a thought dump

blown away by what's happening in portland and how long before i've found out about it. so easy to go completely social media-free for me which sadly is one of the very few ways, i.e. social media, that i hear about rumblings of social unrests and i am shocked, just shocked. i've written a lengthy rant about this on a different platform a couple of weeks ago, and by this i'm not talking about BLM specifically, but the consequences from events transpiring, consequences not in the social sense, but in the sense of how it's been affecting the way that humanity is treating each other and i am in complete disbelief at the lack of compassion, at the staggering height of brokenness that is manifesting in all of us that is resulting in our hurting of each other, and so easily at that. people hear differently, of course, from what the words you actually say, no matter how careful and accurate you may be in structuring responses and somehow my spiel was heard as me being anti the movement when i am not. i never commented on it beyond the fact that the event in question was related to it, namely, a mother shot to death after telling BLM supporters that "All lives matter". i am just as shocked by this act of violence as i am by what's happening in portland, specifically in the case of photojournalist trip jennings being shot in the eye by police while covering the current portland riots. there are more examples, i'm sure, of the consequences of violence there, but i am just in awe and not in a good way that he was doing his job and he was treated like a criminal. also, Bibles were burned?! and i think the essence of all this is, just, what is happening? how have we forgotten, as shown in the way we treat people face to face, that people are, in fact, PEOPLE. and in the case of Bibles being burned, that God is HOLY. how have we moved away from compassion? so far from our identity as the created have we come, and so so...broken. and like i get that the answer is, you know, original sin, consequences of the Fall et al., that evil is everywhere and from the theological/Christian perspective, hey, i get it. but it doesn't erase the reality of evil around us, and how it's shocking to see it played out in what is happening in these protests. i blame nothing but evil, evil in us, outside of us.

clipped from a response in that other platform that perhaps people have forgotten:

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the US Declaration of Independence says, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created *equal*, that they are *endowed by their Creator* with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness."

This equal access, as we see from the founders of the United States themselves, is based on their belief that the Creator, God, had endowed all men with certain unalienable rights—among these: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In other words, according to the US DoI, Americans ought to fight for equal access not only because they recognize that everyone has value, but because everyone has value BECAUSE GOD SAYS everyone has value. From the Judeo-Christian beliefs, we call this imago dei—“image of God”: God created us in His image and His likeness, and it is because of that that everyone has value. It’s why we are commanded by God to love our neighbours as ourselves, because God’s image is in US and in THEM; we value their lives and love our neighbours because God valued and loved them first.

When we remove the God component, we are left only with believing that everyone has rights and we ought to fight for these rights to the death because the US DoI says so—an admirable, but incomplete act. Because when you remove the God component, the "everyone has value” (i.e., deserving of equal treatment, respect, and LIFE PRESERVATION because God had endowed them these unalienable rights) also ceases to exist. And at that point, we are left fighting for these rights to the DEATH regardless of what we do to our neighbours, sometimes, even if it means killing them.

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i pray for peace in this world. i pray, as Paul did in Acts 26 that, "not only you but also all who hear me this day might become such as I am" - a lover and follower of Jesus. 

only through the gospel is the true potential of man reached--potential for compassion and love--and only through God are we complete as human beings. only through the gospel is true Shalom, peace, possible. only through God can we be saved from ourselves. 

without God, there is no loving of our neighbors. there is only loving ourselves. 

without God, we are nothing. 

and...i don't know how to end this, man. 

the harvest is overflowing. 

what's happened to the workers?