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Fragmented Hideouts and the Rising Spirit

© John Erickson



The Gifts of the Spirit bring to us an increase in awareness of God, our *own* spirit, and - an increase in responsibility. "Discerning the spirits" is a foundational theme of the Bible and other spiritual writings, and the process can find us in the midst of a wildly volatile storm, in which we're tempted to change "doctrines" every ten days! But with time, a broader view emerges, one that shows us that our original understanding was not so far off, it only needed a few flecks of illumination.

For thou wilt light my candle: the LORD my God will enlighten my darkness. (Psalm 18:28)




Fragmented Hideouts and the Rising Spirit

Empty fragments of the ego scream
"We're real - we hurt - we need"

Nature whispers, "what is it you need?"

The fragments respond: "that which you denied us long ago."

A voluminous yet subtle wind whispered, "All you had need of was yours, save for your failure to reach."

My spirit rises from my core; my energy propels my consciousness beyond my fears.
"Don't feed the ego," my inner eye warns, "the fragments fuel their lusts from the rising spirit."

I consider. Hadn't the fragments arisen from starvation of spirit during ego's growth?

"Certainly," consciousness responded. "But their now-corrupted forms will misdirect the energy toward the dark. You must guide them with the knowledge they were denied in the ignorance of youth."

One step closer. The horizon gleamed an additional lumen with new understanding.

One's spirit must rise if we are to be whole.
We must deprive man's artificial constructs from leaving us orphaned from nature, from spirit, from life.

Do not fear the dark.
Observe it from the vantage point of light.
As enlightenment filters through, let your rising spirit nourish your being.

The fragments will mend, morphing one step closer to their intended design.


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The "Spirit of the Law" and Bible Inerrancy


© John Erickson



"The word is not the concept".

This is especially true of the Word of God. The bible is written in such a way that the believer is required to reach out beyond his comfortable "natural-world" comprehension and force his spirit into a state of faith. This then energizes the believer to see beyond his natural limitations and thus comprehend God (and his message) more completely.

The bible isn't written in textbook form. We need to grasp the "spirit of the law vs. the letter of the law." But what does this actually mean?

Just as we regard the bible to be inspired by God,  the reader must likewise be inspired by the Holy Spirit in order to understand it.  Often this is just a word of revelation whose relevance is known only to the reader.

The bible is tasked with changing the reader's spiritual and mental state over into the "intangible" realm of "faith". It is not simply a text which passes on knowledge to us in the manner of a history book, but it is  a catalytic agent which interacts with our mental comprehension in such a way as to make it aware of our spirit.  From here we can move forward in a condition of faith, in which  the "spirit" of the words is made clear to our spirit. 

For this festival of epiphanous comprehension to take place, the reader must be motivated enough to seek out an answer rather than simply dismiss a passage as being somehow "erroneous" or a violation of the rules of grammar.

"Inerrancy" pertains to the concept behind the words. The literacy of the various books is influenced by too many disparate factors for it to be consistently "inerrant" in its conveyance of natural detail. Evolutions in linguistic form over the time periods involved, differing languages and the peculiarities of communicative style and comprehension of the individual writers have produced a text that is mysterious on the outside yet intimate and empowering on the "inside".

These "eccentricities" of style drive the earnest seeker closer to a spiritual state within which the concept becomes clear. A purely intellectual study of the bible could never lead us beyond the limits of this finite physical existence.

 Each "oddity" allows the message to address the varied psychological and spiritual states of individual believers.  The entire bible isn't meant to be understood by the entire body of believers - just the word that pertains to one believer's situation at any given time. "Scholarly" studies of the bible can only catalogue details. They can never reveal the inerrant perfection which lay underneath.

Only one's spirit can comprehend that.


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Communing With Daybreak


Life overlaps eternity
The green of nature imperfectly restraining a luminous fuel for the soul
A revelatory whisper
Heard in the isolated life-stations which ambush us spontaneously as we traverse the landscape
Speaking to us of life's worthiness
in a wordless articulation which remains with the beholder.



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Solve for "x"

© John Erickson


The best situations in life are the one's that take a different turn than is expected. Man's attempts to control life, nature, the economy, prevent war... don't often succeed unless  some oddball event massages the process  — and "somehow" things work out.

If we acknowledge the substantiality of the spiritual world and its connection to us personally — if we can "get" God (grasp the "way" in which he exists) — we can then begin to make sense of  the unpredictable interventions that make the rest of this "puzzle" come together:  the illogical pulse.

When we only study the physical world, we're inclined to conclude there's no spiritual existence, no "divine" being. We cannot see it.  We know there is energy.  But — if we can't see it — if it hasn't yet been discovered — we're given to insist on its non‑existence....More...


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