One of my least favorite parts of how JRO wrote Optimus is that he wanted so badly to continue his dark and gritty world building making the Autobots problematic, but evidently couldn't reconcile this with Optimus being a Heroic Paragon, so instead he leaned way too hard into "oh Prowl was the one who did this and it was behind Optimus' back" which if anything I think makes Optimus look worse, not better. Because then it's like, okay I know Optimus trusted Prowl a lot as his friend but you CANNOT TELL ME that over the course of 4 million years, Optimus as the leader of the Autobot army who literally would have access to 99.9% of all the records they produce, would never notice or question where some of these odd/inconsistent details were pointing. It just seems really inconsistent with how a real military would actually function, especially regarding Optimus' character, who is incredibly thorough and responsible and wouldn't neglect to keep up with all the details of his army.

Hell, Optimus knows who the Wreckers are and had them on call for tricky operations when he needed them (Stormbringer) so he's literally not at all ignorant of/averse to the use of special wartime units composed of dubious individuals. He's the fucking commander of an entire army, of course he knows that War Is Hell (TM) and no one's hands are clean. That's not even getting into all the stuff he got up to in phase 2/3, I mean everything from the annexation of Earth to OP breaking humans out of prison against Council orders shows that Optimus is no stranger to immoral and/or unlawful means.

It also leads to a lot of annoying fanon where people write Optimus (sometimes unintentionally, sometimes not) as like some sort of ignorant fool who's unaware of the machinations of his own army or has some sort of naiveté of "b-but we can't use bad tactics against the enemy! I would never condone the use of morally gray means in war!" No, IDW Optimus knows perfectly well all of the bullshit he's enacted/condoned for the sake of trying to win the war. Some stuff is definitely out of character for him and was only machinated because of Prowl, but I think this fandom REALLY underestimates Optimus' personal agency/responsibility as the commander of a whole ass army and ESPECIALLY underestimates Optimus' capacity to condone morally gray Bullshit Of War while still being a good person individually as well as, comparatively, the lesser evil compared to Megatron/the Decepticons.

Anyways what I'm saying is JRO may be a good writer but he's really hesitant to make Optimus morally gray and does some asspulls sometimes to justify most of the bad things the Autobots did as "Optimus just didn't know," and since the majority of the IDW1 fandom only reads JRO's stuff they go running with this premise of ignorant/uninformed Optimus when there's evidence elsewhere in canon to show that Optimus is, in fact, very highly aware of the bullshit he's allowed "for the greater good" and the only stuff he was "unaware of" was the stuff he would literally never agree to the ethics of, like bombing innocent neutrals disguised as Decepticons to get them to join the Autobots.

Crime Blame Time

Everyone's responsible except those responsible. Blame for crime curiously never extends to the nefarious ghouls who inflict pain on others with intent. Law and order types remain stubbornly unsophisticated enough to place responsibility on criminals. Shrieking at everyone and everything but fiends committing heinous acts robs us of more than our stuff, although lots of that is gone. Thank an ideology where nobody's ever at fault and all is communal. You'll still get blamed for promoting alleged repression that made choirboys into felons.

Fiends are lucid enough in wickedness to attack those who are legally constrained from returning fire. Murderers uncannily always strike in areas with heavy gun control. It's surely coincidental that human predators find some of the few gun-free zones in Texas.

Make sure to complain about policies that either encourage or promote mental illness after endorsing them to at least offer rueful mirth among victims. Solitary confinement was supposed to break your spirit. The past two years could've been an experiment to see how much stress citizens could withstand. Breaking us down is supposed to be followed by rebuilding us. But government's in charge of construction if you wonder how pieces that don't fit got crammed there.

Seething perpetrators apparently need to fly red flags higher. The deranged flaunt signs every time. Displaying exactly what those who think Minority Report was a documentary claim will halt mayhem preemptively just adds frustration to carnage. Families should be first responders when it comes to spotting concerning behavior. But that's just another task passed along to an incompetent government that'll seize rights in response to its failures.

Those very deeply concerned about the innocent are not going to inconvenience criminals. The real victims are those who harm others because society is oppressive. Jeff Bezos made fortunes at the expense of the downtrodden who he lured into buying affordable goods they wanted, which makes muggings payback. Eliminating the unjust indignity of needing to find cash for bail preserves the presumption of innocence for much longer than we regressively used to find acceptable. How are they supposed to steal that much currency? Everyone's using cards.

Cities are always dangerous, claim dreadful enablers who turned them back that way. Issuing every excuse for professional hoodlums to prey upon those who committed the crime of enjoying urban life let metropolises revert to hellholes. New York City was once livable, which shocks those whose impressions were permanently shaped by Johnny Carson monologues. To be fair, the time when strolling Gotham's sidewalks didn't present significant threat to one's well-being or wallet was way back during the switch from beepers to flip phones to pocket screens.

Residents who miss riding underground trains without justifiably fearing it could be their last ride don't even have to be old-timers to bore whippersnappers with tales of keeping phones. A supposedly untamable urban jungle became comfortable no matter the time or block number in part by cracking down on quality of life crimes. Now, turnstile-hopping is treated as a human right, which by sheer chance coincides with subways being ruled by the lawless. Poor criminals engage in fare evasion to buy bread for orphans and not because they steal everything possible, including intangible items like rail journeys.

Liberals hate the effects they cause. The next round of paying people not to be poor should make everyone rich. Similarly, confused types outraged at mass murders while demanding police defunding don't seem to appreciate we only laugh to cope with the agony they enabled. Classifying looting as righteous leads to more of it. Social justice lunatics grasp incentives in their perverse way.

Lusting after excuses to confiscate rights is a popular hobby for those whose goal is expanding authority. Oh, and they totally care about victims. Like making fuel more costly as policy, the toughest part for those making poor innocent folks cope with liberal policies is pretending a real-life Purge is an unexpected result. It's normal to feel worse for their victims.

Don't just do something: stand there. Demanding action of any sort is certainly wise as long as people can never do anything wrong, especially when they're vainly looking for answers while upset. Lamenting that nothing is ever done presumes alleged solutions are wise or haven't already failed. Idling beats the something government usually tries, as it inevitably involves hassling the law-abiding.

I agree in a broad sense we need changes. Of course, the fix for legions of villains taking what they wish would entail stopping everything Democrats have done. In this rare case, it's what they haven't done. The one time they make government passive is for its actual function of stopping crime. Lax enforcement, prosecution, and sentencing make the party BFFs with criminals. If that sinister alignment wasn't the intent, they're even more inept than we thought. Permitting robbing until poverty is rampant is one way to align with the poor. The IRS is nothing more than a racket where muggers wear suits.

Gun restrictions that disarm lawful criminals are about to keep us safe any day now. A party that's truly skilled at bitching about what they cause blames you for the hideous results of their utterly backward take on safety. It's little wonder those permitting offenses to flourish oppose accountability as policy.

Yea no. Fuck off.

There has been a LOT of justification posts for pedo/incest shipping in my feed lately and I finally have to say something. Please read to the end.

Firstly none of these elaborate posts that go to incredible lengths to justify pedophilic relationships in “shipping” form or story form or art form EVER seem to mention the damn law. It IS against the law in the United States to depict such relationships whether photographed OR drawn OR digitally manipulated.

Federal law defines child pornography as “any visual depiction, including any photograph, film, video, picture, or computer-generated image or picture … of sexually explicit conduct, where the production of such visual depiction involves the use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct.”  

And yes, you CAN also be charged for WRITING fictional stories involving children in an explicit matter just as Frank Russel McCoy was charged in 2015 with Transportation of Obscene Matters in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1462. He ran a website dedicated to fictional child sex stories that he himself apparently published.

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca11/13-14350/13-14350-2015-03-12.html

Secondly, no one is talking about how downright selfish it is to post this kind of content on Tumblr and in public spaces.

All of these pro-shipping posts try to take a righteous stand by explaining how fiction is separate from reality and how it doesn’t hurt anyone. NEWS FLASH: YOU’RE POSTING IT ON A PUBLIC SITE WHERE PEOPLE *VERY* OFTEN SCROLL UPON IT BECAUSE TUMBLR’S ALGORITHMS PLACE IT IN OUR FEED THANKS TO THE FANDOM ASSOCIATIONS.

And look. When I was 13, best bet I had my own fantasies about older men. There were fictional movie characters I lusted over. There were fictional cartoon characters I lusted over. And I had written my first fanfic at the age of 13 within an anime universe where I made up a fictional pupil that fell in love with her alien martial arts teacher (a full grown man).

But I wrote it for -myself-. On pieces of folder paper. And I had never posted it online. And today I still wouldn’t publish it online in any fandom community I’m in because I understand how it hurts and triggers people and I have enough of a sense of personal responsibility that I’m not going to post it anywhere where someone could come across it and be triggered because I fucking CARE. (–Aside from the fact that now that I’ve far surpassed that age, I now think my own fanfic from back then is gross).

But -thats- the bottom line most of these posts seem to ignore: caring enough about the fucking rest of the world to keep that shit to yourself.

I’m not even going to argue the whole fiction versus reality standpoint. Go ahead and have at that one. Go ahead and keep ranting about how much a fictional ship isn’t real life pedophilia and it doesn’t make these authors bad people because they would never partake in real life.

What you’re NOT gonna do is try to argue how other people SHOULDN’T be hurt or offended by something that’s fictional. You don’t get to fucking determine what triggers someone, asshole. If it triggers them, it triggers them. And all these posts going around about “how not to be triggered by fiction” is honestly fucking sickening and shows a SELFISH disregard for anyone but yourself.

You’re literally out there saying “MY RIGHT TO SHIP IS MORE DAMN IMPORTANT THAN ANYONE ELSE’S FEELINGS OR TRIGGERS.”

Wow. What a stand up fucking person you are.

Ship it in your own head. Ship it in your private groups. Go make your Discords to share your content with each other. But don’t pretend for a fucking second that posting these contents on Tumblr (which is actually against their rules btw) isn’t hurting anyone. It DOES come up in feeds of anyone who follows the fandom. It DOES come up in reblogs of people that we chose to follow not knowing that person took part in that ship.

And since you have to write such elaborate posts defending your ship, that tells all of us that these ships DO get massive amounts of hate and triggers because they DO get massive exposure on this site, and you DO know about that. So there’s no damn two ways about it. You know good and well how many people it offends and triggers and yet you do it anyway. Because your right to post that fantasy is more important than anyone else’s feelings.

And here you are trying to argue that these ships don’t make you bad people... ^

No one can make you change that ship in your mind. No one can stop you from wanting to create arts and fictions of it. I’m not gonna argue with you about the separation of reality from fiction, but I will say that before you defend yourself for not being a bad person, take a good hard look:

You act as if you’re above the law.

You disregard tumblr’s own guidelines.

You don’t give a shit for how your content triggers others on a PUBLIC website and place your right to ship above everyone else’s mental well-being.

And by transitive morality, you’re actually *willingly* choosing to hurt others because you know it will and yet you do it anyway.

Transitive morality is a greater sense of good that the most selfless of people understand. An example you might be familiar with is when MCU Spider-Man tells Tony: “When you can do the things that I can, but you don’t, and then the bad things happen, they happen because of you.” Peter understands that when he can do something to prevent harm and he doesn’t, it’s pretty much like he caused the harm himself.

And yea, not everyone operates by such morality. A lot of people take disgustingly very little personal responsibility in the prevention of harm to others. But that’s why I’m pointing this out to you. So you can learn to be better than that.

You can continue on being selfish because your ship is more important than anyone’s triggers and keep justifying ways it doesn’t make you a bad person.

Or you can look at that list and realize: you know what… that is pretty shitty of me. Be a better fucking person and learn that while it might be harmless to have certain desires in your own head, while you might not be an actual pedophile, while you might not condone real rape and incest, placing your fantasies where you *know* people will be triggered still makes you a pretty damn shitty person.

THE COMPANIONS OF THE PROPHET (PBUH) : Salman al-Farisi (r.a.).Part1

Salman was born among fireworshippers (Magians). He was a small child among fireworshippers. His father, Buzahshan was among big farmers in Iran. He loved his child a lot and never left him alone. He was afraid to let his son go out as if somebody would kidnap him.

When Salman grew up, he went to the temple of the fireworshippers and kept guard there voluntarily. He kept the fire that was regarded as holy burning.  

There was an emptiness, longing, desire and sign in his heart. In the evening, he would stare into the horizon that got red and in the morning; he observed the rays of the sun as if he was attached to a distant sign of dream. He looked as if he was waiting for some news.

Once, his father sent Salman to the farm. On the way to the farm, Salman heard some sounds. When he turned toward the place where the sound came, he saw a church where Christians worshipped. He entered the church out of curiosity. Salman, who took part in the ritual without being aware of it, forgot about the farm and the village, and stayed there until the evening. He was virtually overwhelmed and found this pleasure more effective than that of his father's religion. He received some information from the Christians who took part in the ritual about their religion. He asked where the origin of this religion was. They indicated the direction of Damascus.

Time flew and it was evening soon. Salman returned home unwillingly. His father got angry because he was lost without permission but he became happy because he saw his son again. Salman told him about what had happened. He openly said that fireworshipping did not satisfy him and that he found Christianity superior. His father got furious and reprimanded him by saying, “How can you say such a thing?” However, Salman insisted on his idea. His father locked Salman up in the house by shackling his feet.

This act of his father's strengthened the idea of Salman, let alone changing it; it increased his desire to enter this new religion.

