Close, But No Cigar

Especially for us younger generation, the thoughts, ideas, and daydreams of romance, marriage, and love tend to be rather at the forefront of our minds.

Just admit it.

We can give lots of good, solid biblical reason for it, and lots of them are truly legit.

But what about the world? Lately I have kinda been wondering at the vast obsession of lovers and romance, physical, and emotional. Being ' in love ' is right next door to being ' in heaven '.

Why the hype? Honestly, relationships can be painful, and the world usually tend to try to ward off pain with a ten foot stick slathered in GMO's and Corn Syrup. They are always looking for the ultimate romance, the ultimate fill in the next lover, the next moonlight night, the next long kiss, the next .... yeah, I'll stop there.

 But despite all the hearts and arrows, I think the rest of the world might be closer to the answer than they, or we, realize.

We tend to bash the rest of the world for being so obsessed with romance and love (again, emotional and physical) that we miss the vast point that drives the whole situation, and it puts the world in a different light altogether. And in fact, many of them got the boat while we flounder in the water after missing the pier completely.

God says that he instituted marriage - romance and the whole sheebang included - as a picture of the relationship between Christ and his church. A picture of our relationship with God.

Relationships.

Romances are really about relationships. Deep, loving, caring, relationships.

For the unsaved person, that is as good as it gets in this world - they have no relationships with God, so the next best thing is with each-other.

They actually got closer to the heart message of life than many of us Christians. They have found (even if they don't realize it) that nothing is quite as good as a good relationship.

And what do most of us Christians harp over way too often?

Say it....

Rules.

Can't have tattoos. Can't go out dates. Can't have boyfriends. Can't wear makeup. Can't drink.

You know the lineup - all the things we harp and obsess over, and have a hissyfit around when someone else disagrees, or even worse, crosses the line, because we all know the world will cease to orbit the sun, the mountain will cave in, and the seas will turn to molten magma if the Jones' decide to drink a beer on the lawn.

Now don't get me wrong - I am never saying rules are a bad thing, by a long stretch, I am just saying that the Christian world tends to hang limbo there and squawk at anyone who doesn't have their monkey-bars spaced the same distance apart.

But it is so much more than that.

Christianity is about nothing more than relationships, and how Christ came to ultimately fix our broken relationship with him, and we can then have good relationships with everyone else down here because of our relationship with him.

Sure, there are rules - God made them, so I can't exactly argue can I? Of course we need to obey them.
Just saying.

But one of the biggest reason why we are commanded not to sin, is that it ruins our relationship with God. It was our sin in the garden that ruined our relationship with God in the first place.

See? The world, in all their sensual driven madness, was close, so close, to the ultimate answer. They know (for the most part....) that it can't be in stuff - even big boys with their big boy toys want to have their guy and girl friends out with them on the water and on the dunes.

They just missed who the relationship is with.

We happen to know, and can benefit from that relationship in more ways than we yet know, but we certainly have no right to look down on the world for their drive towards romance.

They know, and are trying as hard as they can to find the ultimate relationship, but can't because the only ultimate relationship is to be had with God - any other relationship will eventually let you down.

They are so close.

But, quoth the old adage, no cigar.

The Top Ten Myths About Country Life - Debunked

Ok, this post has been floating about in my mind now for a while, and at last, I am bringing it down to earth and to the cybernook I call my blog.

So, I have found there is a lot of hype about the country life, and whether you know it or not, a lot you believe about living in the country probably isn't true - unless of course you already live there, in which case you should relate to this post marvelously.

Ready for them? I wish I could arrange these in 10 - 1 order, but I cant decide in which order they should go. I will however save the biggest myth for the last - nice little climax. :)

So here we go -The Top Ten myths about the Country.

#10 -  Everybody is nice and polite in the country
Ha, I so wish this was true, but no, to do that, we would have to eliminate all people - which would make country living rather hard wouldn't it?
I have heard of, and met, my share of country jerks, and while they might not be in the same quantities as un the city, oh boy do they exist.

#9 - Everybody in the country listens to country music.
This is one is debatable as to whether or not it is preferable, but no, certainly not true. I have heard a good share of everything else out in my neck of the woods.
Granted, I would say country music is preferred out here, but is not unanimous across the board.

#8 - Everybody in the country dun be dumb rednecks.
Ok, just because you know me doesn't mean you can judge the rest of us that way. :D
But really, my neighbor, plus one guy I know pretty well up the road, are engineers at Boeing. Seriously. They have some serious smarts up there, and the country is littered with people who are far brighter than you ever dreamed a pair of simple jeans and t-shirt could hold.

Speaking of which .....

