Props to Heidi Michelle, who asked for an epilogue to two posts ago. For those who would like to know to which post I am referring, go here.
When you have been traumatized from the misuse of the biblical text, and you need to detoxify through other streams the King provides, including looking for His Works (the Works of the King have equal weight as testimony to the Words of the King: John 5:36), when you are ready to renege get with the written text of Scripture, how should you go about that task?
Zeroth on the list, wait until you want to try out reading the text. Then if you need a friend on hand while you cross the threshold of reintegrating yourself with the text, pick someone you trust who loves you and let them sit with you in silence if need me while you pick it up and read. It may take some time.
First and foremost, do not ditch the context where you received healing, unless the King says to do so. It’s not like you are using the items you learned about in the season of healing as a stopgap measure until you can go back to the authoritative rule for faith and practice, as if you were settling form one aspect of the King’s reality instead of another.
Second, carry the affection of the King into the reading of the text, and take off a tiny chunk of biblical text and chew through it. Ask Him to be present with you while you read. He is the point, not the text.
I will say that again. He is the point of this whole thing, not the text. And yes, I am strong in teaching, and my teacher is exceptionally strong, who knows the value of the text, but He is the point of working with the text or any aspect of reality.
Third, read only what you can manage. You just got done rehabbing a broken wrist. You cannot put 85 pounds on it.
Your job is to rehab muscle groups, not shoulder an over heavy responsibility and do 3000 pushups out of the gate.
Fourth, be damn patient with yourself. Maybe a phrase or two.
Fifth, do not overload yourself with disciplines and listening to eight thousand hours of another man’s opinion on the topic.
Sixth, stop when He tells you to stop, and stop before you find yourself pushing yourself.
Seventh. Just rest with Him in the text. Most of y’all that I know are experts at keeping the day of Shabbat, but suck at keeping the mindset of Shabbat. There is a mentality perfected by the Desert Fathers of resting in the midst of work, and having a chilled and rested mindset and heart set while they worked.
And some of y’all are fine with the dynamic of observing G-D’S holy day, but bomb on having G-d’s wholly holy heartset, especially when the Shabbat was made for man and not man for the Shabbat.
And you need an actual day of rest AND. a mindset of rest through your week. And to make Him and His gooshy and squishy Mercy affectionate reality and embrace your Shabbat rest.
Anyway, those are just some quick and practical thoughts here.
And yes, I did meddle with some of my friends who ain’t doing the rest thing right.
“The same water that hardens the egg, softens the potato; it’s about what you’re made of, not the circumstances.”
Truly, you can run the route of bitterness and offense, but that is a bit shallow or unexamined, as both the hardened egg and the softened potato serve a purpose.
So, my take.
“The same water that hardens the eggs, and softens the potato, also extracts the coffee. It’s not about your circumstances or what you’re made of; it’s about your design and purpose.” #UseTheResourcesYouWereGivenWisely
Most of you who know me, know I am an obsessive texualist; I love the written Scriptural text of both the New Testament and the Tanakh. In their original languages (Hebrew AND Greek).
However, I have also noticed a disturbing reality.
What do I mean by that?
Well, it’s a trend toward incompleteness.
For example…
“The Bible is the Word of G-d.“
“One interpretation…many applications…“
“G-d will not violate His Word.“
“To equip the saints for the work of ministry….”…silence on what happens after that…
“A team of scholars worked on this translation” …silence on identifying the names of the people who constitute this team…
“G-d is moving up here…”…people fall out, BUT there is little change in their lives weeks later to indicate G-d was moving.
“So-and-so is ready to return to ministry….”…same minister also didn’t reconcile with the first wife or husband he or she cheated on to begin with…
And so forth…
Oh yeah, and the only two political parties in America that merit prophetic words are red and blue…
It remains problematic when we refuse to dig into the nuance of a statement and do not ask what is and what is not being implied in that statement…
It is asinine when we are either ignored when we question the statements being made…
called religious or critical when we look for clarification…
or gaslit when we refuse to accept what is said without question…
It is one of the main threads of my calling to not settle for halfway or partial answers when they are given.