Once Salman managed to the break the fetters and escaped from home secretly. He joined a caravan going to Damascus. When he arrived in Damascus, he said he wanted to talk to the leading person in the Christian religion and was directed to the bishop. Salman said to the bishop that he accepted their religion and that he wanted to serve this religion by staying with them. However, the bishop was corrupt. He hoarded the money he collected from people for himself. He deceived people. The bishop died soon. Salman told people about him. When people found out that he hoarded gold, his dead body was stoned. Even such an ugly situation did not alienate Salman from his new religion. There was always longing for the better and truth in his spirit.

The new bishop that replaced the previous one was a person that Salman expected and adopted. He did not give importance to the world; he was engaged in worship day and night. This person, who was enraptured and overwhelmed with religious enthusiasm, got ill after a while. He gave Salman the following advice, which affected Salman very much:

“O my son! The world is heading toward destruction today. They have changed the true religion and overlooked most of the commands and prohibitions. I advise you to go such and such a person in Mosul after me because he is also in my way.”

After the death of this person, went to Mosul. He worked very hard, traveled a lot and did his best with the desire of finding the best and the truth.  

When he arrived in Mosul, he found the priest. This priest was and indeed a religious person like the bishop that died. However, he was in his last years of his life. It looked as if it was the harvest season for the good people; they passed away one by one.

After Mosul, Salman went to Nusaybin and then to Ammuriyah —now Sivrihi­sar in Turkey. He went to the presence of the last virtuous priest of the true religion. Salman, who looked and longed for religious truths, regarded it as an honor to serve this man, who was overwhelmed with religious service. He also worked and obtained some sheep and cattle. He thought he might need some money in the future. The advice of the person in Ammuriyah was more instructional, thought-provoking and wiser than those of the previous priests:

“My son! I do not know anybody who follows our way in the world now. However, the prophet following the religion of Ibrahim will soon emerge. He will emerge in the Arab land. Then, he will migrate to a place between two stony areas. There are date groves between these two stony areas. There will be some signs on him. . He will eat food provided it is a gift and not eat if it is charity. Between his shoulder blades, there will be the Seal of the Prophethood. Go there after my death if you can."

Listening to the words of the priest very carefully, the good gleams of a brand new world, a world of belief and bliss were shining in Salman’s heart and brain.

Now, Salman was looking for a caravan going to Arabia. The rule "he who searches finds" occurred. He found a caravan and they agreed to take him to Arabia in return for money.

They traveled in the scorching desert for days and reached "Wadi al-Qura". The caravan stopped there for a break. Some cruel people of the caravan sold Salman to a Jew as a slave. From then on, Salman was going to live as a slave of a Jew.

However, Salman did not heed slavery; he lived with the excitement caused by the priest all the time. As he worked in the orchard of the Jew, he thought, “I wonder if this is the place between two stony areas.”

Salman worked all the time; he did nothing but what his master ordered. While working in the orchard one day, somebody from the tribe of Banu Qurayzah came. This person, who was very rich, bought Salman from the Jew. Nothing changed for Salman. He was the slave of another master now. However, his new master took him to Madinah. Salman recognized Madinah as soon as he saw it. "The palm groves between two stony areas", which he pursued for years and which he imagined in his mind, was there. Salman did not say anything to anybody though he was in great excitement of the things that took place.  

Years followed years. Time flew and the light that was expected by all beings, people with heart and mind, all civilizations and the universe emerged. It was heard that Hz. Muhammad (pbuh) was given the duty of prophethood. Everybody and everything paid attention to it. Whenever two people came together, they would talk about the lofty prophet who declared his prophethood in Makkah and who prepared that holy and exalted revolution. As Salman listened to what people talked about, he believed that the secret in his heart and consciousness and the knot in his mind would be revealed. He longed to see that exalted prophet, to follow him and to be his servant and slave. In the eye of Salman, life was the expression of conquering something. He had lived with this desire of conquest since his childhood. This desire urged Salman more strongly and severely now. However, he was a slave of somebody and far away from Makkah.

Once, Salman was working in the orchard. His master was having a rest in the shade of a tree. He heard a relative of his master's come by uttering angry words: “God damn it! Do you know what happened?” Salman and his master listened to him carefully. His master asked, “What happened?” The man said, “The man who claimed to be a prophet in Makkah has come here. He is in Quba. A lot of people gathered around him. They were listening to what he said. There is no peace here for us from now on.”

Salman shivered like a person who had a fever. He fell down. He almost fell into the arms of his master. He asked in excitement, wonder and joy, “What did you say? What did you say?” he forgot that he was a slave. His master got furious and kicked him angrily by saying, “What does this matter to you? Why do you interfere leaving your work?" Salman fell down.

Salman did not feel anything. He did not know whether he was alive or not. He did not feel anything but the excitement in his heart, the glad tiding that he had been expecting for years and the longing for the exalted prophet. He wanted to go and see the secrets he kept in his heart be realized. He pinched and saved some money. In the evening when it got dark, he went to Quba secretly. He was in the presence of the Messenger of Allah.  

He said to the Messenger of Allah, "I have heard that you are a righteous person. I have some money that I saved for charity (sadaqah). Will you accept it?"

The Messenger of Allah took it and gave it away to the Companions near him.

Salman did not have much time. He took permission and left. One of the knots in his heart was solved.

He started to save some money again. He found out that the Messenger of Allah had come to Madinah. He wanted to find out whether the Messenger of Allah, who did not eat something given as sadaqah, would eat something given as a gift. He had some time and went to the presence of the Messenger of Allah quickly. He said, “This food is a gift from me.” The Messenger of Allah said, “Bismillah” and ate some of the food he brought and gave the rest to his Companions.

Thus, another secret was solved. He felt himself closer and more attached to the Prophet each time he saw him. With this feeling, he heard a vast wave of joy babbling in him.

Now it was time for the third thing the priest had said: “the Seal of Prophethood”. How was he going to find out about it? How could he see between his two shoulder blades? While he was hesitant and worried, he heard that the Prophet was in the Cemetery of Baqi. He was there for the funeral of one of his Companions who died.  Salman did not want to miss this opportunity. He rushed to the cemetery. He saw the Messenger of Allah talking to his Companions. The Messenger of Allah had a garment of two pieces. Salman greeted them and wanted to move to the back of the Messenger of Allah. The Messenger of Allah noticed the curious and panicky state of Salman; the Messenger of Allah let his cloak drop down and enabled Salman to see “the Seal of Prophethood” on his back. Salman threw himself down before the Prophet (pbuh) grabbed his feet and started to cry. The divine enthusiasm and excitement that boiled in his spirit, gurgled in his heart and surrounded his being started to drop on the ground as tears from his eyes, which were the windows of his spirit. He forgot his being in the presence of the Messenger of Allah. He came round when the Prophet addressed him, “Turn toward me.” He woke up from a sweet dream that looked as if it would never end. The nice and bright realm he entered got wider. He felt that the longing in his spirit ended, his questions were answered and his self calmed down. It looked as if the real world belonged to him; everything belonged to him.

His fleeing from his father's house into slavery, trouble and agony was transformed into a sweet and enjoyable pleasure. He attained real freedom and broke the chains in his spirit.

Hz. Salman attained real freedom after becoming a Muslim but his material slavery continued. The Prophet's heart did not want this lone Companion to spend his life as a slave. In that period, slaves could attain their freedom by making a deal with their masters in return for giving them a certain amount of money. The Prophet told Hz. Salman to make a deal like that and attain his freedom

Hz. Salman talked the Jew about the issue but he could not persuade him. Finally, he uttered a price that he believed Salman could not pay. He said he would free him if he grew 300 date trees that gave fruits and gave him 40 okes of gold. This was something that could not happen in a short time under normal circumstances. When the Prophet (pbuh) heard it, he said to his Companions, “Help your brother!” The Companions helped him as much as they could. They brought date seedlings and gave them to Salman.  When 300 fide seedlings were completed, the Prophet (pbuh) said to Salman, “After you dig holes for them, let me know.”

The holes were prepared in a very short time with the help of the Companions. When they were completed, the Prophet (pbuh) was informed. The Messenger of Allah (pbuh) planted each seedling with his own blessed hands. The seedlings gave fruit in the same year. Thus, one part of Hz. Salman’s debt was completed thanks to the help of the Muslims and the miracle of the Prophet. However, Salman had not been freed from slavery since the other part of his debt had not been paid. Another miracle took place for the other part of his debt.

Once, the Prophet was sitting with his Companions. A Companion came and gave him a piece of gold as big as an egg to give away to the poor. Stating that sadaqah given to a slave in order to free him is superior to sadaqah given to the poor, the Prophet asked his Companions to find Salman and bring him there. They found him and brought him to the presence of the Messenger of Allah. The Prophet gave the gold to Hz. Salman and said, “Take this gold and pay your debt.  Hz. Salman said, “O Messenger of Allah! This gold is not as heavy as the Jew wants!” The Prophet said,

“Take this. Allah Almighty will surely pay your debt with it.”

Hz. Salman said, “By Allah! I weighed it and it was exactly the same amount as I owed. I took it to my master and was freed from slavery.”

Allah Almighty granted these miracles to the Prophet as an advance payment due to the sincere intention of Hz. Salman and the service he would do for Islam in the future.

After Hz. Salman was freed from slavery, he started to serve the Prophet. He was included among “Ashab as-Suffa”, whose needs were met by Companions and who dedicated themselves to the talks of the Prophet and his lessons. The Prophet made Salman brothers with Abu ad-Darda.

Hz. Salman had a special place in the eye of the Messenger of Allah. The Prophet stated the following in a hadith:

“Allah told me that He loved four people among my Companions specially and ordered me to love them. They are Ali, Miqdad bin Aswad, Salman and Abu Dharr.”

The polytheists could not have a decisive victory at the Battle of Uhud. They were determined to continue their enmity against Islam and Muslims. For, their eyes were covered with the darkness of the polytheism. They could not see the light of Islam. They prepared a crowded army in the 5th year of the Migration. This time, their aim was to eliminate all of the Muslims. It was difficult for the Muslims to stop this ferocious army of the polytheists. On the other hand, Madinah was a city that was open from three sides. Therefore, it was difficult to defend it.  

The Prophet maintained his composure despite this situation. He did not lose his hope. For, he believed that Allah Almighty would help him. However, he did not ignore taking precautions and making preparations. He talked to the people he could talk and did everything that could be done. He talked to his Companions as he always did. They told him about their views one by one. When it was time for Hz. Salman, he expressed his idea as follows:

“O Messenger of Allah! When the cavaliers of the enemy attacked us in Iran, we would sometimes surround the place with a ditch. Can we do it now?”

This idea of Hz. Salman’s was liked by all of the Muslims primarily the Prophet. The Messenger of Allah determined all of the places where the ditches would be dug with Companions. Then, he divided the Muslims into groups and showed them where to dig the ditches. Everybody, Muhajirs and Ansar, young and old alike, took part in the digging.  

While the ditches were being dug, the Prophet prayed as follows: “O Allah! There is no bliss except the bliss in the hereafter. Forgive Ansar and Muhajirs!”

All of the Muslims spoke as follows: “We promised to the Messenger of Allah to make jihad in the way of Allah as long as we lived.”

Salman al-Farisi was in the same group as Amr bin Awf, Hudhayfa bin Yaman, Numan bin Muqarrin and some other Companions in the act of digging ditches. He had a strong body and he was experienced. He could dig a place that 10 people could dig on his own.  

The Muslims competed to adopt Salman since he offered such a form of defense when the ferocious polytheists attacked Madinah. Muhajirs regarded him as a Muhajir by saying, “Salman is one of us.” Ansar said, "Salman is one of us; we deserve it more to adopt him." When the Prophet heard this discussion between Ansar and Muhajirs, he stated the following, which pleased everybody:

“Salman is one of us. He is one of the People of the House (Ahl al-Bayt).”

When Hz. Salman heard this glad tiding, he became very happy. He was on the air. It was such a great bliss to be of Ahl al-Bayt.

While the Companions were digging ditches, the group in which Hz. Salman was confronted a big rock. The Companions tried very hard to break it but they could not do it. All of their tools were broken. Thereupon, Hz. Salman went to the presence of the Messenger of Allah and said, “O Messenger of Allah! May our fathers and mothers be sacrificed for you! We confronted a white rock in the middle of the ditch. We broke all of our axes and sledgehammers while trying to break it. We could not break it. What shall we do? Shall we change the line you drew? What do you order us to do?”

The Prophet asked Salman to show him the rock. They showed it. The Messenger of Allah took the sledgehammer of Salman al-Farisi and entered into the ditch. He hit the rock hard with the sledgehammer. One part of the rock was broken and a light (lightning) enlightened the two rocky areas of Madinah. The Prophet said, “Allahu Akbar!" The Companions also said, “Allahu Akbar!" The Messenger of Allah hit the rock again. One more part of the rock was broken and a light was emitted from it. Both the Prophet and Companions said, “Allahu Akbar!" When the Prophet hit the rock again, the rock was broken into pieces. A light appeared again. When the Prophet said, “Allahu Akbar!", the Companions also said, “Allahu Akbar!"  Then, Salman held the Prophet's hand and helped him out of the ditch. Then, he asked the Prophet, "O Messenger of Allah! May my mother and father be sacrificed for you! I saw some lights coming out of the rock when you hit it. What were they?"

Do you ever play any Muggle games that involve magic? Not real magic obviously but like the kind of stuff they write about in fiction.

I do!

Not as often as I used to, but there’s a little group of them that I still occasionally play with.

I’ve done a few different characters for different side games, but in the main one, I’ve had the same one for years now as the person running them is pretty good about not killing off characters for effect.

Not that it matters much, as there is a Cleric in the group as well as NPC spots to stop and hand over gold in exchange for resurrection–if you’ve dragged the body along with you. The Cleric doesn’t charge though, so we usually just make her do it.

