Roadtripping with Girls

I went surfing on the weekend with a couple rad-core girls. Really they were just that... but I'm going to make fun of them a little bit regardless because, despite getting along rediculously well, girls and guys are always going to have their differences. Fortunately this time there were only three.

1.) They get hungry at different times.
Whenever i was hungry I felt bad gorging myself on snacks while they politely declined. Later, however, when i was not feeling hardly a tinge of hunger, they would say they were starved and b-line to the best restraunt in site. No obligations to that, i can be hungry any time required. I'm just noting that its wierd. Girls and guys are different.

2.) They aren't as decisive?
I don't know if this is actually a girl thing or not... but it seemed like decision making was done with a lot more deliberation and uncertainty. With guys, decisions are often made as follows:
Guy 1 "Hey, let's go light a bunch of big logs on fire"
Guys 3-5 "We're in"
Guy 2 "Ok fine"
Decision made.

Decision making with the girls:
Guy 1 "wanna eat food"
Girl 1 "ummmm... no not really"
Girl 2 "maybe"
Guy 1 "so later?"
Girl 1 "ummm maybe"
Girl 2 "umm... probably?"
Guy 1 "What does 'Probably?' mean?
Girl 2 "maybe?"
Guy 1 "I'm going to go light some logs on fire"

Girls and guys are different

3.) Girls don't think lighting giant logs on fire in the middle of the beach is cool.
A small fire is cool, but why not a big one? Trust us, if we wanted to flex our muscles by lifting large things infront of you we would have lifted things that looked more impressive than logs; like rocks or cars. Guys just like big fires, is that so wrong?

Girls and guys are different.

Wounds

The theme of love, of believing that God is truly a good God in a world suspended in greys and twilights is not one that has escaped my life experience, and perhaps its important that it hasn't. It is a human theme. We need love but people let us down. How can anyone truly love without fail? I know i can't, so it becomes as hard to fall in love as it becomes to accept love. Falling has always required trust and has never been safe. If you are left without arms to fall into too many times it becomes nearly impossible to trust again. But faith makes or breaks us. Unfortunately I think that a cold and embittered heart has become the preference for all too many people. Even  though I should understand love more than most people from my life experiences alone, i still struggle on this point. This is why it is important to be honest on this point. no one needs me telling them something that i have difficulty believing myself. I have to wonder about those people who seem to have blind faith. Seems terribly dangerous to me. Maybe stupid. Definitely weird. Although if thats you, then cool. Sit me down for coffee and tell me how its done. Meanwhile I fall in with the broken and hurt and imperfect and ungodly. Maybe more like the samaritan woman at the well than anyone else. I want to know. I want to believe. I need to believe, but we know that sometimes its hard. I can't see the sun for the daylight: can't see His breath for the wind. But this is what faith is. And if there's anyway for the devil himself to stop my service is for him to convince me of the absence of grace and love.  If only for this reason we need each other to help us see the light in the darkness... 

But I only meant this as an introduction to a few songs that I've crossed recently that I thought were quite beautiful and spoke on this -very human- topic. 

I've really come to enjoy "You Found Me" by The Fray.  Isaac Slade, the lead singer expressed the song meaning in the following words from two different interviews: 

"You Found Me" is a tough song for me. Its about the disappointment, the heart ache, the let down that comes with life. Sometimes you're let down, sometimes you're the one who lets someone else down. It gets hard to know who you can trust, who you can count on. This song came out of a tough time... It takes so much of my faith to keep believing, keep hoping in the unseen. Sometimes the tunnel has a light at the end, but usually they just look black as night. This song is about that feeling, and the hope that i still have, buried deep in my chest.

I kept getting these phone calls from home - tragedy after tragedy. If there is some kind of person in charge of this planet - are they sleeping? Smoking? Where are they? I just imagined running into God standing on a street corner like Bruce Springsteen, smoking a cigarette, and I'd have it out with him." 

I found God on the corner of 1st and Amistad

Where the West was all but won

All alone, smoking his last cigarette

I said, "where've you been?" He said,  "Ask anything."

