Walking free carries with it an inherent commitment to be open to
seeing areas one is not. Seeing such areas does not mean one is not
walking free to the fullest extent possible. It just means the level of
possibility has expanded.

Richard Miller (aka Ragpicker)
_________________________

It’s strange, how this all came at me. It came out of nowhere, like usual. And I’m just saying, it was strange, the whole thing. It happened at work, the place where so much of life does. And I wasn’t looking for it at all. I can’t tell you how much I wasn’t looking for it. I’ve been pretty comfortable all around, lately, telling you how free I am. And how free it all felt, what I’ve found.

And it came sliding in, like such things do. The other Sunday night, I got an email from a local friend. Hey, I just got a message from (no name), an Amish guy from out of state. I guess he has my cell number. And he wants to talk to you. And I responded. No. I’ve heard that name before. The guy ain’t right. He’s not all there. I don’t want to talk to him. And we left it at that.

And the next morning at work, it was busy. Very. But still, he called, the guy I didn’t want to speak to. And I told Rosita, when she beeped me and told me who was calling. I’m not available. It’s not a lie, to tell him that. Because I’m not. Just tell him what I’m telling you. And she did. He wouldn’t give up, though. I heard it as it happened. He wanted the fax number to the place. He had some things he wanted to send me. And Rosita gave it to him. She had no other choice. They hung up then, and I thanked her for guarding the gate.

And soon enough, his message to me came spitting in on the fax. A letter. Looked about like a full, typed page. When you write words on paper, and send them to whoever it is you’re talking to, it’s hard to take them back, should you ever want to. I don’t think the Amish have quite learned how that is. Because some of them just keep doing it.

And it was pretty terse, what this letter said. It’s always abrupt, to read such feedback. First, a greeting in Jesus’ name. They do that a lot, the Amish. Open a letter with a greeting in the name of Jesus. They don’t speak that way, much, but they’ll write it. And it didn’t take him long to get right down to business. He’d read the book. And he felt like he had some things to say. “Like your dad, you are a good writer. While he spent a lifetime promoting the goodness of the Amish, you now seem to be intent on expounding on all the evil that is among them, using yourself as proof of that fact.”

Well, where’s a letter going to go from there, after such an opening? Downhill, most likely. A whole page of admonishing followed. Some of it was fair enough. Some of it was just silliness. At least he thought I could write. He just thought I was writing the wrong stuff. But it was the very end that jolted me the most. He was going to be in the area one day that week. “If time permits, I would like to hunt you up.” That’s what he said, there close to the end. And I just groaned inside. Why in the world would such a man want to stop by and see me? It wearied me, the very thought of seeing him walk through that door at work.

What he said about me and my book was fair enough, I suppose, from his perspective. Not that such a thing is ever fun to read or hear. But I have no problem with what anyone thinks or says about me or my writing, or what they write about what they think. You can send such stuff to me all day long. I don’t like it, but it’s just part of the terrain. If I ever get to thinking I got some real writing skills, I go check out some of those one-star and two-star reviews on Amazon. Some of those are pretty vicious. They used to bug me. But not anymore. Not everyone’s going to get your voice. Not everyone’s going to like anything you wrote. It just is what it is. And I’ve seen and heard enough such criticism that I don’t carry it around with me anymore.

The thing that jolted me was that he wanted to stop and see me. Whatever for? Why would you want to go talk to a person, after sending him such a letter? I mean, it’s idiocy. And I felt it rising inside me, like a wall. I knew what I’d do. If he walks in, I’ll just tell him we really have nothing to say to each other. And I’ll shoo him out the door. Try to stay polite, but just shush him right on out.

And I judged the man, big time. Judged every aspect of who he was. And not just in my heart, either. I spoke it out to my Facebook world. I speak a lot of things there, right when they come down. And I spoke this. Told how weary it makes me, to even think about meeting the man who wrote such a thing. I was looking for support, I guess. And it came, in the comments. What kind of bad man could ever accuse you of such evil? Oh, yeah. They saw it, too, what this thing was I was talking about. But then, suddenly, someone said something that didn’t quite fit the template.

