I hunt for it in my heart and these days its, the rarity that I stumble upon on. It is allusive.

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If Deadness Is Next to Godliness
07/22/2009

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If the way to avoid the murderous rage and deceptive allures of desire is to kill it, if deadness is next to godliness, then Jesus had to be the deadest person ever. But he is called the living God. “It is a dreadful thing,” the writer of Hebrews says, “to fall into the hands of the living God . . . For our ‘God is a consuming fire’” (10:31; 12:29). And what is this consuming fire? His jealous love (Deut. 4:24). God is a deeply, profoundly passionate person. Zeal consumes him. It is the secret of his life, the writer of Hebrews says. The “joy set before him” enabled Jesus to endure the agony of the Cross (Heb. 12:2). In other words, his profound desire for something greater sustained him at the moment of his deepest trial. We cannot hope to live like him without a similar depth of passion. Many people find that the dilemma of desire is too much to live with, and so they abandon, they disown their desire. This is certainly true of a majority of Christians at present. Somehow we believe that we can get on without it. We are mistaken.

(Desire , 54–55)

The question of our hearts...

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The Question Lodged Deep in Our Hearts
07/05/2009

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The question lodged deep in our hearts, hidden from our conscious minds, is: “Do you care for me, God?”

What’s under that question?

Blaise Pascal, in his Pensées, says, “The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of.” What’s under that question is our personal stories, often punctuated by the Message of the Arrows: parents who were emotionally absent; bedtimes without words or hugs; ears that were too big and noses that were too small; others chosen for playground games while we were not; and prayers about all these things seemingly met with silence. And embedded in our stories, deep down in our heart, in a place so well guarded that they have rarely if ever been exposed to the light of day, are other grief-laden and often angry questions: “God, why did you allow this to happen to me? Why did you make me like this? What will you allow to happen next?” In the secret places of our heart, we believe God is the One who did not protect us from these things or even the One who perpetrated them upon us. Our questions about him make us begin to live with a deep apprehension that clings anxiously to the depths of our hearts . . . “Do you really care for me, God?”

This is the question that has shipwrecked many of our hearts, leaving them grounded on reefs of pain and doubt, no longer free to accompany us on spiritual pilgrimage. We might be able to rationalize away that question by telling ourselves that we need to be more careful, or that sometimes others are just bad. We can even breathe a sigh of relief when we realize that trouble has come from our own sin. But even the careful, legalistic, and constricted lifestyle that arises out of thinking we can avoid trouble through our own devices shipwrecks when the Arrows seem to strike us out of nowhere. What are we to make of God’s wildness in allowing these things to happen?

(The Sacred Romance , 49–50)

Do I feel older?

This is a question that I have been asked a lot by different people in the last five hours or so and one that people often ask out of an awkwardness that people often feel because they don't know what to say, or maybe habit. Regardless. The answer is for the first time, yes!

 I feel older and I don't know how to explain it.

 There has been a significant shift in my heart, an almost settling. Not settling, like settling for the second best, but a settling like a seed into soil. Or at the cost of being cheesy. Like Settlers' (don't know if that spelling is write) into their new land. 

 That is more how I feel than ever before, like finally at the age of 27 I am ready to unpack my bags and stay a while.  Don't miss understand me, not move in for life and stay at this age, how I am now or where I am now forever, but ready to take where I am, who I'm with and where I am headed. Tie it all together and invest, even more than I have in the past.

 Invest in who I love, in who I want to eventually love. Invest in who I am and who I eventually want to be. Invest in who my wife is and who I believe she will be. Invest in children that we may have.

It is obvious to me that what I am saying may sound like commonsense. What I am really saying is that I want to be very intentional about what is ahead. 

Ok, just a birthday morning observation.

It is my 27th B- day and it falls right in the middle of a season of sleepless nights.

I have been working on this one sentence for an hour. I get a letter or two in and then it turns into ddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd. because i keep falling a sleep.

Tonight we moved our sunday night gathering from 7:30 to 5 pm, I believe that this will be a great switch for all of us, but seeing as how , I can't hardly get on thought out. I will save it.

K. to tired to write. 

Ciao

The end of May?

 Really? That was fast. May went by way to quickly with a lot of haircuts, a trip to the twin cities, a trip back to Ks., dropping by the old digs in Madison for Aaron's graduation and pretty much not stop motion. Which certainly beats many months previous to this one.

 Summer is right here upon us and soon will be a glance over the shoulder behind us. I can feel my heart waking up to the sensory overload that is the beginning of a summer in chicago.

I pray and hope that we all have an amazing summer and dive into the communities that we are a part of and live life fully alive...

Speaking of... I have a dinner date that is waiting for me. Catch you soon!

Furious Indifference

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All Men Die; Few Men Ever Really LIVE 
05/11/2009

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The most dangerous man on earth is the man who has reckoned with his own death. All men die; few men ever really live. Sure, you can create a safe life for yourself . . . and end your days in a rest home babbling on about some forgotten misfortune. I’d rather go down swinging. Besides, the less we are trying to “save ourselves,” the more effective a warrior we will be. Listen to G. K. Chesterton on courage: 

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. “He that will lose his life, the same shall save it” is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book. The paradox is the whole principle of courage; even of quite earthly or quite brutal courage. A man cut off by the sea may save his life if he will risk it on the precipice. He can only get away from death by continually stepping within an inch of it. A soldier surrounded by enemies, if he is to cut his way out, needs to combine a strong desire for living with a strange carelessness about dying. He must not merely cling to life, for then he will be a coward, and will not escape. He must not merely wait for death, for then he will be a suicide, and will not escape. He must seek his life in a spirit of furious indifference to it; he must desire life like water and yet drink death like wine.

(Wild at Heart , 169) 

You are meant to be...

amazing, beautiful, full of life, creative, wise, sharp and attentive, bearing the image of the Creator of the universe. I hate that this truth is so hard to stomach and that we have to fight to see ourselves as these things. It is part of the battle though. I am talking about the opposite of pride. We are called to be image bearers of God, why are we so afraid of this. Please for the sake of those around you be all that you are called to be. He has come to give us life and life to the full.

This week is off the hook. 

Kimberly and I's week is over the top I will be away at a conference for the beginning of the week and we move saturday and this is only half of the load. You have to laugh, right? I guess that I will just have to pray that I can be extra sharp and attentive.