Painkillers, I might publish this in "Breakaway Magazine" sometime soon

“Painkillers”

The painkillers of life don't stop the bleeding, just dull the pain. I thought these words while in the car tonight. Strange how our minds use metaphors to say what we really see. I honestly do not think I am creative enough to come up with things like that. I think this aphorism (for lack of a better word) has some real meaning though. It portrays what everyone seems to feel but never says: the fact that life without purpose is a death really; we are basically living the time away until our physical deaths happen.
Life is full of cuts; wounds that are inflicted by the lies society and the world push down our throats. The thing is, no one is safe from them. I can imagine a scene of demons sitting down and conferencing about how to target every field of people, big and small, to give them things that will keep them unawares to the huge gash in their chest engendered of their sin. By our separation from God's worthy presence. I imagine them with a business slogan: “We've got a lie, just for you!!”. There'll be a big ad next with the slogan and the words under it read “Just call 1-666-GET-LIES to sign up for your free* subscription”.
Of course, there would be in small print a line telling them that free* means it costs nothing here, not meaning that you wouldn't have to pay anything. Ironic that is ad is a lie in itself. The world tells us that everything has been solved and now you just have to find “what works for you”. They believe their own crap about the materialistic American Dream or 'finding your own truth' (or yourself), or the being in the right crowd. The idea that this place has what we really need is pathetic, and at times even shallow and selfish. With the way this sticky web has spun thus far, it amazes me anyone finds Jesus at all.
Last spring I spent my first border crossing mission trip in the side streets of Ensenada, out in the hills where those who have little money live in houses made of tarp and wood. After my time in Mexico, it is very hard to accept peoples' attitudes about materialism and that way to happiness. In the United States, we have Starbucks on every corner and mustangs and credit cards. This stuff makes people think that our goal in life should be to get a good education, so you can get a good job, so you can get more stuff. The problem is stuff just becomes more stuff and then it becomes junk and debts, and old cars that go o the dump. It doesn't lead anywhere but to working more so you can pay off the debts and then get more stuff. Eventually the debts are paid and the stuff is spent and all you have is garbage, and that's about what your life ends up being worth. One wise Christian guy I forgot the name of once wrote about how he read an article on a person who had the American Dream.
He had a great life, retired rich, and now spent his time collecting sea shells and golfing and doing art projects. What is great about his commentary is that he thought of what the guy is going to say when he sees Jesus: “Jesus, I may not have followed you, but will you look at my shells?” was what he came up with. If that is what life's painkillers do to people, I don't want any. I not so sure I want to buy into anything that makes me think sea shells and a good retirement will save me.
Don't get me wrong, I love democracy. It's very apparent that it's prosperous and is at the time the best method of practicing equality. But it also breeds a wound of materialism and need for stuff that doesn't get you anywhere but death. This is why people cling to painkillers. They need something that will dull the pain in their scars of life behind the Starbucks and credit cards. People really just want to be healed, but buy painkillers instead. This is why we have drugs and teen sex and alcohol abuse and “cliques” and gangs and stuff. To make us feel better. What is ironic is now politics and religion are being used for this also. You're either a Democrat or a Republican or one of those crazy Green Party people (no offense intended). Or you're “religious”; whatever that means. Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist, Orthodox, Taoist, you name it- they got it. You are defined by the stereotype of the religion that suits you.
But when I look to the Word and read what Jesus said, I don't hear anything about getting what you want, or feeling good (or the word religious), or finding yourself. All I hear is about how he heals people where their at and loves them and is always there for you. I don't hear about getting a "good education" or getting laid; I hear about feeding the hungry, giving to the poor, loving the unlovable. So far, he's the only one to do anything right and the only one who can heal the scars, stop the bleeding. He doesn't make you feel good, but he gives you love and cherishes us.
What's odd about painkillers in real life are that they are used for people in extreme pain. Spiritually, people use them, get addicted to them, then die from the wounds that they forgot were still there. But God will never do this. He won't sit and watch you die while feeding you false hope and lying to you. He heals you, no questions asked. He's done it for as long as we've been around. It doesn't cost anything, you don't even have to be saved (though usually, people are when healed). Yet people still would rather be fed the crap society tells us will heal us.
We get stuck with the weighty, molasses feelings of guilt. Or the sensation of loss where you feel the "blood" of your soul draining as you remember that day. Or the muscle wrenching spasms of hate and injustice done to me. Or the sleepy daze of sadness that doesn't leave, just gets covered up. It all gets covered up in layers upon layers of stuff, crushing them all the closer to the body, suffocating the wearer.
Hmm.“Painkillers”
The painkillers of life don't stop the bleeding, just dull the pain. I thought these words while in the car tonight. Strange how our minds use metaphors to say what we really see. I honestly do not think I am creative enough to come up with things like that. I think this aphorism (for lack of a better word) has some real meaning though. It portrays what everyone seems to feel but never says: the fact that life without purpose is a death really; we are basically living the time away until our physical deaths happen.
