Back in Blue

I'm back at the Rant! My buddy Josh inspired me to give it another go!

I just got back from vacation in CA. La Jolla to be precise.

I saw two movies while I was there. Davinci Code and X-men 3. I realize that both appeal to a similar sensibility. The power that seems to come from being an outsider. Whether mutants or enlightened thinkers challenging the Establishment, both seem to tap into a weird duality that exists in our culture. On one hand we all want to fit in, on the other, we admire people who seem to want to be different.

Perhaps the interest is not with the evils of organized religion or the American culture of intolerance, but instead all of us wishing we were braver.

Brave enough to challenge the world, brave enough to demand respect and equality, brave enough to call passive complacency to accountability and answer for itself. We are so often the extras in a movie that looks like it might be really cool to be a part of.

We admire people who have the guts to demand that the world live up to its promises, that the universe fulfill its expectations. I think for me, I need to that demanding of myself.

Jesus did that, He looked at the world as it was, and ordered it to be what it was supposed to be. That would be pretty sweet to be like that. Of course, they killed Him.

do you see what I see?

what do you think a christian looks like? where does the journey start? if I say that it is a person of faith, then what does faith look like? what does it mean to follow Jesus? are these just empty questions with a searching that can never end? as I look to my own faith, do I yet know exactly what shape it takes? should I even know these things, or should faith just continue to be this endless mystery, as the Eastern church teaches? slowly, faith does come...

I think that we are far too impatient with faith. should I trust in something that is easy to believe? shouldn't faith be a journey, a struggle? shouldn't there be something in faith that makes it hard to follow? maybe people sign on for something they think is going to be easy, find it difficult and then get mad at God for false advertising. but aren't I a part of God's marketing team? in some way that's the church, offering the hardest sell of all to people who aren't really looking to buy.

this got negative quick. i don't want my faith to be negative. faith looks forward. faith sees the life that can be. life can be great. we get to be a part of the greater thing. we get to be a part of something that makes us last forever. that gives us meaning. significance. we count.

time

It's been awhile since I posted. Sorry about that. Isn't it amazing how life can go? Somtimes up, sometimes down, but never the same. Life is in a constant state of change. It gets old, though, doesn't it. Don't you wish that everything could just stay the same for any kind of time period.

How can we build faith in this type of environment? How can measure transformation with the standard is always changing? I have to admit that I don't always know the answer to that question.

Immutable. That's the word that may bring us hope. It means unchanging, without turning or shadow. Standard. Consistent. That's God, you know. God is unchanging. Even though our lives are in perpetual flux, action-reaction, adjustment-clarification-adjustment, God stands above it all. He is the standard, He is the constant in the equation. The biblical authors called Him a rock, a refuge, and a fortress. When the change is overwhelming, even when our own inconsistencies dominate our existence, we can look to Him, "yesterday, today, and forever." Because He is constant, we can believe Paul when he says that "God works all things together for those who are in Christ Jesus."

Look to Him, He hasn't gone anywhere, He's right there where I left Him, in control, a sovereign ruler.

Feb. 9

"...true spirituality consists in perseverance, patience, and humility." - John of the Cross

From time to time, I ask myself a simple question. How am I doing, really? It's the "really" that makes it an important question. There is quite a bit about me that is pretty ok, fairly decent, or moderately acceptable. But how am I doing, really?

John of the Cross's words hang out there as a measuring stick, a standard that is both fair and daunting. I know I should be all those things, but at times it just seems too much, too hard, and not worth it. I would rather be weak, angry, and proud. But it is not John of the Cross who calls out to me, it is the incomparable love of Christ. Everytime I feel weak, I see His love performing miracles, casting out demons, and resurrecting the dead. When I am angry at those who have wronged my family or my church, I hear His love saying from the Cross, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they are doing." When I am proud of my earthly accomplishments and pondering my own greatness, I close my eyes and see Him, hugging children, crying with widows, touching lepers, forgiving prostitutes.

I can feel so weak, so inadequate, as to make me want to give in and give out. But yet He still calls, that gentle, powerful voice in my heart and in my head, saying, "This is you, You are this person, you can get there, I will take you there." He makes us who He calls us to be.

Father, make me.

Feb. 8

"Men look on the starry heavens with reverence: monkeys do not." - C.S. Lewis

Great line. What makes us so different from the rest of creation? I think it starts with the ability to recognize that we are in fact created, that we exist because of something else. We look at the heavens and the mountains and the oceans and we ask, "why, how, when, and who?" There is something in us that cries out for more. We are built to want to know more, to love more, to eat more; we have been created with a default set to discontent. Not to frustrate us, but to motivate us. To guide us toward the answers, to gently nudge us away from worrying about where the next meal comes from, on to pausing to enjoy the taste of an apple. This discontent says that procreation to preserve the species is not enough, we need love and heritage. If we follow the nudge, continue to ask our divinely influenced questions, then I think that we see beyond the starry heavens into the smiling, loving, holy face of God.

Father, let me see you today.

january 24

exodus 20

This is where you find the Ten Commandments. It's amazing to think that in these few wrods, barely under 200, God completely defined the way humanity would forever relate to Him. That's why we need to obey. to connect, to relate to the Deity who created all of this. We are the capstone, the pinnacle of that creation, and our Creator wants to knowus and wants us to know Him. They aren't rules that bind us into slavery, they are instructions on how to live free, on how to live above the society of weakness and moral compromise that we are enmeshed in. This is not a religion of weak-minded or emotionally insecure. It is a path of strength and demand to which God calls us all to rise.

Father, in order to obtain perfect freedom, I willingly bind myself to Your Law.

january 20

exodus 8.10 - "Do it tomorrow!"

It's important to note that when the pharaoh made this statement, he was up to his ears in frogs. The plague of frogs had come from God to judge Egypt and apply spiritual leverage to convince the rebellious and stubborn king to allow the Hebrews to leave. In the moment, he decided that it wasn't worth a sea of frogs to keep the Hebrews in slavery. So he decides that he will let them go. But just to prove how great and powerful he thought he was, he tells Moses to wait a day to expel the frogs. The next day, the frogs are gone, and pharaoh changes his mind.

Obedience has to work right then and there. True obedience is immediate. God's words do not come lightly or casually. They are specific, with specific goals and exact timing. If God speaks, we need to obey it immediately.

Father, I want to obey, teach me how to know and when to do.