Alonzo Muncy

So Matthew helpfully divides up most of Jesus’s teachings into five large blocks. Which I’m going to start exploring here. These are mostly notes for myself as I start the day and try to actively live the ethic I believe in but can sometimes not be the best at actually doing.  I use ‘us’ and ‘we’ because you are reading this. In many cases I really mean ‘I’ and ‘me’. Starting with the most famous, the sermon on the mount. 

Matthew 5:3 “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

So I think the fundamental question here is: What does it mean to be ‘poor in spirit’? Whose is ‘the kingdom of heaven?’ 

We will start with the ‘kingdom of heaven’. Luckily for us, we have 30+ other passages in Matthew that mention it.

• 3:2 John tells people to repent because the Kingdom of God is coming.
• 4:17 Jesus starts telling people to repent because the Kingdom of God is coming.
• 4:23 Jesus is telling people about the Kingdom.
• 5:3 here says that the ‘poor in spirit’ will be the ones to have the kingdom of heaven. 
• 5:10 mentions that those persecuted for righteousness will also be part of the kingdom of heaven. 
• 5:19-20 talk about not abolishing the mosaic law, but that those who say ‘don’t follow it’ will be the least and those who follow it will be the greatest.
• 6:10 we don’t have that phrase, but it does contain a desire for God’s will to be done here as in heaven. For god’s kingdom to be present.
• 6:33 seek first the kingdom, then other things will be added to you.
• 7:21 we have the famous ‘lord, lord’ passage where people who do God’s will are the ones who enter into the kingdom. 
• 8:11 we have a centurion who shows with the famous ‘For I myself am a man under authority…’ bit and for this he is commended for his faith and Jesus notes that people from around the world will have their part in the kingdom.
• 9:35 Jesus preaching the kingdom.
• 10:7 Jesus tells his disciples to go and preach the kingdom, 
• 11:11 Jesus says that John was great, but that the least in the kingdom would be greater than him.
• 11:12 I take a bit of a different take here that the kingdom of heaven from John to Jesus’s time has been advancing and those who forward the advance of the kingdom get a part of it.
• 12:25 Famous passage about a kingdom divided against it’s self.
• 13:11 Jesus speaks about the kingdom of heaven in parables because some will understand them and some won’t.
• 13:19 Parable of the sower, same seed, different results.
• 13:24 Parable of the Weeds. There will be good plants and bad plants that will be separated at the end.
• 13:31 Parable of the Mustard seed. The kingdom starts small and grows
• 13:33 Parable of the Leaven. The kingdom spreads everywhere
• 13:38 Sons of the evil one not in the kingdom.
• 13:41 People who do lawlessness and cause sin not in the kingdom.
• 13:43 The righteous are in the kingdom.
• 13:44 Parable of the Treasure. Finding the Kingdom reorients your priorities.
• 13:45 parable of the pearl. Finding the Kingdom reorients your priorities.
• 13:47 Parable of the Net. Wicked and righteous separated.
• 13:52 Someone who understands the old testament and grasps the new will be like someone who has both old and new treasures.
• 16:19 The disciples are given the keys of the kingdom.
• 16:28 some will not die before the kingdom of god arrives. (I think at pentecost.)
• 18:1 Q: “Who is the greatest?”
• 18:3 A: To enter you must be like a little child.
• 18:4 A: those that humble themselves will be the greatest.
• 18:23 parable of the Unforgiving Servant. To be forgiven, you must forgive.
• 19:12 If you can live a celebate life for the kingdom, live it.
• 19:14 Kingdom of heaven belongs to people who are like a child
• 19:23,24 impossible for a rich person, but possible for God.
• 20:1 The Parable of the Workers. God rewards those who are early and those who are late the same access to the Kingdom.
• 20:21 Who is going to be greatest? Those that serve.
• 21:31 The Parable of the Two Sons. Those who do God’s will enter the Kingdom.
• 21:43 Kingdom taken from Israel and given to those that will produce fruit
• 22:2 The Parable of the Banquet. Many invited, few come.
• 23:13 Woe to those who don’t let others enter the kingdom.
• 24:14 When the kingdom is preached to all, then the end can come.
• 25:1 The Parable of the Ten Virgins. The kingdom can come at any time.
• 25:34 Sheep and the Goats. Those who care for others enter the Kingdom.
• 26:29 Jesus won’t drink the fruit of the vine again until the Kingdom comes.

That is A LOT. However, I’ve bolded some traits here for us to take a closer look at: ‘repent’, ‘poor in spirit’, ‘persecuted’, ‘seek God’s kingdom’, ‘humble themselves’, ‘those that serve’, ‘produce fruit’, and so on.

I’m a bit mentally tired after making that whole list, so I’ll cut to the chase. To be poor in spirit to me, seems to mean that we are humble and that we understand our own sinfulness. It is looking into the mirror and seeing that we aren’t quite as well groomed as we should be. We have a small growth of beard that needs to be shaved or makeup that needs to be applied. 