Where were you, when everything was falling apart. 

All my days were spent by the tephone that never rang

And all i needed was a call that never came

To the corner of 1st and Amistad

Lost and insecure, You found me, you found me

Why'd you have to wait? Where were you? Where were you?

Just a little late, you found me, you found me. 

Another record I've been enjoying recently is one called "the Heat" by Need To Breathe. 

Their song "Again" painfully and beautifully paints the fear of falling in love. 

I won't leave you roses to watch them die. 

You won't be the heartache that keeps me sleepless

You won't be the songs that I could never write

I don't want to stay, I don't want to fall

I don't want to have to see you leave me. 

I don't want stay, I don't want to fall in love...

"Looks like love" resolves the conflict later on the album

Our hearts can only shake when there's risk that they could break.

Yea its a risk that I will take. 

Raise your head. Its time to say those words that I have left unsaid. 

I've slept through the sunrise and I turned away every time it got bright.

I won't run when it looks like love. 

I recently turned up a poem i wrote about a year ago and forgot about. 

We Think we're mortified

Or that we're petrified

We know we're lost inside

But what's we got to find?

Something deep within missed

That some say never did exist

We're all accidents down here

Explaining pain. Causing fear. 

All that's left of fallen gods

Of some lost kingdom long forgotten

And when the beauty of the light 

Comes contrasting to turn our heads

We'll close our eyes, The cut's too deep

To risk infection by a dirty sheet

Drawing the life that's left of me

Hanging it for the world to see

What have I become?

We'll stick to our own gun turret

Here that always kept us safe

It's like four walls closing in

But I'll hold my own, this blood soaked place

If "Help me now" escape my lips

Then my religion is lost

The only way to keep me safe

Is keeping this room locked

If hope should be found in me

If I could believe that light

Could ever shine unto me

Then show me now

You're in my sights. 

I just really wanted to share some song and verse but i guess if there was a point to this it might be this: that nobody wants to hear you say that they're a bad person or that you're better than them. But if you believe you are worth loving then you should believe that others are worth loving. If you know that you need love then wake up and realize that everybody feels the same thing. Show a little love eh?  

   

So this is the new Year

I was talking to a friend recently about how, when we both were younger, we thought we'd have done so much and come so far in life by the time we came to where we are now. But of course looking at our lives presently, we easily deducted that our lives and accomplishments have resembled nothing similar. Are there regrets to accompany this observation? No. Life is not what i thought it'd be by now when i was in high school, but I am glad that I have ended up where i am with the experiences i have nonetheless. Who thought things could be better than i imagined? 

It may sound either pie-in-the-sky philosophy or freethinking foolishness to say this but i will say it because i think it is something more: life has more to do with who you are than what you do. Certainly one effects the other, but I tend to think its the former which takes it effect on the latter rather than the contrary. 

This summer I met someone who asked me a question almost immediately upon our meeting. "Are you living the dream? Are you where you want to be- doing what you want to be doing- in life?"

That question might have come across as an awkward conversation opener in most settings, but in this case the friend who i've since learned is a career counselor, pastor and father was too well meaning and good humored for me to answer glibly. 

"you know what..." I answered, "I am. "

How good it felt to say that. 

There had been many times, especially in that previous year when i would have thought twice before answering a round-about no. This time I answered yes... and I think there's something significant there. 

I believe that God has made us. I believe that we are his creations whom he has chosen to extend unbelievable love to. And i think that if we see that and function as he designed us to in relationship to him that we will find ourselves "living the dream". This is what i mean when I say that who you are might president what you do. 

Simply, I think that seeing yourself as a child of God changes a lot of things. 

I don't know exactly where I'm headed in this journey... but I wouldn't ask to be elsewhere. Lately when people ask me what I'm up to, I answer, "I'm living the dream." 

Life may not always be as comfortable as it is right now, but I hope that i can, regardless of circumstances, always say that I am...

In Christ,

"living the dream."

