In regards to the woman at the well saying to the Messiah, “When He comes, the Messiah will tell us all things;” what everyone—including every religious expert—seems to forget about that famous conversation is that by the end of it He did. Everyone—not just women in Samaria—nervously awaits a divine explanation of all things when Christ comes. But everyone misses an obvious thing: that Christ did come. He came to a woman at a well. And He said things. But everyone forgets what He said.  Or at least they can't seem to figure out that even if what He said never explains anything to ten thousand of the cleverest men bathing in the fount of Southern Seminary, it still explained everything to one woman at a well in Samaria.

So what did the Messiah tell her?

Before He miraculously spoke all things, the woman was probably thinking, or rather hoping, the Messiah would tell her all things about the scripture. Or all things about the future or the destiny of nations. Or all things about salvation and prophecy. And maybe He did. We don’t know what the Bible doesn’t say. But we do know what the Bible does say. It says what Christ told her.  And what He told her made her run like mad back to her town and tell everyone. And what He told her saved everyone—The Messiah had indeed come and told her all things. He told her all things about herself. Everything she never knew.


When a man finally confronts God, he's not given an explanation.  He's given a mirror.
​

Strangely, the first thing a modern man finds when he looks into the Theory of Evolution are principles. Strange because the first modern man lost when the Theory of Evolution looked into him was, whether he theorized about opposable thumbs or twiddled them, he needed no principles. But Evolution and modern man don't seem to also notice the first thing found in man's theory of anything--from God, to religion, to public education, to government, to hopscotch and hadron colliders--is man. Which also means, man's principles. Even more strange, the principles are not merely found first and everywhere, but also the same.
For example, the very first principle of Evolution, or anything, is, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again,” or its corollary, “Never give up.”
Which means (Evolution says) Nature, supposedly born by a blind and random accident from nothing, was also born with an accidentally rigid and clear worldview, as rigid as any grandmother's; as it were, accidentally born with her rigid and shining silver spoon in its mouth. So again, despite the most nihilistic Evolutionist's dream of a universe where men are born without any spoons in their mouths who grow into men without any principles in their hearts, the reality is his Evolutionary Theory was born with a rigid morality, or more accurately, is a rigid morality. A morality found not at the end of the process, like an epiphenomenon, but rather, by definition and inescapably, at the very beginning--as the primary principle of life.

A verbose historical figure remains, through his own words, alive even when he is dead.  But as one reads through John Calvin's own words, one  becomes gradually unsure if John Calvin was ever alive even when he was alive. One gets the strange sensation when reading, for example, his explanation of the decretum horribile, that while damning a large chunk of the world to Hell may have been difficult for John Calvin's God, it was rather easy for John Calvin.  To read him very long is to find a man who perpetually seemed, not so much a stranger in his homeland or at home in a strange land, which are  both perfectly Christian discoveries, but rather that saddest of all men: a stranger in a strange land; which is a man who isn’t at home even in himself. 
John Calvin’s view of Christianity is like a rather poetic robot’s view of Christianity, or Mr. Spock's view of Christianity.  It is a view of Christianity by someone who never fully grasped it, not because he never knew what it meant to be a Christian, but because he never knew what it meant to be a human.

Evolutionary Tenets (or “How to Survive”):
These tenets may or may not be a great way to make a giraffe, but they are a great way to make a monster.

1. Your conditions alter who you are.
2. If your circumstances change from bad to worse, then if need be, you must also.
3. Do whatever it takes, whatever it necessitates, to survive.
4. If there are no more leaves on the trees, then nothing else matters: do whatever is necessary to get more; necks will grow taller, teeth will grow sharper, stings will grow deadlier.  
5. Above all:  Worry about your own survival.  Not someone else’s.

Religious Tenets (or “How to Live”):
These may or may not be a great way to make a giraffe, but they're the only way to make a savior.

