Dear Johnny Pentecost

 

    Dear Johnny Pentecost,

    I am a dedicated rapture watcher for many years now, patiently waiting for the flashes of light that will signal war and the next war and the next rumor of war. I’ve been waiting all summer for the next unannounced system failure – halt and catch fire. Should we soon be hearing the drums and drones of war.

    And what of the coming revival? An illegal sequence before the rapture, no?

    Signed - Anxious in Anticipation

    Dear Anxious,

    Your patience will soon be rewarded. Self-proclaimed prophets will come with unintended instructions, but do not despair. Keep an eye on the skies and keep to the program.

    ***

    Dear Johnny Pentecost,

    I am at my end of my rope. My mother-in-law does not regard the Biblical roles assigned to her. She is not a buzzing, but a roll of thunder in my soul. She opens my mail, personal letters, bills, and account statements alike. She has accused me of adultery fifty times if she has done it once. I have reminded her of her place, but she insists and will not submit. And in all of this, my wife says nothing. Please help.

    Signed – Bitter not Better

    Dear Bitter

    Disrespect begins in the head before it moves into the body. But in this case it has gone beyond and has given birth to the contempt of the unbeliever. It may already be too late for her or for you. You must take her by the arm and afterward by the shoulder and shake once or twice (but not more than thrice.) This will be her correction. In the end, unbelievers like her will receive the necessary correction and discipline. Till then you must instruct her in such things as are true, noble, just, pure, lovely and good report. Do not let her speak.

    ***

    Dear Johnny Pentecost,

    My aunt says that Minneapolis is preparing the way for the Antichrist. Is she wrong or is she just crazy?

    Signed – Confused in Saint Paul

    Dear Confused,

    Your aunt may be closer to the truth than you realize. Minnesota, the land of ten thousand lakes and taxes is a leftist, liberal, communist haven and Minneapolis is Moscow on the Mississippi. Minneapolis’ open embrace of the LGBTQI alphabet army is suggestive prophetically.

    In Daniel we read that “he will show no regard for the gods of his fathers or for the desire of women…” Meaning the Antichrist will not only reject his Christian heritage, he will refuse to submit to a Biblical understanding of sexuality.

    It is not prudent to take Biblical instruction from any woman, even a woman as wise and intelligent as your aunt however, in this case she may not be wrong.

The Pentecost Machine

from Doctor Luke’s Personal Notes (Ananias and Sapphira)

    Though I was not present to witness the deaths of Ananias (“Yahweh is gracious”) or Sapphira (“Beautiful”) and neither did I perform an autopsy on their bodies following, I have been asked by members of the community to address as a doctor and member of the Royal College of Surgeons the peculiarities of their sudden demise and to, if possible, describe the cause (other than the supernatural obvious). The community wants to retain a record of these events, as discreditable as it may be, so that Ananias and Sapphira and their legacy will not be forgotten.

    Ananias: 42-year-old, male with no previous history of heart disease or cardiovascular difficulties and his wife, Sapphira: 30-year-old female with sparkling blue eyes and a clean health history were both suddenly and inexplicably struck dead on the same day, within a few hours of each other.

    The couple had voluntarily sold a piece of property and brought the cash to the apostles as part of the voluntary communalism being put into practice by the Followers of the Way. Ananias reportedly told Peter that the amount he brought in was the full amount of the sale. But when challenged on this, Ananias began to sweat profusely. The apostle Peter described this as a lie not to men, but a lie to the Holy Spirit and asked him, “Wasn’t the property yours to use as you wished? And once sold, wasn’t the money yours to give as you desired? What put this scheme into your head? Your philargyry will not save you. Keep your money. Keep your mammon. Keep your mummery.”

    And with that Ananias fell down dead; he ‘breathed out his soul,’ as one witness described it. A group of young men wrapped the body in a sheet and took it out for burial.

    A few hours later Sapphira came too and was challenged in the same way by Peter. “Listen! You can hear the footsteps of the men who just finished burying your husband returning. They’ll carry you out next.” Immediately she fell down dead like her husband. The group of young men who had just buried her husband, wrapped her in a sheet and buried her body next to that of her husband.

    There are a variety of physical conditions that could have resulted in this sort of sudden death. The sudden onset of excessive sweating could be indicative of a Heart Attack. This “cold sweat” would probably have been accompanied by other symptoms including chest pains and a racing or skipping heartbeat. If their deaths were caused by a Stroke they would have felt a numbness or a prickling sensation in various parts of their body, along with a headache and blurred vision. This is not an uncommon occurrence; deaths caused by strokes are fairly common. Emperor Valentinian died as the result of a stroke precipitated by yelling angrily at a group of foreign envoys. I might have suspected a Pulmonary Embolism but there is no indication that either of them were coughing or that they experienced a bloody or frothy mucus with the coughing. Shigellosis (a bacterial intestinal infection) might be considered except there was not an accompanying diarrhea, fever, abdominal pain, or bloody stool. Neither does an Aortic Rupture seem likely as this would have been accompanied by a sudden loss of blood pressure and a blue tinge to the skin. It may have been a case of Exhaustion as the result of diseased blood vessels in the lungs – but this seems unlikely. There was no trace of either Strychnine, or Prussic Acid, or Opium.

    More exotic diagnoses have been suggested including: Being Struck by Lightning – I read an article in one of the Latin medical journals about an entire football team from The Democratic Republic of the Congo that was simultaneously killed by a bolt of lightning. The old adage, “Lightning never strikes the same place twice” is veritably untrue. It is possible that the couple in question were both killed in the same place by separate lightning strikes. This is strange, but not outside of the realm of fortean possibilities. Or they could have been killed by other articles falling from the sky. A villager in Sulaymaniyah, Iraq was killed by a falling Meteorite, and the Greek playwright Aeschylus was killed by Tortoise dropped by an eagle flying overhead which mistook the author’s bald head for a stone on which to drop and break the tortoise’s shell. It’s true that none of the witnesses mention lightening, meteorites, or tortoises, but these possibilities cannot be completely discounted.

    My sometimes traveling companion, Paul, has often suggested that members of the church who violate the standards and expectations of the community should be Turned Over to Satan for the “destruction of the flesh.” I am not sure what he means by that but it sounds like death to me.

    Psychosomatic or Psychogenic Death (sometimes referred to as “Voodoo Death,” is a parasympathetic backlash of the mind against the strong emotions of fear and terror that is powerful enough to shut down the body. It is possible that the couple were, quite literally, scared to death.

    A skillful physician could, from the color and cast of the skin, make an inferential diagnosis of an illness, but it is impossible at this far removal in both space and time to make any authoritative diagnosis, but it would seem that something incredible and fearful happened here. More than that I would not hazard to say.

Allegedly

What follows is a transcript of the emergency meeting of the Jerusalem Sanhedrin, Tammuz 15, in the Year of the Consulship of Ocella and Sulla, otherwise counted as 786 Ab Urbe Condita¹ from a recording made on an Uher 5000 reel to reel tape recorder.² Those present were the rulers, elders, scribes in the presence of Annas, the High Priest as well as Jonathan, his son, and Alexander Unknown - all members of high priestly families and respectable men.

