Apparently this blog is becoming also a creative outlet for me, so don't be too alarmed when you begin to see things that inexplicably rhyme, are chopped into funny paragraphs, and may not make a whole lot of sense.
The following is something I wrote while sitting on the floor of my room. I don't really know what to call it yet, maybe this post's title is sufficient enough for the poem itself. I feel compelled to ask you to "enjoy," but I always thought that was a weird way to introduce something that's not for mere entertainment. So, I will begin with: "here it is."
Oh God, let me disappear,
why can't I to my peers,
stand without fear?
Why to my fears
can't You, the Reigning Champ
Defeat what I can't and move
this Mountain encamped.
Memories, they haunt they
Jab. They tear where there is wear.
They consume me bare, bar
the weight I bear. Break these memories,
Father, into ash and stone, that
I may atone for the infected bone
and eyes alone.
My heart. contrite, my spite it
bites. I can no longer to myself lie
that the poison that lies within mine
eyes stings as lye. Stained by
black die. Broken without even
trying. Without even Striving.
Break these lies, Father, into ash
and powder. The lies I contrive to
keep the sky at arms length
at fist's strength. Dreams once vivid
infected now livid.
Blacked out beaten down broken
bloodied cold.
cold as dead as
with no longer the Breath that sustaineth
the will to prevail. Hail the new order,
unveiled. Tyranny has prevailed, and
on the high seas this ship will sail, sinking
with king drinking to it's offspring
cynic and faith-stale.
Break me into something un-
broken
Take me into steeples un-
spoken.
Work in me something un-
written. Unsmitten and recommitted.
Willing to stand not crouch, confront not couch.
To speak and spread truth spirit led
spirit fed truth abundance
non-encumbrance truth
over my head. Truth... I cannot write
I cannot write
If only to find the switch-light
the mind-light, the on-off nite-light.
That I may lie down to sleep
and my rest be sweet;
Yes, to lie down and not be afraid
of thought unabated.
of thought ungrated, unsated and ingratiated.
That I may lay aside my lies and know: You are God.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Convenient Answers
This last Wednesday, I returned from one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. Malibu, Northern Canada. Breath-taking snow-capped vistas, deep dark-blue ocean, relatively untouched forests, it surrounds you and captures your senses and sense of place and yet, as with beautiful smells and beautiful moments, it all fades to the background eventually...and I was left becoming distracted with something else.
As I listen to other Christians talk, I've noticed that we tend to talk funny about events and opportunities. There never seems to be a wrong answer. And it all feels...too convenient. Has anyone else ever noticed that before? It frustrates me. It frustrates me because it doesn't seem right that there should always be such an easy response. Such easy thoughts. Easy-to-contrive answers.
An example. Kinda like those Choose your Adventure books of old:
Let's say Paul, middle-aged Jr. College graduate, has really been praying about his future. He feels like maybe he should move to the East-coast from Washington because his family here is too oppressive, restrictive, his friends have moved away for their careers, and he feels like he needs a new start.
[Outcome A] Everything works out. He makes it East, get's plugged into a job that's really going somewhere. Away from the oversight of his parents, he flourishes. Paul's prayer may look something like this: Truly, it was God's plan for me to move here. Thank you Father for your provision, and Your plan. Thank you for Your blessings.
[Outcome B] Something falls though. Unexpected expenses turn up, or he can't get a ticket, or he falls ill, or a parent is on his or her deathbed, or any number of reasons. Moving is no longer an option. He's stuck. Eventually this may be Paul's prayer: Thank You Father for growing me, for the challenges you placed in my life that I now recognize have allowed me to grow beyond what a more comfortable life would have. Et cetera.
As I listen to other Christians talk, I've noticed that we tend to talk funny about events and opportunities. There never seems to be a wrong answer. And it all feels...too convenient. Has anyone else ever noticed that before? It frustrates me. It frustrates me because it doesn't seem right that there should always be such an easy response. Such easy thoughts. Easy-to-contrive answers.
