...imagine that you're a prostitute who's keeping a journal:
My pen is on fire
and these words I write
are the burnt sacrifice
placed at your alter every night.
Nightmares claim me as their concubine
their wicked fingers grope my dreams
as they whisper that they love me
I laugh at their inhumanity
cuz I know what true love is.
So what if I was bought and sold
to a brothel on the far side of the sea,
so what if death toys with my body?
I swear I never whored my soul
and still I give allegiance to the only truth I know
Certainly miracles are meant for me.
Every night I'm raped by despair,
yet fear will never impregnate me
I chant grandma's healing prayer
and worship til you take me
for a ride on the wings of dawn,
you lift me higher than the eye can see
Together we transcend reality.
You set me free.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
El Espejo
The following is my first shot at short fictional writing, it was actually written about 3 months ago, and I was too timid to post it anywhere... It just seems like the right time now...
I have to WARN YOU there is PROFANITY and SENSITIVE ISSUES expressed, so you may want to stop right now.
Also, this is a composite of people, stories shared with me, my own personal issues, thought and simple FICTION. I had so much fun writing this.
Otherwise, welcome to El Espejo.....
El Espejo
As we walk up to each other, he smiles at me and with a twinkle in his eyes says something witty, though what I really notice is the sadness behind his eyes. Those eyes are piercing; they say so much and hid so much more.
Looking closely, I can tell he must have been reading before we walked up to each other, because I can see those small indentations around his nose from his recently acquired reading glasses he tries not to use; and never in public. Time is catching up to him.
His hair is slightly graying; more wrinkles cover his face; there seems to be less hair visible on his head; and he bares a few scars on him. Some of the scars are visible on his skin, others would only be found by knowing his life story or if you could look into his heart.
His body aches, his joints are stiffer, and when he sits too long in one position it hurts his hip. Time is catching up to him as his sight is weakening, and he doesn’t move like he did when he was in his twenties, in his thirties, or even a few years ago when he rounded forty. For sure, time is catching up with him and I see him take a big sigh, and again, I see the sadness behind his eyes.
Most people wouldn’t see what I’ve learned to see, in fact, most people thinks he’s always happy, positive, and there to stand strong for them. They don’t see what I see right now.
“Shit happens,” he gruffly chuckles, as he seems to know I am reading his eyes and his body language.
I can also see he is attempting to shrug off the tears and sadness he’s holding back.
I ask how is he doing, and he opens a small crack in the public shell he keeps polished by the front door.
He says, “I’m tired, that’s all.”
Again, he shrugs, as his eyes come up and looks right back at me, there’s something more, something deeper and darker… I just keep smiling and looking him in the face.
His eyes glance away from mine, and I hear him again, sigh and then shudder.
Looking back into my eyes, now his eyes seem softer and a feeling of brokenness comes over me as he says, “Man, I am really lonely.”
“I thought so,” I say as gently as I can.
“It’s not a new feeling, I’ve felt this way much of my life. I mean, I’ve put up with it, fought against it, tried to ignore it, tried even to accept it and even tried to die to it.
Now, crap, I’m just tired of feeling lonely. Please make it go away,” he says, as he looks right into my eyes, piercing my soul and I have to catch my breath before I reply.
I tell him, “I can help, but I can’t make it go away. I know God is with you.”
He slumps his shoulders a bit, “I know that, and I know God is with me, though you gotta admit it doesn’t take all the loneliness away. Come on, I can’t take God out to dinner; He doesn’t go swimming, or wanna call me up and ask me to go out somewhere. Even my ‘friends’ don’t call me like I need, I’m always the one who calls them, I make the effort to go see them. Otherwise, I’m home alone. You know that’s the truth.”
I’m speechless, as he continues.
“You know what I am talking about and even my best friend lives clear across the country and we only can talk on occasion. It’s not even that I think it’s unfair, duh, everyone has their own life to live, we each got responsibilities and priorities, I…I, ah heck, I just wish I was someone’s priority,” he says, nearly raising his voice, not in anger, but definitely frustrated and he’s hurting.
I say nothing, and just stand there before him.
“Look, people do call me, it is just that they usually call me when they want something FROM me, they don’t call because they simply WANT me. I’m a useful tool, a fucking resource to be tapped into….
I hear from two “friends” that preach about love and that we are Brothers-in-Christ, and a whole lot of other sweet sounding Christianese shit, but they only call when THEY need something; when it fits their schedule, and they call me when they want me to be THEIR sounding board; or some other crap. Shit, no one that really matters to me even remembered my FUCKING birthday! How is it that my co-workers remembered but my ‘friends’ didn’t,” saying this, it is clear he’s really wound up now.
He continues, “Love isn’t something that can be preached, it simply is or it isn’t there… You feel it and respond or you don’t feel it and don’t respond. I’m just saying it’s not something around me much...I am not personally loved. Corporately loved, appreciated by my church and my work, yeah. It is just that I don’t I feel special in anyone’s life. I don’t matter enough.
Heck, you can’t even do anything about it. I just wish I was like a rock in that Simon and Garfunkel song… no feelings, no emotions, no pain, no hurt.”
“Wow, that doesn’t sound good,” I say in all sincerity.
“He looks back at me and says, “Should it? What am I to do? Do I continue shelving my dreams and desires on a high shelf of my spirit because not wanting will be less painful? Is this something that I need to bury deep in my heart where it either kills a piece of my heart or where it lays painfully untreated, not addressed, like a cancer.
I’ve been doing that, I think that’s why I talking to you now. To bring it all up and out into the light and then discuss this with you and God is listening too. I am sure He will speak into this too, either directly or perhaps indirectly…either way, it requires me to grab it and be accountable to admitting these things.
You and I both have seen how some people seem to live off of low expectations and mediocrity so things don’t hurt so much…it’s not far to fall if you stay low, you know.”
He laughs as he goes on, “Most people accept their lot in life, and I’m not even sure that I can try to do that anymore. I’m hurting AND I’m hopeful. I’m impatient AND I’m trying to be still and wait…May I say that I am actively waiting? Oddly enough, there is this part of me that would rather dream, scream, and shout for these things to manifest in my life and should they not happen…heck, at least I tried. Or should I just keep my head down low?
There’s a worldly truth in the old Japanese saying, ‘the nail that sticks up gets hammered down.’ Well, I’m still sticking up, and I’m not sure if I should move or that I will be moved, instead.
Is change even possible, can we change God’s mind?
I still think I should try; I just don’t know how to, nor am I sure He’ll do that all for me” with that he becomes silent before me.
“Are you that depressed,” I ask.
“Depressed? No, just tired of feeling unloved; just tired of not feeling special to someone, tired that I don’t have the one big thing I feel I deserve…look at me, in my mid-forties, single, and barely making ends meet, I’m a fucking loser, just like my Dad, and that is something I vowed I didn’t want to happen….crap,” he shakes his head and shakes his fists towards me, yet, I it’s not at me.
With a moment to catch his breath and corral his thoughts he speaks, “I know a family of my own is so much on my heart, and I’m not blind to think that things would be all roses once I had a family. Come on, you know me well enough to know I have seen and heard all the difficulties. I simply want those problems, I want a wife to disagree with; to argue with; to have to discipline my kids; open myself to being hurt…I know I was meant for love, I do that good, I WANT TO BE LOVED! Do you get it?” he says somewhat controlled and yet, tears begin to form.
He looks right at me and says, “Don’t get all Bibled up on me; I just want to be real for a moment, to be human and share with you how I feel. Understand that I know God will never leave me, nor forsake me. I know He loves me and I love Him.
Okay, I also admit that I am impatient and for that matter there is no guarantee that I will ever have a family of my own to love. I missed that chapter and now I’m in my mid-forties. You know there is no way you can tell me what the future has in store for me and I am tired of well-meaning Christians spewing verses meant for the nation of Israel as if God was speaking to me. That is abusing Scripture and sure, there is truth in there. Don’t do a blanket toss from the Bible.” He stops talking and we just look at each other.
