Patience is a virtue

Vox Popoli: Too little, too late?

...but what was once a morale booster has become an irrelevance.

The Q anon movement has one of the most difficult challenges: to save The People from themselves, without creating a messianic figurehead.

To cite a parallel in scripture:

Then one in the council stood up, a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law held in respect by all the people, and commanded them to put the apostles outside for a little while. And he said to them: “Men of Israel, take heed to yourselves what you intend to do regarding these men. For some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody. A number of men, about four hundred, joined him. He was slain, and all who obeyed him were scattered and came to nothing. After this man, Judas of Galilee rose up in the days of the census, and drew away many people after him. He also perished, and all who obeyed him were dispersed. And now I say to you, keep away from these men and let them alone; for if this plan or this work is of men, it will come to nothing; but if it is of God, you cannot overthrow it—lest you even be found to fight against God.” - Acts 5:34-39 (NKJV)

It is not difficult to create a movement, especially if one is good at emotional alchemy. If I can understand how to convert other people's emotions into actions, then I can become quite popular and a movement will come up around me, for at least two reasons. The first reason is laziness, in that humans will by default take the path of least resistance, and so if that means anointing someone over themselves who will do what needs to be done, time and again history has showed this is exactly what people will do, even to their detriment. 1 Samuel 8 records an example of this phenomenon. Now, this laziness is not an inherently "bad" trait, in that another way to look at it would be as "efficiency", in that spending time and effort on things which do not confer a survival or reproductive advantage will obviously prevent the maximization survival and reproductive success, and so such waste should be avoided.

The second reason is the phenomenon of salvation-by-association, or its antithesis, damnation-by-association, in that the adage "it's all who you know" has some truth to it. If we are in close relationship with God, that says something about us. Who we know, who we choose to associate with, and who in return chooses to associate with us, is not insignificant. In the wild, creatures are rarely alone, and both r and K strategists have groupings of their kind. Being isolated from "your people", or "your savior", is a terrible state to be in, and the power of exile, which lives on in banning, holds such a significant connotation because of what such an act would have meant throughout human history.

My wife recently asked me about the "place in society" for narcissists, and the conversation rapidly spiraled in scope as I tried to explain how, historically, they didn't have one, but in modern times, because the cost of depravity is so low, that we are nearly forced to demonstrate narcissistic traits just to survive. That, if we are not protected from being screwed over by others by understanding how people screw other people over, we're likely to get screwed and be at a loss to understand how to behave differently to prevent such exploitation from being repeated again in the future.

That, in some ways, the best means to avert being exploited by someone else is to use their same tricks better than them, but instead of misdirecting them to your own benefit, you simply send them away so that no further exploitation is possible. You use the power of the tools to defuse the circumstances, not keep them going, lest one become intoxicated by the power they wield and become the very thing they'd sought to avoid.

So, for those two reasons, it is just easier for people to look up to someone who has such power and can use it wisely, to someone who can save them from themselves, to offload their own personal responsibility to someone else who can make the decisions for them, to place someone else in a position of authority or power so that the individual is "set free" of such burdens.

That's where Q, whoever it is, has to play a very delicate game, because to really solve the issues in the United States of America, The People need to do the opposite. Instead of putting other people in power over us, we need to own and accept responsibility for our choices. Instead of giving up power to someone else, we must grow in our own strength and maturity.

We must reject our nature and go beyond it, but how can someone inspire someone else to save themselves?

To start, a framework for needing to be saved must exist, and this was generated by Q in detailing how evil and corrupt and terrible things are, and people just don't know it yet, don't accept it, don't understand it. Without this foundation, no further actions can be made, because if there is nothing that people need saving from, then why all the fuss?

Once the framework has been set up, there must be an understanding of responsibility, how things are supposed to be based on how things are now. An example of this might be President Trump hitting a legislative wall that he cannot burst through, but instead of trying harder to do just that, he steps back, shrugs, and says "I am not supposed to be breaking this down in the first place."

