Did you know that April is National Poetry Month? Somehow I didn't until this year, but I spend so much time in libraries now that it's hard not to pick up on these things. I suppose it makes sense-- the first important poem in (semi-) readable English begins with a reference to April, which was also later called the "cruellest month" by T.S. Eliot in the first line of possibly the most famous (and most overrated) poem of our time. Anyway, in honor of all that, I'm going to NOT post another one of my poems (and split my infinitives with pride-- poets can do that!). What I am going to post is a list of good poems by much better poets than myself for you to check out if you're interested. All of these poems should be easy to find online if you don't want to spend your time hanging out in a library like I do. As a side note though, I do find that reading a poem out of an actual book seems to be more enjoyable than reading off a screen-- don't know why that is exactly, but try it and you'll see!
Starting at the beginning, I want to talk about a longer poem that I referenced in my last post but I feel is too big to include in a list. Possibly the best free verse poetry I've ever read is found in The Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot. Yes, The Waste Land is more famous, but the The Four Quartets is better-- and much more encouraging. Trust me. I can't recommend it highly enough; it takes a little bit of effort but it's well worth it. So start there if you can, but if all you have time for is shorter stuff, here is a brief list of some inspiring shorter poems that should make a great jumping-off point into the wide world of poetry (and if you want a much longer list just let me know and I can easily furnish that as well)!
John Donne-- Holy Sonnet 14 (Batter my heart...)
George Herbert-- Redemption
Andrew Marvell-- The Coronet
William Wordsworth-- Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802
Percy Shelley-- Ozymandias
John Keats-- Ode to a Nightingale
Emily Dickinson-- "Hope is the thing with feathers"
Gerard Manley Hopkins-- "As Kingfishers catch fire"
Robert Frost-- The Road Not Taken
-- Two Tramps in Mud Time
Richard Wilbur-- Hamlen Brook
Mark Strand-- Keeping Things Whole
So there you go. A closing thought: our modern way of life tends to cause us to miss the beautiful in the midst of the mundane. I think one of the (many) reasons poetry has such value is that it is intrinsically an appreciation of the beauty God has embedded all over the place in this world. Reading (and writing) poetry helps me remember to look for the beauty of the world... and then I just start seeing it. To appreciate the beauty that God has made is a way to worship him, and that's why we're here, no? Also, we are God's poetry (see Ephesians 2:10-- "workmanship" in that verse is the Greek poiema which is the word we get poem from), so we were made to experience the creative and specific design of beauty because it's who we are! So enjoy the rest of National Poetry Month... and don't stop there.
Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label poetry. Show all posts
Sunday, April 22, 2012
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Trying
I'd like to begin today with an extremely random quote: "Do or do not; there is no try" --Yoda. Our favorite green jedi munchkin utters this line while trying to get Luke Skywalker to use the force strongly enough to lift his X-wing out of the swamp that inexplicably exists on (in?) the asteroid where Yoda lives. At least I think that's how it goes; I haven't seen the old Star Wars movies in quite a while.
Anyway, that particular line has always been one I've loved to quote, partially because Yoda is one of the only voice impressions I can do with any level of proficiency whatsoever and partly because it just seems applicable in many situations. You have to watch out for Yoda, though. As the main philosopher of the Star Wars series (along with Obi-wan, I guess), he's always saying things that are obviously meant to be profound costumed in a mystifying array of vague spirituality, ambiguity, and reversed syntax. When you look closer, though, his statements usually fall somewhere on the spectrum between pure nonsense and outright falsehood.
This one is a prime example. Now, I think it's true that people tend to use the phrase, "I'll try" to indicate that no one should expect them to succeed, either because they aren't up to the task or because they don't actually plan to expend that much effort on it. So in that sense, Yoda's instruction could be legitimate. A jedi saying they'd try would be a cop-out of that order, since the force should enable them to do basically whatever they want (an interesting issue never really addressed in the films, by the way-- why can't they fly? why can't they all shoot lightning out of their hands? If Vader can choke people with his mind, why does he even bother with a lightsaber? But I digress.) Here in the real world, though, there is no force. Here, we have God.
The most powerful force in the universe is not a formless power that can be used to good or evil ends. Far from it, He's a person (three of them, actually) with a very specific will for how things are going to go in his world. His sovereign will puts us in the position where we clearly do not have control over our own success or failure.
I'm not trying to get into the whole free will vs. sovereignty argument here. I think it's self evident, though, that our best-laid plans tend to "gang aft a-gley" as Robert Burns said (rough translation: they go straight to crap a lot of the time). A much more intelligible quote from another poet sums it up quite nicely, I think: "For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business." --T.S. Eliot. Now, Mr. Eliot wrote some really depressing poetry (and some very snobbish literary criticism) early in his career, but then an amazing thing happened: he met Jesus. The quote above is from after that happened, in the midst of his crowning accomplishment, a very long poetic meditation on the value of life (and other things) called The Four Quartets, which I highly recommend.
I think T.S. Eliot was wiser than Yoda. I also think that the preceding is a sentence that has never before been written in the history of literature. I'm ok with that. All I know is that the Bible is filled with verses backing up the idea that we have very little control of the "do or do not" part of life. For us, there is only try!
"Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?" Lamentations 3:37-38
"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain." Psalm 127:1
"Lord, you establish peace for us; all that we have accomplished, you have done for us" Isaiah 26:12
Far from being depressing, this is freedom. If our success or failure as men or women-- as Christians, as people-- depends on our own efforts, we are screwed. But God takes the pressure off! He is already doing things; the things that we have accomplished are all things that he did. Instead of worrying about whether we succeed or fail, we get the privilege of discovering and participating in the plans of God.
"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" Ephesians 2:10 (ESV).
I quoted from the ESV here because the NIV makes the verse sound unnecessarily Yoda-ish by inexplicably translating the Greek word for walk as "do" in this verse (and in no other place for whatever reason) and adding another "do" before good works, where there isn't even a verb in the original! Their carelessness caused me to misunderstand this verse for years, thinking that I had to somehow make God's plans happen.
What if instead, God is already at work in His world? What if his plans are already in motion, and we can just walk right into them as we pursue relationship with Him? What if all we have to do is try, and He handles the success and gives us failure when we need it? What if we can trust that He is strong and He loves us, and the rest is not our business?
Can we really be led by the hand of God, hear his voice, and work alongside Him in his perfect plan?
It's something I'd like to try.
Anyway, that particular line has always been one I've loved to quote, partially because Yoda is one of the only voice impressions I can do with any level of proficiency whatsoever and partly because it just seems applicable in many situations. You have to watch out for Yoda, though. As the main philosopher of the Star Wars series (along with Obi-wan, I guess), he's always saying things that are obviously meant to be profound costumed in a mystifying array of vague spirituality, ambiguity, and reversed syntax. When you look closer, though, his statements usually fall somewhere on the spectrum between pure nonsense and outright falsehood.
This one is a prime example. Now, I think it's true that people tend to use the phrase, "I'll try" to indicate that no one should expect them to succeed, either because they aren't up to the task or because they don't actually plan to expend that much effort on it. So in that sense, Yoda's instruction could be legitimate. A jedi saying they'd try would be a cop-out of that order, since the force should enable them to do basically whatever they want (an interesting issue never really addressed in the films, by the way-- why can't they fly? why can't they all shoot lightning out of their hands? If Vader can choke people with his mind, why does he even bother with a lightsaber? But I digress.) Here in the real world, though, there is no force. Here, we have God.
The most powerful force in the universe is not a formless power that can be used to good or evil ends. Far from it, He's a person (three of them, actually) with a very specific will for how things are going to go in his world. His sovereign will puts us in the position where we clearly do not have control over our own success or failure.
I'm not trying to get into the whole free will vs. sovereignty argument here. I think it's self evident, though, that our best-laid plans tend to "gang aft a-gley" as Robert Burns said (rough translation: they go straight to crap a lot of the time). A much more intelligible quote from another poet sums it up quite nicely, I think: "For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business." --T.S. Eliot. Now, Mr. Eliot wrote some really depressing poetry (and some very snobbish literary criticism) early in his career, but then an amazing thing happened: he met Jesus. The quote above is from after that happened, in the midst of his crowning accomplishment, a very long poetic meditation on the value of life (and other things) called The Four Quartets, which I highly recommend.
I think T.S. Eliot was wiser than Yoda. I also think that the preceding is a sentence that has never before been written in the history of literature. I'm ok with that. All I know is that the Bible is filled with verses backing up the idea that we have very little control of the "do or do not" part of life. For us, there is only try!
"Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?" Lamentations 3:37-38
"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain." Psalm 127:1
"Lord, you establish peace for us; all that we have accomplished, you have done for us" Isaiah 26:12
Far from being depressing, this is freedom. If our success or failure as men or women-- as Christians, as people-- depends on our own efforts, we are screwed. But God takes the pressure off! He is already doing things; the things that we have accomplished are all things that he did. Instead of worrying about whether we succeed or fail, we get the privilege of discovering and participating in the plans of God.
"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" Ephesians 2:10 (ESV).
I quoted from the ESV here because the NIV makes the verse sound unnecessarily Yoda-ish by inexplicably translating the Greek word for walk as "do" in this verse (and in no other place for whatever reason) and adding another "do" before good works, where there isn't even a verb in the original! Their carelessness caused me to misunderstand this verse for years, thinking that I had to somehow make God's plans happen.
What if instead, God is already at work in His world? What if his plans are already in motion, and we can just walk right into them as we pursue relationship with Him? What if all we have to do is try, and He handles the success and gives us failure when we need it? What if we can trust that He is strong and He loves us, and the rest is not our business?
Can we really be led by the hand of God, hear his voice, and work alongside Him in his perfect plan?
It's something I'd like to try.
Friday, February 24, 2012
Integrity in Community
I've had a couple conversations recently that really got me thinking again about the issue of how we relate to each other within the body of Christ (i.e. the church). Long story short, I ended up expressing a lot of my thoughts about it in a poem, so I'll start with that:
Euphemistic Eucharist
Howya doin’? What’s up?
Pretty good, not too much,
life goes on, praise the Lord,
the usual and such--
By pretty good I mean
my family’s a mess--
we fight, except not here:
in this house we just bless.
I’m saying in not much
my schedule is insane:
it’s filled with noise and stress
it hardly can contain--
Life just keeps on going,
and so I don’t have time
to let you see beneath
charade and pantomime.
To praise the Lord I smile
and just sing happy songs;
pain stays behind the mask
where it, of course, belongs--
The usual just means
I’d tell you I’m depressed
were I allowed to break
facades so nicely dressed
And such and such and on--
a thousand pointless things
I’d rather say than tell
you anything that stings.
Safe. But are we happy?
We smile; are we alive?
The one place where it seems
reality should thrive,
instead we hide away;
we put our pride above
our pain--how can we throw
our masks aside and love?
Because we need help and we need
to be saved and all of us are
pretty much the same kinds
of messed up so why not just be real?
Can you see here what I’m driving toward?
Maybe then we could really praise the Lord.
So, I realize that my poem is a bit caustic. I'm just trying to honestly address a real issue, though, and the fact that it keeps on coming up among people I talk to lets me know I'm not the only one who feels it. The issue, as you can probably guess from the poem, is that church (not just mine, or anyone else's specifically, but church in general-- the conversations I mentioned at the beginning were with people from three different ones) has a tendency to become a place of fakeness where people don't feel like they can come with their real problems, instead of what it should be: the place where they could safely be honest and receive healing.
3 questions come to my mind: why does this happen, why is it so bad, and what can we do about it?
Let's break my OCD tendencies toward order and symmetry and start right in the middle with the second question. I don't want to belabor the point that the phenomenon I'm talking about is bad news, but I want to start with what I see as the basic reasons why it is so harmful.
The first is that everyone has problems, and problems don't just go away. Of course, drawing near to God is helpful in dealing with them. God can supernaturally solve them whenever he wants to. The problem comes when churches start teaching (or just believing, consciously or subconsciously), that this supernatural encounter with the healing Lord is only a one-on-one deal. Now, I know that God has healed me at times without any help from anyone else--he's just that good. However, the general model that he has laid out for us is something totally different.
"And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective." (James 5:15-16). This is God's model for healing. We get other believers involved, and they pray for us so that we will be healed. Catch that? James is letting us know that if we won't share our brokenness, both spiritual and physical, we won't access all the healing that we could because it comes through receiving prayer from each other! So that's one reason why it's a crisis that we don't feel like we can be real in church-- where else will we find the righteous men who can pray powerful and effective prayers for our healing?
Another reason is that everyone has problems, and everyone knows this is true. Even (or especially?) people who aren't Christians yet. We might feel like being real with the stuff of our lives will scare unbelievers away, but I propose that the fakeness we choose instead is infinitely more frightening. Everyone knows that people have problems. Everyone knows that they themselves have problems! So if you walk into a group of people where no one seems to have any, what do you think? You think, I'll never fit in with these people. So another reason this fear of dealing with real issues in church is a problem is because it is actually driving away the broken people who desperately need to receive healing by being prayed for (and who God wants to make into the powerful and effective prayers who will then help restore others!).
