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I Have Dreamed, or in Other Words, I Have Seen a Vision—I Have Reason to Rejoice in the Lord!

March 26, 2020 1:32 am

We still do not know one-thousandth of one percent of what nature has revealed to us. I can complain because the rose bush has thorns or rejoice because the thorn bush has roses. Lehi sees a vision of the tree of life—he partakes of its fruit and desires his family to do likewise—he sees a rod of iron, a strait and narrow path, and the mists of darkness that enshroud humans—Sariah, Nephi, and Sam partake of the fruit, but Laman and Lemuel refuse. About 600-529 Before Christ. “And it came to pass that we had gathered together all manner of seeds every kind, both of grain of every kind, and also of the seeds of fruit of every kind. And it came to pass that while my father tarried in the wilderness he spake unto us, saying: Behold, I have dreamed; or in other words, I have seen a vision. And behold, because of the thing which I have seen, I have reason to rejoice in the Lord because of Nephi and also of Sam; for I have reason to suppose that they, and also many of their seed, will be saved. However, behold, Leman and Lemuel, I fear exceedingly because of you; for behold, methought I saw in my dream, a dark and dreary wilderness. And it came to pass that I saw a man, and he was dressed in a white robe; and he came and stood before me. And it came to pass that he spake unto me, and bade me follow him. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

“And it came to pass that as I followed him I beheld myself that I was in a dark and dreary waste. And after I had traveled for the space of many hours in darkness, I began to pray unto the Lord that he would have mercy on me, according to the multitude of his tender mercies. And it came to pass after I have prayed unto the Lord I beheld a large and spacious field. And it came to pass that I beheld a tree, whose fruit was desirable to make one happy. And it came to pass that I did go forth and partake of the fruit thereof; and I beheld that it was most sweet, above all that I ever before tasted. Yea, and I beheld that the fruit thereof was white, to exceed all the whiteness that had ever seen. And as I partook of the fruit thereof it filled my soul with exceedingly great joy; wherefore, I began to be desirous that my family should partake of it also; for I knew that it was desirable above all other fruit. And as I cast my eyes round about, that perhaps I might discover my family also, I beheld a river of water; and it ran along, and was near the tree of which I was partaking the fruit. And I looked to behold from whence it came; and I saw the head of thereof a little way off and at the head thereof I beheld your mother Sariah, and Sam, and Nephi; and they stood as far as if they knew not wither they should go. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

“And it came to pass that I beckoned unto them; and I also did say unto them with a loud voice that they should come unto me, and partake of the fruit, which was desirable above all other fruit. And it came to pass that they did come unto me and partake of the fruit also. And it came to pass that I was desirous that Laman and Lemuel should come and partake of the fruit also; wherefore, I cast mine eyes toward the head of the river, that perhaps I might see them. And it came to pass that I saw them, but they would not come and partake of the fruit. And I beheld a rod of iron, and it extended along the bank of the river, and led to the tree by which I stood. And I also beheld a strait and narrow path, which came along by the rod of iron, even to the tree by which I stood; and it also led by the head of the fountain, unto a large and spacious field, as if it had been a World. And I saw numberless concourses of people, many of whom were pressing forward, that they might obtain the path which led unto the tree by which I stood. And it came to pass that they did come forth, and commence in the path which led to the tree. And it came to pass that there arose a mist of darkness; yea, even an exceedingly great mist of darkness, insomuch that they who had commenced in the path did lose their way, that they wandered off and were lost. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

“And it came to pass that I behold others pressing forward, and they came forth and caught hold of the end of the rod of iron; and they did press forward through the mist of darkness, clinging to the rod of iron, even until they did come forth and partake of the fruit of the tree. And after they had partaken of the fruit of the tree they did cast their eyes about as if they were ashamed. And I also cast my eyes round about, and behold, on the other side of the river of water, a great and spacious building; and it stood as it were in the air, high above the Earth. And it was filled with people, both old and young, both male and female; and their manner of dress was exceedingly fine; and they were in the attitude of mocking and pointing their fingers towards those who had come at and were partaking of the fruit. And after they had tasted of the fruit they were ashamed, because of those that were scoffing at them; and they fell away into forbidden paths and were lost,” reports 1 Nephi 8.1-28. Intelligence penetrated like an eagle’s sight beneath the World-illusion and saw it for what it is—a cosmic process of continual change which never comes to an end, a Universal movement whose first impetus and final exhaustion will never be known, a flux of absolute duration therefore unimaginable. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

And the self-actualized who attains to the knowledge of THAT which forever seems to be changing but forever paradoxically retains its own pure reality, for one as for the ignorant, the flux must go on. However, it will go on here on this Earth, not in the same mythical Heaven or mirage-like Hell. He will repeatedly have to take flesh, as all others will have to, so long as duration lasts, that is, forever. For one cannot sit apart like others while their compassion is too profound to waste itself in mere sentiment. It demands the profound expression of sacrificial service in motion. We live in a World which is full of misery and ignorance, and the plain duty of each and all of us is to try to make the little corner one can influence somewhat less miserable and somewhat less ignorant that it was before one entered it. The escape into Heaven for one is only the escape into the inner realization of the truth whilst alive: it is not to escape from the external cycle of rebirths and deaths. It is a change of attitude. However, that bait had to be held out to one at an earlier stage until one’s will and nerve were strong enough to endure this revelation. There is no escape except inwards. For the self-actualized is too compassionate to withdraw into proud indifferentism and too understanding to rest completely satisfied with one’s own wonderful attainment. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

The sounds of suffering of human, the ignorance that is the root of these sufferings beat ceaselessly on the tympana of one’s ears. What can one do but answer, and answer with one’s very life—which one gives in perpetual reincarnation upon the cross of flesh as a vicarious sacrifice for others. It is thus alone that one achieves eternal life in God, not by fleeing forever as one could if one willed—into the Great Unconsciousness, but by the suffering forever the pains and pangs of perpetual rebirth that one may help or guide one’s own. The mystic arrives at treating all people alike through the emotion of love; the illuminate arrives at it through the knowledge of reason. The first is likely to be changeable, the last permanent because emotion is variable, reason firm. People forget how fast you did a job—but they remember how well you did it. The present is the point at which time touches eternity. Well, obviously, none of this had been unimpeachable to the critics over the years. “Words like “irrationality,” “Illusion,” “willful and heroic dedication”—these rub many people the wrong way. They have hardly helped make our World any better, especially in modern times. We must be animated about the demonic crisis of the times, and be wary of life-enhancing illusions. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

It is precisely at this point that the science of humans comes in. We know that Nazism was a viable hero system that lived the illusion of the defeat of evil on Earth. We know the terrifying dynamic of victimage and scapegoating all across history, and we know what it means—the offering of the other’s body in order to buy off one’s own death, the sadistic formula par excellence: break the bones and spill the blood of the victim in the service of some “higher truth” that the sacrificers alone possess. To treat the body with the same scorn that God seems to treat it is to draw close to Him. Well, we know these things only too well in our time. The problem is what to do with them. People cannot abandon the heroic. If we say that the irrational or mythical is part of the human groping for transcendence, we do not give it any blanket of approval. However, groups f men can do what they have always done—argue about heroism, assess the cost of it, show that it is self-defeating, a fantasy, a dangerous illusion and not one that is life-enhancing and ennobling. The great question is: If illusions are needed, how can we have those that are capable of correction, and how can we have those that will not deteriorate into delusions? #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

If humans live in myths and not absolutes, there is nothing we can do or say about that. However, we can argue for nondestructive myths; this is the task of what would be a general science of society. This admission of the need for guiding heroic myths, and at the same time the plea to be wary of their costs, reconciles a long-standing argument in social theory. Reason is a guide in social life. I have argued elsewhere that one very graphic way of looking at mental illness is to see it as the laying onto others of one’s own hyperfears of life and death. From this perspective we can also see that leaders of nations, citizens of so-called democracies, normal people are also doing the very same thing all the time: laying their power-expiation immunity trip onto everyone else. Today the whole World is already becoming uncomfortable with the repeated war games and biological-weapons test by nations of power trips, test that lay their danger onto innocent and powerless neighbours. In a way it is the drama of the family and the Feifferian love affair writ large across the face of the planet, the “family” of nations. There are no particular leaders or special councils of elite to blame in all this, simply because most people identify with the symbols of power and agree to them. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

The nation offers immortality to all its members. It is wrong to argue that psychically crippled people, what some call “necrophiliac characters,” do evil thing by valuing death over life and so lay waste to life because it makes them uncomfortable. Life makes whole nations of normal people uncomfortable, and hence the serene accord and abandon with which people have defeated themselves all through history. This is the great weakness, as we have now discovered, of Enlightenment rationalism, the easy hope that by the spread of reason humans will stand up to their full size and renounce irrationality. The Enlightenment thinkers understood well the dangers of the mass mind, and they thought that by the spread of science and education all of this could change. The great Russian sociologist Nikolai Mikhailovsky had already singled out the hero as the enemy of democracy, the one who causes others to yield their wills because of the safety it offers them. The thing that had to be done was to prevent society from turning the individual into a tool for the sake of social efficiency and safety. How could the infringement of the individuality be overcome? Mikhailovsky answered in the same vein as modern humanist psychiatrists: by giving the individual the opportunity for harmonious development. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

At about the same time that other great Enlightenment man, Emerson, made his famous plea for self-reliance, for persons with full and independent insides so that they could have the stability to withstand herd enthusiasms and herd fears. This whole tradition was brought up to date by Herbert Marcuse in a brilliant essay on the ideology of death. He argued that death has always been used by leaders and elites as an ideology to get the masses to conform and to yield up their autonomy. Leaders win allegiance to the cultural causa sui project because it protects against vulnerability. The polis, the state, God—all these are symbols of infallibility in which the masses willingly embed their fearful freedoms. There we have it: the culmination of the Enlightenment in a proper focus on the fundamental dynamics of mass slavishness. On the highest level of sophistication we know in detail what people fear and how they deny that fear. Enlightenment rationalism is too easy a creed, and so we would expect to see this weakness in all its thinkers. Some believe that the ultimate cause of all anxiety is death, and this sustains unfreedom. Humans are not free as long as death has not become really one’s own, that is, as long as it has not been brought under one’s autonomy. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

Alas, the fact is that humans do not have any autonomy under which to bring things. This great and fundamental problem for the whole career of Enlightenment science states that whether the individual is at all in a position to grow beyond some kind of transference, some form of moral dependence, and to affirm and accept oneself from oneself cannot be said. Only in the creative type does this seem possible to some extent. However, it can be said that even the highest, most individuated creative type can only manage autonomy to some extent. The fact is the people cannot and do not stand on their own powers; therefore they cannot make death their own. Moral dependence—guilt—is a natural motive of the human condition and has to be absolved from something beyond oneself. One young revolutionary saw that his guilt was absorbed by submission to the revolutionary cell. The weakness of the Enlightenment, then, was that it did not understand human nature—and it apparently still does not. We must ask for the good conscience to be a coward, the uprooting of heroic sublimation. However, this is too easy: even if people admit they are cowards, they still want to be saved. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

There is no harmonious development, no child-rearing program, no self-reliance that would take away from people their need for a beyond on which the meaning of their lives. There is a fallacy in the minds of many that overlooks the depth and universality of the fear of death. The other fallacy is to fail to see the naturalness of existential guilt—and this also fails. The task of social theory is to show how society aggravates and uses natural fears, but there is no way to get rid of the fears simply by showing how leaders use them or by saying that people must take them in hand. People will still take one another’s heads because their own heads stick out and they feel exposed and guilty. The task of social theory is not to explain guilt away of to absorb it unthinkingly in still another destructive ideology, but to neutralize it and give it expression in truly creative and life-enhancing ideologies. Let me move on to some learning that I would like to share with you. I like to be heard. A number of times in my life I have felt myself bursting with insoluble problems, or going round and round in tormented circles or, during one period, overcome by feelings of worthlessness and despair. I think I have been more fortunate than most at these times individuals who have been able to hear me and thus to rescue me from the chaos of my feelings, individuals who have been able to hear my meanings a little more deeply than most I have known. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

These persons have heard me without judging me, diagnosing me, appraising me, evaluating me. They have just listened and clarified and responded to me at all the levels at which I was communicating. I can testify that when you are in psychological distress and someone really hears you without passing judgment on you, without truing to take responsibility for you, without trying to mold you, it feels darn good! At these times it has relaxed the tension in me. It has permitted me to bring out the frightening feelings, the guilts, the despair, the confusions that have been a part of my experience. When I have been listened to and what I have been heard, I am able to reperceive my World in a new way and to go on. It is astonishing how elements that seem insoluble become soluble when someone listens, how confusions that seem irremediable turn into relatively clear flowing streams when one is heard. I have deeply appreciated the times that I have experiences this sensitive, empathic, concentrated listening. I dislike it in myself when I cannot hear another, when I do not understand one. If it is only a simple failure of comprehension or a failure to focus my attention on what one is saying or a difficulty in understanding one’s words, then I feel only a very mild dissatisfaction with myself. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

However, what I really dislike in myself is not being able to hear the other person because I am so sure in advance of what one is about to say that I do not listen. It is only afterwards that I realize that I have heard what I have already decided one is saying; I have failed really to listen. Or even worse are those times when I catch myself trying to twist one’s message to make it say what I want one to say, and then only hearing that. This can be a very subtle thing, and it is surprising how skillful I can be in doing it. Just by twisting one’s words a small amount, by distorting one’s meaning just a little, I can make it appear that one is not only saying the thing I want to hear, but that one is the person I want one to be. Only when I realize through one’s protest or through my own gradual recognition that I am subtly manipulating one, do I become disgusted with myself. I know too, from being on the receiving end of this, how frustrating it is to be received for what you are not, to be heard as saying something which you have not said. This creates anger and bafflement and disillusion. When I try to express something which is deeply me, which is part of my own private, inner World, and the other person does not understand, I am terrible frustrated and shut into myself. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

When I take the gamble, the risk, or trying to share something that is very personal with another individual and it is not received and not understood, this is a very deflating and a very lonely experience. I have come to believe that such an experience makes some individuals psychotic. It causes them to give up hoping that anyone can understand them. Once they have lost that hope, then their own inner World, which becomes more and more bizarre, is the only place where they can live. They can no longer live in any shared human experience. I can sympathize with them because I know that when I try to share some feeling aspect of myself which is private, precious, and tentative, and when this communication is met by evaluation, by reassurance, by distortion of my meaning, my very strong reaction is, “Oh, what is the use!” At such a time, one knows what it is to be alone. So, as you can readily see from what I have said thus far, a creative, active, sensitive, accurate, empathic, nonjudgmental listening is for me terribly important in a relationship. It is important for me to provide it; it has been extremely important, especially at certain times in my life, to receive it. I feel that I have grown within myself when I have provided it; I am very sure that I have grown and been released and enhanced when I have received this kind of listening. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19

Does adoration lead to anything else? Yes—the presentation of our bodies—our entire lives—in an ultimate act of worship. This is how Isaiah capped his great experience with God: “Here am I. Send me!” reports Isaiah 6.8. Similarly, after the great Paul sings in worshipful doxology—“For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever! Amen,” Romans 11.36, he immediately calls us to submission: “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—which is your spiritual worship,” as reported in Romans 12.1. As thou wilt; what thou wilt; when thou wilt. Our devotion must culminate in a conscious yielding of every part of our personality, every ambition, every relationship, and every hope to Him. This done, we have reached the apex of personal devotion. As I cautioned when we began, personal devotion cannot and must not be reduced to a few principles such as meditation, confession, adoration, and submission. Neither can it be put in a logical straitjacket. Sometimes we may be called to confession and submission only. Other times, adoration may occupy an extended time, or our devotions will probably be confined to petition only. There will be times when all of it takes place in twenty minutes. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

However, one thing is certain—it will not happen without discipline. The reason many people never have an effective devotional life is, they never plan for it. They do not know what it is because they have never taken the time to find out. They do not pray because the do not set aside the time. Their character never rises to that of Christ’s because they do not expose their lives to His pure light. Their wills stay crooked because they do not tie into Him. The question for prayerless men is a very masculine one: Are we man enough to meditate? To confess? To adore? To submit? To sweat and endure? Give me, O Lord, purity of lips, clean and innocent heart, and rectitude of actions. Give me humility, patience, abstinence, chastity, prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance. Give me the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and strength, the Spirit of knowledge and Godliness, and of Thy fear. Make me ever to seek Thy face with all my heart, all my soul, all my mind; grant me to have a contrite and humbled heart in Thy presence—to prefer nothing to Thy love. Most high, eternal, and ineffable Wisdom, drive away from me the darkness of blindness and ignorance; most high and eternal Strength, deliver me. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

Most high and eternal Fortitude, assist me; most high and incomprehensible Light, illuminate me; most high and infinite Mercy, have mercy on me. God of the publican, be merciful to me a sinner; this I am by nature and practice, this Thy word proclaims me to be, this I hope I feel myself to be; yet Thou hast not left me to despair, for there is no peradventure in Thy grace; I have all the assurance I need that with thee is plenteous redemption. In spite of the number and heinousness of my sins Thou hast given me a token for good; the golden sceptre is held out, and Thou has said “Touch it to live.” May I encourage myself by a sense of Thy all-sufficiency, by faith in Thy promises, by view of the experience of others. To that dear refuge in which so many have sheltered from every storm may I repair, in that fountain always freely open for sin may I be cleansed from every defilement. Sin is that abominable thing which Thy soul hates, and this alone separates Thee and me. Thou cannot contradict the essential perfections of Thy nature; Thou cannot make me happy with Thyself, till Thou hast made me holy like Thyself. O holy God, make me such a creature as Thou cannot take pleasure in, and such a being that I can take pleasure in Thee. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

May I consent to and delight in Thy law after the inner man, never complain over the strictness of Thy demands, but mourn over my want of conformity to them; never question Thy commandments, but esteem them to be right. By Thy Spirit within me may my practice spring from principle, and my dispositions be conformable with my duty. David said in Psalm 40.8, “I desire to do your will, O my God.” Why did David have this desire? It was because, as the remainder of the verse says, “You law is within my heart.” David found a law written in his own heart corresponding to the law written in God’s word. There was an agreeableness between the spiritual nature within hum and the objective law of God external to him. It is that way with a person who is a new creation in Christ. There is a basic though imperfect correspondence between the law written in a believer’s heart and the law written in Scripture. This does not mean we can discard the law written in Scripture, because the law written in the heart is not self-directing—that is, it does not tell us what to do. It only agrees with and responds to the law written in Scripture. This instantaneous act of God by which He begins sanctification in us is just as much a gift of God’s grace as justification. God does not wait until we surrender all, make a second commitment to Christ’s lordship, or anything like that. God gives sanctification by His grace. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19

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God’s Infinite Liberality Will Always Exceed All Our Wishes and Our Thoughts—God is Always Giving!

March 16, 2020 4:08 am

Spread your arms to those with needs, and serve with joy and zest; fill each day with golden deeds, and give your very best. Our beliefs about what we are and what we can be precisely determine what we will be. The real art of communication is not only to say the right thing in the right place, but to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment. The force of words, being (as I have formerly noted) too weak to hold people to the performance of their covenants; there are in humans true nature, but two imaginable helps to strengthen it. And those are either a fear of the consequences of breaking their word; or a glory, or pride in appearing not to need to break it. This later is generosity too rarely found to be presumed on, especially in the pursuers of wealth, command, or sensual pleasures; which are the greatest part of humankind. The passion to be reckoned upon, is fear; whereof there be two very general objects: one, the power of the spirits invisible; the other, the power of those people they shall therein offend. Of these two, though the former be the greater power, yet the fear of the later is commonly the greater fear. The fear of the former is in every person, one’s own religion: which has place in the nature of humans before civil society. The later has not so; at least place enough, to keep people to their promises; because in the condition of mere nature, the inequality of power is not discerned, but by the even of battle. #RandolphHarris 1 of 17

So that before the time of civil society, or in the interruption thereof by war, there is nothing can strengthen a covenant of peace agreed on, against the temptation of avarice, ambition, lust, or other strong desire, but the fear of that invisible power, which they every one worship as God; and fear as a revenger of their perfidy. All therefore that can be done between two people not subject to civil power, is to put one another to swear by the God one fears: which swearing or oath, is a form of speech, added to a promise; by which one that promises signifies, that unless one perform, one renounces the mercy of one’s God, or calls to Him for vengeance on oneself. Such was a heathen form, “Let Jupiter kill me else, as I kill this beast.” So is our form, “I shall do thus, and thus, so help me God.” And this, with the rites and ceremonies, which every one use in one’s own religion, that the fear of breaking faith might be the greater. By this is appears, that an oath taken according to any other form, or rite, then one’s, that swears is in vain; and no oath: and there is no swearing by any thing which the swearer thinks not God. For though people have sometimes used to swear by their kings, for fear, or flattery; yet they would have it thereby understood, they attributed to them divine honour. #RandolphHarris 2 of 17

And the swearing unnecessarily by God, is but orphaning of his name: and swearing by other things, as people do in common discourse, is not swearing, but an impious custom, gotten by too much vehemence of talking. It appears also, that the oath adds nothing to the obligation. For a covenant, if lawful, binds in the sight of God, without the oath, as much as with it; if unlawful, binds not at all; though it be confirmed with an oath. “We do not think about it enough. We spend too much time cursing time—time waits for no man, time will tell, oh, the ravages of time, time flies! We do not think about the gift of time. Time gives us the chance to make mistakes and correct them, to regenerate, to grow. Time gives us the chance to forgive, to restore, to do better than we have ever done in the past. Time gives us the chance to be sorry when we fail and the chance to try to discover in ourselves a new heart. How we use this time means everything. Will we take the opportunity to transform ourselves, to admit our hideous blunders, and become against all odds, the people of our dreams? That is what it is about, right?—becoming the people of our dreams,” (page 375-376, The Wolves of Midwinter by Anne Rice). #RandolphHarris 3 of 17

One day a patient accused himself bitterly of being ungrateful, of being a burden on the analyst, of not sufficiently appreciating the fact that the analyst treated him at a small fee. However, at the end of the interview he found that he had forgotten to bring the money he had intended to pay that day. This was only one of many evidences of his wish to get everything for nothing. His profuse and generalized self-accusations had here as elsewhere the function of obscuring the concrete issue. Another example which may serve as illustration of many is a mature and intelligent woman felt guilty about having had temper tantrums as a child, although she knew, intellectually, that they had been provoked by her parents’ unreasonable conduct, and although in the meantime she had freed herself of the belief that one must think one’s parents beyond reproach. Nevertheless her guilt feelings on this score persisted so strongly that she was inclined to take her failure to make erotic contacts with men as a punishment for her hostility toward her parents. By blaming an infantile offense for her present incapability of making such contacts she disguised the factors factually operating, such as her own hostility toward men and her having withdrawn into a shell as a consequence of a fear of rejection. #RandolphHarris 4 of 17

