No Fidelity Here

So it's been a weekish since my last post ( I think, yes that's right I'm not going to check, I don't care that much). A reoccurring series of thoughts coming over me is my lack of fidelity with regards to God. Was I created by the guy? Sure. Has everything I ever known merely been something He thought up and said "yes" to? I can't imagine why not. Will God take care of me throughout my life? ...what? God doesn't do that, can He even do that?

Why can the whole world be created and saved through God yet I still hold that He can't help me? Or something else bothering me, do I even want to be "saved", "completed", "made whole"? What if my brokenness is all I know and trust? Is this a problem? Probably. But the mountains can be majestic and the glaciers of the world magnificent but without the brokenness of them, what are they? I want to trust God with others but with myself I delay. Something always comes up and I give God a rain check.

At times, I don't know why. Is it trust? Is it that I just don't think it's/I'm that important? Why can't I do His Will? Ugh...

Sometimes I wish that I was a million miles away, in a country that speaks a language I never heard before, and I? I adapt, I thrive, and I worship God.

I need something to believe. I need to be sustained cause this world isn't cutting it. Should I strive to break it as it has tried to break me? What is permitted? I need something to live for cause this American Dream keeps causing me to wake up in a sweat. Fear of my nightmare, and it's in me. I am it. I need to be poor, I need to be destroyed, crushed, drowned out. Success is too risky, I may like it and who knows how I'll change. God knows I can't turn to Him when my tools glisten so. So break it, me, everything.

There's a reoccurring vision that I'll get at least once a week it seems. I'll be waiting to get into heaven (in a line, yeah, it's silly) and I finally get to Peter and he says that I was amazing, people that interacted with me were able to grow closer to God because I was willing to walk with them through their issues with Him and show His love. This causes me to be very happy, joy is an understatement, it's relief that I was useful to God. I wasn't a waste. Damn, it's a good feeling. But we've both been in this scene and so the next part is only made more bearable when Peter says I can't go inside. After helping others my entire life, I never spent enough time sorting my own issues out, never trusted completely in God. And so I'm sent out in a bitter sweet symphony onto a road going no where for it doesn't lead to God, and I've been on it my whole life. I suppose that road's name could be many things...anyway, whatever it's called, it's not leading me to God...

Okay, need to concentrate. So God, what's up? Why is it so hard to trust you? O, one reason may be because every time I've tried that out it, it didn't really work. Though I suppose most of those times were me asking selfishly which means it shouldn't work: "You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions." (James 4:3) Ugh, I don't know. What am I supposed to trust you with? Anything that would be hard to trust you with is a thing that I'm passionate about. My future welfare, future wife, future plans, current spiritual fighting, and current confusion: these are important to me but what am I to expect if I pray to you God? I've asked you to heal my friends, to save my sister, to purify me but none of these things have been fulfilled that I'm aware of. Sure, you do things by your time not by ours but how the heck can anyone trust in you when you haven't delivered yet...in anything...faith? Possibly but I don't trust strangers I just met to help me with something important, I don't have faith in them because I haven't seen them in action.

We need some more give in take God, I can't trust you if you stay in the clouds. You gotta be in the game with me. I've seen you be with others, I trust you help others, but I've yet to see you really hit me hard with a "God moment" or come through for me when I was about to crumble...or is that it? You won't come until I'm broken down, only then you will redeem and restore me. Is that it? Cause if that's the case I have no idea when I'll see you in my life. I know you know best, I'm sure this will work out. That's nothing to worry about but how can you expect me to think you'll come through for me if you never do (from my perspective)?

Ugh, the two of us need to spend more time together...

