Triplex

1. He for WHO?

2. Payback

3. Holy Suicide!

# 1

Suppose somewhere in Europe there was an early medieval castle with a large box of all-gold coins with Roman inscriptions engraved on each one, along with a note in Latin, stating (using English-worded translation):

These gold coins
noncirculated from Caesar's mint in Rome
are to only be used to pay off any debts
of one son within my future lineage
exactly 1500 years from now
.

Knowing that gold used to be $35 an ounce or so, and now is at least $700 an ounce, that cache of gold would amount to quite a payoff for any debt or debts incurred nowadays.

What direct relation, however, did the one who paid the debt have with the one who used the coins to pay off his present debts? Blood lineage? Yes.

Some people contemplate and question how the death on a cross of a foreign-language-speaking carpenter's son who lived nearly two thousand years ago in a remote location on this planet could possibly "absolve" anyone's "sins" here in 2008 America, or in Scandinavia, Africa, Russia, China, or wherever people are.

There seems to be a serious association problem, indeed!

First of all, of course, the "absolved" has to consider that occasional socially-risque slips of accidental or misinformed, nonintentional mistakes in ANY way comprise the religious-sounding word: sin.

True, "sin" is a word in the dictionary and used in the lyrics of some popular songs, in copious amounts of human literature and in the broadcast media, but use of that word evokes not only embarrassing shame, sorrow, and humiliating regret....but even vengeful retaliation and retribution for acts that go beyond mere nitpicky rules and regulations of "illegality" (whatever that is or is said to be).

In any case, if it wasn't for The HOLY BIBLE, sin would not even have been thought of nor named as such, although the previously mentioned concepts of shame, sorrow, humiliating regret, vengeful retaliation and retribution might probably still exist - but only under those particular names alone.

Now, does one need to take the HOLY BIBLE seriously? In other words, can - then should - one safely disregard and ignore it? How long can a sensible person continue questioning or doubting some or most of the contents of Scripture? Frankly, every time one makes a "morality"-related decision and behaves in accord with or contrary to that, is he or she not obviously behaving either in accord with some directive within that Bible or against some doctrine within that same Bible? Perpetual fence-sitting is practically impossible, though attempts have earnestly been made, but always ending in clear-cut failure.

Although there are indications of bizarre natural coincidences resulting in the survival of Scripture and related Judeo-Christian entities for not only 2000 years but all the way back to recorded history described in the book of Genesis, direct purported eyewitness proof of seemingly-supernatural occurrences is not available, in terms of non-special-effects photographic and videotaped hard-copy verification and substantiation. The scribblings of "Scripture" on well-worn parchment manuscripts of claimed "antiquity" can certainly be debated over, and themselves do not emanate a spooky and mysterious "ark-of-the-covenant" hocus-pocus proof of glowing-and rising-flame, genie-in-a-bottle, Pandora's-Box veracity.

With such evidences absent, utterances of "belief," rock-solid "knowledge" and "assurance" of alleged happenings described in Scripture are declared as if-not-laughable at least phenomenal assumptions of "faith."

The unusualness of some strange events recorded in the Bible is no basis for disbelieving them. Most of us have never seen what formed the huge crater in Arizona, so we only speculate about that. Moreover, arrogant and belligerant blatterings of disbelief from onesself based on one's own or someone else's prejudice, ignorance, or misrepresentational misinformation are in no way proofs against intriguing miraculous happenings found within Scripture.

By pure but not gullibly-naiive common-sense deduction, it should be clear to the sane that there at least was a "God" (if you do not mind me calling such Entity of Omnicient Power and Wisdom that religious label), which "God" created all perceivable entities around us within our environment. It is also logical to the rational that that "God" was obviously greater than what "He" created not only in terms of His power and wisdom but especially "His" continuing existence, both before He created whatever He did, and after He created such. Furthermore, IF that Creator God is presently and intimately involved with us now in the new millennium, does He not realize that such a search-to-find mechanism (of humans seeking to discover around them His nameless and nearly-proofless invisibility and our limited perception of "the supernatural") has severe and lamentable consequences? Contemporary environmental stimuli - much more exciting and captivating than source-questioned words within the Sacred 66 - along with what we can presently see, hear, smell, and feel.....are much more persuasive to us, which our frequently-errant thinking and frail-motivation acting against the admonitions of Holy Writ clearly corresponds to.