The self-recriminations not only protect against the fear of disapproval but also invite absolute reassurance, by provoking reassuring statements to the contrary. Even when no outside person is involved they provide reassurance by enhancing the neurotic’s self-respect, for they imply that one has such a keen moral judgment that one reproaches oneself for faults which others overlook and thus ultimately they make one feel that one is really a wonderful person. Moreover they give one relief, because they rarely concern the real issue of one’s discontentment with oneself, and therefore factually leave a secret door open for a belief that one is not so bad after all. A defense that is directly opposite to self-recrimination, and nevertheless fulfills the same purposes, is forestalling any criticism by always being right or perfect, thus leaving no vulnerable spots for criticism to find a foothold. Where this type of defense prevails any behaviour, even though glaringly wrong, will be justified with an amount of intellectual sophistry worthy of a cleaver and skillful lawyer. The attitude may go so far as to make it necessary to be right in the most insignificant and trifling details—to be always right about the weather, for example—because for such a person being wrong in any detail opens up the danger of being wrong altogether. #RandolphHarris 5 of 17

Usually a person of this type is unable to endure the slightest difference of opinion, or even a difference of emotional emphasis, because in one’s thinking even a minute disagreement is equivalent to a criticism. Tendencies of this kind account to a great extent for what is called pseudo-adaptation. This is found in persons who in spite of a severe neurosis manage to maintain in their own eyes, and sometimes also in those of the people around them, an appearance of being “normal” and well adapted. In neurotics of this type one will scarcely every go wrong in predicting an enormous fear of being found out or disapproved of. A third way in which the neurotic may protect oneself against disapproval is to take refuge in ignorance, illness or helplessness. I encountered a transparent example of this in a French girl whom I treated in German. She was one of the girls I have already mentioned who were sent to me under the suspicion of feeblemindedness. During the first few weeks of analysis I was doubtful myself about her mental capacity; she did not seem to understand anything I said, even though she understood Germany perfectly. I tried to say the same things in simpler language, with no better results. #RandolphHarris 6 of 17

Finally two factors clarified the situation. She had dreams in which my office appeared as a jail, or as the office of a doctor who had examined her physically. Both ideas betrayed her anxiety at being found out, the latter dream because she was terrified of any physical examination. The other revealing factor was an incident in her conscious life. She had forgotten to present her passport at a certain time, as required by law. When at last she went to the official she pretended not to understand German, hoping in this way to escape punishment—an incident she related to me laughingly. She then recognized that she had been using the same tactics toward me, and for the same motives. For this time on she proved to be a very intelligent girl. She had been taking shelter behind ignorance and stupidity to escape the danger of being accused and punished. In principle the same strategy is pursued by anyone who feels and acts like an irresponsible, playful child who is not to be taken seriously. Some neurotic persons adopt this attitude permanently. Or even if they do not behave childishly they may refuse to take themselves seriously in their own feelings. The function of this attitude may be observed in analysis. #RandolphHarris 7 of 17

Patients on the verge of having to recognize their own aggressive tendencies may suddenly feel helpless, suddenly act like a child, desiring nothing but protection and affection. Or they have dreams in which they find themselves small and helpless, carried in the mother’s womb or in her arms. If helplessness is not effective or applicable in a given situation, illness may serve the same purpose. That illness may serve as an escape from difficulties is well known. At the same time, however, it serves the neurotic as a screen against the realization that fear is making one recoil from tackling a situation as one should. A neurotic person who is having difficulties with one’s superior, for example, may find refuge in a server attack of indigestion; the appeal of disability at such time lies in the fact that it creates a definite impossibility of action, an alibi, so to speak, and thereby relives one of the realization of one’s cowardice. A final and very important defence against disapproval of any kind is a feeling of being victimized. By feeling abused the neurotic wards off reproach for one’s own tendencies to take advantage of others; by feeling miserably neglected one debars reproaches for one’s tendencies toward possessiveness; by feeling that others are not helpful one prevents them from recognizing one’s tendencies to defeat them. #RandolphHarris 8 of 17

This strategy of feeling victimized is so frequently used and tenaciously maintained because it is in fact the most effective method of defense. It enables the neurotic not only to ward off accusations but at the same time to put the blame on others. We must show our Scriptures not be in conflict with whatever [our critics] can demonstrate about the nature of things from reliable sources. In fact, it is safe to say that throughout much of church history, Scripture and right reason were considered twin allies to be prized and used by disciples of Jesus. “Nobody knows the actual day on which Christ was born. But December twenty-fifth was a great feast to the pagans of the ancient World, the day when the Sun was at its lowest ebb and people would gather in the fields, in the villages, and in the depths of the forest to beg for the Sun to come back to us at full strength, for the days to lengthen once more. And for warmth to return to the World, melting the deadly snows of Winter, and gently nourishing the crops of the field once again. That is the meaning of all the candles of Christmas, the bright electric lights on our Christmas trees. It is the meaning of all the celebrations throughout the season, that we have the hope always and forever of being better than we are, of triumphing over the darkness that might have dfeated us in the past, and realizing a brilliance never imagined before,” (pages 374-375, The Midwinters Wolves by Anne Rice). #RandolphHarris 9 of 17

Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak—courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen. “Think about it for a minute. Think about what it means to renew, to repent, to start all over again. We human beings always have the capacity. No matter how badly we stumble, we can get up and try again. No matter how miserably we fail ourselves and God and those around us, we can get up and start all over again. There is no midwinter so cold and so dark that we cannot reach for the shining light with both hands,” (page 374 The Midwinter Wolves by Anne Rice). While listening may be the most undervalued of all the communication skills, good people managers are likely to listen more than they speak. Perhaps that is why God gave us two ears and only one mouth. It does not matter what you intend to communicate, but how it is heard that counts. “I am grateful with all my heart that time is once more stretching out before me, providing me again with the chance to somehow—somehow—make amends for the things that I have done. God puts in our paths so many opportunities for that, does he not?—so many people out there who need so much from each and every one of us. He gives us people to help, people to serve, people to embrace, people to comfort, people to love. As long as I live and breathe, I am surrounded by these limitless opportunities, blessed by them on all side,” (page 376 The Midwinter Wolves by Anne Rice). #RandolphHarris 10 of 17

Words have a magical power. They can bring either the greatest happiness or deepest despair; they can transfer knowledge from teacher to student; words enable the orator to sway one’s audience and dictate its decision. Words are capable of arousing the strongest emotions and prompting all people’s actions. In order that all people may be taught to speak the truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it. “And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord gives no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for the that they may accomplish the thing which he commands them. And it came to pass that when my father had heard these words he was exceedingly glad, for he knew that I had been blessed of the Lord. And I, Nephi, and my brethren took our journey in the wilderness, with our tents, to go up to the land of Jerusalem. And it came to pass that when we had gone up to the land of Jerusalem, I am my brethren did consult one with another. And we cast lots—who of us should go in unto the house of Laban. And it came to pass that the lot fell upon Laman; Laman went in unto the house of Laban, and he talked with him as he sat in his house. #RandolphHarris 11 of 17

“And he desired of Laban the records which were engraven upon the plates of brass, which contained the genealogy of my father. And behold, it came to pass that Laban was angry, and thrust him out from his presence; and he would not that he should have the records. Wherefore, he said unto him: Behold thou art a robber, and I will slay thee. But Laman fled out of his presence, and told the things which Laban had done, unto us. And we began to be exceedingly sorrowful, and my brethren were about to return unto my father in the wilderness. But behold I said unto them that: As the Lord lives, and as we live, we will not go down unto our father in the wilderness until we have accomplished the thing which the Lord have commanded us. Wherefore, let us be faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord; therefore let us go down to the land of our father’s inheritance, for behold he left gold and silver, and all manner of riches. And this he has done because of the commandments of the Lord. For he knew that Jerusalem must be destroyed, because of the wickedness of the people. For behold, they have rejected the words of the prophets. Wherefore, if my father should dwell in the land after he has been commanded to flee out of the land, behold, he would also perish. Wherefore, it must needs be that he flee out of the land,” reports 1 Nephi 3.7-18. #RandolphHarris 12 of 17

Christianity is to be identified neither with any Christian Church nor with Christendom as a whole. It embraces both Jesus as the Christ and what is called the “Logos spermatikos.” Every theology knows that there is a sense and a manner in which God is not limited by the Church, that Christ reaches humans outside of those who are official members of the Church. Whether they are aware of it or not, Christ is the unconditional concern. It has to do it even when it is impossible to call him by his name. Every ultimate concern, every protest in the name of the Unconditional against any kind of idolatry—of things, of nations, of doctrines—implies a share in the Christian witness. This explains the messianic eloquence that is it the faith itself in the New Being in Christ which seeks expression in the most meaningless situations as it brings justification in the heart marked by sin, in the mind smeared by unbelief. Christ as the Revelation of the Unconditional among humans must be accepted as the one to explain the contents of the Christian faith, and the datum has to be focused upon as the norm adopted by theology and streamlined according to the norm. O God, Who orders things in Heaven and Earth alike for the assistance of humankind; we beseech Thee that while we are labouring in the lower part of the Universe, Thou would mercifully refresh us by the protection of Thy ministers from above; through Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 13 of 17

And here is the widespread failure to attain Christian maturity among both leaders and followers, referred to earlier. Those who are Christians by profession—and seriously so, we must add—today do not usually have, are not led into, the VIM (Vision, Intention, Means) that would enable them to routinely progress to the point where what Jesus Himself did and taught would be the natural outflow of who they really are on the inside. Rather, what they are inwardly is left substantially as it was, as it is in non-Christians, and they are left constantly to battle with it. That is why today you find many professing Christians circling back to non-Christians sources to resolve the problems of their inner life. Instead of inward transformation, some outward from of religion—often today even called a spirituality—is taken or impsed as the goal of practical endeavour. What is then important is to be a “good____” (you can fill in the blank). And the respective social group—the “good____s”—wiill enforce that importance, on pain of disapproval or exclusion from the group. Or the individual even enforces it upon himself or herself as what is “obviously” right. However, whatever the detail, authentic inward transformation into Christlikeness is omitted. It is not envisioned, intended, or achieved. #RandolphHarris 14 of 17

Not so in the call of Jesus to live with one as one’s student or apprentice in His kingdom. By contrast, for Him and for His Father, the heart is what matters, and everything else will then come along. And the process of inward renovation starts from the stark vision of life in the Kingdom of God. There can be no ongoing devotion without confession, which can take place anytime. Ideally it ought to take place whenever we sin. However, all too often we are too proud and emotionally charged to acknowledge our sins at the time we commit it—for example, when we lost our temper in an argument. However, if we are overloaded with guilt, devotion is impossible. To live by grace is to live solely by the merit of Jesus Christ. To live by the grace is to live solely by the merit of Jesus Christ. To live by grace is to base my entire relationship with God, including my acceptance and standing with Him, on my union with Christ. It is to recognize that in myself I bring nothing of worth to my relationship with God, because even my righteous acts are like filthy rage in God’s sights (Isaiah 64.6). Even my best works are stained with mixed motives and imperfect performance. I never truly love God with all my heart, and I never truly love my neighbour with the degree or consistency with which I love myself. #RandolphHarris 15 of 17

Yet God requires perfection. Jesus said, “Be perfect, therefore, as your Heavenly Father is perfect,” reports Matthew 5.48. When we take Jesus’ words seriously, we are forced to say with the psalmist, “Thy commandment is exceedingly broad,” reports Psalm 119.96. What is the answer to out dilemma? All Christians recognize that we are justified—that is, declared righteous—solely on the basis of the righteousness of Christ imputed to us by God though faith (Romans 3.21-25). However, few of us fully recognize that we are also sanctified through faith in Christ. Sanctification, or holiness (the two words are virtually interchangeable), is essentially conformity to the moral character of God. We normally think of sanctification as progressive, as an inner change of our character whereby we are confronted more and more to the likeness of Christ. That is certainly a major part of sanctification, but not all of it. O Living God, I bless thee that I see the worst of my heart as well as the best of it, that I can sorrow for those sins that carry me from thee, that it is Thy deep and dear mercy to threaten punishment so that I may return, pray, live. My sin is to look on my faults and be discouraged, or to look on my good and be puffed up. I fall short of Thy glory every day by spending hours unprofitably, by thinking that the thing I do are good, when they are not done to thy end, nor spring from the rules of Thy word. #RandolphHarris 16 of 17

My sin is to fear what never will be; I forget to submit to Thy will, and fail to be quiet there. However, Scripture teaches me that Thy active will reveals a steadfast purpose on my behalf, and this quietness my soul, and makes me love Thee. Keep me always in the understanding that saints mourn more for sin than other people, for when they see how great is Thy wrath against sin, and how Christ’s death alone pacifies that wrath, that makes them mourn the more. Help me to see that although I am in the wilderness it is not all briars and barrenness. I have bread from Heaven, streams from the rock, light by day, fire by night, Thy dwelling place and Thy mercy seat. I am sometimes discouraged by the way, but though winding and trying it is safe and short’ death dismays me, but my great high priest stands in its waters, and will open me a passage, and beyond is a better country. While I live let my life be exemplary, when I die may my end be peace. O Light of light, O Brightness indescribable, Christ our God, the Wisdom, Power, and Glory of the Father, Who didst appear visibly to all people as the Word made flesh, and having overcome the prince of darkness, did return to Thy throne on high; grant to us Thy suppliants, amid this dark World, the full outpouring of Thy splendour; appoint the Archangel Michael to be our defender, to guard our going out and coming in; and admit us to place on Thy right hand, to receive the crown from Thee. #RandolphHarris 17 of 17

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Take Time to Honour God, He is Moved by Your Faith—Faith Opens the Door for the Extraordinary!

March 12, 2020 12:14 am

The business of expanding your consciousness is not an option. Either you are expandable or you are expendable. Many people are mislead into thinking, as popular reports sometimes suggest, that neurophysiologists have found many answers to the problem of human behaviour. Most scholars in the field of the neurosciences, on the contrary, have a very different attitude. Our knowledge and concepts of the central neural organization of aggressive behaviour are constricted by the fact that most of the information has been derived from animal experiments, hence almost nothing is known about the relation of the central nervous system to the “feeling” or “affective” aspects of emotions. We are entirely confined to observation and experimental analysis of the expressive or behavioural phenomena and the objectively recorded peripheral bodily changes. Obviously, even these procedures are not entirely reliable, and despite extensive research efforts it is difficult to interpret behavioral on the basis of these clues alone. Those who hope to solve the problem of the neurophysiology of the mind are like people at the foot of a mountain. They stand in the clearings they have made on the foothills, looking up at the mountain they hope to scale. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20

However, the pinnacle of neurophysiology is hidden in eternal clouds and many believe it can never be conquered. Surely if the day does dawn when a human reached complete understanding of one’s own brain and mind, it may be one’s greatest conquest, one’s final achievement. There is only one method that a scientist may use in one’s scientific work. This is the method of observation of phenomena of nature followed by comparative analysis and supplemented by experimentation in the light of reasoned hypothesis. Neurophysiologist who follow the rules of the scientific method in al honesty will hardly pretend that their own scientific work entitles them to answer these questions. Not only the neurosciences and psychology but many other fields need to be integrated to create a science of humans—fields such as paleontology, anthropology, history, the history of religions (myths and rituals), biology, physiology, genetics. The subject matter of the “science of humans” is human: human as a total biologically and historically evolving being who can be understood only if we see the interconnectedness between all one’s aspects, if we look at one as a process occurring within a complex system with many subsystems. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20

The behavioural sciences (psychology and sociology), are interested mainly in what people do and how one can be made to do what one does, not why one does what one does and in who one is. They have to a considerable extent become an obstacle to and a substitute for the development of an integrated science of humans. The brain is more and more understood as a whole, as one system, so that behaviour cannot be explained by referring to some of its parts. Impressive data supporting this view have been presented by E. Valenstien, who has shown that the supposed hypothalamic “centers” for hunger, thirst, pleasures of the flesh excreta, are not, if they really exist, as pure as previously thought—that stimulation of a “center” for one behaviour can elicit behaviour appropriate to another if the environment provides stimuli consistent with the second. Aggression (actually, nonverbal communication of threat) elicited in a squirrel monkey will not be believed by another monkey if the threat is made by the second monkey’s social inferior. These data are consistent with the holistic view that the brain takes account, in its reckoning of what behaviour to command, of more than one strand of incoming stimulation—that the total state of the physical and social environment at the same time modifies the meaning of a specific stimulus. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20

However, the skepticism regarding the capacity of neurophysiology to explain human behaviour adequately does not means a denial of the relative validity of the many experimental findings, especially in the last five decades. These findings, while they might be reformulated and integrated in a more global view, are valid enough to give us important clues for the understanding of one kind of aggression, that of defensive aggression. Neurophysiologist have concentrated their efforts on finding the brain areas which are the substrates of the most elementary impulses and behaviours needed for survival because Dr. Darwin propositioned that the structure and functioning of the brain is governed by the principle of the survival of the individual and the species. There is general agreement with MacLean’s conclusion, who called these basic brain mechanisms the four Fs: feeding, fighting, fleeing, and the performance of pleasures of the flesh activities. As can easily be recognized, these activities are vitally necessary for the physical survival of the individual and the species. (That humans have basic needs beyond physical survival whose realization is necessary for their functioning as a total being will be discussed later.) #RandolphHarris 4 of 20

As far as aggression and flight are concerned—they are controlled by different areas of the brain, but the term “controlled” is quite inadequate. The response is one process going on in other parts of the brain, interacting with the specific area which is stimulated. Nonetheless, it has been shown, for example, that affective reaction of rage and its corresponding aggressive behaviour pattern can be activated by direct electrical stimulation of various areas, such as the amygdala, the lateral hypothalamus, some parts of the mesencephalon, and the central gray matter; and it can be inhibited by stimulating other structures, such as the septum, the circumvolution of the cingulum, and the caudal nucleus. With great surgical ingenuity some investigations were able to implant electrodes in a number of specific areas of the brain. They established a two-way connection for observation. By low voltage electrical stimulation of an area they were able to study changes of behaviour in animals, and later in humans. They could demonstrate, for instance, the arousal of intensely aggressive behaviour by the direct electric stimulation of certain areas, and the inhibition of aggression by stimulating certain others. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20

On the other hand, when emotions like rage, fear, pleasure, excreta were aroused by environmental stimuli, they could measure the electrical activity of these various areas of the brain. They could also observe the permanent effects produced by the destruction of certain areas of the brain. It is indeed quite impressive to witness how a relatively small increase in the electric charge in an electrode implanted in one of the neural substrates of aggression can produce a sudden outburst of uncontrolled, murderous rage and how the reduction of electric stimulation or the stimulation of an aggression-inhibitory center can equally suddenly stop this aggression. Delgado’s spectacular experiment of stopping a charging bull by the stimulation of an inhibitory area (by remote control) has aroused considerable popular interest in this procedure. That a response is activated in some brain areas and inhibited in others is by no means characteristic of aggression; the same duality exists with regard to other impulses. The brain is, in fact, organizes as a dual system. Unless there are specific stimuli (external or internal), aggression is in a state of fluid equilibrium, because activating and inhibiting areas keep each other in a relatively stable balance. This can be recognized particularly clearly when either an activating or an inhibiting area is destroyed. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20

Starting with the classic experiment by Heinrich Kluver and P.C. Bucy, it has been demonstrated, for instance, that destruction of the amygdala transformed animals (rhesus monkeys, wolverines, wildcats, rats, and others) in such a way that they lost—at least temporarily—their capacity for aggressive, violent reactions, even under strong provocation. On the other hand, the destruction of aggression-inhibiting areas, such as small areas of the ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus, produces permanently aggressive cats and rats. Given the dual organization of the brain, the crucial question arises: What are the factors that disturb the balance and produce manifest rage and corresponding violent behaviour? We have already seen that one way in which such disturbance of the balance can be produced is by electric stimulation or destruction of any of these areas (aside from hormonal and metabolic changes). Mark Ervin emphasized that such disturbance of the equilibrium can also occur due to various forms of brain diseases that alter the normal circuitry of the brain. Two kinds of changes affect the neural pathways. One kind is the momentary electrochemical change which is the physical means by which impulses travel along the nerves. This change depends on stimulation: when the stimuli cease, so do this process. This is how the environment—the source of many stimuli—controls the behaviour of the organism. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20

The other kind of change has to do with what happens at the synapse of neurons which frequently activate another. With use, more permanent structural changes take place which enable impulses to travel more easily through these synapses than others: facilitation. It is now generally believed that there are these two kinds of effects. There is a such thing as Phi elements which are concerned with momentary discharges, and Psi elements which bind nervous energy on a more permanent basis (cathexis). This difference, between fleeting and more enduring changes in the nervous system, makes it possible for more central dominance to emerge. Central dominance, from this perspective, accounts for the relatively slight effect made by feeling changes—particular messages being sent along at any moment of perception—on the more enduring structures which are slowly being built up in the course of facilitation, and confirmed by reverberation. This is how the organism controls its own behaviour, instead of being controlled by environmental stimuli only. Enduring changes in the pathways affect the reception and organization of subsequent messages, more than these later messages affect the existing organization. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20

To establish more central control is a victory of the organism over the environment, enabling the individual to adapt the environment in its own interest. Past memories can then be drawn upon to evaluate current events, giving individuals the benefit of past experiences before they take action. The disproportionate fear of disapproval may extend blindly to all human beings or it may extend only to friends—although usually the neurotic is unable to distinguish clearly between friends and enemies. In the beginning it refers only to the outside World, and to a greater or lesser extent it always remains related to the disapproval of others, but it may also become internalized. The more this happens, the more the disapproval from outside becomes unimportant in comparison with the disapproval of the self. The fear of disapproval may appear in various forms. Sometimes it shows in a constant fear of annoying people; the neurotic may be afraid, for example, to refuse an invitation, disagree with an opinion, express any wishes, fail to conform to the given standards, be in any way conspicuous. It may appear in a constant fear of people finding out about one; even when one feels one is liked one’s inclination is to withdraw in order to forestall being found out and dropped. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20

It also may come out in an inordinate reluctance to let others know anything about one’s own private affairs, or in a disproportionate anger at any harmless questions concerning oneself, because one feels that such questions are attempts to try to pry into one’s affairs. The fear of disapproval is one of the outstanding factors that makes the analytical process difficult for the analyst and painful for the patient. Different though each individual analysis is from the other, all have in common the feature that the patient, while desiring the analyst’s help and while wishing to reach an understanding, must at the same time fight off the analyst as a most dangerous intruder. It is this fear that induces the individual to act as if one were a criminal before a judge, and, like the criminal, one is secretly grimly determined to deny and to mislead. This attitude may appear in dreams of being pushed to confession and reacting to it with agony. One patient of mine, at a time when we were close to uncovering some of one’s repressed tendencies, had a day dream which was significant in this respect. One imagined he was a boy who had the custom of finding refuge, every now and then, on a dream island. There the boy became part of a community governed by a law prohibiting any revelation of this island’s existence and demanding the death of any possible intruder. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20

A person whom the boy loved, and who represented the analyst in some disguised form, happened to find one’s way to the island. According to the law one should have been killed. The boy could save him, however, by pledging that he himself would never return to the island. This was an artistic expression of the conflict which from the beginning to the end of the analysis was present in one or another form, a conflict between liking the analyst and hating him because he wanted to intrude into hidden thoughts and feelings, a conflict between the patient’s impulse to fight in defense of one’s secrets and the necessity of giving them up. If the fear of disapproval is not generated by guilt feelings it may be asked why the neurotic is then so much concerned about being detected and disapproved of. The main factor that accounts for the fear of disapproval is the great discrepancy that exists between the façade which the neurotic shows both to the World and to oneself and all the repressed tendencies that lie hidden behind the façade. Although one suffers, even more than one realizes, at not being at one with oneself, at all the pretenses one must keep up, one has nevertheless to defend these pretenses with all one’s energy, because they represent the bulwark that protects one from one’s lurking anxiety. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20

