Room 417

On the hallway wall next to the door is posted “Room 417 Storage”.  In this fairly new facility it is used as an occasional office.  The majority could not tell you where it is or for what purpose it is utilized.  I was assigned to sit in silence in Room 417 with three other people for two and a half hours.  I’m a teacher; you figure it out.  Here are my impressions of the space, the activity, and our path.

In a claustrophobic room

Painted white no decor there

Neither flower nor mind could bloom

Though florescent lights and vented air

 

 White noise from conditioned air

Abundant plastic, metal too

Nothing the senses would find fair

Though clean and bright and also new

 

Sanitized of all that harms

Disease, sharp corners, tanning rays

Not a thing the spirit alarms

Though emergency exits map ways

 

Thus the danger to our lives

All is well but dead inside

No awareness that life never thrives

Except in Sonshine and change of tide

Why Physics

Physics is the way to go

Or stop or go with the flow

Or at least know how it works

Like impulse of bumps and jerks

Who cares may be your question

Each action has reaction

Energy conserved as well

Even if you cannot tell

Not effect your life you say

Neglect it and you will pay

Efficiency or power

Safety of bridge or tower

Go away leave me alone

Please change frequency and tone

Add net force and head for home

Physics guide you as you roam

A Long Simmering Tale of Past Adventure Half-Sought

During D’s Christmas break, he, P, and I went to the Linville Gorge here in our county . Well, I had a bushwhacking in mind, knowing the gorge much better than in previous years.  We went atop the ridge, down a narrow cut between 300 foot cliffs, waded the river without mishap, went upstream, waded the river with some small clothes wetting, and started up the ridge.  The uphill was so strenuous that the clothes wetting and near-freezing temperatures were no problem.  Then began the adventure.  With the shortened hours of winter pushing us, we tried to find a trail I had never been on, though marked on the map.  We didn’t find it so we started up the side of the ridge, a very steep talus field.  From the bottom we could see that it would not be hard to avoid confronting a large cliff in this section so we pushed on confidently.  About halfway up we encountered the remains of a forest fire from about 5 years ago.  No, it’s not what you expect.  The downed pine trunks were thick and thicker still were the 4 year old saplings, about wrist thickness diameter, a foot to foot and a half apart and 6 to 8 feet tall.  The going got extremely difficult, steep upslope, flexible but stiff trunks to push through, and intertwined trunks in varying degrees of rot at waist or chest deep.  The way back was not an option with dark, potential wetting, and significant distance further to go.  The way forward seemed unassailable.  I knew we simply had to make the ridge and trail by dark, though it was obvious there was a goodly hike from there to the truck in the dark.  The guys quieted down to the labor ahead with only occasional exclamations of amazement at how laden with traps the way forward had become.  We reached the ridge as the last orange glow of sunset faded.  After a quick rest we began a long, quick-paced hike out, but the adventure was far from over.  Soon I had to don my head lamp, in recent years a necessary part of any hike, day or overnight.  We surged forward, but had to rest soon after the exertions of the entangled climb.  We got up and went on, noticing that we had a curious view of an adjoining valley we did not expect.  Yes, it was dark and so far moonless, but the lights in the valleys were as jewel-like as the stars. The ridge ran over to the left and the trail began to descend.  I began to have misgivings out loud but continued on.  D stopped us and explained why this could not be the way.  We turned, emotionally fatigued by the setback.  At the point we had stopped to rest we discovered the trail had taken a 180 degree switchback.  The trail we had started down, after inspection was the other end of the one we sought to find at the bottom of the gorge.  We rushed on through open forest across the top of the ridge, up and down.  After traversing a deep gap we were to come on top of a wide-backed, straight and level ridge before a steep drop to the truck, perhaps a mile and a half left.  Soon after we reached the top of the ridge we came upon our most mentally trying difficulty.  A more recent forest fire had totally decimated the landscape (we have suffered extended, several year drought which only in the last month did the NWS say was over).  There are scatter boulders, but otherwise large areas were ashen and very moon-scape in the starlight.  Nothing appeared alive and no remains of plant material was more than knee high.  The soil was almost entirely eroded into ash flows with 100+ yard lengths having no evidence of trail.  Then brush would obscure what indention in rock and gravel suggested the remains of trail.  There is a 300 foot cliff on the right and a long slope that extends for miles through National Forest on the left.  The way is forward.  I would have the guys stand at the last perceived semblance of trail while I searched the scorched landscape for evidence of the way forward.  When I found what seemed to be the way I would call them forward.  After a 1/2 mile or so intermittent areas of unburned forest would arise with definite trail and even blazes on trees, only to be followed by burned out moonscape again.  The temperature was dropping into the mid-twenties and the wind gusted hard in the bare places.  I was thankful for the cool heads of my guys and the seemingly strong headlamp.  Finally we came to the small, tree lined bog that marks the 3/4 point of the ridge.  From here on the forest was thick until we came back to our full circle and the way down where the older fire had ruined the now slowly returning south exposure pine forest.  To say we were exhausted seems trivial but we were also thankful.  P managed to get a cell phone call out (rare on this ridge) to say we were safe and don’t send out the rescue squad.  P has not been hiking since, nor has D but he has lacked opportunity.  I was very thankful for God’s watchcare over our adventure and my unwise choices.  It was an adventure to write home about and probably to give the old man a hard time over in future years. Did I learn anything?  That depends on who you ask.

