History of New Kidron
Ancient History
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
-John 1:1–3
And so New Kidron is in the mind of God from before time, yet was created as a place with the rest of the world in time. I do not know when precisely this took place, as the creation of the Sun, the typical measure of human time, was not yet.[1] But New Kidron was, and God has preserved it until more recent times.
The Founding of New Kidron
Near the beginning of the 21st century, it was given to me to leave my then-current life and come to New Kidron, working to establish God's Kingdom here and, as a prince and son of God by Grace, using my own skills and talents to add to it, imagining, creating, and building as best as I could for God's Glory. For some time, I was not sure if this even was of God, so I consulted with a number of elders, priests, and other persons within the Orthodox Church; all the responses I got were very strong, clear, and blunt and indicated that I should pursue this wholeheartedly. So, after receiving quite a lot more prodding from God, I made the necessary arrangements within the Church and asked that an akathist be served to "officially" bless the founding of New Kidron and my rule here. On Sunday, April 20, 2008, the beginning of the Feast of Creation, such an akathist was served and prayers were offered on behalf of me and my undertaking. Thus, the Kingdom of New Kidron was founded and I led it into what I call the First Age.
The First Age of New Kidron
At the beginning of the First Age, I traveled from St. Seraphim's Sanctuary, one of the original territories and inspirations for New Kidron, all the way to Fortress Kedar in the heart of the New Kidron Valley. Having blessed the fort, I began a number of undertakings: I created many symbols and embellishments for New Kidron, started work on a trail system that would later criss-cross the New Kidron Valley, established a forest chapel at Fortress Kedar (reminiscent of the one at St. Seraphim's Sanctuary), built a bridge over the Brook of New Kidron, and planted a small orchard. This time was characterized by both a lot of physical projects and a lot of imaginative ideas; after this first period, infrastructure has been maintained more than expanded.
During the second period of the First Age, I began to focus much more heavily on the non-physical aspects of New Kidron. It was during this time that I began keeping much more detailed and frequent records, started working intensely to secure and protect the intellectual side of the Kingdom, and launched NewKidron.NET,[2] the "Kingdom's" website. Unfortunately, despite the amount I accomplished (a "national" dress, policy statements,[3] a mission statement,[4] etc.) and learned theologically during this period, I was still getting dragged down into the world's way of thinking, trying to acquire the trappings of earthly kingdoms in order to gain "legitimacy" and "officialness". I had to continually fight against this in myself and, by the Grace of God, pulled the undertaking from the brink a number of times.
During the last period of the First Age, in the third year after founding New Kidron, I intentionally started shifting the focus off of what I could do with New Kidron [in terms of missions, agriculture, intellectual contributions, etc.] and back to the theology behind it. More accurately, the year was dedicated to an even deeper focus on the Trinity. I learned even more during this period than the last, and one of the highlights was the theology of the person: all reality is fundamentally personal. This caused me to change the way I kept my records, writing much more about my own perspectives. But there was a downside to this: I was trying to speak for other people and do projects which benefited people, instead of speaking for persons and working for persons. I was starting to fall into the trap of depersonalization again. As I investigated its machinations, I realized something far deeper was at play: almost my entire idea of a Kingdom of New Kidron was itself founded upon this depersonalization.[5]
This last period was very hard and required much Grace. But, as I had determined from the beginning, New Kidron—whatever New Kidron was—would not be like other nations: whereas other nations seek to destroy threats and use religion for self-preservation, I would willingly destroy New Kidron for the sake of the faith if it became necessary; it would be the thing sacrificed. God took this kenotic offering. But instead of asking me to destroy it, He allowed me to help transfigure it. I stopped keeping records, which were aimed at "New Kidron", not a person. I planned the shutdown of NewKidron.NET, a website that I couldn't divorce from the metonymic depersonalization I had "hard-wired" into New Kidron.[6] And after much more work and failing on my part, the changes started to manifest physically and what I call the Second Age began.
The Second Age of New Kidron
At the beginning of the Second Age, I replaced NewKidron.NET with my new website, JBT.name. Now my presence on the web is no longer as a mere part, founder, or leader of New Kidron, but as a human person. And this typifies the new direction of New Kidron: it remains as a creation of persons, not an entity in and of itself. It remains as a way for me to commune with others and for others to commune with me. And, most importantly, it remains a way in which I can give to the Trinity. All the projects which I have accomplished and still plan to accomplish in the land of New Kidron are being transfigured too, given their true meaning as personal acts, not "things". And New Kidron as a kingdom, the Kingdom of New Kidron, is being fully recognized as a manifestation of the Kingdom of God, the Church. It doesn't "have to be" any worldly thing or follow any worldly pattern; actually, "it" cannot, or "it" would cease to be the Kingdom of New Kidron. In order to remain what "it" is, "it" must remain completely free in Christ as a communion of persons, for that is what the Church is.[7]
