Horrifying for Jesus: The problem with "hell houses"

Hell-raiser?
Poster for hell house in Texas

The first time that I went to a hell house (we’ll get to what that is soon) it depicted a commercial airline crash.  It was pretty impressive really, all taking place within the basement of a Baptist church in Asheville.  Then we were taken through a series of rooms that showed what happened to the characters following their untimely deaths.  Some were lifted away by “angels” (younger members of the church in white robes absent the wings) and didn’t show up until later.

And then there were some who were condemned because of their unbelief.  These were hauled out of sight by other youth members in demonic makeup.  Their eternal destination was what could only be called the “Hell Room”: a very dark room that required holding onto a rope to navigate through.  Still more youngsters in glow-in-the-dark masks and faintly luminescent attire mulling around while an older man playing the devil himself ranted about how there was always room in Hades.  The kids would occasionally whisper “Ssssaaatan!” or some such.  The conclusion of the hell house proper was a room depicting Jesus and the good characters coming in to worship Him.

What followed after was that those of us in our group were brought into a normal classroom up a floor where another older man talked about the gospel of Christ and salvation.  The gist of the message though was clear: be saved or go through worse than what you just saw.

I will be honest: it was a show that even years later disturbs me.   But probably not in the way that the organizers had intended.

There are various names for them: “hell house” or “judgment house” or the like.  They’re meant to  be a Christian version of the haunted attractions that spring up around this time of year.  Some of those are pretty fantastic.   Others are unbelievably complex: Woods of Terror - a nationally renowned annual Halloween attraction - owned an operated by a devout Christian, incidentally - is just down the road from where I live and is a true wonder to walk through.

The “haunted” attractions have a straightforward purpose: frighten the bejeebers out of you momentarily, only to propel you forward into more good-natured horror.  You pay money and for the next 45 minutes you come perilously close to losing bladder control… all for fun, of course.

That isn’t what the hell house is meant to be.

They pop up in various churches every year at this time, just in time for Halloween.  For twelve bucks you pay to travail from the mortal realm on through the torments of the damned, after which you are sent into an indoctrination session to explain what it is that you’ve just witnessed and how to avoid it.  Doing such means turning to Christ for eternal salvation.

I absolutely can accept that.  We are most certainly kept in the arms of God from the moment that we turn to Him and surrender ourselves to His will.  We are told that nothing will separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:39).  Do I believe that once we have salvation, that salvation is eternal regardless of what it is that we do in this life?  Yes.  Definitely.

But could it be that the people who go through a hell house are more being driven away from Hell than into a relationship with God?

There is a difference between the two.  And it’s one that seriously makes me wonder how much of the “repentance” is genuine and how much is motivated by a fear that could very possibly be as temporary as a weekend.

I call it “horrifying for Jesus”.  And there is something that is significantly troubling about that.

Look, I don’t doubt that the intentions of the people running “hell houses” or “judgment houses” are very sincere.  They have set out to do something that we as Christians are meant to do, and in some ways they do it quite well.  And that is, to cause others to wonder about their eternal destination.

But I have to question… as I have long questioned… the methods that are utilized toward that end.

I’m compelled to wonder if the reason why some say that they turn to Christ is primarily out of fear of the torment of Hell.

Now, do I believe that such a thing exists?  As much as I do believe in “once saved, always saved”.  As I have come to understand it over the years, Hell is something that God has to allow.  Hell is for those who not only turn away from Him: Hell is for those who absolutely refuse to acknowledge Him.  Because if they can not stand to be in the presence of God, then being in His presence for eternity would be an even greater torment.  It is something that they could not possibly tolerate.  Heaven would become just like Hell if such a thing were possible.  What is Hell?  It’s the absence of the presence of God more than anything else.

Are our reasons to turn to God because we long to be in His presence, or because we fear the absence of Him?

There is a difference between the two, I believe.  One is based in love.  The other is borne out of fear.  The two are for all intents and purposes incompatible with each other.

So what does it say about us as followers of Christ when we need stunts derived from fear?  How is it that horror has supplanted love and tenderness in drawing others to God?

The NIV version tells us that “For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love, and self-discipline.” (2nd Timothy 1:7).  The KJV version might say it even better: “For God hath not given us a spirit of fear…”

Think about that.  The word of God instructs that we are not given over to be driven by fear, because He who is within us has conquered fear.  The Spirit within us has overcome the fearfulness of these fallen circles of the world.  We are meant to be beyond the realm of this fallen realm and the horrors that are too much a part of it.

So why is it that we are sometimes determined to drag some people back into that horror?  And for an admission fee at that?

1st John 4:18 is even more explicit: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

We are called to be bearers of the Spirit.  Not procurers of terror.

How is it that Christians are using fear as a tactic for winning others to Christ?

And does that, or does it not, speak of our failure as Christians that we have to resort to such things?  Particularly when we are told that this isn’t the way we are supposed to  be.

