The new Jurassic Park movie is out, Jurassic Dominion. The good guys are great. The bad guys are terrible. The special effects are top rate, and the dinosaurs are believably done. I began to think. The scientists violated the natural order to recreate the dinosaurs, which go on to flourish and invade all the ecosystems of the world. That is an interesting metaphor.

Humans create things and events which take on a life of their own and create change in lives, systems, and communities. Many science fiction stories focus on how man is creating his own destruction through science or other selfish manipulation of the natural world. Movies tend to reflect the true fears of people. Certainly dinosaur movies can’t even compare to the destruction caused by any human war.

Humans create to satisfy personal needs. Selfish purpose always creates harm to its surrounding community, whether it is creating something or doing something. A scientist clones a sheep which shifts the natural world. A thief changes all those impacted by the theft, including all the community by the danger he creates. It is amplified by the dimension of the crime and/or the injuries or deaths which accompany the crime. Economics spur wars that destroy.

Each thing we create offsets other things by being out of proportion or sync. Humans have a limited vision and are more concerned with the impact on themselves than they are aware of the invading impact of their actions on the wider world. Pollution is a classic example of negative impact we cause.

Compare the impact we cause to creation by God. The Lord creates for all things to fit and work together without any one setting the others out of balance. He creates things with the ability to right themselves if imbalance should occur. We scar. He heals. Even the evolutionists who deny God have to say that life on this planet is constructed of beautifully put together ecosystems that are so complex and amazing in the way they self-sustain and self-heal.

You can see the desires at play when man creates. It is for himself and his own benefit. The Jurassic creatures are created for power, for money, for prestige. We build civilizations and pollute the creation with the left overs and by-products. God creates for the benefit of the other. Each piece is a blessing to the other pieces. The by-products and left overs feed other parts of the ecosystem. He has and does engineer a whole, fit together. We create pieces, disjointed and often antagonistic that pull against or destroy the other pieces. He is thorough. We are piecemeal. He takes in all contingencies. We take in only the desired impact with limited or no awareness of the relative cost or impacts.

The more I look at life, the more I see that God is real and that mankind needs Him. I am grateful that He makes Himself obvious and available.

This has been a tough season for many. Storms and sicknesses have assailed America, and old age leaves no survivors. We are transitory people in a transitory world. The philosophers say you can’t step in the same river twice because the water has changed. Even our earth, one standard of stability, is changing through earthquakes, volcanos and other natural phenomenon that reshapes the very planet we cling to. It would seem that all is in the process of getting lost through change.

The first law of thermodynamics indicates that no energy is gained or lost in a closed system. It just changes forms. The people who say this consider the universe a closed system. Does that mean that all things are getting lost, not lost, or just changed?

I think about those things when I consider the flow of history and the limited season of each person’s life. The constant change of all life might explain why human beings resist change and cling to anything that represents stability. Change is frightening because we find ourselves where we’ve never been, doing things we haven’t exactly done. Not-changing is repetition of what we’ve done in ways we’ve done it and seems to represent security (even though the river philosophers would deny true repetition as possible). Learning requires change. Mastery requires levels of repetition. All learning requires humility, which might easily be explained as knowing you don’t and can’t know it all.

I am curious about some constants that seem to live in human behavior. Values and purpose can be traced from the earliest of our knowledge of humanity. The undergirding behaviors that lie beneath the shifting cultures and philosophies seem to remain constant. Power, wealth, sex, and like values are easily seen in every culture, every race, at every historical time we know about in human history. How can those flimsy things, values, seem so constant when all else is in change?

I believe these are some of the ways we learn to see that God is real. We see that scientists are using all kinds of profoundly intricate and interweaving established processes to understand the world around them, which stands in the face of believing that all life is random. It is the soul, the deeper part of a person, the spiritual aspect of life, which seems to have an equally or greater stability.

The values we struggle with or against deny that we are just physical beings put together to inhabit a planet. There is an awareness of something completely beyond the limits of ourselves related to values and not just things. Everything has a purpose, things and values. We have physicality and spirituality. There is a book that explains this called the Bible. We are created. God is real. Jesus can be verified. In Him, nothing is lost, ever.

What’s the focus?

I was required to take a long list of education classes as a beginning teacher. Many of the professors in the College of Education had written their own books about how hopeless education is in America based on research that indicated that it was unlikely to get any better. I was working with a group of teachers who denied the research and did a good job regardless of the professors’ rhetoric. Professors spoke words, but the teachers reached lives. It was fundamentally different.

