A Demagogues Conversion

Relocation

2008-08-21T19:57:00.001-07:00

I have relocated: HERE

On the First Day of the Week

2008-07-18T03:40:00.000-07:00

Death where has you sting gone?
Oh Grave! Where is your claim?
You have been defeated.
Your tyrhanny has come to an end,
Crushed by he who was accursed.
The light is passing, far into your depths.
Your caves, your caverns, and your sea.
Have you not known, have you not heard?
All creation groaning for your abdication.
There is an end for there is one who rules the sea.
The terror within has become contained.
Blood speaks of a deeper light, a deeper life,
One in which all tears are wiped away,
For pain and suffering are his displeasure.
His delight bursts forth in renewal,
His smile sustaining all things,
Friends and enemies alike.
His eyes are on those who hope in his kindness,
Whose hearts burn for the restoration of all things.
In silence he hears every groan and every tear.
Reverberating throughout his heart
Intermingling with his own.
Strength unto the weak and healing to the broken,
Justice pours forth from his throne on behalf
Of the brokenhearted.
Put your trust in God, for his Kingdom is sure.
Put your trust in God, for his blood is enough.
Put your trust in God, he lift your head and strengthen your heart.
Heaven mourns over the broken,
But the day of salvation is at hand.
The last enem's destruction is sentenced,
Death shall be no more.

A Brief Statement on Words

2008-02-26T03:39:00.000-08:00

A confession in a prudent time awakens the dormant and even at times the dying. What do we stand on except for that of words and the Word itself. Our composition is based entirely of the word of One’s power sustaining all things. They flow in and out of the cognition of the comatose and the mentally ill as they do the brilliant and the quick witted, reception holds another story. The unlocking of identity and authority of love and even depression hinge on these entities. The make up of a freer sect of breeds the modern elitist. This is our war. They fly around us as wordsmiths and spin doctors alike hold the leash by which we in this land have come out of the womb with. Though wrapped around our neck the freedom is by no means and easy anecdote. One man’s leash is another man’s noose and the reigns tighten by the day.
Oh, what sweet freedom we find in the words that still and quiet our souls. The Word that towers above the need of answers or even explanation this alone is our salvation. The mercenaries of other ages have lauded over the status quo rendering the situation as one of a mess. There have always been renegades and always rebels. The funky one are the only ones worth noting anymore it seems. The brilliant man truly is toppled. An exasperation throws away the sequences of order and logic and the heart gnaws away for the pain of the indescribable. The reign they hold over us, these masters, these words, either to brighten the eye or to depress the mouth. The expanse of longing for these establish us as who we are. The poetic romantic scraping off the demagogues inaugural address. Tools that mold that manipulate that build and that confront.
Like a starting gun to a firing squad to the trigger to the charismatic, the word “Fire” holds the keys to life and death. Four letters, on syllable, and a handful of connotations. Yet this is just one of a plethora of terms in our common vocabulary and at times graze on the border of redundancy. We grope for meaning and find it not. We speak calling things forth sputtering into a needless collapse. Our treaties are but dust and are worth just as much often as the paper it was written on. Unmarked Native American graves are our testament.
It became flesh, skin, bone, uvula, the whole works. It dwelt among us and was surrounded by noise, clamoring, grunts, moans, pants, screams, cries, and various and assorted syllables. In this regiment of things He upheld, created, saw, felt, and expressed himself through He lived. Yet He was known not. He who is life, the Creator and sustainer of all things became flesh and died allowing us to be one with him. There are those whose words do not fall to the ground and that is because it is in fact not mere chattering but the very Word of God. Logos in audible form, proceeding from a broken and contrite human being. This is love that we may become one with Him. So in turn may we depart and flee from the messes and meditations of men and commune with the eternal Excellence and bring him forth to abide within freeing us from the noose of the echoes of emptiness that the princes of the air mutters before they fade into nothing. Eat the scroll. Consume the word. Feast on the Lord and life, and love, and light will abound.

With this I hope to return to the blogging world

Happy Advent

2007-12-18T22:08:00.000-08:00

As it does every year, Christmas time has come again. It’s the wonderful time of the year of family togetherness, sharing, love and of course the incarnation of Jesus Christ. Often what first comes to my memory at least are fond memories of Christmas cookies, Christmas music, Family, some of my favorite presents (one of my all time favorites being the G.I. Joe headquarters), and manger scenes. However, throughout the years and especially this year the magic seems gone. I am assuming it is something to do with growing up because all that is seen is another break from the monotony and hectic pressures of all of life’s needs and concerns. As a kid I stared with wide-eyed amazement at the Christmas tree our family would put up and just get lost in the colorful glow and would often climb under it and stare up for a better look. The house smelled like cookies and my siblings and I would be giddy with expectation of our presents to come while we watched the specials on TV like Rudolph and the Grinch. Joy set in with a mystical blanket that covered everything that I knew.
Yet now I sit in front of a tree and gas fueled fire somewhat missing those days and looking at the world as what it truly is, cold and grim. Granted that I have become much more of a cynic through the past five or so year, more than most but working on it. I could rant and rave about the commercialization of a sacred holiday or even feel so enlightened to bring up pagan traditions and play the role of the wise Grinch. I say this not to make sure that the taste of coal goes forth in this advent but to inspire, provoke, and possibly instill a little hope.
It has been awhile since I have seen a Christmas movie. Some of the bigger ones like Elf and the Santa Clause trilogy have been some of the more notable in the past few years. My favorite by far was the Nativity film that came out last year. The bulk of the family flicks that come out inspire warmth, love, compassion and kindness to one’s fellow man, a breath of fresh air from the chaos and disappointment from life. Sad to say that the most recent Christmas film I watched was the first Die Hard movie, which I suggest no one to see. On top of being filled with profuse profanity, spots of nudity, and all around violence, it also took place on Christmas Eve. Things were blown up, adultery was made light, bitterness was glorified, lives were violently ended, pride was praised, and injustice was having a heyday. This, my friends, is the meaning of Christmas.
Now, before I get labeled a jaded Scrooge, I know that it’s tempting, to better clarify this is the reason for Christmas. Christmas has more often than not become a tradition of Americana and then passes by with the huge sales the next year. Carols are reflected on and we thank Jesus for becoming a baby so that we may have salvation. We are thankful for the gift of God and are befuddled at the hats of the Magi, in this brief time joy has truly come to the world.
There is no book, in my opinion that talks about the incarnation and the meaning of it like that of Isaiah. So much more than forgiveness of sins is at hand:
“Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands far away; for truth has stumbled in the public squares, and uprightness cannot enter. Truth is lacking, and he who departs from evil makes himself a prey. The LORD saw it, and it displeased him that there was no justice. He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no one to intercede; then his own arm brought him salvation, and his righteousness upheld him. He put on righteousness as a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on his head; he put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped himself in zeal as a cloak. According to their deeds, so will he repay, wrath to his adversaries, repayment to his enemies; to the coastlands he will render repayment. So they shall fear the name of the LORD from the west, and his glory from the rising of the sun; for he will come like a rushing stream, which the wind of the LORD drives. "And a Redeemer will come to Zion, to those in Jacob who turn from transgression," declares the LORD. And as for me, this is my covenant with them," says the LORD: "My Spirit that is upon you, and my words that I have put in your mouth, shall not depart out of your mouth, or out of the mouth of your offspring, or out of the mouth of your children's offspring," says the LORD, "from this time forth and forevermore." Isaiah 59:14-21

Now that is quite a heavy passage. This is the love that John 3:16 talks about and is far more poetically explained in Philippians 2:6-11. Jesus came to establish a Kingdom and for that reason He came.

“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.” Isaiah 9:6-7

My friends we have a God who sees and who cares. We have a God who came to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8) and who will permanently crush the serpent’s head and restore righteousness (Gen 3). Righteousness is not some ethereal moral code but rather the correct order in which all things were meant to be and in accordance to the glory of God (Hab 2:7) which is all things aligned to the triune God of relational love. Christmas was for the oppressed, for the poor, for those in bondage, and for the afflicted. Christmas is for every single act of injustice that happens under the sun and the guarantee that there will be justice will be done (Rev 22:12). A Kingdom was brought to the earth through our sympathetic High Priest (Heb 4:14-16) and a day is coming when His and our Father will come and wipe every tear away (Rev 21:4).

I know that this was a tad bit lengthy but with this I wish you a merry and blessed Christmas. May the peace and love of God which go beyond comprehension encounter and guard you and your family. Take heed, justice is coming and we truly do have a good King!

A Bit of Hope

2007-11-26T01:37:00.000-08:00

Efficiency has become the way we have defined success, using in this case the royal “we.” Granted God is by far the most efficient being in all of existence, the popular conceptions of it seem so contrary to His nature. It seems that when God said, “Let us make man in our own image!” the picture that almost appears is that of a lawyer, philosopher, and accountant standing around some blueprints attempting to hash out this newfangled monstrosity. Tireless effort thrown together ends up only in the creation rebelling and the conclave of Creator beings frustrated. Its times like this I wish my mind wasn’t cluttered with so much Gnostic and post-Freudian thought and I could actually get a better hold on beholding God. Don’t get me wrong those are not the only things to blame, we shan’t ignore the purple elephant of the fallen nature by any means but too much detachment has seemed to become the status quo and in far too many cases the golden calf.
The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit birthed all of the created order from the overflow of what they were, are, and will be which is the ineffable joyous immeasurable fountain of love. God has, for me in my upbringing, always seemed as if He were not quite sure what to do with creation. You had the angels and the demons, the elite being that really ruled over the humans; animals who the humans ruled over and were either cute or tasted good or neither; and then there were humans who were made in the image of God meaning that our physiological frame was in some way shape or form a vague comparison to His own. The Trinity was never really applied to anything with the exception of the time the word was actually used. Interchange amidst the Godhead was almost something unnecessary to divulge into or at least it was too noble a pursuit.
With such a detached view it is easy to miss the purpose of even existence. To be honest what had encompassed the years prior was more like communism than Christianity. We work and save people in order to get a pat on the back from God and when you do really well people will acknowledge what you are doing and you might get persecuted, only in the end to have the person realize how good a person you really are. If it came to it, martyrdom was always a high calling. I mean if Jesus could die a gruesome death why couldn’t we. In the end all that seemed left was just a vague picture of this huge mass singing songs for eternity on some shiny surface. Which I guess why the idea of Heaven terrified me so much, perpetual monotony never is appealing unless it is coupled with perpetual agony.
In the end all that I had been left with was the meaning of life was to worship God because He was God and that is what you did. I had heard stories of she kina type experiences and every now and then went to a service where people fell down. The height of encounter was either seeing something really cool or showing some form of emotion.
We were made for so much more. We truly were. Genesis says that we are made in the likeness of God and are to do our heavenly Father’s will. As sons and daughters our primary occupation is to be like our Father through our Brother Jesus Christ. Above all Jesus and God do not base their entire relationship around some strategy board moving people and angelic beings around but their primary occupation is being completely immersed in the love of each other and pouring that forth. At their right hand is pleasures forever more and the fullness of joy is in their presence. This mind you is the God who created music, color, monkeys, mountains, dancing, laughter, sex, relationship, human beings, the four living creatures, and everything else. The angels around His throne are not mindless drones perpetually yelling words God likes to hear but the stay due to the fact that God’s beauty far surpasses any articulation or comprehension. God does not create that which does not reflect His glory, and everything yearns for His rule and reign to be established. Rocks are capable of crying out praise and the Earth is groaning like a woman in labor waiting for God’s radiance to be unrestrained.
This is the God we worship. What a thousand sunrises cannot paint and what a thousand sonatas can articulate pales in comparison to the one who can lay the forest bare with a single blast from His nostrils. To think that we (assuming people are the only ones reading this not highly learned gorillas) were made to partake of that divine and glorious fellowship. I mean words like “glory” and “divine” have been so beaten into the ground that almost all meaning has been stripped from them. The cosmos have been stretched forth by His hand and God knows every movement of my heart. He sees when I wake up, He knows the words that come out of my mouth, He knows what moves me, He knows the sin I am going to commit minutes after I feel His presence deeply, He knows my days and orders my steps, He is coming to rule and reign, and He holds all things together with the power of His word. This is my God,
My God is love. My God is not a detached ruler of a vapid subjugation He mildly loathes. His ways are not our ways nor His thoughts our thoughts. Though our being reflects Him by nature He is not entirely like us. He is the God of communion and the God of Rest. How can one rest detached from others. He who seeks isolation seeks their own destruction. True rest is found in the deepest intimacy feeling secure in every area of your life, this is where the striving ceases.
God is so often looked at as a means to an end and He is only part of the end because that is what the contract we signed stipulates. However, He is the Beginning and the End. The cross was more than a big rubber stamp to declare “Forgiven” on our sin stained name tags but it was the unifying of all things. Jesus went to the furthest extent of pain and abandonment in order for us to enter into the divine fellowship of joy. Jesus came to redeem all and redemption is not just a mere legal standing but it is a reversal of the curse and will be fulfilled when He comes to rule and reign. This does not negate the pursuit of holiness and intimacy but spurs us forward. Jesus did not die for a quota but for a pure and spotless Bride, one in who He would not be unequally yoked to. The cry in our hearts which is a faint reflection of the one in God’s heart is one for total intimacy. There is a reason why Jesus did not say, “Go into the world and make converts,” but called the body to make disciples. We are to follow in His footsteps and not just obtain a shotgun message. In order to walk in the footsteps of Christ we need to be able to be as He is and enter into love, those who love Him are those who obey His commands.
His plan is not based on our whims or accomplishments. He is not critiquing humanity to see if they measure up to His standing. There is a reason why the meek and the poor and spirit are blessed. He is not holding His breath hoping that by some miracle we get everything right, but it is He Himself who is the one who is the Good Shepherd declaring the beginning from the end. His way is gentle and He leads with tenderness. Though He rules with resolve stronger than any iron fist He knows that we are but dust and does not see people as pawns in a game which He is locked in willing for casualties to be a flippant thing. He does not even delight in the death of the wicked but is a God that is longsuffering and came to suffer with us.
The darkness is passing and the true light is already shining. The law brings death and we are to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. He allows the rain to fall on the good and the wicked, this is His perfection. Justice comes forth from His throne and is surrounded by mercy. He does not demand a rigid mechanical obedience because robots are incapable of love, which is the only commandment. We have a High Priest, we have an Intercessor, we have a Friend who was tempted in every way and learned obedience through suffering in order to sympathize (suffer) with us. This is our boldness. This is our confidence. This is our righteous: Faith in Him who loved us.

My Hundredth Blog: A Premium Weez

2007-10-12T03:46:00.000-07:00

Well, what do you know, 100 blog entries. Yup, that is some accomplishment I guess. Shoot I am currently celebrating this momentous occasion with a heapin cup of hot cocoa and gazing into my family's gas powered fire place. The brisk tint of fall has already seeped within my veins bringing nothing but joy to my already content demeanor. On a side not I think demeanor is a pretty boring word, it has a sophisticated sound about it but I think it is only really appropriate for describing a funeral or a coroner's tune fish sandwich.
Well it has been awhile since I have done any honest blogging, a poem here, some thoughts there and that is really about it. Sad to say for the most part the little blogging community I found myself reading went the way of the dodo bird and rapcore and straight up died, its a sad day. The only possible way to avenge such an atrocity is to find five dollars, but honestly, I would need to find atleast ten. A sleek Hamilton would do the trick I mean in this day and age it oculd nearly buy you a car... we do have such a lovely economy.
So an update on life. Amidst the hustle and occasional bustle of my life I have now begun to run sound at the Justice House of Prayer. It has been really fun. I have a meager three sets a week but I try and make the most of it. Granted I am a total newbie and each day I learn that I know even less than I thought I did , I love the fact that I actually effect the sound of some worship teams. I mean it makes me happy, especially at the JPR because the teams are so fresh and have not all conduced themselves into the almost generic IHOP sound. Granted there is a mass of variation within but once you step back it is just a gigantic swirl as an entity unto its own. I mean it is such a breath of freshb air to hear a man shred in fluid 80's style mean electirc guitar, it does the heart well. Along with the pancreas. There is a small chance that I may get the position of sound cordinator over there as well, it was offered to me but I have yet to hear anything back, which is fine with me because I am busy enough as it is with schoolwork.
Now on to school. Classes have been an absolute blast. I have been blessed to dive back into my old debate roots over both of the previous modules and thank God for that lovely kiss. Our class dynamic has been something to completely cherish. Last year I was in a class of about a hundred people and only really knew about a tenh of them. My classes now have twenty people in them and we are really beginning to bond. The Nightwatch FSM as a whole has been throwing down like fiends. God has truly birthed a community with us in the nights and it is something that is forerunning things which are coming to IHOP as a whole. A prophetic spirit has been riding with us and unity has become our defining line. The spirit of unity through the bond of peace flourishes greater than the monster weeds in my back yard and let me tell you that is a wonderful thing (yet I cringe about the yardwork waiting for me when I wake up.) We are with each other almost every night of the week building deep friendships and having good times.
This past week ten of us stayed up all day and went to the Omaha zoo. Apart from the catatonic beginning and ending it was a blast, well the catatonic parts were rather gnarly as well. I mean the shennanagins started right from the beginning when all the guys were greeted in the men's restroom by Josiah saying, "There is a woman in here and she promises she will not look." I mean, classic. She was trying to get her son out who seemed pretty adamant about not leaving. We explored all sorts of terrain from the desert to the rainforest. Two of the more memorable animals were the orangutans and the gorillas. The orangutans tried their hardest to clap, snap, and frown their way into getting food from Tiffany but they did not succeed. All the while the gibbon sitting next to them just stared into space and scratched his belly. In the land of gorillas our group gathered around the protective glass to gaze upon these wild and majestic creatures. Emily locked eyes with the alpha male and he bounded over to where she was and punched the glass as hard as he could. I was daze for about ten seconds and then my entire body was consumed with fear, gorillas my friend, are powerful creatures. The trip left me longing for two things: my own kids to run wild and be filled with wonder and enthusiasm AND the millenial kingdom to come so that we may freely dwell with animals and understand them.
As fall has arrived it is time to have definitive music for the season. Each of the prior falls have had their definitive sounds. 05 had the dulcet tones of Sufjan Stevens and the Danielson Famile. 06 was strictly mewithoutYou. However, I do have a few notable mentions for this year. Currently I have been jamming to the newest release by Maylene but my favorite discovery has been that of Woven Hand. Fronted by David Eugene Edwards, grandson of a holiness rider, brings not only some heavy "alterna-country" or "goth-folk" but also the fear of the Lord. Originally known for his other band Sixteen Horsepower, this is a force to truly be reckoned with. Another band I would love to display to the one or two people who may stumble across this blog is Gogol Bordello. Their frontman is the lead character in the movie Everything is Illuminated, which was a great film..... bearing in mind that the end is always sad when Christ is not involved.
So that is all for now. It has been a wild ride on this blog, let me tell ya. In a while I shall get back to throwing down theological heaviness, but until be blessed in Christ's name.

Grave Robber

2007-09-29T03:45:00.001-07:00

High noon burns the sweat soaked eyes
Dusty brows litter the anxious street
Words are hushed where sleeping dogs lie
All silent when the drunk judge takes his seat
The convict comes down the aisle lookers in tow
Lays down his six shooters the loaded twelve
Peacemakers unsheather that the people didn't know
The Sons of God do not live on shelves

Lawyer started yelling as the preacher was preachin'
Mouthed closed as he took on the hell fire blaze
Bordellos and bars and other places he be teachin'
With a tongue like Bowie's knife the words never a haze
The jury was rigged he had each one hung
Human nature was the gamble for years been set up
The hearts of men wanting holy necks wrung
Plotting his fate with backwash in a bitter cup

Preacher smirks donning hangman's mask
Noose in hand points to the old oak tree
The oak never had any questions to ask
"Cursedbe the man who hangs from me!"
He steps forward to the executioner's laugh
Putting it on like a jewelled necklace
Smeeling in the distance the burning of chaff
Passion burned in the stone set face

Blackness surrounds the roaring fist
Recompense of the piper's receipt
Eternity hosts this flagrant mist
Death shrieked with the given release
Burning eyes with the heavy axe
Hand to handle waylaying the crushing blow
Violence fills the remorseless attack
The Hangin' tree falls with no seed to sow

Grave Robber
Hear the jingle jangle of his keys
Grave Robber
Shatterin' the proud man's kness
Grave Robber
Best do what he said
Grave Robber
Comin' to judge the quick and th' dead

2007-09-25T18:55:00.000-07:00

Her touch was softer than usual tonight. Her cheek pressed against mine as her smile met my face. It had been a while since I had seen her but those green eyes are never easy to forget. She came out of nowhere for what seemed no apparent reason except o share this moment right now. A rendezvous with the mundane abruptly came to an end as the scent of her perfume floated my way, cinnamon and roses. Time and time again had we met, each time more appropriate than the one prior. Everything around us seemed to fade for just a moment. All that was left were the gray clouds above and the incoming mist. Hearts held in unison as her voice began to caress my ears. Each syllable dripped with honey and her breath smelled like sweet incense. Here we stood at the street corner exchanging sweet nothings into each other with our embrace locked within this suspension of time. I could feel her lips move against my cheek and my heart began to move faster and faster palpitating an opus with the speed of a freight train. Minutes passed like hours as we stood on that corner, it seemed the entire world passed by in that brief moment, nothing worth concerning ourselves with. We had each other. As soon as it began the moment ended. Words were never uttered as our eyes remained locked in repose. With a wink she vanished into the crowd knowing that our next reunion will be even more intimate. A tear of bittersweet joy ran down my cheek as my heart began to grown. She needed to go as did I but the parting had never been easy. I go my way and she goes her own as she continues to cry out in the street.

What You Talkin' About Willis?

2007-09-08T04:46:00.000-07:00

To err in ones own mind draws too many fleeting glances from his own heart. The towers of men and empires of humanity are nothing more than flimsy cardboard providing shelter for the wealthy who perpetually feel homeless. The same log that burns in their fireplace is from the tree that holds years of memiores inscribed in noble thought. The fantasy of a broken creature remains fractured like its creator. Links are always missing like the Emperor's new clothes and he who sees is hanged from the noose of Lady Goodiva. He who is begets and that which has come is indeed begotten, yet only one came from the Father. Mistakes of the ages plot out a roas map for the astute to follow. Blind lead the blind but there is one who searches the deep things of the heart, which is deceitful above all things. Good intentions have led to an ocean floor covered with millstones and their partners. He who searches man searches the deep things of God and continues to flow in creativity even after the sixth day. Mountains of ambiguity get laid bare from the nostrils of He who declares the beginning from the end and all that remains is the mountain of perfection. It is He who loved us to the end which beckons all to meet it's looming presence. Rain falls on the righteous and the wicked all the while roads are being carved up the mountain scented like clusters of myrhh. Tunnels are broken open by the heart of John Henry while the peak towers above the plain of delusion. The darkness ever darker and the light becoming rare, flickers of sapphire warm those who have pursued the truth. The end is coming and the days are drawing shorter, these days are evil. Oh what glory waits for the few is but a flicker as a hush directs us to the myriad singing Handel's Messiah.

Exhibit Hall

2007-09-07T02:31:00.000-07:00

Flourescent lighting has become what I see when I close my eyes. The dull hum illuminating what seems to be empty halls. Once looking like a pristine museum has succumbed to the monotony of the custodian who resided there. Pictures have faded and sculptures were left cracked. Yet day in and day out the floors are swept and the brass fixtures are polished to reflective brilliance. At night the routine is once again done and then come morning is left ready for a whole new chorus of messes and smudges. Yet day in and day out with little recognition he does his job. Always with a smile with eyes concealing an aura of euphoric glow. If you still your self for long enough you can even hear him whistling. Few wander into his closet and are merely content with his nightly doings. Inside the thick mahoghany door lie a world beyond recognition; one of murals, sketches, and sculptures reflecting vivid color and life. With each stroke and curve beauty is immortalized. Few have seen and few have asked, and he longs to let the beauty be held.

The Raggamuffin Silhouette

2007-09-04T04:43:00.000-07:00

Broken streaks once again flood the face of the vessel trying once again to serve a purpose. Inclination of the former years dwindle in hindsight yet a vacant light at the end of the tunnel seem to spur life to bloom once again. The broken shards litter the ground like a poorly made mosaic coloring the black asphalt with chipped shades of copper. Angels hum above breaking the silence, Handel’s Messiah in brief synopsis energizing the air hat blows in and out of the cracks that seemed to have marked our subject in the onslaught of fluid thought encircling the dreams that the jar once held. Awakening once again to a new dawn spliced by rain clouds and rainbows the permeation of the translucent colors embody the warmth that heaven sees. The skies open and heaven’s tears begin to pour. Each one collected in the vase that stands as a silhouette in the vacant landscape. The ground is saturated with new life and flowers spring out from under the pavement. A trickle is contained within the vessel as a voice from heaven says, “Well done!”

