Graceful Silence

Mini-soapbox time!

Christians, can we try being graceful and gentle with those people who go against our grain, instead of labeling them "idiots" and reigning over our own little ethical hierarchy?

I just don't think the belief that we're right should be standing in opposition to our call to truth and relationships. It's hard to bring people in to our truth when all they see is how low you place them and how high you are.

I believe that grace, truth, and gentleness should characterize the life of every Christ follower, in every aspect. From our waking to our sleeping - from our rising to our lying down. Every word we say, every person we affect needs to be impacted by the Christ-likeness within us.

We can argue it out with the fact that even Jesus got angry when people were working against the truth, or that Jesus was not always "graceful" or "gentle", but it comes down to the fact that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and we are not, though some need much convincing of this sometimes. We are not God, and we don't have all the authority to throw harsh terms and harsher judgments around. God is the avenger - we need to continue on and impact the world.

I think sometimes we need to forget how vehemently we believe our ethics and accept people for who they are, even if they believe things contrary to what we believe and even if we know that we won't teach them the truth. We can't give up, we can't treat them any differently, because we are Christians, and we are all sinners.

Just because we know the truth doesn't mean we are any higher or any better than anyone else. We need to get over ourselves and move on to Christ. I think a lot of people are deferred from Christianity because some of us are so set in their beliefs and so passionate about defending them that we actually hinder the progress of the faith. If I can't speak with grace, it might be better for me to learn to be okay with not speaking out so much...

Silent Conversations

The character that defines me and the person that I have become over the years is a direct result of time spent alone with God. Silence and Solitude are the two heavy hitters in my spiritual disciplines for the molding of my person. I've listened to well-put-together sermons and gone to many fantastic conventions and sat through many Sunday Schools and Wednesday Nights, and those have aided me in my pursuit of God, but the times which really alter my soul and my being are the times where I stop trying to actively learn new things about God and let Him speak new things into me. Sadly, sometimes I get so worked up in the joy of increasing my knowledge of God that I forget all about stopping for a moment and listening to Him. 

I am a product of long drives and even longer walks - of minutes and hours alone in the stillness, waiting for God. As foolish as it may sound, the memories of those times are some of the most joyful memories I have, for it is in those times that God speaks into my troubles, my anxiousness, and my fear and calms it; it is in those times that God highlights my successes and my victories. I generally take more intimate encouragement from my quiet times with God than I do with my loud times with friends. My friends speak to my ears and my mind, but God speaks to my heart and my soul; God gets to take a shortcut and split me right down the middle and pick apart my innermost being. When I sit and am quiet before God, He reaches beyond my defenses and gets right to the issue at hand. He convicts, challenges, and encourages without taking any unneeded steps to get there. My community is a great supporter in my Christian walk, but there is nothing better or more necessary for a Christian than an intimate, two-way relationship with God.

What I'm trying to say is this: Even though you've got ten thousand things to do today and twenty thousand to do tomorrow, how much more important are they than your relationship with God? Next time you're driving alone, would you maybe think of flipping off the radio and just listening? When you find you have an extra half hour on your hands, would it be better spent on Facebook or listening to God? I'm not condemning anyone for not spending all their time quiet before God, obviously, but I do know that quiet time is something that I struggle to maintain. I really would encourage everyone who reads this to try and schedule just 10 minutes a day to isolate yourself and spend the time just listening. I know I've been amazed with how far I've come and what I've become through my quiet time with God.

A Ticking Clock

My time on this earth is not promised. I am favored to even be alive on the earth at this moment, and every second that passes by is a second in which we are all allowed to exist. God's grace is silently apparent to all who recognize this wonderful act, for as long as God continues to let his broken creation press on in their pursuit of him, more and more people are drawn to the truth of God and his unfathomable mercy and love.

So where am I going with this? Well, here's the thought that I'm thinking right now (though it's really late, and I'm probably just going off on an exhaustion-induced rant):

This life that I'm living, and this flesh that I exist in has never been insured against a sudden end or termination. I am living a life that can, at any moment, be snuffed out and go from exciting to extinct. I think a lot of people don't realize this, or prefer to conveniently look over it. I wonder how much differently people would act, speak, and think if they knew for a fact that they only had two hours to live. I wonder if they would have a different conversation with their friend in the car if they knew they were both going to die in a head-on collision in 30 seconds. I wonder if the husband would refrain from yelling at his wife if he knew she would die of a heart attack in 15 minutes. I wonder if parents would try to enjoy their kids more and kids would act a little better if they knew that their other family members were close to dying. Have you ever noticed that terminally ill patients seem to be treated so nicely by everyone they come into contact with? This makes me wonder one more thing.

