Practical Sourcery

The ruins of Thyatira are in the modern-day city of Akhisar, Turkey. It was the smallest of the seven churches, but received the longest letter.

Jesus had this to say to their angel:

18 “To the angel of the church in Thyatira write: These are the words of the Son of God, whose eyes are like blazing fire and whose feet are like burnished bronze. 19 I know your deeds, your love and faith, your service and perseverance, and that you are now doing more than you did at first.

In this first sentence, the goal post is set for us. Yes, we want to be a Son of Man, but deep down, what we really want is to be a Son of God. We desire blazing eyes and burnished feet. Our lust drives us. That is why we do more now, than we did before.

Success takes hard work. The congregants of Thyatira know this. We aren’t afraid of hard work, it’s just… Sometimes we work so hard, and desire so much, that we lose sight of where we are going. We wander down tangents, and get hung up on rituals that bring us nothing but wasted time.

We hound the neighbor on our right, while suffering the witch on our left to survive. To move forward, we must kill that witch, who lives inside us and leads us astray.

For the purposes of interpreting scripture, a witch is a person who relies heavily on rituals and formulas. Unlike the Jews in Revelation, they believe there is a war between good and evil, and intend to win that war by any means necessary.

Remember, Jews see Satan as God’s prosecutor. They know that he is only performing the tasks that have been set before him. They do not hate him, because God does not hate him.

Witches despise him or overly love him. They can be victims of Stockholm Syndrome. They hate being wrong. They cannot stand injustice, so they stand against it. They lust for perfection, but that lust brings them only rage, which wells up in their eyes, blurring the lines between right and wrong. They cannot see their own hypocrisy. In their minds, if their team does a thing, then it’s good, but if the other side does the same thing, it’s evil.

Let me give you an example, many Christians will damn their neighbors for some small violation of their interpretation of the scriptures, then pray out loud about it, in public. It never occurs to them that their hypocrisy and their vanity are on open display. They will gladly lift themselves up, by throwing others under the bus. It’s a race, after all, and they intend to win. War is hell, for other people, not for them, but a little hellfire is what they really need. Jesus can bring that hellfire, since he has the keys to Death and Hades.

We Thyatirans need a good look in the mirror. We must scrutinize ourselves with blazing eyes. We must ask ourselves why we aren’t out killing witches – if that is truly what Exodus 22:18 tells us to do. It does say, “Suffer not a witch to live”, right there in black and white. So, what are we waiting for?

Perhaps we’re not out slaughtering witches, because we have stumbled upon an apparent contradiction? How do we love our neighbor as ourselves, then kill them for their witchcraft? To answer that question, we have to delve into the story of Moses. We have to uncover the truth of sorcery. We need to know what it is, so that we can kill it properly.

Our research begins with a question: Why was it considered sorcery when the Sorcerers of Egypt turned their staves into snakes, but not when Moses did it? Is the author of that story a hypocrite who saw wrong in the other team, but only right when his team did the same thing?

The answer is, no. We can see from the story that Moses had something the Sorcerers of Egypt didn’t have. He spoke face to face with God. That’s the difference. The Sorcerers had their formulas and rituals. They knew that if they threw their staves on the ground in such a way, they could turn them into snakes. What they lacked was knowledge of the source of this magic.

That’s what Moses had. He was practicing Sourcery.

It is said that the Fallen Angels taught men sorcery. There is power in the world, and the Fallen knew how to tap into it. What they didn’t tell men, was the name of the Source, or how to communicate with Him – sort of. Satan ruled all the world, back then. The Fallen Angels were his legions. They were parts of Lucifer that were broken, confused, and seeking answers. The world was a mystery to them, as much as it is to us.

We, the Children of Matter, were a stumbling block to the Children of Light. So, they investigated us. They questioned us about our world, and their questions woke new inquiries inside us. They noticed things that we took for granted, and they showed us what was possible, by doing the impossible.

Our ancestors put them on pedestals and called them gods. Little did they know that their gods were nothing more than pieces of the One, unified God.

