Oh the Glory!

"You are my peace and solace." It's so strange how I can be so sad and yet be so blessed. I was thinking about chapel today and how we sang and everyone was holding hands in a huge circle, singing "My friends may you grow in grace." I am so thankful for everything I have at Providence. I love all the people, even those who are so fucking loud all the time when I want to sleep or do homework. In that moment, I felt so deep a love for them all. I love all these random people who I live with in this small community of believers.

In moments like chapel, I see the koininia of the Spirit. The fellowship, how we are all one, pieces of the temple, building the temple by trusting in Jesus.

"Jesus I will hide in you." We all hide in him, our dearest lover, the lover of our souls. I cried in chapel today, even though I tried not to. I am always ashamed to cry in chapel but I shouldn't be ashamed of my emotions.

All the forces of life in this fallen world try to tear us down, but we cannot be torn down. Our strength is Christ and he bears our burdens. I can be so sad about all the changes, all the loss at Providence. I want to go sing with my brothers and sisters right now. Singing frees me. I feel like Providence is how the church should be. We are all so close, I mean in a strange way, and we care about each other. We come together and sing and you feel the passion pulsing through all of us. The passion of the Spirit. I believe God smiles at our chapel services. He must cry in joy, he delights in us.

This is what we were created for. Humans were created for this communion with each other and with God. We are one in the Spirit. An unbreakable bond. Oh God, how do you delight in me? But I am thankful you do. This is my boasting in my Lord, my everything, who waters my soul.

I went for a walk today with Karolina through the neighborhoods of Pasadena. Oh the glory, the thick deep roses that are the aroma of God. The trees, the grass, the smell of wet soil, and the sun gleaming it's last light. In times like this, I stare at a flower and I am so overwhelmed by the beauty of it that I can barely breathe. Oh glory, Oh my God who molded the flowers. Creations screams of him, I cannot hide from his presence.

Oh my God, how can I thank you enough for this bittersweet world, and all the gifts I've been given. My God, you are so good and so faithful to me, and if only I saw this all the time. I can't worry, there is nothing to worry about because this God who hides me in him, who gifts me with everything good, he loves my soul. Oh my lover, my hope, I long for eternity in your midst. Let my love last longer than the flower petal morning dew, Oh make me love you steadfastly.

Heart of God

It's so incredible imagining what it would be like to be Hosea. "When the LORD first spoke through Hosea, the LORD said to Hosea, 'Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the LORD'" (Hosea 1:2). God commands him to marry a women who will be unfaithful to him, and he does, and she is unfaithful. Then God commands Hosea to keep going back to her and keep loving her even though she doesn't love him.

They have a child together named Jezreel. Then she has a son and a daughter, named "No Mercy" and "Not My Child". The language implies that the younger two were not Hosea's children, but children from other men who his wife was having sex with. Yet Hosea takes them as his children, he adopts them and continues to love his wife.

God speaks through Hosea saying, "I will have mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God’”(Hosea 2:23). Just as Hosea had taken in the children who were not his children, who were the children of whoredom, to be his, also God would love the people who had forsaken him. He would love Israel even though she was a whore. He would renew her and she would be his.

I just imagine Hosea living his life like this and realizing how hard it is to be faithful to someone who doesn't give a shit about you. Who loves you fakely, who loves at night and leaves in the morning. How he stuck with her and even loved her children. He provided for her too, giving her a home, and loving her. I just imagine how amazing and sorrowful it must have been to experience the heart of God.

I love Hosea! Another blog on Hosea to come when I finish editing it.

Silence of Being

There is no silence in which I can meditate. No silence of mind or surroundings. Sitting down to read Psalm 32, I had to always read it outloud because reading silently to myself I am distractable. What do I think about? Nothing really, I mean nothing significant. I think about the movie I just saw, or how I feel sick and want to go to bed. I think about all this random shit that doesn't matter that much. All this mundane lack of silence. My iPod and my phone keep beeping or buzzing, people talking and laughing outside my room. No silence.

But when I write, that's when my mind works. That is the only time I have control over my mind. 

Lately the theme of confession has been reoccurring in my thoughts, conversations, classes, etc. Psalm 32 says, "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away." I must acknowledge my sins before God and he will forgive them; that promise amazes me, especially when I sin repeatedly, the same way. I need to just say it. When I say it then I realize the gravity of it, especially when I say it again, every day. When I say it, I feel maybe a little more free. Silence is burdensome.

I want to find solace in silence. I wish that my thoughts would settle and I could think quietly or not think at all  without falling asleep. Whenever I try to meditate, I fall asleep. I am fascinated by the Zen Buddhist themes in J.D. Salinger's works. I want to detach myself and unlearn things and think nothing, silence in my mind. My brain is on overload sometimes, like it's spilling out of the edges, a boiling pot of water all this data no organization. I want to really know one thing well, like modern art that focuses on one idea. Or a one word poem that the deaf-mute man writes in Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenters. ("Delighted.")

I want to feel comfortable in silence. Holden Caulfield was my best friend for the few weeks I read Catcher in the Rye because we related so well. But I get the feeling that this is a common feeling among humans, the feeling of isolation and lack of placement. The reaching out with no one to grab your hand, everyone wants to be caught. If I could detach myself from the thoughts of other people. Get rid of some of the data, like what is he thinking, is this awkward, what should we talk about, are you actually interested in what I'm saying, are you listening to me, do you even like me? What time is it, I don't have money, I have to do homework, I'm tired. The overload data of meaningless thoughts.This stuff enslaves me and I'd like to unlearn it and feel the silence, soak it in, and be free in it. 