The Workers Are Going Home

2007-08-26T04:44:00.000-07:00

Summer is coming to a quick and rapid close. It is interesting, it is ending on a note which I honestly never saw coming. Amidst the busines of the base and other things it seems as if myself and the gang are to a degree parting ways yet going the same direction. Seasons change and so do atmospheres. I am pretty enthused for this school year yet am left pondering if this is all there is for me. Granted for awhile my thoughts were tied down here strictly because of the community I am at the point of wondering if this is actually what I want to do with the rest of my life. I have no technical skills and musically am hitting nothing but walls. A couple times a week I even toy with the idea of running off to law school, I mean I am only twenty. Granted regardless of what I will be doing I will be keeping a life in prayer and pursuing God, but is this all there is for me. I hold firm to the prophecies and I beleive that we are in fact living in a sovreign time of history yet I feel as if I am just merely floating. Everything that once drove me seems to have fallen through the cracks of selfish ambition or even futility. As of recent I have been given words about asking for the desires of my heart, I haven't the slightest clue of what they are. I mean other than the normal ones like know God, fall in love, and actually walk in a calling. I will know more and more of God as the days pass, I am not really attracted to anyone at all now, nor do I have any idea of what I want to do with my life. I know I need to grow up and that is currently the one thing I am working on, doing miserably but working on. I mean I live at home with my family, have most of my needs met, and have really never held any responsibilty. I mean God has me where I am for a reason, that is something I cannot refute. I am at a place where I want something to run for. I have come to a place where I don't just want to follow another man's vision but carve out my own. On the plus side I am enjoying school, my heart hurts resoundingly less, hope is blossomming, and I am beginning to have more peace than I have felt in a very long time. I know next month holds many good things, I don't know what they are but its a promise I have been clinging to for about a year now. On another note I miss a lot of the music I used to listen to, specificly Weezer and Ben Folds. If you think of it throw up a quick prayer for their salvation. Thatis all there is from here. Sham on.

A Tux Would Be Nice

2007-08-21T15:12:00.000-07:00

Imagination brings me to speak
Of things I could be for a week
To get this weighty issue off my chest
I think to be a penguin would be best
Waddling around the land of ice and snow
With puffy feathers that look like a fro
Eating fish and playing penguin games
Making penguin friends and confusing their names
Like Biff, Dexter, Fran, and Gus
Cornelius, Cindy, Charlotte and Russ
In the morning we'll dance until noon
Getting down to the Sea Lion's croon
We'd then hussle to pick up the slack
By getting rides on a Narwhal's back
He would sing us a song and we would sing along
Aquatic melody for the price of a few prawn
Then we would fish with all of our penguin chums
Tasty food that would be eaten though we lack gums
Scampering and frollocking and diving off cliffs
Exploring on icebergs with waves like guitar riffs
For a week this snowy utopia would be a magical delight
Any more could very possibly be a terrible fright

*This ditty is dedicated to global warming and the charming documentaries it inspires

It's Now Monday

2007-08-20T01:16:00.001-07:00

So it has been nearly an eternity in which I have blogged something other than memorable points of my all too fabulous life or a lamentable solliloqui for the workings of God in the inner man. So with the crashing dawn of this school year and epiphany of an August I figured I would throw down something of merit. At the behest of Kristine, the Vinyardy Mansionite, I will briefly discuss the Bridegroom in a more guy friendly context.
When every guy ponders what they want, it is obvious. I mean clearly what grips at the heart at every testosterone laden male is the thought of being swept off of his feet and then married in an elaborate ceremony in which he gets lost in his husband's eyes. So yeah, that was sarcastic, I feel it necessary to point that out because of the several times my sarcasm has been taken serious due to the utter lack of fluctuation techniques for type without completely throwing off the reader. Instead I would rather have an excessively long explanation which at the end completely diverts any and all attention away from the original point.
Well that was a waste wasn't it, but a pretty waste..... So okay. I think the hinge pin for a guy to fall in love with the concept of Jesus as a bridegroom is summed up pretty well by Solomon in Proverbs 6:34, "for jealousy arouses a husband's fury, and he will show no mercy when he takes revenge." I heard it put this way, the return of Jesus is easily related to the following situation: Supppose a man's wife or significant other was severely beaten and raped. At the hospital he runs into the one who did it to her waiting to do it again. He in turn has all hell released on himself by the furious husband.
This is the very context for all judgment. God is not some being up in heaven pissed off yearning for the day he can give those jerks on earth their due. It is the lovesick bridegroom who is coming out of Edom clothed in crimson (Is 63) in order to avenge His bride. The very breaking point in Revelation 22:17 "The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" It is the very lovesick groan which incurs the vindication of all mankind. Also God feels the way for His bride very much like a physical man feels towards his own bride.
That is all I really have to post right now. Enjoy this tidbit, I hope to be soon getting back to actually tackling more endearing subjects. God Bless!

2007-08-18T06:27:00.000-07:00

Exhileration filled every nerve in my body. With a simple syllable everything in the room began to slow down and an existential bliss carried me away. One of the most hallowed four lettered words was uttered and I was indeed left speechless. Nothing in me could deny the excitement, somebody tonight had mentioned "Pogs." They were unleashed and my opponent and I were lost in the glory that became the small disks that belong to Kevin Samuel. The game commenced and times of past fame and joy spin beyond my eyes. Before I knew it I had lost. It was close but the defeat still was bitter. Tonight Tiffany Upton beat me in pogs.

It's Been Awhile

2007-08-17T02:09:00.001-07:00

I am happy. Frankly, that is more or less the crux of all I have to say. School started this week which honestly, I was not at all enthused about. Yet my first class has been blowing my mind. This is not in the sense of hearing an amazing sermon or trembling conviction, but it actually feels like a class. For the first time in my FSM career I actually feel like I am in school. The funny thing is that I am a terrible student but I love doing schoolwork, stretching my mind, and being in a place which I can actually engage in some sort of study since I really tend to lack the discipline to do it on my own. I am currently taking Hermeneutics with Karen Schweppler. Not only is it a good class but as supposed to there being a hundred students taking it there are only about twenty. On top of that most of them are my Nightwatch and PR team family. This week we had a debate and my team got the privilege to be the devil’s advocate on the side of universalism. We totally dominated. For the first time I got to throw down with my debate skills in both argument and research. That is one of the few places I actually feel alive if that makes any sense, a smile was definitely left on my face.
On Tuesday my family went out to eat o commemorate the beginning of yet another illustrious school year. At that dinner I receive my new favorite toy, a quacking duck puppet that instead of wings has arms making him look like a retarded frog. It is amazing. As of tonight he will ride in my trunk in order to spread good cheer wherever it may be needed. So far he is the second thing Kacie will get when I die after the Koala lamp. And you can never pass up an opportunity to have some one like Darin Damme shout at full volume outside the prayer room, “SHUT THE DUCK UP!” and then take a second to realize what he just yelled. I have yet to give a name, I will gladly take suggestions.
On top of all of those amazing developments I have to give praise and glory to God and His merciful humility and glorious presence. Last night something hit in the prayer room and the Spirit fell. Amidst a room singing in the Spirit and groaning being called forth I was thrown onto my face. I don’t like talking about my spiritual life/growth/interaction/way I pray but something last night to me to a whole other level I had never been before. I entered into deep intercession, it was great. I don’t understand all that happened but by the end I had tapped into a realm I never had and God pretty much explained what I had been going through for the past year and tied up a lot of loose ends. I left the prayer room giddy as can be and am still feeling a buzz.
That is really all there is to report on. I am currently eating overstuffed pizza rolls and typing on my living room floor and hear bed calling. I wish I was at he PR because from what I have gathered the Thurs 4-6 sets get on the holier side of buckwild. But I am happy pretty much with everything I am at now. It has been a while since I could say that and I am glad this time has come. Tomorrow I have a forest of weeds waiting for me along with some work on my car. Its been a very Shpadoinkle (just think of the amazingnees that word could imply and multiply it by infinite) week.

Again to the Ramblings

2007-08-13T04:41:00.001-07:00

So it has come time again to throw down a decent blog. Today has been a perfect cap to a good week. A couple of hours ago I was doing 70 down 71 with the steering wheel in one hand and a QT cup in the other which I was yakking into. So okay, that was by no means a tasteful way to start off a blog, but hey, the experience was one of those things which left me going, “Huh! This is actually happening. Craziness!” I got a lot on my plate as of now. School starts tomorrow, something I have honestly given little thought to but am fairly excited to see how things turn out.
On top of that I am now an up and coming potentially competant sound guy at the JPR. Other than the fact I completely screwed everything up for the morning people on Thursday that has been going well. It is good to actually be involved in something and serve. I really do like the JPR. It has a stripped down grass roots feel. It is a room which is by no means flashy and for the most part completely empty, I love it, I truly do. I enjoy being part of something that actually seems groundbreaking and being somewhat useful, I mean unlike pretty much all my friends who are either musicians or tech people I have been feeling pretty dang useless. Though it is not much I am pretty pumped.
As of tonight I have more or less been given a pink slip from my paper route. The downside is no money. However, this does free me up to be in the prayer room and actually get support raising help which I desperately need. The guy I run it with, Matt, has a friend, Joe, who just moved down here to escape a life of drugs, depression, and the whole nine yards. The friend is more or less taking my place which I am somewhat bummed about but it by no means kills the joy I get from seeing Joe actually come to discover true Life.
I have nothing of theological importance to say. I toyed with writing an entire entry referencing either Sufjan or Flogging Molly but frankly don’t have it in me. I miss listening to Flogging Molly. Drunken Lullabies in my opinion is the most sing-a-longable CDs next to Weezer’s Blue album. Both of those bands need to get saved, that would make me happy. I am weary and am still in my fairly crumbled state and do appreciate those who have been praying for me. It bums me out that I haven’t been able to hang with a handful of people lately but I am happy to finally to get a workable schedule. Things look up. I’m doing on the better side of decent and God is good. Yay.

A Meager Blog by a Meager Man

2007-08-07T04:35:00.000-07:00

Today I woke up and in the midst of the resetting of my alarms on my cell phone I actually missed a call. After stumbling out of bed I mowed 93% of my yard until I ran out of gas and then took the ugly stick to the rest. I rocked out with Danny Hibberd at the Uptown tonight, it was a good solid four hours of non-stop head pounding magic. My hearing may recouperate in a day or two. I did my route while jamming to Rosie Thomas because I needed soft feminine folk to contain the bar-be-que flavored testosterone then leaking out of my every pore. The route finished and I gave away spare papers. And the I found five dollars. (Under the driverside seat in my car, seriously).

It was a good day.

This One Goes out to the One I Love

2007-08-05T22:28:00.000-07:00

This one goes out to the one I left behind. A simple thought to occupy my mind, this one goes out to the one I love. Fire. Overwhelmed by presuppositions the transition of an elemental situation fans the flame of nothing that seems in the slightest bit tangible but leaves the senses on the fritz. Singled out by a wanton lust for the tangible the tears that have soaked into various fabrics have intermingled with a stillness that flirts with the line dividing solace and imagination. Light and darkness being seprate night will soon be no more. He saw and the grand scoope of things falls into retrospect amidst a sea of twenty something peddling poppy rebellion to teeangers. Sure they have been to the lands of violence and seen the inhumanity of the third world and champion for change and the result we get are masses of children screaming at their parents demanding liberty to actual bring "real" change. The messenger has fallen flat on their face amidst the sea of spin doctors and bs-artists. Hope has become nothing more than a dwindling fashion as the pinnacle has sunken into a warm fuzzy nostalgia we all get from my little pony. Years passed and she was only turned into glue and forgotten in the glitter soaked contruction paper that hangs on a proud mother's fridge. The lines are smudged and the heart is clearly portrayed but one is left asking, "But, is it art?" The fumbled attempts of the preschooler I feel are almost as moving as some of the sixteenth century works of art. That and with that I am not left asking "What the obsession was with male genitalia?" and "Shouldn't Jesus be treated with more dignity?" Hoping one day to be Bohemian like you but left wondering what drove the obsession of people to market that which is holy. The stars are out tonight intermingled with drifting clouds that will either disappear or bring life to dry soil. They move eloquently to the sound of the voice who holds all things together. Behind the voice is a groan for justice being held patiently until the fullness of all things comes. In the meantime absence is pursued to escape that which confuses and the home for the humble is the ground we walk. AS empires are brought low He will build from the ground up. David Crowder in the distance sings the contents of his heart joining with the masses and even our beloved Sufjan and one wonders where the divine hand is. It always seems so easy to pick it out on the grand scale than that of the day to day but it is good and it is never sleeping. Angels continue in hallelujah choruses and one day the veil will be torn. Be still and know until then I supposed. Live for the days you can almost taste the fire poruing out of your mouth while ligaments begin to form on dry bones. This is the one thing that I know. Standing forever in a bleak absolution will wither into vanity and despair. Seek the Lord when He can be found, and when your timing is off remember He has never deserted you.

Welcome to August

2007-08-02T05:19:00.000-07:00

So I figured that it was about time I blogged again. I am spaced out completely so this will most likely be utterly incoherent but here goes. The past few weeks have been a great rollercoaster of emotions. I mean shoot, I never signed up for any of this but what the hey, God is good and He hates letting us stay in the places we are. I am deeply appreciative of my family and friends who have been a blessing and always have been. It seems most of my life in the past year has been nothing more than me crashing again and again and again. There seems to never be an end only a few short breathers. We all come to a place where we realize that we cannot get what we truly want from people. Once you hit that it is as if oblivion opens up and a million questions shoot out of the ground only to disappear into thin air. God is good.
So often we fail to actually trust God to be good. Well often, we limit it to our definition of good which is nothing more than an overused, unexciting, above par term. He truly does have excellence and splendor to bestow upon His people and He truly does reward those who diligently seek Him. It’s odd, we are far too often prone to see the recompense of God to come in terms of our sinning and neglect that which He has promised to bless. We are justified through our faith. This is by no means is limited to atonement, yet it is clearly part of it, but it refers to the reward of everything we have sown. In His mercy He blots out sin and loves to reward righteousness and faithfulness. In the little things no one knows or no one seems to care He has great reward both on this side and the next for us. I for the longest time was a critic of the whole reward message thinking it only prodded people on in a more spiritual version of the American dream. One can look at a message time and time again and then forget and seem to apply it whenever they choose but it stands true forever.
For the past few months I have been driven by some of my dad’s last words. A few days before he passed away he looked at my mom and said, “All that matters is obedience.” That was followed by a deep sigh and a “Jesus you are so good.” He obeyed all he was led to do, in prayer, in petition, and in taking authority. At the end of the day with no results that is where he stood. It really does sadden me that most of my memories of him are fading with age but in time of crisis, semi – crisis, chaos, it is a phenomenal thing to look back on and be grateful.
Life moves on and God never changes. On another note I enjoy the route I have been running. I am psyched because tomorrow I am hanging out with my buddy Matt Johnson and his friend Joe who just moved down here. We are going to indulge ourselves in one of the greatest movies of all time, Kung Pow: Enter the Fist. And by greatest I mean possibly one of the dumbest but oddly enough I find it more quotable than Wayne’s World and the Grail. Granted the quotes are not that meaningful I mean to call it meaningful would be absurd, even more so than the electoral process. But it does have a place in my heart. Tonight I found out that God gave me a gift, I ush well, I ush very well. I got to put my ushing skills to the test while I was an usher tonight. Granted the testing was not hard but I like to believe I passed with flying colors, I mean my shirt even had yellow in it. So I look at the time and am mildly befuddled why I am not in bed and am writing I personally blame Darin Damme who not once but twice played “Lose Yourself” by Eminem on stage tonight on his bass guitars. Then again I would think just having that occur would solidly usher me off into a dreamy place of euphoric contentment. So that is all from here really. God bless.

Yes, Jesus Loves Me

2007-07-31T01:27:00.000-07:00

So on Friday night I had the great honor of losing my 2nd wallet in a month thanks to it falling out of my van due to the paper route. Though there was not much money in it I still lost my liscense and some dignity shoot, I mean thats like two friggin wallets. So tonight, liscencseless I had to go to my buddy Matt Johnson's house in order to drop off a paper needed for the route we share. So I totally space oun and gun thru the stop sign at Grandview and Truman. All of a sudden sirens blare and lights flash. I got pulled over. I freak and well start praying like a madman. There were three infractions I had going for them and one is fairly monumental. After about ten minutes of very flustering and tense conversation I get let off. Jesus loves me. His mercy endures forever and He is good. Yay, Jesus.

A Very Bloggable Day

2007-07-26T05:31:00.000-07:00

The proceeding blog is being brought to you to with a life changing opportunity. In light of the very appropriate song “Today” by the Smashing Pumpkins I invite you to take a few moments and pray for their salvation before continuing in your reading. Thank you!

…Amen.

Today was the greatest day I’ve ever known. Well not really, but it has been exceptionally amazing and if only you could see the exuberance bursting forth out of my drowsy greenish-somethingish (*whatever color my eyes) eyes then you might be compelled to sing the afore mentioned song if not mildly hum the tune.

I woke up this morning to the lament of my little brother. Our house is currently getting painted and he has deep reaching emotions about the current outlook of the house. Instead of being a faded brownish eye sore we decided to spice it up a bit. In the see of fading pastel homes in our neighborhood we are taking the leap to transition into bright white with a sky blue trim. Okay, maybe “spice” was a wrong term since those colors are far more soothing than spicy, more of a reggae if you will but not a salsa. All that said my brother’s complaint stands as this, “It looks like a Long John Silvers©!” The funny thing is that now it kind of done, I chuckled heartily and then journeyed on.

The thankfulness that your house does not smell like old shrimp and old grease is enough it seems to brighten anyone’s day, but the day was far from over. I picked up the first payment from my paper route and was slightly ruffled at the fact that I was mildly short changed. Yet I decided not to let me down so I voyaged over the poorly paved Kansas City roads to Higher Grounds in which I got myself a drink and then moseyed back to the road. As I was driving a flock of geese walked out into the middle of the road. All of them fled except for one. He just stood in the middle of Red Bridge road as happy as can be. For a good minute and a half we were at a stand still, luckily no one was behind us or his honking may have been accompanied by others. He finally moved and clapped his feathers good bye, what a silly goose!

Ten O’clock came around and I decided to make my way to the prayer room. This was the first night I worked my paper route alone so I decided to get some dearly needed Jesus time in. On my way inside I was met by a fully loaded Justin Fry. Justin is a guy who I did the internship with and a stellar man of God. Hands down, he is one of the most chill people I know. We made plans to reconnect tomorrow night and I plunged right into the praising of my Lord. Corey Asbury was leading tonight and I was surprised. I had not actually heard him in a good solid year or two but was never a fan. It could have been his once slightly to very emo hair and it could be my subtle disdain for Jack Johnson. (Before you write me off as a friend mind you I must say that at times Jack Johnson’s music is the perfect groove but not at all times for all things, as when my friend Paul played during my internship.) Commentary aside, it was the greatest set I had been to in the longest time. His bassist is phenomenal and the team hit a solid groove and worshiped and prophesied it through the singing and dancing of the saints. It had been a while since I freely bounced around in the presence of God and let me tell you, I was hurtin’ mighty bad for some. I made my way up front where the One Thing interns had congregated along with Ben Tolston. On a side note, Ben Tolston is an amazing guy. I mean with one quick glance in his direction the air just parts and all you can do is just nod in affirmation knowing all is well with the universe. I would gladly take a bullet anywhere for that guy; to the grocers, the circus, or even maybe the moon. To sum up everything in this paragraph I will end it with this: God is good and it is amazing and so great to worship him.

1:30 rolled around and I needed to saddle up for work. It was a dark night as most nights are and the sun was far from shining its happy face. I arrived at the warehouse and picked up my papers and then made my way to the roll and bag my precious cargo at my usual spot Jackson County Water. The bags I used tonight were incredibly small which made it a hassle to fit the papers in, but duty called. I listened to the books of 1-2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, and Hebrews on a cassette tape tonight as I rolled. Up until Hebrews the one who read the Word was like an announcer entirely detached it seemed from what he was reading. I got to Hebrews and the reader switched to an almost pastoral sounding voice which made it a lot easier to receive. Hebrews is a good book, and I thank God that we have such a great high priest in heaven. Oh, the mercy of God and the passion of the Trinity. It truly surpasses anything of feasible comprehension.
Between the frustration of the bags and the reading of the Word the night was fairly evened out at that point. Rolling papers leaves you with two things. First there is the ridiculous amount of newsprint which get on your hands and is terrible for your skin. Secondly your forearms get a mad workout, the intensity grows with the amount of frustration. I mean that spinach thing with Popeye is most likely a hoax. I have been eating it a ton recently and so far no bulging forearms. Then again I haven’t been eating the canned stuff just the leafy kind found in large plastic bins which apparently everyone and their mom has. And by that I mean at least two of my friends who most likely will be moms one day.

Four hit and I had finally finished. My CDs had become buried in the vast ocean of Kansas City Stars so I was left with whatever was left in my CD player. Within ten minutes I began to laugh at the music playing knowing that I would not be able to or want to change the music at all. It was Paper Religion by Derek Loux. The irony clowns were smiling upon me tonight. Today was the first day I had actually listened to the entire CD, let alone more than three songs. I was thoroughly impressed with it. I remember during my orientation for FSM a very commanding mustachioed kiwi announced Derek Loux as IHOP’s answer to Rod Stewart. In response Derek came up covering his hair in shame. After tonight I feel that accusation was wrong. Though his hair may be reminiscent of the man who’s career was based on him desperately asking people if they thought he was sexy his music isn’t. Derek Loux is not the answer to Rod Stewart but to Phil Collins. Listening to his music took me back to the summer when Tarzan the animated movie came out. This also was the summer of Eiffel 65 and their album Europop which I sadly confess to enjoy. Guilty pleasures aside, the night went well. I finished an hour ahead of my guestimate, briefly chatted with Kristine, handed out leftover papers at IHOP, and then paid off dollar twenty debt at Holtz’s donuts.

Before coming home I swung by Wendy’s to try for once their breakfast items. I purchased some chicken biscuits only to have my socks blown off. The chicken used is pretty much a huge one of their nuggets which are phenomenal which amply make up for their slightly wanting buttery counterparts. I left the drive through content and satisfied. As I waiting to get onto 58 to head home I looked to my left and at the farm next to me a llama was staring very intently at me. The sun was rising above the Raymore water tower behind him and the llama, whose name must have been Julian, just stood there majestically chewing his meal letting the sun shine off of his sleek brown coat. It’s times like that which nothing needs to be done except for a mild sigh of contentment. Today was a marvelous day.

An Apologetic + A Rebuttal = A Blog Entry

2007-07-25T04:02:00.000-07:00

Due to the title and content of the previous post I am pretty sure anyone who read it was left with shock, offense, and possibly speechless. I feel that in light of the gnawing of my own conscience that I need to revisit the words typed and explain myself and add upon what was said and just blog like a fiend. So here goes nothing:
We all come to a place in which we are overwhelmed with our own pain. It seems that more often than not our journey through the Valley of the Shadow of Death is to make an appointment with an old friend. As most encounters with this person you begin with a cringe in your stomach and then a swift blow to your face leaving you disoriented. A battle ensues until for the first time in which seems an eternity there is a slight pause. Though it is brief you can make out the one you have been entangled with and it turns out to be none other than yourself.
Well as fine and dandy as that is, there is a funny thing about suffering. It’s not “haha” funny but more so “this milk shouldn’t be green” funny. At this place most of us good ol’ westerners see that and only that. One can hear stories about pain, see tragedy face to face and at the end of the day all that remains on the top of your mind is that dull or stinging throb. Entropy is a natural thing. The world is falling apart and society regardless of what argument you will take is going to get worse.
The most common answer to said problems is that of escape. Often found in sarcasm, comparison, and addictions we may take escape wherever we please. Yet time and time again we yearn to hit that sweet spot and dwell there and scurry around looking for hope. We are built with an innate sense that what we live in is by know means the pinnacle of what we were made for. So in the meantime throngs of people lie in wait for that sense of hope, misery loves company and remedies grope into the realm of fantasy.
When it comes to suffering there are two ways to go about it. One is taking up your cross and following Christ and the other is picking up a noose. Apart from Christ suffering ever increases into the screaming void of oblivion. Christ did not die for the sake of dying. Nor does He beckon anyone into it for the sheer sake of feeling pain. He is the resurrection and the life. He tears so that He may heal. It ios what His very word declares. I know for my self that this all to often comes as rhetoric and things that apply in every situation except for the one I am in.
Allow me to regress. Into what I am not completely sure, I just really felt compelled to start out a new paragraph like that. In all honesty I have had a rough couple of days, week, season if you will. Honestly in the wake of tragedy, loss, and the sometimes baffling leadership of God one can get completely off. I mean what is often set out to bring some sort of progress becomes nothing more than a flaking sage misquoting the strains of his ever palpitating heart. I admit I hit a new low today. I found a CD that was left in my car and enjoyed the snot out of it. I’m not gonna mention the band name but for the most part it was northing more than a angry and heartbroken proletariat espousing on the futility of his existence. The most many people come, not generally Christians, to addressing God with a situation is to either ask Him to curse it or just blame Him. Of all the prayers most people know, next to the blessing after a sneeze, is that of profanity.
Life happens. I honestly sit here enjoying the roller coaster of what seems spiritual bi-polarity, today joy. I mean things do actually look up but allow me to give a brief synopsis of where I am at. For a good while I had been investing in something which honestly will in no means end from what I see in that which my heart has been set. Thru the course of this I have encountered for the most part my most lingering demons. As many know there is a standstill where the sting is felt and the outcome is nothing more than that of an obscure blur, I concur. It is the human condition. Jesus doesn’t change us with a snazzy transmogrifying device but He is a surgeon, patient and gentle and often without heavy anesthetics. The funny thing with our problems is that we can receive no correction from anyone but Him. Contrary to everything within, He satisfies the desires of all things. I don’t get it at all, but its what the Word says and even that great Shane and Shane song..
Life moves one and the end is yet to come. Variables are the only things that ever seem certain but He is the resurrection. I honestly don’t know what this assimilation of various conjecture adds to, but He did not stay in the grave. He did not stay in the grave. Neither will His people.