To his supporters and opponents alike, this will look like weakness, like giving up, and it will inspire action.

You see, President Trump can't just solve all the problems and then walk away, because when people get things done, when someone saves someone else, a relationship forms which does not go away once all the problems have been dealt with. There will remain the shared history, the debt to be repaid, and I am willing to bet that Trump understands this and wants none of it, because it is that kind of debt which clouds reality.

So Trump, to prevent becoming King, cannot be anything more than a President, but that does not mean he cannot make a big show of the limitations, or lack thereof, for the office in which he currently serves.

Trump needs the people to understand what a President is supposed to be, how they are supposed to act, what the expectations are, because while Trump was elected by many to grenade the existing system, the emotional desire to burn it all down was going to neglect the good and the bad in the system. People weren't going to learn anything if Trump did all the work, and Trump was the "last hope" to try and fix the system from within.

If Trump "can't do it", if the system is truly beyond repair, then Trump doesn't matter. The wall doesn't matter. Draining the swamp doesn't matter.

Because all of those things only really matter, in the grand scheme, if the system will keep going as it has.

Do people really think that, when Civil War V2.0 gets started, that the existing border between the United States and Mexico won't change?

Does a system of surveillance that relies on the internet retain its power to interfere with people's privacy if there is no electricity?

Does a centralized government which has created a police state still have the ability to uphold an oppressive rule of law thousands of miles away when they cannot even communicate across a single city effectively?

These types of questions are what folks should be asking themselves. These are what should frame the reaction.

It would be great if Trump succeeds, if he can pull off all that he set out to, but if he can't, it won't really matter what he has or hasn't pulled off in the first place. He's bought people time either way, and that is a gift.

With Q then, people are getting frustrated because predictions are made but not fulfilled. Ruminations of action, but no results.

The thing is, whoever is behind Q can't be operating on any sort of different MO than President Trump. They are trying to serve a purpose, to fulfill a role in the story, but they cannot become a messiah. Q can't "save the country", but it can lay the groundwork for The People to do so themselves, or if nothing else, again, prepare them for what will come by expanding their understanding of just how depraved anyone around them could really be.

Time will tell what the fruits of Trump and the folks behind Q are, because if they're already fighting Civil War V2.0, if there's a cold war going on for the control of the throne, then the dust hasn't truly settled, we are still in the chaos and "fog of war", and it would be delusional to think that we can properly judge their actions based on the information we have available.

What looks stupid, cowardly, unwise in one moment may no longer look so when further context is added in. When perspective is gained.

And we're denied that, because we can't foresee how things will really play out.

Perhaps, in time, even electing Trump will have been considered a mistake, because had Clinton won, the patient which was already too far gone could have been left in peace instead of going through painful treatments with no hope of success. That, instead of trying to fix the system, we could already have scrapped this one and been well on the way to trying something new.

Unless you, or I, know at least as much as Trump does, as the folks behind Q do, it's from a position of ignorance that we sling our barbs, our criticisms, and so while providing feedback is not a bad thing, it must be tempered with at least the ponder of "why didn't they do what appeared obviously in their best interests to do?"

Trump still needs to hear the fervor, the passion, the support of his goals and the frustration when they are not satisfied from The People who have his back, but if nowhere but your own mind, actually disqualify the alternatives to stupidity and cowardice before presuming those completely explain what is observed.

And then make preparations of your own. And then wait and see what happens.

There's always a reason, even if it's poor, for why someone does something. Time always ends up revealing that, taking away the guesswork of mind-reading.

Daily Bible Study: Proverbs 6:6-11

Go to the ant, you sluggard!
Consider her ways and be wise,
Which, having no captain,
Overseer or ruler,
Provides her supplies in the summer,
And gathers her food in the harvest.
How long will you slumber, O sluggard?
When will you rise from your sleep?
A little sleep, a little slumber,
A little folding of the hands to sleep—
So shall your poverty come on you like a prowler,
And your need like an armed man.

