Wisdom - Who is it? (Pt. 2)

I love this question. While maybe the sense is that perhaps we should be asking "Who" first anyway, that's not the most straightforward way into our language and cultural realizations. To get things clear, we ask 'what' far more often than 'who'. Secondly, it is often easier to try to describe attributes of a person than to think about who a person is, outside of terms of essence. 

Wisdom, as a person, is a lady. Generally, she is the subject of the kind of love and study that everyone desires to have toward themselves, as well as the primary vehicle through whom God created the world and everything in it. She is a Spirit and He is The Spirit. Yes, I called Him a He there, because Jesus called the Spirit a Him. 

By her kingdoms are won, battles are fought, and cities are fortified. It is her work that all the animals have come to be, and her hand is in the depths of the sea. It is not by knowledge that she exists, but at the right hand of the Spirit of the Lord, and at her right hand the Spirit of understanding. She is foreboding and she is kind. Strong as she is meek. Humble as she is proud. Timeless as she is in time. 

Who is able to mimic her? Well, by and large, humans are. We have those cuddly teddy bear types of people running around and hugging people. We also have those honest businessmen who are proud of their empire and meek about their living quarters (it's a bit more rare, but it happens). Then there's Jesus, who did everything in such a way that we can still read His words today, and still feel as if they're relevant. Jesus wasn't a philosopher though, and He spent little time describing essence. Theology today is marked by generations and eons of historical writings and great thinkers before us. Jesus wasn't a thinker though. He was a man. 

And yet, everything that He did is marked and founded in eternities grace, with Wisdom. It's majestic, powerful, and just straight-up good. I want to start creating with Wisdom, and I'm not looking to emulate attributes, but instead have the mark of Her hand on mine. 

Get wisdom, get understanding: forget [it] not; neither decline from the words of my mouth. Forsake her not, and she shall preserve thee: love her, and she shall keep thee.

Wisdom - What is it? (Pt. 1)

Our recognition of Wisdom happens in the same way that we recognize language and music. It can even be related to how we recognize objects as simple as glasses or trees. It happens intuitively within a structured set of beliefs and lessons we hold inwardly to categorize and define things. I've heard it said that Wisdom 'is' knowledge applied. In my opinion, that's a very "workman's way" of seeing wisdom, which isn't necessarily wrong. The ability to apply knowledge is good for productivity, science, and good counseling. However, to look at a tree hand-crafted by The Most High as just 'knowledge applied' is... small. Yeah, it was knowledge applied but if you only see knowledge applied you miss the mark of timelessness that the tree was made with. I don't mean that the trees' life is timeless, all trees die just as all men die. To see timelessness though, you must look at the source, the hands, by which the tree is crafted. 

Take a wood carving, for instance - the art is not defined by the tools used to burn or scalpel the wood into a shape that was foreseen in the minds eye. Tools help the function of expression, just as language helps a poet. If it weren't for the one wielding the blowtorch or the pen the sculpture wouldn't have been created, nor the poem written. Even with Neural networks and AI we can hand the machine tools such as words, and programs to make art, but we haven't yet figured out how to teach a computer how to source the image themselves, for they are without wisdom. 

I would like to pose that wisdom, although by nature divine, can be warped. We see this through grotesque sexuality, violence, and evil perpetrating the world. 'Dark wisdom' if you will. If the man behind the gun didn't have the idea to shoot his wife and kid, the gun wouldn't have done the work itself. 

However, our inward picture is not always either dark wisdom or true wisdom. Much of the time it is mundane and simple. So it is not always wisdom, nor should it be recognized as wisdom, but to refer back to the previous argument we must acknowledge the hands and breath that crafted the inward picture maker. Just as the intention of a poem can be twisted in order to fit a reader's intentions or words can be twisted to gaslight somebody I believe we've allowed our 'inner wisdom' to be twisted by those things which are contrary to God's purposes. 

So what would happen if we were re-imbued with the original purposes of our inner wisdom? Would we be able to create more things with that mark of timelessness and eternity just like our Father did? Were we to draw close to Truth, we would be changed in a way that would radically shift what our hands' works look like. Not only would more things on the earth be marked with timelessness and wisdom, but we would also probably be able to identify the work of Wisdom herself. "Who?" being the next important question in the wisdom series. 

Born Anew

 I'm not sure why, but the first weeks of living with a newborn are rarely documented it seems, and when asking those who have parented and now have grown kids they vaguely remember the first few weeks. We've had an incredibly easy baby, one that generally wants to eat every 2.5-4 hours, enjoys cuddles, has hiccups, and only really cries when she's hungry or wet.  After hearing stories of babies that would cry 18 hours a day for the first year of their lives, I wonder how we got this lucky. 

There are certain things we were very purposeful about doing in the early parts of the pregnancy, like talking to her as if she was there. We frequently read her stories from the bible, and addressed her by the name that we felt was hers. We would have a daily ritual where just before going to bed we would tell her about what the day was like, and talk about people we met, meals we had, what mom was up to, and what I was up to. Even though these things seemed mundane, there was often a positive response felt. I would ask her questions and feel with my spirit what she needed. Mom would rub her belly affectionately, especially when it started growing to the point of feeling the baby in the womb, and the kicks got more intense around the ribs. I frequently blessed her with what I felt were things Abba wanted me to bless her with, and other than that, just eating normally (except no onions), there weren't really any drastic things that took hours and hours of time. 