Finally, and potentially most seriously, being fake in church will hinder our worship. We might think we can sneak in and deal with our problems alone with God and have ourselves fixed by the time we have to talk to anyone. The problem there is that God is looking for worshipers who worship him in spirit and in truth (John 4:23). If we won't be real with God and with our family, we can't worship him in the way he desires. This is serious stuff, and if you don't think so just read in Exodus and Leviticus about people who tried to worship God in unauthorized ways. If we want his healing presence to be with us, we have to be willing to worship in the spiritual integrity God is seeking. Otherwise, our thanksgiving (Greek: Eucharist) will amount to little more than empty words we use to avoid saying what we really mean.
So, why does it happen that we feel like all we can be at church is just fine and peachy-keen, etc.?
I think it probably comes down to fear, mostly. Just because we all have problems and we know it doesn't mean we necessarily feel comfortable sharing them with people! If our fear of being judged for the things that are still messed up about us trumps our desire to be healed from those things, we won't share, plain and simple. If we have a history of being judged, that makes things worse of course, as does seeing other people be judged in places (like church) where they should be welcomed instead. Put all those things together, and fear wins out a lot of times.
Also, I think there's a misunderstanding in the church of what the Bible really teaches about joy. When it says to be joyful in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16), is that the same as being happy all the time? If the joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10), and a fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), are we weak Christians who don't have the Holy Spirit if we go through struggles and trials?
All of the answers are no, in case you're wondering. No one is "too blessed to be stressed" either (although some might be in too much denial not to smile). Joy is not the same thing as happiness, and godly joy is just as compatible with sorrow as with happiness. Jesus himself wept (John 11:35), but he was given the oil of joy more than all his companions (Psalm 45:7). He also got so stressed that he sweated blood (Luke 22:44). So godly joy must be something different than unceasing happiness. What if, instead, it's the ongoing security of knowing that eventually everything will work out for your good because it's all in the control of the all-powerful God who loves you? Then you can feel the pain of loss and brokenness without losing hope, and when you are happy you can be happy for the right reasons. That's the joy that will bring you strength.
One further note on why the problem of disingenuousness happens at church: it kind of gets to be a vicious cycle. No one wants to be the first person to do anything, so if no one is talking about any real stuff, it's that much harder for anyone to break the trend.
Which segues nicely into the last question: what can we do about this thing?
First, let me say that I'm no expert on this. I'm actually more of an expert on being fake, to be quite honest. All I know is that I deeply desire to be real, and I'm starting to learn what that means. So how can we be the ones to step out and start being real in the one place in all the world where the truth should win out? How can streetlights shine into darkness that has clouded the home of light?
The main thing I can see is that we have to start wanting more of God so desperately that we don't care about our own images. We have to care more about what he thinks of us than what anyone else does. This is what it means for him to be our Lord. His opinion is the final word, and what he says goes, no matter what it makes us look like. If we start believing that, maybe we can be the ones to step out and take the first risk. We can't make anyone else be real, but we can show them they won't die if they try it!
Also, we have to confess and repent of our judgmental spirits. This will allow us to bless other people who are real enough to be honest about their problems instead of comparing our own struggles to theirs to see how we stack up. All judgment is comparison, and all comparison is irrelevant because God's love is infinite. What if ours started looking more like his?
We also have to stop getting the truth backwards. It's not that God is so good that his followers shouldn't have any problems; He's so good because welcomes us in spite of them! He fixes them too, but for whatever reason he hasn't chosen to do it instantaneously in most cases. We have to let him be who he is in this instead of making him into a false image of what we want him to be.
I'm sure there is much more to be said on this topic-- does anyone else have any ideas to share on how we can help? I'll end with one I just thought of, which is actually the most important one: prayer. I want to start asking God to change the problems I see instead of just worrying about them. I want to talk less and pray more.
So-- God, change what you want to change. Make us more like you. Make your body whole. Let us walk in integrity, bravery, and community. Give us real relationships with real people, and let us worship you in Spirit and in truth. Amen.
Euphemistic Eucharist
Howya doin’? What’s up?
Pretty good, not too much,
life goes on, praise the Lord,
the usual and such--
By pretty good I mean
my family’s a mess--
we fight, except not here:
in this house we just bless.
I’m saying in not much
my schedule is insane:
it’s filled with noise and stress
it hardly can contain--
Life just keeps on going,
and so I don’t have time
to let you see beneath
charade and pantomime.
To praise the Lord I smile
and just sing happy songs;
pain stays behind the mask
where it, of course, belongs--
The usual just means
I’d tell you I’m depressed
were I allowed to break
facades so nicely dressed
And such and such and on--
a thousand pointless things
I’d rather say than tell
you anything that stings.
Safe. But are we happy?
We smile; are we alive?
The one place where it seems
reality should thrive,
instead we hide away;
we put our pride above
our pain--how can we throw
our masks aside and love?
Because we need help and we need
to be saved and all of us are
pretty much the same kinds
of messed up so why not just be real?
Can you see here what I’m driving toward?
Maybe then we could really praise the Lord.
So, I realize that my poem is a bit caustic. I'm just trying to honestly address a real issue, though, and the fact that it keeps on coming up among people I talk to lets me know I'm not the only one who feels it. The issue, as you can probably guess from the poem, is that church (not just mine, or anyone else's specifically, but church in general-- the conversations I mentioned at the beginning were with people from three different ones) has a tendency to become a place of fakeness where people don't feel like they can come with their real problems, instead of what it should be: the place where they could safely be honest and receive healing.
3 questions come to my mind: why does this happen, why is it so bad, and what can we do about it?
Let's break my OCD tendencies toward order and symmetry and start right in the middle with the second question. I don't want to belabor the point that the phenomenon I'm talking about is bad news, but I want to start with what I see as the basic reasons why it is so harmful.
The first is that everyone has problems, and problems don't just go away. Of course, drawing near to God is helpful in dealing with them. God can supernaturally solve them whenever he wants to. The problem comes when churches start teaching (or just believing, consciously or subconsciously), that this supernatural encounter with the healing Lord is only a one-on-one deal. Now, I know that God has healed me at times without any help from anyone else--he's just that good. However, the general model that he has laid out for us is something totally different.
"And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective." (James 5:15-16). This is God's model for healing. We get other believers involved, and they pray for us so that we will be healed. Catch that? James is letting us know that if we won't share our brokenness, both spiritual and physical, we won't access all the healing that we could because it comes through receiving prayer from each other! So that's one reason why it's a crisis that we don't feel like we can be real in church-- where else will we find the righteous men who can pray powerful and effective prayers for our healing?
Another reason is that everyone has problems, and everyone knows this is true. Even (or especially?) people who aren't Christians yet. We might feel like being real with the stuff of our lives will scare unbelievers away, but I propose that the fakeness we choose instead is infinitely more frightening. Everyone knows that people have problems. Everyone knows that they themselves have problems! So if you walk into a group of people where no one seems to have any, what do you think? You think, I'll never fit in with these people. So another reason this fear of dealing with real issues in church is a problem is because it is actually driving away the broken people who desperately need to receive healing by being prayed for (and who God wants to make into the powerful and effective prayers who will then help restore others!).
Finally, and potentially most seriously, being fake in church will hinder our worship. We might think we can sneak in and deal with our problems alone with God and have ourselves fixed by the time we have to talk to anyone. The problem there is that God is looking for worshipers who worship him in spirit and in truth (John 4:23). If we won't be real with God and with our family, we can't worship him in the way he desires. This is serious stuff, and if you don't think so just read in Exodus and Leviticus about people who tried to worship God in unauthorized ways. If we want his healing presence to be with us, we have to be willing to worship in the spiritual integrity God is seeking. Otherwise, our thanksgiving (Greek: Eucharist) will amount to little more than empty words we use to avoid saying what we really mean.
So, why does it happen that we feel like all we can be at church is just fine and peachy-keen, etc.?
I think it probably comes down to fear, mostly. Just because we all have problems and we know it doesn't mean we necessarily feel comfortable sharing them with people! If our fear of being judged for the things that are still messed up about us trumps our desire to be healed from those things, we won't share, plain and simple. If we have a history of being judged, that makes things worse of course, as does seeing other people be judged in places (like church) where they should be welcomed instead. Put all those things together, and fear wins out a lot of times.
Also, I think there's a misunderstanding in the church of what the Bible really teaches about joy. When it says to be joyful in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16), is that the same as being happy all the time? If the joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemiah 8:10), and a fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22), are we weak Christians who don't have the Holy Spirit if we go through struggles and trials?
All of the answers are no, in case you're wondering. No one is "too blessed to be stressed" either (although some might be in too much denial not to smile). Joy is not the same thing as happiness, and godly joy is just as compatible with sorrow as with happiness. Jesus himself wept (John 11:35), but he was given the oil of joy more than all his companions (Psalm 45:7). He also got so stressed that he sweated blood (Luke 22:44). So godly joy must be something different than unceasing happiness. What if, instead, it's the ongoing security of knowing that eventually everything will work out for your good because it's all in the control of the all-powerful God who loves you? Then you can feel the pain of loss and brokenness without losing hope, and when you are happy you can be happy for the right reasons. That's the joy that will bring you strength.
One further note on why the problem of disingenuousness happens at church: it kind of gets to be a vicious cycle. No one wants to be the first person to do anything, so if no one is talking about any real stuff, it's that much harder for anyone to break the trend.
Which segues nicely into the last question: what can we do about this thing?
First, let me say that I'm no expert on this. I'm actually more of an expert on being fake, to be quite honest. All I know is that I deeply desire to be real, and I'm starting to learn what that means. So how can we be the ones to step out and start being real in the one place in all the world where the truth should win out? How can streetlights shine into darkness that has clouded the home of light?
The main thing I can see is that we have to start wanting more of God so desperately that we don't care about our own images. We have to care more about what he thinks of us than what anyone else does. This is what it means for him to be our Lord. His opinion is the final word, and what he says goes, no matter what it makes us look like. If we start believing that, maybe we can be the ones to step out and take the first risk. We can't make anyone else be real, but we can show them they won't die if they try it!
Also, we have to confess and repent of our judgmental spirits. This will allow us to bless other people who are real enough to be honest about their problems instead of comparing our own struggles to theirs to see how we stack up. All judgment is comparison, and all comparison is irrelevant because God's love is infinite. What if ours started looking more like his?
We also have to stop getting the truth backwards. It's not that God is so good that his followers shouldn't have any problems; He's so good because welcomes us in spite of them! He fixes them too, but for whatever reason he hasn't chosen to do it instantaneously in most cases. We have to let him be who he is in this instead of making him into a false image of what we want him to be.
I'm sure there is much more to be said on this topic-- does anyone else have any ideas to share on how we can help? I'll end with one I just thought of, which is actually the most important one: prayer. I want to start asking God to change the problems I see instead of just worrying about them. I want to talk less and pray more.
So-- God, change what you want to change. Make us more like you. Make your body whole. Let us walk in integrity, bravery, and community. Give us real relationships with real people, and let us worship you in Spirit and in truth. Amen.
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Saying no...
I suppose I probably should have seen this coming.
What, you may ask? Well, of course ever since I posted about saying yes to God, I've been much more conscious of all the ways I say no to him. I'm actually realizing, much to my chagrin, that between outright saying no and just not listening at all, I don't really say yes to God nearly as much as my previous post might have made it seem like. I mean, I even boiled the whole process of life down to a few simple steps in that post... and then I found out I'm bad at doing them.
I guess this is just my personal disclaimer then. I didn't ever mean to suggest that I have life under control, but it turns out that's kind of what I was actually thinking after all. If that sounds prideful... it is. Nice thing is, if you just get something like that out in the open, then God can do something with it. What he likes to do is humbling and often painful, but that's really what progress looks like, I think.
So, I was thinking that I should amend my five-step plan to include a part where we confess and ask for repentance for all the ways we say no. Then I was thinking, not many of us are actually bold enough to say no outright to God (although I have done that, and I don't recommend it). Mostly we just don't ask/listen/pay attention to him. For those of us who know that he actually speaks, this is a little bit like a kid plugging his ears and yelling lalalalala to not hear what his parents are saying. He can try the excuse that he didn't hear, but that doesn't usually get far (note that this is a purely hypothetical kid of course, not based on personal experience at all).
The only difference between us and that kid is we've developed more sophisticated ways of plugging our ears and yelling, so to speak. Last time I mentioned YouTube and its noise-making, distracting brethren on the web and tv. Sometimes it can even be healthy things, like working hard, or even personal relationships. Mostly, however we do it, we say no to God by trying to avoid the silence (physical and spiritual) in which we know he speaks.
