5/9/10

From my journal:

I want to be the kind of old man who has eyes that are always smiling; who calls young women "dear" and it's comforting, and not creepy or condescending; who calls young men "son", and there is a sense in which it is true. And the old man that I will be is going to be determined by the young man that I am. I am trying to be a young man that will turn into that kind of old man, and I need God's love.

I need God's love.

And I am afraid that somehow I can't ever be that old man. I don't know why — the fear doesn't explain itself. But it is there.

I want to be that old man, and I want to be the young man who is going to become that old man. I want to work toward it, but I can never remember. Maybe one day out of twenty I remember, and that's not enough. And I'm afraid.

I am growing old. I am growing old. We all are growing old.

Let's have children and teach them to worship God, and then even after we die, we will still, in a sense, be able to worship God on the earth. What else is there to live for?

What else have I wasted myself on?

What else is there but You?

Like a star when it sees the Sun.

Maybe I could be small
Maybe I could be nothing at all, and You could be everything.

It could start slow, like this; as, after all, seeds become sprouts before they're great oaks
Or strong cedars
Or tall pines
And I've a divided mind
And a long way to go.

Yeah, and maybe not for more than a week at first
(And often faltering, and usually confused, and sometimes unsure)
But trying.
Really, trying.

And slow.
And steady.
And crowned with steadfast love and mercy,
And forgiven all the time.

And then, and afterward, always, a revolution in my ribcage.
And a mind being transformed.
And not holding grudges.
And not loving useless things.
And not hating useless people.
And not shrugging my shoulders
Or closing my eyes
Or giving up so easy
Or anything passive or apathetic or cold.

Maybe I'm a meagre acorn, clinging to a branch on an oak that's getting old, and more dead and barren all the time.
Maybe I could clench my fists
(Unless a seed falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit)
and set my teeth
("Because I live, you will also live")
and drop.

And that could be alright.

Late in the Year

2009 is winding down. It has moved almost entirely from the future, through the present, and into the past, the way that you and I and everyone and everything eventually must.

And lately I feel hopeful. I almost missed out on Christmas this year, so bogged down was I with the stressfulness of the traditions we've built up around it. So preoccupied with all the extra work and patience it required of me that I almost neglected to wonder at the God that became a man. But then I heard a friend sing:

"Why am I shrugging my shoulders while Heaven and nature sing?"

And then I got it. God became a man!

God never does anything the way that anyone else would do it. Ever. A baby that was God was born to an unmarried teenager and laid in a trough for animals. And thirty-three years later, He saved the world by being murdered.

He said that the last would be first, and the first would be last.
He said that people we don't think much of -- the meek, the poor in spirit, the peacemakers, the persecuted -- He said they were blessed. They will inherit the earth; the kingdom of God belongs to them; they will be called the sons of God.
He said evil doesn't just consist in what we do; but in the thoughts and motives that drive what we do.

He never does what anyone else would do or says what anyone else would say. He's wild and scandalous, and entirely unpredictable.

I've been thinking about that for a while now. God's creativity is amazing to me. It makes me excited to follow Jesus, and to be a part of the crazy, convoluted, and unpredictable story that He's still telling.

2009 has been long, and I guess I didn't really enjoy all of it. A lot of that's my fault -- I have a talent for finding the darkness in a picture and then focusing in on it. I can never seem to get my mind away from this idea of the inevitability of death. Which is fine, because everything will die; but it's shortsighted. Death doesn't have the final word. The final scene isn't a graveyard -- it's a kingdom. Focusing on death is shortsighted because I believe in Jesus, and Jesus promises resurrection. Death is just the prerequisite to that.

Death, and death, and death; but then redemption, rebirth, resurrection. God grant that I don't forget again!

So I'm hopeful. 2010 is going to be a good year, I can feel it. I'm moving in with some awesome dudes, and paying a lot less rent. I'm going to have more money. I'm going to accomplish stuff that matters. And I'm going to go on dates with pretty girls; because after all, I'm clever and kind of good-looking. And even if 2010 blows, it'll be alright, because the Almighty crowns me with steadfast love and mercy.

So, there you go. Bring on the new year. I'm not afraid. Er, maybe I am a little, but it'll be okay.

It'll be okay.

There's a stump in my front yard that's sending out leafy, green shoots.

After this pruning, I shall be fruitful.
After this burning, I shall be pure.

Resurrection is preceded by death, as its prerequisite. There is no other way.

Joy is on the other side of sorrow.
Rest is on the other side of labor.
Peace is on the other side of war.
Healing is on the other side of injury.

The only way out is through.
The longest way round is the shortest way home.

Life is on the other side of death.
Hope will light the way.