"God, Damn It!" and Other Misconstrued Prayers

2007-07-23T05:36:00.000-07:00

Her eyes never failed. She didn’t need corrective surgery nor did she need glasses or contacts. There was no color blindness involved or any confusion to the matter. Just six years old and she could identify the blood on the wall along with the weeping in the other room. Both belonged to her mother. She would say that there was something different about the night but the routine was still the same. Her father came home piss drunk and beat the crap out of her mother. The cycle continues until she is punching bag material and her hat gets thrown into the ring.
Here comes the question, why, why in any good, decent, or even reasonable world would this happen. I mean anyone who tries to methodically give an explanation might as well come off as a world class prick at the sight of her scars and two aborted children. I mean what a douche, who would over look the great pain that was afflicted and nonchalantly write it off. I mean she should get whatever she wants just to make up for the travesty. She lives her life bitter and sullen and then dies. As a tear filled eulogy is given she is being tormented in the bowels of hell.
I mean I should cut right there and sell this scene to Hallmark. Or at least CBS could make a made for TV movie staring Judy Dench as the mother. I cringe at writing this but honestly none of this should be taken lightly at all. Yet the scenario happens time and time again that after a hint of another occurrence the halls of decency cry out, “How can this happen?” and “Where is God?” As a white middle class American male who was raised in a fairly healthy home I honestly have no say whatsoever in this matter. I have no place to relate or even imagine the pain which was inflicted. Nor do I know how I would even react to such a situation.
Days pass and the question continues to thrive. God is good right? I know my own pain and am currently blocking out everything I feel that is screaming torment within me right now. I mean hell, it sucks. But it by no means is a comparison to the mass tragedy that takes place mere blocks away.
In the last days we will se visions more vivid than sunsets, brighter than stars and we will recognize each other and see ourselves for who we truly are. When all is said and done we are wicked in nature and violence begets violence. Innocence is all too often raped away and the cycle continues as most cycles do.
He sees and He judges. There is a day appointed for wrath. I speak of this as if I understand it with any clarity. I mean honestly in my own time I tragically stare at happiness which seems constantly held at arms length from me. I mean it’s how most often feel. Nothing ever makes up for that which is incomplete. I mean shoot, I just compared my problems to someone who was abused, beaten, and raped. I might as well be playing the Rolling Stones Sympathy for the Devil at full volume now.
Logic in the end will fall short. All remains in faith. This is the substance of things hoped for. Substance being something that actually exists and is to a degree tangible and hope is that which is known for certain. I mean I write this with scrutiny firing off in my own head. I honestly demand inside a grasp on every situation in its entirety. My current mood is torn between singing praises and screaming profanity. Its how the cookie crumbles I guess.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and he will make your paths straight. I could make arguments up and down. I could expound on how suffering correlates between our capacity to feel love and through it we enter into a deeper communion with the Almighty. I believe that, I mean it is the flicker that shoots off in my head when the ache blows into a migraine but what precedent do I have in saying any of it. We gaze now at a mirror that is dim and more so contorts what is seen instead of bringing total clarity. As we move on clarity begins to unfold brighter than a meadow full of sunflowers. I would have lost hope unless I had not believed I would see the goodness of God in the land of the living.
The sun right now is coming up and the couple in front of me is enjoying a hearty breakfast with a side of menthols. The green car directly in front of this restaurant is missing a window and has been replaced by several layers or poorly translucent tape. The waitress continues her days as more fleeting conversations come in and out of the now brother franchise of Applebees. Well amidst the contorted babble and useless jargon preceding this almost pointless and obligatory sentence I have this to say, the movement of the earth and the progression of time is more often ignored than perceived and truth is more often forgotten than sought or even retained. The sun is coming up on the sub-ghetto Truman Corners and the fading paint on the once prominent establishments will fade to yet another shade lighter. In liturgy, litigiousness, jargon, rhetoric, and all around BS we have lost security in everything. One word stands true in the heavens; that is the Word of God. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everything were meaningless. But everything is so meaningful, and everything turns to crap. Rejoice. Entropy is inherent and there is life only in one man, Jesus Christ.

One of My Current Favorite Songs

2007-07-22T04:31:00.000-07:00

This is a song by Lenny Smith. He wrote several hymns and worship songs way back in the seventies including "Our God Reigns." Other than that he is the father of Daniel Smith who is the frontman of the Danielson Famile a band consisting of himself, his siblings and some close friends. Daniel is also responsible for introducing the world to the magnificent Sufjan Stevens. Here it is, God bless.

Quito

2007-07-21T05:29:00.000-07:00

As goes on there seems to be a heavy dividing line in the arena of sophomoric humor. I mean who ever thought the day would come that I would cringe at the word, “Schwing!” Truly a new era has dawned. I bow my head in confusion, nostalgia, and almost disbelief. Thus is the way it goes with being renewed and growing up.
Today was an odd day. Often I have only a few options and today I had even more. Something hit me and I decided to slink away into retrospection, never a good place for me. A Mountain Goats mix and a black and mild cream (huge mistake) later I made my way towards the Justice Prayer Room. There were three others in the crowd, a sound tech and the team. It was stripped down and raw. No flashy lights, no cameras, just a few people doing there thing contending for the kingdom and loving God. I enjoyed it. About half way thru the set Dave Sliker kicked Josh Forrey off of the drums and totally mellowed out the solid groove that was going on. It wasn’t bad but I mean, you have got to love a drummer whose main influences are that of the prestigious hardcore bands of the day.
I have done a lot of searching, thinking, smarting off, jamming to tunes, and questioning without getting answers to wind up at the same place…. the place of prayer. True this is the guy who could not even make it thru half of Fire Within or even feels entirely gung ho with the current movement in which I am a part of, but I know that the place of prayer and intercession is the only place I can really find solace these days. People come and go, some linger and others merely drift. The same goes with ideas. But God will never change, He is the same yesterday today and forevermore.
In regards to prayer, it is ridiculous to know that God actually hears every prayer and does in fact have deep compassion for the seemingly weak words thrown up into what sometimes seems to be mere oblivion. I mean if you could only imagine the things I have asked for, concerns and other such whatnot I mean I would seem either crazy, mental or devoted. If you continue to hit your head against a wall long enough you will begin to ignore the deepening wound and become more intrigued about the rhythm and get lost in wondering how your head can make a sound like a coconut.
I honestly type this hoping for something profound to protrude from these dashing metacarpals of mine but will most likely meander for a wee bit before coming into rest. Being familiar with the works of Pablo Neruda my soul seems to be doing decent, I mean but laughter has never been a biblical standard for anything. I use it in terms of Guffaws, Chuckles, Chortles, and even on occasion Snickers but the higher ups have yet to set a precedent. I appreciate the family that is coming around me, I mean the prayer room team has a definite chunk of real estate in my heart, some more than others but we’ll see how things go as time progresses. It’s like they all have a manifest destiny for my love, I dig it.
As I listen to Lenny Smith right now I wonder if good music will ever be implemented into worship. I mean real creative and innovative music, maybe something with an edge or something just gritty. Mind you Lenny Smith was an ex-hippie and this music predates even Keith Green, but I long to encounter God in ways my heart has been moved so many other times.
Well this wraps up tonight’s post. It was brought to you by the letter “H” and the number (one, two, three, four, five) (six, seven, eight, nine, ten) (eleven) “12.” God bless!

20 Miles From Jackson

2007-07-20T02:14:00.000-07:00

The air was thick like molasses and only half as sweet. Sweat trickled down every brow in the near vicinity and all were lost in the limbo of dampness. Anticipation ran high. Some waited for days, others hours, some minutes, and there were even a handful who had just stumbled into the gathering and had deep affection for sweaty masses. To some it was the second best thing to yelling, anger, and torches and pitchforks. Often this type of commotion was frowned upon by the local authorities. Today might have been a repeat of the past but the mayor and the sheriff seemed to be the center pieces of the mob.
Many things had been said about the south. Far more have been said about the Deep South. Clichés came into one full blown reality in this little burg. Opossums littered the thoroughfares and silence could never be found under the dulcet tones of banjo music and chirping crickets. Everyone even had their “Sunday Best.” Pastels littered the town square as the light shades of color began to become darker and darker. By noon the entire town will have seemed to be wearing completely different outfits. It was hot. Mosquitoes were frisky. All that fueled the anxious mob were the glasses of sweet tea that had been made the night before.
Hotter than baby gator in a skillet it was and the sizzle of the sweat hitting the ground ran as a mere after thought. Santa came months ago and this event seemed to trump them all. Each person had cleaned up. Each person had all of their accounts in order. Criminals were pardoned. The church in the center of the town even got a new steeple. Quaint would have been an understatement for the hushed and awe inspiring festivities. This was Americana at its finest.
The mayor’s daughter kept the town entertained up near the front. Golden locks and a smile that could slay a wildebeest, she belted out tunes like “It’s a Grand Old Flag,” “The Star Spangled Banner,” “Amazing Grace,” and “Be Thou My Vision.” Some sang under their breath, others just quietly wept. Most of the men held their hats to their chest and stoically took back all they saw as they rested in their austere dignity. Hallmark could not even recreate the moment. After each song a round of applause rang through the air. She would smile and then sing another ditty, her name was Pollyanna.
Two week before the crops had been gathered. They had been stored and preserved. The work of every farmer’s hand had been proudly put on display as the town rejoiced in the accomplishment of their “golden boys.” School was long out and the children played and got into their usual mischief. Girls were teased, rocks were skipped, young lovers looked for hideaways, and countless mason jars were filled with flickering lightning bugs. Life was as it should be as every man, woman, and child greeted each other by name as they strolled down the street.
The time was drawing near. The center of the town bore every soul it laid claim to that day. A light breeze was the only comfort that was allotted to the fortitude of expectancy that dwindled beneath the clock tower. 2:59 PM was struck and all fell indubitably silent. Mother’s tightly grabbed their children. Men embraced their wives. The moment finally came with half of the crowd’s eyes closed shut. Bong! Bong! Bong! The bell shattered the silence with its loud announcement. Profanity and sighs of relief filled the air as the crowd began to disperse. As soon as it came was as soon as it ended. Each left for their own house to carry on with their own lives waiting at least one more year for the world to end.

Yule Brenner was a Skinhead and Led Zepplin didn't Write Tunes Everyone Loved They Left that to the BeeGees

2007-07-17T05:06:00.000-07:00

It has been while since I have given an honest blog and at 7:22 am I think it is about darn time to pound one out. Today has been a day to remember, or might be remembered, that is if I ever come back to this entry. I woke up this morning in not the greatest of moods. After slunking around the house for awhile I went out and did what every red blooded American male does to lift his spirits and fuel the unquenchable inferno of testosterone, I went shoe shopping. You see, what I had been sporting were a sick pair of black Vans (so high school kids can think I can skate) which not only were on the brink of sheer annihilation but had a pungency that would frequently waft all the way up to my nose, yeah, bad news. I traded them in for some cheap Hawk (as in the Tony) shoes and left the stored with a newfangled sense of the meaning of life and better hopes of not looking like to much of a square when I pick my little brother up from the skate park.

There being time to kill before Luke Wood's endearing set, I nestled up in my car and listened to a sermon on the Cross by one of the people from up in Toronto. It was very good. Much of life's problems pale when one takes time to look at the great passion that was displayed at the cross, both by the Father and the Son. Incarnation was not good enough, He had to bleed, be beaten and then die. Granted the eradic palpitations of the twittering heart I carry have become far from ceasing, His sacrifice and love is enough to still even the most hopeless of causes. One point that was made struck me pretty heavily. I had never taken time to think what the name Barabbas meant. I always assumed he was some schmuck whose existence was to be lightly loathed. His name means "Son of the Father" or "Bar Abba(s)." Out of every prisoner held for exchange this was the one who was chosen. Christ's sacrifice was so that we could all truly be sons (daughters) of Abba. If God did not spare His own son how much more will He give us all things. The very act of the sacrifice was to allow his enemies to enter into His divine love. What a good Go we serve.

The prayer room was good as was prayer team. I love talking to Jesus and prophesying, those are always good times. Then I scooted off to my job. I am a part time paper boy. My hands are still lightly stained with newsprint as I tap my black, now maybe blacker keys. I run the route with my buddy Matt Johnson, a chum from the old Fire in the Night days. Gunniong through neighborhoods in the pitchest of dark has rebirthed an old passion of mine, a love and fondness for punk rock. I had seemed to come out of it a while back, yet holding dearly to my rude boy roots. The unfolding began with Charity letting me borrow her "Play it Loud" mix with all sorts of rude goodness and has thusly culminated into an entwining of my heartstrings and the songs of the Toy Dolls. A week ago I was lost in existential bliss whilst being drowned in the euphoria that is Five Iron Frenzy's final performance and the trend seems to rise higher and higher.

In summation, God is good. Heartbreak and disappointment are bound to come, but God is faithful. Punk music is grand. Matt Johnson is a wonderful guy. The body of Christ is in desperate need of spiritual mothers and fathers. Sometimes if your passenger side window won't move be sure to chekc the window lock button before worrying about the vast ammount of empty funds it will take to fix is. God works all things out for the good of those who love Him and have been called according to His purpose, its absurd but then again so is the electoral process but we still vote. I finally found a home, it is the nightwatch and the prayer room. The Lord is good and His mercy endures forever.

Alabama Nova

2007-07-09T05:15:00.000-07:00

Once again cars sped down the highway. The morning air left nothing more than the remants of laughter and old photographs in my memory. Having taken too many friendships for granted all that embodys what seems to be an epiphanal moment is the humming of cars and the crooning of mountain goats. Too little has gone into the thinking and planning of such great exploits whilst a somber mass gets entangled in there own narcissism. To think one day there will be an end to speculation hopes and dreams returning into pastel symphonies delight and wonder. Until now all that has ever seemed to hinge on sincerity is that of an unseen promise. Undone merely by emotional chemistry and pseudo-Shakespearean thoughts, embracing the uncreated becomes a daunting task overwhelming even the slightest of inquiries. To stand at one moment a drooling mess humbled by brilliant sovreignty then to indulge the inner crave into the depths od distraction is a battle that is often lost more times than won. To speak of futures, smiles, hopes, dreams, blood, redemption, laughter, love, trauma, conquest, romance, eyes, smiles, family, friendship, and above all God seem weighed down by the gnawing remnants of what some may even ascribe to be some sort of attention deficit. Long gone seem the days of running through fields and chasing fireflies, trips to Nostalgia land are the best with dear friends though, but in comes the final stare into the world of growing up. Surrounded by maturity and adults the threshold of accomplishment and almost meaning seems like something that has in some places been assumed where as the status quo remains in the subtle monotony of the nuances of anything but. Letting go of many things hails flickering promises yet love feels to command towards the obliteration of all the destroys. Don't get me wrong, I hate sin, I hate my sin passionately. I long for the kingdom to come, I long for the day expression is not only limited to the same old set redone and reworked except even now there may be a techno beat thrown in. I look forward with expectation the day all things are made new. Running with a pack who at one time held vigilantism in their veins, the days draws near in which lines are drawn and bravery, heroism, love, and humility pour forth like perfume and pieces of glass towards a throne. Until then, may we behold and bless, transformation beckons stronger than the steel that binds Optimus Prime's machismo together. Dawn came a couple of hours ago, yet another painting I'm sure God must have put in His scrapbook. In retrospect this entry is nothing more than sporadic conjecture, time moves on and God is good. The times they are a changin' my friend.

My Favorite Place

2007-06-26T23:08:00.000-07:00

It had been a long time since I had ventured into possibly one of my favorite places in this fair city. Amongst the sprawling landmarks, esquisite landscapes, the lakes, the parks, and even the open plains I found myself on my back porch. Honestly it is a sheer place of contentment in a metal chair with feet on a fairly damp railing. The entire porch got set ablaze with the aromas of my coconut, lemongrass, and ginger tea with just a hint of lighter fluid from the grill. Sadly due to the rapid urbanization of the area most of what could be heard are cars on the freeway or a truck delivering hallowed goods to the compellingly cordial Kohls in the distance. Yet amidst the exhaust releases coyotes still howl and crickets still chirp in perfect harmony, granted they don't have much variation but they harmonize oh so eloquently. However, the main reason I love my back porch, primarily in the summer, is because of all the lightning bugs. A hundred or so feet from my porch is a little gorge with a creek and on the other side is a canvas of trees that tower above the grass of my back yard. Hundreds of fireflies flicker and dance all night long and illuminate the covering darkness with great finesse. I mean, in this day and age one sees all sorts of lights everywhere in various colors and intensities. With the exception of the sun, moon, and stars most of these are fueled by the combustion of power plants and the splitting of atoms. Be it oil, kites, or any other source of forging mass ammounts of electricity what was spoken into existence on the first day has become utterly taken for granted. Mind you we shouldn't leave food out for a sun god or anything but since the light bulb amusement often seems to leave (for most) after childhood.
Sorry for the tangent, but I miss the days when I was just a wee munchkin frollicking in a field chasing those little bugs. Granted I totally will most likely do that after this post, but seriously, these things are amazing. Amidst the stars, urchins, and I'm sure at one time unicorns God crafted fireflies for His very own enjoyment. It is interesting to think that even up in heaven the God of Revelation 4 looks down at those little flickering insects with a large grin on His dazzling face. As they dance and I am sure tell jokes in morse code their is an infinite God who takes sheer delight in the workmanship of His creation, from the blinking to the buzzing. In Him all things consist and everything that has been made was made by Him, for Him, and to Him. He truly is good in everything He does. Yet lightning bugs are incapable of love. They were not made in His image and He did not die for them. In all of His delighting in them God did not make them for communion, but He made us. Not only do we (believers) live in Christ but, he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit. (1 Cor 6:17). How much more is our destiny and lives certain that Christ Jesus, the uncreated God of everything, is not just in us smimming amongst the kidneys and spleen, but is part of us and we are in fact part of Him. We are an extention of Christ cojoined and treasured beyond comprehension - comprehension at this point should even be a word thrown out. Recently, ergo the past two days have been shaky, I honestly don't know what happened but it has been like mistaking a train for a baseball, something analogies fail me right now. But He is good, I am at a loss for language but our destiny and inheritance are sure. Halelujah. My Jesus, yes, He is God.

A couple of side thoughts, a (PS) if you will.)
I love my nightwatch family especially my PR team and Chauncey who I kind of went off on and he was so patient with me, a darn fine guy. Also, though I have had it for a year I have totally fallen in love with the album Floating World by Anathallo. God bless I'm off to the porch again and most likely to bed.

My Current Mood

2007-06-24T02:03:00.000-07:00

Factions

2007-06-20T07:46:00.000-07:00

The secand glance
Penetrates the haze of gunsmoke
Objects of masquerade
The tiers of obsession
Compete for ordination

Fallen lips
Cheeks smeared with eyeliner
Hushed moments
Embody the nightly pillage

Business cards voice numbers
Revelation pulls supremacy
Martha become CEO
Mary forever held in stocks
Where she sits and smiles

The Shanty Towns of the beloved
Held at arms length
Redaing pamphlets for apostacy
Wounds never beneficial
The towers begin to shake with dry bones

Architecture rearranges into shambles
Dust gives birth to life
Like Adam's first kiss of breath

Showmanship has eaten the passion
Fighting to justify reception of love
Running around each with a baton
Moving to depletion with storm on horizon

Responsibilty whats that
Not quite yet
It has for too long been assumed
For too long feared

Eclectic images dance in the moonlight
To the sound of horns being blown
Amidst the convoys of radio waves

64's Meanderings

2007-06-19T00:29:00.000-07:00

Sweat stained brim towers above
The tense eybrows that twitch in repose
Direction and discernment rearing shove
Window cocked listening to the winds prose
A transfer of solar bliss brushes the arm
As the fist clenches tight the braided cargo
Return to the stench of a familiar false alarm
Confiding in the dribble from dialogue from Fargo
Don'tcha Know
Eyes glance through the dashing foliage
Presuming adventure of the pioneer past
Intrepid contellations remain on the same page
Fading memories fighting to forever last
Nooses for old friends and comrades
The shadows of legacy to be left unfulfilled
Traversing into nodadic and schemed tirades
Nearing the day futility has finally been killed
Speech rolls off of a drunkard's waving tongue
Descendants from the popular farce play on
Love being caressed and then placed back on it's rung
Wondering if the seldom movements were ever wrong
Words fall to the ground and float overhead
The solace found in hope's gleaming eye is all thats afloat
Synopsis of the cliff notes of life still on my bed
Wondering who would have had these words wrote
Grammar plays on through the night as a dying breed
Language drifting like the Appalachian semi
Word becoming flesh for the illiterate to feed
Love breathed out of a smoke ring tepid in all it ever touches
Rhyme dies off yet posture remains
Through the noise of combustion and convolution
The revolution on the verge of a myth
Spurs on the noble and hopeless alike
With the large hand that holds the bruised
And breathes life into the embers of disillusion
A future is certain
A past is distorted
A present is over scrutinized
Be still and know
He is God

Shiny Happy People

2007-06-13T00:23:00.000-07:00

Nightswimming deserves a quiet night.... once again the words of Michael Stipe repeat on the white rectangle above me. There is a big business for sentiment in the world and one cannot help but get sucked in. Each longs to be part of some spinning montage that depicts a group growing up, learning, making mistakes, falling in love, and at the end contently riding into the warm glow of a setting sun with a sigh of accomplishment slipping out a slightly cracked grin. I'm breaking through, I'm bending spoons, I'm keeping flowers in full blooms, I' looking for answers from the great beyond. All in all looking for adventure in the quirks we hold as our basis for living, friendship. Who can hold onto that forever, there is time where one is young and at one time can soar. I mean of course there is an apparent end to that, I think it's far closer to 30 than 25 but one has to look for that menaing to pursue boldly that which burns within. Inherent clarity seems to come in all shapes of lacking yet we pursue on.
I write these words to myself and a ouple others, more or less to just type something. I would spill my thoughts and feekings on all sorts of issues but I mean, I like what I have and am sure it would not be for the best. From my mouth people can be either blessed or hurt and I feel that the slips of encouragement only mask the wounds which in the past I have doled out with little thought.
My good friend sits in the other room right now as I type and he eats something to hold him down for the few hours of sleep he is getting tonight. Tomorrow night he and another friend of mine leave to see a slew of bands and a large mass of hippies in Tennesse at Bonnaroo. Amidst the dulcid tunes of the White Stripes, Mute Math, Tool, the Police, the String Cheese Incident, Robert Randolph and the Family Band, and Wilco they will mingle with good ol' hippies running around yelling, "T-Shirts and Morphine five dollars!" Yeah, and to be honest I heavily considered going intending to pray and intercede but most likely would end up just seeing shows and praying in tongues on and off. I mean, going into this trip I expected spend a ton of time reading, in contemplation, and kicking it at RiHOP. Yet that has not been the case at all. In weakness you learn to love. Some call it the wilderness, others complacency, honestly I want to live again. The one thing that has been moving and directing my heart is waining into a place hovering right over despair and clinging onto the goodness of God.
My heart has had it's ups and downs. I mean I type this to pretty much Charity and Kacie and I truly thank you both for your friendship. Yet broad scope back into play, I have never lived or been fuled by anything. Opinions wane. Will I live live to 83, will I live to welcome me... who knows but slowly I move to the goal. God opens things when it is his time yet my mind holds static as my heart dangles by a thread chasing what feels a carrot on a string that is always out of reach. So follow me, don't follow me. I've my spine, I've got my orange crush. I mean I have all the right friends and am in a place in which a vision should spur me but has not sunk in. Thats me in the corner, in the backround losing my religion. Its going beyond words yet morphing slowly into a symbiotic being trying to do nothing but uplift and love. Nowhere but up to pour my heart yet it is far to easy to question the answers that pop into your head....
To be blatant, IHOP and the prayer room do not hold my heart. I mean I am there and I love the teachings and the people but my attention is shot and I feel like a hypocrite who spouts off prayers more confident that they are heard but am lost and as a crappy student feel entirely out of the loop. I love my friends but I need discipleship. Don't get me wrong I appreciate the words and prayer sessions but I mean I run a race I have run by myself and to be honest I live in an environment where pretty much every one deals with their own issues and fight scrape to get some sort of solace. I mean don't get me wrong there are leaders but no one to look up to, no one with time that is. I give what I can.... I lack direction and all seems to be a blur. I wish I could play music. I wish I could overcome my distraction. I wish I could watch a romantic movie with hope. I wish I would just step into what I was made for if not know something more than words that have become cliche.... In the meantime I let my scattered thoughts dirft around before sleep and listen to REM. Its the end of the world as I know and I feel fine, should I I don't know. All I know is that sweetness will follow.

