The Renegade Doc Comments

Posts Tagged ‘control’

In talking with friends in the past I have likened our relationship with Father to riding a motorcycle.

You generally have two choices when riding:

• Be the driver, on front, or
• Be on back.

Until now I have pointed out that most of us tell Father to get on back, we’ll be OK driving.

In that analogy we are basically telling Father to get lost, we are in control, we don’t Him.

In contrast, we get on back and let Him do the driving.  He can take us wherever He wants, at whatever speed He wants, through whatever weather conditions He wants – and we can do nothing about it.

If you have ever ridden on the back of a motorcycle you know what I am talking about.  It can be very scary and very exhilarating at the same time!  Either way you have to trust the driver and flow with him or you will never get on that bike again!

Of course, in this life Father asks and hopes that we will lean in and talk into His ear to let him know how we are doing back there and dialogue with Him about the whole experience.

However, recently I have graduated up from the motorcycle in my analogy to a bicycle!

That really is a graduation, a growing, because Life is about Choice, and it really is about independence, but with a twist.

In spite of what we have been taught by church and religion, and the oft-used phrase, usually of resignation, and often of despair, “God is in control,” Father REALLY ISN’T in control.

Now at some deep layer He is in control and could wrap this whole human/Earth planet thing up in a blink.  But at the level we all live in, He has chosen to NOT be in control.

That is the point!!

It’s called Free Will, Choice, Relationship.

So here’s where the bike analogy comes in.

When young and just getting our legs under us, your Dad probably got you a bike and probably put the training wheels on.  As you got some balance and confidence and developed some skill with the bike, the training wheels likely came off.

Then, at some point, whether you had the wheels or not, your Dad (say, or someone important in your life) probably ran alongside, holding on and helping you keep the bike upright.

But soon he let go and there you were, on your own, independent, a big boy/girl, wobbling down the road.

Soon thereafter you could ride without wobbling and with real confidence and skill.

Now here’s where the Choice comes in – the good stuff, the point of Life.

Most of us, when we became great riders, when the wobbles quit, headed down the road on our own to learn and explore and see how good we really were.  Most of us probably never thought to turn around and see what Dad was doing after he let go.

I believe that Father continues to stand there, with pride beaming out of His eyes for us, but longing in His heart for us to come back and invite Him to go riding with us, to lead us on ever more difficult and skill-testing trails, to join us in the adventure, to share Life with us.

Most of us go on and do all those things on our own, never checking in with Father to see if He has any wisdom to share, any ideas to offer, any tips to demonstrate.  And we miss out on His companionship and the shared experience.  We miss the thrill of learning from the Master Bikerider.  We never get the affirmation of our skill by hearing Him say for us to take the lead and see where the trail will take us.

Because we are so busy being totally independent we miss the dialogue, the relationship, the companionship, the bonding, the mutual appreciation, the growth, the instruction.

And so does He.

Let’s ride our bikes WITH Father.

Blessings,

Dr Jon
Renegade Doc

My son and I were out mowing yesterday (he owns a lawn mowing service 30DollarCuts.com) and talking while driving.  His large deck riding mower died last week and he is running behind, trying to mow with smaller machines that take much longer.  Nor does he have the cash flow to buy a newer, large mower and doesn’t want to go further into debt to buy on credit.

We got into a discussion about economics and debt/credit and cash and this led to a discussion about how Father God plays into the mix.

He pointed out that “sin” is very simply the failure to TRUST Father to care, lead and direct us in the way best for us.  I totally agreed and use the word CONTROL to say the same thing (have posted previously about this).

We are born with a heart that from the get-go says, “I’m OK, I can deal with this, thank you,” and put it upon ourselves to take care of ourselves.  We don’t truly or deeply believe that Father a) really cares about us, b) has our best interest at heart, or c) is capable of doing anything about it if He really did care.

This is exactly the message with which the serpent deceived Eve.

This is exactly the response with which Adam responded when given the choice for Eve or for Father.

Adam did not truly believe that Father meant what he said when he stated “it is not good for a man to dwell alone.”  He did not believe that Father, having gone to the extreme of doing surgery to bring Eve to him the first time, would or could also do something extreme to make sure Eve would be able to remain with him.