So how does this work into the practical daily life of the believer? To steal the name of a popular youtube channel, we want to be ‘holier every day’. We do that by recognizing the deficiencies that we have and working to improve them. This can be quite the revelation that we have a lot of sin in our lives that we never saw was there before. Like buying a Subaru and suddenly realizing that there are actually a lot of Subaru’s out there on the road. They weren’t invisible before, but we didn’t notice them. Now that we notice them, we see them everywhere.

So let’s ask ourselves how am I poor in spirit? How am I not living up to the standard that God has set? Those answers will be different for all of us and they call us to take action today.

All quotes from the BSB because they are a modern translation that will let me use it for free.

The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible, BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee. This text of God’s Word has been dedicated to the public domain.

I say this with as much humility as it is possible to do so, I am very smart and ‘thinky’. I don’t mean that as a compliment. For a long time I’ve very much enjoyed the intellectual side of Christianity: Revelation, Apologetics, and ‘historical context of Jesus’. However, I’ve realized that I can’t say much if any of it has really helped to deepen my practical everyday faith. When it comes to the question of ‘doing what I liked’ vs ‘doing what I ought’ it falls squarely into the ‘what I liked’ bit.

I have a bad habit of playing devil’s advocate and perhaps occasionally destroying other people’s faith. With the self justification of ‘if their faith isn’t strong enough to survive questioning, then perhaps it’s not faith worth having.’ This is of course stupid, one does not treat a bud in the same way that one treats a fully grown and healthy plant. Rather than nurturing and helping others grow in faith, I can be a distraction. A cold snap to a faith that is at a tender and vulnerable age. 

Recently, I’ve been coming more and more to the realization that while this sort of intellectual theorizing is useful and necessary (After all, one must be ready to give a reason for the faith we have) it is more often than not less than helpful in our daily decisions.

What good is it if I understand the precise meaning of the ontological argument if while doing so I cultivate in myself a haughty spirit? What use is Jesus’s resurrection if I forget to live my own life with love?

It is quite easy then to in a rush to defend the ‘core tenets of the faith’ that we forget how we act practically in the real world. To have our noses so stuck in a book that the book becomes blinders for the very real suffering around us. How we react to that is the practical and real Christianity that we have.
This is not to say that such thinky things are useless. They are not, the intellect must see that Christianity is reasonable and sensible to come. However, they are not what the daily walk of the Christian life is like. I certainly don’t spend several hours every day doubting God’s existence. I spend many more hours of my day interacting with people. Be it at work, at home with my family, or a short transaction with a cashier on my way home from work. I even interact with people by the way that I drive and park my car. 

One might certainly scoff at thinking that how one parks one’s car is an interaction. However, consider this. At the moment that I write this my car is parked on the street at my sister’s house. Every single person who drives down the road must now interact with my car being parked there. It is a small interaction, but how you do anything is how you do everything. If I park selfishly, then others will have a harder time maneuvering around my vehicle whereas if I park it neatly then they will have an easier one. 

What one must understand is that every interaction is the basis of our future relationship. But what relationship do I have with people who aren’t even my sister’s neighbors but people who live several houses down the street who I may very well never meet before I die? This is of course a natural perspective. We think of death as the end of our lives. However, if the Bible is to be trusted, it’s not. It’s a transition where we will be judged for our actions good and ill that we have done to others. Then through the finished work of Christ we will receive true immortality. We think of immortality for us, but not that the neighbor down the road is also someone for whom Christ died and is wooing to himself. Someone who will hopefully also be an immortal being.
It may very well be that they will only drive by my car once and that will be it for our earthly encounters. However, in the vast reaches of eternity, it is almost certain that eventually we will meet again. Will we get off on the right foot because I was respectful of their use of the road or will it not because I was a jerk who made everyone drive around his poorly parked car?
What we must remember is that every touch echoes across eternity. 

See thinky again. That is a very high and lofty statement. However, we must ground the lofty in “how do I act today?” A lofty statement of intention and vision does nothing if not firmly rooted in the ground of everyday life. How do I treat my siblings, partner, parents, children, friends, strangers? How do I cultivate and make virtue a habit in my day to day life?

I’m certainly far from perfect. I can be insular and inconsiderate. I can preach one thing and do the exact opposite a moment later. This is not because what I’m saying is untrue, but because I am a very imperfect man. 

Every society has it’s high ideals. One might value power, order, and stability. In another, individuality and freedom of expression. In a third, philosophy. We observe two things, first that these high ideals are correct or good in some way. Second, that many fail to live up to the ideals that they claim to espouse. This doesn’t make the ideals wrong or bad, but that mere mortal men are incapable of living up to them. 

Therefore, we must ask ourselves the grounding question. How does this impact my daily life, in what way am I living up to the ideals? In what way am I failing or selfish? By holding ourselves up to a standard, we see all of the ways that we don’t live up to it.