The labor wasn't easy when the time came. I tried to hold Evelinn's knee's for the contractions, but they started at around 9pm and went until 3am. I tapped out around 11pm when she got a small dose of morphine. Elizah Sophia was born at 3:15am, and when she came out we had to cut the umbilical cord fairly quickly because she didn't give her first cries. We took her into the next room while the medical staff took care of mom and the delivery of the placenta, and they rubbed her back with a towel and then baby cried. She then went to sleep soon after and slept pretty easily for the first day, and then had her first feeding sometime later. Now we're in the first couple of weeks of her life, and there are the poops, the pees, and the pukes. Other than that, she still sleeps the majority of the day. She started getting about 6 hours of non-stop sleep during the nights at the end of last week and has kept that pattern up. 

We haven't done a whole lot, and when she sleeps she spends a good majority of that time in her nest. So mom and I and a lot of downtimes just to spend chatting with people, watching tv, reading, writing this blog post, and a few other things. I think everybody hopes for an easy baby, and maybe they'll draw this up to luck. I think there's more to do with it than that.

Why, I wonder? - a representative of one

 When I was a kid we were taught the six 'W' questions to ask to get all the information for a paper. "What", "who", "when", "where", "why", and "how". Now, I enjoy these questions, and I would say that they are ordered from easiest to hardest to answer. Of course, there's a lot more one can say about each question, and great studies have been done about what each word really entails. However, I will be writing about 'Why?' here. This is a question that when put into a religious context, or even in the context of relating to God, I believe is rarely answered, or when it is answered - even correctly - the answer is almost always rejected or unseen. "Why did God allow the crusades?", "Why did God put me in a family where I'd be abused and rejected?", and "Why is He so judgmental in the Old Testament, and so merciful in the New Testament?" - to put a few of the questions that I've heard most often out there. Frankly, these questions are only truly relevant to our culture that has been programmed to hate war, condemn judgment, and celebrate victimization. 

Let me put the frame of Jeremiah onto this post, and lead you into seeing through the lenses of a common jew. We see Jeremiah, throughout the book, prophesying that God will utterly destroy Jerusalem. (34:2) Thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel; Go and speak to Zedekiah king of Judah, and tell him, Thus saith the LORD; Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire. Why was the Lord destroying Jerusalem? Well, Jeremiah knew this very well, but the Israelites were in utter denial. There were false prophets in almost every other chapter saying that there will be peace! It was partly because the people were putting their faith in the false prophet's words that there had to be destruction, and partly because they had been following idols since the times of Isaiah and all the way back to their time in Egypt (with a few exceptions). 

Jeremiah definitely had a few questions of his own (15:18) Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuseth to be healed? wilt thou be altogether unto me as a liar, and as waters that fail? He was confused and had very much been feeling the pain of abandonment from the Lord whom he was serving. Why though? Well, looking at it through the pattern of how God has dealt with people through history, He rarely judges just an individual, but instead deals with people as societies, and communities. Of course, there are generational curses because of certain private dealings, but for the most part, Jeremiah was caught in the crossfire. Better yet, God has purposed that Jeremiah would go through this pain with his own people. 

Being faithful to God doesn't protect us from pain. If anything, it increases the amount of pain that we will go through. We can take the perspective of the common jew and ask "will you always be lying to me?", but realize that God never promised to keep you from pain. He promised to give you His peace that surpasses all understanding. Only with that peace, and joy can we go through the pains of life fruitfully. 

Responsibility and Support - Authorities

 One might define 'Support' as "That which is willingly given outside of what one must." To be one who is a supporter only means to give a part of yourself outside of what you are responsible or obligated to. So what is one truly obligated to? If we were to suppose, for a moment, that obligations were easily defined, one might define an obligation as something that must be done which falls upon the responsibility of some person. However, even that definition carefully leaves out where an obligation comes from. What is the source of an obligation? Who has the right to assign obligations, and why should any obligations exist at all? 

Well, here are three sources one might receive an obligation from, that I have personal experience receiving obligation from. Our authority figures, our beliefs and feelings, and our systems.  Our leaders are most often the people who tell us what to do and just as often do we submit to them. However, in a society where we meet people on a daily basis, there are thousands of daily inputs telling us we "should". I got told the other day to have a piece of cake that I didn't want, and culturally it would be expected to "have the cake" because it's "polite" or "inoffensive." However, in a situation where we are working and our managers must meet a specific metric with their team consisting of you and me, there are certain commands that will be passed down which simply must be accomplished, and others that are intended to fix a certain behavior, or some other intended purpose according to what said manager sees fit. But what about those obligations that nobody talks about? 

