Chris' Christian Blog

April 5, 2021

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Blessed are they that keep judgment, and he that doeth righteousness at all times.

What does it mean to keep judgement? How can we be righteous all the time?

This is a passage I think I can explain without a lot of research and theological terms. Some of the terms within the question itself are theological, but it is theology that most people instinctively know. It does not require much explanation. The term righteous for example is a theological term. Yet the world recognizes righteousness as being a basically upright and just person. This question is asking how we can be righteous? The answer is that if we are doing it then we cannot be righteous. Isaiah 64:6 tells us that our righteousness is like filthy rags compared to God's righteousness. So the short answer to the question is that based on human willpower alone we cannot be righteous. However Jesus Christ changed everything. He left the glories of Heaven to become a man and die in man's place. Since He was God incarnate He was able to do what no human being could do. He lived a 100% righteous life. Then the human Jesus died on the cross and took the sin of the world upon Himself. In dying He accepted the punishment for our sin. Therefore God applies the death of Jesus to the lives of any humans who accept it and through that substitutionary death humans are declared righteous.

"Prompt: I was cruising the galaxy with Commander Wilma Deering and we came across this planet, a favorite of mine,

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FISHING  (E) Oriental Poetry Contest a Pantun Round 57 #2201908 by Monty

Write about fishing today.

I am glad Princess Megan Snow Rose chose this piece. It was written for

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, which is a contest I own. Bringing it up reminded me that I have to close the current round for judging. I think I have over extended myself a wee bit. I often forget to do things because I am doing a half-dozen other things.

As to the prompt, fishing is one thing I do not do a lot of. As a resident of the WV Veterans Home, which is owned by the State of West Virginia, I am issued a special fishing license, which entitles me to fish anywhere in the State of West Virginia (or from the Ohio banks of the Ohio River) since WV owns the Ohio River. However, I seldom exercise the privilege as I have too much to do already. I would certainly never eat anything from the rivers and try not to eat a lot of seafood since the rivers ultimately empty into the oceans. For a real fish story read

Three Wishes  (E) This is one of my Bob Foley Fish Stories #2057733 by Chris Breva

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"Prompt theme: Renewal - “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come.” —Joseph Campbell

How does this quote relate to renewal."

If this is the Joesph Campbell I believe it is, he was instrumental in starting the church of Christ movement, a non-denominational group of independent churches loosely connected by theology. What I believe Campbell was saying is that in order to grow spiritually we have to be willing to change. Christianity calls this change being "born again". Other religions may have different terms for it but the gist remains the same. We discard the person we were in order to become a new and better person. We all grow to some extent by learning. However, real growth comes when we accept spirituality in whatever form and work to become better people.

"Prompt: What is art to you? Do you think there might be a universal set of rules underlying all aesthetics?"

Art is a lot of things to me. It is wall decoration. It is trash and it is treasure. It is beauty and it is ugliness. It is the expression of oneself. A lot of art makes no sense to me. I guess you have to understand the artist's philosophy. I am not even going to try to examine whether there are rules to aesthetics. The question requires a philosophical response based on inductive and deductive logic. As a graduate student taking Christian theology this semester I have to take and defend many positions using deductive reasoning and it quite often gives me a headache. I am going to pass on this one.