The Kingdom Attitude (1)

Where is our true starting point? Which ‘beginning’ will be the groove that actually gets the mouse to the cheese? If we are all battleships steaming full bore towards destruction, don’t we have to put the gears (engines of motivation) in neutral before we can turn around? Hey, because we are wrongly ‘powered’, don’t we have to shut them down and actually replace them with power from heaven? Wrong motivations (power of agreement with spiritual forces not of God) are only possible if we have been convinced, through the experience of sin, that they ‘work’, but only the experience of lining our wills up with sin gives us the motivation to ‘justify’ where we already are through the practice of confirmation bias: of convincing ourselves that the direction the engines (spiritual agreement) of sin we are running on are already going where we want to go. The problem with that, however, is that, because the ship’s compass has also been infected with an unholy spiritual parasite (in lieu of the Holy Spirit, which should have been in that place) that re-orientates us – lines our wills up – with sin; where we think we want to ‘go’ (be devoted to) is where we already find ourselves. No room for faith in this past!

I think sin is the art of chasing our tails so that we can consume them: of robbing Peter to pay Paul: of convincing the right hand that it doesn’t ‘know’ what the left one is up to: of convincing ourselves that death is what we really ‘wanted’ anyway. The wilderness, which I think is a glimpse, by grace, of the reality of chaos we are all floating on already, gives us the truth – beyond the slime of our confirmation bias – that we are already experiencing death – that dessication of thirst – just over the edge of annihilation: frozen statues in the has-been of choices past in need of freedom to choose again; in need of being justified by heaven instead of the self- justification of agreement (confirmation bias) with the past: in need of our lodestones – our sense of orientation – to be re-magnetized to the Sun of Righteousness instead of to ourselves.

The wilderness, which I think is simply the true conception of reality, gives us an experience, gratis grace, from beyond ourselves – from beyond what we ‘think’ we ‘chose’ (but really didn’t, as sin is no real choice, but simply the negation of true choice) – so as to give us a basis to reorient ourselves to a different ‘home’ and re-power ourselves through a different spiritual alignment with a different source of power (motivation) to real choices, which are only possible if they are lining up, through love, with reality. I think all other ‘choices’ (or what we believe, wrongly, are choices) are actually illusions; chimeras that convince us to drop the cheese of choice we were gifted with in lieu of handing our power of motivation – our power of true choice – over to an alien: to another lover (which is spiritual alignment, or, “adultery” with another god, or, power): another source: another (un)holy spirit (which then co-opts our power of choice and ‘chooses’ for us – forces us – through slavery to that sin) with which we then proceed to participate in our own destruction, slowly wearing out the gift of grace and the mercy of God.

I think the wilderness is designed to show us ourselves, in the true mirror of reality, spinning slow circles in the Sargasso Sea. We thought we were running on powerful engines of self-motivation, but our real design was a sailboat, powered by the breath of God. We thought we had to justify where we already found ourselves, but this present world is not our home: heaven is holding our true New Jerusalem until we qualify, by choosing to be re-powered by the Wind of heaven, to live there by choosing not to die here: to be justified by heaven through choosing our true image – which is life – again. Until the wilderness, we didn’t know (conviction) that we were already dead: frozen statues propped up by grace: dead nouns (image of sin) of the past where the only ‘choices’ that ‘work’ are the illusions of insanity instead of living verbs (image of God) of the fluid present where choices actually work/function in concert with the way things really are.

In reality, not being alive and not being able to give and receive love freely, hurts. The wilderness – which is the experience of how things really are beyond our slime of illusion – returns us to that experience of hurt, thus giving us a real chance to want (which is what motivates, or activates, choice) what really works again. May we know the difference this time!

Our earth is very watery!
Scientists say if you were to pour all the world’s
water over the United States, it would be 107 miles
deep.
And ironically, not one single drop would satisfy
a thirsty soul.
“If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you
for a drink, you would have asked him and he would
have given you living water.”
Stay thirsty friends!

I like the point you made in regards to Yeshua being “ driven “ into the wilderness. We tend to avoid wilderness experiences at all costs, considering them “bad“. We avoid the knowledge of our actual condition, seeking quick fixes or being distracted, so as not to have to address the deeper condition of our souls. We certainly don’t want to depend upon our “daily“ bread, leaving us with a sense of continued dependence. After a while, driving a $100,000 car loses its ability to satisfy and we are faced with our internal desiccation. Spending time in the wilderness is the time of reassessing are objectives and direction. We are faced with our own emptiness. Sin, basically, is our independence from God. Seeking to be gods to ourselves! Good luck with that!

For what it’s worth, sometimes having all you need can also bring you to your knees in hunger. You realize you have both needs and wants, but still an emptiness in the being. If we only seek to fill a physical hunger, we can be consumed in that. But if that hunger is filled and you are still hungry, you can realize it is a deeper, spiritual hunger….when you are hungry, you seek to get full.