Elder 1: (Speaking to the detainees – by name Peter and John, and including the formerly crippled man) By what power and what name have you done this?

Peter: Rulers of th…

Elder 2: I’m sorry to interrupt…

Elder 1: Yes? Yes?

Elder 2: But what is the question under discussion here this morning?

Elder 1: What?

Elder 2: Is it the question of the healing of the crippled man…

Scribe 1: Alleged healing…

Elder 2: Yes. Alleged healing. Or is it the question of their heretical doctrine, namely the resurrection of the dead?

Scribe 2: Alleged resurrection.

Elder 2: Yes. Alleged Resurrection.

Elder 1: What?

Peter: Rulers of th…

Elder 1: The detainee will keep silent until he has been addressed. Now, what is the question?

Elder 2: Exactly.

Elder 1: What?

Elder 2: What is the question to be addressed here this morning? Is it the healing… alleged healing, or is the question of the questionable doctrine of the alleged resurrection?

Elder 1: What does it matter? We’re not here for questions; we’re here for answers. Now (to the detainees again) Why haven’t you answered my question?

Peter: Rulers of th…

Scribe 2: Could we have the question repeated for the record?

Scribe 1: I believe it was, “By what power and what name have you done this?”

Elder 1: Yes. Yes. That was it. By what power and by what name? And we are still waiting for an answer.

Peter: Rulers of th…

Scribe 2: Could you speak up? So we can hear your words and record your answer.

Elder 2: Yes. Do speak up.

Peter: Rulers of the people and elders! If you are questioning us about an act of kindness…

Scribe 1: Alleged act of kindness.

Peter: If you are questioning us about an act of kindness to a crippled old man, if you’re asking us how he was healed, then you all should know, that it was in the name and authority of Jesus of Nazareth – whom you crucified …

Scribe 2: Allegedly

Peter: …. and whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands on his own two feet before you today. Of all the given names in this world given to men, there is none other by which we can be saved.

The detainees were excused for the moment, sent back to the holding cells still bearing their fetters.

Elder 1: Your excellencies, what are we to do with these men? They are uneducated to be sure, but they are aweless and unafraid.

Ruler 1: Perhaps it is because they are uneducated that they are so audacious; they have not learned the proper respect for our position, or for theirs.

Elder 1: That may be so. We know them to be associates of the criminal Jesus, who was, like them, untrained and uncredentialed.

Elder 2: However that may be, the man has been healed.

Scribe 2: Allegedly.

Elder 2: Oh, lay off. We all know he was. We’ve all seen him in the court of beggars. We’ve seen him lying there for years. And now we’ve seen him standing in front of our eyes. And what is more, it’s obvious to everyone in the city that he’s been healed. These men are exciting the casual inhabitants of the city – the dockworkers, porters, hawkers, costermongers and the like. If we don’t silence them now, then all the bookbinders, clock-winders, and tailors in the city will be talking about this miracle.

Scribe 2: Alleged miracle.

Elder 2: Shut it, you old fool! You just saw him yourself.

Annas: Gentlemen, please. We are losing ourselves here.

Jonathan: Yes, father. You are quite right. Quite right.

Annas: What we want is stop this report from spreading any further.

Elder 2: And again, I am sorry, my lord, but which report is that?

Annas: What?

Elder 2: Are we trying to stop the report of the healing or the report of Jesus’ resurrection.

Scribe 2: Alleged resurrection.

Annas: Oh, for heaven’s sake. Call the detainees back in and warn them in the sternest terms possible not to speak of this or in this name to anyone ever again.

Jonathan: Yes, father. You are quite right. Again, quite right.

The detainees were called in before the members of the Sanhedrin once more and their shackles were removed from their wrists and ankles.

Elder 1: Gentlemen, you are hereby and forthwith ordered to stop all promulgation and proclamation in, of, about, or concerning the name of one Jesus of Nazareth, who was recently hung upon the executioner’s tree in this very city. You will, pursuant to the orders given by this governing body as incorporated under the authority of the emperor in Rome, Tiberius Caesar Augustus, cease and desist from all reckless speech and discourse, both here in the city of Jerusalem, and in the land of Israel and all her territories.

Elder 2: Now, what say you?

Peter: You are the judges, and you will judge what is right and proper. But we have seen what we have seen, and we know what we know. Is it right and proper for us to listen and to obey you, or to obey the voice of our Lord God?

John: We cannot and will not stop proclaiming what we know to be true.

Elder 1: I warn you again, I warn you most sternly: say no more to anyone about this or you will not fail to face the consequences. The next scream you hear may be your own.

John: And what, good sire, would those consequences be? What punishment is proper for the healing of cripples and restoring them to health?

Elder 1: …

Scribe 1: (Whispering) My lord, we have no chastisement we can give for this. I’m not even sure, my lord, if this can be described as a criminal action.

Elder: (to the detainees) Depart. And go with this warning.

The detainees, including the formerly crippled man, were escorted from the building.

Scribe 1: My lord, I forgot to ask earlier, but it’s important for the records: how old was the man who has been miraculously cured?

Scribe 2: Allegedly cured…

1July 2, 33CE 

2By a strange twist of asynchronicity it was the exact same Uher 5000 reel to reel tape recorder used by President Richard Milhous Nixon as part of his White House taping system. It slipped through time and space and wound up in the possession of the High Priest. It's presence in first century Jerusalem remains unexplained.

If and Even If – Some Random Arguments

    Here I am, just cleaning out the mental junk drawer. 

    If, as the King James Only crowd will argue, the words of God are pure and uncorrupted, pure words, as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times and God has kept them, preserved them from this generation forever (Psalm 12: 6-7), then why was the King James translation necessary? Shouldn’t the Tyndale translation, which preceded the KJV, have been sufficient? Or if the Tyndale was corrupted, shouldn’t the Latin Vulgate translation have been preserved uncorrupted? Or again, why did the Jews in Alexandria in the 3^rd and 2^nd centuries BCE feel the need translate the scriptures into Greek? Shouldn’t the Hebrew originals have been preserved uncorrupted?

    And never mind the fact that the KJV translators themselves rejected the idea that their work was perfect. They explicitly denied it in 1611 in their preface to the completed work.

    Even if we were to accept the historicity of Noah’s ark and the worldwide flood (and that’s a big if…), God’s promise to never again flood the earth (Genesis 9:11) cannot be used as an argument against global warming. God may have promised not to flood the world, but that is not the same as a guarantee of protection from our own climate-changing acts of self-destruction. God’s covenant of mercy does not absolve us of our ecological stewardship.

The Hidden Ranks - A Darling and Mio story

    Darling, traveled under her nom de guerre, wearing the occasional disguise – wigs and glasses. Lifted shoes and invented limps. She was both investigating and investigated. Though not yet defenestrated, the threat was always there. Persistent pursuit. It was adrenaline action without rush. Always professional. Always the cause.

    She carried memos where digital traffic was routinely intercepted. Whispered secrets where phone calls could be overheard. Passed notes in the back of class, backstage, and dead drops out front. They’d given her an implanted electrolarynx to disguise her voice and quiet thumbnail cameras. They’d given her passwords and encryption authentications. But she could not do it alone.