Carlene Prince once told me that I have to look for what is missing…she noted that that is something I do.
And she is right. I hate half-assed investigations.
And I know I sound rude when I question what is stated…
But I cannot accept partial answers or perceived partial answers when they are given.
Especially when some of my friends have been seriously damaged by partial answers.
And my second wife is dead because of partial answers.
These partial answers are the Reasons when you say, “obey my covering”, that I respond with a glorious middle finger.
Gang, one of those statements that is maddeningly incomplete is “the Spirit of G-d will not violate the Word of G-d.”
And we are left with Zero discussion about which “Word of G-d” we mean.
And Zero curiosity about the inverted statement.
And Zero desire to ask if there are any other immutable items which the Spirit of G-d will not violate.
So, here has always been my thought to add to the statement “the Spirit of -G-d will not violate the Word of G-d.”
“Neither will the Word of G-d, both living and written (two forms of λόγος), violate the Spirit of G-d.”
And equally important and immutable as testimony to the Word of G-D’s veracity, and equally admissible as testifying of the Word Himself, are His Works.
…that is, what He does (John 5:36) is as important as the words about him.
And Yeshua BEING THE WORD OF G-D, is blasphemously ignored in this statement in Josh’s gospel. (Hebrews 4:11-16).
We refuse to investigate it because we are told to investigate it is heresy.
Gang, it’s not enough, especially given the regularity with which we ignore the Spirit of G-d, for us to merely assert thus-and-so about the words He speaks WITHOUT ALSO AFFIRMING His WORDS that His works are admissible as much as His tesitmony. It’s ironic that He would speak words about the veracity of his works and we would ignore those words about His works.
Tree carcasses and e-carcasses, if not attended to in reading by the Spirit, who alone gives understanding, will not bring life.
Rather, they will kill.
And that suddenly.
For those who have been so traumatized by the Scriptural text, as one who walks in the authority of a scribe, I would implore you to get out into nature and allow the King to meet you there where He is also. Or whereever you find him.
His Words and His Works…
What is missing from your regular routine that is life-giving and points you back home to Dad?
Go and do that.
And know you are so loved, gang.
And, as someone who reads the text and enjoys it, I would encourage you to do things that are life-giving to your relationship with the King without feeling guilty.
Be blessed as you recover your own walk with Him, gang.
Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he consented. And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of G-d descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
Matthew 3:13–17, ESV
I want to break a “reality” that is religiously-set and irrelevantly calcified about this text.
This text is not merely about obedience alone. Too many dang pastors and believers have made this thing we call water baptism simply about obedience, and then they treat baptism as “must be treated a certain way”.
Baptize people backwards once: irrespective of whether or not they or their spirits have been exposed to water trauma. NO RENUNICATIONS! NO DELIVERANCE! No concern for their vulnerability. No considerations for the nuances of the Father’s heart for the person who is in grave need of a tender embrace. Just straight-as-a-board [censored] obedience to His commandments, as if that was the only thing there was in existence, at the expense of the fullness of what was in this text. One interpretation, slavery to a Master’s will, with zero creative, principled expressions.
I have seen too many of these baptisms where people are lectured on obedience with zero concern for sonship or the creativity that should mark the kingdom. and that galls me.
Too many people are too interested in seeing obedience at the expense of sonship.
And I am done with the preaching of obedience at the expense of the Father’s tender heart, as a father myself, with a tender heart I regained from the King as of August 18th, a heart I had not seen since October of 1984.
Please allow that years of war and prison may change a man.
Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves
Hopefully, as a man or a woman endures years of war or prison or heartache or hardship, they grow in something unshakeable.