So I will leave you here with a question, “What is the practical daily impact of the Bible’s standard on your life?”

The Core Conflict is the conflict that the other conflicts build off of. However, let’s take Star Wars for example (Just like everyone ever). The core conflict is say ‘Will the Empire Succeed in destroying the rebels?” (perhaps not the deepest analysis, but whatever). This question drives the entire movie. Then you have your surface conflicts that are a part of the core conflict such as “Will R2 escape with the data?” and “Will they rescue princess Leia?” Each of which are great conflicts, but not core one.

Core conflict can also refer to what you get when you drill down into exactly what you mean by your central conflict. For example, “Will they blow up the death star?” is one way to state the core conflict, but it might be less useful in helping you come up with ideas for your surface conflicts. It’s perhaps a bit too concrete. Whereas something like “Can good overcome evil?” Suffers the same problem, but is too abstract. Something in the middle, such as ‘Will the Empire Succeed in destroying the rebels?” (Still just spitballing rather than really deep analysis. here.) Might better help you understand how to develop your surface conflicts.

The Core Conflict can also refer to a character’s conflict as well. What it is that they have to overcome internally to succeed. For example, Han has to overcome his worldliness to commit to something beyond himself.

How you state it can change your perspective on scenes. For example, if you were to state the Core Conflict of Star Wars as “Will Luke overcome his worldliness to put trust in a higher power (the force)?” That gives you a very different reading of Han Solo than does something like “Can friendship overcome greed?”

I do slightly worry that I’m perhaps sounding a bit wishy-washy here, the reason for that is because Core Conflict isn’t a binary right/wrong but a way to bring things into focus like a camera lens. You can dial it from utterly concrete to completely abstract to get something that is useful to you and what you want to accomplish.

The core conflict is a tool, and a very useful one because your core conflict should also be driving your surface conflicts. Part of what went wrong in the Phantom Menace (I love that movie and the Podracing, but whatever) is that the Podracing scene took up a significant part of the movie, but was more peripherally to the core conflict than it’s screen time implied. Because the core conflict was out of focus, it wasn’t as good as it could have been. This can be contrasted with the escape from the Death Star in A New Hope scenes where the core conflict is fully in focus as they are directly confronting the force of antagonism (the empire) and having a mixed success. (They escape with the princess at the loss of the mentor.) Because the core conflict is in focus, the action scenes are more effective.

Aiden, Sif, and Hadrian made their way up the mountain with a sheep on a lead. Sif was in her wolf shape, seeming energetic and playful, even though the sheep was understandably nervous.

Sif for her part let her wolf shape stretch out and her legs run. There was something freeing and meditative about the scouting she was doing. Her nose was a lot more sensitive in this form, letting her follow game trails and more. There was so much of the world that was cut off from her when she was in her natural orcish body.

She would run ahead, seeing what was there and then run back, check on her two companions and then run ahead again. She could perhaps make it all the way there and back before noon, but she also didn’t have to lug around a sheep. It was the first time she was running in her wolf shape without the expectations of her clan. She wasn’t following their trails, or hunting with them as a pack. She might not even see them today.

However, that thought was interrupted by the scent of her uncle, along with many others on the path ahead of them. She sniffed the ground getting a better sense of where they were heading. They were also headed up the mountain. A undefined dread filled her belly as she dashed up the mountain. Then, there up ahead of them was the entire clan making their way up the mountainside. She ran up to her uncle who was in Orc form now.

Hafthor looked approvingly at Sif as she shape shifted into her orc form. “Uncle, what are you doing?” She asked.

“We missed you this morning. We are following your lead. You did good going with that insane human. Astrid found the dragon leaving the cave. We are going to lay in wait for it.” The Jarl said with a affectionate hug for his niece. “I hope your experience recently has shown you how to harness your power.”

Sif took the hug, basking in her uncle’s approval, but she stopped, feeling conflicted. Torn between her new friends and her clan. “Are you sure it’s the dragon’s lair?” She asked.

“I don’t know why else a dragon would be leaving the cave in the morning. We are on track to visit the one you visited are we not?” Hafthor asked.

She couldn’t lie to her uncle, but she didn’t want him to take the egg or kill the dragon. “… you are.” She said.

Hafthor raised an eyebrow at Sif. “Is there something wrong?” He asked.

“No, yes, I’m not sure we should kill this dragon. We should just leave and go back home. We have more than enough that the other clans will respect us now.” She said.

Hafthor looked down at Sif, listening to her thoughts. “You aren’t the only one who thinks that. However, if we come back here next year, then the dragon may be gone or killed by the dragon hunters. The egg may hatch. We can do it now and get a lot more than if we wait.”

Sif nodded, appreciating her uncle’s straight forwardness. She understood what motivated him. However, it wasn’t what motivated her. Perhaps if they didn’t find the egg and if they couldn’t trap the dragon, then everything would be fine. Everyone would be satisfied with what they had. She took a breath. “There is a false entrance to the dragon’s cave. It smells like the dragon, but when Aiden and I went in there there wasn’t a way into the dragon’s lair.” She said, fibbing slightly.