Moses did more in Egypt than just free the Hebrews. He also freed the Egyptians from their belief in these old gods, at least for awhile. Remember that the people who killed Antipas did so because he destroyed their fantasy. Sorcerers and magicians don’t like it when you expose their magic tricks. They like to keep their power and their advantage over others, all to themselves. If everyone could do magic, there would be no magicians.

Suffer not a witch to live is an invitation for us to put aside our rituals and formulas and trust God to lead us. It is not our Wiccan neighbor that we need to destroy, it is our own fear of the unknown and unseen. The witch inside us fears the dark. She hates evil things. Still, she lusts for the power they hold over her. She tries to understand them, and make deals with them, so that she can wield their power for herself. She does not see the lust that drives her as a bad thing. The sword in her mouth is tempered with the alien fire in her heart.

Alien - a person who is not a citizen or national of a specific country. An extraterrestrial being. It also describes something foreign, unfamiliar, or repugnant (e.g., alien to his philosophy). Synonyms include foreigner, noncitizen, exotic, strange, and extraterrestrial.

The alien fire in your heart does not belong there. It must be extinguished. But how? Only by opening your heart to Jesus can you rid yourself of alien fire. Let him light your fire, instead of trying to light it yourself.

20 Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.

Recall that food sacrificed to idols is nothing more than wasted labor. We try to grow green grass in a desert. We wear sunscreen when we go out at night. We strive to put things together that do not belong.

The thing is, we were made to expand our understanding. It’s not that we shouldn’t do these things, only that we should do them while in partnership with God. That’s what Moses teaches us. In his case, by talking with God, he knew to ask for a hungry snake.

Adultery requires fantasy. Sexual immorality is the misuse of intimacy. In this context, it means that we long to be close to the wrong things, for the wrong reasons. The intended use of our sex organs is to make babies, right? Then why are they also built for pleasure? Is it so that we will be more willing to make babies, without thought for the consequences? Are the chemical changes that stir us toward sex only there so that we will not think about the future, and what a pain it is to raise children? Are we intentionally blinded by our bodies so that we will not turn away from our duty to go forth and multiply? Are babies cute, so that we won’t abandon them? Is God tricking us into doing what He wants? Probably.

Before you judge Him, ask yourself how many times you have tricked your own children, to get them to comply with your wishes. Did you ever tell them that Santa would bring them coal if they did not behave? Did you tell them that the Easter Bunny left all those eggs for them to find? Have you uttered the words, “Because I said so” when they asked why they should do a thing?

Did you take the shortcut? Did you choose not to give them a lengthy, proper answer, because all you wanted was for them to do what you said? Did you leave their understanding for some future day?

You’re not alone. I’ve done all those things. I recognize them, now, as the misuse of intimacy. Like us, our children only want to be as close to the truth as they can get. That’s the intimacy we all desire, deep down. We want to feel whole. We want to know what’s really going on. We don’t want secrets. When you were a child, did you ever imagine that your parents were doing lots of fun things, only after they sent you to bed? Like me, is your biggest fear that you will miss something? Is that the reason you never leave a movie theater before the show is finished? It is for me. No matter how bad the plot is, I hold out hope that it will get better, or that if it gets worse, it will be a worse like I have never seen.

I fantasize about the future. Most of my fantasies don’t turn out well. I imagine scenarios that could not happen. People who have no reason to hate me, declare themselves to be my enemies, in my dreams. My paranoia ruins my life, over and over again. My own Jezebel fills me with fantasies that cloud my judgment. She sets things in front of me that I should not want, then convinces me that they are exactly what I need. It is only when I have them that I realize she was wrong.

If nothing we predict comes true, are we not a false prophet? If we imagine and prepare for scenarios that could never happen, are we not a blind, soothsaying witch?

Soothsayer – A person who professes to foretell future events, predict the unknown, or practice divination. Originating from Old English, it literally means one who speaks the “sooth” or truth.

I find it interesting that the word sooth was once synonymous with the word truth. After all, the truth can soothe you. There is comfort in the security of knowledge. Those of us who have had our moment possess a bank account we can draw on to refill our inner fire. We know God is real and the whole world is in His hands, and no one can take that knowledge from us.

