Oh I am excited about getting to play Deadlands tonight with the group in person for the first time since New Years! Hooray! ^_^
No more staticy skype calls for at least two weeks!

Migraine, day two...or is it three?
I'm not sure which.
But do your worse.

Quote of the Day:

“If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end; if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin, and in the end, despair.”
-C.S. Lewis

I worry so much about the imaginary...I wish letting go of everything was that easy.

The funny thing about people is that we DON'T let go of something...even if it is unhealthy...we have to be forced to let go...the type of person who willingly moves on from the unhealthy is perhaps the rarest types amongst all people.

It is only by loosing everything we hold dear...that keeps up placated and in one place...only by loosing it all can we be free to see who we really are, free to become what we are meant to be.

Things...only blind and hold back.
People it seems too.

353

I don't quite understand why my body works so hard against me...but I have...some hope here and there...

Who am I kidding?

My only hope is Christ and that this shell and soul will be redeemed...that this age will pass away soon...and the next will bring peace...will bring hope.
That is all I have.
Oh come quickly.
Let this heart not worry,
let this soul find rest
even in this world of chaos
and the pain ripping through me.
My body and soul needing rest
but not finding it...
Let there be a measure of relief,
just carry me through this night
love me Lover.

I...want to go wandering throughout this snowy wasteland.
Feeling the cold pierce my bones.
My body is broken and my soul feels...

It's amazing how much more lame I get with each passing day.

One foot forward while loosing several steps at the same time.
Life is full of silliness...to become bitter is stupid.
There are too many good things to let disappointment crush me.
A smile is fit for every occasion, garnished with tears or otherwise.

Flames Within the Shadows

I've bitten on the fruit
and feel the poison spread.
The finger I point
that spreads the venom I accuse
is just a misdirection.
Hoping I can hide who I really am
from the masses, from you
and most of all me.

I'll never be able to run far enough
to hide from You,
all I can do is embrace the lies
and hope I can hide underneath my shame.

It's true I'll fight You ever step
just so I can hold onto my pride
and bathe once again
in this Hellish flame.

Collect these tears in a basin
and catch them before they fall,
let they be a reminder
for the past, for this present
and carry me into the future
as I want to leave here forevermore.

Carry me in grace
or let me fall to Sheol,
just don't leave me here.
No longer in this purgatory.
Don't leave me here.

Lord...what am I doing?
Really?

Oh insomnia...old friend...we meet again...
I do wish you would stop stirring up my thoughts though.
Being a fatal optimist is hard enough without your intervention.

Ack.
Oh.
There is no...
Well there...maybe...

But...maybe...just that...thought...

Quote of the Day:

“It's no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.”
-Mark Twain

Reiteration

Acid etch this soul,
leave a mark
just as You can,
make it new
and draw out anything worthwhile
that may be left.

Make this as it can be,
make it the best
and dry every tear
of every broken heart
and take away the fear
from every crippled soul,
just be.

Help me forget me
and just burn away
this profane emotion
and make it possible,
just plausible
for there to be renewal
because I don't
I just can't
see what You see.

All I see is this wall,
coated in everything I am not
and everything lacking.
Rambling, loose words
in need of loosing.








Never.
Silence.
Pain.

But as sure as I am of pain,
hope refuses to leave
even as I try to cast it out,
here it shall be.
Take me,
redeem me.
Love me.
Please.

"the storm it rages in my heart, the endless empty roars in my ears
my world is coming all apart, i've no strength left to dry my tears
and through it all i hear your voice, breaking my heart, breaking my will
calms the storm inside of my soul as you whisper 'peace, be still...'"

I have never been happier to do a little cleaning...every little bit helps.
There is no obligation or pressure...so it's easier to act out of love...

I just wish it was this easy to show love to everyone and...I wish this wasn't such an issue of convenience for me.

On the Way to Midway

I saw the clouds part in splendor
showing both heaven and earth
encased with a red hue.
Fireflies danced off the window
as my eyes looked
and searched
for what was never there.

This moment,
this trip,
this very second
was years in the making.
Except I was in the wrong direction,
the wrong place.
Everything I had assimilated
and exported in reason and mind
was because of this.
Was it not?

What is it you are looking for?
Who did you expect?
Are you surprised this tomb is empty?

The slab of rock is broken
but still awaits
what is the next sacrifice.

I play at metaphors
while waxing at sacraments,
not knowing of the things
of which I speak.

I dreamed from my chair
that I could see the sunlight
refracted in your eyes,
that red mixed with blue
making a haze
which startled me to waking.

Of where do silly dreams come?
What is this madness which seizes us?
Drives us?
Compels us to come?

I cannot begin to express what I wish
because I do not even know it.
I sat there typing a letter,
sending words
to a man dead for sixteen years.
Fluttering thoughts to the heavens
and whatever is in the in-between.

I spoke of fear and trembling,
doubt that refines the soul
just as sure as the sacrifice will.

There is pain in offering my hope
and fear
and dream
and whoever is foolish enough to follow after me.