In my case, there were hard times that drew questions and bred offense. My first wife cheating on me. My father abandoning me. My twin sister not making it. My second wife dying of cancer. And the prayers of some dear brothers and sisters as well that softened me.
And to that point, we see some of the things that Father may want to deal with in water baptism. As my mother once wrote to me in 1991 in the yellow letter that no longer exists.
Ask Him to soften the heart of a mean person. He works wonders…
G-d may use water baptism to work a miracle or a set of miracles, and we really need to open up the laver of cleansing to the idea that G-d may want to do more than what we are in baptism.
Jesus came to the Jordan because there was a larger picture than mere obedience. There was a fulfillment Jesus was picturing for each of us. Baptism was and is a path to something more, and there is way damn more in water baptism than we appropriate.
Baptism is designed for deliverance. And we just dunk people and send them along without considering the spiritual encounter that the King wishes to give those who seek baptism in the waters.
And we rarely consider the King might want to not only have them buried in obedience, but we also rarely consider the dynamics of what it means to, literally and with the fullness of our spirits, be “raised to walk in the newness of life” (Romans 6:4). And beyond that, too frequently in water baptism we rarely think, ponder, ask, or allow for the possibility that the King might want to tenderly and affectionately show up; manifest His presence, and endue those being baptized…
…with whatever graces and gifts He wishes to clothe them and us.
Yeshua said this curious phrase:
“Let it be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness.”
Meaning, there were two dynamics the L-rd wants to impart to us.
A measure of righteousness.
Fulfillment
The Presence of the Righteous One: Sonship
Every time in the New Testament the word δικαιοσύνην (righteousness), it parallels the Hebrew word צִדְקָתֽוֹ
There are 10 compound names of Adonai. In order, they are:
Adonai Eccad: The L-rd Who is One: Parallels The Father
Adonai Tseva’ot: The L-rd of Hosts: Parallels the Son, Who Leads the Armies of Heaven
Adonai Makkadesh: The Lord Who Makes You Holy: Parallels the Holy Spirit, Who Transforms Our Nature
Adonai Yireh: The L-rd Who Provides In Response To Sheer Faith: Parallels the Redemptive Gift of Prophet, who must execute the mandates of the King via Galatians 6:5: Faith that works through love.
Adonai Rapha: The L-rd Who Heals Us Deeply and Cleanses Us: Parallels the Redemptive Gift of Servant
Adonai Nissi: The L-rd Who Raises the Banner Of The Word Made Flesh, Himself, Over Us, Through Deep Encounter, Parallels the Redemptive Gift of Teacher, who cannot live in fullness apart from an encounter with the Incarnated Truth.
Adonai Shalom, The L-rd our Peace, who makes us whole through a series of revelations of His loving nature, which parallels the Redemptive Gift of Exhorter, who MUST embrace not only the positive words and revelations, but the hard stuff that causes the Exhorter to embrace a hell of a lot of pain.
Adonai Ra’ah: The L-rd Who Is Shepherd: He Provides all we need through leading us in a path that requires we lean on more than just our own understanding. Parallels the stubbornly independent, Redemptive Gift of Giver.
Adonai Tsidkenu: The L-rd our Righteousness: Parallels the Redemptive Gift of RJD (Rulder/Judge/Deliverer), who, if they walk in righteousness the King provides, and not merely their idea of righteousness, with the three Treasures of the Ark of the Covenant present in their spirits, make the ultimate fathers among the gifts. Manna for the RJD’s provision, The Torah for the RJD’s Moral Authority, and the Staff that Budded for the RJD’s Divine Appointment to Adonai’s Task rather than Self-Appointment to a task of their own choosing
Adonai Shammah: The L-rd Who is There. Parallels the Redemptive Gift of Mercy, and their Presence and Essence-Based Design.
Yeshua in His baptism, was seeking to execute righteousness, a callback to the RJD, and the dynamic of sonship. What we do with baptism, is not a damned matter of one-side-fits-all, lay back and expose yourself in vulnerability to the command of the L-rd who expects you to just leave yourself feeling unprotected, and there is no mention of the spirit realm.
