Spirituality and Tech

Today, from St. Gregory the Theologian (of Nazianzus, in Modern Turkey) God requires 3 things from all Christians: Right Faith in the heart: believe that Jesus is who He claimed to be, believe the Truth of who you are as a beloved child of God Truth on the tongue: not only don’t be a liar, but seek to spread the Truth of Jesus as you go wherever you go, love others through your words by telling them the Truth Temperance in the body: Discipline your body so that you can finish running the race well, as Paul instructed, give it what it needs, but do not over-indulge in food or drink, sleep or any other good thing. Master your body so that its desires do not lead you away from the faith through a series of sins that you become so accustomed to that you begin to identify with it... This is a hard one, here in the West, where we have had access to so much in the last 80 years or so.

I think we are there. St Anthony nailed this one. What is sanity? What the Word says, or what the culture says? Whether it be the masks, or the killshots, or some other technique of control we’ve not fully seen yet, we have seen our friends and family turn on us for not toeing the line on these nonsensical “protections” against what is a variant of the common cold. For that matter, those of us who stand for traditional marriage and family structures, who “cling to their guns and their bibles”, who are “deplorables”, that is why we get attacked, we are salt and light in the midst of a dark, flavorless world that tries to force conformity on us. Stand strong in love and truth. Don’t beat people over the head, just be the beloved child you are, and walk in our Father’s ways.

Never give up. It is ok to be tempted to despair, but never give in, and never give up. It is easy to despair when we look around and see little that isn’t dark or horribly tainted, when it is hard to see how it can ever get better. But St John Chrysostom tells us that if we are truly brave, we will never surrender to despair. How can we never despair? Cling to the Lord. Trust Him more than you trust what you are experiencing right now. Raise your gaze to Him, and lock your eyes on His. That will allow you to never despair. That will make you brave, even in the face of persecution. That will allow you to lock arms with your brothers and sisters and create the future that you want to see.

Prayer is simple. Don’t over complicate it. St. Ambrose was a Russian heyschastic monk in the 19th century. What does that mean? He focused on very simple, mystical things, such as the Jesus prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have mercy on me, a sinner”. These simple words, when repeated as these monks do, can produce some profound religious experiences in adherents. It focuses you on the core of the christian message, that Jesus is the Son of God, and that you are in need of mercy. But I digress, he tells us here that prayer should be simple, as God knows what we need and when we need it.

Abba Epiphanes speaking directly to our situation. Too few Christians actually know the Word. When we do not know the Word, how can we know the Living Word? This lack of biblical literacy has proven Abba Epiphanes’ point, here. It has led to the direct decay of our nation and world. If we say that we want a revival, it has to start at home, in our prayer closets, then overflow into the streets, not start outside and work its way in. Start reading and memorizing scripture. That is the toolset with which the Holy Spirit works to transform us, without that, we stay more or less stagnant and lukewarm, able to be taken in by every wind of teaching that blows, because we do not have the Word in us in any real way.

Rough word today, from St. Maximus the Confessor. Maximus was a Byzantine monk from the 6th and 7th centuries. I expected that he was a desert father with the very ascetic flavor to this quote, but I was wrong, at any rate, back to the quote: humility cuts out the spiritual passions (pride and associated sins), and suffering cuts out the bodily passions. Why are these important? According to the ascetic tradition, it is a great benefit to humans to not indulge the desires of the body, as they believe that indulgence is in itself sinful, as in many cases, the body is held to be evil and must be disciplined to allow one to grow more spiritually. Humility does serve as an antidote of sorts to pride and its attendant sins of self-centeredness, sloth, lust, greed, and the like, which are also kept in check through asceticism. How can we apply this in our lives? If we want to truly be counter-cultural, choosing to go low and to adopt some ascetic disciplines, such as fasting, would go a long way toward that end.

