Switch

Imagine, for a moment, a junction in railroad tracks. Think about the mechanisms that are there to make it work the way it is designed to work, to change the direction of the train. If we take this concept and apply it to the way that we think, then you'll eventually come to the idea of your train of thought. This is a concept that I think we've all heard about at some point which describes the many directions and routes we take with our minds. The thing we often forget is that to change directions a train often needs a switch in direction, and to do that the train needs to slow down considerably to perform the switch safely. Let's say about 5% speed of its max potential. In today's society speediness of thought is often far more celebrated than conciseness of decision. Yet that inherently dishonors the picture of the train of thought, and as such, I believe it has debilitated our ability to appreciate the inherent nuances of the train itself. 

But that's not what I'm addressing here. I'd like to discuss the concept of the track, and who holds the keys to the mechanisms that perform the switch of the rail. My conclusion is that God created the tracks and the switches, and then He gave you authority over the direction of the train via allowing you to control the switches and directional adaptations that you can make. How is this played out when you feel like the chaos of your mind is impossible to control? Andrew, how could you say that the mind is a one-directional entity and claim that you only go one direction at any given time?

If you feel like your mind is out of control, stop believing that lie and move on. Ask for a switch in direction, and pray for the grace to figure out how to do that. That's all I have to say about the first question, if you don't believe your mind is able to be controlled, you've never taken responsibility for it. To answer the second question would probably be a little more complicated, the mind is a one-direction at a time entity, there are an infinite amount of possibilities that you can go with it, and as such you'll want to invest in knowing which directions you care about most, and more than that what direction(s) you were designed to go. But this answer isn't just about topics of interest or things you take pleasure in, it is also about the principle of 'mindset' and the patterns of thought you have engrossed yourself with. There are tracks that we've been on for so long that maybe we don't see the switches, or know how to get out of the deep dense forest we've been stuck in with no way of getting out. To that, I say ask for a new track, or start building one of your own in the direction the Holy Spirit leads you. If you are a track builder who am I to say "no don't do that, that's God's job." 

I have an interest in a multitude of topics, and although I can perform many switches of interest over time that is a poorly spent effort as it takes much more fuel and resources to continue to grow in many directions at once. If you have a train that is designed to do that, then, by all means, switch as many times as you like, but if you have a train that is designed to be a marathon runner allow yourself to pick up speed and coast for a while before you attempt to switch. If you don't know how you've been designed initiate that conversation with God and continue to grow in that or you'll forever regret it. We all need to make switches at some point though, and to not do so would never allow us to look at our train from a different perspective. It's like a change of light, if you're going through a tunnel and the only direction you know is through a tunnel, you eventually become very intimate with the dense rock and the deep guttural echoes as your wheels thud against the tracks. But if you've seen your train in the snow, in the sand, in mountains, and over the sea you know parts of your train you would've never seen before. If you don't have an intimacy with your train you'll never know what else you can withstand, what direction you are meant to go, what problems you can easily solve, and which problems you'll have to spend a little time with. So go and capture your train, subdue it to your dominion, and walk in the authority that God gave you over your track.

The Loss of Art

Ever since I became a Christian I have become engrossed with ancient Hebrew culture, longing to have outside context of what was going on in the days of the Levites. What's also interesting to me is our dating back to Egyptian art and how far back the Egyptian culture seems to go. They've had buildings, archives, and many other things for a very very long time. The only thing the Israelites have had for longer than 400 years is the written word. 

And then I started to think about the fact that it's very likely they had created all sorts of art, as any culture might. As someone who has written poetry, taken photos, and loved music what's interesting to me is to think about the times where I've lost work that I was doing, had treasured for some time, or even used as tools to learn from. The heart wrenching feeling when art is destroyed either on purpose or on accident is a traumatizing experience, and as with any work that we have invested in here on Earth I find it remarkable that the Israelites today are who they are. The level of work they must have lost, the countless years of history, of culture, of family tradition.

When something like this happens how can you not grieve? How can you be in the times of Jeremiah, looking at the culture around you knowing that it was about to be utterly decimated, and that there was nothing you could do about it except continue asking the people to turn away from the wrath of God? He pronounced some of the most violent and heavy judgments ever written down in the Bible, and yet he didn't do it with a hardened heart, he pronounced them weeping over what he knew God had planned. He interceded, begged God for another way.

He lived a really crap life. He could see into the future, he knew that somehow the nation that God so loved would be redeemed. But he never got to see it in his natural life. 