I did not intend to get here
but somehow I did.

Thoughts, metaphors and the like.
Where this ends...I know not.
I just know it is some new beginning
when all I asked for
was just a single resolution.

"I've got a ticket to the moon
I'll be leaving here any day soon
Yeah, I've got a ticket to the moon
But I'd rather see the sunrise in your eyes.

Got a ticket to the moon
I'll be rising high above the earth so soon
And the tears I cry might turn into the rain
That gently falls upon your window
You'll never know."

...and going...going...gone from Mobile...

Tonight went so much better than I thought it would.
Just getting to laugh some...and have some...happy seconds.
Was nice.
Warm fire.
Tasty smores.

Why am I so stressed out?
What does this even matter at this point anyway...

I just realized how asinine me trying to maintain friendships with eternal optimists is.

Stress.
Stress.
Oh stress...

Please quite this ragging storm within me...pride, anger, lust, terror...radical idolatry and the fact I exist is proof enough I am broken...I can't handle this burden...the pain of carrying all of these broken things on my back...

"I am made of parts that freeze and ligaments that atrophy
Though they look they’ll never see
They don’t know something’s wrong with me
And just as well, I’ll never tell what’s underneath the scales
I’ve worn to thin to honor you, my every effort fails
So bury me with Israel and cover up my tracks
Leave not a trace of what I was, I’m never coming back
And if you’re mercy falls upon he whose blood is cold
Unearth me with your hands of love and never break your hold

The world is full of ones like me
Who need to see the truth
But the truth is never truth indeed
The truth is only you"

Meh.
I'm so not in the mood to be a hero right now...

I swear I am not a masochist...I just have bouts of temporal stupidity where I forget where I am just long enough to open myself up for more.

Blaise

Everything I was is nothing that I am.
Such shadows glimmer
as they fade away,
burning out in the night
as rays of life pass through.

Reasoning and resonance,
hope eternal
and grace abounding
in this empty hole.

Quote of the Day:

"This must be Thursday, I never could get the hang of Thursdays."
-Arthur Dent

Oh goodness...my thought process, my ability to comprehend is so so shallow...I know so very little...it is as if the last decade of me studying Christian doctrine and serving has been just to demonstrate to my mid-twenties that all I know is that I know nothing.

Thank you Socrates.
Anything else I should know whilst on my less than merry way?

I need...I need...freedom and to breath and peace.
All of these things...and so much more.

So many free flowing thoughts at an hour that should be too early for people to be allowed to make important decisions.

And...ye gads...my body freaking hates me.
Is it too much to ask that I simply live and not feel like burning exploding magma filled death on top of an emotional turmoil?
Ack.

So strange to care at this late of an hour.

"Blessed be Your Name" - Tree63

I'm so tired...of everything.
Vanity...vanity...such endless and useless vanity.
Does the stress, the conflicting confusion...the pain of breath ever end?

Is there solace when the Lover comes for his broken and lame wife?
Will there be a healing when the two are reunited?
The realm of reality has been spinning out of control since the fall...how much longer can things simply just hold together?

I need peace.
I need rest.
My spirit feels more broken now than ever...I cry out in such mutterings that only the Spirit can understand and translate.

I long for freedom...to feel the wind on my face and taste the salt spray on my tongue.

Maybe me feeling called to the west coast was just a delusion...or maybe it is a season to come. I just know...I just feel...I wish I could live with no human interaction. The pain...is too much.

So much of Jesus is in me...because it is the only part of me that loves people and wants to sacrifice for them...but a such greater part of me hates people and wishes to take my rage and seethe. I want to find solace in the dark so my heart can become stone so I will never feel the stirrings of Jesus and of love...

I just long for solace.
For peace eternal.
All from beyond my broken world.

If my stress levels get much higher I am just going to...well there is nothing I can say.

I will simply just be really, really, really stressed.

*sigh*

Quote of the Day:

“For it is great to surrender one's hope, but greater still to abide by it steadfastly after having surrendered it; for it is great to seize hold of the eternal hope, but greater still to abide steadfastly by one's worldly hopes after having rendered them.”
-Soren Kierkegaard

...did i just wake up?

Quite obviously that was stupid...but what is done is done...it is not like I can find any sort of solace these days anyway.

Poetically Portly Poetry

Dichotomy

Split into partitions we wait,
time making fools of us
just as the sand is passing by
drawing life's breath to abate.

Redundantly the lines cross
falling out of space
just as it is out of time
removing abstracts
and stranding you
with the concrete.

It is the mechanics,
the gears twisting
as the servos click and turn
making this circular madness
into something all too real,
too caustic for emotion
but unavoidable
because of bare flesh.

Wasting away
as only this one can,
just hold out for the night
and pray the resolution
is less a revolution
and just a little something
with more peace,
where the night may end
after the day has passed.
And all that will ever be may be
and the day may pass
into the dark reaches of peace.

Oie...time for a job interview... >_<

Here goes everything and nothing!

Huzzah!

