Things to do 1-24-2010:

General:
(X)-Apologize for missing call and church

Game related:
(X)-Make post for Watchmen forum
(X)-Get stuff ready for Deadlands game tonight

School:
()-Memorize verses for Tuesday Theology
(x)-Do reading for Hermeneutics and Theology for Tuesday
(x)-Make prep outline for Thursday class discussion in New Testament

Sunday morning, how I dislike you.
Coming so early and attacking me with odd symptoms.

I hate that I overslept and miss the ride to church...there will be more chances and thankfully this was just the first time I've missed a possible church service. I hate how it sounds like I think of church as being nothing more than an obligation...because I honestly miss being involved as part of a family...it's just so many churches are less of families and more of a preying ground...uh no pun intended.

I'm working on killing my cynicism...I've never stopped the ministry work regardless of where I am...just because I don't openly preach at people doesn't mean that the gospel isn't being spread...if actions cannot show the validity of Jesus' love than no amount of words ever will. Actions are a better love letter than speaking until I am blue in the face...

I mean, the idea behind church is supposed to be this group of believers who realize the importance of the gospel and have been changed by the love of God...when a person mostly deals with people who are more focused on worshiping religion than learning how to love God and others...it can make for a frustrating and lonely experience.

But...life moves on...I think the most important thing is learning from the experience and not allowing the negative to control me...it's so easy to let myself shut down when I am hurt...even when it is joking jabs, if I don't trust the person or have been hurt I can just shut down and become a robot.

There is such a huge gap for misunderstanding that the fact Christianity has thrived for nearly two thousand years is part of the miracle...

I'm starting to loose some of my capacity of empathy for those who keep putting themselves in bad situations. =/

"A Grief Observed" - A Review, of Sorts

So I read C.S. Lewis' "A Grief Observed" in one sitting today. The only other book I have done that with in recent memory was Elie Wiesel's "Night".

I suppose there is enough common threads between the two for that to make sense...raw and undiluted visions of what it means to suffer, to loose one's world and to question God, to raise the questions shouted when it becomes darkest.

I've never seen such profound lost over love expressed in something that was real...there are so much romantic nonsense and Hollywood embellishments on the subject of love that to actually find such a sincere ache at having lost something so beautiful...it's like drinking frigid water...it quenches the thirst but more importantly awakens the soul to the arid environment that is so deprived of any semblance of understanding love.

I thought I possibly might have understood love but if love is this deep, this profound and so all consuming that to loose it is to loose yourself...than I have profoundly lied to those closest to me.

This is something...so profound, so beautiful and so disturbing at the same time. The majority of people must never love like this or marriage would be so much more respected and revered...as to opposed to being a meaningless laughingstock to most.

In a lot of ways I have sacrificed personal relationships out of fear...it's easier to think you love someone as infinite as God when you have no finite benchmark...instead all I have really been doing is running since I could choose to.

I want to know what it means to really love people...because I am afraid I've never really done that...I have a bad habit of running from most people once they reached certain level of closeness...and I have a developed habit that I have groomed for getting myself into utterly asinine situations.

Apathy is never a solution...but giving access to my inner most thoughts to...well even this blog...it's almost like it can act as a means of misdirections. "Yes, look at this horrible detail of my life so you will NOT see the big picture and the rampant hypocrisy that guides my every breath!"

So many questions...he asked so many questions in the book...none I have answers for. Most pressing are the ones concerning love and about what happens when one dies...what truly happens...answers nowhere to be found in the Bible or on this world.

I am forced to agree with Lewis' assertion that it is with a knowing and sympathetic ear God listens to this plea to know...but ultimately we can't process or understand it. These things are so much bigger...and powerful...

...sigh...I have so much more to think and write about but I must sleep...I'm getting myself worked into a hole of wanting isolation and to be away from people but the morning is early and there is church...so I'll be leaving this with a quote from the book.


** ** ** ** **

"The terrible thing is that a perfectly good God is in this matter hardly less formidable than a Cosmic Sadist. The more we believe that God hurts only to heal, the less we can believe that there is any use in begging for tenderness. A cruel man might be bribed - might grow tired of his vile sport - might have a temporary fit of mercy, as alcoholics have fits of sobriety.

But supposed that what you are up against is a surgeon whose intentions are wholly good. The kinder and more conscientious he is, the more inexorably he will go on cutting. If he yielded to your entreaties, if he stopped before the operation was complete, all the pain to that point would have been useless. But is it credible that such extremities of torture should be necessary for us? Well, take you choice. The tortures occur. If they are unnecessary, then there is no God or a bad one. If there is a good God, then these tortures are necessary. For no moderately good Being could possibly inflict or permit them if they weren't.

