My Car is Registered!!!!!!!!!
And, until I have actual experiences in schools and prisons, a little story about theology:
Everyone agreed it was a tragedy. At 6:45 pm, a bomb exploded at the hotel where the Summit of Christian leaders was held.. Five men were killed, respected leaders all: a Catholic Bishop, an Evangelical Pastor who specialized in End-Times, a Televangelist who followed the teachings of Calvin, a Liberal Christian writer and a Jehovah's witness who had somehow been invited. Why they had been murdered was soon determined by police. Why, in the deeper meaning of the word, this tragedy had happened was discussed for years to come. Perhaps Satan, fearing unity amongst his greatest foes, had goaded the bombers on. Perhaps there was no underlying reason, and things had just turned out this way because some people are psychos. Perhaps God, in his infinite Wisdom, had deemed it time to call them home. Or perhaps, he was simply sick of their bickering.
The five men's eyes slowly opened, or more accurately re-appeared, for their faces has been melted by the heat of the blast. When they saw again, however, their bodies were whole. The writer, whose hours hunched over a screen had not been kind to his vision, suddenly saw clearly, without glasses. They looked around in wonder. They stood on some surface- solid, by the feel of it, but it was unseen in the mist. The mist was thick below at ground level, but as you looked up it faded to a sky of brightest blue. Music, beautiful and bizarre, reached their ears, and a lovely smell- one that can not be described in words- reached their nostrils; or perhaps, their sense of smell itself had been heightened, like that of a wolf.
“Where are we?” the writer said. It was a simple enough question. They tried to think things through. A clap of sound, a flash of sudden light, unbearable heat- and then this. It was all very strange. For many moments, they stood and wondered.
“Heaven”, suggested the Calvinist. It was a good answer, he thought.
“Can't be”, the preacher scolded. “That can't possibly have been the rapture. We won't get to see heaven until the Second Coming of Christ.”
“Oh, you end-timers” scoffed the Calvinist. “You obsess about the obscure and disregard clear doctrine. Did not Jesus say 'today you will be in paradise with me'?”
“If we're in heaven, why is the Cultist here?”snapped the preacher, pointing at the Jehovah's witness, who was still a little stunned by the turn of events.
“A Jew of Jesus' time” offered the writer “would say we are in Sheol, the world of the dead, awaiting the final judgment..”
“At which time he-” the preacher pointed at the Witness again “will be cast into the :Lake of Fire!”
“What'd I do?” the man wanted to know.
“You rejected the free gift of Christ on the cross, you are not 'washed in the blood', you did not accept Jesus as your personal Saviour!”
“Yes, we ALL know that's how Jesus put it!” the Witness snarled back, dripping sarcasm. “How narrow can your mind get? Fool...”
“Watch it! Now you're really on the brink of hellfire!”
“If this is purgatory”, the priest wanted to know, “why is there no pain?”
“It's Sheol, not Purgatory! Purgatory is an invention of your church. You Catholics are all alike. Just wait until your share of plagues is added to you.”
The priest shook his head. “How you Protestants pretend to understand Scripture, while rejecting our Lord's explanations through the church will never cease to amaze me.”
“When I read, the Spirit tells me what it means!”
“The Spirit tells ME that you're an idiot!”
““You're a false teacher with a false gospel. Christ will tell you he never even knew you!”
The Calvinist chucked and shook his head. “Why God chose you lot before the beginning of the Earth I'll never know.”
That set off a whole new chorus of yells, which might have continued for ages of the ages, had not a pair of stronger, louder voices silenced them. There was shouting, load and raucous, but strangely joyous, mixed with the sound of cheering, grunting, and heavy thuds.They walked towards the sound, quiet and a little scared, and the backs of a multitude came into focus, standing in a ring, observing something in the center from which the shouting came.
“Father of many nations, is it? You'll soon see who your daddy is!
“You don't scare me, wait until I get a hold of your hair!”
“I killed thousands with a jawbone. You were scared of your brother!”
Squeezing themselves into the ring, overcome with curiosity, they saw two men, stripped to the waist. Both were wearing gloves, those small fighting gloves which protect your hand but don't pad your blows, as they rolled over and over on the ground, hitting and kicking and grappling, smiling all the while.
“You think you can take me? You could barely build an altar. I pulled down a temple.”
“You used the Lord's Spirit, that doesn't count. I wrestled against Him! Don't forget, I pinned the spirit of the Lord!”
“His angel...” muttered the preacher.
Apparently the hearing of the men was heavenly t0o, for the smaller one stopped- though his head was locked in a pair of monstrous arms- and tried to look up. “Let go for a sec, Samson... Sorry, what was that?”
“Don't you mean, you fought the ANGEL of the Lord? It said so in the Bible...”
“Oh, does it?” Jacob wasn't even breathing hard. Apparently fighting didn't make you tired in wherever-this-was. “the Bible didn't exist in my time, I haven't really read it. Guess I should though, wonder how I came off looking in there.”
“Never read the Bible?” all of them were aghast. “The Bible is the Word of God! His Revelation to Mankind! His one trusted source of Truth!”
“Oh, sorry, man.. Up here, it doesn't seem necessary.”
“You're telling me...” the preacher was still amazed... “that in four thousand years, you've never even bothered to look?”
He was a little sheepish. “To be honest, we keep pretty busy up here. Lately, we've been having a tournament of champions. Took me 3 weeks just to tap out David, you'd never guess how slick you get wrestling bears.”