1. Who you are alters your conditions. 
2. Even if your circumstances change from bad to worse, you don’t have to.  Man does not live on bread alone. 
3. If there are no more leaves on the trees, then grow more trees, or grow more character, or more patient, or more courageous, or sociable, or humble, or loving, or giving—in essence: grow more good, which is to say, more human.  Grow in almost any way except the way that says, “Do whatever it takes to survive.”  
4. No matter if the environment grows worse, the one thing you should never do—as surely as a Giraffe should never grow a short neck—is grow more evil.  
5. Above all: Don’t worry about your own life.

And lastly, and I guess I should’ve asked this earlier, how the question came up to you, since it may have been something quite particular you were looking for, but the last thing I’ll say about “The sons of God and the daughters of men” is that it’s poetic. It’s mythic. It’s a story.  And this is really difficult to describe, because it’s indescribable, and no explanation will be able to explain sufficiently to any person, but especially to modern persons, that it is just the case, to me anyway, that the poetry in the epic poem of our lives and the fairy in the fairytale of our lives are the most real part of what we mostly call real life. I know it sounds incredible and hard, but it is actually true. The reason why people overwhelmingly prefer novels and fiction to non-fiction, is not because they are more exciting or more popular or more simple, but because they are more true. They are more true to reality than “real” books. And it is simply the case that reality is made out of what you don’t see. You get the sense, in that little paragraph in Genesis, that there’s no way that any of what is being said should make any sense, but somehow it does make sense. It is the kind of sense, that if you stop for a second and just let it be, you know deep down that it is saying something about existence—prehistoric existence, post-historic existence—just existence.  It covers everything from the most complicated idea of the realities of what humanity is, all the way down to the simplest idea of sons and daughters.
The reason why Harry Potter starts in a cupboard under the stairs on Number 4 Privet Drive is because everyone who has ever grown up in a house with a family starts in a cupboard under the stairs on No. 4 Privet Drive.
They know exactly what it means without explanation. What they don’t know, even when it is explained to them, is what “The Sociological Effects of Child abuse in preteen Development in Suburban Foster Care” could possibly mean.  Not because it is dull, or overly complicated, or full of too many statistics and facts, but because it is FALSE. 
I suppose the critics of Genesis 6 would prefer the Bible to say something else (I think the rationalistic Christian has no idea what they want it to say). But what else could the Bible say? It just says what it says.  I suppose the critics would want it to say, “Chapter 6: A Study of The Unexpected Decline of the Prehistoric Sumerian Empire Secondary to Sociological and Philosophical Influence of Feminine Diversification in Near Eastern Civilization.”
But it’s obvious that nobody will ever want to read that paper.  Because the average human is first and foremost a poet and a mystic and is like a son of God and a daughter of man and is emphatically not a collection of dry, false statements loaded with wrong assumptions found in the humanities and religious studies of modern man.
Because anything with the breath of a human in it is divine. Anything—anything written, sung, studied, interpreted, or analyzed—anything that includes a human being or passes through a human mind is instantly mythic and psychological and spiritual and divine, and must be seen from the inside; otherwise those human studies are not merely complicated, pseudo-intellectual, overly factual or any of those things we might say about historical papers and journals or even everyday opinion, rather they are simply inhuman and therefore simply untrue.