Abba, Be with us as we look at these last few verses of Psalm 37, help us to get to the Truth that you have for us today. Help us to see these verses as the encouragement that they are. Thank you that we can hide in You. Thank you that you are our strength. Thank you that our future is not determined by our past or present, but by Your promises. You promise us peace and prosperity. Where is it, oh, God? Where is it? Yes, I’m impatient to see the end of the wicked play out before my eyes here on earth. I trust that You will see it done on our behalf, but when? Amen Psalm 37: 37-40 (TPT) But you can tell who are the blameless and spiritually mature. What a different story with them! The godly ones will have a peaceful, prosperous future with a happy ending. Every evil sinner will be destroyed, obliterated. They’ll be utter failures with no future! But the Lord will be the Savior of all who love him. Even in their time of trouble, God will live in them as strength. Because of their faith in him, their daily portion will be a Father’s help and deliverance from evil. This is true for all who turn to hide themselves in him! Blameless and spiritually mature, eh? Just as a warning, I may be a little salty in this devotion. I guess I’m not as mature, nor as blameless as I need to be, then? I’m struggling, here. This passage, and even indeed most of the chapter, even as hopeful and reassuring as it is, feels like pouring baking soda into vinegar right now. I know that I shouldn’t be discouraged or despair, but I’m having a moment as I write this. There’s the unvarnished truth. I’m having a black moment, but it will pass. I know that the Lord will make it right, but it hurts to be reminded when it doesn’t look like there any real movement in that direction in the moment. It actually reminds me of a Proverb... “Like removing a coat on a cold day is one who sings songs to a heavy heart” (Proverbs 25:20) Forgive me for being a bit of a downer today. Ok, I think I’m through it. Back to the Word. The godly will have a peaceful and prosperous future. Cling to that as we go through the hell of the fallout of all the wind that the wicked in our world have sowed, yes, the whirlwind [storm] is nearly upon us. Allow it to do what it was designed to do, that is, cleanse the world. We who are the godly, who do our best to follow the Father’s ways will be able to stand again at the end of it all. The wicked, on the other hand, will be utterly destroyed. They will be utter failures, with no future. I couldn’t help but hear those lines in Trump’s voice, lol. Yes, for all of their plotting and scheming to take us down, for all of their planning to live forever, they will come to noting in the end, and will die and be forgotten. Is that what this whole chapter has been about? Waiting for the wicked to just die off? I like the more spiritual interpretation, as I see it as more encouraging rather than, just wait, you’ll outlive them and take back what they took from you before you die. God will be with us and help us through the storms of this life as long as we are faithful to him. That is the bottom line that I am seeing through this entire Psalm. That is the difference between the godly and the wicked: the godly are protected, even from the fury of the wicked, where the wicked enjoy no such protection. Even when it seems like they will never be ended, remember, they, too, will die, and no one can take their wealth or power with them into the great beyond.

If we pray without ceasing, then we know that God is the one behind our successes, not ourselves. We know that we prayed all through the trial we faced, so we know that it was not our strength, nor our wisdom which brought us out the other side. It makes us humble. Unceasing prayer seems like a nearly impossible goal, doesn’t it? It certainly feels that way, but if we choose something like a breath prayer as a starting place, I think you’ll find it far easier to have a running conversation with your Father than you think. What you might otherwise tweet or post absentmindedly to social media, share with the Lord instead. Anxieties, frustrations, joys, and everything in between. When we are always talking to God, including listening to Him, humility is the natural result, just as Doretheos says here.

St. Augustine would know. That dude got around before he got saved. Let’s break this down... To fall in love with God is the greatest romance... God cannot be exhausted by a human, neither the depths nor heights nor width can be fully explored, so being in the position of a lover seeking to know as much as they can of their beloved, for a lifetime and then some, makes all the sense in the world to me. To seek Him is the greatest adventure... Why would seeking God be the greatest adventure? He is the biggest, most powerful thing one could possibly seek, He can hide anywhere and nowhere at the same time, And you’re very likely to be surprised when and where you really find Him. Finding God is the greatest achievement... Because seeking Him is the greatest adventure, it follows that finding Him would have to be a massive achievement.

How is God leading you? What things grab your attention and won’t let go? What problems do you see that just captivate you until they’re solved? These are probably indications to you what God designed you for, so pursue those things and stay in your lane, so to speak. If God moves you into a different area, go, but either way, focus on Him and His heart, not only for you, but for the world around you.

This is the heart of devotion. Meditation on the Lord even as we breathe. There is a method called a breath prayer. One such prayer goes with the cadence of your breath, and as you breathe in, you say “Abba” then as you exhale say “I belong" and "to you” as you inhale again. So, as you breathe, your mind and heart are centered on God, and you will begin to feel greater peace than you did at first. I used to have a motto: midius de, or “center down”. This was a was to remind myself that I needed to re-focus on the Lord.

