WOW! This must be told!

This post has been a 'to do' ever since Christmas and I just haven't gotten around to it. So here I go since it is worth blogging about.

To say the least, 2009 was a challenging year for me. I lost my job in April and spent rest of the year considering what I was going to do next. I learned very quickly that I was more concerned about doing instead of being. Thus, my security was being found in what I do and not in Christ.

Now, fast forward to Christmas 2009. Being unemployed, I was able to come home to Waynesville a week before Christmas. Remember, the mountains of Western North Carolina were blanketed with snow at this time. Further, one of my parents' dogs (Jake - a golden lab) had gotten to a point where he could no longer walk. So, the day I arrived in Waynesville, I went with my father to the vet to put him down. It was heart breaking. Jake and I really bonded over the last couple of years. Jake's three goals in life were to eat, be petted, and chew on tennis balls. I helped satisfy two of those goals for him.

After putting him down, my father and I then worked on getting my car into my parents driveway since it had gotten stuck in the snow. I ended up pulling my back out from all of the shoveling.

On to Christmas Day and the unexpected... Over the years, my family has gotten used to waking up whenever to enjoy Christmas together. I was usually the last to wake up. This year was no different. Except this year, my family decided to wake me by hovering over my bed with bells in their hands, smiles on their faces, beckoning me to join them downstairs. Had it not been for Christmas, they may not have gotten me to get downstairs so fast. As is tradition we opened up stocking stuffers, then presents under the tree. The last present was opened and in my mind the gift giving was over.

All of a sudden, my brother tells me to go to the coat closet and pull out a box with my name on it, which in my mind was an odd request. It was the same closet from the year before where we asked mother to do the same (she got a banjo for Christmas). Walking slowly with a growing since of curiosity and excitement, I found my way over to the closet and discovering a box with my name on it. Lifting the box out of the closet, I brought it back to the dining room table where I proceeded to cut the tape, freeing the flaps of a standard shipping box (nothing exciting about a shipping box :)). After freeing the flaps and noticing what was inside, my eyes got big as I lifted the box for a 15" MacBook Pro out. As the wows came out of my mouth, I looked up and saw tears welling up in my mother's eyes. I looked over at my brother, and he was just as excited as I was. In fact, as I learned later, it took everything in him to keep his mouth shut the night before.

My family had chosen to forego getting presents for themselves to get me a MacBook Pro for Christmas. What an expression of love! Suppose I did not get the MacBook for Christmas. I would have not walked away from Christmas morning doubting my family's love for me. Yet, my family took great delight in giving this present to me. It was such a joy to them.

This was an unexpected gift at an unexpected time. I know my Heavenly Father took even greater delight in blessing me through my family. It is Him who gets the glory!

Zephania 3:17 says "The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing." Thank you Lord!

And... Thank you to my Dad, Mom, and Andrew. I love you all!

QUESTION

How does one know we aren't living in some sort of simulated reality, as if this world were some simulacra? Does the movie "The Matrix" come to mind. This question is by no means a new question. However, my reason for writing this is simply to consider how we know things in the first place.

More to come later...

For those following....

I have not blogged in a while, especially on the subject of beauty. I am still in the process of asking this question, and have some thoughts. However, I am not ready to share them. Stay tuned though.

Sustainability........Why? AGAIN

For those of you following, please don't misunderstand me. Going "green" is ultimately a good thing. In fact, it should provide an opportunity to share the real reason why this planet is valuable and worth protecting.

God has made us stewards of this planet. Though it will go away we still should be stewards of it. If not for being a good steward, it is a good place to start a spiritual conversation with somebody and share the good news of Jesus Christ with them.

Sustainability........Why?

Being in the world of design, it is impossible to escape the buzz words "sustainability" and "green". Frankly, I am rather disgusted with them. What's the point? Why should I involve myself in practices that support this effort? Well, asking the question why is exactly why I am writing this post. It occurred to me as I pondered the question of 'why' that there is value placed on protecting our planet and making it a better place, but what became even more evident to me as I asked this question was how does one derive an a priori epistemological foundation for valuing this earth and making it a better place? In other words, how does one know that this earth is valuable and worth preserving in the first place? When people throw around words like "sustainability" and "green" have they even thought through their epistemological foundations for this? Does their world view support the idea that this world is valuable and worth saving? I think I can be convinced to make sounder decisions to be "green" and "sustainable", but please note, that I don't think it is enough to throw around without considering how their world view provides a foundation for living this way.

What Is Beauty [PART 1]?

