Standing at The Intersection of Conflict and Belief
“I myself have resolved to follow the path of righteousness henceforth. More than anything, devote yourself to learning and act in accordance with the teachings of the past.” – Katsu Kokichi, Musui’s Story
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0192-Midweek-Debrief—Musuis-Story–A-Tokugawa-Samurai-e2ib66a
“I realized that this was true for both China and Japan: every one of those who had been brought to ruin or lost their lands had been punished by Heaven for neglecting the proprieties between sovereign and subject, the bond of affection between parent, child, and brother, and for wallowing in greed and extravagance. All the more wondrous, then, that I have survived thus far without mishap. Indeed, I am overwhelmed by the mercy and goodness of Heaven that I even hesitate to show my face to my fellow men.” – Katsu Kokichi, Musui’s Story
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0191-Midweek-Debrief—The-First–Final-Story-e2hvrf4
It was not long then until there was the spirit coming, by God’s power, the holy breath, going under the hard stone to the corpse! Light was at that moment opened up, for the good of the sons of men. The many bolts of Hell were unlocked. The road from this world up to heaven was built. Brilliantly radiating, in such a way that the guards, tough soldiers, were not at all aware of when he got up from death and arose from his rest.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0190-Midweek-Debrief—listening-long-to-the-silence-e2hd8i1
Many and powerful are the agents who would bar the door to the key to the universe, many who would throw a veil over him. Moses, you recall, was hard to see. David, perhaps more so. None of this has been easy. And yet there lies between us and Jesus two-thousand years of war, famine, disease, and death.
Jesus is God. He is the turning point of history, which is why there is no more misinterpreted or maligned or slandered figure. And, most of us have a bone to pick with Jesus too.
Where can we be with God in this season of death? We pray for help, some daily, and a few, many more times than that. We ask for a heart that is ready to receive God. “Help me, Jesus,” we beg. “Give me some direction.”
“Or, maybe, you can’t.” The unspoken prayer.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0189-Midweek-Debrief—How-Lovely-It-Was-e2h3eja
Those who do not want to live under God’s government will not be forced to. That would erase the principle of love upon which the cosmos is founded — no one will be sent away from the presence of God who wants to stay. So God’s people have prayed for millennia that there will be no such people. But we know it happens, and that there are too many to name.
Why would anyone want to turn away from God? There are many ways, but rather than try to explain, we pray instead for repentance, and that they, like us, would be transformed. We pray that they may be saved, yes, but even more than that, we pray that they may be changed, to become, in a word, like God.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0188-Midweek-Debrief—Keening-Their-Swords-e2gp442
David was a stone in the path upon which the Paradise King trod.
This King is the earth shaker. He is the cloud rider. He is the guardian of widows and orphans, and a servant-king who withholds nothing from his people. His face is young, yet old beyond the reckoning of this or any age, for he hails from eternity past. It is a beautiful face, full of humility and adoration and power. And he is crowned with purest golden light. He is the morning star and his eyes burn. They blaze with immortal fires, and there is laughter there, laughter and springtime and joy enough to set the whole cosmos to singing.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0187-Midweek-Debrief—The-Flames-of-Time-e2gfa25
After his death, the people waited for a prophet like Moses to appear because Moses had told them to watch.
“Yahweh your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers.” Moses had said, “To him, you will listen.”
And so, the invitation is in front of you too, to hear him. “Come,” Jesus says, “and follow me. Come and learn how to live. Come with me, and I will heal your heart. Follow me, and I will make you human again.”
Many before you have accepted the invitation. There is Paul, the persecutor, who saw Jesus on the throne of God and was blinded by the revelation. There is Polycarp, whose blood put out the fire. There is Irenaeus, who stood like a lighthouse on the edge of a stormy sea, and the waves were perversions of the Gospel of Jesus, and yet he did not yield. There is George, the red-crossed knight, who offered up his head to an emperor rather than renounce his faith. There is Ephraim the Syrian, John the Golden Mouth, and the Venerable Bede. They are your ancestors. They are your family. They have passed the Good News of Jesus from door to door, from generation to generation, like small buckets of sacred treasure. Now, at last, it comes to you, and it is time for your hearts to expand with the inexhaustible joy of God’s love; the love of him who leads you through the Sea of Death onto the welcoming shores of Paradise.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0186-Midweek-Debrief—The-Gloaming-Time-e2g534b
The gods came down. Slinking, slithering, prowling, whispering, they sought out earthly kings. And so, Pharaoh Merneptah heard a voice in the dark and the voice said his name. He woke, and there was Ptah with a plan. The old kings of Uruk also were tutored. Ayala had the fish creature, Adapa, for an advisor. Alaglar had Uanduga from the sea. In his time, Hammurabi met Shammash, and from that god recovered the knowledge the flood had destroyed. The trend never stopped. Descartes saw lights in his tent, and a creature gave him his method. Oppenheimer set off his bomb, and Krishna spoke, “I am become death, the destroyer of worlds.” These had a plan: to rule and remake humanity. The ruling was easily done. The remaking was harder. Harder, but not impossible.
The enemy has always worked to remake humanity in its image, an image of ancient jealousy and ravenous pride.
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0185-In-The-Beginning—-A-Story-e2fr8l8
… we must start in the most difficult place: in the beginning. We have to start where the story is not broken or befouled, when wild waves cooled sun-soaked shores and the choruses of birds carried over ebony cliffs, who knows how far.
It was a wild world, all welter and waste. Unrestrained rivers carved crooked lines across sprawling green plains. The earth birthed bejeweled fruit, and untended forests clawed in vain at the roots of mountains. And God loved it, because he created it.
That is just a small part of the story of the Bereshit, the “beginning” as the Hebrews call it. It is an old story, the first story told by God, and God is very old, and he is not always easy to understand. But, old things are often hard to understand.
For this reason, old stories are abandoned, because they allude us. New stories take their place, stories that are not so wild, or weird, or hard to hear. In general, the more remote a story is, and the more work we must do to understand it, the more likely it is that it will suffer mishandling.
And almost every witch, sorcerer, scientist, and pseudo-philosopher has some interest in mishandling this story. It is not hard to see why. In the beginning, you see the end. If you want to control how the story concludes, you attack it at the very start. – Donavon L Riley. Homily on Creation
Podcast Link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donavon-riley/episodes/0184-Midweek-Debrief—Buffered–Pourous-People-e2fhp82
Almost everyone can agree that one of the big differences between us and our ancestors of five hundred years ago is that they lived in an “enchanted” world, and we do not; at the very least, we live in a much less “enchanted” world. We might think of this as our having “lost” a number of beliefs and the practices which they made possible. But more, the enchanted world was one in which these forces could cross a porous boundary and shape our lives, psychic and physical. One of the big differences between us and them is that we live with a much firmer sense of the boundary between self and other. We are “buffered” selves. We have changed. – Charles Taylor, Buffered and Porous Selves
Article Link: https://tif.ssrc.org/2008/09/02/buffered-and-porous-selves/
The Warrior Priest Podcast 