13.1 Language and Society

In this lesson, we are continuing with our outline presenting a structured approach to the meaning of a new pattern language and how that language influences and shapes all human society during the Age of Tabernacles. In doing so, we include a comparison with how language shapes the present age.

Through five chapters, we hope to develop a pattern language out from which all society will flow. By this outline, we are setting out everything we might think about in creating those patterns of words and meaning. We may not use everything in this structured outline, but I need a complete picture before I start.

IV. Shaping by Language
A. The Golden Oil. The golden oil flowing forth from the two who stand upon the Lord of all the earth is nothing other than Jesus’ injunction, “Learn of Me.” Learning of Jesus as He is has always been simple and present for each little one who loves Him. The problem has always been the complexity of our psychotic resistance.

The metaphor of the Golden Oil marks that flow of “Learn of Me” inside of those who live and think only out from Life. If “sustaining all by His power-filled Word” contains the flow of power generating all the galaxies, then this Jesus of whom we learn, written in our hearts, is vast beyond all.

Jesus as Word. Jesus is Word and filled with words and He interacts with each in a way unique to each. You can have a trillion very different sentient beings and the singing of Jesus matches the heart of each one, different from all the others. Yet He remains human, our Pattern and our Friend, the knowing of God inside the heart of each one who knows God.

The pattern language for which we are reaching, then, is the knowing of Jesus, in the form of Gospel words, that is common to all. The pattern language is the golden oil that causes each to know the same Jesus. Consider the meaning of a society of humans and angels, with all interactions shaped entirely by this flow of the harmonious singing that is Jesus common to all.

B. How Language Shapes the Mind. Without words a human cannot think or reason. Humans who have no words experience only a series of vague sensations, things they cannot really know. Words through the mind are both flow and structure. They carve channels as water through the landscape, yet they build structures of thinking, not randomly, but intelligently. Words are deep memory as well, a vast repository of meanings and understandings, ready to seep up or even gusher up when needed.

Human languages are structured differently in grammatical structure and in the emphases of their vocabulary. The Inuit have many words for snow, the Congolese none.

The Structure of Human Thought. The printing press and the reading of printed pages changed the structure of human thought processes. The high speed images of television, internet, and cell phone have changed how we think even more. The first alteration was beneficial in expanding our ability to concentrate and to process ideas; this second is destructive, in reducing independent thought and the ability to reason.

The frequent use of cuss words, forms of cursing, hardens and narrows the manner in which people view the world. Christian lingo and ways of saying things, as we have known them, serve only to drive wedges between us and God in our thinking and how we respond. These are just some thoughts about language and the mind.

C. The Role of Influencers. The majority of people are as “sheep.” That means they simply live their lives, well or poorly, doing what needs to be done, without giving much thought to the meaning of things. People are easily influenced, especially when they think they are not. The majority “follow the crowd.”

Paul’s layout of a five-fold ministry puts into Christian terms the same types of influencers that are in all societies. An influencer is simply someone gifted with the ability to guide people, whether with ideas or by command. From AD 311 to 1914, the primary influencers shaping human society in the Western world were men of the church. Today, they are whoever appears on TV.

The Prophetic. The “talking heads” on TV, the actors and script writers as well as the news announcers and talk show hosts, stand in the role of the prophetic. The prophetic and evangelistic add power to the ruling ideas (the apostolic) and spread them abroad. But of truth, in our world today, it is money that controls every part of this flow, what is chosen and what is discarded. The financiers are the ones who hold all the power and make all the real decisions. Yet Christianity ruled for so long by the (prophetic) fear of damnation in hell, the whip of the evil one.

Will there be a quality of Resurrection Life inherent in the sons of God that replaces completely the controlling power of money and the prophetic power of fear?

D. The Role of Shepherds. From AD 311 to 1914, most people in western Christian society looked to their pastor or priest for council and guidance in the affairs of life. Today, physicians and psychiatrists have taken a portion of that role. But many now live their lives as sheep without a shepherd, not knowing where to turn. Yet in March of 2020 we saw the power of the “medical expert” on TV, as the Pied Piper, and all the masses ran instantly into compliance to fakery out of fear. Has the “fear of the virus” replaced the fear of “demons in hell?” How appropriate!

True shepherds are the key to a stable society.

