not only by reason, but by heart.

My thoughts have of late been focused on somewhat of a truth-seeking inquisition. I've found that while i know for a fact that my God is real, my erratic doubt leaves my faith --and by that i mean my belief that He will, not that He can-- a reality that is only sporadically within my reach.

The difficulty in following Christ isn't believing that he did what he did. That said, I'm very aware that it's certainly not the easiest thing in the world to grasp... much less believe. Had I not experienced God like I have, I'm sure that I wouldn't have believed it myself. I feel the difficulty is knowing Him and trusting Him.
(I hate the Christian answer as much as you do.)
Once it's unearthed, however, it is a flagrantly terrifying thing. We refrain from handing over our entirety because we're placing everything we are into something that we don't entirely understand, or more truthfully, something we aren't 100% sure is factual.

If our absolutes are founded in our truths and if we are so certain of our God and our faith, why do we as Christians not ask the hard questions and relentlessly challenge our beliefs?
If God is who we believe He is, then why is it that we avoid challenging Him like the plague?
Truth has this arcane way of exposing itself.
Are we afraid that when we seek out truth, Christianity will not make the cut? That God will be proven to be nothing more than a myth and the sophistry of the age?

I have my doubts about God. There are some days that my doubt outweighs my faith by a few anvils. More important than those doubts, however, is what I've found in response to them.

If we find that God is a fallacy, then good for us. We've found truth. However if we find (as I have) that truth seems to rest on the bedrock of a Creator, do not stop until God is as real as the eyes you're reading with. Relying on tradition or the faith of your family will leave you either a nervous wreck or worse,

indifferent.

[On that, allowing only your own perception to be the judge of truth and fiction is a rail towards failure. Einstein said "Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."]

Test everything. Hold on to the good.
- 1 Thessalonians 5:21

"we were made to live creative lives."

off brand cereal with cheap milk
in a plastic bowl that matches our translucent
red and blue plates.
they were given to us because we had no dishes.

(but we don't mind. they go well with our broken table
and magazine artwork on the walls.)

and if you think about it, we're trading nice dishes, a larger apartment and a little more heat
for a life that demands truth, honesty, and a brilliant community with those we see every day and with the One we can't see every day.

when there's no tv, no internet,
and nothing too senseless to distract us
we become more creative in everything.

we've found new things to talk about.
new things to pray about
new things to fight for
and new people to embrace.
i've learned more in these four months
than i ever have at any school.
[not that school is bad. it's just different.
the learning environment institutions
provide have proven to be the bane of my existence.
however... that too will be an adventure
when the time comes]

when we find ourselves trying to push to the middle of God's will
things get rough, challenging, and often awkward.
we get angry and frustrated with ourselves and each other
because in all honesty, none of us are perfect in the slightest
and we are very prone to miserable failure.
however, a wise man once said that God doesn't use us
in spite of our weaknesses
but through them.

if we have committed ourselves to Christ,
we have committed ourselves to each other.
not just the ones who are white or black. or rich or poor.
Christian or Muslim.
we are called to reach out to all ethnicities.
with our truth, yes.
but also with our hands, our hearts, our ears, and our conversations.

i've made some incredible friends that are nothing like me.
one of my closer ones is a mexican immigrant in his late forties.
a brilliant man with hundreds of stories and a heart for God's people.
where would i be without him?
farther from Christ.
and what would i be if i had never said hello?

praise Him with drums, strings and joyful conversation.
worship with feasts with new family and a hunger for abundant life.
My God is good because he loves in a way that doesn't adhere
to our greed and our selfishness and narrow perspectives.
He grows and fills us in a way that makes us His.

