Penetrating Gaze of the Heart

Posted on September 12, 2016 by ehurst

I’d like to offer a prophetic warning: Don’t look for an Antichrist figure. This is not the right time for that. Rather, look for the way the demonic spirit of Antichrist works in these times of tribulation. Ignore how the mainstream and alternative media all try to stir up the fear of one ultimate evil or another.

I hope I’ve succeeded in convincing you, dear readers, that I do not favor any political candidate for any office in the US. How often do we need to say it? God does not deal favorably with any nation that ignores the applicable Law Covenant, and that would be Noah’s Covenant in the case of Western Civilization. Without acknowledging and making at least some claim to embrace that covenant, no Western nation can pretend God is personally involved in their affairs. God rules the non-covenant nations like herding cows; they don’t acknowledge Him and He doesn’t bless them directly. He rules them with an iron rod because they refuse to be family.

Any apparent blessings are incidental. You and I can harvest some measure of covenant blessings because we personally strive to bring our personal domain under the covenant, but that’s about as far as it goes. Neither candidate is any part Messiah or Antichrist, because the system itself is already damned. Without the earmarks of covenant — even a fake one — there’s no attempt to fool heart-led believers (what the Bible calls “the elect”). The folks who are fooled are not heart-led, but rely on tradition, intellect and just about anything except the heart.

I’ve joked about Trump because I was pretty sure God had branded him as the next president (sticking with the symbolism of cattle herding). It’s part of a broader pattern of what I call the right-wing backlash. But I don’t favor him; I’m just preparing for what seems our obvious fate. Nor do I hold any particular spite for Clinton, but I’m convinced from what I know of this country that, if she were to win, it’s likely she would be assassinated. There would be a civil war at the least. The system has run its course and things will change. There will be massive breakage, but the system won’t simply end completely.

There’s going to be some really ugly political shifts and the system will be thoroughly shaken in the next few years. One of the biggest changes is exposure; given the current trends, an awful lot of stuff will be leaked or outright exposed that has long been secret from the world. The future political trends will take that into account, or they won’t survive. The gloves are coming off. I’m willing to bet most of you can see that already.

But just because there is a massive opening of secrets doesn’t mean everything spilled is trustworthy. You should be cynical and skeptical; treat most leaks as intentional. Precious few leakers are selfless and honest, and some of them are insiders using selective leaks as the path of least damage for whatever they represent. Even Snowden says stuff that will mislead you, and we can’t begin to guess why. Did you ever wonder why the stuff he leaked was so old, out of date and obsolete? This is why I keep telling you that facts are untrustworthy; read it with your heart to see the moral implications.

And God help you if you suffer any brand of patriotism, because patriotism is inherently idolatrous. It’s one thing to love your fellow citizens, but all governments and systems of government are inherently illegitimate in terms of our covenant living. They unanimously reject the Covenant of Noah (and Israel rejects the Covenant of Moses, since well before Christ walked the earth). But if you tend to put any trust in government agencies or national institutions, you are walking in darkness. The US military will not save us when things go sour in government. The CIA? They are in the running for the nations worst threat. Everything you think is coming at the US to harm us was planned, funded and provoked by the CIA. I could go on at length, but you get the point.

For that matter, don’t follow me, either. I’m not leading in that sense. I’m begging you to see through the lies and make your own heart-led decisions. I could be wrong on all kinds of things, but your heart won’t lie to you. Pray for the wisdom to discern what your heart says about everything around you. Your brain will lie, because it has no power to handle moral deception, but your heart knows. Follow that.

Posted in sanity | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on Penetrating Gaze of the Heart

The Bath of Wrath

Posted on September 11, 2016 by ehurst

Context first: I don’t dispense truth for your consumption. At most, my writing exposes to your awareness things your heart already knows. Some of us are able to subject our minds to our hearts, and we get to a point where the mind pretty much knows better than try to resist. Instead, we discover the sweet security (shalom) of learning to trust something far higher than our own senses and reason. The mind receives it’s grandest purpose — organizing and implementing the practical requirements of God’s moral truth written in our convictions. What I write here is merely my own narrative, the story of my encounters in my own mind’s exploration of the Land Without Words.

