i got stung by a wasp yesterday while i was hanging drywall.
i feel like i have nothing worthwhile to say, and i usually just don't post anything if i'm experiencing such dilemmas, but as a mentor of mine likes to tell me, "The difference between writers and non-writers is that writers write."
It has been raining like crazzzyy, so my dog and i have not had the opportunity of enjoying a walk together in a while. She is a very smart dog, and every time i put workout clothes on, she thinks we're going on a walk, because i've been telling her that we would. Yes, i talk to and for my pets a great deal, and if you are one of those people that has a problem with that, then i'm sorry. Except, i'm not really sorry. *NEWS FLASH* i think animals will talk in the Kingdom, so why not start practicing???
5/25/10
5/24/10
i like to cook because it's fun.
"Two things I ask of You;
deny them not to me before i die:
Remove far from me falsehood and lying;
give me neither poverty or riches;
feed me with the food that is needful for me,
lest i be full and deny You
and say, 'Who is the Lord?'
or lest i be poor and steal
and profane the name of my God."
Proverbs 30:7-9
5/19/10
"There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear."
So, today i turned in my application to Chic-fila. Haven't heard back from Starbucks or Harris Teeter yet.
You know the ladies in Chic-fila? The oldish ones who refill your drinks and don't expect tips and are always nice and smiling? i like them. They embody what service is all about, if you asked me. "Oh, but I didn't ask you," you say. Just pretend.
Here's the thing. What if we as Christians really were people who lived life without a constantly self-centered focus? What if we walked into a restaurant and instead of being as belligerent as we possibly could toward the waiter or waitress--you know, because it's their job to get our order right--we tried to make their job as easy as we possibly could, and gave a good tip regardless of the job they did? What if we didn't view relationships in light of what the other person was bringing to the table, what they could do for us, how they could make us feel, and instead approached the person with a sincere desire to know how we could serve them? What if we stopped talking so much about love and just did love?
Somewhere along the way, i think the Christian life for a lot of Americans has become a sort of cat and mouse game with ourselves. We can think almost constantly about how we relate to God and how much God loves us and how we can become more spiritual and we have a false humility about our failures such that we keep on and on about them and how God has rescued us from them and introspection and soul-searching are constant musts and how do i look when i sing songs and when is it right to say something during prayer and why is it that she doesn't say the things i say and i'm not hypocritical, just free in Christ....
Do you see what can happen? Before we know it, we have stopped thinking so much about God's grace and started looking at our spirituality as if it were some sort of beauty contest. If we do happen to serve, it's only so we earn more points in the swimsuit competition, you know, the part everyone sees. To be sure, we must all have the willingness to grow personally and to deal with sin and to strive for intimacy with Jesus, but God talks so much more about doing unto others than He does about thinking of our own spiritual appearance.
The model of service Jesus gave us is as follows: He washed the filthy feet of Judas just before his even dirtier lips betrayed Him for thirty pieces of silver.
You know the ladies in Chic-fila? The oldish ones who refill your drinks and don't expect tips and are always nice and smiling? i like them. They embody what service is all about, if you asked me. "Oh, but I didn't ask you," you say. Just pretend.
Here's the thing. What if we as Christians really were people who lived life without a constantly self-centered focus? What if we walked into a restaurant and instead of being as belligerent as we possibly could toward the waiter or waitress--you know, because it's their job to get our order right--we tried to make their job as easy as we possibly could, and gave a good tip regardless of the job they did? What if we didn't view relationships in light of what the other person was bringing to the table, what they could do for us, how they could make us feel, and instead approached the person with a sincere desire to know how we could serve them? What if we stopped talking so much about love and just did love?
Somewhere along the way, i think the Christian life for a lot of Americans has become a sort of cat and mouse game with ourselves. We can think almost constantly about how we relate to God and how much God loves us and how we can become more spiritual and we have a false humility about our failures such that we keep on and on about them and how God has rescued us from them and introspection and soul-searching are constant musts and how do i look when i sing songs and when is it right to say something during prayer and why is it that she doesn't say the things i say and i'm not hypocritical, just free in Christ....
