There is nothing else to voice here.
There is no Breath with which to.
The stages gone through along this way have been, each of them, chronologically very lengthy.
There is no sense the current plane would not follow the same pattern.
Part of what Jesus did was parry and block.
Then it was time for His hands to come down.
And they did.
"There is a time to live and a time to die...a time to kill and a time to heal...a time to break down and a time to build up...a time to mourn and a time to dance...a time to rend and a time to sew"
A time to publish and advance, and a time to relent.
I have no idea if there will be a time to speak again.
It's not now, and honestly I couldn't care less if there ever is.
If there is, it would be in a different place.
Another place was set up a while back, when resurrection seemed more.
It was set up fully public, not private or requiring permission. Yet it's realized some would not wish to view, and so the name isn't put here openly. It would be easily findable and accessible for any wishing to find it.
If it remains largely void, so be it. If something were to genesis, so be it.
The duration of stages is so unbelievably lethargic.
There are no promises besides.
Jesus had a new body upon resurrection. If resurrection were possible, so would I.
Goodbye.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Friday, January 18, 2008
death and burial
Have you ever watched someone die?
Not on television, not an instant death, but rather a death that occurred over time?
Do you remember what took place?
Do you remember the person slowly changing? Do you remember as the death took its grip, its toll, the withering which ate away at the person you had known?
As it got closer to the end, they just weren't themselves were they? The them you had always known, their personality, their goodness, their person--just wasn't the same, was it?
As death consumed, they became a shell of who they had been.
Remember the them who made you smile? Remember the them who was full of good things? Remember the them who gave you hope? the them who helped you? the them who loved you? the them who had life and light inside?
That wasn't them toward the end, was it?
Instead, toward the end, they mostly just lie there.
Instead of their normal personality, they were mostly motionlessness. Sometimes in silence. Sometimes with their mouth gaped open, their breath awkward and irregular as a look either of blankness or pain permeated their person.
They were beyond giving to you as they had once given, weren't they? Near the throes of death they were visibly unresponsive to your words, your love, your care.
It reached a point when you squeezed their hand they didn't squeeze back.
They couldn't squeeze back. In their heart and spirit they wished to. They did feel your squeeze, but death was so close and had them so weakened they couldn't do what their heart and spirit wished to do.
It reached a point where they tangibly gave nothing in return. There was no response to your voice, no response to your love, no response to your touches.
I long talked here about being in a season of winter in life. A season of bleakness. A season where there was no fruit.
At some point it was realized that it was not simply a season of winter going on, but rather a death taking place.
It is taking place no more.
This past June, and beyond, I pleaded Father to please end it. To end the death. To consummate it quickly, if it were possible.
He heard me.
He heard me, not because it was quick (in how we think of quick), but because I'm not dying anymore. The death is over.
What you have been reading since November here is someone who has passed from dying to burial. I have tasted firsthand what burial is.
Whatever I may have thought before now was burial, or being in a grave...no way. Not even. There was no way to even begin to fathom.
I know the death is over because I no longer have a spirit. Throughout my whole life, regardless of the expansion or deflation of my soul, I always had a spirit. There is no spirit now. And what you have read here in the past two months is someone who has no spirit. Someone who is buried. Not dying.
I can tell you firsthand, burial is unlike anything humanly imaginable. To be cognizantly aware of existence but without a spirit is...there's just no way to begin to describe.
As for the soul in burial? It's locked into one position, and one position only. I'll try to illustrate.
Every spring, American pro baseball players begin their season either in Florida or Arizona in what is called Spring Training. It's a precursor to the regular season, where they play exhibition games against other teams.
At a spring training game in 1997, a player named Robin Ventura was coming in to home plate during a game to try and score. It had rained either the previous night or that morning, causing what was normally dirt on the infield and around home plate to instead be muddy.
As Robin came in to score, he slid into home to avoid being tagged out. The cleats on his shoe caught firmly in the mud while the inertia and momentum of his running and body weight carried the rest of him forward.
His foot stuck in the mud? It turned sideways and backwards. Completely backwards, to where his toes were facing his chest. His foot and leg were in a V-shape, to where the outside of his foot was essentially touching his lower shin. His heel was pointed where his toes normally would be pointed.
But Robin's foot did not simply turn sideways and backwards for an instant and then turn back to regular position. His foot, rather, remained locked in the V position where his toes were facing...his face.
And that, friend, is the best I can do to describe the condition of the soul in burial. It is locked in one position--a position of gruesome, horrifying and searing grotesqueness, just as Robin Ventura's foot was locked in utter grotesqueness that spring day in 1997.
There's something else about burial. In burial there is, absolutely, no hope.
None. It is just simply, completely, dark.
There is no sun, and the darkness is so thorough that it causes incredible doubt that a sun even exists.
All the things people try to say ("Things will get better", "God is able...", "God can...", etc)? Flatline.
It doesn't matter how much you know God, how much you've walked with Him, how intimately you have heard and been led by the Holy Spirit, how much you've tasted Him or His power or the Life He can give. Those things have no pulse in burial.
Burial is absolute, utter separation: from life, Life and God.
None of the tangible tastings with Him, none of His goodness, none of His attributes, none of His promises, none of the past things He has intimately and personally said specifically, none of His anything, none of His nothing, none of it carries any weight in burial.
The verses and so forth in the bible do not cause any type of ebb or spark whatsoever in burial. This is because what's in the bible speaks to man's spirit. When you have given up your spirit, when your spirit is dead, those things do not cause any kind of blip.
It is so void and destitute that anything you have ever known about the idea of resurrection, honestly, in the mind and soul is indigestable to grasp. No matter how strong or solid your faith, burial vacuums any tastings of God. If you find yourself reading this finding that impossible to believe, I won't banter with you. All I can convey is the vivid, detailed descriptiveness of what it is here.
I have seen through this there is only one place God is not and cannot be. It is in burial.
It's scary. Scary because I'd never tasted this before. Not even remotely come close to imagining it. Any past imaginings, voicings or notions of being dead or in a grave? Ptthhht. Not even...And for someone who has seen a lot and isn't given to be surprised or scared, to say that it is scary is titanic.
