than anything we can see, hear or otherwise naturally perceive on this earth, and this leads us to the conclusion that perhaps we were made for a higher purpose than what this world offers.
After a great deal of thinking, this is where I found myself.

Game of the Gods?

While watching two recent World cup games a though struck me, and echoed a phrase I heard once: "Soccer is the game of the Gods".

The most impressive goals in the game in my opinion are when the players in a team play as one. When it seems as though they can read each other's minds and the passes come thick and fast with seemingly impossible accuracy and foresight, it is definitely a most impressive thing to watch, especially when the end result is a marvellous goal.

A solo effort that involves great skill and intuition is enjoyable to watch and sometimes quite amazing, but there is nothing quite so entertaining as watching a teamwork together as a multi-faceted entity dominating the opposition.
Why is this a game of the Gods? Take the trinity concept for example; three persons in one. All are the same yet all discrete. A paradox in itself and yet all three work according to the same purpose with one mind and supreme power and knowledge.
A soccer team that effectively works in unity and has the highest level of teamwork is then closest to emulating the character of God than those teams who merely have skilful individuals.

The beauty of the Brazilian team is that they have players that are both skilful players, and skilful team players. I suspect a team that is predominantly skilful in only teamwork would defeat a team that has only individual skill. Certainly individual skill is an honour for the one who has is because it indicates a great amount of time in practice and a high degree of mental sharpness, and this is also characteristic of God. However to have both individual skill and teamwork skill is probably the closest one can get to glorifying God in sport. There is no doubt this applies to a degree, to all team sports but I believe more so to soccer. Strategic and instinctual passing of the ball when executed deftly has a beauty about it that surpasses other team sports in my opinion. It is both an emulation of a Godly character and a glorifying of it. For what is soccer for, if not to earn the glory for beautiful play.

On the other side of the coin we have players that play disgracefully with dirty tackles, pushing and shoving, fake falls, and uncontrollable tempers. All of these characteristics are unGodly and therefore a disgrace to any player who participates in them. And what of courage? Even if a team is down, if they maintain hope and continue to work as hard as they can, they can often turn a game around and come from behind for a victory. The never say die attitude is a very honourable one because it maintains faith in the face of adversity and holds belief in ones fellow players of the game. These sort of virtues that are effective in a game of soccer and are useful in the game of life are all Godly characteristics that bring credit to a man and give glory to the one true God of all.

Give respect to competitors, maintain honour in your play, and play with integrity. Those who follow this ideal are the truly great players of the game.

So when you are facing a decision in your life that requires you to make an important choice in life: remember "Joga bonito" - play beautifully!

Everything You Know Is Wrong pt2

Am I really an alien?
Previously I discussed that I made the discovery that I didn't belong in this world. By "the world" I mean not just this physical reality, but the world that man has made it physically, socially, and morally perhaps even spiritually. All of my rational arguments conviced me that there would be evidence to support this idea, and further to that, perhaps an answer to this dilemma.

So firstly to find any evidence that I was truly not of this world, and not just in my imagination.
From a personal perspective the evidence was all there. I felt a sense of morality, and I watched as morality was mocked by politicians, boards of directors, the media, and people all around me. Of course there were other good moral people around me, but so many people said that each person had the right to choose his or her own morality. They said that no choice had a higher value than another, and each were equally valid to the person who chose it. This seemed absurd to me. If there is any purpose to morality, it is the fact that it actually makes value judgements on the validity of a choice. If one morailty was right, then opposing moralities were wrong. Here was a clear indication that I was out of step with modern thinking at the very least, and possibly out of phase with the world today. I felt a sense of justice that was violated at every turn. Something inside me said that if a wrong is perpetrated, then a penalty must be paid. However eveywhere I looked I saw people getting away with injustices without any price to pay. It seemed that some people could just buy their way out of trouble. The richer you were, the more associations it seemed you would have and also more chance you had of "pulling some strings" to get you out of trouble. My inner being demanded justice, but the world I observed failed to always hold people accountable. I concluded that there was an inherent wrongness about this. From a personal perspective it was clear that I was mismatched to this world that I was born into.

But what about practical purposes apart from my personal offence at the world? Was there any evidence that practically speaking I was a misfit in this world. Surely I could assimilate to the extent that life could be livable, perhaps even enjoyable despit feeling like a misfit.
In many cases people who are labelled misfits in schools are really the people that the supposed cool people reject. The accurate explanation of this is probably that the attractive, egotistical people decide what is cool and what is not, and eveyone who is not them are misfits. The truth is that they are the biggest misfits of all because they tend to reject everything which is other to them despite them being the minority group. However I was in the unique position of being one of the supposed cool people (to which my daughter refuses to believe), but I realised that I was hanging around a bunch of losers (apologies to those people I am referring to). By losers, I mean that they had attitudes and behaviours that were peer-driven, selfish, arrogant, elitist and ultimately self-destructive. I didn't fit the social grouping because I disagreed with the majority of their philosophy. As a result I changed peer groups and found some people that were more honest and genuine. But even in that group, though more confortable, I still felt that there was a chasm between what social interaction was meant to be and what it was in practice. As far as actual school work is concerned, I found it only mildly challenging, until senior high. Then I took some difficult subjects that made me realise that my mind didn't really want to accept the teaching that I was attempting to give it. So although I performed very well in school, there began in my mind a spark of awareness that academic study was not designed for my brain. I only got so far (with very little effort) and it seemed that it required an extraordinary amount of effort to achieve a relatively small gain in improvement.

