Semester Hindsight

So here I am, a week and a half into Christmas break, and I'm just now writing a blog. My intellectual production is apparently less than stellar.

Maybe that isn't the case. Maybe the things that are on my mind are just things that aren't blog material (for a number of reasons). Actually, I'm completely positive that is the case.

I'll try to start thinking thoughts that are fitting to be disclosed in blog format.
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Regardless, I might as well talk about what I have been up to.

-sleep
-additional sleep
-working out (I joined a gym)
-reading (not as much as I hoped)
-writing (nowhere near as much as I hoped)
-thinking (a whole lot about things that don't deserve the attention I give them)

I've decided that since this is a break, that is exactly what I'm going to make it. This month off will be a break that allows me to recover from the strain of my 5th semester at Malone.
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This past semester sucked. Well, I shouldn't be so fast to say that. My schedule sucked. I felt very stretched when it came to time. Far too many days I thought I needed there to be more than 24 hours in that day so I could take some time and slow down. That is a ridiculous feeling to have when you are 20 years old, at least I think it is.

I literally remember thinking that and then saying to myself, "Whatever is wrong here is in the way I'm doing things. There is no way in hell I can actually be feeling like this."

My classes weren't bad, but they weren't amazing. There is a good chance that the schedule I was working with made it harder for me to enjoy my classes. That is a very strong possibility, so I won't put any blame on them.
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There were things about this semester that were awesome.

Move groups were awesome. Hearing the positive feedback and the passion of some students involved. The impact we made through the days with Multi-Development Services and everything else... that was amazing. It was all God, and it was awesome to watch it happen.

Being a CA was awesome. To invest in people, to try and be a resource to people however you can, that was cool. I don't think I was a very good CA, if I'm honest. There is a right way and a wrong way to go about being a CA and I feel like I learned so much about how to do things well by not doing them so well right off the bat. I loved my class, I loved my students, and I loved my professor. There is no way if I do it again that I could have as positive of an experience as I did this time. Maybe I'm wrong... but I really don't know.
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Well, it is what it is. Break is break and God is God. Sometimes when I say things like that people give me a weird look. I think I just mean that God is still God and He is still in control just like always, and break is here and it is a break from all the things I knew it would be a break from. It's predictable.

Maybe it also carries the tone that break isn't as fulfilling as I hoped or thought it could be, so I remember that God is God and that means He is fulfilling. Even though that is a good way to think, I always say is as if I'm dissappointed. I probably am. I probably should get over it. My bad.
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This blog isn't riveting. I'm aware. I have other thoughts. But they aren't refined enough or appropriate topics to be processed in this place. I'm sorry. I feel guilty for that. I probably shouldn't. I probably should get over it.

My bad.
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Peace

Reminiscence

It's been a month. I've been busy, and I'm sorry. Excuses are lame, I know; so I'll stop.
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One of my friends told me I was reminiscent lately. I actually wish that were more true.
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In my life, it is so easy to forget God when things are going well. I have a terrible memory. It is absolutely awful. I don't necessarily forget names or details or information; I forget things that are more important.

I forget God.
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I always have. When things are going well in my life, I feel like I'm in control. I'll think that I'm the reason things are going well. I've started to make the right decisions and finally I have this little part of life figured out. Finally, I understand how to make this happen the right way.

The truth is quite different, however. In reality, the reason I forget God is because when things are bad I have to cry out for Him. When things are bad, I can't get through without God. So I cry out and beg for Him to walk with Him and put all my focus on Him.

I need Him because I am weak.
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The change comes when I experience success. Success socially, or romantically, or academically, or emotionally. That success gives me this ridiculous feeling of self-sufficiency. It makes me think that I don't need Him anymore, because I can take it from here.

The sad part is that once I get to that point, I then have the greatest chance to completely mess up everything.
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I need to stop forgetting God. I forget that God got me to where I am. I forget that God gave me these people in my life. I forget that God gave me the opportunity to be where I am.

I forget things that I absolutely KNOW.
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It is frustrating to have this kind of a memory. I can only imagine how much it hurts to be where God is, on the other side. I'd hate to care about a person who constantly forgets or rejects my desire to love them and do life with them.

It's like I tell God that He can sit this one out; I got it.

When the truth is all I've got is the recipe to fail. All I have is the experience of screwing up great things. Unfortunately, I forget that I don't have any other experience.
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I really don't want to forget God. I don't want to forget the things I know. I don't want to forget that my life runs through Him.

Those are terrible things to forget. Trust me.
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Peace.

Fortune Teller

Jesus isn't safe.
Jesus really effs with your life.
Jesus makes things hard.
Jesus puts what I care about in danger.

But that is only because I care about the wrong things.
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Sometimes I really believe I am going to go somewhere that isn't safe. Not that I can't or don't do things worth doing here and now, but this feeling just seems to tell me I'm going somewhere very different.

Somewhere where I don't have any cares that could hold me back. (People or things)
Somewhere where I do what Jesus did. (Show people who God is)
Somewhere where I love like Jesus loves. (Unconditionally)
Somewhere where I do things most don't want to do. (Let my heart be broken; over and over)
Somewhere where I am really called to be. (Somewhere different)
Somewhere where I don't even know who will be there with me. (This sucks)
Somewhere where I don't have anything but my character and my actions. (Only He defines me)
Somewhere where nothing matters but Jesus. (Like it should be now, but it isn't)

Good God, that's scary...

Things Exist

Recently I've been telling myself "things exist" over and over.

I write it on my whiteboard. I write it on my wrist. I write it on my arm.

I need to be reminded that "things exist."
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I need to remember because I have strong desires for specific things deep down in my soul. I want these things so badly now, or in the future, that sometimes it consumes me and everything I do is somehow motivated by trying to get the things I want in my life.

I build these specific things I desire up in my mind to the point that I begin to think that nothing better exists. My head tells me I could never have anything better.

I begin to believe they are the best things that could ever happen in my life.
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As far back as I can remember, I remember always getting to a point when I really wanted something I began to believe that it was the best thing that I could ever have.

I would really be missing out if I didn't have whatever that was in my life. (And I really didn't want to miss out)
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But as far back as I can remember, I was always wrong too. There always came new things or people or opportunities that were so much better than anything I had ever seen before in my life. I just had to go through some life to get to them.

Better things existed. Better things had always existed. Even though I was positive they didn't.
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Things come and things go. Desires change with time. It's tough to think ahead and expect something better when you feel like you have something golden right in front of you, just out of your reach.

I just need to remember that things exist. And they always have.
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Peace.

Hair Ties And Life Stories

Last year around this time I found a black hair tie in a friend of mine's bookbag. I put it on my wrist.

Not because it meant anything. That was kind of the point. I actually just did it because I thought it looked kinda cool. Another part of me liked the idea of wearing a wristband that didn't mean anything since everyone always seems to wear wristbands that stand for something. I guess I just wanted to go against the grain a little bit.
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I had that wristband on my right wrist 24/7. People would ask what it stood for, or what it meant, or why I was wearing it. They always seems so surprised/confused when I would say it didn't mean anything; I just thought it looked kinda cool.

I guess people really don't wear wristbands just for the hell of it. Except me, that is.
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I tell this story because about 3 weeks ago I lost my black wristband.

And all of a sudden, my meaningless black wristband had a ton of meaning to me. Not intentionally, of course, but I started to catch myself noticing it wasn't on my wrist and then I would begin to remember everything I went through or experienced over the past year of my life.