Let's lay down our petty luxuries,
Close our eyes to the shining foil with which we've gilded our makeshift wealth
(mudpies and cowpats disguised in gold candy wrappers);
Let's get dirty and muddy,
Let's ruin our clothes and reduce them to rags,
Let's make our hands hard and our eyes dim,
Let's dig for real, lasting riches
In the mud and the mire
(Wealth is on the other side of poverty
Plenty is on the other side of want).
And even if we don't find any
(But we will find all we need)
We haven't really lost anything.

What good is a grape hanging ripe on the vine?
Why not be crushed to make wine?

(Mending is on the other side of brokenness.)

Everything will be ruined.
Everything will be alright.

Life is on the other side of death.
Hope will light the way.

On the Dark Pleasures of Sleeping In

This tension between glory and apathy;
between the good fight and a good night's sleep;
between a maybe-wife-and-kids and my much-loved sittin'-around time;

and this question of what all the fighting is worth if it won't end while I live--

It pulls me apart at the seams.

All human action is ultimately self-motivated
(even the most selfless altruist in some sense wants to be altruistic),
and so often, I just run completely

out.

of.

fuel.

(My head is in the sand. I keep a white flag on my person at all times. I don't care. I'm not involved. I don't need it. I give up. Just leave me alone.)

(It doesn't matter to me if I don't win; just so long as I don't lose.)

"Keep your head low and your mouth shut" has always been my motto, but it's not really real life.

But what's so great about real life?

What do you get out of it?

And no use saying "It's not about that"--everybody's out for something. All human action is ultimately self-motivated; there's no other way.

But through the mud and muck and mire
(Like a treasure buried in the silt
Like the sun reflected off the windshield of a car)
Truth and beauty and goodness shine a light I can't ignore
(or not for long, anyway)
And on good days, I want to be out for that.

On good days, glory overcomes apathy.
On good days, the good fight is better than a long nap.
On good days, just sittin' around gets boring
(and anyway a wife would be so soft and smell so nice!)

But even on good days, it's still a fight just to not feel like I could go either way.

Lord Jesus, have mercy on me.

A Psalm

Let my cluttered, muddled mind praise YHWH!
Let my nearly constant confusion praise YHWH!
Let my useless daydreaming praise YHWH!
Let my social anxiety praise YHWH!
Let my inability to make conversation praise YHWH!
Let my crippling sense of futility praise YHWH!
Let my ruined childhood praise YHWH!
Let my neglectful father praise YHWH!
Let my haunting fear of imitating him praise YHWH!
Let my fear of rejection praise YHWH!
Let my fear of women praise YHWH!
Let my burning lust praise YHWH!
Let my idolatrous pantheon of pretty girls praise YHWH!
Let my shitty job praise YHWH!
Let my complete inability to wisely manage my time praise YHWH!
Let my broken family praise YHWH!
Let my misanthropy praise YHWH!
Let my total lack of ambition praise YHWH!
Let my chronic despair praise YHWH!
Let my frequent sense of meaninglessness praise YHWH!

Let all my many and various inadequacies praise YHWH!

Rejoice!
Rejoice!
Rejoice!

The bows of the mighty are broken, but the feeble bind on strength!

The full have hired themselves out for food, but those who were hungry are filled!

There is hope for a tree cut down, that it will sprout again, and its shoots will not cease!

Let everything that has breath praise YHWH!

Praise YHWH!

(Psalms 148, 149, 150; 1 Samuel 2; Job 14: 7-9; 2 Corinthians 12:7-10)

On Patriotism and Hero Worship (or, if you prefer, 'Inflammatory')

I have a very strange habit: Whenever I find something cheesy or overwrought or vapid or brainless, I kind of zone out and start testing the idea behind it in my mind. For example: Terrible, theologically bankrupt worship songs usually get me to thinking really seriously about theology. A more concise way of putting it might be to say that if something aims for my heart and misses, it frequently hits my head.

So a few nights ago, I found myself at the Stone Mountain laser show. It was gloriously Southern: I was surrounded by rednecks in camping chairs and on blankets, and vendors carrying overpriced glowsticks and light-up plastic swords; and a very 'Merican (woo!) spirit hung over the whole affair. The show itself consisted of what you would expect; lots of Georgia-themed songs, a bit about the Civil War that got all the Confederates in the crowd worked up. There was a scene depicting a couple of robots falling in love to the tune of R.E.M.'s "It's the End of the World as We Know It" that was unexpected and kind of cool; but the rest, though amusing, was pretty predictable.

Then, near the end, they played the full version of "Star-Spangled Banner" (which must have been six minutes long), set to scenes of people most Americans would probably call heroes--John F. Kennedy, George Washington, firemen, astronauts, soldiers, the NYPD, etc. And I stood up and put my hand over my heart, like everyone else, because however detached and over-rational I may be, I am an American. But I started thinking about patriotism and hero worship; and I just do not understand it.