This was to begin to crytallise when I studied at University. The deeper the academic study went (I am talking about mathematical sciences here) the more I realised that even science couldn't perfectly fit the world. It came close, but again, the closer you got to true answer, the more extraordinary the amount of effort was needed to make it even more accurate. It's a little bit like converging to a number that is infinite but never actually completely getting there. Attempting to calculate Pi is an example, and there are many more complex problems that require small amounts of work to get a very good estimate of the solution, but then require a great amount of work to make that answer marginally more accurate. There also seemed to be a large amount of guesswork (educated guesswork I admit) where certain things were unknown. What didn't seem right to me, was that we should get so close but never be exact. Now you may say that mathematics is exact, and I agree, but the problem lies in its ability to perfectly represent reality. It comes ever so close but never perfect, and it seemed to me that this was unsatisfactory. Certainly from a pragmatic approach this was fine, but from a philosophical viewpoint it troubled me. Yet another arrow into the target for my mismatched theory.
I found that in every area of life, whether it be work, social, family etc, that there is always a feeling of "mismatchedness". Nothing is the way that it ought to be. I wondered why I thought it ought to be another way unless I was designed to live a certain way, but I was actually living contrary to that design.
And was I alone in this conviction?

Everything You Know Is Wrong pt1

Weird Al Yankovic wrote a song called "Everything You know is wrong".

Yankovic's lyrics read thus,
"Everything you know is wrong
Black is white, up is down and short is long
And everything you thought was just so
Important doesn't matter"

I remember hearing it years ago and it just clicked with me. From the time I was about 10 years old I had felt that there was something very wrong about the world. I don't mean the corrupt politics, or the secret business deals, or any number of evils that abound in the world. Everyone is aware of those things really, apart from naive simpletons and small children (who should rightly be protected from such harsh realities).

No, what I am talking about runs far deeper than any conspiracy theorist could imagine. I felt that there was a fundamental "wrongness" about everything that existed. I couldn't explain it, but I was convinced that nothing in this world was as it should be. It was like there was a way that things were meant to be, and ought to be, but it wasn't that way.

I felt as if perhaps at some point in history, there had been a branching, and the universe had taken a turn for the worse. Perhaps in another dimension an alternate universe existed that I belonged to. A universe in which I was destined to exist in, but somehow I ended up in this one.

It is no strange thing then that the song by Petra titled "Not of this world" struck such a chord with me. The lyrics read,
"We are pilgrims in a strange land
We are so far from our homeland
With each passing day it seems so clear
This world will never want us here
We're not welcome in this world of wrong
We are foreigners who don't belong
We are strangers, we are aliens
We are not of this world"

On hearing these lyrics, I felt like screaming "Yes! That is exactly how I feel". However, nobody could tell me why this was the case. Perhaps I was mad, perhaps I was deluded in some way into thinking I didn't belong in this world. Maybe some higher power was playing an enormous hoax on my mind. Whatever it was, I felt this great displacement from my observed reality, and what I couldn't understand was how so many people seemed completely oblivious to the mismatched reality of their lives in this world.

I suppose this sort of feeling is the basis of so many people heartily embracing non-conformity, and leading many others to some kind of nihilistic despair. However for me, it began to lead me into the search for the reason behind this pervading sense of wrongness.

Before I even knew of people like St Anselm, or Descartes, or knew what ontological meant, I was beginning to formulate my own ontological argument for something deeper and larger than what I understood the world to know. If I had this fundamental sense of not belonging in this world, then perhaps, even if only in part, it was true. If I had such a strong sense of wrongness about the world, and there was no other reason to believe that I was mad or deluded, then it was almost certain in my mind that even if everything was not wrong, then at least some of it had to be. If I have such a deep and unfulfilled desire for something that I knew not what, then that something had to exist. C. S. Lewis put it like this:
"A man's physical hunger does not prove that man will get any bread; he may die of starvation on a raft in the Atlantic. But surely a man's hunger does prove that he comes of a race which repairs its body by eating and inhabits a world where eatable substances exist. In the same way, though I do not believe (I wish I did) that my desire for Paradise proves that I shall enjoy it, I think it a pretty good indication that such a thing exists and that some men will. A man may love a woman and not win her; but it would be very odd if the phenomenon called "falling in love" occurred in a sexless world."

This seemed to me a most satisfactory argument, though I did not find this passage of writing until years after I had discovered the concept. The reading of it was the first time I had seen it explained so succinctly.

So now I had discovered that perhaps I wasn't completely out of my mind, and there was maybe some truth to these concepts that permeated my being. Not satisfied with merely an ontological argument I was convinced that there was more to know. The line of reasoning that had brought me thus far was really only useful to point out and support the sense that I had in my inner being. How to find out more would have to come with a more systematic approach, and perhaps a great deal of reading and thinking. I was convinced that if I was right, then there would be evidence everywhere to support it.

The Final Whistle ...

Victory to Australia!

Well, the long weekend is over and the Australian Socceroos have succeeded in winning their first game in the World cup, against Japan.

I spent the evening (and early morning) at a friends house. He had set up a large projection screen and had the lounges and chairs arranged for a comfortable view of the match for about a dozen or more of us that arrived. After a few games of pool on the nearby billiards table we settled in to watch the match.

Having conceeded a goal in the first half, the socceroos must have tasted bitter disappointment, and it seemed that it was impossible to break through the defence of the Japanese team despite a much higher shot rate at goal. However in the last 8 minutes or so of the game, when Australia scored the equaliser, then a second and finally a third goal, the triumph was complete.
With each successive goal, our screams of jubilation rose until it reached a crescendo of cheers, whistles, and "woohoos". I must say that I did feel somewhat sorry for the surrounding neighbours that weren't soccer supporters, because anyone who was asleep within a kilometre radius would surely have sat bolt upright in bed at the cacophony of male voices that echoed throughout the suburb at each and every moment that Australia scored, and especially at the final whistle.

