Category Archives: Theology
The Man Job (Debates Us)
The man Job who represents all of Humanity our challenges and potential, stands ready teach us about the way to have understood the Biblical narrative.
The Man Job who lived 2000 years before the birth of Jesus Savior of the Humanity, but after His work.
The Man Job before the Jew and Gentile divides and doctrines of election.
The Man Job before Law, Moses, Temple, Priests, Augustine, Calvin Luther and Arminius , a gentile Known by the Living God.
The Man Job not dead spiritually as some have taught, The Man Job seen by God as upright and blameless.
The Man Job a Representative of us all, stands ready to teach us from antiquity the weakness of our Theology.
The Man Job is ready to teach us, but no longer as the self-righteous friends protecting their pet Orthodoxies.
ANZAHOLYMAN
much more to follow
Fixed Horizons & New Perspectives
One of the things I find myself doing more and more lately, is observing how I Perceive & Understand the world around me. It goes with saying that my Perceptions affect my ability to truly learn and change. This is I am sure closely related to my desire to see beyond the Fixed Horizons I have built up over the years. Most of these fixed Horizons to my dismay are constructed more of fiction than fact, although for many years I have been loath to admit it.
This for me has been most acute in the area of Theology, which for many years I treated as an exact science rather than the art form it really is. There is a reason why the Theology Department at a liberal arts college, is not found in the Science Building. Because Theology uses some of the same tools of logic and language, I just Assumed it carried with it the same weight.
So let me tell you what changed, I simply stopped treating the study of an Infinite God as a Fixed Horizon. More importantly I stopped being fearful of questions that challenged by heretofore untouchable understanding and perceptions. If there is one thing I am most thankful for in this Post Modern Age of Derrida, Rob Bell, Peter Rollins, and a whole host of new thinkers. Is the courage by which these women and men ask questions that challenge Orthodoxy which holds the idea and assumption that it alone has the right of succession. Because after all only the Old Questions and the assumptive answers discovered in ages past, can rightly be called the Truth. It reminds me of how Dear Leader is chosen in North Korea, did anyone doubt it wasn’t going to be a Jong boy child?
Of course these types of environments are dangerous to challenge but without any credible threat other than a seven letter word (heretic), the questions are out of the bag. With the result that our passionate pursuit of God might actually begin to look like something, more than just a fortified castle with moat and burning oil included.
Let me give you an example from the other day, I had always assumed back in my Calvinist day, that Adam died spiritually in the Garden with Eve. Then one day I heard someone ask a question that would challenge all my Fixed Horizons. What if He only died Physically and it was His perceptions that changed His ability to see God clearly? Wow then man being born to die and go to hell was just a perception based on an assumption, pretending to be a Fixed Horizon.
What would my theology look like if God still thought it was all Good and the process is one of restoration, rather than a courtroom with God demanding payment for being offended?
What if God is Love?
What if I was partly or completely wrong?
So my New Perceptions and Assumptions are no more fixed than theirs, and are based on the Fluid Horizon of What if. I have discovered and infinite God there who Loves me, a God who must be forever discovered, Horizon over Horizon over Horizon! I have discovered faith again and the actual need for grace in the face of my ignorance, with eyes wide open.
ANZAHOLYMAN
Theology in PENCIL.
I came to the protestant faith in the early 70′s, and right off the bat I was introduced to Rational Theology which was treated as a science. This led to very lively debate and a thirst to discover a faith that was beyond question. A faith that could stand up to any intellectual challenge, one in which I was right and could prove it.
So I found myself knee-deep in Francis Shaffer, Josh McDowell and Walter Martin, just to name a few. Eventually I embraced Calvinism because on the face of it, it looked like the most airtight theology available.
I can remember feeling so confident as I explained why the vast majority of humanity would spend an eternity being tortured in hell’s fire, and I still got a good nights sleep. Then slowly God began to chip away at my bullet proof theological Positions and my passion for winning an argument and being right.
Slowly I began to see that my God had become very small and His love reduced, to Rational arguments about Limited Atonement and a Justice that just wasn’t very Just. Furthermore I began to realize that I knew so little about the actual Love of God, that my previous confidence in all things Rational lost its objective reality. Then I began to read those I had previously judged as heretics, an destined for Hell for rejecting “The revealed truth about God’s word.”