It was like a chapter of my life could be defined as the chapter I wore this black hair tie on my wrist.
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To be honest I miss it; I don't want that chapter of my life to end.
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A couple great friendships grew and formed in this chapter.
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A couple relationships got off the ground but never went anywhere in this chapter.
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A lot of great times were shared with my core group of friends in this chapter.
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I lived in Upper Barclay for the first time in this chapter.
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I took a hiatus from theater in this chapter.
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I struggled with pacifism and government in this chapter.
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I broke a bone for the first time in my life in this chapter.
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I broke a bone for the second time in my life in this chapter.
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A lot of great books were read in this chapter.
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I spent my first summer in Canton in this chapter.
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I took the longest road trip of my life in this chapter.
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I hurt a lot of people in this chapter.
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A lot of people hurt me in this chapter.
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I loved a lot of people in this chapter.
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A lot of people loved me in this chapter.
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I had the internship of a lifetime in this chapter.
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The vision for Move groups came in this chapter.
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I pursued and ran from Jesus in this chapter.
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Jesus pursued me in this chapter.
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You were in this chapter.
Thank you.
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I'm going to miss that chapter.

Peace.

Notice The Difference

I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judea which were in Christ; but only, they kept hearing, "He who once persecuted us is now preaching the faith which he once tried to destroy." And they were glorifying God because of me.

Galatians 1:22-24
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In this passage, Paul is recapping much of what he has done since the time he became a follow of Christ. He talks about how he had left many of his Jewish contemporaries in the dust and was also a wicked persecutor of the faith.

And then he talks about he was making his first visit to the churches in Judea.
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The reason this gets to interesting to me, is that Paul talks about how the churches Judea were completely unfamiliar to him by sight; they had only ever heard about how he was attempting to destroy the faith.

So let's recap for a second. We have Paul, a former Pharisee of Pharisees that was advancing far beyond many of his peers and also was rigorously pursuing Christians to put them to death. And now, he will go and visit Judea.
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What is so amazing to me about this passage is the reaction from the Judean church when they hear that Paul is coming to visit.

They begin to glorify God, not because they have seen Paul, but simply because they are aware of what his old ways were and what his current ways are. And it is night and day, ladies and gentlemen. Night and day.
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These believers had never even seen Paul, but they were rejoicing for the change of his heart and love given to him by the Spirit.

What is the chance that something like that happens to us on any kind of consistent basis?

I think that it happens a lot when we first come to follow Christ, right? At that point, the only thing on our mind is how do we follow Christ in a genuine way? What do we have to do to show the world that we have his Spirit?
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Maybe for you, you have never really not been a Christian. In that case, maybe the question you need to reflect on is when was the last time someone told you that you were a blessing to them? Maybe it was yesterday, and maybe you don't remember when the last time that was.
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If there was a time in your life when you did not follow Christ, then here is a question you can ask yourself: What can I do that will let me shine the brightest I can possibly shine in this world; that will make me look different?

The answer to that question may not be what you are looking for, and I'm not suggesting you need to go and leave everyone that God has put in your life behind. What I would say I am suggesting, is that if you look at where God has brought you at this point in your life, then take a look around and see where is that Christ's light needs to show up.
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Paul tells us about how the change in his life made people give glory to God simply because they heard about the change in his life. That's sweet.

One way I feel like that could apply to us, is to see if there is a way that we can do the kinds of things that Paul did and live with that kind of vigor so that we can help people see that light that Christ has put in us. And that question applies to anyone, whether you have just become a Christian or you have been going to church since you can remember.

What is it about you and the way you conduct yourself that is going to make people praise God that you chose to follow him?
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Peace.

Hell's Invitation

In his book, Sex God, Rob Bell talks about how big the implications of our actions actually are. We hardly ever realize it and we allow ourselves to think as if we are unimportant and we are unable to actually make an impact.

Rob has this to say regarding that:

"With every decision, conversation, gesture, comment, action, and attitude, we’re inviting heaven or hell to earth."
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Obviously Rob believes that our actions actually carry HUGE implications in the spiritual realm of our world. And I think he is completely right.

It is funny because we will so often act as if the things we do, even when we know they are wrong, don't matter because we can't make a difference. But by the same token, if we are trying to do something good or honorable, we want the praise and we want to be noticed for the fact we are attempting to make a difference and positive impact in our world. I guess we just can't make up our mind whether we are instrumental or we don't matter at all.

I'm pretty sure we are instrumental.
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In any case, I think that something we really need to recognize is just how influential we are in the world and what our responsibility as Christ follows will always be: Bring the Kingdom to earth.

If that is true, then everything we do (gestures, decisions, thoughts, comments, attitudes) will bring either more of Heaven or more of Hell to our world.

We are so much more influential than we ever want to accept.
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I want to add something to what Rob said in his book (which by the way, if you have not read Sex God, you must. It is literally amazing. One of the best books I've ever read).

Not only do we create a world which more resembles either God's eternal presence or His eternal absence, but we have the ability to create and sustain an atmosphere around us that affects everyone we come in contact with. We create something that is painful and frustrating and sorrowful; and it follows us wherever we go.

Not only do we create that kind of an environment for the people we interact with; we create it for ourselves, too.

We have the ability to make our lives a living hell, and everyone who is reading this right now knows exactly what I am talking about. We make decisions and do or say things that not only make it Hell for people to interact with us, but we make it Hell to be us. We invite Hell, not only into this world, but we invite it into our hearts and our persons.

And trust me, as fallen beings, we are fantastic at harboring Hell deep within ourselves.
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So this is what I suggest. Pursue the Kingdom. Spend time with Christ and ask Him to fill you. We cannot do this alone, and we do not have to. Not anymore.

When Christ is thriving within us, then pursuing the Kingdom is our truest desire, and He will speak how it is we should do that to us. We just need to listen.

But take heart. We don't have to make those decisions alone. We have a wonderful loving savior who is willing to walk right next to us, every single step of the way.
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"My old self has been crucified with Christ. For is it no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me."

Galatians 2:20
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Peace.

Another Fall

I haven't posted in about a month, and for that I apologize.

I have been really busy, I promise.
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It is a new fall semester, and this one is pretty busy. I have 2 music lessons, 4 classes, CA stuff going on, small group stuff going on, a nearly-daily workout routine, and a pseudo social life. I'm also on the market to be involved with some sort of theater on campus, which is something I really do want to get back into. It's a balance that I'm learning is pretty tough to maintain.

Balance is so hard, but it is also the key.
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I've come to see something weird in my perspective toward a lot of things nowadays. I feel like I have been here at Malone for 2 years, and I have gone through a lot of phases where I cared a lot about this or that or this or that... I have tried to keep my hand on top of everything and stressed myself out about a lot of different things. I think that at this point I have come to understand myself well enough that I know what it is I need to stay on top of and what it is I don't need to care about or get worked up about anymore.

Does that make sense at all?

It's just like, I've been here for 2 years now, and I have stressed about not going to chapel, or not doing every single reading for every single class, or not working ahead, or anything else I could worry about. But I think that now I have gotten to a point where I have a good handle on what is worth stressing about and what isn't.

And here is my conclusion: Most things aren't worth stressing about... At all.
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I think that is a good thing a bad thing. Becoming apathetic normally isn't a good thing, but I just look at it as really understanding my priorities. I do feel bad that some things are getting the shaft, but really it just is what it is. I just can't handle anything more at the moment.

At the end of the day, I'm not even a month into the semester, so there is still a lot to figure out, but I'm just going on down the road. If I see you along the way, make sure you say hi.
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Peace.

Looking Through A Different Lens

I feel like I am starting to struggle to see people through the same lens as God.  Not all the time, but I am noticing my struggle.

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It is easier to not see people in that lens because they don't matter to you as much.  You don't feel this wicked amount of compassion being ripped from you all the time.  You don't want to be or feel as invested in everyone.  

And, as a consequence of caring or not caring for someone, they don't have the ability to hurt you as much.

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But I would rather hurt and be You, Lord, than heal and be me.  Always.

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"We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour.  If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as the way in which they should break, so be it."

-C.S. Lewis

"Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins."

-1 Peter 4:8

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Peace.

Just Friends

Most of us have been in a place or gone through the experience where imagining being "just friends" with someone we deeply care about fills us with disappointment, sadness, frustration, anger, depression, hurt, and tons of other painful emotions that drag us down.

Those experiences suck.  They suck bad.

