an apology to a friend

Dear friend,

I know these last few months have been excruciatingly painful.

I know stuff has been going on for quite some time.

I know, because I've seen the hurt beneath the smile.

That pain has amplified magnitudes in the recent past.


And I want to apologize.

I want to apologize on behalf of the people who should be comforting you, but have not and are not. And won't be.

I want to apologize on behalf of the people whose words should be salve to you, but are not. And won't be.

I want to apologize to you on behalf of a religion which thinks it has or can help ease this present radical swarm of pain and anguish a little bit, but which instead provided no substance at all. Not even partially.


I'm sorry for what has not happened. I am sorry for the portrait that's been painted. The portrait which has left you saying "is that it?"


But at the same time, it's not an accident what has happened.

You see, I think, God has authored all this.

What He has done (and is attempting to do) in this, I think, is something you won't hear preached in (hardly) any pulpit...in this land, anyway.


Let me backtrack just a little, if you'd allow the courtesy, to talk about this hunch I have.

It's just a guess at something, regarding the confusion about the pain, the circumstances leading up to now, the situation now, why God seems nowhere to be found, and why, because of that, other things are being pursued.

I don't blame you for not wanting to listen.

Most of what everyone has been saying is like that school teacher in the Peanuts comic strip to your ears: MAW WAH WAH WAH WAH, BAH DAH WAH WAH LAH. You know what I'm talking about.

I know it too. That's why it doesn't bother me that you're rolling your eyes right now.

I am sorry that people have said mostly (only?) eye-rolling things.

I'm sorry for the dispassionate words.

I'm sorry for the shallow sentences and hollow tidbits.

I'm sorry for the empty things said while a Glee-Club-grin has been plastered on the face.

I'm sorry for the attempts to inspire you with positive, encouraging, uplifting words and attitudes.

That's not where your heart is, nor where you have been.

The depth of what's going on in your heart makes their cheap ass, echoing consonants & vowels a joke.

You've been wounded for a long time, and that wound has expanded greatly as of late.

I'm sorry for the band-aids people have spewed your way, without so much as looking at you as they rush by.

I am so sorry.


I also want to apologize for what these who know better have also done.

Pretty much without their knowledge (they are oblivious to it even as we speak), they have taken on the attitude and actions of this God-forsaken culture.

Maybe it all began with a song in the mid-80's that stuck:

"Don't worry, be happy!"

This culture and the Church have told you, and are still telling you, to ignore your feelings.

They have told you, and are still telling you, to ignore your heart.

They've ignored, and are still ignoring, your questions.

Ignoring your doubts.

Ignoring your pain.

Ignoring your fears.

All you're good for to them is some rushed pat answers, some PMA rah-rah, and some psycho-babble which pukes its way out of their mouths.

The Church, just like culture, has told you to look within yourself and get through this by being strong, being determined, by deciding to be resilient, to be courageous, to stick it out, to grit it out, to be of good cheer, to pony up, that "when the going gets tough the tough get going", etc.

You know what I'm talking about. You've also heard, like I have, the umpteen million snippets about self-strength and self-reliance. These are the things that culture and the Church say together.

This culture and the Church exist on the same premises.

Sometimes, like above, they both say the same thing.

Other times they use different words to promote the same belief(s).

This culture markets to you that you should be happy. Always. 24/7. If you're not, something's wrong, and your happiness is just a product, a condition, an environment, a situation, a circumstance, some counseling sessions or a prescription medication away.

The Church markets to you that you should be blessed. Always. 24/7. If you're not, somethings' wrong, and your blessing is just a prayer, a Scripture, a financial seed, a church family, an accountable friend, some counseling sessions or a prescription medication away.

The Church is no different from the world. And, therefore, has been as pathetic and damaging as the world toward you.

Actually even worse, because of the idea people in the Church would or should "get it".

I am so sorry.


But there's that one thing more I wanted to say aside from the apology.

That thing that you won't hear being talked about in churches...let me get back to that.


Life has been hard. It's been and is difficult. Has been, and is, painful.

And yet I mentioned while ago that God has authored it.

I know, I know, you've talked to people about what's been going on for quite awhile now, and when you talk about this frustration and the difficulty they have told you things like "the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy. This is all the devil's work. You just tell him to go back where he came from and get out of here. He has no claim on you. He can't do this to you. Let's pray against the dark forces in this."

More Peanuts teacher...BLAH WAH DAH WAH WAH.

I know. I am so sorry.

When they say these things, there's something inside that cringes and says "No, that's not it." Something doesn't ring a hundred percent true about it.

I'm sorry for the blind stabs in the dark.

It's kinda like law school dropouts. They have just enough information to be dangerous, in that they know a few terms and concepts to sling around, but really they don't know what the hell they're talking about.

Like I said earlier, I see God authoring this.


Huh?

Well, everyone in Christianity talks about it really fervently once a year.

By the way they talk about it, it's something, though, only for Jesus and not for anyone else.

It's talked about in this "hey, look what the martyr of this religion did. Wasn't that nice of Him? We all get to ride on the coattails of what He did. We're not expected to do the same."

The whole religion, today at least, is built around the nostalgia of talking about what the hero did a long time ago.

It's none about the idea that anyone who becomes a follower of the head cheese is to actually follow in his footsteps.


And that's simply the one thing I want to say.

He does want you to follow in his footsteps.

The guy you decided to follow? He wants you to follow.

Yeah, I know, mind-blowing concept and rocket science here.


You see, all this pain and circumstance that has led you to the brink? All this lament, all this pain, all this frustration, all this depression, all this clamoring, all this unsettledness, all this funk, all this unhappiness?

It's exactly what God has wanted...and has brought about.

When the gunk started, it's my hunch that was just the beginning where He's wanted it to go.

As things have gotten progressively worse over time? Not where He wanted them.

Things gotten really bad? Nope.

Angry and hurting? Not there yet.

Rotten? Getting there.

Pulling your hair out? That's the idea. Getting warmer.

So helpless to the point you can't take it anymore and you wish you would die?

Yes.

What no one is telling you or encouraging you to do, but what God does want and has brought you to in this pain of life, is death.

God wants you to die.

And He has led you to the cliff.


Church doesn't want to talk about this today.

There is largely lip-service and skim-right-past Jesus saying "whoever find his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life (for my sake) will find it". (Matthew 10)

Or, slightly differently said, "Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it." (Luke 17)

All this stuff withering down all around you, things out of control and going haywire? It's God.

When you told Jesus "I will follow You", He said "okay".

You meant what you said. He means what He says.

All these Christians who go around saying "well, you know, we're all just imperfect sinners"? They're right.

(The shit-eating grin on their face when they say it is annoying as hell, but the words in and of themself? Yep yep.)

And since we do have things God wants to get out of us (so He can show us a better Way), He's simply brought to a boiling point. He's got those things festered to the surface now so He can get rid of the old.

By death.

But He ain't gonna do it for you. It takes two to tango in this.

Your part takes faith, a word today that is being whored like never before.

Faith is used as a word to obtain possessions, position, recognition, power, money, wealth, status, favor, etc., all in the blessed name of Jesus.

That's not faith.

Faith is stepping off the cliff to die.

Faith is actually, and literally, taking Jesus at his word when he says "if you're going to follow me...if you are going to follow me, you have to step off the cliff."

This entire religion is not about blessing and happiness.

It's about seeing if we'll step off the cliff and die.

God has brought you to the cliff, friend.

And we have to be willing to step off before anything else happens.

The basic premise of this whole thing is we leap toward death without anything to go on except the word of some crazy dude who says if we will step off then he'll do something about it.

All this talk about blessing and abundance and wealth and prosperity?

Pure bullshit.

God and Jesus want you to fling yourself off the cliff to die.

That takes faith. And there's some other stuff going on too.

The world is tugging extremely hard, for you to cure the woes with its fixes, its solutions, its answers, its offerings.

And the Church is telling you there's no way it is God's will that He would want you to lose anything. He wants you full to overflowing, blessed and happy. He wants the best for you...because He loves you.

See what I mean?

There's no mention of death preceding rebirth. No mention of our lives being something we must lose.

All the churches are talking about victory (in Jesus), and how it can be yours, mine, anyone's.

But who's talking about that first requiring that we step off the cliff and abandon what we have known as life?

That's where God has you. At the cliff.

And I'm sorry no one is talking to you about death and abandonment and forsaking all that you know and have known.

No one is talking to you about being helpless. Yet Jesus says "My strength is made perfect in your weakness."

If you want to experience what's of him, he says "step off the cliff".

Lose your life. Give it up. Let go of it.

Abandon it all.

God is not going to push you off the cliff. He's simply brought you to this point.

It's up to you whether you look at all this pain and shit as a blame-God mirage, a woe-is-me party, an excuse to try and rid the pain by absorbing yourself into what the world is offering you, or whether you'll see it for what it is: the idea that we must step off, fall and die, leaning on nothing but the words that upon doing so you'll find something that to this point is an abstract concept.

