Four years later...

The Sun went down and somewhere in the night madness turned to sadness. I fear I will never feel its warmth again.

My Buddy Hank

AUTHOR'S NOTE: It is 4:30 and I am vey, very tired and not thinking clearly... please have grace!
Ok, so I dropped my last blog and remembered I wanted to write about something significant. Hank, the "Bible Answer Man" Hanegraaff. The name says it all, doesn't it? What a mark of intelligence on our part to bestow or even condone such a name upon a man. And not to mention His own humility! What a burden... THE Bible answer man!
There is a grossness to me about the false masculine that runs our Church today. I mean a sick gross feeling I get when I think of how clinical and over intellectual we have become and how few people ever seem to think it wrong. Emotions and experience have all taken a back seat becuase they kept trying to drive and no one thought they would get us anywhere. But are our intellects flawless? Men, we are unhealthy. We are full of ourselves and hold the blessing until we are satisfied to give it to our children, and that day often never comes because the real reason we withold it is fear. Dare I say cowardice. We hide behind intellect because we fear our emotion. We write it off as Godly, because it is more easily controlled. Yet our children and wives cry in the shadows because of our tyranny. We rule with an iron fist and a stone heart. We break the spirits of our children and force them to do the same to theirs simply because they don't know better... they only know theology.

Such irony.

Counterfeit revival? How about COUNTERFIET EQUIPPING? That's right... you read it. Why? I'll tell you why, because any Christian Church, teaching, ministry or the like that allows people to consider being mentally educated the equivilent of being spiritually whole is guilty of a "form of godliness but denying it's power". Was it the "Spirit of Education" that fell in the book of Acts? What I mean is that we can be so stupid, we will actually think it right and holy to judge a person's spirituality on how much they know, not WHO they know. We think head-knowledge is gifting. Well, the heart learns, too my friends. It takes two wings to fly and a lot of believers don't even know they are still on the ground. In fact, the healthy ones who have been changed by intense suffering and revelation from God, whose gifting, like Paul says, is evident in people not certificates, often go unrecognized (even scrutinized). Why? Maybe because we are not accustomed to the blood of Christ actually showing itself in any healthy way other than socio-economically, financially (oh, for the "word of faith people", let's call all that "prosperity") or intellectually. No, that is too great a price. No one looks THAT deep. Not now. Not in America. Why bother? Pay "Pastor Bastor" to do that for us! And Hank, my friend... you may be a msart cookie, but we need to talk about WHY people are falling for the counterfiet revivals... what are they missing that even YOUR show can't give them? We all need to look one level deeper... WHY do we do the things we do? Paul brings up that great question in Romans, but who gets the answer?

Psalm 25:14
The LORD confides in those who fear him; he makes his covenant known to them.

Now, what is the Fear of God? Because the one who knows THAT kind of fear will know God's secrets... maybe even His plans. And the beauty of that is, the ones who are told these things are told only because they are considered by God safe enough not to exploit it; and the ones who would exploit it will most likely never be told. :)

Ok, so God bless you Hank; you must know better.

In the Weeks After

So here I am, weeks after my loss of Ray and my decision to love all mankind and keep "no record of wrongs" and the hits just keep on coming. Now, I almost lost my house because my failing business was costing me too much to keep on life support. We shut Soma's down officially two Saturdays ago, hoping to have a great show of people only to be hit by a huge storm a few days prior and lost electric in the building until... you guessed it, Saturday. No one came for our last night... maybe 5 or 6 people. Most everyone else was out of electric and out of touch for no phones or internet or anything. Does it feel like I made the wrong decision? Not actually. You see, my life has been this crappy for quite a few years, so I cannot say things have gotten worse, just that they have not gotten any better. And this is just the start of it. So, now what?

Though He slay me, yet I will trust Him.

If this sounds trite to you, you haven't suffered enough. If this melts your heart, give me a call because we might make great friends.

I hate life today. I hate that I had no choice to be born and no choice in death unless I commit suicide... yeah right! And I further hate that everything else in between is up for grabs. One can have a crappy birth, a crappy life and a crappy, tormenting death and there isn't a thing someone may be able to do about it except pray to God... and for what? That He would change his mind? Like he didn't notice this issue already? Like He wasn't alrady "working on it" and didn't need another email about it? All that pain a person can endure. What a waste of nerves and feeling. Why bother? So some other person can be affected? Great. Why not share the effect a little balanced with both of them to give the other guy a break? Aw, nevermind... I'm just venting nonsense anyway... He is God; let Him do what is right in His eyes.

This particular post has very little place on this blog. In fact, I may come back and delete it when I wake up and get a little wiser to my ramblings. Hope I did not cause anyone to "stumble"

Alvin out

The Decision

Friday, one of my best friends, Ray Chang, died after a fight with cancer for about a year. He was 28. He knew nothing of what would happen to him, but walked in the hope that God would heal him eventually. Obviously, it was not going to be in the way we all thought. Rather, he got his victory by getting out of the physical and with God where he belonged.

Needless to say, we are all hurt, bewildered and scrambling for as much faith as we can to justify our loss with claims that "He is with God now," and the like. But the bottom line is, just as a scientist with a theory, we are claiming to believe something we cannot prove. The only one of us who can prove it cannot talk to us anymore because he is out of the game. We are acting in hope; we will most likely know mothing more of our supposed afterlife until we arrive at it ourselves.