There are a few different spell casting classes, all of which are tied to talent points that you assign and earn along the way. Some require high wisdom or high charisma and some just require high intelligence.

What I have started out as a Wizard class, which is one of the high intelligence classes, and I thought it’d be a bit fun to not only throw all the available points into intelligence but also take away from wisdom and charisma just to boost it.

What that resulted in was a person who was incredibly skilled with a whole hell of a lot of general offensive magic–at the expense of common sense and people skills.

Early on, half of the interactions with the NPCs were other party members just trying to keep him from talking to people or doing something incredibly dim and making life difficult. He was good in combat, however, and that’s a good chunk of the game, so they were happy to keep him around and just distract him to keep him from making life difficult when interacting with people outside the party.

The thing with Wizard is that it’s a base class; after a certain level, you can either stay that way or you can split off at any time into specific schools of magic.Specifically, any of the following: Artifacter, Bladesinger, Lore Mastery, Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, Invention, Necromancy, Transmutation, Technomancy, Theurgy, or War Magic.

Go ahead and guess which one I went with. I’ll give you a hint, it starts with an N.

And the thing about Necromancy is that, to use a few of the more prominent skills, such as Command Undead, the undead creature in question just has to win out over how charismatic the Necromancer is.

He wasn’t. At all. So, more often than not, he’d go to do a Command Undead and essentially get a rude gesture in return. Didn’t stop him from trying, but it almost never worked and eventually he was convinced by the others to just stop trying and raise bones or corpses or something that someone else hadn’t already raised once because those were bound to obey.

At certain high levels, you can take a few talents that result in one arm becoming skeletal and having what amounts to an instant death spell on them. That means, if you get close enough and physically touch someone, they will more than likely just drop over dead.

There are also spells that have an area instant death effect but those have to be specifically cast.

So, again, he was incredibly useful in combat, especially if they just wanted it over with quickly or needed to literally answer a, “You and what army?” type of situation. Nobody ever said the army was required to be comprised of the living, after all.

However, that low Wisdom stat meant that he often forgot that touching people with that hand, which was his dominant hand, would more than likely kill them.

They were run out of several towns after he’d shake hands with, say, someone in charge, a guard, a shopkeeper, any random person, and they’d instantly die.

At first, the Cleric would take over, calm things down, resurrect whoever had died free of charge (which isn’t a horrible thing for that particular class, it’s essentially a favour they get from whatever deity they worship, so the resurrected person isn’t considered undead and is fully alive), and they would at least all be able to leave without being chased out by an angry mob.

After awhile, however, the person leading the game decided that rumours had spread about my absolute idiot of a Necromancer and people started denying the entire group access to their towns specifically because of him.

And the Cleric’s deity started denying resurrection requests because the deity was sick of dealing with my idiot Necromancer.

The first time that happened, he stepped in with, “No big deal, I can resurrect things too!” and raised someone–which created what was, more or less, a very ‘alive’ and aware corpse that nobody would really want to be around on account of them being a walking corpse.

When you raise them quickly enough, which you’re not supposed to do, you’re supposed to wait a specified amount of time so you don’t bind the spirit back to the corpse and get an undead thing that knows it’s undead, knows that’s not right at all, and you’ve essentially made an abomination by binding a living soul to a dead body and forcing it to exist that way.

The Cleric just about lost her mind screaming at him about that and all he responded with was, “I don’t see the issue; he was dead, now he’s not, problem solved.”

There was a back and forth of what amounted to, “Oh, it’s exactly the same! Resurrection is resurrection!” vs. “IT’S NOT EVEN CLOSE TO THE SAME THING , YOU HORRID LITTLE GREMLIN!” and the Cleric ended up obliterating the new abomination with a blast of divine energy while still arguing with him about it.

There are certain things that are not advisable to say to a Cleric, especially in an argument.

Among those:

“Yes, well, at least I don’t have to beg to a god and ask permission to raise the dead!” That–was strike two.

Anything that amounts to, “What are you going to do? Smite me?” because that’ll spiral off into an argument about how it’s not that she can’t smite me, it’s that she doesn’t want to, oh great excuse to explain why “your god” didn’t answer at least I don’t have to draw power from a deity because I can do it myself, keep talking and I will blast you into oblivion with holy fire and no I do not care that we’ve known each other for decades I will end you right here, you and what army because I can raise an army literally any time, you wouldn’t dare (he would and did, but it wasn’t terribly impressive as the only dead things or bones around were of various woodland creatures–the, uh, Druid was not happy about that), WATCH ME!, I swear to my and every other god I will dispatch you to whatever hell awaits your sort with righteous fire, just try it you wouldn’t dare!

At that point, the rest of the party just…walked away. Didn’t want any part of this argument and she actually did try it and caused a good deal of damage on the first hit because she caught him unaware.

Holy fire does a good deal of rather painful damage to things that deal with the Not Holy side of things and while a smarter person might have just stopped there and apologised, his reaction was more along the lines of, “You absolute bitch! You deserve everything I’m about to do to you for that!”

…and an actual fight broke out.

The best part is, in these games, at least with the group I play with, you speak as your character, so the other three in the group got to sit there and watch me and the person playing the Cleric argue about this in character for a good half hour, and through the actual fight that broke out in the game itself.

Trouble there is both of them were pretty evenly matched in terms of magical skill and, after that 20 minutes, when it was clear there was either not going to be a winner or someone was going to require a paid resurrection at the end, the other three came back and just–kind of pulled them apart and gave them a, “We have BETTER THINGS TO DO you two! Grow up!” lecture.

So, that was about the sixth town he’d managed to get them barred from and this time the Cleric wouldn’t let it go. Everyone else was just, “…this is not worth the fight, let it go, we’ll go somewhere else,” and the Cleric was absolutely done with my Necromancer but they weren’t allowed to fight anymore so it never went beyond verbal back and forth after that.

At one point she threatened to rip that arm off of him and beat him to death with it and he was just, “HA! Whatever, I’m basically immune to the entire school of magic by this point so it’s not going to bother me one bit.” You–become more or less immune to Necromancy, by the rules, if you stay in that school long enough.

Out of frustration, her solution ended up being tying an oversized, bright purple oven mitt over that hand so when the inevitable happened and he did try to touch someone, it wouldn’t kill them.

He ended up agreeing to it because, fine, whatever, if it’ll stop you screeching at me.

It worked out pretty well, he stopped accidentally killing people when meeting them, no more being run out of or barred from towns, yay!

Except now, he’d forget to take it off in combat and had several instance of walking up to someone all dramatic to deliver the deathblow and get interrupted by the NPC with, “Sorry, I know this is serious and all, but…are you wearing an oven mitt?”

“Oh! Right! Sorry about that!” Mitten comes off, touch-and-kill the NPC, mitten goes back on. He was always very, very good about remembering to put it back on because if he didn’t, the Cleric started yelling at him again until he did.

That got so bad that everyone in the party would repeatedly remind him, prior to engaging in combat, to take the fucking mitten off for the love of everything holy on account of the game leader deciding that, while the mitten was on, his abilities in general were greatly reduced as they were being blocked by the protective holy spells the Cleric had put on it.

So, with the mitten on, he was, more or less, completely useless in combat.

After a few months of that, new rumours spread about this idiot and his big mitten, and NPCs started conversations with, “I’m not talking to you until he puts his mitten back on.”

The Cleric somehow became the unofficial “keep our Necromancer from ruining everything, please” keeper and more than once he’s told her, “If I wanted someone to hover over me like an overprotective mother, I’d dig her up and raise her!”That never went over well and usually got a, “DO. NOT.”

Before games would start, if it was that group of characters, there would be bets around the table as to how he’d manage to completely drive things off the rails.

After a few years in that game, they started being a bit more strategic and dragging fights to areas where they knew he’d have a lot of things to resurrect and throw at whatever was attacking them; there were a lot of fights in or near graveyards.

The others I have are completely normal, all things considered.

Fire and Brimstone

A few years ago, a close friend of mine came out to their parents as a non-Christian. Distressed by their child's infidelity, they said that if they had known this would happen then they would have never had kids in the first place. In effect, things would have been better if they were never born. 

That’s a cruel thing to say to a child, but it’s also refreshingly honest. I think if more of us took the fundamentalist doctrine of hell seriously, then conversations like this would be more common. These feelings might surface for others. Fundamentalism of any kind can create the circumstances that lead kind and gentle people say remarkably harsh things. 

Damnation complicates interfaith relationships because it raises the stakes in a way that's rarely acknowledged. For me, it also dredges up a series of experiences I had as a child preoccupied with the fear of hell. I've since discovered that this is not uncommon. So before I talk about the doctrine as a barrier to relationships, I wanted to share a few experiences of why I see efforts to internalize the doctrine of hell in children as emotionally manipulative at best and abusive at worst.

Growing Up Damned

Growing up in a fundamentalist tradition, I thought about hell a lot. Of course, I was taught about hell a lot. I imagined it as an active, eternal torment and in long family car rides I wondered what it would even look like to inflict that kind of pain. I pictured immersion in lava pools, splinters under fingernails, hooks in one's skin, and being eaten alive by rats. I shuddered at these ideas. I also cried a lot. For a significant portion of my childhood, I believed I was nearly or definitely damned. Based on my 4th grader's interpretation of Hebrews 6:6 and an offhand comment by the Bible school teacher, I thought my joke delivered in a sugar rush at bible class was "mocking the holy spirit" - which I interpreted to be the unforgivable sin. I remember sobbing into my pillow and quietly weeping hymns that night just in case God was still listening. 

Now that I'm older - and out of the church - some friends have shared similar experiences. Their damnation came from things like muttering "godammit" or was evidenced by their failure to speak in tongues. Some described recurring nightmares and even panic attacks that were triggered by fire and brimstone sermons. Many of the object lessons I received on hell are still burned in my memory. 

A high school friend from a sister church recounted one object lesson about hell that she found especially devastating. One time at Bible camp, about half of the campers hiked to a hilltop for the nightly sermon only to find that many of their friends were missing. She took a seat among the empty chairs as the preacher welcomed them to heaven, and began preaching from Matthew 7 & 25. He read, "small is the gate and narrow is the way that leads to life and only few will find it" and "[the unsaved] will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life." At that moment, she began to hear her friends calling her name through the trees from the bottom of the hill. They, the unsaved, were begging her to come back. To save them.

I remember listening to a leader in my old church as he explained how the gospel is like a cure for cancer. "Imagine that everyone in your school is dying of cancer, and you have the cure in your backpack. Are you going to share it with them, or keep it to yourself? How selfish must a person be to withhold that from those that need it most?" I agreed and felt a fresh burden of guilt - how many people haven't I told? How many are unsaved from my cowardice and apathy?

Parents sometimes complained about these  lessons and as a teenager I didn’t understand that. If we really believed these are the terms of existence shouldn’t be we made fully aware of their gravity? 

I've often wondered if, as kids, we took the idea of damnation more seriously than our parents did. In an episode of The Life After, a therapist joins the hosts to talk about internalized fundamentalism and undoing what some call religious trauma syndrome. One host offers an explanation for why children (now millennials in their 20s-30s) experienced this growing up:

“This is something very interesting that I have not heard a lot of commentary on, but I’m really interested in exploring: A big part of the reason that our generation experienced so much religious trauma is that our parents' generation more or less chose Christianity, and our generation was born into it. So for us, growing up, it was our entire reality. Whereas for our parents, it was an augmentation to the reality they already knew. They were able to pick and choose what they let in, whereas we didn’t have a choice. That’s part of the gap. That’s why we can’t communicate [about the impact of our religious upbringing].”

The doctrine of hell was a defining aspect of my faith by design. While I personally think it's a stretch to call these experiences religious trauma or spiritual abuse, I'm troubled that emotionally manipulating teenagers this way is normalized -- even systematized -- in so many traditions.

 Why Hell Matters for a Nonbeliever 

I became a Christian universalist at 17 - even as a Christian, I thought to torture nonbelievers for their nonbelief was morally indefensible. But even after leaving the faith entirely, that fundamentalist doctrine has caused me more pain than any other. It also makes interfaith relationships much trickier to navigate. 

One reason for this is that I find myself preoccupied by its normalcy. In fact, I'm comfortable saying that my damnation is the primary lens through which I view the church. Every steeple, every cross on the highway, and every bible verse on Facebook is a reminder that a considerable portion people in this country would not object to my eternal suffering as long as it's at the hands of the right deity. That number includes many family members and people I grew up with. Maybe you can see why that’s a little preoccupying.

This means that my damnation often becomes the unshakeable backdrop to any relationship that I have with a Christian person. Even when they’re not thinking about it, I almost certainly am - and I want to know what they're thinking about it. There's not a clear way to introduce that into a conversation, but I'm always curious. I mean, maybe I want to be friends, but it's awkward if you think your God will call for my torture in fifty years. In many cases, there’s no aspect of faith that I want to engage believers on more than this point exactly. I rarely do, because it's impolite to ask that kind of question, and when the conversation arrives I often find myself ill-prepared to engage. 

This is because I find communicating the relational toll of this dynamic to be almost impossible. Asking someone to take my perspective is hard because, for one, there is a lack of any secular analogue. In that past, I've asked whether it would change our relationship if I believed that eating animals for food was a sin. (I'm a vegetarian.) Would it change anything if I believed that, if you don't also become a vegetarian, you will be reincarnated as an animal that's needlessly slaughtered forever? That if you stop eating meat now, you can save yourself this fate, but that I'm afraid your late omnivorous relatives are already in anguish for their crimes? Of course I don’t want that for them, and it’s sad but it’s true. That I don't make the rules, but also the rules are fair? Maybe our dinner parties would be a little more awkward. Maybe you wouldn't let me around your kids. Or invite me to dinner at all. You can see that our interactions might be a little strained, and you might have some questions about what this means for our relationship.