It’s like this: followers of Christ don’t need gimmicks like hell houses.  When we do so, we diminish the light within us.  We are shying away from showing forth the new nature that we are meant to show forth to the world around us.  We replace that light with darkness.  We are in effect admitting that darkness is stronger than light.

We aren’t supposed to be like this.  We shouldn’t need depictions of damnation to encourage others to seek after Him.  I believe that Christ is reality… and that should be more than enough.  Christ suffices.  Fear does not and never will, and is never meant to be a substitute for love.

As I said, I don’t doubt the intentions of those who organize judgment houses, hell houses, whatever.  They mean well.  But there is supposed to be something infinitely more powerful than terror that will draw people toward God.

And it doesn’t charge ten bucks and change, either.

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My prayer for this day

Dear God,

Please show me how to believe, without needing to understand.

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Gone to Terminus

Don't even think of phoning or e-mailing or telegraphing or Pony Express-ing me for the next few hours.  At least not until tonight's season premiere of The Walking Dead finishes.

(Okay, there are a few who I am expecting to call if they need to, but that's it...)

Looking forward to learning more about Terminus.  It can't be that bad.  Can it?  Can it?

Will post some thoughts after the show.

EDIT 10:15 p.m. EST:  Okay I guess Terminus is a bad place after all.

"No Sanctuary" was a solid opening for the fifth season.  Although, I'm a bit confused as to the history of Terminus: was Lieutenant Tasha Yar and her friends all good guys before they got turned onto the other white meat?

Wait... I can't believe I just wrote that.

Carol must have pulled off the all-time greatest single-action zombie kill in the history of every media conceivable.  She was all kinds of bad-a$$ in this one.

This was an episode that pulled the group back together (absent Beth, but after seeing the promo for next week I'd bet that we'll be seeing her again soon).  It was an action piece designed to round up everybody and propel them into whatever's coming next.  I will admit that the Terminus storyline (if this is the end of it... see what I did there?) was a bit of a letdown after all of that build-up.  But if it was meant to be for sake of action and suspense as opposed to propelling the lore forward (though we did get a bit of that with what Scientist Dude said about the disease) then it served its purpose.

Next week: Father Gabriel Stokes!

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So, about what happened in North Carolina yesterday...

Celebrating that one unaccountable man has redefined more than six thousand years of tradition from across the width and breadth of human society with one stroke of a single pen.

Seems more than a little ridiculous to me.  To say nothing of arrogant and presumptuous in the extreme.

I've seen a lot of hate and viciousness since yesterday afternoon.  Most of it seems to be coming from those who were most clamoring for "equality of love".  I can't understand that.  Or maybe I can and I don't care to articulate why... because what would be the point?

It's not same-gender marriage.  Same-gender marriage is a contradiction.  It's an oxymoron.  It is something so illogical that it cannot exist.  There will be consequences. Legal and otherwise.  Especially legal.  Ramifications for both "sides" of this debate.

Personally, I'm not worried at all about yesterday.  Marriage is something beyond human establishment.  It's untouchable.  Those people - and I'm referring to both parties involved in this - can scream that it's a mountain all they want.  Still doesn't change the fact that it's a pebble.

Bear in mind that at the time I was against Amendment One.  For various reasons I am still against it.  There are some things which are defined by something higher than man.  Whether that is God or immutable law, there are concepts which can neither be defined or redefined by legislation or activist judiciaries.  I couldn't support Amendment One because I knew something of the spirit of the men who were most pushing for it, and theirs was NOT borne out of respect for that higher concept of marriage.

And ironically, neither is what happened yesterday.  But where does this end?  Will polygamy be next?  Will corpses be given legal rights so that necrophilia is legitimized?

How far does this now go?

I'm looking at the LONG-term ramifications. And there will be consequences of this trend.

Some have asked by what right am I to dictate how two people are to love each other?  Well , I haven't conspired or ever attempted to tell anyone about what they express to another person.  I do have to sincerely wonder though about defining and re-defining something that is derived from law higher than man's.  Let's be honest: is what happened yesterday about marriage, or is it about coercing those who do not agree with it into endorsing something that they do not believe in?  There are some businesses which do not cater to same-sex marriages.  Some bakeries have refused to make wedding cakes for same-sex couples.  They have been "penalized" with fines and made to sit through "sensitivity" classes.  Are they to be forced to do so against their beliefs?  It is already happening.

If two people want to express their love for each other, fine.  Let them do it.  Knock themselves out.  But that doesn't mean that I or anyone else should be made to give it an official stamp of endorsement.  I didn't think that Amendment One needed to do that for traditional marriage and I don't think that one judge's decision "needed" to do that for "gay" marriage either.

I cannot reiterate nearly enough that marriage is something man can't define.  Our attempts to do that will only meet with disaster.  Perhaps not today, but eventually.

For what it's worth: I think a case can be made that Amendment One, and it's biggest proponents, paved the way for what happened yesterday.  It really was one of the worst-worded, worst-inspired amendments that I've ever seen (and I mean from a strictly legal perspective, not on whether one agreed with it or not).  The ones who were demanding it cared more for strutting their own egos than they were about anything else.  One cannot set out to do something with an impure motive.  Doing so will in time destroy that work.  And that is what happened here.  It became less about defending marriage and more about looking like players at the big table of politics.