It was a brief comment. And it came from a place that startled me. From my good friend, Richard Miller. He will write to the world one day, when he chooses to do so. And his is a singular voice you can’t help hearing. Because he’s seen a lot of hard things, been to a lot of hard places, slogged down some really tough roads. And he got through. And now he just speaks what he sees with a gentle, honest heart. I’ve seen him in discussions often on Facebook, and he has a knack of slicing right through to the core issue of things. And he’s been right where I was in that moment, many times. Many times. And he told me what he saw, and it was different from what I was seeing. And he just kind of slid it in, offhand like. “Thought hit me Ira… wonder why you are being given this opportunity… probably worth paying attention to what happens inside..”

I have to say, it was a bit like walking into a wall, his comment. And it brought me up short, made me stop and think. I claim to be free, almost to a point of pride. I try to walk as free as I can from every oppressive force. Free from the state. Free from any kind of burdens of resentment and rage against those who have wronged me. And free from other Christians who try to ensnare me with their elaborate tangled webs of law and guilt, all based on judgment. I won’t get bogged down with unnecessary baggage. I just won’t. You just throw it off and keep walking. And traveling light that way is a beautiful thing, from what I’ve seen so far. And I’ve not been shy, in speaking it. How beautiful it is to walk free, wherever you are.

And yeah, I know I went off about this in the last blog. But I don’t think I quite got it told, so bear with me here. (If I’m making too much like an Amish preacher who doesn’t know when it’s time to shut up and sit down, skip this paragraph and the next few.) I can’t even begin to describe how free it is, when you actually grasp what the state really is, and accept what you see in your mind. You live as undefiled from it as you can. I don’t participate at all. I don’t vote. I don’t cheer or even watch the state worship before any sporting event. I don’t “support the military.” I pledge no allegiance to any flag of any state. If that makes me a bad person in your book, well, that’s your book. This is my blog. You don’t have to read it, if you don’t want to.

I look at all those who actually fell for the vast abominable lie that is Obamacare, and just pity them. How naïve can you be, to have any shred of faith in such an obviously evil statist power grab? The whole thing was designed to do exactly what’s happening. Deprive people of choice and freedom, deny them health insurance, so they have no choice but to kneel and worship the beast that is the state. And cry out to it save them. It’s just like it was in Old Testament times, such praying to vile false gods, when the people were led into idol worship by evil kings. The Lord holds them all in derision, such idols and especially such desperately wicked kings. He always has, and always will. And He will always bring them down in His own time.

And don’t even get me started about the noise of all the incessant political drama that rages every day all around us like so much sound and fury. It’s so plastic and contrived. It’s all fake crap. Anyone who craves political office craves power. The lure of raw power will always tug at the hearts of even those with generally pure intentions. And it will snare most people. Ron Paul was pretty much the lone exception to that rule, at least in modern times. The lust for power drives most of those who want to get elected to anything. I can’t think of a place where that fact does not apply. And craving power is never a good thing, not in any setting I can think of. It’s a destructive thing, and corrosive. Why even acknowledge the state that craves power as remotely capable of even the slightest redemption? You can’t. It’s a beast that feeds on innocent blood and war and death.

And it’s not that all those oppressive laws pouring down won’t affect you. They will, but it’s just part of living in the terrain you’re in. You keep walking along as best you can, and do what you have to, to stay out of the clutches of the gangs of armed, lawless goons that roam the land and oppress and enslave the people. I always try to stay alert, stay aware of who those goons are, what the state is, and where I am. It’s all occupied territory around me, and I never forget that.

I call that walking free in my physical world. And I call it a beautiful thing.

There’s another world out there that’s a little tougher to walk free through. A world more important than the physical one. The spiritual world. And it affects me far more deeply, what I encounter in my heart, than anything I might see collapsing around me, right here, in this world. Because it affects how I choose to live in any world. If your heart is calm, at least in what you know (not always in how you react, because sometimes it’s hard to keep your reactions calm), nothing else matters. If it isn’t calm, it’s a roller coaster out there.