For most of the past three years I have thought that the scale of pain in life went from 1 to 5, and I was continuously at 4 or 5 (with a couple of exceptions). In burial the pain scale goes to 8 billion, and there is no fluctuation. Your soul stays pegged at the top. Continuously.
The worst of this is I've never known what it is to exist without a spirit. Even in my most rebellious days against God I still had a spirit. There was still in my deepest core, despite what I was doing or living, a sense of Him.
There is no sense of Him in burial.
That's not an atheistic statement. It's not saying He isn't. It is simply the matter that He is in no form, in no way here. In burial not only are you beyond your own rope, there is likewise none of God's rope. Neither is any of His rope anywhere to be seen, not even within sight. And that is what scared me. For the first time ever...ever...not even a glimmer of the faintest kind whatsoever. Utter void and absence.
God is, but He is not in burial. (because He, Father, cannot be buried). Jesus was buried, but not God the Father.
Burial is being cognitively aware of some type of existence. But it is not life. It is not human existence, because it occurs without a spirit, without a heart, and with the soul locked.
The hollowness, the void. It's never been this. And so, yeah, the things which has been posted here? It took a bit to realize it, but I finally did realize that this was no longer dying. The death pleaded for was done. This was something else.
I can't bring myself to talk about what happened at the very end. What consummated the death.
I just can't.
All I can say is that I was in a winter, then dying, but not anymore.
And so realize something from having read these postings over time and from noticing the change. The turn. The degradation. The nosedive. The slipping. The cynicism. The pessimism. The deterioration.
You have witnessed a death. And just as those who become something other than themselves as death overtakes, so you have seen that here. The "that's not like him", the "what is this", the "oh my", the "I thought he was", the ugliness, the bitterness, the lack of response, the flinches to pain, the seizures, the darkness?
You have seen a death as it took place. And you have also seen glimpses of the utter blackness and hopelessness of burial.
And so I leave you with a picture. Just as the baseball story illustrates the condition of the soul in burial, so this picture partially illustrates what death and burial have been like. One's entire person charred and mangled beyond recognition, then turned inside out and exposed.
It's not pretty. It's gruesome, as life and Life have literally been sucked out, and all that remains near the end is an unresponsive, ugly shell.
During the season of death one said to me, "You will never be able to say that you were abandoned in this place. If you expect me to stand outside, I'll stand outside and wait. I have all the time and patience in the world and it will be well worth seeing you rise out of this death and emerge truly alive from this grave. You see, the women got to see the resurrected Christ first because they didn't run away as he was dying. They stayed through the blood and the beatings while everyone else ran away to hide. They didn't flee and neither shall I." And "I will be here until you are out of this hell. I love you and you have a friend for life...whether you want one or not."
They left.
The bible says Jesus' death was so thorough, so gruesome it made his form beyond recognition. That he couldn't be recognized as a human being.
I know now.
What it is for beating and death to disfigure.
In death I likewise became unrecognizable from who I once was. In more ways than one.
Not on television, not an instant death, but rather a death that occurred over time?
Do you remember what took place?
Do you remember the person slowly changing? Do you remember as the death took its grip, its toll, the withering which ate away at the person you had known?
As it got closer to the end, they just weren't themselves were they? The them you had always known, their personality, their goodness, their person--just wasn't the same, was it?
As death consumed, they became a shell of who they had been.
Remember the them who made you smile? Remember the them who was full of good things? Remember the them who gave you hope? the them who helped you? the them who loved you? the them who had life and light inside?
That wasn't them toward the end, was it?
Instead, toward the end, they mostly just lie there.
Instead of their normal personality, they were mostly motionlessness. Sometimes in silence. Sometimes with their mouth gaped open, their breath awkward and irregular as a look either of blankness or pain permeated their person.
They were beyond giving to you as they had once given, weren't they? Near the throes of death they were visibly unresponsive to your words, your love, your care.
It reached a point when you squeezed their hand they didn't squeeze back.
They couldn't squeeze back. In their heart and spirit they wished to. They did feel your squeeze, but death was so close and had them so weakened they couldn't do what their heart and spirit wished to do.
It reached a point where they tangibly gave nothing in return. There was no response to your voice, no response to your love, no response to your touches.
I long talked here about being in a season of winter in life. A season of bleakness. A season where there was no fruit.
At some point it was realized that it was not simply a season of winter going on, but rather a death taking place.
It is taking place no more.
This past June, and beyond, I pleaded Father to please end it. To end the death. To consummate it quickly, if it were possible.
He heard me.
He heard me, not because it was quick (in how we think of quick), but because I'm not dying anymore. The death is over.
What you have been reading since November here is someone who has passed from dying to burial. I have tasted firsthand what burial is.
Whatever I may have thought before now was burial, or being in a grave...no way. Not even. There was no way to even begin to fathom.
I know the death is over because I no longer have a spirit. Throughout my whole life, regardless of the expansion or deflation of my soul, I always had a spirit. There is no spirit now. And what you have read here in the past two months is someone who has no spirit. Someone who is buried. Not dying.
I can tell you firsthand, burial is unlike anything humanly imaginable. To be cognizantly aware of existence but without a spirit is...there's just no way to begin to describe.
As for the soul in burial? It's locked into one position, and one position only. I'll try to illustrate.
Every spring, American pro baseball players begin their season either in Florida or Arizona in what is called Spring Training. It's a precursor to the regular season, where they play exhibition games against other teams.
At a spring training game in 1997, a player named Robin Ventura was coming in to home plate during a game to try and score. It had rained either the previous night or that morning, causing what was normally dirt on the infield and around home plate to instead be muddy.
As Robin came in to score, he slid into home to avoid being tagged out. The cleats on his shoe caught firmly in the mud while the inertia and momentum of his running and body weight carried the rest of him forward.
His foot stuck in the mud? It turned sideways and backwards. Completely backwards, to where his toes were facing his chest. His foot and leg were in a V-shape, to where the outside of his foot was essentially touching his lower shin. His heel was pointed where his toes normally would be pointed.