There is a certain comraderie that is felt between men of similar mind, and similar desires. When they get together to share in the enjoyment of a similarly appreciated sporting event, even more so. However, I have never heard a more disjointed and staggered rendition of the Australian National Anthem such as the one that we men attempted at the beginning of the socceroos debut match. We were out of tune, out of time, and quite possibly some of us were out of our minds, but we all stood together with patriotic pride to indicate the appreciation we have for our country. Our origins may have been Scottish, British, German, or any other country represented there, however we all became united by a common love. A love of this country and a love of soccer (except for the guy with the funny haircut!). We shared that night, a common desire of victory despite the odds.
When those desires are fulfilled by the victory of a sporting team, especially one of national representation, then the comraderie is sweet indeed.

Now, what better common love and desire is there, in the history of mankind, than to seek the deepest mysteries that underpin, the universe, our world, and our individual lives, and to know Him who is behind it all, who has the key to our ultimate joy. The sharing of our common spiritual ancestry, and the will to discover and share the purpose innate in that commonality must be the cause of the greatest comraderie that ever could be.

I wonder if we will ever in this life cheer as loudly about the victory we have in Christ. I suspect that when he scores that final goal that seals the fate of the opposition, and then that final whistle blows, there will be a triumphant cheer that will wake up not only the neighbours, but every creature both physical and spiritual in all existence. Unlike a soccer match, the victory in this game is guaranteed, and we await the final whistle with great anticipation.
Now that is a game to get excited about!

Your number is up. My word!

Pythagoras of Samos believed that the ultimate reality of nature is number.

He had perhaps a greater insight than he realised, because as we know today, numbers and associated theories and laws have formed the fundamental foundation necessary for the success of modern science. Not only that, but somehow we discovered that there are certain numbers that seem to underpin the very reality of our physical universe. Consider the numbers pi and e. Both are transcendental numbers which mean that they are infinitely long and have no pattern to their decimal places. Pi, which is the number that represents the ratio of a circles diameter to its circumference is from memory is approximately 3.141592635. It has been calculated to in excess of 8 billion decimal places, yet still there is no pattern. Each discovered extra decimal place is as unpredictable as the previous one and it is one of the few truly random numbers in the universe. It continues with infinite decimal places of unpredictable numbers which has led some mathematicians to believe that discovering pi's secret will help them better understand the universe. I suspect that the infinitude of Pi is perhaps a statement of the omnipotence of God.

e is also a transcendental number and it represents the natural logarithm.

These transcendental numbers are universally profound and fundamental in the reality that we experience.

I suspect Pythagoras was nearly right with his statement that the ultimate reality of nature is number but only partly. Of course, number is fundamental in this world, however word encompasses number, though number cannot encompass word. That is you can express number in language but you cannot express word in mathematics. In a sense number is a subset of word. Therefore word is the greater of the two in real terms, and suggests a very high likelihood on the prime importance of word above all else.

Word can express wisdom, emotion, knowledge, fact, beauty, and of course mathematics. From the spoken word amazing things have happened both throughout history and in our own individual lives. If you subscribe to the Christian belief with respect to origins, then the universe was brought into existence by the very words of God. With words we can bring a person out of the utmost despair with verbal expressions of love and encouragement, or we can destroy their happiness and send them to the pits of misery with venomous words of hate. With words we can speak the truth that sets people free, or we can bind them in ignorance with lies. With words we can appease an angry nation, or incite them to bloody war.

Word can educate or oppress, and despite the language barrier between races, can bring together a global community.
In his gospel account, John of the first century writes that "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God". I find it no surprise that the word has such power because the Word is the ultimate power in the universe, and predates all history and all matter.
Pi is an amazing transcendental number, but the Word even transcends it!

Faith in what?

Should one meet that dogged naturalist,
who claims also to be a factualist,
take heed to what they saith,
and note how they have faith,
in things to which the truth is partial,
and to how with all their strength they marshal,
conclusions in which they have no room,
restricted by the things they assume.

Note how even the simplest of thinkers,
will presume (in philosophy he tinkers),
in things beyond his full understanding,
the grounds in which he has no landing.
Even so that enigmatic specialist,
who claims never to have merely missed,
that point of dissenting view,
or accept that he never knew,
that belief is what drives us to discover more,
and that facts alone can never reveal the core,
of who we are and why we're here and what we have to do
and how our very hearts and minds belong to you know who.

It doesn't matter who you are, or what your upbringing or environment is, there seems to me to be an almost universal truth that has applied to virtually everyone I have met. That is, that the power of a person's belief will usually overpower an argument that is contrary to it. Very few people are completely and utterly impartial in their understanding an conclusions in this world.

Let me give you an example. My wife works with some people that demonstrate a classic case in this respect. One of the dogmatically held beliefs, held mostly by the overweight people at her work, is that some people are just lucky with their weight, and if you are unlucky then there is nothing you can do about it. Perhaps it has something to do with metabolism or thyroid they might argue, but nonetheless some people are lucky and others aren't. Apparently my wife falls into the former category. The fact that she has maintained a good figure in their eyes is because she is lucky, or she finds weight control easy or any number of emotional reasons. They are always surprised at how little she eats at work and say that no-one could survive on that little amount of food, and that she must be eating on the sly.

Perhaps they think she eats healthy meals for show! Then they complain about how lucky she is that she has a good figure. They say she is "small-boned", which she isn't. They say that she has hereditary or genetic advantage, which she doesn't. In fact almost all of her relatives are overweight to some degree, some excessively so. They say she mustn't get hungry, but she does. Any number of weird an irrational argument will spout forth from their lips in spite of the evidence because they already believe that a persons weight has to do with the luck of the draw in life.

