The Drag The Rush The Road The Closet The Chapel My Sneakers

The past month or so running has been treated with a basic neglect. I have not accepted any genuine responsibility for engaging in the playful challenges that running has faithfully provided. I only find myself running to church (both literally and figuratively). The fourteen+ mile trek becomes the battleground for what consumes or errodes my peace, patience and consolation. It becomes a battle of will and a beating of my body into submission and then using it to work out  my salvation, figuring our how to be loving and kind.  Sin doesn't get thrown into some abyss lost to God, but rather I do think it gets washed over. Sin has a very long shelf life as it were and the misgivings of childhood and young adulthood remain steadfast reminders of how the old is always waiting on the new to give way. I will begin to commit to running again to decide that it is important for many reasons and that I am not healthier for my sporadic haphazord approach. I have not even freed my schedule  (insert laugh) I just replaced running time with more down time, loitering about the house or taxing the kids to and fro. There has been growth in the churching of me which is odd because I have been actively churched for years now. My home chapel is firmly established and I enjoy and look forward to my prayer time, as I do my running and more so. In my recent history, running was the temple for my prayer now I have a temple and chapel to prayer privately and more openly with my children. The prayer of Saint Ephraim has been weighing on my mind and I have been praying it daily. I hope this Lent I learn true patience and love.

Co dependence (a font of selfishness) evidence of resentment

The heresy of false piety a trap for all. Stop the vicious cycle of concete and self doubt. Stop people pleasing and trying so much. This requires a change in attitude, behavior and even venue (where and with whom you roam). Stop relying on the testimony of non-believers, doubters and of those who fail to understand and rely on personal convictions and your own testimony of who you are and how you will be. By holding on to anger or resentments you delude yourself into thinking that your anger is justified and that you are approaching the situation from a power position when in fact you are weakened and more vulnerable and most importantly not justified.

Codependence or people-pleasing is clearly demonstrates fear, insecurity and dependence. Looking to others to find value by finding some excuse to be with them is time consuming self serving and fails to ultimately improve self worth or self concept. Despite the efforts and the good works they remain fruitless because self worth and value has been set by performance based approval or an external rating system to determine value. These accolades and praise or secondary gains are without value.

When a co-dependent person stops the cycle of being half there is a retraining of those around them which takes place. The now independent and whole person re-teaches others how to treat them. There are two common reactions to this change the first is that some people will protest and ultimately leave the friendship. This is a kind of pruning and discarding of what is fruitless. There will also be those who are eager to embrace the new dynamic of the relationship now too being afforded the privilege of giving as well as receiving. The second change is an internal one self concept will dramatically improve as your confidence in your innate value is affirmed. It is the result of accepting and receiving from others and not feeling the need to contrive or control  the circumstance too much.

When you embrace the good and the abilities in others instead of being in crisis mode and processing difficulty a whole new way of being unfolds like a flower. It is the harvest. Remember that when you are dependent on helping others you oblige them to also remain impotent and half.
As with any new situation or task when stepping out of our comfort zone it raises all sorts of psycho-social resistance to the demand set before us. There is avoidance, regret and an increase in irritability and anxiety. Self-doubt or lack of trust in personal ability and fortitude will dissipate when as the risk increases so too does the rate of small successes. This pairing of adventure with acheivement is powerful and a practical approach to what ails us all. It is the short term objectives which reenforce achievement thereby confirming competence and increase self-confidence. We must be practiced and look for forums to practice what challenges us and stretches us beyond our comfort zone. By moving through the insecurity and unsure footing and crowing our efforts with success and achievement or progress the circle of comfort is increase and our skill set expanded.

An Oldie but Goodie with a Gender Twist

"A man was gossiping with his friend about a woman whom they hardly knew - I know none of you have ever done this. That night, he had a dream: a great hand appeared over his and pointed down on him. He was immediately seized with an overwhelming sense of guilt. The next day he went to confession. He got the old parish priest, Father O' Rourke, and he told him the whole thing. 'Is gossiping a sin?' he asked the old man. 'Was that God All Mighty's hand pointing down at me? Should I ask for your absolution? Father, have I done something wrong?' 'Yes,' Father O' Rourke answered him. 'Yes, you ignorant, badly-brought-up man. You have blamed false witness on your neighbor. You played fast and loose with his reputation, and you should be heartily ashamed.' So, the man said he was sorry, and asked for forgiveness. 'Not so fast,' says O' Rourke. 'I want you to go home, take a pillow upon your roof, cut it open with a knife, and return here to me.' So, the man went home: took a pillow off his bed, a knife from the drawer, went up the fire escape to his roof, and stabbed the pillow. Then he went back to the old parish priest as instructed. 'Did you cut the pillow with a knife?' he says. 'Yes, Father.' 'And what were the results?' 'Feathers,' he said. 'Feathers?' he repeated. 'Feathers; everywhere, Father.' 'Now I want you to go back and gather up every last feather that flew out onto the wind,' 'Well,' he said, 'it can't be done. I don't know where they went. The wind took them all over.' 'And that,' said Father O' Rourke, 'is gossip!'"