What I'm finding is that no matter how well I think I'm doing with this stuff, I'm still much more of a mixed bag of good and bad than I wish I was. I suspect the same is true for you, if you're honest. Even in this, though, we have hope:
Our hope is that God pursues us.
Even when we are running away (or toward any other thing, which is the same), he comes after us. He doesn't mind the whole mixed bag thing so much; it's really his only option for people to work with. Check out the story of Elijah in 1 Kings 19, for example! Elijah just had pretty much the most amazing mountaintop experience (literally) possible in the chapter before, and in chapter 19 he freaks out and runs away. He also asks God to kill him rather than making him keep working! Keep in mind this is the same guy that was eventually found worthy to skip the whole death thing and get carried into heaven on a chariot made of fire as well. Was he perfect? No. But God pursued him... and he spoke to him in the silence (1 Kings 19:12). I know the NIV says gentle whisper, but the literal translation is "thin silence." That phrase inspired a poem for me that reflects my desire to listen and respond to the Lord, and I'll finish with that:
Elijah's Prayer
let me be found
in the thin silence
listening
let my voice
surrender and stay
quietly
for you
let my heart
be wholly at home
to whisper
resting on you
let me be lost
Amen
What, you may ask? Well, of course ever since I posted about saying yes to God, I've been much more conscious of all the ways I say no to him. I'm actually realizing, much to my chagrin, that between outright saying no and just not listening at all, I don't really say yes to God nearly as much as my previous post might have made it seem like. I mean, I even boiled the whole process of life down to a few simple steps in that post... and then I found out I'm bad at doing them.
I guess this is just my personal disclaimer then. I didn't ever mean to suggest that I have life under control, but it turns out that's kind of what I was actually thinking after all. If that sounds prideful... it is. Nice thing is, if you just get something like that out in the open, then God can do something with it. What he likes to do is humbling and often painful, but that's really what progress looks like, I think.
So, I was thinking that I should amend my five-step plan to include a part where we confess and ask for repentance for all the ways we say no. Then I was thinking, not many of us are actually bold enough to say no outright to God (although I have done that, and I don't recommend it). Mostly we just don't ask/listen/pay attention to him. For those of us who know that he actually speaks, this is a little bit like a kid plugging his ears and yelling lalalalala to not hear what his parents are saying. He can try the excuse that he didn't hear, but that doesn't usually get far (note that this is a purely hypothetical kid of course, not based on personal experience at all).
The only difference between us and that kid is we've developed more sophisticated ways of plugging our ears and yelling, so to speak. Last time I mentioned YouTube and its noise-making, distracting brethren on the web and tv. Sometimes it can even be healthy things, like working hard, or even personal relationships. Mostly, however we do it, we say no to God by trying to avoid the silence (physical and spiritual) in which we know he speaks.
What I'm finding is that no matter how well I think I'm doing with this stuff, I'm still much more of a mixed bag of good and bad than I wish I was. I suspect the same is true for you, if you're honest. Even in this, though, we have hope:
Our hope is that God pursues us.
Even when we are running away (or toward any other thing, which is the same), he comes after us. He doesn't mind the whole mixed bag thing so much; it's really his only option for people to work with. Check out the story of Elijah in 1 Kings 19, for example! Elijah just had pretty much the most amazing mountaintop experience (literally) possible in the chapter before, and in chapter 19 he freaks out and runs away. He also asks God to kill him rather than making him keep working! Keep in mind this is the same guy that was eventually found worthy to skip the whole death thing and get carried into heaven on a chariot made of fire as well. Was he perfect? No. But God pursued him... and he spoke to him in the silence (1 Kings 19:12). I know the NIV says gentle whisper, but the literal translation is "thin silence." That phrase inspired a poem for me that reflects my desire to listen and respond to the Lord, and I'll finish with that:
Elijah's Prayer
let me be found
in the thin silence
listening
let my voice
surrender and stay
quietly
for you
let my heart
be wholly at home
to whisper
resting on you
let me be lost
Amen
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
A Winter Poem in Spring
I'm looking out a window right now at that beautiful kind of wet snow that sticks to only the tops of tree branches and makes the whole world look like if you bit it, you'd taste ice cream. Earlier, I took a walk in the beginnings of it, but it was still a pleasant surprise when I looked out later to see that it had covered everything. I know it's almost April, and even my winter-loving self has to admit that it is now, by all official standards, spring. I just think it's kind of funny that just because of that arbitrary division of months, some people act like this snow is an affront to the dignity of the world.
That got me thinking, too, about how we don't really get to decide when a lot of different things happen in life. We can strive and try and even ask God for things, but they happen exactly when he wants them to happen, regardless of our plans or categories. Just like it snows in April (and sometimes May too) in Cleveland.
Then, I started thinking about the challenge of staying in the present. I wrote last time about how the desire to have everything right now gets in our way. However, that doesn't change the fact that right now is really the only moment we have to work with. I think our problem comes when we spend now focusing on later or already. When we do that, we effectively take ourselves out of the present. What's more, we make it very difficult for people to connect to us because we are somewhere (or somewhen) else.
God is never like that, though. As we try to become more like him, it's important to remember that he is definitionally the God who IS. It's his name. I AM. Although he is not bound by time and experiences all the moments of it equally, he has dedicated his presence to being with us. God with us, Immanuel, is really just a synonym for I AM in my mind. If you look at how Jesus lived when he was here, he embodied this divine characteristic fully. He was able to devote his full attention to wherever and whenever he was, and whoever he was with. He knew so well how to be present.
Now, I don't think it's wrong for all you colder-blooded people to wish for warmer weather. I just made the connection mentally that staying emotionally and spiritually present in our lives can be like trying to appreciate a snowstorm in spring. If we can look past the potential inconvenience and the fact that the whole thing isn't what we were expecting (or hoping for in many cases), there is great beauty to be seen and enjoyed. Although the seasons of our lives may not last as long or may last longer than we expect or want, God never fails to give us beauty out of our ashes (see Isaiah 61:3). Instead of getting stuck on the beauty of the future (or past), why not stay in the present and enjoy what's there?
That's what I'm trying to do. In fact, I've been trying to do it for awhile now, and this whole winter stream of consciousness reminded me of a poem I wrote a long time ago. For some reason or other, snow has always been something that gets me thinking about these deeper things, I guess. I'll end with this:
Comparison
faintly perceptible
falling in silence
uncounted stacking
of discrete moments
gentle brilliance
smiling, smoldering cold
overpowering flash
that marks restive roads
empty blanket plush
insulating clarity in the dark
silken momentum
across great distance
quiet everything covering
shining outer shells
restoring final stream
that gives growth future
indirect ocean
wave of frozen clean
and how could we be anywhere
but home?
That got me thinking, too, about how we don't really get to decide when a lot of different things happen in life. We can strive and try and even ask God for things, but they happen exactly when he wants them to happen, regardless of our plans or categories. Just like it snows in April (and sometimes May too) in Cleveland.
Then, I started thinking about the challenge of staying in the present. I wrote last time about how the desire to have everything right now gets in our way. However, that doesn't change the fact that right now is really the only moment we have to work with. I think our problem comes when we spend now focusing on later or already. When we do that, we effectively take ourselves out of the present. What's more, we make it very difficult for people to connect to us because we are somewhere (or somewhen) else.
God is never like that, though. As we try to become more like him, it's important to remember that he is definitionally the God who IS. It's his name. I AM. Although he is not bound by time and experiences all the moments of it equally, he has dedicated his presence to being with us. God with us, Immanuel, is really just a synonym for I AM in my mind. If you look at how Jesus lived when he was here, he embodied this divine characteristic fully. He was able to devote his full attention to wherever and whenever he was, and whoever he was with. He knew so well how to be present.
Now, I don't think it's wrong for all you colder-blooded people to wish for warmer weather. I just made the connection mentally that staying emotionally and spiritually present in our lives can be like trying to appreciate a snowstorm in spring. If we can look past the potential inconvenience and the fact that the whole thing isn't what we were expecting (or hoping for in many cases), there is great beauty to be seen and enjoyed. Although the seasons of our lives may not last as long or may last longer than we expect or want, God never fails to give us beauty out of our ashes (see Isaiah 61:3). Instead of getting stuck on the beauty of the future (or past), why not stay in the present and enjoy what's there?
That's what I'm trying to do. In fact, I've been trying to do it for awhile now, and this whole winter stream of consciousness reminded me of a poem I wrote a long time ago. For some reason or other, snow has always been something that gets me thinking about these deeper things, I guess. I'll end with this:
Comparison
faintly perceptible
falling in silence
uncounted stacking
of discrete moments
gentle brilliance
smiling, smoldering cold
overpowering flash
that marks restive roads
empty blanket plush
insulating clarity in the dark
silken momentum
across great distance
quiet everything covering
shining outer shells
restoring final stream
that gives growth future
indirect ocean
wave of frozen clean
and how could we be anywhere
but home?
Sunday, October 31, 2010
A New Street
When I started this blog, I noted that in some ways it was a chronicle of my journey into the "real world," as far as I understood that at the time. The first entry was over a year ago now, written the day after I turned in my last paper and shut the door on college. The journey continues to be a long and strange one, and although I'm still not sure I know what the real world is, I believe I'm taking the next step towards it. Tomorrow begins the one year lease of my first apartment, my first time out from under my parents' roof.
I have lived in this house where I sit right now for 19 1/2 years, which is a pretty high percentage of a life of only 23 1/2. There are memories in every corner of it; in some ways it will always be home. It's time, though, and it's been time for a while now, for me to move on. I think it will be a spiritual change just as much if not more than a physical one.
It's funny, because for a long time I've thought of autumn as a time of new beginnings. I know everything is dying and falling and such, but it seems to me that new things are always beginning in this time. Maybe it's just that every school year offers the elusive possibility of a fresh start, but even now that I don't have that on my plate, things still feel new around the fall.
I have no idea what God wants to do in me in this season, but I want all of it. He's giving me a new road to walk down, and I don't want to miss any of it by taking unnecessary detours. I love my parents, and I'm blessed to know that I'll always have a place to return to if I need it. But for now, God is sending me to be a light on a new street. I look forward to writing again from there! For now, I'll end with a poem I wrote a long, long time ago that somehow feels very fresh and new to me right now. Things always cycle like that, I'm finding. Out of death comes new life; out of old things, new things are born. And fall doesn't really begin until you drink apple cider around a fire :)
Deeper
Floating in the same wind that brings
impending autumn, surrender
and freedom awaken together.
With hayrides and first
days of school
comes the dream that this fall
could be different,
the restless replaced
by anticipation,
a promise beating back
the patterns circling
viciously around—
a fall deeper, into one
transcending the changing seasons,
more faithful than the turning
leaves, who bears me in
their opposite direction,
resting in pursuit
and drinking apple cider
by the fire.
I have lived in this house where I sit right now for 19 1/2 years, which is a pretty high percentage of a life of only 23 1/2. There are memories in every corner of it; in some ways it will always be home. It's time, though, and it's been time for a while now, for me to move on. I think it will be a spiritual change just as much if not more than a physical one.
It's funny, because for a long time I've thought of autumn as a time of new beginnings. I know everything is dying and falling and such, but it seems to me that new things are always beginning in this time. Maybe it's just that every school year offers the elusive possibility of a fresh start, but even now that I don't have that on my plate, things still feel new around the fall.
I have no idea what God wants to do in me in this season, but I want all of it. He's giving me a new road to walk down, and I don't want to miss any of it by taking unnecessary detours. I love my parents, and I'm blessed to know that I'll always have a place to return to if I need it. But for now, God is sending me to be a light on a new street. I look forward to writing again from there! For now, I'll end with a poem I wrote a long, long time ago that somehow feels very fresh and new to me right now. Things always cycle like that, I'm finding. Out of death comes new life; out of old things, new things are born. And fall doesn't really begin until you drink apple cider around a fire :)
Deeper
Floating in the same wind that brings
impending autumn, surrender
and freedom awaken together.
With hayrides and first
days of school
comes the dream that this fall
could be different,
the restless replaced
by anticipation,
a promise beating back
the patterns circling
viciously around—
a fall deeper, into one
transcending the changing seasons,
more faithful than the turning
leaves, who bears me in
their opposite direction,
resting in pursuit
and drinking apple cider
by the fire.
Monday, May 31, 2010
One Step
I'll start off today with a poem I wrote a while ago as I was preparing to graduate from college:
One Step Forward Taken
Somewhere outside empty,
around the corner
from unrest and
down the next
street from destiny
is my intended
destination. I sit
in my life
like a kid
in the car
in the family
driveway and say
Are we there
yet? knowing only
leaving and arriving.
Wherever there is,
I can’t get
to where real
and fake diverge
all at once,
so I tend
to take less
than the first
step.