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In those relationships, the other person does not want to commit to you in a way that makes your relationship more serious because their feelings and attachment to you doesn't reflect yours.  Well why does that make a difference?  It makes a huge difference, as we all know, because in relationships there is an aspect of mutuality and responsibility both parties share.  You are responsible to him/her and she/he is responsible to you; and you both want it that way.

That is one of the things that makes relationships so beautiful; mutuality.  You both want what it is you have with each other.  At least, you want it enough to stay in it and work through things and hopefully have something that is really rewarding and amazing.  (Granted, that is not always how it looks, but for the sake of my point I'll stick to the more positive side of things.)

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So, when you get into a relationship with a person, you have the responsibility to not hurt that person.  That person has handed you their heart and now they trust you to keep it and not kill it.  Sometimes, rejecting their heart because you are not up for that responsibility doesn't make things not hurt, its just a different stage of the process that brought about the pain; it came sooner than later.

Rob Bell, in his book  Sex God, wrote that when we love another person and want to pursue something romantic with them, we are handing our heart to them.  When they turn us down, the reason it aches and hurts so bad deep inside is because we offered a piece of ourselves to them and they rejected it.  That hurts.  That hurts bad.

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How often do you think that we tell God we want to stay "just friends" with Him? 

I gotta tell you, I think that God loves us so much that He chases after us and pursues us constantly.  I think a lot of times God asks us to have a very intimate and deep relationship with him, but we freeze.  We will stop dead in our tracks, because we don't want that responsibility.  Some of us think that we can't handle the responsibility, and some of us just don't want to be that tied down.  Being good friends is much safer.  

The more casual our relationship with God the more insulated we feel from our responsibility to Him.

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Unfortunately, or maybe not so unfortunately, we can't really side step what our relation to God is.  When it comes down to it, we can put it off and stall and make as many excuses as we want, but we were made to be in an intimate relationship with God.  It is simply in our design as creatures.  

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It is a crushing blow to love someone and have them reject your heart and hand it back to you.  Love is just a dangerous game.  C.S. Lewis wrote that the only place we will ever escape all the dangers of love outside of Heaven will be Hell.  Since we aren't in Heaven and we are hopefully not on the way to Hell, love is always going to be here and it is always going to be dangerous and tough.  That is just the way our world works.  But even still, loving is the most rewarding thing and, ultimately, the most Christ-like thing many of us will ever do in this world.

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I'm not sure if you remember what it feels like to be told that someone didn't want to have a relationship that was anything more than friends with you, when you clearly had feelings that were much stronger than friendship.  If you don't know from experience, let me tell you that it is crushing.  It can cripple you.

So now take a look at your relationship with God.  We all know where He stands and what His feelings toward us are.  We all know how much He loves us; so much that He died for us.  But what are you saying back to Him?  That is what really matters.  We can't change God and how He pursues us or the fact that He loves us.  All we can do is change our response to His love.

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"If you have ever given yourself to someone and had your heart broken, you know how God feels.  If you have ever given yourself to someone and found yourself waiting for their response, exposed and vulnerable, left hanging in the balance, you know how God feels." - Rob Bell

Peace.

The Day Does Not Belong To Me

One evening last week I heard a man talking about how every morning he wakes up and asks, "God, what are you going to do today?"

He asks because he knows that our lives are not about us; they are about the people God can use us to reach.  And then one day down the line it, for those people it won't be about them anymore either; it will be about the people God can now use them them to reach.

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How far away from that mindset do we find ourselves the majority of the time?

I'll tell you what I do.  Every day I wake up and have this selfish desire deep inside for God to catch my attention today.  What I want is for God to set up spotlights around the things I will come across that day so I know who or what I am supposed to engage and who or what I can ignore with a clear conscious.

Do you see the difference?

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Anything less than coming to God everyday and saying, "Here I am, what I can I do for you and your Son?" is not acceptable.

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Now, maybe you are in the process of getting to that point.  You don't feel like you are a person God can use because you don't know enough or you aren't mature enough or you haven't experienced enough.  Whether or not that is true isn't important.  What is important is to recognize that if you never get to the point where you are asking yourself, consistently, "God, what are you going to do with me?  Because I'm ready," then you are never reaching your potential as a follower of Christ.

Plain and simple.

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The realization is nothing spectacular.  To be honest, I think it is just something we are lazy about.  I mean, really, who in their right mind wants to give up the right to use today "how I want" to use today?  No one but Jesus.  (But the good news is: He lives in you, craziness and all.)

No one ever sacrificed everything they ever wanted and desired as perfectly as we should, except Jesus.  No one ever gave up their entire life and all that came with it for what the Father desires, except Jesus.  No one was ever perfect, except Jesus.  But hey, no one ever said following Christ was easy.

But it's worth it.

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Jesus said to his disciples, "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it.  What good will it be for you to gain the whole world, yet forfeit your soul? Or what can you give in exchange for your soul?  For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father's glory with his angels, and then he will reward everyone according to what they have done."

Matthew 16:24-27

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Peace.

Movies Movies Movies

I love movies.  This summer I have watched a lot of movies.  There is no way I can remember all the movies I have seen so far this summer.  Even still, I will try to give a few quick reviews of the movies I remember I've seen this summer.

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THE HAPPENING - I don't dislike Mark Walberg at all, and I was really routing for a good performance.  Nope.  I was denied.  The acting by Walberg was terrible.  It sounded like every line he said he was reading for the first time.  The script didn't help him any.

3 out of 10

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THE INCREDIBLE HULK - As my roommate Sam said, "If you watched it on mute it would be a kick-ass movie."  A lot of the dialogue was just really poor.  Espicially William Hurt.  Ugh, it made me cringe at times.  Liv Tyler and Edward Norton were pretty solid, to be honest.  But aside from the fact that a solid portion of the movie was decent, some things that happen in that movie are just ridiculous.  Maybe I'm just spoiled from the next movie I'm about to review.

5 out of 10

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THE DARK KNIGHT - Amazing.  Incredible.  Astonishing.  Phenomenal.  The Nolan brothers writing was amazing.  The direction was flawless.  The performances from Bale, Oldman, Gyllenhaal, Freeman, and Caine were all awesome.  Just awesome.  Eckhart was an fantastic Harvey Dent.  Heath... oh, Heath.  Ledger's performance has actually made me want to act again.  It was such an experience to see him put a face on a character so sinister and dark that he didn't seem real.  Albeit, I know that it was only possible for Heath to do what he did because of the amazing script the Nolan brothers gave him.  The whole movie has made me want to write and act again.  It was just that amazing.

On the trivial side, I will say that the incredible detail the sonar was able to give batman was a little too much for me.  I love how realistic Chris Nolan is trying to do everything, but that sonar just seemed to be such a step away from that.  I didn't like it.  Also, the CGI Two-Face was a little much for me.  I'm not saying I have an alternative, just that looking at it was a little distracting, in a bad way.  The last thing I will say is that Harvey Dent turned a little easier than I thought he would.  He was so strong the entire movie, then after one event he just gave up.  I think there is a case to be made for the way it went.

All those critiques are more than trivial, and the movie is still my favorite movie EVER.  Seriously, if you have not seen this, or have seen it only once, go see it.  RIGHT NOW!

10 out of 10

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THE STRANGERS - I wanted this to be good.  I really really did.  It was freaky, yes.  It wasn't scary for the hour and twenty I was in the theater though.  I love the fact that the motive was random.  I loved that a lot.  But I suppose when there is no motive, there is no plot.  That may have been why only freaky cinematography was all the movie has to offer.  Also, the ending... I was not happy.  Either way, I just wish the movie has more to offer than people popping out and some creepy scenes.  Just too predictable.

4 out of 10

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THE MISSION - This movie is not recent, but I saw it for the first time recently.  It was really solid.  Jeremy Irons and Robert De Niro were both really good and just the whole story was unique and something I really appreciated.  The spiritual aspect was also something I enjoyed.  The conflict of interest between De Niro and Irons is very valuable.  Everyone with any kind of interest in the Christian faith should see this.

