Prayers from the cave…

Posted on September 30, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

I recently spent two weeks in Nashville, where I spent time with old friends, played music, and caught up on the years we’ve missed. I attended a function hosted by my publisher, and got to meet many fellow authors, and I made some new friends. It was a wonderful time, a period of self reflection, hope, and sentimentality all at once, and I learned a tremendous amount. The most important part of the trip, though, happened on the way home, somewhere between Valdosta Georgia and the Florida state line.

I’ve struggled for the last year or so with my faith. It’s almost funny, because one of the central conflicts in my first two books revolves around the battle between faith and doubt as darkness closes in. My own internal war ended up mirroring some of the strife I’ve put my characters through; my characters dealt with this better than I did personally, and when I wrote those books, I believed I’d put that particular struggle behind me. I was wrong. I’ve been embattled on a variety of fronts for the last year, and it took a hard toll upon my soul until it reached a point where I began to question that which I knew to be true. I wondered where God was, and I went so far as to question the validity of His promises, to wonder about His goodness. Heresy, I know, and wrong-headed, but I don’t think I’m alone in this kind of battlefield. Somehow, I’d managed to succumb to a sense of hopelessness, and I’d put myself in a cave.

A man bereft of hope is like body without bones; there is nothing to hold him upright and together. I’d become that guy, without really knowing it, without seeing a way out. And when that happens, the instinct is to retreat, to become defensive and withdrawn, to cast blame and doubt around with careless abandon. We isolate ourselves, which only makes things worse.I felt very much like an Object of Wrath, ignoring in my own mind the second part of that very important verse in Ephesians.

So, driving through the hills of Alabama, the long stretches of construction south of Atlanta along I-75, I had plenty of time to think. Mostly, I listened to music on Spotify, and I reflected on the new friends I’d made and the old friends I’d reconnected with. Right around Valdosta, my phone died, and the music ended. I couldn’t find anything to listen to, so I hit the “seek” button on the truck radio, and I heard Dr. David Jerimiah begin to speak.

It was a sermon titled Praying From the Cave, based around Psalm 142. David (the king, not the preacher) was in a cave, running from Saul. He was depressed, isolated to the point that other men did not care if he lived or died. Yet within that dark place, David cried out to God, thanking him and praising him, laying his burdens at God’s feet, recognizing his own pain, and turning to God for refuge.

About ten minutes into the sermon, something happened.

I’ve had times where I felt God’s presence, singing in church with hand held high, a joyful noise on my lips and a connection to the Creator, like an electric thrum of peace and rightness. I’ve been touched by a sermon or a verse, and felt convicted, nudged, and I’ve had verses jump out at me as though they were highlighted in bright yellow.

This thing that happened somewhere in Georgia was different; God hit me in the head with a ball bat. I was driving down the road with tears on my face, broken. Facing myself and my doubt, my mistakes and delusions and bitterness. God slayed me, and I was shattered. I prayed then, and I could almost see a darkness, like ashes swirling in the wind, leaving from my chest. It sounds nuts, but there was a palpable, physical sensation of great weight being lifted, immediately followed by hope and joy.

I thought I’d cried out to God before, and I’ve been on my knees. But there was something in me left then, some element of reserve or doubt or perhaps pride which prevented the profound kind of healing I so desperately craved. I understood that God had been right there with me all along. That no matter what happens, I’m still a part of his plan, and that even though it may not seem so at the time, in the end, all things do work for His good. I’d forgotten that my hope lies with Jesus, and everything else is really the small stuff. I’d neglected certain things and ignored certain truths. These things were made clear to me in an instant. I’ve got some work to do, but I’m not alone, and I never was.

Somewhere in Georgia, I reconnected with my best friend, the most important friend I’ll ever have; he was beside me all along.

Ephesians 2:3-5

“We were by nature objects of wrath. Because of his great love for us, but God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive in Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved.”

Psalm 142:6-8

“Listen to my cry, for I am in desperate need; rescue me from those who pursue me, for they are too strong for me. Set me free from my prison, that I may raise your name. Then the righteous will gather around me because of your goodness to me.”

The End of Times… War and Rumors of War

Posted on September 7, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

Mankind has always possessed a morbid fascination with the apocalypse. From the Biblical Flood and Mayan calendar to modern day science fiction, civilizations have been aware and intrigued, sometimes terrified, by their impending doom. In fiction, this is entertaining, but the reality is more chilling. Societal collapse has been a recurrent theme in our history, and perhaps this is one of the reasons we are drawn to books like The Stand and television shows like The Walking Dead.
For many Christians, the End of Times means the rise of the Anti Christ, Armageddon, and the return of Jesus. Christians have been looking toward the heavens for about two thousand years now, wondering if this is it.

