Terrible joke alert (but one of the oldest jokes I can remember so): Two guys are driving to California. They run over a squirrel, possum, armadillo, etc… Then they run over a hitchhiker. One turns to the other, “hey Philippe, I think we’re getting closer to California. I heard that hitchhiker say something about Sunny Beaches.”
Human nature is funny and a little depressing. In a different life I’d love to be a sociologists and psychologists, but for this life I will content myself on spelling them correctly and being able to tell them apart (usually).
Friday I took my kids to the YMCA to go swimming. My children are becoming water spiders and having a great time this summer playing, swimming and burning off the tops of their noses (sunburns). At the Y in Arlington they have a new swim director who has instituted a set of draconian laws regarding children and swimming. Don’t get me wrong, I think pools should be safe and that its important for children to learn how to swim. But the new rules are enforced so inconsistently and arbitrarily that it has left my kids upset on a number of occasions and myself wandering when Mr. Scrooge became a swim director. One day my kids pass the swim test, the next they don’t. One day they are on top of the world, the next they are cordoned off in the shallow end (which is 1/5 of the total pool size) with 60% of the pool’s occupants.
I guess what really annoys me about this fiefdom that has been created on this sandless beach (hence the title) is that the life guards don’t bother to actually teach the kids how to swim, they just tell them that what they are doing is wrong. Then they go about socializing, twirling their whistles and stopping occasionally to yell “stop running!!!” at a random kid. Okay, the kid is my son Gabe and he was running a lot but…
On a related note (in my mind – though no one else may make the connection) I watched a show last night about what the earth will look like in 25 million years. You know the type of science shows on Discovery or National Geographic that you watch and don’t understand every third word but it makes you think you’re smart so you keep watching. Anyway, so I’m watching this show and my brain is thinking “wow, these college teachers are smart, so smart, yet they’ve all bought into a bad assumption.”
Second bad joke alert: The president, a pastor, Michael Jackson, a boyscout and the smartest man in the world are on a plane. The plane’s going to crash. There are only four parachutes. The President and Michael Jackson both take one and jump (this joke was funnier before MJ died), then the smartest man in the world takes one and jumps. The pastor turns to the boyscout and says, “you take the last one son, you have your whole life ahead of you.” The boyscout responds “don’t worry father, there are two parachutes left, the smartest man in the world just took my knapsack.”
It seems to me that everyone wants their kingdom to be in order regardless of the cost. They know who the king is, who the good guys are, who the bad guys are, what “truth” is and what the lies are that their enemies tell. They then build their whole lives around these assumptions or preconceived ideas. But what happens when these assumptions turn out to be false and their whole lives turn upside down in a moment? What happens when the truth you built your life upon turns out to be a knapsack full of Hardy Boys novels and vienna sausage?
I mentioned last month about my idea about oil and Noah’s flood. I don’t know enough to be dogmatic about much, but I am dogmatic about the fact that others are too dogmatic. It seems most scientists and educators never even question the “millions of years” age of the earth. As I’m watching this show (and later another show on Super Tsunamis) it keeps popping into my head that what they are talking about could just as easily (if not easilier – sic) be explained by a massive flood. Scientists even have a term for a cataclystic event that killed most of life on earth. They call it “The Great Dying”. But if you were to approach them with Noah’s Flood most would laugh and say, “Well, we KNOW that this happened 250 million years ago so go away … [you crazy Creationist]”
I guess my question is “really?” How do we know? Can we be sure? Have you ever actually tested it and proven to yourself or have you taken someone else’s word for it? What do you do with all the information that doesn’t fit into your well constructed edifice?
I went through a decade long period from my late teens to my late 20’s where I really examined my beliefs. I struggled with the Trinity, with Faith, with the Supernatural, with the Goodness of God (especially in regards to Heaven & Hell) and with Calvinism and Hobbism (did Waterson voluntarily retire, or was forced to quit by The Man?). Testing ones beliefs is a good thing. A great thing and after coming through this period I realized something quite profound, being color blind is a bad thing.
A song by Michael W. Smith growing up went “why can’t we be colored blind?” The song was kinda catchy and its message a good one (accepting other races, nationalities, differences…) but the problem to me was that if you were color blind then all you’d see would be black and white. And isn’t that what the song was preaching against?
For awhile (yes I’m throwing a lot of dots at you that I will try to connect momentarily) I wished I was a prophet. I admired people who saw life in stark contrast. People like Keith Green, Steve Camp, David Wilkerson, Bill Gates … oh, wait, wrong list, he goes on my next list (hint: homophone).
But I always saw the areas of gray. I couldn’t be so definite. I had this nasty habit of seeing arguments from multiple sides. I became what I most despised a d… (no, I didn’t become a Democrat, but if I had would that have been so wrong?) No, I became diplomatic. I saw the many shades of gray that seperated the white from the black. Then I heard a prophet say that the kingdom of darkness goes all the way from dark to the very edge of pure light. Any gray was “giving place to the enemy.” So some of the people I grew up under, who had a lot of great things to say I must add, drew the conclusion that we must reject all compromise and live separate / pure lives. Much later in life, the inverse of that thought also hit me. God’s kindgom goes all the way to the other extreme as well. The real battle is fought in the fields of gray.
So these Christian prophets made their assumptions. They knew what the truth was. They knew who the bad guys were. They knew they were right and anyone who disagreed with them was wrong. So they instituted their biblically based life principles into a draconian set of rules that demanded outward conformity. A conformity that was external without regard for the heart and emotions of those left crying in the shallow end. They also never questioned the rightness of their assumptions.
Ironically, the biblical admonition of a prophet is that he/she is right 100% of the time. If they were to err, they were to be stoned. I haven’t witnessed a modern day prophet yet that wasn’t wrong a few times, and when they are, they want some gray / grace. So they demand right or wrong, black or white, but when they err they want gray or grace. In my mind the word that pops up is hippopatomus… oops, wrong page.
What I think I’m trying to say in this quickly crumbling castle is; Dude! My kids want to swim. Don’t be such a hard***. Give them a break. If your rules are so important, then teach the kids to reach them. Creating a rigid system to fulfill some deep seated insecurity is pathetic. And have you tested to see if your system even works? Or do you just assume it is? If so, then why are all the kids in the shallow end? I don’t mean to be coming in a like a flood, but maybe you’re wrong. I believe that the guards, prophets and teachers are there for safety but if they’re not down in the real world, then they quickly become the despots of their own sandless, joyless and misguided failed kingdoms.
Sorry, my bad, I got so sidetracked by the YMCA fiasco I forgot how I was going to tie this article back to Evolutionary scientists and Christian prophets. Shoot I missed it, I guess we can kiss that wave goodbye.
Speak Your Mind