Do not mistake me; I do not believe that there is anything wrong with admiring people who do extraordinary things, and even less with loving the place you call home. But I guess, at bottom, I don't really believe in heroes; and I will never in all my days assert that America is the greatest country in the world. In the first place, what kind of criteria do you use to determine that? I have only been to one other country, and I prefer America to that place; but translating that into America being superior would just be stupid. And as for hero worship: why? Do people not know that all of those men are dead and buried, or will be soon? And even if their lives were given for something we call 'noble', for peace or freedom or justice; even if their lives have made our lives better--we all are going to die, as well; and so will our children, and so will theirs. We are like the flower of the field, that blooms today, and tomorrow is gone, and its place does not remember it; or again, like the dew that vanishes before midday; or again, we are like the wind that passes, and comes not again. "All is vanity", said the Preacher; and he spoke the truth.

So with these thoughts flying back and forth over my mental landscape, I thought (lest I should fall again into that old black despair I used to love so much): To what should these energies be devoted? Nations and their heroes are not sufficient objects for the worship a man, even if they do frequently steal it. A man's country can be, and frequently is, positively evil; and as for heroes -- from dust they came, and to dust they have or someday will return.

Jesus, the Christ, is the only hero who has conquered death, and whose accomplishments and victories will benefit us long after we have withered away, and our place as forgotten us. He did not come from the dust, and He has not gone back there. His kingdom is the only nation that does no evil, and is always, in every way, admirable and worthy of a man's allegiance.

Christ's life was not a campaign. He did not rally for a revolution in a temporary government. He did not seize a seat of power and pass just laws that would pass away as soon as a stronger army than His decided they wanted His land. Rather, He came to write a new law on our hearts that will never pass away, even if every army in the world comes against it. His revolution was a revolution in our hearts and minds; and His cause was our salvation, not our temporary peace and prosperity. When He died, He did not "go the way of all the earth" -- He took sin on his sinless self, condemning it by dying; and rising in victory, He cancelled the debt we had incurred by sin, buying for His followers an eternal freedom, and not a temporary one.

As for His nation, it is not a geographical territory with fixed boundaries -- it is a kingdom in the hearts and minds of men that spans the globe. It is an empire of liberation, not conquering countries for resources, but men and women for their freedom. The Crusaders marched under the banner of the cross, but they were advancing the kingdom of the Pope, not of the Christ he claimed to serve. And the kingdom of Christ is unshakable: though all the armies in the world should fight against it, it cannot fall. It is a kingdom built on love and not strength; on freedom and not slavery.

May our eternal God and Father rescue us, lest ever we should worship or pledge our allegiance to anything less.

Send down roots and send out branches.

Sometimes I wonder if maybe I'm secretly a weird hippie.

Case in point: Lately, I have really admired trees. Not just that I think they're pretty and enjoy looking at them (though they are pretty, and I do enjoy looking at them); but I have wanted to be like a tree.

At this point, you've probably already made up your mind either that that's a great idea and we should all admire trees, or that I'm a weirdo and I should not be trusted. But I'm going to try to explain why I look up to trees in a figurative and not just a literal sense.

First, I admire their stability; I appreciate that they don't move. A tree stays right where it's planted. The trees outside my grandparents' house have been there since before I was born; and if there's no really horrific storm, and if no one decides to build anything, they will be there after I die. People are always getting up and running around; it seems like the place where we are is never quite good enough for us. But not so with trees. They just stand, silent and patient, where the Maker put them; they soak up the sun and the rain and they weather the wind and the storms, and they grow right where they are. I want to be like a tree. I want to be content where I am. Sun or rain, storm or calm, I want to grow where I've been put.

I admire trees because they have roots. Think about a big, old oak tree, with roots spread out for yards around it. It has roots deep underground; and no one can see them, but they're there. They hold it in place. When storms come and the wind blows, the oak still stands, because its roots hold it up. And no one sees them. It sends its roots down deep to nourishment, down and down to dirt and water, and it draws strength from them, and it grows. And it's not showy. No one sees. But it happens. I want to be like a tree. I want to send down roots to where there's good water, to where there's healthy earth. I want to send down roots so that when storms come, I don't get blown over or swept away.

I admire trees because they have branches. They have all that strength in their roots, but it's not enough--if they don't have leaves and branches, they'll die. So they stretch out their hands to catch the sun and draw nourishment and strength from it, too; and this they do in the open for everyone to see. If they were proud of their roots, and ashamed of their need for the sun, they would die; but they humbly reach up to the sky for their life. And in stretching out their branches, they make homes in their arms for birds and squirrels and bugs and all kinds of life, and give shade to everyone who passes under them. They reach out to get life, and they end up giving life, too. I want to be like a tree. I want to send down roots and send out branches. I want to reach out humbly and unashamedly for what I need. I want to be safety like home and gentleness like shade.

I admire trees that grow fruit. They do all the things I've already talked about, and they take their life, and they put it into something that's good, and wholesome, and pleasing to taste; and in doing it, they spread the life that they've drawn, both through their wholesome fruit and from the seeds in it that, hopefully, become more trees. I want to be like a tree. I want to spread goodness. I want to share life.