There are many who would be wise to learn from this.

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A Facebook post: My beliefs about politics, law enforcement (and other stuff)

 Earlier this morning, following some comments on Facebook, I posted a status articulating some thoughts about politics, government, and my take on respecting law enforcement.  Subsequently I've been feeling led to post it here as well.  It could be because I really haven't written anything here for quite a while about my beliefs on some things.

Anyway, here it is...

---

There are some people on Facebook who the better angels of my nature are struggling to keep me from referring to as "blithering idiots". Specifically, the ones demanding to know if I am "left or right".

Those who know me best know that I'm neither, and that I have long been above such... at least what I consider to be... an immature, inaccurate and childish paradigm.

I may be fiscally conservative, but I'm not a be-all, end-all "conservative". Neither have I ever thought of myself as "liberal". "Libertarian" doesn't fit either. "Anarchist" certainly doesn't.

I am merely the person God made and meant for me to be... and I will NOT be pegged as "left" or "right" or anything else on the political "spectrum". I'm not on that spectrum. I'm above it. I believe in personal freedom with responsibility. Apparently that is too much for some to comprehend.

Neither do I appreciate the insinuation that I "defend" the "wrong people" because I expect more, and better, from those who have chosen to *serve* us in an official capacity. This is a government of the people, by the people and for the people. There is no tier system separating "us" from "them". Neither is trust or respect inordinately bestowed on those who have chosen to take up a mark of such service. That level of respect and trust must be *earned*. It doesn't come automatically with a badge or a uniform. That kind of unquestioning "respect" is ultimately what has led to tyranny throughout too much of history.

I don't "disrespect" anybody. But if someone wishes to bear a mark of distinction from others, then they'd damn well better LIVE UP to that with honor. I am an Eagle Scout. Every day I do my best to live up to what that means. I can't add to the honor of that, but I certainly can take away from it. I don't want to do that, because if I did that would bring the honor of a lot of people - who I consider better than I - into question. The same holds true for law enforcement, or anyone else who puts on a uniform. There are some among those who "get" that. There are too many who don't. And lately more than a few of them are taking away from the honor of those that do strive to live up to that honor.

Yet some have recently implied that I'm worse than "wrong" because I choose to question the honor of anyone at all.

We, each of us, are citizens of this country. It is the responsibility of each of us to respect the rights of others and to uphold the Constitution. There are some who have ostensibly chosen to make doing so a paid career of that. If so, then they SHOULD be held to a higher standard than other citizens. They SHOULD be held accountable for what they do with the power and authority entrusted them.

I don't say that out of disrespect toward anyone. But neither can I ascribe a "respect" that is synonymous with fear, toward those who believe they must be feared because of their chosen profession. I can't disrespect, but neither is my respect so cheaply gained. Neither should it be for anyone else.

I believe in accountability on the part of ALL of us, without partiality.

Just as I will not only NOT be branded as "left" or "right" or whatever, and in fact I loathe those who demand that of me.

I am simply what God has led me to be after much life and experience. I am what He would have me to be.

And if others don't have the capacity or the desire to understand that, then that's their problem, not mine.

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That show you like is going to come back in style

It's happening.  No joke.  Right on time.  Just as dream-Laura said to Dale Cooper.

Twin Peaks, arguably the most influential television show of all time, is coming back.  We will see it again 25 years after that final episode of its second season in 1991.

Not a remake.  Not a relaunch.  It's going to be an honest to goodness continuation of the ground-shattering series.  With creators David Lynch and Mark Frost writing the episodes and Lynch himself directing every one.

The nine episodes of Season 3 (jeez did I really just write that?) will run on premium cable channel Showtime in 2016.

Earlier today Kyle MacLachlan tweeted that he would be returning as FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper.  The last time we saw him in 1991, "Coop" had been taken over by the ultra-malevolent spirit Killer BOB, smashing his own head into the bathroom mirror and screaming in mock rage about Dale's girlfriend.  Except it was strongly implied that the real Cooper was still trapped in the Black Lodge (sort-of a Hell dressed up to look like a French bordello, and everyone in it talks backwards).

Deadline Hollywood has tons more about Twin Peaks' return as does The Telegraph.

Look!  Official announcement video from Showtime!



This is a big, big deal.  That cannot be stressed nearly enough.  I was intending on being in "radio silence" on the Internet for this coming week as I finish up writing the third part of my book.  This news totally jerked me out of that.

Or maybe there was something more amiss.  During the weekend I came across my CD of the Twin Peaks soundtrack, composed by Angelo Badalementi.  It was released in September of 1990 and I bought it that first week.  I was thinking of putting it on my iPad for listening while I work.  No question about that now.