“There are other people who have it worse than you,” I say.
“Fuck you, is that supposed to make me feel better? No shit Sherlock, I mourn for them too, I mourn for those of my friends who hurt, I mourn for widows, orphans, divorcees’ and those, like me, who are lonely and unwed. You moron, it doesn’t change HOW I FEEL, now does it?” shaking his head at me, now definitely AT me, as he continues, “please, please, please, don’t now jump to the, ‘well maybe it’s God’s will for you,’ load of garbage either,” he takes a breath.
He continues, “God is God and God is good, He has never blessed a storm, he doesn’t make bad things happen, nor does He waste opportunities to reveal His love through the things in life. Hear me out, I am accountable for the choices I’ve made in my past; the things He has shown me to work on and that I am slow to do; and for the things I rejected. I even have to accept that the world is a mess and none of that is God’s will.
No, I’m not going to cop that on God.
I admit there are things in this world that simply suck. I think it sucks for a woman to lose her husband to cancer and now she has to raise two great kids alone. I think it sucks that diseases are not cured, or healed, or for that matter that disease even exists. Why little children should suffer? Don’t say it’s God’s will, because it is not. Even higher gas prices and the price of tea in China are to be blamed on God, no, nada, not. Look, we simply live in a fallen world and we have freewill.
Since the beginning of the earth and throughout today and beyond we’ve made choices and listened to voices that are not God’s. These come from within our own flesh, from the material world around us, and from the enemy of God.
Huh, I know this life I complain about is not God’s will, and I know He can and will use these things in the end to His purposes, but nah, He didn’t cause it, and I can man up to my fair share of mistakes, disobedience, choices, and freewill” he says with finality.
“I apologize for going for the “go to” canned answer earlier, you caught me off guard, and heck, I almost did say that it must be God’s will for you, I am so sorry,” I sheepishly admit.
“There, now you are being real, and I forgive you, thanks for that little bit” he says with even a little satisfaction and smirk.
I look right into his eyes and say, “I realize I have no answers for you, no one does, what I have to offer you is my ears to hear you, and a heart to stand here with you. I’ll also keep praying and keep asking God to grant the desires of your heart, without guarantees that everything will go your way on earth, okay?”
“Okay, that’s all I want, yes, prayers do help and I am sure whatever God’s plans for me are; those plans will be those that best fit His purposes… I submit to that, I just needed an ear to listen to me and to say, ‘yeah, that sucks.” He still looks right at me.
“Yeah, that sucks.” I chuckle.
“There it is. Look God’s equation of life and his level of mathematics’ is so huge and so beyond our comprehension that somehow disasters, horrors, pain, sorrow, suffering, unfulfilled dreams are mixed with laughter, joy, blessings, and fortunes to somehow come together for the good of the Kingdom of God, and I am not going to try to understand something I can’t. It’s a waste of time, and I doubt I am smart enough to even ask the right questions, let alone know any answers.
I am also sure God will answer me, to the level I can understand and only when I really need to understand it, Some things he holds to explain over time and it is that pace and length of time that my relationship with Him is getting real and better. I do trust God, and as I am human and frail, I get frustrated, no not at God, not even totally at me… just frustrated at the situation, condition, affects of whateva’ prevents me from what I want and from what I ‘feel” I deserve…that is even a loaded statement.
Look, I am going to try surrender the things that are beyond my comprehension and reach and to accept the things I do understand, and once in a while, I going to come to you and speak some new sad, crying-out to God kind of psalms to you, grieving over my life… David wrote a few and now I am.
Don’t misunderstand all of this, I think it is healthy to face this straight on and be real, even expose myself, I usually suck it up quite well and I am sure once we’re done here, I’ll go back to being that strong person for everyone else.” He says with a sense of closure and serenity even.
“I’m cool with that, and I too like counting on you. I’ll try to be a bit more sensitive to what’s going on in your heart and let’s check in again more often, okay?” I ask.
“Yes, thanks that would be good.” He says as he cracks a smile and turns away.
We both turn at the same time, and as I walk away, I take on last glance back at….the mirror (el espejo).
I have to WARN YOU there is PROFANITY and SENSITIVE ISSUES expressed, so you may want to stop right now.
Also, this is a composite of people, stories shared with me, my own personal issues, thought and simple FICTION. I had so much fun writing this.
Otherwise, welcome to El Espejo.....
El Espejo
As we walk up to each other, he smiles at me and with a twinkle in his eyes says something witty, though what I really notice is the sadness behind his eyes. Those eyes are piercing; they say so much and hid so much more.
Looking closely, I can tell he must have been reading before we walked up to each other, because I can see those small indentations around his nose from his recently acquired reading glasses he tries not to use; and never in public. Time is catching up to him.
His hair is slightly graying; more wrinkles cover his face; there seems to be less hair visible on his head; and he bares a few scars on him. Some of the scars are visible on his skin, others would only be found by knowing his life story or if you could look into his heart.
His body aches, his joints are stiffer, and when he sits too long in one position it hurts his hip. Time is catching up to him as his sight is weakening, and he doesn’t move like he did when he was in his twenties, in his thirties, or even a few years ago when he rounded forty. For sure, time is catching up with him and I see him take a big sigh, and again, I see the sadness behind his eyes.
Most people wouldn’t see what I’ve learned to see, in fact, most people thinks he’s always happy, positive, and there to stand strong for them. They don’t see what I see right now.
“Shit happens,” he gruffly chuckles, as he seems to know I am reading his eyes and his body language.
I can also see he is attempting to shrug off the tears and sadness he’s holding back.
I ask how is he doing, and he opens a small crack in the public shell he keeps polished by the front door.
He says, “I’m tired, that’s all.”
Again, he shrugs, as his eyes come up and looks right back at me, there’s something more, something deeper and darker… I just keep smiling and looking him in the face.
His eyes glance away from mine, and I hear him again, sigh and then shudder.
Looking back into my eyes, now his eyes seem softer and a feeling of brokenness comes over me as he says, “Man, I am really lonely.”
“I thought so,” I say as gently as I can.
“It’s not a new feeling, I’ve felt this way much of my life. I mean, I’ve put up with it, fought against it, tried to ignore it, tried even to accept it and even tried to die to it.
Now, crap, I’m just tired of feeling lonely. Please make it go away,” he says, as he looks right into my eyes, piercing my soul and I have to catch my breath before I reply.
I tell him, “I can help, but I can’t make it go away. I know God is with you.”
He slumps his shoulders a bit, “I know that, and I know God is with me, though you gotta admit it doesn’t take all the loneliness away. Come on, I can’t take God out to dinner; He doesn’t go swimming, or wanna call me up and ask me to go out somewhere. Even my ‘friends’ don’t call me like I need, I’m always the one who calls them, I make the effort to go see them. Otherwise, I’m home alone. You know that’s the truth.”
I’m speechless, as he continues.
“You know what I am talking about and even my best friend lives clear across the country and we only can talk on occasion. It’s not even that I think it’s unfair, duh, everyone has their own life to live, we each got responsibilities and priorities, I…I, ah heck, I just wish I was someone’s priority,” he says, nearly raising his voice, not in anger, but definitely frustrated and he’s hurting.
I say nothing, and just stand there before him.
“Look, people do call me, it is just that they usually call me when they want something FROM me, they don’t call because they simply WANT me. I’m a useful tool, a fucking resource to be tapped into….
I hear from two “friends” that preach about love and that we are Brothers-in-Christ, and a whole lot of other sweet sounding Christianese shit, but they only call when THEY need something; when it fits their schedule, and they call me when they want me to be THEIR sounding board; or some other crap. Shit, no one that really matters to me even remembered my FUCKING birthday! How is it that my co-workers remembered but my ‘friends’ didn’t,” saying this, it is clear he’s really wound up now.