No, he saw the predicament that he was in, that Eve had been disobedient and had caused a conflict, and rather than talking it over with Father and letting Him direct and provide and discuss solutions, said “I’m good here, I can handle this, I’m in control.”

Failure to trust led to failure to communicate and loss of relationship and that in turn led to living life on a lower plane.  Now there was sweat with labor, pain with childbirth, thorns from the earth.  Now there was covering up, blame, guilt, loss of relationship, living primarily in the physical with a little spirit thrown in (instead of the other way around) and death.

Now there was living by using our head, our knowledge, to figure things out, to be logical.

And guess what.

I and you and we still do it this way all the time!

I am especially bad with living this way when it comes to money.  The car needs a repair, I don’t have the money.  Out comes the plastic.  I can’t believe that Father will somehow provide.  So I am in debt and have become a slave to the creditor.  The rest of my life is on hold until the debt(s) are paid.  I cannot fulfill my greater purpose until what I owe everyone else is covered.  That is death.

We do it in religion.  While we say all the right words, we don’t really trust Father will provide for a life of fellowship together, so we build mausoleums we call “churches” and organize to make sure everything works out alright and set up rules of conduct and behavior to keep everything under control (that word again!).  And it is killing us deep inside.

And it is all so subtle, and so pervasive.  The quickest way to be enslaved in your heart once again, after having found some freedom and after having finally started to truly trust Father once again, is to hang around a religious person once again, as wonderful as they may be.

This control thing, this failure to trust, this thinking we can do it on our own is so deep that it needs a surgery to get it out.

This is exactly what Yeshua did.

His life showed us how to stay in relationship, in listening mode.  He did nothing that wasn’t first shown to him by Father.  His death was the surgery required to fix this deep-seated, inbred problem.  His resurrection was the healing, the bringing forth of the “Eve” that will complete us, and his Spirit sent after is the power that enables us to live the same way.

This Spirit, this life, will be one of Communion with Father, of Trust, of restoration of relationships, of openness/nakedness, without shame, without guilt, living once again from spirit and not just stuck in physical.

I want to live that way, how about you?

And my son’s lawn mowing?  Perhaps if the money for a bigger mower isn’t available it means Father is directing him away from cutting grass and into that which is even nearer and dearer to his deep heart.  Or perhaps there are some life lessons he needs to learn, some actions to take to generate the cash.  Either way, by listening and trusting like he has never done before, he will be drawn into Father’s heart – and his own.

Blessings,

Dr Jon

I have a confession to make.

EVERYTHING I have always done in life was first run through the filter of “Right and Wrong.”

So what’s the big deal?  That’s what we are supposed to do, right?  No.

That’s another way of saying “Good and Evil” which is the problem with the world in the first place, the choice Adam made which put us in this place of choosing control, as we discussed in recent posts.

Points out that the choice to keep control is deeply ingrained in me, for sure; more than I had imagined.

So what is wrong with doing the “right” thing, you wonder?  Isn’t that what we are supposed to do?

Again, forgive me for being the Total Renegade, but NO, we are not supposed to live by “right and wrong.”

There are problems when we do this.

First, it is all about me.  As Eckhart Tolle points out in his new book, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose, the ego lives by identification and separation.  ”Right and wrong” is totally about identification.  You are either “right” or you are “wrong.”  Either way you are then separated.  If you are “right” you separate from all those that your “rightness” defines to be “wrong.”  And vice versa.

Second, it is all about control.  If I define myself to be “right” I have subscribed to some/someone’s belief system about what “right and wrong” is.  Once having made the decision, I make sure (I control my behavior and situation) that I continue to behave “rightly.”  But what if the belief system is different from someone else’s and what I say is “right” is actually “wrong” to them?

For example, I grew up in Maine in the ’50s and ’60s where swimming was done only from Memorial Day to Labor Day.  The water was too cold outside those dates (and not so warm then, either!).  For us it was no big deal to go “mixed bathing” (boys and girls together).  On the other hand, “Christians” in Maine at that time thought it was “wrong” for women to wear makeup.  Then we moved to Florida where we soon discovered that mixed bathing was tantamount to committing the unpardonable sin but wearing makeup was expected – the more the merrier.  Imagine my consternation when I came home one day and my sister met me at the door with lipstick on!  I thought she was the newest local stripper!