2016.  Plenty of time to get some damn fine cherry pie and clean out the percolator...

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Just watched the premiere of STAR WARS REBELS

I had heard only insanely good things about Star Wars Rebels: the latest animated series taking place in that galaxy far, far away.  It's also the first real Star Wars production since Disney took over the franchise.  And additionally, it's the first installment of Star Wars since the new canon policy was announced earlier this past spring.  The gist of that being: anything that Disney does with Star Wars from now on is canonical so far as the lore goes.

Tonight was the premiere episode, an hour-long special titled "Spark of Rebellion".

What did I think of it?

Star Wars Rebels is already the most fun, the most unadulterated, the most mature, and purest Star Wars experience that I've enjoyed in a very, very, very long time.

 I can't think of a single thing that I didn't like about this.  Where the prequels failed, Star Wars Rebels is already succeeding.  Eventually it didn't register with me that I was watching a computer-animated series.  This is Star Wars the way it should always be.

It will be two years ago this month that the announcement came about Disney taking over Lucasfilm and its properties.  A lot of people wondered then... and have since... what was going to become of this beloved saga now that it was at the Mouse House.

Based on what I saw tonight: be of good cheer, friends.  Star Wars is in good hands.  And it may be in the best shape that it's ever been in yet.

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75,000 words!

As of today, the book project has officially smashed through the 75,000 words mark.

This is considered the minimum point of a memoir. And that's what this is (among other things).

That is enough material to quantify as being a book. But there is much work still to be done. It wouldn't surprise me if at least one of the "locked-down" chapters was re-written, and that's what I'm considering even now. One of the first chapters written is also now being taken apart piece-by-piece and those parts implemented in a chapter I've just started.

And based on input from a good friend, Robert Frost is no longer referenced in the prologue. Lord willing that this is published, you will probably correctly guess what was going on there.

Two chapters finished today and I'm at the point I was aiming for! Think I'll celebrate by watching this week's new episode of Doctor Who.

EDIT 08:27 p.m. EST 09/28/2014:  For a few years now and especially since I began this project some friends have asked if I had ever done National Novel Writing Month in November.  I haven't yet.  And I'm going to be totally pooped after finishing this book up by the end of October (Lord willing).  But maybe next year?

Writing (TITLE REDACTED) has become a far more amazing experience than I could have possibly anticipated.  I don't know if I could have written a book until now.  Just the way that my own mind has worked against me for all this time.  It's like I'm being born again as a writer.  Entire new vistas are opening up for me and this project was the first real step toward reaching those.

I do not doubt that this will not be the last time that Robert Christopher Knight writes something this big.  National Novel Writing Month requires 50,000 words for a novel to qualify as being fulfilled.  Not everything has to be done within the month of November: you can take however long you need to in order to outline your story.  It's just the novel itself that has to be started and finished within those thirty days.  If I have an outline to work with, I'm confident that I could easily reach 50,000 and maybe even 60,000 words within that window.  And already I've a few ideas for stories.

NOT this year though, LOL!  I'm not Stephen King after all.  Then again I'm not George R.R. Martin either :-)

(Please Mr. Martin, don't hate me for saying that.  Or hate away and kill me in the next book.  I'd be down with that...)

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Book report: What is old is new again

Some developments since the last time I posted about how my writing project is going...

• The original title of the book, which then became another title by changing one word, is now the title once more.
• Manuscript is now hovering around 73,000 words.  It's going to hit the 75,000 mark that I've aimed for since starting writing this!  But still a lot more work to go.
• There are now two definite "parts" to the book completed.  I just began writing Part 3.  As things stand now there will probably be five parts, and an epilogue.
• Each part has a title.
• The parts are separated by theme, not necessarily by span of time.  Whereas Part 1 covers many years, Part 2 encompasses about 18 months... but those are 18 crazy months.  Lord willing that this gets published you'll understand why.
• I just began writing stuff specifically for Part 3.
• The book's original prologue eventually became the ending of what is now Part 3.  In the past few days however it has shifted around and now it's the very first chapter of Part 3!
• Some of the very first chapters that I wrote will wind up making up the bulk of Part 4.  Again, if this gets published you'll see why that is.
• It now looks as though I'll have a finished product this time next month.  'Course, I was saying that last month at this time too.
• I've discovered that I do some of my best writing while hopped-up on Mountain Dew and Fire sauce from Taco Bell (usually 4-5 packs per each soft taco).
• Have also discovered that I do some of my best writing while wearing a button-up shirt open with a gray t-shirt beneath, with music playing from my iPad nearby (lately it's been a lot of Lindsey Stirling especially her album Shatter Me).
• There have been other developments, which I am keeping close to vest for the time being.

I had no idea writing a book could be so much fun!  I may have to do another one sometime :-)

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Just watched the premiere episode of GOTHAM

I rarely watch television.  A show has to be very good for me to invest any of my valuable time toward.  As things stand now the only shows that I can think of that I indulge myself in are Doctor Who and The Walking Dead.

It is much rarer still that I will watch the pilot episode of a new series when the show has its premiere.  In fact, I can probably count the number of times that I've done that, across my entire life, on one hand.