He continues, “Love isn’t something that can be preached, it simply is or it isn’t there… You feel it and respond or you don’t feel it and don’t respond. I’m just saying it’s not something around me much...I am not personally loved. Corporately loved, appreciated by my church and my work, yeah. It is just that I don’t I feel special in anyone’s life. I don’t matter enough.
Heck, you can’t even do anything about it. I just wish I was like a rock in that Simon and Garfunkel song… no feelings, no emotions, no pain, no hurt.”
“Wow, that doesn’t sound good,” I say in all sincerity.
“He looks back at me and says, “Should it? What am I to do? Do I continue shelving my dreams and desires on a high shelf of my spirit because not wanting will be less painful? Is this something that I need to bury deep in my heart where it either kills a piece of my heart or where it lays painfully untreated, not addressed, like a cancer.
I’ve been doing that, I think that’s why I talking to you now. To bring it all up and out into the light and then discuss this with you and God is listening too. I am sure He will speak into this too, either directly or perhaps indirectly…either way, it requires me to grab it and be accountable to admitting these things.
You and I both have seen how some people seem to live off of low expectations and mediocrity so things don’t hurt so much…it’s not far to fall if you stay low, you know.”
He laughs as he goes on, “Most people accept their lot in life, and I’m not even sure that I can try to do that anymore. I’m hurting AND I’m hopeful. I’m impatient AND I’m trying to be still and wait…May I say that I am actively waiting? Oddly enough, there is this part of me that would rather dream, scream, and shout for these things to manifest in my life and should they not happen…heck, at least I tried. Or should I just keep my head down low?
There’s a worldly truth in the old Japanese saying, ‘the nail that sticks up gets hammered down.’ Well, I’m still sticking up, and I’m not sure if I should move or that I will be moved, instead.
Is change even possible, can we change God’s mind?
I still think I should try; I just don’t know how to, nor am I sure He’ll do that all for me” with that he becomes silent before me.
“Are you that depressed,” I ask.
“Depressed? No, just tired of feeling unloved; just tired of not feeling special to someone, tired that I don’t have the one big thing I feel I deserve…look at me, in my mid-forties, single, and barely making ends meet, I’m a fucking loser, just like my Dad, and that is something I vowed I didn’t want to happen….crap,” he shakes his head and shakes his fists towards me, yet, I it’s not at me.
With a moment to catch his breath and corral his thoughts he speaks, “I know a family of my own is so much on my heart, and I’m not blind to think that things would be all roses once I had a family. Come on, you know me well enough to know I have seen and heard all the difficulties. I simply want those problems, I want a wife to disagree with; to argue with; to have to discipline my kids; open myself to being hurt…I know I was meant for love, I do that good, I WANT TO BE LOVED! Do you get it?” he says somewhat controlled and yet, tears begin to form.
He looks right at me and says, “Don’t get all Bibled up on me; I just want to be real for a moment, to be human and share with you how I feel. Understand that I know God will never leave me, nor forsake me. I know He loves me and I love Him.
Okay, I also admit that I am impatient and for that matter there is no guarantee that I will ever have a family of my own to love. I missed that chapter and now I’m in my mid-forties. You know there is no way you can tell me what the future has in store for me and I am tired of well-meaning Christians spewing verses meant for the nation of Israel as if God was speaking to me. That is abusing Scripture and sure, there is truth in there. Don’t do a blanket toss from the Bible.” He stops talking and we just look at each other.
“There are other people who have it worse than you,” I say.
“Fuck you, is that supposed to make me feel better? No shit Sherlock, I mourn for them too, I mourn for those of my friends who hurt, I mourn for widows, orphans, divorcees’ and those, like me, who are lonely and unwed. You moron, it doesn’t change HOW I FEEL, now does it?” shaking his head at me, now definitely AT me, as he continues, “please, please, please, don’t now jump to the, ‘well maybe it’s God’s will for you,’ load of garbage either,” he takes a breath.
He continues, “God is God and God is good, He has never blessed a storm, he doesn’t make bad things happen, nor does He waste opportunities to reveal His love through the things in life. Hear me out, I am accountable for the choices I’ve made in my past; the things He has shown me to work on and that I am slow to do; and for the things I rejected. I even have to accept that the world is a mess and none of that is God’s will.
No, I’m not going to cop that on God.
I admit there are things in this world that simply suck. I think it sucks for a woman to lose her husband to cancer and now she has to raise two great kids alone. I think it sucks that diseases are not cured, or healed, or for that matter that disease even exists. Why little children should suffer? Don’t say it’s God’s will, because it is not. Even higher gas prices and the price of tea in China are to be blamed on God, no, nada, not. Look, we simply live in a fallen world and we have freewill.
Since the beginning of the earth and throughout today and beyond we’ve made choices and listened to voices that are not God’s. These come from within our own flesh, from the material world around us, and from the enemy of God.
Huh, I know this life I complain about is not God’s will, and I know He can and will use these things in the end to His purposes, but nah, He didn’t cause it, and I can man up to my fair share of mistakes, disobedience, choices, and freewill” he says with finality.
“I apologize for going for the “go to” canned answer earlier, you caught me off guard, and heck, I almost did say that it must be God’s will for you, I am so sorry,” I sheepishly admit.
“There, now you are being real, and I forgive you, thanks for that little bit” he says with even a little satisfaction and smirk.
I look right into his eyes and say, “I realize I have no answers for you, no one does, what I have to offer you is my ears to hear you, and a heart to stand here with you. I’ll also keep praying and keep asking God to grant the desires of your heart, without guarantees that everything will go your way on earth, okay?”
“Okay, that’s all I want, yes, prayers do help and I am sure whatever God’s plans for me are; those plans will be those that best fit His purposes… I submit to that, I just needed an ear to listen to me and to say, ‘yeah, that sucks.” He still looks right at me.
“Yeah, that sucks.” I chuckle.
“There it is. Look God’s equation of life and his level of mathematics’ is so huge and so beyond our comprehension that somehow disasters, horrors, pain, sorrow, suffering, unfulfilled dreams are mixed with laughter, joy, blessings, and fortunes to somehow come together for the good of the Kingdom of God, and I am not going to try to understand something I can’t. It’s a waste of time, and I doubt I am smart enough to even ask the right questions, let alone know any answers.
I am also sure God will answer me, to the level I can understand and only when I really need to understand it, Some things he holds to explain over time and it is that pace and length of time that my relationship with Him is getting real and better. I do trust God, and as I am human and frail, I get frustrated, no not at God, not even totally at me… just frustrated at the situation, condition, affects of whateva’ prevents me from what I want and from what I ‘feel” I deserve…that is even a loaded statement.
Look, I am going to try surrender the things that are beyond my comprehension and reach and to accept the things I do understand, and once in a while, I going to come to you and speak some new sad, crying-out to God kind of psalms to you, grieving over my life… David wrote a few and now I am.
Don’t misunderstand all of this, I think it is healthy to face this straight on and be real, even expose myself, I usually suck it up quite well and I am sure once we’re done here, I’ll go back to being that strong person for everyone else.” He says with a sense of closure and serenity even.
“I’m cool with that, and I too like counting on you. I’ll try to be a bit more sensitive to what’s going on in your heart and let’s check in again more often, okay?” I ask.
“Yes, thanks that would be good.” He says as he cracks a smile and turns away.
We both turn at the same time, and as I walk away, I take on last glance back at….the mirror (el espejo).
Monday, October 27, 2008
I Can't Make You Love Me
Bonnie Raitt wrote a marvelous song that has remained one of my favorite songs of all times, I Can't Make You Love Me. It is a great R&B song with such sad yet honest lyrics....