Well esteemed...

Quote of the Day:

"They shall have stars at elbow and foot/ Though they go mad they shall be sane/ Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again/ Though lovers be lost love shall not/ And death shall have no dominion."
-Dylan Thomas

"But what wisdom is there within us
To live based on the feeling of our hearts
How many times has instinct let us down
Never to be thought through
Never to be questioned
Say what you really mean
When your ambition calls you
For what use is there in praying
If you will only hear what you want to hear?"

It is morning.

Yes.

It is.

Being around a group of people...being able to connect...to be a center of attention and make people laugh...almost never do I feel more alive and afterward never do I feel so empty and certain of my own futility and irrelevance.

At least I found out the cafeteria is open until midnight these days and the calzone I ate was flipping awesome.

It is so utterly bizarre to have a study group in my room right now. O_O
There shouldn't be THIS many people here...it is...

...strange.

Yes.

"The sunlight is fading,
the longest shadows have been cast.
Like songs from a siren,
hurricanes from the past.
And I am a failure,
defeated every time,
so let me lie here,
a sidewalk for a shrine.

I am so lonely,
they say you were lonely too.
dear God be my savior,
I wait for you."

I am sure it is merely my vanity of vanities that seeks to find resonance between the life of Kierkegaard and myself...but surely the parallels are not just the blossoms of my overactive imagination.

Quote of the Day:

“I seem forsaken and alone, / I hear the lion roar; / And every door is shut but one, / And that is Mercy's door.”
-William Cowper

Oh thundering rain...fall down and wash away...wash away this headache and confusing state of being.

I really do not like...

I am feeling so...worn out with life...and just hearing the same words and phrases again and again.

After a while the words start to loose their meaning.

It could be about Jesus or sex.

I'm just sick of words loosing their meaning and me having to hear it...again and again. Something sacred should be treated as thus...and it's just so irritating to hear the same words...again and again.

Stupid!
Stupid!
Stupid!
Stupid!
Stupid!
Stupid!
STUPID!

I'm feeling lost in this...lost here and being within the boundaries of love and falling in and out because of You.
Chasing...running...falling again and again.
Just to find the answer...here and there...
...there and here.
Is it really coloring outside the lines
if it means getting lost in You?

I forgot that I was ahead about being behind when I quit.
Just needed to jot that down somewhere for future reference.

So tired...so much pain...so alone... =/

And now...a migraine.

Jesus...seriously?

Did I do something to make this the weekend from Hell?

Free to Run, Free to Feel, Free to See

You know...I'm not even sure what I would have done if things would have worked out 'perfectly'.

More than likely just panic, freak out and screw things up like I normally do.

Providence rarely makes sense from a finite perspective.

But there is the need to hope that...all of this will be okay...


I long to see fields of flowers
and feel the warm breeze on my face.
I remember when we were kids,
free to run through woods
and to play carefree.

Time was just a friend,
the seconds ticking away
until we could play
and imagine a new life
free of all pain.

Adventures anew
with every day
and I just long
to feel the freedom
that comes with faith
and belief in friends.

I just wish I could see you
and know it wasn't just dreams
conducting me on this path
but the words are so true
even when my faith is weak
and I need to be healed.

I just want to take you by the hand
and show you this childhood memory.
Tales of dragons and elves,
of good winning over evil
and the hope that this make believe
can one day be true.

Senseless frustration because I cannot let go and simply just adapt to the changing streams of life.

Being able to do everything except what I feel I want to do the most is perhaps the single most frustrating thing I have felt in recent memory.

Outside of the whole feeling like death thing.

That is slightly irksome.

"I Surrender All" - Newsboys

"When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of Glory died
My richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride

See from his head, his hands, his feet
Sorrow and love flow mingled down
Did ever such love and sorrow meet
Or thorns compose so rich a crown

O the wonderful cross, O the wonderful cross
Bids me come and die and find that I may truly live
O the wonderful cross, O the wonderful cross
All who gather here by grace draw near and bless
Your name

Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were an offering far too small
Love so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul, my life, my all"

I know it is wrong to despair...but I am hurting so badly right now.
My body hates me and vice versa...

This reminds me so much of China...incredible pain and feeling so far away from everything and everyone...

Father help me to speak praises instead of curses, I want to scream until my throat goes numb and I can pass out from the pain...I don't understand why I have to hurt so much...it just feels like fire is inside my body burning me.

Please give me some measure of relief?
I understand me being alone...I'm accepting that...but do I have to suffer in my body as well? My spirit is broken and the shell it resides in is just a few steps away...

Carpenter, what is it you want of me?

"Take this broken heart
If it brings You praise
Take this beaten soul
Shivering hands I will raise
Hope unstoppable
Sing the morning sun:
'Wake up, oh sleeper
The daylight has come'

You are, You are
Invincible
You are, You are
Unbreakable"

What a lucky jerk.

And I think I have food poisoning.

Why is it the smallest gestures of kindness make me want to burst out crying?
I wish I wasn't so prone to deep emotions...