An example. Kinda like those Choose your Adventure books of old:
Let's say Paul, middle-aged Jr. College graduate, has really been praying about his future. He feels like maybe he should move to the East-coast from Washington because his family here is too oppressive, restrictive, his friends have moved away for their careers, and he feels like he needs a new start.
[Outcome A] Everything works out. He makes it East, get's plugged into a job that's really going somewhere. Away from the oversight of his parents, he flourishes. Paul's prayer may look something like this: Truly, it was God's plan for me to move here. Thank you Father for your provision, and Your plan. Thank you for Your blessings.
[Outcome B] Something falls though. Unexpected expenses turn up, or he can't get a ticket, or he falls ill, or a parent is on his or her deathbed, or any number of reasons. Moving is no longer an option. He's stuck. Eventually this may be Paul's prayer: Thank You Father for growing me, for the challenges you placed in my life that I now recognize have allowed me to grow beyond what a more comfortable life would have. Et cetera.
I see this scenario play out countless times in the lives of the people I know, where they've (or myself even) faced a decision. A moment of great opportunity, perhaps. A moment of great hesitation. And regardless of it's outcome, regardless of the pain or joy, the victory or the failure, it's somehow alright. It's somehow all justified, with some tidy (and yet often dis-satisfactory) explanation. Often with no explanation at all.
But maybe that's the point.
Maybe if God is truly over and in and around all, then this really does make sense. Because if He's really holding the infinity of time and possibility in His hand, then there really is nothing that can escape Him. Nothing that happens outside His purposes, nothing that removes or alters His plan.
But maybe that's the point.
Maybe if God is truly over and in and around all, then this really does make sense. Because if He's really holding the infinity of time and possibility in His hand, then there really is nothing that can escape Him. Nothing that happens outside His purposes, nothing that removes or alters His plan.
Is this comforting or confounding?
Or both.
What frustrates me is it's it just seems too... good, I guess. Or rather, it just seems unnatural because we as people never have all the answers, or if we do, it's because we're actually trying to scam someone or are delusional. But maybe that's because we're just people and that's what we do anyway.
Maybe I wish God was just a little less infinite.
Friday, March 12, 2010
A Sponge in a Fist
I keep probably too many journals at this point. Does that mean I have too many thoughts and not enough words, or the other way around? Not enough action? Who knows. What I do know, I was reading through a "spiritual journal" of mine the other day, and there were a couple good excerpts.
This first one was written with poeticalness in mind. I'd heard a guy preforming what he calls "Spoken Word" which is poetry that is written to be spoken, very rhythm intentional. Similar to rap in many respects, yet without the conventions that follow from music. I thought about him for a long time, and during church while I was dosing off again, I wrote this.
I hit the clock pound the books grind the nose where I'm to go there can be no soul. It's choked, erased, and extracted with care and time leaving nothing but a filmy grime.
The place to where I trek, there's no going back no respite. A wheel unhinged, an American unbinged. Impossible. I realize the size of my disguise leaves no room to contrive another lie inside the time that I have to Die.
God, You become the sweat the tears drawn out of pain and uncertainty. Pressured forth like a sponge in a fist or puss from a cyst Why is this so? Why are You not my everything my everytime that when I fall up not down, I realize the Source instead of drown in the impossible drone of industry and sound?
Pressure me into You so instead of forgetting or running, into You I find my source for divorce from life so contorted.
This first one was written with poeticalness in mind. I'd heard a guy preforming what he calls "Spoken Word" which is poetry that is written to be spoken, very rhythm intentional. Similar to rap in many respects, yet without the conventions that follow from music. I thought about him for a long time, and during church while I was dosing off again, I wrote this.
Myself
I hit the clock pound the books grind the nose where I'm to go there can be no soul. It's choked, erased, and extracted with care and time leaving nothing but a filmy grime.