Jezebel is a soothsayer. Her words are soothing for those who have never had their moment. There is pleasure in rituals, and comfort in formulas. “We’re all doing it, come join us. Be one of us. Be with us. There is safety in numbers and calculations.”

Jezebel wants us to plan ahead, for every possibility. She tells us that in the houses of the wise, there are stocks of food and drink. She forgets that we are simple fools, believing in a foolish miracle. True wisdom comes from God, not mathematics. This will become obvious when we get to the Number of the Beast. Animals follow their instincts. They put things away for rainy days. Squirrels store nuts. Bears store fat. A Son of Man trusts his God. We store our treasures in Heaven.

What I mean by this is, saving things for a rainy day seems like a good idea, unless you get hit by a bus on a sunny day. I’m not saying you should not prepare for the future. Noah prepared for a flood no one thought would come, except him, but he only did it because God told him to.

Let God tell you what to prepare for. The Sorcerers of Egypt knew that if they asked for snakes in just the right way, their sorcery would reward them. Moses practiced Sourcery. That Source, who knew exactly what Moses needed, gave him a hungry snake that devoured the others and made Moses look like the most powerful, brilliant sorcerer in the world.

If you pray in secret, in your closet, where no one can hear you but God, no one can tell you that you’re praying for the wrong thing, because no one knows what you are praying for, or that you are even praying at all.

If you follow the light that is in your heart, and it’s the light that belongs there (not an alien one that was placed there by someone other than God), then your path will always be lit, and you will never put a foot wrong. You are a Son of Man, not a Boy Scout. You cannot prepare for everything, nor should you try.

Instead, trust that God will prepare you for the challenges ahead. Remember that in Hebrew, Jezebel means “Where is the Lord?” She wants to find Him, but she’s going about it the wrong way. He is not lost. He is omnipresent. If the fire in your heart is not alien, then your light will shine out onto the world and you will see Him everywhere you look. To know what He wants, we need only ask, then give Him time to answer.

Proverbs 21:20 There is treasure to be desired and oil in the dwelling of the wise, but a foolish man spendeth it up.

Treasure to be desired, or the desire to be treasured? Is not our greatest wish to be desired by God, to be one with Him, to be a Son of God, not just a Son of Man? In fact, is it not our greatest desire to wed the Son, so that in marriage we can become one with God, Himself? What gems or metals or worldly things could compare to that? None. But how do we make it happen? With oil, of course.

Many people still warm their homes with heating oil. We cook with cooking oil. We lubricate machinery with oil. Oil makes the world go, literally. Our vehicles run on fuels made from oil. Proverbs 21:20 gives us the where (God), the why (desire), and the how (oil). The when is up to us. It all starts with a question (What do you want me to do, Lord?).

21 I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. 22 So I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways.

Indecision is painful. Worry is suffering. A burst bubble can hurt worse than an arrow through the heart. Only when we look in the mirror and don’t recognize the person staring back at us, do we realize how far off track we are. The solution is not to go forward, it is to go back. That’s what repent means. Turn around. Give up the fantasy and embrace the reality. You may find that truth is stranger (and more fascinating) than fiction.

To get out of the church of Thyatira, or any of the churches, we need to go back, not deeper in. That means we have to repent, which literally means to turn around. The exception to this is Philadelphia. In that church, there is a door that we must go through, to get into heaven.

Rituals are laborious and time consuming. The true burden is light, because it is Light (the fire inside you that comes from Jesus being in residence in your heart). How heavy is light? Not heavy at all… sort of.

Our burden is our vanities. They are tied to the wave lengths of light, because Lucifer is the Light, and he was divided, like a ray through a prism. His questions bombard us daily. They can lead us toward the seven Deadly Sins, or in the direction of the seven Saintly Blessings. Think of them as potentiometers that God uses to adjust us, the way a DJ changes sounds.

A potentiometer is a slider that changes the potential in a circuit. The knob you use to change the volume level of your car stereo is a potentiometer. Where vanities are concerned, it is the amount of shadow, and thus our potential for forward movement, that changes.