Would I act differently as a Christ follower if I knew I was going to die in 24 hours?

Well, of course I would! I would go out and proclaim Christ on the streets! I would go and repair some broken relationships, forge some new ones, plant some seeds, and pull some weeds. I would try to set everything in order that I have for so long been putting off. I would pursue the attainment of harmony in my life before I passed.

So, then, I have to wonder something else: Why am I not living like that right now? After all, I've established that my time is not guaranteed, and my minutes' number is not known to anyone but God. I could die in my bed as I'm writing this post; I could die in 5 minutes; I could die in 5 decades; either way, one thing is certain: I will die. I have a very, very short time to live my life here on this earth, and I am beginning to get sick and tired of myself when I push things off or procrastinate. Honestly, I don't have time to procrastinate; We don't have time to procrastinate. I cannot afford to use my time for myself. My time belongs to God, and God is all about people. And if God is all about people, then that means that I, as a Christian, as a physical mirror of God, must be all about people as well. I must put aside all selfishness and proclaim the Gospel to those in need of it. I need to get down in the mud with people and speak Christ to them. I need to get out of my comfy bed and sleep on hard concrete floors if that's what it will take to bring someone to Christ.

My nervousness, embarrassment, shame, and awkwardness really don't mean anything, because I am not my own, I am Christ's. Everything I am - everything I do, say, think, and pray - needs to be dedicated to God and his purpose. I have a short 80- years to complete the task he has given me, and I'll need every second to do so. I honestly look at the decades I may have and I wonder how in the world I will be able to do all of what I am called to do. But I place my faith in Christ and in his unfailing grace. If he takes me today, he is good. If he takes me in 90 years, he is just as good. The lord takes us when he wills, but we do as much as we can before our end.

To A Nameless Love

Behold! A figure in the West!

Strong! Bold! Full of heart, empty of fear

Eyes as with fire from Hades, but cooled with calm from Poseidon

Her Will fortissimo, as rushing Alpine

Constant, unchanging,– a mountain in seas of reeds

But I could climb it, to see from Olympus’ peak

The utmost secret: her fashioned armor’s chink

Hark! A light in the East!

Lo! The second Sun!

Her Beauty trumps all else; squanders my clumsy tries

An earthquake my limbs, when mine meet her blazing eyes

Wisdom is gone! Learning has fled!

My thoughts are a tumble with her piercing my head

Were I a bird in the sky, climbing toward your radiance

That I may steal the Sun a glance but even for a moment!

Shout! A spirit from the South!

Full of life, empty of death!

In her there dwells no fury; her soul hath not rage

Her life is her stage; her death is a cage

Let no man resist her glee! Death to me thrice for to step on her joy!

Thirty pearls she wears when her twice-gleaming emeralds seize mine

All my wealth, my peace would I give to reach beyond her rhind!

Kneel! A queen of the North!

Fear! Love! See none but her!

Purity made bold; love so true; care seen pure

To stand 'fore is a lifetime; to touch her feet, an eternity!

I am no man before such greatness!

A bug on her tree - nay, a speck of black bark.

My whole life to achieve a fraction of her spark.

Alight! The four ways combine!

Here stands she, for whom you waited the time!

Whole being demanded, whole being I give

But to have you and hold you as long as we live!

Renewal, Redemption, and Restoration

Something that has been eating at my mind when I find myself otherwise unoccupied is the thought of how much focus I and others put on the negative. Whatever situation I am in, I often find myself recognizing what things are wrong with such a situation, overlooking what is good and emphasizing what is bad. I am characterized with a predisposition to test things and to determine whether or not they could be improved, instead of accepting them as they are and giving praise. This of course is two-sided, having one end where I am cursed, not able to shake the haunting recognition of the unsatisfactory, while on the other, I am able to use it to multiply the blessing to other people.

I feel that we often fail to realize the utter goodness of God. We spend our time wailing and feeling sorry for the starving children of Africa or the terrorist attacks or the broken families that we experience or the break-up that we just went through, without recognizing the efforts of God to teach us something or to call us to action. 