I wrote this poem in the midst of thinking about moving out of academia into "real life," but I've realized since then that it applies to so many different situations. It seems like my brain always wants to do things later or somehow start at a more easily defined time, e.g. "I'll start my workout plan on Monday, but today's Thursday so there's no use starting it now" or "Next month I'll have to eat healthier, but this one is already pretty shot" or "Next year I'll really start working towards my goal of dunking a basketball"-- you get the idea. Goals that seem very big just can't be accomplished all at once, and that can often lead to putting off even their smallest beginnings (which then leads, of course, to putting them off again later). Those are just examples, but it can happen with anything.
Am I the only one that does stuff like that? No? Good, I didn't think so. I think it's really an example of how we listen to the voice of fear in our lives. The whole situation reminds me of something my pastor likes to say, which I will paraphrase from the Ricktionary like this: "Our enemy always wants us to do things a little, and later. God wants to give us more, and now!" And isn't that the truth? It seems like there is often a questioning voice advising us to hedge our bets or put things off until we're more ready or the time is more right. But when is that, exactly?
What I'm trying to learn to do is take the first steps. If I realize something needs to change in my life, I don't want to finish out this week doing it wrong and start trying it the right way on Monday! I need to accept that real change is messier than that and can't be confined to my (sometimes unreasonable) desire for order. I want to take the first step toward doing the things God has placed in my heart right now, right here in the middle of all the ridiculous mess and chaos. I don't have time to wait for things to be more right or ready. A little and later just isn't going to cut it for me; I need more of God and his help, and I need it now!
That might seem a little demanding, and I guess maybe it is. All I know is that God has given us the green light to come after him with that kind of intensity. Check out Genesis 32. Jacob wrestled with God (!!) all through the night and wouldn't stop until he received a blessing. He wasn't like, "let me just get things straight with my brother who wants to kill me and then I'll start following you and seeking your blessing." He knew he couldn't go any further without God's blessing and he needed it right then. He took the one step he needed to take, even though he took it (and every other step from then on) with a limp.
I don't want my fear of limping to get in the way of my taking that first step, whatever it may be.
There's no time to waste.
One Step Forward Taken
Somewhere outside empty,
around the corner
from unrest and
down the next
street from destiny
is my intended
destination. I sit
in my life
like a kid
in the car
in the family
driveway and say
Are we there
yet? knowing only
leaving and arriving.
Wherever there is,
I can’t get
to where real
and fake diverge
all at once,
so I tend
to take less
than the first
step.
I wrote this poem in the midst of thinking about moving out of academia into "real life," but I've realized since then that it applies to so many different situations. It seems like my brain always wants to do things later or somehow start at a more easily defined time, e.g. "I'll start my workout plan on Monday, but today's Thursday so there's no use starting it now" or "Next month I'll have to eat healthier, but this one is already pretty shot" or "Next year I'll really start working towards my goal of dunking a basketball"-- you get the idea. Goals that seem very big just can't be accomplished all at once, and that can often lead to putting off even their smallest beginnings (which then leads, of course, to putting them off again later). Those are just examples, but it can happen with anything.
Am I the only one that does stuff like that? No? Good, I didn't think so. I think it's really an example of how we listen to the voice of fear in our lives. The whole situation reminds me of something my pastor likes to say, which I will paraphrase from the Ricktionary like this: "Our enemy always wants us to do things a little, and later. God wants to give us more, and now!" And isn't that the truth? It seems like there is often a questioning voice advising us to hedge our bets or put things off until we're more ready or the time is more right. But when is that, exactly?
What I'm trying to learn to do is take the first steps. If I realize something needs to change in my life, I don't want to finish out this week doing it wrong and start trying it the right way on Monday! I need to accept that real change is messier than that and can't be confined to my (sometimes unreasonable) desire for order. I want to take the first step toward doing the things God has placed in my heart right now, right here in the middle of all the ridiculous mess and chaos. I don't have time to wait for things to be more right or ready. A little and later just isn't going to cut it for me; I need more of God and his help, and I need it now!
That might seem a little demanding, and I guess maybe it is. All I know is that God has given us the green light to come after him with that kind of intensity. Check out Genesis 32. Jacob wrestled with God (!!) all through the night and wouldn't stop until he received a blessing. He wasn't like, "let me just get things straight with my brother who wants to kill me and then I'll start following you and seeking your blessing." He knew he couldn't go any further without God's blessing and he needed it right then. He took the one step he needed to take, even though he took it (and every other step from then on) with a limp.
I don't want my fear of limping to get in the way of my taking that first step, whatever it may be.
There's no time to waste.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
A Heart for Cleveland
One of the biggest things God has been doing in my life recently is teaching me how to feel. If you know me well at all, you know that I'm a thinker. I love to analyze things, and I tend to turn them over in my brain repeatedly until I arrive at what I deem to be a "solution," whatever that means. I've always wanted to have a logical reason for things, and that pretty much leaves emotional considerations in the background.
I've come to realize, though, that my unflappable logic and analysis has often just been another layer of my biggest weakness: pride. My refusal to feel was really just arrogance, an attempt to control the world through understanding. If I remain unaffected, I stay in control.
When it comes down to it, I really have believed that I was in control in my life. Now, it obviously takes some pretty selective memory to believe something like that in the face of all the craziness of life, but I was getting the hang of it. Problem was, the One who really does have the control wasn't too thrilled. He's not really a fan of competition for his position.
Long story short, God started shattering my perceptions of control by using my emotions. Now, I don't know if you've ever tried to make yourself feel something (e.g. joy, love, etc.), but if you have, you know that it really doesn't work. If you haven't, give it a shot sometime. I don't think it's possible, at least not for long. Anyway, the conclusion of all my logic and analysis was that if I had all the answers, I should be happy. Needless to say, I wasn't.
To give an example, I'll share a poem I wrote somewhere in the midst of trying to analyze my way through life. During my Junior year of college, my mom had totalled her car (she was fine) and was borrowing mine, so I had to take the bus/train to school for a while. The experience had quite an effect on me, and I wrote this in a subconscious attempt to deal with what I was feeling but didn't want to admit.
Commute
Today I am riding through
the steel bowels of a single
manmade mountain. It isn’t
very impressive, but it is all
the subway we have here. I
haven’t eaten for hours,
but I don’t get off as I reach
the city center, a hard rock
that only turns to living flesh
at certain quite specific
times. Those times, you can
lose yourself in the hurrying
humanity and quietly pretend
you have the answer to the
endless iron question. Other times,
it’s better to pass quickly by
the dirty Modernist monuments
and hope you can catch
the next bus at your connection
further on.
Thursday, 4:34
by the market tower clock
and I am boarding the 4:25.
The conglomerate smell of the
market is all I will enjoy today, not
the shouting vendors as they
make their best deal or set up
the stuffed pig’s head at
just the right eye-level
to scare the children. I don’t
have time for the homemade
glazed doughnuts from the
baker in the far northwest corner
or the fresh produce that
is somewhat less fresh than
the sellers say, but still a bit
more fresh than it smells.
No,
today my goal is just to make
it home, taking the redline 66X
and the 20A through the shades
of culture, death and life
to my refuge from the smoldering
embers in the dying heart
of the fire, where I can set myself
apart and analyze as I prepare
for the inevitable onrush of
tomorrow and my next ride.
I knew even then that this withdrawn analysis was not going to be the answer, but writing this poem provided me with the first realization that that's what I was doing. I had always thought of myself as a city kid, in touch with the problems of the street. Really though, despite the fact that I lived within the city, I had left it, to protect my heart from the hardness and pain. I was taking sociology classes, learning how to analyze the problems of the city without really feeling them, trading emotions for statistics. As I hope you can tell from the poem, I love my city (well, most of it anyway), but I was turning my back on it.
Even more pressing on my thoughts was my own survival in finishing college and managing my life. I spent a lot of time in survival mode in those days. Living like that gets tiring though, and God had other things in store. First, he had to bring me face to face with my own emotions, which turned out to be darker and much less controlled than I had thought. I had to learn, as strange as it might sound, to feel what I was really feeling, even if it meant admitting that I had no idea what to do with it and very little (if any) control over it. It's a journey I'm still walking on, and probably will be for quite awhile.
As I feel my own emotions more and more, though, I'm finding that God has more for me than just that. He also wants me to feel His emotions! I think we can easily forget that God feels things just like we do. Actually, I guess a better way to put that would be that he feels things even more deeply and profoundly than we do. And the biggest thing he feels? Love.
In asking God what he feels, I have become much more conscious of his overpowering love. For me, for others, for his Son, his church, everyone. God feels sorrow mixed with love, anger mixed with love and joy because of love. In fact, one of the most amazing and praiseworthy things about God is the way that he loves us beyond explanation, despite ourselves.
So, back to my poem for a minute. The problems of Cleveland are pretty overwhelming, and you can see a lot of them if you take the rapid from University Circle to the W. 25th street bus. They seem too big to handle from the perspective of just me and my thoughts and feelings. When I look at my city, I can feel frustrated, afraid, or even depressed.
But what does God feel about Cleveland? In most cases, I'm guessing it's something like compassion. I'm sure there are things that make him happy, angry and sad as well, but I think the overriding current is compassion for people who have lost their way. Therein lies the difference between God's thoughts and mine. I see large-scale societal problems that I don't even know how to begin to change, and the result is the overwhelming emotions I've tried to get rid of. God sees the problems and could rectify them instantly, but his heart is for the people. Although he could change things on the grand scale, his method of choice is compassion.
That's why it's so important for us to be in touch with God's heart, not just to know but to feel what he feels. Compassion, it turns out, is not nearly as overwhelming as fixing all the deep-seeded problems that plague my city. Each person I see on my commute through Cleveland is someone God loves, and I can treat them like that. I don't need to analyze so much as I need to feel God's love, and if I have no idea where to start, I can just start where I am. If I can just do that, I can break out of my protective bubble and really start making a difference.
And if we all could do that... who knows what could happen here?
I've come to realize, though, that my unflappable logic and analysis has often just been another layer of my biggest weakness: pride. My refusal to feel was really just arrogance, an attempt to control the world through understanding. If I remain unaffected, I stay in control.
When it comes down to it, I really have believed that I was in control in my life. Now, it obviously takes some pretty selective memory to believe something like that in the face of all the craziness of life, but I was getting the hang of it. Problem was, the One who really does have the control wasn't too thrilled. He's not really a fan of competition for his position.
Long story short, God started shattering my perceptions of control by using my emotions. Now, I don't know if you've ever tried to make yourself feel something (e.g. joy, love, etc.), but if you have, you know that it really doesn't work. If you haven't, give it a shot sometime. I don't think it's possible, at least not for long. Anyway, the conclusion of all my logic and analysis was that if I had all the answers, I should be happy. Needless to say, I wasn't.
To give an example, I'll share a poem I wrote somewhere in the midst of trying to analyze my way through life. During my Junior year of college, my mom had totalled her car (she was fine) and was borrowing mine, so I had to take the bus/train to school for a while. The experience had quite an effect on me, and I wrote this in a subconscious attempt to deal with what I was feeling but didn't want to admit.
Commute
Today I am riding through
the steel bowels of a single
manmade mountain. It isn’t
very impressive, but it is all
the subway we have here. I
haven’t eaten for hours,
but I don’t get off as I reach
the city center, a hard rock
that only turns to living flesh
at certain quite specific
times. Those times, you can
lose yourself in the hurrying
humanity and quietly pretend
you have the answer to the
endless iron question. Other times,
it’s better to pass quickly by
the dirty Modernist monuments
and hope you can catch
the next bus at your connection
further on.
Thursday, 4:34
by the market tower clock
and I am boarding the 4:25.
The conglomerate smell of the
market is all I will enjoy today, not
the shouting vendors as they
make their best deal or set up
the stuffed pig’s head at
just the right eye-level
to scare the children. I don’t
have time for the homemade
glazed doughnuts from the
baker in the far northwest corner
or the fresh produce that
is somewhat less fresh than
the sellers say, but still a bit
more fresh than it smells.
No,
today my goal is just to make
it home, taking the redline 66X
and the 20A through the shades
of culture, death and life
to my refuge from the smoldering
embers in the dying heart
of the fire, where I can set myself
apart and analyze as I prepare
for the inevitable onrush of
tomorrow and my next ride.
I knew even then that this withdrawn analysis was not going to be the answer, but writing this poem provided me with the first realization that that's what I was doing. I had always thought of myself as a city kid, in touch with the problems of the street. Really though, despite the fact that I lived within the city, I had left it, to protect my heart from the hardness and pain. I was taking sociology classes, learning how to analyze the problems of the city without really feeling them, trading emotions for statistics. As I hope you can tell from the poem, I love my city (well, most of it anyway), but I was turning my back on it.
Even more pressing on my thoughts was my own survival in finishing college and managing my life. I spent a lot of time in survival mode in those days. Living like that gets tiring though, and God had other things in store. First, he had to bring me face to face with my own emotions, which turned out to be darker and much less controlled than I had thought. I had to learn, as strange as it might sound, to feel what I was really feeling, even if it meant admitting that I had no idea what to do with it and very little (if any) control over it. It's a journey I'm still walking on, and probably will be for quite awhile.
