Josh Garrels - Zion & Babylon

....and dear black friday -take that- jesus is bigger than all our greed.

dear black friday

Dear black friday,

I wish I could point the finger at you and say with a clean conscience that I have no part in you. I don't shop on you, I don't take advantage of all the sparkly things you offer.... But the truth is, you reflect our hearts. Mine not withstanding. As a human race we are greedy, selfish hoarders who look after our own good before others, and it just manages to manifest itself in a lot of different ways. We don't always give all our allegiance to this demon - but none of us has been entirely free of it for our whole life. And none of us is innocent. Black friday, I want to play a song for you. maybe we'll look back at Jesus and remember that there's something a lot more important than "getting our own"- in whatever manner we do that.

Why am I awake at 12:14 am writing a blog after a long day/late night of work?.....

I like sleep. In fact, I like it when it happens around 10:30pm. But I've blazed through the day so quickly that I've hardly given anything a thought. Maybe it makes more sense to say I haven't really paused. I guess I'm pressing the pause button now.

Be still. Be thankful. Acknowledge the one who got me through the day, who upholds me with his love.

I think I'm just going to sit in the quiet for a little while, and ponder the largeness of that thought. Of what it really means to be grateful. Of what it really means to acknowledge the grace of God. Of who Jesus is, and what it means to know him. Of the good news that is good.

After all the busy-ness, all the noise, at the end of the day when I've made it through another...

I just need to stop in the stillness and remember.

He really is amazing.

"Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth"

Revolution

Everyone is groaning and aching for a new world, a right world. Revolution after revolution. The world is in an upheaval from it all. And everyone dreams of a someday right world when there is no more suffering, pain, hurt, death. Except it’s just like when Jesus came the first time- all were looking expectantly for a messiah, but they wanted him to overthrow the system their way. Instead, he came as a humble leader who served everyone, and gave up his life for our sins. Not exactly what the Jews wanted or were expecting. And this time? This utopia everyone is so fond of seeking? ….It still isn’t Jesus.

We want our own. We are upset and angry because we aren’t the one percent (even though we are the 20% - oh the irony. I know I'm generalizing and that not everyone is in it for that, but the majority of words I've heard and signs I've seen...)…. And we somehow deserve our own. I have a feeling that Jesus might flip the whole scenario on it’s head and tell us to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us, to take no part in injustice, but also to trust to his ultimate justice. He might just tell us to forget about our predicaments for a moment and take consideration of others’ predicaments. He might tell us to receive grace and to give it abundantly.

He might even tell us to be thankful.

He might tell us to topple the system by putting the greedy, and the rich who are hoarding to shame by our abundant giving, and by our humility- not by our demands for more.

p.s. occupy wall street, greed has nothing to do with the amount of money you have. It is a condition of the heart and applies to more than just money or material wealth. You can just as easily be greedy and poor as you can be greedy and rich.

You want to ‘occupy wall street’? You want revolution?

Lay down your own will and your own life and follow Jesus and his way. Love your neighbors. Love your enemies. Lay down your so-called rights for other’s rights. Glorify him, not yourself. Be thankful. Always. Mourn with those who mourn. Rejoice in the redemption that you’ve been given that can’t be taken away by any of this stuff. Take Joy in who Jesus is and his love and grace toward us. Seek his face. Be free to trust in him, not yourself, not humanity.

America, I don’t know if you’re ready for real revolution. It might be hard. (It might also be really good) It might not be what you want after all……

Jesus shines brightly

small disclaimer: I wrote this about a month ago, when things were different, did not intend on sharing it, or really doing anything with it. I just wanted to write. It's got lots of bad grammar, incorrect sentence structure, and I'm not fixing any of it. But even though the situation has changed a lot since then, I really think that some of the content is worth sharing.... about Jesus and all that. so here it is:

