life out of death

I got to know Alicia after the joy of living had left her. For the last 2 years, she tried to decide whether or not to die. In spurts she would look for something to live for but could never settle on anything enticing enough to make her want to live. And so she took her life. This is the tragedy. A beautiful, talented, smart girl didn’t want to live… so she didn’t.

I myself struggled with the urge of suicide for many years. Dark spirits tormented me nearly to death. Depression was my constant companion, even after God saved my soul. But I didn’t accept my life till 5 years afterwards. It was then that I realized I was slowly destroying myself and that I should instead accept the life that God had not only given me, but saved from me, and for me. Only after I turned and embraced my life did I understand the joy of living, or the beauty surrounding me.

So when Alicia appeared in my life and started talking about her struggles, I understood much of what she was going through. She spoke of the pain of living each day on this earth, the attractiveness of death, and uncertainty of what is after death. She lamented the clutching depression, and her inability to accept the Christian answers to her struggles. And yet she was sporadically happy.

Much of life is pain. This world is not as God created it to be. And so living in it has become a struggle with hurt and heartbreak everywhere. You can be sure, simply by existing, to hurt others and be hurt yourself. With love now comes betrayal. Destruction continues right alongside new beginnings. Defeat and despair cover many people. Yet this is not all there is. Through it all life dances, tossing small joys and breathtaking beauty which remind us of what was supposed to be. These call our attention up from the muck to search for the life which sustains.

There are those who don’t want to live and yet don’t want to die. They hold the gift of life, but refuse to open it. How do you start living? Just open your eyes and look around. Allow your heart to receive the joys. Look, embrace, be, live. More than breathing. More than surviving. You are called to more than that. You are needed. Who you truly are, is needed. God placed you in the lives of those who need you. If everyone embraces who He made them to be, His plan works wonderfully.

When I first decided to quit my destructive ways, and truly live, an occasionally wise man sat in the car with me and talked me thru how to do this. He said, “Don’t wait for the big joys. Start looking for the little joys and those will combine into bigger ones.” And as he spoke, we watched a raccoon family step out of the garbage heap and start their nightly stroll. “Like that!”

The small joys are everywhere. A hawk soaring overhead. The smell of the ocean in the air. Reading a book to a sleepy child. The gentle touch of a hand. This is life. The smoothness of a wood table. The rough tree bark as you climb. The sparkling tears that fall. This is life. You get one chance at it and every moment is packed. Look around and revel in it. Even emotions – all of them. Someone gave you those emotions. If you have ever been numb, you can understand that God granted us the ability to feel.  Sit in those emotions and welcome them, even sadness. Even grief. Grief: the emotion of having lost that which you love.

Alicia can’t enjoy life anymore. If you believe this is a tragedy, then prove it by living. Truly living. Take life and shake it for all its worth. Live the life God gave you and take the joys He offers. Be who He meant you to be. Saint Ireneus  said “The glory of God is man fully alive.” And so, the glory of man is to be fully alive, thereby glorifying God. He doesn’t need you, but He made you to live with Him.

There is a war for each of our souls. The war for Alicia was lost. I grieve that something so shielded her eyes that she could not see the beauty of life. Each of us remains somewhere in that fight against evil and death. Jesus came to give us life that we may live, both in the next life and this one. Deuteronomy 30:19-20 “today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, that you and your descendants might live!”

Life is breathtaking. So beautiful it hurts. So powerful and desirable we fear we may break under the sheer majesty. Life is not easy, nor simple. Sheer complexity at every layer. But our hearts must be open to both pain and joy to live. It is worth it. Give it a try, I dare you. 

Blessings

Blessed. Another Christianese word, right? Yes, and so much more. Perhaps it is christianese because without that relationship with God, one can’t quite grasp the full meaning of that word.

I feel blessed. Family and friends have been telling me that I am for years, but I never accepted the fact. But it has finally pushed through to my subconscious and now I know it for myself. Blessed. You have all read the cliché meanings of blessed; given gifts, alive, shown favor, etc. but for me, it’s the feeling of needing to dance or shout or sing for the pure joy of being alive. Even if yesterday was awful, or even this morning.

I have many things to be thankful for, yet none of them I earned. I didn’t earn a good family who tried their best to teach me to place my feet on solid rock and think clearly. I didn’t earn a good education. I didn’t earn true friends. Yet more than this, I am loved, because someone made me loveable. And so my heart sings, even if I don’t open my mouth or feel particularly happy.