 

We are the Dead

I decided to go to the Cenotaph for this Rememberance Day, but first I had to find out where it was. I searched online couldn't find an address or order of ceremony, but there was a map that pointed to its general location, so I used that as a start. After cruising around the area I decided that the map could have been wrong and started looking in another part of town. Giving up on that, I decided to pull into a coffee shop and look at one of their newspapers. Surely a local newspaper from the day before would provide information on where and when events would be held. 

Nope. So I decided to ask the Barista if she knew where the cenotaph was.

"The...?"

"The cenotaph"

This is awkward and she looks confused, she probably thinks the Cenotaph is some pagan temple or something... Let's try again,

"The memorial? The place where they have rememberance day stuff?"

"um... Kyla probably knows, I'll ask her..."

I wait while she gets her co-worker's attention

"This guy is looking for the..."

"The cenotaph"

"The ceno... ?"

"The place where they have the Rememberance day festivities. Well not festivities, more like a events or assembly or whatever, you know?"

"Rememberance day...?"

This is going no-where

Then a lady who looked like she was over 25, overhearing gave me directions. I thanked her (for the fact that she knew what I was talking about as well as for that she was able to help me be on my way). 

Half way there I pulled in behind the distinctive ford scored with firefighting logos that I knew belonged to the biggest war buff in school and the one person I would trust to be heading one place 10:30am on Nov 11.  I followed him the rest of the way and found He was glad that I came. He was there with his wife, brother and sister-in-law, so I wasn't suddenly so alone in my venture. 

Did you know that today was the 90th anniversary of the end of WWI? 90 years! A lifetime, that's it. Much less time spans us and WWII. The local roll call of those fallen was perhaps a dozen for WWI and some 30 or 40 for WWII. How many people lived in this cow town at the time? Not many... of which a dozen during WWI, 30 or 40 during WWII would have been a considerable percentage! There was also one fallen in Afghanistan, a silent reminder that war is far from extinction. 

The turn out wasn't much bigger than my home town which is a much smaller town, but that might be accountable to the fact that my home town has a far older populace. 

The cadets marched into the square. Usually I'm not a big fan of cadets, but today they looked in good form. The Mounties came next followed by the military. Mounties, as ridiculous as any non-Canadian may say they look are sure to always convey a sense of true Canadianism in me. These, with the military appear disciplined to a tee. They can't afford to fake it. The veterans walk in, amongst respectful clapping, bearing Flags that represent Canada, British Columbia, the United Nations, and some others I'd be slower to name: probably The RCAF and divisions like that. 

There's the anthem, the silence, the gun salute and the long recognitions as family members show their respects at the wreaths. 

"Why is it that i feel a need to go?" I asked myself as I was on my way there. It wasn't likely that many if any of my school associates would be attending.  I guess its because I've been raised to believe that it is important. And I do. I think its very important, and the day when I forget the 11th of November will be a bitter bitter irony indeed. 

LEST

WE 

Forget

thoughts (H:11:1)

Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. Never been easy to understand. But neither is our Creator who is worthy of all trust and faith. Closed eyes open to the providence in the dark that surrounds like a blanket all lost. And a pinhold of light breathes like hope through the canvas of our closed tight eyelides. Hope rises on horizon like endlessday forboding. And I, I with squint eyes now open break day with a grin. Love has come. Love has come. Love has come. And I'm ready to go home now. 

A walk in the woods

I make it a habit to go for a walk most mornings.  With much thankfulness I can say that I most always have somewhere enjoyable to walk. In my current estate it is a short trail that finds its way up the side of a small mountain as it bends away from a quiet road and a surging stream (in which, today, I saw my first salmon this year. Two of them, each some 20 inches long.)

It was a beautiful morning today. Accented by the fact that it had been raining with opression the day before, the sun cutting colors through the golden autumn leaves left an impression that only being there could render.  I stopped at a point where I could still see the road bending away below and still hear the rushing of the stream behind the birds and the forest's hum. My feet have stopped crunching leaves beneath them and in the thick stillness I see the trees growing up the decline below set as silhouettes against the relentless morning sun- whose beams lay stripes on the path and make my shadow dance quietly in the underbrush when I walk. The air is misty and dense. For the first time I notice that steam is rising off the moss growing on the trees below me, which had accumulated much moisture the day before and was now giving it back to the demand of a new day rising. 