I travelled with another teacher I will call G. Germane to take classes toward certification. I was an idealistic student and wanted to grasp every bit of understanding I could get. My questions were typically based on how to apply information to real life situations in the classroom. I found that I was particularly grievous to one teacher who always cut me off curtly and showed me that I was out of place. My friend, Germane, told me what was wrong. He said, “The class is not about the subject, but about the teacher. Your questions dim the spotlight of his rhetoric to focus on the content and function. Audience members are there to applaud, not to question the actor.” I was completely out of phase with the focus of what was happening. I was there for function and the professor was there for performance and publicity.

It is necessary to guard against corrupt people and corrupt teaching. The core focus is the proving ground. Cults become all powerful when the cult leader becomes the gatekeeper to heaven and heavenly rewards (leader or person focus). My professor was that way, but only to a small degree. He only gave grades and sarcastic disdain. Most students cooperated with his vanity as grades required it. Sadly, I must admit and observe that anyone who has a self worth deficiency has sacrificed some level of truth or honor to get approval. The desire to have oneself put on a pedestal for admiration or see oneself in power over others shifts God from the throne. It is one of the fastest ways to see through a false teaching.

Check this idea out. Read the New Testament. Who saw Jesus for who He really was and who didn’t? The people competing with God for control and admiration missed Him completely. The kind of people Jesus describes in Matthew 5 completely see Jesus. Learning to discern the heart of a matter can reveal form or function, God or man, truth or scam. Follow the admiration, power, money trail to find the true focus. Pray for discernment. Choose Jesus.

One of my mother’s favorite phrases was, “This too shall pass.”It was one of those “Just hang on” phrases that moms and dads use to encourage their children not to give up or give in to frustration or despair. Frustration and despair are common currency in all countries, cultures, and individuals. You can see it in all walks of life, all religions and faiths, all levels of success and failure. You might consider that it is planet wide and ocean deep.

Misery, the absence of good, has a brother who is fatalism. Fatalism sings back up to misery’s lead, telling you that misery will never go away. You get sick with the flu, pinned to the bed, and it seems that it will never go away, until it does. Misery attacks health and circumstances. Fatalism attacks expectations and perception. They can be very formidable as a tag team wrestling partnership. They can seem pretty huge when you are the skinny kid standing across the ring facing them alone. The alone part is the biggest deceit.

You are not alone. Misery and fatalism will try to talk you into self-isolating, running into a private cave, a private hell. Lies. There are people around you, even the annoying ones, who want you to get better, even when they don’t know how to say it. There are prayer partners and hundreds who have written books about facing the same issues you face. You are surrounded by movies, books, testimonies, preachers and so many more who have suffered and won, suffered and grown, suffered and become deeper persons – the kind you automatically go to for help.

I was going through a rough patch and was convinced I was helpless and powerless. I pray more when I’m distressed, which is sad to say, but true. I landed on a series of questions posed by the Lord. “Without any change in your situation can you — Love Me, be loved by Me, and love others like I do?” The questions began to cause a shift from helpless to helpful, from powerless to empowered. No distress in life or circumstance can separate me from God’s love or His life, which I can both experience and share. I can have hope and faith during a time of misery. I don’t have to wait until it’s over to be strong. I’m not alone for the Father is with me, speaking words of hope, of faith, and of love. He has surrounded each of us with a cloud of witnesses, easily accessible.

As mom said, “This (misery) too shall pass.” However, joy and hope can be continuous and without end. “I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.””
John 16:33 ESV

Who will catch you when you fall? Anyone who has had a great adrenaline rush knows what follows. The entire person goes into a slump when the adrenaline is burned out or used up. It is like the body has used all its resources during the adrenaline rush and has absolutely nothing left after. It is the sudden drop from feast to famine in a few heartbeats.

Other things can create the same high/low pattern. I saw students come in to class so hyper you couldn’t settle them down. They fell asleep midway through the class, a pattern called the sugar blues. Sugar and other things that make a person high can leave them blue at the other end. Addictions are created to keep the blues away and keep the high going. Anything can be used, even video games, for a person to try to control their own highs and lows with their own ability. I’m sure that is why the Bible teaches so much about idols, things people use to control their own lives or the lives of their surroundings. Godless gods.

That’s a long introduction to ask you how you are dealing with the day after Christmas? How long before the fresh paint of new wears off and drudgery returns? Is Christmas a high/low experience or another day of deep loving among friends and family? The difference seems to be tied to a frightening word called “humility.” You can’t love or be loved without humility. Humility truly experiences the worth of the other in the relationship and shows that value in thoughts, words, actions, and feelings.

Marriages can be a good metaphor. We are in a time where divorces outnumber marriages, but there are some marriages that last a joyful lifetime. The difference is in the values of the people involved. Lifelong marriages are like Christmas every day. Even hardships become miracles of growth and depth. The weaknesses of the partners becomes the strength of the relationship. It is just like Jesus said, “But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” 2 Corinthians 12:9 ESV. These successful marriages require a God who is God who is stronger than two people trying to be god. Love requires humility which breaks the addiction of people serving themselves.

