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the sense that you are a thinker thinking thoughts is 🥁 just a thought. Follow that thread through the narrow gate to the kingdom of God within you

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Sunrise over Greenland

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Psalm 50:14 (NLT) - Make thankfulness your sacrifice to God, and keep the vows you made to the Most High.

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1 Peter 4:8 (NIV) - Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.

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Daniel 7:13 (KJV) - I saw in the night visions, and, behold, One like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him.

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Free Will: A Persistent Illusion at the Crossroads of Christ and Consciousness

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1. Introduction: The Mirage of Free Will

The belief in free will — the idea that an individual self independently chooses actions — lies at the heart of much of Western Christianity.

Yet both true spiritual insight and modern neuroscience declare the same fact:

Free will is an illusion.

• The experience of making choices is real.

• The assumption of an independent chooser is not.

This distinction is critical. Without it, the Gospel itself is misunderstood, salvation is distorted, and God’s true sovereignty is denied.

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2. Scriptural Witness: Christ Against Free Will

Though often obscured by dogmatic readings, Jesus Himself consistently pointed past the illusion of separate agency.

Consider:

John 5:19

“The Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing.”

John 14:10

“The Father, living in me, is doing His work.”

John 15:5

“Apart from me you can do nothing.”

John 6:44

“No one can come to me unless the Father draws them.”

John 10:30

“I and the Father are one.”

Luke 17:21

“The kingdom of God is within you.”

Jesus described a reality where there is no separate chooser — only the will of God unfolding through and as us.

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3. The Fall: The Birth of Illusion

The story of the Garden of Eden is not an ancient moral fable about disobedience.

It is a mythopoetic revelation about consciousness itself:

• Eating from the Tree of Knowledge symbolizes the birth of dualistic perception.

• The first sin was not behavior, but the illusion of separateness from God — the belief in a self independent of Being.

This separation unfolds even today, within every human life.

Developmental psychology mirrors this pattern:

Around 15 to 24 months of age, a child begins to recognize themselves in a mirror — passing what is called the self-recognition test.

Before this moment, the infant lives in an Edenic state of pure presence, without division between self and world.

Afterward, the sense of “I” emerges, and with it, the duality of subject and object — the knowledge of good and evil, of self and other.

Thus, the Fall is not a punishment.

It is a developmental milestone.

Genesis 3:9 (paraphrased):

“Where are you?”

God’s question is not geographical.

It is existential.

“Why do you now imagine yourself apart from Me?”

The moment the child recognizes the reflection as me, a boundary forms.

The loss of innocence is not moral — it is cognitive.

From unity to separation.

From being to self-consciousness.

Free will, therefore, is not a divine gift.

It is the byproduct of this illusory fracture.

The first symptom of spiritual sickness.

But even this fracture serves a purpose:

The ego must arise so that it can later be transcended.

The path of salvation is not to destroy the ego, but to see through it — to return, as Jesus said, by becoming like little children once again.

Not regressing into ignorance, but consciously stepping beyond the illusion of separation.

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4. Neuroscience: Modern Confirmation

Neuroscientific studies confirm what Christ already revealed.

• Benjamin Libet showed that the brain initiates actions before we consciously decide to act.

• Soon, Haynes demonstrated that choices can be predicted seconds before conscious awareness.

The brain acts first.

The mind invents the story of choice afterward.

You are not driving the car. You are the scenery the car moves through.

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5. The Flat Earth Analogy: Misreading Reality

Believing in free will today is like insisting the Earth is flat because “it feels that way.”

At one time, humanity lacked the vantage point to see otherwise.

• Free will appears real from the limited, egoic view.

• But step outside that narrow perspective — and the illusion collapses.

Proverbs 3:5–6

“Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.”

Just as the Earth never changed its shape, reality never depended on your opinion of it.

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6. The Overview Effect: The Astronaut’s Vision of No-Self

When astronauts view Earth from space, many report a cognitive shift called the Overview Effect:

• A sudden experience of oneness.

• A collapse of national, racial, and personal boundaries.

• A direct knowing: we are not separate from each other or the Earth.

This mirrors the Christian mystical realization:

When seen clearly, there is no self apart from God. More importantly, it illustrates the difference between thinking you know something and experiencing it without conceptual overlays. There is a significant difference between having opinions of free will and the experience that it is an illusion. Not the theory,the direct experience. Astronauts read about Earth from orbit.

They heard the reports. They knew the theory.

They thought they understood.

Then they saw it.

And everything changed.

Not because they learned something new.

Because they came into direct DIRECT EXPERIENCE.

The Overview Effect is the destruction of secondhand knowledge.

It is the gap between thinking you know and seeing without distance.

