DOES FOREWARNED MEAN FOREARMED?
This my work is more about seeking than finding; of that which was found only a little bit is truly certain; the rest, however, is marked as “problem to be found”. Augustine.
Augustine of Hippo, also known as Saint Augustine and in the Eastern Orthodox Church as Blessed Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa. He was born on November 13, 354 AD, and died August 28, 430 AD (age 75 years). According to Dr. Douglas Hall of McGill University, “he was perhaps the main architect of Western theology who, writing in Latin – as then all people did – wrote: Si comprehendis, non est Deus, (if you think you understand, it isn’t God you are talking about). “God remains the unknown one, even when God reveals Godself – no, especially then!”, writes Dr. Hall in his book, What Christianity is not.
Here is one of my educated guesses about the many unknowns in the Bible: In these last days, much that was pure guesswork, becomes plain when it actually happens. When there is a mention of ‘let the reader beware’, it often means that we can only grasp the mystery, when it knocks at the door.
Forewarned is forearmed?
This past week, close to Easter, I read Luke 18: They will mock him, insult him and spit on him; 33 they will flog him and kill him. On the third day he will rise again….The disciples did not understand any of this. Its meaning was hidden from them, and they did not know what he was talking about.
The mindset of the 12 disciples was fixed on ‘power’, on becoming important functionaries in the “Jesus” Empire, where victory over enemies was assured, where providing bread was no problem, as Jesus fed thousands of people, so Jesus’ words of his impending death fell flat.
Today is no different. Creation/God is speaking loud and clear that our increasing use of fossil fuels will kill creation, but we ignore the signs, and continue our rapid descent into the cosmic holocaust that awaits us.
Or take another one of Jesus’ sayings.
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. (John 10: 10).
This begs the question: ‘Who is the ‘thief’, and what is ‘life’?
My simple answer is: “We”. We, especially we, the latter-day earth-dwellers, especially we, the affluent Western folk: we are the thieves. ‘Life’ is living in tune with creation.
I sincerely believe with Psalm 24: The earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it. I also believe Psalm – 115: 16 – The highest heavens belong to the LORD, but the earth he has given to mankind. Yes, God gave to earth to us, not to exploit, but to enhance, to beautify, to improve, and make better.
He gave it to us to delight in its intricacy, be amazed at its coherence, where everything is connected to everything else, where the chemical air composition is just perfect, health-enhancing, where the waters covering 70 percent of the globe, always have the perfect temperature, just to give 2 examples.
But just as the disciples ignored Jesus’ repeated warnings that he had to suffer, had to die, would voluntary surrender himself to ultimate trauma and the most horrible death, we too ignore the increasing signs that God’s creation, leased to us under strict conditions of betterment and enhancement, will suffer the same fate of Christ, as Peter, the apostle, among many, wrote: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare”.
The above is the ultimate happening: total incineration. ARCTIC NEWS lately brings daily examples of situations how this can could play out. Up, way up North, in the Polar regions, where the shallow Arctic Ocean is rapidly warming, it threatens to melt the immense mass of METHANE accumulated there, one hundred times more lethal than the GHG – the Green House Gases – generated by our so adored automobiles. Here the prediction of the apostle Peter, is being implemented, but we refuse to believe it, just as the disciples did not absorb Jesus’ sayings.
Who says that the Bible is a mysterious book? As the theologian Karl Barth told us: Always read the news with an eye on the Bible, and always read the Bible with an eye on the news.
We have been warned. We ignore the warnings. We are forewarned, but refuse to be forearmed.