Text Treatise: How Do We Deserve to Be Treated by Other People?

This was a response to a friend's text. I had expressed frustration with the behavior of coworkers and she'd replied with the ever-relevant "anything better than hell is better than you deserve."

Well, there are two levels of "desserts." The one you mentioned is before me always and is a relished bulwark against pride and resentment. Then there is "what we deserve" in the sense of how other humans should treat us if they were acting in obedience to the Law of God and with the Love of Christ. So there is a sense in which it is wrong how you and I and any Christian is treated -- but it's not wrong because we deserve better on our merits, but because God says that there is a better standard by which they should be treating others. So not a dessert in an ultimate sense, but a dessert in the sense of idealized personal relationships.

Basically the ultimate sense is important to avoid sinning by thinking that we deserve any thing, which is pride: thinking we deserve more than we do, which in an ultimate sense is nothing good, and everything bad. The second sense is helpful in addressing grief and other emotions in response to ill treatment: that feeling such a way is valid and appropriate. You have been wronged, and you are not inherently wrong to feel anguished or even angry about it. "But in all your anger do not sin." It's helpful as a perspective on why it's wrong: it's not wrong, what they did to you, because you're hurt. That makes you the standard, and now we're back to pride. It's wrong because it's a sin against God. David after indirectly murdering Uriah: "against you, and you only, oh Lord, have I sinned." If you should be angry at mistreatment, it should be because they're dishonoring God, not because they insulted you. I try to harness my feelings of insult and turn it into zeal instead. To validate the emotions in an appropriate way, with truth.

~ Rak Chazak

Poem: Community

When in the beginning, all of the stuff of the cosmos had been organized
And not one creation deviated from the Creator's perfect design
All was not well, for man by himself, was lacking in something besides

He lacked not in purity, intellect, strength, creativity, life or desire
If labor was favored, Adam was capable. No goal could not be acquired
But there was a whole other realm of experience to which he could not aspire

Man by himself does poor company keep, and his actions are wholly self-serving
But give him relations, and for a plot twist, make them all, of his love, undeserving
And fix within each the capacity for selfless love and its requisite yearning

NOW! Man in community is more of a model of a relational Father above
When, denying himself, he freely surrenders -- expressing the Trinity's love --
And loves his own wife with no thought of reward: this is how marriage is done

"It is not good for man to be alone" -- and this is what that Scripture means:
That, though we are physical beings, we know, all is not what it seems:
When a man connects spiritually with his friend, his joy will surpass his best dreams.

~ Rak Chazak

"Pre-Evident Grace" -- a.k.a. The Real Meaning of Foreknowledge

This was a post I made in the comments on one of Elizabeth Prata's recent posts about Calvinism. I had remarked that the Bible itself was the strongest argument for the doctrines of grace, because after you hear all the preachers make their case, you are left with the undeniable fact that the Bible says God elects people for salvation not based on what they do. In fact, the Bible says faith is a gift, so how can faith be something you give to God to make Him save you? It can't.

I ended my first post by saying that those who don't accept Calvinism, ultimately, then, are not treating the Bible as if it is inerrant or authoritative. Someone replied that non-calvinists can believe the Bible's inerrant. I agree, it's possible, but here is what I had to say:


If you believe the Bible is inerrant in theory, then show that you believe it in practice.

When the Bible says this: "For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified. " (Romans 8:29-30),

then acknowledge that God decides where someone will spend eternity BEFORE the call (contemporaneous with regeneration and initiation of conversion), and before they become a believer who has faith in God (which is justification). The eternal destiny is set before belief begins. How then can anyone say that God decides to save people based on what they will believe? You can say that God knows the future, that is undoubtedly true -- BUT it misses the point that the logical sequence of God's actions from God's perspective are laid out in these verses, and it shows that God follows a sequence.

Foreknowledge is, (and this is yet another exciting proof of the doctrine of Illumination, because I had reasoned to this before) as John MacArthur recently said in a radio broadcast, not a mere knowledge of the future. In fact, the verse specifically does NOT say that it is the *future* that God knows (He does know it, but it's not the context), it is **those He justifies** that He knows.

This is an article from Grace To You confirming my statement about JMac's view.

What then is foreknowledge? God has an intimate relationship with certain people, others He does not. And as a merciful God, He would never enter into close communion with someone and then cast them off afterward. The point of foreknowledge is to show that God doesn't choose people based on their belief in Him -- He chooses people based on what sort of relationship He is going to have with them. Those whom He will be to as a Father, those He will secure eternally for salvation, and ensure that before earthly death, that He will justify them by faith and give them the right to be called children of God.

When I understood this passage, I understood why I naturally comprehended the qualities of God like omniscience, omnipotence, goodness, Biblical infallibility etc, long before my crisis of faith that led to my conversion whereafter I *consciously* apprehended the Gospel and can claim salvation by grace through faith. I was a nominal believer before, but I can see God's hand in my life keeping me from the kinds of behavior patterns (sexuality and drugs being obvious examples) that beset so many others I've heard stories from. I was morally upright, in a limited human sense, and it was by the grace of God, because I was not spiritually regenerate, just well behaved and with a good brain. I believe that God, knowing that I *would* be brought into a right relationship with Him as His child, extended "pre-evident grace" (if you will humor me making up a new word) to me even during the time of my life that I lived without the full knowledge of salvation.

That is foreknowledge. It is not "knowing that I would choose Him." It is knowing that He would choose ME, and ensuring that as a consequence, He would lead me by His Spirit to come to an eventual understanding of the Gospel that I might be saved through the hearing of the word preached.

If someone insists that Romans 8 implies that God saves men based on knowing that they will believe on their own, then they are not honoring the Word and even if they insist that it is infallible, they are not submitting to what it plainly says and are not in practice treating the Word as if it is true, or authoritative.

That is my lengthier treatment of this matter. I hope I neither seemed too harsh or too soft. It's a serious issue but it doesn't make someone a heretic -- it does require your repentance, though.

Thanks for reading.

~ Rak Chazak

The Extrapolation Principle

 The Extrapolation Principle is the application of the idea that God is aware of everything, including human thoughts.

Consider: if you thought of something, then if it was the case that your idea is totally novel, such that God would not have thought of it, then your thoughts could catch God by surprise. He would be, in some sense, ignorant. We know this can't be true, because He is all-knowing.

This also means that, if you can think of a possible reason for why God might have done something, then, provided your thought process is logically sound and not in contradiction to some known Biblical truth, it is reasonable to believe that that thought would have entered into God's decision-making process, as a supporting reason for making the choices that He did.

That's basically it, for this post. I can't make it clearer with more words. But I figure I'll share an example of what I mean, that happens to be what I was thinking about when I formulated this thought.