The Unforgiven

This is something I wrote a day or two ago. It's certainly not spectacular or anything, just my thoughts streamed out piece by piece. But it talks about something I've always had trouble with, self forgiveness. It's so easy for me to forgive others, "they don't know better," "he did not mean to," or (my favorite) "it was just the way they were raised." Who knows, maybe it is a pride thing, "I can't hold them to the standards I hold myself to, they aren't as (insert word-ex:smart, religious, thoughtful) as me." But to myself, I can be a nazi. Want to see me uncomfortable? Have me walk behind an attractive woman who may or may not be dressed "liberally." And if we walk up some stairs, dear God you know how I will stare at the surrounding grass with fascination. "Look at how intrinsically beautiful that leaf is (still a few more stairs to go...) O! There's another one...(stare at said leaf because I don't want to give into lustful glances). And if I give in? O, the guilt, the conviction of my own depravity. But that's just a silly example. Then life happens and I can be consumed by it. It's odd, guilt doesn't need a soul to weigh down. At least if it does, it is not aware of the need as it slowly kills the joy and love of the infected soul. This weekend I had a fall of grace and as I moved past it my dear old friends hypocrisy, self-loathing, and naturally guilt were there to make sure I didn't move on too fast, that I learned my "message" from the experience. But their message is not one I wish to hear, I've heard it far too long for too many years of my life. I feel like I don't even need to mention it. Everyone's heard the voices crawling in their heads, that you are not what you should be, that you can't change. Condemned to live in self denial only indulging in guilt and humiliation, that's the only honorable way to live, that's all I deserve. I deserve this. I would be selfish to expect better. O, how convincing self-conviction can be. You know all your weaknesses and shortfalls but whenever you try to think of the good qualities of yourself, how easy is it to brush them off as "not that important" or "I'm being proud" or even "that's an evil thing to be good at." Surprised? Yeah, I even get the last one. I have qualities that transfer well to being a scoundrel and I may well be that but I choose to use these gifts in a different way if I can. But being able to lie like a champ, what holy work can be done with being able to sin so well? And so it seems like we were bred incomplete, disgusting. This poem (I guess that's how it would be classified...), is about if you try to carry your sin, your hurt. We have to let it go though, it's not ours to keep. We need to move on and walk unburdened in the path God sets before us...holy smokes, this intro is longer than the actual poem...whatever. Enjoy.

The Unforgiven

Time's so easy to live in. We play, we dance, we sing, and then finally we go. But that's not how the story ends, is it? We can't just end there when that's only the prelude and we as we are, only the beginning.

As I'm getting older, fewer things are mattering. But it's cool because what remains matters so much more. The process is slow, scientists couldn't perceive it, but I'm becoming a better person (I think). But it's caused by one of my biggest problems.

I've always been taught that to live with beauty, strength, and without regret is the one rule for a good life. I don't know who told me this, kids just pick stuff up. But I'm not following my own rule, if nothing else, I am living with constant regret.

It's been too easy to go to God to solve my problems, He's too good at fixing them. So as a fool, I've hid them behind a fig leaf, as if the Almighty God could be thwarted by that. I relish the pain of solving my own problems but I don't know why. Maybe because I feel I deserve it.

But it's been not enough, I have to find other people's problems and try to help them as well. I needed to hurt more, no one ever learned anything being happy. Somber wisdom was preferable to happy foolishness. I was helping God, I was exempt from needed Him, I aided Him. I was a fool.

I've been stupid. Why do men hold onto their sins like coveted treasures? We abandon our children and dreams before our sins...is that why women fear abandonment so much? If their fathers leave them for sins, what does that make them?

At times I wonder if I run from happiness. I'm happy to be content but to be more is not necessary. Why do I feel guilty about the prospect of being happy? Even as I type this the answer echoes from the deep chasms of my heart, "Because you are not worthy of it"

Why does God accept us back so readily? Doesn't He know the extra guilt I receive with His forgiveness? It's so easy, but I'm so unworthy. His forgiveness condemns me as I am humiliated by how more than me He really is.

If pride was the father of sin and God was the father of righteousness, why do we sometimes feel like orphans? We have two fathers. Fighting over our custody. Over our dreams and hopes.