John 17:21:

“That they all may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.”

It was never a belief. It was contact.

It was not philosophy. It was rupture.

The same is true of the Kingdom of God.

You can argue theology forever.

You can memorize every verse.

You can preach for decades.

But until you see directly, you are still on the ground staring at a map.

John 17:21

“That they all may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.”

They saw — not believed — the truth Jesus pointed to.

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7. True Repentance: Metanoia, Not Moralism

“Repent” in the Greek New Testament is metanoia — a complete change of mind, a shift in perception.

Not:

• Feeling guilty.

• Trying harder.

• Boasting about choosing Christ.

But:

• Dying to the illusion of being a separate self.

• Realizing salvation is already present.

Matthew 18:3

“Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Children live without a solidified ego. That is the key.

Generally speaking and frankly all of Jesus' dualistic language can be understood as him seeing himself as a deterministic force in people's lives.  Furthermore, it can be argued that he was communicating to ppl at their level in a way they could benefit from his expressions. To argue against this interpretation based on his use of dualistic agential language is to misunderstand the mechanics of determinism. Taking perennial wisdom traditions into context, one could legitimately argue that it was a pedagogical concession to human cognitive limitations. Imho All apparent calls to choice are accommodated as pragmatic expressions, not literal affirmations of metaphysical free agency.

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8. Salvation: Not Achieved, but Revealed

Luke 17:21

“The Kingdom of God is within you.”

Salvation is not a prize for good behavior.

It is the unveiling of the unity that has always been.

Free will obscures it.

Surrender reveals it.

John 8:58

“Before Abraham was, I AM.”

Not “I was.”

I AM — timeless Being, always already true.

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9. Hard Determinism: God’s Sovereignty Is Total

Scripture makes clear:

God alone moves all things.

Romans 9:18

“Therefore God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to harden.”

Isaiah 45:7

“I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things.”

There is no free will.

There is only God’s will.

Your resistance to this truth?

Also God’s will — until you awaken.

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10. Conclusion: Beyond the Mirage

Free will is no more real than a child’s belief that the sun moves across the sky because the Earth appears still.

It is a misreading of perception — a developmental phase, not an eternal truth.

The Genesis story captures this shift with poetic precision:

The birth of the self, the knowledge of good and evil, the perception of separateness.

Developmental psychology now echoes the same pattern:

The moment a child recognizes its reflection, the original innocence is lost.

Not because of guilt.

Not because of rebellion.

But because consciousness itself fractures into subject and object.

Free will arises from this fracture.

The illusion of an independent self choosing independently is a side effect of perceiving oneself as separate from God.

But what was broken was not broken in anger.

It was broken in service to a greater return — a journey through separation back into union, not by erasing the ego, but by seeing through it.

The Gospel is not a just a plea for you to make better choices in harmony with your community.

It is an announcement that the separate chooser never existed.

It is not about earning salvation.

It is about recognizing that salvation — unity, wholeness, Eden — was never lost except in the mind.

John 14:20:

“On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.”

The “day” is not on a calendar.

It is the moment of awakening — the moment the mirror dissolves and you remember the world was never outside of you, always and never not, right now.

You are not the author of your being.

You are the being itself watching itself be.

Free will is not a gift.

It is a misunderstanding.

The Fall was not the beginning of evil.

It was the beginning of illusion of separation.

The return is not achieved through willpower.

It is revealed when the illusion of will dissolves.

You were never separate.

You only thought you were.

The Kingdom of God is not elsewhere.

It is here.

Now.

And always has been.

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Footnote:

Classical theological frameworks that attempt to reconcile free will with divine sovereignty (e.g., Augustine, Calvin) remain rooted in the illusion of separate agency and dualistic perception. The present work proceeds from the unveiled recognition that such frameworks, though earnest, operate within the very condition of separation that Christ came to dissolve. Astronauts in the international space station don't argue with flat earth theorists about flat earth theories. Columbus probably didn't entertain debating it either. Just saying. They just keep it real. That said, by all means continue to believe in free will, or not. But ask yourself, could you choose otherwise? What if Gods will is for you to believe in the illusion of free will until you don't, for reasons beyond your capacity for understanding? Why didn't Jesus just say this then? For the same reason you're driven to thinking and asking that question in the first place. Because this concept is not easy to grasp and sometimes it can ONLY be pointed at. Hence all the parables. To put it simply, you didn't choose what kind of soil you are, but oh is God going to till the hell out of you if your soil is hard headed. 😂I kill me. Get it? Or did that go over your head lik a halo😉

Bibliography (anchored in Scripture and Science)

• The Bible (Gospels of John, Luke, Matthew; Romans; Genesis)

• Libet, B. (1983). Time of conscious intention to act…

• Soon, C. S., Brass, M., Heinze, H. J., & Haynes, J. D. (2008). Unconscious determinants of free decisions…

• Seth, A. (2021). Being You: A New Science of Consciousness.