But Robin's foot did not simply turn sideways and backwards for an instant and then turn back to regular position. His foot, rather, remained locked in the V position where his toes were facing...his face.
And that, friend, is the best I can do to describe the condition of the soul in burial. It is locked in one position--a position of gruesome, horrifying and searing grotesqueness, just as Robin Ventura's foot was locked in utter grotesqueness that spring day in 1997.
There's something else about burial. In burial there is, absolutely, no hope.
None. It is just simply, completely, dark.
There is no sun, and the darkness is so thorough that it causes incredible doubt that a sun even exists.
All the things people try to say ("Things will get better", "God is able...", "God can...", etc)? Flatline.
It doesn't matter how much you know God, how much you've walked with Him, how intimately you have heard and been led by the Holy Spirit, how much you've tasted Him or His power or the Life He can give. Those things have no pulse in burial.
Burial is absolute, utter separation: from life, Life and God.
None of the tangible tastings with Him, none of His goodness, none of His attributes, none of His promises, none of the past things He has intimately and personally said specifically, none of His anything, none of His nothing, none of it carries any weight in burial.
The verses and so forth in the bible do not cause any type of ebb or spark whatsoever in burial. This is because what's in the bible speaks to man's spirit. When you have given up your spirit, when your spirit is dead, those things do not cause any kind of blip.
It is so void and destitute that anything you have ever known about the idea of resurrection, honestly, in the mind and soul is indigestable to grasp. No matter how strong or solid your faith, burial vacuums any tastings of God. If you find yourself reading this finding that impossible to believe, I won't banter with you. All I can convey is the vivid, detailed descriptiveness of what it is here.
I have seen through this there is only one place God is not and cannot be. It is in burial.
It's scary. Scary because I'd never tasted this before. Not even remotely come close to imagining it. Any past imaginings, voicings or notions of being dead or in a grave? Ptthhht. Not even...And for someone who has seen a lot and isn't given to be surprised or scared, to say that it is scary is titanic.
For most of the past three years I have thought that the scale of pain in life went from 1 to 5, and I was continuously at 4 or 5 (with a couple of exceptions). In burial the pain scale goes to 8 billion, and there is no fluctuation. Your soul stays pegged at the top. Continuously.
The worst of this is I've never known what it is to exist without a spirit. Even in my most rebellious days against God I still had a spirit. There was still in my deepest core, despite what I was doing or living, a sense of Him.
There is no sense of Him in burial.
That's not an atheistic statement. It's not saying He isn't. It is simply the matter that He is in no form, in no way here. In burial not only are you beyond your own rope, there is likewise none of God's rope. Neither is any of His rope anywhere to be seen, not even within sight. And that is what scared me. For the first time ever...ever...not even a glimmer of the faintest kind whatsoever. Utter void and absence.
God is, but He is not in burial. (because He, Father, cannot be buried). Jesus was buried, but not God the Father.
Burial is being cognitively aware of some type of existence. But it is not life. It is not human existence, because it occurs without a spirit, without a heart, and with the soul locked.
The hollowness, the void. It's never been this. And so, yeah, the things which has been posted here? It took a bit to realize it, but I finally did realize that this was no longer dying. The death pleaded for was done. This was something else.
I can't bring myself to talk about what happened at the very end. What consummated the death.
I just can't.
All I can say is that I was in a winter, then dying, but not anymore.
And so realize something from having read these postings over time and from noticing the change. The turn. The degradation. The nosedive. The slipping. The cynicism. The pessimism. The deterioration.
You have witnessed a death. And just as those who become something other than themselves as death overtakes, so you have seen that here. The "that's not like him", the "what is this", the "oh my", the "I thought he was", the ugliness, the bitterness, the lack of response, the flinches to pain, the seizures, the darkness?
You have seen a death as it took place. And you have also seen glimpses of the utter blackness and hopelessness of burial.
And so I leave you with a picture. Just as the baseball story illustrates the condition of the soul in burial, so this picture partially illustrates what death and burial have been like. One's entire person charred and mangled beyond recognition, then turned inside out and exposed.
It's not pretty. It's gruesome, as life and Life have literally been sucked out, and all that remains near the end is an unresponsive, ugly shell.
During the season of death one said to me, "You will never be able to say that you were abandoned in this place. If you expect me to stand outside, I'll stand outside and wait. I have all the time and patience in the world and it will be well worth seeing you rise out of this death and emerge truly alive from this grave. You see, the women got to see the resurrected Christ first because they didn't run away as he was dying. They stayed through the blood and the beatings while everyone else ran away to hide. They didn't flee and neither shall I." And "I will be here until you are out of this hell. I love you and you have a friend for life...whether you want one or not."
They left.
The bible says Jesus' death was so thorough, so gruesome it made his form beyond recognition. That he couldn't be recognized as a human being.
I know now.
What it is for beating and death to disfigure.
In death I likewise became unrecognizable from who I once was. In more ways than one.
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
I don't recall
ever coming across anyone who has called any of you cowards, selfish or thoughtless.
Everyone's thoughts were drawn to certain things from that day.
Some to the planes. Some to the rescue personnel.
I was always drawn to you. The hundreds of you.
I have spent many hours through the years wondering what kinds of things went through your hearts, through your minds.
Each time I've thought of it the deepest core of me has been stirred beyond words. The swirl, the utter dichotomy, the indescribable tearing, the turmoil, the agony. Human expression can't even begin...
What ten thousand things raced through you?
What went through your stomach, your mind, your heart?
When you first realized that...?
Right before you...?
So convenient for outsiders to opine. To denigrate. To condemn and slough off.
They can't imagine.
I can.
You weren't cowards. Not pussies. Not self-centered. Not thoughtless.
Not those of you who had children. Not those of you who had someone you loved deeply and passionately. Not those of you who had nothing. Not those of you who had anything in between.
None of you.
I used to wonder what it was like to be you.
I don't wonder anymore.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
Sunday, December 23, 2007
today
is the 23rd.
T minus and counting.
i hope You understand the difference between theoretical and tangible.
No mincing here.
NOTHING to lose. And You think that's a cliche.
