maybe it is just the way it works

For now we have a Supreme Court that has only 8 justices instead of the 9 it is designed to have. As cases come before the court, most of the attention has been on what happens as a result of a 4-4 split vote. The outcome of a specific court action is what is anticipated in controversial or important precedent setting decisions. But maybe there is a bigger issue here. Maybe the specific decision on a case is not what ultimately matters because there is something more significant going on that we may not see at first glance. I have written often about perception and "its not what we see, but what we see it is" (http://profoncall.blogspot.com/2015/09/what-is-it-you-see.html).

I think the 4-4 court is a diversion from the real issue. Are the splits because the two sides consistently see the Constitution differently or because 4 justices, we call the liberal ones, see the Court's role differently from the Constitution. In other words, for these four justices have the relative truths of Social Justice replaced the absolute truths of The US Constitution?  The upcoming vote on the appeal from a lower Texas court on The President overstepping his Constitutional role will be a 4-4- split and therefore the outcome will be OK. BUT if this is what we see is important, then we have missed the real issue. The lower court's action is stopping The President from ignoring and altering immigration laws because he doesn't like them. This is not about immigration. The fact that 4 sitting justices would so blatantly ignore the Constitution's Articles setting up separation of power for political preference is way more scary than immigration and even the upcoming Presidential election. When the Supreme Court walks away from its designed role, it becomes a counterfeit court. It becomes its own creation. BTW, where did the highest court ever get the name "Supreme" in the first place?

                                          Is this the way it works? 

People establish institutions and call them Supreme? Is not everything that exists not under the Sovereign power of Him who is Supreme? If so, what are we to think about all of this hulla-ballu going on around us? What is really real? How does this all work? Who is the real Supreme Court that will never act against its designed purpose?

We should all spend some time pondering these questions. But it is easy to get distracted by what is right before our eyes, making our broken moments feel better. If we believe God is the real Supreme Court, then we probably should ponder a bit what He says about the way it works.

First, He says that we should focus on what is eternal and invisible, not what is temporary and observable to our physical senses. Then He says that what is eternal is real and what is observable allows us to understand and enjoy what is real while we are left in our current finite state. But, all of creation yearns for their final state where we experience what is real without having to go through models or pictures that represent what is real.

For instance, God told us that we have priests that can mediate our time with Him and sacrifices that we can offer to appease Him. But these are examples of what is the real mediator and appeasement, Jesus. There are seasons of the year where nature cycles between life and death and back to life again. These cycles point to the resurrection power of God. Nature also yearns for the time that it no longer has to continue these cycles, but can enjoy life without death forever.  

We fuss over how culture has destroyed marriage. Our society has not destroyed marriage, but has warped what God intended as a pointer to how people should relate to Him. Homosexual marriage is only one way man has used Social Exchange as a basis for marriage. Jesus tells us in The Sermon on the Mount that heterosexual desires distort God's intent for marriage also in many ways. God tells us that reality is an intimate relationship with Him through His Son Jesus. The commitment and trust that we can experience through the institution of marriage is not the real thing, but it points us to what is real in our relationship with Jesus. While no marriage is perfect, a Godly marriage is one where commitment is sourced in willful affection, not duty or necessity, and trust is based in a vulnerability that produces intimacy. When we can have this in human marriage, we get a glimpse of what its like to know God. Being single is not a distortion of marriage but in some ways being single bypasses having to experience this intimacy and commitment through another person and directly seek it with Jesus.

The problem we should have with the way man has distorted God's design for marriage is like the problem we should have with the way the 4 justices have distorted the design of our government as established in the Constitution.

What happens is man claims truth is relative and creates counterfeits of what is real by establishing false models or pictures of what is real. Man does this so that he/she can become the designer, the creator. Man's nature is to twist around the way things really work away from the Supreme design for his/her own interest.

Look for it, it is everywhere, not just around us but in our own lives. Where do we look at the pointer as being the real thing? In what ways do we rely on counterfeit pointers so that we can fool ourselves into thinking that our self serving desires are what is real? However, we do not have to settle for the counterfeit models, because we can have the real thing, even now.

Maybe this is deep to fully grasp, but not too deep to ponder, I plant my grass seed in th Fall so that the roots of the grass can grow deep during the cool off season. Then when the heat comes, the grass can remain strong by reaching deep for its nourishment. Our risk is not that understanding what is real is too deep, but that we get caught up in the temporal and visible so that we do not consider what is real.... and when the heat comes, we do not have deep roots for our nourishment.