Gadfly's Muse

Isaiah 46 & 47: A God For All Seasons (of Life)

Image:  "A Monarch", 2019, Severna Park, Md

Isaiah 46:4  Even to your old age, I am He, And even to gray hairs I will carry you! I have made, and I will bear; Even I will carry, and will deliver you.

Isaiah 46:9–11 Remember the former things of old, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like Me, 10 Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure,’ 11 Calling a bird of prey from the east, The man who executes My counsel, from a far country. Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it.

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Back in the 60's a play called "A Man for All Seasons" hit Broadway.  With some differences it was made into a hit movie of the same title.  The story is about Sir Thomas More, who was famously executed by Henry VIII for opposing that king's desire to have his marriage annulled so that he could marry another woman.  The main point of the story (as told by its writer Robert Bolt) is that a man's only certain guide through the "seasons" of trials he faces in life is to be true to his own conscience.  Thomas More was a "man for all seasons" because he never compromised his convictions about right and wrong.

First of all - It was and is a play... it should not be confused with the reality of More's life though the outline of the play is correct.

Secondly, we have to recognize some caveats about the play's main premise.  Is a man's conscience always a reliable guide?

To answer this question I might just mention that the answer is an emphatic "No!"  Different culture's instill different ideas of right and wrong in those born into them.  The idea of showing "mercy" to enemies was ludicrous to those North American Natives who routinely subjected captive prisoners to horrible deaths before the eyes of their entire tribe.  Spartan teenagers were turned loose to fend for themselves, practicing terrorist  tactics against the enslaved helots in order to learn how to survive behind enemy lines.  Even a cursory scan of history shows that secular man does not have a conscience that can be trusted to guide him in true righteousness.

What man needs, in order to become a "man for all seasons", is a "God for all seasons."  Man needs to be taught righteousness... His heart, though inclined to sin through Adam, has to be changed such that he can adopt the way of righteousness and have his conscience changed to reflect its true principles.  God, in these chapters, speaks through Isaiah and proclaims to us that He, and He alone, is just such a God!  He is the God we need but more than that, He is the God whom we have offended and therefore He is the One Who must forgive.

"Remember this, and show yourselves men; Recall to mind, O you transgressors.." (46:8 )  Here is the starting point for any hope of having a renewed conscience.  We must hear God speaking to us... and calling us to acknowledge our guilt before Him.  He calls us to "Remember" that He is, in fact, the God for all Seasons. (46:9-10)  It is He who showed HImself in the "former things of Old."  It is He, and only He, who has "declared the end from the beginning and from ancient times things (still) not yet done."  He calls us to remember His all-sovereign, omniscient Self... to come to grips with that awesome Reality.  He is not some philosophical mind game.  He does not dwell in idle speculation nor is He encompassed by abstract knowledge, no matter how beautiful.  He is the Absolute of all things and He is a Person to Whom we owe account.

He declares that the "seasons" of our lives are the subject of His divine decree.  It is He who brings a "bird of prey from the east" (Cyrus of Persia).  He has spoken it and will bring it to pass.  He purposed it and He did it.  This same principle applies to us in all our every day circumstances.As Sir Thomas More was tried and tested by the God ordained circumstances of his life, so each of us, come into being in our own time, walk through our prescribed pathways and are subject to the same kind of "proving of our metal" as was he.  Thomas More was portrayed as trusting himself... trusting his conscience... relying on his own understanding... proving himself to be an individual, a ship tossed by gales but always holding course.. a man true to himself.  If those things were indeed true of him then he died trusting the wrong god.  The goal of our lives must not be to prove ourselves as individuals, autonomous, facing all odds with nothing but our own resources.  No, our goal is to prove ourselves faithful, clinging to God as our hope and help, always looking to Him for guidance, searching out His will for our trials and in full submission such that the glory of our lives is that He is glorified in them.