Amazed with the lot of it I look upward and wonder at the golden yellow leaves that pattern the sky from their limbs and motherly trunks that set themselves far below on the ground beside me. 

"Like a crown." I think to myself.

"But not a spoiled and pompous crown that we think of ( so unfortunately) when we think of kingly. No. This crown is one that is too earthy in tone to assume more than it is. This maple dons a humble crown. Up there, existing in all its splendor, this maple knows that to think of itself more than a maple would only destroy the true glory that its simple existence allowed it. Such is humanity! So creation - so our lives."

And for a moment again I realize that being quiet and enjoying the Creators work is no less than he might have me do in this moment. Enjoy, breathe, learn. 

Why not?

I continue to walk again, only in time for another traveller on the trail to mostly miss seeing me gazing off into the air. As his dog approaches the owner makes a joke. 

"There ya go Fellah!"

Talking to his dog, 

"You can have him for breakfast!"

Talking about me. 

I laugh and give the canine a rub on the head before carrying on to greet his owner and pass by. Walking away I think to myself how much I liked the dog. 

Later I see a small bird that land and skirts around my near peripheral- enough to show his colors that would have been a blur in flight. Then he flies away. 

The morning sun is burning on into day and I am almost back to the place I currently call home. 

Hope, Love, Truth hold ground in me today. 

I know God loves me. But I don't need to know. I need love.

I was just sitting here on my couch listening to Jars' new recording of "Love song for a Savior" when a simple and profound thought struck me.  

Here i am, having been raised by an incredibly loving family in a relitavely supportive social structure. I've accepted God's love in my life, at least so I say. I'm at Bible college, have a bible, and have discovered that page after page spells love, and yet... 

Yet I have such a hard time accepting God's love. I know it I know it I know it.... than why don't I receive it? Ephesians 3:19 says that the love of Christ "surpasses knowledge" (niv).... well then why can't I believe it.  Its so important I know. my emotional, physical and spiritual self all scream for it. 

The message in church today was more or less about taking the love into the world. It was about showing God to a world who is caught in a great separation from God- from Truth. 

I have every reason to do this don't I? What is the thing that would hold me back? 

If the enemy wants to hold off the attack, what is an easier way to do it, to fight back, or to make his enemies question their cause? 

This was my thought: No wonder I have a problem receiving and believing God's love! What better place for the Enemy to target all of his arrows? 

In addition, what better way to infuriate God?

Where did i put that shield of faith? 

So How do we combat the lies? I'm sure there are many ways, but on a practical note I know God's love most presently and practically and real when another of the body of Christ shows Christlike love to me. There's nothing like it. Maybe there is more to be said for encouragement and love among comrades than I thought about before. 

Simple, but in my mind, profound. 

I put off lunch to write this. 

Love ya later,

mc

What would a smart person do?

Sometimes I get to thinking about the stupid things i did when i was younger, sometimes these things are laughable, and on a bad day depressing. But in any case, I was thinking recently about how it seems every year I think I've got it together-like "now I've arrived". 

Having realized that i seem to think this all the time and i still look back on my mistakes and groan at my ignorance leads me to ask one question (which i hope proves some increase in wisdom). The question is this: What stupid thing am i doing right now?!

Ok, so I'm sortof joking... because if i thought that way all the time I'd probably hide in my closet afraid to do anythings for risk that i will fail. But I think it is worth having friends around who can check you and kick you in the rear when you need it, 'cause sometimes it takes another party to see your stupidity just as it might take another party to see your success. 

Just a thought

from yours truly

Breakfast

As I ate my pancakes this morning,

I thought

In the nineteen eighties there was a big scare about

Bombs

That maybe

One would set the world ablaze with an apocalypse

(I lived in Canada

On a farm

And i think i remember the tv being on

And having military on screen

We didn't watch much tv

It might have been cuba

As my mother folded laundry

In the farmhouse)

I had Maple syrup on my pancakes today

I remember the scares

Terror

Death

Kids stay inside

I remember the turn of the century

Bunker down

They said

Even though nothing happened

Not to say that nothing has

They say that our society is consumeristic

It's probably more so than the history of mankind put together

But then again

We have technology

Improving moving

Plastics and oil. Computers and landfills.

