#1976- Mirage Designs

"Our knowledge is a receding mirage in an expanding desert of ignorance" -Will Durant

           

            Grief is a long and complicated process, so is the deterioration and fall of a culture. This writer has never been in a Starbucks. I have never seen a Star Wars movie. BUT, I do have the common sense to identify the design of a mirage, and we are witnessing civilization on the brink of disaster.  

            This world traveler remembers standing at the harbor in Kolkata, India, near the great Queen Victoria Museum; where the barge from the Britannica first landed with King George and Queen Mary of England making their first appearance in the colonial India. The British Empire, at one time, occupied most of the civilized world. They did not do it by being nice. I saw their inhuman activity on every Continent. Their main ambition was to bring the wealth of the world to the British Isles (great art sculptures from the Parthenon, Greece, etc)... "The end justifies the means."

            America is now going through the same trauma, "divide and conquer." In my lifetime (87 years) I have seen, with ever increasing racial and economic hatred, the rich thrown in conflict with the poor. No one trusts one another any longer...family, associates, (long time friends), law enforcement (meant to protect), even professional medical groups....church members, and the hierarchy of any denomination.

            In the divine design of our creator, even the very words of the God-man Jesus, who put on a tent of flesh and dwelled among us...when told to "Love one another, even love our neighbor as ourselves" (Matthew 22, 34:40). Gods grace always does one of two things in every person's life. It either makes you angry, or makes you more a worshiper of him. We certainly know, and can grieve over the condition of the world...a world of angry people, just watch your news reports, (listen to the radio). The greatest question in life, whether rich or poor, smart or dumb, good health or disabled/poor health...is WHY ME?

      God's grace is the greatest incentive for concern about everything. His greatest gift, liberty....does the average human being, the only animal that can consciously think, and knows he's going to die, ever consider that his mind (his crowning glory above other animals) is in direct communication...a direct relationship with the creator of the Universe?.....who threw the stars into space; and, it was such a casual observation on his part. ‘He made the stars also …’ (Genesis 1:16)

It is amazing how long simple routines endure...how casual we treat the greatest knowledge that one can comprehend; and the church house, the school house, AND even at your own home. (your house). 

            Everything in war is improvisation. When will our military leaders learn that you cannot plan combat warfare ahead of time? When will American voters learn that you cannot trust the words of ANY politician, the words of any fake news commentary. The scourge of anger supposedly manifests in any area of the world. This world traveler has ventured every Continent. The anger is not there among normal/common people. We all just want the same things, God's greatest blessing...free will, coming from the gift of conscious thinking. The best way to deal with guilt is denial, and when these designs of mirage prove to be fake, then we will just have "excuses." Remember these words, "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." -Jim Elliot
            God's greatest creation, the human mind, it never ceases to amaze. In other articles, I have told about my hard work and making it through eight years of University education. I worked for a member of the Medical School staff, Ms. Annie. She and her three sisters lived in a beautiful home left to them by their parents (none had ever married). One morning, there was a stray puppy at the back door. They told their cook, "don't feed that dog, he will take up here." But of course, the cook fed the hungry dog, and he DID take up there; riding in the front seat of Ms. Annie's car, sleeping on their Persian rugs. The dog adopted a bad habit of chasing cars off Rosemary Street. They had to break him from this, he might get run over. So, I looked into a dog psychology book.

            So, Annie was driving the car down the street, her sister with a big pan of water in the back seat, to throw on the dog when he began chasing the car. Of course, the dog hearing the sound of Ms. Annie's car (that he recognized), immediately flung himself out into the street onto the car...ready to go for a ride. Annie, afraid she was going to hit "her" dog, slammed on brakes and her sister baptized the entire car with all the water from the pan that was meant for the dog.

            We must remember that God knew what he was doing...creating dog's with superior senses of smell and sound, bird-life with superior eyesight, cows and horses with superior digestive systems, fish with superior breathing systems, etc. We, as human beings, must cease trying to design a mirage, and rather, seize life as God prepared it for humanity.