Here is a freewrite/prayer that will only make sense to me with time.

Dear God,
Why don't I slow down?
Meditate on your peace and lovingkindness. 
I pray that love is more than just an abstract word to me. 
That it's not what I use to feel all warm and fuzzy inside,
Or something that I flippantly say to express the inexpressible things that make the world keep spinning.
I pray that you mold my life to be about people. About using every bit of the compassion you've put inside this aching chest to pour out over the needy, the destitute. 
I believe Your Word. I believe it with every fiber of my being. And while that's not a popular stance here in the academic world, while it's much more attractive to only believe the parts of the Bible that I like, and subscribe to the image of God that I like, and rationalize it with endless theological discourses.
God, I want to grow to appreciate You for you. In your love, in your anger, in your grace, and in your wrath. Don't let me forget that my emotions cannot be made to contain the unbending truth of who you are. My whims cannot pick the attributes that define such an amazing, larger than life Savior. May I cling to You with everything that I am, and not let words like liberal or conservative, Christian or Muslim, pacifist or just war activist...(or backwoods redneck, for that matter.) You have given me my everything...bend my will to yours. Let my preconceptions die in the face of a furious passion that words can't adequately capture. If this world is a stage, let me be praying for its salvation in the audience, lest I be tempted to join the parade of the desperate and the loneliest. 
Holy God, transform us to look more like you. Don't let me cripple myself under the weight of my own arrogance, or let my good deeds get the better of me. Don't let academics choke my faith, and don't let the opinions of others shape what I am passionate about. Please, God...please take hold of my trembling hands. To be perfectly honest, I am scared to death. Once again, you wrecked my life. You took everything I once held sacred and showed it to me from a different angle. You told me in a loud voice that I could no longer be passive, no longer deal in the abstracts because they make me feel good and smart, or bother keeping a record of all the good things I've done because they cannot save me. Yahweh, If I do good, let me do good because you are the only good thing in me. Shatter my pride like you once shattered my tibia and fibula. Like broken bones, let me remember the pain of my arrogance and let it hurt every time I take a step on a rainy day. Take from me all I took from you, and may I never forget that you are the Giver. 
God, I'm tired of my secrets. If they're worth hiding, then its not worth living. So let me go in faith and be transparent, exposed to the light because ugly lust can't survive but in the dark. Refine my heart and let me live for you. Don't let me cling to what I know kills me. 


Anger 
Pride
Lust
Violence
Impatience
Laziness 


God, tame this bonfire that rests behind my teeth. Rip it out and replace it with Your passionate words of love. Hopelessness pervades me, but remind me that I need to rediscover my first love if I'm ever gonna discover the compassion You have for your Bride. I'm fumbling, and it's humbling to be in Your presence. Let me do that more often. Consume me, great redeemeer. God, free me from my self obsession so that I may serve you without shame. 


I have uncloaked my face to the light.
Adonai, don't ever let me look back.

The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things

Lines in my hands, light through the walls 
I'm writing letters to you with my prayers 
Long before what I've stood up will fall 
Or who I thought I might be is ensnared 


A man inside a fish, scales from someone's eyes 
A family in a great big boat while the rest of the world dies 


You're making food to feed five thousand 
You're saying "let the children come to me" 
In the corner of the classroom I am pulling back the carpet 
I'm afraid of what I see.


What is truth? What is truth? What is true? 


How big are love and history and what hides inside their mouths? 
There are holes in me from things pushed in when I pull them out 
And out of which come questions that I cannot unwrap 
What I once learned is not enough to hold the torrent back.


I feel as though the weight of questions has grown to cruel to bear 
And though I long to lift it now the load makes me despair 
Ask though I may the faces who once led me by the hand 
Their voices are unfamiliar 
I'm not sure they understand 


And now my spine is bowed by boxes on my back 
I don't know how to open them 
I want to give them back 
And yet you will not stir to ease this burden that I carry 
It seems as though you've piled them up and treated me unfairly 


It's this devastating world that laughs and steals upon my back 
And everything comes crashing down when my will finally cracks 


