Sermon on the Mount 1

Posted on October 7, 2017 by ehurst

We have no good way of extrapolating backward from Matthew’s Greek Gospel to the Aramaic words Jesus spoke. Thus, we have to rely on Matthew’s choice of terminology and his knowledge of Greek. He was a cousin of Jesus who served in Herod’s tax bureau. It’s hard to imagine he wouldn’t have learned some Greek simply because it was the most commonly used language of commerce throughout the Roman Empire. It was everyone’s second language, when it wasn’t their first. Matthew’s position out near the northern border of Herod’s kingdom would necessitate a working knowledge of Greek. So we have to trust his Greek rendering of his cousin’s teachings, even if we dare to assume Jesus never bothered to use Greek Himself.

It’s also important to note that Matthew may have been forced by circumstances to summarize. But we also have to recognize that the Messiah trusted him to handle this job properly. As we read through Matthew’s Gospel, it exudes the air of Ancient Hebrew culture, not in the high sense of something like Isaiah’s courtly prophecy, but of a Hebrew man rediscovering the truth hidden by centuries of Hellenizing influence. It addresses the dire need of Jewish readers to reclaim that lost heritage, at least insofar as Jesus Himself conveyed the same demand in His teachings.

So Jesus was speaking to common folks who were likely quite confused by rabbinical teaching. Instead of citing dozens of preceding scholars and confusing things even more, Jesus worked at presenting the truth as a challenge to listeners to leave behind the nit-picking legalism of Judaism and simply open their minds to the leadership of their hearts. We know that He used common parabolic images that would have been recognized, particularly from Old Testament Scripture. But He used them in a way that renewed their mystical call to rise above oneself and receive truth from the heart. It was like plowing up hard-packed roads, and then watering the soil to see what would grow.

This was God’s Covenant people, who bore in their souls a very ancient calling to know and walk in the moral character of their Lord. Some would not get it right away, and some might never do so. However, Jesus knew that using parables would beckon from the heights of the soul. Some would take awhile, but the power of God’s truth was enough to break through a bunch of bad rabbinical teaching. Meanwhile, a major element in all of Jesus’ ministry was the background noise of expecting the Messiah “any day now.” His disciples were pretty sure Jesus was the Messiah, but didn’t have a clear idea what God had actually said about Him.

Beatitudes Matthew 5:3-12

The starting refrain is “blessed” — Matthew uses the Greek word indicating “how fortunate!” To a Hebrew mind that would register as God’s favor.

v3. The first is “poor in spirit.” This conjures the image of someone who cowers somewhere out of the way, hoping he’s not noticed so as to avoid punishment. In more common usage, it indicates someone who frankly owns nothing except what’s in his hands. This is a beggar whose condition is so pitiful that he couldn’t work for a living. These people know they are dependent on the kindness of strangers. By casting it as a spiritual condition, Jesus indicates someone who creeps into the back of the Temple courtyard and cowers before the Lord.

This is an ancient feudal protocol: the most insignificant servant in a ruler’s court who huddles in the far corner. He has to be there, but he better not make his presence known until he’s called. Jesus said such people are the first ones welcomed into the Kingdom of Heaven — a code phrase for the Messianic Kingdom. People who want to claim citizenship under the Messiah, which implies a certain degree of kinship, would have shed all their pretense and claims under any previous regime. Whatever you hold in this world has no bearing on your place in the Spirit Realm.

v4. To mourn or grieve is in the same context as the preceding. You should be deeply aggrieved at how necessary it is for the Messiah to start from scratch as the first beatitude implies. What a rotten condition the Covenant Nation must be in! They have drifted far, far away from the nation that would welcome and embrace the Messiah when He appeared.

And it should be obvious that this grieving would start with one’s own sins. Notice there’s no indignation and judgment lauded here, but the simple fact of being deeply sorrowful for sin. Jesus has Isaiah’s declaration in mind here:

Then I said, “Woe is me! For I am undone; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, Jehovah.” (Isaiah 6:5 MKJV)

It is the kind of heart that weeps this way over sin that qualifies to receive the comfort the Messiah will bring with Him.

v5. The word translated “meek” refers to a person who bears gracefully the unjust abuse of others. The implication is someone who is oppressed by government, particularly someone living under military occupation by hostile foreigners. It is also used to refer to someone who is a social outcast, implying that they refuse to get involved in petty partisan disputes. Jesus says that God and His Creation are on your side if you are that kind of meek. You are too busy with the Master’s moral agenda to pay much attention to persecution. You stick to your mission and your domain. Someday you’ll look around and realize all your enemies are gone, and the Messiah has put you in charge.