~ ~ ~

I was contemplating marriage when I went to bed last night. I decided to explore it from a different aspect than is typical. The common ways of looking at human sexuality and relationship are from a procreative and theologically symbolic standpoint:

Procreative: God made male and female separate, as well as sexual reproduction and sexual desire, in order to establish a balance in the created order and to perpetuate humanity.

Theologically symbolic: God made male and female separate, that they may, when they come together in marriage, be a representation of the relationship that Christ has with His Church -- distinct centers of consciousness, but united in purpose (and as near to unity of essence as is possible), both serving the other.

But I figured, why not look at it from a contingency standpoint.

Premise: God is so great that when we recognize that we cannot have a perfect relationship with Him in this world, we will desire to leave it to be with Him. This means we won't care if we die. We'll be prone to recklessness or at least apathy with regard to protecting our earthly lives, since life with Him is far more to be desired than a lesser life on earth.

So God has the conundrum, of how to motivate the humans not to totally throw away their lives so they can pass through death into eternity. He's got to make some aspect of earthly living have enough of a fixation on the heart of men that they won't be tempted to give it up so easily. He needs to do something to make them individually invested in promoting His kingdom on earth, and not just focused on joining His kingdom in heaven.

What's a God to do?

The delights of heaven far surpass the delights on earth. So God might have thought, "I'll create something so delightful that men will hardly choose to die than miss the experience of it." And He created sexual pleasure.

The intimacy of the loving relationship between Father and Son, and Savior and Saint, far surpasses human relationships on earth. So God might have thought, "I'll create something so intimate, than which nothing else will come closer to resembling My relationship with those whom I love." And He made possible the marital union between man and wife.

And then, to ensure that mankind would not be so singlemindedly devoted to pursuit of this passion (recognizing, after all, that not all would be holy in their motivations) at the expense of all others, He connected human sexual intimacy to the generation of life itself, so that as long as people would desire that intimacy (which He made nearly inevitable), new people would be born and His desire that mankind would fill the earth would never be thwarted. Further, the presence of helpless children would serve as a modulating effect, on sinners and saints alike, making them more responsible and convicting them with a sense of duty, and thus providing a way that mankind would perpetuate itself even if it operated on the basest of human urges.

The fact that I thought this means that God knows that I would think it.
Since God is eternal, that means that He was aware of this thought 'before' He created mankind, before He made them male and female and created sex and sexual reproduction.
The Extrapolation Principle then means that, provided there's nothing ludicrously antiBiblical about this speculation, that it's quite possible that these notions constituted some of the multitudinous considerations that God would have processed in His divine mind when deciding how He was going to create the universe. It doesn't mean it was the primary reason (certainly not, by far), but it implies that He would have been aware of it, and the fact that He did what He did in the way that He did takes all possibilities into consideration.

So my conclusion, then, is that one of the supporting reasons for why God made marriage is so that His children would have something to root them in this world and keep them temporarily content with persisting in a shadow of eternity, until the future consummation. A sea-anchor, if you will.

It can't replace God for us. But it's the closest we have to being face-to-face with Him, our true love, between now and the day we're glorified and perfected in Him. And it's such an example of His kindness to us, that He would allow us to have this 'small slice of heaven', the better to know Him by, by intimately loving and being loved by another person.

Tell me that's not romantic.

~ Rak Chazak

Personal Life Update: Admission Applications

Details are omitted for reasonable reasons.

I'm halfway through the application and enrollment processes at two higher education institutions: one a community college and the other a university. Until this fall, I didn't have a clear conception of what specific career goals I wished to aim toward, and was wary of making decisions without the requisite information to make them well. But now, I have a notion of what to do with my degree, and consequently, know what I need to do to get from here to there. First I learned about accreditation agencies that can certify you for a specific career position, and then I found different accredited programs around where I live. I picked two institutions for their relative convenience in terms of location to me, and am intending to conclude the bulk of the remaining prerequisite courses at the community college, while applying to be wait-listed in the mean-time at the university, for the Fall 2015 program.

Now it's a waiting game of two sorts: waiting to be admitted, and then waiting to see if I make it into the actual courses that I'll be wait-listed for. Being on the wait list is not a death sentence, it usually is as good as getting into the course itself, because a fair number of people are often bound to drop the course or fail to meet criteria and be removed administratively, opening up slots for you. So I'm fairly confident in getting the prereq's out of the way. This will make me higher ranked for the 2-year program I'm applying to, so that when they run numbers before the Summer, and then again before the Fall, I'll likely move up and have a much better shot at securing a position. The other thing to "wait" for is the question of financial aid. I'm almost guaranteed to get loans like the ones I already hold, but finding need-based grants and scholarships would be nice.

The specifics of the outcome belong to the Almighty. But I learned this wisdom from a speaker at one of the few Cru meetings I attended one semester: that (using a Biblical example, he asserted) stepping out in faith is the mark of obediently waiting on God. Faith is not total resignation and waiting for God to do everything. Faith is knowing what is in accordance with the will of God, seeking to do it, and praying for Him to lead you to the right conclusion. Whether God answers your prayer or not, you still act in faith. By trying to accomplish something, you give Him the divine prerogative He deserves, to decide the outcome. But if you refuse to try to accomplish something, such that it is impossible, then you are not being faithful and waiting, you are essentially trying to control the outcome by limiting yourself to the option of failure. "You do not receive because you do not ask." (James 4:2) Faithfulness involves both asking God for help, and striving to be obedient whatever the outcome. It is not one or the other; it is not doing nothing, and waiting for God to move, and it is not trying to do things in your own power, for God.

If I don't apply, I can't be accepted. Only by applying, can I have the option of either being accepted or denied entry into a course/program. So which one of these confers more glory to God? The one where He can bless your obedience or the one where He'd have to perform miracles to alter the nature of reality just to give you the good things He desires?

I feel good, because I know that it's wise to improve my marketability as a suitable employee for the particular field I have in mind. I also know that a good work ethic and personal responsibility is pleasing to God. And I know that whatever the outcome, it's solely in His control, because I made sure to pray beforehand, that whatever I pursue would be the path that He intends, and that I do nothing from the strength of my own flesh but by His Spirit.

Stepping out in obedient faith. Now it will be exciting to see what God will do with it.

~ Rak Chazak

The Sufficiency of Minimalism

Would you  be satisfied with a nearly deistic God? That's not saying He is, but considering how you'd react to a very minimally involved deity is an important thought exercise that can help you evaluate and strengthen your faith.