Bored to Death

      On my classroom wall is posted the statement, “Bored is not a circumstance; it’s a state of mind.”  From the frequency of gaming, surfing the web and channels, and various other vicarious pursuits of entertainment coupled with short attention spans and lack of excitement for anything short of amazing I would say it is a common state of mind.  Other evidences may be harder to see: boredom with marriage, the job, the church, or life itself.  As Thomas Dubay puts it in The Evidential Power of Beauty boredom is “an insipid tedium with existence itself. Reality [is] a colossal blah.” (p.73)  What is the cause of this state of mind?  Part of Dubay’s answer is as follows: “The personal inability to perceive truth and beauty is related as first cousin, if not sibling, to a lack of wonder, which in turn, often if not always, arises from jadedness, from a perduring and even disgusting boredom caused by excess and overindulging” (p.72)  He is in fact repeating himself because jadedness means dullness brought on by excess.  So many people are seeking out more amazing, more sensually beautiful, or more violent stimulation to stave off boredom but these things are causing it.  In fact, “fully jaded men and women, old or young, marvel at nothing.” (p.73)  One area where this dullness is resulting in a desire to ramp up the stimulation is the immodesty of dress in public and in every form of media.  I think that the following statement relates to this idea: “It is one of the notable sadnesses of our time that so many are incapable of fascination with the deeper levels of human beauty, especially those rooted in the spirit, levels that far transcend physical attractiveness.” (Dubay, p.64) To summarize, boredom occurs because over stimulation dulls the mind so that it cannot in turn “perceive truth and beauty”.

          But if over stimulation were the primary cause would it not be eventually self-correcting when the stupor of dullness persists?  Would not the bored soul stop pushing forward into continued boredom?  I believe the answers are no.  The bored person is addicted to the stimulation of senses because he or she is trying to fill a great void, an emptiness in their soul brought on by their own sin or very frequently the hurt caused by someone else’s sin.  Jeremiah 2:13 says that people “hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water.”  Obviously the answer is not pouring in more stimulation to relieve the boredom or hurt because the void can never be filled that way.  As a friend of mine said recently, when people are so focused on themselves they cannot help but become bored.  They need to focus on something outside themselves. 

       You may say, “What’s the big deal.  Someone is bored.  Get up and do something; get over it.”  I am not referring to a momentary Tuesday afternoon lack of something to do.  As I have observed it this boredom is a growing disease that is robbing people of purpose and happiness.  To the unbeliever I would say, you need Jesus who can heal your sin and your hurts.  As He has said, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.” (Matthew 11:28)  God’s salvation is sufficient but that salvation will need to be worked into a person’s life through a growing relationship with God that will heal hurts.  The believer who is bored has either given up ground or never taken it from the enemy.  The first part of the verse above about broken cisterns says, “My people have committed two evils: The have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters”.  Our primary focus must be God.  Part of the solution for the believer may be to fast from mere entertainments and seek more profound beauty.  “Cease striving and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10)  Seeking God will increase your thankfulness and erase the dullness of reaction to beauty and truth.  The dullness of boredom can be erased by knowing and serving God rather than things or ideas or self.