8.5 out of 10

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TALLADEGA NIGHTS - This movie was just too random for me.  It is quotable, just like any other Will Ferrell movie.  It was funny, but the plot and some of the scenes just seemed to random and dragged on.  I guess I'm glad I can say I've seen it, but it wasn't what I was hoping for.

6 out of 10

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INDIANA JONES AND THE KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL - Sure, it was cool to see another Indy movie.  Sure, Shia Lebouf was a pleasant surprise.  However, George Lucas needs to stop.  He just needs to stop.  This movie has an ending and a story line that is just so crazy... I don't know what else to say.  If you are going to see this movie, it should only be because it is an Indiana Jones movie and Harrison came back to do it.  There really isn't any other worthy justification.

4 out of 10

...

THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: PRINCE CASPIAN - I haven't read the book, but this was entertaining.  Peter really got on my nerves.  I'm just saying, the kid had a chip on his shoulder that really started to piss me off.  Its okay thought, last movie Edmund made me want to punch him right in the face.  In this one, that responsibility just shifted to Peter.  So be it, I enjoyed watching this movie.  Aside from the bear who had the most hilarious voice and Lucy's line early in the movie, "Feels like magic!" (what does magic feel like?  And how would you know Lucy, eh?) the movie was pretty solid.

7.75 out of 10

...

That is all I can remember as of now that I've seen this summer for the first time.  Hope they help.

Peace.

Waste Time In Creative Ways

I heard about this through another blog, so it is in no way an original idea.  But it was too fun not to pass on.  (I'm starting to hate how this sounds like I'm justifying an email forward... all of which I HATE!)

...

1. Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random

The first random Wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2. Go to Random quotations: http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3

The last four words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.

3. Go to flickr's "explore the last seven days" at http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/

Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

Put it all together, that's your debut album.

...

My future album is:

Chand Kings - Be At Your Side

...

I thought it was fun.

Peace.

Live, From Vacation

I can only imagine checking this blog occasionally and seeing every single time the only posts that are being are added are merely quotes from books I've read.  I'm sorry, but I guess I'm starting to summer coming to an end, and that is stressing me out because I have a lot to get organized and done before that happens.

...

This past friday we did The Big Event at Rivertree, which was a way to get a large group of people connected and hopefully plugged into Thrive groups in one night.  Me and Toby came up with the format and it was one of my biggest projects for the summer.  It went well.  We had to deal with a lot of last minute changes, but hey, thats ministry.  

In all honesty, that is one of the things I have learned over and over again while at Rivertree: that things will change last second in ministry all the time and you just need to be cool with that.  God will get out of your efforts what He desires, and thats is ultimately what we always want.  So in the end, everything is cool.  But seriously, that is a lesson you can only learn and grow comfortable with through experience.  At least that's my opinion.

...

So I've obviously been reading a lot this summer.  That is cool.  Read a lot of good books.  The funny thing is... the list of books I want to read just keeps getting longer.  I can only imagine that that is how it is going to be for the rest of my life at this point.  I don't think I'm going to be able to read books as fast as they come across my radar.  How discouraging.  Ha.

...

The rest of the summer is a lot of just gearing up to be ready when the switch happens back to school.  I have things to get done at the theater, I have books to read, I have to things to do academically for the internship, I have things to continue praying about and organizing for small groups, and I have a lot of debriefing and just casual conversations with people at Rivertree that are still happening.  It may not sound very stressful, but it feels very rushed to me.  Oh well, that really is life.

...

As of now, I am in Pennsylvania.  Back home visiting the family for the first time since Mother's Day.  It is nice to come home and see everyone.  It's nice to be around people who, because of trial and error (and just the test of time), I feel have a real unconditional love for me.  That is so nice to be able to run to or just experience every time I come home.  I'm sure that is an obvious and unnecessary statement to make, but to me it was worth saying.

It has taken me being severely detached from my high school friends for over a year for me to actually want to see them again and spend time with them.  I was ready to move on, but now I'm ready to see people and say hi.  Hopefully I get to do that while I'm home.

...

I am currently rereading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis (slowly) and reading The Barbarian Way by Erwin McManus (very fast).  Hopefully I will get them both done by the time my vacation is over.  I just bought The Secret Message Of Jesus by Brian McLaren and want to get done with that by the time school starts.  I better pick it up.

...

Not too much else is new.  Just kinda trying to stay connected and keep my head on straight.  This summer has been an amazing blessing.  I hope things continue to be as fruitful as this.

Hope things are well with you all.  Blessings.

Peace.

Under The Overpass

The book all incoming freshman need to read this next semester is called Under The Overpass: A Journey of Faith on the Streets of America by Mike Yankoski.

Mike his friend Sam travel to and live homeless in 6 cities over a 5 month period.  The book recaps much of Sam and Mike's journey and the way they were able to reflect upon their faith through their experiences on the streets and their interactions with numerous "church-goers" throughout those 5 months.

It was a really good book.  A lot of story telling and some really honest and valuable reflection from their perspective after going through that experience.  As usual, I have quotes to share.

...

"For the life of me, I couldn’t find a connecting thread of radical, living obedience between what I said about my world and how I lived it."

---

"I sat there in church struggling to remember a time when I’d actually needed to lean fully on Christ rather than my own abilities.  Not much came to mind."

---

"Lying there, in the same room as 150 drug addicts, felons, alcoholics, and homeless men, with Taylor snoring not three feet away, I suddenly felt entirely weak, unable, and inadequate to bridge the gap between myself and these men.  Then I realized I didn’t have to bridge that chasm.  That wasn’t my responsibility.  My responsibility was simply to be there, and to trust that the Lord would use me, that he would bridge the distance."

---

"The men I was meeting were at the bottom—the worst point of their lives—and weren’t afraid to admit it.  But the ruin opened the way for honesty.  Pretending didn’t help anymore, and anyway, they didn’t have the strength to keep it up.  They just told it as it was, when it was.  I found that part of living in ruin refreshing."

---

"Something critical is missing in places that care for the broken and needy if the only people there are also broken and needy.  Without the presence of people in the rescue missions whose lives are not defined by addiction, alcoholism, crime, and mental illness, there is little positive influence.  Chaplains and pastors can only spread themselves so far."

---

"If we are the body of Christ—and Christ came not for the healthy but the sick—we need to be fully present in the places where people are most broken.  And it has to be more than just a financial presence.  That helps, of course.  But too often money is insulation—it conveniently keeps us from ever having to come face-to-face with a man or woman who life is in tatters."

---

"Our good intentions and sound theology are wasted when the people we minister to don’t feel that we care about their immediate concerns."

---

"All of God’s children are beggars at the foot of the Cross, broken people in need of mending."

---

"A church is just a building if there’s no one in it."

---

"Begging is hard.  It’s something you expect hungry dogs to do, but not men and women made in God’s image.  The minute you put out your hand, or open your guitar case, it feels like you’re writing 'failure' and 'weakness' all over yourself.  You’re telling everyone who comes by, 'I am unable.'  The message blares up and down the sidewalk, and across multiple lanes of traffic.  And the message doesn’t stop screaming until you pull back your hand, or close up your case."

---

"In his book The Ragamuffin Gospel, Brennan Manning writes, 'We are all equally privileged but unentitled beggars at the door of God’s mercy.'  I thought of that as person after person walked past without donating or even making eye contact.  I felt frustration rising until I realized how unentitled I really was.  No one deserves mercy.  And no one walking by owed us a dime.  Mercy is, by definition, undeserved, or else it isn’t mercy.  Every coin in the case looked different after that."

---

“I want to eat” no longer meant just walking to the refrigerator or ordering off the menu.  Every sandwich demanded hours of sitting on hot cement, playing and singing, trying to be heard above the noise of the street.  And on this afternoon, exhaustion from walking everywhere, the dehydration of living outside, and the lack of sleep from being constantly moved by the police and security guards had taken its toll.  So we just sat, half-aware, watching people ignore us."