Pray without ceasing. Cry out. Lament. Praise. Never let the lines of communication between You and heaven go silent. Pound on the doors Of heaven. Do not get tired of asking, seeking, and knocking. For when you ask, you receive (perhaps not immediately), when you seek, you will find; when you knock, doors will open. Keep asking, seeking, and knocking. St Anthony has an interesting take here, that the constant pleas will force the Father’s benevolence to come to your rescue. Perhaps he was thinking of the parable of the unjust judge, rather than the passage I sited just now...

St. Clement has a valid point, methinks. If God were like a candy machine, where you put in a certain thing, make your selection, then get what you want right away, then there would be no relationship, No reason to pursue God or godliness, no Reason to change your heart or to grow, other Than to get whatever you want from the cosmic Candy machine.

Father, Help us to slow down. Help us to not live as though every little desire constitutes a hellfire emergency until we have it in our hands. Help us to live in the rhythm of heaven, not at the with the cadence of earth. Thank you that we will see the Wicked overthrown and forgotten, even in our lifetimes. I have been impatient with how you are doing things, I repent. I will continue crying out, lamenting every injustice, and praising for every small victory. Thank you that none of my emotional swings can interfere with your plan. In Jesus’ name, Amen. Psalm 37:34-36 (TPT) So don’t be impatient for Yahweh to act; keep moving forward steadily in his ways, and he will exalt you to possess the land. You’ll watch with your own eyes and see the wicked lose everything. I’ve already seen this happen. Once I saw a wicked and violent man overpower all who were around him, a domineering tyrant with his prideful and oppressive ways. Then he died and was forgotten. Now no one cares that he is gone forever. This is hard. We want, and sometimes feel like we NEED things to happen YEARS ago, but God has his ways. God has his plan. We can be sure that we will live to see the powers that be overthrown. God has said it many times in his Word, and that Word does not return without fulfilling the purpose for which it was uttered or written. Breathe. Trust Him. He never fails. Be steadfast in your choices to follow His ways. Take one step at a time, focused on that step, not one that you think might come down the road. Don’t rush Him. Stay faithful to each thing He places in your hands to do. Do it thoroughly, not in some kind of half-assed way. He will see to it that you receive your reward in this life. You will possess the land. Your dreams, as long as they were dreamed with God, will be fulfilled if you stay faithful rather than taking matters into your own hands. Let go of the trauma. Let go of the pain. Let go of the frustration. Let Him heal you and prepare you to receive what He has for you. The psalmist tells us that he has seen this happen in his own life, that this tyrant who beat everyone down, who was prideful and so domineering, died and was not remembered. He was not celebrated, nor was his memory cherished by those who survived him. He was as though he had never been. This is the fate of those who choose to run after power for power’s sake, who have no fear of God in their hearts. As I said earlier, our role in this is to be faithful to what God places in our hands to complete. If He assigns you the task of vengeance, take it one step at a time, and be thorough. If He tells you to do something else, do that other thing, but pray for the fulfillment of God’s plan in that situation. Cry out, lament, praise where needed, but never let the line go quiet, whether in active prayer or a more contemplative, listening mode.

Passion is destructive, according to Macarius. He was a desert father, one of the most influential of those. Rebuke should be in love and peace, not anger. That truly is a challenge, and one that I am not in a place to say that I’ve surmounted it, as my kids will tell you. I get impatient, I yell, sometimes too much. It is embarrassing, to be honest. I know it doesn’t do any good, and the boys rarely respond appropriately, so why do I let myself get so worked up? I guess I have some rough edges that need smoothing out. Marriage and parenting are great for that. How do we overcome that, but still be effective people? That is THE question, isn’t it?

What is your relationship with stuff? Do you own much? How concerned are you with the condition of your investments? It is allot of responsibility, isn’t it? I’m not saying that I want you to give it all away... Jesus did that a few times, and I am not Jesus, believe it or not. What this says to me is that simplicity is better than complexity. We need not chase after things and stuff, and indeed if we are too consumed with the rat race, as we talked about yesterday, we lose sight of the Kingdom for having tried to build our little kingdom here on earth. There is nothing wrong with possessions, as long as your identity is in Christ above all else. Hold things loosely. Cling to the Lord, not to that which we see here on earth.