(If and) When God accepts me into heaven, will I accept His acceptance or remember? We are the lost children, unattended to as our parents fight over us. There are so many trails but only one leads to Him. And even if I find it, what if I can't forgive myself of the others I lost along the way?

God is perfect, of that I doubt many will disagree. So why the despairing and lost? Satan did not and can not outmaneuver God but he could have more willing tools than God. And our brokenness is not on Him, no it is on us. And if we are not careful we shall become the unforgiven.

This is the world we live in (part dos).

It occurred to me that the post I just wrote (the one below this one, you should probably read it before this one) was supposed to address something other than what it did. I guess it doesn't really matter since this is kind of a bunch of random thoughts in one group. But what concerned me about my previously mentioned friend was that being happy was one of her main goals/priorities in life.

Naturally, whenever I speak of others and their opinions, only uplifting things are stated and eventually I may finally venture forth to bring up some small issue that I have with their said opinion. That being said, her opinion sucks. You can't strive for happiness as a goal. It's too broad. Happiness (to me at least) is best achieved when you are pursuing something and are enjoying yourself in the process. To pursue happiness itself seems dangerous, especially since she didn't even mention God in her priorities...God is a mere dominant strategy for her. She believes in case that saves her but as for actually changing her actions, please, let's not be superstitious here.

And you know what I dislike the most about this whole priority question episode? I wonder how many people would actually read that question and stop to think compared to the masses that are no doubting just continuing the reading (instant gratification?). Anyway, I don't like that I believe those are her priorities...her life reflects them clearly. Drinking, sex, and having a lot of shallow silly friends (possibly I fall under this...), yep she's looking for happiness. And I wonder if it's such a high priority because she's having little luck finding it. Reasoning: If someone is usually happy and at least generally content with their life, would being happy be one of their top three priorities in life? I'd answer no, only those who aren't happy truly understand what a blessing it is.

So she's dying of thirst. What would you do for a cup of water in the middle of a desert after a day or two? She needs the happiness but doesn't realize that pursuing it directly is like chasing a mirage in the desert, it's so close...you can almost taste it and then it retreats back into the distance and you're left broken. Hopeless. I don't want this for her. She can be so much better, the potential is ridiculously amazing compared to her now (though, she is a good person now, just not really a happy/devout person). At least she's a humanitarian...I guess that's nice...

Ugh, do I do this a lot? Yesterday someone mentioned that they felt like they were a project in my eyes. The paragraph above doesn't give a much different story...is this a reoccurring theme in my friendships? I feel like sometimes I'm drawn to "projects" though I honestly don't view either of the previously mentioned people as projects. I wonder if it's so I can learn how to fix my sister...but I'm not God...I am an instrument of His though. What if He's using me to improve people? And by being with them, I introspectively improve myself, everyone wins.

Friendships are actually something I've been thinking a lot about recently. Why do I have them? Do I pick people that I think I'd be useful to or people that I think would be useful to me? Or is this the wrong way to view people in general...am I their tool or are they mine? If God's using us to improve each other, what's intrinsically valuable?

God is intrinsically valuable. This can be my given. So whatever God values is valuable for His opinion is the only one that matters, this is how we can all be instrumentally valuable. However, if God wills us to even throw our lives away, we should, yeah? For pleasing Him is the only thing that matters. So if He wishes us to fix people and in the process be purified and refined ourselves, then we should? And if God wants us to live lives that don't particularly make us happy, we should for God wills it? Of course, I've always seen happiness as an attitude thing. I could be happy leading people to their lethal injection if I had the right attitude about it. Though I don't suggest adopting such intense attitudes...ugh, I have a headache and as I close my eyes I can hear distinctly my sub conscience scream "Shut up!"

This is the world we live in.

What are your priorities? This is a question a friend and I asked each other. The results were interesting and religion may have had a hand in where we differed.

She said her top three priorities (ascending order): being in shape, pursuing happiness, and helping the very few people in this world she cares about.