    Milo too, serving in an army without a gun, within the hidden ranks. Constantly pushing back with ink and film and precision knives against despotic force. Unlawful, maybe. But they would not be brought under the power. They would not be enslaved by chaos or corruption. They would not be held in bondage by fascist atrocities or soldiers in the church.

    There were cops on the street and in the air to maintain the deregulated status quo – twenty-four seven drone surveillance. Masked blacked out forces operating with impunity. Between the streetlights, between the taboo, the dangerous, the risky and the public square. Everywhere. There were dead friends too. Murdered and long dead men and women with names unspoken unlisted, dirtied with painful memories. Teenage boys stabbed in jail. Women beaten to death by sidewalk police. Broken down, despised and ostracized by political forces forever beyond their reach.

    But not without a fight. They’d sworn true faith and allegiance to justice, and to love if not to law.

    She saw reflections in the mirror, in the pupils of strangers’ eyes. Reflections in late-night television. The weight and cruelty of the everwatching eye. Flickering screens and shifting positions. Emotion laid low, beneath layers of self-control. Passion suspect beneath purpose.

    House and home. Children. What could not be protected had to be put aside. He had plans. She had opportunities. None of it mattered. Their marriage now, their only safeguard. They’d sacrificed everything but one another.

The Darling and Milo stories: 
1 - Everything’s Back to Normal
2 - One Life and One More
3 - Milo Remembers
4 - Milo Wonders 

Milo Wonders

     This is the fourth installment of what is becoming a series. I like these character, Milo and Darling. I'm curious what will happen to them. 

Milo Wonders

    Milo sat at his drafting table, work lamp off, magnifying loupe put away in its case. Evening was coming and Darling wasn’t home. He wasn’t worried, not just yet. A loving marriage that had earned his trust. Repenting. Forgiving. Never enemies. Trust. Their marriage in this thirty years war had survived.

    Survived her travel, twenty-five thousand, forty-thousand miles, he’d lost count. Survived illness, and bitterness ongoing. Seasick, airsick Fear. Survived apartment fires. Survived dangerous mobs and riots in the streets.

    And through it all she was keeping the record, writing the report through the regular rhythms of bitter conflict and escalating violence – in the city and the nation beyond. The assaults, black and blue, and unlucky blows.

    He checked his watch and went to the kitchen. He’d start the potatoes and wait.

    “My thoughts have been and will be formed and pass away. I know the dust and dwelling place. I know the frailty of this flesh. Every tombstone. And there are times and there are places – still dwelling, being, living now. Thoughts going. Thoughts drift. I wonder. My struggles before, blood, trouble, and trials of love, and strength, and sorrow when the world comes to an end. My thoughts to the very last will be written.”

    Now the sky was dark and blackout conditions in force. Curtains drawn and lamps down low. Dinner dishes for one cleaned and put away. Her portion waiting in the fridge. He checked his watch.

    “I am a man, well pleased. I am a man of conscience, unashamed. But I’m having a hard time finding my thoughts. My mind. Do you think it strange? Do I love and serve? Am I distracted?”

    He imagined not murderers and thieves, but busybodies and gossips. There was the danger. Evildoers. Purloined letters. The private correspondence of critics. Damaging interoffice memos circulated, copied, and passed on by Darling to her handlers. Undermining the State Press – writing the free press, underground. He imagined fiery hell burning away. The fiery judgment of a living hell. The godly and the free suffer persecution. But fire and water purify.

    He checked his watch. “Fire can save us, yeah? Purify? I hope.”

    Hours later, one in the morning, she came through the door. Returning home, she fell into his arms, burning with fever. Ill. One hundred degrees. One hundred one. He rushed her to bed.

    “Can we live a thousand years like this, Darling?”

1 - Everything’s Back to Normal
2 - One Life and One More
3 - Milo Remembers

No Revelation, No Knowledge

    This is a companion piece to The MAGA Glossolalia, built from the same scaffold — 1 Corinthians 14, the same Paul passage about tongues and intelligibility and the failure of speech to communicate — but they're doing completely opposite things with it.

    The MAGA Glossolalia was extroverted and performative. The speaker was loud, certain, facing a crowd, wielding language as domination. His tongue was a weapon. The unintelligibility was a feature — meaning hidden from the intellectuals, the barbarians getting barbarous tongues. The speaker had all the best words and didn't care that they communicate nothing because communication was never the point. Power was.

    This piece is the not that.

    The same diagnosis, one delivered as exposure, one as confession. The same theology. Different rooms.

No Revelation, No Knowledge 

    “I love you.”

    These are words easily spoken. These are words easy to understand. These are words spoken white-knuckle into the air.

    “I do. I will.”

    We speak by revelation –the things we do not know. A model of the Christian faith and maturity through marriage, sex, and children.

    We speak by knowledge – in romantic statements, most curious and long out of love. Obstinate and distant.

    We speak by prophecy – more frightful than hell, captured by solitude, the net of eternal damnation.

    We speak by words of instruction – Brutally honest. Lights off, frigid and fearful. Increasingly distant. The seemingly impossible and the least likely to succeed.

    Speak in a tongue, any tongue, any language and speak to God but never to me. Disconnected from reality. And not to other people because nobody understands anything anymore. Preaching the entire Bible but the meaning is hidden. Frustrated and afraid. Defeated. I needed help but didn’t know how to ask.

    I love you, please.

    Maybe she knows she’s giving a half-truth and doesn’t care. Maybe she’s too lazy to look deeper, to investigate. What she’s heard confirms what she already believes, so she won’t bother to look. Maybe she’s as lost as me. Either way, stop dressing up like a grieving widow and speak to me, please.

    Flute or lyre or trumpet – it’s all the same note without a melody. I do not understand the meaning of the sounds you are making. All of our conversations are like this - no sound doctrine, no meaningful discussion. A drone or a dirge unsung forever.

    No revelation.

    No knowledge.

    No prophecy.

    No doctrine.

    My heart derives no comfort from ten thousand words in this unknown tongue.

Real Christian Men, Real Christian Marriage – Another Troll Conversation

    He was there again. On my porch, waiting for me when I got home from work. “Can I come in for a bit, Carter?” he asked with that smug grin he always has when he comes over. It had been a long day in the hot sun. I wanted to say no. I wanted him to just go away, but I’ve committed to this exercise, and I mean to honor it. I sighed...

    “Sure, why not?” I said as I opened the door and let him in. “You’ll have to excuse me. I’m still sweaty and gross.” I gave him a glass of water and invited him to sit on the couch while I went into the bathroom, took off my shirt and began to clean up with a washcloth.

    “Havin’ a bit of a whore’s bath, are you Carter?”

    I rolled my eyes. It was too hot for this. “What can I do for you, Gunner?”

    “Carter, you know I’m concerned about you. You’ve been on my mind, and I’ve been thinking about your condition. You’re on, what is it, your third marriage?”

    I tossed the washcloth into the sink and came back out to the living room. It’s true. He was right. I’ve been married twice before, and I don’t mind talking about it. I am what I am. Mistakes and warts and all – but he was taking a lot of liberties here. “Yes, Gunner. That is correct.”