Waver No More

The United States is not a Christian nation any more than the Northern Kingdom of Israel was a godly nation in the days of Elijah.  King Ahab and his father had made sure of that by not merely carelessness with God’s commands but actually having ”forsaken the commandments of the Lord” (I Kings 18:18).  As it says in Nehemiah 9:26, “they…cast Your law behind their backs.”

 

          So Elijah comes along to chide Israel, God’s people for turning godless, right?  No, hear what he said: “Elijah came near to all the people and said, ‘How long will you hesitate between two opinions?  If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.  But the people did not answer him a word.” (v.21)  The challenge that Elijah gives these wayward people is actually an idiom, or word picture, in the original language.  As Charles Ryrie conveys it the question should read literally, “How long are you hopping between two forks?”  Picture someone, who is not well endowed with balance high up in a tree, trying not to fall as he jumps between two branches, wanting to discover which is easier to perch upon.  Their choice was between the covenant keeping God, the Creator, Who was the Originator and Sustainer of Israel on the one hand.  On the other hand is Baal, whose name means ‘lord’, an idol who is the fertility god and rainmaker and highly favored in the palace to the risk of life and property if you did not worship him.  So the people ‘play both sides’ or ‘ride the fence’ as we say.  “The people did not answer him a word.”  What can they say?  He has described their procedure.  When you are desperate or needy apply to this God for help; when it’s safe and convenient declare for that one. 

 

And how is it different in America?  “I believe in God.  I go to church.  I’m a Christian.”  But all too frequently under the surface you will find a humanist, who is one who “upholds human [as opposed to God’s] reason, ethics, and justice, and rejects supernaturalism.”  Based on this stance they are apt to say things like the following. “If it’s an unwanted child wouldn’t everyone be better off if it were aborted?”  “God could have created using evolution.”  “How I dress is my own business.”  “I just couldn’t live with him/her.”  And in numerous other ways we ignore God’s Word for our own preference.  Elijah’s challenge to you, America, is declare for God and live for Him or stop pretending and live for your idol, yourself.  God hates vacillation, for He says, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot.  I wish that you were cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm…I will spit you out of My mouth” (Revelation 3:15-16). 

 

See where complete departure from God gets you.  Of course, many are refusing to acknowledge God and our society is coming apart at the seams, beginning with the family.  Elijah challenges those people as well:  “Elijah said to the people, “let them [the prophets of Baal] choose one ox for themselves and cut it up, and place it on the wood, but put no fire under it; and I will prepare the other ox and lay it on the wood, and I will not put a fire under it. Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the LORD, and the God who answers by fire, He is God.” And all the people said, ‘That is a good idea.’” (v.22-24)  The prophets of Baal dance and sing, pray and yell and cut themselves all day long, “but there was no voice and no one answered” (v.26).  The path we as a people are taking is failing as fast as the day comes to an end.  We will not succeed apart from God because there is no truth for living life there.  And we will not succeed in wavering between two opinions.

Americans, Burke County residents, “Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord” (Acts 3:19).  It is a good way and a way of life and truth.

You Don’t Want Fair

A common thought and pronouncement in our culture is, “That’s not fair.”  But we don’t really want fair ultimately because then we would all be in a world of hurt.  And that world is called hell.  What we want is privilege. Privilege is offered to all who will accept it by admitting they have done wrong and trusting the Savior to rescue them from fairness, that is, hell.  Without hell there would be no need for a Savior.

         

          So why not choose to believe that there is no hell and no Savior?  There are several problems with that decision.  First of all, if there is no hell it is not fair or logical.  If there is no hell then God is not just because everyone who does bad things no matter how heinous gets away with it.  If you execute them they either go to heaven or cease to be.  This lack of belief in hell is one of the reasons I believe there is an ongoing occurrence of mass murders followed by suicides.  If someone kills a dozen people and then kills himself he thinks he has avoided all punishment while expressing his deep anger and controlling his own destiny.  We need to teach people about hell so they will have a vague sense of the torture that awaits those who neglect the Savior for control of their own destiny.  God says, “He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished” (Exodus 34:7) and “The soul that sins will die” (Ezekiel 18:4). 