Mine were a little muddled...I found that I had the text book answers to the question but whenever I thought about what I think about I thought that I think (sorry for that, I think that thought line is thoughtfully entertaining) more about secular things than about God...but it's confusing because a lot of the things I care about or at least the ways I go about them still incorporate God. But He's not what I'm thinking about.

But I'm just dodging the question, yeah? Well don't worry, I'll answer it. Though I'll be doing my top five because I know all of you just salivate over your laptops until my next post to know more about me. In ascending order: taking care of my body, being more intelligent than those who surround me, taking care of my friends, (these next two were when I had serious trouble) finding someone to marry that fits my qualifications (not going into those since that would take its own post...), and pursuing God until I collapse.

But the big problem I had was that a lot of these intertwine...I am taking care of a temple of God when I exercise, I strive to know more than others only to give them a hand up, I take care of my friends because I care about them and think that's how God would want me to treat His children, and my future wife would have to have a serious Christian foundation. So as an aggregate, pursuing God does come first, but for the most part I rarely explicitly think about it...

But maybe I'm just making an excuse? Maybe the cold truth is God isn't number one in my life. In theory I know He matters so much more than me but something gets lost in translation from the sketch paper to real life. And here is where we sin, I suppose. We all know what we "should" do but alas that's not for us.

In fact I remember in my teenage years I thought of myself as God's twisted angel, willing to help others through questionable means. I would do whatever I thought yielded the best results for God, no matter the personal cost. Ha, I was (and still am) quite dramatic in my thoughts. I imagined being at the gates of heaven, seeing all the people God saved through using my as He did and having St. Peter say I couldn't enter the gates because I hadn't lived a good life though I had good intentions. To me this was beautiful, to be condemned for having the strength and conviction to do what no one else was willing to do, the right thing. Lies and deception? Psst! Mere venial sins, what are they compared to being an instrument of God. His dark knight.

Then as I became more introspective, I realized that this may not be God's thought process but my own pride mixed with Satan. It was a lack of faith essentially. I wasn't willing to trust that not sinning, I could serve God efficiently. I had to live by my own code, I threw God's out...not the best plan. So now I've stepped away from this thinking a little (though not completely). God made me strong enough to accomplish whatever He set out for me to do. I need to trust in that...and trust in Him...

How Things Are Going...

I feel like the only time I write is when I'm struggling with something so as a result my posts are morbid or unfeeling. However, I don't feel that way today. Today, I can feel my heart beat, strong and steady and willing to beat until God says stop.

Religiously I've grown (I believe) in the last couple of weeks. I was struggling with putting God before school and relationships but I believe (that hopefully) I've fixed that for now. It's ridiculous just how easy it is to forget about your relationship to God when more tangible issues face you. And then what are we to do if the issues are mixed with God? I suppose "pray" would be the textbook answer here (textbook being the Bible).

I've been dealing with something recently that is connected to God and I have prayed on but still are unsure as to how I should proceed...of course, because I lack imagination in my daily life, my problem is about a woman.

Unfortunately, I am completely oblivious to the crushing of my own heart when I am with her. I have been friends with her for a year though I always have wanted to be more. She however, feels differently but really values me as a friend. And I don't think I'm just saying that to at least ease my pain a little, I honestly think I am one of her best friends though I could be ridiculously mistaken (a man can be logical in all things except where his heart is, there I believe logic fails drastically and we must all look to God as our only compass towards joy). Anyway, she's gone through some troubled times and I really feel like I need to be with her to help her talk it out and I love spending time with her (even if I'm stuck as a "friend") but it's killing me slowly because I can't move on. Whenever I've been rejected in the past, I would just isolate myself from the person and time would heal the wound as I moved on. Now however, I feel like I need to be there for her and I want to be around her but I know she doesn't want me and it hurts like hell.