If we recognize that these things he has to hide form the basis of his fear of disapproval we can understand better why the disappearance of certain “guilt feelings” cannot possibly free one from one’s fear. There is more that has to be changed. To put it very bluntly, it is the whole insincerity in one’s personality or rather, in the neurotic part of one’s personality, that is responsible for one’s fear of disapproval, and it is in this insincerity that one fears detection. As to the special content of one’s secrets, one wants in the first place to conceal the sum total of what is usually covered by the term aggression. This term is used to include not only one’s reactive hostility—anger, revenge, envy, desire to humiliate, and the like—but all one’s secret demands on others. Since I have already discussed these in detail it suffices here to say briefly that he does not want to stand on his own feet, that he does not want to make efforts of his own in order to achieve what he wants; instead he inwardly insists on feeding on other persons’ likes, whether by domineering and exploiting or by the means of affection, “love” or submissiveness. As soon as his hostile reactions or his demands are touched upon, anxiety develops, not because he feels guilty but because he sees that his chances of getting the support he needs are endangered. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20

In the second place he wants to hide how weak and insecure and helpless he feels, how little he can assert himself, how much anxiety he has. For this reason he builds up a façade of strength. However, the more his particular strivings for security are focused on dominance, and thus the more his pride is also linked with the notion of strength, the more he thoroughly despises himself. He not only feels that there is danger in weakness but also considers it despicable, in himself as well as others, and he classes as weakness any inadequacy whether it concerns not being master in one’s own houses, inability to overcome barriers within oneself, having to accept help, or even being possessed by anxiety. Since he thus essentially despises any “weakness” in himself, and since he cannot help believing that others will despise him likewise if they find out his weaknesses, he makes desperate efforts to hide them, but always with the fear that he will be found out sooner or later; therefore the continued anxiety. Thus guilt feelings and their accompanying self-recriminations are not only the result, instead of the cause, of a fear of disapproval, but they are also a defense against this fear. They fulfill the double purpose of inviting reassurance and of blurring the real issue. The latter purpose they accomplish either by diverting attention from what should be concealed, or by exaggerating so greatly that they appear untrue. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20

An illustration of the general pattern of personal transformation is provided by programs that teach people to refrain from doing something very harmful, something that could possibly lead to untimely death. A desirable state of being is envisioned, and an intention to realize it is actuated in decision. Means are applied to fulfill the intention (and the corresponding decision) by producing the desirable state of being. This includes a conscious involvement of God in the individual’s life because it is highly effective in brining about personal transformation. It works in terms of essential structures of the human self revealed by God through His people. When we stop to think about it, there is no such thing as unqualified freedom. Such “freedom” would not be freedom, it would be anarchy. It would be everyone doing what is right in one’s own eyes; and given our sinful nature, it would be total chaos. In the Untied States, we say we live in a “free country.” We understand that freedom to be political freedom: the right to have a say in our government. However, we all recognize we are not free to disobey the laws of our state or nation. We are not free, for example, to drive on the left side of the highway. My son observed a humorous example of freedom when he visited a country in which automobile drivers are undisciplined and “free spirited.” #RandolphHarris 14 of 20

He saw cars stopped at a railroad crossing for a passing train. Instead of lining up behind one another to cross in their proper turn, several cars lined up at the crossing guard accord the entire road. Each driver wanted to be the first to cross when the guard was raised. However, when the train had passed, lo and behold, cars were lined up completely across the road on the other side of the tracks. “Freedom” quickly turned to chaos! That kind of thing happens in a much more serious way when we insist on unqualified freedom from the law of God. We have indeed been set free from the bondage and curse that results from breaking the law. And we have been called to freedom from works as a means of obtaining any merit with God. However, we have not been called to freedom from the laws as an expression of God’s will for our daily living. Paul said, “For in my inner being I delight in God’s laws,” and “I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s laws,” reports Romans 7.22,25. A few verses before he had characterized God’s law as “holy, righteous and good” as reported in Romans 7.12. It seems inconceivable that Paul would want to be free, or urge others to be free, from what was holy, righteous, and good—that in which he himself delighted. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20

So, then, God’s law is not opposed to grace, nor is it an enemy of grace. Neither is the law of God opposed to us as we seek to live by grace. To live by grace means we understand that God’s blessing on our lives is not conditioned by our obedience of disobedience but by the perfect obedience of Christ. it means that out of grateful response to the grace of God, we seek to understand His will and to obey Him, not to be blessed, but because we have been blessed. When the Psalmist speaks of meditating on the Law of God day and night (Psalm 1.2), he uses a word which means “to mutter.” This word was used to describe the murmurings of kings in Psalm 2.1, and for the chattering of doves in Isiah 59.11. In fact, St. Augustine translated Psalm 1.2, “On his law he chatters day and night.” Meditation is intrinsically verbal. This means the Psalmist memorizes God’s Word—for one cannot continually mutter the Scripture without memorizing it, and vice versa. Personally applied, this tells us that along with our systematic reading of the Bible, we ought to select especially meaningful segments to reverently mutter over. Sometimes it may be a single verse—Philippians 3.10, for example, the four emphases of which I like to murmur in the NASB: that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being confronted to His death. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20

Slowly and prayerfully turning over Scripture in this manner engages the eyes, the ears, and the mouth, and drills through the serpentinite to the heart—maximizing internalization and devotion. “And thus Laman and Lemuel, being the eldest, did murmur against their father. And they did murmur because they knew not the dealings of that God who had created them. Neither did they believe that Jerusalem, that great city, could be destroyed according to the words of the prophets. And they were like unto the Jews who were at Jerusalem, who sought to take away the life of my father (Lehi). And it came to pass that my father did speak unto them in the valley of Lemuel, with power, being filled with the Spirit, until their frames did shake before him. And he did confound them, that they durst not utter against him; wherefore, they did as he commanded them. And my father dwelt in a tent. And it came to pass that I, Nephi, being exceedingly young, nevertheless being large in stature, and also having great desires to know of the mysteries of God, wherefore, I did cry unto the Lord; and behold he did visit me, and did soften my heart that I did believe all the words which had been spoken by my father; wherefore, I did not rebel against him like unto my brothers,” 1 Nephi 1.12-16. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20

Grant us, we beseech Thee, O Lord our God, ever to rejoice in devotion to Thee; because our happiness is perpetual and full, if we are continually serving the Author of all good; through Jesus Christ our Lord. We beseech Thee, O Lord, let Thy faithful people rejoice evermore in Thy benefits; that being ordered by Thy governance, they may please Thee in their lives, and happily obtain the good which they pray for; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Grant, O Almighty God, that we may attain to the fulness of joy, and be the more earnestly devoted to Thy Majesty; through Jesus Christ Our Lord. Lord, pour into our hearts Thy servants that joy of the righteous which is in Thee; that the praise of Thee, which becometh well the upright, may purge out all unholiness from our minds; through They mercy. O Merciful God, when I hear of disagreeable things amongst Christians, it brings an additional weight and burden on my spirit; I come to thee in my distress and make lamentable complaint; teach me how to take reproofs from friends, even though I think I do not deserve them; use them to make me tenderly afraid of sin, more jealous over myself, more concerned to keep heart and life unblameable; cause them to help me to reflect on my want of spirituality, to abhor myself, to look upon myself as unworthy, and make them beneficial to my soul. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20

May all Thy people know how little, mean, and vile I am, that they may see I am nothing, less than nothing, to be accounted nothing, that so they may pray for me aright, and have not the least dependence upon me. It is sweet to be nothing and have nothing, and to be fed with crumbs from Thy hands. Blessed by Thy name for anything that life bring. How do poor souls live who have not thee, or when helpless have no God to go to, who feel not the constraining force of Thy love, and the sweetness of communion? O how admirably dost Thou captivate the soul, making all desires and affections centre on thee! Give me such vivacity in religion, that I may be able to take all reproofs from other people as from Thy hands, and glorify Thee for them from a sense of Thy beneficent love and of my need to have my pride destroyed. A competent teacher puts oneself behind one’s pupil’s eyes, inside one mind, and starts instruction from what one finds there. The prudent teacher will reveal what will best help people, not necessarily what they like to hear or all that one knows. One must give people what is best for them, must first evaluate how much truth they can take in. It is utterly impracticable and imprudent to give all people all the spiritual truth at all times. The prudent teacher will give out only slightly more than the seeking enquirer is able to receive. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20

Covenants entered into by fear, in the condition of mere Nature, are obligatory. To further highlight the illustration, if I covenant to pay a ransom, or service for my life, to an enemy; I am bound by it. For it is a contract, wherein one receiveth the benefit of life; the other is to receive money, or service for it; and consequently, where no other law (as in the condition, of mere nature) forbiddeth the performance, the covenant is valid. Therefore prisoners of war, if trusted with the payment of their ransom, are obliged to pay it; and if a weaker prince, make a disadvantageous peace with a stronger, for fear; one is bound to keep it; unless (as hath been said before) there ariseth some new, and just cause of fear, to renew the war. And even in all common-wealths, if I be force to redeem myself from a thief by promising him or her money, I am bound to pay it, till the civil law discharge me. For whatsoever I may lawfully do without obligation, the same I may lawfully covenant to do through fear: and what I lawfully covenant, I cannot lawfully break. A former covenant, makes void a later. For a person that has passed away one’s right to one person today hath it not to pass tomorrow to another: and therefore the later promise passeth no right, but is null. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20

WE BUILD EACH HOME LIKE OUR OWN

Some people succeed because they are destined to, but most people succeed because they are determined to. At Cresleigh, we take pride in the design and construction of every home we build. We strive to lay the foundations for a thriving community with interconnections, energy efficiency, and construction longevity at its core. Our team members are passionate about creating a home you can rely on, one that assures you can focus on what truly matters: creating memories with those you love.

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Your life is the sum result of all the choices you make, both consciously and unconsciously. If you can control the process of choosing, you can take control of all aspects of your life. You can find the freedom that comes from being in charge of yourself. https://cresleigh.com/find-a-home/

When You Become Weary and Feel Like Quitting, Wait on the Lord and He Will Renew Your Strength!

March 9, 2020 12:51 am

Strange, when you come to think of it, that of all the countless folk who have lived before our time on this planet not one is known in history or legend as having died of laughter. The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon, but only to hold a person’s foot long enough to enable one to put the other somewhat higher. Do not compromise yourself. You are all you have got. If you have the will to win, you have achieved half your success. If you do not, you have achieved half your failure. If you have made mistakes, there is always another chance for you. You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing we call “failure” is not falling down, but the staying down. “Treasure the pain; treasure what you have, including fear. Treasure it because if we do not live this life, if we do not live it to the fullest year after year and century after century, well, then we die,” (Page 32, The Wolves of Midwinter by Anne Rice). To understand each faculty is to grasp first the nature of the faculties in general, and their relationship to each other and the divisions of knowledge. The fundamental relationship among the faculties is that of knowledge to action. Understanding, reason, and imagination yield contemplative knowledge and memory recorded and recalled it. Knowledge is a state or condition of the human being that constitutes a potential for action. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

In any instance of rational behaviour, action came about when an individual, confronted with the need to choose among alternatives, brought one’s knowledge to bear in ways that controlled appetite and directed one’s will. Rational conduct is thus knowledge actualized. Practical knowledge, on the other hand, is a state or condition built up chiefly through experience. It becomes rational to the extent that knowledge affected experience. The best division of human learning is that derived from the three faculties of the rational soul, which is the seat of learning. History is properly concerned with individuals, which are circumscribed by place and time. For though Natural History may seem to deal with species, yet this is only because of the general resemblance which in most cases natural objects of the same species bear to one another; so that when you know one, you know all. All this relates to the Memory. Philosophy discards individuals; neither does it deal with the impressions immediately received from them, but with abstract notions derived from these impressions; in the composition and division whereof according to the law of nature and fact its business lies. And this is the office of work of reason. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

The sense, which is he door of intellect, is affected by individuals only. The images of those individuals—that is, the impression they make on the sense—fix themselves in the memory. These the human mind proceeds to review and ruminate; and thereupon either simply rehearses them, or makes fanciful imitations of them, or analyses and classifies them. Wherefore from these three fountains, Memory, Imagination, and Reason, flow these three emanations, History, Poesy, and Philosophy. I consider history and experience to be the same things, as also philosophy and the sciences. These faculties or powers had as their vehicle the motions of spirits. Each faculty modulated, shaped, and figured spirit movement in ways peculiar to it: some of the ancients, who in too eagerly fixing their eyes and thoughts on the memory, imagination, and reason, have neglected the faculty of thinking [or cogitation], which holds first place in the work of contemplating and considering [id est, in the work of conception]. For one who remembers and also one who recollects, is thinking; one who imagines, is thinking; one who reasons, is thinking; and in a word the spirit of a human, whether prompted by sense of left to itself, whether in the functions of the understanding, or of the will and affections, dances to the measure of thoughts. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

The context of the passage makes clear that by nature the souls of all living creatures are in infinite and endless motion, the human soul having its own mode of motion That which is in motion is spirit. It seems evident, then, that thinking is a general mode of spirit activity in the rational soul and that the faculties designate distinctive types of motion. Thinking is like a radio carrier wave which is modulated according to the tasks it does. The faculties are types of modulation. Although we speculate much about the spirit, the physical basis of mental life, very speak very little about the anatomical location of mental activity. We are aware of the medical lore which locates the faculties in the ventricles of the brain. That arrangement of the intellectual faculties (imagination, reason, and memory) according to the respective ventricles of the brain is not entirely destitute of error. Yet, it is known that the cognition of humans is in their head, but we also know the heart and the gut seem to have intellectual abilities as well. Primary learning is the acquisition of rather simple connections between events, based largely on sensory input and simple messages from other parts of the body. The simpler the organism, the more simply and easily these connections are made—the faster, too, and the more enduringly. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

Mature learning, on the other hand, depends a great deal on meaning, that is on relating the current sensory input to what is already known. And what is already known is stored in the association areas in very complex ways. So, the more complex the organism, the slower the incorporation of new sensory input into the existing frame or context. We know this from other forms of organization. How hard it is to get some change introduced into bureaucracy, and how hard it is for us outsiders to talk to those inside—insiders like to talk to each other. Only the higher beings have the capacity to learn through the use of concepts and symbols. The first learning of primates is extremely slow, and very different from that at maturity. Human meticulousness in the learning process is due to the very complexity of which our thinking is ultimately capable: primitive animals learn fast; complex, patterned, configurational learning comes later and takes longer. To appreciate the nature of more central functioning, it now becomes important to distinguish between two parts of the cortex (the surface of the brain). Some cells here are connected directly with the sensory nerve-cells bringing messages about the environment or the state of the body; other cells are mainly connected with each other; this is the distinction between the sensory cortex and the association cortex, respectively. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

This distinction between sensory and association cortex enables us to speculate about how environmental, peripheral, sensory control over behaviour differs from the higher achievements of some animals: more central controls over behaviour, even amounting to purposive behaviour. Verbal and nonverbal feedback are strategies thar are most rudimentary forms of vivification. First, let us consider the verbal modality. There are two basic ways to provide verbal feedback—noting and tagging. Noting alerts clients to initial experiences of resistance; tagging acquaints them with those that follow. Some examples of noting are observations such as, “This issue seems really difficult for you,” and “You appear to be distracted right now.” Some examples of tagging are, “Whenever we discuss this topic, you seem to want to change it,” and “There you go again, preferring to argue rather than face your life.” Because I am trying to alert rather than shock, I sometimes find I necessary to temper my appraisals. For example, I might say to a client just beginning treatment: “I wonder if I am pushing too hard right now. Maybe you can begin again where you feel comfortable.” #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

I also try to acknowledge the potential fallibility of my feedback; this helps clients to direct themselves to the relevant issues. “My observation my have been off base here,” I might remark. Or I might say, “I wonder if we could suspend my observation for a bit, see how it feels to us at a later time.” I find that use of nonverbal feedback to be particularly elucidating to clients. Whereas verbal feedback appears to animate predominately conscious domains of clients’ resistance, nonverbal feedback seems to clarify primarily subliminal barriers and domains. By mirroring a client’s crossed arms, for example, unless they are posing for a studio picture, I am able to help one see how unexpectedly guarded one has been about a particular topic; by echoing a client’s sense of being “choked up,” I am able to appraise one of one’s “suffocating” relationship. Resistances sometimes seem like broken records to clients, endlessly duplicating a theme. While the vivification process can often amplify that sense of repetitiveness, it can also provide fresh opportunities to transcend it. I try to alert clients to these possibilities and to subtle changes in their patterns of defensiveness. For example, I might refer an intellectualized client to one’s sudden use of the pronoun “I,” or direct a client who chronically suppresses one’s sadness to an abruptly formed teardrop. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

The idealized image might be called a fictitious or illusory self, but that would be only a half truth and hence misleading. The wishful thinking operating in its creation is certainly striking, particularly since it occurs in persons who otherwise stand on a ground of firm reality. However, this does not make it wholly fictitious. It is an imaginative creation interwoven with and determined by very realistic factors. It usually contains traces of the persons genuine ideals. While the grandiose achievements are illusory, the potentialities underlying them are often real. More relevant, it is born of very real inner necessities, it fulfills very real functions, and it has a very real influence on its creator. The process of operating in its creation are determined by such definite laws that a knowledge of its specific features permits us to make accurate inferences as to the true character structure of the particular person. However, regardless of how much fantasy is woven into the idealized image, for the neurotic oneself it has the value of reality. The more firmly it is established the more one is one’s idealized image, while one’s real self is proportionately dimmed out. This reversal of the actual picture is bound to come about because of the very nature of the functions the image performs. Every one of them is aimed at effacing the real personality and turning the spotlight on itself. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

Looking back over the history of many patients we are led to believe that its establishment has often been literally lifesaving, and that is why the resistance a patient puts up if one’s image is attacked is entirely justified, or at least logical. As long as one’s image remains real to one and is intact, one can feel significant, superior, and harmonious, in spite of the illusory nature of those feelings. One can consider oneself entitled to raise all kinds of demands and claims on the basis of one’s assumed superiority. However, if one allows it to be undermined one is immediately threatened with the prospect of facing all one’s weaknesses, with no title to special claims, a comparatively insignificant figure or even—in one’s own eyes—a contemptible one. More terrifying still, one is faced with one’s conflicts and the hideous fear of being torn to pieces. That this may give one a chance of becoming a much better human being worth more than all the glory of one’s idealized image, is a gospel one hears but for a long time means nothing to one. It is a leap in the dark of which one is afraid. With so great a subjective value to recommend it, the position of the image would be unassailable if it were not for the huge drawbacks inseparable from it. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

The whole edifice is in the first place extremely rickety by reason of the fictitious elements involved. A treasure house loaded with dynamite, it makes the individual highly vulnerable. Any questioning or criticism from outside, any awareness of one’s own failure to measure up to the image, any real insight into the forces operating within one can make it explode or crumble. One must restrict one’s life lest one be exposed to such dangers. One must avoid situations in which one would not be admired or recognized. One must avoid tasks that one is not certain to master. One may even develop an intense aversion to effort of any kind. To one, the gifted one, the mere vision of a picture one might paint is already the master painting. Any mediocre person can get somewhere by hard work; for one to apply oneself like very Tom, Dick, and Harry would be an admission that one is not the mastermind, and so humiliating. Since nothing can actually be achieved without work, one defeats by one’s attitude the very ends one is driven to attain. And the gap between one’s idealized image and one’s real self widens. One is dependent upon endless affirmations from others in the form of approval, admiration, flattery—none of which, however, can give one any more than temporary reassurance. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

One may unconsciously hate everyone who is overbearing or who, being better than one in any way—more assertive, more evenly balanced, better formed—threatens to undermine one’s own notions of oneself. The more desperately one clings to the belief that one is one’s idealized image, the more violent the hatred. Or, if one’s own arrogance is repressed, one may blindly admire persons who are openly convinced of their importance and show it by arrogant behaviour. One loves in them one’s own image and inevitably runs into severe disappointment when one becomes aware, as one must at some time or other, that the gods one so admires are interested only in themselves, and as far as one is concerned care only for the incense one burns at alters. Tracing out and enabling helps clients to trace out the consequences of their resistances and enabling them to be resistant are two other ways to catalyze productive change. I have often found it helpful for client invested in smallness, for example, to detail the dullness, routine, and oppressiveness that they foresee in their lives. I have found it equally useful for inflated clients to peer into their unsettling futures. While such strategies may acutely frustrate certain clients, they can also alert them to present opportunities, which can head off their nightmarish fantasies. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

Ambivalent clients can also benefit from the strategy of tracing out. Experientially detailing the pros and cons of a situation or anticipating the meaning of remaining ambivalent have all helped my clients to substantively reassess their predicaments. One of the most interesting and ironic features of vivification is that when all else fails, just allowing the client to resist can be the most salient remedy. When I worked with highly resistive (nonviolent) children, for example, I found that divesting of a given treatment plan was more effective, frequently, than pressing for a particular strategy. Highly resistive adult clients also respond favourably to such divestitures. When such clients are allowed to simply be their withdrawn, grandiose, or intractable selves, they will frequently begin to relinquish those dispositions. For example, I suggested to one intransigent client that she just “be that way,” and that she could use her time as she wished. At first she agreed and diverted us to another topic. As time went on, however, it became clear that she felt uncomfortable with this arrangement. When I worked with her to stay present to that discomfort, she acknowledged how infuriated she had become with herself and how tired she had become of treating herself like an invalid. It was then that she recommitted to change. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

Vivifying or modeling desired behaviour is another way to catalyze resistant clients. By forming an alliance with the part of a client that could be, the therapist can tacitly underscore who that client is; the contrast between the two can invigorate the client to transform. I once told a client who was about to give up on herself, for example, that I was not about to give up on her, and that I would form an alliance with the part of her that believed. Although little changed at first, she gradually realized how absurd her hopelessness had been. As long as I can be of help to you, I will work with you. You not only have permission without condemnation to express your struggle to be; you have prior experiences, from the greatest authority (God), of your own rights and your own being. You are a person with your own rights. To make covenant with God, is impossible, but by deep prayer of such as God speaks to, either by revelation supernatural, or by his lieutenants that govern under Him, and in His Name; for otherwise we know not whether our covenants be accepted, or not. And therefore they that vow anything contrary to any law of nature, vow in vain; as being a thing unjust to pay such a vow. And if it be a thing commanded by the law of nature, it is not the vow, but the law that binds them. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

Christianity is holding that human beings are somehow good apart from God and therefore capable of saving themselves, even saving themselves by merit. The fear of many is that if you do not hold human beings to be, essentially and as such “rotten,” and forever so, you are thereby committed to the view that they are, as such, essentially good and therefore righteous and meritorious. This is a field of battle fought over by Pelagius and Augustine many centuries ago and repeatedly revisited through Christian history. It involves many important issues, which cannot be fully dealt with here. We must keep clear, however, that it is the worth of the human beings, not their righteousness, which is tied to their nature. Things of great value can still be lost and often are; and to be of great values does not mean one is not lost, but is saved and safe. “Depravity” does not, properly, refer to the inability to act, but to the unwillingness to act and clearly the inability to earn. Everyone must be active in the process of their salvation and transformation to Christlikeness. This is an inescapable fact. However, the initiative in the process is always God’s, and we would in fact do nothing without His initiative. Yet, that initiative is not something we are waiting upon. The ball is, as it were, in our court. #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