Why Hell Matters for Believers

The doctrine of hell also impacts Christians who have relationships with nonbelievers. It raises the stakes for any Christians willing to have interfaith relationships by casting nonbelievers as both a soul that’s in danger and a spiritual threat. This is why I've seen preachers tell new Christians not to befriend nonbelievers, and why I've had parents tell their Christian kids to stop hanging out with me. I think this advice is hateful and misguided, but more than anything it’s self-preserving and intuitively follows from the doctrine of damnation. Moreover, it puts many of the necessary conversations out of reach. 

The mathematician Blaise Pascal invented a tactic of evangelism that won souls by threatening them with Hell. (He was also a lot of fun at parties.) It’s called Pascal’s wager, and it goes something like this: “If you’re an atheist then you might as well be a Christian, because if you’re right then you’ll die and be dead, but if you’re wrong then you’ll die and be damned. So, just be a Christian. Why roll the dice?” It's about as effective for evangelism as it is unethical. But it's an excellent retention technique for those already in the pew. If you're a Christian already persuaded of the stakes, it's a paralyzing reminder about the cost of defecting. 

When I was a Christian, I found the risk of dissuasion utterly terrifying. I read up on apologetics mostly to reassure myself that I could parry every objection with my faith intact if any atheist came looking for a fight. But when the atheist is a loved one, the stakes get even higher. It’s not enough to defend myself anymore. I have to bring that person back to the fold before they're calling my name from the bottom of the hill. So many believers decide to withdraw altogether. By taking a step back, they can at least say it's in God's hands. But the relationship is too risky to pursue.

My point here is not to say that the doctrine of damnation is incorrect -- though I obviously think that. My point is to say that it’s damaging. A judgment about whether another person’s life stance makes them worthy of suffering will matter for that relationship, and in the end that judgment is what the doctrine is about. It’s especially preoccupying for the deconverted when we assume that Christians take the belief as seriously as we did when we internalized it in childhood. 

Addressing that assumption requires a conversation where we may find ourselves at an impasse: the doctrine of damnation is both preoccupying to nonbelievers and immobilizing to believers. I can't say that every nonbeliever wants to have this conversation or that every believer is so reticent. What I can say is that on three different instances, I have been contacted by an old friend who I thought was just catching up, only to discover they were enlisted by a concerned believer to "give me a nudge in the right direction." Presumably feeling ill-equipped to do this themselves, my family recruited someone with ministerial experience. I found myself heartbroken, not only by the pretense of reunion, but because I desperately wanted to have that conversation - not with a minister but with those closest to me. Not to interrogate or dissuade them, but to unpack the challenges that I'm writing about now. 

Even as I'm attempting to acknowledge the pain on both sides of this discussion, I'm still blinded by my indignation about it. (I’m shaking as I type this.) Personally, I've found it a relief to openly ask Christians about this in a way that is as nonjudgmental as I can muster. Taking an exploratory posture toward these attitudes has at least put my wandering mind at ease and is a big part of why I feel less preoccupied with all of this than in years past. That's required self-restraint on my part and interpersonal courage on theirs. Relationships have grown as a result, and I consider myself extremely lucky for the opportunity to have them. I don’t know if it’s something talk through and be done with, but even if the questions may never be entirely resolved it’s a conversation worth having.

23.06.2020

Emailed this to a friend earlier today.

I have been putting off even beginning to allow myself to process my feelings on this since I found out Zac Hanson was a raging racist, transphobic, sexist piece of shit. The problem is he keeps doubling down on his stance and making it so much worse, instead of letting me delete him from my memory and never have to think about him ever again.

This is so different to when multiple women came forward with allegations against Jesse Lacey. Like the second I found that out I never listened to Brand New ever again. Done, deleted. They were one of my favourite bands too, like the same level as Fall Out Boy, MCR, Panic and anything Andrew McMahon does. It hurt, mostly because I used their music to help me get through dealing with shitty men doing similar things to what Jesse Lacey did. But I haven’t really thought about them since, and I only miss their music sometimes. Maybe one day I’ll be able to listen to it without feeling disgusted, but that time is still a long way off.

I am also not the kind of person to idolise celebrities really? Not since I was a kid, anyway. Like all my favourite bands now, I have no idea about their personal lives beyond probably the mid 2000s. I have no clue what their kids, or wives names are, or even how many kids they have. I don’t even know all the names of the people in the band sometimes! I don’t feel connected to them as a person, I feel connected to them through their art, their music, their lyrics. As well as the fandom, the fans, the concerts, and the things I experienced in my life while listening to their music.

Anyway, here’s a brief timeline of what lead up to the main blowout to help put things in context:

May 25th-27th: George Floyd was murdered and Hanson posts normal content on social media with ordinary fan comments

May 28th: Protests against police brutality happen across America, Hanson shares a post about the rocket launch. A handful of fans (mostly Black and POC) express their hurt and frustration with Hanson in the comments

May 31st: Hanson posts advertising a livestream with an organisation that provides mental health support to musicians. Fans comment pleading with them to do the right thing, other fans start absolutely dog-piling those fans and tell them to stop “attacking” Hanson

June 2nd: Black out Tuesday. Taylor posts a black square and a few people comment asking him to actually say Black Lives Matter. The main Hanson account posts nothing.

June 3rd: Isaac posts on his account that “racism is wrong!” to very mixed reactions. Still won’t say Black Lives Matter.

June 4th: Zac posts about recording a podcast. He responds to a few comments about why he won’t say Black Lives Matter, it turns into a shit show and he deletes all the comments.

June 5th: The main Hanson account makes a post advertising their shitty yearly island vacation but it got blown up with backlash in the comments so they deleted the post. Zac makes a really fucking weird instagram text post, that says “Racism is wrong, but simply saying I denounce racism in a post will not save the life of the next young black man who comes upon it, or the next victim of reckless brutality”. The main Hanson account posts a photo with the one black hand in it they could find and still refuse to say Black Lives Matter.

This is where I jumped in and commented “Open your purse” and got completely torn apart by racist fans. I spent hours fighting back and supporting another indigenous Hanson fan who was also getting hurled tons of abuse in the comments. It was genuinely hard to try to calmly engage with these people who were spewing paragraphs about how Hanson don’t owe us anything and to “stop forcing your beliefs on them”. Whew. I think I blocked like 60 accounts, and had to change all my instagram settings to keep me as protected as possible without having to go private.

I knew Hanson fans were terrible. I found this out while in line for their first concert, when everyone was obnoxious assholes who wanted to brag about how many tens of thousands of dollars they’d spent following the tour (no one in line with me in the mornings were locals or even from New Zealand). The more money you spent, the more of a fan you were in their eyes.

This put me completely off ever going to their yearly fanclub island retreat which had been on my bucket list for at least a decade. The thought of being trapped on an island with Hanson and hundreds of complete assholes put me right off for life.

The funny thing is, I always met the nicest and most amazing fellow Hanson fans in line for other bands concerts? But the second concert I went to really solidified my opinion of Hanson fans being the most entitled assholes ever. I should have known it was only a hop skip and a jump for them to slide over being to racist as hell.

I eventually ended up deleting my original comment because a week later I was still getting angry racists coming at me for a fairly mild but sassy post. Which is hilarious because when Gerard Way made a similar half-assed post on his instagram, nearly every comment was “open your purse” and sarcastic “we stan a king who does nothing!!”. The next day he was like, I fucked up, here are some links and resources, we are redirecting the MCR store page to links to donate etc. There were probably some fans getting angry at the “backlash”, but if there were any I didn’t see it. Just insane to see the difference between two groups of fans for bands that I like(d).

On June 6th, a whole lot of Zac’s personal social media accounts got leaked, including a Pinterest board, youtube account and instagram account. He then he publicly confirmed they were all his because he’s a fucking idiot.

A few days later I got sent a link to the r/PostHanson subreddit, which had screengrabs of all of Zac’s pinterest boards. Seeing all those ridiculous and incredibly offensive “memes” was like a punch in the gut.

I had not kept up with this dude's personal life at all, I have forgotten his wife's name and lost track of how many kids he has after the first one. I just figured he was probably conservative because homeschooled + super religious + getting married quick and churning out babies. I’d never really heard or seen Hanson take a political stance on anything, but I didn’t really follow them too closely.

Apparently it was known to fans that Zac was SUPER INTO GUNS and played airsoft which is basically paintball crossed with modern military reenactment?

His pinterest page was completely full of stuff he’d pinned about guns (so many guns) and second amendment memes, that said things like “an 18 year old is too young to buy a gun, but a 5 year old is old enough to decide its own gender?” and one with a picture of a man and a woman with the caption “I told her guns make me feel uncomfortable, she said we should both see other men” which he added the comment “So true” to. The worst were the ones that were supportive of George Zimmerman.

I felt frightened, disgusted, and upset.

On June 8th the Hanson instagram account finally posted (with comments turned off) saying Black Lives Matter.

Since then, Zac has really just…. doubled down on being a shithead. He’s been posting as normal on his main account, blocking fans and deleting even mildly critical comments, liking the most disgusting comments that racist fans have been posting in support of him - one comment he liked was a fan justifying Zimmerman murdering Trayvon Martin. Also replying to some critical fans, making a ridiculously long comment where he thinks everyone is mad at him for being a second amendment nutter which genuinely made me more upset, angry and scared. He truly is the most dangerous type of white person: uneducated, ignorant, arrogant, and with a massive platform to spread his fucked up views. As someone else summed up so perfectly in a comment on one of his posts:

Too stubborn to look inward and see how their own actions, thoughts and behaviours are problematic. No desire to actually hear out marginalised voices. Instead, they'd rather create their own narrative, they want to play the victim, feign being attacked, deflect from any of the issues brought up, and will do anything BUT hold themselves accountable. Instead, they block black people and other POC (Rule #1 of what NOT to do right now), and will "like" comments of other uneducated ignorant white fans who are blindly loyal to anything he says and also don't care at all about marginalised and underrepresented people. Because it's all about HIM. The Poor, entitled, white man is feeling attacked. Zac, you are less than a man. Your development, somewhere down the line, was truly stunted.You are so brainwashed, so self righteous and so far gone, I don't know if you are even salvageable at this point. You would rather be in your bubble, clutching your guns and "liking" comments on your page that are defending the murder of black children than taking the bandwidth, introspection and WORK is takes to actually evolve and be a good person. As a black woman, at least I know now not to waste another dime of my money on you. Now go do what you do best and block another black voice, or write yet another tone deaf and ignorant response to make POC feel crazy (ie: "I'm sorry you are feeling hurt", "I love you", etc.) SAVE IT. That's more deflection bc YOU as the white man are CAUSING the hurt. If you want to love black people, start with explaining to all of your black fans why you believe a young, innocent black child named Trayvon Martin deserved to die because he attacked George Zimmerman. You were man enough to post it. Be man enough to defend it and stand BY your actions.

So I’m not entirely sure where that leaves me or where to go from here. I feel completely blindsided by the boy I picked as my favorite member when I was 12 grew up to be an abhorrent racist fuckhead. I saw in the subreddit support group someone said it feels like someone died and we are all in mourning, which sounds strange but it really does. The Zac Hanson I thought I knew is dead. He never really existed in the first place, or maybe he did for a short while before all the hate wormed its way into his heart.

I also believe that the type of music you choose says a lot about you as a person, and so much of my identity in my preteen and early teen years are wrapped up in Hanson. Both them as individuals as much as the music - I think that's why I can’t separate them because there has never been any separation between the two for me. I first heard Hanson on MTV with their music video for Mmmbop and decided I was in love with Zac before the song was over. I don’t think I can ever stomach listening to that song ever again.

Everyone makes mistakes, has racism to unlearn etc, but Zac hasn’t even bothered to lie and give us the PR answer of “I’m listening and learning etc”, even if he isn’t. He doesn’t even want to seem like he’s saving face because he truly thinks nothing he said or did was wrong, and that is the most horrifying thing of all.

I don’t know how to move past this. It's very easy to think, “people are flawed so you shouldn’t idolise them” but I can’t just snap my fingers and remove this weird 23 year old bond I have that is a mix of intense love and nostalgia? Like there was genuinely a point at age 13 where I actually truly believed: if he could just come to NZ and lock eyes with me at a concert we would fall in love and get married. Which sounds wild but it's how all 3 of them met their wives so it actually was a pretty solid plan.

I immediately took down my signed photo of the band that I had on the wall though because seeing it didn’t remind me of the happy memory of seeing them in concert for the very first time, it just reminded me that Zac is an awful person and his brothers are probably the same and just better at keeping their views private.

I always wanted to get my Hanson tattoo covered and redone but now I think I’m just going to get it covered. A lot of fans are selling or throwing out merch, but I don't want to do that so I've just packed the few things I have away so I don't have to see them for now.

Thinking about the time I met Zac makes me feel sick. It used to genuinely be the best day of my life that I could think about if I was having a shitty day and think “Hey, remember Zac Hanson hugged you”. I’m just so angry that he has tainted so many amazing and happy memories with the hateful rhetoric he is spewing now. I know over time it will hurt less but everything just hurts a lot right now.

Thank you for coming to my Ted talk lmao.