I want to be caught when I reach out. I want to feel like people understand what I'm saying. I want people to look at the details, like Jane's knights lined up on the back row. I want to be able to relate to people, and be simple. Enough of this putting on a show, everyone trying to show off who they are competition. I wish that I could be like Holden with his deaf-mute wife in the middle of nowhere content in each others company but just in a state of being. This is silence.

What does Psalm 32 mean? Silence is burdensome. That silence is a hiding fearful kind of silence. I want a being kind of silence, which frees. "You are a hiding place for me." It is in God I find myself when I hide in him, and in God I find the silence of being. There is no worry of him being dissatisfied or bored with who I am. There is no nervousness that he is judging me or that he feels awkward and would rather be somewhere else. He chose me. I am caught in him. 

Lizard Sun Bath

I understand
Lizards
Now the way
They lie belly
On the cement
Burning flesh
Belly warm
Asleep.

You Should Be Equally Disturbed

Corpses scattered, man holds boy murdered in Rwandan Genocide

Bloodied bodies on Rwandan streets, 1994. A century of bitterness and oppression broke loose, as the Hutus mowed down the once superior Tutsis. The Tutsis were lighter skinned Africans with sharper features who in the 19th century, during Belgium's occupation of Rwanda, had been declared by the Belgic as the superior race. The Tutsis were the minority of Rwandans who were put into power in the Beligic colonies. The rest of the population, the darker skinned and less wealthy were called the Hutus. They were given identification cards and declared either superior or lesser. The 100 days of genocide in 1994 between the Hutus and the Tutsis was a result of this racial tension that had been created in the 19th century. This creation of race was a result of social darwinistic ideas imposed upon the Rwandan colony at the end of the 19th century. In 100 days, an estimated 800,000 people were murdered.

Today in Dr. Mac's Western Civ. class we learned about this, and watched portions from the movie Hotel Rwanda. Before class I had just been at Planned Parenthood doing sidewalk counseling, or trying to convince women not to get abortions and not to support Planned Parenthood. My mind was on the genocide of unborn babies when I came to class and learned about the Rwandan genocide. I was deeply disturbed by the images of all the dead people in the movie, but then I thought about how other people, whether Christian or not, would probably be equally disturbed. I would say that something is seriously wrong with a person if they are not at least somewhat disgusted by the Rwandan genocide. 

Yet an hour earlier I had conversed with a girl, 17 years old, who was at Planned Parenthood to get her second abortion this year. She already had a toddler, which her mom was currently caring for, and she had killed her second child in January. She told me that adoption wasn't an option for her because she couldn't live her life worrying about what kind of family her child was raised in. She couldn't do an open adoption because then she would have to worry about her kid. If she had the baby, she would keep it, but she doesn't have enough money. In her mind, she was doing what was best for herself and her daughter by letting this child go. 

I asked her why it was okay to kill a child because it's in her uterus but it's wrong to kill a little kid. She just answered that abortion isn't a good thing, but it was her best option. She said that it is nice to be able to get an abortion in her situation. She refused any alternatives like adoption, or charities to help with costs. When I realized I could do nothing to stop her, because my words had been spent, I told her about past-abortion counseling. But she informed me that she wasn't really affected by her last abortion, so she doesn't think she'll be needing counseling. 

She was cold, set in stone. I realize this could have been a front that she was putting on for me, but her arguments were all so self centered. They were all arguments I've heard before, the same dehumanizing selfish arguments. How can we rationalize murder? How did murder become an option because of convenience? 

Foot of an aborted baby found in a dumpster outside a Planned Parenthood

I see connections between the Rwandan genocide and the current worldwide abortion genocide. In America (mind you, this is ONLY the numbers from America, not counting everywhere else in the world), approximately 3,315 children are killed with their mother's consent everyday. In 100 days, that's 331,500. But now imagine that this is something that has been legal in America since 1973. This isn't 100 days we're talking about, but 39 years! And abortion is not just in America; it is all over the world. How can the world be horrified by 100 days of genocide in Rwanda killing 800,000 people, but so many people are indifferent, or stone cold careless, or radically in support of abortion, 39 years of unborn child genocide? 

Both the conflict between the Hutus and the Tustis were a result of social darwinistic theory, that some races and peoples are genetically superior to others. That those who are superior deserve power and better lives. Planned Parenthood was also started by Margaret Sanger, a huge social darwinist who wanted to stop minority groups (blacks, mexicans, etc), poor people, sick people, retarded people, etc from having children. She was a proponent for eugenics, sterilizing these groups, but she also found another way to make these unwanted human beings stop procreating. She set up Planned Parenthood centers in minority and low income areas that gave out birth control and performed abortions. Just because that was about 100 years ago does not mean that Planned Parenthood's reason for existence has really changed (other than the fact that they get a lot of money from abortions). They still dehumanize, and target these supposedly less valuable mothers, killing their unwanted children.  

There are social darwinistic similarities between the Rwandan genocide and the current abortion genocide, yet 100 days of murdered Africans disturbs most people significantly more than 39 years of unborn children murdered in clean medical offices that claim to be bettering society. Let's be honest about this. Stop looking the other way and rationalizing murder. Convenience is no excuse for killing. If killing innocent Rwandan people by the 1000s is wrong, then be consistent. Be equally as disturbed when you think about all the unborn children that are slaughtered every day by a doctors hands and a mother's consent.