Great Controversy

GOOD } evil } GOOD

Redefining God

If God is sometimes perceived by some unbelievers, as well as believers, as not being as good as we'd like him to be, then we have to be as good as we think he should be. Sometimes we attribute to God partial blame for the unpleasant experiences we see all around us, e.g., suffering, death, hunger, poverty, etc. While it is true that he doesn't cause these terrible things, he allows them since he could prevent them if he wanted to. Or he could have avoided all of them by not creating the world and humanity in the first place.

I wouldn't save the entire human population--the good with the evil--if I were God, but I'd give them a million life times to make a decision in my favor. If after a million life times they still would not want to love me, I'd give them a million more chances. At some point they would tire out of having to do it all over again, and they would throw up their hands and say, "Okay, you win, I'm on your side, as well." 

On the other hand, I'd be unfeeling, in a sense, to allow someone who made some truly horrific mistakes in his or her lifetime, e.g., Hitler, Stalin, Nero, etc., to live again and again, with the possibility that they might well make the same kind of mistakes time after time. Perhaps there is some benevolence after all in letting individuals only live once and make a choice for good or evil.

On the other hand, I would never destroy what I have created. It would be an admission that I had made a mistake in creating mankind in the first place. And, of course, we know that God does not make mistakes. Otherwise he would not be God.

Or perhaps there are other explanations like the traditional Great Controversy theme that Joseph Bates developed and Ellen White wrote about in the book of the same name. In that explanation as to why there exists good and evil in this world, it boils down to man possessing freedom of choice. 

Another factor put forth in the Great Controversy theme is that the other created intelligences in heaven and other worlds need to know that God is a God of love and who will not destroy those he's created in his image. He provided a way out for those who rebelled against him by coming and suffering in their place the death that should have been theirs at a great risk to himself. God, in the person of Jesus Christ, could have failed in his mission to live a sinless life in place of sinful humanity. Had he failed it would have been an imaginable disaster on a cosmic scale:  the very creator of the universe doomed to eternal oblivion for violating his own moral law. Few mention this unthinkable potential result of Christ's sacrifice in becoming God with Us.

Other explanations as to why we live in an imperfect world have, no doubt, been put forward by philosophers, theologians and scientists, and by other individuals who are perplexed by the inconsistencies of life as we see it.

In spite of these observations, I still choose to live my life with a desire to know God and to seek his face. It's better than looking at reality through totally humanistic eyes.

Yoko Ono Adventist Society

Most people know little about Yoko Ono's art credentials before she met Beatle John Lennon. She was a conceptual artist and had exhibits in important museums when the Beatles were just starting out.

Recently I finally caught up with some of her Fluxus art creations at the Guggenheim's The Third Eye Exhibit in New York City. Until I actually saw the art work side-by-side with John Cage's conceptual scores and La Monte Young's Meditation room environments did it finally hit me that she was a respected avant-garde artist. I, of course, had enjoyed her conceptual art from what little I was able to see and hear of it via excerpts from the book Grapefruit and her collected works sampler, the six-CD Ono Box. But it was the inclusion in a major art retrospective that finally completed the journey for me.

What, if anything, does Adventism have to do with Yoko Ono? Nothing just yet. Or, if anything, there exists a conceptual connection that, in itself, is bound to create such a link. Anything is possible and it is my hope that Ms. Ono may one day contribute her unique gifts towards making Adventist Christianity, or Christian Adventism, as cutting edge as her art and music have been.

A google search of "Yoko Ono" and Adventist turned up an article in the Takoma Park Voice that contained a wonderful performance art description of Ono's work in the Takoma Park area. The Takoma Park area is where the General Conference Headquarters of Adventism are located, as well as one of its largest churches, The Sligo Seveth-Day Adventist church. The google search also produced too many other web sites that time does not permit me to explore. So perhaps there is a six-degrees-of-separation connection between Yoko Ono and Adventism after all. Please consult: The Takoma connection to Yoko's "Wish Trees" of the world .

The power of positive thinking and the law of attraction have come to be stabilizing filters through which I make sense of my life for three years now. It's amazing for me to find echoes of both these methodologies in the art and music of Ms. Ono and--through her influence--in the lyrics and music of John Lennon, her deceased husband.

From a spiritual point of view I find examples of the power of positive thinking in the Psalms and in the work of Ellen G. White both of which impart untold blessings to my life on a daily basis.

There is, at least, one member in this conceptual Yoko Ono Adventist Society. No doubt this post will bring others out of hiding.

Deserted Island Opus: Frustrated Excellence

Cecil Taylor, the Avant Garde pianist who was one of the challenging and challenged practitioners of Free Jazz during the 1960s, tells of a time in his life when no one cared to hear his music and therefore he was without a recording contract once again, as well as, without any scheduled performances. During the day he worked at whatever nickel and dime jobs he could to survive, but at night he came alive when he gave the most exotic sounding pianist concert imaginable for an audience of one, himself.

What little I've heard of Cecil Taylor's music I've enjoyed immensely. Of course, when he was composing his perplexing free jazz pieces I was but a child and his music would have sounded like noise to my untrained or unchallenged ears. I wish I could have somehow have been in the next apartment or in front of his summer building as he nightly played his liquid songs of frustrated excellence, with the appreciation that 30 years of persistence have granted me in returning time and again to the austerity of Free Jazz.

Sometimes you have to live your life or work at your art or craft even though there may not be anyone to take note of what you have to give to life. If, like Cecil Taylor, you are the only one who wants to listen to or who is able to listen to a piano that is played upside-down, and inside-out, then do so and relish each quixotic note that your fingers, or your voice, or your words, or your actions produce. If there is no one to take note of the work of art that is your life or your art, then enjoy the serenity and the tranquil independence of your Deserted Island Opus, in spite of the absent audience. Someday they may very well regret that they were far away when the place to be was right by your side, enjoying as you enjoyed what you contributed to life.