---

"When you kneel, hungry and broken at His table, you receive grace from Him you might, at some other time, have completely missed."

---

"I remember many times I had walked past a homeless man or woman sitting on the sidewalk, awkwardly averting my eyes and whistling to cover my discomfort.  I wondered if those men and women had been frustrated with me as I now was with the people who were walking down the stairs."

---

"We agreed that our own ideas and expectations tended to make us deaf to hearing God’s will.  We needed, at least at times, to lay down and listen.  Leave the next move completely up to God."

---

"What is your definition of a Christian?  Is it broad enough to encompass the drug dealers, pimps, prostitutes, and broken people of the world?  Jesus said that he came to heal the sick.  Drug dealers are messed up just the same as liars are messed up, just the same as all humans are messed up.  We all need Jesus.  We all struggle with personal ways in which sin plays itself out their eyes."

---

"What’s worse?  To not do dope or to not love your brother?  Why do we kick drug users out of the church while quietly ignoring those who aren’t dealing with other, equally destructive sins?  Why do we reject the loving, self-sacrificing, giving, encouraging, Jesus-pursing drug addict but recruit the clean, self-interested, gossiping, loveless churchgoer?  Which one do you supposed Jesus would rather share a burrito with under a bridge?"

---

"If we as believers choose to forget that everyone—even the shrunken soul lying in the doorway—is made in the image of God, can we say we know our Creator?  If we respond to others based on their outward appearance, haven’t we entirely missed the point of the gospel?"

---

"To me, one of the best things about the gospel is that Jesus Christ proclaims and restores human and eternal worth for everyone who believes—regardless of what a person might look like or smell like now, no matter what’s crawling through his hair.  And because we follow this Christ, each of us has both the ability and responsibility ('response-ability') to do the same."

---

"The words 'Jesus loves you' take on a whole different meaning when you’re down and out.  You hear them differently.  You need them more.  Just saying them to the next desperate person you meet could change his day.  Wrap those words in friendship, a home-cooked meal, bus fare, and you could change his life."

---

"Walking into a church where we hoped to find genuine fellowship only to be met by condescension or suspicion or disingenuous flattery was the worst kind of rejection."

---

"We don’t go to church, we are the church.  So many problems that show up on the church steps, or in the pews, or between congregations seem to start with misunderstandings about that.  The church isn’t a physical building or doctrinal statement or perfectly produced program.  It is us—we are the living expression of Christ’s presence in this world, His body.  The sooner we realize that, the sooner we’ll be able to be the healing body of Christ to our sin-sick world."

---

"The bottom line is real love shows itself in action."

---

It's a solid book.  I'm going to be discussing it with people for a while once school starts.  Hopefully the conversations are fruitful.  I'm sure they will be.

Peace.

Sex God

I finished a book by Rob Bell called Sex God a couple of weeks ago, it has just taken me a long time to type up all the quotes I got from the book and blog them.  

The book was amazing.  I didn't really feel like it was something spectacular at the time when I was reading it, but when I go back and read the quotes I took away from it... wow.  Rob Bell is an amazing communicator and someone I deeply admire.

...

"You can’t talk about sexuality without talking about how we were made.  And it will inevitably lead you to who made us.  At some point you have to talk about God."

---

"What we often do is reverse the creative process God initiated.  We start with different cultural backgrounds and skin colors and nationalities, and it’s only when we look past these things that we are able to get to what we have in common—that we are fellow image-bearers with the shared task of caring for God’s creation.  We get it all backward.  We see all of the differences, and only later, maybe, do we begin to see the similarities.  The new humanity is about seeing people as God sees them."

---

"How you treat the creation reflects how you feel about the creator."

---

"A church exists to be a display of the new humanity.  A community of people who honor and respect the poor and rich and educated and uneducated and Jew and Gentile and black and white and old and young and powerful and helpless and fully human, created in the image of God."

---

"With every decision, conversation, gesture, comment, action, and attitude, we’re inviting heaven or hell to earth."

---

"Our sexuality has two dimensions.  First, our sexuality is our awareness of how profoundly we’re severed and cut off and disconnected.  Second, our sexuality is all of the ways we go about trying to reconnect."

---

"I often meet people who aren’t park of a church and don’t want anything to do with God because 'all those religious hypocrites.'  Often they have great pain that they blame on 'the church.'  But it’s not possible for and institution, whether it’s a church or a school or a business or even the government, to hurt somebody.  Institutions are made up of people.  People hurt people."

---

"You can’t be connected with God until you’re at peace with who you are.  If you’re still upset that God gave you this body or this life or this family or these circumstances, you will never be able to connect with God in a healthy, thriving, sustainable sort of way.  You’ll be at odds with your maker.  And if you can’t come to terms with who you are and the life you’ve been given, you’ll never be able to accept others and how they were made and the lives they’ve been given.  And until you’re at peace with God and those around you, you will continue to struggle with your role on the planet, your part to play in the ongoing creation of the universe.  You will continue to struggle and resist and fail to connect."

---

"When we deny the spiritual dimension to our existence, we end up living like animals.  And when we deny the physical, sexual dimension to our existence, we end up living like angels.  And both ways are destructive, because God made us human."

---

"Paul insists that everything God created is good, and we come to see this through what he calls 'the word of God and prayer,' which is the hard work of study and reflection and meditation and discussion and debate.  The temptation is always to avoid things that are difficult and complex.  To go around them rather than through them."

---

"One of the marks of someone who has experienced significant growth in their soul is their ability to live in the midst of tension."

---

"You are not alone.  Whatever you struggle with, whatever you have questions about, you are not alone.  It doesn’t matter how dark it is or how much shame or weakness or regret it involves, you are not alone."

---

"If I want something to the point that I can’t conceive of being content without it, then it owns me."

---

"Life is not about toning down and repressing your God-given life force.  It’s about channeling it and focusing it and turning it loose on something beautiful, something pure and true and good, and something that connects you with God, with others, with the world."

---

"The story the Bible tells is of a living being who loves and who continues to love even when that love is not returned.  A God who refuses to override our freedom, who respects our power to decide whether to reciprocate, a God who lets us make the next move."

---

"Love is handing your heart to someone and taking the risk that they will hand it back because they don’t want it.  That’s why it’s such a crushing ache on the inside.  We gave away a part of ourselves and it wasn’t wanted."

---

"Jesus always chooses the path of love, not power."

---

"If you have ever given yourself to someone and had your heart broken, you know how God feels.  If you have ever given yourself to someone and found yourself waiting for their response, exposed and vulnerable, left hanging in the balance, you know how God feels."

---

"Our first need is not for people to fix our problems.  People who charge in and have all the answers and try to make things right without first joining us in our pain generally annoy us, or worse yet, they push us away.  They have nothing to give us.  The God that Jesus points us to is not a god who stands at a distance, wringing his hands and saying, 'If only you’d listened to me.'  This is the God who holds out his hands and asks, 'Would you like to see the holes where the nails went?  Would that help?'"

---

"In matters of love, it’s as if God has agreed to play by the same rules we do.  God can do anything—that’s what makes God, God.  But God can’t do everything.  God can’t make us love him—that’s our choice.  Love is risky for God too."

---

"At the heart of the worldview of a Christian is the simple truth that people are worth dying for."

---

"Agape doesn’t love somebody because they’re worthy.  Agape makes them worthy by the strength and power of its love.  Agape doesn’t love somebody because they’re beautiful.  Agape loves in such a way that it makes them beautiful."

---

"What we do comes out of who we believe we are."

---

"Your worth does not come from your body, your mind, your work, what you produce, what you put out, how much money you make.  Your worth does not come from whether or not you have a man.  Your worth does not come from whether or not men notice you.  You have inestimable worth that comes from your creator.  You will continue to be tempted in a thousand different ways not to believe this.  The temptation will be to go searching for your worth and validity from places other than your creator.  Especially from men."