At bottom, I admire trees because I see in them many of the ways in which I should relate to Jesus. I want to stand still and be content and grow where He puts me; I want to send my roots down deep into His truth and His strength, and draw strength from Him; I want to send branches up in worship and adoration, and send branches out to do His work; I want to grow fruit to nourish and share life with others, and plant seeds to grow more trees for Him. I want and need all of these things.

"Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
but his delight is in the law of YHWH,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
He is like a tree planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers."
Psalm 1:1-3

Yes, please.

And that's why I admire trees.

A Prayer, after a Day in the Sun

O Father, make me as humble as the ground that uncomplaining supports my feet;
Make me as forgiving as the grass that does not curse me as it springs back up from my heavy, clumsy steps;
And Lord, give me the resilience to spring up when I am tread upon.
Make me as kind and gentle as the refreshing breeze that rushes past,
And as free as when it runs away to where you send it, with neither tearful goodbyes nor anxious, stubborn see-you-laters.
(Let me cling, my God, only to unchanging You, who give and take away and are always just and generous.)
Make me as lovely and lively and, at times, severe as the sun, that burns and blesses; let my brightness not be harsh to the lowly, and let it not be lenient to the proud.
Jesus, make me as open and honest as the sky
--It wears proudly the beauty You give it by day; and humbly and without shame it disappears to show Your stars by night.
O great God, I am amazed by your creation
--The sun and sky and trees and wind and grass and ground and bugs all telling Your story; all singing, in the voices You have given them, Your praise.
O merciful Lord, grant that I might join in their chorus.
Amen.

An Observation on Moses

(If you want to really follow along here, read Exodus, chapters 2-4)

I've just started reading in Exodus, and I've noticed something about Moses that I've never noticed before. Perhaps you'll find it interesting.

Moses comes to us as a man of action. The first time we see him (after he's grown up, that is), he catches an Egyptian slave-driver abusing a fellow Hebrew, and murders him. He doesn't ignore it and keep passing, or even stand by and watch--he gets involved. A little later, he comes upon two Hebrews fighting, and demands of the one in the wrong why he is striking his brother. Once again, he is not passive--he gets involved. After he flees to Midian, he finds the priest's daughters in trouble; they need to water their flocks, but the local shepherds are trying to drive them away. Once again, Moses puts his neck out--he saves the girls from the shepherds, and waters their flocks for them.

So that's three instances, in pretty rapid succession, that kind of show us the sort of man that Moses is. He's not the kind of guy to just sit back and watch things happen; he's bold, and he stands up for what he believes is right.

But a strange thing happens when God begins to speak to him from the burning bush. Suddenly all the fight seems to have gone out of him. God tells Moses to stand up to Pharaoh for the people of Israel; He equips Moses with everything he needs--He sends Moses in His name, and gives him the ability to perform miracles, and promises to give Moses the words to say to Pharaoh; but suddenly Moses goes limp. He doesn't want to get involved. He keeps looking for excuses. He wants God to send someone else.

What's happened here? Why is Moses suddenly so afraid? Earlier on, he killed a man, on his own volition, because he was abusing just one of his Hebrew brothers; but now he's not even willing to go and just talk to Pharaoh, with the authority of YHWH, to set all of Israel free.

Maybe he's just grown complacent over the years. Maybe he's gotten comfortable; he's got his wife, his kids, his job . . . it's not glamourous, but it's familiar. Stable. When we think about it that way, it kind of starts to make sense, doesn't it? It's so tempting to turn a deaf ear to God's call when that call leads us into unknown territory.

Moses actually doesn't give us a fantastic example in this case. He finally agrees to go, but only after God promises to give him his brother Aaron for a mouthpiece. While Moses is still on the way to meet him, God actually comes out to where Moses is lodging with the intention to kill him, because Moses has dishonored God's covenant with Israel, by neglecting to circumcise his sons (more evidence, maybe, that Moses has forgotten where he came from?).

There are plenty of lessons to learn here, but I'll leave that to the reader and the Holy Spirit. I've just been mulling over these things for a couple of days, and thought it might be of interest to others.

May the God of peace be with you.

Golden Calves

Tomorrow is St. Valentine's Day.

I kind of forget about it. I've never had a girlfriend, so the holiday has never really meant much to me; except maybe to make me aware that I've never had a girlfriend, which is something I expend a fair amount of energy trying to forget.

This is the part where, in years past, I might have gone on a rant about how stupid the holiday is. I would probably have said at some point that it's a holiday invented by card and chocolate companies to make us spend money. Which is likely true; but to be honest, if I did have someone, I'd be buying cards and chocolate like everyone else.

So I'll say it: I really wish I had someone. I do. The girl in my dreams is short; she's pretty, not hot. She has red hair, and gets all her clothes at Anthropologie, and she is always down to get a loaf of bread and go feed ducks. We get all dressed up like rich folks going to an opera; but instead, we go have a picnic. It's just the kind of people we are.