Sad ruins remain to remind us that the world as we know it is far from eternal. Entire cultures in the Pacific rose and fell, and disappeared. The mighty Mayans are gone, the Roman Empire fell, sacked and destroyed from within. Yet, even those breakdowns did not lead to the destruction of the human race. Life went on.

Only in the last sixty years, the blink of an eye in terms of history, has mankind developed the ability to cause its own extinction. While in the past, a meteor strike, super-volcano, or a blast from a star light years away could have erased us from the planet, we now can do it ourselves with the push of a button.

A global nuclear war is one obvious way this could happen. To put this in perspective, consider that Russia and the United States possess thousands of nuclear weapons. Russian weapons are dirtier and their largest nukes are more powerful than those in the United States’ arsenal, but it’s irrelevant. The tipping point for a nuclear winter is roughly one hundred explosions, according to the most recent science. There has been debate over the years on this topic, with some estimates coming in at only thirty or forty simultaneous explosions causing the planet to go cold. If thousands of these weapons were launched, that’s the end of us. The atmosphere is choked with radioactive ash, obstructing sunlight, the temperature falls, plants die, and there is no more food. The animals die, and homo sapiens perish right along with the rest of them.

In the last sixty years, we have also decided to come up with other, creative weapons of extinction. Biological weapons could do the job just as well as nuclear bombs. Our scientists tinker with viruses, which actually alter DNA, finding ways to make these things more deadly. A genetically altered virus could end our species. We’re looking at the worst outbreak of Ebola, a virus as scary as its name, which according to Dr. Tom Frieden, the Director for the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, “is the world’s first Ebola epidemic, and it’s spiraling out of control. It’s bad now, and it’s going to get worse in the very near future. There is still a window of opportunity to tamp it down, but that window is closing. We really have to act now.”

Against this backdrop, we now have the greatest level of danger in the world we’ve seen since World War II, with Russia poised to trigger a global war over the Ukraine, and Vladimir Putin on the throne and his finger on the button, not the kind of man to face in the ultimate game of chicken. Because, he’s the guy that doesn’t swerve at the last minute. Then of course, there is the militant, insane, ISIS movement which is spreading like the black plague, a tide of evil which is consuming countries torn by war. The radicals are willing to stop at nothing, bereft of the slightest shred of morality or human decency, killing innocents without remorse or hesitation, and seeming to relish every shot Shia, every cut throat.

In Gaza, Israel sends in armored vehicles to stop rocket attacks on civilians, and levels schools, homes, and lives. Israel is defending itself against attack, against those who use children as human shields in order to gain support from around the world. Hamas WANTS to provoke Israel into these attacks. It’s Terror 101. Israel becomes more isolated from the rest of the world, increasingly vulnerable to attack from neighbors who have invaded time and time again. Israel also has nuclear weapons, and while they will never confirm this, everybody knows. If Israel is attacked, and it’s really just a matter of time, they will use these weapons if it looks like the war is lost. It’s called the Sampson Option, and it is chilling.

The Old and New Testament in the Bible lay out some things which have come to pass that are irrefutable, though seemed highly unlikely. Israel, it was foretold, would cease to exist, and it’s people would be scattered. That happened more than once. The temple would be torn down. The Romans did that. Israel would become a nation again. This seemed impossible, yet in 1948 Israel was again a nation. One of the last important pieces of scriptural prophecy is the rebuilding of the Temple. There are plans underway now in Jerusalem to do just that.

Whether one believes in the prophecy or not, those things did happen. The book or Revelation, the last and scariest book of the Bible, is rife with images and verses open to debate, with the scrolls and seals being opened, the four horsemen of the apocalypse coming, and death on a pale horse riding to doom mankind.

These may not be the end of times, and perhaps humanity will figure out a way to become better, alter its essential warlike nature and selfishness and transcend the hatred we wield like a sword. At no time in all of human history, though, has the end seemed quite so imminent or possible.

Children of Wrath…Available now on Amazon

Posted on August 27, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

A religious war threatens to destroy everything that matters to William. There is no escaping evil and madness…It must be defeated.