Rapture Modernday Heresy

By Anthony M. Coniaris
As I was driving one day I encountered a bumper sticker admonishing me: “WARNING! In the event of Rapture, this car will be driverless.”

The strange belief in the Rapture teaches that some day (sooner rather than later), without warning, born-again Christians will begin to float up from the freeway, abandoned vehicles careening wildly. There will be airliners in the sky suddenly with no one at the controls! Presumably, God is removing these favored ones from earth to spare them the tribulation of the Anti-Christ which the rest of us will have to endure.

Unfortunately the Rapture has been promoted widely by the Left Behind series of books that have sold over 70 million copies.

The Rapture represents a radical misinterpretation of Scripture. I remember watching “Sixty Minutes”a year ago and was appalled to hear the announcer say that “the Rapture is an unmistakenly Christian doctrine”. It is not!

It is a serious distortion of Scripture. It is astonishing that a belief so contrary to Scripture and the tradition of the Church could be propagated by so-called “Christians”.

According to the Bible and according to the belief not only of Orthodox Christians but also of the Roman Catholic and most Protestant mainline churches, the true Rapture will not be secret; it will be the great and very visible Second Coming of Jesus at the end of the world. That is the one and only “Rapture”. It will not be a separate, secret event but one that every eye shall see (1 Thess. 4:16-17).

The word rapture is not found in Scripture but hearkens to 1 Thess. 4:17 where St. Paul says that when the Lord comes again “we who are alive…shall be caught up…in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” This “being caught up…in the clouds”—arpagisometha in Greek, is translated by some as “raptured”. The word itself is not found in Orthodox theology.

The notion of a rapture in which Christ comes unseen to take believers away secretly, and only later comes back again for everyone else publicly—this whole teaching is quite novel. It was almost unheard of until John Nelson Darby formulated it in the 1800s as part of a new approach to the Bible, sometimes called “dispensationalism”.

The purpose of the “Rapture” is to protect the elect from the tribulations of the end times. Yet Jesus said nothing about sparing anyone from tribulation. In fact, He said, “In the world you have tribulation, but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world.” Nowhere did Jesus ever say that He would return secretly to rapture the elect. Rather, He promised to be with His elect in all tribulations. “Lo, I am with you always. I will never leave you or forsake you.” He even had something good to say about being persecuted: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:10).

Those who espouse the Rapture claim that Matthew 24:40-41 refers clearly to the rapture of the just, “Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left.” The entire passage, however, refers to Christ’s second coming where He will judge the living and the dead and separate the just from the unjust.

Darby taught as dogma that when the Scriptures reveal that the Lord will reign on earth for a thousand years (Rev. 20:4), this figure is to be taken literally, rather than as a symbol for eternity as we believe. The Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431 condemned as heresy this teaching which is calledchialiasmos (millenianism or 1000 years). In fact, the Seven Ecumenical Councils (325-787 A.D.) in which the essential truths of the Christian faith were defined never mention a rapture. Yet evangelical Christians and Pentecostals keep using obscure passages of the book of Revelation which purport to give a detailed timetable of what will happen at the end of the world, despite the fact that Jesus Himself warned that no man knows either the day or the hour when the Son of Man shall return.

A major problem with the Rapture is that it ends up teaching not two but three comings of Jesus—first His birth in Bethlehem; second, His secret coming to snatch away (rapture) the “born-again”; and third, His coming at the end of the world to judge the living and the dead and to reign in glory. Yet only two not three comings of Christ are mentioned in the Bible. We have the clearest definition of this in the Nicene Creed when we confess that “the Lord Jesus Christ…will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead. His Kingdom will have no end…. I expect the resurrection of the dead. And the life of the ages to come.” There is no mention of a “Rapture”.

As already stated, most Christians, Orthodox, Roman Catholics and Protestants do not believe in the Rapture. In fact, one Protestant pastor, John L. Gray, summarized magnificently what we Orthodox and most other Christians believe about the Rapture when he wrote these remarkable words,
Though many believe and teach this “Pre-Tribulation Rapture” theory, they erroneously do so, because neither Jesus, Paul, Peter, John, nor any of the other writers of the Bible taught this. Nor did the early church fathers, nor any others for many hundreds of years…. Did you know that NONE of this was ever taught prior to 1812, and that all forms of Pre-Tribulation Rapture teaching were developed since that date? …. If I were to preach something, or believe something, supposedly from the Bible, but cannot find that ANYONE ELSE before 1812 ever believed it or taught it, I would seriously question that it is based on the Bible.

Thus the Rapture is foreign to the Bible and to the living tradition of the Church. It is what we call a heresy, a false teaching. False teachings, such as this, happen when people—like John Darby—believe that they have the right to interpret the Scriptures individually apart from the Living Body of Christ—the Church—where the Spirit of Truth abides and leads us to all truth.

I can think of no better words to conclude than those of Jesus when He speaks of the one and only “Rapture”, the Second Coming:

“Be on guard. Be alert! You do not know when that time will come…keep watch…if he comes suddenly, do not let Him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: Watch!” (Mark 13:32-37).