And that's where the rubber meets the road in this. Jesus is either who he says he is, or he is the biggest liar and snake oil salesman in the history of the world. It's one or the other.

His words about losing life before finding it, THAT is what we are faced with.

If you're going to find out, it's not going to be by doing or following what the Church is telling you is "Christianity".

It's going to be by stepping off the cliff, which is only one of several options, because the world and friends and church are telling you other things besides this.

One more thing I must say honestly. Stepping off the cliff is not a one-time thing.

There will be other steppings off the cliff. None of them fun. None enjoyable. All painful. Wrenching.

I love you.

Your friend

the Clean Bathroom Society

We've all been there.

That roadside gas station potty break somewhere along a trip. Or maybe just an impromptu jaunt to the bathroom at a restaurant during a meal.

Just as unpredictable as our bladders is the state of the bathroom.

The first senses that perk upon entering are usually sight and smell.

Are stray paper towels on the ground? What about random pieces of toilet paper?

Check. None or minimal.

Good.

How does it smell in here? Maybe an auto-timed refresher goes off every x number of minutes. Maybe it smells like bathroom cleaner or disinfectant. Or maybe our concern is just the absence of the smell we hope is NOT in there...

Check.

Whew. All good signs, or at least the absence of bad signs in this place.

We edge to the bathroom stall door, which though unoccupied is almost shut.

And then...we see it.

The sight that repels us as humans more than most others.

It might even induce the gag reflex among some of us.

The sight that makes us gasp "Oh my God"...if we aren't dry heaving, that is.

It's the proverbial Holy Shit bathroom stall. Literally.

There is no water in the toilet. All that is 'down in there' is a mass of feces and toilet paper.

It's so bad it makes your heart cringe for whoever's going to have to right the wrong.

Some are worse than others.

Sometimes the dung is not restricted to the toilet itself.

(I can't speak for you ladies' restrooms. Maybe the uncool in a ladies' room never reaches this level.)

I bring this up because I walked into the worst one I've ever walked into about a month or so ago.

I'll spare any more details. Save it to say it was horrible. I don't get grossed out at all, and even I was saying "wow".

The first thing I did upon seeing it was hope that the other remaining stall in that bathroom was not in similar shape.

It wasn't.

That same day the thought struck me about what happened.

It is human nature to turn up the nose, to shout "oh my God!", to curl the nose and think rottenly and nauseatingly of the scene.

Yes, we are a Clean Restroom Society.

We like things clean. We like them tidy. We like things to smell good and be comely.

We don't like filth. We don't like stench.


Thinking through that reinforced something.

Made me think of something that is not clean and dainty and pleasant, as human beings would prefer it.

Something that stinks, filled with rotten filth.

It doesn't fit within the confines of what people are willing to tolerate, what we're comfortable seeing or enduring.


And so what do we do?

One of several things.

The first thing is immediately seek a different bathroom stall. Outta there, man--pihChhooon!! (or whatever Looney Tunes noise you'd like to insert)

We don't like dysfunction. We don't like disgusting. We don't like icky.

It's natural for us to walk the other way.

Quickly.

And that's what I've run into. Largely treated like a leper by most folks.

Works for me. They've got a real high chance of being a Clean Bathroomer anyway.

If they can't immediately excuse themselves, they do their best not to let the lip curl while talking right there.

If by chance they can suppress the lip curl, though, they usually can't contain the look-over-the-shoulder, the dumb stare or the head shake as they walk away.

Second way of dealing with it: find another bathroom.

Not only do they look immediately for another stall or bathroom, they wish me to find another one too.

"Find another stall. Surely it can't be God's will that THIS be your stall in life. Jesus has a nice, shiny spotless stall right over here, see?"

"Did you know Jesus died so that you could have a clean stall?"

"God has a wonderful stall for your bowel movement." (aka, "God has a wonderful plan for your life")

(sidebar: next time someone feeds you the 'wonderful plan' gunk, reply back with the 'wonderful stall/BM' line)

"You just tell the devil to go back to his stall. This is not your stall."

"You just claim a clean stall, and God will give you one."

To mention that if I'll pray more, God will provide me a clean(er) stall.

If I'll plug into a church, God will give me a clean(er) stall.

Perhaps worse than this, which royally pisses me off to no end, is having people tell me to mentally imagine the shitty stall is not real.

"You just need to rise above this stall."

"Don't focus on this stall."

"When I think of you, brother, I think of the nice, sanitized stall God is going to give to you."

"Let Jesus lift you up to another stall."

"Think about the good stalls."

"Whatever stall is clean, whatever stall is pure...think on these stalls."

"God give you clean stall." (aka "God bless you", aka "God be nice to you")

These comments, I think, are the worst of all, because they bid me to pretend. They bid me to a world of make-believe. They bid me to ignore my heart. They bid me to be an actor.


I mentioned a few weeks ago about just puking my way through life. A friend came on and commented that though they hate to see my puking, it is so easy for them to stay beside me, handing me a glass of water or a wet towel for my forehead.

That's friendship.

That's Jesus, folks.

To follow, I think, is entering shitty stalls.

Not being fake. Just being there.

There are friends who are in here with me in mine. Not because they have to. Not because their own stalls are stenchy or oh-my-Goddish. But because they look beyond their own circumstances to the heart of a friend.

Jesus reaches a point with his disciples when he says "I no longer call you servants...now I call you friends."

How many of us have ever said to a friend "you can be in my foxhole any time".

I have.

And yet how many of us hesitate, or turn back, when that friend's foxhole reeks of dung.

And yet that dung is their current lot, their test, their hardship, their wilderness for a season, or longer.

I've done this. To my shame. To friends, to strangers, to the robbed man on the side of the road...

To angels.

To Jesus.

It's human nature to turn away.

It's of Jesus to jump down in.

If we would quit talking about being an "oasis of love" on our church websites, and actually get in the shit trenches with people, wow.

It is these nasty, unbecoming circumstances Jesus talks about when he says he is with us and won't forsake us.

And, it's been my experience, these crappy places (by human standards and appearance) are where He shows up, where He does blow the mind, supernatural stuff. The unexplainable. The miracles. The drop your jaw stuff.

He does things opposite the world.

Where pomp and order and cleanliness and showmanship and pizzazz and glitz and sizzle are? Jesus isn't...or at least not in the way he's Wizard of Ozzed to be there.

I was in a restaurant tonight and saw the name of a tv show flash on the screen. The name of the show: "The Most Beautiful Ugly".

Yeah, that's what following Jesus is...the ugly beautiful.

That's why He's not a member of the Clean Bathroom Society.

by their fruit you will know them

A few days ago I sent a comment/prayer-request to a megachurch.

I gave them a summary of my life's dips since the beginning of last year, and asked them their take on it.

After pasting a canned-text blurb about their church, proclaiming that theirs is a type of faith "that overcomes, and is not overwhelmed, dissuaded or defeated in any area of life", the reply from them ended with this personal snippet:

"our purpose is teach people to live by the Bible and the principles found in it, which will help them overcome in every area of their lives. God bless! webmaster"

Hmmm....

So I wrote back:

"do x and y will be the result.

Someone recently talked to me about the Way (as they referred to it) being about being fathered by God himself, not adhering to a list of principles (aka laws, codes, precepts).

They said following laws in the Old Testament is equivalent to people today following principles.

Living by laws (now called principles), they said, was scrapped by God a long time ago. Yet you're saying it IS about living by principles (formerly called laws).

Hmmm. Maybe that's why I can't get any synthesis from the various people I am inquiring of.

Real life for people not hovering inside a brick & mortar cocoon transcends formulas, which is why the Body largely talks out of their ass when formulaic approaches are trumped by God himself.

It's also the basis for hollow, empty comments which show the unrelatablity of 'church' to train-wrecked and piss-stained lives like mine. Wow."

So my response back to the webmaster is a microcosm of what I express on my blog. Transparent, straight up, wounded and wondering what the hell the Church is doing (cause it sure ain't about applying the salve of God). Disgust that the Church is largely dispassionate and self-absorbed inside their sanctimonious bubble.

Okay, to some of you this will be a surprise, and to some of you not.

Here is Sphincter Boy's reply back to me. Direct quote within the parentheses is exactly the response.

"James 1:14-26:

14What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, 'Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,' but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. 18But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds." Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do. 19You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder. 20You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? 21Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,"[e] and he was called God's friend. 24You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone. 25In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging tothe spies and sent them off in a different direction? 26As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.

Luke 6:46-49
46 Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say? 47I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. 48He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. 49But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete."

That was the reply. No dialogue. No conversation.

Just throw a couple of Scriptures out, after a kneejerk lightning-quick search on biblegateway, and voila, the wounded inquirer is put in his place, to be heard of no more. Oh, that is unless he decide to start REALLY following Jesus.