Hafthor nodded, “Do you want to join the scouts?” He asked.

Sif knew that even recently she would have leaped at the offer her uncle was making. She reluctantly shook her head. “No, I… the reason I was gone this morning. It was because I needed time to think after what happened.”

“Think? What were you thinking about?” Hafthor asked.

“Just, everything with…” She found she didn’t even want to say her names. “The fight yesterday. I need to learn who I am without you without the clan. Will you be upset if I don’t return with you to our homelands?” She asked.

Hafthor’s green eyes judged her, “Sif, you have the ability to bring great honor and great same to our clan. You may never return from leaving the clan. I suppose I could force you to return with us, but that would only make you resentful and sullen. I’ve made that mistake before. So I won’t make it with you. You know what you want and aren’t afraid to claim it. That’s a very orcish thing and I’m proud of your strength of spirit. If you do decide to stay here, even if I don’t understand why, can you make me one promise?” He asked.

Sif nodded, “Yes, anything.”

“Bring our clan honor and if… when you return, return in strength.” He said.

“I promise. Thank you.” She said, giving her uncle a tight hug.

“Good, now go do what you feel you must and I’ll pass word to the scouts.” He said.

Sif nodded, transforming back into her wolf shape. She trotted off, back towards Aiden and the sheep they were leading towards the lair. As she did so, she couldn’t help but feel conflicted about what she had done. How her uncle had acted. She felt confident that he uncle was a good man, if focused on the honor, survival, and strength of the clan. Even though nothing she would do would hurt her family, she still felt like she was betraying them in some vague way.

She spotted Aiden and Hadrian and stepped back a little to transform back into her Orcish form. “We have a problem, my clan knows where the Dragon’s lair is and they want to set a trap.” She said to them.

Aiden and Hadrian exchanged looks. Aiden put a hand to his head and took a breath. “Ok, that’s fine it’s not the end of the world. We can do something, I’m sure.”

“I have a plan on how to deal with it. Is there anything special about that cave?” She asked.

“Not that I know of?” Aiden asked, not sure where she was going with that.

“Then I think we can sneak in using that back entrance we spotted on the way up. I told my uncle that it doesn’t lead to the main lair, so he won’t be guarding it. We can sneak in, grab the egg, and sneak out.” Sif explained.

Aiden closed his eyes, communing with Askook. “Askook is angry, he’s on his way. But if their already this far up the mountain. I don’t think he’s going to arrive in time.”

“Is he ever not angry?” Sif asked.

“No, but I also think this really isn’t a good time.” Aiden said. “Tie the sheep to that tree, we’ll move faster without it.” he directed Hadrian.

The three of them followed the orc trail up to the lower cave entrance. The cave sloped sharply upwards inside. Lighting a candle, they clambered up the slope and made their way through a couple of twists and turns. At one point, Sif changed her shape into wold form to smell which way the main cave was before changing back. They emerged into the main cave behind where the egg rested in it’s nest made of an amalgamation of gold and silver.

The egg was large, almost too big to be carried. “Sif can you lift the nest?” Aiden asked.

Sif went over and tugged at it. “Not with the egg in it. It’s heavy. Like seriously heavy.”

Aiden nodded, picking up the egg with both hands. The egg was golden with red speckles. “Allright, we got what we came for. Hadrian, why don’t you take the lead?” He asked.

“Alright,” Hadrian said, moving back down the cave.

From the entrance Aiden heard a squealing grunt of orcish. “Hurry!” He said, following Hadrian.

Sif followed the two of them, lugging the heavy nest with her. She put the next down next to a boulder. “I’ll move this to stop them.” She said, pushing on it to close the smaller entrance with a grunt.

Aiden nodded, sliding down the the sharp incline they had just come up a few moments before. They hit the exit running, and Aiden felt a sense of Deja vu as he started running back down the mountain and through the forest. This time, he felt like he knew where he was heading better. ‹I’m Coming!› Askook thundered in Aiden’s head.

Aiden heard a wolf cry from above him on the mountain and knew that the Orcs were after him. His heart pounded as he ran with Hadrian beside him. “We need to split up.” He told Hadrian as they approached a fork in the ways. Hadrian went right and Aiden went left, back towards Brindlethorpe.

He could hear the howls of the wolves get closer as he headed down towards the river. Suddenly there was a wolf running beside him, he glanced over and saw that it wasn’t the white color of Sif’s fur, but a darker grey. The wolf looked at him with the vivid green eyes of an orc. Then it picked up it’s speed for a second and slid to a stop in front of him. The wolf bared it’s teeth and barked at Aiden. Aiden turned, moving past the wolf and down towards the river. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do when he reached it, but hoped he would think of something when he got there.