“You know”, Samson put in, wiping a lock of hair from his face, “we've been getting a lot of Bible questions lately. Everyone who comes here talks about it. “
“Well, I'm sorry, God didn't give us lion-ripping power, he gave us his inspired Word!” more sarcasm. Samson just laughed. “Fair enough. I'll go see if Paul is busy. I understand he wrote the parts you guys read most.”
It took a while- or not, time didn't really exist for them- until Samson returned, bringing a man with him. This one didn't look like he would last long in the tournament of champions. He was short lean and slender like a runner, and his back was covered in scars. Each one shone a little, and you could tell he wore them proudly. He shook each of their hands in turn. “I'm Paul”, he said. “Pleased to meet you.”
“The APOSTLE Paul?”
He shrugged. “I suppose. What can I do for you guys?”
They had to think about it for a second. “Where are we?” asked the writer. It was, after all, the original question.
“In heaven, of course..”
“In the Kingdom of Heaven- you know, the one that starts on earth, or in Heaven Heaven, the new Jerusalem?”
“Do you SEE a new Jerusalem?” scoffed the end-times preacher.
Paul laughed. “John, John, John. I told him not to use those metaphors. People won't understand, I said. They take everything literally, I said. But no, John says, I just write down what I saw. Do you think I knew what the crazy creatures in Revelation stood for?”
The writer was used to being misquoted. “Poor guy.”
“Oh, I wouldn't feel too sorry for him”, Paul laughed. “You should have seen John tear into Matthew when he read his Gospel. 'How can you leave out the Entire salvation-through-faith part? You made it look like Jesus was all about good deeds! Heaven and hell based on feeding your neighbor, without a word about the prayer of salvation? John went on and on. Man, he's lucky Matt turned the other cheek!” Paul laughed. “All us Bible-writers get it sometimes. I get off easy, I think, I guess a “#1 Evangelist all-time” Crown of Righteousness makes people lay off a bit. Just James won't shut up. 'Don't forget works. You keep leaving out works. Faith without works is dead'.”
If they were aghast before, they were flabbergasted now. “You ARGUED? You guys disagreed?”
“Well, we were all inspired to God to write, but yeah, we all had our viewpoints, emphasised different things...”
The writer had been wondering for years. “Can you explain how the Bible was Inspired, please? I've always wondered. Did God dictate to you?”
“Of course he did, or the Bible would be just another book!”
“Inspired doesn't mean infallible!”
“Oh, wow, you really are a heathen!”
“Pull the log out of your own eye, buddy!”
“How about the other writers? Leviticus doesn't seem too special! And Song of Songs- are you kidding me, inspired erotica?”
“You ARE going to hell-” “I'm saved by faith, you dolt!” “You can lose your salvation, you know” “No, you can't” “Heresy, absolute heresy!”
Then they began to pepper Paul with questions.
“Did creation take place in 6 days?” “Is Evolution from Satan?” “Why were others punished for David's sins?” “Does hell have real flames?” “What's the unpardonable sin?” “Did you ever baptist infants?” “Why is gayness an abomination?” “Why couldn't the Jews eat pork?” “Does the rapture happen BEFORE or AFTER the millennium?” “Can women preach in church?” “What if they cover their heads?” “Why Must Catholics be so stupid?” “Is Jsus really the Saviour of ALL, or did you just kinda throw that in there?”
Paul sighed. A deep, heavy sigh. He raised his hands until they calmed down.
“I'll try my best to answer all your questions. Really, I will. But first, let me explain a few things.”
They were all ears. On earth, a Bible lesson from the Apostle Paul would have been a dream come true. What's more, they were all certain they would be proven right.
“In my time on Earth, I had many of the same problems you did. I was a Pharisee. An expert. I, too, struggled to understand my Scriptures. Songs of Songs? I didn't like that one much. Psalms? David praises the Lord for his protection in one, and cries out in fear the next. And the Prophets... ahh, yes, the Prophets. They were all over the place, stuff that happened lifetime, stuff fulfilled in Christ, stuff about the second coming. I knew the Prophets back-to-front, but I needed a voice from heaven to see they pointed to Jesus. Imagine that!”
“Of course, God gave me incredible knowledge afterwards, showed me the heavens and all that, taught me great mysteries so I could preach to the nations. That was my primary calling, after all. Those Books I wrote... letters, really... “Romans” to the church in Rome, “Corinthians” to those in Corinth, “Galatians”, ah yes, to those foolish Galatians. Still trying to do under their own power what God has already done. I was confident in my writing, of course, but I had no idea that God would use it shape our faith two thousand years later.”
He sighed again. “You guys realize that I wrote in Greek, right? We all have the gift of tongues now, of course, but if I gave you originals of my letters when you were still alive, you wouldn't understand a word. I tried- oh, wow, did a try- to put the unfathomable mysteries of God down in words people back then could understand. Frankly, I'm always amazed at how well you guys do now. Faith? Hope? Love? Eternity? Justice? Two thousand years of culture, two thousand years of evolving language, even those concepts don't mean quite what they used to in my time. If I was writing letters to the church in, say, New York, you bet I'd phrase things differently. I mean... how was I supposed to anticipate the Internet... man, would that have made my job easier. TV? Movies? Nuclear Bombs? Dating? Feminism? Hinduism? Liberalism? Even the Son was misunderstood, by His own friends, in His own time. What chance do I have?” He took a deep breath.
“I'm sorry, guys. You want Scripture? You want understanding? This is what I wrote: For now we see in a mirror, dimly, then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully.