I bet if I joined their church's "Believers Club" for $60 per month I woulda gotten a different reply.

Par for the fucking course.

Some might wonder if I just make up this ire out of my ass.

No, I do actually put transparent hurt out there to Christianity.

I'm not heckling, I'm just being honest that largely the Church couldn't give a fucking rip about people like me.

Like I've been saying a long time, if you don't fit the victory or blessing mold, or don't line up within "acceptable" behavior or language as determined by the World Honorable Organization of Righteous Eclectics Society, then you're the wounded robbed man on the side of the road outside Samaria.

Not so much even an "I'm sorry to hear of what's been your lot. I don't have an answer for what's happened to you, nor can I excuse what the Church has done, or more accurately, failed to be to you. I'm simply sorry."

Nope.

Gotta use Scripture and in essence say "fuck you, vermin."

Well, he got that part right. I am effed, and I am vermin by not only the world's standards but also by the Body's.

Interesting how in the very Scripture he threw in my face he said "I will show you my faith by what I do."

Yes, you have shown me you and your church's faith by what you have done.

Loud and clear, you have shown me.

Jesus, thank you that You are not like people who claim to be Yours.

truth be told

another one stokes the fire...

Okay, before I go any further, the following is NOT preaching the choir, so to anyone who follows Jesus, this isn't for you.

Further disclaimer, this is simply a raw expression of the human heart.

If you have any prudish or propriety tones coursing through your veins, you ain't gonna like this, so please just take a break today and come back tomorrow.



ATTENTION ALL HAPPINESS AND BLESSING LEMMINGS OF THE EARTH.

YES, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. YOU SPEND THE BRUNT OF YOUR TIME, EMOTIONS AND ENERGY PURSUING HAPPINESS AND EARTHLY BLISS IN ITS VARIOUS FORMS.

AND YOU ACHIEVE SOME OF THIS TEMPORARY EMOTION. SOME MORE THAN OTHERS.

IF YOU ARE A 'CHRISTIAN' WHO DOES THIS SAME THING, YOU THINK BY CALLING IT "BLESSING" INSTEAD OF "HAPPINESS" THAT IT MAKES IT INNOCENT AND YOU SOMEHOW HAVE GOD'S FAVOR IN WHAT YOU DO.

ATTENTION, ACHTUNG, ATENCION!!!

YOU ARE BLIND.

YOU ARE FUCKING BLIND.

YOU ARE A SNIPE HUNTER.

YOU ARE CHASING A MIRAGE, AN APPARITION, A PSEUDO-STATE.

YOU'VE BOUGHT A LIE, AND DAMN ANYONE WHO GETS IN YOUR WAY OF PURSUING IT.

YOU DON'T GIVE A FLYING FUCK ABOUT THE HEARTS YOU BLUDGEON THROUGH YOUR BLIND PURSUIT.

YOU GET TO ROMP OVER WHOEVER THE FUCK YOU WANT IN YOUR NARCISSISTIC QUEST, BUT GOD FORBID ANYONE DARE TO SAY ONE WORD TO YOU...TELL YOU EITHER NICELY OR STERNLY YOU ARE A LOST, SELFISH, HYPEREMOTIONAL BAG OF AFTERBIRTH.

GO READ YOUR FUCKING BIBLE ABOUT WHAT JESUS SAYS THE STATE OF THE HEART IS IN THOSE WHO PURSUE DIVORCE. THEN READ A LITTLE MORE, THE PART OF THE NT WHERE IT TALKS ABOUT PEOPLE FORSAKING JESUS AND TURNING BACK FROM FOLLOWING HIM.

THIS IS YOU.

YOU ARE SPITTING IN GOD'S FACE IN THIS HOUR. TELLING HIM AND HIS WAYS TO FUCK OFF.

YOUR HEART IS FULL OF REBELLION, WHICH THE BIBLE SAYS, VERY BLUNTLY, IS WITCHCRAFT.

YES, WHAT YOU ARE DOING IS BLESSED BY SATAN. SATAN LOVES WHAT YOU'RE DOING.

SATAN LOVES YOU, FRIEND.

YOU ARE OF HIS CAMP IN THIS.

"HE WHO IS NOT WITH ME IS AGAINST ME."

"THE THIEF COMES ONLY TO STEAL, KILL AND DESTROY."

YEAH, YOU KNOW THESE. THEY HAVE COME OUT OF YOUR MOUTH BEFORE IN CONVERSATION WITH OTHERS.

DID YOU SAY THEM WITH THE ALL TOO COMMON CUTE LITTLE HALF-BAKED CHRISTIAN SMILE ON YOUR FACE? THAT LIMP SMILE AND YOUR HALF-ASS, HOLLOW TONE YOU HAD WHILE SAYING THEM? FRUIT THAT THIS WHOLE CHRISTIANITY THING IS LIP SERVICE. THEN AND NOW.

"THEY HONOR ME WITH THEIR LIPS, BUT THEIR HEARTS ARE FAR FROM ME".

"THE MALICIOUS DISGUISE THEMSELVES WITH THEIR LIPS".

I HOPE GOD BREAKS YOU. I PRAYED EXACTLY THAT TONIGHT, THAT HE BREAKS YOU. I PRAY HE LAYS YOU FLAT OUT ON YOUR EFFING BACK. CAUSE YOU NEED TO BE.

AND IF HE DOES IT, IF HE DOESN'T HAVE IT TO BE THAT YOU GET ALL THE SLACK YOU WANT TO DO YOUR LITTLE PIG-HEADED SELFISH BULLSHIT AND TAKE HEARTS WITH YOU IN THE PROCESS, HE'LL DO IT OUT OF LOVE. YEAH, L-O-V-E IS AT THE ROOT OF HIM SMACKING YOU.

OH, AND IF BY GOD'S PLEASURE, YES HIS PLEASURE NOT YOURS, SHOULD HE LET YOU TAKE THIS SLACK OUT IN ACTION TO THE END OF YOUR SELFISH FULFILLMENT, REMEMBER THAT MERCY AND SOWING & REAPING ARE NOT ALWAYS INTERCONNECTED.

I HOPE YOU GET LAID OUT BY GOD BEFORE YOU FOLLOW THROUGH WITH THIS, FOR MANY PEOPLE'S SAKE, INCLUDING YOUR'S AND EVERYONE YOU WILL TAKE THROUGH HELL WITH YOU.

I'M SORRY TO SEE YOUR EMBRACING A LIE. BUT IF YOU DO, YOU DO.

GOD SMACK YOU, FRIEND.

DON'T INSULT ANY OF OUR INTELLIGENCE BY WISHING GOD'S BLESSING ON ANY OF US OR YOURSELF.

PART OF THIS LIE IS YOU SOMEHOW THINK GOD SMILES ON YOU IN LIGHT OF WHAT YOU'RE DOING.

GOD SAYS VERY OPENLY HE HATES WHAT YOU ARE DOING.

a tune that came to mind this morning...

oh, Lord, I just can't see
The cherries ever lining up for me

I'm not resigned to pull Your arm
......

For if I'll give that arm a go
What You can do I just don't know

I've come to see that less is more
And after saying that I was shown the door

So grant me less and kill me please
That's when I feel the Breath and breeze
That others will not ever feel
Yet they're the ones living in Your will

not the contender

My television tastes are highly boring. Not extensive. Nor is my movie knowledge, really, or music knowledge for that matter.

Anyway.

I've been watching some portion of this tv series where boxing aspirers are vying for a chance to legitimately contend for a world boxing title.

There's a predictable format to the show. They show the pre-fight interviews and prep. The fight itself. They show the losing boxer walking solo heading back to his locker room. Then they show both the winning and losing boxers in their respective locker rooms.

The last two times I've watched this show, it has stirred me to tears.

Not upon the announcement of the winner of the fight.

Not during the post-fight locker room clips.

What has stirred me is watching the losing boxer walking away right after the match, alone in defeat.

stark

I ran across a song this weekend that I hadn't heard in a while.

Upon listening to it and looking up the lyrics, it caused some heavy thinking about the stark contrast between the real life shit that people deal with...compared to the "let's lift our hearts up as a banner of sweet fragrance unto the Lord" stuff.

Below is real life for some people who live outside the Pat Boone, sweet, warm cocoon of Churchianity.

And the sad thing is that Churchianity is marketed as "the answer", for both the people below as well as the millions who live somewhere else along the spectrum.