Being blessed is less about the gifts and more about being secure in the love and accepting the gifts. I am blessed. 

the vision

I opened a drawer this morning to clear it out. What I pulled out are pieces of my heart, parts I can’t put back, cracks I smothered as I tried to “just deal”. Which ironically is not dealing. So while the notebook and tiny tapes lay as silent reminders of what was, I sigh.

And in among the pictures and memories, I found a folded paper full of tiny written words. To read caught my heart, choked my breath. It is called “Waiting. Watching: 24-7-365”. I wanted to share it with you all.

So this guy comes up to me and says,

“What’s the vision? What’s the big idea?”

I open my mouth and the words come out like this…

The vision?

The vision is JESUS: obsessively, dangerously, undeniably Jesus.

The vision is an army of young people.

You see bones? I see an army.

And they are free from materialism – they laugh at 9-5 little prisons.

They could eat caviar on Monday and crusts on Tuesday. They wouldn’t even notice.

They know the meaning of the Matrix, the way the West was won.

They are mobile like the wind, they belong to the nations, they need no passport.

People write their addresses in pencil and wonder at their strange existence.

They are free, yet they are slaves of the hurting and dirty and dying.

What is the vision? The vision is holiness that hurts the eyes.

It makes the children laugh and adults angry.

It gave up the game of minimum integrity long ago to reach for the stars.

It scorns the good and strains for the best.

It is dangerously pure.

Light flickers from every secret motive, every private conversation.

It loves people away from their suicide leaps, their Satan games.

This is an army that will lay down its life for the cause.

A million times a day its soldiers choose to loose that they might one day win the great…

“well done” of faithful sons and daughters.

Such heroes are as radical on Monday morning as Sunday night.

They don’t need fame from names.

Instead they grin quietly upwards

And hear the crowds chanting again and again: “COME ON!”

And this is the sound of the underground,

The whisper of history in the making,

Foundations shaking,

Revolutionaries dreaming once again.

Mystery is scheming in whispers, conspiracy is breathing…

This is the sound of the underground

And the army is discipl(in)ed – young people who beat their bodies into submission.

Every soldier could take a bullet for his comrade at arms.

The tattoo on their back boasts “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.”

Sacrifice fuels the fire of victory in their upward eyes.

Winners.

Martyrs. Who can stop them?

Can hormones hold them back?

Can failure succeed?

Can fear scare them or death kill them?

And the generation prays like a dying man with groans beyond talking, with warrior cries, silphuric tears and great barrow loads of laughter!

Whatever it takes they will give:

Breaking the rules,

Shaking mediocrity from its cozy little hide,

Laying down their rights and their precious little wrongs,

Laughing at labels, fasting essentials.

The advertisers cannot hold them.

Peer-pressure is powerless to shake their resolve at late night parties before the cockerel cries.

They are incredibly cool, dangerously attractive inside.

On the outside?

They hardly care!

They wear clothes like costumes: to communicate and celebrate, but never to hide.

Would they surrender their image or their popularity?

They would lay down their very lives,

Swap seats with the man on death row,

Guilty as hell: a throne for an electric chair.

With blood and sweat and many tears,

With sleepless nights and fruitless days,

They pray is if it all depends on God and live as if it all depends on them.

Their DNA chooses JESUS. (He breathes out, they breathe in.) their subconscious sings.

They had a blood transfusion with Jesus.

Their words make demons scream in shopping centers.

Don’t you hear them coming?

Herald the weirdos!

Summon the losers and the freaks.

Here come the frightened and forgotten with fire in their eyes!

They walk tall and trees applaud, skyscrapers bow,

Mountains are dwarfed by these children of another dimension.

Their prayers summon the Hound of Heaven

And invoke the ancient dream of Eden.

And this vision will be.

It will come to pass;

It will come easily;

It will come soon.

How do I know?

Because this is the longing of creation itself,

The groaning of the Spirit, the very dream of God.

My tomorrow is His today.

My distant hope is His 3-D.

And my feeble, whispered, faithless prayer invokes a thunderous, resounding, bone-shaking great “Amen!” from countless angels,

And hero’s of the faith, from Christ himself.