Do you see what can happen? Before we know it, we have stopped thinking so much about God's grace and started looking at our spirituality as if it were some sort of beauty contest. If we do happen to serve, it's only so we earn more points in the swimsuit competition, you know, the part everyone sees. To be sure, we must all have the willingness to grow personally and to deal with sin and to strive for intimacy with Jesus, but God talks so much more about doing unto others than He does about thinking of our own spiritual appearance.
The model of service Jesus gave us is as follows: He washed the filthy feet of Judas just before his even dirtier lips betrayed Him for thirty pieces of silver.
5/17/10
endless and temporary.
In an attempt to make the most of my time, and in order to free myself from what i realize is (or was) probably an addiction to being socially aware, i am no longer a part of the facebook world. For now, this is only a summer hiatus, but i wouldn't be surprised if i become more permanently detached from Mark Zuckerberg's brain child. So, if you read this blog and are a part of the facebook community, it would be pretty neat if you could still spread the news of my latest blogs. i fully intend on writing more in my absence from that realm.
i was at the Outer Banks last week, and had the following to write in my journal:
i was at the Outer Banks last week, and had the following to write in my journal:
When the waves crash, why do they never crash the same? Why is it that each grain of dampened but drying sand, giving water back to the recession, is never flooded again just as before? And as water runs quickly up the beach, its white foam diligently seeking my bare feet, why do some waves overtake me while others die just shy?
These are not mundane questions, for their answers are wrapped up in the beauty of God. And yet i see my mind is dissatisfied without at least mulling over the "reasons" and the "science." But that is why only a penultimate, fleeting thought; simply a fluttering doubt before it is overtaken by a rising wind of God's ultimate power. His final putting to rest of mysteries and not-so-mundane questions.
For you and i, each passing moment is as the occasionally lazy, sometimes frightening, and always individual waves that meet their death on the shore. We may walk along these sands of daily living--eying the chasing foam, wandering here or there, with no aim for the future, and without regard to the footsteps in our wake--finding that we arrive to a destination. It surprises us in its finality and terrorizes us with its uselessness, but what else could we expect? We have only looked at our feet.
5/9/10
a story of Pip.
The other day, i was determined to get rid of my farmer's tan, and I also wanted to get a little bit burnt (but only a little), because usually that keeps me from getting too burnt the rest of the summer. However, even the best, most well-laid plans go awry, and i ended up getting absolutely toasted. But just neck to waist-line on my front side as well as my shoulders. So it's stays hidden to the unaware and innocent bystander, all the while with pain happening underneath my soft Gap v-neck. i only mention the t-shirt because i have a few of those particular products from the Gap ("cause i'm the Gap, like Banana Republic and Old Navy"), and the reason i have them is because they are the softest things i've ever felt and because such softness helps to alleviate the discomfort of my skin being a color which God did no bestow upon me at birth.
i applied for a job at Starbucks. i love coffee, and i love Starbucks, so maybe i'll work there. The reason i hope to work there or to get a job waiting tables or some other such non-accounting job is pretty interesting and hugely educational to me in the way of the education you receive outside a classroom and which has basically nothing to do with anything in the realm of school. i had great expectations--and for those of you who have read that book, you will know even more astutely what i'm talking about--in regards to a job in Richmond, Virginia. Everything about this job, including the part about me finding out about it completely "randomly," seemed to point to the fact that it was the coolest opportunity ever, and that it was God's will. And all of it, as i am finding out now, was in fact God's will, just not the part about me actually going to Richmond and working. Here's the thing, God does stuff to teach us. He is intimately aware of the deepest parts of our lives that need changing, and only He can change them. But sometimes the change is weird and unexpected and something we don't see as good. i was really pissed off that this didn't work out. i was angry that i now had nowhere to work that was "cool" for my resume, and i was angry because that meant there would be something on my resume that would hurt my stupid, stupid pride. i was scared because i had no idea what was going to happen and i hate not knowing, as has been the discussion topic of several of my posts. And i was confused, because it had all seemed, as we cliche-holic Christians say, like a "God-thing." It was. i just had to realize that a "my-thing" and a "God-thing" aren't necessarily the same.
i have realized over the past couple of weeks that my arrogance in this case went so far as to assume things about God's will that i had no business assuming. i took for granted some things foolishly. i celebrated the last 10 meters of the proverbial race and got passed. And when it didn't work out like i was so dead-sure it would, that all led to me becoming moody toward my girlfriend; it led to me being angry; it led to me worrying way too much; and in short, it kept my eyes off of God and His proven character, and on me and how i was going to have to fix things. This was not okay. It was sin.
