Humble Thyself

I don't know what I'm doing. There, I said it.

There have been quite a few changes over the past couple of weeks and I'm still picking up the pieces from the whirlwind.

I've moving on from my job of 3 years to a new position tomorrow. I've looked over the tools that I'll be using for the job and, while they're quite nice, I can tell it's going to be a challenge and change of pace from what I'm used to. I'm excited about the prospect of something new but, at the same time, terrified that when it comes down to it, I'll crash and burn for days or weeks to come.

Was this the right move? Only time will tell.

I quit being a Youth Counselor to redouble my efforts on Service Projects.

I may not have spoken about this before on this blog but I've taken a survey of a good lot of congregants to get information on their connections to service-oriented organizations and activities as well as skills, needs, and/or desires to participate or spearhead service opportunities. I've been sitting on this pile of data and I fear that I have been paralyzed into inaction. Luckily, a friend of mine has been kind enough to brainstorm next steps with me next weekend. I just hope we start something good.

This evening was the first evening I spent as an ex-Counselor. I've had a lot of time to think about things and one thought that keeps coming back to me is how much I miss those kids. You'll probably never get a "thank you" out of any of them in their teen years but there are times, if just for a moment or two, where you know that they love you. Those moments have filled me with such hope for the future and such joy to be alive that you can't even begin to full comprehend it until you've worked with kids yourself.

And I want to give that up?

I believe deeply in this cause. I want to belong to a church that has its eyes set on God and its heart set on others because that's what I think God wants of us.

But still, am I doing the right thing? I guess I'll find out.

How can I be okay with that? With so many possibilities and chances for things to go terribly wrong, with so many questions left unanswered, how can I possibly be calm taking these leaps?

One of my favorite Christian songs has been Humble Thyself in the Sight of the Lord. The lyrics are quite simple: "Humble thyself in the sight of the Lord and He shall lift you up." It's a direct quote of James 4:10 and, while it's a simple little thing, it speaks volumes to me in these situations.

There's a certain kind of arrogance that comes with complete certainty, whether it be in a situation or within one's self.

Now, what do I mean by that? I would like to believe that I have everything under control. I would love to believe that what I'm doing makes sense and always makes sense to me. Nothing would satisfy my sinful nature more than to believe that I can know everything that will unfold before me or even who I am in total. However, I don't think that God wants that for me.

While I'm not trying to say that God wants to keep me in the dark about what to do next or what I truly am capable of, I do think there's a certain level of uncertainty that can be healthy to personal development. I've found that, most times, I learn more from my mistakes than from me successes. At the same time, I should learn to trust that the Ultimate Reality really knows what He's doing. If I begin to distrust the Ultimate Reality, then I begin to separate myself from Him.

In situations like these, as hard as it might be, I think that my best option is to humble myself and trust that the Lord will lift me up. I mean, what else can I do? What else would I even want to do? Nothing. Apart from Him I can do nothing so that's what I'll do: humble myself.

Love [redacted] Thyself

I hate politics.

That may be a little strong. I don't really hate politics completely. I hate the bickering and staunch idealism that makes nothing happen. I hate the corruption that takes place, especially when its legal corruption.What I hate the most about politics is how it brings out some of the worst of human nature. I can think of a recent news story for probably each one of the seven deadly sins in some politician's life and it all stems from the one thing that makes capitalism and free markets work: selfishness.

That being said, socialism isn't exactly a great alternative. I may be doing a terrible job running my life but at least I get to decide how I want it ran through my own guiding principles, not some ideals impressed upon me by a group of individuals who decide what the common good is. Here again, it's so easy to fall into the trap of overwhelming selfishness.

Let's stop for a moment here and think about something that you may not have considered: why is selfishness something to be averted? Certainly, there have been quite a few people that have considered selfishness not only to be good but a virtue. How unimaginable that must be to think such things!

But, of course, it's not so simple.

Nietzsche, as misunderstood as he is (and I may be misunderstanding him now myself), brings up a good point in his book On the Genealogy of Morality. An eagle should not be held accountable for being a bird of prey. The eagle is seen as a symbol of strength and, to the contrary of what most in our culture would consider to be the right and appropriate action to take, must use its strength in the form of violence to survive. The Romans regarded this bird as a noble beast and, even in American culture today, it's seen a symbol of great pride. How can this be reconciled with our notion evil as it stems from violence and murder? How can we condemn this selfishness when it is necessary for survival?

