Pseudo-reality.

They say nothing takes the place of a face-to-face. I'm starting to see that's true. The thing is, for all the people you run across and network with, everything is meaningless if your lives never physically cross paths.

I'm starting to wonder at this pseudo-reality we've created for ourselves, that somehow online friends are better than the ones in front of us, or that we can say things to strangers we can't say to family.

It's a strange thing, that we would trade the beauteous splendor of an intimate moment with a friend for three hours in front of a monitor.

Nothing too profound here. I could make it interesting. I could talk about how we treat God the same way...shoving him aside for worthless idols -- just as we shove off a real relationship for a false one.

Not that there isn't any sort of commonality, camaraderie, or true friendship there. Certainly such attractions and affections are present, and real.

But sometimes I can't help but wonder if it's a bastardization of the real thing. I mean, is there a reason we're so uncomfortable with "online buddies"?

Sure, lots of good things happen. Most people are introverted, socially awkward people hiding behind a monitor -- and one day they'll learn they're lovable too. But more often than the predators, I think I've started seen another kind of trend: the trend to not speak.

This trend started with cell phones and email and TV and picked up with text messaging, video conferencing, and instant messaging -- all nouns that have become verbs. Figure that one out. (Hey, I'm still an English major; get over it.)

And so we went through the automated tellers and telemarketers and so on until, quite frankly, it's all become a farce. A freakishly obnoxious farce. And the stranger thing is, some people will like it; others will hate it; but no one will do anything to change it.

Interesting, hm?

So, if anyone actually reads this, chime in. What do you think? Of course, there's a good chance I just offended you.

When darkness falls....

Sometimes the writer in me gets lost in the story...far too well. This is the last act of book one, and my heart too long in darkness dwells.

Thus is my prayer:


I sit at the keyboard with the end in sight. So dark, so treacherous, so perfectly evil is the scheme. My hero quivers with wrath and fear; my favorite lies in the villain's grasp, down in the darkness where shadows dwell.

The enemy's strength swells beyond measure; our allies fall away. Treachery and knavery run amuck; who can stay evil's claw?

Her talons bright and sharp; her kisses smooth as honey and bitter as the root-- Ah, she is the vixen whose cunning wiles bring low most valiant of men.

And who may stay her hand?

Come now, winsome lies; come to me with pain; let me writhe in thy spined agony and wither on the vine. Come, come, thou most bitter of despair; be downcast and wriggle helplessly. Thy strength perish, thy beauty be stripped away, fallen down and trampled like crushed roses 'neath my foot.

Come down, little dove; make war with the serpent here; come, come, white-winged mourner of the dawn, come play with the scales that slither upon the ground, cursed forever to eat the dust...and dust become.

Oh, drown in sorrow, my loving one; come into eternal hate -- be consumed with violence; drink deep the cup of spite! Be consumed and drown, fall down, to the ground, and may your name be accursed, forever, til the lights go out.

And none can rescue thee.

Come, come down where Hades reigns; bow before Pluto's throne and make his cold thy home. Ride upon Charis' chariot and drink deep of the river Stix. Come, come down to eternal senselessness, and ne'er know pleasantry again.

Sell thy soul. Make thy bed. Claim the phoenix, and drown.

Masquerade is all anon; treasure deep died and gone; most vile one we spite, now your master be. For my vision tints red and my glory's in vain, so be counted in my lament.

Where is courage, where is strength; where is the Holy One? Where is the morning star and lightborn master of the sky? Where is the invisible who once was my delight? Has even he who is forever abandoned me to shades? Cruelest of cruel shall he be if to the shadows he dost leave, and thus consign me to nevernight, and Nomean's sport.

Telyon, O Elyon; where art thou, Kadosh? Lightmaster, King Most High, lion and lamb, boy and man -- have you let me be? Have at last my sins so great, too great for thee to purge?

Though thou slay me, master mine, yet I shall trust in thee.

Shaleh.

God Talk.

Someone asked why it's never recorded that Jesus laughed. Someone else replied that maybe Jesus only laughed in private with his Father. Now, I'm sure putting words in God's mouth is blasphemy, but.....

Scene 1

God: Hey, what's up?

God: Not much. You know these goobers down here don't get my jokes. I mean, the whole water to wine thing was hilarious.

God: Well, that's okay. Surely the got the whole "you're a sheep" thing.

God: Nope. Nada. I tried. Got nothing. And they really, really didn't like my "Before Abraham was, I am" line. Hey, I found it witty.

God: And it was! So, they haven't picked up on the whole "Yeshua means 'He saves'" thing yet, have they.