I think that one of the most frustrating and counter-productive characteristics that a person could have is to be closed-minded with regard to what they believe, especially when they hold such strong beliefs about topics they only partially understand, or even have no knowledge about.

The truth is that people believe what they do, in most circumstances, because they want to believe it. For the overweight people, it is more comforting to believe that there is some divine injustice in the world that makes some people overweight and others to have a healthy body. The more difficult to accept truth is that they are responsible for their own weight control. Complaining about a persons lucky disposition to be thin while eating a hamburger, two donuts, a meat pie and drinking a litre of Coke is a clear case of belief overpowering the logical truth.

People don't believe in God because they don't want to. Who wants to believe in a God who has ultimate power over our eternal destiny and will judge us according to our actions? Who wants to believe in a God who places expectations on our lives that are hard to live up to and will require us to give up some things that we would like to keep? Who wants to believe in a God who wants us to submit to His rule in our lives and lays out a path of ridicule and persecution before us?

But that is not the most important question. The prime query of importance is not whether God is a desirable concept but whether or not it is true that God exists.
People will go to extraordinary lengths to rationalise away the need for God because His existence threatens our autonomy. They will earnestly seek the evidence to support what they already believe, and desperately try to turn around the facts that don't.

Every person has faith. It is the object of the faith that varies. To some it is science, or the ability of man to persevere and overcome. To others it is an omnipotent being who has a master plan. To yet others it is the self or perhaps the pantheistic all. To those who don't believe in faith, you simply just need to examine your daily life. By getting up when your alarm sounds you are exercising faith in the alarm clock (or the designers and builders of it) that it is working correctly. You get in your car as you leave for work and you have faith in the engineers and manufacturers and automotive governing bodies that your vehicle is safe (perhaps also your mechanic). Even the act of sitting on a chair is an act of faith because you are trusting in the ability of the designer and manufacturer of that chair that it will hold your weight. Now people may say that it is a proven thing rather than faith. For instance, we look at a chair and we see that it looks very similar to many other chairs that we have sat on before and they all held our weight, so logically this chair should conform to this idea and also support us. However, this particular chair may look similar but be different that others so there is still a degree of faith, however small, that is needed. In fact, without faith, we would not be able to get anything done in life. We simply cannot understand the complex theories behind everything that we use in life so we have to trust in those who have the expertise. Imagine not accepting a doctors diagnosis until you could prove it from first principles. The 6 years of study involved (assuming you have the academic ability) just to verify the diagnosis is absurd. The untreated illness may have killed us by that time. No, we have to trust in people directly and indirectly, and things or concepts in the abstract sense at least.

Science was born out of faith. Without faith that the universe has some sort of order to it, we would never have discovered it. Many people don't realise that the great fathers of modern science all discovered amazing things because they believed it was there to be discovered, and they had a world view that accommodated the vast possibilities. A universe that was designed by a Creator, must have a logical design. That structure and order must be evident in the things of the world and it must be possible to discover them. Edison didn't give up after a few tries when attempting to make a light bulb. He continued with thousands of different materials because he believed that he would eventually find the right one. Faith in a solution was his ally. It was possible of course that he would be wrong, in which case his time would have been completely wasted and we would not have the incandescent light bulb today. The point of most importance is choosing an object of your faith that is to the best of your knowledge trustworthy and reliable and have your beliefs flow out of that. Then having the flexibilty to modify those beliefs when proven otherwise.

Big bang theorists and macro evolutionist have struggled through experiment after experiment, and setback after setback, to try and prove conclusively their theories, and every step of the way they come up with weirder and more implausible explanations because they hold dogmatically to their belief, despite other evidence. Very few people are true authentic scientists, and when I discover them I have a great deal of respect for them. Professor Paul Davies is one of them, and he also criticises other pseudo-scientists who popularise unproven theories as though they were ultimate and proven truth. He is by no means a theist, but he is wise enough to recognise that our theories about origins are just that: theories. They are not laws and they are definitely not infallible. In fact there are an abundance of flaws in most of the current popular theories. He recognises that there has to be some deeper underpinning to the universe. A power or inevitability that is simply not explained through materialistic philosophy.

Ultimately we need to accept that as human beings we simply do not act as purely rational and logical creatures. We believe what we decide to believe for what ever reason that might be, and then we try to squeeze the facts in to support our belief while brushing aside those facts that contradict our views.

Only when we recognise this, will we be able to break through our psychological and emotional limitations, and then begin to see real truth for what it is and accept the consequences and logical outworkings of it without prejudice.

My Home Allegory

I had a plan.

It took a while to design this plan.
I gathered together all the ideas that I had gained over the years. From various sources I chose what I considered the best features, and applied them in ways that would suit me the best.
A room here, a bathroom there, a strategically placed hallway, stairs to a mezzanine area on one side and sunken living room on the other.
Each of these features I had seen used elsewhere in other peoples homes but had never quite seen a home with everything that I liked. The only solution of course, was to design my own so that I could build it to have every feature that I felt useful and necessary.

It seemed like a great strategy for building the best home for me. Of course it would not suit everyone, but that was the great thing about having the freedom of choice to have a home that reflected my personality with the quirky features that I believed would make me feel "at home".

I then set about to build this home. It was a labourious task, and took a little longer than I expected, and despite criticisms from various people who said I should build my house like theirs, I persevered and eventually completed the construction exactly the way I wanted. Now I could sit back and enjoy it.