*Bonus - count the REM references

Mirrors & Smoke

2007-06-02T21:23:00.000-07:00

So, my first stint in Richmond endfs tonight. Tomorrow I embark to Atlanta and the mosey over to Norfolk VA and back to where I am. Here are a few thoughts and/statements regarding the current scenario.

*I miss QT, who knew, I mean honestlt sometimes you are just jonesing for a taquito or an eggroll, both of which are of clearly atrocious quality but a taquito and an eggroll none the less.

*Nothing out here is open past 11 pm unless it is a regular alkeyhall bar or the bar of the hookah variety. After being at the hookah bar twice, I yearn for the House of pancakes, they close out here by 12.

*My heart goes out heavily for this city, after seeing friend after friend in sullen monotonous dribble I have this dull ache to be hear, nothing throbbing but enough to make me go, hmmm......

*RiHOP (Richmond's International House of Prayer) is frankly amazing. It is downtown in Carytown which is a cross between the Lawrence, Wesport, and the Plaza. It is two blocks from a strip club, surrounded by bars and clubs, down the street from Edgar Allen Poe's house, close to where slaves were held pre-sale, and a few blocks from the oldest Masonic temple in the US. Let me tell you, spiritual significance. The few times I have gone I have just been blown away by the presence of God. God has big things and intercession if fueled as from outside the windows in this second story loft can see every walk of life.

*I may be taking annother direction in life. This time where as unstructred and uninhibited as it is has left me with alot on my plate. I may pursue the one thing that honestly burns in me, which may lead to me leaving FSM, it is all just very theoretical but life is changing, seasons are dawinng and I stand no only at the forefront of my existence.

*I plan on coming out here more frequently I hope and would love to bring my family out here to see all the great things God is doing. On that note I miss my family at IHOP dearly from the PR Team FTFNF and foreign and student friends alke. My heart aches fo rizzle.

*I am planning on sometime in the near future switching to wordpress I mean I hate blogger layout, and shoot its what all the cool kids do, I mean and then actually getting invovled in a blogging community, that would be fun.

*My summer has now been given the two albums which will most likely etch the memories into my life. These include Silverchair's Young Modern and Jars of Clay's Good Monster. Silverchair where as they are not redeeming really the music alone if breathtaking. It is an album in which I can get utterly consumed with auditory bliss through almost every second of listening. the same goes for Good Monster, however, the lyrics are phenomenal, with hints of blue grass roots I get propelled into thought and smiling whilst jamming.

*Richmond is a good city, I mean historic, beautiful, and in deep need of God. My heart is still deeply ties to this city even after four years. I miss Kansas City its true.

2007-05-26T00:08:00.000-07:00

A disconcerted effort follows parched lips
Cracked and peeling the grip the cup
Searching for moisture

Hidden behind them swirl the eulogy
Of a time that once was and God willing
Will never be again

Sadness bound in selfish repose with silence
Lockjaw vernacular pitted against the cries
Of hope persistent bellowing

The shattered glass cuts deep into the dross
A faded cross still swaying from rugged neck
Defying the meandering thoughts

Heaven hangs above like Orion's bow
The river Kedar too long a distance
For the sake of closure

Her voice trails allong the countours of my mind
Like the dew of an inbreaking dawn
Distracting from all other color

A melody comes from the distant hills
A hopefull banjo strumming in the wind of decision
Chiming in with the bluejay's ditty

Samson's hair at my feet a time once held
By warrior's defending the promise of life
Budding forth into virtue

Mistakes are held by all at my side
Denial of our humanity pales in contrast
To the taste of new creation

Now I lay me down to sleep with the laughter
Of times once spent in an oblivious demeanor
Being redeemed into a glorious smile

Hackneyed Journal Entry

2007-05-25T20:14:00.000-07:00

Right now I write on a back porch staring skly high at the glowing orbs above. Life goes on and time stands still for no man. Over the past couple of days I have been reimmersed into the universe of the american pursuit, life, love, sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Formalities fall by the wayside as a man excitedly welcomes you inot his house while he takes yet another hit from his gravity bong. Mind you this was just a detour on the way to a concert whose population was primarilh hippies. Desperation floods all that I see, I mean that and denial. It happens where you lock eyes with a girl as she expouses about the weekend she had when she kicked dignity out the door, a laugh follows then a look craving some sort of congratulations. What is man that God is mindful of them. I mean where words fall and salt either pollutes or loses its saltiness truth fizzles into complacent disillusion. So I sit here about to retreat in to read. It has been a pleasant stay. I met with a friend of the family earlier today and he told me of his journey whcih bolstered some hope in me. Also he is working towards producing a screenplay on the life of John Newton and working on writing a couple others. Tonight I will most likely drive around and do pretty much nothing, I mean Richmond seems to have less open than KC. Right now my buddy is at work and then will close his evening enjoying some of the "benefits" of one of his friends. I don't envy him, shoot I know I would have but everything breaks in my heart. Which leads me to my only state, I mean honestly dealing with my own feelings which I am pretty sure that will be crushed....... yet clinging on to the non jackass true view of my Almighty Father.I don't fear anyone reading this but man, it is dang lonely, but not at the same time. I know a trite as it sounds gratitude for the pr team and ftfnf crew and all the others have dramatically increased. I have found rest. But at the same time also unrest. It would be to grow up, I want to act my age but everything in me opposes it. God is good, if some one read be blessed. You are deeply treasured, both by God and most likely me.

Night Swimming

2007-05-24T21:01:00.000-07:00

His sovreignty streches aurora's flame
Corrosive love debunking the myth
Passionate zeal the mortals can't tame
As they wait for Kubric's monolyth

The hounds of heaven on my backdoor
Wisdom's beckon to forlorn ear
A string quartet of angels emplore
Charity's reckoning to cancel fear

Words flow through the dullen void
Constellation dividing our time
Impermeable discretion with which we toyed
Falls underneath His whisper sublime

The heart made of harpstrings does sing
Lament and sonnet for the unseen King

My Journey Thus Far (Abridged)

2007-05-22T23:20:00.000-07:00

On the road again.... doo doo doo doo on the road again.... hmmm hmmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm hmm....... doo doo doo doo doo doo on the road again. I never could remember those lyrics but I like the tune.

So anyways, right now I am lying on top of a quilt on a bed in Richmond, Virginia. I am in my good friend's house, the one which I spent every summer for a good long portion of my life. Also I just met (Kah-CAW!) Anthony, he seems pretty rad. Being here brings back memories, good ones and sad too. All in all I am pretty bushed. I figured that if I did not blog now I would probably never get around to it and diligence would go to pot..... so here we go.

Day one. I embarked east with my feathers fairly ruffled at gas prices but then got cruising and was able to deeply inhale the in vigorating aroma of the open road, thats right diesel exhaust. For the most part day one was pretty uneventful. I was cruising off of about four hours of sleep and all I had in me was to pay attention to the road. I caved in and got a Rockstar Juice energy drink and let that keep me going, which suprisingly has no high fructose corn syrup in it.

I did however get through Stuart's teachings on the Lake of Fire and it was a hell of a good listen. Bad puns aside I liked it, it had been awhile since I had thought/mused/meditated on judgment and damnation. I thank the Lord that He has taken me from where I once was with this subject, namely self righteous and trigger happy. He is good, and He loves His people, I mean alot. And that my friends is a whole bunch.

I got turned around in St. Louis and ended up making another detour as well. I personally blame the rascally Sufjan Stevens fro writing songs pretaining to landmarks in Illinois. I saw a road sign to Carlyle Lake and just had to venture. It added another fifty minutes to the trip but I did also get to see the Kaskaskia River (another Sufjan interlude) and the benevolent and wonderful Sassafrass Road.

I got to kentucky and despite all the bad news I heard about the state I di not mind it at all. Its not the greatest place in the dark but the next day it was a pretty drive. I miss green mountains a whole lot. I satyed at a sleazy, and I mean sleazy as in I never want to come close to imagining the other clientel in that dingy place ever, hotel and conked out for the night after a hearty meal of Taco Bell.

Today was a good day. A beautiful drive through the mountains. West Virginia is officiall my favorite state tp drive through, I mean truly magnifiscent. I love the Appalachians, I could go on for hours but I am tired and the position I am typing with is kind of killing my wrists. My mind wandered back to a subject I thought I had moved on from and a handful of other stuff God and I were currently processing, it was a good time thanks to the aide of Woven Hand, Audra Hartke, Bob Dylan and part of a sermon by Andy Comisky. I love that state.

As soon as I crossed over to Virginia all of a sudden the heavens opened. By opened I mean it poured rain and hail with a vengeance. In the distance I could see bolts of lightning but could not see 20 feet in front of me. Normal driving this is tolerable but not when you are in the mountains with huge trucks, not a very enjoyable experience.

Everything cleared and I ended up moseying on my way to Richmond. It was a gorgeous drive and I will post some pictures of the trip thus far in a future juncture. I got in town and all of a sudden my inner man kicked in, I mean praying in the Spirit and a buzzing. I mean I get out of my car and there is no life. I take for granted that I live in a semi open heaven around people who love and pursue the Lord. I had assumed alot about what the return would be like but never imagined anything so lifeless. It will be a tough stay, its good to see my friends, but once again there is no life. God is good. I am tired. You are amazing. Be blessed in Christ's holy name.

A Meager Entry

2007-05-20T11:31:00.000-07:00

Again left
Vaguely bereft
Hidden in the cleft
A longing
To flow into symmetry

The sky beats down
Green Towers
That loom above
Hearts that beat
And lives that are led

Its a far better thing I do
Its a far better death I die

Romantic cliche becomes reminiscent
Of tandem moments never held
From such great heights

The dull hum of a soundtrack
Propel into the distance
Lost vantage points
Littering the highway with pages from a screenplay
Dancing in the air
Along with that beloved plastic bag

He's got the whole world in His hands
Shouldn't that always be enough

A signing off of sorts
Attempt of momentous proportion
Leaves with statement

Time will move on
It will never be stopped
Change will happen
Inevitability wrapped in uncertainty

Here's to the summer

The Sunrise Does Prophecy My Beloved Return

2007-05-18T04:34:00.000-07:00

So it has been a good long while since I have posted anything, let alone a personal reflectionesque entry. So here it goes. I sit here at the close of yet another nightwatch Thursday wearing my Thursday shirt and slightly wondering what ever happened to them. That aside I can say that there is something in the air, not the avian flu, but something that smells of change. Tonight after carousing and chillaxing with friends, Romans, and countrymen I was left with more or less little solace. I don't know what is around the corner, just change. Upon dropping off Kevin Samuel at his ever humble abode I gunned it to the QT, picked up some wine flavored Black and Milds, and then proceded to my little nook off of 155 near N. Madison. Honestly, I don't really know why I got them but I did and just stared into the horizon and talked to God. Not much happened, just some dodgy thinking and humming along to the Danielson Famile mix cd in my car. In the distance I could see the sky erupting in quite a formidable fashion. Towards the east the skyline was covered with a warm orange glow that began to emerge with a sense of great dignity. Whisping away into a dulcid yellow, the rest of the expanse was bursting forth with an intoxicating blue that faded into the darkness of the entrails of night. It was very serene, a haunting peace but it held an anthem of peace within its presence. The sight greatly contrasted the weary groan of all that seemed to be in me. Honestly I don't know what is to come, I hope good things but even hope has become such an empty word. I mean after a long season of having my heart and soul broken an end seems near but holding only irresolution. But there is an end atleast.
The cd cycled over and I decided to mosey over to the room of prayer. I mean atleast there you can be somewhat direct with God and it is just good to be with familiar faces who you run with. I left after the set and just ended up standing outside beholding what I had earlier seen birthed. After a brief conversation with Bates I continued to get lost in the sky. The bright sun was cresting in a glorious fashion over the trees and life seemed to become illuminated. Not in the sense that answers and closure was brought at all but the green leaves upheld the light in the distance and as every day the earth was awakening. I have never been much for describing beauty and joyous things very eloquently, honestly I used pretty much all I have in the previous paragraph, but it was a moment that had me briefly captivated.
God is good. I am clueless and I am glad I have people to run with. My horizon is currently really packed. Three days from now I leave to go beack east for about a month. Honestly I am returning to relationships that lie dormant in a place in which obscurity and apathy swirl in a cyclone of convenient escapism. Sure it sounds harsh but then again it is in America. God is good. I can take all the prayer I can get if you think about it. But yeah.... thats all from here, enjoy a sunrise, but remember what follows.

Basement Acoustics

2007-04-30T20:38:00.000-07:00

Constantly running
From tragedy's hallowed porch
The distance is all but a blur
With the eyes turned backwards

No goal was ever in sight
Just a forlorn starting line
Glory's distant shores
Tend to be a memory
...a fleeting one at best

Feeding on the dirge
Feeling unworthy of the flute
Joy seems so much farther beyond
Anything that could be grasped

Solitude's noose is in the corner
Next to the ash of a million bridges
Never wanting to call attention
So a trophy case was built

Be still My child
May these arms carry you
The fractured legs
Will never escape disfunction

Hush my beloved
And let My hope arise
In the heart of my children
I will consume the gaze

A time will come for everything
Everything in its place
Even you believe ot or not
Do not scorn my grace

The love beats stronger
Than your rusted shell
Completion will run its course
Your vision should never be hell

In the stillness of silence
My breath will overcome
Soothing the wounded wings
My strength will take you home

The Great Plains of Kansas

2007-04-30T20:32:00.000-07:00

For too long it seems
I've been lost in suspension
Like a dandilion
Blown across a rolling plain
The placid visage
Keeps getting to my head
Yet together we float
Dotting the sky like tiny angels

Destination unsure
Expectation was our place of birth
Light hitting every hair
With the wind pulling us skyward

Caught in the currents
Presumption mixed with passion
Musing forever onward it seems
Never content with the atmospheric home

Unless a seed falls to the ground and dies
It will never live

Agrippa's Indictment

2007-04-26T01:39:00.000-07:00

There will be no moral outcry without the shedding of blood. The weapons of our warfare are not of this earth but they are powerful to tear down strongholds, taking every thought captive to Christ and tearing down every single high and lofty argument that sets itself against the knowledge of God. Unicef has left thousands in its wake as casualty counts grow amidst the differing of opinions and the mad lib constitution declaring peace. Much dreaming and many words are meaningless, empty, worthless, hollow, dead, obsolete, and fluff at best. Candy coated frivolities trickles down the ear canals as arousal beats down the eyes into subconscious euphoric ideology. We see the corpses as channels turn highlighting another reason why Zoloft prescriptions need to be refilled.
The bottle will be empty and the words will be tested. In the beginning was the WORD and the WORD was with God and the WORD was God. The WORD became flesh and the shouts from His blood rings out through every drop of rain, in every corpuscle of sand, of every tear, and every breath that is breathed. To and fro the hearts of kings are shifted as the lofty are dethroned. Who can build an empire? Who can create breath? Who can tactfully navigate the synapses firing in the brain? Acknowledgement has long been deferred to science, greatness is only as far as the Aryan race they say, once said but people keep looking for other examples and we may just be one more dead child away from finding the answer.

No one is righteous, not one. Far less than two or three and beyond the accomplishment of one righteous man. What can righteousness gain. What flaw can construct the perfect society without trampling the destitute or running from house to house with a noose looking for a scapegoat. Divine providence answers this question as homes and brothels are washed away in the wake of a tsunami.
As if the mortal can control the tide and a thousand butterflies beating there wings simultaneously will accomplish nothing if a voice cries out “Be Still!” So speak of worthiness. So speak of magnitude as the blood of the weak drip down your ever so nicely chiseled chin. I mean let us speak honestly, when was the last time one was born without inflicting pain and taking utter delight in the suffering of the so very worthy recipient.
Bel stoops down and Nebo falls low off of the carts along with the iPods and plasma screen televisions. All will become plunder and all will become dust. Which empire is that which will rise above entropy? Who commands the skies even now or paints the sunrise or sunset, even through the smog the radiant light bursts through the combustion of meager convenience. Trailer park trophy wives and wall streets window shades become the talk of the town as both collect dust with fervor.
As if within the confines of a conscious thought or originated idea can peace be spawned. Jump out of the hummer sporting Che on your shirt and write your manifesto in the crimson of there own blood they will fleet away to nothing. Communism brought us nothing more than 10,000,000 more graves, isolation, and a fourth Rocky flick, is the the epoch of man? Some sort of hope because like the drunk uncle in the corner is the knowledge that we cannot do anything on our own.

There is one who sees every tear that hits the ground the one who declares Himself to be the Father of the fatherless and the defender of widows in His holy habitation. Who judges the deeds of man and who holds the seas within the span of His hand. There is one who will wear crimson once again as He redeems for His sake those who have cried out for the salvation. The is one kingdom that will overcome and there is one who will avenge and it is His to repay. “Vengeance is Mine!” Thus sayith the LORD. He reigns from on High and His is the kingdom not made by human hands. The whirlwind will come and judge the hearts of man in a sieve and there will be a mess on the threshing floor. Blood will be shed as teeth are gnashed against there Creator.
What becomes of this vindictive Man? As if the great fascists could serve as counterparts as this appropriation of violence. By no means. God is LOVE. God is meekness and humble. God is the sustainer of life and is good to all. He cries out for those to enter into the kingdom of peace yet ears are shut and opinions are elevated.
A wise man heeds direction yet a fool delights in airing his own opinion so take heed all who pine after another manifesto. There is no Tyler Durden, he was all in your mind and will pass away just like the millions of other pipe dreams that spawn for ubiquitous iniquity. A high and lofty opinion will do nothing to alleviate the vendetta we all have. There is one vendetta higher than our own and it stands firm in the heaven shining forth the brightness and splendor of holiness. There is one who made for love and who was scorned. There is one who gave breath and is spat upon. There is one who bled and is parodied.

What is man that God is mindful of him? This goes beyond rhetorical but every answer holds its own gain and thoughts. There is nothing to marvel at except for the volumes of self righteous and inflated thought. Upon the dusty shelves of law offices spawn the decisions for why people do what they do and why AIDs is spreading through Africa and even why compromise becomes the best blanket unless someone happens to be a bigger spender. Yet there is a law that stands in heaven.
It stands firm assaulting every offender as guilty of high treason and shines as anarchy breeds under the guise of civilization and social contracts. Yet it is pure and all will fade away save for that which is found in the law and that which has been redeemed by such. The fruit was eaten and the tower’s foundations were in fact laid. The plans of man will be laid barren as the spiral into utter deprivation of that which they were knit together for. Sheep go to heaven and goats go to hell but all we end up wanting is a girl with a short skirt and a long jacket. We have built our religions and built them bigger by widening the corridors and adding more lanes. Yet in the previous statement all that stands out for the most part is the fact that I (the writer) is or at one time was a Cake fan.

Oh but to speak of love with utter joy and full blown exuberance. Beyond the confines of the most articulated sonnet breathed from the pen of the greatest writers of all time heralds that which is solace love and beauty. A regal joy holds attention as the thousand monkeys on a thousand typewriters concoct nonsense that which was done goes thoroughly through the gate of incoherent babble to that of awe filled silence enveloped in mysterious light and color surpassing visions the temporal can even fathom. This is love. The uncreated on a rugged piece of would; held onto a thing in which He held together with the word of His own power and created good. Bearing the full cup of wrath for His enemies to bring them into utter pleasure and euphoria, that day calling forth the condemned to join Him in Paradise.
Awaken you kings and awaken you peasants. Proletariat and Bourgeois alike this is your redemption. There is a king who will come and reign. The lines are being drawn between territories just as His hands drew in the sand whilst forgiving a harlot. Do not rage against the mercy for wrath will be poured out and blood will be avenged. Under the Scarlet fountain sins are atoned for and the sinful nature is dashed like pottery. His blood will cover all including the prominent “A” we all wear. Jealousy is a husbands fury and the drops of a bucket are about as much regard as the fortunes of men. It will fall. Advancement goes beyond petty servitude. Humility paves the path letting the only righteous one be judge and jury. Your heroes will all be dead yet there is one who is alive. Who can trust man who has but a breath in his nostrils.
Beyond manifesto and beyond writ the kingdom moves forth the Father of lights who sustains His children. The vapor of all that is done under the sun will flee away as soon as He splits the skies yet He knows every sparrow that falls to the ground how much more will He avenge, uplift, uphold, and bless His children. He is love. He created laughter and song and still is opposed. In His presence is fullness of joy. His adversaries will quake at His presence and He will come with the shout of the archangel. Look to the sky heed the warning. The shadow is coming. The shadow is coming. The WORD became flesh and will break out of the cliché He has been made.

Night will be no more.
There will be no more tears.
There will be no more death.
The increase of His government and peace will know no end.
Their worm will not die out.

2007-04-24T02:33:00.000-07:00

See how I dance
On the embers of the mighty
The absence of breath
An all fades away
To what do I owe this pleasure
The pomposity of your empire
As I spin and dance
Amidst the moths sent from above
Futility falls within your ranks
As bloodshot eyes
Evelope perplexity
Who can straighten that which I made crooked
The poignant path was not discovered by you
Tremble before My throne
You frivolous kingdoms
The spendthrift armies march forth
Salvation they do not bring
The more that is built
The brighter the fire will burn
Refinement lies undermeath my every syllable
May gold remain
For the ashes of stubble will linger among the moths

Some Words

2007-04-19T01:39:00.000-07:00

A petrified example of a modern conundrum lies within a slue of countless epitaphs. The statistics continue to pile up until you have books. After books we progress onto volumes. Box sets and collectors editions as well; sold at a bargain price in order to collect dust in a library as the owner totes their ownership in sophisticated conversation propping their ego among their peers. Hard copies are so wonderful to get hold of. The numbers pile up as the kill count rises. The news at ten will show it unless you happen to catch the nineteen commercials during the Simpsons, that way you can know before anyone else and let concern wrought your face. Nameless and faceless, yet they demand our attention ever so much. Maybe it is a comfort that we are alive, perhaps it is a dulling contentment knowing that not all the bad things in the world happen to us, and to others it is a tragedy quickly remedied by Friends re-runs and a case of Diet Coke®.
What have we become? Has blood become so dispensable that if a death is not gruesome enough then it isn’t worth any attention. The streets are littered with our malcontent as well as posters and pop up ads alike. The frivolity of humanity dances along in a Meow Mix commercial with all the subtlety of moss in a redwood forest. Yet onward we move. Life goes on a grief is ignored as weakness and the cycle begins anew. This is a society far detached from its own existence. We are made to feed. Born, bred and raised to consume to fix that pain that gnaws away, anything to make the voices stop and anything to bring a little bit of solace.
This isn’t to say that it is a new thing but lets be honest for a second, when have we had so many numbing agents so rapidly available for our consumption. We move on with the sands of time ignoring history while brashly stating, “Those who forget history are condemned to repeat it.” What is there to offer anymore? What is there to gain in the never ending hierarchy of thought, conjecture, promise, and delight? There is nothing new under the sun as with a single bullet or a single car wreck all that was ever gained perishes if not moves down to the descendents.
Branching out into the insipid the disdain of actuality strikes the masses as nonsense where inside is there birthing a hope that somehow inside there can be a breech of duality in which we all have our own secret Tyler Durden. Of course there is no contentment, we have no knowledge of what being is. We have come to a place in which we do and we perceive what we can and go from past assumptions scraping by to find their due. We grow up as victims there has to be some way to get vindication. Years of mistreatment and pain squelched into a malaise of bitterness begins to seep inside. We are owed something right, where is the justice. Thirty-three dead, this is the triumph of the will. What is consequence and what is justice? Who even has language anymore holding a line of obscurity demanding the line be held with utter fervor.
The hangman is calling and the law is becoming a thing of the past. Presumption courses through the veins of the obsolete yet one thing betas true, we can achieve nothing. Who can straighten that which God has made crooked and who can fix that which God has bent. Given over to the divine hammer we become formed and fashioned after our own liking. He is the potter and we are the clay. The brittle and the cracked have melded together into a defiant cry for certainty.
There is one. Only one man who can bring justice. He saw and was displeased that there was no justice. He made the rebels for a kingdom not made by human hands, one filled with joy, peace, wholeness, and tranquility. Yet they rage in ignorance and in full knowledge. Apart from this kingdom there is only death and obsoletion. From His throne flows a river which brings life to that which is dead and whose trees bear the fruit of life and whose leaves hold healing for the nations. At this throne does the justice flow and from none other. The foundation of this throne are righteousness and justice and from it floes mercy like a raging torrent.
Speak of revolution and I will show you 10 million dead alongside the grave of Che Guevara. This is no revolution, this is a siege. A clash of empires vying for dominance. The two will be revealed and death and Hades will follow. Marching into some glorious sunset will decadence burn up.
Wisdom and truth call forth with the violence of love calling the vile to enter into their home. Invisibility warps the mindset as fear has come as a proper diet for far too long now. The kingdom advances and the violent take it by force. Yet ignored goes forth the orgy of defiance. Heaven calls forth as voices begin to pipe up. Negotiations were thrown out the window years ago as Death was nailed to a rugged piece of wood. Lines drawn in the sand are no being redone in wet concrete and an era begins to dawn. The kingdom of heaven breathes life and rest onto its warriors hidden in the cleft of love. The battle will soon break out from skirmish and a highway will be paved with blood. They will overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony loving their lives not unto death. Joy is their strength and life is the product. Fear has died in their eyes as boldness grips the depths of compassion.
There will be a day when there is no pain. There will be a day when sorrow will cease. There will be a day when no longer war will be studied. There will be a day in which the child plays with the cobra and the lion lays with the lamb. There will be a day of peace. There is only one who is righteous and there is only one who is worthy to open the scroll. It will be opened and lawlessness shall end. The increase of His government and peace shall know no end from ocean floor to distant stars. Cling to hope for redemption draws nigh, let us lay aside the vices of the contemporary and put to death the cocaine of humanism and enter fully into His glorious love and through abundance of joyously given grace enter into the life wrapped deep inside the jubilant dance of the Triune song. Put to death the former things and enter into the glorious dawn of the new day. Christ is the only way.