The Sufficiency of Minimalism

                What if God doesn’t intervene in earthly affairs? What if, after the conclusion of Acts, God neither acts through human nor supernatural agents of change, instead letting everything proceed according to physical laws and human decisions alone? What if every change in a person’s mind, from contrition to conversion to sanctification, is not the result of an active alteration of their mental substrate by the Holy Spirit, but merely a deterministic inevitability resulting from contemplating the truths of the Scriptures? What if God’s irresistible grace, as well as His sanctification, was accomplished not by an act of His in the present, but an act of His in the deep past, which continually effects salvation throughout all time, so that He is still the author of it all, despite no supernatural behavior on the individual or subatomic level?

                Would you still attribute every good thing to God? Would you still give Him the credit? Give Him the glory? Or would it cheapen your understanding of His goodness? Is your faith dependent on a belief in God supernaturally intervening to manipulate world events, subliminally, all of the time and everywhere? As if, perhaps, this is the only way that you can conceptualize Him being in control of everything, or deserving credit for the outcome? If your idea that God plays ‘cellular train conductor’ in people’s brains, or ‘atomic pool shark’ in the particles of earth and sky and sea, were challenged or undermined, would your faith fall apart? This is worth seriously considering.

                I’ll confess: my conception of God’s involvement does include the idea that He bumps this atom here, increasesthat action potential there, annihilates this positron here, raises the thermal energy of that molecule, breaks that peptide bond, induces magnetism in some metal somewhere, alters the velocity of some photon, pulls, shifts, breaks, combines, removes, replaces, diverts, and orchestrates an endless undetectable masterpiece of butterfly effects all over the world to minutely influence world events and accomplish personal and national histories without transgressing the boundary of personal autonomy that He intentionally limits Himself not to.

                But suppose this notion is incorrect? What if He doesn’t make a billion tiny interventions every second? What if He makes none? Or one every year, utilizing much more extended butterfly effects? Does my belief in God’s sovereignty and intimate care for human lives and world events rise and fall with this romantic view of Him as a maestro? No, it does not, and should not. It is my own idea, based on what I know about God’s power and wisdom, but my own idea, nonetheless. Him sovereignly ordaining everything that occurs does not need to mean that he flips a switch every time something happens. He could have planned it out a thousand years earlier, and being infinitely intelligent, perfectly predicted everything that would happen over that time period that led up to that moment. Or, He could have intervened the Planck-second immediately preceding. Whichever is the case, it changes nothing about the fact that it is entirely within His power to do either.

                In the interest of developing a satisfied faith in God, I’ve contemplated ideas like this from time to time, and considered that though God is probably very active—and must, on some level, be, because of His promise of the indwelling ministry of the Holy Spirit to believers—I should be able to find contentment with the possibility that He’s minimally involved in human affairs, and much more is due to chance and human agency than even I believe.

                When it comes to the bedrock of my faith, I know from the witness of history that He really did come in our likeness to die for our sins in our stead, so that justice could be served and I can be free from His wrath and reconciled to Him as a forgiven, redeemed and beloved son. That is ALL that is necessary to come to an unshakable faith in Him. Everything else is a splendid, wonderful continuation of His grace toward us, sanctifying us from now until the day of His return. But even without this, I have everything I need in order to be accountable to Him, to believe in Him, and to trustingly persevere to be obedient from this point on until the future consummation, even if, hypothetically, my faith received no further encouragement whatsoever, and life was one big struggle to resist despair from constant flaming arrows and assorted spiritual anguish.

                This is being content with as little as possible. When you are content with the least, you will be ever more grateful, the more you receive. The sufficiency of minimalism is not something that should characterize your faith—as resisting more than the essential doctrines of Christianity—but is something that should support your faith, being something in the back of your mind that tells you that no matter how your faith might be shaken as you go along, no matter how much it may be attacked, and how strong the temptation to despair, you know with full confidence that the core of your belief is stronger still, and no matter how wrong everything else you believe may be, no matter how effective the attempts to destroy your faith, nothing will ever be able to change the root facts of the Incarnation, Crucifixion, Death Burial and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, and on this hinges everything else, so hold on to it no matter what!

                The most minimal truth is the most sufficient. Contentedness with this leads to a lifetime of confidence and overflowing gratefulness at whatever more you receive from God than this knowledge, to strengthen your faith. And when we’re in eternity, and God reveals to us just what the extent of His interaction with physical reality was, we’ll have an endless number of reasons to be awed, thankful and filled with an attitude of worship toward Him for everything He did that we never knew while we walked in the valley.

~ Rak Chazak 

Further reading (very interesting): The Expansion of Space--A Dark Science. Keeping in mind the link above to electron-positron (anti-electron) annihilation, these two excerpts stood out: 

Vacuum energy comes from the spontaneous emission of virtual particle/anti-particle pairs that appear momentarily from small quanta of energy from the vacuum, sort of a quantum foamy stuff, and then these particle pairs self-annihilate releasing the same quanta of energy back into the vacuum. Its energy density is non-zero, in fact, if you estimate it from electron/anti-electron pairs filling a volume on the scale of their Compton wavelength you get an energy density about 48 magnitudes higher than the estimated average mass density of the universe. From this it follows that the matter content of the universe is only a tiny fraction of the total energy, when compared to the vacuum energy. The particular choice of the wavelength one uses for the cut-off energy in the calculation of its energy density has led to a figure as high as 10,120 times the average mass density of the universe.

....

The quantum vacuum impedes the progress of photons through space to the speed, c, and hence it introduces the first “clock” and the forward arrow of time. Empty space would have meant unimpeded photons with infinite speed.

This last sentence is intriguing because of its relevance to Dr. Jason Lisle's Anisotropic Synchrony Convention, a model he lays out where the one-way speed of light is postulated to be infinite, in order to explain why we can observe distant starlight in a young universe. This might be worth devoting a whole article to, itself, some time. 

The Purity Principle: A Biologist's Perspective on the Timing of God's Wrath and Salvation

This'll be a long post with lots of pictures, yay! Make sure to click "Read More" so you don't miss out! 

The Purity Principle

Thesis abstract: my observation and speculation that the reason the Fall happened before Adam and Eve had children, and that the Flood destroyed all of mankind except Noah’s family, is that God chose those times to avoid the far more complicated consequences of what would happen if only a part of mankind fell at once, or how to keep the Messianic Line undiluted from Adam to Christ. They appear to be decisions made mainly on the basis of demographics, with respect to their relation to sinfulness and its effects on the righteous who are living, keeping in mind God’s respect for the deterministic autonomy of man.

How can I say that with simple words? = Specific points in history have seen God’s intervention, I speculate, because of an implied, but (to my knowledge) inexplicit, goal of maintaining the spiritual purity of believers: first the patriarchs, then Israel, and then the Church.

