Tag Archives: Guilt

November 11th – November 18th, 2005

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So much life. I feel it straining against the seams of my….personality? What is it trying to escape from? What is chafing against all the life coming out? What is it that leaves little red impressions in my skin like a belt-too-tight, or an ill-fitting pair of pants?

Where life DOES squeeze out, it comes out in such strange little ways: Seeing tools hanging on the wall of my newly constructed shed in an orderly fashion: LIFE! Anticipating a meal: LIFE! Not just the sensation of the heater and the candles and the cold light coming through the blinds; it’s the IDEA of those things. It’s more than the sensory input or even the experience itself…

I anticipate feeling pain now. It’s not masochism as I understand it…(besides there are many KINDS of pain that I do NOT look forward to and I’m not getting off on it). But there is something so living, so squirming and fluid-filled about mourning…about grieving…about conviction and realization and repentance. I could become a repentance junky…YIKES! What’s that?

I feel two things this morning…

1)      Continued confusion about what it is that “holds back” the LIFE…that strains against it…the contradictions thing I guess.

2)      Worship. Adoration. Love for the Creator that made it possible, even the contradictions. I guess that’s part of it then, isn’t it? Somehow, the synergy of the moderating force in my life which struggles against the force of unbridled LIFE defines me and makes the entire experience of living possible somehow. I love the author of my life. I love how HE touches me. How He pursues me and surprises me. I love how He has wired me to receive LIFE. The Bible says we were made for His pleasure, and like so many others, there are times when I resent His selfishness…some have made a career of resenting Him. But today, I’m acutely aware that it is through giving US pleasure that HE receives His own. He is the most gracious of lovers….truly His ecstasy is fulfilled only when mine is.

How I long to be a lover like Him.

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Such interesting connections during my time with Alex last night. X’s treatment of me (of himself and of love in general) is betrayal. I was betrayed by my family (by my mom in particular). I was treated as a criminal when a crime had actually been perpetrated against me. Go figure: when something like this happens again I tend to be a bit touchy. Alex used the word “bullied” in describing how X is treating me.

I hate bullies. I hate bullying. But the truth is that I’m afraid of confronting bullies when it comes right down to it. I FEEL like I should, like I want to…but I’m afraid.

If I didn’t confront them in the way and for the reasons that Jesus did not confront…it would be one thing. But the reason I don’t is self-preservation. I don’t know…maybe I’m beginning to confront in appropriate ways these days. There is a price to be paid for it though. Bullies make you pay when you present the truth to them.

There’s a contradiction in there…I know that bullies are simply scared and wounded people, and that God loves them…that ultimately they must find their way into love and healing and forgiveness, and it’s my job to facilitate parts of that. The contradiction lies in the fact that I want to punish them. I want them to stop victimizing others ESPECIALY because they do it out of their own pain. I think it would almost be easier to deal with someone who caused pain because they liked doing it. Maybe dealing with psychopaths is easier: they can be pitied.

I really have no pity for X. I mean, there are moments that I mourn the loss of all his potential to his self-serving abusiveness. But it’s rare that I really sympathize with the hell he must live in….because it’s self-imposed, and self-constructed.

But at the same time I also see (like I see in my mom’s life) the external causes. Stuff he didn’t ask for and was “done” to him that results in this. Ultimately, yes, we must each stand before God alone…responsible for our own choices…the Devil can’t MAKE us do anything…but still it’s a sad state of affairs when a kid gets treated like X did, or like Mom did.

Lyrics of the song I’m listening to: “Jesus…sent to save not to condemn.”

God help me to embrace the contradictions within me, and help me to differentiate between myself and all that is other.

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Mark 7:37 “He (Jesus) has done everything well…” I say it to people all the time: HOW we do things is as important as WHAT we do. Maybe I’m under-emphasizing it. Maybe WHAT we do is ultimately pointless…at least in the natural.

Healed people get sick again.

People forget what they’re taught

Inspiration wears off

We fall out of love

We sin…over and over again.

Lazarus eventually died…again. Could it be that it’s ENTIRELY how we do things?