God: Dense as bricks. I got nothin'. *shakes head* Although Judas liked my bronze snake gig. No idea why. Guy's got a weird sense of humor.

God: Just watch out for the coin trick.

God: Right.

God: Oh! Tell me they liked the whole "let's lower the crippled dude through the roof" thing.

God: Nuh-uh.

God: Loaves and fish?

God: Tried. Twice.

God: Well, what about-

God: Nope.

God: Really? Shocking. Well, what about-

God: Nyet.

God: And-

God: Nein. See the trend?

God: So disappointing. Give a man wits and he makes brain stew.

God: Tell me about it. Party poopers.

God: Those are goats.


Scene 2

God: I just don't get it. Why didn't I record myself laughing?

God: I have no idea. I guess we should answer the question.

God: Right. So, why did we forget?

God: Well, I was kinda laughing at the time.

God: True, but Peter could've written it down.

God: Peter can barely spell his own name. But it was funny when he jumped out, then walked on water, then forgot he could swim.

God: Yeah, but I thought it was funnier when he didn't know what to say in the garden.

God: That wasn't funny! It wasn't even worth a response, and you know it!

God: Oh, come on. You laughed. I saw.

God: Did not!

God: Did too!

God: Fine, I laughed. But only when he wasn't looking. He has sensitive feelings.

God: Yeah, I know. He didn't get the "do you love me" thing either.

God: At least he tried.

God: I don't do brownie points.

More on the terror of grace.

Some didn't understand how I'm using the word "terrible." I'm not meaning it like it's this horrible, evil, vile thing. I'm using to to mean "something which strikes fear or terror."

So I don't mean that grace itself is this scary thing we dread. I'm using it the same way we use the term "the fear of the Lord".

Since God has replaced our spirit of fear for a spirit of power, love, and a sound mind (discipline), he cannot mean that we are still afraid to be in his presence. Rather, he commands us to come with confidence before the throne of grace (Hebrews 12).

And yet "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."

I do maintain there's something slightly nerve-wracking about being given something I know, beyond doubt, I don't deserve, and that, in fact, I live when I deserve death. This is why every time we sin it's such a big deal. It's the serial killer who is pardoned by his lord...and starts planning another kill.

Can you imagine the shame on the redeemed serial killer's face when his master finds those plans?

That fear of God, that terrible grace, is the part of you that shudders every time you sin, and even at the mere thought of sinning.

Per Terror's Grace, the reason my main character (Hunter) stops talking to his adopted father (whom he calls Pop) is because he's angry with him for sending him back into the circus (where his blood father is the ringmaster).

Before it's over, Hunter loses his temper, and, in a desperate attempt to save a small boy the same fate he fared, uses the same warped, perverted powers his blood father had used.

And then his phone rings, with Pop on the other end. And, the catcher is, Pop already knows.

Can you imagine the sheer terror of answering that phone after Pop has extended him so much grace?


You're right -- God's mercy is complete, and we have confidence that he is unyielding in his desire to save, and he will not abandon us.

But that doesn't stop me from being unable to pick up the phone when he comes to call me on my sin.

That's the reason Adam and Eve fled when God came looking for them.

The Terror of Grace.

In my Dialogues with God thread, I wrote that God is terrifying, and that his grace is also terrifying, but that is why we are to love him. Indeed, that is why we love him.

It's a topic I'm exploring through a story called Terror's Grace, and, while I won't go into all the details, as it's a bit complicated and beside the point of the thread, the purpose is to demonstrate this aspect of God.

"What?" you say. "I mean, I know God can be terrifying, but his grace is our comfort."

Well, yes. My point is that his terror is our comfort.

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge."

"It is a terrible thing to fall into the hands of God."

"It is better to fall into the hands of God than men."

Try this with me. In the past we've said that God is not tame, that he is neither mocked nor questioned, and that sometimes he refuses to answer the questions (indeed, so he has said).

Consider: We've said that God is not safe. That God is like the companion who could, upon whim, crush us to bits, and yet chooses not to.

In that is our comfort.

The disconcerting part is: Grace requires that the recipient be deserving of death.

To use a literary example, Aragorn can kill Frodo and his three friends and take the Ring for himself at any possible moment. We know far too well what he's capable of. He can take on the Nine, spot an ambush out of thin air, and put fear in the hearts of the dead. He has the power to frighten Sauron himself.

Indeed, he was right when he told Frodo, "You aren't nearly frightened enough."

Now consider this: There was a powerful man who rule an empire, but he was betrayed and cast out of his magnificent palace. Being mild-mannered and slow to anger, the man waited. In private he gathered his armies, under the nose of his enemy.

