A Law of Love and Fellowship

Posted on December 6, 2017 by ehurst

On an academic basis, I consider this study of American cultural boundaries useful. Part of my approval rests on establishing the clear difference between the Puritan Pilgrims (Puritan WASPs) and other Northern Europeans (non-Puritan WASPs). The author helpfully goes on to explain how the Constitution reflects a mostly Puritan ideal of civil law that is revered as sacred, and not simply a matter of sensible compromise between disparate cultures. Thus, the Bill of Rights was little more than a token recognition of the non-Puritan culture that wasn’t obsessed with using law to create a Utopia.

Yes, Puritans are responsible for what we now regard as Social Justice or Political Correctness. Puritanism, in essence, fully accepted the elitism of the English nobility, but not the pagan background for it. The Puritans insisted that their purified “Christian” outlook justified taking over the reigns of the British Empire. Since they couldn’t dislodge the existing “pagan” nobility from the UK, they needed an untamed land to colonize with their better brand of elitism. “We’ll show them!” When the Articles of Confederation were drawn up, the Puritans were not yet a dominant political force. They first provoked a wave of disorder and chaos, then used it as an excuse to assert their more elitist approach. Does anyone remember that the Constitutional Convention overstepped their mandate completely? It was a coup.

The result was a very strong central government that the states actually didn’t want, but the Puritans managed to seized the reins of power just long enough to ram this thing through. Yes, the US Constitution is the result of a conspiracy. The Bill of Rights was a way to keep the non-Puritans from coming back and wiping the whole thing away. You see, the non-Puritans didn’t want to seize control; they wanted a system that prevented it. They wrongly believed the Bill of Rights was enough to preserve their functional freedoms. It was pure propaganda, and the non-Puritans bought it.

Since those days, the thread of Puritan theology has stained the very soul of US government. Meanwhile, the language of liberty with all the various non-Puritan quotations has been used as a false front in a fundamentally oppressive elitist intent.

It’s useful to be aware of this. It helps to understand just what has given life to this awful situation in which we live, and why it simply cannot be amended and made better. The whole point of history as an academic discipline is to track the influences that brought us where we are today. This is wholly consistent with what we teach as a prophetic view of what God is doing in our world today. Allow me to point out how other threads of human history provide a blueprint for driving forward into America’s future as heart-led people of faith.

One of the few things the Roman Empire got right was taking a cue from previous empires: Subject nations retained some legal authority over their own people regardless of where they were within the wider empire. While it was argued and debated in the Roman Senate just how much of Roman Law trumped these other subject kingdom laws, the fact remained that an officer of the Assyrian court could legally track down and arrest any Assyrian subject as far away as Baetica (southern Spain today) for violating Assyrian law. This was the principle under which Saul of Tarsus could arrest Christian Jews in Damascus. It’s also why Jews could observe their cultural uniqueness wherever they went, within some limits.

Rome was the last imperial government to maintain this tradition. Since then, no empire has extended that privilege to conquered kingdoms and states. The US in particular is pernicious and hateful about forcing the Puritan WASP mythology down everyone’s throat, even where she lacks so much as the pretense of legal authority. But the fundamental Biblical Law does recognize the right of kingdoms to maintain their own national culture and law.

We who walk in the heart-led way and share in the Radix Fidem Covenant are free in Christ to maintain our identity wherever we go in this world. We will never see official recognition anywhere on a human level, but Creation (reality) itself will support our efforts to assert our unique way of life. That’s because our way is so much closer to God’s own ways than all of the rest of humanity put together. While one could argue how well we succeed, our entire aim is to walk in His revelation from the start, the same revelation by which our Creation judges all things. We can afford to be gentle and wholly voluntary in our “enforcement” of our covenant, because Creation itself is the enforcement mechanism. There’s no elitism here.

God says He judges us on the desires of our hearts, our commitment and faith, not our ability to succeed. Biblical Law is not legislation and regulation, but love and fellowship. Are you a citizen of such a kingdom?

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Kiln of the Soul Boundaries

Posted on December 5, 2017 by ehurst

Kiln of the Soul is the oddball name I came up with some two decades ago as a name for my ministry. It’s never been incorporated under any laws, and that’s intentional; it’s part of our identity.

Any physical congregation that grows up around my work will be called “Kiln of the Soul.” Because this blog and this virtual parish is an extension of that ministry, it bears the same name. The title of the blog –“Do What’s Right” — simply reflects my feeble attempt at marketing, because the bottom line is helping people understand what is morally right, and how to find the power to live by it. If you develop your own ministry, nothing keeps you from using the same name I do, but you would have to realize it might be confusing. To make it easier, I chose another name for our particular kind of religion: “Radix Fidem.” I wrote up a Radix Fidem pamphlet (PDF) to introduce it, and a longer booklet (PDF) explaining it in more detail.