Either way, we're for it.

What do people mean when they say, "I am not afraid of God because I know He is good?" Have they never even been to a dentist?"

If I am to speak I must be cleansed for I am a man of unclean lips, one who has never understood love and played at understanding the Divine...so much eternal beauty and with every breath I am forced to relearn the basics of my faith again.

Quote of the Day:

"I hate cynicism...it's my least favorite quality and it doesn't lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you're kind, amazing things will happen."
-Conan O'Brien

Fleeting Glimmers of Dying Reds on the Water

Tonight my heart is bleeding,
just falling apart for You.
It's now or never
failing or fallacy,
either pull me along
and let me live
or let the sun fade on this life.

At Your beauty I'm lost for words.

I can't give
I can't trade this away,
my soul is fading
while trapped in this dying machine
and all I have left
is nothing.

Let me fall on grace
for it's all I have left
as this dark night
slowly passes on,
seemingly to never end
as I wait praying.

The cornerstone of human failure is thinking we know what we want, one might think that I would have caught onto this by now but getting what I want is so often the stupidest thing I could have done.

Procured C.S. Lewis' "A Grief Observed" from the library five minutes before closing.

Apparently being able to cough up my lungs helps me have better timing.

Quote of the Day:

“Without friends the world is but a wilderness. There is no man that imparteth his joys to his friends, but he joyeth the more; and no man that imparteth his grieves to his friend, but he grieveth the less.”
-Francis Bacon

Being socially interactive is not quite as easy as some people might have you think.

Quote of the Day:

“Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden.”
-Orson Scott Card

Quote of the Day:

“I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare.”
-C.S. Lewis

Beauty Veiled in Pain

Perfection is lacking in the colors
as they fall like painted rain drops
moving in patterns
as echos of hope
make their way to your soul.

Hope eternal,
reflecting in everything
and faith that this kernel of love
with blossom
in this wasteland
and grow into full.

The death of hopelessness is near
and nearer still
growing as near as you are to me
with only pale distance in between
and as vivid as touching your hand
with the hope of never being released.

Everything we have strived
and hoped to hope for
with the death of pain.

Love, love given on a kiss to the breeze
as words grow and pain is realized
in ways so often untold.
Only this shred of perfection
expressed in Eternity can heal.

Believe, hope and breath
and regardless the distance
love can carry in this night
and through this sickness.

Breath and being made alive,
oh dear Muse
how can this ever be enough?

Returning Redundancy

...I am so lucky to be loved.
Even when I whine, cry and throw a temper-tantrum about being sick or in pain or social drama...the One who sang me into being still loves and holds me close...I can never understand how it works or the whys...but Love is its own reason...

I want to be more grateful and more helpful to those around me...and not just this negative downturn...but God it is so hard to focus on the positive when it feels like your insides are melting...but...I suppose Paul set the precedent of grace being more than sufficient...

It is just...is exhausting trying to be brave and that is why I have to use this blog as a verbal beating place to get out this negative in me...

I want perfection, I can feel the heartbeat of One so infinite and beautiful...and seeing the Hell we have made this world it hurts...it hurts to feel separation even though there is that renewed connection because of Jesus...

I'm so tired...and aching and just wish every thing could be made right and beautiful right now...that the ones I care about could feel Your love...I don't understand why You hide Your face and will not be seen...reveal Yourself...I am not enough and it is not like any of this was me anyway.

It's just You being nice enough to use a broken vessel...thanks...again, now and forever.

...and even more needless frustration...

Quote of the Day:

“The real problem is not why some pious, humble, believing people suffer, but why some do not.”
-C.S. Lewis

Thoughts Like Flames

Why can I have a rather awesome day but I get all upset and mopey because I manage to botch up just one single conversation out of the whole day?

I don't even know why I bother getting myself so stupidly worked up over something as complicated as taking a breath of air and trying to be myself...I can never tap into the supposed source of intelligence and wit I posses when I need them most.

I can babble like an idiot as often as need be...I just want...

I just wish the canvas of life could be rolled back and I could look into the width and breadth of eternity and see my Love...I was touched by the Eternal and Infinite tonight...for just a fleeting moment and now...it's like silence...and emptiness and I have no way of...

To feel the Eternal and have no way of expressing the complexity of the Love...the intoxication of the song that brought life into being...is there words? Can there ever be words?

I just need...