But I'm not one to just sit there taking it without action. I decided to pray to God, see if the big guy could give me any words to go by. All I got was this though: "You're not going to get her, but you can save her." I don't know what to make of it to a degree because I'm fairly sure she's a better Christian than me, how could I save her? But then again, I don't matter. I can't save anyone, only God can. So whether I think I'm useful or not, if God wants me to be with her and talk about our lives, shouldn't I? Plus, if I actually care for her, won't I just do that which I believe will make her the happiest?...even if it destroys me?

So this post wasn't too much about God but since no one reads this anyway I feel like I have not let my readers down. Adios.

Dreams and Other Forgotten Things

When I was younger, I used to have big plans on how I could help people with my life. My general philosophy was that I was going to make damn sure I left the world in better condition than I found it...but it's impossible.

Why do we all give up? Sure, we never say it, such things are improper. But we do, we compromise. We give in. We grow too fat and lazy to pursue dreams. They're so intimidating aren't they? I mean holy smokes, just look at what I used to think I'd do...I can't do that without global support. One man used to do a lot back in the day, but now with no one believing in anything nothing gets done. Men could cast off their mortality and become the center of an idealistic movement back in the day. Now though? No chance. People have been taught since they were young to not be a sucker, don't fall for anything, and realize that everyone's trying to scam each other. But with a generation of atheists who think they know what's up, we're all screwed. No dreams can be accomplished by men of that caliber, we need to be naive. We need to be willing to be wrong. Faith, not even of God but of ourselves, that's is what is required. But we don't want to believe in ourselves because that's the worst thing to be wrong about. We aren't willing to fail there. And so we don't try.

The Desert

The oases in life are too few and far in between. We all enjoy them don't we? But we can't just stop there, there's a desert that needs crossing. Yeah, life can suck, sure it seems that our society is based on entertaining ourselves until our deaths. But we are not just consumers, we are so much more.

That's how it goes doesn't it? We get worried about the actual substance of our lives but then we get a pep talk from someone, something that's no doubt uplifting and probably full of crap. Without religion of some sort, everything is literally pointless in the truest sense of the word. Sure we attribute value to things, but we die, thus nothing truly holds value since it is only valuable because we like it (how many have died for that shiny shit called gold?). Maybe in a century gold will be replaced as the all important thing by something else...like toilet paper. All matter doesn't matter, only what we do with it does, and only if there is a God does what we do with it matter.

How can men without faith not commit suicide? To have such conviction and faith in your own beliefs that there is nothing worth believing in would be to be a god yourself. To choose when you existed or not, what greater power could you ask for? Why give this temporary place such power as to decide that for you. It's slavery. Running with fear from the inevitable, I'd rather face it, laugh at it. But I can't...I'm trapped.

My god will not allow me to die just because I deemed this so pointless, for some reason He sees reason in it and so I respectfully wait. He knew men would have to turn to Him here. Surrounded by the products of our sick minds we see our daughters and sisters turn into whores and prostitutes, we see our sons and brothers turn to different addictions becoming slaves or slavers, and worse of all we see ourselves change. We used to have men in the world. Men who would sail into what scholars assured them was their deaths. Men who would fight for one woman instead of taking whatever he could get with hordes of them. Men with loyalty, but that word's a joke nowadays. And are we happier?

I say no. We are trying to take all the short cuts we know and its leading to a pathetic civilization. An individual person can be so beautiful and brave but once put into the masses of cowards, they become suicidal and unseemly. We deserve this but I still want to save us. I'm certainly no Jesus or Mohammad but God deserves more from us, and so do my children.

So don't try to stay in your current oasis, our lives aren't about just being comfortable. It's about fighting constantly (usually with our bodies) to be better people. We can be so much better but damn it, it'll cost. It took Moses 40 years just to get to the promised land, and he only got to see it. Well I'm willing to die unburied in the desert but if someone looks on at my remains I want it to show that I was going somewhere, not just hiding in the oasis from the heat of life.