If I were to tell you "one must take care of a baby" you would probably say "well duh." But is that an internal push to continue our progeny, or is it a cultural and systemic responsibility pushed onto us from the outside? Well, this is one of those situations where all three are very obvious factors. There's a reason that the saying is "it takes a tribe to raise a child." It takes systems, culture, parents, and the feeling of obligation. But how much of that obligation and responsibility really is legitimate? How much of it is pre-determined according to our own histories and personality, our culture, and our inner world? 

One must take care of an infant, or else the infant will fall into oblivion. One must train up their child in the way that they should go, else the child will fall into sin and be twisted by the thorns of iniquity. So is raising a child "supportive"? With the definition of support that I've given, it would almost never be supportive, because raising a child is one of those things that comes with the most obligations and responsibilities. Now if we were all responsible for raising our children in our community, why wouldn't we be responsible for our community itself? Suppose you walk by the guy who's obviously on drugs and all you can give him is a sneer? Or better yet, an ignorant straightforward look as they search for your eyes? What is your communal responsibility to that man? Well, it depends on your belief, my belief is that I owe that man nothing, but I want to support him by looking at him as if he's an actual human being who happens to be living on this earth with me. It is a deep desire of mine to support him with sustenance, but most of the time all I can offer is presence and attention. They are there, they belong somewhere, and they have a purpose. 

Spirit Blessing

 Spirit of Sweden, I call you forward in the name of Jesus of Nazareth. Spirit you have come from an ancient place and dwelt in this land for a very long time. You have seen the transformation of peoples, societies, laws, policies, kingdoms, nations, truth, and land. You, who dwell within the land that has changed its borders and area, its rulers and authorities, and its people and language. I bless you to see where you are today, and though there is much to grieve about, the people who have received from you believe they are doing the right thing. There have been reports of the people who live upon you that have been good. People whom they have ruled over have lived peaceably under their authority, and they got their unction from you. You are a peacemaker and reconciler, and gatherer of people. You have an immense capacity to allow people to feel comfortable in your presence. I bless you, spirit of the land of Sweden, to see that this capacity doesn't stop at allowance, but goes on to expand those that live and reside within you from a place of comfortably safe to a place of naham(נָחַם). A reversal of discomfort and trial by grief, and release from tribulation and toil by rest. You have the keys within you to open the doors of the hearts of men, to soften hardened hearts, and delight darkened souls. 

I bless you, in the name of Jesus, to carry out these things for all those that live within you, and those that you touch. 

Down to the nitty-gritty

If you've ever thought to yourself "man I really ought to find myself a foreign wife." I am writing this, having found a foreign wife, in the interest of preparing you for the road that lies ahead of you. Nobody did it for me. And I've made a lot of mistakes.

I met my wife while I was in France on a temporary residency carte de séjour(Sojourners card), and she came down to the South of France as a Swedish citizen. France is an EU country so she didn't have to deal with immigration whatsoever, however as I am an American citizen I had been dealing with the French immigration system for quite a while. Luckily I had help, and proof that I had been there for some time. We started dating in December, got married in late September. We decided to get married in a country that wasn't (legally)home to either of us, and so had to go through the proper legal steps in order to be allowed marriage. We had to work with our respective embassies, and the local authorities in order to pull it off... That, we thought, was tough. 

Fast forward a couple months, and we go to the states to visit my family. We learn that she can't stay for longer than 90 days and the U.S immigration system doesn't allow the ESTA (visa waiver program) to be extended. But we did our research and found that I could petition on her behalf for her to receive an immigrant visa (the I-130). So we filled out the application, - which took about two hours - and $545 later we find that average processing times for the immigrant visa ARE 3-5 YEARS. And that's just for the form to get in the hands of the case worker. Many people haven't seen their families for 10-12 years waiting for their petitions to go through. There are certain things that you can try to expedite this process, but as of writing this I haven't tried any of those things. So within the U.S Immigration laws, she's not allowed to be here more than 90 days, legally, and is expected to stay in her home country while I wait in the U.S for years hoping I'll get to see her one day. 

Strike. There must be a way around this? Or so we thought. We figured "well she could just stay here in a visitor visa while I work and we can make it that way!" So we decided to send her to Luxembourg to see if we could get an appointment for a B-2 visitor visa (DS160 application). She got the appointment, and all seemed to be going well... Until we find out that if she has intent to immigrate the USCIS will reject her visitor visa, and since we have the application on her behalf immigrant visa underway, she is unable to come to the states. Ok, so plan C, come back on an ESTA and figure it out from there? Oops, because her passport has a rejected mark on it, that too will get rejected. Meaning she's not even legally allowed to SET FOOT on American soil. Ok so now what? I guess I go to her.

Well, if you do marry a foreign citizen, try to be in the same legal jurisdiction from an immigration standpoint. (EU, Switzerland, or EEA countries for instance, or America, and its territories.) Or be prepared to have met your wife or husband, and that's about it for the first years of your marriage, especially if you plan on getting into America with them. Don't get scammed. Be good, and do things right. If I were to do this over again, I'd probably have started the immigrant visa the day we met, or never have submitted it at all and just had her get a visitor visa to get in, and while she's in renew that every year or so. Now we don't have that chance. We do have the chance to be in Europe, but until I get residency somewhere I can't make money there quite yet.

So there's that. Feel free to comment. And may God be with you!