The B. S. M. G. Report

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4266)

Life does not come from strife

But love is from above

BAD

Hellhole.

Nazareth, Galilee, was a community constricted by the domination of the Roman Empire, superstitious and afflicted, impoverished by a belief in a God requiring homage instead of offering compassion.

From this environment, two humans emerged, who found themselves in the unenviable position of having to reject all their training and lose most of their friends, to follow what they believed was divine guidance.

Mary of Nazareth and Joseph of Nazareth

What does a young peasant girl do when she’s suddenly found pregnant and she contends it was at the beckoning of Jehovah?

What does a man do when he’s betrothed to be married and his girlfriend is suddenly impregnated, offering the lamest excuse possible: “The Holy Spirit did it.”

SAD

Joseph was an honorable man, so even though he loved Mary, his training, support system and sense of culture told him that she was a sinful woman, and he must cast her away. He was considering doing it privately so nobody else would know, sending her far away from the Nazareth community, where she certainly would be condemned for being a whore (even though short days earlier she was considered a favored lass).

Mary was given a choice.

God did not intrude or demand that she birth a baby. Yet she replied, “Behold, I am the handmaiden of the Lord.”

But Nazareth commenced to gossip.

She was labeled a sinner. But worse than that—she was blasphemous by proclaiming that she had divine “hookups.”

Yes, it is so sad that religion offers little relief for those who suffer. When there’s a need for mercy, religion falls back on statutes and interpretations. If it had not been for Joseph deciding to let his love for Mary stay strong when the angel told him that she was telling the truth, our story would have been forever altered.

MAD

Then comes the intervention of those motivated by politics and greedy for power. The Romans wanted taxes, forcing Joseph to return to Bethlehem, with his wife in her third trimester. And Herod, who called himself “the Great,” was so worried about losing his title of “King of the Jews” that when Wise Men from the East came inquiring about a star in the sky, he made preparation to kill whatever was being born in that light.

It is important to know this:

There is no such thing as a politician who is spiritual.

There are no Presidents, Kings or Chancellors who have found a redeeming way to combine their faith with their function.

Beware any man or woman who seeks votes by quoting Holy Word.

Herod believed himself to be a righteous man, given responsibility by the Roman government to protect his people from annihilation. It is maddening that even today, we trust powerful pundits in palaces to provide inspiration to our lives.

GLAD

And then there were the Wise Ones.

They possessed that beautiful balance between personal innocence and professional cynicism.

Even though they were willing to trek across the desert, following a Star with no guarantee of a payoff in the end, when they encountered Herod the Great and they realized he was full of chicanery and lies, they avoided any further contact with him.

They took a different way home.

It says they were warned in a dream. But what made them wise was that they already had an inkling that they were talking to a devil with angelic manners.

The Christmas Story is a tale of Bad, Sad, Mad and Glad.

God does not wait until everyone is perfect to set in motion perfection.

There was no other time in history when the world was united in one spot of Mesopotamia. The Roman Empire had extended its influence from India all the way to what we know as England.

So when the Prince of Peace was born, and later was accepted by the Roman Empire as the true message, the Gospel was able to go from the dreariness of the Middle East throughout the whole world.

It eventually crossed the Atlantic to the New World.

It is amazing.

It is always astounding how Bad and Sad, and even that which could make us Mad, by the simple anointing of wisdom, can change the whole story to something Glad.

 

 

 

G-Poppers … December 2nd, 2016

 Jonathots Daily Blog

(3143)

G-Pop was wondering what it would have been like if Facebook had been around for the birth of Jesus.

What would have grabbed the attention of the average Facebook reader in Judea?

Let’s look at the classic elements of the story:

• Rejoice
• Glad tidings of great joy
• A Savior is born
• Prince of Peace
• Listen to the angels
• Can you see the star?

These would more than likely have been deemed boring, averaging seven likes, zero comments and no reposts.

Even if someone had inserted the statement, “a baby was born in a manger,” the single repeating comment would have been, “Come on, Joseph. Get a job.”

Facebook demands drama.

Facebook seeks attention.

