You Don't Have Plenty of Time

Today at our church, the pastor told the famous allegory of "The Council of the Devils in Hell" as part of his sermon.

The allegory can be worded in any number of ways to either stretch out the story or to shorten it up, but in general it goes something like this:

Satan had learned of a large spiritual revival in a community, and so he convened a council of devils to determine the best step to derail this awakening.

Three devils spoke up with a plan. The first said "We'll simply whisper in their ear that there is no God."

Satan looked at him skeptically, saying that they would never believe it. "Too much beauty on Earth. They would simply look around at the mountains and sky, the seas and the forests, and know that He exists."

The second devil then spoke up: "We'll whisper in their ear that there is no Hell."

But again, Satan shook his head side to side: "Never buy it. They'll remember the most evil of men over time, and know that those men aren't going to heaven, that there must be a place of punishment."

The devils were becoming frustrated when a third blurted out: "Let's tell them they have plenty of time."

"That's it!" proclaimed Satan. "Go spread the word to all mankind."

This subtle yet powerful allegory should be a major warning to us all - none of us, no matter how young, healthy, happy, or successful knows how much time they actually have left in this life.

If it be God's will that I make it that long, I will turn 55 years of age just two weeks from today. 

Those years have been filled with the loss of friends, family, co-workers, neighbors, and celebrities of all ages, economic situations, and levels of health and illness.

Jesus' Example

In the Catholic Church, today is set aside as the "Commemoration of the Baptism of Our Lord Jesus Christ." On this day, readings and sermons remind us of that important event in Jesus' life.

He travels to the River Jordan, where his cousin, John the Baptist, has been doing the work of preparing the way for Christ's coming by proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.

John calls on people to repent of their sins, and to change their lives. He preaches that the hour is growing late, warning people to "Repent, for the kingdom of Heaven is close at hand." He then baptizes with ritual immersion in water as not just a sign that you are sorry, but as a whole change of life.

John has also been proclaiming that he himself is no one special, but that soon will come one greater than he, one who will baptize people not with water, but with fire and the Holy Spirit. It is Jesus about whom John speaks, and soon enough the day comes when his proclamations will turn to reality.

One day, while continuing his work of baptizing the usual array of sinners: ordinary folk, prostitutes, tax collectors, soldiers, and even clergy, suddenly Jesus appears in their midst, demanding to be baptized. John hesitates, saying that it is Jesus who should be baptizing him. But the Lord insists, and John proceeds with the ceremony.

At it's conclusion, as Jesus raises from the water, the sky parts, God's glory shines down upon the scene, and a dove descends, coming to rest on the Lord. God's voice is heard by all: "This is my Son, the Beloved; my favor rests on him."

Why did Jesus insist on his being baptized by John, when quite obviously as the Son of God, he could indeed have insisted just the opposite? His own words tell the story. In responding to John's incredulity, Jesus said: "Leave it like this for the time being; it is fitting that we should, in this way, do all that uprightness demands."

At What Price Your Soul?

We're all human. We're all weak. We all yield to sins of the flesh at one time or another in our lives. We all misplace our priorities from time to time.

Some of us live in a perpetual state of yielding to temptation. There are many among us who willingly commit sins, often the same ones over and over, and who believe that we have time to overcome these. We'll stop. We'll make amends. We'll confess, and do penance, and pray, and convert our lives. Just not yet. Not today. Not this moment. I need one more.

When we willfully and repeatedly engage in the same sin, over and over, in full knowledge that this is exactly what we are doing, then we have given over a portion of our lives to the devil. We may as well have sat down across a table from Satan and shook his hand over the deal.

There are many who call themselves Christians who on this very day are living a life of sin. They are carrying on an extra-marital affair, either cheating on their own spouse, or engaging in a relationship with someone who is married, or both. They are stealing from a business, social organization, charity, maybe even a church. They are selling drugs, or taking illicit drugs.

I don't think that I am over-stating things at all if I make the unverifiable claim that there are literally millions of alleged "Christians" across the globe committing these sins, and many others, on a regular basis. Maybe you have been in the past, maybe you are right at this moment, one of them.