Quote of the Day:

“May I kiss you then? On this miserable paper? I might as well open the window and kiss the night air.”
-Franz Kafka

"I’m languorously open-ended and the ending’s no good
I’ve been told to break the mold and I would if I could
But apathy is easier than caring at all
And the undulating nothingness means having a ball

Incredibly impressive and bereft of concern
Lobotomized and optimized and then I’m ready to burn
At war within myself and self is winning the fight
Because feeling like no one at all means feeling alright

Sense of purpose has got me feeling worthless
And I’m fading away, but that’s okay"

...and again.

...I absolutely hate these moments of feeling like a stupid little kid again...

Mea Maxima Culpa

Empty veins running dry
just filled with remnants
of bare faced contempt.

Light playing tricks
as shadows dart across
and the sun fades,
light all at a loss.

Hope, that insufferable
and impossible state of becoming
blossoms through these scales,
sin incapable of stopping.

...the question I have to ask...is how serious are you being?
What is...this?
Is that what you really want?
Everything in life has been building up for...and THIS is it?

Megalomania is the life for me.

Quote of the Day:

“Peace if possible, truth at all costs.”
-Martin Luther

Unraveling and falling so hard...

I can't decide if I am trying to be realistic or I am just giving into cynicism in order to protect myself from the inevitable pain of living.

To live is to hurt...to act is to bring pain...but there is still beauty and wonder...even at the lowest levels of human misery...things we never would have known or seen unless we fell from such a great height and suffered in such a manner that only serves to point back to the cross.

I can wish...and hope for Love to win...to save the day.

But the test is one of endurance...how long can I go on while feeling as though all I hold dear is an infinite number of lifetimes away?

"Healing hands of God have mercy on our unclean souls once again.
Jesus Christ, Light of the World,
burning bright within our hearts forever.
Freedom means love without condition,
without beginning or an end.
Here's my heart, let it be forever Yours,
only You can make every new day seem so new."

I'm trying not to hate me most of all...but...Lord I do not see what You see...what do You see in me?

Blithering Waste of Space

...why do some people depend on me?
I would rather just...hide than have to touch that pain.

Jesus I'm so freaking sick of being a hypocrite...being paralyzed by my fear and the fact that being able to do ministry means having to rip my heart open so I can be healed.

I have so many thoughts and theories that I am lost...so lost and I do not know my right hand from my left...I don't know what is wrong or even right...I want...I NEED to know what matters...what is good, what is true...what is worth fighting and living for.

I have so many vague sketches about what You want me to do...everything around feels so fleeting and fading...how can I do anything of worth? How can I be of any impact when the languages being spoke are so foreign to me?

Thinking I was ever meant to be a minister...or a husband or a father...just feels so stupid. I can't even be a good boyfriend or a theology student...I've failed and screwed so much up with people...how many people have I shoved further from You because of my worthless tongue and my inability to articulate emotion?

It feels like living in a vacuum alone is preferable to a life of constant fear of speaking because of fear of people...fear of me...but mostly a fear of You.

I'm sick of being apathetic towards those who depend on me for some reason...I love my pithy sayings...oh how I love my philosophical quotes that garner me attention...I've done nothing but worn the cross as a merit badge to get what I have wanted...no wonder I have been wandering in this wilderness for so long.

I want to swear, I want to scream to the heavens to get you to hear me...I want to beat these cinder blocks with my fists until they are a bloody mess...I feel such anguish and outrage in my soul when I look at the church...and when I look at myself.

How did we...how did *I* get so far away from simple love of You, others and ourselves?

I have all this wasteful energy to spend...that I try to spend on myself...and so what? For what? What good? What beauty comes of this disgusting heart and mind that only craves death and sin?

I have hope...stupid hope of seeing things through with people...of maybe seeing some sort of future materialize our of thin air...but it is stupid and childish dreams that will never be.

The reality feels...it seems like I will never be able to function as the other half of any sort of relationship...platonic or otherwise...I cannot even master the basic steps of loving You...how can I deal with someone that will destroy my heart again and again?

Why do I always want to run?
By what stupid means do I stand here now?
Is it by faith...or hope or even love?
Or is it pure stupidity...too foolish to move?

I'm afraid You...or you...might start to see me as the fraud I am. That I have always been afraid of being...I'm frightened of emulating the failures of my father...

I'm human...I get that point...I keep trying but I'm human and I will continue to screw up until I die...I'm disgusted with every portion of my body that is flesh and the infestation of disease and sin that is rotting me from the inside out...

I just...need to feel Your love and peace...anything else is...just dust...all things and all people...

Quote of the Day:

"Peace of heart that is won by refusing to bear the common yoke of human sympathy is a peace unworthy of a Christian. To seek tranquility by stopping our ears to the cries of human pain is to make ourselves not Christian but a kind of degenerate stoic having no relation either to stoicism or Christianity."
-A.W. Tozer

"I did my best, it wasn't much
I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch
I've told the truth, I didn't come to fool you
And even though
It all went wrong
I'll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah"

*sigh*

Sometimes I really do not like myself...and wish I could just leave it all behind...