Rather, the L-rd works with our trust level, and encourages us to seek as much Freedom as can be found. Baptism was designed to be deliverance and healing and exorcism all rolled into one. And an encounter with the Righteous Father. We were made to be creative with water baptism from person-to-person as each has need.
And, the L-rd is willing to work with us, and He is willing to develop trust with us so that we can be increasingly made whole in Him. If we are not comfortable, He will not force us, and those who father us and lead us into the Kingdom, should be completely sensitive to whatever set of needs we have, and be willing to work with us.
Father is not a tyrant in water baptism. He is so creative, and tender, and loving, and His heart is so incredibly full of desire, and His Father’s heart is rich in affection toward us as his sons. Baptism is meant to be tailor-made to each person’s walk, past, present, future, spirit, soul, body, birthright, and offices. In this, the fullest expressions of liberating and affectionate righteousness are made known.
Fulfillment
Water Baptism is more than a blasted ritual of roteness that takes five minutes, and is celebrated by something silly like “and in obedience to his commandments”. Not that obedience is not important, but it takes a backseat to reconciliation and fulfillment and deepening intimacy and affection between the One Who Ordains Water Baptism, and the one being baptized.
We were made to take the season of baptism and move with Father, seeking Him for what He wants in our own particular case for the Baptism. There is a cleansing He wants to work in water baptism that is the opposite spirit of futility.
So, if we have some broken places in our past, He actually can use the baptism as a moment where he manifests to us and in us to heal or to make right something that was made wrong years before. Such as the time when a man was being water baptized and wanted to be rid of his tattoos, and as he went under the water, and then came up, he went under tattooed and then emerged from the waters with the tattoo ink having disappeared from his skin.
Or my friend Amy Dudley who wrote a renunciation and reminded the kingdom of darkness who she was and whose she was. And she dealt with a number of spiritual attacks and asked the L-rd in the baptism, which was a forward-facing triune immersion, to remove those attacks and junk from her life, and in response, the baptism became a time of healing and deliverance and impartation.
Baptism is meant to be more than obedience, gang. Way more. I would even go so far as to emphasize that baptism is not about obedience. Rather it is the first step full of potential toward us becoming imbued with the flow of sonship.
Indeed, the Father of Heavenly Lights, did not express His desire, or ours, by saying, “yay, you obeyed.”. No!
He did not celebrate the Son by saying, “this is my servant who was good and faithful and dotted every I and crossed every T in perfect obedience (though he did obey)”. Perish that thought.
Rather He responded to Yeshua’s water baptism by saying, “this is MY BELOVED….”
“this is MY SON”
“I take immense PLEASURE IN WHAT HE HAS DONE”
Love, affection, and pleasure marked the baptism.
Desire and fulfillment, and the expression of sonship which is the major expression of righteousness.
And realize there might be a cost of which you were not aware. So, when you say you want something, and it is out of G-d’s timing to give it to you, the clowns might be willing to give it to you….with strings attached.
“You will make your prayer to him, and he will hear you, and you will pay your vows.”
Sometimes a complex problem requires a complex and multifaceted solution. Don’t be afraid of undertaking these sorts of problems. Airflight was not solved by Wilbur and Orville flapping their arms harder. Neither will some Kingdom problems be solved by yelling Jesus’ name more vociferously and sincerely.
For every complex problem there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
And G-d doesn’t want His kids devolving into simple slaves with slave mentalities that beg for completed products to solve those problems.
Sometimes He wants to hand us raw materials and expects us to transform those raw materials into a complex and multifaceted answer as we build to solve a problem we have because he has given it to us to steward.
Consider that you may have been handed a complex problem because the last few people He asked to solve that problem said no.
A few weeks ago, I posted some thoughts pertaining to Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2, and some of the cruel realities of fathering in the last 40 or so years.