Solomon might as well have replied, “I am blind. I want to see,” like Bartimaeus, when God asked him one dark evening before his reign, “What do you want?” Because Solomon's answer was essentially the same. And in both cases it was granted. Which says something.
But the important point of the story, for Solomon as well as Bartimaeus--even though every Calvinist (who for some reason is determined everyone should be as sad and angry as John Calvin, believing with the Pharisees man was made for the Sabbath) would heartily disagree--is not whether God knew, or didn't know what Solomon wanted before He granted his wish, but rather, whether Solomon knew, or didn't know what Solomon wanted before He granted his wish. It has been long argued using the scriptures, by persons much smarter than I, how gravely important it should be to me that God knows what I want. But what it is not arguable in the scriptures is how important it is to God that I know what I want. God actually knows what I want: sure, I'm not debating that. I'm simply pointing out that even if it is awe-inspiring and comforting; it isn't very helpful. But what is helpful, because God knows it's helpful, is if I know what I want. God implies in His question and answer session with Solomon: not only is it wise to answer the question, "What do you want?" correctly, but also foolish to answer incorrectly. He leaves no room for the arbitrary answer. So if I answer, “I want a long life,” it reveals not how wise I almost am, but how foolish I certainly am. God seems to say it is not merely wishful thinking, or positive thinking, or maybe even a slight overreach in powerful thinking to desire all my enemies to be defeated, but profoundly foolish thinking—not because wishing for their defeat makes me wrong, but because it makes me weak; that it is not only wishful thinking or forward thinking to desire wealth, but foolish thinking—not because wishing for wealth makes me wrong, but because it makes me cheap. Therefore the wisest man in all the world answers not, “I want to see long life,” or “I want to see all my enemies defeated,” or, “I want to see wealth,” but instead, “I just want to see,” in a sense, see everything. Because when a man finally sees everything, one of the first thing he sees is how little things are. Because he simply sees, for example, he sees how little a thing like a man’s net worth is. He sees low enough to see the infinite wealth adorning a lily of the field. And in the very next instant the foolish man who once saw his own life and the terrifying and inevitable death thereof, as a tragedy of incalculable loss, now sees with wisdom a life no larger or more important than a lily plucked from the soil worth ten thousand of Solomon’s kingdoms and tossed away in the breeze.
​

This is a continuation of my ongoing exploration of Fear; which is not like a dangerous expedition through  an unexplored cavern, but a dangerous expedition through an unexplored closet.  And, by the way, if this jagged little object from the bottom of a rather messy closet seems incomplete, it is only because it is a piece of a puzzle. Like myself. And like every human. And it is like us not only because we are all tiny pieces of a gigantic puzzle, but also because we are each a gigantic puzzle unto our tiny selves. A gigantic puzzle within a gigantic puzzle. Puzzling, eh?
So here is another tiny piece to try and fit.


On Fear--
When you have finally been scared to death, not as the phrase is commonly used, but rather as scared in death or frightened of death; and not merely frightened by a vague vision of your future death or by small jump-scares of death in your otherwise pedantic journey; but when you actually melt with terror and surprise at the living putrefaction, at the busy and thriving state of decay and death discovered just beneath the pretense of your pedantic life; when you tremble at the actual deaths you caused and the actual deaths you are—fear that your life is truly dead; that’s when you are truly frightened.  That is the true terror of Revelation, the true fear that rattles loose a mystery in the prophet's Good News: “Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven is near!” That is exactly the terror of the poor goat who, up until that moment, because he was always rather bored and timid and anxious and weak and miserable like a little sheep, actually believed himself a little sheep, now suddenly quakes and bleats before the shepherd--a shepherd who regards what goats believe with all the concern of a tollbooth collector, shaking his head and pointing with his staff to the other goats as his eye moves on to others. That is the terror of the chaff screaming away in the wind, “Wait! No! I am the wheat!”  
While the man with his back bent to the threshing floor, winnowing fork in hand, says almost to himself, “I never new you.”  And keeps threshing.
​