There is darkness, but always hope, even when it appears absent. This book is about holding onto faith in the face of evil and loss, and it picks up about ten years after the events of Objects of Wrath. I hope you all will read this, tell your friends about it, and let me know what you think. I love interacting with readers, and I’m easy to connect with on Facebook, Twitter, and GoodReads.

This book is available on Amazon, Banes and Noble, and through itunes, in e-book format, and in about two weeks, in paperback as well. Objects of Wrath is also on audible.com as an audio book, and if you haven’t read that one, I’d suggest reading it first; the books are able to stand alone, but I don’t spend much time going into events that happened in the first one.

Thanks for all the support, and happy reading!

We The People

Posted on August 3, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

I love the United States of America; we are the greatest nation in the history of mankind, yet we are not the country that we were, nor the one we believe ourselves to be. America lost its light along the way.

America stopped Hitler. America invented rock and roll, the automobile, and the internet, and put men on the moon. We are a nation of innovators, fiercely independent, and hard working. We as a people were admired for standing for freedom and democracy. That is part of our heritage.seantsmithauthor.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/what-do-i-need-to-know.jpg”> Self-Compassion

America defeated the Soviet Union without firing a shot. (Not The Big shot, thank God.)

Those are defining moments as Americans, right? We stopped Stalin, King George, and Saddam Hussein. We helped rebuild Germany and Japan after World War II.

But…America became a nation by killing off the people that were actually Americans first. Whoops.

Along the way, America built a nation upon the backs of people who were enslaved. Slavery happened. People owned people. That’s also part of our heritage. This country would not exist as we know it without the push west at the expense of the Native Americans and the generations of slave trade and labor which built the agricultural base in the South.

I love America. I love the United States. We are not all one thing, though, either good or evil, nor have we ever been a homogenous society. In fact, our diversity is one of the things that made us great. We have been a champion of freedom and that which is good, but we have also committed atrocities and grave mistakes.

And now, while the United States consumes itself with bitter fire and ignorance, self righteousness and self- loathing at the same time, what is the truth of it? As a people, as Americans, can we recognize the difference between a patriot and a fool?

It’s harder than we think, and now a war within looms because we’re that idle and dumb. The patriots, who are not actually patriots but those who undermine the country with lies, ignorance, and hatred, are dangerous because many of them advocate open war, rebellion, and violence. And their numbers are growing.

The amount of misinformation being blasted over the airways and internet is mind-blowing. The truth seems hard to discern, and many people, it seems , prefer to believe lies, whether the lies we tell ourselves or the lies of others, than to look for the cold, hard truth. The truth, like the America itself, is not just one thing.

The United States strove to be a beacon of hope for the world, a “city on a hill,” and in many respects, the country succeeded in fulfilling the hopes of our founding fathers. It seems to me though, that we the people no longer strive for this ideal.

We watch videos of cuddly cats on the internet rather than try to learn something. We past memes on social media full of ignorance and hate because it is easier to click than it is to actually read. We are convinced we are right and that the other side is wrong, seldom listening to those who disagree with us, remaining in a bubble of ignorance.

The true patriot will listen, learn, and read a history book.

One of the building blocks of our democracy is compromise. Without it, the government cannot function, either at the national or local level. When politicians and voters become so entrenched in their beliefs that they are unwilling to bend, the whole system breaks down. The government now is a picture of this dysfunction. Unfortunately, the government reflects the will of the people, and we are divided.

The true patriot will strive for unity over division. The only way this great country will find its light again is if we the people become that light.

Angry with God….

Posted on May 15, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

One of my favorite movie scenes is from Forest Gump, when Lt. Dan rages from the crow’s nest of his shrimp boat in the middle of a hurricane, shaking his fist at the heavens. Feeling betrayed by God, the universe, and life comes naturally to us, I think. It certainly does for me.

A central tenet of Christianity is the acceptance of God’s supremacy, and that in the end “all things work according to the good.” When looking at hurricanes, genocides, and war, it is impossible for me to understand how these can be good. I can’t wrap my head around it, because it seems unjust. I grapple with these things on an intellectual level, but in the end I retreat into a leap of faith, admitting that a power as vast as God must be, there is no possible way I can understand the infinite permutations of destiny, the colorful threads connecting a universe larger than my puny mind can comprehend. When it’s personal, though, is when it becomes dangerous for me. My faith is not strong enough.