I hope and pray that your Christmas will be a joy all year long. I pray that the love you give and receive will overcome all the highs and lows of life. I pray that the Joy of Jesus empowers you to find joy in all of your life, even your mistakes He has to clean up.

Sometimes people see things through a tight lens when the possibility of a long lens or wide lens would take in more. Santa is like that for me. He has become a hero because Jesus has used this man’s testimony through seventeen centuries to teach the world about heaven and heavenly values.

Santa started as a loving Christian in about 300 AD. His parents died and left him wealthy. His generosity became his fame. His acts of faith and faithfulness, especially toward children and sailors, had the Catholic church proclaim him a saint so his testimony would not be lost and would continue to inspire others.

He became associated with Christmas giving and was known through many cultures and many diverse costumes as the epitome of Christmas. Germans gave him a name which translates to “Christ Kind.” Yet, he was kicked out of the church by protestants who did not want anything to do with Catholic saints, changing him to Father Christmas and other secular titles. His mission didn’t change or his message, whether in the church or out.

Santa came to America through the Dutch and Germans. We settled on the Dutch name, translated as Santa Claus. He has lots of historical involvements with many places, even Jacksonville, Florida a long time ago, being named for St. Nicholas. Lincoln even considered Santa Claus an advantage to the union during the Civil War. He has been an ever present representation of Jesus’s life and values.

Santa took on a particularly hard challenge during the early 1800s. Christmas was an unruly time of drunkenness. American leadership wanted the season to become family friendly, especially as children were beginning to be recognized as their own stage of life and in need of protection. Santa was made for that job. He was one of the main influences that brought Christmas back in to the home for children and families.

Santa’s next feat was evangelism to the church. Santa helped the church bring Christmas carols and Christmas traditions into their celebrations and Sunday Schools to reach families with the message and life of Jesus. He went from Christian to bishop to saint to secular to church evangelist representing the heavenly qualities of Jesus life the entire time. And this is just the tip of a seventeen centuries long story.

We know the qualities of heavenly values through the fruit of the Holy Spirit: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23 ESV Jesus has used the testimony of Nicholas the Bishop across cultures, across nations, even nations at war with each other, to teach His message to all persons, believers and unbelievers for centuries. Amazing. Jesus loves us and works to reach out to us continually in ways beyond our imagining and through people who might surprise us. Celebrate Jesus this Christmas. He loves you more than you can know.

Are prophets harbingers of doom or progenitors of hope? Bible prophets reveal what humans truly look like and act like from a heavenly perspective. Consider that all things work together perfectly and in complete unity in heaven. There is no sorrow or hurt or pain.

Now consider some of the most famous body builders like Andreas Munzer, Dallas McCarver, and many others like them. They have the exterior look of perfection, but their body abuses to achieve the appearance of perfection have caused many to die at an extremely young age or face an old age of grievous health issues.

Heaven is substance over appearance. Earth is appearance over substance. Prophets give the warning that few hear. They would be the ones telling the body builders what they are doing is wrong, what is going on inside their bodies, and the price they will pay for it. Isn’t that more loving and friendly than all those who praise the muscles and encourage the body builder to continue in their life of abuse? Why do Bible readers perceive the prophets as crushing cruelty when they are the ones who see the situation as it really is and fight for the truth that will rescue?

Whose fault is it that the body builder avoids all the signs and information that would protect him/her from harm? What motivation drives them deeper into the pit? Why suffer torment and horror for a few moments pleasure and glory? In like reasoning, why does the allure of sex cause so many people to violate their lives, relationships, and own personal values? The Bible has an easy word for this called “sin.”

We hate the word “sin” because it is a label for behavior we don’t want to change, thoughts we don’t want to quit thinking, feelings we don’t want to quit experiencing. It is a label for the abuses we chose for ourselves because the pleasurable appearance trumps the destructive function and outcomes. God, as a loving Father, doesn’t want us to hurt ourselves and stands against the harm.

Children fight their parents while their parents are trying to protect them. People do the same toward God and blame Him when they can’t get what they want and can’t get God to remove the consequences of bad behaviors. God is a faithful father who won’t give in to tantrums, ugly words, manipulation, or any of the other techniques people have learned to get their own way. He knows what is best and is not trapped or tricked by human scams. God loves us, even when we don’t want to be loved and protects us even when we desire the danger. He wants our lives to be like heaven. He is the progenitor of hope.