E. The Role of Teachers. The teachers of the children are the ones who control entirely what and how the next generation thinks, the words and ideas that will shape their lives and all society. This fact has been fully understood in western society for 500 years. From 1540 until around 1901, the fight to control the teachers who would shape the minds of the next generation was between the Jesuits and the Puritans (Calvinists).

In their deep struggle against each other, these warring factions created systems of control in western education. Sometime around 1901, Marxists, understanding the same deep principle, began to step, oh so slowly, into those systems of control, becoming, at first, just another “voice.” Today, the Marxists control most education in the entire world.

Using Language to Shape. There is a deep level of trust between children and their teacher. And the teachers use words, symbols, and structures of thinking to shape the minds of their wards. A teacher has complete control inside of their classroom. In the end, the teacher is the most important change agent for future generations. They succeed because they shape the future, not the present, therefore no one pays attention. Teachers use language to shape minds and all society.

I am very glad that God made me a teacher and that I have a reasonable education and experience in that field. If God were to give me some role in the shaping of education in the Age of Tabernacles, I know that I would sing with all JOY.

A Hundred-Year Transition. Let’s continue thinking about the transition. Consider the world of 1901, then of 1951, and then of 2001. From 1901 to 1951, the outward way of life changed dramatically, but inward thinking remained basically the same. From horses to cars on freeways, from word of mouth to telephone and television, yet in 1951, people shared similar values and outlooks on life to those of fifty years earlier.

The outward change from 1951 to 2001 was much less dramatic. A cell phone was still a phone and transport the same, but inward values and outlooks were utterly changed. Yet the changes of thinking that would come were established between 1901 and 1951, in education, in medicine, in finance, in technology, and in influence.

A Fifty-Year Transition. The dramatic changes we are calling forth in the heavens and in governance will speed these transitions up, most certainly. So, let us say that it will take about twenty-five years to make full changes in the outward way of living, but then another twenty-five years to change completely how everyone thinks. It will not be until the second generation born inside the Age of Tabernacles approaches their thirtieth year that the ways of living and thinking will be fully established inside of life.

The inward changes are far more important than the outward changes, and one thing only causes those inward changes of thinking, the faces of the influencers, especially the teachers, the Spirit in which they move, and the pattern language that they speak.

The Beast versus the Lamb. Today, we live in a world fully formed and shaped by the image of the beast, that is, the faces of the influencers, the spirit in which they move, and the pattern language they use. Fifty years into the Age of Tabernacles, we will live in a world fully formed and shaped by the image of Christ the Lamb.

We are speaking of the entire breadth and depth of all societies in every land, language, and culture on earth. This is NOT accomplished by violence, whether by human blows or by divine fiat, but by My Spirit, says the Lord. It comes from the faces of the firstfruits of Christ and the language that they speak, that is, the Song of the Lamb. And we know that God puts His Word first, above all else.

What I Mean. The purity and the power of the words that we speak comes first; Spirit and face come before them to prepare their way and then follow after to confirm and to establish. You see, only as resurrected sons of God can we talk about “making the world a better place.” And that transition to “a better place” cannot come overnight, but will take at least fifty years, or about two generations. This transition is what I mean by “The Kingdom Being Built.”

What we want, then, is the Pattern Language that will prevail in the transformation of how everyone on earth thinks in the story of their minds and how they perceive reality. This is our present purpose.

The Underlying Power. Again, the purpose of this outline is just to place thoughts in front of ourselves so that we have a more complete picture of the meaning and importance of the language we choose to speak and the words we pass on to the next generation. The Webster’s 1926 dictionary I use shows a great depth of purpose and meaning in the words of English, drawing deeply from the Bible and things written by intelligent and creative people. A modern dictionary shows no purpose beneath the use of any word and provides only shallow and limited meanings for them, with no reference to a deeper culture.

Is the meaning of words and symbols, now the flow of Golden Oil (Learn of Me), the true underlying power guiding everything?

V: The Structures of Society
A. Governance. We use the word “governance” to mean guidance, not dictate. The society flowing out from us, as rivers of Spirit, knows, not just liberty, but “glorious liberty.” Yet glorious liberty comes only out from the sacrifice of the Lamb, that is, the willingness of others to allow you to be and to do things they do not like.

Natural law has one rule – do not steal. Murder is stealing life; adultery is stealing the devotion of marriage, and so on. Governance, then, is, in part, the protection of that devotion that exists between an individual and that which belongs to that individual, that is, their property.