It is almost inconceivably extremely more rare that I will watch a premiere episode and find myself impressed.

All of that said, having just watched the premiere of Fox's new series Gotham, this episode wildly exceeded all possible expectations.

This is potentially the finest and most faithful take on the Batman mythos than anything we've seen yet, including the Christopher Nolan film trilogy.  Very astounding that, given that this series is taking place years before Bruce Wayne pulls on the cowl for the first time.  Speaking of which, I thought that Gotham's interpretation of the Wayne murders was the best on-screen adaptation of that iconic moment by far.

Fox, congratulations.  You've pulled off the seemingly impossible by compelling me to put Gotham in my DVR's queue right from the getgo.

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This is one of the greatest photographs ever taken

"Weird Al" Yankovic, Neil Gaiman, and George R.R. Martin... all three together in one epic image!

I should make this the wallpaper image of my iPad, since I have all of Gaiman's Sandman series and Martin's complete (thus far) Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire books loaded on it.  To say nothing of practically every song and video that Weird Al has produced throughout his career.

Seriously, that is a very, very cool picture.  Oh, to be a fly on the wall when those three geniuses came together...

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Holding pattern

For the past few posts I've been chronicling the progress of my book. Friends on Facebook are getting to see more in-depth "as it happens" but I still want to keep a more public record about how it's going. The past few days merit that.

At the end of August I had 66,000 words and when I read over Part 1 this past Sunday it took around 2 hours time. That wasn't everything that's been written, just the continuous material that flows from the prologue on through the point where I'm in the... uh-uh-uhhh, that would be telling ;-)

So how much new material did I generate this week?

Only a little more than a thousand.

However, it should be stressed that while that's just the new stuff, there's been a lot of work done in the past four days. Okay, three actually: I took yesterday off to... well, to be honest I needed to re-focus my thoughts on God. I needed to be refreshed as only He can provide. And He provided something for my book, when I least expected it to happen. That is now something that I'm going to use toward this project.

So in the three days that there's been work going on, I've edited some stuff, taken some things out and re-arranged a lot of manuscript.

One example is the prologue. The original is now further into the book (perhaps at the end of Part 2), and the new prologue - which was already written - was further along in Part 1. What is now at the beginning of the book is something that, without fail, everyone I've shared it with has been very disturbed by it. When I told Dad about it, to be frank, he was rather horrified.

But that can't be helped. This is the story of me, and everything that I've gone through. The good and the bad. One friend said that this book is going to educate those without bipolar and it's going to be an inspiration for those who do have it. I want to believe that he's right.

Everyone is telling me that this is going to be published. I want to believe that, too. I feel like my book is in a kind of limbo already. On one hand memoirs can be a tough sell. On the other hand however, memoirs about manic-depression are few and far between and tend to sell quite well in bookstores and on Amazon. I guess there's that going for it.

There is one other thing that is happening behind-the-scenes about this project, but I don't know if I should write about that. Don't want to "jinx" it. It does have to do with what God showed me yesterday, though. If (okay my friends keep telling me "not 'if', it's 'when'") this is published, I may post that little thing here.

In the meantime, the manuscript is holding steady, undergoing a little pre-emptive maintenance, as it were. It didn't start as a memoir but for all intents and purposes that is what it has become, in addition to being about aspects of bipolar that are very, very rarely written about (that also, I think will play in its favor).

And in case anyone is wondering: I'm having a lot of fun doing this. I'm growing as a result of it. God has truly been leading me along with this endeavor and I'm coming through it as a better person than I was before. And that's always a good thing.

Expect another update soon. Like, whenever. Or something...

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Thoughts on this season's DOCTOR WHO thus far

Two things have been the focus (okay, focii) of my faculties in recent weeks.  The first, of course, has been working on my book.  Chapters 1 through 11, as well as the preface and the prologue, are now locked-down and pretty much finished apart from some, shall we say, "supplementary material" that is going to provide a very intimate look into the mind of a manic-depressive.  Those chapters constitute Part 1.  I'm going to start writing Part 2 tomorrow.  And the chapters for Part 1 aren't the only ones already finished: the first several that I wrote haven't been assimilated into the main manuscript yet.  Those will add substantially more material.

But yesterday afternoon I took some time to read the preface, the prologue, and Part 1.  I made note of how long it took to read all of that.  It took a little over two hours.  Factoring in that my reading was probably faster than a first-timer's because I'm already intimate with the material, that might be two and a half, to three hours reading time thus far.  If it comes out around five or six hours, that should be plenty.  Anyway, I'm quite happy with progress thus far!

The second thing that has been on my mind has been Doctor Who, and Peter Capaldi's first steps as the Twelfth Doctor which began in earnest with the season premiere "Deep Breath" two weeks ago.  Since then we've had "Into the Dalek" and last night's "Robot of Sherwood" (penned, I noticed, by Mark Gatiss, who seems to be everywhere lately).  And I've had some time to think about it all.  And what do I make of the Doctor's adventures thus far since his regeneration from the Matt Smith era?

