EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE

Everywhere All at Once

If you are already a Christian and have attempted to tell a non-Christian person about Jesus, you will already have noticed that they behave like a flea on a hotplate! They won’t stay still. They jump around with all their “whataboutisms”. You know, “Well, if there is a god, then why is there so much evil in the world?” “Why doesn’t He show Himself?” “It was just a bunch of goatherders that wrote the Bible!” “The Bible is a bunch of Chinese whispers passed down through the ages and is used by the church to dupe stupid people!”

Image from Net

Apologies if I seem to have been jumping around like a flea there as I listed some of the excuses people use to not listen to you telling them about Jesus. You can add your own complaints to this list if you like. However, I’m going to take the Apostle Paul approach as I try to get you to listen to what I have to say about Jesus. Notice what he said when he was talking to some people in Athens. He wants them to know that he is not ignorant of their culture. How does he do this? He engages them by quoting from a couple of their own poets. However, notice that he has a purpose in mind. He wants to tell them about his grandkids? No, he wants to tell them about Jesus. But first he starts by telling them about God and who He is and our relationship as human beings to Him.

“For ‘In Him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we are indeed His offspring.’” Acts 17:28. 

The first of the two quotes is probably from Epimenides, a poet from Crete. And the other is from a poem Phainomena by a guy called Aratus. We take it that the ears of these men Paul was talking to would’ve pricked up when they heard him quote from their fellow Greeks. Paul was really good at this sort of thing. For the rest of us it can be a bit like the roller shutters coming down at tucker shop closing time when we try to talk about the things of God to some people! We see a glazed look begin to appear in their eyes. They may begin to look at their watch or phone and give other social cues that they are done with you.

We press on! In order for humanity to live and move and have our being in God, He would need to be everywhere all at once. And this is exactly what God reveals about Himself in the Bible. He encapsulates everything everywhere all at once. This, of course, is not to say that everything is God. It simply means that God is the creator of everything everywhere. There is nothing outside of His creation except Him. However, if you or I built a house, we could move into that house. But we could only be in one room at a time. God is not like us. He is in every room of every house and in every nook and cranny of His universe because all of Him is everywhere all at once. This everywhere-at-once-ness of God is called Omnipresence.

Next, God knows all things. He knows the beginning, middle and end of all things. And He knows everything all at once. God’s knowing-everything-all-at-once-ness is called Omniscience. And there is one more attribute of God that we need to know about, and that is His Almightiness. He is Almighty God, Omnipotent. Let’s list those three attributes that belong only to God, and then we’ll move on: Omnipresence, Omniscience and Omnipotence. Put simply, God is the Creator and we, along with the rest of His creation, are simply creatures dwelling in His creation in which He is present and can see all things and can do all things. So, when Paul says, “For we are indeed His offspring” he means that we have been created by God.

The One and the Many

Because God is three Persons in one God, He is the original One and Many. And because He is Creator, we should expect to see many reflections of His Oneness and Many-ness in all of His handiwork, and we should expect to see little clusters of “trinities” in everything everywhere.

The Creator created space, time and matter. When did He create time? “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” So, time first began when God created it, and as He created time, He was creating space into which He placed the matter He was creating. “For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” Exodus 20:11a. God distinguished one day in the cycle of every seven as a special day, a holy day.

So, time can be measured by days, cycles of seven. And as we live and move and have our being in Him, He has given us six days to work with Him and one day a week to rest with Him. And notice why God created the sun, the moon and the stars: “And God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the heavens to give light upon the earth.’ And it was so. And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars.” Genesis 1:14-16.

So, time is measured by the sun, the moon and the stars on their courses and cycles, days, months and years. Tides and female human menstrual cycles even fit into God’s sovereign plan. And the eternal God, who knows the end from the beginning, is reflected in the trinity of past, present and future.

And what about space? God was nowhere before He created space because there wasn’t anywhere to be. But now that He has created space, He is everywhere all at once. He is in the longest lengths, the deepest depths and the highest heights. For He, the triune God, made the three dimensions of length, breadth and height. He is at the outermost reaches of His universe, and He is in the minutest atoms. All of Him is everywhere all at once! “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.” Colossians 1:16.

