This Good Friday

On this Good Friday, I am being still. (I am) painting in order to express something without words, and letting myself let go from all the dizzying thoughts on theology and scripture.

Sunday comes Easter, and here I meditate on the death of my God. If my God broke His own body and let Himself die, so to produce within Him a greater Life for all, how now then should I live?

Lately, I've been so consumed with being joined together in the likeness of His death (Romans 6:5). Things have been swirling around me this past week or so. Things that involve figuring out what comes next after I graduate in exactly two weeks, rearranging my thoughts on certain scriptures, and having to soon say a goodbye to some people as I leave this place in my my life. All these things are building up, and I just want the fears and anxieties that come along with them to die. Please die, die with Christ, so I can be raised in His Resurrection.

I am realizing I cannot stop the storms of life, but I can bring my Jesus into the picture. By doing so, He offers a stillness as I am knowing He is God. When I try to pay attention to what the Lord is doing in my life, and my understanding falls so short, I feel frustrated and sometimes so annoyed. To that, my Jesus speaks to me. haha He speaks to me!

C.S. Lewis described in Weight of Glory, in regards to academia, that it is not 'our knowing' that should become our focus, but 'what is being known'. I think this can be applied to my life presently. In my own attempts at figuring out the work He is doing in me, I am coming to terms that what is being known is more important. Oh joy! He is making Himself known in me!

Good Friday, you became Saturday...and Sunday is coming!

That's right. Death has no dominion, and this swirl of worry and fear, it holds no power over me. I want to live in the way of Death and Resurrection, being made fully alive in Him.

Jesus, I celebrate You in me.

Just a little thank you note

I'm sick and in bed. Feb 8. 8 things:

1. Journals, thank you for helping me remember again

2. Old saved letters, thank you for preserving the magic within a moment

3. Bed, your awesome for being such a comfort to me today

4. CapriSun, whoever designed you, I'm impressed, you're great for when lying in bed

5. Clementine, I think you farted a couple times while laying here with me.. thanks for the wonderful odors. NOT.

6. Dear Jesus, thank you for making me me. Eternally grateful.

7. Spring break, you're coming soon, I'm excited, I get to see my twinzie soonzies

8. March 18, you have the honor of being the day a certain somebody comes home, for that I am thankful

Adventure

It's a friday night and I stayed in. Listening to Beirut, eating chocolate cookies, and on my way to finishing up my thoughts on this thing called Adventure.

The past few weeks have been spent looking at grad schools and getting things together last minute for grad applications. Life is becoming more focused, more serious. All this anxiety has left me waking up with back aches and dry eyes from leaving in my contacts all night, it's given way to sleepless nights, and having to catch my breath as I feel my heart beating a hundred times a minute.

While Jesus takes me from my worries and brings me to His feet, I find myself in the midst of people, songs, and conversations centered around this reality of adventure.

The more I enter into the freedom of choosing, and letting my life take its shape, the more the Lord has been revealing to me how sinful it is to live otherwise. I was made for adventure. And we are to live wholly the way we were made, because if not, we are compromising the image of God in us. We are defacing our divine design.

Speaking of defacing, I stumbled on a friend's blog the other day and found a photograph of graffiti sprayed across a building. Its words formed the sentence, "Everyday we live under the violence of normalcy."

How true is this? I heard a story once that models this kind of violence pretty well. There was a Bear. This Bear was taken in captivity for a number of years and put in a cage. Every single day, the Bear would walk along the edge of its cage in a square. When he was finally released into the wilderness, he kept walking in a square, as if he was still confined by his cage.

We are just like this! Our vision is so short, and we cannot see past our nose! We are blind to the freedoms we do have, and our lack of imagination and dreaming have caused us to be bound by our own set of rules and boundaries. We trap ourselves under the systems of this world, governed by our own comforts and our false sense of security.

Howard Macy writes, "The Spiritual Life cannot be made suburban. It is always frontier, and we who live in it must accept and even rejoice that it remains untamed." It is an act of holy rebellion to break the mold we have set up for ourselves. I think we guide our lives by other people's expectations and societal norms, instead of paying attention to what actually makes us come fully alive.