There is a scene that accompanies every regeneration.  It has never had a formal name.  I call it the "assumption scene".  The regeneration itself is the renewing of the Doctor's body and the beginning of his new personality.  Everyone knows that.  But for me that's never been the real beginning of a new Doctor's career.  That comes later.  It comes when the Doctor properly assumes the role along with whatever costume he has chosen for the part.  "The Christmas Invasion" in 2005 has David Tennant's Doctor running around in pajamas and defending the Earth, but for the most part that was not the Doctor.  Not yet.  He's the Doctor when he comes out of the TARDIS's wardrobe in his now-classic duds and shows up at the Tyler's flat for Christmas dinner.  Then he was the Doctor.  The rest of the time since regenerating from Christopher Eccleston he was a "quasi-Doctor".  And then in "The Eleventh Hour" there was Matt Smith running around in the Tenth Doctor's rags.  Toward the end of the episode he takes new clothes from the hospital's locker rooms, takes on a new look (especially the bow tie) and stares down the Atraxi... and then in that climactic moment he declares once and for all "I am the Doctor".

That is the moment when Matt Smith truly became the Doctor.  The assumption scene.  Which to me is just as crucial for the new Doctor's career as is the regeneration itself.

So I was looking forward to the assumption of Peter Capaldi's Doctor into his role.  And I'm still trying to digest it.  It is definitely Capaldi stepping into the role he has dreamed of having for most of his life.  I just wasn't expecting... well... a Doctor so dark taking over the controls of the TARDIS.

And I think that's a good thing.

His costume alone says volumes.  I didn't write about it when it was revealed but I've loved that look ever since.  It definitely has a healthy dose of Jon Pertwee's ensemble (absent the ruffles) but there's also the First Doctor's look, a dash of Eighth Doctor's attire and a healthy pinch of the Ninth Doctor's outfit.

Peter Capaldi's outfit is what I call "the Johnny Cash costume".  He's the Man in Black of the Time Lord set.  This costume confidently tell us "The fun and games are over, time to get serious."

But of course, it's not the looks alone that a Doctor make.  Most of all, there is the personality.  What that actor brings of himself into the role.  What makes the current generation of the Doctor his own.

Three episodes in, and Capaldi is nailing it.  He is absolutely bringing it as the Doctor.  And the more I watch him the more I'm discovering that he's already among my favorite incarnations of the runaway Time Lord.

Now, a look at the individual episodes...

"Deep Breath" almost... almost... completely satisfies as a story.  That, despite having all of the elements there for a proper explosive first story for the new Doctor as was his regeneration in last year's Christmas special.  I mean, we have dinosaurs.  We have mysterious deaths.  We have the return of Vastra, Jenny and Strax (who never fails to crack me up).  Clara (Jenna Coleman) is increasingly becoming one of my fondest companions in the entire history of the show, especially with her performance in that final scene.  And the new Doctor's gradual process of taking on his proper role is frantic and manic and just plum delightful to watch in spite of his utter confusion (again, this is a good thing).

Where "Deep Breath" went wrong for me is that it seems too long of an episode.  I think it was an hour and a half?  There could have been some editing of the second half and it wouldn't seem to have been bogged down in that section of the episode.  But that's really a minor quibble in the scheme of things.  And it more than made up for it in the the scene with the telephone at the end (you know what I'm talking about if you've seen it, and if you haven't then I'm not going to spoil it here).

I will also say this: the return of the clockwork robots was an utter delight.  When I first saw their inner workings in the half-faced man I wondered if Moffatt was taking us back into "The Girl in the Fireplace" territory.  And when the Doctor pulled that circuit out of the console and we see the name imprinted upon it... well, I nearly shrieked with delight.  Because "The Girl in the Fireplace" is my #1 favorite episode of the revived series's run and some consider it to be the finest Doctor Who story ever.  That also made up for what might have been too long of a running time for this episode.

I'd give "Deep Breath" 4 and 1/2 sonic screwdrivers out of 5 on The Knight Shift's longstanding rating system for Doctor Who.  Didn't quite hit the mark completely, but it's pretty dang close.  And I will go on record as saying that I thought the "assumption" scene was spot-on for this new Doctor.

Now... "Into the Dalek"...

With all due respect to Mr. Capaldi and that this was the one thing he was looking forward to most as the Doctor, this episode came way too SOON for his tenure.  For two reasons.  First, out of the four most recent stories ("The Day of the Doctor", "The Time of the Doctor", "Deep Breath" and now this episode) the Doctor has faced the Daleks three times.  Dear Steven Moffatt: please give the Daleks a rest for a while.  Yes, we love the Daleks.  We love to hate the Daleks.  But there is such a thing as too much Dalek.  I'm sure Terry Nation's estate is eating all this up like gangbusters but it's simply over-saturating the Doctor Who mythos right now.  I wouldn't mind if the entirety of next season was without a Dalek story.  If there is one, then the only way it could merit that is if it had the return of Davros... and even that would have to be pretty gosh-darned worth it.

