Buried with their Words

Knowledge

2006-03-03T12:58:00.000-05:00

It seems to me that the more educated a person is, the harder it is for them to accept God. This is not to say that all educated people are incapable of a solid relationship with their Creator, for in reality there are many who do have such a relationship - I am just saying that it is harder. Why do you think it is that we are called to have faith like a child? The uneducated, untainted mind can simply believe. What has our education taught us? We are told, from the beginning of our education, to question everything: authority, faith, previous knowledge, traditions... the list goes on. We are told to accept nothing at face value, to always seek out the reason. And yet, God simply says, "Accept."

And so it is that we continue to distance ourselves from God, even when we are trying to learn more "about God." It's because the focus becomes more on knowledge. We spend more time talking about God than we do talking to God, completely forgetting that this is a relationship with your Father, not a research project that one day you will stand before God and receive a grade on how much you know. The only way to truly know God is to spend time in His awesome presence. No book, no energetic speaker, no deep, philosophical conversation is ever going to replace what God has to offer us - Himself. It's faith. And in the end, that's all we need.

When God Breaks Through

2006-01-30T15:22:00.000-05:00

Type: Faith & Life

It amazes me how adamantly God chases after us. He never gives up. Never. A few days ago, God gave up knocking on my door and decided to take a sledgehammer to it! And all it took was me opening up even the smallest part of myself to Him. Once He had that, He began smashing down walls and doing some much-needed house maintenance. He had to start with those things that most stood in the way: spirits of judgment, fear and self-centeredness. These were parts of me that were dictating my actions, my very life, and God revealed the truth of myself. It was at that point that I just poured out to my Father to take those things from me. I condemned those spirits in Jesus name, declaring that I no longer was a slave to them. And God was and still is faithful. But he wasn't content with that, yet. No, no. He wanted everything. So with tears in my eyes, I asked God to saturate me - to leave no part of my life unclaimed by Him, so that nothing gets in the way of my relationship with my Lord and Savior.

God turned this boy, who was broken and hurting, into a man filled with peace and joy, and a passion for Him. Now, my prayer is that those around me can also discover their place with our Loving Father. All praise, power and glory to God on high, and to His Son, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Just one of those things...

2006-01-26T00:58:00.000-05:00

Type: Introspective

Ever notice in the times you need someone the most, you tend to push them away? Why do we do that? Maybe it's just me. The worst is they beg you to open up to them, to tell them what's wrong, and yet we hide behind the simple phrase, "It's nothing." Meanwhile, "nothing" tears and shreds at our hearts, pleading to be released, to be set free. Yet we press on, digging our heals. Maybe we enjoy suffering. There's some abject fascination with our own pain. And while we wallow in our own melancholy, basking in our vilest of self pities, our loved ones get shoved away. The worst part is when we succeed, and the one we love does what we so adamantly asked them to do: the go away. It's in that moment, that time when we realize what we have done, that the pain becomes agony. Our selfish writhing was centered on one thing: we wanted that attention. We wanted that pity. But in the end, what we wanted most (and didn't even know it) was love. And when that person walks away, we feel that love slipping... and it's the most frightening thing in the world. All because we simply couldn't tell them how we felt.

Why must we do this? I don't know. I do it. I know I do. And every time it tears me to pieces; pieces that then must be picked up and put back together again over time. What's it going to take for me to not do this to myself? Or in the end, will I finally find the point where the pieces just won't fit any more. I just don't know...

He Is Legend

2006-01-17T12:35:00.000-05:00

Type: Review

Whenever I hear a new song by a new band (or even a new album), I am usually both excited and skeptical at the same time. I am often afraid that when I look deeper and find more of the artist/album, I am going to find they put all their creative intent into one song and left the rest of the album to sort itself out. On occasion, however, I look deeper to find out that I had only begun to hear what the artist had to offer.

I recently picked up the album "I Am Hollywood" by He Is Legend. I sat down and listened to the whole album with the liner notes open on my lap (as I do with all new albums when I first get them). And then I listened to it again. Then I drove home from North Carolina, and listened to it at least twice on that trip. I got three other CDs for Christmas, but this one stuck. I am listening to it even as I type this. Their style is somewhat difficult to classify, as they harness the energies of several styles , including: heavy metal, hardcore, punk and jazz. The diversity found within each song is what catches me, though. It is also why I can actually listen through the whole album without getting bored and changing it. And trust me, I get bored and change music on an alarmingly frequent basis (usually to the frustration of whoever I am driving with at the time).So consider this a recommendation: check out He Is Legend.