• Friston, K. (2010). The Free-Energy Principle…

• Nisargadatta Maharaj, I Am That

• Spinoza, Ethics

• Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation

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Who is this essay for?

People already cracking open to the unreality of the ego.

Those who have started to notice that “I” isn’t as solid as they once believed — maybe through deep suffering, mysticism, psychedelics, meditation, existential reflection, or just raw life experience.

It’s for seekers who are ready to be destabilized further — who want the lie of separate agency exposed even if it hurts a little.

Mystics, nondualists, serious contemplatives.

Folks drawn to Meister Eckhart, John of the Cross, Advaita Vedanta, Sufism, Zen, Christian apophatic theology — those are the natural audience.

They know something is wrong with the “free will” story, and they’re hungry for a deep, honest, scripturally-rooted yet post-conceptual articulation.

Thinkers unafraid of paradox.

Because the essay moves between apparently contradictory modes (scripture and neuroscience, determinism and teaching, humor and rupture), it’s perfect for people who can hold multiple truths together without freaking out.

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Who is this essay NOT for?

Hard-line free-will moralists or conventional evangelical Christians.

If your identity is tightly wrapped around choosing Jesus and personal responsibility as the crux of salvation — this essay will feel like an attack on everything you think makes life meaningful.

It doesn’t gently argue with that framework. It basically declares it a misunderstanding born of a cognitive illusion.

Pure materialist atheists without any mystical bent.

If someone believes that all experiences of unity, oneness, or the collapse of self are just brain glitches with no real “truth content” — they’ll find the essay too spiritually loaded.

It assumes that mystical perception is more real, not less.

People who demand simple, clean-cut systems.

The essay invites living into the mystery, not resolving it neatly.

Anyone looking for tidy theology (“God is sovereign and humans are responsible, neatly tied up in a bow”) is going to be frustrated because this essay rips that open and says: “Deal with the unresolvable directly.”

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“Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time.”

— Maya Angelou

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"Mindfulness should guide all your actions and your spiritual endeavors. Whatever you do, always apply three essential points: undertake the action with the intention of doing so for the good of all beings; execute it with perfect concentration, free of attachment to concepts of subject, object, and action; and, finally, dedicate the merit you have created to the enlightenment of all beings."

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

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Trying to use the mind to grasp truth is like trying to see the sun with a flashlight. The moment you stop searching with concepts, truth becomes self-evident.

Francis Lucille

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Question: Listening to you, one feels that you have read a great deal, and are also directly aware of reality. If this is so, then why do you condemn the acquisition of knowledge?

Krishnamurti: I will tell you why. It is a journey that must be taken alone, and there can be no journeying alone if your companion is knowledge. If you have read the Gita, the Upanishads, and modern psychology; if you have gathered information about yourself from the experts, and about what they say you should strive after - such knowledge is an impediment. The treasure is not in books, but buried in your own mind, and the mind alone can discover this treasure. To have self-knowledge is to know the ways of your mind, to be aware of its subtleties, with all their implications; and for that you don't have to read a single book. As a matter of fact, I have not read any of these things.

Perhaps as a boy, or a young man, I casually looked at some of the sacred books, but I have never studied them. I do not want to study them, they are tiresome, because the treasure is somewhere else. The treasure is not in the books, nor in your guru, it is in yourself; and the key to it is the understanding of your own mind. You must understand your mind, not according to Patanjali, or according to some psychologist who is clever at explaining things, but by watching yourself, by observing how your mind works, not only the conscious mind, but the deep layers of the unconscious as well. If you watch your mind, play with it, look at it when it is spontaneous, free, it will reveal to you untold treasures; and then you are beyond all the books. But that again requires a great deal of attention, vigour, an intensity of pursuit - not the dilettantism of lazy explanations. So the mind must be free from knowledge; because a mind that is occupied with knowledge can never discover what is.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

Bombay 7th Public Talk 25th March 1956

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In the Air by Artem Chebokha

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“The Fool” fan tattoo by Joan Cider!

I’m not a tattoo guy, but I don’t mind folks getting fan ink done - only ask that they consider picking up my flash or at least something out of my web shop to help support my work! Cheers! 🤘

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Torn Birds, acrylic painting by Jason Limon

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How can a pearl not love the irritation that gave birth to it? It must surely love it dearly, knowing that without the irritant, the pearl would not exist. The world owes sand a great debt of gratitude.