Life is full of cuts; wounds that are inflicted by the lies society and the world push down our throats. The thing is, no one is safe from them. I can imagine a scene of demons sitting down and conferencing about how to target every field of people, big and small, to give them things that will keep them unawares to the huge gash in their chest engendered of their sin. By our separation from God's worthy presence. I imagine them with a business slogan: “We've got a lie, just for you!!”. There'll be a big ad next with the slogan and the words under it read “Just call 1-666-GET-LIES to sign up for your free* subscription”.
Of course, there would be in small print a line telling them that free* means it costs nothing here, not meaning that you wouldn't have to pay anything. Ironic that is ad is a lie in itself. The world tells us that everything has been solved and now you just have to find “what works for you”. They believe their own crap about the materialistic American Dream or 'finding your own truth' (or yourself), or the being in the right crowd. The idea that this place has what we really need is pathetic, and at times even shallow and selfish. With the way this sticky web has spun thus far, it amazes me anyone finds Jesus at all.
Last spring I spent my first border crossing mission trip in the side streets of Ensenada, out in the hills where those who have little money live in houses made of tarp and wood. After my time in Mexico, it is very hard to accept peoples' attitudes about materialism and that way to happiness. In the United States, we have Starbucks on every corner and mustangs and credit cards. This stuff makes people think that our goal in life should be to get a good education, so you can get a good job, so you can get more stuff. The problem is stuff just becomes more stuff and then it becomes junk and debts, and old cars that go o the dump. It doesn't lead anywhere but to working more so you can pay off the debts and then get more stuff. Eventually the debts are paid and the stuff is spent and all you have is garbage, and that's about what your life ends up being worth. One wise Christian guy I forgot the name of once wrote about how he read an article on a person who had the American Dream.
He had a great life, retired rich, and now spent his time collecting sea shells and golfing and doing art projects. What is great about his commentary is that he thought of what the guy is going to say when he sees Jesus: “Jesus, I may not have followed you, but will you look at my shells?” was what he came up with. If that is what life's painkillers do to people, I don't want any. I not so sure I want to buy into anything that makes me think sea shells and a good retirement will save me.
Don't get me wrong, I love democracy. It's very apparent that it's prosperous and is at the time the best method of practicing equality. But it also breeds a wound of materialism and need for stuff that doesn't get you anywhere but death. This is why people cling to painkillers. They need something that will dull the pain in their scars of life behind the Starbucks and credit cards. People really just want to be healed, but buy painkillers instead. This is why we have drugs and teen sex and alcohol abuse and “cliques” and gangs and stuff. To make us feel better. What is ironic is now politics and religion are being used for this also. You're either a Democrat or a Republican or one of those crazy Green Party people (no offense intended). Or you're “religious”; whatever that means. Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist, Orthodox, Taoist, you name it- they got it. You are defined by the stereotype of the religion that suits you.
But when I look to the Word and read what Jesus said, I don't hear anything about getting what you want, or feeling good (or the word religious), or finding yourself. All I hear is about how he heals people where their at and loves them and is always there for you. I don't hear about getting a "good education" or getting laid; I hear about feeding the hungry, giving to the poor, loving the unlovable. So far, he's the only one to do anything right and the only one who can heal the scars, stop the bleeding. He doesn't make you feel good, but he gives you love and cherishes us.
What's odd about painkillers in real life are that they are used for people in extreme pain. Spiritually, people use them, get addicted to them, then die from the wounds that they forgot were still there. But God will never do this. He won't sit and watch you die while feeding you false hope and lying to you. He heals you, no questions asked. He's done it for as long as we've been around. It doesn't cost anything, you don't even have to be saved (though usually, people are when healed). Yet people still would rather be fed the crap society tells us will heal us.
We get stuck with the weighty, molasses feelings of guilt. Or the sensation of loss where you feel the "blood" of your soul draining as you remember that day. Or the muscle wrenching spasms of hate and injustice done to me. Or the sleepy daze of sadness that doesn't leave, just gets covered up. It all gets covered up in layers upon layers of stuff, crushing them all the closer to the body, suffocating the wearer.
Hmm.
All I wanted was to pull it off in the first place. But then I would have had to look at it. To acknowledge their presence. All of these painkillers tell you its okay, but their empty claims, such as the war buddy telling his mutilated friend that he's “gonna be fine”. Just wait a little longer. Yes, somehow I've let myself believe their crap yet again. Reality only hits me at 11:59, when I realize that all they've done is make me forget that I was still bleeding.
All I wanted was to pull it off in the first place. But then I would have had to look at it. To acknowledge their presence. All of these painkillers tell you its okay, but their empty claims, such as the war buddy telling his mutilated friend that he's “gonna be fine”. Just wait a little longer. Yes, somehow I've let myself believe their crap yet again. Reality only hits me at 11:59, when I realize that all they've done is make me forget that I was still bleeding.

