Child of Man, Face of God: Parts 1-3 (Updated and reposted from April 2016)

 Part I

"For the inheritance of Lord Jehovah is children, the reward of the fruit of the womb."

-- Psalm 127:3

History tells us 1.5 million children were slaughtered during the Holocaust.  People try to soften the description by calling it murder.  When 1.5 million children are gassed, cremated in ovens, or shot and dumped in mass graves, to call it murder is compounding the slaughter of innocence with a healthy dose of bullshit.  To say it was directly, or as a direct consequence, of Nazi actions, is letting the Nazis off easy for the sake of history.  These genocidal sociopaths had no place in their "new world order" for the sick, the infirm, the physically or mentally deficient, gays, or the Jews.  Jews.  Sound familiar?  

If you hear a familiar tone, it's because history repeats itself when we don't teach real history; we teach a softer, kinder, and sadly imperfect fairy tale that won't give children nightmares.  Enter the Nazi legacy of radical Islamic terrorism.  Oh, yes!  We have the Nazis to thank for Islamic terror.  Check out this link for an eye-opening history lesson: Al Qaeda Terrorists Nazi Connection

We've all been victims of Nazi smoke and mirrors.  It is a dirty little secret that escapes occasionally from the allied countries of WWII that are complicit in a sick, twisted, whitewashing of a dark time in world history.  Is it really any surprise that the Nazi "final solution" has continued under the leadership of Al Qaeda and other radical Islamic heretics?  Should we really be surprised to hear of atrocities against women and children?  Hundreds of children are being slaughtered and/or having offenses committed against them by these heretics, while hundreds more are being psychologically twisted to the insanity that is the sociopathic Islamic heresy by being forced to fight, rape, and murder alongside them in the "name of Allah."  The only differences between this new threat to innocence and the Nazi scourge are the efficiency of the killing machine, and, of course, the heresy of doing it all in God's name; the slaughter of God's innocent creations is still slaughter, and the slaughter of women, children, and innocence is still heresy.  The evil leaders who dare say they are the word of Allah on earth should be ashamed.

“And everyone who commits an offense against one of these little ones who believe in me, it were profitable for him that a donkey's millstone would be hung around his neck and he be sunk in the depths of the sea.”

-- Matthew 18:6

Have you ever seen children in a cancer treatment center or a children's hospital?  It always amazes me how much better they deal with life, knowing the likelihood of their impending death.  Adults and families are falling apart around them while they act as the calming influence.  How mature is that?  They have lived too short of a life to have become fearful of losing. Losing what?  Everything?  They come into this world with a child's innocence and, before adults can ruin them, they leave just as innocent as the day they were born.  And, during the short time these special children are with us, they teach us so much about life and God, if we are willing to listen.

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.”

-- Angela Schwindt

One of the reasons children are so important to me, other than having my rights to be a parent ripped away from me by my ex, is my realization of how important being blessed by God to even be a parent was.  I let that "special someone" make that opportunity slip through my fingers by legal decree.  I claim the title of parent only by virtue that I sired two great children, but my job, my divorce, and my ignorance were roadblocks to me earning that title.

Some of us are ordered by the court system of this country to surrender our rights to be parents to a spouse that has as much interest in the child's welfare as they had in building a marriage and a family.  The child is considered a mistake or a pawn to be used as leverage to get as much as the "custodial parent" can before the child comes of age and the vault to free money is forever closed.  This isn't parenting.  I don't think anyone is truly prepared to be a parent unless they have lost their right to be a parent.  

I think this is why I care so much about children.  I think this is why deadbeat parents and parents that simply abandon their children piss me off so.  You learn to hate the accusatory looks fathers get from child support officers and the way they treat you as less than deserving of their respect.  Deadbeat parents make those of us who truly care really look guilty. 

"People were bringing little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” And he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on them and blessed them."