Okay...I think my body is done freaking out for now.
Now...to be productive.

Thoughts...thoughts...

Peace...such beautiful peace.
=)

At the least I no longer am having Cymbalta withdrawals.
Hooray.

On the down side I really hate my schools inability to manage money.

We Christians are such a silly lot.

These Frail Hands

Whispers cloud my soul.
Tangents, broken thoughts, half phrased lies...nearly a quarter of a century of life runs through my mind at any given point...portraits of a past I mostly wish I could leave behind.

It feels like weakness to admit to how much...hurt is there.
But there reaches a point where talking about it does nothing but fuel the pain itself...it goes from an acknowledgment of insecurity and fear and pours directly into the 'how' and 'why' I despise myself the most of all humans.

Perfect Love drives out all fear...
I have seen it and felt it on a cosmic scale...beyond my own comprehension...I have seen only the merest fraction of what Love is and it is enough to destroy me if that tempest would not have been held back.

There are only a handful of people who actually make me speechless and can shut me up long enough for me to realize how often I speak just to be heard.
One of them is Divine and the other is a mystery that I worry I'll frighten off if I continue to act as myself.

I suppose being human...being alive...none of this was going to be easy...

The best thing I can do at any given time is just keep myself busy so I will stop trying to reassemble most of my life...I am not just trying to remember but I am looking for a reason to stop trying.

I never realized how easy it is to create circular tangents that only lead to more pain and confusion.

That is one reason I need a steady group of support (Magically refereed to as being a 'Church' in another time and place) is to keep me from being a danger to myself...if I can keep myself busy with projects and helping people...then I can stop chasing demons that may have never been there.

Or maybe I have this all backwards...

I honestly am not sure.
Life is getting better than it has ever been...is it just fears of being a failure? Or my inability to trust my Love to deliver me from these things?



Beauty has stolen my soul...my heart...that is something no human being has understood...I can't control this...I do not want to. I feel more assured of my Love and less of the inadequate terms we throw around...I never wanted symbols...I want to real thing...pure grace driven love that removes everything broken and impure...and replaces it with Love.

I want to become something beautiful...something I have never been.
I want to become more than this broken body and soul could ever be on their own...I need to be redeemed and brought back up out of this hole I have fallen in again.

I can't stand the shallow bastard son I am...I hate calling myself a Christian because I am anything but a reflection of Jesus. I am just this selfish and sickly jerk who can't even stay healthy long enough to...

It's not just feelings, emotions, doubt, fear, anxiety...it's not just THESE things, there is so much more that exists beyond this fragile glass life we try to cling to so desperately.

There is a part of me that wants to gather every fragment of my life, every memory, every paper and receipt...take them all and start a fire to burn away every last remnant of whoever 'Matt Pike' is. I'm not sure I ever knew him and I can't promise I would actually like him should we meet one day.

There are so many tangents just in trying to write about writing about thinking...so many people playing roles...I even typecast Jesus as being someone He is not...how can I have stable friendships or that stupid notion of...?

There is hope, beauty, love...such abstract terms finding absolute meaning only in the chief sins of our depraved behaviors to one another. It's only in taking Light to the absolute darkest areas can we see what Jesus meant when He talked about praying for those who hate us, loving others as much as we bother to love ourselves...

So conflicted, so convoluted...but oh so beautiful.
I never knew the Light was so beautiful until I could see the stars adrift in the sky from this living Hell of bad health.



"When the concrete of the world
Becomes too cumbersome to lift
And the cataracts of fear and doubt
Cloak truth beyond what we can sift
And darkness, darkness bleeds its way
When crippling anguish clouds our sight
The ghosts of dusk have bared their teeth
Set their claws to bring the night
Hold on, hold tight
Darkness can’t perceive the light
Though lightlessness has chilled us numb
And though its wings may cloud the skies
The dark shall never overcome
Light of the World
Your love has never failed

And these frail hands
They tremble as they pen perhaps their last
And these weak words
Can never say what cannot be surpassed
I need Your love
And most of all I want to feel Your peace
I need Your love
Let everything that You are not decrease"

Oh never let me forget where I have been...
Never let me forget the depths to which I have fallen but remember always that You have rescued me from.

Why did I just spend a half hour crafting a new song list for studying?
Ack...my brain is all over the place.

I have so many tangents floating about...so many I wish to pin on the wall so I can address them!

"Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so!"

And there is...that as well.
Yes...that....

Okay wow...brain melted.
Heh...smiles and such.
Need to read more.
Want to rest alot.

Music...music.

I need to write on Biblical interpretation...so many thoughts on the theories flying around in my mind...

Ack...textual criticism...

Hmm...

...hmm...

...hmm.

Yes?