    “Was it just a string of bad luck there, Carter? I’m kidding. I’m kidding. But seriously, are you going to do something different with this one to make it last?”

    “You’re walking a fine line here, Gunner...”

    “I’m just telling you the things you need to know. You need to learn how to lead as a husband. Be the head, not the tail. You’ve probably been beaten down by the feminists. Real Christian men know how to satisfy their wives. And evangelical men have the lowest reported rates of domestic abuse among any group in the United States. Real Christian men, Carter.”

    “I don’t know where you got your statistics,” I said. “Maybe they’re true. Maybe they’re not. Maybe the lowest reported rate of abuse is not actually the lowest. I don’t know. But are you sure that’s the way you want to go, Gunner? Are you sure that’s the argument you want to make? I’ve seen your arrest record, you know. It’s in the public records. We don’t have to go down that road if you don’t want to. I’m giving you the opportunity to start over.”

    There was a long pause while he glared at me. “I was a different man then. And she’s forgiven me.”

    “I’m sure she has, Gunner. She’s a better woman than you deserve.”

    “You’re soft, Carter. If you don’t get it, you must be gay or retarded.”

    “Now see – there must have been a dozen other ways you could have made your argument, but you went straight to ableist and homophobic slurs.”

    “I didn’t call you a fag, so what’s your point?”

    “Cruelty is the point, isn’t it, Gunner?”

    “Truth hurts, Carter. Can’t help if it offends you.”

    I stared at him. Silent. Just waiting for whatever would come out of his mouth next.

    “I don’t want to hear it. We’re not talking about this. I swear, you’re so frustrating, Carter. How dare you? Who the hell do you think you are, anyway? Coward! Fool! Who do you think you are? You’re not God. You’re just a man. And not much of a man. You do the cooking. You do the laundry. Don’t you? You’re not an impressive man. You’re not a godly man in any way. You’ve got no dignity. You’ve got no masculinity. Shut up, little boy. Grow up. Maybe one day you’ll know what it means to have a godly marriage. Shame on you for saying you’re a Christian. You won’t submit to spiritual authority. I’m here, I come here for your own good, Carter. And you’re just too stupid to receive it.”

    I stared at him in continued silence for a few seconds and then offered him another glass of water. He launched himself from the couch and stormed out of the house.

    I’m sure I’ll see him again sooner or later.

The Conversations: 

An Imaginary Conversation with a Real Troll (the first of the series) 
I Will Not Fight the Argument (the second)
Supermarket Wrestling (third conversation)
Do You Even Pray (the troll returns)
All Means All (A fifth conversation)
The Doctrine that Cannot Be Challenged (sixth conversation)
Toward Sodom - (a halfhearted seventh conversation)
Millions of Years of Death (the eighth conversation)
Truth with Untruth (the ninth conversation)
Bulls, Dogs, and Villains (the tenth conversation)
The Righteous Forsaken (the eleventh conversation)
A Sabbath Garden (conversation number twelve)
Doesn't Doctrine Mean Anything to You? (conversation thirteen)

The MAGA Glossolalia

    This is a companion piece to No Revelation, No Knowledge, built from the same scaffold — 1 Corinthians 14, the same Paul passage about tongues and intelligibility and the failure of speech to communicate — but they're doing completely opposite things with it.

    No Revelation, No Knowledge is introverted and devastated. The speaker is alone with one person who has stopped listening. The tongue is a failure. The unintelligibility is a wound — meaning hidden from the one person in the world it needs to reach, the simplest possible words spoken into the same silence as ten thousand unknown ones.

    They share the same diagnosis, one delivered as exposure, one as confession. The same theology. Different rooms.   

The MAGA Glossolalia

 I know what you’re hearing. People are saying that there are many forms of activity and there are, so much going on, our country is hot. This is a great time. Our country is hot. I hate to say it, but I will. A year ago, a year and a half ago, two years ago, the last administration, we were a dead country. But there are many forms of activity. And many gifts, right? Tremendous gifts. Gifts no one has ever seen before. The gift of utterance expressing wisdom. Wisdom. I know wisdom. So wise. The gift of tongues, different tongues, all kinds of, you know, English, and Russian, and Chinese, and Iranian, all kinds of languages. And the interpretation of tongues. We have people who can translate them all. So good. So great.

    And, and listen. I, if the trumpet sounds – you know the trumpet, sound a call which is unrecognizable, who will be ready for the attack. You saw that in China just recently. You saw that in Venezuela. You saw that right now in Iran. Everything’s gone. Their Navy’s gone. Air Force – gone. And we are speaking their language. Barbarous tongues for barbarians. Inarticulate heathens.

    And you know, in the world, you’ve got the hypocrisy of the vocal. The liberal left and the fake-news media, they’re all saying stuff about me. Terrible stuff. Just terrible. They look you in the face and lie. Just straight up lie. So when the transgressors are come to the full they’ll get theirs. Look me in the face. I’m fierce. And maybe you can understand their dark sentences.

    But not them. They won’t understand. The so-called intellectuals don’t understand, I mean I speak it plain. I tell you what it is. The truth. And they don’t get it. They can’t, they just can’t comprehend. Other people, the meaning is hidden.

    No revelation. No knowledge. No prophecy. No instruction.

    You’re not strangers. You’re Americans. We’re not just raving. If I have to use strange words, then I’ll speak with strange words to this nation. The tongue of mystery. I have all the best words. Now there are some really brilliant people here today. I’m maybe slightly more brilliant. But don’t feel guilty about it. You should never feel guilty about success. You don’t need to repent here. These are words spoken with no interpretation.

Milo Remembers

    I remember the radio was playing a slowed-down, strung-out cover version of Get Happy as I entered the neighborhood near the Seattle airport that first night. “Come on, forget your blues, get happy…” I remember the city roads full of bandits and highway men. There were seedy strip clubs, children’s massage parlors, and perfect prostitutes that would walk up, knock on the door, and turn green under the neon and streetlamps– just like that, every night.

    I went to school with serial killers and other uneducated alcoholics, the whole mentally gangrenous generation. I went to church at the chapel of drinks and parties and it was there that I learned to hide

    But you knew where to find me, didn’t you, Darling?

    I went to work straight away. I sold liquor and fireworks for five years, condoms, porn, and beer for slightly longer. How long those awkward years – waiting for an opportunity to prove myself by asking inopportune questions about guns, and gangs, and alcoholic crime, and the women’s prison beatings – all of which occurred without the interference of the local police.

    What were you doing there, Darling? Surely it was no coincidence?

    I knew how to run and ruin the virgins then, when we first met. I didn’t burn them all, nor their contact information. I knew the voyeur struggle, alone. I knew the critic thinking. I knew the empty home that cost Jesus his life. Faking a porn addiction as a way to overcome the bad times. Often sorry. Acting out, like a script, dark and dangerous in dangerous positions. I could have died and scorned the shame.

    You read it all, yourself, once we were married, Darling. Why do I revisit this?

    We walk on and work through the mess, the specks, the planks, and piles of stones. Death and life. Life and death. But now? Now, how does it end? The two of us together, Darling. With Sibelius on the phonograph and dinner on the stove. Life and death. Death and life. We walk on through the mess.