I recognize the futility of it. I understand there is no arguing with God, and that nothing good can possibly come of the attempt. And still I’m guilty of it. I look around at things, and I say to myself, “that’s not fair. Why?” It is ultimately a selfish emotion, at its root, even if it is couched in compassion. What I’m truly saying is “Why Me?” Which is absurd, human, and a bit pathetic.

I had a discussion recently with a Godly man, a much wiser one than I. I told him I was feeling rankled with God. ” Yes, I’ve made some big mistakes, made some dumb decisions, I said. I’m trying hard to rely on God, and I’m not seeing any improvements. In fact, things are getting worse.”

“I see,” he said, nodding his head. “So you’re angry with God because of things you did, and now you’re upset because He’s not fixing things as quickly as you like? Did I get that right.”

I had to sheepishly agree with him, and recognizing that made me feel a bit better. There are consequences. Perhaps it’s not God’s role to make those go away.

I’m working at focusing on the good, seeking out the light, and infusing my life with a greater sense of gratitude, for anger is a poison in our veins, a killing toxin. A life bereft of hope is tragic and lonely. I’m lowering my fist.

Continue reading →

The New Cold War

Posted on April 27, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

With Russian nationalism on the rise, troops and armor massed on the border of the Ukraine, and vitriolic rhetoric burning up the airwaves between Moscow and Washington, there is little doubt that the Cold War is once again very real. Russia has at least three thousand deliverable nuclear weapons, and the United States has somewhere around that number– more than enough to plunge the word into a nuclear winter. There seems to be the perception that the old Cold War doctrines of “Mutually assured destruction,” or MAD, and detente have fallen by the wayside and are no longer relevant, but that is not the case. The world is still a scary place, and right now, it’s the scariest it’s been since the Cuban Missile Crisis. The problem stems not only from the leadership,but from the people.

In the United States, President Obama is frequently called weak by the opposition. A casual stroll through social media will reveal a myriad of memes and posts declaring that the Commander in Chief is afraid of Putin, and that the United States should be doing more, whether in the Middle-East, or in Crimea. Conversely, within Russia, Putin is trying to shore up support for himself, and is appealing to lingering vestiges of pride many Russians still feel about the Soviet Union. This is a recipe for disaster. Two leaders squaring off with nuclear weapons, trying to prove a point.

Putin’s overly virile posturing, chest thrusting, bombastic aggressiveness might be laughable in other circumstances, yet the hawks within the U.S. seem to fixate on Putin’s pushiness and conclude that by comparison, President Obama is a weakling. Many of these people, including some of our elected officials, seem to think putting boots on the ground in Eastern Europe is a wonderful idea, that the United States should send more Aircraft Carriers into the region, including the Black Sea, and perhaps threaten direct military action backed by airstrikes and missiles. These hawks within the United States seem to have never cracked a history book, and they continue to howl about Obama’s capitulations, weakening the administration further, reducing our ability to act in a sensible fashion and further emboldening Russia. It’s ironic, and maddening. The notion that political dissension stops at the borders and does not extend to foreign policy is one of those Cold War rules that has indeed fallen away, and this makes the current international situation more volatile.

Yet the U.S. has imposed the toughest economic sanctions against Russia since the Cold War (technically) ended. The United States has two carrier groups in the region, and recently sent ships into the Black Sea.

Russian fighter jets buzzed a U.S. destroyer in the Black Sea, flying at a mere five hundred feet above the deck. Russian long range bombers have frequently violated U.S. airspace off the coast of Alaska. Subs carrying nuclear weapons engage in games of cat and mouse beneath the oceans, just off our shores. We can hope clear heads prevail. We can pray that some twenty-year-old sailor or pilot or soldier doesn’t make a mistake, a single push of a button which could unleash World War Three. That’s how it starts.

A global nuclear war will make all other wars in human history seem tame by comparison. What keeps me awake at night is that many people seem to have forgotten this.

Enjoy the Apocalypse!

Choices

Posted on April 22, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

From my novel in progress, The Tears of Abraham

Sometimes, bad decisions change little beyond the moment, and a wrong turn is merely that– a left which should have been a right. Often, though, a bad choice builds momentum and mass and creates its own gravity and destructive physics until the present, future, and the past are distorted and corrupted. Loving the wrong woman is like that.

It’s the hunger of the stone seeking rock bottom. The splash and the inevitable descent and weight of consequence dragging and drowning the laughter of young dreams deeper and darker into the mud and the choking abyss of mediocrity, irrelevance, and then oblivion. The ripples on the surface of the waters have no memory.