---

"When our trust has been betrayed and those who were supposed to stand by us don’t, this naturally has consequences for how we think about God.  It becomes hard to trust that God is good when our significant relationships aren’t that good."

---

"If you see me for who I really am, the me that no one else has ever seen, the me that I wouldn’t dare to show anybody else on the planet, the parts of me I’m not sure I want anybody to ever see, if I give you that kind of glimpse into the seat of my being, into my soul, will you still love me like you do now?  It’s our question for each other, and it’s our question for God."

---

"It is easy to take off your clothes and have sex.  People do it all the time.  But opening up your soul to someone, letting them into your spirit and thoughts and fears and future and hopes and dreams…that is being naked.  This is why when people sleep together after they’ve just met, they’re raising the chances significantly that the relationship will not survive.  Racing ahead of the progression always costs something.  When there is no common mission, no shared task, no sense of bone of bone and flesh of flesh, no bonds that take years to develop, many end up moving from relationship to relationship, having sex but never really being naked.  Too much too fast rarely endures."

---

Seriously, if you have not read this book, you need to.  Fantastic stuff.

Peace.

Pride = Pressure

I haven't blogged in a little over a week-ish.  Partly because I was at Cornerstone Festival in Illinois most all of last week and didn't have any kind of steady access to a computer.  There are other reasons I don't blog sometimes though.

...

I feel a pressure to blog.  I know that not more than 5 people even read this blog on any kind of consistent basis, but even still, I feel a pressure to process things that are interesting and be able to express my thoughts at least once every week and a half-ish in a blog.  I think it is good for me.

...

I've realized I treat my blogging habits a lot like my poor prayer habits.  When I feel like I've got myself all together and I can stand on my own two feet and my pride isn't incredibly damaged and I feel like I can cover up the disgraceful sinner I am a little bit, I have no problem holding dialogue with God.  

But...

When I know I'm wrong and I've screwed up and I feel the conviction of those situations, prayer is so hard for me.  My pride just makes grace very hard.  I don't want to be loved because that's just what God is: love.  I want to be loved because I'm good and I've earned it and I am worthy of love.  Even though that is never the case, sometimes it is easier to fool yourself about it more than others; at least it is for me.

...

Blogging is the same as prayer for me.  When I'm in a rut, and I know my mind is focusing on stupid things that I want to process out in the open but that wouldn't be the best thing... I just shut down.  

"I can't come to my blog readers with this crap!"  

"I could never blog about this junk!"  

"Hell, even thinking about this is a waste of time, how could blogging about it be worth anything?"

...

So I am sorry, but my pride and the pressure I put on myself cripples me.  Trust me, I know they are poor traits.  I dislike them about myself very much.  Changing some things about who you are just takes more time that others, and sometimes I'm not sure we are even the ones who can change ourselves (at least not alone).

Peace.

Soul Cravings - Destiny, Meaning, & Seek

The first section of Erwin McManus's book Soul Cravings is titled Intimacy.  The rest of the book is split up into 3 sections titled Destiny, Meaning, and Seek.

Here are some quotes from Destiny, Meaning, and Seek.

...

"You cannot live the life God created you to live without being ambitious.  The reason your heart leaps when you see greatness is that your spirit is drawn to it.  The reason we can experience the vicarious exhilaration of a great victory or an amazing accomplishment is that the human spirit resonates with greatness.  While many of us have come to believe ambition is unhealthy, the truth is when you lose ambition, you lose your future.  When you lose your future, you lose hope.  And no one can live well without hope.  Without ambition we have no dreams worth living.  When we let our dreams die, we start dying with them."

---

"God created us to engage, solve problems, meet needs, do something with our lives.  He made us to get involved and expects us to act.  That’s why someone like Mother Teresa helps us believe in God.  Human compassion reflects God and moves us toward God."

---

"We were created to believe in progress and to pursue it with passion.  It is God who designed us this way.  He made us creative, and he holds us responsible.  Somehow there are many of us who have missed this point.  We have allowed human history to be shaped by those who do not reflect God’s value for love, for beauty, and for justice."

---

"Humans are not content to simply survive, we are driven to thrive.  It’s not enough for us to merely exist; we are compelled to achieve.  This drive would not even exist without a concept of time.  We understand that each day is not a reoccurring cycle of static events.  The human experience is not only that time moves, but that we do too.  We have been created with not only awareness but a need for progress."

---

"Take a few minutes sometime and find your nearest cemetery.  Walk through the memorials there representing the lives of a countless number of people who lived before you.  You will see different dates of birth and times of death, but they will all have one thing in common—the dash between the two.  To everyone who is a stranger, our dash will be just that, a space holder in between the pertinent information.  But for those who know us, the dash represents the totality of our lives."

---

"Is it possible that the reason we find God in our deepest despair is that this is when we are most earnestly listening?"

---

"Atheist, agnostic, existentialist, humanist, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, Christian—we all need to believe that somehow our lives matter.  There is a reason for our existence, a reason to live, and if we can’t find it, we’ll just make it up.  And if we lack imagination, then we’ll just medicate ourselves, sedate ourselves, intoxicate ourselves, indulge ourselves, deceive ourselves, or just simply come to the end of ourselves."

---

"To go beyond feeling, to go beyond compassion, you have to believe that it is right to act, that you were created to bring change.  If Jesus was nothing else, he was an activist for change.  To be a follower of Christ is to believe that everyone’s life can be different.  No one is defined by the status of their birth.  Our destiny is not limited to our pedigree.  Every human being is of equal value to God.  No one must remain a prisoner of fate."

---

"Faith is simply the word for trust when used in relation to God."

---

"Over the years, I found that cynicism is a way of escape.  You’ve believed, you’ve trusted, you’ve put yourself out there, and you’ve gotten hurt.  Someone lied to you, or betrayed you, or maybe it was even God.  He just didn’t show when you needed him.  So you retreat to the only place you know to go.  You go hide inside your own soul and decide that you can trust no one but yourself.  In the end, this is at the heart of the path that leads us to trust only in ourselves."

---

"God himself stepped into human history so that we would know that he is not only the source of truth, but that he is utterly and completely trustworthy."

---

"Whatever religion is used to manipulate or control people, I consider it the enemy of humanity and the enemy of God."

---

"Never let anyone tell you that God is offended by your questions.  Your questions will lead you to God.  Your soul craves meaning even as it longs for God.  To search for one is to find the other.  Go ahead—question everything.  We’re all trying to make sense of this life that we’ve been thrown into.  A lot of times the world doesn’t help the process at all.  We experience pain, disappointment, tragedy, betrayal.  It fills us with doubt and bitterness and leaves us confused.  I love that God understands that, that he knows life’s a struggle."

---

"Some people who do not believe in God are consistent and don’t believe in love either.  No primary evidence.  In fact, my nonscientific research has found a direct correlation between losing faith in love and losing faith in God.  But for many people it is at this point where they simply live with the inconsistency.  You can’t see God; you can’t prove God in the laboratory.  Believing in God is a stretch, but they believe in love.  But you can’t see love.  You can’t prove love.  The only evidence available is secondary.  No primary evidence.  Yet when you love someone, you are more certain of that than of almost anything else.  Love reminds us there is a knowing beyond reason."

---

"For love to exist it doesn’t even require reciprocation."

---

"No matter how hard your life is, if you can imagine a different one, it somehow seems to pull you through.  You can stomach who you are, no matter how much you hate yourself, if you can somehow believe that one day you’ll become someone different."

---

"I guess it will never be easy, but Jesus made it possible.  You don’t have to be afraid to commit your life to someone who gives his life for you."

---

This book is a great read for a person who is new to Christianity or doesn't really know what they believe.  

Even though that is who I think McManus wrote the book for, I still enjoyed it very much.  Seriously, check it out.

Peace.