I wrote the following as part of that post:
“For those of you that have not seen Guardians of the Galaxy 2, you might not understand….but for those who have, father issues are some of the hardest to deal with…and for those of us who had messed-up interactions with our fathers who refused intimacy, and who had to attempt to make do with predators as fathers, until we embraced the Father of Lights as our Father or His Son as Father, this cut and the following posted segments from GOTG 2 are for you.”
Now, my sister, Dina, had pushed back to me, when I was remarking bitterly against the dynamic of spiritual fathering typically presented by most charismatic churches, that G-d does set the lonely in families.
So, in light of that remark, I continued in that post:
“And to Yeshua, thank you for the steadfast fathering you provided.
“He sets the lonely in families…” even if those families are Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
And the nature of those family units might range from place to place.
Well, there is a place in Guardians of the Galaxy 2, where Peter Quill is forced into a major fight with his father, Ego, in which one of them must kill the other. Earlier, in the prequel to this MCU film, we learn Peter’s mother died from cancer, and during the unfolding of events in the second film, Peter is drawn into the fight with his biological father because Ego was the one who implanted the tumor in his mother’s brain that killed her.
Well, throughout the film, there are a number of alternative-family themes that are presented. As we know that Gamora was the adoptive daughter of Thanos, the Mad Titan and genocidal maniac, and Rocket, the Guardians’ very-wisecracking genius raccon mechanic, was the product of experiments that resulted in him literally being ripped apart and put back together, making it difficult for him to trust anyone. So that when Rocket becomes vulnerable, it hits on things that many of us Gen-X’er’s, and beyond, have endured: Especially being thrown-away by many of our fathers, pastors, and “coverings”, which is why so many of us are suspicious of people purporting to be apostolic fathers and spiritual leaders.
It also helps show that many of us in my generation, because the Trinity Himself has sovereignly raised us, because we were fathered by G-d, there is deep compassion in many of us who survived the loss of physical family, and many of us developed hearts to father other throw-aways.
Dorothy, a friend of mine, remarked the following, and I want none of y’all to miss it, gang:
“The idiosyncratic broken-but-healing-and-unlearning-toxic-patterns found family in Guardians was the realest part of the movies, tbh. And it needed the comedy and the satire, because it hit pretty hard sometimes. We’re all in this broken scene, somewhere, however long or briefly… On a few levels, it’s about stopping and redeeming a multi-generational saga of dysfunction.
Also, it was a tiny bit cathartic to watch [Rocket] the raccoon vent so much semi-justified distrust and pain and rage in the “safe” context of a story with a happy ending. That kind of strong-coffee vicious bitterness doesn’t show up in cinema too often, but it’s very familiar.
Dorothy
My ex-spiritual father and mother did some things like this to many of us who were college-age in the early 2000’s.
The “father” preached a sermon one December evening in which he was responding to a group of us who had taken it upon ourselves, at the direction of the L-rd, to engage in territorial warfare against the major clowns that were over the college in our small town, and we were quite effective against them.
In said sermon, he remarked, and I quote, that:
“a bunch of kids were squirting at principalities with water pistols”. And he had said this in light of the reality that we refused to submit our ministry to his apostolic oversight and covering.
Further, practicing witches had infiltrated the church’s intercessory group, which was led by the “mother”, whether or not she realized it, and launched attacks against us, cursing us in a number of ways. All in all, by the time we all left the college after graduation that year, many of us were really beaten up badly. And many of us were trailed for years afterward by a network of antichrist spirits that had connected between every town where we each moved to. It made our capacity to hold jobs and buy property all but impossible. On top of that, other things were imparted to us because these believers perceived we were not submitting to their authority.
So, when you barf on me with “submit to my covering and apostolic oversight”, that’s a trigger that I am going to probably have trust issues. I don’t do covering, and I don’t mess with control or manipulation, one bit.