Sneak Peek… Children of Wrath

Posted on April 13, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

Being a hero in the eyes of my children was far more important to me than the adulation I’ve received over the years for getting shot and stabbed and being any sort of a leader. The memories that keep me warm on snowy winter nights here in Yellowstone are of times when I was a real hero. I remember my son Ryder and his little sister Grace on Christmas morning gazing with wide eyed wonder at the presents under the tree while a fire cracked and popped in a log cabin steeped to the roof in drifts. I hold those perfect moments close to me, those fleeting times that were really gifts my children gave to me. I can now open them like a book, and I turn back the years to see that look of amazement they rewarded me with when I lifted a heavy log, carved a bow, or brought home a wolf cub. I wrap myself in those precious memories like a warm bison blanket to keep the cold at bay and stave off the lingering chill of things I would rather forget.

The winter Ryder turned nine, Grace was six, and the cold was bitter and long. Maybe with the telling of it, these many years later, forgiveness will find me and I can draw close and smile.

The Fall obliterated humanity about sixteen years before that season; the bombs and pestilence that followed The Fall pushed us to the brink of the abyss, but we managed to survive. In the nine years we had been in the west, the scattered groups of survivors inhabiting the region enjoyed relative peace and security. It was a time of rebirth and renewal, and my best memories live there still. The weaponized fungus we had come to call Tarantula still thrived in the warmer regions, but the cold of the north kept it at bay. We were full of hope, though we bore the wounds of the past. We believed we had made it through the worst of it.

I was then not yet thirty, and still very much in my prime, my hair dark and short, with not a hint of the white beard and long mane I now wear. “You look like Noah,” Crystal jokes these days. “What happened to my sculpted David, my Greek hero?” She laughs and there is no malice in it; the gray is earned and I wear it with the cantankerousness of an old Grizzly baring his yellowed fangs over a kill, long of tooth and the gold fading, but still dangerous. I was much more dangerous then. I stood six feet four inches, was broad of shoulder and narrow of hip, and I was strong. Hazel eyes, still bright with hope then, before they were faded and dimmed by sadness, which still burned with a zest for life.

“You’re old beyond your years,” I recall Crystal saying back then. “Such an old soul.” But really, I think that was all of us.

Hero of My Own Life

Posted on April 2, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

“Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.“

This is the opening line from my favorite Charles Dickens book, David Copperfield. The line pierced me when I read it back in high school, again in college, and now, as a forty-five year old man with more life in the rear-view than on the horizon. In my youth, the line held promise and exhortation and there was joy in reading it. Now, though, it feels different. I’m more than halfway through, and I am a hollow hero at my best, anti-hero perhaps, and villain at my worst. My own characters, the heroes, would despise me. I’ve been stabbed, shot at, punched and hurt. I’ve squandered love and money and friendship and decades for the idea that I was that hero in my own story, some kind of Harlan Howard, Steinbeck, Hemingway creation, and well… No. The story is mine, and there are no heroes. Maybe God should have been, but he wasn’t. I tried, and I guess if He wanted to then it would have been more apparent who the hero was.

It ain’t over yet. I’d love to see something spectacular. I’d love to see a hero.

Review: Lone Survivor

Posted on March 6, 2014 by Sean T. Smith

Poster art for "Lone Survivor."

Lone Survivor is one of the best films I’ve seen in years, and I’d put it right beside Saving Private Ryan in the war genre. It is that good. The action sequences are relentless, gritty, and real. There is an emotional depth to Lone Survivor that I’d hoped to see, and the movie exceeded my expectations. That the movie is grounded on Marcus Luttrell’s true story gives the film great meaning.

There are heroes humping through the mountains of Afghanistan as I write from the comfort of my home, a forgotten war still being waged. My deepest gratitude goes out to the men and women serving our country and risking their lives.

The film manages to encapsulate some of the dilemmas with this war, without being preachy. There are significant problems with the Rules of Engagement because our troops are fighting an insurgency that melts back into the civilian population. And there is the problem of logistics and “too many moving parts” which puts our soldiers often unnecessarily in harms way.

We see the fear, sacrifice, brotherhood and blood of heroes. I wept as the credits rolled, feeling both grateful and inadequate, having done little of worth with my own life. I highly recommend this movie.

Author Sean T. Smith

Writing, Religion, and the Apocalypse!

Tag Archives: objects of wrath