Soul Cravings - Intimacy

I finished a book called Soul Cravings by Erwin McManus not too long ago.  I loved it.  I wound up getting 79 quotes from the book (I wasn't kidding when I said I was a big quote guy!).  

There is no way I'm putting up 79 quotes in a blog post, so I'm going to split the book into 2 sections. 

There is a section in the book called Intimacy and then there are 3 other sections in the book that I didn't get as many quotes from.  So here are some of my favorites from the Intimacy section.

...

"If you try to ignore it, if you think that you can live your life without love, you’re in even worse shape than the person who’s desperate to find it."

---

"When love does not come to you, it breaks your heart, but when you do not give love away, it hardens your heart."

---

"Our need to love, though rooted in God, is not limited to him.  Love is not a limited commodity.  Love expands as we give it away.  Love dies when we do not."

---

"Love is not about how many people we have used, but how much we have cherished one person.  I’ve come to find over time that players are the ones who are most afraid.  They are afraid to love, and so they make it a game.  They’re terrified of loving deeply, and so they keep everything superficial.  I think deep inside they wonder whether any woman could actually love them if she really knew who he was."

---

"Home is ultimately not about a place to live but about the people with whom you are most fully alive."

---

"When it comes to love, often we are our own worst enemies.  When we’ve been hurt in the past, when we feel that love has betrayed us, we can easily become the enemies of love.  To see if it’s real, we do everything we can to destroy it.  We tell ourselves we’re testing it, but actually we’re resisting it."

---

"The truth of the matter is that we’re uncomfortable with God.  We’re disoriented by the way he loves.  We want God to love us for an endless number of good reasons.  At the same time, we find ourselves nervous before him because he sees right through us and knows everything that isn’t lovable.  He tells us that he is our place of rest and acceptance and unconditional love, yet we cannot reconcile this love.  We know who we are.  We know all that is unlovely within us.  We wonder how we have become worthy of such love, and that’s what worries us—we know we’re not.  So we run.  We run from God because he sees us best; we run from God to escape our own sense of unworthiness; we run from God because we are certain that the closer we come to him, the more guilt and shame we will feel."

---

"It is just too hard to believe that if you come near to God, you will find yourself not drowning in condemnation, but swimming in compassion.  Jesus called to all who were weary and who found their souls exhausted to come to him and find rest.  He is telling us that God will be for us our place called home.  We run from God because we long to be loved and we have convinced ourselves that the One who is most loving could not and would not embrace us.  We run from the One our souls crave."

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"What in the world would happen if people actually began discovering the actual message of Jesus Christ—that love is unconditional?  What would happen if we began to realize that God was not, in fact, waiting for us to earn his love, but that he was passionately pursuing us with his love?  What would happen if the word got out that Jesus was offering his love freely and without condition?  Would anyone actually choose to be a slave to ritual and legalism when he could have relationship and love?  The answer, unfortunately, is yes.  The reason religion works is that we believe in conditional love and doubt the existence of unconditional love."

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"What we have described as love has become something so superficial, something so thin and without substance, that pretty much anything qualifies as love.  If we really knew love, if we knew deep, profound, unending love, maybe we wouldn’t love chocolate.  While I’m sure God appreciates all these things (after all, he is the Creator of all that is good and perfect), creation is not the object of his affection.  When it comes to love, you exist in a unique category.  There are a lot of things that are on that list.  He can re-create whatever he wants.  You, however, are not on that list.  You are unique and irreplaceable."

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"You are the object of God’s love."

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"This is the story of God: he pursues you with his love and pursues you with his love, and you have perhaps not said yes.  And even if you reject his love, he pursues you ever still.  It was not enough to send an angel or a prophet, for in issues of love, you must go yourself.  And so God has come.  This is the story of Jesus, that God has walked among us and he pursues us with his love.  He is very familiar with rejection but is undeterred.  And he is here even now, still pursuing you with his love."

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"There is only one reason for God to come himself, because in issues of love, you just can’t have someone else stand in for you."

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"Religion exists not because God loves us too little, but because we need love so much.  In the end all religions misrepresent God.  They either dictate requirements for love or simply become a requiem for love.  I think many of us have rightly given up on God on this basis alone.  We’ve been told that God is a reluctant lover and that his standards must be met before there can be any talk of love.  This is lunacy.  Love exists because God is love.  Our souls will never find satisfaction until our hearts have found this love that we so desperately yearn for."

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"Jesus, it seems, is certain that the more you love God, the more you will love people."

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"The truth is, we were designed for relationship, and when our relationships don’t work, they affect how we see God, how we relate to God, and even whether we will believe in him."

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"Our need for relationship comes from the core of our being.  It would be the greatest of tragedies to sacrifice others in the effort to find ourselves.  Our souls crave to belong.  The experience of love, though it emanates from God, is not limited to him.  We are created for each other."

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"If God is at the core of something, if he exists at the hot, flaming center, what you’re going to find is love.  Jesus knew this all too well.  He warned us against the trappings of hypocrisy. When those who claim to represent him are unloving, those searching for God might conclude he is as well.  The problem, of course, is that we are all hypocrites in transition.  I am not who I want to be, but I am on the journey there, and thankfully I am not whom I used to be."

---

"Honesty is the only context in which intimacy can develop."

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"Love, no matter how you come at it, is a huge risk.  It makes it easier for me to remember that God will never reject me because I’m not good enough and that any community that has His heart will embrace me as I am.  Jesus invites us into a community where imperfect people can find acceptance, love, forgiveness, and a new beginning."

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"There may be no greater proof of God than the power of community.  There may be no greater gift than a place to belong.  While it may seem that you’re selling out to admit you need people, the irony is that you’ll never really know yourself until you’re in a healthy community.  We only truly come to know ourselves in the context of others.  The more isolated and disconnected we are, the more shattered and distorted our self-identity."

---

"The power of community is that is helps us understand ourselves.  In a healthy community we come to know ourselves and find strength in that knowledge.  In community we learn how to live a life beyond ourselves, we begin to discover our potential and our strengths, and we are best positioned to make out greatest contribution."

---

"God can lead you through even the most painful tragedies if you ask him for his wisdom and allow him to help you make sense of your life."

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"He gambled everything on the power of love.  That love was more powerful than hate.  That love was more powerful than death.  What was he thinking to die for us, to give himself for you and for me, knowing we might just kiss him on the face and then walk away?  Love’s just crazy like that."

---

Part 2 is coming.  

Peace.

Sometimes It's Too Much

I'm not sure, but I would imagine most people can sympathize with me. Sometimes you can just find yourself in such an emotional rut that you can't make sense about how you feel or what you think about a ton of different things.  

The only thing you can really make out of these kinds of situations is that everything is very intense.  

...

Sometimes its amazing, sometimes its terrible.  Sometimes its just confusing.  

The only thing I can make out tonight is how much I don't feel like myself.  The only thing I know is how lost I feel in some ways and how I don't feel lost at all in other ways.  The only thing I know is how intense it is.

...

I guess it all comes down to what it is we are talking about; specifics. This isn't the place to have that conversation though.  Sorry.

Peace.

Blissful Moments

I just finished a book called Soul Cravings by Erwin McManus.  I absolutely loved it.

You all know that I will, of course, post a huge blog containing all my favorite quotes from the book (of which there are a TON), but for now I just want to focus on one quote.

...

"Have you ever experienced an entirely blissful moment? A moment when everything was right in the world? Can you remember how you didn't have a care in the world? Or at least so it seemed. I've had many times like this. And ironically it wasn't because everything in life was exactly as I wanted. I have never had that moment--maybe because my expectations are too high. But what I did have was a wonderful sense of optimism. When you lack hope, you feel powerless to change anything and certain that nothing will change. When you have hope, you are able to see the beauty and potential of every circumstance. Life is filled with wonder. Hope empowers us to pursue our dreams."

...

I know EXACTLY what moments he is talking about in that paragraph. I love those moments so much; those are my favorite moments in life. Those are the moments where I really do feel happy.