I don't begrudge

It's just

I had maple syrup on my pancakes.

There are men that we are told to be afraid of

Or men that we're supposed to hate

Or races that we're supposed to dissengage with

Or sects who we disregard.

I'm not proposing much

Its just,

I had maple syrup this morning

Be careful or your frail body will fall victim to danger

Stay under the shelter of your knowledge

I hear the president has an "end the world now" button

In his office

And that the Pope has a direct phone line to God

I hear that DNA has been mapped by supercomputers

and that someone cloned a sheep

But I sit back

And have to laugh

Because i have maple syrup on my pancakes.

Here

Well, one way to make a change in the, sometimes horrific, world could be this. It seems to have worked before. Its something. Oh, and if you can't go to Washington D.C. you can digitally sign what i think to be an pretty darn good petition.
Easier on paper I'm sure, but i guess that not for us to complain... right?

hmmm... it seems like if injustice isn't staring you in the face, it's easier to disagree with but harder to punch out cold...

Thought i'd throw these out to those who potentially read here.

"Peace"

Rain Falling on a Battle Field

The Blood on my brow is washed to the ground
And the blood on my spear is forgotten
By a million tears

Pools on the ground reflect our image
And no one in time can explain the scrimmage
Emotions are washed as the thunderheads roll
And lightning flash lights all our faces exposed

The heavy warm rain weighs battle gear down
And one by one, pieces all fall to the ground
And bare chested men, exposed for their worth
Care not for their colors, which lay mingled with earth

Instead all washing their nakedness clean
Are united as one. No difference seen.

And as water quenches a dry tongue
Its invigoration gives life to breath
And one lifts his arms t'ward heaven
In the thundrous quietness

And everyone, they see
That they've all become the same
And that theres only now one army
In the rain

mc Jan/08

Hope Love Life...

The fact of the matter is that I should have crashed and burned a thousand times.

It was only the Grace of God that kept me on me feet and only the knowledge of which that gave me the will to keep standing.

I remember my mom saying that rebellion was a sin. I never really understood that. I thought of the punk rockers with their antiestablishment agendas and something in me desperately related with them. I remember one of the presidents of the United States being quoted as saying that a little bit of rebellion was a good thing once in a while. Stick it to the man! Don't conform. Don't be a pawn.

I think I might finally see what was really meant by the one who said that rebellion is a sin. I don't know, but I realize now in having being saved from myself a thousand times that I don't have anything to stand against. What is there left of me? That is, the me that was defined by myself. We call it pride.

I fall and I fall again and become subject to grace and slowly become by humility- that sweet revelation of seeing myself as I really am.

God said I was worth saving.

I'm worth something. I have to throw off everything I was caught up in about myself to see what that really is because surely this self-motivated pride stuff isn't it. That becomes humility and I begin to see myself as God sees me and I begin to realize that I'm worth more than I ever knew. I stop fighting as a rebel that feels helplessly disvalued by the world. I stop acting defensively knowing my own failures and realize that to continue- knowing what I know now- is pointless, prideful and rebellious. God has called me to something more. He has valued me higher than that! To disvalue what he has called valuable (even worth dying for) - what blasphemy is that!?

So I don't stop acting. No. For surely now it's time to be pro-active.
Knowing what i know now i act out of a new entity and agenda and no-one said it would be easy (when a sinful nature, evil, and -it seems sometimes- the whole world is going the other way down the stream.)

I have a theory that a man goes crazy without something to live for. He'll get depressed, feel devalued, and may end up off the deep end. Probably most of us have experienced that feeling to some extent. Maybe you've lived alone, ate Kraft-dinner, worked at a dead-end job and watched TV in the evenings a little too long for a state of pace. We begin to lose touch of that part of us that wants to live. That's what it seems like to me. I think you might be alive if you know you could die tomorrow and know that something you did today would count.