And that's what it looks like inside my head. A lot of the time. Probably more of the time than is reasonable or healthy.

I am what I am. Laugh if it pleases you.

God is teaching me to be patient, and to commit my girl (or lack thereof) to him. It's a hard lesson, and I'm not enjoying it. But in retrospect, all those times I thought I was ready to love a girl, I wasn't really; and all those girls I was so infatuated with weren't right for me at all. I'm better off for having been alone all this time. At this point, I'd have to be pretty dense to keep on trying to win this game on my own. And anyway, it's so much easier to just enjoy girls' friendship when I'm not worrying about whether or not I want to try to date them. Girls are great people, and when I try to form them to some mold I have in my mind, I completely miss out on that.

I'm not sure where this is supposed to turn into advice, or insight, or whatever. I think I might be better off if I just stop trying to advise other people, and live honestly in front of them instead. I guess if I were going to say anything, it would be this: If you're alone tomorrow, like I will be, don't worry about it. Rest in the knowledge that if there's someone for you, then God knows about them, and He's taking care of the situation, preparing both of you for one another; and even if there isn't someone for you, He will be enough, if you'll let Him. It's a hard pill to swallow, but it's good medicine; it's bitter in your mouth, but sweet in your stomach.

And I can never tell; she might be right around the corner.

Happy Valentine's day. May the God of peace be with you.

A Prayer

Father, helpless, I look to you.
Have mercy on a boy at the end of his rope.
If the rest of the world is buying cheap grace on Sundays and worshipping at the bank,
Then I am clasping my hands and parting my hair,
Hoping that if I put the right gift on the altar, maybe I can play harp one day.

Lord, are you some fickle totem?
If we perform the right dance, will you give us rain?
Are you a cosmic vending machine?
But even if we had quarters, you gave them to us to begin with!

Christ, have mercy on me.
Rescue me from all this fruitless posturing; deliver me from this foolish thought: that I might somehow earn your favor.

Draw near to me, my God and Father.
I am bankrupt. I am weak. I am foolish and conceited and lazy and self-righteous, and I need you.
If you will have mercy on me, then I will exult even in this; for your strength is made perfect in my weakness.
I thank you, for you are merciful.
Amen.

On the Eucharist

"The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread."
1 Corinthians 10:16-17

This week, some of my closest friends are coming to my home, and we are going to eat together. Afterward, we are going to take the Eucharist together. I am very excited, and I want to share just a few thoughts on the meal our Lord has given us. I should say by way of disclaimer that I am no theologian, and I am ready at any time to be refuted by the authority of the Holy Scripture; but by God's grace, I hope that will not be necessary.

To begin, as it regards the meaning of the sacrament, I have little novel insight to offer; but the significance that presents itself to me the most readily is the idea of Christ's sacrifice as a meal for us. It always brings back to my mind the state that I was in before I surrendered to Him. The fact of it is that when I wandered in a barren waste, hungry, and even starving to death, the God of all creation, driven by no need and bound by no obligation, broke His body to give me bread. He fed me, and saved my life. It's life-changing. But that's not all. When I was miserable, and depressed; when everything was gray and gloomy, and I had no happiness, and no joy, Christ spilled His blood to give me wine--to make me glad, to lighten my heart. Parenthetically, that's why I prefer to have real wine in Communion, as opposed to grape juice--I just feel like it loses a little bit of significance when you take the alcohol out.

Second, I take a mystical view of the Eucharist; that is, I believe in a real presence of Christ in the bread and wine. I don't believe in transubstantiation, mind you--but certainly not mere symbolism, either. I believe that when we take the Lord's Supper, we partake in a real way of His sacrifice for us; that He meets us there, with sustenance, with forgiveness. I'm not prepared to defend this view with Scripture (though I'm sure there are those who can); and am indeed prepared to drop it if suitable evidence can be produced against it. But the fact is that there's a difference in me, between the weeks that start with me at church, taking the Eucharist, and the weeks that I don't get it; just like there's a difference between the person I was before I was baptized and the person that I am now. I believe there's real power in the sacraments.

Finally, I love the unity that the Eucharist brings. In the passage that I quoted at the beginning of this, St. Paul seems to hang the unity of the church on the fact that we all partake of the bread that is Christ's body, and the wine that is His blood. When I gather with my friends to share the meal that our Lord has given us, we will all be remembering Him together; and in turn, we will be joining in with the larger body of Christ around the world, that remembers Him in the same way; and I think that's a beautiful thing, and I'm thrilled that I get to be a part of it.

I hope that God has used this to give you something to think about, or teach you something new, or remind you of something old; I hope at the very least that I've spread no falsehood. Thank you for reading. May the God of peace be with you.