Third, when we live by “right and wrong” it is all about mindless following.  We throw away our thinking and our ability to react to life situations and to other people.  We identify them as either “right or wrong” by our belief system, become judgmental and critical and loving people goes out the door.

So what, then, are we supposed to throw away the rule book and just do whatever we want to do?

Yes to the rule book part, but not to the we want to part.

This is the crux of the matter and the whole point of our being here on the planet.

We have the choice to begin to live by transcendence, to live at a higher plane where behavior and thinking is determined by Someone else  for other reasons.  We have the choice to not live all about me, to not have to control everything, to be present and constantly aware to the moment.

This is what Yeshua modeled for us.  Everything he did was only done AFTER he heard (listened to) Father tell him what to do.  Everything he did was also “wrong” by the cultural standards of the time.  Healing on the sabbath, eating before washing your hands, befriending women and “sinners” (the “wrong” people) were all “wrong” and is why He was killed.

Living and acting on the basis of what Father tells us will put us at a level that will have us living by Love, not by rules, living in the moment, not by habit, living in response to life and people, not just walking over them and being critical.

Will it be easy?  No.  It will be a total letting go and releasing of everything we have known before.  For those of us who think we are “right” we have to let go our “righteousness” which is the hardest thing to do.

Will we be wicked?  No.  Father won’t tell us to do wicked things, though He may tell us to do some “wrong” things.

“Right and wrong” – just another way to spell “control” and another way NOT to enter that place of Communion with Father.  Whether you have been “right” all your life, one of the good guys, or “wrong” all your life doing all the “bad” things, it is all the same.  From the basis of Father’s heart and looking for Communion with you, both are “wicked.”

So – confession.  I have spent my life living by “right and wrong” and have been “righteously wicked.“

Time to change and start living by Communion.

Blessings,

Dr Jon

Having briefly outlined the Cosmic Experiment, or perhaps better called the Cosmic Battle, into which Adam plunged our planet, and the resulting Consequences in our previous posts, we come now to the question of what does this mean in daily life, and is there a solution?

As I alluded in the last post, I don’t think any of us truly understand how completely we are overcome by this need to control.  Every fiber of our being is dedicated to it.  We have to control EVERYTHING and we find all kinds of ways to do so, at times actively and at other times passively.

Those of us who are really good at controlling tend to do so forthrightly.  Domineering men and women who have every “i” dotted and every “t” crossed are obvious in their ability and need to control.

Those of us who are not so good at being so forthright have developed a mastery of using passivity and “shrinking” to manipulate our situations and people around us.

Relationships totter and fall, crash and burn around the issues of control and passivity, be they marital, friend or business relationships.  Hint: if you are struggling in any of your relationships, ask where the control issues are.

Business, religion (yes, even the “Christian” church), politics, law, medicine, education, entertainment, the media and every other human organization are all designed to control.  In spite of all the wonderful verbage about how much these aspects of life are set up to help people, they become a monster in their own right, dictating to people what they must and must not do to maintain approval and good standing.

Last weekend I saw a church sign telling the community to “Give the best you have to God.”  That sounds wonderful and who will argue that it is not a good thing to do?  But the implication that there is a part of you that you can keep for yourself is CONTROL, pure and simple.  What if Father is telling you to give Him EVERYTHING, or NOTHING?  Are you listening, communing?

For me, the word “sin” has taken on a totally new meaning.  It is no longer some theological expression that tries to describe how wicked I am, how my behavior needs to be punished.  Rather, it is a word that describes this failure to follow Father’s heart, this falling short of living life in spirit, this failure to commune with Father and instead try to become and live and “make it” on my own, by my own terms, under my own control.

This thing, Control, to which we have given ourselves has totally and insidiously turned and Controlled us!  We are its slave, in more bondage to it than anything else we could possibly imagine.

So we have this problem.  Can this infestation, this spirit-mind-body invasion be negated?

What to do?

Do you want to do?  Do you want release? Freedom?

Many, I fear, don’t.  Being told what to do and how to live life is way too comfortable for many (most?)  Even those of us who are Renegades in some areas find other areas where it is much easier to be told; and we also like to control things that are important to us, such as our “Renegadeness!”

But there is a way to undo, overcome, restore ourselves to the place of Freedom and Communion.  It is simple, yet the hardest thing to do.