He's a consuming fire.
plan on spreading it.
but as we know, fire isn't tamed...
so plan on getting burned (and know that it's good.)

the frantic construction of a palisade between God and my own selfishness

i'm starting to come to the realization that joy isn't necessarily a sum of your happiness over a certain period of time. It's not the amount of fun we have or achieving our goal of frowning less and smiling more. I think that it may be part of it, but when i look back on the most joyful times in my life and back on the joyful times of Paul and Daniel and Isaiah, i can't say that it was because there was some overabundance of sunshine and unusually green grass that they found on the other side of some white picket fence.

cause in all honesty, when we're trying our best to do what God wants

(at least in my personal experience)

anything in overabundance is scarce except maybe second chances and undeserved love.

and joy.

cause i mean, my happiness doesn't come from myself. it's difficult if not impossible to take no other resource but ourselves and flip our mood to be something authentically good. Why? because the center of our discontent isn't anything outside of ourselves. we can blame everything, but ultimately it's because we are doing too much or too little of something.

Alcohol and over-socialization are only two of the virtually fool-proof ways to distract ourselves from the fact that the joy we have falls short of what it is we're actually craving.

what i'm trying to work out is that what we're craving
this comfort,
this sense of belonging,
this sense of identity,
the sense of accomplishment,
and a means to reach all of these,
and even though we can fill them with all of our stuff (that's always really cumbersome and really, really empty,) something always ends up falling out or falling short.

In between the lamentation or discontentment we call our short lived high "joy."

but for some reason or another, when i tie a blindfold around my eyes and march to the beat this ancient drummer that i'm trying so hard to know and understand, all the things that i've convinced myself that matter like financial comfort, my dignity, or my own plans for my ministry end up building a barricade between myself and the life and Christ have for me.

such a bulwark keeps us far too focused on ourselves, and i think that is the root of our discontentment and the ultimate obstruction of our joy.

just an observation.

chapter 6: chicago or "let's see what happens"

by tomorrow night i will have met my new family,
moved into my new house,
and begun my next task for the son of david.

i'll meet new people
make new friends
who need him as much as i do

and i will love them
and love them
and love them.

when he shows up, i won't be surprised.

faith?

pause the music on my playlist above.
it will be much more enjoyable with the correct music playing.

the trickle effect of power and a literal take on the whole "mustard seed" thing.

our heroes are idols standing on thousand foot towers with power, influence, merchandise and witty catch phrases. They promise us solution, fashion, and thirty second prayers to save us from Hell. We flash pictures of their faces hugging poor black children and elderly women in nursing homes just before they retreat to one of their beverly hills fortress... which is one of several.

we drool over their beautiful faces, their inspirational words, their wonderful intentions, and then we wait to see change trickle down from their sky scraper status and giant-sized power to us.

we argue what will be best for the world, we vote, we listen to sermons justifying the military gaining ownership of the cross, we decide that an unborn baby's life should be protected but a criminal's should not, and we wait for the big dogs to change the world for us. we are then left to pat ourselves on the back and sleep through the night knowing that we've done what's asked of us. We are the good citizen.

widows are made from campaigning and overworked heroes. Holy families eat their overpriced post-church meals disregarding the several nearby who would trade their bottle for half a sandwich. All of us rely on services and organizations and politicians to help the world. We love the poor when we get up on saturdays and go to the food pantry. we do something nice for the community for that annual event. so much is missed and left to wilt in the shadow of government plan and the church's limited interests.

meanwhile, a few start to realize that passion, motivation, and a legitimate love for neighbors and Christ spreads fast enough to make an arsonist envious; and while the heroes bicker over each other's opinions, much needed change disseminates households, neighborhoods, cities.

we become friends with the poor. we pick up trash because it helps others enjoy creation. we reach out in love rather than obligation or some twisted sense of self gratification. we write to the soldiers and we baby sit their kids out of love, not pity. we demolish social status and give our extra coats... not because it's nice, but because it makes everyone a little more alike.

but i tell you:
vote, find your opinion, volunteer.
then pick up the pieces that all of these things leaves behind for the sake of being what Christ asks us to be.

it can happen
or it can end with my punctuation.

