LOVE, SEX, RELIGION, & POLITICS

I had an interesting inspiration last night. I realized that the "Second Coming" of Christ has nothing to do with the reappearance of Jesus. The Second Coming is the realization that God's love is unconditional. This is what Jesus taught, but until it sinks in to individual consciousness, Christ has not come to you. The full implications of unconditional love are startling, especially to thought that is accustomed to Old Testament beliefs that all sorts of conditions must be met before one can experience God's love. There is a popular series of books called "Left Behind" which imply that those who do not accept Christ will be "left behind" when Christ comes. I understand now that those who will be left behind will be those who cling to the belief that God's love is conditional. Ironically, that will likely include most fundamentalist Christians, the same people who believe that failure to accept Christ (a belief in a prerequisite to receive Go

When I was a teenager, there was an elderly man in our church. I passed him in the foyer one Sunday morning and he said "Jimmie, do you remember what I told you?" I didn't recall ever having any conversations with him, so I said I didn't. He said "Don't be afraid of anything." Some months later I saw him again. He said "Do you remember what I told you?" I said "Yes." He repeated, "Don't be afraid of anything." That has proven to be a difficult challenge. But his advice has stuck with me. I can't say I've mastered my fears by any means, but I have at least come to understand the principle, if not the practice. Somewhere back in the '90s I was reading the book A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson. In that book I was introduced to the idea that the opposite of love is fear. At first I thought, as you probably do now, that hate is the opposite of love. But it immediately occurred to me that you can

Someone once asked me "What is God?" I replied "God is Love." She shot back "God is an emotion?" No, Love is much more than emotion. Love is a fundamental Principle of life the universe and everything. Emotion is just one way that Love is manifested. Love is also manifested as life, beauty, creativity, order, unselfish action, obedience to laws, and countless other forms. The Love I'm talking about is absolutely pure, unconditional, and absolute. That is God. The 13th chapter of 1st Corinthians describes the attributes of Love: "Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends." Yet how often do we attribute these characteristic to God? I think one of the hardest things for people t

It was reported in the local paper that the city manager of Largo, Florida is to lose his job because he plans to have a sex change operation. I'm not going to pass judgement on the firing. The city is closer to the situation than I am, and may have information I don't have. Reports indicate a crowd of 500 people showed up to the City Commission meeting to express their opinions. One was a Baptist minister. Here's how our paper reported his comment: ' 'If Jesus was here tonight, I can guarantee you he'd want him terminated,'' said Pastor Ron Saunders of Largo's Lighthouse Baptist Church. ''Make no mistake about it.'' Is he talking about the Jesus who dined with sinners? Is he talking about the Jesus who let a sinful woman wash his feet at a dinner party? I don't think so. I don't think Jesus would have put someone out of a job they had executed faithfully for fourteen years for this. What I see in Largo, Florida is nothin

Too late! I'm started. Love, sex, religion & politics seem to be the things I think about most often. They have developed a complex interrelationship in our culture, and they have in recent years resulted in unhealthy divisions among our fellow human beings. We now have liberals battling conservatives, fundamentalists battling gays, Muslims battling Jews and Christians (in the name of God, no less!), moralizers battling the allegedly wicked, and more. The key to resolving these divisions is love. Pure, absolute, unconditional love. At first this may seem too simplistic for our complex world. But because God is Love, love is really is the foundation of everything. Love is the basis of all life. As a practical matter, without love we have no real basis for law and order. Paul said  "Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law." Romans 13:10 Over the course of this journal I hope to find practical applications of lo