God has invaded human history and reality. Jesus Christ has died on our behalf, is risen, and is now supervising events on Earth toward an end that He will certainly bring to pass, to the glory of God. The issue now concerns what we will do. The idea that we can do noting is an unfortunate confusion, and those who sponsor it never practice it, thank goodness. If we—though well-directed and unrelenting action—effectually receive the grace of God in salvation and transformation, we certainly will be incrementally changed toward inward Christlikeness. The transformation of the outer life, especially of our behaviour, will follow suit. That too is an inescapable fact. “No good tree produced bad fruit,” reports Luke 6.43. However, this means both goodness and ability in union with God, not apart from Him—not independently, on our own. The transformation of the inner being is as much or more a gift of grace as is our justification before God. Of course neither one is wholly passive. (To be forever lost you need only do nothing. Just stay your course.) However, with reference to both justification and transformation, “boasting is excluded” by the law of grace through faith (Romans 3.27-31; Ephesians 2.1-10). #RandolphHarris 15 of 19

In fact, we consume the most grace by leading a holy life, in which we must be constantly upheld by grace, not by continuing to sin and being repeatedly forgiven. The interpretation of grace as having only to do with guilt is utterly false to biblical teaching and renders spiritual life in Christ unintelligible. Hopefully, it will now be clear that our inner (and therefore outer) being can be transformed is not only possible, but has actually occurred to a significant degree in the lives of many human beings; and it is necessary if our life as a whole is to manifest one’s goodness and power, and if we as individuals are to grow into the eternal calling that God places upon each life. God is the only who has no beginning. Now whatever has a beginning, is not eternal. Therefore God is the only one eternal. Eternity truly and properly so called is in God lone, because eternity follows on immutability. However, God alone is altogether immutable. Accordingly, however, as some receive immutability from Him, they share in His eternity. Thus some receive immutability from God in the way of never ceasing to exist; in that sense it is said of the Earth, “it shall stand forever,” as reported in Ecclesiastics 1.4. Again, some things are called eternal in Scripture because of the length of their duration, although they are in nature corruptible things; thus Psalms 75.5 the hills are called “eternal” and we read “of the fruits of the eternal hills.” Deuteronomy 33.15. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

Some again share more fully than others in the nature of eternity, inasmuch as they possess unchangeableness either in being or further still in operation; like the Angels, and the blessed, who enjoy the Word, because “as regards that vision of the Word, no changing thoughts exist in the Saints,” as Augustine says. Hence those who see God are said to have eternal life; according to that text, “This is eternal life, that they may know Thee the only true God,” excreta (Jn. 17.3). There are said to be many eternities, accordingly as many share in eternity, by the contemplation of God. The fire of Hell is called eternal, only because it never ends. Still, there is change in the pains of the lost, according to the words “To extreme heat they will pass from snowy Psalm “Their time will be forever,” reports Psalms 80.16. Necessary means a certain mode of truth; and truth, according to the Philosopher, is in the mind. Therefore, in this sense the true and necessary are eternal, because they are in the eternal mind, which is the divine intellect alone; hence it does not follow that anything is eternal besides God. Be present, O Lord, to Thy suppliants, and graciously protect those who place their whole trust in Thy mercy; that being cleansed from the stain of sin, they may continue in holy living, and being sufficiently supplied with temporal blessings, may attain the inheritance of Thy promises; though Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

Grant us, O Lord, we beseech Thee, always to seek Thy kingdom and righteousness; and of whatsoever Thou seest us to stand in need, mercifully grant us an abundant portion; through Jesus Christ our Lord. “For behold, it came to pass that the Lord spoke unto my father (Lehi), yea; even in a dream, and said unto him: Blessed art thou Lehi, because the things which thou has done; and because thou hast been faithful and declared unto this people the things which I commanded thee, behold, they seek to take away thy life. And it came to pass that the Lord commanded my father, even in a dream, that he should take his family and depart into the wilderness. And it came to pass that he was obedient unto the word of the Lord, wherefore he did as the Lord commanded him. And it came to pass that he departed into the wilderness. And he left his house, and the land of his inheritance, and his gold, and his silver, and his precious things, and took nothing with him, save it were his family, and provisions, and tents, and departed into the wilderness. And he came down by the borders near the shore of the Red Sea; and he traveled in the wilderness in the borders which are nearer the Red Sea; and he did travel in the wilderness with his family, which consisted of my mother, Sariah, and my elder brothers, who were Leman, Lemuel, and Sam,” reports 1 Nephi 2.1-5. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

Sovereign Lord, when clouds of darkness, atheism, and unbelief come to me, I see thy purpose of love in withdrawing the Spirit that I might prize him more, in chastening me for my confidence in past successes, that my wound of secret godlessness might be cured. Help me to humble myself before Thee by seeing the vanity of honour as a conceit of human’s minds, as standing between me and thee; by seeing that thy will must be done, as much in denying as in giving spiritual enjoyments; by seeing that my heart is nothing but evil, mind, mouth, life void of thee; by seeing that sin and Satan are allowed power in me that I might know my sin, be humbled, and gain strength thereby; by seeing that unbelief shuts thee from me, so that I sense not thy majesty, power, mercy, or love. Then possess me, for thou only art good and worthy. Thou dost not play in convincing me of sin, Satan did not play in tempting me to it, I do not play when I sink in deep mire, for sin is no game, no toy, no bauble; let me never forget that the heinousness of sin lies not so much in the nature of the sin committed, as in the greatness of the Person sinned against. When I am afraid of evils to come, comfort me, by showing me that in myself I am a dying, condemned wretch, but that in Christ I am reconciled, made alive, and satisfied; that I am feeble and unable to do any good, but that in Hum I can do all things; that what I now have in Christ is mine in part, but shortly I shall have it perfectly in Heaven. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19

BRIGHTON STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH

Rancho Cordova, CA |

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Distinguish Between Duty and Anxiety, and May our Character and Not Our Circumstance Chiefly Engage Us!

March 7, 2020 3:43 am

Get up every morning know that time is moving forward and God is manifesting your dreams. I do not want to get to the end of my life and find that I just lived the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well. Tomorrow is the most important thing in life. It comes to us at midnight very clean. When it arrives, it is perfect, and it puts itself in our hands and hopes we have learned something from yesterday. A result of human’s vulnerability to death and one’s symbolic consciousness of it is the struggle to get power to fortify oneself. Other beings must simply use those powers that nature provided them with and the neural circuits that animate those powers. However, humans can invent and imagine powers, and they can invent ways to protect power. This means that all the moral categories are power categories; they are not about virtue in any abstract sense. Purity, goodness, rightness—these are ways of keeping power in tact so as to cheat death; the striving for protection is a way of qualifying for extra special immunity not only in this World but in others to come. Hence all categories of dirt, filth, imperfection, and error are vulnerability categories, power problems. For young children Band-Aids are already an obsessive religion that sets the whole tone of it: cleanliness is safety. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20

So we see that as an organism humans are fated to perpetuate oneself and as a conscious organism one is fated to identify evil as the threat to that perpetuation. In the same way, one is driven to individuate oneself as an organism, to develop one’s own peculiar talents and personality. An what, then, would be the highest development and use of those talents? To contribute to the struggle against evil, of course. In other words, humans are fated to consider this Earth as a theater for heroism, and one’s life as a vehicle for heroic acts which aim precisely to transcend evil. Each person wants to have one’s life make a difference in the life of humankind, contribute in some way toward securing and furthering that life, make it in some ways less vulnerable, more durable. To be a true hero is to triumph over diseases and things like the Coronavirus, want, death. If it has been able to being real benefits to life of human kind, one knows that one’s life has gad vital human meaning. And so people have always honoured their heroes, especially in religion, medicine, science, diplomacy, and way. Here is where heroism has been most easily identifiable. From Constantine and Christ to Harriet Tubman and De Gaulle, people have called their heroes “saviours” in the literal sense: those who have delivered them from the evil of the termination of life, either of their own immediate lives or of the duration of their people. #RandolphHarris 2 of 20

Even more, by one’s own death the hero secures the lives of others, and so the greatest heroic sacrifice is the sacrifice of the god for one’s people. We see this in Columbus, Christ, Robert E. Lee, John F. Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr. The giants died to secure humankind; by their blood we are saved. It is almost pathetically logical how humans, the supremely vulnerable beings, developed the cult of logic. However, if we add together the logic of the heroic with the necessary fetishization of evil, we get a formula that is no longer pathetic but terrifying. It explains almost all by itself why humans, of all beings, have caused the most devastation on Earth—the most real evil. Humans struggle extra hard to be immune to death because they alone are conscious of it, as far as we know; but by being able to identify and isolate evil arbitrarily, they are capable of lashing out in all directions against imagined dangers of this World. This means that in order to live one is capable of bringing a large part of the World down around their shoulders. History is just such a testimonial to the frightening costs of heroism. The hero is the one who can go out and get added powers by killing an enemy and taking one’s talismans or one’s scalp or eating one’s heart. Humans become a walking repository of accrued powers. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20

Animals can only take in food for power; humans can literally take in the trinkets and bodies of one’s whole World, like we saw in the film Neon Demon. Furthermore, the hero proves one’s power by winning in battle; one shows that one is also favoured by the gods. Also, one can appease the gods by offering to them the sacrifice of the stranger. The hero is, then, the one who accrues power by one’s acts, and who placates invisible powers by one’s expiations. One terminates those who threaten their group, one incorporates their powers to further protect one’s group, one sacrifices others to gain immunity for one’s group. In a word, one becomes a saviour through blood. From the head-hunting and charm-hunting of the primitives to the holocaust of Adolf Hitler, the dynamic is the same: the heroic victory over evil by a traffic in pure power. And the aim is the same: purity, goodness, righteousness—immunity. Hitler Youth were recruited on the basis of idealism; the nice boy next door is the one who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima; the idealistic communist is the one who sided with Stalin against one’s former comrades: terminate to protect the heroic revolution, to assure the victory over evil. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20

The ending of a life is sometimes distasteful, but the distaste is swallowed if it is necessary to true heroism: as one of the revolutionaries asked Pyotr Verhovensky in The Possessed, when they were about to end the life of one of their number, “Are other groups also doing this?” In other words, is it the socially heroic thing to do, or are we being arbitrary about identifying evil? Each person wants one’s life to be a marker for goo as one’s group defines it. Humans work their programs of heroism according to the standard of cultural scenarios, from Pontius Pilate through Eichmann and Calley. People cause evil out of good intentions, not out of wicked ones. People cause evil by wanting heroically to triumph over it, because humans are a frightened being who tries to triumph, a being who will not admit one’s own insignificance, that one cannot perpetuate oneself and one’s group forever, that no one is invulnerable no matter how much of the blood of others is spilled to try to demonstrate it. Another way of summing up this whole matter is to contrast evil out of good intentions, but the idea that evil is as a fatality for humans, forever locked in the human heart and soul. This is what gives some psychiatrists, such as Dr. Freud, such a dim view of the future of humans. Many eyes looked to a man of his greatness for a prophecy on human possibilities, but he refused to pose as the magician-seer and give people the false prediction. #RandolphHarris 5 of 20

And it is possible that some people do have evil locked in their souls and hearts, and they like to torture and end the life of those who are beautiful and kind because it reduces the competition and it is fun to them see others suffer. As Dr. Freud reported in a late writing: “I have not the courage to rise up before my fellow-humans as a prophet, and I bow to their reproach that I can offer them no consolation.” This is a heavy confession by one of history’s greatest students of humans; but I am citing it not for its honesty or humility, but because of the reason for its pathos. The future of humans was problematic for Dr. Freud because of the instincts that have drive humans and will supposedly always drive them. As he put it, right after the above admission and at the very end of his book: “The fateful question for the human species seems to me to be whether and to what extent [it] will succeed in mastering the human instinct of aggression and self-destruction.” The most that humans can seem to do is to put a veneer of civilization and reason over this instinct; but the problem of evil is “born afresh with every child,” as Dr. Freud wrote three years earlier, in 1927, and it takes the form of precise instinctual wishes—incest, lust for ending the life of another, cannibalism. This was human’s repugnant heritage, a heritage that one seems forever destined to work upon the World. From crooked wood of which humans are made, nothing quite straight can be built. #RandolphHarris 6 of 20

Yet today we know that Dr. Freud was wrong about evil. Humans are a crooked wood all right, but not in the way that Dr. Freud thought. This is a crucial difference because it means that we do not have to follow Dr. Freud on the exact grounds of his feelings for the problematic of the human future. If, instead, we follow Rank and the general science of humans, we get quite different picture of the oldest “instinctual wishes.” Incents is an immortality motive, it symbolizes the idea of self-fertilization—the defeat of biology and the fatality of species propagation. For the child in the family it may be an identity motive, a way of immediately becoming an individual and stepping out of the collective role of obedient child by breaking up the family ideology. Historically, the brother-sister marriage of ancient kings like the Pharaohs must have been a way of preserving and increasing the precious mana power that the king possessed. Cannibalism, it is true, has often been motivated by sheer appetite for meat, the pleasures of incorporation of a purely sensual kind, quite free of any spiritual overtones. However, as just noted, much of the time the motive is one of mana power. Which largely explains why cannibalism becomes uniformly repugnant to humans when the spirit-power beliefs that sustained it are left behind; if it were a matter of instinctual appetite, it would be more tenacious. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20

And as for the lust for ending a life, this too, we now know, is largely a psychological problem; it is not primarily a matter of the satisfaction of vicious animal aggression. We know that people often end life of others with appetite and excitement, as well as real dedication, but this is only logical for animals who are born hunters and who enjoy the feeling of maximizing their organismic powers at the expense of a rapped and helpless prey. If a covenant be made, wherein neither of the parties perform presently, but trust one another; in the condition of mere nature, (which is a condition of war of every person against every person,) upon any reasonable suspicion, it is void; but if there be a common power set over them both, with right and force sufficient to compel performance; it is not void. For one that performs first, has no assurance the other will perform after; because the bonds of words are too weak to bridle means ambition, avarice, anger, and other passions, without the fear of some coercive power; which in the condition of mere nature, where all people are equal, and judges of the justness of their own fears cannot possibly be supposed. And therefore one which performs first, does but betray oneself to one’s enemy; contrary to the right (one can never abandon) of defending one’s life, and means living. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20

However, in a civil estate, where there is a power set up to constrain those that would otherwise violate their faith, that fear is no more reasonable; and for that cause, one which by the covenant is to perform first, is obliged so to do. The cause of fear, which makes such a covenant invalid, must be always something arising after the covenant made; as some new fact, or other sign of the will not to perform; else it cannot make the covenant void. For that which could not hinder a person from promising, ought not to be admitted as a hindrance of performing. One that transfers any right, transfers the means of enjoying it, as far as posses in one’s power. As one that sells land, is understood to transfer the herbage, and whatsoever grows upon it; nor can one that sells a mill turn away the stream that drives it. And they that give to a being The Right of government in Sovereignty, are understood to give one the right of levying money to maintain soldiers; and of appointing magistrates for the administration of justice. To make a covenant with bruit beats, is impossible; because not understanding our speech, they understand not, nor accept of any translation of right; nor can translate any right to another; and without mutual acceptation, there is no covenant. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20

Love does not harm to anyone. However, suppose that were all we knew about love. Suppose we did not have the Ten Commandments, from which Paul quoted in verse 9: “’Do not commit adultery,’ ‘Do not murder,’ ‘Do not steal,’ ‘Do not covet.’” If we did not have those specific directions, how would be know what it means to harm one’s neighbour? Most of us are familiar to some degree with the classic description of love given by Paul in 1 Corinthians 13.4-7: Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trust, always hopes, always perseveres. Paul did not give a dictionary definition of love; instead, he described it in terms of specific attitudes and actions toward one another. What are these attitudes and actions? They are nothing more than various expressions of the moral law of God. However, no doubt the later Paul who wrote these words was very sure that whatever spiritual formation in Christlikeness he had received might be overwhelmed. There remained in him a spark of evil that could be fanned into a flame were he not watchful or if God did not continuously direct and uphold him in every dimension of his nature. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20

Paul knew he was running a race, as you and I are. That race will not be over until we pass into God’s full World. No doubt he had in his lifetime seen many falter and fail, many who would not be able to say at the end, as he did, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith,” reports 2 Timothy 4.7. The image of the athlete was strong and ever-present in Paul’s World and in his own mind. He knew that you had to keep yourself in spiritual shape to finish and finish well. In 1 Corinthians 9 he discussed how he therefore conducted himself in his course of life, how he exercised and treated his body severely, making it his slave (not he its slave), “lest possibly, after I have preached to others, I myself should be disqualified,” reports 1 Corinthians 9.27. The valid point in “miserable sinner” Christianity is correctly expressed in these well-chosen words by St. Augustine: If anyone supposes that with humans, living, as one still does, in this mortal life, it may be possible for him to dispel and clear off every obscurity induced by corporeal and carnal fancies, and to attain to the serenest light of immutable truth, and to cleave constantly and unswervingly to this with a mind wholly estranged from the course of this present life, that humans understand neither what one asks, nor who one is that is putting such a supposition. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20

If ever the soul is helped to reach beyond the cloud by which all the Earth is covered, that is to say, beyond this carnal darkness with which the whole terrestrial life is covered, it is simply as if he were touched with a swift coruscation, only to sink back into his natural infirmity, the desire surviving by which one may again be raised to the heights, but one purity being insufficient to establish one there. The more, however, anyone can do this, the greater is one; while the less one can do so the less one is. In the spiritual life one never rests on one’s laurels. It is a sure recipe for falling. Attainments are like the manna given to the Israelites in the desert, good only for the day (Exodus 16.4,20). Past attainments not place us in a position of merit that permits us to let up in the hot pursuit of God for today, for now. Paul knew that, and he knew that others missed it or forgot it to their great harm. We deserve nothing before God, no matter how far we have advanced, and we are never out of danger. As long as we are “at home in the body,” as reported in 2 Corinthians 5.6, we still just recovering sinners. And in these respects, though only in these respects, do we remain as wicked as anyone else—Mother Teresa as Adolf Hitler. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20

However, to distort this important truth into a claim that we can never really change, and especially in our hearts, is to substitute a glaring and harmful falsehood for liberating and life-blessing truth. And that distortion, which sometimes is a true expression of genuine humility, can also be done by those who wish to take themselves off he hook, to enjoy remaining the same in their inner life. It is not easy to really want to be different. As my personal understanding of the interior life has developed, I have learned that apart from the well-known Scriptural calls to prayer, there are two great human reasons we ought to pray. The first is because of what prayer does to our character. Prayer is like a time exposure to God. Our souls function like photographic plates, and Christ’s shining image is the light. The more we expose our lives to the white-hot Sun of His righteous life (for, say, five, ten, fifteen, thirty minutes, or an hour a day), the more His truth, His integrity, His humility. As we have seen, this was true of General William Harrison, who maintained a disciplined devotional life for over seventy years. People say his presence brought a distinct sense of Christ. The second corresponding reason is that prayer bends our wills to God’s will. If I throw out the anchor to my yacht, and catch hold of the shore and pull, do I pull the shore to me, or do I pull myself to the shore. Prayer is not pulling God to my will, but the aligning of my will to the will of God. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20

What tantalizing personal benefits are offered by time spent in the presence of God in prayer! Herein is possessed the spiritual desolation of our days. The open secret of many Christian Bible-believing churches is that a vanishing small percentage of those talking about prayer are actually doing that they actually talking about. Leviticus 19 is basically an amplification of the Ten Commandments as originally set forth in Exodus 20. Let us consider verses 11-18 of Leviticus 19: “Do not steal. Do not lie. Do not deceive one another. Do no swear falsely by my name and so profane the name of your God. I am the LORD. Do not defraud your neighbour or rob him or her. Do not hold back the wages of a hired being overnight. Do not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block in front of the blind, but fear your God. I am the LORD. Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favouritisim to the great, but judge your neighbour fairly. Do not go about spreading slander among your people. Do not do anything that endangers your neighbour’s life. I am the LORD. Do not hate your brother in your heart. Rebuke your neighbour frankly so you will not share in one’s guilt. Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbour as yourself. I am the LORD.” #RandolphHarris 14 of 20

Now, let us paraphrase those verses using the format “Love does not,” which Paul used in 1 Corinthians 13. When we do this, the passage from Leviticus 19 reads as follows: Love does not steal, it does not lie, it does not deceive. Love does not profane God’s name. It does not defraud nor rob its neighbour. It does not hold the wages of a hired being overnight. Love does not curse the deaf, nor put a stumbling block in front of the blind. Loves does not pervert justice, nor show partiality to the poor or favouritism to the great. Instead, it judges is neighbour fairly. Loves does not slander another, nor do anything that endangers one’s life. Loved does not hate its brother, nor seek revenge, nor bear a grudge, but rather treats its neighbour as itself. We can see from the paraphrase that the various expression of God’s moral law, wherever they occur in Scripture, are simply a description of love in action. Leviticus 19 also helps us understand who our neighbour is. One is the hired person, the def, the blind, the less affluent, the great, the person whom we are tempted to lie to, or steal from, or slander. One is the person who has wronged us and against whom we are tempted to hold a grudge. Our neighbour is even the person whose life we might endanger by reckless behaviour. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20

We can easily say our neigbour is anyone with whom we come in contact. However, because of our human frailty and our tendency to have moral blind spots, it is helpful to think in terms of specific situations. He principle of love is not a higher principle over God’s moral law. Rather, it provides the motive and the motivation for obedience, while the law provides the direction for the biblical expression of love. If they were not motivated by love for both God and our neighbour, the actions prescribed by God’s law would be hollow indeed. I would much rather do business with someone who wanted to treat me fairly because one loved me than someone who deals fairly only because “it is good for business.” I would also want one’s love to be guided by the moral and ethical principles of the Christian Bible. Some people fail to attend church and read less because they are not spiritually sensitive and as open as others. Also, many people are dominated by the time crunching production ethic of the marketplace, which makes them feel lightyears away from deep prayer and reading of the Christian Bible. However, most fail because they simply do not know how to go about cultivating the disciplines of the interior spiritual life. One’s prayer and devotional life cannot be reduced to a few simple rules. These areas of spiritual experience are far too dynamic and personal for simplistic reduction. #RandolphHarris 16 of 20

We must also be cautioned against imagining from the outline we are using (deep prayer, confession, adoration, submission, petition) that there is a prescribed order for devotion, for there is not and never has been. Life’s rhythms sometimes demand that we launch directly, for example, into petition with “Lord, help me!” Other times will be spent almost entirely in confession, or meditation, or adoration. God’s Word is essential to developing a Christian mind. All Christians and Catholics, no matter what denomination or faith should be systematically reading through the Bible, once a year if possible, so that our minds are being perpetually programmed by the data of Scripture. This understood, there is yet another step: intersession—which is like a marathon of prayer, where you bare your entire soul to God, all your concerns, praise, and dreams for the future and personalizing and internalizing the Word of the Lord. “And now I, Nephi, do not make a fully account of the things which my father hath written, for he hath written many things which he saw in visions and in dreams; and he also hath written many things which he prophesied and spake unto his children, of which I shall not make a full account. But I shall make an account of my proceedings in my days. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20

“Behold, I make an abridgment of the record of my father (Lehi), upon plates which I have made with mine own hands; wherefore, after I have abridged the record of my Father then will I make an account of my own life. Therefore, I would that ye should know, that after the Lord had shown so many marvelous things unto my father, Lehi, yea, concerning the destruction of Jerusalem, behold he went forth among the people, and began to prophesy and to declare unto them concerning the things which he had both seen and heard. And it came to pass that the Jews did mock him because of he things which he testified of them; for he truly testified of their wickedness and their abominations; and he testified that the things which he saw and heard, and also the things which he read in the book, manifested plainly of the coming of a Messiah, and also the redemption of the World. And when the Jews heard these things they were angry with him; yes, even as with the prophets of old, whom they had cast out, and stoned, and slain; and they might take it away. However, behold, I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make the mighty even unto the power of deliverance,” reports 1 Nephi 1.16-20. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20

Grant, O Lord, that Thy family, devoted to Thy service, and confiding in Thy protection, may obtain the blessing which they humbly implore; that being at rest under Thy defense, they may not be left destitute of assistance for this life, and may be prepared for the good things which are eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord. O Thou Most High, it becomes me to be low in thy presence. I am nothing compared with thee; I possess not the rank and power of Angels, but Thou hast made me what I am, and placed me where I am; help me to acquiesce in thy sovereign pleasure. I thank thee that in the embryo state of my endless being I am capable by grace of improvement; that I can bear thy image, not by submissiveness, but by design, and can work with thee and advance thy cause and glory. But, alas, the crown has fallen from my head: I have sinned; I am alien to thee; my head is deceitful and wicked, my mind an enemy of Thy law. Yet, in my lostness Thou hast laid help in the mighty one and one comes between to put one’s hands on us both, my umpire, daysman, mediator, whose blood is my peace, whose righteousness is my strength, whose condemnation is my freedom, whose Spirit is my power, whose Heaven is my heritage. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20

Grant that I may feel more the strength of Thy grace in subduing the evil of my nature, in loosing me from the present evil World, in supporting me under the trials of life, in enabling me to abide with thee in my valleys, in exercising me to have conscience void of offense before thee and before humans. In my affairs may I distinguish between duty and anxiety, and may my character and not my circumstance chiefly engage me. “I would be very happy to oblige you, if my passes were respected. But the fact is, sir, I have, within he last two years, given passes to two hundred and fifty thousand men to go to Richmond, and not one had got there yet.” (President Lincoln’s answer to man who asked for a safe conduct to Richmond, 1863.) I distrust the legends which are told about most gurus by the disciples. They exaggerate because they have stopped seeking truth. When a person turns belief in the superior knowledge of the guide into belief in the virtual omniscience of the guide, it is dangerous. After having charted all the merits and capacities of the enlightened person, one’s devotees and disciples easily fall into exaggerations and forgets one’s limitations, or ignore the simple fact that one remains a human among humans. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20

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God, the Creator of the Universe, Will Thrust You Further and do More than You Can Even think or Ask!