v6. The fourth one is painfully obvious in most English translations. The Jewish society of their day was filled with obnoxious characters lusting after all kinds of wealth and power, any competitive advantage at all. They held feasts inviting only each other and jockeyed for places of honor in public. And here Jesus reminds them that Messiah won’t be too impressed by such folk when He comes. In the Kingdom of Heaven, people who have an appetite for equity and divine justice are the folks who will feast at His table.

v7. It seems funny how everyone in Jesus’ day knew what mercy and compassion looked like, but there was so little of it being offered. There’s nothing wrong with upholding the law and moral standards. This is not about being lax and lazy about enforcing what your heart demands as essential for shalom. But it was a sour and evil person who acted as if they never needed mercy themselves. It’s not hard to adjust the punishment to fit the crime and offer something that emphasizes reform and recovery over torment.

v8. Here is a flat statement of the heart-led thinking of Ancient Hebrew culture. A pure heart in Hebrew minds meant a clear and unambiguous commitment to Jehovah as divine Father and Lord. It indicates someone who is intent on absorbing the character and personality of God. Everyone listening to Jesus teach would have recognized the full meaning behind this image. It stood in stark contrast to what they saw every day.

v9. Regarding peacemakers, we must first remind ourselves that “peace” is equivalent to the Hebrew term shalom — the blessed state that grows up around the people who are faithful to the Covenant. It implies reasonable prosperity, security from threats, health against plagues and social stability. So a “founder of peace” is someone who promotes Covenant moral purity. Granted, there is an emphasis on seeking to defuse tensions, but that is frankly taken for granted, seeing we live in a fallen world. It’s all about reducing tension between God and His people. It does not include making a false peace that compromises righteousness, but seeks to find room for everyone to seek the heart of God. A “peacemaker” is also someone who carries the sword; that’s part of the Hebrew image here.

v10-12. These final three verses are all one point, and a very emphatic one. Having already hinted at this in verse 5, Jesus expends quite a few words flatly pointing out the proper expectation of someone who intends to make ready for the Messiah’s arrival. If the Messiah will need to break down the current system — not just Roman government, not just that poser Herod, but the current Judean leadership — then obviously things will get ugly before it’s done. And as people begin to reclaim their covenant heritage of mystical moral purity, they should expect to get into lots of trouble from the folks currently ruling.

This would be nothing new for some Judeans. The Sanhedrin routinely called the peasants “ignorant” and “accursed” and treated them accordingly. The mutual resentment was well established. There was already an undercurrent of resistance against the still-morphing oral Talmud of their day (“Traditions of the Elders”), and common folk were well aware this oral legal code was not quite what Moses taught. So Jesus is partly taking the common man’s side against the corrupt leadership.

But at the same time, He was calling for the people not to get hung up on whining and vengeance. Instead, He raises a much higher standard that was always within reach of the heart, but impossible for the legalist mind of the Jewish government. So He goes on at length about bearing up under the coming persecution as things are sure to get worse before they get better. Jesus includes the line about how this same persecution was the common lot of prophets before Him, indicating an emphasis on the ancient mystical ways, not the new and shiny legalistic nonsense. The heart-led mysticism was not forgotten, but that lamp of truth was growing dim. Jesus was stoking a bonfire with it.

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Covenant Soldier

Posted on October 7, 2017 by ehurst

When it comes to human events in this world, everything rests on the Covenants. Nothing we do in this life can be isolated from the applicable covenant. Let’s not bog this down with chasing all the ways in which the Covenant of Christ is or isn’t like the Law Covenants. Moses is ended, but stands as a testimony. Noah stands as the applicable Law Covenant and it’s part the Faith Covenant of Christ. What we can know about Noah comes from our understanding of Moses. You must learn to think like an Ancient Hebrew to understand any of it, and a major element in that is thinking in terms of covenant; reality is a covenant.

Thus, a major factor in our thinking about how to walk in this fallen world is recognizing how humanity generally rejects the Covenants. Our personal individual adherence to the Covenants produces powerful effects, but this is all dampened by the general failure around us. This is the crux of our witness to the lost world; they need to see the blessings of embracing the Covenants. They need to see that there is a difference. When God’s wrath moves on the earth, our Savior’s blood on the doorposts of our existence marks us out for sparing.

That can mean rough treatment and being driven out of place, but that’s part of how God moves us to where He wants us to serve Him. We take it in stride as part of our covenant existence.

All the more so for a soldier, called by God to serve in one or another military system, is it essential to grasp the covenant nature of reality. There are some heavy personal questions about serving in the military of a secular state. If you are going to be a soldier, your options are limited when born in such a place. You’ll have to find that sweet spot of peace with God, and that means having your own system of internal caveats about what the system tries to tell you.