So for the Twelfth Doctor's sophomore outing what do we get, but a Dalek episode.

I thought "Into the Dalek" was a fairly good episode, but as I said it just came too soon.  And this goes to the second reason why I say that.  It's because Peter Capaldi needs to "earn some flying time" before taking on the Doctor's oldest and greatest adversaries.  He's still showing us that he really does have the chops to fight the classic bad guys, and not just the Daleks but also the Cybermen and the Weeping Angels and all of that lot.  But I will also say that "Into the Dalek" is the first episode that gives us the Twelfth Doctor in all his magnificent glory... and I think that it will only get better.

"Into the Dalek" receives 3 and 1/2 sonic screwdrivers.  With most of the deductions going for, I say again, that it comes too soon in Capaldi's reign.  Here's hoping that Moffatt and crew will recognize this and lay off the Daleks for a spell.

And then there's this weekend's entry "Robot of Sherwood".

This was a total hoot of a story to watch!  Not the least of which is that the chemistry is getting better and better between Clara and the Twelfth Doctor.  In "Robot of Sherwood" she really does come across as having accepted that this actually, seriously is the Doctor that she once knew with Matt Smith's face.  It's not just her playing alongside a different actor carrying the name now.  "Robot of Sherwood" I think marks the true beginning of the dynamic between the Twelfth Doctor and Clara.  We see that in the first scene when the Doctor asks Clara where she wants to go and she gleefully replies Sherwood Forest in the time of Robin Hood.  Which of course, the Doctor knows wasn't real.

Or was it?

Without spoiling it for anyone who hasn't watched it yet, "Robot of Sherwood" was just plain rollickin' fun to behold.  Capaldi gets to show us a more action-oriented Twelfth Doctor, maybe even a Doctor that we have rarely seen embrace the role quite so vigorously.  The archery scene is hilarious.  And the revelation of what is really going on was quite satisfying.  I thought that there was quite a bit of "Robot of Sherwood" that hearkened to "State of Decay" from Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor era.  And that's not a bad thing either.

I'm going to give "Robot of Sherwood" a score of 4 sonic screwdrivers.  And I'm going to note that if this episode is any indication, the production and the writing for the Twelfth Doctor's time is getting better with each new story.  It's going to be a lot of fun to see what is going to transpire throughout the rest of the season.  But please, Steven Moffatt: NO MORE DALEKS FOR AWHILE!

(But I won't mind an extra helping of Strax, if you won't mind :-)

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Things taking shape

I'm rather enjoying blogging about writing a book, even though there has been a severe deficit in blogging about everything else.  Mark it up to pouring all of my writing energies into composing manuscript.  This is something that I have spent most of my waking hours doing, with varying degrees of activity, since May.  And now on the tail end of August I can look with some pride at more than 66,000 words of text composed for my little tome about having bipolar disorder.

I'm finally seeing the shape of it forming, coming together.  But there's still a lot of work to do.

My target is between 75,000 and 100,000 words.  And as I've been writing this the scope of it has shifted from my original intent.  There is now much more autobiographical information within it than I had initially thought would be included.  And I don't know if that's a good thing.  But friends I have shared that sentiment with have told me that anyone can read (or write) a textbook about manic-depressive illness, but only I can write about what bipolar has done to me personally.  I'm the only one who can convey the real pain and frustration that this disease brings with it.

So if you guys won't mind reading the life story of Robert Christopher Knight, I guess you will get to do that.

Things are still moving around though, and I don't know how much they will continue to do that.  There have been a lot of chapters that had false starts and wound up deleted.  Other chapters have been consolidated with each other.  There are a few that I'm considering tearing out completely.  I wouldn't be surprised if this book ended up radically different from how I first envisioned it to be.

I do have an ending for it, however.  It eluded me for the longest time but how to wrap it all up finally hit me earlier this week.  And the title has changed by one word.  Two if you count the subtitle.

And Lord willing, my first book will be completed by the end of this coming month.  And then we shall see what we will see...

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When God gives you what you want more than anything else...

I'm not the same man that I used to be.  Not since I was finally given that which I have wanted most of all.

For a very long time, and we are dealing with years, there is something that has been on my heart more than anything else.  Something I have longed for.  Something I have not actually wanted, but needed.

I needed it more than I needed any other element that could possibly lay within the boundaries of my life.  I needed it so much that it was no matter of satiation of desire for the sake of happiness, but rather something that I required to have, for since longer than I can readily remember, a sense of life itself.

It was the thing that I had prayed to God, more than anything else, that He would let it happen.

Two weeks ago I was experiencing a very deep bout of depression.  The medication wasn't working as well as it should have.  Neither was anything else.  In such times I turn often to prayer, to reading from my Bible (especially the Book of Job and the Psalms), to focusing on some shred of happy thoughts.  Anything that can give me something to grasp hold of and climb up and out with.