So in this gloom, I have of course began to once again ponder the ideas of which I write here. But moments ago I realized that I make my claims and arguments as an unarmed soldier behind friendly lines; I have not dared to venture out for what I baelieve because I have not truly decided to believe it... until now.

As of moments ago, I finally confessed to God (in much fear) that I will renounce the traditional views of our modern Church (i.e. eternal Hell and the like) for what I now choose to believe to be the "True" view of God... one of Love that goes beyond all understanding... and offer my personalized copy of the theoligical view of an eternal torment for those who do not believe, to Him to destroy, that I may walk in belief that ultimately all will come to God and be with him forever.

As of now, I will be labeled as either an ultimate reconciliationist or a universalist, but I shall consider myself nothing but a true believer, more authentic now than I may have ever been before.

If I become a better, stronger and more healthy believer (in the eyes of myself and others whom I trust) because of this decision, I shall know it is true. The only other outcome is that I waste away into a heresy, and in that case (ironically) I can only hope that in my blindness, God will have mercy on my soul for I "know not what [I[ do."

So, Ray, I guess I'll see you in a little while. And God, I hope to see you sooner.

Alvin out

Satan's Victory

Jesus is called by John the Baptist "The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.". What exactly does this mean? Does this mean he takes away the sins of the world or WILL take them away? Did someone not hear John say after that, "That is, if they come to Him to accept it." and forget to write that part down?

As Christians, we like to talk about our endeavors on the field and say things like, "Even if ONE person comes to God, it's worth it.". So, if one person comes to God, it's worth it, right? But what if one person is decieved by the Enemy and falls into eternal Hell? Can Satan say it was "worth it.", too? Does God truly go after the one and leave the other 99 because he wants EVERYONE? It's just a thought.

Look at Luke 15. The sheep, the coin, the prodigal son. What does that say to you? Does it look like anything was required of the sheep? The coin? Only the prodigal comes back on his own... but he finds that all was forgiven the moment he left anyway. Nothing was required of him... even when he TRIED to repent, his father ignored his words and commenced celebration. You would figure a good "talking to" was in order here to make the point, but Jesus ignored it. Why?

Maybe it's because redemption is easier than we think. Maybe Satan has truly lost like we talk about. Maybe Jesus really does take away the sins of the world because "[We] know not what [we] do". As Paul Cain said, "When love returns to the Father's House, the prodigals will come home."

What might we be missing here? The prodigal son obviously went to Hell, but he eventually came home.

Again, just another thought.

Please don't disregard me for this!

In case some of you who are reading the new blog "Back to Eden" have come here. Please note that this blog, the restoration of humanity, is not intended to anything other than a "journal" of sorts while I process things God has placed on my heart concerning the lost. You are welcome to read it, but please do not if you are in a place where you are not able to consider what I say without judging me or writing off my other writings as a result. I do not want my "venting" on this blog to interfere with the truth I know in the other blog because I have come to no conclusions here as of yet. I only use this to cleanse my thinking out from time to time. My other blog is more of an unfinished basement without much light; this blog is but a hole I may have found in the yard.

Alvin

Manager

So I am talking with a friedn of mine and she tells me that she holds to the belief that God always gives everyone a fair chance (many many chances)but that there is a time when it is "too late", but for the life of me, I cannot understand why we don't talk about it more in the Church... meaning God's real love. She sounds so different compared to everyone else I talk to in that she sees God showing more to people than most would talk about. Even on a death bed, she sees God after a person's heart. I guess she seems to be more about the Love of God than Hell, but most Believers don't even know how much God loves them, so how on earth could they possibly convey God's love to others?
I mean, if she and I were there, what would we see? Would we see God just saying "Sorry son, I tried and tried and tried but you would not accept. And even though you did not have to ask to be born in to Sin because Adam's original sin defiled you by default, now I have no choice but to declare that Jesus Blood shed on Calvary does not apply to you, because you did not accept it or ask for it. And there is NOTHING I will do about it now because you have left your physical body, and that was the only state in which you could have received this. I say this because my servant Paul wrote 'it is appointed unto man once to die, and after that comes judgement.'." or would he say..."I forgive you because you did not know what you were doing."? Which sounds more like God to you?
Any comments? Please?

Adenominationalism

I want to introduce a theory I have on something that is not actually related to the restoration of humanity (or "the Grace of God for mankind") but it does relate to the church. For a couple of years now, I have been seraching for a term to define my view of what the Church should be and I might have just discovered the word I was looking for. It is adenominationalism. Long, but accurate... it literally means "without division". It is my belief that whether we accept it or not, the Church is One. One God, One Way, One Church... that is the Father's House; the Church is every one of us who knows the Lords salvation. Sure, within it are many mansions to use a quote, but none of them can disregard any other part of the house without seriously hurting themselves as well as others. It seems to me that we, as One House, are too far broken to ever claim "unity" in any way... even ecumenical events seem to be a farse. We need to drop our denominational titles (including the infamous and over used "non-denominational") and say what we really want to say about eachother... YOU ARE WRONG! Sure, some divisions seem tolerant and have their "views", but why be divided, then? What is the need? Now we have reinvented over 20,000 new wheels, each with it's own leadership structure that hold its own autonomy. I mean, then the Baptists ban Disney, do they check with the PCUSA or Nazarene Churches to get confirmation? Are you kidding?
Ok, I'm getting emotional and crazy now, so I'll stop...