As I feel my own emotions more and more, though, I'm finding that God has more for me than just that. He also wants me to feel His emotions! I think we can easily forget that God feels things just like we do. Actually, I guess a better way to put that would be that he feels things even more deeply and profoundly than we do. And the biggest thing he feels? Love.
In asking God what he feels, I have become much more conscious of his overpowering love. For me, for others, for his Son, his church, everyone. God feels sorrow mixed with love, anger mixed with love and joy because of love. In fact, one of the most amazing and praiseworthy things about God is the way that he loves us beyond explanation, despite ourselves.
So, back to my poem for a minute. The problems of Cleveland are pretty overwhelming, and you can see a lot of them if you take the rapid from University Circle to the W. 25th street bus. They seem too big to handle from the perspective of just me and my thoughts and feelings. When I look at my city, I can feel frustrated, afraid, or even depressed.
But what does God feel about Cleveland? In most cases, I'm guessing it's something like compassion. I'm sure there are things that make him happy, angry and sad as well, but I think the overriding current is compassion for people who have lost their way. Therein lies the difference between God's thoughts and mine. I see large-scale societal problems that I don't even know how to begin to change, and the result is the overwhelming emotions I've tried to get rid of. God sees the problems and could rectify them instantly, but his heart is for the people. Although he could change things on the grand scale, his method of choice is compassion.
That's why it's so important for us to be in touch with God's heart, not just to know but to feel what he feels. Compassion, it turns out, is not nearly as overwhelming as fixing all the deep-seeded problems that plague my city. Each person I see on my commute through Cleveland is someone God loves, and I can treat them like that. I don't need to analyze so much as I need to feel God's love, and if I have no idea where to start, I can just start where I am. If I can just do that, I can break out of my protective bubble and really start making a difference.
And if we all could do that... who knows what could happen here?
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Finding Christmas
As I've been getting older, I find that I sometimes have trouble getting in the "Christmas spirit" like I did when I was a kid. Maybe it's just because when I was little, all Christmas meant to me really was the excitement of getting new stuff. You know, waking up and realizing you finally made it through the agonizingly long night, going downstairs to find the tree all lit up and a beautiful unknown haul of presents under it... that kind of stuff. I think decorations also seem more fun and festive when you're a little kid, and they certainly aren't just another task that needs to be completed. Anyway, Christmas was definitely joyful to me when I was a child, albeit possibly not for the right reasons.
Somewhere along the way, though, you start to realize that presents aren't always going to be enough. I've always known what Christmas is really all about (Linus in "A Charlie Brown Christmas" anyone?), but I think my young brain had a bad disconnect between that and what actually happened around Christmas. Good tidings of great joy=...presents?? Now, I realize of course that Jesus gave us the best gift and that's why we give gifts on Christmas, and I love giving gifts to people I love! All I know is, I was at the mall yesterday buying said gifts, and I left feeling depressed despite the fact that I got some really cool stuff I'm excited about giving.
Here's a poem I wrote most of a long time ago (and without thinking about Christmas) that describes some of my thoughts today:
Search Engine
A search for entertainment, from desire to forget
the pains already suffered and prevent the ones not yet,
a fight to disengage the mind and not to know, just feel:
we can only live when happy; deeper feelings we conceal.
So the cycle will increase just as it always has before,
an insatiable desire reaching out for more and more.
A search for education, to remember we aspire,
to learn why things aren’t working out through knowledge we acquire,
and so the mind is stretched while the emotions just congeal:
we trust only what we understand and nothing else is real.
But as we learn, the more we know at some things we must guess:
disillusionment reversed, reaching into less and less.
A search for something different, but what difference does it make
in a Nutri-sweet and plastic world where everything is fake?
Still the imitations indicate that real things do exist,
and they might be there for finding if we only can resist
the current that pulls down around and kills beneath the fall
to go through instead of under, to where truth is all in all.
I guess maybe I'm just tired of all the fakeness. I'm with Charlie Brown: Christmas is way too commercial. And man, if he was worried about that in the '60's, what would he say now? See, I'm all in favor of gifts, but I'm worried that we're skipping the part about honoring and remembering Jesus' gift and just using it as an excuse to go whole-hog into the materialism that is probably the #1 besetting vice of American culture. I know he would want us to celebrate his birth, but I can't help asking: is this how he would want us to do it?
It's this materialistic tendency, I think, that can make all the best things about Christmas the things that we end up hating. Maybe that's why I like How the Grinch Stole Christmas (both versions) more than almost any of my friends do. I identify with the Grinch! I also think the modern version is really on to something with this idea of Christmas as a search for something. Unfortunately, they chose to express that insight through the song, "Where are you, Christmas?", a song that is almost tolerable when that cute little who sings it, but completely insufferable when sung by Faith Hill or whoever it was in the credits. In any case, that song (like so many other secular songs) is inches away from being a Jesus song. It has an excellent grasp of a real problem... but then it offers a worthless solution.
The solution offered by the song is, however, close: it suggests saving Christmas by having love and joy in our hearts. Great, now how do I do that, especially when I have to go to the mall filled with shoppers that generally tend to seem much more angry than loving and workers that seem far more depressed than joyful? That could just be because I'm such a last minute shopper... but still. The key thing is, there's no way I can just generate these good feelings. In the terms of my poem above, I can't entertain myself into forgetting my pain, and I can't intellectualize it away. I desperately need a third option, but I find it obscured by a lot of fakeness and annoying decorations.
I'm not trying to be a downer here. I think the state of Christmas in America is pretty sad, but there is one thing I like about it: it gets people searching. It's also the one time every year when the gospel message gets on national tv (thank God for Linus!). Hopefully, when people get tired of the cheap imitations, they'll realize that the mere proliferation of imitations means there must be something real somewhere. There is real love to be had, and real joy comes with it. That's why all I really want to do this Christmas is worship God and spend time with people I love. What if we focused on that instead of making a part-time job out of managing/purchasing/looking for Christmas? As I'm trying to shift my focus, I'm noticing that the real joy and peace that are supposed to be associated with Christmas spirit have come to me from the Father and his love! Have we ever thought that maybe the "Christmas Spirit" should be the Holy Spirit? I ask because the Spirit is the one who reveals the Father's love and the joy of being saved by Jesus to us, and we'll never find Christmas until we find Christ.
Somewhere along the way, though, you start to realize that presents aren't always going to be enough. I've always known what Christmas is really all about (Linus in "A Charlie Brown Christmas" anyone?), but I think my young brain had a bad disconnect between that and what actually happened around Christmas. Good tidings of great joy=...presents?? Now, I realize of course that Jesus gave us the best gift and that's why we give gifts on Christmas, and I love giving gifts to people I love! All I know is, I was at the mall yesterday buying said gifts, and I left feeling depressed despite the fact that I got some really cool stuff I'm excited about giving.
Here's a poem I wrote most of a long time ago (and without thinking about Christmas) that describes some of my thoughts today:
Search Engine
A search for entertainment, from desire to forget
the pains already suffered and prevent the ones not yet,
a fight to disengage the mind and not to know, just feel:
we can only live when happy; deeper feelings we conceal.
So the cycle will increase just as it always has before,
an insatiable desire reaching out for more and more.
A search for education, to remember we aspire,
to learn why things aren’t working out through knowledge we acquire,
and so the mind is stretched while the emotions just congeal:
we trust only what we understand and nothing else is real.
But as we learn, the more we know at some things we must guess:
disillusionment reversed, reaching into less and less.
A search for something different, but what difference does it make
in a Nutri-sweet and plastic world where everything is fake?
Still the imitations indicate that real things do exist,
and they might be there for finding if we only can resist
the current that pulls down around and kills beneath the fall
to go through instead of under, to where truth is all in all.
I guess maybe I'm just tired of all the fakeness. I'm with Charlie Brown: Christmas is way too commercial. And man, if he was worried about that in the '60's, what would he say now? See, I'm all in favor of gifts, but I'm worried that we're skipping the part about honoring and remembering Jesus' gift and just using it as an excuse to go whole-hog into the materialism that is probably the #1 besetting vice of American culture. I know he would want us to celebrate his birth, but I can't help asking: is this how he would want us to do it?
It's this materialistic tendency, I think, that can make all the best things about Christmas the things that we end up hating. Maybe that's why I like How the Grinch Stole Christmas (both versions) more than almost any of my friends do. I identify with the Grinch! I also think the modern version is really on to something with this idea of Christmas as a search for something. Unfortunately, they chose to express that insight through the song, "Where are you, Christmas?", a song that is almost tolerable when that cute little who sings it, but completely insufferable when sung by Faith Hill or whoever it was in the credits. In any case, that song (like so many other secular songs) is inches away from being a Jesus song. It has an excellent grasp of a real problem... but then it offers a worthless solution.
The solution offered by the song is, however, close: it suggests saving Christmas by having love and joy in our hearts. Great, now how do I do that, especially when I have to go to the mall filled with shoppers that generally tend to seem much more angry than loving and workers that seem far more depressed than joyful? That could just be because I'm such a last minute shopper... but still. The key thing is, there's no way I can just generate these good feelings. In the terms of my poem above, I can't entertain myself into forgetting my pain, and I can't intellectualize it away. I desperately need a third option, but I find it obscured by a lot of fakeness and annoying decorations.
I'm not trying to be a downer here. I think the state of Christmas in America is pretty sad, but there is one thing I like about it: it gets people searching. It's also the one time every year when the gospel message gets on national tv (thank God for Linus!). Hopefully, when people get tired of the cheap imitations, they'll realize that the mere proliferation of imitations means there must be something real somewhere. There is real love to be had, and real joy comes with it. That's why all I really want to do this Christmas is worship God and spend time with people I love. What if we focused on that instead of making a part-time job out of managing/purchasing/looking for Christmas? As I'm trying to shift my focus, I'm noticing that the real joy and peace that are supposed to be associated with Christmas spirit have come to me from the Father and his love! Have we ever thought that maybe the "Christmas Spirit" should be the Holy Spirit? I ask because the Spirit is the one who reveals the Father's love and the joy of being saved by Jesus to us, and we'll never find Christmas until we find Christ.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Literary Lists
As we near the end of the year, it seems like all kinds of organizations are busy giving out awards. I'm not sure why we as humans have such a compulsion to do this, but awards are everywhere. Most Valuable Player. Best Picture. Employee of the Month.
Ok, maybe not that last one so much (as Demetri Martin says, "Employee of the month is a great example of how someone can be a winner and a loser at the same time"), but we do love to give each other awards. Maybe we like it because it makes us feel safe or because if we praise another person's efforts, we feel justified in soaking in everyone's admiration when we do something praiseworthy. Maybe we're just an awful lot like Wemmicks.
Anyway, I'll leave any further commentary on why we do the whole award thing and its ramifications to the Wemmicks. If you don't know what those are, you'll be doing yourself a favor if you find out and read about them, trust me. For now, the thing that got me inspired to write this entry is a specific aspect of the awards process. A lot of awards, particularly in sports and entertainment, have finalists. Instead of voting between every single football player, for example, a group of finalists is selected to be voted on. These select few qualifiers are the cream of the crop from which the eventual award-winner is sure to be chosen.
But really, I'm not sure why we always have to narrow it all the way down to just one winner. I actually kind of like the idea of recognizing the top 3 or so entrants in a category as all being excellent. And besides, I don't have delusions of grandeur so bad that I think I have any authority to confer any big awards. I do, however, like sharing things I enjoy with others. Also, I wouldn't want to share only one thing in a category, when there are several I like. I think the idea of a top 3 is much nicer :)
So, today's category is: literature! Despite the fact that my house is nearly being overrun by them, I still really like books (and reading in general). As I sit in my room and look at the books I have while I type, I see several different categories emerging. I'll give you a top three books or authors in various genres for you to check out if you want, along with brief explanations for my choices. Also, feel free to tell me about your picks: just click on the comments link at the bottom of the post. And the categories are:
Books of the Bible:
(note: I realize this may be slightly heretical since all of Scripture is equally valid and inspired [see 2 Tim. 3:16]. However, I wanted to include the Bible in these lists and lumping any other books with it in a category is even more blasphemous! So, these are just the books of it that have meant the most to me in my journey so far, not that they are any better or worse than any others.)
1. Psalms-- I almost always feel that the prayers of David and the other psalmists are the cries of my own heart. I have taken more encouragement from this book than any other, by far. Plus, the poetry of it is beautiful, which is another plus since I love poetry. I could go on about this book forever, but I'll just say that you could do much worse than starting each day with a psalm. That's what I do.
2. Colossians-- As you may have noticed from my recent posts, I just keep coming back to this one. It's so simple, yet the challenges in it are more than we can master in a lifetime. I like how it takes all of Paul's theological prowess and just brings it right to the bottom line.