It’s not a matter of orthodoxy. A critical element in our teaching here is that you are responsible for coming up with your own beliefs. Nobody has to declare this as their own personal creed. I wrote the material; it is my creed. But just like any Ancient Near Eastern feudal family household, in order to be a part of the household where I am the elder, you have to be able to say, “I can live with that.” This is a written record of our covenant; we all agree to proceed on the basis of what that says. It’s no different from saying you can live with me as head of household.

It so happens my personal style is very libertarian, in the sense that I operate with very lax controls. I make room for a lot of dissent. I’ll tell you that I do have two doctrinal points I consider utterly essential for keeping peace with me and everyone else in our household of faith. One: We are accountable to the Bible (using the Protestant canon). That means you take seriously your obligation to what it says and you won’t attempt to pass judgment on the message. We still have a lot of room to debate what it demands of us, and that’s the whole point in my whole approach to seeking a Hebraic mind for understanding the Scripture. We can debate how it applies, but if you suggest you are exempt from obeying the Bible, you are not family. Two: It is utterly essential that you operate on the basis of sacrificial love and compassion with the other members of the family.

The reason for that should be obvious in one sense, but it rests on yet one other issue which cannot be made doctrinal: the heart-led way. I’ve published a whole book on what that phrase means. I realize just how hard it is to disentangle ourselves from the Western assumption that the heart is a metaphor of sentiment, however strongly held. The Bible says the heart is the seat of conviction, faith, an acute moral awareness that is superior to the intellect. The brain wants to establish what something is and what we should do with it, but the heart knows instinctively what really matters in the first place. And because we have a whole lifetime of social conditioning to ignore the heart and place the intellect on the throne of decision, it takes some time and effort to subject your mind to the heart.

You see, we humans are fallen, but the rest of Creation is not. We were designed by God to manage Creation on His behalf, but we lost that authority when we chose to place the intellect on the throne. We can access that authority only when the heart rules and we are driven by a personal commitment to God as Lord of all things. We have to overcome a whole world of people who ignore the heart, and make a conscious effort to restore things to what God intended.

I cannot imagine how you can restore the heart to the throne without awakening an awareness that Creation is alive, sentient and willful. Creation is a person, altogether at once, and each element, all the way down do the subatomic particles. Each is a unique individual, with an awareness and will, and all of it remains unfallen. However, it also is now unmanaged because we allowed the Devil to fool us and accepted his story about how things should go. When you restore the heart, you become aware of Creation as your friend and ally, and you can begin working on restoring how Adam and Eve managed the Garden of Eden without the “sweat of the brow” physical labor. We are supposed to reunite with the natural world around us as long lost family. Creation is eager to cooperate, and if you can’t sense that, then you can’t sense properly how to deal with your fellow humans, who are also part of Creation. I teach that, but it’s not doctrine, per se; it’s an orientation of soul. That’s what we mean by “heart-led.”

So I can’t make heart-led a requirement, but if you don’t have it, you can only hope to fake your way through things. You won’t be able to keep up, and I really cannot imagine how you would swallow half of what your elder says we need to do as a household together. On the other hand, it’s not magic. I am utterly convinced anyone living, and capable of understanding what I write, can recover the heart-led power within their own soul. A surprising number of people are just a step away from it already, and need only hear or read the teaching to realize it was there all the time. Membership in our household of faith presumes you are heart-led.

You can still work with us without all of that. It makes you more like a volunteer supporter (“servant”). And if all you can do is just admire our work from a safe distance, you are an ally. Everyone else in the world is neutral (don’t know/care) or an enemy. It’s not for me to brand people; it’s more a matter of recognizing roles. You’ll notice there is almost nothing similar to most membership procedures you’ll encounter with other religious groups. Your role is a matter of how you engage or don’t. You decide your level of involvement, when and for how long. If I don’t know you’re there, it’s hard to love you and care for you.

That’s Kiln of the Soul.

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Photography: Draper East Again

Posted on December 5, 2017 by ehurst

Yesterday was unusually warm for this time of year; above 60°F (16C) all day. Since I knew a cold front was coming today, I decided to shift my workout schedule around and make one last exploration bike ride ride to the east shore of Draper Lake. This exploration took me to the very southeastern corner, and included Points 22 and 23. The southern shore will require a day when I can drive the car because it is not bike accessible. As usual, the lavender numbers indicate the approximate location of the following images.

Who would have expected to find a park grill out in the woods? This was on the trail around the shoreline right near where I started in the upper right hand corner of the satellite image. I recollect that this part was closed to motor vehicles just a few years ago, so this still looks usable. I was able to ride a good bit more on this exploration because the sand was less soft. In some places there were stretches of bedrock, but in others it was damp and hard-packed from wave spray where it was exposed to the stiff southerly winds.

The bronze plaque reads, “Scott Wheeler, 1970-1997.” It’s a common name and my search was swamped with meaningless data. There’s nothing in the local obits from 1997, so he may have been from another state. It’s just one of those mysteries. The monument was braced by large black sandstone boulders, which was a good move, given the sandy shore moves from time to time.