March 5, 2020 3:09 am

The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work, second, consistently, third, common sense. Some people dream of worthy accomplishments, while others stay awake and do them. Somehow I cannot believe that there are any heights that cannot be scaled by a person who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four C’s. They are curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy; and the greatest of all confidence. Adult learning is a changed relationship between the central effects of separate stimulations. Two sets of events, which are separately experienced on two unconnected occasions, can become associated. It is possible to begin to imagine how one might learn to recognize, for instance a bird, either though seeing and touching it, or through hearing it. Circular cell-assemblies are capable of reverberation. The association might be set up by vision, and yet be manifested later purely from hearing a sound, or feeling a touch. Any element can stand for the whole, and the whole can stand for any element. We catch here a glimpse of what is called conceptual learning or symbolic learning; learning through the use of the words and symbols. #RandolphHarris 1 of 18

There is a possibility that a subsystem may act as a link between two systems (conceptual structures). The two systems have a subsystem connecting them, to provide a basis of prompt association. Thus, two concepts may acquire a latent association without ever having occurred together in the subject’s past experience. For instance, a person fears apple-picking and window-cleaning because these are associated with going up steps, and this is associated with some danger connected with being in an upstairs room. And so the experience of seeing something can be associated with something heard, or a word that is read may be associated with a picture or a sound. These can all stand for or means each other. The process of thinking must be rather like this—a sequence of central events which starts when one central activity is a stimulus for the next month, without need the intervention of a sensory stimulus. One of the most interesting epochs in human history is the so-called Neolithic revolution. That revolution accompanied the development of agriculture in Asia Minor about 10,000 years ago. It is very likely, although we have no proof as yet, that it was women who discovered agriculture, and what they discovered was that wild grasses could be raised and improved to yield edible what and other grains. #RandolphHarris 2 of 18

The men were not so ingenious. In that same period, they were probably still hunting or were acquiring and caring for flocks of sheep. With the discovery of agriculture came the awareness that one’s food need be limited only to what nature provided of its own accord, but one could also take a creative hand in the natural process. Using one’s intelligence and skills, one could produce something. As I said, it happened only a short time ago. In the early years of this revolution—let us say in the first four thousand—you would no doubt have found remarkably peaceful societies, ones in many respects like those of the North American Pueblo Indians. They were probably even matriarchal in organization and inhabited small villages. They produced a little more than they needed at any given moment, and that surplus gave them added security and allowed their populations to grow. However, they did not have so much surplus that one group would envy another and want to take away its surplus. Neolithic society, like modern tribes I have just discussed here, was probably characterized by a genuinely democratic way of life and, as I said, by much stronger role for women and mothers. #RandolphHarris 3 of 18

Patriarchal organization came much later, about 4000 to 3000 B.C., a period in which everything changed. People were able to produce much more than they needed. Slavery was introduced. The division of labour became more pronounced. Armies were built up; governments were formed; wars were fought. Humans discovered that one could use other humans to work for them. Hierarchies formed, with kings at their heads. The kings were deputies of God and often filled the role of high priest. That situation encouraged the development of aggressiveness, for humans now had the ability to rob, steal, and exploit. And natural democracy gave way to a hierarchy in which everyone had to obey. Proponents of the instinct theory often claim that war is caused by human’s aggressive instincts. That is a very naïve as well as a very incorrect view. First of all, we know that most wars come about because governments convince their populations that they are under attack, that they have to defend their most sacred values, their lives, their freedom, democracy, and Lord knows what else. The wave of enthusiasm for war lasts a few weeks and then is pretty much gone. Now people have to be threatened and punished to continue fighting. However, if people were by nature so aggressive that war actually satisfied their aggressive instincts, then governments would not have to take those measures. #RandolphHarris 4 of 18

On the contrary, they would have to propagandize for peace all the time so that people would not be constantly yearning for a war in which they could vent their aggression. However, as we all know, that is not the way things are, and we can even identify quite precisely the period when war as an institution had its beginnings or, if you will, was invented. It was the period after the Neolithic revolution, the period that saw he rise of city-state, of kings, of armies, and of the capability to make war, take slaves, steal treasure, and so forth. There was no organize war among the hunter-gatherers and the primitive agriculture peoples, because the capability for it simply did not exist. What this discussion shows us is that a number of primitive tribes have social systems in which friendliness and cooperation are predominant and aggression at a minimum. If that picture of primitive societies is correct, the “hydraulic” theory that identifies aggression as an instinct cannot be maintained. Another point we can cite against the instinct theory is that levels of aggression within a society can vary greatly. If we look at the early 1930s in Germany, for example, we find that the Nazis drew most of their support from the old petit-bourgeoisie and from officers and students whose careers had been disabled by postwar conditions. #RandolphHarris 5 of 18

The Nazis found no emotional echo in the middle class an upper middle class. I do not mean to say that those classes did not acquiesce in the Nazi system, but the ardent Nazis did not come from those classes, much less from the working class. Convinced Nazis were, as we all know, more the exception than the rule in the working classes, though, oddly enough, convinced anti-Nazis were also an exception among workers. Why that is so is another question altogether. We find a similar situation in the American South. In some cases, the less affluent people in the South have an incredible store of aggressiveness, typically much more than Southern middle class and more too than the working class either in the South or on the American East Coast. Aggressiveness is always most present in those classes that are on the lowest social level, at the bottom of the social pyramid. Those are people who have few pleasures in life, who are usually uneducated, who see themselves being slowly squeeze out of the social mainstream, who are lacking in motivation and interests. Such people build up vast amounts of sadistic rage that does not develop in people who are productively occupied an who feel fully engaged in—or at least not totally exclude from—the social process. #RandolphHarris 6 of 18

Those latter people, who are underrepresented and being pushes out of society, have interests; they have the feeling that they are in step with the rest of society. That is why those classes do not develop the same measure of sadism and aggression that the old petit—bourgeoisie in Germany did or that certain classes in American do. Levels of aggressiveness will differ in individuals, too. Take the patient who comes to a psychiatrist and says, “Doctor, I strongly dislike everybody. I do not care for my wife. I find my children unpleasant. I cannot stand the people I work with. There is nobody I actually like.” For the psychiatrist, and I would hope for almost anyone else, too, that patient has rendered one’s own diagnosis and declared oneself sick. We do not respond to such a person by saying, “But of course, everything is perfectly clear. We have here a case of the aggressive instinct at work.” We say instead that this man’s character is so constituted that it constantly produces aggression. We then ask: How did this person get this way? We inquire into the social circumstances of his life, his family history, his past experiences. We try to understand why such a high level of aggressiveness became part of this individual, part of one’s character structure. We do not say, as the advocates of the instinct theory say when they talk about war: “There is nothing you can do about it. This case just proves all over again how strong our inborn aggressiveness is.” #RandolphHarris 7 of 18

All of us know aggressive people, and by aggressive I do not mean just quick-tempered. I mean destructive, hostile, sadistic people. And we all know friendly people who strike us as being warm and nonaggressive not just on a superficial level but at their very core. Their friendliness cannot in any way be equated with weakness or servility. If we are unaware of such differences, then we are in a bad way—and many people are in a bad way, because they do no notice those differences. However, most people who take the trouble to look around them with any care know very well that those characterological differences exist. The contradiction between the guilt feelings that are manifested and the lack of that humility which should accompany them must be considered. The neurotic will make great demands for consideration and admiration and will also show a distinct unwillingness to accept the slightest degree of criticism. This contradiction may be glaringly obvious, as in the case of a woman who felt vaguely guilty of every crime reported in the papers, and even blamed herself for every death in the family, but was so overwhelmed by an acute outbreak of rage that she fainted when her sister rather mildly reproached her for requesting too much consideration. #RandolphHarris 8 of 18

However, the contradiction is not always so conspicuous; it is present much more frequently than appears on the surface. The neurotic may mistake one’s self-accusatory attitude for a sound critical attitude toward oneself. One’s sensitivity toward criticism may be screened by a belief that one can take criticism very well, if only it is made in a friendly or constructive manner; but this belief is only a screen and is contradicted by the facts. Even obviously friendly advice may be reacted to with anger, for advice of any kind implies criticism for not being altogether perfect. Thus is guilt feelings are carefully examined and are tested for genuineness, it becomes apparent that much of what looks like feelings of guilt is the expression either of anxiety or of a defense against it. In part this holds true also for the normal individual. In our culture it is considered nobler to fear God than to fear people, or in non-religious terms, to refrain from something because of conscience rather than because of a fear of getting caught. Many a husband who pretends to be faithful because of his conscience is in reality merely afraid of his wife. Because of the great amount of anxiety in neuroses the neurotic in inclined more often than the normal individual to cover up anxiety with guilt feelings. #RandolphHarris 9 of 18

Unlike the normal person one not only fears those consequences which are likely to happen, but anticipates consequences which are likely to happen, but anticipates consequences utterly disproportionate to reality. The nature of these anticipations depends on the situation. One may have an exaggerated notion of impending punishment, retaliation, desertion, or one’s fears may be completely vague. However, whatever their nature one’s fears are all kindled at the same point, which may be roughly described as the fear of disapproval, or if the fear of disapproval amounts to a conviction, as a fear of being found out. The fear of disapproval is very common in neuroses. Nearly every neurotic, even though one appears on surface observation to be entirely certain of oneself and indifferent to the opinion of others, is excessively afraid of or hypersensitive to being disapproved of, criticized, accused, found out. As I have already mentioned, this fear of disapproval is usually understood to indicate underlying guilt feelings. In other words, it is considered to be a result of such feelings. Critical observation makes this conclusion questionable. #RandolphHarris 10 of 18

In analysis a patient will often find it extremely difficult to talk about certain experiences or thoughts—those, for example, concerning death wishes, masturbation, incest wishes—because one believes one feels guilty. When one has gained sufficient confidence to talk about them, and recognizes that they do not meet with disapproval, the “guilt feelings” vanish. One feels guilty because, as a result of one’s anxieties, one is even more than others dependent on public opinion, and hence mistakes it naively as one’s own judgment. Furthermore one’s general sensitivity toward disapproval remains fundamentally unchanged, even if one’s special guilt feelings vanish after one has brought oneself to talk about the experiences that prompted them. This observation suggests the conclusion that guilt feelings are not the cause but the result of the fear of disapproval. “But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit,” reports 2 Corinthians 3.18. We have looked, now, at the basic dimensions of the human self and at the central principle of its dysfunctionality and corruption (that is, self-denial). Spiritual formation in Christ is the process by which one moves an is moved from self-worship to Christ-centered self-denial as a general condition of God’s present and eternal kingdom. #RandolphHarris 11 of 18

The next logical step in a practical treatment of spiritual formation might seem to be the provision of detailed instructions on how to move from a life of self-adulation to one of self-denial, dealing with each of the dimensions of the human being in turn. And we plan to do just that. However, before it can be effectively done in our contemporary context, we must clear up a few more preliminary matters. First of all, we must be clear that such a transition as is envisioned in Christian spiritual formation can actually happen, and can actually happen to us. This, today, is not obvious. What we see around us today of the usual Christian life could easily make us think that spiritual transformation is simply impossible. It is now common for Christian leaders themselves to complain about how little real-life difference there is between professing, or even actual Christians, on the one hand, and non-Christians on the other. Although there is much talk about “changing lives” in Christian circles, the reality is very rare, and certainly much less common than the talk. The “failures” of prominent Christian leaders themselves, already referred to, might cause us to think genuine spiritual formation in Christlikeness to be impossible for “real human beings.” How is it, exactly, that a man or woman can respectably serve Christ for many years and then morally disintegrate? #RandolphHarris 12 of 18

And the failures that become known are few compared to the ones that remain relatively unknown and are even accepted among Christians. The effect of Christians working in the church, politics, business, entertainment, or education depends on the circumstances of how widely the failure becomes known, and on various other factors. There was a case of a pastor who became enraged at something a subordinate did during a Sunday morning service. Immediately after the service he found that subordinate and gave him a merciless tongue-lashing. With his lapel microphone still on! His diatribe was broadcast over the entire church plant and campus—in all the Sunday school rooms and the parking lot. Soon there after he “received the Lord’s call” to another church. However, what about their spiritual formation of this leader? Is that the best we can do? And is one not still really like that in one’s new position? Malfeasance with money is less acceptable than anger, and misconduct dealing with pleasures of the flesh is less tolerated still. However, is the inner condition (the heart) all that different in these cases—before God? The sad thing when a leader (or any individual) “fails” is not just what one said or did, but the heart and life and whole person who is revealed by the act. #RandolphHarris 13 of 18

What is sad is who these leaders have been all along, what their inner life has been like, and no doubt also how they have suffered during all the years they “did it” or were found out. What kind of persons have they been, and what, really has been their relation to God? Real spiritual need and change, as we have emphasized, is on the inside, in the hidden area of the life that God sees and that we cannot even see in ourselves without his help. Indeed, in the early stages of spiritual development we could not endure seeing our inner life as it really is. The possibility of denial and self-deception is something God has made accessible to us, in part to protect us until we begin to seek him. Like the face of the mythical Medusa, our true condition away from God would turn us to stone if we were fully confronted it. It would drive us mad. He has to help us come to terms with it in ways that will not destroy us outright. Without the gentle though rigorous process of inner transformation, initiated and sustained by the graceful presence of God in our World and in our soul, the change of personality and life clearly announced and spelled out in the Bible, and explained and illustrated throughout Christian history is impossible. We not only admit it, but also insist upon it. #RandolphHarris 14 of 18

However, on the other hand, the result of the effort to change our behaviour without inner transformation is precisely what we see in the current shallowness of Western Christianity that is so widely lamented and in the notorious failures of Christian leaders. One that performs first in the case of a contract, is said to merit that which one is to receive by the performance of the other; and one has it due. Also when a prize is propounded to many, which is to be given to one only that wins; or money is thrown amongst many, to be enjoyed by them that catch it; though this be a free gift; yet so to win, or so to catch, is to merit, and to have it as due. For the right is transferred in the propounding of the prize, and in throwing down the money; though it be not determined to whom, but by the event of the contention. However, there is between these two sorts of merit, this difference, that in contract, I merit by virtue of my own power, and the contractors need; but in this case of free gift, I am enabled to merit only by the benignity of the giver; in contract, I merit at the contractors hand that one should depart with one’s right; in this case of gift, I merit not that the giver should part with one’s right; but that when one has parted with it, it should be mine, rather than another’s. And this I think to be the meaning of that distinction of the schools, between Meritum Congrui, and Meritum Condigni. #RandolphHarris 15 of 18

For God Almighty, having promised Paradise to those people (hoodwinked with carnal desires,) that can walk through this World according to the precepts, and limits prescribed by one; they say, one that shall so walk, shall merit Paradise Ex Congruo. However, because no person can demand a right to it, by one’s own righteousness, or any other power in oneself, but by the free grace of God only; they say, no person can merit Paradise Ex Congruo. However, because no person can demand a right to it, by one’s own righteousness, or any other power in oneself, but by the free grace of God only; they say, no person can merit Paradise Ex Condigno. This I say, I think is the meaning of that distinction; but because disputers do not agree upon the signification of their own terms of Art, longer than it serves their turn; I will not affirm anything of their meaning: only this I say; when a gift is given indefinitely, as a prize to be contended for, one that wins merit, and may claim the prize as due. It is safe to say that throughout much of church history, Scripture and right reason were considered twin allies to be prized and used by disciples of Jesus. Jesus our Master, do Thou meet us while we walk in the way, and long to reach the Heavenly Country; so that following Thy light, we may keep the way of righteousness, and never wander away into the horrible darkness of this World’s night, while Thou Who art the Way, the Truth, and the Life, art shining within us. #RandolphHarris 16 of 18

O LORD, our support and our refuge, deliver us from temptation, give us the defence of Thy salvation, hold us up with Thy right hand, teach us by Thy discipline, and make our way and our life undefiled. “And it came to pass as he (Lehi, Nephi’s father) prayed unto the Lord, there came a pillar of fire and dwelt upon a rock before him; and he saw and heard much; and because of the things which he saw and heard he did quake and tremble exceedingly. And it came to pass that he returned to his own house at Jerusalem; and he cast himself upon his bed, being overcome with the Spirit and the things which he had seen. And being this overcome with the Spirit, he was carried away in a vision, even that he saw the Heavens open, and he thought he saw God sitting upon his throne, surrounded with numberless concourses of Angels in the attitude of singing and praising their God. And it came to pass that he saw One descending out of the midst of Heaven, and he beheld that his luster was above that of the Sun at noon-day. And he also saw twelve others following him, and their brightness did exceed that of the stars in the firmament. And they came down and went forth upon the face of the Earth; and the first came and stood before my father, and have unto him a book, and bade him that he should read,” reports 1 Nephi 6-11. #RandolphHarris 17 of 18

O God of grace, Thou hast imputed my sin to my substitute, and hast imputed his righteousness to my soul, clothing me with a bridegroom’s robe, decking me with jewels of holiness. However, in my Christian walk I am still in rags; my best prayers are stained with sin; my penitential tears are so much impurity; my confessions of wrong are so many aggravations of sin; my receiving the Spirit is tinctured with selfishness. I need to repent of my repentance; I need my tears to be washed; I have no robe to bring to cover my sins, no loom to weave my own righteousness; I am always standing clothed in filthy garments, and by grace am always receiving change of raiment, for Thou dost always justify the ungodly; I am always going into the far country, an always returning homes as a prodigal, always saying, Father, forgive me, and thou art always bringing forth the best robe. Every morning let me wear it, every evening return in it, go out to the day’s work in it, be married in it, be wound in death in it, stand before the great white throne in it, enter Heaven in it shining as the Sun. Grant me never to lose sight of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, the exceeding righteousness of salvation, the exceeding glory of Christ, the exceeding beauty of holiness, the exceeding wonder of grace. #RandolphHarris 18 of 18

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Put God in Remembrance of His Promises, Not Your Problems, and He Will be Faithful to His Word!

