Tag Archives: flesh and blood

Armour

dictionary with letter A

 

Armour: (n) 1. the metal coverings formerly worn by soldiers or warriors to protect the body in battle. 2. (v) provide someone with emotional, social, or other defenses.

In medieval times if you showed up wearing armour, people got the idea that you wanted to fight. Even though many of the knights were proud of the quality of their outer wear, it was usually worn for battle.

I point this out because when I was in high school sitting in a Sunday School class in a very conventional church and a scripture was read which gave direction to “put on the whole armour of God,” I raised my hand and questioned the prudence of such an endeavor.

I explained to the Sunday School teacher that since Jesus told us that we didn’t need to be afraid of evil, nor did we need to resist it, what was the sense of showing up in life looking like you were ready to kill people, seemingly convinced they were ready to destroy you?

The gentleman in charge of the class, probably not wanting to take on the teenage conclave in the first place, cleared his throat, commented to me that it was “an interesting question” and began to move on to the next point.

Possessing the combination of an inquisitive mind and an ass-hole stubbornness, I interrupted and said, “Well, I know it’s interesting or I wouldn’t have brought it up, but what do you think about it?”

His cheeks turned red, he gulped and said, “It’s the Bible. It must be right.”

Well, I wasn’t convinced.

I’m still not.

Christianity suffers from one fatal contradition.

How do we love our neighbor as ourselves and still live the defensive life of trying to kick the crap out of the devil? It’s just too easy to think that the devil is in the people we’re supposed to love.

It’s a great copout.

So even though some guy named Paul thought, many centuries ago, that he had discovered a clever analogy by using armour to describe awareness, I refuse to walk into life clad in metal garments which communicate that I’m scared to death of the world around me.

So I suppose if people want to hurt me they can.

But if they want to hug me, they will get flesh and blood … instead of tin.

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Apparition

dictionary with letter A

Apparition (n.) a remarkable thing that makes a sudden appearance, especially a ghost.

I believe in ghosts.

Not the cloudy, smoky spirits of souls who have gone on to their reward or retribution. I’m talking about the ghosts of bad ideas, inclinations and fallacies that possessed our world in the past, and now have come to haunt us in the present.

  • Sometimes I just wish we could come up with new bad ideas.
  • Sometimes I just wish there was something new.

But instead we have the poltergeist of previous ridiculous concepts rising up from the grave, where we thought we buried it, only to spook us once again.

We don’t have new scandals. We have the spirit of Richard Nixon and Watergate infesting the present bodies of our politicians, making them do the same stupid mistakes he tried to pull off, which ended up with his destruction.

We don’t have music born of the spirituality and emotions of our own generation, but rather, grave-robbers who go and dig up the tunes of those who are now decomposing.

We are continually vexed by the apparitions of past failures or the ongoing celebration of victories, where the band has already played and marched away.

We spend too much time celebrating the past, forgetting the prejudice, disease and dumbness that prevailed.

I believe in ghosts because we refuse to inter the past.

So we just keep living this stuff over and over again … like a bunch of tales from the crypt.

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Apparent

dictionary with letter A

Apparent (adj.)1. clearly seen or understood; obvious. 2. seeming real, but not necessarily so.

All of our eyeballs have been blurred, leaving our vision tainted.

Perhaps it was the disappointment brought on by the tension of adolescence, or some hidden prejudice inserted into our thinking by well-meaning parents.

It might have been high expectation which was dashed and brought crashing to the earth by the flak of reality.

Somewhere along the line we began looking at the world through clouded lenses of bigoted conclusions.

Therefore what is apparent to one person is not equally as apparent to another. Matter of fact, we’ve developed a whole philosophical approach to the issue, insisting that we’re all quite different, and in our difference we find our “special purpose.”

Yet it doesn’t occur to us that if we all have different views of what is necessary, beautiful and spiritual, we’re more likely to collide into each other in the dark than to embrace each other in the light.

I do think it’s important that we come to some common ground on what is apparent, and even if we don’t completely understand it, submit to the wisdom of some very essential precepts:

1. We are not here alone.

In other words, we cannot live our lives as if there are no other human beings, and trying to pursue our goals without a belief in a Creator can be more frustrating than enriching.

2. The truth will make you free.

Lying is a detour which takes you through town, past the beautiful houses, but always ends up at the city dump. No one ever gets away with lying–and truthfully, the longer the deceit is disguised, the worse the retribution.