Like a recovering alcoholic, i am a recovering addict to being in first-place, of winning and believing i was solely responsible for victory. Pride, in the general sense, is the root of all sin, for it was the original sin. But there are those of us whom pride affects on an additional, more specific level such that it is extremely difficult to accept losing of any type. It is from that that i continue a long journey towards healing through the God of the universe that humbled Himself to death, even death on a cross.
For you and i.
i applied for a job at Starbucks. i love coffee, and i love Starbucks, so maybe i'll work there. The reason i hope to work there or to get a job waiting tables or some other such non-accounting job is pretty interesting and hugely educational to me in the way of the education you receive outside a classroom and which has basically nothing to do with anything in the realm of school. i had great expectations--and for those of you who have read that book, you will know even more astutely what i'm talking about--in regards to a job in Richmond, Virginia. Everything about this job, including the part about me finding out about it completely "randomly," seemed to point to the fact that it was the coolest opportunity ever, and that it was God's will. And all of it, as i am finding out now, was in fact God's will, just not the part about me actually going to Richmond and working. Here's the thing, God does stuff to teach us. He is intimately aware of the deepest parts of our lives that need changing, and only He can change them. But sometimes the change is weird and unexpected and something we don't see as good. i was really pissed off that this didn't work out. i was angry that i now had nowhere to work that was "cool" for my resume, and i was angry because that meant there would be something on my resume that would hurt my stupid, stupid pride. i was scared because i had no idea what was going to happen and i hate not knowing, as has been the discussion topic of several of my posts. And i was confused, because it had all seemed, as we cliche-holic Christians say, like a "God-thing." It was. i just had to realize that a "my-thing" and a "God-thing" aren't necessarily the same.
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,"
declares the LORD.
"As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts."
Isaiah 55:8,9
i have realized over the past couple of weeks that my arrogance in this case went so far as to assume things about God's will that i had no business assuming. i took for granted some things foolishly. i celebrated the last 10 meters of the proverbial race and got passed. And when it didn't work out like i was so dead-sure it would, that all led to me becoming moody toward my girlfriend; it led to me being angry; it led to me worrying way too much; and in short, it kept my eyes off of God and His proven character, and on me and how i was going to have to fix things. This was not okay. It was sin.
Like a recovering alcoholic, i am a recovering addict to being in first-place, of winning and believing i was solely responsible for victory. Pride, in the general sense, is the root of all sin, for it was the original sin. But there are those of us whom pride affects on an additional, more specific level such that it is extremely difficult to accept losing of any type. It is from that that i continue a long journey towards healing through the God of the universe that humbled Himself to death, even death on a cross.
For you and i.
5/4/10
pursue Truth.
i should like to write now of expectations, for the summer is nearly upon me in all its humidity and opportunity.
i wish to read. Among my list: Harry Potter (haven't read any of them); Les Mis (can never read too many times); and Outliers (by Malcom Gladwell). There are many more, but this blog has never been exhaustive in its efforts to disseminate information, so i see no need to begin now.
i wish to wait on people at tables in a restaurant, and get paid for my services. There is a long story behind why i hope to do this and not do what i had planned on doing this summer in Richmond. More on that in a week or so. [hopefully]
i wish to play with my dog on a regular basis. i wish also to take her on walks most mornings.
i wish and desire to wake up each morning and make the decision to love ardently and passionately. To love co-workers and treat them with a respect foreign to our culture. To love my parents with a thankfulness that does more to reflect the immeasurable impact they have had in and on my life. To love my sisters as a brother who seeks first to protect and care rather than deride and annoy. To love the woman God has put into my life with humility and grace. To love God. To really love God.