I grow weary of the endless talk about the end times. Especially the type spouted by those eager churchgoers who burn their heads over Nineveh so seriously like Jonah, saying things like: "You don't have to look too far to see the signs of the end times. Everywhere is terrible. If there was a ever a time for the Apocalypse, it has to be this time." All this kind of babbling thinking and speaking smacks of wishing God would destroy the world rather than save it. It smacks of a false solemnity with barely a pretense of fear; like that of an Aztec priest discussing his grim sacrificial duty, who, safe from the fires himself, almost seems to enjoy the thought of a virgin (which almost by definition is a person who doesn't know any better) being flung into a volcano. And because I have been the unwilling participant in so many of these end times discussions, either formal or informal, I have discovered it is apparently the special purview of everyone from 13 to 103 who has, one, an opinion and, two, circumstances. Which means, even though it is a favorite topic of a wide variety of Christians, it is not an especially Christian topic, but only an especially human one. But for my part, I do not grow weary merely because it is the darkest way to talk about a thing as beautifully lit as Christ and His Church, but because it is the dullest. And it is exactly because of this penchant by puritans for tirelessly polishing a dark thing up into a dull thing, that I believe this sour-hearted, half-speak so commonly heard at church to also be the most wrong thing.
The human idea of the judgment and wrath of god and its terrible effects is not especially special, but the Christian idea is. The Christian idea is this: The warning of End Times, of ultimate Judgment and wrath, is not to produce flight. It is to produce fruit. It is not to start a person fleeing for their lives, but to stop them--for there is nowhere to go--to stop them fleeing from their lives, and to stand firm, plant roots and grow for their lives. It is not to make them run, but make them repent. Not to make them focus on the End, but on the Beginning. Not to increase worry to withered heads already hanging down in their hands, but to encourage those withered heads to rise up and wait at the door all night and look for the Lord in the darkness.
The frightening warnings in Revelation should not induce fighting and fierceness, anger and resentment, complaining and bitterness within the soul—all of these of course are already there. If the only frightening they do is frighten the soul to a gnashing pessimism, then that soul was not nearly frightened enough. The warnings should, and in fact do when read properly, induce the opposite. Which is: they should induce change. For that is what a revelation is. It is a new vision. One gained not merely by changing one desolate landscape for the next, but by changing one’s point of view--so all at once one may see the entirety of the universe in the portrait of a sinner. A shift in point of view so remarkable that one no longer casts his narrow, roving eyes upon the horizon from now till the end of time, but instead does the reverse. He goes all the way to the end and turns around--in essence, goes to Hell and back-- and by placing his back to tomorrow, looks toward today; comes back to that which is new and right now; sees not the time a human ends, but the time he begins. He stands with the glowing Hell of fire and brimstone behind him, with the smell of ash still in his nose, shining with a new spirit, one of hope for the hopeless and charity for the undeserving and faith in the faithless.
(Luke 3:4-14)

Mark 10:51-52
Bartimaeus was a man who new exactly what his problem was.  And because he knew it, he also knew what life, problem solved, would look like.  And a man who knows this—knows exactly his problem and can see the other side, this other life—is a unique man, maybe the most, in all the world.  He will stand out and shout to the crowd, “I know something now!”
Because a man who finally knows his problem finally knows its answer,  or might, or something of it, and draws closer to it.  He to It and It to him.  The answer is, strangely, and, in part, finally seeing both things, maybe loving both things, certainly accepting both things: problem and answer.  It is a faith, a realization, a sight before sight, a sight while yet blind. And somehow through this one and only possible vision in blindness:  truly seeing the utter darkness; through this one and only possible health of sickness: finally accepting the fatal illness; through this one and only possible heartbeat of the heartless:  at last reaching out and feeling the beating heart of another; the troubled soul begins to know the troubler of souls is near.  Answer calls to answer: like calls to like:  Seer of his own sightlessness calls out to the Giver of sight who, in turn, calls out to the seer of his own sightlessness. The two meet.  They will meet. They must.
It is the beginning of Faith.  It is local and particular—as beginnings only are and only can be.  Faith does not begin abstracted out to a distant philosophy or mythical something far off in the future, then walk slowly backwards to end at a very concrete, very practical and very alive now. Rather now is first. Now is the dawn of Faith, not its dusk.  Blind Bartimaeus’ faith instantly shines a broad and universal daylight; instantly reaches philosophical and mythic proportions.  Not the other way around.  The question is immediate—right now—just like it’s answer:
“What do you want me to do for you, Bartimaeus?”
“Teacher, I am blind. I want to see.”
“Your faith has healed you.”
Immediately he received sight and followed Jesus along the road.

 A man will never find the answer to his problems until he realizes he has an even bigger problem with the answer.  Only then will he discover the problematic answer to his problem is the problem of Jesus, the bearer of Elijah's nickname: the Troubler of Israel.