For most of my life I have carried the spirit of sadness. When I was younger I constantly prayed for strength. In trying times I prayed for discernment. And what shall I pray for now? I pray that not only my eyes be illuminated, yet that my whole spirit is illuminated.
Ever since I was born and even in the womb I was a sleeper. My mother always told me this. Lord cause me to arise and take away my spirit of doubt. For what should I be doubtful of anymore? I weathered so many storms even when the spirit of chaos engulfed me.
All my life I weathered harsh storms. Our Lord Jesus Christ caused me to stride upon the water and to look down upon the depths. Even when my ship crashed into the waves. I only became more stubborn in my faith! I even feared I would be swallowed up in the abyss, but you kept me afloat. So when I called upon him for strength he did answer.
You saw me Lord how I was heartbroken so many times. In my heart I was even made to perish. What brought me to perseverance? I saw others fall away like the grains onto the worn path and hard ground. I've heard the cries in the night and seen faces full of anguish. I've heard the silence of the plains and I looked at the devil in his eyes.
Many saw me as weak, yet many found controversy with me even when I was always chosen last for everything. Truly what is this life? Whenever I glimpsed the ways of the Lord they always made sense. When I prayed to you with pure faith in my heart you did answer and it was good because it was your way.
@Sosleepy8999@BrainbowManic@kameronwaters I have been thinking about your response. Like I said my knowledge is really scattered these days. It would be worth it for me to read the book of Isaiah in it's entirety. I just hope I don't steer people the wrong way with what I said.
how can you not believe in God when octopuses DREAM and otters have a favorite rock they carry around in a little SKIN POCKET and cows have BEST FRIENDS and bees are out there communicating the coordinates of flowers through INTERPRETIVE DANCE and they have REGIONAL DIALECTS??
cats are PURRING at frequencies associated with bone healing??? forests get absolutely incinerated and respond by growing FLOWERS??? dolphins literally invent NAMES for themselves and yell them across the ocean??? penguins are waddling around Antarctica looking for the PERFECT LITTLE ROCK to give their beloved???
CROWS REMEMBER YOUR FACE. THEY TELL OTHER CROWS ABOUT YOU. THEY TELL THEIR CHILDREN ABOUT YOU. YOU CAN HAVE GENERATIONAL BEEF WITH A BIRD.
goats have ACCENTS. rats GIGGLE when you tickle them. elephants mourn their dead. whales make SONGS and then OTHER WHALES LEARN THE SONG and suddenly everybody across the ocean is singing the new hit single.
monarch butterflies are born knowing how to fly thousands of miles to a place THEY HAVE NEVER BEEN. sea turtles hatch out of an egg, immediately sprint toward an OCEAN they have never seen, disappear into it for like THIRTY YEARS and then somehow come back to THE SAME BEACH???
birds can see COLORS THAT WE CANNOT SEE. there are colors happening RIGHT NOW that we don’t even get to know about.
there are sea slugs that eat algae and STEAL ITS CHLOROPLASTS and then are just like great thanks I’ll be PHOTOSYNTHESIZING NOW. there are mushrooms communicating underground. there are seeds sitting in the dirt for DECADES like no actually I will wait.
squirrels plant MILLIONS OF TREES because they simply cannot remember where they put their snacks.
A CATERPILLAR GOES INTO A LITTLE BAG, DISSOLVES MOST OF ITS BODY INTO ORGANIC SOUP, REARRANGES ITSELF, GROWS WINGS AND LEAVES.
and you’re telling me a tiny acorn knows how to become a 70-foot oak tree??? nobody tells it what to do??? it just has TREE INSTRUCTIONS INSIDE IT???
your body started as ONE CELL. ONE. and that cell divided itself into a brain that can think about its own existence and eyes that can look at stars and hands that can hold somebody else’s hands and a heart that runs on ELECTRICITY without you even asking it to???
the iron in your BLOOD was made inside a STAR.
I’M SORRY?????
we are walking around on a wet rock covered in bioluminescent oceans and singing whales and laughing rats and birds holding lifelong grudges and flowers exploding out of FIRE and somehow we’re supposed to act like this is a normal place to live?????????
There were a few instances where they listened to their prophets and for it they were spared. But as many point out and a vast majority of the old testament describes they refuse their prophets. Then they get steamrolled or destroyed in some awful fashion. And yet when we read these stories we can't help but feel like we would act in a similar way. These stories often outline our own behavior.
Civilization Unbound
God willing it is so hard to do the right thing. To be righteous that is the hardest thing you will do in your life.
I called a friend and we discussed the right way to raise a child. That is to pull them out of this world. And keep them from what is unrighteous which we have seen. We discussed the old ways and how those people were more right than we are now.
Why? Because they were more eloquent and they were more down to earth. How passionate those revolutionaries must have been. Do you know what they fought for? A better life. Did they even fight the king? They also fought the natives.
So our fight is somewhere in between those two. We fight between raw savagery and the overwhelming tyrant. And we fight against the plotters of our world and we fight against a grave future that is headstrong. I have seen the tyrant and I have seen the savage. I like neither of them and this is our American spirit. My friend is my brother and not by blood, but in the spirit! I do see this in my neighbor and I do see this in my cousins.