-- Mark 10:13-16

I feel for children that have no loving father, and no loving parents, and I really feel for children that are being used as pawns by their custodial parent just to bilk money from the other parent that would much rather have the children in a loving home with two loving parents.  These kids might as well reside in paid foster care for all the court system cares.  Whether the child ends up with an immoral parent is of little concern.  The scales of justice are indeed blind.  If all of this isn't committing an offense against the child, then what is?  People that use children for profit have no right to be parents of children.  For all intents and purposes they are whoring their children out, and they should be ashamed of the abuse it is evidence of.

"Dear God,

I just want someone to love me, someone to talk to when I need to talk. Someone to cry on when I need to cry. Most of all, someone to love me and walk as far as they wish through my life. Amen."

-- Prayer from a homeless child

If you want an eye-opener, don't listen to what street kids have to say.  Their words are colored by disappointment and their situation.  Read what they write.  Read what they write about feelings, and their wants, hopes, and desires.  I have looked into the face of a homeless child and seen the lack of trust, the anger, and the wheels turning to determine how best to use me to their advantage.  I have also looked into their eyes and found fear and hurt, the pleading soul I was looking for.  Many parents don't lose their children because they want to, they lose the children because they have never been taught how to parent, how to teach and love, or how to persevere.

A child comes into this world innocent, ready to be taught the moral lessons needed to find their path into the next life.  They are born innocent, but with the capacity for free choice.  Their choices, if not guided by good parenting and advice, can lead them down some dark paths.  What we do to them, as they grow, determines who they will become as adults.  They need love, and they also need discipline.  They need a good balance of emotions to prepare them for the ugly, dangerous, world that awaits them, while also being able to appreciate all the beauty and love they will find.

“A child needs both to be hugged and unhugged. The hug lets her know she is valuable. The unhug lets her know that she is viable. If you’re always shoving your child away, they will cling to you for love. If you’re always holding them closer, they will cling to you for fear.”

-- Polly Berrien Berends

When I look into the face of a child, I see the many faces of an emotional God.  In children of want, I see a face that repeats the question of Christ, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from helping me, and from the words of my groaning?"  And, in this face, I understand that each of us is in shame.  Each of us turns our back on the least of us.

The next time you see a street kid, the next time you avert your eyes or make to turn away so as not to be bothered, realize that there stands the message from an accusing God.  These are the children of men, the gift of a loving God.  Dare we abandon them?  Dare we even consider turning from them?  Maybe we should learn to think twice, for these children are the reflection of our future.  Is this really what we want our future to be?  We would be better served to go after those that abandoned them in the first place.  These "parents" are the real evil architects, the real threat, the real warning of the imminent downfall to the future of mankind.  We have met the enemy and it is truly us.  

Where "baby boomers" ruined the country, the millennials, ill-equipped from lack of parenting and quality education,  are left to wallow in the devastation left by unions, corrupt politics, and a liberal legal system spinning out of control.  They face threats to world peace and freedom.  If ever there was a time for the second coming of Christ...  

Maybe our prayers to God are the best legacy we can leave these kids.  And, we might think about asking them for forgiveness.  Just saying.

"The power of words is that a life can be launched with as little as a single phrase, an uplifting word or an act of kindness.

Think of the power we wield and the impact we can make if we become more intentional about encouraging our children.

Our words are often the very things that help create future dreams. And sometimes those dreams are to be just like us."

-- Anonymous 

Part II 

"Mamas don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys..."

-- Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson

The children of the depression carried all of the hopes for a better future, better times, and a great society.  A greater majority would find themselves fighting in WWII or working in factories in support of that war effort.  When it was over, we would enjoy a resurgence of American pride and plenty.  We would finally realize the dreams of a car in every garage, a chicken in every pot, and the house that goes along with it.  We would incur debt.  

We would finally, in the mid-1960s become the Great Society.  Really?  It doesn't matter the century, decade, or year in which a government outlines programs based on bullshit, when the programs finally launch they still smell just as bad.  Like missiles with built-in, American-made, intentionally-malfunctioning guidance systems, they go everywhere but where we were led to believe they would end up.  We end up proving how continually gullible we are, and all we do is harm our children.  