Hopefully, Encouragement

I've been doing my daily offices lately out of the Book of Common Prayer. There are things I like about doing it this way, and things I don't. What I don't like is mainly that there's not a whole lot of continuity; jumping around so much, you kind of lose your sense of the narrative. But I like the sense of connection--when I read the Scriptures set out in the Book of Common Prayer, I'm joining in with my brothers and sisters all over the world who are reading the same Scriptures; I also like that the decision about what to read is taken out of my hands, so that the Word is made that much less subject to my own whims. One thing I really love is that it brings me to the Psalms every day, and that's a beautiful place to be.

So much of the Bible can seem disconnected, can't it? You read about God's dealing with the Israelites, or about King David's reign, or even about Jesus raising the dead, and as wonderful as it all is, sometimes it can seem a bit distant from you. Sometimes it can seem very much like it's coming from the top down--it's all about what God is doing to people. But the Psalms have such an involving perspective--they are written from the bottom up. The Psalmist is not unsympathetic or distant; he is very much a part of our broken and yet beautiful world. In those 150 prayers, he explores the whole range of the human experience; from the highest ecstasy to the lowest despair; from the hottest rage to the coolest, most calm peace. The Psalms are wonderful, to me, because they give me permission to simply be human--to be sad when I'm sad, happy when I'm happy, and angry when I'm angry.

The past couple of weeks have been difficult for me. Between girl troubles, drama at work, family problems, moving out from home for the first time, and all the old demons that those things woke up, my heart has been a stormy sea; and it's seemed at times that I only mount one wave to be hit in the face by the next. The worst of it was the sense of distance from God; for so long, I had felt so near to Him. I had really been striding along, following Him; but then when things got hard, it seemed like I just couldn't get a hold of Him, whatever I did. And then I began to actually be angry with Him. There was a sense of purposelessness in the pain--"God, what is this all for? Is it really necessary?" I wondered why He didn't seem to be doing anything about it. I remember praying desperately one day, saying almost nothing except "If you won't save us, who will?" It was like the weight of the whole world, of all the pain I've ever felt, was crushing me, and He wasn't going to do anything about it. And spread over it all was this kind of intellectual frustration; I wanted, I really wanted, to just come up with some objective answer to it all, and just pick myself up and move on. But the heart refuses to be dealt with that way. Sometimes you just have to be sad until you're done being sad.

I've become convinced, and the past couple of weeks have helped to solidify my conviction, that God understands us. By that I mean that He graciously makes room for all the irrationalities that come with being human; He has compassion for our unreasonable sadness, and even for our ridiculous anger towards Him. God has condescended to wrestle with me. To wrestle! When He could so easily and so justifiably crush me between His thumb and forefinger, or under the weight of His very self. To wrestle, when He could even go limp and give in, and spoil me like a useless child.

I wanted to find a rational answer to my emotional tumult, but God knew better. God didn't come to me with answers, or some proposition to make me see the facts and pull myself together. And so often, that's how He deals with us, isn't it? I said that my heart was a stormy sea; my Lord calmed it the way that He calmed another stormy sea, by saying simply: "Peace, be still." Not "Brendon, I'm in control, and I'm using all this for your good, so you've really got nothing to worry about." Not "How dare you, a man, be angry with God?" No, just "Peace, be still."

The end of it is that as much as it hurt (and may hurt still--who knows what a day may bring?), it's been good for me. I understand my own humanity a little better; the nature and place of sadness and anger, and how God relates to them. I understand God a little better. My sense of His goodness and mercy is a little improved. I have been between the anvil and the hammer, and I'm a little sharper for it.

The Psalmist prayed from every place the human heart can go. He prayed from black despair, and from blind anger--anger against God. I know so many people who have been having a hard time this month--so many that I almost believe there's something objective that's just making times hard for all of us, together--and I want to offer them encouragement. I want to remind them that it's alright to be sad. It's alright to be angry and to wrestle with God, like the Psalmist did. It's good for us, in the end; I'm not sure we can really know God without fighting Him. But a beautiful thing about the the Psalter is that the last three Psalms in the book are all exultant injunctions to praise God, and praise God, and praise God. The Psalmist feels everything a man can feel, and ends it all by giving glory to God. I think that's gorgeous, and I think it's enlightening. And I think that if we have the courage to weep and to fight, to be naked and transparent before God, we will end the same way.

I hope you've found some small encouragement in this. May the God of peace be with you.

A Prayer for Honesty and Humility

O Father, make me honest.
Teach me not to pretend.
Teach me to let my "yes" be yes, and my "no," no.
Teach me to let go of all this awful posturing; this ugly vanity; this horrible need to impress people; this drive to justify myself.
Are you not my Justifier?
Teach me to be open and transparent before my neighbor, as I am before you.

Father, make me humble.
Teach me to forget myself.
Teach me to love without care for whether or not I am loved in return.
Teach me to let go of all this awful, grasping greediness; all my designs and purposes for people; all my demands and daydreams; and simply love as you give it to me to love.
Will you not be sufficient for me?
Teach me to rest in your love. Amen.