You know...but still...cries in the night, feeling so lost and displaced and not even knowing why or how this came...or could be...

I just know...I know that even though I want to give up now...I can't...

Please keep me afloat, give me the strength to break through any level of despair and remember Your face in the darkest of nights...

"Cassie (Acoustic)" - Flyleaf

Feverish Pain

So hard to focus.
Pain is so real.
Feeling lost and even though I am stationary it feels like I am tumbling and falling far away.
I do not like the sensation.
I know...I know...the thoughts are coming and going...already so lost...

I want to know the how and why...

I loose my faith so easily...when the pain is so intense.
It is times like this...like when I was in China in so much pain that I forget why I am alive and I simply wish and pray for an end to the pain. Be it death of some other means...because I despair far too easily...and seek after things that were never my own.

I am so cold.
I feel so alone.
I do not have clever words.
I feel lost and isolated.

I do not know what warmth and what it is like to not have the burning sensations robbing me of strength and focus.

Where is this?
Where to?
Why can things not simply be more easy?
Or maybe just less pain for once?

One oddly nice night.
Sickness though.

Still...so sick...and blah...feel like I've been ran over multiple times.

Quote of the Day:

“This is my depressed stance. When you're depressed, it makes a lot of difference how you stand. The worst thing you can do is straighten up and hold your head high because then you'll start to feel better. If you're going to get any joy out of being depressed, you've got to stand like this.”
-Charlie Brown

I'm not doing so bad for feeling like thawed out death.

Can't breath...gonna fall over...ack...flam building in lungs... x_X

Quote of the Day:

“A God who let us prove his existence would be an idol.”
-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

It's the small things...the very small things that make life not just enjoyable but worth living.

However...peace, hope...and love eternal are a beautiful canvas to pain a life on.

The fact that there are "Christians" who are saying the earthquake in Haiti is the judgment of God is tapping into the source of rage I normally reserve for Westboro church.

Isn't it LOVELY to have people in such direct contact with God they can not only tell us His EVERY thought but those in Heaven and in Hell?

Oh Jesus help me to learn how to love because my rage wants me to do things that would only shame You...

-Dayquil
-Gatorade
-As I Lay Dying
-Rabbinic Stories

Such an odd combination but for now it is working.

I think the fever is gone but it is so cold I would rather just wait and see...and see...

Fever...and nyquil make for some bizarre dreams...I hate vampires, why are they in my dreams?

Shoo.

I would rather dream about reading my books for class tomorrow...or sleep writing my masters thesis so I will not have to do it later.

Worst case scenario I would rather dream about a girl...granted, they tend to be as safe as dealing with a full sized dragon...but at least (some) are not vampires.

And the fever begins...ack....

Quote of the Day:

“The really good idea is always traceable back quite a long way, often to a not very good idea which sparked off another idea that was only slightly better, which somebody else misunderstood in such a way that they then said something which was really rather interesting.”
-John Cleese

I hate causing awkward moments.
I can say with quite honesty that it depresses me...I cannot help how people react...but having people look at me as though I was some sort of...thing that should be removed from their presence...it is a bit saddening.

Besides my aches and pains the only other really bad thing is I think I am coming down with a cold or something else...really bad headaches and my throat hurts and fever...

Seeing one of my best friends from my time down here at Mobile was nice...a reminder that there are other humans that live in this area. Hyperbole I know...just...

The Bible study tonight was nice...along with classes it is encouraging to see leaders actually advocating deeper learning and pushing the students to dig into the Old Testament to attempt to understand the historical context of their faith and how Christianity can only be understood from a Jewish perspective.

And rambling.
On and on and on like I do best.
Words to hear myself speak.

I'm not ready for what is next...so it is nice to know it won't be...

Whatever and ever amen.

Hope for the hopeless.

Rabbis and Such

As always with any Mashburn class, Hermeneutics is already giving me a deeper insight into the teachings of Jesus. There always is the idea of people bringing their own ideas into what literature says...the fact people twist Jesus' teachings to suit their own agenda is nothing new.

The Jewish thought of taking scripture and all the commentary built around it and going off of that...is an interesting concept. Why did certain Rabbi's feel one way towards this law and felt more that this is the appropriate interpretation?

Jesus taught with stories and questions...following in the line of Rabbis that the Pharisees themselves were not just a part of but a major part of the influence of Jewish theology for the past two thousand years.

What I'm interested in doing is reviewing the method of which Jesus taught the parables...actually attempting to look at them from the perspective of a first century Jew familiar with how Rabbis taught might actually give a better perspective on how radical and how unique Jesus' ministry and teachings were/are.