Facebook feeds off frenzy.

Facebook is selfish.

No, for the Christmas story to have worked on Facebook, one would need to hand-select the elements, and twist them a bit to make them of interest to the market:

“Pregnant teen and her boyfriend snub traditional marriage”

“Bonnie-and-Clyde-style crazy kids hold shepherds hostage in stable”

“Foreigners, astrologers, wanted for questioning by authorities for smuggling in unknown drugs”

“Lights in the sky! Could it be aliens?”

“And here is a picture of my ‘fur son,’ Jehoshaphat, the cat, as he rubs up against a little immigrant boy in the barn. Isn’t he cute? I mean the cat.”

G-Pop contends that we have become a society of “I’s” who include a few “we’s” if they agree with “us.”

To get likes, shares and comments, the entry has to be insipid enough to have universal appeal to those who find most of the universe unappealing.

But there will be a persistent few who insist on planting the notion of salvation, joy, humanity, brotherly love and peace on Earth.

And who knows?

Maybe in two thousand years, if that is done, they might call us Wise Men.

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

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G-Poppers … December 25th, 2015

 Jonathots Daily Blog

(2793)

G-Pop smiles, with a deep sense of satisfaction and a warm sensation of knowing.

The story would have to be told.

Had Levi Matthew and Dr. Luke failed to pass along the tale, some intelligent soul with an ability to craft words would have needfully granted our race a sharing of such an unfolding, so as to keep us from falling off the cliff of our own sanity, to splatter on the rocks of our despair.

After all, we need a Virgin Birth.

There must be a confirmation that women have struck out on their own, using the power of their own contents to birth a saving force for the world, free of manly intervention or boasting.

The same story certainly must contain wise folks from the East, who are heretics and enemies of acceptable religious inclinations. They appear–awed and in wonder over the miracle that was seen through their eyes and their perspective.

The plot thickens with the introduction of drunken shepherds who insist they’ve been visited by angels. They bring a working man’s energy to a project which might be in danger of becoming too “frilly.”

Add on the fact that as always, there is no room for a good idea in the local establishment, but instead, it must be relegated to the confines of a sheepish environment.

And of course, we need some sort of leader, ruler or in this case, king, who is so prejudiced and afraid of immigration bringing in riff-raff to take his job that he decides to close the borders and punish the children.

So we end up with refugees who have no place to go, no visa, no invitation, and land in Egypt, where they are nobody, possibly suspected of being terrorists.

The story would have to be told.

Whether it’s true or not can be debated by those who certainly have too much time on their hands, or the details can be gnawed on as food for thought.

But if a woman didn’t birth a child on her own, without the approval of a man, and if that child was not accepted by weirdos and drunkards while being rejected by kings and princes, and chased on down the road to feel like a refugee … what in the hell good would it be to us?

 

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

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Populie: Christmas is for Children … December 3, 2014

  Jonathots Daily Blog

(2432)

I read it over twice just to make sure.

But even with this double scrutiny, I was unable to find the mention of any children in the original Christmas story, except for one baby born in a manger.

The tale contains a king, three astrologers from Mesopotamia, shepherds, a confused purported virgin, a bewildered carpenter-in-training, a prophet and a prophetess, a greedy innkeeper, and many souls who were finding their situation quite taxing.

But there was no one under the age of fifteen who was mentioned except the little fella with straw for a pillow.

Yet today you would assume that Christmas was conceived in the minds of the Madison Avenue elite, who were desiring to come up with a holiday that focused on “tots before they were teens.”

Politics loves this populie, because it provides new stumping ground extolling the family and high-sounding ideals.

The entertainment industry certainly focuses on kids because it frees them from having to put a spiritual spin on December 25th, but instead, advertises Santa Claus, candy canes and overgrown elves.

And religion can barely contain itself, trying to yank that baby out of the wooden cradle and on to the cross as quickly as possible.

In the meantime, the significance of “peace on Earth, good will toward men” dissipates into the background in favor of sitting back in our easy chairs, shaking our heads in awe as the youngsters rip open their presents.

Attention one and all: Christmas is for us. It may be our only chance.