A Prayer and Confession

O God, to every open window and every unlocked door, my feet are quick to run.
Show me but the batting of long eyelashes, or the curve of a cute nose;
Let me hear one sweet laugh or one kind and softly spoken word;
Let me only feel the warmth of a hand in mine,
And every thought of obedience and devotion is forgotten;
Every flame of fidelity, every spark of the divine love is put out.

Is that what you are to me, Lord?
Is the life of Christ only what I'm willing to settle for instead of sex?
Is the Son of man only some poor replacement for hair and eyes and hips?
Do I only fold my hands to pray so long as there's no one pretty to put them on?

If it is so, then I am a fool, and I have learned nothing at all from my wandering.

When I wandered in a desert waste, who found me?
Was it some pretty fantasy?
No, Lord; it was you.
You found me walking in circles, muttering nonsense to myself,
And you shut my mouth, and you opened my eyes, and you set me on the path that leads to life.

When I was hungry and thirsty, who fed me?
Was it some maybe-someday sweetheart?
No--she has only ever been faithless;
She has given me dust to eat, and tears to drink.
But you--you broke your body to give me bread,
You spilled your blood to give me drink.

And yet for all this, I have turned aside to every other road,
Chasing the imagined scent of sweet perfume and the echo of some flirting voice.

O my God, forgive me.
The story of you and I is the record of your fidelity and my faithlessness.

Rescue me, Father, from my own foolish fantasies.
Every other well is empty; every other garden, overgrown;
And if I found my brown-eyed girl, though she had all the beauty a man could look for,
Though she were the kindest and most graceful of all your creatures,
Yet if I found her by leaving your flock and straying from your pasture,
She too would prove a spring of corruption, and a bed of thorns and weeds.

O Lord, be thou my vision.
Let your grace be sufficient for me.
Let your love be to me fullness and life. Amen.

A Prayer

But oh, I just don't know!
I want to stay; I want to go.
Would the world were a single point,
And all my loves together.
Don't make me leave; don't make me stay!
I am rooted down; I am chased away.
The warmth of Home eludes me.

O God, to whom all is Near,
Put me in my proper place.

Time

I have Wednesdays off from work, for reasons that aren't entirely clear to me. It seems like it's the one day of the week when everyone else in the world is busy. So usually, I just end up spending the whole day alone; which isn't good for me, because at some point over these three post-home school years, I've become an extrovert--which is not to say that I'm always fun or interesting to be around; but I draw a sort of energy from being around people I like, and when I'm alone and unoccupied for a whole day like I was today, I kind of go crazy. Today it was so bad that I was willing to just go for an aimless drive, even though gas is more expensive than human blood, and even though I drive a '92 Blazer that chugs it, and even though it was close to 1 am.

Another symptom of the kind of loneliness I can get on days like this is a sort of nameless melancholy. I say nameless because a lot of the time it doesn't really have an object. Sometimes I just feel sad, and it's not because of anything in particular. Tonight God used that feeling of sadness to kind of open up some deep places in my heart; things related to my past and my childhood that I hadn't really brought to him for healing yet.

I decided to drive by the house I lived in about 12 years ago, when I was nine years old, because it's kind of out in the sticks, but not a sketchy place to go at one in the morning. Seeing it got me thinking about my childhood. People talk about having good or bad or happy or tragic childhoods, but to be honest, I don't know which of those would best describe mine. Maybe I was just not as reflective as other children, but whether or not my childhood was good or bad really depended on whatever was happening to me at any given moment. On days when I didn't have school work to do and I got to play video games a lot, I had a good childhood; on days when I had to go with my mom on errands or--God forbid!--to the mall, I had a bad childhood. I don't think I really had a sense of continuity between days, or even between different parts of the same day, until I was eleven or twelve years old.

But thinking about my childhood did bring up the rest of my past, and things did happen that were more detrimental than a day lost to shopping. I think I've had kind of a utilitarian approach to the painful things that have happened in my past; "I know what happened, I've learned what I can from it, let's move on." But in my hurry to get past the pain, I think I may have neglected to take it to God, and ask for His healing. If God will heal me of the wounds I've suffered, then I know He can use even my scars to show His glory. But if I don't take the injuries and disappointments of my past to Him, they become just some bad things that happened to me, that maybe I learned something about coping or human nature from, but that ultimately don't mean much.

I don't want to go on with the futile bandages of utilitarianism over these cuts and wounds. I want to open them up to my Father's healing hands.