This was just an eye-catching arrangement of natural elements. Because the water level is controlled, there are long stretches of decades with no new erosion until the lake is flooded with excessive rain with no place to go. This lake is a water reservoir and is frequently refilled from the Atoka Reservoir, so it’s pretty rare to get more water than OKC can use. Only the wind and rain is likely to wear away enough soil to make those cedars fall over.

Farther around the shore, this tableau presented itself. There were several extensions of this bedrock standing far out into the water, but the pictures didn’t turn out well. The day’s wave action followed a few weeks of dry light winds from the opposite direction carrying sand. Thus, these rocky outcroppings were coated in wet sand and pretty slippery.

This one showed up farther around on the next point. Not visible from this angle was a channel of moderate depth separating it from the place I stood. A boat could pass through there, so it constitutes a tiny island just offshore. The whitecaps in the image show how stiff the wind was.

Out on the point itself were more of the same kind of outcroppings. This was where I had to go up and over the dunes because it was too rough to push my bike around the end. There was a lovely spot near those scrub oak trees where the water had hollowed out of the rock and people had used it for a large campfire site. The image I took was marred by glint off their litter; it has seen a good bit of recent use.

The end of my shore chasing was the large covered dock. With the somewhat low water levels, the dock itself was resting on the lake bed, but the walkway was just floating enough to rock heavily from the swells. The sections are held together by huge 2-inch bolts through heavy plating ears with bolt holes. These bolts are loose and the whole thing made quite a racket. It also made quite an entertaining walk out to the dock, heaving under my feet. The water is just deep enough to sustain the full 2-foot waves that occasionally blew in. The place was still a lovely chapel for worship, but I was quite alone with God the whole time. It makes me long for fellowship.

The weather forecasters call this a “moderate chop” for boating, but by the time it hits the shore rocks, the waves are dampened by the rising bottom. As I stood watching this spot, a few waves stood as much as 6 inches. What it represents is a stiff southerly wind that made it a lot easier to pedal my way home for 15 miles, since it was a tailwind.

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The Vast Reaches of Eden

Posted on December 4, 2017 by ehurst

The Kingdom of Heaven bears fruit; that is its nature.

We are fallen creatures, expelled from Eden and the Tree of Life. Our existence is not what God intended, and He has taken the initiative to restore us. God has provided the Flaming Sword of revelation to slice off from our existence everything that He cannot allow into His divine Presence, so we can regain access to the Tree of Life. We have the opportunity of this life to embrace His revelation and restore our lost heritage as family members of God.

A critical element of that divine heritage is redeeming our lives here in a fallen world by living like people who belong in Eden. God’s first step along that path was calling out the Nation of Israel. When things worked as intended, Israel lived according to their Covenant as a demonstration of what Eden might be like in a certain context. They were a beacon to other nations. But Israel strayed from that path again and again, shredding the Covenant and their mission to the point that no one was conforming to the divine moral character of God so as to return to Eden.

God came Himself once again in the Person of His Son to reestablish the meaning of the Flaming Sword and the call to return to Eden. It meant a new covenant, but the essential mission was unchanged. God still calls to a fallen world to join His new nation under a New Covenant.

It started something big that changed the world. For reasons we will never understand in this life, just as He allowed Israel to depart from their covenant, He allowed His new nation to depart from the New Covenant. We have reached another breaking point, as in the days of Christ. There are a lot of parallels, though He’s not going to send His Son back again in physical form. The original New Covenant still stands, but the called out church seems to have lost track of fundamental nature of that Covenant. In a sense, they have surrendered to the same slippage and shredding that characterized the failure of Israel.

We are no better than those who have lost their way. For reasons we’ll never understand on this side of Eternity, God has chosen to reveal His New Covenant afresh to us. Some of us have rediscovered the Flaming Sword, allowed it to carve up our lives, and had gained a fresh taste of Eden. We can talk to Creation and hear its voice calling us back to Christ. He is the Flaming Sword, the Living Law of God, the paramount expression of God’s divine moral character in human form. It’s all about Him, not us.

As God’s children, we cannot get enough of His attention and favor. It’s the ultimate privilege of life itself that He allows us to tag along as He works in this world, restoring Eden. It’s as if we are skipping along, giggling and singing and celebrating His warm attention on us, allowing us to participate in His mighty work. We get to put our hands on some of this work as He directs, but it’s really all His hands doing things. The lost souls around us see this; God uses this blazing light show of love to draw them into His family. He uses our giddy delight in the privilege of His doting favor to draw attention to His glory and His open offer. The Flaming Sword is not all pain; it’s healing and restoration as part of divine privilege. The Sword becomes a part of us, and we of it.

“Religion” is the word we use to describe our individual manifestation of that Flaming Sword. Religion is the thing we can show other people to give shape to the invisible faith that burns with the flame of that sword. It’s obvious that no two of us will have the exact same religion. Conforming to someone else’s religion is not faith. But by the same token, there must be enough held in common to allow us to live together as a divine family of faith. What we share here at Kiln of the Soul is just one small household of that vast nation God intends to grow on this earth. It’s just one franchise in a vast empire.