Here’s my big idea: have you noticed, for instance, that every single person in Jesus’ lineage as given in Matthew and Luke (as far as can be told from Biblical background information on them) were saved? What are the chances of that? Now, there must certainly be unbelievers in His ancestry somewhere, BUT nevertheless the fact that there is at least one lineage containing an unbroken chain of belief in God, from father to son, from Adam to Christ, is a very conspicuous observation. And it begs analysis of why this might be the case.

I should clarify how I am using the word purity. You may have gotten the idea from the last paragraph, but let me dispel any possible misunderstanding. My notion of purity in this article concerns itself with spiritual genealogy. The physical lineage doesn’t matter; this isn’t promoting nationalism or ethnic divisions between people. In the context of Israel and the Church, Biblically, purity means you have believers inside and unbelievers outside. Let unrepentant ones in, and the passage “a little leaven leavens the whole lump” comes true. The idea is that unbelief is, from a demographic viewpoint, infectious. Leave it alone without a purge of some sort (does not need to be violent), and over time it has the tendency to totally corrupt everything. We see this in the example of Noah, whose culture had become so far removed from God (from the impurity of the God-believing Sethites intermarrying with pagan Cainites, which tainted the succeeding generations with the Cainite godlessness) that he was the ONLY man alive on earth who walked with God!—out of the millions or possibly billions of people alive at that point. As a student trained in biology, this makes me think of serial dilutions. 

Right-click on any of the following images to see them in a full size view.

Faithlessness, if tolerated by the faithful, and absent God’s intervention, has the effect of diluting faithfulness over time so that there is less and less faith on earth, by proportion of the total population, by every succeeding generation.

This is obviously a bad thing, and if God does not desire (as I believe the Bible gives us strong support to believe) for faithfulness to ever disappear completely from the earth, at any one time, then He would have to do something to protect the diminishing remaining faithful from the corrupting godlessness around them.

And this is, I believe, a supporting reason for God’s decisions in history to a) send the Flood, b) call Abraham out of Ur, c) the Israelite Exodus, d) the Zionistic theocratic laws for Israel that forbade intermarriage with foreigners, and ultimately why Jesus came at just the time that He did.

Naturally, the main reasons from a theological point of view, and a historical point of view, are different, more obvious, and more important. But every good thing done has more than one good reason for doing it, and I’m going to use the space after the jump to describe how God’s desire for the spiritual purity of the various people God has dealt with has, I believe, been a supporting reason for His decision making and His perfect timing.

Christian Encouragement: How I Compliment Pretty Girls Who Have Good Theology

The following contains 1,700 words of fairly easily-readable monologue that I sent as an expanded version of a compliment to a girl on her theological soundness and zeal. I'll place a page break early on, to avoid cluttering the front page, and encourage you to click on "read more" to look at the whole thing for your consideration, edification, what-have-you.

Hiyah,

I came across your facebook profile on a [..............] post where you had commented. So the fact that you seemed to affirm pre-trib eschatology was what first stood out, not to mention the fact that you're following a page representing Reformed doctrine, which is encouraging. The next thing that I saw was that you're cute, which is only natural considering that I'm a typical male in that I'm visually oriented, and that my personality preference (which I find the Myers-Briggs profile to be a fairly effective measure of) is to thoroughly evaluate everything I perceive. It's a little unclear from facebook and your blog, but erring on the safe side, I'll treat you as if you're married and avoid anything that might be flirtatious. However, I have many compliments to give you.

It's rare for most young people to be very theologically astute -- I speak as one myself, who feels sometimes as if the peer landscape is very sparsely populated with Christian brethren -- and considering that roughly half of any age group is female, and only a subset thereof is of notable physical attractiveness, it's only logical to conclude that it's a very rare thing for a beautiful young woman to be so zealous for good doctrine as it is apparent to me that you are.

And mark, that is primarily what makes you beautiful:

3Your adornment must not be merely external-- braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; 4but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God. 1 Peter 3:3-4

Movie Review: Hercules ft. Dwayne Johnson, and Edge of Tomorrow

I used my day off to take scrap garbage to the landfill, and watch two movies from Redbox back-to-back. The $2.50 for two movies is sweet, sweet free market delight. I might never go to the movie theater again, save once a year for auspicious occasions. Let the lowest-priced DVD-quality video provider win.

Hercules:

What I liked: With the exception of one flash-back of his wife, there really wasn't any sexual innuendo aside from wordplay that younger children would miss.

What I really liked: The movie avoided cliche'd supernatural cinematic overtures, and left the question of Hercules' mythology largely ambiguous. The movie even ends with a narration asking whether Hercules was more myth than man and whether it mattered; The Rock doesn't do anything that's necessarily impossible, just in two scenes he performs deeds that seem highly, highly improbable, which I suppose are included to offer the viewer something to grumble about--whether it indicates superhuman strength or not. In the legend of Hercules, Zeus' jealous wife Hera possesses Hercules to murder his family, driving him mad. But in the movie, it's part of a very human, larger plot twist that plays an integral role in the theme of who the man is, where he stops and the myth begins.

What might make you think: I appreciated that the film offered a "mythologically accurate" retelling while at the same time eschewing the cliche's and offering you a suggestion of how it might have happened if there were no gods or demons involved at all, just larger-than-life men who inspired embellished storytelling for one reason or another. I also appreciated that for once, this was directed at an actual myth, and not like so many modern movies, an attempt to undermine the Bible's account of history by recasting it as an after-the-fact hagiographical depiction of a much different reality.

It's a war movie, so there's blood and depictions of dead bodies, implied just-barely-off-screen breaking of bones, and intense emotional grief/anger, on people's faces as well as in the audio, so it's not a fairy tale movie but because of its lack of sex and obscene gore, as well as comparatively minimal profanity, it should be fine to watch with your preteen.