There is nothing here. Inside or outside.
Get to it, p.J., otherwise You'll be calling up a stone.
There are more who know how to speak besides Jeremy.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
the man in the suit
just couldn't wait
for the man in the suit
three loops down
and still going
since the days of the pretzel
the man in the suit
on his way
because of
and for
it was being kept under wraps
was gonna surprise...
longed to surprise
craved to surprise
the flower through ice
but the man in the suit
got a phone call
an unspoken message
about his suit
a blunt message
about the heart
for the man in the suit
three loops down
and still going
since the days of the pretzel
the man in the suit
on his way
because of
and for
it was being kept under wraps
was gonna surprise...
longed to surprise
craved to surprise
the flower through ice
but the man in the suit
got a phone call
an unspoken message
about his suit
a blunt message
about the heart
Sunday, December 16, 2007
I remember
I remember you, sir.
It was 1997.
I have never, ever forgotten you.
I have never forgotten what you said without saying a word.
Never forgotten.
I am now you, sir.
It was 1997.
I have never, ever forgotten you.
I have never forgotten what you said without saying a word.
Never forgotten.
I am now you, sir.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
blood and ice
blood
so much
lost and flushing
not dripping
gushing
still alive
after losing
so much...
how on earth?
crevices
cracks
holes and seeping
gaping wounds
endless steeping
red river flowing
deluging
undertowing
ice
numbing
not just cutting
slicing
not just nipping
dicing
frozen meat
in an arctic freezer
the sharpest cleaver
as though blunt
does nothing
not just stinging
violently swinging
landing
upon its mark
golpes to the face
bludgeoned mutton
stunning concussions
wincing
gripping
flinching
now nothing
all gone
the cold hard truth
it doesn't matter
most particularly not to God
and so
because of this
there will soon be
one final act
of coldness
I will be God
for an instant
and all the coldness
will cease
instead of being
the one fucked
in this worthless shithole
I will be the one
who does the fucking
I will be the author
of ice and gales
and wind and hail
as I pin the tail
God has shown
His priorities--
more importantly,
His lack of them
I will
in a moment
show Him mine
and all will see
this rendition
of blood and ice
loud
clear
unequivocal
complete
then He and they
can ponder
what to do
with that blizzard
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
the lamb and the shepherd
Once upon a time there lived a lamb. The lamb was in many ways like other lambs, yet in other regards was different. The lamb grew up as lambs do, taking other lambs and the shepherds of the field as they were, because (of course) this was what the lamb knew. It didn't know any different than what had been around it.
And then, over time, something took place in the lamb. Somehow, and none of us really know how, the lamb was able to see its growings up and its surroundings in a different light, as they really were. This was a good thing, though some (perhaps even many) would not view this as so.
The lamb, who for so long had taken and accepted lambs and shepherds as they were, began to see that lambs and shepherds were not as they appeared to be. They were not as genuine as they gave themselves off to be. They were not as true as they thought themselves to be. They did not love as they proclaimed to love. The lamb saw that, sadly, love was a lip-service word which rolled off the tongues yet in reality had no sustenance with it.
The lamb took this all in, and as turns would have it became what many would say is skittish.
There also, in this same time, lived a shepherd. This shepherd was a good shepherd, yet as fate strangely had it had only ever been around mostly bad and black sheep. The shepherd had endured through this lot, though not very well at all.
One day, as it was, the lamb and this shepherd crossed paths.
It was an interesting acquaintance, for the lamb was skittish and the shepherd had the exclusively bad history with sheep. Even despite what they both had lived, the lamb and the sheep nonetheless came together.
Their time together was good, yet at the same time there was something not quite settled. Whether this was of the lamb or the shepherd no one knows, and it doesn't really matter. Let it simply be said that in light of the goodness of the lamb and shepherd experiencing each other that there was an underlying coarseness that permeated the air.
After some time of being together, despite the goodness that was taking place, the lamb told the shepherd it was going away. The lamb was endeared to this shepherd, yet something about the coarseness took its toll on the lamb. The lamb told the shepherd it was going to another pasture for a bit, and did.
And so the two were apart. Every once in awhile the shepherd would call out to the lamb. The lamb, in the neighboring pasture, could hear the shepherd but did not reply. The lamb missed the shepherd, yet the lamb knew that the time was not yet right to return.
After some bit of time, the shepherd called out again as had occasionally been done. The lamb, this time, replied. The lamb came back from the neighboring pasture to the shepherd.
Something was noticeably different.
The coarseness was gone.
For however things transpire, there was a new dawning for the shepherd and the lamb. A new air over this pasture, and in this new air the shepherd and the lamb came together.
And here is the most difficult part of this account, for here is where human words fail, miserably, to adequately convey what took place for the shepherd and the lamb.
Some would call it good. Others would call it beautiful, others magical. Still others would call it heaven. Heaven because of how much good and healing and Life was now taking place.
The lamb's skittishness, well founded because of the past, was gone. The lamb gave itself to the shepherd with total abandonment. This was not the first time the lamb had been around a good shepherd, yet it had been so so long. So much since the previous good shepherd had been bad, and the lamb had, realistically, given up hope of ever being with a good shepherd again. To be here now, this was just so so good for the lamb.
The shepherd, who had only been around black sheep until now, flourished. After all the years and years of anguish and self-doubt, the shepherd now, finally, was tasting what it was like to be a good shepherd with a good sheep. As they spent time together as shepherd and lamb, the knots and warpings and entanglements, which had seized and gripped and lambasted the shepherd mercilessly for so long, became undone.
It was beautiful. It was heaven. It was Life. The mutual freedom and healing taking place between them was amazing.
One day the lamb was grazing in the plentiful pasture the shepherd provided for it when the shepherd approached. The shepherd knelt down next to the lamb, as was customary and routine for the shepherd to do.
Often the shepherd would kneel down and talk gently to the lamb. Other times the shepherd would kneel and stroke the lamb's wool. Sometimes the shepherd would do both, stroke gently and talk soothingly. Sometimes the shepherd would kneel down, wrap arms around the lamb and carry it over to the fresh spring brook for a crisp and filling drink of water.