A set of posts that reflect upon History

in earth and time shared by John Parsons as a sobering yet hopeful thought that looks upon this week being Good Friday on the day of the April full ‘pink’ moon, and then Passover on Saturday (simultaneously earth day), culminating with Easter (resurrection) Sunday:

Divine history is somewhat “cyclical” in its expression. The closer we go back to the beginning, the more we see how the future was “seeded” and gets replayed in every generation. Both the Tree of Life (עֵץ הַחַיִּים) and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (עֵץ הַדַּעַת טוֹב וָרָע) were present in the original paradise (Gen. 2:9). When Eve listened to the lies of the nachash (serpent) and regarded the forbidden tree as “desirable to make one wise,” she immediately began her descent into exile. At the very dawn of human history, then, we see that “truth” (אֱמֶת) apart from God (א) leads to death (מֵת). Adam and Eve’s disobedience led to God’s gracious promise regarding the coming “Seed” who would restore all things by being victorious in the war for truth (Gen. 3:15). Of course, this promised Seed was Yeshua, our Suffering Servant and “Second Adam,” who, through His sacrifice upon the cross, “reversed the curse” and reconciled humanity with God. Note, however, that this “proto-gospel” message also implied perpetual warfare between the heirs of the Messiah (called the “children of light”) and the heirs of Satan (called the “children of darkness”). The ongoing enmity between these “two seeds,” then, was ultimately something God willed (1 Thess. 5:5; Col. 1:13; 1 John 3:10). The children of light are called to be am kadosh - a holy people - separate from the evil engendered by the fallen world and its forces, just as the very first creative expression of God was the separation of light from darkness (Gen. 1:3-4). The children of light “hate evil and love the good,” and conversely, the children of darkness “hate the good and love evil” (Psalm 34:21, Prov. 8:13, Amos 5:15). The Exodus story, then, is not so much a matter of ancient history as it is a present revelation of God’s righteous liberating power over the powers of darkness. The great Exodus led to Sinai, and with it the re-encountering of the Tree of the Knowledge of good and evil, just as the Cross of Yeshua is the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden of God. Life is about spiritual warfare, and the power encounter between God and Pharaoh is a paradigm for the ages. Therefore Yeshua refered to his own sacrificial death as the great Lamb of God the final exodus (Luke 9:31). [Hebrew for Christians]

Throughout history we see the repeated attempt to resuscitate or revive ancient “Ra worship” (which derives from Satan in the garden). Every culture has its emissaries of evil -- its “pharaohs,” its political dynasties, its caste systems, and its presumed sense of status quo. In the ancient world, most political figures were literally deified; in the Middle Ages, they were thought to rule through “divine right”; but in today’s secular world, there is no justification given for their control other than through deception and the naked “will to power.” In nearly every case, however, it can be stated that politicians and leaders of this world represent what is most sick about the human condition. Politicians and princlings are given “their hour” in this earth, and they are undoubtedly groomed by the “god of this world” who was a murderer and a liar “from the beginning” (John 8:44). The dust and ashes of countless past civilizations and regimes attest to this truth...

Today we are living in a world that is “globalist” by design. Politicians are often unwitting lackeys for the darker powers seeking to consolidate power to enslave the whole earth. The so-called global economy and its system of usury is the mechanism that will give rise of yet another “Pharaoh” who likewise will be judged by the LORD God Almighty at the End of Days...

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Many people live in a state of fear because they believe the lies and propaganda of “the lords of the darkness of this world” / τοὺς κοσμοκράτορας τοῦ σκότους τούτου (see Eph. 6:12). Satan’s power always has been through the use of deception. If he can get you to believe a lie, he will begin to control you through fear. This is how the devil has always gained the kingdoms of this world -- through deception, threats, and violence... As followers of Yeshua, we must always keep in mind that reality centers on the LORD God of Israel and never in the “rhetorical violence” and metaphysical fantasies of political or media figures.

The LORD God of Israel truly cares about people’s liberation from deception and oppression. The story of the Exodus is His everlasting rebuke to all the world’s dictators and should cause every politician to soberly assess their fate... The time is coming when His judgment will fall upon all the “kings of the earth who take counsel against the LORD and against His Anointed One” (Psalm 2:2). [Hebrew for Christians]

There is a core element of your spiritual life that is all-determinative, that effects everything else, and that is the decision of whether you will choose to "show up," whether you will engage its hope; and whether you will open your eyes and yield yourself to the light... And this is an ongoing decision. Therefore we read: “If you walk in my statutes (אִם־בְּחֻקּתַי תֵּלֵכוּ) and observe my commandments and do them...” (Lev. 26:3). The sages note that unlike the holy angels, we must "walk out" the faith of our days, and therefore we are always moving either forward or backward. In this world, God’s sun shines on the just and unjust alike (Matt. 5:45). Every human being lives by faith of some kind, and it is therefore impossible to opt out of the decision to “choose this day whom we shall serve” (Josh. 24:15). Indifference or apathy is as much a spiritual decision as is outright rebellion, and if we do nothing today to draw us near to the Lord, we will eventually regress and slip backward. This is all very sobering. "No one knows the day or hour," and that's why it is so vital to turn to God and be healed while there is still time. So turn today and bacharta ba'chayim (בָּחַרְתָּ בַּחַיִּים) - "choose life!" "For this commandment (of turning to God) is not hidden from you, and it is not far away... No, the matter is “very near you” (כִּי־קָרוֹב אֵלֶיךָ הַדָּבָר מְאד) - in your mouth and your heart - to do it" (Deut. 30:11-14; Rom. 10:8-13). [Hebrew for Christians]

4.16.19 • Facebook

Can People Really Enter the Heavenly Kingdom By Having Good Behaviors?

By Jingjie

To gain salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom is the common hope of all believers in the Lord. Many of them think that as long as they enthusiastically expend and work hard for the Lord and do good deeds, they can obtain the Lord’s approval and be taken into the heavenly kingdom when the Lord comes. Is that really the case? Did the Lord Jesus ever say anything to this effect? How can we enter the heavenly kingdom?

The Lord Jesus said, “Not every one that said to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). And Jehovah God said, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45). According to God’s words, we can be sure that those who enter the heavenly kingdom must do God’s will, that is, they follow God’s way, obey God, love God and worship God. They are the ones who have been freed from sin and been cleansed. Take a look at us. Although we practice outward good behaviors, and have cast aside everything to labor for the Lord, it’s undeniable that we are still controlled by our sinful natures and live helplessly in the vicious cycle of sinning and repenting, and that what we reveal is satanic corrupt disposition such as arrogance, selfishness, despicableness, and deception. For example, though we believe in the Lord, we still give in to our fleshly desires to lie, commit fraud, deceive, pursue vanity, covet money, and follow evil worldly trends; while we follow God, we worship and follow men; when encountering tribulations and trials that harm our personal interests, we blame and even betray God; our work and preaching is merely to barter with the Lord and ask for His blessings; we scramble for fame and profit with our co-workers, and even establish our own kingdoms by engaging in jealousy and disputes; when God’s work and words don’t accord with our notions, we carelessly judge, resist, and betray God. This is just like what the Jewish chief priests, scribes and Pharisees did. On the outside they appeared humble and patient, donated and helped others, and even traveled far and wide to spread the gospel—exhibiting some seemingly good behaviors. But when the Lord Jesus came to work, they frantically condemned and opposed Him in order to protect their own status and livelihood. They even colluded with the Roman government to nail Him to the cross, committing a grave sin and thus being cursed and punished by God. The Lord Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (John 8:34-35). God’s words say, “You must know what kind of people I desire; those who are impure are not permitted to enter into the kingdom, those who are impure are not permitted to besmirch the holy ground. Though you may have done much work, and have worked for many years, in the end if you are still deplorably filthy—it is intolerable to the law of Heaven that you wish to enter My kingdom! From the foundation of the world until today, never have I offered easy access to My kingdom to those who curry favor with Me. This is a heavenly rule, and no one can break it!” God’s words make it clear. God is holy and righteous. The kingdom of God is under His dominion. He will never allow the impure or corrupt into His kingdom, and this is decided by His righteous disposition. As for us, our sinful natures have not been resolved and our satanic dispositions have not been cleansed. For instance, we act based on our own desires instead of God’s words; when confronted with things that are not in line with our notions, we have no obedience to God; when we sacrifice something, we start asking God for blessings. So, no matter how much we suffer or work, and no matter how many good deeds we appear to do, how can we become people who do God’s will and enter God’s kingdom? Those who follow God’s will are undoubtedly those who obey God absolutely. They are definitely of the same mind as God. They surely will not disobey or resist God. These people are the ones who are qualified to enter the heavenly kingdom and receive God’s promise. As the word of God says, “A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and has not been changed, or been perfected by God, can you be after God’s heart? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and that you are not counted as a sinner because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are not sinful, and are not impure. How can you be saintly if you have not been changed? Within, you are beset by impurity, selfish and mean, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance.”The Lord Jesus once prophesied, “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth” (John 16:12-13). The Bible also predicted, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). From these verses we can see that, according to the needs of us corrupt humans, in the last days God will express all the truths that save mankind, and do the work of judgment starting from God’s house. Only by accepting this work can we receive salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom. Just as God’s words say, “Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.”From God’s words we understand that, the Lord Jesus only completed the work of redemption, rescuing man from sin. Hence, we are no longer cursed for violating God’s laws, and can come before God to pray to Him and enjoy His grace and blessings. But our sinful natures remain deeply rooted within us, and we are still compelled by our satanic nature to oppose and betray God. Moreover, without knowing God, we are unable to fear God and shun evil, much less reach a state of complete obedience to God, the compatibility with God and purification. Therefore, we have not been truly gained by God and we still need God to do the work of completely eliminating sin. For this reason, based on His plan of saving mankind and the needs of us corrupt humans, God has expressed the truth and carried out the work of judgment and chastisement in the last days to remove the shackles and restraints of us and the root causes of sin, so that we can be completely changed and cleansed, cast off Satan’s influence, and receive God’s salvation. Only then can we be eligible to enter the heavenly kingdom.

Can People Really Enter the Heavenly Kingdom By Having Good Behaviors?

By Jingjie

To gain salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom is the common hope of all believers in the Lord. Many of them think that as long as they enthusiastically expend and work hard for the Lord and do good deeds, they can obtain the Lord’s approval and be taken into the heavenly kingdom when the Lord comes. Is that really the case? Did the Lord Jesus ever say anything to this effect? How can we enter the heavenly kingdom?

The Lord Jesus said, “Not every one that said to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). And Jehovah God said, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45). According to God’s words, we can be sure that those who enter the heavenly kingdom must do God’s will, that is, they follow God’s way, obey God, love God and worship God. They are the ones who have been freed from sin and been cleansed. Take a look at us. Although we practice outward good behaviors, and have cast aside everything to labor for the Lord, it’s undeniable that we are still controlled by our sinful natures and live helplessly in the vicious cycle of sinning and repenting, and that what we reveal is satanic corrupt disposition such as arrogance, selfishness, despicableness, and deception. For example, though we believe in the Lord, we still give in to our fleshly desires to lie, commit fraud, deceive, pursue vanity, covet money, and follow evil worldly trends; while we follow God, we worship and follow men; when encountering tribulations and trials that harm our personal interests, we blame and even betray God; our work and preaching is merely to barter with the Lord and ask for His blessings; we scramble for fame and profit with our co-workers, and even establish our own kingdoms by engaging in jealousy and disputes; when God’s work and words don’t accord with our notions, we carelessly judge, resist, and betray God. This is just like what the Jewish chief priests, scribes and Pharisees did. On the outside they appeared humble and patient, donated and helped others, and even traveled far and wide to spread the gospel—exhibiting some seemingly good behaviors. But when the Lord Jesus came to work, they frantically condemned and opposed Him in order to protect their own status and livelihood. They even colluded with the Roman government to nail Him to the cross, committing a grave sin and thus being cursed and punished by God.

The Lord Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (John 8:34-35). God’s words say, “You must know what kind of people I desire; those who are impure are not permitted to enter into the kingdom, those who are impure are not permitted to besmirch the holy ground. Though you may have done much work, and have worked for many years, in the end if you are still deplorably filthy—it is intolerable to the law of Heaven that you wish to enter My kingdom! From the foundation of the world until today, never have I offered easy access to My kingdom to those who curry favor with Me. This is a heavenly rule, and no one can break it!” God’s words make it clear. God is holy and righteous. The kingdom of God is under His dominion. He will never allow the impure or corrupt into His kingdom, and this is decided by His righteous disposition. As for us, our sinful natures have not been resolved and our satanic dispositions have not been cleansed. For instance, we act based on our own desires instead of God’s words; when confronted with things that are not in line with our notions, we have no obedience to God; when we sacrifice something, we start asking God for blessings. So, no matter how much we suffer or work, and no matter how many good deeds we appear to do, how can we become people who do God’s will and enter God’s kingdom? Those who follow God’s will are undoubtedly those who obey God absolutely. They are definitely of the same mind as God. They surely will not disobey or resist God. These people are the ones who are qualified to enter the heavenly kingdom and receive God’s promise. As the word of God says, “A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and has not been changed, or been perfected by God, can you be after God’s heart? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and that you are not counted as a sinner because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are not sinful, and are not impure. How can you be saintly if you have not been changed? Within, you are beset by impurity, selfish and mean, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance.”

The Lord Jesus once prophesied, “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth” (John 16:12-13). The Bible also predicted, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). From these verses we can see that, according to the needs of us corrupt humans, in the last days God will express all the truths that save mankind, and do the work of judgment starting from God’s house. Only by accepting this work can we receive salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom. Just as God’s words say, “Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.”