An Oboservation

2007-04-15T01:00:00.000-07:00

So I just finished watching Blood Diamond. Good movie I thought. I have various and estranged thoughts, feelings and opinions regarding it but I only feel compelled to leave one. The entire movie was to depict the horrors and the atrocity of mankind in Africa. It evoked the grief and terror of merciless bloodshed, violence, destruction and devastion of human life for personal and vain gainings. Prior to the feature there was a preview for the video game based on the movie 300 in which you the participant hack and slash your way to a gruesome victory letting your main accomplishment be the heap of bodies in your wake. Amidst all of the sentiment and attempts to grab at our heartstrings to bring justice to a fallen and maimed world there is nothing sheer exposure will permanantly bring. The world is spinning in its own circles. No one has an army to intervene, the UN is worthless, the US is tied up in its other obligations and as soon as we would entire the nation within 3 weeks the war would be protested by the same people who demanded they be sent. As Darfur was rocked for there was nothing brought. No peace, nothing. Is there any settlement now. Has Rwanda become a haven of utopian conquest. No. What are opinions and what are thoughts. Amidst words there is nothing but rhetoric and empty dreams. The masses come demanding food and drink yet the only true answer is to eat the flesh and to drink the blood of Christ. We have our movements. Let Bono seel all he has to give it to the poor to only let them purchase weapons and then continue to feed off of each other. Lets drop food and feed egos letting us know that we who are good, who have been blessed with a greater and higher moral authority, who know better than anyone else, by mere providence are the sole salvation for these pity cases that demand our all (by all I mean our two cents both literal and metaphorically speaking). There is a crisis. Yet how can we as a culture mitigate that which we have no grid for and at the same time still posess the depths of wickedness we are trying to squelch. Do we therefore abandon hope and drop what we do, by no means. Do we cut aid and pull back, no. To we hide to be enveloped in ignorrance, of course not. We, I say we as Christians, are to go before the throne and command the kingdom to come. The kingdom yearns to go forth and take the land with violence. Through intercession, mercy deeds, and the release of the Gospel can any true change can happen. I mean within the entire war torn continent the only real change for good is being done by men and women like Rolland and Heidi Baker. Not only are people the problem but so are principalities and demons. We need God. I sit here kind of stunned and left with a sleu of thoughts regarding the recent release of movies like this. I mean for me personally I take it as an oppurtunity to see the world around me because the scant news articles I occassionally peruse really don't paint that great of a picture. Yet I am left worried. Americans love entertainment and we love sentiment. We love to boldly go forth and parade a cause. It is like a fad. Trapped within our suburban landscapes many march for declaring truth, justice, and problems. However, there is a day coming where every prop will be knocked away and even those in mansions will manifest the truth of their humanity, which is wickedness. There is none righteous but God. He loves righteousness and hates wickedness. Apart from His sight there is only flaw and evil. In the ever growing world community we need sentiment to begin to wilt and true compassion to take its place.

Melvis and Me and a Damme Too (The Great Ohio Excursion)

2007-04-14T19:01:00.000-07:00

2 days. 24 hours in a van. 1,400 miles.

*Friday 6 am me and my brother Josh (Melvis, Captain M, the Captain) embarked to take him to meet up with YWAM's GX international team in Continental Ohio.

*Our escapades went forth with the commanding ballads of the singer/songwriter Raffi including: Banaphone, Michael Row Your Boat Ashore, C-A-N-A-D-A, Got to Sing, Who Built the Ark and one of my all time favorites Shake Your Sillies Out. We were pretty bummed that we couldn't get some of his others like This Little Light of Mine, Baby Beluga, or especially Down By the Bay. It was grand none the less.

*Moving on we went through other such greats as ELO, Blue States, some Canned Heat, and other estranged music such as the delightful Mickey Finn. Its not a real trip until your vehicle sounds like a 1930s speakeasy. Some good times. We discovered some marvelous places. Our number two favorite was Gas City in Indianna. I mean who wouldn't want to live there. Shoot we nearly stopped in the Taco Bell there. So As you roll your eyes at the wonderful sophmoric humor let me tell you my favorite new town: Effingham, Illinois. I mean seriously, just say it a couple of times. And yes it is a real place, with its own fairgrounds and everything.

*For any Sufjan fans not only did we see road signs for Chicago but also Decatur. We passed Carlyle Lake and crossed the Kaskaskia River.

*Like every great trip we packed some great food. Amidst the green tea, fruit chips, cookies, and sandwiches there was one thing that we pretty much stuck with, a five lb bag of Gummy Bears. Yeah, that is alot. I mean five pounds. After about two and a half lbs we just got sick of it. We ended up just throwing it out the window hoping for bears to grow. We had both Grizzly and Polar varieties and they should be full grown by late August.

*Indianna and Ohio are very boring states. I mean sheesh, wow. It was so painfully long driving through them. It was like "Ah-ing" for hours without a single "Choo." That and I think I found a city with worse roads than KC, Indiannapolis. Yikes it was confusing. I mean if you like the country and nothing around I guess it would be a cool place to be but, I have to pass.

*On our way to Continental, which is a small town in rural Ohio, the Captain and I were pretty antsy. It had been about 11 hours in the car and the back country roads were getting to us. It was wierd, next to every other farmstead was a nice personallized pond. I mean nice clear water, nicely set boundaries and lovely tractors in the distance, some good times. So in the spirit of the land we were kind of hoping for a sheriff to cross our path. I mean we wanted to be chased. I mean plowin through hay bales kind of chased. We foud some banjo music and cranked it in the van and went a lookin'. Granted had we seen one we would have slowed down, just due to time contraints but seriously, I never was a Dukes fan but something in us just wanted a chase.

*So we got to Continental High School, home of the Pirates, while blasting some banjo music with the windows down and met up with Darren who happened to join us out there. We went inside and watched the presentation. It was really good. I mean there was skating, dancing and some really good testimonies. Honestly, it was really good to get outside of the bubble, I mean really good. It made me miss doing youth ministry, its been about 4 years since I have done any. At the end there was a huge response, alot of people came up and got saved. Funny thing is that as soon as the altar call was given Darren and I instinctively just started going at it in tongues. Good times.

*I am really excited to have my bro do this, I mean he doesn't really go to churhc but he loves God. That and it was really rad funny seeing the people flock to the presenters who they were so impressed with. I joined in and got my buddy Mickael Santillian's autograph on my hand. He is 5foot nothing and 14 and I give him a ride home about once a week with my bro. He was taken back, Darren even got a dollar signed.

*Darren and I then ventured to the Comfort in about an hour away and we crashed for the night enjoying some pizza and recanting tales of the previous week. It left me jonesing really bad, I mean bad. I need to get back east, see the outer banks and just get some Bojangles chicken, its been years.... I miss it.

*The next morning he left and then I headed back home. 11 hours in the car by myself were good. I ended up listening to a bunch of music I hadn't really listened to in a good long time including Blindside, Mae, the Insyderz, Maylene and Calibretto. Not to mention some good old fashioned Bob Dylan. Also I jammed out to some sermons from TACF. Interesting thing is that as soon as Ed Piorek (one of those preaching) started talking about getting lost in the river of God I drove across the Mississippi, it was a good visual. It was a good time. I mean God and I had some really good talks. 11 hours and 15 bottles of green tea later I finally made it home.

*It was a long two days. But good I would have to say it was good. This has by far been one of the most peculiar spring breaks I have ever had.

Intro for the Next Little Red Book

2007-04-11T21:00:00.000-07:00

All hat are left are caricatures of dreams that once lived. They fly through the air whimsically asking for the owners to join them there. What is there left to pursue? Anything of conquest or grandeur seems to be a blowin’ in the wind as pomposity sinks to record lows. Nothing more than marketing agents are left selling products and namely themselves, always cutting the best deal for the most compatible of cliental. What is left? Are there words? Are there songs? Sure we can rehash a few feelings, throw in a couple new scenarios, campaign for a cause which will ultimately go ignored as the world continues to turn.
Truth cries out in the streets for an open ear. Ears not plugged by headphones and Apple devices are clogged with opinion and jargon that even the one who spews it is not even sure of. To use vocabulary for such dubious gain, enjoying the accomplishment of using something new and exciting where even the painful expression of Homer Simpson has been immortalized within our hallowed vestibules. Like a pen tickling an ear so go forth the droning of the resources at the skeletal fingertips of the ever advancing megalopolis.
Left with nothing but bytes identity has been erased without a glance. From the big yellow bird to the kid with his pie we embrace one another with the conquest of the familiar roads. Voices in an endless supply on play lists churning through cognition that flickers like a dying light bulb. It is clearly dying yet it is lauded for its uniqueness and nonconformity letting the sputtering hum chide in with the volumes of public opinion. Sure it isn’t glamorous but may the glamorous be damned. For too long has propriety held down the visage that has berated this people long enough like the crack of a slave master’s whip. Decadence pours forth as splendor as the grunge cried out “Rape Me” and the children of years later join the parades that make Tim Burton seem like Mr. Rogers.
Yet we are left with the pedestals. An inward spiral of a food chain that preys on that which is weak and nullifies pain as an identity or as a gift of attention. Daddy’s little girl grows up to be all she ever wanted. Writing songs of heartache and glamour as she bares all in magazines inviting thousands to rape their minds. Words scream for meaning as “love” has been torn down to just another empty orgasm crushing the innocence of a naïve child. The seal is broken and the ache pours forth. Confusion fuels animosity as the vacuum perpetuates nothing but verbose lies and pimped out rides. Even those who despise the culture cannot live without it.
Opinions run like wildfire consuming all sense of cohesiveness. Millions march against that which they do not parading a cause that gets them attention. Vengeance lies in the heart of the masses as injustice continues to gnaw away at their lifestyle. Spanning all scopes of social class, the bourgeois and proletariat alike sink there claws deep within themselves as they do each other. A vendetta will come as the wheel is being spun to select next year’s scapegoat.
Lenin has been long dead. As has Lennon, but his message was at least catchy so it sticks around today. The banners of yesteryear have been traded in for blogs and home movies. Wayne and Garth would be proud, but frankly they were a joke to begin with. Pomposity and Novocain are sold side by side with Mountain Dew in vending machines; there is no Yellow Five which makes it less of a hazard. Society has now been left vapid. With an empire of crutches that would even make the Big Bad Wolf laugh. There will be a huff and there will be a puff.
Truth cries out and will be heard. Awaken my friends from the inebriation of the status quo and rise beyond the noise of the neon signs and personal dating ads. Truth runs up and down the streets looking for a friend in her time of agony and loneliness. In her is the wellspring of Life, a radiant kingdom paved by the blood of its humble and tender King. Blood alone turns the wheels of history and the kingdoms of the earth will become the Kingdom of our Lord. Truth will lay waste to every crutch holding up only those who have answered her ringing call.
Amidst concubines and gardens, conquests and riches, wisdom and folly there was only vanity. In a time where even that which is concrete becomes a platform of change and interpretation how much more is there vanity. He calls to pull out the IV line and feel. Awaken to that which is real and be long in the affection and groaning of heaven. He is the only physician. Escapism leads only to a catatonic state rot with cynicism and bitterness. Truth rings out and may her friends make her known, only that which is known may be trumpeted. This tree is sweet to the taste but amidst many counterfeits may she be solely feasted on.

Residue of a Lucid Thought

2007-04-11T20:15:00.000-07:00

As a dawn melds into the burning haze of dusk I come before this time and place with nothing to offer you except that which beats fervently deep inside me. Unto your mighty and glorious face I lift up that which has been breaking for what seems an eternity pass. Succumbing once again to this unobtrusive medium of solitary composition I feel the breaking begin to ensue. As the words dance around me in lucid symphony the brilliant hope pierces my soul separating light and shade. Of cataclysm and memorials twilight lay far in the background as almost chapter turns seem eminent. Your mercy moves through me like the silhouette of words long spoken ago. Truth echoes from the streets looking for just a friend and by happenchance few have inclined there ear. Each letter the silver lining of infinitude unlocking a chasm deep of joy and mystery laced with the sting of agony. Before time they stand still spoken to embrace the one who ventured in the garden. So speak words and calloused tones the light pours forth out of Your radiant lips washing over the fledgling youth as with each loose end you play my heart strings and move from dirge to waltz to symphony and back again. Lost amidst the frailty of misconception we drift along hearts laid bare before Your gentle hands. Destiny commands within the sheltered minds as You even now survey your promised land. Without regret fearing remorse I fall into Your arms the delicate balance of safety and affection in the tears of confusion and ache. You surround your people and whisper through the skeletons each word wrapping tightly around the brittle bringing new life to that which has fallen away to despair. Dusk comes yet all that is left an unsettling. Heart in Your hands and a breaking most emanate. The angels dance through the movements of the tears and planets alike each one you cherish like a Father over His beloved children. The times and seasons seem useless as the one who changes them continues to remain aloof. I pine for your touch and your breath to consume just one second of this haggard pursuit. In tenderness you look down peering deep into the well of my gaze drawing deep the water that He once poured. The bubble out into tears washing over that which for so long holds a scrutinizing reign. Fists broken from beating the wall and tongue dry from years of rhetoric He calls out to rest.
“Rest in My arms and partake of My table, Oh my child whom I delight. Your heart beats into the night and each palpitation wraps around the inferno that burns deep within mine. Come behold the pouring of weakness as disdain trickle from immature cravings. Each tear flows into my heart covering the depths of each chamber as I long to make all things new. In the broken places I have found you faithful My friend in whom I am utterly ravished over. The day will come when the words will ring true as the Word becomes flesh and absorbs every ounce of your precious frame. A wedding is planned and a day of gladness will come, in the meantime find your solace in me.”
Galaxies spawn overhead lapping up the cosmos in an array of supernovas and black holes. The trees clap in the wind as You suspend even plastic bags in flight. The foundation of jubilation to be laid from Zion into the halls of the courageous and uncertain alike. You breathe your breath with burning flooding the absolute with that which is beyond comprehension. The words continue to dance through me as chapters unfold and homesickness grows. Oh to be of another age to see the land that stretches afar and behold the King in His beauty. Thoughts will ponder the former terror as hope arises from the ashes of His wonderful creation. Even the weak shall become luminous as justice will be poured forth. What is man that you are mindful of Him that blood screams from the dust a victory cry over the broken body of Death. Beauty will arise in due time as rotations begin to plod onward. Yet I cry from this place of humanity, “Oh to know love and to know Christ. To live beyond words and fractured feelings. To drink deep of the vats of the goodness of God and the pleasure of the joyous Son. My Father in heaven Holy is your name I praise and bless You. Oh to drift into the sea of reality to be lost in that which awakens the dead. You have not forgotten me or any of your children, I pray that I would see your face.”

Hillbilly Hunting

2007-04-08T21:48:00.000-07:00

So I am going to the woods by myself for a couple of days. Looking for God, solace, and contemplative stuff. I am going hopefully in utter silence. I will be in the middle of nowhere, if you wanna throw out a prayer for me I will greatly appreciate it. Anyhoo..... thats all be thoroughly blessed!!

It Must Be Beautiful

2007-04-05T05:30:00.000-07:00

What was dim becomes clear
With a dulcid roar
And a hint of sunshine
Like the meadows of spring
The wind is caught in its untimely dance
With a voice in the distance
Warming the uncertainty
Hope rises through semi poetic thought
A new day awakens as will another tomorrow
Destiny collides with destiny
Letting the uncreated one marvel
At the work of His glorious ways
Nothing is forgotten
Say for released sin
Wholeness grabs us by the hand
Linking a people to the radiant homeland
At the end of the yellow brick road
Gold and cinders glowing beneath our feet
With a heavy sigh we move on certain He hears
With a heavy sigh He longs for the day
Which every tear is gone and there is no sorrow
Songs will be sung with great joy
Symphonies and ska will fill the air
As a mighty chorus pulls us through the bog

Journally Nonsense

2007-04-03T07:11:00.000-07:00

I don't really know why I am writing, just something I felt like I need to do. To be honest I stare at the screen hoping that by some miraculous way that questions I have will be answered, solace will be gained, and that someway somehow there would arise through these many words some peace and comfort would be gained. Its interesting the way the mind wanders. Honestly I am not posting really for any of my four readers but really just for myself. Looking back the past month I can do nothing but say that God is good and that He is faithful. His gentleness and provision have far supassed anything I have attempted to conceive. It's not good for man to be alone. It isn't and man let me tell you, after years of living in haunting isolation and obscurity it is so good to have friends to run with. Honestly, I mean from the depth of my heart my friends are so dear to me and yeah.... I'd say more but I have honestly no words or attention to do so. Shoot I still want to be in love hardcore and everything, but shoot, who doesn't to a degree. I mean right now I stand with contentment with what I have smiling at God with a big goofy grin, He returns it with an even bigger one. God is good and prayers have been answered. Shoot I kind of am getting a picture of why I am alive and the fruit of God's redeemingand healing work. I mean we need to know the Father and we need to know love. We need dignity, security, direction, and identity from the one who made us. I guess it kind of is the more manly compatable view to what the Bridegroom offers, I mean don't get me wrong there are probably a million theologically wrong things with that statement but it is kind of how I see it now. I mean shoot we are a broken orphaned people raised by a glowing box. There is ache and a void which only He can fill. You can't give answers unless you have the answer in living breathing moving wonderment in you. Processes can be a pain but God is good.

So if you are still reading, I assume you are one of my beloved comrades. Meaning you are amazing and just all in all spectacular. Be blessed. I mean seriously ask God to bless you right now, that'd cool. I mean the prayer of Jabez did make it into the Bible..... anyway, I need sleep. Peace out!

The Prodigal Son

2007-03-31T02:26:00.000-07:00

Luke 15:11-32 (The Prodigal Son, some thoughts and revelations)

v20 And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him.

Upon just the beginning of his return the father bolts out of his door towards his son. A far way off, not within the fence but a far way off. He runs and embraced his son with loving kisses pouring out affectionate kisses on the one who had returned.

21And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.'[c] 22But the father said to his servants,[d] 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. 23And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. 24For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate.

This is the attitude God has towards us. Upon the entering into the kingdom His primary goal is to in fact lavish us with His undying affection and set us as who we really are. To know that yes we are His children, and we are loved. His desire is constantly towards us and He has searched the depths of our hearts and minds and jubilantly has accepted us into the Beloved. He calls for the "Best Robe," a ring and shoes restoring dignity. Also He calls forth the fattened calf and celebration to boisterously expound upon the joy that somersaults in His heart at the very return of the son who had thrown away everything and forsook who He was. He is quick to redeem and does so promptly. All in the household rejoice with loud singing and triumphant jubilation because of this.

25"Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27And he said to him, 'Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.' 28But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, 29but he answered his father, 'Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. 30But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!' 31And he said to him, 'Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.'"

The older son became swiftly indignant out in the field. Bitterness rose within a sense of fervent entitlement. With loathing breathes he sulked in misery about not getting his due. He was working for a reward. He was plowing away in the field. This was a large house and place with servants, those who do work. They were brought in so that the fammily would not need to embark on menial toil but flourish together in love, passing on a rich and very deep heritage which the father longed to lavish and pass on to the next generations as a true inheritance. The same goes with our heavenly Father.
We were all astray. We all came back but the thing is many of us have jumped ship into working into the field to earn some sort of reward and inheritance vying for the favor and affection of our heavenly Father hoping for a pat on the back for a few good deeds, a few days fasted, ect. ect. ect.... Yet upon our entering the kingdom His desire is to establish us truly as heirs. Freely we receive therefore we freely give. We earn nothing. We earn no inheritance. He calls us to cast our cares upon Him and embrace our identiy a beloved children of God who are deeply loved. He no longer calls us slaves, but sons, if sons then heirs (Galatians 4:6-7). We call out Abba Father and He responds. His yoke is easy and His burden is light. He does not desire slaves but sons and daughters who are about His business.
This only comes about from coming to Him with nothing asking for embrace. We need to learn how to receive. How can we pour out that which we have not received or talk about that which we do not know? This is what you have been made for. He knows your pain, thoughts, fears, desires, and weaknesses along with all of your sin and His desire is for you to come in and be with Him. Working for recompense will lead to only emptiness, jadedness, pain, envy, insecurity, and bitterness. Be still and know He is God. You cannot enter into your full calling until you hear the words, "This is my beloved son (daughter), in whom I am well pleased!" God longs for friends not slaves. Children not butlers or maids. His desire is to love. From that and that alone comes forth the budding kingdom of God!

A Thankful Thimble of Thursday Thoughts

2007-03-30T07:12:00.000-07:00

It has been a good day. There is peace for once. I thank God for that. Class was good. PR Team was good, as was prohpecying over a mighty man of God. The prayer room was good, it was good to rest. PFI: tongues got interpreted, words were given and angels were there. Alisha Powell's team as usual was amazing, mad props to Han Man Kim. Kicking it with Darren was rad along with collecting 50 huge worms and putting them in a small QT coffee cup with dreams of fish big in our eyes. Catching up on my own procrastination and staying up way too late hasn't been too bad either, well so far. How the lines have fallen in pleasant places, I can't wait to see where they lead me. God is good and so are my friends, go you. Be blessed. Amen.

Sigh...... I Love Jesus

2007-03-29T05:08:00.000-07:00

Riding forth on the anathemas of the archetypes of a dying world comes the rider named faithful and true. Raising a war cry that shines forth in glowing brilliance illuminating the darkest haunts and giving life to every dead plant. With the sunrise He rides forth boldly coming to the cry of His dearly beloved to save her from the death that has her surrounded. Sustained by all consuming zeal He rides with loud shouts of singing backed by the choirs of heaven. Resolute He rides forth with peace burning deep within His jealous eyes. He is our God. He is the one who was slain driven by love so indescribable that even death and Hades fell underneath its triumphing heralds. Bearing the scars of a battle He entered surpassing obligation but out of sheer delight He embraced inscrutable agony and now His time has come. The increase of His government and peace will know no end streaming from Jerusalem to the smallest galaxies in the universe. Commanding love drives Him as patience fuels the pent up affection and rage that rises deep within the heart of He who overcame. For this He is worthy, for this He is given the name above every name and due all glory, praise and honor.
There is a blood that screams louder than the loudest lie. There are tears that falls harder than a pounding monsoon. Justice cries forth in the streets, running to and fro beckoning all the afflicted to come to her healing embrace. She is scorned as groans fill the heavenlies. Death reigns over the multitude as He weeps aloud over the slain of His creation. His love shouts louder than the scars of Baal and the vomit of Ashera. The scars of land and people whored away are covered by this all consuming wave of love. All who enter in are cleaned and fully accepted in the Beloved.

Oh, how He loves us, Oh, how He loves us. Taste and see that He is good. The foundation of His throne is righteousness and justice and mercy pours forth like a raging stream. His promises are yes and amen, truly they are. He has not forgotten His people and calls them to walk fully as ambassadors. Fed on joyous hope we march on laying waste the forces of death, sin, and disease. It is for you, it is for me, may His love abound still more and more consuming the apple of His eye, His radiant and stunning bride.