It wasn't just the clinical depression, however.  There was a certain situation that had come about, how I'm still not quite clear on how it happened.  But it brought me into contact with that which had been what I had endured a tremendous amount of suffering.  The thing that I had prayed to God about for so long.

Once again, I asked Him to bring whatever He would know best for it.  So that I might at last know how to go on living.

That was on Sunday and Monday.  On Tuesday I had an appointment with my counselor.  I shared with her everything that I had been going through, including my prayers to God.  Especially how it was that I didn't know if He was listening, because I had been praying for so long to Him and it was like He didn't care.

I came home at 1:30 that afternoon.

It was about 6 that night when I checked my messages and was startled to find something awaiting me.

And at long last, after needing it, after crying for it, after praying for it for so very long, I have that which I have wanted more than anything else.

I have closure.

I can move forward with my life with no regrets now.

Except that I've gone so long with needing this, it became the focus of my earthly life.  And now that need has been fulfilled.  I don't have my heart burdened by it.  I am finally free.  God set me loose from that bondage: the captivity of a desperate heart.

And now, I don't know what to do.  It's like the song says, "I ain't changed, but I know I ain't the same."

The book is the biggest thing that I'm concentrating on right now, but I've no doubt that this is going to impact it.  It has to.  But, I think it will be in a good way.  The chapter that I had finished and was previously the most difficult (before I started working on the suicide one), I've let a longtime and trusted friend read it.  It has to do with an aspect of bipolar disorder that does not get a lot of discussion.  My friend read it and she gave it her hearty approval.  If I can write about something so intimate and it can pass muster with my friends, I think that the rest of what I'm working on will be more than okay.

Other than that, I don't know what the heck it is that I need to do, or even want to do.  Not even things that I've long been interested in seem to sparkle anymore.  I know there were some serious developments on the Star Wars front this past week but they don't faze me.  And I don't know why that is.

Maybe I'm growing up.  Or growing more.

I suppose I'll just have to now wait for God to present something new to me.

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Regarding Robin Williams...

It was a grim irony that last night, when Dad told me that the news had just broke that Robin Williams was dead, I was working on my book and the chapter on suicide.

I haven't blogged very much lately.  It's because I've been devoting myself to writing my book about bipolar.  I'm going to take time to post some more fun stuff soon (we do have the return of Doctor Who coming up after all).  But this is something that put a lot on my heart and I was feeling led to get it out of me and into a blog post this morning.

Robin Williams was a huge part of my childhood and adolescence years and then on through early adulthood.  He may have had the widest spectrum of acting talent of our generation.  Good Morning Vietnam comes especially to mind: an amazing display of Williams' repertoire with comedy and drama.  Dead Poets Society and Awakenings solidified his dramatic presence.  Later on in his career he pulled off some astoundingly dark work, in such films as One Hour Photo and Insomnia.  But it was always his comedic work that will be remembered most.  Just as an aside, when our local theatre guild was mounting its production of Peter Pan earlier this summer, I had Steven Spielberg's Hook playing in the background often as I worked on my book and other projects.  If Peter Pan was going to be portrayed as a grown-up, there was virtually nobody else who could have pulled that off than Robin Williams.

The man was an engine of innovation and creativity.  And now it looks like the price to pay for that was only too high.

Depression is something that unless you have it, you can't understand it. And I have not met anyone with it who has wished depression on anybody else, for however brief a time, just so they can "get" what this is like.  I have also never met anyone with depression who seriously wanted to die.  I don't think Robin Williams wanted to die either.  He was just trying not to feel the absence of feeling.  I know that doesn't make sense to some, but those with depression will understand all too well.

1 out of 5 people - at least - with bipolar disorder will attempt suicide and too many will succeed.  I am one of those who has tried, though I didn't realize it at the time that it's what I meant to do.  I was just wanting there to be an end to the pain.  What caused me to fail in that attempt?  That's something I'm writing about in my book right now.  It's something that I'm still exploring, actually.  In a very horrible way I was trying to feel something, as opposed to wanting to escape life completely.

Winston Churchill had depression: he called it his "black dog". I have a name for my own depression: "the dark fountain". It erupts when I am manic. It erupts worse when I'm depressed.  It smothers and suffocates and leaves you desperate for the tiniest breath of hope.  And when there is no hope you become desperate to escape, and more often than not it's without any real understanding of what it is that you are doing.

I know.  I've been there.

This is something that can't be "switched off" and medication often BARELY keeps it in check.

With someone as creative and passionate as Robin Williams, I can only imagine the intensity of his depression.

Just some thoughts that I'm having this morning.

Thoughts and prayers going out to his family.

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I never want to have to do that again

I just finished writing the very most difficult chapter of the book yet.  No doubt it will be the hardest of the book when it's all finished.

Lord willing that this is published, you will know which chapter it is when you read it.

I am really opening myself up here.  With things that I would have never imagined I would be writing about, not in a million years.  But, there it is.

I've spent the better part of two months working on this one chapter, on and off.  Now it's done.  I'm going to go watch The LEGO Movie again now and distance my mind from this thing.

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