Part of the problem of being a 21st century Caucasian protestant who has grown up in spoiled America is that I have no idea what it was like to be a poor Jewish denizen being repressed by the Roman Empire.

Context for understanding any teaching, literature, poem, parable or question is important...otherwise you negate any possible meaning by the preconceived notions you bring to the table.

Hmm...more later I suppose...

To Hermeneutics and beyond!

I'm awake.

It is nice to be able to just lay here in bed for a little while.

Even with the pain and stress...it is nice to just be able to breath.

Pain is unavoidable...but I guess part of life is choosing what to do with that pain...although at the time it is hard to make any rational and logical thoughts concerning it.

I am trying not to over think things...and just take this process one step, one breath, one moment at a time. Even with all the fears and doubts running in the background...right now I feel the impossible peace that I can only successfully blame on Jesus.

I am here but I am not...

Who I am...and who I am not...multiplied by the fading vistas that surround the evening sky.

Everything and nothing at once.

Pure paradoxical contradiction that is mixed with redundancy.

But I want to feel...want to be overwhelmed by what it means to be alive.

Prayers...a lot of those right now...mixed with traces of doubt and fears of my own inadequacy. Wishing I could take on the weight of others so they could be free...prayers laced with profanity because of the injustice I see around me...

I want to feel more than just the base elements I have been engaging for a while...I want my body, my mind and soul to be taken up in the song...and I want to feel You again...I want to just let everything...everything...fade and refocus as it ever will...

Having some sense of what I am talking about what be nice as well...but I can't have everything...can I?

Quote of the Day:

“If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this.”
-C.S. Lewis

So...plus five points for good thinking about how I could get studying done at the commons/cafe.

However minus several hundred points concerning the idea that there would actually be people here to socialize with.

Do kids these days not drink coffee or something?

Revised Song of Hope

Muse dear Muse
sing a song of roses and the kingdom,
of the sun giving life
and all that is yet to come.

Sing a new song full of hope
for the days passed
and for the measure yet to come
as the sea continues to crash
on the Western shore.

Remind us of the hope alleviating the fears
of the shadows racing across
as the Dark continues to fall.
Reminders of divisions failed
and the hope burning inside
as the heart chooses to beat again.

With Hope unstoppable,
Peace renewed
and Love undefinable
these words take form and fly
from lips to ear
with a gentle cry
and the expectation
of all to come.

Dear Muse sing
and sing again
as the Night comes
and beats against your wings.
Sing for the day to come,
the eternal Dawn
which will burn away every trace
of fear and distortion.

Hope is coming,
hold tight.

Quote of the Day:

“We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started... and know the place for the first time.”
-T.S. Eliot

Fooling, Foolish Inklings

Like the rest of this tune that has gone amiss, I'm feeling a bit out of place and out of sync with matter which I thought I knew for sure. But really it is my own fault for making assumptions about things as fickle and untrustworthy as humans, not that it is wrong to trust or fall or rise up for any of this but at the same time...

How much of it is with reason or point?
I try to make things work in my mind.
I'm good at making the illusions seem real.

Maybe I owe people some apologies but at the same time I suppose no one has a gun held to their head to where they are forced to talk to me. Getting around talking to me is so easy...I wish it was as easy as removing myself as a friend from facebook so I wouldn't have to deal with myself. I understand why people can get sick of dealing with me...because I am sick of dealing with me.

I hate how undependable I am, I can't stand how I break commitments based upon how my health is, I cannot stand how weak my resolve and heart are, I wish I was a better Christian, I wish I would stop complaining, stop being judgmental, I wish I could be a good little lamb and stop questioning and trying to fix the world...but here I am with all my flaws and aches and my pains.

None of you are ever under any obligation to stay.
You are invited to stay for the remainder of the show.
Just bear in mind that if you cut out earlier there will be no ticket refunds.

It's not possible to reboot or reset this mind, do a memory wipe or make everything equal out a certain way...welcome to being human and trying to deal with the fact no one is who you would like them to be and everyone is wishing you were different (at some level or another, various shades of shallowness do apply).

And...those who love me for who I am are just a handful.
The rest know me so little that they would not understand my complaint about them not understanding me at all.

The question is why are YOU here?
What did you come to see?
I don't have much right now and it looks like things are going to be the same for a while.

I feel like I'm plugging in the holes of a ship.
One thing gets better and another hole happens.