There is no one right answer, but I can tell you of the answers I have found along the way. To be sure, most of them became clear in my conscious awareness after I left that service. Here’s hoping that some of this will speak to others, even if they have nothing to do with the military.

For the individual covenant soldier, military victory means almost nothing. While it is the ostensible goal in every way, every day, it remains merely ostensible (definition: appearing as such but not necessarily so; pretended). You know what it means to everyone around you, but you also keep a clear view of what it means in your heart.

It may have nothing to do with God’s favor. The Ancient Hebrew understanding of this rests within the wider Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) cultural viewpoint. In that world, the gods controlled who won battles, in the sense that two opposing sides prayed to their respective deities. They firmly believed it was essential; there were no atheists in that world. In their minds, your deities would embolden you for battle, and the army with stronger faith and obedience won. The other side would lose heart, in the sense that their gods would abandon them. So the whole point of battle was to stand firm in the melee and make the other side fold and run.

The Hebrews added a few elements that were not ubiquitous in the rest of the ANE. A critical point is that the Hebrews knew they might be called by Jehovah to enter a battle they were supposed to lose. They would inquire of God before battle, and sometimes dared to ask if they should expect victory. On occasions, the response included a confirmation that they would win and how to go about it.

And if they didn’t inquire, the outcome was a disaster regardless whether they won. Without covenant loyalty, there might was well not be a covenant. Without that covenant, their existence was virtually meaningless.

Today’s covenant solider knows that his military and his nation is going to face disaster sooner or later, because nobody bothers to consult with God. They all assume it’s a matter of good troops, good training and weapons, and good execution. That’s what the troop are taught. But the covenant soldier knows it’s really a matter of being there and doing his best because that’s the calling of God for him individually. His moral victory is obedience from the heart in the midst of vast moral failure all around him.

He’s there because he’s a witness in the context. His life has no meaning without the covenant. Everything else is just the context. His witness is in how he gives his full humanity to the ostensible mission and plays the role to the hilt. He’s hardly afraid of death or disability arising from such service; that’s just a matter of how God has chosen to use him. He remains a witness to the glory of Christ for the duration of the mission in this life.

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Mission Priorities

Posted on October 6, 2017 by ehurst

Our path is communion with Creation. We don’t have wisdom so much as we participate in divine wisdom. Sometimes we can communicate that wisdom to other people as a way of signalling that we can offer something worth their attention. We are most alive as part of Life.

The first symptom of senescence is not forgetting things or disconnecting from current reality; it’s to stop growing. God help me if I have not changed, if I have not grown in some way, during the past week.

Caveat: I stand by my prophetic statements. Very few of them were offered as “thus saith the Lord.” Most of them were carefully rendered as my best estimate of what my heart saw. I’ve always tried to warn readers that a prophetic gift is not flawed; the failure is in our making sense enough to tell others. It’s guaranteed that something I’ve shared in the past will not work out because I didn’t quite grasp the moral thrust involved. If I don’t fail, it’s because I didn’t try at all.

In the past few days I’ve stepped through a door that was not previously visible to me. It’s not significant to you; it cannot be. It is to me. The moral lesson is what matters here, but the narrative of my experience is the parable through which you see the truth of God’s moral character.

That parable narrative includes me watching a few videos. I generally hate videos because they are designed to weaken your moral boundaries. It’s not that you cannot resist, but that the danger is quite real. I don’t make rules about avoiding TV and movies; I offer a warning that you dare not let them inside your credibility defenses. Always view them with a cynical eye; steel yourself and never relax. If you understand manipulative conditioning, you know how to watch videos.

So I tend to watch videos that capture something not otherwise available to us as experiences. I like the “caught on tape” stuff that isn’t highly edited. For example, I studied traffic collision forensics in the military. I’m not at all interested in human verbal conflict, so I don’t care for the up-close and personal road rage videos, but I do like to watch traffic incidents from surveillance or helicopter cameras, and it’s not too bad from dashcams.

In a similar vein, I don’t mind fictional stuff aimed at portraying real events in military history, but I’m always very skeptical, looking for a hidden agenda. Recently I branched off into watching military themed game videos. We all know how you have to exercise a great deal of suspension of disbelief in that genre. Even without direct combat experience, having handled real weapons teaches you a lot about how far the video game makers will stretch things.

Most of them are shoot-em-up stuff and I tire of that in minutes. Those with an actual story line may engage me for a while longer. Unfortunately, the story lines are shot full of contrived and well-worn, low brow TV plot dramatic devices. Very few video game companies employ a genuine fiction writer with talent. Way too many of them force the story in such a way as to snatch back from the player’s character everything he/she has gained up to that point in playing the game. You end up in scenarios where something that should be easy by now isn’t even permitted, and you can bet this frustrates the players. But every game maker is doing it, so there’s no avoiding it.