Here goes, day 2 of sort of stream of conciousness. I don’t really know if I type fast enough to do “stream of conciousness, nor if it would be different for me than the normal type of writing for me, since I rarely edit, and I rarely stay on topic without jumping around. Oh well. Once again. Here goes. My house. It’s the one thing that’s been irking me lately. I don’t want to be there, no secret. I wonder if I could’ve contributed more. I wonder what will happen to me, I wonder where I’m going next. I know in my head that God will provide, that there really is no cause to be anxious or worry. But I am worried about staying and worried about going. I long for a real home like I haven’t longed for in a very long time. Peace, quiet, music, no craziness, lightness, people smiling and having a good time. I’m tired of all this. Stress, unrest, dog’s fighting, people fighting, greed, selfishness, denial, falling, sin. I don’t want to be around it anymore God, I want rescued. I’m not in a desperate state or anything, I just want to have some semblance of peace from you. I want to see redemption. I taught A. to spell his name today, pointed to the magnetic letters one by one in the kitchen on the fridge. He’s pretty awesome. He can be a brat like any other kid too, but he really is sweet. And right there as I was leaving the house, my heart broke. I saw things. A beautiful garden, a house full of people who definitely weren’t perfect and were flawed but who nonetheless loved Jesus, and his light – the light of knowing him was showing in their eyes. And then I came back down from the cloud. I said bye to A., he asked where I was going. I told him out to a coffee shop and he promptly replied “bye eein” in his cute ‘r’-less way. And my heart broke. It broke when I found out M. came home last night drunk as hell. It broke when I thought of J.. It broke when I thought what an amazing kid A. is. It broke, It broke. It broke. Why is all this crap happening? I don’t want to see it happen. I don’t. I took a picture of M. on the porch at night playing his guitar months ago, when I was obsessed with redemption. I hope I’m still obsessed. But sometimes redemption looks ugly or bleak. Sometimes we don’t see it. Sometimes we blow up the beauty in front of us that God is putting together because the ache or the fear is too much for us to stand, and he is too much for us to comprehend. He transforms our messes, his goodness supersedes our pushing away and our destruction. We can ultimately turn our face from him, but he will still bring redemption, but only those who have eyes will see it, only those who have ears will hear it, and only those with open hands will receive it. I don’t understand myself and I don’t understand others when we openly shun the only thing that will cleanse us, and reconcile us and make us able to stand in God’s presence. I don’t understand this disdain for blood. I do wish I had done more. I’m not convinced that it would have changed anything, but I know that God can change things. I wish I had pointed to Jesus more, and less to myself or nothing. I wish I’d had courage to do things despite the reaction I knew – or was convinced they-my actions- would produce. I think it’s ok that I want to cry right now. I don’t feel better than anyone, and I don’t feel ultimately responsible for anyone’s salvation. But I do feel the brokenness. I do feel that. I do feel the ache. And it cuts. I don’t care how happy people in asheville want to feel. It’s a sad desperate day unless Jesus is in it. You can stuff all the people and activities and warm fuzzy’s in there you want. But I’m not convinced. I’m a consumer. I’m a greedy person, I will continually manipulate goodness for my own benefit. Hell, I don’t even know how to really, truly appreciate goodness unless it’s through him to begin with. And that is humanity. We chose, and we’ve been living in the ramifications of that choice ever since, and the only way back is through knowing jesus. India. Starving kids, the world in rubble, half –destroyed pieces, and yet we deny it daily, and we enter into the day thinking everything is sunshine and daisy’s without ever being confronted with the deep gaping wound in our flesh and in the world around us. Transcendence isn’t the answer. Blind ignorance isn’t either. It takes courage to look the world in the face and myself, marred, in the mirror. I don’t have it. I don’t. Some days I don’t even have the courage to acknowledge it. Can we just skip that part, Jesus? I really just want to have a happy day today. Can we just pretend for one day that the world around me is really, just ok, as is? Can we paint a pretty picture, like thomas kincaid? But no. He won’t have any of that. On the days I choose this, I deny him. On the days I choose him,there is no denying of the brokenness, despite my lack of courage. But the days I choose to acknowledge him and the brokenness are the best ones. On those days, I know I need him. It may be a struggle for joy, but at least it’s authentic- in the truest sense. And at least my salvation isn’t in myself. There is no pretense. We’re in a war, and our hearts are being torn to bits by the shrapnel. But hope. Hope holds us up. Or as merton says ‘hope deprives us of everything that is not God, in order that all things may serve their true purpose as means to bring us to God.’ Hope will deprive us, but it will be good deprivation. And it will be hard deprivation because we will struggle, and we will want. Always wanting. Maybe it’s never wanting the right things or in the right manner that’s our trouble. Our hope in God though, that will never disappoint. And here’s the crux: all this brokenness is necessary to, and a direct result of, a people who refuse to believe that we are constantly dependant on, and indebted to someone greater than ourselves. That indeed we cannot fix ourselves. We can’t. And that ultimately, ‘fixing’ is actually not a state of simply good morality, fixing is actually a state of our soul- and of our relation to God. You could be the most ‘moral’ person on earth by our standpoint and be the furthest away from being ‘fixed’. Because the marred state of our insides isn’t just the result of external things, it’s the result of a concious breaking of relationship- the relationship being the thing that actually makes people moral….or shall we say righteous. You are righteous- you become righteous through your relationship with Jesus- with God. You literally become new. Not a robot who performs x and y to get to z. The love doesn’t come from being loved by others- not by that form of reciprocation, nor by forced actions, strength of willpower, it comes from knowing Jesus, and being changed by knowing him. This is the good news in the midst of the dark. He is the truth walking around with the flashlight, taking our hands and walking with us so that our feet know where to go. We just take his hand. That’s all. And we just keep hold of it. And we ask him to hold tightly to ours even when we are unsure.