Edge of Tomorrow:                  (Groundhog Day, or Source Code, with guns and aliens)

Random Thought: An Ad Absurdiam Reason Why God is not Female

I was singing a line to a hymn in my head when I stumbled upon an obvious realization. “When He shall come with trumpet sound, oh, may I then in Him be found.” If it’s easy for people to mock true religion now, for “things hard to understand,” just imagine the fodder for immature minds that would be provided if God had in fact revealed Himself as a woman, or having a “female” nature. “When She shall come with trumpet sound, oh, may I then in Her be found.” Can we agree that the imagery connoted by saying that you’re “inside” a female God is at best problematic, and at worst, so tied to sexual euphemisms that it seriously gets in the way of properly thinking about God—even if it was the case, in this alternate reality we’re envisioning, that He revealed Himself as a Heavenly Mother? God is a woman, and we want to be in Her…inside Her? So many wrongs. Take the phrase, 

10 Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on My own authority; but the Father who dwells in Me does the works. 11 Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe Me for the sake of the works themselves.
~ John 14:10-11

, which would if God revealed Himself in feminine terms be rendered, "My mother is in Me and I am in My Mother"], as a ridiculous example. Though a female God would probably have shown up as a female Jesus, but still. Something about the language of being “in Him” excludes a sexual context from consideration, so it’s just transparently easier to understand than the alternative. Here’s my parting thought: God is transcendent, which means that though He is so great as to be unable to be understood completely, He is fundamentally able to be understood rightly, on multiple different levels, no matter your knowledge or intelligence. This seems to me like a satisfactorily simple example of just one more reason why God could have validly chosen to reveal Himself in masculine terms. And indeed, probably something that in actual fact crossed His mind in making that decision, since it crossed mine and He created me and knows my thoughts…just saying.

~ Rak Chazak

Proof of God: The Argument From Possibility

The Argument From Possibility

                I was recently watching another episode of the traveling atheist (‘Closer To Truth’ with Robert Lawrence Kuhn) and the episode focused solely on the ‘Ontological Argument for God,’ or in other words, the argument from existence. Meaning that some clearly obvious facts about existence are taken and used as the axioms in a logical proof that is intended to demonstrate that God’s existence is necessary.

                Why everyone seems to zero in on Anselm of Canterbury’s “that than which nothing greater can be conceived” thought-experiment as the best representation of the Ontological Argument (or synonymous with it, even), is beyond me. At least one person in the episode (the series is presented through interviews with philosophers, scientists and theologians) made the statement that to take Anselm’s pondering on ‘the greatest conceivable being’ and to hold this up as a proof is to stretch it far beyond what it’s intended to do, even by Anselm himself—and he placed the blame on well-meaning but incorrect theologians in time past. What that interviewee said was that Anselm simply suggested that whatever you conceive of a thing, the actual thing itself is by definition going to be ‘greater’ than the conception of the thing. That seems benign enough, and it’s a satisfactory conclusion to me, who has wondered since first introduced why this is held up as the best that Christian philosophy can do.

Wiki Commons image. Alvin Plantinga.

                The last interviewee of the episode, Alvin Plantinga, also made a similar remark about Anselm, that as stated, the argument doesn’t work. But he had apparently developed an improvement of the argument, which he called “The Argument from Possible Worlds,” or something similar. While I didn’t quite follow his construction of his proof, I immediately understood the summary: he said that as constructed, the proof leads someone to be totally committed to the reality of God’s existence as a necessary fact, provided that he begin with the acknowledgement that it is possible for God to exist. For anyone to believe that God does not exist, they would have to claim that it is impossible for God to exist.

*    *     *     *     *

                This immediately made sense to me, because I’d constructed a similar logical proof before. I don’t believe this is the same proof Plantinga’s developed, and I don’t seek to take credit for his idea, but the thought process is similar, and he did remind me of it. Without further ado, here’s the Argument from Possibility.

The Choice

                Like Plantinga’s Possible Worlds, the proof does not unilaterally demonstrate God’s existence. What it does instead is to show that one must choose between the belief that God’s existence is either a fact, or that it is impossible. To believe that it is possible and yet that it is not actual, is to commit a logical contradiction. It is not possible for God’s existence (1) to be possible, and (2) for God not to exist.

Defining Possibility

Phreniology: Theory of the Mind-Brain Interaction

I've had an idea that the body is a machine, the brain is the computer that controls it and runs subprograms, and the mind is the "user" component that "operates" the brain-body system to get the living human being to perform the actions desired by the operator. As an allegory for how our bodies, corporeal and incorporeal, actually work together. I was interested when I picked up a magazine from the leisure-reading rack at the YMCA and read this:

Credit for the information: National Geographic Magazine, February 2014 edition.

"Caltech and UCLA scientists use pictures of celebrities to study how the brain processes what the eyes see. In 2005 they found an individual nerve cell that fired only when subjects were shown pictures of Jennifer Aniston. Another neuron responded only to pictures of Halle Berry—even when she was masked as Catwoman. Follow-up studies suggest that relatively few neurons are involved in representing any given person, place, or concept, making the brain staggeringly efficient at storing information."

I fired off a text to my college friends telling them what I thought:

This is interesting, and seems to confirm my phreniology theory (+10pts for using big words!) that the brain is not the thing that stores memories--the mind(the spirit/soul) is--it is merely the biological machine that allows our complete human form to have access to our spiritual-identity-associated-memories for the purpose of conscious, mind-and-brain thought processing of these memories. How's that sound?

If the brain itself doesn't store memories, then the one-neuron recognition finding would be consistent with this: the memories associated with identifying and recognizing Jennifer Aniston as a singular individual need only be accessed by a single neuron "tagged" as the gateway for the brain to interact with the mind's memories. The rest of the brain's activity, beyond this one neuron, makes up the biological "processing" of this connection, that allows you to consciously realize that you're looking at Jennifer Aniston.

Side thought: In other words, every individual you can recognize is represented by one neuron. So, it seems likely, is any given place, any given major event in your past experience, and any given major concept that you understand or believe in. They are like locked gates that your brain holds the key to; it opens each gate when prompted, and proceeds to open up related thoughts through that particular memory-jogging avenue. (Your mind-brain therefore has an almost infinite capacity for remembering things, since you have hundred billions of neurons. It would seem necessary, if we're going to live forever, and remember a near infinite amount of things, wouldn't it?) Have you ever found that, for example when remembering song lyrics, you can only remember some things if you first "go through" the associated stored memories that come before it, in a sequence? I've heard the old poets of old held a remarkable amount of history in oral tradition, and perhaps this is how.

This makes further sense when it comes to mentally impaired or brain-damaged individuals. Their brain-mind connection is hampered because the brain is damaged. The brain therefore can't interact with the mind properly, and conscious thought is hamstrung and takes place less efficiently. Even more interestingly, this can explain why seemingly smart people can make such mind-numbingly (points for relevant adjective!) idiotic decisions and go from reasonable starting points to impossibly bizarre and false conclusions. In this case, their brain isn't damaged, but their mind is. The Bible says that those who rebel against God and do not have the Holy Spirit in them have a 'natural mind' and a 'seared conscience.' (1 Timothy 4:2, 1 Corinthians 2:14) My understanding of this is that unbelief literally makes you unintelligent, and perhaps that's because the mind fails to interact with the brain properly--it's the reverse of the previously discussed circumstance, except in this case it's your fault for it. Romans 1:21-22 further buttresses this notion, that prolonged and obstinate refusal to repent before God will literally make people stupid. The smart choice, in more than one way, it would seem, is to submit in faith to Christ.