It offers three very important possibilities which tend to escape us by the middle of January, and certainly have run away in horror by April 15th, when the IRS drains our sensibilities.

1. We are all the children of God.

If Christmas is for children, it is only because we live in the household of “Our Father which art in heaven.” We have lost our innocence. We favor a jaded outlook. We have resigned our place in the human family, running away to live in an orphanage, simply to make ourselves seem abandoned.

2. Children need to be taught.

For a very brief moment, we begin to look at the Jesus-born-in-the-manger as the life coach he was intended to be instead of the human sacrifice we have thrust upon him. After all, the angels foretold of “peace on Earth, good will toward men,” not a sacrificial blood-bath that ends up with us forming religious institutions with dark, dank corridors.

3. Going forward means going back to pick up what we lost.

There is nothing more precious than being nine years old on Christmas morning. To reject that memory as being idealistic, foolish or silly is to lose one’s soul before dying.

It’s not so much that “Christmas should be in our hearts each and every day of the year” as it is that our hearts should never surrender Christmas and the memories that make us chill with anticipation.

Bluntly, if you’re not excited about what’s going to happen next, you need to change what’s next.

So be careful with the populie that says “Christmas is for children,” because you soon will find yourself angry at the holiday, and also at the little fellows and ladies who keep trying to hang the holly and trim the tree.

It is only true that Christmas is for children as long as we understand that to gain a true spiritual and emotional sensibility… we must all become as a little child.

 

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Please contact Jonathan’s agent, Jackie Barnett, at (615) 481-1474, for information about scheduling.

*****

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Reservations… December 16, 2013

Jonathots Daily Blog

(2094)

“Behold, the handmaiden of the Lord…”

These were the words uttered by the Virgin Mary of Nazareth upon hearing that she was to be the human incubator of the Messiah. Of course, she had no idea what the project entailed, nor exactly how God works with people to perform greatness.

• Jesus was an idea.
• God loves ideas.

The problem with our comprehension of the Divine is that we believe the “idea person” should jump in and do all the work. It doesn’t happen that way.

Actually, if you study the story carefully and put it into the context of Mary’s lifespan, it is a tale of unfulfillment, punctuated by obedience and highlighted by very brief moments of encouragement.

For after all, getting pregnant in a small town when you’re not married is not pleasant whatsoever–especially among people who consider stoning. Being a teenage girl going through morning sickness, swollen legs and a growing belly leaves little time for reflections on angels and promises.

And then to discover that your family is about to be taxed and you will have to leave town during your third trimester to journey over a hundred miles away–only to have your water break right outside the town of your destination, while your husband is unable to find any kind of lodging without situating you next to an animal–well, it certainly takes the glimmer off the original statement of acceptance and willingness.

But it didn’t stop there.

She was chased out of Israel, lived for at least five years in a foreign land, returned home to renewed gossip from non-forgiving-nor-forgetting townsfolk, and settled into what seemed to be a quiet life with a normal family, with no signs of her “miracle son” being particularly special, except for the one time when he was twelve years old and disobeyed her by hanging out in the temple.

When he was grown, she watched his erratic behavior as he lived among wild beasts and fasted, preached against religious intolerance and was rejected by his home town and nearly killed.

Shortly after that, his execution was completed on a hill–hung between two thieves and thrown into a tomb, where to her amazement, he was resurrected. But even at the point of her death, his movement and words had not traveled much beyond the borders of Judea. Hardly confirmation for a world-wide savior.

All of this was initiated by an angel’s proclamation and the only further confirmation she received to give strength to the original promise was an occasional dream, which she had to choose to believe was significant.

The Christmas story is a beautiful insight into the mind of God. It reminds us that everything which is eventually deemed heavenly is brought to pass … through earthly sacrifice.

 

The producers of jonathots would humbly request a yearly subscription donation of $10 for this wonderful, inspirational opportunity

Click for details on the SpirTed 2014 presentation

Please contact Jonathan’s agent, Jackie Barnett, at (615) 481-1474, for information about scheduling SpiriTed in 2014.

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