Look closely at the soup kitchen photo above; a sad reminder of mistakes made in our past.  Now, check out the photo shown here:

History isn't repeating itself, history never really changed.  We never learn anything except how to exacerbate a problem.  We vote morons into political office to assist us in our efforts to continually fail.  We seem to enjoy voting these incompetents into positions of authority so they can spend our money and live better than we do; we must, because we keep on voting them in.  

Our children keep on suffering for our inability to vote for quality leadership.  We send them to colleges and universities we can't afford, so instructors, well versed in failure, can indoctrinate our children on how to carry on this tradition of failure.  Socialism... I apologize for my error... our government wins by creating a society of young people indoctrinated to believe the government is better than it is.  Like an addictive "Everything Drug," our children are supposedly given "everything" and are expected to produce nothing.  The drug is bought on credit because society is broke and deeply in debt.  This Everything Drug is "given away" with the government's full knowledge that this young society will never be able to pay this drug lord, the government, back for everything given.  Our children become indentured servants to the government we put in place, and the children don't much care... because they're hooked.  They become whores for their votes until such time as the government either takes over completely or implodes from massive, uncontrollable debt.  Our indoctrinated children will love us, right?  Of course, because we have allowed our children to become numb to being screwed over.  "It's okay; just give me more of everything."  Good parenting teaches, there is no such thing as a free lunch.

"Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him."

-- Psalm 127:3

But, what does all of this have to do with children and God?  Well, According to Nelson Mandela, "There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children."  Children are a gift, a heritage, to mankind from the Lord.  They are a "reward" that we have endeavored to corrupt through our abuse.  

We have forgotten what Christ said about how to treat children, these gifts of God: “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”  This point is driven home with, “And everyone who commits an offense against one of these little ones who believe in me, it were profitable for him that a donkey's millstone would be hung around his neck and he be sunk in the depths of the sea.”  There are those who believe they can ignore this warning, and they can, while they are alive.

We support government programs that reward poverty and stagnate initiative.  We allow parents to continue not progressing forward as productive members of society, not making of themselves everything the Lord intended, and to abuse their children by blatantly teaching them, encouraging them, to follow in their footsteps to nowhere as if this abuse reflects some twisted praise of God to be further rewarded by the Almighty.  The rest of us shake our heads at this lack of parenting, yet we give passive encouragement for abuse by not curtailing the programs which, in themselves, encourage continued abuse.  Not one of us is immune to culpability for what we do in the face of God for these gifts of life, our heritage, not one of us.  Where one child fails, so fail us all!  It makes one well up with pride, doesn't it?

I challenge everyone to visit a shelter for youth in this country, and not a government-controlled excuse for one.  Visit a shelter run by people who really care, if you can find one.  Ask those people about the youth they are there to assist.  Volunteer at a soup kitchen.  Meet some of the young people there.  Meet their parents, especially if they're there as a "homeless" family.  Ask your questions about their circumstances.  Listen to their stories, hopes, and fears.  Dare to look into their eyes, if your conscience can handle it.  Dare to look for the "face of God" and, if you think you see a glimmer of it, dare to see past it to what the future holds, and remember this poem by John Donne:

"No man is an island,

Entire of itself.

Each is a piece of the continent,

A part of the main.

If a clod be washed away by the sea,

Europe is the less.

As well as if a promontory were.

As well as if a manor of thine own

Or of thine friend's were.

Each man's death diminishes me,

For I am involved in mankind.

Therefore, send not to know

For whom the bell tolls,

It tolls for thee."

Part III

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

-- Jeremiah 1:4-5

 

In the age of the second coming, which faces of the "less of us" will we protect?  Which "child" of God, this time, will we deny three times?  We place so much faith in a book written by men and touted as the Word of God; will we accept its sexist tone and deny that Christ may reappear as female?  Will we fail at this test of tolerance as well?  The face of God will, once again, appear as a child before us.  Which child will we choose to accept or deny?  Who among the lesser of us will be appointed as a prophet to the nations?