My Song

"My Song"

I've got two faces. One, I keep with me and God. It's the one I don't have to deal with all the time. The other, is me. What everyone sees. Is me. But I don't have to deal with that one either.
Why? This doesn't make sense. I'm a geek philosophizes in his spare time. I seek to understand people and what they want versus what they need. Yet I personally can't deal with myself; "The world is crumbling, but I know why", sings a member of Jars of Clay. Quite insightful. But I know why. I find myself not understanding how I can see through others' problems and know how to deal with them, but I can't solve my own. The world is crumbling, as well as I. But I know why. Why do I have to tell everyone else why? Why I can't fix my own is maybe what I want, but maybe I want to keep it this way? I don't know. He does.
He gets it. That would make sense. He made it, He works it, He can comprehend it. But I'm still here. I still can pick up this cross of shame and grace and walk up that once crimson hill back in Israel. Yet the hill isn't really in Israel. It's in here. In this page. In these words. In my mind, heart, body. Then why?
A friend, Joel the Beloved, told me something in a somewhat unsteady argument where we had decided that the other was an idiot for not solving their respective problem by now. He said, with a slight amount of contempt, that it would be nice if I would just "not be so cryptic all the time." He was referring to my (obviously annoying) habit of pointing out easy to understand ideas in a way that makes no sense to everyone else. I like to call it my "Epic" syndrome. I like things to sound amazing. But he would refer to it as my Proverbial Sayings Syndrome.
Maybe thats what this is: an explanation for all my cover-ups and stealth operations on the battlefield. Here I am, pretending to be a leader, someone called by God to do something; But I have my own agenda. And "my people" sit back and tell me that I'm forgiven, just try again. I see that as only skin deep.
The funny thing is, He's the one really saying it.
I get myself into this idea of freedom, but it only lasts so long. Then I find myself looking for the painkillers again. I can't deal with it. I gave it to Him, but I want it back, so that I don't have to deal with it. It is just another easy to use pronoun. My end shows my means. I'm justified. Think about it. It doesn't matter what my it is, just that I keep holding on. All I want to do is let go, but I really, really just want to not deal with it.
Maybe my cryptic sentences will finally stop being two-faced and show up their worth in my friend's eyes. Maybe not. Either way, I hope I can realize that he is not so easy to figure out. He's a soul. and souls have a tendency to be deep. Deeper than I can see or feel. But maybe, just maybe, he'll get me this time and finally feel what I feel when I worship. One wise person commented (not to me) that singing songs other people wrote is worshiping God through their eyes and hearts. A type of communion that goes through other people into the worshiper and becomes them, so they can see another facet of His mind-blowing coolness. These words are my song. My facet that God assigned me to portray. This is my song. My song rings true, but me doesn't. Not yet. I'm still working on that. Conclusion sold separately.