No longer will I tote the cryptic words of ages gone 
When I was being broken, where were you all along? 
Lessons recounted faithfully now fall like clumps of wool 
The men and women who lied to me are cockeyed, panting wolves 
They wave their flags and cast their stones and sneer with lusty grins 
Commanding me to follow a path they have never believed in 
They low like cattle with bulging veins and militant fists in the air 
Join their flock or burn in hell and I'm not sure that I care


Crawling out from the wreckage of all that I've been taught 
I'm leaving it behind 
They fling their venom out at me when I resign 
Outside the gates I drag myself into a world bigger than I had believed 
And inside they flay their sheep lest they follow me and leave 


But after everything I've done and everything I do 
I can still remember you 


Lines in my hands, light through the walls 
I'm writing you letters with my prayers 
After all that I've stood up falls 
And I afford you none of my cares 
If I ask you "what is truth" will you be silent still? 
My questions and doubts made a chasm 
That I fear you can not fill 


Perhaps the lens I've eyed you through 
Keeps me from knowing what is truth 
I can't find what I'm looking for 
And I still remember you 


When I relent the shackles of all that I've been fed 
I pull back the floor and find something beautiful instead. 


After everything That I've been through 
I don't recognize myself anymore 
Sometimes I think I might remember 
But then I close the door 


I walk away from everything and find myself made free 
In all the tangles of who I am the truth is that you love me 
Just as I was, just as I am, just as I will be 
In all the tangles of who I am, the truth is that you love me! 


--Showbread

revelation must be terrible
   knowing you can 
never hide your voice again. 

You're the blood in my veins, You're the fire burning deep inside.

I'm back at Gardner Webb, gearing up for gratuitous amounts of snow and the beginning of Spring semester 2011. Yay! Boy, am I glad to be back! Tonight was a night of just hanging out and reuniting with some of my beloved friends. 


I'm ready to get back in the swing of things around here. Ready to actually be doing something instead of just wandering aimlessly through life. That being said...there's a lot of things I missed out on over the break. I forgot to reflect. I mean, I tried, but I just came up short. I really wanted to think extensively about the mistakes I let define me last semester, and to correct them, in hopes of becoming closer to being the man that God wants me to be. 


I am terrible with commitment. I struggle a lot with staying dedicated to things, especially things that involve promises I've made or things I've mindlessly busied myself with. This break, I was supposed to transfer a lot of VHS tapes to DVD for Sonja, a friend of ours. Most of them were of Jennifer. Some backstory: I knew Jennifer for most of my life. Last year, due to some complications, she passed away. It was terrible. I don't think I've been the same person since. There's something missing in me, a little bit of the joy that used to define me. Nowadays, I cover that joy up with fake happiness. And I am happy, really, but I just can't shake the grief. I miss her so much. 


But these videos are important to Sonja. She wants to preserve them on DVD. I started watching them and transferring them over, and I just couldn't finish. I got so angry, so upset. I lashed out at my parents for no reason and just stayed pretty yucky for the rest of the night. I couldn't keep my commitment because of a grief that I let define me. That's a problem. 


Constantly, I see it in my relationships. It's hard for me to talk to girls I used to date. Not because anything terrible happened (most of the time), but because I'm afraid of the awkwardness. The awkwardness that comes in friendly chats with no real meaning or depth because I'm afraid to open up. Maybe I'm afraid to open up to not just them, but to the world. I can't commit because I'm afraid they'll all see what's inside. And that's a scary position to be in. 


My relationship with God, I think, is the hardest hit by my noncommittal personality. What I fear the most is stripping myself bare of all my worries, all my struggles, all my grief before one who knows the words I say, the thoughts I think before they even happen. It's irrational, but "just this once" I think. "It's too painful to be honest," I say. The truth is that I just want an excuse to hold onto the bitterness in my heart. Because somehow, I think, somehow it will set me free. 


All of these areas are stupid. I have no excuses to not commit. It's something that in my now 20 years of life, I should've have learned to deal with. I want to count myself among men of integrity, when all I am is a fake.


So pray for me as I make it a PRIORITY to spill my guts and let others in. To be real and be honest and pour all of my heart, life, and will into the promises I make, relationships (be they platonic or romantic) I find myself in, and the Kingdom that gives Life. May my relationship with Jesus be paramount, and my heart be vulnerable. 


