Kingdom Come

We see the same process after Peter denied the Lord three times, then proved in changed behavior that he was truly one with him. 

“Jesus shewed himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberias…He saith the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest [publicly identify with] thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, [reminding him of the three denials] Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.

Jesus saith unto him…[You’ll have the chance to prove your words by your actions] Verily, verily, I say unto thee…when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands [in crucifixion exactly as you feared a few nights ago]…signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, Follow me.” (John 20-21)

Jesus’s notice to Peter of his destiny wasn’t a punishment for his past action, but a “redo” on his betrayal. This is the ultimate relationship restorer – shared experiences and identities.

Likewise, the Woman who denied God in search of personal empowerment was given the chance for a redo through shared experiences and identities.

The following verse is not unique to Jesus the Christ, but reflects Woman’s role as God’s Chosen One as well in every generation after generation.

“In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his Chosen One into the world, that we might live through him.

No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected / accomplished in us.” (I John 4:7-12)

There is a universal consensus on the importance that mothers – much more so than fathers – play in the development of their children. The relationship between a mother and her child profoundly influents the child’s emotional, mental, physical and social growth and development.

This comes at a tremendous personal cost to women, which many women steadfastly reject. “Women’s rights” demand freedom to kill unwanted babies in utero, and to pursue personal goals while farming out childcare to government agencies.

This comes at a tremendous cost to children. The psychosocial fact is acknowledged by secular agents that it is the mother’s provision of secure attachment from infancy, where children feel consistently loved and supported that is the essential foundation that predicts future emotional, mental, social, and cognitive outcomes.

I grew up in a large family where our domineering father could not tolerate attention being taken away from him. Our family was one hot mess. When I was an adult my mother sobbed out her guilt and regret to me for not standing up for us kids.

On the other end of the spectrum of attachment, one of the central themes in the famous slasher movie “Psycho” is Norman Bates’ intense attachment to his mother, leading him to adopt her persona, including and essentially her rejection of any other women in his life.

I knew a man who was married to a Mrs. Bates figure, who, like Norman, had utterly absorbed her mother’s rule rejecting any attachment to anyone else. She actually told me she refused to kiss him to prevent any progression of physical touch. My private name for her was Our Lady Of Perpetual Prepubescence. 

Her husband and his nephew they fostered were even worse hot messes, and I absolutely suspect that her death was not accidental.

Somewhere along the middle of the Attachment spectrum is the mother who endures sleepless nights walking a baby with colic, who gives up the best years of opportunity for professional advancement at work while prioritizing care of her children, who sacrifices intellectual and social stimulation for what seems endless repetitions of infantile songs and books, and once gaining some freedom when the child starts school repeats the worst parts of having and raising children all over again to create a family in which sibling rivalry dominates the baseline home chaos.

And then as adolescents these children are rude, rejecting Mom’s opinions and refusing to spend time with Mom at every opportunity, including moving out of the family home as soon as college or a job makes it possible. They marry and openly declare forsaking Mom, whose financial ability to support herself in old age has often been severely damaged by insufficient employment while raising her children and divorce, while divorced older men increase their wealth by no longer supporting a wife.

The rise of psychology, the introduction of mass-produced consumer goods, and the expansion of leisure time offered people new ways of forming their identity and presenting it to the world. In place of defining themselves through the cultivation of virtue, people’s hobbies, dress, and material possessions became the new means of defining and expressing the self… “The vision of self-sacrifice began to yield to that of self-realization,”

While advice manuals of the 19th century (and some of the early 20^th as well), emphasized what a man really was and did, the new advice manuals concentrated on what others thought he was and did…A great example of this is Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People from 1936. It focused on how to get people to like you and how to get others to perceive you well versus trying to improve your actual inner moral compass.

“Character is nature and nurture. It is nature cultured and disciplined, so that natural tendencies are brought under the sway of the moral motive…

Above all, [character] includes a choice, a settled habit or bent of will, so that it can be seen in its outcome in conduct…

The one quality most associated with character in the nineteenth century was self-mastery – the dominion of an individual over his impulses and desires, so that he was in control of them, and not the other way around. A man of self-mastery embodies the kingship of self-control and can direct his will and make his own choices, rather than being a slave to his base impulses.

Why don’t we see more self-control exhibited in Sons of God?

It’s a thoroughly uncomfortable way of life, full of rejection by people who are made uncomfortable by righteousness, self-sacrifice, and out-and-out suffering.

“all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.” (II Timothy 3:12)

“if ye suffer for righteousness’ sake, happy are ye: and be not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled…Having a good conscience; that, whereas they speak evil of you, as of evildoers, they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation in Christ….For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God.” (I Peter 2:19-23, 3:14-18)

David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfil all my will.” (Acts 13:22)

How is that? David who committed adultery and arranged the assassination of her husband to cover it up? Isn’t this on the order of Trump and the Epstein scandal?

The difference – and this is how all humans, being sinful, are saved from eternal death to eternal life.

“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (I John 1:8-9)

And the cleansing process absolutely includes suffering.

“because thou hast despised me…I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house.” (II Samuel 12:10-11)

1) First the inevitable blowback from the relationships we damaged with our self-centered behaviors.

2) Then the chastising of a loving Father bringing us to repentance,

3) And possibly most of all – the agony of our self-awareness of the harm we’ve caused once we’re in a righteous state of mind.

David lost prized sons because they modeled their own self-serving behaviors after their father’s, Amnon was assassinated by his younger half-brother Absalom for raping then discarding Absalom’s sister Tamar. Adonijah was executed by Solomon for failing to live up to the terms of his probation when he plotted a coup. Absalom was executed by David’s top general Joab for inciting civil war to usurp David’s throne, and yet David screamed, ” O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!” (II Samuel 18:33)

Can we not understand that as Jesus, son / likeness of David and son / likeness of God, writhed in agony under the whip and on the cross, that the Creator of every law of the universe also writhed in agony “O my son, my son!” wishing he could have changed that awful experience? 

“the child that Uriah’s wife bare unto David…was very sick. David therefore besought God for the child; and David fasted, and went in, and lay all night upon the earth…And it came to pass on the seventh day, that the child died.” (II Samuel 12:15-18)

David spent the rest of his reign in gut-wrenching suicidal grief over the loss of relationships and lives of four cherished sons.

And watches as each son upholds the most basic law of reality – transfer of life energy – and transforms into the image and likeness of his Father.

“in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared; Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered; (Hebrews 5:7-8)

Wait – is that Jesus or David?

Both, as they submit to death in accepting God’s righteous judgment and regeneration to eternal life.

Unfortunately, most people refuse to even consider taking personal responsibility for their sins of action and attitude.

You may have heard the term “shadow self” before. The idea therein is that good and evil reside in us all was introduced into our vernacular by Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung who described it as our immoral impulses, desires, and personal qualities that that we refuse to acknowledge.

We need a Seed of the Woman, someone human like us, to redeem us from our sin nature.

“They sung a new song, saying, Thou…wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.” (Revelation 5:9-10)

“For it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren / family,” (Hebrews 2:10-11)