If my phreniology theory is right, then an interesting conclusion results: you don't actually lose your memories. You may forget them, but you've merely lost access to them. You'll be able to access them once more in the eternal state, when your whole human form--mind and body--is repaired to full capacity. Unless, that is, you never submit your carnal mind to Christ.

~ Rak Chazak

Further reading:
http://www.gotquestions.org/seared-conscience.html
http://biblehub.com/1_corinthians/2-14.htm

I've Finally Arrived

Because of my personal history of not being frequently immersed in social situations with people my age outside of school, sports, or places where adults congregated, I've had far less experience in terms of the types of encounters I've heard from others that they were having or have had. 

Some personal information, non-explicit nor personally identifiable. Discusses being 'hit on' and romantic crushes.

It wasn't until after graduating high school that I had the experience of unrequited emotions toward me by other people. Well, that's not entirely accurate, because I was aware of a few crushes in middle school (I was cuter then), but they were overtly declared and fizzled, they've just taken me more and more by surprise as time has gone on. 

-  A girl who avoided me ever after touching me inappropriately (and not getting the reaction she was expecting, I guess) wrote a suggestive note in my yearbook indicating she had tender feelings for me.

-  A girl in my freshman year of college brought a movie over to watch in my dorm room. When we said goodbye, she kissed me on the neck. I was totally oblivious to the presence of any physical attraction up to that point, and I think my 'failure to reciprocate' explains why she and her three friends always seemed to interact with me awkwardly, though they would acknowledge me and wave if we passed each other on campus. 

-  Another girl that year sent me an email to say she was avoiding me because she liked me. Nothing came of that, for obvious reasons.

-  Someone I hadn't spoken to in two years, because she had asked me "do you hate me?" which I took as an offensive insult and said 'yes' in desperation to end her insecure texting, emailed me to try to reconnect, and shared that she'd really liked me/had a strong crush for some time. She again persisted with the "do you dislike me?" questioning, my best guess is because she wanted me to say I liked her, but I refused to take her lead, and she became offended and ragequit.

-  I went on a casual 'date' with a girl I'd flirted with in Fall 2011, and after talking for a long time she revealed that she had a boyfriend and was most interested in seeing 'what I was like,' because of persistent negative rumors about me on campus [as a result of presenting Biblical Christianity on the university forum] that she had become aware of. 

Nothing like being ambush-kissed or having to constantly defend your friend/family/partner in court because of false allegations by a 'crazy ex,' or being propositioned for a threesome, or going to a social gathering where a fight occurs or police arrive for whatever reason. Just a bunch of people failing to consider that their assumptions about how people respond to certain behaviors might be..let's say limited. 

*   *   *   *   *

Piggybacking off that last idea, I now come to the topic of discussion. A friend of mine had once informed me that they've been 'hit on' by people of "all 3" claimed orientations, i.e. hetero, bi and homosexual, both males and females. To me, I'd just assumed it was something that wouldn't happen because I just don't go out to places like clubs or parties or wherever else one might expect to be hit on (oh, almost forgot bars). The lack-of-alcohol factor also would play a role, since slightly inebriated people might be less inhibited and feel more confident or flamboyant. For that reason, I wasn't expecting to get handed a note by a coworker (from a guest) one day that said 'call me' (or 'text me?') with a number attached. A few days later, sitting at home, I let my curiosity lead me to send off a text.

It went sort of like this:

-Initial Contact
-Who's this? response
-Explanation; so we don't know each other?
-Respondent feigns uncertainty
-I suggest it was someone playing a prank giving me his number
-Suddenly remembers who I am
-Tells me I'm "seriously attractive."
-I reassure him and thank him for the compliment, then ask if he got the impression I had 'an animus, condemnation, disgust, meanness, lack of respect etc or made you suspicious that I harbor those emotions toward you'
-He replies no, tells me I'm nice, 'obviously very intelligent' and deserves 'props for being as respectful as you are.'
-I tell him "You happen to have stumbled upon one of the most conservative Christian 24-year-olds this side of D.C." and explain that my kindness is not in spite of my Christianity, but as a result, a derivative of my beliefs which "leave no part of life uninfluenced."

I decided to tell him that, I explained, "because tomorrow is not promised. There is no better moment than the present," to talk about such a serious subject.

This is the conversation, summarized. I'm including his final text as a whole, as an anecdotal evidence for any Christians out there who aren't sure/confident about whether they should be up-front with the fact that they are Christian and "preach" to people when they've just gotten to know them a little bit. I wasn't sure how he would react, because chances are he could be like the homosexual activists at my university who have gone out of their way to try to destroy for me, academically, professionally and otherwise. But I stepped out in faith. Here's his response:

I really think you're honestly an awesome person [Hakam]. I'm really glad you've been openly honest with me about this all. It brings a lot to mind, because a lot of people have reacted very negatively. & you being a Christian, & reacting as respectful as you possibly could, is sure a powerful thing to see. I'm more then open to answering any questions & talking to you about anything at anytime you'd like. In my personal opinion someone as intelligent & awesome as you should not be working at [Restaurant]. Keep up the good work & push for what you want, [Hakam]. I believe in you. You're for sure an awesome dude.  & again, I'll just say if there's any possibility of us becoming friends, I'd be more then happy too. You seem like a really cool guy with a great outlook on life. & I see you going big & making it just from the little I know about you! 

- Results not typical. Faithful witness is required by God of Christians regardless of the end result. -

I appear to have an open door for further witnessing, with a person who's now in a position to listen and care about what I tell them.

