I know that my redeemer lives. This knowledge is born of my faith, and my faith comes from my personal spiritual experiences. My experiences are repeatable for myself: therefore, to me, they are scientific proof. To anyone else, they will mean nothing unless that anyone else has his own corresponding spiritual experiences.

Whoever searches for a reason for faith in external proofs is a fool that does not understand faith. What, would such a searcher have the same demands for evidence were someone to profess love for that person? Is not the unspeakable bond of the heart sufficient? If not, love can never be in the life of that person. And, since faith is love, so goes faith.

But open a heart to love, and it opens to faith. There are things about love for which I have no reasons, but only trust, and that trust is sufficient even if irrational. When I allow this irrational, unproven faith into my life, I find that my heart fills and then spills over with joy and love. When this faith guides my heart and my actions, I seek to do good and to serve others. Would I subject such goodness and service to withering doubts to drain my desire to do them? Or would I be better for it if I kept my faith, nurtured it, purified myself that my faith would become more perfect?

For this I know: were there nothing to have faith in, there would be no restraint on the soul. Our world groans under the oppression of the faithless, the sociopaths that will murder to get gain. Would we have no faith, no love, to keep their numbers from including the whole of the human race, descended into an orgy of shouting, murder, shrieking, and tortured lusts? For that is the logical conclusion of the logical elimination of faith and love – every man prospering according to his own strength, preying on others lest he himself become prey. There is no rational reason to be otherwise, save as part of some calculated evil that requires patience to unfold. I will mock any philosophy that purports a reason to avoid sociopathy if that philosophy does not make an appeal to the irrational.

And that irrational is the faith and love we rightly associate with the divine. It is that which elevates the soul and promises us, one and all, that observation of a higher law is justified. It is that which motivates sinners to change their hearts and minds and to desire no more to sin. It is that which consoles in time of grief, it is that which elevates in time of depression. It is the only thing that can save us.

I believe that Jesus made no cold calculation before he submitted to the awful trials of his atoning sacrifice. No, he made that decision with the warmth of faith and love. He did not know what was on the other side of that bitter cup when he assented to drink of it. He trusted that it was the right thing to do, because he had faith in the Father, whom he loved perfectly.

May I know a day of such perfect faith and love in my own life: that is my prayer.

Have I done all that I could have done?

That question haunts lives. That question leads to rash decisions to change everything. That question is the root of the life crisis, whenever it may happen. It is in resolving that question that we either find peace or our undoing.

Popular culture has given us a strange view of success, seeing it as an end in and of itself. The “happily every after” formulaic ending dismisses all future storms and trials and gives the erroneous impression that should one perform similar feats in one’s life, the same formulaic, dismissive ending awaits.

History, however, shows that there are no endings in a life, other than the actual ending of life. No amount of prior success can cause one to gloss candidly over a current struggle. Ronald Reagan attained fame as an actor and became a president beloved and revered by many – yet, he faced a battle with Alzheimer’s as his life drew to a close. A harsh, cold winter to close out a life that knew a brilliant summer and fall. Abraham Lincoln never gave up in his political struggles and became elected president – twice – and then his life ended in an agonizing day of pain following a fatal gunshot wound. Helen Keller learned how to communicate, a triumph for sure, but her struggle for workers’ rights goes largely ignored.

Success is all in how one chooses to measure success. There are the false standards of the world that only measure to a point and then ignore subsequent pains. Then there are standards we can choose in our own hearts. I prefer the latter.

So what standards do I select? Moral ones. If I can live my life and keep my soul intact, if I can shine it up after it’s taken some damages, if I can get clean and sober and stay clean and sober, then I am succeeding. If I can help other people, if I can be kind, if I can be a good person where I am, then I am a success.

What might have been different in my life? Lots of things. Would I be more successful by worldly standards with different choices? Certainly. Would I have been more successful by my own moral standards? No, and quite possibly I would have had need to jettison those moral standards in order to rationalize what I might have done to attain worldly success.

Successful lives, according to worldly standards, are typically a result of blind luck or criminal intent. Success from my standard can be found in finding joy in small moments and in being kind to people who won’t do anything for me in return. With the wrong view of life, it is possible to be completely bored with a fireworks show at the Eiffel Tower and with the right view, to be completely satisfied with watching an ant make his rounds.

I’ve seen no-talents fall blindly into success and geniuses forced to keep their day jobs. I’ve seen criminals praised for their business acumen and truly talented individuals completely ignored as they quietly heal lives. Asking what might have been indicates a yearning for the world and its fickle treasures. Being at peace with decisions made, even if those decisions could have been better, is the key to being at peace with one’s life, which I consider to be success.

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Changes are still possible in any life. But choose those changes carefully. Peace and happiness are more important than money and power. True success is intrinsic and the crisis of what might have been is resolved successfully in finding the peace of the just and charitable soul.