Everything’s Back to Normal
One Life and One More

    I don't quite know who these two people are just yet - where they live, or what they're doing. They just started showing up in my writing and I've enjoyed finding them. I expect that I'll see a bit more from them. 

Gravemouth

    “A life so perfect! A life so free!”

    Gravemouth was born with a bifurcated tongue and lives a life of toxic lies. Nodding off now. Downing caffeine-based beverages to stay awake all night. With headaches, heartburn, twitch and slur. Aggressively high blood pressure. Gravemouth is cognitive decline.

    “The AntiAmircan Dumocrats hate me!”

    History deep and dull must be warped, distorted, and denied for Gravemouth to keep control. He becomes increasingly chauvinistic under intense criticism.

    “Shut up, Piggy. Bitch!”

    Overbearing and boorish. Angry and harsh. Just another child of God in the Christian MAGAnation. Using abusive language with the staff. Screaming at subordinates. Quick tempered and harsh.

    “They were off message. Now they’re unemployed! This will be the defining measure of success or failure in my administration. Loyalty or I’ll put you in the wood-chipper myself!”

    Gravemouth is the perpetual bully. A domineering bulge. Blind, indifferent, embittered. At war with the world.

    “I know we’d be there for them. I don’t know that they’d be there for us with all of the money we expend, with all of the blood, sweat and tears… They’re not there for us. I can tell you. You can’t trust them. And if you can’t trust them, you beat them.”

    Plagiarism. Crudeness. Egoism and an unseemly consolidation of power. He is a vulgarity born of burn out. Disintegration. Standing and falling apart. Burn down the office. Gravemouth will burn the world to eat the ashes.

One Life and One More

    A lush tone poem by Sibelius played upon the phonograph as Darling sliced vegetables in the apartment kitchenette. The light of a hazy sunset filtered through the flag that hung in the window. She could feel the lush orchestration and soaring melody thrumming inside her.

    “Darling, are you okay?” Milo asked from the door. She was standing at the counter, with peppers and onions on the cutting board and knife held loosely in her hand, but she wasn’t moving. “You seem distracted.”

    “Yes, Milo” she said and then, “No, my love.”

    “You are distracted,” Milo said. He said aside the drafts and drawings he carried and, stepping into the kitchen, relieved her of the knife.

    She clenched her teeth and, looking silently about the room, shook her head. She saw her reflection in the window and again in the cracked mirror on the wall in the living room. “Not distracted,” she whispered.

    “You’re shivering,” Milo said. “Cold too. What is it?”

    “The death of so many. I could not. We couldn’t.”

    Milo led her to the couch at the center of the living room. “Sit, Darling. Sit. Please. Let me get you something.”

    “No,” she said clutching his arm. “I want nothing.” She looked into his eyes. “Just sit with me a while.”

    He sat on the couch with her, and it was a comfort. To them both. A comfort to know that she belonged to him and he to her, in equal measure. They sat that way, together, until the sun was set and the room was dark.

    "We don’t know what we’re doing, do we?” She said later, during dinner. Not really. Your art and my travel. And yet we cannot do nothing. How can these little motions stand against so many lives?”

“If we can save but one,” Milo said.

    She’d fallen in love with him years before, slowly, over occasional conversations and walks to the market. He was patient. Always patient.

    “One life,” he said again. “And one more.”

    Gunshots erupted in the night – as they had most every night that month. These were not so close as some of the others. Perhaps at the train station down the street.

    “One life,” she whispered back.

    “And one more.”

Everything’s Back to Normal

    I don't quite know who these two people are just yet - where they live, or what they're doing - but I've enjoyed finding them and expect that I'll see a bit more from them.

And Say, Amen

    Glorified and sanctified be God’s great name throughout the world
    which He has created according to His will.
    May He establish His kingdom in your lifetime and during your days,
    and within the life of the entire House of Israel, speedily and soon;
    and say, Amen.

    To life, a blessing. To life with grief. A life of questions and too few reasons. The complexity of purpose is beyond us. We are too weak for these heavy weighted conversations. We are more suited to pleasant reminiscences and the laughter of games.

    May His great name be blessed forever and to all eternity.
    Blessed and praised, glorified and exalted, extolled and honored,
    adored and lauded be the name of the Holy One, blessed be He,
    beyond all the blessings and hymns, praises and consolations that
    are ever spoken in the world; and say, Amen.

    Shade the window and light the candle and, with head covered, recite the remembered prayers of our grandmothers and grandfathers.

    May there be abundant peace from heaven, and life, for us
    and for all Israel; and say, Amen.

    Remember that time in the park, when the sunlight filtered through the oak leaves and we rolled upon the grass, our clothes still wet from the stream…?

    He who creates peace in His celestial heights,
    may He create peace for us and for all Israel;
    and say, Amen.

    An angel of the sun rises with the steel of God in his hand.

All I Know Is Darkness – a Psalm for Palestine

    A song of sickness and native-born suffering.

    Look, it is night, it is dark, but look, shuttered windows and boarded doors on the street, unfriendly faces leering from suspicious shadows, and the message you receive, loud and incessant, insistent, if you’re listening, is: help, oh, God, help me!

    I’ve been filled for so long now, time, times, and half a time at least, with misery, living on the shores of Sheol, numb and numbered with the ones hanging upside down over oblivion, stalked and hunted and left for dead, all strength is stripped from these arms, like one of the slaughtered tossed into a ditch with no protection, unremembered, even by you, no flowers, no grass, only stones beneath the grave, not a place for anyone, only depth, only darkness.

    Drift

    Like a man from the black, friendless, defiled, grotesque, wheeling, spinning, thrashing but no escape, trembling hands a prayer for return, but the dead see no miracle, no sign, no wonder, only shadows rising with no praise.

    Drift further

    With the door closed behind, the room is black and dark and silent, do they sing here? Love songs? Hymns? Do the spirits sing spiritual songs? Do they know your wonders in the void? And still I’m here, weeping in the dust on the floor, every morning, every evening, though those words mean nothing when you won’t even look at me, I was born too close to death, wounded in birth, I bleed to death, shifted weight and slipping foot, I carry unfinished terrors in my wretched body, and all I know is darkness.

Everything’s Back to Normal

    She arrived home a few minutes early, before the shouting, before the gunfire. She came back to their apartment to relax. To rest before the next trip to the other side, across town. To Kyiv, Belfast, Beit Lahia, Chicago, Des Moines… She knew she would need to sleep in the meantime of memory. She was tired. More than tired, really. She was worn thin by the constant pressure of disaster, the rapid cycling of bad news. The listed names of the dead mispronounced on the radio.

    “Is that you, Darling? I’ve been waiting for you.” Her husband, the artist. The insurgent.

    She smiled flatly at his voice. “It’s me. I’m home.” She tossed her keys into a small dish on the table beside the door, hung her coat on a hook and closed the door. She saw her reflection in the windows staring back at her years apart. Remembering. Hoping. Some things can’t be clear. Some things can’t be returned. She wondered if it were a question or an exclamation. She had no response either way. “Working late?” she called out to him.