He will be pleased. I swear it.

from eyes gazing up at our shining city.

every single time i hear exhausted chord progressions
with tired, stereotypical lyrics sung in your identical voices
and watch you smile at all the people you've gotten to sing along,
my toes curl and my eyes tend to role.

however, when you shout through your cross-shaped megaphones
that you're presenting this bland and empty lump to the most creative, brilliant, and deserving
as an act of worship,
it makes me want to smash your oh so coveted acoustic guitar
into your faux-hawked, soul-patched face.




our shining city on a hill has termites and water damage and is rusting and falling apart from the inside out.
to be quite honest, i'm not so sure that i'd want to be a part of something that is noticeably messed up from a distance.

------

reconstruction is essential
and it starts with you and me.

the breath of frigid air after the exhale of smoke.

he had these aspirations of being a writer, a beat poet, a rapper, a teacher, a famous musician, and a silent revolutionary. everything was perfectly designed and had a consistent underlying utopian aroma.
but as he expected (and hoped)
he had come to the inevitable place where he stood at the edge of everything that was familiar
and looked out at the world completely unversed.
he asked his father if it were safe to jump






and his father said

of course not.
but the consequence of not jumping is too severe.

tears from the saints

-------
[My friend, if you cannot see over or much less tear down your wall, perhaps you aren't meant to do it alone.]



We are a family of a gargantuan number. We have our brothers and sisters dying from a lack of hope while we sit and proclaim that we are God's faithful children. Love is perverted by the media and men who make their living by selling the one's they're suppose to be cherishing.


What is it going to take for us to understand? Will it take more extremists smashing airplanes into buildings? Is it going to take more orders to fly our planes over there to kill their people, innocent or not?

Last time i checked, knocking on your neighbors door and buying lunch for Leroy from the corner of 5th and Main didn't have to be instigated by a life-altering predicament. For whatever reason, our society has decided that mass death and tragedy is a fitting catalyst to start loving each other.


at least for few months... until the shock of the towers falling becomes old news, and the acts of love quickly become shooed away by our business of life. Because our lives are far to important to jeopardize by truly helping someone else.

It makes me sick that Christian America finds so easily what needs to be done to progress their own holiness, but so easily overlooks and neglects the ones suffering down the street.

The churches are not steping up to the plate,
So now we as the church will.

Father, we will lead them home.

dislocated hips and scalded lips.

So I have a question.

How do we go about worshiping God when we can never begin to paint an accurate picture of who he is? How can we as people possibly give Him something that's fit? How can we take our tainted, blemished, and faithfully screw-up lives and present something to Him that's acceptable?




I've been thinking about how let down He must feel. How hard it is to watch us and allow us to choose to hit the ground running from Him, only to fall flat on our faces and into the most turbulent of situations.





So how can i possibly show substantial and legitamite gratitude to the King who gave me something to contribute to His sovereignty. I'm no longer living to make a living. Because that, i think, is the saddest, most tedious fate imaginable. instead he asks me to pick up His flag and march, to become part of something that will never die out. Revolutionary? That's a radical title, but it's something to strive for.

how can I give something suitable back? what can I bring to the table that leads God to say "Thanks bro. I needed that."

Isaiah was a great follower, but it wasn't until God brought handed embers to his lips that he saw and understood how much this Guy deserves,


I'm fed up with not knowing who I'm living this thing for. And if it takes wrestling with Him, or having His touch scald my skin, I'm willing.

It's worth a handicap.

some beat poetry and commentary.

[You spat in the dirt and healed the blind man's eyes to lead me to the fact that I'll never really understand





and that sometimes it takes the sharp pain from the bright light that blinds me so that i can eventually see and to finally know my real name.



--some percussion interlude of sorts--


And the whole thing makes me sick sometimes, because I'm ultimately the reason you were bound and stuck up there like some piece of art on a wall. And you've become art on my chest that reminds me that there's more



so much more to this whole thing. ]

--------

It excites me that the way I string together my words on paper, the music I make, and my ridiculous, elated dancing are all my language in which to worship creatively.

basically, He comes down to saying this:

Love them all and worship One; do it creatively... And in the most literal sense of the phrase, to hell with the rest .