"Imitate me as I imitate Christ."
~ Paul
1 Corinthians 11:1

~ Rak Chazak

Journal Entry: Sputter and Fizzle

Friday, December 27, 2013

A man traveling with two other people waited alone in the restaurant while they went to the bathroom. He stood with his hand in his pockets behind the farthest band of the extendable tape and said, ask me any question you’ve always wanted to know the answer to. He seemed to be addressing both me and [Joe], who were both engaged in cleaning—me, trays; he, odd items and surfaces. I asked him to tell me how many minutes it would be before they would order. He kept trying to ask the question. He then said something like, what is your view/have you heard of the God question? I heard that as, “The God Question,” and endeavored to inject jocularity as I sometimes do in situations where people are being awkwardly confrontational, in order to distract them off their track, so I said that I thought he was talking about a book. He made some unclear statements to the tune of it being an important subject, this could be your only opportunity, are you sure that/what’s your choice?, both before and after I said that I wasn’t authorized to talk about subjects that could potentially offend people while in my capacity as an employee. He said that he was impossible to offend. He sorta just waited around while I was mostly silent thereafter, Joe looked at me confusedly, and the man made a few weak attempts at speaking, as I just mentioned. When [the manager] came to swap out my drawer and put Joe on, he left with the people who were with him. I think I know what he was doing. He seemed to be trying to start a witnessing encounter. He had what he thought was a decent “hook,” and he felt comfortable since the dining room was empty and he in all likelihood was simply passing through, so he felt bolder—not yet quite in his element, however, since his body language, distance from his addressees and fumbling obscurity were an obstacle to getting to the point. His engagement hinged on getting people to be both curious and ask and answer questions with him, but he seemed to not have counted on what he would do if that didn’t happen, or people didn’t engage. He didn’t have a plan B, and he left without leaving a clear Gospel presentation. Suppose he is saved—he just needs to refine his methods and aspire to be less mysterious and more direct with his introduction—and be prepared to make a point even when his hearers are unwilling to talk back. People at work or in a line are a great captive audience; he should expect to talk without them talking at all. Suppose he isn’t saved—it’s fantastic that he left discouraged and I hope he comes to the Truth. Personally, I’m suspicious that the former is true.

~ Rak Chazak 

Word Study: Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me

It's time again to do another short word study to gain a deeper insight into the message of the Bible.

What is "God?"

The word "God" in the first of the Ten Commandments is the Hebrew word Elohim, defined here at BlueLetterBible.com, together with a list of the instances where it is used in the Old Testament. There is also a word study on that site here. Elohim is a plural word (-im is the plural ending to words in Hebrew), and always refers to the Trinity when used of God in the Bible. The plural always takes a singular noun when referring to God, also, driving home the point of the existence of the Trinity by grammatical evidence. Likewise, the singular word El is used of the individual persons of the Trinity, the Father, Spirit and Son, as shown in the BLB word study linked.

I briefly touched on the meaning of Elohim in a previous blog post. The word connotes strength and when referring to humans can be understood to mean "mighty ones," powerful people whom even in Modern English could be symbolically spoken of as "gods among men," without anything being lost in translation. The word is translated in various places as 'judges' or 'rulers'

Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods

What does this mean?

Let's look at it grammatically. 'other gods' implies a comparison rather than a contrast with God. The 'other gods' are clearly presented as false gods, in context of the Ten Commandments, but the word Baalim (a catch-all term for false gods), the plural form of Baal, which means "lord" and was the primary [implied false] deity of the Canaanites, as defined here, was not used, since that would imply that God was a false god, grammatically speaking, because of the usage of "other." 

Why is this significant?

I think it's because if God had inspired Exodus 20:3 to read "thou shalt have no false gods before me," then there would undoubtedly have been those who would have claimed, "God, we don't believe in any false gods [baalim], we simply worship 'true' gods [elohim] in addition to you; is that so wrong?" By not merely forbidding "false gods," but forbidding the worship of any conceivable deity of any kind God closes all loopholes and makes no excuses possible.

Application

Yet, Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox today put church "saints" [elohim*] before God and worship them.

Others put charismatic figures such as politicians, celebrities, etc as their [elohim] in their life, which they worship in the sense that worship consists of respecting and obeying your god, desiring to please your god, and looking to your god for guidance and hope in accomplishing a solution to whatever problem you're praying to them for their aid in fixing.

And most of the rest think so highly of themselves because of persistent self-esteem campaigns and the Gospel of The Inherent Goodness of Man that they are their own elohim, the highest ruler and authority in their life to which they give deference above all other earthly and heavenly authorities.

God says that no matter what sort of "mighty one" you can conjure up, whether you recognize it as a "false god" or not, it is wrong of you. Whatever your alternate object of worship, it is not worthy and you should cast it aside and worship only God, Elohim-Elyon, the Most High God. 

The Call of the Individual

What is your idol today? We all have temptations. Even if you have no person or earth system that you put your faith in for deliverance, perhaps your tendency is like mine, the most simple kind: that subtle pull of your inclination to worship self, to consider your own wants first and to be the final arbiter of what course of action you will take. No matter how often you've mentally handed the reins over to God and repented of trying to be your own God, there are always improvements to be made. For the Christian believer, this is part of sanctification. And if you are not Christian--if you have never yet stopped serving "other gods [elohim]"--or if you are not sure where you stand, may I encourage you to seek to be saved? The same website I've been utilizing for this post has a concise and clear explanation of what it is your soul needs, even though it's our natural tendency to do just the opposite. I encourage you to give it a read: How to Know God.

~ Rak Chazak

* in context of this blog post. Not to be confused with the actual old testament word for saint, Qaddiysh

Time to Get Critical: Mandisa’s “Stronger” and “Overcomer”

Abstract

Mandisa is a popular CCM artist but her two most recent songs are poor influences. They encourage listeners to focus on their own abilities and to seek power to overcome difficulties inside themselves, rather than trusting in God for help. The songs make inappropriate guarantees of end to difficulty, and relegate God's role in our suffering to the sidelines, as someone cheering us on rather than leading us through it. For these reasons, I discourage everyone from listening to or promoting those two particular songs. Their melodies are no substitute for their lacking content.

Analysis

                I don’t know this particular artist, I can only judge the subject matter of the songs that are aired constantly on my local Christian radio stations. Their frequency implies that they are very popular, and so I think it’s important for there to be an analysis of them on the Internet somewhere. I’ll do my best to give them a fair treatment here.

                The songs are not blatantly anti-Christian, and in fact have a few references to Biblical doctrines (the latter more so than the former), but these would be easily missed by the Biblically illiterate main stream christian crowd, and especially any nonbelievers who might be listening in. The songs unfortunately fall into the category of CCM (Christian Contemporary Music) that can be summed up as “self-help encouragement.” The problem is not that it attempts to make people feel good, but that the emphasis is far too often on some alleged inherent capacity in the individual to “be great,” rather than on relying on God for blessings.

                Now I’ll look at a sampling of the lyrics. Here is the chorus from “Stronger”:

When the waves are taking you under

Hold on just a little bit longer

He knows that this is gonna make you stronger, stronger

The pain ain’t gonna last forever

In time, it (can/will) only get better

Believe me, this is gonna make you stronger, stronger

As is common when I write the longer blog posts, I’m not online as I write this, and so I can’t remember the entire song’s lyrics (repetitive as they are), but here is an excerpt from the second verse:

Try and do the best you can

Hold on (for as long as you can/and let Him hold your hand)

Go on, fall into the arms of Jesus [**the only reference to Him by name in the entire song]

whoa oh oh

****** (I can’t remember this line)

Even if you cannot feel Him

I promise you that He still cares

(chorus)

                All right. So what’s wrong with that? Let me count the ways: 1) emphasis on what you do, not what God has done for you or will do through you, 2) unBiblical promise that pain will go away (the song does not imply it will end in heaven), 3) unBiblical view of sanctification, 4) distant view of Christ as someone on the sidelines cheering you on.