Proverbs 6:6-11 (NKJV).

We often think of your intellect, our ability to choose other than our base instincts, as being an intrinsic bonus to our existence, that because we are not bound by our instincts we are necessarily superior to mindless creatures, such as the ant.

Yet Solomon wants to take our thoughts into a different direction.

The ant does what it is supposed to do, and without coercion, because the ant is not distracted by the pursuit of pleasure, by the arrogance of believing that "there will be more time later" to prepare. The instincts of the and are so highly refined that self-destructive behaviors are gone. The ant just works and works and works and does not question this.

Humanity was created to glorify God, though through a different means than any other creature. Where the natural world speaks to God's power through reflection of God's designs, God's heart for the process of creation itself, both of the beautiful and the unique, humanity was to demonstrate God's glory in a manner which held more significance: choice.

People are unique in that we are not coerced into the glorification of God in this life. We are given license to live how we choose, and while God does provide a baseline influence on everyone, some will reject God and some will accept this influence.

God does not want us to be mindless, shuffling through the rituals and marching in lockstep with some moralistic dogmas. Our purpose is not to be perfect, but to be refined, and to submit to that refinement process. To do that, however, we must focus our attention to deny and escape from the distractions that the ant can so easily avoid by nature.

This is the significance of the worship that humans provide to God, that we come to understand the infinitely great gift of existence we have been granted, and that we live in a way which we choose, and that our choices reflect alignment with God. We don't do this on our own, either, as God is quick to offer help to those who cry out earnestly and in good faith. How God answers will not likely be in the manner we expect, but God is not dead.

The sluggard that Solomon speaks of is not only ungrateful for their existence, they believe that prudence in behavior is not required in order to sustain their own existence. They believe, according to the lies they'd been told, that the effort expended is simply "not worth it". We see this mindset today, assisted greatly by the numerous social and political safety nets available for those who fall.

We can even witness how some will willingly give up their future, who will enslave themselves to the will of another, merely to avoid having to bear any burdens of responsibility for themselves. To not need to overcome their own weaknesses, but to submit to someone else who can do it for them.

Solomon pleads with the lazy, the indolent, to not leave their fates to chance. It's possible that, even having not stored up, not having prepared, that dumb luck would keep someone alive. That they ended up being in the right place at the right time, and that they would be saved despite their irresponsible behavior.

But luck is indifferent to those it looks upon, and always runs out for each of us, and we never know exactly when that will be. Only those who have not relied on luck will be prepared to face the circumstances before them with any real confidence.

Solomon is also giving this advice as a warning to even those who heed it, in that those who have been lazy, who haven't prepared, are the first to become predators when their needs are no longer satisfied. The expectation to maintain their lives will not be based on reason or effort, but merely on the fact that they are now hungry and you possess the capability to feed them, so whether they are justified or not, you will become their target.

Like a chain reaction, the hunger of the sluggard causes them to strike out, to create hunger in others from whom they steal, and this does not even begin to speak of the hunger for justice when people have been wronged out of the selfish ignorance of others.

Do not be the lazy person, and protect yourself from those who are lazy, do not feel pity for them, they have brought upon them the fate that they now attempt to renounce. Time and again we deceive ourselves into thinking that "oh, if they just knew better, then they'd act differently."

Because the truth is that we always know, and knowledge is not the problem. We are not ignorant to the sins we commit, we are only more convinced of our own craftiness to try and avoid the consequences than we are in the surety of the consequences we will face.

Choose God, choose to commit to the only master whose desire is to help you overcome your own self-destruction so that you can satisfy your true purpose. Choose the one in whom there is only good, who will not merely absorb the glory we give greedily, but who will reward and bless us, whether in this life or the next, for our obedience, for our alignment, for our choice to deny the distractions.

It's your choice.