It is to those who submit in this way that He promises to sustain us in the seasons of life.  "Even to your old age, I am He.  Even to gray hairs I will carry you!  I have made, and I will bear; Even I will carry and will deliver you!" (46:4)  Here is our confidence.  We have such a God for all our seasons.  He who foretold our days before there was even one of them will certainly accomplish His purposes in us.  

That is Someone to respect and honor far more than Sir Thomas More.

 

 

 

 

 

"THIS Is The Major Existential Threat We Are Facing?": Sayonara Madame Secretary

 

Warning: Spoiler Alert - Season 5, Episode 1

That's it... I'm done... and I am pretty disgusted with Netflix as a result.

We have watched the first four seasons of this piece of fluff with mild amusement.  Yes the liberal stuff was present and yes the idea that this woman could accomplish political miracles (nuclear arms deal between Pakistan and India, stopping major dictators in their tracks, forcing major concessions from Russian diplomats, bring peace to the middle east... etc. etc.) almost over night not only stretched credibility it ripped it to shreds.  But I liked the dialog.  Some of the characters were amusing and so were the sub-plots.  

So, last night I turned on Netflix and started the first episode of Season 5.  It began predictably enough... major blast at the White House... looks like the President, the VP and a host of other politicians would be killed... I was all set to see her elevated to the presidency since she as Secretary of State was 3rd in line for succession.  All of this in the context of elaborate, world shaking events.

It seems that India was persecuting Muslims.  Pakistan was about to run out of water so she needed to convince the Indians to guarantee water to Pakistan in order to avoid a nuclear war (ok... just go with it... that's high school thinking, I know).  But, you see, the real problem in India was those doggone Nationalists who were pushing the Muslim persecution.  And Pakistan, again, they had doggone Nationalists of their own and they ran the Pakistan military and how could anyone but Super Secretary bring them to the table.  She did.  The representatives of the two countries gather at the white house with the President to sign a nuclear weapon treaty... wow... approved by the Senate over night on nothing the SecState's say so.  Impressive... but that's what this series is all about.

Then it got really stupid.

She is delayed in traffic and while she is delayed the White House is hit by a RPG - that's Rocket Propelled Grenade for you civilians.  Where did it come from? Some vague building roof top somewhere in DC.  Folks, an RPG flies for about 3000 feet.. max... that's about 1/2 a nautical mile.  Can you imagine the Secret Service not having every building roof top in a 1/2 mile of the White House constantly covered?  Next... this RPG was dead on... absolutely precisely delivered... it had to come through a window in order to blow up the room.  You gotta be kidding me.  But... OK... this is fiction... this is fantasy... let's get on with the story.

The stupidity gets worse.

It seems that this blast was not from some highly professional terrorist organization that had been planning this for years.  No... the guys who shot this RPG were... wait for it... American Aryan Nationalists.  Now... Aryan Nationalists is liberal code for people who own guns, don't want open borders, vote for Trump, and have the sheer gall to not buy into globalist propaganda.  They are, of course, white (i.e. Aryan).  They must have had an intelligence operation that put NSA to shame because this entire thing was put together essentially over night.  How did they know where the meeting was?  How did they get access to the firing position?  The whole thing is ludicrous and is even more ludicrous when you realize that Aryan Nationalists are presented as beer swilling red-necks with virtually zero capacity for sophisticated ops.

But that's still not the breaking point.

The breaking point came when all of a sudden the Secretary calls in previous Sec States for advice.  There in all there glory are Colin Powell, Madeline Albright and her majesty Hillary Clinton herself.  Noticeably absent was Condoleeza Rice.  What was their advice?  Pacify the people.  Tell them everything's OK.  Sure, a chunk of the White House just got blown up... but the President is OK and what's most important is that we got the Nuclear treaty signed.  It's all good... just tell the folks that we have to get to the bottom of this and put an end to all of these Nationalist sympathies.

You see, the problem is, that these folks are just not embracing diversity.  And because they don't embrace diversity, as defined by folks like the SecStates mentioned above, they are the cause of these kind of terrible things happening.