Forget the government because they are our arbiters. But the American spirit is truly of the people. No greater bond hath these amongst men, but brothers and sisters of the spirit.
I have seen women come together and provide for the ravaged and the widower. Mother nature crushed our brothers in the street, but mothers came together and provided for them. What grace is this? No civilization provides grace such as this. Only in America have I seen grace rise amongst the women no less. We act as if there is no grace left, but I have Never seen the women of a country be so generous as the women of America.
I have never seen such good mothers and I have seen the mothers who abandoned their children. Once they were born it was to the dirt and the farmer's care their children were given. Men keep a watchful eye on your wives because they are like the flower of our inheritance. Young men I have seen avert their gaze lest they fall into sin. What kind of civilization does these things by heart?
Things like that come from interpretations I just cannot comprehend. You've ventured far from what the Bible stated. Women don't need to shave their heads. When do we embrace simply what God has made good? I believe in that. We never trick God. To think we have fooled God is to belittle him. And I think that's what Jesus wanted people to understand.
I think the prophet was saying it's wrong in general. But I could be incorrect. That is my view on the matter anyways. Christians don't sacrifice animals or make offerings because Jesus fulfilled that requirement. Back then it was an acceptable practice before God, but that changed at some point. I'm no scholar that's just my view. Isaiah did go up to heaven and did speak with God so maybe he saw the practices of his people needed revision.
@BrainbowManic@kameronwaters Well I don't agree with the practice anyways because I am a Christian. Waving a chicken around and slaughtering it will not save your soul. I can't bring myself to believe Jesus would approve of this behavior.
-My tears have overcome me. I am drawn out. All my worries, all my sorrows have been made hewn. I have become fraught in my depths. Apologies do not know my sadness. Beauty brings me to tears, majesty has made me weep, honour has brought me low, congratulation made me ill.
I want to play, but my wings have sheared away from my zenith, knocked from the sky. Even my joy repents. My comfort has gone away. My breath has all flowed out and the crown of my head has been taken off. For my anguish has gone on for so long.
My Mother, my Father, my Brothers do not forget about me, for my spirit has chilled before winter. The clouds of frost have already arrived. My waters are restless. The fire of my life is extinguished.
The tormentors pace anciously outside my door. Sadness has become a dangerous emotion in these times. So may I have triumph? May I have redemption? Will peace ever find me? Has truth yet vanished from my lips?
I am no good. I am feral and I am like a beast. The breadth of me has been made flat. All of it is gone. I am empty. My heart is hollow.
My weeping is like the walls of a basement and a flood has come to inundate me. My mortar has been washed out and I am made to collapse. Where my time is short. You can find me in the rubble. I am like the shores of that great place, my foundations scattered and the tides washing over me.
Morning sun:
When I look at the morning sky and see it's beauty. I know that what God has made is beautiful and makes perfect sense. And then I know what men make is not beautiful and makes no sense at all. What we do harms our souls and our constructs cause us suffering.
In my renewal of memories I have lost the fidelity of the images which once represented me. The conquests which once defined me. They have become pixelated as I sought to shrink them even further. My eyes had passed through the stars and I have lost those pictures. These landscapes were vast and they were of many worlds and yet I have lost them. All we can do is move on. In many lifetimes and many vistas. All we can do is renew the mind and move forward.
Hear this: I am militant for the opposite reasons they are militant. I am seeking understanding and I am seeking truth in a militant fashion. There will be a point this shall divide people.
Discernment is my weapon and it is not double edged, but double pronged. I will chop and hack away at their lies till they expose themselves to themselves and then they shall see.
Their lack of understanding has caused derision amongst the hearts of men! And in derision comes folly. I see it and I hear it amongst others. I've seen it on the face of a tyrant.
The over eager exploitation of men causes contrition amongst them. There is truly something stronger than this. I have seen death because we have ground down the spirit. I have glimpsed strength beyond this.
The Sickness
We are at a point in society where we aren't even human anymore. If you need help you are weak, outcast and wholly misunderstood. We are made to go through many psychology and sociology courses in school, but we understand nothing about ourselves. The one who is contemplative is made out to be insane. Education is a fight and knowledge must be hidden. We are scared and full of hatred. The neighbor is the lesser man, a conniving fool, and I must fend for myself if I am to survive.
Congratulations bring about feelings of inadequacy. Everything is a test, everything must be timed, measured and compared amongst the group and this determines a person's value. If you are low on that hierarchy you're worthless and should be ground to dust.
Do you have an important word to say? Shut up you! The idiot is speaking. "The enemy is at the gates!" Don't talk about it you might hurt someone's feelings. Everyone and everything is a joke. Nothing is serious. Where is their conscious?
Living?
Lord have I eyes to see and ears to hear? Or am I truly deaf and blind? Is my heart on fire? Have I become too involved in the world? Do I tell the truth or have lies overcome me? Am I living Lord? Or am I destroyed?
@GaryLGray Damn bro it's the global warming. I guess I'll just have to freeze to death and starve this winter because the only way to right this injustice is by not using oil or petroleum products.