So, whether through a telescope or a microscope or with the naked eye, everything we can see and even the things that we cannot see, were created by God for God. Even the trinity in matter of solid, liquid, gas/vapour, yes, ice, water, steam.

“A generation goes, and a generation comes, but the earth remains forever. The sun rises, and the sun goes down, and hastens to the place where it rises. The wind blows to the south and goes around to the north; around and around goes the wind, and on its circuits the wind returns. All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full; to the place where the streams flow, there they flow again.” Ecclesiastes 1:4-7.

Yes, God has a plan and, because He knows the end from the beginning, through circuits and cycles, He carries out His plan, working in space, in time and in matter. “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” Romans 8:28.

A KNOCK ON YOUR DOOR

 

A KNOCK ON YOUR DOOR 

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” Genesis 1:1

An old guy used to knock on my door unannounced usually on a Saturday morning. Invariably, it would be at the most inopportune time. I’d be busy in the backyard or cleaning my fish tank or something. I’m sure you’ve had the same experience? Well, the first time the old guy knocked on my door I said to him, “You are here to tell me that Jesus is not God. Well, I am here to tell you that He is! You go first.” And then we’d crack open our Bibles. The old guy was persistent. He kept on coming back periodically. He usually had one of his older granddaughters with him. Eventually we just had nice conversations about our grandkids.

Does it really matter if Jesus is God or not? For that matter, does it really matter if God exists or not? What difference does it make whether God exists or that Jesus is God? Well, with all the books and movies coming out nowadays, you’d think that God and Jesus don’t matter and that we live in a universe that has no rhyme or reason to it. Indeed, they talk more about a multi-verse more than a uni-verse. Well, like I said to the fellow grandad who used to knock on my door, “You are here to tell me that Jesus is not God. Well, I am here to tell you that He is! You go first.”

Okay, it’s really hard to have a conversation with someone when they are reading. So, I suppose I’ll do most of the talking. But please feel free to express out loud any disagreements we may be having.

Right, you don’t believe in all that God stuff? Science has disproved it! And you don’t believe all that Bible stuff? Chinese whispers! Whoops! You think it’s inappropriate to refer to things by their ethnicity? Danish bacon, Scottish haggis, English breakfast tea, Canadian back bacon, Italian marble, but not Chinese whispers? Wow! You live in a strange world, a weird universe. Oh wait! I forgot. You live in a multiverse. You live in a place where wearing kilts and traditional Scottish dress is frowned upon as “cultural appropriation”. Inappropriate for some reason. Does one need to be Chinese to order a Chinese takeaway or Mexican to eat at Taco Bell? Can the son of a Scottish father and a Mexican mother wear a sombrero with their tartan kilt? Or is it either one or the other? Are we from different planets? Oh wait! We ought not to use the terms father or mother? And we shouldn’t refer to a male child as someone’s son? A Mexican is guilty of cultural appropriation if he wears traditional Scottish dress, but a man can dress-up as a woman and compete as a female in women's sports? Oh, let’s just talk about our grandkids instead of arguing about these things!

Is it safe to use the phrase, “The elephant in the room”? Or do we have to stipulate whether it’s an African elephant or an Indian elephant before we go there? Or is the mere mention of the words Africa or India some kind of “dog whistle” to those who live in a universe/multiverse where everyone is afraid of being accused of cultural appropriation? Well, let me start by talking about the elephant in the room…

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light.” Genesis 1:1-3. The Rev Prof Dr Francis Nigel Lee wrote a brief foreword for a book I published way back in 2006. In it, referring to Genesis 1:1-3 in particular he said, “God tri-une, at the start, created the tri-universe”. So, though not quite the multiverse of contemporary, i.e., Postmodernist, thought, we see that there are three aspects to what is known as the universe. Dr Lee spells it out elsewhere,

“God Triune, at the beginning, created the tri-universe (two-heavens-and-one-earth). Gen. 1:1f. The first heaven is the air surrounding our earth, and an integral part thereof (Gen. 1:6). The second heaven is outer space, and the third heaven is the dwelling-place of God’s good angels (II Cor. 12:2). All three, like the Three Persons within God Triune Himself, interpenetrate and overlap one another — which is quite what one would expect creatures of God Triune to do. Indeed, this is what Rev. Prof. Dr. Cornelius Van Til meant by ‘the one and the many.’ I Cor. 12:12-20.”[1]

So, here we see where that door-knocking granddad and I disagree with each other. Because he denies that there are “Three Persons within God Triune Himself”, he disagrees that Jesus is God. He thinks that Jesus, like the angels, the air surrounding our earth, outer space, the entire universe, is a creature like all the other creatures created by God, some just listed.