The orcish werewolf had accomplished their goal. Slowing Aiden just slightly for more of the wolves to catch up. One diversion became two, then three. Aiden got the sense they were herding him towards something. As he broke into a clearing, he could see what it was. A giant brown bear standing on it’s hindlegs right where Aiden wanted to go. He looked around, spotting wolves emerging from the woods all around him. He slid to a stop, caught where they wanted him.

Nightmare felt a tug on her skirt. She whirled around to see a young girl, perhaps seven years old. The girl offered out a signature pad. “Can I have your signature for my collection?” She asked.

Nightmare rolled her eyes, picking up the pen and signing quickly. “Fine, but be careful. I could have trapped you in a nightmare.”

The girl smiled up at her, obliviously innocent to the danger she had put herself in. “It’s ok, you would have found me. Thanks for the signature!” She said, running off with her new prize.

Nightmare knew better than that, she could find most of the people who got lost in the nightmare realm she was the portal to, but not all of them. Some had physically entered the nightmare realm and never returned despite her best efforts to find them. “Right, kid. You have more faith in me than I do.” She breathed out softly.

The smartwatch on her wrist beeped with a familiar alarm. It was time for work, she reached out into the realm of dreamers, a close cousin to her own. She found someone who was already having a nightmare about falling endlessly. She tapped into the energy his fear of falling generated for her and floated upwards. It was a relatively cheap way to gain flight, and the sleeper would just remember an incredibly vivid nightmare of falling that would go away in time.

She followed the GPS coordinates, landing just outside the doors to the bank, she threw them open and strode inside. A pair bank robbers were in the process of grabbing everything they could out of the vault. “Gentlemen, if you will please stop and wait for the police to arrive, I think we can work this out peacefully.” She suggested.

They turned towards her with guns, “Fine, we can do this the hard way.” She said, dropping the human like appearance and revealed her true form, a crack in the universe that led to the nightmare realm. She moved quickly, expanding and swallowing the two criminals whole, and in her haste also grabbing a bank teller.

Nightmare sighed, she hated using her powers like this, the portal often grabbed people who she hadn’t wanted to grab. She sent her mind into the nightmare realm. It was a dark and ever shifting realm. She went for the teller first, as they were the innocent in all this. She was on top of the highest building in the city, stuck outside far from any entrance. Nightmare stepped out onto the ledge with her and reached out her hand to take the old lady back. However, as she did so, the distance between them seemed to stretch and grow. Such was the nature of the nightmare realm. She didn’t have much power over it.

“You got swept into the nightmare realm. I’m a portal out of here, but I can’t reach you where you are. You need to step towards me.” She called out to the frightened teller.

“I… I can’t. It’s so high up, I’ll fall.” The teller trembled, looking down.

“Look at me.” Nightmare told her, and the teller did. “Keep your eyes on me, and you won’t fall. I promise.” She said, sounding more confident than she actually was.

“Oh… ok.” The lady said uncertainly and stepped forwards to where Nightmare could touch her hand. Then they were back in the bank. “Sorry about that, my power can be unpredictable.” Nightmare admitted.

The teller clearly didn’t know what to say, “Thank you?” She asked.

Nightmare wasn’t sure how to feel about that. “Your welcome,” Nightmare responded before diving back into the nightmare side to find the two would be robbers. She grabbed them, allowing her to pull them back out disarmed of their pistols back into the real world and the hands of the police. The police thanked her and a reporter snapped a picture. She felt a touch on the back of her elbow. She whirled to see the old teller.

“I need to thank you. I don’t know what you did. I hate heights, always had to live on the first floor because of it. The fear never felt so real. I think I feel better about heights now. Thank you for helping me face my fear.” The teller said.

Nightmare wasn’t sure what to say, but she smiled at the teller. “Your welcome.” She said, feeling just a tiny bit more confident about rescuing people who fell into the nightmare realm.

If there was anything Blair wanted more than not getting eaten by the grue, she didn’t know what it was as she stumbled through the forest sobbing. She looked backwards, but didn’t see anything. That didn’t mean anything, she knew they were invisible. However, millions of years of evolution told her to look for it.

She tripped on a branch and fell to the ground, banging her shin on a root. She whimpered in pain as she tried to stand, but found she couldn’t. So she crawled forward, trying to get just a bit farther away from the monster and what the monster had done to Becky.

It had started out as a normal enough Saturday. Wake up, prepare a picnic basket, go to the park and eat with some friends. The sort of thing that people did for fun. There was a sudden unnatural chill and Adrian was lifted up as if by magic, and disappeared halfway into the mouth of a Grue. Blood sprayed across the group of friends as they sat there in shock. Blair didn’t move, frozen in fear.

Then the screaming and running started. John took a swing at where he assumed the Grue would be. He stumbled, falling into nothing and disappearing into the Grue’s mouth. Becky grabbed Blair’s hand, pulling her up and into a run. They had started towards the car, but Janice was slightly faster than them. There wasn’t any sound, just Janice getting grabbed by an intangible something and thrown into the invisible maw of the beast that made no sound. Even though it made no sound, Janice’s screams of agony as it chewed were more than enough to cause the pair to divert course into the woods.

