Why love is still better than hate: thoughts from study this week.

Three areas God is talking about now according to NT Wright: How we know anything, who we are or the problem of determining identity, and are their any better or worse narratives-ie what is your narrative in life (what is your matanarrative?); how do you interpret Reality and Life. These three areas all shifted as we trailed in post-modern culture. And these three areas are where our answers matter most. Willard, would say identity, purpose and narrative also are the three big issues today. How we know, who we are, and what’s the best story of life? These three areas still matter.

The postmodern assumption that all metanarratives are suspect, has left it hard to interpret one story as more true than another. A crisis in knowing is the result. Or seeing everything in terms of power dynamics, and personal choice.

Then, there is the deeper ethical problem we all face. We can’t really live out of ethical pluralism where every story has the same weight. If so, we can kill jews or take ten wives or kill when we feel like it etc. Ironically, the refugee issue in europe has brought up a call for justice and fairness—but based on what standard or metastory. If all narratives are truly equal we face a crisis of interpretation in short. I like that point, NT Wright and even Tim Keller make in the area of ethics. You can’t really live out life if all ethical systems are equal! Nice reminder today in study!
The human heart still thinks its better to love than hate. Why is that, and based on what? It still matters which story you choose to live by!

I once asked a Rabbi also, what empowers your ethics? For Christians, though one doesn’t always see this in practice, but it can be found among spiritually mature folks, it would be the Holy Spirit forming himself in our heart and causes us to live more from and in the fruits of the Spirit—patience, love gentleness etc…

Dallas Willard points out that we need some sort of Power to live out our ethics. It’s not enough to just want to do good, to help the refugees and those suffering, we need real empowerment to do that, and live well. And some ways of living are better than others. It is better to love your neighbor than to rape them. Most people would agree with that statement. But if I believe all ethical systems are equal it’s hard to say love is better than hate!

I think that pluralism is actually a great opportunity to find the great stories again, and to pick out ones which feel actually true. It forces us to discern the spirit of things, to pick and choose wisely what is truer. In this sense, it’s good to be moving into supermarket of spiritualities phase in history. Then you have to really shop to know which ones hold water to what is Real. You compare and contrast and see what actually works in real life.

I personally would still choose love over hate, but to do so, I assume that one version of life is better than another! Nice remembering this, while reading Wright, Willard and others on ethics this week! These questions still seem important to me in terms of practical living, and motivating your ethics. The way of love still seems better to me than hate. And our stories which have begun still seem to desire an ending…

Lastly there is the area of beauty, or aesthetics. If all art is equal, then pornography and picasso are on the same level or plane aesthetically. I have not found that to be true. Just to fruits alone would prove that. Pornography leads to poor relationships, narcissism and a corrupted view of other. Looking at art, leaves you with other sorts of fruits.

Some art actually is better than other art, whether i like it or not. Relativism in the area of beauty seems impossible to live by for me at least. Any given sunset, is more beautiful than watching a bomb kill thousands on the news. At least, that is my view and experience. It’s hard to live in the art world, if all things really are equal. Watching someone kill themselves is uglier than watching someone dance and perform well. At least that’s how I see it. Buber also argued often from aesthetics, and its hard to live if there is no standard at all of what is beautiful.

Why love is still better than hate: thoughts from study.

Three areas God is talking about now according to NT Wright: How we know anything, who we are or the problem of determining identity, and are their any better or worse narratives-ie what is your narrative in life (what is your matanarrative?); how do you interpret Reality and Life. These three areas all shifted as we trailed in post-modern culture. And these three areas are where our answers matter most. Willard, would say identity, purpose and narrative also are the three big issues today.

The postmodern assumption that all metanarratives are suspect, has left it hard to interpret one story as more true than another. A crisis in knowing is the result. Or seeing everything in terms of power dynamics.

Then, there is the deeper ethical problem we all face. We can’t really live out of ethical pluralism where every story has the same weight. If so, we can kill jews or take ten wives or kill when we feel like it etc. Ironically, the refugee issue in europe has brought up a call for justice and fairness—but based on what standard or metastory. If all narratives are truly equal we face a crisis of interpretation in short. I like that point, NT Wright and even Tim Keller make in the area of ethics. You can’t really live out life if all ethical systems are equal! Nice reminder today in study!

The human heart still thinks its better to love than hate. Why is that, and based on what? It still matters which story you choose to live by!

