I found this quote in a bonhoeffer book today while browsing the library.... :
'In the end, there are only two possibilities of encountering Jesus: either man must die or he kills Jesus. '

I went jogging through the little patch of woodland trails near my house today. It was quiet, no other humans, and as I was nearing the end of the path back to the road all the sudden I see hanging, suspended in mid-air, a leaf. It is just dangling there, held by two tiny strands of spider web, like some mystical appearance out of a fairy-tale. I had to stop and stare for a moment, at first bewildered, then just in a soft wonder. I mean, how often do you come across floating leaves in the woods? And how often do you pause, just to stare at something and ponder.....?

Open your eyes this moment and see the redemption breathing around us in the darkness. And live in Him.

"She does not belong by rights to this world at all, but to some other planet, probably mercury. Her proclivity to her true sphere destroys all the natural influence which this orb would otherwise possess over her corporeal frame."

I love George Macdonald.



A few things:

Life can be really hard. Really Hard, and I don't even know the half of it. It'll probably just get harder.

But life can be really good, even through all the sludge.... because of this hope, and because of this love.
I have things to smile about, and I'm going to smile, even if it's through the tears.

hunger pains and crimson stains

I came to a coffee shop, bought the cheapest thing I could (tea)(hey, rent's due soon) and sat down, took a deep sigh and prepared to start learning more photoshop. And then I came across this while checking email. Perhaps I should summarize. Someone is selling a mansion for 75 million dollars..... with 23 bathrooms, 13 bedrooms, a bowling alley, movie theater.............
Is your jaw dropping, have you gone into a coma yet?
This is definitely an extreme case, I'm not implying that the majority of Americans walk around with millions of dollars in their pockets, and bathrooms enough to use a different one every day for more than three weeks, But to me, these are the implications of a starving nation, and really, of a starving humanity(as much as we have helped the idea along, it's not just americans chasing their own prosperity). I've heard of such things, but today I am sitting here shell-shocked because I don't understand how someone could come to the conclusion that they should build something like this. I don't understand it. What could inspire you to be so bored, what could inspire you to hoard so much? These are the signs of a starving nation,and it outrages me that we live in such poverty that people hedge themselves in with all the greed and comfort and safety they can muster in the hopes that they will allude life, and maybe death too.....
And somehow the same thought I have been having lately is connected. We are hungry for something else. It's as though we have this giant tapeworm living inside us, eating everything in sight, demanding more and more, and yet we are still hungry......and we are either still unaware of our tapeworm, or are left asking the question, 'how do we get rid of it?' and 'how do we get rid of this persistent hunger?'
I also look around and see a church full of people, containing a huge amount of love, and generally speaking we can be pretty good sometimes at lavishing it upon each other, at loving those who love us (sometimes). But I'm left wondering there as well, if we have something that destroys the tapeworm and satisfies the hunger.....why aren't we giving it to the people that are hungry?

What are we doing, Body of Christ??? Are we building our own invisible mansions full of other things that hold no value? Are we really seeking out those whom Jesus seeks, are we really looking with his eyes? Are we really loving with his love? Or are we building our own half-hearted, self-imploding time bomb?
I guess I want to see impossible perfection, in the sense that it actually is possible. Jesus broke a few loaves of bread and fed people who were really hungry-thousands. So why is it that we are so unsure of the love he has given us? Is it a small thing that he did this? We are unsure of ourselves, when we should be sure of him. Is it a small thing that he covered us with his own crimson stains? Is it a small thing?
Or is it a big enough thing that we have faith and love, from him, to love others, to feed the hungry, to comfort the sick and dying and lonely in the smallest ways (and just maybe those are the big ways)? to love those who spite us, and annoy us, and reject us.....and know that it is multiplying just like the bread and fish? Is it a big enough thing that we have faith that he is multiplying the love he has given us inside of us to amounts we can't even imagine?
Jesus told his disciples to feed the crowds. He would not give them an impossible command, he doesn't toy with people that way. It was possible because they had Jesus with them. It is possible because we have Jesus with us.
I'm not advocating a faith based on works, or our justification based on works. I don't believe in that at all. What I am sick of is a bunch of unmotivated, lazy people sitting around talking about theology and arguing and debating and getting all 'intellectual' about things. (I'm not isolating myself from this group, by the way) What I am sick of is a gospel that says Jesus loves you exactly like you are and you don't have to do anything to earn it and ends there. I think that statement is true, but I don't think it ends there.
What I am advocating is a love that actually has power and compels, because I am sick, really, really, sick and tired of myself, and others who have made this blood into something weak and fluffy.
What I am saying is that if we really know Jesus, if we really know the Father, we should look more and more like him the longer we know him. We should have works, only because there is simply nothing else a love of this magnitude can do except produce more love of the same kind. Anything less is taking away from the power of what has been done for us, and the love that has blanketed us.
Are we living like these crimson stains are a small thing?

If we are, we shouldn't go looking for works or signs or power.........
We should go find Jesus....or go be found by him,
and then see what happens.

I don't think I want 23 bathrooms. And I don't think I want the disillusion that I am as far removed from that tapeworm as I would like to think I am.
I want to walk beside Jesus and watch as he brings light and love everywhere my feet carry me. I've only got a tiny crust of bread, but I've got Jesus.

goodness

Awhile back I remember a friend writing something relating to God's character, and how we were to know it if we weren't to base it on our circumstances, since our circumstances can be bad indicators of such. And I remember sitting to muse on this for a few moments....and then, without realizing that he had already answered the question himself, at the end, thought "the cross!"
It was then I saw "in the person of Jesus" as the already given answer. I smiled.

I guess I just thought of this because I've been sitting here thinking about how good God is, apart from my circumstances. A lot of my circumstances have in fact just changed in the last 48 hours or so..... but it's funny, I feel his being good as being a prelude to these. I almost feel these circumstances as insignificant, because he was already so good, and his being good had nothing to do with these particular circumstances, it has to do with who he is and what has already been fulfilled. he didn't have to do any of it(changing my circumstances) to somehow be further classified as good. I'm kind of out of words at this point. And that's really ok.
"He is good" doesn't quite encompass it, but it's all I've got. Usually at this point I steal someone's words when mine aren't adequate (quote) but, really, maybe you should just go read the whole book of psalms, or spend a few days in the woods, or sit silent under the stars, or breathe the morning air as the sun is waking.
maybe you'll start to understand what 'good' means...
and maybe you'll be astonished.