"As I lay me down
I confess
I'm a fool for You
no more, no less"

Galatians 2

"Yet we know that a person is made right with God by faith in Jesus Christ, not by obeying the law. And we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we might be made right with God because of our faith in Christ, not because we have obeyed the law. For no one will ever be made right with God by obeying the law."
-Galatians 2:16


I have to stop and ask...what is the point?
Why do I bother to read scripture?
Why do I pray?
Why do I pray for myself, for this family of believers around me?
Why do I pray for others to see Jesus?
Why do I pray for health?
Why do I walk the path of celibacy and have taken vows of additional personal morality of things that are not emphasized in scripture, yet I feel strongly about?


"I was born
I was born to sing for you 

I didn't have a choice
But to lift you up
And sing whatever song you wanted me to
I give you back my voice
From the womb my first cry
It was a joyful noise
Oh, oh

Only love
Only love can leave such a mark

But only love
Only love can heal such a scar


Justified till we die
You and I will magnify

Oh, the magnificent

Magnificent"

I have seen beauty in suffering.
I have found grace in a gutter when I was laying down, incapable of breathing from the pain...and here I stand today.

This is not about myself, not that I advocate or think God doesn't care and the individual is meaningless, but I do not want to advocate Matthew or a line of theology that is *mine*.

I have seen, felt...experienced what it means to be loved by Jesus...what it means to be forgiven and have this burden I place on myself lifted.

So quick, so fast I am to place large and unessential and unnecessary burdens on myself...and for what? What goal? What purpose?


*****
****
***
**
*

My life are those marks and they are quickly counting down and counting out.
Life is spinning out of control and will end soon.

I want to feel this electricity of grace coursing through my veins, I want to feel this energy and put it to work. Not keep the love inside, keep the love for me...but pour it out, let my life be emptied and let the grace of God be seen...no matter the cost, no matter the pain.

If Jesus can somehow take this broken shell and use it, make something so impossibly beautiful, than he can do anything at all.

I have faith that this pain, this suffering my Father, my Lord, my God, my Abba, my Daddy...I have faith that this isn't in vain, that I am not suffering and will die alone. Even in my darkest moments where I have cursed You, You have drawn closer to me.

Divine madman.
You are.
But so wonderful.
So frightening, so powerful...but such Love.

A Few Glimpses of Gallifrey:

http://bug-eye.deviantart.com/art/Gallifrey-172671252?q=boost%3Apopular%20gALLIFREY&qo=131

http://amras-arfeiniel.deviantart.com/art/Gallifrey-174233976?q=boost%3Apopular%20gALLIFREY&qo=18

http://aerindarkwater.deviantart.com/art/Gallifrey-desktop-163365162?q=boost%3Apopular%20gALLIFREY&qo=15

http://evionn.deviantart.com/art/Gallifrey-lights-84928349?q=boost%3Apopular%20gALLIFREY&qo=20

"He's like fire and ice and rage. He's like the night, and the storm in the heart of the sun. He's ancient and forever. He burns at the center of time and he can see the turn of the universe. And... he's wonderful."

Quote of the Day:

"If you two could put your weight on the door and stop the it from opening too suddenly, I don't want to loose my arm. I'm rather attached to it and it is so handy"
-The Fourth Doctor

Such a strange but wonderful time.
Never know what to expect with life.
In spite of my cynical self...life can be wonderful and beautiful.

Galatians 1:10-12

"Do you think I speak this strongly in order to manipulate crowds? Or curry favor with God? Or get popular applause? If my goal was popularity, I wouldn't bother being Christ's slave. Know this—I am most emphatic here, friends—this great Message I delivered to you is not mere human optimism. I didn't receive it through the traditions, and I wasn't taught it in some school. I got it straight from God, received the Message directly from Jesus Christ."
-Galatians 1:10-12


The question that has to be asked...at one point did it seem like conformity was the right path?

I suppose there is the danger of being so obsessed with avoiding conformity that there is this accidental bastardization that comes about by trying to avoid conformity...