To deny that Jesus is God is to deny that God is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Christians are baptized into one name, not three names: “Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” Matthew 28:19b. So, my fellow granddad was in error thinking that Jesus was not God the Son who entered into His creation as a fully human being at the very first Christmas. We see then that Jesus is God and Man in one divine Person forever. How do we know? Because the Bible tells us so.

“Chinese whispers”? Well, like my fellow granddad has done with Jesus, so some people likewise do with the Bible. They like to change the Bible to suit their own purposes. Their main purpose being to deny the God who has revealed Himself therein. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” has become garbled down through the ages. It is now “The multiverse just is.” What’s the multiverse? To use a movie title it is, Everything Everywhere All at Once. There is no God. There is no beginning. There is no rhyme or reason. It is only formless and void, chaos.

Yes, I’d rather talk about my grandkids than the weird things some people believe, but I was reminded the other day when lying face down on a table as my physiotherapist stabbed, poked, prodded and massaged my busted shoulders and neck that, now more than ever, people need to hear about Jesus. Why? Because of what He will do for those who belong to Him: “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” Revelation 21:4.

---

[1] God Triune in the Beginning – and for the 21^st Century: Dr F N Lee - Sermon God Triune in the Beginning – and for the 21st Century Page 2 (dr-fnlee.org)

HITTING THE TARGET

 

“At great turning-points of world-history, man’s historical consciousness is strongly aroused. The relativity of our traditional measures and opinions manifests itself in a clear way. At these historical turning points those who do not live by the Word of God and who had considered these traditional measures and opinions to be the firm ground of their personal and societal life, easily fall prey to a state of spiritual uprooting, in which they surrender themselves to a radical relativism, which has lost all faith in an absolute truth.”

(‘In the Twilight of Western Thought: Studies in the Pretended Autonomy of Philosophical Thought’ by Herman Dooyeweerd, Paideia Press 2012, Series B, Volume 4, p 45)

 My big brother Fearghas (artist, Gaelic poet, published author etc.) sent me the above quote. Fearghas has been a student of Herman Dooyeweerd (1894-1977) for many years and the lines of his thought (as clearly evidenced below) are very indebted to his writings. His blog is found at: Mouse in a Glass: Luch sa Ghlainne (mouseglass.blogspot.com)

We interacted as follows:

Fearghas & Neil

NEIL: I like the Dooyeweerd quote. He mentions that “…those who do not live by the Word of God … easily fall prey to a state of spiritual uprooting…”

I suppose Jesus’s Parable of the Sower (with the seeds and soils) applies here. So, it’s all about God’s Word taking deep root in the soil of Holy Spirit-prepared hearts.

As we say, the sword of Lord (which is the Word of God) is our best defence – against all would-be invaders of God’s Garden. For, Satan, our enemy, likes to sow weeds amongst God’s crops. The sword of the Lord is the ploughshare by which we cut down both the wheat and the tares. God harvests the former for His Kingdom and the latter for His Furnace. We are merely labourers in His fields.

Rudi Schwartz and I have laboured hard writing our book (The Unfaithful Bride & The Faithful Groom), in which we have tried very hard to communicate to the intelligent reader, how to, among other things, Scripturally discern the wiles of the devil – both inside and outside Christ’s Kingdom on earth.

Inside the Kingdom the subtle Serpent attempts to uproot the Word from hearts or at least stunt growth and outside he seeks to prevent the seed of the Word from being sown, by making sure the ground remains stoney and always in the shadows.

