Says Who!

We live in an era of per­va­sive pseudo-authority. There is an avalanche of petty rules writ­ten daily by face­less bureau­crats, designed to con­trol peo­ple they have never met. Most of these “require­ments” func­tion as but ulti­mately lack valid author­ity. For the most part, they work by intim­i­da­tion — which takes many forms. In the end, it is a smoke and mir­rors game of bul­ly­ing peo­ple into shift­ing forms of worldly conformity.

In sec­u­lar his­tory, Jesus was known as a revolutionary…and he was in more ways than one. More and more I find myself tak­ing that cue as a Chris­t­ian. Pre­tend author­i­ties of his day made all sorts of reli­gious and sec­u­lar rules. He acknowl­edged some of them and ridiculed oth­ers. One phrase he said still echoes in my head: “Their reli­gion is but rules made by men.” Jesus was a unique non-conformist that some­how knew what was of God and what was not. In the end, they exe­cuted him over petty claims and dis­torted spin on some of the things he had said (that later became true anyway…like the fall of Jerusalem).

Insti­tu­tions have their place and lend sta­bil­ity to a cul­ture, but they often serve as obsta­cles. Cre­ated for OUR good, we are bul­lied into serv­ing THEM instead. We do not erect stone gods like prim­i­tive peo­ple once did; we make paper ones and keep them in alpha­bet­i­cal order in file cab­i­nets. We are told to bow to titles — cre­ated by our own designs. In the Old Tes­ta­ment that was referred to as idolatry.

Do not give your real­ity away to actors or min­is­ters that pose as polit­i­cal or reli­gious author­i­ties. Just because some­thing is in print or on TV does not make it true. The “major­ity” is not the ulti­mate author­ity and never has been. As the early apos­tles said, “We must serve God rather than men.” I have a sim­i­lar expres­sion that I have used since high school: “Who died and made THEM God?” Peo­ple cre­ate their own pris­ons, because they are ter­ri­fied by the prospects of their free­dom. They pre­fer rules to spirit.

Says who! Is there a direct cor­re­la­tion between a state­ment and real­ity? Since when did uni­ver­sity chairs (of what­ever field of study) become thrones? No one can intim­i­date you with­out your allow­ing them to do so. Stop rolling over and play­ing dead! They are only people.