Turn down the lights, turn down the bed
Turn down these voices inside my head
Lay down with me, tell me no lies
Just hold me close, don't patronize - don't patronize me
Chorus:
Cause I can't make you love me if you don't
You can't make your heart feel something it won't
Here in the dark, in these lonely hours
I will lay down my heart and I'll feel the power
But you won't, no you won't
'cause I can't make you love me, if you don't
I'll close my eyes, then I won't see
The love you don't feel when you're holding me
Morning will come and I'll do what's right
Just give me till then to give up this fight
And I will give up this fight
Chorus:
Cause I can't make you love me if you don't
You can't make your heart feel something it won't
Here in the dark, in these lonely hours
I will lay down my heart and I'll feel the power
But you won't, no you won't
'cause I can't make you love me, if you don't
I was hanging with a good friend last night and we got to talking about classic songs, classic times in our lives, and classic pain...
So today, I popped this song on after some contemplation of stuff going on in my life, or rather, stuff NOT going on in my life. Things lost, gained, changed, and coming forth.
I find it fun to look (hear) how the secular world talks of love and great things like that.
So, what if this song was from God to His bride--the Church? Our freewill can cause us to chose not to love Him. Our freewill can supersede His will and intentions for us...it has happened before. Our freewill can cause us to act like we are near Him and yet all we are really doing is patronizing Him.
Sure, this is not the perfect song to talk about the loss of our First Love...yet, pretty much has got me thinking about the times I got my mind and priorities all screwed up... missed the mark and pulled away from the God who loves me...yet, I have chosen at times to withhold from Him, love.
I'm in a place right now, that when I think of His love for me, I want to sing Natalie Merchant's, Kind and Generous to God:
La-La-La-La-La...
You've been so kind and generous, I don't know how you keep on giving
For your kindness I'm in debt to you
For your selflessness, my admiration
For everything you've done, you know I'm bound,
I'm bound to thank you for it....
La-La-La-La-La...
Hey-hey-hey-hey-hey...
You've been so kind and generous, I don't know how you keep on giving
For your kindness I'm in debt to you
And I never could have come this far without you
For everything you've done, you know I'm bound,
I'm bound to thank you for it....
La-La-La-La-La...
Oh,
I want to thank you for so many gifts you gave, the love and tenderness,
I wanna thank you
I want to thank you for your generosity,
the love and the honesty that you gave me
I want to thank you, show my gratitude, my love and my respect for you,
I wanna thank you
Oh I want to thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,
thank you
So, now here's the challenge...what song do you think of about Your love for God and what song do you think of about His love for you?
(No you can't use Christian songs for either question...unless you come up blank)
Turn down the lights, turn down the bed
Turn down these voices inside my head
Lay down with me, tell me no lies
Just hold me close, don't patronize - don't patronize me
Chorus:
Cause I can't make you love me if you don't
You can't make your heart feel something it won't
Here in the dark, in these lonely hours
I will lay down my heart and I'll feel the power
But you won't, no you won't
'cause I can't make you love me, if you don't
I'll close my eyes, then I won't see
The love you don't feel when you're holding me
Morning will come and I'll do what's right
Just give me till then to give up this fight
And I will give up this fight
Chorus:
Cause I can't make you love me if you don't
You can't make your heart feel something it won't
Here in the dark, in these lonely hours
I will lay down my heart and I'll feel the power
But you won't, no you won't
'cause I can't make you love me, if you don't
I was hanging with a good friend last night and we got to talking about classic songs, classic times in our lives, and classic pain...
So today, I popped this song on after some contemplation of stuff going on in my life, or rather, stuff NOT going on in my life. Things lost, gained, changed, and coming forth.
I find it fun to look (hear) how the secular world talks of love and great things like that.
So, what if this song was from God to His bride--the Church? Our freewill can cause us to chose not to love Him. Our freewill can supersede His will and intentions for us...it has happened before. Our freewill can cause us to act like we are near Him and yet all we are really doing is patronizing Him.
Sure, this is not the perfect song to talk about the loss of our First Love...yet, pretty much has got me thinking about the times I got my mind and priorities all screwed up... missed the mark and pulled away from the God who loves me...yet, I have chosen at times to withhold from Him, love.
I'm in a place right now, that when I think of His love for me, I want to sing Natalie Merchant's, Kind and Generous to God:
La-La-La-La-La...
You've been so kind and generous, I don't know how you keep on giving
For your kindness I'm in debt to you
For your selflessness, my admiration
For everything you've done, you know I'm bound,
I'm bound to thank you for it....
La-La-La-La-La...
Hey-hey-hey-hey-hey...
You've been so kind and generous, I don't know how you keep on giving
For your kindness I'm in debt to you
And I never could have come this far without you
For everything you've done, you know I'm bound,
I'm bound to thank you for it....
La-La-La-La-La...
Oh,
I want to thank you for so many gifts you gave, the love and tenderness,
I wanna thank you
I want to thank you for your generosity,
the love and the honesty that you gave me
I want to thank you, show my gratitude, my love and my respect for you,
I wanna thank you
Oh I want to thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,
thank you
So, now here's the challenge...what song do you think of about Your love for God and what song do you think of about His love for you?
(No you can't use Christian songs for either question...unless you come up blank)
Saturday, October 18, 2008
A Tall Tale..A Fiction of Course
Imagine you are the owner of a large widget company. You started out, just you making and selling widgets. They were the most excellent of widgets and people clamored for you to make more widgets. Soon your business began to grow and grow and grow. You started bringing other people on board to help you. They came with some skills, talents, and even passion for your widgets. They liked how you ran your company, your mastery of making widgets, and they took pride in working for you.
Over time, the work became more demanding and the initial thrill of working for the best widget company wore away. In its place came complaints that the widget design needed to be changed. Grumblings started that you didn't know what you were doing and that you were wrong. Your employees began to feel they were entitled to speak disrespectfully, call you at home, and even yell and slam the phone; hanging up mid-conversation.
What would you do with employees like that?
Would you pay them any longer; fire them?
Would you allow your own children to talk to you in such a disrespectful manner?
Would you want to be around a spouse that talks to that way?
If this behavior occurred in a court room, before a judge, what would happen?
If someone spoke this way to their teacher, what would happen?
Would they talk this way to themselves?
Would they speak this way to the face of God?
How would you feel if some people did this to you in just a week, a month, a year?
If knowing this kind of behavior, would you hire people like this?
Are these attributes that God blesses?
How would you feel if this behavior became the culture of the company and every employee felt they could violate common understandings of respect for those in authority over them; those in the lead.
How would a General respond to a Lieutenant who talked this way?
What makes an employee think they are entitled to speak in such a way?
The Bible says to work for people as if you were directly working for God. Do you think these employees have ever read or understood that passage?
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are careful to tithe even the tiniest part of your income, but you ignore the important things of the law—justice, mercy, and faith. You should tithe, yes, but you should not leave undone the more important things. Blind guides! You strain your water so you won't accidentally swallow a gnat; then you swallow a camel!
Now, none of these widget employees have ever been an owner of a company and not one of them have the talents, skills, or balls to ever try to manage more then their tiny little cubicles and yet they seem to be able to tell you, your faults, shortcomings and problems. They are ineffective in motivating others within their cubicles, they've done poorly at drawing in more employees or customers to enjoy your widgets, they whine and pout daily that things are so hard, and they seek first to complain. They seem to think they have the whole world figured out, yet their own cubicle is a mess.
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! You are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and self-indulgence! Blind Pharisees! First wash the inside of the cup, and then the outside will become clean, too."
They are simply taking liberties with you (liberties: a too free, too familiar, or impertinent action or attitude). Would you even want to listen to them?
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people's bones and all sorts of impurity. You try to look like upright people outwardly, but inside your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness."
There you are the lead person in the company, concerned for so many things, the widgets, the customers, AND the employees. In fact, you are so concerned about the well-being of the company and its affect on the community, you have decided to forgo receiving any compensation from the earnings of the company. You basically are the hardest working, most concerned, most passionate, and most compassionate VOLUNTEER there...and you find people pooping in your Cheerios. There are days where you look up and think, "shucks, I don't get paid enough for this crap."