"We've all seen a man at the liquor store beggin' for your change
The hair on his face is dirty, dread-locked, and full of mange
He asks the man for what he could spare, with shame in his eyes
"Get a job you fucking slob," is all he replied
God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in his shoes
'Cause then you really might know what it's like to sing the blues

Mary got pregnant from a kid named Tom who said he was in love
He said, "Don't worry about a thing baby doll,
I'm the man you've been dreaming of."
But 3 months later he say he won't date her or return her calls
And she swears, "God damn, If find that man I'm cuttin' off his balls."
then she heads for the clinic and
she gets some static walking through the door
They call her a killer, and they call her a sinner
and they call her a whore
God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in her shoes
'cause then you really might know what it's like to have to choose

I've seen a rich man beg
I've seen a good man sin
I've seen a tough man cry
I've seen a loser win
And a sad man grin
I've heard an honest man lie
I've seen the good side of bad
And the downside of up
And everything between
I've licked the silver spoon
Drank from the golden cup
And smoked the finest green
I've stroked the daddies dimes at least a couple of times
before I broke they heart
You know where it ends, yo, it usually depends on where you start

this kid named Max
He used to get fat stacks out on the corner with drugs
He liked to hang out late
get shit-faced and keep the pace with thugs
Until late one night there was a big gun fight and Max lost his head
He pulled out his chrome .45, talked some shit, and wound up dead
Now his wife and his kids are caught in the midst of all of this pain
You know it crumbles that way
at least that's what they say when you play the game
God forbid you ever had to wake up to hear the news
'Cause then you really might know what it's like to have to lose"

yes...

I'm more thoroughly convinced than ever.

Eff this place.

Don't bless this country. Judge it. Judge us, Lord.

"God Judge America!"

I got my hand raised. I'll go first.

Judge me some more.

Give me some more on the chin.

Kill me in eighteen thousand more ways.

Judge every single last one of us.

Show us the lip service we give You.

Let us live our own shallowness.

Our hearts are far from You.

Reckon unto us as in times past.

Let us writhe in our own vomit.

Let us lay in our own blood and afterbirth.

Bring us to death.

Then clean us.

dichotomy

I'm blessed because my spirit is poor (aka, ripped to shreds).

You're blessed because life is going well.

I'm blessed because I mourn.

You're blessed because you have and claim "victory in Jesus" in ALL things.

I'm blessed because I am meek--I have no options.

You're blessed because you have options.

I'm blessed because I thirst for righteousness.

You're blessed because you are righteous.

reminder

"I could wish you joy and peace
To last a whole life long,
I could wish you sunshine
Or a cheerful little song,
Or wish you all the happiness
That this life could bring...

But I wish You Jesus more than anything.

I could wish you leaves of gold
And may your path be smooth,
I could wish you treasures
Or that all your dreams come true,
And I could wish you paradise,
That every day be spring...

But I wish You Jesus more than anything.

'Cause when I wish you Jesus
I've wished you everything."

thin shell II

Here's another largely accepted line that is embraced and cooed over by much of the Body:

"When life gives you lemons, make lemonade."

This is par for the weak, feeble, shallow course.

Saw this on a church marquee about five months ago.

I don't think I've ever come across one single person who didn't smile, nod or glibly affirm this statement.

And here's the question.

I can understand that comment when life gives you lemons.

But what is your comment when life deals out pig diarrhea or goat vomit?

Tick, tick, tick.

Buehler?

Buehler?

Yeah, that's what I thought.

You largely have no answer, body of Christ. You just want to stay on the skim surface of life.

You try and paste this cutesy little phrase onto everything, literally, and the Truth is you have no effen clue what to do when people experience train-wreck emotions in life.

In the past year and a half, with shit compounding nonstop, you, Body, have wanted to just skim the surface with me and blindly thought (hoped?) that your little hollow little cliches would have any value.

Well, they have had value. Negative value of the piss off variety, leading me to go to God and say "these folks claim Your name, so why are they so blind and clueless in terms of their 'ministry'?"

You think that just because you inscribe the name of Jesus on the band-aids you run around putting on people's wounds that that's going to have some kind of Jesus-based magic fairy dust effect.

Please do me a favor.

Leave the name of Jesus out of what you are doing. And leave Scripture out too.

Cause what you are doing takes the Lord's name in vain more than my language.

The word vain means empty. And your hollow cackling is empty. My expressions are raw, honest emotions from within--the reality that the life of a follower of Jesus is not peaches and cream.

I don't give a rat's ass about your eyes bulging out and your jaw gaping when you hear the adjectives and expressions that come from within my heart. I'm letting the impurities rise to the surface--not veiling them in some societally or church-induced etiquette.

You see, I have decided to be a transparent follower of Jesus. And when you blurb out your "out of the heart the mouth speaks" scriptures about my language, you are just scratching the surface of truth.

The only thing you are able to recognize from that is that there is something going on with me.

And that's as far as you can go.

What you can't put your finger on, what you simply know is "something", is called poison.

There is poison in my heart.

And you have no clue, Body, what to do with this.

My transparency about the poison makes you uncomfortable.

You're more concerned with my choice of adjectives than you are with the anguish and the shit I'm enduring in this farce called life.

And so in these moments of discomfort you kneejerk.

When the kneejerk happens, out come the cliches, platitudes and scriptures.

Out comes your lemonade comment, that infinite pearl of effing wisdom.



For a long time I made the mistake of remaining in contact with local wounders of the heart.

I was stupid enough to think "maybe they'll come around, maybe they'll get it".

Survey says?

Ehhhh!!

One friend, who is an exception to this circus ministry, has a theory about what's going on.

He says "you know, I think there is a religious spirit that follows you around, and he hops on whoever it is you're talking to."

I think he's right. As time goes on, man do I think he's dead on about this.

Cause I have no problem telling a demon to fuck off, and that's exactly what I've felt like saying time and time and time again.

That and I've also thought of saying "you're joking, right? You can't be serious. I mean, you're a Christian for Christ's sake, and THAT is what you have to say?"

Maybe I should stop being so "nice" to people, and be transparent not only about what is going on in "life" but also about the glaring and excruciating shallowness of most of the Body.

I've resigned that any noticeable percentage of the Body is going to learn how to deal with real life issues of those around them who hurt.

I will be the guinea pig of blind stabs in the dark no more.

thin shell of truth around a big fat lie

I read something a few weeks ago that both saddened me and fired me up. (That's pretty much most things in life.)

It was a cutesy little saying, complete with a picture of a diaper-wearing baby...used as a prop to try and innocent-ify and justify the lie in the words.

The phrase was "smile even when you're sad, cause you never know when someone is going to fall in love with your smile".

Hey Charlie, got news for you, when I'm sad that means something in life is ripping the fuck out of my heart.

That means I've got anguish and turmoil going on.

And you're telling me to ignore my heart?

You're part of the mask crowd.

You want a smile, when someone is going through shit.

Hmmmm. This is why it is said "man looks at the outside, but God looks at the heart".

You, Mr./Mrs. Christian, are telling others the outside is what counts.

Why are you, who do this and claim Jesus, encouraging people to live a lie?

Doing all they can to make others think they are what they are not.

Not in terms of their beliefs, but rather in terms of their heart.

Some use the name of God and/or Jesus to justify forcing a "happy veil" upon themselves. And others.

May it somehow sink in that God is zero percent into facade and fakery.

He knows the condition of our mind and emotions. Our hearts.

Why, then, spend wasted time trying to convince yourself (and God, and others) that your heart is A when God clearly knows it's B?

God is more honest about your heart than you are.

And there are others who pick up on it too.

Wonder if it's ever crossed the mind that even nonbelievers can see through the pretending. That they can see through the charade though not as "spiritual".

Their skepticism, I think, is welcomed by God. They have a nose for the Truth...they just don't know it. Don't care to know it cause they're turned off by what they're seeing.

And God appreciates that.

Jesus very plainly says "you will know them by their fruit".

Have we paused to ponder that we're known by our fruit too...

You see, in the attempt to be sweet and compassionate and positive (and in this case, cutesy about someone's damaging experiences), what is really happening is their heart is being steamrolled.

When someone is hurting, or bludgeoned, why try to inject your happy-clappy b.s. into them?

That's exactly what the cutesy little statement says: ignore the reality of the heart, and "be happy".

How callous, you who claim to have the compassion of Jesus.

How self-centered, you who don't want your positive little world disrupted by others' pain.

Do you know not know (y)our Savior is the Man of Sorrows?

I know. That doesn't fit the bill of your Sunday morning, riled-up, rah-rah portrait of Jesus.

You go on, now.

Keep doing your Jesus-frenzy b.s..

I'm going to sit over here with some folks.

A girl whose heart is being ripped in two by a broken home.

A heavyset lad who gets the 'fatty' business at school.

A lady who just lost her daughter in a car accident.

A man who just became a paraplegic while riding a motorcycle.

A man whose wife left him for an old high school boyfriend.

A girl who just became pregnant.

A guy who just lost his job and has five mouths to feed.

A lady just diagnosed with serious cancer.

I have no idea what to say.

I hope I don't say a word. I hope I'm at a total loss.

What I pray happens is that the Holy Spirit falls down, and as a result God allows my mind and heart to literally feel what His heart is about their situation.

