Love one another!

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength […] Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30-31). 

In these two commandments, Jesus summarizes his whole message. But how often do we really live by it?

What do we answer to questions such as the following: Am I really doing my best to practice non-judgment and forgiveness in all situations? In most? At least towards those closest to me? How do I view those that are different from me? That think differently from me? How do I view people that have the “wrong” opinions? If a brother came to me in sincere repentance and confessed his sins, would I be able to meet him/her in unconditional love no matter what he/she confessed? Would my capacity for unconditional love be affected by whether what he/she confessed affected me personally or not?

When I’m being honest with myself, I’m forced to admit that I’m often unable to follow even the most basic teachings of Jesus and the Bible. And yet I’m often off into all kinds of more or less advanced speculations about right and wrong. I try to figure out what logically must follow from this and that, while ignoring how much I lack when it comes to following that which is written in clear language. Not only written in clear language, but put at the centre of everything that the central figure of the Bible taught. Things that even a five year old can understand.

St. Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians, says: “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing” (1 Corinthians 13:1). 

In light of this quote from st. Paul, I often feel like nothing. I’ve felt the love I’m capable of. If I look back at those moments, when I’ve been overwhelmed by love not just for those around me, but for the whole of humanity, the world and life itself, I wasn’t aware of this at the time. But I believe that these have been moments when my ego has stepped aside to freely allow God to love through me. 

In my day to day life however, I often feel numb, disconnected and uncaring. This in a time when we need to love, care for and forgive one another more than ever. In a time when we need unity more than ever. I know that I can still choose to act in a loving manner, no matter how I feel. And in these colder moments, perhaps it’s the best that we can do. If it is, it has to be enough until we can do better. But when life runs on autopilot, which it often does, and negative emotions sneak up on us, it’s not always easy to remember to be our best. And more times than I would like to admit, I willingly act against against better judgment. Even though I, at the time, manage to convince myself that I’m not. 

Here I would like to interject, that the more I've processed the negative emotions that I've suppressed and allowed to fester inside my body, the more I've been able to let God's love shine through me. Suppressed emotions, I believe, is one of the main reasons why we feel numb and unloving.

Furthermore, there seems to be layers to this. It probably comes to no one’s surprise, that temptations are harder to resist some times than others. But there seems to be more to it. Sometimes the bile just starts flowing, seemingly by itself. Other times, we have a few seconds to stop ourselves, but for one reason or another, we don’t. We may provide more or less muddled justifications for our behavior. But the truth is that we often simply don’t want to stop ourselves. Our ego has been hurt and demands that the world listens to it when it expresses just how hurt it feels, how it wants others to pay for the hurt and how it expects to be compensated. Or that someone else has done or not done something that disqualifies them as good people. 

If what characterizes Christians is their love for their fellow people, we fall short of this ideal way too often. I fall short of this ideal way too often. I have learned to say no to the really low emotions, such as hate and contempt. If a contemptuous thought creeps into my mind, I usually catch it and refuse to engage with it. But I feel unjustified anger way too often. Anger that is not about some injustice out in the world, but one that stems from my pride having been wounded or something equally ridiculous. 

As you can see, I have a long way to go. But that has to be okay. We all have our baggage. Little habits of thought, speech and action. And if I look at where I was just a couple of years ago, I’ve made a lot of progress. I’m not really such a self-righteous jerk anymore. My baggage is not as heavy anymore. I know that it’s time to put my life completely in God’s hands, no matter what. I know that I owe my whole life to God. Discernment is something that I pray for often. I do my best to understand God’s will. Even if I often fool myself. I want to be able to notice when I speak, act and think in a loveless manner. When I judge and condemn. To bring the light of awareness into the dark corners of my life. And I humbly as God to remove the burden of lovelessness from my shoulders.

The radical love message of Jesus has always been important. But as I said before, I believe that it’s more important than ever today. Because the world is growing colder and darker. It’s easier than ever to get swept away by its ways. What is instead needed, is to stand strong in our faith and make a conscious effort to burn brighter.

In the times ahead we will need each other more than ever. In a few years, we are going to need to come together more than just when we meet at church on Sundays or through the regular church activities. Therefore we need to work actively to strengthen our love for one another. To build up love within ourselves. It’s not always easy. Many of us have, unconsciously, grown cold and numb for many years. If so, it’s time to awaken!

We need each other’s support, care, unconditional love and help through tough situations. Each other’s forgiveness and understanding. And we need to be able to both count on receiving and be able to give this.

You are loved and your life matters!