But God has been good to me, especially over the past few years, since I've moved back to Georgia. And in reminding me of my past, He also brought to my memory all the good things that have happened in it. I've been blessed beyond telling in the wonderful people He's brought into my life over these three-and-a-half years; friends, and role models, and brothers and sisters. My heart is full because of them. God has taught me so much through the people He's brought into my life in recent years. My friends have been the kindness and provision of God to me. When I was backwards and weird, they reached out to me, to better me; when I was lonely, they comforted me; when I was a pessimistic killjoy, they brightened me up. I can't even express my gratitude toward and for them. And though I've drifted apart from many of them, God is teaching me even in that how to enjoy His gifts for a season while He gives them, and gracefully and thankfully let them go when He takes them away. There are friends I've lost touch with, but I am never far from them in spirit. They have a home in my heart.

Right here in the present, I am happier, and more joyful, and more hopeful, and more at peace than I have ever been. I am walking more closely with God than I ever have. Wonderful things are happening, and I am very much looking forward to what God is going to do. He's bringing new people into my life, and I am excited to build new relationships with them, with Christ as our foundation. I don't have any idea what's going to happen, but I know God is going to be in it, and I'm genuinely excited to be who and where I am right now.

I suppose that's all kind of rambling, but it's been an emotional night for me, and I didn't want to let the urgency of it slip away without trying to write it down. Thank you for reading my ramblings. God bless you.

Isaiah 55

The following is not an original thought; but after so many millennia of human history and thought, I should think any original thought outside the realm of science and technology to be extremely suspect.

The following is not an original thought; it is one of my favorite passages in the Scripture: chapter 55 of the book of Isaiah. If I were a student at a school of theology I might be equipped to give you some context, or to make a very insightful comment on it; but I am not, and other than this chapter, I haven't read Isaiah for a while. So instead I'm just going to tell you that this chapter makes me want to shout, and then let it speak for itself.

Isaiah 55
Ho, everyone who thirsts,
come to the waters;
and you that have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without price.
Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread,
and your labor for that which does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good,
and delight yourselves in rich food.
Incline your ear, and come to me;
listen, so that you may live.
I will make with you an everlasting covenant,
my steadfast, sure love for David.
See, I made him a witness to the peoples.
See, you shall call nations that you do not know,
and nations that do not know you shall run to you,
because of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has glorified you.

Seek the LORD while he may be found,
call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake their way,
and the unrighteous their thoughts;
let them return to the LORD, that he may have mercy on them,
and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
nor are your ways my ways, says the LORD.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts that your thoughts.

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven,
and do not return there until they have watered the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

For you shall go out in joy,
and be led back in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you
shall burst into song,
and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress;
instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle;
and it shall be to the LORD for a memorial,
for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

On Submission

What if I could take Jesus seriously?

My whole life, I have read His promises of peace and hope and joy and eternal life and received them happily, and soundly closed the book whenever He started to talk about me denying myself, and taking up my cross (that is, readying myself to go to my death) and following Him.

But what if I didn't do that?

God's promises and His commands are one. The command to take up our crosses and the promise of eternal life cannot be separated from one another, because taking up our crosses is the only way we can obtain eternal life. It's written on the foundation of the whole creation: Nothing may really live that will not submit to death. Even Jesus Christ, God-in-the-flesh, submitted to the will of His Father, which was death, for the greater glory that was set before Him.

So what if I took up my cross?

What if I let go of comfort, of fast food and television and air-conditioning, and allowed Jesus to make me to be content with only Himself?

What if I let go of controlling my own life (control was only ever an illusion anyway) and submitted to go where He sends me?

What if I let go of my ego, of my need to be right, and to be liked, and to have my rights, and submitted to be despised and abused and made to look foolish, if that would bring glory to Christ?

Jesus is my Savior. What if I also submitted to Him as my Lord--my Owner and Ruler?

"O the depths of the riches and the wisdom and the knowledge of God!
How unsearchable are His judgments, and how inscrutable His ways!
For 'Who has known the mind of the Lord?
Or who has been His counselor?
Or who has given a gift to Him,
To receive a gift in return?'
For from Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever."

That's from Romans 11. I forget the exact reference, but it's verse 30-something--close to the end. My pastor preached on it a month or two ago, and he said something I don't think I'll ever forget. In those verses, St. Paul puts his whole discourse on pause, and just breaks into doxology, praising God. He paints a picture of God, exalted and holy; whose decisions are beyond finding out, whose actions are too great, too far-reaching, too powerful even to be examined. And my pastor's comment was this: There are only two reasonable ways to react to that kind of God: either to submit to him without reservation, or to just walk away.

I cannot walk away from God. I've been down that road, and I know where it goes. When we walk away from God, all that waits for us is misery and futility and death of every kind.

But I have only been playing with the idea of submission. The Holy One has been advancing on me, as it were; and at every step I have conceded, I have drawn another line between us. In every concession there's been an escape clause: "Jesus, you can be my King unless . . ."

But whether I submit or not, Jesus stands alone at the helm of creation. Every knee will bow, and every tongue will confess, that He is Lord. Jesus is Lord. There's no way around it.

What if we all bowed our knees and confessed His name now?