If this takes place there will be a lot of tears shed.

There will be no "how is your prayer time and Bible reading" interrogation.

Why not?

Cause Jesus knows suffering.

Cause not everything Jesus does centers around black and white ink.

Cause there's a time to mourn and a time to dance.

Life is not all about dancing.

Please quit acting like it is.

Please.

There will be plenty of time for dancing in eternity.

For now, why don't we care about people's lives, WITHOUT pouring out Christianese hollowness left and right out of our mouths?


Start looking at the fruit.

Get on the same page as Jesus.

It's not a place filled with pleasantries.

Or velvet-pillowed pews.


It's going to stink.

There is no glamour in getting knee, waist or neck high in the vulture vomit of life.

The world doesn't give recognition or medals for this.

The more anonymity the better.


This is a far cry from what is comfortable for Christians.

Many are content with the "fall in love with a smile" quote at the beginning, not getting down into hell with someone in pain.

if you like, just keep singing "if you're happy and you know it, clap your hands" with the 3-year olds in Vacation Bible School.

Teaching them at an early age to wear the mask...

Getting them well-trained to later in life be part of the "Bless God, brother, doing fine, God is good all the time" crowd.

Who cares if people are drowning in the vomit of life.


It's hard to find those who embrace raw honesty.

It's hard to find those who have compassion stemming from God himself.

Particularly in church.

Why don't we break the mold, and become this for people?

Not by our own doing. But let's hit the Throne and ask God to shatter our paradigms.

Ask Him to show us a new way.

One that does not lead to death.

today's misc

For some time now (as if it's any small secret) I have had a growing uneasiness within the Body.

A look around seems to reflect a baby-fied Body. As if we're to live tiptoe-on-eggshell lives (toward each other and toward those not of the Way).

Any message communicated is supposed to be positive, and warm, and cozy, and encouraging, and uplifting, and edifying, and...aren't we all familiar wtih this?

Earlier today I read Ezekiel 16.

Wow, was that ever refreshing. God told His own how He had taken them at birth, writhing in the blood of their own afterbirth, and cleaned them up. As they grew, God himself adorned them with clothes and other things of His. Because of this, they had grown into something of great value and beauty. They were "blessed" (God, I hate that word).

As time wore on, they used this God-given beauty for self-indulgent ends, spitting on God and going to such lengths with the indulgence that even ungodly people were cleaner in God's eyes than them.

What did God do? Say "Oh, it's okay, just return to Me and I'll bless you. It's okay. You're still young and growing. I am patient, I am kind. I am tender and merciful"?

No.

Did God whip out a "I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, to bless you...to give you a hope and a future"?

Sort of. First He said they were going to reap what they had sown. In saying this, God was not reserved, had no hidden meanings in describing what the reaping was going to be.

It was graphic. And dismal. And fierce. And deadly.

God pulled no bones about it.

He didn't sugar coat what He said.

He was straight up. And angry.

There would be reconciliation afterward. At that later time God would extend a covenant to them and they would know that He is the Lord.

When God puts someone on their back, He leaves little doubt.

I know this, for I have lived it.

And am still living it.

I drifted from Him, and it grew from nonchalance into bedrocked, calcfied, stiff-necked apostasy.

To the point I told Him I thought I'd gone past the point of no return.

That based on my own assessment of my heart, and what I was living, that I had absolutely no desire, no drive, no fire, no whatever to intercourse with Him anymore.

My neck was stiff. And I knew it.

And I was honest with God that it was stiff. Unbending.

I mean, duh, He knew it, but what does a parent do when their child says "I've run away, and I don't figure you want me back. I have no intention of coming back.

There's no point to your keeping a spot open for me at the dinner table. I don't belong. I don't desire to come back. I admire the family, always will, but from a distance.

I don't fit in, so why don't you just cut your losses? Don't concern yourself anymore. I was part of the family, but I'm not around amymore. Haven't been for years. Postcards are fine, but we're pretty much past much else."

That's in a nutshell what I told God.

I had no interest in His ways. Not to the point of being willing to forsake what I'd become bedrocked in.

Want to send a postcard or letter? Fine.

Want me to come back? Thanks for offering, but no thanks.

Let's just call it a draw. Y'all go do your thing, I'll do mine.


I was content to be lost. That's all there was to it.

I was living Ezekiel 16.

Taken something God had authored and used it for self-indulgence to the hilt. No rules. Full steam ahead.

I have been on the business end of God's anger, and it ain't pretty.

It laid my entire being out on my back.

Naked. Exposed. Shamed.

Stung. Chafed. Smitten. Raw.

These words are a joke. They don't even begin.

But here is the nugget amidst it all.

Amidst the marrow-piercing anguish? Love.

It doesn't matter what face God is showing us at any given moment.

Underneath the face, whatever it may be, at the core: love.

I know Ezekiel 16.

I know what it is to reap. I know what it is to be the object of God's anger.

But even in the most godless moments of my life there has been honest communication with Him.

The conversation above, I really had with Him. Thought I was past the point of no return, so why bother?

He bothered because of His love. Not His anger.

The face was anger, but c'mon, pleading for blind mercy when I purposely and defiantly shit in His face for years?

Sure He's merciful. But He's also just.

Which is it?

The answer is yes.

Just like Ezekiel 16.

Not far into the come-to-Jesus party (literally), a friend shared with me a similar passage to the one in Ezekiel.

This one also describes my situation, and God, to a T.

"Fear not, for you shall not be ashamed; neither be confounded and depressed, for you shall not be put to shame. For you shall forget the shame of your youth, and you shall not [seriously] remember the reproach of your widowhood any more. For your Maker is your Husband--the Lord of hosts is His name--and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer; the God of the whole earth He is called. For the Lord has called you like a woman forsaken, grieved in spirit, and heartsore--even a wife [wooed and won] in youth, when she is [later] refused and scorned, says your God. 'For a brief moment I forsook you, but with great compassion and mercy I will gather you [to Me] again. In a little burst of wrath I hid My face from you for a moment, but with age-enduring love and kindness I will have compassion and mercy on you, says the Lord, your Redeemer.'"
(Isaiah 54, Amplified Bible)

So that's part of my story, folks.

I didn't write this post for any particular reason.

If you've read any of my back posts, you don't have to go far to see me scald the Positive Gospel and all the creampuff Christianity b.s. going around.

I've been smitten by God, my father. And I'm better for it.

Don't understand why this gets such a bad rap from people.

Sure it's going to hurt like hell. But do you just want to eat baby food forever?

Selah

Brillo

A brillo pad against the skin,
A hollow emptiness within,
Striking strong a foreign chord,
Polar from the healing Lord.

Ministry this cannot be--
Binding, when I should be free
To loose my heart and all within
And have the healing start again.

Healing softly touches wounds
And vanquishes the discord sounds
That smartly grate the spirit’s jewel
And leave red marks of rat-tailed towel.

Jagged glass and cuts abound.
Blinds and thickened scales around.
The toro signal strong and clear--
Water will not come from here.

amazing...

Took this photo myself this past weekend.


What a marketing ploy.

What a con job.

What a hoodwink.


What a crock of kimshi.

creampuff bullshit

Garbage by any other name is still garbage.

God is man

let's go ahead and admit it, why don't we?

We are gods.

We give the one true God lip service.

We have too many options.

We can do things ourselves.

We are so smart.

We are so advanced.

We have so much technology.

Who effing cares about what Jesus says.

Who effing cares about what God's illustrated in His book.

God works through man.

We "trust God to work through man".

We look to ourselves to inspire each other.

We look to each other for "encouragement".

We are who "bless" each other.

We heal ourselves.

Take a hike, God. We got it figured out.

We've seen what You've done, but we can do better because we have Power Point, and electricity, and knowledge, and experience, and "wisdom".

And education.

"Education is the key to the future". (Along with information, and "awareness", and "diversity")

All we need You for is to help us from hurricanes hitting us real hard again (where were You last year, by the way?), oh and please don't let the stock market go down. In Jesus' name, Amen.

We got the rest, thanks for offering though.

See ya!

I mean, Ya!

teach them young

to separate human wisdom from godly wisdom.

just the main dish, no side items please

I do not "keep up" with any Christian media of any kind. I have no interest in who the "in" or "rising" people are.

The American Body has its own version of this (as mainstream culture does), and I wholeheartedly couldn't care any less about either one of them.

And there's even more craw in my jaw about the Body doing this shit, cause the Man tells His folks not to show favoritism and they do it anyway. (And they laughingly excuse and "justify" themselves about this when called on the carpet about it.)

Whenever I browse around to read or hear other stuff, I usually have to sit through a marketing or favoritism plug (usually both) before getting to the meat of what I went there for in the first place.

A few weeks ago a friend of mine gave me a CD that had a great talk on it. First, though, I had to wade through 12 minutes and 43 seconds of some introductory guy going through all this other shit.

