Letters

“You’re Killing Her!”

 I had an interesting dream (aren't most dreams interesting?) recently.

Do you remember the battle of wits in The Princess Bride? My dream wasn't about that scene, but it referenced one line from it. This is that scene:

Vizzini: So it is down to you, and it is down to me. If you wish her dead, by all means, keep moving forward.
Dread Pirate Roberts: Let me explain...
Vizzini: There's nothing to explain. You're trying to kidnap what I have rightfully stolen.
Dread Pirate Roberts: Perhaps an arrangement can be reached?
Vizzini: There will be no arrangement, and you're killing her.

That's the line: Vizzini, holding the knife to the princess's throat, declares to the man who loves her, "You're killing her."

"You're killing her!" The villain blames the hero for the villain's own actions. That's a memorable scene in what is arguably the best movie ever made, but that scenario plays itself out over and over in the real world: the person doing good is blamed by the evildoers for the evil that he himself is doing. (I wonder if that ever happens in politics?)

God used that scene in a dream. It seemed that Father was calling out that lying spirit.  I was thankful.

And that's when Father spoke into the dream, and his mighty voice declared two things.

1.  A number of his kids have been falsely accused of what the devil has been doing. The accusations are lies. That's not who you are and you haven't done those things, the enemy has done them. Don't believe the lie.

2.  The enemy has had other lies, other lying spirits, deployed to protect the lie. Those are being disempowered and terminated as well. Some of them were very powerful, some very skilled with weaponry (I think of giants and swordsmen, of course.)

I believe that the lie that "You're killing her" is being exposed as a lie: those who are accusing others, more specifically, those who are accusing you, of doing evil will be exposed as liars, and they themselves will face consequences for that.

It's worth mentioning that if you've actually done the evil thing and it's just being exposed, then you don't qualify for this promise. There's a lot of real evil, even among the church, and much of it is being exposed these days, and God is not offering to keep sin hidden.

In addition, I believe that Father is revealing, and disempowering, other spirits who have been assigned against you to protect the lie that the accuser is making against you. He has made plans that would cover his lie, and if it were found out (as it is now), to cover his escape, but Father has already dealt with those lies as well.

So the exhortation is for us to pay attention. Specifically, we are called to stop paying our attention to the accusations against us, to let go of the fear that they are spewing at us, and to fix our eyes on the One who has already defeated them, who is now marching them off to captivity.

Look to your deliverer. Look to your King.

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Letters

The Bible Contains Lies. It Says So.

The Bible contains lies. It says so. 

Let me back up. I’ve just finished the book of Job. That’s a hard read, for me, anyway. The book has several sections: 

• Chapters 1&2: The Set Up. The conversations in Heaven between God and the devil (that Job never knows about!), and the resulting destruction of Job’s life.

• Chapters 3 – 31: Job arguing with his “friends,” Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. Mostly, Job is proclaiming his innocence and these three are telling him what God is like and why Job is wrong. 

• Chapters 32 – 37: The lecture from “Elihu son of Barakel the Buzite, of the family of Ram.” Mostly, he’s defending God. 

• Chapters 38 – 41: God speaks up. Essentially, “This is above your pay grade, Son,” but how beautifully he says it! 

• Chapter 42: Job repents, God chews out Eliphaz, Bildad & Zophar, God restores Job. 

The verse that stuck out to me most strongly this time was this:

"After the LORD had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has.” [Job 42:7]

And I realized that God just declared that much of Job 3 – Job 31 is “not the truth” about God. That means there are lies there! In the Bible! <Gasp!>

(He also declares that Job was telling the truth when he protested that he was innocent in his suffering.)

So God says at least 29 chapters of my Bible contain lies. That’s worth thinking about. 

Keep in mind that “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” [2 Timothy 3:16-17] 

So it’s “God-breathed.” Other translations read “given by inspiration of God or “breathed out by God.” But that doesn’t mean that every word is literally true or actually factual. It means that it’s inspired by God, motivated by God through the men who wrote the stuff down. It’s still profitable for teaching, rebuking & correcting, certainly.

But not every bit of Scripture is actually, factually correct, at least not these 29 chapters in Job. Don’t get me wrong: the Bible is telling the truth when it records the lies these yahoos are telling about God. But they are still lies, and they’re still in the Bible. 