Your life is not a brief series of random, meaningless events before absolute oblivion. Your life means something. It is not meant to be squandered on pontless distractions and pleasures. No matter where you are or who you are, you are important. You are important to God and you are important to the world. Your choices and actions matter. 

In the past, we may have had to take up real swords to fight living, physical enemies. But today the sword is proverbial. And the war is against meaningless amusements, empty pleasures, addictions and corrupt values. 

You may think that I’m exaggerating here, but I’m not. Because this is a battle for our bodies and minds. And these things kill our spirits. 

To top it all off we did not get to where we are by accident. To a place where we’re surrounded by tools for self-destruction every minute of every hour of every day. This is by design.

No one is going to praise us for taking up this fight. But praise is not the reason why we do what we do. The point is not to be recognized as such or not by others. But those of us that refuse to just mindlessly go along with whatever degeneration our culture offers are heroes. Because it takes strength to go up against all that is preying on our lower natures. It takes courage to go against the cultural norms. And it takes determination to stick to our resolutions.

Best of all is that in this story everyone can be a hero. It doesn’t matter who you are when or where your particular journey ends. All that matters is that you start the journey and keep on walking. God will take care of the rest. And he has the rest of eternity to make you perfect. 

I know that it’s so easy to give in. But whatever you put on the table God and his Holy Spirit can work with that. This is not some airy fairy “is this real or just in my imagination”. You will have real spiritual powers coming to your aid. If you’ve sunk deep in the habit of being distracted you may not notice it at first. But they are there to help you. Eventually things will start to fall into place. Eventually life will not feel so random anymore.

I’m not sitting on some high horse talking down to you from a place of perfection and enlightenment. Just like many other people I’ve made a mess of a lot of things in my life. A mess of bad habits and financial troubles. A mess that I’m still stuck cleaning up. 

The world makes it easy for us to mess up. But this does not take away my, or anyone else’s personal responsibility. No one put a gun to our heads and forced us to mess up our lives. However, as I’ve already stated, I believe that there are people (and perhaps other forces) that want us to be bound to our messes because it benefits them. When the scales fall from our eyes, we will inevitably see all of the things that are there to enslave us. And to me at least, it is obvious that we didn’t get here by accident. 

But it is still our lack of consciousness that allows it to happen. We are still the ones allowing circumstances and our reactions to them to make the choices for us. Our controllers just provide the temptations. We are the ones that are careless with our thoughts, words and actions. They just prey on our carelessness. We are the ones that don’t keep God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit firmly in our minds. Those that want to hurt us just fill up the empty space.

Our past mistakes don’t have to be a waste. It is a cliché to talk about learning from our mistakes. But as with basically all clichés, it contains a lot of wisdom. Because how often don’t we just beat ourselves up for our mistakes without learning anything from them? But when we instead take a step back and try to figure out what went wrong, growth can come pretty fast.

And remember, when you decide to take your power back and say no you have unstoppable powers on your side. God, his son Jesus Christ and his Holy Spirit are there to help you. The almighty, triune, all-loving creator of the universe is on your side. These are not just empty words. It is the truth. You just have to let them in.

Those that want to hurt us tell us that life has no meaning. That we are a problem and even a cancer on the planet. That the world is full of useless people. Such ideas are the real cancer. 

The lack of meaning is one of the major sources of the difficulties that many of us face. The lack of meaning causes many to just grasp for whatever little momentary pleasure that they can get their hands on, with no concern for the future. This is why ideas matter. Why world views matter. They shape our thoughts, words and action. These nihilistic, misanthropic ideas turn “cancer on the planet” into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because what is the point of trying if we’re just destined for oblivion in a meaningless world? A world that is just getting worse and worse, with no real real hope on the horizon. Where the best we can hope for is painful solutions that may or may not solve our problems. In such a world it would be very tempting to say: “Let’s just party till the lights go out.” 

This is not my vision. It is not God’s vision either. So do your best, work with what you’ve got and never lose your hope. An infinitely better future is on the horizon. One where no one is superfluous or useless. One where everyone, regardless of who they are, matter. 

You are loved, deeply cared for and your life matters!

Frame photo by Susan Wilkinson on Unsplash

Life-choices, love, lovelessness, good, evil

God is love. Whenever we act in a loveless manner we shut God out. We move a little further away from God. Of course we don’t know that this is what we are doing. But if we pay attention to how we feel inside we notice that something just doesn’t feel right. We might discover feelings such as sadness and anxiousness.

Before I go on, I want to pause to give you a picture of what I am talking about. My wife likes to bake sweets. She makes delicious cupcakes and apple pie among other things. She loves to make these things for me, for her daughter and her daughter’s boyfriend and friends. And of course for herself as well. For us. 