Let go.  Stop controlling.  Live in Spirit/Intuition as Adam did originally and reenter that place of Communion with Father.

Easy to say, HARD to do.

The first to do it, truly, was Yeshua, the Christ. His answer was to actually start over, to be reborn, to live life with a different set of genes, under a different rule of genetics. He lived under a genetic code of UNCONTROL.

Note how he characterized his life:

I and my Father are one.
I can do nothing unless I first see my Father doing it.
Not what I want, but what you, Father, want.

When the Enemy tempted Him to gain His Success, His Goals, attain His Purpose on His own, He refused, completely submitting to His Father.

Now it is encouraging to see and think that someone could break this “Curse” but is even more discouraging if we thought we could never do so as well.

But the GOOD NEWS is that Yeshua also pointed out that He came exactly for the purpose of Finding and Restoring what was lost, the Communion between human and Father.  It cost Him His life, but it broke the chains of Control that bind us.

Let’s live in that Freedom and return to Communion, letting go of all the Control!

But we can’t do it with our Head, our Words, our Knowledge.  We can’t do it by more ritual or practice.

We must truly LET GO everything that has made sense to us in the past.

We must LET GO all the covering up that we are so good at doing, all the protection and posturing.

We must rebirth and live under a new genetics.

We must also Listen and Commune and then Do what comes to our heart to do, submitting our moments of every day, our energy, our money, our desire, our goals, our everything to that communion.  Father communicates in spirit and we must live at that level, in spirit, to commune with Him.  The dis-order must be put back into its proper order.

It is somewhat analogous to riding on the rear seat of a motorcycle.  All you can do is hold on.  There is NO CONTROL!  Regardless of what the driver does or where the driver goes, there is nothing you can do.  Your life and safety is totally in the hands of the driver.  There can be fear, for sure, but if you trust the driver and believe that he is most concerned for your best interest and care, there is immense freedom.

Go ahead, LET GO.

Get out of the front seat and climb on back.

Love, Communion, Freedom is there for the receiving.

Blessings,

Dr Jon

Having looked in our last post at the choice Father gave Adam (and us), let’s look at some of the consequences of choosing Control instead of Communion.

Father kindly outlined these for us in what is called the “Curse” but to my thinking would better be perceived as a “forth-telling.”  Father is informing us how the universe is set up to work and the result of controlling things on our own.  We make him a Judge and Curser by our labels of His words without spending the time to listen to His heart and discover His intent.  But I digress….

We noted last time that Adam functioned in spirit and could use the spirit-eyes to monitor the physical world.  Now Father tells him that he will work amidst thorns and by the sweat of his brow.  This is another way of telling Adam (and us) that whereas he formerly functioned in spirit, now he will be locked into functioning in the physical.  His ability to sit and see and monitor will be buried, hidden, all but lost and instead he will have to be up on his feet responding to that which is physically in front of you.  Similarly, Eve also will now be locked into the physical world, experiencing pain as part of that which is unique to her, bearing children.

Next, Father tells him that the order of things is now upside down.  Instead of the appropriate Father-Man-Woman order, he states that now the Woman will seek to take over the place of the man.  In other words, she will now attempt to control him and he will in turn try to control Father.  Look how we see that played out: matriarchal societies, so-called “war of the sexes,” Equal Rights Amendment, and “women’s choice” resulting in abortion to name a few instances of this dis-order.

Besides controlling women we also see passive men, as John Eldredge points out.  This is the flip side of the coin of Control.

I believe another aspect of all this is the attempt of the serpent, God’s Enemy, to attack and attempt to destroy God’s Crown of Creation, Woman.  She was His ultimate expression of Creation and from the time she was created Father has not created anything else, of which we are aware.  Thus she is the First Target and thus we see throughout history rape, female subjugation, and female mutilation in obscene and torturous ways, to say nothing of the less severe but equally oppressive economic and social positions given to women over the centuries.  This, I believe is the flip side of women controlling and men overreacting to inappropriate Control.  It all gets very complicated and dehumanizing.

We also noted last time that being completely open, vulnerable and transparent was the patterned lifestyle.  Now that is all changed and Adam is hiding – everything.