The place to where I trek, there's no going back no respite. A wheel unhinged, an American unbinged. Impossible. I realize the size of my disguise leaves no room to contrive another lie inside the time that I have to Die.
God, You become the sweat the tears drawn out of pain and uncertainty. Pressured forth like a sponge in a fist or puss from a cyst Why is this so? Why are You not my everything my everytime that when I fall up not down, I realize the Source instead of drown in the impossible drone of industry and sound?
Pressure me into You so instead of forgetting or running, into You I find my source for divorce from life so contorted.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Life Without Bounds
Forgive me for my silence. It's been a busy few months, and for some reason, the act of blogging has seemed too great of a commitment for me to pile atop of the already considerable stack. A needle too much threatens to topple the whole works, or so it feels.
So, what has changed? What brings me here, now?
Bethlehem. I found out last Tuesday that I will be spending the majority of Summer '010 in the little town Bethlehem, Palestine. Shocking, and exciting, this will surely be an adventure unprecedented in my life. Bethlehem! Palestine! Both words, loaded with meanings and connotations, almost contradictory.
Peace, hope, Christmas, Wise-Men, swaddling clothes, Jesus.
Terror, struggle, dismay, contention, oppressed, Islam.
Through the INN's summer missions program, I will be entering into this. This whirling and struggling to find direction and an equilibrium. (Isn't that what we're all trying to find, afterall?) An Identity crisis of sorts. And I'm not sure where I stand.
My Christian upbringing would suggest that I wholeheartedly support Israel. Kick the Palestinians out, they have to stake. They aren't God's chosen people. Who are they to lay claim to this land.
-- aaaaand, these notions led to the Crusades. Great. Wonderful.
My university education would suggest that I'm compelled to support equality and civil rights and to oppose oppression. That if "the world" can dictate whether a nation has a state or not (as we did with the Jews in 1948), why can't the Palestinians be extended this offer, particularly if we set matters of Religious bias aside in terms of the Government?
Regardless, I've begun learning Arabic.
I can only pray that God prepares my heart for the challenges of mind and heart I'll most certainly encounter.
That God has in store plans for me to experience that which I need to through friends and circumstance that my perspectives may be adequate to enable me to truly see the Arab world for what He sees it as.
So, what has changed? What brings me here, now?
Bethlehem. I found out last Tuesday that I will be spending the majority of Summer '010 in the little town Bethlehem, Palestine. Shocking, and exciting, this will surely be an adventure unprecedented in my life. Bethlehem! Palestine! Both words, loaded with meanings and connotations, almost contradictory.
Peace, hope, Christmas, Wise-Men, swaddling clothes, Jesus.
Terror, struggle, dismay, contention, oppressed, Islam.
Through the INN's summer missions program, I will be entering into this. This whirling and struggling to find direction and an equilibrium. (Isn't that what we're all trying to find, afterall?) An Identity crisis of sorts. And I'm not sure where I stand.
My Christian upbringing would suggest that I wholeheartedly support Israel. Kick the Palestinians out, they have to stake. They aren't God's chosen people. Who are they to lay claim to this land.
-- aaaaand, these notions led to the Crusades. Great. Wonderful.
My university education would suggest that I'm compelled to support equality and civil rights and to oppose oppression. That if "the world" can dictate whether a nation has a state or not (as we did with the Jews in 1948), why can't the Palestinians be extended this offer, particularly if we set matters of Religious bias aside in terms of the Government?
Regardless, I've begun learning Arabic.
I can only pray that God prepares my heart for the challenges of mind and heart I'll most certainly encounter.
That God has in store plans for me to experience that which I need to through friends and circumstance that my perspectives may be adequate to enable me to truly see the Arab world for what He sees it as.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Time flies..
...just like an arrow. Piercing through even the most stubborn of lives, the most stalwart of chain-mail-tradition. It leaves it's impact in the experiences we have, the people we meet, and the places we see. Our perspectives change. Our understandings grow.