I wonder if there are other places, passages that are also inspired by God, where Scripture (accurately) records people saying stupid things, untrue things? (And I won’t even get into the question of where God is speaking metaphorically or symbolically.) 

The Bible contains lies. It says so. 

So apparently, more skill is required when employing the Bible than merely swallowing everything whole. That’s kind of true for all of life, isn’t it?


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Letters

You’re Not Immune From That, You Know

I had just started my walk with father the other day, and I realized I was feeling kind of strange in my soul. I examined my heart for a bit and realized there was a sense of unworthiness there, a vague sense of uncleanness.

What better time to discover these issues, I thought, than walking with God? so I began, as has frequently been my practice, to search my soul with him, to unburden my soul, to find whatever was amiss and 'fess up and fix it. 

I had been going at the search for a little while when I paused and recognized that Father wasn't joining in it with me. It was like he was just standing back, leaning against a tree, arms crossed over his chest, waiting for me to notice him. 

I stopped my search for my dirty laundry and gave him my attention. 

"Son, do you remember the counsel you give people about not treating your emotions as always truthful?" 

"Yes...." I replied. "The feelings are real, but they may not be telling the truth." 

"Yeah. You're not immune from that, you know." 

And I realized that he was telling me that my feelings were lying to me, that I didn't have sin in my heart. What I had  was  an accuser  telling me, lying to me, about sin in my heart. Oops. 

We talked about it some more, about how hard I've had to work to get past that lie that says that God can't relate to people who sin. He reminded me that any time his kids sinned, he was always, always out there going after them. 

"Sin doesn't scare me, Son. But I think it scares you. And sometimes, just the Accuser whispering about sin scares my children off. 

"Come here, Son. Let me hug you."

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Faux Report

Sallie Mae Forced To Forgive Student Debt To Over 100 Million Students

saliiemae

WASHINGTON, D.C. – 

Sallie Mae, the leading scam group of vile assholes to whom more than 250 million people owe their lives and money to, is being forced by the United States government to forgive the debt of nearly 100 million current and former students, thanks to new laws passed by President Obama.

According to the White House press release, Sallie Mae will be forced to wipe the slate clean for nearly 100 million students, as it was found that the company used lies and deceitful tactics in securing loan repayments from people.

“I was told that if I paid $50, that I could have an extra six months to start payments, because I was out of school, but hadn’t started work yet,” said Mark Downs, a former student at UCLA. “I paid the $50, and then a month later I get calls from collection agencies. Sallie Mae had turned me over to outside headhunters to get their money. When I told them that Sallie Mae had said I’d have six more months, the rep for the new company said, ‘yeah, they tell that to everyone.'”

Those kinds of practices lead president Obama to work with congress to secure laws that would not allow for-profit companies like Sallie Mae to deal directly with students, causing most debt to be wiped away.

“This company, and several others, have lied people to and falsified information, and they deserve to be punished,” said President Obama in the press release. “We have worked extremely hard to make it so that people who have been hurt financially and emotionally by this company do not have to pay money that, in other circumstances, they would have been able to pay.”

There is currently no word on when or how the program will be put into effect.

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Faux Report

As Summer Nears, Children Ready To Play Hottest New Swimming Game, ‘Marco Rubio’

marco rubio

MIAMI, Florida – 

For years, a popular swimming game for children – or adults pretending to be children – has always been Marco Polo, where one child closes his eyes and yells out “Marco!” while other children scream “Polo!” in return. This year, though, a group of children in Miami have upped the game, swapping out Marco Polo for Marco Rubio.

“The game basically plays the same as Marco Polo always did, except now we scream back ‘Rubio!'” said Freddy Johnson, 9. “I don’t really know anything about politics, but my dad says that Marco Rubio is a huge joke, and that all he does is play games, so this is a fun way to include him in our playtime!”

Many parents are happy that their children are taking to the new, family-friendly game.

“After the huge fiasco that my family had trying to play Trump-Twister, this is so much easier,” said Mary Lambert, 43, and mother of 3 small boys. “With that game, you have to spin the wheel and whatever random lie or racial epithet pops up, that’s where you have to put your hand or feet. There are so many racist remarks, we all fell down into one giant pile almost right away. ‘Left hand…Mexicans are dirty! Ugh. Horrible game.”

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