 

          So how about having a Savior?  Is that fair?  Is that just?  An evil person does a horrendous crime to another individual or to a whole nation and later believes that “if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).  How can God be just to let this monster off the hook?  He is just because Jesus took the punishment on the cross by being “marred more than any man” (Isaiah 52:14) and by being “sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 6:21).  On the other hand, why should someone who told a “little white lie” be committed to hell?  It is because “whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all” (James 2:10).  So, if you want fairness you cannot eliminate hell and if you want privilege you cannot eliminate the Savior.

 

          Secondly, you cannot arbitrarily refuse the existence of hell and believe in God because God’s Word says it exists.  Jesus speaks of hell frequently in His great sermon as when He says that anyone who speaks to his brother “’you fool’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell” (Matthew 5:22).  Later in Matthew 10:28 Jesus warns us, “Do not fear those unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”  You may object that you do not believe the Bible or do not accept all parts of it.  Then you are creating your own god.  How do you know this god exists and what is your basis of authority for this belief?  My authority is the Bible.

 

          Maurice Rawlings, an initially skeptical emergency room doctor, corroborates the evidence for hell in his book, “To Hell and Back”, by chronicling a number of near death experiences of those claiming to have been in hell.  Why do the popular accounts record “warm lights” but never include these horror stories?  Dr. Rawlings notes, “If the interview is delayed just a little bit…only the positive experiences will be found.  The negative experiences have long since been relegated to the painless portions of the memory, the victim apparently unable to coexist with this painful memory.” (p.33)  His most striking story is about a man whose treadmill test was shortened.  Several times he collapsed and was revived by Dr. Rawlings applying CPR.  He says, “I would reach over and start him up again.  But this time he was screaming the words, ‘Don’t stop! I’m in hell! I’m in hell!’  Hallucinations, I thought…But he was saying the opposite: ‘For God’s sake, don’t stop!  Don’t you understand?  Every time you let go I’m back in hell!’  When he asked me to pray for him, I felt downright insulted.  In fact, I told him to shut up…” (p.36-37).  After the patient’s pleading and the nurse’s “expectant look” he makes up a prayer, “Jesus Christ is the Son of God…keep me out of hell, and if I live, I’m on the hook. I’m yours.” (p.37)  Dr. Rawlings reports, “A religious conversion experience took place…He was no longer the wild-eyed, screaming, combative lunatic who had been fighting me for his life.  He was relaxed and calm and cooperative.  It frightened me.”  He confides that besides converting the patient “this miserable prayer of mine had opened the road to my own salvation.” (p.37)

 

          You can have fair if you like but I prefer the privilege of rescue from hell through my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Finally!

To say that snow is uncommon in my little town would be an understatement.  And when it does come it tends to fade quickly.  We had three inches last night and cold enough to retain it half a day today.  I am so thankful for its beauty and God’s creativity!

Spring delayed                  Not bad sledding           Would you like icing on that?

Just Sayings

Some old sayings recycled and rehashed for the

days we are in:

Desperate times require desperate measures

          So the old saying goes

But are we willing to take the cure

          Before we’re in the throes

 

If it were a snake beside the path

          We’d all been bit for sure

But will we extract the poison there

          So each one can be pure

 

Pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps

          Cannot happen nor would

Since Eve was deceived, Adam rebelled

          We can’t do what we should

 

Problem older than Methuselah

          Recent as your last breath

If not rescued by the Redeemer

          You have no hope but death

 

Right as rain, pure as the driven snow

          Our sin gone by His blood

The Christ has made His beloved so

          By grace’s abundant flood

 

Imitation’s th’best flattery

          Be pleasing in His sight

Now we will and can live for Jesus

          Evidence of His might

 

Oh, lost ones know that the gig is up

          Unless you trust Him too

He died on the cross to rescue you

          And give you life anew

Shack Flak

Let me say it up front. I see most movies after they have gone DVD. I hear most news from a biweekly magazine.  I find out how the ball team did after the season.  By the time I try it out it’s gained the adjective “classic”. That way someone can tell me if it’s worth seeing or hearing or doing. So a friend prevailed upon me recently to read The Shack by Wm. Paul Young, saying it was so good and profoundly affected her (couldn’t stop crying or laughing).  I had intended not to read it after several unfavorable reviews.  But she sent it to me and I agreed to read it, so I decided I could evaluate it objectively given the positive and negative input I had received.