^_^

Quote of the Day:

“If I stand here, I can see the Little Red Haired girl when she comes out of her house... Of course, if she sees me peeking around this tree, she'll think I'm the dumbest person in the world... But if I don't peek around the tree, I'll never see her... Which means I probably AM the dumbest person in the world... which explains why I'm standing in a batch of poison oak.”
-Charlie Brown

Tis true that this is all vain...a blowing of dust in the wind.
But I aim to at least be as productive...and try as much as I may in this finite sandbox.

Letting Go

One of my chief quirks is my inability to let people, ideas, issues and things go...even when I have exhausted every avenue and have done everything in my power...I still worry and let things fester and drive me crazy.

I do not know how to stop worrying and let go.

I think that is such an incidental reference pointing to some deeper issues.

I want control because I want to be God.
I want to know every sordid detail because I want to be God.
I feel that if I have exhaustive knowledge of what is causing the hurt then I can fix it and I will be God.

I have pride issues.
A messiah complex as well.

Somethings were not delivered in Revelation for a good reason...
...my heart and soul ache enough as is...would more really make me happy?

It would not.
It would simply give me 'permission' to stay in this hole of depression and anxiety. The more I stay stationary the worst this all becomes.

The more I breath and see the sunlight...the easier it is for me to see the things in life that are worthwhile...

I just have so much pride.
As if I could actually fix things and help people...

The clay is becoming a bit unruly again and is starting to backtalk to the potter. It's been doing that ever since someone tried to convert me to Calvinistic thought by saying I had no right to dare question or challenge God on anything.

It is a mere flea shaking its antenna at the full force of a hurricane...but the conviction in my heart is to press forward, ask questions, demand justice and help...anything less would be denying who I am.

But the problem is leaving things with God.
Issues, people, hurt, worry...and not trying to fix things.
The more I fix the worst things become.

Being willing...being able...trying...all worthwhile.
Unless I just make things worse in the trying.
Faraway...so close.

It's an abrupt wake up...jarring truth with all this reasonably unreasoned...

Things should be...could be...might be switched around and inverted in tangents that never made sense outside of this mind and context.

I...

It's all baffling.
Confusing and so full of circles

Life oh life.

I have no real response except this automated message
which isn't coming in as clear as before.
It's all being dissimulated
and falling apart
because of this cryptic manner
in which it was raised.

There is a visible contradiction in my mind and that is all I can really say.
I worry too much and hope too far in the non-consequential.
It is so easy to make things about things it never was about...
Could be...could not...should and should not.

I have no answers that can be understood apart from the heart.
I have hope.
I wear it on my sleeve next to my heart.
I keep trying to figure out how to get them to stay in
but they always seem to tumble out at the most inopportune times.

Nothing...something...everything...repetition.

Faith...hope...love.
The only things that matter and yet make so little sense because they exist as a paradox that flies in the face of reason and every fact of us being alive.

Wow.

...wow.

Quote of the day:

"My doctor says that I have a malformed public duty gland and a natural deficiency in moral fiber and that I'm therefore excused from saving the universe."
-Ford Prefect

Watching the opening ceremonies of the Olympics is...strangely inspiring, considering how little I typically care about sports.

There are an infinite number of possibilities mixed with a finite number of improbabilities.

I am not so sure about that...in hindsight or foresight really.

I have questions brewing...so many questions and ideas about what to do...

What I can never sort out is which is me and which is You?

I really do not want to stumble off into doing the right thing for the wrong reason or what simply is wrong...

How can I get back to having a child like faith?
The kind I had in high school where I was teaching and preaching multiple times during the week? I don't want the past...I just...miss serving, I miss the multiple gigs a week where we tried to share Your love.

It simply feels like I'm adrift.
There is more...but I don't feel anyone can really understand it...

I had plans.
Then the plans exploded.
I got new plans.
Then those plans exploded as well.
Tentatively, I am planning on making plans but to be honest I'm not sure how that will end up.

"Wilderness" - The O.C. Supertones

Finished the first season of "Lost" oh my goodness...so freaking intense. >_<
Started watching the first episode of the second season but I'm approaching burn out with the sheer amount of stress I can handle right now.

I have all this to blame on you.
=P

Quote of the Day:

"Do the truth quietly without display."
— Brennan Manning

"I want neither a terrorist spirituality that keeps me in a perpetual state of fright about being in right relationship with my heavenly Father nor a sappy spirituality that portrays God as such a benign teddy bear that there is no aberrant behavior or desire of mine that he will not condone. I want a relationship with the Abba of Jesus, who is infinitely compassionate with my brokenness and at the same time an awesome, incomprehensible, and unwieldy Mystery."
— Brennan Manning

It really feels...and seems like we're all running from or towards something at all times...do we really ever stop to breath? To gaze in wonder at the lengths we have traveled? The pains we have overcomed?

In so many ways...we shouldn't be here.
Shouldn't even have survived and lived this long...
But...grace...providence...

Since we're here...

It is more beautiful, more confusing, more convoluted, more painful, more wonderful than I can ever put into words.

I really should stop.

"Anthem" - Tree63

Tired With a Touch of Hope

So as fun as pain isn't...I feel as though I might have a bit of a better perspective with suffering.