                And the part that bothers me the most is the most subtle: “He knows that this is gonna make you stronger.” The He knows part galls me. Why? Because it says that whatever you’re going through is going to make you a better person somehow, and the only role Jesus has in the whole situation is to know that that’s the case. He apparently DOES nothing, just watches you suffer. At most, the song implies that Jesus tells you that it’s going to get better. But He doesn’t actually help you. The lyrics frame Christ as either unconcerned, sadistic, or impotent. Combine this with the end of the last line of the second verse: when I first heard the song, it sounded as if it would naturally end in, ‘Even if you cannot feel Him, I promise you that He’s still there.’ But according to this song, Jesus isn’t even present with you in your afflictions. He “cares,” but “Stronger’s” Jesus doesn’t ever show it. He’s like the estranged grandparent who lives in the next town over and sends $20 and a generic Hallmark card on birthdays but never visits or calls. I don’t want a God who “cares.” Personally, what has always made most sense to me is to have a God who “knows.” Because since He is omniscient, that means He knows all about my problems, and He knows the best way to answer my prayers. I can trust such a God. But a God whose main emphasis is on emotion divorced from rationality is a scary thought. What good does it do if God, or anyone, “cares” but doesn’t help you? The problem I have with this is that emotions, in the present culture, are viewed as chemical sensations and not as goal-motivators. When I say that God cares, it means that He’s actively being intimately involved in your personal struggles and is guiding you through them for His glory and your good, as the Bible says. When the Culture says “God (or anyone) cares,” it means that He feels bad for you – but that’s the extent of it. In the contemporary view of emotion, God caring about you doesn’t mean anything! It does nothing for you! So how, then, can this possibly be encouraging to someone? I affirm that it can’t. And so the song, though it seems aimed at being encouraging on its face, really plants seeds of discouragement in the listener. Because what happens after a person has been struggling for 30 years, wondering every day when their affliction will end, and all the time people are telling them “hey, God cares.” They’ll despise the gesture. It’s as meaningless as saying “Jesus loves you” because people don’t know what love IS. We need to explain these things, we can’t just throw them out. And sadly, the context of how the words show up in this song confirms that the “encouragement” is empty.

                Do I have a Bible verse to justify this with, so I’m not just throwing out my opinion? You bet. And this is what I challenge the people who say “God cares” frivolously with:

“Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?”

James 2:15-16

A Brief Thought On the Word Glorious

God is glorious, we know that. But the word 'glorious' is often used for such things as a beautiful sunset or other thing that causes us to be amazed. I wondered, linguistically, what the connection is. Because if 'glorious' means 'possessing glory,' it would definitely apply to God, but I'm uncertain that it would be a wise thing to say of material things or human events. On the other hand, if 'glorious' means 'revealing the glory of God,' then it can both apply to God and things. And more than in the former case, the word must necessarily refer to everything, because everything in creation reveals the glory of God (Psalm 19:1-4, Romans 1:18-20). 

I like that. An unbeliever may certainly use the word 'glorious' with different intention, but for me, since everywhere I look I can see God's glory revealed, I can happily declare that the sunrise, the stars, and even "mundane" things like a cold shower or a political victory, are glorious, because they all point back to God, for the one paying attention.

~ Rak Chazak

How Could Sexual Urges Be God-Given?

Culture tells us that there's two main ways to approach sex: as something shameful, or as just something people do. Yeah, there are some who have the idea that sex is something beautiful or romantic or special, but these are unilaterally presented as a minority and as being sheltered, naive and simply wrong. My suspicion is that those who have had sex very young because they saw it as something they 'had' to do, probably take the view that sex isn't special subsequent to having a less-than-wonderful first experience. Upon wondering "was that it?" they don't want to face up to that they did something wrong, so instead they blame the whole concept of sex itself. 

There's a better way.

I am one of those that Hollywood(movies) and New York(sitcoms) pretend don't exist: the romantic. The person who surely must be hopelessly naive if he thinks that sex can be something beautiful and exciting, not just prior to the first time, but every time from then on. But if I simply believed this about sex in general, I would be naive. Instead, my actual view, as with most of my personal beliefs, is very conditional. Depending on the situation, something can be very good or very bad.

Sex is a tool. Like any tool, it has the capacity to be used to create amazing things. But if used wrongly, it can cause horrific injury and even death. (I'm thinking of a circle saw as the metaphor, in case anyone's wondering :D ). If I approach a deadly tool thinking of it as an innocent toy that can only bring me pleasure, then it is inevitable that I will hurt myself, possibly severely, because I had no respect for the tool; I had not submitted my mind to the knowledge of how to use it properly. Sex, if used properly as it should, within a loving, committed-for-life, relationship between only one man and only one woman, then it can bring great blessings to the both of them -- even the greatest blessing of all, life. Sex, if used improperly, becomes an instrument of abuse and defilement, destroying the honor of both men and women and devastating the lives of single mothers and the offspring of men who were too cowardly to stand up and raise their families, as is the man's duty.

If there's a place for sex, then there's a place for sexual desires. And while the line between good desire and lust is nearly impossible for man to toe, and therefore should not be attempted, the fact that we have sexual urges is a divine message to us, telling us something very important about who we are and what our purpose is. 

Watch these two short videos. They'll explain the purpose of sexual desire from a Biblical perspective.

If you want more, here's a bit of further background from Josh Harris.

Taken together, these clips give great advice. The message is this: your sexual desires are not supposed to be an obstacle to you living a godly life. Instead, they are given to you as a motivation to get your life in order so that you can marry and fulfill those desires within the appropriate context. Imagine your desires as rain. It does no good if the rain falls in the ocean, but if it falls on fertile ground it can enable plants to grow -- it can create life. If you have sexual desires, you know you're not called to a life of singleness. Consequently, then, when you pour your energies into the appropriate pursuit, you will reap amazing rewards and be so much more fulfilled than you could possibly be if you had chosen a promiscuous lifestyle.

Just like Ecclesiastes says, "there is a time for every purpose under heaven." There is a time and a place to "glut" on your sexual lusts, as RW Glenn says in his clip above, and that time will come when you have laid the groundwork and entered into a lifelong covenantal marriage relationship. Don't sell your future spouse short by wasting your sexuality on other people, real or imaginary. Pour yourself into them. Enrich their life and yours will be enriched also.

~ Rak Chazak