My faith seems so sure...but then is it faith when all certainties are accounted for? I struggle with trusting such a powerful, all consuming God who seems obsessed with the impossible and implausible...because I...am so weak, so weak and tired. Sleep does never refresh me...and I am afraid I am in such a downward spiral.

Abby, Daddy...I am so weak, my health so frail...and these faith rises up in me when I have nothing, nothing left...I am so weak, so exhausted. I do not care about cliches, about the world to come because right now...this very minute, I am hurting, I am so weak...so tired.

"Too weak to wonder,
too tired to care,
Jesus Christ, are you really there?
I've fallen down,
Can't pull myself back up.
I'm going to drown, have mercy,
Have mercy.

I need you now,
Not words or a feeling.
But Jesus Christ,
I've hit the ceiling."

I don't care what they say, what they write...everything is coming to a climax with You as the sole reason for living...even this broken body of mine is Yours for whatever glory it can be given.

Please do not let me reduce you to a series of tests, a formula and loose what it means to have You be my Daddy, my Love, my reason, my being...everything I could ever dare dream to hope to see...to feel...to pray and want to know.

I suppose like Mary...I want...not I need to hide these words in my heart, to feel your love anew each day...I love You, even though I ache and want to scream until I am hoarse. I need You, I need You so much especially when I am hurting so bad and feel so weak...

Please, please, please do not tarry my Love, hurry and rescue me from the limb I got myself stuck on. I blame all on You when so much is my fault...I pass the blame but never the guilt and get myself stuck in cycles...

Thank you, thank you for love...such uncompromising grace and mercy that carries me.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
A million times again and again.
Such beauty, such wonder.
Such terror and such hope.
Jesus Christ,
everything I am
and pressing me to overcome
everything I am not.

"I believe there'll come a day
Maybe it will be tomorrow
When the bluebird flies away
All we have to do is follow
I believe a dream can still come true
Why shouldn't I believe the same in you?

You may say I'm a fool
Feeling the way that I do
I believe in friends and laughter
And the wonders love can do
I believe in songs and magic
And that's why I believe in you

You may say I'm a fool
Feeling this way about you
There's not much I can do
I'm gonna be this way my life through
Because I still believe in miracles
I swear I've seen a few
And the time will surely come
When you can see my point of view
I believe in second chances
And that's why I believe in you"

"I've been in every black hole
At the altar of the dark star
My body's now a begging bowl
That's begging to get back
Begging to get back to my heart
To the rhythm of my soul
To the rhythm of my unconsciousness
To the rhythm that yearns
To be released from control

I was punching in the numbers
At the ATM machine
I could see in the reflection
A face staring back at me
At the moment of surrender
Of vision over visibility
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me

I was speeding on the subway
Through the stations of the cross
Every eye looking every other way
Counting down 'til the pain will stop

At the moment of surrender
Of vision of over visibility
I did not notice the passers-by
And they did not notice me"

Quote of the Day:

"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 (Aramaic for "Daddy") of Jesus, who is infinitely compassionate with my brokenness and at the same time an awesome, incomprehensible, and unwieldy Mystery."
—Brennan Manning

I try to smile.
But sometimes the pain is too real and too much.
Sometimes it is my stomach or my back...or conversing with...

I sometimes wish I was born so I wouldn't feel so strongly.
But...that would mean I was not me.

I want to make You proud.
And...I can make her smile and laugh even in the awkward times...so that is something.
Right?

As annoying as some people are...setting them on fire would simply be a waste of perfectly good fire.

Quote of the Day:

"That is so bloody typical of this galaxy. I finally get my daughter back and now you tell me we're all about to be blown to pieces in four minutes."
-Arthur Dent, "And Another Thing"

"you and me
we're in this together now
none of them can stop us now
we will make it through somehow
you and me
even after everything
you're the queen and I'm the king
nothing else means anything"

I sometimes have to wonder why I think so much of marriage and family.

I'm in no position to even start that stuff...even if I had someone I could trust, someone to open my soul to...that wouldn't just use me and toss me aside.

