"God is not waiting around to get even with people for things that they have done fifteen years before. God is gentle and humble of heart; unconditionally good and loving. Therefore we do not need to cower and grovel before God’s will. We need to trust in it; trust in its awesome beauty, its unconditional power to bring goodness out of seeming limitless diversity of so many people’s lives; trust in the affection that the Hebrew prophets termed hesed we emet— a parent’s love for a child.”
Robert J. Spitzer
"And because of the abundance of wickedness, the love of many will grow cold."
Matthew 24:12
"Caesar was swimming in blood. Rome and the whole pagan world was mad. But those who had had enough of transgression and madness, those who were trampled upon, those whose lives were misery and oppression, all the weighed down, all the sad, all the unfortunate, came to hear the wonderful tidings of God, who out of love for men had given Himself to be crucified and redeem their sins. When they found a God whom they could love, they had found that which the society of the time could not give any one— happiness and love."
Henryk Sienkiewicz, Quo Vadis: In the Time of Nero
Stocks were off to the races later in the day as John McCain suggested he could support the tax bill currently being debated.
It is so kind of Wall Street and the wealthy being enthusiastic for a 'middle class tax cut.' Not.
Notice that VIX continued to climb today.
Towards the abyss— step by step, inch by inch.
Gold and silver have gotten smacked around post option expiry as I had suggested that they might be.
Let me assure you of one thing. You are not going crazy, and the world has not been turned upside down. Like the last two bubble tops, in 2002 and 2008, things that don't make sense appear to be the norm, and what is proven and substantial seems but a vapor.
This is the objective of a control fraud, and quite a few other frauds in this world: to make one lose their bearings.
Earlier today with this calculated confusion in mind, I picked a the quotes above.
Together they show the joy of the good news. And love is its fulfillment.
To turn this joyful gift of peace into hatred, violence, greed, or harshness to others, and especially the least of these, is to sin against the gift of the Spirit, which is peace and love.
God is not a fool, nor vindictive, nor faithless. God is love, a love so great that He does not overwhelm us with it, out of respect and love for our free will to love Him or not.
To think of God as being in our own human terms and motives, merely more powerful, is to create a false idol that inevitably ends in resentfulness, anger, and despair.
As always, if you wish to test the message of those who would speak for Him, or if you examine your thoughts of these things, always look for the love in it. Love is the one thing that evil, in its selfish egoism, cannot abide. You may find everything else in there, from self-righteous indignation to stern and unyielding judgement the is blind to His redemption— but you will not find love.
And if you love the Lord, as He loves you, you cannot turn out of fear back to the despair of the darkness. For the price has been paid, and you have been freed to walk in the light. And He will be with you, as He has promised, until He leads you into His father's house.
And if He puts a suffering or a setback upon us as we and the world may see it, it is what we would wish for ourselves, if we were but wise, and understanding of His economy.
As I have mentioned before, I do not direct my writings to those who have given themselves over to Mammon. Try as we might, they are in God's hands now. We can remember them in our prayers, but their willing blindness is going to require more than logical arguments and moral appeals.
No, what is of more concern now at this time is the love of the faithful, which is at risk of growing cold given the increase in wickedness and the temptations to despair.
As C. S. Lewis noted in his famous correspondence of the devils,
The Screwtape Letters:
“Be not deceived, Wormwood, our cause is never more in jeopardy than when a human, no longer desiring but still intending to do our Enemy's [God's] will, looks round upon a universe in which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.”
Have a pleasant evening.