And He is the original dreamer,

The ultimate winner.

Guaranteed.

For that vision I will arm myself. For that I will get my ass in gear. Let it be. How could I ever have forgotten?

Is this the day I die? Or is this the day I live? The space between matters not.

(I wrote this 2 months ago. I have carried that paper ever since in my Bible. It re-awakens the fire everytime I read it. )

typical morning

Get up, walk in search of coffee to the kitchen. Notice mom staring at her little red laptop next to the random monitor at the table. "Morning". Delayed response. Also a low-sounding version of "hi" comes from dad's nook. Slippered feet rest on his foot stool, legs supporting his laptop. But that's all I see around the book case. Hmm, coffee, cold, microwave. Hmm, banana, ripe. Sit on couch, read World article by osmosis till brain wakes up. 

Dad shows me Mark Steyn's pointed article likening Europe to an orchestra. Something about Greece and Italy playing cards in the dressing room waiting for the German guy to come and hand them a check. Apt. Mom, still sitting at the table, joins the discussion of Europe's downward spiral, complete with defining social states and demise of the life of work expectations. 

Slight switch to recap of recent family gathering. Background on how things have been shining light on how people are doing and slow changes to the power plays. Mom half typing and asking questions on who said what calling for much repetition and therefore dad and I smiling at each other. 

Next up, plans for weekend and coming week. Why yes, my birthday is coming up. And they both miraculously remembered what age I'm turning :P Dad heads out door to look at issues mom has raised about car. Both stop talking and stare at me. Looking at my feet, and then grabbing them, I wondered if I could walk like that. So I tried. It works, also probably looks hilarious. I crumpled up laughing and found both parents looking at me with that look of "yup, she is still a kid sometimes." I join dad to go look at car issues before he leaves to read at a coffee-shop. 

Re-enter house to find mom rushing around collecting her things before leaving for class. I hold the door, telling her to have fun learning, and get along with classmates, etc. She shoots back with a black look and how sexual deviancy is not her favorite class. 

I forgot to mention the smoking pan while we were talking.

And I sit down to write. Is this picture perfect? No. It is a family living with each other, not just in the same house. Somehow it works, all the quirks and frustrations laughed at. Unless I'm in a rush to leave, then I just get frustrated. Still need to learn something...

vancouver pics

https://picasaweb.google.com/103959679677428217376/2012Vancouver

sister trip to vancouver.

trip update

People have been asking when I am leaving again, and I haven’t really known what to say. Now I do, and here is the story. I not only travel on these trips as a travel companion, I plan them also. Which is a large job. I didn’t quite realize how much of a job it would be to plan a 2-3 month trip until I started. And when I realized, I found something else I could accomplish that day. And did the same thing the next day, and the next. I believe this is a form of procrastination.

Anyways, Shannon and I hadn’t talked in a few weeks. The idea being to give her time to get her back healthy again. Well, last week I was called over to help her for a few hours. Why? Because her back had gotten so much worse that she needs back surgery asap. So I guess it’s a good thing I hadn’t planned a big trip. Hence I am somewhat relieved to say I have no idea when we are leaving. Sometime after she recovers from her surgery we should leave again. I will keep you all updated. 

Leading and Following

“Who is the one doing it, you or God?” ...I hate that question. If it’s you, then God is practically out of the picture. If it’s God, then what are you doing, sitting on the couch? “Neither” doesn’t work, and “both” sounds like a copout. You know what? The Bible rarely speaks in the language of one or the other doing stuff. More often it speaks of God telling the characters to do something, and those people doing it, or sometimes doing it. So it’s both, right? Not exactly.

Ever been on a walk with a good friend in their neck of the woods? Walking side by side, conversing about anything, loosing track of where you are because you have no need of keeping track? They are, in a sense, leading you. They pick the trails, they know where they are, they know how far it is from the house. They may even guide you over muddy areas. Leading, but walking side by side, conversing without intentionally instructing. You become so intent on the conversation and learning about your friend, that you simply follow their lead without thinking. The trail is no longer important, it may even turn out to be different than you would have chosen. Congratulations, you have exhibited trust in your friend.

Now replace that friend with God, and the trails with your life. Aha. That is why the Bible stresses focusing on God. Focus on Him, let Him lead, and it will be an amazing walk. Amazing does not mean lush grass…