A blunderbuss is needed to scare away and even blast garden pests, and I think Rudi and I have succeeded in this area. Metaphorically speaking, (like the “Glorious Twelfth” in Scotland!), we had a field day blasting every wind of doctrine that winged our way.

To slightly change the metaphor, Satan has Christianity running-ragged as Christians tilt their lances at every windmill. Evil seems to be ubiquitous, popping up its ugly head in, eg restaurants, movie theatres, doctors’ offices, Xray Clinics, hospitals, kindergartens, public libraries, colleges, schools, universities, retail stores, beer!, the White House, yes, even churches!

However, I wonder if there is a target that we could aim our large calibre high velocity weapons of spiritual warfare at (perhaps in a future book). What/where is the heart of the matter? David struck Goliath directly on his forehead. I feel as if we Christians are fighting on too many fronts at the moment (from Darwinism to Dispensationalism, from Socialism to Secularism, Arminianism to Wokeism, Premillennialism to Postmodernism, basic Socialism to Cultural Marxism etc.).

Dooyeweerd points directly at the heart of the matter: too many Christians are NOT living by the Word of God. The question then is, as Francis Schaeffer puts it in his book title “How Should We Then Live?” In other words, how should we glorify God and enjoy Him forever?

I know I’ve sort of answered my own question here, but what do you think Fearghas? How do we convince Christians to live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God? 

FEARGHAS: Humanism is in crisis. It is currently shifting from its classical objectivistic mechanistic rationalistic polarity (which presupposes the abiding normative laws of mathematics and physics — a clockwork UNI-verse model, if you like), to its post-postmodernist subjectivistic irrationalistic personalistic polarity (ie radically rejecting all normativity as it sinks into a black-hole of infinite flux — a haywire MULTI-verse model of alternative cosmic realities, if you like — see (with visual health warning) the recent Oscar-winning Michelle Yeoh movie ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’), but also the dissolution of human normativity into potentially non-regulated acid-baths of experimental bio-engineering, transhumanism, and AI consciousness. The ultra-relativism of the latter subjectivistic polarity infamously rejects for instance the normative laws of biology in regards to the trans debate, but it rejects also the normative laws of speech and civilised discourse which undergird the negotiated social peace upon which democracy is premised — hence its modus operandi presents (counter-intuitively perhaps) as strident intransigence, governmental absolutism, raw mob power, infantilised hysteria, all symbolised by the iconic weapon of baby-pink-and-blue-painted baseball bats wrapped in barbed wire. 

The objectivist rationalist polarity of humanism was a hugely pernicious and resolute opponent of Christ and His Word, giving rise to so-called Higher Criticism and to the moral blankness of mechanistic selfish-gene High Darwinism. All of which as we know have presented relentless challenges to Biblical accounts of the miraculous, but above all to the substitutionary death and resurrection of Christ. 

The new beast from the sea, however, manifests in its subjectivism as a shape-shifting, obsessively personalistic, ultra-relativistic tyrant. Our retaliation would seem to require renewed focus on the incarnation of Christ, of course along with his sacrificial death, resurrection and ascension — his embodiment in birth, in resurrection and in ascension providing the definitive endorsement of human and creational normativity. He is the True Man. He is the Last Adam. We are made in his likeness, in the image of God. There does not exist an infinity of conflicting variations of my or your selfhood populating endless random universes. THIS cosmos is all there is, and we are the stewards of it. This cosmos is from him through him and to him. He upholds all things by his word of power. He reconciles all things in heaven and earth by the blood of his cross. This whole creation groans in travail as it waits for that day, the redemption of our bodies, being a new creation which in some deep sense will yet be a continuation of this one, as our resurrected bodies will have unfathomable continuity with our present bodies. 

This cosmos fell with the First Adam and is rescued by the Last Adam. We must emphasise all the more the structural norms of this creation (eg binary maleness-femaleness, eg the family unit optimally being comprised of mother, father, and progeny, eg the integrity of animals “according to their kinds”) — but also the exhaustive structural frameworks which comprise temporal reality in its totality, these are the concrete ordinances of the Lord, as the psalmist tells us. God’s creational ordinances have not as such fallen with man. They have not as such been corrupted by sin. God’s creational laws remain transcendently intact. Only the heart of Man has fallen, in its daily rebellion rejecting the pristine given-ness of God’s creational order, and in arrogant delusion attempting to level it all to dust and to rebuild it from scratch in the image of apostate humanity. 