Most of humanity manages to function with a certain amount of unconscious assumption about reality. There’s a kind of glue that holds together all the pieces. It doesn’t require absolute reliability, but enough that the surprises can be assimilated. It really does vary with the individual, but we can make some broad generalizations for the sake of common understanding. What we usually mean by the term “coping mechanism” signals that a certain amount of breakage is expected. Our mind maps out reality and has to make changes now and then, so the really smart people draw their maps in pencil. But the whole map dissolves without that glue to keep the paper intact.

As you probably know, neurosis is when the glue fails in spots. Psychosis is when the glue fails wholesale. There has to be a certain amount of space in the mind for drawing the map.

So our human function isn’t tied to the facts — the details we draw on the map — but to the existence of a map in the first place. And as noted, for most Westerners in particular, it’s seldom a conscious factor of awareness. For the most part, the mapping manifests in a body of assumptions about what is morally right and wrong. It’s the individual moral ground of assumptions that make up the material of the map of what “ought to be.” Drastic changes in the facts are tough to handle, but losing the structure of knowing will drive folks crazy.

The wrath of God is rather like a good soap-and-water bath. If your map is just cheap paper, it will come apart when God’s wrath rains down in your life. If you manage to weave in the threads of God’s moral character as the fabric that holds your map together, it’s a whole different experience. Instead of destruction in your life, His wrath is just a nice bit of laundering. Afterward you feel fresh and ready to start again. Western moral reasoning is just cheap paper, rather like the mass-produced rough stuff you get with dollar store coloring books.

When I prophesy that God is shifting reality, it’s not as if I’m saying the sky will turn green, or clouds will become mashed potatoes, or something noticeable like that. Rather, I’m warning that God will rain down His cleansing wrath on peoples’ maps. It’s too subtle for most of them to notice, but He’s taking away the temporal appearance of moral substance on which people have built their assumptions.

You see, Satan is the author of a lot of cheap garbage that passes for moral truth. God in His ineffable, inscrutable plans allows the Devil to do certain things for some limited time. It serves to entice and enslave folks who swallow the Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. It’s not that the apparent facts of our existence here changes that much; it still looks the same. It’s much more subtle than that. The big lie is something people seldom think about consciously, a raft of assumptions what we should expect if we just push hard enough to figure it out.

For example, just about every person influenced by Western values assumes that we should be able to fold up space and travel across light years in seconds, if we can just figure out how. They assume we could, in theory, travel across time barriers and carry our conscious existence into the past or the future. And we have even been led to imagine that we humans have the power to make substantial changes in this earth, like change the climate.

Yet, if you can read between the lines in the Bible, you’d find those three things are flatly impossible. And failing that, your heart would kick your brain with the recognition that those things will never happen. The boundaries are not factual, but moral in nature. God is actively watching and won’t let it happen.

Thus, at least a portion of what God is doing in our days, right here and now, is reaffirming His revelation about those moral limits on us. He’s washing away those subtle lies under the very ground on which most minds stand and walk. While those minds are, for the most part, wholly unconscious of it, they can’t understand why everything they’ve built on those false assumptions is starting to come apart. God is actively watching and His hands are busy. It’s just the same as you and I shaping things with Playdough, though far less discernible to the human senses.

Obviously our Creator is wiser than to just make it too obvious. His revelation warns that there will always be plausible deniability of His handiwork. If you exclude His revelation, you cannot perceive full reality. If your heart is actively ruling your mind, then you can sense it these things directly. You know reality is shifting daily as people are struggling to keep things together. And failing. We know the truth of God’s wrath falling like soapy rain on all human works, and we look forward to a good bath for our lives.

Posted in teaching | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on The Bath of Wrath

Psalm 117

Posted on September 10, 2016 by ehurst

Some people find significance in the observation that this is the middle chapter in the entire Protestant canon, and also the shortest chapter. In a few manuscripts it is considered part of either the previous or succeeding psalms, but there seems no justification for that.