Once or twice I’ve run upon some half-way decent attempt at character development, even if the plots are full of holes. But then it always hangs on wholly unnecessary drama, anger and hatred. The story line intertwines major characters as long-time enemies, when in reality it never happens like that. Trust me; the people who work in the likes of Delta Force have many human flaws, but if they ever let something personal cloud their decisions, they are dead by now. The real story of heroism is never a vendetta.

Real military heroes are people who managed to push themselves against the odds to carry out the mission, and they are generally flexible enough to accept a sudden change in the mission falling down from above. I know that’s disappointing when you have invested moral energy into something, but it does happen and the professionals suck it up and keep trucking. The secret operations troops are professionals who know the limits of their discretion. They don’t require regimentation and discipline because they are disciplined internally. You don’t see that kind of thing in very many video games.

After watching a few different game video series, I was really turned off. I can handle the juvenile moderation of threats in the game. Side note: The so-called “expert” difficulty options in game settings are no less unrealistic because it’s the kind of threat to the protagonist that is wholly unrealistic. They are frequently slanted against creativity, trying to force the player into decisions nobody would make in the real world. But in general, what I found most annoying was the utter lack of realistic characters; they are always supermen too psychologically messed up to qualify for the high-end secret missions.

So after about the fourth or fifth such disappointment, it hit me why I’ve always felt that strong draw to the military as a mission field. To be honest, it’s really not the fields of harvest I know I’ll find there. Working those fields is a really sweet blessed thing, but it’s not the point. It’s the opportunity for me to walk by my true calling and nature. This is what’s in my heart, my “true will” as some would say. It’s the core of obedience to my Lord.

That doesn’t change my prophetic visions of the future mission adventure; I still believe what I’ve written about it is in front of me. It changes how I’ll face what is coming. It’s not the field of labor that matters, but the labor itself. I’ll take that heart-led commitment wherever my Lord sends me, and I’ll bear it like a soldier. It took a little prodding and exposure to folly to remember that it’s not a matter of the atmosphere I’m hunting for, but it’s all a matter of the atmosphere I bear with me. Creation is alive and responds to me personally, as it does to all of us. If I am in communion with the moral fabric, I am God’s man for the job, whatever the job is. The moral truth in us changes what is around us.

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Mark Your Calendar

Posted on October 5, 2017 by ehurst

Okay, this is just a post about the political situation, so you don’t have to read it. I spotted something interesting today and thought it might mean something: WARNING: There Is Going to be an Attempted Communist Revolution on Nov. 4. The title is click-bait, but the story is well researched. What it points to is November 4 as the official kick-off for a new level of annoyance from the activist left. It would appear something of substance is being organized.

I highly doubt the plans are for a full revolution that day, but rather the beginning of a long campaign that should allow them to move toward a revolution. Or, I suppose they could all get arrested, run over, shot up and realize it ain’t happening. This wouldn’t be the first time crazy stuff was planned and attempted and didn’t work out. Still, it seems to me that this could be some serious hassle for those of us with better things to do. These people will be trained and paid in bigger numbers than ever before. They’ll be all lawyered up in advance. And make no mistake: There are a very huge number of lefties out there who actually have been hoping for this for a long time.

What would make it easier for them is any number of systemic crises, some of which their paymasters have been trying to instigate. Soros and his gang do have friends in high places in US government, and in pivotal non-government places, as well. Even worse, they have friends in other national and international governing institutions. So my point here is to suggest you keep your eyes on that date and be aware what these folks are aiming to do.

Then again, it could all be nothing more than just Internet noise.

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It’s Who I Am

Posted on October 5, 2017 by ehurst

Why do you do it?

It’s who I am.

I fully admit that I was a fool, but not the kind of fool most people think I was. I was a fool for believing the lies. Not in the sense that I was a fool to do what I did, but in the sense that I believed the lies about why I was doing it. It was the right choice, but not for the reasons they fed me. Some part of me grasped the motivation for driving forward through the head games and nearly meaningless exercises that were cooked up by mindless bureaucrats who had no clue what it all meant. That part of me knew it wasn’t the pretty baubles on my chest or the gold stripes on my sleeve.

It wasn’t in the honors and titles and accolades on pieces of paper now long forgotten. To be honest, it wasn’t even the camaraderie, and it sure as hell wasn’t the pay, and it wasn’t the tax and price breaks I’m offered today. It wasn’t for the way civilians who don’t have a clue keep thanking me for a service that in many ways dishonors them. It wasn’t for the flag, or apple pie and “liberty” and to build a better world for my children. I know better than to think I accomplished anything at all along those lines.