LOVE

The bonnie, bonnie banks o' Loch Lomond

‘God is love’ (1 John 4:8,16). If it’s true that love is more a verb than a noun, then what did God, who is love, do? ‘In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth’ (Gen. 1:1). ‘For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day’ (Exo. 20:11). And, like Father like Son, Jesus says, ‘My Father has been working until now, and I have been working’ (John 5:17). So, God (who is love) brought creation into being over a period of six days. He did it verbally, ‘By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and all the host of them by the breath of His mouth’ (Ps. 33:6). ‘By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible’ (Heb. 11:3).

God is love because the three Persons in the Godhead love each other eternally from eternity unto eternity. The three persons are one God. ‘For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one’ (1 John 5:7). Some Bibles may miss out this verse, but it is Biblically true nevertheless. For in the beginning the Father spoke the Word and Their Spirit brought creation into being.

Yes, in the Godhead, God loves God, and each Person loves His neighbour as Himself. If love were the ball in a pinball machine, then to reflect the Godhead, it would need to ping back and forth perpetually and keep on running up a score forever.

But does God love anything other than Himself? ‘For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life’ (John 3:16). So we see that God loves the world. And we see that this love is not an emotional feeling as humans tend to describe love. ‘Love Hurts’ and ‘I Feel Love’ are a couple of well-known songs that describe love as a feeling. However, God’s love for the world is a ‘doing’ love. He sent His Son into the world. ‘And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us’ (John 1:14a). But what happened when God entered His creation on the planet earth as a human being? Do we love the One who is love and made us in His own image that we should be like Him and love God and our neighbour as ourselves? Well, it looks like the ones that don’t love Jesus are going to perish. Clearly, only those who believe in Him will receive everlasting life rather than perishing in hellish torments forever, i.e., everlasting death as opposed to everlasting life.

How can the Scriptures reveal that God is love if He sends people to hell? Well, we’ll leave that for God to answer the individual on Judgment Day. But for now, God is expressing His love for the world by inviting everyone to believe in His Son and be saved. However, no one will believe in the Son unless they are born of the Spirit. (John 3:5-8). We breathe out to speak. The ‘Breath’ of the Father and the Word must speak to our hearts before we will believe unto everlasting life. ‘For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death’ (Rom. 8:2).

The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, who have been loving each Other from eternity, are extending that love to whoever will believe in Jesus. Why would anyone reject this offer? You’d have to really hate God to not accept His offer of everlasting love in everlasting life. Why would anyone not prefer everlasting bliss over everlasting torment? Perhaps it may be because they do not believe? For, ‘whoever believes in Him should not perish’. God is love. Accept Him. And accept His offer of love while you yet have breath.       

THE STONE OF DESTINY (Book Review)

                                                         The Stone of Destiny

The Stone of Destiny by Andrew Neil MacLeod is a very entertaining novel! The story is an amalgam of Sherlock Holmes, Harry Potter, the Da Vinci Code, and American Treasure married to Alice in Wonderland (without Alice!).

Samuel Johnson and James Boswell are a sort of Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson on a Harry Potter adventure all over Scotland in ye olde Hammer Film adaptation complete with battles with Werewolves, warlocks and witches and the likes.

I was reminded of Walter Scott’s Rob Roy book. Not for similarities of writing styles, but in book title misnomers. Like the elusive Rob Roy of Sir Walter’s pen, there wasn’t exactly that much scribbling on the Stone of Destiny. Yes, Rob Roy and the Stone are key features in both books respectively, but I purchased The Stone of Destiny thinking that there would have been a bit more of the Stone in it. Anyway, I enjoyed what I read.

It contains some beautiful prose: “The moon hung low in the bay, its silvery edges softened by diaphanous wisps of cloud, reflecting its broken image on the wine-dark water.” p. 305.

Aye, a ripping yarn if there ever was one! It’s steeped in Scottish folklore (and porridge) during the 18^th century.    