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you build tombs for the prophets your ancestors killed and decorate the graves of the godly people your ancestors destroyed. Then you say, ‘We never would have joined them in killing the prophets."
Don't you wish people (I won't even say Christians...non-Christians seem to be nicer) would grant you liberty (freedom or release from slavery, imprisonment, captivity, or any other form of arbitrary control) instead of taking liberties with you?
Why do "Christians" treat non-believers better than they treat those they are close to, in ministry with, go to church with?
"Yes, how terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. For you cross land and sea to make one convert, and then you turn him into twice the son of hell as you yourselves are."
It is a sad thing that the Bible says nothing about being respectful; showing love for one another; about being helpful; or any other silly notion of kindness, joy, peace, or self-control. Wait a minute, it DOES, in fact, it says plenty about it... It is time for some employees to ask for forgiveness. Unfortunately, I don't have time to write out the end of the story...Maybe the widget company will have to close its doors. Maybe the owner of the widget company will be crucified, or stoned to death. Maybe things will get better...
Thank goodness this is just a tall tale, a fiction of course.
Over time, the work became more demanding and the initial thrill of working for the best widget company wore away. In its place came complaints that the widget design needed to be changed. Grumblings started that you didn't know what you were doing and that you were wrong. Your employees began to feel they were entitled to speak disrespectfully, call you at home, and even yell and slam the phone; hanging up mid-conversation.
What would you do with employees like that?
Would you pay them any longer; fire them?
Would you allow your own children to talk to you in such a disrespectful manner?
Would you want to be around a spouse that talks to that way?
If this behavior occurred in a court room, before a judge, what would happen?
If someone spoke this way to their teacher, what would happen?
Would they talk this way to themselves?
Would they speak this way to the face of God?
How would you feel if some people did this to you in just a week, a month, a year?
If knowing this kind of behavior, would you hire people like this?
Are these attributes that God blesses?
How would you feel if this behavior became the culture of the company and every employee felt they could violate common understandings of respect for those in authority over them; those in the lead.
How would a General respond to a Lieutenant who talked this way?
What makes an employee think they are entitled to speak in such a way?
The Bible says to work for people as if you were directly working for God. Do you think these employees have ever read or understood that passage?
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are careful to tithe even the tiniest part of your income, but you ignore the important things of the law—justice, mercy, and faith. You should tithe, yes, but you should not leave undone the more important things. Blind guides! You strain your water so you won't accidentally swallow a gnat; then you swallow a camel!
Now, none of these widget employees have ever been an owner of a company and not one of them have the talents, skills, or balls to ever try to manage more then their tiny little cubicles and yet they seem to be able to tell you, your faults, shortcomings and problems. They are ineffective in motivating others within their cubicles, they've done poorly at drawing in more employees or customers to enjoy your widgets, they whine and pout daily that things are so hard, and they seek first to complain. They seem to think they have the whole world figured out, yet their own cubicle is a mess.
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! You are so careful to clean the outside of the cup and the dish, but inside you are filthy—full of greed and self-indulgence! Blind Pharisees! First wash the inside of the cup, and then the outside will become clean, too."
They are simply taking liberties with you (liberties: a too free, too familiar, or impertinent action or attitude). Would you even want to listen to them?
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people's bones and all sorts of impurity. You try to look like upright people outwardly, but inside your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness."
There you are the lead person in the company, concerned for so many things, the widgets, the customers, AND the employees. In fact, you are so concerned about the well-being of the company and its affect on the community, you have decided to forgo receiving any compensation from the earnings of the company. You basically are the hardest working, most concerned, most passionate, and most compassionate VOLUNTEER there...and you find people pooping in your Cheerios. There are days where you look up and think, "shucks, I don't get paid enough for this crap."
“How terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you build tombs for the prophets your ancestors killed and decorate the graves of the godly people your ancestors destroyed. Then you say, ‘We never would have joined them in killing the prophets."
Don't you wish people (I won't even say Christians...non-Christians seem to be nicer) would grant you liberty (freedom or release from slavery, imprisonment, captivity, or any other form of arbitrary control) instead of taking liberties with you?
Why do "Christians" treat non-believers better than they treat those they are close to, in ministry with, go to church with?
"Yes, how terrible it will be for you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. For you cross land and sea to make one convert, and then you turn him into twice the son of hell as you yourselves are."
It is a sad thing that the Bible says nothing about being respectful; showing love for one another; about being helpful; or any other silly notion of kindness, joy, peace, or self-control. Wait a minute, it DOES, in fact, it says plenty about it... It is time for some employees to ask for forgiveness. Unfortunately, I don't have time to write out the end of the story...Maybe the widget company will have to close its doors. Maybe the owner of the widget company will be crucified, or stoned to death. Maybe things will get better...
Thank goodness this is just a tall tale, a fiction of course.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Law of Undulation: Peaks and Troughs/Hills and Valleys
Having had such a radical upswing in the Holy Spirit’s move in my life over the past year, and especially in the past few short months; I and others are wondering how sustainable being “up on the mountain top” is in the long run. So these valleys, troughs, and lowlands are also a part of life.
Trying to think this through, I know there are times that feel like long dry seasons, with no end in sight. Then I pull back and look at things from God's eyes, and I realize they are milliseconds; just momentary pauses so to speak.
C.S. Lewis wrote of the law of undulation, and it could apply to what is going on with the move of the Holy Spirit, manifested evidence of the supernatural, dunimus-type power, and even the lack of one or more of those too...things do go up and down.
I also hold to God speaking through nature; it takes time for a seed to germinate, it takes a freeze for apples to be produced, and it takes harsh weather and struggle for grapes to produce the qualities to make a great wine. Seasons are there for a reason and every season serves a purpose.
Even within a season, there are undulations in the conditions and weather. Even within a season there are so many changes…
So I should not be surprised by change, undulation, dry spells, or huge downpours…enjoy them all and stand in awe of God through it all.
I continue to contend for more of the Holy Spirit in my life and in the life of the Church. I also am working on being settled into the palm of Our Lord, that He knows what He's doing, and I just need to be the person he wants me to be.
I remember hearing someone say, in my response to my question on how best to pray: It's not what you pray or how you pray that matters; it is WHO you are when you are praying that does matter. I'll take that and also apply it to spiritual gifts, ministry, supernatural encounters, and in relationships.... working on WHO I am...and helping, guiding and encouraging others in their walk too.
So, this law of undulation is actually a great workout…getting me spiritually buff! There are times when it is full-bore powerful, with supersets of spiritual exercise and outpourings… There are also times of rest, of refining some of the basics of Christian fitness or even mixing things up a bit so as to cause a bit of “spiritual muscle confusion” so that my spirit does not get used to doing things the same way all the time…hitting a plateau and hindering any further growth. My spirit also needs some rest—even active rest, to allow for healing, mending, and creation of more spiritual muscle packed with God’s dunimus power!
I know I am sort of all over the place on this blog, yet I don’t apologize. I think this is also an exercise in mixing things up and breaking down some of the walls and hindrances in my thinking and writing. How fun is that! I’ll be back up on the mountain soon enough… It’s just my hope, desire, and passion, to grab some more people to join me on the trek.
God Our High Place, ROCKS!
NOTE:
If you want to quickly read the Law of Undulation element...click this link to my earlier blog entry...Letter #8 from Screwtape Letters (C.S. Lewis) is near the end of the entry.
Tempt To Virtue
http://faithbrothers.blogspot.com/2008/10/tempt-to-virtue.html
Keiger
Trying to think this through, I know there are times that feel like long dry seasons, with no end in sight. Then I pull back and look at things from God's eyes, and I realize they are milliseconds; just momentary pauses so to speak.
C.S. Lewis wrote of the law of undulation, and it could apply to what is going on with the move of the Holy Spirit, manifested evidence of the supernatural, dunimus-type power, and even the lack of one or more of those too...things do go up and down.