Which leads us into the initial topic of how anyone can possibly assume (and not presume) that a Jewish man's death (among a hideously-attired peasant community of radio-free and non-televised grounded-and-not-airborne people speaking the foreign languages of Roman Latin, classical Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic dialogues nearly 2000 years within Israel of the Middle East - dinging around with pathetically-primative non-motorized donkeys and their non-plasticized, non-computerized, non-pasteurized, non-refrigerated cargo) atone for anyone's "sins" to justify his or her ultimate entrance into "everlasting Heaven?"

Such genuine and workable absolvement could ONLY occur if that bloody Jesus who hung and died on that Roman torture tree was in some way one and the same with the previously-mentioned Creator God who obviously created all inanimate objects within His created universe, especially upon that infinitesmal speck called Earth.......and all animate lifeforms, which of originating-and-surviving-necessity from-the-start were fully-adult, completely-functional, having all necessary-to-operate non-partial-punctuated-assemblage/non-"evolutionary" non-evolving parts working simultaneously together in nearly-incredibly-intricate coordination and cooperation.....only and always reproducing "after their own kinds" from human to human or jackass to jackass, but not human to jackass nor jackass to human, or as better put in Job 11:12 ("But a stupid man will get understanding, when a wild ass's colt is born a man").

Christian churches with Christian Bibles are myriad which perpetuate the Scriptures (not the "heresy" nor the "myth") stating that Jesus actually was and still is "the Son of God," and thus part of the Holy Trinity (ala First John 5:7 = "For there are three who bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit, and these Three are One").

A plethoria of indications irrefutably establishing such Divine Equality abound in the Bible, such as:

Ps 102:25 = Of old You did lay the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands.
Isa 9:6 = For to us a child [Jesus] is born, to us a son [of God and of man] is given; and the [worldwide] government will be upon His shoulder, and His name will be called "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."
Zec 12:1 = An Oracle: The word of the LORD concerning Israel: Thus says the LORD, who stretched out the heavens and founded the earth and formed the spirit of man within him:
Joh 8:58 = Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM."
Joh 10:30 = [Jesus said:] "I and the Father are One."
Heb 1:8 = But of [Jesus] the Son, [God the Almighty Father] says: "Your throne, God, is for ever; the righteous scepter is the scepter of Your kingdom [and not queendom].
Heb 1:10 = And: "You, Lord, did found the earth in the beginning, and the heavens are the work of Your hands....."

More proof of Christ Jesus the Messiah and Lord being part of the Sacred Triune and thus now-interactive-with-present-day-humans Godhead is found in Colossians chapter 1 of the New Testament:

11 May you be strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy,
12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.
13 He has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son,
14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation;
16 for in Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities--all things were created through Him and for Him.
17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.
18 He is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in everything He might be pre-eminent.
19 For in Him all the fulness of God was pleased to dwell,
20 and through Him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of His cross.
21 And you, who once were estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil works,
22 He has now reconciled in His body of flesh by His death, in order to present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before Him,
23 provided that you continue in the faith, stable and continuous, not shifting from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which has been preached to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.

The following part of the New-Testament book of Romans plainly proves the universality of not only the existence of a Creator God intimately interacting with us, but a Creator God who Himself has seamlessly integrated Himself with us pertaining to sin, justification, atonement, and righteousness leading to whatever never-ending [eternal] destinies there will be of all individual humans:

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel: it is the power of God for salvation to every one who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written, "He who through faith is righteous shall live."
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who by their wickedness suppress the truth.
19 For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
20 Ever since the creation of the world His invisible nature, namely, His eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse;
21 for although they knew God they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened.
22 Claiming to be wise, they became fools,
23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves,
25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen.
26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural,
27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in their own persons the due penalty for their error.
28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct.
29 They were filled with all manner of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity, they are gossips,
30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,
31 foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.

It should begin to dawn on even the most densely-ignorant but open-mindedly and genuine scientific evaluator not simply that but also how the death of the sinless Father's Son of God merged with sinful Mary's Son of man became and yet is THE for-ALL-humanoids, absolutely-perfect, one-time, ONCE-for-all sacrificial expiation against all their "sins" (as Scripture terms them).