Nope. All that is just the background noise. Today I see that more clearly than ever.

And if I could, I’d do it again. I’d probably choose a better course through the maze, but I wouldn’t hesitate to go into that maze and get all shredded by a system that doesn’t give a damn about me. I’d face all the petty self-aggrandizement of the mafia NCO corps and the constant betrayal of people who pretend to be your friend just so they can use your energy for their own promotions.

I’d go back today if they’d have me.

It’s who I am.

It’s a question of the God who made me and created the drive inside of me. I didn’t choose where I was born and political machinations that rule this country. I don’t hate our alleged enemies; it’s nothing personal. But I’ll kill those enemies just the same. I’ll salute the flag and obey the protocols because that’s part of the job. I’ll give everything within me to do what the job demands and strive for excellence. But not because I believe in the system or any part of it; I’d do it because there’s no other way I can obey that drive deep in my soul.

This is why I’ll still play the game by the rules as much as is human possible, but don’t you dare drape that damned flag on the Cross. My Savior is above all that. I’ll sacrifice every shred of my flesh for that flag because that’s what He requires of me, not for anybody else. And I have no doubt some of our enemies serve Him, too, but I’m the one who makes that final decision what He requires of me. Nobody else has that authority. Nobody on this earth speaks for God inside my soul.

I cannot possibly find peace with my God any other way. I’m His agent in the midst of all the lies and darkness in this world. Anywhere the door opens for me to be who I am called to be, I’m going in. I’m not dead yet and there’s plenty I can still do, just as if I were still a soldier in uniform. There’s another mission out there somewhere, and I’ll give it my full energy and loyalty for the same reason.

It’s who I am.

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Nitpicking with Hardware

Posted on October 4, 2017 by ehurst

In February it will be two years with my iPhone 5. I’ve come to hate it.

Granted, it’s a good camera, not bad shooting videos, and I’ve enjoyed the GPS and mapping service. But it’s a crappy phone and totally useless for web browsing.

My carrier is Sprint and they have some odd restrictions on things, but I’m very near to disconnecting this thing and switching to a Kyocera Dura phone. I can probably buy my own, perhaps a refurb, very cheaply and just own the thing outright. About the only actual drawback is that texting will be a lot slower. I promise not to weep about that.

I’m especially interested in pertinent comments you might have on this.

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Will the Real Peasant Please Stand Up?

Posted on October 4, 2017 by ehurst

I’ve been asked to describe culture and class in a little more detail. It’s pertinent if I’m going to allege that one particular culture is closer to God.

One again: We are not talking here about economic class. There is some overlap between economics and culture; most people in a particular economic class tend to manifest the cultural habits of their class. However, people can rise up and fall down the economic scale and keep their cultural orientation. Such people will be under a great deal of social pressure to conform to the culture of those around them, but most people tend to stick with what they know best.

In the Bible, as part of the Ancient Near East (ANE), there was only aristocracy and peasants. The difference between them was quite small. You’ll notice that Scripture consistently assumes that power and wealth go together. That’s because, in the most ancient associations, wealth was generally not possible without first having some political power. It wasn’t a question of personal ownership as we think of it in our society, but of having access and power to dispose of wealth. There was this underlying assumption, as big as a rhino wandering around a tiny house, that people held power only because it was necessary to protect and lead everyone in the clan. The shepherd of the clan held that authority on behalf of his flock of kinfolks.

It’s a human instinct that someone has to make the decisions, and it shows up even in the most democratic cultures. In America, it’s the simple reluctance to take the blame when things go wrong. There is no shepherd virtue at all, so the people in charge tend to be those with ambition and lust for power. This is radically different from the ANE world, where wielding power was a duty, and it included the duty to care for the people over whom one held power. Sure, personalities and talents varied, but ANE aristocracy were born to a sense of obligation. Even though we find some threads of that in Western history — think of the French term noblesse oblige — it lacks the depth of compassion presumed necessary by the broad collection of ANE cultures. Western aristocracy is “us versus them” with the lower classes, whereas in the ANE, aristocracy was “these are my family, my real treasure.”

Further, the ANE aristocrats never forgot their duty to the gods. In their minds, the whole universe (however they imagined it) was alive with the moral obligation to appease the gods, because the deities were the ultimate feudal authority. Everyone human served the gods in one way or another. You would struggle to find examples where this was not someone’s basic assumptions.