I began to see that being a follower of Christ was far more than being right about what I thought I knew and could debate about God and His Universe. I know however have found myself in the position of seeing all Theology a merely speculative, and Love as God’s highest truth. Now all my theology I write in pencil, just in case I learn something more about my Infinite Father God. Some are very concerned for me some even question my salvation, but I have found a relationship that is far beyond the intellectual rationalization of God and His word.
I have discovered beauty and wisdom in the teachings of a mixed bag of thinkers, rebels and other’s heretics. I now consider my theology and open book one I dare not close, for fear of thinking I got it figured all out.
ANZAHOLYMAN
“Jesus” The ONLY Way for EVERYONE…
“No man comes to The Father but by me” Jesus
So I have a question, because Jesus said this how should we understand His words?
Did Jesus mean – people must come through him via the Doctrines and Graces of the Catholic Church?
Did Jesus mean – the Confession and Full Baptism method made popular in the 20th and 21st centuries?
Did Jesus mean – a Proper understanding of the Theological implications of Atonement and Justification?
OR
Did Jesus mean – His cosmic role as Savior of The Whole World, because it is all held together by the Power of His word.
Did Jesus Mean – He has reopened the entrance of Heaven by defeating the Prince of the Power of the Air, and lead captivity captive.
Did Jesus mean – That he has caused a heavenly shfit and now the grave at some point in the future will release all mankind, that they might stand before the living God to give account for the life they where intrusted with.
What ever he meant by what He said it is my opinion, that we should always understand such teachings from the point of view as Him being Co-Creator and Savior of the world, and not one particular and narrow religious or theological Point of View.
ANZAHOLYMAN
Unity in Loves Diversity
The season is fast approaching where we will have to be Unified for All mankind.
The Solitary age is coming to a close and the Unity of Loves Diversity is upon us.
A simple observation will reveal that trillions of dollars have been made off the illusion of Separateness, and Superiority of all kinds religious, cultural and racial.
Now that system is on the verge of collapse and the truth is,
YOU CAN”T HAVE ALL, AND ITS NOT ABOUT YOU!
You can have all the love you could possible posses, and all the relationships that builds up others and the Joy of truly being like God.
Creativity is still free but the Creativity that has been misused to control and manipulate others, is coming to an end.
So much humanity wasted on more than we could ever use, we must unite against the old paradigms as we unify and create a new world, a Christ centered one. Not the Christ of theology from the imagination of fallible men, but rather the Christ at the center of a new earth, bigger than any Religion, Race or Creed.
The closer we get to the time of Unity in Loves diversity and the end of the age of Greed and Raw power, the more true power will shift in favor of “Unity in Loves Diversity.”
They have killed so many voices of Unity and yet God still persists and now a paradigm shift is here. War as a means of profit must come to and end, the people must say no more and the voices are rising. How much wealth of all kinds wasted on the tools of War, there must be another way “Love your Enemies.”
The prophet Isaiah spoke of this time, a time when those who divide for profit will be brought low.
When as Jesus taught so often that the first shall be last and the Last shall be first.
There is no escape my friends Paradise will be here, but only for those who will share with their fellow-man. Hear the call and reach out and you will find provision where others are only finding the end of the ways of greed and the Individual divine.
The Kingdom of God is going to manifest not on Paper or in Cathedrals but in the Fields and Forests.
God is looking for those who believe “Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will be Done.”
ANZAHOLYMAN
Isaiah 11
The Branch From Jesse
1 A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;
from his roots a Branch will bear fruit.
2 The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—
the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and of might,
the Spirit of the knowledge and fear of the LORD—
3and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.
He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,
or decide by what he hears with his ears;
4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy,
with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.
He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;
with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked.
5 Righteousness will be his belt
and faithfulness the sash around his waist.
6 The wolf will live with the lamb,
the leopard will lie down with the goat,
the calf and the lion and the yearling together;
and a little child will lead them.
7 The cow will feed with the bear,
their young will lie down together,
and the lion will eat straw like the ox.
8 The infant will play near the cobra’s den,
and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest.
9 They will neither harm nor destroy
on all my holy mountain,
for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the LORD
as the waters cover the sea.