Protecting Liberty. In Our Glorious Salvation we see more clearly the meaning and depths of Adam’s lust to CONTROL all the irritating people interacting with him, intruding on his self-exaltation. Out from this same lust, shared by all humans, has come an entire pattern language given to structures of control, which is then used by Christians to define God’s Kingdom!

The Song of the Lamb, then, is a pattern language that protects glorious liberty in an entirely different way. Yet those who give of themselves to honor others can never come under the control of those who receive that honor. Consider these words: Owe no debt or obligation to anyone, except to love one another (Romans 13:8). – We must have an entire language of Godly governance inside of liberty.

B. Land and Resource Use. We are developing the importance of this concept, that LIFE creates spaces for its expression and then flows into those spaces to be shaped by them. Life then uses whatever materials are at hand inside a given space to build more rooms in which to dwell.

In stating this concept, I have expressed Synergeia and Symmorphy, that is, when I bring God into this picture. Synergeia is the flow of Life together, God in our togetherness, and Symmorphy is the creating of spaces shared together. So yes, the geographical topic of “land and resource use” is a central part of the meaning of Symmorphy, that is, when the Spirit of God flows with us through our pattern language.

Dwelling Together. Maureen and I dwell together inside our home and on our property, that is, our land. Our belongings, that is, our resources, are all interwoven, and we make use of that which belongs to us, land and resources, in a reciprocal manner.

In the text, Patterns of Home, you will find a thread common to everything, that the pattern language being used comes out from a FAMILY enjoying that home in a reciprocal manner. Our pattern language by which all land and all resources are made use of in society will come out from the meaning of an individual family sharing life together. The pattern language by which a home is developed then becomes the same pattern language by which all lands and resources are used across the whole earth.

C. Economic Activity. “Economic activity” means the exchange of the value of labor and goods between two people.

Consider these pattern words – “My word is my bond,” words that used to be common in America. These are human words from the heart, but clearly, they come out from the speaking of God. They mean – “I have magnified my word above all my name,” that is, even if I suffer loss, I will keep to my word. It is evident that when “My word is my bond” is an essential element in the pattern language of the internal self-story of the vast majority of a society, that the result will be a society that is just and prosperous. What broke these pattern words? – The insertion of a third party with violence, that is, the dictate of political government legislation.

Prosperity. Self-sufficiency results in poverty; abundance comes from the division of labor with giving and receiving, or “trade.” God created us to need one another in many kinds of ways. Needing each others’ creativity and productivity is very much part of that interchange. Yet this whole realm is known to us now as filled with all sorts of lying and much twistedness of both greed and envy. It is here that a True pattern language out from the Spirit will be most needed.

God told the children of Israel that He had given them the power to “get wealth.” That meant four things: liberty (respect for others), the devotion of property, the devotion of word (contract), and peace (no one is trying to steal).
 
D. Culture. We are thinking of culture in the sense of the common ways of thinking and doing shared by a particular group of people in distinction to the culture shared by other groups of people. Inside of culture is found all the expressions of creativity, literature, music, art, and so on. Not all cultural practices are healthy or wise, however. Some practices are destructive or unjust. At the same time, enjoying the cultures of others is very much part of being human.

This is not a study of “culture,” but rather a question as to the pattern language that would shape great differences of culture, yet all inside the goodness of God. Out task is to make all things good, NOT to make all things uniform. Differences are very much a part of what is good.

E. Relationships and Interactions. What about long-distance communication, long-distance trade, travel, the pursuit of adventure, the use of technology, the need for large agreements, now known as “corporations,” in order to accomplish large things? Yet all of these things begin close to home, inside the local community. When Community is Christ, shaped by the sharing from every individual member inside of Love, then local relationships become the guide for larger long-distance relationships and interactions.

God is very practical as well as exuberant, and human society reflects both. “Bliss” or “utopia” are contrary to God and humans and are not inside our picture. My whole work life has been solving problems; it’s what gives me joy.

An Age of Wonder. We understand that all the parts of human life inside of society are of God. All the problems in our world today are caused, not by this structure or that, but by the absence of the knowledge of God. When the knowledge of God fills the earth, coming through resurrected sons, then the same structures of human interaction will continue, yet now filled with goodness.

The post-Apocalyptic world will be an age of wonder, of people thinking, “Wow, this is how I always knew things should have been, this is where my heart sings.” Yet all of human life and interaction will flow out from that golden oil of “Learn of Me” entering first into the Church to then become light for the entire creation.