The only problem was that after only six months the upstairs bathroom began to leak through the floor into the living room downstairs. Everytime I had a shower, the living room ceiling would drip water onto the carpet and coffee table. Unfortunately I had not put enough thought into waterproofing and plumbing. Some of the piping was not designed properly and so it also didn't flow enough water causing it to back up and flood the rooms. Other parts of the house began to develop cracks because I had not put enough thought into the structural support. One of the piers had shifted and a whole section of the external wall of the dining room wall was staggered and separating. It seems that I had not put enough thought into getting the right foundations either.

People kept telling me that I should have consulted the Architect before I built, but I argued that I didn't need the Architect to stick his nose into the design of my house. I built it the way I wanted because I knew an Architect would have too many restrictions on how things were done, and that would limit the ability for me to express my character and emotion in my home. Then they suggested that I get the Architect to look at the damage of my home because they thought that he would know how to fix it.

I decided that I did not want to involve someone else in my home, especially not the Architect. This was my home and I had the right to have it however I chose. I would do the repairs myself. I would fix the foundations, bolster up the structural components, and repair the plumbing. After a couple of years however I discovered that it wasn't ever going to work. No sooner had I fixed one problem, then another one would re-surface even worse than before. My home was literally falling down around my ears. If I didn't do something about it then I would have no home left. My home was beginning to resemble a big pile of junk and I began to really hate my home.

With a certain amount of reluctance I realised that I just had to swallow my pride and go to the Architect for help. I had to humble myself in the knowledge that I really didn't know how to build a home properly, and needed to trust the Architect and allow him to design my home for me. What I wasn't ready for was his verdict that my existing home had to be completely demolished. Everything apparently had to be torn down before the new home could be built. This was very hard to take because there were so many things about my old home that I really loved. In the end I agreed, though, and the new plans were drawn up and then approved. When it came to the construction of my new home, however, I decided that there were some parts of the old home that I really couldn't give up so I decided to re-use them in the new home.

Eventually the new home was sufficiently constructed to the point that it was habitable again. But I was to discover that the parts of the old home that I had coveted and secretly re-used in the new home would be my downfall. Some of the parts had hidden flaws in them and began to fall apart. One of the ornamental architraves that I had saved from the old home was infested with termites, and before I knew it half of my home was destroyed like it had been struck down with cancer. I was very distraught now and realised why the Architect had told me that the old home needed to be completely destroyed.

Again I had to go before the Architect in humility and plead with him to help me fix the damage that I had caused to my new home. Thankfully he did so and it was repaired as good as new.

Some years later, I began to get comfortable with my new home, and perhaps a little bored with it, so I decided that I would build a new wing. Perhaps because I had forgotten the grief and distress I had suffered prior to allowing the Architect to intervene, or perhaps I had foolishly believed that I knew more about building a good home than before, but I decided to do it on my own without the help of the Architect.

It doesn't take a genius to realise that I didn't use the correct foundation, and neglected to build the structure properly, which meant that the entire wing eventually had to be demolished. Fortunately most of the original structure of the new home remained intact because of its strong foundation.

Now I come to the realisation that I will never be able to improve my home or learn how to enjoy my home to the fullest extent unless I consult the Architect every step of the way. Attempting to do anything in my home without him is foolish and futile and will never stand the test of time. In the building of any home, if you want it to endure and be the best home that you could ever have, then it pays in the long run to consult the Architect first.

In case you didn't get the allegorical reference, replace "home" with "life" and then replace "the Architect" with "God" and read again.

Australian Idol (shower version)

Sometimes I fancy myself as a bit of a singer.

It usually happens when I am in the shower making up some crazy melody that I belt out at the top of my lungs. For a moment I think that I could really write a good song if I could just get that melody down and figure out some chords to support it. More often than not, it slips from my mind when I am in front of the computer ready to lay it down. Then briefly I feel like the character in Tenacious D's Tribute. If you are not familiar with this song then I will explain. The character in the song meets the Devil, who demands that he play the best song in the world or the Devil will eat his soul. Spontaneously he begins to play, and it just so happened to be the best song in the world. Unfortunately he cannot remember the tune, and goes on to say that this song doesn't sound anything like it, but if you were there you would have believed it.

Now I am really just being humourous in the way that Jack Black was, because I don't really consider myself to be a very good singer (I certainly wouldn't ever consider doing something as stupid as entering Australian Idol), but this morning as I sang away with unselfconscious abandon, I really did think I hit a good tune. Perhaps it was because I was in a really funky mood or maybe it was merely because I was singing a praise to God that I really meant, but it flowed and rhymed like I have never done before. It was like I was inspired. "What a great song!" I thought, I really should record that.

As I was coming down the stairs and the tune mercilessly faded from my mind I realised something with percussive clarity. Whether or not what I had sung was the best song in the world (of course I am sure that it was not) it didn't really matter because it didn't need to be recorded. How convenient I hear you say! However one thing I know, is that the song was heard by someone. In fact, it was heard at least by the person that it was spontaneously written and performed for (and perhaps a few of my neighbours as well whether they wanted to or not). Nobody else needed to hear it though. If I had a need to perform it in front of people it might actually be because of a sense of pride - a puffed up self importance, or the desire for someone to recognise my skill in performing, or even my abilities as a songwriter. But that would just water down and corrupt the real beauty of an inspired audience with God. And what is the prime purpose of man if it is not to give praise and recognition to that which is infinitely greater than he, and from whom he receives all good things. It is the best of celebrations.

No man need know, nor congratualte, nor verify me, nor acknowledge any great thing that I might claim about myself. The one greater than all has already done so in a way so profound that even if there were no other happy moments in my life until the passing of it, joy would still abound unending.

I can't get no ...

The Rolling Stones sang "I can't get no satisfaction". A poignant statement about human desires and our inability to fulfil them.