From God’s words we understand that, the Lord Jesus only completed the work of redemption, rescuing man from sin. Hence, we are no longer cursed for violating God’s laws, and can come before God to pray to Him and enjoy His grace and blessings. But our sinful natures remain deeply rooted within us, and we are still compelled by our satanic nature to oppose and betray God. Moreover, without knowing God, we are unable to fear God and shun evil, much less reach a state of complete obedience to God, the compatibility with God and purification. Therefore, we have not been truly gained by God and we still need God to do the work of completely eliminating sin. For this reason, based on His plan of saving mankind and the needs of us corrupt humans, God has expressed the truth and carried out the work of judgment and chastisement in the last days to remove the shackles and restraints of us and the root causes of sin, so that we can be completely changed and cleansed, cast off Satan’s influence, and receive God’s salvation. Only then can we be eligible to enter the heavenly kingdom.

The Blue Parakeet

The Bible Reading Landscape in Canada

In 2013, the Canadian Bible Engagement Study found that weekly Bible reading had fallen by half since 1996: only one in seven Canadian Christians read their Bible at least once a week. The study found that, rather than a lack of time, there are several reasons that influenced the poor number -

Many Christians believe that the Bible has irreconcilable contradictions

Many Christians believe that the Bible is irrelevant to modern life

The study concluded that there is a lot of work that the Church has to do to engage the Christian community on fostering a Bible reading habit, educate on the Bible’s reliability and applicability of the Bible, as well as encourage reflection and discussion about its teachings.

While the church has some responsibility, I believe Christians should take initiative and be active in discovering how the Bible can be meaningful in their own lives. It starts by reading it from front to back. However, I admit that extracting meaningfulness and living out the Bible’s message can be difficult.

What really is “reading the Bible”?

When I read the Bible, there are passages that challenges me to question how I am really reading the Bible and how I can live it out in my life. The Bible is God inspired, in that the authors were lead by the Holy Spirit to write the words that God want his people to hear. Surely, when it is written in the Bible, God wants me to listen to the words He had spoken through the authors. But that can be challenging to me. Let’s take Leviticus 19 for example.

“Be Holy because I, the Lord your God, am holy” (19:2). I know it is difficult to be Holy like God, but yes, I do agree. But the following are like rocks on the road that makes me trip.

You must observe my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God (19:3)

Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed. Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material (19:19)

Do not eat any meat with the blood still in it (19:26)

Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head (19:27)

I have broken all these rules many times in the past. I don’t keep the Sabbath (Friday night sundown to Saturday night sundown), I wear cotton-polyester shirts, I sometimes eat medium rare steaks, my mom and barber cuts hair from the sides of my head. I can see why many Christians believe the Bible is irrelevant to everyday life; what we are reading here are remnants of commands that God had given to Israelites many, many years in the past. They should not be relevant today! Right?

We chance upon passages that we believe are no longer relevant to our times and we want to dismiss them and explain them away. However, is that right to do so? Scot Mcknight has written a book about this very problem called The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible.

The author starts by describing the different ways we read the Bible. One of these ways include reading the Bible as a collection of laws. It becomes a measuring stick to evaluate whether we are good people, causing us to become pompous, self righteous and arrogant against those who try but fail to follow the Bible. That is not the purpose of the Bible. Moreover, it is impossible to follow each and every commandment written. When one tries to explain away commands  (for example kill magicians [Exodus 22:18]), the Bible no longer retain meaning as a lawbook.

The author believes that reading the bible as a story is a more appropriate way. When we actually read the Bible from cover to cover, we would discover it can be divided into 6 plots

God and creation (Genesis 1-2)

Adam and Eve created as one body, however, they shattered this union by sinning (Genesis 3-11)

God’s covenant community is restored to God, self, others and the world after a struggle for unity (Genesis 12-Malachi)

Jesus Christ who is the story and in whose story we are to live, returns us to unity through his incarnation, death, and resurrection (Matthew to John)

The Church as Jesus’ covenant community (Acts to Jude)

The consummation, when all designs of our Creator God will finally be realized forever (Revelations)

The author calls this The Story in the Bible, a complete and unifying narrative that holds the Bible together. Each book in the Bible expresses one or more of the above plots. God had inspired all the different authors in the Bible across its entire history to provide interpretive retellings of the same Story that would speak to God’s people in that particular era in which the book was written.

 Discerning the Bible’s messages

A simple example of reading the Bible as story is when we read the passage of Matthew 4:1-11. Before the start of Jesus’ ministry, he was tempted by the devil for 40 days in the desert. Reading through it, some of us, including myself, were taught and believed that Jesus had provided us with a method to respond to temptations to sin by quoting the Bible at Satan. While this is a good attempt at interpretation, we are only imparting what we believe into this story. The lesson of quoting verses was not mentioned anywhere in this text (as opposed to Jesus’ parables where he explains the meanings of his stories). Rather, if we take a step back, we would see this story sharing similar elements to previous books in the Bible.

Jesus’ temptation is an alternate retelling of Adam and Eve’s temptation by Satan in the Garden of Eden. Jesus is recast as the second Adam and acts as a foil to Adam. Jesus becomes the perfectly obedient son of God who resists Satan’s temptations.

Jesus’ temptation is an alternate retelling of Israel’s wilderness wanderings. He is recast as the second Moses. Unlike Moses, Jesus resisted temptations and was able to leave the wilderness in contrast to 40 years of wandering.    

Jesus’ temptation can be interpreted as an updated version of older stories where we see an example of the perfect person who can lead us through the wilderness and restore our broken relationship with God. Much different than what we initially believed.

Using this Bible reading foundation, the author goes through several detailed examples to show how reading the Bible as a story helps us to understand the meaning behind passages that we believe are irrelevant and not applicable to modern life. One example that allowed me to see this reading-Bible-as-story principle in action is how Paul determined how to apply the act of circumcision decreed by God in the past to the Christian community in his time.

God commanded to Abraham (a Jew) that the males of his generation and the generations thereafter should be circumcised (Genesis 17:9-14). Those who are not circumcised would break God’s covenant. Therefore circumcision had been a big deal for the Jewish community. The time after Jesus’ ascension into heaven, there were many non-Jewish converts to Christianity. There was a huge debate in Acts 15 whether to circumcise these non-Jewish converts. To end the debate, Paul reasoned that while circumcision is a command that would last forever, it was not necessary for converts. But how did he come to this conclusion?

Paul believes circumcision is a physical act that shows you are part of God’s people. However, being circumcised does not mean you would enter into a relationship with God where you follow his commands wholeheartedly. He argues using Deuteronomy 10:16 and Jeremiah 4:4, taken from the Old Testament, that circumcision is not merely surgery on the body, but is a matter of the heart (Romans 2:28-29). Moreover, he goes on to say that baptism fulfills and replaces circumcision. Paul believes the rite of baptism serves the purpose of physical circumcision (Colossians 2:11-12). Instead of a physical cut by human hands, baptism is an act of circumcision of the heart by the spirit to mark you as part of God’s people, through death by sin and raised to new life into the Eternal Kingdom.

In this example, Paul, as a leader in the early church, had the problem of discerning whether what was meant for Israelites in the past (circumcision) was to be applicable to the changing times (the growth of non-Jewish converts in the church). He had to understand what was written about circumcision in the past (a God given command), understand the union-nonunion-union Story of the Bible, and discern that circumcision is still very much a requirement in his time as was in the past to be God’s people; however, this temporary requirement to enter into a covenant community was eventually fulfilled spiritually by baptism, which is only made possible by the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Where will God Lead Us?

Essentially, reading the Bible and locating what was read in the context of the Story would help us interpret and understand odd passages in the Bible. This method would help us discern how the ancient Word and expressions of faith in the past can be modernized to live out in today’s world.

I admit this approach of reading the Bible requires hard work. Even the author shares that it is time consuming and will take practice to apply it to your Bible reading. Jesus’ temptation and Paul’s decision regarding circumcision may at first seem straightforward, but the waters are muddied when faced with contentious issues such as abortion, homosexuality or assisted death where there is no straightforward answer in the Bible. As these issues become more widely discussed, what answer could we conclude from the Bible and how can we live that out in our society today?

I appreciate that the author was careful not to tell us “answers” or expert opinion on the mentioned contentious issues. He does guide us on one appropriate way on how the read the Bible so that we are equipped to start thinking about these issues and discerning the answers ourselves by relying on God’s spirit, the Story, and the tools of history and language. The Blue Parakeet is an interesting book and it spurred my interest in learning more about other methods on reading the Bible. In the meantime, through reading the Bible in this way, I pray that I can hear and understand what God is saying in the past so I can know what God is saying to me in the present. Then I would be able share this message to others and live out the message in this world.

JESUS ENTERS INTO UNHOLY PLACES

Fifth Sunday in Lent [March 21]

Mark 2:13-22

“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners” (Mark 2:17).

Jesus becomes a significant challenge to the religious elite of his day. They want to know why he eats with sinners and tax collectors (2:16). The working theory, championed especially by the Pharisees, was that the reason for the woes of God's people was that they didn't take God’s commandments seriously enough (particularly purity laws). Guard and promote this seriously enough and God would come and restore Israel's fortunes. In other words, the big problem was that there were too many sinners in God’s ranks and if they wanted God to step in and fix the situation then they needed to raise the piety and purity stakes. Which, for Israel’s religious life shaped by the scribal class, meant strict adherence to God’s commands. And then just to be really safe we’ll surround those commands with other commands. And then some extra commands on top of that.Until they had become so layered with commandments that it was though the really religious folk were surrounded by walls and walls of purity and morality that would keep you at extreme distances from anyone who was a little suspicious on the sin front. It kept the problem out there. Which meant become separate. Other. Distant. Removed.

This is what defined the leadership of the religious authorities. They observe, sit back, judge and accuse. They take every opportunity to draw thick and heavy lines of exclusion. And that's what the leadership of God's people understood as holiness. Which then instantly plunges Jesus into problematic territory. Because the Pharisees and company have cleverly diagnosed the problem and the solution. If everyone plays their part then God will do his part. But along comes Jesus. And instead of keeping his distance from unholy people and unholy places, Jesus enters in.

He sees Levi, a tax collector aiding the efforts of the conquerors, in the thick of his work, and he invites him to come and follow him. Immediately Levi gets up, just like Simon Peter, Andrew (Mark 1:16) and the Zebedee brothers (1:19) before him, and follows him. Jesus is on the front foot with both tradies and traitors. He doesn’t find them while they’re in the temple, or praying and studying the scriptures in the synagogues. He finds them going about their everyday, normal activities, and calls them, just as they are. Which in Levi’s case included being something of a professional-swindler, a traitor to the national cause. He was a sinner. Which was supposed to mean he was dangerous. Disgusting. Dirty. It was people like Levi who brought judgment upon the whole community. It was people like Levi who were the problem. But Jesus sees him. Jesus calls him. Jesus is a blazing fire of grace and welcome. He takes the initiative to seek out and call the disenfranchised and the overlooked, the infidels and the outcasts. All without exception were invited to take up their place at the messianic banquet.

Which means something pretty powerful to those who have been left on the outside of community. It means something powerful to those who have heard the message you’re the reason for the mess we’re in. This message continues to mean something powerful to those who have heard the message that they’re dangerous, dirty or disgusting, to those who have experienced through any kind of relational distance the message that they could never belong in our communities, in our lives, in our hearts.

So imagine then the power of a different message - the message that Jesus comes with that declares you’re an essential part of God’s dream for the world! You are welcome here! Not only do you have a place in it, I’m asking you to help me to make good on this dream! You can imagine the spirit-soaring conversation and laughter as hungry people fill their bellies. The kingdom of God is a roaring party. Jesus breaks the rules. Holiness was supposed to be about keeping a safe distance from anything that might have a contaminating influence. But throughout Mark’s Gospel we have this theme instead of Jesus entering in.

Jesus enters into people’s worlds, touches wounds, and extends compassion. He offers hope and a radical welcome. Instead of being contaminated he radiates a contagious holiness that brings colour and life to the world. Shockingly we learn that this is how God intends on putting the world right.God longs to transform the world not through distance, but rather through the way of engagement, the deeply human way of touch, connection, compassion and inclusion. That’s what holiness looks like to Jesus. Holiness means entering into unholy places. And it still offers us a new way of measuring goodness: not understood in terms of what we deny, resist, or exclude but rather by what we embrace, what we create, and who we include.

Shame and exclusion don’t call the shots at Jesus’ table. It doesn’t matter if you’ve got your life together. It doesn’t matter who or what you know, or even what you’ve done. Jesus’ table is for the hungry. Jesus’ table is for the hurting and the sick. Are you hungry? Are you human, broken and messed up like the rest of us? That’s what counts at Jesus’ table.

For reflection and practice

·       Think of someone you might describe as a holy person. What is it about them that reminded you of holiness?

·       Where are the “unholy” places that you imagine Jesus might enter into today?

·       Think about your life. What do you deny, resist, and exclude?

·       What do you embrace, create, and include?

·       In what way do you relate to being hungry, hurting, sick, or unholy? Spend some time sharing with Jesus about these places within you. What kind of compassion does he offer you?

Share a spirit-soaring meal with someone this week.

How TV Predicted Politics in the 2010s

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/how-tv-predicted-politics-in-the-2010s/

How TV Predicted Politics in the 2010s

And if “The West Wing” trio worked in Congressman Frank Underwood’s Washington, they might just get shoved in front of a moving Metro train. When Netflix premiered “House of Cards” in 2013, it seemed natural to juxtapose it with the brighter era of political TV that preceded it. If only we knew at the time that the show was preparing us for a decade of dark political TV to come—and reflecting an overall perception of Washington that would soon have an impact on therealWashington.