They ran as fast as they could, heading down towards the stream. As they ran over the bridge, the grue slashed with it’s invisible claws, sending Becky staggering back. She looked up at Blair with a smile, “There are worse places to die I guess,” She said as her eyes closed. Blair just wanted to sink down and be eaten with Becky. However, she didn’t have the courage for that. She let Becky’s body drop to the ground and with a chill running down her spine started running without direction, just wanting to get as far as she could from the Grue.

Blair ran out of energy to move any farther, she lay there crying. She was certain that she was going to be as dead as her friends. She didn’t believe in an afterlife, just nothing just like there was before she was born. She grabbed a stick, using it to pull herself up. She looked around, not sure exactly where she was.

Lost and alone, she started to trudge through the forest again. That’s when she smelled blood. She turned around sniffing for the source of the scent. It got stronger and Blair realized that it wasn’t the Grue she smelled, but the blood of it’s victims. The world grew cold around her. She couldn’t run any more, there was no escaping a Grue on the hunt. She would die tired, but she felt a choice. She could curl up and whimper on the ground, she could run like she had from Becky’s death, she could fight and do absolutely nothing to the monster. She didn’t choose any of them, she stood, straightening her shoulders. She looked at the source of the bloody smell. Red hot anger welled up in her. Anger at the ancient immortal predator that was approaching her, angry at the deaths of her friends, anger at her own life cut short. “Go to hell.” She snarled before her life ended like a sentence that had reached a period.

Sarah awoke from cryrosleep. The glass slid down and the bed tilted up. She stumbled out of it feeling tired and woozy. “Computer, Coffee.” She ordered feeling bleary eyed. The experiments with cryrosleep had revealed that she would feel tired when awaking, but to actually experience it was something else.

“You have a mission update.” The computer replied as it poured the cup of coffee.

“Coffee first, then mission update.” Sarah said, picking up the glass. She slid into the table and sipped the coffee for a long minute as she got her bearings. She was Sarah Nike, technically 132 years old, even though a hundred of that had been in cryrosleep. She had spent ten years of her life preparing specifically for this mission. Technically longer, as she had dreamed of this moment from her seventh birthday when the transmission had been received from this planet. “Cease all communications. They will hear you.”

Humanity had done as it was told, ceasing communications was pretty hard but with the stakes being the potential annihilation of humanity, they had changed everything. All radio transmissions of any kind were banned. Lasers were now the standard method of communication over long distances. Lasers were also the standard method of ship propulsion, with solar sails letting humanity keep expanding across the solar system. Lasers could be tightly controlled within the limits of physics meaning that it would be harder to spot the beams. Humanity had gone silent, yes. However, humanity knew from long experience that living in terror wasn’t a life. They would fight back, regardless of the outcome of Sarah’s mission. Her mission was to win humanity allies and take back as much information as possible about their new enemy.

With her cup of coffee done, she spoke to the computer. “Ok, give me the mission update.” She said.

“There is a ship off our port bow.” The AI reported.

“Very well then, open up with our tightbeam communicators send the welcome packet.” Sarah said.

The reply was terse, “Why are you here?”

Sarah wondered if they had read the packet before responding, but supposed they probably wanted to hear it from her. “We couldn’t talk long distance, so humanity sent me for a in person visit.”

“What part of ‘Cease all communications’ was unclear?” The ailens replied.

Sarah supposed they hadn’t shot her out of the sky yet, so she had that going for her. “The ‘they will hear you’ part. Who are they? We need to know.”

There was a long pause, long enough for Sarah to wander from the table to the single viewing port to put her eyes on the ailen ship. It wasn’t how humanity designed their ships. Humanity’s ships were black, except for the reflective solar sails that were only deployed when a course correction was required. This one looked more like an asteroid. “You have come a very long way. There is no more harm in telling you than you have already done. Our name for them is night-stalkers. Roughly two and a half thousand years ago, we received a transmission from a solar system. It was broadcast far and wide by them. It greeted the species of the universe and stated that it wanted friendship and peace. A hundred and fifty years later, as we were preparing a reply, the sun went supernova. The species was obliterated.”

Sarah nodded, “The dark forest problem.” She said simply.

“The dark forest problem?” The aliens asked.

“In short, that life that makes it’s self known is destroyed. That is why the universe is so silent.” Sarah explained.

“It’s not so much a problem as a reality. A reality you were foolish to defy.” The ailens said.

Sarah paced across her small ship for a moment. “Does that mean you are going to destroy us?” Sarah asked, a hint of fear in her voice. She had expected to die on this mission, but there was a moment of doubt, hoping that humanity had gambled correctly.

“No. But that doesn’t mean there are those who will. Are you here to destroy us?” The ailens asked.

Sarah breathed a sigh of relief. “No. We do, this meeting is the proof that we need that our plan will work. The forest is no longer dark.”