I once asked a Rabbi also, what empowers your ethics? For Christians it would be the Holy Spirit forming himself in our heart and causes us to live more from and in the fruits of the Spirit—patience, love gentleness etc…Dallas Willard points out that we need some sort of Power to live out our ethics. It’s not enough to just want to do good, we need real empowerment to live well. And some ways of living are better than others. It is better to love your neighbor than to rape them. Most people would agree with that statement. But if I believe all ethical systems are equal it’s hard to say love is better than hate!

We are all so social! We become with. How remarkable. Life is relational. We become ourselves with. Jesus was not only in the lonely garden, He also developed in family and among friends. So are we. God is social.

Each person an entire poem in waiting. And each day you see us shine in Him. You see us being ourselves occasionally poking out just to shine. We each actually are meant to shine so very brightly in our uniqueness. I hope that for everyone. It really is nice just shining in our being, and those particular clothes He dressed us in before time.

I think exaggerating True life, is the right way to go, until we are living it more fully!

Circus boat!
By the old river, near where I am staying in Prague, is a performance art boat started by the sons of a local theater hero. I love the metaphor of a traveling, on water, circus boat! Have boat, will go with the Flow of the River!

Also, i’ve secretly always wanted to live on water, and in the circus. I’ve done some circus (worked as a clown during university), and had many friends who lived in the actual global circuses of the world, but never tried it on the water! (Once, gave a pass to a book store i was running to some Croatian circus family, they only bought cook books about fish. But that’s another story!) Love to combine the two metaphors, seems like they already are in my heart.

Water, and rivers (the realm of the prophets and Wisdom) specifically, speak of messages, connectivity and memory; circus, of child like wonder and possibilities (unless we come as kids, we cannot enter The Kingdom..). The two together carry the right message, i think.

Nice to have a friend point out this floating performance space to me last night. Sort of a medieval circus on water! I think I’ll enjoy it! Photo to follow as I experience the show…nice discovering new metaphors this week, or combinations of older ones, which lead and lean forwards…into new Hopes!

People often say I exaggerate life. I’m not sure that’s possible really. It’s much bigger or grander than we imagine, and there are so many unseen realms intersecting at any given moment! Just ask Daniel, the prophet.

The setting alone is an endlessly enormous room which we have barely learned to live in! Each of us are novels God’s been wanting to write forever! Our names and stories (paths prepared beforehand-ephesian 2:10) are written in Him somehow. So, both identity and calling are held secure in Love. Yet, we are novices at being written well!

It’s hard to exaggerate what really is. Hyperbole may be, at least in the right direction of the truth. “Sometimes one must yell, to pronounce Silence.”
Or, as the writer Flannery O’connor put it: “Sometimes I have to caricature my characters, so the reader can hear redemption.”

People often say I exaggerate life. I’m not sure that’s possible really. It’s much bigger than we imagine, and there are so many unseen realms intersecting at any given moment! And the setting alone is an endlessly enormous room which we have barely learned to live in! Each of us are novels God’s been wanting to write forever!

