Lamar Howell's Weblog

“We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passion unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” John Adams in letters to his Son, 1798

Some people seem to think that the only way to break the power of so-called white privilege, the corruption of politics, and the greed of Wall Street is through social revolution. We must remind ourselves of France and Russia and where their revolutions took them.

But a social revolution without God’s laws restraining and guiding people is a recipe for chaos and cruelty. If people think that in order to build a new house they must burn the old one down, their thinking is flawed. Destruction cannot lead to success, and uncontrolled fire cannot generate useful power. Rage satisfies bloodlust only temporarily. Anger is not air in a balloon which escapes with a hissing sound and then lies limp; it is a generator fed by the gasoline of self-righteous ego, a monster continuously prowling for prey.

Revolution always has to be brought under control by reason and a greater and orderly lawful power. If not it becomes tyranny, and the people suffer under its iron low-lying cloud for long periods of time.

True revolution is in the heart, and it is through the one who rebelled against religious hypocrisy and held fast to God’s commands — Jesus Christ. He took the rage of us all.

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I think the greatest obstacle to current Western culture’s acceptance of Christianity is rooted in a deification of human rights. The cry for civil, human, universal rights is so loud and its stamp so indelible upon the Western psyche that any concept of the fallen nature of humankind, the need for salvation, the depravity of man, and other Biblical doctrines runs counter to that deification ideal. In the end, the so-called culture war not even about humanism versus Christianity; it is about being human itself. The exaltation of being human will always bring humans down rather than lift them up, which Christianity in fact promises. It eventually reduces humans to a level equal with animals, perhaps even plants or rocks. And, without a Creator who holds people accountable and who gives individuals a higher identity, anybody or anything can become dispensable on a whim. So, the gods of the Greeks and Romans (mirrored images of humans), eventually turn on each other, because the only thing that has any meaning is raw power, and the will (or gall) to project it.

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I’m water, 75 percent
Today I’m treading myself, trying to stay afloat
And I’m evaporating tears into heaven
and condensating to come down and try again
to be simply water
Alas, I’m steaming from an underground hot geyser of dark hurt or rage
and it’s coming to the surface of me in hisses and squirts of pain and relief
Now, I’m ice, skidding across myself with cold thin metal feeling-void blades
And I’m turning an shooting up shards of ice onto shocked onlookers and clueless gawkers
Yes, I’m water, 75 percent
But the quarter of me that is not
is holding back the dam, resisting the uncontrollable flood of emotion
Wishing away the growing clouds of nimbus and numbness
Playing it cool
Staying solid
Refusing to meltdown
Hardcore
Man of steel, no — flesh and brittle bone
Alone, misunderstood
I choose to join with the water
gushing from His side
Water and blood spray me whole.
Liquid, ice, and steam
The trinity of watery me

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