3. Matthew-- The story of Jesus' life is indispensable, because he is the model we are supposed to follow. Add to that the Sermon on the Mount, a great assortment of parables and miracles, and you've got yourself a book you can live by.
Nonfiction Authors:
1. C.S. Lewis-- Put simply, the man's prose style is unparallelled (in fiction or nonfiction). His thoughtful yet extremely readable expositions of doctrine and faith put him squarely at the top of my list. Even when I disagree with him, reading his words makes me glad to be associated with Christianity.
2. Dan Allender-- His books have been a huge help to me in navigating the messy and henceforth largely unknown world that is my emotions. He is quite insightful and able to cut through confusion to a strong central point.
3. Wayne Grudem-- Known mostly for his Systematic Theology, this guy is very definitely systematic. I don't know of a better teacher for doctrine and theology. Also, I probably identify with him so well because of his exhaustively analytical and logical style. Some have said that I am, in fact, a bit analytical myself. Maybe.
Fiction Series:
1. The Lord of the Rings trilogy, plus the Hobbit and Silmarillion (J.R.R. Tolkien)-- Anyone who knows me even a little should have seen this one coming a mile away. The breadth and depth of this story is amazing, and I think it holds some valuable spiritual lessons as well. Where it really succeeds, I think, is in creating a world with its own hidden lore that feels as if it really existed and could be explored further if you could just find some more books about it. I don't believe it can ever be matched.
2. The Sherlock Holmes mysteries (Arthur Conan Doyle)-- I've always loved mysteries, and there really aren't any better than these. Finely crafted, suspenseful, and funny as well, they are the perfect reading for a dark and stormy night.
3. The Time quartet (Madeleine L'Engle)-- I know, I know, you were probably expecting the Chronicles of Narnia in this spot. They are great, but there's seven of them and I only really love three, plus C.S. Lewis already made the finals on another list. So, how about A Wrinkle in Time and its companion stories about the wonderful Murry family? The strange fantasy world of these stories is truly fantastic, and I really like the mind-bending plots as well. And despite the fact that they get a bit mystical, there are some solid spiritual lessons to be found here as well. A dark horse favorite of mine, and really worth reading.
Poets:
1. Robert Frost-- My all-time favorite, and unmatched master of making rhymed poetry profound and haunting. He was truly a craftsman, and the way he blends form and content is inspiring to me as a poet. There will never be anything like his poetry as far as I can tell.
2. Mark Strand-- A more contemporary poet whose work I think will stand the test of time and one day rise above the rest of his generation to be included in the canon of great literature. He sees life from a different angle, and he shows it to us beautifully and with just the right amount of words.
3. John Donne-- Kind of an old-timer, but absolutely unrivaled in spiritual depth and density. I'm not sure anyone ever has or will work so much theology into poetry so successfully. His poems can be a bit of a puzzle, especially due to slightly antiquated language and convoluted syntax, but the knots are always worth untying.
Children's Authors:
1. Shel Silverstein-- I could have easily included him on the poets list as well, but his pictures and poems together are what really make him unique. They've been making me laugh for years. You have to watch out, though, because right in the midst of all the humor he sometimes says something so poignant and profound that you can go from laughing to crying before you know it if you aren't careful. Quite an achievement, if you ask me.
2. Dr. Seuss (aka Theodore Geisel)-- These books are just classics. They have a charm and offbeat humor to them that really sets them apart, both in the words and pictures. Also, I challenge anyone to read the last page of Fox in Socks correctly the first time through without laughing. I'm not sure it can be done, but I love it.
3. Donald Sobol-- Wait, who? Another guy whose creation's name (Encyclopedia Brown) became more famous than his own. Maybe it just happens to mystery writers a lot. Anyway, as I said, I love mysteries, and these were my favorite as a young kid. They don't always seem too baffling now, but at the time they were just the right kind of challenge, and I identified with the main character. I get nostalgic just thinking about these stories.
Children's Authors (Picture book subdivision):
(note: call me childish, but I still love kids' books, and I wanted to include some more. These coming ones, while they do have words, are most memorable for their amazing pictures.)
1. James Gurney-- Creator of the Dinotopia series, which is actually quite a memorable set of stories as well. However, I know for a fact I will always think first of the astonishing pictures of this island of dinosaurs whenever these books are mentioned. It is so beautiful that I won't even waste my time trying to describe it.
2. Graeme Base-- His fanciful and fun picture books with their poetic accompanying stories are some of the most lasting memories of my childhood. Beautiful artwork, funny writing, and a touch of mystery: a perfect combination.
3. Martin Handford-- Not so much an author, I suppose, as an illustrator, but I'm pretty sure his Where's Waldo books can claim more of my time than any other picture books. I spent countless hours searching for Waldo, the Wizard Whitebeard, Woof, and the various other characters, and I loved every minute. The drawings are still very cool (and hilarious) to me now.
And last, but not least,
Comic Strips:
1. Calvin and Hobbes (Bill Watterson)-- As I mentioned previously in the post announcing its arrival at the bottom of my blog, this is without question the finest comic strip ever created. It is so far and away above its competitors in my mind that this is one category I almost did just pick a winner in. By way of my promised further explanation, the main reasons I think this strip is so great are that it's extremely funny while also being very smart, while also remaining truly real (even though Hobbes' reality is purposefully never resolved). I love Calvin's immense vocabulary (for anyone, but especially for a six-year-old), and his immature take on the big questions of life, which are somehow still profound even in the midst of being hilarious. I can't even really explain how this was pulled off, I just know it was. The artwork is fantastic too, especially when any of Calvin's alter-egos (Spaceman Spiff, Tracer Bullet, Stupendous Man) enters the scene or when Calvin's imagination (think dinosaurs) is allowed to run wild. All told, the sheer quality of this comic makes reading today's pathetic comics page kind of depressing, but it's so worth it.
2. The Far Side (Gary Larson)-- This is one of the strangest and therefore funniest comics ever, to be sure. The one-panel design has its limitations, but they are actually used to their fullest capacity. It's bizarre and unexpected, but that makes it great. Also, it was really the first media of any sort that I know of to tap into the innate humor of the cow. Enough said.
3. Peanuts (Charles Schulz)-- It should really say something about the quality of this comic that it's still running long after its creator's death. I know it trailed off a bit at the end, but the early ones really were funny and endearing like few other comics have been. No list of comics would be complete without this strip. Its characters are iconic and its enjoyment timeless. Now enough of this listing... I want to go watch a Charlie Brown Christmas!
Ok, maybe not that last one so much (as Demetri Martin says, "Employee of the month is a great example of how someone can be a winner and a loser at the same time"), but we do love to give each other awards. Maybe we like it because it makes us feel safe or because if we praise another person's efforts, we feel justified in soaking in everyone's admiration when we do something praiseworthy. Maybe we're just an awful lot like Wemmicks.
Anyway, I'll leave any further commentary on why we do the whole award thing and its ramifications to the Wemmicks. If you don't know what those are, you'll be doing yourself a favor if you find out and read about them, trust me. For now, the thing that got me inspired to write this entry is a specific aspect of the awards process. A lot of awards, particularly in sports and entertainment, have finalists. Instead of voting between every single football player, for example, a group of finalists is selected to be voted on. These select few qualifiers are the cream of the crop from which the eventual award-winner is sure to be chosen.
But really, I'm not sure why we always have to narrow it all the way down to just one winner. I actually kind of like the idea of recognizing the top 3 or so entrants in a category as all being excellent. And besides, I don't have delusions of grandeur so bad that I think I have any authority to confer any big awards. I do, however, like sharing things I enjoy with others. Also, I wouldn't want to share only one thing in a category, when there are several I like. I think the idea of a top 3 is much nicer :)
So, today's category is: literature! Despite the fact that my house is nearly being overrun by them, I still really like books (and reading in general). As I sit in my room and look at the books I have while I type, I see several different categories emerging. I'll give you a top three books or authors in various genres for you to check out if you want, along with brief explanations for my choices. Also, feel free to tell me about your picks: just click on the comments link at the bottom of the post. And the categories are:
Books of the Bible:
(note: I realize this may be slightly heretical since all of Scripture is equally valid and inspired [see 2 Tim. 3:16]. However, I wanted to include the Bible in these lists and lumping any other books with it in a category is even more blasphemous! So, these are just the books of it that have meant the most to me in my journey so far, not that they are any better or worse than any others.)
1. Psalms-- I almost always feel that the prayers of David and the other psalmists are the cries of my own heart. I have taken more encouragement from this book than any other, by far. Plus, the poetry of it is beautiful, which is another plus since I love poetry. I could go on about this book forever, but I'll just say that you could do much worse than starting each day with a psalm. That's what I do.
2. Colossians-- As you may have noticed from my recent posts, I just keep coming back to this one. It's so simple, yet the challenges in it are more than we can master in a lifetime. I like how it takes all of Paul's theological prowess and just brings it right to the bottom line.
3. Matthew-- The story of Jesus' life is indispensable, because he is the model we are supposed to follow. Add to that the Sermon on the Mount, a great assortment of parables and miracles, and you've got yourself a book you can live by.
Nonfiction Authors:
1. C.S. Lewis-- Put simply, the man's prose style is unparallelled (in fiction or nonfiction). His thoughtful yet extremely readable expositions of doctrine and faith put him squarely at the top of my list. Even when I disagree with him, reading his words makes me glad to be associated with Christianity.
2. Dan Allender-- His books have been a huge help to me in navigating the messy and henceforth largely unknown world that is my emotions. He is quite insightful and able to cut through confusion to a strong central point.
3. Wayne Grudem-- Known mostly for his Systematic Theology, this guy is very definitely systematic. I don't know of a better teacher for doctrine and theology. Also, I probably identify with him so well because of his exhaustively analytical and logical style. Some have said that I am, in fact, a bit analytical myself. Maybe.
Fiction Series:
1. The Lord of the Rings trilogy, plus the Hobbit and Silmarillion (J.R.R. Tolkien)-- Anyone who knows me even a little should have seen this one coming a mile away. The breadth and depth of this story is amazing, and I think it holds some valuable spiritual lessons as well. Where it really succeeds, I think, is in creating a world with its own hidden lore that feels as if it really existed and could be explored further if you could just find some more books about it. I don't believe it can ever be matched.
2. The Sherlock Holmes mysteries (Arthur Conan Doyle)-- I've always loved mysteries, and there really aren't any better than these. Finely crafted, suspenseful, and funny as well, they are the perfect reading for a dark and stormy night.
3. The Time quartet (Madeleine L'Engle)-- I know, I know, you were probably expecting the Chronicles of Narnia in this spot. They are great, but there's seven of them and I only really love three, plus C.S. Lewis already made the finals on another list. So, how about A Wrinkle in Time and its companion stories about the wonderful Murry family? The strange fantasy world of these stories is truly fantastic, and I really like the mind-bending plots as well. And despite the fact that they get a bit mystical, there are some solid spiritual lessons to be found here as well. A dark horse favorite of mine, and really worth reading.
Poets:
1. Robert Frost-- My all-time favorite, and unmatched master of making rhymed poetry profound and haunting. He was truly a craftsman, and the way he blends form and content is inspiring to me as a poet. There will never be anything like his poetry as far as I can tell.
2. Mark Strand-- A more contemporary poet whose work I think will stand the test of time and one day rise above the rest of his generation to be included in the canon of great literature. He sees life from a different angle, and he shows it to us beautifully and with just the right amount of words.
3. John Donne-- Kind of an old-timer, but absolutely unrivaled in spiritual depth and density. I'm not sure anyone ever has or will work so much theology into poetry so successfully. His poems can be a bit of a puzzle, especially due to slightly antiquated language and convoluted syntax, but the knots are always worth untying.
Children's Authors:
1. Shel Silverstein-- I could have easily included him on the poets list as well, but his pictures and poems together are what really make him unique. They've been making me laugh for years. You have to watch out, though, because right in the midst of all the humor he sometimes says something so poignant and profound that you can go from laughing to crying before you know it if you aren't careful. Quite an achievement, if you ask me.
2. Dr. Seuss (aka Theodore Geisel)-- These books are just classics. They have a charm and offbeat humor to them that really sets them apart, both in the words and pictures. Also, I challenge anyone to read the last page of Fox in Socks correctly the first time through without laughing. I'm not sure it can be done, but I love it.
3. Donald Sobol-- Wait, who? Another guy whose creation's name (Encyclopedia Brown) became more famous than his own. Maybe it just happens to mystery writers a lot. Anyway, as I said, I love mysteries, and these were my favorite as a young kid. They don't always seem too baffling now, but at the time they were just the right kind of challenge, and I identified with the main character. I get nostalgic just thinking about these stories.
Children's Authors (Picture book subdivision):
(note: call me childish, but I still love kids' books, and I wanted to include some more. These coming ones, while they do have words, are most memorable for their amazing pictures.)