I also hold to God speaking through nature; it takes time for a seed to germinate, it takes a freeze for apples to be produced, and it takes harsh weather and struggle for grapes to produce the qualities to make a great wine. Seasons are there for a reason and every season serves a purpose.
Even within a season, there are undulations in the conditions and weather. Even within a season there are so many changes…
So I should not be surprised by change, undulation, dry spells, or huge downpours…enjoy them all and stand in awe of God through it all.
I continue to contend for more of the Holy Spirit in my life and in the life of the Church. I also am working on being settled into the palm of Our Lord, that He knows what He's doing, and I just need to be the person he wants me to be.
I remember hearing someone say, in my response to my question on how best to pray: It's not what you pray or how you pray that matters; it is WHO you are when you are praying that does matter. I'll take that and also apply it to spiritual gifts, ministry, supernatural encounters, and in relationships.... working on WHO I am...and helping, guiding and encouraging others in their walk too.
So, this law of undulation is actually a great workout…getting me spiritually buff! There are times when it is full-bore powerful, with supersets of spiritual exercise and outpourings… There are also times of rest, of refining some of the basics of Christian fitness or even mixing things up a bit so as to cause a bit of “spiritual muscle confusion” so that my spirit does not get used to doing things the same way all the time…hitting a plateau and hindering any further growth. My spirit also needs some rest—even active rest, to allow for healing, mending, and creation of more spiritual muscle packed with God’s dunimus power!
I know I am sort of all over the place on this blog, yet I don’t apologize. I think this is also an exercise in mixing things up and breaking down some of the walls and hindrances in my thinking and writing. How fun is that! I’ll be back up on the mountain soon enough… It’s just my hope, desire, and passion, to grab some more people to join me on the trek.
God Our High Place, ROCKS!
NOTE:
If you want to quickly read the Law of Undulation element...click this link to my earlier blog entry...Letter #8 from Screwtape Letters (C.S. Lewis) is near the end of the entry.
Tempt To Virtue
http://faithbrothers.blogspot.com/2008/10/tempt-to-virtue.html
Keiger
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Consider It Pure Joy!
The Word of God says it all...James 1:2-4
Consider it wholly joyful, my brethren, whenever you are enveloped in or encounter trials of any sort or fall into various temptations.
Be assured and understand that the trial and proving of your faith bring out endurance and steadfastness and patience.
But let endurance and steadfastness and patience have full play and do a thorough work, so that you may be [people] perfectly and fully developed [with no defects], lacking in nothing.
AMP
Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don't try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way.
MSG
Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
NASB
Dear brothers and sisters, whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything.
NLT
Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.
NLTse
My brothers and sisters, when you have many kinds of troubles, you should be full of joy, because you know that these troubles test your faith, and this will give you patience. Let your patience show itself perfectly in what you do. Then you will be perfect and complete and will have everything you need.
NCV
My brothers and sisters, be very happy when you are tested in different ways. You know that such testing of your faith produces endurance. Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won't need anything.
GWT
Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
TNIV
What is perseverance?
* Perseverance is commitment, hard work, patience, endurance.
* Perseverance is being able to bear difficulties calmly and without complaint.
* Perseverance is trying again and again.
Consider it wholly joyful, my brethren, whenever you are enveloped in or encounter trials of any sort or fall into various temptations.
Be assured and understand that the trial and proving of your faith bring out endurance and steadfastness and patience.
But let endurance and steadfastness and patience have full play and do a thorough work, so that you may be [people] perfectly and fully developed [with no defects], lacking in nothing.
AMP
Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don't try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way.
MSG
Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
NASB
Dear brothers and sisters, whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything.
NLT
Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.
NLTse
My brothers and sisters, when you have many kinds of troubles, you should be full of joy, because you know that these troubles test your faith, and this will give you patience. Let your patience show itself perfectly in what you do. Then you will be perfect and complete and will have everything you need.
NCV
My brothers and sisters, be very happy when you are tested in different ways. You know that such testing of your faith produces endurance. Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won't need anything.
GWT
Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
TNIV
What is perseverance?
* Perseverance is commitment, hard work, patience, endurance.
* Perseverance is being able to bear difficulties calmly and without complaint.
* Perseverance is trying again and again.
Tempt To Virtue?
I have been struck by this quote from Rory and Wendy Alec, producers of God.tv:
"...the Lord said something to us some years ago - He said - When you hate sin because it HURTS ME - then it will lose its grip on you. When you hate sin because it displeases ME - its hold diminishes."
As I've written before, there is a prayer I say nearly everyday, "Lord, please teach me to hate the sins I currently love." And through time and culling of sinful, distasteful habits, behaviors, and thoughts I'm moving more towards the light and more Christlike in my life. Am I there yet? Not even close, yet further along then I was a year or more ago...each day--a step in the right direction. I think C.S. Lewis spoke of me when he wrote, "Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased" (The Weight of Glory).
It drives me a bit crazy that I am so easily pleased and so vulnerable in certain aspects of my life and that I am not totally surrendering some of the sins I still love. I long for the day when the character of Jesus Christ will be fully formed in me and I will move consistently and completely in the gifting the Holy Spirit pours over my life. For now I can only mumble a portion of what Paul wrote, "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me" (1 Corinthians 15:10).
I am such an unfinished work of God, and working out my salvation...with fear and trembling; a total reverence for God. I must try to maintain those few areas of my life that have already been refined and cleansed by God and continue to tackle the many areas of my life that are still in need of serious attention and purging. It's not something I can do alone, no, I need God's strength, the Holy Spirit's counsel, and the prayers and sharpening of the Body of Christ... I need you.
I think the stuff God is revealing as dross up in me...and some day some to dross OUT of me is a bit painful...but it sure has my attention and it has me turning deep in my being to God. I like what C.S. Lewis said of this pain: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world" (The Problem of Pain). He sure has shouted to me of late.
I am surprised at how God uses me and takes such risks on me every day. I totally trip out how in my weakness He is strong...for I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. God's amazing grace is truly amazing and He knows what I am made of and yet still uses me and allows His will to be done through my life. I ponder how many times I halted, hindered, detracted from His will being completed through me? How does my freewill play into the possibilities of God? Wow, that sure gets me thinking and wanting to work harder at hearing AND obeying Him.
Lastly, I find it truly amazing, yes, amazing that God enjoys seeing me try...and even fail, yet trying again... to follow Christ; to love God; heed the counsel of the Holy Spirit; and to choose God. Yeah, I'm not down on myself right now, though I am conscious of a need to press through on some things "sticking" to me and that I need to work on with God. I am seeking His joy even as I go through some internal hardships combined with some external struggles and unfulfilled desires...just like everyone else I suppose is too.
I just love letter 8 from Screwtape Letters, by C.S. Lewis. This a great book and this is my most favorite letter from it. The book is a great study via reverse theology, as one demon writes to his apprentice nephew about the life of a Christian.
I will leave you with this letter and I hope you will read it over a few times:
VIII
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
So you "have great hopes that the patient's religious phase is dying away", have you? I always thought the Training College had gone to pieces since they put old Slubgob at the head of it, and now I am sure. Has no one ever told you about the law of Undulation?
Humans are amphibians—half spirit and half animal. (The Enemy's determination to produce such a revolting hybrid was one of the things that determined Our Father to withdraw his support from Him.) As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time. This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time means to change. Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation—the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks. If you had watched your patient carefully you would have seen this undulation in every department of his life—his interest in his work, his affection for his friends, his physical appetites, all go up and down. As long as he lives on earth periods of emotional and bodily richness and liveliness will alternate with periods of numbness and poverty. The dryness and dulness through which your patient is now going are not, as you fondly suppose, your workmanship; they are merely a natural phenomenon which will do us no good unless you make a good use of it.