If this franchise looks like home to you, don’t just sit out in the courtyard. Come on in the door and take part in the life of his household. Make yourself known; get to know those already here.

A part of our story here is a powerful conviction that God is about to shake our world. Sometime in the very near future, America will enter a crisis. Not an apocalypse, but it will be a severe crisis nonetheless. God’s patience with America has run out. The people aren’t going anywhere, but the way of life and system of government will be shattered. It’ll be the American people, but it won’t be the US any more. This is far more than just Creation snapping back into place, but God’s personal attention and wrath is falling on the US (and other places, too, but I’m called to prophesy to America). It’s going be crazy and chaotic, and the sense of order will be shredded. People are going to question what they thought they knew about life, their world, and reality itself.

In my own personal experience, people shoved out of their comfort zone are folks who are best able to hear the gospel, to consider facing the Flaming Sword. There are some folks you and I could never reach from where we stand, but there will always be some who gravitate to our message, to our sense of shalom in the midst of the storm. God is going to herd them into our household. Build up the structure and make way for more souls.

Indeed, pray for souls. Ask God to add to our number. Such a request demonstrates that we understand the gospel. Pray that we are made able to welcome them, that we have stocked up enough provisions to share. We’ll have our hands full. And don’t get lost in the idea that this is a virtual parish; where you are geographically is where most of this activity will happen. I’m sure the virtual parish will grow, and we surely do need a network of other blogs as a faith community online, just as a real household has many different people in it. But bloggers are people in real places and some of you will never be bloggers. That’s just the way it is. If you aren’t here in Central Oklahoma with me, then in geographical terms you will be an anchorage for souls where you are.

This is the vision I share. I’m not God and I’m not the head of a religion. I’m just the elder, the head of household. We still need a pastoral priesthood. If you are part of this household, it’s because you are comfortable with my religion; it bears some resemblance to your own. You feel like family. Let me provide some divine moral covering while you do your part to build the Father’s empire. Eden is huge, with room for a whole lot more people.

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Clarifying “I Need More”

Posted on December 3, 2017 by ehurst

Ref: I Need More — I suppose sleeping on it gives me more time to process and reduce the initial excitement.

This is another one of those points when some of you are likely to have had enough and move on. That leaves a bunch of folks who are simply observing, and just a few who actually find themselves called into this madness. Honestly, I’m not trying to wear you out. If you can’t keep up, I don’t blame you. I’m driven and all I intend here is giving you an honest account of where I’m headed, so you have a fair chance to bail out if it’s not for you.

For those who are still with me, I sense we need more organization. On the one hand, the underlying theory calls for maximum individuality. On the other hand, most of us are simply not quite ready for everything that comes with that. It requires a powerful internal drive and is quite burdensome. So between the unchanging truth and our current context must be a way point where we can rest temporarily until we can shake off the oppressive weight of our Western culture.

So I’m asking for two things here. First, I want to paint in brighter colors our respective roles as a virtual parish. The I-need-more part is that I’m not satisfied with the lack of interaction between us as people of faith. Some of you probably aren’t too sure you want to embrace a more defined role as member of the parish family, but when you believe you are ready, I think it’s important that we model as much as possible a literal community of faith. Just as a reminder, a biblical household of faith includes allied neighbors, servants and employees who benefit, and family who actually belong and have a vested interest. You are the one who decides which you are. It’s not a question of me applying a label, but describing the boundaries as best I can so you’ll know for yourself and your prayers about your involvement here will become more sharply focused.

Second, I desperately need to exercise the heritage of heart-led faith in the flesh. That heritage includes face-to-face communion. I need a heart-led buddy — at least one — someone who consciously acknowledges what we all believe and can truly say, “I’m your brother/sister.” I have the invaluable advantage of a wife who is on board, but this thing is awfully hard to explore in reality without another male figure who takes it seriously. All of that is just the core of what a genuine faith fellowship is about. It’s supposed to grow into a family, and the family becomes a tribe, and eventually a “secret kingdom” as one writer called it, an invisible feudal domain discernible only to a heart of faith.

As you can see, a critical element is that this is all tentative in the first place. We are doing eternal faith in a fallen world that is frankly ephemeral in nature. On top of that, as a particular manifestation of that faith, our parish is still trying to figure out how all of this is supposed to work for us. If what I’m teaching reflects the genuine gospel of Jesus Christ, then it’s worth an investment of life itself.

But the last thing I want to do is lock people into some collection of rituals and formal doctrine that leaves the door open too wide for dead religion. Somehow we have to make sure this thing is nearly impossible to do without a valid heart-led conviction driving you through it.