How attuned to this world are you? How aware of heaven are you? These, according to St. Isaac, are mutually exclusive. This comports well with how Jesus and Paul explained things as well, I am reminded of The Parable of the Sower, and how easily the ones who are too wrapped up in or full of the lust of the eyes and the pride of life fall away, kind of like Andrew Tate. Yes, I went there. He defected to Islam recently, because he was too full of himself to need the Lord at all. Too full of his Lambos and Bugattis, too full of the young people he was scamming to notice that he was slipping away from the Lord until Islam, with its very male-centric way of life was irresistible for him. Paul also talked about this in 1 Corinthians, when he encouraged them to stay single so that they could be more concerned with the Kingdom than the needs of their spouses or families.

Ignatius of Antioch brings down the house with this one. Simple. Punchy. To the point. Are we really Christians, or is it just convenient to be called “Christian” in our context? Would you refuse to spit on a picture of Jesus? Would you curse Him if someone twisted your arm? This is hard. It is easy to armchair quarterback here, and believe that each of us who profess the Name of Jesus would actually stand up for Him should worse come to worse, but would we actually stand up or would we cower, afraid of being called a name, or some such thing? I feel like that is the majority of the American church right now, because most of us do not really know the Lord. Once we know Him, once we have experienced His love for us, it becomes much harder to deny Him when put to it. However, Peter denied Him 3 times the night before Calvary, after he had literally been with Jesus almost every second for the previous 3 years.

Here is a quote about theosis from one of the Cappadocian Fathers, Gregory of Nazianzen, who was brother (literally) to St Basil the Great, and friends with Gregory of Nyssa. But enough on that... Union with God is the only place we can find mercy. Let that sink in. Because God is Good, the only font of genuine mercy (all other mercies are tributary and lesser than His), and endless loving bounty, the only place we can find the fullness of these things is in Him. Sure, there are facsimiles here, but no human can be perfectly merciful toward oneself or any other, without first receiving it from God. What is this theosis I speak of? Theosis is full union with God, where we have become so like Him that He cannot help but take us into Himself fully, that is what heaven is about, not standing around with harps and singing hallelujah for eternity (boring!), but becoming one with God. We can experience this in part here in this life, but it takes dedication and a will to empty oneself. I will find other quotes about this in the future, as I think this is something woefully lacking in the Western Church.

Christ is all in all. Amen. This prayer invites Jesus to be our light, our shield, our covering, to be under, above, beside us, in front of us, behind us, in us, and outside us. Do you need wisdom? Try Jesus. Guidance? Try Jesus. All around protection? Call on Jesus. Let Him be all that and more for you today. He is our Lord, but a the servant Lord that He is, He also helps us, guides us, and protects us from the enemy’s efforts. That is not to say that Jesus will negate the consequences of our choices, but those things which come at us which we did not bring on ourselves, he will at least dull for us.