    “Just trying to finish up before…”

    Then came the explosion and the fire. The gunshots. The sirens. The roar and shout. The oppressive heat of rising fire. Ringing alarums in the air.

    Weightless and unreal, she fell to the floor. Her eyes were closed but she knew his weight when he covered her with his own body. His skin, his flesh, his scent. She could feel his heart pounding against her back. The screams were hers and his together in the dark. One.

    Later, when the smoke had thinned, the glass swept up and the bodies removed – little more than the diluted nightmares of social polish – she went into the cramped kitchenette. “Coffee?” she asked as she watched him spread their beloved flag across the cracked window. Another reminder of danger.

    The coffee pot rattled in her trembling hand. Another cup of coffee? We can’t go back to the way things were. Everything’s back to normal. And things will never be normal.

A Biblically Indexed Police Blotter

    Repeat Juvenile Runaway Near E. 9^th St. N.
    1.0 mi East 9^th St. North

    Deputies responded to possible repeat runaway report involving a juvenile. The same juvenile reportedly involved in similar incidents all this year.

    See: Proverbs 22: 6 and 29:17 and Jeremiah 31:16-17 - “...your children will return to their homeland.”

    High Speed Pursuit of Maroon SUV on Highway 8 
    1.6 mi US-8

    Law enforcement units were involved in pursuit of a maroon SUV traveling eastbound on Highway 8. County and state agencies were notified for assistance.

    See: Leviticus 26: 8 – “five of you pursuing a hundred of them, one hundred pursuing ten thousand; and your enemies will fall beneath your sword.”

    Suspicious Persons Reported / Possible Burglary in Progress 
    0.5 mi East 11^th St. South

    Deputies investigated a possible burglary after a caller reported a suspicious person or persons who may have entered their home. Unidentified person was described as white, male, wearing gray clothing and a pink backpack, last seen running toward a nearby liquor store.

    See: Mark 3:27 – “no one can make his way into the Strong Man’s house and plunder his property unless he has first tied up the Strong Man. Only then can he plunder his house.”

    Youth Driving Recklessly on Moped 
    1.7 mi East 13^th St. North

    Deputies responded to report of a juvenile driving recklessly on a moped. Caller was waiting for deputy to make definitive identification of the youth.

    See: Proverbs 14:16, and Judges 9:4 - “...Abimelech hired reckless and violent adventurers to follow him.”

    Unresponsive Female in Alley 
    2.9 mi East 18^th St. North

    Emergency responders were dispatched to East 10^th St. N. for a report of an unresponsive female. Caller indicated that a medical alert button had been activated, but there was no response from the individual.

    See: Numbers 31:9 – “The Israelites took the women and their little ones captive and carried off all their goods as booty.”

    High Speed Pursuit Ends in Collision 
    3.4 mi IA-234

    Deputies pursued a maroon SUV at high speeds on Highway 234 and into rural roads including North 750^th Avenue. The chase reached speeds of over 100 miles per hour. Pursuit concluded when vehicle crashed into a large stone. Two individuals were rushed to the hospital.

    See: Psalm 91:12 - “They will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”

    ERROR.Corrupted X.X=forensic.theology.database.X
    ERROR.Coherence.threshold.exceeded+5.X
    ERROR.MunicipalX=XApocalypse.log.X
    SYSTEM.OVERLOAD>>RESET.EISEGESIS-1.8X>>RESET.EXEGESIS+3.X
    X.X>>REINTERPRET.X

Not More than I Am Able

    I find Saint Bernard of Clairvaux to be both a compelling and disturbing individual in the history of Christianity.

    I appreciate his devotional writing. He wrote some eighty-six sermons from the Song of Solomon - and never got past chapter two! He was one of the co-founders of the Knights Templar. 

    He also stirred up enthusiasm for the second crusade by promising that it would be a means of grace and absolution for sin. And then, when the crusade failed, blamed it on the sins of the crusaders. Go figure. 

    Today's backyard recording is based on one of his writings. 

    My God, my help, I shall love you as I am able
    yet my love is less than your due
    not more, not more, not more than I am able
    for even if I cannot love you 
    as much as I should
    still, I cannot love you
    more than I can. 
    I shall only ever be able 
    to love you the more 
    when you give me more
    and still, you'll never find my love worthy of you. 

New Truths and New Knowings

    There are new truths and new knowings. There are revelations yet unseen. My imagination is active. My intellect goes forth to create according to what comes to mind. From the remnant of dreams, all the vapors and gasses of the night combined with a line upon line study of the scriptures. I’m putting together the outline and notes that will lead us, point to point, maybe not you would want to go, but to where you need to go - the end of knowing. Follow with me. All will be revealed.

    First, there are some who stand prepared at the gates. Always in readiness. Always in faith. Ethiopian Copts are guarding the Ark of Covenant in an undisclosed location, behind an unmarked door. The guardians have the key. The guardians have the lock.

    Let there be demonic dermatology for the warlock senator from Georgia. The curse of his skin be upon him.

    If you always follow the angel of prophecy, you’ll never be lost. This remains true – though I’ve stumbled occasionally. Usually somewhere in Daniel’s Seventy Weeks. The little horn, the tin horn dictator, shouting in my ear distracted me, but only for a time. Even among the wise rulers, those with understanding, some will stumble. A number of them will be purged. Purified and made clean. Purged and made white. White with fear and bloodless pale. Where is it leading? Follow on.

    Stalin has been spotted on Venus, his visage in the clouds.

    And now we come to the extraterrestrial, inter-dimensional, documentary entities – stepping between the registers of spatial timeslips and their spiritual machines – oft observed flying through our airspace. The chariots of God are twenty thousand, even thousands of angels. Observe the wheels within the spinning wheel. See it spin, high and dreadful above the surface of the earth and full of eyes, lifted up into higher dimensions. Ancient angels identified as aliens in our day, instantly transformed from magic to material by material magic.

    Finally, look closely at the seven resurrections of the American empire - no love and no lie - after years of dispute and negotiations and the successive waves of diplomatic “healing,” it will be destroyed by Christ at his coming. Count the multinational corporations and financial manufacturers that dominate every field, internet and satellite television – they illustrate the need for American independence.

    The whole global system is fractured. It cannot be saved. There is little time left – less than eight hours. Eight hours relative.

The Verisimilitude of Truth

    Ready now. This is all the warning we’re likely to receive, and we are already sinking. Check winds and tides and set sights for enemy lines. The right kind of people have the right kind of skills. Men of arms and a warrior ethos. Bear down and engage. Clear the fleet for fire.

    We hold these truths to be self-evident:

    The people of Iran want freedom – therefore we must bless them.
    The people of Iran are terrorists – therefore we must bomb them.

    The military has directed energy weapons, microwaves, and laser beams. We saw dragons and we saw drones. Sound waves and energy raves. Their heads were exploding inside their skulls. Bleeding from the nose. Vomiting blood. Moving helps with the pain, but they fell, incapacitated. Good show. Show death like a sleep and let them cry for water. No one has gone consciously unto heaven from death.

    Gunshots continue.