We associate envy with green, pride with violet, lust with pink, wrath with red, sloth with blue, greed with yellow, and gluttony with orange. This is a basic truth of the universe that our ancestors recognized.

God and science are not enemies. One created the other, and that other helps us understand the One.

Rainbows contain all of these colors. The covenant God struck with Noah was built around a rainbow. It has two meanings: One, it is for all people. Two, it is a promise that we will be given light (Clarity), in pieces.

Note: The covenant with Israel was for Israel, alone. The Ten Commandments change and expand on the Noahide Laws. There are seven vanities, represented by seven colors, and seven laws were given to Noah. The Israelites got a bigger burden, because they wanted to be special – not just Moses, but all the way back to Abraham. Abram didn’t want a god, much less anyone else’s god. He chose to settle for nothing but the best. Enoch tells us that Abram saw the moon and thought it was god, until it sank below the horizon. He thought the same of the sun, until it was gone. He told himself that the best god would never leave, or be thrown out. He swore that he would not bend the knee to a lesser god. His faith and his gluttony paid off. The thing is, God is omnipresent, so the moon and the sun were also God, in disguise.

Noah’s covenant assures us that the Light is not just for the Israelites. Truth comes from all corners of the world, and all levels of society. The scriptures are not the only source of epiphanies. If you have ever had an epiphany, you know that they are lightning bolts in the brain, that bring more thunder and lightning. They are the sudden illumination of some truth, that you previously did not see. That truth is not completely clear until the thunder has rumbled, and the storm has passed. Only when the clouds clear, can we see clearly.

Recall, though, that Zeus wielded lightning bolts, too. The shards of epiphany are scattered throughout the world, waiting to be found. Abram had no book to guide him. His only tools were his feet and his indignation. He dared God to show Himself, and God gave him what he wanted.

To clarify, Abram dared the gods of his father to stop him from destroying them. They showed him that they were unable to move at all. Then Abram moved, because his father kicked him out for spoiling the fantasy. It was during that unintended journey that he found the true God.

Epiphanies are everywhere, because the whole world is a love story.

The Noahide Laws and their corresponding vanities:

• Do not worship Idols (Envy) – There is only one God we should desire to be like. The blessing that is connected to envy, is kindness, because kindness only comes from understanding. When we truly understand our neighbor, our envy is tempered. Likewise, kindness is what we should show toward God, even when we think He is purposely harming us. We must remember that we are children, and His love is parental in nature.

• Do not curse God (Pride) – Too little pride makes us hate the people we think are better than us. Too much pride makes us hate the people we think are below us. We must fix our perspective. We must admit that God’s mind is not ours, and that Heaven is not at our beck and call. We must strive to put ourselves, and others, in the proper place. That is why the blessing tied to pride is humility.

• Do not commit murder (Wrath) – Either with our words, or with our actions. We can kill the spirit, just as easily as the body. Wrath’s opposing blessing is patience. The distance between wrath and patience is very short. In fact, it is only a breath away.

• Do not commit adultery (Lust) – Adultery requires fantasy. Stay grounded. Chastity opposes lust, because chastity requires abstinence (disengagement), while lust wants us to engage. Remember that adultery is not the same as premarital sex. It is the act of cheating on your spouse, with someone else, even if that other person is not real, and the adultery is only in your mind. Entertaining fantasies about your spouse, could also count as adultery. I know of marriages that ended because one spouse imagined that the other was cheating, but they weren’t. It’s important that couples see each other clearly, and don’t let their imaginations get the best of them.

• Do not steal (Greed) – This is not just about physical possessions. We must refrain from gatekeeping Heaven, or casting others into Hell. If you don’t want it done to you, don’t do it to someone else. I have never met a thief who wanted other thieves to rob them. Charity offsets greed. Like the old adage says, it is better to give than to receive, especially if what we’re receiving is stolen property. We can’t let our desire for accessories make us an accessory.