If we do indeed truly believe that Jesus Christ is our personal savior, that he willingly gave up his life on a cross for the very sins that we are committing, then how long can we keep doing so without our conscience overwhelming us and giving us pause?

The Fall

Here on earth, it's the "Fall" season, and last night we were reminded of that fact with the now-annual modern rite of the "Fall Back" act of turning clocks back one hour in a return to standard time from daylight savings time.

But those are not what we're going to talk about here in reference to the Fall. We're going to take a look back at mankind's fall from grace, and even further back, to the fall from heaven which led to that one in Eden.

Most people are aware of the name "Lucifer", and in Christian tradition the name has been assigned to the principal angel with glory as bright as the morning star who led a revolt in heaven against God.

The term Lucifer should not, however, be understood to be a proper name of "the Devil" or "Satan", merely a reference to that state from which he has fallen, that place in the glory of heaven itself.

The devil is but one of what were originally angelic creatures created by God as spiritual beings in a state of innocence. They ultimately became evil as a result of their own willful act, and when this act saw them cast out in the first 'Fall from Heaven', they turned their gaze towards God's human creation, leading us to sin and to our own separation, or the 'Fall of Man' from paradise.

That first fall of the angels came when, as Isaiah told in reference to the King of Babylon in his own day, and as is applied originally to Lucifer "Thou said in thy heart: I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit in the mountain of the covenant, in the sides of the north, I will ascend above the height of the clouds, I will be like the most High."

The angel known as Lucifer led a rebellion of angels in heaven, seeking a place above God. The result was a war like none ever seen here on earth. As described in "Revelation" or the "Apocalypse": "there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon (Lucifer), and the dragon fought and his angels, and they prevailed not..."

The result of this rebellion, and the victory by Michael and the angels of heaven, was the 'Fall from Heaven' referred to earlier: "..neither was their place found anymore in heaven. And that great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, who seduces the whole world; and he was cast unto the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him."

Lucifer/Satan had ultimately committed the first sin of "pride", or the excessive love of one's own excellence. Through the love of his own worth, he attempted to withdraw himself from subjection to Almighty God. He was able to get the angels opposed to the Divine Incarnation to follow him.

These angels were jealous at the very thought of a lesser being, a human, being raised above them. That is how they saw Jesus, a man who would be raised above them.

It's Hard to Dance With a Devil On Your Back

Florence Welch awoke one morning after a particularly long, hard night of partying and drinking way too much. This particular morning-after found her body exhausted, her mind a scramble, and her soul depressed.

She wasn't particularly happy about what she could remember about that previous night. At the time she thought she was having a good time, but she didn't think about the consequences.

That is always going to be a problem, not realizing the fullness of the price that you are going to have to pay for the mistakes that you are willfully making right now in your life.

Florence Welch is a singer and a songwriter, and so the outlet that she chose to help her express and overcome her feelings that morning was to pen a song called "Shake It Out", one that she had her band, 'Florence and the Machine', set to music and video.

The bible tells us that Satan was an angel in God's heavenly army. The single most beautiful and magnificent angel, he was known as Lucifer, the angel of light. There was something about him that stood out, and it was noticed by other angels as well. His ego grew so large that he eventually believed that he could take God's place, and so he rebelled against God.

Of course, he could not win, but you could not tell him that. In the end he was banished from heaven for eternity, along with a third of the angels. They had chosen to follow Satan in his folly.

Cast down to earth, they looked about at God's creation knowing how important this world was to the Almighty. In particular, Satan saw the man and woman who were particularly beloved by God.

Adam and Eve had been created in God's own image, and they dwelt in a garden paradise without a care. They had no idea of the danger that was now approaching. They didn't even know of the concept of danger or fear. How could they possibly have been prepared for the devil?

'LOST' No More

In the single biggest plot-revealing episode, and one of the best overall, in the long and entertaining history of the TV show 'LOST', last night showed that the writers and producers have indeed taken it's huge audience on a worthy morality trip.

For those who do not watch the show, the references to the story line herein will be over your head, but you can still understand the direction this article will take. For those many who, like me, are already strongly addicted, you might even find yourself farther along than these thoughts will travel.