I also have the option of going to the store and buy a very delicious chocolate bar, made by huge, shining machines in a huge factory. My wife’s apple pie or cupcakes may contain somewhere around five ingredients. The chocolate bar may contain thirty ingredients, all carefully selected to make it as profitable as possible. And to make my inner caveman go nuts and just mindlessly munch it down without really thinking of what I’m doing. Many of these ingredients I have to look up online to find out exactly what they are.

See the difference? My animal instincts don’t, but I sure do. 

If I’ve gorged on processed, mass-produced junk long enough, my tastebuds might even prefer it over that which is made with love and care by a person. 

As I said in the first paragraph, we often don’t notice when love is missing. We are often so out of touch with ourselves that we don’t even notice that we feel bad. That something inside of us protests. That it is signalling that something is wrong. Because the world is so filled with things that keep us occupied. That pull us away from our direct experience of life. This is by design.

But when someone points this out to us and we understand it, we can’t help but notice it. What was priorly invisible to us suddenly is everywhere (We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one [1 John 5:19]). This is similar to “good and evil” or why not the Freudian “eros and thanatos”. This is how we label in a good way. Not to become narrow minded or dismiss people that are different from us, but to more easily understand the world and our being in it. To deepen this understanding. In this case so that we can avoid what hurts us, others and our relationship with God. And why it is to be avoided. 

Before I move on, I want to add a little disclaimer. What I’m about to say is not meant to shame anyone. I know how hard it is to break habits and I still struggle with quite a few myself. I even up to quite recently bought mass-produced food and ate too much of it and I still have a problem with over-eating sometimes. 

It is when we stop trying, even though we have the strength to do so, that we let evil take a hold on us. God only gives us more than we can handle if it serves some higher purpose. Never to just make us feel bad about ourselves.

That being said… It is obvious that when we treat others with compassion, kindness and the likes we act in a loving manner. And it is also obvious that when we treat others as mere objects to be exploited for our gain, pleasure or entertainment, or when we downright hurt and condemn others, we act in a loveless manner. 

But when we pay for mass produced trash that poisons our bodies, we are also acting in a loveless manner. Because there is no love towards ourselves in the act. And there is no love for the consumer in the production. 

When we watch pornography or mindless entertainment that poison our minds and souls with destructive values or fuel our instincts with perversion, we act in a loveless manner. And the same goes for the values we take in via music.

“Aren’t we supposed to have any fun?” you might ask. 

Well, go ahead and have as much “fun” as you want. I believe that it is your absolute right to destroy yourself and I would never dream of trying to stop you from doing so. As long as you don’t directly hurt others with your actions, in my view, you should be allowed to do whatever you may please by worldly authorities. 

But maybe, just maybe, there is something infinitely better that that opens up to us when we exercise a bit of discernment. Maybe the comparison between gold and mud does not even begin to describe what we gain by removing that which is loveless from our lives. 

Believe me, there is a whole world waiting for you, right here and right now, filled with love, truth and beauty, once you start removing that which is hurting you from your life. The choice is easy once you see it with clear eyes. It is a choice between love and lovelessness, eros and thanatos, good and evil, happiness and dispair. It isn’t more complicated than that. It never was. Allow the scales to fall from your eyes and you will see it too.

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

Are we just smart animals?

I’ve pondered the significance of the teachings of Jesus a bit lately. I think that most would recognize that Jesus has had a huge impact on mainly the Western civilization. But it is an impact that has stretched far beyond it. But how huge this impact really was and still is, took some reading to realize.

One thing that struck me just now, is that Jesus’ radical love message in a sense calls us to leave our animal nature behind. The animal world is governed by survival of the fittest, dominance, ruthlessness and gratification of urges. In short: it is governed by instincts. The majority culture of the society that Jesus lived and taught in was governed by such values.

I think that most could also agree, that if everyone at least attempted to live as Jesus taught, no matter how faulty they were in this pursuit, the world would probably be a paradise. Even if all of us were miserable creatures, with extremely low self-control, we could still create paradise on earth, if everyone made a sincere effort to follow Jesus.

So, what Jesus taught was something that run contrary to our nature, but that has the potential of creating a world that we actually want to live in. Something that actually struck a chord with so many people, that he shaped our civilization more than any other historical figure. In spite of it going against our animal nature.

I think that is worth thinking about.

It seems to me, that if we follow our animal nature, we do what comes natural. But we end up creating chaos for ourselves and others on a personal level. And the more people that act like animals, the worse our societies become.

I think that this also is worth thinking about.