It is still used as part of the “Hallel Psalms” at Passover. Some English translations probably capture the more recent Talmudic Jewish attitude with a tinge of nationalism, perhaps even racism. However, it’s hardly any challenge to see beyond that when you consider the more consistent prophetic attitude from both ends of the Bible. That prophetic word says the only reason for the advantages of the Covenant was so that the light of truth could be shined on those who did not have the Covenant, and the blessings could be shed abroad to those who didn’t belong under it. The whole idea is a welcoming invitation, not exclusion.

So perhaps we would benefit from an alternative translation that captures more of the original Hebrew flavor:

“Let every human living celebrate Jehovah; cheer loudly His name everyone! For His kind mercy prevails over all our needs, and the certitude of His Lordship remains stable into infinity. O celebrate Jehovah!”

Posted in bible | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Psalm 117

Be the Solution

Posted on September 9, 2016 by ehurst

It’s really simple folks: Be the solution. Wherever you are, in whatever setting, by living a heart-led existence in the midst of rising turmoil and chaos, you are a solution to the problems everyone else is facing. Granted, that often means that we are not providing exactly what they believe they want, but when our very presence draws down into the world the blessings of God, people are going to sense it on some level. It’s not our power; it’s God’s power at work in us.

So strive mightily to overcome your own internal resistance to God’s truth. His truth is more valuable to us than life itself. If we have to delve into deception for the sake of safety, then safety is wrong. On the other hand, it’s too easy to mistake our reasonings for truth. Truth is rooted in the heart, and arises into our consciousness as conviction. It pays little heed to what our minds can grasp and control, so teach your mind to doubt the orthodoxy of a society that doesn’t recognize the wisdom of the heart.

When you realize that reality is fungible, you aren’t restricted to your senses and logic, but you rely on the eternal truth. This makes you into a rock of stability and trust in the center of a chaotic world. We are entering a time when people will go bonkers trying to pull reality back under their control, but God is shifting reality around us already. Be an island of truth.

Posted in prophecy | Tagged , | Comments Off on Be the Solution

Cycling: Over 20

Posted on September 8, 2016 by ehurst

01oldbarnAs always, click on any image to see it full-sized. CTRL-click will open the image in a separate browser tab.

Tomorrow threatens to bring storms and no ride, so today was a good time to overdo it. The route was pretty simple: over to Midwest Boulevard, north to Memorial Road, over to Douglas Boulevard for a couple of miles, back to Midwest Boulevard, and back home. 02memorialThe total distance was about 24 miles, the first time since beginning recovery to ride more than 20. Up around Memorial Road, the Aubrey McClendon memorial has seen no upkeep since about a month after the wreck. I’m waiting to see if the anniversary in March brings any changes.

03pasturepondtreesI really hadn’t planned any photography, but I knew something would call my name once I got out on the road. All of these shots were taken with the bigger camera. It’s not so much that I had a lot on my mind, but aside from the exercise, I knew I needed the outlet for my soul.

04countrymorning I’m still striving to keep my radar attuned to the nature channel, the one that tells me when there’s something worthy of a picture. Creation itself is plenty wise to decide things like that. More than once I caught it as I passed and had to circle back to get the camera out.

06pastureridgeAt any rate, there wasn’t an awful lot on my mind, just trying to stay in the wordless mode, except the part of me that needs to pray. I forgot to mention that yesterday was Veloyce’s birthday. Mine comes in ten days and I’ll turn 60. I’m just a kid.

07hillyfarmBut despite stopping for pictures, I still had to stop and rest for a bit at the bridge on my way back. I also didn’t have quite enough water. That’s one of the signs of conditioning — how much water you consume. When I’m in really good shape, it doesn’t take as much water.08crutchocreekThough I was very glad that my right leg was a full-time participant this time, it was my whole body that was tired. It will still take some time for me to recover the conditioning I lost during the four months I wasn’t riding. Then again, riding a mountain bike means slower travel than on a lightweight hybrid or road bike. Still, I’m convinced I need that versatility.