I'm okay with everything and nothing happening...I'm on the process of learning more and how and such...it's not easy and even if I have to endure even more I will.

I have hope about a handful of things...but they aren't my salvation...they won't make me joyful...they will just be nice things to have along the way.

But...as I have been learning...if I need to I can and will do without.

Such intoxicating...such unstoppable hope...

Quote of the Day:

"Forgiveness is giving up all hope of having had a better past."
— Anne Lamott

I'm not a fan of this...uncertainty but at this point...I have no other choice.

Faith...belief...trust...such novel and high concepts until you are forced to depend upon them with your life. Then they just tend to suck at times...but still be good and worthwhile...just it's hard at times.

Difficult...but not impossible...

Stress...stress...stress...productive stress despite other factors, fun factors though.

And stuff.

Such stuff.

And other stuff.

Stuff again.

I'm such a dork. ^_^

Prayers feel insufficient right now...but what more can I do?
I'm frustrated by my inability to act...to serve...to take away the pain of others...Jesus Christ, what more can I do?

Will it take drawing a circle and refusing to budge to make you move?
I don't enjoy being one of your most belligerent children...but my soul is screaming out at seeing the pain...

...I suppose I had gone too long without sticking my foot in my mouth.

Fleeting Rain Drops

Peacefulness flows like a river,
arching from your mind
and passed through the soul
as I lay here thinking...wondering...hoping...

Everything that is and will be
is but dust,
bits and pieces
of the general mish mash
just coming together
as we're all coming apart
and just wondering,
where You are?

Close enough to feel
but far enough to hurt,
it's like we have this dance
for just the two of us.

Every passing minute
and every fleeting second
is another without
and while wanting.

Such silly notions
and thoughts that captured my mind
as I wander about in wonder
of this endless...abundant beauty,
commonly called grace.

It's not that nice guys finish last, it's just we're the only ones stupid enough to get up at one AM to listen to someone talk about something that we have no idea what is what about...

Hmm...is there a way to make that sound less cynical?

Mayhaps.

But it's early.

And it's my blog and I'll whine if I want to. =P

Another Thing on Pain...

There is a lot of positive.
Suffering leads to the impossible...
I hate saying that because it means once again that Jesus is right and I tend to be a whiny crybaby...but things are this way...the way they are could not be different...anything else is the denial of reality as we see it.

It's easy to sit on this perch and complain about the pain because it is easy...the most difficult thing however...is making myself breath and then, despite the pain, push forward into the task of loving.

God, other and myself...one must not forget to truly love themselves...otherwise they cannot love God or others.

I hate pretending to be strong...it feels like I'm lying...but otherwise I would be causing those who do care about me to worry even more than they do...and everyone reaches a limit of where they simply cannot take or deal with anymore stress.

Besides, maybe if I lie about how my health is enough my body will start to believe it and I can magically "Try feeling better" and it will work.

The loud noises, the screams and terrible music...it reminds me of being in the hotel room in China, sick with dysentery. I was on the fifth floor I think...and across the street was the shop that played this terrible techno CD from about 8am until around 6pm. It was about fifteen tracks I had memorized by the third day of my sickness.

I would wake up from my fever humming the bar it was on.
I had my portable CD player and listened to stuff like Brave Saint Saturn, dc Talk, Five Iron Frenzy and Blindside...but the loud abrasive music didn't exactly help my headache...

I guess I say that just to be able to say...sometimes life simply sucks. And it can always be worse...I have most of my heath...I just feel nauseated and have a really bad migraine...it could be worse.

I have those I love and who love me...and the One who is Love...even when I am hurting...there is peace and hope I cannot deny.

I want to be healed and whole...but maybe that is not my destiny...if by suffering I become more like Christ...I become more understanding of pain and can help those who suffer...maybe this isn't all just pointless.

Certainly I wish someone else would make the sacrifice...but who will?
Maybe...just maybe all these dreams may start to become real...and I could help someone...

I'm never going to get use to the nausea...and on top of it...the idiots are still yelling about the game that ended three hours ago.
I really do not like sports...

In the good news realm...I think I may have my thesis paper topic: "Kierkegaard's View of the True Relation of the Christian and of the State"

Could someone please explain to me, please tell me what I did to have the gods of poverty, death, social drama and poor health chase me across this world?

Paradiso

Reality is a harsh enough mistress, why must my dreams lend themselves to solidifying the nihilistic horror of being aware to the true purpose of the universe?

I have and will continue the pursuit of truth at the sacrifice of everything...just as I have the first twenty-three years...so is it too much to just want a happy dream from time to time?

Happiness in life is not impossible...just vastly improbable...and for those who are aware, who seek and wish to know how far this rabbit hole goes...there is nothing but an assured life of...

But why get ahead of myself?
Many much more talented and useful people than myself have fallen harder and failed to finish...so who is to say I'll make it to the next mile marker or even the next step before I fall down and quit?