And when your covering proves to provide me no significant increase of spiritual protection or blessing, but rather constrains and constricts me with the threat of cursing if I don’t lick your boot or kiss your ass, then we are also going to have issues.
What follow are a few clips from Guardians that show what real fathering is like.
Once Yondu realized what Ego was doing with children, he resisted delivering Peter to Ego.
There are other places where this fathering shows up, and it provides solid impetus for us to model some level of fathering the best we can, as many kids are growing up without a solid model of earthly fathering, even if it means the only fathering we received was directly from G-d the Father; friendships with; or through books, materials, blog posts, composed by men and women with a fathering mantle.
And granted, Yondu was probably not what many people would describe as a model father, but he did intervene to protect Peter from Ego, and he did reconcile with his clan, the Ravagers, and made peace with Stakar.
There will come a time when we each have to accept the fathers in our lives, however imperfect the packaging is, and just allow them to love on us as best they each can. And I think this is why we need things like strong-coffee vicious bitterness to help us heal something deeply that we cannot possibly heal on our own, gang.
Be deeply at peace, precious friends, and know you are each loved so incredibly, and please, if you need to talk about some of these issues, my email is theparacleteshammer@gmail.com or the paracleteshammer@protonmail.com. I can also be reached on my cell at (413) 657-1887
In those days John [the Baptizer] came preaching in the wilderness of Judea, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight.’” Now John wore a garment of camel’s hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, G-d is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”
Matthew 3:1–12 ESV
Gang,
Many of you know of Prophets as brusque, rude, hell-bent on the rightness or righteousness of their cause, and in many cases that would be a correct assessment. But that is not the whole story.
John’s heart and zeal was for the annunciation of the coming kingdom. He is not merely showing his trailblazing with zero compromise, but he is also showing a deep heart and yearning and tenderness and brokenness that was also full of tunnel-vision
In their love and tenderness, the Father put the Prophet on a Mission: to purify those things that are impure. And to cut up the things that need to be cut up in order to have a clean and blank slate, so that, if the Prophet has high numbers in interpersonal relationships, they can build something deep and protective and loving and affectionate with others.
So, the high-functioning Prophet’s iconoclasm is not tied up in their hatred of sin, though that is a major factor, so much as their love of the people caught in that sin.
So, he or she is going to take it hard and fast with an axe to those with the choking spirit of religion.
I have one sister (she is too close to be called a mere friend, and I DESPISE the religious usage of that term by people who are stuck on the usual bandying of “brother” and “sister” without having first paid the price in terms of earning the authority and intentionally choosing their family) who is a Prophet who is like this throughout.
At first, stand-offish, but once connected, is as gushy as many a Mercy I know to those they trust.
The Baptizer’s overarching zeal and truly (I rarely use the following word because it has become overused), their PASSION (something you love so much you are willing to suffer for it) is others’ freedom. Their love is for others’ deep and prevailing liberation from bondage.
It’s not merely for the Baptizer, (no I will not call him a Baptist, that manner of translation is incorrect and culturally stupid, he is a Baptizing one, one who Baptizes, and Immerser, a Baptizer, not the leader of some denomination) or for any Prophet, about doing the things, but showing they are authentic in doing the things.
And so with us, Prophets’ first and foremost DESIRE, is our authenticity in responding.
There have been a few times where I told the story of my divorce. And while I mentioned the adultery and the emotional abuse and the other dynamics, I will note that the divorce in the spirit did not coincide with the divorce in the legal sense.
Sure, my legal divorce was filed Pearl Harbor Day 2012 and finalized the day of the Boston Bombing, but the actively divorce took place a couple of years earlier, in March 2010.
At that point, my then-wife gave me an ultimatum. Move with her or she was leaving with the kids.
At which point I felt the breaking of the covenant.
The rug had been pulled.
I was 30 at the time. And I knew the marriage was over and that she had chosen her mother over me.