What does it matter?
I can't define myself by actions, titles or people...
It is who I am in the light of eternity and the end...


"Now I am somewhere I am not supposed to be,
and I can see things I know I really shouldn't see
And now I know why, now, now, now I know why
Things aren't as pretty
On the inside"


I want to be like Paul, being content in any situation.
But I'm shallow.
In ways I am coming to grips with that...but I don't want to be content with mediocrity...and be changed by the patterns I hate.

Who am I?
I feel as if I am being torn into several pieces...all of them having to be me...forced to be various shades of...so many, many things.

I know I am me.
That should be enough but I worry.
I forget who God is...and what it means to be loved and faithful.

It's a struggle to find balance.
I just...

Words, so many many words.
Endless words.
Circles and figures.
Pain and so much and so little.

*Bleep*

"With Pollyanna" - Bill Eager

Yeah.
Freaking infectiously happy.
But I want to use this as refrain in writing a story...obviously EarthBound/Mother and Chrono Trigger inspired...just like everything else I write...but maybe this time it will be the best story I can write.

Just.
Maybe.

Thank you Jesus.

"The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things" - Showbread

Existential Turnips

I really have no idea what that title is supposed to mean.

It might very well has come to a point where the most sense I can make out of life is that it is literally nonsense.

The more I learn about those I'm close to the more I realize how dark and broken this world is.

Maybe I am negative but maybe it's the fact this is a broken and disjointed world spinning out of control.

I look and see how frigid and unforgiven this world is as it seems the best among us are kicked around the most and when they fall down they are stomped on extra hard for daring to be talented or trying hard.

I know life isn't just this thankless struggle on a bleak island surrounded by darkness, demons screeching in the night and the world dissolving into Silent Hill every few minutes...but all the pain, all the human misery, all the broken emotions...all the pain in people's day to day lives is worse than any monster and any Hell excessive fundamentalists can dream up in their off time.

Maybe it has taken me almost twenty-five years of my life and the last few years spent as a chronically sick and disjointed misfit just sort of falling from place to place...but I think I am finally starting to feel like I am somewhere I am supposed to be.

The more I really read and try to understand the Gospels, the more I see that Jesus really was that "man of constant sorrows" (Isiah 53) and it was by choice. He chose to be born to a poor family and into a social situation where they would be alienated because of everyone thinking he was a bastard child...He chose to seek out students who were social outcasts or viewed as being unwanted and disgusting...not only were they students but they became friends...He saw the people no one wanted, the ones without potential, the screw ups, the rejects, the fools, the ones at the end of their ropes...and those were His friends and the ones He called His family.

If that made no literal or logical sense in the first century Roman province of Judea, then I suppose it doesn't make much sense in twenty-first century Alabama.

At least to those who haven't really seen Jesus.

I get asked on a regular basis, "What are you going to do with your life?" and I have a series of stock answers I reply with depending on my mood or whatever seems best at the time.

Honestly, I don't care about titles and I try to lie to myself and say my health is going to get better and the pain and symptoms aren't getting worse (Is it a mark of a bad liar that I can't even convince myself?)...where will I be in a few months, a year or a decade?

This is the best plan I have been able to put together after years of research, planning and lots of papers:

I want to help people.
I want to pray.
I want both of those things push me to giving up my notions of comfort so I can help more.

Jesus is with the poor and broken.
He may be invited in happier and richer sections of town but I am not sure he will turn up because of being busy helping the poor and broken...at least from how I have read the Bible and from the writers of those I trust.

One of those "case in points" would be this:



"“If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14.26 … the theological student learns that these words appear in the New Testament, and in one or another exegetical resource book he finds the explanation that to hate in this passage and in a few other passages by weakening means love less, esteem less, honor not, count as nothing. The context in which these words appear, however, does not seem to affirm the appealing explanation. In the verse following this we are told that someone who wants to erect a tower first of all makes a rough estimate to see if he is able to finish it, lest he be mocked later. The close proximity of this story and the verse seems to indicate that the words are to be taken in their full terror in order that each person may examine himself to see if he can erect the building."
-Soren Kierkegaard, "Fear and Trembling"



When it seems like theology was becoming a crutch to satisfy myself I turned to philosophy to make myself have to dig for answers about why I believe I have a right to hope when those I love are wracked with doubt, depression and self destruction.