A haiku and a thought.

[Reaching contentment
Is to relinquish the search
for life and His plan.]

Restlessness and discontent make an impeccable recipe for progress. If we're comfortable in our lives, perhaps we're doing something very wrong.

What are we willing to give up to live past our own potential, and live up to the potential we were made to live up to.

You see, I've given up on my fear of failure because I've come to the realization that with the life ahead of me, I will inevitably fail far more than most.

I'm looking forward to every stumble.
It's all part of the race.
[Heb. 12:1]

Christmas thoughts.

My youngest sister stood by my right side with her arms around my waist and her ear against my ribs, and I listened to her sing a worship song as loud as she possibly could about a God she has only just met. To my left side was a man who hated God, a man who boldly and bitterly shouted mockery at God in a room filled with people praising the one he so despised.



----------------
I want to know why the number seven
and why seven stars, and why you revealed them in your palm
I want to know how you felt after you overturned the tables
and how ironic you found the palm leaves
and how dreadfully prophetic the timber strapped to your back.





and how often did you make a fist?
and then lower it to take the blows
I mean you were a pretty strong guy
you made tables and chairs and
I'm sure you had some heavy callouses





and I wonder how it felt when you made the choice to die?
I mean, you had to be pretty young, maybe ten years old.
at ten years old i was chasing cats with wooden swords
meanwhile, you're reading about how they'll turn swords against you
i can imagine you weren't too stoked to read Isaiah





And what if you had to fall out of love for your cause
I mean, you were a twenty-something who made the point to love everyone
And I can only imagine an unfortunate, beautiful soul falling for you
then having her tears fall for you when you reject her for your cause
I can only imagine you got upset with your father quite a bit









yet somehow you managed to pull the whole gig off immaculately. Your unorthodox life stuck out like well constructed graffiti.



your illustration of love is paramount in my life.

Thanks for the worst.

There's something to be said for the most awful, terrifying, odious times of our lives.

I think it's
Thank You."

Thanks for every dark,

depressing, hating,

angry, violent,

lustful,

and destructive night that I've had to go through.

Thanks for all the pain and isolation I've braved,

and for all the idiotic and harmful decisions I've made.

Thanks for my falls,

my addictions,

my lies,

broken skin,

and broken holes in my walls.

Somehow you managed to let it all pull me closer to you.

You've got my trust.

Brushes and Paints.

"Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the Teacher.

"Utterly meaningless!

Everything is meaningless."

-Ecclesiastes 1:2

I found this particular verse by reading a devotional put together by Martin Luther. At first it comes across as incredibly emotionally driven and ridiculous; and Solomon's intentions were just that, he was basically venting when he wrote it and came to his realization through his rant.

This guy owned everything. like, literally.

He had slaves, entire vineyards, basically all of Jerusalem... no jokes, if this guy wanted it, he could have it within a day. He goes to the extent of saying "I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure" in 2:10

So obviously, the tangible things: Food, wives, followers, palaces, the grand typical wants of the times. But atop that, he had an immense amount of self-derived wisdom. He soaked up every bit of everything he could and took it to heart. He was a ridiculously intelligent and wise man. On paper, this cat pretty much had it made... He lived the American dream by starting from scratch and building himself up using his own sweat and blood.

and then the next verse comes.

"Yet when i surveyed all that my hands had done and what i had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun."

I think in a conceited sort of way, I deep down consider myself to be relatively wise for my age. I've put myself through a substantial amount of unnecessary problems that I've gathered wisdom through. But it goes on to say that unless the wisdom in me isn't of God, it's meaningless. "like chasing after wind" it says.

Solomon basically speaks down to people like himself who live like they're living on this place forever. He poses the question of "why live like this?" Why live to form some image, to build up some massive stage to stand upon, when in an incredibly minuscule time frame you'll be gone from this place.