#7 - Everybody in the country wears jeans, or overalls.
I have seen a wide variety of clothes out here, from jeans, to overalls, to coveralls, to shorts, shorts so short you cant even call them shorts anymore, Khakis, skinny jeans, jeans with so many holes there is more holes than jeans, dress pants, yeah. It's all here. Jeans certainly have center stage, but again, is not unanimous.

#6 -  Everybody in the country has cows and chickens at the very least.
Dead wrong. Me and my neighbor are the only ones on our street that has chickens. Cows appear about once every two blocks. You would not believe the amount of people who move out here just to get some land and make it look nice, then just sit at it and stare at it. Literally. There are tons of people out my way who have no animals besides dogs, and maybe a stray barn cat or two.

#5 - Goats are these lovely quiet animals that stand still to be milked, and sheep are docile and follow the shepherd quietly wherever he goes.

Let me inform you.

When Christ compared Christians to sheep, that wasn't exactly a compliment. Sheep are scatterbrained, dumb, do whatever everybody else is doing, even if it is dumber than what they are presently doing, are obsessed with food, and can get so scared they will literally kill themselves.

Sound familiar?

Oh, and when he compared the unsaved to goats - Ha - depending on the goat, that could be a flat out insult. Of course Christ wasn't insulting people - goats are actually a very god word picture of unsaved people - It's just that goats in real life are so downright .... (thinking of nice word...) .... Evil.

I have heard stories of nice, quiet, behaving goats, kinda like all those rumors you hear about dragons in Antarctica.



And yes, they will eat anything.

Goats will intentionally look for ways to do what you know you don't want them to do, and you can see them calculating in their minds how much longer they can pull off their mischief until you get to them.

I plain out don't like goats, and sheep are ok - for their purpose.

The way I see it, there is a reason God said sheep are going to Heaven, and goats are going to Hell.

Just saying.  



#4 - We live on Ham, steak, mashed potatoes, fried chicken, and home-baked pies.
Oh Golly I wish. I would be one happy dude - imagine all that meat..... Oh yeah, I could do that - if I was flat out rich.

#3 - We spend the evenings sitting on the front porch and watch the sunset.
Like, never.
We are usually busy feeding animals at that time - everyday. Silly things need feeding regularly.
Some of us don't even have a front porch. We do, and it even has a swing in it, but we hardly ever get to use it. :)

#2 - We all have rocking chairs on the front porch.
Literally, the last time I saw a legit rocking chair was at Cracker Barrel.  Nuff Said.

Ready for the  #1 Myth about the country life? This might surprise you.

ROOSTERS DON'T CROW AT THE SUNRISE.

They just don't. Know why?

Because they crow ALL. THE. TIME.  - I heard one crow at 3:00 A.M once. They crow in the morning. They crow in the evening. They crow anytime in-between they feel like it. They just crow.

Honestly, I really have no idea where this one came from, because it is so far out there, it just simply had to be nearly made up out of someones head. Someone woke up, heard the rooster crow, and just randomly decided that the rooster had to be crowing at the sun, because he obviously wasn't crowing at the llama.

Or something like that...


So there they are! All ten of them, debunked. Country like just ain't what it's all chalked up to be.

Got any other country myths that your backwoods life has debunked? I would love to hear them!

Unsafe

From time to time for sheer amusements sake and for just 'keeping tabs on the culture', I watch videos on youtube where people argue about gun control. The majority I see are Piers Morgan vs. _____, and most of them follow the same basic blueprint.

 

Anti-gunner says world would be safer if nobody only law enforcement had guns, or make guns ridiculously hard to get a hold of. Gun advocate throws in a few statistics about how things are safer with guns, and proceeds to get adamant about their guns and their constitutional rights, ending in a stereo-typical 'you can have my guns one round at a time' statement. 

Piers rightly states that most gun advocates that get on that type of show all do that, with little variation. He appears to be dead right. 

Of course, the gun advocates are usually right in their analysis, when it comes to statistics, motivations, etc., but  over and over again, it seems to me that they miss the real mark. There is a real point, way deep down past the layers of anti-gunners arguments, rules, and TV talk shows. 

The real nugget? The real deal behind guns, drugs, teen drivers, and cattle ranchers?

They (Fill in that Pronoun with your party of choice) think they can make the world safe. They think that with all their rules, regulations, and lack of freedom, keeping the law-abiding citizen tacked to his chair in an attempt to pin the criminal, that somehow, someway, the world will be safe.     

Safe.

Oh the word, they roll it around in their mouth in sheer joy at it's sound. They harp on it daily, as a matter of fact. Gun control is worth it - stiffer driving laws are worth it - higher taxes for 'better' schools are worth it - if they can only keep one person safe. 

I have been thinking on this, and I want to see if I can put this question, this issue, to rest in one fell swoop, because the answer is not what it may at first appear.  

