When many come and tell you, “The end is nigh!” and then ask you for money, know the end is not yet. When many come and claim, “I know the Lord’s mind!” and invoke a simpler time, and a simplistic morality, know that the Lord did not send them. When many come and tell you they are protectors of life, yet they ignore the beggar at their very feet, know that they know nothing of the religious good. These things must truly transpire before the Age of Gold is upon you, upon the world. Yet the Age of Gold is here, and it has always been here: in every act of kindness against the rules, the rebellion against the evil that was greater than them. It is not the end, for the end comes far from here, in what may be known as 40 days of mystic time. Truly, truly, it is quite the reverse, the beginning opposed to the end, and those reverse of love’s intent will not tell you that this is what is so, for they understand it not. Hearken and lo, the Beginning is near!
Tag: age of gold
God in the Age of Iron
The Black Iron Prison was the hidden architecture of what was called the Age of Iron. Which was what basically the Old Testament covered: the wrath of God, who was a jealous God. The Age of Gold is what Jesus Christ came to bring about: the God of mercy, the God who is love. One might well wonder, just exactly how is it that the first God is the same God as the second? There was one theory a friend of mine handed me, that when God came down to Earth and lived life as a man, He at that point understood the human condition, and sort of mellowed out. But aren’t we told that God does not change? How is it that the God who is love rained down fire and brimstone and obliterated Sodom and Gomorrah?
One idea that might lead us somewhere is the Book of Job. This is where God and Satan (the Satan who at that time seemed to be a minor functionary in His court) made a wager at the expense of Job. Satan, in stages, completely wrecks the man: kills all his children, breaks his bank, and even covers him in painful sores. At the end, when Job is at the end of his rope—complaining how it’s not fair—God shows up and asks him, where were you when I laid down the foundations of the world? Basically, oh, do you really know so much as to criticise Me? What one is careful to mark, however, was that at no time does He bring up Satan as the culprit of his pain. God takes all the credit for all that happens to Job, good and bad—telling him, I know better, I know why.
What if there are other “judgments of God” that aren’t actually Him, in just the same way? It’s an interesting take. He would have known about them all, but He had delegated certain authority to other entities, who were not “all love”, that did all the bad things we associate with that unforgiving Age of Iron… But we can investigate another avenue, which is to follow what Jesus Christ said about divorce. That Moses gave divorce to the people because of the hardness of their hearts. Down that simple road of thought, the trip leads to the stop that it was us that changed, not God. Something happened to change us, to change the whole equation of the world: and it was Jesus Christ. Not just what we observed on Earth, but a hidden act, within the sign of Jonah.
Harshness, in the Age of Iron, was the only way things got done. We were all in the Prison, which, indeed, was not the work of God. The Black Iron Prison was what the world in its entirety was contained within. We had to play by Prison rules. And if we were going to be like that, God was going to be hard on us—not the least reason of which was because we deserved it. Then, something amazing happened: Jesus who is Christ came here, and He broke the vicious feedback loop, and breached the Iron. And the breach was like the tiny mustard seed, which took and is taking 2000 years to blossom. For a thousand years is as a day to God, and the Christ was two days in the earth. The breach finally bubbled up to the top in 1974 in the resignation of Richard Nixon—a king deposed by tradesmen, without a drop of blood being shed. Hallelujah.
But now, as we are still left with much of the trappings of darkness, let us be ready to understand the world in a greater vision than was apportioned Job: the Iron was not of God. You can believe in a God who is all love, and that includes both mercy and justice. Many things He took credit for, and blame, many misunderstandings he patiently suffered until the time came as to remove from us the judging of God by man. Whether we be ready or not for the Age of Gold to come, it comes. In certain places it has come already, but not nearly enough. And some still work as if the Iron has not broken, but we know better. Light has already peeked in. Hearken: the Beginning is near.
The MACHINE
The MACHINE is a remnant of the Age of Iron, which has ended and is ending and will end. It is a face of Death, which is the Antichrist, who is the Son of Satan. It manifests most notably in human beings. You have seen it at work. Whenever one follows the rules without compassion for one’s fellow human being, when one does that, it is the MACHINE taking hold. That is its cold side. Its hot side is to resort to senseless violence. Sometimes the two go hand in hand, violence applied to enforce rules, feeding death at the expense of life. To fight against the machine is notoriously difficult; it is a narrow way. If you counter violence with violence, the MACHINE is halfway manifest in you. If you fight with cold logic, one could say the same of that.
The MACHINE is not alive, but surrounds itself with life to shield it from anything that would lead to its demise, or any dimishing of its power. It is perverse like that: pawns of life being used as shield for the king of death. There is no reasoning with it. But it may be defeated. It involves turning a zero sum game into a positive sum gain. Watch Christ fight it: when being nailed to the cross, he says, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Thus, what we need to combat the MACHINE: Logos, or holy Reason. Pray for the one who refused you service because of the rules. Forgive them without having received an apology, as if you had. Turn the other cheek. In all things, act with love.
It is not really proper to ask, “What would Jesus do?” He has an authority which is not of human beings. Instead, ask if a saint would do it. Everyone understands it and is a little disappointed that that is better than the Jesus question on what you should do. Because what a saint puts up with are all the mundane little annoying things, with a smile. That’s often harder, less glamor. Fighting the MACHINE is not some swordfight with flaming swords at the gates of paradise. It is, little by little, to make the world a better place. Hate cannot defeat hate. Risk something in order to show compassion, against the rules. Put yourself in harm’s way to protect the weak. Fear not: we have always already won. Fill up your own life with the telling of how exactly we did so.