Furthermore, we can have some form of gradation that says certain desires of the will are simply "self-serving" or for personal "self-interest" while others are truly selfish. Many people will argue that every action taken falls onto that gradation since every act of the will is, in one form or another, self-serving, be it blatantly obvious through the goal in mind or simply the pleasure of helping someone out. Therefore, every action undertaken, as it provides the one taking it with some conscious or unconscious reward or punishment-averted, is selfish. From this perspective, selfishness is not a virtue but it most certainly is not a vice.

So...
Selfishness is inherently wrong because it preys on the less fortunate?
Selfishness is inherently good because it is necessary for survival?
Selfishness is not inherently good or bad because everything we do has some selfish outcome?

If you've read this expecting an answer, you've come to the wrong place. I cannot answer which one is right or wrong for you because I think the question of the inherent right, wrong, or indifference of selfishness is a flawed question. The concern that needs to be addressed here is one of motive.

Instead, consider the following statement: You have to do what's right by you.

Oh, how I hate that phrase, probably because it's normally comes after a patronizing talk by someone who is either "much older and wiser than me" or has simply run out of helpful things to say. To anyone who says this to me, with the utmost sincerity and respect I must reply, "No, I do not and should not always do what's right by me."

I know it's taken me a while to get here but this is truly my main point in writing this piece and that is to quote the Apostle Paul: "[Love] is not self-seeking... It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." (that's from 1 Cor. 13 for those of you who haven't been to a wedding lately)

Consider with me the divorce rate in the world today. Now, I'm not saying that every marriage is ideal (I know mine can always use some work) but can you imagine how many fewer divorces there would be if people viewed love for one another in the same way that Paul views love? Imagine how many stronger couples there would be in the world today if they considered the true nature of love, which is not romance (sorry ladies but it's true), nor sex (sorry guys but it's true), nor some magical high that you feel as you live "happily ever after."

Love is the willingness to sacrifice yourself for betterment of another and expecting nothing from them in return.

Can love be selfish? In a way, yes. I do indeed feel much better about myself as a person when I sacrifice my needs for those that I love. However, I believe that the better observation here is that it's not self-seeking. The love that sacrifices for the betterment of another expecting nothing in return cannot, by very definition, be self-seeking and while human love cannot be perfect since the lover can always receive, as CS Lewis points out in his poignant but apologetically-awful book The Problem of Pain, we can rest well knowing that our love can be true to its purpose.

What more could you ask for?

Reason to Live

Everybody wants to go to heaven but nobody wants to die.

That's how the album Collision by the David Crowder Band begins and I think it's true, in a sense. I think there could be a handful of objections that could be raised to it. However, I think most of them could be met and parried back if not disbanded forever. Here are some points that have come to mind from this quote.

Everyone wants to go to heaven

Well, if the alternative to heaven is a place that is so pitiful as a wrathful, burning, teeth gnashing hell then I would think that most definitely people would choose heaven over it, even if they had to put up with a God who they couldn't stand for all eternity.

The question of wanting hell becomes a little more interesting if you focus more on the separation from God. From a pluralistic view, consider a separation from the Ultimate Reality. When it comes down to brass tacks, we're talking about deluding one's self (or allowing one's self to be deluded) to the point where you cannot stand the idea of being in touch with what actually is.

Now, you might ask yourself, "Why would anyone want to do that?" You can offer plenty of positions on the subject, calling on an evil figure like Satan slowly whispering in your ear and turning you against the greater reality or maybe a genetic predisposition towards not being in touch with the reality that you've been constructed into. However it begins,  the final outcome comes down to personal choice and willpower. Some notions or feelings in the soul of the delusional man drives him to break with Ultimate Reality and pursue a darker path. He feels cheated by the other (or maybe simply another) and, so, decides to never again pursue the light. He stops focusing on his purpose and begins to pervert the idea into meaninglessness. Whatever the condition, whatever the circumstance, through a series of mistakes and missteps, some of which he has no control, the decision is made that the reality which exists is more unbearable than a reality that one can create for themselves. This brings me to my next point.