An image is something that everyone has, whether they like it or not. It's just been recently brought to my attention that my image has absolutely nothing to do with me, other than the fact that my body wears it. I'm to be sculpted. I'm the blank canvas that God paints.

I have a say in the matter obviously, but I'm making a pact right now to work on handing over the brushes and paints.

Up a creek without a camera.

He saved a million men starving from their lack of bread and ripped their souls from the tempters hands by taking lashes from lesser men striving for a heavier purse.

----

That was the start of a post i planned to finish a week ago. I never got around to it. However, I liked the sentence, and feel that it should stay... so I hope you enjoy.


So a good bit has happened.

-I've graduated from high school and my sights are set on LU, which I'm not entirely stoked about.
-I'm putting every ounce of my graduation money towards a Canon EOS 400D Digital Rebel XTi, 28-135mm and 70-300mm lenses, and a tripod. Unfortunately for me, my graduation money combined is worth not even half of what I need... so most of the summer will be working towards it.






Now, I kinda find this selfish. Despite the fact that the camera will probably be used more for others than myself, it's and incredibly hefty dent in my wallet. Even more so, that's a lot of money going towards me. Me has a heck of a lot of things. Me doesn't exactly NEED this camera, but wants it very, very, very badly.

I have this very bold and audacious (I don't know if that's a word, but I'm running with it,) idea of taking pictures of life and working them into stories in this blog and really giving people something to learn and experience. And I feel with such an able camera, and with all of the research I've done, I can achieve that.

Thanks to the wise words of Steve last Sunday, I prayed about this purchase. I'm kinda waiting for something to pop up and be all like "STEPHEN, PUT ALL OF THAT MONEY TO SAVE THE CHILDREN IN AFRICA!" And I actually expect an answer much like that one, but so far, haven't received it. I've even gone to the limit of finding what I could to to serve with this thing. Cause I mean, at the end of it all, it is a thing. That's it. But my desire for this thing has driven my to put most of my money into it.


Is this bad?




















I'm trying desperately to make this a good thing.










I mean, perhaps the beginning sentence does in fact relate to all of this.

My Castle in the Air.

So I was flipping through photos when I found this one.

I mean, I have absolutely no reason to begin thinking about this now, but this picture made me.

I had no choice.

This is my fantasy as an elderly man.

-------------------

I'm (hopefully) going to be that guy at that bench one day.

I'll have my wife of a million years beside me under my arm, looking out at the world and finally be content in stopping. My skin will be weathered and wrinkled and my hair and my eyes blurred, but still blue. People will see life in my wrinkles.

And I will know exactly what love is.

I'll be able to answer my grand children's questions of:

"What did you used to do when you were younger?"

"How did you meet grandma?"

"Grandpa, what do your tattoos mean?"

I'll be a bottomless vat of stories.

And when the time comes to stand before God, when I'm up there shuffling my feet, recollecting how I was planning to explain everything, He'll stop me and tell me I did alright.

A tenebrific week into a hopeful one.

It's been a while since the last time I've posted anything of substance. I've been unbelievably busy with theatre and music... so busy that I've kicked God out for literally about a week.

I mean; I've acknowledged his existence, talked to him here and there... but at the end of it all, I suck.

A substantial amount of change is going to happen very soon for me. Granted, I know I've said this before, but It's reached a point of paramount significance. I've been living for Stephen for the past two weeks and I've gotten absolutely nowhere except further from everyone who means something to me.

I've realized this week that when I have too much to do, I block out everyone. Then, when I have time, I look behind me to see if I've run anyone over during my frantic race to get everything done. I hate it because I always find a way to set time a side, and recently I haven't.

-------------------
Lots has happened recently.