To decide what the best use of it is, you must ask what use the Enemy wants to make of it, and then do the opposite. Now it may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else. The reason is this. To us a human is primarily good; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at its expense. But the obedience which the Enemy demands of men is quite a different thing. One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth. He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself—creatures, whose life, on its miniature scale, will be qualitatively like His own, not because He has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to His. We want cattle who can finally become food; He wants servants who can finally become sons. We want to suck in, He wants to give out. We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over. Our war aim is a world in which Our Father Below has drawn all other beings into himself: the Enemy wants a world full of beings united to Him but still distinct.
And that is where the troughs come in. You must have often wondered why the Enemy does not make more use of His power to be sensibly present to human souls in any degree He chooses and at any moment. But you now see that the Irresistible and the Indisputable are the two weapons which the very nature of His scheme forbids Him to use. Merely to over-ride a human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless. He cannot ravish. He can only woo. For His ignoble idea is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with Him, but yet themselves; merely to cancel them, or assimilate them, will not serve. He is prepared to do a little overriding at the beginning. He will set them off with communications of His presence which, though faint, seem great to them, with emotional sweetness, and easy conquest over temptation. But He never allows this state of affairs to last long. Sooner or later He withdraws, if not in fact, at least from their conscious experience, all those supports and incentives. He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs—to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best. We can drag our patients along by continual tempting, because we design them only for the table, and the more their will is interfered with the better. He cannot "tempt" to virtue as we do to vice. He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger, than when a human, no longer desiring, but intending, to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.
But of course the troughs afford opportunities to our side also. Next week I will give you some hints on how to exploit them,
Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE
"...the Lord said something to us some years ago - He said - When you hate sin because it HURTS ME - then it will lose its grip on you. When you hate sin because it displeases ME - its hold diminishes."
As I've written before, there is a prayer I say nearly everyday, "Lord, please teach me to hate the sins I currently love." And through time and culling of sinful, distasteful habits, behaviors, and thoughts I'm moving more towards the light and more Christlike in my life. Am I there yet? Not even close, yet further along then I was a year or more ago...each day--a step in the right direction. I think C.S. Lewis spoke of me when he wrote, "Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased" (The Weight of Glory).
It drives me a bit crazy that I am so easily pleased and so vulnerable in certain aspects of my life and that I am not totally surrendering some of the sins I still love. I long for the day when the character of Jesus Christ will be fully formed in me and I will move consistently and completely in the gifting the Holy Spirit pours over my life. For now I can only mumble a portion of what Paul wrote, "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me" (1 Corinthians 15:10).
I am such an unfinished work of God, and working out my salvation...with fear and trembling; a total reverence for God. I must try to maintain those few areas of my life that have already been refined and cleansed by God and continue to tackle the many areas of my life that are still in need of serious attention and purging. It's not something I can do alone, no, I need God's strength, the Holy Spirit's counsel, and the prayers and sharpening of the Body of Christ... I need you.
I think the stuff God is revealing as dross up in me...and some day some to dross OUT of me is a bit painful...but it sure has my attention and it has me turning deep in my being to God. I like what C.S. Lewis said of this pain: "God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world" (The Problem of Pain). He sure has shouted to me of late.
I am surprised at how God uses me and takes such risks on me every day. I totally trip out how in my weakness He is strong...for I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. God's amazing grace is truly amazing and He knows what I am made of and yet still uses me and allows His will to be done through my life. I ponder how many times I halted, hindered, detracted from His will being completed through me? How does my freewill play into the possibilities of God? Wow, that sure gets me thinking and wanting to work harder at hearing AND obeying Him.
Lastly, I find it truly amazing, yes, amazing that God enjoys seeing me try...and even fail, yet trying again... to follow Christ; to love God; heed the counsel of the Holy Spirit; and to choose God. Yeah, I'm not down on myself right now, though I am conscious of a need to press through on some things "sticking" to me and that I need to work on with God. I am seeking His joy even as I go through some internal hardships combined with some external struggles and unfulfilled desires...just like everyone else I suppose is too.
I just love letter 8 from Screwtape Letters, by C.S. Lewis. This a great book and this is my most favorite letter from it. The book is a great study via reverse theology, as one demon writes to his apprentice nephew about the life of a Christian.
I will leave you with this letter and I hope you will read it over a few times:
VIII
MY DEAR WORMWOOD,
So you "have great hopes that the patient's religious phase is dying away", have you? I always thought the Training College had gone to pieces since they put old Slubgob at the head of it, and now I am sure. Has no one ever told you about the law of Undulation?
Humans are amphibians—half spirit and half animal. (The Enemy's determination to produce such a revolting hybrid was one of the things that determined Our Father to withdraw his support from Him.) As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time. This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time means to change. Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation—the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks. If you had watched your patient carefully you would have seen this undulation in every department of his life—his interest in his work, his affection for his friends, his physical appetites, all go up and down. As long as he lives on earth periods of emotional and bodily richness and liveliness will alternate with periods of numbness and poverty. The dryness and dulness through which your patient is now going are not, as you fondly suppose, your workmanship; they are merely a natural phenomenon which will do us no good unless you make a good use of it.
To decide what the best use of it is, you must ask what use the Enemy wants to make of it, and then do the opposite. Now it may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else. The reason is this. To us a human is primarily good; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at its expense. But the obedience which the Enemy demands of men is quite a different thing. One must face the fact that all the talk about His love for men, and His service being perfect freedom, is not (as one would gladly believe) mere propaganda, but an appalling truth. He really does want to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of Himself—creatures, whose life, on its miniature scale, will be qualitatively like His own, not because He has absorbed them but because their wills freely conform to His. We want cattle who can finally become food; He wants servants who can finally become sons. We want to suck in, He wants to give out. We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over. Our war aim is a world in which Our Father Below has drawn all other beings into himself: the Enemy wants a world full of beings united to Him but still distinct.
And that is where the troughs come in. You must have often wondered why the Enemy does not make more use of His power to be sensibly present to human souls in any degree He chooses and at any moment. But you now see that the Irresistible and the Indisputable are the two weapons which the very nature of His scheme forbids Him to use. Merely to over-ride a human will (as His felt presence in any but the faintest and most mitigated degree would certainly do) would be for Him useless. He cannot ravish. He can only woo. For His ignoble idea is to eat the cake and have it; the creatures are to be one with Him, but yet themselves; merely to cancel them, or assimilate them, will not serve. He is prepared to do a little overriding at the beginning. He will set them off with communications of His presence which, though faint, seem great to them, with emotional sweetness, and easy conquest over temptation. But He never allows this state of affairs to last long. Sooner or later He withdraws, if not in fact, at least from their conscious experience, all those supports and incentives. He leaves the creature to stand up on its own legs—to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish. It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be. Hence the prayers offered in the state of dryness are those which please Him best. We can drag our patients along by continual tempting, because we design them only for the table, and the more their will is interfered with the better. He cannot "tempt" to virtue as we do to vice. He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. Do not be deceived, Wormwood. Our cause is never more in danger, than when a human, no longer desiring, but intending, to do our Enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.
But of course the troughs afford opportunities to our side also. Next week I will give you some hints on how to exploit them,
Your affectionate uncle
SCREWTAPE
Sunday, October 05, 2008
Peace Out
I've been a bit quiet on the blogfront. I just haven't been in the mood to talk about what God's been doing in my life, mostly because I've been having a hard time discerning God's voice from mine. So stupid, huh? I doubt my giggly girly voice is anything like God's, and yet, the question that constantly pops up is: Is it him or is it me?
I'm beginning to sort things out, and I'm also realizing that my questions are too big to keep to myself. :P
This is my senior year at UH, and it's a pretty confusing time for my classmates and me; it's a time to make some pretty big choices. My decision:
I applied for the Peace Corps.
Whether I'm accepted or not is up to the Lord... I have my interview soon, and if that goes well, then a very comprehensive health examination that will take months to complete. So even though I don't know if I'll get into the program, I do know that it's what I really, really want.
I've been afraid to tell fellow Christians about this decision because I was afraid of being asked questions like: Why not do a mission? Why not join a Christian organization? Why not do something Spirit-led?