For the unwashed, 'LOST' is a program on the ABC network that is now running it's 6th and final highly-rated and award-winning season. It's story began with the crash of an airliner just off the coast of an island in the South Pacific, and the efforts of the survivors to, well, survive on that island in the aftermath of the crash. That has been even more difficult than it might sound.

It would take me forever to lead anyone who has not watched through the various characters and story lines, so I won't even try, but suffice it to say that there have always been a number of underlying mysteries to the plot line, not the least of which has been that the island has some type of mysterious, mystical quality to it. So what indeed is this island supposed to be, or represent?

There is also a character named Richard Alpert who, despite flashbacks to the island's past and flash forwards to it's future, always remains the same age whether the show is taking place in the present day, or in the 1950's, or in the 1970's, or a few years into the future. Who is Alpert, and how is it that he never ages?

There are a number of characters that have died during the course of the show's run, and yet somehow turn up either 'alive' again or as apparitions, appearing to various other characters at pivotal moments, often with important advice or messages. Who is really dead, who is alive, who is an apparition, who is really who they appear to be?

Even the main characters of the program such as Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Hurley, Locke, Sayid and more all seem to have multiple elements to their personal backgrounds and human characters that defy definition. Who are these people really? Why are they here on the island? What is their individual, specific role in the ultimate story line?

Most importantly perhaps has been that ultimate story line. What indeed is 'LOST' really all about? Early on it appeared to be a 'survivor' type program. Some people survived a plane crash and had to learn to live on a deserted island while hoping for a rescue. Then it became apparent that the island was in fact not deserted, and their survival became even more difficult and deadly as they banded together to overcome the new and ever more mysterious challenges.

But as the show has moved along and the story line has progressed through the years, the plot line has revealed that the program is, in fact, about something much bigger than a 'stranded on an island trying to survive' story. 'LOST', it turns out, is about the ultimate struggle of good against evil. And not in some generic idea sense, but in the very nature and origin of good and evil.

As was revealed last night (disclaimer alert for those fans who have not watched), the island actually represents the very 'cap' or wall that separates hell from the earth. The character Jacob is apparently a sort-of angelic 'protector' of the island who has been bestowed with power to keep the island safe. He is, however, not immortal and if Jacob were to be killed the island could cease to protect the earth from the evils of hell spilling out directly on to the earth.

That evil, of course, comes in it's most dramatic form from the devil. The shows 'Man in Black' who can take on the form of a 'Smoke Monster' and who has now taken on the form of the deceased character John Locke is in fact Satan himself. With Jacob out of the way, the devil is free to escape from the island and loose hell on earth.

The devil, unfortunately for him, cannot directly kill Jacob himself. He must get some human to step up and do it willingly. For centuries, Jacob has been luring men and women to the island via shipwreck and plane crash as a sort of test for humanity. He believes that men will ultimately prove to be of a 'good' nature, but appears thus far to have been disappointed. He begins to sense that one day soon, the devil may make good on his long-standing threat to "find a loophole", finally have Jacob killed, and make his escape from the island to earth.

This was the reason for the crash of Oceanic flight 815, the plane crash that brought most of the main characters to the island. Jacob had been scouting for years for someone to ultimately take his place should the devil actually succeed in having him killed. Jacob has ultimately found six candidates to replace him, and directed all of their lives towards the point that placed them on that doomed flight. All six are now on the island, though the actual successor has yet to be revealed, perhaps not even yet been actually and finally selected.

As was already seen in the show, perhaps the single most conflicted character in it's history, Benjamin Linus, is finally deceived by the devil to kill Jacob. At the current time, the devil is preparing to make his exit from the island. What might try to stand in his way ultimately, who will become a 'successor' to Jacob, and how that battle plays out will make up the rest of the story line, in all likelihood.

But the important point in all of this is that 'LOST' has come out of the closet. It recognizes publicly that there is indeed good and evil in the world. It recognizes that there is indeed a real place called hell, and a real devil that means real harm to the world. It recognizes that the only way to overcome that evil power is for good men to recognize those facts and to be willing to stand up and fight against it.

Richard Alpert was a man driven by complete love and devotion to his wife, a woman whom he lost in her youth before they could really even begin their lives together. At his lowest point, he was drawn to the island by Jacob, who touched him with the ability to live forever and bestowed on him the role of 'messenger' and 'guide' to those others who would be drawn to the island for their own test.