There is no child born of a woman that does not have sinful nature.  "Does not have a sinful nature" is not to say they are born with sin, but they are born with a sinful nature.  Hence the adage, "Spare the rod and spoil the child."  All children need guidance to remain on the right path, lest they stray.  Even Jesus had to test his mettle, as it is one thing to have knowledge of something and yet another to have experience of something.  Know you have done wrong, admit to the same, and if you repent you will oftentimes avoid the wrath of that damned rod.

Children left to their own devices, without guidance or role models, will easily stray to the inviting side of evil.  Even a Pit Bull Terrier is born to be one of two natures.  It can be love and family oriented, which it prefers, or it can be taught a meanness that can kill.  The difference between the dog and the child is the child's ability to choose that which it prefers; that which it inherently knows and has been taught is righteous and moral.  This is why if you look into the eyes of a child that has sinned you will see the soul of a child in crisis that knows what is right.  It may be a child of man, but you will see in their eyes, the face of God reaching out to you.  It is up to you, your free choice, to deny or accept the plea.

The child's soul left too long in the darkness, will be like a festering wound.  Caught in time, it may recover given a healthy dose of love and attention.  Left too long, or if the infection goes undiagnosed, harder it will be to reverse damage to the soul.  Woe to any soul requiring amputation, and woe to the society that allows it.

Today we are seriously concerned about viral effects on an unborn fetus, yet our young people have been at risk of spiritual and moral infection for decades due to the growing lack of parenting, one-parent households, abandonment, and more which society condones by turning a blind eye.  As a society, we should be ashamed.  As people of faith, we should be ashamed and appalled as children walk the streets at risk, or die alone of violence and hunger, or are murdered before they even have a chance at life.  

We have to ask ourselves, which of these lost children would be our savior?  Which of these lost faces will we look at and see in them the face of God?  How many times will we accept the murder of the "next coming" before the child has a chance to breathe?

“Never open the door to a lesser evil, for other and greater ones invariably slink in after it.”

-- Baltasar Gracian

Editor's Note

(Re: disclaimer cum "get out of jail free" card)

Before you go getting your panties in a bunch, it is essential to understand that this is just an opinion site and, as such, can be subjected to scrutiny by anyone with a differing opinion. It doesn't make either opinion any more right or wrong than the other. An opinion, presented in this context, is a way of inciting others to think and, hopefully, to form opinions of their own, if they haven't already done so. This is also why, occasionally, I will present an "opinion" just to stir an emotional pot. Where it may sound like I agree with the statements made, I'm more interested in getting others to consider an alternate viewpoint. 

I fervently hope that we keep open and active minds when reading opinions and while engaging in peaceful and constructive discussion, in an arena of mutual respect, concerning those opinions put forth. After over twenty years with military intelligence, I have come to believe engaging each other in this manner and in this arena is the way we will learn tolerance and respect for differing beliefs, cultures, and viewpoints.

We all fall from grace, some more often than others; it is part of being human. God's test for us is what we learn from the experience, and what we do afterward.

Pastor Tony spent 22 years with the United States Air Force Intelligence as a planner, analyst, briefer, instructor, and, finally, a senior manager. He spent 17 years, following his service career, working with the premier, world-renowned, Western Institutional Review Board helping to protect the rights of human subjects involved in pharmaceutical research.

Ordained 1n 2013 as an "interfaith" minister, he founded the Congregation for Religious Tolerance in response to intolerance shown by Christians toward peaceful Islam. As the weapon for his war on intolerance he chose the pen, and wages his "battle" in the guise of the Congregation's official online blog, The Path, of which he is both author and editor. "The Path" offers a vehicle for commentary and guidance concerning one's own personal, spiritual, path toward peace and the final destination for us all. He currently resides in Pass Christian, Mississippi, where he volunteered as the lead chaplain at a regional medical center.

Feel free to contact Pastor Tony: tolerantpastor@gmail.com