    Somewhere off the coast of Yemen, a U.S. reaper drone fires a Hellfire missile at a flying, glowing orb. A kinetic strike by Hellfire missile results in destruction. In explosion. Details remain unclear.

    45% of Precision Strike Missiles
    50% of THAAD Intercept Missiles
    50% of Patriot Air Defense Missiles
    30% of Tomahawk Missiles
    20% of long-range Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles
    20% of SM-3 Missiles
    20% of SM-6 Missiles.

    Depleted.

    Decades and centuries. I was there, strong and full of life… a threat to global peace and security… the most vicious of all the little Satans… Brutal new age powers. Richer. Stronger. Vigorous voices beg no forgiveness and make no apologies.

    We are scouring Hillary Clinton’s 30,000 retrieved emails for clues. I myself haven’t read them, of course, but I am familiar with the contents. I know all of what I need to know. The information I received had the verisimilitude of truth. I read it quickly enough, skimming for what stood out to my eye and my mind. I regret my confusion and wish to clarify...

Before the Money

 

    The other day I wrote a surreal sort of crime story: Money Makes Demands. I thought it was going to be just a one-off bit of writing, but today I've written a sort of backstory for that story. 

Before the Money

    How did it begin? First point – and on this he was very clear. Certain: I would give him an alibi for the time of the murder. And just like that, I was in for better, for worse. For risk and reward. For crime and punishment.

    I’d been a man without a safety-net for too long. Not destitute, not yet. But these were desperate times. The obvious shocks and lesions of international discomfort and internal abuse. Living in danger both foreign and domestic. And here he was offering me money for a job – a job that would cost me. Laurence had the notes, the books, the one remaining letter, and – importantly – the motive. I was to be a blind. A shield.

    I was to be the protection and security of division. What he hadn’t inherited, he’d taken. What he hadn’t taken, he’d destroyed. A known offender. There were stories of contacts in Italy and Spain. Trade in Eastern Europe. All the illusions of a criminal imperium of a mid-level boss. And me – just another day player. An unnamed extra in the night.

It wasn’t always like this. Golden nostalgia tells me things were in the long distant past. But too much time passed now. An ex-wife or two. A foundered business. My daughter – was she angry with me? The two of us alone for so many years and separated now.

    Thirty years ago, thirty-five, there had been adventure. Promise and challenge. There had been love – or the expectation of love. All of it unfulfilled. No champagne. No lunch at L’Adagio. I had the early trauma and long path of failure same as anyone. What secrets did I have? Laurence knew he could offer and knew I would have to accept. ­The bright light of youth had gone out years ago.

    Laurence gave me the list:

    -Theft from property
    -Homeless
   -Disappeared and unidentified
    -Apparent suicide
    and
    -No record of employment

    “What does any of this mean?” I asked but Laurence only raised an eyebrow. He wasn’t one to answer questions.

    “You want the money? You’ll follow instructions. Details will follow.”

    Money was transferred with a pen and a click. Payment message received. Now I was obliged to follow through. There was always a choice. Choices and options. There were choices that had to be made. But was I prepared to kill for them?

    The law firm downtown where Laurence held office was a false front. That was obvious. No investigation was necessary. I took the money along with the list. He motioned toward the door. But I hesitated to leave. Not that it was warm and dry inside – though it was. Not that it was pouring outside – though it was. But a reluctance. A reticence. I knew what I was getting into.

    Or thought I did.

    The night that followed, behind the Leslie Houses in the dark, working over the earth. Digging in the uneven ground. Soft earth and wet leaves. Dark but not silent. I could hear the murmur of voices, muttered prayers and intimate whispers. Screaming fathers. Laughing children. Televisions and barking dogs. I worked quiet, looking for the older graves. “This is the first test,” I told myself. “This is the first of what will come.”

    I crouched in the dark. He hadn’t said grave robbery. But would I have refused? Could I have refused? The world fell silent. And now it was raining again. Drenched and slipping in mud, I was nearly done when my phone rang.

    “Get the item and get out of there. Now.”

    Head beating. Surprised by tears. Somewhere between scream and sob. I couldn’t help myself It felt like a dream. Rush run faster. A kind of clarity in movement. Thrust. Double back dark but not empty. Across the field. A glance back and no one. The car was waiting. Drawn up and ready and away. I’d become another crime story. I would make the delivery and wait for the next assignment.

***

    The fact remains that I’d tried to call my daughter earlier that day. Truth, whole truth and whatever. She was always the one to charge in and change until things worked again. She was the one who looked after people She looked after me after her mom left us. And again, after her stepmom left. And then, somewhere along the way she’d left me to. Or I’d left her. Or both.

    She didn’t answer, of course. Maybe her phone was turned off. Maybe she still didn’t want to talk to me. There wasn’t enough evidence to convince her of the better life. I already tried.

    Our last conversation was a shortness of breath. “I’m not really interested,” she said at the end. “You don’t have interruptions. You have objectionable characterization. You have the resistance of a moment.”

    “We need to talk,” I said to her voice mail and put my phone back into my pocket. I told myself that I would try to call her again later. But I knew it was unlikely.

    Meanwhile – Laurence…

    Someone was in charge, but I didn’t really think it was him. Strangers not friends, someone else was in charge. It could have been any number of blood sucking ticks from any one of the families that had moved into controlled territory. A pattern of abuse that led to the death of his victims. Hurt and humiliation. Hurt and burns. There were people chattering on the courthouse steps and women in the bathroom – but no one was talking about him. Whoever he was.

    The trial was over before it had begun. Betrayal was there. Say what you want. What now? More questions?

    I checked my phone for any sort of response and went outside for a cigarette. If anyone was going to find me, it wouldn’t be there. Walking away, unstuck and open. Skulking around outside. Chain smoking on the stairs. Worrying about everything. I was still trying to make sense of it all. Life in the past few days or months or years… I couldn’t make sense of any of it.

    What was I doing in this hotel room? This hotel room? I didn’t understand but maybe that was the advantage of disappearing problems. I was scared – an odd inglorious feeling. I was frightened. There was real trouble – of falling – of running from police. Released from the rails and real trouble. There were gunshots and breaking glass outside and the crash of falling bodies. I hooked the chain on the door and turned off the lights. I lay on the bed and starred at the ceiling.

    Spiders and sex workers running through the night. The mercurial mercy of doctors, cops, ministers. It was all betrayal. Betrayal and murder. And I still had to set up that alibi.

    Kicking myself now.

    What could I say? I knew the despondent feeling of wanting the consolation of a woman. The remembered past was locked away. All you could do was deal with the pressure brought to you. I might have made mistakes. You make a lot of mistakes along the way – but there had to have been a few good decisions too, right?

    More gunshots and the sky broke.

Crickets, Fireworks, and Christian Perfection - An Ascension Day Sermon

    Tiff and I weren’t here last week – some of you noticed. Joyce sent us a copy of the bulletin to make sure that we knew we were missed. Thank you, Joyce. I was doing what I’m doing today, filling in for an absent pastor, across town. But here I am today and here you are. So as we celebrate Mother’s Day

    Well, you didn’t hear it last week. I thought I could get away with reusing the same sermon.