QUEENSBERRY RULES & THE V.O.L.A.

VOLA in foreground

It was very frustrating, when we were kids, watching the good guys in the white hats trying to beat the bad guys in the black hats in the old matinee westerns. The bad guys never played by the rules and the good guys were always hogtied against them because they abided by the rules.

Likewise, I remember getting my first kicking at the Vale of Leven Academy when my opponent did not play by ye olde Queensberry Rules. He grabbed me by the hair and kicked my face in and continued kicking me when I was down. That’s when I learned (the hard way) that the dirty scoundrels had introduced the boot to fist fights!

The Lefties seem to win because they follow the Saul Alinsky Rules for Radicals approach. They punch below the belt by simply demonising their opponents. If Donald Trump is worse than wee Adolf, then why would you even engage him in a debate (regardless of what the debate is)? And so it is with the Left. They think they have the moral high ground. And we non-Lefties have lost the argument to them if we have to begin every discussion with “I’m not a racist/bigot/homophobe/misogynist/Islamophobe/transphobe etc. It means we’re always on the backfoot, up against the ropes, in our duels with the bad guys.

I, of course, see everything in terms of those who are for Christ and those who are against Christ. In other words, it’s all about Christ.

I am a Christian who is thankful that Conservatives share a lot of my views, views that come from the Bible, (as does Western law and Western civilization itself. Sure, there are other influences, but these are usually more negative than positive).

Now, here’s the bottom line: A healthy pulpit means a healthy nation. The Christian pulpit in the West for the moment is really unhealthy. (Yes, of course, we’re speaking generally here.) It’s all fixated on Christ’s “Second Coming”, the last days, and the spectacular end of the world stuff. This means that most Christians are not engaging the enemies of Christ (e.g., the Woke people and those who enable this anti-Christian nonsense, enablers such as (Take it Easy)Albanese, (standard response please)Palaszczuk, (good-riddance)McGowan, (Chairman Dan), (exit stage left, or is right?)Biden et al).

See Amazon for a copy

My pal Rudi and my book called The Unfaithful Bride & The Faithful Husband is about Christ and His disobedient church on earth. As the whole Bible shows, whenever she is disobedient to God, the nation comes under God’s judgment as punishment (yes, so that she will come crawling back to her Husband), and whenever she is obedient Him, He blesses the whole nation, i.e., His bounteous blessings overflow even among the pagans. Thus, healthy pulpit, healthy nation.

The judgment of God is seen in things like legalised abortion, legalised homosexuality, redefining marriage, legalised transgenderism (with its attendant mutilation and castration of the nation’s children etc.). It’s not great fireballs from the sky, but an abandonment by God and therefore an increasing withdrawal of His moral restraint on society. And so the bad guys win – that is until the bride starts to be obedient to her Husband again. Then it’s a time of blessing that overflows into the rest of society.

I know that this sounds a wee bit pie in the sky to many of today’s Christians and pagans alike, but that is mainly because most popular Christian authors and speakers are all doom and gloom people. They are capitol P Pessimists to the enth degree! They are hoping that God will take them out of the earth. But the bride's Husband prayed to the Father, “I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one” (John 17:15). But meanwhile Christians are asking to be “raptured” out of the world! – when they should have their sleeves rolled up and be about extending Christ’s Kingdom on earth.

Yes, like all the shades of Marxism in their long march over the decades through our teaching institutions, schools, colleges, universities etc., Calvinists like myself and Rudi are in it for the long-haul.

I attended Vale of Leven Academy in the 60s and 70s. I was shocked to hear recently that a practicing homosexual man was invited by my old school to come and groom the kids on the delights of sodomy! Wow! LORD OF THE RINGS STAR VISITS VOLA... - West Dunbartonshire Council | Facebook

As the wild west was civilised by the rule of law in the hands of the good guys, so will backslidden, disobedient, and morally corrupt Western civilisation be re-civilised when Christians stop disregarding God’s law.