Maybe you've seen the way a friend's demeanor changes when he gets into a job that is fulfilling to him, or when he starts back at college and feels like his life is going somewhere, or when he enters a relationship with a significant other. Suddenly there’s something real to live for!

Jesus showed me that i was worth something. I respond and accept it. I love him for it and respond accordingly (Something most definitely real to live for!)I find myself living -ideally every part of my life and being- for HIM. Purpose. Hope. Life. Love.

Alright...

I Found Profound

From a book of clever and heartwarming short stories and antidotes about life that my mom recommended, called "Front Porch Tales"( by Phillip Gulley.)
I was apprehended by the end of one of the stories called "The Kitchen Table" By the moral which I found considerably profound. Maybe you won't; maybe you will. The following is the summary from that chapter:

"A friend came for dinner not long ago. He asked me where I had bought my table, and I told him I had made it. He wanted me to make him one, but I told him no. A man has to be careful not to let his hobby become his business. He was talking about how his kitchen ta ble is forever falling apart and lamenting the shoddy nature of today's craftmanship. People slapping things together in five minutes expecting them to last a lifetime.
We got to talking about how that isn't only true about furniture, it's true about life. Folks get discouraged because God doesn't make them saints overnight. They don't understand all the years of God-work that go into making one's life a thing of beauty- a lot of shaping, a lot of smoothing, a lot of finishing. And if we rush the process, the flaws will surely show.
Once a week I rub a coat of lemon oil into my table. It reminds me that my table is never really finished. Kind of like me. "

What can I do?

I regularly read World Vision Bulletins.
World Vision is an organization which I have come to trust for relatively accurate international statistics and news. It has also proved itself to be nothing less than a respectable and effective Christian Humanitarian Organization.
So when I read their most recent Bulletin with the heading, "Sudan Crisis Continues. Dozens Die from Hunger Daily." I have reason to believe that it is more than an attention grabbing header. Its probably also nothing less than the truth.
Same goes for the other bulletins I've pulled out of the archives. One reads, "Action now will save lives! Silently, starvation stalks millions in Africa". Another "emergency bulletin" appeals that "Starvation Threatens Millions in Zimbabwe". This one includes a picture of a mere toddler sitting sadly, stomach enlarged from sickness, on the ground.

Of course these Bulletins appeal for financial support for these situations and as I read the details of the specific catastrophe I will probably be moved to give up a bit of what I suddenly realize is worth so little to me and so much to them. My heart begins to break as i begin to comprehend what I'm reading.
I've come to wonder, however, if money is really all I can give...

I know that there is desperate need left right and center. I need not look far and I need not look for the physically malnourished or sick. However, the physical need in countries like Sudan, Zimbambwe, Kenya, Ethiopia and Darfur is what I'm looking at imparticular at the moment.

In our typical western mindset we seem to assume that money will make everything all right. Everybody needs money and everything can be done through the all sufficient currency.
Can it really?
I want to know.

If money is all it would take to stop dozens from dying in Sudan daily then why does starvation continue? What is money? We've got lots of it don't we? If that's all it takes and they're not getting it then I fear that something is not right at all. Surely that can't be all there is to it... can it?

Is it a lack of educated people helping those in impoverished countries to survive, heal and rebuild? I never see much of a recruit section on the World Vision website for this. Are more people needed? If so, what kind of people? What kind of training is needed? These are things I actually want to know! Nurses? Agriculturalists? School Teachers? Economists? Engineers?

And my third question is, if it's not money and if it's not people then why do people still die?
I know that this question is very ignorant and that the answer is very involved, but If you have a possible partial answer, I'd like to hear.

mc

To die, Truly to Live

There comes points when the things we have to fight for or at least stand in objection on their behalf become pointed and concise. I probably will not say all that has been on my mind on such matters for the last while except that some of these causes have come to a starker battleline in my mind.
I have begun to lose confidence in instititions that I once took as acceptable in the imperfection that institution have to a biased individual. In true Canadian form I figured we have it pretty good and I can leave things mostly up to the government to decide. However, I say it to say that that bell inside me has gone off. This is the bell that just knows that something is not right. Something can not be tolerated. There is injustice and it must be stood against.