“What do you mean?” They asked.

“Tell me, how many species of plants and animals are there on your homeworld?”

“Many.”

“You are technologically superior to them, they could advance and destroy you.” Sarah said.

“We can monitor them and destroy them before they become a threat. We don’t want to just kill them.” They responded.

“Exactly, you don’t want to just kill them. We don’t kill them either. The fact is that life has to coexist with other life, even life that it preys on. Because of that, destroying others is a choice. A choice that one might or might not make. A choice you haven’t made. A choice that we haven’t made. We know so much more now and that knowledge gives us confidence.” Sarah explained.

“Knowledge of what?”

“If there were only two species in the universe, then the chances are that they would be very far apart. However, we are close together. Not only us, but there are at least two more in the neighborhood. There are probably more. We know that if we hide like you have, it’s only a matter of time before the enemies who want to destroy both of us come. We are close enough that even if we never speak of each other, whatever finds one will find both. Science is a network, the larger the network the more probable and advancement. We have a better chance working together than we do separately.”

The aliens were silent again. “Very well, we will help you.”

So there is a lot of hubub about AI right now. There are a lot of people who HATE AI and feel that everything made with it is illegitimate. If it’s made even partly by AI, then they don’t want anything to do with it. I don’t feel that same way. To me, AI is a tool, one that is rapidly changing the landscape for creatives. So this is going to be my explanation as to why.

Just to get the trolls rolling, here is a bit of AI art that I made:

It’s fairly nice I think. I would definitely use it as like an icon somewhere. However, like many pieces of AI art, when you look closer, it’s not perfect. In fact it’s pretty far from it. What is the dragon doing with four nose holes? The top and bottom jaw look like they might not go together very well. It would probably be better with a little more variation in color. Also what is up with the zillions of horns? I’m sure someone who is more critical of art than I am can find more issues.
Regardless of those flaws, I still claim this as my piece of art. It’s the AI art equivalent of a two year old’s scibble. Someone who is better at prompt engineering could probably get a better result.

So why is this piece of art mine? It there are two major reasons, because I take responsibility for it and because AI is a tool not a replacement for an artist. Let me upload a second pic that I made.

So all I did was make the dragon on a black background? Is this something artistic? Certainly. I had to pick out what was background and what wasn’t I had to figure out how to compose it so that it looks good. This is absolutely a piece of art that I made because I made artistic decisions about it. But what if I used a diffrent tool? It might come out differently, it might come out like this.

It’s much the same artistic sort of decision. I could modify the prompt in a lot of diffrent ways to get other results like making it not be a creature of AI horror.

The point here is that doesn’t really matter if the artistic decisions are made by prompt or by me using the paintbrush. I still have to make decisions. I am still the artist and AI is my tool.

There are a lot of arguments about AI, lots of considerations we need to take in. However, I feel that at it’s most fundamental, AI is a tool. A tool we can use badly or wisely. There a lot more topics, like what do we source our AI from? I think ‘bespoke’ AI specifically from permitted datasets is going to be a thing. There are so many different things you can optimize your AI for that I think ‘bespoke’ is where AI may head in the future where the AI is tailored to your tastes. I also see I haven’t gotten into the blandificaiton that AI produces. Perhaps I’ll address those things later but they don’t effect the bottom line that I think AI is a tool for artists, not a replacement.

So, today I was reminded of something. God is our Father. I’m blessed with a particularly great father and I’m not always a good or even an ok son. Some people don’t have that blessing and there are terrible or missing fathers. There are a lot of people who have grown up without a father being in the picture. I’m reminded of a friend of mine who became a teen mom but the father bailed out on the situation. (It was a good thing because he’s kinda a jerk.)

I think if I had to choose an image of fatherhood that our society has today it’s not a great one. He’s mostly missing, perhaps bumbling and a bother when he is there, and almost never good. I think the only time I’ve seen ‘a good dad’ as a character point is perhaps with Benjamin Sikso on Deep Space Nine. As a result, I think our society also views God in something of the same way. Mostly missing, perhaps bumbling and a bother if he is indeed there.

A story that reminds me of this is that of a young woman who goes to a catholic church to pray. A priest comes over and asks if he can help and starts to teach her the Lord’s prayer. ‘Our Father who art in heaven.’ She can’t say those words because her father abused her and she doesn’t want to think of God as her father.

If anything, I have the opposite. My father is extremely godly, not in the pious sort of way but in the practical loving sort of way. He is knowledgeable enough to teach, and has helped me out of my faults time and again. He loves me. That doesn’t mean he’s doesn’t have his fierce side. Like C.S. Lewis said, ‘Of course you should be afraid, Aslan isn’t a tame Lion. But, he is good.’ One very important aspect of manliness is found in that dichotomy. However, it’s not a uniting of things that are opposites. Weak is not good. Evil is not strong. Good and Strong complement each other.