1. James Gurney-- Creator of the Dinotopia series, which is actually quite a memorable set of stories as well. However, I know for a fact I will always think first of the astonishing pictures of this island of dinosaurs whenever these books are mentioned. It is so beautiful that I won't even waste my time trying to describe it.
2. Graeme Base-- His fanciful and fun picture books with their poetic accompanying stories are some of the most lasting memories of my childhood. Beautiful artwork, funny writing, and a touch of mystery: a perfect combination.
3. Martin Handford-- Not so much an author, I suppose, as an illustrator, but I'm pretty sure his Where's Waldo books can claim more of my time than any other picture books. I spent countless hours searching for Waldo, the Wizard Whitebeard, Woof, and the various other characters, and I loved every minute. The drawings are still very cool (and hilarious) to me now.
And last, but not least,
Comic Strips:
1. Calvin and Hobbes (Bill Watterson)-- As I mentioned previously in the post announcing its arrival at the bottom of my blog, this is without question the finest comic strip ever created. It is so far and away above its competitors in my mind that this is one category I almost did just pick a winner in. By way of my promised further explanation, the main reasons I think this strip is so great are that it's extremely funny while also being very smart, while also remaining truly real (even though Hobbes' reality is purposefully never resolved). I love Calvin's immense vocabulary (for anyone, but especially for a six-year-old), and his immature take on the big questions of life, which are somehow still profound even in the midst of being hilarious. I can't even really explain how this was pulled off, I just know it was. The artwork is fantastic too, especially when any of Calvin's alter-egos (Spaceman Spiff, Tracer Bullet, Stupendous Man) enters the scene or when Calvin's imagination (think dinosaurs) is allowed to run wild. All told, the sheer quality of this comic makes reading today's pathetic comics page kind of depressing, but it's so worth it.
2. The Far Side (Gary Larson)-- This is one of the strangest and therefore funniest comics ever, to be sure. The one-panel design has its limitations, but they are actually used to their fullest capacity. It's bizarre and unexpected, but that makes it great. Also, it was really the first media of any sort that I know of to tap into the innate humor of the cow. Enough said.
3. Peanuts (Charles Schulz)-- It should really say something about the quality of this comic that it's still running long after its creator's death. I know it trailed off a bit at the end, but the early ones really were funny and endearing like few other comics have been. No list of comics would be complete without this strip. Its characters are iconic and its enjoyment timeless. Now enough of this listing... I want to go watch a Charlie Brown Christmas!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Inside Out
I'll start today's entry with a poem. It's the most recent one I've written, not old stuff like what I've posted so far. In fact, no one has ever read this poem before whichever one of you gets here first! It's the first one of its kind, a streetlights premiere. Here it is:
Inside Out
isolation underneath impressive
unknown against accomplishment
doing always more being less
hiding in the center of circles
victories full of sound alone
another world in control
politeness over perversion
impeccable outside filthy
confusion masquerading completion
pride intertwining pain
admiration in place
of love impossible
because artificial
because unknown
Don’t let me miss you.
So, this is a highly personal poem, but I share it because I think that it doesn't apply only to me. There are some lessons in it that I'd love to spare anyone else the pain of having to learn the way I did. I guess it's specifically about my ongoing journey of figuring out who I am and learning to actually be that person. I'll give a little bit of my own backstory as well as some insight into my strange poetic method in order to hopefully explain this little poem.
In terms of poetic style, this one is really kind of a personal anomaly. As most of you already know, I'm a big fan of complete sentences and good grammar, sometimes to the point of being a bit anal about it. So here we have this poem that completely resists both punctuation and normal syntax until its very last line. Guess which line of the poem I wrote first and which one is the most important to understanding the whole poem...
I made all those unusual (for me) stylistic choices for a reason though. The best way I can describe what I'm going for in this poem requires a visual aid. Unfortunately, this is the internet, so you'll have to make your own since I can't really show you. Don't worry though, it's very simple and I'll walk you through it. Ok, so to see what this poem is like, you need a sock. Any kind of sock, it doesn't matter, but it does need to be one you aren't currently wearing. I'll wait while you go get one.
...
Ready? Alright, hold the sock in front of you, so you can look straight down into the hole. That top circle of the sock is like the last line of my poem. So, grab the sock by that with one hand, and with the other push the rest of the sock up from underneath so it ends up inside out (get it?) and upside down. Notice, that hole is still in the same place, but now you can see a lot more of what used to be inside it. It's also much less pretty than the outside of the sock, and more disorderly. All that crazy fuzzy stuff you can now see, along with any accompanying dirt, sand, toenail fragments, etc., represents the rest of my poem. Wasn't that fun?
Anyway, the idea I'm going for is that in a good poem, each line that actually appears (e.g. Don't let me miss you) should have all kinds of stored up meaning underneath the surface. This poem takes that one particular cry of my heart and turns it inside out so you can see the mesh and mess that it actually consists of. I've written other poems sort of like this before, now that I think about it, with endings that encourage reinterpretation of the whole rest of the poem in their light. Maybe I can start a new genre! "Sock poems"...
On the more serious side, though, I think the underlying issue of this poem is one that everyone can identify with. All of us want so badly to be loved, and we will really do just about anything to make that happen. The problem is, who we are is not what we do. I've spent (read: wasted) so much time in my life trying to conform my image to what I thought people wanted me to be. I specifically remember in middle school looking at the "cool kids" who picked on me and my friends and analyzing what made them cool. "Oh, so cool kids wear this and act like this... I can do that!" And you know what the scary and really sad thing is? To a pretty great extent, I did.
Now, I had determined beforehand that I would use the coolness I would obtain to be nice to people those other kids would be mean to. I did end up being able to do that in some ways, but I also became in other ways just as judgmental as those people I hated. I knew all along that I was worth more than they were giving me credit for, but unfortunately I solved that problem by trying to attain what was valuable in their eyes, not by realizing their standard was twisted. So while I did eventually largely escape their judgment, I did so by buying into their bankrupt standards of coolness.
To make a long story very short, the result of my quest to remake my image was, on the surface, successful. People started to think I was cool, girls started to pay attention to me, and I was loving it. I used my sense of humor to make myself the center of attention and used my accomplishments and skills in an attempt to force people to respect me. Below the surface, though, something very different was going on. I was in the process of actively forgetting who I was.
I started getting more and more stressed out, and that led into deeper problems like depression. See, constantly managing what everyone is thinking about you is a heck of a lot of work, and it was burning me out while I was unaware. I was thinking about every single action and decision based on what it would do to the image I was portraying to everyone. In the process, I was losing touch with what I actually wanted. I became all the ugly things in my poem while looking like I was all their exact opposites. Worst of all, I wanted love, but all I got was admiration. But how could anyone have actually loved me? They didn't know who I really was! Many admired my fake front or thought it was cool and had things together, but who was underneath? I was largely unaware myself, so how could they know?
Thankfully, God still knew what was underneath. He let me get to the desperate end of my remaking of myself in my own image, and then he came at that front with a sledgehammer. He used people that knew me before my front and some that he just supernaturally told about my issues to challenge me about who I really was. I felt like huge chunks of me were falling off as what was inside was painfully brought out. He showed me through a series of very painful circumstances how broken I was (am) and gave me no other choice but to admit it.
Then the strangest things started to happen. I had thought that God (and everyone else) would reject me if they saw the brokenness I was hiding. But as I became more honest about who I was and began to take off my many masks, I felt God's love more and more. And, people started being able to actually care for me, and for some reason, they wanted to do so! There's really no other word for it but grace.
Here's the thing: if God created us, then it stands to reason that only he knows what we are really made for. Only the maker would. So I think the only way we can ever hope to love anyone else or be loved ourselves is to know God. If we know him, he can tell us who we actually are and give us strength to walk in it. This enables us to love others and be truly loved for who we are in return. It's change from the inside out.
For me, I tried to change my outside to find love, and all it brought was destruction inside. Don't waste your time with that! Jesus wants to move on the inside and let the change flow out in "streams of living water" (John 7:38). Recently a friend of mine reminded me of the prayer of St. Francis. This prayer talks about that kind of inside out change and reminds me a great deal of the streetlights' call, so I'll finish with it (slightly amended with a prayer of my own that should be quite obvious):
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
God, O God, don't let me miss you.
Amen.
Inside Out
isolation underneath impressive
unknown against accomplishment
doing always more being less
hiding in the center of circles
victories full of sound alone
another world in control
politeness over perversion
impeccable outside filthy
confusion masquerading completion
pride intertwining pain
admiration in place
of love impossible
because artificial
because unknown
Don’t let me miss you.
So, this is a highly personal poem, but I share it because I think that it doesn't apply only to me. There are some lessons in it that I'd love to spare anyone else the pain of having to learn the way I did. I guess it's specifically about my ongoing journey of figuring out who I am and learning to actually be that person. I'll give a little bit of my own backstory as well as some insight into my strange poetic method in order to hopefully explain this little poem.
In terms of poetic style, this one is really kind of a personal anomaly. As most of you already know, I'm a big fan of complete sentences and good grammar, sometimes to the point of being a bit anal about it. So here we have this poem that completely resists both punctuation and normal syntax until its very last line. Guess which line of the poem I wrote first and which one is the most important to understanding the whole poem...
I made all those unusual (for me) stylistic choices for a reason though. The best way I can describe what I'm going for in this poem requires a visual aid. Unfortunately, this is the internet, so you'll have to make your own since I can't really show you. Don't worry though, it's very simple and I'll walk you through it. Ok, so to see what this poem is like, you need a sock. Any kind of sock, it doesn't matter, but it does need to be one you aren't currently wearing. I'll wait while you go get one.
...
Ready? Alright, hold the sock in front of you, so you can look straight down into the hole. That top circle of the sock is like the last line of my poem. So, grab the sock by that with one hand, and with the other push the rest of the sock up from underneath so it ends up inside out (get it?) and upside down. Notice, that hole is still in the same place, but now you can see a lot more of what used to be inside it. It's also much less pretty than the outside of the sock, and more disorderly. All that crazy fuzzy stuff you can now see, along with any accompanying dirt, sand, toenail fragments, etc., represents the rest of my poem. Wasn't that fun?
Anyway, the idea I'm going for is that in a good poem, each line that actually appears (e.g. Don't let me miss you) should have all kinds of stored up meaning underneath the surface. This poem takes that one particular cry of my heart and turns it inside out so you can see the mesh and mess that it actually consists of. I've written other poems sort of like this before, now that I think about it, with endings that encourage reinterpretation of the whole rest of the poem in their light. Maybe I can start a new genre! "Sock poems"...
On the more serious side, though, I think the underlying issue of this poem is one that everyone can identify with. All of us want so badly to be loved, and we will really do just about anything to make that happen. The problem is, who we are is not what we do. I've spent (read: wasted) so much time in my life trying to conform my image to what I thought people wanted me to be. I specifically remember in middle school looking at the "cool kids" who picked on me and my friends and analyzing what made them cool. "Oh, so cool kids wear this and act like this... I can do that!" And you know what the scary and really sad thing is? To a pretty great extent, I did.
Now, I had determined beforehand that I would use the coolness I would obtain to be nice to people those other kids would be mean to. I did end up being able to do that in some ways, but I also became in other ways just as judgmental as those people I hated. I knew all along that I was worth more than they were giving me credit for, but unfortunately I solved that problem by trying to attain what was valuable in their eyes, not by realizing their standard was twisted. So while I did eventually largely escape their judgment, I did so by buying into their bankrupt standards of coolness.
To make a long story very short, the result of my quest to remake my image was, on the surface, successful. People started to think I was cool, girls started to pay attention to me, and I was loving it. I used my sense of humor to make myself the center of attention and used my accomplishments and skills in an attempt to force people to respect me. Below the surface, though, something very different was going on. I was in the process of actively forgetting who I was.
I started getting more and more stressed out, and that led into deeper problems like depression. See, constantly managing what everyone is thinking about you is a heck of a lot of work, and it was burning me out while I was unaware. I was thinking about every single action and decision based on what it would do to the image I was portraying to everyone. In the process, I was losing touch with what I actually wanted. I became all the ugly things in my poem while looking like I was all their exact opposites. Worst of all, I wanted love, but all I got was admiration. But how could anyone have actually loved me? They didn't know who I really was! Many admired my fake front or thought it was cool and had things together, but who was underneath? I was largely unaware myself, so how could they know?
Thankfully, God still knew what was underneath. He let me get to the desperate end of my remaking of myself in my own image, and then he came at that front with a sledgehammer. He used people that knew me before my front and some that he just supernaturally told about my issues to challenge me about who I really was. I felt like huge chunks of me were falling off as what was inside was painfully brought out. He showed me through a series of very painful circumstances how broken I was (am) and gave me no other choice but to admit it.