On this day, the shepherd bent down as usual. The lamb didn't know what the shepherd would do, yet knew that it was always good. Part of the beauty between the shepherd and the lamb was the suspense of not knowing what was in store, yet the certainty of knowing that whatever was forthcoming was something good.
When the shepherd bent down to the lamb this day, the lamb saw the shepherd make a motion not seen before. This did not startle the lamb for the shepherd was good, and whatever the shepherd did was good.
Suddenly the lamb felt a fiery pain race across its neck from right to left. This startled the lamb, and as it looked down it saw mats of blood and hair already clumping together upon its wool. Beyond this was also blood already forming a pool on the ground. How so much blood could already be out of the lamb and all over everything was beyond comprehension.
The lamb began to raise its glance to the shepherd, but the lamb was already beginning to black out. There was no allowance in this flash of time. No accommodation for shock, for the lamb was already going.
In the final instant, through blood spurting up into the air, the lamb could barely make out the shepherd through the wall of red. The shepherd had stood up and was walking away. As things for the lamb quickened, the shepherd walking briskly and without so much as looking the lamb in the eye, mumbled over the shoulder "I'm not who you think I am."
Then everything, for the lamb, went completely and utterly black.
And then, over time, something took place in the lamb. Somehow, and none of us really know how, the lamb was able to see its growings up and its surroundings in a different light, as they really were. This was a good thing, though some (perhaps even many) would not view this as so.
The lamb, who for so long had taken and accepted lambs and shepherds as they were, began to see that lambs and shepherds were not as they appeared to be. They were not as genuine as they gave themselves off to be. They were not as true as they thought themselves to be. They did not love as they proclaimed to love. The lamb saw that, sadly, love was a lip-service word which rolled off the tongues yet in reality had no sustenance with it.
The lamb took this all in, and as turns would have it became what many would say is skittish.
There also, in this same time, lived a shepherd. This shepherd was a good shepherd, yet as fate strangely had it had only ever been around mostly bad and black sheep. The shepherd had endured through this lot, though not very well at all.
One day, as it was, the lamb and this shepherd crossed paths.
It was an interesting acquaintance, for the lamb was skittish and the shepherd had the exclusively bad history with sheep. Even despite what they both had lived, the lamb and the sheep nonetheless came together.
Their time together was good, yet at the same time there was something not quite settled. Whether this was of the lamb or the shepherd no one knows, and it doesn't really matter. Let it simply be said that in light of the goodness of the lamb and shepherd experiencing each other that there was an underlying coarseness that permeated the air.
After some time of being together, despite the goodness that was taking place, the lamb told the shepherd it was going away. The lamb was endeared to this shepherd, yet something about the coarseness took its toll on the lamb. The lamb told the shepherd it was going to another pasture for a bit, and did.
And so the two were apart. Every once in awhile the shepherd would call out to the lamb. The lamb, in the neighboring pasture, could hear the shepherd but did not reply. The lamb missed the shepherd, yet the lamb knew that the time was not yet right to return.
After some bit of time, the shepherd called out again as had occasionally been done. The lamb, this time, replied. The lamb came back from the neighboring pasture to the shepherd.
Something was noticeably different.
The coarseness was gone.
For however things transpire, there was a new dawning for the shepherd and the lamb. A new air over this pasture, and in this new air the shepherd and the lamb came together.
And here is the most difficult part of this account, for here is where human words fail, miserably, to adequately convey what took place for the shepherd and the lamb.
Some would call it good. Others would call it beautiful, others magical. Still others would call it heaven. Heaven because of how much good and healing and Life was now taking place.
The lamb's skittishness, well founded because of the past, was gone. The lamb gave itself to the shepherd with total abandonment. This was not the first time the lamb had been around a good shepherd, yet it had been so so long. So much since the previous good shepherd had been bad, and the lamb had, realistically, given up hope of ever being with a good shepherd again. To be here now, this was just so so good for the lamb.
The shepherd, who had only been around black sheep until now, flourished. After all the years and years of anguish and self-doubt, the shepherd now, finally, was tasting what it was like to be a good shepherd with a good sheep. As they spent time together as shepherd and lamb, the knots and warpings and entanglements, which had seized and gripped and lambasted the shepherd mercilessly for so long, became undone.
It was beautiful. It was heaven. It was Life. The mutual freedom and healing taking place between them was amazing.
One day the lamb was grazing in the plentiful pasture the shepherd provided for it when the shepherd approached. The shepherd knelt down next to the lamb, as was customary and routine for the shepherd to do.
Often the shepherd would kneel down and talk gently to the lamb. Other times the shepherd would kneel and stroke the lamb's wool. Sometimes the shepherd would do both, stroke gently and talk soothingly. Sometimes the shepherd would kneel down, wrap arms around the lamb and carry it over to the fresh spring brook for a crisp and filling drink of water.
On this day, the shepherd bent down as usual. The lamb didn't know what the shepherd would do, yet knew that it was always good. Part of the beauty between the shepherd and the lamb was the suspense of not knowing what was in store, yet the certainty of knowing that whatever was forthcoming was something good.
When the shepherd bent down to the lamb this day, the lamb saw the shepherd make a motion not seen before. This did not startle the lamb for the shepherd was good, and whatever the shepherd did was good.
Suddenly the lamb felt a fiery pain race across its neck from right to left. This startled the lamb, and as it looked down it saw mats of blood and hair already clumping together upon its wool. Beyond this was also blood already forming a pool on the ground. How so much blood could already be out of the lamb and all over everything was beyond comprehension.
The lamb began to raise its glance to the shepherd, but the lamb was already beginning to black out. There was no allowance in this flash of time. No accommodation for shock, for the lamb was already going.
In the final instant, through blood spurting up into the air, the lamb could barely make out the shepherd through the wall of red. The shepherd had stood up and was walking away. As things for the lamb quickened, the shepherd walking briskly and without so much as looking the lamb in the eye, mumbled over the shoulder "I'm not who you think I am."
Then everything, for the lamb, went completely and utterly black.