These are but a smattering of my expectations, for i am expecting much. i am expecting this summer to be the most prolific time of my life to date as a writer, and so i look forward to sharing with you--in what is to this blog perhaps a new format--what the summer holds. i am not aware of your expectations as a reader, but i ask that you expect great things. i ask that you expect difficult things. i ask you to expect that those two are often very closely related.
i wish to read. Among my list: Harry Potter (haven't read any of them); Les Mis (can never read too many times); and Outliers (by Malcom Gladwell). There are many more, but this blog has never been exhaustive in its efforts to disseminate information, so i see no need to begin now.
i wish to wait on people at tables in a restaurant, and get paid for my services. There is a long story behind why i hope to do this and not do what i had planned on doing this summer in Richmond. More on that in a week or so. [hopefully]
i wish to play with my dog on a regular basis. i wish also to take her on walks most mornings.
i wish and desire to wake up each morning and make the decision to love ardently and passionately. To love co-workers and treat them with a respect foreign to our culture. To love my parents with a thankfulness that does more to reflect the immeasurable impact they have had in and on my life. To love my sisters as a brother who seeks first to protect and care rather than deride and annoy. To love the woman God has put into my life with humility and grace. To love God. To really love God.
These are but a smattering of my expectations, for i am expecting much. i am expecting this summer to be the most prolific time of my life to date as a writer, and so i look forward to sharing with you--in what is to this blog perhaps a new format--what the summer holds. i am not aware of your expectations as a reader, but i ask that you expect great things. i ask that you expect difficult things. i ask you to expect that those two are often very closely related.
4/26/10
"dimly"
the looking glass was there
and it spoke of many things
i did not listen
for what i found ill in others
was yelling back at me
from myself
oh, the honest looking glass
and difficult.
and it spoke of many things
i did not listen
for what i found ill in others
was yelling back at me
from myself
oh, the honest looking glass
and difficult.
4/25/10
act of will.
"Think of the impact if the first thing radical feminists thought of when the conversation turned to evangelical men was that they had the best reputation for keeping their marriage vows and serving their wives in the costly fashion of Jesus at the cross."
- Ron Sider
4/13/10
"No, not vainly there did I dwell, Nor vainly listen all the night long."
i find myself interested in the different types of blog hosts available to the would-be blogger. i also find myself trying to figure out the various processes that occur within that drive bloggers to blogspot as opposed to tumblr, or tumblr as opposed to wordpress, etc. Personally, i like tumblr, but it is way too busy for my diarrhea of the mouth (pen, actually. or in this case, keys). i dislike wordpress because of its name. Yes, that is silly. Mostly, i just chose blogspot because Google is best. And because you need not ask its purpose since its name is self-explanatory.
i don't understand at all more than half the things that go on in my mind, and i understand the rest of the things that go on in my mind less than half as much as i'd like.
i wish sometimes, and perhaps most times when i'm submitting my random thoughts to this blog, that i knew what you, the reader, think when you read what i have to write. i like very much to think, but i can pretty safely say, or at least with moderate safety, that to cause others to think is ever so much more intrinsically fulfilling. To me.
Now, let's say you are the type of person who only reads this blog when the posts don't require you to scroll down. You probably won't get this far. And that saddens me, because only those willing to scroll down will see that i wish so very much that you would take the time to read even the boring, longish posts. In reality they aren't too terribly long. Perhaps someone who scrolls down is a friend of yours and they will pass along this message from me.
For those of you who read at least with some care the majority of the things i post, a great deal of gratitude is always extended toward you. But i must entreat you to not just read this. i must entreat you to not just read this. As with anything you read, you must always look for truth. Truth can be found in very deceitful places. Truth can be found amongst liars and thieves. Truth can be found in darkness. Truth can be found anywhere, really. If someone says "There is no truth," they have given you a clue that to deny Truth is to create your own version of it, a version which is always striving to get back to the Truth, but refusing to come to grips with the fact that It must have originated before there was origin.
