Good post!
When evaluating worldviews, a Christian must remember 2 Timothy 2:24-26: we must present God's truth gently and kindly in order to set free those who have been captured by deceptive philosophies and worldviews.
Mankind is on a normal spiritual developmental cycle.
We are now approaching the pinnacle of self actualization of the ego. We are full of ourselves. The upcoming mid-life crisis is necessary in order to get rid of the old to make room for the new seed to sprout within us. When we are full of ourselves we have no room for God.
Erik Erickson quoted Anna Freud in his 1958 book “Young Man Luther: A Study in Psychoanalysis and History” that “the period of Reformation was the beginning of the glorification of the ego of common man.” This is when the scriptures were translated into common man’s language and many more people could read and interpret the scriptures for themselves. This created self empowerment.
Our souls are seeds that are planted here on earth to grow, (read Jesus’s explanation of the parable of the weeds in Matthew 13)
In the mid-life crisis diminishing of the ego that is forthcoming, each individual has 4 options.
1. Circle back, have affairs, buy the sports car, seek validation of our ego self in new ways. This is the most common path that keeps people circling as a dog chasing their tail.
2. Give up and die. This life is too rough and I can’t do it. Let me die and leave this mess.
3. As we approach the dark night of the soul or empty self, fear becomes very great. The closer we get, the greater the fear becomes. People in this phase of development seek someone else to surrender their individual authority. This is what gives cults their power over people. This is how the anti-messiah will fool people into following him. This is happening now.
4. The 4th option is to go through the dark night of the soul by looking within self for the Light of God. When this first happens there is a period of euphoria and bliss that makes a person feel they are one with God and have ended their journey. They will write books and seek followers as they feel they have the answers for everyone. Actually they have just placed their toe on the threshold of the transcendent self and are God aware. They go through the euphoria and think they know it all just as a 16 year old does when they first develop a sense of self when the soul is growing through the teenage transition. It is a natural response to the stability of coming out of the turmoil of transition and into the stability of a new stage of soul development.
The Old Testament teaches us how to come out of dependency and self actuate. The New Testament teaches us how to diminish the ego of self actualization and transition to a self transcendent God aware or experiential stage of soul development.
On This “Little Christmas”
January 6th from my The First Book Of Moses poetry page
Below is an abbreviated form. The entire poem is on my poetry page linked below which offers past history of the way Christmas was observed but also reflections about WWII impact on ethnic groups
L.J.Keslin
On This “Little Christmas”
January 6th
Once Upon a Time and not too long ago
The Twelfth Night Of Christmas
was celebrated with a ball
From the Day of Babes Birth
and the 11 thereafter
kith and kin were paid a visit
and friends from far and near
once were paid a call
So on this day I pray in the spirit that this date recalls
Let the gift of homage of kings gain
in the spirit of the days this season yet remain
ere it wane
Be thine Blessings Great
and misfortunes thee none befall
moses@maqs.net
http://www.theusmat.com/natdesk.htm
Most likely of Parthia; some accounts have them accompanied by many soldiers.
I ran across a similar quote that said, "Never tear down a fence until you know why it was put up." To me, that is the essence of conservatism. Social norms and values evolved over thousands of years to be a certain way for specific reasons . . . reasons we may have forgotten. Wrecking that logical and thoughtful evolution of behavior is a highly reckless, arrogant and egotistical endeavor . . . some, like me, would say foolish. In that vein, I view most leftists as undisciplined morons.
Ran Dass came here quite a few years ago. We have a few mutual acquaintances who are his followers.
While his taking drugs could imitate the process of achieving spiritual bliss, it is not the real thing. His stroke a few years ago actually helped him understand the process more than his intellectual studies and drug use.
Taking drugs is like jumping up to peep through a window. You might get a little bit of good feeling from what you see through the window, but you can’t crawl through the window and enter the room to pure bliss that is permanent.
O Lord, grant us Your Vision in 2020.
Merry Christmas… and Happy (remember why it’s called) 2020!
“...left him, at the end of life, depressed and searching.”
Well, he went to the ends of the earth to avoid just cracking open a Bible and searching there. He didn’t really want to find the truth, if you ask me, because he spent his life running away from it.