-Jerry died, which means Lynchburg will be wiped of the media map forever.
-An LU student made several homemade bombs that were to blow up Ben Phelps and his "GOD'S YOUR ENEMY! GOD HATES FAGS! EVERYONE BESIDES US IS GOING TO HELL!" Westboro Baptist Church brigade who were picketing Jerry's funeral. The explosives were found in his car before any damage was done.

(Their whole view irks me. [you can read up on it here http://www.godhatesfags.com/] God hates everyone who isn't a puritan-based Christian like we are. Everyone who doesn't believe in exactly what we do is going to Hell, because we're the only ones who have ever interpreted the Bible correctly.

Somehow, I don't think Jesus died for people he hated, seeing as he pushed the whole 'love-love deal. I also think it soils the entire idea of salvation... I mean, It's wrong to sin, yeah. But if you do, you're alright, cause that's why Jesus died in the first place. But you know what guys, maybe you're right. But come time to stand before the Big Guy, you may wish you had drawn people toward God, not scared them away.

Just a thought.)

-I'm going to be graduating soon. That's a weird feeling. A good one, but a weird one.
-My band House is basically set for shows in the summer, which means I'll be working from 8-4 every weekday, and practicing every other minute after that. (once again, cramming my schedule.)

Guess it's time to stop writing and actually do what I've been intending to do all day.


My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.
(Exodus 33:14)

Wednesday Morning Coffee and Fries.

I'm sitting at starlight cafe doing homework, which I find pretty ironic... skipping school to do homework; but it's pretty typical for me.

I was working on my soundplot for tech theatre, which is already two days late, and the lady ordering her drink at the counter passed out and fell to the floor. She seizured, but only for four seconds, (for some reason, i counted time.)

Everyone leaped up to help. Some called 911, some got her pillows, some just surrounded her and asked if she was okay... it had to be incredibly overwhelming, so I thought it would be best to stay out of the way. I have this thing about people watching. It's completely unintentional, but I like it, so I see no reason to stop. I saw the baristas flipping out because they didn't know how to handle the situation, an English teacher continuing to correcting papers, trying to pretend nothing was happening, and a little girl. The little girl was smiling.

Not at the lady of course, but at her mother, who had fled from her table to help the woman. Her mother was fitting a pillow beneath the woman's head when the little girl looked at me, looked at her mother, then back at me... with subtext of "That's my mom." I smiled and nodded. She was then instructed to go to the back and find a damp washcloth to put over the fallen woman's forehead.

She immediately obeyed.



Proud of her parent who, she believed, had saved this woman's life.

Once the ambulance came and left, and I knew everything was okay, I got to thinking on my heroes. I realized my heroes were either dead, intangible, or no longer worthy of being my hero.

Ralph Waldo Emerson one said "At last every hero becomes a bore." Some day, the mother of that girl will no longer be a hero. She will no longer be invincible. She will be a mortal mother "who just doesn't understand."
She will grow to find new heroes, idolize other people that are much more extravagant than her mother.

I realized that a child's perception of any human hero holds the characteristics of God. I was told once that people will only let you down. Friends are amazing, and they can be the most ideal companion, but in some way shape or form, they can't live up to what you'd like.

I've realized I don't have heroes. I look up to certain people, but I keep their flaws and imperfections in the back of my mind, dulling the effect of their awesomeness.

I've raised my expectations for my heroes... so much so that I think only one will ever be considered mine.

He can't let me down.

Sunk.

I'm gonna buy a gun and start a war... if you can tell me something worth fighting for.

======================================

======================================

Lately I've been asking myself what I'm doing this for. This whole life deal. I Initially said "I'm living for Christ," but that was pretty much a lie. I'm living for myself and dragging God along for my own benefit. Listening to Him when he's practiacally screaming at me, and praying when I suck and need help.

Truth be told, I feel as though I'm suppose to be undergoing some titanic change, but I'm missing my directions to do so because I'm so wrapped up with the rest of my life.

I'm not really positive as to why I'm posting this, but I will.

Take it as you will. Perhaps you're in the same place I am.