I have had moments in my life
That now are real and solid dreams
Moments of repeated stillness
The same breeze, differently flavored
The same leaves, differently colored
My eyes dreaming along with
The moment.
Heaven is made of the peace of
Those moments.

There are many things wrong in the world, all of them because of humans. It’s not even all the humans doing the things that make the world a harsh, unfair, imperfect place. Relatively few people are involved in the destruction of things for their own benefit: very few are involved in murdering the world and those who live in it for their gain. The rest of humanity is doing just fine, or would be doing just fine, were it not for the consumers and destroyers of the world.

There is no restriction on who will or will not be evil: men may choose for themselves if they will follow a path of self-sacrificing love or of prideful hate. There is a consequence in every choice, and those who choose evil will discover to their horror what an illusion they chased after. Wealth and power are illusions. There is no way we can truly own anything, although there are ways we can deprive others. There is no way we can have true power without love, although we can compel others with hate. In the world to come, we will have everything we need and want nothing more, so there will be no ownership. In the world to come, others will be glad to do anything we ask, and we will be glad to do the same for others, so there will be no power.

If there is power, it will be love, and not the power of the world. If there is ownership, it will be our own minds, souls, and the consequences of our choices which we cannot give away, ever, so there will be no ownership of the world. Those who cling to this world in this life will find it hard or even impossible to be loving, for clinging to the world is evil. It is the service of evil to demand everything for the self. Those who can let go of the world in this life will find it hard or even impossible to be hateful, for letting go of the world is love. It is the service of love to offer everything of the self unto others.

I do not want the wealth or power of this world. I want the love that is not of this world.

I am a Christian. That means I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that he made an intercession on behalf of humanity to allow them a path of salvation. As the Son of God, he could make an infinite atonement, while we as mortals can only make insufficient finite payments for the wrong we have done. Therefore, our return to where we came from is conditional not upon our own efforts, but our ability to satisfy the terms that Jesus laid down.

His terms are stated simply: we are to have faith in him and his sacrifice; we are to set aside actions and thoughts that do not show love to others or ourselves; we are to follow him; we are to endure to the end. There is no free ride at any point, just as there was no point in Jesus’ mortal existence that suddenly became easy for him. Faith demands of us that we accept unseen evidence and rely instead upon love to guide our beliefs. Setting aside the unloving actions involves arduous processes of repentance, which involve not just leaving behind those evils, but fending off repeated temptations to return to them. Following Jesus involves doing the work that he would do if he were here, and it is not the play of children, but the work of a loving brother, giving support to people that suffer alongside us. Enduring to the end is painful – avoiding the pain is not endurance. We cannot cheat any of those processes, if we want Jesus to be able to say to us that we have lived as he wished us to live.

But we have that faith to sustain us. God is love, and faith is an expression of that love, that trust, that belief that, yes, there is something unseen that is nevertheless there. Faith is an expression that that something unseen is calling to us, in words of tender, caring love, for us to return to that love from whence we came. That love is perfect and we must be ourselves perfect to return to it. As we live, we cannot avoid imperfections. We need a way to rid ourselves of those imperfections, and Jesus provides that way. He allows us to make imperfect payment for our sins, he allows us to attempt to repent and fail, so long as we continue to try to keep repenting. He encourages us to express our faith, our love, through the works that he would do. This is what is meant by “faith without works is dead.” Faith is an expression of love, and true love demands true action. I cannot tell my family that I love them and do nothing. Love requires that I help them, that I sacrifice for them, that I mourn with those who mourn, that I bear one another’s burdens.

My works are not a replacement for my repentance. Neither is my repentance a replacement for my works. Both are parts of the love I feel. Together, the two add up to measure my worthiness. Worthiness itself is not a negative judgment, but a measure of the peace in one’s soul. Lack of work and a pile of sins prevent us from feeling peace. We gain peace when we make sacrifices for others. We gain peace when we leave behind the things that keep us from loving others and ourselves, which are our sins. The more peace we feel in our hearts, the more worthy we are of the blessings of Jesus.

But Jesus does not ever want our lack of worthiness to keep us from turning to him and giving him a chance to bless our lives. He never wants our lack of worthiness to make us give up on starting to do the hard work of faith, repentance, commitment to his path, and enduring to the end.

That is why we start with faith, because faith is love. If we start with that faith, that love of God, we then accept that we can be loved, and that love can transform. Why does love conquer all? Because God is love. But true love is no magic wand or sprinkle of pixie dust: true love is hard-working, toiling, cheerfully sacrificing, and eternally enduring.

May we all increase the peace in our lives by helping others and leaving behind our sins. May we place our faith in Jesus, and let us allow him to show us what he can do for us when we give our lives over to him in trusting, loving faith.