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
reality in the season of pretentiousness
Well well well, here we are again. The six-week time of year where people engage in trying to have others believe things which are not.
I've got a job where I interact with the public on a daily basis, and just like clockwork here it is. Just like the sun coming up, the week before Thanksgiving people have turned on their "nice" switch and for six weeks pretend to convince people of a wide variety of things.
I wouldn't hate this time of year, except for how rift with fakery and pretention it is.
Is there some good come about from what some do during this six weeks? Sure, and I won't knock that. What ticks me is that in January this same everybody will flip that same switch off and go back to being Hyde instead of Jekyl until next November twenty-something.
This exposes the niceness of this six weeks as, let's be honest, a bunch of chicanery and shallowness.
I would rather people be the same all the time. Why do this in December when you won't be doing so in March? Why are you going out of your way in November, when the rest of the year it's all about your "me and my schedule" mentality?
But this is the time of year for people to crank their penance into hyperdrive. We're jerks for 46 weeks of the year...let's do penance for six to make up for all the rest.
Quite honestly, and I can only speak for me, I'd rather us be self-absorbed jerks and jerkettes as the rest of the year. Slathering on the fakery shouts pretentiousness to me, and I'd rather have people's true self than their attempted deception.
Another part of the year is the mierda people send out at Christmas. Females have the family put on nice clothes and tell them to smile real big, to project to the world what happy and together people they are. (It's such a female thing to project images to others--yet males successfully brainwashed are just as gung-ho about it as the ladies.)
The truth of the matter is these people's lives are writ with quite a bit of ongoing disappointment. The reality of women who talk a big game but then got lost in what women get lost in, and the men who distance themselves from the dig of this by burying themselves in work, civic causes, adulterous lovers, church, naughty pictures, sports, men's groups, other activities. (Then the women are somehow perplexed by the distance, prompting the circular conversations writ with awkward silences and rehashing the same topics rehashed umpteen million times before...yet everyone and everything remain static like rats on a treadmill.)
Yet in light of this reality, look at how many project an Ozzie & Harriet existence to the world.
I wouldn't mind this time of year except for what I know will happen in January. These people I interact with in public? They're still going to slosh around the cheery comments. They're going to speak as though they sincerely wish me well, but the truth is they don't give a rat's ass. And the truth also is that come January this temporary chirpiness and their well wishes will return to scowls,impatience and silence.
Give me your scowls and impatience now, please. I prefer the real you over the attempt to be placated. But we both know that isn't what's going to happen. And so I'll continue to bite my lip and give a silent half-nod as people wish Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays and all that.
If I had my druthers, you wouldn't wish me jack shit. All chirpy now, then you turn it off in January. But since it is part of your annual penance and makes you feel better, knock yourself out. There is an ultra nano-percentage of things in life which have even the faintest microblip of merriment, but since people think pretending and the expression of words change dark realities, go ahead and tickle yourself pink. I'm sorry you feel you have to say those things.
I've got a job where I interact with the public on a daily basis, and just like clockwork here it is. Just like the sun coming up, the week before Thanksgiving people have turned on their "nice" switch and for six weeks pretend to convince people of a wide variety of things.
I wouldn't hate this time of year, except for how rift with fakery and pretention it is.
Is there some good come about from what some do during this six weeks? Sure, and I won't knock that. What ticks me is that in January this same everybody will flip that same switch off and go back to being Hyde instead of Jekyl until next November twenty-something.
This exposes the niceness of this six weeks as, let's be honest, a bunch of chicanery and shallowness.
I would rather people be the same all the time. Why do this in December when you won't be doing so in March? Why are you going out of your way in November, when the rest of the year it's all about your "me and my schedule" mentality?
But this is the time of year for people to crank their penance into hyperdrive. We're jerks for 46 weeks of the year...let's do penance for six to make up for all the rest.
Quite honestly, and I can only speak for me, I'd rather us be self-absorbed jerks and jerkettes as the rest of the year. Slathering on the fakery shouts pretentiousness to me, and I'd rather have people's true self than their attempted deception.
Another part of the year is the mierda people send out at Christmas. Females have the family put on nice clothes and tell them to smile real big, to project to the world what happy and together people they are. (It's such a female thing to project images to others--yet males successfully brainwashed are just as gung-ho about it as the ladies.)
The truth of the matter is these people's lives are writ with quite a bit of ongoing disappointment. The reality of women who talk a big game but then got lost in what women get lost in, and the men who distance themselves from the dig of this by burying themselves in work, civic causes, adulterous lovers, church, naughty pictures, sports, men's groups, other activities. (Then the women are somehow perplexed by the distance, prompting the circular conversations writ with awkward silences and rehashing the same topics rehashed umpteen million times before...yet everyone and everything remain static like rats on a treadmill.)
Yet in light of this reality, look at how many project an Ozzie & Harriet existence to the world.
I wouldn't mind this time of year except for what I know will happen in January. These people I interact with in public? They're still going to slosh around the cheery comments. They're going to speak as though they sincerely wish me well, but the truth is they don't give a rat's ass. And the truth also is that come January this temporary chirpiness and their well wishes will return to scowls,impatience and silence.
Give me your scowls and impatience now, please. I prefer the real you over the attempt to be placated. But we both know that isn't what's going to happen. And so I'll continue to bite my lip and give a silent half-nod as people wish Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays and all that.
If I had my druthers, you wouldn't wish me jack shit. All chirpy now, then you turn it off in January. But since it is part of your annual penance and makes you feel better, knock yourself out. There is an ultra nano-percentage of things in life which have even the faintest microblip of merriment, but since people think pretending and the expression of words change dark realities, go ahead and tickle yourself pink. I'm sorry you feel you have to say those things.
Monday, December 03, 2007
it's already beginning, of course
Well well well, here we are again. The six-week time of year where people engage in trying to have others believe things which are truly not.
I've got a job where I interact with the public on a daily basis, and just like clockwork here it is. People have turned on their "nice" switch and for six weeks are already pretending as though they care more than they actually do.
I wouldn't hate this time of year, except for how rift with fakery and pretention it is.