My Spiritual Life in a Nutshell (Well, not completely)

"My Spiritual Life in a Nutshell"

What was, now seems to not have been; what seems to have been now seems was not. I see now that life has become something other than what we try to make it. Life is a reality that we never see completely. It's so odd. To find that life is not what you think, and that your view will never completely be right. It's this idea that God is impossible to label. Nothing seems big enough to contain Him, yet somehow I find ways to box Him in.
When I was little, my sight of God was quite simple. Jesus was this guy who you gave all your negative feelings and told all the bad things that happened to you and asked for stuff you needed. Basically, He was a toy; a machine. A slot machine that I asked for stuff, hoping that I might win the jackpot this time around. If you prayed enough, God might make things the way you want them to be. It was still all about me. Our faith always becomes about us. The me factor is so great that most Christians know the theology, yet don't go deeper. We get so caught up in what is going on with us and with our faith that we miss out on what God's doing and showing us.
My whole life has been about faith. I really haven't had a time I can remember where I didn't believe in God and His authority. But somehow I can get so lost without even running away. I turned 12. I went to seventh grade. My life became about school and sports and friends and stuff and not doing drugs and not joining gangs and being a Christian. I suddenly found myself proclaiming all these labels that I couldn't even define.
We were made to serve and to love serving. It shows in how we always serve someone. It might be yourself, or sex, or drugs, or money, or stuff, or a gang. But we still are serving. I found myself caught in this whirlwind of serving things that I didn't want to serve. Yet I found myself being drawn to serve them more and more. Innocence is so precious. Yet we lose it so freely. My school became overrun with a spirit of violence and hate. I don't know how, but my class suddenly toughened over the summer between sixth and seventh grade. I found myself cussing. Not to fit in, but because it flowed out like butter. It was fun. I cussed. I fought. I was tough. I learned to hate so quickly, I can't know how it overtook me. It seems almost that our first conception of sin being plausible, we have already sinned. I found myself secretly thinking that I was like Adam. Finding the knowledge of good and evil was powerful and enticing. It was all about me, my labels, and people knowing about me the way I wanted them to. I didn't end up doing something horrible. I didn't shoot some other kid and never told anyone or had sex in middle school or anything. But the contemplation of sin as okay, acceptable, was the worst sin I committed. I enveloped myself in darkness. That was to the truly evil piece. Not the cussing or the fighting. It was letting in the evil, knowing it as such, and abiding with it. Understanding the hypocrisy and enjoying it.
My life has always been one spent in the spiritual realm. I know only a few others who can do the same. But it can be fatal, even in small intensity and for a short time, to your ability to see. I would say that you cannot truly know your salvation as amazing as it is without understanding how bad your sin has grown up into. The sin grows. Creepy. Sin grows and intensifies and pulls harder and harder until suddenly you find yourself so far away that you don't want to stop and you want to go back at the same time. Your desire becomes more and more intense, yet your fulfillment and enjoyment decreases and diminishes until you are an empty shell of a person.
The sad thing is, most people don't see their gossip and bickering and open sexuality and lying to their loved ones as evil. Sure, it might be somewhat wrong, but its not all bad. Not all the way bad. Only a little bad. Something I learned in those two years was that darkness at every level still lacks light. That light, being lacking becomes worthless because you still cannot see as well, though you may be able to see some. If we can't see all the way, what then is the point of seeing?!
When I finally saw this, I remembered, out of the blue, that Jesus was the way out. That God will always set you free and clean you and make you entirely new. So I went to my room. I don't remember how, but a bible was sitting next to my bed when I went in my room that night. Strange how those things happen just when God seems like He's not there. So Jesus filled me up, probably for the first time where it meant something more than me. It meant resurrection. It meant death. It hurt. I cried. But Jesus felt my pain. He understood that grief all too well.
Ever since, I have been able at times to find Jesus and physically experience Him when I worship Him. This is where my story gets good. Suddenly, my life changed like crazy. It seems my life hasn't stopped being crazy and changing drastically ever since. My Dad got remarried over the summer in between middle and high school. I received 4 new sisters and a new mom and family to go with it all. We got a new house and a suburban to fit us all in. But God wasn't done. Alice, my step mom, got involved in Inner Healing. I didn't really get it or know why I needed it, but understood what she said about it to be true. But God wasn't done. He put me a new school after my freshman year. It was crazy.
I had never felt God say, Go to another High School to be a soldier for me, before. But now I had. I didn't have some crazy encounter or something hear about on the 700 Club; I just knew I had to go to this new school. But God wasn't done.