Yeah, and he was doing it in the stereotypical soft, little, dainty, Mickey-Mouse, "positive", warm, "inspiring", nice-guy Christian tone of voice.

When I go to any website (excluding most blogs) to see what other Followers, churches or people are doing, there HAS to be a Store or Shopping Cart option, doesn't there?

And some of the crap I see on these sites is worse than Shopping Network trinkets...by a long shot.

This being said, there are some of the folks I've gone to check out on the recommendations of friends who are solid. And some of them grate.

If they have any showmanship or false eloquence woven into their words or their tone, I'm outta there. Turn the knob. Click the back button. See ya.

I don't need to be "sold" on the Way. I'm in it. So just say what you're going to say, without putting any of your own pizzazzle in it, and let the Holy Spirit do with it what only He is to do--make something of it.

There is this permeating thought in the Body that we (humans) are to have anything to do with impacting people.

We're not.

To think we have a part in any message or event or whatever "moving" anyone, I think, is to err.

The more I look around what is going on in the Body there seems to be a swarm of "ooh, let me inject all this snazzy, societal stuff into Christianity, and then watch God do something with it."

To do this is to not even be in the same ballpark.

I hate seeing human thinking woven into things pertaining to God. Let God author it, otherwise don't do the damn thing.

Quit thinking I need to be convinced of anything.

And quit weaving human energy, human pizzazz and human 'wisdom' into Body stuff.

Let God be God.

What a freakin' concept.

blessing

I do not want to be (circumstantially) blessed.

Blessing loosens this tenacious grip on the spicket of living Water.


Blessing brings distance and separation.

And self-reliance.

Blessing gives the false illusion that I am creeping back onto the throne.

That life is to go as I tell the Man.


I do not want to be apart from Jesus.

I wish to consume him.

With no ketchup.


Besides, I'm already blessed.

It's just not in the way churchianity thinks...

groupthink

I'll never forget a class I took in college. Dr. Conrad, Tues/Thursday morning.

One of the things we talked about in class was a concept called "groupthink". I've never forgotten it, but had not thought of it in years.

In the last few months I've dusted the cobwebs off of it, for it seems to be alive and well. It's alive, I think, in American society and also within Churchianity.

I'm not much of a list person, lists have grown to grate against me, but I found this quite interesting above that grating.

Bear in mind, also, groupthink is a term developed in corporate America, so it's not saying it's a 'perfect fit' in every respect to the Body. In a general sense it does cause the eyebrows to raise...

GROUPTHINK

conditions leading to groupthink:

• low hope of a better solution than the one offered by the leader(s)

• high group cohesiveness

• the persuasive strength of the group's leader


symptoms of groupthink:

• illusion of invulnerability

• unquestioned belief in the inherent morality of the group

• collective rationalization of group's decisions

• shared stereotypes of outgroup, particularly opponents

• self-censorship; members withhold criticisms

• illusion of unanimity (false consensus)

• direct pressure on dissenters to conform

• self-appointed "mindguards" protect the group from negative information

throw and pierce

Throw your darts, Jesus.

They pierce the hearts of the King's enemies.

Your arrows are sharp.

Secure your sword on your thigh.

Ride on.

We know what the scepter of your Kingdom is.

one way or the other

God is going to show you that happiness is not what He's all about.

You are living your life fixated on that God-forsaken "h" word...and steamrolling hearts in the process.

With yourself on the throne of your own life, you live, act and breathe with every step toward perpetuating yourself as a god.

You wish to be God for yourself, and you wish to be a god to those around you.

Go ahead. You think there is an unlimited length rope on your life that God will never take up the slack on. "He'll never ever take up the slack on me. He is love. He is mercy. He is lovingkindness. He is forgiveness."

What a shame you are putting the cart before the horse. That book of His you swear some feign of loose (or zealous) allegiance to? Hmmm, let's see:


• God does not hear those who embrace and savor wickedness in their heart.

• The Lord is far from the wicked but hears those who are in good standing with Him.

• Any who is turning His ear away from what God is saying to them personally, their prayers are a stench to God.

• Those who implore God for help He hides his eyes from. They pray many, many times, but God doesn't hear because their hands are full of blood.

• God doesn't listen to those headstrong in wickedness.

• Those who ask God for things based on selfish or wicked motives will not get what they ask. The intention of the desires is to spend the "answered prayer" for sensual purposes and desires.


Let this sink in. Turn off the TV, get rid of all external noise and let this sink to the deepest marrow.

What's gonna come of this?

Are you going to keep playing the mask-game with other people, putting on a show to the world that you are what you are not?

"One word of rebuke to someone wise does more than a hundred lashes to the back of a fool."

Are you going to keep playing this game of imbeciles, doing well so far at fooling the world when in reality you're selfish, headstrong and out of control with your prayers and your desires? You couldn't be farther off His map than you are.

Boy, have you got a hard dose of reality forthcoming.

You think there's nothing that will keep you from continuing to laugh all the way to the physical and emotional bank.

Be blind. It is going to be a smack of shit when those scales are removed and life as you think God wants it perpetually for you gets shredded...by Him.

God is trying to love you out of who you are now.

When that fails He'll do it the hard way.

Wear all the Christian jewelry you want. God doesn't see it.

Babble all the prayers and society-induced Christianese slang out of your mouth you want. God doesn't hear it.

cup

"for I am already being poured out like a drink offering"

Interesting how seldom we speak to each other along these terms when "life" (small "l") brings what can subsequently spawn maturity.

There seems to be much obsession with eggshell-walking when hardship and trials are afoot.

And yet, the most powerful thing I've heard spoken in the midst of life's torrent is:

"when is any Christian going to come up to you and say, 'you know, you are being poured out like a drink offering. Crushed and pressed, just like a grape for wine'?"

This statement stirred me at a very deep root level, and even in the midst of embracing it I am still digesting it.

It pricks me, and stirs something mysterious yet powerful within, which I'm not tasting all of yet.

It's the kind of thing which impacts the paradigm about an entire season of life.

Or would that be life from here forward, period?

I just read last night when two were speaking with Jesus, and the subject arose they wished to be seated next to him in the next Life.

Jesus said "You don't know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup I drink or be baptized with the baptism I am baptized with?"

When do we talk about drinking our bitter cup, so that we can "know Jesus, and the fellowship of his suffering, as to be continually transformed into his likeness, even unto death"?

What do we think our bitter cup is?

Disappointment that sister Betty Sue didn't make her special broccoli rice casserole at the latest church potluck?

Wonder as to why the church bought a new video projector instead of cushions for the metal fold out chairs in fellowship hall, which are always so cold and uncomfortable?

Disgust that we missed the latest episode of our favorite tv show?

Lament that the store was sold out of the latest gadget we wanted to buy for ourselves or someone else?

Tears from living beyond our means, and subsequently our resolve to keep up with the Joneses in some form or fashion is being eaten away?

Outcry at having to wait fifteen extra minutes before our hairdresser can get to us, because the person before us was late?

The list goes on...and on...and on.

Do we even know what bitter is?

Do we drink it when offered to us, that we might actually start to become like the guy we speak all warm and positively of, Jesus? (gasp)

"That I may know Jesus, and that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His resurrection [which it exerts over believers], and that I may so share His sufferings as to be continually transformed [in spirit into His likeness even] to His death" (third notch of Phillipians).

This explains a lot.

I've been silently pondering for some time how much this has become a gospel of words and debate and posturing. Posturing, not power...

Dead-raising power ebbs into oblivion, cause we don't want to go through the same sufferings Jesus went through.

I wonder at what point he quit being the Man of Sorrows.

Or, better asked, at what point did the Body stop acknowledging him the Man of Sorrows?

We won't see power unless we take the bitter cup...

And drink.

When we we are the most empty and the least "ourselves", that is the point when power beyond our comprehension can be birthed.

Jesus says "My power is made perfect in your weakness".

So while we waste days and time and lives and energy seeking for the Ward and June Cleaver life, there's a guy who watches, eager to see if we're going to let our guard down.

See if we're going to quit playing the "I've got it together", "I'm blessed" facade game.

See if we're going to dare to actually and literally follow.

See if we would defy all human sense and propriety and talk to Him about what our own bitter cup might be.

See if we'd be willing to drink it.

See if we're willing to abandon ourself.

See if we're willing to cut bait.

See if we will embrace bitter, instead of command it out of our life in Jesus' name.

See if we're willing to die.

It is here when "the kingdom of God is near".

Do we even care?

Dare we let the shackles be removed. They're uncomfortable, yet largely not enough to matter.

And so we continue to be bats of Grombiton. Staring at the ground, wondering what the hell we have wings for, and never looking up to heaven.

antiwisdom

• any of us bent on saving our life will lose it

• through abandoning our life it can be found

• jaw-dropping power through weakness

• life via death

• teachers of God's Law (principles) lead others to become double sons of hell

• recognition comes through humility (not promotion or marketing)

• healing by spit

• be anonymous and you'll be the most recognized

• two swords is sufficient weaponry for a kingdom. A very powerful one at that.

