Consume Product

Give this a listen, it's not even 3 minutes:

https://media.christogenea.org/videos/wmfinck/old-testament-vs-paganism-which-more-jewish

If you go back to my previous post on Jesus (the God-Man) and faith (loyalty) to Him, then you are naturally curious about what it is you are supposed to do. The answer is pretty obvious -- you do the things Jesus did, which is roughly live according to the ideal.

Of course, if you're a mere mortal like we all happen to be, you understand that living up to one's ideals is virtually impossible. And because of this fact, a lot of people simply give up on it and start talking about "do good enough" or taking 2nd place or settling for the less-than ideal.

And if you follow that logically, eventually you end up in a state where you are actually doing your worst. Your animal nature overcomes your higher nature, and you live worse than beasts, because while beasts exist in a lower level of existence, they lack the tools and the intellect to truly destroy their environment, whereas you do.

And thus humanity seems doomed forever to a downward spiral towards not just our own deaths, but the death of the entire planet, and if we ever figure out space travel, the death of the entire universe.

This is why the scriptures are full of calls to "repent!" If you're wondering what God might say to you today, it's likely "Repent! Repent! Repent!"

To expand upon what that means, let me spell it out for you:

* You are supposed to do / become X
* You did not
* So you probably gave up trying and now you are never going to achieve X
* Stop doing that to yourself! Keep trying to do / become X! Never give up!

This simple phrase "repent" contains all of that message for you.

Now, when you pick up a stick, you pick up both ends of the stick. If you repent, then the Lord has been clear that he will forgive you, completely. So if you have any shame or regret before God for what you've done in the past, you can fully eliminate all of that simply by repenting.

Since we are a stubborn and foolish people, we need reinforcement to help us truly grasp this concept, so I will try to put it in as plainly as possible.

Let's consider you set for yourself a goal to become strong. That's a very good thing. God wants you to be strong.

Now, if you don't do anything to become strong -- you are a loser and you will never get strong. **Don't do that!** Set some goals that will help you become strong.

So maybe you set a goal to wake up a little early and do some simple exercises, like, say, push-ups. But when morning comes, you hit the snooze button and you don't do any push-ups. **Don't do that!** When you set a goal, you actually have to do it! How do you fix that? You actually do the thing you planned to do! Don't delay! Just do it! Drop to the floor and do some push-ups right now. Set that alarm clock and wake up and do some more. Set your goals, achieve those goals, and keep going, and if you fail to meet a goal, correct course INSTANTLY and get back on track!

Now, you've been waking up a little early, you're doing push-ups, and at first you see some progress. Maybe you noticed your shoulders and neck are getting bigger, and certainly you've gained a little confidence and self-respect. But you realize you have a long way to go on the road to get stronger. If you just keep doing push-ups, you'll never get there. **So don't do that!** Keep learning about what it takes to get stronger, and keep adjusting your goals. Maybe you decide to go for a run three times a week, or you decide to start lifting free weights, or you want to join a fitness group in your community, or whatever it is. Keep adjusting your goals and keep learning more about how to achieve those goals!

This is what "repent" means. You figure out you lack something that God wants you to have. You set some goals to get that thing. You keep adjusting and learning and improving and you keep getting closer and closer to getting that thing. That's repenting. It's something you do all the time. You never stop. You just do it and do it some more.

The neat thing is, the way our bodies work, the way this world works, NO ONE REALLY CARES what you did in the past because the past is buried in the past. What matters is what you are doing RIGHT NOW and what you will become as time marches on.

If you're a pathetic loser of a human being, you'll always stay a pathetic loser unless you start making forward progress. And if you keep making forward progress, you won't be a pathetic loser for very long!

And conversely, if you've achieved wonderful things and become an amazing person, but you fail to consistently do those things to keep becoming an amazing person, you will gradually become a pathetic loser.

The past doesn't matter. Which way you face, what kind of progress you are making -- that's the most important thing!

On the topic of sin -- we Westerners have abstracted this concept away and incorporated some very weird ideas that don't come from the Bible. I recommend not thinking too hard about sin except that it is anything that keeps you from being perfect or whole like God is. In other words, there is an ideal, and not reaching that ideal is "sin". The point of Jesus is that even though we are not ideal, we can move towards becoming the ideal, and that is what we should be doing.

Don't get caught up too much in defining sin. Instead focus on the ideal, and move that direction. As a practical example of this, consider "becoming wealthy" as an ideal. Things that help you build real, inter-generational wealth are good. Things that do not are sin. So, cheating and lying and being dishonest with others is a sin -- you are not building relationships of trust and love with your neighbors and you're making people angry who may one day decide to destroy you out of malice. But if you are honest and generous and kind, people will gravitate towards you and you'll be able to find others who are similar, and together build a community where you all can help enrich each other through mutually beneficial arrangements.