Because I’ve been lucky enough to have an amazing Father, I also am able to come to him with my problems and needs. It’s something that I’m not good at. I don’t like being a ‘bother’ or ‘disrespectful’. Coming to someone with your problems and needs isn’t either of those things, but it can feel like it. One of my flaws is that I don’t advocate strongly enough for myself because I don’t want to be a bother or disrespectful.

Regardless, I had a problem. I wasn’t going to be able to solve it myself so I needed my Dad’s help. It’s the sort of thing I want to be self-reliant about so it was especially embarrassing. My father helped me, and when we were finished with what needed doing he only asked me one question. “What did you learn from this?” He asked. I gave an answer. I don’t know if it was the one he was looking for.

One thing that I didn’t include was the fact that I have a good father. One who I’m able to ask anything from. I’m lucky that as a Christian, I don’t have one good father. I have two, one of whom is God himself. Just like I shouldn’t be afraid to ask my Earthly father for help, and he’ll give it. I shouldn’t be afraid to ask my heavenly father as well.

So, today I was reminded of something. God is our Father. I’m blessed with a particularly great father and I’m not always a good or even an ok son. Some people don’t have that blessing and there are terrible or missing fathers. There are a lot of people who have grown up without a father being in the picture. I’m reminded of a friend of mine who became a teen mom but the father bailed out on the situation. (It was a good thing because he’s kinda a jerk.)

I think if I had to choose an image of fatherhood that our society has today it’s not a great one. He’s mostly missing, perhaps bumbling and a bother when he is there, and almost never good. I think the only time I’ve seen ‘a good dad’ as a character point is perhaps with Benjamin Sikso on Deep Space Nine. As a result, I think our society also views God in something of the same way. Mostly missing, perhaps bumbling and a bother if he is indeed there.

A story that reminds me of this is that of a young woman who goes to a catholic church to pray. A priest comes over and asks if he can help and starts to teach her the Lord’s prayer. ‘Our Father who art in heaven.’ She can’t say those words because her father abused her and she doesn’t want to think of God as her father.

If anything, I have the opposite. My father is extremely godly, not in the pious sort of way but in the practical loving sort of way. He is knowledgeable enough to teach, and has helped me out of my faults time and again. He loves me. That doesn’t mean he’s doesn’t have his fierce side. Like C.S. Lewis said, ‘Of course you should be afraid, Aslan isn’t a tame Lion. But, he is good.’ One very important aspect of manliness is found in that dichotomy. However, it’s not a uniting of things that are opposites. Weak is not good. Evil is not strong. Good and Strong complement each other.

Because I’ve been lucky enough to have an amazing Father,

First, here is a very lovely pic, Space Exploration-Styx by Santa Norvaisaite. Source: https://santanorvaisaite.com/projects/PXW313?album_id=2158539

So this blog isn’t going to be about the picture above, but about a book I was reading today. In it, they talk about a piece of technology. They mention having to get used to a manual safety on a gun because they use Biometric gun grips. I’m not an expert on guns, I’m competent. My biggest ‘gun accomplishment’ to date is earning the most ‘A zone’ hits in a practical shooting competition. I managed this feat of basic accuracy by going so slowly that I nearly placed last. The competition was a lot of fun. So don’t take anything I say about guns as gospel. So why am I writing this? Because what I want to address isn’t about guns. It’s about storytelling and how I’d want someone to deal with me when I eventually make the same mistake. (Because we all do.)

So what mistakes did this author make? First, he gave the character a Glock with a manual safety. Glock safeties are internal. To use it, you just pull the trigger. There are actually some Glocks with manual safeties but they are rare. Then, they kind of just assumed that biometric gun grips work. The thing about a system like that is that it has to work 100% of the time. Even if you or it are covered in demon goo, blood, or dirt. I don’t currently know of a system that is able to work with that in theory. Most importantly, he assumed that a biometric grip would be a replacement for a safety. While I don’t personally carry a gun with a safety, I wouldn’t necessarily want my gun to be ready to fire anytime that I’m just picking it up. The combination of these three completely kicked me out of the narrative of the book.

Much as I’m complaining here, the book wasn’t really about guns. It was about fighting demons who want to rule the world. Well, it’s also about the fact that the main character isn’t proficient with guns as the other character. It’s also about the relationship between the three characters in the scene. Of those four things, the accuracy about what they said about guns is the least important thing. Because of that, I’ll continue on because I’m connected to other things in the story than guns.

I don’t know if the author wants to know if he’s wrong. I think I probably would. I think if I made a mistake that kicked someone out of a book, I’d like to know. Perhaps even fix it. But what I really want is for someone to keep reading what I’m writing and connecting with the world and characters that I’m creating. That’s the thing that is most important, and what I want to happen when people read what I write.

In summary, I read a book that I enjoyed that has this moment where they say something weird about guns and kicked me out of the story. However, I think we need to understand that those details aren’t really what we are reading for. We are reading for connection, conflict, and character.

I hope you have enjoyed my rambling musings and that’s it for today.