    Actually, today is Ascension Sunday. One of my favorites in the church calendar – though it doesn’t get the pomp and splendor of Easter, or the emotional saturation of Christmas. It doesn’t get page after page of psalms and hymns and spiritual songs like the other High Holy Days. In fact, if you check the index in the back of The United Methodist Hymnal, under the Christian Year heading, there are only six listings – and two of those are All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name, under two different melodies.

    In some denominations the clergy may switch to white or gold vestments. Whoa… way to really party it up… I recently learned that in Florence, Italy they celebrate the Festa del Grillo - the Cricket Festival - on Ascension Day. Crickets are sold in tiny little cages and then the children release them into the streets. Loki – who wants to be an entomologist – will appreciate that one. And in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, people often hike up into the mountains on Ascension Day – like the disciples following Jesus up the Mount of Olives to witness his ascension.

    But I think we need something like fireworks for Ascension Day. Shooting up into the sky in a blaze of brilliant glory, cascading colors, the sky ablaze with sparkles and spangles. It’s a joyful, brilliant day to be celebrated with song and explosion. Loud songs and small explosions…

    For forty days he continued to show himself alive to his disciples after his Passion – that is to say, after his pain. For passion is pain. And pain is death. He showed himself to them after his death. For forty days he showed signs, and wonders, he showed them many demonstrations, evidences, and proofs. He spoke to them of many things: of shoes, and ships, and sealing-wax, of cabbages, and of carpenter kings. He spoke to them of the coming the Kingdom and of God¹.

    “And don’t leave Jerusalem,” he told them while he was sitting down to eat with them, “until you receive what was promised.” They were sitting around eating and drinking, sharing a communion of fellowship with the risen Lord. I like to think that his favorite post resurrection meal was broiled fish and honeycomb.²Those privileged to share that meal with him would remember it always. “John baptized with water,” he reminded them. But not too many days from now you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit – and this is a baptism by fire - and this is where the sprinkling versus full immersion debate gets interesting…

    And the disciples asked him, “Lord, has the time come for you to restore the Kingdom to Israel?” They were thinking perhaps of the Maccabean glories, and Solomonic marvels, and Davidic victories of the past. “Are you going to, in this hour, make Israel great again?”

    But Jesus said “No,” or rather, “It’s not really for you to know.” He commissioned them instead to be his witnesses in ever-expanding circles – in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria – and to the remotest parts of the earth. And the commission is given with another promise of the Holy Spirit.

    Meanwhile the disciples were still trying to figure out when the Kingdom would be restored even as Jesus was lifted up from the ground. A glorious sight - he rises up and up and up through endless ranks of invisible angels, until he is disappeared in a cloud. Up through obscuring clouds. Gone. Vanished. Disappeared from their eyes. Two men in white step into view and announce that this same Jesus will come back in the same way he went.

    And here we are - celebrating the ascension of the risen Lord. Let’s sing another hymn and where are the fireworks and the crickets? Today is a day to celebrate.

    The risen and ascended Christ is the promise of something extraordinary and it rarely gets discussed – at least on this side of the Eastern Orthodox / Roman Catholic / Protestant divide. It is the promise of theosis or divinization or even deification– to use some of those heavyweight theological words.

    And this might sound a bit alarming – as if the substitute pastor were saying that we all get to be God, or little g gods. But he’s not. You don’t have to send Pastor Mark a concerned email.

    The word Theosis is a two-part Greek word: theo being God and the suffix -osis which means a process. Think of a white cloth being saturated with red dye by the process of osmosis. In the same way we are filled and saturated with the presence of God by theosis.³ Theosis is the end goal of our salvation. It is what we were created for. It is what we are redeemed for.

    We were created in the image and likeness of God – and this isn’t just our physical, fleshy bodies. We were created to be good, as all of creation was called good. Very good.

    Since we’re good Methodists here, lets quote John Wesley:

“In the image of God was man made, holy as he that created him is holy, merciful as the author of all is merciful, perfect as his Father in heaven is perfect. As God is love, so man dwelling in love dwelt in God, and God in him. God made him to be ‘an image of his own eternity’ an incorruptible picture of the God of glory. He was accordingly pure, as God is pure. … He ‘loved the Lord his God with all his heart, and with all his mind, and soul, and strength.’ … Such then was the state of man in paradise. By the free, unmerited love of God he was holy and happy, he knew, loved, enjoyed God, which is (in substance) life everlasting. And in this life of love he was to continue forever if he continued to obey God in all things.”⁴

    But sin broke that goodness and death destroyed that life. We were enslaved by fear and lust and shame and wrath and hate. Christ came to restore what had been destroyed, to return what we’d traded away, to revive what was dead.

    The second century Bishop, Irenaeus of Lyons wrote, “The only true and steadfast Teacher, the Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, through his transcendent love, became what we are, that he might bring us to be what he is himself”⁵

    Saint Augustine of Hippo said: “We carry mortality about with us, we endure infirmity, we look forward to divinity. For God wishes not only to vivify, but also to deify us.”⁶

    In the second letter of Peter we read: By his divine power he has lavished on us all the things we need for life and true devotion, through the knowledge of him who has called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these, the greatest and priceless promises have been lavished on us, that through them we should share the divine nature and escape the corruption rife in the world through disordered passion.”⁷

    Paul said it over and over again in his letters: If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation… For me to live is Christ… It is no longer I that lives, but Christ that lives in me… Christ in you, the hope of glory… And we all, with unveiled faces like mirrors reflecting the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the image that we reflect in brighter and brighter glory.⁸

    Ascension Sunday is not some weird appendix to Easter. Ascension Day is not an afterthought. The Ascension is not just Jesus going away with a promise to return. It is Jesus enthroning a redeemed and restored humanity in the presence of God the Father through the power and presence of the Holy Spirit.

    This is the entire sanctification, the Christian perfection that John Wesley described. That we are so filled with the love of God and a love for God that “no wrong temper, none contrary to love, remains in the soul; and that all the thoughts, words, and actions are governed by pure love.”⁹

    The disciples, having watched the risen Lord, rising into the sky, went back to Jerusalem worshiping and full of joy, continually praising God.¹⁰ When we leave from this chapel, we should go out into the world like bottle rockets, shooting up into the sky in a blaze of brilliant glory, cascading colors, the sky ablaze with sparkles and spangles of holy joy. We go out, transformed in brighter and brighter glory. We should explode in love for each other, for our neighbors, for our enemies, for the world. We should be brilliant bursting bodies of love for God.

1Lewis Carrol - The Walrus and the Carpenter

2Luke 24: 42 (not all of the early manuscripts include the honeycomb. It’s probably rightfully omitted from our translations, but I still like it.)

3Frederica Mathews-Green, Welcome to the Orthodox Church, Paraclete Press, pg. 68

4John Wesley - Sermon 5, “Justification by Faith,” I.1.4, Works, 1:184-85.

5Against Heresies, Book 5,

6Sermo 23B

72 Peter 1:4

82 Corinthians 5:17, Philippians 1:21, Galatians 2:20, Colossians 1:27, 2 Corinthians 3:18

9Thoughts on Christian Perfection (1760), Q. 1, Works, 13:57.

10Luke 24: 52-53