So here’s where we are: My current role is necessarily apostolic. I can’t find anyone else doing what we are doing, so I’m forced to take the lead. But my fundamental calling is pastor-elder, not pastor-priest. I still long for someone to take that latter office for us. Meanwhile, I’m still doing as much as I know how in seeking to establish a house church here. It’s not working too well; the setting itself is highly resistant. As previously noted in several posts here, we are up against a big mountain of crap that is blocking the light of truth and keeping them in the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Something has to shake them loose from all their assumptions. That day is coming, but it’s not here yet. It’s coming for all of America, and I sense that when it does, we will suddenly have our hands full. I believe it would serve best if we could lay the foundation first so it’s more obvious how to build with the living stones God adds to our number.

We have a junior elder, Jay DiNitto. By the way, he’s in Pennsylvania, a long way from Oklahoma. The other links on the right side of the blog interface here (Blogroll) represent people who have long followed this blog and have contributed usefully. If you would like to have your blog linked there, let’s talk about your role and how you’ll be listed. And could I persuade you to comment now and then, or maybe email me once in a while? Don’t worry about what to say; just tell me what’s going on in your life. That’s how I know what to pray for you. Make yourself as real to me as a virtual connection allows. Make me long to come see you in person.

Because that’s what I hope to do sometime in the near future. This is the faith part, standing firmly in my soul without a hint of concrete evidence. I have no idea how it could happen, but my convictions tell me God has plans to make it so. Join me in believing and praying to that end.

But I can’t make any of this happen. It’s on you; it’s between you and God. I’m going to run off in this direction, fully confident that God will supply all I need to make it happen. You can participate or not according to your own sense of calling. You aren’t imposing on me; I’m retired, so I have all day to answer emails, text messages and phone calls (405-503-1692). I’m not as chatty over the phone as I am in person, but that’s just a human factor we’ll have to deal with. It’s not a question of whether you need something; it’s a question of needing each other on a fundamental level. I surely need at least a few of you.

The mission is inherent in the heart-led life. We cannot be silent and keep this to ourselves; we see His glory so that it can shine through us. Our strongest witness is in our fellowship, even when we are forced to do it online. People need to see that the power of the heart-led way overcomes all obstacles. Are you in?

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Sermon on the Mount 9

Posted on December 2, 2017 by ehurst

Godly Giving 6:1-4

The message here is fairly obvious in most English translations of the New Testament. However, it’s easy to miss some of the flavor and context if you aren’t aware of the background.

Matthew chooses the Greek word eleemosune, commonly meaning charitable giving, but the word itself covers a lot more territory. It’s any act of compassion and mercy that helps another human through this life. There’s no lack of wise advice on the hows and whys of mercy in the Talmud, so Jesus goes after the one flaw of the Pharisees in their legalistic implementation of charity. He says you should avoid public notice. If you seek social attention in any way, there was no actual mercy to your action at all; you simply purchased social admiration.

The second verse here is loaded. Around the Temple plaza were donation chests, a common practice from the First Temple. Over time the priests and Levites found it burdensome to keep an eye on those chests to prevent pilfering. During construction of Herod’s Temple, one of the details was to cut a small hole in the outer wall at a convenient height. The wall was thick, and the hole would angle downward like a chute, with a receptacle on the other side that was out of arm’s reach. This small chute was lined with some sort of metal. If you dropped a handful of pennies into it, the racket was substantial to anyone nearby. People would turn to look and get the impression you had made a big donation.

That is, they might think that unless they were savvy cynical peasants. The Pharisees weren’t fooling anyone. We have evidence this noise was what Jesus referred to as “sounding a trumpet” and it would have gotten a snicker from His audience. It was a common practice of socially ambitions Pharisees, more subtle than a literal brassy musical riff, from which we get the English “tooting your own horn.” However, it served the same purpose as sounding a trumpet without being quite so tacky. The Pharisees were careful to do this only when there was a significant audience. Sometimes during low traffic times, they would steer a roving discussion with their peers past those spots so they could pull that stunt. It’s roughly equivalent to big signs today with a section featuring “proudly sponsored by” followed by branding logos and such. It’s considered cheap advertising.

Jesus says that such donors already had what they paid for with human attention. It wasn’t the right way to get God’s attention.

Instead, Jesus proposes a hyperbolic suggestion of keeping your hands ignorant of each other’s doings when you felt moved to give an offering. The equivalent is slipping your hand inside the wall opening past the end of the chute and dropping the coins straight into the receptacle. But more broadly, He promotes a willingness to work in compassion quietly. Do something charitable because you are driven by a passion for divine justice. Of course people are going to find out sooner or later, but that’s not part of the objective. Divine justice is its own reward. It’s the nature of Creation itself. God is the only one who needs to know.

All the modern philosophical blather about the ethics of charity leaves God out of it completely. Never listen to professional charity advisers and fund-raising experts; the charity industry is an abomination. And sometimes you shouldn’t pay attention to what the recipients of charity claim they want and need, but do what God tells you. Give what you have and never let someone try to make you feel guilty. Guilt is the voice of Satan, the Accuser. Do what you know God requires of you; His favor is the only thing that matters.