In the West, people fear deities the same as they fear nature. The image of what constitutes “deity” is far lower, with an instinctive assumption that the deities can be tricked because they were only slightly different from the general run of humans. While you will find threads of this tendency in the ANE, it’s considered bad form. But the only reason we find it at all because of the Curse of the Fall. Not every ANE culture believed in the Fall itself, but most of them had a close companion concept that served the same function. My point here is that the roots of Western religious culture are deeply fallen. For both Greco-Roman and Germanic tribal mythologies, the gods were just people with extra power. There was precious little noble about the pantheons of either ancient culture on which the West stands. You end up with even strong Christian believers holding to an instinct of seeking personal competitive advantage in the world.

Thus, the mere existence of a middle class is rooted in the complete absence of genuine nobility in the West. Nobility in the West means separation and secrecy, an arrogant privilege denied everyone, and that denial comes with a harsh and bitter hatred, though sometimes unconsciously so. And that position comes with a harsh Calvinist image of predestination — “We are nobles because of the iron law of Fate, and we are inherently superior by DNA.” You aren’t going to find the concept of “noble blood” in the Old Testament. Instead of this seeking competitive advantage, and assuming it’s something conferred at birth by the iron will of Fate, the Bible rests on the image that anyone can be elevated on the grounds of commitment to your contextual leadership. And that in turn rests on a commitment to God. It’s a question of living moral fabric, not some iron law of Fate.

This is why faith is dead in the West and is pivotal in the Bible. Calvinism is not from the Bible; it’s a Greco-Roman-Germanic assumption about reality that has been read back into the Bible. The whole point behind Romans 9 is that God has the last word in everything. Who the hell are you to argue with Him? You cannot possibly comprehend what’s involved when He created all things, so stop the carping. Find out what He wants for you and make the most of it, because whatever it is He wants for you is surely in your best interest. Do you understand that, had the Pharaoh of Exodus in the end repented of his willful arrogance against Jehovah, he could have found some kind of redemption? And have you noticed that the question of who gets to go to Heaven isn’t really addressed at all, but is carefully avoided? Romans 9 is all about events in this world.

And when Jesus spoke of going to Heaven, it was always carefully couched in the parable of pleasing His Father as one would any ANE potentate. The whole New Testament carefully avoids precise descriptions of Heaven, but always paints it in parabolic images. But the underlying point is that you have some choice; you can accept what God has designed you for, or you can reject His will and His favor. You have no business asking about whether that buys you eternal fire insurance. Your intellect can’t handle the question, much less the answers. Calvinism seizes this whole package and does violence in making it fit the Western assumptions about reality.

This is why Western Christian religion is so crazy. On the one hand, if you buy into Calvinist assumptions, then you stoutly endure an ugly and fearful world and sing about the joys of Heaven. You think of the world as a dark and brooding place; meanwhile you engage in the schizoid obsession with material advantage as the sign of God’s favor. And if being faithful to the “laws of God” doesn’t bring prosperity, you tear down the system and build one that does, or you move to another part of the world where you can build your own system. (God help whoever happens to live there when you go to seek your “promised land.”) Even the denominations that reject predestination still operate under the Calvinist world view, because it’s part of the Western mind. Of course, you can always drop the whole question and go after and airy-fairy religion of middle class feel-good success.

Meanwhile, the aristocracy-in-effect in the US basically rejects the whole thing, even as they continue promoting the Calvinist Puritan dream for those they rule. Did anyone take a glance at that link to the US Army “Warrior Code”? Can you see how it’s just Puritan ethics as a form of mythology? Keep in mind that the fundamental reason the Puritans left England is because the aristocracy there refused to let the middle class Puritan merchants prosper “as God intended.” And the Puritans left the Netherlands because the Dutch were secular, a secularism tinged with low-class, blue-collar values.

There’s a radical difference between urban and rural lower-class culture. The urban version takes its cues from the same roots that gave birth to the Mafia (think: American labor unions). It’s not exactly communist; it can run that way, but not in a doctrinal sense. Rather, the blue-collar culture is an underworld that can use communism as a false front to confuse the issues. Urban lower class wears multiple masks, but at heart it is a predatory criminal culture; it’s just another face of the middle class culture that arose because they came late to the game and were kept out of the initial spoils of the merchant establishment. Instead of competition, it breeds predatory stupidity; it’s the lower end of middle class materialist culture.

Have you noticed that, whenever anyone starts talking about getting rid of feudalism and class structure, it’s always deeply tinged with middle class material values? And then they put in place a smothering class structure based on nothing more than secular ambition?