A Brief Exhortation

2007-03-25T19:18:00.000-07:00

The magnitude of the situation is lengthened as light begins to pour even more fervently in. Ever groaning palpitations beat from the unknown warmth that ticks loudly within the cracks of a broken and frail. From the depths of the wellspring of the soul LOVE stirs with tender violence amidst the tremors and posing of the child grasping along the paths of destiny and love. As the fire begins to kindle warm eyes look down from heaven intoxicating the Spirit in a union of bliss and exhilaration. Within the temple war has raged as a word speaks “Peace” silencing the daunting precepts once heavily ingrained into the dying empire of lies. LOVE dwells inside and takes delight in the place He has predestined for Himself to rest in. Despite the frailty of the home from the wellsprings of life the adrenal flow of inexpressible joy goes forth as strength through every capillary of the beloved child.
Every hair is numbered as is every nation in that bucket. Within the drop sheer delight is taken in His children as LOVE calls them forth into the transcendent beauty of their true calling. Inhibitions lay six feet under as the Good Shepherd guides with an overflow of tenderness and compassion resolute to have the riches of His inheritance. He is their strength, He is their reward, He is their unity, and He is peace. Shrouded in humility He lusts after those He predestined and carries the wounded and gently leads those with young. As the dwellers of dust are seated with princes and the barren woman sings for she has been given child the King rides forth to the advancement of the love that thrives in the furthest depths of His being.
Rejoice my brother and dance my sister for you are loved. Inside the arms are the joy and affection that you were birthed for. This is justice, that the King would have His way. His way is for you, poor, lowly and broken to walk as who you are: beautiful, cherished, unique and an heir to the one who spoke all things to being and who invented the concepts of affection and laughter. Oh bride the marriage is on the horizon. The day of the gladness of His heart. He sees you and loves you with delight that goes beyond words and heralds out of the sovereign blood once shed.
The kingdom suffers violence and the violent take it by force may his violence consume you and drive out all fear so you may drink deep of the pleasures forevermore and walk as one who is their Beloved’s and the Beloved is theirs. Through this comes the advancement of the Kingdom. The uprising is not through wholesale and well articulated propaganda but through the very whispers of LOVE. Bellow it from the steeples and ride forth. The LOVE that existed before time lies within you. Rest in His arms and sleep in His bed, there is a design for what He did and said.
Be loved beloved, this is your strength and this is your calling to overflow superfluously from the fountain of delight and tears of the Almighty with all confidence and joy. Oh beautiful ones He will finish what He began until all that is left is faith, hope, and love. The greatest of these being love. We march on laying hold of the journey into the heart of the Triune dance knowing that we have not been forgotten and that we will never be alone. Despite abject despondancy and the swirl of voices and feelings that pull every which way the Lord will swiftly come to all who call on His name and wait for His glorious presence and jubilant return.

A New Hope (or Chewbacca's Solo Mission)

2007-03-24T06:58:00.000-07:00

Today was a good day. To warn you this may end up being a somewhat lengthy post, be it I have not yet mapped anything out I had a really good day and I frankly feel kind of like preaching. So my beloved readers, and yes I adore all of you who read from the utter depths of my fledgling heart, here is a peek at what has been going on. I most likely will be vaguely candid on issues I generally skirt but hey, enjoy.

Yesterday was a good day. I just thought I would get that out of my way. I wept heavily for the first time in a good long while. To be a little open with my crowd, God has been in a place of bringing up my darkness and pain in order to open the eyes of my understanding, that I may know the hope of my calling, the glorious riches of His inheritance and His exceeding power towards me who believes and well even doubts at times, a lot of times. I need a father. I lack direction and I have been seeking identity in a vacuum scared out of my mind with no direction and feeling the futility of my own scraping fall to dust and incompletion, well a lot of them. I need to know the Father’s love and well let Him provide for me and drop Atlas and the world from my back I thank you friends who encouraged me. I due and I cannot express enough the gratitude I have in my heart for those who have fought for me and continue to do so, God will reward you, deeply.

Yesterday left me with a lot on my mind i.e. dealing with identity, emotional longings across the board, the future, and well life and God. You know, all of the short concise questions which within12.7 seconds can all be answered by Wikipedia. I mean shoot, that isn’t much, LOL(ok so honestly it has been a good solid year and a half since I have actually typed that and I know that eyes were rolled at its usage but hey, where would we be today without acronyms, IHOP would be sunk). But anyway, tangent aside God has been carrying me in this haze lightly soaking me with hope. Today the three main contributors were men of God who I consider a full honor to know, be with, and befriend: Kevin Samuel, Matthew Johnson, and Joshua Forrey.

Starting with Kevin. We got together at about 5:30ish and rocked out the Antique Furniture Mall (Joe’s Town to the newer crowd) and we found a couple of really comfy chairs two feet in front of a large bureau with nice glasses and an array of Lord of the Rings posters in it. After that we skedaddled over to Sam’s for some food and we just talked. Kevin has some mad depth, I mean for real, God has given him vision birthed deep. Through the laughs and the tears (not really tears) God nudged me to look somewhat up and catch once again another glimmer of hope. Right now if you don’t mind throw up a blessing for Kevin, it would be rad.

So after going home and enjoying some Spongebob with my little bro I went over to my buddy Matt Johnson’s and we caught up with each other on life. It had been a real long time since we had talked and it was good. I like to see the way God moves outside of my own little sphere in His various divine ways. He knows us all and He cares for us all. I mean there is not a sparrow who He doesn’t see fall how much more the one’s He made in His own image let alone His children. I mean He is faithful. That and we played some video games for awhile. I have never been big into playing anything and it had been a long time since I had sat down to play anything but it was good. Some Bond game for X-Box that was just fun. Video games and scintillating conversation about the Almighty, I was a fan. If you can please throw up a quick prayers for Matt, he needs to be blessed gosh dang-it.

Moving on to the next event, Josh. I thank God for this guy, I mean honestly he is a good friend and God has ridiculously blessed me by just knowing this guy. We conversed as we often do, about God, life, the future, and well ‘love and whatnot.’ Anyhoo, throughout the nights events which included meeting a believer who worked at Wal-Mart named Abraham (he is an Indian man who loves Jesus and stocks shelves and if you are ever in there and see him you should rush to bless his socks off), we moseyed to my casa and watched some Fraggle Rock, FTFNF with the crew and watching American Tale (Fiefel Goes West), and kicking it at the ‘Bucks God intermingled with our words as to each of us hope was imparted. I mean honestly, I have been going to God regarding certain things in my life and throwing them at His feet and in turn growing deeper in God. It was something that I have never thought of but God gives voices in your life to truly exhort and to love on ya with. It is not sin at all but things that demand wisdom in order to well fully engage with. Amidst my fear, crap, anxiety, questions, and uncertainty regarding them I have been driven directly into my Father’s huge arms of love. Through all of the workings in my heart and the longings, pullings, wonderings I have found one thing and that is God cares. I mean He knows us. He knows each one of our thoughts, longings, and questions. He knows the demons we still need dragged out of us the deep wells of pain which we have for too long been terrified for Him to probe and heal. He cares and He is so gentle with His children. I mean I am grateful. Throughout 7 or so hours of just talking and actual well, fellowship, I am left with peace resolved even more in the midst of the haze. It was good. I mean a really good night. Right now you should probably pray a blessing over Josh and his apartment they really could use it, I mean a heck of a lot. They are good guys and it would be rad of you to bless them.
So that was a lot, for the few who are still actually reading this God has been hitting me with something really cool lately and I want to expound briefly, I say briefly because I understand the concept of attention spans and I am also really really tired, I am looking forward to the voice of Gobo Fraggle lolling me to sleep in about twenty minutes. Anyway, here goes:

And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. Revelation 12:11

So amidst the battle in which looms in front of us, the one raging on around and in us, and the grand drama that is beginning to unfold like a flower about to bloom we went and yearn to overcome. I mean we do not want to fall away and perish but live confident in the day in which Christ is fully revealed and we are fully transformed into the likeness of our Beloved, Jesus Christ. What holds the authority is His blood which has reconciled all things and conquered death and our testimony. This is not vision that is being preached. This is not mere convictions but the actual declaration of the Son of God through the knowing of a man and entering into an active relationship with the Beloved in whom we believers are in fact accepted in. It comes from the conversations and the contemplation of knowing someone. We will not overcome speaking of a love in which we have never known and He beckons us forth into Him through His word and actual relationship. Amidst the brokenness and fear that grips our depths in Him do we find peace and we testify not just to the addiction which we were delivered of but of the place we have been seated and the kingdom to come in which He bore the full cup of wrath for every individual to enter into.

These are just a few thoughts on that. My brain is friend and the sonnets coming from my pillows are drawing me away. You are loved. My brothers and my sisters in Christ you are accepted and He loves you with a love which testifies louder than all doubt and darkness. Give your wounds to Him and let Him carry you. The burden of clarity and resolve will crush you unless you rest in His arms and cast all your cares on Him. God knows you deeper than even you do and every ounce of His attention and affection is directed directly to you and will see you through. He loved you to the end and the end is yet to come. Be loved and bless you all who have fought for me and stood with me.

On a side note, peace is only found in Christ Jesus, if you have found me through an obscure search engine or my old xanga or myspace and do not know Christ know that without Him the misery will only grow without him and the torment will only increase after death. You were made out of His longing to be enjoyed. In Him is peace and He can overcome every weakness in you for He holds the keys to death and Hades. Call out to Him and He will make Himself known.

*This post has been brought to you in part by the music of Ray Barbee and Paco de Lucia. Blessings all around.

A Journally Thing

2007-03-21T20:40:00.000-07:00

So here we are. The vast abyss ahead of me is becoming to be more comforting than threatening. I mean I see no path, I have no real direction but on I plod. Day in and day out, blind monotony hoping for the best. I know I am not alone in this and I know that God is in control but it would be great to see a few things. Words have fallen to echoes as the mind gets refurbished and fumigated. Despite the loud hacking it has been a nearly pleasurable experience. The heart pounds for love but the pride says no, because of what the heart is longing for, I'm not sure, I'm not sure I wanna be a man anymore....... Okay not really I just like Blindside and haven't heard that song in forever.
The heart pounds and aches. Spiritual, physical, the yearnings more or less converge into one scream lacking any real guide post but God is faithful, I am pretty sure, thats what He tells me anyways. Obscurity and longing all over the place. Patience is honestly a drag because frankly I would love to be at a place in which I am somewhat mature enough to enter into things my heart and soul cry out for.... looking for an off switch has just been a waste of time. But He is faithful and His word is life.
I am His child whom He adores. He knows my thoughts, feelings, desires, pains, troubles, dreams, weakness, and is still entirely for me. This isn't just like some fan drinking a beer hooting at a TV screen watching their team actually make a touchdown, (Joe Gibbs I want something in return for all these years, come on.....); but He is a Father and a Husband and a Good friend who is absolutely absorbred in who we are with an unyielding affection for us. I mean He is good. I mean, if this was something I could plug in my head and all of a sudden know and embrace wholly that would be great. But I know this God does not screw us over. We are not His playthings He messes with to get a laugh. He cares, He truly does. He is good and I ache inside for about a billion things, err... maybe a handful but still He is good. He will finish all He started and yeah, Thank You God!!

Despite the insecurity and uncertainty
He is faithful when I am faithless
May He be strong in my weakness
Blessed be the name of the LORD

Room 238 - early beginnings

2007-03-18T03:10:00.000-07:00

I am beginning to write a story, you can follow it at http://room-238.blogspot.com

Thursday Club (or A Really Good Day)

2007-03-16T07:15:00.000-07:00

So I am going to say that today has been by far the best day I have had in such a long time, do not get me wrong I have had some good days, but today was Ridiculously amazing, and that is ridiculously with a capital “R”.

So for starters, today was pretty crappy at first, I mean uber lame. I got up to go to the prayer room and had some attack, realized it was an attack, fought and ended up walking over to Valley View to see if I had enough money for some coffee. So I mosey on over there and I run into Austin Roberts at the ATM and we ended up getting coffee at the Grounds of the Higher variety. After chatting for an hour and a half I had to head on over to class but God messed me up something fierce in that convo and throughout the remainder of this glorious night of wonder, and here is a taste my loyal fans:

So get this, we are loved. I mean we are really, really loved. I mean we are utterly adored by the same very being who came up with the idea of affection, laughter, joy, and not to mention dinosaurs and echidnas. I mean we, people, we created out of the overflow of a joyous harmony of bliss, excitement and love. He who is love is the very one who holds all things together with the power of His Word and everything consists in, through, and for Him. I mean wow, seriously, think about that. God, the one who created bubbles, penguins, walruses, and music is the one who made you out of just the very desire to fill you with His marvelous wonder and have you get lost infinitely within the beloved with whom His children/bride are accepted in. I mean, seriously, upon making the first man (check out Genesis 2:7-9) He breathed (which as I am told was not far off but as close as a kiss, it makes sense but don’t hold me verbatim) into man and he had life. He then proceeds to make a garden specifically for man to dwell in; God did this for no other creature. It then goes on to say that in it were planted every tree that was good to the sight. I mean, thought and effort went into this and this was the place man communed with God, worked, and was with his wife.
I mean a whole lot comes into the story but more or less, God really likes people, a lot…. For more peruse, meditate, and gnaw savoringly on Ps 8 and 139 and John 17. I mean He likes us a heck of a lot. The thing is that is where we are going. The bride entering into the Godhead. Fullness of joy and pleasures forever more are our inheritance as we get lost into He who is. I mean think of all of the amazing and pretty things this life holds, how much more amazing will the next one be. Don’t get me wrong the whole no marriage thing I don’t get but I am sure by the end of this life I will, if not shoot, God is good and my finite mind cannot even attempt to depict how heaven might even smell, I bet fabulous. Seriously.

Ok so I went to class and we watched a video on revivalists and had some healing along with a test, and for the first time ever signs and wonders seemed attainable, I mean I am really psyched, they are things which I am free to pursue and chase after, let alone you who are reading this, I mean God has great things for you and He loves people.

Also in class this guy gave a testimony about no longer being afraid of God and I was totally pumped, primarily because I had been praying for him for a couple months now and I love to see people be loved, I mean its what we were made for and its where we find our security… not to say I have found great depths, I’m still on a journey but God is good.

So the prayer room was great, the Finland Five is always a grand kick start to any night, I am not going to lie. Jesus is coming and He is raising up a witness to Him and the kingdom to come, it is all driven through love and will be established in unity. We will love one another and our joy will be full as the body moves as one bearing witness to what we have all corporately seen, heard, and handled with our hands according to the Word of Life…. I am thrilled, I mean we get to lay waste to the kingdom of darkness, be consumed in love, become one with our Savior and walk into the grace given to become one with Him in joy and suffering.

On separate note, I really love my prayer room team. I have such a privilege to get together with and I thank God for the friends He is raising up around me, He answers prayer and I am thankful.

PFI time came around and myself and the gang got in the Travail Room and began to pray in tongues for our hour. It turns out that in that time my buddy got some serious deliverance. Then another girl in there got in on it and we were in the room for about two and a half hours. It made me so happy. God has been ripping some things out of me the past couple months and I am so thankful of the work He is working in me, I mean He does make all things new and He is so kind and compassionate and tender with us. The entire result is so that we can enter deeper into love and His heart so I love it.
I was so happy for both of the people tonight, it makes me so happy what God does and how He leads His sheep and how He loves His kids so much, I mean I left that time really ecstatic. Another thing I just want to say, Katherine Kasper is like one of the most amazing people ever, I mean ever. She’s got mad depth and has uber wisdom and authority, I am really glad to have big sisters like her, seriously.

Moving on the prayer room finished the 4-6 out with a bang. There is just something about Alisha Powell singing songs about God and goodness and Jesus that just makes you want to celebrate good times, come on. I mean with half of the room bouncing around in that small marked off area was amazing, I like God, a lot, not just a little but a whole stinkin’ lot.

After that I went to Chick-fil-A with Josiah and Dave from my PR team. Those are two very amazing guys and I think pretty much anybody and everybody would benefit greatly from hanging out with those two more, that is just my opinion. I love Chick-fil-A and I love coupons for free food.

After that I came home and began to type this, took a shower and am now finishing this whilst listening to Sufjan Stevens. Upon closing this I will go to bed with a smile know how great God is and pursuing the befuddling adventure of Uncle Traveling Matt (God bless you Charity Bates). So yeah, be blessed, even more so if you read all of this. I will get back to writing serious stuff soon, I promise, but today was a really good day and I felt it needed to be chronicled.

*Random note: Someone should redeem Fatboy Slim's "Praise You"

Some Words

2007-03-12T03:01:00.000-07:00

These pixels are empty
Lagging musings of a discontent
Distracted mind and a
Lovesick heart
With a heavy emphasis on sick

By no means is this an attempt
To forge a style
Or be creative but merely
An expression of the duldrums
Which crash to and fro
In my very thick skull

My words are empty
Convictions formless
As my heart beats for what is not proper
Propriety never being an issue it seems
Until it hurts
Or you have to get off the couch

My words are empty and opinions hollow
The light that flickers
Needs to rage within the eyes of mine
And out the fingertips

To the few who read this I ask for prayers
I need truth
I need truth to burn inside with violence
I need violence to consume me
The violence of truth that is

Be blessed
All of you
Enjoy the silence
Be loved deeply by God
He knows what you just said
He knows what you yearn for
He knows the stuffed animals you still sleep with...

Yeah I am talking to you
Go team

Anyhoo,
I guess this has no longer become serious but a vent
I just said "but"
Verbally that could have been funny
Anyways.... let truth blaze and let love glow
Its better than a bonfire in Siberia

Waves of Uncertainty

2007-03-11T03:15:00.000-07:00

Be still my soul
You are not in control
Release your reigning grip
Allow me to soar

Calm down my soul
You are not in control
Salvage the sinking ship
Give God the oar

Rest my soul
You are not in control
Still the quivering lip
Your Father has so much more

Rejoice my soul
You are not in control
He hears whats behind your lip
Lean in and be carried to shore

Just a Thought

2007-03-09T05:03:00.000-08:00

Tonight was wonderful. There was joy, rejoicing, prayer and Jesus. I am quite a fan of all of those elements. In the past couple of weeks there has been much talk of revival, and I believe that it is coming, being that no one I know really has any grid for it, especially myself, it will come a lot sooner than we expect. Amidst the solemn assemblies and prayer meetings, which for the record were amazing and very much needed, what was even more powerful to me was the way the night ended out. The set did not have much buzz about it, the prayers were not that heavy, and it for the most part audibly was much like any other set that Alisha Powell may have led. Here was the thing though, people prayed for joy, I mean more than one, I think atleast five people referenced joy in their prayers and a handful more hit hard the whole need of love, Eph 3:16-19, revival's crux, atleast in my opinion.
I have not seen many signs and wonders, I am totally down and I believe that myself and many of my cohorts will be operating in them within the next couple of years. Yet the kingdom is not built on this, it is love and meekness. I feel that tonight was a beautiful kiss from God regarding His people who He loves dearly. It is my stirring now that as Jesus is on His way along with catastrophe, judgment, and revival that above all we become rooted and grounded in the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge and drive out all fear while conquering a multitude of sins, this is the hingepin I feel of the kingdom. In all your getting get wisdom, remember though that without love wisdom is nothing more than a clanging gong or a horrible cliche from a Three Ninjas movie.

Be blessed
He is coming
Love Him with all your heart, mind, soul and strength
Love is light and pierces the depths
Good friends are transparent, the same goes for the Bridegroom and His

He loves you so much and is so proud of you, the mundane service will return in oceans of blissful delight in time of pain, remeber, that you are your Beloved's and He is yours.

An Honest Blog - Like the Stuff Normal People Do

2007-03-08T00:22:00.000-08:00

So, this is going to be like what I gather most blogs are, incessant ramblings to pass the time and hopefully, get some feedback. I just wanted to forewarn you faithful few in case you were expecting some pseudotheological prose or poetry, or even commentary I guess.... well ok I most likely will bring up God, He is frankly amazing, mind you the word frankly comes nowhere close to anything describing the ammount of awesomeness God entails, but hey its an adjective I like and minus the "ly" can be a very commanding name, like a hard as nails police chief or a smug auto mechanic with a heart of gold, plated the inside is really justr zinc. So if you are still reading you might notice that that was a very long sentence, quite long even. Since I am not doing this on word you my friend get to partake inside what may come to be unstructured mayhem, congratulations! For bonus points point out my typos and let me know, its not just words but a game, HooRay!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, I am pretty spaced. The 8 to ten intercession set was rather draining, it was heavy. In regards to revival I know I can get pretty psyched up on an event and well wait for my comissioning in which I am healed of everything, have my life set forth in front of me, be laid down with commanding power, and within a week get engaged and start my now new and glorious life as a better Christian, one with fire!!!!! Well ok, I have fire in me. It burns every now and then and is tended by the Word, the Holy Spirit and my own obedience. I guess it has been a life of reading too many comic books expecting to one day get struck by some divine light, hear my calling and rush forth to save the day, for God, definitely for God, not for my own gloryat all, all for Him, I mean I have no say in having commanding presence, a voice that swoons and shakes crowds, a gorgeous wife to love, and to have a life in which I lead a successful minisitry to the most pained rejected including junkies and hookers in which during the end times a storm of the antichrist's soldiers burst into my church in the middle of a gut wrenching sermon and gun me down as I boldy confess my beliefs in front of them while asking God in my last breaths for their salvation which in turn they receive right after I die and get a high five from God. I mean no selfish ambition or plans of my own at all. I mean lets get real, we all have these fantasies, I mean yours most likely is not at all like mine, maybe it is, go team! The point of that is that we have no honest grid for the workings of God. Frankly (what a wonderful word) this is not our end purpose.
I mean, the end result of all we do is to be deeply in love with God and absorbed with passion for our Creator and our Family. I don't understand this in the slightest way, but its what God has been tellign me and therefore it must be true. I mean currently I am getting so many other things on my mind than just becomming Jesus. For starters girls, I mean they are pretty, its true. I am nowhere in a place for pursuing anyone but I want a wife and a family really, really, badly. Yet I am a 19 year old kid who still doesn't know who he is or what he is doing, lety alone the fact that I need to do some serious growing up regardless of who may be stuck in my head.
Secondly my future. Who am I? Why???? Aaaaah?!!??!? So to be honest I am not that stressed, I should be stressed but I am not, I'm partially stressed about not being stressed but that is about it. I mean my mind wanders there alot but it is nothing but plain old wandering, nothing really productive. But I know my life isn't mine, my calling isn't mine, and God knows when and what proper procedure is, therefore I stare almost blankly into the future holding an invisible hand and hearing a voice in my gut or in my head and trustin that they are right. God likes me, that much I am pretty sure but I need to grow and be diligent so thats what I'm trying to do now.
Thirdly my friends, to be honest, most of the people I know outside of IHOP in KC and Richmond are headed straight to hell and there seems to not be a thing I can do about it, when I even remember. Yet God cares, and constantly weeps for them and I don't. The only place to find love is in intercession and praying in the Spirit it seems since basically most contact has been erased as of now. He cares and hears, He is the God who hears and answers prayer. Repeat that sentence out loud a couple of times it will do you good, it helps me atleast.
Anyway those are my arena's of things I do not need to be carrying now. It is all about love, and most importantly beyond seeing angels and causing limbs to grow I and we need love. Love is the wellspring of life. Jesus was driven by love, not obligation. He healed out of love not pride. He died for love not to prove a point. He conquered death for love, not for kicks. I need God badly. This feels very unannointed and compared to the other stuff I write which at the end of the day is just semi annointed (I hope) words. Love. Be loved, beloved. Drink, eat, and fervently consume love. There is where peace is found. So God likes you, and He is a fan of me. Love is not a cold grimace hiding a mind whipping a heart for being a failure. Lay to waste the darkness and be quick to forgive, pursue love and you will find your home. How else can we be citizens of the kingdom of LOVE.
Anyway......... thats all I got. Its fun to process here, I mean Micah seems to be leading a pretty good set now, I could be pacing and babbling wondering about Clay's setlist and dreading my agreement to go to the airport with Forrey this morning. A guy just sneezed, I don't know his name but I'm sure God would honor a blessing sent his way right now. So that is enough of that, God bless you friend(s).

Hmmmm

2007-03-07T05:37:00.001-08:00

Befuddled, that is a fun word, so is betwixt. That is all.