I am quite worried about my left shoulder and arm...my fibromyalgia is acting in ways I have yet to see before...it feels like I pulled a muscle or at least was hit by a baseball bat...but nothing happened to it. I just had the misfortune of waking up and now using my left arm or hand sends excruciating bolts of pain through my body.

What did I do to deserve that?
How is waking up a crime?
Stuff happens...just making a point to myself.
If by chance you pick up something along the way, splendid.
If not, no surprise here.

I am tired.
Tired of me and my words.
But I am stuck with them.
I envy you, who do not have to live with me.
You can shut me off, shut me down and do anything you want to drown out my voice and you are so lucky.
I wish I could sink to the level that some do in being able to shut their voice out but I can't.

There is no serious way I can drown the voices out.
I refuse to drink and although my pain levels would require any sane doctor to give me narcotics it is best I do not have them because I would be addicted to them in a heart beat.

So my body collides against my soul which hits this frigid stone of reality that makes my bones burn because of the cold.

Why?
Why can I not be like everyone else?
I didn't ask to be special enough to be a fool that has to care about everyone and scare people away because I do not understand certain aspects of basic interaction. If people do not want to share or communicate it is as easy as telling me to go away or just die...or something. I'm not sure what the proper social colloquialism these days.

I do not want to believe in love but I do.
I feel it and God it hurts.
I wish my heart would stop bleeding as it beats so I could catch my breath.
I hate feeling the pain of everyone I am around but I do.
Typically those who mean the most do not realize, do not believe or do not care and so the pain is amplified.

At least I have that handful of people who care.
I wish I could be content with that and just stop caring about the rest of the world.
I can't.
Even the things I hate and that hurt me...I can't stop thinking about or wanting to help.



The more I see, the more people I talk to the more exhausted I am.
Jesus, Jesus...Jesus.
Why?
I know I won't be getting an answer I like...but whatever way it goes...You know I am here and will be. No choice really...but there is love and not just mindless obligation.
Just give me the resources I need, the people so I do not go crazy...and please take the pain in my soul and body away so I can try to function.
Pleas.e

Reason

Reason, reasonably...

I hate how my thoughts, emotions, spirit, mind and body all just do there own thing...I hate the burning fire coursing through my body trying to take control of me.

I just wish this thing could die.

Never to rise again.

So church.
It's a big one.
With a college program.
I hope this isn't as weird or awkward as I am afraid of.
Numbers.
Yikes.

Refracted Beauty, Redacted Hells

With morning so young
and sun so bright
the falling rays of light
burn my eyes as I drag across this land
and wonder where oh where from here?

Bracing my prejudices and fear
and holding my Bible to my heart
I wander as I wonder
and hope against all vivid hope and wonder
that this time,
that this time everything will be new.
Everything that be beautiful and true
will be before me
and the wrongs will be right
and I will for once be allowed
to make the right choice
as the right choice
and not just because of fear
but because of perfect Love
that has killed Death, Hopelessness and Fear.

Oh quite my dear heart,
the waves of rage that threaten to stir you
so early and in a day so young.
So much anger at injustice
and my own inadequacies
as I stumble about looking for metaphors
and a way to murder my pride.
As I so dearly miss my Beloved
and wish this distance, oh so grand,
would part and I could see
with eternal eyes
the beautiful
in the deluded sludge
of this Hell.



Muse, beautiful Muse,
sing to me over this wasteland
that we share in our connection,
such beauty and shades of gray
as burning thoughts
hold salve to the tongue
as frightened words
refuse to be spoke.

For all of our tales
and the Love we share with the Lover
and the connection burning within our hearts
we can see the Truth
and hope with dim eyes
that the eternal will burn
away all the fear
as every tear is wiped from our eyes.

Never shall the rejection of man
haunt our souls
as we may be united
in ways that only proper poets
and prophets have indeed spoke of
since time was put into motion.

Muse, dear Muse,
beauty which gives spark
and sets the mind in motion,
One responsible for so much of this
and the igniting of hope
that the eternal will burn in.
Seeing shades of the future
as the past fades
and the present mists part.

Too much on my mind and too few are the ways in which I can express it...

Quote of the Day:

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.”
-Jim Elliot

Done with New Testament for today!
Hooray!

Now to do Rabbinic readings while "Hott Fuzz" plays in the background...

So tired...moderate levels of stress today...more of being concerned for others than myself.

I suppose I will go eat dinner than come back and try to study some more.
When I finish that I shall reward myself by trying to make a new Deadlands character...

Quote of the Day:

“When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes.”
-Desiderius Erasmus