The existence of a peasantry is fundamental to human nature. The variations can be quite ugly and brutal, but within any given cultural context, the peasants are typically closer to Biblical Law. They tend to be cynical about the world and are too busy with the business of life to put up much of a fuss until they perceive a genuine threat. They don’t waste time with pretensions of class warfare; they tend to live and let live. A lot of people recognize peasant virtues and there is a thriving market in the false pretense to such values. Peasantry is the fundamental state of humanity at large.

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A Quick Shot

Posted on October 3, 2017 by ehurst

If want the propaganda version, you can find it lots of places. It’s baloney.

The real Warrior’s Creed (from Robert L. Humphrey):

Wherever I walk,
everyone is a little bit safer because I am there.

Wherever I am,
anyone in need has a friend.

Whenever I return home,
everyone is happy I am there.

Think about how it is we become that person, and what we have to sacrifice. Then think about how we project that image to the people around us. This is what I strive for.

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Windows Dead Mail

Posted on October 2, 2017 by ehurst

Sometime early this year, Microsoft phased out support for Windows Live Mail, their free email client. In a silent update, all mail accounts were switched from POP3 to IMAP. Your collected old mails didn’t go anywhere, and you could still move messages to your old folders, but incoming messages were no longer removed from the server on your email service unless actually deleted. Again, this was all without notice to users.

So one of my tech support clients contacted me with a problem sending email. The message coming back from her ISP’s mail server was self-contradictory. Only after doing some research did I realize what Microsoft had done. Her storage quota on the ISP’s server was full and it was refusing to handle any outgoing messages until some space was cleared. Further, I believe that Windows Live Mail was no longer keeping up with all the background protocol stuff that changes from time to time.

Here’s the real problem: Windows Live Mail uses a peculiar storage format that nobody else uses. It’s called “eml” but the storage format had been “improved” sometime recently, so it was compatible only with an expensive upgrade to Outlook. Just about every other email client you can install on Windows uses mbox. While Mozilla’s Thunderbird claims it can import the eml format (after you install an add-on), it choked on this particular client’s huge collection of folders and sub-folders from several years of hording. This person is politically active, so email is a major portion of her life.

More research and I found lots of tools to convert these eml folders to mbox, but all of them cost too much. Finally, I found the one free utility that didn’t cost extra, but it required Ruby libraries. Then I noticed the same developer had an older project no longer in development called IMAPsize that, among other things, could convert any collection of eml files into an aggregated mbox folder. But there is a drawback: The software tool is designed for something else entirely and does that conversion as an additional tool. So if you install IMAPsize on your Windows computer and fire it up, you have to cancel the prompts about adding an account and simply go to the tools on the menu and hit “eml2mbox.” This opens a prompt and you can drill down to where the Live Mail folders are stored (see this page for guidance) and select the list of messages inside of a given folder.

You’ll be prompted for a name, which is in effect a “folder” of mbox messages that you are creating. Notice that you’ll be offered a button with the ellipsis (“…”) which allows you to select a folder/sub-folder to open and select all the messages inside. You can simply use the name of the folder where it’s located to maintain your previous structure. It won’t confuse things because the mbox format is multiple messages inside one file, and it will add the “.mbox” extension to the file name. Thunderbird likes that just fine. The laborious part of all this is that you have to invoke that tool and it’s different prompts for each folder and subfolder with the messages inside. You cannot select a folder, only individual eml message files inside the folder.

In my case, it was three folders deep in places, with both messages and subfolders, so I had to convert each little batch, one at a time, to maintain the client’s complex email storage system. It took a long time. What made it slightly easier is that I exported all of her mail from Windows Live Mail to her Download folder, creating a new folder named for her ISP.

After conversion, to import them into Thunderbird, which already had the import-export tools add-on, I first created an empty folder under the “Local Folders” and then right-click on it. From the pop-up menu, I selected from the import submenu to import an mbox folder. In the open prompt, I located her exported email collection and first pulled in all the mbox files there. Then, right-clicking on each of those, I chased down the subfolders inside her original collection and imported each mbox file from there, drilling down as far as needed. Thunderbird swallowed the whole thing very neatly and she didn’t lose her long history of collected messages.

This is how you do customer service.

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I’m Not Finished Yet

Posted on October 1, 2017 by ehurst

This is the last post in the series of four.

In the Old Testament we see a very ancient feudal approach to military service. As a profession, it was not limited to nobles, but included a large number of peasants recognized for their military virtues and talent, men kept on staff as bodyguards and messengers. With the birth of Western Germanic feudalism, this idea didn’t catch on until rather late in the Middle Ages. It’s appearance is mixed with the rise of the merchant middle class. Prior to that, violence itself was considered both a talent and right restricted to noble blood. This exclusive attitude left the merchants few options to exercise their talents, so they developed their own systems and a different approach to things.