          I was struck early in the story with how compelling his tale is, so real and wrenching.  But my first and subsequent contacts with “God” in the story compelled me in a different way.  Mr. Young’s theology is atrocious, in a word, unbiblical. I believe his misrepresentation of the triune Godhead is deepened by the heart rending story and the excellent points he makes about relationship, reconciliation, restoration, and spiritual strongholds. Because he does such a good job of dealing with these ideas many people may be accepting of or overlooking his falsehoods about God. You cannot have a proper or full relationship with a God who does not exist, a figment of Mr. Young’s and perhaps American Christianity’s imagination.

          Consider the following quotes and how they align with Scripture. Papa (the name he uses for Father God) says to Mack, “I don’t need to punish people for sin” (p.120).  Scripture says, “Your sins have made a separation between you and your God” (Isaiah 59:2); “I will by no means clear the guilty” (Exodus 34:7).  Next he follows up by saying, “It is not my purpose to punish sin” (p.120).  It is His purpose for He is “the One forming light and darkness, causing well-being and creating calamity; I am the Lord who does all these” (Isaiah 45:7).

          Young rejects authority structures as un-needed among Christians and nonexistent within the Godhead: There is “no need for hierarchy” (p.124).  Ephesians 1:10 says, “He purposed in Him [Jesus] with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times.”  Jesus said, “We must work the works of Him who sent me” (John 9:4).  Hebrews 5:8 instructs us that “although He was a Son He learned obedience from the things which He suffered.”  But Young has his Jesus saying, “We are submitted to you in the same way” (p.145), referring to sacrificial love.  But the Bible says, “He has put all things in subjection under His feet” (I Corinthians 15:27).  It is true that doing things for people out of a sense of obligation is not love but that does not negate roles and responsibilities.  As an example Young’s Jesus character says, “Fulfilling roles is the opposite of relationship” (p.148).  “Husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church” (Ephesians 5:25); “Wives be submissive to your own husbands…so that…they may be won without a word” (I Peter 3:1).  Proper fulfillment of roles is a sacrifice of love pleading for relationship.

          Previously my mind and heart have flown caution flags at the idea of representing God in visual images such as “The Passion of the Christ.” This view was suggested to me by a former elder who pointed out that the second commandment warns against idols or images in the likeness of God.  I had thought little of it at the time and even thought it did not apply since the actor was representing the second person of the Godhead faithfully in the form of a man which He was.  But having read this erroneous account, red flags went up and I began to question all representations of God apart from Scripture, from a crèche to Aslan.  Then Young limits Jesus to human needs (hunger) and mistakes (like dropping a bowl of batter).  Jesus is not so limited in Revelation 19 when “He judges and wages war” (v.11) and “from His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike the nations” (v.15).  And what of a mere human Jesus “when the doors were shut,…Jesus came and stood in their midst (John 20:19).  God is not represented as a Father and therefore a man as Young’s character suggests because “once the Creation was broken, true fathering would be much more lacking than mothering…an emphasis on fathering is necessary because of the enormity of its absence” (p.94).  Rather, it is in His nature because He is “Eternal Father” (Isaiah 9:6).  Jesus “was calling God his own Father” (John 5:18)  and that upset the Jews.  We are only a reflection of that, poor though we be, not the cause of it. Attempts toward gender neutrality destroy pictures God determined for both man and woman.  The woman is the picture of “His bride”, the Church, who “has made herself ready” (Revelation 19:7).  And picturing God the Father as a man or woman in flesh is mistaken for “God is spirit” (John 4:24). 