Is there some good come about from people being this way during this time? Sure, and I won't knock that. What ticks me is that in January these same folks will flip that same switch off and go back to being Hyde instead of Jekyl until next November twenty-something.
This exposes the niceness of this six weeks as, let's be honest, a bunch of chicanery and shallowness.
I would rather people be the same all the time. Why do this in December when you won't be doing so in March? Why are you going out of your way in November, when the rest of the year it's all about your "me and my schedule" mentality?
But this is the time of year for people to crank up the penance into hyperdrive. We're assholes and bitches for 46 weeks of the year...let's pretend for six to make up for all the rest.
Quite honestly, and I can only speak for me, I'd rather you be an asshole or a bitch like you are the rest of the year. Slathering on the fakery shouts pretention to me, and I'd rather have people's true self than the attempts to deceive. Attempts to make me think they are what they truly aren't.
Another part of this year is the b.s. that people send through their Christmas cards. Everyone puts on nice clothes and smiles real big, so they can project to the world what happy and together people they are.
The truth of the matter is their life and their year is filled largely with strife and underwhelmingness. The reality of emotional roller coaster, hoodwinking women who talk a big game, and the men who distance themselves from this by burying themselves in work, civic affairs, church, naughty pictures, men's groups, other activities.
I wouldn't mind this time of year except for what I know will happen in January. And so these people I interact with in public? They're still going to slosh around the cheery comments, and as much as I can't stand it I'm resigned to it. They're going to speak as though they truly and sincerely wish me well, but the truth is they don't give a rat's ass. And the truth also is that come January this temporary chirpiness will return to the normal scowls and impatience.
Give me your scowls and impatience now too, please. I prefer the real you over the attempt to be placated. But we both know that isn't what's going to happen. And so I'll continue to simply bite my lip and give a silent half-nod as you wish me a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays and all that.
If I had my druthers, you wouldn't wish me jack shit. But since it is part of your annual penance and makes you feel better, knock yourself out. There's not a God damn thing merry or happy about my life, but since people think the mere expression of words changes dark realities, go ahead and tickle yourself pink. I'm sorry you feel you have to say those things.
I've got a job where I interact with the public on a daily basis, and just like clockwork here it is. People have turned on their "nice" switch and for six weeks are already pretending as though they care more than they actually do.
I wouldn't hate this time of year, except for how rift with fakery and pretention it is.
Is there some good come about from people being this way during this time? Sure, and I won't knock that. What ticks me is that in January these same folks will flip that same switch off and go back to being Hyde instead of Jekyl until next November twenty-something.
This exposes the niceness of this six weeks as, let's be honest, a bunch of chicanery and shallowness.
I would rather people be the same all the time. Why do this in December when you won't be doing so in March? Why are you going out of your way in November, when the rest of the year it's all about your "me and my schedule" mentality?
But this is the time of year for people to crank up the penance into hyperdrive. We're assholes and bitches for 46 weeks of the year...let's pretend for six to make up for all the rest.
Quite honestly, and I can only speak for me, I'd rather you be an asshole or a bitch like you are the rest of the year. Slathering on the fakery shouts pretention to me, and I'd rather have people's true self than the attempts to deceive. Attempts to make me think they are what they truly aren't.
Another part of this year is the b.s. that people send through their Christmas cards. Everyone puts on nice clothes and smiles real big, so they can project to the world what happy and together people they are.
The truth of the matter is their life and their year is filled largely with strife and underwhelmingness. The reality of emotional roller coaster, hoodwinking women who talk a big game, and the men who distance themselves from this by burying themselves in work, civic affairs, church, naughty pictures, men's groups, other activities.
I wouldn't mind this time of year except for what I know will happen in January. And so these people I interact with in public? They're still going to slosh around the cheery comments, and as much as I can't stand it I'm resigned to it. They're going to speak as though they truly and sincerely wish me well, but the truth is they don't give a rat's ass. And the truth also is that come January this temporary chirpiness will return to the normal scowls and impatience.
Give me your scowls and impatience now too, please. I prefer the real you over the attempt to be placated. But we both know that isn't what's going to happen. And so I'll continue to simply bite my lip and give a silent half-nod as you wish me a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays and all that.
If I had my druthers, you wouldn't wish me jack shit. But since it is part of your annual penance and makes you feel better, knock yourself out. There's not a God damn thing merry or happy about my life, but since people think the mere expression of words changes dark realities, go ahead and tickle yourself pink. I'm sorry you feel you have to say those things.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
some more gnawing
In the midst of these various shreddings going on, through which God is showing crevices I didn't even know existed in my heart (but which He apparently wishes to bring to light), some sober thoughts came to mind:
• if God did not even spare His own son Jesus in order to perfect him, how is it we would think we can become matured and perfected any other way?
The heart of the matter is today's Body has no ambition with regard to maturing. Let's look at the Church and see what it thinks matures us as Followers: theoretical and scientific dissection of the Book, and praise & worship. Neither one of these according to God, has anything to do with growth. They might be enjoyable in some regards, but they no more mature us than the man in the moon.
• sometimes in this Father seems to be penning akin to Job. Sometimes akin to Jesus. Sometimes Abraham. Sometimes Moses. Sometimes David. The Way is not theory, friends. This Way does not consist of nostalgically appreciating and heralding people of old who endured extreme hardship, faced bleakness, were ripped from stem to stern and yet God was with them. if you are a Follower, God calls you into the arena. He calls me into the arena. Faith lived is very very ugly, yet faith in today's Body is earmarked as this sweet, buttercup-type thing that makes everyone swoon and croon. Is this not how it is portrayed?
Faith played out is very ugly. Very very painful, often taking us to the brink of hell, human emotion and insanity. It is very unbecoming. More plainly, faith actually taking place will rip and shred you. It is not enjoyable or positive in the slightest regard.
But the Body wants no part of real faith. Real faith is ugly. Real faith has no part in the positive marketing paradigm that every church is branding. And that is just sad. The Way is portrayed as this utterly enjoyable, blessed existence in which God spends every ounce of His energy thinking of new ways to be nice to us, give us preferential treatment and make every thing we touch turn to gold.