Lewis wrote about this longing that all men seem to have for something other and greater than what we know. Using an argument similar to the ontological arguments of Anselm and writings of Thomas Aquinas, C. S. Lewis argued that since we have a longing, there must exist an object that satisfies it. He writes "Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. . . If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. "

Yet he goes even further than this by explicitly suggesting that although the fulfilment of this longing will occur some day and be very satisfying, just the longing for such a fulfillment gives us more joy than the consummation of any longing that we can satisfy on our own. There is not just a deeper level of satisfaction but a complete paradigm shift to how real satisfaction is obtained.

It is like the mists on a wind. It can be right in front of us, but the moment we reach out to grasp it, it slips right through our fingers. The more we chase the mists, repeatedly and desperately clutching for them, the more likely we are to trip over somethings as we run, or even fall into a dark pool that we may not be able get out of. We might therfore hope that one day we will have hands that can grab that elusive "mist" and hold it like a precious thing in our hands.

One of my all time favourite books is a fiction by Lewis titled "The Great Divorce" in which he investigates allegorically the concept of people moving inexorably towards one direction or another. It is a dichotomy of spiritual choice. We either are living with the purpose of incrementally becoming better people, or through our resistance to authority, and unwillingness to let go of our foolishness, we are gradually sliding into a pit from which we will never return.
The most striking imagery that occurs in this book is the difference between things of substance, and those without. When our main character visits the edge of a place of real susbtance, he finds that he himself is not really a man of susbtance, and it is only in the light of comparison that it has become so clear. His body seems almost transparent compared to the richness and vividness of his surroundings, and he is so insubstantial that even the blades of grass wont bend underfoot. Lewis alludes to a reality of infinitely higher greatness and worth than the world of mere material importance. In this reality, if we are a person that is moving down the better path, then we will somehow achieve real substance, and those blades will bend underfoot, and our appearance will be more solid, and maybe we will be able to reach out and grab those misty treasures that currently elude us.

Party party party?

Most Australians don't need much of a reason to party.

This is most especially true of young people. In fact it seems to be an integral part of our culture. We celebrate our birthdays, Christmas, Easter, New Years Eve, Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Labour Day, and Queens Birthday. We also have celebrations for various other life achievements like graduating school (primary, secondary and tertiary levels) as well as many other levels of achievement through out our lives. On top of this, we will take advantage of a favourable outcome in our sporting competitions, whether they are Rugby League, Australian Football League, or various other sports. The same also applies to motor sports and in particular the legendary Bathurst 1000. Apart from all of these special events, so to speak, there are various other times at which people decide to get together and party. Then there is the considerable amount of people who frequent pubs and clubs every weekend in order to drink and have a good time.

Why am I so thoroughly itemising every occasion that people use for a party? Simply because I wanted to show how frequently Australians like to party. Perhaps this is similar in many other countries also, and this may just be an attribute of human nature, that we like to celebrate and have a good time. And honestly who can blame a person for wanting to enjoy their life with friends.

However I wonder if we are partying ourselves to death in a most undesirable way. When I was still studying, I worked in numerous factories to pay for my studies. Overwhelmingly most of the people I met in these jobs were doing what Loverboy called "Working for the Weekend". Their working days were menial, boring and unfulfilling, made only mildly bearable by the radio that transported them mentally away from their mundane environment. All thoughts, all efforts, and all desires were for the weekend when they would get drunk, party hard, and hopefully find someone to "root".

To me this seemed to be the most dreary and depressing sort of existence I could imagine in our culture. One of the jobs I worked at was for a landscape supplier. His son had dropped out of university because of how difficult he found it, and the son had resigned himself to working in the factory, and eventually taking over his Fathers business. I had just about finished work there for the holidays and was to shortly return to University. He said to me that I would come back after next term and that I would not be able to finish my University degree. I silently vowed that I would never return to that factory, my resolve mostly driven by my dislike of the soul-less, superficial lifestyle associated with so many of the workers there. I knew that there had to be more to life than their shallow existence.

I disliked the coarseness of their language and their behaviour. I abhorred the way they treated women as objects of sexual conquest, and I loathed the pointless repetition of their lifestyles. However I think the thing that offended my sense of propriety most, was the inappropriateness in their lack of reason for celebration. If one was to try and pinpoint a reason for their apparent exuberance for the party lifestyle, the only answer to be found would be the celebration of maximising ones pleasure of the senses. One person I know put it more elegantly than I could so I will quote his motto: "Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, beer in one hand and boobs in the other, body thoroughly worn out, and screaming WOO HOO"

I felt then, and I feel perhaps even more strongly now, that celebration is infinitely sweeter and more satisfying when there is a good reason for it. Party for party's sake is a poor substitute for authentic celebration due to the victory of your favourite sports team, for instance. Even more so when the victory is personally yours, or you have had some fortuitous event occur. What is satisfying the most I believe is the celebration of the great things that God has done in our lives

There is a right time to laugh and an appropriate time to cry, and a time to party and a time to ponder. It seems to me that a fulfilling life is also a balanced life, whereby you respond appropriately to the given situation. Challenges in life are to be learned from (not shied away from or drowned out with alcohol) and good fortune is to be vigorously celebrated.

The perpetual pursuit of pleasure indicates two things to me. Firstly that people recognise that regular life is not enough to satisfy, so they constantly seek to maximise the joy and minimise the pain. And secondly that there is something missing from the attempts to enjoy life that just doesn't deliver the goods for the longings that we have.