I was pretty badly whipped before I got home. The point is not that you train until you don’t feel it; you train until your body knows how to function when it’s whipped.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | Comments Off on Cycling: Over 20

My Town

Posted on September 7, 2016 by ehurst

We moved often in my childhood, and quite far at times. While most of it was somewhere in Oklahoma, it did range out to Four Corners once. Up through my current adult life, I’ve lived as far west as Salem, OR; as far north as Anchorage, AK; as far east as Seminole, OK; and as far south as the area of Madisonville, TX.

03signI’m going to tell you that Midwest City is not that special. I am particularly unhappy with the municipal government. I’ve had enough dealings with them to know that they are relentlessly middle-class materialists. They invite you to comment and open their meetings, but those meetings are all structured to accommodate the upper middle class only, in the sense that they won’t even register dissent that doesn’t fit into their plans. So if you have a truly substantive complaint against their cultural orientation, it’s as if you said nothing at all. They aren’t particularly arrogant, just restrained by tunnel vision.

Recently the city announced plans to revitalize some of the suburban decay. The old Original Mile will be tarted up a bit. That link takes you to a story featuring an aerial view from the west side of the area under discussion. That’s the large plot of land bought by a speculator who heard that the huge prairie just south of there was slated for a Douglas Aircraft plant back in the 1930s.TinkerShoppingMWC It was eventually called the Midwest Air Depot. Along with a few other companies, Douglas geared up for WW2 and the Air Force moved in some folks to coordinate. Eventually the Air Force took over the place.

Thanks to Rose State College Foundation (used under CC 2.0)

Thanks to Rose State College Foundation (used under CC 2.0)

The Original Mile used to host a large patch of two-story apartment buildings (right), which was the first place Veloyce and I lived after our wedding in 1978. Those buildings are long gone, replaced by the current massive shopping center that faces the northern end of Tinker AFB (above left).

07oldnhood This Original Mile is all looping streets with mostly aircraft company names in some semblance of alphabetical order. I don’t recall seeing an “A” but we had Boeing, Curtiss, Douglas, Ercoupe, Fairchild, Grumman, Harmon, Jacobs, Kittyhawk, Marshall, Northrup, etc. Somehow the northwest corner ended up with botanical names, but what matters most is how easily you could get lost if you didn’t have a map.

04mainbldgAside from what was originally a handful of useful stores along the first row facing SE 29th Street, there was a second group built along SE 15th that still stands today, called the Uptown Center. The big anchor store in the main building was TG&Y, which space is now occupied by Langston’s Western Wear. TG&Y faded starting in the 1970s. Behind the main building stood a Sears auto garage and a military surplus store.

02centerstripThe center building faced out onto Key Boulevard, opposite what was for a very long time our main post office (now Sherwin-Williams paint).01frmrpostoffice I spent a lot of money in the shops that once occupied this strip: sporting goods, boot repair, even a cheap jewelry store where I bought a pocket watch and carried for years.

05lockeFinally, the far western building was an IGA grocery store until that company lost their suburban market share. Actually, the place was run out of business by the aggressive and hateful practices of Nick Harroz, deceased founder of Crest Foods. That man bullied the city government to keep the competition out. He died and his heirs sold the business to some big faceless corporation, but to this day, the old main store management is pretty ugly with certain classes of customers. For example, he hates cyclists. This guy put the bike rack out at the base of their sign next to the sidewalk, as far as possible from the building, as a way of making sure cyclists know they aren’t welcome. Meanwhile, as previously noted Locke Plumbing and Electrical now occupies the old IGA store.

06journalbldgFinally, just for fun, I took a picture of the historic Journal Building, which is opposite Locke on SE 15th and faces out on Key Boulevard. The news company that built it went of business long ago and I can’t find any references to them. I do know that the local county welfare services used it until the renovation, and now it stands empty. The renovation was mostly making the bricks dark.

Oddly, I think this prissy sprucing up of the city won’t go to waste, because our local economy is actually doing rather well. The greater OKC Metro seems to be growing, with vast acreages of McMansions under construction expanding out from the core in all directions for dozens of miles. OKC alone encompasses more than the county, and at last count holds some 620 square miles. Midwest City is the largest eastern suburb. It’s not a bad place to live.