But that's never where the story ends. There is still much written regarding the story of Israel, and from his place in Heaven Jeremiah sees it. 

Ascension Tactics

    So, there are many theologies, philosophies, isms, and everything else in between regarding rising up. While there's a certain truth to elevating and rising, the source of the strength to do so is often mistaken. Take, for instance, a commonly known tactic of receiving revelation from the Hindu and cultural chakra system. The bottom one is labeled "one" to imply that the ground and groundedness is where you begin. Now, there's a value to being grounded, but there is the distinct belief that you must begin by being grounded before you move upward to receive revelation. Very simply, this is the upside-down of what it is God designed humans to function as. We are taught to bring Heaven down, that the son of man has authority to be brought into the throne and have that be the beginning place. Jesus demonstrated this by ascending for us, and then sending His spirit of Mercy and Meekness down to the ground, straight from the top. 

    This is a multi-dimensional spirit, a spirit that permeates through all. Yet again this is established in Scripture as the breath of the Most High God was breathed into Adam into the earth that He molded into the vessel of His glory. Our revelation does not come from the earth, it comes from Heaven and it begins in Heaven, and then it grounds itself into the footstool of the Throne of God. So how do we practice these principles and put them into something we can use? Praxeologize it, if you will. 

    First, come into agreement that you are spirit, and that your spirit comes from heaven. Spend some time making sure in your own heart that these truths are true for you, and that you actually believe that Jesus ascended so that He could lift you out of your strongholds, which are flesh, and bring you into His kingdom, which is light. Then allow Him to. The way that it often hits my imagination as I'm lying down before the Lord is imagining Him reaching down with His giant hands and surrounding me with His grasp. However, this can happen and be just as real for you as anything else God will lead you to see. The reason why you will always find yourself sitting in the throne after you've ascended is that this is your starting place as you are in Christ. You have been seated with Him, and it's just a matter of seeing that so that it will be real for you. Many people who try to ascend or force out of body experiences never go through a tunnel that gets them very high, oftentimes they start just by getting out of their body and seeing themselves lying supine, and then traveling from there, again this is the opposite direction that God would have designed us to go, as it is starting from the ground up rather than starting from the top.  

    Spend some time meditating on the Love of the Lord, to make this reality real for you it could take hours, months, even years for some. The reason this is can be a multitude of reasons, but our God is a God who meets you where you are. Many times I think of the book "You are special." A short book really, one that I was given as a gift when I left my second-grade class in school for another school. The story is of a wooden doll in a village of wooden dolls, and these wooden dolls had a rating system for how each one was via a system of stars and dots. The more stars you had the better, the more dots you had the worse. There was one doll who had many dots, covered completely in dots, a doll who hated his life, oftentimes cursing the very day of his birth. He really got sick of the dots and decided that he'd just go home and never come out again. On his way home he saw a lady doll who had no stickers on her. He watched as people were pleased that she didn't have ANY stickers, and they would try to reward her with a star, but inevitably it fell off. This usually angered them to the point that they would try to give her a dot, but that too always fell off. This doll didn't know how she did it, so he kept following her until he watched her go to the outskirts of the village up a solemn path to a large house. The little doll didn't know where the path lead, so he waited until she got back. After some time, he spotted her walking down the path and stopped her, asking, "what was up there?" 

She answered him "Up there is where Eli lives, the man who created us. You can go see him anytime you want, and he's always available." So the doll went up to the house with its a grand backdrop, larger than life carpentry tables and shoes that he could not tell whether they were attached to anything or not. He whispered "hello?" fearful of what he may find. Someone who saw him like the other dolls did? Someone who wanted to punish him for being such a bad doll? 

"Punchinello, is that you?" the doll heard a voice. 'What kind of name is that?' he wondered, trying to reason with himself and his fear as he stood there waiting to see what might happen. He saw a face pop up from above the table with large blue eyes, intelligent and keen, yet compassionate and loving. "Yes I called you Punchinello, do you know how long I've been waiting for you?" The question took the doll aback. He ended up being taken into the lap of Eli the master crafter and hearing the entire story of how he, Punchinello, came to be. As he listened to how proudly the man talked about him the dots began to fall away one by one. 

This story is a story that carved my childhood and has resurfaced in my adulthood and as such I have been reminded at just how much my Father in heaven has blessed me even when I was lost and searching. Now I'm simply walking deeper into His heart, getting to know His mind, and falling deeper in love with Him as my Groom.