The only thing that hurts worse that exposing the truth is parading a lie. And I refuse to let statistics define me. 


What defines me? Is it Christ? I want to be honest and tell you I'm working on figuring that out.

On Being an Old Man

Tomorrow, I'll be 20 years old. (And by tomorrow, I mean Sunday.) It's surreal. Now, of course I won't be reaching any pivotal age as ascribed to me by Western culture. I've passed eighteen (and haven't even purchased cigarettes,) and 21 just isn't here yet. 

All of the things that we talk up about getting older, they just don't hold up for me when I actually get there. And to be honest, I'm okay without. I don't really have any desire to smoke, play the lottery, or drink. Not that any of those things are inherently wrong (unless of course you value the normal functions of your body/mind and/or just don't know when to quit) they just hold no charm for me. Of course I have my vices, ugly lust and stupid self obsessed tendencies only scratching the surface of my worst features, but what society values as important just doesn't work. Not for me, anyway. What's the big deal? It's only another year older. 

As I approach my exodus from teenage life, I look in the mirror and see the same thing I saw yesterday (or, for that matter, two years ago.) Sure, I've grown up since hitting college. I've learned a whole mess of things about God, myself, and the people that inhabit this spinning blue sphere with me. I've made new friends, I've set out to be a better person. But the fears, the anxiety, the fixation on things I should be fixated on...those things are still the same as they were two years ago. All driven by the singular drive within me to always be right. Hubris. Pride. I am driven by me. And that's a huge problem.

Here lately, the desires God has for me have met in a complete collision with the desires that I have for me. Youth Ministry, in particular. I felt so sure of myself. With my humor, passion for kids, and desire for others to know the gospel, I could certainly be a great youth pastor.

That's where the problem started. Do I still believe God wants me in Youth Ministry? Absolutely. More than ever, actually. But in those ideals of what I could be, I left out the most important factor in the equation. God. What are his desires for how I enact his plan? Should I be the one enacting it? How does letting him live and breathe through my story actually shell out in a world that is so driven by self, by a person that is so driven by self? 

My intentions were pretty much pure. I wanted to show the kids I'm currently working with a genuine way to view God, to experience and to love God wholly, for all that he is. I want to help them through their life situations, show them that there is hope in the confusing spiral of emotions that middle school and high school catapult you through. That despite the dysfunctions that their families, that all our families, go through, we are kept secure in God's love, and nothing can change that.

But I'm not 100% sure that my motives actually lined up with the guidance I could give them. I am to be a mentor, a brother...but maybe I haven't learned all I need to learn when it comes to ministry to really enact the desires God has given me in a youth group setting...not yet. And maybe I should dedicate more time praying for each of them and meditating on God's word than on jumping in over my head. Being 20 years old, I can't assume that I know it all. Not yet. Not ever.

My Sin.

Another topic that is so painful for me to write about. I am the worst of sinners. My pride runs deep and, as a result, my hypocrisy runs deeper. The last thing I ever want to be is a failure. I want to (and so often do) put on a happy face and leave my ruthlessness covered in the dust of years of pretending. I pretend I have it together. But one thing I've still not been able to effectively put into practice is surrendering. I don't know how to surrender my everything, including sins, to God. Or maybe I know, but am scared to do. I'll verbally affirm that surrender is necessary, I'll even agree that its something good for me to do. But I'm much more content to read a rousing book on spirituality or listen to an uplifting sermon than try to actually live what I read or hear. This presents a problem. 

In the first chapter of James, he says "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do." 

But I'm learning. I am learning what surrender looks like, albeit slowly. Surrender looks like putting aside shame and believing God when he tells me I'm forgiven. If I effectively do that, and his forgiveness actually means something in my life, then I'm much less likely to return to my sins and continue in cycles what I know is so disgusting. 

As much as I say that, I'll have setbacks. I'll get angry with someone time and time again. I'll look at things I'm not supposed to and act on shallow feelings that I'm well aware are not up to God's standards. But there is mercy. There is life. And I am slowly but surely becoming the man of God that I know I need to be because of that. I am thrilled that God is merciful. And maybe when I reach 21, I will be able to put my fears and anxieties behind me.