Fear is a deadly thing, and to be honest, it drives most people. Fear of looking bad in front of their friends. Fear of losing money in the stock market. Fear of being hurt. Fear of pain. Fear of insignificance. Fear of insecurity. Fear of fear itself. 

In this case, fear of un-safety. ( I just found out that isn't a word..... oh well.)

In the New Captain America (review coming sometime.... I hope..) there is a stunning line.

Nick Fury has just finished telling Cap how they are about to launch their next step in anti-terrorism - basically to kill anyone who might even be the tiniest possibility of a terrorist with massive souped-up drones. 

Cap: I thought the punishment came after the crime?

Nick: Here at Shield we take the world as it is, not as we like it to be.

Cap: By holding a gun to everybody's head and calling it freedom.   

Freedom is the other side of the coin. 

Freedom is never safe. Total safety is never free. Think about it. If you have the freedom to cut yourself if you pick up that knife sitting next to you, there is a slight risk in that freedom. You just might be dumb and cut yourself. If, however, that knife is removed, technically you no longer have the freedom to hurt yourself with that knife, and again, technically the risk is gone. You are safe now, right? 

The world is scared stiff of getting hurt and getting rubbed wrong, so of course the way to make everybody safe is to make sure that no-one is free. 

The bad guys in Cap 2 ( no spoilers out there for those who haven't yet seen it ) say in the movie that the world can't be trusted with its own freedom - they have to take it away to make it safe. 

Sure, freedom is scary. It means someone might use their freedom to do you harm. They might use their freedom to do something you don't like. The list goes on of things that they could do with their freedom that are potentially harmful, and the quick and obvious solution is to just take away all freedom - far, far safer that way. 

The militia, or even worse, the rabble minded public at large, might decide to storm the capital if capitol hill does something they decide is dumb, therefore lets just make things much safer and remove all public guns. Oh yes, that's better. Safe....

All you gun-toters and conservatives out there, pause just a second though. Don't get yourself too saddled up on your high-horse there. You ain't off the hook either.  

Christ commands us to love. Love unconditionally as a matter of fact, and unconditional love is unsafe. 

It's hard, admit it. 

Ladies, if you do the right thing and don't snap back when your husband is rude to you and run roughshod and (gasp!) unloving over your life, and love him back and serve him, it means he still has the potential to keep on doing it. And that hurts. Are you going to keep loving him? Serving him? 

Guys, when she is disrespecting you, not honoring you, loving her when she is being nasty and a bit of a jerk is not second nature. Being loving keeps you open to more hurt, more pain. 

It's so much easier to take away their freedom to hurt you, by merely walling yourself up, and being unloving back.    

So much safer. 

And that is ultimately why tyranny is wrong - it is the ultimate version of distrust and lack of love. One man in a big chair thinks that to keep himself and his rule safe and happy, he must keep the entire nation under his heavy and blood stained thumb, because freedom is far, far to dangerous. Any and all freedom is a threat to him, so it must all go. Every last bit of freedom.

But Christ knew this, and still left those around him free. Free to hurt him, free to kill him - and kept loving them even when they did. 

And he had total freedom to wall them all off, blast them all to smithereens, and bring the world back down to serene safety. 

Oh that word is starting to bug me...... maybe that is why I like guns without safety's.... That thought literally just came through my mind. Odd.    

Anyway, he didn't do any of that. He used his freedom to love them back, and ultimately, that freedom and love, is what makes us free today, and what makes us love him today. 

Odd isn't it? Without freedom, we cant love. If God never gave us freedom to hate him, we would never actually have the choice to love him. To make the conscious choice one way, there has to be the possibility, and the freedom, of turning the opposite way. 

And that is one of the reasons why I think we should have no other laws besides the biblical laws, because then, and only then, are we being totally loving to our neighbor. I don't believe we should have stupid laws that try to keep ourselves safe from other peoples stupidity. 

Like age limits on driving and owning guns. Really?  Just have the laws in place to punish them if they actually do do something biblically worthy of punishment from the state. Like killing somebody. 

But hey, whatcha know, the Bible has laws on how to deal with that. 

Lets not have anymore of these laws that make the cops come out and play sandbox mediator when we have a fender bender, so nobody can ever be taken advantage of by a jerk who insists it was your fault he hit your bumper, and takes off down the road, leaving you having to now repair your car. 

It's just a big-fat case of not really loving your neighbor. 

But lets be a little more down home shall we?

Let's no longer wall everybody off who is hurting us, be unloving, because that is the easiest way to keep us and our emotions safe. 

Lets instead be open - be loving - be ready to be hurt, be ready to be taken advantage of, be ready for humiliation, be content with things being 'unsafe',  because then, and only then, are we really, truly, loving.