There seems to be this rule at work where the efforts of continuing to maximise our enjoyment of life, will lead us to a place where there is no true satisfaction. Seeking to gain a fuller life (through seeking pleasure, enjoyment, and satisfaction) will cause us to actually lose what life we do have. I have seen it often, where the end result is in fact not more than when a person started, but less. There comes an enslavement to a person's life when they fall into the trap of relentlessly seeking pleasure, like an addiction to alcohol or drugs. This happens because the satisfaction lessens the more strenously we seek it, and the dulling effect is just like that of drugs, which cause a person to escalate into ever more powerful methods of satisfaction. The resulting life spiral sends a person to the very depths of a miserable existence.

Ironically though, when one seeks to do what is right there comes a joy that inexpressibly satisfies regardless of the circumstances. More of this perhaps next time when I wish to address further the concept of this longing that we have.

Spread too thin

I often consider that I have far too much interest in far too many things.

Perhaps I get this from my Father. He had wide and varied interests and was able to try his hand at just about anything with great success. You have probably heard the saying that a person can be a "Jack of all trades but master of none". I felt that that saying applied to my Father in exactly the same way that a square peg fits into a round hole. In other words, not at all. Somehow he had this uncanny ability to discover, analyse and replicate just about any process that involved the use of his hands. From menial tasks to complex and difficult projects, he was able to master them all. The only things he never mastered were those things he never found an interest in trying (electronics and computers were on the short list). It may sound like perhaps I am exaggerating, however let me list some things that he became very proficient in to prove that I am not using hyperbole. His accomplished skills included mould making, panel beating, spray painting, most building trade skills such as painting, bricklaying, carpentry, electrical, plastering, tiling, excavation (bobcat and jackhammering), landscape gardening, welding, and automotive mechanical work just to name a few. He was also able to name any Australian bird by hearing its call, spot a rabbit from 200m and bring it down with a rifle shot, survive in the Australian bush on bush tucker alone, and for many years he rode a 3 speed bicycle to work every day a distance of more than a 70km round trip.
Sadly he passed away some years ago but there is no doubt that he was a remarkable man with many and varied interests.

Living up to this standard is extraordinarily difficult, so I don't really worry about it too much, but I have discovered that I share with him the same insatiable appetite for variety in life. I have completely stripped down and rebuilt probably 4 or 5 cars, played with, broken and repaired many computers, written numerous computer programs and databases, hold a university degree in Mechanical Engineering, raced Motocross for a while, competed in state Drift events, built my own pool and landscaped the yard (including paving, retaining walls, bricklaying, plumbing), learnt how to electrically wire my house with a comprehensive alarm system, CAT5 network, and telephony, learnt how to play better-than-average guitar, produced and recorded my own rock CD, begun to learn Greek and Japanese, and have a deep interest in philosophy. I say these things not to boast, and I certainly don't make any claims to being exceptionally good at any of these things I have listed, but it is just a way of showing what varied interests I have.

This intense interest in so many things in the world is surely an example of a great appreciation and thankfulness for every good thing I see. I find that when I discover a new topic that takes my interest I have to be disciplined to decide that I cannot afford the time to delve deeper into this interest without it adversely affecting what I already do. In principle I think that the initial attraction is a positive thing. It means that I find God's earth an amazing and captivating environment to be in. I find that as I get older, I also appreciate at a much deeper level the complexity and orderedness of the universe in all its aspects, whether the unspoiled "natural" or man-altered "non-natural" or the transcendent "supernatural" things. As I say, in principle this is a good thing. It only becomes a problem in the practice of attempting to manifest so many interests in one life.

Now, to the point of this particular blog. I think maybe I am interested in too many things, and perhaps I don't do justice to any of them quite as well as I know I could. I think of top professionals in their fields and consider the amount of time and effort they dedicate to perfecting their work. Top sportsmen for example spend a great deal of their time in training, attempting to improve their game or event. Top businessmen dedicate most of their time to researching and learning the necessary techniques in order to become the best in their field. Perhaps since my time is so thinly spread across too many interests, I don't excel in any of them. Although not directly related, I have always liked the line of Bilbo's in the Fellowship of the Ring when he said "Why, I feel all thin, sort of stretched, if you know what I mean; like butter that has been scraped over too much bread. That can't be right."

I suppose over the years I have come to recognise this more and more, and so I have begun to plan how to apply a solution to this. I find that I now consciously put aside things that I find very appealing, simply because I cannot fit them in. Also I have seen the need to cull some things in order to excel at others. This brings me to probably one of the most important things a person can do in their life. That is, prioritisation. We need to develop a good system for deciding what those things are that are the most important and useful given the circumstances and abilities that we have been given. Fundamentally we need to first do that which we ought to do. Then we need to choose that which is most beneficial for the overall goal of our lives. And that goal may very well be an unselfish one. I suspect that this is the best type of goal to have.
Can we say that what we are doing at any particular moment in our lives, is an important, honorable and worthwhile endeavour, that is the path to a noble goal?

I have always felt that I had important things to say, but to date I haven't had much opportunity to share them. Perhaps beginning with this blog site this might change.
If you find anything encouraging or helpful in my blogs, then please leave a comment with your thoughts.
Here's to being the best person we can be in every situation.

Change ... or not.

How does a person go about changing themselves?

That is, of course, assuming that you want to change. I suppose if you have a high self esteem and believe your flaws are little or non existent then there is no impetus for change, but I see that as an arrogance on the part of any man who makes such a claim, and an indication of poor self awareness. Or at the very least, an insensitivity to ones impact on other people.

I mean, if you are an introspective person like me, then you are abundantly aware of your shortcomings and faults. Often it is quite easy to realise that a particular trait you have is holding you back in some way from being as effective or productive as you possibly could be.

I know of many people who fear change in their lives, and not just personal change, but change of circumstances or change of environment. Change can also be stressful, but surprisingly when you embrace a change for the good, it can also be very exhilarating.