C'mon now, DOES such an ancient far-away crucifixion and resurrection of That Most-Holy One who purportedly ascended slowly into the clouds NASA-rocket-style and therefore not visibly around anymore have an actual and authentic present-day effect on us personally and presently here in America and elsewhere globally? We read the following in Hebrews chapter 10:

1 For since the [papal-edict, humanly-connived-creed, liturgical and ritualistic] law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same [eucharistic] sacrifices which are continually offered year after year, make perfect those who draw near.
2 Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered? If the worshipers had once been cleansed, they would no longer have any consciousness of sin.
3 But in these [nitpicky and legalistic, nonpredictably-changeable, ecclesiastically-concocted] sacrifices there is a reminder of sin year after year.
4 For it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats [and sporadic polluted acts of self-righteous self-justifying good works] should take away sins.
5 Consequently, when Christ came into the world, He said, "Sacrifices and offerings [of humans boasting atonement-substitution claims of "accepting Jesus as their personal Savior," "believing that Jesus died on the cross for their sins," faith without works, works with or without faith, etc.] You have not desired, but a body have You prepared for Me;
6 in burnt offerings and sin offerings You have taken no pleasure.
7 Then I said, 'Wow, I have come to do Your will, God,' as it is written of Me in the roll of the book."
8 When He said above, "You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings" (these are offered according to the law),
9 then he added, "Wow, I have come to do Your will." He abolishes the first in order to establish the second.
10 And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.
11 And every [catholic, anglican, lutheran, baptist, and whatever else] priest stands daily at his [ritualistic sing-song] service, offering repeatedly the same [churchy] sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
12 But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God,
13 then to wait until His enemies be made a stool for His feet.
14 For by a single offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.

In view of the above, IS it realistic to presume that some Jewish temple will soon be built in Jerusalem in which animal sacrifices of temporary imperfection, reminiscent of Old Testament Torah-elaborated practices, will restart and resume? With or without skullcap beanies or papal or archbishop dunce caps shamefully donned while praying to G-d, contrary to clear instruction contained within First Corinthians chapter 11 verses 1 through 16 about a male human not praying to God with his head covered? And should dependable previous declaration of only the foot and not feet of congregational males and not females desiring footwashing in mixed-gender congregational view on Maunday Thursdays be initially and consistently communicated? Applicable is the Jeremiah 2:25 prohibition of: "Keep your feet from being unshod, and your throat from thirst. But you have said, 'No! I have loved strangers, and after them I will go.'"

# 2

Let's say that you in your starship encounter a not-necessarily-evolved nude male-and-female humanoid couple on a Class M habitable planet in the galaxy, tempting you to violate the Prime Directive of Non-Interference With An Emerging Culture, according to Official Protocol of the Federation of Planets.

Ignoring Federation protocol, you place upon the planet in close proximity of the naked couple a Talking-Serpent Tempter along with a Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil as potential stumbling blocks against the two in-the-buff lifeforms innocently residing somewhere upon the surface of the celestial sphere, with your inerrant foreknowledge expecting the female lifeform to succomb to temptation from the Soliciting Snake to eat some of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, resulting in her becoming ashamed of her newly-discovered nakedness and thus hiding it by sewing and wearing a quite-inadequate-for-total-modesty figleaf. How would you pay her back for all the trouble you - in effect - caused her and were partly responsible for her getting into? One way would be for you to descend, be born nude, always be perfectly and totally nude in her presence, die on a cross for the stated purpose of her no longer being ashamed of her nakedness so that, after your death, she would permanently revert back to 24/7 total nakedness with her all-nude spouse and amidst her future naturist family plus growing global nudist-park community of offspring.

Who really knows what playful, frolicking, and imaginative Christian couples do in secret away from the suspecting lurid eyes and cameras of pervert neighbors?

# 3

Is expedient suicide ever necessary to save the life or lives of others, if there is absolutely no other way out? How many TV programs or movies have you seen where some hero sacrifices himself doing something no other person can nor will do for the safety, protection, or rescue of others? That very thing happened in the case of a young Jewish Rabbi with the smarts, strength, and firepower of a Rambo who could have easily overpowered any group of nasties, but instead let a gang of jealous jewish thugs bind Him, libel and slander him to jewish security guards and Roman police who brought the Rabbi into a prejudiced kangaroo court, convicted Him on false trumped-up charges, severely beat Him up, then hung Him on a Roman cross until He was dead. Was the immaculately-sinless young Rabbi, who was charged with being The King of The Jews (though He Himself did not say anything in Latin, Greek, or Hebrew of the sort about Himself) then guilty of deliberate suicide by not fighting back? And for what purpose? To convince Roman law-enforcement officials and a few sympathic Jews that He was innocent and simply wanted to continue helping everyone who acknowledged His special medical credentials by performing medical miracles on acknowledging believers from clinic to clinic and hospital to hospital? But would such non-resistant virtual suicide (and thus indirectly-self-inflicted murder, in essence) be "holy" - unless the Rabbi, with foreknowledge of what His Dad would do, let others murder him, being that He knew full well that His Dad would thereafter regenerate and resusitate Him back to life?