And when things break his heart, they break ours. When he is grieved, we are. When he is pained, we are. When he rejoices over his relentless love and redemption for us, so do we. When he sees the blood of Jesus and says we are clean, so do we. When he says take hope and joy in the midst of all this, in him, and spread it- not in ignorance of the bombs going off around us, but in defiance of it- We do. When he says he is more powerful, more loving, more of everything good than any of the worse we can imagine, we believe him. And when we take Jesus’ hand with us in dark places, we take his flashlight too, and he shines brightly in the dark. He does. He shines brightly in the dark.

this song has been playing on repeat for two hours:
'My hope is built on nothing less than jesus blood and righteouness'

'on Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand'

It hasn't gotten boring yet.

I walked into work today with 15 minutes to spare and quickly sat down to chug some water and make an attempt to cool off in the air conditioning. I flipped my bible open.....what to read? I only have fifteen minutes. hmmm... there's the beginning of Colossians. Pretty good. I skim through to the beginning of chapter 3. And lots of things grab my attention, but one sentence stops me dead in my tracks (well, actually a couple):
Were you not raised to life with Christ? Then aspire to the realm above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God, and let your thoughts dwell on that higher realm, not on this earthly life. I repeat, you died; and now your life lies hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is manifested, then you too will be manifested with him in glory.

and a little further:
Whatever you are doing, whether you speak or act, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.


Lately I've been feeling this aching emptiness off and on. And I think I know why. It's our disease.
We tell each other we have such-and-such to accomplish in our lives. Whether it be day-to-day, week-to-week, year-to-year..... I'm surrounded by people who measure the value of their lives based on what they accomplish- and I do it too. And if we didn't accomplish enough this week, we end up in a frantic rush to accomplish, or the dull void of not even knowing what we're working for anymore, because the years go by much faster than expected. Please don't take this as me admonishing anyone toward laziness. In fact, quite the opposite. Our time is a gift and therefore to be cherished... I said cherished, not hoarded, right?

But here's the thing, if we do anything 'great' or 'small' .....we do it through Christ, right? so who's got their ruler out? What are we measuring for? We've got nothing to claim. Everything has been sanctified whether mundane, simple, hard, big or small. It's only for us to realize the sanctity of everything we're doing- of who we're being through Christ. That part in John where Jesus is telling the disciples to abide in him? Guess what folks, when we abide in him we do all things in the name of Jesus whether word or deed, we don't do something contrary to him- because then it wouldn't be done in his name. That's what it looks like. Paul is basically admonishing them to keep their minds, hearts, actions -all that they are- on/in Christ, because that's the only way you can do all things unto him and in his name.

We need to be aware of the transient nature of earth- and of all this. It doesn't mean removal from the situations we are in, or the injustice around us.... It doesn't mean that we stop chasing righteousness and seeking the kingdom of God right now- it means a hope that is bigger than transient. It means something more than just stopping all the suffering or evils of this world. It means looking into Jesus' eyes, seeing his hands -the wounds, remembering his blood given to make us clean and knowing that it is He who pours his glory and presence into something (or someone), not us. It is knowing that we can trust Him to use anything done to him for his glory, not constantly measuring what you are doing to see if it's glorifying him.
It's just looking at him.
It's just abiding in Him.
It really is.

It's really that simple.
You, I, they, don't have to do anything great.


He already did. And still is doing.

I don't get it.

I don't claim to be an extremely wise person, so maybe this could easily elude me, but I don't don't get "the Church"
I don't get what it's come to be about, why it is an institution, or why we seem to botch it up so badly. I don't get why it's so complicated. I don't understand why we need to be performing all these things. "performing" being the key word.

How can following a person look like this? And why do we have a need to make ourselves feel justified and important by doing all this?

Wednesday I came to the conclusion that my heart is utterly wretched-my motives, my actions, my thoughts- all of it- there is no redeeming quality. I can't even bring myself to follow, or look to Jesus like I want to.
But God asked me if I just had enough faith, just enough to believe that he is everything(really more of a concession), and that he can do everything- and that when he said he would give the spirit to those who asked, he wasn't joking.
He told me to look at his face and believe him- and to be completely overwhelmed by his mercy and grace.....
to cast myself aside, to die,
to stop striving.

And to trust that his grace is enough to do what he promises, his grace is enough to change us all, His redemption is enough to glorify himself and to fill us with him so that we aren't wretched.
We aren't wretched because of him, and only because of him. And he who promised is faithful- one day he will redeem all this, and one day we will be made able to see him face-to-face, regardless of what it takes or what it already has cost him.


The whole church thing- it's supposed to be a reflection of him, but it seems like we're all so busy trying to make sure we do that very thing- that we cast Jesus aside in the process, because, sorry Jesus, but we don't have time for you here, we're trying to reflect God, and that's really hard work, don't you think?

It's like this: maybe if I could take the time to shut-up, he might actually be able to speak through me. If I would take the time to know him, I might just start acting like him without even being all that aware of it.