First, he is hiding his body.  And to do so he used perhaps the most uncomfortable piece of vegetation to do so.  The fig leaf is a spiny, itchy, nasty thing to have against one’s body.  Why didn’t he at least choose an elephant leaf or something smooth?  Did he foreshadow the extent to which we will deceive ourselves and engage in self-destructive behaviors?

Second, he is hiding his emotions.  He is full of fear and shame with no love for himself or his wife being apparent.  He is blaming her and not himself for his actions.  She in turn is passing the blame on to the serpent.

Third, he is hiding his spirit.  No longer is he walking in the garden, listening to, communing with loving Father.  Rather, he is hiding behind fig leaves, bushes and wife, getting as far away from Father as possible.

He is cowering in shame.  Whereas he formerly was innocent to the ideas of Good and Evil,  he now cannot even tolerate exposure to, and the concept of, Good – his body, that to which Father had already given the highest accolade of not only “Good” but “Very Good.”  With this reaction to Good, if Adam had any idea what Evil would look like, he would probably have buried himself in a hole and not just hid in the bushes.

And so we see what choosing Control, Self Direction and Situation Manipulation has done.  From a wide open, free, transparent, unashamed spirit body in proper alignment with his world and the universe and in intimate Communion with Loving Father, Adam and Eve have become separated from themselves, from their Lover, from each other and from his own heart, suffering the shame and pain and lack of a broader vision, being locked in a physical world, exiting only by physical death which could come all too easily.

But do we really understand how deeply this need to Control has invaded the human spirit, mind and body?  Do we really “get” how completely it has affected even the daily minute by minute aspects of our lives, our relationships, our desires, our choices about everything?  I think not.

Is there any way out of this predicament? any way back to the Garden of Eden and the freedom of Communion?

Is there a way to get out of the driver’s seat and back to the rear seat?  Do we want to?

Next time.

Blessings,

Dr Jon

When Father made man He put him in a Paradise, with a task.  Like any garden, it needed to be nurtured and protected and Father told Adam to “dress and keep” the garden.  We also have the boundaries outlined for us and when you look at it the size was very large – most of the Middle East.

So think a minute.  Even if Adam was 10 feet tall and could run 50 miles per hour, there was no way that he could guard the perimeter and get to a particular location in time to effect a protective action.  Did that mean Father gave Adam an impossible task and set him up for failure?

Look again.

Every day Father came and spoke with Adam and Eve, fellowshipping and communing (and I think discussing with them how to do the gardening, and living, that needed to be done).

So think again for another minute.  God is Spirit and can only communicate in spirit.

Putting all this together I have to make the following conclusion:

Adam was living on the planet in a physical body, having a physical experience, but was doing so by thinking, choosing, emoting in spirit.

So instead of an impossible task, Father gave Adam a “growing” task.  I believe he could literally sit in the middle of the garden – or anywhere for that matter – and in his spirit’s eye look over the entire garden and know what was going on, then take appropriate action in a timely and effective manner.

As part of this scenario, there was also the state of “naked and unashamed” which means that there was perfect clarity at every level of Adam’s existence.  There was nothing in the way to prevent Adam from communicating with every level of himself, with his wife, and with God.  There was nothing which would prevent his spirit from hearing and seeing anything in the garden.

In that context there was also a hierarchy of authority that kept things in proper order: Father was at the top overseeing everything, communicating, teaching, loving Adam and Eve.  Adam was next, keeping watch over the garden, loving his wife.  Eve was last inline, offering her beauty and insight.

This was a perfect arrangement, based on communion, with control and submission in the appropriate order.  The only thing that could upset this applecart was for the disciple to try to take over the place of the teacher, for the communion to be replaced by control.

And that is exactly what happened.

Father set it up to give Adam the choice:  choose Life or choose Knowledge.  Choose to return Father’s love and be present with Him in fellowship and communion or choose to be self-sufficient and in control of his own existence.

Adam, we know, chose to take control (the big lie of the serpent – you will be like God; He isn’t really loving you; His communion with you isn’t really in your best interest; you can do a better job if you do it yourself).

(Question: what would you have done?  What do you still do?)

Adam chose Control over Communion.  In analogy, he chose to boot Father out of the driver’s seat of the motorcycle instead of riding on behind, a place where he had no control.

As we know, it had fatal and ongoing, damning consequences.

What were those consequences?  How does it affect our life today?

Next time.

Blessings,

Dr Jon