What is a truly Christ-like approach to injustice? That is one very loaded question.
But it is a sort of beautiful thing to believe that you are fighting for righteousness.

Closer on Sundays

Do our sunday morning church services promote the idea of a impersonal God. Of a God who is only in the presence of the clergy, in the 2 hours, on a sunday morning? And that is why we go?

Do we expect God to be more "present" there than anywhere else?

Do we want God to be as "present" all the time anyways?

(Is Omnipresence biblical? Is Omnipotent biblical? Do those questions matter?)

"Is that why we go?"

If not, then is that place to be more revered than the bible study, or more holy than the coffee shop, or more a place to meet with God than your local bar, your getaway, your hiding place, or East Hastings? More than your friend's broken home, the sufferer's broken hope, or your own broken soul?

(Let's ask Him now)

departure: on a personal note

They say that old habits die hard. The same could be said of old friends.
I wonder, however, if new friends don't die hardest.
It's been a crazy year, certainly. I would be dishonest to say that there hasn't been times when I considered dropping my current expenditure all together in the pursuit of something else. For better or worse, my outlook on Bible college has improved this semester. Not only am I coming to realize it's practicality and what it has actually done already to improve my skills but I have also begun to meld with a community. I have come to find some level of human syncronicity which I believe is about as valuable and biblically a part of the Christian and human experience as it is comfortable and wonderful and painfully difficult to consider leaving.
I have built friends. Friends die hard. The old ones can pass from direct correlation with less pain perhaps because of the unbreakable tie which already exists and which we both know will not break. New friends, no matter how much my personality connects with them or the intense experiences we've shared or conversations we've delved into, don't perhaps have that same unbreakable tie. Though I may not think much of it later, right now it is difficult.

My room right now is in slight disarray. Things are in boxes or general piles in preparation for eventually moving out. It is another reminder that the end will probably come upon me quickly, and before I could ever have thought to have tied up loose ends and said adequate goodbyes.

It seems I've never been that good at goodbyes. I'm not sure if it's because I'm afraid of vulnerability and so decide to be senseless and overly-practical on the matter or if I simply see no worth in too much emotional expulsion when all things come to an end, its the future and the present we strive for (not things past), and after all- most of my worthy friends I'll see again one day in this life or the next. Why get worked up over a few years? Does that sound cold? Life is a battle, casualties are regular and those closest friends to me have often been friends expendable as myself to the cause at hand. Hmmm... Perhaps that's what makes it so difficult and confusing. It's not pure sadness regret or even anger. It's a confusion coming from a deep connection; and though the will is keen and the mind decided, the emotions are hard to express and the heart hard to read.

My thoughts and feelings bear a resemblance of a kind to my room. They are messy and being put aside to be dealt with later. I wonder, however, if I won't be able to just throw every thought into the back of my head like stuff into the truck box, but rather loose conclusions and work projects into loose ends and unconfirmities as I walk along the road of tying down the bird cage while the pheasant flies away with my heart. Ya, unsorted thoughts indeed. Don't mind me.

On a different note, I drove to Ashcroft last weekend (just before Cash Creek)- a little interesting update for you. It was a fun time. For a good story: we ( my traveling companions and I) prayed that my truck would make it and that it would have enough gas to get us there (as we began to think she was hitting rock bottom with no stops left on the route.)
I think God might have had some good humor in response to that prayer- or maybe He just knew I needed a close call to learn to rely on Him - yet again.
The truck coasted down the last bit of the highway, across the Thompson river, into Ashcroft, down the road, and brought us practically to the doorstep of our destination (with minimal pushing). Now that was rad! (Although next time I'd better fill up the tank).

Culture Thief

This is something I have thought about and pondered for quite some time, the item of Christian mission stealing ethnic culture. Although this has been put on the table even more in my recent Cross Cultural Studies class, I'd like to look at it in a more localized light as well.