Nobody wants to die

This, of course, is difficult swallow either on a literal and metaphorical level because of the evidence to the contrary but, in what could be seen as a depressing and invigorating twist of fate, I would argue that it is true.

First, consider the literal version of Nobody wants to die and its stark contrast to the number of people who commit suicide in a year or become martyrs in their own right. The former, I would argue, isn't truly accurate to the intent of those who commit suicide. That is, those who want or do commit suicide don't kill themselves because they want to die but, rather, because they no longer want to live. Like the delusional man who has meandered his way towards meaninglessness, those who desire to commit suicide have followed that broad, self-destructive path to come to the conclusion that they want no part in what reality has to offer them.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, we have those who believe so strongly in the Ultimate Reality that they're willing to risk everything to defend the belief. Granted, I don't agree with some of the extremes that martyrs will go to, especially when it means killing others along with themselves, but, nonetheless, one could say that this is a case in which the person wants to die. Again, I would disagree. The point of self-sacrifice is not to die but, rather, to live on in a greater capacity, be it in the afterlife, in the hearts and minds of the generations to come, or some other goal that aligns itself with the Ultimate Reality.

From a metaphorical perspective, we have this idea of dying to yourself. Although I'm sure this probably isn't a strictly Christian idea, this idea of "taking up the cross and dying to yourself," I really feel no reservations in talking about it from the Christian perspective since that is my perspective.

In Luke 9:23-24, you'll find the verses that I'm referring to: "Then he said to them all: 'Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.'" Now, while I care a great deal about the final resting place of your soul, my point in mentioning this is not to speak of an eternity after the mortal coil has been shuffled off. Salvation is meant to be an ever-present experience that begins when a man dies to himself. When I consciously decide that there is no reason to live outside of  the Ultimate Reality, in that very moment, I cease to exist. That is, the man who lived for another reality that was not the Ultimate Reality is no more and, in his place, another man stands who, as he is aligned with that which will always be, can never be destroyed. How awesome is that? Everything is new again.

I hate to leave you with an anticlimactic ending to a blog post but I really must be getting to bed and, I'm afraid that, if I don't post this now, it will be lost to drafts forever. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed spewing it.

Schizophrenic Poetry

I find that I write the best poetry when I am near complete exhaustion.  I don't think that this is a rare phenomenon. My mental acuity is in a different frame of reference. The less hindered I am by my rationality, the easier it is for my expressive nature to overtake me. It's a little odd, to tell you the truth. I would never take drugs or anything similar to inhibit my reason solely for the purpose of creating works but, at the same time, there's an edge to my intellect. There's a set of clearly defined rules of what should and should not write about that my mind knows. For the most part, it's a good thing. When it comes to writing poetry, though, not so much.

A man is not one man. That is, he is a complex weaving of many men fighting for control of the consciousness of the man. There are extremes to this, of course. Some people actually do create multiple personalities to deal with this struggle. They feel that the war is too great inside them and so they split themselves in two, in three, in four, etc. The more fortunate among us are able to find a diplomatic solution to the matter.

I am a lover. I'm not talking about romantic love specifically but love of all kinds. I love people (it seems a bit unlikely, I know, but it's true). I love this Earth. I love to love others.

I am a sinner. I'm not here to confess all of the sins I've committed in my lifetime. If you've known me for any stretch of time, I've probably sinned against you. It always seems to be to the people that love me the most, which torments me constantly to think on.

I am a Christian. That has so many meanings to so many people so I may have to clarify it at some point in time but it should suffice for now to say that I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ.

I am a skeptic. I don't know everything and I will freely admit that. There are times when I sink into severe doubt about my theological beliefs but that's not a bad thing. If God wanted blind faith, he wouldn't have given us free will, though, right? Agnosticism is the closest I could ever be able to get to atheism. After all that I've experienced in my life, there's no way that I could ever say, with any certainty, that there is no God or some other Ultimate Reality. With the way that God has lavished His love on me, I don't think I'll even get to the point of agnosticism.

Here we are. And by that, I mean, here I am: a synthesis of many antitheses. All the while, I need to be setting my soul free. Well, here goes nothing.