One day this king saw his enemy and his enemy's son...and the dog was beating his son severely. So the king took the son and made him his own, and rode away.

The son was angry with his first father, and despised him. Time passed, but something in the son's heart would not mend. Something lacked in the grace bestowed him.

So the king sent this son back to his father's encampment and made him a prisoner. The son was enraged, feeling abandoned and betrayed, despised.

The enemy troubled him day and night, punishing him for the king's kindness. Night after night the son begged for release, but none came. He had not spoken to the king since his departure...and so bitter was he that he refused.

Finally, when all seemed lost, and the son thought he would die in despair, he was taken in the night by a rebel, stolen in the darkness and made a slave to a foreign emperor.

All seemed utterly lost.

I won't tell you how it ends. I honestly can't say yet. But here's the thing: Ultimately, grace depends on forgiveness. And accepting it.

To truly receive grace, you'll have to extend it on the one person you despise the most, the one person who has done you the most harm and cost you the most.

To truly say "My comfort is God's sovereignty," I have to be like Frodo: I know that Aragorn can kill me. Unlike Frodo, I know that Aragorn should kill me, and if he decides to, people will rejoice over my bones.

Grace is harsh, because it demands something of us. Grace is not complete until it is extended on someone else. For, like God said in Genesis 12, "I will bless you, and you will be a blessing, and all the nations will be blessed because of you."

Compassion is dangerous. Jesus was compassionate, but no power on earth could stay his hand, and our God is a jealous God. Jesus is jealous for his own. Jealous.

The terror isn't in that Jesus could kill you. The disconcerting part is knowing that he should; and, because he does not, he expect you to not "kill" others.

Furthermore, Jesus will often force you to put your money where your mouth is. With a mere thought he can end everything. And he rightly should.

Yes, God is love.

And that is why none of us can stand to look him in the eye when we've sinned. Yes, God's holy, and we tend to squirm.

But think about this: I've said before that I don't do anything (for the most part) that leaves me in the position where I cannot look my father in the eye. I can't bear the shame of the disappointment in his eyes. I can't.

Grace is terrifying because we never deserved it to begin with, and, as a result, whenever we sin, we remember that this same Jesus who extended grace extends justice.

If Jesus was "always raising the bar," then we have to assume that the law of grace is far more unsettling than the law of Moses.

In other words, if I have three rules to abide by, and I break one of them, I know I can be disciplined and move on. It is possible to abide by three rules.

The trouble with the law of grace is, we have to abide by it, and we really don't know what the rules are.

The thing with grace is, we're required to do the same. God became a man and died for the people who killed him. And he wants you and I to imitate him, to become the refuse of the world and die for people who kill us.

And that itself is troubling. Furthermore, we have to do it every day. And we have to trust that this God who demands we die won't kill us, and that he'll keep the promises he's made even when it looks like he's gotten bored and thrown us back to the Predator like an unwanted chunk of rotten meat.

We live these lives wondering why we're so far from home and if God wasn't just playing a sick joke and if he isn't going to turn around and cast us off again, so that we're worse off than when we started: Humiliated, dead, and dying.

Now that would be pitiable.

My dialogue with God.

I feel your familiar pull again, that gentle twinge at my heart. I know it too well, and my first impulse is to recoil and flee from your sight. We’ve known each other a long time, you and I. And yet you still deign think that you can call me aside whenever you will.

“But, my dear,” you say with a smile and a paternal expression, “You are mine, and I’ll call you when I will.”

I was going to write; I don’t want to talk now. Cannot you wait until I’m ready?

“If I wait, you will never be ready, and you will die. Besides, you were hardly writing when I came looking for you.”

Looking for me? I didn’t know I was missing.

“Exactly the point, my dear. Now, if you please, come sit with me; come to the table I’ve prepared and listen to what I say.”

Say? Will you speak to me?

“Only if you come when I call.”

I want to run. The impulse is so strong, down to my marrow I wish to flee this being who holds me hostage upon summons. But he is right; if I do not come, I will starve to death. Though he slay me, yet I will trust in him. What else am I to do? Whom in heaven shall I have besides him; who is like him, to whom shall I compare my master?

Half-hearted and frustrated, I take my crinkled pages, thin and worn, and pen and ink and scroll. From there I kneel upon the floor, and bow my head, waiting his blessing. I do not wait long, for his hand is my crown.

I kneel upon the floor, the rough material scratching my knees. My mind is in a whirl, my body as restless as my soul. Still, the master calls me, and who am I to deny his will?

My mind amounts to naught, for the toils of the world roll off me, and my sins are known no more. My conscience is clear; save me from even unintentional sin; may I never blatantly defy you, O Lord Most High.