Then the strangest things started to happen. I had thought that God (and everyone else) would reject me if they saw the brokenness I was hiding. But as I became more honest about who I was and began to take off my many masks, I felt God's love more and more. And, people started being able to actually care for me, and for some reason, they wanted to do so! There's really no other word for it but grace.
Here's the thing: if God created us, then it stands to reason that only he knows what we are really made for. Only the maker would. So I think the only way we can ever hope to love anyone else or be loved ourselves is to know God. If we know him, he can tell us who we actually are and give us strength to walk in it. This enables us to love others and be truly loved for who we are in return. It's change from the inside out.
For me, I tried to change my outside to find love, and all it brought was destruction inside. Don't waste your time with that! Jesus wants to move on the inside and let the change flow out in "streams of living water" (John 7:38). Recently a friend of mine reminded me of the prayer of St. Francis. This prayer talks about that kind of inside out change and reminds me a great deal of the streetlights' call, so I'll finish with it (slightly amended with a prayer of my own that should be quite obvious):
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.
God, O God, don't let me miss you.
Amen.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Qualifications
Recently, the process of trying to find a job has gotten me thinking about what qualifications I actually have as I've attempted to list them in my resumé. I've realized that there are some real, concrete things about me that qualify me to do certain jobs and not others. When it comes to doing God's work, though, I often feel so unqualified. I can't really understand why it is that God would want to have me even attempt to serve him, given my great propensity for messing things up. Too often, the person doing ministry one minute is off ignoring God's voice in some sinful pattern the next and then thinking "surely if the people in charge/people that I minister to knew how I really am, they wouldn't let me serve them... surely there's someone more qualified." If I can't even hold my own life together, how am I supposed to make an impact on my city? my church? my family?
I guess you could call that kind of feeling desperation.
Here's what I mean: in order for my life to avoid crumbling into chaos, despair and failure, I am constantly in need of God's miraculous intervention. He has to hold it together, not me, because I can't. That may sound like kind of a downer, but the funny thing about it, I'm coming to see, is that this is exactly how God wants us to feel. I think he's constantly leading us to a place of desperation for him, whether we like it or not. And just so you know I'm not making this up, check out the book of 2 Corinthians: the whole thing is about this! Paul is trying to give us this doctrine of desperation throughout this whole letter. Some highlights:
1:8-9--"We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead."
I find it very comforting that the greatest missionary in history despaired of life at some points along the way. Even he needed to learn not to rely on himself. Now, I'm not saying that the hardships of my life are comparable to Paul's, but this is still so cool: God uses our hardships to free us from the burden we put on ourselves of having to make everything work out all the time. That's his job, and he can handle it. He does, after all, raise the dead.
3:4-6--"Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant."
Simply put, God qualifies us to do his work. Not anything about us or our quantifiable job skills or gifts. God is not about resumés. The only reason we get to do his ministry is because he says so. This also frees us from having to worry what people think about it. God said it, so we do it, whether we feel qualified for it or not. Another point about that: we have no business questioning God's call on us. We might not understand why he has chosen us, but it's really none of our business. We don't earn it. I can't say that enough times.
4:7--"But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us."
A crucial point: being desperate for God relieves us of any glory that might come as we follow him. What we do is only a result of his power, and we are just broken, dirty vessels. It's a good thing we don't have to carry the glory, because we can't handle it. It goes straight to our heads and we forget our place all too easily. Our overwhelming imperfections, though, make it obvious that God is the only one who accomplishes anything. As Isaiah said, "all that we have accomplished you have done for us" (Isaiah 26:12).
12:9--"But he [God] said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness"
These words of God to Paul really sum up the whole thing: God uses our brokenness to highlight his power. Therefore, we actually get stronger by making ourselves weaker and relying on God's power. As Paul is forced to conclude, "when I am weak, then I am strong." (12:10).
The challenge, then, is learning to rest in the knowledge that we aren't perfect and never will be in this life. We can choose to be depressed about this, or we can choose to minimize ourselves and rely on God to give us good and perfect gifts and to be strong through us. This strength is the kind we need to change a broken city, not whatever pitiful power we can muster up on our own. He qualifies us to do it, and who can argue with God? I don't know why he would choose me out of the many options, I just know he did. I'll finish with a poem I wrote about that and about learning to rest at God's feet despite everything else, being weak but relying on his strength. So enjoy, and also check out the "poem of the day" from the Library of Congress newly added over on the right--I told you more poetry was coming! I also know it's risky putting my poems in such close proximity to those of the masters: please don't compare the two, just enjoy each one for what it's worth. Here's mine:
One Among Many
Under a tolling fog,
in the speckled mist,
answer the question soaking you
gently as you are unaware
who is calling—
Dampening wind
reaching around umbrellas, under hoods
slanted in momentary hesitation
pointing in one direction,
soon forsaking stillness—
Listen through the footsteps,
over the engines; wait
alone in the reverberation
of small voices fading
for the one who asks—
Hear what you can,
see only what you cannot,
and there on the hill
inside the fog
rest.
I guess you could call that kind of feeling desperation.
Here's what I mean: in order for my life to avoid crumbling into chaos, despair and failure, I am constantly in need of God's miraculous intervention. He has to hold it together, not me, because I can't. That may sound like kind of a downer, but the funny thing about it, I'm coming to see, is that this is exactly how God wants us to feel. I think he's constantly leading us to a place of desperation for him, whether we like it or not. And just so you know I'm not making this up, check out the book of 2 Corinthians: the whole thing is about this! Paul is trying to give us this doctrine of desperation throughout this whole letter. Some highlights:
1:8-9--"We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead."
I find it very comforting that the greatest missionary in history despaired of life at some points along the way. Even he needed to learn not to rely on himself. Now, I'm not saying that the hardships of my life are comparable to Paul's, but this is still so cool: God uses our hardships to free us from the burden we put on ourselves of having to make everything work out all the time. That's his job, and he can handle it. He does, after all, raise the dead.
3:4-6--"Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant."
Simply put, God qualifies us to do his work. Not anything about us or our quantifiable job skills or gifts. God is not about resumés. The only reason we get to do his ministry is because he says so. This also frees us from having to worry what people think about it. God said it, so we do it, whether we feel qualified for it or not. Another point about that: we have no business questioning God's call on us. We might not understand why he has chosen us, but it's really none of our business. We don't earn it. I can't say that enough times.
4:7--"But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us."
A crucial point: being desperate for God relieves us of any glory that might come as we follow him. What we do is only a result of his power, and we are just broken, dirty vessels. It's a good thing we don't have to carry the glory, because we can't handle it. It goes straight to our heads and we forget our place all too easily. Our overwhelming imperfections, though, make it obvious that God is the only one who accomplishes anything. As Isaiah said, "all that we have accomplished you have done for us" (Isaiah 26:12).
12:9--"But he [God] said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness"
These words of God to Paul really sum up the whole thing: God uses our brokenness to highlight his power. Therefore, we actually get stronger by making ourselves weaker and relying on God's power. As Paul is forced to conclude, "when I am weak, then I am strong." (12:10).
The challenge, then, is learning to rest in the knowledge that we aren't perfect and never will be in this life. We can choose to be depressed about this, or we can choose to minimize ourselves and rely on God to give us good and perfect gifts and to be strong through us. This strength is the kind we need to change a broken city, not whatever pitiful power we can muster up on our own. He qualifies us to do it, and who can argue with God? I don't know why he would choose me out of the many options, I just know he did. I'll finish with a poem I wrote about that and about learning to rest at God's feet despite everything else, being weak but relying on his strength. So enjoy, and also check out the "poem of the day" from the Library of Congress newly added over on the right--I told you more poetry was coming! I also know it's risky putting my poems in such close proximity to those of the masters: please don't compare the two, just enjoy each one for what it's worth. Here's mine:
One Among Many
Under a tolling fog,
in the speckled mist,
answer the question soaking you
gently as you are unaware
who is calling—
Dampening wind
reaching around umbrellas, under hoods
slanted in momentary hesitation
pointing in one direction,
soon forsaking stillness—
Listen through the footsteps,
over the engines; wait
alone in the reverberation
of small voices fading
for the one who asks—
Hear what you can,
see only what you cannot,
and there on the hill
inside the fog
rest.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
A prayer for the orphans
As some of you may already know, one of my biggest interests in life is poetry, both reading and writing. My ongoing side project for the past couple of years has been working on an initial manuscript for a book of my poems, which I hope will someday be good enough to be published. Poetry is really one of the best ways that I'm able to express the deep things that get stirred around inside me from time to time, and just as with my more prosaic thoughts, I imagine that a lot of times people will be able to identify with them. So, every now and then when one of my poems seems appropriate to a subject that I want to talk about, I'll post it here.
By the way, I'm always open to comments and suggestions on my poetry (and my other postings too!). Just click on where it says comments below the post and tell me what you think. Fellow poets, feel free to use that forum to suggest possible edits as well, or to post your own poems if they relate to the subject. Just be nice :)
What follows is the first of my poem blogs (plogs?), which is a poem that I actually wrote a long time ago (a few of you may have already seen it) but seems more applicable than ever right now. Enjoy:
Redefinition
You are valuable in a way
that he never said
and your every smile stands
in cut glass defiance against
all the cries, not admissions
of anything or flags in the wind
but repairs that bring strength
in the gaps between
all you deserve diverging
from him to create
room for the incandescent
gift of heat instead
burning your new word
across the silent fields together
so you never are defined again
by what you never had.
Just so you know, that huge break means the poem is over. Anyway, recently at my church (check out http://www.vineyardcleveland.com/ for more info and to actually hear the sermons I'm just about to talk about) my pastor has been talking about something he calls the "orphan heart." People that have this heart live with feelings of abandonment and inadequacy because, in some area or another, they never received the love they needed to grow. Usually, it seems to me that this comes from being mistreated or neglected by a father, although I'm sure mothers and other influential figures can have the same effect. And because none of our parents are perfect, it really seems like all of us deal with this orphaned feeling in some way or another.
So, this poem is for the orphans. It's a fragile group of people, but one in which I have no choice but to include myself as well. And I guarantee you that Cleveland is full of them. The challenge for us, as streetlights, is to bring the Father's love to these people. A challenge, because a lot of them will run from us. A challenge, because our own brokenness wants to make us hide from them. And a challenge, more than anything else, because a lot of us are just too busy to notice how amazing God is and tap into his heart of love for us and for those we find ourselves in contact with.
That, though, is also the reason we have hope. If we pay attention, God's love is so big that it makes obstacles pale in comparison. He wants to redefine us, so that we can pass that gift along to others. We ARE his. We ARE loved. We ARE important. Who wouldn't want someone to tell them that?
So, I'm attempting to let God redefine me in this transitional season. That's the only way I'll have something to give to my city. But what I'll have... it'll be exactly what they need.
By the way, I'm always open to comments and suggestions on my poetry (and my other postings too!). Just click on where it says comments below the post and tell me what you think. Fellow poets, feel free to use that forum to suggest possible edits as well, or to post your own poems if they relate to the subject. Just be nice :)
What follows is the first of my poem blogs (plogs?), which is a poem that I actually wrote a long time ago (a few of you may have already seen it) but seems more applicable than ever right now. Enjoy:
Redefinition
You are valuable in a way
that he never said
and your every smile stands
in cut glass defiance against
all the cries, not admissions
of anything or flags in the wind
but repairs that bring strength
in the gaps between
all you deserve diverging
from him to create
room for the incandescent
gift of heat instead
burning your new word
across the silent fields together
so you never are defined again
by what you never had.
Just so you know, that huge break means the poem is over. Anyway, recently at my church (check out http://www.vineyardcleveland.com/ for more info and to actually hear the sermons I'm just about to talk about) my pastor has been talking about something he calls the "orphan heart." People that have this heart live with feelings of abandonment and inadequacy because, in some area or another, they never received the love they needed to grow. Usually, it seems to me that this comes from being mistreated or neglected by a father, although I'm sure mothers and other influential figures can have the same effect. And because none of our parents are perfect, it really seems like all of us deal with this orphaned feeling in some way or another.
So, this poem is for the orphans. It's a fragile group of people, but one in which I have no choice but to include myself as well. And I guarantee you that Cleveland is full of them. The challenge for us, as streetlights, is to bring the Father's love to these people. A challenge, because a lot of them will run from us. A challenge, because our own brokenness wants to make us hide from them. And a challenge, more than anything else, because a lot of us are just too busy to notice how amazing God is and tap into his heart of love for us and for those we find ourselves in contact with.
That, though, is also the reason we have hope. If we pay attention, God's love is so big that it makes obstacles pale in comparison. He wants to redefine us, so that we can pass that gift along to others. We ARE his. We ARE loved. We ARE important. Who wouldn't want someone to tell them that?
So, I'm attempting to let God redefine me in this transitional season. That's the only way I'll have something to give to my city. But what I'll have... it'll be exactly what they need.
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