Welch Withdrawal

2006-01-16T21:12:00.000-05:00

Type: Random

It occured to me, as I was riding along in the jumper seat of my father's pickup truck, that I had not talked to Mr. Daniel Welch in quite some time. You see, when you have someone like Mr. Welch to talk to, it becomes quite difficult to go any length of time without hearing or reading some thought coming from their vast imaginations. After you have had these thoughts and mutterings, it is very hard to go without them. And then you hear something on the radio, or something someone else is speaking, and you think, "That sounds like something Welch would say..." The pain is almost unbearable. Thus it is that I have concluded that I had Welch Withdrawal, and the only cure was more Welch. I suppose that would mean I have a Welch addiction, but I am not ready to accept that at this time. They have meetings for that, don't they?

Boards

2006-01-09T02:52:00.000-05:00

Type: Rant

When any given area of life is assigned a "Board" I cringe. I refer not to a slab of wood, neither the rolling nor surfing kinds, but rather to a group of people in charge of one organization or another. I'm not sure whether it is a requirement, but the criteria for these Boards appears to mostly consist of finding people that have no involvement in the organization for which they are making all the decisions. For example, often people found on a Board of Education have never been involved in education in any way. They are not teachers, nor are they qualified to be so; they are not administrators (once again not qualified in this aspect, either), and yet they hold the power to affect the lives of teachers and administrators as they like. Most of them do not even have children in the school over which they preside! And these Boards infect every organization in life, from schools, to government, to churches; no one is safe from them!

A recent life event has affected my family, and (you guessed it) it involved a Board decision. It saddens me that these people have the power to do these things for a place they that set foot in once a year to have a meeting. And in this meeting they sit around changing things that do not need to be changed, and leaving things alone that need to be changed. Alas! This is life. Beware the Boards!

What Should Be

2006-01-06T12:07:00.000-05:00

Type: Rant, Pet Peeve

"It shouldn't be like that." Have you ever debated a problem and been given this argument? There you stand, doing your best to present a viable solution to the task at hand, and someone is still stuck on the fact that it shouldn't be a problem to begin with. And this argument is given everywhere and taints just about every problem.

Example: I had jury duty a year ago for a DWI case. There we all sat around the table discussing our take of the evidence, and inevitably we had the people arguing, "Well, I don't think it should be like that." They did not argue that the evidence was unclear. They did not argue that the officers involved failed to follow exact procedure. No, they argued that the law shouldn't be set up the way it was, as if the law was even up for debate. At this point, I felt it was my duty to remind them that whether or not they thought the law SHOULD be set up that way, it WAS that way, and it was our job to determine whether or not the individual had broken the law as it was written.

The "What Should Be" argument is counterproductive. It ignores the issue at hand by declaring there shouldn't be an issue. It's like snow blowing through an open door, and someone standing there arguing that snow shouldn't be cold. Well it is, so shut the freaking door!

Prologue

2006-01-05T12:44:00.000-05:00

Whilst sitting amongst the ashes of 2005, the question that I had asked myself for quite some time changed its form and the answer became clear to me. The question I had formerly asked myself was, "Why blog?" For years I had read through the thoughts of bloggers here and there and thought, "Well, that's nice, I suppose," and dismissed the thought of blogging entirely. And so, I sat aside while friends posted their rantings and ravings and tidbits of wisdom, or rambled on about random events or ideas (some humorous, others... not so?). These same friends would inform me of the joys and wonders that are blogging, but I would simply reply, "It's not for me." Why would I write? What could I say?

And then, as the wreckage of the late year was coming to its final rest, the words of a friend struck home: "You need a blog to put this all into..." "This all" was composed of various rants and mutterings that I had uttered over some time during an Instant Messenger conversation. And that is when the question changed. No longer did I ask myself, "Why blog?" Rather, I asked myself, "Why not?" No answers came to mind.

Thus, with the dawning of 2006 I stand, or sit as the situation may dictate, at the threshold of a new doorway that creaked open hesitantly. Where this path will lead, I cannot say. Should you follow? That is not a choice I can make for you, nor would I make it should the opportunity present itself. I'm not even sure that I am prepared for this journey, myself... but I'm going anyway.