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go here to buy my stock photography Alan Creech
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aaron klinefelter
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I think it's important for us to realize that our world, our whole world is broken, not just us. When that tear happened, it happened at a deep metaphysical level. So, it's not just a perfect world and cosmos as God intended it and then us, sticking out like a sore thumb in creation as the one bad spot. When this rupture happened, it happened, yes, in us but also in the dimension of reality in which we reside. All these things are spoken, we must understand, about things that we cannot fully explain or understand, so there you go. We do as well as we can. I don't believe the dimensional divide was ever supposed to be this pronounced. I mean to say, our perception of that dimension where God and Angels exist without measure, without interference let's say, wasn't meant to be this cloudy. It's not "natural." So the idea of what is "natural" versus what is "supernatural" is a construct developed as a result of the fracture that took place in our reality. You might call that "the fall." What we have then, briefly, is one whole Nature, created Order, existing in multiple dimensions of reality. Heaven, hell, the "heavenlies," the "spiritual realm," etc. We have lots of ways to think about it. God has tried to help our not yet fully formed minds to be able to understand it all. I think maybe that as we talk about something called supernature, we make it easier to dismiss as unreal. We've put it off in a category above nature, outside of real life, so we don't really have to deal with it. I know many of us deal with it anyway, but it's still separate in an odd way, as if it's not a part of God's created Order. I believe part of our whole transformation is coming to realize and understand that it's all just as real as our stubbed toe on the dresser last night. I'm not sure, really, that we can ever get where we want to go in this life without that realization being a part of it. There is one Nature - one created Order. It's all real. God inhabits all of it. And this Nature has become, if you will, nature - a broken reality. I go back to what I said earlier - that I don't believe that our perception and experience of this whole reality was ever meant to be this separated. The way Adam was described in Genesis as having walked in the garden with God, conversing freely with HIM. We try to understand that in a way that we can in our broken state, but I don't think we're quite understanding what was going on there. I think it was more than simply Adam, in this limited nature, and God coming down so that Adam could talk a little bit and then going back "up to heaven." I think what we see there is an unbroken cosmos where Adam and God were existing on the same plane, where the dimensional "walls" were more or perhaps totally, transparent and much less than solid. Using a word like "sense" or "sensing" for us is a second-best. It's a way we can try to talk about what unhindered seeing would be like. When, for instance, we get what is called a "word of knowledge" or a "prophecy" to share with someone or the church, I think what's happening there is akin to hearing through a thin wall into the next room - similar to the "seeing through a glass darkly" metaphor. In our growing union with Christ in the Holy Spirit, we're tapping into the other dimension of reality. In reading some of the Celtic Christian tradition we come across this notion of "thin places" - trying to describe places or states where we are "close" to the "other side." Again, all these words and ways we talk about it are us, in our fractured state, trying to explain what's going on. Spiritual experiences in the Church and in our lives are a matter of breaking through reality walls more than some linear timed event God is doing and then stops doing. I don't think Jesus knew things that others didn't know only because He was God (and He was and IS, don't misinterpret me) but because, as a Man, He was fully aware and incorporated into all Reality. He is also the first-born of many siblings - we are being made into His Image - into Real People - Humans with a capital H. This is what the Orthodox call Deification. I like that term. It says more than sanctification. I use transformation mostly. Not just moral rightness. Not just believing right things to get to the right place. Not only (even if good and true as much as it is) being Loved and learning to Love. MORE than all that - something that transcends and encompasses all that - the ontological transformation of our very being. That is the goal of God for us. He said things like "you'll do these things I do and greater..." That's not going to happen just because of some faith contract we make by saying certain words or believing certain things at certain times. This is going to happen when we become what He was - when we are transformed into His Image - that's His language, not mine. So, it's a big deal. All this is not merely a matter of earthly one (or even 3) dimensional life... plus God. And I think I better stop writing now because this is blogularly, very long, at this point. Pax vobiscum. technorati tags > theology, mysticism, spirituality, metaphysics, supernatural, heaven Labels: theology :::
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three quotes |:: "Then, if we cannot as yet think alike in all things, at least we may love alike. Herein we cannot possibly do amiss." "Keep your eyes on the crucifix, for Jesus without the cross
is a man without a mission, and the cross without Jesus
is a burden without a reliever." "...I am deeply convinced that the Christian leader of the future is called to be
completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self."
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