Hello again Europe,
Just checking the pulse of your heart! Glad to be back! I should address you more properly, but today i feel casual, thankful, awake and happy to see you again friend. Let’s just be ourselves with one another. I enjoy you. And I think we all need one another now.
We are all precarious right now, so let’s be kind to one another for another train ride or so….let’s share ferris wheels and zoos and things which remind us of life. I always love it, when we are alive together, just listening, beholding in thanks.
I always feel welcomed here. People whistle in Belgium-a good sign. I always notice that, and their curiosity about other. Talked to about ten people on the train up, and in several different languages. I like speaking other languages when jet lagged-makes it more poetic, and you don’t care as much about mistakes! The lady on the train held suitcases from sliding for a Spanish family, and the fellow across from me told me all his favorite spots and festivals, and invited me for dinner this week.
Kindness cannot be overrated in these days. Gentle curiosity in language and action. Tenderness, what a great state of being, even, is in short supply these days!
Once, my wife Amy fell off her bike here, literally nine people came to help, including an old man with a cane! Kindness combined with a curiosity about other are helpful attributes these days!
First things i always notice in belgium: people whistle, they don’t make straight lines, and they are genuinely curious about other. Makes sense Pieter Bos (the late nations theologian from Holland) called belgium, “creative friend”. Feels true to me at least. And we all could use a creative friend at the end of the world!
Nice to be back, and see some old arts friends today as well. We picked up just where we left off in our stories (which are still odd tales)…as life should be. Also to enter with a monkey-clad ferris wheel celebrating one of the oldest and definitely best zoos in Europe felt specifically welcoming to me—combining creatures and child like wonder are two of my favorite things. At the center of the ferris wheel were images of kids playing with animals, my kind of symbol! Plus, this zoo is art, seriously! As is the train station of course.
Sorry to take photos of the normal, and myself (I was my only model to work with today-that will change tomorrow! One good thing about being your own model, is you work for free!) but I always see it best upon arrival. See people, places and things for the wonder they are, that is.
Sort of like seeing an old friend, you haven’t seen in a while. You see them almost as if for the first time again. Just this side of in between-as I often am in life! Like I said, i like the in betweens, i see the symbols clearest there! Tried to do only selfies today, tomorrow only doors. It’s good to make limits! Glad to be back with europe, an old friend!
“You are a gem in Him, so shine!”, I heard today as I came in. I often hear little words or word poems, as i come into regions or cities, or see old friends. So, I concur, as I am back in the diamond city again. Nice to see you again creative friend. Let’s play like the monkeys, otters and squirrels, like little kids in an enormous room! “Until we are what we really are.”
That was my little entrance prayer today anyway! Love you Europe despite ourselves. And in clear view also of what we are, and are becoming. I like how our stories intertwine at the heart. Just checking in on yours today, as I land into it!
(Written on napkins and receipts in travel. Thought I’d share it. Thanks for your patience and kindness. Let’s welcome one another as if we were forever.)

Hello again Europe,

Just checking the pulse of your heart! Glad to be back! I should address you more properly, but today i feel casual, thankful, awake and happy to see you again friend. Let’s just be ourselves with one another. I enjoy you. And I think we all need one another now.

We are all precarious right now, so let’s be kind to one another for another train ride or so….let’s share ferris wheels and zoos and things which remind us of life. I always love it, when we are alive together, just listening, beholding in thanks.

I always feel welcomed here. People whistle in Belgium-a good sign. I always notice that, and their curiosity about other. Talked to about ten people on the train up, and in several different languages. I like speaking other languages when jet lagged-makes it more poetic, and you don’t care as much about mistakes! The lady on the train held suitcases from sliding for a Spanish family, and the fellow across from me told me all his favorite spots and festivals, and invited me for dinner this week.

Kindness cannot be overrated in these days. Gentle curiosity in language and action. Tenderness, what a great state of being, even, is in short supply these days!

Once, my wife Amy fell off her bike here, literally nine people came to help, including an old man with a cane! Kindness combined with a curiosity about other are helpful attributes these days!

First things i always notice in belgium: people whistle, they don’t make straight lines, and they are genuinely curious about other. Makes sense Pieter Bos (the late nations theologian from Holland) called belgium, “creative friend”. Feels true to me at least. And we all could use a creative friend at the end of the world!

Nice to be back, and see some old arts friends today as well. We picked up just where we left off in our stories (which are still odd tales)…as life should be. Also to enter with a monkey-clad ferris wheel celebrating one of the oldest and definitely best zoos in Europe felt specifically welcoming to me—combining creatures and child like wonder are two of my favorite things. At the center of the ferris wheel were images of kids playing with animals, my kind of symbol! Plus, this zoo is art, seriously! As is the train station of course.

Sorry to take photos of the normal, and myself (I was my only model to work with today-that will change tomorrow! One good thing about being your own model, is you work for free!) but I always see it best upon arrival. See people, places and things for the wonder they are, that is.

Sort of like seeing an old friend, you haven’t seen in a while. You see them almost as if for the first time again. Just this side of in between-as I often am in life! Like I said, i like the in betweens, i see the symbols clearest there! Tried to do only selfies today, tomorrow only doors. It’s good to make limits! Glad to be back with europe, an old friend!

“You are a gem in Him, so shine!”, I heard today as I came in. I often hear little words or word poems, as i come into regions or cities, or see old friends. So, I concur, as I am back in the diamond city again. Nice to see you again creative friend. Let’s play like the monkeys, otters and squirrels, like little kids in an enormous room! “Until we are what we really are.”

That was my little entrance prayer today anyway! Written on napkins and receipts in travel. Thought I’d share it. Thanks for your patience and kindness. Let’s welcome one another as if we were forever.