He Who Is Worthy To Tred The Winepress

2007-03-06T01:26:00.000-08:00

He was flung like the opening pitch of the World Series into the stone pit. Bruised and out of breath He lays there embracing the cup that He chose to bear. In climbed His Father, almost emotionless in His face as pain flared in the back of His burning eyes. The Father lifted His foot and dropped it with force onto His Son’s chest. The Son sputtered, coughing up blood as agony writhed through His entire frame. The space was confined, a dingy wine press, painted white and often used for grapes. The spicket was open ready to receive, the overflow of wine that was about to be trod.
There is a brief second after the first blow, plans and preparation had brought them there, the Spirit of Love held them together as the air ran thick with betrayal. Another blow. This time it is to the head cracking the skull, letting scarlet run down an already agonized forehead. Another and another blow came as the Father’s feet fell heavily on His beloved Son. Amongst the bitter cries in anguish not a single complaint was uttered from the Son as His strength was spent writhing in a pool of His own blood. The Father above Him losing none of His focus began to stomp with all of His might.
His robes were immersed in crimson as the fullness of anger was unleashed upon His humble and willing Son. Pain. Pain. All there is to describe is pain. Agony and torment riddle every scream as the Son becomes a pulpy mass. In His blurred vision He sees His creation; His hearts begins beating faster than a hummingbird’s wings. He longs for them, as does His beloved Father. Redemption drives the eternal bond of love as the Father drops His foot again onto the Son’s head, another blow laden with wrath.
It goes on for hours as the level rises. Broken bones become paste while nerves shoot off in excruciation. He is all alone as He becomes one with the liquid He lies in. The Father taking tortuous pleasure in the crushing of His only Begotten continues stomping in fury for what seems hours. The wine pours forth and drains into vats marked “JUSTICE.” The vats are many and seem to keep coming as they are filled with the wine being made. It takes three days to drain, every drop collected as the wine press empties itself completely.
The Father sees His Son laying there and picks Him up. Life bursts froth from the Son as the Father plants a heavy kiss on His Son’s forehead. “Well done My Beloved Son.” The alienation fled as the union of the Love that passes knowledge flows once again between them, scars remaining declaring Lordship over heaven and earth. LOVE beats strong within the dance of Radiant Affection while the blood cries out to have its inheritance.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. - 1 Peter 2:24

Who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. - Philippians 2:6-11

Who Are You

2007-03-05T20:02:00.001-08:00

Hear your knees give way as you fall face first into the mud. There you lay, covered in filth as the ever heavy burden lies upon your fragile shoulders. Breathe in and taste the earth as the voice above your shoulder cracks the whip into your now bleeding ears. You cannot hear a thing; say for the failure that has overwhelmed you. Stuck in the drudge of sin and failure strengths flies away life trash coming out of a car window on the highway. Filth has overcome you are even your eyes become stained and marred.
This is not who you are. His yoke is easy and His burden is light, the frame you carry it with folds underneath the immensity of its weight. Do not build your kingdom, do not mark your claim, find no satisfaction on the ground you tread. This is not who you are. Succumbing to a walking corpse each stagger is limp and wrought with incompletion. This is not who you are. Fear besets the hints of condemnation that the frame pours out like sweat in a sauna, every pour covered and breathing becomes a hallmark moment tucked back into the recesses of your hollow imagination.
Awaken my brother, awaken my sister, awaken myself to who you are. Your place is at the right side of you Maker, absorbed in the power and majesty of your Beloved. This world is not your home and the kingdoms you see and the kingdoms of your flesh are not the place of your citizenship. We are princes and princesses, full of might and strength through He who overcame death and is the Captain of our salvation. Royalty flows inside your blood as you wander as a stranger in a desolate and pain consumed land.
The Spirit that raised Christ from the dead dwells within you, death has been conquered and calls you to awaken to who you are. You are loved, enjoyed, the object of ineffable indescribable affection. Your strength lies within the joy of the ever laughing ever rejoicing triune God of wonder. This is who you are.
You were born for legislation, to command and conquer. Your mission is to lay waste all that hinders love. Who you are has been cloaked and sealed in a perpetuity of lies shrouding the blood that once purchased you. We walk in the way of the cross taking the communion of joy mixed with suffering for the blood alone turns the wheels of history. We are soldiers of love, warriors whose message may lack eloquence but drips of the insatiable dissatisfaction of the status quo. Set higher above the burning ones our dwelling is in the city where the streams of its river make glad.
This is who you are, a son, a daughter of the Living God who is high above all of creation. In Him alone is fear gone and the monkey of condemnation stripped off of your back. War is raged through the song that bounds through your heart praising He who is worthy of all power, strength, glory, and worship. Snatch others from hell as we take prisoner the enemy bringing them into the glory and joy of salvation, the eternity set within the bitter, evil, confused, and pain filled existences. This is who you, built on the Word of life, cleaned by the river of life, containing the glory of the one who is holy. Marked “Holy unto the LORD,” identity calls you forth.

Isa 33:17 Your eyes will behold the king in his beauty; they will see a land that stretches afar.

Psa 46:4 There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High.

Eph 2:19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God…

A Striking Revelation

2007-03-04T03:36:00.000-08:00

My hands are dripping with blood as I raise my head a few inches. The heat on my face intensifies as I see my opponent in front of me, glaring with hatred at everything he sees. I pick the glass of my now numb hands, remains of a mirror I have for so long been striking. He laughs at me as I wince with each piece being torn away, my nostrils only flair larger. For too long I had succumb to lies, death my old nemesis dangles a friendship band we at one point both shared, that time is over, long over. He holds the mirror in front of me, mangled like squirrel in a wheat thresher. The sweat comes off of my brow entering a cut, the sting feels as nothing as I reach for the blade on the ground reflecting the moon and bringing light to a once oblivious fool. Within seconds I grab it and thrust it through its throat, his cackle turns to a gurgle as the pupils in his already leery eyes turn bloodshot. Pain envelops the whimpers he pathetically makes while his heavy knees hit the ground with a great thud. He desires no mercy. He just burns with fury and anger, in dying seconds lurching forward to devour what he can of my flesh. As he inches closer fires rages out of my stomach consuming everything that stood in front of me. Warmth filled me like hot cocoa or a stiff drink, heat wrapped itself around my heart like a coat made of down and Kevlar. Safety set in my eyes as LOVE enveloped me. The ashes of my foe slowly fly away in the distance intermingling with the song birds swooping overhead. A rooster crows, dawn is on its way.

We love because He first loved us. John 4:19

I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever! And I hold the keys of death and Hades. Revelation 1:18

A Heavy Sigh... (followed with periods for heaviness effect)

2007-03-03T00:59:00.000-08:00

Come to me Oh God
As my being screams to You
Meet me in this lurid place
Awaken the eternity that dwells within
Hidden mystery and light ineffable

I cry out in desperation
Running from distraction the smile haunts me
As the workmanship of Your hand
Of Your beautiful bride dances
Amidst the swirl of disarray

The voice haunts me as I flee to find Your face
As years of distraction cash in their chips
Beauty and joy alone
Are birthed within Your dancing heart
Take me there I pray

Poetic jargon dulls my tongue
Yet all that flows out is but lukewarm verse
Bearing my arm to the fellow eyes
Disdain lingers in the back of my already
Palpitating throat

Love and delight flows from Your gaze
Your life flows from all You made
Especially the princess who resonates
The glory of your radiantly creative
Illustrious week

Consume me with Your eyes that burn
Deeper than the whites of my own
Your gaze is what tears me apart with longing
To have the very wellspring of life
Beat within my own heart

Bless You Oh God for there is none like You
As Psalms have become clichés
May Your song beat within me
And hold Your precious one in Your arms of love

I Like God 2 - The Sequel

2007-03-02T00:47:00.000-08:00

Bless the LORD Oh my soul and all that is within me. Praise be to the LORD God my rock and my Creator. You formed me and you made me, fearfully and wonderfully and you rejoice madly over even my smallest eyelash. None can compare with your matchless beauty, Oh, you who made the dinosaurs and kittens fluffy; to You and You alone, Oh God, belong all praise. You are timeless, changeless, and infinite in you splendid magnanimous jaw-droppingly, heart twitterpating beauty my God whose very face puts the sun to utter shame. Brightness and countless majesty bursts forth from your hand as your humble love cascades over waterfalls and through the cosmos as You lower your thunder to mere whispers and wash our feet. There is none like you, may all tremble at the beauty of Your holiness, you are fairer than, other than, transcendent in beauty, set apart from the start you stand alone….. You who speaks through your beloved servants and echo from the vocal cords of men like Clay Edwards. I adore you. I long for you and your kingdom for the sweet fragrance of your ubiquitous aroma sweeter than roses and barbeque, you lay siege to every sense ripping it from the cognizance and leave even the most verbose of personages speechless and the great minds to succumb the dross of Beavis and Butthead. Who can comprehend your ways Oh high and might Judge for justice is the foundation of you commanding throne of dominion. Blessed be Your name, Your words, Your people, Your will, and even Your toes my king, my beautiful and remarkable king. Behold and bless the LORD you who minister at night. Within the shroud of darkness become ravaged by the unapproachable light letting it lay siege to every part of the cancer that lays within. Your plan shatters tanks and crushes the futility of modernity as You laugh at those who wage war against You.
Words aside, let me tell You what God. I want to see you right now grab you and give you the biggest and longest kiss more passionate than Bugs ever gave to ol’ Elmer. You are magnificent. I love You, let me tell you, I love You. Your roar makes Mufasa sound like a prepubescent girl shrieking. There is none like You my beautiful Beloved. Oh’ how You love me, so much that it leaves me babbling nonsense. Kiss me with the kisses of your mouth, Your love is more delightful than wine. When You are done I won’t wipe off the glossy residue the grace on Your lips layered on me. I am not gonna lie. I love You. You changed the times and the seasons, even as the shroud grows You are not deterred and the flowerbed of Your affection blossoms with even deeper ferocity making the hanging gardens look and smell like a mighty landfill, with plastic bottles and Styrofoam sticking out of the muck. You are good, You are God. Daddy, Beloved, and Living Flame of Immaculate Radiant Light, shining forth brighter than a thousand lightbrites and illuminating even the darkest obsidian, blessed be Your Name Oh God, blessed be Your spectacular name!

It has been awhile, but I burn inside, praise be to God through Jesus Christ His glorious Son through the Comforter. Grace, peace, and joy be to all who read through the afore mentioned names. Be blessed!

The Feast of Kings

2007-03-01T04:12:00.000-08:00

The sun cracks from its lair birthing illumination to the world lying in darkness. Dawn trickles in like rain through a leaky window tantalizing every link of the spectrum. Roosters crow in the distance as a new day bursts forth with vigor and light. Song birds carol in the lightly blowing wind as they soar above the dew soaked earth. Life has entered into a Kodak moment, one more precious than even old Walt could imagine. Breathing in the fresh morning mist a conquest teeters on the brink of embarking. Mind locked and coffee brewing steady hands run their course. Firm and set they forge beauty as a trained eye guides. A renaissance of culinary brilliance emerges as cars start in the distance, stress has all but left. Partaking of euphoric sustanence I can feel the light awakening in my eye, the strength of the day at last. Surging through my frame is taste so indescribable that words cannot suffice. Cinnamon Toast Crunch, its the taste you can see.

A Cry Was Heard in Ramah

2007-02-28T18:44:00.002-08:00

Cataclysmic catechisms
Verbosity engulfing common thought
Empires feud and war
Casualties lay under foot
Lining the pews and padded seats

Exposition drips from the empty pen
As microphones litter the atmosphere
With jigsaw puzzle pieces
Wholeness wrapped in aluminum foil
Demagogues churn as the best intentions
Make way the highway to hell

Nietzsche’s hand shake finalizes ordination
The bells ring flat and deadpanned
As cardboard faces stare
Masks embarking upon ritual
Tethered to the ground by fear or bitterness

The shouting escalates amidst the hollow
As words dull into rhetorical placebo
Noise and clatter has deterred the eardrum
The children laugh and the children weep
The eyes still remain glazed

Light has been contended
While the archetypal darkness
Espouses from the ignorant lips
Hoping for some sort of authoritative vindication

Wolves whoring after modernity
Feasting on the flesh of newborn lambs
As sincere songs rise into the heavens
The incense does not go unnoticed

Who has stood in the council of the LORD?
Who has wept at his side?
Who has drank deep of the pleasures evermore?
Who knows LOVE?
And who has befriended JUSTICE?

I Like God

2007-02-28T02:44:00.000-08:00

The heavens bellow
At the top of their lungs
Holy, Holy, Holy

All creation rings out
As particles of light bounce
To and fro
Illuminating the handiwork
Of majesty

Al becomes trite as the echo proclaims
Beauty unspeakable
Dancing through the northern lights

Clichés are laid to waste
As even gnus and narwhals
Herald the brilliance
Of the King of imaginations

Joy drips from the sonnets of hummingbirds
Nectar upholding the buzz
Of energy ricocheting through the expanse of azure

Waterfalls churn the anthem
Of the mighty roaring voice
Even after He took on flesh

Illumination prances through
The darkest of grey
Tantalizing the eye
Stronger than any Skittles commercial

As creation sings praise
With the trees clapping along
What is man that He is mindful of us
Or the son of man that He cares for us

Great is the LORD
And most greatly to be praised

Up, Up, Up!

2007-02-27T03:26:00.000-08:00

Pain seems far gone within the bright and shining eyes. The child rumples his hair and sticks out his tongue at his Father staring above him. Disheveled hair and a sticky smile, the munchkin extends his arms to the beaming smile towering above him. Oblivious to all around him he longs to be in the best place in the whole wide world, his Daddy’s big, strong arms. While an airplane crashes into a building beside him and evil men lurk in the shadows he is safe. Snuggled up on the burly shoulder with his Daddy’s beard tickling his neck he giggles in delight as he is carried through the creepy valley. Darkness is all around yet he is fixed like a moth to the brightness of his Dad’s smile. There is safety and peace in His arms, we can’t jump that high but He will pick us up to envelop us in the comfort of peaceful serenity against His beating heart. Its all He wants, to hold us against His brawny chest to tell Him what His heartbeat is saying.

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. – Proverbs 3:5-6

The Futility of a Right Broken Arm

2007-02-26T05:12:00.000-08:00

My pupils flicker in and out of dilation as insomnia as delirium conceives within the weak frame I now bear. The taste of gunpowder is fresh on my tongue; a thoughtful souvenir from another oblivious kiss from death. The grave dances inside my narrow mind as another seeping wound comes un-bandaged. My soul aches with discomfort because my mind fills with the gleam of the knife shoved deep within the back of my best friend, my beloved, my life. My hair a mess and voice is hollow as I approach the silhouette in the distance. Wrong needs to be made right. A thin veneer of delusion brings thick smog to my already sporadic vision. Reaching the destination, my breathing becomes heavier and heavier, gunpowder never was a good compliment of asthma. In my right hand trembling fingers tap anxiously on a wood handle looking for a splinter, as my pulse quickens with the thought of avenging the cancer as soon as possible. In the other hand jingle a few nails, laden with rust, imbedded deep with disease; which seems nothing more than triviality.
Static was all that seemed left as once again turmoil grabbed my throat, squeezing hard. I coughed up blood which only widens the now creeping grin on my ashen face. Lifting my gaze I scream with a hoarse and raspy voice, “Get off that cross! You have no right to be on that. Let me die!” Sweat trickles out of my forehead burning my eyes as it mixes with soot. Blindness would have been an improvement. I stagger to my knees as guilt gnaws away like leprosy. As my entire surroundings spiral into nothing I am suddenly stopped and put to the ground. Thick fingers scrape the cataracts off of my eyes. Regaining consciousness I am lost within a whirlwind of blood and fire. His eyes burn through me, everything in me convulses as a soothing love bursts forth out of His eyes surging deep into the most desolate crevices of my inner man. We lock eyes for what seems decades leaving me speechless with tears pouring down my face, washing the soot away.
His hand, stronger than death and gentler than a whisper, raises my broken frame up from a near fetal position. Eyes still locked He said one thing to me, “I love you.” These words entered through my ear canals into my brain and exploded. A war rages against the torrent of lies I had for so long called home. The single phrase pierces the deepest part of my spirit maiming every cliché I had constructed and mauls every thought that held my heart with a wrought iron leash. Mere syllables poured forth a warm peace that surrounded my fractured and brittle heart. As fire surges through frame once torn by decay, Eden seemed to be reborn within the deepest parts. With tears in His eyes he grabs me and the blood dripping off of Him flows onto the scars and boils that once marked my identity. As I am covered within this eternal embrace my back aligns and head lifts. Together we create a fountain of tears intermingled with blood. A stream trickles from us springing flower blossoms forth out of the rocky foundation we stand on. Dawn peaks her head through the now blurry distance as the opus of Life carols through the faintly blowing breeze.

The LORD looked and was displeased that there was no justice. He saw that there was no one; he was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm worked salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. Isaiah 59:15-16

Butterfly Kisses

2007-02-19T01:49:00.000-08:00

A small child spins in the meadow
A fistful of flowers and a twinkle in her eye
The bordering sunflowers match her dress
As the sun glows with a nice soft breeze

She dances on top her future carefree
Gone are the bodies the message creeps on
As images of Marilyn Monroe flicker in her bedroom
Marking the early erasure of innocence

She continues to spin with a song in her head
Oblivious to revolutions failed and lingering
Cobain and Lennon are stuck in their graves
As angst lies in wait to captivate her soul

The breeze is soft and the day is warm
Innocence ticks away as death rears its ugly head
Words fly back and forth
Raping hope from the oblivious and the ignorrant

Hallmark cards all end up in the same place
Next to chicken bones in a landfill
Leaving the earth to absorb moments now lost
Sentiment hollowed amidst a haze of insecurity

Words were spoken as breath was breathed
Dry bones awakened to life
Desire to fight and love
Quaked within the frailty of faith

There is One who sees
There is One who weeps
There is One who can save and only one
He asks for you to weep with Him

We Haven't Just Been Told, We Have Been Loved

2007-02-16T03:05:00.000-08:00

When all is said and done, the loud noise has done nothing but breed insecurity. Zeal in honest efforts moves the many and blind into either disillusionment or migraines. Fro the soapboxes of the faithful words fall like bricks and efforts seem futile. As dissipation reigns within the catacombs of their own security LOVE cries forth for justice. The scales are thrown out and the hangman is given the pink slip as the roar of the bonfires kindled with dictionaries dances hauntingly in the still air.
Justice cries forth as LOVE raises his bullhorn. As the little children cry out for hope with semi vacant stares there is one in heaven who hears and is alive. As fertility blooms as does destiny. While cells multiply songs are written and sunrises are painted. The good pleasure of LOVE brings forth all things for its own pleasure, to be swallowed up in eternal tango of joy, love, and mesmerizing jaw dropping beauty and splendor between the three smiling Lovers. Creativity is ejaculated as dreams of more lovers are birthed and forged.
Amidst the orbiting infernos who are declaring their uninhibited adulation, the heart if LOVE burns vehemently, as the objects of His affection immerse themselves into rebellion and bitterness spawning fear and pain. He calls out incessantly while only a few of the ones He called good in their mother’s wombs turn to Him. Boundless delight flows from His heart to His adopted children and bride, as ineffable splendor and euphoria are in store and available to them. Each and every one shines as the apple of His eye.
This is the destiny of man, to be utterly enveloped in LOVE. LOVE is what we crave and fights valiantly to, through, and overcoming the menace of Death. The Father sees His children and swoons over them speaking mysteries and comfort, delighting with an exuberant uproar at even the most inaudible “I love You” directed to LOVE. The Son made way as the Spirit dances and mauls the one in us who have not come to terms with their death yet.
There is a lap that beckons from on high. There are arms, big, brawny, strong, safe, and tender whose embrace we were meant to be forever cherished and held in. Our security and identity is found in this and this alone. LOVE marches forth beckoning the treasures of His uncontainable heart to join in the safety of His dream, the day of the gladness of His heart. In Him there is fullness of joy, for LOVE casts out all fears and knows His beloved, whether from the hair on their head or what kind of monkey makes them laugh the hardest, He knows and He cares, and it makes Him smile larger and brighter than any Cheshire cat, and not to mention it does nothing but calm the soul.
As two lovers lock eyes and passion emerge here there are eyes staring at His bride ablaze with depth and love unimaginable waiting for one just to take the plunge into getting lost utterly enamored with the swirling cavalcades of intimate tenderness. LOVE is a consuming fire and will take hold of His bride.
As fear besets His wide eyed delights He has rest for them. LOVE is not a collection of words or a select set of feelings so sporadic that even gauging what they are do nothing but breed frustration. LOVE is simply love. In Him we fight the raging storms to bring destiny to the most detestable and plagued. It is the power that heals with the inferno of a sincere hug. He calls out, be still little children, I know you and I love you. Rest in me. My arms are safe. My face is lovely and my voice is sweet. I will take care of you, Faithful and True are not minor adjectives but they are my name. I have never hated you and my plans for you are good. Rest in me and you will grow and you will be safe, I am the strong tower. Your Father He is God, and He loves His kids.

Rest fo the Weary

2007-02-12T00:24:00.000-08:00

His yoke is easy and his burden is light. Nothing is hidden from him, not just our sin but our dreams and hearts as well. He is a good Father who takes good care of his children. We can do nothing on our own and are called to trust in the LORD with all of our hearts and lean not on our own understanding. As believers, we are his children in whom our Father in heaven has good things for us and knows our hearts. He sees our eyes dart around, He sees our hearts ache for all sorts of things, He has placed dreams deep in our hearts for us to partner with him and fulfill. He is good, in all of His ways. There will be rebuke but He does not stare down at His children as if they were utter failures. He longs for His people to stop coming before Him wincing bracing to be backhanded because they feel they are failures. To those who pursue He will reward, the diligent and faithful are delighted in and He has uncontainable grace for the immature and weak. In Him is rest alone as He removes the yokes that tie His people down and breathes life into the deepest wounds. In Him is peace and in time of trial He never leaves, commit your paths to the LORD and He will make your path straight. I admit that in all honesty that the footprints in the sand has become almost a meaningless cliché to me, I stare ahead at the onslaught in the distance and throw the weight of the world on my shoulders, He died for me it’s the least I can do right? Does this at all mean that we should throw off all care and do as we wilt, by no means. In the race we do get weary, but those who wait on the LORD will mount up as eagles, swooping with ease and caih-ng at the top of our lungs. Not only is there physical restoration but emotional and spiritual as well. He knows what we can handle and He knows us from the size of our feet to the longings of our hearts. Every good and perfect gift comes from above from the Father of lights. As we press on our strength is found in Him and our lamps needs to be filled with the oil of gladness. Do I say this as to say I have attained it, shoot no, but its His call to the weary, the busy, the broken, and the confused, and all who call on His name. Contend for the peace that passes knowledge and cling to hope.

“Rest in my arms,
sleep in my bed,
there’s a design,
to what I did and said.”

Vito’s Ordination Song
Sufjan Stevens

A Fist Full of Marshmallows

2007-02-08T03:59:00.001-08:00

See the flames begin to crawl
The roar is thick and black
As the bridge is consumed
The delicate glow warms the back
As I daintily frolic away
Maniacal laughter
Chimes in with the inferno’s bellowing
No turning back
It stands no longer as a lie
Truth becomes solid as the futile
Wisk into the waltz of grey soot
And fireflies in the air
Burn
Let it burn
As the fire grows inside

A Man's Wisdom Gives Him Patience

2007-02-08T02:39:00.000-08:00

Reliving a moment
The dialogue sputters forth
Like a dying outboard motor
Hacking and wheezing
Breathing afresh an industrial sunrise
The provocation of the hungry
Has lost its excitement
Love cries for a new vessel
The cracks espouse the fragrance
Letting it swirl into a soupy union
With motor oil in the gutter

Gifts have come down
As the elixir of life bubbles forth
Wisdom cries in the streets
“Make me your home!”
As locked eyes share silence

Clichés become parasitic
Latching onto the flowers we deliver
Turning the roses black
And the lilies gray
As fervor burns within immature thoughts
The heart does backflips
Occasionally hitting walls
She calls forth come and drink
Straws are provided

The sails of our ships
Weren’t meant to be drapes
As pretty as the lavender is
They yearn for a commanding white
Love and emotion cry forth
Like a three year old in a candy store
Scolding fails and leashes
Appear barbaric
Yet we groan and wisdom cries out

Fire needs to be contained
Our forests dry out
And Smokey is just too adorable
To be taken seriously
But mind you
Gold cannot be refined on its own

Commissioning the Warhorses

2007-02-07T04:06:00.000-08:00

Sing joyfully to the LORD, you righteous; it is fitting for the upright to praise him. Praise the LORD with the harp; make music to him on the ten stringed lyre. Sing to him a new song; play skillfully and shout for joy. (Psalm 33:1-3)

This is the advancement of the kingdom, how the armies move forth, rushing headlong into the vile bombarding all that is putrid with the symphonic booms from before the throne of LOVE. Darkness flees and trembles as His proclamation thunders over the mighty waters. Mountains melt like wax and destruction consumes the wicked at the very sound of the unapproachable light. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain before the beginning of the world to receive His due. He who fought and suffered is the one and only faithful witness riding forth on a white horse leaving the river of the wicked in His wake. Awesome in holiness, dreadful in beauty; where there is an abundance of dreams and words there is vanity, so we stand in awe of God-jaw agape, tongue rolling on the ground, eyes popping out of our heads, and hearts rushing like locomotives, as dread and joy and love throb along even the smallest of capillaries. God is good all the time and all the time God is good echoes forth more than mere liturgy, it transcends into the hardest of shackles breaking loose the captive and setting the prisoners free. Even in simplicity it shatters the darkness, the symphonies are coming, a soundtrack for an invasion. Praise God all his people the Kingdom of Heaven is marching on!