This is a situation that caused me to turn internally and the only person I had to turn to and lean on was the King.
When you have no one, as I did, you still have the King.
And when you are alone, He will build things into you, and a depth of intimacy that can survive even death.
‘Cuz, you know, “love is as strong a death.”
Now, in order for love to be made as strong as death, it must endure against the spirit of death. You are meant to be tested in your kettle against certain things in the spirit.
Kind of like Isaiah 54:17, if you want no weapon formed against you to prosper, then you have to be willing to sing in your barrenness and embrace the first 16 verses and the process of Isaiah 54.
Cause and effect.
If you sow against testing and refinement, you will be stronger against the fight.
Ask me how I am so effective against some things.
It’s because I have been in the fight for years.
If you want the walk someone else has, you also are asking for the grace to endure what that other person has endured.
Friend, your responsibility is to dig deep wells with the King and lean HARD on him.
I am proof in the Kingdom that this can be done, and it will knit your hearts more deeply and more intimately with his and it will pour into you a well and a storehouse of resources that others will find life-giving after you pass through the season of hell.
Lean, lean, lean….
Do not lean on your own understanding….
In all your ways KNOW Him (that same word for “know” in Proverbs 3:6, is the same word for Adam “knew” his wife Eve).
There is an intimacy that only comes when you have suffered deep emotional loss.
And that will bless your heart and spirit with a spring of life you never had.
Gang, most of my posts include some sort of vignette from my painful life.
Well, to be honest, most of it was not painful, but there are places where one might say “wow!”.
And, hopefully, the end of whatever piece I compose feels better than the beginning…
So with that, I will mention something that helps you out or affirms you.
And, soon enough, my exegesis of Matthew will continue.
With that, let’s dive in….
My father, as many of y’all know, was not interested in a family for most of his life.
And when it came to me, because I acted less traditionally masculine, but more feminine, he didn’t allow me to help him in the garage when I was a kid.
And later on in his life, when I tried anything other than a superficial conversation with him, he changed the subject, or redirected, or excused himself, or ignored me.
That sort of nonsense does not help.
So, I spent years living in agreement with a lie that “if I am more masculine, I will be accepted”.
But here is the problem with that mindset, if you can accept it. And this is really going to sound weird.
But it may provide some better framing to the alternative sexuality lifestyle culture.
If we understand that some masculine and feminine can mean “giving” and “receiving”, respectively, and that some men may present as more feminine as some women may present as more masculine, we might have an opportunity to frame the conversation better.
What if more masculine women really aren’t born wrong, but are more designed to give or provide, and vice versa with more feminine men being designed to be tender and receive?
So it’s not an issue of, I must be designed for an alternative lifestyle, but I am equipped for more receiving or giving.
Further, what if we are each some mix of giving and receiving and are thus designed to interact with both masculinity and femininity on some level?
“Freely you have received; freely give.”
What if Jesus is presenting masculine dynamics and feminine dynamics because we are made to be conduits of the grace of G-d, and some of us need to learn the dynamic that does not square with our presenting sex?
What if we need to stop forcing people into one sexual box or another?
What if we just need to let people be WHATEVER G-d designed them to be, and they should just be what they are designed to be?
What if He made more tender men to help those tender or soft-hearted and mistreated women work through some of their issues of being mistreated at home as kids, and vice versa?
What if He made some men or women to be more assertive because they will help a partner who was also made to be assertive come alive after having been mishandled as a child and forced into a box of passivity?
What if people who were bashed by abusive authorities need someone who is tender to just love them to a place of wholeness?
And what if someone who has been beaten to passivity needs someone who will unswervingly cheer them on?
And what if all it will take for that man or woman to reach their destiny is a loving and supportive friend?
What if some men are made to be more sensitive and some women are made to be more aggressive?
What if the problem isn’t “make men more masculine” or “make women more feminine”, but “allow people to execute based on their design.”?