Of course, “Scandal” and “House of Cards” were just TV—few people on the government payroll, after all, could afford those wardrobes. But these shows’ portrayal of the creeping rot of Washington didn’t show up in a vacuum. Television can both set and reflect the mood of the nation, creating expectations about human behavior. After Barack Obama’s 2008 victory, many mused, in seriousness, about whether Dennis Haysbert’s acting turn as President David Palmer on “24” helped get voters used to the image of a black president. Something similar might be at work now. Today’s real-life sweeping nihilism about politicians’ motives, the widespread hatred of the “swamp,” the notion that the process is flawed and the rules of engagement themselves might not be worth following, was, if not created by television, then at least predicted by it.

To realize how dark TV’s take on Washington has been these past eight or 10 years, it’s worth thinking about how relatively sunny the view was just a decade earlier. The aughts were full of political shows whose central politicians were virtuous and well-meaning, engaged in public service for the right reasons. This wasn’t a just a liberal Hollywood thing; in ABC’s short-lived “Commander in Chief” (2005-06), Geena Davis, a vice president who ascended to the Oval Office when her boss died, was a political independent. Fox’s “24” (2001-10) didn’t take a progressive view of issues like torture—but when Kiefer Sutherland and his fellow counterterrorism agents played fast and loose with the Geneva Accords, they did so for the sake of virtuous presidents and the safety of the American people.

And nothing screamed “higher calling” more than “The West Wing,” which aired on NBC from 1999 to 2006, tracking the righteous souls who worked for President Jed Bartlet. The soundtrack was stirring and majestic; the opening sequence was gauzy and triumphant; in most episodes, someone gave a speech about doing the right thing. When the actors showed up on the Democratic campaign trail—as they did en masse for Hillary Clinton in 2016—you sometimes got the sense that they actually believed they had been part of the government.

“The West Wing,” created by Aaron Sorkin, was a liberal wish-fulfillment fantasy, but it also mostly imbued Team Bartlet’s conservative antagonists with a certain kind of honor: They wanted power, but in service to their causes, and with ultimate respect for the system. (That point was underscored in a 2002 documentary-style “Special Episode” that featured gauzy interviews about the work of White House staffers, and included such Republicans as Marlin Fitzwater, Peggy Noonan and Karl Rove.) Even though the show premiered seven months after President Bill Clinton’s highly partisan impeachment trial, it was forever optimistic about the system—confident that a few good friends and well-placed Sorkin-penned speeches could fix whatever ailed democracy. If there was political analysis embedded in “The West Wing,” it was the notion that the system fell short when the players didn’t fight hard enough for what they believed in; when they were too willing to play the safe bet instead of taking a risk for the greater good.

Then came the end of Obama’s first term—a moment when, if you were a liberal with Sorkinesque optimism about “Yes We Can” slogans and transformative change, you might be coming to terms with the notion that politicians are imperfect, gridlock is pervasive and Mitch McConnell isn’t just going to step aside to make way for your higher cause, whether it’s universal health care or closing Guantanamo.

And a new era of political TV shows took that disillusionment one step further. Shows like “Veep” and “House of Cards” offered a new, darker theory: The system can never work if everybody in politics is terrible and venal and self-serving—and the very nature of Washington makes people terrible and venal and self-serving.

“Veep,” a kind of inverse of “The West Wing” that premiered in 2012, was a farce about ambitious politician Selina Meyer and her marginally competent, politically hungry staff. Here, majestic “West Wing”-style music is played in little jabs, like punchlines, between scenes where Meyer does her best to squeeze political capital from every situation. And her disdain for the actual public is glaringly obvious. (“I’ve met some people, some real people, and I’ve got to tell you, a lot of them are f—ing idiots,” she says in the first season.) Where the staffers in “The West Wing” were fast and loyal friends, Meyer’s staffers mock and undermine one another other without mercy. The closest thing Meyer has to a friend is the devoted body guy who brings her snacks on demand and whispers useful facts in her ear in public settings. In the series finale, she sets him up to take the fall for a political scandal—and watches FBI agents haul him away, out of the corner of her eye, as she delivers a nomination acceptance speech at the party convention.

“Veep” was created by a Scotsman, Armando Iannucci, a veteran of scathing British black comedies about the moral compromises of government. He held no special reverence for American institutions, and he was keenly aware of the comedic possibilities when teeming ambition crashed into powerlessness. Around the time of the series premiere, Iannucci told theLos Angeles Timesthat he was partly inspired by Lyndon B. Johnson, who spent his vice presidency “sort of sitting in his office waiting for a phone call.” (The running joke in the first season is that Selina keeps asking if the president called, and the answer is always “no.”) Like the best satire, the show has an undercurrent of sadness; Meyer is acutely aware of how much toil and personal sacrifice it has taken to obtain whatever capital she has, and how much the struggle has changed her as a person. The finale offers a brief, melancholy image of her sitting alone in the Oval Office, having sacrificed every relationship to reach her goal.

“House of Cards,” too, had roots across the pond; it was loosely based on a British political-thriller series from the 1990s. But where “Veep” spun nihilism into farce, “House of Cards” turned it into high melodrama. The credit sequence shows the monuments of Washington in ominous time-lapse photography, with dark clouds sweeping overhead and shadows climbing up the buildings. The central characters, politician Frank Underwood and his wife, Claire, are so deeply committed to Washington power that they’d do anything to get it—not just the garden-variety TV fare of murders, affairs and bribery, but some truly sinister bureaucratic moves. In the second season, in order to blackmail a pregnant former employee, Claire forges health insurance paperwork to deny her a drug that would aid blood flow to her placenta. “I’m willing to let your child wither and die inside you if that’s what’s required, but neither of us wants that,” she says, matter-of-factly.

The ruthlessness of politics was a running theme throughout the decade. Even soap-opera fantasies picked up on the idea of Washington as a force for ambition, evil and, really, not much else. “The Oval Office, in our show, was a place that corrupted anybody who came near it,” “Scandal” creator Shonda Rhimes told reporters before the series finale. “And the closer you came, the more corrupt it made you and the more damaged it made you.” This year, Netflix’s “The Politician,” a Ryan Murphy political allegory set at a California high school, mocked the poll-driven, values-free drive of a budding politician and his handlers.

The most powerful way that TV predicted politics in the 2010s, though, was in its prescription for a fix: the suggestion that what Washington really needs is an outsider to swoop in and shake things up (or drain the swamp, if you prefer). Mainstream networks in particular offered another archetype alongside these power-hungry nihilists: the accidental politician who reluctantly takes high office, then comes face-to-face with that broken system. These shows might have been more optimistic about human nature than “Scandal” or “Veep,” but in their own way, they were just as cynical about Washington.

In 2016, ABC launched “Designated Survivor,” a political thriller starring Kiefer Sutherland, best known as fearless agent Jack Bauer in “24.” Here, Sutherland plays Tom Kirkman, a mild-mannered career academic who serves as secretary of Housing and Urban Development—but is so bad at navigating Washington politics that one morning, he learns that president plans to fire him. He has one final duty: to be the Cabinet member taken to a secure location during the State of the Union address, just in case. As it so happens, that night, somebody blows up the Capitol.

Kirkman takes the Oath of Office with no trust, no mandate and no idea how to do the job, though viewers surely trust that his inner Kiefer Sutherland will come through. It does, in a mild-mannered way, as he fires subordinate generals, stumbles through international crises and finds it within himself, eventually, to deliver a stirring speech. (In the third season, he delivers his own State of the Union address, but goes off-script and caterwauls at Congress: “The system is broken and you people broke it!”) Through it all, Kirkman is fighting against a greater conspiracy: a network of corruption that wrongly believes he’d be an easy mark. As other characters handle the action-adventure work, Kirkman stands his ground; it’s his rare integrity, his un-Washingtonian Kiefer-ness, that holds the nation together.

CBS’ “Madam Secretary,” which premiered two years earlier, has a similar premise: Elizabeth McCord, a former CIA analyst-turned-college professor, is tapped to become secretary of State after the current one dies in a plane crash. The president, a former CIA director, tells McCord he trusts her to think more expansively than most Washington lifers, and within reason, she complies, battling a White House chief of staff who would prefer she follow protocol more often. “This is me not being a politician,” she declares in one early episode, explaining an unconventional decision.

“Madam Secretary” is more like “The West Wing” in the sense that multiple characters have virtue. The president is a basically a good guy; the McCords’ marriage is a mutually supportive dream; the State Department staff is behind her. (So are some real-world political operatives: In one 2018 episode, former Secretaries of State Hillary Clinton, Madeleine Albright and Colin Powell appear together, as themselves, to offer bland advice about pushing for national unity after a crisis.) Still, the show’s backdrop is a Washington that’s compromised and divided, full of conspiracies and unworthy opponents, from secretive bureaucrats to government moles and ambitious two-dimensional senators. At the end of the first season, one such senator discovers that McCord shared classified information with her husband Henry. Issued a subpoena to appear before the Senate committee, Henry declares his intention to obstruct justice. “This whole thing lacks integrity,” he tells Elizabeth. “I feel no ethical obligation to play by their rules.”

Ultimately, Elizabeth barges into the hearing, takes Henry’s place at the witness table and delivers an impassioned speech, saying she only broke the law because she cared about the country and didn’t know who else she could trust. (“Man, I have never heard a more eloquent defense for violating the Espionage Act,” another character says, in admiration.) She storms out of the hearing without being dismissed. Soon afterward, the president informs her that the Justice Department has decided to let it pass.

Of all of the political shenanigans on television this decade, that 2015 scene might have been the most telling, and the most predictive of the real-life politics that were to come, not long after the episode aired. “The West Wing” never argued that the rules of political engagement can and should be broken. But today, real-life Washington is full of disagreements, not just about facts and outcomes, but about the basic codes of conduct, the processes that everyone needs to follow, the obligation anyone has to play by anyone’s rules.

Again, it’s just TV. But academic treatises have been written about how TV crime shows can create a warped impression of the criminal justice system, giving jurors outsized expectations, for example, of the power of forensic evidence. A decade ago, on political TV, we had an openhearted baseline expectation about how the system works, why it fails and what kinds of behavior gets rewarded.

But in these 2010s shows, the characters learn that breaking the codes of conduct and propriety will wind up taking you far. Selina Meyer of “Veep” and both Underwoods of “House of Cards” all get to be president in the end. Elizabeth McCord, of “Madam Secretary,” eventually becomes president, too. But, you know, a good one. So long as you’re on her side.

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Can People Really Enter the Heavenly Kingdom by Having Good Behaviors?

By Jingjie

To gain salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom is the common hope of all believers in the Lord.

 Many of them think that as long as they enthusiastically expend and work hard for the Lord and do good deeds, they can obtain the Lord’s approval and be taken into the heavenly kingdom when the Lord comes. Is that really the case? Did the Lord Jesus ever say anything to this effect? How can we enter the heavenly kingdom?

The Lord Jesus said, “Not every one that said to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). And Jehovah God said, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45). According to God’s words, we can be sure that those who enter the heavenly kingdom must do God’s will, that is, they follow God’s way, obey God, love God and worship God. They are the ones who have been freed from sin and been cleansed. Take a look at us. Although we practice outward good behaviors, and have cast aside everything to labor for the Lord, it’s undeniable that we are still controlled by our sinful natures and live helplessly in the vicious cycle of sinning and repenting, and that what we reveal is satanic corrupt disposition such as arrogance, selfishness, despicableness, and deception. For example, though we believe in the Lord, we still give in to our fleshly desires to lie, commit fraud, deceive, pursue vanity, covet money, and follow evil worldly trends; while we follow God, we worship and follow men; when encountering tribulations and trials that harm our personal interests, we blame and even betray God; our work and preaching is merely to barter with the Lord and ask for His blessings; we scramble for fame and profit with our co-workers, and even establish our own kingdoms by engaging in jealousy and disputes; when God’s work and words don’t accord with our notions, we carelessly judge, resist, and betray God. This is just like what the Jewish chief priests, scribes and Pharisees did. On the outside they appeared humble and patient, donated and helped others, and even traveled far and wide to spread the gospel—exhibiting some seemingly good behaviors. But when the Lord Jesus came to work, they frantically condemned and opposed Him in order to protect their own status and livelihood. They even colluded with the Roman government to nail Him to the cross, committing a grave sin and thus being cursed and punished by God.

The Lord Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (John 8:34-35). God’s words say, “You must know what kind of people I desire; those who are impure are not permitted to enter into the kingdom, those who are impure are not permitted to besmirch the holy ground. Though you may have done much work, and have worked for many years, in the end if you are still deplorably filthy—it is intolerable to the law of Heaven that you wish to enter My kingdom! From the foundation of the world until today, never have I offered easy access to My kingdom to those who curry favor with Me. This is a heavenly rule, and no one can break it!” God’s words make it clear. God is holy and righteous. The kingdom of God is under His dominion. He will never allow the impure or corrupt into His kingdom, and this is decided by His righteous disposition. As for us, our sinful natures have not been resolved and our satanic dispositions have not been cleansed. For instance, we act based on our own desires instead of God’s words; when confronted with things that are not in line with our notions, we have no obedience to God; when we sacrifice something, we start asking God for blessings. So, no matter how much we suffer or work, and no matter how many good deeds we appear to do, how can we become people who do God’s will and enter God’s kingdom? Those who follow God’s will are undoubtedly those who obey God absolutely. They are definitely of the same mind as God. They surely will not disobey or resist God. These people are the ones who are qualified to enter the heavenly kingdom and receive God’s promise. As the word of God says, “A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and has not been changed, or been perfected by God, can you be after God’s heart? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and that you are not counted as a sinner because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are not sinful, and are not impure. How can you be saintly if you have not been changed? Within, you are beset by impurity, selfish and mean, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance.”