A Dainty Prelude

2007-02-06T03:49:00.001-08:00

Blood alone turns the wheels of history. Philosophies and dogmas pile up next to each other as anything remotely gleaming of truth is has become like beating a dead horse. Rhetoric is all but inspiring as the anarchists, hedonists, proletariats, and the breathing preach the message that is as praiseworthy as the monkey on their backs. Cynicism is what eats away at all spoken in self justified unbiased doctrines that spew forth from what seems every medium, minus that of miming because we got the box thing years ago. Revolution is a word that is spread like a plague and with the face of Che on it with a hint of humanistic zest it has become more marketable than Beanie Babies with an even larger variety. With such ranting and almost seemingly hypocritical cynicism one may have begun to disregard the beginning quote. Spoken by reformers and dictators alike, it is the one vice that relegates true change.
Punk is dead, “Extreme” sports have lost the draw, as the only moving and news making changes are brought by violence. As bombs explode bringing families to the grave the ground cries out for retribution. Nothing is without consequence as the masses indulge in the destruction of human life and complain about the nine dollar ticket prices. Discontentment lies under the skin of the masses who lie under the yoke of depravity and those with light have lost what seems to be the actual reason of them having the light, if at all. As truth is being paraded and dumbed down into rancid compromise we have made bubble gum into a three course meal.
As many lie in bed and embrace isolation and meaning fear has gone from being an arch enemy to being an occasional one night stand. Death looms overhead as bloodlust isn’t being met by the nation’s cafeterias. Sure twelve year olds give themselves as offerings looking for dismissive approval but if you tell them no, they’ll run farther into brokenness. As commentators of the day rape truth of all meaning they lead hordes into assembly lines building altars of futility.
A wake of corpses our the foundation of our knowledge as good news is when there have only been two murders, a rape, and only one abducted child in the news. As discontentment rages on numb futility seizes the backbone of society.
There is one who sees the wickedness, which is mocked, has all he made bowing to the vapid and main all who seek truth. Joy and pleasures have gone out the window and nose candy and convenience pump depression into the starved masses.
Blood was shed and death was conquered, all evil was put to shame by the blood of one man. The Creator paid for something with His own flesh and blood and the earth cries for vindication. In this blood are truth, life, and freedom. The one who sculpted every heart will return and take hold of what is rightfully His. Holy rage will burn as the tenderhearted one avenges his children.
Left with no resolve, revolution seethes under the surface with tensions thrashing against the malevolent frigidity of pride’s shell. He beckons us to dine with him, to eat his flesh and drink his blood; he is the one and only meal. True love has nothing but this that one lay down their lives for their friends and enemies. Love calls forth out of the white noise and incessant babble. He binds up the brokenhearted and made every heart to be filled with pleasure joy and peace. Rebellion is inherent in mankind’s system growing a dependence on the toxic. In Christ there is beauty and peace. He is on the move and in him only is there security as the sword is being drawn from its sheath.

Hey Look: A Poem

2007-02-06T03:00:00.000-08:00

A simple glance
And I’m lost
It’s as if within
Lay a vortex of the indescribable
Colors, lights, and songs
Dancing resonating life
In its beautiful splendor
The heart groans
Knowing the time has not yet come
Patience clenches its teeth
As doubt flutters like a butterfly

Burning fills the glance
As if shockwaves
Waylaid every pulse of the heart
Hope is tightly gripped
As the fleeting moment passes
Heavenly glow is all that remains
As passing time seems to ride my back
I can’t help but yearn for fulfillment

He crafted the heart
And feels every movement
His joy shall come to pass
As his delight is my joy
He is the faithful witness
What has embarked
Shall be completed
In His good and glorious time

He loved us to the end
The end is yet to come

A PSA For the Faithful

2007-02-03T06:15:00.000-08:00

Injustice, it’s more prevalent than the Green and White caffeine empire. Our minds are so trained to ascribe our own hierarchy of laws to what we think is right that often we stare at God as if He were a barrel of a shotgun. We have crime and then punishment, law and order, and sometimes CSI. The default justice grid is one in which evil is punished and all hell breaks loose against any offenders lest they run to mercy. Yet this is only part of the picture. Justice shines forth as God bestows blessing and fullness on those who have been faithful. God, the one who made every heart and sees every deed is faithful to complete what He has in fact started. It is His very joy and delight to see His children enter in to all He has for them. He is the good Father along with the one who is dripped in blood. The good He has for His beloved ones are not secluded to what is beyond this present age. It is His delight to answer the cry of their hearts and partner with them in that. He has destiny’s and He has placed dreams in every one, those who seek first the kingdom of God will enter into them and even beyond drinking deep that is the bliss and joy that is Him. Rejoice you who serve the Lamb, He is faithful, He knows your heart, and He will be your strength. He comes to those who wait for Him, and He does it with bouncing, spinning, rejoicing, singing, and resounding joy. Granted God is no candy man, but “without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” Hebrews 11:6

This Is Love

2007-02-01T22:56:00.001-08:00

With a quick breath lungs filled with death. It hung like a mist Thicker than gun powder as darkness enveloped the sunrise with a twinge of agony. It seemed the trees withed in pain as the sun appeared to die. Onlookers gawked at the spectacle, raised above the growing pool of blood. Every red droplet entered nasal cavities as even they wind was on the verge of snapping in half. Christ hung; the grotesque embodiment of pain. Suffering ruminated over the faintly breathing corpse. Weary from the cup of wrath, nails scraped bone as He looked toward heaven. As a warrior roars so did His voice thunder across the now epileptic sky. Everything shook as the violence of the conquest of the Innocent One had been birthed.
Father into your hands I commit my Spirit.
The ground shook.
The LORD saw and His arm brought justice, death had been crushed, bones crunched, snapping with a loud crash and succumbing to its very name, as He rose.
He sees the earth and He conquered, waiting for the day in His heart, the one that pounds like a freight train as the earth looks no bigger than a penny. Collision is in His eyes as the fire that consumes His vision screams for vindication.
The roar from the Cross screams across the created order beckoning His creation to partake in life. There is no justice and truth is lacking, those who consume it are made prey, as the earth shakes in virulence convulsing for retribution.
It is His to avenge, He will repay. Face set like flint as justice swirls around Him as a chaotic maelstrom. Fire rages forth from the throne as it waits for its recompense, longing for His inheritance to reach fruition.
Passion flares as He sees every tear and hears every scream.
Their will be retribution, redemption will hold its final work. Clothing primed for dying, the visceral scream in His heart beckons you to respond.

God is Good

2007-02-01T04:22:00.000-08:00

Once again I sit with this vague expectancy that as soon as I walk out the doors and go to my car the clouds will part and for once it will all make sense. Yet I sit here knowing one thing, God is good. Sure I could ramble off a bunch of statistics and give a survey of events to prove so but I have none available. He is good it rings in my soul and it is utterly flooring me, it is His goodness that is the very crux of all existence. From the highest angel to the smallest quark it screams that God is good, situations seem monumentally daunting in proving this it seems but regardless He is good. He sees every sparrow that falls, he protects the widow and the fatherless and he is love. He searches and knows the depths of my longings and questions and the only things He has for me are good. Through trial and tribulation He remains the same, good and just. He is beauty and the Maker of all, He holds the hearts of kings in His hands and the foundation of His throne is righteousness and justice. He is our strong tower and He is our saving grace. He is good and from that revelation all worship and praise stems. Every good and perfect gift comes from Him the Father of lights. Our existence is to dive into the great deeps of His goodness and inhale filling our lungs and bloodstream with life, without it there is only death. He sees how my heart aches for love, vision, and meaning….. shoot He sees all of His children’s. He is a good Father who gives good gifts. Blessed be His name, I pray awaken my heart, mind and spirit to bask in the radiant exuberant blissful pleasure that is His goodness. May my song be, He gives and takes away but my heart will choose to say, “Blessed be the name of the LORD!” You O Lord, are good! I bow before You in gratitude of Glad God of Heaven, praise be to your name!!!!!!!

A Thought on Waiting

2007-01-29T01:28:00.000-08:00

Time has become such a noose, lightly draped over the neck of desire. With each second that ticks away incompletion solidifies in our hearts and minds. The ache groans deeper and longer as satisfaction seems irrevocably postponed. Oblivion seems just a few steps shorter as the gorge of longing digs within the enigmatic corridors of our hearts. Love is patient, love waits and pines for fulfillment but loves calls for a deep well, not a 12 oz can. In the ache, narcissism wields its ugly head and beckons the subject at hand to invert and enter into a whirlpool pouring inward and drowning all that once burned pure. There is one way alone to pull from the tattered cycle, that is to look to he who is love. In Him are hidden all of the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and He who made our hearts know our desire more than even ourselves. We are made in the image of the consuming fire and are called to dig deep wells in which the fire may rest and we rest in Him. From Him all things stem, for Him, to Him, and through him. Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart. We were made to love, let the reservoir grow.

Soldiers Little Ditty

2007-01-29T01:17:00.000-08:00

Fire violently consumes their eyes. Everything resonates of life as they stare headlong into the sun. Destined to dwell amidst burning, they feel beckoned home. Their cry, "How long will the wicked prosper?" For they soon shall become just like dust. Tenacity erupts in a violent maelstrom of fervor within the hearts of these people. Arms locked they fearlessly march through the valley of the shadow of death led by the Light that destroys all in its wake. The virulent cancer lashes forth taking casualties, yet they fearlessly march eyes set on the bliss to come. The weak are marching on as the world staggers like a drunkard. Though my body may perish it is only a shadow. We will follow the lamb wherever he goes; he loved us to the end.

Taste and See

2007-01-27T03:21:00.001-08:00

No one can hear anymore. It is as if as soon as incoming sound is turned cut off the catalogs of vapidity and the profound unlock like a heinous game of 52 pick up in your head. Silence has become static, our own creations forge our realities as fantasy drifts in and out of our conscious line of view and conviction. Truth was thrown out the window years ago and all that’s left are creations and forgeries it seems, half hearted attempts to get the mind buzzing while they stand proudly cutting the yellow tape meant to connect the mind and the heart. Buzzing is more than a honey producing allergy trigger pin, it is the dull whir our the gears in our heads wearing out. The teeth are gone it seems, all that remains are circles spinning round and round with a haunting hum hurting your head. Alliteration aside, we live in a culture where we embrace amusement without even realizing that the very meaning of the word means: to come against thinking.
With the gears grinding and chipping away at each other and hearts that are being cultivated for insecurity and obscurity we long to be fascinated, and we long to be moved. Born with two eyes we yearn to see. Sculpted with ears we crave to hear. Knit together with hands we are compelled to create. Birthed with mouths we pine to resonate. Six billion plus people with destiny and existence screaming in there souls and there is nothing but cancer and static meeting them.
The delicacy of this era has become produce and meat. The earth feeds from the knowledge of good and evil and feasts upon humanity. We all have been forged to experience what none can describe and that is God. Made in his image, creativity lurks in the crawlspaces of our being and we like a deer in headlights stare blankly and let it run us over. There are colors to be seen, symphonies to here, visions to behold, and a God to behold jaw on the ground in utter terror, joy, bliss, and trembling. We are made to allow him to move through us expressing his very being. He is the Father of lights and we behold only an infinitesimal part of the radiant spectrum. This is his pleasure, making himself known while drawing his creation into sheer astonishment of his unspeakable beauty.
With the majority disconnected from the hope of his calling, emptiness eats away at humanity like leprosy. Perversion spreads like wildfire because there is no knowledge of God, wisdom is lacking, and vision has been dragged into an alley mugged, beaten and left for dead. God beckons forth humanity to enter into communion. The heavens are invading the earth as the epic known as this age is drawing to a close. God will manifest himself through his people and beckons his beloved bride, children, and siblings to join with him. Symphonies of heaven and of the Lamb wait in anticipation to be released. God burns with longing to reveal visions of his glorious and transcendent radiance. He who makes all things to, through, and for himself is calling his bride to manifest and express his very awe instilling nature.
This is worship, beholding and becoming who the triune community of love is. As light is reflected through a prism so is the light of God is reflected through his children. The earth is the LORD’s and all that is in it and his glory will cover the earth like the waters cover the sea. He is not a vacuum, nor a formula, he is. If the only word angels can find in using to describe him is holy, you can bet that is how he will manifest himself when all things are brought to an end.
All beauty and creation stems from him, he is the perfection of beauty and in him are hidden all of the treasure of wisdom and knowledge, and he is the Word of Life. Behold him as the masses bow down to a soup can.

Much dreaming and many words are meaningless, therefore, stand in awe of God.

– Ecclesiastes 5:7

Up From the Ashes

2007-01-25T02:01:00.000-08:00

It has begun to erupt, slowly but surely the fuses are being flipped and the fuses are being lit. As discontentment seethes in the air, the faceless inhale deeply preferring this to the grainy smog. A few cough and sputter out of what has seemed like an endless coma. Hazy lines dance in front of most of the awakening eyes. Something is different, as the lucid bill hadn’t been paid and the dreams ended. Groping in a blur the only hope it seemed was to hold onto each other.
Something beat in each heart. It grew as vision slowly became clear. It pounded against the sternum as if it were about to send the vessel into cardiac arrest. The sight was endless it seemed, as if it made devastation seem like a warm Disney finale. The ground was covered in corpses, breathing out death with each snore. The stench was unbearable as a few found legs, and the pounding persisted.
The faces now began to emanate expression, mostly of shock horror and disgust. Yet the pulse kept screaming. It felt as if there were hands pumping the heart to come to life. It grew harder and louder as the huddled group stared blankly at their soot covered faces. Harder, and harder, it shoved and pushed, and pounded. Then it all of a sudden it stopped.
The silence was deafening, as a light breeze blew through the rusty atmosphere. Then in the stillness of mystery another sound began to trickle. The rhythm was almost hypnotizing as the frail heads began to slowly bounce along to the sound in utter bewilderment. Life began to fill there eyes and dignity began to cascade over their frames. They had awakened, and were beginning to see for the first time.
The only things on the ground were trumpets, and each one was inscribed with the names that flickered in there static cognitions. The only other thing flashing was a cross. LOVE had awakened them, it was time to get up.

He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity into man’s heart so that he cannot find out what God has done from beginning to end. Ecclesiastes 3:11

Our Chemical Romance

2007-01-23T00:07:00.000-08:00

On the embankment if time one lone echo is heard. Some say it is an echo, but the rising understanding is that it is a sound that has never ceased proclaiming its burning oracle. This war cry forged before time stood still let alone was sketched, resonates in the ears of the hopeful, bitter, and despondent alike.
Kindred hearts in agony mourn their tragic disposition as the only escape they have is discussing the current situation, abscesses are the common identity as dignity has not been stolen but whored away in order to keep the situation to a minimum. Lost in thought and fantasy the masses scrape on by, hushing those who make any statement in regards to the current scenario. It will last forever as the world marches on, hand in hand, proclaiming the anthem of their sad parade. It marches through tossing out needles like candy and colorfully altered Prozac in order to truly taste the rainbow.
Anxiety grips all who have some sort of clue, the overwhelming cry of the broken, battered, neglected, raped, starved, dying, and utterly forlorn. The army armed with pamphlets beckon all the broken hearted to join the sad parade (the official name has changed over the year but this is the organization funding it, they had a better budget than even Macy’s).
The children join the dance in the inner ranks as the “learned ones” lead, removing clothing and baring all in order to find their true potential, or at least to find at least one person to fully accept who they are, its what the bands marching have referred to as love….. it was the whole purpose of marching; it was even the biggest word on the front of the brochure. Everything is in the name of love, from the engraving on the conductor’s baton to the shackles being subversively placed around the each of the company’s ankles.
The echo still persists, as merriment fights to drown it out. Yet it persists. Shattering trees and piercing eardrums it continues and grows, yet the revelry grows. There is one cry, one Word that stands alone predating the revolution of the decaying orb. LOVE! It is on the horizon and only life is found in Him. He will return and all things will be made new, LOVE beckons, flee the sad parade and you will be made alive in Him, and in Him only is their life.
Untied by pain the death parade marches onward into the darkness. Feeding each other with insecurity and fear it persists.
LOVE became flesh and bore all pain and grievances in His death for the very sake of love. He made each in the parade for LOVE and apart from Him there is only death. LOVE calls to those He fought to be with and will have His due. Reach out and touch it, LOVE marches forward.

The Letters of a Parched Tongue

2007-01-22T06:01:00.001-08:00

They surround me and bounce through the air as if there was some machine just pumping them out. It seems all too mechanical the way expression flows as if the heart patted the mind on the back as it pushed the autopilot button on and left the cockpit. Nothing is left except for what the universe can’t help but take pride in pointing out that is decay. Life has entered boldly through the gates of entropy as though a pile of rocks is the pinnacle for absorbency, the quilted quicker picker upper is as close second d but the manufacturing sponsor can’t quite make the cut. Disposable information, feelings, and words are hinge pins on which the arrogant find themselves manipulating as if the pulse of a heart was nothing more than a vice, one better than Miami vice because commercials always had been ridiculously annoying. Silence has been replaced by a dull buzzing as even in the wind airwaves flicker on and off. I want to put my tender heart in a blender, spin it around to a beautiful oblivion, if not just for the reason so that dissection can be skipped and it can be consumed through a crazy straw in a Big Gulp® cup. So we watch it spin round and round, throwing in ginseng mixed with catchphrases, lemon juice and sarcasm with bite, and topping it off with a spoonful of sugar and flattery to make it more palatable. Millions of computers are having the refresh button rubbed away from the all American myspace community whose spite for the very nation they loathe is what they are becoming. At least that is the goal isn’t it, spoon feeding strangers heaps of their souls like a sample lady at Sam’s club, window shopping wasn’t cutting it, that and with the obesity epidemic who wants to look right? Its who we are, almost innately in the cubicles of our minds pining away longing for the office with the window, hoping to open it for a fresh breath of air while we do our duty to first and make sure the locks are secure, we can’t help but worry our secrets will come out.
They prance and they fall delicately balanced between the tongue of our mouth and the tongue of our shoes. The origin of all has been long forgotten. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. In Him is the light of mean apart from Him there is no light, no love, no authority, no justice, and no peace. He is the very Word that holds all things together and will one day unite them into one world. The Word became flesh and dwelled among us. He died and rose from the grave conquering death and promised to put the Word (or the Spirit of Truth) in our hearts to guard and lead us unto His return when death will be no more.
To some this may sound like religious dribble, others it may ring of words that have turned to rhetoric, danced to the realm of jargon and have become nothing more than a sheet of scribbles tucked away under some dusty book in the crevice of one’s own mind. This is truth, it is the only way even historically in which life can be restored, champions for peace and righteousness, broken hearts mended and knives removed from backs. For some our backs are filled with scrapes which are so unrecognizably interwoven that we can’t tell the original wounds from the scratch marks to ease the incessant itching. Humanity and westerners are united primarily by one thing and that is our very reaction to pain. Or social structures and clicks are formed into clubs of like minded individuals who find the answer to their pain in some specific way, shape, or form. The most common thread between all groups is that the thickest bandage over the gaping wound is that of words. These words cover, not smother, and let infection build in the heart and the spirit until, as is often the case, the words form a callous around the wound prescribing the only “sane” rational, numbness. We get lost in aware unawareness that we codger lies and cling to lies and empty half truths longing someway to ease the pain.
There is only one great physician, His name is God. Taking the office of Father, Mother, Brother, Bridegroom, Judge, and a plethora of others He being God is the only one who can rectify the pain and darkness that consumes the deepest parts of who we are. He knit us in our mother’s wombs; He predestined us for love, delight and greatness; he knows our hearts, thoughts, and dreams; and He is rich in tender mercies not even snuffing out the dying ember. He made us for His convenience and His pleasure and will is that we, being made in His image and made to receive and give love to Him and each other, may enter into the full ecstasy of joy intimacy and fellowship. He being the Word is the source of life, in Him there is truth. Demagogues die, spin doctors stare at their ceilings in regret, the poets drown in angst, but there is only one who will affirm the echoes that stir within each of our souls, He is the Word and He beckons us to choose him or be consumed by pain.

What If I Stumble

2006-12-27T22:56:00.000-08:00

We cling so tight to destiny
As we sway back and forth
Often nothing left to go back to
As the ideas fade away

With tear filled eyes we forget the promise
We hold so very dear
Reckless abandon drove us
Wondering why we are here

God I beg you
Give me grace to fight
I'm tired and I'm forgetful
Sleeping through the night

I need help
Like a blind man's rubiks cube
Disarray the watermark
The colors faded and crude

Too forlorn for tears
Too distracted to sleep
Too wounded to heal
Too busy counting sheep

Lord my cup is empty
Keep me from filling it up
Let me hold on to your tender love
Remove the bittter cup

Bread and wine like placebo
Ritual demands
Too lost for words even now
Take me in your hands

Dad I need you now
As I nail my Brother's hands
Take away this hammer of mine
A quick as you can

Hold me now thats all I beg
As you beckon me to come
Hold me tight never letting go
Restore me and take me home

2006-12-21T06:14:00.000-08:00

The city fills the boy's lungs as he gasps for air. Not a soul around for miles as tears pour down his soot covered cheeks. Jeans ripped and his one bright red fire truck shirt are now faded and a smoky brown. Ash as far as the eye can see as a flickering streetlight is the only sign of life. Sitting down under the translucent buzz he lifts his brown eyes and whimpers, "I just want to let you know I love You, I just wanted you to know." Streams race down his face as his shattered heart begins to burn with an indescribable comfort. Immediately he is in the air delicately being cradled by arms laced with brawn. He looks up to see a tear filled smile looking at him. "You have no idea how much I know you love me!" his savior whispers in his ear. For what seems an eternity they stand in unbreakable tear riddled affection. He blinks and sees the sky between his Messiah's strands of hair and is warmed by the orange, purple, and white glow. He is let down and put on his feet as the man wipes his tears away saying, "I'm home for good!"

The sunrise does prophecy my beloved's return

Dance With Me

2006-12-19T16:34:00.000-08:00

He inhales. It is the first time he's felt alive in a good long while. Boiling anticipation seizes him as the lights begin to dim. The appetizers were nowhere near the satisfaction of the full course on its way up. Lost in the euphoria of sweat, smoke, and the hint of alcohol in the air. Eyes wild as energy rushes through his veins. With clenched fists he makes himself ready for this moment. A man steps through the darkness as time begins to stand still. Two more steps and he can see the man's eyes riddled with anger and tipsy with power. Validation and profanity pierce through the speakers through his heart. The riot begins, each one fighting for his life, as a messgae they have wept to cascades through the dank room. The movement is hypnotic as for a second he stops and locks eyes with the man on the stage. Pulsing andrenaline ingites his already pounding heart at blood from his lip touches his tounge. This is all he has, spinning in the etheral chaos. Anger boils in his veins as justice somehow seems to be met with one blow after another let the words that give him life wash over him.
The dance ends and a smile come to his face for just a few short hours. Life is bright in the smoking section of IHOP. Scars and stories are shared amonst friends as lyrics are crazenly quoted at the table. After this home awaits, along with a now empty bed. The darkness lulls his aching body to sleep as once again the rage begins to seethe underneath the surface. Blankets gripped tight as he drifts off, back into the land of nightmares.

He Sees, He Feels, He Weeps

The LORD looked and it displeased Him there was no justice. He saw that there was no one, He was appalled that there was no one to intervene; so his own arm worked salvation for him, and his own righteousness sustained him. (Is 59)

Letter to Santa

2006-12-12T05:06:00.000-08:00

The ambiance could not have been better. The candles, Italian cuisine, the tuxedo, the lingerie. The room was dim as the movement was unfolding. The eyes, the laughter, the smile, the baiting. Unfolding into a symphony of motion, sweat, joy, and trembling. Locked eyes as hope intermingled with fear sink in. Exhilerated exhaustion fills the room as the climax fades. Hours pass as fan blades churn the atmosphere as empty eyes follow. A single tear hits the pillow before sleep sets in. Now moved on, responsibility thrown away with a battered heart as apathy now eats away with the now hardening cynicism.

He Sees, He Feels, He Weeps

There is no fear in Love

For perfect love casts out all fear

Spring Is Breaking

2006-12-12T05:02:00.000-08:00

Don't wait for the dust to settle
As light breaks through the boards
The tiny particles now have an audience
For their timely dance
Stains announce the residence boldly
As revelation awakens
Awareness pours through an open window
Letting the wind further pull the paint
The Victorian era held no candle
To this house's heyday
Survey the now visible wounds
And for the first time
Take a deep breath of air

Asked and Answered

2006-12-12T05:01:00.000-08:00

Never had it been so eloquently put until Kurt Cobain had a generation sing along with him the phrase 'Rape Me." The request is surely and steadily being answered as even the prepubescent girls mold themselves into nothing more than vices for arousal. Boys are being raised to feast on the weak as with the push of a button the imagination dies as a man's innards are glazed over a screen with a yell of pain compliments the accomplishment so adequately. All thats left is induced paranoia numbed by our gods and godesses which flows so freely from the IV line that comes out of our walls. It goes far beyond, waste and condemnation. Atleast thats the hope beating inside now jaded hearts. Death surrounds all either by cowardly self righteousness or desperate cries for something we just don't ever seem to know what it is. Its the look shared between a couple about to enter into another one night stand that cries out for some sort of affirmation and love. We were made for love. This is our existance, love. We are beings milling around for purpose, and that is love. This is only found in God. God is love, above and beyond all other images of Him He is a community of three beings who dance around in absolute delight and pleasure of each other. Our meaning is to enter into this dance as one, His birde, and enter into this joy. His Son alone bridge the gap for us to enter this dance. The soul burns to enter, but it only comes through the Son who gave everything so that you, the one who He formed/chose/gave humor/gave peronality/gave the desire for love, may enter in. In it there is meaning, no longer does one have to cry in there bedroom looking for some empty voidfill, wondering why he or she did this or that or if even you have any worth. Who you are can be only found in Christ, anything else is death, even the things that sound good, death. He is love, Shakespeare and Hollywood are not.