My wife and I are generally quite open to change in our lives, at least the change in environment or circumstances. We both find it an exciting thing when we independently come to the realisation that it is time for change in some way. Like the time we bought our first house, and again 7 years later when we decided to move. It has happened also when we have decided to change churches, and again when we decided to have kids. Every time we get that deep seated conviction that a change is good, we become restless about where we are, and feel almost compelled to move into that change. And when you have spent a considerable amount of time in prayer about something (especially when you are initially unsure about it) and then you finally come to a sense of peace and conviction about it, it seems pointless to stay where you are. Even more so when two people independently come to such a conviction in this way, since it is like a validation of fate, if you will. A confirmation of a good path to take, perhaps in a personal sense the knowledge of God's will.

But that is merely environmental or circumstantial change. To change one or more components or characteristics of who we are as people, is perhaps a much bigger challenge. The first part of the challenge is actually recognising the need for the change. Perhaps one of the biggest problems in today's culture is the fundamental lack of self examination. There is a prevalent ethos that (apart from criminals which most of us believe we are not) there is no ultimate right and wrong; only variation. Through this line of reasoning each of us should be proud of who we are and rejoice in our uniqueness, believe in ourselves, never doubt ourselves, and never waste time with guilt. From this point of view with our self-boosted ego, a person almost definitely will not see a need or feel compelled to change.

Unfortunately without a benchmark standard, (an external ultimate framework of morality), we tend to wallow in the sea of relativism where every view is different, and every view is good (which is the same as saying nothing is good or better). The age old virtue of discernment is discarded as irrelevant, and everything holds the same value, which is really the same as saying nothing has any particular value. This evil manifests itself in the schools where children are discouraged from competitive behaviour (a child has no right to be better than another child), and in the battle of the sexes where women demand equality with men in everything. The problem with the schools standpoint is that discouraging competition leads not to lifting the low to a higher level of excellence, but rather dragging down the high to a level of mediocrity. The problem with feminism is that it doesn't recognise that women are better than men in some things, and men are better than women in other things. It is the way God designed us in order to complement each other and make two halves into a better whole. This is also the main reason why homosexuality can never be of the same balanced and productive standard as a heterosexual relationship which we were designed for, nor can it be a healthy environment in which to raise children. Distinction through good discernment is essential for promoting good, and improving life and self.

So, it is important to realise that inner change is necessary. That many people don't recognise this is tragic not only for the individual, but also for society as a whole.

However, if we recognise we need to change, we have to find a way for it to be effective and lasting. I know that often when I make a resolution to change in a particular way, I become very enthusiastic about it and implement some method for the change to occur and for a time it seems to have worked. Then slowly, or sometimes suddenly, I fall back into the old ways. The paradoxical saying again echoes in my mind "The thing that I want to do I do not do, and the very thing that I do not want to do; that I do".

Somehow there is a law at work in me that fights against my efforts towards change for the better. There seems to be a universal flaw in mankind that prevents us from keeping our resolutions, and it often takes an extraordinary amount of effort to make them stick. Clear evidence of this is how many people decide to get fit, then purchase exercise equipment, only to have it sit disused in the corner of the room. Have a look in the For Sale section to see how many exercise bikes or treadmills are for sale second hand and are described as "hardly used".

No, deciding to change is not nearly enough. Doing the things to change is not enough either. The change has to be deep within us and fundamental to our being. To change our very being, to manipulate the very core structure of who we are as individuals is something that requires expertise and superior knowledge.
Take the example of the computer, for it is such a good concept for life analogies. When I am using a computer program, such as Microsoft Word, to write a story, I can do all sorts of wonderful things like formatting text and embedding pictures, and many other things to customise my story to be the way I want it to appear. If however I discovered a flaw that some malicious person had introduced into the program that caused the program to crash and make me lose all of my unsaved work, I would be most upset. The program was not meant to do that. That particular feature was not a desired one and can be very damaging to my document. I might lose a large part of my story, or the whole story could become corrupted. If I wish to continue using this version of Microsoft Word, the only way to avoid this problem in the future is to have the programmer or designer of Word fix the bug by breaking apart the code, finding the offending segment, and modifying it back to how it was initially designed. It requires intimate knowledge of not only the programming language, but also the structure of the Word program itself.
So apologies for those who are non-technical, but hopefully you can see the analogy. The operating system is the universe in which we live. The program is the life that we have been given, and we are the operator at the computer making decisions about how we want to write the story that is the events in our lives.

However, unlike a computer program that can just be re-installed when it becomes corrupted, we are only given one life to live (sorry to the Hindus and others who believe in re-incarnation - you are wrong). It cannot be replaced, it must be repaired. However we do not have the knowledge and expertise to perform these delicate internal modifications to ourselves. Nor in fact, are we even knowledgeable enough to even recognise most of the subtle bugs that pervade our lives and covertly sabotage our chances of a life full of joy.

No, we must call on the Designer of Life to repair and reconfigure us in ways that we simply cannot. It takes first the recognition that the flaw exists and it exists in us. The Manual of Life can help us to see these flaws clearly, and even give us the direction in which we should be moving. It takes a humbling of the heart to surrender that part of ourselves that is corrupting us, to give it over and earnestly ask the Designer to make the changes in us. All that remains is the continual willingness to travel the difficult path that will lead us towards good. Meanwhile the designer will do all that is necessary with the internal modifications that makes this path an easier one to travel, and we will find ourselves equipped for every good task carrying a shield to protect us from the temptations and misleadings that may come to destroy like computer viruses do.

Only then, can we bit by bit, and step by step move closer to the person we were designed to be.