The Lord Jesus once prophesied, “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth” (John 16:12-13). The Bible also predicted, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). From these verses we can see that, according to the needs of us corrupt humans, in the last days God will express all the truths that save mankind, and do the work of judgment starting from God’s house. Only by accepting this work can we receive salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom. Just as God’s words say, “Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.”

From God’s words we understand that, the Lord Jesus only completed the work of redemption, rescuing man from sin. Hence, we are no longer cursed for violating God’s laws, and can come before God to pray to Him and enjoy His grace and blessings. But our sinful natures remain deeply rooted within us, and we are still compelled by our satanic nature to oppose and betray God. Moreover, without knowing God, we are unable to fear God and shun evil, much less reach a state of complete obedience to God, the compatibility with God and purification. Therefore, we have not been truly gained by God and we still need God to do the work of completely eliminating sin. For this reason, based on His plan of saving mankind and the needs of us corrupt humans, God has expressed the truth and carried out the work of judgment and chastisement in the last days to remove the shackles and restraints of us and the root causes of sin, so that we can be completely changed and cleansed, cast off Satan’s influence, and receive God’s salvation. Only then can we be eligible to enter the heavenly kingdom.

How to Become a Holy Christian

Follow peace with all men, and HOLINESS, WITHOUT WHICH NO MAN SHALL SEE THE LORD

Hebrews 12:14

Holiness is a very important attribute that you must develop in your quest to become a strong Christian. To be holy is to be special.  God wants holiness in the sense that he wants us to be special and separated unto him.  

By living your life in a certain way and not doing what everyone else is doing, you become special, separated and unique in the eyes of the Lord.  Don’t you want to be special in the eyes of the Lord?  

In order to be used by God, you must be separate, different and special. A vessel in the hands of God is a special vessel indeed.  Being holy is simply being a special and unusual vessel in the hands of the Lord.  

Today, many do not like the topic of holiness because most of us are falling short of the standards in the Bible.   However, it will serve you well to strive for holiness!  No matter how many times you fall, you must get up again and keep pursuing the high standards of holiness God has set for his people.  A righteous man falleth seven times and rises again.  Remember, it is worth doing anything and suffering any inconvenience in order for God to choose you and use you.  

I want to simplify your search for holiness by giving you what is called the holiness code. The Holiness Code is a term which refers to the set of instructions given in Leviticus Chapters 17 to 26.  In this small section of the Bible, the word ‘holy’ appears forty-three times.  The text in this section seems to have a lot to do with holiness.  The Holiness Code consists of the following rules which must serve as a guide to your quest for holiness.  You must strive to follow the rules in the Holiness Code.  You are likely to fail, but the holiness code will be a guide for your attempt at holy living.  

THE HOLINESS CODE

Holiness Code No.1: Keep all the commandments of God.  

If ye walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them; then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.

Leviticus 26:3-4

Holiness Code No.2: Fear and respect your father and your mother.  

Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and keep my sabbaths: I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 19:3

Holiness Code No.3: Do not worship idols.  

Turn ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods: I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 19:4

Holiness Code No.4: Remember the poor in your midst.

And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger: I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 19:10

Holiness Code No.5: Do not steal.  

Ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie one to another.

Leviticus 19:11

Holiness Code No.6:  Do not tell lies and deceive people.  

Ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie one to another.

Leviticus 19:11

Holiness Code No.7:  Do not use God’s name in vain.  

And ye shall not swear by my name falsely, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:12

Holiness Code No.8: Do not cheat someone of his wages nor hold on to it.  

Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour, neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.

Leviticus 19:13

Holiness Code No.9:Be kind and considerate towards the handicapped and  never harm them.  

Thou shalt not curse the deaf, nor put a stumblingblock before the blind, but shalt fear thy God: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:14

Holiness Code No.10:  Ensure that there is justice and fairness towards all men no matter how rich or poor they are.

Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment: thou shalt not respect the person of the poor, nor honour the person of the mighty: but in righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbour.

Leviticus 19:15

Holiness Code No.11:  Do not spread rumours or bad stories.

Thou shalt not go up and down as a talebearer among thy people: neither shalt thou stand against the blood of thy neighbour: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:16

Holiness Code No.12:  Do not hate your brother in your heart or bear someone a grudge.    

Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thine heart: thou shalt in any wise rebuke thy neighbour, and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:17-18

Holiness Code No.13:Do not practice sorcery or divination.

Ye shall not eat any thing with the blood: neither shall ye use enchantment, nor observe times….Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 19:26, 31

Holiness Code No.14:Do not let your daughters become prostitutes and sexually  cheap girls.  

Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness.

Leviticus 19:29

Holiness Code No.15:Keep the Sabbath and show respect to the house of God.  

Ye shall keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:30

Holiness Code No.16:  Honour the aged.

You shall rise up before the grayheaded and honor the aged, and you shall revere your God; I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:32 (NASB)

Holiness Code No.17:Give strangers fair treatment and show them kindness.  

And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 19:33-34

Holiness Code No.18:Do not be cheat or dupe people in business.  

Ye shall do no unrighteousness in judgment, in meteyard, in weight, or in measure. Just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a just hin, shall ye have: I am the Lord your God, which brought you out of the land of Egypt.

Leviticus 19:35-36

Holiness Code No.19:Do not give your children over to idols and demons.

Again, thou shalt say to the children of Israel, Whosoever he be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that giveth any of his seed unto Molech; he shall surely be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones.

Leviticus 20:2

Holiness Code No.20:Do not make tattoos and marks on your body.

Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the Lord.

Leviticus 19:28

Holiness Code No.21:Do not commit adultery.

And the man that committeth adultery with another man’s wife, even he that committeth adultery with his neighbour’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall surely be put to death.

Leviticus 20:10

Holiness Code No.22:Do not engage in homosexuality.  

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

Leviticus 20:13

Holiness Code No.23:Do not have sex with animals.

If And if a man lie with a beast, he shall surely be put to death: and ye shall slay the beast. And if a woman approach unto any beast, and lie down thereto, thou shalt kill the woman, and the beast: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

Leviticus 20:15-16

Neither shalt thou lie with any beast to defile thyself therewith: neither shall any woman stand before a beast to lie down thereto: it is confusion.

Leviticus 18:23  

Holiness Code No.24:Do not have sex with your sister or step sister.

The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father, or daughter of thy mother, whether she be born at home, or born abroad, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover.

Leviticus 18:9  

And if a man shall take his sister, his father’s daughter, or his mother’s daughter, and see her nakedness, and she see his nakedness; it is a wicked thing; and they shall be cut off in the sight of their people: he hath uncovered his sister’s nakedness; he shall bear his iniquity.

Leviticus 20:17

Holiness Code No.25:Do not have sexual relations with a woman as well as her daughter.

Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter, neither shalt thou take her son’s daughter, or her daughter’s daughter, to uncover her nakedness; for they are her near kinswomen: it is wickedness..

Leviticus 18:17

Holiness Code No.26:Do not have sexual relations with your grandchild.

The nakedness of thy son’s daughter, or of thy daughter’s daughter, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover: for theirs is thine own nakedness.

Leviticus 18:10

Holiness Code No.27:Do not have sexual relations with your mother or your step mother.

And the man that lieth with his father’s wife hath uncovered his father’s nakedness: both of them shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.

Leviticus 20:11

Holiness Code No.28:Do not have sexual relations with your aunties and uncles.

Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s sister: she is thy father’s near kinswoman. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother’s sister: for she is thy mother’s near kinswoman.  

Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s brother, thou shalt not approach to his wife: she is thine aunt

Leviticus 18:12-14

Holiness Code No.29:Do not have sexual relations with your brother’s wife or your son’s wife

Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy daughter in law: she is thy son’s wife; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness. Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother’s wife: it is thy brother’s nakedness.

Leviticus 18:15, 16

Holiness Code No.30:Do not have sex with your maid.

And whosoever lieth carnally with a woman, that is a bondmaid, betrothed to an husband, and not at all redeemed, nor freedom given her; she shall be scourged; they shall not be put to death, because she was not free.

Leviticus 19:20

by Dag Heward-Mills

Can People Really Enter the Heavenly Kingdom By Having Good Behaviors?

By Jingjie

To gain salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom is the common hope of all believers in the Lord. 

Many of them think that as long as they enthusiastically expend and work hard for the Lord and do good deeds, they can obtain the Lord’s approval and be taken into the heavenly kingdom when the Lord comes. Is that really the case? Did the Lord Jesus ever say anything to this effect? How can we enter the heavenly kingdom?

The Lord Jesus said, “Not every one that said to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). And Jehovah God said, “You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:45). According to God’s words, we can be sure that those who enter the heavenly kingdom must do God’s will, that is, they follow God’s way, obey God, love God and worship God. They are the ones who have been freed from sin and been cleansed. Take a look at us. Although we practice outward good behaviors, and have cast aside everything to labor for the Lord, it’s undeniable that we are still controlled by our sinful natures and live helplessly in the vicious cycle of sinning and repenting, and that what we reveal is satanic corrupt disposition such as arrogance, selfishness, despicableness, and deception. For example, though we believe in the Lord, we still give in to our fleshly desires to lie, commit fraud, deceive, pursue vanity, covet money, and follow evil worldly trends; while we follow God, we worship and follow men; when encountering tribulations and trials that harm our personal interests, we blame and even betray God; our work and preaching is merely to barter with the Lord and ask for His blessings; we scramble for fame and profit with our co-workers, and even establish our own kingdoms by engaging in jealousy and disputes; when God’s work and words don’t accord with our notions, we carelessly judge, resist, and betray God. This is just like what the Jewish chief priests, scribes and Pharisees did. On the outside they appeared humble and patient, donated and helped others, and even traveled far and wide to spread the gospel—exhibiting some seemingly good behaviors. But when the Lord Jesus came to work, they frantically condemned and opposed Him in order to protect their own status and livelihood. They even colluded with the Roman government to nail Him to the cross, committing a grave sin and thus being cursed and punished by God.

The Lord Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the Son stays ever” (John 8:34-35). God’s words say, “You must know what kind of people I desire; those who are impure are not permitted to enter into the kingdom, those who are impure are not permitted to besmirch the holy ground. Though you may have done much work, and have worked for many years, in the end if you are still deplorably filthy—it is intolerable to the law of Heaven that you wish to enter My kingdom! From the foundation of the world until today, never have I offered easy access to My kingdom to those who curry favor with Me. This is a heavenly rule, and no one can break it!” God’s words make it clear. God is holy and righteous. The kingdom of God is under His dominion. He will never allow the impure or corrupt into His kingdom, and this is decided by His righteous disposition. As for us, our sinful natures have not been resolved and our satanic dispositions have not been cleansed. For instance, we act based on our own desires instead of God’s words; when confronted with things that are not in line with our notions, we have no obedience to God; when we sacrifice something, we start asking God for blessings. So, no matter how much we suffer or work, and no matter how many good deeds we appear to do, how can we become people who do God’s will and enter God’s kingdom? Those who follow God’s will are undoubtedly those who obey God absolutely. They are definitely of the same mind as God. They surely will not disobey or resist God. These people are the ones who are qualified to enter the heavenly kingdom and receive God’s promise. As the word of God says, “A sinner such as you, who has just been redeemed, and has not been changed, or been perfected by God, can you be after God’s heart? For you, you who are still of your old self, it is true that you were saved by Jesus, and that you are not counted as a sinner because of the salvation of God, but this does not prove that you are not sinful, and are not impure. How can you be saintly if you have not been changed? Within, you are beset by impurity, selfish and mean, yet you still wish to descend with Jesus—you should be so lucky! You have missed a step in your belief in God: You have merely been redeemed, but have not been changed. For you to be after God’s heart, God must personally do the work of changing and cleansing you; if you are only redeemed, you will be incapable of attaining sanctity. In this way you will be unqualified to share in the good blessings of God, for you have missed out a step in God’s work of managing man, which is the key step of changing and perfecting. And so you, a sinner who has just been redeemed, are incapable of directly inheriting God’s inheritance.”

The Lord Jesus once prophesied, “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth” (John 16:12-13). The Bible also predicted, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God” (1 Peter 4:17). From these verses we can see that, according to the needs of us corrupt humans, in the last days God will express all the truths that save mankind, and do the work of judgment starting from God’s house. Only by accepting this work can we receive salvation and enter the heavenly kingdom. Just as God’s words say, “Though Jesus did much work among man, He only completed the redemption of all mankind and became man’s sin offering, and did not rid man of all his corrupt disposition. Fully saving man from the influence of Satan not only required Jesus to take on the sins of man as the sin offering, but also required God to do greater work to completely rid man of his disposition, which has been corrupted by Satan. And so, after man was forgiven his sins, God has returned to flesh to lead man into the new age, and begun the work of chastisement and judgment, and this work has brought man into a higher realm. All those who submit under His dominion shall enjoy higher truth and receive greater blessings. They shall truly live in the light, and shall gain the truth, the way, and the life.”

From God’s words we understand that, the Lord Jesus only completed the work of redemption, rescuing man from sin. Hence, we are no longer cursed for violating God’s laws, and can come before God to pray to Him and enjoy His grace and blessings. But our sinful natures remain deeply rooted within us, and we are still compelled by our satanic nature to oppose and betray God. Moreover, without knowing God, we are unable to fear God and shun evil, much less reach a state of complete obedience to God, the compatibility with God and purification. Therefore, we have not been truly gained by God and we still need God to do the work of completely eliminating sin. For this reason, based on His plan of saving mankind and the needs of us corrupt humans, God has expressed the truth and carried out the work of judgment and chastisement in the last days to remove the shackles and restraints of us and the root causes of sin, so that we can be completely changed and cleansed, cast off Satan’s influence, and receive God’s salvation. Only then can we be eligible to enter the heavenly kingdom.