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I Need More

Posted on December 2, 2017 by ehurst

You should know that this is off the top of my head, in the sense that I’m not composing this in a text editor as I normally would. I’m writing this directly into the blog posting interface. The message itself is ephemeral. I’m convinced we are at a turning point, and what God does next depends on how the virtual congregation of this parish responds. I can’t tell you where the threshold is, either in numbers or time frame; I’m not in charge. This blog isn’t going anywhere, but it will affect my mission.

This afternoon I had a vision, a brief flash of discernment. It came in response to a prayer for more hints or clues about the mission. To be honest, I am still wondering why that laptop matters so much. Once more: This is not me trying to cadge a new toy. I’m happy with what I’ve got — provided my life continues more or less on the same track I’ve been on since starting this blog 9+ years ago. All I’m really doing is teaching and sharing my faith experience. I’m striving to make it something accessible to a very wide audience, but I absolutely must avoid what others have done before me.

Heart-led faith demands something different. I can’t use the methods of mainstream Christian religion. On top of that, a virtual parish can’t do what a physical church does in the first place. But we can do more than we are doing now. I’ll take the blame for a false start two years ago, though I still believe it was something completely out of my hands. Things changed because the wider context changed, and God decided to follow a different track, and now we are at another fork in the road in which you do have some choice.

Here’s the substance of my vision: Where we stand now offers a lot of parallels with the New Testament churches of the First Century. We are departing from a very calcified religion that has long left its roots, and become something so compromised I don’t see how we can stay. I feel very like the Apostles having been kicked out of the old religion and ready to start something radically new. We will surely be persecuted sooner or later, but if we hesitate, we are the ones who will lose out. God is going to do what He does and we are invited to participate. But I cannot work alone. Jesus called twelve for a reason, and part of that reason was to multiply His reach after changing them into different people. I’m just one; where are the others?

With roughly 850 subscribers, it’s pretty hard to sort through and visit all the blogs and websites to see if anyone else is promoting heart-led religion, as well. I believe it’s time to become just a little more organized about this. Any fool can be a simple member of the parish; I can’t keep working alone. It’s not that I’m whining, but I know for certain God intends to put to work those who make themselves available. And while nobody is obliged to echo my teaching, I’m hoping just a few of you folks are close enough to my teaching that I can recommend you to readers. Aside from a link list of friends, I need a list of affiliate sites. Can we at least get that far?

But even more important is that I very much need to associate with folks who feel called to the mission of the gospel. I need it so much that I would love to find a way to come see you in person sometime in the future. I have no idea how we could fund such a thing, and I really don’t care who travels how far to meet, but I’m determined that I will not work alone any longer. Genuine shared faith requires a face-to-face communion; it’s part of the essential nature of how God designed us. If not with some of you, I’m pretty sure God intends to get some other folks involved in that way.

I’m convinced God plans to have me traveling in the future. I have no hint of any details, mostly because He’s waiting to see if some of you want in on this. If it means bike-riding across country or just hitch-hiking, one way or another, I’ll be traveling, likely starting in the coming calendar year. Obviously this will affect what happens on this blog, but by no means do I expect to stop posting. This thing is about ready to move into missionary mode, so I would hope at least a few of you readers will join me. Again, I have no details on how long God will wait or what His plans are. All I know is this thing is moving forward in a different direction and His plans are variable depending on how many of you commit to taking part.

Don’t allow yourself to be moved by anything but that internal drive of the Spirit. Join me if you can’t escape it, but somebody will be in on this.

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Sin Is a Tragedy

Posted on December 2, 2017 by ehurst

Here at Kiln of the Soul, we teach that Biblical Law is self-enforcing. We as individuals struggle to enforce the divine will on ourselves, much less on anyone else. Yet we are obliged to try despite the inevitable failures. Moreover, He requires that we strive to bring His Law to life within that small domain of stewardship He grants to each of us. It is only because His Law is also self-rewarding that we are fed and encourage to keep going.

Yes, His Law is its own reward. The sweet communion of His favor in our hearts is the one thing we need more than life itself. This is why we strive against the vast mountain of deception, struggling to embrace and manifest the essence of His divine will, His moral character. Creation celebrates that character with us, rejoicing that return to Eden and our birthright of holiness.

It’s a precious gift, and sin is anything except what He gave us. Sin is disputing with God’s revelation. That revelation reflects what was true before Creation, so it is not subject to the reasoning and fashions of human cultural drift. His revelation is eternal, and will still be the very nature of reality itself long after this world is gone. This is where we belong, church family.

We who walk in the heart-led way of that truth find it tragic when people cannot discern the sweetness of His Law. What a waste, to give one’s life to anything less! It’s a free gift to all of fallen humanity. All we can do is live this precious gift and pray that our example sways just a few to begin seeking their divine heritage. Further, this divine heritage is unique to each individual, so it’s not as if the details of our personal blessings are going to work for everyone. God’s revelation allows a large range on many issues, and all we can do is decide whether someone else’s answers offer enough harmony with ours to serve alongside them.