Having grown up going to Church "functions" and services I have seen the church communities successes and failures to be relevant (if I may use such a use thrashed word). Living in what I will call the "buckle of the bible belt" (Audio Adrenaline coined that one) (and in a secluded Bible college setting no less) has made the failures and attempts to "relevancy" (lets call it relatability- I think that works better) quite bold.

Think about your city, Do you appreciate it for its diversity? Do you enjoy its spectra of talent, ability, creativity and ingenuity- even its open-mindness?

Now think about if your whole city were to become converted Christians in the manner that the institutionalized church appears to generally intend. That is, to bring them all to church, integrate them into church culture and then let them out again.
Maybe you yourself are getting a little bored of "church" as you know it- not because theres no truth and community there but because otherwise it is very unrelatable.
(I don't want to sound complacent, but try to spur envisioning and thoughts for a crazier tomorrow. )

I don't want to go knocking on my local church body either, because I think they rock! However, trying to find a place for open and constructive and thought provoking criticism I say this: If your city was to become all like the general "church-goers" how much of the culture and soul of your city would be left?
I am not saying that "church goers" are not inwardly diverse, but they often outwardly seem quite similar, general, limited and open to stereotypes.

That leads to another question, and on this one I am still working in my own life.
Could it be that a lie has been planted in our life that we should be less than we have been created to be because a sort of cultural theology that constantly restricts our potential?

I don't know. It's a hard question to ask.

Adrenaline Days

Possibly one of the most influential movies on my life (although I suppose there has been many) is "Dead Poets Society". If you have ever seen the movie, you know that it can be summed up in three English words or two Latin words. Carpe Diem: Seize the Day.
Some will say to look before you leap. Others will say that he who hesitates is lost. Where is the balance of foolishness and recklessness when it comes to risks? I don't know. But I hear that when old people were surveyed (for those who believe surveys), one of the biggest things they regretted not doing more in their lives was taking risks.

What might taking risks do for me?
- it might quench a stale and boring lifestyle
- it would probably break me outside of my comfort zone into realms of new possibilities
- It might help me make mistakes that I learn more from than I would have anyways otherwise.
- It could help me recognize the vitality and realness that life can be as I push limits.
- It might result in a Bill Gates Maneuver some day. Ha Ha, Caching!

How does this fit with God's intent for my life?
- will I shy from taking risks for fear that they are not in God's will?
- or will I embrace them, knowing that God is my strength in everything and, like a father to child, will pick me up if I fall down while trying to learn how to walk.

Again, I think there is a balance.. But I can say that I'd love to live a little more on the edge? I'd like to have a more child-like trust sometimes and perhaps even incorporate an adrenaline rush moment into each day. These are just thoughts right now but just for fun, what if my calendar looked like the following:

Mon: Jump off something so high it scares me
Tues: Call up an old friend who I haven't talked to in at least two years
Wed: Take my skateboard down the hill that no-one has ever not bailed on.
Thurs: Tell someone how much I appreciate them
Fri: Burn out in a parking lot and/or go skydiving- you only live once.
Sat: Vent my problems on a good friend
Sun: Just ask her out already (hypothetical)
Mon: Jump off something higher than last week

to "Get it!"

You know those times when you just "Get it"?

A decline to a half baked lifestyle can happen so subtly. I might call it "a removal to religion".
I think this has happened to me quite a bit over the last year- which I suppose is somewhat easy when one is in an environment that can appear so subsurface that you can forget that the big stuff is underneath the skin.

I guess I just want to say "GET IT!"
There's a big picture- I've got to grasp for it. Theres a lot I don't understand- I've want to admit it and grow through it. There is a life that is beyond - I've got to live it.
I'm not about throwing fundamental truths and wisdom out the window. I believe, however, that the big picture of What God is all about is so beyond our common idea of Religion.
I seem to have embarked on another adventure that is beyond what I can do. It is therefore rooted so much more in reliance, trust and love than in me trying to do something independently. It is an intense 2-way relationship and I love it!

So that's where I'm at. It's cool.
Where' you at?