Dorothy, the Tin Man, the Lion, and the Scarecrow meet the wizard at the end of the 1939’s Wizard of Oz. The wizard is uncovered, and he gives each one recognition and a symbol of recognition for what they’ve had all along: the Tin Man a ticking clock for the loving heart he had shown, the Scarecrow a diploma for the intelligence he had manifested, the Lion a medal for facing the terror he had overcome, and Dorothy finds that she had the ability to go home all along. Each of these characters was manifesting what they wanted most all along the journey. Each was unable to see it until the wizard pointed it out and gave them a symbol of recognition. We are each manifesting a relationship with Jesus, even when we don’t see it. Be encouraged and let Him show you.

I’ve spoken to many Christians who have a hard time realizing that Jesus speaks to them. The Lord is talking to all His children. Most people experience this like the characters in Oz, unable to see what is there working within them the entire time. Some Christians get recognition and begin to see that Jesus is revealing Himself and His life to them. Every Christian can experience this joy.

Godly “coincidences” happen to Christians all the time. People pray about friends they haven’t seen for a while and suddenly run in to them or get a call, a text, or some other connection – not a coincidence or accident. Jesus is at work. I know many people who pray ardently throughout the week only to have the Sunday sermon hit on many points about which they were thinking or praying. This is not a coincidence. These are typical “accidents” of believers which prove that Jesus is at work in and through their prayers. There is not enough room in a blog or book to example all the ways Jesus reveals Himself in and through all of His children.

It is often easier to see the Lord at work in others than it is to see Him at work in yourself. He works in you if He works anywhere because He is true to His word and His promise. I encourage believers to pray and share. I’m convinced that the more you pray and the more you share, the more you will experience those Godly “accidental” recognitions which will prove to you that the Holy Spirit is alive in your life and working in and through your prayers. Jesus is alive and not in hiding. He loves His children and is communicating with them. Trust Him. You are important to Him, and He won’t leave you out or ignore you.

Jumpin Jack was the town alcoholic. He lived this role for a small mountain town in western North Carolina. The major part of the town was one block long on one side of the street. The town phone book was part of a regional book and only had three pages of double spaced entries so you could add your friends from outside of town. I lived there during the first stages of recovering from traumatic life events and needed to be away from the rest of my life.

I was always impressed with the way the town treated Jumpin Jack. He was a part of them, had his own seat at the table for community events, and was well known and well treated by the town officer who had to take people fifteen miles north or south to a bigger town to arrest them and put them in jail. Jumpin Jack knew he belonged though he was not proud of his life and knew the town didn’t like the way he lived. He felt like an outcast, even as he was included. That doesn’t seem to be the way we treat others now.

Somewhere it seems that we’ve lost the sense that we are a part of each other and that no one is perfect. We are all imperfect people in an imperfect world. We are each gifted with different talents, different understandings, and differing abilities. No one stands alone. We can see in culture, politics, all the way down to families, that division destroys. Love and forgiveness employs the ability to have relationship and community. It should not be surprising that the cross, forgiveness, is the center of the Christian faith because forgiveness is necessary for any relationship to exist, even between the closest of friends.

The power of deep friendship is the automatic and total degree of forgiveness. You know you have a deep friend when, no matter the length of time apart or the hardships experienced, the friendship remains fresh, alive, and healthy. Foxhole friends are those men who have fought in foxholes together in real or circumstantial wars. Their friendship surpasses all known barriers to closeness because their lives and survival have depended on each other. They have bonded in layers of caring that most cannot imagine.

I believe Jesus wants us to know and experience this level of loving and friendship. We are all fighting wars in our lives, in our circumstances and in our selves. Jesus is in that foxhole with us. We can depend on Him. We are loved beyond our comprehension.

I am living in the land of more and less. I know what I used to be, and I hear how people relate to me now. They don’t recognize me as the man I once was. For that I am profoundly grateful. I know Harry 1.0. He is diminishing as the upgrades go forward. Luckily most have met Harry 2.0, the “after salvation” Harry, the improved and improving version. I’m now living in the land of more and less.

I have more of the qualities I want and less of the qualities I detest, even though those bad qualities still exist in me. I have become more honest, more trustworthy, more sincere, more thoughtful of others, less angry, less hateful, less selfish, less bitter, more forgiving, more tolerant, and the list goes on. This is the gift of God to me. Every bit of this change can be traced to my salvation and my relationship with Jesus. He has been working steadfastly to reduce the bad and increase the good. I am cheering for his success and praying for the strength not to resist His efforts on my behalf. I am excited to see God’s final reveal of His renovation project in me.

Jesus is not apposed to tearing out walls, ripping up tile, and replacing all the fixtures in His renovating. I am the house being renovated and testify that the work is worthy but painful. Jesus knows what has to be done. He has a plan. Some rooms get renovated more than once before getting to the “better/more” state because the renovation goes forward in stages. Every stage increases the more desirable and decreases the less desirable.The Lord is teaching me to set my mind and heart on the continuous process being continuously changing. He will complete the renovation someday. Until that day, I live in the land of growing more and less.