There is something strange happening in the world. Part 2

So, what can we do? I believe that the only thing that we can do, is trust that God wants what’s best for us, and do our best to be our best, towards ourselves, each other and the world. I cannot believe in some final judgment where the saved go to heaven and sinners go to hell. There is no way for me to reconcile this with the idea of a good God. Not if God also is omnipotent. I don’t understand how an omnipotent, good god could make/let even the worst person in the history of mankind suffer forever. But I’m open to the possibility that there is something I don’t understand here.

What I do feel is important right now however, is that we do our best to be our best. Not because of some reward or punishment down the road, but because this is what God calls us to do. Because it is what is going to give us the best possible outcomes, and because there might be some hard lessons in store for us otherwise. 

I wish to interject that being our best, does not mean to be flawless. On the contrary, being our best often means to accept and embrace ourselves as flawed creatures fully. To allow ourselves to make mistakes and accept that we sometimes act against our own interests. Because this is part of being human.

So maybe, just maybe, this is not a time where God will let fire rain down on earth in a literal sense, where the saved will get to live in paradise, while sinners will face eternal suffering. Maybe this is rather the time where we really start seeing that living for our own selfish interests and instant gratifications will do nothing good for anyone. Maybe this is a time where we finally see our madness and confusion for what they are and choose to let go of them. 

And I don’t know. Maybe in the end it is as simple as letting go of fear and embracing love. But maybe things are a little more complicated than people make them as well. Maybe we don’t have to be afraid of anything. But maybe, when it comes to certain things that we need to let go of, we will find a few things that are rather difficult to do so with. Maybe things that we have made parts of our identity and that we are very defensive about. I know that this has been the case for me. And it took som pretty deep soul searching to see these things and how they affected my life and ultimately who I was as a person.

There is something strange happening in the world. Part 1

In New Age circles there is talk about “The Ascension Process”. In more biblical contexts, people are talking about “the apocalypse”, “armageddon” or “the end-times”. 

Personally, I find labels like this one problematic, since labels bring with them certain ideas and expectations, exclude others, brings some to the forefront and others to the back. 

A very common human trait seems to be that we want to know. And we don’t just want to know. We want to belong to the group that knows something that the others do not. This is of course one of the many ways that the ego tricks us and I don’t think that we can say “I don’t know” enough these days.

But I find it interesting to look at the ideas of the Ascension Process and The Apocalypse together. Because both of them have some merit. 

On the one hand, we have a huge amount of people reporting strange things happening with them, that seem to point to some magnificent revelation of us being much more than we seem, when we perceive the world through our physical bodies with our physical senses. I’m one of those people.

On the other hand, we have enough biblical end-times prophecies coming true that I believe it warrants at least enough concern, that we cannot just brush it off lightly. We of course have the verse from Matthew that says “You will hear of wars and rumors of wars.” We also have several places in the Bible, where it is talked about how people are going to be in the end-times. One usch place is Timothy 3:2-4: “People will be selfish, greedy, boastful, and conceited; they will be insulting, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, and irreligious; ³ they will be unkind, merciless, slanderers, violent, and fierce; they will hate the good; ⁴ they will be treacherous, reckless, and swollen with pride; they will love pleasure rather than God.”

I’m not saying this to condemn anyone. I don’t think people are this way because they are bad. And these are all traits that I myself wrestle with. And… I’m actually going to write something completely different here than I thought. I honestly don’t think that these traits are more prevalent today than in Jesus’ times. It’s just that we recognize them as something bad today and we actually have a bigger chance of catching a glimpse of who we really are today than in ancient times. So this could actually be a prophecy that is unequivocally positive throughout. People are as they’ve always been, but now they have a chance to see it and recognize it as something that doesn’t make either themselves or anyone else happy. 

I guess that I believe that we can’t just condemn everything that belong to the category of New Age as bad or evil, because I’ve seen how this stuff works and how it is helping me to become a better person. Besides, what has been crammed into this labe is everything from letting go of negative emotional energy, to tarot cards and astrology, to channeling and contact with spirit guides.  

My slow insights

There is something strange going on in the world. I see it out there and in my life. And for some, everything seems to fall into place fast. For me, it has been a very slow ride. Partially, it’s because I’m very cautious about believing things that I don’t have sufficient reasons to believe. I don’t know if this is always a good thing. Because I believe that it often gets in my way of letting go and just trust. 

Another, definitely more negative reason, is that I’ve been dragging my heels when it comes to my self development. I’ve been slipping back into old habits, procrastinated and made excuses for it. 

But maybe this is how it should be. You see, I’m going through some sort of spiritual process. Within Spiritual / New Age circles, there is talk about the Ascension Process, which is supposed to be a global shift in consciousness. I’ve been studying this a lot, because there is something big happening. But it could also be the apocalypse. The one in the Book of Revelations. It could be both (this is what I’m leaning towards), because it is by no means certain that the darker aspects of the Book of Revelations are to be taken literally. Apocalypse means something akin to unveiling or disclosure (the literal translation is “from cover”, which makes little sense unless you know the intended meaning).

The most common scholarly approach, is that it was written in a cryptic way to pass under the radar of oppressive Roman authorities. This I believe to be at least partially wrong, but I won’t get into detail about it. I just believe that it’s worth bearing in mind when our speculations start to move towards some violent end of everything.

So, why did I suddenly fly off into this area? Well, because I want to document, as truthfully as possible, the process that I’m going through. Because something is definitely happening with me. And with other people. And the world. And maybe things in my process are just the way they should be. Maybe they are slow, so that I really have time to see what is going on and analyse it. So that I can truly see all the pitfalls that I fall into, why I fall into them, what they mean and how they affect me. 

And maybe I won’t be able to speak to people that find the more esoteric stuff hard to swallow, unless I’m truly one of those people. Just a thought.