What’s The Difference? Psalm 37:31-3 Father, As we look at this passage today, open our eyes. Most of us probably do not know this passage well, as it is not the section that most people are familiar with. Help us to be the Faithful Lovers the first part of this passage describes. Help us to be those whom you defend because we love you. Help us to stand undaunted because we have done nothing wrong, even when we are accused. Thank you that you are faithful even when we fail. Thank you that we can be at peace even when we stand wrongfully accused, when we are being spied on. In Jesus’ Name, Amen Psalm 37:31-3 (TPT) The ways of God are in their hearts and they won’t swerve from the paths of steadfast righteousness. Evil ones spy on the godly ones, stalking them to find something they could use to accuse them. They’re out for the kill! But God will foil all their plots. The godly will not stand condemned when brought to trial. How different are you? Do you stick out like a sore thumb? Do you shine like a star in the universe? Do people know to leave you a wide berth because you savage anyone within reach? Are you the “saint” and just love God and others with all that you are? Are you a Faithful Lover of God, or are you a wicked one who seeks to destroy faithful ones? In all likelihood, if you are watching this, you are probably the former more than the latter. We all have our moments, though, where we allow jealousy and similar negative patterns to overtake our more heavenly orientations, and we engage in mudslinging or slandering another human made in the image of God. Or, perhaps you are a wicked one, (yes, the binary is that strong that there really is no grey area, here) and perhaps you seek to curse me or others who are blessed by these weekly thoughts. I don’t know. But you do, and the Lord does. To be clear, I have not seen any blowback (yet) for one of my devotions or memesplanations. As far as I know, I have not faced anything more than the usual antics from the enemy due to my existing as I do. I am grateful for these realities, and I do not take them for granted. Are you one who holds the ways of God in your heart? Are you steadfast in righteousness? Then you are the kind of person that God desires to be near to, He will protect you from those evil ones who are jealous of your Light. Those who spy on you to try to find some obscure thing to nail you on, some small aspect of your walk that they think they can spin to the point where you will get into trouble. Like Potiphar’s wife, or Daniel’s coworkers, or Shadrach, and Abednego’s fellow officials, who did did all they could to first corrupt, then to destroy these biblical exemplars. They stayed faithful, keeping God’s ways in their hearts. They did not swerve from steadfast righteousness, even when it could have cost them their lives. Be encouraged, and stand fast. God will not allow your adversaries to wreck you in court in the end. They may win for a time, but ultimately, they will be shown to be the liars and shiesters that they are. Have you been one who envies others who are upright and do well in life, seeking for some skeleton in their closet, or pile of detrius swept under the rug, which might explain how they got where they are? Have you sought to destroy another, even in little ways? Have you seen God protect His faithful ones? Ever seen your best laid plans to bring down a righteous person blow up in your face? Perhaps it is time to rethink your life, and possibly join those whom you’ve ridiculed and sought to destroy. There is grace for you. Forgiveness, too. Repent. Change your mind, and allow God to change your heart away from that orientation toward destruction and toward one of blessing instead.

Love is the key. Love makes the world go round. Love holds the universe together. Love is the root of wisdom, so causing love to spring forth is, in itself, wisdom. God is love, John Chrysostom. John the Beloved tells us that at least once in his letters. He is right about this, though, if you destroy love, life ceases to be worth living. It is the foundation on which all exists, and the mortar which holds all together. Let that sink in. Love made it all, love sustains all, and that is why when it feels absent, it is so shocking.

This is a hairy topic. I do not pretend to have answers, but what follows is an excerpt of my thoughts on the matter: As a protestant, I struggle with what I feel is a fixation on Mary, who yes, was chosen by God to be the mother of Jesus. She grew the God-man in her womb. I believe that Jesus was fully God and fully man, from conception, otherwise he would neither be a sufficient sacrifice nor an effective example for us. My Catholic and Orthodox brothers and sisters would probably want to shake me vigorously because to them, my thinking does not go far enough. To that I say that mystery is important, and I am comfortable with saying that I do not know enough to conclusively say that either Mary was not somehow the “mother of God” or that she indeed was. I do not think that it is important for salvation to know for sure one way or the other.

St Ambrose spitting some truth here about the conscience. Have you recently done something you knew was wrong, or failed to do something that you knew you needed to get done? How did that feel? Were you ashamed? Have you tried to punish yourself in any way? Our conscience condemns us when we sin, either by commission (that which we do, but ought not), and omission (that which we ought do, but do not), this is natural. We run for cover, or we stand and beat ourselves up for whatever it was, unless we have deadened ourselves through callous, repeated sin patterns so we no longer hear our consciences. Tell me I’m not the only one who either hides or self-abuses in some way when I know that I screwed up. So what do we do about it? We seek forgiveness from God, the injured party, and from ourselves. We repent, then allow that sin to be as though it never happened. That is not to say that consequences cease to exist, but forgiveness is the path to freedom for you and for the other person, particularly.

Back to the early Church Fathers... This quote from Polycarp seems poignant to me, now. As believers, we need to be this strong in our convictions, that even if (and I do see the potential for this sort of scenario happening here in America, if things do not change quickly in terms of the direction this nation is taking) this happens to us, we will stand strong in our belief in Jesus as our Lord and Savior. The enemy is turning up the heat, or trying to, on anyone who stands up against the corruption in our society, from the alphabet soup of sexual perversion, to divorce, to abuse, to human trafficking, and all of the other things that the Church has been mute about in large part for the last 50 years. This is whether it is due to the 501C.3 and Johnson Amendment or due to complicity in these heinous crimes which are being revealed to us right now.