Last night and the night before, I had dreams of things yet to come. The night before last, I was with all my family and we celebrated as we held and played with Jarom, who died in 2001 before he turned 3. But we were all there, together, and there was great joy. In my dream, I heard a voice say that even for just one day, such a gathering is a great blessing, but that it will one day be forever. I knew this to be true, and I woke up feeling wonderful. Last night, I dreamed that all my family was together and we were celebrating the wedding anniversary of my wife’s parents, who died many years ago. I knew her father before he passed and he was a wonderful man: I never knew her mother. Even so, both were there, and we were having a great occasion. I woke from that dream feeling wonderful, for it was another harbinger of the great millennial day to come.

It is not the first time I have dreamt of a thing to come: I have had dreams of a game I would one day play, a place I would one day work, and of a trip I would one day take. In each dream, I was taught that I can receive messages about things yet to come through my dreams. I do not claim to have a power all my own in that regard. I claim instead that these dreams are of divine origin, and they are sent in order to help me to proclaim good news to my family and friends.

For in those little dreams, I was prepared to receive the truth of bigger dreams. When I was 13, I had a very real vision of the woman who is now my wife of 28 years. I have had other interactions with the deceased in my dreams, and also with the yet-to-be-born, all in my family. The dead of my family do not haunt me: they send me messages of joy and comfort and of the good days without end that are yet to come. The dead of my family do not harm me: they give me help and strength. The dead of my family are still my family, and they will always be my family even if they will not always be dead.

Hundreds of years ago, an ancestor of mine had a dream of a day yet to come, when the truth of God would be restored upon the earth and that, through that truth, families would be restored. Such a restoration has come to pass, and the visions of this day now point to the fullest restoration of all. For after there is a restoration of truth, there comes a restoration of lives and then a restoration of loves. That is the resurrection. That is the dawning of the great millennial day to come.

I have had many dreams come true, and these all have a certain character to them. Without fail, dreams of that type are the ones to come true. When I have dreams of the same type of days yet to come, I know they will come to pass. I have no way to prove that to anyone else but to say that I have dreamed a dream, and it was wonderful. It was of a day I wish to greet with joy, and it is a reason to choose life over death, to choose to not smoke, to not drink, to not view pornography, to not sin. It is a reason to choose to study the scriptures, to pray often, to seek to stand in holy places, to become even as a little child.

Families can be together forever, and the gatherings will be holy, blessed, wonderful, and joyful. Seek always the truth that binds together with the greatest love and submit to that truth in order to receive its blessings. Be as a little child, and you will see your fathers and mothers before you as well as your children after you for all eternity. This is what becoming like God truly means: God has His family around him for all eternity, and to be in the same condition is to share in the inheritance of God. This I write in the name of the Son of God, who makes all this possible with his atoning sacrifice, Amen.

It finally arrived, and none too soon… I love fall rains and listening to sparse acoustic guqin or koto music. I like to smell the earth, as the microbes in the ground release their water-activated scents… are they giving thanks? Not in a scientific sense, no… but spiritually, the music tells me that there is a harmony involved, that in the harmony, there is a love, and where there is love, there is gratitude.

The plants, the soil, the rains, the winds, the clouds, the vines, the rocks, the insects, the worms, the mushrooms, the grasses, the birds, the squirrels, the bushes, the unity of all these things and more, such is life. Such is the stuff of life. And here, I take pleasure in the way it is all brought together in the world of the shower.

Periodically, the leaves bend to let the water fall closer to the earth. The leaves take a rest from eating sunlight to drink their fill from the water as it returns to the earth. And there is harmony, the likes of which it takes a great stillness to see.

I love the rain, because it causes me to pray without realizing it.

Last year, I started listening to Christmas music the day after Halloween. Truth be told, I received some rightly deserved criticism for slighting Thanksgiving in such a fashion. In my defense, there is not much music about Thanksgiving in an outright way like there is about Christmas. So, this year, I took on a challenge to find the music of Thanksgiving, and, in the process, find the Spirit of Thanksgiving, which I expected to be every bit as vital and life-affirming as the Spirit of Christmas, which I have grown to love over the years.

My journey started with Johnny Cash. He has two songs about Thanksgiving, and both brought warmth to my heart and tears to my eyes. Johnny Cash knew what it was like to be a tree shorn of its leaves, to not have much, but to be thankful for what it still had… to be thankful for intangible, spiritual things such as love and hope and peace.

There were the novelty songs about Thanksgiving, sure, just like Christmas, but not in as great a number. Thanksgiving is not a worldwide holiday. It is a holiday of the United States of America when we observe it in November. No one else is a co-celebrant with our nation on our day of Thanksgiving. It is a holiday of North America, with its climatologic particulars that bring a grey, drear weather to much of the nation for much of the month as the leaves fall to the ground after the brilliant, fiery beauty of October that is the equal of April’s grand blossoming. The harvest is in: there is no more planting or growing until springtime. Winter comes soon, and we must pass through its trials if we are to survive. The Pilgrims of old chose this time of year to offer thanks for their survival thus far and to look forward to their anticipated future in their New World, where, more than anywhere else they had been, they felt as if they were in God’s hands.

