"Jesus is for Losers"

(see the song by Steve Taylor--not what your think--but it's not about us--He takes care of the shovel-loads of trivia in our life in Factoid-onia)

I reviewed the lyrics of, "I Believe in You," by Bob Dylan from his born-again days.'S Quite the contrast with the current albums, which get progressively more sensuous with each one. I would call this, technically speaking,   reactionary, for the following reasons:

First, Dylan couldn't take the heat of being associated with ordinary Christians.  He's a very smart man, but except for a brief period of honesty about his actual condition before God, he voted his people, his politics, and his personal and ever-wavering passions. He just couldn't resist being part of the smart set and being brother to the Sophists in the entertainment biz,  which is at bottom what Dylan is still all about. "Touring"--he just can't get enough of it! Other examples of this would be TSE, who could stand being conservative, but not being mocked by his colleagues and critics.  "The poet of the century" could no longer refer to Christ in his swan songery. In its stead came the strange god of the Mississippi, the "strong brown god" of the massive and impressive river running by the town in which he grew up, St. Louis as I recall. Yet another fallen brown god-unto-himself would be Mel Gibson; and even Martin Luther at the befuddled end of his life. Trivial pursuit for the broken warrior types who fell back into the default positions of their troubled youth; and were and are dogged relentlessly by their earthly successes. "Better to be a doorkeeper," as David once sang. He would know--and his end, and his son's end, are surely nothing but whimpers, and most disappointing.

Second, and related to this, Dylan could not maintain his image as a mystery man and intransigent poet of unexpected twists and turns, and continue to maintain a genuine Christian witness. He saw that all his fame and influence could disappear almost overnight in the sturm und drang of the scorn of his critics and his colleagues.  Ironically, he has abandoned his poetry stance, too, and gone back to the merely sensual "folk-rock oldies" position from which he sprang.

Thirdly and perhaps underlying all the others would be the sort of sexual addiction that made him a hypocrite even while he was writing these paeans to Christ.  The man always portrays himself as in impossible relationships with women, in spite of all his power and  fame; yet is he not to blame for his own dysfunctional relationships? Since he held such power over them -and us- that few of us--blessedly-- will ever experience?


"Take a lesson from  the fig tree..."

I have a fig tree from the local farm store--but I have to bring it indoors for the winter. It won't survive the winter at this latitude. It produced two figs this year, very small as you can see.  The 'first fruit' disappeared without a trace; I don't think the cats ate it, and they keep all squirrels away, but it could have been an Extra Bold Bunny...or... it was, Taken Up, hm?

The second one, shown above, fell into my hand when I touched it.  It kind of looks like one of those pineal-like souls from the movie, "Cold Souls."  But could this fouled fig, three-quarters mummified, be a symbol of , well, us?  If not, we are moving towards this frustrated impotent and seedless state at ever increasing speed. Will future generations be able to produce better fruit than this? Or does this represent the state of the whole earth, minus a small but shrinking pale green remnant?

It is the Sensate Culture that contains the most "sugar" for fermentation. And once sugar or its fermentation products are consumed and then cease, nothing is left but dissipated energy that has been scattered abroad and wasted for no good or God-reason at all.  Witness the burgeoning no-child option, and the fact that we consume for ourselves and not for the future, whatever it may even physically be, much less our spiritual estate.

Small remnants still give me hope.  Some are still in the world but less and less of it--as indeed the world can offer less and less through its greedy death-throes.  Life will find a way--but all the more so will God and His Resurrected Son.  What McWorld offers was represented by the miniature mummy stolen by Hazel Motes for his "Church Without Christ" in the novel, "Wise Blood" by Flannery O'Connor.  And may I add that O'Connor did not end up like the sophisticates and Sophists and Sadducees noted above.  May I reach my end like her, only more so...Holy Spirit come and do in me what no man can.

"This man who formerly persecuted us is now preaching the faith he sought to destroy." "Wise Blood" made the difference, not a fallen shrivelled fruit.  (Gal 1--the whole chapter)