The Lefties are all about chaos, disorder, and anarchy – so that they can bring in their Socialist utopia through society’s collapse. Christians are (or used to be!) about law and order so that Christ Kingdom will come: “Thy Kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

I am optimistic that the good guys will win. E.g., I am glad that I had just finished my six pack of Budweiser right before the Bud Light fiasco took place, otherwise I would have had to pour them down the gurgler! And look at what’s happening to Target etc. Go Woke go broke seems to have some truth to it. Yes, there are glimmers of hope appearing on the horizon. May the Sun of Righteousness rise with healing in His wings…

SOMETHING'S GONE WRONG WITH THE VALE

                                        SOMETHING’S GONE OFF IN THE VALE

Loch Lomond. Many songs have been written about this body of water and its beautiful surrounding bens and glens. “By yon bonnie banks and by yon bonnie braes / Where the sun shines bright on Loch Lomond…” This drinking-water reservoir overflows into the River Leven which wends its way through the Vale of Leven where it pours into the River Clyde at Dumbarton Castle and Rock.

Vale of Leven from Carman Hill

The Scots love writing songs about everything. There is even one called “The Song of Clyde” to which, on account of industrial pollution in the 60s and 70s, the famous comedian Stanley Baxter adjusted the lyrics accordingly, and sang the spoof “The Pong of the Clyde.” But meanwhile back in the Vale of Leven.

I grew up in the Vale of Leven with my two older brothers and two younger sisters. We have all a long since departed from “That lovely valley where the Leven flows” (aye, words from yet another song!). However, memories of the Vale of Leven with its ubiquitous view of the proud head and broad shoulders of Ben Lomond stay with you wherever you go. The snow-capped Ben Lomond has been etched into my retina! We used to row our sculling boats, fours and eights on Loch Lomond. We used to lean over the side to scoop up mouthfuls of its pristine waters. We’d swim in it in summer and skate on it whenever it froze solid. Aye, “The wee birdies sing and the wild flow'rs spring / And in sunshine the waters are sleepin'; / But the broken heart it kens nae second spring / Tho’ the waefu’ may cease frae their greetin’.” Och, it’s really difficult not to burst into song about the place! Although Anglicised, the Vale of Leven is full of poetic Gaelic names describing the terrain. Indeed, it was due to these placenames that my eldest brother, Fearghas, began to learn the neglected language. But here’s the rub.

Note the brown "slope of sludge" on the hilltop

The beautiful Vale of the Leven has grown a great puss filled carbuncle on its eastern hills. Observe: The word “Auchencarroch” leapt out of an article big brother Fearghas was reading. “Sewage sludge used to be disposed of at sea at Garrioch Head in the Firth of Clyde. But this was stopped because surprise, surprise the sludge was polluting the marine environment. So where to now does it go. Well where better than the rural hills of Auchencarroch above Loch Lomond and the National Park.” (From an online comment, 9 Jan 2022.) Scandalous!

I have often wondered if yon sewage ship still sailed out to sea towards Ailsa Craig to take a dump so as to feed the fish on the West Coast of Scotland recycled nutrients was still in action, what, with all the “Save the Planet” movements going on nowadays. But alas! It seems that (a wee bit hyperbole in play here) they now sail the “ship of stools” (you’re going to have to excuse the rude and crude puns here) up the Clyde, then up the Leven to Jamestown, put it on rollers and drag it up the Auchencaroch Brae to convert the effluence to affluence for the obviously corrupt (inebriated or simply insane!) Boards, Councils and Agencies.

Comment mentioning Auchencarroch

Aye, maybe the sludge sloop, keich ketch, sh-te ship no longer flies the jolly-jobby flag (Jobby Roger?) from its highest mast as it takes humanity's stench far out to sea. It simply unloads its corrupt cargo of compost to have the foul-smelling toxic Number 2 material transported through the beautiful Vale of the Leven. Deposit it up a hill so the (h)ill winds can carry its waft through the village. The Vale has gone from the sweet smells of the malting process from the local whisky distilleries wafting through the air to the eyewatering pungency similar to right after faither’s been to the lavvy, aye, from eau de cologne to literal toilet water! They cleaned up the “pong of the Clyde.” How are they going to clean up the sludge on the slopes?