Alpert himself finds that after generations of service to Jacob, who promised him a pivotal role in some earthly epic, that with Jacob now dead his life appears to have been lived in vain. He believes that he has strived and worked all this time for no reason, and he abandons his faith and prepares to instead turn himself over to the devil, who he now believes may have the actual ultimate answers and truth.

It is at this low point in last night's episode that Richard is finally comforted by the soul and spirit of his deceased wife, through the translated words of the character Hugo 'Hurley' Reyes acting as an intermediary. Alpert appears to have been pulled back from the abyss, and last night left us with at least the impression that he would now refocus himself on his work towards ultimate good that Jacob assigned to him.

The show 'LOST' has never been simple, and there have been many opportunities to question the outlandishness of some of it's basic premises and plot lines. But as the last few seasons have wound down towards what should be a dramatic ultimate conclusion, most of those questions are indeed becoming answered.

'LOST' fans should no longer be lost. The show has clearly defined it's basic premise of good against evil. Both fans of the show and those who have never watched would be wise to understand that it's basic premise is indeed true. There is a devil, there is a hell, and he does want both to bring hell to earth and to capture your immortal soul for eternity.

It is a part of the job of every one of us during our lives here on earth to recognize that evil, to open ourselves to God's love for us, to embrace Jesus Christ as did Alpert and his wife, to love one another and find inspiration to go on in the most difficult of moments, and to overcome or at least to willingly fight against evil whenever we are faced with it. Like the direction that the show finally revealed last night, this will leave you lost no more.

NOTE: as always, the title of this article at the original www.mattveasey.com website is actually a link to further information on the topic. This time it links you to the official site for 'LOST' at which you can view all episodes, including last night's highlighted herein.

A Heart That Plots Wicked Schemes

On this Sunday morning we continue the discussion of Proverbs 6:16-19 in the Bible which lists those things which the Lord hates.

The fourth item in the list journeys deep into our hearts. Not our physical hearts, but those things which can be found at our very inner core - for each of us, the heart of the matter in all things that we consider in our lives.

Those whom the Lord hates in this item are plotters and schemers of sin. Those who plan to do someone else ill. Those who plan to take what is not theirs. Those who intentionally and with malice aforethought actually take the time to sit down and think about their sin and how to make it happen.

The man who sees a way to deceive his business partners of money, and then goes about the planning and execution of his embezzelment. A woman who feels the desire and sees an opportunity to steal the body and possibly even the heart of a man who is already married to another, and then begins to lay the bait for her seduction.

The first human schemes occurred way back in the beginning of man himself. Eve used her seductiveness to get Adam to take a bite of the apple, the very act of defiance of God's will that drove man from paradise. She knew they were different, man and woman, for God had made them that way on purpose in order that they might procreate and populate the earth.

Eve had been led into this plot by the whisperings of the great deceiver Satan, who had lied and manipulated her as only he can to pull man away from God. Eve knew that her feminine charms would be enough to coax Adam into the bite, and went about the task of using them for that very purpose.

A Lying Tongue

If you ask almost anyone to list the things that they hate, 'liars' will inevitably be near the top. A funny thing, since every single one of us has lied, and continue to lie at times.

Not always about big things, but often in small ways that involve both actual words that come from our mouths, or actions that we take or do not take. We do it in ways that we ourselves might not define as a 'lie' but that others most certainly would.

You see, most of us equate a lie with intent. As long as we did not actually intend to mislead someone maliciously then it wasn't really lying.

Maybe a 'mistake', or an 'exaggeration', or we were being 'nice' to someone by not hurting their feelings in telling them the cold, hard truth. Perhaps we were simply balancing two bad outcomes and deciding that by telling a 'little white lie' (in our minds) we would spare ourselves and possibly others a worse outcome than would occur by telling the truth.

Lying does not in actuality go to 'intent', instead being defined as an untrue or inaccurate statement that may or may not be believed true by the speaker. Call it whatever you want, defend it however you want - we are all liars.