Time is essential to the very foundation of how we know how to exist. How to be. In our language, culture, thoughts, the concept of time is deeply rooted because the passage of time is often the only constant in a person's life. In the life of a community. In the life of a society.
But it didn't have to be so.
God didn't have to design our universe this way... but He did. And God, not being given to fancies and whims, chose to do so with purpose, as with everything else that He does.
Time is a gift. Cliché, but true.
Does that mean I shouldn't sit down and be playing Gratuitous Space Battles for another hour? I don't know. Should I be working 50 hour work weeks so that I can pay the lease on my two new cars? [Alright, so that one's a pretty loaded question...] Should I be working on that 10000 piece 3-D mystery puzzle in my basement? If I really enjoy doing something, is that reason enough to be doing it? (even if it's something as innocuous as puzzle-building?)
Does it even mater? Am I just being trivial?
When does hanging out turn from discipleship into distraction? Is there something in this about being too caught up in the things of God?
Time...there is a time for every season. Do we get to dictate what those seasons are?
Hmm...
Time is essential to the very foundation of how we know how to exist. How to be. In our language, culture, thoughts, the concept of time is deeply rooted because the passage of time is often the only constant in a person's life. In the life of a community. In the life of a society.
But it didn't have to be so.
God didn't have to design our universe this way... but He did. And God, not being given to fancies and whims, chose to do so with purpose, as with everything else that He does.
Time is a gift. Cliché, but true.
Does that mean I shouldn't sit down and be playing Gratuitous Space Battles for another hour? I don't know. Should I be working 50 hour work weeks so that I can pay the lease on my two new cars? [Alright, so that one's a pretty loaded question...] Should I be working on that 10000 piece 3-D mystery puzzle in my basement? If I really enjoy doing something, is that reason enough to be doing it? (even if it's something as innocuous as puzzle-building?)
Does it even mater? Am I just being trivial?
When does hanging out turn from discipleship into distraction? Is there something in this about being too caught up in the things of God?
Time...there is a time for every season. Do we get to dictate what those seasons are?
Hmm...
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Finding purposeful Purpose
Recently, I found myself in attendance to a Leadership camp of sorts, a provided feature of my church to it's college students who have committed to greater responsibility within their immediate community. As far as camps goes, there was nothing unexpected (except the quality of food, which far surpassed anything I thought possible from a retreat centre). Ultimate Frisbee (which has somehow become somewhat of an icon for Christian College men), about 4 girls to every 1 guy, plenty of, and of course Spiritual reflection.
During a period of this reflection time, we were given paper with specific questions to ponder deeply about and to write the outpourings of one's soul upon...even though, realistically 90 percent of these sheets have by now been either tossed, recycled (we are from Seattle, afterall), or forgotten between pages of the Bible.
Regardless, One of these questions regarded "Our Purpose" and, more specifically,
"What big thing do I think God will be accomplishing through me this next week/month/year."
What a pretentious question! As we were so informed, this also happens to be one of the top questions Christians in America are asking their selves. This of course, led me on a bit of a rant on my laptop. The following is an excerpt of stated rant (spelling left intact for historical accuracy):
People, it seems, continue to be asking them self the wrong questions, stressing needlessly about "what God wants them to do" or "what is God using me for?" Those questions miss the point, they skip to the end while missing everything in between. We're here to share the Love of Christ, to bring others into this wonderful community that He has provided the framework for. To point the way to saving grace. Most any other specific thing is inconsequential to that.
Should I be a lawyer or an epidemiologist? Sell groceries or work for my church? Certainly, there may be "callings" folk will have. God may reach down and nudge your heart...but for the most part, don't sweat it. What you are doing right now is important and meaningful whether or not you can tell. To borrow from a completely over-rated and over-used cliche, "a thread in the tapestry."
He, God the Father, Savior of the World, knows what's going on. That's what's important.
** Note, this is assuming that while you may be doing something seemingly inconsequential to the ends of Eternity, what you are doing in that is living a life reflective of the characteristics of Christ.