Daily Bible Study: Proverbs 5:7-14

Therefore hear me now, my children,
And do not depart from the words of my mouth.
Remove your way far from her,
And do not go near the door of her house,
Lest you give your honor to others,
And your years to the cruel one;
Lest aliens be filled with your wealth,
And your labors go to the house of a foreigner;
And you mourn at last,
When your flesh and your body are consumed,
And say:
“How I have hated instruction,
And my heart despised correction!
I have not obeyed the voice of my teachers,
Nor inclined my ear to those who instructed me!
I was on the verge of total ruin,
In the midst of the assembly and congregation.”

Proverbs 5:7-14 (NKJV).

I don't think that there is divine coincidence in that when you read scripture it's magically going to be exactly what you need to hear. I think that what's more likely the truth is that the Bible is jam packed with truth and, given the universal nature of truth, it's simply not going to take much effort to find something that is pertinent to what you're dealing with.

It's not that God is guiding you to a specific nugget of truth, it's that you're mining a huge vein of truth, so coming across it shouldn't be all that surprising. Shouldn't.

The reason I wanted to say this is because the world desires a demonic ideal called "globalism". The Neo-Babelism inherent in globalism is found in the lofty ideal that man-made systems of government could unite all the peoples on our planet to work towards a single goal, that they would all share the same identity, and that "peace" and "harmony" would exist between all humans.

This secular philosophy is demonic in the sense that it seeks to bring people together under the banner of human power, ignoring God. Whereas later in scripture we would see that "all are one in Jesus Christ", the powers of this world seek to create their own perverted unity among flesh.

Look at who Solomon says will benefit from those who follow the path of the "immoral woman": aliens, foreigners, and the "cruel". In other words, that the immoral woman will sell out her own people, seek to take them away from caring for and investing in their own interests, merely to serve her own.

Look at the political priorities in the United States under the influence of the "immoral woman". Illegal immigration is at an all time high, and billions of tax dollars, collected from legal citizens, are spent to subsidize the lifestyles and health of these foreigners. There are entire states who have prided themselves on their supposed altruism, their reallocation of resources away from the future of the people who those resources were collected from and to the benefit of the foreigner.

Even legal immigration paints no better a picture, with a majority of those who have rushed to gain entry into this country as a migrant, or a refugee, did not bring with them skills that could earn a living wage, and are themselves also significantly dependent on handouts from the government, resources stolen from those who are working hard to provide for their own families but also expected to carry the burden for others who can't or won't do it themselves.

The threat that Solomon sees is that it's not just the long-term consequences of the individual's life that giving in to temptation threatens, it's the legacy of a people. By the time that Solomon reigned, how many times had Israel come under judgment from God for chasing the gods of the people around them, the people they were supposed to put out of the promised land, the people who sacrificed children and practiced divination and sorcery?

How many times had Israel whored herself out, played the harlot, and had come under judgment of God?

The book of Judges alone recounts at least six times that this happened.

The temple was originally plated in gold, essentially floor to ceiling. Yet each time Israel abandoned God, the temple was sacked and pillaged and the glory they took for granted was stolen from them.

People who do not belong to your "tribe" will gladly take from you everything of actual value in exchange for providing you a fleeting pleasure, and this is the main sentiment behind Solomon's admonition. For the same reason that the adulterous woman steals from the wife of the man, so do nations that give in to the seductive claims of those who worship other gods find their own futures stolen away from them as well.

Solomon also makes a foreboding statement in that repentance will not come until near total destruction is upon those who have rejected sound advice. That it won't be until there's nearly nothing left to lose that an appreciation for what one already had can truly be found.

As with prior advice, Solomon wants the listener to avoid learning the "hard way", to not have to lose everything before its value can be understood, because the cost is more than any one generation can bear, let alone recover from. Throughout the Old Testament we see that Israel never goes through this cycle entirely in one generation, it's always across multiple, and we can see this dynamic play out now.