There is a greater story to walk into, a destiny that involves "stepping into the current of God's will," as a certain Mister Aaron put it. Everyone has been uniquely designed and wired, and there's a way to marry that with your life's pursuits.

May I live a life that rebels against the expectations of others, and restores the image of God in me. I pray that I may fully submit to the Lord's will so that I may experience a greater freedom, so to get caught in the wind of His Spirit. Like a leaf, I will go where Your wind leads me. Give me grace to do this Jesus. And let me live with peculiarity, so that I may bring glory to the God who has marked me. In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen and Amen.

the in-between.

"I love people. Everybody. I love them, I think, as a stamp collector loves his collection. Every story, every incident, every bit of conversation is raw material for me. My loves not impersonal yet not wholly subjective either. I would like to be everyone, a cripple, a dying man, a whore, and then come back to write about my thoughts , my emotions as that person. But I am not omniscient. I have to live my life, and it is the only one I'll ever have. And you cannot regard your own life with objective curiosity all the time..." -SYLVIA PLATH (from the unabridged journals of sylvia plath)

One of my favorite things to do is to write down other people's thoughts...It's like being in someone else's shoes-- I'm thinking the thoughts they were once thinking. And yet, my perspective is still distinctly different, and I am placed in between my thoughts and theirs. Nonetheless, I love being welcomed into this mystery of finding where in the core of their being, where their thoughts come from. Alas, I never know if I make sense. I do know thatAbba's thoughts are higher than mine, and "as the heavens for height and the earth for depth, so the heart of kings is unsearchable" [Proverbs 25:3]. His depths are unfathomable, but He invites me to search Him, and promises me that He would let Himself be found.

Returning to the idea of "in-between," I enjoy that place, it makes things exciting and at the same time terrifying. Exciting because I'm anticipating what's next, but also terrifying because it causes me to lean. And isn't that exactly what Jesus calls us to? haha

On other things... here is a peek into my life currently:

this is fall.

a certain Somebody took me rowing in a boat.

Revelation of the week: It is a miracle for people to love.

To the Moon.

All of creation is telling a story. [Forgive me, if I've worn out this concept all too much. It's something I can't run away from, this story continues to draw me in, again and again.]

These past few weeks I've been watching the moon. I'm always looking for the full moons, so fun. There's something in my heart that receives so much joy when I catch it, especially when it's rising. It bears much meaning to me. It signifies something more than a just a floating celestial body in the night sky, it's actually a picture story. Do you know it? Have you been listening to her tell her story? Let me tell you about it:

When I've watched for her, sometimes she's waning and other times she is waxing. She sometimes can't be seen. The Moon isn't always whole. She is crescent at one time, then a half of herself, and then almost full. And my eye catches her most beautiful state when she's fully herself, when she's Mrs. Full Moon. Yes, I've decided she's married, married to the Sun.

Do you get it? The Moon personified is humanity, and the Sun is both Father God and Bridegroom Jesus. We have first been invisible, dead, darkened. As soon as we enter into the place of encountering the Sun, or rather Son, we begin to reflect that. In the process of time, we are changed, and more and more we become whole-- changed from glory to glory till that day when we we see Our Creator face to face, and we are seen most fully ourselves. We return to our first image, our intended state of being: like God. Notice I said state of being (no longer becoming).

We are the Moon reflecting the Son. This is the glory of creation, to make known the beauty and splendor of the Father. And in the dark of night, we can too be a light to those groping in the shadows.

What's more, Abba is faithful to prepare the Bride for His Son, and she will mirror her Maker, the Master Craftsman. We shall walk in fullness. Oh Glory. Renew us, and make Your Bride, Your Church, look like You so that we could better love the Son as You love Him.

Jewish blessing of the Moon:

Praised are you, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, who created the skies with his word, and all heaven’s host with the breath of his mouth. He gave them appointed times and roles, and they never miss their cues, doing their creator’s bidding with gladness and joy. He is the true creator who acts faithfully, and he has told the moon to renew itself. It is a beautiful crown for the people carried by God from birth (Israel), who will likewise be renewed in the future in order to proclaim the beauty of their creator for his glorious majesty. Praised are you, O Lord, who renews new moons.