We all got dark places in our hearts. All of us. If you claim you don’t have, you are a liar and a false teacher. And if you are a “real” preacher spouting such stuff, you are a false shepherd. And this is how I see it. If all (or most, if you want to get technical about it) sins are weighed the same, what kind of voice can I have to point at other people and proclaim their sins? That’s what Jesus is here for. He covers those dark places for me, the dark places where I know how sinful I am. And He wants me to walk free out there, free to speak to people right where they are. To listen, really listen, to what they have to say. And to love them, in a flawed reflection of how He loves them. Because I am where right they are, just coming from a different place. And if I have to tell them where I’m coming from before they see it on their own, I’m not coming from the right place.

What kinds of sins do I engage in every day, that are just as abhorrent to the Lord as anything you see around you? There are many, if I’m honest with myself. As any person will admit, if there’s any kind of honesty about what all goes on in the human heart, what all goes on, often, when no one else is watching. And then there’s that tricky little thing of judgment. I abhor being judged. But I’m all too happy to judge those who judge me, especially Christians. And especially the Amish. How can you walk free, when you judge others in your heart? How can you walk free, if you refuse to speak to people right where they are? If you’re too good to stand right where they are with them? I don’t think you can.

Which doesn’t mean you have to accept the judgment that comes at you. It just means you try to listen to what is being said without judgment. I don’t quite know if that’s possible, but it seems like it ought to be. And it doesn’t mean you don’t recognize and stand up to the spiritual bullies, and smack them when you see them wounding the weaker among us. Hit them hard, right in the face. Stop that. Now. And you tend to those they’ve wounded, protect them. But even to the bullies, I think, you have to try to talk face to face. Maybe you can’t. I don’t know. I haven’t tried. I’ve pretty much cut them off, so far. And there are times you have to cut people off, if the situation degenerates to that point.

But you are no better than they are, not before God if He judged us like we deserved. And right there, that’s the core of it. That’s why you never can walk in judgment, I think. Not in judgment of someone’s heart. Because if He held us to our own standards, none of us could grasp even so much as a shred of hope for salvation. We’d all fall short. All of us. And no great proclamations being spoken, here. Just grappling my way through this, like a man who sees darkly, through a blurred glass. But a man who has a little bit of faith that he’ll get to where he wants to go.

I claim to walk free. But Richard’s gentle advice made me see how I have been judging them pretty harshly, a lot of people. He told me. Look to your own heart first. At least that’s what I heard him saying when he said it. Pay attention to what’s going on inside you. But I’ve been so busy judging their hearts, the people that come at me with hostile intent from the place I broke free from, a place where I’ve seen so many battles and taken a whole lot of real hard hits. And it startles me. I’m not as free as I thought I was. I got no right to judge anyone. No one. Not like that. Not ever. It’s not my job, to judge anyone’s heart. So I got no right. I just don’t. No one does.

I probably will react like I always have, though, the next time someone comes at me all scolding and judgmental. Because that’s just how it goes. It’ll be pretty tough, not to. It never did happen with this guy who wanted to stop by, because he never got there. We’re busy at work, and I didn’t fret about it much. When and if he walked in, I figured I’d just try it out, this new place of not judging his heart, and play it by ear. Listen to what he has to say, and let it go where it goes. But he never came. And now I’m wondering. How would it have gone, had he showed up? Not that I’m wanting anyone like that to ever show up. I want people like that to leave me alone. But I know they won’t, now and then. I know I’ll run into this guy or his twin sometime, somewhere, when I’m least expecting it. And least prepared. That’s just how it goes when life comes at you. But still. I’m thinking, mulling it over, the thing that Richard told me. And this is where I am right now in my own heart.

You can choose to stay right where you are in your judgment of anyone from anywhere in your past. Or anyone around you. I can’t blame you a bit. And I won’t judge you one bit if you do. Because I don’t know where you’ve been, I don’t know what you’ve seen. I don’t know how deeply you’ve been wounded, or when or how. But I think I’m going to step through this new door and check out what this new place looks like, how it works.

Because from where I am right now, it looks like a pretty free place to be.