But that is not when I turned it off!

I turned it off when SecState went on national TV and solemnly proclaimed that "Nationalism is the number 1 existential threat we are facing today" (not exact quote... I turned it off).

This was the most blatant piece of manipulation of "entertainment media" I have ever seen.  There was no attempt whatsoever to explore the fundamental issues.  The bottom line - if you are not on board with the liberal party line - if you actually believe that American citizens ought to require their politicians to promote our national interests first and all subordinate considerations, well, second or third... then you, my friend, are a "nationalist" - and, especially if you are "Aryan" then your soul is beyond redemption.

I'm done.   I will not watch any more of this series... I  may not ever watch Netflix again.

I sincerely hope that a general boycott begins so that the folks in the entertainment media discover just how much it may cost for them to switch from entertainment to propaganda.

Other than that... it was a great night.

 

Doing The Job....

I spent 23 years in the military during a time (Viet Nam) when the wider culture was definitely not disposed to endorsing that lifestyle. This movie demonstrates that finally it is possible for our stories to be told without the false romanticism of the early days nor the hideous distortions of the Anti-war crowd.

When a military person talks about "doing his job" there is an entire layer of meaning that is included there that simply does not communicate very well outside the circle. He/She is not talking about simply putting in time at the desk nor just earning a paycheck. That person is talking about an entire focus of life and mission that integrates sense of country, sense of responsibility, sense of mutual dependence, sense of honor, sense of necessity that transcends ordinary vocation. This is not to romanticize it nor to unduly glorify it. It simply is what it has to be. The well understood observation that when the bullets are flying that a soldier is not fighting for his country, he is fighting for his buddies, is true. But the reason why he is fighting for them is because, fundamentally, they share that same set of sensibilities, each to a greater or lesser extent and each in different proportions. Life is clarified greatly when your immediate actions and those of your brothers in arms constitute issues of life and death. The simultaneously liberating and depressing reality that death is only one bullet away at any given instant and that there really is no such thing as a "safe area" breeds a certain callousness as well as intense awareness of each moment. There is the story of the soldier crossing Flanders field in World War I, in the midst of mind boggling carnage, suddenly being intensely aware of a single tree still standing and beautifully shrouded in fog. Life is real when your business is death.

This of course does not mean, necessarily, that this intensity of experience is always conducive to mental stability. There are those of us in whom sensory over-load simply is intolerable and the danger of foundational collapse is a real possibility. That challenge is always present and as this movie shows, each person responds to it in their own unique manner.

I have seen few movies which rivets the audiences attention to the military experience as well as this one. There are no rose colored glasses here but neither are honor and duty held in contempt. The central character hates the statement "it is what it is" but in the last analysis, that is the message that the story communicates. The connection between the grandson and the grandfather is far more than common military experience but it cannot be separated from it. Their stories are different but fundamentally the same. As the grandfather says... "you cannot choose your war... you have to just go and do the best job you can." That statement communicates the fundamental integrity and prevailing moral virtue of military service. A price has to be paid... but the whole point is that is a price that must be paid. Not everyone is called to it and not everyone can do it... and that also is just how it is. But for those who do and for those whose integrity is proven in it, there is a transcendent bond that is established among them that is as important as life itself. It simply is the way it is.

What is possible to achieve is exactly what this movie portrays as being achieved, both by the grandfather and his grandson. The respect and appreciation of superiors and inferiors alike, when the man they want to fight with is the man that is there with them. Grandfather and grandson both walked the walk and their reward was not a grand parade and a bunch of medals. Their reward was the look in their fellow soldiers' eyes when tough decisions had to be made.

Some will say that such is not worth it... they are the ones who don't know what it means to "do their job."

This is a great movie and it is well worth watching.

 

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cross posted at UTI:Unscrewed (02-02)

I liked this movie and I will tell you why, but first, contrary to all the movie promotes, let's get the negatives out of the way first.