So Repent! Repent right now! Stop holding back from the ideal! Make goals, keep those goals, and study and plan and keep doing that! When you get down, or side-tracked, or you lose your focus, or whatever else might come up -- get back on track as soon as possible!

Comment 1:

*"The people defending this guy and even acting as if this is some novel new 'chill dewd' that anon has invented are openly outing themselves as being the exact kind of person the anon is making fun of, while also displaying their mental inability to comprehend what the anon is making fun of him (and, by extension, them) for. The anon has been exposed to perhaps hundreds just like them, all of them the same, all of them lacking self-awareness of the generic mold they came from, and, as such, the anon knows them better than they know themselves.

Their default reaction is condescension, thinking that as long as they can get themselves to assume that they are morally and intellectually superior, that they have, in doing so, earned said superiority. And yet it is only in their ignorance of the truth of what anon is saying that they can find this self-superiority. They act as if Anon's statement has no substance, when in reality it is simply that they do not have the eyes to perceive it.

This man's life is based off of the learned imitation of impressions, and drive mainly for simple pleasures that can be easily repeated. He doesn't think about what things really are, but focuses on their outer appearances, and by extension the comfort these outward impressions provide. He is a shallow man, focusing on these impressions, and pre-packaged concepts delivered to him solely for his pleasure.
His life, internally and externally, is entirely derived from the tapestry of culture around him. He doesn't think outside of his lane or explore anything else. He grows into models made by whatever people, real or fictional, that he happens to have exposed to. He intellectually is a domesticated animal that eats whatever is put into its bowl, and never thinks, metaphorically speaking, about cuisine or spices, much less hunting for meat.
He is a standard-issue man with a standard-issue life desperately fetishizing both of those facts like it's a holy revelation. He drinks standard-issue booze and consumes standard-issue entertainment with his standard-issue friend group and has a vasectomy so he can indefinitely have the same probably-uninteresting sex with his girlfriend who is probably blonde, white, wears a bit of eyeliner and whose true love in life is Starbucks' pumpkin spice latte.
This man is pathetic because he has put no effort into defining himself, but rather into desperately chasing after conformity to whatever the zeitgeist deems right for him. He has no spine, but is, as an individual, molded effortlessly by the culture of the lowest common denominator, and has surrendered his internal personality thereto. He is nothing but what the world around him decides he is. And he is happy with that.
'Success' monetarily, or even in relationships means nothing without a functioning soul.
'Happiness' is worse than meaningless when it's found in a life so repugnant as this."*

Comment 2:

*"Basically, the issue is he's trying to be too 'archetypical' of a kind of archetype that has no inherent value--'sitcom city man', 'nerd', 'semi-responsible adult'--and has little to no identity of his own or apparent thoughts in life.

His interests are also whatever mainstream culture or circumstance has pushed in front of him, IPA because everyone drinks IPA, Richard & Mortimer because everyone knows that's the cool nerbdy show, arcade games because that's what he always wanted to blow an endless supply of quarters on as a kid, etc. This reflects the larger issue of the fact that he isn't consciously living his life, he's just existing as another cog, not just in 'the machine' as a vague concept, but in culture as someone who picks stuff up and regurgitates it, because they have have little to no self-determination and are probably not that smart, or if they are then they turn off their brain for everything except what they know is appreciated, like work and such.

You might not see it as morally objectionable, but it's not really about morals so much as distaste.

Think of it this way: If you genuinely find someone physically ugly, you'll treat them well if you're an alright person but you'll still internally recoil to some degree. That is what the recognition of them as ugly is. You deny to yourself that you think of them as ugly, because you think it's the same as putting them down as a person, but their perceived ugliness undeniably exists in your head, you just don't intentionally let it affect your view of them as an individual--if you're an alright person. Having personal standards for appearance isn't cruel, treating people cruelly is.

However, if you were to draw an ugly caricature of someone, you'd draw them looking how you internally define 'ugliness'. This means that there is inherently a subjective preference that exists in you that is not based in morals, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Now, if that's the case, if people can have this kind of preference for appearance alone and not be immoral, as I believe they can, then there can certainly be this for personality. This is one such case. There is a kind of person that many find ugly in terms of personality. Just like caricatures employ many physical features that are commonly disliked, this post is a caricature comprised of numerous features of personality that are despised, in order to derive humor from contempt at the sum of these specific characteristics alone. Not because they're bad, but because they're disgusting. They're disgusting, and everyone has a right to disgust, even when they can't manufacture a moral reason for it."*

Seems like all the places I usually go to are getting kiked. Or maybe I'm becoming more of a purist.