My other brother, Stuart, wrote the following in an email to his siblings:

“Beautiful vale, beautiful vale,” they would warble at the steps of Loch Lomond Rowing Club. On a traditional Saturday night, departing members would be singing with undiscerning ease as the wee bar closes and members disgorge into crisp air… “Beautiful Vale o’ the Leven..."

 

They lift their eyes to the gentle slopes of grazing elevations beyond, up in the fading shadows, their own hills, the proceeding and receding hills of their fathers (and also their mothers), shades of curious twilight, of waning brows and folding crests. “Beautiful Vale of Leeee-ven”, they sing, the vale of their own people, where earthly silhouettes meet the frowning darkness of the sky; they breathe the comfort of a languid breeze, and yet from somewhere indefinable… a whiff of, what, of possible putrefaction.

It’s easy to be poetic about Vale of Leven, of Carman, of Auchencarroch, yet on the hill the very harvest moon ascends with eternal inspiration, there is a scar, a fell shadow upon this vale of ours, a humiliation visited by our own ungrateful elected representatives, I say, and the bloated officials whose wretched silken socks and probably initialled underwear we finance through fatted salaries : 

A landfill neither hidden from view, nor buried from the perceptions of eye, or of ear, or of nose, a stinking sludge dump. A feculent insult to hapless inhabitants downwind, placed with scientific precision on the highest point of their valley’s erstwhile distinction. A carbuncle, a cesspit, a pitiless pit of pertinacious tumult and torment.

You will find no mention of sludge dump on the documents that guided it there. Merely the bland language of inhuman carelessness essayed by faceless officials (who live in leafy Bearsden) determined to make the unacceptable inevitable.

 

It did, of course, find no objections:

3. CONSULTATIONS

1. 3.1  Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park Authority has no objection to the proposal and considers that the impact on landscape character have been adequately addressed. Despite the close proximity to the National Park, there will not be any significant indirect landscape impacts or magnitude of change. They do however recommend that lighting, materials and landscaping are carefully considered and conditioned accordingly.
2. 3.2  West Dunbartonshire Council Roads Service has no objection to the principle of the development since there are no additional incoming trips being generated by the proposal. They do request that the existing days and hours of operation restrictions be applied to this application.
3. 3.3  West Dunbartonshire Council Environmental Health Service has no objection to the proposal, provided that development is undertaken in accordance with the details submitted as part of the planning application.
4. 3.4  Scottish Environmental Protection Agency has no objection subject to conditions relating to SUDS, material recovery facilities, a waste management plan and site specific construction method statement.
5. 3.5  Scottish Water, West of Scotland Archaeology Service, Scottish Natural Heritage, and British Airports Authority all have no objection to the proposal.

4. REPRESENTATIONS

4.1 None.

Stuart

Stuart, Catriona & me where Leven meets Clyde

So there you have it. The Vale has gone stale! Loch Lomond and its bonnie banks and all the way down the Vale of Leven is often referred to as “God’s country!” by its inhabitants. We love walking on its bens and through its glens. Cow-pies, deer-droppings, sheep and rabbit pellets weren’t too hazardous. But the guff of the other stuff is more than we can bear! There must be better ways of disposing of the very thing we don’t like hitting the fan! So, here’s a wee reminder from the Bible just to let you know that Almighty God cares about these things. It’s dead easy. What if the Lord Himself were to walk on those hills? Aye, if the people of the Vale ever want to receive the blessings of God again, consider, garner and apply the general principles found in the following:

“Designate a place outside the camp where you can go to relieve yourself. As part of your equipment have something to dig with, and when you relieve yourself, dig a hole and cover up your excrement. For the Lord your God moves about in your camp to protect you and to deliver your enemies to you. Your camp must be holy, so that he will not see among you anything indecent and turn away from you” Deuteronomy 23:12-14 NIV.

Aye, someone said about a referee at a Rangers versus Celtic match that we should “Dig a hole and bury him!” That man knew not of what spirit he was. However, if the Vale folk would seek to honour God, then they ought to dig a hole and bury it – but not on a hillside overlooking the beautiful valley, no, not (as the commenter has well-said, on “the rural hills of Auchencarroch above Loch Lomond and the National Park.”