No matter how I try to approach it, this world is screwed up and the only thing that even seems to do any good is hug the person wracked with guilt and pain, shaking and crying, and tell them that I love them.

If they do not see Jesus in my love, in my actions, in the very breath I breath...what right do I have to invoke the Holy Lamb of God, the only thing that is of any worth or goodness in my life, in my self-righteous ventures that are in vain?

I suppose that seems a bit drab and depressing.
That isn't my intention per say.

If anything, I sort of feel a bit more confident that moving back to Mobile and attempting to continue my studies while feeling like I am falling apart wasn't as stupid as it may have seemed at first.

I am becoming a bit more certain about how unimportant "practical" things are and that learning to really pray, really love, really spend time with people is about the most important thing I can do.

If you take away nothing more from this pompous and excessively long meandering spewage of verbiage...know you are loved.

You are more beautiful, more worthy, more needed, more desired and more loved than you will ever have the faith to believe.

Nothing can extinguish the fires of eternity and that is what drives the madness of God's love for you.

At least that is my belief.
Take it for what you will my friend.

"Hulking, smashing, I come crashing,
nothing like when I was small.
I am unstoppable, I am the cannonball.
That feeble coward that you knew,
has undergone an overhaul.
I am unstoppable, I am the cannonball

And everyone will say it's just an accident,
like some mishap or a tragedy.
I think that failure has a purpose,
and I don't believe it's chance if I fall.
And I know that if I ever do fall, He will catch me.
And if He ever lets me fall down,
for the good of those who believe Him,
He will make me into a cannonball.
Unblemished, and faultless.
A burning luminescence.
Unequaled precision, beyond your scope of vision.
Cannonball."

“Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor.”
-Anne Lamott

Attempts at perfection seems to so often turn into a pointless battle of egotism and self-righteousness that ends with me saying "screw it" and slamming my head on my desk.

I am going to stop this, if nothing more than to just save on having to buy so much Excedrin.

The "short cape" that I spent at least 30+ hours trying to recall the name of is a "mantle".

Bah.

Peace and Love, Hope and Dreams

How has this world been held together when there is so much mistrust, so much pain, so much hate and such endless self destruction?

Somehow, someway, some means that I truly do not understand...I am trusted.

The personal and broken lives of friends...and they trust me to hear, to listen, to see their wounds...a broken and tired child who doesn't know his left hand from his right...and yet, with just a prayer and hope...sometimes things can be okay.

Is this what you meant to be community?
Just this...simple hope that by being honest...by trying to do the right thing...somehow, someway...things can somehow work out?


I know it's stupid but sometimes I think I must have done something horrible, something terribly sinful to "deserve" all the pain and doubt I have. Not being able to sleep because of the levels of pain and then to hurt so much that I can't write, much less pray like I used to...but...isn't this love?

Love requires honesty.
Love requires disarming.
Love requires pain.

For love to grow, muscles have to be stretched, pulled, broken, stitched back together...and repeated, again and again...again and again.

God it hurts.
But if this is life, if this is what it means to live in live...and "fellowship" I suppose I can say it might just be worth losing my life over.

I still have so many doubts about being called and where I am being called or even if I can do anything right...but even with all my doubts...You believe in me.

Which is painful but I can't help but believe.
It goes beyond what I can choose to do and you love me.
Love me.
Love. Me.

After all the unintentional pain I have caused...been apart of...thank you for holding me, keeping me close and not letting me fade into the dark.

Ha.

I should not find that endlessly hilarious.

But I do.

I have to keep laughing.

Wow...just...wow.

The nerve and arrogance of some people.

Seriously.

Who died and made you God's Dean of Admissions?

Why must life continually be so...so...complicated?