• Do not eat flesh torn from a living beast (gluttony) – In the scriptures, eating meat means consuming the life of another, in the sense that we take their behaviors into our own life. We emulate them. When Jesus told us to take of his body, this is what he meant, that we should study his life and learn from his example. In the same sense, we can chew apart someone’s life, while they are still living it. This can be bad. It is in our best interest not to devour a person or their actions, until they have suffered a spiritual death and can handle the scrutiny. If you talk to a reformed criminal about their life, they will often times help you chew it up. They can do this, because the person they were is dead, and hindsight is 20/20. If you try the same thing on a criminal who is not reformed, they will chew you up, instead. One way to look at this is, that it is warning us against emulating bad behavior because of peer pressure or our own need to fit in. There is a hole in us that can only be filled by God. Gluttony requires temperance. Temperance is the act of restraining ourselves. Gluttony tells us we don’t have enough. Temperance says we have plenty.

• Establish courts of justice (Sloth) – True justice is elusive and must be pursued. We cannot be lazy in our quest for it. Real sloths aren’t lazy, they just move very slowly. Our search for justice should be undertaken with a similar metabolism. Pointing the finger is never something we should rush to do. Diligence sits at the opposite end of sloth, and it is with diligence that we should leave no stone unturned.

Now back to this:

21 I have given her time to repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. 22 So I will cast her on a bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways.

The path of revelation is not for the weak of heart. The whole world weeps because of Jesus, not for him. Learning the truth about our intended mate takes courage and self-reflection. In order to let him be himself, we must come to grips with who we are, and who we want to be. His life should be a lesson for us. That doesn’t mean we need to do all the things that he did. Instead, we should ask why he did them, and what was served by doing them. Everything he did was for us, to show us how to live.

He cursed a fig tree, for not giving him figs, when all he wanted was some figs, even though he knew that figs were out of season. That is a wholly irrational act. He was telling us that it’s okay to be irrational, on occasion. He understands, because he was also irrational in that moment.

In Mathew 11:17, he compares his generation to children playing in a market, who say we have piped unto you but you have not danced, we have mourned unto you but you have not lamented. In this verse, he is trying to tell us that Heaven is not at our beck and call. He did not exclude himself from his generation. In fact, we are all members of his generation. Like him, sometimes we want figs, when figs aren’t in season.

To mourn is to feel or express deep sorrow, grief or regret, following a person’s death or a significant loss. It is easy to feel as if Jesus is gone from us. We mourn because God seems so distant, even though we tell ourselves again and again that He is omnipresent. We accuse Jesus, and God, of not lamenting our separation. A lament is an audible expression of grief. We can’t hear them wailing out there in the darkness. They don’t seem to care that we aren’t with them. They don’t share our grief. In our minds, we truly are dead to them.

That’s what it is like for the congregants of Thyatira. We don’t have that bank account to draw on, or perhaps we simply forgot how to access it. We have misplaced our treasure, because we were distracted by Jezebel and her soothing invitation. It is always easier to sit and be loved, than it is to go out and love.

23 I will strike her children dead. Then all the churches will know that I am he who searches hearts and minds, and I will repay each of you according to your deeds.

All the things that we bring into the world are our children. For the congregants of the other churches, the people in Thyatira seem to be zombies. I’m sure you’ve heard your pastor say something similar. “All those people are dead, because their lives mean nothing. The things they do, the idols they pursue, the roads they wander lead to the corner of nothing and nowhere. They are wasting their energy and their time, because they don’t have Jesus. Nothing plus nothing, equals nothing.”

Jesus knows everything about us. He knows what we did, and more importantly, why we did it. When he promises to repay each of us, in kind, he means that if we engage in lust, he will teach us the value of chastity. If we are proud, he will not hesitate to humiliate us. Some people learn best, the hard way, and some of our best lessons are born from our tribulations.

Not all of us in Thyatira have ghosted our date, and run off with Jezebel. Some of us are holding on to the hope of him.

24 Now I say to the rest of you in Thyatira, to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan’s so-called deep secrets, ‘I will not impose any other burden on you, 25 except to hold on to what you have until I come.’