During a period of this reflection time, we were given paper with specific questions to ponder deeply about and to write the outpourings of one's soul upon...even though, realistically 90 percent of these sheets have by now been either tossed, recycled (we are from Seattle, afterall), or forgotten between pages of the Bible.
Regardless, One of these questions regarded "Our Purpose" and, more specifically,
"What big thing do I think God will be accomplishing through me this next week/month/year."
What a pretentious question! As we were so informed, this also happens to be one of the top questions Christians in America are asking their selves. This of course, led me on a bit of a rant on my laptop. The following is an excerpt of stated rant (spelling left intact for historical accuracy):
What a total BS question! I mean, how on earth are we supposed to even kid ourselves that we could answer that! There are so many subtle things happening at every moment, God-direcctted and planed surely, thhat there is no way we could ever truely know the full impact of our day-to-day actions. And I firmly beleve that it is in these day-to-day actions that we really find the purposse that God has put us on this Earth for.
People, it seems, continue to be asking them self the wrong questions, stressing needlessly about "what God wants them to do" or "what is God using me for?" Those questions miss the point, they skip to the end while missing everything in between. We're here to share the Love of Christ, to bring others into this wonderful community that He has provided the framework for. To point the way to saving grace. Most any other specific thing is inconsequential to that.
Should I be a lawyer or an epidemiologist? Sell groceries or work for my church? Certainly, there may be "callings" folk will have. God may reach down and nudge your heart...but for the most part, don't sweat it. What you are doing right now is important and meaningful whether or not you can tell. To borrow from a completely over-rated and over-used cliche, "a thread in the tapestry."
He, God the Father, Savior of the World, knows what's going on. That's what's important.
** Note, this is assuming that while you may be doing something seemingly inconsequential to the ends of Eternity, what you are doing in that is living a life reflective of the characteristics of Christ.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Musty Mustard
Today was a good day.
Not in a bright-sun-sandals-flowers-unicorns sorta way, but in a much deeper way. A day that is the beginning of much better things. A day that marks the passage of many restless nights and an unsatisfied spirit...quite possibly only to usher in more of such nights. For now, I will count myself as satisfied.
Understanding came to me this afternoon over lunch. Friends are truly the greatest blessing a person can have, and it was with a friend today that I was able to talk and work out my mind, if only in part. I realized what the crux of my spiritual questioning has been. Something that it has been rooted in.
I want things to be concrete. I want to know for certain so much about what I believe... but so much about what I believe is so far beyond the human capability for description. Faith is then necessary, or else there really is nothing. On the other hand, I have been compelled that there must be at least something that can really be dug into without hitting the "faith-wall." What are those things? What (explicitly) are those things that require trust alone? Many of my previous questions can be seen as probes into these questions...seeing how far I can go without losing my footing of faith. Today I have been assured that yes, there are things to be taken without any faith at all...but they are small, and far between. Mustard Seeds. I was told there are two such seeds that are readily available. Seeds rooted in the reality that is around us without further insight. Without degrees, doctorates, or doxology.
- Community
- The Bible
I feel encouraged...for I seem to have reached a new starting point. I will continue my search for more mustard...
Further notes on Faith:
My friend assured me where one finds evidence in support of one thing, contrary evidence will surely be found. Therefore, a faith that is based solely on "evidence" for faith will be weak and fickle...that person could just as easily be persuaded by contrary evidence. Therefore, faith actually is then integral in one's belief in the person of Christ. Without it, you have no sticking power. Easily tossed about as a ship on the sea...
I was given a great analogy as well concerning faith and our understanding of God. My friend has been married for 7 years, known his wife for 9 years and fully aware that she could cheat on him. He has plenty of evidence that she would never cheat on him from all those years together, but he must still take it on faith that she will honor their commitment.
Faith reconciles the truth of her freewill with his knowledge of her character and actions.
The truth of our human condition with our understanding of God.
Pain and suffering with an omnipotent God.
Sin with a loving God.
Selah
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