Posted in personal | Tagged , , | Comments Off on My Town

Cycling: Western Hills

Posted on September 6, 2016 by ehurst

As always, click on any image to see it full-sized. CTRL-click will open the image in a separate browser tab.

01krausroadToday it was more about getting the exercise, so it’s a cycling post with a few pictures. Because I still can’t really go all that far, I’m trying to find some back roads I hadn’t seen before. I went north on Air Depot to NE 10th, west to Sooner Road, north to NE 23rd and then west again to Bartell Road.02chontam I was hoping, but while it was pleasant enough, there was nothing picturesque there. It ended at NE 50th, and I took a short zigzag up to Krause Road where I saw a couple of interesting scenes.03krausjunk There was supposed to be a nifty Buddhist garden up there, but at some time in the recent past it was fenced off and made private. I thought it odd that a junk yard was next door to the garden.

05ffmonumentBack out on NE 50th, I headed west toward the museums and the Katy Trail. This was to make sure I hit some good, solid climbs. Of course, I had to shift down pretty low, but I wanted the right knee to get all the work it could stand. Climbing up the Firefighter Museum, today I decided to stop and take some pictures from the foot of that strange statue that stands out on the end of a ridge.04lincolngolf06zoolake Maneuvering around the walls of honor, in one direction was this view across a steep draw at the Lincoln Golf Course (left). On the other side was a nice shot of the lake adjacent to the big zoo (right). That also puts them in proper arrangement with where I saw them from the memorial.

Heading south, the golf course was very busy this morning.07canebrake There was and a rather long line of golf carts waiting at the first tee, and people lined up on each successive tee waiting for some previous party to clear. To slow things even more, the groundskeepers were all over the place. Farther south past the OK National Guard HQ and the OKC Public Schools storage depot was this lovely cane brake across the trail.08wildblossoms I heard numerous whispering voices as I rode through, so I turned to take a picture. Just a short distance farther began the heavy sweet scent of these lovely white flowering vines. For something like 3 miles these things were everywhere on both sides, thickly covering whatever grew or stood there along the path.

09ncanse4thDespite the awful racket from the interstate highway below, I paused briefly where NE 4th crosses over. Farther along I spotted a couple of scruffy fellows trudging along the sandy trails the parallel the river banks. They were carrying a couple of loaded t-shirt bags that appeared to be from the Metro Petro down on ML King near Reno Avenue. An awful lot of beggars stand near the interstate highway ramps there or somewhere close to the intersections of the surface streets. The North Canadian flow had receded again to expose a lot of newly positioned sandbars, as this view from the bridge on NE 4th shows. By the time I got home, I was whipped. It was a good workout, 15 miles with some long and steep hills.

Posted in cycling | Comments Off on Cycling: Western Hills

Photography: Labor Day Ride

Posted on September 5, 2016 by ehurst

As always, click on any image to see it full-sized. CTRL-click will open the image in a separate browser tab.

01LamaRanchThe ride was good exercise and my knee is getting more used to it, as you might expect. However, there was no real adventure here in terms of riding. Rather, I felt drawn to head up through Spencer and back on NE 63rd to Air Depot. Another mile north and taking one detour up a dead end road, and I eventually headed back home down Midwest Boulevard.02RiverNorth Instead of regaling you with descriptions of the images, I feel the need to let them speak for themselves, and simply give you some idea where they are taken. My talent means nothing if these images don’t speak a wordless message to your heart. I will tell you that the first image (above left) is a lama ranch in Spencer, since you may not recognize that critter’s profile hiding behind the tree.

03RiverSouth04ExtractionLakeThese are in the vicinity of NE 63rd and Midwest Boulevard, around where the North Canadian crosses NE 63rd. This is that spot where the river valley is very broad in all directions.

05UphillPasture07OldSchoohouseThe next pair were taken farther west from the major intersection. That’s the old Sunshine Schoolhouse again. The new owner cleared it and cleaned it up a bit, then left it for the weeds to take over again.