I miss those moments. I haven't had moments like that consistently in a long long time. This last school year I actually became very aware of the lack of these moments in my life and had a couple conversations with people about that. I'm almost not sure which is more painful, to not experience those moments or to recognize you haven't had those moments and consciously long for them.

...

I'm working on it though.  I'm getting hope back in my life; a healthy kind of hope. Not the hope of ambitions and desires I prop up, but a more generic hope of what I feel is coming. Good things are coming. Good things. Blissful things.

...

Peace

God Loves The World

God so loved the world that he sent his one and only begotten son that whoever should believe in him will never perish but have eternal life.

John 3:16

This verse is so popular.  It's such a good summarization of  the Christian faith.

...

What hit me recently was the phrasing of the first 5 words of this verse: "God so loved the world."

I know that Christians can get really caught up in trying to separate ourselves from the world and completely detach.  We try to exist in a place but simultaneously not look or touch anything around us that we don't label "safe."

It isn't nearly as bad in all cases as it is in others.  I've caught myself occasionally slipping into a mindset that attempts to discard the world as worthless, but some people carry a condemning perspective that tints the way they see everything in our world.

I can certainly concede that the world is a fallen place and far from what it should be.  Even still, I think it is a nasty pitfall to get caught in when you fail to see anything that comes of the world as anything other than useless or, lacking merit or, (in a worst case scenario) evil.

...

I just love how John phrased that verse.  

God so loved the world that he sent his son to die for it. Period.  

...

I can't imagine anything better than being able to look at things in the world and people in the world and see the intrinsic beauty that God sees as a product of him, the Creator. When God looks at drug-dealers and adulterers, porn-stars and murderers, thieves and liars, all he sees are his children that he loves with all his heart.  Albeit, children that are lost and children he is longing to come back to him, but these are people that God is absolutely crazy about.

How soon when we deal with those people do we run out of mercy and grace? How soon do we shower them with our judgement?  Way too soon.

I can't imagine anything better than getting to a place where when we see those people we see them through God's eyes and not our own.  I can't imagine anything better than looking at the world and the numerous things in it that we are so ready to condemn and ridicule, and instead see the awesome characteristic that God sees in them.

...

I don't think we are supposed to burn records and ban books.  I don't think we are supposed to shut ourselves off and turn away from the things the world creates.  I think we are supposed to reach our hands out and polish things so they shine like they were meant to.  I think we should see things in the same light Jesus would see them.  I think we should look at people through the same lens Jesus did.  And then love them.

Peace.

Starving Jesus

I already posted a blog about how I am a big quotes guy. 

I just finished a book called Starving Jesus by Craig Gross and J.R. Mahon.  These guys are from the XXXChurch.com ministry, but the book isn't about that ministry.  Here are some quotes I liked.

 

(Since the book is written by two guys, if it is a quote from Craig I'll put CG in parenthesizes after the quote and JR for quotes from J.R.)

...

 

"Satan does a great job ministering to those in the church who love the fame and power associated with helping others heal.  You can get drunk on helping people change their lives. Unchecked, the lie becomes “God had little to do with it, and I am solely responsible for this new life.”  Believe that lie long enough and you start believing your own press.  Satan then devours those seeking themselves by helping them celebrate their own self-centeredness.  In the long run, the lie turns into a self-righteous theology that says, “I am the bottom line in the lives of people.”  The ministry quickly becomes about a man and what the man has to say or not say." (CG)

---        

"Jesus understands the human drive to be important and valued by other people.  He is here to set us free from ourselves.  The freedom needs to express itself in selflessness and service to others.  He’s looking for your reaction to the world to be that of a servant." (CG)

---

"Paul, James, Luke, Mark, and countless others who have followed in their footsteps all dealt with the truth and its ability to set us free from sin.  Their evangelizing tactics differed from one another, yet what they said and how they said it was so offensive to the world that most of them wound up dead at the hands of another man or country." (CG)

---

"Be willing to fight the good fight every day.  This doesn’t mean we match wits with the world. It means we are to be salt and light, to let the world see our good deeds so they, the world, can praise the Father.  We collectively need to offend the senses of the world with the truth.  The life of Christ was, is, and always will be offensive to the world." (CG)

--

“Sometimes I think we have lost our nerve as followers of Christ.  I often think if we lived under the threat of death in this country, similar to what the early church faced, we would be on our game.  The early church knew what the deal was.  They knew it was only a matter of time before they were going to be put in jail and crucified.  Paul called himself a prisoner of Christ.  The first time I read that, I thought, That ain’t for me.  Think about it: Their message was so disturbing, so offensive, that they knew it meant death.  When Jesus told his disciples, 'Take up your cross and follow me,' he was not talking about some little mission or job; he was talking about dying for the cause." (CG)

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"The world has come to identify us by what we hate and what we are offended by, instead of by what we love or why we love." (CG)

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"Whether it’s a porn-show outreach, feeding the homeless, or painting your neighbor’s house, we must meet people the same way Jesus did—unafraid of what the truth will do for them." (CG)

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"Perhaps more than anyone in history, Paul understood his role of offending like Jesus.  We often like to dismiss Scriptures from Paul, because they make us responsible to all the people around us.  Paul says, 'By all possible means I might save some' (1 Cor. 9:22).  All possible means.  That Scripture is not a loaded gun giving you license to be a complete idiot in the name of Christ, but it is the freedom to go, do, and say what you need to.  To say it to anyone, anywhere, at any time.  Actually, it is a responsibility." (CG)

---

"You want to know if you’re listening to God?  Ask yourself one question: Who am I predominantly concerned with when I am making decisions?  Is it you and your plans?  Is it God and his already-established will for you, found in his Word?  It takes a lot of guts to answer this question.  Answering means you will come face-to-face with yourself.  If you are answering honestly, you will gain the understanding that you walk with Christ has very little to do with you plans and design.  It is solely about serving God and those around you.  That question should be in your breast pocket at all times.  Use it as a guidepost for making decisions." (CG)

---

"Put down the life you think you need, and open yourself up to the life Christ has designed." (CG)

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"He gave himself until they killed him.  His resurrection means you need to do the same." (CG)

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"If you’re looking for God to tell you directly what to do, you are not studying the Word, and you’re definitely not understanding that this ain’t about you." (CG)

---

"Giving should equal relationships.  We should be striving to build new friendships and new communities every day.  We should be looking constantly for ways to inject our newfound freedom into the lives of those lost and looking for Christ.  Giving is not about the church, it’s about the faith Christ had in us to give.  He sat on a hill two thousand years ago and assumed we would." (CG)

---

"Christ knew we would struggle with prayer.  He knew praying to a God we can’t see or touch would be problematic.  That’s why he taught us exactly how to pray.  That’s why he challenged the disciples to pray.  Jesus would go off for hours—sometimes all night—and pray.  He did this consistently, so you and I would know the value of prayer, the value of talking with the Father alone about whatever… It was simply asking God to do whatever it is we cannot or sometimes just don’t want to do." (JR)

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"We understand that works aren’t saving us or anyone else, for that matter, but works designed to inspire people to Christ will help answer the most important question in the world: Who is Jesus?" (CG)

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"I will walk with him, because he is my life.  Maybe that’s a little perfunctory, but that’s all it is and all it has to be." (CG)

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"Church is sinful because we are sinful.  We as a body are prone to wander from God; God doesn’t wander from us." (JR)

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"When you act out your faith, when you move toward God, it is often the hardest thing to comprehend, especially when it produces fruit you can touch, eat, and share.  From nothing stems something.  This is how God gets it done.  But how can it be true?  How can God, whom we have never seen, never heard, interact with us?  How can God change our lives after the collection of garbage we manage to amass in a lifetime?  Yet somehow when we step forward in a belief that says he can and will, he shows up and we come to understand he is our salvation, our hope, and our freedom from whatever sin takes us down." (JR)

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I've certainly read better, but it was worth the read.  Check it out and tell me what you think.

 

Peace.