These were the questions I feared.
Sure, one day I'd like to go abroad for the sole purpose of spreading the gospel, but not now.
I just want to get away, go to another country, take on a humble yet important job, help people and even more, help myself. I want to remove myself from everything familiar to pray and contemplate in the unfamiliar . I want to get to know myself - my strengths, my weaknesses, and mostly, my limits. I want to be pushed and tested, and I want to come out with a clearer idea of who God's made me to be. Then I'll go back to school.
That's my plan. Doesn't sound very Christian, huh? I know, it's completely selfish (I want, I want, I want) -- too selfish for a Christian organization. That's just one of several reasons I actually like the fact that it's a government-run program.
But the funny thing is that the more I pray about it, the more I become convinced that God is supportive of what I want. I'm aware of how likely it is that my stubbornness is keeping me from hearing God in truth, but another part of me believes that no matter what, he won't abandon me. He'll never, ever let go.
Wherever the Peace Corps puts me (if I'm accepted) God is already there. It's just a different environment and capacity in which I can try my best to love others. At the very least, I have peace about that.
But still, I'm wrestling with bigger questions:
Is it better to wait until God tells you what action to take? Or do you propose an action to God?
Is it really possible to get past your own desires? I suppose everything's possible, but what kind of faith does that take?
And this whole "dying to yourself" thing -- does it mean that I should always put aside my desires? Does obedience involve fighting off every desire? Are all of my desires out of line with God's?
While I appreciate the fact that God doesn't operate within the constraints of a formula, sometimes I just wish I was a little better at figuring him out!
- kacie
I'm beginning to sort things out, and I'm also realizing that my questions are too big to keep to myself. :P
This is my senior year at UH, and it's a pretty confusing time for my classmates and me; it's a time to make some pretty big choices. My decision:
I applied for the Peace Corps.
Whether I'm accepted or not is up to the Lord... I have my interview soon, and if that goes well, then a very comprehensive health examination that will take months to complete. So even though I don't know if I'll get into the program, I do know that it's what I really, really want.
I've been afraid to tell fellow Christians about this decision because I was afraid of being asked questions like: Why not do a mission? Why not join a Christian organization? Why not do something Spirit-led?
These were the questions I feared.
Sure, one day I'd like to go abroad for the sole purpose of spreading the gospel, but not now.
I just want to get away, go to another country, take on a humble yet important job, help people and even more, help myself. I want to remove myself from everything familiar to pray and contemplate in the unfamiliar . I want to get to know myself - my strengths, my weaknesses, and mostly, my limits. I want to be pushed and tested, and I want to come out with a clearer idea of who God's made me to be. Then I'll go back to school.
That's my plan. Doesn't sound very Christian, huh? I know, it's completely selfish (I want, I want, I want) -- too selfish for a Christian organization. That's just one of several reasons I actually like the fact that it's a government-run program.
But the funny thing is that the more I pray about it, the more I become convinced that God is supportive of what I want. I'm aware of how likely it is that my stubbornness is keeping me from hearing God in truth, but another part of me believes that no matter what, he won't abandon me. He'll never, ever let go.
Wherever the Peace Corps puts me (if I'm accepted) God is already there. It's just a different environment and capacity in which I can try my best to love others. At the very least, I have peace about that.
But still, I'm wrestling with bigger questions:
Is it better to wait until God tells you what action to take? Or do you propose an action to God?
Is it really possible to get past your own desires? I suppose everything's possible, but what kind of faith does that take?
And this whole "dying to yourself" thing -- does it mean that I should always put aside my desires? Does obedience involve fighting off every desire? Are all of my desires out of line with God's?
While I appreciate the fact that God doesn't operate within the constraints of a formula, sometimes I just wish I was a little better at figuring him out!
- kacie
Friday, October 03, 2008
The Joy of the LORD
Do we really understand this when we hear it; “the joy of the LORD”? I wonder how many times I’ve flipped it and mistakenly heard it as, “the joy of ME”. Seriously, I am so myopic in my view of life…after all, isn’t all about me?
If I am truly seeking the joy of the LORD, then I am seeking those things, those attitudes, those purposes, and those desires that give God joy…ohhh, that’s sure different, ain’t it. I mean, don’t we so often think that we were created for our pleasure, that our happiness and joy is what it is all about? We consider it pure joy when we get what we want and we act like spoiled little kids when my genie image of God is shattered; when He is silent to our tantrums, to our selfish desires, to our mean-spirited ambitions. Isn’t it wise to look after what we want in life…after all, it’s all about me, right?
I’d be afraid to ask God to tally up how many times I asked Him for silly, self-pleasing stuff versus how many times I asked Him about what I could do for Him…that would please Him? I shudder to see how lop-sided that would look…yikes.
For a time now, I’ve tried to start out my day, asking God what I could do today to please Him. I also ask at the end of my day, what things I did that DID please God. And YES, I just so happen to have it posted on my PDA each day to remind me. LOL.
So, when was the last time YOU asked God, “Lord, what pleases You? What will place a smile on Your face? What can I do for You, Abba, Father, Papa God?”
Hmmmm.
Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself in the LORD and He will give you the desires of your heart.”
To get the desires of your heart is to delight yourself in the LORD…to be in pursuit of the things that delight, please, bless the LORD. When that condition is met and matched than of course He will give you the desires of your heart. It’s because they become one and the same…they fit into His joy and it pleases him.
We need to understand that God takes pleasure in the things that interest us and that He is a loving Father that gives us good things…and those things must match His nature and His will and purposes for our lives.
It is important to look at God in relationship rather than just as the ultimate provider. I need to be in relationship with Him, to also seek His delight…the joy of MY Lord.
It is not a genie-in-a-bottle situation; it is a loving Father who truly knows what is best for us….and He does want to give us the desires of our hearts…. Don’t you want to do the same for Him?
Daddy, I want to give you the desires of Your heart. What can I do right now to place a smile on Your face and glint in Your eye?
If I am truly seeking the joy of the LORD, then I am seeking those things, those attitudes, those purposes, and those desires that give God joy…ohhh, that’s sure different, ain’t it. I mean, don’t we so often think that we were created for our pleasure, that our happiness and joy is what it is all about? We consider it pure joy when we get what we want and we act like spoiled little kids when my genie image of God is shattered; when He is silent to our tantrums, to our selfish desires, to our mean-spirited ambitions. Isn’t it wise to look after what we want in life…after all, it’s all about me, right?
I’d be afraid to ask God to tally up how many times I asked Him for silly, self-pleasing stuff versus how many times I asked Him about what I could do for Him…that would please Him? I shudder to see how lop-sided that would look…yikes.
For a time now, I’ve tried to start out my day, asking God what I could do today to please Him. I also ask at the end of my day, what things I did that DID please God. And YES, I just so happen to have it posted on my PDA each day to remind me. LOL.
So, when was the last time YOU asked God, “Lord, what pleases You? What will place a smile on Your face? What can I do for You, Abba, Father, Papa God?”
Hmmmm.
Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself in the LORD and He will give you the desires of your heart.”
To get the desires of your heart is to delight yourself in the LORD…to be in pursuit of the things that delight, please, bless the LORD. When that condition is met and matched than of course He will give you the desires of your heart. It’s because they become one and the same…they fit into His joy and it pleases him.
We need to understand that God takes pleasure in the things that interest us and that He is a loving Father that gives us good things…and those things must match His nature and His will and purposes for our lives.
It is important to look at God in relationship rather than just as the ultimate provider. I need to be in relationship with Him, to also seek His delight…the joy of MY Lord.
It is not a genie-in-a-bottle situation; it is a loving Father who truly knows what is best for us….and He does want to give us the desires of our hearts…. Don’t you want to do the same for Him?
Daddy, I want to give you the desires of Your heart. What can I do right now to place a smile on Your face and glint in Your eye?
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