08RanchDraw09RanchTopTurning north on Air Depot, then right on NE 66th revealed a lovely hilltop horse ranch. The horses included a lot of paints that were frisky and playful as I passed.

10Horses11SteelFarmJust about everywhere you look out in the area are horse pastures and pens over varying sizes. I’ve never seen a horse quite that shade of gray; it was actually somewhat blue, but the camera didn’t pick that up.

06HillyRanchThe hills can be pretty steep in places, considering this is Oklahoma.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments Off on Photography: Labor Day Ride

Call on Him

Posted on September 4, 2016 by ehurst

It’s the biggest compliment you can offer.

Our culture arises from Western feudalism, where a man’s pride and glory was in the property he owned, and the power he wielded. The more important he is, the less important others are to him. Thus, we are all used to petty bureaucrats flexing their importance and reminding us of our impotence. Debase yourself and beg, and maybe they’ll pay attention when the mood strikes them.

That’s totally different from the culture of the Bible. In Ancient Near Eastern feudal culture, a man’s power and glory rested on the number of dependents who served in his household. More people calling on him to exercise his power meant higher prestige. It was blessing that others came to you for help. In fact, a man who had to train up servants to sift through all the petitions brought into his courts was very important, indeed.

Call on Him; He takes it as a blessing when we seek His face.

Posted in teaching | Tagged , | Comments Off on Call on Him

Psalm 116

Posted on September 3, 2016 by ehurst

Still reviewing the “Hallel Psalms” used with Passover, this one is unique in the collection — it was originally composed as an intensely personal individual experience. However, it’s not hard to see how it calls on the nation to enter into that experience as a reflection of all the trials of the Exodus.

Who could be unmoved by the devotion of others to our welfare? Well, Our God is a Person, as well, and He defines the quality of faithfulness we love in others. He is the source and ultimate symbol of what makes every child warmly embrace his or her own parents. When I cry, God hears. Why should I go to anyone else?

We might struggle to recount the sorrows we’ve seen, but God was there in the midst of them. He stands ready to deliver. We say these words often, but far too many people have their minds closed off to the deep moral awareness of their hearts. When your heart becomes the seat of your awareness, you cannot avoid sensing the full weight of His divine Presence. You know He’s there and will deliver you; there is no doubt that He cares beyond all comprehension.

And even if someone lacked the broad sense of worldly wisdom, when their hearts rule their minds, the pure simplicity of moral focus will carry them through. God watches of them as if they were the greatest men on this earth. There are times when all the erudition in the world won’t help you, but a pure heart that rules can carry you through Hell.

So the psalmist calls for his soul to stop panicking and just return to that place of peace, because the Lord’s redemption is so overwhelmingly generous and sure. Every flaw of our human existence is more than matched by His power and mercy. Death has to wait until God is ready for us; meanwhile, He wipes our tears and gives us traction to march on His mission. With such gracious provision, we are eager to carry His banner before the whole world.

In verse 10 the word for “I believed” is better translated as moral certainty. It comes from the image of nurturing something with constant long-term care; it’s a faith that is unshakable because God is the one who is faithful. With that kind of commitment binding us to the Lord, we would be eager to relate at length to anyone who will listen, how God carried us through our own personal exodus from slavery. By comparison, we are quick to confess our cynicism about human nature, even our own nature.

How could we possibly repay His kindness? What could we give that God did not give to us first? So in His divine Presence, we worship and share with Him the sweet wine of deliverance. Not merely for show, but we will humbly and publicly render to Him whatever offering and service is mentioned in the covenant by which we have vowed to serve Him. And typical of any real shepherd sheikh, God counts as His most precious resource the people of His living domain. When any of them perish, it’s a big loss.

How fortunate we are to count ourselves slaves born in His household, yet He adopted us as His own children. So the full accounting of what He demands is our minimum return to Him. We will gladly set the example for others, to encourage and provoke them to the same ardor in serving Him. Let us all keep each other honest in upholding the covenant.

Posted in bible | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Psalm 116