March 4, 2020 1:17 am

We understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for those who believe. To be a leader means willingness to risk—and a willingness to love. Has the leader given you something from the heart? It is never too late to be what you might have been. You cannot build your reputation on what you are going to do. There are countless ways of attaining greatness, but any road to reaching one’s maximum potential must be built on a bedrock of respect for the individual, a commitment to excellence, and a rejection of mediocrity. Therefore, do not try to become a person of success, but rather a person of value. Facilitation is the process which happens when the axon of a cell a is near enough to excite cell b and repeatedly takes part in firing it. Some growth process or metabolic change takes place in one or both cells such that a’s efficiency, in being one of the cells that can fire b, is increased. Since a number of cells are simultaneously involved, in a pattern, facilitation means that a pattern of cells firing frequently in such a process, become in some sense a stronger structure. Such stronger structures are called “cell-assemblies.” The hypothesis of a more permanent change, a structural change, is crucial to most writers in this field. It is the permanence which is made to account for learning, that is for the fact that previous experiences can affect subsequent experiences. #RandolphHarris 1 of 11

Cell-assemblies have the interesting property that they may be able to prolong their period of excitation—and hence their capacity to excite other cells—by a process called reverberation: A repeated simulation of specific receptors will lead slowly to the formation of an assembly of association—area cells which can act briefly as a closed system after stimulation has ceased; this prolongs the time during which the structural changes of learning can occur, and constitutes the simplest instance of a representative process (image or ideas). Imagine we had a triangle connected by arrows. Arrows represent a simple assembly of neural pathways firing in a sequence. Pathways (1, 4) fires on the first and the fourth occasion. Pathway (2, 14) fires on the second occasion and the fourteenth, and so on, illustrating the possibilities of an “alternating” reverberation which would not extinguish as a simple closed circuit. The process of reverberation is important for at least two reason. A set of stimuli—or any interconnected set of concepts—can be kept buzzing in the head long enough to affect the patterning of messages which come in thereafter. A set of stimuli kept going in this way increases the chances that a permanent structural change will occur. #RandolphHarris 2 of 11

This notion is used to facilitate an understanding of the conceptualizing, or the classifying function of the nervous system. Because of the processes of facilitation and reverberation, a system of connexions is formed which will record the relative frequency with which, in the history of the organism, different groups of internal an external stimuli have acted together. Each individual impulse will, on its occurrence, have evoked other impulses which correspond to the other stimuli, which have in the past usually accompanied its occurrence. We shall call this bundle of secondary impulses which a primary impulse sets up through these acquired connexions, the following of the primary impulses. There is continual working and reworking in this process. Some connections between particular neurons will strengthen with experience; others will weaken. An accumulation of tiny changes will have major effects in the long run. Some units capable at first of synchronizing with others in the system, would no longer be able to do so and would drop out: “fractionation.” Others, at first incompatible, would be recruited. With perceptual development there would thus be a slow growth in the assembly, understanding by “growth” not necessarily an increase in the number of constituent cells, but a change. #RandolphHarris 3 of 11

This kind of change can make possible a development of the utmost psychological significance: the formation of concepts not based on any particular perceptions. There is no reason why such connexions as we have been considering would be formed only between primary sensory impulses. Any impulse which occurs as part of the following of other impulses will, on each of these occasions, acquire or strengthen connexions with other impulses forming part of the same following. Connexions of this kind will therefore also be formed between impulses which, as primary impulses, rarely if ever occur at the same time. If you train teachers, or nurses, or psychotherapists, about all you can evaluate them for is the success with which they are impersonating the role model you provide for them in a textbook, or by the example of the living teachers. You are actually teaching them to be imitators, and you grade them an A, B, C, D, or “flunk” on the basis of how well they imitate. I think that is the way it should be. However, trouble arises when the practitioner, who has successfully impersonated the role model, goes out of school to practice. One may continue to judge one’s “goodness” or “badness” on the basis of how well one conforms to one’s original impersonation. This is no longer appropriate. #RandolphHarris 4 of 11

One should be evaluated and should evaluate oneself on the basis of one’s results. If one is a salesperson, then sales. If one is a teacher, by students who learn. If one is a therapist, with patients who get well. If one is a nurse, with patients who are comfortable and nonanxious during their recovery. The ways of producing these results must be more diversified than the role enactment which yielded a high grade in a training school. I have seriously thought that training schools ought not to award a degree or diploma until two years after training. If one has successfully imitated one’s teachers and followed their instructions, the graduate gets a provisional badge. If in two years one still practices in the way one did when one left, that provisional badge is take away. Unfortunately, there are many therapists who engage in a perpetual impersonation for the rest of their career. What makes it even more terrible, they feel self-righteous about it and condemn responsible explorers and pioneers. Some of our most creative psychotherapists have been vituperated, blasted, criticized, threatened with expulsion from their personal societies. They may have explored beyond the orthodox training they received, an so they should. However, it calls for courage. Let us ask, “What do training schools or institutional settings do to our courage and creativity? Have the fostered them or diminished them?” #RandolphHarris 5 of 11

If carried out in a spirit of responsible commitment to the task of healing, and if procedures are shared with colleagues, for their testing and criticism, then professional associations like the American Psychological or American Psychiatric Association will allow deviations and idiosyncrasies. The freedom to explore, elbowroom, has always been there. In fact, not to grasp it is to neglect one’s professional responsibilities. This raises the question, why do not more of us reach out and use it? I suppose a lot of the resistance to growth comes from within, but there may also be instances where it comes from without. A rule of thumb I always use in any setting where I work is, “Do I get headaches there?” If I get headaches, the resistance to my growth comes from without. If I get bored, the resistance to my own growth comes from within. However, that rule of thumb may only be peculiar to me. It may not be relevant to you. Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. There are many primitive tribes in which no marked aggressiveness appears at all and in which, on the contrary, a spirit of friendliness predominates. In descriptions of such tribes we find a number of traits that commonly occur together and form a syndrome: minimal aggression (and, concomitantly, no crimes and almost no murder), no private property, no exploitation, and no hierarchies. #RandolphHarris 6 of 11

Tribes of that kind occur among the Pueblo Indians, but similar ones can be found all over the World. There are tribes whose members are not farmers like the Pueblo Indians but are extremely primitive hunters not much different from the hunters of 30,000 years ago. It is a pygmy tribe that lives in the jungles of central Africa. Aggression is almost nonexistent among these people. Individuals do, of course, get angry occasionally, and then observes whose theories about aggression differ from mine will say: “There, you see? That man there is angry.” However, I must say I find that a rather petty way of looking at things, for it is one thing if a person gets angry now and then an quite another is one is overloaded with aggression that it prompts one to want war, to kill people, and so on. There is a huge difference between a person who may get angry occasionally and one who is destructive and full of hate; anyone who fails to see that difference is, I think, a rather obtuse observer. The pygmy hunters regard the jungle in which they live as their mother; like all hunters, they kill only as many animals as they need to eat. Putting stores away for the future is out of the question, because they have no way to preserve their meat. When they need food, they hunt. #RandolphHarris 7 of 11

There is no great surplus, but by and large they have enough to live on. That is why there is no private property. And they have no leader. Why, indeed, should they? Their lives are governed by the demands of their situation, and everyone knows what one’s task is. If we wanted to put it that way, we could say that these tribes possess a deeply rooted sense of democracy. No one tells anyone else what to do. There is no reason why anyone should. One could not gain any advantage by doing so. And, of course, there is no exploitation. Why would anyone want to make use of another’s labour? Should I send someone out to do my hunting for me? That would make my life awfully boring. And then what else is there to do? There is really nothing one can do for me. Family life is peaceful. Monogamy, with the possibility of easy divorce, is the rule. Pleasures of the flesh before marriage are permitted for some. Pleasures of the flesh are not burdened with any guilt feelings for a select few. When the woman becomes pregnant, the couple will ordinarily marry, and the partners remain together for life, unless they should develop a disliking for each other at some point. However, that rarely happens. The pygmies are carefree, too, even though the hunt does not always go smoothly. #RandolphHarris 8 of 11

Sometimes there is a shortage of game; sometime they have lean years. However, they trust the jungle to nourish them. They are not possessed by the idea that they have to use more, save more, have more, and that is why they are generally quite content. Tribes like this are the truly affluent societies—not because they are so wealthy but because they do not want more than they have. And what they have is enough to provide them with a secure and enjoyable life. I want to stress particularly how important it is to see the entire system and structure here and not just to isolate one feature from it. If you ask simply, “Is this aggressiveness or is it not it?” you will have difficulty answering it. However, if you take in the whole social structure, then you will see that you are dealing here with basically friendly people who are not fighting among themselves or jealous of each other and whose lack of aggression is an element we would logically expect, given their overall psychic and social orientation. And you will see, too, how closely the psychic system is linked to the social one. Believers, whatever your ability, you must regularly read and study God’s Word. If you refuse, you are in effect “editing God” and will never have a fully Christian mind. #RandolphHarris 9 of 11

We beseech Thee, O Lord, in Thy loving-kindness, set in order our life and conversation, that no adversities may prevail against us, and nothing salutary be wanting to us, through Jesus Christ our Lord. “I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents, therefore I was taught somewhat in all the learning of my father; and having seen many afflictions in the course of my days, nevertheless, having been highly favoured of the Lord in all my days; yea, having had a great knowledge of the goodness and the mysteries of God, therefore I make a record of my proceedings in my days,” reports Nephi 1.1. Lord Jesus, give me a deeper repentance, a horror of sin, a dread of its approach; help me chastely to flee it, and jealously to resolve that my heart shall be thine alone. Give me a deeper trust, that I may lose myself to find myself in thee, the ground of my rest, the spring of my being. Please give me a deeper knowledge of thyself as saviour, master, lord, and king. Give me deeper power in private prayer, more sweetness in thy word, more steadfast grip on its truth. Give me deeper holiness in speech, thought, action, and let me not seek moral virtue apart thee. Plough deep in me, great Lord, Heavenly husbandman, that my being may be a tilled field, the roots of grace spreading far and wide, until thou alone art seen in me, thy beauty golden like Summer harvest, thy fruitfulness as Autumn plenty. #RandolphHarris 10 of 11

I have no Mater but thee, no law by thy will, no delight but thyself, no wealthy but that thou givest, no good but that thou blessest, no peace but that thou bestowest. I am nothing but that thou makest me, I have nothing but that I receive from thee, I can be nothing but that grace adorns me. Quarry me deep, dear Lord, and then fill me to overflowing with living water. “Yea, I make a record in the language of my father, which consists of the learning of the Jews and the language of the Egyptians. And I know that the record which I make is true; and I make it with mine own hand; and I make it accord to my knowledge. For it came to pass in the commencement of the first year of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah, (my father, Lehi, having dwelt at Jerusalem in all his days); and in that same year there came many prophets, prophesying unto the people that they must repent, or the great city of Jerusalem must be destroyed. Wherefore it came to pass that my father, Lehi, as he went forth prayed unto the Lord, yea, even with all his heart, in behalf of his people,” reports Nephi 1.2-6. Grant to Thy servants, O Lord, the pardon of their sins, comfort in life, and perpetual guidance; whereby they may faithfully serve Thee, and be always enabled to attain Thy mercy; through Jesus Christ our Lord. #RandolphHarris 11 of 11

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And Grace Always Gives Far More than We Have “Earned.”

January 16, 2020 5:11 am

Traveling is almost like talking with people of other centuries. There are strings in the human heart that had better not be vibrated. Things turn out best for the people who make the best out of the way things turn out! Our great weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time. It is quite noticeable that our clients tend in the direction of permitting each member of the family to have one’s own feelings and to be a separate person. This may seem like a strange statement, but it is actually a most radical step. Many of us are perhaps unaware of the tremendous pressure we tend to put on our wives, our husbands, our children, to have the same feelings we do. It is often as we said, “If you want me to love you, then you must have the same feelings I do. If I feel your behavior is bad, you must feel so too. If I feel a certain goal is desirable, you must feel so too.” Now the tendency which we see in our clients is the opposite of this. There is a willingness for the other person to have different feelings, different values, differ goals. In short, there is a willingness for one to be a separate person. It is my belief that this tendency develops as the person discovers that one can trust one’s own feelings and reactions—that one’s own deep impulses are not destructive or catastrophic, and that one need not be guarded, but can meet life on a real basis. #RandolphHarris 1 of 21

As one learns that one can trust oneself, with one’s own uniqueness, one becomes more able to trust one’s wife, or one’s child, and to accept the unique feelings and values which exist in this other person. One woman wrote a letter explaining something she had experienced in her family. “I realized that I had not sown my 14-year-old son Phil any real love in a long time, because I was so resentful of standards that I have always thought were important. Since I have stopped taking most of the responsibility for his goals, and responded to him as a person, as I always have to Sarah, for instance, it is surprising what changes have appeared in his attitudes. Not Earth-shaking—but a heartwarming beginning. We no longer heckle him about his school work, and the other day he volunteered that he had gotten an S—satisfactory grade on Mrs. Swanson’s trigonometry exam the first time this year.” A few months later I heard from her husband. “You would not recognize Phil….While he is hardly garrulous, he is not nearly the sphinx that he was, and he is doing much better in school, although we do not expect him to be graduated cum laude. You should take a great deal of credit for his improvement, because he began to blossom when I finally began to trust him to be himself, and ceased trying to mold him into the glorified image of his father at a similar age. Oh to undo our past errors!” #RandolphHarris 2 of 21

This concept of trusting the individual to be oneself has some to have a great deal of meaning to me. I sometimes fantasy about what it would mean if a child were treated in this fashion from the first. Suppose a child were permitted to have one’s own unique feelings—supposed one never had to disown one’s feelings in order to be loved. Suppose one’s parents were free to have and express their own unique feelings, which often would be different from one’s, and often would be different between themselves. I like to think of all the meanings that such an experience would have. It would mean that a child would grow up respect oneself as a unique person. It would mean that even when one’s behavior had to be thwarted, one could remain open “ownership” of one’s feelings. It would mean that one’s behavior would be a realistic balance, taking into account one’s own feelings and the known and open feelings of others. One would, I believe, be a responsible and self-directing individual, who would never need to conceal one’s feelings from oneself, who would never need to live behind a façade. One would be relatively free of the maladjustments which cripple so many of us. If I have been able correctly to discern the trends in the experience of our clients, then client-centered therapy seems to have a number of implications for family life. Let me attempt to restate these in somewhat more general form. #RandolphHarris 3 of 21

It appears that an individual finds it satisfying in the long run to express any strong or persistent emotional attitudes in the situation in which they arise, to the person with whom they are concerned, and to the depth to which they exist. This is more satisfying than refusing to admit that such feelings exist, or permitting them to pile up to an explosive degree, or directing them toward some situation other than the one in which they arose. It seems that the individual discovers that it is more satisfying in the long run to live a given family relationship on the basis of the real interpersonal feelings which exist, rather than living the relationship on the basis of pretense. A part of this discovery is that the fear that the relationship will be destroyed if the true feelings are admitted, is usually unfounded, particularly when the feelings are expressed as belonging to oneself, not as stating something about the other person. Our clients find that as they express themselves more freely, as the surface character of the relationship matches more closely the fluctuating attitudes which underlie it, they can lay aside dome of their defenses and truly listen to the other person. Often for the first time they begin to understand how the other person feels, and why one feels that way. Thus mutual understanding begins to pervade the interpersonal interactions. #RandolphHarris 4 of 21

Finally, there is an increasing willingness for the other person to be oneself. As I am more willing to be myself, I find I am more ready to permit you to be yourself, with all that implies. This means that the family circle tends in the direction of becoming a number of separate and unique persons with individual goals and values, but bound together by the real feelings—beneficial and disadvantageous—which exist between them, and by the satisfying bond of mutual understandings of at least portion of each other’s private Worlds. It is in these ways, I believe, that therapy which results in the individual becoming more fully and more deeply oneself, results also in one’s finding greater satisfaction in realistic family relationships which likewise promote the same end—that of facilitating each member of the family in the process of discovering, and becoming, oneself. If we could sell our experiences for what they cost us, we would all be millionaires. Next is the discipline of communication. Recently the readers of a popular women’s magazine were asked the question, “If you could change your husband, what would you change?” The overwhelming consensus was they would like them to communicate better. They indicated that even more, they would like their husbands to listen. All that can be said is that, the two people happened to hit on the same thought—and Shakespeare made use of it first, that is all. #RandolphHarris 5 of 21

The stereotype is the husband buried in the morning newspaper at breakfast, preferring to read a news agency report of the latest scandal in a European government, the scores of yesterday’s athletic contests, and the opinions of a couple of columnists whom one will never meet rather than listen to the voice of the person who has just shared his bed, poured his coffee, and fried his eggs, even though listening to that live voice promises love and hope, emotional depth and intellectual exploration far in excess of what he can gather informationally from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Christian Science Monitor put together. Men, the discipline of communication demands that you set aside regular time to talk—and that you really do talk, and that you communicate more than facts, that you communicate feelings—that you learn to talk in metaphors and similes with phrases that begin, “I feel like…” And it means that you listen. It is recommended that 65 percent of an executive’s time should be spent listening. How much more so the wise husband. The Biblical, prophetic illumination of the human soul in its lostness is empathic, starkly clear, and repeated over and over, from Moses and Samuel to Jesus, Paul, and John. The only path of spiritual transformation today is still possessed through this illumination. It must be gratefully and humbly accepted and applied, to oneself above all. #RandolphHarris 6 of 21

When the prophet Jeremiah, for example, says, “The heart is more deceitful than all these and is desperately sick: Who wan understand it?” we have to recognize from our heart that we are the ones spoken of, that, indeed, I am the one described. Only then is a foundation laid for spiritual formation into Christlikeness. The initial move toward Christlikeness cannot be toward self-esteem, because of confusion about what self-esteem means, and because, realistically, I am not okay and you are not okay. We are all in serious trouble. That must be our starting point. Self-esteem in such a situation will only breed self-deception and frustration—as is now increasingly recognized, by the way. For the realities of our soul will still be what they are and will still have the consequences for evil that they naturally do—regardless of what we or others may say to “pump ourselves up” and really, to conceal and deny who we ae. A high opinion of ourselves will only make those consequences more difficult to deal with. Denial—usually in some form of rationalization—is the primary device that humans use to deal with their own wrongness. It was the first thing out of the mouths of Adam and Eve after they sinned, and it continues up to the latest edition of the newspaper. The prophetic witness from God must throw itself against the massive weight of group and individual denial, often institutionalized and subtly built into our customary ways of speaking and interacting. #RandolphHarris 7 of 21

Jesus addressed leaders of his day in language that may see harsh and pitiless to us, but that was the only possible way he could be of help to them, strongly self-defended as they were; and perhaps the same is true of us as well. “You Pharisees clean the outside of the dish, but your insides are full of greed and filth. How foolish of you! Is not God as interested in your insides as your outside?” reports Luke 11.39. And, “If you wash a dish well on the inside, will not the outside come clean in the process?” reports Matthew 23.26. Jesus proceeds to point out how they love and vie for public recognition of “approval” (Luke 11.43) and how in doing so they are like graves, all nice prettied up on the outside, but full of disgusting rot inside (verse 44; compare Matthew 23.27-28). They were unable to believe in Jesus because they sought to be honored by each other (John 5.44). They desired to be exalted. Spiritual transformation does not lie in this direction, for them or for us. In the financial World, an investment that doubles itself in a few years is considered an excellent investment. Yet that is only a hundred percent gain. Jesus promises us not one hundred but ten thousand percent return. Why does Jesus use such an astonishing amount as ten thousand percent? He is telling us that God’s reward is out of all proportion to our service and sacrifice. He is telling us that in the Kingdom of Heaven God’s reward system is based not on merit but on grace. And grace always gives far more than we have “earned.” #RandolphHarris 8 of 21

The generosity and the magnanimity of God are so great that he accepts nothing from us without rewarding it beyond all computation. The vast disproportion existing between our work and God’s reward of it already displays his boundless grace, to say nothing of the gift of salvation which is made before we have even begun to do any work. God calls us to service Him, not because He needs us, but because we need Him. Then His reward for our service is always for our service is always out of proportion to our efforts—as Jesus said to Peter, “a hundred times as much,” reports Matthew 19.29. The ontology of love leads to the basic assertion that love is one. This contradicts the main trend in the recent discussions of the nature of love. They were useful in so far as they directed the attention to the different qualities of love. However, they were and are misleading in so far as they consider the differences of qualities as differences of types. The error was not that one distinguished the qualities of love—on the contrary, more distinctions should have been made in what was often comprehended under the name eros. The error was that one did not start with an understanding of love as one. Such an understanding, of course, would have led to an ontological analysis. For only the relation of love to being as such can reveal its fundamental character. If love in all its forms is the drive towards the reunion of the separated, the different qualities of the one nature of love become understandable. #RandolphHarris 9 of 21

Traditionally epithymia (desire) is considered the lowest quality of love. It is identified with the desire to sensual self-fulfillment. There is a strong interest on the part of philosophical and theological moralists in establishing a complete gap between this quality and those which are supposed to be higher and essentially different. On the other hand, there is a tendency on the naturalist side to reduce all the other qualities of love to the epithymia quality. A solution of this problem is only possible in the light of the ontological interpretation of love. First of all it must be said that libido—to use the Latin word—is misunderstood if it is defined as the desire for pleasure. This hedonistic definition is, like hedonism generally, based on a wrong psychology which itself is the consequence of a wrong ontology. Humans strive to reunite themselves with that to which they belong and from which one is separated. And this is true not only of humans but of all living beings. They desire food, movement, growth, participation in group, intimacy, and so forth. The fulfilment of these desires is accompanied by pleasure. However, it is not the pleasure such which is desired, but the union with that which fulfils the desire. Certainly, fulfilled desire is pleasure, and unfulfilled desire is pain. However, if one derives from these facts the pain-pleasure principle in the sense that life essentially consists of feeling from pain and striving for pleasure, it is a distortion of the actual process of life. #RandolphHarris 10 of 21

Whenever this happens life is corrupted. Only a perverted life follows the pain-pleasure principle. Unperverted life strives for that of which it is in want, it strives for union with that which is separated from it, though it belongs to it. This analysis should remove the prejudice towards libido, and it can give criteria for the partial acceptance, partial rejection of Dr. Freud’s libido theory. In so far as Dr. Freud descries libido as the desire of the individual to get rid of his tensions, he has described the perverted form of libido. And he has acknowledged this implicitly (though not intentionally) be deriving the death-instinct from the infinite, never fulfilled libido. Dr. Freud describes human’s libido in its perverted, self-estranged stage. However, his description, in which he joins many Puritans (old and new ones who would be embarrassed by this alliance) mises the meaning of libido as the normal drive towards vital self-fulfillment. In the light of this analysis it is justified to say that epithymia is a quality which is not lacking in any love relation. To this extent the naturalists are right. However, they are wrong if they interpret libido or epithymia as the striving for pleasure for the sake of pleasure. The attempts to establish an absolute contrast between agape and eros usually presuppose an identification of eros and epithymia. Certainly, there is epithymia in every eros. However, eros transcends epithymmia. #RandolphHarris 11 of 21

Eros strives for a union with that which is a bearer of values because of the values it embodies. This refers to the beauty we find in nature, to the beautiful and the true in culture, and to the mystical union with that which is the source of the beautiful and the true. Love drives towards union with the forms of nature and culture and with the divine sources of both. This eros is untied with epithymia if epithymia is the desire for vital self-fulfillment and not for the pleasure resulting from this union. This valuation of eros is attacked from two sides. Love as eros is depreciated by those theologians who depreciate culture and by those who deny a mystical element in human’s relation to God. However, it is a rather self-defying attitude if somebody depreciates culture and does it in terms of culture, if one, for instances, uses millennia of linguistic culture in order to express one’s rejection of culture. Without eros towards truth, theology would not exist, and without the eros towards the beautiful no ritual expression would exist. Even more serious is the rejection of the eros quality of love with respect to God. The consequence of this rejection is that love towards God becomes an impossible concept to be replaced by obedience to God. However, obedience is not love. It can be the opposite of love. Without the desire of humans to be reunited with their origin, the love towards God becomes a meaningless word. #RandolphHarris 12 of 21

It is important to look at history, but at the same time look beyond history to the ultimate power and meaning and majesty of being. There are two orders of being: the human, political, historical order, and the divine, eternal order. If we know these two orders, we can speak, moving continually between the depth of human nothingness and the great height of divine creativity. The human order, the order of history, is primarily the order of growing and dying. “Surely the people is grass.” Human’s experience of melancholy, awakened by fading and perishing nature, is symbolic of their transitoriness. Generations after generations grow up, struggle, suffer, enjoy and disappear. Should we talk all this seriously? Should we take it more seriously than the growing and fading of the grass? The prophet, when one was asked to speak to one’s nations raised the questions: Why speak to them? They are grass. We could continue: Why write and work and struggle for them? They are grass. What matter, when after a few years all those for who we wrote and spoke and struggled will have vanished? They were grass, the grass withered, the flowers faded. That is the order of history. However, the other order appears at the horizon: The word of God shall stand forever! #RandolphHarris 13 of 21