But I rejoice in the knowledge that I am a Child of God. And my prayer for my 20th year of life on this blue, spinning orb, is that next year, when I look in the mirror, I remember what I look like. And I hope that looks more like Jesus. 

With grace like fire,

And my life like a tall tree,

Consume me, my maker, 

Consume me and set me free. 

My mind drifts like the tides,

Like foam out on the beach.

My heart floats away untethered,

But never beyond your mercy's reach. 

You are God,

You are God,

and I am not whole yet. 

It's easy to drown.

There was once a boy who feared death. The boy feared it so much that he decided to dig a hole in the sand and hide. The sand was hard, and cut the small cracks in his fingers, producing blood. But he kept digging because he knew that once he finished this daunting task, he would finally be safe from the discontinuity he feared most.
____________________________


In a few hours, the boy was satisfied with the deep hole he'd made with his own, now badly bleeding, hands. He crawled in his hole and sat, contemplating his new life under the beach.  It would bring him safety, it would bring him happiness. He would find it, he decided, if it was the last thing he ever did.

There was once a girl who feared nothing. The girl was known for her fearlessness and one day, she decided to take a walk on the beach. The sand felt warm on her toes. The water rushed against her ankles and she felt all the pleasures of life manifest themselves in one wonderful ocean wave. Life was too beautiful to fear anything. Here, in the midst of it all, she was safe.
_______________________________




The girl stared towards the horizon and saw an enormous boat. Then she started swimming. Further and further, filling her lungs with more and more air to stay afloat. She would reach the boat if it was the last thing she ever did.

---

The ocean roared, it's waves came further and further towards the shore and the girl trudged onward. The boy sat in the depths of the sand, still wondering if there was something worth experiencing out there, even if it meant his demise. He quickly decided this was not so. So he stayed in his hole.




The boat came closer and closer to the girl, the unusually strong current pulling it in with the tide. The girl paid no attention to the boat, even though reaching it was her goal. Her eyes were fixed on the water below her rapidly spinning arms.




The water approached the hole in the sand, faster now than in seasons past. The boy sat in ignorance of the encroaching sea.




The girl heard the whirring and felt a whirlpool sucking her out into what she's sworn was the open ocean. The last thing she felt was hard crunch spinning metal against pruned flesh. The last thing she saw was a sea of red.




The boy looked above him as the saltwater began to fall and sting his eyes. The last thing he felt was the swelling of his lungs. The last thing he saw was a flurry of brown, wet sand. 

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Ain't it a shame that they won't remember all of this...

Happy 2011!
I hate resolutions.


Mark Twain said, "New Year's Day - Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual." 


And that's all they are. Good intentions. This past year has magnified my imperfections. The lens that I previously used to judge others has found a mirror, and the searing pain of it has made me into someone else.


I love the person I am becoming, and I hate him, too. He's becoming more vulnerable, relinquishing his hold on his secrets and crying out to God for some kind of way home. The only problem is that I'm fighting him. Fighting him to the death. If he represents the new man, I feel caught in between the old and the new. I'm just asking God why. And, as of yet, there's no answer. 


I want my life to be something beautiful, something vulnerable, and something that shows the love of God with no man made barriers around it. I don't want my imperfections to remain hidden so that others will think I'm a good person. I really could care less about how "good" I am. 


I am for these ideas. I'm all for the lofty little concepts that make spirituality easy and accessible, but when I try to translate those into my life, into practical usage, I'm left with an icy heart and a stony gaze. Stuck miles away from where I want to be, but so close to the light. I'd hope by now that my chest cavity is filled with water, and the glacier that stopped beating long ago is replaced with a burning passion  for God and his Gospel. 


I fear that if I make a resolution to become a better man, I've missed the point of Christ's love entirely. The point is that I won't ever measure up. The point is that by grace I have been saved, through faith in the one who melts the glaciers and burns down the forests that I've set in his way. I am here for surrender. 


So I won't be paving hell with any resolutions this year.
the only one I could think of just doesn't quite capture the love that sustains me.
But one day, by clinging tightly to that truth, the truth that saves, I won't feel like the man stuck in between the new and the old. But even if I do, It'll be alright. 
Cause he's got the whole world in his hands.


Happy 2011. 
May the grace of God be with you always.