          So despite Young’s insights into relationship with God and among men the ultimate result I believe will not be closeness to God because people will be disappointed as they find God is not who they thought He was.  It results in a wrong view of ourselves as well so that his Jesus says, “I have no desire to make them Christian, but I do want to join them in their transformation into sons and daughters of my Papa, into my brothers and sisters, into my Beloved” (p.182).  Certainly much referred to as Christian today is not, but it is not something to be ashamed of and retreat from.  Tremendous progress of the Gospel in and from Antioch resulted in “the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch” (Acts 11:26).  Lord, do such a work in me that I am that kind of Christian.  Help us to be “seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence” (II Peter 1:3).  Oh, Lord, give us that “true knowledge of Him” so that we might catch a fuller glimpse of Him and His promises.

What Is Truth?

“What Is Truth?”

Creatorworship

 

When Jesus was on trial before His death on the cross, Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea was questioning Him in order to discover why He was being accused.  Jesus gave Pilate answers and silence that must have seemed irrelevant to the accusations.  The apparent lack of correlation between accusations and answers pushed Pilate to frustration¹ since he was trying to spoil the accusers’ design and release Jesus.  In the midst of the growing tension Jesus and Pilate have a verbal exchange of which the following is a small part:  “Jesus answered, ‘…for this I have come into the world, to testify to the truth.  Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.’  Pilate said to Him, ‘What is truth?’  And when he had said this he went out…” (John 18:37-38).  There is no evidence that he either waited for an answer or wanted one.

          There is a similar lack of commitment to discover the answer today so that we need to know it all the more.  “What is truth?”  The question is not simple and I believe it can be expanded into three questions.  How do we define the concept truth?  Does truth exist and can we objectively know it?  Assuming truth does exist, which set or sets of truth claims are true? 

          Several different dictionaries I referenced record that truth is “conformity to fact or reality.”  In other words, in order for something to be true it must be the original item or line up in visual (and 4 other senses) and verbal description with the original.  Josh McDowell points out that, for instance, lying is wrong not because my parents, my church, or the Bible teach it was wrong.  These sources report that it is true that lying is wrong, but they are not why it is wrong.  Neither is it wrong because it is illegal, it hurts someone, or feels wrong.  These perspectives are consequences of the truth that lying is wrong, but they are not why it is wrong.  McDowell’s concludes, “Lying is wrong because it is contrary to the nature and person and character of God,” which is “…God is true” (John 3:33).  He IS the original.  “Thy Word is truth” (John 17:17) because it aligns with and accurately reports who He is.  Your parents, church, the law, your feelings, and their pain report truth when what they communicate corresponds to who God is.

          Answering the second question about whether truth exists and can we know it proceeds directly from whether or not the original exists and we can know it.  Jesus said, “I am…the truth” (John 14:6).  McDowell paraphrases this verse, “I have fidelity to the original”, which is effectively what Jesus said: “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30).  To Philip’s request Jesus said, “…He who has seen me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘show us the Father?’” (John 14:9)  Jesus has complete fidelity to the original.

          But which truth claim or claims are true?  First of all, we can eliminate the plural because two opposing claims cannot be true at the same time and in the same sense (law of non-contradiction) in that the truth of one requires the falsehood of the other. If you do not accept this law of logic you have no truth claim, being self-contradictory.  As to which claim is truth, my best effort is to agree with all the believers past and present that “He who receives His (Jesus’) testimony has set His seal to this, that God is true” (John 3:33).

          The reason we know that Pilate did not want his question answered is because, if he had, the answer was standing right in front of him.  In a song by Michael W. Smith the refrain begins, “Ancient words ever true, changing me, changing you…”  And why do they bring change?  It is because, “the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12).  This truth is not meant to merely be some awesome monument which at first sight is admired and afterwards ignored.  Being “living and active”, it either penetrates the pores (“and marrow”) of your being purifying everything it touches or it work hardens your exterior by relentless pounding until you are brittle and break.  The truth exists. You can know it.  You should pursue it.

 

¹In order to see this frustration building it is helpful to look at all four accounts:  Matthew 27:11-26, Mark 15:1-15, Luke 23:1-5, John 18:28-19:16