“Hold what you have, even if it’s nothing.” That’s the message here. Jesus promises that he will come. He doesn’t say when, or where he’ll meet us, only that he will meet us. The minutes are ticking away. The waiter keeps asking us if we’d like to order, but we don’t want to eat alone, or give up our table. So, we wait.

The so-called deep secret of Satan is so-called, because it isn’t really a secret. It’s just hard to accept. The truth is, the devils are on our side. Satan might be our adversary, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t working for us. He is the resistance in our resistance training. He tells us that we’re not good enough, so we’ll try and be better. He makes us question, so we’ll go out and find the answers. He makes us uncomfortable, so we’ll leave our comfort zone. He is God’s prosecutor, but he’s not looking for a life sentence, just a plea-bargain.

He wants us to plead guilty, because repentance requires it. We have to know exactly what we did wrong, so we won’t do it again. We have to understand how it affected us and everyone around us.

It’s not sympathy we should give him, it’s love. He is our enemy, in the sense that he wrestles with the person we think we are. We are told to love our enemies. Naturally, sympathy is only born of love and understanding, so we can give him it, as well.

We can sympathize with him, once we recognize that he is working on making us better, just like we are. We have that in common. His intentions for us are not evil. He does not cast us into Hell. He does not hold the keys to Hades, Jesus does. He does not bring the hellfire, Jesus does. He has a place in the Lake of Fire, because that lake symbolizes our intense scrutiny.

Sometimes the Devil does not see us clearly. It is not his perspective that matters. When we hear his voice, we should immediately seek a second opinion. To understand him better, we have to learn some things about ourselves.

I know that it’s hard for some of us to lift the blame off of that old serpent. If he didn’t make us do it, then who did? I’ll just say this, there is no negligence where omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence exist. Sometimes we like to act as if Satan is just out here pulling the wool over God’s eyes. If you find it hard to blame God for everything you perceive as bad, it’s because you’re in love, and you’re not seeing clearly. You’ve got a nice, thick pair of rose-colored glasses on.

Sometimes, when we first fall in love, we don’t see our date clearly. We miss all the red flags. The thing is, God isn’t flawed, and neither are we. Our flesh was built for this very purpose. We were designed to run amuck in this world, so that we would know how to behave ourselves in the next. So go ahead. If you’re going to give God the credit, give Him the blame, as well. He can handle it.

26 To the one who is victorious and does my will to the end, I will give authority over the nations— 27 that one ‘will rule them with an iron scepter and will dash them to pieces like pottery’—just as I have received authority from my Father. 28 I will also give that one the morning star. 29 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches.

There’s that Morning Star, again. We are promised that not only will we recognize all the pieces of Lucifer, and how they affect our lives, they will shine for us as a constant reminder, and we will see them at work in others, and in the world. God is a DJ. He uses our vanities to move us. Once we accept that, and see it in action for ourselves, we can never forget that He is near us, and active in every moment of our lives.

The nations are not countries or peoples. They are the four nations that Daniel saw God send into the world. They are represented by the four Seraphim that sit before the throne, in Revelation. Their names are Monarchy, Theocracy, Democracy and Anarchy. We will delve into them in great depth, when we get to them. For now, know that they symbolize ways that we work well together, or don’t.

Understanding them can help us to know our role in any situation. That is what it means to rule them with an iron scepter.

Iron was the best, most durable metal until the invention of steel. We say things like “iron will” to denote someone’s unchangeable determination.

We rule the nations with a scepter, which is the symbol of sovereignty. It is not a sword, or a staff, or any other sort of weapon. We do not need to rein them in or beat them into submission. We cannot force them to work for us. Their servitude is voluntary and comes from our deep understanding of them.

We can dash them to pieces like pottery, in that we can take them apart and see their parts, and how they work. In doing so, we can recognize that they help us carry our water, which is our life, or should I say, they teach us how to carry ourselves, through every moment of our lives.

Jesus promises us authority over our lives, the way he received authority from his Father. He is assuring us that he has already walked this path, and scouted its pitfalls. Under his guidance, we will not falter. We just have to walk the walk and talk the talk.