I have recently been asking the question "What is beauty?" I posed the question to a friend of mine. We had a very stimulating conversation over the subject then let me borrow a book called Philosophies of Art and Beauty: Selected Readings in Aesthetics from Plato to Heidegger. I opened the book and noticed a section with readings from Augustine. I jumped to his section.

I am not done with his section of the book. What I find interesting is Augustine makes a distinction between the delight of the senses and something using your senses as a conduit to delight the mind. He would call the latter "reasonable."

My initial reaction is that I agree that the senses are indeed a conduit. However, I think he falls short by limiting the delight of the inner parts of us to the mind. I think it is much more than that. Please stay tuned as I continue to read and blog.

Much Love ~ A to the K

Adam and Eve?

I was recently invited by a co-worker of mine to attend a lecture at a church (will remain un-named) where the question of whether Adam and Eve were real people or an allegory was posed. The pastor proceeded to eloquently discuss the issue without a leaning as to where he stood. Finally, in the question and answer time, his stance seemed to become more evident. He seemed to support the idea that Adam and Eve were an allegory. When the question of how sin came into the world was posed, the pastor postulated that sin came into the world when humans evolved into consciousness, thus choosing to rebel against God.

I discussed this with my co-worker after, and he seemed to not have an issue with the idea that Adam and Eve could be an allegory. After all, this doesn’t change his in faith in God. Immediately, I had to examine personally if this was something that needed to be held on to or whether it was something that should be left open. After Paul did exhort Titus to teach what is in accordance with sound doctrine, and there are theological doctrines which are not viewed as primary and are indeed still questioned and scrutinized, and it’s ok. Then it hit me. The allegory concept seems to inadequately deal with how sin came into the world. Thus, it is clear that this issue is not one of those issues that is secondary and open for discussion.

So - if sin came into the world via an evolved state of human consciousness, then how would that effect the earth itself? Scripture tells us that the earth became cursed once Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. - Genesis 4:17b, 18 - "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat of the plants of the field." An evolved human consciousness does not deal with this truth. - Romans 8:20, 21 - "For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God." So if sin came into the world through evolved human consciousness, then how does the earth become cursed? For a further discussion of Romans 8:20, 21, you can copy these links into your url.

-Matthew Henry's Commentary

-John Darby's Synopsis of the New Testament

Since the evolved state of consciousness doesn’t adequately deal with sin coming into the world and all of creation becoming cursed, this line of reasoning minimizes what Christ accomplished at the cross. In Ephesians 1:9, 10, God’s will is to bring all things in heaven and earth under one head, who is Christ. Jesus did die for us, but He also died to redeem the rest of His creation since we subjected it to the curse. This is seen in Revelations 21:1 where a new heaven and a new earth are created come into existence. This is where the redeemed will spend eternity with God.

Further, the more I thought about this, the more I became convinced that Adam and Eve being an allegory was not sound doctrine. No matter whether one takes the Creation story literally or not, what Scripture does tell us is that God created Adam and Eve and then communed with them in the Garden of Eden before the fall. Communing with God denotes consciousness and rationality. This is seen in Genesis 2:16 when the LORD God says to Adam that he can eat of any tree in the garden he was placed in, but is commanded to not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Why would one give a command to a being who could not process it? The second indication that we have that Adam and Eve were indeed fully conscious and rational human beings is found in Genesis 2:25 when it says they were both naked and they felt no shame.


To continue, in Romans 5:12-21, Paul refers to Adam as "one man" over eight times in these last verses of Romans 5. Paul goes on in Romans 5:14 to call Adam a "pattern of the one to come." The Greek word for "pattern" is Typos which means a prototype, pattern, model after which something is to be made. It would seem that Paul, being well versed in the Torah/Old Testament, and being a Jew himself, was not referring to Adam as an allegorical figure. Just as sin came into the world through the trespass of one man (Rom. 5:15), so also the gift that came by the grace of one man, Jesus Christ.

Further, if Adam and Eve were allegories, when does the allegory stop and real history start being recorded. Am I to believe Noah was not real either?

Is a stance on this issue necessary for salvation? No. However, it is necessary for sound doctrine. Theology should never be over-run by science - or science simply can not dictate theological interpretation. This is eisogesis which means the interpreter is bringing his or her own interpretation to the text instead of digging out of the text the original intended meaning. In this case, there is enough in the text to point to Adam and Eve being real. Even if one is a proponent of theistic evolution, one must not ignore the text and go so far as to say they were not real. It is clear that the allegory concept does not adequately deal with sin coming into the world, and it is also clear that Paul, being a student of the text conceived of Adam as being a real person.