Here is a Truth that has changed the whole world forever. It is a Truth that flourishes during persecution of those who believe it, and it is a Truth that exists whether or not you believe it. It is this: Jesus died for the sin of humanity, but He is not dead anymore. He is not dead anymore. This is not religion, for religion is simply man's attempt to explain the unexplainable, or to describe the indescribable. No, this Truth is an event in history. Christianity was not built on the teachings of Jesus or on His perfection or on anything else but that event: The Resurrection. We as Christians don't place our faith in religion or doctrine or rituals or moralistic living; we place our faith in a Man who did, in history, what no one else could have done or will ever be able to do. He died and then He defeated death. That is profound and beyond explanation, but it is Truth.
i don't understand at all more than half the things that go on in my mind, and i understand the rest of the things that go on in my mind less than half as much as i'd like.
i wish sometimes, and perhaps most times when i'm submitting my random thoughts to this blog, that i knew what you, the reader, think when you read what i have to write. i like very much to think, but i can pretty safely say, or at least with moderate safety, that to cause others to think is ever so much more intrinsically fulfilling. To me.
Now, let's say you are the type of person who only reads this blog when the posts don't require you to scroll down. You probably won't get this far. And that saddens me, because only those willing to scroll down will see that i wish so very much that you would take the time to read even the boring, longish posts. In reality they aren't too terribly long. Perhaps someone who scrolls down is a friend of yours and they will pass along this message from me.
For those of you who read at least with some care the majority of the things i post, a great deal of gratitude is always extended toward you. But i must entreat you to not just read this. i must entreat you to not just read this. As with anything you read, you must always look for truth. Truth can be found in very deceitful places. Truth can be found amongst liars and thieves. Truth can be found in darkness. Truth can be found anywhere, really. If someone says "There is no truth," they have given you a clue that to deny Truth is to create your own version of it, a version which is always striving to get back to the Truth, but refusing to come to grips with the fact that It must have originated before there was origin.
Here is a Truth that has changed the whole world forever. It is a Truth that flourishes during persecution of those who believe it, and it is a Truth that exists whether or not you believe it. It is this: Jesus died for the sin of humanity, but He is not dead anymore. He is not dead anymore. This is not religion, for religion is simply man's attempt to explain the unexplainable, or to describe the indescribable. No, this Truth is an event in history. Christianity was not built on the teachings of Jesus or on His perfection or on anything else but that event: The Resurrection. We as Christians don't place our faith in religion or doctrine or rituals or moralistic living; we place our faith in a Man who did, in history, what no one else could have done or will ever be able to do. He died and then He defeated death. That is profound and beyond explanation, but it is Truth.
4/6/10
...
"Some people confuse life with God."
This is a problem. Let me clarify:
Often we look at our circumstances, the little story-lines and events that surround us throughout each day of our lives, and we mistake those bytes of reality for God and His character. The reason this is a huge problem is because circumstances are always changing and swinging back and forth like some proverbial metronome. God is constant and forever. Forever in the past, forever in the present, forever in the future. To confuse Him for the life we live and draw some crooked parallel is a huge danger, and it is why we so often have such an extremely skewed idea of who God actually is. Because God is "I Am," He doesn't look at our lives in such a "here and now" fashion. He sees how this present reality, for us, fits in with the whole story. And He is moving even when we can't see Him or feel Him or understand Him. Even when it seems like our present circumstances are proving that He isn't full of Love and Grace and Justice, and even when it seems like He is more of a distant godfather rather than God who is the Father to the orphans, even now, He is so much more than we can imagine.
In Him all things hold together.
This is a problem. Let me clarify:
Often we look at our circumstances, the little story-lines and events that surround us throughout each day of our lives, and we mistake those bytes of reality for God and His character. The reason this is a huge problem is because circumstances are always changing and swinging back and forth like some proverbial metronome. God is constant and forever. Forever in the past, forever in the present, forever in the future. To confuse Him for the life we live and draw some crooked parallel is a huge danger, and it is why we so often have such an extremely skewed idea of who God actually is. Because God is "I Am," He doesn't look at our lives in such a "here and now" fashion. He sees how this present reality, for us, fits in with the whole story. And He is moving even when we can't see Him or feel Him or understand Him. Even when it seems like our present circumstances are proving that He isn't full of Love and Grace and Justice, and even when it seems like He is more of a distant godfather rather than God who is the Father to the orphans, even now, He is so much more than we can imagine.
In Him all things hold together.
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