Tell you what. Go ahead and believe that. Cuddle up in the Praise/Blessing/Victory Room and don't ever come out. The rest of us lament that by this you are having your baby bottle surgically and permanently attached to your lips. Go ahead. Run from the growing up that God would have for you.
This reminds me of a friend of mine, God bless his little heart. In the last year and a half God has penned some serious shit in his life, designed to prod this friend into a much deeper albeit extremely painful place. What has this guy done? Taken it like a man? Taken it on the chin and gone deeper? No way. He has tucked tail and run as fast and far as he possibly can away from it all.
This has crushed me and frustrated me. I see God trying to bring this friend to follow Jesus, to embrace the Via Dolorosa, and he'll none of it.
One of the most frustrating things about this is the havoc and searing pain in this friend's life is answered prayer, yet he doesn't even realize it.
He doesn't realize that what he prayed for was for a snippet from Philippians to come to bear: "that I may know Jesus, that I may come to know the power outflowing from his resurrection and that I may share in his sufferings as to be continually transformed into his likeness, even to his death".
My friend prayed for that...but doesn't know it. He saw firsthand some powerful things that were going on with me in the midst of suffering and he told God "I want power like that in my life". God says "okay" and began to sear him. All he's done since then is tuck tail and ask God to please go back to being nice to him. He's openly admitted to me (on more than one occasion) the pain of what's going on's entirely too much to bear, and further admitted he's hidden himself in video games and romantic relationships to try and get away from the pain. Pain that God has scripted, bidding him to grow up and come to know the power he thought he expressed to see.
But that brings to light an interesting point. My friend is not alone. The truth is millions of people who embrace the Way have no desire whatsoever to actually, literally and legitimately become like Jesus. People all over the place are expressing hunger to become like Him. God hears this. Yet when He begins to pen things that will spur people to (gulp) actually get on the road to becoming like Jesus they tuck tail, run, and cry out to God about how strongly they're being attacked and will He please reprieve them.
And God's saying "Um, you asked for this. You asked to become like Jesus and I'm obliging."
"But no, Father. I'm your child. I'm supposed to have VICTORY in all that I do, and this just doesn't fit the bill. Um, will You just go back to being nice to me?"
This conversation doesn't actually take place because many are laser-locked on a false paradigm. They don't realize when they ask to grow, ask to become like Jesus that God responds with...suffering.
Do we not get it? Do we not very plainly and openly read in the book that growth is spurred by hardship? We do, but we go into heavy denial of this because the paradigm of the Church does not (let's be honest here) line up with what God says very plainly about growth and about becoming like Jesus.
The Way is not about glitz, glammer, SUVs and slick-looking suits. The real Way will take you to the brink of human existence. Pulpits won't say this because they are too dependent on people to pay building mortgages and staff salaries.
I'm offering up a dare, friend. I dare you to tell Father that you wish to become like Jesus. That sounds silly, doesn't it, because you've already asked Him this and are in process of this taking place, right?
Well here's the deal. Do the same thing, only this time add two words to the end of the request. The two words are "Your way". Or for those of you who are a little more anal retentive, feel free to clarify it a bit more. "Father, I want to become like Jesus, Your way. Not as I've been taught and told by the Church, but rather Your way."
Fair warning here. Should you dare, it is advisable you strap on a helmet and clench your butt cheeks. Cause if you mean it you're about to taste something vastly different than what you've been told your entire Christian life. That verse you've often quoted, "God's ways are not man's ways"? Tell Father you desire Christianity His way.
Don't be like my friend and tuck tail. When the shit begins to hit the fan, don't go decreeing it "an attack" or go hide up in things like my friend has.
If you're going to go through with telling God you wish Him to do something, let Him do it. I assure you it is not going to be pretty. It's going to be ugly and it's going to lance you like you have never fathomed.
But it's worth it.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
abrasions and concussions
One of the perils of Feminine Christianity permeating today's Body is the unwavering premise God is one who authors and scripts tenderly, softly, sweetly, etc.
It is rather my experience that He is violent and abrasive in His pennings.
With about as much sweetness as a Brillo pad laced with jagged glass.
Things which have been ripped asunder in life and in my heart are occurring with the type of pain that there are no human words for.
Yes, THAT type of pain. And yes, things which are His doing.
This season seems just almost about to stop rippling when double-whammys stun to the core with heart-numbing concussions.
This has been happening in two's.
I've commonly heard a lot of folks refer to things coming in threes.
Two's. Three's.
Hmmm. Twenty-three's.
I wonder how numb you were when here, Jesus. No one cares to think about that, do they?
Monday, November 19, 2007
friends
I am not one to ask Father for relief from things. That is just not the nature of my relationship with Him, strange as that sounds to some.
For those of you who do have a petitioning relationship with Him, would you please? There are two more wrenching blows which have hit with full gale force in the last week and, quite honestly, things are a mess.
I can deal with the blows, it's the resulting full tilt and tailspinning which don't appear to be good...or could they be part of the water getting down the mountain?
Don't know. I only know the searing from these lancings to the marrow.
I am in need of salve, and in need to hear from Him in this.
Thanks.
For those of you who do have a petitioning relationship with Him, would you please? There are two more wrenching blows which have hit with full gale force in the last week and, quite honestly, things are a mess.
I can deal with the blows, it's the resulting full tilt and tailspinning which don't appear to be good...or could they be part of the water getting down the mountain?
Don't know. I only know the searing from these lancings to the marrow.
I am in need of salve, and in need to hear from Him in this.
Thanks.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
silence screams
The hands are frozen solid on the face of saving grace
Infidels and harlots in a blackened burning place
Silence screams, the echoes roar
Silence screams, forever more
With idiots and mannequins and charlatans in tow
Circus clowns and lunatics and ladies dressed for show
In a sullen field of chaos where dead men still have dreams
From pressure in these spaces silence screams
The folly in our passion
The prisoners of desire
The foolishness of bigots
Fodder for the fire
In bitterness and exile
As brutal as it seems
In the coldest darkest spirit
Silence screams
"Silence Screams"
--Rez Band
Friday, November 16, 2007
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
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