Eventually, I arrived upon this song: David Johansen singing “A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4axKHtMNKw

It’s my favorite rendition of the hymn/folk tune, however you want to see it. It is what Thanksgiving means to me: the sound stripped-down like the trees, leaving one with little to cover the truth beneath. The reflection on life’s essentials goes well with the coming starkness of the season. It provides fuel for the coming winter, a reminder that the light will come again to our lives.

I’ve discovered that often, autumn songs are used to sing about loss, breakups, or other misfortunes. But they can also be about digging deep into the soul to find that inner strength to carry on, knowing that things must yet still get worse before they can get better. They can be songs about brave dignity, simple victories, and lingering hopes that will one day bear fruit.

After all, the trees lose their leaves, but they are not dead. The animals burrow in the ground to hibernate, but they are not dead. The land and air turn colder and whiter, but they are not dead. Life goes on. Life perseveres. But, in order to do so, life must shed nearly all of its summer glory and return to its fundamentals.

What are we truly thankful for at Thanksgiving? A roof above our heads. Heat in the home. Food on the table. Family gathered together. We are thankful for a catalog of the essentials. Music that is bereft of ornamentation, with an honest voice and quiet accompaniment, that to me is a pure expression of the spirit of our American Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a time to look upon our essentials and to give thanks for their presence and for our own endurance.

Even if those essentials are present in our lives in a diminished capacity, they still remain. There is a way to be thankful, even if those essentials are all but eliminated in our lives. The fact that they are not totally gone means that we are not totally gone. The fact that they are not totally gone means that, though a rough and cruel winter may lie ahead, we will survive it, even barely survive it, but we survive it to find the springtime on the other side.

And that is what I hear in this song. I hear the Spirit of Thanksgiving.

Which is better, to live a life of ease or to live a life with hardship? I am convinced that the hardship is more important than the ease. While it is nice to have a break from a hard life, it is the hardships of mortality that we are here to experience and to learn from. We do not fully understand the importance of pain, sadness, loss, and death. We may have clues to their importance, but the full value is yet to be revealed to us.

Which leads me to the title, the trade-off between ease and hardship. The grand, Faustian bargain that we all face: do we choose to avoid hardship or to endure it? Do we escape to luxury, or do we make sacrifices? And by luxury, I don’t mean enjoying a few days off from one’s work. I mean a life in which there is little or no work. I know of few paths to luxury that do not involve a crime or great sin of some sort, and none that involve compassion for one’s fellow man. If we have compassion, we work – and work is hardship.

I know of men of great means that nevertheless devote themselves to long hours of service. They know that the hardships they endure on behalf of others are much more important than enjoying their riches. I know of men of little means that will use whatever they can get their hands on to get substances that will remove them from their hardships. I say those things to show that appearances do not always give a glimpse into the hearts of others. We have all kinds of people in the world.

The diversity in the world to come, however, will be limited. Heaven is not known for its broad spectrum of inhabitants. They tend to be people that undertook hardships and not those that escaped them. It is here on this earth, away from God and His perfection, that we are able to experience the deep lessons of mortality. These lessons, in turn, prepare us to return to God.

When we avoid the pain by running to the arms of pleasure, we do not do the things we are meant to do here and set ourselves up for a true hell – regret. After this life, we have memory of things unatoned for, and that is why I choose to work and endure other hardships. That is why I want to do the work of God here, so that I can do the work of God later on. Life here is not supposed to be heaven. If it were, then it would not be here, it would be in heaven.

Trading mortal experiences for a counterfeit of heaven is the great trade-off that we are offered. To accept is to live without pain. To reject that exchange is to life eternally without regret.

I love music to be happy to. I love music that speaks of a better day and a better way. I love music that lifts me up and shows me the way to go. That means I love this collection. I need to get more of The Staple Singers, that’s for sure.

Is it funk? Is it soul? Is it gospel? Is it rock? Does it matter? It’s definitely resonant of the seventies. Think Jackson 5, Sly and the Family Stone, the O’Jays… yeah, the good stuff. The music is fine stuff on its own, but the spirit behind it takes it all to a higher level. Make no mistake, there’s a message in this music, but it’s an open invitation to everyone that wants to be a brother or a sister to one another. To me, that’s the true spirit of Christ, and it’s something the world can always use more of.

Anyone that thinks choirs of angels singing would be boring beyond belief is obviously not taking into account that Pops Staples is in heaven right now. This stuff never gets old, and that’s important when you contemplate eternity.