Second, the order of history is an order of sin and punishment. The exile, following the destruction of Jerusalem, was, as all the prophets said, the punishment of the people for their sins. We do not like words such as sin and punishment. They seem to us archaic, barbaric, and invalid in the light of modern psychology. However, whenever I have met exiles of high moral standards and insights, I have discovered that they feel responsible for what has happened within their own countries. And very often I have met citizens of democratic countries, citizens of this country, who have expressed a feeling of guilt for the situation of the World today. They were right, and the exiles were right: they are responsible, as are you and I. Whether or not we call it sin, whether or nor we call it punishment, we are beaten by the consequences of our own failures. That is the order of history. However, at the horizon the other order appears, saying that our struggles are not in vain, that our iniquity is pardoned. There is a third element in the order of history, uniting finiteness and sin: the tragic law which controls the historical process, the law which ordains that human greatness utterly fall. There is human greatness in history. There are great and conquering nations empires; there are even nations and empress which manifest a certain righteousness. There are princes and even good princes; there are judges and even just judges. #RandolphHarris 14 of 21

There are states and constitutions and even states and constitutions which provide a certain amount of freedom; there are social orders and even some which provide a certain amount of equality. There are creative spirits and even some which have the power of knowledge and understanding. However, just in being great and powerful and righteous they touch the divine sphere, and they become arrogant, and they are brought to nothing. They are without roots; they wither; the divine storm blows over them, and they vanish. That is the subject of Greek tragedy. That is the message of the prophet to the nations of the World. They are all subject to the law of tragic self-destruction—the bad and the good, individuals and nations, the weak and the heroic. And again the other order, the order beyond history and tragedy, appears at the horizon: He gives power to the faint and their strength is renewed, so that they shall mount up with wings as eagles. The order beyond the order of history is the divine order. And it is paradoxical: humans are like grass, but the word of God spoken to them shall stand forever. Humans stand under the law of sin and punishment, but the divine order breaks through it and brings forgiveness. Humans faint, falling from the height of their moral goodness and youthful power, and just when they have fallen and are weakest, they run without weariness and rise up with wings as eagles. #RandolphHarris 15 of 21

God acts beyond all human assumptions and valuations. He acts surprisingly, unexpectedly, paradoxically. The negative character of the historical order is the absolute order of the divine order. The weak and despairing, the sinful and tragic in the historical order are the strong and victorious in the divine order. The prophet also speaks of the paradoxical destiny of the servant, the elected nation. Described as a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, it is despised and rejected in the human order. Who does not think, hearing these words, of the exiles not only of Israel but of all nations of the World? However, the divine order appears. The exiled nation, or (as the Christians later, historically wrong, spiritually right, interpreted it) the Man on the Cross, represents another order, an order in which the weakest is the strongest, the most humiliated, the most victorious. This historical, human order is overcome by the suffering servant, the crucified Saviour. If we doubt this paradox, if we despair about our situation, if our exile is without hope or meaning for us, the prophet should fill us with shame for the arrogance of our rationalism and the narrowness of our moralism. He points to the creation of the World, of humankind, of history. He asks, “Who has directed the Spirit of God? With whom took He counsel and who instructed Him and taught Him the path of justice?” #RandolphHarris 16 of 21

We always wish to teach God the path of justice. We tell God that He must punish the bad and reward the good, especially in relation to ourselves. However, God accepts no counsel concerning the course of history, as He took no counsel concerning the structure of the World, with all its natural destruction, cruelty, and transitoriness. The divine order cannot be judged according to the measures of the historical order, the measures of human comfort and morality, democracy and civilization. That was the answer Job received from God when he struggled with Him about the unintelligible injustice of his historical fate. God did not justify Himself in moral categories; He triumphantly pointed to the unexplorable greatness of nature which cannot be measures according to the measure of human righteousness. However, if the divine order and the historical order have nothing to do with each other, how can the divine order concern us at all? How can eternity and forgiveness and divine help concern us if we are in the other order, the historical order, standing under the law of finiteness and weakness and punishment? How can the divine order comfort us in our misery? How can we listen to the words of the prophets which tell us of the end of our warfare? There are three answers to this question. First, the divine order is not the historical order; and we should not confuse these two orders. #RandolphHarris 17 of 21

No life is able to overcome finiteness, sin, and tragedy. The illusions of our period have been that modern civilization and conquer then, and that we can achieve security in our own existence. Progress seemed to have conquered tragedy; the divine order seemed to be embodied in the progressive, historical order. However, for nearly six decades our generation has received blow after blow, destroying that illusion, and driving to despair and cynicism those who wanted to transform, and thought they could transform, the historical order into a divine order. Let us learn from the catastrophe of our time at least the fact that no life and no period are able to overcome finiteness, sin, and tragedy. The second answer is that there is another order to which we, as human beings, belong, an order which makes humans always dissatisfied with what is given to one. Humans transcend everything in the historical order, all the heights and depths of one’s own existence. They pass, as no other being is able to pass, beyond the limits of their given World. Humans participates in something infinite, in an order which is not transitory, not self-destructive, not tragic, but eternal, holy, and blessed. Therefore, when one listens to the prophetic word, when one hears of the everlasting God and of the greatness of His power and the mystery of His acts, a response is awakened in the depth of the human soul; the infinite within one is touched. #RandolphHarris 18 of 21

Every being knows, that in some depth of their soul that greatness of God is true. Our despair itself, our inability to escape ourselves in life and in death, witnesses to our infinity. The third answer is that the two orders, the historical and the eternal, although they can never become the same, are within each other. The historical order is not separated from the eternal order. What is new in the prophets and in Christianity, beyond all paganism, old and new, is that the eternal order reveals itself in the historical order. The suffering servant of God and the enemies because of whim one suffers, the Man on the Cross and those who fainted under the Cross, the exiled and persecuted in all periods of history, have all transformed history. The strong in history fall; the strength of each of us is take from us. However, those who seem weak in history finally shape history, because they are bound to the eternal order. We are not a lost generation because we are a suffering, destroyed generation. Each of us belongs to the eternal order, and the prophet speaks to all of us: Comfort ye, comfort yet, my people! “And they were strict to observe that there should be no iniquity among them; and whoso was found to commit iniquity, and three witnesses of the church did condemn them before the elders, and if they repented not, and confessed not, their names were blotted out, and they were not numbered among the people of Christ. However, as they oft as they repented and sought forgiveness, with real intent, they were forgiven,” report Moroni 6. 7-8. #RandolphHarris 19 of 21

The time has come that we have longed for; what greater or better work can be found than to proclaim that might of our Risen Lord? Bursting open the doors of the grave, He has displayed to us the glorious banner of His Resurrection. Through Him the sons of light are born to life eternal; the courts of the kingdom of Heaven are opened to believers; and by the law of a blessed intercourse, Earthly and Heavenly things are interchanged. For by the Cross of Christ we have all been redeemed from death, and by His Resurrection the life of us all has risen again. While He has assume our mortal nature, we acknowledge Him as the God of majesty; and in the glory of the Godhead we confess Him God and Man: Who by dying destroyed our death, and by rising again restored out life—even Jesus Christ our Lord. O Son of God and Son of Man, Thou wast incarnate, didst suffer, rise, ascend for my sake; Thy departure was not a token of separation but a pledge of return; Thy word, promises, sacraments, show thy death until thou come again. That day is no horror to me, for thy death has redeemed me, thy Spirit fills me, thy word governs me. I have trusted thee and thou hast not betrayed my trust; waited for thee, and not waited in vain. Thou wilt come to raise my body from the dust, and re-unite it to my soul, by a wonderful work of infinite power and love, greater than that which bounds the oceans’ waters, ebbs and flows the tides, keep the stars in their courses, and gives life to all creatures. #RandolphHarris 20 of 21

This corruptible shall put on incorruption, this moral, immortality, this natural body, a spiritual body, this dishonoured body, a glorious body, this weak body, a body of power. I triumph now in thy promises as I shall do in their performance, for the head cannot live if the members are dead; beyond the grace is resurrection, judgment, acquittal, domination. Every event and circumstance of my life will be dealt with—the sins of my youth, my secret sins, the sins of abusing thee, of disobeying thy words, the sins of neglecting ministers’ admonitions, the sins of violating my conscience—all will be judged; and after judgment, peace and rest, life and service, employment and enjoyment, for thine elect. O God, keep me in this faith, and ever looking for Christ’s return. I hold that if the Almighty had ever made a set of people that should do all the eating and none of the work, He would have made them with mouths only and no hands. I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. Would that there were an award for people who come to understand the concept of enough. Good enough. Successful enough. Thin enough. Rich enough. Socially responsible enough. When you have self-respect, you have enough. You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you. Anything we can conceive, through God we can achieve. #RandolphHarris 21 of 21

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Something Very Strange and Mystic Happened to Me, Something Realistic and as Weird as Can be!

January 11, 2020 3:36 am

To give and not to count the cost; to fight and not to heed the wounds; to toil and not to seek for rest; to labor and not ask for any reward, save that of know that we do Thy will. Do not lower your expectations to meet your performance. Raise your level of performance to meet your expectations. Expect the best of yourself, and then do what is necessary to make it a reality. Life is not a destination, it is a journey. It is not a series of goals, it is a series of steps, of events unfolding as you make your way. If a person is accepted, fully accepted, and in this acceptance there is no judgment, only compassion and sympathy, the individual is able to come to grips with oneself, to develop the courage to give up one’s defenses and face one’s true self. However, this is not a perfect World and there is evidence of hostility as members differ. Somehow, in a setting where people are interested in being normal, civil, and peaceful every blow is softened, as if the sharp edges have been removed; if undeserved, people will go off on something else; and the blow is somehow lost. In my own case, even those people who originally irritate me, with further acquaintance I begin to accept and respect; and the thought occurred to me as I tried to understand what was happening: Once you come close to a person, perceive one’s thoughts, one’s emotions, one’s feelings, one become not only understandable but good and desirable. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16

Some of the more aggressive ones speak more than they should, more than their right share, but the group itself, by its own being, not by setting rules, eventually made its authority felt; and unless a person is very sick or insensitive, members more or less, in this respect, conform to what is expected of them. The problem-the hostile, the dominant, the neurotic—is not too acute; and yet if measured in a formal way, with a stop watch, at no time is a session free from aimless talk and waste of time. However, as one watches the process, the idea may persist that perhaps this waste of time may be necessary; it may very well be that that way a person learns best; for certainly, as I look back at the whole experience, I am fairly certain that it would have been impossible to earn as much or as well or as thoroughly in the traditional classroom setting. What a better way can a person learn than by becoming involved with one’s whole self, one’s very person, one’s root drives, emotions, attitudes and values? No series of facts or argument, no matter how logically or brilliantly arranged, can even faintly compare with that sort of thing. In the course of this process, I saw hard, inflexible, strict and rigid persons, in the brief period of several weeks, change in front of my eyes and become sympathetic, understanding and to a marked degree non-judgmental. I saw neurotic, compulsive persons ease up and become more accepting of themselves and others. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16

In one instance, a student who particularly impressed me by his change, told me when I mentioned this: “It is true. I feel less rigid, more open to the World. And I like myself better for it. I do not believe I ever learned so much anywhere.” I saw shy persons become less shy and aggressive persons more sensitive and moderate. One might say that this appears to be essentially an emotional process. However, that I believe would be altogether inaccurate in describing it. There was a great deal of intellectual content, but the intellectual content was meaningful and crucial to the person, in a sense that it meant a great deal to one as a person. In fact, one student brought up this very question. “Should we be concerned,” he asked, “only with the emotions? Has the intellect no play?” It was my turn to ask, “Is there any student who has read as much or thought as much for any other course?” The answer was obvious. We had spent hours and hours reading; the room reserved for us had occupants until 10 o’clock at night, and then many left only because the university guards wanted to close the building. Students listened to recordings; they saw motion pictures; but best of all, they talked and talked and talked. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16

In the traditional course, the instructor lectures and indicates what is to be read and learned; students dutifully record all this in their notebooks, take an examination and feel good or bad, depending on the outcome; but in nearly all cases it is a complete experience, with a sense of finality; the laws of forgetting begin to operate rapidly and inexorably. When people read and think inside and outside the class; it was they who chose from this reading and thinking what was meaningful to them, not the instructor. This non-directive kind of teaching, I should point out, was not 100 percent successful. There were three or four students who found the whole idea distasteful. Even at the end of the course, although nearly all became enthusiastic, one student to my knowledge, was intensely negative in his feelings; another was highly critical. These wanted the instructor to provide them with a rounded-out intellectual piece of merchandise which they could commit to memory and then give back on an examination. They would then have the assurance that they had learned what they should. As one said, “If I had to make a report as to what I learned in this course, what could I say?” Admittedly, it would be much more difficult than in a traditional course, if not impossible. The desperateness with which detachment is defended has a further explanation. #RandolphHarris 4 of 16

The threat to detachment, “smashing the wall,” often means more then temporary panic. What may result is a kind of disintegration of personality in psychotic episodes. If in analysis detachment beings to crumble, the patient not only becomes diffusely apprehensive but directly and indirectly express definite fears. There may be, for instance a fear of becoming submerged in the amorphous mass of human beings, a fear, primarily, of losing one’s uniqueness. There is also a fear of being helplessly exposed to the coercion and exploitation of aggressive persons—a result of one’s utter defenselessness. However, there is still a third fear, that of going insane, which may emerge so vividly that the patient wants absolute reassurance against such a possibility. Going insane in this context does not mean going berserk, nor is it a reaction to an emerging wish for irresponsibility. It is a straight expression of the specific fear of being split right open, often expressed in dreams and associations. This would suggest that relinquishing one’s detachment would bring one face to face with one’s own conflicts; that one would not be able to survive it but would be split like a tree struck by lightning, to use an image that occurred to a patient. This assumption is confirmed by other observations. Highly detached persons have an almost insurmountable aversion to the idea of inner conflicts. Later will tell the analyst that they simply did not know what one was talking about when one spoke of conflicts. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16

Whenever the analyst succeeds in showing them a conflict operating within themselves, they will imperceptibly and with amazing unconscious skill veer away from the subject. If, inadvertently, before they are ready to admit it, they recognize a conflict in a momentary flash, they are seized with acute panic. When later they approach the recognition of conflicts on a more secure basis, a greater wave of detachment follows. Thus we arrive at a conclusion that at first glance would have been bewildering. Detachment is an intrinsic part of the basic conflict, but it is also a protection against it. The puzzle resolves itself, however, if we are more specific. It is a protection against the two more active partners in the basic conflict. Here we must reiterate the statement that the predominance of one of the basic attitudes does not prevent the other contradictory ones from existing and operating. We can see this play of forces in the detached personality even more clearly than in the other two groups described. To begin with, the contradictory strivings often show in the life history. Before one has clearly accepted one’s detachment a person of this type will often have gone though episodes of compliance and dependence as well as through periods of aggressive and ruthless rebellion. In contrast to the clearly defined values of the other two types, one’s sets of values are most contradictory. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16

In addition to one’s permanent high evaluation of what one regards as freedom and independence, one may at some time in the analysis express an extreme appreciation for human goodness, sympathy, generosity, self-effacing sacrifice, and at another time swing to a complete jungle philosophy of callous self-interest. One may feel puzzled by these contradictions, but with some rationalization or other one will try to deny their conflicting character. If one has no clean perspective of the whole structure, the analyst will easily become confused. One may try to follow one path or the other without getting very far in either direction because again and again the patient takes refuge in one’s detachment, thereby shutting all the gateways as one would shut the watertight bulkheads of a ship. There is a perfect and simple logic underlying the special resistance of the detached person. One does not want to relate oneself to the analyst or to take cognizance of one as a human being. One does not really want to analyze one’s human relationships at all. One does not want to face one’s conflicts. And if we understand one’s premise, we see that one cannot even be interested in analyzing any of these factors. One’s premise is the conscious conviction that one need not bother about one’s relations with others so long as one keeps at a safe distance from them; that a disturbance in these relations will not upset one if only one keeps away from others. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16

And even the conflicts of which the analysts speaks can and should be left formant because they will only bother one; and that there is no need to straighten things out because one will not budge from one’s detachment anyway. As we have said, this unconscious reasoning is logically correct—up to a point. What one leaves out and for a long time refuses to recognize is that one cannot possibly grow and develop in a vacuum. The all-important function of neurotic detachment, then, is to keep major conflicts out of operation. It is the most radical and most effective of the defenses erected against them. One of the many neurotic ways of creating an artificial harmony, it is an attempt at solution through evasion. However, it is no true solution because the compulsive cravings for closeness as well as for aggressive domination, exploitation, and excelling remain, and they keep harassing is not paralyzing their carrier. Finally, no real inner peace of freedom can ever be attained as long as the contradictory set of values continue to exist. Let us meditate on the mystery of time. Augustine points to the depth of this mystery, when he says, “If nobody asks me about it, I know. If I want to explain it to somebody who asks me about it, I do not know.” There is something unspeakable about time, but this has not prevented the most profound religious minds from thinking and speaking about it. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16

It is not vain speculation when the writer of the first part of the 90^th Psalm confronts the eternity of God with the transitoriness of human existence. The melancholy experience of human finiteness drives one to utter the tremendous words of the psalm. It is not empty curiosity when Augustine tries, in his most personal book, the Confessions, to penetrate the ground of our temporality. We are not making an abstract statement but are rater expressing a profound religious feeling, when we sing, “Time like an ever-rolling stream bears all its sons away.” It is not mere philosophy, but a tragic feeling of life, which impels the earliest Greek philosopher to say that all things must return to their origin, suffering punishment, “according to the order of time.” It is not merely in the interest of systematic theory that the Fourth Gospel uses again and again the phrase “eternal life” as the expression of the highest good, which is ever present in Christ. It was a religious event when Meister Eckhardt pointed to the “eternal now” within the flux of time, and when Soren Kierkegaard pointed to the infinite significance of every moment as the now of decision. Time is as inexhaustible as the ground. Even the greatest minds have each discovered only one aspect. However, everyone, even the most simple mind, apprehends the meaning of time—namely, one’s own temporality. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16

One may not be able to express one’s knowledge about time, but one is never separated from its mystery. One’s life, and the life of each of us, is permeated in every moment, in every experience, and in every expression, by the mystery of time. Time is our destiny. Time is our hope. Time is our despair. And time is the mirror in which we see eternity. Let me point to three of the many mysteries of time: its power to devour everything within its sphere; its power to receive eternity within itself; and its power to drive toward an ultimate end, a new creation. Humankind has always realized that there is something fearful about the flux of time, a riddle which we cannot solve, and the solution of which we could not stand. We come from a past which is no more; we go into a future which is not yet; ours is the present. The past is ours only in so far as we have it still present. The past is ours only in so far as we have it still present; and the future is ours only in so far as we have it already present. We possess the past by memory, and the future by anticipation. However, what is the nature of the present itself? If we look at it closely, we must say: it is a point without extension, the point in which the future becomes the past; when we say to ourselves, “This is the present,” the moment has already been swallowed by the past. The present cannot be caught; it is always gone. So it seems that we have nothing real—neither the past nor the future, nor even the present. #RandolphHarris 10 of 16

Therefore, there is a dreaming character about our existence, which the psalmist indicates, and which religious visionaries have described in so many ways. Time, however, could not even give us a place on which to stand, if it were not characterized by that second mystery, its power to receive eternity. There is no present in the mere stream of time; but the present is real, as our experience witnesses. And it is real because eternity breaks into time and gives it a real present. We could not even say “now,” if eternity did not elevate that moment above the ever-passing time. Eternity is always present; and its presence is the cause of our having the present at all. When the psalmist looks at God, for Whom a thousand years are like one day, he is looking at that eternity which alone gives him a place on which he can stand, a “now” which has infinite reality and infinite significance. In every moment that we say “now,” something temporal and something eternal are united. Whenever a human being says, “Now I am living; now I am really present,” resisting the stream which drives the future into the past, eternity is. In each such “now,” eternity is made manifest; in every real “now,” eternity is present. Let us think for a moment of the way in which we are living our lives in our period of history. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16

Have we not lost a real present by always being driven forward, by our constant running, in our indefatigable activism, toward the future? We suppose the future to be better than any present; but there is always another future beyond the next future, again and again without a present, that is to say, without eternity. According to the Fourth Gospel eternal life is present gift: one, who listens to Christ, has eternity already. He is no longer subject to the driving of time. In him the “now” becomes a “now eternal.” We have lost the real “now,” the “now eternal;” we have, I am afraid, lost eternal life in so far as it creates the real present. There is another element in time, its third mystery, which makes us look at the future; for time does not return, nor repeat itself: it runs forward; it is always unique; it ever creates the new. There is within it a drive toward an end, unknown, never to be reached in time itself, always intended and ever fleeing. Time runs toward the “future eternal.” This is the greatest of all the mysteries of times. It is the mystery of which the prophets, Christ, and the Apostles have spoken. The eternal is the solution of the riddle of time. Time does not drive toward an endless self-repetition, nor to an empty return to its beginning. Time is not meaningless. It has a hidden meaning—salvation. It has a hidden goal—the Kingdom of God. It brings about a hidden reality—the new creation. The infinite significance of every moment of time is this: in it we decide, and are decided about, with respect to our eternal future. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16

Life is not a destination, it is a journey. It is not a series of goals, it is a series of steps, of events unfolding as you make your way. The purpose of life is not to be happy. The purpose of life is to matter, to be productive, to have it make a difference that you lived at all. “Time is nothing. I shall wait for another to come who is as strong as you are. Humans are changing. Their dreams are filled with the forecast of these changes. Mortals dream ceaselessly of immortality, as their lives grow longer. They dream of unimpeded flight,” page 884 of The Witching Hour by Anne Rice. Be careful of what you focus on. There are forces in this World that are billions of years old. “It is sufficient to say not that he is Precambrian and self-sufficient, and if not immortal, his life span could be billions of years. It is conceivable that he absorbed consciousness from mankind, that is consciousness gives off a palpable energy, he had fed upon this energy and a mutation has created his mind. He continues to feed upon the consciousness of the Mayfair Witches and their associates, and from this springs his learning, and his personality, and his will,” page 886 of The Witching Hour by Anne Rice. This is why the King James Bible says, “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you,” reports James 4.8. And it is also where the idea of the law of attraction comes from. You attract what you focus on. You give that power in your life, and it will have the ability to manifest. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16

The law of attraction is also why some Christians do not seek revenge. They believe God will act in the favour and take care of all that needs to be handled. God says he will never give us more than we can bear and through our faith, we have to consent to that truth. Speak to our hearts, O Christ our Overseer; say to us, “Hail, be strong and of good courage.” Thou who didst this of old, canst Thou not do the same now? Thou canst, Thou canst indeed! For Thou art Almighty. Thou canst, O most Loving, Thou canst do what we cannot conceive; for nothing is impossible to Thee, Almighty God! Truly, O Saviour, for us Thy Body is red with Blood; Thou has “washed Thy garment in wine, and Thy clothes in the blood of grapes;” for Thou art God alone, crucified for us, whom the old transgression gave over unto death; by Thy wound have been healed the countless wounds of our sins. And now, O loving and crucified Christ, redeem us with Thine own; save us, O loving Goodness, O God, Who reignest with the Father and the Holy Spirit, One God for ever, throughout all ages. Hear us, O Lord, Father Almighty, through the New Adam; that being buried with Jesus Thy Son, and raised up again by His life, we may in this ensuing night of His holy Resurrection, by the grace that attends the great solemnity, by His gift and Thy blessing, and the counsel and mysterious working of the Holy Spirit, obtain absolution through Him, Who with Thee we will have World peace and overcome all obstructions and bondage. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16

God by mode is in all things by His presence, power and substance; still He is said to be present more familiarly in some by grace. God is said to be in a thing in two ways; in one way after the manner of an efficient cause; and thus He is in all things created by Him; in another way he is in things as the object of operation is in the operator; and this is proper to the operations of the soul, according as the things know is in the one who knows; and the thing desired in the one desiring. In this second way God is especially in the rational creature which knows and loves Him actually or habitually. And because the rational creature possessed this prerogative by grace. He is said to be thus in the saints by grace. However, God is in other things created by Him, may be considered from human affairs. A king, for example, is said to be in the whole kingdom by his power, although he is not everywhere present. Again a thing is said to be by its presence in other things which are subject to its inspection; as things in a house are said to be by its present to anyone, who nevertheless may not be in substance in every part of the house. Lastly, a thing is said to be by way of substance or essence in that place in which its substance may be. Now there were some (the Manichees) who said that spiritual and incorporeal things were subject to the divine power; but that visible and corporeal things were subject to the power of a contrary principle. Therefore against these it is necessary to say that God is in all things by His power. #RandolphHarris 15 of 16

O God, Thy main plan, and the end of thy will is to make Christ glorious and beloved in Heaven where he is now ascended, where one day all the elect will behold his glory and love and glorify him for ever. Though here I love him but little, may this be my portion at last. In this World thou hast given me a beginning, one day it will be perfected in the realm above. Thou hast helped me to see and know Christ, though obscurely, to take him, receive him, to possess him, love him, to bless him in my heart, mouth, life. Let me study and stand for discipline, and all the ways of worship, out of the love for Christ; and to show my thankfulness; to seek and know his will from love, to hold it in love, and daily to care for and keep this state of heart. Thou hast led me to place all my nature and happiness in oneness with Christ, in having heart and mind centered only om him, in being like him in communicating good to others; this is my Heaven on Earth, but I need the force, energy, impulses of thy Spirit to carry me on the way to my Jerusalem. Here, it is my duty to be as Christ in this World, to do what he would do, to live as he would live, to walk in love and meekness; then would he be known, then would I have peace in death. “And I, Moroni, will not deny the Christ; wherefore, I wander withersoever I can for the safety of mine own life,” reports Moroni 1.3. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16

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Sometimes an Angel Has to Fall to Know One Was in Heaven—Are You Living?