It is probably one of the reasons that we hate liars so much. When we tell a lie ourselves we understand what we are doing at our very core. That guilt feeling is hard-wired into us as a part of our humanity.

The Temple of You

We've all done it from time to time, taken a good, hard, long look in the mirror. That isn't meant to be rhetorical. I mean actually looked at our visage as it is reflected back to us, our physical appearance.

The reactions to that visage spread out across a wide spectrum from "yeah, baby, I got it goin' on" to a panicked scream. People who don't like what they see have sometimes taken extreme measures to change their bodies, but this does not always change the reflection.

Some of these include turning to an eating disorder such as anorexia and bulimia, even plastic surgeries that are not for some medical necessity. Some decide they just want to forget or push away the image. They turn to the bottle or to drugs. Some need constant reinforcement of their worth, and in doing so turn to numerous sexual partners in an effort to constantly stroke their egos.

This isn't going to turn into one of those 'hell fire and brimstone' speeches against the evils of the flesh. God knows that I have fallen victim many a time in my own life. Taking control of some of these reactions to the reflection has taken me most of the 47 years that I have looked in the mirror.

But maybe it would have all clicked in a bit sooner, and maybe I would have control of my weight and its related concerns, if I had the experience that I had a few days ago at an earlier point.

In the past few days I have been re-exposed to an old, famous quotation, and had it more clearly expressed and explained, and I hope that this renewal finally changes my approach to this problem.

We have all likely heard the old saying "Your body is your temple", but how many of us have really ever thought much about the meaning behind that saying? The saying comes directly from the Bible.

End of Days?

Every once in awhile, I sit down to watch some TV, nothing special is on my agenda, and a show or movie catches my attention and ends up drawing me in to watch the whole thing.

That very thing happened yesterday with Arnold Schwarzenegger's 1999 apocalyptic themed movie "End of Days", which I watched on the 'Encore' movie network.

I grew up in the whole Schwarzenegger-Sylvester Stallone-Bruce Willis-Harrison Ford-Clint Eastwood era of movie watching. I simply enjoy watching these actors performances in most of their action adventures.

This group of actors has delivered more memorable one-liners than any collective group in the history of cinema. Their films have come during the era when special effects have allowed almost anything to happen and seem realistic.

The plot of "End of Days" finds Schwarzenegger portraying an ex-cop turned private security specialist. He is providing security along with his partner, played by Kevin Pollack, for a wealthy Wall Street financier played by Gabriel Byrne.

Problems begin when Byrne's character's body is taken over by Satan himself. It is the devil's goal to mate with a chosen human woman in the final hour before the end of the Millennium.

That chosen woman is played by the beautiful Robin Tunney. The film is also highlighted by one of the final appearances (the last in a major film) from veteran actor Rod Steiger.

As the rest of the world prepares to celebrate the coming of the year 2000, officials of the Church are trying to track down and stop the mating process of Satan and his chosen concubine. Per the story line, this would result in the birth of a child who will usher in a 'hell on earth' scenario.

Schwarzenegger's character is an unbelieving, pragmatic dupe whose own wife and daughter were brutally murdered a few years earlier. He has descended into a battle with alcoholism in the aftermath, and is now just moving through life using his particular 'skill set' to provide private security services.

He finally is forced to realize that in this case, he is providing those services for the Dark Prince himself. Thus begins his mission: to protect Tunney from becoming the devil's mate, something which she was apparently born to become.

God and Country

Of course it's purely a hypothetical question if you live in America or most any free nation, but if you simply had to make a choice, which would you choose: God, or country?

If you're someone who is among the tiny minority of Americans who doesn't believe in God to begin with, it's an easy question. And if you're one of those who loves God completely but has little faith or confidence in any government, then it's probably an easy choice for you as well.

But the vast majority of Americans would find this a difficult question with which to wrestle. Your first inclination would be to say something like "There's no way that would ever happen here in the U.S., so I don't even have to worry about it." Perhaps true.

When the United States of America publicly issued its Declaration of Independence on July 4th, 1776, the document began:

"When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them..." 

The Declaration goes on to famously state:

 "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." 

The document, written by Thomas Jefferson, was signed with affirment by him, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and leaders from all 13 original colonies. So the United States at its founding was a nation of believers.