My soul aches for completion...it misses you...it misses things that I never have known and may never see. Is it silly to cast everything on the dreams and longings of a place that may have never been?

...there is hope, solid and hopefully undying hope...it's just the pains and frailties of my health act as this thorn that makes me doubt...that makes me afraid that I am forgotten and that...

I just...wish and hope I can get lost on this past to truth...maybe see the ones I'm looking for while on the way...maybe there will be...

Okay...weird night.
I want this weekend to end already so I can get back to class...so much less confusing >_>

Oh how I can't stand the part of me that is such a fatalist and doubter of all that is good...

Such an odd and exhausting night...

"But if you can't close up all the gaps tonight
Put me to bed in your way
You see right through everything I am
For you my insides are displayed
Sing me to sleep my beautiful one
I will love only you for all time
Sing me to sleep my only one
With promises that you are all mine

Be still my heart, I hear your back cracking
It sounds like music to me
I see your face and I can hardly breath
It looks just like a song to me"

I wish my body did not hate me and would stop trying to reject the fact I am alive. =/

Late Night Pain Induced Ramblings

I have got to learn how to deal with stress better...it feels like I've been kicked right in the stomach...and just...God I need help...serious help.

I keep hearing about all these horrible and bad things happening to friends...and I feel powerless. I mean...when bad things happen to a friend that is Christian...I can relate and there is that common ground of "Oh yes, Jesus does love us and has our best interest at heart but life will still suck and horrible things will happen because somehow this is for some sort of greater good." but with my friends who aren't...I am always at a loss for words...I can't even hug them because of the distance...so it's just me wanting to cry while praying.

I know it's stupid...and so needlessly messianic of me...but I just wish I could take away all of their pain and show them the Love I have seen and felt...I am already hurting so why not add more pain to what I am going through? I sort am beginning to understand what Paul meant when he wrote about being willing to trade away his connection with God just so the rest of his 'family' could know.

I hate feeling like I'm simply proselytizing...because it is the difference between telling about love and showing love...and I wish my heart and life wasn't this black hole of contempt, bitterness and selfishness...so maybe I could get over myself and the fact I am in pain...and actually do something to help someone.

...I feel like I whine about this all the time...but...I just want to give love...because it's what I have been given.

I hope I don't make things worse.

Why must technology fail the only time I need it to work?!?

"Jesus my heart is all i have to give to you, so weak and so unworthy,
this simply will not do, no alabaster jar, no diamond in the rough,
for your body that was broken, how can this be enough?
by me you were abandoned, by me you were betrayed,
yet in your arms and in your heart forever i have stayed

Your glory illuminates my life, and no darkness will descend,
for you have loved me forever, and your love will never end"

"Matthias Replaces Judas" - Showbread

I have so much and so little to say at the same time.
Words...seem to be absent these days...

...it is way to freaking early in the morning to have to hear someone sing opera. #_#

Quote of the day:

"Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, "Why me?" Then a voice answers, "Nothing personal... your name just happened to come up.""
-Charlie Brown

I am a rather silly human being for smiling over something so small...and though I am touched with the curse of hyperbole...somethings really are just better left unsaid...except with a smile of course.

"When peace like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul."

I felt sort of melty right now.
Is that even physically possible?

So close to being done with this weeks massive projects...I slept much longer than I meant to but my sanity is more intact than it normally would be...I may be actually on the verge of learning how to balance my time with writing stuff for school.

Scary stuff.

I'm still not used to this whole being an adult thing...

Trying to make sense of what is going on with these texts and on in my mind and soul right now is a dozy.

I like writing about this stuff...now why is it so hard to...you know, actually write about it...

"If Jesus Christ is true
then I am mostly lies
if Jesus Christ is Love
then I have failed to try
if Jesus Christ is Life
then please just let me die
let...this...die..."

Lord, why do I have the distinct feeling you are about to take all of my plans, put them in a blender, hit puree and then throw the whole contraption out the window while I look on in confusion and horror?

I get the fact You are infinite, incomprehensible, terrifying and by all accounts a nice guy to drink wine with, but at what point did I start taking what is the right thing to do and make it all about me?

This isn't a disaster...far from it...it's just confusing and it is stressful to have to hang here in the air while waiting for something to happen...

...it's like how I've applied to xxxChurch for their internship three times now and have been turned down each time...was that even something You told me to do? Is any of this ministry stuff even YOU? Or is it just my megalomania wanting to try and 'save' people to make Matthew look good?

I'm not under the deluded impression that there is a 'good' or 'right' way to come to you...there is no selfless way to turn to you over anything because that is all I am ever really concerned about...me and how people fit into my plans, my wants, me this...my that...

If I haven't been listening...I am.
I have a lot of work to do but I am listening.
If you want to be a help please set my systematic theology and new testament text books on fire and speak to me from them. It's not that I need a sign or anything but I just really, really, really hate those books.

Help me keep my sense of humor while it is nighttime.
I just...I have no words.
Just bad jokes.
Help.
Please?

Stress.

Upset.