So there is nothing in our witness about enforcing God’s Law, as if there is anything we can do to change another’s heart. God alone can do this, so our mission is to live, not pretend we can enforce His Law. All around the world wallows in darkness and sorrows of hearts closed to His truth. This is why our message is: What you are doing is not in your best interest.

We can speak only what we know, what we have experience at the hands of Our Lord. Here at Kiln of the Soul we teach that some issues are simply too obviously strict in God’s revelation. For example, we find homosexuality a tragic mistake, a rejection of God’s divine will for the individual. What God put into DNA reflects what He demands of you. Your sexual identity is His choice. If you want to work alongside us, you need to work through any confusion on that point. The same goes with cross-dressing, since the Bible makes it clear there is something deeply fundamental to human nature in that question.

Human sexuality is easily the most dangerous single moral minefield in every generation. Nothing else about us is so utterly destructive, keeping us from full entrance into Eden. But even when we can get people to understand that, we have vast cultural mountains to move to uncover what God intended.

Here in America, the single biggest lie is that human nature can be reshaped by the will of humans. It’s as if there is no God, and certainly no revelation. We make fearful things that cannot be erased from our fallen nature. Biblical Law is about building barriers to restrain the worst of human sinful lusts. It’s not about brain-washing and fear, but of constructing ways to keep ourselves honest. The only sin you can conquer is the one you confess to God.

Pretending that Western men should not desire feminine flesh is utterly stupid, and vice versa. Stop suggesting it’s a crime to have perverse desires; it’s a crime to let them wander freely. The Wisdom Literature of the Bible (indeed, of the whole Ancient Near East) is loaded with references to the wisdom of holding your tongue. It’s partly parable for the idea of keeping some things to yourself. Not in steely self-discipline, but what we seek to cultivate is civil self-containment of things that do not contribute to shalom.

It shouldn’t be creepy if anyone you encounter should be caught looking at you with some kind of longing. Wiser people do less of that, but wisdom is a goal, not an iron demand. Men gazing at under-dressed women is not a crime, just immaturity, as is the woman’s lack of modesty. Jesus warned us that some temptations in this world are hard for us heart-led folks to overcome (Matthew 18, which includes a subtle warning about pedophilia). But we cannot control the sinful impulses of others, only defend the feudal grant from God for our little personal domain.

Again, this is not about harsh and punitive measures, but a recognition that the soul in the mirror is no better than any other. We will ever face the hostile ignorance of the world around us. It’s our sense of shalom and power in this world that calls to the lost souls.

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Photography: Draper East Shore

Posted on December 1, 2017 by ehurst

There are a few areas on the east shore of Draper Lake I hadn’t explored last year. Yesterday was the right weather for resuming that. The map shows a substantial peninsula connected to SE 119th Street. The lavender numbers indicate the location where I took the following images, and also indicate the approximate route of my wandering. Please note the image shows a higher water level than I found yesterday.

That street isn’t actually open to motor vehicles west of Stanley Draper Drive, but it’s still clear cut through dense woods. I shot this image back up the hill from the shore of the lake. Aside from patches of bare sandstone, the ground is just fine-grained sand. I was standing right in the curve where the trail drops south. To the right of where I stood taking this shot was a large hollow where the Parks Dept. had pushed soil up on the side of the road to inhibit vehicles from accessing the shore. While it’s been dry quite some time, it still had some residual moisture, making it a thick mud hole. I was just barely able to skirt it. I had to push my bike across a lot of soft sand to another steep rocky climb like the one in the picture.

The satellite image is a few years out of date. It shows a trail chasing the shoreline that is no longer visible. You could probably discern a roadbed in the terrain, but it’s socked in with trees and shrubs, not to mention lots of thorny vines. I did get to Point 20, but not that way. Just a little further up and over the ridge is a trail that has seen some use in recent years. To block it, Parks Dept. put down a pile of truck tires; you can still see them if you zoom in on satellite images. They weren’t much hindrance to me pushing my bike past them.

There is where the adventure began. In the satellite image above you can see an open field just off the road on that trail. That’s where I had a the first flat ever on these hybrid tires. So I stopped, pulled my tool bag of the handlebars and inverted the bike. I carry a spare tube, so didn’t try to repair the flat one, just swapped them out. I also carry a very small hand pump that works well enough if the user is patient and persistent. I checked the tire and found no foreign sharp object; it must have been from some of the metal debris dumped out there over the years. Back on the trail, the way was just barely passable, but I rode almost all the way back down to the shore. I missed my intended turn toward to the far end of the peninsula, though.

Instead, I wound up on the shore almost straight west. I was treated to this delightful view of a collapsed bluff. I was able to walk all over it, but because some of the rocks wobbled under my weight, I didn’t feel safe trying to carry my bike over it. Instead, I had to navigate the thick underbrush to go around this.