When my tire goes flat on my truck, I spend all my time regretting taking the road I did, because I would have missed the nail if I had gone a different route. Then my mind is taken up with making arrangements, fixing my car, paying for repairs, and then continuing my life unchanged. I have so often failed to see the effort of God in situations such as these! He is trying to teach me humility; he is trying to teach me patience; he is trying to teach me acceptance, forgiveness, and satisfaction. Who am I to be frustrated at God for the things he does to me? I have the believe that everything God works for is for Good; I praise him for that and look toward that when I am placed in a situation like this. 

Let us begin to see and find the good in things. This is not a call to optimism, but a call to realism. If you are a Christian, as I am, this ought to make perfect sense - with faith in Christ comes the realization that while everything is not as God intended it to be, the End will be. Everything that happens to us may not happen because God was the cause, but my God is a God of redemption, and he takes even the most broken and twisted things of Man and of the Enemy and reshapes them into purity, holiness, and love. 

This is where I place my trust: If my God can redeem even a man such as me, then he can certainly redeem the evils of this world and the actions of it.  

Purity

I was speaking this week with a group of friends about the subject of purity in our lives, and our reason and method of upholding it. The subject of relationships and how we are to go about them has been a hot topic in my mind recently. I've been putting some thought into just why I am trying to be pure. Is it for my future wife? Is it because I don't want to be a hypocrite? Is it moral? Ethical? Why exactly do I, do we as Christians, strive for purity?

Well, that's the key right there - "as Christians." Literally, "follower of Christ." As a follower of Christ, why do we strive for excellence, for blamelessness, for purity in our relationships? The first suggestion may be that  we must remain pure in order to become faultless before God in the end. We must eliminate from ourselves any form of impurity so that we may become pure in the sight of God. Purity is our means to attain an end, a goal, that being blamelessness before God.

However, in this discussion with my friends, we talked about a different option. We talked about how ultimate reason of our purity and the real goal of it should not be a "for" but rather a "because." I am trying to be pure because I have been made pure in Christ. I strive for cleanliness in my life because my life has been cleaned by the blood of the Lamb. At least in my life, staying pure in order to benefit my career and my future wife and my friends and my kids are all great reminders, but they are not reasons for it. I use the things that benefit from my purity as reminders that point towards the one and only real reason for my purity - that being Christ, and my new life that I have received. 

The old life is dead and gone. I must live a new live because my old life is gone. I really have no choice in the matter. If I am to continue being a Christian, I have no choice but to challenge the impure things in my life and to overcome them with this new Power. I am pure not in order to become a righteous man; rather, I am pure because I am a man who has been made righteous.

"What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life." -- Romans 6:1-4

People - The most important thing

This next semester, I am going to be volunteering at LifeChoices Pregnancy Center, helping out with phone lines and hopefully eventually being introduced into the counseling side of the ministry. This has been a long time in the making, and I am very excited to get involved with this ministry.

I have a great passion for people. People are the most important thing in this world, and though I tend to hide it behind an unemotional face, I really do care a lot about every person in this world. It tears me up inside when I see girls and guys in broken, damaging relationships.

"Relationship" in and of itself is an area of life that I believe can be the most beneficial to everyone, as well as the most damaging. The reason why the Garden of Eden was so wonderful was not because the fruit tasted amazing or the weather was perfect or the animals were friendly - the reason it was a perfect place was because God was in direct relationship with His creation, man and woman to the point that they empirically experienced Him. Relationship can make a life perfect, but it can also make a life corrupt. Man was given perfection, but continually lowered his standards, and is now paying for it. Abuse, rape, incest - all these things are corruptions of the original perfection that was found in the Garden.

So then, what am I to do? My desire is to reintroduce Perfection into the broken relationships of people. This society is promoting freedom over perfection; by their standards, freedom is perfection. You can choose to have sex with whoever you want, so do it! You don't need marriage; you don't need chastity; you don't need commitment. Live a full life! This is the mindset that I see when I watch modern movies, listen to modern music, and examine modern relationships. It sounds appealing to lots of people - but then they wonder why these relationships are coming up short in their production of joy. For all the love they receive and all the people they sleep with and all the freedom they try out, they can't get rid of that empty feeling inside of them. My want, then, is to provide to these empty people the experience of the fullness that comes in Christ. I want to show them the freedom that comes from being subjected to Christ.

I want to be a helping hand and an open ear to people when they come to find healing. As a Christian, I am called to be a light to the world; as a caring person, I have a huge heart for these people. My current prayer is that God will use me to impact the lives of the people I will be in contact with in order to produce healing and, ideally, new believers.