January 1, 2020 12:46 am

Make sustained rapid improvement a way of life. Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task. If it is in the right direction, there is nothing wrong in change. To improve is to change, so to be perfect is to have changed often. Start by doing what is necessary; then do what is possible; and suddenly you are doing this impossible. God moves in a mysterious way, his wonders to perform; God plants his foot steps in the sea, and rides upon the storm. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance. Some people think that it seems God does not exist because if one of two contraries be infinite, the other would be altogether destroyed. And the word “God” means that He is infinite goodness. They say, if God existed, there would be no evil discoverable; but there is evil in the World. Therefore, God does not exist is their thought. However, it is said in the person of God: “I am Who am,” reports Exodus 3.14. We know God exists. It is certain, and evident to our senses that in the World some things are in motion. Now whatever is in motion is put in motion by another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is noting else than the reduction of something in a state of actuality. #RandolphHarris 1 of 19

However, nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thu that which is actually hot, as fire, makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and thereby moves and changes it. Now it is not possible that the same thing should be at once in actuality and potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot simultaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cld. It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, exempli gratia that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by another. If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. However, this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God. #RandolphHarris 2 of 19

The second way is from the nature of the efficient cause. In the World of sense we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient case of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible, Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinite, because in all efficient cases following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or only one. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient cases, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate cause. However, if there be no first cause it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name Go. The third way is taken from possibility and necessity, and runs thus. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated, and to corrupt, and consequently, they are possible to be and not to be. However, it is impossible for these always to exist, for that which is possible not to be at some time is not. #RandolphHarris 3 of 19

Therefore, if everything is possible not to be, then at one time there could have been noting in existence. Now if this were true, even now there would be nothing in existence, because that which does not exist only begins to exist by something already existing. Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; and thus even now nothing would be in existence—which is absurd. Therefore, not all beings are merely possible, but there must exist something the existence of which is necessary. However, every necessary thing either has its necessity caused by another, or not. Now it is impossible to go out to infinite in necessary things which have their necessity caused by another, as has been already proved in regard to efficient causes. Therefore we cannot but postulate the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity, and not receiving it from another, but rather causing in other their necessity. This all beings speak of as God. The fourth way is taken from the gradation to be found in things. Among beings there are some more and some less good, true, noble and the like. But “more” and “less” are predicated of different things, according as they resemble in their different ways something in which is the maximum, as a thing is said to be hotter according as it more nearly resembles that which is uttermost being; for those things that are greatest in truth are greatest in being. #RandolphHarris 4 of 19

Now the maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus; as fire, which is the maximum heat, is the cause of all hot things. Therefore there must also be something which is to all beings the cause of their being, goodness, and every other perfection; and this we call God. The fifth way is taken from the governance of the World. We see that things which lack intelligence, such as natural bodies, act for an end, and this is evident from their acting always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result. Hence it is plain that not fortuitously, but designedly, do they achieve their end. Now whatever lacks intelligence cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence; as the arrow is shot to its mark by the archer. Therefore some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God. Since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil. This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it to produce good. Since nature works for a determinate end under the direction of a higher agent, whatever is done by nature must needs be traced back to God, as to its first cause. #RandolphHarris 5 of 19

So also whatever is done voluntarily must also be traced back to some higher cause other than human reason or will, since these can change or fail; for all things that are changeable and capable of defect must be traced back to an immovable and self-necessary first principle. The human situation is one of finiteness—all flesh is grass and the grass withereth. It is one of sin—we receive double for all our sins. It is one of vanity and pride—we are brought to nothing and fall utterly. However, in spite of one’s realistic knowledge of human nature and density, darkness and light follow each other; after the depth of sin and punishment, the prophet announces forgives and liberation. However, the wave falls, and the prophet asks himself how he could have made such an announcement, when all the goodness of mortal beings is as the flower of the field, which faces because the breath of God blows upon it. However, he does not remain in the depths of his melancholy: over against human mortality the word of God shall stand forever. There is something eternal to which we can cling: Be not afraid, the Lord God shall come with strong hand. So the wave rises, and then again it falls: the nations are as a drop of water and a piece of dust; all nations are as nothing before God, they are counted as less than nothing. #RandolphHarris 6 of 19

Again the wave rises: God stands above the circle of the Earth, above all created things, above the highest and the lowest! And when once more the wave falls and the servant of God complains that he does not receive justice from God, the answer is that God acts beyond human expectation. He gives power to the faint and to one that hath no might God is increaseth strength. God acts paradoxically; He acts beyond human understanding. How shall we interpret these words? Is there a way to unite the heights and depths contrasted in this essay? Shall we understand the words of consolation and hope as vain promises, never fulfilled in the past and never to be fulfilled in any future? Shall we understand then as an escape from the realization of Human’s real situation, through mysticism and poetic elevation? If so, what about the probing realism of the prophet’s analysis of the human situation? One saw history as it is, but at the same time one looked beyond history to the ultimate power and meaning and majesty of being. One knew two orders of being: the human, political, historical order, and the divine, eternal order. Because one knew these two orders, one could speak as one did, moving continually between the depth of human nothingness and the great height of divine creativity. #RandolphHarris 7 of 19

Let us look at these orders, these different natures, and their interrelation. In speaking of them we speak of ourselves, because we belong to both of them in every moment of our life and history. The human order, the order of history, is primarily the order of growing and dying. “Surely the people is grass.” Human’s experience of melancholy, awakened by fading and perishing nature, is symbolic of one’s transitoriness. Generations after generations grow up, struggle, suffer, enjoy and disappear. Should we take all this seriously? Should we take it more seriously than the growing and fading of the grass? He prophet, when one was asked to speak one’s nation, raised the question: Why speak to them? They are grass. We could continue: Why write and work and struggle for them? They are grass. What matter, when after a few years all those for whom we wrote and spoke and struggled will have vanished? They were grass, the grass withered, the flowers faded. That is the order of history. However, the other appears at the horizon: the word of God shall stand forever. Second, the order of history is an order of sin and punishment. The exile, following the destruction of Jerusalem, was, as all the prophets said, the punishment of the people for their sins. We do not like words such as “sin” and “punishment.” They seem to us old-fashioned, barbaric, and invalid in the light of modern psychology. #RandolphHarris 8 of 19

However, whenever I have met exiles of high moral standards and insights, I have discovered that they feel responsible for what has happened within their own countries. And very often I have met citizens who democratic countries, citizens of this country, who have expressed a feeling of guilt for the situation of the World today. They were right, and the exiles were right: they are responsible, as are you and I. Whether or not we call it sin, whether or not we call it punishment, we are beaten by the consequences of our own failures. That is the order of history. However, at the horizon the other order appears, saying that our struggles are not in vain, that our iniquity is pardoned. There is a third element in the order of history, uniting finiteness and sin: the tragic law which controls the historical process, the law which ordains that human greatness utterly fall. There is human greatness in history. There are great and conquering nations and empires; there are even nations and empires which manifest a certain righteousness. There are princes and even good princes; there are judges and even just judges. There are states and constitutions and even states and constitutions which provide a certain amount of freedom; there are social orders and even some which provide a certain amount of equality. There are creative spirits and even some which have the power of knowledge and understanding. #RandolphHarris 9 of 19

However, just in being great and powerful and righteous they touch the divine sphere, and they become arrogant, and they are brought to nothing. They are without roots; they wither; the divine storm blows over them, and they vanish. That is the subject of Greek tragedy. That is the message f the prophet to the nations of the World. They are all subject to the law of tragic self-destruction—the bad and the good, individuals and nations, the weak and the heroic. And again the other order, the order beyond history and tragedy, appears at the horizon: He gives power to the faint and their strength is renewed, so that they shall mount up with wings as eagles. The order beyond the order of history is the divine order. And it is paradoxical: humans are like grass, but the word of God spoken to them shall stand forever. Humans stand under the law of sin and punishment, but the divine order breaks through it and bring forgiveness. Humans faint, falling from the height of their moral goodness and youthful power, and just when they have fallen and are weakest, they run without weariness and rise up with wigs as eagles. God acts beyond all human assumptions and valuations. He acts surprisingly, unexpectedly, paradoxically. The negative character of the historical order is the beneficial character of the divine order. The weak and despairing, the sinful and tragic in the historical order are the strong and victorious in the divine order. #RandolphHarris 10 of 19

The prophet speaks of the paradoxical destiny of the servant, the elected nation. Described as a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, it is despised and rejected in the human order. Who does not think, hearing these words, of the exiles not only of Israel but of all nations of the World? However, the divine order appears. The exiled nation, or (as the Christians later, historically wrong, spiritually right, interpreted it) the Man on the Cross, represents another order, an order in which the weakest is the strongest, the most humiliated, the most victorious. The historical, human order is overcome by the suffering servant, the crucified Saviour. If we doubt this paradox, if we despair about our human situation, if our exile is without hope or meaning for us, the prophet should fill us with shame for the arrogance of our rationalism and the narrowness of our moralism, of history. He asks, “Who has directed the Spirit of God? With whom took He counsel and who instructed Him and taught Him the path of Justice?” We always wish to teach God the path of justice. We tell Him that He must punish the bad and reward the good, especially in relation to ourselves. However, He accepts no counsel concerning the course of history, as He took no counsel concerning the structure of the World, with all its natural destruction, cruelty, and transitoriness. #RandolphHarris 11 of 19

The divine order cannot be judged according to the measures of the historical order, the measures of human comfort and morality, democracy and civilization. That was the answer Job received from God when he struggled with Him about the unintelligible injustice of his historical fate. God did not justify Himself in moral categories; He triumphantly pointed to the unexplorable greatness of nature which cannot be measured according to the measure of human righteousness. However, if the divine order and the historical order have nothing to do with each other, how can the divine order concern us at all? How can eternity and forgiveness and divine help concern us if we are in the other order, the historical order, standing under the law of finiteness and weakness and punishment? How can the divine order comfort us in our misery? How can we listen to the words of the prophets which tell us of the end of our warfare? There are three answers to this question. First, the divine order is not the historical order; and we should not confuse these two orders. No life is able to overcomes finiteness, sin, and tragedy. The illusions of our period have been that modern civilization can conquer them, and that we can achieve security in our own existence. Progress seemed to have conquered tragedy; the divine order seemed to be embodied in the progressive, historical order. #RandolphHarris 12 of 19

However, for nearly three decades our generation has received blow after blow, destroying that illusion, and driving to despair and cynicism those who wanted to transform, and thought they could transform the historical order into a divine order. Let us learn from the catastrophe of our tie at least the fact that no life and no period are able to overcome finiteness, sin, and tragedy. The second answer is that there is another order to which we, as human beings, belong, an order which makes beings always dissatisfied with what is given to one. Humans transcend everything in the historical order, all the heights and depts of one’s own existence. One passes, as no other being is able to pass, beyond the limits of one’s given World. One participates in something infinite, in an order which is not transitory, not self-destructive, not tragic, but eternal, holy, and blessed. Therefore, when one listen to the prophetic word, when one hears of the everlasting God and of the greatness of His power and the mystery of His acts, a response is awakened in the depth of one’s soul; the infinite within one is touched. Every being knows, in some depth of one’s soul, that is true. Our despair itself, our inability to escae ourselves in life and in death, witnesses to our infinity. The third answer is that the two orders, the historical and the eternal, although they can never become the same, are within each other. The historical order is not separated from the eternal order. #RandolphHarris 13 of 19

What is new in the prophets and in Christianity, beyond all paganism, old and new, is that the eternal order reveals itself in the historical order. The suffering servant of God and the enemies because of whom one suffers, the Man on the Cross and those who fainted under the Cross, the exiled and persecuted in all periods of history, have all transformed history. The strong in history fall; the strength of each of taken from us. However, those who seem weak in history finally shape history, because they are bound to the eternal order. We are not a lost generation because we are a suffering, destroyed generation. Each of us belongs to the eternal order, and the prophet speaks to all of us: Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people! I have learned that there are not different types but qualifications of love, since the different qualities are presented, by efficiency or deficiency, in every act of love. This insight, however, does not make the distinction of the qualities of love less important. If, as I shall suggest, one has to distinguish the libido, the philia, the eros, the agape qualities of love we must ask: how are they related to each other? What is meant if one speaks of love without qualification? Which quality of love is adequate to the Great Commandment? Which to its emotional quality? #RandolphHarris 14 of 19

Whenever the word love is used one also speaks of self-love. How is self-love related to the qualities of love, to its ontological and to its ethical character? First of all one must ask whether self-love is a meaningful concept at all. Considering that love presupposes a separation of the loving subject, and the loved object, is there such a separation in the structure of the self-consciousness? I am very doubtful about using the term self-love, and if it is used, abut using the term self-love, and if it is used, about using in it any except a metaphorical sense. Besides this terminological question, one must ask how the different qualities of love are related to what is metaphorically called self-love, and how it is related to the ethical and to the ontological nature of love. This survey of the problems and confusion, connected with the use of the term love is equaled by a survey of the confusions and problems connected with the public discussion of the concept of power. I may tell an anecdote which has more symbolic than analytical meaning. I have been warned not to announce a lecture on “Love, Power, and Justice” in the Untied States, because power would be understood as the product of the electrical power companies, and justice as the fight against the policy of the Federal Government to provide for affordable electrical power by the regulation of rivers according to the pattern of the Tennessee Valley Authority. #RandolphHarris 15 of 19

Power in the sense presupposed by this story is electrical power. In the same way the term power can be applied to all physical causes, although theoretical physics has got rid of this anthropomorphic symbol and has replaced it by mathematical equations. However, present-day physics speaks of power-fields in order to describe the basic structures of the material World. This is at least an indication of the significance the term power has even in the most abstract analysis of physical occurrences. Physicists are usually conscious of the fact that they use an anthropomorphic metaphor when they use the term power. Power is a sociological category and from there it is transferred to nature (just as is law). However, the term metaphor does not solve the problem. We must ask, how is it possible that both physics and social science use the same word, power? There must be a point of identity between the structure of the social and the structure of the physical World. And this identity must be manifest in the common use of the term power. There is, however, only one way of discovering the root meaning of power, namely to ask about its ontological foundation. And this, of course, is one of the purposes of these lectures. Within the social realm the meaning of power is burdened by another ambiguity, the relation of power and force. This duality is almost exclusively restricted to the human sphere. #RandolphHarris 16 of 19

For only in humans, that is in the being whose nature is finite freedom, the distinction of power and force is meaningful. One speaks of power politics, and one often does so with moral indignations. However, this is the consequence of mere confusion. Politics and power politics are one and the same thing. There are no politics without power, neither in a democracy nor in a dictatorship. Politics and power politics point to the same reality. It does not matter which term you are using. Unfortunately, however, the term power politics is used for a special type of politics, namely that in which power is separated from justice and love, and is identified with compulsion. This confusion is possible because there is indeed a compulsory element in the actuality of power. However, this is only one element, and if power is reduced to it and loses the form of justice and the substance of love, it destroys itself and the politics based on it. Only penetration into the ontological roots of power can overcome the ambiguities in the relation of power and compulsion. If power is distinguished from compulsion the question arises whether there is a power which is neither physical nor psychological, but spiritual. Compulsion uses both physical and psychological means in order to exercise power, must conspicuously in the terror methods of dictatorships. No compulsion at all is presupposed in spiritual power. #RandolphHarris 17 of 19

Nevertheless, one assumes that spiritual power is the greatest, that it is the ultimate power. One does so whenever one says that God is Spirit. It is meet and right that we should give thanks to Thee, O Lord God, through Jesus Christ Thy Son, Who, being God Eternal, was pleased to becomes Man for our salvation. O the one, peerless, manifold Mystery of our Saviour! For He, being one and the same, God mist high, and perfect Man, both supreme High priest and most scared Sacred Sacrifice, according to His Divine power created all things, according to His human condition delivered humans; by virtue of His Sacrifice He atoned for the polluted, in right of His Priesthood He reconciled the alienated. O the peerless Mystery of redemption! Wherein those ancient wounds were healed by the Lord’s new medicine, and the judgment passed before on the first human rescinded by the privileges of our Saviour. The one in self-indulgence extended one’s hands to the tree, the other patiently fitted His to the Cross; therefore deservedly did the punishment borne by innocence become the discharge of the debtor, for with good right are debts remitted to debtors when discharged on their behalf by Him Who owed nothing. “And it came to pass that they began to spread upon the face of the land, and to multiply and to till the Earth; and they did wax strong in the land,” reports Ether 6.18. #RandolphHarris 18 of 19

Creator and Redeemer God, Author of all existence, source of all blessedness, I adore thee for making me capable of knowing thee, for giving me reason and conscience, for leading me to desire thee; I praise thee for the revelation of thyself in the gospel, for thy heart as a dwelling place of pity, for thy thoughts of peace towards me, for thy patience and thy graciousness, for the vastness of thy mercy. Thou hast moved my conscience to know how the guilty can be pardoned, the unholy sanctified, the poor enriched. May I be always amongst those who not only hear but know thee, who walk with and rejoice in thee, who take thee at they word and find life there. Keep me always longing for a present salvation in Holy Spirit comforts and rejoicings, for spiritual graces and blessings, for help to value my duties as well as my privileges. May I cherish simplicity and Godly sincerity of character. Help me to be in reality before thee as in appearance I am before humans, to be religious before I profess religion, to leave the World before I enter the church, to set my affections on things above, to shun forbidden follies and vanities, to be a dispenser as well as a partaker of grace, to be prepared to bear evil as well as to do good. O God, make me worthy of this calling, that the name Jesus may be glorified in me and I in him. #RandolphHarris 19 of 19

BRIGHTON STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH

Rancho Cordova, CA |

Now Selling!

NOW SELLING! Brighton Station at Cresleigh Ranch is Rancho Cordova’s newest home community! This charming neighborhood offers an array of home types with eye catching architecture styles such as Mid-Century Modern, California Modern, Prairie, and Contemporary Farmhouse. Dining rooms are perhaps the best evidence of the revolution that took place in society in the middle of the nineteenth century. The Industrial Revolution not only made all the furniture, dishes, and silver plate possible, but also created a new class of people to use them. Early in the nineteenth century, the existence of a dining room at all was the mark of gentry. The landed gentry of the South and the merchant shippers of the North might boast a separate room just for eating, but they represented only a very small part of the population. By the 1860s, a separate dining room was considered de rigueur (prescribed or required by fashion, etiquette, or custom) for even a cottage.

When the guest filed into a Victorian dinner in the late nineteenth century, they found small menus on the table describing what cuisine they would be served. Staff set and removed plate for every course, and no one used fingers to touch the food. There were special forks and ladles and knives for every conceivable food: oyster ladles and forks; tomato servers; fish knives and forks; cake knives and servers forks; different spoons for clear sup, for cream soup, for dessert, for fruit, for breakfast coffee, for dinner coffee, and for tea. The volume and variety of silver-plated flatware and hollowware would baffle any modern dinner. What is so amazing about Victorian table manners is how successful they were. We may no longer use all the cutlery, but we have internalized their whole system of suppressing bodily functions and being proper. Cresleigh homes residence 4 osfer a formal dining room. Have your cake and eat it with whipped cream!

Style is displayed in exquisite proportions in residence 4, of Cresleigh homes, at Brighton Station. This 3,501 square foot home has a superb floor plan, which has a cache of thoughtful amenities. The chef inspired kitchen has a huge island, and opens up to the large great room, with an optional fireplace. Notice the abundance of storage in the butler’s pantry, and walk-in pantry. There is also a cozy home management office on the first floor, along with a formal dining room, coat closet, and a master suite with its own bathroom. The first floor also boast of a powder room for guest, a mud room and a 3-car tandem garage, which easily holds a family fleet, or a portion of it that can be converted into an optional workshop.

An elegant stairway leads to the master suite on the second floor, which offers both conviences and quiet seclusion. Included are many special features: a coffee bar, bathroom with deep soaker tub, multiple vanities, and walk-in closet. There are two more bedrooms, complimented by a charming loft, which could be converted into a 5^th bedroom with only a little rearranging, and there is another full bathroom that comes standard. This come contains 3.5 bathrooms and up to five bedrooms. There is also outdoor livability with a large covered porch with an optional outdoor fireplace, and extended patio. How will you customize your home?

Located off Douglas Road and Rancho Cordova Parkway, the residents of Cresleigh Ranch will enjoy, being just minutes from shopping, dining, and entertainment, and quick access to Highway 50 and Grant Line Road providing a direct route into Folsom. Residents here also benefit from no HOA fees, two community parks and the benefits of being a part of the highly-rated Elk Grove Unified School District. These chic residences (1-4) reflect Cresleigh Ranch’s exuberant spirit, varied architectural traditions, and incomparable landscape. Happy Exploring! https://cresleigh.com/brighton-station/residence-4/

Randolph Harris II International Institute

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BRIGHTON STATION AT CRESLEIGH RANCH

Rancho Cordova, CA |

Now Selling!

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