This next image shows how the bluff cuts off the shore. But the shore was quite ample and clear beyond that and I decided not to try an immediate return back up the trail. I just kept going around the shoreline. It was a delightful choice at first, with numerous places where the underlying bedrock extended out into the water. But I had to walk the whole way, because there was just too much loose sand.

So I kept trudging, hoping to glimpse a trail opening. Keep in mind that I no longer have my iPhone, so I didn’t have access to GPS and satellite views, only my memory of out-of-date imagery. I never saw a usable trail leading away from the shore. I kept walking all the way around the peninsula, clambering over the rock outcroppings.

I did encounter some black sandstone here and there. It’s harder than the red stuff, but still just sandstone. There were places where it lay on the sand in large fields of fist-sized stones. I was ready to get out of there long before I was able. I ended up having to hike all the way around up into the deep swampy inlet you can see on the south side of that peninsula. It happened to be dry enough to walk on yesterday, and just as the shore turned back south is where I finally found a navigable trail. It was mostly ridable and I was glad to get off my feet. I came out onto the route marked “Westminster Road” which looks just like SE 119th above. At this point I wasn’t exactly sure where I was on the map because I had no map. I was actually just a hundred meters from where I had first rode off into the woods.

Still, I turned south and stayed along the shore I hadn’t yet explored. Eventually it led me to SE 134th and I knew then where I was. I was very whipped at that point and faced a long slow ride home northward on Stanley Draper Drive (which turns into Post Road) because I also had a headwind. But I did okay, and felt as tired as I normally do after those 50-mile rides.

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…And Furthermore

Posted on November 30, 2017 by ehurst

This continues the previous post.

Patriarchy is written into human DNA. As long as there are X and Y chromosomes, and their presence results in physiological differences, nothing on this earth can change masculine dominance. It exists when it is denied. It can surely be done wrong in culture, but it cannot be removed.

By the same token, matriarchy is also wired into human society. These are not competing systems, but parallel. There would be no human life on earth without both of these. All you can do is make life miserable by trying to ignore or hinder their essential natures. Instead of taking umbrage at how God decided things should be in this world, it works a lot better to understand how each of these two powerful forces of nature operate.

A primary failure of the West that it does not balance the two. As just one example, the doctrine of a man’s castle-home is contrary to Biblical Law. In the Bible, the woman owns and controls the living facility. The castle is hers; the man focuses on defending the family, not the facilities. Yet, even in saying that, the Western mind will twist it into something contrary to human nature itself. It’s not that men can’t have forts, but that the fundamental design of living quarters is not a man’s forte. Housing architects and residential planners should all be female.

The whole business of human government requires a division of labor between men and women. There are some things men do better, and some women do better. It’s not that women are confined by men to certain roles, and whatever the men don’t want to bother with is their problem. It’s that wise heart-led men know better than to proceed without feminine support and counsel. A woman’s place of honor is no mere pedestal; feminist polity is matriarchy overreacting to masculine folly. Western Civilization is larded with false dichotomies.

For similar reasons, a genuine patriarchal government always keeps the door open to meritocracy. They need not be mutually exclusive. Doing this well prevents mere ambition from taking over. At the same time, nepotism is not a sin; like everything else, it has its place. Indeed, belittling and making nepotism illegal hardly prevents something so utterly natural. Just because you can put a label on something to disparage it doesn’t mean you understand what’s going on. There will always be some human activity that simply cannot be improved.

There will always be people who govern best by knowing when, and to whom, they should pass the buck. These have historically been the greatest rulers in human history. At the same time, this never works well in war. Any combat leader who isn’t the first to face enemy fire is the leader who sacrifices his troops for his own petty personal comforts. The reason someone like King David lived so long while leading in that fashion is because God protected him. A critical element in that protection was that readiness to lead from the front. In peace, he was the first to pass the buck. He failed most as king when he failed to distinguish between recognizing a particular issue as a matter of administration or war.

Whenever Americans work alongside other nations and cultures on anything at all in this world, Americans are notorious for two things. One is the utterly hidebound worship of rules and regulations as written. Two is the frequent failures that relate to keeping the rules when they don’t matter and ignoring them when they do. A related issue is the consistent deception about why certain rules exist. Nobody in their right minds will trust Americans for anything that really matters because they consistently lie to each other while pretending to worship honesty. A genuine and honest American really stands out in foreign countries.

The single greatest moral flaw of the West can be narrowed down to the assumption that human behavior can be made efficient. This is false even if you completely ignore the Fall. The very concept of efficiency is an abomination to God, so one of the greatest heresies is the idea that God does things that are reasonable. Faith in God is inherently unreasonable and extravagant, because God is not bound by human reason and He has always been extravagant. But you notice how many folks are disappointed because they reasoned that God should do or give some particular thing that made sense to them. They assume God is conserving resources, because otherwise they are logically forced to accuse Him of lying. The real issue is that Westerners refuse to bow the knee with enough extravagance and self-sacrifice.

Reason, when it stands alone, is the Devil in disguise.

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