• following a set of rules/principles/codes accomplishes nothing

• God's kingdom can't be found by carefully watching for it

• 20/20 vision doesn't mean one can see. In fact, there's a good chance one can't.

• don't let anyone know about the good being done. This is the great way.

• some insane-sounding dude offers you a trade. He says he wants your crap, your garbage, your pain, your sickness. That scum that's calcified at the bottom of the septic tank of your life for years? He wants that shit, literally. And in return offers a backpack so light it can hardly be felt. You think there've been some lousy stock market trades over the years? None of them is as lousy or crazy as this dude, who actually wants the stock that's tanked, drained and bankrupted us. He wants our shit stock (and it's not because he's selling short).

• success means being broken, crushed and poured out

• staunch rule-abiding is just as strong (or even stronger) a stench to God as loose living

• a camel passes through the eye of a needle easier than a rich man enters into God's kingdom. No, really.

• true wisdom and real life are foolishness to the human race (which we're a part of)

others?

the facade of fortune and blessing

"When the Lord shall restore the fortunes of His people, then Jacob shall rejoice and Israel shall be glad." (Psalm 14)

How many of us spend time and energy trying to artificially create and restore our own fortunes and the fortunes of other people?

How often is this veiled behind "encouragement" and other emotionally whored words?

How many among us are prophets?

Has God told us about the fortunes of others among us?

Would you care to elaborate on the vague and arbitrary term "things will get better"?

Sounds so wise, doesn't it? So comforting. So encouraging. So uplifting. So inspiring.

I can read that shit in a fortune cookie insert, or on an astrology website.

Or hear it in a sermon.

today's thought

Too many people, I think, throw pearls before pigs.

So much trampling.

So much pain.

So much bludgeoning.

So unnecessary.

the path

Imagine if everything you've ever learned and been taught, for years and years, your whole life even, turned out to be a big fat lie.

From your farthest back recollection of words, what you've been told (and are still largely being told) is the truth...is not.

Imagine grappling with the idea that you have been hoodwinked by the hoodwink above all other hoodwinks.

And what turns up is that none of what you see or know is actually true.

While this takes place, the things you've regarded most valuable are ripped or stolen from you, and take chunks of flesh as the ripping occurs.

As you begin to discuss this with other people, it's as if you're talking Greek, or Chinese, or whatever colloqialism stands for the deer in the headlights look.

But wait, some people only give you blank stares. This is only partially frustrating and annoying.

The real kicker comes when people start telling you that what you're experiencing is not real.

Well, some tell you it's not real. Others tell you to ignore it.

not what you hear today

You are considered blessed by God (spiritually, not physically or circumstantially) when your spirit is broken and you are poor.

When you are emptied, when you are done, when you are beyond bleeding.

When there is no pulse. When there is no heartbeat.

When you are dead.

This is when you are blessed by God.

the selfish blind

One of the things I thought of earlier today..

PMA "believers" are self-centered and narcissistic.

Any time you hear someone say "let Jesus lift you up out of your circumstances" what they are really saying is:

"Oh, no. The circumstance you have just told me about is not positive. It contradicts my paradigm about life, that everything is to be positive and blessed, which is as God wants it. Surely this negative, unpleasant thing is something Jesus wants to remove or replace with something positive, so let Him do so. Your situation brings discomfort to me, so help me out here by letting this become something else."

Someone else's pain, someone else's hurt, someone else's shithole, someone else's train wreck would dare to ruffle a PMA idiot's perfect little world they are trying to cocoon themselves into.

But it doesn't stop here! They selfishly go around spitting their positive-cocoon mucus on other people to try and spin the same protectionism for them.

So break out the name of Jesus, to take people out of circumstances God is using to break and bring death within them.

It's the "let Jesus lift you" approach, or otherwise it's "rebuke satan out of your circumstances" mode.

The sad thing is the percentage of people who fall for this garbage, or are too "nice" to put their foot down on this bullshit.

If there was ever a definition of barking up the wrong tree, or poking things with a stick, or taking blind stabs in the dark, God's "finest" are at it around the clock, courtesy of one of the most popular gospels in the Body, the PMA Gospel.

And to call this for what it is is like a fish fighting against water.

unceremoniously beautiful

This is one of the most beautiful things I have read.

It's beautiful in its simplicity.

It's beautiful in its non-glamour.

At its essence it is the Way.


And it does not surprise at all the Body is wrought with excusitis about doing what Jesus says his followers will do.

I wonder what most Churchians think the Way is.

"reading the Word"? "praying"? "worshipping the Lord"?

From what I'm seeing, a slew of people think these things are the Way.

The Way seems to largely (exclusively?) be about building ourselves up "in the faith".

Survey says?

Bullshit!

This self-absorbing crock has got to go.

This story shouts reinforcement that churchianity is about gain, increase and attainment, while the Way is release, divestment and giving.

I think the gal who wrote this post about Haiti is overly conciliatory and gracious to excuse-making "Christians". Much more so than Jesus himself.

From what I'm unlearning (and learning anew) about Jesus, I think He scathes the sloughing of this lackadaisacal excusitis out of the mouth.

Not everyone is "led" to Haiti. Yet I see Jesus being more like this:

J: "okay, not to Haiti, fine. What are you doing?"

person: "um, I've been in the Word a lot more recently."

J: "uh huh."

person: "And I've been praying a lot more. You know, talking to Father. He's really been blessing me a lot. I've been telling Him how thankful I am."

J: "mm hmm."

person: "Worship has been so meaningful lately. I've really been experiencing God! It's been so awesome! He is so awesome!"

J: "yeah. What are you doing?"

person: "I'm growing in the Lord."

Do you think at this point Jesus'd just shake His head while saying "depart from Me"?

Think He'd light into them like He does the 'learned' God-people who claim to know God yet hem-haw about tangibly helping anyone?

Think He'd take their day-planner, which would show Him how 'busy' they are, and rip it in pieces?

Or would He just glance down at their day-planner for a few seconds, then look them in the eye for a few more, then walk away and say nothing?

Would He bend down and scribble something in the sand?

Something else?


There's no glamour in the beauty of the Haiti visit. There are no kudos from society (except for feel-good blurbs on the news if the trip was at Thanksgiving or Christmas).

I think about how many people in the city I live in go to church, and then on the heels of that wonder how many unvisited people are in hospitals and reclused in their homes today, tomorrow...

I wonder how many people in this city go to bed hungry each night.


Anyway, this story from Haiti is so beautiful.

Churchianity is so ugly.

And I don't think Jesus is resonantly quiet about it.

the Comfort Gospel

It is somewhat mind boggling (and somewhat not) how obsessed the Body is with comfort and convenience as it pertains to the Way.

It is very common to see churches state things such as "if there's anything we can do to make your visit with us more enjoyable (or comfortable, or pleasant, etc), please let us know".

Whatever they can message to market their church, their members or their environment as cozy and appeasing, they do.

I can't remember the last time I saw a handout or website that didn't shout this from the roof tops.

I don't see Jesus saying anything about comfort or convenience.

On the other hand I see where He went up on a mountain, and the lame and crippled had to somehow get up the mountain to be with Him. Interesting how they were healed up there.

Someone close to me is so obsessed with comfort at the moment that it might end up killing them, literally, within the next six to twelve months.

i really don't understand this whole comfort thing.

today's thought

Susie, you raised a good one.

He is blood with my blood, and spirit with my spirit.

He is plugged into the Vine.

And from the Vine is Life.

Regarding me, he has done what few would do and what none others have done.

He's your son. He's my brother.

And so I'm thinking of you today.


"A friend loves at all times, and is born, as is a brother, for adversity"
Proverbs 17:17

bears, part II

So, we talked about bears. What they truly are, versus what they are perceived to be in artificial and skewed environments.

That’s too bad.

But wait! Here comes mankind!

Mankind has put their own spin, their own twist, to help understand and gain knowledge about what bears are.

Unfortunately, not everyone pitched in on mankind’s portrayal of bears.

And so we’re left with this picture. It is what mankind has determined bears are.

Some folks are/were disinterested, or dispassionate, or dis-something talking about bears.

Therefore, what you see here is what you're supposed to get.

Notice the contrast between the previous post’s bear and the one here.

The bear in the previous post was ferocious, beautiful and terrible.

Bears, as mankind has ended up portraying them, are sweet and precious and soft and wonderful and warm and loving and forgiving and embraceable and approachable and cuddly and fuzzy and soft and nonviolent and passive and…

Bears as humans describe them are not fierce, or imposing, or terrible, or passionate, or any of the powerful qualities quite noticeable about real bears.

Bears are never portrayed as bloody or bold.

