My most significant Unseen Realm insight came not from what's in scripture, but from what's not in scripture. :)
Heiser wrote, "Biblical theology should be derived from exegesis of the biblical text within the framework of the original context of those texts... any articulation needs to be defensible with respect to what the biblical text can sustain. If the text can’t sustain it, it shouldn’t be said. Once we know what the text can sustain, the truth assertions it asks us to believe carry authority."
The Unseem realm showed me how to focus on what the text can sustain, not on tradition or extra-biblical assumptions. When I modelled this, I found that some of my prooftexts didn't sustain what I thought they did. That led to a more careful reading of the word, greater humility, and an increase in empathy toward those I disagree with, especially on secondary issues.
@cessadelove1 It gets better. In the original language, Noah didn't build a boat. He built a "tēvāh" - meaning a box, ark or container. This was also a loan word from Egypt where it meant container/coffin (hah!). So ya, it doesn't have any traditional "boat" features. It's just a big box! :)
Imagine a woman fleeing an attacker—and her car won’t start because it thinks she’s impaired.
Imagine a farmer injured on the job—his truck won’t start because it thinks he’s drunk.
These are the unintended consequences of the Kill Switch mandate.
Kill the Kill Switch.
This paragraph by C.S. Lewis, written in 1948, still hits hard:
“If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things—praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts—not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.”
@TheCinesthetic RDJ as Doctor Doom is wild and I hate it. Iron Man’s arc meant something—his face, his voice, his sacrifice. Recasting the same actor as Marvel’s next big villain feels like it cashes out the emotion for a meta wink. Let Tony - AND RDJ - stay finished.
@netflix So sorcerers as innate casters weren't a thing in the 80s were they? Also, Will, as he is given his power by Vecna would qualify more as a warlock in modern game terms, would he not?
In 1936, J. R. R. Tolkien published a Christmas poem titled “Noel” in the annual magazine of Our Lady's Abingdon, in Oxfordshire. The poem was lost to history for nearly 80 years until scholars Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull rediscovered it in the archives. It reads:
Grim was the world and grey last night:
The moon and stars were fled,
The hall was dark without song or light,
The fires were fallen dead.
The wind in the trees was like to the sea,
And over the mountains' teeth
It whistled bitter-cold and free,
As a sword leapt from its sheath.
The lord of snows upreared his head;
His mantle long and pale
Upon the bitter blast was spread
And hung o'er hill and dale.
The world was blind, the boughs were bent,
All ways and paths were wild:
Then the veil of cloud apart was rent,
And here was born a Child.
The ancient dome of heaven sheer
Was pricked with distant light;
A star came shining white and clear
Alone above the night.
In the dale of dark in that hour of birth
One voice on a sudden sang:
Then all the bells in Heaven and Earth
Together at midnight rang.
Mary sang in this world below:
They heard her song arise
O'er mist and over mountain snow
To the walls of Paradise,
And the tongue of many bells was stirred
in Heaven's towers to ring
When the voice of mortal maid was heard,
That was mother of Heaven's King.
Glad is the world and fair this night
With stars about its head,
And the hall is filled with laughter and light,
And fires are burning red.
The bells of Paradise now ring
With bells of Christendom,
And Gloria, Gloria we will sing
That God on earth is come.
@AslansHowe In the CI vs ECT debate, Isa 34:10 and Rev 14:11 aren’t rivals but a trajectory. Let Isa’s original context define “smoke forever” as irreversible judgment; then ask how Rev reuses or intensifies that image. Exegesis of OT → informs NT. RE: theology, must consider whole canon.
A good reminder for us in today's climate: "You shall not seek vengeance, and you shall not harbor a grudge against your fellow citizens; and you shall love your neighbor like yourself; I am Yahweh." - Leviticus 19:18
My wife started competing with me.
Not for attention.
Not for control.
For victimhood.
It started after a hard season.
I'd come home drained from work.
She'd been drained from the kids all day.
Both of us desperate to be seen.
I'd say: "Today was brutal. My boss—"
She'd cut in: "You think that's hard? Try being stuck here with a screaming toddler for nine hours."
I didn't realize we'd started keeping score.
Every hard day became a competition.
Every struggle became a bid for sympathy.
Every conversation became: "Yeah, but mine was worse."
Her exhaustion vs. my exhaustion.
Her sacrifice vs. my sacrifice.
We stopped comforting each other.
We started one-upping each other.
One night she was crying in the kitchen.
I walked in, saw her tears, and my first thought was:
"I had a harder day than her."
I didn't hold her.
I calculated whether her pain outranked mine.
That's when I realized:
We weren't fighting each other.
We were fighting for the same thing — to be the bigger victim.
And in the Victim Olympics, there's no gold medal.
Just two people keeping score while the marriage bleeds out.
I put down the scorecard that night.
I sat next to her and said:
"I'm sorry. I've been competing with you instead of carrying you."
She looked at me like I'd spoken a foreign language.
Then she cried harder — but different this time.
We didn't fix it overnight.
We'd built the habit for years.
But we made a rule:
When one of us is struggling, the other one listens. No comparisons. No "me too." Just presence.
Hardest thing I've ever done — letting her win without keeping score.
Your wife doesn't need you to understand how hard her day was.
She needs you to stop measuring it against yours.
And brother...
If every conversation feels like a competition?
Maybe it's because you turned your marriage into a scoreboard instead of a shelter.
Put down the scorecard.
You're not opponents.
You're teammates who forgot they're on the same side.
I used to love my wife because she earned it.
When she was kind, I was kind.
When she respected me, I respected her.
When she didn't—I didn't.
Marriage was a transaction.
A balance sheet.
I gave what I got.
Nothing more.
Then one Sunday our pastor said something I couldn't shake.
"The way you treat your wife is the way you treat the Lord."
I thought he was being poetic.
He wasn't.
That night I looked at my wife.
Really looked.
She was exhausted.
The kids had been brutal.
The house was chaos.
And I was keeping score.
Waiting for her to earn my kindness.
That's when it hit me:
I wasn't loving a woman.
I was worshiping myself.
Every act of service I withheld was worship I stole from God.
Every cold shoulder was an altar to my ego.
Every "she started it" was a prayer to my own righteousness.
Marriage isn't a contract between two people.
It's an offering to the One who made them.
I started loving her differently.
Not because she deserved it.
Because He does.
I served her when she didn't thank me.
I pursued her when she pulled away.
I led when I didn't feel like leading.
Not for applause.
For an audience of One.
She noticed.
Not right away.
But one night she said:
"You're different. What happened?"
I told her the truth.
"I stopped loving you to get something back."
"I started loving you to give something up."
She didn't understand at first.
Now she does.
When you love your spouse as an act of worship
Everything shifts.
The scoreboard disappears.
The transaction ends.
And marriage becomes what it was always supposed to be.
A daily death to self.
A living sacrifice.
An act of worship disguised as a Wednesday night doing dishes.
Your spouse isn't your enemy.
They're your offering.
Treat them like one.