Hear the groaning of my soul, O Lord; can you not hear my cry? My mouth utters no speech, but my soul is rent in twain; O soul, O soul, know the Lord; make him thy portion and thy salvation. What shall assail a man? Shall he lament in vain? O God, my God, forget my sins, maker of the day. My spirit tremble within.

What shall I say then, when my flesh and spirit wreak havoc on mind and blood and my soul is downcast within? What then, O Lord my God; how does the soul of man prevail?

“There was a boy who became a dragon, and a dragon who became a man, and that man became the firstborn among the stars. There was a man who had two natures: one to save, the other to destroy, and the power of life and death was given him…But his strength was his weakness, and his weakness strength…and his mind was ruined, body defiled, and yet he was the favored of the Master of Lights…”

But, Father, what shall we say? What of the man who was lightborn and felled from the sky? Shall he too be a son of stars?

“There was a man who was the favorite among all the others; he knew the scrolls and knew all that the Holy One had to say. He was the chief practitioner, the renowned teacher, but the shadows entwined him, choking him until he became their slave, and he lost all that he had, even those he once wished to save…”

Yes, and what happens to this man? Can he return to the height from which he fell?

“That was only the beginning, for his pride swelled, and his rebellion deepened…”

What shall I say, mighty one? Is there such thing as grace; is it to be feared or craved, or somewhere in between?

“I’ve told you before, my child, I am the sovereign one; I have compassion on whom I please; the one I’ve loved, the other hated. Consider now, the terror of grace, and know what you long for, for when the place of desolation comes, then you will know the favor and terror of the Lord.”

I want to love you, O Most High. Make me love you.

“Why must I make you? Love me of your own accord.”

You terrify me.

“I am terrifying. Love me.”

You are my hiding place, my shelter. You are my strength and my shield, the lifter of my head. The eternal God is a dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms.

“I have made you. I have unmade you. I have remade you. And I am remaking you.”

But how can this be?

“Tell me, my child of many questions, shall I answer everything, and lessen your trust in me? Or shall you revel in my glory, and behold my lavish mercies?”

One more, and I shall relent: What do you wish of me?

“Have I not shown you, little one, what is good, and what I require of you? Do justly and love mercy, and walk humbly with me. For I am with the lowly, the heart that laments his sin, the one who is desolate and knows I am his terrifying grace. But be excellent in what is good, and innocent of evil. Be as I am. Come near to me, child; for only then will you be able to do such.”

I am afraid.

“Take courage, and be of good cheer: for I cast aside none who come in my name, and this is the year of my favor. Do not despair, for I am your strength; I offer you power, love, and a sound mind. Is this not sufficient for you?”

My mind is unsound, my body undisciplined, my soul desperately wicked.

“Come close to me, child. Let me hold you. Is not my right hand over you?”

And yet I am afraid.

“Child, my child: It is better to fall into my hands than of men, though my hands are terrifying. Come with confidence, my love. Tremble no more.”

Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart.

“I am. And I will be. But you must trust me. Shall I save a man from drowning only to tie him to the boat and watch him die of exposure? Surely not! Is my arm to short to save, little one?”

Be thou my dignity, thou my delight.

“Child, your glory and your crown is before you. Can you imagine this, that I have blessed you so that you may become a blessing? Draw near to me.”

Whatever befall, still be my vision, O ruler of all.

“Let me show you something, little one. There is this path they call the shifting path, and it winds throughout the whole of the earth. On it alone shall you find the way to my city. It twists and turns and the landscape alters. You cannot leave it for even a moment, for if you linger too long, it may move, and you will never find it again on your own. For, child, don’t you see: It is not the path that moves, but everything surrounding it. And so the earth itself deceives you, here in this prelude to glory.”

Oh, so if I stay on the path, I will find the road to glory, and there the key to save the world?

“Child, it isn’t your duty to save the world. That belongs to another. But to live, you must follow the path, for everything off the shifting path is lost forever.”

Then keep me to the path.

“Only if you follow me.”

The truth is that you are with me always, and that you will never let me go. You have been so good to me, words cannot express the depth of my debt to you. For you comfort me whene’er I’m troubled; you lift my head in my despair. You chastise and rebuke. I have crawled into your lap and wept more than once. And, most often, you laugh at me. You’ve given me a light heart and made me merry despite grief. This makes my joy all the more; I am drunk on such good pleasures.

Spirit of the Most High, stay upon me; counsel me and prompt me at will. For one day I will no longer resist you; one day my joy will be complete. One day the end of the story will come, and thus conclude my dialogue with God.