The costs of divorce do not just affect the parents and their children, but even on to the children of their children, and their children, and so on. While we live in a world abundant with resources due to human ingenuity, all we can do is effectively distract from the pain and suffering, we can't eliminate it, make it go away, or prevent its onset. The cost of sin, materially in our lives, the natural consequence of our disobedience, is terribly great, and we need to weigh that in our decisions.

Solomon did not want his offspring to follow in his footsteps in all things, only in wisdom. We'll see why as we continue in scripture, but know that Solomon is not just providing advice in a hypocritical "do as I say, not as I do", but instead from a "learn from my mistakes, so that you can avert the suffering and pain that I have brought upon myself."

Do not give up what belongs to you, your family, your "tribe" in the pursuit of temporary pleasures.

Daily Bible Study: Proverbs 3:13-18

Happy is the man who finds wisdom,
And the man who gains understanding;
For her proceeds are better than the profits of silver,
And her gain than fine gold.
She is more precious than rubies,
And all the things you may desire cannot compare with her.
Length of days is in her right hand,
In her left hand riches and honor.
Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
And all her paths are peace.
She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her,
And happy are all who retain her.

Proverbs 3:13-18 (NKJV).

It's worth remembering that Solomon did not ask God for material gain, but wisdom. It's also worth "skipping ahead" to know that the material gain of Solomon due to his wisdom would also ruin him, that he would abandon "her" in the later stages of his life, and that he would regret that.

Based on some quick research, this may be supported in that some think the earlier chapters of Proverbs may actually have been written last, and so while Ecclesiastes goes into the "why", these first 9 or so chapters of Proverbs are the "what to do", sanitized of the "why" so as not to clutter the good advice with a regaling of his failures.

That makes sense, in that often times advice is given with the instruction first, and the explanation second. The instruction is the more important part of the advice, and the explanation merely comes in to offer a context, a background, in case the reader is not able to grasp the significance of the wisdom as offered, and stubbornly demands to know why things must be the way they are.

It's also worth noting that polygamy was common in this era, and so while we in our post-monogamous culture might find the concept of wisdom being treated like a woman a little odd, in Solomon's era, taking on another wife who had some great quality about her was a socially acceptable norm.

In giving advice to his son, who would likely be the next ruler of Israel, or at least in the line to do so, there would be many temptations to go after material gain. To gaze at the beauty of precious metals and rare gems, to engage in the collection of power and profit to enrich oneself. The other leaders of foreign nations would be doing this, and collecting unto themselves great earthy wealth.

Solomon is trying to draw a contrast that would later be echoed in advice regarding those who "seek first the Kingdom of God". In seeking material gain, you will find a path to destruction and strife. In seeking wisdom, you will find a path to peace and material gain.

There is a paradoxical vibe to this, that to get what you want you must first seek something else whose byproduct is what you want instead of seeking that byproduct itself. Yet we can see this dynamic in secular circumstances all the time.

People want the benefits of healthy living, but without the pursuit of proper diet and exercise. People want the lifestyle benefits of wealth, but without the decades of saving and working hard. People at 35 want the benefits of a healthy marriage, whether children or the mature relationship with their spouse, but without having spent their late teens through their 20's in marriage and raising kids.

We constantly want the benefits without the investment, and often times sin and temptation offer just that. What is adultery but the offer of sexual satisfaction without the commitment of marriage? What is greed by the offer of material satisfaction on a timeline that your efforts would not otherwise produce? What is lust but the desire for that which may very well be good on its own, and in due time, but you seek to find shortcuts and ignore the consequences of getting exactly what you want when you want it?

In this manner, Solomon is telling us that wisdom, and not any material gain, is what we should strive to find, to hold on to, to cherish in our lives because wisdom will not leas us astray, to our ruin. Do not pursue the byproducts of wisdom, the things which intend to compete with wisdom to bring us peace and satisfaction, as they simply cannot.

Simple advice, and later on in scripture we'll be able to understand why all the better.