3. Miracles are God’s business, but talent is mine.

There is no replacement for ability applied with hard work. Those who peddle shortcuts, easy diet plans and get-rich schemes may be the closest thing we will ever see to flesh-and-blood satans.

There are things which are apparent. If we agree, we can begin to pull together instead of pushing and shoving each other. But to get this done, we must stop believing that the Earth is a series of human islands instead of a continent of brothers and sisters.

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Anvil

dictionary with letter A

Anvil: (n) a heavy steel or iron block with a flat top and concave sides, and typically a pointed end on which metals can be hammered and shaped.

I took a long moment to think this one through.

I like things that make me think because thinking is admitting that you don’t know and you aren’t afraid to learn if any information is actually available.

Here’s what I came up with:

You’ve got one big piece of metal in your hand in the shape of a hammer that’s hitting another piece of metal really hard to put it in shape, while a very sturdy piece of metal beneath it withstands the blows and remains firm so as not to inhibit the shaping of the object.

They’re all metal.

Some of them just have to be stronger than the others to sustain the pressure.

I know that appears to be too philosophical, but if you pause for a moment, it really isn’t. It’s just practical.

For a brief season, we have children who are brought into this world and must be molded, guided and shaped into human beings. I must warn you, they do not arrive human, but rather, as self-centered, egotistical, overly intelligent little monkeys who need to be removed from their jungle environment and taught the ways of true humanity.

There’s a lot of debate today on whether there’s some hitting and beating needed in that process.

Let us agree on the following four points:

1. There are moments in raising a child when you are well prepared to kill them, and if you got the right jury, who had also parented, you might get off for time served.

2. Since the sensation is common to us all, what sets us apart from those who end up damaging their children instead of helping them is what we might call “holy restraint.”

3. Holy restraint is not achieved without pursuing something holy. To do that means you need to invest your brain more than your brawn. The advantage we have over children is that they’re just not as smart as we are yet. And the second advantage is that we control the macaroni and cheese.

4. A child who learns is like a piece of steel that is squeezed between the hammer and the anvil. Since both of them are stronger, he or she will eventually find a reason to comply.

Now, I realize the analogy doesn’t work well because the hammer actually hits the steel against the anvil. But since our children are made of flesh and blood instead of iron and alloys, it might be a good idea to adjust the strength projected to the object addressed.

As flesh and blood, they need wisdom and guidance from people who know how to outsmart them.

Parenting is more about trickery than it ever is … about spanking.

 

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Antiquity

dictionary with letter AAntiquity: (n) the ancient past, especially the period before the Middle Ages.

Every once in a while, a startling revelation will cross my mind, giving me a sensation similar to standing on the deck of the Santa Maria, spying the New World. Of course, as in the case of Christopher Columbus, nor is it to me.

Truth has been around for a long time and it always has three important ingredients:

  1. It actually works.
  2. It doesn’t hurt anyone else.
  3. It’s not ashamed of the failed experiments leading to greater revelation.

Often when I find myself in a circle of believers who are discussing the Good Book and stories of biblical proportions, my brain freezes, as I wonder why they think these individuals had any greater spirituality than we do.

Actually, if I found myself translated back to antiquity, I’d be walking around as a god with my level of knowledge, in comparison to the fear, superstition and incomplete hypotheses of their time.

If we really believe that spiritual evolution stopped on the Isle of Patmos with John the Apostle, or on the mountain with Mohammed, then we are negating hundreds and hundreds of years of scientific miracles and human growth.

I think the Good Book is exactly that–it’s a good book.

As a good book, it has plot twists, character development, elimination of villains, and the exposure of bizarre ideas, as the story line is pushed along towards what we hope will be a happy ending.

Even though our children have a difficult time imagining Alexander the Great or Cleopatra, when we parallel these individuals with updated versions of our own time–like Kanye West and Kim Kardashian–it’s much easier to see where we’ve come from and possibly where we need to go.

I am not of the belief that any good thing should be thrown away. Generally speaking, I don’t walk out of a movie once I’ve paid my premium price, even if the flick is not to my liking. I try to find something usable.

There is much we can learn from antiquity:

We can learn that superstition cannot shout down science.

We can learn that we are learning, and therefore should never be content in our own level of comprehension.

And we can learn that those who made the history books were once just clumsy, insecure flesh-and-blood creatures … who spent way too much time wondering if they were sexy.

 

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