October 11th, 2005

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Just prior to, during and immediately after a short-term mission trip to Brazil in August 2005, I simply didn’t write. I began a home improvement project that Autumn: leveling out a place in our back yard and building a storage shed. Our yard is quite sloped, and so “leveling” it actually required digging up about 8 cubic yards of dirt and moving it by hand. It ended up being another “hole” like digging the pond was a couple of years earlier. Over the years I have come to appreciate this kind of physical activity which results in a measurable accomplishment. For someone in my line of work it’s highly gratifying. It reminds me of farm work, my childhood and my father.

In recent months I have actually come to find that physical labor is one of the only ways that I can enjoy a work-out. I have good friends who can only work-out if it’s a game (basketball, volleyball, anything where scores are kept) and others who can only do it if it involves a machine and a monthly membership fee. I find both methods un-satisfying at best. However, if I can point to a big hole in the ground, barn full of hay, stack of fire wood, or a commute to work on foot or a bicycle…I’m a motivated fellow. I tend to get a certain kind of thinking and praying done at these times too…

In this entry I refer to “Tom” who is a rock star in the evangelical church world. He had recently moved to the Puget Sound and while he was employed at a different church, things weren’t working out and he was beginning to explore other options. An old friend of his was an attendee at our church and invited him to visit once. We had a chance to meet briefly and talk about his circumstances a little. It would be the equivalent of coaching a park-league basketball team and having Michael Jordan show-up one day saying he was unhappy with the Bulls and was thinking about getting back to basics by joining YOUR team. In other words…it f*cks with your mind a bit.

It’s been a while.

So, while I’m digging the ginormous hole in my backyard yesterday and trying to use the activity to focus my prayers, I’m drawn back to a sense of introspection and reflection. There is a component of confession and repentance in the feeling but I don’t understand why.

I have certainly become less tolerant over the last couple of months. But frankly, I’m thinking that’s good. Granted, I am less patient – not good. More judgmental – definitely not good. Less driven by feelings (good and bad) – strange, but I think good for me, and less motivated by what other think – VERY good.

But at the same time, there’s a deeper sense of the evil in me that needs to come out. Not behavioral but more fundamental – character stuff.

As I consider this Tom fellow and my conversation with him last week, I feel all those things I listed above, from the un-usual emotional disconnect all the way over to judgementalism. It’s a little test-tube, a microcosm of what’s going on deeper in my life:

  • Despite my efforts to the contrary, I am lead by my expectations. When he confessed that he was un-tethered and looking around for a new church situation, I SAID to him, “take your time, it’s not about church, seek God, blah blah blah.”

But that was just stuff I’m SUPPOSED to say – thoughts that I wish I did not have to manufacture. The truth is I am PANTING at the prospect of him dropping everything else and coming to our church to take my place as Music Director, lead us to the “big-time!”. I am still in the Matrix. What’s more, I forget that I am from moment to moment.

  • When he tells me of his plan to perhaps launch a consulting company rather than work at a church….my judgementalism shows up. He plummeted right off my respect scale. In my mind, He became just another career-centered person. When I heard that he “trusted God completely with his plan to come out here to Seattle”, but also managed to arrange for a pretty plush “severance” package…’just in case things didn’t work out”…I blanched again. He’s more enmeshed in the Matrix than I am. I totally judged him in that moment.
  • Oh and let’s not lose sight of the fact that in that moment of judgment, “Hypocrite” was added to my resume. HIS career mindedness was faithless and shallow, while the feather in my cap that winning him to “our team” would bring was holy. Sheeesh.

I can smell the fragrance of TRUE freedom wafting over the hillside and into this pit I’m digging; Freedom from being swept off my feet by hollow approval or even just association with “rock stars”, and freedom from being a judgmental asshole about it when I do manage to be free. I smell that freedom all the time. It captivates my attention. I structure my life so that I can get nearer to it. But as yet I have done little to get out of this hole except bitch.

I guess the key is to realize that while IN the hole…I am still free. I don’t need to get OUT of the hole to be free. I can be free inside it. Perhaps the fragrance of what I perceive to be freedom is just a different kind of hole. I need to find ways to be the free man God wants to be anywhere.