Avalanche

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                                                                        Avalan
che
 
 It could have been a mountain traveler, or a deer traversing the upper col.
It could have been nothing more than temperature change on that section of the
mountain. Exactly what triggered the calamity was never discovered, but after
examining the damage, it was clear that someone had made a disastrous
decision. The village was destroyed.  
 
 It is said that the natives of northern Alaska have twelve different words
for what we of lower latitudes call snow. We so infrequently see snow, it all
looks the same to us, but Eskimos and Athabascan have most of their lives to
make a study on it. Today, to preserve life and property, the study of snow
has become a science. 
 
 An avalanche, the sudden flow of a large mass of snow and ice, can be set off
by a combination of factors, including temperature change, the sheering of
creeping snow masses, and sudden vibrations. But without a "set up," none of
these factors can occur. The more devastating types of avalanches occur when
heavy upper levels of snow don't have time to cohere to the existing lower
levels. A pellet like type of snow called "graupnel" or "popcorn snow" by
skiers can act like millions of tiny ball bearings layered beneath slabs of
snow melted and frozen again into slabs of ice. Additional layers of new snow
can add to the tremendous pressures and multiply the dangers. 
 
 Sometimes these factors occur only on a certain part of the mountain slope.
If one section reaches a critical state, an avalanche in an upper section can
be enough to set off the entire mountainside. The upper and smaller avalanche
can be the "trigger" for the lower sections that are not as critical.

 Mountaineers and  "helicopter skiers" know that the hazards of avalanches
among the trees are diminished. The trees act as pylons adding stability to an
otherwise unstable condition. In the village mentioned above, someone decided
to harvest the timber the previous summer that had for centuries been the
stability that had averted devastation. This time, when conditions became
critical on the upper col, there was nothing to retain the deadly energy
unleashed on the lower mountain. Thousands of tons of snow and ice traveled
down the over 30% slopes attaining speeds of up to one hundred and sixty miles
per hour destroying everything in it's path. At those speeds, even the few
remaining trees (regardless of their size) are sheared off or uprooted to feed
the monster. Roaring down the mountain, the white monster takes on a liquid
state. When the kinetic frenzy finally stops, the "liquid" immediately becomes
concrete like creating a frozen mixture of ice, tree trunks and humans, if
they find themselves in it's path. 
 
The Apostolic Church finds itself on the brink of the third millennium and a
massive avalanche. Men in high places of church government are running through
the pews crying, "Numbers, Numbers!" Whole churches seem to be fixated on
filling their pews at any cost. Unsubstantiated rumors of huge revivals
including stadiums filled with thousands of people receiving the Holy Ghost
ring in the ears of men truly burdened for lost souls and discouraged by their
meager twenty-five to thirty five member churches. It is now an "acceptable"
standard to have Trinitarians preach on "church growth" behind our Oneness
pulpits. Ecumenicalism is in the air. Apostolic preachers refrain from
preaching the only saving message for fear of offending and breaking down
"dialogue" with our Trinitarian "brothers." The barriers are broken. All are
"Christians." 
 
  Somehow a thin layer of "graupnel" (that unstable, ball bearing type snow)
has been inserted somewhere above the Apostles and prophets and beneath
today's church. An enemy has done this. If this wasn't enough, the huge
ancient trees of the necessity of the New Birth, Jesus' name baptism and the
infilling of the Holy Ghost have been hewn down for the fireplaces of
"numbers." 
The mammoth trees of the Oneness of the Godhead that once made the
mountainside stable have been cut down and sold for reconciliation to our
Trinitarian "brothers." The beautiful trees of Holiness (without which no man
shall see the Lord) were logged out in exchange for the hope that our young
people would not feel "out of step" with the world. 
 These "trees" that stabilized the mountainside are all but gone. The graupnel
is in place. Temperatures are right. What is the trigger that will set off the
greatest avalanche in history, the great falling away? 
 Unlike the avalanches of this natural world, the victims of this spiritual
avalanche will never know it occurred. They will look around and they will be
arm in arm with their Trinitarian brothers (just like before the disaster) and
they will think nothing has changed. There will be buildings filled with
people (the numbers they once coveted) and no doctrinal differences (the
differences that once embarrassed them because they found them indefensible).
We will become a massive mixture of frozen debris forever cemented together
into an ecumenical amalgam.  
 Conditions will remain critical until those in high places of  "Church
government" stop crying, " Numbers, Numbers!" and start preaching, "Doctrine,
Doctrine!" 
 
 By Mike Reed
 Inspired by Elder Dallas Mefford