Remember that, for a merchant, everything must serve the virtue of monetary profit. The idea of the modern secular state is entirely a creature of the middle class culture. I’m not going to wade too deeply into a historical analysis of Germanic military culture, but I will tell you that the US military is self-consciously modeled to a great degree on Prussia. You can find an excellent summary here. The author notes the essential element of Calvinism. The hide-bound legalism of both religious Calvinism and US Military ways is well known.

Have you noticed that a very religious Calvinism is the primary source of a secularized state? The whole idea of modern military conscription is based on the Calvinist Prussian model of creating a system that swallows everyone and spits out uniformity in a sense of honor and duty to the state. It’s part of the US education system, of course. It’s this all-encompassing compulsory participation based on the a priori assumption that the world is a threat. It is very uniquely rooted in the dour and gloomy outlook of primitive Germanic tribal culture. If you understand the dark world of Beowulf, you understand the basis for Calvinism, Prussian culture, as well as the US education and military systems.

The harshly leveling effect did tend to pull up the weak, but it also makes precious little room for those who are highly talented. At the very least, it constrains and harshly channels that talent in service of the state. There is no such thing as genuine military virtue in the US Army; there are only varying degrees of bringing glory to the state. At least, that’s how it comes out on paper. In actual practice, everyone in the military who deals with a natural born trooper recognizes it and seeks to advance his opportunities, even if they all have conflicting ideas about what path of advancement is best. But that favor is fragile, because it pushes the talented trooper up against the boundaries of the envelope.

The bureaucratic hive-mind is the direct result of the Calvinist Prussian model, which in turn is a very critical element in middle class culture. Everything must serve the state, so much that the health of the state is the definition of “common welfare.” It’s when people instinctively balk at the dehumanization that they start wondering if violence itself is inherently immoral. Such is the natural result of being still stuck deeply inside the idolatry of the state. This whole thing of the genetic gloomy disposition and it’s resulting cultural paths through Calvinist Prussian middle-class and fundamental assumptions about reality can leave very few escape routes for the individuals who realize they don’t belong in that system.

Only when you make a concerted effort to understand that false world view in comparison to other world views can you find a better path. We who promote the heart-led way have a very big task breaking people free from the cultural prison here in the US. You have to crawl completely outside of this prison in order to understand who you are in Christ before you can go back inside and help others to escape. That’s the paradox of being a witness for Christ; the whole point of escaping is to come back inside the walls on His terms. We are truly free, but for most of us that freedom means nothing until we demonstrate it to those still chained.

This is the whole point of God’s revelation in the first place. It sets us free to walk in the truth inside the prison walls of the Fall. In a very real sense, the prison is just an artificial construct of the human mind. Our mission is to pretend just enough that the walls are real, because they are very real to those still enslaved to their sin. That’s how we enter their prison in order to bring them out.

On the one hand, I’ve often tried to deny that I am a soldier by nature. That’s because I cannot embrace the Calvinist Prussian model of external constraints. Instead, I was born with a sense of obligation based on the moral character of God. That’s in contrast to the “duty, honor, country” ethic of mainstream US military thinking, which amounts to idolatry of the state. My motto is that “duty, honor, order” in the sense of conforming to the image of Christ.

While English translations vary widely, some implying that violence itself is evil, that’s not what the Scripture actually says. The Bible is loaded with lauding a proper military posture based on personal calling and commitment to protecting God’s blessings (shalom) from the ever-present threat of those guided by Satan. So long as we are under the Curse of the Fall — until Christ returns to restore Eden — it’s part of the resistance against sin to know that we must be ready to shed blood. Sometimes it’s our own, but too often people have chosen a path that demands their blood at our hands. Somebody has to do that job; that’s fundamental to the Covenant of Noah.

I’m one of those people called to that job, one of those peasants with a talent for military service. I take no pleasure in violence, but I understand it’s place in Biblical Law. I do take pleasure in keeping shalom at whatever price fallen men want to charge for it. While shalom is commonly translated as “peace,” it also means duty, honor and order under God’s hand. God commanded violence often enough to make it clear He intends some of us to be talented at executing His justice among men. That’s part of my calling.

This is why I still feel drawn to military service. The only option for such service is a system still stuck inside the prison. I’m determined in Christ to bring His truth back into the prison. I can’t free military service itself, but I have already seen with my own eyes individuals within that service who were set free when I obeyed the call to get involved. That call has not ended. The circumstances have changed greatly, and I’d be shocked if I found myself in uniform again, but I cannot avoid praying and seeking a way to get involved in the military again where my Kingdom harvest was by far the most fruitful times in my life.

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