Or crucified.

They’re portrayed as pristine, and perfect, in an exclusively warm fuzzy kind of way.

So we are now in a quandary.

Bears are what they are, yet most of the ways humans see and perceive and talk about bears is strangely different.

They’re misconstrued by how they’re viewed through artificial environments and media.

And they’re misconstrued by how mankind has decided to portray them.

These are sad portrayals of bears. And yet so few know (or care about?) the difference.

Very few travel to where bears can be seen as they are. To do so is dangerous, unpredictable.

Some would even say unsafe.

Very few people pursue anything up that alley.

It’s much safer, simpler and more stable to stick with the cuddly, warm, safe (and skewed) concept of bears.

And yet there remain other folks.

Some forage into the unknown, outside of buildings, away from what society has handed and told them, regardless of what they’ve heard or previously experienced with bears.

Some zoo goers or bear watchers encounter a series of life events which leads to conflict. They know what they’ve been told about bears, but something just does not resonate.

This generally happens when folks find themselves in the wilderness.

Not by their choice, of course. They’d lived a life of the cuddly variety, and rather enjoyed seeing and viewing bears this way.

Interestingly, those who are in the wild are still able to communicate with those who go to teddy bear shops, watch cuddly bear cartoons, listen to cutesy bear radio, and/or sit around talking about how cuddly and sweet bears are.

The conversations are quite awkward.

It's not that baby bears don't have the docile characteristics, but is that all bears are?

bears

Bears are ferocious, beautiful and terrible all at the same time.

This is a bear.

We rarely see them outside of zoos or on a movie or TV screen, yet seeing them this way is not to see them as they are.

To see them reduced, entrapped or sedated is not getting a real sense or real picture of bears.

When we see them in a watered-down, artificial environment we have a distorted concept of the nature and personality of bears. We humans largely see bears in a skewed and safe environment.

Because of this, we feel we are superior to bears. We have this snubby, prideful sense of dominance over them.

We attribute this to our profound intellect, and mankind's ability to use logic and invention and technology to gain the upper hand over bears.

If we were to encounter bears as they truly are, in a real (not artificialized) environment, and without the trappings of technology and man-made stuff, we would have a much different view of bears.

Our view of bears is warped by the trappings of "civilized" society.

We don't need bears.

They are not part of our daily life. We are immunized from their existence/impact upon us.

They may be ferocious and terrible, but we don't have to be concerned about that.

the same yesterday, today and forever

Last weekend my four year-old and I went to the mall.

We found a spot near the store we were to go in, and she climbed up through the front seat to get out of my driver door.

Things were going as usual, and as I began to close the door behind her for some unknown reason she hesitated from her gait toward the back of the car.

The next second and a half went by in slow motion.

As I saw the hesitation, my gaze was shifting from watching her to watching where the car door would close behind her. In the middle of the change of view, I heard the car door's "chunk" closing sound.

I simultaneously began to hear the cry as my eyes saw the driver door fully closed (no cracks or ajarness whatsoever) and my daughter's finger only partially visible outside the airtight, shut door.

I know it hurt like hell, and opened the door as soon as I could get to it.

I picked her up and then looked at her hand. It just so happened the side I saw first was the side the door had closed on (the non-palm side).

It was not bleeding, but the skin was heavily indented in a weird configuration. The skin was solidly compressed halfway through to the palm side of her hand in a quasi figure-8 shape, as if drawn by a two year-old. Kind of circular, but with other lines and shapes blended in.

I was amazed skin so deeply compressed that far through the finger was not bleeding.

The door had squished and imprinted this side, and though not bleeding it looked ugly, awkward...painful. There was no doubt from the wailing that it hurt immensely.

The palm side of the finger had a thin cut where the outermost phalange (?, section of finger) met the second phalange from the end. It was bleeding very slightly (on the surface, not dripping), the skin broken just enough to bring out the red stuff.

My heart then split in two directions.

Comforting my daughter as much as humanly and compassionately possible being one of them.

As for the other...there is a song I heard some months ago called Cry Out to Jesus. That's a very weak description of the fierceness and depth with which I called out to the Man about what had just happened.

I was humanly aware of the possibility of a broken finger, and I was keeping alert for the ongoing reactions of my daughter to see if that was a possibility to address.

At the same time, I was leaning on the Man as ferociously as I did when the rusty nail impaled my foot a few months ago, which I blogged about here.

I had picked my daughter up, and was holding her in one arm while my other arm both hugged her to me and also was cupped over her hand which she held close to her body.

My heart was laid out bare on her behalf.

For what must have been three solid minutes I must have simply called out for Jesus to help us, just saying it with my heart and lips over and over and over.

Initially we were by the car, and at some point during those few minutes we began to walk toward the mall as she continued to cry and as I continued to cry out to the Man.

As we neared the door to the mall and the crying started to subsist from wailing, I decided to check how the finger looked.

I was surprised, and not surprised.

The back (non-palm) side of her finger, the side which had been closer to the slamming door, where the skin had been compressed half way through toward her palm, was spotless.

No indentation whatsoever.

No redness. No swelling.

No marks of any kind.

No hint at all of the weird configuration the completely closed door had left on half of her left ring finger.

Her finger was as flesh-colored and normal appearing as all her fingers.

The mild cut on the palm side, along her phalange joint, was still cut but the blood was not oozing out. It was staying put, visible at the surface but not going anywhere.

My daughter was still crying, of course. We had stayed by my car until wail had subsided to cry, and even these several minutes later she was still crying and somewhat upset.

I knew that if the finger had been (or remained) broken that the pain would still be cause for a wail these several minutes later. And she would have repeatedly been saying "Daddy, my finger hurts, my finger hurts".

Her comments were about her finger having been caught in the door, not about continued pain.


It's very probable the mild cut on the palm side will heal completely and not scar at all.

I wish, though, that it would scar.

To be a lasting reminder of the Man's touch and compassion in that hour.

God and family

God does not look at family like Americans do.

Read something recently where a guy said part of his Personal Mission Statement (yeah, you can see where this is going real quick) he wishes to be a "Christian Family Man".

Buddy, you don't even know what you're saying.

What you meant to say is your ambition is to be a Family Man as somewhat moral Americans define Family Man.

You have no intention to be a Christian Family Man as Jesus talks about family.

To live as Jesus talks about family would shatter a lot of American churchianity "Christians".

Not many want to digest Jesus regarding family.

why

Some things just won't go away.

There is no shortage of rock-staresque preachers here and there. Some raising $20 million to fund a set of private jets (mission accomplished, by the way). Others soaking up the tv prestige of a "successful" ministry. (Ministry by whose standards?)

But wait, here comes a new Movement in the United States! It appears to be called Emergent, or the Emergent Church. People who have waxed tired and empty of traditional churchianity and all the dung of what is portrayed as the Way.

So what does one of the Emergents' more well-known guys do?

What else? He goes on a nationwide tour!

Going to the biggest cities with the brightest lights.

Charging $10 per head to come hear him talk.

He'll probably be introduced by popular Christians in each city's limelight: a local radio personality, a "big name" local preacher, etc.

When he's introduced the words will be full of praise and adoration and walk-on-water aura...about and for him.

They'll probably be selling t-shirts for $20 each. Long sleeve cotton tees will sell for $30.

The books he's written will be for sale.

• sigh •

The guy's got good things to say. Just why all this other stuff?

Some things just can't stop. I guess.

Even within this Emergent movement there is name-dropping, "in" people, etc.

"Have you read so-n-so's book?" "Did you hear so-n-so is going on tour?"

Is this just an American thing, that every group (even those who don't wish to be like other groups) thinks it must engage in this crap?

Societally-agnostic living.

Societally agnostic Following.

What a concept.

recent ponderings

why do Followers have any interest in material attainment, when the way to Life is to give one's self away?

why all the talk about providing or giving justice to the wronged, instead of becoming one with them in their brokenness?

why all the focus on growth and increase, instead of just going out and feeding some hungry folks less than three miles away?

why all the focus on blood, when family is not defined by blood?

why do Followers think things must always be getting better, or always positive, in life? They must have a different bible than I have. The one I read seems to have a lot of ebbing in life, even for those in God.

People who are like this must have really shallow faith. That must be why I get so steamed when they approach me to ask if my life is "better".

If our existence is gauged by our circumstances alone, then damn the irony of having less than ideal circumstances when we go around telling others we're "fine" all the time.

Sometimes circumstances are so strong that's all we can see. We don't care to hear about anything else. We don't care to be fake.

When life is like this, we crave the freedom to be transparent. And we hunger for others to be transparent as well.

We want to express what is really and rawly in our heart. We don't want restrictions or codes or guidelines put on us at times like this.

Some of us will even steer clear of those who aren't transparent in times like this.

••••••••

I've realized what some of the frustration from the past seven months has stemmed from. More on that later, in its own post.